meet with in the prophetic Writings: which cannot but ftrike us with an awful reverence of the divine Power.

15. NOR are they lefs pathetic in the gentler strains. What inftance is there of the greatest tendernefs and love, which God has not adopted to exprefs his by? He perfonates all the nearest and most endearing relations: that of a Husband; I will marry thee to my felf, Hof. 2. 19. of a Father; I am a Father to Ifrael, and Ephraim is my firft born: nay, he vies bowels with the tender sex, and makes it more poffible for a mother to renounce her compaffions towards the fon of her womb, then for him to withdraw his, Ifa. 49. 15. By all thefe endearments, thefe cords of a man, thefe bands of love, as himself ftiles them, Hof. 11.4. endeavoring to draw his people to their duty, and their happiness. And when their perverseness frustrates all this his holy Artifice; how paffionately do's he expoftulate with them? how folemnly proteft his averfness to their ruin? Why will ye die O house of Ifrael? for I have no plefure in the death of him that dieth, faith the Lord God, Ezek. 18. 31, 32. with what regrets and relentings do's he think of abandoning them? How shall I give thee up Ephraim? how fhall I deliver thee If rael? how fhall I make thee as Admah? how Jhall I fet thee as Zeboim? my heart is turn'd within me, my repentings are kindled togethers Hof.

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Hof. 11.8. In fhort, 'twere endless to cite the places in these prophetic Books, wherein God do's thus condefcend to folicit even the fenfitive part of man; and that with fuch moving Rhetoric, that I cannot but wonder at the exception fom of our late Critics make against the Bible, for its defect in that particular: for Oratory is nothing but a dextrous application to the affections and passiors of men. And certainly we find not that don with greater advantage any where then in sacred Writ.

16. YET it was not the defign of the Prophets (no more then of the Apostle) to take men with guile, 2 Cor. 12. 16. to inveigle their affections unawares to their understandings; but they addrefs as well to their reafons, make folemn appeals to their judicative faculties. And now judg I pray between me and my vineyard, faies Ifa.5.3. Nay, God by the Prophet Ezekiel folemnly pleads his own caufe before them, vindicates the equity of his proceedings from the afperfions they had caft on them; and by moft irrefragable Arguments refutes that injurious proverb which went currant among them; and in the clofe appeals to themselves, O houfe of Ifrael are not my waies equal, are not your waies unequal? Ezek. 18. the evidences were fo clear that he remits the matter to their own determination. And generally we shall find that among

all

all the Topics of diffwasion from fin, there is none more closely preft, then that of the folly of it. Idolatry was a fin to which Ifrael had a great propenfion, and against which most of the Prophets admonitions were directed. And certainly it can never be more expos'd and the fottish unreasonablenefs of it better difplaied, then we find it in the 44. chap. of Ifaiah. In like manner we may read the Prophet Jeremy diffwading from the fame fin by Arguments of the most irrefragable conviction, Jer. 10.

17. AND as the Prophets omitted nothing as to the manner of their addrefs, to render their exhortations effectual, the matter of them was likewife fo confiderable as to command attention; It was commonly either the recalling them from their revolts and Apoftacies from God by Idolatry, or else to convince them of the infignificancy of all thofe legal ceremonial performances they fo much confided in, when taken up as a superfedeas to moral duties. Upon this account it is, that they often depreciate, and in a manner prohibit the folemneft of their worships. To what purpose are the multitude of your facrifices unto me? bring no more vain oblations: incenfe is an abomination to me; the new moons and fabbaths, the calling of affemblies I cannot away with it is iniquity even your folemn meetings, &c. If. 1. 11. 13. Not that these things

were

were in themselves reprovable; for they were all commanded by God; but because the Jews depended fo much on these external obfervances, that they thought by them to commute for the weightier matters of the Law (as our Savior after ftiles them) Judgment, Mercy and Faith, Mat. 23.23. lookt on these Rites which difcriminated them from other Nations, as difpenfations from the univerfal obligations of nature and common juftice.

18. THIS deceit of theirs is sharply upbraided to them by the Prophet Jeremy; where he calls their boasts of the temple of the Lord, the Temple of the Lord, lying words: and on the contrary, laies the whole stress of their obedience, and expectation of their happiness on the justice and innocence of their converfation, ch. 7. 4. And after do's smartly reproch their infolence in boldly reforting to the house, which by bringing their fins along with them, they made but an Afylum, and Sanctuary for thofe crimes. Will ye fteal, murder and commit adultery, and fwear falfely and burn incenfe to Baal, and walk after other gods whom ye know not, and come and ftand before me in this house? Is this house which is cal led by my name, become a den of robbers in your eies? chap. 7. 9, 10, 11. Indeed all the Pro7.9, phets feem to confpire in this one defign, of making them look thro fhadows and ceremo

nies, to that inward purity, Juftice and Honefty, which they were defign'd to inculcate, not to fupplant. And this defign as it is in it self most excellent, moft worthy the command of God, and the nature of man; fo we have seen that it has bin pursued by all the most apt, and most powerful mediums, that the thing or perfons addreft to were capable of; and fo that the Prophets are no less eminent for the difcharge of this exhortatory part of their office, then they were in. the former, of the predicting.

19. THE next part of Scripture we are to confider, is the Doctrinal; by which I fhall not in this place understand the whole complex of Faith and Manners together; but reftrain it only to thofe Revelations which are the object of our Belief: and these are so fublime, as fhews flesh and bloud never revel'd them. Those great mysteries of our Faith, the Trinity, the Incarnation, the Hypoftatical union, the Redemtion of the world by making the offended party the facrifice for the offence, are things of fo high and abstruse fpeculation, as no finite understanding can fully fathom. I know their being fo, is by fom made an Argument for disbelief; but doubtlefs, very unjustly: for (not to insist upon the different natures of Faith and Science, by which that becomes a proper object of the one which is not of the other) our

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