the speaker. And this vivid conception of the man, no one recorded circumstance in his history disturbs. We contemplate him with intense interest: we discourse about him with no common confidence.

But the chief thing which gives vividness to the portrait of Jacob is the presence of that brother who from the very first, stands in marked contrast with him. "The boys grew," (says the sacred record :) "and Esau was a cunning hunter, a man of the field: and Jacob was a plain man dwelling in tents." It follows: "And Isaac loved Esau because he did eat of his venison: but Rebecca loved Jacob."

Few words! but they proceed from a mighty Master. Here is the chronicle of forty years of human life. On Esau's side, it is a period of wild adventure and of high animal enjoyment. A jovial hunter,—a careless, easy companion,—the slave of fiery passions, the creature of quick and generous impulse, -will he not have grown into favour with the inhabitants of the land of his sojourn, into contact with whom his own restless habits must have infallibly brought him? Yes, he will have learnt their ways, acquired their habits, attached himself at last to what he beheld of attractive among them. He was quite a man of the world, in his peculiar oriental 1 Gen. xxv. 27, 28.

way kind, warm-hearted, easy, affectionate, and I make no doubt, of most popular manners: not hampered with strong opinions: quite indifferent to dogma. Returning to the tents at Beersheba, after prolonged absence, it is not obscurely hinted that Esau could be even womanly in his attentions towards his aged father; careful to gratify him in a small matter, and in a way which seems to belong rather to the tenderness of the other sex....The very utmost that can be said for Esau, has now been said.

As for Jacob, it must be freely admitted that the epithet applied to his brother seems rather to belong of right to him: while one fails to perceive his title to the description of being "a plain man,” (aveρwπos άπλаσTOS). But the explanation is obvious. "A cunning hunter" is the fitting praise of one who excels in the sports of the field: while Jacob's guilelessness,-(for that is doubtless the meaning of the word,)-refers, not to the method by which the man endeavoured to accomplish his purposes and attain his end; but to his single-heartedness in GOD'S sight; the sincerity of his love towards GOD; the plain downright childlike faith with which he clung to GOD's promises, and the guileless earnestness with which he coveted the Blessing which had been his sire's, and his sire's sire's before him.

We must attend to this feature in Jacob's character: else we shall fail to judge rightly of the rest of the story. And, standing before some to whom the picture which we just have drawn of Esau's habits will effectually recommend itself,-(as, apart from its less obvious, fatal adjuncts, it reasonably may,)—I feel bound to invite your attention, further, to what seems to be implied by the declaration that Jacob was "a dweller in tents." We must recollect the relation in which the chosen line stood towards Canaan,—the land of their sojourn. They were to be its future lords and were only not put into immediate possession, because, (as the righteous Judge Himself declared,) "the iniquity of the Amorites was not yet full." All around them therefore dwelt an idolatrous and an accursed race, with which they were clearly to have the least possible intercourse. They were, on the contrary, to cherish their own pure and precious traditions, looking beyond the present into a glorious future; and through the vista of Canaan, (which, in the fourth generation was to belong to Abraham's seed,) fasten their gaze upon the Land of everlasting Life.

Such had been the course of Abraham: such was the course of Isaac. They confessed themselves to 1 Gen. xv. 16.

be but strangers and pilgrims' and lived like men who seek a country. O yes! "They are not to be heard which feign that the old Fathers did look only for transitory promises." It was faith in CHRIST'S most precious Blood which sustained them; and they saw,-afar off, indeed, and dimly; yet they saw,"the Day of CHRIST, and were glad :" they beheld the sacrifice of His Death, and the Redemption and recovery of our fallen race, which was to follow; and they looked for the City which hath the twelve glorious foundations, whose maker and builder is GOD! They had their daily, and their weekly rite, be sure; and the priestly office was fully recognized among them; and they had their complex curious Ritual, like the Church of a later day. And we may be persuaded that the cunning hunter who trod in the steps of Nimrod and of Ishmael, made light of, while he turned his back upon, the ancestral worship of the line of Shem:-just as we may be convinced that the same service of the Most High was the joy and crown of him whose posterity afterwards called their dwelling-places "the tents of Jacob." Nor may we think of Jacob as dwelling solitary, because he will have been a feeder of sheep, and because he dwelt at home. For upwards of a hundred years, Noah,

1. Heb. xi. 13.

Shem, Arphaxad, Salah, Eber, Peleg, Reu, Serug, Nahor, and Terah, were all alive together:—such a College of Saints as the world had never beheld before, and will never behold again; and although all these were now dead, yet with their descendants must have survived a school of sacred learning, in which Jacob may well have become a great proficient. For nineteen years he will have held direct intercourse with Eber, who for upwards of two hundred and fifty years had dwelt with Noah. Isaac himself was able to transmit to Jacob the traditional lore which for fifty long years he had derived from the very lips of Shem, a man who had known the World before the Flood. Is it possible to recollect all this, and not to behold in the statement that Jacob,-(singlehearted and guileless towards GOD,)—eschewed the roving life of Esau,-Can we, I ask, overlook in this, the implied revelation of days spent in holy thought, and in earnest prayer?... Add to it all the solemn circumstance that a prophecy had been delivered to his Mother from the very mouth of GOD, that "the elder should serve the younger;" and there is no room for surprise at the disclosure made in Holy Writ concerning the Mother's abiding partiality for her younger son. A voice from the ancient Patriarchal hearth of Beersheba declares that "Isaac loved