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are generally found to disappoint a person on his first view of them. But let him be sure that they are excellent, and that he only wants the knowledge and the taste to appreciate them properly, and every suc-: ceeding sight of them will open his eyes more and more, till he learns to admire them, not indeed as much as they deserve, but so much as greatly to enrich and enlarge his own mind, by becoming acquainted with such perfect beauty. So it is with great poets; they must be read often and studied reverently, before an unpractised mind can gain any thing like an adequate notion of their excellence. reader must be convinced that if he does not fully admire them, it is his fault, and not theirs. Here, as in every thing else, humility is the surest path to exaltation." These remarks apply with the greatest force to the Scriptures, embodying as they do, in the noblest and most appropriate language, not the conceptions of the human intellect, but truths so unusual, so grand, and so ennobling, that even after having been revealed, they cannot be received by the natural man without a discernment imparted by the Spirit. The truths illustrated in this Song are pre-eminently among those which are spiritually discerned. They are not so much the principles of the doctrine of Christ, as the things which are brought more particularly into view as we go on unto perfection. nature of the subject, love, makes it belong to the advanced part of the Christian life more especially; and as sanctification refines our spiritual perceptions, and by raising us from our degradation of darkness

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towards the condition of saints in light, gives us the ability to appreciate the love of Jesus-we see more and more beauty in this Song; we see in it nothing but beauty; we find our objections against it arose from the corrupt heart rather than from the book; we feel thankful that the Author of our faith has provided for us. words so rich, so glowing, and so perfect for giving utterance to our emotions; and we rejoice to find, under the light of the Holy Ghost, our unsanctified misapprehensions giving place to the conviction, that the love of Jesus towards us is infinitely greater than is even here expressed.

The Scriptures contain truths, promises, and illustrations, adapted to every variety of circumstances, and to every grade of religious experience. Particular truths can be fully understood, and the power of certain promises can be adequately felt, only by our being brought into situations where the soul is made to feel the need of those truths and those promises. Here are innumerable gradations of truth adapted to the different degrees of the growth of the soul in grace, from the first exercises of conviction to the highest measure of sanctification attainable on earth. A particular development of our spiritual perceptions is requisite for feeling the beauty and power of any one of the portions of truth in this ascending scale; and as the unrenewed man, even with profound learning, fails to apprehend the perfection of holy beauty in passages with which he has a mere scientific acquaintance, the Christian, while understanding all the heart. can know of the truths adapted to the steps of religious

experience through which he has passed, may yet fail to comprehend and appreciate thoroughly, portions of holy writ lying in regions of pious exercises whereunto he has not attained. Three things are necessary for understanding perfectly the Scriptures: such an acquaintance with them as may be derived from human learning; the illumination of the Holy Spirit; and a position in the circumstances for which those truths were specially given and adapted. The two last are not inferior in importance to the first, and other things being equal, the man who has the advantage not only of the teaching of the Spirit, but of being led by Providence through the circumstances of life in which the want of certain promises is felt, and their comforting power enjoyed, will be better able than other persons to see beauty, and richness, and glory, in many domains of gospel truths, which must have lain unobserved by him, had he not been drawn into these green pastures, and beside these still waters, by the Presence that dwelt amid the pillar of fire in the wilderness.

Hence, this Song is not so much a favourite in the early stage of the religious life, as at subsequent periods when we have grown in grace. It is the manual of the advanced Christian. When love has been more perfected by the Spirit, hither do we come for expressions of that love. When we are anxious to hear from the lips of Jesus the fulness of his love to us, here do we rejoice to sit and listen. The Jews were not wrong when they represented this book as the holy of holies in the fabric of revelation; for assuredly, the voice here speaking, the living oracles here uttered, can be

heard only by those who have been initiated into the mysteries of godliness and dwell under the shadow of the Almighty. Accordingly, this book has been a favourite with eminent Christians. While some persons versed in biblical lore, but ignorant of the alphabet of piety, can see nothing further in this Song than an amatory eclogue; and others, whose piety we are far from doubting, can represent these words given by inspiration, as "leading us away from pure and spiritual devotion," by "connecting amatory ideas and feelings with a devotional frame of mind;"* there is, and always has been, in the Church, a class of persons of no questionable character for ability, learning, or holiness, who esteem this book among the choicest portions of the word of God. Were we to speak of the partiality of Lady Guyon for this book, some might reply she was a mystic. Whether mystic or not, far better would it be for the world, were the tone of her deep, fervent, energetic piety, more common. But who will bring the charge of mysticism against Leighton, Owen, Romaine, President Edwards, and Chalmers. That most profound of metaphysicians, the immortal author of the treatise on the Freedom of the Will, was peculiarly fond of the book of Canticles, and read and meditated much upon it. "The whole book of Canticles," says he, "used to be pleasant to me, and I used to be much in reading it about that time, and found from time to time an inward sweetness that would carry me away in my contem

*Stuart on the Old Testament, p. 374.

plations." The great leader of the Free Church of Scotland in her exodus, speaking of Dr. Pye Smith's asserting the non-inspiration of the Song, says: "It would bespeak not only a more pious but a more philosophic docility, to leave that book in undisturbed possession of the place which it now enjoys, where it might minister, as in ages heretofore, to the saintly and seraphic contemplations of the advanced Christian, who discovers that in this poem a greater than Solomon is here, whose name to him is as ointment poured forth, and who, while he luxuriates with spiritual satisfaction over pages that the world has unhallowed, breathes of the ethereal purity of the third heavens, as well as their ethereal fervour." Owen says: "Then may a man judge himself to have somewhat profited in the experience of a mystery of a blessed intercourse and communion with Christ, when the expressions of love in that holy Dialogue, the Song, do give light and life unto his mind, and efficaciously communicate unto him an experience of their power. But because these things are little understood by many, the book itself is much neglected, if not despised." In the words of the saintly McCheyne, "No book furnishes a better test than does the Song of the depth of a man's Christianity. If his religion be in his head only, a dry form of doctrines; or if it hath place merely in his fancy, like Pliable in Pilgrim's Progress, he will see nothing here to attract him. But if his religion have a hold on his heart, this will be a favourite portion of the word of God." Beza, the friend and associate of Calvin,