offered himself without fpot to God, CHAP. purge your confcience from dead worksh "to ferve the living God."

But as it may be thought, that this is fpoken only by way of application and comparison, let us proceed to examine the other paffage. "The bodies of those beasts, "whose blood is brought into the fanctuary by the high-prieft for fin, are "burned without the camp. Wherefore, Jefus alfo, that he might fanctify the "people with his own blood, fuffered with" out the gate It appears then, that Chrift was crucified out of the city, in order that this typical Prophecy might be accomplished.

By an attentive obferver, many points of resemblance will be difcovered between the emblem and the reality. The heifer was free from all blemish; Chrift was pure from every stain of fin. The heifer, on account of the impurity of the people, was

The fprinkling of the water of feparation is particularly faid to purify from the contact of a dead body.

II.

i Heb. ix. 13.

* Heb. xiii. II.

G 3

made

SECT. made unclean '; Chrift, on account of our II. iniquities, was made even fin itself m. The

heifer had never been brought under the yoke; Christ, so far from being subject to the bondage of fin, conferred upon others the glorious freedom of the fons of God. The heifer, as St. Paul obferves, was flain without the camp; Chrift fuffered without the gates of Jerufalem. Such are the principal features, in which the type and the antitype resemble each other.

A curious Jewish tradition respecting this ceremony is mentioned by Maimonides;

תשע פרות אדומות נעשו משנצטוו במצות זו עד שחרב הבית בשניה : ראשונה עשה משה רבינו שנייה עשה עזרא ושבע מעזרא עד חורבן הבית: והעשירי עושה המלך המשיח מהרה Nine red heifers * יגלח אמן כן יהיה רצון :

"have been facrificed between the original

delivering of this precept, and the defo"lation of the second temple. Our master "Mofes facrificed the firft; Ezra offered

up the fecond; and feven more were "flain during the period, which elapfed "from the time of Ezra to the deftruction

* of the temple. The tenth, King Mef- CHAP. "fiah himself will facrifice; by his speedy 11. "manifestation he will caufe great joy. Amen, may he come quickly "."

The Lord has indeed revealed himself already, and in his own person has offered up the last and the true facrifice, of which all others were only the appointed emblems. At once the priest and the victim, he has fully accomplished this fingular prophetical tradition, and has fhewn himself to be the only oblation which can take away the fins of the world. It is poffible, that God may have ordained it, that the Jews fhould thus unconsciously and involuntarily bear their teftimony to the felfoffered facrifice of the Meffiah. Such a fuppofition is not entirely devoid of probability, fince a fimilar inftance of undefigned prophecy is recorded by the pen of St. John°.

7.

The cities

7. There is a circumftance in the appointment of the cities of refuge, too re- of refuge. markable to be omitted in difcuffing the

SECT. purport of the ceremonial institutions. II. When the guilt even of unintentional vio

8.

Unclean meats.

lence had been incurred, the offender was directed to flee to one of these cities, from which he was not allowed to depart till the death of the high-priest.

This ordinance fhews the extreme hatred of God against any fin whatsoever; and proves that nothing but the death of our great high-priest could expiate that taint of original corruption, from which all our hidden and involuntary offences derive their origin. Before the mediatorial facrifice of Christ, we were confined, without a poffibility of deliverance, in the city of deftruction. The mercy of God did not indeed fuffer the destroyer to go forth against us: but we remained prisoners of hope, till fet free by the meritorious oblation of the Lamb of God,

8. The last peculiarity of the ceremonial inftitutes, which fhall be confidered, more particularly connects the Law and the Gospel. The Jews were ordered to abstain from certain kinds of meats, which, upon examination, will be found usually typical of fome vices practifed by the ido

laters;

laters; and, pursuant to the type, they CHAP. carefully withdrew from the company and II. fellowship of its antitype, the heathen nations. Thus the hog was a fit emblem of gluttony; the vulture, and the kite, of rapacity and cruelty; and the owl, of those deeds of darkness, which fhun the light. On the other hand, the kinds of food, which they were allowed to eat, were generally emblematical of fome virtue; as the ox, of patience and industry; the sheep, of meeknefs and innocence. Confequently,

those animals may be confidered as typical of the Church of God, at that time confined to the Jews.

But, when the Gospel came, the wall of distinction, between the Jew and the Gentile, was to be broken down. In place of the external cleanlinefs of meats, the fpiritual cleanliness of the foul is to be fubstituted; and, instead of rejecting unclean food, we are commanded to reject unclean actions,

Let us now advert to a famous typical prophecy under the Law, with its interpretation and completion under the Gospel. "There fhall come forth a rod out of the

" ftem