Page:The rock of wisdom.djvu/75

 and temperance. 2d. To restrain them from the views of which these animals were symbols. 3d. Because the things here forbidden were for the most part unwholesome and not proper to be eaten. 4th. That the people of God by being obliged to abstain from things corporally unclean, might be trained up to seek a spiritual cleanness.—Hoof divided and cheweth the cud, signifies discretion between good and evil and meditating on the laws of God: and where either of these is wanting, a man is unclean in like manner. Fishes were reputed unclean that had not fins and scales; the camel, the hare, the coney, the swine, are mentioned as unclean in scripture. "And whatsoever hath not fins and scales ye may not eat: it is unclean unto you. Of all clean birds ye shall eat. But these are they of which ye shall not eat; the eagle and the osifrage, and the espray, and the glede, and the kite, and the vulture after his kind, and every raven after his kind." "When the plague of leprosy is in a man then he shall be brought unto the priest." Lev. 13: 9. The leprosy has the figure of sin, and the observance prescribed in this and the following chapter intimates what ought spiritually to be done in order to be delivered from so great an evil, or preserved from it. The prescriptions with relation to garments and houses infected with the leprosy, are to teach us to fly from ail such company and places as are apt to be the occasion of sin. Thus you may readily see by any evil or lying: thus Elisha's servant, Gahazi, after Elijah had healed the man that had the leprosy, his servant had a covetous heart and told his master and the man a lie, and Elisha said unto him, "is this a time to receive money or garments, olive-yards or vine-yards, sheep, oxen, men-servants and maid-servants." He then stood speechless to hear his awful sentence: "the leprosy, therefore, of Namon shall cleave unto thee and unto thy seed forever; and he went out from his presence a leper as white as snow." Here is the fate of all liars: let this be a warning for all of us for there was no remedy for his malady: an awful sight indeed! And now these ceremonies used in the cleansing of a leper were mysterious and very significative; the sprinkling of seven times with the blood of the little bird, the washing himself and his clothes, the