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Not in being filled, and overlaid with filver and gold, for these are spoken of as comparatively vile and contemptible. "The filver is mine, and the gold is mine, faith the Lord of hofts," a claim exactly in the fame fpirit with that made in the fiftieth Pfalm. Hear, O my people, and I will fpeak: O Ifrael, and I will teftity against thee: I am God, even thy God. I will not reprove thee for thy facrifices, or thy burntofferings, to have been continually before me. I will take no bullock out of thy houfe, nor he-goats out of thy folds for every beast of the foreft is mine, and the cattle upon a thouf and hills. I know all the fowls of the mountains; and the wild beafts of the field are mine. If I were hungry, I would not tell thee; for the world is mine, and the tulnefs thereof. Will I eat the flesh of bulls, or drink the blood of goats? Offer unto God thanksgiving; and pay thy vows unto the most High.' "Lebanon is not fufficient to burn, nor the beafts thereof fufficient for a burnt-offering." But when " facrifice. and offering thou didst not desire, when burnt-offering and finoffering were not required, then said I, Lo, I come, I delight to do thy will, O my God." This, Chriftians, like the flar. which conducted the wife men of the Eaft, leads us directly to the Saviour of the world. Would you behold the fuperior. glory of the latter temple, look to Simeon vifiting it, looking and longing for the confolation of Ifrael; behold him with the babe in his arms, exulting with joy unfpeakable and full of glory, in having seen the falvation of God. Look to Jefus at the age of twelve years fiting in the temple in the midit of. the doctors, both hearing them and afking them queftions," displaying at that tender age, a wifdom and dignity-tar fuperior to that of Solomon in his zenith. Look to that fame Jelus, in his zeal for the honor of the facred edifice, purging it of thofe impurities which a worldly fpirit had introduced into it. Listen to the divine eloquence which there flowed from the lips of him who fpake as never man fpake. Hear him predicting its deftruction, and establishing the truth of his own miffion in denouncing against it, and devoting it to, total and irrecoverable ruin. Behold Him on those ruins, rearing an everlafting and a fpiritual building, on a rock against which the gates of hell fhall never prevail; and in all this, behold as in aglafs the glory here spoken of, the advent of "the defire ot all nations," the "ftar of Jacob" arifen, Shiloh come, to whom. the gathering of the nations fhall be, "the Prince of Peace," by whom peace is proclaimed, and through whom peace is given to him that is afar off and him that is nigh."

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In order ftill farther to justify the application of this prophe cy to the perfon and character of the Redeemer, we may inquire into the import of the other expreffions here employed, to defcribe the appearances of nature and providence, which fignalized the era of his manifeftation in the flesh. "Yet once, it is a little while.". The reign of prophecy was haftening to a conclufion. Haggai was one of the laft on whom that spirit rested; with Malachi, who lived probably somewhat later, it entirely ceased; and a dark period of five hundred years, without a vision, intervened, till it was revived in one who came in the fpirit and power of Elias, the forerunner of the Meffiah, the voice crying in the wildernefs, Prepare ye the way of the Lord, make straight in the defert a highway for our God,"Isaiah xl. 3. and it shone in all its luftre in the Meffiah himfelf," the great prophet that fhould come into the world." By him it is here intimated that God fhould fpeak "once" for all; that he should be the full and final declarer of the will of God to mankind," yet once" but no more

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"It is a little while." With God what is purpofed, is be gun to be executed, his agents are already at work, time is loft with him who fees the end from the beginning. "The Lord is not Black concerning his promise, as fome men count flackness;" "beloved, be not ignorant of this one thing, that one day is with the Lord, as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day," The interval between the prediction and the accomplishment, though a period of five centuries, is, in the fight of God, "a little while;" and five centuries, when they are paft, are but "a little while" in the eyes of man alfo. But to what circumftances attending the coming of our Saviour refers the Proph et, when he reprefents the great God as "fhaking the heavens and the earth, and the fea, and the dry land, and all nations ?" It is well known that the facred writers frequently employ, by a bold figure, the appearances of the natural world to reprefent and explain moral objects. In the cale before us, it will be found that both the literal and figurative sense of the words are strictly applicable to the fubject. Every one, who is at all acquainted with the history of mankind, knows that the whole course of things has been a conftant and fucceffive conauffion and convulfion, a fhaking of the nations, ftruggle for dominion, the progress of empire from eaft to weft; and an afpect of the heavenly bodies and influence, analogous to the state of the moral world. The obferver of nature endeav our to trace all thefe up to their native causes in the great

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fyftem of the aniverfe; the moralift looks for them, in the nature and conftitution of man, and the politician, in the combinations and exertions of paflion and intereft. The Believer, the Chriftian refers all to God, fees him in the cloud, in the fky; hears him in the wind, in the thunder, in the fongfter of the grove; and he fees the fwelling tide of nature and providence labouring with one object of peculiar impor tance; all things are fhaken and compofed in fubordination to the preparation of the gospel of peace.

Let me compress what I mean to say within a narrow compafs; and I fhall do it nearly in the words of an elegant preacher whom I have oftener than once had the honour to quote in this place. The eastern part of the world was, in the wifdom of Providence, firft peopled, great and extenfive empires were fit formed there, and there learning and the arts were first brought to perfection. But while fcience and empire flourished in the eaft, a power was rifing by degrees in the western world, which was one day to furpass all that had gone before it. Unknown to the proud empires of the east. ern hemisphere, which vainly flattered them!elves that they divided the world amongst them, this power was then filently advancing from conqueft to conqueft, and the Roman eagle was by degrees ftrengthening her wing, and preparing to take her flight round half the globe. The fucceffion of those great monarchies, thofe fhakings of the heavens and the earth, this fhaking of all nations, led gradually and imperceptibly to that happy conjuncture, that fulness of time, that maturity of divine counfel which fuited the introduction of Chriflianity. They arofe one after another, they enlarged one upon another, till at length the genius of Rome, under the permiffion of heaven, triumphed over and swallowed up all others, and expanded, opened, united, confolidated, that wide-extended, well-informed, civilized empire, through which the gospel of Chrift was destined to make a progress to rapid and so successful. To favour this great event, to procure attention to the Author and finifher of our faith, and to render the firft appearance of our holy religion at once more auguft and more fecure, the struggles of ambition which had fo long fhaken the world, those restless contefts for fuperiority, fubfided at last, fuddenly and unexpectedly, into univerfal peace. That ftormy ocean, which had been for ages and generations in continual agitation, now all at once funk into a furprising calm; the bloody portal of Janus, which had fo long emitted unrelenting deftruction to mankind, was fhut, and the globe was inftantly overĺpread

overfpread with tranquillity, relieved from the din of arms, from the confufed noife of the warrior, and the horrid fight of garments rolled in blood, in order to receive the Prince of Peace.

The fhaking of the nations, as paving the way for the défire of all nations, is ftriking to the contemplative mind in another point of view. Philofophy rode triumphant, every question relating to phyfics, morals, politics fcience, religion, was freely canvaffed; and the noife of the fchools in many inftances drowned that of the enfanguined plain. The introduction of Christianity was preceded by a remarkable diffufion of knowl edge, and the radiance of science ushered in the gospel day, as Aurora announces the approach of the fun, and prepares the world for it. Egypt, Perfia, Greece, and Rome, poured from their leparate urns, those diftin&t rills of science, which meeting in one great channel, became a mighty flood, and overspread the vast Roman empire. And thus was Revelation enabled to give a most illuftrious proof of its coming down from above, by diffufing over the world, all at once, a light fuperior to afi collected human wifdom in its brighteft glory. And need we afk who it was that thus fhook and fettled the fea and the dry land, who regulated the vaft engine, who conducted all these great events, and brought them to one iffue, concurrence and conclufion? At the fame period of time, the promised Meffiah came the greatest empire that ever exifted was at the height of its glory learning flourished beyond what it had done in any former age: and the world was bleffed with univerfal peace. A coincidence of facts, every one of which is in itself fo extraordinary, that it cannot be paralleled by any other times, clearly points out the hand of that fupreme, over-ruling power, who from eternity beheld the great plan of his providence through its whole extent, who alone" can declare the end from the beginning, and from ancient times the things which are not yet done," faying, " My counfel fhall ftand, and I will do all my pleasure."

To put this beyond all doubt, let it be obferved, that these events took their rise in remotest ages, and were prepared in times and countries far diftant from and unknown to each other. Empire which fprang up amidst the feven hills of Rome; Science nurft in the academic groves of Greece; and religion from the obfcure vales of Judea, all met at one grand crifis. To one another unknown, they must have been conducted by the hand of Providence. But meet they did, and peace from. heaven crowned them with her olive. And thus were the

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nations fhaken, to prepare the way of the Lord; thus "the valleys were exalted and the mountains and hills laid low, the crooked made ftraight, and the rough places plain," and the high and afpiring thoughts of men were brought into captivity to the obedience of Chrift.

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But the heavens and the earth were literally fhaken, at the coming of the defire of all nations." Witnefs that new created ftar which conducted the eaftern Magi to the place where the Saviour was born; witnefs the defcent of Gabriel and a multitude of the heavenly hoft, to announce his arrival; and witnels the other appearances of celeftial fpirits to minister to the Lord of Glory in his temptation and agony, at his refurrection and afcenfion into heaven; witnefs the defcent of Mofes and Elias to the mount of transfiguration; witnefs too the eclipfe of the fun beyond the courfe of nature, which marked the hour of his death, the quaking of the earth, the rending of the rocks, the rifing of the dead: witnefs the voice from heaven which, like thunder, oftener than once, fhook the echoing air, while God himfelt declared his well beloved Son, and demanded attention for him. All thefe confirm the teftimony of the Prophet, they point it to the Lord Jefus, and infpire joy unfpeakable and full of glory, on difcovering the perfect coincidence between prediction and event. To this aufpicious, this all important era we are now brought; and the next Lecture, with the divine permiffion, will detail the remarkable circumftances which immediately preceded, or which accompanied the birth of Christ.

And was all this mighty preparation made to introduce at mere man of like paffions with ourselves? Were the heavens from above and the earth beneath ftirred to meet him at his coming? Did flaming minifters defcend fingly and in bands, did departed prophets revifit the earth, and the dead bodies of faints arise to do homage to a creature, their equal, their fellow? It is not to be believed. But furely this is the Son of God; and to receive him, coming for our falvation, what fo lemnity of preparation was too great, what homage of angels. and men too fubmiffive, what teftimony of created Nature too ample?" Hofanna to the fon of David, bleffed is he who cometh in the name of the Lord, Hofanna in the higheft."

Is his name and defcription "the defire of all nations ?" how fitly applied! Is light defirable to the benighted, bewildered traveller in a land of fnares and of the fhadow of death?' İs pardon defirable to a wretch condemned? Is the cooling Atream defirable to the parched pilgrim, and bread to the hun

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