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70 denote Joseph’s forgetfulness of the evil which he had suffered, previous to his exaltation in the land of Egypt. (See Gen. xli. 51.) Ephraim too, in the original tongue, means fruitfulness, and was accordingly applied to denote Joseph’s fruitfulness in the land of his affliction. (verse 52.) When the mind, therefore, in the course of regeneration, is brought to a state of internal peace, which leads it to forget its former disturbances, it then arrives at the state signified and represented by the birth of the former; and when, by this peace, it is rendered fruitful in goodness and truth, it then arrives at the state signified and represented by the latter.

173. It is written in Psalm iii. 3, But Thou, O, art a shield for me, my glory, and the lifter up of my head. The connected sense of the passage appears to be this, that the Lord, as a shield, protects man from all infernal evils, and, at the same time, gifts him with spiritual truth, here signified by glory, and thus elevates his ruling love to the possession of an eternal good, signified by lifting up the head.

174. Solomon saith to the Lord, I am but a little child; I know not how to go out, or to come in. (1 Kings iii. 7). Such is the confession of every child of wisdom. He acknowledges his own comparative littleness, in the view of his Heavenly Father’s greatness, and that of himself he has no knowledge, either as to the right conduct and government of his external or his internal man.