prophecies are as clear as those before the death of Antiochus. Neither is Antiochus fo very particularly dwelt upon as is commonly imagined; neither is he spoken of with greater resentment, than other prophets exprefs towards the kings of Affyria and Babylon. All honeft men, who love liberty and their country, must speak with indignation of tyrants and oppreffors. 6. His fixth objection is, that Daniel is omitted among the prophets recited in Ecclefiafticus, where it seems proper to have mentioned him as a Jewish prophet-author, had the book under his name been received as canonical, when Ecclefiafticus was published. It might have been proper to have mentioned him, had the author been giving a complete catalogue of the Jewish canonical writers. But that is not the cafe. He mentions several who never pretended to be infpired writers, and omits others who really were fo. No mention is made of Job and Ezra, and of the books under their names, as well as of Daniel and who can account for the filence of authors in any particular at this distance of time? Daniel is propofed (1 Macc. II. 60.) as a pattern by the father of the Maccabees, and his wifdom is highly recommended by Ezekiel : and these are fufficient teftimonies of his antiquity, without the confirmation of a later writer. 7. It is objected, that Jonathan, who made the Chaldee paraphrafes on the prophets, has omitted Daniel: from whence it fhould feem, the book of Daniel was not of that account with the Jews, as the other books of the prophets were. But there are other books, which were always accounted canonical among the Jews, and yet have no Chaldee paraphrafes extant, as the books of Ezra and Nehemiah. Jonathan might perhaps not make a Targum or Chaldee paraphrafe on Daniel, because half of the book is written in Chaldee. Or he might have made a Targum on Daniel, and that Targum may have been loft, as other ancient Targums have been destroyed by the injury of time; and there are good proofs in the Mifna and other writers cited by Bishop Chandler, that there was an ancient Targum on Daniel. But tho' Jonathan made no Targum on Daniel, yet in his interpretation of other prophets, he frequently applies the prophecies of Daniel, as fuller and clearer in describing the fame events; and confequently Daniel was in his esteem a prophet, and at least of equal authority with those before him. The ranking of Daniel among the Hagiographa, and not among the prophets, was done by the Jews fince Christ's time for very obvious reafons. He was always esteemed a prophet by the ancient Jewish church. Our Saviour calleth him Daniel the prophet: and Jofephus (7) speaketh of him as one of the greatest of the prophets. 8. That part of Daniel, fays the objector, which is written in Chaldee, is near the stile of the old Chaldee paraphrafes; which being compofed many hundred years after Daniel's time, must have a very different ftile from that used in his time, as any one may judge from the nature of language, which is in a conftant flux, and in every age deviating from what it was in the former: And therefore that part could not be written at a time very remote from the date of the eldest of those Chaldee paraphrafes. But by the fame argument Homer cannot be so ancient an author, as he is generally reputed, because the Greek language continued much the fame many hundred years after his time. Nay the ftile of Daniel's Chaldee differs more from that of the old Chaldee paraphrafes, than Homer doth from the latest of the Greek claffic writers: and when it was faid by Prideaux and Kidder, whose authority the objector alleges, that the old Chaldee paraphrases came near to the Chaldee of Daniel, it was not faid abfolutely but comparatively, with refpect to other paraphrases, which did not come near to Daniel's purity. (7) Jofephi Antiq. Lib. 10. Cap. 10, & 11. 9. It 9. It is objected that the Jews were great compofers of books under the names of their renowned prophets, to do themselves honor, and particularly under the name of Daniel: and the book of Daniel seems composed to do honor to the Jews, in the person of Daniel, in making a Jew fuperior to all the wife men of Babylon. If there is any force in this objection, it is this. There have been books counterfeited under the names of men of renown, therefore there can be no genuin books of the fame men. Some pieces in Greek have been forged under the name of Daniel, and therefore he wrote no book in Chaldee and Hebrew long before those forgeries. In like manner fome poems have been ascribed to Homer and Virgil, which were not of their compofing; and therefore the one did not compose the Iliad, nor the other the Æneid. Some falfe writings have been attributed to St. Peter and St. Paul; and therefore there are no true writings of those apoftles. Such arguments fufficiently expofe and refute themselves. One would think the inference fhould rather lie on the other fide. Some books have been counterfeited in the name of this or that writer; and therefore that there were fome genuin books of his writing, is a much more probable prefumption than the contrary. 10. The 10. The tenth objection is, that the author of the book of Daniel appears plainly to be a writer of things paft, after a prophetical manner, by his uncommon punctuality, by not only foretelling things to come, like other prophets, but fixing the time when the things were to happen. But other prophets and other prophecies have prefixed the times for feveral events; as 120 years for the continuance of the antediluvian world; 400 years for the fojourning of Abraham's feed in a strange land; 40 years for the peregrination of the children of Ifrael; 65 years for Ephraim's continuing a people; 70 years for the defolation of Tyre; 70 years for Judah's captivity; and the like: and therefore the fixing of the times cannot be a particular objection against the prophecies of Daniel. Daniel may have done it in more inftances than any other prophet: but why might not God, if he was fo pleased, foretel the dates and periods of any events, as well as the events themselves? Josephus, whom the objector hath quoted upon this occafion, differs totally from him. He (8) afcribes this punctuality to divine revelation, not like μελλοντα μονον προφητεύων διετελει, καθάπερ και οἱ αλλοι προφη ται, αλλά και καιρον ώριζεν, εἰς ὃν ταυτα αποβήσεται. Libri enim quotquot a fe confcriptos reli |