CHILDREN'S

BIBLE LESSONS;

OR,

TYPE AND ANTITYPE.

BY

HARRIET A. D. THORN.

LONDON:

WERTHEIM, MACINTOSH, AND HUNT,
24, PATERNOSTER-ROW,

AND 23, HOLLES-STREET, CAVENDISH-SQUARE.

1859.

2524+

58.

LONDON:

WERTHEIM, MACINTOSH, AND HUNT, 24, PATERNOSTER-row, AND 23, HOLLES-STREET, CAVENDISH-SQUARE,

CHILDREN'S BIBLE LESSONS.

CONVERSATION I.

THE TABERNACLE,

"Israel in ancient days

Not only had a view

Of Sinai in a blaze,

But learned the Gospel too;

The types and figures were a glass,

In which they saw a Saviour's face."

COWPER.

"How amiable are thy tabernacles, O Lord of hosts!" -Ps. lxxxiv. 1.

Mrs. Cameron. Then you are all here, and waiting for me, dear children. I rejoice to find you so attentive, and so increasingly anxious to receive my instructions, for it gives me hope that the "Great Teacher" himself numbers you among

B

those who sit at His feet, and listen to His voice. The Bible is a sealed book, alike to the learned and to the unlearned, until the Holy Spirit reveals its hidden truths, and opens the heart to receive them. Psalmist felt the need of this teaching: What was his prayer?

The

Charles. "Open thou mine eyes, that I may behold wondrous things out of thy law." (Ps. cxix. 18.)

Mrs. C. And now that we, dear children, are about to inquire into the spiritual significance of the symbolic rites of the Levitical Dispensation, let us make this prayer our own, and earnestly seek that Divine enlightenment, without which all our reading and learning must be in vain. Let me hear what you understand by a type.

Mary. It means an emblem or representation, I think, Mamma. I remember your once speaking of the violet as a type of humility.

Charles. Oh yes; because just as the violet always hides itself in the shade, as if it did not like to be seen, so people who are humble-minded are modest and retiring,

and do not put themselves forward to be admired by everybody.

Mrs. C. Yet emblems such as this, however striking or beautiful, are, after all, mere fancied resemblances. A type according to the sense given in Scripture (the word itself is not used in our translation of the Bible) may be defined as that which gives a picture beforehand of something more important to come after; a kind of prophecy, foretelling by things instead of words. The Apostle calls them "examples" (rendered in the margin "types")-" figures of the true" -"a shadow of good things to come." (See 1 Cor. x. 6; Heb. ix. 24; Heb. x. 1.) By means of them, God, in condescension to human weakness and ignorance, was pleased to teach the Israelites. Nor did their mission end there, for not only does the record of them remain for our instruction, but if we turn to the Epistle to the Hebrews, we shall find that God has graciously vouchsafed to explain their meaning to us. But now, dear children, let me hear what know about the Tabernacle

you in the Wilderness.