some a promise, others a threatening; some a wish, others an exhortation; some a censure, others a motive to action; some a parable, some a reason; some a comparison of two things together, some a vision, some a thanksgiving; some a description of the wrath, or majesty of God, of the sun, or some other thing; a commendation of the law, or of some person; a prayer; an amplification of joy, or affliction; a pathetic exclamation of anger, sorrow, admiration, imprecation, repentance, confession of faith, patriarchal or pastoral benediction, consolation, &c. I take the greatest part to be mixed, containing different kinds of things. It is very important for a man, who would compose, to examine his text well upon these articles, and carefully to distinguish all its characters, for in so doing he will presently see what way he ought to take.

Having well examined of what kind the text is, enter into the matter, and begin the composition; for which purpose you must observe, there are two general ways, or two manners of composing. One is the way of explication, the other of observations: nor must it be imagined that you may take which of the two ways you please on every text, for some texts must be treated in the explicatory method, and others necessarily require the way of observations. When you have a point of doctrine to treat of, you must have recourse to explication; and when a text of history, the only way is observation.

In discernment upon this article the judgment of a man consists; for, as texts of scripture are almost infinite, it is impossible to give perfect rules thereupon; it depends in general on good sense: only this I say, when we treat of a plain subject, common and known to all the world, it is a great absurdity to take the way of explication; and when we have to treat of a difficult or important subject, which requires explaining, it would be equally ridiculous to take the way of observations.

The difficulty, of which we speak, may be considered, either in regard to the terms of the text only, the subject itself being clear, after the words are explained; or in regard to the subject only, the terms themselves being very intelligible; or in regard to both terms and things..

If the terms be obscure, we must endeavour to give the true sense but if they be clear, it would be trifling to affect to make them so; and we must pass on to the difficulty, which is in the subject itself. If the subject be clear, we must explain the terms, and give the true sense of the words. If there appear any absurdity or difficulty in both, both must be explained: but always begin with the explanation of the terms.

In the explication of the terms, first propose what they call ratio dubitandi, that is, whatever makes the difficulty. The reason of doubting, or the intricacy, arises often from several causes. Either the terms do not seem to make any sense at all; or they are equivocal, forming different senses; or the sense, which they seem at first to make, may be perplexed, improper, or contradictory; or the meaning, though clear in itself, may be controverted, and exposed to cavillers. In all these In all these cases, after you have proposed the difficulty, determine it as briefly as you can; for which purpose avail yourself of criticisms, notes, comments, paraphrases, &c. and, in one word, of the labours of other persons.

If none of these answer your expectation, endeavour to find something better yourself; to which purpose, examine all the circumstances of the text, what precedes, what follows, the general scope of the discourse, the particular design of the writer in the place where your text is, the subject of which it treats, parallel passages of scripture which treat of the same subject, or those in which the same expressions are used, &c.; and by these means it' is almost impossible that you should not content yourself. Above all, take care not to make of grammatical matters a principal part; but only treat of them as previously necessary for understanding the text.

To proceed from terms to things. They must, as I have said, be explained, when they are either difficult or important. There are several ways of explication. You may begin by refuting errors, into which people have fallen; or you may fall upon the subject immediately, and so come to a fair and precise declaration of the truth; and, after this, you may dilate, (if I may venture to say so) by a deduction of the principles, on which the text

depends,

depends, and on the essential relations, in which it ought to be considered1.

The same method must be taken, when texts are misunderstood, and gross and pernicious errors adduced. In such a case, first reject the erroneous sense, and (if necessary) even refute it, as well by reasons taken from the texts, as by arguments from other topics; and at length establish the true sense.

Take for example, John xvi. 12. I have yet many things to say unto you; but ye cannot bear them now. You must begin by proposing and rejecting the false senses, which some ancient heretics gave of these words. They said, Jesus Christ spoke here of many unwritten traditions, which he gave his disciples by word of mouth after his resurrection-An argument which the church of Rome has borrowed, to colour her pretended traditions. After you have thus proposed the false sense, and solidly refuted it, pass on to establish the true, and shew what were the things which Jesus Christ had yet to say to his disciples, and which they could not then bear.

I would advise the same method for all disputed texts. Hold it as a maxim, to begin to open the way to a truth by rejecting a falsehood. Not that it can be always done; sometimes you must begin by explaining the truth, and afterwards reject the error; because there are certain occasions, on which the hearers' minds must be preoccupied; and because also truth, well proposed and fully established, naturally destroys error: but, notwithstanding this, the most approved method is to begin by rejecting error. After all, it must be left to a man's judgment when he ought to take different courses.

There are texts of explication, in which the difficulty arises neither from equivocal terms, nor from the different senses in which they may be taken, nor from objections which may be formed against them, nor from the abuse which heretics have made of them; but from the intricacy of the subject itself, which may be difficult to comprehend,

aud

Mr. Claude here explains Acts ix. 5. not as expressing merely that Paul's opposition to him was fruitless, but as saying, that it arose from the hardness of his heart; as though oxλngóv co had been put for oxangóτns o. The Editor, not thinking the interpretation just, has omitted it. The Reader, if he wish to see an illustration of the point before him, may refer to the first head of Skel. 85.

and may require great study and meditation. On such texts you need not, you must not, amuse yourself in proposing difficulties, nor in making objections; but you must enter immediately into the explication of the matter, and take particular care to arrange your ideas well, that is to say, in a natural and easy order, beginning where you ought to begin; for if you do not begin right, you can do nothing to the purpose; and, on the contrary, if you take a right road, all will appear easy as you go on to the end. If, for example, I were to preach from this text, The law was given by Moses; but grace and truth came by Jesus Christ; I would divide this text into two parts. The first should regard the ministry of the law; the second, that of the gospel: the one expressed in these words, The law was given by Moses; the other in these, Grace and truth came by Jesus Christ. I should subdivide the first into two parts; the law, and its author, Moses.

I would then enter into the matter, by saying, that I could not give a more just idea of the law than by placing it in opposition to grace and truth; so that, to consider it well, we must observe it in two respects; as a ministry of rigour opposed to grace; and as a ministry of shadows and imperfections opposed to truth.

To explain the law as a ministry of rigour, I would observe, that in the design of God in sending his Son into the world, and in bringing men to salvation, it was necessary, before he began the work, to prepare the way, and to remove those obstacles, which, had they not been removed, would have frustrated his design. One of these obstacles was man's ignorance of himself and God. He was ignorant of himself; for he was a sinner immersed in crimes, an object of the eternal vengeance of the Creator, deserving to be plunged into hell, a slave of unrighteousness, of himself incapable of the least degree of holiness, and yet more so of delivering himself from the curse under which he was, and of entering into communion with God. Yet, ignorant of his state, he believed himself worthy of the love of God, capable of acquitting himself well of his duty, and of answering the whole end of his creation, enjoying himself with as much pride, quietness, and haughtiness, as if he had been the happiest of all creatures.

On the other hand, man had indeed some confused ideas of the divinity; and, before the coming of Christ,

he

he could not but see in the works of nature, the providence, the justice, and the majesty of God: but all these ideas were entombed in an almost infinite number of errors, and all became useless, by the infinite dissipations which worldly objects caused, by the natural blindness of his mind, and hardness of his heart. In one word, he slept a double sleep, equally ignorant of his misery and his duty. The sword of divine justice was upon him; but he did not feel it: and although the condition of his nature, and his dependence upon God, bound him to almost infinite obligations, yet he did not perceive them.

It was therefore needful, before Christ came into the world, to awaken man from his double security. He must be made to feel the greatness of his sins, the curse that he had drawn on himself, the horror of hell, which he deserved, the excellent glory that he had lost, and the Creator's indignation, to which he was exposed. It was needful to discover to him his inability to raise himself from that profound abyss into which he was fallen; to make him see, in all their extent, the rights of God, what mankind were obliged to render to him, and how far they were from an ability to do it. It was needful, in one word, to mortify their vanity, to abase their pride, and to conduct them, all-trembling, confounded, and afraid, to the foot of God's tribunal, in order that they might receive with joy the declaration of his mercy.

This was the end which God proposed in the ministry of the law, and for this purpose. 1. He manifested him self from the highest heavens in all the magnificence of infinite Majesty, to which all that pompous train belongs, which accompanied the publication of the law, and surrounded mount Sinai with thunderings and lightnings.

2. He declared all his rights over the creature, and the duty which a creature naturally owes him, by that admirable moral law, the words of which he caused them to hear from the midst of flaming fire, and which at length he wrote with his immortal finger on tables of stone.

3. He shewed most clearly and intelligibly, what a just and innocent creature might naturally hope for from him; and on the contrary, what a sinner had to fear. Do this (said he) and thou shalt live; and on the other hand, Cursed is every one who continueth not in all things written in the law to do them.

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