seed in a time of prosperity, it must be after his leaving the earth, for whilst here he was the man of sorrows.

"He shall see of the travail of his soul, and shall be satisfied by his knowledge shall my righteous servant justify many, for he shall bear their iniquities. Therefore will I divide him a portion with the great, and he shall divide the spoil with the strong, because he hath poured out his soul unto death: and he was numbered with the transgressors, and he bare the sin of many, and made intercession for the transgressors."

The oriental expressions of having a portion with the great, and dividing the spoil with the strong, I knew in other eastern books referred to prosperity. I remembered that whether he merited it or not, the name of Christ had extended over a considerable part of our race, and that his friends believed his sceptre would reach still wider. I did not know but that his portion was to be truly great.

The doctrine of vicarious sufferings is reiterated in these two last verses. That he was to be numbered with actual transgressors is declared, (one was crucified on his right hand, and the other on his left.)

That he was to pray for them is announced; and I now see that it is very affecting to think of his saying, whilst the weight of his body was resting on metallic spikes, "Father forgive them, they know not what they do."

On closing the volume I could not but confess that the circumstantials of life, and death, trial and burial, resurrection and results, were presented in singular variety. If I had asked myself why I had read this so often before without observing it, the truthful answer must have been somewhat humiliating. In consequence of the long indulgence of sin, sensuality and pride, it is true that

ignorance and sluggish inattention will take possession of the soul of man. Respecting heaven's pure religion, the intellectual operations of the wisest become utterly besotted.

tor.

CHAPTER LXV.

Means of rescue.-The following passage of Scripture I never did read with profit until aided by a commentaThe meaning is not so hidden, it is not so obscure as to baffle the research of the unlearned, but it required the remarks of others to awaken towards it my scrutinizing regard.

Daniel Chap. ix. 20. And while I was speaking, and praying, and confessing my sin, and the sin of my people Israel, and presenting my supplication before the Lord my God for the holy mountain of my God;

21. Yea, while I was speaking in prayer, even the man Gabriel, whom I had seen in the vision at the beginning, being caused to fly swiftly, touched me about the time of the evening oblation.

22. And he informed me, and talked with me, and said, O Daniel, I am now come forth to give thee skill and understanding.

23. At the beginning of thy supplications the commandment came forth, and I am come to show thee; for thou art greatly beloved: therefore understand the matter, and consider the vision.

24. Seventy weeks are determined upon thy people and upon thy holy city, to finish the transgression, and to make an end of sins, and to make reconciliation for

iniquity, and to bring in everlasting righteousness, and to seal up the vision and prophecy, and to anoint the Most Holy.

25. Know, therefore, and understand, that from the going forth of the commandment to restore and to build Jerusalem, unto Messiah the Prince, shall be seven weeks, and threescore and two weeks: the street shall be built again, and the wall, even in troublous times.

26. And after threescore and two weeks shall Messiah be cut off, but not for himself: and the people of the prince that shall come shall destroy the city and the sanctuary; and the end thereof shall be with a flood, and unto the end of the war desolations are determined.

27. And he shall confirm the covenant with many for one week and in the midst of the week he shall cause the sacrifice and the oblation to cease, and for the overspreading of abominations he shall make it desolate, even until the consummation, and that determined, shall be poured upon the desolate.

I desire to place before the reader a few facts of which I was informed by the commentary of Scott, and of others which I had known and laid aside; but they were brought to my recollection in such a way that I must necessarily apply them. After travelling speedily over this ground, I shall endeavour to draw the necessary inference.

The Israelites, in reckoning their time, made use of two kinds of weeks, very different in duration, but the same in parts, commencement, and termination. They used the week so well known with us, seven days in extent, and commencing with a Sabbath of one day, or twentyfour hours. Their other week, which we have ceased to use, was seven years in extent, and commenced with a Sabbath of one year's duration. Of course each day

of this week was one year. The Israelite, who would say it was three weeks until jubilee, meant twenty-one years. That a week was seven years in length, did not seem strange to him, as it does to those who have long ceased to compute time in this way. The heathen took up the Jewish mode, and reckoned by that week. A celebrated author, in writing his life, and stating that he had passed his eleventh week, did not pause to make any explanation. He seemed to feel that the pagan world, at that time, were so familiar with the week of years, that all his readers would know he was seventyseven years of age. The people of Daniel, and perhaps all the surrounding nations, knew well that these seventy weeks, named by the angel, reached across four hundred and ninety years; and they were looking for the appearance of a great Saviour the year in which Christ was born, but they did not know him when he appeared unclothed with pomp.

The people of Israel were in captivity; their homes were naked and despoiled; and if they ever did return to build their city, it must be by edict from the potentate holding them in subjection. After the vision of the prophet, those who were watching for the redemption of the world, would also watch and listen for a command from some of Persia's monarchs to restore and to build Jerusalem; and, from the date of this command, would note the commencement of the seventy weeks. There were two commands to this effect: ordering, and then ordering again, the restoration of Jerusalem. One of these decrees was obtained in the seventh, and the other in the twentieth year of Artaxerxes.

Sir Isaac Newton justly observes, "That the dispersed Jews became a people and a city, when they returned into a body politic; and that was in the seventh year

of Artaxerxes Longimanus, (Maclaurin.) The seventy weeks accomplish the declarations of Heaven, if commenced immediately after one of these commandments, and if weeks of solar years are used; whilst from the other, if seventy weeks of lunar years are stretched, the termination is the same. This astronomical accommodation awakens the surprise of many. It is said that the discoveries, which Isaac Newton stated would be made from this prophecy, have been seen by astronomers now alive, but the Christian world have never had, it seems, a full or plain account of this matter. That the walls and streets of Jerusalem were near fifty years in building, and that the times were so troublous that the workmen laboured with a sword in one hand, and a building implement in the other, I had read elsewhere, but had never applied it so as to note the accuracy of the prophet, until reminded of the prediction and the fulfilment by the commentary.

Whoever reads Ezra and Nehemiah, may feel that the difficulties connected with Jerusalem's restoration, were indeed sufficiently pressing to merit the language "troublous times." That expression will never again stand before him as covered with obscurity. Scott points us to the fact, that the seventy weeks in the text is divided into three several portions. These three different periods are of a very unequal length; but when added together, make up the seventy. They are a term of seven weeks, and of sixty-two weeks, and of one week. The seven weeks' term extends across the time of building, which was so dangerous and so toilsome. This lasted forty-nine years: each one of the seven weeks being seven years, according to our mode of reckoning. The workmen were beset by their enemies in such a manner, that they laboured whilst clothed in armour. The sixty