The Monarchies

Prophefy. Or how can any one think, that Isaiah fhould
fay fo many great and wonderful Things of a Prophet,
who was, in all Refpects, inferior to himself? What was
there fo ftupendous in the Birth of Jeremiah, as fhould
make Ifaiah cry out here, Who fhall declare his Generation?
This can agree only to the eternal Generation of our blef-
fed Lord. How are we healed by Jeremiah's Stripes? And
what Prophet was ever made a vicarious Punishment, for
the Sins of the People?

Nor will the Expofition of fome other modern Jews, who apply this Prophefy to the Jewish Nation, be of more Validity. For how fhould the Prophet ever come to defcribe that refractory People, who were always fo ftubborn under their Afflictions, by a Lamb that openeth not his Month? When that Nation was fo often reproved by the Prophets, for their enormous Sins. How could they be faid to have done no Violence, neither to have any Deceit in their Mouth? How could the Jews, who were God's People, be faid to be stricken for the Transgreffions of God's People? This is to make the fame Jews to be both Innocent and Tranfgreffors, to fuffer and not to fuffer at the fame Time; which is fuch horrible Nonfenfe, as is not to be endured.

Phil. I confefs I am more puzzled with this Chapter, than any other Place I know of; and when I am more at Leifure, I will give it a more attentive Confideration than I have hitherto done. And now, Sir, will you be pleased to proceed to fome other Prediction.

Cred. Next, Sir, I defire you would reflect upon that wonderful Prophefy contained in the II. VII. VIII. and and Weeks IX. Chapters of Daniel. I pray you attentively to conProphefies fider, how evidently he fets forth the four great Monarof Chrift. chies of the World: Firft, By the Interpretation of

in Daniel's

Nebuchadnezzar's Dream, Chap. II. And then again,
By the Representation of the four great Beafts, Chap.
VII. and VIII. How should it ever enter into Daniel's
Thoughts, unless affifted by the fore-knowing Spirit of
God, that the Kingdom of Perfia fhould be deftroyed by
Alexander the Great, or the King of Grecia, as it is

*

plainly

plainly fet down, Dan. viii. 21? Or that, upon the first King of Grecia's Death, feveral Kingdoms should arife out of his Conquefts? v. 21. What fhould move him to fay, That in the latter Time of their Kingdom (i. e. of the Grecian Monarchy) when the Tranfgreffors are come to the full, a King of fierce Countenance, and understanding dark Sentences, fhall ftand up; and his Power shall be mighty, but not by his own Power, and he shall destroy wonderfully, and Shall profper and practice, and fall destroy the mighty, and the holy People. And through his Policy he shall caufe Craft to profper in his Hand, and he fall magnify himself in his Heart, and by Peace fhall destroy many; he shall stand up against the Prince of Princes, but he shall be broken without Hand, &c. Dan. viii. 23. Which is a perfect Defcription of the Power, the Pride, and Craft of King Antiochus, one of the Seleucide; as alfo of his unmerciful Cruelty to the holy People, or the Jews, and of his remarkable Death, as you may find them recorded in the Books of the Maccabees, and in Jofephus. But this is not all; for after the Prophet has been foretelling of the Succeffions of these four earthly Monarchies, he begins to tell of the heavenly or fpiritual Kingdom of Christ. And in the Days of thefe Kings fhall the God of Heaven fet up a Kingdom, which fhall never be destroyed, and the Kingdom Shall not be left to other People, but it shall break in Pieces, and confume all thefe Kingdoms, and it shall stand for ever, Forafmuch as thou faweft, that the Stone was cut out of the Mountain without Hands, and that it brake in Pieces the Iron, the Clay, the Brafs, &c. Dan. ii. 44. And when in the VII Chap. he speaks of the fame Monarchies under the Reprefentation of Beafts, he fays: As concerning the reft of the Beafts they had their Dominion taken away, yet their Lives were prolonged for a Seafon and a Time. I faw in the Night Visions, and behold one like the Son of Man came with the Clouds of Heaven, and came to the Ancient of Days, and they brought him near before him: And there was given him Dominion, and Glory, and a Kingdom, that all People, Nations, and Languages fhould ferve him: His Dominion is an everlasting Dominion, which shall not pass away, and his Kingdom

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Kingdom that which fall not be deftroyed. And again,
The Saints of the most High fhall take the Kingdom, and
poffefs the Kingdom for ever, even for ever and ever.
Now what greater Evidence can be required of the Truth
of the Chriftian Religion, then that fo many hundred Years
before, it should be predicted, That, in the Time of the
fourth of these great Monarchies, or the Roman Empire,
the Kingdom of the Son of Man, or Jefus Chrift, fhould
be established, which fhould continue for ever? It is
very wonderful that Daniel, who lived in fo early an Age,
fhould foretell, fo exactly, not only the Diffolution of
the great Empire he then lived under, but of feveral
others that fucceeded upon it; and fhould give fuch a
particular Description of King Antiochus, and his barba
rous Ufage of the Jews, as looks more like a Hifto-
ry than a Prophefy. But it improves our Faith to a Sort
of Demonstration, to find this holy Prophet, fo many
Ages before, foretelling the Succefs of the Chriftian Reli
gion, and the Kingdom of Chrift enduring for ever. If
we fuppofe, with you Deifts, that all this was a rambling
Guefs; yet how could Daniel guefs at a thing which
he cannot be fupposed to have thought of? One could
hardly fuppofe that a Man, who lived under the Power
and Grandeur of one of the Eastern Monarchies, could
ever think it should be destroyed by a King of Grecia,
a poor inconfiderable Spot of Ground in refpect of their
vaft Dominions, and, at the Time when Daniel lived,very
little known at Babylon? But it is inconceivable, how it
fhould enter into Daniel's Thoughts, to talk of a fpiri-
tual Kingdom of Saints, or good Men; and this at a Time,
when the Minds of the Jews were fet only upon a tem-
poral Kingdom, upon returning Home again, and being
victorious and glorious in their own Country. How
came he to guess that there fhould be a Perfon called the
Son of Man, that this Perfon fhould have Dominion and
Glory given him by God? That this Person was to have
a Kingdom, and that Kingdom to be of Saints, and thofe
Saints of all Nations and Languages, and their Kingdom
to continue to the End of the World too? After this
Rate

T.

Rate, one may write a Hiftory, as well as a Prophefy, by Guefs. In fhort, the great Porphyry was fo confounded by the furprising Exactness of this Prophefy, in relation to the four Monarchies, and the Cruelties of Antiochus, that he was forced to affert, That the Author of the Book of Daniel lived after Antiochus's Time. And I wonder why fome of you Deifts (to tread in your Master's Steps) don't as well affert, that he lived fince Conftantine, when the Empire became Chriftian: For the Prophefy is altogether as exact, about the Kingdom of Chrift, as about either of the Monarchies. Nay, if we were at this Day to contrive an hieroglyphical Description of the Prevalency of Chrift's Kingdom over the Powers of this World, and the Fall of the Pagan Empires by the Progrefs of Chriftianity; how could one better exprefs it, than by Daniel's Stone cut out of the Mountain without Hands, which brake in Pieces the Images, which reprefented the four Empires? What could be more ftrong and powerful, than those vast Monarchies? And yet the ftrongest of them, viz. that of Rome, that had fubdued and proudly ftood upon the Ruins of all the reft, and laid out all its Force, and Power, and Policy, against the Chriftian Religion, was never able to prevail against it. For, notwithstanding this, This Stone cut out of the Mountain without Hands, the Religion of Chrift that was founded upon no human Art nor Policy, a plain Inftitution, without any artificial Finery, propagated only by a few unlearned Fishermen, affifted by the Power of God, deftroyed all the Pagan Worship throughout the Roman Empire, brake down their Images, demolished their Temples, and banished their Gods, and never ceafed till it had perfectly broken in Pieces this great and gaudy Image, and had fubftituted, in lieu of it, the fpiritual Kingdom of Chrift, which muft endure to the End of the World.

This is a wonderful Prediction, and the more we confider it, the more we must admire it; and that alfo which follows concerning the Time of the Death of the Meffias, is not only the Subject of our Admiration, but likewife

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a great

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up

a great Confirmation of our Faith. After threescore and
two Weeks, the Meffias fhall be cut off, but not for him-
felf; and the People of the Prince that shall come, shall de-
ftroy the City and the Sanctuary, and the End thereof shall be
with a Flood, and unto the end of the War Defolations are
determined. And he shall confirm the Covenant with many
for one Week, and in the midst of the Week he shall caufe
the Sacrifice and the Oblation to cease; and, for the over-
Spreading of Abominations, he shall make it defolate, even
untill the Confummation, and that determined fhall be poured
out upon the Defolate, Dan. ix. 26, 27. Now if by these
62 Weeks, and the 7 mentioned before, which make
in all 69 Weeks, (fully to be compleat before the great
70th Week, v. 24. wherein these remarkable Things are
to happen) I fay, if by these we are to understand Weeks
of Years, as it muft in fome Places of Scripture, that is,
69 times 7 Years, or 474 Years, reckoning from the
Time of this Prophefy to the preaching of Christ, the
Time will come very near to the Account of our ordi-
nary Chronology; and, perhaps, if the Reigns of the
Perfian Kings, and fome other Particulars in Hiftory,
were well adjusted, this prophetical Computation would
exactly agree even with the Time of Chrift's Death. But
it has pleafed the wife Providence of God, to fuffer thefe
Matters to lie in fome Manner of Confufion, that our
Faith might be founded upon a nobler Principle than
that of Chronological Niceties: But yet the Prophefy,
if attentively confidered, carries as much Weight with it,
as if it agreed with the Chronological Tables to a day.
Here are predicted fo many of the principal Actions in
the Life of Chrift, as to their exact Time, and other
Particularities, that, after all the Subterfuges and Shifts
which can be made, they can be attributed only to the
all-knowing Spirit of God, that, fo many Ages before,
revealed them to this Prophet.

* Vid. Ez. Cap. iv. Rev. xii, 6. xiii. 5. and particularly, Gen. xxix• 27. Fulfil her Weeks, (i. c.) her Seven Years, Levit. xxix. 27. Thou fhalt number Seven Sabbaths, or Weeks, of Years unto thee.

How