Beligion.

IS THE DESTINY OF NATIONS DISCOVERABLY INDICATED IN THE PROPHECIES OF SCRIPTURE?

AFFIRMATIVE ARTICLE.-II.

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"Now we see through a glass darkly." Mystery and prophecy are the lenses through which we are led to look upon miracle, wonder, and history. The thin dawn and twilight of Revelation tells us of the serpent's head bruised by the woman's seed, and the noonday brightness of Christ's glory shows us that the coming and the salvation of Jesus Christ were discoverably indicated even at the time when the morning stars were young. The rainbow of promise" which God set in the clouds is a discoverable and a prophetic indication of divine mercy, not past only, but present and future. The promise God made to Abraham regarding his seed discoverably enough indicated what was to be, and has been, the history of the Jewish nation. In Moses there are given discoverable indications of our Redeemer from the bondage of sin and death, and he said, "A prophet shall the Lord your God raise up unto you, like unto me; Him shall ye hear in all things" (Acts vii. 37). Along the whole course of Scripture, prophecy becomes clearer and more distinct as the fulness of time approaches, and then the Sun of righteousness arose, making all that was previously dark plain as the sun at noonday. So has it been in the past with God's word; so we should say it is likely to be in the future. God's revelations must give discoverable indications of their approaching fulfilment ; and though but a part and not the whole is visible to mortal view, that which regards the destiny of nations must be, though by slow degrees, and cautiously, seen to be indicated in God's prophetic books. But we must recollect that clouds and darkness are around God's throne, and that the clearness of the heavens is for the perfected saint, not for the sinner under probation. Earnest students of God's word are expected, by our Saviour himself, to be able to discern the signs of the times; and hence we must believe that the destiny of nations is discoverably indicated in Holy Scripture. But J. J. is wiser than Jehovah, in his own conceit. We know the character of the person who is wiser in his own conceit than ten men who can render a reason, though there is no word in our tongue to name one who treats with disregard and contempt "the revelation of Jesus Christ which God gave unto Him, to show unto His ser

vants things which must shortly come to pass; and He sent and signified it by His angel unto His servant John " (Rev. i. 1); and makes a jesting mockery of the students of this precious Book given to show things which must be hereafter. Of this same prophecy, too, the Spirit of the Lord, by whose inspiration it was given, has said, "Here is wisdom. Let him that hath understanding count the number of the beast" (Rev. xiii. 18). It is also expressly asserted that “these sayings are faithful and true: and the Lord God of the holy prophets sent His angel to show unto His servants the things which must shortly be done" (Rev. xxii. 6). Is J. J. willing to be reckoned among those who, "seeing, see not," because they will not understand?

Bishop Hurd (1720-1808) was a great and good man, and had J. J. read his “Introduction to the Study of the Prophecies concerning the Christian Church," he would scarcely have ventured to use the words "drivelling triviality" regarding such studies, or classed those who pursued them with " charlatans" and "religious fanatics." What "Seven Dials' cunning" is, we do not profess to know; but we do think that in the following passage from the work above-mentioned there is a wisdom which excels, and an honesty which rebukes, the smartness of such writers as J. J.:

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"If we look into the writings of the Old and New Testaments, we find, first, that prophecy is of prodigious extent, that it commenced from the lapse of man, and reaches to the consummation of all things; that for many ages it was delivered darkly to few persons, and with large intervals from the date of one prophecy to that of another; but at length became more clear, more frequent, and was uniformly carried on in the line of one people, separated from the rest of the world, among other reasons assigned, for this principally, to be the repository of the divine oracles; that, with some intermission, the spirit of prophecy subsisted among that people to the coming of Christ; that He himself and His apostles exercised this power in a most conspicuous manner, and left behind them many predictions, recorded in the books of the New Testament, which profess to respect very distant events, and even run out to the end of time, or, in St. John's expression, "to that period when the mystery of God shall be perfected."

If J. J. acknowledges these premises laid down by Bishop Hurd, he must either grant that "the destiny of nations is discoverably indicated in the prophecies of Scripture," or make some affirmation which shall be equivalent to an assertion that God has set in motion all this vast and intricate machinery of prophecy only to puzzle the world with a set of useless enigmas; and that our Lord Jesus, following in the same course, propounded useless predictions, because they were such that their meaning was incomprehensible; for that, I presume, must be held to be the case, if they do not contain discoverable indications of their signification. That men have made mistakes regarding the meaning of prophecies is no proof that they give no discoverable indications of their meaning. The stars, re

maining as they have been from the creation, have supplied mankind with the Ptolemaic, the Copernican, and the Newtonian theories; but that does not prove, it rather confirms the assertion that they did give intelligible signs of the secrets of the mechanism of the heavens. All the mistakes of commentators cannot destroy the fact of the truthfulness of God; and it is impossible for us to believe of God that He would give to mankind a whole series of distinct prophecies, with moral consequences depending on them, and yet supply a clue to their interpretation and their meaning.

In Bishop Newton's (1704-1782) "Dissertations on the Prophecies" there is a passage on "the fulfilment of the Mosaical prophecies concerning the Jews," referring chiefly to the 28th chapter of Deuteronomy, the greater part whereof," he says, we see accomplished in the world at the present time.” "And is not," he asks," the truth of the prediction fully attested by the whole series of their history, from their first settlement in Canaan to this present day?" After tracing the course of the history of the Jews from that predictive passage through their wars with the Chaldeans and with the Romans; the sieges they endured from Shalmaneser, Sennacherib, Nebuchadnezzar, and Titus; the strange circumstances of the siege of Jerusalem; their being rooted out of their own land; their dispersion, and its circumstances, and the oppressions they were fated to endure, as well as the long continuance of their plagues, he remarks as follows :-"Here are instances of prophecies, of prophecies delivered above three thousand years ago, and yet as we see fulfilling in the world at this very time. And what stronger proofs can we desire of the divine legation of Moses? How these instances may affect others I know not; but for myself I must acknowledge they not only convince, but amaze and astonish me beyond expression. They are truly, as Moses foretold they would be, a sign and a wonder for ever.' "Moreover, all these curses shall come upon thee, and shall pursue and overtake thee till thou be destroyed, because thou hearkenedst not unto the voice of the Lord thy God, to keep His commandments and His statutes which He commanded thee; and they shall be upon thee for a sign, and for a wonder, and upon thy seed for ever." Here it is distinctly asserted and implied that discoverable indications of the destiny of nations are to be found in Scripture prophecies, of which the proofs are patent unto this day. How can these things be accounted for else? And the moral purpose, as we have said before, of all this should not be lost sight of. As Richard Hooker (1553-1600) has remarked, "God mingled prophecies of things both civil and ecclesiastical, which were to come in every age, from time to time, till the very last of the latter days, that by those things wherein we see daily these words fulfilled and done, we might have strong consolation in the hope of things which are not seen, because they have revealed as well the one as the other. For when many things are spoken of before in Scripture, whereof we see first one thing accomplished and then another, and 1865.

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so a third, perceive we not plainly that God doth nothing else but lead us along by the hand, till He has settled us up upon the rock of an assured hope, that not one jot or tittle of His word shall pass away till all be fulfilled?'

Prophecy might in some measure be represented to the mind under the figure of the chorus to a Greek play. The chorus foretells, describes, and criticizes the action of the stage; brings the minds of the spectators into a fit state for comprehending and tracing out the awful complications of the plot; and introduces those reflections which seem appropriate to the events involved in the performance. But the chorus does not actively aid in bringing about the catastrophe, or in altering the tenor or tendency of events; it testifies, abjures, warns, exhorts, and grieves, but it does not affect the chains of causation which are exhibited as working on to some great and terrible end. The grandeur and sublimity of the Greek choruses are admitted by all; but some are found to doubt the continuous miracle of prophecy. Now those prophecies with which Scripture teems are couched in language more sublime, with a prevision infinitely more perfect, in a greater variety of forms, and in a spirit of moral earnestness far surpassing the grandest strains of the Greek tragedians. They give indications of the great drama of Time as really discoverable and as truly affecting as anything in literature-yea, much more so; we cannot therefore agree to the dictum of J. J., that all speculations about the teachings of prophecy are absurd and ridiculous.

We deem it our duty to express our regret at the levity with which J. J. treats this subject. On almost every page he endeavours to turn into jest matters of sacred importance whose associations ought to be kept free from merriment. Let him remember who has said, "Let your speech be alway with grace, seasoned with salt;" and let him endeavour to employ "sound speech that cannot be condemned, that he that is of the contrary part may be ashamed, having no evil thing to say " of him. On this topic, at least, let us have neither banter," nor foolish talking, nor jesting, which are not convenient." The spirit in which " W. Č. Markham" approaches this discussion-abating a little for his hasty preliminary rashness of judgment is much better adapted to the theme. It is a deep and solemn consideration whether the destiny of nations is discoverably indicated in Scripture prophecies; for it involves not only the truth of God's word, but also the moral effects which the perceptible fulfilment of prophecy ought to have upon us. It is especially incumbent on thinking readers to see that the arguments used in this debate are sound, for the issues are momentous; as the acceptance of the negative would go to cut away one of the grandest" evidences of Christianity." The accuracy of this statement may easily be tested by the perusal of any work on accomplished prophecies; indeed, may be taken as proved by the references of Jesus to fulfilled prophecy.

D. J. MILLer.

NEGATIVE ARTICLE.-II.

THE absolute truth of the prophecies of Scripture does not need to be denied by those who adopt the negative of this question. The impotence of human faculties alone requires to be predicated. Because we affirm that the human intellect is limited, we do not require to affirm that Scripture is false. Prophecy is one of the deep things of God. Prophecy is a mystery; prophecy is God's divine foreknowledge of events, but it does not imply man's knowledge of these, still less does it involve his foreknowledge of them. Much may be true that is not discoverable by man, or even discoverably indicated to man. If it were not so, man would be allwise; for there would be no wisdom beyond his power to conceive and believe, to know and to judge about. It would be so preposterous to make such an affirmation, that we shall not gratuitously assume that any one of the writers on this question will regard it as tenable. How many books have been written on prophecy, all of which are now the merest lumber! They were held by their authors, as by many of their readers, to be the true and perfect mirror of the future, drawn from the unerring word of God, and therefore infallible; but the error was in human self-sufficiency, not in the Scriptures' insufficiency.

"Too well they act the prophet's fatal part,
Denouncing woe to man with zealous heart;
And each, like Jonah, is displeased if God
Repent His anger, or withhold His rod."

In Luther's time the world was to come to an end, and the fanatics of that day left lands unploughed and duties unperformed, because the day of the Lord was at hand, till want and pestilence made them wiser. How many tomes of old divinity prove that Napoleon I. was the great Apollyon of Revelation, and the French Revolution the outpouring of the vials of divine wrath! but now Napoleon III. figures as the future hero of Armageddon, and the Pope has got back his former title of Antichrist. Now all this is sad-sad for man's sake and the gospel's; for every one of these self-satisfied egotists who believe that unto them have the deep things of God been revealed, creates a band of followers only to be transformed into a band of dupes-dupes, too, who revenge their disappointment, which is the result of their own folly, by casting away their faith in the word of God, when they would act far more wisely in casting away their too consummate confidence in themselves and in their accepted prophets and seers.

Take as an example the most important series of prophecies that were contained in the Scriptures-those relating to the coming and work of the Saviour; these will prove that the destiny of nations (He came for the healing of the nations) is not discoverably indicated in Holy Writ. It was discoverably indicated that Jesus would be born in Bethlehem (Matt. ii. 5), but when was unknown,