Lord bless thee, and keep thee; the Lord lift up the light of his countenance upon thee, and be gracious unta thee; and the Lord give thee peace.-The lifting up the light of the Lord's countenance brings favour and life; and the light and love that are reflected by it fhew us the confecrated way through the vail, and sweetly attract the foul to God, until the heart is fo inflamed, and our nearness fo great, that be that loveth dwelleth in God, and God dwelleth in him: and here we look as through a mirror, till we are changed into the fame image, from glory to glory. And this was fhewed to the three witneffes on mount Tabor, when Mofes the mediator, and Elijah the prophet, appeared in glory, both to refign their offices to the only prophet of his church, and to the only mediator of the better teftament. At which time the Lord Jefus appeared in his proper luftre, and through the vail of his flesh let his natural rays of infinite divinity, glory and majesty, shine forth: at which time Mofes and Elijah refigned their offices; and in the glorious vifion withdrew, and appeared no more-to let the witneffes fee that the borrowed rays on Mofes' face are no where now to be feen but in the face of the Son of God, who is the fountain of glory, light, life, and love.

Again. The light of glory on the face of Mofes was to fhew the origin of the law, to give a fanction to it, and to put an honour on the office of Mofes; that the law was given by the God of glory, and was to be received as fuch, being attend

ed

ed with the glory of God on the face of the mediator of it, who brought it to them. But then all this was to lead the people to another Mediator, to a brighter glory, and to another dispensation, which was to be written on the fleshly tables of finners' hearts, and to be attended with the glory of God by the coming of the Holy Ghoft: the original of which is from God, the fountain of all grace; and which brings life and immortality to light in the finner's foul, that the ever-bleffed Mediator may be glorified; for God will have the Son honoured even as himself is honoured by all that believe, and will difplay the riches of his grace in glory by Jefus Chrift for this very end and purpose, that all who are faved and glorified may ascribe their falvation equally to God and the Lamb for ever and ever.

And, laftly, This glory on the face of Mofes, in the ultimate end of its fignification, was to fhew, not only the glorious vifion of faith in this militant ftate, but the glorious views of the Saviour in the world to come; when we shall fee as we are feen, and know as we are known; awake in his likeness, and be for ever fatisfied therewith.-This is the mystery of Mofes' rays. I come now,

Thirdly, To the vail upon his face. This vail fheweth, that the law then given was a vail, or covering, over the covenant of grace, which God made with Abraham; and that this covenant lay hid under it; that Mofes himfelf, and his law on tables

of stone, were fwaddling bands over the law of faith, which ever was and ever will be written on the fleshly tables of the heart of God's elect when called by grace; and this vail was a covering over the better Mediator, who stood behind this wall, and fhewed bimfelf through this lattice; and that the better covenant was hid under the law, and only here and there peeped out in an unconditional promise, here a little and there a little, in fuch paffages as these; "The Lord will circumcife thy heart, and the heart of thy feed, that thou mayeft love the Lord with all thine heart, that thou mayest live." "He fhall raise you

him fhall ye hear."

Say not,

up a prophet like unto me; "He is thy life, and the length of thy days." "He is the rock, and his work is perfect." who fhall afcend into Heaven, or defcend." "That (fays Paul) is the word of faith that we preach." "The word is nigh thee," &c. "Shewing mercy unto thousands of them that love me, and keep my commandments." Pardoning iniquity, tranfgreffion, and fin; and will not clear the guilty"-that is, not with fatisfaction by a furety. All thefe, with all the fhadows of the ceremonial law, were fo many branches of the everlasting gofpel, which fhone through the vail of that dark difpenfation, and which Ifrael could not fee; but took the law as their rule of righteousness, by which they thought to obtain eternal life, when it only promifed life in the land of Canaan. They fought righteousness by the works of it, and never attained to it, but stumbled at the Rock

Rock of ages. They called themfelves Mofes' difciples, who accuses them to the Father for rejecting the prophet he foretold fhould come; threatening them with destruction if they refused to obey his voice: hence, being dead, he yet speaketh in his teftimony against them; but they clave to their accufer, and cursed and killed the only Advocate, who fhewed himself to their fathers behind the skirt of Mofes, and whose glorious gospel lay couched under his killing letter. This was the delufion of poor Paul; he thought the law was ordained to life; but, when the commandment came, he found it to be unto death. And thus their table (of the law) became a fare unto them, and that which should have been for their welfare (properly viewed) became a trap; the way that seemed right unto them became, in the end, the ways of death of death; "for the way of God is above to the wife, that he may depart from hell beneath." The wife and learned fcribe, and the felf-righteous pharifee, who thought themfelves, and no others, at the portals of heaven, were difplaced by the publicans and harlots; and they themfelves were left to add fin to fin, by not entering heaven themfelves, and by hindering others who were going; and thus became the deceivers of the fons of men, the murderers of the Son of God, and the awful heirs of the greater damnation.

And the church of God at the prefent day fwarms with fuch as thefe; who have no holiness but a sheep's skin, an outward fhew in the flesh, a volun

tary

tary humility, natural meekness, and the art of moving the paffions of poor finners, in order to counterfeit the operations of the Holy Ghoft. And thus they who fit under them are deceived by the art of oratory, by having their feelings affected, their blood moved, and their natural and corrupt affections stirred up-by an audible voice, a hollow fpeech, whining heart, and crocodile tears; when fuch are conscious to themselves that they are deftitute of grace, and in a state of enmity to God; that they aim at nothing but a livelihood, and that the work of the pulpit is the hardest labour they grapple through. Being deftitute of the well of living water, the whole of their matter is preffed from their library, committed to a treacherous memory, and brought forth as empty hufks from the external furface of the letter, without any light into the matter, or life in the means, unctuous experience of it, or faith in it; it is the work of a blind watchman, who speaks a vision out of his own heart, and not out of the mouth of the Lord; having feen nothing, and known nothing, but what he knows naturally.

Secondly. This vail was to fhew the Ifraelites that Chrift, the light of God's Ifrael, and the co-. eternal beam with God the Father, was then fhining in the face of Mofes, to lead their minds to the finner's only and everlafting friend; and that after that glory and that divine ray they fhould feek, however it might be vailed or wrapped up-whether by the

law