taken none effect. For they are not all Israel which are of Israel neither because they are the seed of Abraham, are they all children; but, In Isaac shall thy seed be called; that is, they which are the children of the flesh, these are not the children of God; but the children of the promise are counted for the seed. For this is the word of promise, At this time will I come, and Sarah shall have a son.' As if he had said, it is not the being by natural descent the child of Abraham, which constitutes the true Israelite, but inheriting the faith "which Abraham had, being yet uncircumcised." As the apostle had proved in the fourth chapter, "the promise that he should be the heir of the world was not to Abraham or to his seed through the law, but through the righteousness of faith. Therefore it is of faith that it might be by grace, to the end the promise might be sure to all the seed, not to that only which is of the law, but to that also which is of the faith of Abraham who is the father of us all." The apostle having thus referred to that principle which proved that the admission of the believing Gentiles into the church of Christ, was consistent with the entire scheme of the divine dispensations, proceeds to argue with the Jews, that they had no right to complain of another nation being now admitted to the peculiar privileges of the chosen people of God, since they had themselves enjoyed these privileges merely by an act of unmerited favour on the part of God, as was evident from the history of Esau and Jacob, and their posterity; and that therefore a similar gratuitous favour might with strict consistency be extended to the Gentiles, by admitting them into the Church of God in place of the Jews, whose disbelief excluded them. The tenor of the apostle's argument clearly points out this to be his meaning, which he thus illustrates :"When Rebecca also had conceived by one, even by our father Isaac (for the children being not yet born, neither having done any good or evil, that the purpose of God according to election might stand, not of works, but of him that calleth); it was said unto her, The elder shall serve the younger; as it is Rom. ix. 6-9. + Rom. iv. 12. Rom. iv. 13, 16. written, Jacob have I loved, but Esau have I hated. What shall we say then? is there unrighteousness with God? God forbid. For He saith to Moses, I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I will have compassion. So then it is not of him that willeth, nor of him that runneth, but of God that showeth mercy.' This passage would, indeed, seem very inexplicable, if Esau and Jacob were thus represented as individuals, who being not yet born, neither having done any good or evil, were by a positive and unconditional decree of predestination, one elected to certain and eternal happiness, and the other doomed to certain and eternal misery, in the future world. But it is most clear both from the original history and the reference here made to it, that no such idea was meant to be suggested by either. In both, Esau and Jacob are considered merely as representatives of the nations who were respectively to descend from them, the Edomites from Esau, the Israelities from Jacob; and the prophetic declaration in the history denotes, that contrary to the expectations arising from primogeniture, contrary also "to him who willeth," to the personal inclination of Isaac who designed the blessing for Esau, forgetting or disregarding the prophecy to the reverse pronounced at their birth, and finally contrary also "to him who runneth," to the efforts of Esau, who ran to execute his father's commands for securing the blessing to himself-in opposition to all these, the Israelites were to be the chosen people of God, in exclusion of the Edomites, who were to be their inferiors both in temporal and religious concerns. This PREDESTINATION OF NATIONS to execute the divine purposes in the PRESENT WORLD, not the PREDESTINATION OF INDIVIDUALS TO ETERNAL HAPPINESS OR MISERY IN A FUTURE STATE, was most clearly meant both in the prophecy and the apostle's argument, so far as refers to Esau and Jacob. For when, before the children were born, Rebecca went to inquire of the Lord, he said unto her; "Two nations are in thy womb, and two manner of people shall be separated from thy bowels and the one * Rom. ix. 9 to 16. : people shall be stronger than the other people and the elder shall serve the younger."* This prediction the apostle directly quotes, as the fact to which all his reasoning exclusively applies. This was the election he here speaks of, for, says he, "It was said unto her, The elder shall serve the younger." It was this that verified the declaration of God's "loving Jacob," and his posterity; and "hating," that is, comparatively rejecting, and degrading Esau and his posterity. It is with relation to this national selection and this national preference that the apostle maintains the selection of Jacob rather than Esau, did not depend on " any good or evil," the individuals had done, it being "determined before they were born." With respect to this only, he defends the righteousness of God, and maintains that such national preference was consistent with the perfection of the divine justice and the equity of God's moral government. That it was thus consistent, has I trust, been already proved; and we must allow it to be so, or affirm it impossible for God to choose any people out of an idolatrous world, who should preserve amongst men his law, his worship, and his word; since any such choice must imply similar national preference and similar national exclusion. But except it can be proved that to predict the posterity of the elder brother should thus serve the younger, is synonymous with predicting the elder brother and all the individuals of his posterity were to be universally and unconditionally condemned to eternal misery, the younger and all the individuals of his posterity as universally and unconditionally exalted to eternal glory-this passage cannot be forced into a proof of unconditional decrees deciding the personal election or reprobation of every man who cometh into the world, even "before he is born, or hath done ought good or evil;" the doctrine which this and similar passages are adduced to establish. Another instance to support the same tenet has been adduced from Pharaoh, of whom the apostle in the next verse declares "The Scripture saith unto Pharaoh, Even for this * Vide supra, from 90 to 92; also 178 to 182. same purpose have I raised thee up, that I might show my power in thee; and that my name might be declared throughout all the earth. Therefore hath he mercy on whom he will have mercy, and whom he will be hardeneth." It has been truly remarked, that St. Paul here only briefly adverts to the original narrative; and cannot mean to infer any thing more than what that narrative implies; and it seems evident, that the hardening of heart here spoken of, is not active on the part of God, but merely permissive and judicial. It is indeed most clear that this entire transaction, and the reasoning of the apostle concerning it, cannot relate to any absolute predestination fixing the eternal happiness or misery of Pharaoh as an individual in the future world, for this plain reason, that the execution of such a decree could not show the power of Jehovah to human eyes, or declare his name through all the earth, because no living men could witness it. This narrative records merely the series of God's providential dispensations and awful judgments, visibly exercised over the sovereign of Egypt and his subjects collectively; the great majority of whom had impiously defied the God of Israel, and persecuted his chosen people with a malignity and cruelty unparalleled. It seems to me that the writers, whose observations on this subject I have seen, have not sufficiently attended to the dispositions which had been clearly manifested by Pharaoh and his people, in facts occurring long before the deliverance of Israel from the house of bondage commenced, From not reflecting on these facts, Pharaoh seems generally regarded as a yet neutral and untried character, and it therefore appears peculiarly harsh, that before Moses had any interview with him, God should declare, "I will harden his heart, that he shall not let the people go."+ Let us then consider the dispositions and character which Pharaoh and his people had long before that time signally displayed. Eighty years, at least, before the mission of Moses to the Egyptian monarch, his predecessor had pronounced that horrible decree against the unoffending nations of Israel, which † Exod. iv. 21. Rom. ix. 17. charged all his people, saying, "Every son that is born ye shall cast into the river, and every daughter shall ye keep alive :"* doubtless for the most polluted purposes. Divine Providence had prevented this execrable decree from being carried into effect; and the king who was its author, had sunk in the grave. But his policy and his cruelty towards the enslaved and persecuted Jews, had been adopted by his successors, and by the Egyptian nation at large; who continued uninterruptedly to tyrannize over the Israelites with excessive severity. They made their lives bitter with hard bondage, in morter and in brick, and in all manner of service in the field; all their service wherein they made them serve was with rigour; they set taskmasters over them to affiict them with their burthens."† And during the reign of that Pharaoh to whom Moses was sent, this system had been persevered in with the most unrelenting tyranny and the children of Israel "sighed by reason of the bondage, and they cried, and their cry came up unto God, by reason of their bondage; and God heard their groaning, and God remembered his covenant with Abraham, with Isaac, and with Jacob. And God looked upon the children of Israel, and God had respect unto them. And he said unto Moses, I have surely seen the affliction of my people which are in Egypt, and have heard their cry, by reason of their taskmasters; for I know their sorrows. Now therefore, behold, the cry of the children of Israel is come unto me; and I have also seen the oppression wherewith the Egyptians oppress them. Come now, therefore, and I will send thee unto Pharaoh, that thou mayest bring forth my people the children of Israel out of Egypt."‡ From these passages it is clear, that Pharaoh was not at that time a neutral and untried character. He had already shown an inveterate hardness of heart, by persisting from his earliest years to that moment in an unmitigated course of tyranny and oppression over the chosen people of God. If therefore God, as the first step for the deliverance of his people, had cut him off, without further warning or respite, it had |