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refuge, of which Christ is the foundation stone; that the hail or visitations of God, shall destroy every other refuge; that those who take refuge by faith in the sacred mansion, shall be secure in the day of adversity. Our Lord alluded to this, when he said to Peter, "thou art Cephas," which signifies a stone, “upon this rock," so often mentioned by the prophets, "I will build my church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it, Matt. xvi. 18.

20. The whole of the forty-ninth chapter is predic tive of the unsuccessful preaching of Christ to the Jews, and of the extensive success his gospel should have among the Gentiles. "Listen, O isles, unto me, and hearken ye people from afar. The Lord hath called me from the womb, from the bowels of my mother hath he made mention of my name. Then I said, I have labored in vain, I have spent my strength for nought, and in vain : yet surely my judgment is with the Lord, and my work with my God. And now, saith the Lord that formed me from the womb, to be his servant, to bring Jacob again to him, though Israel be not gathered, yet shall I be glorious in the eyes of the Lord, and my God shall be my strength. And he said, it is a light thing that thou shouldest be my servant to raise up the tribes of Jacob, and to restore the preserved of Israel: I will also give thee for a light to the Gentiles, that thou mayest be salvation to the ends of the earth." We have but to read the gospels, to acknowledge the correct accomplishment of this prophecy. We are told that the Messiah should be glorious in the eyes of the Lord, notwithstanding his unsuccessful mission to the Jews; that he should succeed among the Gentiles; and that he should in the issue restore the preserved of Israel, who are now dis persed among the nations.

21. We shall take leave of Isaiah, by a view of the birth, sufferings, and glory of Christ, as predicted in the fifty-third chapter. "He shall grow up before him as a tender plant, and as a root out of dry ground; and when we see him there is no beauty that we should de

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sire him." A plain indication, that the house of David should be in an abject situation at the birth of Christ; and destitute of palaces, revenues, and armies, which are so desirable to worldly courtiers.

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"He is despised and rejected of men, a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief; and we hid, as it were, our faces from him, he was despised, and we esteemed him not. Surely he has borne our griefs, and carried our sorrows; yet did we esteem him striken, smitten of God, and afflicted. But he was wounded for our transgressions, he was bruised for our iniquities, and the chastisement of our peace was upon him; and by his stripes we are healed. All we, like sheep, have gone astray; we have turned every one to his own way; and the Lord hath laid on him the iniquity of us all. He was oppressed, and he was afflicted, yet he opened not his mouth: he is brought as a lamb to the slaughter, and as a sheep before his shearers is dumb, so he opened not his mouth. And he made his grave with the wicked, and with the rich in his death. cause he had done no violence, neither was deceit found in his mouth; yet it pleased the Lord to bruise him he hath put him to grief. When thou shalt make his soul an offering for sin, he shall see his seed; he shall prolong his days, and the pleasure of the Lord shall prosper in his hand," &c. What a portrait of suffering innocence! Innocence silent when accused, and passive when punished, because we were guilty. How correct and striking is the application of all these expressions to the situation and sufferings of the son of God? On the other hand, how perverse are the unbelieving Jews to apply this prophecy to Josiah ; for though it be true, that he was wounded with an arrow, yet he was not born in obscurity; he was never unpopular and arraigned at the bar of justice. And the last verse can in no sense be applied to him, nor indeed to any one but Christ, who was raised from the dead, spoiled of his enemies, and saw the prosperity of the church. "Therefore will I divide him a portion with the great, and he shall divide the spoil

with the strong; because he poured out his soul unto death."

22. The predictions of Daniel are obviously connected with those of our Lord and St. Paul; and peculiarly so with those in the book of Revelation. The Assyrian, the Persian, the Grecian, and the Roman monarchies, are represented by four beasts, which successively vanquished one another. Then he speaks of a fifth monarchy, represented by a stone cut out of the mountain without hands, (and we have noticed already, that Christ is that stone) which brake in pieces the other kingdoms, and became great and filled the earth. See chap. vii.

23. Dan. ix. 24, &c. "O Daniel!" said Gabriel, "seventy weeks are determined upon thy people, and upon thy holy city, to finish transgression-to make an end of sins-and to make reconciliation for iniquity--and to bring in everlasting righteousness-and to seal up the vision of prophecy-and to anoint the most holy. Know, therefore, and understand, that from the going forth of the commandment to restore and build Jerusalem unto the Messiah the prince, shall be seven weeks, and three-score and two weeks; the street shall be built again, and the wall, even in troublous times. And after three-score 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. 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, for the overspreading of abominations, he shall make it desolate, even until the consummation, and that determined shall be poured upon the desolate."

This is one of the most distinguished predictions in the Old Testament; and having the clearest historic evidence of its accomplishment, it equally demonstrates the truth of prophecy, and of the Christian re"ion. At the expiration of seventy years from the

commencement of the captivity of the Israelites, God was pleased to deliver them: and by the same number of weeks to fix the time when he would effectuate a much greater deliverance, even our redemption from sin by the oblation of Christ. But the seventy weeks in prophetic language are considered as seventy times seven years. These were to be calculated from the going forth of the commandment to rebuild the city and sanctuary of Jerusalem: not indeed the commandment in the first year of Cyrus, but the edict of Artaxerxes; otherwise, the four hundred and ninety years would not reach to the crucifixion of Christ. Whatever difficulty may occur in the chronological adjustment of these weeks, many of the pious Jews in our Saviour's time really understood them to be accomplished, “ and looked for redemption in Israel,” Luke. ii. 38. Aets ii. 5. Exclusively of this difficulty, the group of occurrences here predicted needs but little explication. 1. The Messiah was really to be cut off, though guiltless. 2. He was to finish transgression; that is, to expiate sin by the sacrifice of himself. He was to make reconciliation for iniquity; and he has made peace by the blood of the cross. 4. He was to bring in everlasting righteousness; and he has made a sin-offering for us, that we might be made the righteousness of God in him. 5. He was to seal up the vision of prophecy; this he has done by accomplishing whatever was predicted of himself, and by the introduction of a happier dispensation. 6. He was to anoint the most holy; that is, the church, which he has anointed with the graces and gifts of the Holy Spirit. 7. It is said, "He shall confirm the covenant with many;" and he does, confirm it with all who believe, by giving them a new heart, by making them his sons and daughters, and by remembering their sins no more. 8. The Messiah was to be cut off previously to the destruction of the city and sanctuary; these being both destroyed soon after his passion, demonstrate, in the unconstrained language of prophecy, that he was the Messiah. 9. The sanctuary was to be

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made desolate, even until the determined consummation; this is a luminous fact, the sanctuary is still a desolation; and when Julian, the apostate Emperor encouraged the Jews to rebuild it, eruptions of fire caused the workmen to desist. Vide Socra. Hist.

Eccle. Lib. iii. cap.xx.

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24. Joel ii. 28, 31. “And it shall come to pass afterward, that I will pour out my spirit upon all flesh, and your sons and your daughters shall prophecy, your old men shall dream dreams, your young men shall see visions: and upon the servants and upon the handmaids in those days, will I pour out my spirit. And I will show wonders in the heavens, and in the earth blood and fire, and pillars of smoke. The sun shall be turned to darkness, and the moon into blood, before the great and terrible day of the Lord come. This propheey corresponds with another in Isaiah, xliv. 15. and it is applied emphatically by Saint Peter to the effusion of the Spirit on the day of Pentecost, Acts ii. nor is there any other period to which it can be applied. Formerly, the gifts of the Spirit had been restricted to prophets and elders, but under the Christian dispensation, the gift is predicted as general, to Jews, proselytes, and Gentiles, of every nation. It is further announced, that the age should be characterized by persecution, and the greatest national disasters or vengeance of God upon the wicked, which we apprehend to be implied by the blood, vapor and smoke.

25. Hag. ii. 6, 9." Thus saith the Lord of Hosts; yet once, it is a little while, and I will shake the heavens, and the earth, and the sea, and the dry land: and I will shake all nations, and the desire of all nations shall come, and I will fill this house with my glory, saith the Lord of Hosts. The silver is mine, and the gold is mine, saith the Lord of Hosts. And the glory of this latter house shall be greater than the former, saith the Lord of Hosts, and in this place, will I give peace, saith the Lord of Hosts." When the aged Jews saw the plainness and diminutive structure of the second temle compared with the first, they wept. Then the

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