covenant transactions, but are fincere and honeft; they mean what they fay, and perform what they promife. If they do not this, whatever they may think of themselves, they are not God's children; but children of the devil, who was a liar from the beginning. If we are faithful, he will be our Saviour; will deliver us from fin and hell, and conduct us to immortal glory. But if we rebel, and vex his holy Spirit, that ftrives with us, he will turn to be our enemy, and will fight against us; we fhall lofe our best friend, and fall into the hands of the most formidable enemy.

4. We may from this chapter draw many noble arguments and encouragements in prayer, especially in time of trouble. We may obferve God's tender regard to his people: he is afflicted in their affliction, like a tender parent fympathizing with a fick child; his bowels yearn over his fuffering fervants. He is fo good that he makes his former mercies an argument to bestow further favours; which men would rather confider as an argument against doing it. Let us think of our covenant relation to him; and plead these things in prayer: let fatherless children especially, remember, that tho' their parents are ignorant of them, and acknowledge them not, yet God is their father, and his name is everlasting. Let them seriously addrefs him under that title; and in him the fatherless will find mercy.

CHA P. LXIV.

This is a continuation of the prayer begun in the former chapter. It defcribes the cafe, and is intended for the use of the jews in their prefent difperfed state, and not their captivity in Baby- lon, as fome understand it.

H that thou wouldst rend the heavens, that thou

wouldst come down, that the mountains might flow down at thy prefence! Oh that God would look upon us, and show himself as visibly in our favour as he did to our fathers at mount Sinai, when there was fuch thunder, lightning, and rain, as made the mountains look as if they were 2 melted down; As [when] the melting fire burneth, the VOL. V. Bb fire

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fire caufeth the waters to boil, or when the fire make the metals melt, and the waters boil, to make thy name known to thine adverfaries, [that] the nations may 3 tremble at thy prefence. When thou didst terrible things [which] we looked not for, in our deliverance from Egypt, and at mount Sinai, thou cameft down, the 4 mountains flowed down at thy presence. For fince the beginning of the world [men] have not heard, nor perceived by the ear, neither hath the eye feen, O God, befides thee, [what] he hath prepared for him that waiteth for him; or, as in the margin of our bibles, neither hath the eye feen a God befides thee which doeth fo for him that waiteth for him. Thou meeteft him that rejoiceth and worketh righteoufnefs, that is, thou meeteft with thy ·favour, or with joy, those who ferve thee cheerfully, [thofe that] remember thee in thy ways, who obferve and own thy providence, and regard thee in every merciful and afflictive event: behold, thou art wroth; for we have finned: in thofe is continuance, and we fhall be faved; that is, in thofe ways of thine, efpecially thy ways of mercy, there is continuance; thy mercy is everlasting, therefore we 6 fhall be faved. But we are all as an unclean [thing,] and all our righteoufneffes [are] as filthy rags; our best Services are imperfect, defective, and mixed with pollution: and we all do fade as a leaf; and our iniquities, like the wind, have taken us away; as the wind doth a withered leaf, thou haft driven us out of our land, and deprived us of 7 good. And [there is] none that calleth upon thy name, none who is earnest in his interceffion for us, that stirreth up himself to take hold of thee, to avert the judgment; an allufion to holding a man's hand when he is going to Strike: for, or rather, therefore, thou haft hid thy face from us, and haft confumed us, because of our iniquities. 8 But now, O LORD, thou [art] our father; we [are] the clay, and thou our potter; and we all [are] the work of thy hand.

9 Be This fpeaks the unfearchable wisdom and grace of God in his fcheme for the falvation of his people; as if he had faid, Thou haft not yet done thy utmoft, there is ftill more in referve.

LoWTH tranflates it; Lo thou art angry (for we have finned) because of our deeds, for we have been rebellious.

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Be not wroth very fore, O LORD, neither remember iniquity for ever: behold, fee, we beseech thee, we [are] all thy people; thy peculiar, covenant people, and 10 not thy creatures only. Thy holy cities are a wilderness, Zion is a wilderness, Jerufalem a defolation; even Sion and Ferufalem, the upper and lower city, and all the cities II of the holy land alfo, are defolate. Our holy and our beautiful houfe, where our fathers praised thee, is burned up with fire and all our pleasant things are laid waste; not only the temple, but the palace and the fynagogues are 12 deftroyed. Wilt thou refrain thyself for thefe [things,] O LORD? wilt thou hold thy peace, and afflict us very fore? Wilt thou neither show compaffion to us, nor execute judgment upon thofe that opprefs us?

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REFLECTION S.

ET us learn to entertain high thoughts of the power, wisdom, and goodness of God. What a beautiful idea of them is there in this chapter! He is able, and intends, to do what his people have never feen nor heard of before; fomething beyond their highest conception. The apostle accommodates this remark to the gospel difpenfation, I Cor. ii. 9. Eye hath not feen, nor ear heard, neither have entered into the heart of man, to conceive the things which God hath prepared for them that love him; because it revealed glorious things, which human wisdom could not discover. It is also applicable to the future ftate of the righteous; for we can form no idea equal to what God intends for them. As we defire to be the objects of divine favour, and to share in the bleffings of his people, let us wait for him in the way of duty, and love him with all our hearts.

2. Let us obferve the character of good men, as it is here described; examine ourselves by it, and endeavour to answer it in our conduct. He will meet them who rejoice and work righteoufnefs, who are faithful and conftant in the dif charge of their whole duty, and who do it cheerfully. Let us rejoice in God, in our relation and obligations to him. Let us remember him in his ways, whether of judgment or B b 2

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mercy; and accommodate our temper to his various providences. He will then meet us; admit us to converfe with him; vifit us with his favour, and fhow himself as our friend and helper.

3. We are taught our duty in times of publick trouble, and that is, humbly to bewail our fins before God; our guilt and pollution, and the imperfection of our righteousness; to deprecate the continuance of his anger, and intreat his kind and powerful appearances for us; to feek his mercy to remove our calamities, and his grace to reform our manners. On this errand we may comfortably apply to him, as our creator and father, who has shown fo much goodness in our creation and support; and much more, as our God in Jesus Christ. But let us remember, that if we defire thefe bleffings, we muft ftir up ourselves to take hold on God; do all we can to quicken our fpirits; and engage all that is within us in this important work. Then we may hope that our prayers will prevail, and that God will ftir up his ftrength, and come and fave us.

CHA P. LXV.

This chapter is an answer to the people's complaint in the foregoing one, of God's rejecting them; informing them that it was for their fins, efpecially their rejection of Chrift, when the gentiles received him; and it concludes with promises of their future restoration.

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AM fought of [them that] asked not [for me;] I am found of [them that] fought me not; I am fought now of them that asked not after me before, (thus St. Paul interprets the words, Rom. ix. 25, &c. and ch. x. 20.) I faid, Behold me, behold me, unto a nation [that] was not called by my name; I manifcfted myself to them 2 and invited them to feek me. I have spread out my hands all the day with great earnestness unto a rebellious people, which walketh in a way [that was] not good, after their own thoughts; after their corrupt doctrines and 3 fuperftitious ways of worship; A people that provoketh

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me to anger continually to my face; that facrificeth in gardens, and burneth incense upon altars of brick; Which remain among the graves, and lodge in the monuments, who ufe abominable rites in honour of the dead, or to confult them, which eat fwine's flefh, tho' forbidden by the law, because used in idolatrous rites among the heathen, and broth of abominable [things is in] their 5 veffels, fuch as a kid feethed in its mother's milk; Which fay, Stand by thyself, come not near to me; for I am holier than thou; valuing themselves on their own fanctity, and counting others unclean and profane: an exact defcription of the character of the pharifees in Chrift's time. Thefe [are] a smoke in my nofe, a fire that burneth all the day; 6 they are offenfive, as the smoke of wet wood. Behold, [it is] written before me, I will not forget it: I will not keep filence, but will recompenfe, even recompenfe into 7 their bofom, Your iniquities, and the iniquities of your fathers together, faith the LORD, which have burned incense upon the mountains, and blafphemed me upon the hills: therefore will I measure their former work into their bofom; I will take their former and latter fins inta account when I come to punish them as a nation. Nevertheless there fhall be a remnant according to the election of grace: for

Thus faith the LORD, as the new wine, or rather, a good grape, is found in the cluster, and [one] faith, Deftroy it not, for a bleffing [is] in it: fo will I do for my servants' fakes, that I may not deftroy them all; as when a man who is pruning a vine, and cutting out the dead branches, fees a cluster likely to ripen, he leaves it, faying, thefe will become good grapes; fo fome of the jews Shall be converted, and fome of the unbelievers fhall be spared, Bb 3

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It is objected, that this cannot be applied to the jews after their captivity, because they were then free from idolatry; but it may refer partly to the idolatry of their fathers, as in v. 7. It chiefly defcribes their wickedness in Chrift's time, in language taken from their antient manner of tranfgreffing; it is a kind of proverbial expreffion for worshipping God in a way that he hath not directed, as incenfe and a pure facrifice are put for gofpel worship; or it may refer to their complying with popifh idolatry to avoid perfecution, as many of the jews yet do.