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of making you more the children of Satan than you could have been without it; of aggravating your guilt, and procuring for you more intolerable dungeons in the regions of the damned. But if your parents are happily made the instruments of your conversion; if they are honoured with training you up for God; with what rapturous pleasure, with what extatic joy will you meet them at the coming of the Lord! Then will you bless God for a religious education, and that he graciously put you under the care of those that feared his name. With what unspeakable, transporting delight will they and you spend a vast, and endless eternity, where there is fulness of incomprehensible beatitude, and inexpressible pleasure for evermore?

Bear with me, my reader, whilst I address myself to such members of gospel churches, if any such there be, who neglect the worship of God in their families, and who may therefore very properly be said to live without God in the world. Your neglect of a practice so commendable is dishonouring to your Maker, and injurious to yourselves and families. You appear, indeed, in the congregation of worshippers on the solemn day, and assume the appearance of Christians; but alas there is nothing in the family which distinguisheth it from that of the merest pagan. The heads of the family have no communion at the throne of grace, the servants have no example of piety set before them, the children are not trained up in the way they should go; they are left unprincipled, the ready prey of darkness and error. Awful case! if found in the family of a professor of religion.

You will perhaps alledge your bashfulness and want of courage in excuse for your neglect. But this is in the highest degree absurd and preposterous. Is it a shame for a needy sinner to bow the knee to the Father of spirits? A shame for the perishing beggar to solicit an alms? This shame is unwarrantable and impious; it betrays an heart turned aside from God to the creature; as it is not the divine presence of which you are ashamed, but the presence of your fellow mortals. Were it the divine presence of which you were ashamed, you would blush in private the same as in public; and this very shame would issue in your enlargement, rather than in your embarrassment. Your busines in prayer is solely with that God who searches the heart of man; with that God who is the judge of all; consequently your fear of your fellow creatures is impious in his sight. It is the heart that God requires, and where the heart is lifted up unto him, you may be very easy with regard to the manner in which you express yourselves, as it is not the labour of the lips, but the language of the heart that meets with divine acceptance. In a word, no excuse whatever, no not even conscious guilt upon the heart, will justify this sinful neglect

of family religion. May that God, who is worthy to be praised in all the families of his people, enable my reader and me to resolve with holy Joshua, that, we and our houses will serve the Lord.

P.S. The author frankly acknowledgeth, that he is indebted to former writers for some of the foregoing remarks on this important subject.

PEREZ-UZZAH;

OR THE

DANGER OF INNOVATIONS AND OF DISCORD

CONSIDERED.

2 SAM. vi. 6, 7.

And when they came to Nachon's thrashing-floor, Uzzah put forth his hand to the ark of God, and took hold of it, for the oxen shook it. And the anger of the Lord was kindled against Uzzah, and God smote him there for his error, and there he died by the ark of God.

IN this chapter, out of which I have chosen the subject matter of the following Essay, we have an account of king David, and his army's bringing up the ark of God from Kirjeath-jearim, where it had been during the reign of his predecessor, in the house of Abinadab. There it had remained from the time of its return out of the land of the Philistines after its capture by them, in that battle so fatal to Israel, when the sons of Eli were slain, and all their hosts either fell by the sword, or were dispersed for the wickedness of the priesthood. Wherever the ark of God was carried in the enemy's land, disease and death were its constant attendants, which convinced even the pagan nations of their impiety and sacrilege, and compelled them to make their offerings to the God of Israel, whose hand was so heavy upon them and upon their gods. To make an atonement, and procure deliverance from the plague, they offered unto God five

golden mice, and as many golden emerods, and sent the ark of the covenant back into the land of Israel. Its arrival at Bethshemesh was about the middle of wheat harvest; there it was received with the greatest joy and thankfulness. But its presence was as fatal to the inhabitants as it had been in the land of the Philistines; for of those inhabitants, there fell by the hand of God upwards of fifty thousand, on account of their having dared, contrary to the law, to look into the ark, and behold its contents so inviolably sacred. They therefore sent messengers to the inhabitants of Kirjath-jearim, requesting them to come down to Bethshemesh, and bring up the ark into their city. With pious care the inhabitants of Kirjath-jearim fulfilled their request, and brought up the ark of God, and put it into the house of Abinadab on the hill, where it remained till its present removal. With solemn pomp king David, that pious prince, attended by thirty thousand chosen men, besides a prodigious concourse of people, out of all the tribes of Israel, conducted the sacred ark upon a new carriage, from the house of Abinadab, amidst the shouts of triumph, and the voice of music.

But it was not long before all this rejoicing was turned into sorrow and lamentation; for as they had begun wrong in acting contrary to the law, one mistake leading on to another, they escaped not without some tokens of the divine displeasure; which had doubtless been avoided, had the law of the Lord respecting the ark been properly observed. Passing through the thrashing-floor of Nachon, whether from smelling the corn, and desire of feeding, or from some other cause, the intractable animals walked carelessly and stumbled, as they are said to have done, 1 Chron. xiii. 9. This stumbling of the oxen shook the ark upon the cart, and seemingly endangered its falling; to prevent which, Uzzah, the son of Abinadab, put forth his hand, and laid hold on it. This act of unseasonable and unwarrantable zeal, being an affront of that Deity represented by the ark, awoke the jealousy of heaven, and brought upon him instant judgment, and death premature. As in this account there wanteth not difficulties, of which the cavillers at revealed religion have sufficiently availed themselves, and with which, some virtuous and undesigning minds have been puzzled. I shall,

1. Clear the acount of every thing difficult in it, and then, 2. Shall apply it practically to gospel purposes.

I. Then to clear up the difficulties attending this narrative, be it observed, that the

1. Arises from a comparison of this passage, with its parallel in 1 Chron. xiii. 9. In the text the place is called Nachon's thrashing-floor, and in the parallel it is called the thrashingfloor of Chidon; which some have attempted to account for by supposing, that the thrashing-floor spoken of might belong to two different owners, whose names were Nachon and Chidon;

and that the one text names the floor by one of its owners, and the other text by his partner. Others upon grounds more war❤ rantable, from Jewish records affirm, that Chidon was the name of the place where the thrashing-floor was made, and that its owner was called Nachon. And it is as probable, that this place might be called the thrashing-floor of Chidon, as that Sarah's grave should be called the cave of Machpelah, especially as the word signifies a place rather than a person. But take it in which view we will there is no contradiction, and indeed very little difficulty. He must be fond of cavilling who, from this circumstance, finds occasion for infidelity to display its talents. But the

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2. And greatest difficulty is that judicial and sudden breach made upon Uzzah, from whence the place takes the name of Perez-uzzah by giving the text but a cursory reading, the sons of infidelity may seem to have got something to prey upon at the expence of revelation; but I trust, that upon a close attention to the subject, the divine character shall go unimpeached, and revelation retain its full and unshaken evidence. These are somewhat like to the ideas that suggest themselves first, upon a cursory reading of the words; "The ark of the Lord was a sacred emblem of the divine presence; this sacred emblem had been by the hands of the enemy carried out of the land of Israel, and had been dishonoured and polluted within the domains of infidelity; wonderfully redeemed from a pagan land, and arrived within the borders of Israel, the congregation of the Lord go down, solemnly to conduct it to the most honourable residence, and rejoice exceedingly that it is once more in their possession: so great their joy, that their principal concern seems to have been the safety of this sacred emblem. It seemed to be in danger as passing through the thrashing-floor, and a pious regard for its safety, induced a young man, who had left his father's house for its protection, to put forth his hand and lay hold on it to secure it from falling; and for this cause he is instantly struck dead by the hand of God, whose goodness is unto all, and whose tender mercies are over all his works."

This paraphrase on the words is as favourable to infidelity as can be wished, even by the most sanguine of her votaries; but favourable as it may seem, I trust it shall appear, that every censure of revelation built upon it is like a castle built in the air, a fabric without foundation. I shall for once attempt to vindicate to man this part of the divine conduct, and trust to shew it equity and propriety. In order to which, observe in general that every part of this transaction with whatever piety and zeal it was conducted, was injudicious, unwarrantable, and directly against the well known law of God, which they were instructed in from their infancy.

1. They put it upon a cart, which was contrary to the law given in Numb. vii. 9. But unto the sons of Kohath he gave none, because the service of the sanctuary belonging unto them was that they should bear it upon their shoulders.' Also Numb. iv. 15. Here was therefore an unlawful step taken in putting it at all on a cart, notwithstanding new; seeing it was contrary to the very letter of the law, and a step which very likely was taken at the advice of Abinadab, on the hill, or Uzzah his son, who fell by the ark of the covenant.

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2. The service of the ark, and the tabernacle appertained to the Kohathites only, and a stranger might not approach unto it under pain of instant death, Numb. iii. 10. And thou shalt appoint AARON AND HIS SONS, and they shall wait on their priest's office, and the stranger that cometh nigh shall be put to death;' compared with v. 38. where the same threatening is denounced against the stranger who would dare to approach those sacred emblems of the divine presence. But here is one, who does not so much as appear to have been a Levite, much less a Kohathite, and less still of the sons of Aaron, adventuring to do that which was unlawful for even the Kohathites or the sons of Aaron to have done; shall it then be thought strange that he dies for his presumption? For,

3. Even the Kohathites might not touch the ark, under pain of death; but carry it by the staves of shittim-wood upon their shoulders, notwithstanding they were chosen and sanctified to its daily service; and shall it be thought that a common Israelite should take the ark in his arms, contrary to the law, under the notion of its better preservation, and escape with impunity, whilst the jealous God of the ark was a present witness of the impious transaction? Inflicting instant death upon the son of Abinadab, for his unhallowed and unlawful care, was therefore every way consistent with the given law, which he ought to have been acquainted with. Was it necessary that God should give an account of his ways to man; there is yet another thing, which might be, and indeed which most generally is, adduced in defence of this act of justice inflicted upon Uzzah. I mean,

4. His unbelief and mistrust of God's protecting of the ark in its tottering state. The God of Israel had preserved the ark of his covenant, whilst in the hand of his enemies, and made its presence terrible to the heathens even in the house of their gods. The hardened Philistines were not able to do it injury, though fully in their possession; and now it tottered as passing over the thrashing-floor of a friendly Israelite, the youthful Uzzah could not leave it to divine protection. Here was undoubtedly & visible distrust of the providence of God, added to all the former impiety specified in the foregoing particulars, the whole amount ing to the fullest justification of the ways of God; and fertile of

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