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to extend the kingdom of Christ through all his connections. Out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaketh, and a good man out of the treasure of the heart bringeth forth good things.

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CHAPTER VII.

The Tenderness of Christ's Ministry.

THE character of the Mosaic dispensation was of a nature highly penal. All its institutions were rendered effective by the enactment of certain proportional punishments to which transgressors became liable; and the sentences earried into execution upon Nadab and Abihu, on the worshippers of Baal-peor, and the golden calf, on Korah, Dathan and Abiram, and on the blasphemer and sabbath-breaker, are sufficient to show that whoever violated the known stipulation of the law, was actually subjected to all its rigours. He that despised Moses' law, died without mercy under one or two witnesses.' And though it was permitted that for lesser transgressions a trespass-offering should be made, yet the disabilities under which the offenders laboured for a time, and the burthensome nature of the ceremonies by which

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they were restored to legal purification, would strongly tend to inspire a feeling of preference for a new covenant of love, which should supersede the pains and penalties of the Mosaic code. What the spirit of that code was, may be collected from the confession of St. Paul, who having been brought up in its principles at the feet of Gamaliel, and of the strictest sect, a Pharisee, candidly allows that it was a ministration of condemnation' and death, and 'gendered unto bondage'?' Indeed the circumstances under which the law was delivered are strikingly descriptive of the character of the whole dispensation. They that heard the voice intreated that the word should not be spoken unto them any more; (for they could not endure that which was commanded, and if so much as a beast touch the mountain it shall be stoned or thrust through with a dart :) and so terrible was the sight, that Moses said, I exceedingly fear and quake.'

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Gal. iv. 24.

2 Heb. xii. 19–21.

Now the Christian dispensation was so essentially different in all respects, that its distinctive characters are undoubtedly mercy and love. Its very name proclaimed the glad tidings of the new covenant, and prepared an expectation of something more suitable to the necessities of man, than the world had experienced under the law of Moses. Nor were these hopes disappointed when its gracious terms were revealed by the divine prophet of the church. The very foundation of the whole system represents the Father as reconciled to the world' by the death of his Son-the enmity abolished -the curse of the law taken away-believers 'justified from all things from which they could not be justified by the law of Moses'— comforted with joy unspeakable, and filled with a peace which passeth all understanding. The whole scheme of the Gospel, conceived and executed as a pledge of the divine love to man, is from first to last a scheme of tenderness and mercy. It provided for those who required the fostering care of some arm strong enough to help them in their hour of need-it gave light

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to the spiritually blind-it gave liberty to the captives under the yoke of Satan-it gave life to the dead in trespasses and sin. In a word, 'by the bringing-in of a better hope,' the ministry which was established under the new economy became known by the cheering title of the ministry of reconciliation, and its members were charged to deliver, as the peculiar message of their founder, that God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son for it'—and that God was in Christ reconciling the world unto himself, not imputing their trespasses unto them 3.'

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It would have been highly inconsistent with such a dispensation, if its promulgator had not been distinguished for tender and compassionate feelings; or had God, in proclaiming it, displayed himself again to the world in the same overwhelming manner which had formerly caused the Israelites to intreat that the word should not be spoken to them any more, if ac

3 John, iii. 16. 2 Cor. v. 19.

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