Presents one of those remarkable circumstances in which divine grace is seen gloriously triumphing over man's sin. "It is evident that our Lord sprang out of Juda." (Heb. vii. 14.) But how? "Judas begat Phares and Zara of _Thamar_." (Matt. i. 3.) This is peculiarly striking. God, in his great grace, rising above the sin and folly of man, in order to bring about his own purposes of love and mercy. Thus, a little farther on, in Matthew, we read, "David the king begat Solomon, of her that had been the wife of Urias." It is worthy of God thus to act. The Spirit of God is conducting us along the line through which, according to the flesh, Christ came; and in doing so he gives us as links in the genealogical chain, Tamar and Bathsheba! How evident it is that there is nothing of man in this! How plain it is that when we reach the close of the first chapter of Matthew, it is "God manifest in the flesh" we find, and that, too, from the pen of the Holy Ghost! Man could never have devised such a genealogy. It is entirely divine: and no spiritual person can read it without seeing in it a blessed exhibition of divine grace in the first place, and of the divine inspiration of Matthew's gospel in the second place,--at least of his account of Christ's genealogy according to the flesh. I believe a comparison of 2 Sam. xi. and Gen. xxxviii. with Matt. i. will furnish the thoughtful Christian with matter for a very sweet and edifying meditation. CHAPTER XXXIX.-XLV. In perusing these interesting sections of inspiration, we perceive a remarkable chain of providential actings, all tending to one grand point, namely, _the exaltation of the man who had been in the pit_; and at the same time bringing out by the way a number of subordinate objects. "The thoughts of many hearts" were to be "revealed;" but Joseph was to be exalted. "He called for a famine upon the land: he brake the whole staff of bread. He sent a man before them, even Joseph, who was sold for a servant; whose feet they hurt with fetters; he was laid in iron; until the time that his word came; the word of the Lord tried him. The king sent and loosed him; even the ruler of the people, and let him go free. He made him lord of his house, and ruler of all his substance; to bind his princes at his pleasure, and teach his senators wisdom." (Psalm cv. 16-22.)