epentance.

In the whole of the second part, the Prophet, _as a rule_, takes his
stand in the time which was announced and foretold in the former
prophecies, and especially, with the greatest clearness and
distinctness, in chap. xxxix., on the threshold of the second
part,--the time when Jerusalem is captured by the Chaldeans, the temple
destroyed, the country desolated, and the people carried away. It is in
this time that he thinks, feels, and acts; it has become present to
him; from it he looks out into the Future, yet in such a manner that he
does not everywhere consistently maintain this ideal stand-point. He
addresses his discourse to the people pining away in captivity and
misery. He comforts them by opening up a view into a better Future, and
exhorts them to remove by repentance the obstacles to the coming
salvation.

Rationalistic Exegesis, everywhere little able to sympathize with, and
enter into existing circumstances and conditions, and always ready to
make its own shadowy, coarse views the rule [Pg 170] and arbiter,
has been little able to enter into, and sympathize with this ideal
stand-point occupied by the Prophet; nor has it had the earnest will to
do so. To its rationalistic tendencies, which took offence at the clear
knowledge of the Future, a welcome pretext was here offered. Thus the
opinion arose, that the second part was not written by Isaiah, but was
the work of some anonymous prophet, living about the end of the
exile,--an opinion which, at the time of the absolute dominion of
Rationalism, has obtained so firm a footing, that it has become all but
an _axiom_, and, by the power of tradition, carries away even such as
would not think of entertaining it, if they were to enter independently
and without prejudice upon the investigation.

The fact which here meets us does not by any means stand isolated. The
prophets did not prophesy in the state of rational reflection, but in
_exstasis_. As even their ordinary name, "seers," indicates, the
objects were presented to them in inward vision. They did not behold
the Future from a distance, but they were rapt into the future. This
inward vision is frequently reflected in their representation. Very
frequently, that appears with them as present which, in reality, was
still future. They depict the Future before the eyes of their hearers
and readers, and thus, as it were, by force, drag them into it out of
the Present, the coercing force of which exerts so p