after the fall of the empire, uniting in itself all these marks and indications, I need not tell you. Let the corruptions of doctrine and precept, the usurpation of the rights of conscience, the prohibition of the free use of the Scriptures, the establishment of a spiritual idolatry, the principle of working by craft, meretricious splendor and religious delusion-"THE ENERGY OF ERROR," as the apostle terms it-together with the persecutions which characterized for so many centuries the church and bishop of Rome, expound the divine prophecies.

Such a combination of tokens, verified before our eyes in an APOSTACY, which has existed unchanged in all its characters for nearly twelve centuries, is a proof of prophetic inspiration of the most illustrious kind; at the same time that it explains and develops the mystery of the divine Providence, which the actual state of Christendom exhibits-nay, it turns a most painful and oppressive view of the declension of the church, into a stronger confirmation of the Christian's faith.

But, I pause for surely the combined force of these branches of the fulfilment of prophecy overwhelms the mind. Each division strengthens the rest: they embrace not matters of curiosity, but subjects in which the highest interests of revelation are concerned. Under the first head, the prophecies of the Messiah, we see the Christian dispensation established. Under the second, the predictions concerning the Jewish and Christian churches, we see, so far as we have hitherto gone, the designs of God, as to the progress of redemption, developed. We behold the Jewish people cast into exile-the cities and nations of the world exhibited in their connection with the church, and the providence of God displayed in all the revolutions of empire-and the Christian church desolated by spiritual judgments for its unfaithfulness to its privileges and advantages. But we must not stop here: let us add a reflection, as we proposed, on the

IVth and last branch of this second head, the prophecies OF THE FUTURE CONVERSION OF THE WORLD, AND THE FINAL TRIUMPH OF HOLINESS AND TRUTH.

For such is the consummation to which we are encouraged to look forward. "The earth is to be filled with the knowledge of the Lord, as the waters cover the sea." The vail is * 2 Thess. ii. 11.

to be removed from the heart of the Jew. The antichristian apostacies are to cease. The heathens are to be brought home to the fold of God. Jerusalem is not always to be trodden down of the gentiles. Satan is to be "cast into the lake of fire, and to be chained, and deceive the nations no more." Christ our Lord is to reign over all the nations of the earth; a long and glorious period of truth and holiness is to succeed to all the confusions and disorders of the present state of things; and, lastly, after a brief effort of evil and sin, THE END is to come. Our Lord will appear to judge the quick and dead, the general resurrection will take place, the righteous and wicked be assigned to their respective portions, and the kingdom of the Mediator be " delivered up to God, even the Father."

I adduce not these unaccomplished parts of prophecy, as direct supports of my argument-the case admits not of itthey are not as yet fulfilled—but I adduce them as some additional presumption of the truth of all we have hitherto proved. That such a scheme as we have developed, centring in the person of the Saviour, drawing into its current all the events of the world, marked by the exile of the former church, and by the apostacy of large portions of the present-that such a scheme, thus far so undeniably fulfilled by all the events of history, should not rest incomplete, but should look forward to a conclusion as great and glorious, as all the parts are majestic and divine-that it should stretch on to the end of all things, and not desert us till the honor of God is vindicated, the grace of Christ made triumphant, the power of darkness utterly discomfited, and the salvation of the world accomplished-is a token of a divine inspiration, which adds force to all the preceding considerations. The very hazarding of prophecies, which reach to the consummation of all things, and which, if not of divine prescience, may be defeated and rendered incapable of fulfilment, in any passing age, is itself no mean proof of inspiration. What religion but the true would have suspended the faith of its adherents on the successive development of prophecy, from the time of its promulgation to the last judgment?

More than this: That during eighteen hundred years, no series of historical events should have arisen to contradict, in the least, the succinct and anticipated scheme of the prophecies; but that, on the contrary, the present state of the world should be obviously adapted and prepared for the fulfilment of all the remaining predictions, is a positive argument of no

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slight force in our favor. The Jews are still distinct from other nations. The Christian church is waiting for the destined termination of the eastern and western apostacies; which is to close her oppressions, and bring on the return of the Jews, the conversion of the nations, and the final triumph of the peaceful and holy religion of the Bible throughout the world. In the mean time, the innumerable prophecies fulfilled and fulfilling before our eyes, are the pledge and assurance of the accomplishment of the remainder. The hope of this blessing sustains the church under the corruptions which prevail, and excites an expectation of the second coming of our Lord; even as the accomplishment of the predictions of the old dispensation sustained the faith of the Jewish church, as to his first advent. The prophecies also animate to many important duties, warn against the contamination of antichris tian doctrines and practices, and promote humility, prayer and dependence upon God. With such uses attached to the unfulfilled word, and with such a long series of previous predictions accomplished, I conceive that the future parts of the divine scheme form a powerful presumption in favor of the celestial origin of the whole. In so vast a plan, it is greatly in favor of its inspiration, that it stops not at an intermediate period, nor forsakes the system unfinished, but stretches onward to an adequate and most glorious consummation. Ì affirm, that no mark of truth can be more palpable than the permitting, in this way, every successive age to judge of the gradual fulfilment of prophecy, by the unerring comment of facts, and thus nobly challenging all the generations of men to the investigation of its claims. This becomes the great God: it bears the impress of his majesty, his omnipotence, his wisdom, his foreknowledge, his supreme providence and grace.

But I must hasten towards THE CONCLUSION of this branch of our subject. What mind of any candor and sincerity can hesitate on yielding to the prodigious force of this argument from prophecy? The arguments deduced from the necessities of mankind, from the authenticity and credibility of the books, and from the miracles, were in different ways most satisfactory. They were just what might be expected in the case of a revelation from the Almighty God. The argument from miracles, especially, was most conclusive. We saw and acknowledged the finger of God. But I ask any unprejudiced person, whether the prophetical argument be not still more convincing,

from the accumulated riches of the divine glory apparent in it. I ask whether, if you contemplate the character and scheme of it, in its extent, the union of all its parts in the divine person and glory of our Lord, the infinite wisdom and contrivance of those parts, the characters of the prophets themselves, and the high and important moral ends to which it was and is subservient, it do not bear the impress of the prescience and power of God. I ask again, whether the divine faithfulness and truth apparent in its accomplishment -the events of nations and empires bowing to its designsthe annals of six thousand years proclaiming the hand of Providence engaged in its inspiration and its fulfilment—I ask any unprejudiced person, whether such an exhibition of infinite foresight and omnipotent power, which is now going on and accumulating its effects in every age, do not prove the truth of that religion of which it is a prominent part. I ask, whether the correspondence which has been shown between the scheme of prophecy detailed in the last Lecture, and the fulfilment of its several parts, as we have been considering it now, do not put a seal, as it were, to the divine origin of both.

And when the evidence from this whole prophetical inspiration is added to that from palpable miraculous powers -when we consider that the same persons perform the mighty works who predict the improbable and often remote eventsthat the same lips of Moses and the prophets, of Christ and his apostles, which uttered the several prophetical declarations, and ventured their cause on the accomplishment of them in distant ages, were those which proclaimed the doctrines of religion, and then performed the supernatural deeds which were the instant and undeniable credentials of their mission;—when all this is considered, I know not what excuse men can offer if they continue in doubt and hesitation on the truth of Christianity. The same divine glory which, in the wonders of creation, spreads before the eyes of men the proofs of "his eternal power and Godhead," is apparent in exhibiting to them more convincing and direct evidences of his will, with like profusion, and variety, and magnificence, in the book of revelation, and the accomplishment of prophecy in the events of the world. The demonstration is as

complete in its kind to prove the mercy of God in the incarnation of a Saviour, as is that by which his existence, and wisdom, and power are proved by the order and arrangement of

the material world. It is as little needful that Jesus should now repeat his miracles, or deliver again his prophecies, as that the world should be, a second time created.* The proof continues in each case; and, as to Christianity, increases. The miracles of the first ages of the Jewish and Christian dispensation are, in fact, propagated in the fulfilment of prophecy in every succeeding one. Men sometimes are disposed to think that if they could see a miracle wrought in their own sight, they would believe the gospel without delay, and obey it unreservedly.† They know not their own hearts. "If they believe not Moses and the prophets, neither would they be persuaded, though one rose from the dead.' But in the whole range of prophecy now fulfilling before their eyes, they have, in fact, a series of divine interpositions, not precisely of the nature of miracles, in the sense of brief, and instant, and visible suspensions of the laws of nature; but evidently so, in the sense of supernatural interference in the rise and fall of cities, and nations, and empires, in the arrangement of times and circumstances, in that wonderful display of infinite foreknowledge and infinite power apparent in the control of the wills of unnumbered free and accountable agents to a certain result.

I ask, for example, whether the present state of the Jews be not, in the sense I have stated, a miracle, nay, the most striking of miracles, to the considerate mind—a miracle, not transient, and ceasing with the life of the individuals who are its subjects, but permanent, and protracted already through the course of above fifty generations-a miracle not delivered only on the report of others, and recorded in authentic historical documents-satisfactory as this would be—but extant before their own eyes, and subject to their own inspection and examination-a miracle not wrought in one nation of the earth, and confined to a certain number of witnesses, but open to the observation, and presented to the deliberate and repeated scrutiny of all mankind.

In truth, prophecy forms the grand and abiding moral demonstration to a reasonable and accountable world, of the divine original of the Scriptures. On this evidence it is that the Almighty himself is pleased to rest the weight of the argument. The prophets under the Old Testament, and our Lord and his apostles under the New, in their addresses to the Jews, who admitted the sacred writings, appeal to the + Bishop Newton.

* Franks,