not so much to the purpose.  This circumstance of itself should teach us to examine the prophecies in question with caution, and also with candour, since many worthy and religious men have thought them sufficient to prove that Jesus was indeed the Messiah.  These prophecies I shall reserve last for consideration, and shall now begin with the others usually adduced, taking them up pretty much in the order in which they stand in the Old Testament.

The first passage is taken from Deut. xviii. 15, “The Lord thy God will raise up unto thee a prophet from the midst of thee, like unto me, unto him ye shall hearken.  According to all that thou desiredst of the Lord thy God in Horeb, in the day of the assembly, saying.  Let me not hear again the voice of the Lord my God, neither let me see his great fire any more, that I die not.  And the Lord said unto me, they have well spoken that which they have spoken.  I will raise them up a prophet from among their brethren, like unto thee, and I will put my words into his mouth, and he shall speak unto them all that I command him.  And it shall come to pass, that whosoever will not hearken unto my, words which he shall speak in my name, I will require it of him.”

This passage is pertinaciously and solely applied to Jesus, by many Christian writers, because it is so applied by Peter in the 2 chap. of Acts, in his sermon to the Jews, just after he had received the full inspiration of the Holy Spirit, and of course must be considered as infallible.  Nevertheless, these words of Moses are supposed by many learned men, both Jews and Christians, to be spoken of Joshua, whom Moses himself afterwards, at the command and appointment of God, declared to be his successor, and who was endowed with the spirit which was upon Moses, (see Deut. xxxi. 33, xxxiv. 17,) and to whom the Jews then promised to hearken, and pay obedience to, as they had done before to Moses.  But others understand them to be a promise of a succession of prophets, to whom the Jews might upon all occasions have recourse; and one or the other of these seems to be the certain meaning of the place.  From this consideration, that from the context it appears Moses was giving the Jews directions of immediate use; and, therefore, in promising a prophet to them, to whom they should hearken, he seems to intend an immediate prophet who might be of use to the Jews, and answer their common exigencies, and not a prophet two thousand years to come.

But I take the words to promise a succession of prophets, and for that sense wherein Grotius and Le Clerc, and most of the Jews, take them.  I shall give my reasons, for this, and show that they do not necessarily refer to Jesus Christ.