promise and prospect like this never can be made to harmonise with the result that is obtained from the predicted judgments upon Edom, as read by the strictly literal style of interpretation; for, according to it, there should be no remnant to be possessed, no seed or place of blessing, as connected with Edom, but one appalling scene of sterility, desolation, and cursing. The demands of a prophetic harmony, as well as a due regard to the nature of the prophetic style, require that the revelations of judgment should be understood in the manner we have explained them.

SECTION II.

PROPHECIES RESPECTING THE JEWISH PEOPLE.

FROM the prophecies which respected the nations that surrounded Israel, we naturally pass to those which respected Israel itself. What prospects did the prophetic volume, as it certainly existed about the period of Babylon's beginning to lord it over Israel and the world, hold out in regard to the covenant-people? They were then undoubtedly in a very depressed and perilous condition; and, if judged merely by outward appearances and according to human calculations, they were not more likely to have a prolonged existence than the small states around them-immeasurably less likely to occupy a prominent place in the future history of the world, than Tyre or Egypt, Babylon or Persia. But the word of prophecy did not frame its anticipations by the outward aspect of things; and never did it speak in bolder terms and a more assured tone, of the future greatness and glory of the covenant-people, than when their political position had reached its lowest ebb. While it declared, that the Philistines were to cease from being a people that the Moabites, the Ammonites, the Edomites, the wealth and power of Tyre, of Egypt, of Babylon, of the whole

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heathen world, were to pass away, it spoke in other language respecting the seed of Israel and the house of David-they were to rise and take root and flourish, when their rivals and oppressors had perished-were even to give laws to the world, and make the whole earth blessed in their blessing. There is scarcely one of the later prophets, by whom this high destiny of Israel is not disclosed, and in the larger prophetical books it occupies a most prominent place. Yet, when we look attentively into them, we find it is no indiscriminate assertion of future eminence and glory, not a resolute vindication of the highest rank for the Israelitish people at large, such as the fond yearnings of patriotism or the promptings of ambition might have put forth; but a variable and chequered prospect, in which the evil was strangely to intermingle with the good, and the greatest indignities and sufferings were somehow to be combined with the highest glory. Micah, prophesying more than a hundred years before the Babylonish captivity, speaks both of extreme desolation and singular blessing being destined for Jerusalem: she was to be ploughed as heaps, yet was to be delivered from her enemies; nay, made the subject of a salvation and a glory which should raise her to the head of the nations, while it should involve herself in trouble and distraction, (ii. 10, iii. 12, iv. 10-13, vii.) In the latter half of Isaiah's prophecies, also, these two themes constantly alternate with each other, in what is said of Israel's future. In an earlier prophecy-the brief, but pregnant and comprehensive revelation of chap. vi.-it was distinctly foretold, that, on account of the prevailing hardness and corruption of the people's hearts, "men should be removed far away, and there should be a great forsaking in the midst of the land;" that even though there should be a remnant, a tenth, that should return, yet this also should be for consumption (or, being eaten); and for the same reason as of old, because sin should again obtain a footing in them; for it is added, that amid all troubles and consumptions, the holy seed should be the substance in them, the one truly conservative element. In like manner, in Daniel's prophecy

regarding the coming of Messiah, toward the close of the seventy weeks, while the greatest results were then to be accomplished—" making reconciliation for iniquity, bringing in everlasting righteousness, sealing up the vision of prophecy, and anointing a holy of holies"-it is still said, that "desolations were appointed," insomuch that even "the city and the sanctuary were to be destroyed." So, again in Zechariah, chap. xiii. 8, 9, in immediate connection with the smiting of the shepherd of the sheep, there is predicted the cutting off of two-thirds of the people, and even the remaining third was to be "brought through the fire, and refined as silver is refined." In Malachi, the last of all the prophets, the aspect that is presented of Israel's future is in many respects dark and lowering; images of terror and alarm are crowded into it; it speaks of a day that should burn as an oven, consuming the wicked as stubble, of the Lord's presence being like a refiner's fire and a fuller's soap, of the land being possibly smitten with a curse;-while yet the salvation of the Lord was sure to come, and when it did come, was to bring power to tread down the wicked, in order that the righteous might be exalted to the chief place of honour and blessing.

Now, we have surely some right to demand of one, who if disposed to doubt, is not determined to reject all proof of supernatural insight and direction, whether we have not in these diversified predictions the indication of a knowledge essentially divine? Here, again, it is not some loose and random utterances we have to deal with, such as either the forebodings of a gloomy imagination, or the excitement of a fervid and hopeful enthusiasm might call forth. There is not only foresight, but foresight of a most impartial and discriminating kind, capable alike of descrying the darker and the brighter aspects of the future, dwelling even with painful emphasis upon the coming evil and reiterating it; yet without ever losing sight of the coming good; and even when the clouds of present trouble gathered thickest, only proceeding with a clearer eye and a more assured step to reveal the glorious and blessed future that

lay beyond. Most remarkably have both parts of the prospective outline been fulfilled. The subsequent history presents many a dark and troubled page to substantiate the vision of coming evil-corruptions within and calamities without, defections the most heinous, and chastisements the most severe; yet in the midst of all, and in spite of all, there came out a greatness and energy, an effulgence of light and life and glory, which strikingly contrasts with the comparative smallness of Israel's position, and the external meanness of their circumstances. The mightiest and most imposing of the surrounding kingdoms came to nought; but Israel still existed, and we may say, in the language of another (Dr Arnold), "Still exists unchanged. Still God's people in every land carry back their sympathies unbroken to the age of the first father of the faithful; the patriarchs and prophets are the spiritual ancestors of the apostles and ourselves; their prayers are ours, their cause was ours; for their God was ours [and the Messiah born of them is our light and salvation]. And if Israel after the flesh were to return to the Lord, what has she lost of her old identity? Place does not make a nation, but the sameness of sympathies. And in this respect there is nothing of Israel in the earliest times which would be dead to Israel now. This can be said of no other nation upon the earth; and thus has Israel endured, because she was, though imperfectly, the representative of the cause of that God who alone endureth for ever."

It is enough here to look thus to the main features of the prophetic outline-those more prominent aspects of it, which cannot fail to impress themselves on any careful and unprejudiced reader of Old Testament prophecy, in connection with the past of Israelitish history. Its bearing upon the still remaining future is another point, and one that will call for separate and particular investigation. In the meantime, and as regards the plain import of a whole series of prophecies concerning Israel, it seems undeniable that most striking fulfilments have taken place of what no merely human eye could have foreseen, nor the shrewdest intellect anticipated.

SECTION III.

PROPHECIES RESPECTING THE MESSIAH.

THE portions of the prophetic testimony we have already considered, argue nothing directly for the truth of Christianity. They afford, we think, conclusive proof of the supernatural foresight of the persons who indited them; and so may be regarded as placing the seal of divine attestation on the writings of the Old Testament prophets. Unbelieving Jews, however, hold this in common with ourselves; while they reject Christ and the Scriptures of the New Testament, they appeal to the confirmation, which their own history and that of other nations mentioned in ancient prophecy yields of the divine direction under which their prophets wrote. But the apologetic value of prophecy would be small, if it stopt there. By much the most important question now is, how it tells on the claims of Jesus of Nazareth to be the Messiah? For here we have to do with the main trunk of the prophetic tree, not simply with a few occasional branches. And accordingly it is here that the Scriptures of the New Testament lay the great stress of the argument from prophecy; "the spirit of prophecy," they declare, "is the testimony of Jesus;" and both Jesus Himself and His apostles made constant reference to the things written in the prophets, as what at once required and found a verification in His appearance among men. Here, therefore, especially, it is necessary to compare together prophecy and history.

We again conceive ourselves in the presence of one who doubts-doubts, perhaps, whether there were anything more in the prophecies of the Old Testament than certain indefinite longings after some distinguished guide and leader, or a series of guides and leaders, who might carry the nation to a high degree of glory; and whether anything written and verified in this respect was so peculiar as to exceed the limits of men's