The New Temple.

MATTHEW Xvii., 5.

"And while he yet spake, behold a bright cloud overshadowed them, and behold a voice out of the cloud which said, This is my beloved Son in whom I am well pleased, Hear ye Him."

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TWELVE lowly-born, humble dependents on Him whom they called "master," and He, to human eye, as poverty-stricken as themselves, needed something more than a bare declaration, that "in the Father's house" were mansions," and at "his right hand pleasures for evermore." Sympathizing with creature doubts, and knowing "whereof we are made," that Master vouchsafed a glimpse of the glory which shall be-as much as humanity could stand-to Peter, James, and John; and, in the

transfiguration recorded in this chapter, we

behold the wonderful condescension of Jesus,

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to "settle" ground" and "stablish" the

faith of His followers.

Of the amazing wonders of that event it is not intended to speak; for it would be impossible even to condense them, into anything like compass, for the occasion which brings my Reverend hearers together; but, in order to help in the elucidation of the text, it will be necessary to glance at their principal features.

It would seem, from the concluding verse of the preceding chapter, that Jesus had intimated to His Disciples, that there were some standing around Him, at that moment, who should not "taste of death until they saw the Son of man coming in His kingdom;" and, in less than a week, that declaration was fulfilled: for, "after six days Jesus taketh Peter, James, and John, and bringeth them up into an exceeding high mountain, apart, and was transfigured before them, and his face did shine as the sun, and his raiment was white as the

light, and behold there appeared Moses and Elias talking with Him."

We are warranted in believing, that, in the glorious change on the countenance and raiment of their Master, the Disciples beheld a small portion of that transcendent glory which He has now assumed in His kingdom above; and then saw, with the natural eye, the realization of a grand truth they were soon to declare, that "this mortal shall put on immortality;" and, in the presence of Moses and Elias,—the one who saw death and was buried, the other caught up without death,— they learnt an article of their future “ Creed," which enabled them to assert their belief in the resurrection of "quick and dead."

Thus arrayed in glory, stood the Lawgiver Moses and the Prophet Elias, respectively representing "the Law" and "the Prophets," talking with Jehovah-Jesus on the decease He should accomplish at Jerusalem; and at this juncture, as the Heavens opened and the glorified three were communing together, "behold

a bright cloud over-shadowed them, and behold a voice out of the cloud which said, THIS IS MY BELOVED SON IN WHOM I AM WELL PLEASED, HEAR YE HIM." In Spirit, try to behold this goodly scene; go back in thought to Moses and his mission; call to mind Elias the prophet and his labour meditate on their joint work; and then the words of the text will bring before us, as into focus, the consummation of that mighty scheme, which was concerted in Heaven to be completed on earth, and which the scene in this chapter was designed to illustrate: the voice, as it were, declaring the meaning of the whole, when it said, "This is my beloved Son, hear ye Him." Moses and Elias (the Law and the Prophets), "were until John:" they must decrease into shadow as Jesus comes forth. "Hear ye Him." Our text sets before us

I. The "Beloved Son."

II. The Dedication by "a voice from Heaven." III. The Command concerning Him, "Hear ye Him."

I. The "Beloved Son."

How full of import is this expression, containing within its embrace the whole history of the family of man. In the way of contrast, how forcibly it takes us back to the events in Paradise: it exhibits to us the CURSED SON, withering under the wrath of God, shrinking from Jehovah's presence,-an outcast from a Father's love. It discloses to us the awful gap between Creator and creature: it portrays the degradation, the gloom, and the wickedness of the ONE MAN "(Adam) through whom (or in whom) all have sinned:" gaze, I pray you, on this representative of the human race: well is it, to catch him as it were, just as he became conscious of sin and its heinousness, at the very moment Satan's prophecy concerning him was being fulfilled,-"ye shall be as Gods, knowing good and evil," when the depth of his fall had stricken him, and the Lord's voice calling in the garden fell on his ear: watch the image of God departing from him, and the superscription of his new parent,

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