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praife but righteousness, a broken fpirit, prayer, and praise, are faid to be facrifices: that is, fuppofing facrifices to be fymbols; and righteoufnefs, a broken fpirit, prayer, and praife, to be the things which are reprefented by them; it is not faid, that the fymbols are the things reprefented by them, but that the things reprefented are the fymbols which are reprefentative of them. Now this is evidently falfe and abfurd; and, therefore, a mode of expreffion, that has never been in ufe among any people, however rude or barbarous. For though there is nothing more common, than to hear a picture, or ftatue, called a man or a woman; or a map, a country; or a horn, (the emblem of plenty) plenty; yet we never hear a man, or a woman, called a picture or statue; or a country, a map; or plenty, a horn, because the latter are fymbols or emblems of the former. This obfervation clearly fhews us, that the Dr's interpretation of the texts under confideration, or rather, the interpretation which his notion of facrifices requires to be given to them, in order to render them proofs of it, is inconfiftent both with truth, and with any of thefe ways of speaking about symbols, which have obtained among men.

§. 20. IF it be needful to fay any thing further, to fhew the falfhood of that interpretation of thefe texts, which is neceflary

to

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to render them fubfervient to the Dr's purpofe; let us try the following method. In place of the word facrifice, let us substitute the fymbol of the thing which is fuppofed to be represented by it; and in place of the term facrificing, the fymbolical action which is faid to be denoted by it; and see how the fense will turn out. When thefe fubftitutions are made, the texts will run thus. Pfal. iv. 5. Offer unto God the fymbols of righteousness. Offer unto God the fymbol of thanksgiving.

Pfal. 1. 14.

ver. 23.

Pfal. li. 17.

Whofo offereth the fymbol of praife, glorifieth me.

The fymbols of a broken spirit, which God requireth, and will accept of, are a broken fpirit.

1 Pet. ii, 5. Ye are an holy priesthood to offer up Spiritual fymbols of addrefs, acceptable to God.

Heb. xiii. 15. By him let us offer up the fymbols of praife to God continually, &c.

In two of these renderings, the fenfe is abfurd; in them all, it is low and trifling: and, therefore, it cannot be thought to be the true and right fenfe of them. Wherefore, fince the Dr's end and defign in quoting these texts, requires a fenfe to be given to them, which is either abfurd, or jejune and frivolous, it cannot be fuppofed, that D 3

that

that is the true fenfe of them, or that they' can, in any respect, fubferve his purpose.

21. THE rhetorical figure, which is ufed in these texts, feems to me, to be either an allufion to facrifices, not as fymbols of prayer, praife, &c. but only as having fomething that was fimilar to them, in their efficacy, effects, or manner of oblation; or to` be a metonymie of the effect for the cause.

§. 22. WHERE there happens to be a remarkable fimilitude or resemblance between two things in fome quality or circumftance, the one of them is frequently called by the name of the other, on account of that fimilitude only. And in this way of allufion to fimilitude, and not to symbol, may prayer, praise, &c. be called facrifices. Sacrifices were oblations that were offered to God: and when they were offered, with the prefcribed difpofitions of mind, they were acceptable to him, and available to obtain bleffings from him. In like manner, penitent difpofition, righteoufnefs, prayer, and praife, exercised and performed in obedience to the will of God, are oblations tendered to him by the mind, acceptable to him, and available to obtain from him the fame bleffings as facrifices, but in a different way. Wherefore, there being fuch an evident refemblance between the oblation, efficacy, and effect of thefe, and thofe of facrifices, they may, on that account, be called

facri

facrifices; and they really are fo called in an elegant and emphatic manner, and that without any regard to facrifices as fymbols or emblems of them. The texts, therefore, before us, in which these modes of expreffion occur, may be thus understood, without any ftraining; and when they are fo understood, they afford a fenfe which is both good and elegant: whereas, if they are understood in the Dr's way, as carrying references to facrifices, as fymbols of prayer, praife, &c. the fenfe is either abfurd, or low and frivolous, as we have already seen.

S. 23. PERHAPS the fenfe of these texts may be more ftriking and affecting, if we confider the rhetorical figure, ufed in them, to be a metonymie of the effect for the caufe, or of the thing accepted for the ground of acceptance; a rhetorical figure which frequently occurs in holy fcripture.- -The acceptance and whole efficacy of facrifice did depend on the penitent difpofition, righteoufnefs, and the fincere prayers and praises of the offerers. And may not a broken fpirit, righteoufnefs, prayer, and praise be, on this account, called facrifices; and they who practifed them, be faid, to facrifice them? In this cafe, the thing accepted will be put for the ground of acceptance; and that on which the whole worth of facrifice depended, will be called facrifice. The texts before us, thus understood, will have a D 4 fenfe

fense not only good, but highly elegant and emphatic; and the phrafeology in them will be very fublime and poetical and the thing inculcated will be this, that the acceptance of facrifice did entirely depend on a virtuous temper and behaviour; that, without thefe, the most pompous and expensive facrifices were worthlefs and unprofitable; that, therefore, the tendering to God a good heart, and a pious and virtuous life, ought to be confidered and regarded as the best and most excellent oblation that can be made to him.-To conclude, if we understand what is faid in thefe texts, either in the figurative fenfe now mentioned, or in that which is expreffed in the foregoing paragraph, they will have a fenfe that is good, elegant, and emphatic.

8. 24. BEFORE I leave these texts, it may not be altogether foreign to my design in this performance, to obferve, that the Dr. before he can adapt them to his purpose, and make them fubfervient to it, has two things to prove; (1.) That these texts will have a confiftent, good, and probable sense, when the terms facrifice and facrificing, which occur in them, are understood as having a reference to facrifices, as fymbols or emblems of addrefs to God. And, (2.) That these terms cannot be understood in a lower, or in any other, figurative fenfe, than his. For if he could prove the for

mer,

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