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CHAPTER II.

THE HISTORICAL PROPHECIES OF DANIEL 2.

Καί μοι δοκεῖ μεγίστην θεὸν τοῖς ἀνθρώποις ἡ φύσις ἀποδεῖξαι τὴν Αλήθειαν,

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Καὶ ποτὲ μὲν παραχρῆμα δείκνυσι τὴν αὐτῆς δύναμιν, ποτὲ δὲ πολὺν χρόνον ἐπισκοτισθεῖσα, τέλος αὐτὴ δι ̓ ἑαυτῆς ἐπικράτει

POLYBIUS, Lib. xiii.

"BEHOLD there shall stand up yet three kings, and the fourth shall be far richer than they all; and by his strength, through his riches, he shall stir up all against the realm of Grecia." b Our riper age seldom is altogether free from the prepossessions of our boyhood, and our translators, having

a As all prophecy is connected with history, historical prophecies may seem as tautological an expression as Hume's sceptical doubts; but some such expression is necessary as the professed object of this inquiry is history and not religion.

b Chapter xi. v. 2.

apparently taken for granted that this rich king was Xerxes, have not shewn their usual accuracy.

"He shall stir up all against the realm of Grecia." What is there in the original to authorise the word "against"? Is it the particle? If this particle is to be considered as a preposition, should it not rather be rendered by "with"? If it is not to be considered as a preposition, will not its sense be fitly rendered by "the"? ("He shall stir up all the realm.") And is not this the meaning which the Greek translators have given it? ('ETavaσTHσETαι πάσαις βασιλείαις.) "The realm of Grecia." The original says the realm of Iun, or, according to the vowel-points, of Ja

van.

Of the seven sons of Japhet there are two whose descendants are particularly mentioned in the tenth chapter of Genesis. The sons of Gomer were three in number, and the sons of Javan four. We are not told that these, or any of the descendants of Japhet, built towns, like the descendants of Ham and Shem, we are

told only that "by these," i. e. the sons of Japhet, were the isles of the Gentiles di

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vided in their lands; every one after his tongue, after their families, in their nations. The Greeks themselves did not lay claim to a priority in agriculture, nor pretend that the goddess of corn was descended from their Autochthones "." The barbarians are more ancient than we," says Socrates, in Plato's Cratylus, "It appears, from a strong concurrence of circumstances recorded by antient writers," says Mitford, "that the early inhabitants of Asia Minor, Thrace, and Greece, were the same people." Why, then, are we to confine Javan to Greece? Abraham and Lot sepa

rated because the land was not able to bear them that they might dwell together. Pastoral tribes still require a large tract of country, but by the land of Javan, one of

a Athens was the mother of the arts and sciences. Very true, if so be that the moon is the mother of sunshine. The Elgin marbles show the skill not of one age but of centuries. We talk of Pericles and Phidias, but we forget Solomon and Hiram.

b Mitford, Chapter i. sect. 4.

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those seven by whom the isles of the Gentiles were divided, we are to understand a country, which was “ scarcely half so large as England, and not equal to a fourth of France or Spain," which, with all its glory and consequence, was "lost in a single province of the Roman empire."

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"Behold there shall yet stand up three kings in Persia, and the fourth shall be far richer than they all." Let us see how this fourth king is made the same as Xerxes. The three which were yet to stand up are said to be Cambyses, Smerdis, and Darius. As Smerdis was an usurper and impostor, and as his reign lasted but seven months, it may seem strange that the angel has

a Mitford, Chapter i. sect. 1.

b Gibbon, Vol. i. chapter 1. When the artist of the island of Barataria increased the number of the caps, he diminished their size; but although we fill Greece with heroes, demigods, gods and goddesses, so that they

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numbered him among the kings of Persia. But what shall we do with Cambyses? If he is not the same as Nebuchadnezzar, must we not make Nebuchadnezzar the same as Labynetus? Nine kings are said to have reigned after Xerxes; in what part of the prophecy shall we find any allusion to them? Seventy weeks, or 490 years, are all that we can allow from the going forth of the commandment to restore and rebuild Jerusalem unto the Messiah, and if we believe the prophecies of Isaiah, we cannot well refuse to date the seventy weeks from the reign of Cyrus; for it is Jehovah himself, who saith of Cyrus, "He is my shepherd and shall perform all my pleasure: even saying unto Jerusalem, thou shalt be built;' and to the Temple, 'thy foundations shall be laid.' The death of Alexander is dated from the 324th year в.c. and consequently the reigns of Cyrus and of the three kings who preceded Xerxes, and of Xerxes himself, and of the nine kings who followed him, must be comprised in limits ridiculously narrow.

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