ing it with the second precept in another respect; because children are so very apt to follow the example of their parents in religion. How often do men give this as an apology for a falfe, or what they acknowledge to be a corrupt religion; how often is it employed as an argument even against impartial examination, that their religion is the fame which their fathers profeffed?

· Breach of covenant is another fin which God efpecially punishes in the fame manner. Zedekiah had entered into a covenant, to give his fubjects that liberty which God had appointed in the law. But he and his princes afterwards tranfgreffed it. Wherefore the LORD denounced vengeance against them; "-Zedekiah king of Ju"dah and his princes will I give into the hand of "their enemies." This vengeance was executed in a most affecting manner. The king of Babylon flew the fons of Zedekiah before his eyes, and then he put them out; as if God would fuffer this wretched parent to retain his fight, only till he had witneffed the mercilefs extermination of the fruit of his body.

The fhedding of the blood of his faints is a fin that God remarkably vifits on fucceeding generations. All innocent blood defiles the land in which it is fhed. If men fhould make no inquifition for it, God will. It hath been a thousand times remarked, even by thofe who know not the truth, that the providence of God is more fignally feen in the discovery and punishment of murder,

* Jer. xxxiv. 21.; xxxix, 6, 7.

than

than with respect to any other crime. The barbarous heathens of Melita, when they faw the viper faften on Paul's hand, had only one opinion about the matter; and this they formed without hefitation. "No doubt," said they, "this man "is a murderer, whom though he hath escaped "the fea, yet vengeance fuffereth not to live." Nor is it furprifing that God fhould efpecially profecute this fin. We find the reafon of this, in the law given to all the fons of Noah, on the reftoration of the world. He adjudges to death every murderer, becaufe "in the image of God "made he man m." This crime is an attack on God himself, in his only visible image in this lower world. But when it is committed in the way of perfecution, it is ftill more heinous in his fight. There is a double attack on the Majefty of heaven; on his image, as it ftill imperfectly remains, in confequence of the first creation, and alfo as restored by the fecond. Nay, when men are perfecuted for righteoufnefs' fake," God knows that his image in the new creation, is the very ground of the perfecution.

Need we wonder, then, that "the death of his "faints" fhould be efpecially "precious in his fight?" Their immediate perfecutors may feem to efcape; but the guilt defcends to fucceeding generations. God deals with perfons, families, focieties and nations, in a way peculiar to himself. There is a certain appointed measure of iniquity that he allows them to fill up, before he call them

1 Acts xxviii. 4.

m Gen, iz. 6.

to account.

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When he promised Canaan to Abraham and his feed, he did not give them immediate poffeffion. They had to wait for about four hundred years for the accomplishment of the promife; because "the iniquity of the Amorites was "not yet full "." Thus God deals with wicked families. When they have perfecuted his fervants, he fulfils his threatening; They fhall judge thee,-after the manner of women that "fhed blood; becaufe-blood is in their hands. "They fhall flay their fons and their daughо 97 ters In this manner did God vifit the blood of his fervant Naboth on the houfe of Ahab. For the crime of this wicked prince was not fimply murder, but perfecution. He shed the blood of Naboth, for his ftrict adherence to the divine precept, in refufing to fell, or to exchange, his inheritance P. The vengeance overtook Jehoram in the portion of Naboth, in that very field which his father had procured for himself by the murder of a righteous man.

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So ftriking was this difpenfation of providence, that it forcibly brought to the recollection of the wicked Jehu the prediction delivered by Elijah, which he repeated to his captain in these words; "Surely I have seen yesterday the blood of Na"both, and the blood of his fons, faith the LORD; "and I will requite thee in this plat, faith the "LORD 9." Manaffeh "fhed innocent blood very much, till he had filled Jerufalem from one "end

n Gen. xv. 16. o Ezek. xxiii. 45-47Lev. xxv. 23. 25.; Numb. xxxvi. 6.-9.

p Kings xxi. 2, 3. comp. q 2 Kingfis. 21. 24.--26.

"end to another "." This God vifited on the third generation of his pofterity; and not on them only, but on the whole nation. For as they had fuffered themselves to be feduced by him, "to do more evil than did the nations "whom the LORD destroyed before the children "of Ifrael;" God viewed them as having made the blood-guiltinefs of Manaffeh their own, because they used no proper means for the prevention or reftraint of this atrocious wickednefs. The Chaldeans were fent against Judah to destroy "it ;" and this is the reason affigned : Surely "at the commandment of the LORD came this upon Judah, to remove them out of his fight, "for the fins of Manaffeh, according to all that "he did; and alfo for the innocent blood that "he fhed, which the LORD would not par"don "."

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Thus did the Jews, who rejected the Son of God, fill up the measure of their fathers," as he forewarned them : 66 Behold, I fend unto you prophets, and wife men, and fcribes, and fome "of them ye fhall kill and crucify, and fome of "them fhall ye fcourge in your fynagogues, and

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perfecute from city to city: that upon you may "come all the righteous blood fhed upon the earth, from the blood of Abel unto the blood of Zacharias. Verily I fay unto you, all these things fhall come upon this generation "." Many of their predeceffors had been severely punish

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I 4

r2 Kings xxi. 16. s 2 Kings xxi. 9. 3. 4. See alfo Jer. xv. 3, 4.

ed

t 2 Kings-xxiii. 26.; xxiv.

u Mat. xxiii. 32. 34.-36.

ed for this very crime. But the punishment due to them as a nation had been still in a great meafure deferred. This generation killed the heir, and thus explicitly fet the feal of their approbation to all that their fathers had done to the fervants. They murdered the great Prophet of the Church, and thus practically vindicated the conduct of their ancestors, in fhedding the blood of his meffengers. They killed "the juft One,” and brought on themfelves the guilt of all the righteous blood formerly fhed. God was therefore to visit them with as much feverity, as if he had never before made inquifition for blood. As their guilt was accumulated from one generation to another, their punishment was to be unexampled. He would profecute his controversy with them, with as great feverity as was poffible, without utterly destroying them as a people. Hence the apostle Paul gives this account of their fin and punishment: They "both killed the Lord "Jefus, and their own prophets, and have perfe“cuted us ;—to fill up their fins alway: for," or therefore the wrath is come upon them to the "uttermoft y." *

x Mat. xxi. 35---41.

y 1 Theff. ii. 15, 16.

A

The obfervations of a very eminent writer, on the parallel paffage, Luke xi. 50, 51, deferve our attention. "There is in this commination an appearance of severity beyond the rule established, Exod. xx. 5.-Here the vengeance and punishment due unto the fins of an hundred generations, is threatened to be inflicted on that which was prefent.The cafe here is particular. That in the command respects the common cafe of all falfe worshippers, and their pofterity; but this refpects the perfecution unto blood and death of the true worshippers of God. Now, though

God