mercies they enjoy, and walked worthy of them, the Jews would soon be stirred up to seek those blessings, in the contempt of which they are hardened by Christians themselves.]
Let us learn then from hence,
1. To cultivate a knowledge of the Holy Scrip- tures ourselves —
[To us also are they a witness, as they were to the Jews of old, and are at this day : only they testify for God and against us in a thousand-fold greater degree. Hear what our blessed Lord himself affirms : " Search the Scriptures ; for they are they which testify of me." O what mysteries of love and mercy do the New-Testament Scriptures attest! the incarnation, the life, the death, the resurrection, the ascension of Jesus Christ ; his supremacy over all things in heaven and earth ; together with all the wonders of redeeming love ; how loudly do they testify for Christ ; and how awfully will they testify against us, if we neglect them ! If God commanded that the Jews, "men, women and children, and the strangers within their gates, should at stated times be gathered together, to hear the law, and learn to fear the Lord and to do his commandments," and that every individual among them in all successive ages should learn this song ; much more ought we to assemble ourselves together for public instruction, and to commit to memory select portions of Scripture, and to teach them diligently to our children, in order to obtain for ourselves, and to transmit to others, the know- ledge of God's will as it is revealed to us in the Gospel0 ! We call upon all of you then to study the Holy Scriptures in private ; to teach them to your children and servants ; to be useful, where you can, in reading them to your poorer neighbours, who through ignorance are unable to read them for themselves, or through sickness are incapacitated from attending the public ordinances. To be active also in the conducting of Sunday schools is a service most beneficial to man, and most acceptable to God.]
2. To impart the knowledge of them to the Jewish nation —
[They, alas ! have almost universally forgotten this song : but we have it in our hands, and profess to reverence it as the word of God. Ought we not then to concur with God in that which was his special design in transmitting it to us ? Ought we not to use it as the means of conviction to the Jews ; and as the means of consolation to them also ? Ought we not to seek that they may be partakers of our joy, and be again en- grafted on their own olive-tree ? Yet, strange as it may appear,
0 ver. 12, 13.