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called, because they prophesied in the times of the first temple; and the posteriores, because they prophesied in the time of the second temple: and when these latter prophets died, then all prophecy expired, and there was left, as they say, only a Bath Kol to succeed some time in the room of it. So we are told: 'Our Rabbins say, that from the time the latter prophets died, the Holy Spirit was taken away from Israel; nevertheless they enjoyed the filia vocis':' and this is repeated in Massec. Joma, cap. 1.2 Now all that time which the spirit of prophecy lasted among the Jews under the second temple, their chronology makes to be but forty years. So the author of the book Cosri: The continuance of prophecy under the time of the second temple was almost forty years3.' And this R. Jehuda, his scholiast, confirms out of a historico-cabbalistical treatise of R. Abraham Ben Dior, and a little after he tells us, that, after forty years, their sapientes were called senators: 'after forty years were passed, all the wise men were called the men of the great synagogue'.' And, therefore, the author of that book useth this æra of the cessation of prophecy; and so this is commonly noted as a famous epocha among all their chronologers, as the book Juchasin, the Seder Olam Zuta, as R. David Gantz hath summed them all up in his chronological history, put forth lately by Vorstius". The like may be observed from 1 Mac. ix. 27, iv. 46, and xiv. 41.

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This cessation of prophecy determined as it were all that old dispensation wherein God had manifested Himself to the Jews under the law, that so, by its growing old and thus wearing away, they might expect that new dispensation of the Messiah, which had been promised so long before, and which should again restore this prophetical spirit more abundantly. And so this interstitium of prophecy is insinuated by Joel, in those words concerning the latter times; "In those days shall your sons and your daughters prophesy'," &c. And so St Peter makes use of the place, to take off that admiration which the Jews were possessed withal, to see so plentiful an effusion of the prophetical spirit again': and therefore this spirit of prophecy is called the testimony of Jesus in the Apocalypse3.

According to this notion we must understand this passage, "The Holy Ghost was not yet given, because that Jesus was not yet glorified'." To which this also plainly answers, “He ascended up on high, and gave gifts unto men;" as likewise the answer which the Christians at Ephesus made to Paul, when he asked them whether they had received the Holy Ghost, "That they knew not whether there was a Holy Ghost"; that is, whether there were any extraordinary spirit, or spirit of prophecy restored again to the church or not, as hath been well

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in sensum loquitur: 'Anno 52 Medi et Persæ mortui sunt Haggæus, Zacharias et Malachias isto tempore sublata est prophetia ex Israele, fuitque annus 3442.' Hactenus ille. Licet autem omnia exem. plaria Seder Olam Zutha Venetum, Teutonicum et Cracoviense, varient in numero annorum creationis, tamen illos mortuos esse anno 52 Medi omnia exemplaria æqualiter habent. Explicabimus autem deinde, annos illos 52 absolvi anno 442. Et Rasi b. m. scribit cap. 2, de 5 rebus; quæ defecerunt in templo secundo hunc in modum: Ab anno secundo Darii,

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observed, of late, by some learned men. But enough of this.

We come now briefly to despatch the second inquiry, viz. What time the spirit of prophecy, which was again restored by our Saviour, ceased in the Christian church? It may be thought that St John was the last of Christian prophets, for that the Apocalypse is the latest dated of any book which is received into the canon of the New Testament. But I know no place of Scripture that intimates any such thing, as if the spirit of prophecy was so soon to expire. And, indeed, if we may believe the primitive fathers, it did not; though it overlived St John's time but a little. Eusebius tells us of one Quadratus, 'who, together with the daughters of Philip, had the gift of prophecy'.' So the report was. This Quadratus, as he tells us, lived in Trajan's time, which was but at the beginning of the second century. And a little after, speaking of good men in that age, he adds: 'Many strange and admirable virtues of the Divine Spirit as yet showed forth themselves by them?.' And the same author tells us out of Justin Martyr, who lived in the middle of the second century, and then wrote his Apology for the Christians, that the gift of prophecy was still to be seen in the church: Γράφει δὲ καὶ ὡς ὅτι μέχρι καὶ αὐτοῦ χαρίσματα προφητικὰ διέλαμπεν ἐπὶ τῆς ἐκκλησίας. Yet not long afterward there is little or no remembrance of the prophetical spirit remaining in the church. Hence the Montanists are, by some of the fathers, proved to be no better than dissemblers, when they pretended to the gift of prophecy, for that it was then ceased in the church. And so Euse

1 Τῶν δὲ κατὰ τούτους διαλαμψάντων καὶ Κοδράτος ἦν. Ον ἅμα ταῖς Φιλίππου θυγατράσι προφητικῷ χαρίσματι λόγος ἔχει diamρéal-'qui cum Philippi filiabus prophetica gratia illustris fuisse memoratur.' Euseb. Hist. Eccles. Lib. III. cap. 37.

2 ἐπεὶ καὶ τοῦ θείου πνεύματος εἰσέτι τότε δι' αὐτῶν πλεῖσται παράδοξοι δυνάμεις ἐνήργουν. Ibid.

3 Ibid. Cf. παρὰ γὰρ ἡμῖν καὶ μέχρι νῦν προφητικὰ χαρίσματά ἐστιν. Justin Martyr, Dial. cum Tryphone Judæo,cap.81.

bius tells us, and withal that Montanus and his accomplices only took advantage of that virtue of working wonders, which yet appeared (as was reported, though doubtfully) in some places, to make a semblance of the spirit of prophecy: 'But then especially did Montanus, Alcibiades, and Theodotus raise up in many an opinion that they prophesied: and this belief was so much the more increased concerning their prophesying, for that as yet in several churches were wrought many miraculous and stupendous effects of the Holy Spirit; though yet there was no perfect agreement in their opinion about this'.'

To conclude this, and to hasten to an end of this discourse of prophecy: there is, indeed, in antiquity, more frequent mention of some miracles wrought in the name of Christ; but less is said concerning the prophetical virtue, especially after the second century. That it was rare, and to be seen but sometimes, and more obscurely in some few Christians only, who had attained to a good degree of self-purification, is intimated by that of Origen in his seventh book against Celsus: Πλὴν καὶ νῦν ἔτι ἴχνη ἐστιν αὐτοῦ (τοῦ ἁγίου πνεύματος) παρ ̓ ὀλίγοις, τὰς ψυχὰς τῷ λόγῳ καὶ ταῖς κατ ̓ αὐτὸν πράξεσι κεκαθαρμένοις.

1 Τῶν δ ̓ ἀμφὶ τὸν Μοντανὸν καὶ ̓Αλκιβιάδην καὶ Θεόδοτον περὶ τὴν Φρυγίαν ἄρτι τότε πρῶτον τὴν περὶ τοῦ προφητεύειν ὑπόληψιν παρὰ πολλοῖς ἐκφερομένων. Πλεῖστ ται γὰρ οὖν καὶ ἄλλαι παραδοξοποιΐαι τοῦ θείου χαρίσματος εἰσέτι τότε κατὰ διαφό ρους ἐκκλησίας ἐκτελούμεναι, πίστιν παρὰ πολλοῖς τοῦ κακείνους προφητεύειν παρεῖχον, καὶ δὴ διαφωνίας ὑπαρχούσης περὶ τῶν δε

δηλωμένων. Εuseb. Hist. Eccles. Lib. v. cap. 3.

2 And that the gift of working miracles had ceased in his time, St Chrysostom doth more than once afirm, Τῆς δυνάμεως τῶν σημείων οὐδ ̓ ἴχνος ὑπολείπεται, Lib. IV. de Sacerdotio, &c. The like is affirmed by St Austin. Orig. Ed.

3 Orig. Contr. Cels. Lib. VII. cap. 8.

CHAPTER XIII.

Some rules and observations concerning prophetical writ in general.

WE

E should now shut up all this discourse about prophecy; only, before we conclude, it may not be amiss to add a few rules for the better understanding of prophetical writ in general.

I. The first, which yet we shall rather put under debate, is concerning the style and manner of languaging all pieces of prophecy; whether that was not peculiarly the work of the prophet himself; whether it does not seem that the prophetical spirit dictated the matter only, or principally, yet did leave the words to the prophet himself. It may be considered that God made not use of idiots or fools by whom to reveal His will, but such whose intellects were entire and perfect; and that He imprinted such a clear copy of His truth upon them, as that it became their own sense, being digested fully into their understandings; so as they were able to deliver and represent it to others, as truly as any can paint forth his own thoughts. If the matter and substance of things be once lively in the mind, verba non invita sequentur: and, according as that matter operates upon the mind and phantasy, so will the phrase and language be in which it is expressed. And therefore, I think, to doubt whether the prophets might not mistake in representing the mind of God in their prophetical inspirations, except all their words had been also dictated to them, is to question whether they could speak sense as wise men, and tell their own thoughts and experiences truly or not. And, indeed, it seems most agreeable to the nature of all these prophetical visions and dreams we have discoursed of, wherein the nature of the enthusiasm consisted in a symbolical

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