it is capable. As it was with the old law covenant, so will it be, also, with this. "Not one jot or tittle can pass from it, till all be fulfilled." It will be fulfilled in them, not merely in the inward experience (as now) now) of believing individuals among the nation, but nationally; so that it will express the collective experience, and be (as it were) the epitome of the history of that whole people.

If we examine the terms of this new covenant of God with Israel, we find two great and leading particulars under which the blessings promised in it may be arranged: JUSTIFICATION and SANCTIFICATION: the free, complete, everlasting forgiveness, and oblivion, of all possible offences; and then, all spiritual blessedness, resulting therefrom: more especially, these three: divine renewal, divine relationship, and divine illumination.

The basis, and foundation stone, of the whole edifice of covenant blessings, is (as I have said) the most free, perfect, and everlasting forgiveness, and oblivion, of all possible offences. FOR I will forgive their iniquity, and I will remember their sins no more: or, (as the apostle quotes the words, Heb. viii. 12,) "I will be merciful to their unrighteousness, and their sins and their iniquities will I remember no more."

These are the terms which God lays down, as

the beginning of all his future dealings with Israel. So he takes them into covenant; with the most entire obliteration, the clean wiping out, of all that mighty mass of national iniquities, under the weight of which they have been lying, accursed, for, now, nearly eighteen hundred years, and only aggravating their guilt, by their continued impenitence and rebellion against their King. What are the judgments of God that are yet to fall upon that devoted people, it is impossible, accurately, to tell. Their own Scriptures clearly predict a last dreadful tribulation, "the time of Jacob's trouble," (Jer. xxx. 7,) when they shall drink "the dregs of the cup of trembling, and wring them out:" when "the consummation, and that determined shall be poured upon the desolate." (Dan. ix. 27.)

But then, at length, mercy succeeds to judgment. "I will not contend for ever," saith the God with whom we have to do, "neither will I be always wroth for the spirit should fail before me, and the souls that I have made." (Isa. lvii. 16.) And, when once mercy's tide sets in, to that people, O with what a swelling, overflowing flood, will it speedily obliterate all traces of foregoing judgments! swallow up, and bury in the depths of everlasting oblivion, all their former shame, and bygone iniquities, and fill every bosom, of the

ransomed thousands of Israel, with wonder, and joy, and praise. "Awake, awake, stand up, O Jerusalem, which hast drunk at the hand of the Lord the cup of his fury. (Here, at least, is not the Gospel Church; there can be no doubt, what is the Jerusalem that is here addressed.)...... Thus saith thy Lord, the Lord, and thy God, that pleadeth the cause of his people, Behold, I have taken out of thy hand the cup of trembling, even the dregs of the cup of my fury: thou shalt NO MORE drink it AGAIN, but I will put it into the hand of them that afflict thee." (Isa. li. 17, 22, 23.) "For a small moment have I forsaken thee, but with great mercies will I gather thee. In a little wrath I hid my face from thee, for a moment; but with EVERLASTING KINDNESS will I have mercy on thee, saith the Lord thy Redeemer. For this is AS THE WATERS OF NOAH unto me: for, as I have sworn, that the waters of Noah should no more go over the earth, so have I sworn, that I would not be wroth with thee, nor rebuke thee. For the mountains shall depart, and the hills be removed; but my kindness shall not depart from thee, nor the covenant of my peace be removed, saith the Lord, that hath mercy on thee." (Isa. liv. 7-10.) "Comfort ye, comfort ye my people, saith your God: speak ye comfortably to Jerusalem, and cry unto her, that her warfare is accomplished; that her iniquity is pardoned; for

she hath received, of the Lord's hand, double, for all her sins." (Isa. xl. 1, 2.) "I, even I, am he, that blotteth out thy transgressions for mine own sake, and will not remember thy sins." (Isa. xliii. 25.) "I have blotted out, as a thick cloud, thy transgressions, and, as a cloud, thy sins: return unto me, for I have redeemed thee." (Isa. xliv. 22.) "In those days, and in that time, saith the Lord, the iniquity of Israel shall be sought for, and there shall be none; and the sins of Judah, and they shall not be found: for I will pardon them whom I reserve." (Jer. L. 20.) "And I will cleanse them from all their iniquity, whereby they have sinned against me; and I will pardon all their iniquities, whereby they have sinned, and whereby they have transgressed against me. And it shall be to me a name of joy, a praise, and an honour, before all the nations of the earth, which shall hear all the good that I do unto them; and they shall fear and tremble, for all the goodness, and for all the prosperity, that I procure unto it." (Jer. xxxiii. 8, 9.)

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See, here, (as I have said) the flood-tide of mercies and forgivenesses setting in, to Israel; the Lord turning the captivity of his people the rivers in the south," when, for ages, the scorching heat of Divine judgments has dried up all their channels of blessing, and made them as the parched desert, and like the heath in the

wilderness. But, now, the Lord returns to Jerusalem in mercies. In that day, (the day in which "the Lord shall set his hand again, THE SECOND TIME, to recover the remnant of his people which shall be left, from Assyria, and from Egypt, &c.") "In that day, thou shalt say, O Lord, I will praise thee though thou wast angry with me, thine anger is turned away, and thou comfortest me. Behold, God is my salvation: I will trust, and not be afraid for the Lord Jehovah is my strength and my song: he also is become my salvation. Therefore with joy shall ye draw water out of the wells of salvation." (Isa. xii. 1-3.)

O what a day will that be to Israel, when, instead of the cross of Messiah being to them (as now) a stumbling-block, they shall see that the precious blood-shedding of Immanuel is the foundation of all their mercies; the seal of their new covenant of grace and peace: the life of all their joys-when they shall say, in the language of their own prophet, which they can now so little explain or understand,—" Surely he hath borne our griefs, and carried our sorrows: yet we did esteem him stricken, smitten of God, and afflicted. But he was wounded for our transgressions: he was bruised for our iniquities: the chastisement of our peace was upon him, and by his stripes we are healed......For the transgression of (us) his people