risk awaits a doctrine which is wrapt up in an emblem transferred from the unchangeable objects and operations of the visible universe. This statuary of truth' endures. A truth committed to the charge of words whose import is purely conventional, may be misapprehended or even explained away. But a truth interwoven with an opposite emblem can be corrupted only by deleting that emblem; like that image of himself which Phidias stamped so deeply in the shield of Minerva, that it could not be effaced without causing irreparable damage to the statue."

We have been led into these remarks in connection with the volume which stands at the head of this article, and from which we have allowed ourselves to be too long detained. It is a volume, from the perusal of which we have derived much pleasure, and which we would most heartily welcome as a valuable addition to our religious literature. It is not often, indeed, that a practical religious work, embracing such various excellencies as Mr. Adamson's "Scripture Metaphors" is to be met with. The same good taste the same pictorial and graphie style-the same earnest and animated spirit, and sound theological views, which characterized his former productions, are here united in a higher degree, corresponding to the wider range and more various and elevated nature of his subject. If he is not always equal-if he does not uniformly maintain the same vigorous style, he is yet never uninteresting. Open the book at almost any page, and you will find something to please or instruct you. Everywhere throughout the volume there are evidences of a ripe fancy, a warm heart, and a liberally cultured intellect; and not a few passages rise by a most happily sus tained and glowing flight, into the lofty region of poetry. There is evidently, indeed, a truly poetic vein in Mr. Adamson's mind, discovering itself, not merely in the frequent character of his own writing, but in the richness and variety of his poetic citations. He is ever ready with the apt illustration, and brings forth abundantly out of his treasury" things new and old" to grace his page, and cast a fresh lustre on his meaning. The fine poetic sensibility which the volume so copiously manifests, in union with an unfailing healthiness of feeling, and remarkable justness of sentiment, qualifies Mr Adamson, in no ordinary degree, to be an expositor of the sacred metaphors. For this is, no doubt, the chief difficulty in their interpretation--to unite a lively literary appreciation of them, and apprehension of their poetic propriety, with a deep and sound sense of their spiritual import. If an expositor wants the former, he will, in defiance of all rules of literary criticism, convert the metaphor into a mere waggon of theology, and instead of drawing forth from it one truth, or, perhaps, one aspect of a truth, he will unfold it into a whole system of divinity. If he wants the latter, he will necessarily merely play with the shell, without ever reaching that for which the shell is alone valuable. And theological literature would furnish many specimens of both these extremes of interpretation, although we in Scotland have been generally most prone to the former excess. Mr. Adamson has had the sense of this difficulty very clearly before him, as evinced by his preface. "The good

dle way.

old saying, medio tutissimus ibis," he says, "applies with peculiar force to the interpretation of sacred metaphors," and he has, we are bound to say, upon the whole, most successfully walked in this midHis literary taste has preserved him from the extravagancies of an unscrupulous orthodoxy, and his sound Christian sentiments from the mere dalliance of a not less unscrupulous neology. We do not know, indeed, that we have ever seen some of the fine images of Scripture, so rich and fine in themselves, that the treatment of the preacher mars more frequently than ministers to their effect, analyzed with a more skilful and felicitous hand than in various chapters of this volume, The whole chapter on the "Jubilee" is, we think, peculiarly fine, as a specimen of exhaustive interpretation of the metaphor-every minute feature of it being developed, without any straining, into a rich and varied application to the Gospel. In order to show this adequately, we would require to quote the greater part of the chapter, which, however, as we desire to take notice of several other passages, our limits will not permit. We give the description, therefore, only of the " Jubilee Morn," in the introduction of the chapter, and we are far mistaken, if our readers do not agree with us, in thinking it a piece of exquisite and beautiful writing.

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"Blessed is the people that know the joyful sound.'-Psalm lxxxix. 15. "There is in the above sentence a very obvious and beautiful allusion to a remarkable institution under the Mosaic economy; that is the feast of jubilee, celebrated, according to Divine appointment, every fiftieth year. It was ushered in by the blowing of horns over the land, and was observed with every outward demonstration of national joy. No one of the Jewish Festivals showed more clearly than this the gracious nature and purposes of the God whom they worshipped. In the ordinary course of Providence what a change takes place in society after the lapse of forty-nine years! Of those who, from being rich and increased in goods, have been reduced to indigence, how many! Of those who, from folly or misfortune, have been obliged to alienate their possessions, how many! Of those who, from being comfortable and independent, have fallen into pecuniary embarrassments, how many! In such a course of time the face of society is changed, and its internal mechanism remodelled. To rectify these disorders was one of the grand ends for which the feast of the jubilee was ordained. It was the day of universal restoration to the rights which had been forfeited, and the privileges which had been lost. Whatever either of natural or of civil liberty had been foregone, was on that occasion recovered. The captive who had been taken in war was redeemed without a price; the slave who had been either sold to a master, or born in his house, was set at liberty; the debtor was released from his obligations; and the man who had been under the necessity of selling his ancient possession, was again entitled to the inheritance of his fathers. The door of every prison-house was opened; the heavy burdens were removed; the bands of oppression were loosed, and liberty was proclaimed throughout all the land. "It was the acceptable year of the Lord,-the season in which every mourner might well rejoice and be glad. To this the Psalmist manifestly alludes, when in the motto prefixed he says, Blessed is the people that know the joyful sound.'

"Soon as the watchman could discern the first faint streak of morning light in the sky, the trumpet was blown in Zion; and far and near, over

city and country, mountain and valley, rock and plain, the silver-toned blasts of sacred music proclaimed to the inhabitants that the year of redemption was come. No district of the land was forgotten; no village, however obscure, neglected. Here, there, and everywhere, the loud and prolonged voice of the trumpet told that the slave might now be set free, the debtor released, and the outcast restored. Oh! it was a joyful solemnity that of the jubilee; and blessed, thrice blessed, were those interested in it. Thanks to the God who appointed it! It was what man, selfish, uncompassionate man, would never have contemplated. It bore upon it the stamp of heaven. It was the Lord's doing, and might well be marvellous in the people's eyes.

See! the stars of heaven have not yet all disappeared. They shine serenely down upon the mountains and plains of Judah. The deep silence of nature is interrupted only by the gentle murmurs of the flowing river. The high towers of Jerusalem point silently towards the sky; myriads of men and women are asleep within its walls, when, lo, the reddening east indicates the morn. Forthwith the solemn stillness is broken by the sound of jubilee. Through the sweet morning air, wave upon wave of melody is rolled. The mountain sends it down to the plain, and the plain echoes it back again to the mountain. The festival is proclaimed. The rush of waters is drowned in the announcement. All nature is pervaded by the breath and voice of gladness. The slumberers awake. They that were in darkness show themselves. The volume of music extends from city to city, and from tribe to tribe; the shouting of the people is blended with the voice of the trumpet; and in the light of the new-risen sun the whole land keeps jubilee. 'Blessed is the people that know the joyful

sound.""

The "Delicious Shadow," from the motto, "I sat down under his shadow with great delight, and his fruit was sweet to my taste," Canticles ii. 3, is also throughout a very fine and striking exposition of the metaphor. The three leading ideas which he draws from it we think very happily exhaustive of its rich and comforting import, although he has expended his illustration too exclusively on the first. "The metaphor under consideration," he says, suggests the three following ideas. I. That the Lord Jesus affords protection to his true disciples: they sit down under his shadow.' II. That he affords them wholesome entertainment as well as useful defence. III. That the protection and entertainment which they thus experience are felt by themselves to be most pleasurable and satisfying; They sit down under his shadow with great delight, and his fruit is sweet unto their taste." In illustrating the first of these heads, he takes occasion to contrast, in what we think very striking and forcible terms, the comparative resource furnished by the gospel and infidelity under the adversities of life. Of the miserable refuge of infidelity he thus speaks

"Let them suffering under such adversities be persuaded to search and look if within the wide compass any such refuge can be found as that which is provided in the gospel. Many a protection has indeed been suggested by the disciples of worldly wisdom; but the experience of all that resorted to them, has shown them to be vain. Infidelity has fetched her seeds from afar, and so a tree has been reared, under the shadow of which the careworn and the miserable have sometimes been tempted to sit down. But the deadly night-shade is no more foul, nor its fruit more poisonous. It

has been planted by fiendish hands, and is watered with the blood of souls. Its shadow is the dark one of death; and its berries, like the cruel venom of the serpent's tongue. It serves only to draw down lightning on the head which it promised to defend: no joyous birds sing among its branches -only the doleful cry of the raven and the owl proceeds thence, and near it is the den of every unclean beast. Into the secret of its thick gloom never may our souls come!

"Better indeed, infinitely better, it were to stand in the face of all tempests, naked and defenceless-better to endure the fiercest heat that ever fell from a burning sun, than flee for refuge to the inhospitable covert of that accursed tree. What! to tell me when my fortune fails, that there is no God above, to whom as the disposer of my lot, I can unbosom my secrets in confidence of prayer; to tell me when my strength decays, and I am bowed down under the infirmities of age, that I can have no staff to aid me in the remainder of my journey; to suggest to me when my spirit is wounded to the very quick with the cares and sorrows of the world, and no man living can ease the bitterness of my complaint, that I may cease my unavailing prayers, inasmuch as there is no Divinity to hear, or that if there be, he is not merciful enough to heed them; that, when the storms and tempests of life beat unmercifully upon my person, neither in earth nor heaven is there one being under whose shadow I can abide; that, when my children die and are buried in the grave, dear to my bosom as beyond all utterance they may have been, I shall never more look upon their lovely forms, nor hear the glad voices with which they cheered my dwelling; that the sacred ties of friendship, which death's unceremonious hand snaps asunder, shall never again be renewed, and that all which I can do at the mouth of their sepulchres, is to say to corruption, Thou art my father; and to the worm, Thou art my mother and sister!' Well may we blush to think that such miserable comforters are any where to be foundthat such heartless consolation has ever been delivered."

There are so many good things in Mr. Adamson's volume, and our space is so limited, that we feel at some loss in the selection of passages to present to the reader. There are some very sound and admirable sentiments in "A Change of View," which we would willingly have transferred to our pages. "Darkness and the Dark Mountains," contains some powerful and solemn writing. The shadow of the theme seems to have passed for the while over the writer's soul, and given its own darkly picturesque colouring to his pages. There are also some most animated and graphic passages in the "Exalted Mountain," and "The Good Shepherd;" but we can only afford room for the opening paragraph of the former,-which we think touches very beautifully a peculiarity of the prophetic gift. The motto is from Micah, iv. 1. "In the last days it shall come to pass that the mountain of the house of the Lord shall be established on the top of the mountain," &c., and the subject is thus introduced :

:

"The eyes of the prophets were often wet with tears when, looking through the veil of coming time, they beheld from afar the judgments that were to be visited upon the earth. Indeed the gift of prophecy would have been to its possessor a source of the most exquisite misery, if it had been restricted only to the dark passages of human history. It was no wonder that Jeremiah, of a compassionate nature as he was, wished that his head were waters, and his eyes a fountain of tears, that he might weep day and night

for the slain of the daughter of his people. But the future had a bright side as well as a dark, and it was as cheering to contemplate the former, as it was dismal to apprehend the latter. As the sorrows of the prophets were greater, their joys also were higher than those of ordinary men. They trembled indeed when others feared not; but they had peace likewise, when others were in trouble. In the little cloud no bigger than the hand of a man, they could hear not only the roar of thunder, but the sound of abundance of rain. It was theirs not only to apprehend the distant storm, but to delight themselves in the refreshment of the bright sunshine that would succeed it. Their spirits were deeply moved with consternation as they viewed the war of elements; but they had this for a compensation, that they could perceive also the ultimate repose into which all that was tumultuous would be subdued :—

"The Broken Heart" we would have wished also to notice,-but we can only bear a passing testimony to the very ingenious and satisfactory view upon the whole which it presents of the natural causes to which our Lord's death is to be traced. We think, however, that the view would admit of even yet more careful and impressive elaboration. The only other extract we can find room for, we think a very delightful one-bright with the fresh and living spirit of poetry, which is ever breaking out like a bubbling spring, in the course of the volume, and baptizing in its own beauty, its solemn instructions. It is from the "Goings forth of the Lord," Hosea vi. 3. "His going is prepared as the morning." The third idea suggestive of this image, he says is that of gladness and joy :

"Truly' says the wise man, the light is sweet; and a pleasant thing it is for the eyes to behold the sun.' As the night is a season of gloom, the morning is one of cheerfulness and joy. The night is a season of danger and anxiety-the morning one of comfort and refreshment. Hence David in the 30th psalm, represents the truly penitent soul as waiting for the consolations of religion under the image of those who watch for the coming of the morning. All nights indeed are not equally dark and cheerless; sometimes the moon sheds her serene light over the water and the land; and under her propitious influence the ship moves in quiet beauty over the bounding wave, or the traveller is aided in gaining his destination. Sometimes, too, in absence of the moon, the stars lend their benignant influences, and maintain in a right course those who should else have wandered from the way. But neither the moon in all her beauty, nor the stars in all their brightness, can compare with the splendours of the orb of day. At his rising nniversal nature is refreshed, and the earth on which he shines puts on a robe of gladness. The wild beasts of the forest retire into their dens,-the birds of heaven sing among the branches-the flocks of the valley, and the cattle upon a thousand hills, alike drink in the blessed influences of morn. Inanimate nature herself breaks forth into singing. The air is rich with balm -the breeze is winged with health-and the stream sparkles with gladness. The sea itself from all its multitude of waves, gives utterance to a song of praise the pastures of the wilderness revive-and the little hills rojoice on every side.