his affections for these yield to the higher duty he owes to his heavenly Lord and Master. Such expressions, therefore, of love or hatred must be taken in a comparative, not an absolute sense, and are to be interpreted with reference to the particular purpose for which they are used. Now the privilege of which the Jews, as the descendants of Jacob, were wont to make their boast, the Apostle shews did by no means warrant them in arrogating to themselves any exclusive right to the Divine favour; since it originated entirely in the free grace, the sovereign disposal of Almighty God. The promise was first freely made to Abraham. Abraham was desirous that it should be fixed in the line of Ishmael; but God denied his request, and bestowed it on Isaac. And in the case of Esau and Jacob, Isaac's intention of transmitting it to the elder son was frustrated, "that the purpose of God, according to" the "election" he had made of the younger son, "might stand, not of works," not of any meritorious claim on the part of Jacob, “but of "HIM that calleth," that is, of God, who had declared beforehand that so it should be. In all this there is nothing that can with propriety be applied to the calling and election of individuals to a state of salvation. On the

contrary, the scope of the Apostle's reasoning is to convince the Jews, that the promise of salvation through the Gospel was not limited to them by virtue of those particular privileges they enjoyed as the posterity of Jacob; but should extend to those who had been called, "not of the Jews only, but also of "the Gentiles ;"-to all, of whatever age or country, who were willing to accept it, and to fulfil its conditions.

There is, indeed, a manifest difference between such privileges and those which relate to men's personal salvation. St. Paul does not undervalue the former; but he contends that they did not confer any exclusive right to the latter. He says, that to the Israelites pertained the adoption, and the glory, and “the covenants, and the giving of the law, "and the service of God, and the promises; "whose are the fathers, and of whom as 'concerning the flesh Christ came, who is

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over all, God blessed for ever." But with respect to the spiritual benefits of the Gospel dispensation, he reminds them that God had foretold by his Prophet Hosea, “I will call "them my people which were not my people, "and her beloved which was not beloved';" clearly pointing out that the blessing should

k Rom. ix. 4, 5.

I Hosea ii. 23.

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be extended to other nations not heretofore in covenant with him. The Apostle contends also, that concerning privileges of the former kind, no one had a right to complain of partiality or injustice on the part of the Almighty, in exercising his sovereign prerogative by the choice of any particular person, family, tribe, or nation, to be the depositaries, or the immediate instruments of his will. "I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom "I will have compassion":"—I will bestow on what people I think fit the peculiar and distinguished favour of being set apart from the rest of mankind for this special purpose:—and "it is not of him that willeth, nor "of him that runneth ","-it is not from any merits or pretensions of their own that they are thus selected, but from GOD, who is pleased to confer this blessing upon them. There was no unrighteousness in conferring these distinctions upon one rather than another; nor are we qualified to sit in judgment upon the fitness of God's providential dispensations in this respect. He raises up such or such instruments for special purposes as he sees fit. "At sundry times and in divers "manners," He hath manifested himself to a

m Rom. ix. 15.

n Rom. ix. 16.

particular people, or to certain individuals, as if with greater solicitude for them than for others, but in reality for the good of all. When he thus chose the Jewish nation to be his peculiar people, and gave them special laws and ordinances, it was not only to distinguish them from the rest of mankind, but to make them the means of preserving true religion upon earth. Hence the Psalmist says, "He did not deal so with any nation, "neither had the heathen knowledge of his "laws." All which the Apostle ascribes to the mere good pleasure and sovereign will of God; because these were tokens of favour to which none had an actual right, and which therefore might be granted to some, without any injury to others on whom they were not bestowed. But this can never be said of the supposed arbitrary election of certain individuals, and the rejection of others, with reference to the promise of eternal life. Every attribute of the Deity, every declaration of his will in Scripture, stands pledged, as it were, that on this great point "there shall be "no respect of persons." Here, then, is no absolute, unconditional, irrespective call, or election, to the Divine favour; but "the grace of God, that hath appeared unto all

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• Psalm cxlvii. 20.

"men "," is extended to all who are willing to accept it; and will enable all who rightly apply it to "work out their own salvation." Neither is there any other sentence of predestination gone forth, than that which we may conceive to be founded upon the Divine foreknowledge of every man's personal conduct under the circumstances in which he may be placed.

With this clue to the Apostle's application of the history of Jacob and Esau, I now proceed to examine some circumstances of the history itself, and of the parties concerned in it; which may, perhaps, throw still further light on the equity of the Divine proceedings.

It will assist our judgment in this respect, if we endeavour to carry ourselves into patriarchal times, so as to enter into the views and feelings of the parties implicated in this transaction.

From the earliest intimations that the Patriarchs had received of a future Deliverer, through whom "all the nations of the earth "should be blessed," great solicitude appears to have prevailed respecting the privilege of being the progenitor of the promised seed. The right of primogeniture was, in this point

P Titus ii. 11.