• Νεώτεροι opponuntur πρεσβύτεροις et ex lege oppositionis intelligendi sunt omnes reliqui qui exceptis Presbyteris ecclesiam constituerent."-KUTTNER.

SCHOTANUS, though obviously very averse, "a communi Doctorum sententia discedere videri," states very distinctly, and defends very successfully, what appears to me the true meaning:-"Hic per juniores intelligimus totam ecclesiam. Id autem probamus (1.) ex repetitione verbi presbyteri; (2.) ex collatione in verbis: similiter; (3.) quia summissionem regimini opponit; (4.) quia passim Apostoli quando agunt de officiis in quibus mutuus est respectus, solent utrumque urgere. Si autem quis dicat nomen illud juniores repugnari, respondemus nequam. Nonne Apostolus Paulus totam Ecclesiam Galaticam filiolos' vocat, Gal. iv. 19, et hæc ratio est, quia tum temporis præcipue Ecclesiæ præficiebantur qui provectioris ætatis erant."

"Per juniores autem hoc loco maxime intelligitur Grex qui pendet à pastoribus, quia pastores et presbyteri, maxima ex parte, electi fuerunt ex senioribus ætate, et proinde maxima pars gregis constabat ex junioribus."-AMESIUS. "Sicut nomen, senior, præfectum significat, etiam si ætate sit minor, ita nomen, junior, sive adolescens, recte interpretante Beda, subditum omnem, tametsi ætate superiorem designat."-HESSELIUS.

NOTE D, p. 703.

"Kóμẞos nodus vinculum quo illigabantur manicæ præsertim in vestitu servorum."BENGEL. Grotius gives the following quotation from Pollux, lib. iv., which is quite to the point:-Τῇ τῶν δούλων ἐξωμίδι καὶ ἱματίδιον τί προσκεῖται λευκὸν, δ' ἐγκόμβωμα λέγεται. Putting on the tykóμßwua, was preparing in a becoming manner to act as a servant; assuming the appearance and preparing for the duties of the servile state. "'Eyxóμßopa vestis humilis et servorum erat: qui cum breves tunicas quas inwuidas vocant gestarent, super has ¿ykóμßopa induere solebant; palliolum vilissimum sed candidum; quod et ißnua ut observant antiqui dicebant."-HEINSIUS. Sac. Exercit. p. 577.

DISCOURSE XXII.

TWO VIEWS OF AFFLICTION AND ITS DUTIES.

1 PET. v. 6, 7.-Humble yourselves therefore under the mighty hand of God, that he may exalt you in due time; casting all your care upon him; for he careth for you.

THERE are few practical questions of deeper and more extensive interest, than how should we conduct ourselves amid the afflictions of life, so as to be best sustained under them, most improved by them, and soonest and most certainly delivered from them? This is a question which concerns us all; for, however we may differ in other points of view, here we all occupy common ground. We are all sufferers. It is not less universally true that "man is born of a woman," than that he is "born to trouble." It is certain, too, that affliction, though in all forms in itself an evil, is far from being an unmixed evil; that by means of it, men, constituted and circumstanced as they are, may be made wiser and better, and ultimately happier, than they could have become without it. "It has been good for me that I have been afflicted," says the Psalmist. "Chastisement yieldeth peaceable fruits," says the apostle. And there is "a great crowd of witnesses" of the wisest and the best, in every age, all of whom have set to their seal that this testimony is true.

It is, however, just as certain that there have been many sufferers who could not truly make the psalmist's declaration their own. It has not been good for them that they have been afflicted. They were bad when affliction seized them; they did not improve under its grasp; and now that it has let them go, they are worse than ever. Indeed, the waters sent forth from the fountain of affliction seem in themselves poisonous as well as bitter. The infusion of a foreign ingredient into them appears to be necessary to make them salutary, or even safe. Their effects are usually powerful; but they often aggravate rather than mitigate moral disease.

The different effects of affliction on different individuals, depend mainly on their being, or their not being, under the influence of the Holy Spirit; and that is chiefly manifested in the views they entertain of affliction, and in the dispositions they cherish under affliction, two things which are very closely connected with each other. The influence of affliction on the mind and character of a man who considers his sufferings as the effect of blind chance or unintelligent necessity, or of intelligent but malignant power; and who is inconsiderate, or proud, or fretful, or desponding under them-must be very

1 Job xiv. 1. Psal. cxix. 71. Heb. xii. 11.

different from its influence on the mind of a man who considers his sufferings as proceeding from the appointment, and inflicted by the agency, of the infinitely powerful, wise, righteous, and benignant Sovereign of the universe; as tokens of displeasure against sin, yet means of reclaiming sinners; as important parts of God's mysterious economy for making foolish, depraved, miserable man, wise, and good, and happy; and who cultivates a thoughtful, submissive, prudent, devout, patient, hopeful disposition under them.

The moral effect of affliction on an irreligious or superstitious mind cannot but be mischievous, though it will vary with the variety of character and circumstance, and take the form, in one case, of stupid insensibility; in another, of querulous fretfulness; in another, of hopeless despondency; in another, of hardened impiety. It will in every such case drive men from God, not draw them towards him. It will make them worse and more miserable, not better and happier; it will fit them for hell, not for heaven.

On the other hand, the moral effect of affliction in a mind enlightened with heavenly truth, and a heart pervaded by holy influence, must be in a very high degree advantageous. Every principle of the new life, such as faith, hope, penitence, patience, humility, self-sacrifice, is exercised and strengthened; and the result is, increased conformity in mind, and will, and choice, and enjoyment, with the allwise, the all-holy, the all-benignant, the ever blessed, God. Who would not wish that his afflictions might have this result? We must be chastened; this is a settled point. "To each his sufferings, all are men.' Who would not tremble to be so chastened as to be destroyed with the world? who would not desire to be so chastened as to be made partakers of God's holiness? It is this book that alone can so instruct us in the true nature of afflictive dispensations, and in the right way of dealing with these dispensations; as that it may be secured that, in our case, the last, and not the first, result shall be realized. We must go to the school of revelation, in order to learn how to behave ourselves in the school of affliction so as to obtain improvement there; and a most instructive lesson of this kind may be derived from that interesting passage of inspired Scripture which has been read as the subject of discourse. May the great Teacher, who makes all whom he teaches apt to learn, enable us so to improve it, as that "his rod and reproof," when he sees meet to subject us to them, may more than ever "give wisdom!"

These words present us with two interesting views of affliction; first, as a state of subjection to the mighty hand of God; and, secondly, as a state of anxiety and carefulness; and with two corresponding views of the duty of the Christian under affliction, each accompanied with its appropriate motive. In the first view of affliction, the Christian is to humble himself under the mighty hand of God; and he is to do this because humility is well-pleasing to God, because it is the hand of God, the mighty hand of God, that he is under, and because doing so is the appointed way to be exalted in due time; and in the second view of affliction, the Christian is to cast all his cares on God, and he is to do this because God cares for him. This is the

1 Gray.

outline I mean to fill up in the remaining part of the discourse; and, in doing this, I shall not first consider the two views of affliction, then the two views of the duty of the Christian under affliction, and then the two views of motive urging to the performance of these duties, but I shall successively, as the apostle does, take up each connected view of affliction, duty, and motive.

Before entering on this, however, it may be proper to say a word or two on the manner in which these two verses are connected with the immediately preceding context. In the close of his directory respecting ecclesiastical duties, the apostle recommends the cultivation of humility as necessary to that mutual subjection by which all in christian fellowship, whether office-bearers or private members, whether elders or juniors, should be distinguished; calling them to put it on as their appropriate dress when in love they served each other; and he strengthens his recommendation by quoting an Old Testament oracle, in which God's complacent approbation of the humble, and his indignant reprobation of the proud, are strongly expressed. "God resisteth the proud, and giveth grace to the humble." And in proceeding to offer them some advices suited to those circumstances of persecution and trial to which, by the appointment of God, and through the direct and indirect agency of the great adversary the devil, they were already exposed, and were likely soon to be still more exposed, he naturally, in so high a recommendation of humility as a disposition peculiarly pleasing to God, finds a ground for enjoining on them the cultivation and display of this virtue, in reference to their afflictions, viewed as the work of God's hand: "God resisteth the proud, and giveth grace to the humble. Humble yourselves therefore under the mighty hand of God." The quotation from the Old Testament is brought forward as a motive to enforce equally the injunction that precedes it, and the injunction that follows it.

L-FIRST VIEW OF AFFLICTION, AND ITS DUTY.

§ 1.-Affliction is subjection to the mighty hand of God.'

The first view here given us of a state of affliction is, that it is a state of subjection to the mighty hand of God. The words of the apostle are equivalent to, Being in affliction, ye are under the mighty hand of God; humble yourselves under it. "The hand of God," like "the arm of the Lord," is a figurative expression for the power of God in action, as men put forth their power by their arm and hand. He is said to have brought his people from Egypt "by strength of hand;" that is, by the exertion of power. It is said, "None can stay his hand," none can prevent or control the exertion of his power. When Job expresses a wish that, by an act of Divine power, he might be destroyed, he says, "Oh that it would please God to let loose his hand, and cut me off;" and, speaking of the power of God as the efficient cause of all things, he says, "The hand of the Lord hath done this, in whose hand is the soul of every living thing, and the breath

1 Vide Note A.

of all mankind." The epithet "mighty" is added to suggest the idea of great, resistless energy.

To have the hand of God on a person, to be in his hand, or under his hand, does not necessarily indicate being in a state of affliction. It merely means that the power of God is exercised with regard to that person. Jehovah is said by Moses "to love his people;" and in a parallel case he adds, All his saints are in thy hand," protected by thy power. “The hand of our God," says Ezra, "is upon all them for good that seek him; but his power and his wrath is against all them that forsake him. The hand of our God was upon us, and he delivered us from the hand of the enemy." The powerful inspiring influence of the Holy Spirit is described as the hand of the Lord being on the prophets, in the cases of Elijah and Ezekiel. But the phrase is very often used in a more specific sense, as descriptive of the power of God put forth for punishment or chastisement. It is said, "the hand of the Lord was heavy on the men of Ashdod," when he visited them with a severe judgment. "The hand of the Lord is on thy cattle," said Moses to Pharaoh, when he announced the plague of murrain. Have pity on me," says Job, "Have pity on me, O my friends, for the hand of God hath touched Day and night," says the psalmist, "thy hand was heavy on me. Thine arrows stick fast in me; thy hand presseth me sore." "Let me not fall into the hand of man, but into the hand of the Lord," said David, when called to choose whether war, or famine, or pestilence, was to be the punishment of his son. Some interpreters consider the phrase before us, "under the mighty hand of God," as merely referring generally to the being entirely at the disposal of God, completely in his hand; but the use of the epithet mighty, and the contrast of the depressed state of the person under the mighty hand of God, with the state of elevation promised him if the temper of his mind should properly correspond with his circumstances, as well as the succeeding context, all convince me that the apostle had in his eye" the manifold trials," "the afflictions," to which, as a part of the christian brotherhood in the world, those to whom he wrote were exposed. The thought which he wished to bring strongly before their mind is this: Those afflictions to which you are exposed are the result of the Divine appointment and agency.' Let us shortly illustrate that thought; it is an important one.

"Affliction cometh not forth of the dust; trouble doth not spring from the ground." They "come down from above;" they "come forth from Him who is wonderful in counsel, and excellent in working.' There are many who think and feel in reference to afflictive dispensations, as the Philistines of old did, when they said, a chance hath happened us." But there is neither blind chance, nor unintelligent necessity, in God's world." He worketh all things according to the counsel of his own will." No event occurs apart from his plan,

1 Job vi. 9; xii. 10.

Deut. xxxiii. 3. Ezra viii. 22, 31. 1 Kings xviii. 46. Ezek. i. 3. 1 Sam. v. 11. Exod. ix. 3. Job xix. 21. Psal. xxxii. 4; xxxviii. 2. 1 Chron. xxi. 13.

Job v. 6. James i. 17.

Isa. xxviii. 29.