4. If, then, the faith of Abel had an immediate connection with his sacrifice, and both with his being accepted as “righteous,”--that is, _justified_, in St. Paul’s use of the term,--to what had his faith respect? The particular object of the faith of the elders, celebrated in Hebrews xi, is to be deduced from the circumstances mentioned as illustrative of the existence and operation of this great principle, and by which it manifested itself in them. Let us explain this, and then ascertain the object of Abel’s faith also from the manner of its manifestation,--from the acts in which it embodied and rendered itself conspicuous. Faith, in this chapter, is taken in the sense of _affiance_ in God, and, as such, it can only be exercised toward God, as to all its particular acts, in those respects in which we have some warrant to confide in him. This supposes revelation, and, in particular, promises or declarations on his part, as the ground of every act of affiance. When, therefore, it is said that “by faith Enoch was translated that he should not see death,” it must be supposed that he had some promise or intimation to this effect, on which, improbable as the event was, he nobly relied; and in the result God honoured his faith in the sight of all men. The faith of Noah had immediate respect to the threatened flood, and to the promise of God to preserve him in the ark which he was commanded to prepare. The chapter is filled with other instances, expressed or implied; and from the whole, as well as from the nature of things, it will appear, that, when the Apostle speaks of the faith of the elders in its particular acts, he represents it as having respect to some promise, declaration, or revelation of God.