ing their bonds asunder, and delivering them out of prison, where they were bound in affliction and iron, and sat in darkness and the shadow of death for healing them by his word when afflicted with sickness: for delivering them from the perils of the sea, and making the storm a calm, so that the waves thereof are still. All this scenery is well drawn out, and finely applied, by a devout and elegant commentator of our own church, who has made the book of Psalms more useful to pious Christians, than it ever was made since the reformation; and, I may add, before it. From that Psalm, as from the miracles of Christ, we learn the weakness and wretchedness of man, and the goodness of God with the power of his grace. We see the necessity of prayer for the help of God; after the example of those, who cried unto the Lord in their trouble, and were delivered out of their distress.

No forms of prayer can be more significant than those which are built upon the miraculous works of Christ. These shew us what our wants are, and thence teach us what we are to pray for and when we have respect unto them, and the author of them, we mix an act of

The Reverend Dr. Horne, Dean of Canterbury, and President of Magdalen college in Oxford.

of faith with our petitions, which will never fail to render them more acceptable; for we read, that the power of Christ took effect on those only who had faith to be healed. There is not a want of man, nor any occasion in life, on which the miracles of Christ will not sup ply us with the finest matter of devotion, and in some such form as the following with which I shall conclude.

"O Son of David, thou great physician of "souls, who didst once exercise thy power in "the land of Judæa, and wentest about doing "good; thou art still with us; and hast pro"mised so to be unto the end of the world. "Have mercy upon us under all the weaksc nesses of our nature, and succour us under "all oppression from evil men or evil spirits:

deliver us from the bonds of our sins, and give light to us when we sit in darkness: open our eyes, that we may see the things which belong to our peace: give us an ear to hear " and understand thy word; and a tongue to

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praise and confess thee before men: give "strength to our feeble hands, that they may be "lifted up to thy name, and let our knees be "flexible and ready at their devotions: cleanse "us from our secret faults, as well as our out"ward offences; feed our souls with the bread

"of life, and let us hunger and thirst, that thou mayst satisfy us. Be mindful of us, O Lord, "in our distresses, when we are tossed about 66 upon the waves of this troublesome world: "and in all our dangers of soul and body, "stretch out, to save and defend us, that right "hand which raised up thy disciple sinking in "the mighty waters. In all things let our "faith be toward thee, and then shall thy power and mercy be toward us for deliver❝ance and salvation." AMEN.

LECT.

LECTURE XI.

THE USES AND EFFECTS OF THE SYMBOLICAL

STYLE OF THE SCRIPTURE.

Now it hath been shewn what the figurative language of the holy scripture is, by an induction of particulars; we may proceed to speak with more confidence concerning the uses and good effects of it. We now stand as it were upon an hill, up to which our enquiry hath conducted us, thence to survey the fruitfulness of the holy land. We have seen that the law, in its sacrifices and services, had a shadow of good things to come; that its history is an allegory; that God used similitudes by his prophets; that Christ spake in parables; that the apostles preached the wisdom of God in a mystery; in a word, that the whole dispensation of God towards man, is by signs, shadows and figures of visible things. The law of Mo

ses,

ses, the Psalms, the Prophets, the Gospels and Epistles, and most of all the Revelation of St. John, use and teach this figurative language: and therefore, in the use and interpretation of it must consist the wisdom of those who are taught of God. Here is the mind that hath wisdom, saith St. John, the seven heads are seven mountains, on which the woman sitteth : Where the word wisdom is applied to this science of decyphering the figurative expressions in the language of the Revelation. So at the end of the 107th Psalm, wherein the salvation of man's soul is set forth under all the forms of deliverance from bodily dangers, it is added, whoso is wise and will observe these things, even they shall understand the loving kindness of the Lord. Whatever the form and manner may be after which the divine wisdom is communicated, it must be the best: and such we shall find it when we enquire how the improvement of man's mind is promoted, and all the purposes of God's revelation answered by the use of this symbolical or figurative style of speaking from the images of things.

1. This method is necessary to assist the mind in its conceptions, and supply the natural defect in our understandings. Being men, invested with an earthly body, which hath a