VER. 15-19.] EPISTLE TO THE HEBREWS. 167
ritual eye: always provided that their search and inquiry be regu- lated according to the will of God, in a due use of the means; for to this purpose not only the private endeavours of men are re- quired, but the use also of the public ministry, which is ordained of God to lead men gradually into continual further acquaintance with the will of God in the Scripture.
Some think that it belongs unto the fulness of the Scripture that each place in it should have various senses,—some say three, some four. But this, deed, is to empty it of all fulness; for if it have not everywhere one proper determinate sense, it hath none at all, This it hath; but the things which the words of it are signs of and are expressed by, are so great, deep, and mys- terious, and have such various respects unto our light, faith, and obedience, as that it is unsearchably instructive unto us. “ The commandment is exceeding broad,” Ps. cxix. 96, 82 7307;—the word used to express the wideness of the sea, Ps, civ. 25, “bina Dn DY} An, —“'The great sea,” that hath “wide and large arms,” which it stretcheth out to comprehend the whole earth. So doth the command widen and stretch out its arms, to comprehend the whole church of God, to water it and to make it fruitful. God haying enstamped his authority and wisdom upon it, every concern- ment of it, every consequence from it, every circumstance reported in it, hath its authority in and upon the consciences of men for the end whereunto it is designed. Hence we may observe, that in the quotations of testimonies out of the Old Testament in the New, it is very seldom that the principal aim and intendment of any place is insisted on, but rather some peculiar specialty that is either truly included in the words or duly educed by just consequence from them.
And this may teach men what diligence they ought to use in searching and studying of the Scripture. Slight, inadvertent con- siderations will be of little use in this matter. Especially is this incumbent on them whose duty and office it is to declare and ex- pound them unto others. And there is amongst many a great mis- carriage in these things, and that both in some that teach, and some that only privately read or meditate on the word. Some men preach with very little regard to the Scripture, either as to the treasury and promptuary of all the truth they are to dispense, or as to the rule whereby they are to proceed. And some are ready to coin notions in their own minds, or to learn them from others, and then attempt to put them upon the Scripture. or obtain counte- nance from thence unto them: and this is the way of men who invent and vent false opinions and groundless curiosities, which a previous due reverential observance of the word might have de- livered them from, And some again, and those too many, super-
168 AN EXPOSITION OF THE © [CHAP. IIL
ficially take up with that sense of the words which obviously pre- sents itself unto their first consideration, which they improve to their own purpose as they see cause. Such persons as these see little of the wisdom of God in the word; they enter not into those mines of gold; they are but passengers, they do not “stand in the counsel of God, to hear his word,” Jer. xxiii. 22. It is certain that the dili- gent search into the Scriptures which is commended unto us, which the worth of them and the things contained in them requires, and which that fulness and comprehension of truth that is in them doth make necessary, is by most neglected. And the same may be ob- served in multitudes of commentators and expositors, They ex- press things otherwise one than another, but for the most part directly the same. Seldom any one ventures into the deep one step beyond what he sees his way beat before him, and, as he sup- poses, his ground secure; though a diligent inquirer may often find the most beaten path either to turn away from the fountain, or at least to end and fail before it comes there. I would not speak any thing to encourage men in bold adventures, groundless conjectures, and curious pryings into things hidden, secret, and marvellous; but it is humble diligence, joined with prayer, meditation, and waiting on God for the revelation of his will, in the study of the Scripture, upon the account of the fulness of its treasury, and the guiding, instructive virtue wherewithal its concerns are accompanied, that I would press after. And hence I am persuaded that the church of God hath, through his care and faithfulness, had great advantage from their opposition unto the truth who, to countenance their own errors, have searched curiously into’all the concernments of the words of many testimonies given unto the truth. For though ~ they have done this to their own destruction, yet “ out of this eater there hath come forth meat;” for they have not only given an occa- sion unto, but imposed a necessity upon us to search with all dili- gence into every concernment of some most material passages in the Scripture, and that to the clearing of the truth and the stablish- ing of the minds of many. That which I would press from these considerations, grounded on the precedent before us, wherein the apostle, from sundry latent circumstances of the text, draws out sin- gular useful observations in reference unto our faith and obedience, is, that our utmost diligence, especially in them who are called unto the instruction of others, is required in this neglected, yea despised work of searching the Scriptures. And as a consequent of the neglect hereof, I cannot but say that I have observed a threefold defect amongst sundry teachers, that was in general intimated be- fore; as, first, When men scarce at any time make use of the Scripture in their preaching any further than to make remarks and observations on the obvious sense of any place, neither entering