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Methodius. A. D. 290. 195
us:" ' see Heb. xii. 15. This is tiiken from tin; frajrinnits
of the treatise Of the Resurrection.
appears to allude to it several times.
In the l>aii(|uet he
He says: ' The*^ law
was not so beautiful as the gospel ; for that was a kind of
type and shadow of things to come : this is the truth and the
grace of life.' And a little before he had said :
' For' the
law is the type and shadow of the image, that is, of the gospel
; but the gospel is the injage of the truth itself.' This Is
very agreeable to m hat is said, Heb. x. 1, " For the law having
a shadow of good things to come, and not the very image
of the things, can never with those sacrifices make the comers
thereunto perfect." He says likewise :
' Fors after the
resurrection the truth shall be clearly manifested to us, when
we " shall see face to face," and not " through a glass
darkly" and " in part," the holy tabernacle, the city in the
heavens, " whose builder and maker is God :" here he joins
together words of 1 Cor. xiii. 12, and Heb. xi. 10, M'hich
last place is thus : " For he looked for a city which hath
foundations, whose builder and maker is God." He speaks'*
of " Jesus having passed into the heavens ;" the very same
expressions which we have in Heb. iv. 14. Having made
honourable mention of Seth, Enos, Enoch, Methuselah, and
Noah, he adds: ' These' were the first lovers of righteous-
ness, and the first of the " first-born " children " which are
written in heaven :" ' see Heb. xii. 23. These allusions, and
these expressions, borrowed, as it seems, from the epistle to
the Hebrews, afford a probable argument of his using it,
and of his respect for it.
Let us now see whether Methodius has not ascribed thisepis-
tle to St. Paul :
' Since,' says'" he, ' the law, according to the
apostle, is spiritual, containing images of good things to
come.' The first part of the observation seems to be taken
from Rom. vii. 14, where it is said, that " the law is spiritual :"
and the second from Heb. x. 1. Indeed the writer of the
epistle to the Hebrews there says, that the " law had not the
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