Earlier text: OTHER PARABLES OF CHRISTSPIRITUALISM A SATANIC DELUSION.
As THEY acknowledge Satan to be their god and father, we should naturally expect that when they pray at all, they would pray to him. Miss Lizzie Doten, a celebrated trance lecturer, opened a prayer as follows:— “O Lucifer, thou son of the morning, who fell from thy high estate, and whom mortals are prone to call the embodiment of evil, WE LIFT UP OUR VOICES TO THEE.” Prof. W. Chaney, at San Jose, Cal., Jan. 29, 1874, at the opening of a debate with Eld. Grant on Spiritualism, uttered the following in his prayer to the devil in blasphemous mockery:— “O Devil, Prince of Demons in the Christian Hell! O thou Monarch of the Bottomless Pit! Thou King of Scorpions having stings in their tails, to whom it is given to hurt the earth for five months, I beseech thee to hear my prayer. Thou seest the terrible strait in which I am placed, matched in debate with one of the big guns of Christianity. — Remember, O Prince of Brimstone, that when thou stretchest forth thine arm, the Christian’s God cannot stand before thee for a moment. Therefore we beseech thee to stand by us on this occasion. Bless thy servant in his labors before thee. Fill his mouth with words of wisdom. Enable him to defend thee from the false charges about to be made against thy Sulphurous Majesty, and triumph by truth and logic over his opponent, so that this audience may realize that thou art a prayer-hearing and a prayer-answering devil.” A Spiritualist prayer, called an “Invocation,” found in Banner of Light, April 18, 1871, opens thus: “Thou spirit of the air,” etc. And this of course means no other than Satan, who is called the “prince of the power of the air.” Eph. 2:2. No doubt, Satan inspired that prayer to himself as the spirit or prince of the air. The apostle Peter says: “God spared not the angels that sinned, but cast them down to hell [Gr., TARTARUS] and delivered them into chains of darkness,” etc. 2 Pet. 2:4. Dr. Wm. Ramsey, an able and learned writer, says: “The word tartarus means, according to Greek writers, in a physical sense, the bounds or verge of this material system. . . . That place is, probably, at present, within the atmosphere of our earth.” The learned Ralph Cudworth, D. D., in his “Intellectual System,” vol. iii., p. 363, while speaking of Peter’s remark, says:— “And by tartarus here, in all probability, is meant this lower caliginous [i. e., dark] air or atmosphere of the earth, according to that of St. Austin concerning these angels, ‘that after their sin, they were thrust down into the misty darkness of this lower air.’” De. Gen. ad Lit. lib. 3, cap. 10. Apuleius, de Deo Socratis, says:— “There are certain divine powers of a middle nature, situate in this interval of the air, between the highest ether and the earth below. . . . Through the same demons, as Plato says in his Symposium, all revelations, the various miracles of magicians, and all kinds of presages are carried on.” It must please Satan to see that men are willing to worship him directly by name; but when that is too bold, he is satisfied to receive homage through personification, as in the Egyptian hero-worship, and in that of the Romans, Brahmins, and Hindoos. The following extract is from a prayer offered by E. S. Wheeler, in Music Hall, Boston, Sunday, March 5, 1871, and published in the Banner of Light, July 15, 1871:— “Most holy angels, O ye great and good and beautiful souls, who have made earth the Heaven it is fast becoming, hear our prayers. Unable to comprehend an Infinite Mind, we offer our supplications to you. Great souls that have blessed the world, condescend to bless us. Martyrs, heroes, patriots—ye who have inspired in all times the hearts of men, give us your sympathy, your love, your wisdom, in this hour. Mighty ones of years gone by—Pythagoras, Zoroaster, Confucius, Buddha—come to us. Socrates, Plato, Jesus, Mahomet, Ann Lee, Washington, Channing, Elizabeth Browning, Theodore Parker, hear us as we ask for strength and wisdom, and give, in answer to our practical prayer for help, that assistance which you well know is our necessity. Amen.” Farmer, in “Demonology,” says:— “To some persons it may appear strange that the possessions should be ascribed by many of the fathers after the time of Justin Martyr, to fallen angels.” “Several philosophers taught that the heathen demons were evil spirits of a rank superior to mankind, and that these demons personated the souls of the dead, gods, and genii, and procured themselves to be worshiped under their names.” In this devil-worship, Spiritualists have “progressed” backward into heathenism, so that now they can number their brethren by hundreds of millions! Rev. B. Clough, speaking of the heathen of Ceylon, says:— “I now state, and I wish to be heard in every corner of the Christian world, that the devil is regularly, systematically, and ceremoniously worshiped by a large majority of the inhabitants of the island of Ceylon!” “Ye shall be as gods.” Gen. 3:5. “Who changed the truth of God into a lie, and worshiped and served the creature more than the Creator, who is blessed forever. Amen.” Rom. 1:25. “Because that, when they knew God, they glorified him not as God, neither were thankful; but became vain in their imaginations, and their foolish heart was darkened. Professing themselves to be wise, they became fools, and changed the glory of the uncorruptible God into an image made like to corruptible man, and to birds, and four-footed beasts, and creeping things.” Rom. 1:21–23. A. J. Davis, in a work entitled, “The Educator,” pp. 303, 326, says:— “The being called God exists, organically, in the form of the being called man. . . . Man is God’s embodiment—his highest, divinest outer elaboration. God, then, is man, and man is god.” The “father of lies” said, “Ye shall be as gods,” and we find that Spiritualists take the side of the devil every time. In the last National Convention of Spiritualists at Chicago, Ill., Mr. Pope said:— “I am further convinced by my inspiration that whereas the devil, in the garden of Eden, declared if man, in his compound condition of Adam and Eve, would disobey the prohibition against eating of the tree which was adapted to his tastes and his conditions, he should become as God, knowing good from evil, that voice has gone on until, in the latter days, we hear it repeating, ‘Ye are gods.’ We know that this divinity is in humanity, that this God is manifest in the flesh. . . . When we know that we are gods, and that we have the power, we shall advance to that position in which we shall become judges.” “The soul is a god of itself.”—Spiritualism, vol. i., p. 10. Greatness Without Self-Knowledge
It is a great thing to be a great man, but it is a greater thing not to know it. Premillennial Adventism.
By James White
The term which Henry Cowles, D. D., uses to express the scriptural view of the second advent, which view he opposes in the Interior for April 26, is Premillennial Adventism. Adventists affirm that Christ will come before the millennium. Their opponents deny; but there is no definite agreement among them that the second advent will occur at the close of the millennium, or how, if ever, such an advent is to take place. Two points which Dr. Cowles makes against the premillennial second advent of Christ we briefly notice. He affirms (1) that “For the honor of God it cannot be true, and ought not to be true.” And (2) “For the veracity of God it cannot be true.” The learned doctor represents Christ and Satan on a strife for numbers; and for the honor of God, Christ should have the most. Should Christ come before the millennium, he concludes, to use his own words: “Only a most meager minority in numbers are rescued by the world’s great Redeemer.” Without doubt the Universalist would suggest that Mr. Cowles reflects dishonor unspeakable upon Christ’s work for more than eighteen centuries already past, or, as we might say, for six thousand years, in rescuing only a most meager minority. For the honor of God he would have them all saved. Why not be as jealous of the honor of God in the past as in the future? But the Son of God did not dishonor himself and the scheme of his saving grace by placing himself on a strife with Satan for numbers. If any such motive could enter into the plan of the Infinite One, he could as well save all men. This very question was up before the Master, however, in the days of his flesh. “Lord, are there few that be saved?” inquired one of his disciples. “And he said unto them, Strive to enter in at the strait gate; for many, I say unto you, will seek to enter in, and shall not be able.” Luke 13:23, 24. But this question of numbers is more definitely answered in Matt. 7:13, 14: “Enter ye in at the strait gate; for wide is the gate, and broad is the way, that leadeth to destruction, and many there be that go in thereat. Because strait is the gate, and narrow is the way, which leadeth unto life, and few there be that find it.” Christ here states that which had been true in the history of past ages, that which was true in his day, and which would be true to the close of human probation. The Son of God did not enter the strife with Satan for numbers. There are two views of this question of numbers, both directly opposed to the words of Christ, which start in differently, but end alike. They are the views of the premillennialist and the Universalist. While the premillennialist has the way so narrow that, to use Dr. Cowles’ words again, “only a most meager minority” pass over it for the first six thousand years of human probation, and then from some indefinite point widen so as to embrace a converted world, the Universalist has the way, from beginning to end, wide enough for all mankind. But unfortunately for these pleasing fables, the words of Christ demolish them both at a single stroke. The many go in the broad way; the few in the narrow way, and there is not a single intimation from Christ or his apostles of any change at any future time from this decision. “The second chief objection to this theory,” says the learned Dr. Cowles, “is that for the veracity of God it cannot be true. If God’s word is to stand, this theory must go down. Ages ago the infinite Father said through his prophet David, Ps. 2:8, to his Son: “Ask of me, and I will give thee the heathen for thine inheritance, and the uttermost parts of the earth for thy possession.” Here Mr. Cowles stops short with David, without note, comment, further quotation, or any statement whatever showing for what purpose the heathen were to be given to Christ. And why did he stop with verse 8? He well knew that verse 9 would express his false application of verse 8. In quoting verse 8 alone, he presumes astonishingly upon the ignorance and credulity of the readers of the Interior. But the “Infinite Father” has not left this matter where Dr. Cowles has. In the very next verse the destiny of heathen lands at the consummation is given in these words: “Thou shalt break them with a rod of iron; thou shalt dash them in pieces like a potter’s vessel.” Dr. Cowles will not, for a moment, maintain that the strong expressions—“break them with a rod of iron”—“dash them in pieces like a potter’s vessel”—mean conversion. He will find less difficulty in the milder expression of Paul—“And the God of peace shall bruise Satan under your feet shortly”—in proving the conversion of the devil, than in proving the conversion of the heathen by Ps. 2:8, 9. It is by means of partial quotations, and garbling the words of God’s prophets, that Dr. Cowles opposes the premillennial second advent of the Son of God. And it is a remarkable fact that on this division of his second paper, in laboring to sustain his position from the Bible, he does not make a single quotation from the words of Christ and his apostles. ROBERT PATTERSON, D. D., an able and well-tried defender of the Christian faith, has spoken on the subject of the Second Advent in the Interior in his usual forcible manner, under the caption, The Blessed Hope. Length ever adds to the value of productions rich in important history, and ablaze with living truths for the people. Mr. Patterson says:— When our Lord left his church on earth to go to the Father, he left her in a sorrowful condition. His five hundred disciples were surrounded by the whole world of his enemies, organized into anti-Christian religions and governments by one of the highest intelligences, animated by the most venomous malice, and educated by the experience of ages in the most effectual modes of destruction. The Lord was not ignorant of our danger; nor in his last discourses did he extenuate it, nor promise any abatement of the world's enmity and the church's tribulation. But he did promise that he himself would return to overthrow his enemies, and that he would support us till that blessed day. “The world hateth you. In the world ye shall have tribulation. Ye shall weep and lament, but the world shall rejoice. Ye shall be sorrowful, but your sorrow shall be turned into joy. A woman when she is in travail hath sorrow, because her hour is come; but as soon as she is delivered of the child she remembereth no more the anguish, for joy that a man is born into the world. Ye now therefore have sorrow, but I will see you again, and your heart shall rejoice and your joy no man taketh from you. If I go away I will come again and receive you to myself, that where I am there ye may be also.” Such was the blessed hope of his personal return with which he comforted his church on his personal departure. During all the period of his absence, he said we must suffer tribulation; and so it has come to pass. If we are to enjoy any period of outward peace during his absence, if his church is to be delivered from the assaults of the world, if there is to be any age of purity when the tares shall not grow among the wheat, or if, at his coming he shall be welcomed by the population of an earth filled with the glory of the Lord, or indeed even be able to find faith in the earth—it will be to him a most unexpected surprise. Jesus did not know of this millennium. We say he did not know of it, because he did not tell us of it; and he says, “I have called you friends, for all things which I have heard of my Father I have made known unto you.” But in all his discourses and parables there is not the least hint that we are to hope for any period of peace or glory before his coming. The apostles are equally ignorant of a Christless millennium. For three hundred years after our Lord's departure the blessed hope of the church was the hope of his return. But when, in the progress of her predicted apostasy, the bride of Christ began to solace herself in his absence with the friendship of the kings of the earth, very naturally she averted her eyes from the eastern sky, and from that return of her Lord which would put an end to all her worldly grandeur. When the Reformers put the gospel trumpet to their mouths, and began to blow the reveille which was destined to awake the harlot of Babylon, the dreams of a Christless millennium were instantly swept away with the rest of the popish trumpery; and the church again began to look for the coming of the Lord to destroy Antichrist. Luther hoped that it might not be much more than a hundred years from his day. In their letters, sermons, and confessions of faith, the Reformers proclaimed their premillennial hopes. “The major part of the divines,” of the Westminster Assembly, as Baillie tells us, were “express chiliasts.” They conclude their noble Confession with a declaration of their faith in the second coming of the Lord in words which fully express the faith of premillennarians; but which are utterly unintelligible on the theory that Scripture teaches us not to expect his coming for thousands of years. For it is not merely the fact of his future coming to judgment, but its impending uncertainty as a constant motive to each of us to be always ready, which they proclaim in these ringing words:— “As Christ would have us to be certainly persuaded that there shall be a day of Judgment, both to deter all men from sin, and for the greater consolation of the godly in their adversity, so will he have that day unknown to men, that they may shake off all carnal security, and be always watchful, because they know not at what hour the Lord will come; and may be ever prepared to say, ‘Come, Lord Jesus! Come quickly!’ ”—Confession of Faith, Chap. 33, Sec. 3. This confession of faith in the second coming of the Lord was adopted without alteration by the Presbyterian churches of England, Scotland, Ireland, and the British colonies; by all their various branches; and by the General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church of the United States, and all the smaller bodies of Presbyterians in America; who, with one consent, confessed their faith in the premillennial advent of the Lord, so far as they could do so by giving it the place of honor as the climax of their printed and published Confession of Faith. The other Reformed churches uttered corresponding testimony. During the heat of the battle with popery, our reforming ancestors strengthened their hearts by looking for the coming of the Lord, and encouraged each other by the cry, “Hold the field! for he is coming with legions of help,” a sentiment embodied recently in a popular revival hymn, but familiar to the old Scottish Covenanters. But ere long a second apostasy from the faith set in among the Reformed churches. It was known in Scotland as Moderateism; in England, as Arianism, and more recently, as Broad Churchism; in America it called itself Unitarianism; and in Germany, Rationalism. Setting up human reason as the judge, and our very limited modern observation as the evidence, and denying that any event ever could occur but according to the course of the observed laws of nature, it reduced Jesus to the rank of a Jewish rabbi, rather in advance of his day, but totally unacquainted with modern science. Of course the notion of such a person returning from the invisible world to reign upon the earth was remanded to the Hebrew mythology. But the common people of the Reformed churches still revered their Bibles, and it would not do for the Rationalists, who still held their chairs, pulpits, and pay, as orthodox Protestants, openly to deny the Bible. It was, however, easy to make it void by what was called a spiritualizing interpretation, which developed into the mythical hypotheses. The promises of his second coming and reign on earth were interpreted to mean simply the spread of his gospel, and the submission of a great part of the world to Christianity for a period of a thousand, or, as some thought, 360,000 years; during which mankind was to advance in the arts of civilization, and enjoy unexampled peace and prosperity. At the close of that extended cycle, too vast for the common mind to see across, possibly some great convulsion of nature would occur, and it might be said, the Lord would come and destroy the world, and call the human race to judgment. This theory was elaborated and popularized by an English commentator named Whitby, who, by his published correspondence, is proved to have been an Arian, but whose commentaries were popular with his own class, and whose mythical millennium was received with favor by many of the orthodox pensioners and friends of the State churches of Europe, to whom it promised a long lease of tithes and honors. Through their influence it was imported into America, where it was immediately utilized as material for platform platitudes and perorations. But, like all compromises between truth and error, this theory was fatally defective. The Rationalists protested that such a personal coming of Christ would be a violation of natural law, whether it occurred to-morrow or a thousand years hence, and so would be inadmissible. When some of the Germans were willing to relinquish the personal coming entirely, and to substitute, instead, a spiritual reign, the modern Jews turned on them with the demand, Why should not the same principle be applied to the first coming of the Messiah? Why should not all the predictions of a Messiah be understood to be simply personifications of the reign of righteousness desired by pious Jews? Mere projections of the longings of the Hebrew mind? Why not, indeed? If the second advent be mythical, why not the first as well? An increasing number of the clergy of the churches of England, Scotland and Germany are returning to the ancient faith in the coming and kingdom of our Lord. This recovery of faith in England and Germany has not been unfelt here in America; the more scholarly and fervent class of the rising ministry feel its influence. The revivals now in progress are everywhere accompanied by increased study of the words of Christ and the apostles. The contrast is observed between modern and apostolic preaching. The people ask, “Why are the preachers so silent on the coming of the Lord? The Old Testament is full of promises of his coming. Every thirtieth verse of the New Testament presents that as the blessed hope of the church; or as one motive to work, and warfare, and patience; but we do not hear a sermon on the subject once in seven years. We hear hundreds of sermons on science, sermons on politics, sermons on the scandals of the day; how is it that our preachers so industriously avoid the subject which our Lord and the apostles introduced into all their discourses?” It is true that the Presbyterian churches have never been entirely destitute of able defenders of the faith in the second advent proclaimed in their Confession of Faith. The number is increasing, and a noble band of professors and ministers of learning, ability, and standing are now proclaiming the personal reign of Jesus as the only hope of the salvation of our earth from sin, and sorrow, and death. Prof. Duffield, in his sermon before the Synod of New Jersey, indicates premillennialism as the doctrine of the standards of the Presbyterian church. Dr. Craven, in his learned and exhaustive Excursus on the Basileia, in Lange's Commentary on the Apocalypse, establishes the scriptural application of the term, “the kingdom of heaven,” to the millennium only. Dr. Brookes, of St. Louis, in his popular volume, Marantha, gives a review of the scripture testimony, proving unanswerably149 that there can be no millennium till the Lord comes. And Dr. Willis Lord, recently Principal of Wooster University, Ohio, in a beautiful little volume just published by W. G. Holmes, Chicago, displays Christ's coming as Our Blessed Hope. The Second Advent.
By James White
The present is a time of great interest on the theme of the second advent of Christ. Probably no man has done as much to wake up the discussion of this question since the days of William Miller as the revivalist Moody. His remarkable sermon at Chicago upon the subject seems to have marked an era of bold and fervent expression from both sides among those who have regarded ours as a work of mistaken zeal. The editor of the Interior (Presbyterian), in his issue for April 26, speaks of “two remarkably vigorous papers,” in that issue, on the Second Advent. He says: “Dr. Cowles’ second paper has an intensity which is heightened by the compression required in limited space, and which is inspired by a deep conviction that he is dealing for the honor of the Master. Dr. Robert Patterson, author of the Fables of Infidelity, and widely known as one of the most trenchant and able of writers, whose article will be found on the second page, is not less zealous and forceful on the other side of the question. He charges the opponents of the premillennial theory with apostasy—with finding their inspiration in the rationalistics of the age. We should say that neither of these writers knows of the article of the other; it is, therefore, in no sense a debate.” We have no expectation that such men as Mr. Moody and Dr. Patterson, who are really doing good service in preparing the public mind for our specific work, will ever unite with us in our distinctive message to the world. And more, we fear that when those who “keep the commandments of God, and have the testimony of Jesus Christ,” Rev. 12: 17, shall feel the wrath of the dragon, these men, borne on by the popular tide, will find themselves on the wrong side in the closing conflict. Whatever the future may prove in this respect, we have our work, and should attend to it, and let God work out final results by ways and means such as he sees best. “Master,” said a good disciple who was taking too narrow views of Heaven’s broad providential work, “we saw one casting out devils in thy name, and we forbade him, because he followeth not with us. And Jesus said unto him, Forbid him not, for he that is not against us is for us.” Luke 9: 49, 50. J. W. Thoughts on the Book of Daniel.
By Uriah Smith
VERSES 23–26. Thus he said, The fourth beast shall be the fourth kingdom upon earth, which shall be diverse from all kingdoms, and shall devour the whole earth, and shall tread it down and break it in pieces. And the ten horns out of this kingdom are ten kings that shall arise; and another shall arise after them; and he shall be diverse from the first, and he shall subdue three kings. And he shall speak great words against the Most High, and shall wear out the saints of the Most High, and think to change times and laws; and they shall be given into his hand until a time and times and the dividing of time. But the judgment shall sit, and they shall take away his dominion, to consume and to destroy it unto the end. We have here further particulars respecting the little horn. 1. He shall speak great words against the Most High. Has the papacy done this? Look at a few of his self-assumed titles: “His Holiness,” “Vicegerent of the Son of God,” “Our Lord God, the Pope,” “Another God upon earth,” “King of the world,” “King of kings, and Lord of lords.” Said Pope Nicholas to the emperor Michael, “The Pope, who is called God by Constantine, can never be bound or released by man; for God cannot be judged by man.” Is there need of bolder blasphemy than this? Listen also to the adulation the popes have received from their followers without rebuke: A Venetian prelate in the fourth session of the Lateran, addressed the pope as follows: “Thou art our Shepherd, our Physician, in short, a second God upon earth.” Another bishop called him the “lion of the tribe of Judah, the promised Saviour.” Lord Anthony Pucci, in the fifth Lateran, said to the pope, “The sight of thy divine majesty does not a little terrify me; for I am not ignorant that all power both in Heaven and in earth is given unto you; that the prophetic saying is fulfilled in you, ‘All the kings of the earth shall worship him, and nations shall serve him.’” Again, Dr. Clarke, on verse 25, says: “He shall speak as if he were God.” So St. Jerome quotes from Symmachus. To none can this apply so well or so fully as to the popes of Rome. They have assumed infallibility, which belongs only to God. They profess to forgive sins, which belongs only to God. They profess to open and shut Heaven, which belongs only to God. They profess to be higher than all the kings of the earth, which belongs only to God. And they go beyond God in pretending to loose whole nations from their oath of allegiance to their kings, when such kings do not please them. And they go against God, when they give indulgences for sin. This is the worst of all blasphemies. 2. And shall wear out the saints of the Most High. Has the papacy done this? For the mere information of any student of church history, no answer need here be given. All know that for long years the papal church has pursued its relentless work against the true followers of God. Chapter after chapter might be given, would our limited space permit. Wars, crusades, massacres, inquisitions, and persecutions of all kinds—these were their weapons of extinction. And fifty millions of martyrs—these will rise up in the resurrection, as witnesses against her bloody work. Pagan Rome persecuted relentlessly the Christian church; and it is estimated that three millions of Christians perished in the first three centuries; yet it is said that the primitive Christians prayed for the continuance of Imperial Rome; for they knew that when this form of government should cease, another far worse persecuting power would arise, which would literally, as this prophecy declares, “wear out the saints of the Most High.” Pagan Rome could slay the infants, but spare the mothers; but Papal Rome slew both mothers and infants together. No age, no sex, no condition in life, was exempt from her relentless rage. “When Herod died,” says a forcible writer, “he went down to the grave with infamy, and earth had one murderer, one persecutor, less, and hell one victim more. O Rome! what will not be thy hell, and that of thy votaries, when thy judgment shall have come!” 3. And shall “think to change times and laws.” What laws? and whose? Not the laws of other earthly governments; for it was nothing marvelous nor strange for one power to change the laws of another, whenever it could bring such power under its dominion. Not human laws of any kind; for the little horn had power to change these so far as its jurisdiction extended; but the times and laws in question were such as this power should only think to change, but not be able to change. They are the laws of the same Being to whom the saints belong, whom it wears out with persecution; namely, the laws of the Most High. And has the papacy attempted this? Yes, even this. It has expunged the second commandment, to make way for its adoration of images. It has divided the tenth, to make up the number. And, more audacious than all! it has taken hold of the fourth commandment, torn from its place the Sabbath of Jehovah, the only memorial of the great God ever given to man, and erected in its place a rival institution to serve another purpose. See Catholic catechisms, and the work entitled, “Who Changed the Sabbath?” and works on the Sabbath and Law, published at the Signs Office. 4. “And they shall be given into his hands until a time and times and the dividing of time.” The pronoun “they” embraces the saints, the times, and the laws just mentioned. How long a time were they to be given into the hands of this power? A time, as we have seen from Chap. 4: 23, is one year; two times, the least that could be denoted by the plural, two years; and the dividing of time, or half a time, half a year. We thus have three years and a half for the continuance of this power. We must now consider that we are in the midst of symbolic prophecy; hence this measurement is not literal, but prophetic. The inquiry then arises, How long a period is denoted by the three years and a half of prophetic time? The only rule given us in the Bible is, that when a day is used as a symbol, it stands for a year. Eze. 4: 6; Num. 14: 34. The ordinary Jewish year, which must be used as the basis of reckoning, contained three hundred and sixty days. Three years and a half contained twelve hundred and sixty days. Each day standing for a year we have twelve hundred and sixty years for the continuation of this horn. Did the papacy possess dominion that length of time? The answer again is, Yes. The edict of the emperor Justinian, dated A. D. 533, made the bishop of Rome the head of all the churches. But this edict could not go into effect till the Arian Ostrogoths, the last of the three horns that were plucked up to make room for the papacy, were driven from Rome, and this was not accomplished till A. D. 538. The edict would have been of no effect had this latter event not been accomplished; hence from this latter year we are to date, as this was the earliest point where the saints were in reality in the hands of this power. From this point did the papacy hold supremacy for twelve hundred and sixty years? Exactly. For in the year 1798, Berthier, a French general, entered Rome, proclaimed a Republic, took the pope prisoner, and for a time abolished the papacy. It has never since enjoyed the privileges and immunities which it possessed before. Thus again this power fulfills to the very letter, the specifications of the prophecy, which proves beyond question that the application is correct. Here the judgment, a judgment like other national judgments of which the Bible speaks, see Acts 7: 7, etc., sat upon the papacy. Its dominion was taken away, that is, its supremacy was broken, and a consuming process there commenced which is to continue till the end of time. Yet the papacy will exist, though with but a shadow of its former prestige, till the appearing of Christ, to be consumed with the spirit of his mouth, and destroyed by the brightness of his coming. How accurately verse 26 has been fulfilled since 1798, and is being fulfilled to-day, is evident even to the casual observer of passing events. This is doubtless to be understood more particularly in a national sense. Individuals are still its zealous devotees; but everywhere it has lost and is losing, national recognition and support. Verses 27, 28. And the kingdom and dominion, and the greatness of the kingdom under the whole heaven, shall be given to the people of the saints of the Most High, whose kingdom is an everlasting kingdom, and all dominions shall serve and obey him. Hitherto is the end of the matter. As for me Daniel, my cogitations much troubled me, and my countenance changed in me; but I kept the matter in my heart. After beholding the dark and desolate picture of papal oppression upon the church, the prophet once more turns his eyes with delight upon the glorious period of the saints’ rest when they shall have the kingdom free from all oppressive powers, in everlasting possession. What could the children of God do in this present evil world, sighing over the misrule and oppression of the governments of earth, and the abominations that are done in the land, if they could not look forward to the kingdom of God, and the return of their Lord, with full assurance that the promises concerning them both shall certainly be fulfilled, and that speedily? NOTE.—Some startling events relative to the papacy, filling up the prophecies uttered in this chapter concerning that power, have taken place within a few years of the present time. Commencing in 1798 where the great national judgment fell upon the papacy, what have been the chief characteristics of its history? Answer: The rapid defection of its natural supporters, and greater assumptions on its own part. In 1844 Judgment of another kind began to sit, namely the investigative Judgment, in the Heavenly sanctuary, preparatory to the coming of Christ. Dec. 8, 1854, the dogma of the Immaculate Conception was decreed by the pope. July 21, 1870, in the great Ecumenical Council assembled at Rome, it was deliberately decreed by a vote of 538 against 2 that the pope was infallible. In the same year, Napoleon, by whose bayonets the pope was kept on his throne, was crushed by Prussia, and the last prop was knocked from under the papacy. Then Victor Emanuel, seizing his opportunity to carry out the long cherished dream of a United Italy, seized Rome to make it the capital of his kingdom. To his troops, under General Cadorna, Rome surrendered, Sept. 20, 1870. Then the last vestige of the temporal power departed, nevermore, said Victor Emanuel, to be restored; and the pope has been virtually a prisoner in his own palace since that time. Because of the great words which the horn uttered, Daniel saw the beast destroyed and given to the burning flame. This destruction is to take place at the second coming of Christ and by means of that event; for the man of sin is to be consumed by the spirit of Christ’s mouth and destroyed by the brightness of his coming. 2 Thess. 2: 8. What words could be greater, more presumptuous, more blasphemous, more insulting to high Heaven, than the deliberate adoption of the dogma of Infallibility, clothing a mortal man with the prerogative of the Deity, which was accomplished by papal intrigue and influence, July 21, 1870? Following in swift succession, the last vestige of temporal power was swept from his grasp. It was because of these words, and as if in immediate connection with them, that the prophet saw this power given to the burning flame. His dominion was to be consumed unto the end; implying that when the last vestige of his power was consumed as a civil ruler, the end is not far off. And the prophet immediately adds, “And the kingdom and dominion, and the greatness of the kingdom under the whole heaven shall be given to the people of the saints of the Most High.” All has now been fully accomplished except the closing scene. Next comes the last, crowning, finishing act in the drama when the beast will be given to the burning flame, and the saints of the Most High take the kingdom. U. S. A RELIEF light boat was built at New London many years ago. While the workmen were busy over it one man lost his hammer. Whether he knew it or not, it was nailed up in the bottom of the boat. Perhaps if he found it out, he thought the only harm done was the loss of the hammer. But the boat was put to the service, and every time it rocked on the waves that hammer was tossed to and fro. Little by little it wore for itself a track, until it had worn through planking and keel, down to the very copper plating, before it was found out. Only that plate of copper kept the vessel from sinking. It seemed a very little thing in the start, but see what mischief it wrought. So it is with a little sin in the heart. It may break through all the restraints around us, and but for God's mercy, sink our souls in endless ruin. A few evil words in a child's ear have rung in his soul for twenty years and brought untold harm. It is the sin hidden in our hearts that we should most fear. There are none who do not need to offer up the prayer: “Cleanse thou me from secret faults.”—Golden Censer. Have the People Any Snap?
It has come to be a common question concerning a pastor, “Has he any snap in him?” Now there comes one in the Congregationalist, and suggests that a candidate for a vacant pulpit might well ask, “Have the people any snap in them?” and expands the question in the following way: “Have they snap enough to pay the minister’s salary promptly? Have they snap enough to go to church for every service required of him as certainly as to their place of business week-days, storm or sunshine, winds blowing hot or cold. Have they snap enough, when there to keep wide awake?” DARE to change your mind, confess your error, and alter your conduct, when you are convinced you are wrong.