is impossible to read in the 15th chapter of Genesis the particulars of Abraham's offering of the heifer, the goat, the ram, the turtle-dove, and the pigeon-their ages, their sex, the circumspection with which he dissects and disposes them-whether all this be done in act or in vision, without feeling assured that very minute directions upon all these points were vouchsafed to the Patriarchal Church. Then as she had her sacrifices, so had she her types-types which in number scarcely yield to those of the Levitical Law, in precision and interest perhaps exceed them. For we meet with them in the names and fortunes of individuals whom the Almighty Disposer of events, without doing violence to the natural order of things, exhibits as pages of a living book in which the Promise is to be read-as characters expressing His counsels and covenants writ by His own finger-as actors, whereby he holds up to a world, not yet prepared for less gross and sensible impressions, scenes to come. It would lead me far beyond the limits of my argument were I to touch upon the multitude of instances, which will crowd, however, I doubt not, upon the minds of my readers. I might tell of Adam, whom St. Paul himself calls "the figure" or type "of Him that was to come."* I might tell of the sacrifice of Isaac (though not altogether after him whose vision upon this subject, always bright though often baseless, would alone have immortalized his name)—of that Isaac whose birth was preceded by an annunciation to his mother-whose conception was miraculous—who was named *Romans, v. 14. 1 Corinthians, xv. 45. † Genesis, xviii. 10. Ibid. xviii. 14. of the angel before he was conceived in the womb,* and Joy, or Laughter, or Rejoicing was that name-who was, in its primary sense, the seed in which all the nations of the earth were to be blessed-whose projected death was a rehearsal (as it were), almost two thousand years beforehand, of the great offering of all-the very mountain, Moriah, not chosen by chance, not chosen for convenience, for it was three days' journey from Abraham's dwellingplace, but no doubt appointed of God as the future scene of a Saviour's passion too § -a son, an only son the victim-the very instruments of the oblation, the wood, not carried by the young men, not carried by the ass which they had brought with them, * Genesis, xvii. 19. ‡ Ibid. xxii. 18. Ibid. xxi. 6. § Ibid. xxii. 2. 2 Chronicles, iii. 1. but laid on the shoulders of him who was to die, as the cross was borne up that same ascent of Him, who, in the fulness of time, was destined to expire upon it. But indeed I see the Promise all Genesis through, so that our Lord might well begin with Moses in expounding the things concerning Himself;* and well might Philip say, "We have found Him of whom Moses in the Law did write." I see the Promise all Genesis through, and if I have constructed a rude and imperfect Temple of Patriarchal Worship out of the fragments which offer themselves to our hands in that history, the Messiah to come is the spirit that must fill that Temple with His all-pervading presence, none other than He must be the Shekinah of the Tabernacle we have reared. For I confess myself wholly at a loss to ex* Luke, xxiv. 27. † John, i. 45. plain the nature of that Book on any other principle, or to unlock its mysteries by any other key. Couple it with this consideration, and I see the scheme of Revelation, like the physical scheme, proceeding with beautiful uniformity--an unity of plan connecting (as it has been well said by Paley) the chicken roosting upon its perch with the spheres revolving in the firmament; and an unity of plan connecting in like manner the meanest accidents of a household with the most illustrious visions of a prophet. Abstracted from this consideration, I see in it details of actions, some trifling, some even offensive, pursued at a length (when compared with the whole) singularly disproportionate; while things which the angels would desire to look into are passed over and forgotten. But this principle once admitted, and all is conse |