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the Rent of Land; 2. Upon the Capital of Manufactures; 3. Upon the Price of Corn; 4. Upon Foreign Commerce and Retail Trade. 4s.

Anticipation; containing the Speeches on the Business of the Congress, the Property Tax, &c. To be spoken on the 9th of February. 1s. 6d.

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LITERARY INTELLIGENCE.

WORKS IN THE PRESS.

A Memorial in behalf of the native Irish with a view to their improvement in moral and religious knowledge through the medium of their own Language, by Mr. Christopher Anderson, of Edinburgh.

The Theological Works of James Arminius, D.D. Professor of Divinity in the University of Leyden.

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A Narrative of the Invasion of France in 1814, including the History of the Restoration by M. De Beauchamp, author of the History of the War in La Vendee.

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A Treatise on Gas Light, exhibiting a summary description of the apparatus and machinery best calculated for illuminating Streets, Houses, &c. by Mr. Accum.

THE

BRITISH CRITIC,

FOR MARCH, 1815.

ART. I. The Prophecy of Ezekiel concerning Gogue, the last Tyrant of the Church, his Invasion of Ros, his Discomfiture and final Fall, examined and in Part illustrated. By Granville Penn, Esq. 12mo. 175 pp, with a preface of 54 pp. Murray. 1814.

MR. Penn is the author of several learned works, which have engaged the attention of the public. The present tract is intended as a sequel to the "Christian's Survey of all the primary Events and Periods of the World," which, on its first appearauce, was examined at the tribunal of public criticism, and soon passed to a second edition.

The prophet Daniel, whose book, small in size but abundant in awful matter, extending from his own days to the end of time, has caused him to be always ranked as one of the four great prophets, foretels, with an eye particularly to the later periods of his prophecy, that "many shall run to and fro, and knowledge shall be increased." xii. 4. Accordingly in the marvellous events, which, within the last five and twenty years, have passed in rapid succession before the astonished eyes of Europe, general attention has been forcibly directed to the sacred volume. The learned have asked themselves, and the unlearned have asked their neighbours, whether revolutions, new and unparalleled in the annals of the world, are not foretold in the mysterious page of prophecy. And although we have, in consequence, heard at one time of " Antichrist in the French convention," and at other times been amused with other plausible theories, which, have been swept away with the events which gave them birth; yet, on the whole, the boundaries of just interpretation have been extended; and we may apply, though not perhaps without some limitation, the observation of the sagacious Newton, that few have in these later days applied themselves in good earnest

VOL. HI. MARCH, 1815.

te

to these studies, that have not made some discovery worth knowing.

Mr. Penn is a learned and patient investigator of whatever subject he undertakes. We entered upon his exposition of the prophecy concerning Gogue, not without fear, or, as he perhaps would call it, prejudice, because in his preface he removes some things, which we have been accustomed to regard as fixed points and landmarks in the field of as yet unaccomplished prophecies. We had not proceeded far in his book, when our wonder, not to say astonishment, was roused; and we were more than half inclined to accede to his interpretation of the prophecy. We had scarcely gone through the volume, when our doubts, or at least some of them, returned upon us. Whe ther a second and a third perusal have entirely removed them, we forbear to say, till we have laid before our readers an abstract of the work, that they may be able to join with us in deciding the question, or, which we rather wish to judge for themselves.

The prophecy concerning Gog, or, as Mr. Penn writes it, Gogue, and pronounces it like Rogue and Vogue, it being written with the long vowel in Greek, гг, (p. 51.) is contained in the 38th and 39th chapters of Ezekiel; of which the first foretels the invasion, and the second the sudden repulse of the tyrant, (p. 97.)

"There is no name in the Scriptures," it is observed, p. 51, "which has more puzzled the Biblical critics than this of Gogue." Mr. Penn finds it, under the double form of Gogo, of the third, and Gogus, of the second declension, (p. 55,) to have, always subsisted in the national history of the Franks or French, as the first Major Domus Regia, Dux Francorum, or Regent of that people (p. 69,) in the sixth century, under Sigebert, king of Austrasia, comprehending the North-eastern part of France (p. 56). He appears not to have been a native of the kingdom, (p. 64,) had for a time great authority and fame, Some curious and not but came to a sudden and violent death.” inelegant verses, addressed to Gogue while he held the Frankish reins of government, are produced by Mr. Penn from Venantius Fortunatus, bishop of Poitiers, which strongly mark his high authority, and, in the various names of places mentioned in them, connect very remarkably the proper name of Gogue with the territory of France (p. 61).

From this view of the subject our readers will anticipate us in supposing, that Gogue, in Mr. Penn's conception of the character, is no other than the now fallen tyrant Buonaparte. How this is made out, we proceed to shew.

The exposition principally depends upon one preliminary or postulate, and one important correction of our authorized ver

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sion. The preliminary, necessary to be conceded, is this: that "Israel," denotes here, not the land of Judea, but, as it confessedly does sometimes, the "Israel of God," and the "mountains of Israel," the whole extent and pale of the Christian Church.

It is the opinion of Mr. Penn, declared in his Survey, (p. 186,) and occasionally repeated in the present treatise, "that as the Jews, at the first coming of Christ, were blinded by their expectation of a temporal Messiah; so those Christians are blinded, who at the eve (as he takes it) of his second coming, expect a temporal restoration of the Jews." It is not necessary at present to discuss this question, upon which our author intends "fully to assign his reasons, on another occasion." (Pref. p. xlix.) Whether the literal interpretation of this class of prophecies is or is not chimerical, it may be allowable to have recourse to a figurative or spiritual sense in a particular passage, if it appears that the context plainly demands it. Whether such necessity exists in the present case will be better seen as we proceed.

The striking alteration of the current version, on which the whole hypothesis hinges, respects the opening of the prophecy, xxxviii. 2. which Mr. Penn, without disturbing the original text, renders thus: "Son of man! set thy face upon Gogue, of the land of Magogue, the Cloud of Ros, Mosc, and Tobl; and prophesy against him."

The Hebrew word 287, rosh or ros, as an appellative noun, it is observed, (p. 15,) signifies head, chief, or prince; but the Seventy regarded it as a proper name, and as such retained it in their translation. Jerome also preserved it in his Latin version; and Bochart, Michaelis, Archbishop Newcome, and others have approved of this translation.

"And it is indeed remarkable, that while the Greeks were in the constant practice of adding their own terminations to all barbarous or foreign names, they should yet have preserved this name in the same indeclinable and Asiatic form, in which we behold it in the earliest translation of the prophecy."

Thus then we discern the modern names of Russia and of Moscow or Moskwu, in the ancient names of Ros and Mosc. And the third name, Tobl or Tubal, is similarly traced to TOBOLSKI, the metropolis of Siberia, to which the river Tobol gives name;" and thus the three denominations, united in the prophecy, point out, with equal capacity and conciseness, those

* Hos. i. 10, seems an instance in point.

2

widely

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