Touching the future condition of this people, “wonderful from their beginnings hitherto," the best lesson is learned by the study of the past. Prophecy, compared with history, has "fixed an insurmountable “barrier at the threshold of infidelity."

This stronghold of evidence is, however, derived from taking prophecy in its obvious literal meaning, and history in its manifest literal facts. If it be improper to interpret Moses and the Prophets literally, then history cannot be appealed to for evidence of inspiration. On the contrary, if it be proper to appeal to the facts of history as evidence of inspiration, then the literal interpretation of Moses and the Prophets is established.

"That the people of a single state (which was of very limited extent and power, in comparison of some of the monarchies which surrounded it) should first have been rooted out of their own land in anger, wrath, and great indignation.-the like of which was never experienced by the mightiest among the ancient empires, which all fell imperceptibly away at a lighter stroke; and that afterwards, though scattered among all nations, and finding no ease among them all, they should have withstood eighteen centuries of almost unremitted persecution; and that after so many generations have elapsed, they should still retain their distinctive form, or, as it may be called, their individuality of character, is assuredly the most marvellous. event that is recorded in the history of nations. Aud

*

if it be not acknowledged as a "sign," it is in reality, as well as in appearance, a wonder" the most inexplicable within the province of the philosophy of history. But that, after the endurance of such manifold woes, such perpetual spoliation, and so many ages of unmitigated suffering, during which their life was to hang in doubt within them, they should still be, as actually they are, the possessors of great wealth; and that this fact should so strictly accord with the prophecy, which describes them on their final restoration to Judea, as taking their silver and their gold with them, and taking the riches of the Gentiles; and also, that, though captives or fugitives, "few in number," and the miserable remnant of an extinguished kingdom at the time they were "scattered abroad,” they should be at this hour a numerous people; and that this should have been expressly implied in the prophetic declaration, descriptive of their condition on their restoration to Judea, after their wanderings, that the land should be too narrow by reason of the inhabitants, and that the place shall not be found for them,† are facts which as clearly shew, to those who consider them at all, the operation of an over-ruling Providence, as the revelation of such an inscrutable destiny is the manifest dictate of inspiration.

Such are the prophecies, and such are the facts, respecting the Jews; and from premises like these, the feeblest logician may draw a moral demonstration. *Isaiah lx. 9. lxi. 6. Isaiah xlix. 19. Zech. x. 10.

If they had been utterly destroyed; if they had mingled among the nations; if, in the space of nearly eighteen centuries after their dispersion, they had become extinct as a people; even if they had been secluded in a single region, and had remained un-united; if their history had been analogous to that of any nation upon the earth, an attempt might, with some plausibility or reason, have been made to shew cause why the prediction of their fate, however true to the fact, ought not, in such a case, to be sustained as evidence of the truth of inspiration. Or if the past history and present state of the Jews were not of a nature so singular and peculiar, as to bear out to the very letter the truth of the prophecies concerning them, with what triumph would the infidel have produced those very prophecies, as fatal to the idea of the inspiration of the Scriptures. And when the Jews have been scattered throughout the whole earth; when they have remained everywhere a distinct race; when they have been despoiled evermore, and yet never destroyed; when the most wonderful and amazing facts, such as never occurred among any people, form the ordinary narrative of their history, and fulfil literally the prophecies concerning them, may not the believer challenge his adversary to the production of such credentials of the faith that is in him? They present an unbroken chain of evidence, each link a prophecy and a fact, extending throughout a multitude of generations, and not yet terminated.

Though the events, various and singular as they are, have been brought about by the instrumentality of human means, and the agency of secondary causes, yet they are equally prophetic and miraculous; for the means were as impossible to be foreseen as the end; and the causes were as inscrutable as the event; and they have been, and still in numberless instances are, accomplished by the instrumentality of the enemies of Christianity. Whoever seeks a miracle, may here behold a sign and a wonder, than which there cannot be a greater. And the Christian may bid defiance to all the assaults of his enemies from this stronghold of Christianity, impenetrable and impregnable on every side.

These prophceies concerning the Jews are as clear as a narrative of the events. They are ancient as the oldest records in existence; and it has never been denied, that they were all delivered before the accomplishment of one of them, They were so un-imaginable by human wisdom, that the whole compass of nature has never exhibited a parallel to the events. And the facts are visible, and present, and applicable even to a hairbreadth. Could Moses, as an uninspired mortal, have described the history, the fate, the dispersion, the treatment, the dispositions of the Israelites to the present day, or for two thousand two hundred years; seeing that he was astonished and amazed, on his descent from Sinai, at the change in their sentiments and in their conduct in the space of

forty days? Could various persons have testified, in different ages, of the self-same and similar facts, as wonderful as they have proved to be true? Could they have divulged so many secrets of futurity, when of necessity they were utterly ignorant of them all? The probabilities were infinite against them; for the mind of man often fluctuates in uncertainty over the nearest events, and the most probable results; but, in regard to remote ages, when thousands of years shall have elapsed, and to facts respecting them, contrary to all previous knowledge, experience, analogy, or conception, it feels that they are dark as death to mortal ken. And, viewing only the dispersion of the Jews, and some of its attendant circumstances-how their city was laid desolate their temple, which formed the constant place of their resort before, levelled with the ground, and ploughed over like a field—their country ravaged, and themselves murdered in mass-falling before the sword, the famine, and the pestilence;-how a remnant was left, but despoiled, pursecuted, enslaved, and led into captivity;-driven from their own land, not to a mountainous retreat, where they might subsist with safety, but dispersed among all nations, and left to the mercy of a world that everywhere hated and oppressed them ;-shattered in pieces like the wreck of a vessel in a mighty storm;-scattered over the earth like fragments on the waters, and, instead