ll this is a mystery. He therefore gathers up every
utterance, and carries them to his mountain home. In that consecrated
cave he spreads out the panorama; and lifting up his eyes to heaven for
light, he traces the picture to see what "the Spirit of Christ which was
in" him "did signify."

"Sweet is the harp of prophecy; too sweet
Not to be wronged by a mere mortal touch,
Nor can the wonders it records be sung
To meaner music, and not suffer loss."

II. THE THEME.--It is here presented in a twofold aspect. First, in its
_entirety_: and secondly, in one of its _branches_.

1. The great subject of prophetic enquiry is _salvation_. "Of which
_salvation_ the prophets have enquired and searched diligently."

(i.) In its _nature_. Is there a word in universal language which has
as much meaning in it as this word salvation? It takes within its range
all time and all eternity. Though specially designed for man, it has its
influence upon every order of being God has made, and presents the most
glorious manifestations of God himself which the world possesses. It
glares upon sin with indignation, but throws its arms of mercy around the
sinner; offers to him a deliverance from the guilt and power and
pollution and inbeing of evil; gives him the favour and image of his
Maker; assures to him victory over his final adversary; introduces him
to, and acquits him before the great white throne; and arrays him in all
the glories of an everlasting heaven.

To understand it fully comes not within the range of angelic intellect;
and yet it demands our highest regard, as it has had the attention of
enquiring prophets. 'Tis true they had not the light upon it that a
better dispensation has given to us. It is not to be expected that they
should be penetrated with its glory as we ought to be; but they were so
impressed by its grandeur, that their thoughts were raised above all
merely temporal deliverances, and they felt that their own interests were
wrapped up in the theme. "And thus," we are told, "did this sweet stream
of their doctrine, as the rivers, make its own banks fertile and pleasant
as it ran by, and flowed still forward to after ages; and by the
confluence of more such prophecies, grew greater as it went, till it fell
in with the main current of the gospel in the New Testament both acted
and preached by the Great Prophet himself whom they foretold as to come,
and recorded by his apostles and evangeli