cular, or to any set of precepts, but it was a general engagement to obey Gon's voice indeed, and to do and perform all the statutes, and judgments, and laws, which God should think fit to give them. When Jeremiah prophesied, the Jews were guilty of the highest abominations; and yet they came regularly to the worship at the temple, but without a reformation of their lives. Hereupon the Prophet's message to them was, that if they continued in this course, they might put their burnt-offerings to their sacrifices, and eat their flesh; they might even break through, and not pretend to observe, the legal institutions for their burnt-offerings; for that God would not accept them for an exact performance of one part of his law only, when what he required of them was to obey his voice, and to walk in all the ways that he had commanded them." Thus the design of Jeremiah, in the words before us, appears evidently to be, not to suggest to the Jews that burnt-offerings and sacrifices were originally no part of their religion; but to remonstrate to them, that sacrifice and offering r Ver. 10. Ver. 21. 1 Jerem. vii. 8, 9. t The law of the burnt-offering was, that none of it was to be eaten, but the whole burnt and consumed upon the altar, so that if the Jews had done what the Prophet bids. them ver. 21. they had acted contrary to the law for the burnt-offering; and his directing them so to do, is only hinting to them, that it was of no moment to be exact in their sacrifices, without amending their lives. a Jerem. vii. 23. was but one part, and that a regularity of their lives and manners was another; and that a due care not of one or either, but of both these parts of their duty, was enjoined, in the general command given to them, to obey God's voice in order to be his people. There remains to be considered, 3. A passage in Ezekiel.* Ezekiel represents that God gave the Jews, first his statutes and his judgments, which if a man do, he shall even live in them; and afterwards because they had not executed these judgments, but despised his statutes, that therefore, he gave them statutes, that were not good, and judgments, whereby they should not live. The former of these statutes and judgments are said to be the moral law; and the commands of the ritual law are supposed to be the latter. But I would observe, 1. That whatever the statutes were, which are thus said to have been not good, whatever were the judgments, whereby they should not live; it appeared evidently from the Prophet, that they were not given to that generation of men, who received the ritual law; and consequently the ritual law could not be any part of these statutes. The Prophet remarks, that the Israelites after receiving the law, rebelled against GoD in the wilderness; that God had said, he would pour out his fury upon them to destroy them; but that for his name's sake he had not executed this vengeance ;* yet, that he did determine not to bring THEM into * Ezek. xx. 10. y xx. 11. a * Ver. 24, 25. "Spencer. de legib. Heb. 1. 1. c. 1. § 2. c. 14. § 3. Ezek. xx. 13. Ibid. d Ver. 14. k с m the land of Canaan, though his eye had spared them from destroying and making an end of them. Thus in five verses he sums up what had happened in GoD's dispensations to the Israelites, from the giving of the law, unto the punishment of their misbehaviour at the return of their spies out of Canaan; during which interval, how oft did they provoke Gon 2h yet many a time turned he his anger away, and did not stir up all his wrath, until at length, though his eye spared them, and he would not kill all the people as one man,' which had indeed been to destroy and make an end of them in the wilderness, yet he lifted up his hand, that he would not bring them into the land, which he had given them," but denounced against them, that all those who had seen his glory and his miracles, and had tempted him now ten times, and not hearkened to his voice, should surely not see the land, but fall in the wilderness; but that their little ones should be brought into it. After this, the Prophet proceeds to relate what happened to their chil dren; that God said unto them, Walk ye not in the statutes of your fathers....but walk in my statutes, and keep my judgments, and do them. But the children rebelled against GoD, and because they had not executed his judgments, but had despised his statutes, therefore he gave them statutes that were not 9 good, and judgments whereby they should not live." Thus it must be undeniably plain, that the Prophet could not, by the statutes not good, mean any part of the ritual law; for, the whole law was given to the fathers of those, of whom the Prophet now speaks; but these statutes were not given to the fathers, but to their descendants. 2. If we go on, and compare the narrative of the Prophet with the history of the Israelites, we shall see further, that statutes and judgments not good are so far from being any part of Moses' law, that they were not given earlier than the times of the Judges. On the first day of the eleventh month of the fortieth year after the exit from Egypt, Moses, after he had numbered the people in the plains of Moab, by Jordan near Jericho;' and found that there was not left a man of those, whom he had almost forty years before numbered in the wilderness of Sinai, save Caleb and Joshua," by the command of GOD made a covenant with the Israelites in the land of Moab, besides the covenant which he made with them in Horeb. The fathers who had so often provoked GoD, were now all dead, and here it was, that GOD said unto their children, walk ye not in the sta tutes of your fathers, neither observe their judg ments, nor defile yourselves with their idols....but walk in my statutes, and keep my judgments and do them.' Here it was that God commanded them, not to be, as their fathers, a stubborn and rebellious ge • Deut. i. 3. * Ezek. xx. 24, 25. 'Numb. xxvi, ▾ Ezek. xx. 18, 19. neration, but to set their hearts aright, and to have their spirits stedfast with GoD. For this was the purport of what Moses gave in charge to them, that they might teach their children the same, that it might be well with them, and that they and their children might hear, and learn to fear the LORD their Gon, as long as they lived in the land, whither they were going over Jordan to possess it. We do not find, but that from this time to the death of Moses, the Israelites were punctual in observing what he commanded, and after Moses was dead, they served the LORD all the days of Joshua, and all the days of the elders that over-lived Joshua. But when all that generation were gathered unto their fathers, then the children of Israel did evil in the sight of the LORD, and followed other gods of the gods of the people, that were round about them, and prom voked the LORD to anger, and served Baal and Ashteroth so that here the scene opens, of which Moses had forewarned them, and to which Ezekiel alludes; and accordingly what Ezekiel mentions as the punishments of these wickednesses, began now to come upon them. The Prophet remarks, that Gon said, he would pour out his fury upon them, and accomplish his anger against them; and agreeably hereto we find, that the anger of the LORD was • Deut. xxxi. 12, 13. Joshua xxiv. 31.-Judges ii. 7. • Ver. 10, 11, 12. 13. 4 Deut. xxxi. 29. Ezek xx. 21. f Ibid. Ibid. |