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towards others as we desire that they should act towards us, was the sum and substance, the scope and completion, of "the law and the prophets :" he lays great stress on the words of Hosea, & I will have mercy and not sacrifice: he places judgment, mercy, and fidelity among the weightier matters of the law he teaches that on the two commandments which enjoined the love of God and of our neighbour all the law and the prophets depended, as leading principles. This was indirectly abating the reverence of the Jews for the ceremonial part of their law which our Lord may further be supposed to have intended, by healing on the sabbath, by vindicating his disciples for plucking ears of corn on the sabbath, by commanding the infirm man to take up his bed on that day, and by absenting himself from many of the legal feasts. It would have been matter of great offence to the Jews if he had not been born under the law, and if he had not conformed to it in general. In many places he mentions the observance of it as a duty. "If thou bring thy gift to the altar, and there remember that thy brother hath ought against thee; leave there thy gift before the altar, and go thy way; first be reconciled to thy brother, and then come and offer thy gift." His words to one whom he had healed of a leprosy were, "Go thy way, shew thyself to the priest, and offer

f Matt. vii. 12. gib. ix. 13. xii. 7. hib. xxiii. 23. ¡ c. xxii. 40. Γνώθι σεαυτόν· καὶ τὸ, Μηδὲν ἄγαν· ἐκ τέτων γὰρ ἤρθῆται τα λοιπά παίζα. Know thyself: and, do nothing to excess: for on these every thing else depends. Plut. quoted by Wetstein in loc. * Matt. v. 23, 4.

c. viii. 4.

n

the gift that Moses commanded." And this was his general exhortation to the people: "Whatsoever the Scribes and Pharisees command you to observe, that observe and do." There are also many occasions on which he speaks honourably of the law. "Think not that I am come to destroy the law and the prophets: I am not come to destroy, but to fulfil." I am not come to abrogate it prematurely and unnaturally; but to accomplish its typical and prophetical declarations, and to supersede it by a law of grace and truth. "It is easier for heaven and earth to pass "What is away, than one tittle of the law to fail."

written in the law? how readest thou ?" However, he plainly intimates the superior excellence of the gospel covenant. "Among those that are born of women there is not a greater prophet than John the Baptist but he that is least in the kingdom of God is greater than he.” When he observes that "all the prophets and the law prophesied until John," he asserts their subserviency to the gospel covenant. And when he says to the Pharisees in another place, "The law and the prophets were until John;" there is a very remarkable implication that the ceremonial law subsisted no longer to the members of the kingdom of heaven. This was one of the truths which his disciples could not bear. Stephen was arraigned before the Jewish council for being supposed to advance it. But after Christ's death the Spirit clearly revealed that the Mosaical law was not

m Matt. xxiii. 3. n c. v. 17. P Luke x. 26. See also Matt. xii. 5.

t

• Luke xvi. 17. Matt. v. 18. 9 Luke vii. 28. and p. p.

Matt. xi. 13.

Buke xvi. 16.

t

Acts vi. 14.

obligatory on Christians and the epistle to the Hebrews was written to shew the superiority of the Christian law above the Jewish.

W

Another subject, occasionally introduced by our Lord with the greatest wisdom, was the admission of the Gentiles into the church of God. This part of the divine counsels is early mentioned in the gospels, to shew that it was not an after thought on the rejection of Christ by the Jews. It was referred to by Simeon, when the child Jesus was presented in the temple. The appearance of the star to the Arabian Magi shewed that the Gentiles had an interest in the birth of Christ and John the Baptist alluded to the conversion of the heathen, when he taught the Pharisees and Sadducees that God was able of the very stones to raise up children unto Abraham. Our Lord's prophecies of this event both by parable and in express terms are elsewhere enumerated. The * most distinct of them was addressed to the Jews during the last week of his life. To his he was more explicit; and, especially, resurrection. It was made the subject of to Peter, when he had received the Spirit. what a tumult was raised, when St. Paul represented Christ as saying, "I will send thee far hence unto the Gentiles." To this apostle the gospel of the * uncircumcision was committed; and he expressly

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disciples after his

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a vision We see

w Luke . S1, 2

2 Matt. xxi. 45

bib. xxviii. 19.

d c. xxii. 21.

⚫ Gal. ii. 7.

assures us that the call of the Gentiles was God's

f eternal purpose.

It must be observed also that the wise and lowly Jesus was not full and explicit on the subject of his own glorious nature and exalted offices. This light was too strong to be admitted at once. But after his resurrection and ascension and the descent of the Holy Spirit, after a gradual preparation of men for such magnificent truths, it was revealed by his apostles that he was from the beginning, that he was the h Word of God, that by him all things were cre-, ated, that he was the image and 'representative of the invisible God, and that he was over all " God blessed for ever.

k

SECTION XIV.

A RECAPITULATION OF OUR LORD'S CHARACTER.

UPON the whole when our Lord is considered as a teacher we find him delivering the justest and most sublime truths with respect to the divine nature, the duties of mankind, and a future state of existence; agreeable in every particular to reason, and to the wisest maxims of the wisest philosophers; without any mixture of that alloy which so often debased their most perfect productions; and excellently adapted to mankind in general, by suggesting

Eph. iii. 11. i Col. i. 16.

1 John i. 1. kib. v. 15.

b John i. 1. 1 John i. 1. Rev. xix. 3. 1 John i. 18. In Rom. ix. 5.

circumstances and particular images on the most awful and interesting subjects.

We find him filling, and, as it were, overpowering our minds with the grandest ideas of his own nature; representing himself as appointed by his Father to be our instructor, our redeemer, our judge, and our king; and shewing that he lived and died for the most benevolent and important purposes conceivable.

He does not labour to support the greatest and most magnificent of all characters; but it is perfectly easy and natural to him. He makes no display of the high and heavenly truths which he utters; but speaks of them with a graceful and wonderful simplicity and majesty. Supernatural truths are as familiar to his mind, as the common affairs of life to other men.

He takes human nature as it came from the hands of its Creator; and does not, like the stoics, attempt to fashion it anew, except as far as man had corrupted it. He revives the moral law, carries it to perfection, and enforces it by peculiar and animating motives: but he enjoins nothing new besides praying in his name, and observing two simple and significant positive laws which serve to promote the practice of the moral law. All his precepts, when rightly explained, are reasonable in themselves and useful in their tendency and their compass is very great, considering that he was an occasional teacher, and not a systematical one.

If from the matter of his instructions we pass on to the manner in which they were delivered, we find

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