properties of each nature are preserved without confusion?-_*

-He who affirms this to be impossible, is surely bound first to prove to us that he has "found out the Almighty unto perfection."

Or will it be maintained that, though Omnipotence could effect this, yet no circumstances could possibly occur in which it would be becoming the WISDOM of God to produce such an union?

No man of reason, modesty, or piety, will venture on this assertion: but every such man will admit that the Infinite Being is alone competent to know, whether such a proceeding would be worthy of Himself in any circumstances; and, if ever proper, what circumstances would render it so.

The pretence of impossibility is absurd, arrogant, and blasphemous. The question is a question of fact, and can be decided only by its proper evidence, competent testimony; the testimony of the scriptures, the declaration of His word who cannot be mistaken and who cannot deceive.

-No impossible, no inconceivable thing. It is absurd, and very irreligious presumption, to say, This cannot be. If a worm were so far capable of thought, as to determine this or that concerning our nature; and that such a thing were impossible to belong to it, which we find to be in it;—we should trample upon it. More admirable DIVINE patience spares us!" Howe's Calm and Sober Enquiry concerning the Possibility of a Trinity in the Godhead, § 16.

That testimony we have endeavoured fairly and impartially to ascertain: and, if we have not been altogether unsuccessful in our attempts to avoid fallacy in argument, we might here close our pleadings. Jesus of Nazareth, all who are called Christians acknowledge to be. the long-promised and expected Messiah: therefore, ALL the properties and characters by which the records of divine prophecy have described the Messiah, MUST belong to him, in their strictest and most entire signification. Did the Christian scriptures do no more than afford satisfactory evidence of the simple proposition, Jesus is the Messiah;-we should be obliged by necessary inference from the prophetic descriptions, and by all the rules of honest criticism and interpretation, to conclude that his person comprized the unique and mysterious union of humanity and DEITY.

But the Christian scriptures are not thus bare and scanty in their information. It must appear previously probable, and it will turn out to be true in fact, that the writings of the inspired apostles confirm and amplify the descriptions of prophecy, by more full and clear statements of the truth respecting the Person, as well as the works and offices of HIM to whom they bear witness. The careful investigation of those writings, with a view to elicit their genuine and unaltered sense on this subject, will be our endeavour in the sequel of this Inquiry.

CHAP. VII.

AN INQUIRY INTO THE STATE OF OPINION AND EXPECTATION WITH RESPECT TO THE MESSIAH, EXISTING AMONG THE JEWS IN THE PERIOD BETWEEN THE CLOSING OF THE OLD TESTAMENT AND THE DISSOLUTION OF THEIR NATIONAL

ESTABLISHMENT.

Ir is a natural and proper inquiry whether we have any information of the manner in which the Jews understood the prophecies concerning the Messiah, in the interval between the closing of the Old Testament and the general diffusion of Christianity. Such information, though it would not possess determining authority, could not fail to be interesting; and, as the acceptation of terms in ancient languages is a matter of testimony, it would furnish a valuable addition to our means of ascertaining the genuine sense of the prophecies referred to.

The period in question, however, was not the most advantageous for the preservation and increase of accurate religious knowledge. Its earlier part was chiefly filled up with political commotions, the contentions of ambitious parties, and an incessant and sanguinary series of

struggles for national independence:* its close was marked with the contemptible superstitions of one class of the community, the courtly libertinism of another, and the ferocious exasperation of the third. On the moral state of the former portion of this time we know with certainty very little but in regard to the latter, we have sufficient evidence that the doctrines of religion were corrupted to the very first principles, and that its profession and practice had lost almost every character of a reasonable service. Indeed, the most favourable estimate of the whole period will not prepare us to expect the evidences of much skill or accuracy in the interpretation of the sacred oracles and in the statement of the sentiments which they were designed to convey.

It is, then, no subject of surprize, that our materials are few and small for the conduct of this inquiry. The number of Jewish writers, during this period, is not great: but the parts of their writings which bear on the present, or any other,

* 66 Idolatry was not introduced into the second temple; but then no prophets, no zealous reformers, arose, to restore the worship of God when it had gone into neglect. The Asmonæans designed to satisfy their ambition, rather than to reform the church. Those heroes, so much admired as they are and esteemed as saints, can never be justified for depriving of the crown and sovereignty the house of David, whose posterity languished in disgraceful poverty. They usurped the priesthood, which belonged to the family of Eleazar; as they had done the kingdom, which belonged to that of David. Basnage's Hist. of the Jews, b. i. ch. i.

theological question, are in proportion still more scanty. The works which fall under this description are the Ancient Syriac Version of the Old Testament, the Greek Version commonly called that of the Septuagint or the Seventy Translators, the Chaldee Targums or Paraphrases, the writings of certain Alexandrian and other Jews usually called the Apocrypha of the Old Testament, the works of Philo and Josephus, and any fragments of information which may be found in the Rabbinical writings.