of 2 Chron priests, endeavoured to dissuade him from it, he fell into a rage, and received their re- From 1 Kings monstrances with threats. God however took care to vindicate the sacredness of the viii. to the end sacerdotal office: For the moment that he took the censer in his hand, and was going. to burn incense, he was struck with a leprosy, which no art of man could ever after cure; so that, while his son Jotham (as his father's viceroy) took the public administration upon him, he was forced to live in a separate place by himself; and, after a reign of two and fifty years, died, and was buried, not in the royal sepulchres, but *2 in the same field, at some distance from them, because he was a leper, and was succeeded by his son Jotham. During the reign of this Uzziah, there happened some events mentioned in other parts of Scripture, which are not to be found in the books that are purely historical. Such are that terrible earthquake whereof Amos (a) prophesied two years before it happened; that sore plague of the locusts, whereof Joel (b) gives us so full and lively a description ; and that extreme drought, mixed with fearful flashes of fire, which fell from heaven, and (as the prophet (c) expresses it) " devoured all the pastures of the wilderness, and burnt up all the trees of the field " But that which we are chiefly concerned to take notice of is the succession of prophets in Israel and Judah, whom God raised up to give them instructions and exhortations, and to denounce his threatenings and judgments against them, upon their persisting in their impieties: And these he appointed, not only to warn them by word of mouth, (as his former prophets had done), but to commit their admonitions to writing, that posterity might see the ingratitude of his people, and all other nations, from their backslidings and punishments, might learn not to do so wickedly. The first of these prophets was Hosea, the son of Beeri, who, according to the introduction to his book, prophesied in the reigns of Uzziah, Jotham, Ahaz, and Hezekiah, kings of Judah, and in the days of Jeroboam the second king of Israel; and consequently continued to be a prophet at least seventy years, unless we may suppose (as (d) some "for thou, and thy sons with thee (says God to Aaron) shall keep thy priest's office, for every thing of the altar, and within the veil, and ye shall serve. I have given your priest's office unto you as a service of gift, and the stranger that cometh nigh shall be put to death," Numb. xviii. 7. The punishment for such as would intrude into Divine ministrations, was capital we see; and there fore God smote Uzziah with such a disease as was a kind of death; because it separated the person that was afflicted with it from the commerce and society of men, even as if he were departed this world, and (as the Psalmist expresses it) become free among the dead, Psal. Ixxxviii. 5. But besides the infliction of this disease, Josephus tells us, "That the very mo ment that Uzziah was going to burn incense, there happened a terrible earthquake, and as the roof of the temple opened with the shock of it, there passed a beam of the sun through the cleft, which struck directly upon the face of this sacrilegious prince, whereupon he instantly became a leper: nay, that this earthquake was so very violent, that it tore asunder a great mountain, towards the west of Jerusalem, and rolled one half of it over and over a matter of four furlongs, till at length it was stopped by ano ther mountain which stood over against it, but choak ed up the highway, and covered the king's gardens all over with dust." But all this may be justly suspected. That there was a great earthquake in the reign of Uzziah, is evident from the testimony of two **Josephus will needs have it, that his body was (a) Chap. i. I. (b) Chap. ii. 2. &c. (c) Joel i. 18. &c. or 4654. 757. A. M. 3001, have done), that this is a spurious title of some ancient transcribers, and that the true nt. Chris. beginning of his work is at the second verse," the beginning of the word of the Lord 1003, &c. or by Hosea." However this be, we may observe, that he speaks positively of the captivity of the ten tribes, and inveighs strongly against their disorders; that he foretels, that the kingdom of Judah should for some time subsist after them, but that at length they too should be carried away captive beyond the Euphrates; and, through the whole, lays open the sins, and declares the judgments of God against a people hardened and irreclaimable. The next prophet is Joel, the son of Pethuel. He mentions the same judgments that Amos does; and under the idea of an enemy's army, represents those vast swarms of locusts which, in his time, fell upon Judea, and occasioned great desolation. He calls and invites the people to repentance, and promises mercy and forgiveness to those that will listen to the call. He speaks of the teacher of righteousness whom God was to send, and of the holy Spirit which he was to pour out upon all flesh; and in the conclusion, relates what glorious things God would do for his church in the times of the Gospel. The next prophet is Amos; for he lived in the days of Uzziah king of Judah, and of Jeroboam the IId, king of Israel. He begins his prophesies with threatenings against the neighbouring nations that were enemies to Israel; then reproves the people of Israel and Judah for their idolatry, effeminacy, and other sins; exhorts them to repentance, without which their hypocritical services will do them no good; foretels their captivity, and other heavy judgments of God; and at last speaks of the restoration of the church among the Jews, and the happy accession of the Gentiles. The next prophet is Obadiah; for he was contemporary with Hosea, Joel, and Amos. He denounces God's judgments against the Edomites for the mischiefs they had done to Judah and Jerusalem, whom he promises that they should be victorious over these Edomites, and their other enemies; and at last foretels their reformation and restoration, and that the kingdom of the Messiah should be set up by the bringing in of a great salvation. The book of Jonah is an history rather than a prophecy; and if it was written by himself, it is a frank acknowledgment of his own faults and failings, and a plain evidence, that in this work he designed God's glory, and not his own. For it contains remarkable instances of human frailties in the prophet, of God's compassion and condecension to him, and a noble type of our Saviour's burial and resurrection. The other prophet that lived in these times was Isaiah the son of Amos, whose prophesies may be divided into three parts. The first part includes six chapters relating to the reign of Jotham, the six following chapters relate to the reign of Ahaz, and all the rest to the reign of Hezekiah. The great design of what he does is to foretel the captivity of Babylon, the return of the people from that captivity, and the flourishing kingdom of the Messiah: but the whole book is highly serviceable to the church of God in all ages for conviction of sin, direction in duty, and consolation in trouble; and its author may justly be accounted a great prophet, whether we consider the extent and variety of his predictions; the sublimity of the truths which he reveals; * St Jerom, in his introduction to Isaiah's prophe cy, tells us, that his writings are, as it were, an abridgment of the holy Scriptures, and a collection of all the most uncommon knowledge that the mind of man is capable of. "Quid loquar (as his words are) de physicâ, et theologicâ? quicquid sanctarum est Scripturarum, quicquid potest humana lingua proferre, et mortalium sensus accipere, isto volumine continetur. Hieron. præfat. in Isaiah. **Grotius compares this prophet with the great *2 the Grecian orator Demosthenes; for in him, says he, we meet with all the purity of the Hebrew tongue, as in the other there is all the delicacy of the Attick taste. Both are sublime and magnificent in their style, vehement in their emotions, copious in their figures, and very impetuous when they set off things of an enormous nature, or such as are grevious or odious: But there is one thing wherein the prophet was superior to the orator, and that is, in the honour of his illustrious birth, and relation to the royal family of majesty and elegancy of his style; the loftiness of his metaphors, or the liveliness of his From 1 Kings descriptions. viii. to the end of 2 Chron. 46 THE OBJECTION. BUT how highly soever we may think fit to commend the prophet Isaiah, others there are that appear upon the stage in this period of time, whose conduct we have reason to censure, as not so well comporting with their sacred character. Lying and dissimulation was certainly a sin under the law as well as under the gospel; nor had the greatest prophet, by virtue of his call, an exemption from speaking truth any more than the meanest man in Israel; and yet we find no less a man than Elisha telling the soldiers (a), who were sent to apprehend him, a parcel of lics, that they were out of their way, had mistaken their road, and were come to the wrong place; but that, if they would commit themselves to his conduct, he would be sure to carry them to the man whom they wanted: Which they, poor creatures, being now smitten with blindness, were glad to accept of, and so, by the wiles and deceptions of this man of God, were unhappily drawn into a snare. Nay, so great a propensity had this prophet to the common art of falsehood and dissimulation, that (b) when the king of Syria sent to him in a friendly manner, and with a large present even tempted him to tell him the truth, concerning the event of his sickness, we find him still prevaricating; returning a fallacious answer to the king, and at the same time telling Hazael another story, which might probably at this time put him in the thoughts of ascending the throne of Syria (to (c) which he had been anointed before by the prophet Elijah) by the immediate murder of his master. Whether it is that prophets looked upon themselves as superior to kings, or, in virtue of their office, claimed a dispensation from the common forms of civility, but so it was, that this same Elisha (d), when Joash, king of Israel, did him the honour of a visit in his sickness, flew into a passion with him, for no other reason but the senseless trifle of not striking with an arrow upon the ground as oft as he would have had him: Nor can we account why the high priest Jehoiada, who (as to secular matters) was no more than a private man, should take upon him to place Jehoash upon the throne of Judah, without the general consent of all the states of the kingdom, unless we may suppose that he affected the regency during the minority of the prince, and, upon that account, was as assuming in his way as if he had been a prophet. These priests and prophets then (we may say with the apostle) were men of the like passions as we are;' but then it is to be hoped that they died in charity, unless we may except the prophet Zechariah, who, in suffering martyrdom, called upon God (e) to avenge his death, as did not St Stephen, who, when he was expiring, kneeled down and prayed for his murderers, (ƒ) Lord, lay not this sin to their charge.' Jehu, in his time, was certainly the minister of God to execute wrath upon the house of Ahab; but then we know very well that the ends of Divine Providence are not to be served by any indirect means, nor can lying and dissimulation, in any sense, Judah; and therefore what Quintilian says of Corvinus Messala, may be justly applied to him, viz that he speaks in an easy flowing manner, and in a style, which shews him to be a man of quality. Grotius on 2 Kings xix. 2. and Quintil. lib. x. c. 20. (b) Ibid. viii. 8. &c. Ant. Chris. or 757. A. M. 3001, be proper expedients to accomplish his designs; and yet we find this same Jehu tran&c. or 4654. scending his commission, and (a) falling upon Ahaziah, king of Judah, (where he was 1003, &c. slain it is not agreed), for no other reason but because he happened to be in the king of Israel's company. We find him, (b) under the pretence of a greater zeal for idolworship than ever Ahab had, drawing all the priests and worshippers of Baal, like so many lame cattle into a penfold, and there slaughtering them: Though how they came to pay any regard to his proclamation, who had made already (c) such havock among them, or how the temple of this false god should be able to contain all its worshippers, whom the connivance of the law, and countenance of the court, had made so numerous, we cannot well imagine. Nay, we find him calling upon Jehonadab, the son of Rechab, to be a witness (d) of his zeal for the Lord,' and yet this vile reformer of others continues in the worship of the golden calves, which were objects not much better than the images of Baal; and though he will not depart from the sin of Jeroboam, who made Israel to sin, receives this commendation from God himself, (e) Because thou hast done well, in executing that which was right in mine eyes, therefore thy children of the fourth generation shall sit on the throne of Israel.' ANSWER. Wicked princes are by principle enemies to good men; but why Jehoram, king of Israel, should be for taking away the life of the prophet Elisha, who had been so very serviceable to him in his wars against Syria, and that for no other reason but because Samaria was besieged and reduced to the last extremity of famine, (as if it had been in the prophet's power either to make the enemy's army withdraw, or (f) to open windows in heaven,' and make it rain corn as it once did manna) is beyond our conception. But of all the characters that appear upon the stage in this period of time, the most unaccountable is that of Jonah, a sad, testy, splenetic creature, who, upon every turn, is growing angry with God, and if he has not his will in every thing, wishing to die; who repines at Providence, because (g) it is slow to anger, and of great kindness,' and had rather see the whole city of Nineveh laid in Ashes than that one tittle of his prophecy should be unaccomplished. And therefore, if God foresaw, that upon the Ninevites repentance his comminations would be null, a person of another cast had been a properer messenger, since all he had to carry was but a short admonition; which, before he had gone half through so large a city, was in danger of becoming a thread-bare story." ST PAUL, speaking of the propagation of the gospel, and the seeming insufficiency of the means which God had employed to effect it, has these remarkable words :—(h) "Ye see your calling, brethren, how not many wise men after the flesh, not many mighty, not many noble are called; but God hath chosen the foolish things of the world to confound the wise, the weak things of the world to confound the mighty, the base things of the world, and things that are despised, yea, and things that are not, to bring to nought things that are, that no flesh should glory in his presence:" And then proceeding to speak of himself; (2) " And I, brethren, says he, when I came to you, came not with excellency of speech, or of wisdom, declaring unto you the testimony of God; but was with you in weakness, and fear, and in much trembling; and my speech and my preaching was not with enticing words of man's wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power; that your faith should not stand in the wisdom of men, but in the power of God." Now if God, in the conversion of the world to Christianity, made use of instruments, (a) 2 Kings ix. 27. (e) Ibid. ver 30. (b) Ibid. x. 18. (c) Ibid. ver. 17. (d) Ibid. ver. 15, 16. (h) 1 Cor. i. 26, &c. of 2 Chron. in themselves so incompetent for the work, lest the work might be imputed to human From 1 Kings powers; by parity of reason we may presume, that, in the conversion of the Nine- viii. to the end vites, God might not employ a prophet of the best natural temper and qualifications,(since Isaiah was then of age, and seems to have been better fitted for such a mission that the glory of the event might not be ascribed to any innate abilities of the prophet, but to the sole power of God which accompanied him, and (a) "made the foolishness of his preaching (as the apostle expresses it) effectual to save them that believed." [There is indeed reason to believe that Jonah himself was one of those who halted between two opinions, worshipping sometimes the true God, and sometimes one or other of the false gods whom the house of Ahab had introduced into Israel. If this was the case, he was employed, and indeed compelled, against his own will, to go and preach in the name of Jehovah to the Ninevites, as well for his own conversion and the conversion of his countrymen, as to reclaim the king and people of Nineveh from the iniquity of their ways. In this respect his preaching was much fitter for the people to whom he was sent, and indeed to accomplish the various purposes which it was intended to serve, than the preaching of Isaiah, or any other prophet, uniformly zealous for the Mosaic law, could have been. It was, like the prophecies uttered by Balaam-a priest of BaalPeor, and like the miracles wrought by Moses in Egypt, a triumph over the gods of Nineveh and the idolatrous Israelites, and a triumph obtained by the instrumentality of a worshipper of those gods (b).] We must not imagine, however, that, in his address to the people of Nineveh, the prophet had nothing to say but this one sentence, "Yet forty days, and Nineveh shall be overthrown." This indeed was the sum and substance of his preaching; but we may well presume, that he took frequent occasions to expatiate upon it, by reminding them of the number, and nature, and several aggravations of their offences; by acquainting them with the holiness, justice, and omnipotence of God; that holiness which could not behold iniquity without detestation; that justice which sooner or later would not suffer it to go unpunished; and that Almighty Power, which could in a moment lay the stateliest cities in ashes; by exhorting them to repentance, from a dread of his impending judgments, and by instructing them in the method of pacifying his wrath, and effecting a reconciliation with him. Some of the ancients are of opinion, that Jonah received no orders from God to limit the destruction of Nineveh to forty days, because there is no such time fixed in his instructions; all that God appoints him to do is, (c)" to go unto Nineveh, that great city," (as he calls it)" and to preach unto it that preaching which he should bid him :" and therefore they suppose, that the space of forty days was an addition of the prophet's own, and, for that reason, not exactly fulfilled; but there is no occasion for charging him with any such falsification, since the comminations of God are always conditional, and answer his gracious purposes much better when they are averted than when they are executed. And indeed, though in this case they were averted for a while, yet, when the people relapsed into their former iniquities, the prophet's prediction did not fail of its accomplishment. For if we take the forty days to denote forty years, a day for a year, and the overthrowing of Nineveh, not to signify its final destruction, but only the subversion (d) of that ancient empire of the Assyrians, which had governed Asia for above thirteen hundred years, and was destroyed under the effeminate king Sardanapalus ; then was the prophecy literally fulfilled, and from its fulfilling we may trace the time of Jonah's mission. But though this prophecy of Jonah was not fulfilled at the end of forty days, as he |