THE FACT OF PREDICTION. 



73 



political events. Prophecy was not^ what one old divine once called 

 it, " history written beforehand." And it generally, if not always, 

 had, primarily, a bearing on the time and place of its delivery. 

 The prophecy from Isaiah xlix, 6, quoted in the paper, was, as 

 clearly appears from the context, spoken originally of Israel or a 

 portion of Israel, and though we recognize it as chiefly fulfilled in 

 Christ, St. Paul adopted it as applicable to Himself (Acts xiii, 47), 

 and so justifies us in applying it to the Church, But the main 

 conclusion of the paper is that prediction is the action of a 

 superhuman mind. As Baron Von Hiigel, I believe, points out in 

 his recent work on Eternal Life, all the past, present and future in 

 time are, eternally and always, completely and simultaneously open 

 before God. From Him, therefore, emanates ihe element of 

 Prediction in spiritual prophecy. From Him, too, must emanate, 

 though we cannot understand how or why, any other true cases of 

 prediction which have come within human experience. 



The Eev. E. Seeley drew attention to the value of prophetic 

 prediction as an argument for the Divine Authority of the 

 Bible, and to the tendency of some modern critics to question the 

 dates of the prophecies when they were inconveniently exact, rather 

 than accept the predictions made. 



Referring to the Author's remarks on Egypt, p. 67, he thought he 

 overlooked the predictions in Isaiah xix, 12, 20-25, of a latter-day 

 restoration of Egypt, and of a similar restoration of Assyria, and 

 also Isaiah's very remarkable words linking both of these predicted 

 restorations with the latter-day prosperity of Israel (also left 

 unnoticed by Mr. Urquhart). 



During own own lifetime it has been increasingly evident that the 

 unique British Empire has been receiving and possessing the 

 blessings promised to Israel ; so that we may perhaps be justified 

 in considering it to be (at least, for the present) the political 

 Kingdom of God, — the political aspect of the Stone Kingdom." 



We, living more than 2,000 years after Isaiah and Daniel, know 

 that Britain is now assisting effectively in restoration in Egypt and, 

 in a less degree, in Assyria. And throughout the world this 

 strange Empire is growing and working as no other Empire ever 

 has in the past; but, as some "kingdom" must do, in the days of 

 " the toes," to fulfil these predictions and many others. How could 

 Nebuchadnezzar or Daniel or Isaiah know of things so strange and 



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