restored (vi. 9; vii. 6); her fruitfulness returns, as in the morn ing of the gospel (vi. 6, vii. 13); her evangelising efforts are wider, "Come my beloved," we hear her saying, "let us go forth into the field let us lodge in the villages." She is the admiration of the nations. "The daughters saw her and blessed her; yea, the queens and the concubines, and they praised her' (vi. 9).

What greatly corroborates the view we have taken of the import of the "Song," is the manifest progression which we are able to trace in it. That progression exactly corresponds with the development of divine revelation and the growth of the church. We begin amid the night shadows; at length comes the daybreak; and, last of all, the sun reaches his mid-day splendour. By a second and similar train of imagery is the progressive development of divine truth put before us: there is the passing away of winter; the opening of spring, when the vine flowers, the pomegranate buds, and the fig tree putteth forth her green fig. Then comes summer, and at last autumn when the fruits are ripened. By a third train of imagery is the same thing brought before us. First, the bride hears only the bridegroom's voice: she rests upon the promise of the advent. Second, she comes into his house, and sits at his table there is now a typical worship which foreshadows Christ's coming. Third, she sees himself. He comes in the flesh. But again he departs; and when at last he returns, it is to abide. By yet other symbolisations is the correspondence shewn between the development of the truth and the progress of the church. At the opening of the Song, the church is seen as a single individual: towards its close, she has become a multitude, an embannered host; she is, " as it were, the company of two armies." In the second chapter, the church is described as "a lily," lowly, and scarce seen by the world; but in the seventh chapter, she has shot up into a goodly tree, and attracts the sight, for, it is said, "thy stature is like to a palm tree." At the beginning, she is "black," and cannot enlighten the world; but by and by she begins to shine with a light like that of the sun at noon-day. At the outset, she has neither defence nor organisation, she is " among thorns," and she is seen smitten and bleeding, from the sword of "the watchmen;" but before all is over, she has swelled into an embattled host: she is fully armed, thoroughly organised; she marches under banners, and, as a victorious army, strikes terror into her foes. So many coincidences cannot be merely accidental: there is here design. The successive scenes fall into dramatic order. This implies that the Song is what we have stated it to be, even an allegorical history, not a mere painting of the experience or the graces of the true Christian, or of Christ's excellency and love,

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but a history of the church and of redemption; not a history of one epoch only, but of all epochs, from the days of Eden downwards.

The book closes with an allegorical representation of a great ingathering to the church; and its last words are a prayer that these blessed scenes may soon be realised: "Make haste, my beloved, and be thou like to a roe or to a young hart upon the mountains of spices." And to this prayer the closing words of the Bible are an echo: "Surely I come quickly; amen, even so come, Lord Jesus."

Let us glance back on the poem, the import of which we have so rapidly sketched, and the true reading of which we have endeavoured to give. Viewed as a literary production merely, it commands our admiration. The affluence of its imagery; the originality and boldness of its metaphors; the exceeding appropriateness of its allegories, when the right key is applied; the depth and strength of its passionateness; combined with the absolute purity of its feeling, and the exquisite simplicity and tenderness of its beauty, are such as to leave it without a rival. Like all the other parts of that wonderful volume of which it forms a part, it soars high above all similar compositions, and looks down upon them as the heavens look down upon the earth. The book is oriental in every point. In its feeling and modes of expression, it is thoroughly oriental. It is abrupt, passionate, tender, all by turns. The discourse of its interloquitors is copious and flowing. At the same time it is interrupted by sudden breaks and transitions, such as deep emotion is incident to. Its imagery is thoroughly oriental. It places us in an eastern clime, and regales us with the beauty of its luxuriant vegetation, and the odours of its rich aromatic plants and flowers. By turns we feel the delicious freshness of an eastern night, and the scorching heat of an eastern noon, and thankfully we accept the cool shadow of the apple tree, and the refreshing juice of the pomegranate. The land which it calls up, is especially that which was the glory of all lands. But it is not the treeless, flowerless Palestine of the present day which this poem puts before us; it is the Palestine of Solomon's age, when the land overflowed with corn and wine, with flowers and fragrance. But what a picture,—so chaste and pure, yet vivid and glowing! Where in lyrical compositions is there a production like this, so simple and natural in its diction, yet so instinct with the spirit of deepest tenderness and living beauty? We are made to walk through the land, and visit every region of it in succession. Now we are in the stately Lebanon, and list the thunder of its streams, as they dash from rock to rock, and hear the winds roar among the boughs

of its mighty cedars. Now our steps lead us along Sharon's green plain, whose deep verdure the blushing rose bespangles, while onward towards its strand come rolling the white-topped billows. Now we are transported towards the eastern chain of hills, where the gloomy waters of the Dead Sea repose in their deep, black gulf, with its awful memories of judgment. Now we are in the gardens of Engedi, breathing the fragrance of camphire, and myrrh, and calamus, and all the chief spices. Now we are by the pools of Solomon, the soft trickling of the waters of which cool the heats in the vale of Bethlehem. Now we are in the vineyards, admiring the tender grape, or the ripening cluster; and now we are in the wilderness, where the flocks roam over the breezy pasture-lands. All hours and seasons pass over us :-the daybreak, when the shadows flee away, and the mountains begin to glow with the gold of morning; the noon, when the flocks rest; the delicious but short-lived eve; the dusk and lustrous night, when the stars crowd the firmament; the winter, with its beclouded skies; the spring, when the rain is over, and the new verdure clothes the earth, and the flowers begin to enamel it; when the fig-tree puts forth its green figs; the young vines being to sprout, and their grapes to clothe the bough; when the song of birds comes from the grove, and the voice of the turtle-dove is heard in the land. But this imagery, unrivalled as it is in simple yet rich beauty, is but subsidiary to the action. It is only the embroidery of the veil which hangs before the mystery of the plot; that plot the plot of all time, arranged before the foundation of the world, and in its issues running on into eternity. J. A. W

ART. VII.-Kennedy on Man's Relations to God.

Man's Relations to God, Traced in the Light of the Present Truth. By the Rev. JOHN KENNEDY, Dingwall. Edinburgh: John Maclaren. 1869.

MR

R KENNEDY is evidently a man of a devout, earnest, and thoughtful spirit, animated by a sincere love to the truth, and well acquainted with our systems of theology. The volume before us bears witness to no small amount of acuteness, energy, and skill in dialectics. And yet we are. constrained to say that we regret the publication of such a treatise at the present time. We were flattering ourselves with the idea that evangelical divines were beginning to come to a better mutual understanding on the points which have so long divided them, and which, like a civil war, had pitted

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father against son, and brother against brother, leaving behind them a melancholy train of lacerated feelings, broken fellowships, and burning animosities. We fear that the present work, if it should produce any effect, will only revive the strife, and embroil the question in fresh complications. We fail to see the precise meaning of Mr Kennedy's title page; but, supposing that his object is to trace the relations between God and man in opposition to prevailing error on that subject, we have been somewhat disappointed. We expected the author would deal with some of the rampant heresies of the broad school, with those who openly oppugn and deride the doctrines of grace-such as the reality and necessity of an atonement, justification through the blood of Jesus, and regeneration by the Holy Spirit. But with the exception of some very vague allusion to what has been termed the universal fatherhood of God, not as held by Maurice and his class, but by some evangelical divines, "the present truth," in the estimation of our author, so far as we can judge, is the limited view of the atonement as bearing exclusively on the elect, in opposition to what has been called "the double reference" of the atonement, general and special. With regard to this phraseology, we have already, in an article devoted to this question,* ventured to express our disapproval of it, as capable of a double or doubtful sense. If, however, by the general reference of the atonement, nothing more is intended than that aspect of the work towards the fallen race of Adam, without distinction or limitation, which is recognised in such scriptural phrases as "goodwill towards men," or "we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son," and in our own standards, when Christ is said to have "died to satisy divine justice and reconcile us unto God,❞—we see no reason why the use of the phrase should be grudged to such as may deem it necessary to the offer of salvation to guilty men; especially when we find them prepared to plead with equal earnestness for the special aspect of the atonement. Surely we ought to rejoice, if any phrase or fashion of speech serves to tide preacher or hearer of the gospel over what may appear a bar to salvation; when we find that the same bar once surpassed, is hailed as a security against being drifted back from the haven into the wild and stormy

ocean.

To enter into a critical examination of the work before us, would involve us in discussions too wide for our pages, as indeed Mr Kennedy has honestly confessed they were too wide to be fully handled in his own. Our author belongs to the federal school of theology, introduced by Witsius and other

* See British and Foreign Evangelical Review, April 1868.

divines of the 17th century, the phraseology of which, having been adopted by the Westminster divines, is so familiar to Scottish ears. "The covenant of works" and "the covenant of grace" are old distinctions which have well served their day, and still have their own advantages; but we doubt if scripture warrants us to confine our views of redemption to any one phase or figure of speech. Various metaphors besides that of "covenant" are there employed; progress in hermeneutics and other sciences have opened up other modes of illustration; and, while the scheme of mercy stretches out before us in the wide and varied field of revelation, we see no reason why we should hedge in our vision by persisting to view it only through the economy of two covenants, with their suretiships, conditions, seals, sanctions, and promises. Our remote ancestors managed to make very good bread in their day without the aid of our modern machinery; but it does not follow that we should have recourse to the primitive flail to beat out our corn, or to the old process of winnowing it between two barn doors. We hardly think that Mr Kennedy will confine himself, in his ordinary ministrations, as he has done in these pages, to handle gospel doctrines according to the covenant of works and the covenant of grace.

Our author has divided his treatise into four parts, embracing man's relations to God as created, as fallen, as evangelised, and as in Christ. As he has honestly confessed, this programme is much larger than he has found leisure to treat within the compass of a small volume. We do not, therefore, propose to follow him in a minute analysis of its contents. On the question as to the relation of man to God as created, the author seems to think he has struck out a middle course between Dr Candlish and the advocates of a universal fatherhood. We cannot, of course, be expected to plunge into this controversial ocean; nor can we venture to think that we are competent, within a few pregnant sentences, to lay down a theory of our own, which may still the noise of warfare, and settle the dispute. But we do not think that Mr Kennedy has gone far in this direction. He distinguishes between parentage and fatherhood, allowing that God may be said to stand in the relation of parent to man, as his creature, in the same sense as he does towards the lower animals, but contending that he cannot be regarded originally as his father. We only remark here, that if man be viewed simply as a creature, and God as his maker, it certainly does not follow that he is the father of man, but neither does it follow that he is his parent. The mere fact of creation forms no foundation either for parentage or fatherhood. A man may build a ship, but we do not call him the parent of the ship. The lower