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and art united in rendering it a most fertile region. It was called the granary of the world. It was divided into several kingdoms, and their power often extended over many of the surrounding countries.' Yet the knowledge of all its greatness and glory deterred not the Jewish prophets from declaring, that Egypt shall become a base kingdom, and never exalt itself any more among the nations. And the literal fulfilment of every prophecy affords as clear a demonstration as can possibly be given, that each and all of them are the dictates of inspiration.

Egypt was the theme of many prophecies, which were fulfilled in ancient times; and it bears to the present day, as it has borne throughout many ages, every mark with which prophecy had stamped its destiny:

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They shall be a base kingdom. It shall be the basest of kingdoms. Neither shall it exalt itself any more above the nations: for I will diminish them, *that they shall no more rule over the nations. The pride of her power shall come down. And they shall be desolate in the midst of the countries that are desolate, and her cities shall be in the midst of the cities that are wasted. I will make the land of Egypt desolate, and the country shall be destitute of that whereof it was full. I will sell the land into the hand of the wicked. I will make the land waste, and all that is therein, by the hand of strangers. I the Lord have spoken it. And there shall be no more a prince of the land of Egypt."n

Egypt became entirely subject to the Persians about three hundred and fifty years previous to the Christian era. It was afterwards subdued by the Ma

1 Marshami Can. Chron. pp. 239, 242.

m Ezek. xxix. 14, 15.

n Ezek. xxx. 6, 7, 12, 13; xxxii. 15.

cedonians, and was governed by the Ptolemies for the space of two hundred and ninety-four years, until, about thirty years before Christ, it became a province of the Roman empire. It continued long in subjection to the Romans-tributary first to Rome, and afterwards to Constantinople. It was transferred, A. D. 641, to the dominion of the Saracens. In 1250 the Mamelukes deposed their rulers, and usurped the command of Egypt. A mode of government the most singular and surprising that ever existed on earth, was established and maintained. Each successive ruler was raised to supreme authority, from being a stranger and a slave: no son of the former ruler, no native of Egypt succeeding to the sovereignty; but a chief was chosen from among a new race of imported slaves. When Egypt became tributary to the Turks in 1517, the Mamelukes retained much of their power, and every pasha was an op pressor and a stranger. During all these ages, every attempt to emancipate the country, or to create a prince of the land of Egypt, has proved abortive, and has often been fatal to the aspirant. Though the facts relative to Egypt form too prominent a feature in the history of the world to admit of contradiction or doubt, yet the description of the fate of that country, and of the form of its government, shall be left to the testimony of those whose authority no infidel will question, and whom no man can accuse of adapting their descriptions to the predictions of the event. Gibbon and Volney are again our witnesses of the facts.

"Such is the state of Egypt. Deprived twentythree centuries ago of her natural proprietors, she has seen her fertile fields successively a prey to the Persians, the Macedonians, the Romans, the Greeks, the Arabs, the Georgians, and, at length, the race of Tartars distinguished by the name of Ottoman Turks. The Mamelukes, purchased as slaves and

introduced as soldiers, soon usurped the power and elected a leader. If their first establishment was a singular event, their continuance is not less extraor→ dinary. They are replaced by slaves brought from their original country. The system of oppression is methodical. Every thing the traveller sees or hears, reminds him he is in the country of slavery and tyranny." "A more unjust and absurd constitution cannot be devised than that which condemns the natives of a country to perpetual servitude, under the arbitrary dominion of strangers and slaves. Yet such has been the state of Egypt above five hundred years. The most illustrious sultans of the Baharite and Borgite dynasties, were themselves promoted from the Tartar and Circassian bands; and the four and twenty Beys, or military chiefs, have ever been succeeded, not by their sons, but by their servants.”P These are the words of Volney and of Gibbon ;-and what did the ancient prophets foretell? "I will lay the land waste, and all that is therein, by the hands of strangers. I the Lord have spoken it. And there shall be no more a prince of the land of Egypt. The sceptre of Egypt shall depart away." The prophecy adds," they shall be a base kingdom; it shall be the basest of kingdoms." After the lapse of two thousand and four hundred years from the date of this prophecy, a scoffer at religion, but an eye-witness of the facts, thus describes the self-same spot :-" In Egypt there is no middle class, neither nobility, clergy, merchants, landholders. An universal air of misery, manifest in all the traveller meets, points out to him the rapacity of oppression and the distrust attendant upon slavery. The profound ignorance of the inhabitants equally prevents them from perceiving the causes of

• Volney's Travels, vol. i. pp. 74, 103, 110, 198. P. Gibbon's History, vol. vi. pp. 109, 110, Dublin ed. 1789.

their evils, or applying the necessary remedies. Ignorance, diffused through every class, extends its effects to every species of moral and physical knowledge. Nothing is talked of but intestine troubles, the public misery, pecuniary extortions, bastinadoes, and murders. Justice herself puts to death without formality." Other travellers describe the most execrable vices as common, and represent the moral character of the people as corrupted to the core. As a token of the desolation of the country, mud-walled cottages are now the only habitations where the ruins of temples and palaces abound. Egypt is surrounded by the dominions of the Turks and of the Arabs; and the prophecy is literally true which marked it in the midst of desolation :-" They shall be desolate in the midst of the countries that are desolate, and her cities shall be in the midst of the cities that are wasted." The systematic oppression, extortion, and plunder, which have so long prevailed, and the price paid for his authority and power by every Turkish pasha, have rendered the country desolate of that whereof it was full, and still shew both how it has been wasted by the hands of strangers, and how it has been sold into the hand of the wicked.

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Can any words be more free from ambiguity, or could any events be more wonderful in their nature, or more unlikely or impossible to have been foreseen by man, than these prophecies concerning Egypt? The long line of its kings commenced with the first ages of the world, and, while it was yet unbroken, its final termination was revealed. The very attempt once made by infidels to shew, from the recorded number of its monarchs and the duration of their reigns, that Egypt was a kingdom previous to the Mosaic era of the deluge, places the wonderful nature of these predictions respecting it in the most striking 9 Volney's Travels, vol. i. pp. 190, 198.

view. And the previous experience of two thousand years, during which period Egypt had never been without a prince of its own, seemed to preclude the possibility of those predicted events which the experience of the last two thousand years has amply verified. Though it had often tyrannized over Judea and the neighbouring nations, the Jewish prophets foretold that its own sceptre should depart away; and that that country of kings (for the number of its contemporary as well as successive monarchs may warrant the appellation) would never have a prince of its own; and that it would be laid waste by the hands of strangers. They foretold that it should be a base kingdom, the basest of kingdoms; that it should be desolate itself, and surrounded by desolation; and that it should never exalt itself any more among the nations. They described its ignominious subjection and unparalleled baseness, notwithstanding that its past and present degeneracy bears not a more remote resemblance to the former greatness and pride of its power than the frailty of its mud-walled fabrics now bears to the stability of its imperishable pyramids. Such prophecies, accomplished in such a manner, prove, without a comment, that they must be the revelation of the omniscient Ruler of the universe.

r Egypt has, indeed, lately risen, under its present spirited but despotic pasha, who is both an oppressor and a stranger, to a degree of political importance and power unknown to it for many past centuries. Yet this fact, instead of militating against the truth of prophecy, may, possibly at no distant period, serve to illustrate another prediction, which implies that, however base and degraded it might continue to be throughout many generations, it would, notwithstanding, have strength sufficient to be looked to for aid or protection, even at the time of the restoration of the Jews to Judea, who will seek "to strengthen themselves in the strength of Pharaoh, and trust in the shadow of Egypt." Other prophecies respecting it awaited their fulfilment. Yet, whatever its present apparent strength may be, it is still but

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