“The stone that smote the Image became a great Mountain, and filled the whole earth.” Daniel ii. 35.
1 Yesterday I drew your notice to the outlines of the history of the Church, and the clear and precise anticipation of it, by our Lord and His Apostles. The Gospel Dispensation is confessedly a singular phenomenon in human affairs; singular, whether we consider the extent it occupies in history, the harmony of its system, the consistency of its design, its contrariety to the existing course of things, and success in spite of that contrariety, and lastly, the avowed intention of its first preachers to effect those objects, which it really has attained. They professed to be founding a Kingdom; a new Kingdom, different from any that had been before, as disclaiming the use of force,—in this world, yet not of this world,—while it was to be, notwithstanding, of an aggressive and encroaching character, an empire of conquest and aggrandizement, destroying all former powers, and itself standing for ever. Infidels often object to us, that our interpretation of the Scripture prophecies concerning Christ’s Kingdom is after all but allegorical, and therefore evasive. Not so; we are on the whole willing to take our stand on their literal fulfilment. Christ preached that “the kingdom of God was at hand.” He founded it and made Peter and the other Apostles His Vicegerents in it after His departure, and He announced its indefinite extension, and its unlimited duration. And, in matter of fact, it exists to this day, with its government vested in the very dynasty which His Apostles began, and its territory spread over more than the world then known to the Jews; with varying success indeed in times and places, and varying consistency and unanimity within; yet, after making every allowance for such partial failures, strictly a visible power, with a political influence founded on invisible pretensions. Thus the anticipations of its founders are unparalleled in their novelty, their boldness, and their correctness. To continue our review.
3. 2 If the Christian Church has spread its branches high and wide over the earth, its roots are fixed as deep below the surface. The intention of Christ and His Apostles, on which I have dwelt, is itself but the accomplishment of ancient prophecy.
First, let it be observed that there was an existing belief among the heathen, at the time of its rise, that out of the East a new Empire of the world was destined to issue 3. This rumour, however originating, was known at Rome, the then seat of dominion, and is recorded by a Roman historian. Next, it became matter (as it would seem) for heathen poetry. The most celebrated of Roman poets has foretold the coming of a new Kingdom of peace and righteousness under the rule of a divine and divinely-favoured King, who was to be born into the world. Could it be maintained that he wrote from his own imagination, not from existing traditions, this would not at all diminish the marvel, as not in any measure tending to account for it. In that case, the poet would but take his place among the Prophets. Further, if we admit St. Matthew’s testimony, which we have no excuse for doubting, we must believe, that, just at the time of Christ’s birth, certain Eastern Sages came to Jerusalem in search of a child, of whom they expected great things, and whom they desired to worship in His cradle. And lastly, another Eastern Sage, fourteen hundred years before, had declared, heathen though he was, and uninterested in the event, that “a Star should come out of Jacob, and a Sceptre should rise out of Israel, … that out of Jacob should come He that should have dominion.” [Numb. xxiv. 17, 19] Now, whether we may assume that this last prophecy is faithfully recorded by Moses or not, so far is clear, and not a little remarkable, that the Jewish traditions concerning the expected Empire profess to take their rise in heathen sources 4. It is a clear coincidence with the fact, already adverted to, of the prevalence of such predictions among the heathen at the time of Christ’s coming.
While such was the testimony of enemies and strangers to this destined rise of a prosperous Empire from Judea, much more full and varied are the predictions of it delivered by the natives of that country themselves. These, as contained in our holy books, have been again and again illustrated by Christian writers, and neither need nor admit of enumeration here. I will but cite one or two passages, by way of reminding you of them. “Ask of Me, and I shall give Thee the heathen for Thine inheritance, and the uttermost parts of the earth for Thy possession. Thou shalt break them with a rod of iron; Thou shalt dash them in pieces like a potter’s vessel.” “Gird Thy sword upon Thy thigh, O most Mighty, with Thy glory and Thy majesty. And in Thy majesty ride prosperously, because of truth, and meekness, and righteousness: and Thy right hand shall teach Thee terrible things. Thine arrows are sharp in the heart of the King’s enemies, whereby the people fall under Thee … Instead of Thy fathers shall be Thy children, whom Thou mayest make princes in all the earth.” “The Lord shall send the rod of Thy strength out of Zion; rule Thou in the midst of Thine enemies … The Lord at Thy right hand shall strike through kings in the day of His wrath.” “It shall come to pass in the last days, that the Mountain of the Lord’s House shall be established in the top of the mountains, and shall be exalted above the hills; and all nations shall flow unto it … Out of Zion shall go forth the Law, and the Word of the Lord from Jerusalem. And He shall judge among the nations, and shall rebuke many people; and they shall beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruning hooks; nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war any more.” “It is a light thing that Thou shouldest be My servant to raise up the tribes of Jacob, and to restore the preserved of Israel. I will also give Thee for a light to the Gentiles, that Thou shouldest be My salvation unto the end of the earth.” And almost in the same words, the aged Simeon recognises in the infant Jesus the Lord’s promised “salvation, a light to lighten the Gentiles, and the glory of His people Israel.” [Ps. ii. 8, 9; xlv. 3-5, 16; cx. 2, 5. Isa. ii. 2-4; xlix. 6. Luke ii. 30-32.] In these passages the prediction of bloody revolution and of peace are as strangely combined, as in our Lord’s account of His Kingdom, as being at once a refuge and consolation, and a sword. Maintain, if you will, that they have not hitherto been so fully accomplished in its history as is conceivable; yet, in matter of fact, has not this twofold character of the Dispensation been in such measure realized, as substantially answers to the words of the prediction? Consider only the wars and tumults of the Middle Ages, of which the Church was the occasion, and, at the same time, its salutary influence upon the fierce and lawless soldiers who then filled the thrones of Europe. Take the Prophecy, take the History; and say fairly, whether, in accordance with the Scripture prospect, we do not actually find in the centuries I speak of, a political power, making vassals of the kings of the earth, humbling them beneath its feet, affording matter of endless strife, yet acting as the very bond of peace, as far as peace was really attained. How truly have “the sons of them that afflicted” the Church, “come bending unto her; and they that despised her, bowed themselves at the soles of her feet,” [Isa. lx. 14.] and “the enemies of Christ been made His footstool!”