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SERMON XV.

2 PETER i. 20, 21.

Knowing this first, that no prophecy of the Scripture is

of any private interpretation. For the prophecy came not in old time-or, as it is in the margin-“ came not at any time—by the will of man; but holy men of God spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost.

In the verse which immediately precedes my text, the apostle mentions a “sure word of prophecy,” which he

a earnestly commends to the attention of the faithful. This word of prophecy, I conceive, is to be understood, not of that particular word of the psalmist, * nor of that other of Isaiah,t to which the voice uttered from heaven at the baptism, and repeated from the shechinah at the transfiguration, hath by many been supposed to allude; not of either of these, nor of any other particular prediction, is St. Peter's prophetic word, in my judgment, to be understood; but of the entire volume of the prophetic writings of the whole body of the prophecies which were extant in the Christian Church, at the time when the apostle wrote this second epistle. You are all, I doubt not, too well acquainted with your Bibles, to be told by me, that this epistle was written at no long interval of time before the blessed apostle's martyrdom. He tells you so himself, in the fourteenth verse of this first chapter. The near prospect of putting off his mortal tabernacle, was the occasion of his composing this epistle, which is to be considered as his dying charge to the church of God. Now, the martyrdom of St. Peter took place in Nero's persecution, when his fellow-labourer St. Paul had been already taken off. St. Paul, therefore, we may reasonably suppose, was dead before St. Peter wrote this epistle, which, by necessary consequence, must have been of later date than any of St. Paul's. Again, three of the four gospels, St. Matthew's, St. Mark's, and St. Luke's, were all published some years before St. Peter's death; for St. Luke's, which is beyond all controversy the latest of the three, was written about the time when St. Paul was released from his first imprisonment at Rome. It appears from these circumstances, that our Saviour's prophecy of the destruction of Jerusalem and his last advent, which is recited in the gospels of the three first evangelists, and St. Paul's predictions of Antichrist, the dreadful corruptions of the fatter times, and the final restoration of the Jewish people, delivered in various parts of his epistles, must have been current among Christians at the time when this second epistle of St. Peter was composed. These prophecies, therefore, of the Christian Church, together with the prophetic writings of the Old Testament, the books of the Jewish prophets, the book of Psalms, and the more ancient oracles preserved in the books of Moses, make up that system of prophecy which is called by the apostle“ the prophetic word,” to which, as it were, with his last breath, he gives it in charge to the true believer to give heed. If I seem to exclude the book of the Apocalypse from that body of prophecy which I suppose the apostle's injunction to regard, it is not that I entertain the least doubt about the authenticity or authority of that book, or that I esteem it less deserying of attention than the rest of the prophetic writings; but for this reason, that, not being written till many years after St. Peter's death, it cannot be understood to make a part of the writings to which he alludes. However, since the sentiments delivered by St. Peter are to be understood to be the mind of the Holy Spirit which inspired him,-since the injunction is general, prescribing what is the duty of Christians in all ages, no less than of those who were the contemporaries of the apostle,--since the Apocalypse, though not then written, was nevertheless an object of the Spirit's prescience, as a book which, in no distant time, was to become a part of the oracular code, we will, if you please, amend our exposition of the apostle's phrase: we will include the Apocalypse in the word of prophecy; and we will say that the whole body of the prophecies, contained in the inspired books of the Old and New Testament, is that to which the Holy Spirit, in the admonition which he dictated to St. Peter, requires all who look for salvation to give heed, “as to a lamp shining in a dark place;". a discovery from heaven of the schemes of Providence, which, however imperfect, is yet sufficient for the comfort and support of good men, under all the discouragements of the present life; as it furnishes a demonstration

* Psalm 8.7.

* Isaiah xlii. 1.

not of equal evidence, indeed, with that which the final catastrophe will afford, but a certain demonstration -a demonstration drawn from fact and experience, rising in evidence as the ages of the world roll on, and, in every stage of it, sufficient for the passing generation of mankind, “ that the Most High ruleth in the kingdoms of the earth,”--that his providence directeth all events for the final happiness of the virtuous,—that " there is a reward for the righteous,--that there is a God who will judge the earth.” In all the great events of the world, especially in those which more immediately concern the true religion and the church, the first Christians saw, and we of these ages see, the extended arm of Providence

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by the lamp of the prophetic word, which justly, therefore, claims the heedful attention of every Christian, in every age, “till the morning dawn, and the day-star arise in our hearts,”—till the destined period shall arrive, for that clearer knowledge of the Almighty, and of his ways, which seems to be promised to the last ages of the church, and will terminate in that full understanding of the justice, equity, and mercy of God's dealings with mankind, which will make a chief part of the happiness of the righteous in the future life, and seems to be described in Scripture under the strong metaphor of seeing the incorporeal God.

This is the sum of the verse which precedes my text. It is an earnest exhortation to all Christians to give attention to the prophecies of holy writ, as what will best ob. viate all doubts that might shake their faith, and prevent their minds from being unsettled by those difficulties which the evil heart of unbelief will ever find in the present moral constitution, according to those imperfect views of it which the light of nature by itself affords.

But to what purpose shall we give attention to prophecy, unless we may hope to understand it? And where is the Christian who is not ready to say, with the treasurer of the Ethiopian Queen, " How can I understand, except some man shall guide me?” The Ethiopian found a man appointed and impowered to guide him: but in these days, when the miraculous gifts of the Spirit are withholden, where is the man who hath the authority or the ability to be another's guide ? — Truly, vain is the help of man, whose breath is in his nostrils; but, blessed be God, he hath not left us without aid. Our help is in the name of the Lord. To his exhortation to the study of prophecy, the inspired apostle, apprized of our necessities, hath, in the first of the two verses which I have chosen for my text, annexed an infallible rule to guide plain men in the interpretation of prophecy; and in the latter verse, he explains upon what principle this rule is founded.

Observe me: I say the apostle gives you an infallible rule of interpretation. I do not tell you that he refers you to any infallible interpreter; which perverse meaning, the divines of the Church of Rome, for purposes which I forbear to mention, have endeavoured to fasten upon this text. The claim of infallibility, or even of authority to prescribe magisterially to the opinions and the consciences of men, whether in an individual or in assemblies and collections of men, is never to be admitted. Admitted, said I?-it is not to be heard with patience, unless it be supported by a miracle: and this very text of Scripture is manifestly, of all others, the most adverse to the arrogant pretensions of the Roman pontiff. Had it been the intention of God, that Christians, after the death of the apostles, should take the sense of Scripture, in all obscure and doubtful passages, from the mouth of an infallible interpreter, whose decisions, in all points of doctrine, faith, and practice, should be oracular and final, this was the occasion for the apostle to have mentioned it-to have told us plainly whither we should resort for the unerring explication of those prophecies, which, it seems, so well deserve to be studied and understood. And from St. Peter, in particular, of all the apostles, this information was in all reason to be expected, if, as the vain tradition goes, the oracular gift was to be lodged with his successors. This, too, was the time when the mention of the thing was most likely to occur to the apostle's thoughts; when he was about to be removed from the superintendence of the church, and was composing an epistle for the direction of the flock which he so faithfully had fed, after his departure. Yet St. Peter, at this critical season, when his mind was filled with an interested care for the welfare of the Church after his decease, upon an occasion which might naturally lead

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