And well bestowed and well arranged they are. And we are much indebted to the learned and laborious author for the pains he has taken, though we wish he had brought his thoughts into a smaller compass. But when we review the passage with reference to its accomplishment, how do we stand? "From the going forth of the commandment to restore and rebuild Jerusalem until Messiah shall be leader shall be seven weeks, and threescore and two weeks it shall be rebuilt, the street and the lane, but the times will be with straitness." This cannot mean, according to its natural construction, that only seven weeks shall elapse between the going forth of the commandment and the leadership of the Messiah. No: we must therefore read the passage more fully thus, From the going forth, &c. shall be seven weeks, and sixty and two weeks, during which latter period it shall be built again, but the times will be with straitness; i. e. the whole will be a season of much distress and difficulty. Now, to be sure, this may be the meaning of the writer, but it is not at all that which is expressed; and we are still in a strait, and in fear lest we put a forced and unnatural construction on the words of the author*. In this difficulty may we suggest that perhaps we are carrying our views too far; and that the expressions here employed respecting the seven weeks, point out that period when a regular government was established under a leader or chieftain, appointed or anointed to the high office? We may save ourselves the trouble of stating objections to such an explanation, for they will start up readily at every one's bidding. But we will just observe, that if it be objected that the term "anointed" is thus applied to a different person in this verse from Him whom it manifestly designates in ver. 26, it may be answered, that the other term, " leader," or "prince," is so applied to two different persons in these verses by all expositors. Or, if no earthly leader may be allowed to possess the title of "anointed," may it not be applied to the Son of God, as Guardian of the Jewish people after their return to their own land? "Seven weeks shall elapse from the time of the commandment going forth till the Anointed One shall show himself the leader of his people by establishing them in their country and city, in despite of all opposition." This sounds harsh to our ears: Granted:-but would it have appeared harsh or extraordinary to the prophet Daniel? Certainly there is much in the writings of that extraordinary, highly favoured, and greatly beloved person, which would lead us to think that the office of the Son of God was known at that time and acknowledged, not only by

* Dr. Stonard, we perceive, has replied to this objection rather sharply in a note; which, however, requires further illustration.

him, but by others. We take no pains to support this conjec ture, and indeed would purposely abstain from dwelling upon it, as our proper business is to report the opinions of others, not to put forth our own. But let it not be thrown aside, "caret quia vate sacro," because it wants the eloquence of Dr. Stonard to deck and dress it out to every advantage. The difficulties which surround the text and its interpretation are such, that one cannot but desire a solution of them; and that is likely to be the best, which will bring the words to the most simple and easy construction.

It is now high time that we should proceed to the accomplishment of the prophecy. This occupies the larger part of Dr. Stonard's volume, and is ably, accurately, and eloquently discussed. We shall take the different parts in the order in which the author has treated them, and give (as far as our limits will permit) the best analysis in our power.

And first for the beginning and end of the great period of Seventy Weeks. Dr. Stonard reminds his readers, that, according to positions already proved,

"The term must be deemed to take its beginning..from the period when Jerusalem was fully rebuilt in its proper character as a defenced city, and reinhabited by the Jewish people, serving God and living together according to the rites of worship and the civil laws ordained by Moses, then re-established in their proper force and efficacy Again," it "must be considered to have reached its end at whatever time the city and its inhabitants ceased to be in that state; that is to say, whenever the city should be destroyed, the temple demolished, and its religious services abolished... Now such a re-establishment of Jerusalem and of the Jewish polity therein is not like a single fact, of which the date is capable of being precisely defined, but consists in the series as well as assemblage, of a great number of events successively and gradually brought to pass; and among these it would be a matter of extreme hazard to fix upon that crowning one, by which the restoration of the city, with its ecclesiastical and civil polity, was consummated. Hence it must have been little else than impossible to say, in what precise year the term had its beginning, until its expiration enabled men to understand the mind of the prophetic spirit..... Hence it is evidently the more reasonable way of proceeding to take an inverted course, and having fixed the date of the expiration of the predicted term of weeks, to reckon backward by an easy computation to its commencement.

"In the present instance the point of termination is one of the most conspicuous events in the records of time, and it took place with the force and suddenness of a single blow. Jerusalem was all at once destroyed, the temple was burnt, the forms of its religious services were abolished, the frame of government dissolved, and the people scattered abroad; so that the literal and the figurative city sank together in a

common ruin. These events took place in the month of September, in the year of our Lord 70, according to the vulgar era. Here then we find the seventy weeks terminated; and hence consequently must their beginning be reckoned by a retrograde calculation to a point of 490 years distant from it, that is to say, to the year B. C. 420. Then, if ever, we shall find the instant of time, when the holy city of Daniel was in a restored state, corresponded to his expectations, and its own name; when it was not only a city of habitations, but a defenced and fortified city; when the temple worship, the priesthood, and the whole polity of the Jews, both civil and ecclesiastical, were thoroughly reformed and resettled." P. 203.

Dr. Stonard then goes into a laborious and minute investigation of historical events, from which he fixes the above date of 420 B. C. as the period marked by the conclusion of Nehemiah's labours in reforming the Jewish Church and State; and more particularly by that which may be considered as their crowning act, the expulsion of Joiada, the son of the high priest who had married one of the daughters of Sanballat the Horonite. This he takes" for the ultimate crowning event, by which the restoration of the people and city of Daniel was perfected; and from which consequently we must begin to reckon the seventy weeks."

To this date we have no objection: it was fixed by the excellent Dr. Hales; and from a variety of circumstances which are traced by Dr. Stonard, but in which it is impossible to follow him in this brief analysis, it seems likely to be truly fixed as the one great era of complete restoration and reformation. The fact of the two periods corresponding so exactly to each other is very satisfactory. But whether the seventy weeks should end with the dissolution of the Jewish polity, is still a question. Let us, however, proceed to the six particulars which are enumerated, v. 24, as to be brought to pass during this term: "To put a stop to transgression," &c.

Of the first five of these there will be little difference in the interpretation. The expression in the last, which is here translated" an holy of holies," has been variously understood. Dr. S. after remarking on the absence of the definite article, explains it of" the Holy of Holies of the Christian Church, into which one great High Priest hath entered, bearing his own blood." "The Christian Church is the new tabernacle, a spiritual one, in which the Most Holy Place is accessible to every worshipper, without exception of nation, office, or condition." The sacred unction here mentioned, and "communicating the character of superior holiness," he concludes to have taken place when Jesus himself was anointed with the Holy Ghost

when the blessed Spirit descended upon the Apostles, and again upon Cornelius and other Gentile converts. Dr. Stonard's interpretation appears to be correct. Of the correctness of his argument respecting the absence of the article, we may be allowed to doubt. The fact is, we believe, that when the place called the Holy of Holies, is mentioned in other passages of Scripture the definite article is (as Dr. S. has remarked) always prefixed to the second noun ; and a singular use of the Article it appears to be. But it is so used in several instances in speaking of holy things. If however any importance be attached to this phrase with regard to the Most Holy Place it must militate against our author's exposition of this passage.

We now come to "the additional term of seven weeks; the subordinate term of sixty-two weeks; and the appearance of Messiah, as leader, in the sixty-second week." "From the going forth of the word to rebuild Jerusalem until Messiah shall be leader there shall be seven weeks."-Does this denote a command of God, or the edict of some human Governor? Our author decides upon the latter as being almost certain; referring to a similar expression in v. 23 of this Chapter. And he may justly do so. But when he observes that "the Hebrew word does not necessarily or properly signify a decree or commandment, but merely a word," though we must admit this also to be just, we cannot help noticing a passage in Esther i. 19, strictly parallel to this, where the phrase is applied to a Decree going forth from Ahasuerus.

Dr. S., according to the principle already stated, fixes the date of the going forth of this Word 49 years behind that which he has assigned to the commencement of the 70 weeks, that is, to the year B. C. 469; and he points out with much ingenuity the circumstances in which the Persian monarch was then placed, owing to the two-fold defeat which he had sustained from the Athenian general Cymon in the preceding year, which might induce him to shew favour to the Jews, for the sake of establishing a friendly power in that part of his empire. We have already expressed a doubt respecting the true interpretation of this passage; and here again we must say that we do not feel satisfied in fixing the going forth of a word or commandment, human or divine, to restore and rebuild Jerusalem, to a period long before which the temple had been rebuilt, "and some of the people at least had been dwelling in ceiled houses." Dr. S. to be sure may argue that it is probable that at this time a decree may have gone forth from the Almighty to complete the rebuilding and restoring of the city. But when we consider that the conclusion of the Babylonish captivity was a subject of prophecy,

and the duration of the Jewish polity on their return from Babylon equally so, does it not strike us as very extraordinary that no fixed and determinate period is to be discovered when a decree went forth, or-if it please better Dr. Hales and Dr. Stonard-when the Almighty may have seen fit to issue his word? no fixed period from whence the act of rebuilding and restoration is plainly to be dated! It may be very difficult to say when this great and complicated work was completed; but cannot we say at what time it was begun? With regard to the state of the City at the time when the decree is supposed to have gone forth, we must admit that it is described by Nehemiah to be one of great desolation; and perhaps as the captivity was manifestly reckoned, not from the year in which the temple and city were destroyed, but from the capture several years before, so the decree for restoration may be supposed to have taken effect, not when the people were first permitted to return from Babylon, but when things were in that state in which they were when the captivity commenced.

The next point is to fix the date of Messiah's leadership. Dr. S., it will be recollected, construes the words of the Prophet," until Messiah shall be leader;" and understands them to refer to the time when he appeared as a leader. This he did, according to our author, at the age of 12,-in the year 8,— when he signally distinguished himself amongst the doctors: a date which falls within the last of the 62 weeks, and therefore, as Dr. S. thinks, will fully satisfy the Prophet's intention according to the mode of reckoning common amongst the Jews. We have already ventured to "hesitate dislike" of the translation "till Messiah shall be leader;" and we cannot say that our author's interpretation of the phrase in the accomplishment of the prophecy is satisfactory. The term is, throughout the Hebrew Scriptures, applied to some one in the actual possession of power and authority: for the most part to a king, or head of a tribe, or to him who is placed over the temple or its treasures, or to a captain or a prince. But we know of no passage where the use of it will warrant such an application of the phrase as that made by Dr. S. in the present instance. It is, as Dr. Hales has remarked, employed with reference to our Lord in 1 Chr. v. 2., Isa. lv. 4. In the former passage there is a manifest allusion to the headship of a tribe; in the latter he is spoken of as a second David; and indeed the kingship of that monarch may be properly taken as typical and explanatory of the leadership of Messiah. Dr. Hales mentions also Micah v. 2, as quoted by St. Matthew where we must take the Greek Yuevos, or perhaps should take the Hebrew as parallel to 7, which evi