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EVIDENCES OE CHRISTIANITY.
THE MESSIANIC PROPHECIES.
WALTER LACY ROGERS.
PUBLISHED BY THOMAS SCOTT,
NO. 11, THE TERRACE, FARQUHAR ROAD,
UPPER NORWOOD, LONDON, S.E.
1 8 7 6.
Price Sixpence.
��THE MESSIANIC PROPHECIES.
HE first in order of time of the evidences of Chris
tianity are the celebrated predictions which gave
to the chosen people, in ages long anterior to the event,
the expectation of a Messiah. They are the first also
in importance, because prophecy is an evidence of
Christianity alone. There have been other teachers of
religion and morality who have claimed to work miracles,
who have suffered martyrdom, and who have received
the honours of a posthumous deification. Nor is
any religion, while it flourishes, without its seers,
its medicine-men, its auguries and oracles. But it
was the advent of Jesus alone which is said to have
been the subject of previous prophecy, and to have
been heralded during a period of four thousand years
by the whole literature of an ancient people. Certainly
this is evidence indeed. It is true that the people
themselves, the fellow-countrymen and lineal descend
ants of the writers, while clinging fanatically to the
prophecy, have always obstinately repudiated the appli
cation of it. It is true that they have asserted, with a
resolution unparalleled for its trials and endurance, the
right of understanding their own language. It is true
that for all ecclesiastical purposes that language is with
them and them alone a living tongue, and that, if they
could conscientiously admit that the words of their old
prophets as they still read them have not been unfulfilled,
they would escape from a position which is getting every
year more desperate, and gain for themselves and their
T
B
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Evidences of Christianity.
literature a place in the religious scale which would
satisfy even the arrogance and patriotism of a Jew.
But they will not. Because (it is said) two thousand
years ago an excited section of their nation, which was
then in a chronic state of disturbance, and was stumb
ling and wading on through blunders and bloodshed *
up to the climax of national and political suicide, mis
took the character of a man whom his nearest friends
did not understand, and were instrumental in putting
him unjustly to death, therefore their descendants
prefer still to deny the character of this man, than
allow that even under such circumstances their an
cestors could have made a mistake. With this theory,
however improbable, we are not at the present moment
concerned; for it stands to reason that, given an
accurate translation of the Bible, f we are as capable of
forming an opinion nowadays as any Jew in the first
century as to whether the plain and natural meaning of
a prophecy was fulfilled in the historical character and
career of Jesus. It is only those who interpret the
prophecies in a non-natural sense who must bear in
mind that the interpretation which they advance is the
interpretation of foreigners and aliens from the tongue
in which those prophecies were written; and that other
than the literal meaning of the words has ever been
denied by those who formed and spoke the language,
and by teachers whose minute study of every part of the
national literature at the time when this new interpre
tation was first advanced, is a matter of history. Or to
put the matter in a different way : No doubt there are
in England and Germany scholars capable of interpret
ing Aristophanes better than any modern Athenian
* Acts v. 36, 37.
I With regard to this, it must be remembered that the orthodox
octrine of the inspiration of the Bible means not only that each
ook of the Bible as originally written was the word of God, but
that the compiled volume, and its remote descendant, the version
of it that was translated in the days of James I., and our present
version of that translation, are equally inspired.
�The Messianic Prophecies.
7
can. But who would trust to the criticisms of an
English or German professor who discovered in the
“Clouds” points and allusions which we know were
not recognised at the time the play was represented, nor
by any contemporary or immediate successor of Aristo
phanes, however critically he might have studied the
subject ? Surely it was for the Jewish contemporaries
of Jesus to say whether the Jewish prophecies were or
were not fulfilled in him. Their leaders would natur
ally have come to some conclusion on the subject
before they had committed themselves to one side or
the other. There must have been at the time many
“ rulers in Israel ” willing to be convinced, like Nico
demus, or like those who accepted the impartial and
judicious advice of Gamaliel (Acts v. 34-40). What
we propose to do, therefore, is to look at a few of
the principal Messianic prophecies, and see for our
selves why it was such men were not convinced;
whether, in short, according to the fair and plain
meaning of these prophecies as they have come down
to us, any one of them has been specifically and exclu
sively fulfilled in the character and career of Jesus.
Let us begin with the direct prediction of the
Almighty himself, Gen. iii. 15: “I will put enmity
between thee and the woman, and between thy seed
and her seed : it shall bruise thy head, and thou shalt
bruise his heel.”
This prophecy is said to have been fulfilled so far as
it is Messianic—
I. By the mission and teaching of Jesus.
II. By the triumph of Jesus over sin and death.
III. By the temporary humiliation and apparent
defeat of Jesus in his trial and crucifixion.
It may be objected, first, that the order of the clauses
in the prediction has not been observed in the order of
the fulfilment, and that this point, so far from being
immaterial, is really of the essence of the case; for it
makes all the difference to mankind whether the
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Evidences of Christianity.
crowning victory rests with Jesus or with Satan. But
waiving this point, has any one a right to say that this
prophecy has been fulfilled specifically and exclusively
in Jesus ? That there always has been and always will
be enmity between the seed of the woman (not Jesus
only) and the Serpent is clear. The very name of Satan
(adversary) or of Devil (confounder) implies this. It is
also clear that man, in his progress onwards, is con
stantly let and hindered by the powers and effects
which are represented under the symbol of the Serpent.
And who can doubt that those powers are constantly
being defeated, and good triumphs over evil ? Was not
the prophecy fulfilled ages before the Advent in the
career of thousands and thousands of good men of all
nations struggling against Ignorance, Superstition, and
Selfishness—defeated in their own persons and in their
own time, but in spite of that defeat, and frequently by
their own sacrifice in the cause, ensuring the ultimate
victory of those principles for which they had so man
fully contended ? What did Jesus more than this ?
Let us take next the prophecy contained in Jer.
xxiii. 5-8: “ Behold the days come, saith the Lord,
that I will raise unto David a righteous Branch, and a
King shall reign and prosper, and shall execute judg
ment and justice in the earth. In his days Judah
shall be saved and Israel shall dwell safely, and this is
his name whereby he shall be called, The Lord our
Righteousness. Therefore behold the days come, saith
the Lord, that they shall no more say, The Lord liveth
which brought up the children of Israel out of the land
of Egypt: but the Lord liveth which brought up and
which led the seed of the house of Israel out of the
north country and from all countries whither I had
driven them; and they shall dwell in their own
land.”
It may be objected that this prophecy is one of those
which has not yet been fulfilled, but is to be so in due
course. To that we reply, that if so, it is not, until
�The Messianic Prophecies.
9
fulfilled, any evidence of Christianity, and should not
be quoted at all; that if it alludes only to the Second
Advent it cannot be adduced as a proof of any special
interposition of God in the first Advent; but that,
placed as it is in the Epistle for the 25th Sunday after
Trinity, it is intended by the Church to commemorate
the Feast of the first Advent.
Otherwise it would
be more appropriately placed for the Sunday after
Ascension-day. Has, then, the prophecy been fulfilled
by the coming of the Jesus of the gospels ? If he was
raised up “ as a Branch unto David,” he must have
been the actual, not the putative son of Joseph. It is
not here a question what the J ews thought, but what
God said. These profess to be the words of the Al
mighty spoken through one of his chief prophets, and
it would be what is called blasphemous to say that God
meant, “ I will pretend to raise up unto David one who
shall be no relation to him ; I will foist a child of my
own upon the Royal stock, in order that you may listen
to him under the belief that he is a lineal descendant
of your Hero King.” It is a dilemma from which there
appears to be no escape, but which does not seem now
adays to create any difficulty, viz., that either Jesus did
fulfil the Messianic prophecies, in being the descendant
of David, and in that case he was not the Son of God,
or that, if he was the Son of God, he did not fulfil the
*
prophecies.
Next, Jesus did not become a “ king,”
nor did he “ reign,” and certainly he did not “ prosper; ”
and as for executing “justice and judgment upon earth,”
it was the very part which he indignantly repudiated
(Luke xii. 14). In the days of Jesus Judah was not
“ saved,” nor did Israel “ dwell safely.” On the con
trary, they were rapidly preparing for themselves that
* This difficulty must have been felt in the first ages of Chris
tianity, and no doubt was the reason why Justin Martyr and the
earliest of the fathers trace the genealogy of Jesus up to David
through his mother. But the subsequent acceptance by the
Church of the gospels of Matthew and Luke in their present
form as inspired writings makes this no longer possible.
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Evidences of Christianity.
political destruction, which, soon after fell upon them.
Lastly, when and by whom was Jesus ever called “ the
Lord our Righteousness ? ”
The 53d chapter of Isaiah is not a prophecy at all.
It is written in the past tense, and professes to he a
historical narration of the career of some one who had
adopted in public life an unpopular cause and been its
martyr. It seems to have been composed by a friend
who had sympathised but not suffered with the martyr,
and who, after the danger had passed, writes in terms
of mild self-reproach of the want of courage of himself
and the other followers of his hero. All this may have
been written of several popular leaders whose followers
have hung back when the cause became a dangerous
one. But it must have already happened, and cannot
be taken to have any reference to events which did not
take place until seven or eight centuries afterwards.
In the concluding verses there is a prediction of the
ultimate triumph of the cause and of the martyr’s
reward j but this, if it is to be applied to the case of
Jesus, has not yet been fulfilled, and forms no part of
the evidence of Christianity. For it is not yet a matter
of history that Jesus has “ seen his seed” or has “pro
longed his days,” or that the “ pleasure of the Lord hath
prospered in his hand” (whatever that may mean).
“ He shall see of the travail of his soul and be satisfied”
will of course be attributed to the historical scene of the
Agony in the garden ; but it is equally applicable to the
last hours of a thousand other martyrs who faced death
with more courage and satisfaction than Jesus did.
So too of Isaiah ix. 6. Is this a prophecy—and if
so, has it been exclusively fulfilled in Jesus ? “ Unto
us a child is born, unto us a son is given,” is a state
ment of fact, and of a very common one, not a predic
tion. It is true that a prediction follows, but is it
applicable ? What “ government ” ever rested upon
the shoulders of Jesus ? When was he ever called
“Wonderful,” or “Counsellor,” the “Mighty God,”
�The Messianic Prophecies.
11
the “ everlasting Father,” the “ Prince of Peace 1 ” *
All this and the predictions in the next verse are still
unfulfilled. The more thoughtful and logical amongst
the Christians recognised this, and conceived the Millen
nium as a period for the realisation of these visions.
But the doctrine seems of late years to have fallen into
disrepute, and nobody cares to maintain it. With this
we have nothing to do more than to point out that such
an idea is, at all events, an acknowledgment that these
prophecies have not already had a fulfilment.
The prophecy quoted from Micah v. 2 is an impor
tant one, because it is said to have been recognised at
the time of Jesus’ birth by those most competent to
form an opinion on the subject (Matt. ii. 4) as applicable
to the birth of the Messiah. And the fact that upon
a report of the Christ having been born, Herod at
once referred to the “ chief priests and scribes of the
people,” proves that both he and they were keenly alive
to the importance of the Messianic prophecies, and pre
pared to recognise as the Christ the person who fulfilled
them. This is the prophecy : “ And thou Bethlehem,
in the land of Juda, art not the least among the princes
of Juda; for out of thee shall come a Governor that
shall rule my people Israel.” But has it been fulfilled
in Jesus ? The four biographies that we have of him,
differing as they do in many other particulars, at least
agree in this, that God’s chosen Israel—the people who
prided themselves on their descent from Abraham, the
people who inhabited the land formerly allotted to the
tribe of Juda, utterly and consistently rejected Jesus,
and his pretensions, and his doctrine, and his disciples
after him. “ He came unto his own and his own re
received him not” (John i. 11). It is clear that they
regarded him, if not as an impostor, at all events as a
* As to this title compare what Jesus said of himself, Matt. x. 34,
“ Think not that I am come to send peace on earth : I came not to
send peace but a sword ...” No one can dispute the fulfilment
of this prophecy.
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Evidences of Christianity.
crazy and mischievous fanatic (John viii. 48), of no
use to them in their schemes of turbulence and rebellion
(Luke xx. 26). In no sense did Jesus himself aspire to
rule God’s people Israel, nor had he the slightest sym
pathy with them or their rulers, or their projects. His
influence was confined to the hybrid population of
Galilee, a simple people, ignorant of the old Jewish
writings (John vii. 49), without any pride of race or
national sympathy with the inhabitants of Judea.
The story of the flight into Egypt is, as is well-known,
only given by the author of the first gospel, and it is
inconsistent with the history given in the third of Jesus’
early days. It winds up with the quotation, “ Out of
Egypt I have called my son” (Hosea xi. 1). Now this, we
must point out, is no prophecy at all. It is like many
other so-called prophecies, nothing more than the narra
tion of a simple fact. In this case the fact is a well
known one, in Biblical history at all events; but
whether it were so or not, the words quoted are an
allusion to the past, not an anticipation of the future.
Is this so or is it not so ? We can point here to no
less an authority than that of Dr Farrar, who (“Life
of Christ,” vol. I. p. 39) says of this passage that the
writer of the first gospel finds in this narrative “ a new
and deeper significance for the words of Hosea,” and
then adds in a note—
“ ‘ Or in other words, totally misunderstands them,’
is the marginal comment of a friend who saw these
pages. And so no doubt it might at first appear to our
Western and Northern conceptions and methods of
criticism; but not so to an Oriental and an analogist.
Trained to regard every word—nay, every letter of
Scripture, as mystical and divine; accustomed to the
application of passages in all senses—all of which were
supposed to be latent in some mysterious fashion under
the original utterance, St Matthew would have regarded
his least apparently relevant quotations from, and allu
sions to, the Old Testament, not in the light of occa-
�The Messianic Prophecies.
13
sional illustrations, but in the light of most solemn pro
phetic references to the events about which he writes.
And in so doing he would be arguing in strict accord
ance with the views in which those for whom he wrote
had been trained from their earliest infancy. Nor is
there even to our modern conceptions anything errone
ous or unnatural in the fact that the Evangelist transfers
to the Messiah the language which Hosea had applied
to the ideal Israel.”
To our modern conceptions there is nothing erroneous
or unnatural in a man’s writing what he has been
inspired to write. And if the author of the first gospel
was supernaturally informed that Joseph was ordered by
God to take the child into Egypt and keep him there,
in order that a certain prophecy might be fulfilled, he
had no option about his narrative. But Dr Earrar does
not put the case so high as that, fand we should like to
ask so experienced and conscientious a scholar as Dr
Earrar is well known to be, whether there is not to our
modern conceptions something very erroneous and un
natural in the fact of a historian transferring to his own
hero language which had been applied to a totally dif
ferent character ? And whether such a person as Dr
Earrar describes the author of the first gospel to have
been, can be considered a trustworthy biographer ?
Were not the natural and acquired tendencies of his
mind apt to make him look upon as not sufficiently
important the hard and fast lines of historical accuracy ?
In a word, is it not just possible that the whole story
of this Egyptian expedition—upon which the silence of
the author of the third gospel cannot be satisfactorily ac
counted for—was assumed both by writer and readers to
have taken place in accordance with “ this most solemn
prophetic reference ? ” And though this may not be
admitted, it is clear that language which Hosea had
applied to the ideal Israel, and which had no objective
relation to Christ, is not evidence of Christianity.
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Evidences of Christianity.
The difficulty as to the prophecy quoted in Matthew
ii. 23, “ He shall be called a Nazarene,” is of a different
ort altogether. It was spoken “by the prophets.”
When, and by whom ‘I No one is able to point out the
passage in any book of our Old Testament, and it is
mere assumption to say that it is a quotation from some
prophetical work or works now lost. The explanation
suggested—viz., that it was prophesied generally that
Jesus should be a “Netser,” or “ Branch” (of the house
of David) is no explanation at all. The statement of
the inspired Evangelist is that Joseph went “and dwelt
at Nazareth ” in order that the prophecy which called
Jesus a Nazarene (i.e., an inhabitant of Nazareth) might
be fulfilled. But if the prophecy did not call Jesus an
inhabitant of Nazareth, it was not fulfilled by his dwelling
at Nazareth, and Joseph could not have gone there for
that purpose. Moreover, it appears to be a historical
fact that Jesus was called, perhaps in his lifetime, cer
tainly after death, “ the Nazarene,” and we have there
fore here a curious phenomenon. In other places it
would appear that a history has been made to fit into
the prophecies ; but in this the reverse has taken place,
and a prophecy has been coined to anticipate the his
tory.
And whatever explanation is given admits
that what we have said of the prophecies in general
is true of this one, at all events—viz., that the inter
pretation of it is the interpretation of foreigners and
aliens from the tongue in which the prophecy was
written.
Again, let us take the prophecy in Isaiah vii. 14,
“ Behold, a virgin shall conceive, and bear a son, and
shall call his name Immanuel. Butter and honey shall
he eat, that he may know to refuse the evil, and choose
the good. For before the child shall know to refuse the
evil, and choose the good, the land that thou abhorrest
shall be forsaken of both her kings.”
Here, if anywhere, would the expounders of Scripture
have been justified in departing from the harsh literalism
�The Messianic Prophecies.
15
of the text; and by accepting a metaphorical interpreta
tion, have avoided the reproduction of the grossest
feature in Greek and Roman mythology. But the
exposition unfortunately happened at a time when
asceticism both in man and woman was looked upon
as the height' of moral perfection; and the stainless
purity of the young wife was supposed to occupy the
in estimation of Him who had made woman simply as
a helpmeet for man, a lower place than the crude innocence of the inexperienced virgin.
In order to give this passage more apparently the
form of a prophecy, the future tense has been substituted
for the present in the first paragraph. The proper
translation is said to be, “ is with child and beareth
a son.” * Consequently here too what is called a
prophecy is the statement of a fact. But is there any
analogy here to the case of Jesus?
According to
the authors of the first and third gospels, Mary
while still a virgin became enceinte, and bore a son.
So far the prophecy may be said to have been fulfilled ;
but beyond this there is no pretence for such an
assertion. Mary did not call his name “Immanuel,”
nor anything of a similar signification, but called his
name “Jesus,” and that by the express direction of the
angel Gabriel, who seems to have forgotten this pro
phecy of Isaiah—or, at all events, not to have been
struck by its relevancy. As to eating butter and honey
that he might know to refuse -the evil, and choose the
good, if this means the adoption of an ascetic diet (such
as John the Baptist’s, for instance), in order, according
to the popular error of the day, to quicken the spiritual
perceptions by mortifying the flesh, the description was
singularly inapplicable to a person who was known
amongst his contemporaries as “ a gluttonous man, and
a winebibber.” Further, the event which was to happen
before the child knew to refuse the evil and choose the
* The Holy Bible, with a Commentary.
V. p. 80.
By Canon Cook. Vol.
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Evidences of Christianity.
good, happened, as every schoolboy knows, within a very
short time of the prediction, and cannot be supposed
to have been predicted by reference to another event
which was not to happen for seven or eight centuries.
The only pretence therefore of fulfilled prophecy here
is the alleged virginity of Mary at the birth of Jesus.
If this was really fulfilled in his case, we may at once
grant that it was exclusively fulfilled, and constitutes
evidence for Christianity, in comparison with which the
failure of all other evidence would be immaterial.
What proof then have we of this miraculous occur
rence 1 The appearance of Gabriel, according to the
third Gospel, the dream of Joseph, according to the
first Gospel, are the only occasions on which it was
positively asserted. Neither do these two witnesses
agree together. According to one, it was announced
to the husband and not to the wife, according to the
other, it was announced to the wife and not to the hus
band. Moreover, they are themselves miraculous, and
a miracle (it is plain), cannot be evidence of another
miracle unless confirmed itself by some independent
testimony. We must look, therefore, for some such
testimony of these visions. They are never again
alluded to by the same evangelists, and never by
Jesus nor any of his disciples, nor the two other
evangelists.
Still, indirect testimony of them it
ought not to be difficult to find in the record of their
effects. If first the mother and then the father of a
child had received from God, before that child’s
birth, direct revelations of its Divine character, what
would—what must—have been the result? Would
they not have been themselves, and would they not
have brought up their family as his earliest disciples ?
Any picture gallery of old Masters will answer this
question. Look where you will what do you see ?
The Madonna in an attitude of rapt devotion over, or
positive worship of, her wonderful Child. Joseph,
Elizabeth, and other relations frequently accompany
�The Messianic Prophecies.
17
her, all deeply impressed by the sight of One, whom,
ordinary child as he was to others, they knew, on evi
dence they dared not question, to be the Incarnate
God. No wonder the greatest painters could choose
no more fitting subject for the highest exercise of their
art. No wonder that they should have succeeded so
well in a conception at once so natural and so sublime,
and that the constant realization of so vivid and deeprooted an idea never palled from repetition on the pro
fession or the public!
At the time when these
pictures were executed, art was fostered, patronised,
and directed by the Church, and this therefore
is the answer which the Church has given over and
over again to our question. And being the natural
and acknowledged result of these appearances, do we
find in the biographies of Jesus (written, be it re
membered, by his own friends and disciples), that it
ever took place ? Quite the reverse. Nothing is clearer
from the Gospels than that Jesus’ own family and rela
tions were, if at all, among the latest of his disciples.
Mary and Joseph “marvelled” at the “Nunc me dimittis ” of Simeon. Mary sharply rebuked Jesus, just
as an ordinary mother would an ordinary child, for
leaving them after the feast, and when by way of reply
Jesus asked them if they did not know that he must be
about his Father’s business, they stared in his face in
utter ignorance of what he was talking about! At a very
early period of his public career, when his biographers
assert that his fame had gone through all Syria, they
are forced to acknowledge that Nazareth was not con
vinced (Luke iv. 23).
His friends said “ He is
beside himself” (Mark iii. 21).
His mother is
not mentioned as among the women who followed
and ministered to him (Luke viii. 3).
Indeed,
his adversaries could point to his mother, and his
brothers and sisters, and say—“ Are they not all with
us V' and that there should be no misunderstanding
on the subject, we read, in reply, the bitter sarcasm
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of the disappointed enthusiast—“A prophet is not
without honour, save in his own country, and among
his own kin and in his own house:” Matt. xiii. 56;
Mark vi. 4; see also John vii. 3-10. What other mean
ing can we attach to the sneers which Jesus was
constantly pointing at the obligations of relationship
both in his own case—Matt. x. 35-37, xii. 48 ; Luke
xi. 27, 28—and that of others—Matt. viii. 21-22; T,ukp.
ix. 59-62, xxi. 16 ; and his public adoption of the ties
of sympathy in preference to those of blood—Matt. xii.
49, 50; Luke viii. 211 Was it not Mary’s incredulous
curiosity as to the powers of the Prophet which
brought upon her the rude rebuke—“Woman! what
have I to do with thee; ” and her tardy recognition
of the suffering Martyr, the curt dismissal from the
Cross ? *
After this, we are not surprised to find that not one
of Jesus’ brethren is named among his apostles, and
only one, years after, among his disciples. Then, too,
his mother is mentioned as being among his followers,
Acts i. 14, so it would appear that it was the death of
Jesus rather than his birth which converted his own
family.
But there is still another quarter in which we should
expect to find confirmation of the stories connected with
the Miraculous Conception, and that is in the sayings
and doings of John the Baptist. He is said to have
recognised Jesus before the birth, he publicly proclaimed
him before the baptism, he died when Jesus was in the
full swing of his career, and by that time he had learned
* It is worthy of remark how invariably distrust of, or disbelief
in, the power or mission of Jesus aroused in him the roughness of
language, which, when addressed to bis mother, seems so un
accountable, Matt. xii. 34, 39. Even his most intimate disciples
were not spared, Matt. xvi. 23, Luke xxiv. 25. How else can we
account for the cruel speech to the poor broken-hearted Syrophcenician, Matt. xv. 26 1 And so in contradistinction we may
notice the gracious replies which always followed an acknowledg
ment of his power and position, Matt. xvi. 16-19, xv. 28; Luke
xxiii. 43.
�The Messianic Prophecies.
19
to doubt, if not to deny, that the Messiah had really
come. Is it possible that John, if he had known from
his infancy the stories that we have heard—John, whose
own birth, whose own name, must have constantly re
called them,—could have ever wavered in his belief ?
John was, at the time we speak of, in prison, and the
events that were going on beyond the walls he could
only become acquainted with by the reports and de
scriptions of others, a very unsatisfactory basis of reason
ing, and one never to be adopted in preference to one’s
own experience. John, it must be remembered, had
been no ordinary child. He was “filled with the Holy
Ghost even from his mother’s womb,” and “ the hand
of the Lord was upon him,” Luke i. 15, 16. In his
early days he must have heard and appreciated the
wonderful stories of Jesus’ birth and childhood. Con
sequently, though he himself did not know Jesus by
sight, he announced to the people his coming and great
ness (Luke iii. 16), and yet, so little conviction did all
these reminiscences carry with them, that he actually
sent to ask Jesus whether he was really the Messiah,
*
or whether, with his sanction and that of the Holy
Ghost, John had introduced an impostor to the public?
And what said Jesus in reply ? Did he appeal to John’s
experience and faith ? Did he remind him of what he
must have heard over and over again from their common
relations ? Did he appeal to John’s own life—for if Jesus
was not the Messiah, John’s career as the Forerunner
(John i. 31) was a total mistake. Not at all! He told the
disciples to go back and “shew John again those things
which ye do see and hear.” Jesus knew that John
had heard it all before (Luke vii. 18), but he had
nothing to add, nothing to appeal to, but the sights of
* The character of John the Baptist was too honest and straight
forward to render possible the ingenious explanations usually given
of this question. Besides the little sting added by Jesus to his
eulogy on John (Luke vii. 28), proves that Jesus at all events
looked upon the question as a simple one and resented it.
�20
Evidences of Christianity.
the streets and the gossip of the synagogue. This
might have been evidence to one who knew no better,
but to John, who, as a babe unborn, had acknowledged
the Divine Embryo, who had been kept acquainted all
along with the Messiah, when he no' longer knew the
Man, such “signs” as these were very weak. They
had failed to convince him before, probably they failed
again, and John the Baptist died an unbeliever.
This, then, is some of the indirect negative evidence
against the authenticity of the first chapters of the first
and third Gospels, in which the Miraculous Conception
is respectively asserted. Indirect negative evidence is
not evidence of a very strong order, but here there is
a good deal of it, and none of a stronger sort on
either side. No allusion is ever made afterwards
in the New Testament to the story. John would be
the best authority on the subject, as being the con
stant companion of Mary after the Crucifixion, and it
is never hinted at in any of the works attributed to
him. Paul never notices it, though it would have been
a useful foundation upon which to build some of his
dogmatic teaching. These chapters might be left out
without, in either case, doing the slightest violence to
the commencement or contents of the rest of the Gospels
of which they now form a part. Taking the prophecy,
(Isaiah vii. 14) therefore, as it stands, and acknow
ledging that it was fulfilled according to its primary
signification, we are justified in asking, had it any
other, or is the story of the Miraculous Conception an
invention and interpolation of a later date by some
one “ trained to regard every word, nay every letter,
of scripture, as mystical and divine, accustomed to the
application of passages in all senses,” and determined
to see in the idea which engrossed his mind, the fulfil
ment of every allusion in the Old Testament ?
That the evangelists took liberties with the histories
they professed to be writing, in order to bring them into
agreement with the predictions, is clear from two episodes
�The Messianic Prophecies.
21
related by them all. The first is the ride of Jesus into
Jerusalem. The authors of the second and third gospel
relate the story as that of a simple incident. The
author of the fourth is struck with the idea that some
thing of the kind had been predicted, * and accordingly
(quoting apparently from a very bad memory), adds to
the story—“ As it is written, ‘ Fear not, daughter of
Sion, behold thy King cometh sitting on an ass’ colt.’”
Then the author or interpolator of the first gospel takes
up the story, with this addition, and referring to the
passage, and, not understanding the tautological idiom
of Hebrew poetry, fancies that two animals are men
tioned. Consequently, looking at every word of scrip
ture as mystical and divine, he not only puts a second
ass into the scene, but actually makes Jesus ride upon
both at once (Matt. xxi. 7). Again, the authors of the
second and third gospels mention that the soldiers
divided Jesus’ clothes amongst themselves by lot. The
author of the first gospel tells the same story, but sees
in it the fulfilment of a prophecy, and adds—“ That it
might be fulfilled which was written : They parted my
garments amongst them, and upon my vesture they did
cast lots.” The author of the fourth gospel takes it
up at this stage, but (also misunderstanding the Hebrew
idiom), thinks the prediction must have been more
exactly fulfilled. Consequently, he makes two separate
transactions of it, the soldiers divide the garments, and
cast lots for the coat. In order that this may appear
reasonable, he minutely describes the coat; and it is
but the natural conclusion to the story that we find to
this day the preservation of the identical article at
Treves, where it has been exhibited for centuries to
comfort the faithful and confound the sceptic !
No one supposes that God endows men with superna
tural powers except for some purpose, and no one ought
to believe that in spite of his supernatural interference
that purpose should miscarry. Now, what could have
* Zechariah ix. 9.
�'ll
Evidences of Christianity.
been the object of these so-called prophecies, if it were
not that when the Messiah came he should be at once
recognised by those who were best acquainted with the
writings of the prophets ? But was this the result ?
Not at all; these were the very persons upon whom no
impression was made ! We quote the prophecies as evi
dences of Christianity, it is true: but to address prophecies
to Jews in order eventually to convince Gentiles would
surely have been a great waste of power, such as is incon
ceivable in the God of Nature! Did Jesus ever use these
prophecies as a proof of his mission ? His object was
to seek and to save those who were lost—he was not
sent except to the lost sheep of the house of Israel.
Would he not, therefore, when exhibiting his credentials
to the scribes and rulers of Israel, be likely to appeal
to tests the validity of which they would be most
anxious to maintain and to see fulfilled ? We are told
that he did so constantly in support or illustration of
his argument. But he never appealed to what have
since been looked upon as the great Messianic pro
phecies in support of his own pretensions.
*
In their
worst treatment of him he asked that they might be
forgiven on account of their ignorance (Luke xxiii. 46),
but why, with such crushing arguments at his com
mand, had he not taught them better ? There must
have constantly been among his audience persons old
enough to have heard the stories “ which were noised
about throughout all the hill country of Judea,”-—to
have remembered the taxing, the visit of the Magi, the
Song of Simeon, the witness of Anna. Why, when
Jesus was accused of having come out of Nazareth, of
being born of fornication, of having a devil, of making
himself equal with God, did he not appeal to the pro* The quotation from Psalm ex. is hardly a Messianic prophec5r, though Jesus claimed it as appropriate to himself. _ Our
idea of the functions of a Messiah is an attitude of constant inter
cession between an erring people and an angry God—not one of
dignified repose while the angry God makes for him a footstool of
the erring people.
�The Messianic Prophecies,
23
phecies, and then point triumphantly to their wonderful
fulfilment ?
There must have been many members of the San
hedrim before whom Stephen was tried, who remembered,
and none who had not heard of, the wonderful child who
at twelve years of age was found in the Temple sitting
in the midst of the doctors, both hearing them and ask
ing them questions. What better argument could
Stephen have used than to show that this child, at
whose understanding and answers they had been so
astonished, was in reality the Euler that their prophets
had said should come out of Bethlehem, should be
born of a virgin, and be the promised Branch of
the house of David1? He might have reminded them
of the voice that “ was heard in Eamah,” and explained
how Jesus was preserved from the massacre, and how,
in compliance with the prediction of Hosea, he
had returned from Egypt. He might have pointed
out that the very name “ Jesus of Nazareth,” used by
his accusers on this occasion, was itself a fulfilment of
prophecy, and unimpeachable evidence in his own favour.
The events preceding or at the crucifixion, the Betrayal
by the friend, the thirty pieces of silver, the being
numbered with the transgressors, the parting of the
raiment, were all too recent to have been forgotten.
He would have shown that, so far from destroying that
place, and changing the customs which Moses had
delivered, the whole career of Jesus had been to fulfil
the spirit of the Law, and all the deep and mysterious
sayings of the greatest and wisest of their prophets. If
he had had such materials at hand, is it conceivable
that he should have made the inane, rambling speech
which the writer of the Acts has put into his mouth? As
to the result is it possible to blame the Sanhedrim? They
had an imperative duty to perform under Deut. xiii. 10.
Stephen had it in his power to show by quotations,
by facts, by living witnesses, that Jesus was the very
Lord God who had brought their ancestors out of the
�24
The Messianic Prophecies.
land of Egypt and ont of the house of bondage, and
thus have ensured his own acquittal—and converted his
judges and Paul besides. If he refused to do this, and
even to attempt it, he can have no right to the honoured
name of Martyr, simply because he refused to bear wit
ness to the Truth, upon the only question which was
then at issue.
Had Paul known of the Messianic prophecies we have
quoted, how gladly wordd he have verified the fulfil
ment of them, how gladly would he have used that
fulfilment in his arguments with the Jews, and in his
epistles. How valuable they would have been to the
author of the Epistle to the Hebrews, who has strung
together out of the Old Testament every passage in
which he fancies he finds a type of or allusion to Christ
•—to whom it was “ evident that our Lord sprang out
of Judah ” (Hebrews vii. 14), which obviously he could
only do by being the actual son of Joseph. And as
they are not used by Jesus himself, nor by his followers
after him, we can only conclude that their applica
tion to Jesus is the result of ecclesiastical research and
ingenuity in post-apostolic ages. The gospels, as we
have them now, cannot be identified within a hundred
and fifty years of the last events they profess to com
memorate, and so far, therefore, from being supported
in any way by the old writings of the Prophets, we
have every reason to believe that they have themselves
"been moulded in many of their most important par
ticulars to suit the fancied requirements of those ancient
Oracles.
TURNBULL AND SPEARS PRINTERS EDINBURGH.
�
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Evidences of Christianity. The Messianic prophecies
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Rogers, Walter Lacy
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Place of publication: London
Collation: 24 p. ; 18 cm.
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Thomas Scott
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Conway Tracts
Messiah
Prophecies
-
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Text
QT') i'
THE MODERN ANALOGUE
OF THE
ANCIENT PROPHET.
A DISCOURSE
DELIVERED AT
jSoUTH
J3 LACE
pHAFEL,
J'lNSBURY,
SUNDAY, FEBRUARY 27TH, 1876,
BY
T. W. FRECKELTON.
Price 2d.
�a
----
—
�DISCOURSE.
“ What went ye out into the wilderness to gaze upon ? A
reed shaken with the wind ? But what went ye out to see ? A
man clothed in soft raiment ? Behold, they that wear soft cloth
ing are in king’s houses. But wherefore went ye out ? To see
a prophet ? Yea ! I say unto you, and more than a prophet”—
Jesus.
There are few things more difficult to understand,
interpret, and figure truthfully to our minds, than
our own time with all its relations and interests.
It is so near that it lacks perspective. We cannot
focus our eyes upon it; and its elements are confused
and hazy. We are so personally implicated and
interested, that we cannot keep our judgments un
disturbed by personal equation; and things take to us
exaggerated, reversed, and deceptive forms. Are we
indeed living in a crisis or epoch-making time in the
history of mind and thought ? or do we, in imagina
tion, born of our vanity, merely fancy so ? Who can
tell us? Our great grand-children will be able to
�4
decide perhaps, but that will be too late to
help us. Even for our wisdom there is left no resource
but to try to think as clearly and broadly as possible ;
to hold tenaciously by such reality as we can see ; to
do the duty of the day which is given to us, so as not
to be ashamed and confounded when the night comes,
and leave the rest to the Power that shapes out of
darkness the destinies of men and of the race. We do
seem, however, to live in a period when the long con
flict of all historic time between the rival forces
which strive for the control and leadership of men, is
deepening into an intensity which is exciting, and may
become tragic. We cannot, if we would, remain dis
interested and quiescent in the struggle, for we are
necessarily involved in it, either as partizans or as
portions of the territory in dispute; and it is demanded
of us, by our very humanity, that we do not consent
to be played with as pawns in a game; perhaps, no
less, that we ought not to stand by indifferently when
such great issues are at stake.
This contest of which I speak is called by many
names, takes many forms, but is being waged every
where. Here, with a quiet and determined persistency ;
there, with much noise and smoke of angry battle. In
spirit, it lies between slavery and freedom; between
an alliance of priest-craft with state-craft, and freethought with free institutions. It concentrates itself
most around the functions of the Priest, as the
�5
dogmatic asserter of a metaphysical theology and
sacerdotal rules of life; and the functions of the
Teacher, as an instructor of the intellect, the ethical
judgment, and the conscience of men, and an
awakener and inspirer of their automatic self-poise
and self-control. On the one hand, the Priest 1 on
the other, the Prophet 1 to which of these is it just
and fit that men should listen and hold themselves
ready to follow ? One or other, I say, it must be
in the end. Which? is a vital question—vital to
individual character; more so to social order, liberty,
and progress; most so to all the highest hopes and
divinest prospects of the race. There is, indeed, a
third pretender to this right of leading men, which
must have a word, but upon which it is not safe that I
should trust myself to speak much. I might say
things more strong than graceful, or indeed useful
here. I mean the so-called teacher who is not a
teacher at all, but a reflector; not so much as a
il voice crying in the wilderness ” even; only an echo !
whom the people like and follow because he just
reflects back upon them their own opinions, thoughts,
and notions; in whom they see themselves reflected,
and are never weary of admiring their own smirking
■faces; a plane surface, echoing back whatever the
popular voice shouts against it. In such, there can
exist only utter despair of spiritual health and
guidance. We are sometimes called upon to admire
�6
their sincerity and conscientious energy, and the great
numbers of people they attract compared with men of
large and free thought. By all means, whatever is
good and admirable let us admire ; but it should not
be forgotten what millions of men these echo-teachershave repelled, stultified, and rendered altogether in
disposed for the exercise of either thought or effort.
In a mere echo there is no added wisdom; a reflection
adds nothing to fact. As well might a sick man take
for physician his image in a mirror, or a love-sick
maiden, Narcissus-like, seek to wed the bright dream
of her face mirrored in a lake ! As well might a lost
and benighted traveller ask his way of the echoes of
the dark places into which he has stumbled ! “ Vanity
of vanities, this also is vanity!” Believe me, sirs, in
all high things we are helped more by challenge of
the old in us, and by words which awaken longings
and aspirations after the unattained, than by mere
reiteration or fine-phrased illustration of our own
thoughts. We are vain enough, any way, without
being taught, in the name of philosophy and religion,
to make ourselves the measure of universal and
absolute truth.
It is a notable fact in the history of the world that
the Prophet always—never the Priest or the Echo—
has been the saviour and inspirer of society. All the
great movers of men—Reformers, Patriots, Revealers,.
Guides—have been men of the Prophetic faculty. Inc
�7
the old Hebrew times, from Moses, who laid the basis
of the Nationality, to John the Baptist, who cried in
the wilderness “ Prepare ye the way of the Lord,”
every step in the progress of liberty of thought, every
new influx of patriotic enthusiasm or religious life is
marked by the name of some Prophet—Samuel, David,
Huldah, Elijah, Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezra, and the rest.
Every decadence of power; every usurpation of
tyranny; every idolatrous relapse; and every national
humiliation is linked with the name of some foolish
King; some venial Priest, some mere echo-voice which
cried Peace! Peace! when no peace was possible; some
spiritual quack who healed the hurt of the people
slightly and but for a time. Call over the bead-roll of
the true saints and heroes who have blessed mankind
most permanently, and whose spirits to-day rule and
inspire us from afar; there is no Priest amongst them
except he be one in outward form and name alone,
but whose universal soul has risen out of mere priestly
limitations into the comparatively free life of the
prophetic spirit; a phenomenon more common under
Christianity than any other form of religion; because
theoretical Christianity is confessedly “ without Priest,
Temple, or Ritualand, however in practice this ideal
may be degraded, any impulse of reform or tendency
to wider application, turns instinctively to this as its
point of departure : so that whenever a Christian Priest
has been a Reformer or Patriot, he has, to that extent,
�8
ceased to be a Priest. Such a man was Luther, Priest
only in name ; Prophet by birth and in substance of
soul. Such other men there have been, but not with
them can the priest-idea be credited at all. In the
Classic lands and times it was not less so. It was not
to Priests at all that Greece and Rome owed their
strength, their place, their brilliant immortality of
genius and power. While the Priests were laughing
in each other’s faces at the sacrifices, it was the Poets,
the Patriots, and the great creative Artist-souls who
revelled in universal beauty and sought eternal order
and truth, who built the Peoples’ names into an im
perishable glory.
We are not surprised to find how prominently the
Prophet often stood out in the olden* times, and what
various parts he played; the spirit of his work always
the same, the form determined by the needs of each
age for itself. The groundwork idea of the Prophet
is that he is a Seer,—that he sees,—clearly realising,
in essence and in relation, that which is hidden from,
or unheeded by, common men. It is further charac
teristic of him, that he is possessed by his vision. Not
so much that he has the truth, as that the truth has
him. Not that he has an idea, one amongst many
others, but that his idea is incarnated in him; conse
crates him thoroughly; uses him constantly : so that
he is grandly sincere, single-natured, self-sacrificing.
All this has been summed up in past time and called
�9
a divine inspiration ; a God’s message to men; a reve
lation from the Most High Unseen Power; a thing
to be considered supernatural, miraculous; a voice
from which no man must dare appeal; and much more
of this sort which some of us now call nonsense, not
without a certain fitness of speech. But it is not all non
sense : for if the Supreme Power never breaks the
blank, despairing, awful, silence—speaks never a word
of light and strength to bewildered humanity; leaving
us in unresolvable doubt as to whether there be a Su
preme Power at all; Life and Time are indeed, to all,
except the smallest fraction, but vanity and vexation
of spirit. Perhaps it were far more true to say that
we and all things are surrounded and pervaded by
perennial revelation, and that a prophetic soul big with
Truth, on fire with genius, glowing with a high, pure,
enthusiasm for righteousness, is a concentration in
time and place of such revealing power, and, indeed
a God’s message to common men, to which, whoso is
wise will take heed as to a light shining in a dark
place. Without this faculty of seeing, and this de
lirium of abandonment to one high purpose, there can
be no true Prophet: for though these things are pos
sible in some degree to all men, to a great leader their
fulness is indispensable. To such the spirit of God
must be given without measure, and when present
in the flesh it must be counted a divine bestowment.
We*may note also how penetrative is this prophetic
�IO
vision; a kind of unconscious analysis first, synthesis
afterwards; going beyond things into their ground of
being, their relations and consequences; and hence in
dealing with human affairs, it often takes the character
of prevision and fore-announcement,—so often, that the
exaggeration of this feature has come to be counted as
almost the one characteristic of aprophet, and prophecy,
which means revealing,—teaching—has come to be un
derstood only as forecast and foretelling. This is the
sense in which theological people speak of the pro
phecies and Prophets of the Bible : but such view may
easily be so put as to be a degradation both of the
man and his function. A Prophet is surely something
more than a superior kind of fortune-teller. There are
shallow critics, however, who say that all so-called
prophecies are but instances of being wise after the
event; not seeing that a true prophetic insight actually
does and must foresee many things,—just as Science can
foresee certain phenomena,—because it deals with
eternal principles, which, whenever they come out in
special instances, tend to take a similar complexion and
similar forms: and it only needs an average amount
of worldly wisdom and induction from experience, to
make the requisite corrections and show how these
principles will reveal themselves in any particular
case. It would be easy, as instances of this, to quote
many passages from the speeches and writings of
Theodore Parker, on the certain results of slavery in
�II
North America, which read, to-day, like historical
statements respecting the war which did not break out
until after his death.
The third essential thing to the Prophet is that he
should possess a magnetic soul, quick with universal
human sympathies and affinities; capable of awakening
in men that divine hunger and thirst which are the
root-conditions of life; and of attracting men to the
beauty of his own ideal, against the gravitation of all
the forces of ignoble passion, of material interest, of
slavish fear, and imbecile indifference, which paralyze
and charm souls to their death. These, then, are the
necessary qualities of the Prophet,—sight in the sense
involving insight, complete Consecration, and the
power to move men. These given, the form of
the prophetic activity is determined by the tem
perature and the needs of its own time. There
are accidents of various kinds, which arise in con
nexion with things, from the special individuality,
culture, or condition of the man himself; or from the
state of civilization and general culture of his age;
for, whatever may be the grandeur of his figure and
the promise of his genius and work, there is a sense in
which all are products of the past; and, as to the form
they take, it can never very greatly transcend the
limits of the current civilization. Hence, in the study
of past particular instances, we find that such men
have been fearlessly uncompromising, rigidly dog
�12
matic; pertinaciously insistent; men very much of one
idea, and disposed to realise it by what seemed the
nearest way, going straight to their aim. Qualities
which in certain aspects and circumstances must be
pronounced good; indispensable, indeed, when the rough
work of the world has to be done; inseparable, per
haps, from intensity of conviction, and possession by
a dominant purpose when associated with imperfect
culture and unscientific modes of thought. But in
certain other aspects these qualities are defective;
tending to narrow the mind, to blind it to compensa
tions and equivalents, to lead it to make no allowances,
and so become sour, fanatical, uncharitable, perse
cuting, but this is the prophetic spirit demoralised
and run to seed. Perhaps we are near the truth when
we say that the form of the prophetic mission, at any par
ticular time, is the result of a certain automatic and un
conscious self-adaptation to the existing want. Hence
Moses was a patriot-deliverer and law-giver. Samuel
was an administrator and consolidator of national
polity. David, and Cromwell long afterwards, were
battle-heroes and kings. Socrates, for his part, fol.
lowed the profession of his mother, and was a deliverer
of fair youths, who in the philosophic schools of
Greece, felt the birth-throes of new thoughts and
divine inspirations. Plato was a seer and thinker,
who was contented quietly to sow the seed of philo
sophic thought, and leave all to time and the orderly
�13
laws of development. John was a voice crying in the
wilderness. Jesus a teacher of spiritual and practical
religion; a revealer of the Fatherhood of God and of
human brotherhood. Paul was a missionary of the
new faith, and wrote its gospel in wanderings over
many lands. Milton was a patriot and a poet: and
Shakespeare the revealer of the human heart to itself.
Wesley and Whitfield poured the life and day of a new,
divine inspiration upon a dead age and upon the com
monest ways of life; and Theodore Parker, in many
respects more like a Hebrew prophet than any man
of the Christian ages, was, like a second Moses, the
deliverer of an enslaved race, though he also died on
Pisgah, seeing the promised land only from afar: like
a second Elijah, too, he was, denouncing all idolatries
and hollow hypocrisies; though braver than Elijah,
for Parker fled from the face of no woman or man.
He was like John the Baptist rather, the stern rebuker
of crowned and gilded sin, the forerunner of a diviner
age; nor, indeed, all unlike Jesus himself, for intensity
of ethical purity; for sweetness of reverence; breadth of
sympathy; tenderness of love; capacity for self-sacrifice
and strong trust in God. What Carlyle and Emerson
have been to this age it is, as yet, impossible fully to
say; for not yet, thank God, has death rounded their
work into completeness; but I think it will still be seen
that each has given us light and help specially suited
to our needs. What do we not owe to Carlyle ! for
�14
having said so much which ought to clear from our
eyes all baseless fabrics of vision, to drive all aching
unrealities out of our hearts, and teach us that only what
is true and good can be beautiful and eternal. And
of Emerson, what shall we say ? he is indeed a prophet,
and more than a prophet. All these years he has
lived with us, his eyes seeing the truth in the deep,
calm eyes of Nature; his words vibrating in unison
with Nature’s mighty heart. How wonderful in pas
sionless serenity ! How tenderly human in emotion 1
How sweeping in philosophic vision ! How grandly
patient, and full of hope and faith. Two mighty
helpers these, who, with other thinkers and workers
still with us, are laying broadly and deeply the founda
tions of the new City of God ; that thrice-consecrated
temple, which is yet to rise in a purified and glorified
humanity; and in the beauty of which the nations to
come shall dwell and worship and serve.
Is it not true, as I said, that the interest of all past
history centres itself around prophetic souls ? Heroworship is the light of history. All history resolves
itself into reverence for heroes, and the story of their
thoughts and works. Contemporaneous history, too
often, alas ! does not see its heroes; or ignores them
with a supercilious scorn, in its anxiety to push to the
front Tyrants who have sold Justice, trampled upon
Truth, and ground down the faces of good men to the
earth : or puppet Kings, whose weak heads had much
�T5
ado to support the weight of their crowns ; or Poten
tates, who have been powerful only in the mockery and
poison of their gilded sin. What we call history has
been, until of late, all too full of slaves set on horse
back and riding to the devil—as such must, with a
swift celerity—while, bespattered with the mud of
their horses’ heels, the true princes of men have toiled
on foot behind. But the large generalisation and the
sure justice of Time sets that all right at length, and
the despised Prophet takes his rank. The common
consent of men, and the innate gratitude of the race,
set his name amongst the stars; or if, his name being
forgotten, that may not be, his words become the
terms of justice and the boundary lines of law; his
acts are the landmarks of civilization; and his ideas
the paths of an ever-progressive righteousness.
In earlier times the Prophet stood out with con
siderable boldness of relief. He was a central figure,
to whom men looked up, and from whom influence
and guidance radiated in every direction. Not seldom,
even kings waited upon his word, and the destinies of
nations lay in his hands. It is, perhaps, not less so
now in reality, but it is less obviously so. There are
several things now which tend to mask the great living
teacher and inspirer amongst us. We have a far larger
and more generally exercised literary habit, and
greater appliances for spreading thought. We live in
an atmosphere constantly vibrating with intellectual
�i6
effort and result; and it is by no means easy to sort
out such a babel of voices, and to apportion truths
and the results of thought to their proper owners.
The world is full of these echoes, not altogether
truthful echoes either,—for that were not so much
amiss,—but diluted echoes; distorted echoes; and
echoes of echoes; each more diluted and distorted
than the last, to the tenth generation. It is, indeed,
grand to have a true voice amongst us; were it only
one divinely-appointed, heaven-sent leader, seer, and
thinker; but to have for every one such a score of
badly-made journeymen who cannot think, but only
<c steal the thoughts of others, clip them round the
edges, and challenge those whose they are to swear to
them,” is not well, only a misleading and a bewilder
ment. What a crowd of these must any man sternly
put aside, who would find a strong voice to help him,
and would hear and judge for himself 1 It is but in
few cases now that a man of genius occupies the com
manding height which marks some special instances
of the past. The status of men generally is higher.
There is a more equable distribution of education; of
culture; perhaps of average power. The mountains
are as high as ever from the level of the sea, but the
lowlands have been raised. This cannot, however,
supersede genius, or compensate for its absence; but
it makes exceptional men less easy to recognise—
tends, perhaps, also to make them more rare. This
�17
further fact also may be noted. The old prophetic
function was of a very compound and complicated
character. When there are few workers and much to
be done, genius must be a man-of-all-work; sometimes
poet, prophet, philosopher, battle-hero, and lawgiver,
all in one. The mythic Orpheus must use his lyre for
taming beasts and building walls. David must not
only sing psalms to his harp, but charm away with it
the madness of Saul; and lay it down to grasp the
sword, and, by-and-by, the sceptre. Jesus must be
not inspired teacher alone, but witness, confessor,
martyr also, to the power of the truth he sent. Luther
was not only a reformer, but a translator, a theologian,
and ecclesiastical administrator to the new Church.
Milton, who was a poet born, and who grew up to
man’s estate conscious of no other function, must put
aside what he felt to be the great work of his life, and
betake his quiet, stately soul into the arena of one of
the stormiest times of history; spend all the flower of
his life as patriot; as educator of public sentiment;
justifier of stern and bloody deeds of retribution; and
the performance of state offices in the midst of the
very birth-throes of modern civil and religious liberty,
and only, when in old age and blindness, can find in
the reckless indifference of a corrupt time, the quiet
to sing his immortal song. So, in varied forms, it has
been true of many another. But now we have reached
a stage when a division of labour becomes the more
�i8
natural and economic course. Carlyle may philoso
phise, Emerson speculate, Darwin study the occult
laws of life, and Herbert Spencer generalise, each his
whole life long; with this penalty, however, that he
shall remain unknown, or known only to be misunder
stood, except by his select circle of followers. As
thought advances and becomes more general; as
culture takes more differentiated forms; as there is
attained a more exalted condition of the ethical con
science ; and men become more greatly human, there
will be less occasion for single men to become such
prominent and central figures; and, probably, less
tendency for genius to manifest itself in spurts and in
incalculable ways; and the prophetic function will
become more and more a thing of spirit, less and less
of form. Still, none, nor all of them, will make the
true Prophet any the less a fact or a necessity. So
long- as the world is full of wonder and mystery; so
long as passionate human hearts exist; so long as the
intellect of man feels the pressure of the ever
surrounding boundless unknown; so long as remain
the questions, What ? Whence ? Whither ? Wherefore ?
so long will the Prophet be a necessity; and must
come, in answer to men’s cry, if there be any pity in
the sweet heavens; or the heart will project some
visionary, exalted or degraded, image of itself into
objectivity and cry, “ These be thy gods, O Israel 1
who brought thee up out of the land of Egypt! ”
�19
For whatever the prospects of future advancement
may be, the state of large masses of the people is
such, and such are the conditions that relate truth,
enthusiasm, and work together in the practical issues
of men’s lives, that, for ages to copie, men will need
and look for such hero-souls, as people in great dark
ness pine for the dawn, and will so welcome them
when they come, however much at first ignorance or
mistake may blind them, or hide their deliverers from
their eyes.
In another respect, too, the condition of the times,
is greatly changed. The taunt which Jesus threw at
the Jews—“Which of the prophets have not your
fathers persecuted, from righteous Abel to Zachariah,
whom ye slew before the altar ? ” might, until a com
paratively recent period, be applied with almost equal
force to any other people. The advance of civiliza
tion and the wider spread of knowledge have, at least,
driven persecution into other and less obvious forms..
Indeed, it had become high time for men to improve
as to the way in which they treated their truest and
best. It was too long the case that the “ Kingliest
Kings were crowned with thorns.” They ought now,
no longer, to come to their own, their own “ receiving
them not,” but to a world prepared for them, and glad
to hail their advent. Jesus said, in his time, that if
men would but lift their eyes, they would see the fields
white for harvest; how much more should it be so now 1
�20
Let us gladly say, it is so ! The true prophets of the
last few generations have not been stoned or very much
persecuted in any serious way. The last experiment
■of that kind tried in England was with Wesley and
the early Methodists, and produced quite other results
than short-sighted people expected to see. Now, if we
hear some poor soul crying out that he is a prophet
and persecuted, it is some incompetent shepherd whom
■no sheep will follow;—some ridiculous fanatic of
whom the world is weary;—some priest, who will keep
thrusting himself between men and the face of God;—
some poor atrabilious Churchman who being paid and
having sworn to do one thing, does quite another, and
■cries because he cannot “ eat his cake and have it ”
at the same time; or some wretched anachronism
that, born two centuries too late, is vainly trying to
climb the tower of the age’s thought, to put back the
clock with his hand; and because some strong man
thrusts him aside, not perhaps too gently, or some
impatient foot kicks out the bottom of the ladder, fills
the air with unmelodious howling. In these days,
though a man be a prophet, he need not dwell in the
wilderness, eating locusts and wild honey, and clad in
a skin; but may live in a decent house, pay scot and
lot, have wife and children, and clean linen to boot:
nay, may even earn “wealth, and honour, and troops
of friends ; ” for there is now, thank heaven, a calcul
able and increasing proportion of the people who are
�21
ready to hear and follow any clear, strong, voice, that
has in it the ring of honesty, intelligent sincerity, and
true leadership. The time is dangerous enough to
prophets, but not in the old way. The danger now isfrom the excitements of adulation and flattery,—the
soporific effects of fulness of meat,—and a life of
temptations to ease, and the saying of smooth, soft
things. Do not mistake me. There is room yet for
the old prophetic fire of consecration, and the stem
exercise of the Prophet’s function; nay ! for aught I
know, for neglect, persecution, and death. I cannot
tell what might happen if some man should arise
amongst us, fired with the passion of genius ; who in
burning words should tell us all the truth, and force
back upon our sluggish consciences all our duties,
respecting useless and effeminate luxury side by side
with wretchedest poverty in its lazar-rags; about
drunkenness and gluttony; sensualism and greed of
gold; impatience of honest work, and the practice of
small cheating, that like a wretched little devil eats out
the heart of trade;—the truth about indifference to
high thought, and the vapid dilettanteism that chatters
about Poetry, Art, and fashionable Philosophy, of
which it knows nothing;—the truth about the want
of honesty in politics, and sincerity in religion, and
about many things worse even than these, and which
shall be nameless now. Such a Prophet, I trow, would
not have a very quiet time; and would cry with
�22
Moses, “ Have I conceived all this people ? have I
begotten them? that thou shouldest say unto me,
carry them in thy bosom.” Or moan with Jeremiah,
“Woe is me, my mother, that thou hast borne me a man
of strife and a man of contention to the whole earth !
every one of them doth curse me.” Or weep with
Jesus, “O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, thou that killest
■the prophets and stonest them who are sent unto thee;
how often would I have gathered thy children
together, as a hen her brood under her wings, but
ye would not I ”
Where shall we look for our prophets ? Are there
:any such souls amongst us now ? Do we know them ?
•or are they amongst us as angels entertained unawares ?
I think they are with us, and not altogether unknown.
•Our own generation seems rich in such. Some of
them have gone over to the majority, but still other
voices linger, and new ones are rising into power.
The oldest form of prophetic afflatus,—poetry, namely,
■still lives, and will never be superseded; because,
however the most advanced intellectual activity may
he busy discovering and making sure the way of
progress the feet of the people will have to tread,
there will always be in advance of that, an exercise of
the poetic imagination feeling among the nascent
forms of things, all along the margin of the unknown,
for analogies with what we know. No man can fore
cast the probabilities of the future who feels or affects
�23
scorn for the poetry of his own age. Erasmus Darwin
the poet was the precursor of Charles Darwin, the
naturalist and all-comprehensive man of science, who
has said or done little that did not lie folded in the
thought of his ancestor, like a flower in the bud. I
would counsel the young especially to keep well
abreast of the poetry of their own age. The future
lies nascent in it. It is the Morning Star resting over
the cradle where the New Life is being nursed into
power. I do not mean by Poets, merely musical
singers, though they too are God’s gift and divine.
Poetry is a thing of thought and intense feeling, no
less than of rhythm and music. I think that we have
amongst us heavenly voices of both kinds, fitted not
only to charm us from vexatious cares and empty
frivolities, but to waken us into hopeful strength of
purpose. I find a certain class of supercilious people,
who have yet much to learn, scoffing at Tennyson and
Browning, and considering such prose-poets as Carlyle
and Emerson hyper-mystical and superseded ; and yet
I think that these men, and others of their faculty,
have still something to say to us, if we have but ears
to hear. There are still amongst us a thousand things
that look fair, which would take in a moment their
own aborted deformity, did we but touch them with
the Ithuriel’s spear of Theodore Parker’s fiery in
tensity. And there was once a voice, eloquent within
these very walls like the voice of a charmer—a true
�24
prophet he was, seer, thinker, poet, all in one. Some
of you remember him well. You are now grey, and
growing somewhat weary of the world, but you will
never forget his voice, whose teaching nourished your
youth, and made it “ sublime, with the fairy-tales of
science, and the long results of time.” And if, this
morning, my words have been uninteresting to you
and wearisome, I know that your minds have looked
beyond me, and seen the deep calm eyes of William
Johnson Fox, with which he used to look down the
future, and see all the wonder that will be, and have
heard his voice, with which he being dead, yet
speaketh, and shall speak, until many a grand dream
which he saw afar off, but died without realizing, shall
become the life of men who may perchance never hear
the echo of his name.
O sirs! we are, for the most part, but small and
common men. No Prophets we,—alas ! Not great
at all, “ except it be some far-off touch of greatness to
know we are not great ” I—but next to being a
prophet is to know one when we see him; and to
have humility to obey and follow our natural God
given leader when we have found him. This is some
times a hard task; a day’s work not to be done
without cost and pain; but, surely, within the com
petency, and for the best concern, of every honest
and sincere man.
�
Dublin Core
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Title
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Victorian Blogging
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A collection of digitised nineteenth-century pamphlets from Conway Hall Library & Archives. This includes the Conway Tracts, Moncure Conway's personal pamphlet library; the Morris Tracts, donated to the library by Miss Morris in 1904; the National Secular Society's pamphlet library and others. The Conway Tracts were bound with additional ephemera, such as lecture programmes and handwritten notes.<br /><br />Please note that these digitised pamphlets have been edited to maximise the accuracy of the OCR, ensuring they are text searchable. If you would like to view un-edited, full-colour versions of any of our pamphlets, please email librarian@conwayhall.org.uk.<br /><br /><span><img src="http://www.heritagefund.org.uk/sites/default/files/media/attachments/TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" width="238" height="91" alt="TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" /></span>
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Conway Hall Library & Archives
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2018
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Conway Hall Ethical Society
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Pamphlet
Dublin Core
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The modern analogue of the ancient prophet: a discourse delivered at South Place Chapel, Finsbury, Sunday February 27th, 1876
Creator
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T.W. Freckelton
Description
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Place of Publication: [London]
Collation: 24 p. ; 16 cm
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[South Place Chapel]
Date
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[1876]
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G3369
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<a href="http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/mark/1.0/"><img src="http://i.creativecommons.org/p/mark/1.0/88x31.png" alt="Public Domain Mark" /></a><span> </span><br /><span>This work (The modern analogue of the ancient prophet: a discourse delivered at South Place Chapel, Finsbury, Sunday February 27th, 1876), identified by </span><a href="https://conwayhallcollections.omeka.net/admin/items/show/www.conwayhall.org.uk"><span>Humanist Library and Archives</span></a><span>, is free of known copyright restrictions.</span>
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application/pdf
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Text
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English
Subject
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Free thought
Prophecies