"land of darkness, it is darkness itself, the land of the "fhadow of death; all confufion and diforder, and "where the light is as darkness. This is my house, "there have I made my bed: I have faid to corrup❝tion, Thou art my father; and to the worm, Thou "art my mother and my fifter: As for my hope, who "shall fee it? I and my hope go down together to the "bars of the pit." Job x. 21, and xvii. 13. When he humbles himself in complainings before the almightinefs of God, what contemptible and feeble images doth he use! "Wilt thou break a leaf driven to and "fro? Wilt thou purfue the dry ftubble? I confume

away like a rotten thing, a garment eaten by the "moth," Job xiii. 25, &c. "Thou lifteft me up to the "wind, thou causeft me to ride upon it, and dissolvest "my substance." Job xxiii. 22. Can any man invent more despicable ideas, to represent the fcoundrel herd and refuse of mankind, than those which Job uses? chap. xxx. and thereby he aggravates his own forrows and reproaches to amazement : " They that are younger "than I have me in derifion, whofe fathers I would "have difdained to have fet with the dogs of my flock: "for want and famine they were folitary; fleeing into "the wilderness defolate and wafte: They cut up mal"lows by the bushes, and juniper-roots for their meat: "They were driven forth from among men, (they " cried after them as after a thief) to dwell in the cliffs "of the valleys, in the caves of the earth, and in rocks: "Among the bushes they brayed, under the nettles "they were gathered together; they were children of

"fools,

"fools, yea, children of base men; they were viler "than the earth: And now I am their fong, yea, I am "their by-word," &c. How mournful and dejected is the language of his own forrows! "Terrors are "turned upon him, they pursue his foul as the wind, "and his welfare paffes away as a cloud; his bones are pierced within him, and his foul is poured out; "he goes mourning without the fun, a brother to dragons, and a companion to owls; while his harp and organ are turned into the voice of them that weep.” I must transcribe one half of this holy book, if I would shew the grandeur, the variety, and the juftness of his ideas, or the pomp and beauty of his expreffion; I must copy out a good part of the writings of David and Isaiah, if I would represent the poetical excellencies of their thoughts and ftyle: nor is the language of the leffer prophets, especially in some paragraphs, much inferior to these.

Now, while they paint human nature in its various forms and circumftances, if their defigning be fo just and noble, their difpofition fo artful, and their colouring fo bright, beyond the most famed human writers, how much more muft their descriptions of God and heaven exceed all that is poffible to be faid by a meaner tongue? When they speak of the dwelling-place of God, "He inhabits eternity, and fits upon the throne "of his holiness, in the midst of light inacceffible." When his holiness is mentioned, "The heavens are not "clean in his fight, he charges his angels with folly : "He looks to the moon, and it shineth not, and the <ftars

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"stars are not pure before his eyes: He is a jealous "God, and a confuming fire." If we speak of ftrength, "Behold, he is ftrong: He removes the mountains, " and they know it not: He overturns them in his an<< ger: He fhakes the earth from her place, and her pil"lars tremble: He makes a path through the mighty "waters, he difcovers the foundations of the world:

The pillars of heaven are aftonished at his reproof.” And after all," These are but a portion of his ways: "The thunder of his power who can understand ?" His fovereignty, his knowledge, and his wifdom, are revealed to us in language vaftly fuperior to all the poetical accounts of heathen divinity. Let the pot

"fherds ftrive with the potsherds of the earth; but "fhall the clay fay to him that fashioneth it, What "makeft thou? He bids the heavens drop down from "above, and let the fkies pour down righteousness. "He commands the fun, and it rifeth not, and he "fealeth up the stars. It is he that faith to the deep, "be dry, and he drieth up the rivers. Woe to them

that seek deep to hide their counsel from the Lord; "his eyes are upon all their ways, he underftands their "thoughts afar off. Hell is naked before him, and de"struction hath no covering. He calls out all the stars

by their names, he fruftrateth the tokens of the liars, "and makes the diviners mad: He turns wife men "backward, and their knowledge becomes foolish.” His tranfcendent eminence above all things is mot nobly reprefented, when he "fits upon the circle of "the earth, and the inhabitants thereof are as grass"hoppers:

"hoppers: All nations before him are as the drop "of a bucket, and as the fmall duft of the balance : "He takes up the ifles as a very little thing; Lebanon, "with all her beafts, is not fufficient for a facrifice to "this God, nor are all her trees fufficient for the burn"ing. This God, before whom the whole creation is as nothing, yea, less than nothing, and vanity. To "which of all the heathen Gods then will ye compare me, faith the Lord, and what fhall I be likened to " And to which of all the heathen Poets fhall we liken or compare this glorious orator, the facred defcriber of the godhead? The orators of all nations are as nothing before him, and their words are vanity and, emptineis. Let us turn our eyes now to fome of the holy writings, where God is creating the world: How meanly do the best of the Gentiles talk and tride upon this fubject, when brought into comparison with Mofes, whom Longinus himself, a Gentile critic, cites as a mafter of the fublime ftyle, when he chofe to use it; "And the "Lord faid, Let there be light, and there was light; "Let there be clouds and feas, fun and ftars, plants "and animals, and behold they are :" He commanded, and they appear and obey: "By the word of the "Lord were the heavens made, and all the hoft of "them by the breath of his mouth :" This is working like a God, with infinite eafe and omnipotence. His wonders of providence for the terror and ruin of his adverfaries, and for the fuccour of his faints, is fet before our eyes in the scripture with equal magnificence, and as becomes divinity. When "he arifes out of his "place,

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"6 place, the earth trembles, the foundations of the hills "are fhaken because he is wroth: There goes a smoke 66 up out of his noftrils, and fire out of his mouth devour

eth, coals are kindled by it. He bows the heavens, " and comes down, and darkness is under his feet. "The mountains melt like wax, and flow down at his 66 prefence." If Virgil, Homer, or Pindar, were to prepare an equipage for a defcending God, they might fe thunder and lightnings too, and clouds and fire, to form a chariot and horses for the battle, or the triumph; but there is none of them provides him a flight of Cherubs instead of horses, or feats him in "chariots of fal"vation." David beholds him riding 66 upon the heaven of heavens, by his name JAH: He was mounted upon a cherub, and did fly; he flew on the wings of "the wind;" and Habbakuk sends "the peftilence before "him." Homer keeps a mighty ftir with his Negeλnyeρελα Ζεύς, and Hefiod with his Ζεὺς ὑψιβρεμέτης. Jupiter, that raises up the clouds, and that makes a noise, or thunders on high. But a divine Poet makes the "clouds but the duft of his feet ;" and when the Higheft gives his voice in the heavens, "Hail-ftones and "coals of fire follow." A divine Poet difcovers the channels of the waters, and lays open the foundations of nature; "at thy rebuke, O Lord, at the blast of "the breath of thy noftrils." When the Holy One alighted upon Mount Sinai, "his glory covered the "heavens: He stood and measured the earth: He be"held and drove asunder the nations, and the everlast❝ing mountains were fcattered: The perpetual hills « did

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