Jews in their infidelity, and consequently of their final rejection by God, was their refusal to coalesce with the Gentiles, in the common enjoyment of gospel privileges.

The state of subjection to his father, and of personal dependence upon him, in which all the years of his life had been passed, since the departure of his brother, he calls a slavery; but whether from the irritation of his feelings at the time, or from the truth of the fact, we need not determine. It is sufficient to observe that in language to the same effect, do the apostles speak of the service required by the ancient law, from those who were subjected to it. They call it a yoke and a burden, which neither they nor their forefathers had been able to bear; and they represent it as not the least acceptable effect of the death and passion of Christ, that their hope of present acceptance with God, and of final salvation hereafter, was no longer to be placed on the old rigid and inexorable footing. The galling yoke of the law was to be commuted for the easy one of the gospel; and the heavy, insupportable burden of Moses, for the light and tolerable load of Christ. In a word, the bondage of the law was thenceforth to be superseded by the liberty of the gospel.

Whether under the influence of the same feelings, or from the consciousness of the truth of the fact; he appeals to his father if, at any time during this past period, he had transgressed a command of his. The word which he uses is evroλ-and that may be properly understood of such principles of duty, and such requisitions of practical obedience, as depend on the will and injunction, the ipse dixit or good pleasure, of a competent authority. It would

apply therefore especially to the ritual, ceremonial, or positive part of the law of Moses, in contradistinction to the natural or moral. And if it is the Jew who is speaking in the person of the elder brother it is in the strictness of his observance of this part of the law, with the hope and expectation of pleasing God thereby, that he makes his boast; a boast, which if so intended, with very little qualification may be admitted of the Jews of our Saviour's day, as likely to be founded in sincerity, and possibly to be justified by the truth of the case. whatever latitude they might allow themselves with regard to the precepts and duties of the moral code, they could not be reproached with a wilful neglect of the ceremonial. They were too much disposed to trust to the latter, instead of the former, and to act on the principle that a strict and punctilious observance of the one, was sufficient to compensate for a lax and superficial performance of the other.

For

Notwithstanding this uniform obedience to his father's will, this punctual observance of all that could be required of a son, not the least indulgence had yet been conceded to him; not so much as the gratuity of a kid, to make merry with his friends: which is a lively description of the stern and uncompromising spirit of a covenant like that of Horeb, of a law like that of Moses-as founded on the strict principle of giving and receiving; of a debtor and a creditor; of a quid pro quo; of a promise and a condition; of a work and its wages: as exacting compliance with the very letter of its terms; as holding its subjects at all times, to the bond of their engagement; as making no allowance for human infirmity, and unavoidable derelictions of duty; as resenting the

least breach of the contract, as vitiating the whole; as requiring in short every thing on one hand, or being bound to allow, and disposed to bestow, nothing on the other.

The gift of a kid was no doubt mentioned by way of invidiously contrasting its value, with that of a fatted calf; and the constant refusal of the one to himself, as so much the more unjust and unfair, when compared with the immediate relinquishment of the other, out of compliment to his brother. And considering the law as a severe taskmaster, who would grant him no privilege, but at its utmost cost -and his own rights and advantages as consequently exclusive, because bought at their full price-at the expense of individual pains, privations, compliances, so constant and laborious; so incompatible with personal independence; so grating to personal inclinations were the Jew to see all that he prided himself upon and supposed to be his, suddenly and gratuitously lavished on the Gentile, who had done nothing to deserve it-had suffered nothing to earn it, in comparison with himself-he might naturally be tempted to exclaim,

Then all was lost-this labour and this pain!
And the stern tyrant's covenant was vain!

Virgil. Georg. iv.

Certain it is, that not merely contempt, but jealousy also of the Gentile, was a motive which influenced the Jew, in refusing to associate with him on a footing of equality, and as one of the people of God and the children of Abraham, as much as himself.

The elder son, indeed, was the person, who, next to the father, was most interested in the return and restoration of his brother; and most bound by duty

and station, to have sanctioned and promoted the common joy of the family, in consequence of that event: nor did it less become the Jews, nor would it have been less pertinent to their relation both to God and to the rest of mankind, instead of resenting, opposing, and thwarting the dispensation of grace in favour of the Gentile, and their admission into a share of the same moral and spiritual privileges, which they possessed themselves, to have rejoiced at it, and by all means in their power to have endeavoured to give it effect.

The elder son knew very well that the younger brother was the son of the same parent with himself; and had all the claims of a brother on his own affection: yet he was determined not to own his relationship, and speaks of him to his father as This son of thine. The Jew too was much better aware than the Gentile, that all mankind were the creatures of the same Maker, and the offspring of the same first pair, and therefore strictly brothers in descent. Yet when do we find them so acting, as if conscious of this truth; or so affected by it, as to shew a fraternal sympathy in the welfare, whether temporal or spiritual, of their Gentile brethren?

Observe too, the invidious allusion to that fact in the past history of the prodigal, his devouring the living of his father, with harlots—which was obliquely to censure not only the judgment and prudence, but the strict moral propriety of the father, in being so ready to forgive a son, who had not merely shewn no regard for his property, but was of such dissolute and vicious habits. Did the Jews, too, consider it no disparagement to the truth, the justice, the holiness and pureness of God, not merely

to deprive them as they thought unfairly of blessings and privileges which were justly their due, and ought to have been reserved to them, but to transfer them gratuitously to others who were not even fit to receive them? who had made too bad an use of former advantages to deserve fresh favours; who had never been the servants of God, but hitherto the slaves of Satan; who had never done any thing to promote his glory, but so much to dishonour and injure it; who had never known, nor acknowledged the true God, but had lived until then, in a state of apostasy from him, and in a kind of spiritual fornication, the votaries of false religions.

Yet, admitting that festivity and rejoicing were now for the first time to be instituted in the family of the father, and that, even to commemorate the recovery of its younger member; the elder son was still invited to partake of them along with the rest: and whatever indulgences had been denied to him before, the restriction was taken off now. And if unexpected or peculiar favour seemed to be extended to the Gentile, by his gratuitous reception into the church of God, and to a share of the spiritual advantages of the Jew, with none of the conditions, exactions, compliances-upon which, and in which, their enjoyment by the latter heretofore had been placed— yet the rigour of his own law was mitigated to the Jew; the terms of his own covenant were put on an easier, and more favourable footing. If gospel privileges were freely conceded to the one, the curse of the law was voluntarily abrogated to the other: if no burden was imposed on the Gentile, the yoke was lightened to the Jew. The same liberty was offered to both; the same Saviour, in his merits and