Almighty. We learn also that, in a manner imperceptible by us, they promote all our good resolutions and designs, and assist us in our endeavours to attain that perfection in holiness, which may entitle us to become heirs of Salvation. With great reverence, therefore, and respect should we regard these glorious Beings, the delegated ministers of the most High God; but by no means must we pray to or worship them. "For it is written, thou shalt worship the Lord thy God, and him only shalt thou

But though not objects of worship, they are nevertheless objects of our imitation; since, as we pray that God's will "may be done on Earth as it is in Heaven," we should labour with all diligence to fulfil the same; i. e. that as the Angels in Heaven not only do the will of God, but do it with all readiness, cheerfulness, constancy, and delight, so should we endeavour to please God by a similar acceptable service; in the hope that, by emulating their zeal and obedience to the divine commands, we may be united with them in a blessed immortality. We cannot doubt, however, that to whatever Being we pay divine honours, we profess that Being to be God.†

* Matt. iv. 10.

+ See Wake on Church Catechism, p. 90, 136.

"Wherefore let us beseech the Almighty, that we, being warned by his holy word, forbidding all Idolatry, and by the writings of old godly Doctors, and Ecclesiastical Histories, written and preserved by God's ordinance for our admonition and warning, may flee from all Idolatry, and so escape the horrible punishment and plagues, as well worldly as everlasting, threatened for the same, through our only Saviour and Mediator, Jesus Christ."*

* Second Homily against the Peril of Idolatry, ad fin.

SERMON XVIII.

ON A REMARKABLE PASSAGE OF THE PROPHET EZEKIEL.

EZEKIEL XIII. 20, 21.

Behold I am against your pillows, wherewith ye there hunt the souls to make them fly, and I will tear them from your arms, and will let the souls go, even the souls that ye hunt to make them fly.

Your kerchiefs also will I tear, and deliver my people out of your hand, and they shall be no more in your hand to be hunted; and ye shall

know that I am the Lord.

THE general scope of the Prophecy, contained in this passage of Scripture, and those which immediately precede it, is obvious enough. The difficulty lies in the terms in which it is conveyed and it is remarkable that no difficulty of this kind appears to have been noticed till within less than a century of our own times. The words of the Prophet, from the sixteenth verse of this Chapter, are as follows: "Likewise thou, son of man, set

thy face against the daughters of thy people, which prophesy out of their own heart; and prophesy thou against them, and say, Thus saith the Lord God: Woe to the women that sew pillows to all arm-holes, and make kerchiefs upon the head of every stature to hunt souls! Will ye hunt the souls of my people, and will ye save the souls alive that come unto you? And will ye pollute me among my people for handfuls of barley and for pieces of bread, to slay the souls that should not die, and to save the souls alive that should not live, by your lying to my people that hear your lies? Wherefore thus saith the Lord God: Behold I am against your pillows," etc. Evidently, therefore, the objects of this Prophecy, against whom a woe is denounced, were those female soothsayers, who, falsely pretending to be divinely inspired, deceived the captive Israelites with their fictitious oracles, promising good or ill luck to the parties consulting them, after the manner of our fortune-tellers at present, according to the rate at which they were paid, and thus frequently discouraging and afflicting the righteous, and giving confidence to the wicked.

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By sewing pillows to their arms," it is implied that the false Prophetesses seduced their followers into a state of thoughtless indolence and security. But how "kerchiefs,"

coverings, or ornaments for the head, contributed to this indulgence, seems difficult to imagine. I think it more probable that by "kerchiefs," according to this sense of the Prophecy, were meant bolsters, or pillows for the head, in contra-distinction to those which were applied to the arms; both being figurative terms to signify nearly the same thing. It was the opinion of a learned Critic, that the expressions used by the Prophet allude to a superstitious practice of these fatidical women in delivering their oracles; that they applied pillows to the arms, and coverings to the heads of those who came to consult them, as a ceremonial necessary to a due reception of their predictions; but it seems more reasonable to suppose that it was the Prophetesses themselves who were so habited, in order to impose by their appearance, as well as by their words, on their infatuated disciples. It is remarkable that in an ancient version or rather paraphrase of this passage of Scripture it is rendered, "Woe to those females who make phylacteries, and suspend them upon their arms, and place them upon the heads (of persons) of every age." seems plainly to refer to a well-known custom of the Jews, who, previously to their acts of devotion, whether public or private, put on their phylacteries. These were broad strips of parchment, on which were inscribed certain

This