HE word Bible means THE BOOK, because it is the best of all books, the one book which contains all that is needful to teach every one the way of salvation. This blessed book is also called THE SCRIPTURES, which means The writings, because these are the writings, or messages, which God has sent to man. If you take up any of our English Bibles, and look at the title page, you will read: "The Holy Bible, containing the Old and New Testaments." The word Tes tament means a will, or manifestation of the benevolent intentions of a person toward kindred and friends. Among men, this testament, or will, only takes effect after the death of the person who makes it, and the testator can alter or change it, to the last day of his life, and it is usually only the last or latest will or testament which is held to be valid. But God is not only infinitely wise, and just, and benevolent, but he is also eternal, or ever living, and so when he declares his will or intentions toward us, since he can never die, he graciously allows us to come into the immediate, or speedy possession of the blessings which he has in store forus. His will or intentions of love toward us have never changed, and.. though more than sixteen hundred years were consumed in the communication of the different books or portions which go to make up his will, yet there is the same great purpose and plan running through the whole of it,. perhaps more fully displayed in the later, than in the earlier portions, but so plain in all, that none need fail to comprehend it.* So, when we read about the "Old," or earlier, and the "New," or later Testament, we are not to suppose that what is called the "Old Testament" is like an old will, which a man has made and thrown aside as worthless,, because, for some reason, he prefers to make a later will, and a different. disposition of his property. God does not change: he is the same, yester * The Greek word, which, in the title pages of our Bibles, is translated Testament, is, in some passages in the New Testament, rendered Covenant; but this word, as it is used there, expresses almost precisely the same idea which we have explained above; that of the voluntary obligation which God has assumed to grant us redemption through the sacrifice of his Son; and as God is ever-living, it is, perhaps, more strictly correct to speak of this obligation as a Covenant between him and us, than as a Testament or will, which would only become valid on the death of the testator. But our English Bibles have so accustomed us to the use of the word Testament that we have adopted it in this work. day, to-day, and forever; and what he willed three thousand years ago, that he wills to-day. The two Testaments are but parts of one and the same manifestation of his love and good will towards us, though expressed in different ways and under different circumstances, so far as man is concerned. Very often, indeed, almost always, the man who would make a will or execute a deed of gift, employs another man, usually a lawyer or notary, to draw up the papers for him. He tells this man what his ideas are, and the lawyer or notary writes them down, using such language in expressing them, as best accords with the legal forms of the time. So, the great God, in communicating his will to man, has employed men to write it out in human language; and while he has revealed to them, or inspired them with the thoughts which he wished men to know, he has allowed each man to express these thoughts, under the Divine superintendence, in the wor s which he would naturally choose. They were all good men, and their words were good, but the thoughts were God's thoughts. There were probably about forty of these writers, in the Old and New Testaments, and each one had his peculiarities of style and manner; but, as we shall show you by and by, the books written by them, when compared with the best books which have been written by men whom God did not inspire, show a very wonderful difference, and prove that God's thoughts are not like our thoughts. The Jews, for whom all these books of the Old Testament were first written, divided them into three classes, viz.: I. THE LAW, which was also called the Pentateuch or Five Books, and comprised the five books usually supposed to have been written by Moses-Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers and Deuteronomy. II. THE PROPHETS, in which they included not only the prophetical books which we recognize under that name-Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel and the smaller prophecies, twelve in number, from Hosea to Malachi-but also the books of Joshua, Judges, First and Second Samuel, and First and Second Kings. III. "The Sacred Writings," which included the three poetical books, Psalms, Proverbs and Job; "the Five Rolls," Solomon's Song, Ruth, Lamentations, Ecclesiastes and Esther; and the books of Daniel, Ezra, Nehemiah, and First and Second Chronicles. This was the arrangement at the time our Saviour was on earth. But it was not a very good one; and the Jews who spoke the Greek language, and had had the Old Testament translated into Greek, adopted in that translation the different, and in many respects better one, which we have in our English Bibles. Let us look at this arrangement of the books of the Old Testament a lit tle, and see what was God's plan in causing this portion of his will to be made known to us in writing. We shall find that he begins by telling us how this world and all worlds were created; how this world was fitted to become the habitation of man; how man was created, and put in å beautiful garden, and the first woman given to him for a companion; how they disobeyed God's commands, and did that which he told them not to do, being tempted to this disobedience by an evil spirit; how they were driven out of the beautiful garden; how they had three sons and several daughters; how one of these sons quarrelled with another, and killed him, and thenceforth went away from his parents, and his children became very wicked; how the children and descendants of the third son, Seth, were good, and obeyed God for a considerable time; how finally all became so wicked, except one family, that God destroyed them, and sent his flood to drown the world; that it was peopled anew from this family of Noah. Then, after some general description of Noah's other descendants, God gives a more particular account of the descendants of Shem, and of his grandson Eber, and of his descendant in the seventh generation, Abraham, who with his son Isaac, and his grandson Jacob, were the founders of the Jewish or Hebrew nation. Thenceforward the historical narrative is occupied mainly with the history and movements of the descendants of these three men, who eventually occupied almost the whole of Palestine, and particularly with the Jewish nation, the descendants of Jacob. It relates their migration into Egypt, and their return, more than four hundred years later, to Palestine. Their long journey in the wilderness, their organization there into a compact and civilized nation; the establishment of laws, government, and religious rites and ceremonies; describes how their first government acknowledged only God as their Supreme Ruler, and that the judges, rulers, and lawgivers who governed them under him, were selected by his will. After a time, they became restive under this control, and desired to imitate the nations around them in having a king, as they had already often imitated them in falling into the worship of idols. We are told that God permitted them to have kings, some of whom were both good and great men, and among the number David, the sweetest poet, as well as the bravest commander in all their history; Solomon, the wisest of men; Asa, Jehoshaphat, Hezekiah and Josiah, all good and judicious rulers. But the greater number of their kings were bad men, and taught the people to worship idols, and to disobey God. Yet God was very merciful and loving to the Jewish nation, and he not only caused these good kings to write many psalms, and poems, and books of instruction for them—all of which he has made a part of his will or testament-but he raised up many prophets and teachers to warn and instruct them; and these warnings and prophecies are also written down for our instruction. At length, they became so wicked, that he caused, first, the kingdom of Israel-for they had divided into two distinct and often hostile kingdoms-to be conquered by their enemies, and the people to be carried into captivity, among the nations of the East, from whence very few of them ever returned to their own land. This destruction of their sister nation did not have any permanent good effect on the kingdom of Judah, and, one hundred and thirty-two years later, they also were carried into captivity in Babylon, and subsequently scattered through Media and Persia, and their beautiful temple, built by Solomon, was destroyed. At the end of seventy years, a portion of these captives, or rather their descendants, returned to Jerusalem and its neighborhood, probably not more than 45,000 or 50,000 at first, and rebuilt the temple. Henceforward they were not idolaters; but, at the coming of Christ to the earth, more than four hundred years later, they were formalists, worldly, ambitious, and haughty. We find most of the Old Testament, then, occupied with the history of this one Jewish nation, and what there is of other history is given mainly in its relation to them; what there is of poetry and literature is their poetry and literature, and describes their conditions and history, and their country; what there is of prophecy, relates mainly to them, or to the nations which had made war upon them; though, occasionally, some other nations are the subjects of prophetic denunciation; and the picture of a more glorious future, under the reign of the Messiah, is portrayed with wonderful beauty. But, taken as a whole, we may say, that from the beginning of the book of Exodus to the closing chapter of Malachi, the Old Testament is devoted to the history, the condition, the wanderings, backslidings, and crimes of the Jewish nation, and to their tardy and incomplete repentance. You will see, then, that when God communicated to his servants what they should say in this Old or earlier Testament, he did not intend to make a history, though all the history that is given incidentally is true; he did not intend that it should be a treatise on science, explaining either how the world was made, or how animals or man grew up in their present forms and with their present habits, or how trees, plants and flowers, or minerals, were produced; though all the allusions to these matters, if rightly understood, are perfectly in accord with true science; nor is it a |