SECTION XXXII.

The same subject continued.-Abraham's vision at Mamre a type of the sin-offering of purification: and of the gospel emancipation from the bondage of the law.

The promise of God to Abram was, in its primary sense, a temporal promise of territorial possession to himself and his descendants. The ultimate result was to be a blessing conferred on the whole race of mankind. Abram, probably, understood this universal blessing as referring to "the seed of the woman, which should bruise the serpent's head." (Gen. iii. 15.) "Get thee out of thy country, and from thy kindred, and from thy Father's house, unto a land that I will shew thee." "And I will make of thee a great nation, and I will bless thee and make thy name great; and thou shalt be a blessing." "And I will bless them that bless thee, and curse him that curseth thee;" "and in thee shall all families of the earth be blessed." (Gen. xii. 1.)

Abram accepted this promise of the Lord with un

doubting faith; and hesitated not, at once, to get him out of the country, in which his Father Terah had settled, and to abandon his kindred. The country in Mesopotamia, where Terah had founded and established his family, seems to have offered every inducement for a permament occupation. It presented all the attraction of a quiet and settled possession ; and it possessed that especial claim to the protection and affection of Abram, which was held sacred in the early times it contained the tombs of his Father, and of his brother Haran. But, there was no hesitation. "Abram departed as the Lord had said unto him."

He probably was also aware, that Terah himself had originally designed to migrate beyond the Euphrates westward. For Terah "went forth from Ur of the Chaldees, to go into the land of Canaan: " although, when he "came to Haran, he dwelt there." Abram, therefore, saw in God's command the completion of his Father's first intention. We, also, may perceive, in Terah's original design, the dawn of that appointed scheme, in the Almighty's predestinated counsels, to which Abram, and not Terah, was to be directly called. When Abram arrived at Sichem, he pitched his tents there. But what were then his prospects, as to the accomplishment of the promise, in which he trusted? His hopes of a direct and legitimate progeny rested on Sarai. "But Sarai was barren; she had no child." He was to become " a great nation,"-But he had abandoned the land of

his father and his family, and was a stranger in the plain of Moreh. He had little prospect of an undisputed settlement then; for "the Canaanite was then in the land." Nevertheless, for his encouragement the Lord appeared unto him again, and repeated his promise in terms still more clearly expressed. "Unto thy seed will I give this land." On this announcement, he performed an act commemorative at once of his faith in the promise, and of his devotion to Him who had promised. "Then builded he an altar unto the Lord, who had appeared unto him." Did he then experience the commencement, at least, of that great destiny, to which he had been called? Did Sarai conceive? Did he find his position in the land becoming more inviting, more extended, more sure in his possession? The reverse was the case. He had no settled abode. The very altar, which he had raised to God was deserted; and he wandered onward to the south, to Bethel, where again he built an altar. Still there was no rest; this altar was abandoned like the former; and "he journeyed, going on still towards the south." He now encountered a most severe trial to his constancy and faith. Instead of prosperity and abundance, and the acquisition of fertile lands, he was threatened with the most dreadful of all calamities-with the horrors and destitution of famine. "There was a famine in the land: the famine was grievous in the land."

In consequence of this visitation, he was compelled

to take refuge in Egypt. What, then, was now his condition? To how many weak mortals would the promise, under his present circumstances, have appeared only a fancy or delusion! He had found no resting place; and now he had been compelled to leave behind him the very country, which had been promised as the inheritance of his posterity; and to seek an asylum in Egypt. To save his own and Sarai's life; and the lives of Lot and his attendants; he had crossed the border river and had placed the desert as a barrier between himself and the country of his hopes. But this discouragement, great as it must have been, was not all. A far more bitter and almost hopeless affliction befel him. Even Sarai, the essential instrument of the promise-without whom every chance of its accomplishment must vanish away-even she was taken from him. "The Princes of Egypt saw her, and commended her before Pharaoh, and the woman was taken into Pharaoh's house." Under this trial, it is clear that the faith of Abram, constant and unshaken as it had hitherto been, was still but the faith of mortal man. It had its seasons of imperfection. It betrayed a principle of weakness in all its strength. He had anticipated the probability of this calamity; and, instead of boldly trusting in the promises and power of his God, he yielded to his fears, and even assisted by his own act the very event, which he most dreaded. To save

as he thought, his own life, he made Sarai pretend that she was his sister.

But now a slight dawn of more hopeful prospects beamed upon him. Out of evil, good came. Pharaoh restored his wife uncontaminated. "Why didst thou not tell me she was thy wife? Why saids't thou she is my sister ?—so I might have taken her to me for my wife." He then sent Abram away and his wife, and all the cattle and wealth with which he had enriched him.

Abram now established himself once more at Bethel; and after his separation from Lot, he received a further assurance of God's promise. On this occasion the promise was so expressed as to have a double application. It referred, in the first place, to his destiny, in an ultimate and spiritual sense, as the Father of that innumerable family throughout all the world, who, in the fulness of time, should be called, by the instrumentality of his own lineal descendants, to the real knowledge of the true God. Secondly, it referred to the promise of an actual possession by his own progeny of the country, in which he was then sojourning. The first intimation, that in his "seed all the families of the earth should be blessed," was now more distinctly explained. He was allowed a clearer conception of his double destiny as Father of Israel after the flesh; and as Father of the spiritual and true Israel after the promise. It was revealed to him that his seed was destined to