into their Bibles, and remember the ftyle and way of
writing that is ufed by the ancient prophets. Have
they forgot, or were they never told, that many parts
of the Old Testament are Hebrew verfe? and the fi-
gures are ftronger, and the metaphors bolder, and the
images more furprizing and strange, than ever I read in
any profane writer. When Deborah fings her praises
to the God of Ifrael, while he marched from the field
of Edom, she sets the "earth a-trembling, the heavens
drop, and the mountains diffolve from before the

"Lord.
They fought from heaven, the ftars in their
"courfes fought againft Sifera: When the river of
Kihon fwept them away, that ancient river, the
"river Kihon. O my foul, thou haft trodden down
"ftrength." Judg. v. &c. When Eliphaz, in the book
of Job, speaks his fenfe of the holiness of God, he in-
troduces a machine in a vifion: "Fear came upon me,
"trembling on all my bones; the hair of my flesh ftood

up; a fpirit paffed by and stood ftill, but its form was undifcernible; an image before mine eyes; and filence; Then I heard a voice, faying, Shall mortal "man be more just than God?" &c. Job iv. When he defcribes the fafety of the righteous, he "hides him "from the fcourge of the tongue, he makes him laugh at

deftruction and famine, he brings the stones of the field into league with him, and makes the brute animals <enter into a covenant of peace." Job v. 21, &c. When Job fpeaks of the grave, how melancholy is the gloom that he spreads over it!" It is a region to which I must 66 fhortly go, and whence I shall not return; it is a C "land

"land of darkness, it is darkness itself, the land of the "fhadow of death; all confufion and diforder, and "where the light is as darkness. This is my house, "there have I made my bed: I have faid to corrup ❝tion, Thou art my father; and to the worm, Thou art my mother and my fifter: As for my hope, who fhall fee it? I and my hope go down together to the "bars of the pit." Job x. 21, and xvii. 13. When he humbles himself in complainings before the almightinefs of God, what contemptible and feeble images doth he ufe! "Wilt thou break a leaf driven to and "fro? Wilt thou pursue the dry ftubble? I confume <i away like a rotten thing, a garment eaten by the "moth," Job xiii. 25, &c. "Thou lifteft me up to the wind, thou caufeft me to ride upon it, and diffolveft my fubftance." Job xxiii. 22. Can any man invent! more despicable ideas, to reprefent the fcoundrel herd and refuse of mankind, than thofe which Job ufes? chap. xxx. and thereby he aggravates his own forrows and reproaches to amazement : They that are younger "than I have me in derifion, whofe fathers I would "have difdained to have set with the dogs of my flock: *for want and famine they were folitary; fleeing into "the wilderness defolate and wafe: They cut up mal"lows by the bushes, and juniper-roots for their meat: "They were driven forth from among men, (they

66

cried after them as after a thief) to dwell in the cliffs "of the valleys, in the caves of the earth, and in rocks: "Among the bufhes they brayed, under the nettles

they were gathered together; they were children of

"fools,

"fools, yea, children of base men; they were viler "than the earth: And now I am their fong, yea, I am "their by-word," &c. How mournful and dejected is the language of his own forrows! « Terrors are "turned upon him, they purfue his foul as the wind, "and his welfare pafles away as a cloud; his bones "are pierced within him, and his foul is poured out; she goes mourning without the fun, a brother to dragons, and a companion to owls; while his harp and organ are turned into the voice of them that weep." I muft tranfcribe one half of this holy book, if I would fhew the grandeur, the variety, and the juftness of his

ideas, or the

copy out a

pomp
and beauty of his expreffion; I muft
good part of the writings of David and

Ifaiah, if I would represent the poetical excellencies of their thoughts and ftyle: nor is the language of the leffer prophets, especially in fome paragraphs, much in

ferior to these.

Now, while they paint human nature in its various forms and circumftances, if their defigning be fo juft and noble, their disposition so artful, and their colouring fo bright, beyond the most famed human writers,

how much

more must their defcriptions of God and

heaven exceed all that is poffible to be faid by a meaner tongue? When they speak of the dwelling-place of God," He inhabits eternity, and fits upon the throne "of his holiness, in the midft of light inacceffible." When his holiness is mentioned, "The heavens are not clean in his fight, he charges his angels with folly : "He looks to the moon, and it fhineth not, and the

C 2

"ftars

"stars are not pure before his eyes: He is a jealous "God, and a confuming fire." If we speak of strength, "Behold, he is ftrong: He removes the mountains, "and they know it not: He overturns them in his anger: He shakes the earth from her place, and her pil"lars tremble: He makes a path through the mighty "waters, he difcovers the foundations of the world : "The pillars of heaven are aftonished at his reproof.” And after all," Thefe are but a portion of his ways: "The thunder of his power who can understand ?" His fovereignty, his knowledge, and his wifdom, are revealed to us in language vaftly fuperior to all the poetical accounts of heathen divinity. "Let the pot"fherds ftrive with the potsherds of the earth; but "fhall the clay fay to him that fashioneth it, What "makeft thou? He bids the heavens drop down from "above, and let the fkies pour down righteousness. "He commands the fun, and it rifeth not, and he "fealeth up the stars. It is he that faith to the deep, "be dry, and he drieth up the rivers. Woe to them

that feek deep to hide their counsel from the Lord; "his eyes are upon all their ways, he understands their "thoughts afar off. Hell is naked before him, and de"struction hath no covering. He calls out all the stars "by their names, he fruftrateth the tokens of the liars, "and makes the diviners mad: He turns wife men “backward, and their knowledge becomes foolish.” His tranfcendent eminence above all things is most nobly reprefented, when he "fits upon the circle of "the earth, and the inhabitants thereof are as grafs66 hoppers:

hoppers: All nations before him are as the drop "of a bucket, and as the final duft of the balance: "He takes up the ifles as a very little thing; Lebanon, "with all her beafts, is not fufficient for a facrifice to "this God, nor are all her trees fufficient for the burn❝ing. This God, before whom the whole creation is "as nothing, yea, less than nothing, and vanity. To "which of all the heathen Gods then will ye compare "me, faith the Lord, and what shall I be likened to ?" And to which of all the heathen Poets fhall we liken or compare this glorious orator, the facred defcriber of the godhead? The orators of all nations are as nothing before him, and their words are vanity and emptiness. Let us turn our eyes now to fome of the holy writings, where God is creating the world: How meanly do the beft of the Gentiles talk and trifle upon this fubject, when brought into comparison with Mofes, whom Longinus himself, a Gentile critic, cites as a master of the fublime ftyle, when he chose to use it; "And the “Lord said, Let there be light, and there was light; "Let there be clouds and feas, fun and ftars, plants "and animals, and behold they are :" He commanded, and they appear and obey: "By the word of the "Lord were the heavens made, and all the hoft of "them by the breath of his mouth :" This is working like a God, with infinite eafe and omnipotence. His wonders of providence for the terror and ruin of his adverfaries, and for the fuccour of his faints, is fet before our eyes in the fcripture with equal magnificence, and as becomes divinity. When "he arifes out of his