fore the use of this form of expression, rather than king, designates the extreme point of degradation to which the city would be brought before the Deliverer came to Zion, even He who should turn away iniquity from Jacob: answering to that famous passage in Hosea, "For the children of Israel shall abide many days without a king, and without a prince, and without a sacrifice, and without an image, and without an ephod, and without teraphim: afterwards shall the children of Israel return, and seek the Lord their God, and David their king; and shall fear the Lord and his goodness in the latter days." (Hos. iii. 4, 5.) But, it may be said, Is not this going beyond the state in which our Saviour found things when he came? The answer is, Our prophet presents us not with his lowly but his triumphant coming; his coming as the man of war, to do execution upon the Assyrian, and utterly to destroy him. Now things are just in the state thus described, and shall continue till he come to break the gates of Babylon. The true example of it is the state of Jerusalem during the captivity, when she had a king, but away from her, as Christ now is; going into that separation in humility, but therein exalted into honour, as Zedekiah was;-a faint type, as in such a worthless person, of the true King of Jerusalem, during this the season of her overthrow by the mystical Assyrian, the head of the mystical Babylon. Such is the knot which God ties, worthy of Him who is introduced in the next verse as able and willing to unloose it all.

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And thou, Bethlehem-Ephratah, though thou be little among the thousands of Judah, yet out of thee shall he come forth unto me that is to be ruler in Israel: whose goings forth have been from of old, from everlasting." (Mic. v. 2.)—This is the key of the whole prophecy, the seal and the test of it; and as it condescendeth upon the place of Messiah's birth, it marketh the whole to be chiefly concerning place, as the prophecy of Isaiah, which we have examined, concerneth the person, and is sealed by the particular prediction of the virgin's conceiving a son whose name is Emanuel. And seeing that this is the only passage of Micah referring to Messiah, it seems to indicate that Micah's peculiar office, among the prophets of the Lord, is to set forth the name and condition of the place which is to be honoured with Messiah's birth, and of the place which is to be glorified with the soles of his feet. Isaiah the prophet of the person, Jeremiah of the suffering, Ezekiel of the glory, Daniel of the time, Micah of the place, Haggai of the house; and so, I doubt not, it might be discovered of the rest of the Prophets, that they had each their several places and offices in that procession which prepareth the way of Christ, and rightly introduceth him to the knowledge of the world.

The words "And thou," which introduce this glorious predic

tion, are not only to draw attention, but likewise to connect the story of Zion's desolation and the Judge of Israel's disgrace with the story of Zion's deliverance and glory; shewing from what quarter they should come: And thou, Bethlehem-Ephratah, this is thy destiny, small though thou be, to yield forth the Redeemer of Zion's bondage and the Builder-up of Zion's peace.' The place is Bethlehem, and Ephratah is added to distinguish it from Bethlehem a town of Zebulun (Jos. xix. 15). It is the place, as we have already observed, where Rachel died in labour with Benjamin; the mystical meaning of which we have explained. But perhaps it is more to our purpose here to observe, that it was the birth-place of David (1 Sam. xvi. 12), who was the fullest type of Christ, the ruler and the feeder of Israel; in which character Christ is presented to us in this prophecy. And as Bethlehem yielded forth that valiant youth who slew Goliath of Gath, defier of the armies of Israel; delivered his people from the Philistines; and took Zion from the Jebusites, and made it the seat of dominion; even so Bethlehem shall yield forth the Son of David, to put an end to the Assyrian and his yoke for ever, and make Zion to be the pride of the whole earth.

The name Beth-lehem signifies the house of bread, and Ephratah signifies plentiful, Ephratah great fertility; and all travellers are agreed that the character of the land around justifies the name. Its situation is about six miles south of Jerusalem, on an eminence, with hills on every side of it. Its size was inconsiderable, "little among the thousands of Judah." This was a division of the tribes into thousands, with each a ruler over it, made at the suggestion of Jethro (Exod. xviii. 21), and often referred to in the historical books of Scripture (Num. i. 16; Deut. xxxiii. 17; Joel xxii. 14; 1 Sam. xxiii. 23). Among them, Bethlehem, though small, was chosen to the very high honour of being Messiah's birth-place; for that this prophecy referreth to Messiah the Jewish commentators knew well; and of whom else could it be said that His goings forth were from everlasting? The wise men at once answered Herod, "In Bethlehem of Judea, for thus it is written by the prophet, And thou Bethlehem, in the land of Juda, art not the least among the princes of Judah." For the discrepancy between the original promise and this version of it I do not think that Matthew is accountable, who merely reports the answer of the wise men to Herod. It is most likely that so famous a prophecy had got into common use among them, and, like every thing which is passed from mouth to mouth, had lost something of its original form, but retained its true spirit. Now the true spirit of the prophet Micah is to express, not the meanness, but the great exaltation of Bethlehem; that, little as it was, it should be chosen for the birth-place of the Everlasting King; and as such it would be spoken of among

the people, who all knew well where the hope of their nation was to be born (John vii. 42); and so it is most likely the chief priests would report it unto Herod, for it is not obtained from the LXX. whose version is as exact a translation of the Hebrew as is our own. It was little among the princes of Judah, and at the same time it was not little; its littleness being connected with its real state, its importance with this prophecy no wonder therefore, that, in handing the prophecy from mouth to mouth, it should come to be connected not with the littleness but with the importance of Bethlehem. Some have thought that this discrepancy should be reconciled, by reading the Hebrew as a question, "And thou, Bethlehem-Ephratah, art thou little among the thousands of Israel? out of thee," &c.; which is in substance the same with the verse in Matthew, "Thou art not little." Either way is satisfactory, but we prefer the former, both because it is congenial with what in all such cases of singular and popular prophecies is found to have place, and likewise because the prophecy turneth in no mean degree upon the littleness of Bethlehem. Babylon, "the lady of kingdoms," stands contrasted with Bethlehem, "little among the thousands of Judah :" the one gathereth her troops, in order to smite the Judge of Israel; the other yieldeth forth her Babe, in order to revenge the royal line of David, and smite the Assyrian in his land. As in the prophecy of Isaiah explained above, when the bough of the Assyrian was lopped with terror, and the high ones of stature hewn down, he who did it is represented as the lowly branch, the sucker, from the stem of Jesse; so here, when she, the city that sat as a queen and did oppress the nations, is to be spoiled and for ever overthrown, he by whom it is done must proceed from one of the humblest of the hamlets of Judah. And as in that personal prophecy, when king Ahaz and all the royal line are brought low by the perpetual stroke of the Assyrian, he who breaketh the rod of the oppressor must proceed from the family of Jesse, a shepherd; so in this local prophecy, when the walls of Jerusalem and the towers of Zion and the holy temple are laid in the dust, he who is to build them again, and set them up for ever in imperishable glory, must proceed from Bethlehem, the native village of David, of no repute amongst the tribes of Israel. As the light of salvation broke forth from the land of Zebulun and Naphtali, and from Nazareth the most contemptible of the towns thereof; so the hope of the strength of Israel, and the glory of the towers of Salem, must come forth from one of the lowliest of the villages. And, to put still more contempt upon the grandeur and glory of man, it is appointed of God that He who is to be the Redeemer of the tribes of Jacob, the Leader and the Commander of the people, shall have the poorest and meanest accommodation which that

mean town can afford; that his mother shall be cast out from the habitations of men, and have to seek her shelter among the brutal tribes, which her Son came to redeem from the bondage of corruption, as he came to redeem men from the bondage of Satan and the pains of hell. He was indebted to mankind for his flesh, for his birth-place he must be beholden to the beasts; to repay both debts by the eternal redemption of both the rational and the irrational creation into that state of goodness in which they were created by God in the beginning. "And she brought forth her first-born Son, and wrapped him in swaddling clothes, and laid him in a manger, because there was no room for them in the inn" (Luke ii. 7.) These, together with all the other circumstances of hardship and cruelty, of poverty and meanness, which attended upon the birth of Shiloh, the Gatherer of the thousands of Israel and the Captain of their salvation, are all intended to be conveyed in these words of the prophecy, "Thou, BethlehemEphratah, though thou be little among the thousands of Judah ;" and, being so, we think it would be to take away a great point of beauty and strength from the prophecy to read it as a question, "Art thou little among the thousands of Judah?" although even in that case the question would have little or no effect, unless it were in other respects a small and insignificant place. Take it as we may, the simple amount of the discrepancy between the original and the version of the wise men is, that the one hath the letter, the other the spirit of the words; the one being the form written in the book, the other the form which it took in being handed about from mouth to mouth.

From the form we now pass to the substance of the prediction, which, being literally rendered, is, "From thee to me shall (one) come forth for to be ruler in Israel; and his goings forth from the beginning, from the days of eternity." Not only from the passages already referred to in the New Testament (Matt. ii. 6, John vii. 42) doth it clearly appear that this was understood, both by the learned and the unlearned among the Jews, to refer to the nativity of Messiah; but all their most famous commentators, as Jonathan, Kimchi, Salomo, and Abendana, have so interpreted it indeed, of whom else can such things be spoken? "From thee"-that is, from Bethlehem, and not merely from a Bethlehemite stock. His stock is determined to be of Jesse, and of David, by other Scriptures: this is to determine the very place of his nativity.-"To me"-that is, to Jehovah, the eternal God, who chose Abraham to be the father of the nation of kings and priests, and Canaan for the land of their habitation; who chose Zion to be his seat, and Jerusalem to be his abode for ever; who also chooseth one from amongst the people to be Governor over them for ever: and this one he declareth that Bethlehem shall produce for his service; Bethlehem, and no other spot whatever

upon the earth. Why should God be at such pains in defining the place of Messiah's birth? Not merely that Messiah might be known when he should come, but because place is one of the elements of the Divine purpose: as also is time, and rank, and descent, and all other things noted in the prophecies; which contain not arbitrary notices, to compose together a knot which God alone might be able to unravel;-mere safeguards against false Messiahs, tests and testimonies of the true one;but they are things in themselves of importance enough to be included in the great scheme and revelation of God. All nations have looked upon it as a matter of no mean importance, exactly to ascertain and honourably to commemorate, the birth-places of their greatest benefactors and most famous men; and I believe, that of every well-constituted and unsophisticated mind it is a natural feeling to be much attached to the place of their nativity, and very friendly to the inhabitants thereof; and that modern philosophy, which, under the affectation of universal love and disinterestedness, sets light by these natural desires, and even counts it good and acceptable with God to root them out, is fallacious, and contrary both to the method of God and the experience of all good men. To be able to forsake all these natural attachments for the sake of Christ, is most righteous and dutiful; and because it is accounted of great price to do so, and expressly commanded when need is, it is clear that there must be such an attachment naturally in the mind, and that of no mean degree; otherwise where were the sacrifice? Now, because I fully believe that there is no natural desire which hath not a good intention of the Creator, and which is not made to be gratified; and because, in every case where persons are called to sacrifice the same during the present evil age, and to prefer the naked word and power of Christ, it is always promised that he shall inherit in the same kind manifold in the age to come; therefore I surely believe, that there will be some acknowledgment hereafter, of this great principle in the human mind, to gratify which the greater number of the most noble and reverend structures which the world contains have been erected. And what this recompence in kind to the saints, for forsaking their native country and all other things for Christ's sake may be, I have often sought to discover: and sometimes it hath occurred to my musings, that as the spirits of the departed are said to haunt the places which they loved best while in the body, and as every particular place hath from the superstition of the Papacy received its guardian saint; so, in the age to come, those martyrs, who have suffered from the cruel hands of their brethren, may be permitted to recompense their much suffering, and to accomplish their many blessings, by being in very deed constituted of Christ the King, special guardians and governors over their several