who, like many others, was rather fond of metaphor and
so-called spiritual meanings taken from temporal incidents, preached a
sermon on the taking of Jericho under Joshua. Mr. Bell, the geographer,
who knew him, queried him thus:
"Weel, what meaning will ye screw
out o’ your text, frien’?"
"My brethren," said the preacher,
"you are not to imagine that no more is meant than the Jericho that Israel
invested; it has another and a spiritual meaning; it is to adumbrate or
shadow forth New Testament times. It has also a hidden and allegorical
meaning, and refers to the human heart, and the wall that encircles it is
the wall of sin, which is around every heart."
"And then the minister went on,"
said Mr. Bell, paraphrasing in his own way:
"And the touting (blowing).
o’ the tup’s horns, at the sound o’ which the stanes o’ the wa’s cam’
rattling down, is the sound o’ the minister’s preaching the Gospel, and
the noise brings down the wa’s about the sinner’s heart."
