The great prophecy, therefore, was most literally fulfilled in fact. But if we understand the name “Jehovah” as applied to the promised seed of the woman, the Saviour who was to come, the fulfilment is still more remarkable; for it was in the line of Shem that the Coming One appeared. No trouble is taken in the Scriptures to record the genealogies of either Ham or Japheth, and they terminate with two generations. But the sacred line of Shem is carefully preserved. We have every link given, from Adam to Abraham, and after that from Abraham to the Lord Jesus; so that if we thus understand the title Jehovah, the prophecy would mean, Blessed be the Coming One, the Lord Jesus, the Christ, the God of Shem; and we should see in it the prophecy that the coming deliverer, the deliverer promised to Eve, should arise out of the family of Shem, so that in him and his seed should all nations of the world be blessed. I need not stop to point out how exactly this prophecy was fulfilled in the birth of the Lord Jesus Christ about 2,300 years after it was spoken by Noah. (3.) But now for Japheth. The meaning of the name is generally considered to be “enlargement,” and the prophecy is that he should be enlarged. The meaning of this must be, that he should be gifted with what may be termed a spreading power. His great characteristic is to be expansion, or, the enlargement of his borders. Now think for one moment of Europe and Europeans. Think of Europe as the home of the sons of Japheth according to the Scriptures, or of the Aryans according to the men of science. And may we not appeal to any one who will take the trouble to look around the world at this present day, and ask whether this power of spreading is not one of the most peculiar and exceptional features of the European family? Ham and Shem are not spreading anywhere; but Japheth everywhere. Why, look at this little island of our own—one of the very least of the “isles of the Gentiles”—and see how its people have spread. Not only has it peopled the vast continent of America, but it possesses at this present time such a colonial empire that the sun never sets on the dominions of our Queen. Most truly and most remarkably in our own case has God enlarged Japheth, and so made England a “witness to the truth” of the prophecy which He gave through Noah no less than 4,000 years ago. But there still remains that last clause, “He shall dwell in the tents of Shem,” and, as we ought never to speak too dogmatically respecting the prophetic Word, I am free to admit that it is not perfectly clear in what sense it should be understood. It may refer to the spreading of the Europeans into all the nations of the world, and so dwelling in the tents of Shem; and if there were nothing more than our own settlements in foreign lands, there would be the most complete fulfilment of the prophecy.