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ON THE GENERAL DIFFUSION OF KNOWLEDGE. 



watched and scrutinized. Their enemies had 

 taken every precaution which human wisdom 

 could devise, to prevent the dead body of their 

 Master from being removed from the sepulchre, 

 either by fraud or by violence, and to secure the 

 public from being deluded by any attempt at 

 rmposture. And yet, only a few days after he 

 was buried, and in the very place where he was 

 crucified, his resurrection was publicly asserted 

 and proclaimed ; and no attempt was made on 

 the part of the Jewish rulers to invalidate the 

 testimony of the apostles, by producing the dead 

 body of him whom they had crucified on whose 

 tomb they had set a seal and a guard of Roman 

 soldiers. For it is evident, that if his body 

 could have been found, they would have pro 

 duced it as the shortest and most decisive con 

 futation of the story of the resurrection. All 

 these circumstances being considered, to sup 

 pose that the apostles either were deceived, or 

 attempted to deceive the world, would be to ad 

 mit a miracle as great as that of the resurrec 

 tion itself. But if the fact of Christ s resurrec 

 tion be admitted, the truth of the evangelical 

 history and of the doctrines of Christianity fol 

 lows as a necessary consequence. 



Prophecy forms another branch of the external 

 evidences of religion. As God alone can per 

 ceive with certainty the future actions of free 

 agents, and the remote consequences of those 

 laws of nature which he himself established 

 prophecy, when clearly fulfilled, affords the most 

 convincing evidence of an intimate and super 

 natural communion between God and the per 

 son who uttered the prediction. It is evident, 

 however, that prophecy was never intended as 

 an evidence of an original revelation. From 

 its very nature it is totally unfit for such a pur 

 pose, because it is impossible, without some 

 extrinsic proof of its divine origin, to ascertain 

 whether any prophecy be true or false, till the 

 period arrive when it ought to be accomplished. 

 But when it is fulfilled, it affords complete evi 

 dence, that he who uttered it spake by the spirit 

 of God, and that the doctrines he taught were 

 dictated by the same spirit, and, consequently, 

 true. To us, therefore, who live in an age pos 

 terior to the fulfilment of many of the ancient 

 prophecies, and while some of them are actually 

 accomplishing, the fulfilment of these predic 

 tions forms a powerful and striking evidence of 

 the divine authority of the writers both of the 

 Old and the New Testament. 



The first prophecy which was given forth in 

 the garden of Eden, that &quot; the seed of the woman 

 should bruise the head of the serpent,&quot; and the 

 predictions of the Jewish prophets respecting the 

 appearance, the miracles, the sufferings, the 

 death, resurrection, and subsequent glory of Mes 

 siah, and the opposition he was to endure from 

 the people to whom he was sent, were literally 

 accomplished, when Jesus Christ appeared in 



the world ; and the narrations of the evangelists 

 may be considered as a commentary upon these 

 ancient prophecies. The deliverance of tiie 

 Jews from the Babylonish captivity, and its ac 

 complishment by Cyrus, the conquest of Egypt 

 by Nebuchadnezzar, foretold by Jeremiah, the 

 succession of the Assyrian, Persian, Grecian, 

 and Roman monarchies, the persecution of the 

 Jews under Antiochus Epiphanes, and the erec 

 tion of the papal kingdom foretold by Daniel, 

 and the destruction of Jerusalem and the dread 

 ful miseries which should befall its inhabitants, 

 foretold by Jesus Christ, have all received their 

 accomplishment, according to the spirit and im 

 port of the original predictions, and this accom 

 plishment is embodied in the history of nations. 

 But there are prophecies which were uttered 

 several thousands of years ago, of the accom 

 plishment of which we have sensible evidence at 

 the present moment, if we look around us and 

 consider the state of the nations and empires of 

 the world. For example, it was prophesied 

 respecting Ishmael, the son of Abraham, &quot; that 

 he should be a wild man ; that his hand should 

 be against every man, and every man s hand 

 against him ; that he should dwell in the pres 

 ence of all his brethren ; that he should be mul 

 tiplied exceedingly, beget twelve princes, and 

 become a great nation.&quot; This prediction has 

 been literally accomplished in the Arabs, the 

 undoubted descendants of Ishmael, who, for time 

 immemorial, have been robbers by land and pi 

 rates by sea ; and though their hands have been 

 against every man, and every man s iiand 

 against them, they have always dwelt, and at 

 this day, still dwell, in &quot; the presence of their 

 brethren,&quot; a free and independent people. The 

 greatest conquerors in the world have attempted 

 to subdue them, but their attempts uniformly 

 failed of success. When they appeared on the 

 brink of ruin, they were signally and providen 

 tially delivered. Alexander was preparing an 

 expedition against them, when he was cut of? 

 in the flower of his age. Pompey was in the 

 career of his conquest, when urgent affairs called 

 him to another quarter. Gallius had penetra 

 ted far into their country, when a fatal disease 

 destroyed great numbers of his men, and obliged 

 him to return. Trajan besieged their capital 

 city ; but was defeated by thunder, and light 

 ning, and whirlwinds. Severus besieged the 

 same city twice, and was twice repelled from 

 before it. Even the Turks have been unable 

 to subdue the Arabs, or even to restrain their 

 depredations ; and they are obliged to pay them 

 a sort of annual tribute for the safe passage of 

 the pilgrims who go to Mecca to pay their devo 

 tions. The curse pronounced upon Ham ; the 

 father of Canaan, could also be shown to have 

 been signally accomplished in the case of the 

 Canaanites, and the Africans, their descendants, 

 who have been literally &quot; a servant of servant* 



