They bought Jesus as a slave; and they themselves were afterwards sold and bought as slaves at the lowest prices* : they preferred a robber and a murderer to Jesus, whom they crucified between two thieves; and they themselves were afterwards infested with bands of thieves and robberst they put Jesus to death, lest the Romans should come and take away their place and nation; and the Romans did come and take away their place and nation‡; and what is still more striking, and still more strongly marks the judgment of God upon them, they were punished with that very kind of death which they were so eager to inflict on the Saviour of mankind, the death of the cross; and that in such prodigious numbers, that Josephus assures us, there wanted wood for crosses, and room to place them in§.

*Ibid. 19.

See page 59 of this Treatise.

† Ibid. 57.

See the Bishop of London's Lectures, and Bishop Newton, as before quoted; and this Treatise, page 63r

Now, according to your own scriptures that fatal catastrophe which involved your ancestors in all these miseries, was not to take place until after the coming and crucifixion of their Messiah: for thus spake the prophet Daniel, prophesying almost. five hundred and forty years before the birth of the Messiah: "Know and understand, that from the going forth of the commandment to restore and to build Jerusalem (i. e. after its destruction by the Babylonians) unto Messiah the prince, shall be seven weeks, and threescore and two weeks*: the street shall be built again,

* In prophetical language, a day is reckoned for a year, or seven years to every prophetical week. This key is given us by Moses, Lev. xxv. 8, and Numbers xiv. 34: and also by Ezekiel iv. 5, 6; and by this it appears, that from the commission granted to Ezra to rebuild Jerusalem, until the complete restoration of the city, there were exactly 49 years or seven weeks. From this period until the first proclamation of the Messiah by John the Baptist, there were exactly 434 years, or sixty-two weeks. John's ministry terminated at the end of 3 years and a half, when our Lord began to preach "the kingdom of God,” and thus virtually, "in the midst of the week, caused the sacrifice and oblation to cease" (see Daniel ix. 27); for he him self declared that "the law and the prophets (i. e. the ce. remonial law-or law of sacrifices, &c. and the prophets

3

and the wall, even in troublous times. And after threescore and two weeks shall Messiah be cut off, but not for himself; and the people of the prince that shall come, shall destroy the city and the sanctuary, and the end thereof shall be with a flood, and unto the end of the war desolations are determined.” Such is the prediction of one of your own prophets; which not only proves that the appearance and death of the Messiah were to precede the destruction of Jerusalem and the temple, but also marks the precise time when, in under it) were until John; since that time the kingdom of God is preached." And exactly at the end of this prophetical week, i. e. at the expiration of the remaining 3 years and a half, he confirmed the abolition of the Levitical law by the "one offering of himself" upon the cross. This ever-memorable event happened precisely in the very month which completed the 490 years, or whole period of seventy weeks, mentioned by Daniel in the 24th verse of the above cited chapter; and it deserves the particular attention of the reader, that Ferguson, the celebrated astronomer, who applied the principles of his favourite science to this very prediction of Daniel, declares, as the result of his calculations, that the "prophetic year of Messiah's being cut off was the very same as the astronomi

cal."

* Daniel ix. 25, 26.

the person of Jesus Christ, he actually did appear. The same prophet also thus describes the great purposes of his advent; viz. to finish the transgression, and to make an end of sins, and to make reconciliation for iniquity, and to bring in everlasting righteousness." And are not these precisely the very purposes for which, according to the writers of the New Testament, Jesus Christ came into the world, and which, before his departure out of it, he fully accomplished? Daniel predicted, moreover, that the Messiah should "cause the sacrifice and the oblation to cease:" and accordingly, still to use his language, has not "the daily sacrifice been taken away, and the abomination that maketh desolate been set up?" and has not your nation (to use the words of another of your prophets) abode many days without a king, and without a prince, and without a sacrifice, and without an image, and without an ephod, and without teraphim* ?" It was likewise foretold by Daniel, that the

Hosea iii. 4.

Messiah would "seal up the vision and prophecy;" and accordingly this prediction, like all the rest in your scriptures relating to the Messiah, was accomplished in Jesus Christ; for is it not clear that his favourite disciple St. John was the last inspired prophet? Did not the prophetic vision close with his "Revelations ?" and hath any one since prevailed to unloose the mysterious and inviolable seal? It may further be proper to remind you, that precisely at the period of Christ's advent, a lively expectation of the appearance of your Messiah in Judea, was not only current throughout your own nation, but even obtained in many parts of the Roman empire. Hence the rise of those "false Christs" and "false prophets," which we have described, and the credulity of your ancestors in believing their declarations. They promised temporal deliverance, dominion, and glory; therefore they were regarded. They true Messiah offered a release from the captivity of sin and Satan, a spiritual salvation, and everlasting glory