Such then is the excellence of the sacred style, that it is accommodated to our capacities, it delights our imagination, and leads us into all truth by the pleasantest way; it improves the natural world into a witness of our faith; it transfigures us from natural into spiritual men, and gives us a foretaste of the glorious presence of God. If these are the effects of it, it must be of infinite value to particular persons in their several studies and professions.

And first, it is absolutely necessary to a Christian preacher: whose doctrine, if it be after the form of the scriptural imagery, will be more intelligible, more agreeable, and more edifying to all sorts of hearers. If this is the method God hath been pleased to prefer for the teaching of man, it must be the best when one man undertakes to teach another. We have seen how our Saviour's preaching was in the form of parables: how the apostles in their interpretation of the old testament apply it as a figure and shadow of things to come; and how in their exhortations they reason from some parallel case in the ways of nature. And still it will always be found, that nothing has such an effect in preaching, as the skilful handling of some image or figure of the scripture. For truth, as we have often observed, does not en

ter

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ter into men's minds in its own abstracted nature, but under the vehicle of some analogy, which conveys a great deal of sense in very few words: and therefore the best preachers have always taken advantage of some such analogy, after the manner of the scripture itself, which gives us the pattern of all true preaching.

Let me show you how this is by an example. Suppose a preacher would persuade his audience not to abuse the station in life to which Providence hath appointed them; and not to presume upon the character they may sustain amongst men for a short time here upon earth: he reasons from the transitory nature of worldly things and this he teaches them to see in a glass, by setting before them the changeable scenery and temporary disguises of men in a theatre. In the world at large, as upon a stage, there is a fashion in the characters and actions of men, which passeth away, just as the scenery changes, and the curtain drops, in a theatre; to which the apostle alludes. The world is a great shew, which presents us various scenes and fantastic characters; princes, politicians, warriors, and philosophers; the rich, the honourable, the learned and the wise: and with these, the servant and the beggar, the poor, the weak, and the despised. Some seldom come

from

from behind the scenes; others, adorned with honour and power, are followed by a shouting multitude, and fill the world with the noise of their actions. But in a little time, the scene turns, and all these phantoms disappear. The king of terrors clears the stage of these busy actors, and strips them of their fictitious ornaments; bringing them all to a level, and sending them down to the grave, as all the actors in a drama return to their private character when the action is over.

From this comparison, how easy and how striking is the moral. Nothing but a disordered imagination can tempt an actor on a stage to take himself for a king, because he wears a crown, and walks in purple: or to complain of his lot, because he follows this fictitious mo. narch in the habit of a flave. Therefore let us all remember, that the world, like the stage, changes nothing in a man but his outward appearance: whatever part he may act, all distinctions will soon be dropped in the grave, as the actor throws off his disguise when his part is over. On which consideration, it is equally unreasonable in man, either to presume or to complain *.

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* See Dunlop's Sermons, vol. 1. on 1 Cor. vii. 31. The fashion of this World passeth away.

One such moral lesson as this, which shews us the real state of things under a striking and familiar resemblance of it, is worth volumes of dull abstracted reasonings. It captivates the attention, and gives lasting information: for when such a comparison hath once been drawn out, the instruction conveyed by it will be revived as often as the image occurs to the me

mory.

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To the scholar, the symbolical language of the bible is so useful, that every candidate for literature will be but a shallow proficient in the wisdom of antiquity, till he works upon this foundation and for want of it, I have seen many childish accounts of things from men of great figure among the learned. In ancient times, sentiments and science were expressed by wise men of all professions under certain signs and symbols, of which the originals are mostly to be found in the scripture; as being the most ancient and authentic of all the records in the world, and shewing itself to be such in the form of its language and expression.

How nearly poetry and oratory are concerned with the science of symbolical expression, has already been observed. With this key, a scholar may penetrate far into the arts of poets and orators; and the next thing to composing

well

well is to taste and judge well. But it is also of eminent use for unfolding the religious mysteries of Heathen antiquity.

The Grecian and Roman mythology has been much inquired into by the learned, and is still a great object with them. Whoever considers the form of religious instruction in the church of God, will plainly see, that the mystical or mythological form among the Heathens was derived from it, and set up against it as a rival. It pleased God to prefigure the mysteries of our faith from the beginning of the world by an emblematic ritual: this manner therefore the heathens would necessarily carry off with them; and when they changed the object of their worship, and departed from the creator to the creature, they still retained the mystical form, and applied it to the worship of the elements of the world; describing their powers and operations under the form of fable and mystery, and serving them with a multitude of emblematic rites and ceremonies. Because the true God taught his people by mystical representation, they truly would have their mysteries. too: and I take this to be the true origin of the fabulous style in the Greek mythology: though it makes a wretched figure in many particulars; as the woolly-headed negro savage does, when

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