hand of power, he should dash in pieces his enemies as a potter's vesselb. Again, " His soul was not to be left in hell, nor was this Holy One to see corruption0." Does not that clearly shew that his soul was first to go into hell, i. e. the place of departed spirits ; that his body was to be consigned to the grave; and that he was afterwards to rise from the dead, and go into the presence of his Father, where there is a fulness of joy for evermore d? Again; his sufferings are, in the 22d Psalm, minutely described, as preparatory to that exaltation which he was to receive, when " the kingdom should be his, and he should be the Governor among the nations e." The Prophet Isaiah speaks of these things in as plain language as the New Testament itself. The Messiah, according to him, was to have his visage marred more than any man, previous to his sprinkling of many nations, and converting to himself the
kings of the earth f Daniel also speaks to the same
effect, saying, that the very Messiah, who was to possess an everlasting kingdom, must nevertheless be first " cut ofT,-' though not for himself, but for his people's sins, to make reconciliation for their iniquities, and to bring in everlasting righteousness g.
Now the Apostle would ask, Are not these passages con- tained in your Scriptures ? and have not the most pious and learned men of our own nation considered them as predictions relative to their Messiah ? And do they not in that view proved indisputably, that Christ must die and rise again ?
We may conceive him, then, as proceeding to the types, by which these things were shadowed forth. What, he would say, meant the restoration of Isaac from the dead, but the restor- ation of God's only dear Son from the dead, after he had been offered a sacrifice for sinh? What meant all the Mosaic sacri- fices, and the carrying of their blood within the vail, but the shedding of Christ's blood, and his going afterwards, as our great High Priest, with his own blood, into the holy place not made with hands ; himself being shadowed forth, both by the victim that was offered, and the priest that offered it1? What meant that peculiar offering, the two birds ; of which one was killed, and the other, dipped in its blood, was let loose into the airk ? or that of the two goats, whereof one was slain, and the other, with all the sins of Israel put upon its head, led into the wilderness, that it might never more be seen of men ? Were these of doubtful signification ? Do they not prove clearly what the Messiah was to do and suffer ; even that, for
b Ps. ii. 1 — 9. c Ps. xvi. 9, 10. d Ps. xvi. 11.
e Ps. xxii.l — 18,22,27,28. f Isai.lii. 14,15. Seealsoliii.9— 12. B Dan. vii. 13, 14. with ix. 24, 2(3. h Heh. xi. 17 — 19.
j Heb. ix. 7. 11. 12. * Lev. xiv. 49— 53.
4(34 ACTS, XVII. 11, hi. [1789.
every sentiment to that test, and try it by that touchstone
" If men speak not according to the written word,
there is no light in them0."]
2. That the knowledge of Christ, as dying and vising again for us, is the one appointed mean of sal- vation—
[It was with Jews that the Apostle argued : yet the Jews did worship the only true God, and professed to reverence his holy law. But when the Gospel was fully preached, the Jew could no longer be saved by the observance of his own law: he must embrace the Gospel, and look to Christ as the Messiah, the Saviour of the world. Thus also must all act who bear the Christian name : they must not be contented with an outward conformity to the Gospel, but must embrace it as " all their salvation and all their desire." As for the opposition that is made to the life and power of the Gospel, it is rather an argu- ment in its favour than otherwise : for thus the Gospel ever has been treated ; and thus it will be, as long as there shall be an ungodly man upon earth. But, if the whole world should rise up against it, let it be our endeavour to receive it in our hearts, to confess it with our lips, and to adorn it with our lives.]