simple reliance on the many able and approved Expositors of the things which are most surely believed among us, but as having himself also been at pains to trace his religious creed to the supreme Authority on which it rests-παρηκολουθηκότα ἄνωθεν πᾶσιν ἀκριβῶς: Luke i. 3.

Here, then-in these words of the Evangelist, thus slightly modified-is the purpose which the present undertaking is designed to subserve; to fix men's attention on the Original Text of the Christian Scriptures; to induce the Classical Scholar not to throw away the obvious advantages, which early familiarity with the Greek tongue must have given him, for arriving at the mind of Christ, as made known in the writings of His inspired Apostles; nor to imagine that the same appliances and means by which, one after another, he has unlocked the treasures of Heathen Literature, can ever be out of place when applied to the "thoughts that breathe and words that burn" in the unchecked, unpremeditated eloquence of St. Paul. Nor is this the whole result at which our undertaking aims. Retracing those ancient channels of Interpretation and Comment which pious hands have dug, it would bid the reader mark, and verify for himself, the immediate derivation of the pure wells of our Church, her Liturgy and Articles, from the fountain-head of Scriptural and Apostolical teaching; and more than this-it would climb with him to the height from which St. Paul deduces Christianity itself; and, guided now by the hand of Inspiration, observe how that inestimable LOVE wherewith God so loved the world, that He gave His

only-begotten Son, and in Him to as many as should receive Him, and believe on His name, gave power to become the sons of God (John i. 12. iii. 16. xvii. 20-24)—how this grace of God, and the gift thus obtained through the grace of the One Mediator between God and Men (Rom. v. 15. 1 Tim. ii. 5), dates not from the birth of the Man Christ Jesus, but from the beginning of all things, even before the foundation of the world (Eph. i. 4. 2 Tim. i. 9. 1 Pet. i. 20); and so the election of grace (Rom. xi. 5) is, on the part of God, the one eternal purpose, predestination, and provision of His love (Rom. ix. 11. Eph. i. 4—6. iii. 11), to which all things from the beginning of the Creation have conspired to give its foreseen development and effect; and if, from among Men, it has led to His selection of one individual, or one nation, for an especial honour which in His wisdom He has not entrusted to another-these have been vessels of mercy, not more unto themselves than unto others; God having provided for those also who through their instrumentality should believe on Him; and so provided, that without this crown of rejoicing (1 Thess. ii. 19) not even His most favoured servants should be perfect in His sight. I KNOW HIM THAT

HE WILL COMMAND HIS CHILDREN AND HIS HOUSEHOLD

AFTER HIM, THAT THEY TOO SHALL KEEP THE WAY OF THE LORD—this is the highest grace that Man's own faithfulness ever has found before the heart-searching God. BEHOLD I, AND the children WHOM GOD HATH GIVEN ME -this glory, shadowed now in the Christian Church, will be fulfilled when the Lord, for whom we look, shall be revealed

from Heaven, not only to be glorified in His Saints, but also to be admired in all them that believe (2 Thess. i. 7. 10).

What, then-if this be indeed St. Paul's doctrine of Predestination; if our election of God (1 Thess. i. 4), so far as that grace is given to individual believers, resolves itself into this; not that we have already attained unto it, or are already perfect; but that with full purpose of heart (Acts xi. 23), answering, however faintly, to the fulness of the Divine purpose towards us, we are aiming on our part to lay hold upon that blessed hope, for which we believe (and, according to our faith, so shall we find) that Christ's helping hand has laid hold on us (Phil. iii, 12. Heb. ii. 16)—if, while we so believe, and so taste of the heavenly gift (Heb. vi. 4), we are, in the truest sense, of the seed of Abraham, and heirs to the full extent of the promise (Gal. iii. 29); and yet so free is Man's own agency in this matter, that he who ministerially has been a vessel of election (Acts ix. 15) unto others, may himself fall from grace (Gal. v. 4), nay, in the end, be found to be a castaway (1 Cor. ix. 27)—what shall we say, then, of more recent speculations on this subject? where is Predestination in the modern acceptation of the term?

It is, we reply with our Apostle-as would it had ever been-excluded, by more enlarged views of St. Paul's inspired teaching; suggested, in the first instance, by a closer and more critical observation of his language; sustained and strengthened by thoughtful consideration of the context, and logical connexion, of each controverted passage; and set (it is conceived) beyond all reasonable doubt or question by all

that we know of the times, and of the peculiar circumstances, under which he wrote.

FEAR NOT, LITTLE FLOCK; FOR IT IS YOUR FATHER'S GOOD PLEASURE TO GIVE YOU THE KINGDOM (Luke xii. 32)—in these encouraging words, addressed (even as the herald Angel had addressed men that were not disobedient to the heavenly vision) to those Jews who first put their trust in Christ, ministering thereby to the praise of God's grace and glory (Eph. i. 6, 12), we have, as it were, the key-note to that melody of the heart with which, at midnight and in prison, Paul and Silas prayed and sang praises unto God (Acts xvi. 25). And does not the same note of holy confidence and joy pervade that wonderful chapter to the Romans, in which to those who love God and, should He even slay them, would still put their trust in Him (Job xiii. 15), the Apostle reveals that of such is the kingdom of Heaven; inasmuch as both He who is sanctifying them, and they who are being sanctified by His Spirit, are all of One God and Father, who before the foundation of the world accepted THE MANY in THE ONE SON OF HIS LOVE (Rom. v. 19. Col. i. 13. 1 Pet. i. 20); and yet, when He had thus far brought many sons to glory, was pleased to make both the Captain, and the ransomed Host of His spiritual Israel, perfect through sufferings in the flesh (Heb. ii. 10, 11)? Does not the same note of praise and thanksgiving pervade the entire Epistle to the Ephesians, in which, on behalf of those who in that idolatrous city had chosen that good portion which (but with their own consent) neither devil nor man should thenceforth take from them (Luke x. 42),

he blesses the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who, having predestined such as should believe on Him (Rom. iv. 24. 1 Pet. i. 21) to stand in the relation of SONS UNTO HIMSELF IN JESUS CHRIST (Eph. i. 5), has given them, with the will, the way also and the means to find their portion in the inheritance of His saints in light (Col. i. 12)? And thus, whilst (in the words of St. Peter) he sanctified the Lord God in his own heart, and, comforting them who were in any trouble by the comfort wherewith he himself was comforted of God (2 Cor. i. 4), armed his converts also against that fear of Man that bringeth a snare, was not his gospel (as he emphatically terms it, Rom. xvi. 25) a preaching of Jesus Christ which furnished a ready answer to every man that asked of them a reason for the hope that was in them (1 Pet. ii. 15)?

Yes, both to Jew and Gentile does it furnish such an answer: for (1) do the Jews require a sign (1 Cor. i. 22)— even a kingdom of God that should come with observation (Luke xvii. 20)—an heir to the full blessedness of the promise made to Abraham's seed (Rom. iv. 13. Gal. iii. 29)— and yet more, a son of David who should restore again the kingdom unto Israel (Acts i. 6)? Behold, writes the Apostle, One born indeed of the seed of David according to the flesh, but in that new and spiritual nature, in which God hath made Him His first-born from the dead, A SECOND ADAM; once more declared to be (as was the first Adam, before he fell), THE SON OF GOD. Behold Him, as Head over all things to the Church of God, which He hath purchased with His own blood (Acts xx. 28), no longer now a living soul, chained