man's parallel between the scripture prophecies and the oracles of the Pythian Apollo.-"The PROPHECIES of the Pythian Apollo," says he, "were indeed obscure, equivocal and ambiguous, admitting not only different but contrary senses; so that the character here given of the scripture prophecies was undoubtedly true of them, that no event could restrain them to one determinate sense, when they were originally capable of many. For if the obvious sense failed, as it often did, to the ruin of those who acted upon it, there was another always in reserve, to secure the veracity of the oracle: till this very character of its ambiguous and enigmatical senses, confirmed by constant observation, gradually sank its credit, and finally detected the imposture."* The prophecies of the Pythian Apollo were obscure, equivocal and ambiguous. And this, says he, was the character of the scripture prophecies. Just otherwise, as is seen above. Scripture prophecies were obscure; but the obscurity arose neither from equivocation nor ambiguity (which two qualities proceed from the EXPRESSION) but from the figurative representation of THINGS. So that the obscurity, which the Pythian oracle and the scripture prophecies had in common, arising from the most different grounds, the character given of the oracles, that no event could restrain them to one determinate sense when they were originally capable of many, by no means belongs to the scripture prophecies, whatever the men he writes against (who appear to know as little of the DOUBLE SENSE of prophecies as himself) might imagine. For though equivocal and ambiguous EXPRESSION may make a speech or writing, where the objects are unconfined, capable of many senses, yet a figurative representation of THINGS can give no more senses than two to the obscurest prophecy. Hence it will follow, that while the expedient in supporting the Pythian oracles, by having a sense always in reserve to satisfy the inquirer, would gradually sink their credit, and finally detect the imposture; the discovery of a SECONDARY SENSE of prophecy, relative to the completory dispensation, will necessarily tend to confirm and establish the divine origin of scripture prophecy.

Such was the wonderful economy of divine wisdom, in connecting together two dependent religions, the parts of one grand dispensation: by this means, making one preparatory of the other; and each mutually to reflect light upon the other. Hence we see the desperate humour of that learned man, and very zealous Christian, † who, because most of the prophecies relating to JESUS, in the Old Testament, are of the nature described above, took it into his head that the Bible was corrupted by the enemies of JESUS. Whereas, on the very supposition of a mediate and an ultimate religion, which this good man held, the main body of prophecies in the Old Testament relating to the New must, according to all our ideas of fitness and expediency, needs be prophecies with a DOUBLE SENSE. But it is the usual support of folly to throw its dis* Examination of the Bishop of London's Discourses on Prophecy, &c. pp. 89, 90. Mr Whiston.

tresses upon knavery. And thus, as we observed, the Mahometan likewise, who pretends to claim under the Jewish religion, not finding the doctrine of a future state of rewards and punishments in the law, is as positive that the Jews have corrupted their own scriptures in pure spite to his great prophet.*

III. Having thus shown the reasonable use and great expediency of these modes of sacred information, under the Jewish economy; the next question is, whether they be indeed there. This we shall endeavour to show. And that none of the common prejudices may lie against our reasoning, the example given shall be of TYPES and DOUBLE SENSES employed even in subjects relating to the Jewish dispensation only.

1. The whole ordinance of the passover was a TYPE of the redemption from Egypt. The striking the blood on the side-posts, the eating flesh with unleavened bread and bitter herbs, and in a posture of departure and expedition, were all significative of their bondage and deliverance. This will admit of no doubt, because the institutor himself has thus explained the type-" And thou shalt show thy son," says he, "in that day, saying, This is done because of that which the Lord did unto me when I came forth out of Egypt. And it shall be for a sign unto thee upon thine hand, and for a memorial between thine eyes; that the Lord's law may be in thy mouth: for with a strong hand hath the Lord brought thee out of Egypt. Thou shalt therefore keep this ordinance in his season from year to year." As therefore it was of the genius of these holy rites to be typical or significative of God's past, present, and future dispensatious to his people, we cannot in the least doubt, but that Moses, had he not been restrained by those important considerations explained above, would have told them that the sacrifice of the lamb without blemish was a type, a sign or memorial of THE DEATH OF CHRIST.

2. With regard to DOUBLE SENSES, take this instance from Joel: who, in his prediction of an approaching ravage by locusts, foretells likewise, in the same words, a succeeding desolation by the Assyrian army. For we are to observe that this was God's method both in warning and in punishing a sinful people. Thus, when the seven nations for their exceeding wickedness were to be exterminated, GOD promises his chosen people to send hornets before them, which should drive out the Hivite, the Canaanite, and the Hittite from before them. ‡ Now Joel, under one and the same Exod. xiii. 8, et seq.

See note L LL, at the end of this book. Exod. xxiii. 23. This, the author of the book called the "Wisdom of Solomon " admirably paraphrases:-"For it was thy will to destroy by the hands of our fathers both those old inhabitants of thy holy land, whom thou hatedst for doing most odious works of witchcrafts, and wicked sacrifices; and also those merciless murderers of children, and devourers of man's flesh, and the feasts of blood, with their priests out of the midst of their idolatrous crew, and the parents that killed, with their own hands, souls destitute of help: that the land which thou esteemedst above all other might receive a worthy colony of God's children. Nevertheless even those thou sparedst as men, and didst send wasps, forerunners of thine host, to destroy them by little and little. Not that thou wast unable to bring the ungodly under the hand of the righteous in battle, or to destroy them at once with cruel beasts, or with one rough word: but executing thy judgments upon them by little and little, thou

prophecy, contained in the first and second chapters of his book, foretells, as we say, both these plagues; the locusts in the primary sense, and the Assyrian army in the secondary-" Awake, ye drunkards, and weep; and howl all ye drinkers of wine, because of the new wine, for it is cut off from your mouth. For a nation is come up upon my land, strong, and without number, whose teeth are the teeth of a lion, and he hath the cheek-teeth of a great lion. He hath laid my vine waste, and barked my fig-tree: he hath made it clean bare, and cast it away: the branches thereof are made white-The field is wasted, the land mourneth; for the corn is wasted: the new wine is dried up, the oil languisheth. Be ye ashamed, O ye husbandmen; howl, O ye vine-dressers, for the wheat and for the barley; because the harvest of the field is perished.*-Blow ye the trumpet in Zion, and sound an alarm in my holy mountain: let all the inhabitants of the land tremble: for the day of the Lord cometh, for it is nigh at hand; a day of darkness and of gloominess, a day of clouds and of thick darkness, as the morning spread upon the mountains: a great people and a strong; there hath not been ever the like-A fire devoureth before them, and behind them a flame burneth: the land is as the garden of Eden before them, and behind them a desolate wilderness; yea, and nothing shall escape them. The appearance of them is as the appearance of horses; and as horsemen, so shall they run. Like the noise of chariots on the tops of mountains shall they leap, like the noise of a flame of fire that devoureth the stubble, as a strong people set in battle array. Before their face the people shall be much pained: all faces shall gather blackness. They shall run like mighty men, they shall climb the wall like men of war; and they shall march every one on his ways, and they shall not break their ranks. Neither shall one thrust another, they shall walk every one in his path; and when they fall upon the sword, they shall not be wounded. They shall run to and fro in the city; they shall run upon the wall, they shall climb up upon the houses, they shall enter in at the windows like a thief. The earth shall quake before them, the heavens shall tremble; the sun and the moon shall be dark, and the stars shall withdraw their shining."f

The fine conversion of the subjects is remarkable. The prophecy is delivered in the first chapter,-Awake, ye drunkards, &c. and repeated in the second-Blow ye the trumpet in Zion, &c. In the first chapter, the LOCUSTS are described as a people;-For a nation is come up upon my land, strong and without number. But, that we may not be mistaken in the PRIMARY sense, namely, the plague of locusts, the ravages described are the ravages of insects: "They lay waste the vine, they bark the fig-tree, make the branches clean bare, and wither the corn and fruit-trees." In the second chapter, the hostile PEOPLE are described as locusts: AS THE MORNING SPREAD UPON THE MOUNTAINS. The ap

gavest them place of repentance, not being ignorant that they were a naughty generation, and that their malice was bred in them, and that their cogitation would never be changed." -Chap. xii. ver. 3, et seq.

* Chap. i. ver. 5, et seq.

Chap. ii. ver. 1 to 10.

pearance of them is as the appearance of horses, and as horsemen so shall they run, AS a strong people set in battle array. They shall run LIKE mighty men, they shall climb the wall LIKE men of war. But that we may not mistake the SECONDARY sense, namely, the invasion of a foreign enemy, they are compared, we see, to a mighty army. This art, in the contexture of the prophecy, is truly divine; and renders all chicane to evade a double sense ineffectual. For in some places of this prophecy, dearth by insects must needs be understood; in others, desolation by war. So that both senses are of necessity to be admitted. And here let me observe, that had the commentators on this prophecy but attended to the nature of the double sense, they would not have suffered themselves to be so embarrassed; nor have spent so much time in freeing the prophet from an imaginary embarrassment (though at the expense of the context) on account of the same prophecy's having in one part that signification primary, which, in another, is secondary: a circumstance so far from making an inaccuracy, that it gives the highest elegance to the discourse; and joins the two senses so closely as to obviate all pretence for a division, to the injury of the Holy Spirit. Here then we have a DOUBLE SENSE, not arising from the interpretation of a single verse, and so obnoxious to mistake, but of a whole and very large descriptive prophecy.

But as this species of double prophecy, when confined to the events of one single dispensation, takes off the most plausible objection to primary and secondary senses in general, it may not be improper to give another instance of it, which shall be taken from a time when one would least expect to find a double prophecy employed, I mean under the gospel dispensation. I have observed, somewhere or other, that the ECONOMY OF GRACE having little or nothing to hide or to shadow out, like the LAW, it had small occasion for typical rites or celebrations, or for prophecies with a double sense; and that therefore they are not to be expected, nor indeed are they to be found, under the gospel.

Yet the example I am about to give is an illustrious exception to this general truth. The explanation of this example will rectify a great deal of embarrassment and mistake concerning it, and, at the same time, support the general truth. The prophecy I mean, is that in which Jesus foretels his FIRST and SECOND COMING IN JUDGMENT, no only under the same ideas, but in one and the same prediction, as it is recorded, in nearly the same terms, by Matthew, Mark, and Luke; though omitted by St John, for the reason hereafter to be given.

But to comprehend the full import of this prophecy, it will be proper to consider the occasion of it. Jesus, after having warmly upbraided the scribes and Pharisees whom he found in the temple, with their superstitious abuses of the law; with their aversion to be reformed:-and their obstinate rejection of their promised Messiah; left them with a dreadful denunciation of the ruin* then hanging over their civil and religious policy. His disciples, who followed him through the temple, greatly

* Mat. xxiii. Mark xii, 34. Luke xvi. 25.

affected with these threats, and yet possessed with the national prejudice of the eternity of the law, pointed as he passed along, at the temple buildings, and desired him to observe the stupendous solidity and magnificence of the work. As much as to say, "Here are no marks of that speedy destruction which you have just now predicted: on the contrary, this mighty mass seems calculated to endure till the general dissolution of all things." To which, Jesus, understanding their thoughts, replied, that in a very little time there should not be left one stone upon another, of all the wonders they saw before them. And from thence takes occasion to prophesy of the speedy destruction of the Jewish nation. But as the bare prediction of the ruin of that splendid economy would be likely to scandalize these carnal-minded men, while they saw nothing erected in its stead, by their Messiah and deliverer, it seemed good to divine wisdom to represent this destruction under the image of their Messiah's coming to execute judgment on the devoted city, and of his raising a new economy on its ruin; as was done by the establishment of the Christian policy.*

But yet, as this was to be unattended with the circumstances of exterior grandeur, he relieves the picture of the church-militant, erected on his coming To JUDGE JERUSALEM, with all the splendours of the churchtriumphant, which were to be displayed at his second coming TO JUDGE THE WORLD. And this, which was so proper for the ornament, and useful for the dignity of the scene, was necessary for the completion of the subject, which was a full and entire view of the dispensation of grace. Thus, as JOEL in one and the same description had combined the previous ravages of the locusts, with the succeeding devastations of the Assyrians, so here, JESUS hath embroidered into one piece the intermediate judgment of the Jews, and the final judgment of mankind.†

Let us now see what there was in the notions and language of the Jewish people, that facilitated the easy introduction of the secondary sense; and gave the style, which was proper to that sense, an expressive elegance when applied to the primary.

The Jews, besotted with their fancied eternity of the law, had entertained a notion that the destruction of Jerusalem was to be immediately followed with the destruction of the world. This made the closeness in the connexion between the primary and secondary sense of the descriptive prophecy, easy and natural; and as it made the two destructions scarce dividual, so it left no room to distinguish, in any formal manner, between the first and second coming in judgment.

The old prophetic language was of equal use and advantage to interweave the two senses into one another, which the notion here mentioned had drawn together and combined. The change of magistracy, the fall of kingdoms, and the revolutions of states, are described, in the old language of inspiration, by disasters in the heavens, by the fall of stars,

* See Julian, or a Discourse concerning his Attempt to rebuild the Temple. Mat. xxiv. Mark xiii. Luke xxi.