irresistible testimony, as those of the Old Testament; for they were built upon the old as a foundationwere addressed to those who were perfectly familiar with it, and were sure to be at once admitted in all their pretensions, provided the substantial grounds of their claims to credit could not be impugned. The Epistle to the Hebrews shews, at once, how far this analogy between the two covenants might be carried, and how unnecessary the writer held it to pursue the argument through all its branches.

But it may reasonably be alleged, that though this argument goes far towards accounting for the omission of all notice of the continuance of such portions of the Old Covenant, as are alike essential to both; yet it makes little towards the justification of those silent changes which were adopted, and in matters, too, as we have seen, of very considerable moment, in the construction of the New Covenant. To account for this, and to shew that these changes were not only justifiable, but even compulsory; and so much so, as to supersede any necessity for even alluding to, or recording them, let us consider that the Mosaic Law was the type, as well as the commencement, of the Christian system, and that it prefigured it, not only in what was to be continued, but also in what was to be done away. Now a type is of the nature of a precept. The

Almighty, in the primitive ages of the world, commanded as often by signs as by words; and when these signs had their accomplishment, men were as much bound to fulfil the anti-type, to the very letter, as they had previously been to fulfil the outward sign, or obey any other distinct command of God. Hence these changes to which we have alluded, were made silently, and without express direction; because they were necessarily implied in that outward form to which they succeeded, and had been already included in the command which established that which went before. To illustrate this by an example. It has always been matter of some surprise that a change so great as that of the Sabbath from the last to the first day of the week, should have taken place, without any express command on the subject, or even any distinct record of the transaction, in the word of God. We find there, indeed, that the change did, and that very early, take place in the Church; but it is always alluded to, rather as a matter of course, than as being, as in truth it was, a momentous deviation from the precept of the Law. Much more satisfactory reasons can be assigned for the change itself, than for this profound silence concerning it. But we seem to perceive one in the preceptive character of a type, which will account for the non-necessity of prescribing or recording this change, by the utter impossibility of

avoiding of it.21 The observance of the Sabbath, as is well known, was imposed on the Jews for a twofold reason they were commanded to observe one day in seven, to commemorate the creation of the world-they were commanded to observe a particular day in seven, to commemorate their own deliverance, on that particular day, from the bondage of Egypt. When Moses rehearses the Law to the people, he adds, after the fourth commandment— "And remember that thou wast a servant in the land of Egypt, and that the Lord thy God brought thee out hence, through a mighty hand, and by a stretched out arm: therefore the Lord thy God commanded thee to keep the Sabbath day." As

"22

21 There are, of course, various other good and cogent reasons for this change, which are familiar to every student of divinity. This is here assigned, not as being the sole, but as a sufficient

reason.

22 Deut. v. 15. Bishop HORSLEY, in one of his admirable sermons on the Sabbath, has the following remark: "It has been imagined that a change was made of the original day by Mosesthat the Sabbath was transferred by him from the day on which it had been originally kept in the patriarchal ages, to that on which the Israelites left Egypt. The conjecture is not unnatural; but it is, in my judgment, a mere conjecture, of which the sacred history affords neither proof nor confutation." The change of the day by Moses may be doubtful; but had the Bishop sufficiently weighed the force of the text above quoted, he would not have hesitated to allow, that the reason assigned by him for the observance of the particular day, was to commemorate the Egyptian deliverance.

far then as the first reason for observing the Sabbath, and therefore one day in seven, is concerned, it is immutable; as far as regards the second, which specified the particular day, it was not only mutable, but inasmuch as the reason on which it was founded was itself a type of something to follow, it was necessarily to be changed when the anti-type arrived. The deliverance from Egypt fore-shadowed the deliverance of all mankind from more than Egyptian bondage; and as the commemoration of the former of necessity passed away when the actual deliverance had been completed, so was the day on which it was celebrated as necessarily changed, for that on which the real and effectual transaction took place. If it would have been absurd to continue to offer the Paschal Lamb after the real Lamb of God had been slain, which took away the sins of the world; it would have been not less so, to observe the day on which their earthly deliverance took place, when the day of their spiritual liberation— that of the resurrection of our Lord-was known. The type was, in this case, a precept; and commanded the change as clearly, as, in the first instance, it had commanded the observance.

The same mode of reasoning may be applied, and with undiminished force, to the two other important differences between the Old Law and the New, to which we have specially alluded; viz., the estab

lishment of fixed administrators, or a prescribed succession in the Priesthood; and also the strictly legal form in which the writings of the respective legislators under the two systems are couched. In both these cases, a silent but essential change took place under the scheme of the Gospel; and the principle which we have just laid down, will shew that this silence arose not from the indifference of the matter, but the very contrary-from its being taken for granted that the changes were absolutely necessary, to maintain the identity of character which existed between the two systems.

With respect to the Priesthood. The Law of Moses was of such a character, as necessarily to require a considerable number of men, and those of various grades and offices, to put it into execution. The services of the Temple, at once incessant and multifarious, could only be conducted by a large body of public servants, well trained for their several offices, and enabled to devote the whole of their time to the duties of their ministry, by absolute freedom from all secular cares and occupations. Hence the propriety of an office so minute and complicated being hereditary in a particular family, and the necessity, also, for a public provision for their maintenance.23, And though that department of

23 That provision, we may remark, was very equitably proportioned to their numbers-the secular tribes contributing one-tenth