are not the less because they are bestowed daily and hourly; nor becaufe they are bestowed on many other perfons as well as upon you, Thefe bleffings are as truly the free and unmerited gifts of your Almighty Benefactor, as the miracles wrought for the deliverance of the Ifraelites in Egypt, in the wilderness, in the land of Canaan. What title had you to the bleff ings of creation, of protection, of redemption, more than the Ifraelites, had to a མ༤ paffage on dry ground through the Red Sea; to the prefence of God in a cloudy pillar to guide them by day, and in a pillar of flame by night; to the fupply of manna, during nearly forty years; to the fupernatural deftruction of the army of Sennacherib; or to the warnings during many centuries of a fucceffion of infpired prophets? Were mighty works wrought by the hand of Omnipotence for the Jews? Those very works were wrought not for the Jews only, but for your admonition; for your benefit. Mighty as they were, mightier have been wrought for you,

T

Christ, of whofe coming and office the Jews had learned through the medium of prophecies then involved, as to matters of detail, in much obfcurity, has fince their day defcended from Heaven; has lived as man, and fuffered more than man; has made that full atonement on the crofs, which the law given by Mofes was intended only to prefigure and introduce. The interceffion of Chrift, now pleading for you at the right hand of God, was to the Jews altogether unknown. The fanctifying aid of the Holy Spirit of God, to enable you to will and to do what is acceptable to the Deity, was by the Jews very imperfectly understood.

Do you admit the magnitude of thofe your obligations to Heaven? Afk yourself then, in the fecond place, whether you are leading fuch a life as correfponds with an avowed fense of those obligations: fuch a life as correfponds with a conviction of the extraordinary bleffings conferred upon you by the Almighty of his own free grace. While you are wondering that the Jews, enlightened byim

mediate

mediate communications from above, could relapse with such frequency into the darkness of idolatry; ask yourself whether, in the full enjoyment of greater light, you are nat.deviating into the paths of darkness. "The covetous man," faith the Scripture,

an idolater (b), "and "hath no inheritance "in the kingdom of Chrift and of God." The glutton is branded in the facred volume with the fame ftigma (i): and his end is declared to be "deftruction." Whenever you permit any inclination, any pasfion to predominate in your heart over the fear and the love of God; you incur the guilt of idolatry. And unless through the Divine grace you fincerely repent, and turn from fin unto habitual holiness; you shall have "no inheritance in the kingdom of Chrift and of God:" your "end fhall "be deftruction."

(b) Ephef. v. 5.

(i) Philipp. iii. 19.

CHAP.

IV.

ON THE BOOKS OF THE OLD TESTA

IN

MENT.

N the preceding Chapters the Scriptures of the Old Testament have been regarded as facred records of unquestionable authority. As the faith of Chriftians ought in every particular point to be established on rational evidence and fober conviction; it will be proper in the present Chapter to lay before the reader a brief statement of the grounds, on which the claim of the Jewish Scriptures to his belief and reverence is established.

: The Old Teftament refolves itself into two leading divisions; the canonical books, and the apocryphal books (a). The canonical books

(a) These general terms, together with many of the modern names, as Genefis, Exodus, &c. by which the books of the Old Testament are distinguished, have been borrowed from the denominations used by the Greek

tranflators

books are those which were written by the aid and under the guidance of Divine inspiration. The apocryphal books were compofed by uninfpired men; and are therefore liable to error: but, on account of the religious instruction and the historical facts which they contain, were fubjoined by the Jews, yet feparately and as a detached appendix, to the facred volume; and have been for the fame reafons continued in that place and character by the Chriftian church.

The canonical books were again fubdivided by the Jews, for the fake of convenient reference and quotation, into three claffes; not fo diftinguished through any difference in the authority affigned to them,

translators and commentators. The words 66 canon,' and "canonical," are derived from Kavwv, a rule: and imply that the authenticity and infpiration of the books of Scripture to which they are applied have not been hastily taken for granted; but have been examined and afcertained by the proper rule or criterion. Apocrypha and apocryphal, words derived from anugurтw, to hide, denote that the writings to which they are affixed are not of manifeft and indifputable authority.

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