the more the Jewish worshippers loved the habitation of God's house, and entered into the meaning and spirit of its sacred services, the more deeply were their souls penetrated by the sense of the holiness of their God, causing them to say, "Thou art holy, O thou who inhabitest the praises of Israel; and holiness becometh thine house for ever."

It has, indeed, been frequently contended, that the spirit which the Jewish law tended to nurture in the minds of the Jewish people was selfish and servile, as regards God-and exclusive and uncharitable, as regards men; and such, therefore, as it were dishonouring God to imagine he could approve or love in his people.

Now, it is to be freely conceded, that there is much plausibility in these objections, and the more that they have received too much countenance from the actual character of the Jews. But closer consideration will satisfy us, that there is, notwithstanding, nothing in them which reflects dishonour upon God as a lawgiver.

The Jewish law was undeniably enforced by temporal, rather than by future sanctions; and the spirit which was cherished under it partook less of the spirit of liberty than of the spirit of bondage. It is otherwise under the Gospel. God has not given to us the spirit of fear but of power and of love; and, though the word and providence of God have not withdrawn us from under the influence of the immediate consequences of our conduct, we are now chiefly acted on by the consideration of future and eternal retributions. This difference in the principle of the Divine administration under the Jewish and Christian economy,. and in the spirit and principle of the subjects of each respectively, does not however involve such contrariety as would infer a difference in their origin, or warrant the belief that this less than the other is worthy of God. God now deals with sons, who are capable of juster knowledge of their Father's character, and further foresight of the consequences of their own conduct. He was then dealing, as we have said, with

children, intellectually and morally, as very babes, who, unskilled as yet in their Father's character, incapable of estimating his designs, and less considerate of invisible and future events than of those which were instant and visible, were of course more under the yoke, and the spirit of bondage. This, I conceive, is at once the simple reason and the sufficient vindication of what was no doubt distinctive of the Jewish as distinguished from the Christian dispensation. It must not be supposed, however, that the temporary sanctions, by which obedience was enforced upon the Jews, exhausted all the issues of their moral existence, so that they were done with judgment and retribution when they had enjoyed the worldly blessing, or had borne the worldly curse. While these were dispensed, in order to maintain the national covenant, the Israelites were besides under the obligations of God's moral law, which formed a character, and entailed responsibilities, enduring as their immortal existence. Neither do we allow that the spirit of fear was the exclusive spirit of God's ancient people. If this were then the prevailing spirit, yet even then there was held out to them, under the veil of types, that hope of mercy and salvation, which awoke and cherished in them the spirit of love and filial confidence toward God, which we find often expressed, and which we may be certain, was more often enjoyed by God's ancient people. And those terrors and restraints which are uttered in terms so rigorous and vindictive, besides being restricted in their application to the corrupt and unfaithful, the unjust and the unholy, were of the nature of a merciful, though seemingly severe expedient, by which, through a just dread of his judgments, God sought to rid his people of those slavish terrors by which idolatrous nations were and ever have been held in the most deplorable bondage. As one well says, "they were conservative meanswere defensive weapons, were necessary and benign instruments, employed to expel from the rude minds. of their infant nation the cruel and foul belief and worship of Moloch, of Baal, of Thammuz. The stern

t

ness of Jehovah should then be thought of as we regard the compassionate rigour of a parent, who strives at all hazards to rescue his children from some cruel and seductive thraldom."* On the same principle we are still required to make God our fear and our dread; and though, being under the covenant of peace, freed from servile terror, as indeed God's children were, many of them, under the Law, we are still admonished for our victory over all other fears, to "fear God, who is able to destroy both body and soul in hell."

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The other objection taken against the Jewish institute as cherishing an exclusive and uncharitable frame of spirit will soon appear to be equally groundless. No terms can be conceived more violent than those which infidels have used to stigmatize the seclusion of the Jewish people; and nothing more malignantly triumphant than their appeals to the character of that people, as the ample justification of their charge. Tacitus, in his days, speaks of the Jews as "a people whose religion had made them haters of mankind." Voltaire, in modern times, has reiterated and aggravated the reproach, asserting "that it was commanded them to hold all other people in abhorrence," and "by their very law itself they at length found themselves the natural enemies of the whole race of mankind." We are not concerned here to vindicate the character of the Jews. Of the great body of that people we find as hard things written in their own Scriptures as the most malignant enemies have been able to indite: and yet it is only justice to maintain, that so many of them as walked in the law, and were approved of God, did display a character of moral excellence unequalled by any who lived in the same ages, but in other nations of the world. But it is not the Jews, but the Lawgiver, whom we would vindicate; not what they were, but what he required them to be; and what would have been their character had they freely and fully imbibed the spirit and embodied the habits which his law required.

*Fanaticism, page 427.

*

Now nothing is more easy than to demonstrate the allegations just quoted to be impious and malignant slander. It is no doubt true that, of itself, a privileged religious seclusion, such as the Jews enjoyed, is apt, through man's depravity, to generate a haughty contempt of others; and it may not be denied that, in the later ages of their state, this spirit rose in the Jews to a fearful extreme. But it is due to the Jewish Scriptures to remark, that there is no injunction of the law which commands it-no observance of their religion which can be pretended to give it countenance; and that much is there enjoined and commanded to counterwork this evil tendency, and to preserve them humble, and make them kind and beneficent. As if to beat down all spiritual pride, they were continually reminded of their humble origin, and of their frequent rebellions against the Lord;t and were taught, at the same time, to refer all their blessings to their God: saying, "Not unto us, not unto us, but unto thy name, O Lord, give glory." And while all spiritual pride was thus kept down, those unsocial feelings which are so ready to spring from it were with equal rigour repressed and forbidden. The separation which they were required to maintain from the men of other nations was as a guard of safety, thrown around the chosen race, to defend them from the contamination of the surrounding corruptions. Though thus intended to preserve the purity, and perpetuate the privileges of God's people, it was by no means designed to confine but rather to diffuse them. In the very terms of the covenant of promise, of which they were the depositaries and guardians, it was intimated that, in the fulfilment of their trust, "all nations of the earth should be blessed." Their law, besides teaching them to look on all men as their brethren, provided, with a benignity which is absolutely alone in all the legislation of antiquity, for the defence of the stranger within their gates. Although it was forbidden them to form alliance with any of the hea

* Deut. xxvi. 4-10.

Deut. ix. 4. 7. 24.

thens in their worship, yet in the early times, whosoever among the nations, far or near, would renounce his idols and cleave to the God of Israel was made welcome into the bosom of the Jewish state. And as connecting their own prosperity with the salvation of the world, they were taught to pray for the universal diffusion of his grace and mercy, saying, "God be merciful to us and bless us, and cause his face to shine upon us, that thy way may be known on the earth, and thy saving health among all nations.”

In these statutes and prayers, who but may discern the same spirit of universal good-will-designed by God, and inculcated on his covenant people-which breathes in the Law and from the spirit of Christ? His love, indeed, as illustrated in the ancient economy, appears in conjunction with a strict and jealous holiness. It is not otherwise now. His command still is to his spiritual people, "Come out and be separate, and touch not the unclean thing, and I will receive you, and I will be a Father to you, and ye shall be my sons and daughters, saith the Lord Almighty." Ungodly men no doubt resist obedience to this injunction as the dictate of spiritual pride or of malignant and unsocial affections. But the spirit of the Gospel is humility and charity. While, as Christians, we are forbidden to be conformed to the world, we are enjoined, as we have opportunity, to do good to all in it. We are not now, indeed, separated from the world, as the Jews from the gentiles, by any line of local separation; but rather, like the Levites in Israel, are scattered over the world, which is now the redeemed inheritance of Jehovah, as a royal Priesthood, every where to maintain God's worship, and diffuse his blessings.

IV. Let us in the last place, contemplate the character of God, reflected from the history of the Jews, as fulfilling his word of promise and of prophecy. You remember that, from the beginning, God gave promise to Abraham that he would make of him a great nation; and you know, that though the promise was long delayed; though the child of promise was