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the rigid school answers that St. Paul decides the question as to Adam, in Rom. v., and another ventures to thinks that he is nearly as plain about Eve in Ephes. v. Not at all, cries the voice of Mr. Lord across the Atlantic, the word TUTóc only means a similitude, not type properly, in Rom. v., and nothing of the sort is said in Ephes. v. Thus the direct tendency of this demand for chapter and verse in the New Testament touching the Old, is to limit us to a minimum of typical instruction, if not to rob us of it altogether.

So.

The fact is that Scripture differs from mere books of information and science, inasmuch as these are wholly irrespective of moral condition and may be mastered alike by the evil and the good, while that depends on our measure of subjection to the Spirit of God. And as the children of God are not equally spiritual, so they differ in the degree of their understanding of and relish for all that is of God. If all Christians had a single eye, every one would be full of light. But this is not Each has to contend with influences, prejudices, prepossessions, &c., which as far as they work, obscure the judgment, and thus lead to differing views and practice. Hence it is that the evidence of the Word which is irresistible to one is weak or null to another, rightly or wrongly, of course, as a man is led by the Spirit. To take the same example as before, a man better taught than Bishop Marsh would see ground in Jude 11 and Heb. xii. 24, for interpreting Cain and Abel typically. And if they are to be so taken, why not Lamech and Seth, of whom serious and interesting facts are recorded in the same chapter? Again, the hardest exactor of express New Testament authority can scarcely deny a formally typical force to the deluge. (See 1 Peter iii.) Has then the subsequent altar which Noah built no future bearing? Nor God's blessing of him and his sons, with its solemn committal of the sword of government and the covenant with the earth and all flesh? And the city and tower in the plain of Shinar, has it no language for our ears, that Babel, where language was confounded by the judgment of Jehovah, and the various tongues of men began? If Sarah and Hagar, if Isaac and Ishmael have the explicit sanction of Scripture, is it not implied as to Abraham and Lot? If Melchizedek cannot be disputed, what are we to infer about the combinations of the Kings and their conflicts, what about the intervention of the head of promise and the deliverance of his earthly-minded kinsman? Are all these great connected circumstances unmeaning, save as moral and historical? Is "the possessor of heaven and earth" an immaterial title there and then, because "the most high God" merely is cited in Heb. vii.?

In short, there might be reason in thus confining our investigation to those portions of the Old Testament which are employed unambiguously as figures in the New, if the New Testament either professed to be, or in reality was, an exposition of all the parts of the Old. But all must confess that this is not the case; which it ought to be, if types are to be sought nowhere in the Bible beyond the very limited horizon which is formed by the direct notices and explanations of the latest revelation. On the contrary, we have here

either passing allusions, or large principles laid down, because God addresses his family as having an unction from the Holy One, and knowing all things. "I have not written unto you," says St. John, "because ye know not the truth, but because ye know it, and that no lie is of the truth....These things have I written unto you concerning them that seduce you. But the anointing which ye have received of him abideth in you, and ye need not that any man teach you: but as the same anointing teacheth you of all things, and is truth, and is no lie, and even as it hath taught you, ye shall abide in him." Thus says the Holy Ghost by St. Paul, and this just after glancing rapidly over a number of typical transactions in the history of Israel:-"I speak as to wise men; judge ye what I say.' That is, the New Testament pointedly addresses itself not to the ignorance of Christian men, but to their capacity to use the Word of God aright, in virtue of the Holy Ghost dwelling in them. This is so much the more remarkable as being said to the Corinthians, whom the same epistle had characterized as babes in Christ. "I have fed you with milk, and not with meat: for hitherto ye were not able to bear it, neither yet now are ye able. Nevertheless," says the Apostle, "I would not have you ignorant, how that all our fathers were under the cloud, and all passed through the sea," followed by the statement that these things were our examples (literally, types, figures of us).

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Now, is it possible for an unprejudiced man to read this last passage, and to gather from it that the Holy Ghost is laying down a systematic summary of all that was typical in the journeyings of Israel? Is it not, rather, true that we have simply an application here, as elsewhere, of so much as naturally bore on the question in hand, the danger of idolatry, &c., and of being content with ordinances without life? So, afterwards, there is a striking use made of the fact, that Israel, after the flesh, ate of the sacrifices, and were partakers of the altar; as, in the preceding chapter, direct reference is made to the law of Moses. "Thou shalt not muzzle the mouth of the ox that treadeth out the corn. Doth God take care for oxen? or saith he it altogether for our sakes? For our sakes no doubt, this is written: that he that ploweth should plow in hope, and that he that thresheth should be partaker of his hope." Spiritual husbandry was the grand idea in the mind of the revealing Spirit. Further on, in the same chapter, the Apostle applies the special provision which God enjoined in behalf of the priests and all the tribe of Levi; that, as they had no part nor inheritance with Israel, they should eat the offerings of the Lord, and his inheritance. Evidently, therefore, while there is nothing like or pretending to be, a catalogue raisonnée of Old Testament figures, they are profusely used, in addressing believers; (not Hebrews merely, but Gentiles also); and as clearly those used are cited not in the least degree as exceptional cases, but rather as specimens of a vast class which pervades the Bible.

Is it then seriously contended that the brief direction respecting the ox in Deut. xxv. 4, is picked out by the Apostle as the sole word in the chapter which has special application to Christians? Of course that was what

the Spirit wanted in 1 Cor. ix., and what the saints who are exhorted needed to weigh. But if the occasion had demanded it, was there not typical instruction of the deepest moment in the same context? In the first verses, it is as to a brother, even if in the wrong, and justly to be punished; in the last verses it is touching the sworn enemies of the Lord and his people. Forbearance towards Amalek would be indifference to the honour of the one, and the wrongs of the other. The judge must see the faulty Israelites beaten according to his misdeeds, but with a fixed limit, lest "thy brother should seem vile to thee." We are satisfied, also, that the central details of the chapter are equally written under the same prescient eye; the ordinance of perpetuating each family name in Israel; and the keeping up, under severe penalty, of purity and delicacy of feeling, even where those nearest to us are menaced or suffering; and the maintenance of the most thorough integrity in all dealings, small and great, in the sight and blessing of the Lord.

Are we not to enquire how they too bear on the future, using those which are infallibly determined as our help, with the general analogy of Scripture, to search into the rest; for the Spirit searcheth all things, yea, the deep things of God? If there is no dispute about the Red Sea, why should there be about the waters of Marah? If the manna was unquestionably typical, why doubt about the Sabbath connected with it? If the smitten rock in Horeb is pregnant with lessons for us, why sever from it the subsequent conflict with Amalek? Why nullify the beautiful picture which follows in Exod. xviii., where Gentiles and Jews eat bread before God, and the leader of the people lays down the order and means of right government? Again, if the worship of the golden calf be so full of warning, what of the judgment which Moses executes with the sons of Levi? (Exod. xxxii.) Has the pitching of the tabernacle without the camp no voice for us, and the deepened fellowship which Moses enjoyed with the Lord there, and his earnest pleading before him? Here, again, the New Testament casts its unwavering light upon an incident which, without it, we might have made of no account; for at first sight, it might strike the careless reader as the least promising, in a typical point of view,-the veil which Moses put on his face in speaking with the children of Israel, and took off in going in before the Lord to speak with him, 2 Cor. iii. To deny a figurative force to these other circumstances in Exodus, because one or two only may have the direct stamp of St. Paul, is to deprive us of an incalculable amount of their value. To say that we cannot understand them clearly and certainly, according to our general intelligence of Scripture, is to reduce Christians to the alliteration of a former economy: it would justify that dulness of hearing which the Apostle censures in the Hebrew saints, Heb. v. They were unskilful in the word of righteousness, and needed to be taught explicitly what they ought to have been teaching. He had many things to say respecting Melchizedek; but their senses were comparatively unexercised to discern both good and evil. And when he does open that remarkable story as a shadow of Christ, he in no way intimates that all was said which might be said, but only what they were able to bear. Sufficient is furnished to quicken, not to clog, their feeble spiritual digestion. Thus no use is made of the bread and wine which Melchizedek brought out to the victors, while there is considerable reasoning upon the dignity of his office and person, surpassed only in the real and eternal glory of Christ. The moment the argument of the epistle requires the actual exercise of Christ's priesthood to be treated of, the Apostle glides on to the Aaronic intercession within the veil, based upon sacrifice. (Heb. vii. 25, viii. —x.) How arbitrary, then, to assume that So in 1 Cor. x. 1-10 a few leading facts are alluded we have more, in such New Testament expositions, to, as having befallen the Israelites, and chiefly re-than clear light cast upon certain grand landmarks, that, corded in Exodus and Numbers: the passage through thus using what we have, more may be given? the Red Sea under Moses, the manna, the water from This is entirely confirmed by what we read of the the rock, on God's part; the lust, idolatry, tempting holy places, sacrifices, feasts, and other rites, stated or Christ, and murmuring, on theirs. Are we then to occasional. It were utterly unreasonable, if we may exercise no spiritual judgment respecting the other dis- venture on the ground of the objectors, to hold that the plays of God and man, no less solemn and profitable? | mercy-seat, the candlestick, and the altar are the only

Take, again, the provision for the Levites in Numbers xviii., &c., alluded to in 1 Cor. ix. 13. Is that to be dislocated from its connexion, and to be regarded as the only food for the servants of the Lord, found there? Is the priestly rod of Aaron, once dead, but now alive again for evermore, without fruit for us? Is its sole use as a token against the rebellious children of Israel? As to the red heifer in Numb. xix., we presume that the most clamourous demand, apostolic endorsement, must bow to Heb. ix. 13. It was as appropriate in itself as in the circumstances and season where it occurs, the type of Christ sacrificed and brought home, by the Spirit of God, to the individual saints in the wilderness, where an unintentional defilement is contracted by contact with the things of death: in a word, the shadow of God's gracious way of restoring communion with himself, when interrupted in our wanderings here below. It is not redemption which is in question here, but priestly grace, and the remembrance, in the Spirit, of Christ's suffering to meet those unwilling soils which might be too lightly slurred over in the desert. And is it conceivable that grave men should think the scene of Meribah (Numb. xx.) to be a mere historical fact? We are compelled to allow more in the serpent of brass in the following chapter, because of the Lord's word to Nicodemus in John iii. Is the land which lies between given up to barrenness? Or is it only fallow ground, because men have been slow to take and till it in the name of the Lord? Strange indeed would it be, that God should have written his Word as those deem who acknowledge that Numb. xviii. and xx. are eminently typical, but strip withal the intervening portion of all such claim, in the face of a narrative at least as full and as striking.

Thus

vessels of the sanctuary which have a typical significance, idea. Every other of which the Bible speaks is as because others are dimly, if at all, explained, while these much as possible conformed to that standard. The are clearly alluded to in Rom. iii., Rev. i., and Heb. state of things under the Fathers and Israel is exalted xiii. respectively. Is it merely the covering-lid which somewhat, the characteristic points of the present ecohad a meaning, and not the ark of the covenant itself? nomy are considerably depressed, the grand distinctions -that holy throne whereon God rested in moral judg-of the age to come are well nigh ignored, so as to obliment of his people, the law within, and the cherubim terate, as far as fancy can, those differences of dispenits external supporters? The table, too, with its twelve sation in which God has been thoroughly testing man, loaves, had this no far-reaching value, as well as the and displaying his own righteousness and grace and candlestick with its seven branches? And the two glory, to the ultimate and abiding joy of all who trust altars, with their suited spheres, is one blind, and has in him. the other alone an eye that looks onward? Were the We would not be understood as slighting much that robes of glory and beauty which the high priest wore, is really good and valuable in Dr. F.'s book. A good for mere passing show? Or if the curious girdle tells a deal of what we have been insisting on in this paper, is tale of service, what are we to infer as to the ephod truth common to him and to us. Nor do we mean that and robe, and broidered coat, and breastplate, and mitre? Dr. F. is singular in making the church, so-called, the Their consecration, too, is surely something for us; for great centre of movement in his system: for theologians if Christ loves and has washed us from our sins in his in general are in the same way disciples of Ptolemy, own blood, he has also made us kings and priests. In rather than of Copernicus. But Dr. F. has the unshort, all things are ours-the washing, the blood- happy distinction of working out this fundamental error sprinkling, and the anointing; and all the sacrifices more systematically, as far as regards his two subjects, too; the sin-offering, burnt-offering, ram of consecra- than perhaps any one who has gone before him. How tion, and meat-offering. There were, no doubt, reasons this vitiates his work will appear abundantly. why the Apostle could not then speak particularly of the in chap. ii., in shewing how the relation of type and sanctuary and its vessels. There is no reason to deny antitype implies that the realities of the gospel were the force of all as figures, though we may not have contemplated from the beginning, he says that on this equal clearness of view about each. The same con-account "the gospel dispensation is called the dispensiderations apply to the feasts and other ordinances in tation of the fulness of times"; whereas it is as plain Leviticus. It is most anomalous to own that the pass-as can be that Ephes. i. so speaks of the future admiover and its accompanying feast of unleavened bread nistration of the universe, when God shall gather togehad a prophetic bearing, and to disown it in the feast of ther in one under Christ's headship, all things both trumpets. It were passing strange that Pentecost should which are in heaven and which are on earth. And this have its fulfilment, and that Tabernacles should have is so far from being confounded with the aim and obnone. How much more simple and harmonious to jects of the gospel dispensation, that the following infer that, as a whole, not merely the Levitical system, verses pursue the latter topic in relation to those who but the historical facts and times, persons and things are being gathered out from both Jews and Gentiles. of Old Testament Scripture, were ordered, selected, and If Dr. F. deny the justice of our accusation on the plea presented in the Word of God, so as to teach a little to that, in this same vol. i., page 61, he speaks of the those of small faith, more to those of larger spiritual Redeemer as "Himself the beginning and end of the measure, with an ever-increasing fulness as the eye scheme of God's dispensations," we answer that he means becomes more single to Christ, and the ear more attuned the Redeemer solely in relation to his church, as far as by the Spirit to his voice? human blessing is concerned. His various glories are merged in this one. Son of David, Son of Abraham, Son of man-all these and more are exclusively limited to him as head of the church. Thus, no space is left for the various circles which have him for their common centre.

But if this last remark be admitted, as it is to us clear and certain, their fallacy is obvious who try to squeeze the types of Scripture into a human system. Every branch, indeed, of revealed truth has been stripped of its bloom and fragrance by a similar process. If there be any which more than others resist, and Dr. F. cannot prove that which is the very substratum suffer from such violence, it appears to us to be the of all his writings. We have shown more than once in very twain which Dr. Fairbairn has chosen-the kin- the Bible Treasury, that the church of God, properly dred themes of Scripture type and prophecy. His so designated, is peculiar to the present dispensation: school has not been safe or happy. He is a good deal enamoured of, and tinctured by, the novel speculations of German critics. He is keenly attached to the spiritualizing tendencies, which would blot out, if they could, the special hopes and inheritance of Israel from the chart of God's future counsels. He does not see that the church is but a little, though exceedingly blessed and glorious, part of the purposes of God as to man. Accordingly, the work which God has now in operation, and which contemplates by grace ourselves as its objects, becomes in his view the all-absorbing

Dr. F. affirms, without even attempting to demonstrate, its identity throughout all dispensations. Hence, to take in all the redeemed, he is compelled to reduce the idea of the church to "a nursery for training souls to a meetness for immortal life and blessedness." Were this an adequate definition, his conclusion doubtless follows; for nobody questions that God has always been saving souls by his Word and Spirit. But we deny his premises, and submit that he overlooks the doctrine of Scripture. It is not a question of words merely, as some would say, but of things. The New

difficulty. God and his Word will never admit of rules which can save us from the need of being spiritual, whether in intelligence or in walk. Such rules, like creeds and articles, have scarcely any positive value, though they may be of use negatively in checking and correcting men in a path of error.

A NEW BIBLE, OR A TRUE BIBLE?

No. II.

THE next important correction of the authorized translation of the Bible, which we are anxious to notice, is that passage which relates to the Divine institution of the Sabbath, Gen. ii. 1-3. The first sentence of the second chapter should have been made the last sentence of the first chapter. The second chapter should then have begun in the following manner:

Testament is explicit, that the church is based upon It is the practical application which is the main redemption, not promised only, but accomplished, and demands the Holy Ghost sent down from heaven as its formative power, uniting all, whether Jew or Gentile, in one body, of which Christ in heavenly glory is the head-a condition which was not true of the times anterior to the cross, and is not, nor can be predicated of the saints who are to be called on earth during the millennium. Clearly, then, it is not a question of being saved only, but of other and higher privileges, ordered in the sovereignty of God and super-added to salvation. Dr. F., we repeat, cannot prove his thesis. He takes it for granted and continually asserts it because it is absolutely necessary to his system. He will hardly take advantage of a mistake in the common version of Acts vii. 38, where "the church in the wilderness" means simply, really, and nothing but the Israelitish congregation there. Almost as rationally might it be argued from the mere term, that "the church" is intended by "the assembly" in Acts xix. Neither the one nor the other, in the foundation or in the form, was the church of God as presented in the Scriptures which develope it. Dr. F. may flatter himself with being spiritual (as contrasted with Jewish or semi-Jewish interpreters), because he sees not Israel only, but the church under the tutelage of the law and the rudiments of the world. He may reproach us with being Jewish, because we affirm that the Jews and not the church had to say to the Babylonish captivity. To us, we avow, it seems distressing confusion, to apply what is said of Israel to the church, as if it was all the same thing organically, though now improved and enlarged. To use it, as he does, without proofs, is to build without a foundation.

"And on the seventh day the Omnipotent had finished his work which he made; and he rested on the seventh day from all his work which he made. And the Omnipotent blessed the seventh day and sanctified it; because in it he rested from all his work which the Omnipotent created and made."

In this passage, as it stands in the original, it is of great importance to observe that from the intensive form of the Hebrew verb signifying ended or finished, it ought to be translated completely finished, or caused to come to an end; and that the use of this form implies that God had made a full end of his work before the seventh day commenced. The Greek translators of the Septuagint version, apparently not seeing the force of this intensive form of the Hebrew verb, have thought proper to alter the phraseology of the first sentence, and to translate it thus:

"And God finished on the SIXTH DAY his works which he made."

Now, it is quite true that God did finish all his works reference to the creation of man, on the SIXTH DAY, and that on the SEVENTH DAY he rested from those works; but the same thing is clearly and distinctly implied by the Hebrew expression; and therefore the idiomatic English phrase which most correctly renders the sentence according to its real meaning, is had finished.

Dr. F. objects, with justice, to the vagueness of the rules laid down by such as Glassius, and offers his own specific directions, which are a decided improvement. But the fact is, that the most important pre-requisite for rightly interpreting the types, is an adequate know-in ledge of the truth of which they are the forms. Thus, if a person confounded the character of two different acts, offices, dispensations, &c., he would in similar ratio make a jumble of their prefigurations. Another element of some weight is the nature of the surrounding context. This, if duly applied, would cut off many popular turns, e. g. the appearance of Esau borrowed by Jacob, which some make to figure the imputed righteousness of Christ! Here, however, are Dr. F.'s five canons :"Nothing is to be regarded as typical of the good things under the gospel, which was itself of a forbidden and sinful nature." (I. 138.)

"We must be guided not so much by any knowledge possessed, or supposed to be possessed, by the ancient worshippers concerning their prospective fulfilment, as from the light fur nished by their realization in the great facts and revelations of the gospel." (I. 143.)

We must "be careful to make ourselves acquainted with the truths or ideas exhibited in the types, considered merely as providential transactions or religious institutions." (I. 148.)

"The type has properly but one radical meaning, yet the fundamental idea or principle exhibited in it may often be capable of more than one application to the realities of the gospel." (I. 152.)

"Due regard must be had to the essential difference between the nature of type and antitype." (I. 157.)

Trivial as this amendment of the authorized version

may seem to be to the ordinary reader, it meets the objections of many gainsayers, and shuts them up to the conclusion that God performed no part of his work on the seventh day, but consecrated it to that rest which was absolutely necessary for man, and which he, by a gracious anthropopatheia transferred to himself. In this way the Creator manifested his deep sympathy with his creature, and gave him an earnest and a foretaste of that heavenly rest which awaits the suffering believer in Jesus. On the perpetual authority of the Sabbath, as an institution of God, when man was in a state of innocence, we refer to what, we have said in a former number, p. 25.

In addition to this institution in paradise, God gave to man another of equal importance, the sacred institution of marriage. Strange to say that man has more frequently and more wickedly attempted to destroy these two holy and beneficent institutions given to him in a

state of innocence, than any others which have been instituted since the fall. One evidence of his desire to render the law of marriage subservient to his own corrupt purposes, is the omission of the word two in the very words of the institution. The great Lawgiver himself, when he tabernacled on earth, for the sake of the redemption of man, restored this word, which the Jews had taken away, in order to render its injunctions of none effect. "Have ye not read," said our Lord to the Pharisees, Matt. xix. 4, 5, "that he who made them at the beginning, made them male and female, and said:

"Therefore shall a man leave his father and his mother, and shall cleave unto his wife, and they two shall be one flesh?" Gen. ii. 24.

"Wherefore, they are no more twain, but one flesh. What therefore God hath joined together let not man put asunder." By the restoration of this little word two to the phraseology of the law of marriage, He completely forbade divorce, adultery, bigamy, and polygamy, those horrid evils which arise from the corruptions of this holy institution, and which have sullied its dignity and its beauty in all ages; and in none more than in the present day, among the Roman priesthood, the followers of Mahomet, the lower classes in this country, and the Satan-deluded Mormons.

This little word two, which has been omitted in the present Hebrew text, from what cause we know not, but which we can easily conjecture, is still to be found in the Samaritan text of the Pentateuch, in the Septuagint Greek version written about 280 B.C., and indeed in all the ancient versions. In the revision of our authorized version, this word should therefore certainly be restored to its place, so that there may be a full agreement between the history of Moses and the words of our Lord. This correction is omitted in the Pocket Paragraph Bible, but supplied in the Annotated Paragraph Bible of the Religious Tract Society.

Until mankind return to the sacred observance of these two divine institutions first established in paradise, when man lived in a state of innocency and holy communion with his Maker, happiness can never be restored. All the attempts of philanthropists, legislators, and divines, with all the nostrums of political economists and agitators, and all the schemes of the advocates of national education, will utterly fail of their intended effect in the amelioration of society, unless these holy, good, and just laws of God be patronized and enforced by government. There is a spurious liberality now afloat which avows the dangerous notion, that if a man be honest and upright among his neighbours, pays his debts, and does not rob or steal, or otherwise injure his neighbour in his worldly affairs, he has a right to observe or not observe these laws of God, just as he pleases! Horrid fallacy! It is true that we cannot make a man a Christian by act of parliament; but it is equally true that every human government has a right to exact the observance of those laws which are necessary for the well-being of society, and the happiness of the human race.

The Christians who faithfully observe these laws are the salt of the earth; and were it not for their obser

Let

vance by his own people, God would speedily bring destruction upon the globe, and swallow up, as he did Korah, Dathan, and Abiram, the whole race of ungodly sinners, who are living in open defiance of his precepts. the government of this country, and its legislators and judges, beware how they tamper with the commandments of God which have never been abrogated; and let them not dare to pass any laws that would diminish the sanctity of the Sabbath, or allow the people to do as they like on that holy day. We warn them not to open the places of amusement, or of secular instruction, to the public on the Lord's day, or to permit them to be opened for the pretended benefit of the people, especially the lower classes; lest they should have reason to repent their proceedings when it is too late. We warn them also not to tamper with the laws of marriage, or to dare to secularize that which God has rendered sacred by his own institution. If they do so, either rashly or presumptuously, they will dislocate the whole frame of society, and produce a social revolution of the very worst description-a revolution which will involve both themselves and the people in one common ruin. Let them not be deceived, but remember that it is true both of nations and of individuals: "God is not mocked"; he will not be mocked; "for whatsoever a man soweth that shall he also reap.'

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We wonder much that the clergy of our land have not raised their voice in a more public and emphatic manner than they have done, and protested against the open infringement of God's laws, which has been aided and abetted by Sir Benjamin Hall and his co-adjutors, and the motley squad of trumpeters and musicians which has followed in his wake. We wonder still more that any clergyman should be found, or allowed to hold a place in the church, who would advocate for one moment the conversion of the whole or any part of the Lord's day into a holiday, as Dr. Hook and others have done. "Tell it not in Gath; publish it not in the streets of Askelon." That those who are appointed by government, and paid by the nation to preach the truth and expound the laws of God, should be among those who justify a departure from the original sanctity and integrity of any divine institution, is both prepos terous and lamentable; and we hope that it will be viewed in its proper light by those who have the power to effect an amendment.

We formerly observed that the translation of that part of the address of Satan to Eve, in which he says, "Ye shall be as gods, knowing good and evil," requires amendment, inasmuch as it does not convey the whole truth of the passage in the original. It ought to be translated into these words: "Ye shall be as the Omnipotent, knowing good and evil." As it now stands in the common version, it would seem to imply that Adam and his wife were acquainted with more gods than one, and that polytheism was known in the world, and coeval with the creation of man. This idea we know is absurd, for polytheism did not originate among men till after the Flood: and if Satan had used such language as that meant by the word gods, implying that there were more gods than one, he would not have been understood by Eve at all; but if he used the proper name

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