events, yet Providence bent them to the most merciful ends. When the whole DRAMA was opened, then the wifdom and contrivance of every part of it was difplayed. Then it appeared, it was not they (as the patriarch inferred in confolation of his brethren), it was not they that fold him, but GoD;-'twas he fent him thither before them,-his fuperintending power availed itfelf of their paffions,-directed the operations of them, held the chain in his hand, and turned and wound it to his own purpose. "Ye verily thought evil against me, but GoD meant it for good,-ye had the guilt of a bad intention, his Providence the glory of accomplishing a good one,-by preferving you a pofterity upon the earth, and bringing to pass as it is this day, to fave much people alive." All history is full of fuch teftimonies, which though. they may convince thofe who look no deeper than the furface of things, that time and chance happen to all,-yet to thofe who look deeper, they manifeft at May God grant the perfuafion may make us as virtuous, as it has reason to make us joyful; and that it may bring forth in us the fruits of good living, to his praife and glory!-to whom be all might, majefty, and dominion, now and for evermore. Amen. SERMON IX. The Character of Herod *. MATTHEW II. 17, 18. Then was fulfilled that which was spoken by Jeremy the prophet, faying,-In Rama was there a voice heard, lamentation, and weeping, and great mourning; Rachael weeping for her children, and would not be comforted, because they are not. TH -- HE words which St. Matthew cites here as fulfilled by the cruelty and ambition of Herod, are in the 31ft chapter of Jeremiah, the 15th verfe. In the foregoing chapter, the prophet having declared GoD's intention of turning the mourning of his people into joy, by the restoration of the tribes which had been led away captive into Babylon; he proceeds, in the beginning of this chapter, which contains this prophecy, to give a more particular defcription of *Preached on Innocents Day. the great joy and feftivity of that promifed day, when they were to return once more to their own land, to enter upon their ancient poffeffions, and enjoy again all the privileges they had loft, and amongst others, and what was above them all, the favour and protection of GOD, and the continuation of his mercies to them and their pofterity. To make therefore the impreffion of this change the ftronger upon their minds -he gives a very pathetic reprefentation of the preceding forrow on that day when they were firft led away captive. Thus faith the Lord, A voice was heard in Rama; lamentation and bitter weeping, Rachael weeping for her children, refufed to be comforted, becaufe they were not. To enter into the full fenfe and beauty of this defcription, it is to be remembered that the tomb of Rachael, Jacob's beloved wife, as we read in the 35th of Genefis, was fituated near Rama, and betwixt that place and Bethlehem. Upon which circumftance the prophet raises one of the most affecting fcenes, that could be conceived; for as the tribes in their forrowful journey betwixt Rama and Bethlehem in their way to Babylon, were fuppofed to pass by this monumental pillar of their ancestor Rachael, Jacob's wife, the prophet, by a common liberty in rhetoric, introduces her as rifing up out of her fepulchre, and as the common mother of two of their tribes, weeping for her children, bewailing the fad catastrophe of her pofterity led away into a ftrange land-refufing to be comforted because they were not,-loft and cut off from their country, and, in all likelihood, never to be reftored back to her again. The Jewish interpreters fay upon this, that the patriarch Jacob buried. Rachael in this very place, forefeeing by the fpirit of prophecy, that his pofterity fhould that way be led captive, that she might, as they paffed, here intercede for them. But this fanciful fuperftructure upon the paffage, feems to be little elfe than a |