To reconcile this fevere decree to the principles of justice, and to God's own declarations, Ezek. xviii. of his limiting the vengeance of guilt to the person of the offender, we need only reflect upon one plain obfervation, which every day's experience fufficiently furnishes us with; that nothing is more common, than for children to appear unrepentant, and, it may be, improved and inveterate in the fins of their ancestors; and that nothing is more eafy to the divine prescience, than to foresee this, and to pronounce upon it. And that this was the cafe of the Amalekites, fufficiently appears from their hiftory. For as their fathers attempted upon the Ifraelites, when under the manifeft protection of GOD; their fons continued to do the fame upon every occafion, tho' the fame protection became every day more and more confpicuous, by many and repeated inftances.

How this decree had hitherto been put in execution by the people of GOD, and under his immediate direction, from age to age, will best be learned from the books of Numbers, Joshua, and Judges. And now Saul, as next in order, was appointed, was in a very folemn, express, and particular manner, commanded to execute his part. And to fhew that the fins of thofe very Amalekites now commanded to be deftroyed, were the real motives of their deftruction; they are in that command given for it, exprefly and emphatically called the finners the Amalekites: and their king is charged by the prophet with the guilt of murders (and the Kenites, as lefs criminal, are commanded to be separated from them).

BUT.

BUT we are asked, Why their innocent children should be put to death? To this it is very obvious to answer by another very plain question; Why do innocent children die every day? It was a mercy to the children of the Amalekites to be taken off in their innocence, before they were tainted with the infection of their fathers guilt *.

AND to put it out of all doubt even with Saul himself, that the punishment and prevention of guilt were the only end and aim of that command; he was exprefly injoined to destroy not only the Amalekites, but all that they had, ox and sheep, cameland afs; that the memory of fo vile a race might be blotted out from under heaven. A command admirably fitted to spread and to establish the terror of divine vengeance upon guilt over the earth, and, in confequence of that, to reftrain the enormities of mankind. Whereas had the Amalekites been commanded to be deftroyed, and their fubftance fpared, avarice and intereft might have justly been fufpected as the real motives of this extirpation; and the divine command as a pretence only.

BESIDES all this; tho' Saul might not have enter'd rightly into the reason of the command,

* We are told, that Schah Abbaz extirpated the inhabitants of feveral villages in Perfia, for their abominable wickedness (Ambaff. Travels, 1. 7. p. 294.). Nor have historians, as far as I can learn, charged this act upon him as cruel or tyrannous.-There is fuch a thing as the vulgar call an ill breed; and fins run in the blood. It is certainly a bleffing to the world to have fuch a race rooted out. The infection of incorrigible guilt fhould be arrested at any ate; and if nothing but extremities can effect this, extremities are then fufficiently juftified in the great Governor of the world; nay, they are manifeftly required and exacted from him in that character, Men are tied down to other measures of acting.

nor been influenced either by duty or gratitude to a religious obfervance of it; yet one would think the example of Achan, fo fresh in the history of his own nation (Joh. vii.) who was deftroyed, with his whole family, for a like inftance of difobedience, might fufficiently have deterred him from flighting it.

WHEREAS then Saul did not only difobey this command, but acted in manifeft oppofition to the reafon and end of it; fparing the murderous Agag, (in all probability, from the profpect of a rich ransom, or perhaps, a proud partiality to the regal character †) and all the spoil that was worth saving, and deftroying only the refuse; yet was he fo hardened in his stubborn disobedience, as obftinately to affirm to Samuel's face, that he had executed the divine command. And when that was confuted by the evidence of fact, he then had the hardiness to shift the blame from himself, and to fhield his avarice under the fhew of popular piety:- The people (faid he to Samuel) took of the spoil, the chief of the things, which should have been utterly deftroyed, to facrifice to the Lord thy God in Gilgal.

To this Samul made that noble reply (1 Sam. xv. 22.): And Samuel faid, Hath the Lord as great delight in burnt-offerings and facrifices, as in obeying the voice of the Lord? Behold, to obey is better than facrifice; and to hearken, than the fat of rams.

† An important leffon this to princes, that guilt fubjects them to the feverest strokes of the divine juftice, as much as the meanest of their fubjects.

WHEN

WHEN this laft heinous act of disobedience was added to Saul's other fins, GOD, by the mouth of his prophet, pronounced the decree of his depofal from the fovereignty; nor could Samuel's long and earnest interceffion ever prevail to reverse it*.

THIS was the state of things, when Samuel was exprefly commanded by God, to fill his horn with oil, to go to Bethlehem, and there to anoint one of the fons of Jeffe the Bethlehemite (whom GOD should then name to him) to fucceed Saul in the kingdom.

THE prophet would gladly have excused himfelf from executing this dangerous commiffion, from the apprehenfion of Saul's hearing it, and revenging his depofition upon him. To remove his fears upon this head, God commands him to take an heifer, and to give out, that he was come thitherto facrifice to the Lord; which, as a prophet, he had a right to do where-ever he thought fit. HE went accordingly, and was no fooner arrived at Bethlehem, but the people crouded about him, in dreadful apprehenfions of his being fent to denounce fome divine threat or vengeance for their fins t. But Samuel foon quieted their fears upon that head, and only let them know, that he was come to facrifice to the LORD; and injoined them to fanctify themselves for their attendance upon

*It was poffibly an additional aggravation of Saul's fin, that tho' he had fo ill executed the divine command in relation to Amalek, yet he erected a trophy, (the vulgate hath it, a triumphal arch) as a monument of his victory over them. Poffibly the first monument of the kind that ever was erected.

+ Or perhaps, in apprehenfion of his having fled thither from Saul's wrath, and that they might fuffer by fheltering him.

B 4

the

the altar (It seems some fanctification was then deemed neceffary, to qualify perfons for their fit attendance on the most folemn ordinance of religion*): And when the facrifice was over, he called Jeffe and his fons to the feast, which always followed the facrifice.

UPON the appearance of Eliab the first-born of Jeffe, the prophet, ftruck with the gracefulnels and dignity of his perfon, haftily concluded him the man appointed to the fovereignty by Almighty God. But this his human judgment (which probably was grounded upon the remembrance of a like graceful mien and prefence in Saul) was quickly reproved; and he was given to understand, that GOD judgeth not, as man too often doth, by appearances, and seeming perfections, but by the fecret and unfeen powers and difpofitions of the heart.

IMMEDIATELY fix other fons of Jesse were ordered to pafs in review before the prophet; but none of thefe had the divine approbation,

THE prophet, (as we may well imagine) fufficiently embaraffed at this fufpenfe of the divine defignation, asked Jeffe, If he had no other fon? To which he answered, That he had one more, his youngest, in the fields, keeping his flock. Upon which, the prophet immediately ordered him to be fent for; declaring that they must not fit down until he came. Feffe obeyed: and when David

* Now, however ritual this fanctification might be, yet I believe it is not doubted but that it was intended as an emblem of that purer, and more spiritual fanctification, which should be required of all thofe who commemorate the great facrifice for the fins of the whole world.

arrived,