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of his rivers, which hath said, My river is mine own, and I have made it for myself. 4. But I will put hooks in thy jaws, and I will cause the fish of thy rivers to stick unto thy scales. 5. And I will leave thee thrown into the wilderness, thee and all the fish of thy rivers: thou shalt fall upon the open fields, thou shalt not be brought together nor gathered: I have given thee for meat to the beasts of the field, and to the fowls of heaven,' &c. to ver. 17.

SECT. 2. No. 7. In the ancient picture writing, men being represented by the figures of the things to which they were metaphorically likened, the Jewish prophets have raised many allegories on that foundation. Thus, because princes and great men were likened to trees, the power of the Assyrian kings, and the greatness of their empire, are represented by Ezekiel in an allegory formed on the qualities and circumstances of a tall cedar tree with fair branches, among which all the fowls of heaven made their nests; and under which all the beasts of the field brought forth their young; and under its shadow dwelt all great nations, Ezek. xxxi. 3-9. Moreover, the destruction of the Assyrian empire is in the same allegory represented by the breaking of the boughs and the falling of the branches of this cedar, and by the departing of the people of the earth from its shadow, ver. 10-14.

In like manner, nations being metaphorically compared to a forest, their desolation and destruction are represented by the burning of a forest; as in the following allegory, Ezek. xx. 46. Son of man, set thy face towards the south, and prophesy against the forest of the south field; 47. And say to the forest of the south, Hear the word of the Lord, Thus saith the Lord God, Behold I will kindle a fire in thee, and it shall devour every green tree in thee, and every dry tree: the flaming flame shall not be quenched, and all faces from the south to the north shall be burnt therein. 48. And all flesh shall see that I the Lord have kindled it: It shall not be quenched. 49. Then said I, Ah, Lord God! they say of me, Doth he not speak parables?'-On this allegory our Lord's expression, Luke xxiii. 31. If they do these things in a green tree, what shall be done in the dry?' seems to have been founded.

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In allusion to the symbolical meaning of trees in picture-writing, the introduction of the Israelites into Canaan, and their becoming a great nation in that land, are represented under the allegory of a vine brought from Egypt and planted in Canaan, which took deep root and filled the land: Psal. lxxx. 10. The hills were covered with the shadow of it, and the boughs thereof were like the goodly cedars. 11. She sent out her boughs from the sea, (the Mediterranean Sea), and her branches to the river, (Euphrates). Why hast thou then broken down her hedges, so that all they which pass by the way do pluck her? The boar out of the wood doth waste it,' &c.

SECT. 2. No. 7. b. Because in ancient times kings, and magistrates, and priests, were metaphorically called shepherds, on account of their care in governing, defending, and instructing their people, the prophet Ezekiel hath, upon this metaphor, formed a beautiful allegorical discourse, in which he severely reproved the Jewish princes, magistrates, and priests, for their negligence in the execution of their offices; for their enriching themselves and living luxuriously at the expense of their people; and for their being at no pains to promote their happiness. Ezek. xxxiv. 2. Thus saith the Lord God unto the shepherds, Wo be to the shepherds of Israel that do feed themselves! Should not the shepherds feed the flocks? 3. Ye eat the fat, and ye clothe you with the wool, ye kill them that are fed; but ye feed not the flock?' For this unfaithfulness God threatened to punish the Israelitish princes and priests severely; ver. 10. Thus saith the Lord, Behold I am against the shepherds, and I will re

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quire my flock at their hand, and cause them to cease from feeding the flock. For I will deliver my flock from their mouth, that they may not be meat for them.' The people, thus neglected and spoiled by their rulers, God comforted in the same allegorical language, ver. 12. 'I will seek out my sheep, and I will deliver them out of all places where they have been scattered in the cloudy and dark day Ver. 14. I will feed them in a good pasture, and upon the high mountains of Israel shall their fold be; there shall they lie in a good field.' In the mean time, to prevent the wicked among the Israelites from fancying themselves the objects of his love, God reproved them in the same pastoral dialect; ver. 17. 'As for you, O my flock, thus saith the Lord God, Behold I judge between cattle and cattle, between the rams and the hegoats. 18. Seemeth it a small thing to you to have eaten up the good pasture, but ye must tread down with your feet the residue of your pastures? And to have drunk of the deep waters, but ye must foul the residue with your feet? 19. But as for my flock, they eat that which ye have trodden with your feet, and they drink that which ye have fouled. 21. Because ye have thrust with side and with shoulder, and pushed all the diseased with your horns, till ye have scattered them abroad; 22. Therefore will I save my flock, and they shall no more be a prey, and I will judge between cattle and cattle. 23. And I will set up one shepherd over them, and he shall feed them, even my servant David, a prince among them,' &c. On this allegory our Lord seems to have formed his parable of the sheep and the goats, in which he hath described the general judgment, Matt. xxv.

B. Of the proper Allegory, as set forth in a Dream or in a Vision.

HAVING treated of verbal allegories, it remains to treat of those allegories which were set forth in symbols actually presented to the imagination of the prophet in a dream while asleep, or in a vision while awake. These allegorical dreams and visions, the persons who were favoured with them communicated to their contemporaries by word of mouth, and sometimes committed them to writing, for the instruction of posterity. In these, as in other allegories, the persons or nations who were the subjects of them were designed, sometimes by their known symbols, whose figure was presented to the imagination of the person who dreamed or who saw the vision, and sometimes by arbitrary symbols, whose character, however, and attending circumstances, were so formed as to lead to their meaning.

Of allegorical dreams formed on symbols which were generally known, that of Pharaoh, Gen. xli. 17. is a signal example. For, one of the symbols by which Egypt was designed being an heifer, the seven years of great plenty which were to be in Egypt, were represented in Pharaoh's dream by seven very fat and well-favoured kine, which came up out of the Nile, and fed in an adjoining meadow; and the seven years of famine which were to succeed the years of plenty, by seven other kine, lean and ill-favoured, which also came up out of the river after the former; and the greatness of the famine, by the lean kine eating up the fat kine, and remaining as lean and illfavoured as at the beginning.—Nebuchadnezzar's dream, Dan. iv. is another example of an allegorical representation formed on a well-known symbol. For, princes and great men being represented in picture-writing by trees, the greatness of Nebuchadnezzar's kingdom, and the benefits which the nations over which he reigned derived from the power of his kingdom, were represented by a tree which in his dream he saw growing in the midst of the earth, whose height reached to heaven, whose leaves were fair, and its fruit was much, affording meat for all.

The beasts of the field had shadow under it, and the fowls of the air dwelt in the boughs thereof.'-In the same dream, the punishment which God was to inflict on that proud prince for his impiety and other sins, was allegorically represented by the hewing down of that great tree, the cutting off of its branches, the driving away of the beasts from under it, and of the fowls from its branches. On this symbol our Lord formed his parable of the grain of mustard seed which a man took and sowed in his field, whereby he allegorically represented the wide spreading of the kingdom of heaven, or gospel dispensation, and its beneficial influence on the happiness of mankind: Matt. xiii. 32. Which indeed is the least of all seeds, but when it is grown it is the greatest among herbs, and becometh a tree; so that the birds of the air come and lodge in the branches thereof.'

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Of the allegorical dream formed on an arbitrary symbol, we have an example in the great and terrible image which stood before Nebuchadnezzar in his dream, recorded Dan. ii. 31. and which, by the different materials of which it was composed, represented the four great empires which were to rule the nations of the earth in

succession.

The head of this image, which was of fine gold, signified the Babylonian empire; its breast and its arms of silver, signified the Medo-Persian empire; its belly and its thighs of brass, the Grecian empire; and its legs of iron, and its feet part of iron and part of clay, the Roman empire in its different states. And whereas this great image was broken in pieces by a stone, which was cut out of a mountain without hands, and which afterwards became itself a great mountain and filled the whole earth, that accident signified the utter destruction of these idolatrous kingdoms, to make way for a kingdom which the God of heaven was to set up, and which was never to be destroyed. The order in which these four empires were to arise, and the peculiar qualities by which they were to be distinguished, were shewed to Daniel himself, chap. vii. 2. in an allegorical vision, formed on the arbitrary symbols of four beasts which arose out of the great sea, after it was violently agitated by storms, and whose forms and qualities were different from any beasts known to exist. See an interpretation of that vision in my Truth of the Gospel History, p. 219.

The living creatures which Ezekiel saw in his vision, chap. i. were still more monstrous, and unlike any thing in nature, than the beasts in Daniel's vision. Each of them had four faces, namely, the face of a man, of a lion, of an ox, and of an eagle. Their feet were straight with soles, like those of calves' feet. They had the hands of a man under their wings, and their appearance was that of burning coals of fire from which went flashes of lightning. They were accompanied with wheels of the colour of beryl. Each wheel had a wheel within it, and their rings were so high that they were dreadful, and had eyes round about; and when the living creatures went, the wheels went; for the spirit of the living creatures was in the wheels. The likeness of the firmament, which was stretched over the heads of the living creatures, was as the colour of chrystal. And above the firmament was the likeness of a throne, as the appearance of a sapphire stone; and upon the throne, the likeness of the appearance of a man above upon it. His loins downward had the appearance of fire, like the bow that is in the cloud in the day of rain.

This allegorical vision not being accompanied with an interpretation, its meaning cannot be determined with any certainty. Only, as the prophet in the conclusion of his account of it says, ver. 18. This was the appearance of the likeness of the glory of the Lord;' and insinuates, that the things spoken to him, which are mentioned in the following chapters, proceeded from this

appearance, it may perhaps be conjectured, that the vision was an enigmatical representation of the attributes of the Deity exerted in the government of the world; and that that representation was formed by the union of a number of symbols, whose meaning those who understood the ancient picture-writing knew, but which we, whose knowledge of that sort of writing is extremely imperfect, cannot pretend to explain.

It remains to observe, that in foretelling future events, especially those which were of an extensive nature, and at a great distance in point of time, the Spirit of God thought proper to make use of allegorical dreams and visions, rather than of plain verbal descriptions, for the following reasons:-1. These dreams and visions, whether formed on known or on arbitrary symbols, were naturally so dark, even when accompanied with an interpretation, as not to be distinctly understood till they were explained by their fulfilment. This darkness I think was necessary to prevent unbelievers from pretending that the prophecy, by exciting persons to do the things foretold, occasioned its own accomplishment.2. The images of which these allegorical dreams and visions were composed, being all objects of sight, they made a much more lively and forcible impression on the minds of the prophets, than it was possible to do by words; consequently, they could be more distinctly remembered, and more accurately related to others, than if the qualities and actions of the persons represented by the symbols in the dream or vision, had been expressed in a verbal description.-3. The facility with which the representations in an allegorical dream or vision could be remembered, and the precision with which they could be related in all their circumstances, rendered the transmission of them to posterity as matters of fact easy. And although the meaning of these dreams and visions was not understood by those to whom they were related, yet being of such a nature as to make a strong impression on all to whom they were related, when they came to be explained by their accomplishment, the inspiration of the prophet who had the dream or vision was rendered undeniable, and the sovereignty of God in the government of the world was raised beyond all possibility of doubt.

SECT. IV. Of the Method of conveying Instruction by significant Actions.

To render speech forcible and affecting, mankind, in all ages and countries, have been in use to accompany their words with such gestures and actions as indicated the sentiments and feelings of their mind. This was the custom more especially in the first ages of the world, when the primitive languages were not sufficiently copious, and men's passions were under little restraint. Hence the eastern nations, whose imaginations were warm, and whose tempers were lively, early delighted in this method of communicating their sentiments and feelings; and even after their language became so copious as not to need that extrinsic aid, they still continued to express their sentiments in the same way. Nay, all savage nations at this day express their strongest feelings by accompanying their words with significant actions, which shews that the custom is founded in nature. The scriptures furnish many instances of this custom. For example, to render promissory oaths more solemn and binding, the person who sware the oath put his hand under the thigh of him to whom he sware: Gen. xxiv. 2. Abraham said unto his eldest servant of his house,-Put, I pray thee, thy hand under my thigh: 3. And I will make thee swear by the Lord the God of heaven, and the God of the earth, that thou will not take a wife unto my son of the daughters of the Canaanites.'

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In like manner, Jacob before his death required his son Joseph to put his hand under his thigh, and swear, that he would not bury him in Egypt, but in Canaan with his fathers, Gen. xlvii. 29.

To express extreme affliction and grief, they rent their clothes, and covered themselves with sackcloth. Thus it is said of Jacob when he saw Joseph's coat, 'He rent his clothes, and put sackcloth upon his loins, and mourned for his son many days.'-1 Kings xxi. 27. when Ahab heard Elijah's words, he rent his clothes, and put sackcloth on his flesh, and fasted, and lay on sackcloth and went softly.'

which thou cursedst is withered away.' Peter called his Master's declaration, in consequence of which the fig tree was destroyed, a curse, agreeably to the phraseology of the Hebrews, who considered land absolutely sterile as cursed; Heb. vi. 8.-By the typical action of destroying the barren fig tree, our Lord intimated to his disciples the destruction which was coming on the Jewish nation on account of their wickedness.-John xiii. 4. Jesus riseth from supper, and laid aside his garments, and took a towel and girded himself. 5. After that he poureth water in a bason, and began to wash the disciples' feet, and to wipe them with the towel wherewith he was girded.

Moses having constrained his wife Zipporah to cir-12. So after he had washed their feet, and had taken cumcise her son, she, to express her detestation of the action, and her displeasure with her husband for having commanded it, cast the foreskin of the child at his feet, and said, 'Surely a bloody husband art thou to me.' Exod. iv. 25.

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Anciently the significant actions with which any kind of information was accompanied, were commonly of the typical kind; that is, they were so contrived as to express the information conveyed by the words. Thus, when Moses saw an Egyptian smiting an Israelite, he slew the Egyptian, to shew, by action, that God would by him deliver the Israelites from the bondage of the Egyptians. So Stephen assures us, Acts vii. 25.-Thus also, 1 Kings xi. 30. The prophet Ahijah caught the new garment that was on Jeroboam, and rent it in twelve pieces. 31. And he said to Jeroboam, take thee ten pieces; for thus saith the Lord the God of Israel, Behold I will rend the kingdom out of the hand of Solomon, and will give ten tribes to thee.'-1 Kings xxii. 11. Zedekiah the son of Chenaanah made him horns of iron; and he said, Thus saith the Lord, With these shalt thou push the Syrians until thou have consumed them.'-2 Kings xiii. 18. Elisha said unto the king of Israel, Smite upon the ground: and he smote thrice, and staid. 19. And the man of God was wroth with him, and said, Thou shouldst have smitten five or six times, then hadst thou smitten Syria till thou hadst consumed it; Whereas now thou shalt smite Syria but thrice.' The king's fault was, that knowing his smiting upon the ground was typical of his smiting Syria, he ought to have smitten it oftener than thrice.-Neh. v. 13. Also I shook my lap and said, So God shake out every man from his house, and from his labour, that performeth not this promise, even thus be he shaken.'-Ezek. xxi. 6. Sigh, therefore, thou son of man, with the breaking (beating) of thy loins; and with bitterness sigh before their eyes. 7. And it shall be when they say unto thee, Wherefore sighest thou? that thou shalt answer, For the tidings, because it cometh; and every heart shall melt, and all hands shall be feeble,' &c. Ver. 14. • Thou, therefore, son of man, prophesy, and smite thine hands together.'

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In later times, likewise, the Jews accompanied their discourses with significant actions, to give their instructions the greater force. Matt. xviii. 2. Jesus called a little child, and set him in the midst of them. 3. And said, Verily, I say unto you, except ye be converted and become as little children, ye shall not enter into the kingdom of heaven. 4. Whosoever, therefore, shall humble himself as this little child,' &c.-Mark xi. 12. On the morrow when they were come from Bethany, Jesus was hungry. 13. And seeing a fig tree afar off having leaves, he came, if haply he might find any thing thereon; and when he came to it he found nothing but leaves. Now the time of (gathering) figs was not yet. 14. And Jesus answered and said to it, No man eat fruit of thee hereafter for ever. And his disciples heard it.-20. And on the (next) morning, as they passed by, they saw the fig tree dried up from the roots. 21. And Peter, calling to remembrance, saith unto him, Master, behold the fig tree

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his garments and was set down again, he said to them, Know ye what I have done to you? 14. If I your Lord and Master have washed your feet, ye also ought to wash one another's feet.' Ye ought to do the meanest offices to each other, when they are necessary for promoting each other's happiness.-Luke ix. 5. Whosoever will not receive you, when ye go out of that city, shake off the very dust from your feet for a testimony against them.'Matt. xix. 13. Then there were brought unto him little children, that he should put his hands on them and pray. 15. And he laid his hands on them.'-1 Tim. iv. 14. Neglect not the spiritual gift which is in thee, which was given thee according to prophecy, together with the imposition of the hands of the eldership.'-Matt. xx. 34. Jesus had compassion on them, and touched their eyes; and immediately their eyes received sight.'— John ix. 6. He spat on the ground and made clay of the spittle, and he anointed the eyes of the blind man with the clay; 7. And said to him, go wash in the pool of Siloam.'

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These examples shew, that our Lord's taking Peter's wife's mother, who was sick of a fever, and Jairus's daughter, who was dead, by the hand; and his touching the eyes of the two blind men mentioned Matt. ix. 2. with other things of the like nature, were merely significant actions, by which he intimated to the persons themselves, and to those who were present, that he was going to work a miracle in their behalf. So also, before he said to his apostles, John xx. 22. Receive ye the Holy Ghost, he breathed on them,' to intimate, that by the invisible operation of his power he would confer on them the gifts of inspiration and miracles.

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Another remarkable instance of enforcing information by a significant action, we have Acts xxi. 11. Agabus took Paul's girdle, and bound his own hands and feet, and said, Thus saith the Holy Ghost, So shall the Jews at Jerusalem bind the man that owneth this girdle, and shall deliver him into the hands of the Gentiles.'

Lastly, it is well known that baptism and the Lord's supper were instituted by Christ, and appointed to be continued in the church, for the purpose of setting before the people by significant action some of the greatest articles of their faith.

Since then it was common in the eastern countries to give instruction by symbolical actions, as well as by words, the many extraordinary things done by the Jewish prophets, for discovering to the Israelites God's purposes concerning themselves, and concerning the neighbouring nations, cannot be matter either of astonishment or of offence to us. They were all of them done at the commandment of God, and agreeably to the manners of the times; and were admirably adapted to convey, in the strongest and most forcible manner, the information intended.

Thus, Isaiah was commanded by God to walk three years, not only barefoot but naked, that is, without his upper garment; namely, the hairy mantle commonly worn by the prophets, Zech. xiii. 4. And this he was to do as a sign and a wonder upon Egypt and Ethiopia,

Isa. xx. 2, 3.; that is, as it is explained ver. 4. to shew by action, that the king of Assyria would lead away the Egyptians prisoners, and the Ethiopians captive, young and old, naked and barefoot, even with their buttocks uncovered, to the shame of Egypt.-B. Lowth, in his note on Isa. xx. 3. thinks it probable that Isaiah was ordered to walk naked and barefoot three days, to shew that within three years after the defeat of the Cushites and Egyptians by the king of Assyria, the town should be taken. For he thinks the time was foretold, as well as the event; and that the words three days may have been lost out of the text at the end of ver. 2. after the word barefoot, a day being put for a year, according to the prophetic rule.

In like manner Jeremiah was ordered, chap. xix. 1. to get a potter's earthen bottle, and with the ancients of the people and of the priests, ver. 2. to go to the valley of Hinnom, and prophesy in their hearing that Jerusalem was to be destroyed. And that his prophecy might have a strong impression on the imagination of the men who were with him, he was ordered, ver. 10. to break the bottle in the sight of these men; 11. And to say unto them, Thus saith the Lord of Hosts, Even so will I break this people and this city, as one breaketh a potter's vessel that cannot be made whole again.'

The same prophet was ordered, Jer. xxvii. 2. to make bonds and yokes, and put them on his own neck, and to send them to all the neighbouring kings, by the messengers whom they had sent to Jerusalem to persuade Zedekiah to enter into the confederacy which they had formed against the king of Babylon; and by that symbolical action the prophet was to signify to them, that the issue of the confederacy would be certain captivity to them all. But we are told, chap. xxviii. 10. that the false prophet Hananiah took the yoke from off the prophet Jeremiah's neck, and broke it, and spake in the presence of all the people, saying, Thus saith the Lord, Even so will I break the yoke of Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon, from the neck of all nations, within the space of two full years.'

Once more, Jeremiah having written in a book his prophecy concerning the destruction of Babylon, recorded Jer. li. he gave it to Serajah, ver. 60. and ordered him when he came to Babylon with Zedekiah to read it, and having read it, to bind a stone to it, and cast it into the midst of Euphrates. Ver. 64. And thou shalt say, Thus shall Babylon sink, and shall not rise from the evil that I will bring upon her.'

With the same design of speaking by significant actions, Ezekiel was ordered to delineate Jerusalem upon a tile, and to besiege it by building a fort against it, raising a mount, and setting a camp with battering rams against it round about. This siege the prophet was to continue four hundred and thirty days, and during the continuance thereof he was to eat and drink by measure: and his bread was to be baked, that is, prepared, ver. 15. with dung-the fuel with which he was to prepare his bread was to be dung. By these symbolical actions the prophet shewed that Jerusalem was to be besieged, and that during the siege the inhabitants were to be punished with a grievous famine, Ezek. iv.-In the following chapter the prophet was ordered, ver. 1. to shave his head and beard, and with a balance to divide the hairs thereof into three parts, and, ver. 2. when the days of the siege were fulfilled, he was to burn with fire a third part of the hairs in the midst of the city: next, he was to take a third part and smite about it with a knife; and the remaining third part he was to scatter in the wind, except a few hairs which he was to bind in the skirts of his garment. The meaning of these symbolical actions God explained to the Israelites as follows:-Ver. 11. Because thou hast defiled my sanctuary with all thy detestable things, and

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with all thine abominations; therefore will I also diminish thee; neither shall mine eyes spare, neither will I have any pity. 12. A third part of thee shall die with the pestilence, and with famine shall they be consumed in the midst of thee; and a third part shall fall by the sword round about thee; and I will scatter a third part into all the winds: and I will draw out a sword after them. 13. Thus shall mine anger be accomplished, and I will cause my fury to rest upon them, and I will be comforted. 15. So it shall be a reproach and a taunt, an instruction and an astonishment, unto the nations that are round about thee, when I shall execute judgments in thee, in anger, and in fury, and in furious rebukes. I the Lord have spoken it.'

For the illustration of the foregoing allegorical action, I will here transcribe B. Lowth's note on Isa. vii. 20. 'In the same day shall the Lord shave with a razor that is hired, namely, by them beyond the river, by the king of Assyria, the head and the hair of the feet: and it shall also consume the beard.'-"To shave with the hired razor the head, the feet, and the beard, is an expression highly parabolical; to denote the utter devastation of the country from one end to the other, and the plundering of the people from the highest to the lowest, by the Assyrians, whom God employed as his instrument to punish the Jews. Ahaz himself, in the first place, hired the king of Assyria to come to help him against the Syrians, by a present made to him of all the treasures of the temple as well as his own: and God himself considered the great nations whom he thus employed as his mercenaries, and paid them their wages. Thus he paid Nebuchadnezzar, for his services against Tyre, by the conquest of Egypt, Ezek. xxix. 18-20. The hairs of the head are those of highest order in the state; those of the feet or the lower parts are the common people; the beard is the king, the high-priest, the very supreme in dignity and majesty. The eastern people have always held the beard in the highest veneration, and have been extremely jealous of its honour. To pluck a man's beard is an instance of the greatest indignity that can be offered, Isa. 1. 6. The king of the Ammonites, to shew the utmost contempt of David, cut off half of the beards of his servants; and the men were greatly ashamed; and David bade them tarry at Jericho till their beards were grown,' 2 Sam. x. 4, 5. &c."

Once more, God ordered Ezekiel, chap. xii. 3. to prepare stuff for removing, and to go forth with it at even in the sight of the people, as they who go forth into captivity, and, having digged through the wall in their sight, to carry his stuff out thereby upon his shoulders in the twilight, with his face covered that he might not see the ground. The prophet having performed these actions in the sight of the people, when they said to him, What dost thou? God ordered him to reply, ver. 11. I am your sign like as I have done, so shall it be done unto them: they shall remove and go into captivity. 12. And the prince that is among them shall bear upon his shoulder in the twilight, and shall go forth: they shall dig through the wall to carry out thereby he shall cover his face that he see not the ground with his eyes. 13. My net also will I spread upon him, and he shall be taken in the snare and I will bring him to Babylon, to the land of the Chaldeans; yet shall he not see it, though he shall die there. 14. And I will scatter towards every wind, all that are about him to help him,' &c.

From these examples of significant actions, concerning which God declared that they were commanded to be done for the purpose of prefiguring future events, we may conclude, that those uncommon actions which he commanded without declaring the purpose for which they were commanded, had, like the others, a typical meaning. This conclusion is warranted by the inspired writers, who

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in after times have pointed out the things signified by these actions. For example, when God ordered Abraham to sacrifice his only son, although he did not tell him the purpose for which that difficult command was given to him, yet, from the apostle's terming the suspen sion of that command a receiving of Isaac from the dead for a parable, Heb. xi. 19. we learn, that by the command to sacrifice Isaac, and by the suspension of that command, the death and resurrection of God's only Son was prefigured. In like manner, when the sacrifice of the passover was instituted, although no intimation was given of its having a typical meaning, we know that it prefigured the sacrifice of Christ, together with the influence of that sacrifice in procuring the salvation of believFor we are told expressly, John xix. 36. that when our Lord hung on the cross his legs were not broken, that the command concerning the paschal lamb, Exod. xii. 46. Neither shall ye break a bone thereof,' might be fulfilled. Besides, in allusion to the typical meaning of the passover, Christ is called, 1 Cor. v. 7. our Passover; and is said to be sacrificed for us. Farther, when God ordered Moses to lift up the image of a serpent on a pole, that the Israelites in the wilderness who were stung with serpents, might be healed by looking at it, although nothing was said concerning its having a typical meaning, yet that it had such a meaning we learn from our Lord himself, who thus explained it, John iii. 14. ‘As Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of man be lifted up, that whosoever believeth on him, should not perish, but have eternal life. Wherefore, the lifting up of the brazen serpent was a type of Christ's being lifted up on the cross; and the health which the Israelites obtained by looking to it, represent ed the salvation of those who believe on Christ as the Saviour of the world. Hence, in allusion to the typical meaning of the brazen serpent, Isaiah introduces Messiah saying, chap. xlv. 22. Look unto me and be ye saved, all the ends of the earth.'

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Upon the whole it appears, that the uncommon actions performed by the Jewish prophets, were all of them sig nificant; both those whose meaning was declared, and those whose meaning was not declared; and that they were commanded by God, for the purpose of prefiguring, in a symbolical manner, future persons and events. It is true, the long duration of some of these symbolical actions, the labour with which they were performed, and the pain which they occasioned to the persons who performed them, have afforded infidels a pretence for speaking of the prophets as fanatics and madmen, who by such doings debased the prophetic office. For which reason, to vindicate the character of these holy men, some of the learned Jewish doctors have given it as their opinions, that these uncommon actions were transacted only in visions, in which the prophets seemed to themselves to do them. But this supposition is contradicted by the scriptures, which represent the actions under consideration as done in the presence of the people, for the purpose of drawing their attention to the informations with which these actions were accompanied: an effect which the relation of a vision could not produce, because the incredulous and profane would naturally consider such a vision either as a fiction or as an illusion. The character, therefore, of the Jewish prophets will be more effectually vindicated, if we recollect what they themselves constantly affirmed; namely, that all the uncommon things which they did, they were commanded by God to do; and that, after the events prefigured by these actions came to pass, no doubt could be entertained of their being commanded by God to do them. Next, if we remember, that in the early ages it was usual to convey instruction by symbolical actions, we shall be sensible, that the things for which the prophets have been censured as madmen, did not appear

to their contemporaries in the light in which we moderns view them that they excited the curiosity of the people among whom they were transacted, and led them to inquire of the prophets what they meant by them, as in the instances mentioned, Ezek. xii. 9. xxi. 7.: that, being addressed to the senses of mankind, they must have conveyed the instruction with which they were accompanied in the most forcible manner: and that instruction thus forcibly conveyed, making a strong impression on the mind of the spectators, must have been long remembered, and could be communicated to others with great accuracy. Thus it appears, that in the early ages, when the art of writing was little known, the most effectual method of communicating and diffusing knowledge was to instruct the people by significant or symbolical actions, and that in fact this method was commonly practised, especially among the eastern nations; wherefore, the Jewish prophets are not to be ridiculed for the symbolical actions with which they accompanied their predictions. The importance of the end for which they performed these actions, and the success with which they accomplished that end, are a sufficient vindication both of the wisdom of God in commanding them, and of the good sense and piety of the prophets in performing them. For which reason, I think, we cannot be mistaken in believing they were all performed exactly as related in the scriptures,

SECT. V. Of Instruction conveyed by some Actions and Events happening in the ordinary course of things.

1. It is now time to proceed to the consideration of a method in which God communicated the knowledge of things future, which though different from that described in the preceding section, and more removed from common observation, was nearly allied to it. For, whereas the prophets, by the divine direction, assumed characters not naturally belonging to them, and performed actions altogether out of the common course, for the purpose of prefiguring future persons and events, the characters and actions and fortunes of some eminent persons, whose distinguished stations placed them in the view of the world, were so ordered by God as to be exact representations of future persons, who, when they arose, by the likeness of their characters and actions and fortunes to those of the persons by whom they were represented, would make mankind sensible that the inspired teachers spake truly, when they declared that the one had been prefigured by the other. In some instances, the persons whose characters and actions prefigured future events, were declared by God himself to be typical, long before the events which they prefigured came to pass; but in other instances, many persons really typical were not known to be such till after the things which they typified happened.

1. Of the first-mentioned sort we have a remarkable example in Abraham, whom God declared to be a typical person, by constituting him the father or type of believers of all nations; and by making with him, as their father, a covenant, in which he promised to be a God to him and to his seed in their generations, and to give to him and to his seed the land of Canaan for an everlasting possession; which promises had not only a literal but a typical or second meaning; as was shewed at large in Ess. v. sect. 1, 2, &c. consequently the covenant with Abraham was an allegory.

2. A second example of a typical person we have in Melchizedec, who, in his character of a king and priest united, was declared by God himself to be a type of his Son's becoming a king and a priest in the human nature; and who, by blessing Abraham, prefigured the efficacy of the priesthood and government of the Son of God, in procuring for believers the pardon of their sins. Psal. cx.

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