ticular detail, a more exact history, The predictions are the clearest, as the calamitiest were the greatest, which the world ever saw. And what heinous sin was it which could bring down such heavy judgments on the Jewish Church and nation? Can any other, with half so much probability, be assigned, as that which the Scripture assigns, their crucifying of the Lord of glory? As St. Paul expresses it, 1 Thess. ii. 15, 16, "they both killed the Lord Jesus, and their own prophets, and persecuted the Apostles," and so "filled up their sins, and wrath came upon them to the uttermost." This is always objected as the most capital sin of the nation. And upon reflection, we shall find some correspondence between their crime and their punishment. They put Jesus to death, when their nation was assembled to celebrate the passover; and when the nation was assembled, too, to celebrate the passover, Titus shut them up within the walls of Jerusalem. The rejection of the true Messiah was their crime; and their following of false Messiahs, to their destruction, was their punishment. They sold and bought Jesus as a slave; and they themselves were afterwards bought and sold as slaves, at the lowest prices. They preferred a robber and murderer to Jesus, whom they crucified between two thieves; and they themselves were infested with bands of thieves and robbers. They put Jesus to death lest the Romans should come and take away their place and nation; and the Romans did come and take away their place and nation. They crucified Jesus before the walls of Jerusalem; and before the walls of Jerusalem they themselves were crucified in such numbers, that it is said room was wanting for the crosses, and crosses for the bodies. I should think it hardly possible for any man to lay these things together, and not conclude the Jews' own imprecation to be remarkably fulfilled upon them, "His blood be on us, and on our children." Matt. xxvii. 25. We, Christians, cannot indeed be guilty of the very same offence, in crucifying the Lord of glory: but it behoves us to consider whether we may not be guilty in the same kind, and, by our sins and iniquities, "crucify the Son of God afresh, and put him to an open shame," Heb. vi. 6; and, therefore, whether, being like them in their crime, we may not also resemble them in their punishment. They rejected the Messiah, and we indeed have received him but have our lives been at all agreeable to our holy profession, or rather, as we have had opportunities of knowing Christ more, have we not obeyed him less, than other Christians, and "trodden under foot the Son of God, and counted the blood of the covenant, wherewith we are sanctified, an unholy thing, and done despite unto the Spirit of grace?" Heb. x. 29. The flagrant crimes of the Jews, and the principal sources of their calamities, in the opinion of Josephus, were their trampling upon all human laws, deriding divine things, and making a jest of the oracles of the prophets, as so many dreams and fables: and how hath the same spirit of licentiousness and infidelity prevailed likewise among us! How have the laws and lawful authority been insulted with equal insolence, and impunity! How have the holy Scriptures, those treasures of divine wisdom, not only been neglected, but despised, derided, and abused to the worst purposes! How have the principal articles of our faith been denied, the prophecies and miracles of Moses, and the works of Christ and his Apostles, been ridiculed, and impiety and blasphemy not only been whispered in the car, but proclaimed from the press How hath all public worship and religion, and the administration of the Sacraments, been slighted and condemned, and the Sabbath profaned, chiefly by those who ought to set a better example, "to whom much is given, and of whom much, therefore, will be required!" And if, for their sins and provocations, "God spared not the natural branches, take heed lest he also spare not thee. Because of unbelief they were broken off, and thou standest by faith; be not high-minded, but fear." Romans xi. 21, 22. God bore long with the Jews; and hath he not borne long with us too? But he cut them off when the measure of their iniquities was full; and let us beware lest our measure be not also well nigh full, and we be not growing ripe for excision. What said to the Church of Ephesus is very applica"Reble to us and our own case ; member, therefore, from whence thou art fallen, and repent, and do the first works; or else I will come unto thee quickly, and will remove thy candlestick out of his place, except thou repent." Rev. ii. 5.— BISHOP NEWTON. was HYMN. Great God of Abraham, hear our prayer; Their misery let thy mercy heal; How long shall Jacob's offspring prove Thy quick'ning Spirit now impart, And wake to joy each grateful heart; While Israel's rescued tribes in thee Their bliss and full salvation see! § LXXVII. CHAP. XXIV. 29–35. Christ foretelleth the signs of his coming to judgment. e 29 ¶Immediately after the tribulation of those days shall the sun be darkened, and the moon shall not give her light, and the stars shall fall from heaven, and the powers of the heavens shall be shaken : 30 And then shall appear the sign of the Son of man in heaven: " and then shall all the tribes of the earth mourn," and they shall see the Son of man coming in the clouds of heaven with power and great glory. 31 And he shall send his angels with a great sound of a trumpet, and they shall gather together his elect from the four winds, from one end of heaven to the other. k shall see all these things know 'that it is near, even at the doors. 34 Verily I say unto you, This generation shall not pass, till all these things be fulfilled. 35 "Heaven and earth shall pass away but my words shall not pass away. d Dan. vii. 11, 12.-e Is. xiii. 10. Ezek. xxxii. 7. Joel ii. 10, 31; & iii. 15. Amos v. 20; & viii. 9. Mark xiii. 24. Luke xxi. 25. Acts ii. 20. Rev. vi. 12.-f Dan. vii. 13. g Zech. xii. 12-h ch. xvi. 27. Mark xiii. 26. Rev. i. 7.-i ch. xiii. 41. 1 Cor. xv. 52. I Thess. iv. 16. - Or, with a trumpet, and a great voice.- Luke xxi. 29.- Jam. v. 9.-1 Or, he-m ch. xvi. 28; & xxiii. 36. Mark xiii 30. Luke xxi. 82.-n Ps. cii. 26. 1s. li. 6. Jer. xxxi. 35, 36. ch. v. 18. Mark xiii. 31. Luke xxi. 33. Heb. i. 11. Reader. These verses are usually regarded as a direct prophecy of our Lord's second coming to judge the world, of which great event the destruction of Jerusalem before alluded to may be regarded as a type. Bishop Horsley explains the notes of time thus ;-Immediately after the tribulation of those days, i. e. after the whole period of the tribulation of the Jewish nation,-the whole period during which Jerusalem is to be trodden down. The things to be speedily fulfilled (ver. 34), and which some of the Apostles and their contemporaries were to see, were the destruction of Jerusalem and the ruin and distress of the Jewish nation,-the commencement of that great and long tribulation which is to be followed by the return of the Son of man. 32 Now learn * a parable of the fig tree; When his branch "The tribulation began," says he, is yet tender, and putteth forth "in the days of the Jewish war; leaves, ye know that summer is but the period of it is at this day in nigh: its course, and will not end till the 33 So likewise ye, when ye time shall come, predetermined in the counsels of God, for the restoration of that people to their ancient seats. This whole period will probably be a period of affliction, not to the Jews only, but also in some degree to the Christian church: for not before the expiration of it will the true church be secure from persecution from without, from corruption, schism, and heresy within. But when this period shall be run out,-when the destined time shall come for the conversion and restoration of the Jewish people, immediately shall the sun be darkened, and the moon shall not give her light, i. e. great commotions and revolutions will take place among the kingdoms of the earth.-Under the image of these celestial disorders, the overthrow of some wicked nations in the last ages is predicted; probably of some who shall pretend to oppose, by force of arms, the return of the chosen race to the holy land, and the reestablishment of their kingdom." It is the general opinion of our Divines that the restoration of the Jews will consist in their conversion to the Christian faith, and their re-admission into the Divine favour, and that their return to their native land, in addition to those spiritual blessings, is also to be expected. READER.-Then shall appear the sign of the Son of man in heaven. The belief of our Lord's coming, so explicitly foretold, is an article of no little moment in a Christian's creed. It is true that the expectation of a future retribution is what ought, in the nature of the thing, to be a sufficient restraint upon a wise man's conduct, though we were uninformed of the manner in which it will be brought about, and were at liberty to suppose that every individual's lot would be silently determined, without any public entry of the Almighty Judge, and without the formality of a public trial. But, our merciful God hath been pleased to ordain that the business shall be so conducted, and the method of it so clearly foretold, as to strike the profane with awe, and to animate the humble and the timid. He hath warned us,-and let them who dare to extenuate the warning ponder the dreadful curse with which the book of prophecy is sealed, " If any man shall take away from the words of the book of this prophecy, God shall take away his part out of the book of life," God hath warned us that the inquiry into every man's conduct will be public, -Christ himself the judge, the whole race of man, and the whole angelic host, spectators of the awful scene. -As no elevation of rank will then give a title to respect, no obscurity of condition shall exclude the just from public honour, or screen the guilty from public shame. The sentence of every man will be pronounced by him who cannot be merciful to those who shall have willingly sold themselves to that abject bondage from which he came to purchase their redemption,- who, nevertheless hav ing felt the power of temptation, knows how to pity them that have been tempted; by him on whose mercy contrite frailty may rely, whose anger hardened impenitence must dread. To heighten the solemnity and terror of the business, the Judge will visibly descend from Heaven, the shout of the archangel and the trump of God will thunder through the deep,-the dead will awake,-the glorified saints will be caught up to meet the Lord in the air,-while the wicked will in vain call upon the mountains and the rocks to cover them. Of the day and hour when these things shall be, knoweth no man; but the day and hour for these things are fixed in the eternal Father's counsels. Our Lord will come; he will come unlooked for, and may come sooner than we think. God grant that the thought and expectation of that glorious advent may be so fixed in our hearts, that by constant watchfulness on our part, and by the powerful succour of God's holy Spirit, we may be found of our Lord, when he cometh, without spot and blameless! HORSLEY. And they shall see the Son of man coming in the clouds of heaven with power and great glory.-This will be the glory of that day, to see the visible appearance of the Son of man in the clouds of heaven, attended with myriads of angels to his throne of glory, where he sits encircled with the heavenly host, and all mankind standing before his tribunal, expecting their final doom from his mouth.-Who can possibly conceive the joy and exultation of that day, when good men shall see their Lord coming in the clouds of heaven, clothed with a human body, but bright and glorious as the sun; a body which still retains the marks of his sufferings and the tokens of his love! How will it transport us to see him whom our soul loveth! to see him whom we have so ardently longed and desired to see! To see him, I say, not as the shepherds did, a poor helpless infant, wrapped in swaddling clothes, and lying in a manger; to see him not arraigned as a malefactor, nor hanging in a shameful manner upon the cross, but to see him in all his majesty and glory, to see him a triumphant conqueror and judge, to see him with crowns and laurels in his hands, and in him to see the certainty of our faith, the completion of our hopes, the rewards of our patience and sufferings, and our final conquest over death and hell. O joyful day, when this royal bridegroom shall come in the glory of his Father to meet his spouse the church, to conduct her to his Father's house, there to see and to partake in his glory, never to part more! Methinks I see holy and devout souls, in the highest raptures and ecstacies of joy, embracing and comforting one another at the appearance pearance of their Lord. Here comes the blessed Jesus, it is he himself, the true image of God, the very brightness of his Father's glory! This is that very day we have so |