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the Assyrian, because his heart is lifted up in his height to contemn his Maker, I cast him down to hell with them that descend into the pit; there shall he be comforted (mark the scornful strength of this expression) in the nether parts of the earth. No; the watchmen have always blown the trumpet, and warned the people, for their blood was required at the watchmens hands; and he that hath taken the warning hath in all times delivered his soul; for an æternal existence was always therein revealed. Nor could less be understood from the prophet's words in the xviiith ch. unless the Israelites closed their eyes upon these facts:-Ye say the way of the Lord is not equal: Hear now, O house of Israel; is not my way equal? are not your ways unequal? When a righteous man turneth away from his righteousness, and committeth iniquity, and dieth in them, (that is undergoes temporal death,) for his iniquity that he hath done SHALL He die. Again, when the wicked man turneth away from his wickedness that he hath committed, and doeth that which is lawful and right, he shall save his SOUL alive.

The internal evidence of the book of Daniel is as strong, and, perhaps, somewhat more direct; in fact the resurrection and the judgment are there laid down in so many express terms: And at that time Michael shall stand up, the great prince which standeth for the children of thy people: and there shall be a time of trouble such as never was since there was a nation, even to that same time:

and at that time thy people shall be DELIVERED, every one that shall be found written in the book. And many of them that sleep in the dust of the earth shall awake, (death is here again called sleep) some to EVERLASTING LIFE, and some to shame and everlasting contempt: And they that be wise shall shine as the brightness of the firmament; and they that turn many to righteousness as the stars for ever and ever *. Who can assert that this was a temporal Messiah; this a perishing deliverance, or this the life that is even a vapour, that appeareth for a little time and then vanisheth away, which Daniel recorded as the Hope of Israel? In the awful vision, too, described in chap. vii. the great judgment is plainly proclaimed, there, too, the everlasting dominion which shall not pass away, over all people, nations and languages, of the Son of Man, is revealed, while the Saints of the Most High are to take the kingdom and possess the kingdom even for ever and ever! Temporal as the commencement of this kingdom may be, no earthly dominion can endure throughout æternity.

Nor should the examples of his own perfect faith in this his doctrine of life æternal, as evidenced in his defying the punishment of being cast unto the lions, nor that of Shadrach, Meshac, and Abednego, to whom, with Daniel, God gave knowledge and skill in all learning and wisdom, be passed over in silence. They clearly, by their own confession, were by no means assured that

* Ch. xii.

they should be delivered from that appalling fate when they were cast into the burning fiery furnace before the vast multitude of all the tributary states of the Babylonian empire, but simply believed in that God who was able to raise them from the dead and the Almighty thus gave, to assembled nations, a mercifully ordained proof, of faith, in life æternal.

The prophecy of Habbakuk commences with lamenting that the law was slackened, and judgment doth never go forth: for the wicked compass about the righteous; I cry (saith the prophet) out unto thee of violence, and thou wilt not save. Yet how triumphantly does he afterwards justify the ways of God upon this very ground! Art Thou not from everlasting, O Lord my God, mine Holy One? WE (clearly meaning himself and the righteous of his people) shall NOT DIE! O Lord! Thou hast ordained them (that is the wicked) for judgment; and O mighty God, thou hast established them for correction!* Although the figtree shall not blossom (saith he elsewhere, confiding doubtless in this truth,) neither shall fruit be in the vines; the labour of the olive shall fail, and the field shall yield no meat; the flock shall be cut off from the fold, and there shall be no herd in the stalls: Yet I will rejoice in the Lord, I will joy in the God of my salvation! ↑ The prophecy of Zephaniah breathes, like all the rest, the most terrible threatenings mingled with the + C. iii. 17 & 18.

* C. i. 12.

the most tender promises; and in describing the day of the Lord clearly implies far more than any temporal deliverance: Wait YE, saith the Lord (to his faithful,) upon me, until the day that I rise up to the prey: for my determination is to gather the nations, that I may assemble the kingdoms, to pour upon them mine indignation, even all my fierce anger: for ALL the earth shall be devoured with the fire of my jealousy*. Throughout the book of Jeremiah there are innumerable indirect allusions. In ch. xvii. after quoting the words of Moses, The fire is kindled in mine anger which shall burn for ever, he points out the safe and everlasting refuge of the faithful: A glorious high throne from the beginning is the place of OUR Sanctuary. O Lord, the HOPE OF ISRAEL, all that forsake thee shall be ashamed, and they that depart from me shall be written in the earth (to be destroyed, clearly, by the same fate,) because they have forsaken the Lord, the fountain of living waters! Then pointing out to the people the utter insufficiency of all personal righteousness, he prays, heal me, O Lord, and I shall be healed; save me, and I shall be saved: for Thou art my praise. THOU ART MY HOPE IN THE DAY OF EVIL. Nor are public examples in this faith wanting in these records, casually brought forward to rebuke the disobedience of Israel. I allude to the house of the Rechabites, mentioned in the 35th ch:-They said we will drink no wine; for Jonadab the son of Rechab our father, commanded us, saying, ye shall

* C. iii. 8.

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drink no wine, neither ye, nor your sons for ever : Neither shall ye build house, nor plant vineyard, nor have any: but all your days, ye shall dwell in tents; that ye may live many days in the land where ye be strangers. It might be urged that the Rechabites were not of the blood of Israel, but descended from the father-in-law of Moses for from that early period they had dwelt amongst the people but it appears undoubted that Jehonadab, illustrious as he was in his zeal† for his God, took these means, strong as they were, to teach his descendants that here they had no continuing city; fully understanding from the law of Moses that they were strangers and pilgrims upon the earth.

The prophecy of Nahum, not the least sublime amongst these sacred writings, as well as that of Jonah, the most ancient of the whole, is directed chiefly against the city of Nineveh; nor need the type of Jonah, from which the Jews might have gathered faith in the power and will of their God to raise his people from the grave, be now insisted on. Micah seems to have been contem

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