In this list are not included almshouses, on account of which some addition must be made, but the precise figures are not available for reference. The above figures show, however, that more than one in every hundred of the population was carefully provided for; but, as they only represent the number of inmates on one particular day, they afford no proper clue to the actual numbers relieved by their means during the course of a single year.

England also is a free asylum for political refugees, and all who are cast out from their own countries on account of their political views, so long as they have not committed any civil crime, find a home in this country, where they are absolutely beyond the reach of their enemies. In this country alone also, together with its dependencies, is the Sabbath observed in a manner at all approaching that in which it was of old commanded to be kept. The observation of the Sabbath is moreover one special mark of distinction which might be expected to be found amongst the Israelites, for God gave it to them as a perpetual covenant, as it is stated in the book of Exodus, Ex. xxxi. 16. "Wherefore the children of Israel shall keep the "Sabbath, to observe the Sabbath throughout their generations, for a perpetual covenant.

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England, then, has observed, and does observe, a peculiar fast, chosen of old by God Himself, upon the observance of which it was promised to Israel that her light should rise in obscurity, and her darkness be as noonday; that the Lord would guide her continually, and satisfy her soul in drought, and make her bones fat; then will the Lord cause her to ride upon the high places of the earth, and feed her with the heritage of her father Jacob. It has been shown in the foregoing pages that the blessings promised to Israel have, in their minute details, fallen upon England; that she, at at the present day, occupies the place amongst nations promised to the Israelites; that the ancestors of the English race not only came out from the very districts where the Israelites were last heard of, but that

the English now occupy the parts of the earth whence Israel is eventually to be called to people again their ancient possessions in Syria. The actual identity of England with Israel rests, it is true, upon purely circumstantial evidence, but it is submitted that a stronger case could hardly be produced in favour of the identity than has now been given.

CHAPTER XI.

CONCLUSION.

Before bringing the present work to an end, some further remarks relative to the prophetic three days of the prophecy in Hosea, referred to at page 105, seem necessary. The words of this prophecy are, "After "two days He will revive us; in the third day He will "raise us up, and we shall live in His sight."

According to the interpretation given of this prophecy in a preceding page it should date from B.C. 721, and the fulfilment of the second day-or 2,000 years -from then would bring us to A.D. 1279. At that date England was under the rule of Edward the First, who, four years after that date conquered Wales, and took further steps towards the consolidation of the kingdom by the conquest of Scotland, from whence the regalia and crown were taken and brought to England, together with the coronation chair now in Westminster Abbey in the year 1296. In Edward's reign, says Lord Brougham, "we may truly say that the "constitution of Parliament, as now established, took "its origin; and however that body may have occasionally had to struggle for its privileges, how often "soever it may have submitted unworthily to oppres"sion, how little soever it may have shown a deter"mination to resist cruelty and injustice, and even a "disposition to become the accomplice in such acts, "we must allow that, generally speaking, it has, ever "since the end of the thirteenth century, formed a "substantive and effective part of the constitution, and "that the monarchy then assumed the mixed form "which it now wears." The two great principles of popular representation and parliamentary taxation were

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established in this reign, as well as a considerable improvement in the English law.

The very year, 1279, which completed the two thousand years of Hosea's prophecy, appears also to have been the first year when coal-to the use of which England owes much of her prosperity-was first used at any distance from the collieries; for in that year it is recorded to have been used in the south of England, and to have been purchased at Dover for the use of the Castle, and twenty years later it was used in quantity by the brewers and smiths of London. It was not, however, till the year 1621 that it was used for the manufacture of iron, to which industry England is much indebted for her present position amongst

nations.

The great religious movement which ultimately led to the "Reformation was commenced 80 years after the completion of the two prophetic days, by the preaching of Wickliffe against the errors of the Romish Church in 1360. The movement thus set on foot was greatly aided by the invention of printing in the following century, and it finally culminated in the revolt

of the whole Teutonic race from Rome between the years 1526 and 1560.

By the accession of James the First to the throne of England in 1603, Scotland became united to England. The empire thus became still more firmly established, and from that date the tide of England's prosperity began rapidly to rise. The "London East India Company," which was formod in 1600, sent out their first ships in 1601, and in 1624 the first judicial authority was, on petition to James the First, given by the Crown to the Company. This Company laid the foundation of England's greatness and power in the East, and by it the first steps were taken that have since so strangely resulted in the possession by England of "the heritage of the heathen," and of sovereign rulership over many kings. At the commencement of James the First's reign, also, England began "to "break forth on the right hand and on the left," and her

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sons began to seek the waste places of the earth to dwell in, and, accordingly, the first colony was planted by England's sons in the year 1607.

How all these events which followed one another in succession after the completion of the second prophetic day of Hosea have been gradually growing and increasing in their results and effects towards the establishment of the most mighty and gigantic Empire that the world has ever yet seen, has already been shown in the preceding pages.

We have already stated that in King Edward the First's reign the regalia of Scotland were brought to England, together with the coronation chair, which latter relic the king is reported to have deemed "the "one primeval monument which binds together the "whole Empire." By the treaty of Northampton in 1328 all these regalia and relics were to be restored again to Scotland, but, although the jewels were permitted to be taken, we read, "Lapidem tamen de "Scone, in quo solent reges Scotia apud Scone in "creatione sua collocari, Londinenses noluerunt a se "demittere quoquomodo." (Nevertheless, the Stone of Scone, on which it was the custom for the Kings of Scotland to be set at their creation, the Londoners would on no account suffer to be sent away.) What is the history of the Stone, and has it any bearing upon the subject now under consideration? These are questions which may well deserve a brief examina

tion.

This stone is called by the Irish and by the Scotch "Lia Fail," and "The Stone of Destiny;" but, chiefly, by the English, "Jacob's Pillow." The first name signifies "The Wonderful Stone," the word "lia" or "leag" is Irish, and means "a stone," and "fail" or "phail" is a Hebrew word, which is translated where it occurs in the Bible "Wonderful." The fact of this stone having received a Hebrew name lends some support to its English title, viz., "Jacob's Pillow." The exact date when this stone first arrived in Ireland is not certain, it is supposed to have been about B.C. 580, and a