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DISC. great ends ferve the fymbols of Paradife, III. the facrifices of the patriarchs, the types

of the law, the vifions of the prophets, and the facraments of the Gofpel, with the numberless expreffions and defcriptions borrowed from them, and referring to them. These constitute a kind of facred language peculiar to holy writ, and only explicable by it. The knowlege of this language is a fcience by itself, and the study of it, well worthy the attention of fuch as have leisure and abilities to profecute it, is it's own rich and exceeding great reward. The fubjects are of fuch infinite moment, that all others muft, in comparifon, appear to be as nothing. And the drefs, in which they are prefented to us, is the most ornamental and engaging in the world. It is of that kind, to which both eloquence and poetry, among men, owe all their charms. The doctrines of Scripture are not propofed in a naked logical form, but arrayed in the most beautiful and ftriking images which the creation affords *.

* See Ld. BACON's Advancement of Learning, B. vi. C. 3. A cele

III.

A celebrated and well known author, DISC. whofe effays have long been the established standard of true taste and fine writing, makes, in one of them, the following obfervations" By fimilitudes drawn from "the vifible parts of nature, a truth in "the understanding is, as it were, reflected

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by the imagination: we are able to fee

something like colour and shape in a no"tion, and to discover a scheme of thoughts "traced out upon matter. And here the "mind receives a great deal of fatisfaction, " and has two of it's faculties gratified at "the fame time, while the fancy is bufy "in copying after the understanding, and tranfcribing ideas out of the intellectual "world into the material. It is this talent "of affecting the imagination that gives an " embellishment to good sense, and makes "one man's compofitions more agreea"ble than another's. It has fomething "in it like creation, and bestows a kind "of existence. It makes additions to na"ture, and gives greater variety to God's "works. In a word, it is able to beautify

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DISC." and adorn the most illuftrious scenes in III. "the univerfe, and to fill the mind with "more glorious fhews and apparitions than

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Perhaps it is impoffible any where to meet with jufter fentiments than these are, clothed in more apt and elegant expreffions. And this fingle paffage would have sufficed to establish the reputation so justly acquired by it's author. The inference I would beg leave to make from it is this: If fuch be the cafe in human compofitions, where fimilitudes are drawn by fhort-fighted man, to illuftrate things temporal; what muft it be, when they are drawn, to illustrate things eternal, by him, who has a perfect knowlege of the nature and properties of the objects from whence they are drawn, as well as of thofe to which they are applied; nay, who, doubtless, created the visible world, among other purposes, for that, to which he himself, in his Reve

y Mr. ADDISON'S concluding paper on the Pleasures of the Imagination. Spectator, vi. N° 421.

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lations to mankind has fo continually em- DISC. ployed it, that of serving as a picture, or representation of the world at present invifible? 66 Eye hath not seen," fays an Apostle," nor ear heard, neither hath it en"tered into the heart of man to conceive "the things that God hath prepared for "them that love him. But God hath re"vealed them unto us by his Spirit ";" and the Spirit, knowing our infirmities, and whereof we are made, hath revealed · them, from the beginning, by external figns, fymbols, facraments, and a figurative language, fupplied by them. Upon this very principle it is, that another acknowleged master of style and compofition grounds the character of the facred writings, confidered in that view "Elo

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quence (fays he) is that which perfuades: "it perfuades by moving; it moves by "things, and palpable ideas only and "hence no eloquence is fo perfect as "that of the Scriptures; fince the most fpiritual and metaphysical things are

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VOL. I.

z 1 Cor. ii. 9.

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DISC." there represented by sensible and lively

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In juftification of this remark, let the appeal, in the instance now before us, be made to every one endued with fenfibility. The pofition to be laid down is, that, through the alone merits of the Redeemer, we now inherit eternal life. Is it poffible for all the art of man to convey this truth in terms so pleasing and informing, as those few ufed by St. John, with allufion to the fcenery in Eden? "And he fhewed me "a pure river of water of life, clear as

crystal, proceeding out of the throne of "God, and of the Lamb. And in the "midst of the street of the new Jerufalem,

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a ROLLIN, Belles Lettres, ii. 360.-" To quarrel with our Maker about this way of proceeding, would be to "blame him for conveying truths to us in the most affecting and agreeable manner; or for creating us with those faculties, which are fitted to receive truths, thus conveyed. For the most important truths, as we are framed at prefent, can make but a flight impreffion on the mind, "unless they enter firft, like a picture, into the imagination, and from thence are ftamped on the memory.” PETERS, Crit. Diff. on the Book of Job, Part 1. Sect. x.

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