of Christ, sitting in the throne of David; but, to give an accurate idea concerning the universality of the reign, and the general obedience to the will of God which will then be brought about, we will copy from the Prophet Zechariah one of the plainest among the prophecies: "And the Lord my God shall come, and all the saints with thee....And the Lord shall be King over all the earth: in that day shall there be one Lord, and his All the land shall be turned as a plain from Geba to Rimmon, south of Jerusalem: and it shall be lifted up, and inhabited in her place, from Benjamin's gate unto the place of the first gate, unto the corner gate, and from the tower of Hananeel unto the King's wine-presses. And men shall dwell in it; and there shall be no more utter destruction, but Jerusalem shall be safely inhabited....And it shall come to pass, that every one that is left of all the nations which came against Jerusalem shall even go up from year to year to worship the King the Lord of hosts, and to keep the feast of tabernacles. And it shall be, that whoso will not come up of all the families of the earth to worship the King the Lord of hosts, even upon them shall be no rain. And if the family of Egypt come not up, that have no rain, there shall be the plague, wherewith the Lord will smite the heathen that come not up to keep the feast of Tabernacles. This shall be the punishment of Egypt, and the punishment of all nations that come not up to keep the feast of tabernacles" (Zech. xiv. 5, &c). Here we see Christ the King sitting upon the throne of David, and all the nations under heaven coming up year by year to worship him as the King the Lord of hosts, and mingling together as one people in the keeping of the great feast of tabernacles. What is this but the manifestation of the Father and Lord of all, the Source of all power, the alone Will to be obeyed, the Governor of all the earth, bringing all things in subjection unto his own will, and visiting just judgment upon the gainsayers. The very wording of the prophecy, designating the nations by the names of families, points to the great God as the Father of all. It will be readily understood, that so long as the works of creation refuse obedience to their Creator, whatever manifestation is working out there cannot be a manifestion of God the Father. He may be seen by faith, but he cannot be seen in the visible state of the world and its inhabitants. But when all are brought into obedience unto one will, and every transgression and disobedience does immediately receive its just recompence of reward; then will the very form and fashion of society, and the actings and movements of mankind, manifestly set out the eternal will of God, and the power and majesty of the Father, "dwelling in light which no man can approach unto," and yet ordering all things according to the counsel of his own will."

d. Lastly, we approach the end of all time, the eternal dispensation, which we have before designated as the Resurrection dispensation. And here, having before noted the dispensations manifesting the separate Persons of the eternal Godhead, we have the sum of all and the perfection of each in the manifestation of the Unity of the Godhead in the Trinity of Persons. This is a separate dispensation, because it has a beginning, whilst eternity has no beginning. It is not indeed temporary, but eternal -it shall be for ever and for ever-but it stands so far linked in with time that it has a beginning; and has therefore a neverending prolongation of time, rather than a merging into eternity; or, if you please so to say-and this seems to accord with the word-it is a bringing back again into eternity of that which was taken out of eternity, without losing it in eternity. It will not be merged so as to be forgotten, but will remain as a smaller circle within the boundless circle of eternity.

The proof of this last purpose of manifestation is found in the quotation before taken from St. Paul's Epistle to the Corinthians, where he shews, that, all things being after the general resurrection and judgment put in order under Christ, and the last enemy, death, being destroyed, Christ himself is put in order under the Father, that God may be All in all. By God All in all, we must understand, that every thing which during the progress of time was working visibly in contradiction of God, and every portion of evil which was mingled with God's creation, and every relation towards unrevealed creation into which Christ by his union with man's nature was brought, being now done away with, Christ is no longer manifested apart from the Father and the Holy Ghost that by the manifestation of the Father and the Spirit in himself he may manifest God; but he is, as the head of all new creation, in his mystical body the church, so put in order under the Father that the three God-Persons are at once and altogether manifest in him, and are the substance, the fulness, the All in all of every thing; the beginning, the continuance, and the end; the outward, the inward; the object, the subject; the life and the living one; the glorifier and the glory-in a word, the God manifest.

9. In the consideration of the offices of the Lord Jesus we shall draw the like conclusion as to the purpose of manifestation. (a). The Prophet is the declarer of the word of God; the Priest is the minister of the Spirit of God; the King is the executor of the will of God; and the Judge, judging according to the will of God as taught in the word of God through the Spirit, sits in the seat of God. Thus Christ the Prophet set out the word of God, which he himself is. As the Word made flesh, as well as the Word which in the beginning was with God and was God, he is set out in the Jewish laws and ordinances as

fully as things seen can set him forth. He was also set forth in the providential course of the Jewish dispensation with the like complete fulness. Not only is he set forth as the "Lamb slain from the foundation of the world," but he is also declared as the glorified God-Man, as the same glorified God-Man; the Head of all authority and power; and also as the same glorified God-Man, so made the Head of all things, having in him all the fulness of the Godhead bodily: that is to say, the fulness of Christ was manifested so far as created things, speaking to the senses of the natural man, could manifest it.

(b.) Christ the Priest hath shed forth the Holy Ghost, and in him the Holy Ghost is now manifested as the Spirit of God. The form and fashion of things seen as modelled in the Jewish dispensation, constitutes the subject by which the Spirit is made known; and these things, which spake to the natural man during the Jewish dispensation, are now made to speak to the inner man concerning the things of Christ. By means, therefore, of that which was done during the Jewish, is the manifestation of the Spirit now by the ministration of the Great High Priest made to us Gentiles.

(c.) Christ the King will shew forth the reality and power and all-pervading controul of the will of God. He will take unto himself his great power, and will reign, all the earth being made obedient to him.

(d.) Christ the Judge will vindicate the majesty and truth and righteousness of God. Of all the offices which are known upon earth, the judge is certainly the most godlike. The calm majesty unmixed with any contention, which according to truth divides betwixt right and wrong, condemns the evil and vindicates the good, is superior to the kingly office: kings are the ministers of judges, and execute the decrees of the judge. The king must fight and contend to vindicate his own majesty; but the judge, having delivered his judgment, is entitled to call upon the king to carry it into execution. How well this accords with the relative nature of the offices of Christ it is unnecessary at any length to observe. When Christ rules as King he will subdue, and by the power of his arm preserve, mankind in their obedience, or cut them off in their transgressions; but when he sitteth as Judge, wickedness abides not in his presence, but is at once put away for ever.

10. God's purpose of self-manifestation we would therefore. infer to be completed in Christ Jesus, by the Lord Christ's manifestation in the church as Prophet, Priest, King, and Judge; and in these offices setting out the Son, the Spirit, and the Father, and the Triune God.

11. If this be the truth, we shall expect to find that this order of manifestation is the root of all figurative language, and

will furnish a true key for the interpretation of Scripture: we should therefore follow up the examination by a reference to the particulars of the Jewish dispensation; and, as that is supposed to be the ground-work and base of the whole structure of manifestation, we must expect to find much confirmation of what has been advanced.

A. 1. In the Epistle to the Hebrews St. Paul says, "Christ is not entered into the holy places made with hands, which are the figures of the true; but into heaven itself, now to appear in the presence of God for us" (ix. 24). And in another place he says of the Tabernacle, "which was a figure for the time then present " (ver. 9)." But Christ being come an high priest of good things to come, by a greater and more perfect tabernacle, not made with hands; that is to say, not of this building; neither by the blood of goats and calves, but by his own blood he entered in once into the holyplace, having obtained eternal redemption for us." (vers. 11, 12). And in another place, "The law having a shadow of good things to come" (x. 1). And thus we are taught that the Jewish tabernacle was a figure of the true tabernacle, and that the most holy place was a figure of heaven, and that the high-priest's entry into the most holy place on the day of atonement was a figure of Christ's ascension into heaven.

A. 2. The Tabernacle was made according to the word of God to Moses in the mount. "For see (saith he), that thou make all things according to the pattern shewed thee in the mount." It was in this tabernacle that the Lord's presence dwelt. It was to this tabernacle that the ordinances and worship, and the daily ordering of the people in their march and in their encampment, had reference: and the great importance of the tabernacle, as a manifestation, is likewise gathered from the preceding texts, as well as from the eighth chapter of the same Epistle, where Christ is declared to be "a minister of the true tabernacle, which the Lord pitched, and not man" (ver. 2).

A. 3. If, as we gather from the texts quoted, the most holy place in the tabernacle was a figure and foreshewing of heaven, the place of God's presence, we shall do well to examine the whole building, which as a whole is also declared to be the figure of the true. In the xv th, xvi th, and xvii th chapters of Leviticus the whole is set forth. First, there is the ark, on which was placed a mercy-seat, and on the mercy-seat two cherubim shadowing the mercy-seat with their outstretched wings: then there is the most holy place of the tabernacle, divided from the holy place by a vail: next the holy place, also divided from the court by a hanging; and last of all is the court of the tabernacle, enclosed all round by curtains. Now in the court of the tabernacle stood the great brazen altar, upon which was offered

the flesh of the offerings; and stood also the great brazen laver, In this court the Levites in which the offerings were washed. ministered. In the holy place stood the golden candlestick, with its seven branches; the golden altar of incense, and the golden table of shew-bread. In this place the priests ministered. In the most holy place stood the mercy-seat, and cherubim upon the ark, and the golden censer. Into this place the high priest and Moses alone entered. In the ark was the golden pot that had manna, and Aaron's rod that budded, and the tables of the covenant: this no man might touch, and into it no man could look and live.

A. 4. Into the court of the tabernacle, but nowise into the tabernacle itself, were the people of the Jews permitted to enter. Here, in the court, they offered their offerings and performed their service unto the Lord. This therefore was the place of their dispensation: and the continual offering up of sacrifices and offerings were a continual shewing forth of Christ's death. There was also, as we shall see hereafter, in the form and manner of offering, and in the offerings themselves, an adumbration of all the offices of Christ; and so in the very threshold of the tabernacle, a complete picture of the whole building: but this place, the court, was clearly, in the great divisions of the tabernacle, the figure of the Jewish dispensation, wherein Christ the Prophet bore witness for the truth of God and sealed it with his blood.

A. 5. In the holy place of the tabernacle none but priests could minister. The service of this place was an evident type of Gentile worship. The golden altar of incense was every morning and evening made use of to offer sweet incense before the Lord; a clear figure of the prayers of the saints, as David gives us the key: "Let my prayer be set forth before thee as incense, and the lifting up of my hands as the evening sacrifice" (Psa. cxli. 2). The table of shew-bread (upon which was bread set in order, with frankincense, every Sabbath, to be eaten by the priests in the holy place) spoke before of our table of the Lord, whereon is set bread and wine, to be received by the faithful, by us who are made kings and priests unto God; wherein we receive the The body and blood of Christ our passover, sacrificed for us. candlestick also, with its seven lamps, is the very figure used by the Spirit to the Apostle John to shew him concerning the Gentile church; and he is specially informed (Rev. i.) "the seven candlesticks are the seven churches-not seven out of a greater number, but the complete number, the whole church. These lamps, or candles, were trimmed every morning and evening; and it was upon entering to trim the lamps that the priest was to offer the morning and evening incense. Before the priests could enter into the most holy place, they were commanded to wash