There is more in the Old Testament to our purpose in the life of DAVID than of any other person, because perhaps he was the most marked type of the Messiah. David was the man after God's own heart', as Christ was his Son in whom He was well pleased. David was the son of Jesse the Bethlehemite-Christ was born in Bethlehem, the city of Jesse and David. The enemies of David were many and continual, as were those of Christ. The opposition made against David described in the twenty-second Psalm is applied in the New Testament to the opposition that Jesus met with during his ministry. When David was compelled to save himself by flight, as Absalom attempted to seize his throne, he passed over the brook Kedron, the very brook Kedron, which Christ passed over, when He was betrayed by one of his Apostles. The nature of this circumstance is rendered typical by the following words used by both David and Christ, "Mine own familiar friend, in whom I trusted, which did eat of my bread, hath lifted up his heel against me?" The very fact of the

1 Many frivolous objections have been made against the application of this eulogium to David, on account of the sins recorded in his life; and some years ago, a blasphemous work was published under the title. The objectors, however, forget, that the eulogium is applied in the Theocratical sense, that David's zeal in preserving the Mosaic Law in its purity, his firm dependance on God, and fulfilment of the Mosaic injunctions in his conquests eminently qualified him to be so called.

2 Psalm xli. 9. John xiii. 18.

Jews using the Psalms at their daily worship twice a day, is corroborative of the assertion, that they looked upon him as a type of the Messiah; because they thus explained many parts, which referred to him, and were accomplished in Christ. But there is a fact that cannot be passed over, which renders David, perhaps, more emphatically typical of Christ, than any other. Christ, by God Himself, is named David. "I will set up," said He, "one shepherd over them, and he shall feed them, even my servant David; he shall feed them, and he shall be their shepherd. And I the Lord will be their God, and my servant David a prince among them. I the Lord have spoken it '." Such indeed was the scope of the promise made to David. "Thy house and thy kingdom shall be established for ever before thee; thy throne shall be established for ever 2."

Now, as the kingdom had in fact departed from the house of David at the Babylonian captivity, though the line of David was preserved in verification of prophecy, the sense of the prediction, often repeated in different terms, could not have been of a temporal, but must have been of a spiritual nature; and taken in connection with the promise of the

1 Ezek. xxxiv. 23, 24. See also Jer. xxx. 9. Ezek. xxxvii. 24, 25. Hos. iii. 5.

2 2 Sam. vii. 16.

Messiah to spring from the tribe of Judah, and with other passages restricting his descent to the line of David, it could only have received its accomplishment in Jesus, whom we have shown to have been the Messiah by various other proofs.

The peaceful reign of SOLOMON is figurative of the peaceful reign of Christ. Solomon was the wisest man that lived under the Old Dispensation, and Christ is said to be made of God unto us wisdom, and to make us wise unto salvation. The wisdom of Solomon consisted in the knowledge of heavenly things. Spiritual wisdom is often put for Christ. It is that wisdom, that cometh from above, spoken of by St. James, which "teaches us to be humble and holy in all our conversation 2." The queen of Sheba came to Solomon from a heathen land, to be instructed in heavenly wisdom. The Magi came from the East to see the Son of God. Solomon was wise in proverbs and allegories; Christ taught in parables. As Ecclesiastes or the preacher, Solomon imparted the knowledge of heavenly things, and taught the uncertainty of life. Christ revealed to us the way to heaven, and powerfully led the attention from the perishing things of

3

1 See 1 Cor. i. 30.

2 James iii. 17.

3 The Orientals say that her name was Balkis.

earth to things eternal, bestowing that wisdom, that cometh only from above.

Solomon was but a figure of Christ, who declared himself greater than He, and in his name displayed a typical analogy to that of Shiloh, which had been given to the Messiah.

JONAH was an ordained sign of our Saviour's death and resurrection. Christ Himself accounted this sign sufficient. "There shall no sign be given," said He, "but the sign of the prophet Jonas'." Jonah willingly submitted to be thrown into the sea to assuage the raging of the tempest. Christ submitted to death to appease the wrath of heaven. Jonah remained three days and three nights in the whale's belly 2. Jesus was in the cavity of the earth

1 Mark viii. 12.

2

6

According to the translation of Mr. Jebb," Jonah was in the cavity of the whale (ἐν τῇ κοιλίᾳ τοῦ κήτους) for three days and three nights.' The great body of orthodox commentators have been in the habit of considering that Jonah was received into the belly or stomach of some great fish; and, since the days of Bochart, they are generally agreed, that the fish in question was not a whale, but a shark. It must, indeed, be admitted, that from the narrowness of the passage, a man could not have passed into the stomach of the whale; but a learned French writer has brought invincible reasons to prove, that neither could a man be received into the stomach of a shark, and preserved there, without a series of miracles. That fish is furnished with five or six ranges of teeth, placed in each jaw,

for three days and three nights. Our Saviour Himself rendered this circumstance typical. "For as

after the manner of a palisade, which must have prevented the safe ingress or egress of the prophet. The monster's dreadful voracity must have been charmed down; its extraordinary and most rapid digestive powers must have been kept in abeyance; and even if the body of a man could have been preserved entire, it is hardly possible to conceive how, in such a place, respiration could have been carried on.

"On the contrary, a safe and practical asylum is afforded, not, indeed, in the stomach, but in another cavity of the whale. The throat is large, and provided with a bag or intestine, so considerable in size, that whales frequently take into it two of their young when weak, especially during a tempest. In this vessel there are two vents, which serve for inspiration and respiration; and here, in all probability, Jonah was preserved; not, indeed, without miracle, but with economy of miracle, so frequently exemplified in Scripture. This receptacle may be accounted a sort of air vessel, and sufficiently answers to the term koλía in St. Matthew, which I have rendered cavity."

"Of the above opinion," proceeds Mr. Jebb, "a strong and undesigned, and independent confirmation, is afforded by an eminent naturalist, 'La nature a construit ces masses organisées de manière qu'elles peuvent s'élever à la surface des eaux, ou s'abaisser dans leur profondeur à volonté. Du fond de leur gueule part un gros intestin, fort épais, fort long, et si large qu'un homme y passeroit tout entier. Cet intestin est un grand magasin d'air que ce cétacée porte avec lui, et par le moyen duquel, il se rend à son gré plus léger, ou plus pesant, suivant qu'il l'ouvre ou qu'il le comprime, pour augmenter, ou pour diminuer, la quantité d'air qu'il contient.' Dict. d' Hist. Nat. par M. Valmont Bomare, Art. Baleine. This, it will be ob served, is the testimony of a writer who had not the case of Jonah at all in view; who wrote merely as a naturalist; and who could, therefore, have given no such colouring to his description, as the Jesuit might, perhaps, be suspected of giving." See also Professor Lee's Observations on the Leviathan, in the Book of Job.