the fulness of the Gentiles shall be come in, and Israel after the flesh shall turn again to the Lord. But if that was nowhere more clearly predicted than in this chapter, the children of Israel, in my judgment, would have little ground for their expectation.

—“I will even make a way in the wilderness, and rivers in the desert." "Est utique character certus et in dubius temporis gratiæsensus sententiæ mysticæ est, Deum facturum esse, ut inter gentes, huc usque fluctuantes inter diversissimas et falsas de religione opiniones, certus sit canon fidei et morum, secundum quem incedentes pervenire possent ad communionem Dei in communione ecclesiæ, cujus figura est Zion et Hierosolyma; tum quoque ad hæreditatem mundi. Porro suâ curaturam providentiâ, ut inter gentes doctrinæ salutaris indigas, sitibundas, veræ consolationis et donorum Spiritus Sancti exsortes, copiosa vigeret institutio apta animum refcere et consolari, ῥέουσα ἐκ διδασκαKas dɣIOV AVEVμaros." Vitringa in Is. vol. ii, p. 463, 2.

Verse 20. "The beast of the field," &c. "Tunc quod nunquam factum est fiet: ut omnes bestiæ et dracones, et struthiones, qui in solitudine gentium morabantur, et idololatriæ sanguine, morumque feri

5

tate bestiarum similes erant, glorificent me atque collaudent." Hieron. ad locum,

Verses 22-26. "But thou hast not called upon me," &c. "Not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according to his mercy he saved us by the washing of regeneration and renewing of the Holy Ghost." Tit. iii, 5.

"thou hast made me to serve with thy sins". Sin was the cause that made the Son of God assume

the form of a servant.

Verse 27." Thy first fathers"

Now he threat

ens the Jewish nation. Thy first fathers," Israel after the flesh. "Thy teachers," the priests of the earthly tabernacle, the scribes and pharisees, and Jewish doctors.

CHAP. XLIV.

The first five verses of this chapter Vitringa joins to the preceding, and the 6th he makes the beginning of a new discourse.

Verse 1. "Yet now hear," &c. The discourse again turns to the spiritual Israel, the children of the promise.

Verse 4. "And they shall spring up as among the grass." Bishop Lowth would read

;

,כבמים חציר,,and Houbigant

The alteration that would the least differ from the present text, and

would very well agree with the antient versions,

;כבעין חציר

would be ; "like grass beside a fountain:” and this would make a gradation of the imagery, from grass to willow trees, and from a fountain to canals. But after all, no emendation is necessary;

;בכין חציר before כערבים only in rendering take

"And they shall spring up like osiers among the grass beside canals of water."

Verse 7.-" the antient people ;" rather, "the everlasting people."—" a quo posui populum æternum; hoc est, ex quo vocavi Abrahamum, cui cujusque posteris dedi tabulas pacti æterni-Aben

מבריאת,populus primus; Kimchius עם עולם ,Ezra

by, a creatione mundi. Sed, etiamsi phrasis hanc significationem facile ferat-longè rectius hic quis cogitaret de Noa, ejusque posteris, in gentes et familias per orbem divisis, quibus Deus fœdere æterno condixit inhabitationem hujus orbis, nullis deinceps aquis obruendi, hoc est, ad συντέλειαν των αιωνων, cujusmodi promissum non sanxerat hominibus primi mundi. Et fateor cogitationem mihi altè hæsisse. Sed si phrasin ad ecclesiam transferas, aut ad semen Abrahami non carnale, sed

mysticum, interpretatio est nobilior." Vitringa in

Is. vol. ii, p. 481, 1.

"unto them." For, read, with Bishop

Lowth, ;"unto us."

Verse 8.-" from that time." From what time? From the time of the appointment of the everlasting people. The context affords no other answer to the question. Now, from the time of the call of Abraham, his family were the depositaries of the promise and prediction of a redeemer: whereas Cyrus was not heard of in prophecy before the age of Isaiah. Hence it is evident that the event to the production, the prediction, and the first appointment of which, God here appeals as a proof of his sole Godhead, is the general redemption of mankind by a descendant of Abraham. The deliverance of the Jews by Cyrus is mentioned afterwards only as an earnest of that greater mercy. Vitringa, who makes the deliverance by Cyrus the main subject of this prophecy, and the event particularly alluded to in this and the preceding chapter, expounds" that time," most harshly and unnaturally, of a time not mentioned before, the time in which Isaiah and the succeeding prophets prophesied.

Verse 9.-" and they are their own witnesses,

that they see not, nor know;" rather, " and they are witnesses for them [or against them], that they see not, nor know." That is, they, the workmen, are witnesses against the idols that they make, that they are inanimate and senseless.

Verse 10. "Who hath formed"- The word ", not standing at the beginning of the sentence, but following the words ", is not interrogatory, but renders the pronoun quisquis.'

Verse 11. and the workmen they are of men." " and the workmen themselves shall colour," i. e. be reddened with shame. See Bishop Lowth. But see also Blaney on Jer. x, 14.

Verse 12. "The smith with the tongs both worketh in the coals," &c. By comparing this with the first line of the following verse, I am inclined to think that the two first words here,

n, are

חרש עצים ,opposed to the two first of that verse

And as those two describe the workman in wood, the carpenter, so these two describe the workman in metal, the smith. That the y here is opposed to the word ' in the following verse, and is the name of the tool with which the smith begins his work, as is the name of the tool with which the carpenter begins his work. And I suspect that a