Therefore, hear the prophet Daniel; for no other like him, has the Lord raised up, to discover to the world the order of its times, unto the end. No man before him, or after, has recorded for the admonition of the nations, a prophecy so distinct, so strongly marked in all its characteristic features, and yet so consistently united in one grand whole; so definite and precise in the order of the succession of events, and all terminating over and over again in the same everlasting kingdom of the saints and of" THE SON OF MAN."

This name, which our blessed Lord condescended to take in the flesh, and to delight in during his ministry, is revealed in Daniel's prophecy; and it was understood by the Jews, as it is by Christians, to characterise the Messiah, whose king. dom is an everlasting kingdom. And when the Lord preached the kingdom of heaven, he was understood to mean that same, particularly foretold in Daniel, of which, as Son of Man, he was in person the chosen heir, and anointed king. And the great error of the Jews was that same which prevails now, in expecting a temporal state of extraordinary felicity in this world:-and would that the similitude held no further! But truth it is, however fearful, that this felicity is not expected in the world with Jesus.-No matter why; the fact is so. The Jews had satisfactory reasons; and so have the Gentiles.

The Jews confidently expected deliverance from the Roman yoke, and in their turn universal dominion; as the church now expects to get the victory over the world, and to have the control of all nations, for the glory of God.

The Jews thought to gain this pre-eminence not without the arm of the Lord, outstretched in their behalf. Likewise the church are now expecting it, not without a manifest dis. play of the divine power, to convert the world.

But the Jews would not have Jesus, the son of David: they preferred Cesar, and even Barabbas. Jesus did not more freely offer himself to them, as the monarch of their expected

kingdom and millennium, than he now offers himself to Christians. But the Jews excused themselves: and so do the Gentiles. The Jews had a satisfactory reason in the meanness of his circumstances. The Christians find their apology in the height of his exaltation. So, from the antipodes of argument, they come to the same fearful conclusion. Christendom, as certainly looks for a millennium in this world, without the living presence of the Lord Jesus, as the Jews did, after they had procured his crucifixion. But disappointment came on the city of Jerusalem; and it must come over Christendom. They of old lost their millennium: and it must ever be so with those who expect great felicity in this world. Jesus gives his people no promise of felicity in this world. They should not look for it here, while he is in heaven: nor should they look for it to come here, except he bring it with him from heaven. The order of the time is revealed in Daniel, and also the manner and not by Daniel only; but by himself in person, and by all the prophets and the gospel of his coming again, in a time the world think not; but think a long season of " peace and safety."

Horne says: "Of all the old prophets, Daniel is the most distinct in the order of time, and easiest to be understood; and on this account Sir Isaac Newton observes, in those events which concern the last times, he must be the interpreter of the rest. All his predictions relate to each other, as if they were several parts of one general prophecy. The first is the easiest to be understood, and every succeeding prophecy adds something to the former." (Horne's Introduction. Vol. 4. p. 193.)

THE PROPHETIC IMAGE OF DIFFERENT METALS.

Possibly you will believe the poets. In heathen Greece, and pagan Rome, they looked forward with hope to a better and happier condition of things on earth, in which righteous. ness, peace, and the humane arts will flourish; and evil in all its forms will be forever cast out. But only the word of God presents this hope in a form tangible, clear, and consistent; and marks the order of its accomplishment; and loudly proclaims that its day is at hand. The poets of antiquity sang of the golden age, and of the age of silver fol. lowing, and of the brazen age, and of the iron age in which we live, and from which the earth is to return, they supposed, to the golden age anew. The Grecian poets, if I recollect right, designate theirs, as the brazen age: the Roman poets certainly mark theirs, as the iron age: but all agree that from the iron a return is had to the golden times.

The Eclogue of Virgil, addressed to Pollio, is so remarkably adapted in time and character to the birth and kingdom of our Lord Jesus Christ, that no reader can fail to be struck with the singular felicity of many of its lines.

It begins:

Sicelides Musae, paulo majora canamus.
Ultima cumaei venit jam carminis aetas:
Magnus ab integro seclorum nascitur ordo.
Jam redit et Virgo; redeunt Saturnia regna:
Jam nova progenies coelo demittitur alto.
Tu modo nascenti puero, quo ferrea primum
Desinet, ac toto surget gens aurea mundo.
Casta fave Lucina: tuus jam regnat Apollo.

I prefer the translation of Davidson, as follows:

Sicilian Muses, let us sing in yet higher strains.
The last era of prophecy is come.

* Cumae gave its own name to one of the Sibyls, or Roman prophetesses.

The great series of ages begins anew.

Both the Virgin, † and the Saturnian times return,

A new race from high heaven comes down.

Be kind to the babe, by whom the iron generation first

Shall end, and the golden generation arise all over the world,
O, chaste Lucina; thy own Apollo reigns.

This is wonderful. Stript of the pagan garniture, it is holy prophecy. But Daniel, with more than poetic inspiration, unfolded these things, through the dream of the Assyrian king, and manifested the hidden mysteries of the future, in the explanation of the image

"Whose brightness was excellent and the form thereof terrible. This image's head was of fine gold, his breast and his arms of silver, his belly and his thighs of brass, his legs of iron, his feet part of iron and part of clay. Thou sawest till a stone was cut out without hands, which smote the image upon his feet, that were of iron and clay, and brake them to pieces. Then was the iron, the clay, the brass, the silver, and the gold, broken to pieces together, and became like the chaff of the summer threshing floors; and the wind carried them away that no place was found for them; and the stone, that smote the image, became a great mountain, and filled the whole earth. This is the dream;" and the interpretation of it follows.

The image is one and entire. It presents in one view the dominions, that should rule the world to the end of time. The image is composed of four different metals; until, in the feet of it, clay is introduced, and mixed with the iron.The stone smites the image in the feet of iron and clay, and breaks them to pieces, and at the same time together with

† Astraea, the fabled Goddess of justice, reigned in the golden age, as did also Saturn. The wickedness of men compelled her to flee from earth to heaven, whence she returns to administer justice in the return of the golden age.

them the whole image also in all its parts, even to powder, "that no place was found for them :" and the stone fills "the whole earth."

The interpretation is given by the prophet, and is not to be mistaken: for he directly applies the head of gold to the Assyrian Monarch, to whom he expounded the dream and he plainly tells him, that another, a silver kingdom, after him should arise, inferior to his own; and another, a third kingdom of brass, which should bear rule over all the earth.

No difference of opinion scarcely exists, in relation to the kingdoms designated by the silver and brass for it is perfectly well known, that when the Assyrian of gold lost the empire, Cyrus, the Persian, with Darius the Mede, gained it; and must of necessity answer to the silver breast and arms of the image. And, again, their empire yielded to the arms of Alexander of Greece, commonly called the Great, who first among men is accounted the conqueror of the world as Daniel predicted two hundred years before his empire bore rule over the whole earth. Not the order of succession only, but this word, "which shall bare rule over the whole earth," fixes the prophecy of the third and brazen kingdom, upon Greece, beyond any possibility of a mistake, through the Macedonian Alexander.

And if some think this is not the Lord's manner, to unvail the order of succession in this world's empires merely : I reply, that the situation of Daniel as prime minister of As. syria; and also the object of the revelation itself, being to introduce to the knowledge of man, the purpose of the Most High, to supplant, in his times, the kingdoms of this world by establishing his own everlasting dominion: it is not strange, that he should have for this once revealed the fate of empires, distinct from the attendant state of his church and people; but directly leading to the fulfilment of all the promises, in the dispensations of the fulness of times, and the kingdom of heaven. And, whether it appear well and consistent or not