my Spirit upon the house of Israel, saith the Lord God." The positive assurance-" neither will I hide my face any more from them"-demonstrates that the fulfilment is yet future, for nothing is more notorious than that the Jews have been under the hidings of God's face for centuries past.

If we feel ourselves at liberty then to evaporate the solid substances here submitted to us into airy phantoms in the alembic of a spiritualizing interpretation, what portion of holy writ can plead exemption from the same process? The Grotian mode of solution, which turns the whole into an emblematic device designed to set forth the reinstatement of the Jews in the enjoyment of civil privileges, in their own land, after the return under the decree of Cyrus, though inadequate, may yet be tolerated as preserving the substantial truth of the imagery of the bones; but what favor can be shown to a construction that entirely merges the original express subject of the vision in some arbitrary spiritual creation, for which no adequate authority, no satisfactory reasonings, can be adduced? To make the house of Israel here a typical term for the Christian church, is very like making the figurative resurrection of the dry bones a proof direct of the general resurrection of the dead. The following extract from "Begg's Connected View," p. 19, has a pertinency in this relation which cannot be mistaken.

"If these predictions do not prove the future restoration of the literal Israel to the land of their fathers, it may certainly be asked, In what lan-guage could such a promise be made, that would not be equally liable to be misapplied, perverted, or discredited? We may as well deny the literal conversion as the literal restoration of Israel-most of the passages which assure us of the one, predicting also the other. If it was not a figurative dispersion they suffered, neither will it be a figurative restoration they shall enjoy. And if dispersion was a part of the punishment of their national transgression, so also will restoration be obtained when forgiven of the Lord, and will be connected with their national repentance. And how wonderfully has the Lord preserved the Jews for this display of His sovereignty and grace! Although scattered into every nation of Europe, -nay, attracted into every country under heaven into which commerce has been introduced-and possessed, as many of them are, of immense wealth-they have not been allowed to become the proprietors of any soil. They have no inheritance in other lands, and they have always cherished a passionate desire to return to their own. Throughout their long captivity, they have been thus kept unsubjected to the influence of other local attachments, and in a state of constant readiness for migration ; and recent movements among them render it highly probable that the time of their general departure is at hand. By the dispensations of His providence, the Lord is manifestly preparing the way for their return. In the plenitude of their uncontrolled power, earthly potentates may indeed combine, and, with a view to perpetuate their systems of iniquity, may create kingdoms at will, allot to them the territories they shall possess, and appoint the kings by whom they shall be governed, without asking counsel of the Lord, or regulating their decisions by His 'sure decree.' In all their

calculations, Israel may not be reckoned; in their disposal of territory, no portion may be assigned for their inheritance. But the God of Jacob has purposed, and who shall disannul it? "Zion shall be redeemed with judgments, and her converts with righteousness.' 'But ye, O mountains of Israel, ye shall shoot forth your branches, and yield your fruit to my people of Israel; for they are at hand to come.' Is. i. 27. Ezek. xxxvi. 8."

The parallelisms of prophecy are all important in any exegetic process. They do not always lie upon the surface of Scripture, like the bones spread over the face of the visionary valley. But a studious inquest will frequently reveal them, and we rejoice over them as one that has found great spoil. In regard to the present oracle, we believe it is to be brought into juxtaposition with two or three passages in the other prophets which are seldom viewed in this connexion. Of these the following stands conspicuous: Is. 66. 14, “And when ye see this your heart shall rejoice, and your bones shall flourish like an herb." The connected words have only to be read to convince any one that the period referred. to is precisely that which is contemplated in the present vision, as it is the prediction of a day when Jerusalem, or the Jewish nation, is to be signally honored, and "peace extended to her like a river, and the glory of the Gentiles like a flowing stream." Most intimately related to this is another passage of the same prophet, and referring to the same time, ch. 26. 12-19, where the subject of the prophecy is undoubtedly the Jews in the latter ages. Vitringa, Michaelis, and other expositors are satisfied that it does not refer to the period of the Babylonish captivity, though that may have given occasion to the peculiar style of announcement adopted. After putting into their lips the acknowledgment, " O Lord our Lord, other lords beside thee have had dominion over us, but by thee only will we make mention of thy name," they go on to say, that these their former enemies and masters are dead, they shall not live; they are deceased, they shall not rise; therefore thou hast visited and destroyed them, and made all their memory to perish." They then proceed, by way of contrasting their own more privileged lot with that of their oppressors, to declare in an address to the Most High, and in the language of firm assurance, "Thy dead men shall live, together with my dead body shall they arise. Awake, and sing, ye that dwell in dust: for thy dew is the dew of herbs, and the earth shall cast out the dead." This is all but universally conceded to be the foreshowing not of a literal but of a figurative resurrection. Their resuscitation, as Mr. Barnes remarks, (in loc.) imports that "they shall be restored to their country, and be reinstated in all their rights and immunities as a people among the nations of the earth. This restoration shall be as striking as would be a resurrection of the dead from their graves. Though therefore this

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does not refer primarily to the resurrection of the dead, yet the illustration is drawn from that doctrine, and implies that that doctrine was one with which they were familiar." As to the connected phrases Mr. B. further remarks, "they may be rendered my deceased, my dead, and will thus be parallel with the phrase, thy dead men,' and is used in the same sense with reference to the same species of resurrection. It is not the language of the prophet Isaiah, as if he referred to his own body when it should be dead, but it is the language of the choir that sings and that speaks in the name of the Jewish people. That people is thus introduced as saying, my dead,' that is, our dead,' shall rise. Not only in the address to Jehovah is this sentiment uttered, when it is said, 'thy dead shall rise;' but when the attention is turned to themselves as a people they say 'our dead shall rise;' those that appertain to our nation shall rise from the dust, and be restored to their own privileges and land."

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As the imagery then of the two prophets is perfectly tantamount, we see no good reason to doubt that both predictions refer to the same event; and we believe we may safely interpret Dan. 12. 2, of the same period and the same accomplishment: "And many of them that sleep in the dust of the earth shall awake, some to everlasting life, and some to shame and everlasting contempt;" implying that that which was a national restoration to all, should be a spiritual resurrection only to a part. The rest, by abiding in unbelief, should incur a doom of woe and wrath commensurate with the blessings which they forfeited. The mention of the dew,' as the emblem of the reviving influence by which the morally dead are resuscitated, and consequently of the Spirit of God, the true agent, naturally reminds us of other passages which this term is a connecting link to bind together in union with the present. Thus Hos. 14. 15, "I will be as the dew unto Israel; he shall grow as the lily, and shoot forth his roots as Lebanon." This, from the context, can be referred to no period so properly as to the final restoration of Israel, as the declaration immediately preceding is, "I will heal their backsliding, I will love them freely; for mine anger is turned away from him." When shall this be realized but in the day of Jacob's redemption? Again, Is. 18. 4, " For so the Lord said unto me, I will take my rest, and I will consider in my dwelling-place (Marg. I will regard my set dwelling), like a clear heat upon herbs, and like a cloud of dew in the heat of harvest." This refers to the time when an ensign is to be lifted up upon the mountains, and the great trumpet blown (comp. Is. 27. 13), and "the present brought unto the Lord of hosts, of a people scattered and peeled, and terrible (venerable) from the beginning, to the place of the name of the Lord of hosts, the Mount Zion." This is

unquestionably the future return of the dispersed of Israel to their own land. Once more, Mic. 5. 7," And the remnant of Jacob shall be in the midst of many people as a dew from the Lord, as the showers upon the grass, that tarrieth not for man, nor waiteth for the sons of men." When the dew' of divine influence has revived them, they shall themselves become as a renovating dew' to the heathen nations, among whom they shall sojourn, and in whose conversion they shall be instrumental. Thus strikingly do we find the present prophecy ramified in its connexions with various other portions of the Scriptures, all bearing on the same great and glorious issue.

Behold, they say, Our bones are dried, and our hope is lost. Heb., our expectation is perished. Gr. άnóλwhev ý éλnis quor, our hope has perished. Nothing could be more appropriate to express the burden of despondency which the depressed, afflicted, down-trodden condition of the Jews has for ages put into their lips. They are a people sick with hope deferred. The accumulation of their sufferings in all ages since the crucifixion has impressed a character of grief and depression upon their nation, and the tone of sorrow, lamentation, and woe, pervades all their utterances as a people. Continually expecting their Messiah, yet continually disappointed, they present a living image of despair. Withered, bowed, woe-begone, they evince an inner consciousness, which they do not seldom express, that the curse and blight of heaven is upon them. A dispirited, downcast, and mournful air, is the very national costume of the Jew. Wherever found they are marked by this characteristic, and that too just in proportion to the degree in which they are imbued with the true spirit and genius of Judaism, and are conscientious in the performance of its rites. The true devotee of the Talmud always presents the aspect of one who is weighed down by the yoke of ceremonies, and oppressed with the mournful lot of his people. He wears the demeanor of one who is incessantly engaged in fruitless attempts to solve the problem of the long-continued sufferings of his race, and the language of the text is the language of his condition, even when his lips refuse utterance to the despairing words. It is virtually the language which the prophet attributes to them in the parallel prediction already considered, Is. 26. 17—18," Like as a woman with child, that draweth near the time of her delivery, is in pain, and crieth out in her pangs; so have we been in thy sight, O Lord. We have been with child, we have been in pain, we have, as it were, brought forth wind; we have not wrought any deliverance in the earth." This from age to age has been the dominant mental state of these "tribes of the wandering foot and weary breast." That hope which comest to all, comes not to them, after the lapse of centuries of sore disap

pointment. It has sunk to its last expiring gleam in their bosoms, and they find no solace in the prospect of the future. Their perpetual unuttered apostrophe is," O God, why hast thou cast us off forever? why doth thine anger smoke against the sheep of thy pasture?—We see not our signs; there is no more any prophet; neither is there any among us that knoweth how long." It is while groaning under the pressure of this calamity that the reviving message embodied in this prediction is to reach their inmost souls. In the midnight depths of their darkness this morning-star of hope is to arise. It is the wont of the divine benignity to take occasion from the extremest straits of his people to illustrate the riches of his grace. He that scattered Israel will yet gather him again, and though the mercy promised is not irrespective of their faith in the Messiah of the Gospel, yet their past unbelief shall not preclude the exercise of that sovereignty of beneficence which secures their future blessedness.

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We are cut off for our parts. Heb. we are cut off for us, or for ourselves. The pronominal adjection for us, for ourselves, seems designed to give a peculiar einphasis to the term denoting their cutting off. Rosenmüller remarks that this is often the effect of the appending of pronouns in this manner by the medium of the preposition to or for. It is as if it were said, considered in ourselvesviewed as to our own ability or sufficiency-we are completely cut off; we lie as withered branches severed from the parent trunk, and have no inherent power to recover ourselves again to life and vigor. The language will at once clothe itself with fuller significance when we advert to the true import of the original word for "cut off." The Heb. properly and naturally denotes that kind of cutting which takes place when the branch of a tree is severed from the stock, and accordingly the term in that language for axe is, a direct derivative from this root. The idea of pruning is one that comes properly under the radical, and its metaphorical usage may be seen from the following examples: 2 Chron. 26.21,"And Uzziah the king was a leper unto the day of his death, and dwelt in a several (separated) house, being a leper; for he was cut off (1) from the house of the Lord." Is. 53. 8,“ For he was cut off (1) from the land of the living." In the following passages the word is brought into closer connexion with the present, as we may suppose the language to be that of a kind of prophetic plaint uttered by the Jews, in the persons of their typical representatives, David and Jeremiah, in the depths of their national distresses. Ps. 88. 3-5," For my soul is full of troubles, and my life draweth nigh unto the grave. I am counted with them that go down into the pit; I am as a man that hath no strength; free among the dead, like the slain that lie in the grave, whom thou rememberest no more; and they are cut