refutes itself: for if such arbitrary liberties be taken with the language of Scripture; if when the prophet, in two different places of the same prophecy, uses the same words, without any intimation of a difference in his meaning; the interpreter be permitted to say, that the words in one place have a meaning which they cannot have in the other place; then, manifestly, the church is at the mercy of the fancy of the interpreter, and all settled, consistent exposition is at an end.

The true secret of this inconsistency lies here: that expositors have taken it as a sort of sine quá non in their interpretations, that the prophecies have been already fulfilled. The category of yet unfulfilled has not been allowed a place in their systems: hence they have diligently applied every practicable passage to the return of Judah from Babylon, and have toiled with sore labour and travail, to make all the rest fit on to the Christian church. In this they have been baffled, as to any detailed consistency; and yet the degree of similarity naturally to be expected between type and antitype has encouraged them to go on, and confirmed them in their opinions: while all the time they have been pointing out antitypical applications, and calling them expositions of prophecy.

Only admit this idea of yet unfulfilled, and a thousand difficulties vanish. And why should this idea not be admitted? We have seen, that so long as we have the history of the Jews to compare with

the prophecies concerning them—that is, up to this time; a certain mode of interpreting those prophecies, is rendered indispensable: then why not simply continue that same mode of interpretation, when we have prophecy alone not yet illustrated by history? If prophecies concerning the Jews, delivered two or three thousand years ago, be proved, by the history of the interim up to our own days, to have been fulfilled in a literal sense, and therefore to demand a literal interpretation; upon what principle can it be alleged, that other prophecies, delivered in similar language by the same. prophets, are not to be similarly interpreted after our days ? Must God have done, before our days, all the literal things which he ever intended to do upon the earth? Is there indeed any thing magical in the age of the world we live in, that it should change the nature of the prophecy, or of its fulfilment? Or is it that unbelief, though forced to yield to the testimony of history, yet refuses to be effectually taught, even by that plain lesson; and will not take God at his word, or trust him for a moment out of her sight?

IV. The interpretation, then, which remains to be considered, and which alone will be found to harmonize with all that the prophets have written, is that which makes the land always to mean Judæa literally; Judah always to mean the two tribes nationally, with their Israelitish companions; Israel

always to mean the whole ten tribes nationally; restoration always to mean the actual return of the twelve tribes to Judæa; and David, their one king, always to mean the King of the Jews, of the seed of David, Jesus Christ our Lord.

This interpretation holds good in every point. The present condition of the land of Palestine is well known to be one of extreme barrenness and desolation; whereas it was a land of flocks and herds, a land flowing with milk and honey, the glory of all lands. In this we recognize the literal fulfilment of that clause of the prophecy which predicts desolation; and from the next clause of the prophecy, we confidently anticipate a literal renovation to beauty and fertility, accompanied by a multiplication of beasts upon it, as well as men, for the consumption of its produce. In the present condition of the Jewish people, divided and dispersed, we recognize the literal fulfilment of those clauses in the prophecy which imply division, and predict dispersion; and from similar clauses, similarly interpreted, we confidently anticipate a similarly literal fulfilment of the promised restoration and reunion. But here it may, perhaps, be objected, that in order to be consistent throughout, we must maintain, that king David literally shall reign again over the twelve tribes in Judæa, according to the terms of the prophecy. To which I answer, first, that if the prophecy stated this unequivocally, we should have no hesitation in be

lieving and expecting it; neither should the apparent improbability, or even absurdity of it, interfere in the slightest degree with our faith. But, secondly, the Jewish people, who shall be re-assembled in the land, are not the identical individuals of whom the prophet speaks as being dispersed; but their literal, lineal descendants, who shall be found alive at the time appointed of God for their restoration. In like manner, the King of the Jews, who shall reign over the twelve tribes in the land, is not the identical David, or Solomon the son of David, or Rehoboam the grandson of David, who did reign over them before their division; but the literal, lineal descendant of David, the last of the line of Jewish kings who shall be found alive at the time appointed of God for their reunion into one kingdom. The last individual who was born King of the Jews, was Jesus of Nazareth, and he is still alive. He is the literal, lineal descendant of David; and the angel who announced his birth, informed his mother that the Lord God would give unto him the throne of his father David. (Luke i. 32.) The

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It is written of Coniah or Jechonias, the last king of the house of David, before the captivity, "Thus saith the Lord, write ye this man childless, a man that shall not prosper in his days for no man of his seed shall prosper, sitting upon the throne of David, and ruling any more in Judah." (Jer. xxii. 30.) If the word childless, in this passage, be taken literally as an English reader would understand it, it will involve a direct contradiction to Matt. i. 12-Jechonias begat Salathiel. I think it

people have been preserved upon the earth, generation after generation. The King has been pre

has been satisfactorily argued, that the original word, the root of which is simply nudus, may, without any violence, be understood in a general sense, as destitute or deprived. It is translated in the Septuagint, by exкnpuктov. This view would limit the meaning of the word to royal progeny; and indeed the text itself seems to warrant, nay, to require such a limitation, the second clause being an explanation of the first. Write this man childless, &c.—why? because no man of his seed shall prosper, sitting upon the throne of David, &c. It is not said he shall have no seed, but that no man of his seed shall reign. If this exposition be just, it implies that he would have posterity, while it asserts, that none of them would inherit the kingdom of their father. This has been strictly fulfilled. He had two sons, Asser and Salathiel. (1 Chron. iii. 17.) But his successor in the kingdom was his uncle Mattaniah, whose name the king of Babylon changed to Zedekiah. (2 Kings xxiv. 17; Jer. xxxvii. 1.) The last king of Judah, therefore, before the captivity, was of the seed of David, though not of the seed of Coniah. The sons of Zedekiah, however, were slain by the Chaldees, as we read, 2 Kings xxv. 7. The genealogy, therefore, was continued in the seed of Coniah. Jeconiah begat Salathiel, and Salathiel begat Zorobabel, &c. But no man of his seed prospered, sitting on the throne of David. The Lord Jesus is of the seed of Coniah, as truly as he is of the seed of David, or Abraham: but he did not prosper on the throne. (See page 150.) The clause now before us, of the prophecy of Jeremiah, has been in continuous fulfilment since the days of Coniah, even unto our own days: but this clause is not the whole prophecy; and that a limit to the period of the application of this clause was pre-determined, is manifest, from the subsequent clause, which says, Behold, the days come, saith the Lord, that I will raise unto David a righteous branch, AND A KING SHALL