(2.) Prophecy made great use of the present, and es- pecially of the standpoint and personal circumstances of the agent, to illustrate the future. Ezekiel describes the coming glory of the Church under the gorgeous and elaborate description of a temple. All the images in the nine concluding chapters are taken from this one analogy. He sums up his minute and precise repre- sentation with the significant hint, "The name of the city from that day shall be, The Lord is there." The Apocalyptic seer, living when the Temple was laid waste, and all its rites and institutions were superseded, de- scribes the glory of the new Jerusalem in language that. seems to be directly contradictory (Lev. xxi. 22), " I saw no temple therein;" but in entire harmony with Ezek. xlviii, 35, the Spirit testifies, "the Lord God Almighty and the Lamb are the temple of it." Both Ezekiel and John speak of the same glorious future in language and imagery perfectly natural and appropriate to the times and circumstances in which they were placed.
(3.) Frequently the prophetic style received its com- plexion and coloring from the diversified circumstances of the parties addressed, as well as from the standpoint of the prophet. This is peculiarly the case with the language of Daniel, which presents such an approxima- tion to the style of history that some have rashly as- signed his writings to a date long posterior to the cap- tivity of Babylon. The specific form which a portion of his prophecies assumes may be accounted for by con- sidering the great feebleness ami depression of the peo- ple on resuming their residence in Judaea ; the anoma- lous and shattered condition of the theocratic consti- tution when the ark of the covenant, the Urim and Thnmmim, the kingly rule and government, were gone, when the vision was sealed, and no one of the prophetic order remained. This is the time selected for setting forth the external aspect of God's kingdom to one who
PROPHET
was well conversant with political revolutions, who stood at the centre of the world's power and glory when earthly monarchies began to aspire after univer- sal dominion. The \ isions granted to Daniel (viii, ix), though plain to us who read them after the event, were far tr,ini himself or to others I viii, 27 ; xjj. 1,8,9 . In the Bymbols he employs we have a re- i. ; in- own peculiar position and political ov- oid in the detailed exhibition of the c ing
future, in the explicit predictions of the changes and vicissitudes which were al hand, the children ol faith felt that the God of their fathers was still in the midsl of them. Prophecy is always a revelation of specific events, when the events spoken of are to be fulfilled in the nearer future. The picture presented to the Church was minutely portrayed in a historical dress whenever tin- hope of i in- faithful required special and immediate support. (See s viii, below.)
(4.) The divine impulse under which the prophets spoke, though ii was supernatural, acted in harmony with personal characteristics and native susceptibilities. The supernatural ever bases itsell upon the natural. Constitutional tendencies arc moulded by the plastic influence of divine grace, bul are never entirely nhliter- ated. 1 h <• prophets never losl personal consciousness, or any distinctive characteristic of though! and feeling, even when they were raised into an ecstatical condition. Extraordinary impressions of divine light and influence affected the rational as well as the imaginative power. The false lights which pretended to prophecy were im- pressions made on the imagination exclusively, " whose conceptions ran only in a secular channel, as the sect of diviners, enchanters, dreamers, and soothsayers" id. Smith i. The lowest degree of prophecy is when the imaginative power is most predominant, ami the -cine becomes too turbulent for the rational faculty to discern clearly the mystical sense. The highest is where all imagination ceases -as with Moses, "whom God knew ice" where truth is revealed to the reason and understanding.
(.">.) The poetical element of prophecy arises from the ecstatical condition ol the prophet, from the action of spiritual influences on constitutional tendencies. Rut as t lie primary ai f the religious teachers of the He- brews was to influence the heart and conscience, the poetical element, though never entirely suppressed, was held iii restraint, to further the higher ends of spiritual instruction. Hence, as I'.wald remarks, "Prophetical has a form and impress of its own, too elevat- ed to sink to simple prose, too practical in its aim to assume the highest form of poetry." Of the two ideas involved in votes, the prophetical ruled the poetical. The distinction between the poet and the prophet, may be thus expressed: as the prophet's aim was to work upon others in the most direct and impressive manner, he was al liberty to adopl any form or method of rep- resentation : hut a- the immediate aim of the poet is to satisfy himself and the requirements of his art. he can- not vary his definite manner, and change his mode of address at pleasure, in order to work upon others. The poetical elevation appears most vividly in the idealistic and imaginative form, when the patriarchal heads of the Jewish nation, their several families, Zion, Jerusa- lem, their religious ami political centre, are addressed as living personalities present to the mind and eye oi the prophet. A vivid instance of this personification occur- in Jer. xxxi, 15, Rachel weeping for her children,