HEBREW PROPHETIC NUMBERS.
[To THE EDITOR OF THE " SPECTATOR."1
SIR,-Your• interesting article in the Spectator of September• 6th on " Sortes Bibliese " (which I have only just seen), may per- haps be an excuse for• pointing out that the numbers mentioned in the Hebrew and Christian prophecies are all snbmultiples of the great number 5,040, which Plato lays down as the basis of land-division in a well-organised State, in his fifth book of Laws, chaps. viii. and ix. This number is divisible by all the integers, and by forty-nine divisors besides,-namely, by 12, 14, 15, 16, 18, 20, 21, 24, 28, 30, 35, 36, 40, 42 ; by 45 (the sum of the digits), 48, 56, 60, 63, 70, 72, 80, 84, 90, 105, 112, 120, 126, 140, 144, 168, 180, 210, 240, 252, 280, 315 (the accurate cycle which embraces in one system the movements of the sun and moon), 336, 360, 420, 504, 560, 630, 720, 840, 1,008, 1,260, 1,680, and 2,520. 5,040 expresses also the possible per- mutations in a chime of seven bells, by the seventh multipli- cation of the integers in succession. The last of these divisors of 5,040, viz., 2,520, constitutes the " seven times " or Chaldee years of 360 days, of which the half is 1,260 " days," or 42 " months," assigned as important epochs in the Books of Daniel and the Apocalypse, &c. Whether the Hebrews learned the quality of the number 5,040 from the Greeks, or• the Greeks from the Hebrews, or both from a higher source, I cannot tell; but it is at least an indication that some special arithmetical intelligence guided the prophets of Palestine in the numerical marks attached so persistently to their predictions.-I am, Sir, &c.,
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