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the grave, he is the Judge and the Restrainer of the nethermost hell and, in one word, he is the All in all of the creation, so far as its creationand redemption and eternal blessedness are concerned. In the glorious passage on which we are now entering, he is represented, in contrast with those stately and proud cedars of Lebanon who made their boast against God and therefore are brought low, as a Rod out of the stem of Jesse, and a Sucker growing out of his roots; beginning his career in the greatest humility, and thence arising to greatest glory. The "rod" is by some taken in the secondary and figurative sense, of the sceptre or rod of government; which is not only not necessary, but violates the spirit and destroys the beauty of the contrast, which is to represent him as a slender shoot out of an ignoble and unnoticed stem (the stem of Jesse, not the stem of David), as a sucker from the same unseen and despised root. Jesse's was a family without name among the thousands of Judah; the Assyrian was the king of kings, before whom all the earth was silent: yet, while the Lord poured fury and destruction upon his stately pride, and all stateliness whatever, he would take his chosen one from the ignoble stock of Jesse. True it is, that this slender twig grows into the glory of being the rod of eternal and universal empire: but that is not here signified, as I take it, nor even hinted at, but waits to be opened in the progress of the description, when the Spirit of the Lord shall, out of this humble scion of a humble house produce the Branch of renown, the Branch of the Lord, beautiful and glorious. The thing which under these words is taught answereth to that which is written in the liiid chapter of this Prophet: "For he shall grow up before him as a tender plant, and as a root out of a dry ground: he hath no form nor comeliness: and when we shall see him, there is no beauty that we should desire him. He is despised and rejected of men, a man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief: and we hid as it were our faces from him; he was despised, and we esteemed him not." (vers. 2, 3.) -In the twofold representation of his humility, as a rod from Jesse's trunk and a sucker from Jesse's root, there seemeth to be a contradiction: but it is one of those contradictions which will be found in all Messiah's names; as, "the First and the Last," "the Beginning and the Ending." Which contradictions arise, as we have shewn in our third Lecture on the Apocalypse, from the nature of all spiritual truth, which cannot be otherwise expressed than in an enigma, when expressed by means of human language and conceptions. The true form of the enigma before us is contained in Rev. xxii. 16: “I am the Root and the Offspring of David, and the bright and Morning-star." He is at once root and offspring; because, as Christ pre-existent, in whom all the election are chosen before

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the world was, he is that holy One of God out of whom David comes, and to figure whom David was fashioned; and yet, as Jesus the Son of the virgin, he is the offspring of David, of his seed, the issue of his loins. This truth, of his pre-existence as the Christ in the bosom of the Father, and of his afterexistence as the creature, when he became flesh; his all-inclusiveness and majesty and might as the former, his weakness and humility and narrow conditions as the latter; is that out of which the many enigmas and contradictions written of him arise. In a word, that great unit of all orthodox creeds, in which they are all contained-the proposition "Jesus is the Christ "is the greatest of all enigmas, and the parent of all the contradictory names by which Christ is expressed. But for clear and full light upon this subject we must refer to the “ Lectures on the Revelations," where we have opened these names at length. In the text he is called Adon-Jehovah-Sabaoth, a mighty one felling all trees to the ground; and forthwith the twig from Jesse's humble trunk, the sucker from Jesse's hidden root. To understand these things, and to explain them, is the great work of an interpreter and it cannot be done without the profoundest knowledge of the orthodox creed,-that the Christ of God, in whom, before the worlds, God saw his purpose accomplished, his election, his redeemed world, and every thing which shall have an eternal being; he whom he used in all working to and in and for the outward creation; is the very Person who took substance of Jesse's daughter, and was made of the seed of David according to the flesh,—the humblest of the humble trees, the lowliest of the lowly shrubs of the forest. And yet misguided and misguiding men (God guide them into truth!) will say that he had another and a better sort of flesh than ours; that he was of an ethereal temper in his fleshly substance; a tree of paradise, and not the twig from Jesse's trunk; a graft upon Adam's glorious and unfallen stem, and not a scion from Jesse's root. Poor men! how ye are forsaken! and how vaunting of your ignorance, how boastful of your shame!

"And the Spirit of the Lord shall rest upon him, the spirit of wisdom and understanding, the spirit of counsel and might, the spirit of knowledge, and of the fear of the Lord."-This verse standeth between the humility of his origin, the unworthiness of his stock, the want of all worldly advantages, and the destitution of all means of knowledge and instruction above the lowest peasant-between this, I say, and the glorious description of his wisdom and might and exploits which follow, standeth this verse, to reveal to us the cause of that glorious precedency of all kings and pre-eminence above all men which he obtained. No one doubts that the verse on which we have commented con

tains the humility of his birth, the want of desirable comeliness and beauty, the marredness of his countenance more than any man, the miserable endurance of his life, the contempt and rejection and scorn which broke his heart, the complication of disasters which constituted him "the man of sorrows and acquainted with grief;" so that our prophet declareth, "Many were astonished at thee; his visage was so marred more than any man, and his form more than the sons of men." No one doubts, that from the third verse to the end is the grandest description of the work which the Father gave him to do, and which we all believe is advancing rapidly to its consummation. But the question is, how came one so slender and despised to accomplish such a mighty action, and to establish such a heavenly blessedness? What means had he? what instruments used he? how was he furnished? how was he borne through? This question is answered by the intervening verse, which is now before us. Well, and what is the answer? Is it that his Godhead did it? Is it that his Jehovah-Person did it? Is it that his manhood had under its disguise a better manhood, which did it? No it is that the Holy Spirit resting upon him did it. It is an after-consideration, and a question of much depth, how the person of the Adon-Jehovah and the Holy Spirit wrought together unto the end of making that "abominable branch" to become "the Branch of renown "-from which question in its place we will not flee ;-but the thing written before us is, that the Spirit of God resting upon him did it; resting upon him, even this humble one in which the passage before us coincideth with all those many passages of Scripture with which we concluded our former interpretation. Being so, then, that it is a plain declaration in the passage before us, and a most frequently repeated -yea, a constant-doctrine of Scripture, that as a man after his humiliation he did receive the Spirit, and by the Spirit's teaching rise into the wisdom, by the Spirit's acting rise into the power, which is afterwards delineated in such splendid diction; let us the more carefully weigh the parts and properties of this extraordinary unction of the Holy Ghost, which in him was prolific of such wonderful effects.

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"The Spirit of the Lord shall rest upon him :" the Spirit of Jehovah shall rest upon him. It is the same word and form of expression in the original which is used 2 Kings ii. 15: "The spirit of Elijah doth rest upon Elisha." The Spirit of God doth rest upon him who is the Root and the Offspring of Jesse. Now, what can any interpreter understand by this, but that the Man, the virgin's Child, the Immanuel, the God-man who was to come, a true man and yet God with us, was to have the Spirit of God imparted to him; as the spirit in Moses rested upon the seventy elders (Num. xi. 25), and Elijah's spirit rested upon

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Elisha? The text doth not declare at what time of his life this communication of God's Spirit was to be made; but, simply, that it was to rest and remain upon him, and to produce that wonderful wisdom, sanctity, and power, and work those incredible effects, which are afterwards enumerated. It might, indeed, be inferred, from his being the child of a virgin, that this power of Jehovah was to be coeval with, and the cause of, his existence, as it was afterwards announced to the blessed virgin; but it is not expressly so declared in the passage before us. It might be inferred also, that, seeing he is spoken of as a complete person already, and the unction of the Spirit superinduced upon his personality, and not itself of his personality, that his person, because of his name Immanuel, is in itself Divine, anterior to and allindependent of the Spirit's unction. These, I say, are all good conclusions of sound doctrine, which we, looking back from our present position, can see in this prophetic discourse, and so the more admire the extraordinary art of its structure; but thus to infer belongeth rather to the armoury of the theologian than to the workshop of the interpreter. An interpreter makes the arms for the theologian. He may consider his own work, and ought to know its use; but it is not his to use it. Now, what are the characters of this the Spirit of God, and what are its effects? for nothing so much concerneth us poor mortals to know.

1. "The spirit of wisdom and understanding."-In order to come at the characteristic differences of the six forms of the Spirit which are mentioned, combined into three couplets, it will be necessary to exercise much discernment. These two first joined together are so found in various parts of Scripture; of which I shall at present notice only two, as being sufficient for the purpose the first is in the context, ch. x. 13, where the Assyrian is made to say, "By the strength of my hand have I done it, and by my wisdom; for I am prudent." The strength of hand here boasted of, properly falleth under the next couplet, "the spirit of counsel and of might;" but the wisdom and the prudence are the very words which express the first forms of the Spirit, with which Jesse's offspring was anointed. Now, considering this expression, "By my wisdom, for I am prudent," in the mouth of the Assyrian, or any other person, I think we should understand the "wisdom" to indicate the outward application, and the "prudence," or understanding, the inward gift; the one the issue, and the other the source. The other passage (Prov. x. 13) in which these two words are found joined together confirms this conclusion: "In the lips of him that hath understanding, wisdom is found:" for here, I think any one would say, The understanding is the intrinsical and inherent gift; the wisdom is the outcome and offspring which appeareth in the lips of one so gifted: and thus I shall hold

it to be. The spirit of wisdom is therefore that which is described in Christ when it is said that "He spake as never man spake." It pertaineth to him as the Word of wisdom, or as The Wisdom itself; which title he claimeth to himself, Luke vii. 35; and the Apostle asserteth for him, 1 Cor. i. The spirit of wisdom I understand, therefore, to signify the various discourse of reason by which Christ hath set forth his Father's secret mind. And the spirit of understanding is that inward light and clear discernment of reason, from which the forms of wisdom flow: the perception, the consciousness of all truth, from which the utterance of it proceeds; that" life" in him which was the light of men" I can find no better word to express it by than intelligence. It is not reason itself, but the first property of reason that light in which it seeth its own various being, and which, by taking outward forms for use, becometh wisdom. Wisdom pertains to the practical man; intelligence to the meditative and reflective man. The spirit which fitted Joshua for his function as judge of Israel, is called "the spirit of wisdom" (Deut. xxxiv. 9); but Solomon had them both (1 Kings iii. 12). Now let any one weigh wherein Solomon passed beyond Joshua, and he will have a living example of intelligence, as distinguished from wisdom.

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2. "The spirit of counsel and might."-These words are the same with the two contained in Immanuel's name (ix. 6), Counsellor, God mighty; and this last is found again, x. 21: "The remnant shall return, even the remnant of Jacob, unto Godmighty:" and beyond a doubt they signify, the former, the spirit which fits a man for a counsellor; the latter, the spirit which fits a man for a hero, in that sense of the word hero which is described Psalm xlv. when the word Gibbor is used of him. I refer back to our second interpretation for the full exposition of these august names of Messiah. They both refer to Christ in action, as the two former referred to him in thought and word: these characterize him as the Actor of the Father's purpose, those as the Revealer of his will: these, as a Governor and Subduer; those, as a disciple of the Spirit, and the teacher of others: these have their accomplishment chiefly in him when he shall come to counsel and govern the kingdom of the Father; those, to what he hath done in teaching the earth, from the day of the Fall up to this time, and until his coming again.

3. "The spirit of knowledge, and of the fear of the Lord."The knowledge here spoken of is distinguished from the understanding, or intelligence, explained above, by being that which is the result of the exercise of our faculties: not the knowledge of intuition, but the knowledge of experience; as we see in that passage (Prov. xviii. 15) where the word is twice used: "The heart of the prudent getteth knowledge; and the ear of the

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