pensation, and establish the christian upon the very same "foundation of the apostles and prophets, Jesus Christ himself being the chief

corner stone."

But this advent or coming of the Lord, although it be described in terms which seem to imply a personal appearance attended by angels, was entirely figurative, and fully accomplished by the roman armies; Titus the emperor, a prince who for his singular humanity was called the delight of humankind, executed (even against his will, and compelled to it by the infuriated rage and despair of the jews,) that dreadful vengeance which God had decreed, and no repentance on their part had intervened to prevent, or mitigate it. Titus used his utmost endeavours to save the glorious fabric of the temple, but the infatuated jews themselves destroyed it, and the roman soldiers urged on by a divine impulse, were regardless of the commands or entreaties of their emperor, and completed its destruction in his very presence: and according to the custom of the romans on some particular

bccasions, the foundations of the temple were turned up with a plough, which literally fulfilled our Saviour's words" There shall not be left one stone upon another, which shall not be thrown down." And also the similar phecy of Micah, iii. 12.-" For Zion shall be ploughed as a field."

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The signal vengeance of heaven pursued that wretched people in so visible a manner, and with so many striking proofs of a divine interposition, through the whole course of the siege, in favor of the romans and against the jews; that even that vain glorious people took not, as usual, the glory of this conquest to themselves; but acknowledged that a divine band alone had overthrown those prodigious and impregnable fortifications. And the jews themselves, though they disputed every inch of ground with a courage bordering upon absolute madness and desperation, were fully convinced of the same truth.

Not only in Judea itself, but in every othér country where any jews were to be found, the

heavy wrath of God pursued that devoted race, and the most unparalleled calamities fell upon them. No hiding place so secret could be found, but the roman eagles, allured by the scent of the carcass which heaven had allotted to them for a prey, penetrated thither to accomplish their destruction: no castle so impregnable, no rock of so great an height, or of so inaccessible approach to hostile force that it might seem to bid defiance to united ingenuity and valour; but the eagles flew up to it, as it were upon the wings of Providence, to the astonishment even of the romans themselves. The jews of that devoted generation were delivered up to the intense hatred and contempt of all mankind, and like men absolutely deprived of reason, they provoked by an equal bitterness on their parts, that zeal for their destruction which seemed, as if by the inspiration of heaven, to be kindled in every breast.

Our Saviour in consistency with the prophecies, which speak of the jews of that age as "the generation of God's wrath,”—often

reproached them with their voluntary blindness and wickedness, and that the increase of it, by the total withdrawing of all grace from them, should ere long be the consequence, and the punishment of it. And their own historian Josephus, who gives a full and dreadful account both of their depravity and their sufferings, briefly concludes," it is impossible to recount severally the particulars of their wickedness, but in general it may be said, that never any city suffered such calamities, nor was ever any generation since the memory of man, more fruitful in iniquity.” If "God had not shortened those days of tribulation for the elect's sake," that a remnant might remain for the fulfilment of the promises made to Abraham and David, "there should no flesh living have been saved of that forsaken people. "Except the Lord of bosts bad left unto us a very small remnant," (says the prophet) "we should have been as Sodom, and we should have been like unto Gomorrah." (Isaiah i. 9.)

St. Paul did not live to see these days of vengeance. But in the persevering infidelity and increasing wickedness of the jews, he saw the foreboding signs of their approach, and he pronounced, "Wrath is come upon them to the uttermost." (1 Thess. ii. 16.) "God hath given them the spirit of slumber, eyes that they should not see, and ears that they should not bear, unto this day.” (Rom. xi. 8.)—Their condition ever since those fatal days, has been in every respect such as Moses, in the twenty eighth chapter of Deuteronomy, had foretold would be the case, "if they refused to bear that prophet, like unto him, whom God would raise up unto them of their brethren." That spiritual famine now came upon them, "not of bread, nor a thirst for water, but of bearing the words of the Lord. And they shall wander from sea to sea," continues the prophet," and from the north even to the east, they shall run to and fro, to seek the word the Lord, and shall not find it.” (Amos viii. 1 1.

The religion of the modern jews although justly pleading its divine original, can no