sitor of his own communications to men. Since, as we have seen, the
first revelations were made in full view of all that was to follow, the
later revelations must be considered not as a mass of foreign and
heterogeneous materials superadded to the original prophecies, but as a
true expansion of the earlier prophecies out of their own proper
substance. For example, the promise made to Abraham: "In thy seed shall
all the nations of the earth be blessed" (Gen. 22:18), is not so much a
new promise as a further unfolding of the original one: "It shall bruise
thy head." A further development of the same promise we have in Nathan's
words to David: "Thine house and thy kingdom shall be established for
ever before thee, thy throne shall be established for ever;" and in all
the bright train of prophecies in which the glory and universal dominion
of the Messiah's kingdom are foretold down to the day of Gabriel's
announcement to Mary: "He shall be great, and shall be called the Son of
the Highest; and the Lord God shall give unto him the throne of his
father David. And he shall reign over the house of Jacob for ever; and
of his kingdom there shall be no end." Luke 1:32, 33.

And since the manifestation of God in the flesh is the culminating point
of revelation, it follows that the Lord Jesus and his apostles, whom he
authoritatively commissioned to unfold the doctrines of the gospel, must
be, in a special sense, the expositors of the Old Testament, from whose
interpretations, when once fairly ascertained, there is no appeal. The
attempt of some to make a distinction between Christ's authority and
that of his apostles is nugatory. As it is certain that our Lord himself
could not have been in error, so it is certain also that he would not
have commanded his apostles to teach all nations concerning himself and
his doctrines, and have further given them, in the possession of
miraculous powers, the broad seal of their commission, only to leave
them subject to the common prejudices and errors of their age. See
further in Chap. 7, Nos. 3, 4.

11. _The extent of meaning contained in a given revelation must be that
which the Holy Spirit intended._ It is not to be limited, then, by the
apprehension of those to whom it was originally made. Earlier prophecy
is, at least in many cases, framed with a view to the subsequent
development of its meaning. Until such development is made by God
himself, either in the way of further revelations, or indi