obliteration of Egypt, rather than of Assyria and Babylonia. The prophecies concerning Egypt furnish proof of inspiration as much by their silence as by their speech.

No monarchy can compare in duration with the Egyptian. When Abram was a wanderer in the land which his seed were to possess hereafter, the Pharaohs had an ancient and extensive dominion; when the family of Israel had grown into a nation, the Pharaohs were still the mightiest sovereigns of the world; and Egypt enjoyed a considerable degree of independence and prosperity for two centuries after Ezekiel had foretold her doom. The ruins of magnificent cities, with temples, and palaces, and pillars, and obelisks, still witness to Egyptian power. Inscriptions and sculptures bear testimony to the majesty and success of her monarchs and warriors; and the pyramids remain immovable monuments of her civilization. The wisdom of the Egyptians achieved world-wide celebrity; the kingdom was noted as much for its learning as for its military prowess and architectural skill. The fertility of the country was prodigious; for centuries it was the great corn-growing country of the world.

One of the earliest prophecies against Egypt foretold the conquest of the country by Nebuchadnezzar. It was uttered by Jeremiah only a very short time before its accomplishment, and was recorded after that event. It is found in Jeremiah xlvi. 1-12, and ends: The nations have heard of thy shame, and thy cry hath filled the land: for the mighty man hath stumbled against the mighty, and they are fallen both together.' Pharaoh-Necho took advantage of the revolt of the Babylonians against the Assyrians, to invade Syria; on his way thither he defeated Josiah, who opposed him, and finally captured Carchemish, on the Euphrates. He was returning in triumph, laden with spoil, when Nebuchadnezzar, then king only as associated with his father, fell on him, and inflicted upon him so crushing a defeat that all his conquests were wrested from him, and the king of Egypt came not again any more out of his land' (2 Kings xxiv. 7).

A second and more complete conquest of Egypt by Nebuchadnezzar was also foretold. Jeremiah entitles one section of his prophecy, The word that the Lord spake to Jeremiah the prophet, how Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon, should come and smite the land of Egypt' (xlvi. 13). And Ezekiel declared how God promised: 'Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon, caused his army to serve a great service against Tyrus,......yet had he no wages, nor his army......Therefore thus saith the Lord God; Behold, I will give the land of Egypt unto Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon; and he shall take her multitude, and take her spoil, and take her prey; and it shall be the wages for his army' (xxix. 18, 19). And Jeremiah named not only the con

queror, but also the conquered: Behold, I will give Pharaoh-hophra, king of Egypt, into the hand of his enemies' (xliv. 30). Scholars are agreed that Pharaoh-hophra is the Biblical name for the Apries of Herodotus. There is ample evidence that his most popular general, Amasis, rebelled against him, that thereupon Nebuchadnezzar again marched to Egypt, slew Apries, constituted Amasis king, tributary to himself, and transported so many captives as to prove the truth of Ezekiel's words: 'I will scatter the Egyptians among the nations, and will disperse them through the countries.'

The nineteenth chapter of Isaiah contains prophecies about Egypt of rather doubtful application. The invasions by Nebuchadnezzar would answer them, but they seem to refer to the Persian conquest. Cambyses, the son of Cyrus, the founder of the Persian monarchy, attacked Egypt as one of the earliest enterprises of his reign. He completely subdued it, and ruled it with such cruel tyranny that of him the prophet might well be speaking when he said: And the Egyptians will I give over into the hand of a cruel lord; and a fierce king shall rule over them, saith the Lord, the Lord of hosts.' The latter part of the chapter may refer to the expulsion of the Persians from Egypt by Alexander the Great, who favoured the Egyptians, and to the settlement of large numbers of Jews in Egypt, by whom the inhabitants were instructed in the knowledge of Jehovah.

Another peculiarity of the prophecies concerning Egypt is their detailed threatenings against separate cities. In the thirtieth chapter of Ezekiel, from the twelfth to the nineteenth verse, the following cities are warned by name, Noph, Pathros, Zoan, No, Sin, Aven, Pibeseth, and Tehaphnehes.

The

There can be little or no doubt that Noph is the Hebrew name for Memphis, when Ezekiel wrote, the capital of Lower Egypt. It was the chief city of the Pharaohs, and was worthy of the greatness of its kings. Ancient writers speak in the strongest possible terms of its grandeur, though their descriptions are somewhat vague. pyramids were considered to belong especially to Memphis. Its temples were the theme of universal admiration. Very recently the mausoleum of the god Apis has been disentombed, and it justifies the eulogies of Diodorus and others. The vast necropolis of Memphis proves that at one time it could boast of a large population. Now it is waste and without an inhabitant.' Till the excavations of M. Marriette its very site was matter of dispute; the drifting sand had enveloped it.

6

For Zoan the Margin reads Tanis, and with good reason. Zoan appears to have been a favourite residence of the Pharaohs at certain seasons of the year. Here it was that Moses wrought his miracles

before the Egyptian court, and threatened the plagues. Isaiah speaks of the princes of Zoan.' The extent of the mounds or 'heaps' that cover its streets and palaces shows its former importance. Mr. Macgregor describes its present condition: The horizon is nearly a straight line on every side; and looking west, the tract before us is a black, rich loam, without fences or towns, and with only a dozen trees in sight. This is "the field of Zoan." Behind is a glimmer of silver light on the far-away shore of Lake Menzaleh. Across the level foreground winds most gracefully the Mushra; but between that

winding river and the mound we look from, there is, lying bare and gaunt, in stark and silent devastation, one of the grandest and oldest ruins in the world. It is deep in the middle of an enclosing amphitheatre of mounds, all of them absolutely bare, and all dark-red from the millions of potsherds that defy the winds of time, and the dew and the sun alike, to stir them, or even to melt away their sharpedged fragments.' Various remains of buildings may be seen there, and many huge 'vitrified pieces' bear conclusive testimony to the accomplishment of the prediction, I will set fire in Zoan.'

No, or No-Ammon, as it is often called, has been identified with Thebes. This was the ancient metropolis of Egypt, and it continued to be the capital of Upper Egypt after the seat of political power had been removed to Memphis. Homer mentions it, with its hundred gates, and its thousands of soldiers, horses and chariots. Nahum witnesses to its glory and prosperity when he addresses Nineveh : ' Art thou better than populous No?......Ethiopia and Egypt were her strength, and it was infinite.' Its ruins now testify to its former greatness. Dr. Kitto calls it—perhaps the grandest desolation in the world.' Denon tells us how the French army that invaded Egypt caught their first sight of it: On turning the point of a chain of mountains, which forms a kind of promontory, we saw all at once ancient Thebes in its full extent......This city-described in a few pages dictated to Herodotus by Egyptian priests, which succeeding authors have copied-renowned for numerous kings, who, through their wisdom, have been elevated to the rank of gods; for laws which have been revered without being known; for sciences which have been confided to proud and mysterious inscriptions......earliest monuments of the arts which time has respected; this sanctuary, abandoned, isolated through barbarism, and surrendered to the desert from which it was won; this city, shrouded in the veil of mystery by which even colossi are magnified; this remote city......was still so gigantic an apparition, that, at the sight of its scattered ruins, the army halted of its own accord, and the soldiers, with one spontaneous movement, clapped their hands.' Can other evidence be wanting to the past grandeur and present desolation of once populous No'? Many of its buildings are standing; many are mere heaps of fallen stones or overturned fragments. Truly, Jehovah has cut off the multitude of No,' has executed judgments in her, and rent her asunder.

6

Sin is, doubtless, the same as Pelusium. Ezekiel calls it the strength of Egypt;' it was one of the frontier towns, strongly fortified, and strong in its natural position, being defended on all sides by mud and swamp. Consequently it always felt the first fury of every invader from the East. Sin had 'great pain.'

Aven, called 'On' by Moses and 'Beth-shemesh' by Jeremiah, signified Heliopolis. It was the seat of the principal University of Egypt. Here Moses learnt the wisdom of the Egyptians. The obelisk now placed on the Thames Embankment was originally erected before its principal temple. Now mounds and crude brick walls are all that remain of Beth-shemesh!' Its young men have been slain, and fire has devastated the houses of the gods of the Egyptians' (Jeremiah xliii. 13).

Of Pibeseth, or Bubastis, Dr. Kitto asserts: There is no portion of any standing edifice remaining. All is overthrown, and the widespread rubbish affords the only remaining evidence of the ancient. splendour of Bubastis.' And of Tehaphnehes, or Daphnæ Pelusiæ, the same authority remarks: The desolation of the ancient city is so complete, that the site now offers nothing that calls for notice." Truly the pomp of her strength' has 'ceased.'

Side by side with another prophecy by Isaiah, let us place an extract from the Journal of the Rev, G. S. Drew. Isaiah xix. 5, 6: 'And the waters shall fail from the sea, and the river shall be wasted and dried up. And they shall turn the rivers far away; and the brooks of defence shall be emptied and dried up: the reeds and flags shall wither.' Mr. Drew: All through the first sixteen miles of our journey from Birsatîn to Suez, we seemed to be going along the bed of an ancient river. If it was a river, it could not have been far from the coast-line of the sea, for we soon came on endless layers and heaps of oyster-shells. The quantity in which they are found is quite immense...Towards the close of our day's journey, about twelve miles from Birsatin, we came on traces, in an abundance of petrified trunks of trees and logs of wood, of an ancient forest. How strangely different must this country, now a dry and weary desert, have appeared when that forest stood here on the river bank, or marine creek, which then evidently flowed through this very spot! Our road was whitened by innumerable shells, which we at first took to be an additional indication of the water that anciently flowed upon this bed; but we found afterwards they were the bleached shells of the desert snail.' If, as Dr. Keith seems to think, Isaiah's words refer to the decline of the practice of irrigation, there is only too ample proof that artificial fertilizing streams ran formerly where all is now a sandy waste.

The most remarkable prophecy concerning Egypt is yet to be adduced: It shall be the basest of the 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......And there shall be no more a prince of the land of Egypt' (Ezek. xxix. 15, xxx. 13).