this brow (often wet with the sweat of the curse) for the crown of righteousness; and above all, this heart for loving thee who lovedst me and gavest thyself for me! In that day, "the tongue of the stammerers shall be ready to speak plainly," while with all saints they ever speak of the King, on whom they gaze, and into whose image they are changed. And only then shall every faculty find itself satisfied always, and yet ever bewildered in the blessed attempt to understand the "breadth and length, and depth and height, and to know the love of Christ that passeth knowledge." Hallelujah!

Israel's Cemporal Blessings,

IN CONTRAST TO THE CURSE.

BUT SEEK YE FIRST THE KINGDOM OF GOD AND HIS RIGHTEOUSNESS, AND ALL THESE THINGS SHALL BE ADDED UNTO YOU."-Matt. vi. 33.

CHAPTER XXVI.

RICH promises of temporal blessing to Israel form the solemn conclusion to the full declaration made throughout this book of their duty and privileges in things spiritual. He that is so gracious in blessing the soul is not sparing in his kindness to the body. And while all here is spoken nationally, yet do we not recognize Him who said these things at the foot of Sinai, speaking in the same kind tone on the mountain in Galilee, when to every disciple he promises, "Seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things shall be added unto you?" Oh! Israel, our Redeemer is your Jehovah! The same heart yearns, the same lips move, at Sinai, and in Galilee. Oh! that thou hadst hearkened to his commandments! "then had thy peace been as a river"-like thine own river Jordan, ever flowing, often overflowing-" and thy righteousness like the waves of the sea." Like thy great Western Sea with all its waves,

able to cover over all thy sins, such would have been the righteousness that he would have given thee. (Isa. xlviii. 18.) And then all other things would have followed. "Thy seed had been as the sand"-numerous as the countless sands of that wide Mediterranean Sea-" and the offspring of thy bowels like the gravel thereof-filling thy happy land; while "thy name should not have been cut off, nor destroyed from before him." Oh! Israel, return, return! He earnestly remembers thee still.

Vers. 1, 2. "Ye shall make you no idols nor graven image, neither rear you up a standing image, neither shall ye set up any image of stone in your land, to bow down unto it; for I am the Lord your God. Ye shall keep my Sabbaths, and reverence my sanctuary: I am the Lord."

The Lord alone must be worshipped (ver. 1), and He must be worshipped as he requires (ver. 2). The Lord seeks our whole heart, our unaverted eye, our entire soul. "No idols," other objects that sit on the throne of our heart, whether of silver and gold, or of flesh and blood,

or of earth's common objects, like houses and lands, riches

and honor, all these are

"things of naught❞— "Graven images," and like obelisks,) and "im

utterly despicable in his view. "standing images," (or pillars ages of stone," (or "stones of imagery," such as Ezekiel viii. 8, describes)—all these are wholly abominable to the Lord. Set up no rival, none that approaches near; not even father or mother, wife or child. And in order to cherish this state of soul, his Sabbaths must be kept and his sanctuary reverenced; the sinner must employ himself, amid holy scenes and at holy times, in bathing his soul in the love of God. If any one neglects the time set apart by God for this end-"the Sabbath"-how can such a one ever expect to feel steeped in the holy awe

and love that is due to the Lord? When a man goes to the region of the Alps, he requires time to see the relative magnitude of objects; he does not at one glance see their immense height and sublime elevation. It is often days ere he arrive at a proper estimate, because he is now in a new and unwonted region. So it is with Divine realities; you must spend time, continuously and uninterruptedly, in order to have your soul truly affected. In like manner, also, the sanctuary must be frequented. It is the Lord's ordinance. Would you have refrained from taking the fruit of the forbidden tree, as a test of obedience, who will not reverence the sanctuary? Where is your childlike submission of will? Nay, where is your love to your Father, if you go not to the spot where he meets with his own so specially?

All declension and decay may be said to be begun. wherever we see these two ordinances despised-the Sabbath and the sanctuary. They are the outward fence around the inward love commanded by ver. 1.

THE BLESSING HELD OUT.

Vers. 3, 4, 5, 6. "If ye walk in my statutes, and keep my commandments, and do them, then I will give you rain in due season, and the land shall yield her increase, and the trees of the field shall yield their fruit. And your threshing shall reach into the vintage, and the vintage shall reach unto the sowing-time; and ye shall eat your bread to the full, and dwell in your land safely. And I will give peace in the land, and ye shall lie down, and none shall make you afraid and I will rid evil beasts out of the land, neither shall the sword go through your land."

The Lord made Israel "Jeshurun," the prosperous one, blessing him with all temporal things whenever Israel sought the spiritual. It was a scene like the unfallen

age.*

* Such as Hesiod (Epya κ. hμεp. 115) fancies to have been in the golden

Israel was offered the privilege of being, even in respect of temporal blessings, a type of Eden restored. As their ceremonies and institutions were to the world a type of all the spiritual blessings which Jesus brings, so the very aspect of their land might have been the type of the external blessings which Jesus brings at his second coming to the earth.

In Solomon's days, these blessings were probably realized more fully than at any period of Israel's history. His were the times of peace, so peculiarly typical of Messiah's reign in the latter day.

Think of the blessings poured out to their view here. The sky above their land, pure and sapphire-blue at other times, sends down needful rains at the proper season with such regularity, that in ver. 4 the Hebrew calls them your rains" (2). Would they not learn, by every such shower, our lessons? "Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, and cometh down from the Father of lights." (Jas. i. 17.) Their soil scarcely feels what barrenness means; "it yields its increase" for man and beast—even as, when the curse is repealed, we shall sing yet more fully than they, "Let all the people praise thee; then shall the earth yield her increase." (Ps. Ixvii. 6.) The trees that shade their dwellings, or stand thick in their orchards, give abundant fruit; figs, dates, pomegranates, grapes, are poured into their lap as the season returns. Their corn-fields yield so plentifully, that scarcely can the husbandman finish his labors here.

age.

Αφνειοι μηλοισι, φιλοι μακάρεσσι θέοισι. Indeed, Israel's land answers well to the poetic descriptions of that time, "flowing with mlk and honey:"

"Flumina jam lactis jam flumina nectaris ibant,

Flavaque de viridi stillabant ilice mella."

(Ovid's Met. i. 111.)