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This right of the supreme Being to confer favour on whomsoever he pleased, Paul, with great skill and delicacy, illustrates by an example taken from the Mosaic history, which was at once calculated to humble the pride of the Egyptian impostors, and to evince the superiority of the God of Israel over the fancied supreme divinity, which they affected to worship: "For the Scripture saith unto Pharaoh, for this very purpose have I raised thee up, that I might shew my power in thee, and that my name might be declared throughout all the earth; so that he hath mercy, where he chooseth, and hardeneth where he chooseth." It is here worthy of observation, that while the writer so repeatedly represents the Almighty as exercising mercy, he instances his severity only in hardening the heart of Pharaoh, and not in destroying him: and he is careful to state the design, which God had in thus treating the Egyptian monarch. This treatment did not proceed from cruelty, caprice, or ill-will towards the sufferer, but from a regard to the advantages which all mankind would derive, in becoming acquainted with the name and character of Jehovah, "That I might shew my power in thee, and that my name might be declared throughout all the earth."

The assertion, that the Creator acts as it pleaseth

him, and that none can counteract the execution of his will, furnished the blasphemers with another objection: "Why doth he still find fault? Who hath opposed his will?" These questions, being put with an insolence that criminated the divine conduct; and put too by men, who were disqualified by their ignorance and depravity from enquiring with candour and meekness into the reasonableness of God's dealings with mankind, the apostle, instead of answering, repels, by holding up the uncontroulable right, which the Deity has to dispose of, as it pleaseth him, the creatures of his hands: "Nay, O man, who art thou that disputest with God? Shall the work say to the workman, Why didst thou make me thus? Hath not the potter such power over the clay, as to make out of the same lump one vessel for honourable uses, and another for dishonourable?" The promptitude and fertility of our author's imagination are here worthy of notice. His mind was now, for some time, fixed upon that part of the Mosaic history, which represents the Israelites as compelled by the task-masters of Pharaoh to work in mortar and brick. Exod. i. 24. Hence he exhibits the Egyptian oppressors in the humble image of earthen vessels wrought for menial purposes, and their destruction in the Red Sea, under an allusion to the same vessels,

dashed on the ground, and broken to pieces, after the purposes for which they were made, had been answered; while the Israelites, whom the Almighty delivered out of Egypt, he likens to utensils richly decorated, and wrought for honourable purposes. "What if God, wishing to display his anger, and to make known his power, produced, in much patience, vessels of anger, fitted only for destruction, and exhibited his riches and glory upon vessels of mercy, which he had prepared for honourable purposes?" Which question is to this effect; "What thongh the Sovereign Disposer of all things punished with examplary severity, a people, towards whom he had exercised great forbearance, and whom their vices had disqualified for the honour of his patronage and friendship; on the contrary, what if, by a splendid display of power, he rescued the Jewish nation from bondage, and conferred upon them the most honourable distinctions, as his chosen people, ought he on this account to be charged with cruelty, caprice, and partiality ?" To prevent, however, the injurious conclusion that he regarded with partial fondness the descendants of Abraham, to the exclusion of other nations, the writer immediately subjoins that the Gentiles, as well as the Jews, are invited, and indeed preordained to participate in the blessings of the

gospel; and this important point he corroborates by appealing to the Jewish prophets. See the following verses.

I have given a general explanation of this diffieult and long controverted chapter, because it is founded upon two facts hitherto unobserved; namely, that a number of the Egyptians had united with the christian church at Rome; and that the apostle is reasoning against certain impostors of that nation who blasphemed, as evil, the God of the Jews. If this explanation be just, it is evident, that the doctrines of predestination, of election, and of reprobation, deduced chiefly from this passage by Calvin and his followers, fall to the ground, and owe their very origin to those Egyptian teachers, whose impious notions of God the apostle endeavoured to resist.

The Jews in Rome and in other places, supposing the Messiah would be a temporal prince, naturally concluded, that a belief in Christ was inconsistent with civil obedience to Cæsar. This opinion led some of them improperly to interfere with the existing government, and exposed them all to calumpy and persecution. This was a very dangerous error, and the mischiefs, which it had already produced, and was likely still farther to produce, induced the apostle to lay before the church some wise and salutary admonitions, respecting the conduct they should pursue in regard

to the Roman government. "Let every soul submit itself to powers in authority for as there is no power but from God, these powers are appointed by God. Whosoever therefore setteth himself against the power, opposeth the appointment of God; and such opposers will bring punishment upon themselves." Chap. xiii. 1.

The mistaken views of the Jews, and the measures which had been taken by the senate at the instigation of Sejanus, form the only clue to the true intent of the preceding paragraph. It may be paraphrased in the following manner: "Conceiving the kingdom of the Messiah alone to be of divine appointment, some of you oppose the established government, disturb the public peace, and interrupt the administration of justice. But the supposition is as mistaken as it is pernicious. All power, to whatever hands entrusted, is communicated by the disposer of all events for the purpose of doing good; and this end it shall, under his providence, essentially, accomplish. And though pride, ambition, and avarice, may abuse the authority invested in them for the attainment of their respective object, yet this very abuse Infinite Wisdom will overrule, and in the end render subservient to the introduction and establishment of that glorious liberty which awaits the children of God. Resist not therefore by violence, or any other unlawful means, those who

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