the exile. In
support of this view many arguments have been adduced; but the real
argument which lies at the foundation of the whole is the belief that no
such insight into the future is possible as that which this part of the
book manifests, upon the supposition that Isaiah was himself the author
of it. The denial of the genuineness of the chapters in question began
and has always gone hand in hand with the denial of the reality of
prophetic inspiration. In the view of rationalists prophecy is no
revelation of the future through the illumination of the Holy Spirit. It
is only anticipation and shrewd conjecture of the future from the course
of the present. The possibility of prophecy, therefore, is limited by
the possibility of human foresight. Reasoning from this false position,
the critic first assumes that Isaiah cannot have been the author of the
last part of the book which bears his name, and then proceeds to find
arguments against its genuineness. To meet him we must plant our feet
firmly on the great historic truth that God has made to men a
supernatural revelation, of which prophecy in the proper sense of the
word--the revelation of the future by his Spirit--constitutes an
important part. We do indeed find that in the matter of prophecy, as in
all other parts of God's operations, the great law is: "First the blade,
then the ear, after that the full corn in the ear." The way for the
fuller revelations is prepared by previous intimations of a more general
character. Precisely so was it in the present case. Moses himself had
more than once predicted the captivity of the covenant people and the
desolation of their land as the punishment of their foreseen apostacy
from God's service, and also the preservation of a remnant and its
restoration upon repentance. Lev., chap. 26; Deut., chaps. 28-32. When
Solomon had dedicated the temple, and his kingdom was at the zenith of
its glory, he received from the mouth of God himself the solemn warning:
"If ye shall at all turn from following me, ye or your children, and
will not keep my commandments and my statutes which I have set before
you, but go and serve other gods and worship them; then will I cut off
Israel out of the land which I have given them; and this house, which I
have hallowed for my name, will I cast out of my sight; and Israel shall
be a proverb and a by-word among all people." 1 Kings 9:6, 7. When the
prophet wrote, these awful threatenings had been fulfilled u