It may be presumed, indeed, that even this privilege of receiving a revelation was not always accompanied with a power of comprehending its import certainly not of comprehending its full import'. Many of the shadowy prophecies, which foreshewed Christ and his Gospel kingdom, were, probably, as little understood by the prophet as by the people. They were designed as an embryo form of revelation, to be deposited in the old Scriptures, but not to assume their ultimate character and signification, until the fulness of the time. A general surmise of promises not transitory, of a Saviour from sin as well as from sorrow, from enemies spiritual as well as tem

but as one who " as God sitteth in the temple of God, shewing himself that he is God." 2 Thess. ii. 4.

• When Caiaphas declared, that it was expedient that one man should die for the people, that the whole nation might not perish, he appears, not only to have misapplied a prophecy which he was uttering, but to have been unconscious that he was prophesying. See John xi. 49-53. Was this the case with the words uttered by the governor of the feast, when our Lord turned water into wine? "thou hast kept the good They certainly seem to in

wine until now." John ii. 10.

dicate an allusion to the change of dispensation which was then taking place.

poral—this was all that was needed for the contemporaries of the prophet, and for the prophet himself, and was all, possibly, that he generally understood of his own dark visions. "Unto them," writes St. Peter to the Church, "it was revealed, that not unto themselves, but unto us they did minister the things which are now reported unto you, by them that have preached the Gospel unto you with the Holy Ghost sent down from heaven; which things the angels desire to look into." Some, doubtless, like Abraham, beheld the day of Christ with more clearness of prophetic vision than others; but the least of the kingdom of heaven, when it was come, was, in this respect, a greater prophet-knew more of the mind of the Lord-than the greatest of them of old.

It is impossible, for a reflecting mind, not to contrast the Scriptural account of the Lord Jesus, with this view of a strict limitation of the prophetic spirit in all God's other messengers, from

1 Peter i. 12. The original word (agaxia) implies an intense anxiety to ascertain the nature of some object-it means literally, to stoop down in order to examine.

I

"All things"

the patriarchs unto the apostles. (it is his own representation of himself when speaking of the divine secrets) are delivered unto me of my Father: and no man knoweth the Son, but the Father; neither knoweth any man the Father, save the Son, and he to whomsoever the Son will reveal him." Is any ready to reply, as did the Jews of old, "Thou bearest record of thyself, thy record is not true?" His words to us, as to them, are, "I am one that beareth witness of myself, and the Father that sent me beareth witness of me"." Think of the various kinds of evidence by which he bore witness of himself-by which he proved that whatever he asserted God must have sanctioned. Think of the miracles he wrought, the prophecies he fulfilled, the life he lived, and the death he died. Think on the confirmation of his truth by the establishment of Christianity, and by its wonderful results to this day on the world. Think, if you have ever experienced it, on the power of his Holy Spirit to help you in an hour of trial and distress. But, perhaps, he may seem to

Matt. xi. 27. Luke x. 22.

"John viii. 13-18.

have been asserting only a larger share, than belonged to other inspired persons of this Holy Light. Is this the obvious import of his words? Not so did St. Paul understand them, when he spoke of "the mind of Christ," as the source of all his revealed knowledge the height and depth which his unsealed eye was permitted to search. Not such was the interpretation of another apostle-one who was doubtless present when the words fell from his Master's lips. St. Peter speaks of the Old Testament prophets, as St. Paul does of the New, describing them as employed in " searching what or what manner of time the Spirit of Christ which was in them did signify, when it testified beforehand the sufferings of Christ, and the glory that should follow”.” Must we not rather, adopting the language of inspiration, say of patriarchs, and prophets, and apostles, "Were they not all ministering spirits, sent forth to minister for them who shall be heirs of salvation?" But of the Son, "Thy throne, O God, is for ever and ever."

y 1 Cor. ii. 16.

* Heb. i. 14.

z 1 Peter i. 11.

Heb. i. 8. and Psalm xlv. 6.

§. 4. The different purposes for accomplishing which men have been inspired.

THE agency for which the Almighty inspired his servants in his progressive scheme of revelation and guidance is so various, and often of so mixed a character, as to make it difficult to arrange it under any specific heads which would exhaust the subject. Our object will, however, be sufficiently attained, by bringing under review the more prominent of these inspired agents, and examining the nature of their respective commissions. Moses, the Judges and Kings of Israel, the Prophets, and the Apostles, are those whose agency will be considered for this purpose.

Moses was divinely commissioned and inspired to negociate with Pharaoh the removal of the Israelites from Egypt, and to superintend their escape to give them a religious law-to give them a civil polity-to act the delegated part of chief magistrate; and to superintend the observance, both of their civil and of their religious code to prepare, instruct, and train them for