The observation already made respecting the identity of the term, by which weeks and seventy are expressed in the original, easily supplies the answer. For the present translation, weeks seven and weeks sixty and two, we are thus enabled to read, weeks seven and seventy, leaving the number sixty and two to connect with the following passage, with which it has always been connected, even according to the existing translation, in point of sense.

To make this plain to the mere English reader, let the passage, weeks seven and weeks sixty and two, (which he may be assured is a literal rendering of the original both as to the words and as to their position) be read without the words sixty and two, it will then become weeks seven and weeks; and for this last word weeks let seventy be substituted, weeks seven and seventy becomes the reading of the passage. In this, it must be noted, the original has undergone no alteration whatsoever. The

words have been used in their natural and familiar signification; and no change has been introduced, save in the pointing of the sentence, which, as it had no existence in the original hebrew, stands on no better authority than the private judgment of uninspired individuals, and is consequently at all times open to such modifications as the nature of the context may suggest.

But not only is the translation, which has been proposed, admissible, for the reasons just stated; but it is positively authenticated by the most ancient Greek version of Daniel: the Version of the Seventy, which has of late years been discovered and given to the public, reading the numbers, as we have done, seven and seventy. For it must be remembered, that the Greek version of the book of Daniel, heretofore in use, has not been that of the Seventy, but of Theodotion; the former having been long sought after, but not until lately recovered, being found in the Chisian library

at Rome, and published in the year 1772, from a manuscript stated at that time to be nearly 900 years old.

If then we are to interpret the prophecy, as pronouncing, that, from the going forth of the decree to restore and to build Jerusalem unto Messiah the prince, there should be seven and seventy weeks, we shall be surprised to find with what wonderful exactness it has received its accomplishment.

These seventy-seven weeks, (reckoning them according to the known language of prophecy, as weeks of years,) amount tỏ five hundred and thirty-nine years, and these, computing, as is reasonable, by the prophetic (or as some call it the Chaldean) year, complete an interval of five hundred and thirty-one years of the Julian standard with the addition of ninety-two days: a distance, at which, it will appear, from the most accurate chronological researches, the decree of Cyrus is removed from the birth

of Christ—that decree, which is itself pointed out by prophecy * for the rebuilding of Jerusalem and the restoration of the Jews from captivity; and that glorious advent, which is so frequently the subject of prophetic exultation, the long looked for coming of the MESSIAH.

The Angel having thus announced the exact time of the coming of the MESSIAH, by its reference to the decree of Cyrus, proceeds to inform the Prophet of the fates of his country, with which the advent of that great person was so essentially

* "That saith of Cyrus, He is my Shepherd, and shall perform all my pleasure; even saying to Jerusalem, Thou shalt be built, and to the temple, Thy foundation shall be laid." Isaiah xliv. 28.—And again, in the following chapter, v. 13, the prophet is made to pronounce of the same great deliverer, in the words of Jehovah, " He shall build my city, and He shall let go my captives." Yet more, Cyrus acknowledges himself to be but an instrument in the hand of the Almighty in performing this great work; declaring, that "The Lord God of heaven had charged him to build Him an house at Jerusalem," and in consequence thereof issues a proclamation of deliverance for the Jews. 2 Chron. xxxvi. 22. Ezra, i. 1, 2. And all this happens, at the expiration of the seventy years' captivity, which had been predicted by Jeremiah. So that the decree which is referred to in Daniel, as the " decree to restore and to build Jerusalem,” can be no other than the decree of Cyrus, which had been already so long the subject of prophecy.

connected, and to which the prayer of the prophet so immediately related. He subjoins therefore to his account of the weeks that were to precede the birth of Christ, the notice that during sixty-two of these the city and its walls should have been standing in a perfectly completed state; or, in other words, that at the birth of Christ sixty and two weeks should have elapsed from the perfect rebuilding of the city and its walls. Know therefore and understand, that from the going forth of the commandment to restore and to build Jerusalem, unto MESSIAH the PRINCE shall be Weeks Seven and Seventy: Threescore and Two shall the street be built again and the wall."

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Now these Sixty and Two weeks, or four hundred and thirty-four prophetic years, are equal to four hundred and twenty-seven years of Julian reckoning, and two hundred and seventy-eight days: and these, counted backwards from the birth of Christ, will