An exposition with practical observations continued upon the thirty-eighth, thirty-ninth, fortieth, forty-first, and forty-second,…

'Tis not unworthy our remembrance, which some teach allegorically from this natural instinct of the Hawk, helping her self more easily, both to cast and recover her feathers. A sinner in his natural state, is so feathered as he comes from the old Adam, that he had need to cast the old and get new ones. Now if the sinner would do thus, or when he doth thus, he is taught by the wisdom of God (not by the wisdom of the flesh) to stretch himself towards the South, that is, towards the pleasant wind, and ⟨p. 472⟩warm Sun of the Spirit of God, by which his old feathers of sin drop off, and those new feathers of grace and holiness, of faith and repentance, of meekness and humility, of patience and self-denial come on. Thus man is feathered by the second Adam, when he hath cast those of the first; He turns himself to the South, he applieth himself to Jesus Christ, the Sun of righteousness, whose blessed warmth fetcheth off his old black feathers, and clothes him with new and beautiful ones. The Lord who teacheth the Hawk to stretch her wings to the South, must teach us to stretch our selves to the Lord Jesus Christ, that our old feathers may fall away, and that we may be renewed by his Spirit.

'Tis not unworthy our remembrance, which some teach allegorically from this natural instinct of the Hawk, helping her self more easily, both to cast and recover her feathers. A sinner in his natural state, is so feathered as he comes from the old Adam, that he had need to cast the old and get new ones. Now if the sinner would do thus, or when he doth thus, he is taught by the wisdom of God (not by the wisdom of the flesh) to stretch himself towards the South, that is, towards the pleasant wind, and ⟨p. 472⟩warm Sun of the Spirit of God, by which his old feathers of sin drop off, and those new feathers of grace and holiness, of faith and repentance, of meekness and humility, of patience and self-denial come on. Thus man is feathered by the second Adam, when he hath cast those of the first; He turns himself to the South, he applieth himself to Jesus Christ, the Sun of righteousness, whose blessed warmth fetcheth off his old black feathers, and cloaths him with new and beautiful ones. The Lord who teacheth the Hawk to stretch her wings to the South, must teach us to stretch our selves to the Lord Jesus Christ, that our old feathers may fall away, and that we may be renewed by his Spirit.