2. In difcourfing of the other end-I fhall fhew what is the chief good, the fupreme happiness, and highest perfection of man, and how it is to be obtained.

3.

Conclude with an answer to an objection which may

be made to this discourse.'

Under the first of these the Doctor obferves, that the glory of God refults and fprings from the tranfcendent excellence and perfection of the Divine Nature, but especially from the moral attributes thereof; that the holinefs and goodnefs of God are spoken of in Scripture as his fupreme glory and excellence; that the erecting or conftituting a kingdom of truth and righteoufnefs, which shall have no end, is a most excellent defign, tending to advance the Divine Glory, and confequently is to be looked upon as one great end propofed in the creation of rational and free agents in general, either of men or angels.

The glory and excellence of this kingdom, however, our Author thinks confifts chiefly in man's being endowed with freedom of will, though he acknowleges men may abuse and pervert their liberty and freedom of will. This, fays he, is the cafe of the fallen angels and damned fpirits; hence at first 'came fin into the world; hence the fall of our first parents, ⚫ and hence the corruption and depravity of our nature, in all their pofterity ever fince.' But as God from the beginning knew (all this) fo in mercy he provided a remedy against it, by---contriving the amazing method and means of our fal'vation.'

It is to this part of the difcourfe, to which the objection and answer mentioned to be confidered under the third head refers; here, therefore, it may be moft proper to give the fubftance of it.

The objection is, How is it confiftent with God's infinite wisdom and goodness, to create Beings with powers and faculties, which he foreknew they would pervert and abufe, and thereby bring great evil and fin into the world? The fubftance of the anfwer is, that God's end and defign in the formation of the univerfe, we may be fure, was moft excellent and worthy; that the highest excellence is a kingdom of everlasting truth and righttoufnefs; that God intended from the beginning to erect fuch a kingdom, and to create Beings that fhould, by their powers, be capable of being fubject and obedient to this government.--But all true obedience depends upon voluntary choice. It was therefore righteous and juft, wife and good, in God, to confer on his creatures liberty and freedom of will, whereby they might have obeyed and been happy; but fome refufed the ble lings of his righteous kingdom, turned rebels, and were the authors and abet

P 2

abettors of fin. This was owing to their abuse of their free agency, a moft excellent endowment in itfelf; but applied to the commiffion of fin, the fpring of all mifery, which wicked fpirits voluntarily bring upon themselves.

Now from the beginning God forefaw how rational creatures. would freely chufe to act, and the fin and mifery they would be the authors of; he therefore, because they abused this excellent gift of free-will, fuffered them to reap the fruit of their ingratitude, and to bring down utter ruin upon themselves, when they might for ever have lived and enjoyed the inestimable bleffings of his heavenly kingdom.

How fatisfactory this kind of reafoning the Doctor makes use. of may appear to the generality of his readers, it is eafy to guess; but whether the judicious among them will think it at all conclufive, it may not be thought our province to determine. Let it be fufficient for us to remark, that the Author makes ufe of the doctrine of free-will, like many others, as an universal folver of the difficulties occuring in the moral administration of the world.

The fecond fermon on the same text is as characteristic as any of the reft, of that stiffness (we cannot find another word to express our idea) in the Doctor's philosophy, which we mentioned at our entrance on this review. Thus opens the discourse--It is abfolutely necefiary that we have a juft conception of God ---Now the best and trueft apprehenfion is the idea of the moft excellent Being we can conceive, both in natural and moral perfections, but most efpecially in his moral. But the fum and comprehenfion of all moral perfections is righteouf⚫ nefs. Therefore God Almighty must be the most righteous Being we can poffibly conceive.

"But righteousness in general is founded in the nature and ⚫ reason of perfons and things, or of their ideas, a conformity to which is truth; and a practice according to truth, from a principle of love and affection to it, is juft and right, good and excellent, and is the proper notion of all righteousness and holinefs, virtue and goodnefs.'

After this our Author again affumes his favourite notion of free-will, and infifts much upon its being neceffary to conftitute virtue and righteousness, though it may be abufed, perverted, and mifapplied to the commiffion of great fins. For the wicked angels," fays he, in Heaven, diflatisfied with their subjection, forgot their duty and gratitude to their moft munificent benefactor, and raised a rebellion in God's kingdom of truth and ⚫ righteousness.'

In the fermon on 1 Cor. ii. 7. he confiders, 1. Upon what account the wifdom of God, in our redemption, is called a mystery, viz. as including in it all the fublime myfteries of our moft holy religion, which St. Paul calis a mystery of godliness; or it may be fo ftyled in oppofition to the hidden myfteries of the Heathen world, which were fo far from being mysteries of godlinefs, that they confifted in the moft cruel, inhuman, and unnatural ufages and practices; but by the word mystery in the text is more especially meant the great mystery of the vocation of the Gentiles, to the knowlege and worship of the true God, and faith in our Lord Jefus Christ.

2. He briefly obferves the original state of man at first, and the relation he bears to God; and the ftate and condition of mankind after the fin of our first parents.

3. He endeavours to demonftrate the righteoufnefs and wisdom. of God, in redeeming mankind out of their finful and miferable eftate, by the most precious blood of our Lord and Saviour Jefus Chrift.

Under this head he obferves, that as in the original formation, there was a confultation in the Godhead about it; fo the great work of our falvation was refolved and agreed upon between the Father and his Son, and undertaken and conducted by them with the highest wisdom and prudence; that it became God, as a Being of infinite juftice, purity, &c. to confult the honour of his attributes, and therefore he would not pardon man's tranfgreffion without public fatisfaction for the indignity and injury done to his Divine Majefty: but this fatisfaction Adam does not presume to make, and therefore God took the matter into his own hand, and formed the method of our redemption through the merits and mediation of his moft dearly be'loved Son,'

Now the wifdom of this method, the Doctor thinks, is most evident in these two refpects. 1. God took care that the highest regard and reverence fhould be paid to his moral perfections: and 2dly, When God determined to fave man, and to remit the punishment due to his fin, he took fuch a method of doing this, as to demonftrate his great love to him, when he would, at fuch an ineftimable price as the facrifice of his only Son, purchase his redemption: and yet, that man might have no encouragement, from this love, to continue in fin, God laid before him the odioufnefs of fin, and its dire confequences, in the fad fufferings of his Saviour, to deter him from it for the future.

A Differtation on Jacob's Prophecy, Gen. xlix. 10, &c. 8vo. Is. 6d. Withers.

TH

HE defign of this differtation is to fhew, that the interpretation given in our translation of that text, Gen. xlix. 10. The Scepter shall not depart from Juda, nor a lawgiver from between his feet, until Shiloh come, &c. does not come up to the Patriarch's meaning, and fixes no certain determinate æra for the accomplishment of the prediction.

Before the Author enters on the prophecy itself, he makes the following obfervations, viz. That Jacob, in this last scene of his hiftory, plainly appears to be under the influence of Divine Inspiration; that by the fpirit of God he was directed to pafs by his first born fon, and the next two, to affign to Judah the bleffings of the patriarchal promife; that these bleffings were not of a temporal, but fpiritual nature; this he thinks is intimated by the fignification of the word (Judah) which comes from Fada (to praife) and by the manner in which Jacob applies it to his fon, viz. Thou Judah, or, Thou art Judah. The fame (he observes) is to be faid of the word (Fishtechuu) shall bow down, which he is at great pains to fhew is of facred import.

But that the bleffing in the text muft relate to spiritual, and not temporal things, he farther thinks is evident from hence, viz. that the promife of a fcepter and a lawgiver (as our tranflation has it) muft imply fome diftinction of pre-eminence, which the tribe of Judah was to enjoy above their brethren; but that this was not the cafe for more than 600 years, between the death of Jacob and the time of David; though he, indeed, was of the tribe of Judah, and Judah continued a kingdom for 400 years. more, or fo; but then both king and people were fubdued by Nebuchadnezzer, and carried captive into Babylon; after this the royal family of David never recovered the poffeffion of their right, or fo much as laid claim to it.

He then endeavours to fhew, that the feveral governors which the Jews had, from their return, to the coming of Chrift, can by no means answer to the prophecy as interpreted of temporal power and dominion. He finds much fault with the feptuagint tranflation, as very erroneous, and undertaken with very wrong and finifter views, and then comes to his main point, viz. To fhew what, upon enquiry, feems to him to be the natural and true meaning of this fublime and noble prediction.'

'I fhall lay down,' fays he, this firft of all, by way of axiom, that the principal defign is to make a promise of the • Meffiah,

• Meffiah, which is by all, by Jews as well as by Chriftians, acknowleged to be the intendment of, till Shiloh come. Befides this, it contains a promife of fomething relative to Judah, 'fomething which the reft of the tribes were to enjoy for a time, but not fo long as Judah: and in this was Judah's pre-eminence above the reft to confift. Now what this was ist the question, and the only way to refolve this question is, by feeking to difcover the primary and radical sense of the two chief words in the text, which we read Scepter and law• giver?

With regard to the first of these words, which in the original is, Shebeth, and in the Septuagint version, Agxwv, a ruler; the literal rendering of the original, he obferves very juftly, would have been better than a metaphorical one; or if an explication was to be made, it was most natural to have expressed it by the word Tribe, or Tribeship.

The other word Mehokkak, which the Seventy have rendered 'Hyouevos, and our tranflators, law-giver, he fays, is a most beautiful word, indeed, and conveys a noble idea;' for which reason he is at pains to trace it to its original. Our Readers, perhaps, will not follow him through all his remarks upon it with equal pleafure. We fhall therefore content ourselves with giving them the Author's purport in general, which is, that this word, Mehokkak, comes from the radical hak, or hakak, to engrave, and fignifies in this text not a law-giver, but a typifier.

Upon the whole, though the Writer of this Differtation feems to expect our cenfure rather than approbation, we fhall do him the juftice to remark, that he appears to have taken great pains to come at the truth; and that in so candid and impartial a manner, as to render his own attestation of it, and the fears he expreffes for himself in the following extract, altogether needlefs, viz. In fhort, Sir, you have my thoughts on the fubject, fuch as they are, and whatever fentence may ⚫ be paffed upon them by fome of the learned ones of the age, our Monthly Reviewers, Orthodox Deifts, &c. if they should come into their hands, I fhall reft myself on the approbation of God, and of all good men, which I fhall always, in all my ftudies, endeavour to deferve.'