food, and our richest inheritance of blessing came through this nation. Those churches which first adorned Christianity with unequalled piety and beauty, sprung up in Judea; and, through their lively faith and ardent love, the gospel of Christ speedily spread through the Roman empire, and so has reached every Christian land and every Christian heart.

But how changed is this nation now! How low have the Jews sunk in every land! The precious sons of Zion, comparable to fine gold, how are they esteemed as earthen pitchers, the work of the hands of the potter! Lam. iv. 2. Instead of giving light to others, they themselves are sunk into gross darkness, and need to receive light from the descendants of those to whom their forefathers once gave it. They still remain in the hardness of self-righteousness and unbelief, rejecting their true, their only, and hereafter their universally to be owned, honoured, and beloved Messiah.

Yet they are preserved in their distinctness; they are still witnesses for inestimably precious truths; they maintain a persevering hope of a coming Saviour; there is a perceptible and unusual movement among them; there is a growing interest spreading through the nations of the earth concerning them; what then is to be their future state? Has God stores of mercy in reserve for them, and even larger blessings for the world, than have ever yet been received by it, through them?

Our great and glorious God claims it as his own prerogative to foreshew things to come; who as I shall call and shall declare it, and set it in order for me, since I appointed the ancient people? And the things that are coming, and shall come, let them shew unto them. Isaiah xliv. 7. We can therefore know future events with absolute certainty, only as God has revealed them in his own word.

But the history of Abraham and his posterity has from the first call of Abraham been foretold and revealed, and it has been gradually accomplishing from the beginning. Nearly 4000 years since, the promise was given; I will make of thee a great nation, and I will bless thee, and make thy name great, and thou shalt be a blessing; and I will bless them that bless thee, and curse him that curseth thee, and in thee shall all the families of the earth be blessed, Gen. xii. 1-3. We have here outward mercies, inward happiness, true glory, overflowing usefulness, blessedness of friends, victory over enemies, and finally triumphant love in universal blessedness through his seed, secured by God's promise to Abraham and his posterity.

Shortly afterwards Abraham was called to survey the land of Canaan, and it was promised to him in these words, Lift up now thine eyes, and look from the place where thou art, northward, and southward, and eastward, and westward; for all the land which thou seest, to thee will I give it, and to thy seed for ever. Gen. xiii. 14, 15. The promise was renewed, and confirmed to Isaac and Jacob. Gen. xvii. 4-16; xxii. 15—18; xxvi. 3, 4; xxviii. 13-15. The extent of the land is more explicitly stated in the words, Unto thy seed have I given this land, from the river of Egypt unto the great river the river Euphrates. Gen. xv. 18.

These promises, in their plain and obvious meaning, convey a perpetual possession of this land to this nation. Yet hitherto the actual possession by the children of Abraham has been very partial and interrupted. Even in the reign of Solomon there does not appear to have been that full possession and sovereignty of the whole which the promises lead us to expect. And history shews us that for 1800 years, the Jews have been driven from this land, and scattered over the face of the earth; but they are so marvellously preserved in their distinctness, in the midst of the nations, that the literal fulfilment of the pro

phecy is to this day a possibility, and their present state is, in the providence of God such as to make it a probability in the eyes of men in general.

The original promises are confirmed and enlarged in a great variety of forms in subsequent parts of the Holy Scriptures. Prophecies which describe literally their present dispersion and degradation, then promise their future restoration and glory; thus making the dispersion the pledge and assurance of the restoration.

There have been different systems of interpretation of these prophecies in the Christian church. Some would view them as already literally fulfilled; or explain them in a figurative and mystical sense. Others, fully agreeing that true believers have, through Christ, a real interest in every spiritual and eternal blessing promised in the Old Testament, and that the New Testament justifies us in a spiritual application of some of the Old Testament prophecies to the Christian church, believe also that there will be yet an exact literal accomplishment to the Jewish nation of the promises made to them. This is the view here maintained.

Though many Christian commentators of real and deep piety, with much learning also, have laboured to set aside the future literal fulfilment of the prophecies fortelling the restoration of the Jews, yet the general voice of the church in past ages has been in favour both of their conversion and restoration, as clearly foretold in the word of God.*

* It would not have been difficult to have accumulated here testimonies from all ages. Fathers and their successors, Protestants, Reformers of different countries, Puritans, Church of England writers, and Dissenters, and men of vast var ety of opinions on other parts of Christian theology, who have agreed in expounding the prophecies of the Old Testament as declaring a yet future national conversion and restoration of the Jews; but let us rest on the simple and full testimony of scripture. Let the reader's faith be in God's word, and not in man's. My friend, Mr. Brooks, in his valuable work entitled,

In

The object of these introductory remarks is to establish the view of a future literal restoration. order to this, we will notice, (1.) The general principle of interpretation; (2.) Some plain predictions promising their restoration; (3.) The objections sometimes made to this doctrine; (4.) The situation of the ten tribes; (5.) The difficulties in the way of our faith; (6.) Their history when restored; (7.) Some particulars respecting the present circumstances of the Jews; and (8.) The practical use of the doctrine. May our heavenly Father guide both the author and the reader into his own truth!

1. THE GENERAL PRINCIPLE OF INTERPRETATION.

In considering the general principle of interpretation, it is on this subject important not to lose sight of the circumstances in which the prophets delivered their predictions. The times of the prophets may help us in forming a judgment of the past or future fulfilment of the prophecy. Jonah and Amos, and perhaps Hosea and Joel, prophesied before the captivity of ISRAEL. Isaiah chiefly delivered his prophecies after that captivity, as in part did Micah ; and all the rest of the prophets delivered their prophecies wholly after the captivity of ISRAEL.

Jeremiah, Nahum, Habakkuk, Zephaniah, Ezekiel, Daniel, and Obadiah delivered theirs just previous to or at the time of the captivity of JUDAH.

Haggai and Zechariah prophesied after the return of Judah and Benjamin, in the times of Ezra and Nehemiah.

Malachi, delivered his at a considerably later pe

"Elements of Prophetical Interpretation," has brought together much of this voice of the church. Bishop Prideaux states: "Astruunt hoc, inter Patres, Origines, Chrystomus, Ambrosius, Hieronymus, et e recentioribus quam plurimi, qui alias inter se in nimium multis di. gladiantur."

riod, when the Jews had for some time been settled on their return. He describes their state then: Judah hath dealt treacherously, and an abomination is committed in Jerusalem (Mal. iii. 11), and states their rejection, with the exception of the remnant that should abide his coming, in the day of the Lord, on account of their sins.

The desolation then of ISRAEL was the palpable object before some of the chief prophets; and it was their captivity, and the threatening of that to come in Babylon (Isaiah xxxix. 6), which gave occasion to many of the inspired expressions of those glowing predictions of restoration and future glory, with much the Old Testament prophecies, and especially those of Isaiah, abound. Hence there might justly be gathered from them a favourable hope of the restoration of the ten tribes.

But the following table, though the differences of opinion on the dates are numerous, and exact accuracy is not aimed at, as indeed it is not attainable, may assist the reader in gaining a general impression of the connection of the prophecies with the captivities of the Jews, and the restoration of Judah and Benjamin. The dates which the prophets (who mention the names of the kings in whose reigns they prophesied) themselves give, furnish the surest guide; and minute accuracy is not very material.