Imágenes de páginas
PDF
EPUB

learns all things: But it is a thing very pleasing to God, when we recite to one another what we have learned, as diligent and attentive scholars. Since he is so merciful as to vouchsafe his blessing to this exercise, and to edify and strengthen one person by another, though it be not lawful for any man to call himself master: (Matt. xxiii. 10,) ́ For One is our master.'

[ocr errors]
[ocr errors]

As to myself, I reckon I am but a novice, and one of the least disciples in this school; and that I have tasted but some little drop of this vast ocean of wis dom, which is in Jesus Christ, and have greater cause than Job to say; (Job xxvi. 14,) How little a portion have we heard of him.' Yet, with simplicity of mind, I adventure to rehearse my lesson, and impart to others according to my knowledge, as far as it can be done, in few words, in what manner they ought to seek, find, and taste Christ, as the kernel (or sum and substance) of the Holy Scriptures; and to nourish, satiate, and sustain their soul with him unto eternal life.

May God, through his infinite grace and mercy, bless my endeavours, and by them bring many into the way, by which they may have life, and by which they may have it more abundantly. (John x. 10.)

Whosoever therefore thou art, that desirest to come to the true knowledge of Christ, who is the sum and substance of the Holy Scriptures, and to be made a partaker of him, let it be recommended to you above all things, to consider for what reason you do read the Holy Scriptures; or what end you propose to yourself in designing to peruse the whole sacred writings; what it is you seek or look for by it; for every thing is to be referred to its true and full scope

or intention; otherwise the true and full fruit thereof cannot be expected. In reading the Holy Scriptures, the whole intention of the mind must be levelled at this, and no other scope whatever, that first, we may come to Christ, and secondly, by Christ to eternal salvation. (2 Tim. iii. 15. Acts x. 43. John xx. 31.)

That you may well and happily attain this end, by means agreeable to the divine ordinance, and approved of God, you must not set about it, trusting in your own strength, wisdom, and understanding; or imagine, that by diligent reading, meditation, and inquiry, you will be able to search it out; or that then you have compassed your end, when you have acquired some external knowledge of Christ, his person, his natures, offices, states, and all the degrees of his examination and exaltation. But you must humble yourself before God like a little child, and begin all your reading of the Holy Scriptures with a submissive acknowledgment of your own insufficiency, and with serious and most ardent prayers and sighs to God; nor ought you ever to desist from such continual humiliation of yourself; though having made some progress therein, you may find great knowledge in the Holy Scriptures. But if you became and remained truly humble, and innocent, like a very little child hanging at his mother's breasts, surely the pure milk of the gospel would, without hindrance, flow into you, and would replenish your heart more than it might your memory. Concerning this wisdom of babes, see Matt. xi. 25-27.

Nevertheless the things now spoken, are not to be so understood, as if you were not to read the Holy Scriptures, nor to meditate on what you read. Meditation is of admirable use, being tinged, as it were,

with prayer, and exercised by the guidance of the Holy Spirit. By degrees you will learn, howsoever difficult it may seem at first: 1. To attend to the genuine scope of an entire text. 2. To weigh rightly the antecedents and the consequents.

3. To consider distinctly the circumstances, viz. Who? What? Where? By what assistance ? Why? How? When? 4. To compare one sentence with another, the Old, with the New Testament, Moses with the prophets and the Psalms, &c. to explain some things by others, the difficult texts by the more easy ones. 5. To receive the words of the men of God, in a divine sense, with which they were imbued, (which they have declared more clearly and fully in some places than in others) not according to their external sound, nor in a carnal sense, as the world is accustomed to do. 6. To collect one truth out of another. And 7. To contemplate with pleasure, the sweet harmony and connexion of divine truths; as there is a handle given in what follows to such salutary Meditations.

Nor ought you to be too anxious when you begin your meditations on the Holy Scriptures; for if you join ardent prayers and a holy desire of knowing Christ, to your reading of them, the matter will thereupon grow better, you will unawares be conducted by God himself into the most pleasant and sweet meditation of his eternal truth, and he will, by little and little, discover to you the inexhausted profundities and treasures of wisdom and knowledge, that are hid in Christ Jesus. (Col. ii. 3.)

Nor are you to wonder, if at first, in reading the Holy Scriptures, many things seem to you obscure, and less intelligible, and that it is necessary for you

to read the same chapters again and again, before you find any thing that can, in your own opinion, assist you in the knowledge of Christ. Labour not anxiously to understand things that are too difficult for you, but willingly let them pass, until you have your senses more exercised in the divine mysteries. In the mean time you will always discover something that may lead you forwards to the knowledge of Christ. The few things which you find to be easy, you may prudently turn to your own benefit, and may use them to the establishing and strengthening yourself in the love of Christ: thus difficult places will, by degrees, become obvious to you. If any fruit, (as says the Rev. Dr. Spener on this subject, in his book of the Doctrine of Faith, p. 495,) hang higher than you can reach, you must be content to feed on that which is lower. Perhaps God also keeps secret in your heart, this or that passage which at present you do not perceive or understand, but will afterwards be made intelligible to you, if, like Mary, (John xiii. 7,) you diligently ponder it in your heart; while you faithfully obey all the profitable counsel that is given you, the divine light will quickly shine forth unto you, and Christ, as the sum of the Holy Scripture, will disperse the thick cloud that is on your mind, and will illustrate all its chapters, verses, and words, that you may discover that in them, which you could not before by any means be persuaded of.

But that you may have the safest and surest instruction, how you are to proceed by degrees, and so the fittest and best help may be administered to your weakness, and to your senses, as yet but little exercised in the word of God; it is meet, if you desire to

seek rightly, and to find Christ in the Holy Scriptures, that you begin with such things as are most clear and easy on this point. Now the New Testament, in what it teaches concerning Christ the Saviour of the world, is much more explicit than the Old, nay, without controversy, it is the true key of the Old Testament: while, 1. He is therein made present to us, who is promised in the Old Testament; and there prefigured by types and shadows; and 2. Whilst the evangelists and apostles do hardly any thing else, but (as Luther speaks) compel and send us to the Old Testament in search of Christ. Here then it is supposed that the whole Bible, or all the writings of the Old and New Testament, have been once at least read over, and the course of things, described in both testaments, summarily understood by this perusal; but afterwards, when the more solid and more proper knowledge of divine truth comes to be discussed by a nicer and fuller inquiry, from the foundation now laid, the most convenient method for understanding the doctrine, is chiefly, and in the first place, to begin with the writings of the New Testament, to meditate upon them with the greatest industry, and to render them familiar to you.

In the reading of the New Covenant, this ought to be always the chief, nay the only desire of your soul, that you may come to the saving and lively knowledge of Jesus Christ. But that you may arrive at this, it is not only necessary, that you have your mind and heart piously and devoutly fixed on the person, words, and works, as also on the passion of Christ, but that you diligently examine also the words alleged in the New Testament out of the Old, as testimonies concerning Christ; that you turn to

« AnteriorContinuar »