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The life that is due must be taken, or another must be taken in its room; otherwise there is no remission-no reconciliation. "Consent to be sprinkled with that blood, which is the life," is God's message of peace to sinners; that, being sprinkled with it, you may be treated as one who has paid the penalty of death, and received a better life, which shall never be taken from you.

The second statute in this post-diluvian code is that relating to life, the life of man.

The life even of the lower creation, contained in the blood, was to be held by man as a sacred thing. The flesh of the animal was to be used, but the blood was to be left untouched; it was to be poured out upon the earth like water. But man's blood must be under still more careful safeguard, as being a higher and far more precious thing. God, accordingly, provides for this. He hands over the guardianship of man's life to Noah, as the representative of the race, with instructions how to act. "And surely your blood of your lives will I require."* Having stated it thus generally, then something more special is added: "At the hand of every beast will I require it "t-as if giving additional security, and shewing how sacred God reckoned that life, so that, even when taken by the beast, who cannot understand the evil that he commits, and who is not amenable to law, reparation shall be made for it by the death of the animal. Then, further, it is added," and at the hand of man ;" and, as if to increase the emphasis, it is added, “and (or yea) at the hand of each man's brother will I require the life (or soul) of man." God thus makes every man responsible for his fellow's life, he constitutes every man his brother's keeper, teaching him to abhor the spirit of Cain, when, after the murder of his brother, he asked, when God made inquisition for blood, "Am I my brother's keeper?" So far did God cause this to be carried out in after years, that the near relatives of each man were legally constituted the avengers of his blood; nay, more-in the case of a murderer being unknown, the city nearest the place where the murdered man was found was to be counted answerable, till they came forward and cleared themselves in open court. § Thus solemnly did God declare how precious a

*This seems emphatic, "Your own blood, which belongs to your own souls, will I seek after, search for," or make inquisition for.-See Gen. xlii. 22; Ps. ix. 12; x. 15; Deut. xviii. 19; xix. 18; xxiii. 21. The inquiry is judicial, a trial before a judge, who pronounces sentence.

See Exod. xxi. 28, 32.

Num. xxxv. 12, 19, 25, 27; Deut. xix. 6; Josh. xx. 3, 6, 9 2 Sam. 14, 7.

§ Deut. xxi. 1-9.

thing was the life of man, and how jealous he was of its safety.

Thus far, however, it is merely God declaring his own determination to make inquisition for blood. He will not allow it, as hitherto, to fall to the ground unrecorded and unrevenged. That it had hitherto done so, seems implied; though God had, in the case of Cain, declared his abhorrence of murder, and sent into banishment the first murderer, to be a monument to coming ages, yet he had not made any further inquisition for blood. He had not required blood for blood, life for life; the banishment of the first murderer from his presence was the amount of God's testimony hitherto against the crime. And an awful testimony it was, had man considered: nay, the most awful of all testimonies. Utter banishment from Him who is life, is the recompence of him who takes another's life! This was God's proclamation; and in the spirit of this it was that the apostle said, "Ye know that no murderer hath eternal life abiding in him" (1 John iii. 15). But now man was to be dealt with in another way. He had disregarded the spiritual penalty, and God now interposes in a way more adapted to them, whose "imaginations are only evil from their youth." The penalty for murder is to be death; and it is to be executed at once; it is to be executed by his fellowmen. They are appointed God's executioners. "Whoso sheddeth man's blood, by man shall his blood be shed; for in the image of God made he man."

As murder had hitherto been unchecked by law, or judge, or prison; as every man had done that which was right in his own eyes,-violence had filled the earth (Gen. vi. 11), murder had grown into a common deed, life was disregarded, blood was not held sacred, till God had to interfere, and send the deluge, in order to cleanse the earth from the innocent blood with which the earth was polluted. Crimes and murders had been accumulating for fifteen hundred years, unjudged and unavenged; and the deluge, with its overflowing waters, was sent to clear this long reckoning, and sweep off the horrid accumulation, by one tremendous execution-one universal act of judicial vengeance.

But no second such accumulation of unjudged violence and murder was to be permitted to gather. Each crime, as it took place, was henceforth to be judged, that thus it might be seen there was a Judge above, that man might not forget the difference between right and wrong, that he might learn God's estimate of life, and his verdict against its being taken, -and, lastly, that a check might be interposed which would.

restrain man's wickedness, and prevent the same rapid and universal increase of crime as had taken place upon the earth. God constitutes man the judge and avenger of blood upon earth. Death is to be expiated by death, that man may stand in awe. And thus, while the law as to the shedding of animal blood, and the taking of animal life, is widened and relaxed, the law against violence to man's life is made more rigorous, and fenced round with the awful penalty of death. All this is summed up with the solemn reason, 66 For in the image of God made he man." Man is God's creature, and it might have been said, that as God created man, therefore he will protect the creature he has made. Man is God's property, and it might have been said that God must have regard to that which belongs to him. But another reason is given, going beyond all these, and displaying a yet profounder interest in man on the part of God," In the image of God made he man.” And shall not God protect his own image? shall he not secure it from injury? and shall he not avenge its defacement and destruction?

How deep the interest which God thus represents himself as taking in man! how tender and how true his love! He will not have even his body injured, for he feels as if this were wrong done to himself, as it were the defacing of his own image! And how high the estimate in which God regards man!-how differently does he feel from those who, in mock humility, speak of man as too insignificant for God to care for! O man, look upward, and learn the love of thy God! Look to thyself, and learn the value which God attaches to thee, even to that corporeal frame of thine; see how precious thou art in his eyes! What is there that such a God will not do for thee, sinner as thou art?

This law-making for the new world, of course, assumes that there is likely to be violence in the earth again. The deluge has not uprooted man's murderous hatred of his fellow-man, nor made him less selfish, less envious, less proud. Sin has not been plucked out of his nature, and hence all old lusts will soon shew themselves, old scenes will soon be re-enacted. The imaginations of his heart are still as evil as before. Judgment cannot change the sinful nature. God knows this, and it is in the prospect of this that he gives the law we have been speaking of. And then, having promulgated this law of protection, he adds, " And you, be ye fruitful, and mutiply; bring forth abundantly in the earth, and multiply therein;”—thus repeating the blessing, and making man feel that God now replaced him on the earth, again to spread over its surface, and fulfil the ends

for which God had given him possession of the globe and dominion over its creatures.

It is still under Noah's constitution that we live. Upwards of four thousand years has earth thus subsisted. Earth is full of violence and stained with blood; yet God has not again interposed as before. He still keeps up his awful protest against murder, by the laws which in every country under heaven are executed against the murderer. But the day is coming when he will make full inquisition for blood, and avenge it to the uttermost. The day is coming when earth's crowning murder, the blood-shedding of his own Son, shall be avenged. And then shall the fire which shall be kindled burn out the accumulated pollutions of earth, and purify this long-defiled soil. And then, upon a new earth, after a more searching and purifying flood, and under the headship of a greater than Noah, and with laws that shall not be broken, to guard against new outbursts of crime, shall the spared remnant of Jew and Gentile re-people the cleansed globe, and fill it with righteousness and peace.

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This is but the second time that the word "covenant occurs. Both times it is with Noah that the covenant is established; and in both cases there is a similarity of purpose, though with some points of unlikeness. In the first case, it was with Noah and his family, in reference to the flood that was coming on the earth, assuring them of preservation in the midst of it. In the second place, it was with Noah and the whole creation, the whole race of man and animals, giving them a pledge against any such flood in all time to come. Both covenants were made with Noah; though, in the one case, as the head of a family, and the other, as representative of a race and the monarch of the earth. Both concerned the earth and its inhabitants. Both had reference to a deluge. Both were intimations of the grace of God towards man and man's dwelling-place, the earth.

Noah is the first of the human race with whom a covenant is directly made. In Adam's case there is no mention of such a thing; and, whatever might be implied in the transaction after the fall, there is no reference to a covenant. There was, indeed, the announcement of grace to him and his seed; yet this was not made in the form of a covenant with himself. There was in his case a covenant, but not a covenant made with himself, but with another for him, even with him who was to be his substitute and surety. He was not called forth and directly addressed by God-"With thee I will establish my covenant." He stands by, and listens to the declaration

of grace, which is to come to him through the everlasting covenant made by the Father with the Son.

In Noah's case, however, there is a covenant explicitly and personally made-made by God of his own sovereign purpose-made, as the channel through which his grace was to remain and reveal itself upon earth to the spared remnant and their posterity to all generations. That covenant means simply a divine arrangement or purpose-not a bargain or agreement, as it is often said to be is evident from the whole passage. There is nothing here in the way of terms or conditions to be observed on Noah's part. It is a declaration on the part of God to Noah of what he means to do, and of what he will pledge himself to do by oath and token. This arrangement he will establish," giving to man the assurance of its permanency and unchangeableness in the most explicit and impressive way. In this let us mark the following points:

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1. With whom the covenant is made. It is with Noah, his seed (or posterity), the living creature that is "with him;"* the fowl, the cattle, the beast of the earth that is "with him;" nay, it is to include, not only those that actually have come out of the ark with him, but all generations as well. The covenant, then, is a universal one, including in its wide compass all that the earth contains of things that have life; for of the earth itself God had previously spoken (chap. viii. 21, 22), revealing his gracious purpose respecting it, and pledging himself as to its future security from any similar overflow of waters such as that which had just destroyed it. This covenant, then, is specially the living creature's covenant, extending from man downwards to all creatures in all their generations. For His tender mercies are over all his works." He feeds the ravens he watches over a sparrow's fall-he opens his hand, and satisfies the desires of every living thing.

2. For what purpose this covenant is made. It is not to secure either man or beast from death. It is not to reverse the former curse upon the ground. It is not to still creation's groans for the time is not yet come for deliverance,—and ages of grief and travail are yet in prospect; but it is to assure man against the recurrence of any similar calamity like that through which earth had just passed. It declares two things:

* Referring to their being "with him" in the ark, and "with him" in coming out of it, they being thus identified with him. They had been treated as one with him in past preservation, they are to be treated as one with him in future blessing. The words "with you" are repeated, as if to shew the connexion between Noah and the creature.

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