knees? Did He not comfort the widow, and bring joy to those who had none to help-none to look unto? And did He not, after he was cruelly and spitefully treated by his enemies, send his Holy Comforter to perform these same offices? To whom then could these distinguished appellations be claimed, but by Jesus Christ, the Son of God 1? "Whatsoever allowances be granted for oriental hyperbole ; whatever deductions be made on this account from the grandeur of this description, there is one part at least, which must be taken literally. When Isaiah declared, that of his government there should be no end, the expression is too precise to admit any latitude of interpretation. This part, therefore, must be interpreted literally. But of what temporal prince can we say, that his government has no end? There are also other reasons, which prevent its application to any temporal prince among the Jews. The prophecy was delivered in the reign of Hezekiah, to whom indeed a son was born; but a son who was neither Counsellor, nor Wonderful, nor the Prince of Peace. For 'Manasseh made Judah and the inhabitants of Jerusalem to err, and to do worse than the heathens, whom the Lord had destroyed before the children of Israel.' 2 Chron. xxxiii. 9. And his government had not only an end, but a melancholy end: for the King of Assyria 'bound him with fetters, and carried him captive to Babylon.' Nor did many years elapse, before Jerusalem itself was levelled to the ground. And if we examine the later period of the Jewish history, if we endeavour to find in this sublime passage a description either of Judas Maccabæus, or of Simon, or of Hyrcanus, or of any other prince of the Asmonæan race, the prophecy is again inapplicable; for those princes were not of the house of - David and to the house of David was that prophecy restricted. It applies therefore to the person of the Messiah, and of the Messiah alone."-Marsh's Lectures. CHAP. XI. 2. MATT. iii. 16. From the sunken state, in which the family of David was, the prophet takes occasion in the eleventh chapter to describe the glorious attributes of the Great Restorer and King, and the spiritual constitution of his kingdom. The words, in which the prophet, in the second verse, depicts the Spirit of God abiding upon him, and enduing him with celestial gifts, are modifications of those, which declared the government to be upon his shoulder, and his name to be Wonderful, Counsellor, and the Mighty God. From an allusion to these, he takes occasion to show the perfection of his kingdom, the absence of all tumult, sin, and crime from it, and the incorporation of the Gentiles; at the same time painting its glory and blessedness under the most beautiful metaphors. He points also to a more distant era, when the scattered sons of Israel shall be restored to the promised land of their forefathers; when the animosity between Judah and Ephraim shall be at an end, and all shall become willing subjects of the Messiah. He then concludes his prophecy with a song of thanksgiving, which he puts into the mouth of the redeemed. Here are several things, that demand great attention. The Messiah is again introduced, as the shoot or Branch; and the root of David, is particularly Quotations from 12. 2 Thess. ii. 18; cited in Apoc. v. 5. xxii. 16. this prophecy occur in Rom. xv. and we may usefully collate it with Micah v. 1. The Messiah is introduced as, at first, a weak branch sprouting out of the root of David', then increasing in strength and vigour, until, dropping the metaphor the prophet launches into a description of the glory and universality of the Messiah's dominion. Not very dissimilar to it is the following. "Thus saith the Lord God; I will also take of the highest branch of the high cedar, and will set it; I will crop off from the top of his young twigs a tender one, and will plant it upon an high mountain and an eminent; In the mountain of the height of Israel will I plant it; and it shall bring forth boughs, and bear fruit, and be a goodly cedar; and under it shall dwell all fowl of every wing; in the shadow of the branches thereof shall they dwell 2." Here we have an exact prediction of the small beginning, of the subsequent extension, and final universality of the Christian religion. It is also to be observed, that it is not the spirit of Elohim, as in other parts of the Bible, but the Spirit of Jehovah, the Divine Essence, which is to rest upon him; a pregnant proof in connection with others, that Isaiah promulgated the Messiah to be God. Nay, when 1 See Chap. liii. 2 Ezek. xvii. 22, 23. we consider the paronomasia of the Hebrews, it almost amounts to a certainty, that where his salvation is mentioned, and where he is described as the Saviour, the prophet had a clear allusion to the name of Jesus, in which we are confirmed by the emphatic manner, in which the angel mentioned in St. Matthew desired it to be given to Him. These may have been among the Scriptures, which Christ expounded respecting Himself to his disciples after his resurrection. This resting of the Spirit on Christ Jerome has very properly compared to the visible resting of the Holy Ghost upon our Saviour, when He was baptized by John in the river Jordan. In the second verse of the twelfth chapter it is demonstrable from the prophecy itself, that this Saviour was God, the Lord Jehovah, who has been called the Mighty God, and Jehovah our Righteousness; consequently, that the Christian ascription of Divinity to the Messiah was warranted by the antecedent disclosures of God by the mouths of his prophets'. 'Some traces of this prophecy were among the Gentiles. Thus Virgil in his fourth Eclogue: Occidet et serpens, et fallax herba veneni Occidet. Nec magnos metuent armenta leones. Nec lupus insidias pecori. And Horace : Nec vespertinus circumgemit ursus ovile, Nec intumescit alta viperis humus. And CHAP. XXXV. HEB. xii. 12, 13, &c. The thirty-fifth chapter is prophetic of the flourishing state of Christ's kingdom, which was to commence at the advent of the Messiah. Before his appearance the world was as a wilderness; but when his Gospel was made known, when the good tidings were proclaimed," the wilderness and the solitary place were glad, and the desert rejoiced and blossomed as the rose." But as a great part of the world is still a desert, the full accomplishment of this prophecy is yet to be completed: for "righteousness shall cover the earth, as the waters cover the sea." All the anti-christian powers shall be shaken, Christianity shall flourish, and all nations, kindreds, and tongues shall fall down and worship Jehovah in the spirit of truth and love. To Him indeed shall the gathering of the people be. The very Jews, who crucified their Lord and Master shall throw off their hardness of heart and confess Him before men. The tawny African and the Asiatic, shall cast down their rude altars, and their molten images, and flock to the Christian standard. Yea! the whole world shall be converted by the testimony of Jesus. "It shall blossom abundantly, and rejoice even with joy and singing, the glory of Lebanon shall be given unto it, And Theocritus: ἔσται δὴ τοῦτ ̓ ἦμαρ, ὁπανίκα νεβρὸν ἐν εὐνᾷ |