making all mankind blessed through him and likewise to confirm this promise, in a regular course of successive Revelations, each fuller and more explicit than the other. By this time we cannot but suppose the Father of the Faithful must, from the nature of the thing, be become. very desirous of knowing the manner how this Blessing was to be brought about: A Mystery, if we will believe the Author of our Faith, that engaged the attention of other holy men, less immediately concerned than Abraham, and consequently less stimulated and excited by their curiosity-And JESUS turned to his Disciples, and said privately, Blessed are the eyes which see the things which ye see. For I tell you that many Prophets and Kings have DESIRED to see those things which ye see, and have not seen them, and to hear those things which ye hear, and have not heard them*. But we are assured, by the same authority, that Abraham had, in fact, this very desire highly raised in him; Abraham rejoiced to see my day (says JESUS), and he saw it, and was glad; or rather, He rejoiced THAT HE MIGHT SEE, INA IAH.; which implies, that the period of his joy was in the space between the promise made, and the actual performance of it by the delivery of the Command; consequently, that it was granted at his earnest request f. In the second place, we shall shew from the same words, that Abraham, at the time when the Command was given, KNEW it to be that Revelation he had so earnestly requested. This is of the highest importance for the understanding the true nature of the Command.-Your Father Abraham rejoiced to see my Day, and he saw it, and was glad. ̓Αβραὰμ ὁ πατὴρ ὑμῶν ἠγαλλιάσατο ΙΝΑ ΙΔΗ, τὴν ἡμέραν τὴν ἐμὴν· καὶ εἶδε, καὶ ἐχάρη. We have observed that ad, in strict propriety, signifies that he might see. The English phrase,-to see, is equivocal

* Luke x. 23, 24.

+ Thus all the Eastern Versions understand it: Syr. Cupidus fuit videndi.--Pers. Cupidus erat ut videret.-Arab. Exoptavit videre.Ethiop. Desideravit, gavisus est ut videret.

and

[Book VI. and ambiguous, and means either the present time, that -he then did see; or the future, that he was promised he should see: but the original an, has only the latter sense, So that the text plainly distinguishes two different periods of Joy; the first, when it was promised he should see; the second, when he actually saw: And it is to be -observed that, according to the exact use of the words, in ayarıáqua, is implied the tumultuous. pleasure which the certain expectation of an approaching blessing, understood only in the gross, occasions; and, in that calor ap and settled joy which arises from our knowledge, in the possession of it. But the Translators, perhaps, not apprehending that there was any time between the Grant to see, and the actual seeing, turned it, he rejoiced to see; as if it had been the Paraphrase of the Poet Nonnus,

ἰδεῖν ἀγάλλετο θυμῷ. στο από κάθε JJAN 11 whereas this History of Abraham hath plainly three distinct periods. The first contains. God's promise to grant Abraham's request, when he rejoiced that he should see; this, for reasons given above, was wisely omitted by the Historian: Within the second period was the de-. livery of the Command, with which Moses's account begins: And Abraham's Obedience, through which he saw CHRIST's day and was glad, includes the third. Thus the Patriarch, we find, had a promise that his request should be granted; and, in regard to that pro¬ mise, an action is commanded, which, at that time, was a common mode of information; Abraham therefore. must needs know it was the very information so much requested, so graciously promised, and so impatiently expected. We conclude then, on the whole, that this Command being only the Grant of an earnest request, and known by Abraham, at the time of imposing, to be such Grant, he could not possibly have any doubt concerning the Author of it. He was soliciting the God See note [O] at the end of this Book,

See note [P] at the end of this Book.

of

of Heaven to reveal to him the Mystery of Man's Redemption, and he received the information, in a Command to offer Isaac; a Revelation, that had the closest connexion with, and was the fullest completion of, the whole series of the preceding Revelations.

per+

2. For, (as we shall now shew, in answer to the second part of the objection) the Command could occasion no mistakes concerning the divine Attributes; it being, as was said, only the conveyance of an information by action instead of words, in conformity to the common mode of converse in the more early times. This action therefore being mere scenery, had NO MORAL IMPORT; that is, it conveyed or implied none of those intentions in him who commanded it, and in him who obeyed the Command, which go along with actions that have a moral import*. Consequently the injunction and obedience, in an action which hath no such inport, can no way affect the moral character of the sons concerned: and consequently, this Command could occasion no mistakes concerning the divine Attributes, with regard to God's delighting in human sacrifices. On the contrary, the very information conveyed by it, was the highest assurance to the person informed, of God's goodwill towards man. Hence we see there was not the least occasion, when Gon remitted the offering of Isaac, that he should formally condemn human sacrifices, to prevent Abraham or his family's falling into an opinion, that such Sacrifices were not displeasing to himt, any more than for the Prophet Ahijaht, when he had rent * See note [Q] at the end of this Book,

แ

+ See note [R] at the end of this Book.

were

+ "And it came to pass at that time, when Jeroboam went out of « Jerusalem, that the Prophet Abijah the Shilonite found him in the aud he had clad himself with a new garment: and they two way: alone in the field. And Ahijah caught the new garment that 66 was on him, and rent it in twelve pieces. And he said to Jero"boam, Take thee ten pieces; for thus saith the Lord the God of “Israel, Behold, I will rend the kingdom out of the hand of Solomon, "and will give ten tribes to thee." 1 Kings xi. 29-31. The circumstance of the new garment was not insignificant: It was to denote the Power of the kingdom at that time in its full strength and lustre. VOL. VI, Jeroboam's

D

Jeroboam's garment into twelve pieces to denote the ensuing division in the tribes of Israel, to deliver a moral precept against the sin of despoiling, and insulting our neighbour: For the command having no moral import, as being only an information by action, where one thing stood for the representative of another, all the consequence that could be deduced from it was only this, that the Son of God should be offered up for the sins of mankind: therefore the conceptions they had of HUMAN SACRIFICES, after the command, must needs be just the same with those they had before; and therefore, instruction, concerning the execrable nature of this Rite, was not only needless, but altogether beside the question.

But this assertion that A SCENICAL REPRESENTATION HAS NO MORAL IMPORT, having been misunderstood by many, and misrepresented by more (though nothing, as I then thought, could be clearer to men versed in moral matters) I shall beg leave to explain myself.He who affirms that a scenical representation has no moral import, cannot possibly be understood to mean (if interpreted on the ordinary rules of Logic and Common sense) any thing else than that the representation or the feigned aetion has none of that specific morality which is in the real action. He can never be supposed to mean that such a representation could never, even by accident, give birth to a moral entity, of a different. species; though it kept within, much less if it transgressed the bounds, of its scenical nature. Give me leave to explain this by an instance or two. The Tragic scene we will suppose to exhibit a Pagan story, in which a lewd Sacrifice to Venus is represented. Now I say this scenical representation has no moral import. But do I mean by this, that there was no immorality of any kind in the scene? Far from it. I only mean that that specific immorality was absent, which would have existed there, had the action been real and not feigned; I mean idolatry. Again, another set of Tragedians represent the Conspiracy

Conspiracy against Julius Cæsar in the Senate-house. This, I say, has no moral import: for neither could the followers of Cæsar's Cause call these fictitious Conspirators, enemies to their country; nor could the warmest lovers of liberty call them patriots. But if in this representation, the Actors, instead of exhibiting an imaginary assassination, should commit a real one, on the body of the personated Cæsar, Who ever supposed that such a dramatic representation continued still to have no moral import? The men who committed the action dropt their personated, and assumed their real character, being instigated by interest, malice, or revenge; and only waited a fit opportunity to perpetrate their designs under the cover of a drama. Here indeed, the parallel ceases. The feigned Conspirators transgressed the bounds of a representation: while the real death of Isaac must be supposed to make part of the scenical representation, in the Command to Abraham. But it should have been considered, and was not, that I employed the principle of a feigned representation's having no moral import, to free the Command from the infidel objection that it was an enjoined sacrifice; not from the objection of its being an enjoined death, simply: For a human Sacrifice commanded was supposed to discredit Revelation, as giving too much countenance and encouragement to that horrid superstition; whereas, with regard to a simple death commanded, to justify this, I was ready to confide in the common argument of Divines, taken from God's sovereign right over his creatures: Whose power could instantaneously repair the loss, or whose goodness would abundantly reward the act of obedience. Yet the fair and candid Dr. Rutherforth represents my position of a scenical representation's having no moral import, to be the same with saying, that though an action be ever so vile in itself, yet, if it be done to represent somewhat else, it loses its nature and becomes an indifferent one.-Had I the presumption to believe, that any thing I could say would