the power of godliness manifest themselves in thy walk and conduct.

In the preceding discussions regarding the Holy Place, we have avoided referring to the interpretations of the older typologists, or the views of commentators. It would have taken us too long to expose every error, and it seemed better to notice none till we had unfolded what we conceive to be the correct view of the several parts. And this, we trust, has appeared so natural, and is so fully borne out by the language of Scripture, that the contrary opinions may be allowed to remain unnoticed. Indeed, nothing more is needed than to look at them, to see how uncertain and unsatisfactory they commonly are, even to those who propound them. Bähr, indeed, speaks dogmatically enough, although his fundamental error regarding the general design of the tabernacle, formerly referred to, carried him here also for the most part in the wrong direction. But take, for example, what Scott says in his commentary regarding the shew-bread, which may be paralleled by many similar explanations: "They (the cakes) might typify Christ, as the bread of life and the continual food of the souls of his people, having offered himself unto God for them; or they may denote the services of believers, presented before God through him and accepted for his sake; or, the whole may mean the communion betwixt our reconciled Father and his adopted children in Christ Jesus, who, as it were, feast at the same table," &c. What can any one make of this diversity of meaning? When the mind is treated to so many and such different notions under one symbol, it necessarily takes in none distinctly; they become merely so many perhaps's; and instead of multiplying the benefit and instruction of the ordinance, we only deprive it of any certain sound whatever.--The ground of most of the erroneous interpretations on the furniture and services of the Holy Place, lay in understanding all directly and peculiarly of Christ. And this, again, arose from not perceiving that the Tabernacle was intended to symbolise what concerned the people as dwelling with God, not less than what concerned God's dwelling with them. It is not to be forgotten, however, that viewing him as the Head, the Pattern,

and Forerunner of his people, everything that was here shadowed forth concerning them, is true in a higher and pre-eminent sense of him. His prayers, his work of righteousness, and his exhibition. of the light of divine truth and holiness, take precedence of all that in a like kind ever has been, or ever may be, presented by the members of his body. But as Christ's whole undertaking is something sui generis, and chiefly to be viewed as the means of salvation and access to Heaven, provided by God for his people,-as under this view it was already symbolized in the furniture and services of the Most Holy Place, it is better and more agreeable to the design of the tabernacle, to consider the things belonging to the Holy Place as directly referring only to the works and services of Christ's people.

SECTION SEVENTH.

THE OFFERINGS AND SERVICES CONNECTED WITH THE BRAZEN ALTAR IN THE COURT OF THE TABERNACLE-SIN-OFFERINGSTRESPASS-OFFERINGSBURNT-OFFERINGS-PEACE OR THANK-OFFERINGS-MEAT-OFFERINGS.

WE found it necessary, before entering on the consideration of the particular apartments and furniture of the tabernacle, to examine the relation in which the whole stood to the altar of burntoffering in the court, and this we found it impossible properly to explain, without investigating the fundamental idea of sacrifice, as expressed in the more important acts and operations connected with it. What was said there, must here be presupposed and kept in recollection. It was common to all sacrifices of blood that there was in them, on the part of the offerer, a remembrance of sin, and, on the part of God, a provision made for his reconciliation and pardon. The death of the animal represented the desert due to him for sin, the wages of which is death. God's appointing the life-blood of his own guiltless creature to be shed for such a purpose, and afterwards sprinkled on his altar, denoted that he accepted this symbolically as an atonement or substitution for the life of the guilty offerer, and typically implied that he would in due time provide and accept a real atonement or substitution in Christ. In so far as the ancient believer might present the blood of his sacrifice according to the manner prescribed, and in so far as the believer now appropriates by faith the atoning blood of Christ, in each case alike the blessed result is he is justified from sin, and has peace with God.

But it is evident on a moment's consideration, that while the things now mentioned form what must have been the fundamental and most essential part of every sacrifice, various other things, of

a collateral and supplementary kind, were necessarily required to bring out the whole truth connected with the sinner's reconciliation and restored fellowship with God, as also to give suitable expression to the diversified feelings and affections, which it became him at different times to embody in his acts of worship. If anything like a complete representation was to be given by means of sacrifice of the sinner's relation to God, there must, at least, have been something in the appointed rites to indicate the different degrees of guilt, the sense entertained by the sinner, not only of his own sinfulness, but also of his obligations to the mercy of God for restored peace, his several states of comparative distance from God and nearness to him, and the manifold consequences, both in respect to his condition and his character, growing out of his acceptable approach to God. This could no otherwise be done than by the institution of different kinds of sacrifice, suited to the ever varying circumstances of the worshipper; or by the different kinds of victims employed in the same sacrifice, the particular actions with their blood, the use made of their several parts, or the supplementary services with which the offering of them was accompanied. In these respects, opportunity was afforded for the symbolical expression of a very considerable variety of states and feelings. And it was, more particularly by its minute prescriptions and diversified arrangements for this purpose, that the Mosaic ritual formed so decided an improvement on the sacrificial worship of the ancient world. Before the time of Moses, this species of worship was comparatively vague and indefinite in its character. There appear to have been at most but two distinct forms of sacrifice, and these probably but slightly varied-the burnt-offering and the peace-offering. That such distinctions did exist, as to constitute two kinds of sacrifice under these respective appellations, seems unquestionable, from mention being made of both at the ratification of the covenant (Ex. xxiv. 5), prior to the introduction of the peculiar distinctions of the Mosaic ritual; and also from the indications that exist in earlier times of a feast in connection with certain sacrifices, while it was always the characteristic of the burnt-offering, that the whole was consumed by fire. But the line of demarcation between the two was probably restricted to the participation or non-participation on the part of the offerers of a portion of the sacrifice, leaving whatever else might require to bet

signified respecting the state or feeling of the worshipper, to be either expressed in words, or to exist only in the silent consciousness of his own mind.

It is apparently on account of this greater antiquity and more general character of the burnt and peace-offerings, that they take precedence in the prescriptions given in Leviticus concerning the sacrifices. The priority in point of order, after the Mosaic ritual was introduced, belonged, however, not to them, but to the sinofferings; and accordingly on those occasions, when a series of offerings was presented, the sin-offerings invariably came first (Ex. xxix; Lev. v., viii., ix., xvi., &c.) The change introduced by the giving of the law was the cause of this. The law necessarily brought with it the knowledge of sin. It did not, indeed, originate such knowledge; but it imparted much clearer views, and produced a far deeper consciousness of sin, than generally existed before its promulgation. And as consciousness of sin is the foundation and starting-point of all sacrifice, that kind of sacrifice in which the ideas of sin and atonement were brought most prominently out, was fitly regarded as holding the first place in the sacrificial system. It was the kind of offering suitable for those who had either not attained to a covenant-standing, or had by transgression fallen from it. It has, therefore, properly to do with the beginning of all true religion, and may most fitly be taken first.

THE SIN-OFFERING.

This species of sacrifice has so peculiarly to do with sin, that its very name is identified with it (N); in Hebrew, the common term for sin, is also the term for sin-offering. This clearly indicates, that it has specially to do with sin, and aims at atonement, in the most express and definite sense. and definite sense. This, we have already seen, was peculiarly the case with the sin-offerings presented on the day of atonement for the priesthood and the people. And in respect to ordinary occasions, they primarily differed from the other sacrifices, by their being connected with some special acts of sin (Lev. iv.v. 13).1 But in the description given of these occasions, there are

1 The whole of this portion treats of the sin-offerings, and only at v. 14, does the law of the trespass-offering begin. The division of the chapters here is particularly unhappy.