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THE

CHRONOLOGICAL PROPHECIES ;

AS CONSTITUTING A

CONNECTED SYSTEM

IN WHICH THE

PRINCIPAL EVENTS OF THE DIVINE DISPENSATIONS ARE
DETERMINED BY THE PRECISE REVELATION
OF THEIR DATES;

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1872, Dec. 14. Gift of J. Herbert Senter, of Cambridge. (86.21.1861.)

C. WHITTINGHAM, TOOKS COURT,

CHANCERY LANE.

383

NOLAR)

TO THE

MOST REVEREND WILLIAM

(BY DIVINE PROVIDENCE)

LORD ARCHBISHOP OF CANTERBURY,

PRIMATE OF ALL ENGLAND AND METROPOLITAN,
&c. &c. &c.

MY LORD ARCHBISHOP,

ON the possibility of fixing a chronological scale, in the ancient cycles; which would bring demonstrative evidence to the intervals, by which the course of time was measured: I have been frequently indulged by your Grace with a patient, and I venture to believe, a favourable hearing. In the course of Lectures, which I was chosen to deliver, by your appointment and recommendation, the principle, which I believe adequate to the purpose, is so far reduced to practice, that judgment may be passed on its feasibility. I now approach your Grace, with the result of my labors; and I

beg to offer them, if not as an evidence of the zeal with which the trust committed to me has been discharged, as testifying the grateful sense under which it was accepted.

Whatever be the feeling, with which the offering is received, I will venture to hope, that in the particular form, in which my views are now embodied; the principle derives, from the subject to which it is applied, that interest and importance which may give it some claim to attention. The determination of the epochs of the Assyrian or Egyptian chronology, by the genethliacal or canicular cycle, have but a secondary recommendation; as the result brings confirmation to the sacred records, or leads to the subversion of speculative systems, by which they would be opposed or controverted. But in the establishment of the dates of Prophecy by the sabbatical cycle: as tending to the establishment of our faith, by a new and demonstrative species of evidence; the highest interests of humanity are promoted, in the confirmation which is brought to Revealed Religion.

The principle, which I venture to submit, with these claims to your Grace, I am fully aware, must derive its chief recommendation

from its practical effect and utility. But the range and nature of its application may, I hope entitle it to a favorable consideration, as lightening the pains of inquiry into its pretensions. As the great scheme of divine providence, for the recovery of mankind from the curse of sin and sorrow, is progressively submitted, in the course of discussion, to the chronological test; the scene which passes in review is arrayed in all that is calculated to attract or fix attention, from being great and glorious. It is generally allowed, that a purely sabbatical tendency is manifest in the end purposed in his dispensation by the Deity; who has bound himself under the most solemn obligation to lead his elect people into a holy rest. And it may be easily proved, that the same character pervades the entire system of his providence, from the first revelation of his gracious purpose. In the bare statement of these subjects, a sufficient inducement is offered to stimulate inquiry into their reality, however they may be deemed incapable of strict demonstration. And if, as the subjoined work professes to prove, the pervading principle, which gives this sabbatical character to the entire system of Revelation, furnishes in the cycles, by which the festivals

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