In the pure holy place we are contemplating, the mourning souls who hunger now and thirst for righteousness, the holy types therein contained clearly pre-show, will find a full supply; for the true continual blessed bread of life stands always open on the royal table-all freely do put forth their longing hands, take, eat, and live for ever. (Matt. xxvi. 26; Gen. iii. 22.) In this celestial sanctuary, the flame of fervent piety is ever bright and clear; its glorious minister himself here ever trims the lamps-burns the perpetual incense of his costly righteousness* on its refulgent altar, and with the sweet odour of the prayers of saints, wafteth it up to God.+ In this pure rite do purest spirits join. "I saw an angel come and stand at the altar, having a golden censer, and there was given unto him. much incense, that he should offer it with the prayers of all saints upon the golden altar which was before the throne, (though separated by the vail;) and the smoke of the incense, which came with the prayers of the saints, ascended up before God out of the angel's hand." (Rev. viii. 3, 4.) Here spiritual worship is spiritualized indeed; angelic censers are never filled with the strange fire of vain and wayward passions. Upon this splendid edifice no vicarial offerings, no carnal presentations, can be ever laid. Nought but that * 1 Cor. vi. 20. "For ye are bought with a price." "And when he had taken the book, the four beasts, and four-and twenty elders fell down before the Lamb, having every one of them harps, and golden vials full of odours, which are the prayers of saints." precious blood which cleanses from all sin (1 John i. 7) will be accepted here; it was the living goat that was commanded to be brought into its typifying sanctuary*-into the hallowed symbol of those blessed realms, where death will never enter. Here we shall rest a little season, released from all our labours, and our works will follow us. (Rev. vi. 11; xiv. 13.) On the first tabernacle, or outward sanctuary, (Ezekiel xliv. 1,) portrayed in the tripartite division of the temple, we shall primarily observe, that the most limited estimate by which the meaning of this type can be appreciated, must assign it as representative of our worldly sanctuary; and as the inner emblematic sanctuary has, we think, been clearly proved to be a figure of the great celestial sanctuary, or intermediate heavens, the porch walls, gate, and hangings, which in the figurative patterns separate the outward from the inward sanctuary, cannot, we conceive, but be considered as symbols of the boundary, or firmament, which parts between that portion of infinite space wherein our small world revolves and the secondary or intermediate heavens. By St. Paul distinguishing the grand emporium, or visible seat of Deity, by the appellation of the third heavens, a primary division is as clearly implied as is a secondary one, and that these starry heavens which we behold, in which our globe * We do not here offer any comments on that very important type, the-scape goat, as we shall have occasion to consider it very particularly hereafter. and those pertaining to our solar system perform their evolutions, may fairly be inferred. The first is pretty clearly evinced by comparing that sublimest vision in the holy mount, when Israel's elders saw the God of Israel: "and there was under his feet as it were a paved work of a sapphire stone, and as it were the body of heaven in his clearness," (Exod. xxiv. 9, 10,)— like a clear sky spangled with stars,* with the relation of the prophet Ezekiel, who, in the visions of God, (i. 1,) was brought into the temple, "and, behold, the glory of the God of Israel came from the way of the east: and his voice was like a noise of many waters; and the earth shined with his glory." "And the glory of the Lord came into the house by the way of the gate, whose prospect is toward the east. So the spirit took me up, and brought me into the inner court; and, behold, the glory of the Lord filled the house. And I heard him speaking unto me out of the house; and the man stood by me. And He said unto me, Son of man, the place of my throne, and the place of the soles of my feet," &c. (Ezekiel xliii. 4-7.) We may, therefore, it is conceived, feel assured that this place was symbolic of the same place to that whereon the feet of God did rest, when the seventy elders saw the God of Israel; " and there was under his feet as it were the body of heaven in his clearness," which was unquestionably representative of our lower starry heavens. Earth is, in Scripture, often styled God's footstool, a simile See Orton's Exposition of this recital. palpably adapted to the most limited conceptions.* But when Nadab, Abihu, and the elders saw the God of Israel, they had a commensurate prospect. Our earth, in this just view, formed but one little gem in the bright starry pavement, proving the vast assignment of our starry heavens to be the footstool to Omnipotence. The holy of holies, or highest division of the boundless universe, is clearly demonstrated by the emblematic patterns, and the visible appearance of the divine glory, to symbol the place of God's throne; and it may be most reasonably concluded, that the first, or lowest does typify the place of the soles of God's feet. There is no intimation whatever given in Scripture of a quadruple division of the universe, though the Mosaic patterns, in coincidence with the information derived from St. Paul, fully illustrate a threefold one, and do also, we think, clearly prove these nether heavens which we inhabit to be the first and lowest one. one, The point we have just been endeavouring to ascertain, may probably be deemed a very unimportant one for us to decide; but had not a right understanding of this particular been an essential preparatory toward the elucidation of other very important ones, it might have remained uncan * This kind of similes are common in Scripture, to instance only one, namely, the command given forth by Joshua, which was couched in the following terms: "Sun, stand thou still upon Gibeon, and thou, moon, in the valley of Ajalon!" Whereas, all who are not immersed in ignorance, must know, that this miracle was performed by God's suspending the motion of the earth, and that the phraseology employed was merely accommodated to the ideas of the unenlightened beholders. vassed; though we must maintain, that confused ideas engender unbelief, and that just ideas of the universe tend to the establishment of a rational belief. Some truths deducible from Scripture may have been designedly left not immediately palpable, for the purpose of superinducing that diligent search into them, that beneficial exercise of the mind which elucidates truth, by comparing things spiritual with spiritual. All information contained in the sacred volume must be of essential import to us, or such information would not have been communicated. And when we contemplate and meditate upon the awfully sublime, tremendous scene which preceded the ushering in of the Mosaic institution, it fully demonstrates its high momentous import. The Lord himself giving forth his voice, yea, and that a mighty voice, unto Moses, saying, "Lo, I come unto thee in a thick cloud, that the people may hear when I speak with thee, and believe thee for ever. Go unto the people and sanctify them to-day and tomorrow, and let them wash their clothes, and be ready against the third day; for the third day the Lord will come down in the sight of all the people upon Mount Sinai. And thou shalt set bounds unto the people round about, saying, Take heed to yourselves, that ye go not up into the mount, or touch the border of it; whosoever toucheth the mount shall be surely put to death: there shall not an hand touch it, but he shall surely be stoned, or shot through; whether it be beast or man it shall not live when the trumpet soundeth long, they shall come up to the mount. And it came to VOL. I. N |