motives here held out to the Christian! Those who have already finished their course, are represented as witnesses, a cloud of witnesses around one. They anxiously watch our progress, they long for our success, they await the time when we shall gain the victory, for they without us cannot be made perfect.' The Grecian wrestlers and racers exerted themselves to obtain a corruptible crown, (corruptible indeed, for it was of laurel or parsley!) but we, an incorruptible. And woe unto us if we exhibit less energy than they! So run we then, not as uncertainly; so fight we, not as one that beateth the air!" Wilson's Malta, &c.

As has been already stated, (see CROWN,) the Greeks and Romans were in the habit of publicly crowning with wreaths those who had distinguished themselves either in their athletic games or in war.

"Military crowns were conferred by the general in presence of the army, and such as received them, after a public eulogium on their valour, were placed next his person. The Christian also receives his unmerited reward from the hand of the Captain of his salvation: 'Be thou faithful unto death, and I will give thee a crown of life. And like the brave veteran of ancient times, he is promoted to a place near his Lord: 'To him that overcometh, will I grant to sit with me on my throne, even as I also overcame, and am sat down with my Father on his throne.' The saints must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, who will produce the proofs of their fidelity before assembled worlds, to justify the sentence He is about to pronounce. Holy angels will applaud the justice of the proceeding, and condemned spirits and reprobate men will have nothing to object; then while He pronounces, which at once eulogizes their conduct and announces their honourable acquittal, 'Well done, good and faithful servants, enter ye into the joy of your Lord,' He will set upon their heads a crown of purest gold, put a palm of victory into their right hand, clothe them in robes of celestial brightness, and place them around his throne. And so shall they be for ever with the Lord.'" Paxton.

PROCHORUS, Пpoxopos, (Acts 6.5,) one of the seven primitive deacons of the Church at Jerusalem, most probably one of the Hellenistic Jews; but his name does not occur again in the Scriptures, and nothing is certainly known concerning him.

PROCLAMATION, YOU shimea, (1Kings 15. 22; Jerem. 50. 29,) the edict of any governing power, published in a solemn manner.

The laws of Moses, as well as the temporary edicts of Joshua, were communicated to the people by means of the genealogists, or "officers," as in the English version; but the laws and edicts of those who subsequently held the office of kings, were proclaimed publicly by criers, (Jerem. 34. 8,9; Jonah 3. 5-7,) a class of persons mentioned by Daniel (3. 4; 5. 29,) under the word i karoza, which our translators have rendered "herald."

PRODIGAL, one who is profuse, wasteful, and extravagant, particularly one who is thereby reduced from affluence to poverty.

A young man of this latter description forms the subject of one of Our blessed Lord's most touching parables. (Luke 15.) The tenderness and affection of the manner in which the father in the parable receives his repentant son, is abundantly obvious; but the honour implied in some circumstances of his reception, may be illustrated by the present customs of the East. At verse 20 we read, "Now his eldest son was in the field, and as he came and drew nigh to the house he heard music and

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dancing." To express the joy which the return of the prodigal afforded his father, music and dancing were provided as a part of the entertainment. This expression does not, however, denote the dancing of the family and guests, but that of a company of persons hired on this occasion for that very purpose. Such a practice still prevails in some places to express peculiar honour to a friend, or joy upon any special occasion. Major Rooke, in his Travels in India, &c., relates an occurrence which will illustrate this part of the parable.

"Hadje Cassim, who is a Turk, and one of the richest merchants in Cairo, had interceded on my behalf with Ibrahim Bey, at the instance of his son, who had been on a pilgrimage to Mecca, and came from Judda in the same ship with me. The father, in celebration of the son's return, gave a most magnificent fête on the evening of the last day of my captivity, and as soon as I was released, sent to invite me to partake of it, and I accordingly went. His company was very numerous, consisting of three or four hundred Turks, who were all sitting on sofas and benches, smoking their long pipes. The room in which they were assembled was a spacious and lofty hall, in the centre of which was a band of music, composed of five Turkish instruments, and some vocal performers. As there were no ladies in the assembly, you may suppose it was not the most lively party in the world, but, being new to me, was for that reason entertaining."

PROFANE, hhaniph, (Jerem. 23. 11;) ßeßŋλos, (Heb. 12. 16.) To profane, is to put holy things to vile or common uses; as the money-changers did the Temple, by converting a part of it into a place of business, (Matt. 21. 12,) and as those do who allow secular occupations to engross any part of the Sabbath under the old, or of the Lord's day under the new, dispensation. (Exod. 20. 8-10.) Esau, for despising his birthright and its privileges, is styled by the Apostle, "a profane person." (Heb. 12. 16.) The term is also used in opposition to holy. Thus the general history of ancient nations is styled profane, as distinguished from that contained in the Bible; profane writings are such as have been composed by heathens, in contradistinction from the sacred books of Scripture, and the writings of Christian authors on sacred subjects.

PROGENITORS. See PARENTS.

מודיעים לחדשים PROGNOSTICATORS. The

modiim la-hhadoshim, (Isai. 47. 13,) "monthly prognosticators," or, as rendered in the margin of our version, "that give knowledge concerning the months," were probably a class of astrologers who marked out for every year the events which, as they pretended, were to occur in each month of that year, in like manner as do our own "Francis Moore, Physician," and others of equal notoriety, and probably with quite as much, and no more, success. Such practices are very ancient and quite Oriental, and in those countries they have ever been in high repute. Diodorus, speaking of the Egyptian astrologers, says, "they frequently foretell what is about to happen to mankind with the greatest accuracy, showing the failure and abundance of crops, or the epidemic diseases about to befall men or cattle; and earthquakes, deluges, the rising of comets, and all those phenomena, the knowledge of which appears impossible to vulgar comprehensions, they foresee by means of their long continued observations."

Some notices of the practices of these and other impostors have been given under the articles, ASTROLOGY; DIVINATION; and INCHANTMENT.

PROMISE, is a solemn asseveration, by which one pledges his veracity that he will perform or cause to be performed, for the benefit of another, the thing which he

mentions.

A promise, in the Scriptural sense of the term, is a declaration or assurance of the Divine will, in which God signifies what particular blessings or good things He will freely bestow, as well as the evils which He will remove. Promises differ from the commands of God, inasmuch as the former are significations of the Divine will concerning a duty enjoined to be performed, while the promises relate to mercy to be received.

There are four classes of promises mentioned in the Scriptures, particularly in the New Testament: (1,) Promises relating to the Messiah; (2,) Promises relating to the Church; (3,) Promises of blessings, both temporal and spiritual, to the pious'; and (4,) Promises encouraging the exercise of the several graces and duties that compose the Christian character. The two first of these classes, indeed, are many of them predictions as well as promises; and will therefore be found noticed under the head of PROPHECY: the others are mentioned under the several duties or graces to which they respectively appertain; the consideration of them should prove, (1,) an antidote to despair; (2,) a motive to patience under affliction; (3,) an incentive to perseverance in well doing; (4,) a call for prayer.

PROPHECY, nibuath, (2Chron. 9. 29;) πρоÓητeiα, (Matt. 13. 14.) A prophecy is a declaration of certain forthcoming events placed beyond the ordinary limit of human knowledge, and therefore only known to the prophet through the immediate inspiration of God illuminating his mind and irresistibly impelling him to proclaim what was dictated to him. We have no satisfactory reason for believing that this gift was ever bestowed on other persons than those, principally of the race of the Hebrews, who are mentioned as prophets in the Holy Scriptures; although it is not perhaps possible to specify a single nation in any period of time, amongst whom a belief has not existed that the power of predicting future events was enjoyed by some privileged individuals or by some distinct class of men. Ancient Babylon, Egypt, Persia, Greece, and Rome, had respectively their magi, astrologers, soothsayers, and augurs; men, it is well known, who enjoyed a considerable share of the confidence of their countrymen, and who were often intrusted with responsible offices of the government. The natives of the New World, too, distinct from the inhabitants of the Eastern hemisphere in almost every other respect, were all possessed with this belief.

The knowledge of future events, is that object which man, with the greatest desire, has the least ability to obtain. By tracing cause and effect in their usual operations, by observing human characters, and by marking present tendencies, he may found some plausible conjectures about the future; and an experienced politician, who is thoroughly acquainted with the circumstances, interests, and tempers, both of his own community and of those who are his neighbours, will frequently anticipate events with a sagacity and success, which bears some resemblance to direct prescience and excites the astonishment of less penetrating minds. Still, however, he is limited to a kind of contact with present circumstances. That which he foresees must have some connection with what he actually beholds, or some dependance on it: otherwise his inquiries are vain, and his conjectures idle and delusive; and even within those narrow limits, how often is his penetration baffled, and

his wisdom deceived! The slightest intrusion of uncommon circumstances, the smallest possible deviation from rules, which cannot by any means be rendered exact, destroys the visionary chain which he has constructed, and exposes his ignorance to himself and others. The prescience of the most experienced politician, in short, bears a close resemblance to that of an experienced general or a skilful chess-player. Judging how he himself, were he in his adversary's place, would act in consequence of one of his own movements, he builds upon his adversary's acting in the same manner when placed in the same circumstances; and thence, on the presumption of his thus acting, he provides against what he foresees must be the result of it; anticipating in this manner the final winding-up of the affair, even when he is at a considerable distance from its termination. Prescience, then, of the present description, will extend just so far as the principle upon which it is built. But the deducing of effects from a combination of causes can never be carried forward to any very remote period, because new causes, which themselves again must be combined, will perpetually spring up; and consequently, as those causes are as yet unknown, no human sagacity can deduce events from such causes.

Prophecy is, as we have said, the declaration of things beyond human knowledge, and the truth of this is most strikingly observable in the prophetic books of the Old Testament. The Jewish prophets were men generally of the lower ranks of life, of limited or no education, and natives of a country separated from the rest of the world by natural boundaries, and by national and religious rites, which rendered intercourse with other nations exceedingly difficult, and accuracy of acquaintance with foreign policy almost unattainable.

By what foresight, however well founded, by what conjectures, however felicitous, could such men, in such circumstances, at such times, be enabled to foretell, with any tolerable precision, the events of futurity in regard to foreign countries? Isaiah, Jeremiah, and Daniel, from their education amongst courtiers, might be partially informed of the political state of Egypt, Babylon, and other countries respecting which they prophesied; but on what calculations could Amos, the herdsman of Tekoa, ground his predictions respecting Damascus, Ammon, and Moab? Whence did Obadiah derive his prescience of the miseries of Edom? On what intimacy with the circumstances of Nineveh did Nahum base his awful denunciation of entire destruction against that proud city, then the mistress of the world?

The use and interest of prophecy may be considered in various lights. Some have represented it as designed to meet and accommodate the natural anxiety and impatience of men to know futurity, to relieve and soothe the troubled mind, to repress the vain and forward, to discourage schemes of vice, to support desponding virtue. Some have argued, that prophecy was designed to cherish and promote a religious spirit, to confirm the faith of God's sovereignty and particular providence. Some men, measuring the thoughts and ways of God by those of man, have fancied, that an obscure people, a (supposed) carpenter's son, his birth, and acts, and ignominious death, were objects beneath the attention of the Supreme Ruler; and have substituted, as more becoming objects of prophecy, the splendid events, as they consider them, of the rise and fall of kingdoms, and the revolutions of mighty states and empires. But the ways of of God are not as our ways, nor his thoughts as our thoughts. The events which to us appear magnificent and interesting are trivial in his sight, and those which we might overlook or despise form the principal figures in the plan of his infinite wisdom and goodness. There

were intermediate events predicted, as subordinate ends of prophecy, as the state and history of Abraham's, and Jacob's, and David's family; but the great use and interest of prophecy, to which all others were subservient, was to maintain the faith of the Messiah, and to prepare the world for his appearance and mediation. At the same time, prophecy was calculated to serve as an evidence of the Divine origin of Scripture. Considering it in this light, we should first satisfy ourselves that it was given, not after, but long before the events took place; and then carefully compare the facts and circumstances predicted with the events accomplished. If they correspond, the conclusion is unavoidable, that the prophet was commissioned by Omniscience to utter the prophecy, and that it has been fulfilled by sovereign and almighty power. Have Jacob and Moses, David and Isaiah, Daniel and the other prophets, many hundreds of years before, accurately described times, places, characters, and events, with their relative circumstances and contingencies? And have these descriptions been verified in subsequent and exactly corresponding events? It is most assuredly so, "even our enemies being our judges." Then they must have been divinely inspired, and their word and testimony must be true. By these prophecies, interspersed with the greater part of the Scriptures, both of the Old and New Testament, the sacred writers have established their claim to inspiration, that they have not followed cunningly-devised fables, but that they spoke and wrote as they were moved by the Holy Ghost. The use and intent of prophecy, then, was to raise expectation, and to soothe the mind with hope, to maintain the faith of a particular Providence, and the assurance of the Redeemer promised, and particularly to attest the divine inspiration of the Scriptures. "The uses of prophecy," says Dr. Jortin, "besides gradually opening and unfolding the things relating to the Messiah, and the blessings which by Him should be conferred upon mankind, are many, great, and manifest. "(1.) It served to secure the belief of a God, and of a Providence. As God is invisible and spiritual, there was cause to fear, that in the first and ruder ages of the world, when men were busier in cultivating the earth than in cultivating arts and sciences, and in seeking the necessaries of life than in the study of morality, they might forget their Creator and Governor; and therefore God maintained amongst them the great article of faith in Him, by manifestations of Himself; by sending angels to declare his will; by miracles, and by prophecies.

"(2.) It was intended to give men the profoundest veneration for that amazing knowledge from which nothing was concealed, not even the future actions of creatures, and the things which as yet were not. How could a man hope to hide any counsel, any design, or thought, from such a Being?

“(3.) It contributed to keep up devotion and true religion, the religion of the heart, which consists partly in entertaining just and honourable notions of God, and of his perfections, and which is a more rational and a more acceptable service than rites and ceremonies.

“(4.) It excited men to rely upon God, and to love Him who condescended to hold this mutual intercourse with his creatures, and to permit them to consult Him as one friend asks advice of another.

“(5.) It was intended to keep the people, to whom God revealed himself, from idolatry; a sin to which the Jews would be inclined, both from the disposition to it which they had acquired in Egypt, and from the contagion of bad example.

"The people of Israel were strictly forbidden to consult the diviners and the gods of other nations, and to use any enchantments and wicked arts; and that they

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might have no temptation to it, God permitted them to apply to Him and to his prophets, even upon small occasions; and He raised up amongst them a succession of prophets, to whom they might have recourse for advice and direction. These prophets were reverenced abroad as well as at home, and consulted by foreign princes; and, in times of the Captivity, they were honoured by great kings, and advanced to high stations." As it respects us, prophecy connected with miracles affords cogent evidence of the truth of the Christian revelation, as well as of a superintending Providence. This evidence, too, is a growing evidence. The divine design, uniformly pursued through a series of successive generations, opens with a greater degree of clearness in proportion to the lapse of time and the number of events. An increase of age is an addition to its strength; and the nearer we approach the point towards which the dispensations of God invariably tend, the more clearly shall we discern the wonderful regularity, consistency, and beauty, of this stupendous plan for universal good. Of the great use of prophecies which have been fulfilled, as a direct and strong argument to convert unbelievers to Christianity, and to establish Christians in the faith, we have the most ample proofs. Our Lord himself made very frequent appeals to prophecy, as evidence of his divine mission. He referred the Jews to their own Scriptures, as most fully and clearly bearing witness of Himself. Upon them He grounded the necessity of his suffering; upon them he settled the faith of the disciples at Emmaus, and of the Apostles at Jerusalem. The same source supplied the eloquence of St. Peter and St. Paul, and the means with which Apollos "mightily convinced the Jews." This was a powerful instrument of persuasion in the succeeding ages of the Church, and much used by the primitive Apologists. Upon this topic were employed the zeal and diligence not only of Justin Martyr, but of Tertullian, Cyprian, and Augustine. It would never have been so frequently employed, if it had not been well adapted to the desired end; and that it did most completely answer this end, by the conversion of unbelievers, is evident both from the accounts of Scripture, and the records of the primitive Church.

"If we look into the prophetic writings," says Bishop Hurd, "we find that prophecy is of a prodigious extent; that it commenced from the fall of man, and reaches to the consummation of all things; that for many ages it was delivered darkly to a few persons, and with large intervals from the date of one prophecy to that of another; but at length became more clear, more frequent, and was uniformly carried on in the line of one people, separated from the rest of the world, among other reasons assigned, for this principally, to be the repository of the Divine oracles; that, with some intermission, the spirit of prophecy subsisted among that people to the coming of Christ; that He himself and his Apostles exercised this power in the most conspicuous manner, and left behind them many predictions, recorded in the books of the New Testament, which profess to respect very distant events, and even run out to the end of time, as in St. John's expression, to that period, when the mystery of God shall be perfected.' (Rev. 10. 7.)

"Further, beside the extent of this prophetic scheme, the dignity of the Person whom it concerns deserves our consideration. He is described in terms which excite the most august and magnificent ideas. He is spoken of, indeed, sometimes as being 'the seed of the woman,' and as the Son of man;' yet so as being at the same time of more than mortal extraction. He is even represented as being superior to men and angels; as far above all principality and power; above all that is accounted great, whether in heaven or in earth; as the word and

the wisdom of God; as the eternal Son of the Father; | as the Heir of all things by whom He made the worlds; as the brightness of his glory, and the express image of his person. We have no words to denote greater ideas than these; the mind of man cannot elevate itself to nobler conceptions. Of such transcendent worth and excellence is that Jesus said to be, to whom all the prophets bear witness.

"The declared purpose for which the Messiah, prefigured by so long a train of prophecy, came into the world, corresponds to all the rest of the representation. It was not to deliver an oppressed nation from civil tyranny, those acts which history counts most heroic. No: it was not a mighty state, a victor people, that was worthy to enter into the contemplation of this divine Person. It was another, and far more sublime purpose, which He came to accomplish,—a purpose, in comparison of which all our policies are poor and little, and all the performances of man as nothing. It was to deliver a world from ruin; to abolish sin and death; to purify and immortalize human nature; and thus, in the most exalted sense of the words, to be the Saviour of men and the blessing of all nations.

"There is no exaggeration in this account. I deliver the undoubted sense, if not always the very words, of Scripture. Consider, then, to what this representation amounts. Let us unite the several parts of it and bring them to a point. A spirit of prophecy pervading all time; characterizing one Person of the highest dignity; and proclaiming the accomplishment of one purpose, the most beneficent, the most divine that imagination itself can project. Such is the Scriptural delineation, whether we will receive it or no, of that economy which we call prophetic.

"The advantage of this species of evidence belongs, then, exclusively to the Christian revelation. Heathenism never made any clear and well-founded pretensions to it. Mohammedanism, though it stands itself as a proof of the truth of Scripture prophecy, is unsupported by a single prediction of its own."

In order to understand the prophecies, and to form a right judgment of the argument for the truth of Christianity which they afford, we must not consider them singly and apart, but as a grand whole, or a chain reaching through several thousand years, yet manifestly subservient to one and the same end. This end is no other than the establishment of the universal empire of truth and righteousness under the dominion of Jesus Christ. We are not indeed to suppose that each of the prophecies recorded in the Old Testament expressly points out and clearly characterizes Jesus Christ; yet taken as a whole, this grand system refers to Him; for the testimony of Jesus is the spirit of prophecy. All the revelations of Divine Providence have Him for their scope and end. Is an empire or kingdom erected? that empire or kingdom is erected with a view, directly or indirectly, to the kingdom of the Messiah. Is an empire or kingdom subverted and overthrown? that empire or kingdom is overthrown in subserviency to the glory of his kingdom and empire, which shall know neither bounds nor end, but whose limits shall be no other than the limits of the universe, and whose end no other than the days of eternity. Jesus Christ, then, is the only Person that ever existed in whom all the prophecies unite as a centre. In order therefore to oppose error and confront the infidel, we must study the prophecies, not as independent of each other, but as connected; for "the argument from prophecy," says Bishop Hurd, "is not to be formed from the consideration of single prophecies, but from all the prophecies taken together, and considered as making one system, in which, from the mutual dependence and con

nexion of its parts, preceding prophecies confirm and illustrate those which follow; and these again reflect light on the foregoing, just as in any philosophical system, that which shows the solidity of it is the harmony and correspondence of the whole, not the application of it in particular instances.

"Hence, though the evidence be but small, from the completion of any one prophecy taken separately, yet that evidence being always something, the amount of the whole evidence resulting from a great number of prophecies, all relative to the same design, may be considerable; like many scattered rays, which though each be weak in itself, yet concentrated into one point, shall form a strong light, and strike the sense very powerfully. Still more; this evidence is not merely a growing evidence, but is indeed multiplied upon us, from the number of reflected lights which the several component parts of such a system reciprocally throw upon each, till at length the conviction rise into a high degree of moral certainty."

Proceeding to a detailed account of a few of the prophecies recorded in the Scriptures, we may remark that many of those which are found in the Old Testament foretold unexpected changes in the distribution of earthly power; and whether they announced the fall of flourishing cities, or the ruin of mighty empires, the event minutely corresponds with the prediction. This chain of predictions is so evident in the Scriptures, that we are more embarrassed with the selection and arrangement of them, than doubtful of their import and accomplishment. To a superficial observer they may seem to be without order or connexion; but, to a well-informed mind, they are all disposed in such a mode and succession as to form a regular system, all the parts of which harmonize in one amazing and consistent plan, which runs parallel with the history of mankind, past, present, and to come, and furnishes a perfect moral demonstration, that the book which contains such wondrous information is indeed Divine.

The prophecies contained in the Scriptures may be referred to four classes: (1,) Prophecies relating to the Jewish nation in particular; (2,) Prophecies relating to the neighbouring nations or empires; (3,) Prophecies directly announcing the Messiah; and (4,) Prophecies delivered by Jesus Christ and his Apostles. Of these, the prophecies relating to the Messiah, and those regarding the Assyrians, Egyptians, &c., have been given under their respective heads; and those of the New Testament also are noticed in separate articles; which leaves for a brief notice here, some of the more prominent of the predictions referring to the Jewish nation in particular.

At a time when Abraham had no child, and was greatly advanced in years, it was foretold that his posterity should be exceedingly multiplied above that of other nations. The chief of these predictions are to be found in Genesis 12. 1-3; 46. 3; Exodus 32. 13; Genesis 16. 16; 15. 5; 17. 2,4-6; 22. 17.

Ishmael's name and fortune were announced before he was born; particularly that his descendants should be very numerous, and that he should beget twelve princes. The whole came to pass precisely as it was foretold. Compare Genesis 16. 10-12; 17.20; and 25.12-18. “ will make him a great nation," said Jehovah to Abraham, (Gen. 17. 20;) and this prediction was accomplished as soon as it could be in the regular course of nature.

It was foretold that the posterity of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, should possess the land of Canaan; so that though they should be expelled thence for their sins, yet their title should endure, and they should be resettled in it, and there continue in peace to the end of the world. (See Gen. 12. 7; 13. 14,15,17; 15. 18-21; Exod.