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the creation, and degrade ourselves to the condition of brutes ?

God declares that he is a jealous God, and that he will not fuffer worship or adoration to be paid to any thing in heaven above, nor in the earth beneath, nor in the waters under the earth: no created being is to receive such honors. Had our Saviour, therefore, been any other than the only begotten Son of God, could worship and adoration be paid him, consistently with the law of God? Yet David, writing under the influence of the Holy Spirit, fays of the Meffiah, (Pfalm xciii. ver. 2.) "Thy throne, O God, is established of "old: thou art from everlasting;" and, (Plalm ii. ver. 7.) " I will preach the law "whereof the Lord has faid unto me: "thou art my fon, this day have I begot" ten thee." St. Paul, in his epistle to the Hebrews, in the first chapter, is still more explicit. I would recommend to fuch of my readers as may have any doubts on this subject, an attentive perufal of this chapter, which seem to have been written

purposely purposely to remove such doubts. For the fake of brevity, I shall confine myself to the second and fixth verses. In the former, we learn that "God hath in these "last days spoken unto us by his Son, "whom he hath appointed heir of all

things, by whom also he made the "world;" and, in the sixth verse, " And " again, when he bringeth in the first begotten into the world, he faith, and let " all the angels of God worship him."

To all these forcible confiderations, I cannot help adding one, which may make a great impression upon some people: that when hereafter we shall be in the prefence of the Author of all our happiness, and remember what he suffered to purchase it for us, it will be impoffible not to pay him the trueft worship; and God will never, we may hope, impose upon his creatures a prohibition of what the best feeelings of their nature will dictate.

Let us, then, resign ourselves entirely to God, who will, in his own good time, fully fatisfy us on all those points at present

hidden from us, nor expect in this world the knowledge reserved for us in another. How delightful it is to a pious and inquifitive mind, to contemplate on an eternity, employed in the constant acquisition of wisdom! We shall then have a more perfect knowledge of our God than even our first parents had in their state of innocence.

When we consider how fin has darkened our understandings, shall we proudly contend with the Almighty, and reject those mercies and blessings he offers us, because they are so great as to exceed our comprehenfion! We are all ready enough to exert ourselves, nay, even to risk our lives, in the support of our worldly interests : let us not, then, tamely fuffer ourselves to be deprived of those glorious advantages offered us under the characters of the adopted sons of God, through faith in Jesus Chrift, by a senseless idea of the all-fufficiency of human reason! let us hold fast our faith in Him, who is able and willing to fave us; let us, in all fituations of life, endeavor to prove ourselves

his true and faithful servants, nor fuffer any trials or difficulties, much less the vain arguments of those who would set up their own reason as an unerring guide, in oppofition to revelation to induce us to facrifice that character of our Lord, without which all our most valuable privileges would fall to the ground.

" 5. And the light shined in darkness, " and the darkness comprehended it not."

The Jews were under the peculiar care of the Almighty, and styled his own people: they were intrusted with the divine law from God himself: this law was a type or shadow of good things to come. The ceremonial part was a representation of what our blessed Saviour was to fuffer, to redeem lost mankind; but, in process of time, those blessings which were intended to make the Jews more virtuous and humble than the rest of mankind, had a contrary effect, and they became noted for their pride and hypocrify. They trusted

more to the outward ceremonial than to the spiritual part of their religion; therefore, when the substance was come, they refused to give up the types and shadows. They expected that their Messiah should have been a powerful sovereign, and that their government, instead of continuing under the yoke of the Romans, should become the first of empires. Under this delufion, when the true Messiah came, clothed in meekness, without any worldly pomp or grandeur, they rejected him, although he offered to release them from a far greater bondage than that of the Romans. With fuch prepoffeffions, it is not surprizing that "the light shined in darkness, and the " darkness comprehended it not."

The blindness of the Jews to the scriptures which were intrusted to their care, and all the punishments they have drawn down on themselves for their want of proper attention to them, may furnish us with a good lesson.

To be inattentive to so great a blessing as is bestowed upon us in the holy writings,

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