forefaw, when 70 years were fixed as the limits of their punishment, the Babylonian captivity was terminated, their return to their own land (where for a time they enjoyed fignal marks of the Divine favour) was not followed by any long continued obedience; and the threats and even the terms of the Prophecy again attached upon them. Their adverfity accordingly increased by degrees, as their wickednefs became more and more general, and more and more enormous. After the death of Alexander, their country fuffered feverely by the wars which enfued, between the Princes who divided the Grecian Empire. Ptolemy Soter took poffeffion of Jerufalem on the fabbath-day, and carried a great number of the Jews captive into Egypt; and the peace and the privileges they enjoyed during the reign of Ptolemy Philadelphus, were followed by the extreme miferies inflicted by the execrable tyranny of Antiochus Epiphanes. From that period of their history, B. C. 320. B. C. 170. excepting only the brilliant fcene of happiness, which the piety and va lour of the Maccabees were allowed to open for this once more repentant people, we fee them immerfed in crimes, confufion, and tumult; conftantly fubject to the Syrian, the Egyptian, Egyptian, or the Roman power; and continually a prey to plunder, flavery and maffacre, till, by rejecting the Meffiah, they became liable to the punishment denounced by Mofes against those who should "not hearken. to the Prophet whom the Lord fhould raise up, like unto him; and in confequence have fuffered, and are still fuffering, the severest chastisement a nation can undergo. To the accounts of the siege and destruction of Jerufalem, and the entire conqueft of Judea by the Romans, and the state in which the country and the people have ever fince continued, are we then to look, for the moft minute and complete accomplishment of thefe awful predictions; and here we fhall indeed find the agreement between facts and Pro phecies most strikingly exact. The remote fituation, the unknown language, the “fierce countenance," and the martial character of the Romans are strongly marked in this Prophetical description, as if defigned to distinguifh them from the Afiatic conquerors of the Jews. They Several Jewish Expofitors are cited by Patrick and Parker, in their Commentaries upon this Prophecy. Manaffeh ben Ifrael, a very learned and accute Rabbi of They came from far-from the end of the earth. Not only the diftance of Rome from Jerufalem is thus marked, but this intimation of remotenefs is peculiarly applicable to the generals and armies by whom Judea was conquered. In order to carry on war against that country, Pompey left a very diftant province, and Vefpafian and Julius Severus conducted their troops from the island of Britain. Adrian and Trajan, by whom they were finally fubdued, were natives of the distant country of Spain. They came as fwift as the eagle flieth. The rapid flight of the most ravenous bird of prey may be confidered as a juft emblem of a destroying army; and the eagle as peculiarly applicable to the Roman ftandard. But the allufion has also an exact historical propriety; as Titus*, being eager to return to Rome, pressed on the fiege of Jerufalem with the greatest vigour the Spanish Synagogue in Amfterdam, who flourished in the beginning of the laft century, is of opinion, that at the forty-ninth verfe commences the Prophecy of the calamities under the fecond Temple. He refers all the latter part of the chapter to the invasion of the Romans, and the misfortunes that followed it. Parker's Commentary, vol. v. p. 576. • Tacit. Hift lib. Y. t and and alacrity, and preferred an attack by storm to the flow operations of a blockade. A nation whofe tongue thou shalt not underftand. The tongue of the Romans the Jews did not understand. There certainly was fome fimilarity in the languages of the Jews and the Affyrians; but previous to the inva fion of Judea by Pompey, there had been no intercourse between the Jews and the Romans: and the Jews were utterly ignorant of the dialects of the western troops, which compofed the Roman armies. That the Romans were a nation of a fierce countenance, remarkable for their manly and ftern features, and intrepid aspect, might be eafily proved at large, from the representations of fculptors and medallifts, and the defcriptions of their poets and hiftorians. And their haughty and inflexible character is no lefs forcibly delineated in the following fentence: Which shall not regard the perfon of the old, nor fhew favour to the young. Befides the reference to the indifcriminate flaughter and cruel treatment of the Jews of all ages, both at and after the fiege of Jerufalem, It ought to be observed, that at the time when when Mofes uttered this Prophecy, the chil dren of Ifrael, fo far from having any fenced cities, had no fixed place of refidence, but were travelling through the wilderness. The threats of their Lawgiver could not therefore refult from any circumftances of their fituation at that particular time: yet still he defcribes every circumftance in the fame manner as Jofephus, who wrote the account of thefe wars nearly 1500 years after the prediction. The Lord fhall fmite thee with madness and blindness. At the time when Jerufalem was closely preffed on all fides by the Roman armies, three factions, influenced by the most bitter rancour and malice, carried on a civil war within its walls. In proportion as fafety became more improbable, their audacity, or rather their infatuation, increased, and extended to all ranks, from the rulers to the common people. All were equally blind to their dreadful fituation; and internal difcord confpired with their ferocious enemies to hurry them down the precipice of destruction. Jofephus, after relating that the be fieged, elated by a repulse given to the Ro De Bell. Jud, lib. v. c. 8... mans, |