propriate, that this solemn and yet joyous feast, which commemorated the delivery of the Law, and the incoming of the harvest, should at the very hour of its abrogation be thus honoured, by what was in fact the sealing of the apostles' commission, the delivery of the Gospel, and the in-coming of their great and glorious harvest. For mark the first-fruits which it witnessed. "The same day, there were added unto them about three thousand souls!" How was the delivery of the law, for ever overshadowed by the far more splendid manifestations of divine wisdom and love in the proclamation of the Gospel! How were the two wheaten loaves that were offered to God, under the old dispensation, for ever eclipsed by the three thousand souls that were on that day presented. to Him under the new, as cleansed by the blood of his Son, and made meet to be partakers of the inheritance of the saints in light!

22. And when ye reap the harvest of your land, thou shalt not make clean riddance of the corners of thy field when thou reapest, neither shalt thou gather any gleaning of thy harvest; thou shalt leave them unto the poor, and to the stranger: I am the Lord your God.

This single verse comes in with striking and affecting propriety, at the close of the directions for celebrating what might be termed the Jewish "harvesthome."

They were forbidden to make any gleaning of their fields, or to rake up any of the loose ears of corn which the reaper had left, that something might always remain for the poor and the stranger. This was not merely enjoined on the score of charity, but

knowing the hardness of men's hearts, it was absolutely bound upon them by the Almighty on the score of duty; and the solemn reason thus added, "I am the Lord your God." As if Jehovah had said, the whole of your harvest, every blade of corn that you cut, every ear that you gather, comes entirely from my bounty, and I therefore order you to reserve the little that escapes the mower for the poor and the stranger. For many centuries, in our own happy country, this merciful privilege of the poor, although certainly not binding upon us, was still almost universally vouchsafed to them. The increase of machinery-and must we not add, of avarice?—has now, alas! almost abolished this charitable custom; but still we believe that the rich cultivator will not be richer, or the indigent one the farther removed from insolvency, by thus abridging the time-honoured privileges of the poor. To the eye of a Christian, the sight of a field full of gleaners, is one of the most interesting objects which the country can afford him; and when he meets whole families laden with the hard-earned produce, and sees their happy looks while thus securing their winter's store, he thinks of this command of his God, and blesses Him in his heart, for his merciful guardianship of the most destitute of his people; while he also rejoices to think that there are yet some who still love the poor, and desire not to deprive them of these small opportunities of benefiting by the seasons of the rich man's plenty.

The blessing of God usually runs in the channel of the promise, "Them that honour me I will honour;"

and they who honour not God of their abundance, will find in the end, that abundance without God is no blessing. Let us all learn from this "law of gleaning," that we cannot better testify our gratitude, or prove our thankfulness to our heavenly Father in a time of wealth, or prosperity, than by delighting to make our poorer brethren partakers of our joy; and in whatever station of life we are, that acts of kindness, sympathy, and almsgiving, are among the most frequently-required tests, that we are the real partakers of the grace of God, and that we consider ourselves, not the absolute possessors, but simply the stewards of those good things which the Almighty has committed to our charge.

EXPOSITION LXI.

CHAP. xxiii. 23-32.

23. And the Lord spake unto Moses, saying,

24. Speak unto the children of Israel, saying, In the seventh month, in the first day of the month, shall ye have a sabbath, a memorial of blowing of trumpets, a holy convocation.

25. Ye shall do no servile work therein; but ye shall offer an offering made by fire unto the Lord.

We have, in these verses, the account of the institution of one of the lesser feasts, "the feast of trumpets." The Israelites were ordered on the first day of the seventh month, which was, as Bishop Patrick says, the first day of their civil year, to do no servile

work, and to blow the trumpets from morning till evening. The intention of this feast is not known. Some have supposed that it was a memorial of the awful sounds of the trumpet on Mount Sinai, at the giving of the law. Others of the Jewish writers have believed that it had a spiritual signification; that it was intended at the beginning of the year to awaken the Israelites from their lethargy, and to call them to thoughtfulness and repentance. They were thus to be prepared for the day of atonement, which occurred only nine days after, and which, though already described in the sixteenth chapter, is again, on account of its great importance, particularized in the verses that follow.

26. And the Lord spake unto Moses, saying,

27. Also on the tenth day of this seventh month there shall be a day of atonement: it shall be a holy convocation unto you; and ye shall afflict your souls, and offer an offering made by fire unto the Lord.

28. And ye shall do no work in that same day; for it is a day of atonement, to make an atonement for you before the Lord your God.

29. For whatsoever soul it be that shall not be afflicted in that same day, he shall be cut off from among his people.

30. And whatsoever soul it be that doeth any work in that same day, the same soul will I destroy from among his people.

31. Ye shall do no manner of work; it shall be a statute for ever throughout your generations in all your dwellings.

32. It shall be unto you a sabbath of rest, and ye shall afflict your souls: in the ninth day of the month at even, from even unto even, skull ye celebrate your sabbath.

We have before* considered the great and striking peculiarities of this most solemn day in the Israelitish

* See Exposition LVII.

year; the commemoration of the atonement made by Moses, for the sins of the golden calf, and on which the two goats, that most lively symbol of the great atonement, were ever afterwards presented before the Lord, the one to die, the other to escape into the wilderness, laden with the sins of the congregation. Upon the first institution of this important fast, only the priests' duties appear to have been appointed; in the verses we have just read, these are not again repeated; it is taken for granted, that they should remain as already enacted, and now the duty of the people on that day is most clearly pointed out. It was to be kept as a solemn and rigid fast day: the Israelites were commanded to "afflict their souls," or, in other words, to abstain from food, "from even unto even," that is, from sun-set the day before to sun-set on the day of the atonement itself; no work was to be done, upon pain of death, and every soul in the congregation was to afflict and humble itself before God, on account of sin. Since the whole of these ancient institutions were doubtless symbolical and typical of the blessed dispensation under which we live, no one can question the feeling which was shadowed forth by this method of keeping the day of atonement. No one can doubt that in seeking the atonement for our sins, this plainly prefigures the state of mind in which we should approach God. A deep and heart-felt sense of humiliation, sorrow, and self-abhorrence; a loathing of those things that have been offensive to the eye of a pure, a holy, a heart-searching God; a real "afflicting of the soul," and a free and full confession to our heavenly Father, of all that has been amiss, before we