Secondly, With reference to his humanity to be assumed ; as to Abraham, Gen. xviii. 1, 2; — to Joshua, chapter v. 13-15, &c.
2dly, Of angels ; as unto Peter, Acts xii. 7 ; — to the women, Matt. xxviii. 5 ; — to John, Rev. xxii. 8, &c.
Sdly, Of men ;^ as in my text.
Now, the several advancements of all these ways in dignity and pre-eminence, according as they clearly make out intellectual verity, or according to the honour and exaltation of that whereof apparition is made, are too fruitless a speculation ^ for this day's exercise.
Our vision is of the latter sort, accompanied with a sensible appear- ance, and is called opa/^a. There be two words in the New Testament signifying vision, o/'a/«a and oTrair/a, coming from different verbs, but both signifying to see. Some distinguish them, and say that drr-agia, is a vision, — xa^' u-rap, an appearance to a man awake; Spa/ioc, — xad' omp, an appearance to a man asleep, called sometimes a dream, Job xxxiii. 15, — like that which was made to Joseph, Matt. ii. 1.9. But this distinction will not hold, our Saviour calling that vision which his disciples had at his transfiguration, when doubtless they were waking, opa/ia:,, Matt. xvii. 9. So that I conceive Paul had his vision waking; — and the night is specified as the time thereof, not to intimate his being asleep, but rather his watchfulness, seeking coun- sel of God in the night which way he should apply himself in the preaching of the gospel. And such I suppose was that of latter days, whereby God revealed to Zuinglius a strong confirmation of the doctrine of the Lord's supper, from Exod. xii. 11, against the factors for that monstrous figment of transubstantiation.
2. For the second, or time of this vision, I need say no more than what before I intimated.
3. The bringer of the message, — dvrjp n; nv Maytihuv igroog, he w^as a man of Macedonia in a vision. The Lord made an appearance unto him as of a man of Macedonia, discovering even to his bodily eyes a man ; and to his mind, that he was to be conceived as a man of Macedonia. This was, say some,'' an angel ; — the tutelar angel of the place, say the popish expositors,* or the genius of the place, accord- ing to the phrase of the heathens, of whom they learned their demo- nology; — perhaps him, or his antagonist, that not long before ap-
' Zech. ii. 1. ' Vid. Aquin. 2,2, q. 174. art. 3, 4. Scot, in dist. tert.
' Medo, Apost. of Later Times. * A Lapide, Sanctiiis in locum, &c.
UNCHANGEABLE, FREE MERCY. '9
peared to Bmtus^ at Philippi. But these are pleasing dreams; — us it may suffice that it was the appearance of a man, the mind of Paul being enlightened to apprehend him as a man^ of Macedonia; and that with infallible assurance, such as usually accompanieth divine revelations in them to whom they are made, as Jer. xxiii. 28, — for upon it Luke affiraieth, verse 10, they assuredly concluded that the Lord called them into Macedonia.
4. The message itself is a discovery of the want of the Macedonians, and the assistance they required, which the Lord was willing should be imparted unto them. Their want is not expressed, but included in the assistance desired, and the person unto whom for it they were directed. Had it been to help them in their estates, they should scarcely have been sent to Paul, who, I believe, might for the most part say, with Peter, " Silver and gold have I none ; "^ — or had it been with a complaint that they — who from a province of Greece, in a corner of Europe, had on a sudden been exalted into the empire of the eastern world — were now enslaved to the Roman power and op- pression, they might better have gone to the Parthians, then the only state in the world formidable to the Romans. Paul, though a military man, yet fought not with Nero's legions, the then visible devil of the upper world; but with legions of hell, of whom the earth was now to be cleared.^ It must be a soul- want, if he be intrusted with the supplying of it. And such this was, — help from death, hell, Satan, from the jaws of that devouring lion. Of this the Lord makes them here to speak, what every one in that condition ought to speak, — • Help, for the Lord's sake. It was a call to preach the gospel.
The words being opened, we must remember what was said before of their connection with the verses foregoing, — wherein the preachers of the gospel are expressly hindered from above from going to other places, and called hither. Whereof no reason is assigned, but only the will of Him that did employ them ; and that no other can be rendered I am farther convinced, by considering the empty conjec- tures of attempters.
God foresaw that they would oppose the gospel, says our Beda. So, say I, might he of all nations in the world, had not he deter- mined to send his effectual grace ^ for the removal of that opposition;
' Plutarch, in Vit. Bruti,