Xciv INTRODUCTION. 



ness. The Lord hath said that he would 

 dwell in the thick darkness ; l and again 

 Moses drew near to the thick darkness where 

 God was. 2 In the Psalms it is said He 

 made darkness his secret (or hiding) place? 

 Darkness was the state of the original hea- 

 vens, before God formed the light, to which 

 this passage seems to be an allusion. In 

 Isaiah, the term create is applied to darkness, 

 and form to the production of light; 4 from 

 which it appears that it was out of darkness 

 that light was formed ; and these two oppo- 

 sites seem to bear the same relation to each 

 other as positive and negative electricity, or 

 heat and cold. Darkness was that in which 

 the Divine Spirit operated, when by incu- 

 bation motion, followed by light and expan- 

 sion, was educed, and the sea brake forth 

 from the crust of the earth as from the womb ; 

 when the cloud was the garment thereof, and 

 thick darkness a swaddling band for it. 5 



In the different visions of the appearance 

 of the Deity, as the Insessor of the chariot 

 of the cherubim, it is stated, that expanded 



1 2 Chron. vi. 1. 2 Exod. xx. 21. 



3 Ps. xviii. 11. 4 Isai. xlv. 7. 



5 Job, xxxviii. 8, 9. 



