THE OLIVE TREE. 273 



anointing, was rendered more or less fragrant by the infusion of 

 odoriferous plants or substances: otherwise it would have hardly 

 answered the purpose of its adoption in those hot climates. On this 

 account it became highly necessary to the enjoyment of life: and 

 hence the prophet threatened Israel, that they should tread olives 

 but not anoint themselves with oil, Mic. vi. 15. 



The olive tree, from the effect of its oil, in supplying, relaxing, 

 and preventing or mitigating pain, seems to have been adopted from 

 the earliest period, as an emblem of the benignity of the Divine 

 Nature ; and particularly after the fall, to have represented the 

 goodness and placability of God through Christ; and of the blessed 

 influences of the Holy Spirit, in mollifying and healing our disor- 

 dered nature, and in destroying or expelling from it the poison of 

 the old (spiritual) serpent, even as oil-olive does that of the natural 

 serpent or viper. Hence we see a peculiar propriety in the olive- 

 Jeaf or branch being chosen by Divine Providence as a sign to No- 

 ah, of the abatement of the deluge, (Gen. viii. 11); arid may also 

 account for olive branches being ordered as one of the materials of 

 the booths at the feast of Tabernacles (Neh. viii. 15), whence they 

 became the emblems of peace to various and distant nations. Cap- 

 tain Cook found that green branches carried in the hand, or stuck 

 in the ground, were thus universally understood by all the islanders, 

 even in the South Seas. 



In the sacred writings, olives are sometimes represented as beat- 

 en off the trees (Deut. xxiv. 20,) and at other times as shaken oft* 

 (Isa. xvii. 6; ch. xxiv. 13); this, however, does not indicate an im- 

 provement made in aftertimes on the original mode of gathering 

 them, nor different methods of procedure by different people, in 

 the same age and country, who possessed olive ynrds ; but rather 

 expresses the difference between the gathering the main crops by 

 the owners, and the way in which the poor collected the few olive 

 berries that were left, and which, by the law, they were permitted 

 to take. 



The usual method of extracting the oil from olives, appears to 

 have been by treading them with the feet, Deut. xxxiii. 24, comp. 

 with Mic. vi. 15. Whether any previous preparation were neces- 

 sary is uncertain : at present, mills are used for this purpose. 



By what an apt and awful similitude does Paul represent God's 

 rejection of the Jews and admission of the Heathen, by the boughs 

 of an olive being lopped off, and the scion of a young olive ingraft- 

 ed into the old tree (Rorn. xi. 17, &c.) ; and continuing the same 

 imagery, how strictly does he caution the Gentiles against insolent- 

 ly exulting over the mutilated branches, and cherishing the vain 

 conceit that the boughs were lopped off merely that they might be 

 ingrafted ; for, if God spared not the native branches, they had 

 greater reason to fear lest he would not spare them: that they 

 should remember that the Jews through their wilful disbelief of 

 Christianity were cut off, and that they, the Gentiles, if they dis- 

 graced their religion, would in like manner forfeit the Divine favor, 



