and if physicians be right in ascribing such tendency to animal food in general when freely eaten, especially in the hotter climates, it must be acknowledged that the grosser and more indigestible juices of such food must have the greatest tendency to produce such injurious consequences, and blood as the grossest of all animal juices be the most inimical to health and soundness.* To abstain, therefore, from all meat, from which the blood has not been drained, from whatever cause the blood has been retained in the animal, whether purposely by strangling or otherwise, must be much more conducive to health, than by yielding to a luxurious and vitiated taste and adopting a contrary practice.

3. TYPICAL.

"The law was a shadow of good things to come," and 66 though not the very image of those things," was nevertheless designed to symbolize the great events of the Gospel dispensation. Among the various types and figures of the Law was that of Blood, commanded to be poured out as 66 an atonement." "The life of the flesh is in the blood, and, I have given it to you upon the altar to make an atonement for your souls: for it is the blood that maketh an atonement for the soul." (Lev. xvii. 11.)—On these words Bishop Patrick remarks: "The words, as they lie in the Hebrew, may well be translated, Because the life of the flesh (of any beast that is) is in the blood, therefore, I have given it to you (or appointed it for you) upon the altar, to make an atonement which is as much as to say, The life of the beast lying in the blood, I have ordained it to expiate your sins, that by its death in your stead, your life may be preserved: and therefore I require you not to eat that, which is appointed for so holy an end."+-But as "the law made

* Revelation examined with Candour, ut sup.

+ Patrick in loc.

nothing perfect," we are not to suppose that the blood of brute animals made an actual propitiation for sin, but only that the blood of bulls, and of goats, and of other animals, adumbrated the blood of Jesus Christ, which was "shed for many for the remission of sins," and who himself was the true "propitiation for the sins of the whole world." Nothing, therefore, could be more rational than the precept which enjoined, that a thing so sacred in its typical reference, as to be peculiarly appointed for "an atonement upon the altar,” should not lose that honour and esteem which was due to it; which it would most assuredly have done, had it been permitted to be eaten as a common nutriment.

We may, therefore, conclude this section in the words. of a modern and very able writer: "To us these ancient references to things Now distinctly seen, must yield incontrovertible demonstrations of the firm foundation of our faith: -the import of each former ordinance is resolved-every enigma and every symbol which darkened the Jewish dispensation, has passed away-we no longer require highpriests "daily to offer sacrifices, first for their own sins, then for those of the people," those continued exactions have been superseded by the one, full, perfect, and sufficient sacrifice, oblation, and satisfaction of the Son of God, who being constituted our High-Priest, after the power of an endless life; and having accomplished the purposes of his manifestation in the flesh, "is set down on the right hand of the throne of the Majesty in the heavens:" THERE, ever living to make intercession for us, HE abideth a Priest for ever after the order of Melchizedek."*

As to the question of the permanency of the prohibition, different persons will judge very differently respecting it, according as they view it merely as a ritual precept, or as involving considerations both moral and physical. The former will at once decide on its temporary and evanescent

*Dr. D. G. Wait's Sermons. Sermon iii. p. 115.

character, and pronounce it to be no longer obligatory on the professors of Christianity: the latter, acknowledging its authority to have ceased as a ceremonial rite, are, nevertheless, inclined to regard it as still being of considerable importance and utility, and adopt a series of arguments, which, to say the least of them, are exceedingly plausible and deserving of attention. For, according to the advocates of the permanent nature of the injunction, Blood was forbidden in the Noahic grant of animal food, long prior to the Levitical institutions, and therefore not dependant upon them; the Apostles enjoined on the first Gentile churches, to abstain, as "necessary things," from "things strangled and from blood," as well as from "fornication and meats offered to idols;" the pouring out of the blood of slain animals may, with equal propriety, be regarded now, as formerly, as an acknowledgement of entire dependance upon God, as the Author and Disposer of life. There are still barbarous and savage nations to be influenced by the mild character and practices of Christianity, and bloody and inhuman customs to be subdued by its example and temper. The nature of blood itself remains unaltered, and consequently has still the same tendency to generate gross and scorbutic humours, though checked in their virulence by the difference in our climate and our general habits :-and blood is still, comparatively, an indigestible and innutritive aliment. Hence the supporters of this opinion are induced to believe, that to abstain from blood in every form is most consistent with temperance, prudence, and religious caution. But, sub judice lis est; "Let every man be fully persuaded in his own mind;" for "he that doubteth, is condemned if he eat."-Rom. xiv, 7, 23.

DISSERTATION VI.

ON

THE TYPICAL CHARACTER

OF THE

MOSAIC INSTITUTIONS.

THE

HE adumbration of important moral truths by sensible symbols and representations, may be traced to the earliest periods, and to a divine original. In the garden of Eden, the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, and on the expulsion of our first parents from the garden for their violation of the easy test of obedience assigned by their Creator, the Cherubims who guarded the entrance to prevent return, were certainly symbolical in their character. In Patriarchal times, the appearance of the Divine glory or Shechinah passing between the divided animals, when God entered into covenant with Abraham, was similar in its nature, though its object was different. When, therefore, Jehovah instituted a ceremonial amongst the Jews, introductory to a more spiritual and perfect dispensation, it might naturally be expected that its character would be typical and prospective, symbolizing the principal events and truths of that superior and more sublime economy; in other words, that it should be "a schoolmaster to bring us to Christ."

In accordance with these views, the author of the Epistle to the Hebrews, has exhibited many of the coincidences or agreements between the Mosaic Ceremonial, and its glorious antitype, the Gospel; and has fully substantiated the principle of the representative nature of the Levitical persons, institutions, and ceremonies.

The fanciful similitudes in which the unbridled imagination of some divines has indulged, in the comparisons which they have instituted between the legal and evangelical dispensations, have too frequently marked rather the ardent piety of their authors, than their exercise of sober and well-disciplined minds; and led some to discard altogether, without sufficient caution, the idea of the shadowy and representative design of many of the institutions of Moses. But we can never justly reason from the misapplication of a principle, to the inconsistency and absurdity of the principle itself. The want of sobriety in writers on typical subjects, and the extravagance of some of their illustrative positions, can never, therefore, destroy the importance or utility of a judicious exemplification of the various points of agreement of the symbolical with the anti-typical dispensation. Such a view of the whole of the representative system of Moses is highly desirable; we therefore hail the appearance of such works as the Sermons of Chevalier, on the Historical Persons of the Old Testament, and those of Dr. D. G. Wait, in which certain peculiarities of the Patriarchal, the Mosaic, and the Christian Dispensations are discussed with great learning and ability; whilst the excellent work of Mather, "The Figures and Types of the Old Testament," (London, 1705, 4to.) must ever retain its value, until superseded by some other more modern and complete. Under these impressions, the following brief observations are presented to the reader, as supplementary to the remarks of our learned Jewish author, Maimonides.