dor of supreme authority, and all derivative light and rule under her feet; all lesser authority was her crown, and that in perfectness. Thus it is viewed abstractedly, but in purpose with all God attaches to it, and about which all God’s mediate purposes or plans roll—his own glory and Jesus ever the end. And thus shall it close, for it is true, that άρχή τής θεωρίας τέλος τής πράξεως.
For we are not speaking here of God’s returning into his own infinitude, which can hardly be called purpose:[1]—Christ, then, the glory of the Son, was the purpose; but here, it being the ministration of it, the woman is presented and the man hidden. If we descend to detail, we shall find the most marked contrast. The lowest state of the lowest condition of God’s people—that under the law broken, and they ruled over by the last form of Gentile evil, as to its personality—that in which Christ was born; and so rightly. For by sin the glory was all reversed, all was reversed; the throne, which ought to be the instrument of God’s justice, the instrument of slaying His Son, at the instance and instigation, intercession (if you please) of His
- ↑ Purpose has rather the force of the thing purposed, here, than intention. If I am understood, I have no anxiety as to metaphysical precision. The word purpose evidently includes both, but may apply specially to either, i.e. the intention and the thing intended.
