ministry in these touching words: "I am now ready to be offered, and the time of my departure is at hand. I have fought a good fight, I have finished my course, I have kept the faith: henceforth there is laid up for me a crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous judge, will give me at that day; and not me only, but unto all them also that love his appearing" (2 Tim. iv. 6-8).

In connection with this spiritual signification of warfare, and in further illustration of the science of correspondences, let me recall your attention to the battle fought by "the children of Israel with the Amalekites;" and I allude to it thus specifically, because in the internal sense subjects of the most edifying tendency are presented before us, which yet do not appear on the surface of the history. Without some deeper meaning than that of the letter, it is nothing more than the narration of a battle and a victory, a descriptive scene of strife and bloodshed, together with a most remarkable intervention of Divine power. It is thus stated: "Then came Amalek, and fought with Israel in Rephidim. And Moses said unto Joshua, Choose us out men, and go out, fight with Amalek: to-morrow I will stand on the top of the hill with the rod of God in mine hand. So Joshua did as Moses had said to him, and fought with Amalek: and Moses, Aaron and Hur went up to the top of the hill. And it came to pass, when Moses held up his hand, that Israel prevailed: and when he let down his hand, Amalek prevailed. But Moses' hands were heavy; and they took a stone and put it under him, and he sat thereon; and Aaron and Hur stayed up his hands, the one on the one side, and the other on the other side; and his hands were steady until the going down of the sun. And Joshua discomfited Amalek and his people with the edge of the sword" (Ex. xvii. 8-13). In the spiritual import of this sacred history, it treats of a state in man's regeneration, or the gradual process by which he is saved from evil and hell. The hosts of Israel signify, collectively, the Lord's church, and, individually, every sincere member of it, who, in consequence of the indefinite number of affections and thoughts, faculties and powers, constituent of the human mind, and the abundant principles of goodness and truth of which they may be receptive, is called "a host." The armies of Amalek" signify those spiritual adversaries which, with deadly animosity, oppose our progress towards the kingdom of God, or in the attainment of a heavenly state of mind and life, represented

76 Amalek means, in English, "a striking or smiting people."

by the land of Canaan. These implacable enemies of our salvation include not only "the principalities and powers of darkness," but all those false principles and selfish persuasions springing from the love of evil,-those disorderly tempers and unclean thoughts, those malicious dispositions and cruel lusts,-in which they delight to dwell. The battle, therefore, in every particular recorded, was so described in the Word of God as to represent the spiritual conflict between the powers of heaven and hell which is waged in every bosom in the course of regeneration; the means which can alone be effectually employed for the soul's deliverance, and the certain victory to be obtained through perseverance in the Christian course. The fact of Joshua marshalling Israel's hosts, and, under the direction of Moses, leading them forth to the combat, represented the authority of the truth adapted to the natural man, which arranges all within the mind in due order, under the immediate direction of the truth, adapted to the spiritual man, derived from the spirit of the Holy Word, signified by Moses. The battle was fought in a valley, and a valley means the low state of the natural mind, where opposition to heavenly things is always to be met, and which is called elsewhere "the valley of decision" (Joel iii. 14). The success of the battle is not made to depend either on the personal valor of the combatants or on the military skill of their leaders, but on the singular circumstance of the hands of Moses being "held up" towards heaven or “let down" towards the earth, as he stood or sat on the top of a neighboring hill. The hands always mean ability or power, both of the understanding and the will, the former being signified by the left hand and the latter by the right; and the hands of Moses signify the power of truth derived from the Word when received in the mind, and also the faculties of apprehending and obeying it. A hill, in contradistinction to a valley, denotes a state of charity or love actuated by lofty or heavenly motives, in opposition to such as are low, carnal, or grovelling. This is the hill of blessing, the source of all spiritual strength, that girds us for the battle. "I will lift up mine eyes to the hills," saith the Psalmist, "from whence cometh my help" (Psalm cxxi. 1). The holding up of the hands of Moses was an impressive figure of the lifting up, by the power of truth, of all the inward faculties of the soul towards the Lord, that they may be constantly renewed and invigorated by the divine energy and life. "Let us lift up our hearts with our hands unto God in the heavens" (Lam. iii. 41). But the letting down of his hands will represent a decline

of the mental faculties towards the earthly nature, or towards those objects of self and the world, which are beneath,-thus, the substitution of self-will for the Divine Will, of self-intelligence for the Divine Wisdom, and of self-dependence for the Divine Providence. The heaviness of the hands of Moses denotes man's proneness to rest on his own power, in the hour of danger and temptation; and that even truth, however vivid may be its impression on the memory and intellect, is, in such a season of self-reliance, drawn downwards towards earthly objects and sensual pursuits, and is then powerless against the armies of Amalek, which, notwithstanding its presence, prevails over the hosts of Israel. "Aaron and Hur," therefore, we learn, "took a stone and placed it under Moses, and stayed up both his hands, till the going down of the sun, and Amalek was discomfited." Aaron and Hur, the servants and priests of the Most High God, represent the varied principles of faith, accommodated to the outward and to the inward man,—the truth believed from affection and rationally perceived. These are the ministers of the Lord in the soul,-the only principles that can aid and support the sinking, the desponding mind, in the time of spiritual warfare. They are the reactive agents, in unison with the operations of God, for the promotion of our salvation, essential mediums of spiritual victory in the hour of trial. The stone placed under Moses signifies the truth, which inculcates a life of order in the use of the senses, and is thus a support to the divine law in the Word, which rests thereon, and is, in the letter, often meant by a "stone" or "rock." Such a consistent life is the real prop and support of all inward truth and goodness, and is absolutely essential to preserve them from being wasted. The hands of Moses being firmly sustained till the going down of the sun, signifies that such elevation of man's inward powers and gifts, both of reason and freedom, of thought and will, must be perseveringly maintained, till the state of spiritual conflict here treated of is terminated. Then our enemies being vanquished, we shall build, like the triumphant and grateful Israelites of old, the altar of true spiritual worship in our hearts, inscribing it with the holy name, "JEHOVAH NISSI" (the Lord my banner), in the heartfelt acknowledgment that all power to resist evil and do good comes from the Lord alone, who has solemnly proclaimed that "He will have war with Amalek from generation to generation (Ex. xvii. 16)."

"Origen appears to have had a perception | for some spiritual purpose, not apparent in that the record of this battle was designed the letter; for, speaking of it, he observes,

"I would here pause a little, and ask those who are not willing to understand the rela-, tion spiritually, but only according to the letter, whether they can possibly think that the Almighty God could have regarded the hands of Moses in giving the victory either to Israel or to Amalek, as they were raised up or let fall? I would ask such persons whether they think this worthy of having

78 "Are not the two grand vital organs, the heart and the lungs, truly analogous in many important points to the two vital systems of the soul, viz., the mind, or system of thought, and the moral affections of the heart [or will?"-Essay on Analogy, p. 195.

been uttered by the Holy Spirit?"-In Lib. Reg., cap. xx. And Barnabas, in his explanation of the Miracles, says, "The lifting up of the hands of Moses signifies the application of the Law in its highest meaning; but the letting down of his hands signifies a low, an earthly, and a literal exposition."-De Vita Mosis.

found ultimately, if not immediately, resolvable into one or other of two primeval principles, the great god and goddess of the Gentiles."-Cory's Mythol. Eng., p. 6.

Mythological beings are all divided into masculine and feminine. Davis, in his History of the Chinese, tells us that they have among them "fragments of traditionary knowledge ascribing the production of the universe to the coöperation of the active and passive, or male and female, principle. The celestial principle was male, the terrestrial was female; all animate and inanimate nature was also distinguished into masculine and feminine. Nor do they confine this distinction to the animal and vegetable world only, but extend it to every part of nature. Numbers themselves have their genders; a unit and every odd number being male, two and every even number female."

For an argument on the sexual system, which so extensively exists in the animal and vegetable kingdoms, see an interesting and instructive work by L. H. Grindon, entitled The Sexuality of Nature. This intelligent writer says, in his general introduction, p. 1," Nature is a system of nuptials. Every thing in creation partakes either of masculine or feminine qualities:-animals and plants, earth, air, water, color, heat, light, music, thought, speech, the sense of the beautiful, the adaptation of the soul for heaven, all exist as the offspring of a kind of marriage. Restricted commonly to the institution of wedlock, as it exists among mankind, the word 'marriage' rightfully holds a meaning far wider. It denotes all unions analogous to the human in the history both of matter and spirit. As universal laws, sex and marriage rank accordingly with the most important and comprehensive subjects on which science and philosophy can employ themselves. Innumerable phenomena, both of matter and mind, are explained by refer ence to them as a central principle; while in the immensity of their empire, and in splendid uniformity of their vanity, they offer the grandest proof that man is Nature... If we extend our views and reflections concentrated, and Nature, man diffused. They constitute a bond of affinity, which certifies every part of creation to be of common origin and plan, the manifold expression of one primitive idea."

"Loves and marriages," says Dr. Good, "are common to all nature."

"If reason and truth [that is, the understanding] be the most strong and male faculty in human nature. and if sentiment or love [that is, the will principle] be the most beautiful and female parts of the same, then it is evident that every man is in himself both male and female; and so likewise is every woman. The great distinction is, that in woman the feeling heart predominates, so as to give a general characteristic, and in man the rational mind or head predominates in a like degree, so as to form a characteristic.

in like manner to any and all the various systems of the visible creation, whether animate or inanimate, we shall, I believe, find the same truths illustrated continually in male and female expression."—Essays on AnalMasonogy, pp. 227, 239.

"God is both a man and an immortal maid."-Orph. Frag. Which is the same thing as asserting that He is perfect wisdom and perfect goodness.

In the most ancient historical times, "we shall find every nation, notwithstanding the variety of names, acknowledging the same deities and the same system of theology; and, however humble any of the deities may appear in the Pantheon of Greece and Rome, each, who has any claim to antiquity, will be

"Which two great sexes animate the world." Milton's Paradise Lost.

In the Hebrew language, most objects that are double by nature or art, as the eyes, the hands, the feet, etc., are expressed by the dual number; such terms generally refer to the two essentials of the life and mind in conjunction-the left eye or hand denoting the perception and power of the intellect, and the right eye or hand the perception and power of the will-principle.

CHAPTER X.

ON THE WILL AND UNDERSTANDING, AS COMPRISING BOTH THE DIVINE AND THE HUMAN MIND; ON THE MARRIAGE OF DIVINE GOODNESS AND TRUTH THEREIN, AND ON THE UNION OF LOVE AND WISDOM IN THE HOLY WORD, WITH ILLUSTRATIONS.

THERE

HERE are two distinct departments of the human mind which we are taught is a finite resemblance of the Divine Mind. These are the will, or voluntary principle, which is the seat of all the feelings, affections, and desires, and the understanding, or intellectual principle, which is the repository of all the thoughts, ideas, and opinions. The former is internal, the latter external. These two faculties in man are the receptacles of a continuous flow of life from the Lord, and, in their separate and united activities are, in one way or other, constantly referred to in the sacred volume. They partake of a distinction like that of sex, and to which, indeed, the masculine and feminine principles exactly correspond, both in God and man. They are both essential to conscious rational existence, and their union, corresponding harmony, and resulting offspring, are always represented in the Word by the union of male and female, the marriage covenant, and the parental relationship. The diverse constitution of the sexes correspond; a man thinks more from the understanding, a woman thinks more from the heart; the male acts more from the dictates of reason, but a woman acts more from the impulse of affection. Hence they are helps-meet for each other, and, in true heavenly marriage, ❝ are no more two but one flesh."" (See p. 130.)

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Because man from creation was thus endowed with these two faculties, he is said to have been formed "in the image and likeness of God" and to have had breathed into him "the breath of life" (or, more correctly translated from the Hebrew, "breath of lives"), "and man," it is added, "became a living soul" (Gen. i. 26; ii. 7). For, when he is restored to order by regeneration, man is still an image of God, by virtue of his intellectual gifts and their reception of truth and intelligence from the Lord, through the inspired life of his divine wisdom; and a likeness of God, by virtue of his voluntary