and frailty to venture upon those large strides of presumption, which the want only of true understanding and clearness could ever prompt others to make, in many a difficult and slippery road. They, who hastily jump to conclusions, (as one used to express it) are commonly those, who see but a little, and presume a great deal: Did they see more of the way before them, they would not attempt to run, where the ablest find it a labor to walk. To the grief of soberer minds, how often may they hear some poor talkative professors determining upon the most difficult and sublime topics, with the positive air and authority of a general council? And how often do such persons take a great deal of pains to prove, to every intelligent Christian, that really they know nothing of the matter? Bishop Hall names a man of this sort, a bladder full of wind, a skin full of words, a fool's wonder, and a wise man's fool." It is indeed very different to confess the truth, and to make a profession of it: The one implies a previous and certain knowledge; whereas the other may be proposed without any knowledge at all. The meanest beliver, 'tis true, may be called upon at some time or other, to speak for his master and the truths of his gospel; and in doing this, for God, he is not to fear the face of man: But he will always remember, or ought to remember that, if God's providence has rendered this a just or necessary duty, God's grace will not leave him to himself, but be bis mouth and wisdom, his aid and support, which the enemies of truth shall not be able to everthrow. In a word every believer might take up his word, upon such occasions, and address himself to God; Whene'er thy laws,

Thy truth and cause

To own, my duty be;

From fear of shame,

Or love of fame,

Good LORD, deliver me!

Upon the whole, we may reflect that man hath no spiritual understanding from bimself, that he cannot procure it but through the internal renewing and operation of the SPIRIT of understanding and that he cannot even exercise it, when conferred upon him, but by the continual agency of this Holy One. The inference from all which, to the soul of the believer, is, that it is necessary for him, never to lean to his own understanding, but simply to depend upon this LORD the SPIRIT for his instruction in righteousness in the use of his word; and that, for this reason, he ought ever to pray for the fulfilment of the promise, that this blessed guide may not only be with him but dwell in him, as a fountain of grace and understanding, springing up into everlasting life.

OIL OF GLADNESS.

IL is one of the three active principles (as the chemists assert), which enter into the composition of all animal and vegetable substances, and by which they are enabled both to subsist and grow. The essential oil lubricating and sheathing all the parts, and forming a vehicle for the essential salt or nitre by being perfectly intermixed, and both these acted upon by the light; is the mean used by the wise Creator to put in motion the spirit of the whole animal and vegetable œconomy, or, in other words, to cause it to live and prosper. When a tree dies, we perceive an abstraction of this oil from its substance; for, when a part of it is placed upon the fire, it will yield no flame, as every substance, which hath oil in it, obviously will. And every body knows that the fatness of animals, which proceeds from the exuberance of this natural oil, is, when proportional to the other parts of the frame, both indicative of their health and conducive to their beauty.

As oil is an essential part of the life, health, strength, and beauty of substantial forms; it hath pleased the divine wisdom to constitute it for the emblem of THAT HOLY ONE, who imparts every portion of divine life, vigor, and glory to the spiritual world. Whoever is not acted upon by or is not possesed of Him, is dead, according to the Scripture, in the most dreadful sense of that term. Whoever doth not enjoy Him, is so far from being spiritually beautiful, that he is as loathsome and abominable in the sight of Febovab, as a putrid and stinking carcase, can be unclean and offensive to the natural S s

*The earth, while it supplies the various plants which grow upon it, is supplied for that purpose very much by the dew, which is full of oleaginous particles. "The dews (says our philosophical husbandman, Mr. Tull) seem to be the richest present the atmosphere gives to the earth; having, when putrified in a vessel, a black sediment like mud at the bottom. This seems to cause the darkish colour to the upper part of the ground. And the sulphur which is found in the dew, may be the chief ingredient of the cement of the earth; sulphur being very glutinous, as nitre is dissolvent. Dew has both these." TULL's husbandry. c. vi.—A lively comment this upon that gracious promise, I will be as the dew unto Israel; Hos. xiv. 5. i. e. the spiritual cause of all gracious fertility.

sense of man. None ought to be offended at the strength of these expressions; for this very image is employed by God himself to describe his abhorrence of the state of sin, and of those who are in it. Is. xxxiv. 3.

These premises may lead us to the spiritual design, for which the Lord instituted, with so much precision, the ceremony of unction under the Jewish dispensation. Not more than the blood of bulls and goats could take away sin, could oil, as a material substance, either be holy or make holy. It was what the oil signified, and what Jehovah revealed under its emblem, which fulfilled that gracious intention to the heirs of salvation. The true believers then, as well as now, were divinely instructed to resolve the parable, and through the agent in nature, or natural object, to behold and to experience the spiritual blessing from the God of grace. Neither Moses, nor any other man, was equal to the comprehension of so much wisdom, as the spiritual eye sees, in the legal œconomy, under its various types and shadows; nor could any human ingenuity have contrived mysteries so loudly prophetic and deeply predicable, as those in the Levitical service, even though previously possesed of the gospel.* A gracious mind sees the hand of God, beyond the power of man, in the whole arrangement and design.

When unction was prepared according to the command ment in Exod. xxx. 23, &c. the basis of which was dil-olive, strongly impregnated with three principal spices; and when this preparation was poured upon the head of Aaron, and of his sons the high-priests after him; they spiritually beheld the promise, and the mode of its fulfilment, that the Holy Spirit would, in the fullness of time, descend upon the great head of the church, and from him flow down to all his members, that they also might be an babitation of God through the Spirit. They saw, that he was to be anointed (whence his name Messiah, Christ) with this OIL of GLADNESS above those, whom in mercy he would call and make his fellows. Ps. xlv 7. They foresaw in faith, that the SPIRIT JEHOVAH Would rest upon bim (Is. xi. 2.) and be upon him, anointing him to preach good tidings (Is. lxi. 1.) and, in a word, to do all that was necessary to be done for his people's salvation. The souls. It might also signify, the internal consolation, life and

*An Heathen professed, Tradadit arcano quodcunque volumine Moses. Juv. Sat. xiv. l. 102. And to thousands, who would not wish to be thought Heathens, the writings of Moses is as much a volumon urcumon arcumun as they were to. Juvenal.

†The mode of anointing a Priest under the law in the form of the Greek X, from whence it has been conjectured further that

fragrance of this sweet unction to the outward smell signified to them the complacency and delight of the Holy One in this gracious operation, and the communicated excellency bestowed upon them, who received this precious treasure into their souls: It might also signify, the internal consolation, life and support, which they should feel in themselves under his sacred operation.

When they behold the high priest fully anointed with the holy oil, so as (according to the psalmist) to run down upon his beard, and to the skirts of his cloathing; and, on the other hand, saw that the inferior priests were only sprinkled with it, and this sprinkling made not without the blood of the ram of consecration: They were led to consider, that the. Holy Ghost would be poured without measure upon the great high priest of our profession, because of the infinitude of his person and office; but in measure upon those who are spiritual priests in all ages; and that these last would need an atonement for their sin,(in contradistinction to the great Messiab) before they could enter upon the holy service of offering up spiritual sacrifices of prayer and thanksgiving to the Most High.

When they read, that the holy unction was only to be compounded for this use, and that it was by no means to be put upon a stranger, they understood, that the Holy Ghost was not only remote from all impurity and the low purpose of this mortal life in himself, but that also He would peculiarly apply himself to the true Israel of God, and, in that application, render them his peculiar people too.*

Thus the antient believers spiritually beheld the glory of this divine person, and the nature of his gracious office; and if we, in the present dispensation, are favoured with the same anointing, we shall behold these comfortable intentions as they did. We shall find, that the institutions delivered to them have a voice of grace and truth to us, and preach aloud, that Christ and the Spirit are at once the hope and the means

through the Cross of Christ the blessings of the spiritual oil was to flow, has been treated of by some; but not being authorised by the written word, it is not insisted upon here.

* The learned Dean Prideaux, following the Rabbins, seems to suppose, that this Holy Oil was but once made, and that it was afterwards miraculously kept in the most holy place till the destruction of the first temple. But Witsius, with very apparent reason, urges, that there is no ground from the command in Exod. xxx. to suppose, that it was to be compounded only once for all generations, but that it was never to be applied to any profane use after it was compounded. See PRIDEAUX s Connection. p. 1. B. iii. §. 5. WITS De sacerdotio Aaronis & Christi. § 57, &C.

of glory. We shall perceive, that the new Testament only declares in express words the accomplishment in fact of the predictions of the Old, and that there is an inexpressible harmony and inseparable relation between them both. This unction will also enable us to see, that the faith of God's elect is no novelty, but hath ever been one and the same precious gift, almost from the foundation of the world.

When the great Messiah was to appear in the flesh for the accomplishment of his people's redemption, that flesh was qualified for this office, not only by the hypostatic union with a person in Jehovah, but by the special endowment and unction of the Holy Ghost; and for this reason, that, through Christ as the head, the Spirit of grace might have communion" with all the members. Accordingly, it was prophesied concerning our Immanuel, that the SPIRIT JEHOVAH should rest upon him, &c. (Is. xi. 2. and lxi. 1.) constituting thereby what is to be understood by the typical unction: And indeed if Christ himself as to his divine nature, be a person in the Godhead, none but a person of co-equal subsistence could possibly glorify him, as GoD in his arduous mission. Nor when the Holy Ghost descended upon Christ at his baptism, by which he was evidentially anointed and commissioned as man, to proceed on his great work, could any being less than the Almighty afford the qualification. If Christ's disciples were baptized by the Holy Ghost, in order to endue them with power for the discharge of their subordinate commissions; and if this baptism be that UNCTION from the Holy One, which enableth the believer to know all things needful for salvation, and is also the ANOINTING, which TEACHETH his people, and is the TRUTH himself; 1 John ii. 20, 27. "and, further, if no other than an infinite and almighty agent can possibly extend such blessings to innumerable objects at one and the same moment, and guide, rule, and preserve them to everlasting glory: Surely, it is impossible, that the blessed MESSIAH, who is before all things, and by whom all things consist, should have the unction of a creature, and a commission from a subordinate being, to perform his undertaking. A man must have immense credulity in the possibilities of creatures to imagine, that a divine person can receive accessions of power or dignity, either from a dependent being, or from a mere emanation which can scarce be called a being at all.To such unavoidable absurdities are those driven, who, acknowleging the data, or truths of the Scripture, yet venture to deny the conclusions necessarily deducible from them; and denying them because spiritual existence cannot be explained by corrupt reason, which, as to the essence of even the meanest matter, can fully explain nothing in the world. They seem to forget exceedingly, that if finite understand,