CHAPTER XXII. VERSE 17.

And the Spirit and the bride say, Come. And let him that heareth say, Come. And let him that is athirst come. And whosoever will, let him take the water of life freely.

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THE WATER OF LIFE] Ho hudōr zōees, the water of life' the living water. As the terrestrial paradise was supplied with 'a river that went out of Eden to water it' (Gen. ii. 10), so the vision of the celestial paradise (Rev. xxii. 1) presents the enchanting spectacle of "a pure river of water of life, clear as crystal, proceeding out of the throne of God and of the Lamb"; and it is of this 'living water'-the unpolluted and peerless Truth of God-that the children of men are now invited to drink, that they may desire those richer and deeper draughts which heaven will yield. It is not without an instructive design that 'water' receives the denomination 'living,' for what of life would remain on earth were water to be banished from it? And it is not less significant that the Holy Spirit employs the 'living water' of earth to typify the truth by which the life of all redeemed and happy souls is sustained for evermore. Contrasting such an emblem with the inspired allusions to intoxicating wine, as symbolic of moral seduction, corruption, and infatuation on the one hand, and Divine indignation and retribution on the other, we shall have ourselves alone to blame if we mistake the place that ought to be assigned in our own judgment to these material hieroglyphs of moral and spiritual realities. To prize and use with thankfulness such water, and to reject with resolution such wine, cannot be other than the dictate of the wisdom from above 'which is profitable to direct,' and concerning which it is said, 'Her ways are ways of pleasantness, and all her paths are peace.' Such 'wisdom is ever justified of her children'; and in the numberless benefits, personal and social, physical and moral, which have resulted from a faithful adherence to the true Temperance principle of 'abstinence from all that can intoxicate,' the Divine benediction is to be traced as clearly as in the great natural processes whereby the 'face of the earth' is renewed from year to year. Pure, life-giving water is the representative of the Temperance Reformation, as alcoholic, life-impairing wine is of the drinking customs of society; and as are the representatives, so are the effects; and as are the effects, so should be the choice of all men and women who delight in purity, who love mankind, and who seek to worship God 'in spirit and in truth.'

"Wine, like man its maker, flows,
Mirth mixed up with many woes;
But Water, made by Him above,
For ever flows a stream of Love."

APPENDICES.

The impartial reader is respectfully apprised, that in the Notes of the Commentary every known, it is believed almost every possible, critical Objection, has been answered by anticipation, thus doing away with the need for formal and unpleasant controversy. An uncritical and suicidal article against some of the positions of Dr Lees-founded on partial citation of his writings-has appeared in the Bibliotheca Sacra, and been reprinted in an Irish (so-called religious) magazine, which has refused the correction of its errors and inconsistencies. Our last Appendix, however, supplies ample material of refutation. In reply to the vicious insinuation that the temperance proclivities of Dr Lees have warped his critical judgment, we need only say that the temperance cause would be better sustained by viewing tirosh as a species of yayin. We, however, cannot sacrifice principle to party zeal or personal inclinations: with us Truth is every thing, or nothing.

APPENDIX A.

A SELECTION OF SCRIPTURE TEXTS,

EXHIBITING THE AUTHORIZED ENGLISH VERSION WITH SUGGESTED EMENDATIONS.

[Of the passages considered in this COMMENTARY, the following are the principal concerning which it is believed that a Revised Rendering is desirable. The reason for each version will be found in the Notes upon each Text respectively. The words in parentheses are designed to convey the full sense of the original terms.]

PROPOSED Rendering.

I. THE OLD TESTAMENT. AUTHORIZED VERSION. GENESIS 9. 20. And Noah began to be an husbandman, and he planted a vineyard: 21. And he drank of the wine, and was drunken; and he was uncovered within his tent.

And Noah began to be a cultivator of the soil, and he prepared a vineyard. And he drank of the juice-of-the-grape, and was filled to repletion; and he was uncovered within his tent.

[N. B.-In all other places where 'drink-offering' occurs in the A. V., the proper translation is 'libation '—i. e. the pouring out of some liquid.]

[N.B.-In all other places where the A. V. gives unleavened bread,' 'leaven,' 'leavened bread,' and 'that which is leavened,' the preferable readings are 'unfermented cakes,' 'ferment,' 'fermented cakes,' and 'that which is fermented.']