The Second Advent Author:J. Bennett Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: CHAPTER III. Israel's First Restoration. A Sceptical nobleman once asked his chaplain for a proof of the truth of the Bible. The answer was brief and point... more »ed: " Israel!" It is said that this so struck the nobleman as to lead ultimately to his conversion. The reply was just. The Jewish people are a standing miracle. They afford an unmistakable demonstration of the inspiration of the Scriptures. Here is the nation scattered among all other nations, yet different from them. What a marvellous history has marked its career! What is the secret of its longevity ? Great and mighty nations flourished in the days of its youth, but where are they now ? Assyria, Persia, Greece, Eome, each of these has in its turn exercised enormous power. Colossal has been the strength of each. Israel has been trodden down by them as the mire in the streets. And yet they are gone, but Israel remains. Israel has been persecuted, scattered, hated, as no other nation ever was; but do what men will, they cannot get rid of the Jew. Israel to-day is as separate from Christendom as the Gulf Stream from the Atlantic. The question will recur again and again, Why is this ?It cannot be accident. When we turn to the page of inspiration we find the answer. Israel is the hinge upon which God's dealings with men turn. Christ must yet sit upon the throne of His father David, and reign in Mount Zion before His ancients gloriously (Isa. xxiv. 23). Let me illustrate what I mean by speaking of Israel as the hinge upon which God's dealings turn. In Daniel xi. is found a long prophecy. Israel is its centre. Predictions are given with the utmost minuteness of the history of Egypt and Syria (the kings of the north and south), from Alexander's death to the time of Antiochus Epiphanes (vers. 1-32). Alexander's death was about B....« less