EADER, you claim the right to judge for yourself, and you are entreated to use that right in examining the evidences of the truth of the Scriptures. It may be that you have heard the opinions of believers ridiculed, and their arguments treated with scorn because they were not deemed impartial witnesses on the subject. Should such have been the case, we here bring before your view substantial facts, asserted by a professed infidel, and therefore not liable to the objections which are raised against Christian writers. The facts to which your attention will be called are indisputable, and most of the particulars to which they relate have been verified by the personal examination of the most recent travelers, and may now be scrutinized by any one who chooses to visit Syria.

      The object of the present tract is to adduce facts which prove the divine inspiration of the Holy Scriptures, from the writings of Volney, the author of The Ruins of Empires, and Travels in Syria, a most determined infidel. Not only does he attest facts which constitute the literal fulfillment of numerous [319] prophecies, but he describes the peculiar and characteristic features of the desolations foretold by them, with as much detail and precision as if he had copied the prophetic denunciations rather than related his own observations; or as if he had aimed to prove that they had been fulfilled to the very letter. Nor can any authority be adduced superior to Volney as a correct and faithful describer of the countries which he visited; and his descriptions are as minute as the testimony on the subject is unexceptionable. "It has been reserved for the genius of Volney," says Malte Brun, "so to combine the detached accounts of other travelers, antiquaries, and naturalists with the results of his own observation and study, as to offer to the world a complete description of Syria.

      The present state of Judea and its inhabitants, and of adjacent countries, has been foretold by various prophecies, of the exact accomplishment of which we may have at one view the most satisfactory proof, by placing them without note or comment, beside the assertions of a decided enemy of Christianity.

      "O ye solitary ruins! ye silent walls!" exclaims Volney, "how many useful lessons, how many affecting and striking reflections do y e offer to the mind which is capable of considering you aright!"--The Ruins, c. iii.

      It is true that these ruins do afford most important lessons, and especially as to the truth of prophecy. Never was a man more completely vindicated from the charges of his enemies and calumniators, than is the truth of the Bible by the writings of the writer who has dared to call in question its divine authority. That very man, whose senses were spell-bound in the thickest darkness of error, has, however undesignedly, struck a blow powerful enough not only to shake, but to overturn, the erroneous opinions of any individual who will calmly interrogate these ruins, and listen to the voice of their reply.

      It is true, as Volney affirms, that they are not the effect of chance. Chance is but an empty name invented for the purpose of hiding ignorance and sheltering sloth; not a power capable of overthrowing cities, and changing kingdoms into mighty deserts. The destruction of empires demonstrates the wickedness of the men by whom their ruin has been effected and perpetuated. Everywhere, without exception, the Scriptures point out in these ruins the punishment of sin, and thereby make manifest the moral government of God, and show the untiring vigilance with which his providence enters into the minutest [334] details of human events. Considered in their true light, as the express and literal fulfillment of numerous prophecies, they prove, beyond all doubt, the divine inspiration of the Scriptures. We must be deaf to reason, and blind worshippers of idol chance, if, for the sake of listening to the declamations of a lying philosophy, we refuse to hear that spirit. of prophecy which is the testimony of Jesus, while it proclaims: "Verily there is a God that judgeth in the earth." We here invite you, therefore, to behold the fulfillment of what the Lord has foretold, and to be convinced of the undeniable fact that the Bible is the word of God, who, having from the beginning determined the end, has caused it to be written in his book, that all men may know that he alone is God.

      If you will calmly and carefully examine the prophecies of Scripture, as here confronted with the testimony of Volney, you will be compelled to submit to such satisfactory evidence. Volney, however, is but one among a multitude of witnesses, and the prophecies here cited form a small part of those contained in the Bible. The judgments of God, as written in that book, are repeated by thousands of ruins as by so many echoes. The sins of mankind are all known unto the Lord; the guilty shall find no favor in his sight, and none that riseth up against him shall prosper. The anger of nations is the rod of his displeasure. The convulsions of kingdoms and empires prove the infallible certainty of "the word of. God which abideth forever;" and as the [335] most potent among them is successively laid in the dust, a voice from amidst their ruins is heard proclaiming: "One jot or one tittle shall in no wise pass from the law, till all be fulfilled." (Matt. v:18.) " Come, behold the works of the Lord, what desolations he hath made in the earth. Be still and know that I am God." (Psalm xlvi:8, 10.) "Come and see the works of God. He is terrible in his doing toward the children of men. He ruleth by his power forever; his eyes behold the nations; let not the rebellious exalt themselves." (Psalm xlvi:5, 7.) "Sin is the ruin of nations."

      While the revolutions and overthrow of cities and empires, as described by Volney, prove that the prophets by whom they were predicted in such striking detail were divinely inspired, and that "holy men of God spake as they were moved by the Holy Spirit" (2 Pet. i:21), it must also be remembered that these very prophets all bear witness to Jesus Christ, who came into the world to make atonement for sin, and to save his people from the wrath to come. By a succession of inspired men, our attention is directed to the way of salvation which in his unbounded love to a sinful world, combined with his infinite abhorrence of sin, God has condescended to provide for the human race. His own word reveals the way of salvation. "Whosoever believeth in him shall not perish, but have everlasting life." (John iii:16.) "Search the Scriptures," said Jesus himself to the Jews, "for in them ye think ye have [336] eternal life; and they are they which testify of me." (John v:39.) Whosoever, therefore, either attempts to adulterate or wilfully to misconstrue the Scriptures for the purpose of supporting error and superstition, or to withhold it from the people, and give them in its stead dogmas of mere human invention, is guilty of enormous sin. What plainer proof, indeed, can be given of the weakness of a cause, than the attempt to hinder men from examining for themselves whether it is consistent with that divine will, which ought to be the foundation of all faith and of every institution of religion?

      If we possessed no written revelation of the will of God, we must of necessity seek some other means of discovering the way in which we might please him and secure the salvation of our souls. But we are not left to such a difficulty. God has given us the Bible, that infallible testimony which is thus described by the Psalmist: "The law of the Lord is perfect, converting the soul; the testimony of the Lord is sure, making wise the simple. The statutes of the Lord are right, rejoicing the heart; the commandment of the Lord is pure, enlightening the eyes." (Psalm xix:8, 9.) The testimony of which Paul speaks, when he says: "All Scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness." The endeavor, therefore, either to dissuade or to prevent men from reading the Scriptures, must be, in the sight of God, an offense of equal [337] magnitude with any of those which have brought desolation upon the finest countries on the face of the earth. Nor are they much less criminal who, for, the sake of upholding certain peculiar doctrines and ceremonies, which, in the minds of some, are identical with Christianity itself, refuse to bring them to the test of Scripture, and will not submit to its supreme authority. By such means as these, irreligion is encouraged and sanctioned, and immortal spirits are driven to perdition. It is, however, an awful truth that the blood of these lost souls will be required at the hands of those who, having taken from them the key of knowledge, have closed against them that kingdom of heaven which Jesus Christ has, by his own death, opened to all believers.

      Reader, do you wish to believe what is true? Are you willing to be convinced that the word of God is of divine origin, and therefore can not fail? Take the Scriptures then; they are worthy of your perusal, and the very design of their existence is, that they may be read by every man. Get for yourself this precious book, and read it with all the attention of which you are capable. Let no man forbid what God has commanded. Let no man, be he whom he may, prevent you from acquiring the knowledge contained in the word of God. You have seen that according to the testimony of an infidel, by facts attested by himself, the very facts by which he sought to overturn the Christian faith, that the judgments of God are proved to be true, and that the same [338] word of truth which contains the prophecies of these remarkable facts teaches also the way of salvation. Take care, then, that while you "believe the truth," you have no "pleasure in unrighteousness" (II Thess. ii:12); for as no nation can escape the just judgments of God, so neither shall any individual; and there is no other way of deliverance from the dominion and consequences of sin, but through the merits of the Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, the only Mediator and Intercessor between God and man. [339]

[NTC2 319-339]