THIS obvious metachronism is the unavoidable con sequence of taking four full years from the age of the world, and of connecting the hiftorical date of our Lord's nativity with A. M. 4000. But the origin of this mistake is not now the fubject of difcuffion. Its effects must be examined. It contradicts the numbers and imagery of the prophetical vifion in the fourth chapter of Ezekiel ;-nay, perverts the very terms by which the whole is explained. The complex apparatus relates entirely to a then future fiege of Jerufalem;-a fiege of a determinate length;-neither more nor less than 390 natural days. These natural days reprefented as many natural years in paft hiftorical time. If the first of the 390 days represented the first of the 390 years, evident is the abfurdity of affirming, that the 390th year and the 390th day had a different termination. FROM the time of raifing the fiege, 40 days more were to intervene before the carrying away of Judah into captivity. Thefe reprefent as many years of the divine patience towards the tribes of Judah and Benjamin (comprehending alfo the remains of the ten other tribes, who had adhered to the houfe of David, fince the reduction of Samaria); and are counted in. the scheme from the 10th of Tamuz to the 20th of Ab. The 40 correfpondent years are numbered from the beginning of Jeremiah's miniftry, in the 13th of Jofiah. Sixth Age of the World. CHAP. I. From the Refloration of the Jews to the Fall of the Perfian Empire.. I N the interval, from the 19th of Nebuchadnezzar to the first of Cyrus, very little is recorded of the Hebrew captives, while exiles from their country. FOR Connecting the hiftory of this people, and the chronology of the fubfequent times, with the Mathematical Syntaxis of Ptolemy, is wanted a counterpart, fimilar to the Royal Calendar in Judah. From this defect arifes the lofs of a national directory in computation. A register, though not compiled wholly by inspired writers, neither in the form of a national directory, occurs. Its materials exist, though in a state of dif perfion, among the records of various nations. This was precifely the condition of the Jews themselves, after the diffolution of their monarchy. But ftill the femblance of supremacy was preserved, in the perfons of certain chiefs, called Princes of the Captivity, or in high priests, often invefted with the functions of magiftracy. In the facred and apocryphal books, as far as they extend, are preferved the names, number, and order of fucceffion, in which fuch princes, or pontiffs, obtained jurisdiction, from the firft of Cyrus, to the nominal fovereignty of Herod, when the high priefthood ceafed to be hereditary. Much ufeful information of this fort, is likewife contained in the Alexandrine Chronicle *; but especially in Jofephus, who is much more accurate in his accounts of the high priefts, fubfequent to the clofe of the Hebrew canon, than in the times of the Judges and Kings. Ar the time of Zedekiah's degradation, Seraiah was put to death at Riblah, after he had worn the mitre. about 13 years. During the captivity we read of no other high priest than his fon, Jofadac. Probable it is, that he did not all that time hold this honourable rank, If he did not, he might have been fucceeded by an elder Son, or, as was not unusual, in the event of a minority, by a prieft in the collateral line, till Jefhua fhould attain the legal age of confecration. Invested with this character he returned with Zorobabel, and retained the dignity 53 years. AN objection is to be removed. In the fecond year of Cyrus, Jeshua had fons appointed to set forward the work of the Temple; which implies an advanced age at the time of the return from Babylon, and renders improbable the hypothefis of fo very long a pontificate t. It was first discovered in an old library in Sicily. One copy was brought to Rome, another afterwards to Augsburgh in Germany, where it was tranflated and published in 1624. Prideaux prefers, in many things, its authority to that of Africanus and Eufebius. + Ezra, iii. 9. BUT BUT Jeshua the high priest is always characterized as the fon of Jofadac. Whereas the Jefhua in the specified text, and in all others, where his name occurs, was of the Levites, a class inferior even to that of the ordinary priests*. The Jefhua, whose sons set forward the work of the house of the Lord, was the Levite, and is always mentioned with Kadmiel. In this period Aaron's rod began to blossom afresh, when the prerogatives, annexed for a time, to the fceptre of Judah, were reftricted to his own tribe. Frimo avulfo, non deficit alter Aureus, & fimili frondefcit virga metallo. VIRG. One pluck'd away, a fecond branch ye fee SUCH are the numerous records, whence may be conftructed a competent directory for regulating the chronology of the times, to which the canonical history does not reach. In certain notations they differ from one another. To them is not afcribed the attribute of infallibility. The writings even of the infpired hiftorians and prophets feem in fome things to difagree. But apparently difcordant paffages being brought to the test of sound criticism, conformably to the course of nature, and the truth of computation, every colour of ambiguity, error, or impofture, acquires the aspect of credibility. See Ezra ii. 40. Neh. vii. 43-x. 9 -xii. 8. 24. See alfo Dr. Wall's note on Ezra, iii. 9; and Prideaux, vol. i. 215. ful. edition. ANALYSIS go ANALYSIS of the Jewish history, under the princes Years from the death of Seraiah, A. M. 3421. IT now remains, that the anachronisms in the Annals 1. THE identity of Cambyfes, the fon of Cyrus, CAMBYSES, and his fucceffor Smerdis, the impoftor, ble |