Such was the Cloud that appeared at our Saviour's Transfiguration. It is faid to have been a bright Cloud. And St. Peter calls it the magnificent Glory 2 Pet. i. 17. For whereas we are here told, that a Voice came out of the Cloud, it is there expreffed thus, that a Voice came from the magnificent Glory. Yet probably there was a Mixture of Shade. The Cloud overshadowed them: It covered them, and caft a Kind of Vail over the Splendors with which they were furrounded. We do not read that there were Thunders, or Lightning or Tempeft, as at Sinai, or that the whole Mount trembled greatly: It pleafed God now to give a milder Exhibition of his Glory, fuited to the gentler Nature of the evangelical Difpenfation. And, if there had been only this bright and majestic Cloud appearing on this Occafion, it would have tended very much to the Honour of our Saviour Jefus Chrift. But this was not all: Bebold, a Voice came out of the Cloud, which faid, This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleafed; hear ye him. Nothing could yield a more glorious Testimony to our Lord, than to have God himself thus pronouncing him his beloved Son, declaring his Approbation of him, and Complacency in his Undertaking, and folemnly commanding the Sons of Men to bear and to obey him.

Let

Let us a little diftinctly confider this heavenly Voice; for we ourselves are very nearly concerned in it. To this may be applied what our Saviour faith on another Occafion of the like Kind, John xii. 30. This Voice came not becaufe of me, but for your Sakes. It was uttered for our Sakes, for all that fhould ever hear of it by the Gofpel to the End of the World. Since we have fufficient Affurance given us of the Truth of the Fact, that fuch a Divine Voice there really was, it ought in all Reafon to have a mighty Influence upon us: For the Voice is directed as really to us in the Divine Intention, though not fo immediately, as it was to the Disciples that first heard it.

The first Thing to be obferved in this Voice, or Teftimony, is the Declaration here given concerning our Lord Jesus Chrift, that he was the beloved Son of God: This is my beloved Son.

This Character, the Son of God, admitteth of various Senfes in the facred Writings: For befides that all good Men are honoured with the Title and Character of the Sons of God, and are faid to be born of God, because of the Refemblance they bear to him in his amiable moral Excellencies; Adam, our first Parent, is called in a special Senfe the Son of God, as diftinguished from his Pofterity, who are properly the Sons of

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Men,

Men, Luke iii. 38, because he derived his Being in an immediate Manner from God himself, without the Intervention of any human Parent. Magiftrates and Princes are fometimes called the Sons of God, because they in fome Measure resemble him in their Dominion and Sovereignty; and this Character is applied in a ftill higher Senfe to the bleffed Angels, who are far fuperior to the best and greatest of Men in Dignity and Excellence. But our Lord Jefus Chrift is called the Son of God in a yet more eminent and appropriated Senfe. He might be faid to be the Son of God with Refpect to the peculiar Original of his human Nature, with Regard to which he had no natural Father, but had his Body formed in the Womb of the Virgin by the extraordinary Influence and Energy of the Holy Ghoft, or the Power of the Higheft. But this is not the chief Thing that is intended by this Character: For he was the Son of God antecedently to his Incarnation, as is plainly implied, when it is reprefented as the most wonderful Inftance of the Greatnefs of the Divine Love to Mankind, that

God fo loved the World, that he gave his only begotten Son. John iii. 16. or, as it is expreffed, 1 John iv. 9, in this was manifefted the Love of God towards us, that he fent bis only begotten Son into the World, that we

might live through him. He is called his only begotten Son, and his own proper Son, Rom. viii. 32, as being his Son in a most glorious and peculiar and tranfcendent Senfe, in which no Man, or Angel, or any mere Creature, is fo. Hence the facred Writer of the Epistle to the Hebrews argueth, that be is fo much better than the Angels, as be bath by Inheritance obtained a more excellent Name than they: For unto which of the Angels faid God at any Time, Thou art my Son, this Day have I begotten thee? Heb. i. 4, 5. It becometh us not to be too curious in our Inquiries into the Grounds and Reafon of this Appellation. One Defign of it may be to fignify his univerfal Dominion and Sovereignty, that he is the Heir of all Things, as he is called, Heb. i. 2. He is faid to have been declared to be the Son of God with Power by his Refurrection from the Dead, Rom. i. 4, becaufe then his Dominion and Glory was illuftriously manifefted. But the most proper and eminent Defign of this Character, as attributed to our Lord Jefus Chrift, feemeth to be to fignify the ineffable and most intimate Union and Conjunction between the Father and him; that he is the Partaker of the fame Divine Nature, the fame glorious Perfections with the eternal Father, and is the Brightness of his Glory,

and

and the express Image of his Perfon. And, this being fo, no Wonder that he is here alfo called his beloved Son. God, who is Love and Goodnefs itself, loveth all his Creatures with a Love of Benevolence, fo as to be ever ready to do them Good, and to promote their Happiness in a Way agreeable to their Natures, and confiftent with his moral Government and Perfections; and he loves thofe of them beft who most nearly refemble him. But he loveth his Son with a Love of a more eminent and tranfcendent Kind. As he loveth himself with an infinite Love, as being eternally and invariably poffeffed of all poffible Perfections, and taketh a Divine Complacency and Satisfaction in his own glorious Excellencies; fo he loveth his Son alfo with an infinite and eternal Love, as being his own effential Word and Image, in whom with ineffable Delight he beholdeth his own Glory and moft amiable Perfections moft fully expreffed and manifefted. To him may be applied what is faid concerning Divine Wifdom in the Book of Proverbs: The Lord poffeffed me in the Beginning of his Way, before his Works of old. I was fet up from everlafting, from the Beginning, or ever the Earth was. Then I was by bim, as one brought up with him; and I was daily his Delight, rejoicing always before