that the Author of nature is not indifferent to virtue and vice; second, that if God should reward virtue and punish vice, as such, so that every one may upon the whole have his deserts, this distributive justice would not be a thing different in kind, but only in degree, from what we experience in his present government. It would be that in effect toward which we now see a tendency. It would be no more than the completion of that moral government, the principles and beginning of which have been shown, beyond all dispute, discernible in the present constitution and course of nature. And from hence it follows, thirdly, that as, under the natural government of God, our experience of those kinds and degrees of happiness and misery, which we do experience at present, gives just ground to hope for and to fear higher degrees and other kinds of both in a future state, supposing a future state admitted; so under his moral government, our experience that virtue and vice are actually rewarded and punished at present, in a certain degree, gives just ground to hope and to fear, that they may be rewarded and punished in a higher degree hereafter. And there is ground to think that they actually will be so, from the good and bad tendencies of virtue and vice, which are essential and founded in the nature of things; whereas the hinderances to their becoming effect are, in numberless cases, not necessary, but artificial only; and it is much more likely, that these tendencies, as well as the actual rewards and punishments of virtue and vice, which arise directly out of the nature of things, will remain hereafter, than that the accidental hinderances of them will.

On the whole, therefore, we should certainly conclude, that the temporal sanctions of the Mosaic economy, or its connexion with an extraordinary providence, were the very reverse of being inconsistent with the full knowledge and persuasion, consequently with the clear revelation, of a future world. So far from it, indeed, that we should think it impossible for any intelligent Israelite to have lived under the operation of these temporal sanctions, and from that source alone have failed to imbibe the hopes and fears belonging to an eternal world. In the one he possessed the sure ground and necessary elements of the other.-It is somewhat surprising, that one of the latest treatises on this subject, from the pen of an English divine, should still entirely overlook the view of it now presented, and resume substantially the ground occupied by Warburton. We refer to the Essay by Archbishop Whateley on the Revelation of a future state, in the first series of his Peculiarities of the Christian Religion. He does not, indeed, like Graves, place the temporal rewards and punishments in direct antagonism to the expectation of a future state; but neither does he make any account of the former as laying a sure foundation for the latter, and forming a sort of stepping-stone to it. His line of argument rather implies, that it would have the reverse tendency, and that the Jews were only prepared to receive the doctrine of immortality, when their peculiar temporal blessings ceased, § 10. He holds it absolutely incredible, that the Israelites as a people

should have

looked for an after state of being, from their attention being so very rarely, at least, if at all directed to such a state, seeing that they so seldom believed the temporal promises and threatenings, though so frequently pressed upon them and so much more easily believed, and also from the difficulty of getting men, even under the clear sunshine of the gospel, to embrace the prospects of a future life. But in this he evidently confounds two things, the speculative knowledge and belief, with the living faith, of futurity; for on the same ground that he denies the hope of immortality to the Jewish dispensation, he might of course also deny it in great measure to the Christian. Besides, he is after all obliged to admit, that somehow the doctrine and belief of a future state did become prevalent long before Christ,-an admission, which totally destroys his great argument; for unquestionably this prevalent belief sprung up and was maintained without the doctrine being frequently inculcated in any authoritative Scripture. It also destroys his argument from 2 Tim. i. 10; for if the knowledge of a future state existed at all before Christ, it could not be said, that he brought it to light, in the sense in which Archbishop Whateley understands it-that is, in the sense of discovering what was wholly unknown. The assertion of the apostle evidently means nothing more than this, that Christ has brought a clear and full light to bear upon the things of immortality, which hitherto had been in comparative obscurity; he has brought them distinctly into view, and set them, as they never were before, in the foreground of the kingdom of God; and we have no more reason to maintain, from such a declaration, that all was absolute darkness and ignorance before, as to hold, from John i. 9, where Christ is said to be "the true light, which lighteth every man that cometh into the world," that before his appearance there was no true knowledge whatever in the world of God and divine things.]

III. Very nearly connected with this, yet at the same time distinct from it, is another benefit arising from a right understanding of the typical character of ancient Scripture a benefit specially connected with the historical types. For it is only when viewed in this light, that the narratives of Old Testament history can acquire their proper dignity, value, and importance.

There were undoubtedly many ends to be served by the records. of Old Testament history, and we must beware of making so much account of one, as to depreciate or overlook others. There is a use of no mean value even in their least interesting and instructive parts the genealogies, with which they are interspersed. For dry and barren as these for the most part seem, they yet afford some valuable hints concerning the earlier portions of the world's history, and are of especial service to the church, as providing her with the means of identifying Him that was to come, not only as in general the Redeemer of man, but more specially as the seed of the woman, the descendant of Abraham, of the tribe of Judah, of the stock and lineage of David. And for the other portions of inspired history, which contain notices of the life and behaviour of

so many individuals, portray the manners and customs of such different ages and nations, and disclose the dealings of God toward his people, and his successive communications to them through a great variety of states and circumstances-how precious and important these are in many points of view, as mere records of the past, and apart altogether from any immediate connexion they may have with gospel times, no reflective mind can need to be informed. They are, even in that respect, a vast storehouse of valuable information and practical instruction, and can never fail to be found by the prayerful and attentive reader to be "profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction and for instruction in righteousness.'

Yet if viewed only in that light, we scarcely perceive one half their worth; the proper importance of the things they record is not understood, nor can we discern the essential distinction, which exists between these and other events of history, in themselves not less, or perhaps even more important. For with all the lights of knowledge and lessons of practical instruction, which lie scattered over the pages of Old Testament history, how trifling often are the incidents recorded! how small and confined the track over which it ranges! and, in regard, at least, to certain portions, how easy might it seem to have selected other histories, which should have been equally instructive, while they led the mind through scenes more dignified in their nature, and less frequently intermingled with evil! It is well known how often the infidel has given to such reflections an obnoxious form, and sought to take advantage of them, for the purpose of bringing the Bible into discredit as the revealed word of God. But in doing so, he has only displayed, as in other things of a like nature, his ignorance or unfairness in handling the word of God,-wresting one part of its contents from their proper connexion, and thus placing them in a false position, that they might be made to reflect unfavourably on the character of the whole. For let the notices of Old Testament history be viewed in their real connexion with the scheme of grace revealed in the gospel,-let the field, which it traverses, however limited in extent, and scenes which it delineates, however unimportant to the natural eye, be regarded as that field and those scenes, through which, as on a lower and common ground, God sought to make his people familiar with the truths and principles hereafter to be developed in the events of his everlasting kingdom,let this view be taken of the notices of Old Testament history, which is the one Scripture itself requires us to take, and then how high a character does not one and all of them come to possess! What a dignity and importance attaches even to the least of them! The smallest motions on the earth's surface acquire a sort of greatness, when regarded as examples of the law of gravitation, since then even the fall of an apple from the tree appears connected with the revolution of the planets in their courses. And, in like manner, the relation which the historical facts of ancient Scripture bear to the glorious work and kingdom of Christ, gives to the least of

them such a character of sacred dignity and importance, as brings them within the range of God's highest purposes, and renders them "in reality the connecting links of that golden chain which unites heaven and earth.”

This, however, is not all. A right understanding of the typical nature of ancient Scripture is certainly valuable, as serving thus to impart an air of grandeur and importance to its smallest incidents, making the little relatively great, and showing how a place may have been given to them in the sacred record, without in any measure impairing its dignity or lessening its value. But the same consideration warrants us to proceed a step farther, and to assert, not only that such things may without impropriety have been admitted into Old Testament history, but that they must have been found there, in order to adapt it for fulfilling the ends it was intended to serve. The comparatively little and homely appearance of a great proportion of the things recorded in sacred history, was absolutely necessary to render them what they were designed to be the natural and easy stepping-stones by which the church was to be led on to the discoveries of a higher dispensation. It is one thing, that an arrangement exists in nature, which comprehends under the same law the falling of an apple to the ground, and the vast movements of the heavenly bodies; but it is another thing, and also true, that the perception of that law, as manifested in the motion of the smaller body, because manifested on a scale which man could bring fully within the grasp of his comprehension, was what enabled him to mount upwards and scan the similar though incomparably grander phenomena of the visible universe. In this case, there was not only a real connexion in nature between the little and the great, but also such a connexion in the order of man's acquaintance with both, that it was the knowledge of the one which conducted him to the knowledge of the other. The connexion is precisely similar, which exists between the facts of Old Testament history and the glorious revelations of the gospel,-with this difference, indeed, that the laws and principles developed amid the familiar objects and comparatively humble scenes of the former, were not so much designed to fit men for discovering, as for receiving when discovered, the higher mysteries of the latter. To do that, however, it was not less necessary in this case, than in the other, that the first developments should have been made amid such familiar objects and humble scenes as those in question-amid the ordinary occurrences of social and domestic life, or the current transactions of an earthly kingdom. A series of events more grand and majestic could never have accomplished the object God had in view; they would have been too much away from the common course of things; and though they might have commanded the interest and dazzled the imagination of those, who either witnessed or read of them, they could not have implanted truths in the hearts of God's people, and familiarized them to principles, which were, not only in point of fact, but in the apprehension also of their minds, to be most intimately connected with God's chief and ulti

mate purposes of grace. Such an effect could be produced only by such a series of transactions as those we find recorded in the Scriptures of the Old Testament; and thus, what the loose and partial views of superficial men would turn into a ground of accusation against the oracles of God, becomes, when thoroughly investigated, an evidence of the profound wisdom and internal harmony, which render them as a whole worthy of God, and in one part properly subservient to another.

It may be proper just to mention, that though in the above remarks we have spoken of the purpose of God only in reference to those who lived in former times, yet there would be no material difference, if the subject were contemplated in reference to those who live now, or at any period of the Christian dispensation. For what the transactions themselves required to be for the accomplishment of God's purpose in regard to the one, the history of these transactions required to be for the accomplishment of his purpose in regard to the other. Whatever confirmation such things may lend to our faith in the mysteries of God-whatever force or clearness to our perceptions of the truth-whatever encouragement to our hopes, or direction to our walk in the divine life, it may all be said to depend upon the history being of such easy comprehension, and descriptive of facts so plain and familiar in their nature, that the mind can without difficulty both realize their truth and grasp their dimensions.

IV. We have yet another, and perhaps a still more important observation to make, than any of the preceding, on the value of the typical matter of ancient Scripture, and the services which, as such, it is fitted to render in connexion with the knowledge and belief of divine truth. For when rightly understood and employed, it is eminently calculated to enlarge and strengthen our faith in the things of God, by helping out the imperfection of the spiritual idea in our minds, and presenting it before us in its proper fulness. Our views in many important points must otherwise be very defective, and our convictions less settled than they ought to be.

We have now, it is true, the advantage of a full revelation of the mind of God, and it is the privilege even of babes to understand the mysteries of the kingdom of God. But it by no means follows from this, that every portion of the truth may be so distinctly apprehended in its naked spirituality, as to render us totally independent of any outward and sensible representations of it. We are still in a state of imperfection, and so much under the influence of sense, that our ideas even of abstract truth in nature require often to be aided by outward forms and resemblances. how much more must it be so of such truth, as, from being in its own nature spiritual and divine, is less easily brought within the grasp of the mind, than what is, merely natural! Besides, there are portions of the truth which relate to things still future, and do not come at all within the reach of our present observation or experience, though not the less important to be contemplated and believed by the church. It might greatly tend to assist our concep