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THE TDIES OF THE END.

FIVE SERMONS

ON

THE APOCALYPSE,

PREACHED

ON THE FOUR SUNDAYS IN ADVENT,

AND ON CHRISTMAS DAY,

1848.

BY THE

REV. CHARLES J. FURLONG, A. M.

MINISTER OF TRINITY CHURCH,
BOULOGNE-SUR-MER.

Can ye not discern the' sii^ns of llie Times? Matt, xti. 3.

BOULOGNE-SUR-MER,
January, 1819.

boulognk:
c 11 a u l e s a i g r e , p r i n t k u ,

36, nUE DBS PIPOTS.

TO

IHE CONGREGATION

ASSEMBLING l- O R DIVINE AV 0 R S II I P

AT

THE BRITISH EPISCOPAL CHURCH

OF

THE HOLY TRINITY,

BOULOGXE-SUR-MER,

THESE SERMONS,

PUBLISHED AT THEIR REQUEST,

ARE

AFFECTIONATELY INSCRIBED

BY

THE AUTHOR.

871776

SERMON L

THE APOCALYPSE.

' ' ]i2; PetJer, !.;1h9\

We have also a more sure word of prophecy, where-unto ye do \rell
thai ye take heed, as unto a light shining in a dark place, until the
day dawn, and the day star arise in your hearts.

The will of God has ordained, my Brethren, that the
period of our own appointed time upon earth shall be
between the first and the last Advent of our Lord and
Saviour Jesus Christ. Since that first Advent, when, in
the words of the Collect for this day, "" He came to
visit us in great humility," eighteen hundred years have
rolled away : and still we are looking forward to that
"day," also spoken of in this Collect, *'when He shall come
again in His glorious majesty to judge both the quick and
dead." Are we, then, to conclude, that, as so long a
period in the history of man has already elapsed since Christ
was manifested in the flesh, and as the ancient prophecies
that predicted that manifestation extended over an antece-
dent period of nearly four thousand years, we have still io
look forward, through some unknown and indefinite lapse of

time, for the fulfiiinent of the prophecies thai describe His
second coming "in power and great glory V — Nothing could
well be more unreasonable, in itself, than such a conclusion;
and certainly, nothing can well be more inconsistent with
those intimations which are afforded us in the Scriptures of
God respecting it. There is a marked contrast, in this
respect, between the predictions that relate to Christ's first
Advent, and those that relate to His second. In the first,
we see promises gradually developed, pointing obscurely at
first, then more explicitly, and at last with wonderful mi-
nuteness of detail, to Him. i.n whom uU these things that
were written were to be fulfilled. First we see the promise
only of " the seed of +he woman," who should " bruise the
Serpent's head." — Then, after a long interval, the promise of
one, in whom "all the families of the earth should be blessed"
— then, after another interval of nearly two hundred years,
the revelation of the time when "Shiloh" should "come"
— and so, progressively, through " all things which were
written" "in the law of Moses, and in the Psalms" of
David, until the lips of Isaiah and the later Prophets were
commissioned to describe in all the glowing language of
inspiration the coming of Him, who should by suffering re-
deem lost man, and make reconcihation foi him unto God.
But the predictions that relate to Christ's second Advent
bear a very different character. " Watch, for ye know
neither the day nor the hour wherein the Son of man Co-
meth '." — "Of that day and that hour knoweth no man, no,
not the Angels of heaven, but the Father only =»." — " The
day of the Lord so cometh as a thief in the night , for when
they shall say, peace and safety, then shall sudden destruc-
tion come upon them, and they shall not escape ^" — *'He

' Mut. \xr. t:}. '' Matt. xxir. 30. » 1 Thnss. y. 2. 3.

which testifieth these things saith, suiely I come quickly '."
— Surely, these are words that cannot but lead us, if lan-
guage has any meaning, to look to a far shorter period of
time for their fulfilment, than that necessarily imphed in the
progressive development of those promises, which pointed
to a coming, but far-distant, •' fulness of time ", when they
should at length be consummated, and all the riches of
God's mercy manifested in the Incarnation of His Beloved
and only Begotten Son.

Are we to '*take no heed" of these things, my Brethren I
Are we to exempHfy in ourselves the conduct of those
"scoffers," of whom Saint Peter declares that they *' shall
come in the last days, walking after their own lusts, and
saying, where is the promise of His coming^ for since the
fathers fell asleep, all things continue as they were from
the beginning of the creation =." God forbid I— Rather,
shall we "do well, if we take heed to the sure word
of prophecy" — not to dogmatize where the Spirit of God
has not spoken decidedly — not audaciously to fix upon
certain "times and seasons '' as the only ones that the Al-
mighty could have contemplated — not presuming to be
"wise above that which is written " — and above all things,
not daring to pronounce our own views of unfulfilled pro-
phecy to be among the essentials of salvation — but, humbly,
cautiously, prayerfully — and with the deep conviction that,
whether our own interpretation be right or wrong, the pro-
phecy will surely come to pass, and when it is come to
pass, will be so clearly manifested, that all will believe ^1
If we are prepared with this Spirit, then ought we to study
the prophecies that relate to the Advent of Christ " in His
glorious Majesty," even as the pious and believing Jews

'- Pxfv. x\ii 'iO. ' '2. Pet. iii. 4. ^ J"1im \iv. 10.

8

of old studied those that related to His Advent in His great
humilit5." They were taught of God (as, for example, holy
Simeon) through the Prophets, to look forward to the
coming of a suffering Christ. We are in Hke manner taught
to look forward to the coming of a glorified Christ. And
as the believing Israelite was cheered by the prospect of
the Saviour's first Advent, so the pious Christian ought to
be cheered, and sustained, and comforted, by looking for the
Advent of that Saviour, who " shall appear unto them that
look for Him, the second time without sin unto salvation '."

I purpose, therefore, with God's permission, during the
present season of Advent and on Christmas- day, to enter
upon the consideration of one particular department of pro-
phecy relating to the second coming of our Lord and Sa-
viour,— that, namely, which describes the signs that shall
precede and herald His coming. I shall also endeavour to
point out to you in how many remarkable instances those
signs seem to have been fulfilled, or to be fulfilling, in this
our own day. I desire to force no conclusions upon you. I
shall only state to you undoubted and unquestionable
facts, leaving to your own minds, with the aid of God's
Grace, to draw therefrom such inferences as the facts
themselves may svarrant. Whatever those inferences may
be, of this at least I am assured, that if any portion of that
impression be produced upon your minds, which has been
produced upon my own, you will at least admit tliat there
is great room for the most serious thought, the gravest
contemplation. So remarkable, indeed, are the signs of
the present times, that they have attracted the earnest
attention even of men, who, though distinguished by in-
iclleclual attainments, know not the wisdom and the power

2S.

of God as ihey are revealed in His Gospel— liow mucli
more earnestly, therefore, ought the believer in that Gos-
pel to give his attention to these things that are " coming
on the earth ;" and, while doing so, to remember the so-
lemn warning of his Lord and Master, "take ye heed,
watch and pray ; for ye know not when the time is." "And
what I say unto you, I say unto all, Watch !" ' It is from
the Apocalypse, or Revelation of Saint John the Divine,
that we principally derive those predictions, which seem
to forewarn us that "the times of the Gentiles" are about
to be "fulfilled" — Now, I am well aware that there is a
widely-prevaihng prejudice respecting the study of this
Book, which requires to be noticed and answered at the
outset. It is too generally looked upon as a dark and
inexphcable hieroglyphic, or, at least, as being full of
mysterious subjects that ought not to be meddled with.
One writer has even gone so far as to assert that the study
of it "either found men mad, or left them so !" — But, my
dear Brethren, what does the Spirit of God say of this
Book ?— "Blessed is he that readeth, and they that hear
the words of this prophecy, and keep those things that
are written therein ^" Shall we presume to say that it is
wrong, or unprofitable, to read what God's Holy Spirit has
thus pronounced it blessed to read t And if an especial
blessing is thus pronounced upon reading and hearing it,
may we not most justly infer that it is also God's will that
we should humbly endeavour to "mark, learn, and inward-
ly digest it 1 " Unquestionably, to study it in a presump-
tuous, or uncharitable, or wilful spirit, would be not only
unprofitable, but sinful— and any one, who should do so,
might well tremble lest he had incurred the awful ana-

' Mark.xiii, 33. 37. ^ Rev. i. 3.

10

thema pronounced upon all who shall "add unto," or
*'take away from" the things that are written therein • —
But to open the book, and diligently study it, and pray for
the aid of God's Spirit to enlighten our minds respecting
it, surely this is the duty of every man who believes that
" all scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is pro-
fitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruc-
tion in righteousness." ^

This will still more clearly appear, if we consider what
the Apocalypse really is. It is very commonly supposed
that liie words, " the Revelation of Saint John," or " the
Revelation of Jesus Christ," mean a Revelation made bij
Jesus Christ, whereas they rather mean, the Revelation of
Jesus Christ himself — the exposition, or manifestation, as
it were, of Christ in His Glory — In the same sense, the
same word is used in other passages of the New Testa-
ment.— Thus, in the 1st. Epistle to the Corinthians, the
first Chapter, and seventh verse, in our version we read,
"so that ye come behind in no gift, waiting for the coming
of our Lord Jesus Christ" — but in the original it is, "wait-
ing for the Apocalypse of our Lord Jesus Christ ? " Again,
in the 1st E;^istle cf Peter, the first Chapter, and thir-
teenth verse, we read, " Gird up the loins of your mind,
be sober, and hope to the end for the grace that is to be
brought unto you at the Revelation of Jesus Christ." —
"Where, again, in the original it is, "in the Apocalypse of
Jesus-Christ." — In these passages (and there are several
others) you will see that the word means, not a disclosure,
or communication made by Christ to any one, but a ma-
nifestation of Himself and of His Glory. And is it to be
said that we are not to look upon this Divine Revelation

' Rev. xxii. 18, V). " 2. Tim. iii. 10.

11

of our blessed Lord, thus vcuchsafed by Himself, but
turn away from it in dislike or indifference, as if it could
exercise no sanctifying influence upon our hearts, as if
nothing that is profitable unto Godliness could be learnt
from it, and as if a curse rather than a blessing were an-
nexed to the perusal ofil! — Such certainly was not the
opinion of the early Christians, for they made it their fa-
vorite study, and found springs of comfort therein that
strengthened and refreshed their souls in the times of se-
verest trial and persecution. Surely, therefore, the fault
must be our own, if the careful study of it does not still
afford spiritual comfort to us, as it did to them, and tend
to promote the glory and honour and praise of God.

The time at which the Apocalypse was written was
about the year of our Lord, 97. Saint John was banish-
ed to the island of Patmos by the Emperor Domitian,
who is said to have been the first of the Roman Emperors
that adopted this particular mode of punishment. The
Book has been recognized as canonical in every age of
the Christian Church. Ignatius, one of the earliest of the
Christian Fathers, who lived in the year 107— that is, just
ten years alter it was written — quotes several passages
from it, thus proving its actual existence at that early date.
Polycarp, another Christian Father, who lived in the year
108, in the hour of his martyrdom offered up the very
prayer used in the 11th Chapter of this Book, at the 17th
verse,* 'we give thanks toThee, O Lord God Almighty, which
art, and wast, and art to come." Justin Martyr, who lived in
the year 140, that is, only forty-three years after it was
written, not only read it, but wrote an explanation of it.
No reasonable doubt, therefore, can exist of its being
what it actually professes to be, namely, a Book written
under the immediate inspiration of God's Holy Spirit, by

12

"John His Servant, who bare record of the word of God,
and of the testimony of Jesus Christ, and of all things
which he saw." •

There is another point, on which it nriay also be ne-
cessary to offer a few remarks, before I proceed to the
consideration of that particular portion of the Apocalypse,
which I have proposed to make the subject of our medi-
tations. You are of course aware that throughout this
Book the language is in the highest degree symbolical.
And the question may be asked, 'why shoufd symbols be
used, when the plain and abstract ideas might at once have
been employed? The answer to this is obvious. If the
events here predicted by the Spirit of God had been set
forth with such distinctness that it would have been im-
possible not to understand them, not only would the free
course of the events of this world, but even the respon-
sibility of man himself, have been seriously interfered with,
and every thing would have seemed to be bound by a
chain of inevitable fatalism. If, on the contrary, these
predictions had been expressed in language that was ut-
terly unintelligible, they would have been useless, either as
prefigurations of the truth, or evidences of its fulfilment.
Therefore the wisdom of God, in all things perfect, ordain-
ed that symbols should be used, as being both universally
intelligible, and conveying most vividly and permanently
the truths of which they are the vehicles. The Almighty
had long ago employed the same method in communica-
ting to man the Revelations of His will by the mouth of
the Prophets of Israel. In the language of the Hebrew
Seers, from Isaiah to Malachi. "heaven" was the symbol
of civil or ecclesiastical power — "the sun," of a monarch

Kev

13

— •♦ the stars," of inferior rulers,— ''earth" symbolized so-
ciety in a state of tranquillity — and "sea " society in a
state of convulsion. The "air" represented the po-
litical atmosphere — *' earth-quakes, " revolution — and
"hail and thunder, " wars. A " horn " was a king or
kingdom — a "vine," the true Church — and a ''harlot" a
false church — and the very same symbols are found to be
used, in the same meanings, in the Apocalypse. More-
over, these symbols are sometimes used not only in their
primary or figurative sense, but also in a secondary or
literal meaning. For example, Balaam prophesied of "a
star that shall come out of Jacob '," meaning by that star
the Messiah, and the Advent of Christ fulfilled the symbol :
but there was also a literal ^ star that heralded the
Advent of Christ : and thus, whilst the primary meaning of
the prediction was a figurative one, its secondary meaning
was a literal one. Similar instances are to be found in the
Apocalypse, and some of them of a most striking character,
but then, the secondary meaning, however exactly fulfilled,
must never be suffered to supersede the primary one, and
the want of a due regard to this obvious rule has often
led its expositors into manifold errors.

I have thus endeavoured to prepare the way for the sub-
ject, which, with God's permission, I propose to consider
in my morning Discourses during the remaining Sundays in
Advent and on Christmas Day. I have assigned the reasons
why it appears to me that it is the duty of every true be-
liever in Christ to study the Apocalypse. I have pointed out
the spirit and frame of mind in which I conceive that the
study of it ought to be approached. I have sought to ex-
plain to you what this Book really is, and on what autho-

' Numbers xxiv. 17. ' Matt. li. 2.

11

rity 4t rests — and I have assigned, I trust, sufficient reasons
for the employnient therein of the highly figurative and
symbolical language in which its wonderful and awful warn-
ings are conveyed. On Sunday next, therefore, I shall
enter upon the examination of those signs of the present
times, which seem to indicate that we are now living in that
period of the Apocalyptic History, which is there described
as the opening of the Seventh Vial.

Meanwhile, my Brethren, let me once more earnestly
exhort you to remember that it is most especially true
of unfulfilled prophecy, that "we see as through a glass,
darkUng " : and therefore that a broad line of distinciioa
must ever be drawn between our interpretation thereof
and any truth essential to our salvation. We may, or may
noiy be Hving in the period of the opening of the Seventh
Vial — although I conceive that we are — but it is indispula-
hly true that Jesus Christ died to save us from everlasting
death. The first may be true, and probably is so. The
last inusi be true. The first is revealed to us only in
symbols — the last is revealed so clearly that " he that run-
neth may read." We may doubt of our expositions of
prophecy, we may not feel a perfect assurance that we are
right in our interpretation of its symbols, even although
we may have a profound conviction that we are so, but
there can be no doubt, no question, whether our Saviour
is our God, whether His blood cleanseth from all sin,
whether His righteousness is our oaly justification,
whether His cross is our only hope. Bearing this dis-
tinction carefully in mind, then also remember that no sub-
ject of more profound interest, or of deeper importance, can
well be conceived, than this presents to our meditations. For
if our interpretation of this prophecy is correct, then is the
Second Coming of our Lord Jesus Christ in His Glorious

15

Majesty drawing very near indeed. And Up miiy " c; tnf
suddenly to His Temple," yea " in an hour when we look
not for Him," for He himself has told us tha! that " day
shall come upon us unawares, and as a snare shall it come
upon all them that dwell upon the face of the whole earth '."
For "like as it was in the days of Lot; they did eat,
they drank, they bought, they sold, they planted, they
builded; but the same day that Lot went out of Sodom,
it rained fire and brimstone from heaven, and destroyed
them all : even thus shall it be in the day when the Son of
Man is revealed '." — How are we prepared to meet that day,
if it should come, whilst we are yet found alive upon the
earth ! And even if this should not be so, how are we pre-
pared to meet it, if we must first go down into the grave lor
a brief period, and there remain, until the last trump shall
wake the dead, and " all that are in the graves shall hear
the voice of the Son of God, and shall come forth, they
that have done good, unto the resurrection of life ; and
they that have done evil, unto the resurrection of damna-
tion 3" I

' Luke \xi. 33. ' l,iikc« xvii, 3<). ' John v. '28, 29.

SERMON IL

THE GREAT RIVER EUPHRATES.

Rev. xvi. 12.

And the sixth Angel poured out his Vial upon the great river Euphra-
tes; and the water- thereof wai dried up, that the way of the kings
of the East might be prepared.

In the Discourse which I addressed to you, my Brethren,
on Sunday last^ I proposed for your serious consideration
ihe many and grave reasons why it is incumbent on every
believer in Jesus Christ to study those prophecies which
relate to his second Advent ; and more especially, that
wonderful book which is entitled the "Apocalypse,'' or
"Revelation" of Himself. I also endeavoured to impress
strongly upon your minds the necessity of exercising a
cautious, humble, and prayerful spirit, in prosecuting this
study— and still more, of drawing a marked distinction be-
tween our interpretations of unfulfilled prophecy, and those
essential truths of salvation which are plainly and clearly
revealed to all men. Always bearing these precautionary
rules in mind, let us proceed to examine some of those signs
o( the present times, which have recently been manifested,

17

and are still passing, around us : and liaving carefully com-
pared them with the symbolical language of prophecy, let
us well consider whether we can reasonably escape from
the conclusion, that those events are actually being fulfil-
led, under our very eyes, which that prophecy explicitly
declares shall be the distinguishing characteristics of " the
times of the end." It is an enquiry fraught with the deep-
est interest, and involving the most awakening consequen-
ces : for if these things be so, then, in the words of that
eminent Christian and profound scholar, the late D^ Ar-
nold, " the fulness of time is come — there will be no future
history — we are living in the last age of the world's
history — and no other race will remain behind us to per-
fect what we have neglected, or restore what we have
ruined." — How awful, and all but overwhelming, is such a
thought! — It seems, when we look round upon the busy,
trading, enterprising, scientific, multitudinous, world around
us, as if it were impossible that such a change could ever
pass upon it. But pass upon it, it must. It is a mere
question of time. No one doubts this — no one, at least,
who believes God's Word to be true. But then the actual
period is always, by a subtle mental process, adjourned to
some indefinite and far distant epoch. And because the
mind shrinks from the contemplation of that epoch, it un-
warrantably assumes that some very different state of society
will exist on earth before it arrives — that all present things
will first be changed — that men will not be as they noio are
— nor do, as they now do — although the Lord Jesus Christ
has Himself vouchsafed to reveal to us, in the plainest lan-
guage, that even as it was in the days before the flood, so
shall it be in the day of His second coming — and that as
men then " eat and drank," and "bought and sold," and

"planted and builded," and "married wives and were

9

18

given in marriage," "so shall it be also in the day when
the Son of Man is revealed. " ' Yes ! There is nothing
in the Holy Scriptures more surely revealed than this —
that whenever the Lord shall come, He will come " sud-
denly," ^ and "in such an hour as ye think not" ^.^that
He will find men working " in the field," and women
*' grinding at the mill" '^, that is to say, occupied in all the
ordinary labours and business of life — and therefore, whe-
ther that coming be far off, or near at hand, the attempt to
derive any argument against its nearness, or in favour of
its remoteness, from the existing state of society, as if that
were incompatible with the arrival of such a period, is not
only altogether foreign to the subject, but is evidently op-
posed to the express intimations of God's Holy Word.

With so wide a field of prophecy before me, and with a
hmited time within which to address you, I have deter-
mined, my Brethren, to select one particular portion for
our examination; and that, because it is the one in which
we are all most deeply and personally interested. It is
obvious, that in doing so, I shall have certain difficulties to
contend against, because it is impossible for me to do more
than incidentally allude to several antecedent epochs and
dates, referring to events foretold in the Apocalypse, and
long since fulfilled. I must, therefore, so far, ask your in-
dulgence ; and 1 would earnestly hope that what I am en-
abled to set before you, may lead you, by the Divine
blessing, to seek for yourselves a more full aud satisfactory
knowledge of this *' sure word" of God, in the works of
Newton, and Keith, and Faber, and Gumming, and Elliott
— not, indeed, as receiving any thing as a truth, only on

' Lukexvii. 26—30. ' Mai. iii. 1.

' Malt. xxiv. 44. '^ Matt. xxiv. 40, 41.

19

the authority of these names, great as they are ; but, with
your Bibles in your hands, receiving that only, which shall
seem to you to be a just and well-founded exposition of the
Words of the Holy Spirit of God.

1 said, then, in my last discourse, that the signs of the pre-
sent times appeared tome to warrant the belief, that we are
now hving at that period of the Apocalyptic History, which
is described as the Opening of the Seventh Vial. I now
proceed to set before you, what appear to me to be some
of the proofs that such is the case : and as this is the Openimj
only of the SeventhN\^\, it will be necessary for me to con-
sider that which has immediately preceded it, namely, the
Pouring out of the Sixth, in order that we may have a
more complete understanding of the actual fulfilment of
these predictions within our own days.

In the first verse of the Chapter preceding the one from
which the text is taken (the 15th), we read : "And I saw
another sign in heaven, great and marvellous, seven An-
gels having the seven last plagues, for in them is filled up
the wrath of God " — You will observe, my Brethren, these
remarkable expressions — they are "the seven /a^/ plagues,"
and " in them the wrath of God \^ filled up. " Whenever,
therefore, their fulfilment does come, there will be no fur-
ther temporal judgment of God upon this world, as it is
at present constituted. In the sixth verse of the same
chapter, these same Angels are described as coming forth
out of the heavenly temple, "clothed in pure and white
linen, and having their breasts girded with golden girdles."
— This denotes their being sent from the immediate pre-
sence of God, and commissioned to execute special iiidg-
ments. They then receive "seven golden vials full of the
wrath of God, wholiveth for ever and ever ;" and, as you
will read in the fiirst verse of the present chapter, " a great

20

voice" out of the temple thus addresses ihem, "go your
ways, and pour out the vials of the wrath of God upon the
earth." — The first five vials I am precluded from explain-
ing, farther than may be absolutely requisite for introdu-
cing ourselves to the great events of the sixth and seventh,
on which I at present desire to fix your attention. I must,
therefore, briefly state that the First vial, which was pour-
ed out upon " the earth/' is supposed to have found its
fulfilment in that terrible scourge of the whole world, the
French Revolution of 1790 — The Second vial, which was
poured out upon " the sea," in the long and furious naval
wars that immediately followed. — The Third vial, which
was poured out upon '• the rivers," in those fearful scenes
of war and bloodshed which soon took place upon the
banks of the Rhine, the Danube, the Po, and in short
every river of Continental Europe. — The Fourth, vial
which was poured out upon " the Sun " — the Apocalyptic
symbol of kingly power, — in the overthrow and desola-
tion of all the Monarchies of Europe bafore the Imperial
power of Napoleon — and the Fifth whicli was poured out
upon "the seat of the Beast," in the abolition by Napoleon,
in the year 1809, of the temporal power of the Pope, the
incorporation of the city of. Rome with the Empire of
France, and the reduction of the Pope himself to the con-
dition of a stipendiary of the French Empire.

Let us now turn, my Brethren, to the contemplation of the
sixth vial, under which the premonitory symptoms of Him,
who is to reign for ever and ever, begin to develope them-
selves ; and under which we may find most startling proofs
that we have ourselves been living. Of this it is written, in the
text, that "the sixth Angel poured out his vial upon the
great river Euphrates ; and the water thereof was dried up,
that the way of the kings of the east might be prepared."

21

" The great river Euphrates" — of what is that the Apo-
calyptic symbon — On this all commentators are, I believe,
agreed. It is tlie symbol of the Turkish or Mahometan
power. You will find it so used in a previous portion of
the Apocalypse, in the ninth chapter, at the 13th and fol-
lowing verses, where the sixth Angel is commanded to
" loose the five Angels which are bound in the great river
Euphrates," "for an hour, and a day, and a month, and
a year, for to slay the third part of men." Now I must
here observe that it has been clearly established that a
•prophetic year is to be understood and taken as 365 1^4
prophetic days, or literal years — the prophetic month as 30
prophetic days, or 30 literal years, — the prophetic day as
one literal year — and tl\e prophetic hour as 15 literal days.
Remembering this explanation, you will find that *'anhour,
and a day, and a month, and a year" make 396 years and
106 days. Now mark the historical fact. On the 18th
of January, 1075, the Turks set out on their career of
conquest from Bagdad on the Euphrates : and on the 29th
of May, 1453, Constantinople fell beneath their vic-
torious arms — a period of exactly 396 years and 106 days,
as the prophecy had foretold. This minute coincidence
between the historic fact and the Apocalyptic symbol would
alone be decisive, even if there were no other proofs (and
there are in reality many others) that by " the great river
Euphrates" we are to understand the Turkish Empire :
and o{ this it is declared that, under the Sixth Vial, "the
water thereof" shall be "dried up,"

Now, let us turn from the Book of Prophecy, to the
records of contemporary history, to facts that have occur-
red within the recollection of a considerable portion of
those who now hear me. Up to the year 1820— and I re-
quest you to observe the date — the Ottoman Empire had

22

enjoyed along period of repose. Although, during tlie
period of the French Revolution, Spain, Portugal, Italy,
Holland, Germany, Prussia, Austria/ and Russia, had
been overrun and desolated by the tide of war, Turkey
had escaped comparatively unharmed. And at the com-
mencement of 1820, she was free from foreign invasion or
domestic rebellion, and wa? feared and respected as a
powerful and mighty nation. But in the summer of 1820,
Ali Pasha of Albania, and in the following November, the
Suliotes, raised the standard of rebellion. In 1821, the
Greek insurrection began at Patras — then followed insur-
rections in Wallachia, Moldavia, and Candia — and in Sep-
tember of the sanrie year, the Turkish dominions were in-
vaded by the Persians, and the armies of the Sultan rout-
ed. In the years 1823 and 1824, the war in Greece raged
with unabated fury, and terminated in its separation from
the Empire. In 1825, we find the revolt and extermina-
tion of the Janissaries, — in 1827 the annihilation of the
Turkish fleet at *he battle of Navarino, — in 1829, Moldavia,
Wallachia, and Servia declared independent, and not a
Turk permitted to reside on the north of the Danube, —
in 1829 also, Algiers, another province, seized by the
French, — in 1832, the Turkish army utterly defeated by
Ibrahim Pasha, — in 1833, Adana and Syria given up to
Mehemet-Ali, and subsequently Egypt, in reality, — and,
not to dwell longer on the subject, year after year has
seen this once mighty Empire wasting and wasting away,
its territory diminishing, its population becoming thinner
and thinner, the very peculiarities of its bigoted creed dis-
appearing one after another, until, in the eloquent words
of one, who little dreamt, when he uttered them, of any
fulfilment of Apocalyptic truth, I mean Lamartine, —
"the Ottoman Empire" has become "no Empire at all.

23

but a misshapen agglomeration of different races without
cohesion between them — with mingled interests — without
a language — without laws — without religion — without unity
or stability of power. The breath of life which animated
it, namely, religious fanaticism, is extinct. Its fatal and
blinded administration has devoured the race of conque-
rors, and Turkey is perishing for want of Turks.'* — Rather,
"the sixth Angel (has) poured out his vial upon the great
river Euphrates, and the water thereof (is being) dried up" :
and, wonderful coincidence ! according to the most accu-
rate calculations, the two chronological lines contained in
the prophecies of Daniel, the one of the 2300 years, and
the other of the 1290 years, actually meet in this very year
1820, to which history and the Apocalypse both point as
the commencement of the final overthrow of the Turkish or
Mahometan Power.

Such are the historical facts, in which we seem clearly to
behold the fulfilment of the prophecy respecting the drying
up of ** the great river Euphrates." But the text also in-
timates to us, that there was an especial end io be served
by the drying up of this river, namely, "that the way of the
kings of the east might be prepared." Let us see whether
there is any particular feature of the present times, in
which we seem to discern the fulfilment of this portion also
of the prediction.

Nowhere I must observe that "the kings of the east" is not
an accurate translation of the original. It means, more cor-
rectly, " the kings out of the east, " or "originally from the
east" — that is to say, of eastern origin. We find a similar
mode of expression used in the forty-first chapter of Isaiah,
at the second verse — " who raised up the righteous man
from the east, called him to his foot, gave the nations be-
fore him, and made him rule over kings". In which [>as-

21

sage Abraham, the forefather of the Jewish nation, is un-
doubtedly meant : and allusion is made to his being call-
ed out of the eastern country of Mesopotamia. By "the
kings of the, east," therefore, we understand the Jewish
nation. And if it be asked, why the title of" kings " should
be thus given to a nation that has so long been humbled in
the very dust — we reply, to what nation could it be more
fitly applied, than to that which was the chosen of God — of
which Jehovah \i\mse\i ^2iS so long the only king — "to
whom pertaineth the adoption, and the glory, and the co-
venants, and the giving of the law, and the service of God,
and the promises ; whose are the fathers, and of whom aa
concerning the flesh Christ came, who is over all, God bless-
ed for ever. Amen *" — to which the Holy Spirit of God
continually points, both in the Old Testament and in the
New, as appointed to return to their own land, when "the
times of the Gentiles" are fulfilled, that "over them the
Lord may reign in Mount Zion, from henceforth, even for
ever ^."

. Now what has been the great obstacle, hitherto, to that
return of the Jews to their own land, which no one, who
beheves the Scriptures of God at all, denies to be therein
predicted. Has it not been the fulness, even to over
flowing, of "the great river Euphrates 'M In other
words, the fierce domination of the Turkish Empire I Who,
even yet, keeps watch upon the towers of Jerusalem t
Who, even yet, tramples down and oppresses the daughter
of Zion upon her own holy mount? — Even that very
power, once so mighty, once (whilst such was the will of
God) so irresistible, but now '* drying up", and wasting
away, because it has fulfilled its mission of woe, and,

' Rom. ix. 4. 5. ' Micah.iv. 7,

•25

having fulfilled it, is passing away from the stage on which a
mightier scene is yet to be enacted. Thus "the way of the
Kings of the east" is being "prepared" — and, after the
lapse of centuries, we seem to hear, in those lands where
the symbolical Euphrates has so long rolled its floods, the
advancing flow of that river, whose streams shall hereafter
"make glad the city of our God." Once more we see, in
this our own day, the hopes of the Jewish nation intensely
kindled, and converging from a thousand points towards
the home of their fathers. Not in vain, for ages upon ages,
have the fathers of the Jewish people, on the return of
every Sabbath, gone to that particular gate of the Holy
City, through which ancient tradition has taught them to
believe that the conquering Messiah shall enter, and
there in tears and in humiliation, prayed to the God of
Abraham, and of Isaac, and of Jacob, for His coming.
That time will come — perhaps, it may be near at hand,
when He shall come to His Temple. Your own know-*
ledge of what is now passing in the political world must
teach you that a new, and totally different era in the
history of Israel has actually arrived. The wasting of the
Turkish power, the altered feeling towards the Jews in the
nations of Europe, the fact that even the Turks themselves
now give them a sort of toleration, all loudly proclaim it.
The indifference with which the poUtician, and even the
Christian, once regarded the Jews, exists no Ignger. They
command the attention of statesmen and senates. They
are themselves stirred up by an unseen power, working
mightily within them, and turning their hearts towards the
land of their forefathers. These are the events now passing
around us. Do they not seem to point clearly and distinct-
ly to the approach of those latter times, of which the Lord
God has spoken, when, by the mouth of the prophet

20

Jeremiah, He saith of Israel, "Behold, the days come, saith
the Lord, that they shall no more say, the Lord Hveth,
which brought up the children of Israel out of the land
of Egypt : but, the Lord liveth, which brought up, and
which led the seed of the house of Israel out of the north
country, and from all countries whither I had driven them ;
and they shall dwell in their own land '."

Such is the apparent fulfilment, in our own times, and as it
were under our very eyes, of two of the Apocalyptic pre-
dictions that relate to the times that shall precede the Se-
cond Advent of our Lord Jesus Christ. On Sunday
next, I shall, with the Divine permission, resume this most
interesting and important subject, aad shall then bring be-
fore your notice facts equally as striking as those that I have
already drawn from the page of contemporary history.
"When you shall have heard them all, I cannot but think
that you will be ready to admit, in the words of a cele-
brated^German writer (Schlegel,) that " never was there a
period that pointed so strikingly and so clearly to the fu-
ture, as the very hour in which we live" — and more than
this, that the events of that coming future, which even now
is thus casting before it its gigantic and solemn shadows,
will be, perhaps, nothing less than the end of " the times
of the Gentiles," the reign of the Church's long hoped
for Lord, and the commencement of the thousand years
of peace, the Sabbatical rest of this weary, and sorrowing,
and sinful world.

' Jerem. xxiii. 7. 8.

SER3I0N III

THE THREE UNCLEAN SPIRITS.

Rev. xvi. 13,

And I saw Ihree unclean spirits like frogs come out of the nioulh of
the dragon, and out of the mouth ef the beast, and out of the mouth
of the false prophet.

In my last discourse, my Brethren, I called your atten-
tion to the apparent fulfilment, within the period of our own
observation, of two, at least, of those remarkable predic-
tions that relate to the events that must precede the se-
cond coming of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. In
that gradual wasting and decay of the Turkish Empire,
which commenced in the year 1820, and which is going on
at the present moment, I pointed out the accomplishment of
the prophecy respecting the "drying up" of "the great
river Euphrates" — And I may here add a remarkable and
interesting circumstance, which I then accidentally omitted
to notice, namely, that so strong is the impression upon the
minds of the Turks themselves that their empire is coming
to an end, and that the Cross must ere long supplant the
Crescent on the towers of Constantinople, that the wealthy

28

Turkish families are now in the habit of transporting the
bodies of their dead to Scutari, on the opposite shore of the
Bosphorus, in the hope that they raay there remain longer un-
disturbed by the dreaded approach of the Christian conque-
rors— 1 also showed you how, simultaneously with the drying
up of the river Euphrates, preparation is being made for
the return of " the kings of the east" to their own land —
how the Jews themselves are animated by feelings towards
the land of their forefathers, to which they have long been
strangers — how they are assuming a new position in the
affairs of the world, not the least remarkable proof of which
is the fact that one of that nation should have been elected
a representative of the first city in the world, the Capital of
the British Empire — how the obstacles to their return to
their own land, arising out of the bigotry, and intolerance,
and oppression of the Turks, are gradually diminishing —
how, in short, all things seem, under the guiding hand of an
Omnipotent and Inscrutable Will, to be converging towards
that great event, predicted by so many of the inspired ser-
vants of God, the restoration of Israel, out of all the coun-
tries whither the Lord God had ** driven" them, to "dwell"
once more "in their own land,"

I now proceed to the consideration of other and most
momentous signs of the last times, which I believe to be
equally foreshadowed in the expressive symbols of the
Apocalypse, and to be equally accomplishing under our very
eyes. And these also belong to the Sixth Vial, under the
conclusion of which, and the opening of the Seventh, I have
supposed that we are actually living. The prediction of
them is found in the words of my text, " and I saw three
unclean spirits, hke frogs, come out of the mouth of the
Dragon, and out of the mouth of the beast, and out of the
mouth of the false prophet ; " to which is added, in the

29

following verse, " for they are the spirits of devils, \vorl<ing
miracles, which go forth unto the kings of the earth and of
the whole world, to gather them to the battle of ihat great
day of God Almighty." Let me endeavour, with the as-
sistance of the Divine Grace, to explain the prediction, and
point out its accomplishment.

The first characteristic of the " three unclean spirits," that
invites our attention, is, that they are said to be "like frogs"*
— and this characteristic is common to them all. Now, what
pecuhar quality would seem to be symbolized by this animal?
The serpent, we know, denotes subtlety — the Lion, strength
— the Tiger, cruelty — the Fox, cunning— and so on. But of
what can the Frog be the symbol? Those, who know any
thing of its natural habits, will admit that its peculiar charac-
teristic is, the incessant repetition with which it will pour out
its unvarying and disagreeable cry for hours together. This
may seem a trifling fact, but it is not so in fixing the mean-
ing of the symbol, for it indicates loquaciousness, the use of
manywords. And it is somewhat remarkable, that, even
as far back as the days of the great Athenian Satirist, it
was used to designate the prating, noisy advocates of de-
moralizing and revolutionary principles. We shall see that
this explanation has no unimportant bearing upon the in-
terpretation of this portion of our subject.

"We read that the first "unclean spirit" came "out of the
mouth of the Dragon". Who then is meant by "the Dra-
gon"? — Undoubtedly, he whom the Scriptures call " the
serpent", and "the old serpent", even the Devil, or Satan —
he, who fell from heaven, by pride, and by setting himself
up against God — he, who is also called in the Scriptures
"the Prince of this world '," and " the father of lies ^".

John xii, 31. ^ John viii. 44.

30

By the "iinclean spirit", therefore, that "came out of his
mouth", is meant the spirit of ivjideliiy and blasphemy
against God.

Is infidelity, or blasphemy, then, an especial sign of the
present limes ^ — Would that it were possible to answer
this question in the negative ! Would that the dreadful
realities which proclaim and prove the affirmative, beyond
doubt or question, had no existence ! But they do exist —
they are permitted, like the Devil, their parent, "to walk
the earth for a season", "seeking", hke him, "whom they
may devour". Look at the great country, in which we are
sojourning. Do any, even of their own writers, attempt to
deny that the infidel or sceptic spirit is all but universal? " It
is true that the raging blasphemy, which so horribly charac-
terised the Revolution of 1790, is not so prominently con-
spicuous— that the present form of unbelief is rather a cold,
apathetic, indifference to religion in any and every form —
yet I have myself seen in the published writings of a man,
who was subsequently elected a member of the present
National Assembly, the statement that "/Ae first duty of
man was to deny the existence ofGod'\ followed by other
remarks too horridly blasphemous for me to venture to
repeat. This is Atheism, in all its naked hideousness.
But, although it is to be feared that considerable numbers
have been infected by the poison, in this its most virulent
form, still, it is not the prevalent form. It is more correctly
exhibited in the words of another modern French writer,
"in France we beheve in every thing : we believe in Ma-
hometanism, and we believe in Christianity, we build
churches and we build mosques", — meaning, of course,
that they care for the one no more than for the other 1 In
Germany, we see the same infidel spirit rampant every

3L

where. The German press groans with infidel works.
Belief, in Germany, is a sort of Pantheism. The same is
the case, to a great extent, in America. Even in India,
strange to say, of late years, the Brahmins have very gene-
rally exchanged their old idolatry for a professed Deism.
Then we have St. Simonianism, Communism, Socialism,
Chartism, and numberless other forms of this "unclean
spirit", croaking and crawling over the whole earth, in one
great chorus of infidelity, and verifying their frog-like
origin "out of the mouth of the Dragon."

And has our own country escaped from the poisonous
influences of the first unclean spirit? Has infidehty found
no congenial soil, no home, no resting-place, in our
own father-land 1 On the contrary, how startling are the
proofs that meet us, at every point, of the enormous extent
to which infidelity prevails there ! — It has been calculated
that out of the population of London, amounting to about
2,000,000 souls, at least 900,000, never enter any place of
worship of any denomination — that the whole number of
persons found on any one Sunday in all the Churches and
Chapels of all persuasions never exceeds 300,000 and that,
out of these, only 60,000 are Communicants. On the
other hand, there are in London 30,000 regular thieves,
20,000 professed mendicants, 15,000 children who live
by theft and robbery, — 100,000 prostitutes and persons of
infamous character^ — 150,000 habitual drunkards — and so
I might go on, through the whole catalogue of crime. Of
course, I need scarcely add that all these are utterly "with-
out God in the world." In every city and town of the
Empire, similar results, varying according to local circum-
stances, are obtained. Consider also the infidel publications
of England. The enormous number of 11,702,000 copies
of absolutely vicious and Sabbath-breaking newspapers are

32

annually circulated in great Britain, and of works, infidel
and polluting, a yearly average of 10,400,000. According
to a recent authority, the entire yearly circulation of per-
nicious literature stands thus:

Stamped papers 11,702,000

Unstamped papers .... 6,240,000

Miscellaneous papers . . . 10,400,000

Worst possible class . . . 520,000

Total. . . 28,862,000

Can we wonder that, in such a state of things as this,
nearly the whole of the working classes, and great numbers
of the upper and middle classes, are utter infidels t — Nay,
I was assured by a private friend not long since, that even
our Indian Empire is deluged by cheap editions of the worst
infidel writers, printed in England and sent out for sale ! —
But I must "*pause, for time would fail me, if I were to
attempt to follow out all the proofs that the first unclean
spirit, the spirit of infidehty, has "come out of the mouth of
the Dragon, and that it is "a spirit of the devil, working
miracles" of wickedness and power upon the earth.

We read that the second unclean spirit came "out of the
mouth of the beast". Let us examine the meaning of this
prediction, and how it has been fulfilled.

The "Beast" here spoken of by Saint John is the same
that he describes in the 1st verse of the 13th Chapter as
"rising up out of the sea, having seven heads and ten horns,
and upon his horns ten crowns, and upon his head, the
name of blasphemy". Now Saint John himself explains, in
the 17th Chap. , at the 9th and following verses, that the
"seven heads" have a two fold signification. First, they
symbolize "seven hills" which were to be the seat of Govern-

33

ment; and secondly, "seven kings," that is to say, seven
forms of government. He also explains that the ''ten
horns" symbolize "ten kings" — that is, not ijidividualkmgs,
but lines of kings. Now only one Empire has existed on
earth that answers to this description, and that is the Boman,
Rome, as I hardly need say, is built upon seven hills.
The Roman Empire assumed, from fiist to last, seven forms
of government — Kings, Consuls, Dictators, Decemvirs, Mili-
tary Tribunes, Emperors, and "diademed" Emperors, or
Autocrats. Of these St. John says, "five are fallen, and
one is, and the other is not yet come" : which in his day
was accurately true. The.first five had passed away, he was
hving under the first Emperors, and the "diademed" Em-
perors began with Diocletian. Moreover, the ten kingdoms
were, the Anglo-Saxons—the Franks of Central France — the
UUman Franks of Eastern France — the Burgundic Franks
of South-Eastern France — the Visigoths —the Suevi — the
Vandals— the Ostrogoths in Italy — the Bavarians — and the
Lombards — making in all ten kingdoms, now known by
more modern names, but about A. D. 532 the ten main
kingdoms of the Christian world, and having no point of
union whatsoever except the Papacy. On these strong
grounds we infer "the beast" to be the symbol of the Papal
Power : and therefore, the spirit that proceeded out of its
mouth must symbolize Romanism, audit only remains .to
enquire whether this has received any remarkable deve-
lopment within the present generation.

You will, probably, have already anticipated my reply,
when I say that it has received such a development, for
the fact is only too well known. But it will be worth while to
dwell upon some of the details, for they are deeply instruc-
tive, and ought to occupy the thoughts of all, who are Pro-
testants in something more than the name, much more fre-

3

34

queritly than they do; for they would then learn what ''a
battle" must yet be fought in the cause of an open Bible,
and an unreserved preaching of the Gospel.

You have doubtless heard of the "Propaganda'established
for the promotion of the doctrines of the Church of Rome.
It is stated that in the year 1847, that society had an in-
come of two hundred thousand pounds, which is double
the income of the Church Missionary Society, and /ice
times the income of the Society for Promoting Christian
Knowledge. Now, in the year 1845, this Society expended
£40,000 on England alone, and probably in the succeeding
years this has rather increased than diminished. For let
us. gather a few facts as to what has been going on lately
in England. In the last seven years 60 new Roman Ca-
tholic Churches, some of them on the very largest scale,
have been built by one Architect alone. During the same
period, twenty six Nunneries and Convents have been open-
ed. There are at this moment nearly 800 Roman Catholic
Churches and Chapels, and more are to be built. The press
teems with Romanist works and publications : one printer
alone, at Derby, has issued 60 millions of such publications
within a few years. The Roman Catholic Bishops ore, for
the first time since the Reformation, assuming the titles
of the Bishops of the Church of England. It is even said
that we are to have a Roman Catholic Archbishop of
Canterbury, and an Archbishop of Westminster. I have,
myself, been gravely assured by several Roman Catholics,
that they confidently expect that all England will ere long
return to the Church of Rome — resting upon the unhappy
fact that seventy or eighty Clergymen of the Established
Church, and about a hundred and fifty persons of rank
and station, have already done so. I may add that the Col-
lege of Maynooth has been endowed with ampler funds, and

35

that a project is talked of for paying the Ministers of the
Romish Church in Irehmd out of funds to be provided by
the State.

Such are some of the facts with regard to England. Si-
milar proofs crowd upon us from every quarter of the Globe.
In India, in the Polynesia — so long the field of labour to
the Protestant Missionary alone — in America, in Australia,
even in China — only so recently opened to us — the acti-
vity of the Church of Rome is astonishing. Wherever we
are ready to plant the Cross, there she is ready to erect the
Crucifix. Sometimes, indeed, as was the case in our new
colony of Hongkong, she is there before us — nianifesting
an energy that docs infinite credit to her zeal, but is worthy
of a better cause. For remember, my Brethren, that this
Church holds and teaches doctrines, which are "grounded
upon no warranty of Scripture, and plainly repugnant to
the Word of God"; that she authorises practices and obser-
vances, which we justly believe to be idolatrous ; and
attaches the very highest importance to the sacrifice of the
Mass, which our Church pronounces (Art. 31.) to be '-a
blasphemous fable, and dangerous deceit." It is, therefore,
an " unclean spirit", even taken under this point of view ;
and, if this were the time or place to do so, it would be
easy to show how this terrible characteristic is literally true,
by references to the works of Romish casuists, and the
records of all the. past history of the Church of Rome herself,
even as given by her own writers.

Such, then, is a brief outline of the facts, from which we
infer that the second "unclean spirit" has already come
"out of the mouth of the beast.". Let me now proceed to
consider the third and last portion of this morning's subject,
namely, ''the spirit out of the mouth of the false prophet" :

3G

and herein, the first point to be determined is^ who or what
is meant by "the false prophet."

If you will turn to the 19th. Chapter and 20th. verse, you
will find these words, "and the beast was taken and ^ with
him the false prophet that wrought miracles before him,
with which he deceived them that had received the mark of
the beast, and them that worshipped his image." Then if
you will turn back to the 13lh chapter, at the 11th and
following verses, you will read, " and I beheld another
beast rising up out of the earth, and he had two horns like
a lamb, and he spake as a dragon." Amongst the cha-
racters of this second beast, you will see that "he doetk
greaiwonders' {v .13) , B.nd ^'deceiveih them that dwell on the
earth by the means of those miracles which he had power
to do in the sight of the beast" (v. 14), and "causeththe earth
and them which dwell therein to worship the first beast"
(v. 12), and " caused all, both small and great, rich and poor,
free and bond, to receive a mark in their right hand, or in
their foreheads, and that no man might buy or sell, save he
ihat had the mark, or the naine of the beasV (v. 16. 17.).
Therefore, it is perfectly clear that *'ihe false prophet"
spoken of in the text, and the lamb-hke beast spoken of
in the 13th chapter, are identically the same. Who or
what, then, is symbolized by " the lamb-like beast "1

Remember well the characteristics described by Saint
John in that 13lh chapter to which 1 have just referred you,
my Brethren, and then tell me who they are, who carry
out and exercise all the power of Papal Rome? — Who
superintend and direct the working of such miracles as the
liquefaction of the blood of Saint Januarius at Naples, or
the wonders said to have been effected by the " Holy Coat"
of Treves, or that perpetual miracle, transubstantiation— in
which it is pretended that a few words pronounced by the

37

Priest bring Christ down from heaven, and place His living
Body and Blood upon the altar t — AVho have ever been
the great instrumonts of spiritual despotism, binding men's
consciences in fetters stronger than iron, and bidding them
look to the decrees of Rome as if they were the very com-
mandments of God Himself?— Has not the time been,
when, not to receive the Sacraments from the Priest, not to
confess to the Priest, not to receive absolution from him, was
practically equivalent to utter ruin , or exile , or even
death, in this world, and taught to be equivalent to certain
damnation in the next? Is there not a country, indeed,
within the pale of the British Empire itself, where, in our
own day, it has been found that if a man would " buy or
sell" in order to obtain a livelihood, he must have the favor
and permission of the Priest, or no customer dare cross his
threshold? — All these considerations, and a multitude of
others, which time will not allow me to enumerate, point
out the Clergy, Regular and Monastic — the two horns of
the Church of Rome — as symbohzed by the false prophet
in the text — •' a body distinct from the Papacy, and yet
having one and the same object to contend and struggle for,
namely, the supremacy of the Pope, and of the Church of
which he is the ruler."

And if this be so, what is " the unclean spirit " that has
" come out of his mouth ? " — Again, I ask, what is that sys-
tem, resembling Romanism, and animated by the same spirit,
yet not identical with it, that is now extending itself
throughout the whole length and breadth of the Church of
England — and not the Church of England only, but also
the Episcopal Churches of Scotland and America t
What is that system, which has been so truly described, as
" Popery without the Pope ; the body of the Beast without
its head ; the principles, the policy, the passions, the am-

38

bition, the end of Romanism, without the topstone of su-
premacy that Romanism possesses ?" — Have we not Hved to
hear one disciple of this school speak of the vital doctrine
of justification by faith only, as a " soul-destroying heresy '^
— another, " rejecting and anathematising the principle of
Protestantism as a heresy, with all its forms, sects, and de-
nominations"— another, asserting that the blessed doctrine
of the Atonement is to be taught only with "reserve " — an-
other, expressing a pious wish that he may see the Patriarch
of Constantinople and the Archbishop of Canterbury "go
barefoot to Rome" — another, maintaining with all the learn-
ing of a profound scholar, and all the ability of his subtle in-
tellect, that the Apostles left behind them only the seeds
of Divine Truth, which were entrusted by them to " the
Church" — that is, in his sense, to "the Priesthood" — to
be "developed": and that, by this "development," the seed
sown only became the tree under whose shadow all the in-
habitants of the earth were to repose, at the comparatively
recent period of the Council of Trent! — And has not all
this been disseminated with untiring industry in Sermons,
Pamphlets, Periodicals, Tracts, nay, even in Tales, Novels,
and Romances, without number, and without end!^ — Need
I say more, to point out what appears to me to be the ac-
complishment of this prediction \ No, my Brethren, you
will already have anticipated me, when I say, that as I be-
lieve the first frog-like spirit to be the symbol of modern
Infidehty, and the second of modern Romanism, so does
the third appear to me to have received its accomplishment
in modern Tractarianism.

But I must conclude — on Sunday next, I shall proceed
to consider the opening of theSeventh Vial ; and, on Christ-
mas Day, shall pass on to another prediction of the Apo-
calypse relating to the times that shall precede the Second

39

Advent, which seems to be now receiving a wonderful ful-
filment. Meanwhile, my dear Brethren^ remember the
concluding words of the prophecy we have already been
considering: "Behold, I come as a thief. Blessed is he
that watcheth, and keepeth his garments" — even, the gar-
ments of salvation, but more especially, that "wedding-
garment," the robe of Christ's imputed righteousness, in
which whosoever shall be arrayed may with hope and joy
await the Advent of his Lord and Saviour, whether *' He
Cometh at even, or at midnight, or at the cock-crowing, or
in the morning '."

' Mark xiii. 35.

SERMON IV.

THE SEVENTH VIAL.

Rev. xvi. 17. 18.

And the Seventh Angel poured out his Vial into the air : and there

came a great voice out of the temple of heaven, from the throne,

saying, it is done.
And there were voices, and thunders, and lightnings ; and there was a

great earthquake, such as was not since men were upon the earth,

so mighty an earthquake and so great.

So far, I have endeavoured to direct your serious atten-
tion, my Breihren, to some of the events that have been
passing around us during the last thirty years : and to shovir
in what a remarkable manner they seem to correspond
with the Apocalyptic symbols of the Sixth Vial. In the
gradual decay of the Turkish Empire we have recogni-
zed the "drying up" of " the great river Euphrates" —
in the new hopes that animate the Jewish nation and in
their altered political position, the preparation for " the way
of the kings of the East " — in the wide prevalence of in-
fidel writings and opinions, the frog-like spirit that came out
of the mouth of the Dragon— in the simultaneous develop-
ment and increase of Romanism, the spirit out of the mouth

41

of the seven-beaded and len-horned Beast — and in the syn-
chronous rise and wide diffusion of Tractarianism, the spirit
out of the mouth of the false prophet, or lamb-like beast.
It was written that just at the termination of the Sixth Vial,
and before the outpouring of the Seventh, these three spirits
were to go forth throughout the length and breadth of the
earth, to prepare all nations and people for the approach of
a great hour of conflict, called by Saint John, " the great
day of God Almighty," that is to say, the great and final
victory of God's Word and God's Truth over all opponents
and gainsayers whatsoever. We have peen that those three
spirits have so gone forth ; and that at this very moment a
contest is waging such as never has been waged before — a
conflict, not confined to any one country or nation, but
extending over the whole continent of Europe , and
propagated thence, in ever increasing waves, to every
quarter of the civihzed world. The final issue of this great
contest is still in the womb of time. But we cannot doubt
what it will be, for God's Word must prevail: and there
are predictions which seem clearly to point how and by
what means this will be accomplished. But this is a sub-
ject, upon which, at present, I cannot enter, because I
have limited myself, in my present Discourses, to those
predictions only, of which we ourselves either have already
seen, or, are at the present time seeing, the fulfilment. I
shall, therefore, at once proceed to the consideration of the
opening of the Seventh Vial, and of thoss wonderful events
which seem plainly to indicate that, even now, the mighty
Angel has lifted up his hand, and is pouring forth upon the
nations the wrath and desolation with which it is charged.
'* And the Seventh Angel poured out his Vial into the
air" — now the very first thing that arrests our attention,
is, the wide extent of the visitation that this symbol denotes.

42

The air is every-ivhere. From the summit of the lofty
mountain whose snow-clad head rises above the region of the
clouds, down to the darkest depth of the profoundest mine
that the labour of man has ever sunk into the bowels of
the earth, this essential element of animal life is present.
The symbol itself, therefore, would lead us to anticipate
that its fulfilment is not to be looked for in any limited or
particular locality, or in any confined sphere of action, but
that its influence will extend over island and continent, earth
and sea— that the monarch will feel it on his throne, and the
peasant in his cottage — the manufacturer at his loom, and
the merchant in his counting-house — the scholar in the re-
tirement of his study, and the man of business in the pur-
suit of his daily avocations — in short, that it will, more or
less, aflfect all countries, all classes of society, the whole
social, political, and moral economy of those nations, which
the light of the Gospel has reached. These are very remark-
able characteristics, and such as under no ordinary state of
society could possibly meet with [their fulfilment. We shall
see, nevertheless, that they have done so, with a reality
that is actually startling to the mind of him who seriously
studies them, and observes how the key of God's Word
opens successively each ward of the perplexed and intricate
lock of human events.

Before 1 enter upon the discussion of the main portion of
my subject, let me call to your recollection, my Brethren,
that, in my fir§t Sermon, I remarked that the Prophetic
Symbols are sometimes used not only in their primary or
figurative sense, but also in a secondary or literal sense —
and I adduced, as an instance of this, the prophecy of Ba-
laam, that "a star" should "come out of Jacob," which was
figuratively accomplished in the Advent of our Saviour,
and literally in the star that guided the Eastern Kings to

43

the place of His birth. I also observed that similar instances
are to be found in the Apocalypse — and the present would
appear to be one of them.

For it is written that the seventh Angel poured out his
vial upon the ah\ Taking it, then, in its literal sense, there
can be no doubt whatever that the air has been affected in
a most remarkable manner. Look at the peculiar character
of those two diseases, which of late have destroyed so many
myriads of [the human race — the influenza and the cholera.
It is now universally admitted, contrary to all preconceived
notions, and even in opposition to previously admitted
opinions, that they are not contagious, that is, that they are
not communicated from person to person, even in the
wards of the most crowded hospitals. And yet they travel
on, from country to country, following one general line of
advance, and they proceed from city to city, and from
house to house, and from family to family — nay, even as
the proud ship is wending its solitary way over the wide
waste of waters, they travel after it, and overtake it, and
first one is stricken down, and then another, and so they
die, even as their expiring glances fall upon the white cliffs
of that island-home, which the will of God has ordained
that they shall never reach. No : these terrible diseases
are in the air. Human science admits the fact— may not
religion well ask the question, how they came there 1 —
Human science has never yet attempted an answer to that
question. — The Apocalypse points to the uplifted hand of
the Angel of God, pouring out his vial "upon the air" !

In like manner, I might speak of that most extraordinary
and inexplicable blight that has fallen upon one essential
article of human food — so essential, indeed, and especially
to one large and populous section of the British Empire,
that its failure was followed by such scenes of famine and

u

death as Europe has not known for centuries, disarranged
the whole system of the monetary relations between the
different nations of the world, and produced commercial
distress and difficulty of an unparalleled amount. And yet,
although the utmost energies of an enlightened govern-
ment have been exerted to discover the cause of this visi-
tation, and although men of the most distinguished science
and experience were selected to form a commission of en-
quiry into the mode in which this terrible pest was propa-
gated, and to suggest the best means of counteracting it,
their labours have proved utterly futile. Some attributed
it to one agency, and some to another. No-body could
tell "whence it came", nor "whither it went" — a hundred
remedies were suggested, and they all failed — the blight
continues to this day — and if it stop at all, it will stop
because God wills it: for science can do little or nothing,
even to alleviate it ! — Again I ask, do we not seem to
behold the uplifted hand of the Angel of God !

I might speak of many other such things — for example,
the remarkable and unaccountable variations of the mag-
netic needle ; and the increased frequency of the phenomenon
called the Aurora Borealis, or Australis, whose presence
always indicates great disturbance in that subtle and mys-
terious, but mighty fluid, which pervades our Globe, and
every thing in or upon it. And even if it should be thought
that this may savour of too minute an identification, surely
I may refer, as to a very striking and remarkable coinci-
dence, to the furious storms, which simultaneously with the
outbreak of the events of February last, and again in June
last, raged with such fearful violence over the whole extent
of Europe 1

My brethren, there is something very extraordinary in
all this. I do not desire to invest it with any undue impor-

45

tance : but still, to the thouglillul mind U suggests much
matter for grave reflexion : and it seems to me scarcely
possible, even for the most hesitating judgment, to avoid
asking the question, ''does not all this look like a literal
fulfilment of the pouring out of the Seventh Vial upon the
air, especially, when so many other concurrent signs seem
to point to this as the actual period, when, in the order of
God's foreshadowed Providence, we might be led to expect
it?"—

But I pass on from the secondary, or literal, to the i^ri-
mary, ox figurative, sense of the Apocalyptic prediction ;
and to the consideration of those wonderful events, which
seem to proclaim its fulfilment.

I have already stated tp you, my Brethren, that, in the
Prophetic or Apocalyptic symbols, "the air" represents that,
which, by a singular coincidence of expression, we are in
the habit of caUing "the political atmosphere." Moreover,
the air is the region of storms. And accordingly, we read
in the text, that the pouring of the Vial into it was imme-
diately followed by "voices, thunders, and lightnings ; and
there was a great earthquake, such as was not since men
were upon the earth, so mighty an earthquake and so great."
Now these are the Apocalyptic symbols of tumults, insur-
rections, wars, and revolutions — the earthquake especially
indicating social disorgaaization. The fulfilment of this
prediction, therefore, could be looked for only at a period
when the whole frame of human society is upheaved and
shaken by such convulsions as it had never before known,
when old and estabhshed principles are superseded by new
and startling theories, when thrones rock and constitutions
are overthrown, when nations reel to and fro and stagger as
men do who stand upon the ground that is shaken by an
earthquake. With regard to the earthquake itself, also, I

48

may remark that one of the peculiarities of that awful
phenomenon is, that it gives no notice whatever of its ap-
proach. An opinion to the contrary once prevailed. But the
greatest living authority on such subjects * pronounces
this opinion to be a mere "popular error", utterly refuted
both by his own experience and by the observations of other
men of science. Now, we seem to have an intimation of
this at the conclusion of the Sixth Vial, for, in the 15th
verse, we find in the Apocalypse, for the first time, that
emphatic warning, "Behold, I come as a thief", that is,
unexpectedly, "when you look not for it". Now let us
turn from the symbols of the Apocalypse to the astonishing
events that have recently passed in rapid and startling
succession across the stage of Europe.

In the commencement of the present year, all seemed to
be at peace, and to prognosticate its continuance, If men
thought at all of tumult and war , they Avere only looked forward
to as possible, or perhapspro6a^/e, whenever it should please
the Almighty to bring to its termination the already length-
ened hfe of the then reigning King of the French Nation.
Moreover the intercourse of nations, aided by the wonderful
power of that gigantic element which man had so recently
subdued and rendered subservient to his will, was increasing
from day to day. And that intercourse, by a natural con-
sequence, was gradually undermining the strength of national
prejudices, and, in a proportionate degree, strengthening
the bonds of amity and mutual understanaing. The Public
Press, also, for the first time in the history of Printing,
seemed to manifest an increasing unanimity in deprecating
the horrors of war, and in pointing out its utter incompa-
tibility with the advancement of any of the truest and

' Ilumboklt. Cosmos, Art. Earibquakes.

47

best interests, either of individiKils, or of nations. To this
may be added, that, at the same time, — in fact, almost on
the same^day — the assembled Senates of the two greatest
civilized nations of the world heard from the lips of their
respective sovereigns the announcement that, the peace of
the world was undisturbed, and that every thing warranted
the hope of its continuance.

In one day, all this was scattered to the winds! The very
frame and constitution of society were shivered to atoms
at a single blow! — How it was done, is to this hour a matter
of astonishment and perplexity to " the wise of this world."
Every human element of strength and power was opposed
to it. The most vital interests of the largest and most in-
fluential classes of society were plunged by it into all but
irretrievable ruin. And yet, as if it had been propagated
and bred in the very air that men breathed — as if there
were a latent and invisible poison that they imbibed with the
very inspiration whereby life is sustained — on went the march
of revolution, and confusion, and anarchy, from people to
people, and kingdom to kingdom, and country to country,
until, in a few brief months, from the hills of Sicily to the
shores of the Baltic, have been heard "the voices, and the
thunders, and the hghtnings", and every land has vibrated
with the throes of that earthquake, which the concurrent
voice of all mankind proclaims to be unequalled, and un-
paralleled I

There is also a remarkable circumstance, to which I must
call your attention, my Brethren. You will remember that
the predictions of the Apocalypse have reference only to the
Roman world, comprehending, of course, both the Eastern
and Western Empires, but not extending beyond them.
Now observe the limits, within which, on either side, this
mighty earthquake has been confined. Northward, its

48

waves rolled on as far as the Vistula. Austria and Prussia
reeled under its shocks. The whole heart of Germany
vibrated to its innaost chords. It reached the frontiers of
Russia — but there its energy was spent. It advanced no
further. And why ?— Because Russia formed no part of the
Roman Empire, Imperial or Papal — and she remains, re-
served in the high hand of Providence, for other ends,
prefigured, perhaps, in that "great hail" mentioned in the
21st verse of this Chapter, which is considered to be
the emblem of Northern War. In another direction, see
also where "the voices, and the thunderings, and the light-
nings, and the great earthquake" were stayed that they
should not come near. The echoes of those voices— nay,
something of the voices themselves — were heard in our
own beloved country — the deep tones of the distant
thunders resounded in low and awful murmurs against her
shores — she looked forth and saw the forked lightnings
flashing and blazing in the distant horizon — she felt the vi-
brations of the elemental strife that was upheaving with
Titanic force the nations of the continent — but she herself
remained calm, secure, unshaken — the refuge, as she has
ever been, of the fugitive from every ruined state and
kingdom overthrown — and why? — Because she, by God's
grace, was severed from the Roman Empire, once and for
ever, at the era of the Reformation — and because, amidst
much of weakness, much of sinfulness, much neglect of
privilege, in her, and in her alone, the Everlasting Gospel
"has free course and is glorified", the Word of God is
preached, the Bible is open !

Am I talking to you, my dear Brethren, of mere fictions
of the imagination? Am I relating to you things, that are to
be held of no more real existence than the vague phantasies
of a dream ?— No : all these things are facts, startling facU-

49

"-what your own eyes have seen, and your own ears have
heard. You know, too, that no such events have happened
in the world before. Other and mighty changes have, indeed,
been effected — Empires have been overthrown — Thrones
have been laid low — Society has been for a while disorga-
nised— but all this has arisen from totally different causes —
from the lust of conquest — from the quarrels of princes, or
the intrigues of statesmen — from many things of like cha-
racter and origin. But here^ the whole political firmament
has been suddenly and awfully dissarranged — the very air
— the social atmosphere itself. Without preparation, with-
out concert, (for none were more astonished than the actors
themselves in this mighty drama), an irresistible influence
swayed the minds of millions as the mind of one man, and
all obeyed, as it were blindly and instinctively, a simul-
taneous impulse, for which they could not then and cannot
now accourtt:and plunged headlong into a movement, which
now lies altogether beyond man's controul, and must, most
emphatically, be committed wholly and entirely to the hand
of Almighty God. Yes ! even from a professed Sceptic was
this confession recently extorted — I am indebted to one of
my hearers for the interesting fact — and even he, the "Phi-
losopher", that is, the infidelf was constrained to say, "it is
the hand of God" I

I have thus endeavoured — most inadequately indeed,
but, I hope, faithfully — to set before you, my Brethren,
what appear to me to be some of the many clear and con-
vincing proofs that *'the Seventh Angel has poured out his
Vial into the air" — in other words, that we are living under
the Opening of that Vial. There is much of that prophecy
that remains yet to be accomplished, and every advancing
year will throw more and more hght upon it. But even now
we seem to perceive indications of coming events, loom-

50

ing in the distant horizon, and hfting up their pale heads,
like the clouds called thunder-pillars, which announce that
the storm is surely gathering, although as yet we see it but
indistinctly and afar off. The very next verse of this pro-
phecy indicates that "the great city shall be divided into
three parts." " The great city" of the Apocalypse is Rome.
Is there nothing in the present state of Rome, that seems
to announce the approaching division and dissolution of her
iriple crownl

But I must conclude. To-morrow, by God's permission,
1 shall continue and close my subject : and for that holy
and blessed day I shall choose a happier theme. Hitherto
I have had to speak only of judgments and visitations —
the curse, and not the blessing — that are the appointed
heralds of His coming, who shall yet appear, in His glorious
Majesty, "without sin unlo salvation." To-morrow, I shall
bring before you, assigns of "the last times'^'^ matter for
praise, for thanksgiving, for *' glory to God in the highest,
and on earth peace, good will towards men". Oh ! may
His love constrain us to lay these things deeply to heart !
and in seriousness of mind, in strength of faith, and in joy-
fulness of hope, may we assemble around the Table of our
Lord, thankfully to commemorate the death of Him, who
died that we may live, who now liveth to make intercession
for us, and who has said, "behold, I come quickly ; and my
reward is with me, to give every man according as his work
shall be '".

' Rev. xxii. 12.

SERMON V

THE ANGEL FLYING IN THE MIDST OF HEAVEN.

Rev. XV. 4.

Who shall not fear Thee, 0 Lord, and glorify Thy name ! for Thou
only art holy : for all nations shall come and worship before Thee ;
for Thy judgments have been made manifest.

Hitherto, in discoursing upon those signs of "the last
times" which are shadowed forth to us under the mystic
symbols of the Apocalypse, and in comparing with the pro-
bable interpretation of those symbols the events that have
been passing before our eyes during the last thirty years, I
have had to speak, principally, of the fulfilment of God's
temporal judgments, and of the pouring out of His "wrath"
upon the earth. 1 have pointed out to you the gradual
wasting and desolation of a once mighty Empire — the pre-
valence over the whole civilised world of infidelity in every
fearful variety of form — the simultaneous increase of Roma-
nism, and its diffusion with an activity unparalleled since the
Era of the Reformation— the rise of a new form of heresy
among the Clergy of the Protestant Church itself, exhibiting
some of the worst features of Romanism, without its unity

52

or consistency of action — the prevalence of fearful and cala-
mitous diseases, evidently transmitted from country to coun-
try, and from person to person, by ths very air that we
breathe — and lastly, the shaking and rending of the political
atmosphere as by a whirlwind, by whose resistless power
kingdoms have been overthrown and empires subverted,
and the hearts of all men, whether high or low, rich or poor
have "failed them for fear, and for looking after those things
which are coming upon the earth '." All these wonderful
events, crowded together within so brief a period of time,
I believe to have been presented, in divine imagery, to the
mind of the lonely inhabitant of Patmos ; and to be recorded
in that Book, which, inspired by the spirit of God, he wrote
"for our admonition, upon whom the ends of the world are
come =". The continual agreementbetween the recorded sym-
bols and the fulfilled events can be no work of mere chance
or casual coincidence. That one such prediction might
fortuitously meet with an apparently exact fulfilment, might
be possible, although, where so many conditions are to be
satisfied, it would not be probable. But the mathematician
will tell you, that, even calculating according to what is
called "the doctrine of chances", the successive concurrence
of so many predictions and corresponding events would
scarcely fall within the limits of possibiUty. Even on this
ground, therefore — and I need scarcely say that I myself
utterly repudiate it, and acknowledge no such thing as
'chance' in any thing connected with the events of this
world — yet, even on this lowest possible ground, I dare
affirm that there is enough of striking and unquestionable
coincidence, to arouse the serious attention, and demand
the most careful enquiry, of every man, who has a single

' Lukoxxi. 20. ' 1 Cor. x. 11.

53

thought beyond the mere present hour, or who looks forward
for a moment to vvhat may yet be awaiting us in the womb
of Time.

To day * — this blessed day, which , so empha-
tically, **the Lord has made" — this day of "great joy,
which shall be to all people" — I turn again to the Apo-
calypse, to enquire whether, amidst those awful symbols
which we have seen denouncing "woe" to the inhabitants of
the earth, there be no sign of gladness — no rainbow of
mercy spanning the dark clouds of the Divine wrath!
Unworthy as we may be of any such revelation, yet, when
we look to the general course of God's dealings with men,
we might hope to find it : for it is written that the Lord is " a
God full of compassion, and gracious, long-suffering, and
plenteous in mercy »." — yea, that even ** in wrath He re-
membereth mercy." And that hope is not disappointed,
for, among the signs that are ordained to herald the Second
Advent of the Saviour, who, as on this day, was born in the
City of David, we find one, that is a subject only for thank-
fulness and gratitude to Him, who is the Author and Giver
of "every good and every perfect gift 3".

The Seven Vials, on the two last of which alone I have
been enabled, consistently v/ith the object of my present Dis-
courses, to dwell with any particularity of detail, are sup-
posed by the most eminent Commentators on the Apocalypse
to be poured out during the sounding of the Seventh Apo-
calyptic Trumpet — in fact, that the latter is a sort of epitome
of the former. If this be so, the commencement of the
Seventh Trumpet will synchronize with the outpouring of
theFirstVial, that isto say (as I have before observed) with
about the year 1790, or, the commencement of the French

' Cliristmns (lav. ' Ps. Lxxxvi, 15. ' James i. 17.

54

Revolution. Now, soon after me Seventh Trunnpct begins
to sound, we read, in the 14lh Chapter and the 6th verse,
*'I saw another Angel fly in the midst of heaven, having
the everlasting Gospel to preach unto them that dwell on the
earth, and to every nation, and kindred, and tongue, and
people, saying with a loud voice ; fear God, and give
glory to Him : for the hour of His judgment is come : and
worship Him that made heaven, and earth, and the sea, and
the fountains of waters." — Here, then, we are presented
with the sublime symbol of a mighty Angel spreading forth
his wings upon that air which encircles the whole of this
world of ours, and into which the last Vial of the wrath of
God was yet to be poured, and sent forth on a mission, not
of judgment and desolation, but, to convey to " every
nation, and kindred, and tongue, and people", the blessed
gift of that Holy Word, by which alone man is, or can be,
made wise unto salvation. This, again, is no ordinary
symbol, and demands, in order to produce upon the mind a
conviction of its having been fulfilled, the occurrence of
events of no common order apparently accomplishing the
purposes of the Almighty. Let us consider whether any such
events have actually occurred — whether, in fact, they[com-
menced at that very period — and, during the whole period
embraced in the Ponring out of the seven Vials, have con-
tinued, and still continue, in action throughout the world.

About the middle of the eighteenth century a spirit of
slumber and slothfulness seemed to have fallen upon the
whole of Christendom. Even the Church of Rome, gene-
rally so watchful, appeared for once to be buried in repose,
and the thunders of the Vatican had comparatively ceased
to sound in the ears of the Roman world. The Church of
England, on her part, seemed to have forgotten her Pro-
testantism. From her pulpits were heard little better than

55

moral essays, more worthy of the Greek philosophy than of
Christianity : and the vital and essential doctrines of the
Gospel had given place to cold disquisitions on good and
evil, in which he, who looked for his Saviour, could only
say, in the words of Mary, "they have taken away the Lord,
and we know not where they have laid Him *." But a
change was coming. It pleased God, first, to raise up
John Wesley, that eminent man whom the Bishop of Oxford
so recently, amidst the unanimous applause of thousands,
denominated "that blessed Saint of God". He was, how-
ever, only the forerunner of a day for which he would
indeed have blessed God, had it been permitted that, con-
sistently with the appointed age of man, he should have
lived to see it. He first startled the world from its spiritual
slumber; he flung into the lethargic waters that mighty
rock, the rock of salvation by faith in Christ only, which
raised around it the swelling waves whose circles are now
spreading more and more widely every day throughout the
length and breadth of the earth. He fulfilled his mission,
and died in the year 1791. In the year 1795, arose the
London Missionary Society— in the year 1800, the Wes-
leyan Missionary Society — not long afterwards, the Bible
Society, which has translated the Holy Scriptures into one
hundred and forty languages, and circulated upwards of
twenty millions of copies of the Word of God. — About the
same period, also, arose the Church Missionary Society, and
the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel in Foreign
Parts received a great enlargement — ^and these were follow-
ed, in continual succession, by other Societies, in our own
and other Churches, all animated by one and the same
spirit, namely, to preach the Gospel, without reserve, and

LuUc

56

from an open Bible, "unto them that dwell on the earth,
and to every nation, and kindred, and tongue, and people".
Is it possible that any one can close his eyes to the obvious
bearing of this most remarkable fact 1 — The symbols of the
Apocalypse appeared to indicate that during a certain period,
and that a period of "woe" and ^'wrath', nevertheless, an
extraordinary diffusion should take place of the * 'everlasting
Gospel" throughout the earth. We come upon a period
in the history of our race, which, from careful computation,
we believe to be the precise period indicated. During that
period we behold a succession of visitations and judgments,
such as that portion of the world had never known before,
overwhelming it in every part. And simultaneously with
this we seetheWord of God spreading over the whole world,
with unexampled rapidity, and by means of agencies un-
known before, until there is scarcely a nation, or country,
to which its healing influences have not been imparted.
Are all these things to be counted as a mere casual coin-
cidence? — May we not almost, with reverence, ask, whe-
ther, if the predictions of the Apocalypse have reference
at all to the future history of the Church of God, it is pro-
bable, or even possible, that such mighty events would be
unnoticed? —And yet, z/ they are not predicted here,
where else are we to look for them? — Let us remember the
words of our blessed Master, "this Gospel of the kingdom
shall be preached in all the world for a witness unto all na-
tions; and then shall the end come '." Observe His
Words, "for a witness unto all nations." He does not
say, *for the conversion of all nations' — thai shall not be,
until He Himself cometh " in His Glorious Majesty " — but
'* as a witness ." Oh ! has not that testimony been already

Matt. xxiv. 14.

67

borne 1 — In the eloquent and beautiful words of one, who,
though not of our Communion, is indeed "a Master in
Israel *," " If you go to the isles of the great Pacific— you
will hear the heralds of Christianity there. Amid the sultry
air of Hindostan, or the cinnamon groves of Ceylon, you
may find the preacher of the glorious Gospel ; or you will
see him preaching by the rivers of India, or in the plague-
smitten atmosphere of Turkey — praying amid the ruins of
Athens, or having his pulpit on the 'rocky heights of mount
Lebanon. You may trace the course of the Missionary
with the Arab in his " ship of the desert, " the laborious
and patient camel ; or, on the scorched plains of Africa,
finding shelter from its burning sun beneath the shade of
the palmtree ; or sharing his course food with the Laplander ;
or traversing with the Greenlander his everlasting snows ;
amid the Rocky Mountains, or amid the Tartar hordes —
in the Arab's tent, and on the Cossack's steppes — amid the
prairies of Western America, or in. the lanes and by-ways
and alleys of London ; addressing rich and poor, great and
small, Jew and Gentile, barbarian kings and savage tribes ;
and wherever he has spoken, he has left the evidence of the
power of a preached Gospel, and the impress of a God who
has blessed his efforts; till, animated by the results, wa
begin to anticipate the day for which we pray, when

'• Arabia's desert ranger"

" To Christ shall bow the knco,"

" And Ethiopian Stranger "

*• His Glory come and see ; "

** When He shall have dominion "

*' O'er river, sea, and shore, "

*• Far as the eagle's pinion* "

" Or dove's light wing can soar."

' The Rov'. iolin Ciimminq. D. D.

58

And is not all this a subject for joy. and praise, and thanks-
giving'? Or can we be sufficiently grateful to that all mer-
ciful God, who has thus, amidst the "strong wind," and
''the fire," and "the earthquake," caused "the still small
voice " to be heard that speaks in the accents of Eternal
Love, and leads the weary and troubled soul to the con-
templation of glories and mercies yet to be revealed, when
these times of wrath shall have come to their appointed
end, when the earth no longer burdened with the sorrows
and afflictions of its children shall enjoy its sabbatical rest,
when " the day of the Lord " shall have come, and He him-
self shall sit upon His Glorious throne, and from the whole
Church and assembly of the Redeemed by the blood of
the Lamb shall arise the noble " song of Moses the Servant
of God, and the song of the Lamb, great and marvellous
are Thy works, Lord God Almighty ; just and true are Thy
ways, Thou king of Saints. Who shall not fear Thee, O
Lord, and glorify Thy name 1 for Thou only art holy : for
all nations shall come and worship before Thee ; for Thy
judgments are made manifest! "

I have now brought to a conclusion the particular sub-
ject, which I proposed for our meditation during the season
of Advent. There are, indeed, other predicted signs of
'' the latter days," which, as well as those that I have
brought before you, appear to be receiving a wonderful
fulfilment. Amongst them, I may especially refer to the
remarkable prophecy in the 12th Chapter of Daniel, that
towards "the time of the end," "many shall run to and
fro, and knowledge shall be increased." In former days,
if, in the course of a century^ one great discovery in art
or science broke upon the astonished world, it was hailed
with rapture, and recorded in history as an epoch in the
annuls of the human race. Now, scarcely a month passes

59

by, with its few and fleeting days, but we are startled by
some invention unknown and unthoiight of before. Even
time and space themselves have been virtually annihilated.
The very fires, that give brilliancy to the lightning, are
now casting their radiance upon the streets of London,
subdued even to this purpose by the skill of man: and long
since have they been employed to carry his words to and
fro upon the earth with a velocity that leaves behind even
the Sun in his fiery career. The Astronomer directs his search
towards the starry heavens, and discovers planets, suns,
and systems unrevealed before to the eye of man. The
Geologist penetrates into the bowels of the earth, and
brings forth to the light of day from their profound rest-
ing-places the remains of successive creations, that lived
and died upon the earth, before man was placed upon it by
the hand of his Creator. The Chemist elaborates subtle
agents, which soothe the most excruciating agony, and
render practicable such operations for the relief of human
suffering as before would have been accompanied with al-
most certain death. In these, and a thousand other in-
stances, we see the mighty waves of science and lite-
rature, and knowledge, rising and swelHng around us ; and
so they will go rolHng on, until they reach the foot of that
Throne which is to be established over all the earth ; and
there will they reflect the Glory of Him that sitteth thereon,
and proclaim in all their multitudinous forms the inexhaus-
tible power, and might, and goodness of Him, " by whom
all these things were made," and "without whom was not
any thing made that was made '."

But to this .subject, as well as to several others, I can
only make a passing allusion, for the predictions relating to

' John i. 3.

60

them are not found in the Apocalypse ; and it is to this di-
vinely inspired Book alone, and to one portion of its con-
tents only, that it has been my design to confine the sub-
ject of my present Discourses. As I professed that I should
do, in my opening Sermon, I have set before you certain
passages in the Apocalypse, and I have stated to you certain
undoubted and unquestionable facts, which appear to me
to have fulfilled them. If you consider that the facts do
fulfil the symbols, then you will also think that the present
dispensation of things is drawing towards its end, and that
the Millennial rest is not very far off. If you think other-
wise, you are in no way responsible to me, or to any living
man, for that opinion — you may reject all these views of
Chronology, all these historical explanations, and yet, God
forbid that I should say that such a rejection would be in-
consistent with the sincere beUef of the vital doctrines of
Christianity. We must walk humbly, when we tread such
high and hallowed ground —seeking for guidance from the
Grace of God in forming our own views, rather than con-
demning as false the views of others — and with the ever-
present and deep conviction, that, whoever may be right,
or whoever may be wrong, God's Truth itself is unchange-
able, and that although Heaven and Earth shall pass away,
not one jot or one tittle of His Word shall pass away until
all be fulfilled— " Yea," in the words of Saint Paul, ".let
God be true, but every man a fiar; as it is written, that
thou mightest be justified in thy sayings, and mightest over-
come when thou art judged *."

But whatever views of unfulfilled prophecy we may re-
ceive, or whatever we may reject, in this, I trust, that we
are a// agreed, il\ckt Christ will surely come again — that

' Rom. iii. 4.

61

He, who; even as on this day, was born into this lost and
ruined world, to live and die for our salvation, shall come
again, not suffering, but triumphant — and that to Him
shall be " given dominion, and glory, and a kingdom, that
all people, nations, and languages should serve Him" —
that *' His dominion" shall be " an everlasting dominion,
which shall not pass away, and His Kingdom that which
shall not be destroyed '." — And if we do believe this, how
are we preparing for His coming, and for that day when
" the Lord shall descend from heaven with a shout, with
the voice of the Archangel, and with the trump of God ^."
— Remember, that whether we are found alive upon the
earth, or whether we have long since gone down into the
dust, we must equally hear that voice, at whose sound even
the sea shall give up its dead, and death and hell shall
deliver up the dead that are in them, and they shall be
judged every man according to his work ^. Remember
also that such as we go down into the grave, such also we
shall rise from the grave. " He that is unjust shall be un-
just still : and he that is filthy shall' be filthy still :
and he that is righteous shall be righteous still : and
he that is holy shall be holy still 4." How very near
does this consideration bring us to Eternity, and Eternity to
us 1 — May God give us grace to fix it more and more
deeply in our hearts, and so, to prepare ourselves more
and more for the coming of that awful day, when "the
Lord Jesus shall be revealed with His mighty Angels ^ ! " —
Then may we humbly but assuredly hope that, with our
own eyes, we shall behold "the things that God has pre-
pared for them that love Him " ; and that when the woes

■ Daniel vi. 14. ' 1. Thess. iv. 10. ^ i>gy ^^ 13

•* Rov. xxii. 11. ^ 2 Thess. i. 7.

62

of this weary world have terminated, and the cry of sor-
row that has risen for so many thousand years from this
vale of tears have been stilled for ever, we shall blend
our voices in the deep-toned and eternal harmonies of that
song, "Blessing, and glory, and wisdom, and thanksgiving,
and honour, and power, and might, be unto God, and to the
Lamb who was slain, for ever and ever." May God, in
His infinite mercy, grant that such may be our blessed
portion, for the sake of His dear Son ! And in the full
assurance of that sublime, and precious, and sustaining
hope, may we be enabled to exclaim with the Evangehst, in
the closing words of the Apocalypse, ''Even so, come. Lord
Jesus! "

THE END.

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