s may be given, as God gave to Saul,
another heart; and still there may not be bestowed a new heart. To seek
this, however, that they may live, and hence, as a Covenant people,
serve the Lord, all are thus enjoined,--"Cast away from you all your
transgressions, whereby ye have transgressed; and make you a new heart
and a new spirit: for why will ye die, O house of Israel?"[720]

Under various aspects is the new heart presented as a Covenant sign. As
a heart circumcised is it thus described. To the people of Israel, as
debtors to the whole law, Moses declares,--"Only the Lord had a delight
in thy fathers to love them, and he chose their seed after them, even
you above all people, as it is this day. Circumcise therefore the
foreskin of your heart." And in illustration of the duty required of
them thus commanded to obey, at the same time he gives the
injunction,--"Thou shalt fear the Lord thy God: him shalt thou serve,
and to him shalt thou cleave, and swear by his name."[721] And in like
manner, along with the injunction, "circumcise yourselves to the Lord,
and take away the foreskins of your heart, ye men of Judah and
inhabitants of Jerusalem," is given the promise, "Thou shalt swear, The
Lord liveth, in truth, in judgment, and in righteousness; and the
nations shall bless themselves in him, and in him shall they glory."
Strangers brought into God's sanctuary to pollute it, and charged by him
with having broken his covenant, are described as uncircumcised in heart
and in flesh;[722] and in an evil age the house of Israel are classed
with the uncircumcised heathen, as uncircumcised in heart.[723] Yea, to
the unbelieving Jews the martyr Stephen applies the same character. But
of those who are in covenant with God, as the Jews were, an apostle
furnishes the delineation,--"He is a Jew, which is one inwardly; and
circumcision is that of the heart, in the spirit, and not in the letter;
whose praise is not of men, but of God."[724] Again, as a perfect heart,
is the new heart obviously a Covenant sign. The new heart is that which
believes. That is the true heart; and those possessed of it, like
Hezekiah, who walk before the Lord in truth, manifest an integrity which
distinguishes all who, being at peace with God, are in covenant for
ever dedicated to him. Thus, before the Lord, David walked in integrity
of heart; and of a descendant who sat upon his throne, and who with his
people "entered into a covenant to seek the Lord God of