There is one further advantage common both to the visional and parabolical construction, and which therefore might have been mentioned before, namely, that here we may understand by Phrath, the river Euphrates, being properly chosen in the vision or parable, to intimate that the Jews were to be carried captive over that river to Babylon but as to Ephratah, or Bethlehem, which the learned Bochart by conjecture pitches upon, (only to take off a noted difficulty in the literal way,) it appears not what relation that place could have to the main subjectmatter of the prophecy. And as to the criticism upon the phrase, as if it must necessarily signify in Euphrates, rather than by Euphrates, there is no eertainty in it for the Hebrew particle undoubtedly signifies either in or by, according as the circumstances of the text require. Thus far I have been pleading for the way of construction by parable; not making it my own, but doing justice, so far as I can, to it, and leaving it to the reader to think of it as he sees cause. I shall only add, that two very learned and judicious writers of our own, Bishop Stillingfleet P and Dr. Jenkins 9, incline to the parabolical construction, as well here as in several other the like Scripture instances; and they seem to have favoured this kind of construction above the literal one, for such reasons as have been now mentioned .

JER. XV. 18.

O LORD-WILT THOU BE ALTOGETHER UNTO ME AS A LIAR, AND AS WATERS THAT FAIL? The Ob

• See Noldii Concordant. p. 144.

P Stillingfleet's Letter to a Deist, p. 131, 132.

T

Jenkins's Reasonableness, vol. ii. p. 50.

Bishop Stillingfleet speaks thus: “But you will say, these things are "related as plain matters of fact, with the several circumstances belonging "to them. It is true, they are so, but so parables use to be. So was Na"than's to David; so is that of the rich man and Lazarus in the New Tes"tament: so is Jeremiah's going to Euphrates to hide his girdle; for it is "not very likely the Prophet should be sent eighteen or twenty days' journey "into an enemy's country for no other end."

jector lays hold of this as an offensive passage: and I cannot say that he does it altogether without reason. But it is an English offence only: and I am sorry that our translators did not choose a juster rendering, or at least a more decent expression, when they might so easily have done it, and the context itself persuaded to it. The words may be translated thus: WILT THOU BE ALTOGETHER UNTO ME AS A disappointment, AND AS WATERS THAT FAIL? or, waters not sure. It is well known that often signifies, to frustrate, or disappoint": and it is no new thing for Divine wisdom to frustrate and disappoint human hopes and human expectations. Our translators in Isaiah lviii. 11. do not say, WHOSE WATERS lie NOT, but WHOSE WATERS FAIL NOT; because they thought lie an improper word to apply to waters: and surely liar is a word as improper to apply to Almighty God, if they had rightly considered it. They might very justly in that place of Isaiah have rendered disappoint not, as here in Jeremiah also, disappointed. And it is observable, that here in Jeremiah there is a plain allusion to brooks that dry up, and disappoint the thirsty traveller. The Prophet by his complaint in this place could mean no more than this, that God had in a manner deserted him for a time, had left him to struggle with difficulties and hardships unforeseen or unexpected, thereby disappointing, in some measure, his hopes of better success. Having suffered much and long from his cruel persecutors, he looks up to God, and pours out his complaint before him in pathetic strains, as if God had almost forsaken him, and as if the "fountain of living waters" had been in a manner dried up, or had refused to send forth its enlivening streams: a very just and elegant way of describing the uncomfortable condition which the Prophet at that time lay under. But yet, as if he had said too much, he cor

rects himself presently after, and expresses his entire confidence in the Divine promises to support and strengthen him, to MAKE him as A FENCED BRASEN WALL against his adversaries, to SAVE and to DELIVER him, and to rescue him OUT OF THE HAND OF THE TERRIBLEY. To conclude this article, had but the Objector taken the pains to read three verses forwards to the end of the chapter, he might easily have seen how little foundation there was for finding fault with what he had read in verse 18. excepting only the harshness of an ill-chosen word in an English translation.

JER. XX. 7.

O LORD, THOU HAST DECEIVED ME, AND I WAS DECEIVED: THOU ART STRONGER THAN I, AND HAST PREVAILED. Here again, the translation is harsh and faulty. But the margin had guarded the reader against misconstruction or offence, by the softening word enticed, put there for deceived. Indeed the word enticed much better expresses the sense of in this place, though it does not fully come up to it. The occasion of the words was this: the good Prophet had met with a large share of ill usage from an ungrateful people, for the faithful discharge of his prophetic office. Under these his calamitous circumstances, he looks up to God, and appeals to him, the Searcher of hearts, as his witness, that it was not through any ambition of his own that he had entered upon that invidious office; nor had he taken upon him, of his own accord, to reprove his countrymen : but all he had acted in that affair was done pursuant to a Divine call, and in pure obedience to Divine command. He would gladly have declined it, or even have run away from it; but God would not suffer him. Wherefore hereupon he says, speaking to Almighty God; THOU HAST OVER-PERSUADED ME, O LORD, AND I WAS

Jer. xv. 19, 20, 21.

z See Jer. i. 6, 7, &c.

OVER-PERSUADED, (so the words, I think, ought to be rendered,) THOU ART STRONGER THAN I, AND HAST PREVAILED. The passage carries in it a lively idea of the Prophet's great modesty and profound humility, in not affecting high things, or shining offices, but submitting however to the burden of them in obedience to the will of God. For what purpose, then, could the Objector produce this text? Let the reader observe, and marvel: he produced it to prove that prophets have been deceived by relying upon God's word; and of course, that the people also have been deceived by relying upon the word of those prophets b. Never were premises and conclusion less allied, or at greater distance from each other.

JER. XXVII. 2, 3.

THUS SAITH THE LORD TO ME; MAKE THEE BONDS AND YOKES, AND PUT THEM UPON THY NECK, AND SEND THEM TO THE KING OF EDOM, AND TO THE KING OF MOAB, AND TO THE KING OF THE AMMONITES, AND TO THE KING OF TYRUS, AND TO THE KING OF ZIDON, BY THE HAND OF THE MESSENGERS WHICH CAME TO JERUSALEM UNTO ZEDEKIAH KING OF JUDAH.

This is another text which the Objector finds fault with, as making the Prophets act like 'madmen, or idiots. But his censure here also is without foundation. As to the nature of the command here given by God to the Prophet, I take it to be in part figurative and metaphorical; signifying in a lively way what should be the fate of Zedekiah and the other kings in league with him. Jeremiah is commanded in another placed, to TAKE THE WINECUP OF GOD'S FURY, and to CAUSE ALL THE NATIONS,

a See Lowth upon the place. Vitringa in Isa. viii. 11. p. 215. Assembly's Annotations, and Pool's. De Spagne Reformation de quelques Passages, &c. p. 22.

b Christianity as Old, &c. p. 256.

c Ibid. p. 255.

d Jer. xxv. 15, 16, 17.

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whom he should be sent to, TO DRINK IT and it follows, THEN TOOK I THE CUP AT THE LORD'S HAND, AND MADE ALL THE NATIONS TO DRINK, &c. Which means only, that he prophesied against them, and pronounced their doom. In like manner, his sending the yokes and bonds to the princes mentioned, seems to mean nothing more than his declaring from God the fate of those princes, by the token, and under the metaphor of yokes and bonds, to enliven the idea, and to make the prophecy more solemn and emphatical. The words of our learned Smith, being very apposite to our purpose, are here worth the inserting. "Just in the same mode with "this (of the Rechabites) we have another story told, xxv. 15, 17, &c. of his taking a wine-cup from God, and his carrying it up and down, far and near Jerusalem and "the cities of Judah, and the kings and princes thereof; "to Pharaoh, king of Egypt, and his servants, princes, "and people to all the Arabians, and kings of the land "of Uz: to the kings of the land of the Philistines, "Edom, Moab, Ammon; the kings of Tyre and Sidon, "and of the isles beyond the sea, Dedan, Tema, Buz; "the kings of Zimri, of the Medes and Persians, and all "the kings of the north and all these he made to drink "of the cup. And in this fashion, chap. xxvii. he is sent and down with yokes, to put upon the necks of seve"ral kings: all which can have no other sense than that "which is merely imaginary; though we be not told "that all this was acted only in a vision: for the nature "of the thing would not permit any real performance "thereof." Thus far he and what he says appears to be very right in the main only he must, I suppose, have allowed, that Jeremiah made some such yokes with bonds, (as it is certain he did put one upon himselff,) to render the impression of what he was to say the more strong and lively. It was customary for prophets to prophesy

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• Smith's Select Discourses, p. 226.

f See Jer. xxviii. 10, 11, 12.