Now the natural phenomena, referred to by our Saviour, are referred to as indicating not merely certain natural consequences in general, but certain stated and regular consequences in particular. Γίνεται οὕτω, οι καὶ γίνεται, is subjoined to each. The natural effects, supposed to be of this regular kind, are these two, rain and xaúowy, which may well be understood of dry, and hot or sultry, weather. The appearance, which indicates the former, is the rising of the cloud from the west; the appearance, which prognosticates the latter, is the beginning of the south wind to blow. Now the very terms, in which the first of these symptoms is alluded toὅταν ἴδητε τὴν νεφέλην ἀνατέλλουσαν ἀπὸ dvoμv-authorize the following conclusions respecting it. First, it was some well known and memorable cloud; secondly, it was never observed in any quarter but the west : and we have seen it was always the harbinger of rain. The west in Judæa is the region of the Mediterranean sea; this cloud from the west, therefore, was necessarily a cloud from that sea. The cloud itself, the quarter where it first appeared, the effect by which it was followed, are all satisfactorily explained by a case in point, at the end of the great drought before alluded to *. This cloud ( vepéλn) was that cloud, in the shape of a man's hand, which the servant of Elijah, at his seventh errand, saw and reported to be rising from the sea: after which, in a very short time, and almost before Ahab could prepare his chariot for departing, The heaven was black with clouds and wind, and there was a great rain. It is reasonable to presume that this was a familiar phenomenon in Judæa; the natural effect of a long continuance of dry and sultry weather; and the natural prognostic also of its speedy termination, by the setting in of the autumnal rain. With regard to the other phenomenon, the south, in reference to Judæa, is the region of the sandy deserts of Idu of a storm encountered πepì Пiádog dúσ, when Demetrius Poliorcetes was sailing with a fleet to invade Egypt. x 1 Kings xviii. 41-end. msa and of Arabia; that is, the region of barrenness, heat, and thirst: a wind from that quarter, therefore, must needs be the forerunner of sultry weather. Concerning the south winds in that quarter, Diodorus writes thus; Θερμοὶ γίνονται καθ ̓ ὑπερβολὴν, ὥστε καὶ τὰς ὅλας ἐκπυροῦν, καὶ τῶν καταφευγόν των εἰς τὰς ἐν ταῖς καλύβαις σκιὰς ἐκλύειν τὰ σώματα : Seneca; Auster quoque, qui ex illo tractu venit, ventorum calidissimus est z: Pliny; Austros ibi tam ardentes flare, ut gestatibus sylvas incendant, invenimus apud auctores a: Philo Judæus; Ξηρός τε γάρ ἐστι, καὶ κεφαλαλγὴς, καὶ βαρυήκοος, ἄσας τε καὶ ἀδημονίας ἐμποιεῖν ἱκανὸς, καὶ μάλιστ ̓ ἐν Αἰγύπτῳ, κειμένῃ κατὰ τὰ νότια, δι ̓ ὧν αἱ περιπολήσεις τῶν φωσφόρων ἀστέρων, ὡς ἅμα τῷ διακινηθῆναι, τὸν ἀφ ̓ ἡλίου φλογμὸν συνεπωθεῖσθαι, καὶ πάντα καίειν b. But this is not all. A variety of notices, relating to the south wind, may be specified from ancient authors, which, it appears to me, would be applicable to the case in point. I. The year being taken throughout, the prevailing winds, almost every where, are described as the north, and the south. Πλεῖστοι γὰρ βορέαι καὶ νότοι γίγνονται τῶν ἀνέμων — Πλείστων δὲ ὄντων, ὥσπερ εἴρηται, βορείων καὶ νοτίων 4. II. The south wind, in southern regions, was a fair wind; and hence one of its names, and perhaps the most appropriate, was that of Λευκάνοτος. ̓Αργέστην δὲ νότον, τὸν Λευκόνοτον· οὗτος γὰρ ὀλίγα τὰ νέφη ποιεῖ Permutant et duo naturam cum situ auster Africæ serenus; aquilo nubilus f—Ὁ μὲν γὰρ νότος ἀεὶ τοῖς ἑαυτοῦ τόποις αἴθριος 5—Ομοίως δὲ καὶ ὁ νότος αἴθριος τοῖς περὶ τὴν Λιβύην . ALBUS ut obscuro deterget nubila cœlo Sæpe NOTUS, neque parturit imbres Hor. Carm. I. vii. 15. III. The south wind was etesian, or a monsoon, as well as the northern. Both Pliny and Diodorus i assert that the etesian winds were not confined to the northern quarter of the heavens. Ὅθεν καὶ τὸ θαυμαζόμενον ὡς οὐκ ὄν, διατὶ βορέαι μὲν ἐτησίαι γίνονται, νότοι δὲ οὐ γίνονται, φαίνεται πῶς TuμBaivek-Etesiæ et prodromi...certo tempore anni, cum Canis oritur, ex alia atque alia parte cœli spirant-P. Nigidii in secundo librorum, quos de vento composuit, verba hæc sunt; Etesiæ et austri anniversarii, secundo sole, flant1. IV. The northern monsoons were in general the summer wind; and the southern the winter. Hence Lucretius, in his beautiful chart of the seasons: It ver, et Venus; et Veris prænuncius ante V. 736. Hence also his description of the equinoctial points themselves : Nam medio cursu flatûs Aquilonis et Austri, Ib. 688. Γίνονται μὲν γὰρ καὶ οἱ καλούμενοι Λευκόνοτοι τὴν ἀντικειμένην ὥραν (τοῖς βορείοις) m. Quia fatibus etesiarum implentur vada (Caspii sc. maris); hybernus auster revolvit fluctus ". V. The southern monsoon, among its other times, blew most regularly at the close of the brumal quarter, and the beginning of the vernal. Columella De Re Rustica; xvii. kal. Febr. africus, interdum auster, cum pluvia. v. kal. Febr. auster, aut africus, hiemat-Sex diebus ante idus. Theophrastus De Ventis. "Tac. Ann. vi. 33. i Plin. H. N. ii. 47. Diod. i. 39. k Gell. ii. 22. Arist. Meteorol. ii. 5. 1 Aulus Maias; quod tempus austrinum est°. Εκατέρων οἷον τάξις, ἐν οἷς χρόνοις μάλιστα πνέουσι, κατὰ λόγον ἐστί· τοῖς μὲν βορείοις, χειμῶνός τε, καὶ θέρους, καὶ μετοπώρου ... τοῖς δὲ νοτίοις, κατὰ χειμῶνά τε, καὶ ἀρχομένου ἔαρος, καὶ μετοπώρου ληγόντος—Οἱ γὰρ ἠρινοὶ νότοι καθάπερ ἐτησίαι τινές εἰσιν· οὓς καλοῦσι Λευκονότους· αἴθριοι γὰρ, καὶ ἀσυννεφεῖς, ὡς ἐπίπαν-Τὸν βορέαν ἐπιπνεῖν τῷ νότῳ, τὸν δὲ νότον μὴ τῷ βορέᾳ P—Ζῶσι δ ̓ ἀπὸ ἀκρίδων, ἃς οἱ ἐαρινοὶ λίβες καὶ ζέφυροι, πνέοντες μεγάλοι, συνελαύνουσιν εἰς τοὺς τόπους τούτουςὙπὸ . . τὴν ἐαρινὴν ἰσημερίαν, ὅτε λίβες παρ' αὐτ τοῖς καὶ ζέφυροι πνέουσι, παμμεγεθῶν ἀκρίδων πλῆθος ἀμύθητον . . μετὰ τῶν ἀνέμων παραγίνεται 9. This wind from its bringing the birds of passage Aristotle and Pliny call ornithian, or chelidonian; Καὶ γὰρ οὗτοι ἐτησίαι εἰσὶν ἀσθενεῖς· ἐλάττους δὲ καὶ ὀψιαίτεροι τῶν ἐτησίων πνέουσιν· ἑβδομηκοστῇ γὰρ (which he dates from the τροπαί χειμεριναί, or winter solstice) ἄρχονται πνεῖν r. Spirant autem et a bruma, cum vocantur ornithiæ ; sed leniores, et paucis diebus-Favonium quidam ad vii. kal. Martias chelidoniam vocant, ab hirundinis visu ; nonnulli vero ornithian, uno et Lxx. die post brumam, ab adventu avium, flantem per dies novem s. Accordingly Josephus speaks of the south wind as blowing in a given instance, the time of the recapture of Masada', on the fifteenth of Xanthicus, Tuesday April 11. A. U. 826; and Solomon, Canticles iv. 16. alludes to both the north and the south as winds peculiar to the vernal quarter, and wont to succeed each other; Awake O north wind! and come thou south! blow upon my garden, that the spices thereof may flow out. Moreover, the Indian caravans, which set out upon their return between the end of December and the middle of January in every year, upon entering the Red sea, which they did after forty days' voyage, are said to have finished the rest of the journey, which took up thirty days more", africo vel austro—each of them a monsoon, or trade wind. On this principle these Plin. H. N. ii. 47. P Theophrastus De Ventis. Agatharchides, ap. Geographos Veteres i. 42. 4 Strabo. xvi. 1008. r Aristotle ut supra. * Plin. Plin. H. N. ii. 47. t B. Jud. vii. viii. 5. Vol. i. Diss. xiii. 579. H. N. vi. 23. Vide also Solin. Polyhist. liv. winds must have begun, and continued, to blow, in the Red sea, contiguous to Judæa, seventy days after the beginning of January; that is, until as late as the first or second week in March: which would be the beginning of the dry season in that country. Laying these testimonies together, we may fairly come to the conclusion that the south wind's commencing to blow was a natural indication of the approach of the dry, and therefore of the close of the rainy, season, in Judæa: as the appearance of the cloud was of the reverse. If so, our Lord intends to reproach his hearers with not being able, from the signs of the times, as a case in point, to discover that this was the last and concluding period of his ministry. For there was truly something, and had been, for some time past, in his manner and demeanour, which might have warranted this presumption. His diligence, activity, and earnestness, ever since the feast of Tabernacles, up to the present circuit, were sufficient to have raised the reflection that his time was at hand-the exigency of the occasion was pressing-the intermediate period was short, and no part of it to be idly or unprofitably spent. He delivered more discourses, he spake more parables, he wrought more miracles, and, perhaps, he visited more places, within the last three months of his ministry, than ever, within an equal time, before. St. Luke's Gospel, which in less than nine chapters comprized the account of two years and nine months previously, is taken up, for more than fourteen chapters, with the history of these two or three months alone subsequently. Within this period, too, the Seventy had been sent out; that is, the service, before rendered by the Twelve, had been increased sixfold by their mission: and our Lord himself was now following in their track, and visiting personally either all, or most, of the places which had been recently evangelized by them. The same conclusion, respecting the nature of the present time, is obtruded also by the last member of the division, beginning, And why, even of yourselves, do ye not judge of that is just? The reasoning, immediately subjoined, sup |