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Full text of "Christ's second coming : will it be pre-millennial?"

MURRAY AND GIBB, PRINTERS, EDINBURGH. 



CHRIST S SECOND COMING: 



WILL IT BE PREMILLENNIAL? 



REV. DAVID BROWN, D.D., 

ST JAMES FREE CHURCH, GLASGOW. 



" Qua propter, qui dicit Dominum citius esse venturum optabilius loquitur, sed peri- 
culosius fallitur. TJtinam ergo sit verum ; quia erit molestum si non verum. Qui 
autem dicit Dominum tardius esse venturum, et tamen credit, sperat, amat ejus ad- 
ventum, profecto de tarditate ejus etiamsi fallitur, feliciter fallitur. Habebit enim 
majorem patientiam, si hoc ita erit; majorem lastitiam si non erit. Ac per b-oc, ah 
eis qui diligunt manifestationem Domini ille auditur suavius, isti creditur tutius." 
ACGUSTIN, Epist. cxcix. 



SIXTH EDITION. 



EDINBURGH: 

T. & T. CLARK, 38, GEORGE STREET. 
LONDON: HAMILTON & CO. DUBLIN: J. ROBERTSON & CO. 




MDCCCLXVII. 



PREFACE TO THE FIFTH EDITION, 

As stated in a former Preface, I have endeavoured to re 
ciprocate the courtesy and candour with which Mr Elliott 
has adverted to my arguments, in the Fourth Edition of 
his "Horae Apocalypticae ; " regretting, however, that he 
has only touched in the most cursory manner upon some 
points which seem to me to be the hinges of this whole 
controversy.* 

To the arguments of Mr Wood s volume on " The Last 
Things" I have tried to do justice, passing by only such 
as seemed to call for no special notice, or to be sufficiently 
answered by the simple repetition of the statements which 
called them forth. 

The references to Mr Birks s Outlines of Unfulfilled Pro 
phecy " begin at p. 80. I hope (as stated in the Preface 
to the last Edition) that I have overlooked nothing of any 
consequence in that acute and excellent author s treatise, 
though it was impossible to take up his arguments at length 
in the text without re-writing some portions of the work 
altogether, and certainly not with advantage. This remark 
is still more applicable to " Plain Papers on Prophetic and 
other Subjects" (1854), to which I have made but an 
occasional reference. The school of prophetic interpreta 
tion to which its gentle and respected anonymous author 
belongs, is one whose principles would require separate 

* In illustration of this remark, I beg to refer to the following pas 
sages of the present work: p. 198, note f, P- 208, note; and p. 237, 
note. 



VI PREFACE. 

investigation. I have had occasion to touch upon them 
more than once in the course of this volume, but could not 
do more than indicate my views of such a mode of interpre 
tation. I have made some use, both in the text and in the 
notes, of Mr Molyneux s two volumes, entitled, " Israel s 
Future" (fourth thousand, 1853), and "The World to 
Come" (1853). The extreme opinions of this advocate of 
premillennialism throw an instructive light on that mode 
of Old Testament interpretation which seems to make it 
the key to the New Testament. 

The revision for the Fourth Edition was too far advanced 
ere Mr Waldegrave issued his Bampton Lecture (1855), 
for me to make any use of it, which I greatly regret. 
Differing from him as I do in his view of the events sym 
bolized by the millennial resurrection, I could still have 
wished to give some passages of his work in full (and 
should now have done so but for typographical reasons), as 
they put certain points in the argument very happily, and 
some of its criticisms on Mr Birks s work, in particular, 
are, in my judgment, conclusive and forcible. The work 
displays a thorough knowledge of the subject and its lite 
rature, and breathes a fine evangelical tone throughout. 

It is now some years since both Mr Bickersteth and the 
Duke of Manchester, to whose views so many references 
are made in this volume, were taken up from this land of 
shadows, to know even as they are known. Let this 
quicken us who remain behind to be followers of them who 
through faith and patience inherit the promises. 

I have only, in conclusion, once more devoutly to ac 
knowledge the- blessing vouchsafed to this book, in the 
establishment of so many minds unsettled on the subject of 
which it treats. 

ABERDEEN, November 1858. 



CONTENTS, 

PART I. 
THE SECOND ADVENT. 

INTRODUCTION. 

PA<J 

Opening Remarks, ....... 3 

Premillennial Theory stated, ..... 6 

Diversities not taken into account, ..... 7 

Prejudices in favour of the Premillennial Advent, ... 8 

against it, ...... 10 

Irrelevant Matter, . ..... ib. 

CHAPTER I. 

CHRIST S SECOND APPEARING THE CHURCH S BLESSED HOPE, 14 

Scriptural Proofs of this, . . . . . .15 

Not his Coming to Individuals at Death, . . . .20 

CHAPTER II. 

THE HOPE OP THE ADVENT IN RELATION TO THE QUESTION OF TIME, 26 

Objection : Looking for Christ s Coming is impossible, on supposi 
tion of any certain intervening Period of a Thousand Years, ib. 
Plausibility of this Objection, and necessity of examining it, . 27 

Preliminary Explanations : No importance is attached, in this ar 
gument, to the precise period of a thousand years; and there is 
every reason to believe that the commencement and the dose ol 
the Latter Day will be shrouded in such obscurity as to leave 
the same uncertainty overhanging this as all the great periods 
of the Divine Economy, ib. 



viii CONTENTS. 

PAOI 

The Objection tested by Facts ROLLOCK RUTHERFORD. . . 29 

ROBERT WODROW, . ..... 32 

Bearing of these Facts, ...... 33 

The Objection founded on a narrow induction of Scripture Pas 
sages, and opposed to the spirit of a large and important class 

of Divine Testimonies, ...... ib. 

Examples of Passages announcing the work to be done, and the ex 
tensive changes to come over the face of the Church and of 

Society, between the two advents, all implying length of time, . ib. 

Christ s Commission to his Disciples, . . . ib. 
Parables of the Tares and Wheat, the Net, the Mustard Seed, 

the Leaven, ...... 34 

Transfer of Kingdom of God from Jews to Gentiles, . 35 
Degeneracy to characterise the Maturer Periods of the 

Church, or Christianised society, . . .36 

Christ in Heaven till Restitution of all Things, . . 37 
Parables which intimate that He will be away a long time 

that He will tarry, ..... 39 

That He will wear out the patience of all but " God s 

Elect," and try even them to the uttermost, . 41 

The Thessalonian Excitement on the subject of Christ s Coming, . 42 

How treated by the Apostle, . . . ib. 

Import of the Apostolic Warning, . . . . ib. 

Distinction between Events and Periods unavailing, . . 4,5 

Early Chiliasts Lactantius, . . .46 

Excitement in regard to Christ s Coming its Evils, . . 48 

Difference between Feverish Expectation and the Patience of Hope, 50 



CHAPTER III. 

THE CHURCH, OR MYSTICAL BODY OF CHRIST, COMPLETE AT HIS 
COMING. 

The three preceding Chapters preliminary to the proper question of 

this volume, namely, Whether the Second Advent will be Pre- 

millennial, or will introduce a Kingdom of Men in the Flesh 

ruled over by Christ and glorified Saints for a thousand years ? 52 

The Scripture Evidence against this Theory to be arranged under a 

series of Propositions, . . . . ib. 

PROPOSITION FIRST: THE CHURCH WILL BE ABSOLUTELY COM 
PLETE AT CHRIST S COMING, . . . ib. 
Scripture Proof of this, ..... 53 
The Opposite View destitute of support, . . .58 
What do the Premillennialists say to this? It divides them 
into two classes: ..... 63 



CONTENTS. ix 

PAGI 
First Class admit that the Church is complete when 

Christ comes. Examples HOMES, . . 64 

BURNET, ..... 65 

PERRY, ..... 66 

BURCHELL, . . . . .68 

Remarks on this Class, ..... 70 

Second Class, embracing nearly all modern Premillen- 
i nialists deny that the Church is complete when 

Christ comes. Remarks on this Class, . . 71 

Their inconsistency, . . . .72 

Summary, ........ 78 

Supplementary Remarks In reply to Mr Bickersteth, the Duke of 

Manchester, and Mr A. Bonar, ..... 79 

CHAPTER IV. 

ALL THE MEANS OF GRACE, AND AGENCIES OF SALVATION, TERMINATE 

AT THE SECOND ADVENT, . . 95 

PROPOSITION SECOND: CHRIST S SECOND COMING WILL EX 
HAUST THE OBJECT OF THE SCRIPTURES, . . 96 
Object of the Scriptures as regards Saints, . . ib. 
as regards Sinners, . . 98 
Objection answered, ...... 99 

PROPOSITION THIRD: THE SEALING ORDINANCES WILL DISAP 
PEAR AT CHRIST S SECOND COMING, . . . 100 
BAPTISM, ....... ib. 

THE LORD S SUPPER, ...... 102 

The foregoing Conclusions admitted by Mr Brooks, . . 104 
By Mr Bickersteth, . . . . . .106 

By Dr M tfeile, 107 

Summary, ........ 108 

CHAPTER V. 
THE SAME SUBJECT CONTINUED. 
PROPOSITION FOURTH: THE INTERCESSION OF CHRIST, AND 

THE WORK OF THE SPIRIT, FOR SAVING PURPOSES, WILL 

CEASE AT THK SECOND ADVENT, . . . HO 

Christ s INTERCESSION, ..... ib. 

WORK OF THE SPIRIT, . . . . .114 

Both terminate at Second Advent, . . .115 

Extracts from Premillennialists in confirmation of 

this, 

Summary, . . . . . . .117 



CONTENTS. 



CHAPTER VI. 

FAGB 

TIIE KINGDOM OF CHRIST ALREADY IN BEING ITS MILLENNIAL 
ESSENTIALLY THE SAME WITH ITS PRESENT CHARACTER. 

Premillennial Theory of Christ s Kingdom, . . .119 

PROPOSITION FIFTH : CHRIST S PROPER KINGDOM is ALREADY 
IN BEING; COMMENCING FORMALLY ON HIS ASCENSION 
TO THE RIGHT HAND OF GOD, AND CONTINUING UN 
CHANGED, BOTH IN CHARACTER AND FORM, TILL THE 
FINAL JUDGMENT, ..... 124 

Explanations, . . . . . ib. 

Apostolic Views of Christ s Kingdom, . . .125 

Same Ground taken by Premillennialists and Unbelieving 

Jews, ....... 127 

Lord and Christ, ..... . . . . 129 

Throne of David, .... .130 

The Priest upon his Throne, . . . . .132 

The Lamb in the Midst of the Throne, . . .133 

The Key, and Throne, and House of David, . . . ib. 

The Prince of Life, . . , , >,. . . 136 

The Times of Restitution, . . . . .137 

The Disciples View of the Second Psalm, . . . 140 

The Prince and Saviour, . . . . .141 

Apostolic Commentaries on the Hundred and Tenth Psalm, 1-12 

The Kingdom to be delivered up What it is, . . 144 

The Last Enemy destroyed, . . . . .147 

Delivering up of the Kingdom What it is, . . 149 

What it is not, . . 151 

CHAPTER VII. 

THE ENTIRE CHURCH "MADE ALIVE" EITHER BY RESURRECTION OR 

TRANSFORMATION AT CHRIST S COMING, . . . 155 

Alleged everlasting continuance of the Fleshly State, . .156 

Mr Bickersteth, ...... ib. 

Mr Birks, .... , . . . .158 

Mr Brock Mr Lord, . . . . .159 

Remarks on this view, .... . 160 

PROPOSITION SIXTH: WHEN CHRIST COMES, THE WHOLE 
CHURCH OF GOD WILL BE MADE ALIVE AT ONCE THE 
DEAD BY RESURRECTION, AND THE LIVING, IMMEDI 
ATELY THEREAFTER, BY TRANSFORMATION ; THEIR 

" MORTALITY BEING SWALLOWED UP OF LIFE," . 164 

Proof of this, ...... ib. 



CONTENTS. Xi 

PAGR 
Objection, . . . . . . .167 

Reply, ....... ib. 

Supplementary Remarks in reply tt> I>r II. Bonar, . . 170 



CHAPTER VIII. 

RESURRKCTION OF ALL THE WICKED AT THE COMING OF CHRIST. 

PROPOSITION SEVENTH : ALL THE WICKED WILL RISE FROM 
THE DEAD, OR BE " MADE ALIVE," AT THE COMING OF 
CHRIST, . . . . .178 

A prior Resurrection of the Righteous but one direct passage al 

leged for it, . . , . . ib. 

Presumptive Arguments in favour of it examined, .179 

Resurrection of Believers peculiar to themselves, . .180 

Dutch Remonstrants, . . . . .181 

Attaining to the Resurrection from the Dead, . . 182 

Resurrection of, and from, the Dead, . . . 185 

Righteous and Wicked "awake" together, . . . 187 

The Sleepersin the Dustawaking, sometoLife, and some to Contempt, 188 

All in the Graves come forth together, . . . .189 

The view which Premillennialists take of this not tenable, . 190 

The Righteous, while the Tares are burning, shine forth as the sun 
in their Father s Kingdom, . . . . . 194 

The Great White Throne, ...... ib. 

The Book of Life Mr Dallas, ... .195 

Mr Lord Mr Birks, . ..... 196 

Mr Hill, ... ... 197 

The Dead, small and great, : . . . -198 

The "other Book," ...... 201 

Summary, ........ 203 



CHAPTER IX. 

SAME SUBJECT CONTINUED: THE MILLENNIAL RESURRECTION LITE 
RAL OR FIGURATIVE ? 205 

Presumptions against the Literal Sense, .... 206 

Untenable Arguments for the Figurative Sense, . . . 215 

Nine Internal Evidences that the Millennial Resurrection is not 
Literal but Figurative : 
First Argument, . . . . . .217 

Second Argument, . . . . . .218 

Third Argument, ...... 220 

Fourth Argument, . . . . . .221 



XII CONTENTS. 



Fifth Argument, ...... 222 

Sixth Argument, ...... 226 

Seventh Argument, ...... 227 

Eighth Argument, ...... 228 

Ninth Argument, ...... 238 

Summary, ........ 241 



CHAPTER X. 

JUDGMENT OF RIGHTEOUS AND WICKED TOGETHER AT CHRIST S 

COMING. 

Premillennialists spread the Judgment over the whole Thousand 

Years, " . . . . . . . 243 

Mr Brooks View, and Remarks on it, ... 244 

Messrs Elliott, Bonars^ and Wood, .... 246 

Olshausen and Mr Dallas, ..... 249 

Mede, Bickersteth, Birlcs, . . . .250 

Remarks on this last View, . . . . .251 

PROPOSITION EIGHTH: THE RIGHTEOUS AND THE WICKED 
WILL BE JUDGED TOGETHER, AND BOTH AT THE COMING OF 
CHRIST, ........ 254 

Scriptural Proof of this, ...... ib. 

Summary, ........ 269 



CHAPTER XI. 

THE CONFLAGRATION, AND THE NEW HEAVENS AND NEW EARTH, AT 
THE COMING OF CHRIST. 

Final Conflagration as described in Scripture, . . . 273 

Mr Burgh s, Mr Tyso s, and Mr Ogilvy s View of it, . 275 

Mr Elliott s and Mr A. Sonar s View of it, . .277 

Universality of it, . . . . . . . 279 

All-involving, all-reducing, ..... 282 

New Heavens and New Earth Peopled by whom? . . 285 

No Sinners in the New Heavens and New Earth, . . 286 
PROPOSITION NINTH : AT CHRIST S SECOND APPEARING " THE 
HEAVENS AND THE EARTH THAT ARE NOW," BEING DIS 
SOLVED BY FIRE, SHALL GIVE PLACE TO "NEW HEAVENS 

AND A NEW EARTH, WHEREIN DWELLETH RIGHTEOUSNESS" 
WITHOUT ANY MIXTURE OF SlN GOOD UNALLOYED BY THE 
LEAST EVIL, ... ... 288 

Summary of whole preceding Argument, .... 289 



CONTENTS. Xl ii 
PAET II. 

THE MILLENNIUM. 
CHAPTER I. 

THE MILLENNIUM HOW BROUGHT ABOUT. 

PiOB 

T)rM l Neile, 293 

Mr Broots, ........ 294 

Mr T>jso< Mr Ogilvy Remarks on their Views, . . . 295 

Messrs Bonar, ....... 296 

Their Views tried by the Redeemer s Words, . . . 297 

All Nations brought in before Christ comes, . . . 298 

Dr H. Bonar and Dr Bogue, ..... 299 

Missionary Effort paralysed, ..... 299 

Judgments Effusion of the Spirit, .... 301 

Christ s Personal Appearing Miracles, .... 302 

Church s present Resources all-sufficient, .... 303 

CHAPTER II. 

NATURE OF THE MILLENNIUM NOT A STATE OP UNMIXED 
RIGHTEOUSNESS. 

A Millennium without Sin pictured by Premillennialists, . . 305 

But not Believed in, ...... 308 

Tares in the Field during the Millennium, . . . 310 
Not gathered out till end of Millennium, . . . .311 

Parables illustrating Christ s Kingdom, .... 312 

Why the Millennium is not in them, . . . .313 

Millennium belongs to the mixed state of the Church, . . ib. 

CHAPTER III. 

NATURE OF THE MILLENNIUM JUST THE FULL DEVELOPMENT OF THE 
KINGDOM OF GRACE IN ITS EARTHLY STATE. 

Nebuchadnezzar s Vision, ...... 315 

Mede on this Vision, ...... 316 

The Stone becoming a Mountain, .... 317 

Same View given in our Lord s Parables regarding the King 
dom, ....... 318 

The Kingdom wins the victory, . . . 319 

The Victory its Nature 320 



XIV CONTEXTS. 



Daniel s Vision, ....... 321 

The two Visions compared, ..... 323 

Judgment of Antichrist What, .... 325 

Wherein different from Last Judgment, . . . 326 

Universal Dominion given to Christ, . . . 328 

Kingdom given to the Saints, .... 30 

Substance of the Visions, ..... 331 

Destruction of Antichrist gradual, ..... 332 

The Warfare not Carnal, ...... 333 

The Victory slow but sure, ...... 334 

The eventual Triumph, ...... 336 

Note in reply to Dr H. Bonar, .... 337 

CHAPTER IV. 

NO MILLENNIAL REVIVAL OF JEWISH PECULIARITIES. 

Jewish Literalism its Christian Advocates, .... 338 

Mr Fry, ....... 339 

Mr Freemantle, . . . . . 340 

Mr Brock, . . . . . . .341 

Mr Pym Remarks, . . ... 342 

Literalism at a stand, . . . . . 343 

Handle given to the Jew, _ . , . . . . 344 

Literalism self-contradictory, ..... 345 

Literalism contradicts the New Testament, . . . 347 

Jewish Peculiarities for ever gone, . . . 348 

Jewish Ceremonies still expected, ..... 349 

Increase Mather on the Ceremonies, . . 349 

Ezekiel s Temple, . 351 

The Beggarly Elements, . .. . - 352 

Antiquated Shadows, . . . . .-.--. 353 

Admirable views of the Duke of Manchester, . . . ib. 

Summary, ... .... 357 

CHAPTER V. 

NO MILLENNIAL MIXTURE OF FAITH AND SIGHT. 

This as set forth by Mr Brooks, ..... 359 

Mr Elliott, Mr Lord, Mr Birks, . . . . 360 

Dr M Neile, Mr M ait land, Air Wood, . . .361 

Faith and Sight Grace and Glory thus coincident, . . 362 

1 ncongruity of this, as expressed by Perry, . .. . 363 

/)/ n. Bonar The Pavilion -Cloud, . . . . .364 

Either way whether Christ visible or invisible to mortal men 

alike objectionable, ...... 365 



CONTENTS. XV 



CHAPTER VI. 

TTAY OF SALVATION NO LESS NARROW DURING THE MILLENNIUM 
THAN NOW. 

DrM Neile, ........ 366 

Mr Maitland, Mr Wood, Mr Brooks, .... 367 

Remarks on their Views Millennial Rest, .... 368 

Strait Gate Narrow Way, ...... 369 

Millennial Warfare Lust of Flesh and Eye, and Pride of Life, will 

need resistance then even as now, . . . .371 

Summary, ........ 373 

CHAPTER VII. 

MILLENNIAL BINDING OF SATAN WHAT IT IS NOT, AND WHAT IT IS. 

He that committeth Sin is of the Devil, .... 37;> 

Satan stripped of the power of Death over, and bruised under, none 

but Believers, ....... 376 

Bearing of these Truths, ...... 377 

Binding of Satan What it is, . . . . .378 

Apocalyptic Language illustrative of this " Satan s Seat " 
or "Throne," . . . . . .379 

Satan "cast out His place not found" Fall of Paganism 
denoted, ....... ib. 

This Victory How obtained, . . . .381 

Symbolic Language of the Apocalypse, . . . 383 

Satan s Defeat in Antichrist s Destruction, . . . 384 

Meaning is, No party for Satan during the Millennium, . . b85 

How effected, ........ 386 

Supplementary Remarks in reply to Dr 11. onar, Mr Wood, &c., 

1. Extent of Satanic Restraint Durham, . . . 387 

Vitringa, ....... 388 

Hengstenberff, . . . . . . . 389 

2. How Satan will be Restrained, ..... 390 

Apocalyptic Phraseology on this point, . . .391 

Human Instrumentality, ..... 392 

This View sustained by Christ himself, . . . 393 

Confirmatory Extracts Andreas, Parceus, Marckius, . 394 

Edwards, Faber, . . . , . .395 

Yet not urged confidently, ... . 396 

CHAPTER VIII. 

LEADING FEATURES OF LATTER DAY ITS CLOSE, AND THE " LITTLE SEASON" 
TO SUCCEED IT, UP TO THE LORD S PERSONAL APPEARING. 

In what sense the Latter Day is to be viewed as in the Prophecies, 397 



XVI CONTENTS. 

PAG* 
Leading Features of the Latter Day : 

Universal Diffusion of Revealed Truth, . . . 398 

Universal Reception of true Religion, and, unlimited subjection 
to the Sceptre of Christ, . . . . .399 

Universal Peace, ...... 401 

Much spiritual Power and Glory, .... 403 

Infringing of all Israel, ..... 406 

Ascendency of Truth and Righteousness in human affairs, . 409 
Great Temporal Prosperity, . . . . .411 

Setting of the Millenuium Sun The Decline gradual, . .413 

Satan at length let Loose, ...... 415 

The " Little Season," . . . . . . .416 

Nature and Extent of the " Deception," .... 417 

The Assault its Object, 418 

Vastness and Confidence of the Enemy, .... 419 

The Last Crisis, ....... 420 

Christ at length comes to Judgment, .... 421 



PART III. 

OBJECTIONS. 

Objection First, ....... 425 

Second, 433 

Third, 442 

Fourth, ....... 446 

Fifth, .448 

Sixth, 450 

Seventh, ....... 450 

Other Objections General Reply, ..... 452 

Principle of these Objections Exaggerated Views of Difference le- 

tween the Present and the Millennial Era, . . . 453 
Grand Distinctions held forth in New Testament NATURE and 
GRACE GRACE and GLORY ; and corresponding to these, the 

FIRST and SECOND Comings of THE CHURCH S LORD, . . ib. 

Why the Millennium is in the A pocalypse only, . . . ib. 
Uncertainty of Commencement and Close of Latter Day [also of 
" Little Season " to follow it], and, consequently, of the Period 

of Christ s Coming, ...... ib. 

The " Soons " and " Quicklies " of Scripture, . . . 454 

CONCLUSION, ........ ib. 



PART I. 
THE SECOND ADVENT. 



"Sed forte sic in longum nimis protenditur spes magna de illustri adventu 
Domini ad plenissimam suorum u.^d\(iT^ta<ni et universale judicium, Ipsi a 
Patre commissum I Fateor certe longius difl erri quam sibi vulgus hominum in 
Ec:lesia Christiana futurum esse persuadet. Et ipse quoque ego hac de re non 
nisi trepide scribo; etiamsi in clara veritatis luce minus esse videatur quod 
metuam. A mo apparitionem Domini Jesu, nee pf.to moram finis, sperans me mise- 
ricordiam inventururn in die illo : Fidei tamen et prudentias esse existimo, spatiura 
dare Deo opus suum in his terris consummandi antequam claudat sfficula; et 
nobis imperiose non vindicare arbitrium const ituendorum temporum Mundi et 
Ecdesise; quod solius Dei esse nos docuit Dominus. Opus enim quod Deus in his 
Verris exhibere decrevit, et cujus exhibendi caussa Sa;cula condidit, est magnum, 
mirabilf, paradoxum (Hab. i. 5); quod nostri ofiicii est non ex animi nostri par- 
vitate, sed Divina majestate, magnitudine et consiliorum ejus vastitate ac pro- 
funditate metiri. Parvitatis enim animi nostri argumentum est, tempora ilia 
propria, qua; Deus exequendis consiliis suis destinavit, intra angustos constrin- 
gere terminos; impatientiae autem et incredulitatis, nostris eadem cogitationibus 
anticipare, et dicere cum Judaiis carnalibus : Accderet, propere producat opus 
suum ut vide,amus (Jes. v. 19). Fidei contra et <ru$oiruvr.s est, non festinare (Jes. 
xxviii. 16). Novit enim Deum, licet cunctari videatur, non cunctari vere (Hab. 
ii. 3. 4); sed suotempore omnia agere pulchre. An putamus vere, Deum Regnum 
Filii sui, per quatuor nimirum annorum millia ) romissum, tandem in lioc Orbe 
voluisse exhibere et per continuam luctam ad perfectionem aliquam perducere, ut 
illud Mundo ostensum mox rursus dispareat? Sed ipse ego nolo tempori hujua 
Mundi plus spatii dare, quam Prophetise suadent, extra quas nihil sapio." 
VITEINGA, Analc. Apoc. (ad cap. xx. 1-15, sect, xvii,} 



CHRIST S SECOND COMING, &c. 



INTRODUCTION. 

THE subject handled in this volume seems periodically to agi 
tate the Church. It has its law of recurrence. In times of 
general excitement, of extensive change, of pervading uneasi 
ness and trial, of mingled hope and fear it invariably rises to 
the surface. The struggles of the primitive Church forced it 
up, and kept it alive ; with the battles of the Reformation it 
revived; in the exciting times of the English commonwealth it 
took a pretty prominent place among the multitudinous ques 
tions which distracted the Church ; and the first French Revo 
lution startling Europe, intellectually as well as politically, 
from the sepulchral repose of the last century, shaking the 
old continent to its centre, and impregnating the entire 
social system with new elements both of good and of evil 
woke it up, and set inquiring minds to work upon it, to an 
extent unknown before. While some, carried away by the 
unparalleled success of modern missions, hastily anticipated 
the peaceful subjugation of the world to Christ, others were 
hurried into the opposite extreme, of pronouncing all mission 
ary exertions next to hopeless, without the personal appear 
ing, and the immediate agency of Christ. Since then, the 
changes in public affairs, both political and ecclesiastical. 



4 INTRODUCTORY REMARKS. 

have been too organic and exciting to allow of this question 
going to rest for any length of time ; and if the prophet s 
inquiry, "0 my Lord, what shall be the end of these things?" 
is likely to rise from many an anxious heart, in the progress 
of events, and to give birth to speculation, as heretofore, on 
the prospects of the Church, assuredly " we do well to take 
heed to the sure word of prophecy, as to a light that shineth 
in a dark place, until the day dawn and the day-star arise in 
our hearts." 

But all the more does it behove us to see that the light 
that is in us be not darkness. Great mistakes have unde 
niably been committed by the students of prophecy from age 
to age, mistakes which time, that infallible expounder of 
the Divine counsels, has in every case ultimately detected, 
but not till in many instances they had wrought confusion 
and every evil work. Certainly, the Thessalonians, " shaken 
and troubled in mind," by parties who persuaded them that 
" the day of Christ was at hand, even at the doors." were under 
a delusion; nor was it dealt with, in the exercise of apostolic 
fidelity, as a perfectly harmless delusion. It is notorious, 
too, that a large number of the primitive Christians, for three 
centuries, fell into the same mistake, expecting the struggles 
in which they were engaged to issue in the Personal appear 
ing of their Lord, and " the first resurrection" of his martyred 
witnesses. The militant did, indeed, become a triumphant 
Church, but in a very different sense from what was expected. 
The martyred testimony of Jesus " lived and reigned," but 
the martyrs themselves lived not. The Gospel slew the 
great red dragon Paganism was defeated in the high places 
of the field Christianity ascended the throne of the Csesars: 
that was the predicted reality which the enthusiasm of so 
many had led them to misinterpret. The same mistake^ 
nevertheless, has been again and again committed never 
with perfect impunity, and sometimes with consequences 
truly deplorable. 



INTRODUCTORY REMARKS. 5 

One day, however, the Eedeemer will assuredly come in 
Person. Is that day, then, now " at hand, even at tho doors?" 
or, " shall that day not come until " certain events, yet far 
in the future, have prepared the way for it ? A momentous 
question truly; yet not precisely the question which I am to 
discuss. What I have to investigate is not when, but for what 
purposes, the Redeemer will come. 

Some appear to think that all the difference of opinion on 
the second advent is about its nearness or distance. The 
sooner they undeceive themselves on this, the better. For 
my own part, if that were all, I should let the subject alone. 
To me, the coming of the Lord should be as dear as to any 
whose view s about his coming I am to examine. To " love 
his appearing " is not the monopoly of a section of his friends. 
To enter the lists, therefore, with those who think he is at 
the doors, with the mere view of showing that he is not, 
though it may at times become a necessary duty, to prevent 
disappointment,* is not the most agreeable of tasks. But 
mine is very different. So far, indeed, the question of time 
is involved ; but quite indirectly and subordinately. What 
we have mainly to do with is the events. According as 
these are expected before or after the coming of Christ, will 
be the character and complexion they assume in our eyes. 
Is Christ coming, not to terminate, but to reconstitute the 
mortal state to establish a terrestrial kingdom, illuminated 
by the beams of his glory, and pervaded by the sense of his 

* "Sed et illi quibus dicebat apostolus, Non cito moveamini mente, 
quasi instet dies Domini, diligebant utique adventum Domini ; nee cos 
hoc dicens doctor gentium ab ilia dilectione frangebat, qua ut inflam- 
marentur volebat ; et ideo nolebat ut crederent eis, a quibis audiebant 
instare diem Domini, ne forte cum transisset tempus quo eum credide- 
rant esse venturum, et venisse non cernerent, etiam cetera fallaciter 
sibi promitti arbitrantes, et de mercede fidei desperarent. Non ergo 
ille diligit adventum Domini qui eum asserit propinquare, aut ille qui 
asserit non propinquare ; sed ille potius, qui eum sive prope sive longe 
sit sinceritate fidei, firmitate spei, ardore caritatis exspectat." AUGUST. 
Fpist. cxnix. 15. 



G PREMILLENNIAL THEORY STATED. 

visible presence ? The system, in short, which I am to bring 
to the test of Scripture is briefly this : 

TlIAT THE FLESHLY AND SUBLUNARY STATE IS NOT TO TER 
MINATE WITH THE SECOND COMING OF ClIRIST, BUT TO BE 
THEN SET UP IN A NEW FORM; WHEN, WITH HIS GLORIFIED 
SAINTS, THE REDEEMER WILL REIGN IN PERSON ON THE 
THRONE OF DAVID AT JERUSALEM FOR A THOUSAND YEARS, 
OVER A WORLD OF MEN YET IN THE FLESH, EATING AND 
DRINKING, PLANTING AND BUILDING, MARRYING AND GIVING 
IN MARRIAGE, UNDER THIS MYSTERIOUS SWAY. * 

This is Premillennialism, or as the early fathers, and 
after them the Reformers and our elder divines, termed it 
Chiliasm ; that is, the expectation of a thousand years reign 
upon earth after the second coming of Christ. In the above 
statement I have expressed only the fundamental principle 
of the system, to which nearly all the expectants of the pre- 
millennial advent would subscribe, keeping clear of the points 
on which they are divided. I have said, for example, that 
they expect the saints, in glorified bodies, to be associated 
with Christ in his millennial reign; but what saints, is not 
agreed. The early chiliasts so far as I have been able to 
gather their views thought that those whom Christ will 
find alive at his cominar would be left below during: the 

O o 

thousand years, and only such as had died before his coming 
would appear with him in glory. A few in modern times 
are of the same opinion, postponing the change of the living 
saints till the end of the millennium. But the great majority 

* My sole reason for placing these features of the system rather more 
in the foreground than in the first edition, of which Mr Wood complains, 
("Last Things," p. 7), is to bring out more emphatically what it is which 
I wish to investigate. 

f " Hi autem qui spiiitales sunt, istos ita credentes w\ia.<r-r.s appel 
lant GIECCO vocabulo ; quos, verbum e verbo experimentes, nos possum us 
Milliarios nuncupare. 1 AUGUST. De Ciiit. Dei, lib. xx. cap. vii. 1. 

" XiX;*<r, quos nos dicere possumus Milliarios." HIEKON. in Esa. Ixv, 

2fl O-J 
_ --J. 



DIVERSITIES. 7 

of modern premillennialists hold that the saints of both classes 
the dead by resurrection, and the living by instantaneous 
transformation will appear with Christ in glory at the be 
ginning of the millennium. * Again, I have said they look 
for a reign over a world of men in flesh and blood; but what 
men, is not agreed. The moderns, for the most part, expect 
the restoration of the Jews to Palestine, and their supremacy 
over the nations of the earth ;f while the early chiliasts ap 
pear to have agreed with their opponents, that Christianity 
had for ever abolished Jewish peculiarities ; and though they 
were termed Judaizers, this was not, so far as I can observe, 
because they contended for any millennial supremacy of Jews 
over Gentiles, but because their system Judaized Christianity 
itself. In a word, I have said they expect a reign upon earth 
of Christ and his glorified saints; but whether actually upon 
the earth, or only over and hovering above it, in the air, 
and whether visibly or invisibly whether the ruled will see 
their rulers, and, if so, to what extent, whether fully or but 
partially, whether alicays or only at times is by no means 
agreed. 

These and other points of difference I have purposely 
avoided in my statement of their doctrine. Even in the 
sequel, they will be noticed only in so far as they affect the 
common element the essence of the system; I mean, the 
expectation of a mortal and sublunary state after the second 
advent of a, GLORIFIED and FLESHLY state of humanity, as 
constituting the UPPER and LOWER departments of one and the 
.ame millennial kingdom. 

This is the doctrine which, by the light of God s Word, I 

* Mr Burgh limits the saints of the first resurrection to sufferers for 
Christ, in contradistinction from believers at large. Lectures on the 
Second Advent, and Exposition of the Book of Revelation. 

t Certain American writers have lately revived the old opinion, that 
the millennial earth will be wholly in possession of the glorified saints. 
Mr Burchell, in his " Midnight Cry," takes the same view. 



8 PREJUDICES 

have undertaken to examine. Some may think it of small 
consequence whether this system be true or false; but no 
one who intelligently surveys its nature and bearings can 
be of that opinion. Premillennialism is no barren specula 
tion useless though true, and innocuous though false. It 
is a school of Scripture interpretation ; it impinges upon and 
affects some of the most commanding points of the Christian 
faith ; and, when suffered to work its unimpeded way, it 
stops not till it has pervaded with its own genius the 
entire system of one s theology, and the whole tone of his 
spiritual character, constructing, I had almost said, a world 
of its own; so that, holding the same faith, and cherishing 
the same fundamental hopes as other Christians, he yet 
sees things through a medium of his own, and finds every 
thing instinct with the life which this doctrine has generated 
within him. 

Let us not, however, prejudge the question. There is dan 
ger of this on both sides. On the one hand, there are cer 
tain minds which, either from constitutional temperament, 
or the particular school of theology to which they are at 
tached, have tendencies in the direction of premillennialism 
so strong, that they are ready to embrace it almost imme 
diately con amove. Souls that burn with love to Christ 
who, with the mother of Sisera, cry through the lattice, " Why 
is his chariot so long in coming ? why tarry the wheels of his 
chariots?" and with the spouse, "Make haste, my Beloved, 
and be thou like to a roe or a young hart upon the mountains 
of spices " such souls are ready to catch at a doctrine which 
seems to promise a much earlier appearing of their beloved 
Lord than the ordinary view. " I have heard," relates an 
honest and warm-hearted premillennialist of the Common 
wealth time, " I have heard of a poor man who, it seems, so 
loved and longed for Christ s appearance, that when there was 
a great earthquake, and when many cried out the day of 
judgment was come, and one cried, Alas! alas! what shall I 



IX FAVOUR OF THE PREMILLEXXIAL ADVEXT. 9 

do? and a third, How shall I hide myself? &c., that poor 
man only said, Ah ! is it so ? Is the day come ? "\Vhero 
shall I go ? Upon what mountain shall I stand to see my 
Saviour? "* How deeply we sympathize with this feeling 
will by and by appear. It is for such as feel thus, more than 
for any others, that I have undertaken this investigation. 
There are next, your curious and restless spirits who feed 
upon the future. These are charmed with the multifarious 
details of the millennial kingdom. They are in their very 
element when settling the order in which the events shall 
occur, separating the felicities of the kingdom into its terres 
trial and celestial departments respectively, sorting the mul 
titudinous particulars relating to the Ezekiel and Apocalyptic 
cities and such like studies. For such minds, whose appe 
tite for the marvellous is the predominant feature of their men 
tal character, and who live in a sort of unreal world for these, 
the confused and shadowy grandeur of a kingdom of glory 
upon earth, with all that relates to its introduction, its esta 
blishment, its administration, and its connection with the final 
and unchanging state, opens up a subject of surpassing inter 
est and riveting delight- the very food which their peculiar 
temperament craves and feeds on. And, to mention no 
more, there are those who seem to have a constitutional ten 
dency to materialize the objects of faith, and can hardly con 
ceive of them save as more or less implicated with this terres 
trial platform. Such minds, it is superfluous to observe, will 
have a natural affinity with a system which brings the glory 
of the resurrection-state into immediate and active commu 
nion with sublunary affairs, and represents the reign of those 
who neither marry nor are given in marriage, but are as the 
angels of God in heaven, as consisting in a mysterious rule 
over men in the flesh, who eat arid drink, buy and sell, plant 
and build, marry wives, and are given in marriage. To set 

* Christ s Appearance the Second Time for the Salvation of Believers. [By 
John Durant] 1653. HatckarcTs Reprint, p. 119. Lond. 1S29. 



10 PREJUDICES AGAINST THE PUEMILLENNIAL ADVENT. 

about proving to persons of this cast of mind that premillen 
nialism will not stand the test of Scripture, is like attempting 
to rob them of a jewel, or to pluck the sun out of the heavens. 
To such minds, any other view of the subject is perfectly 
bald and repulsive, while theirs is encircled with a glory that 
excelleth. To them it carries the force of intuitive perception; 
tliejfeel they know it to be true. 

But are there no anfa -premillennial tendencies, which re 
quire to be guarded against? I think there are. Under the 
influence of such tendencies, the inspired text, as such, pre 
sents no rich and exhaustless field of prayerful and delighted 
investigation; exegetical inquiries and discoveries are an un 
congenial element; and whatever Scripture intimations re 
garding the future destinies of the Church and of the world 
involve events out of the usual range of human occurrences, 
or exceeding the anticipations of enlightened Christian saga 
city, are almost instinctively overlooked or softened down. 
Such minds turn away from premillennialism just as instinc 
tively as the others are attracted to it. The bare statement 
of its principles carries to their mind its own refutation not 
so much from its perceived unscripturalness, as from the ab 
surdity which it seems to carry on the face of it. They 
have hardly patience to listen to it. It requires an effort to 
sit without a smile under a grave exposition and defence of 
it. If they undertake to refute it, it is a task the irksome- 
ness of which they are unable to conceal, and their unfitness 
for which can scarcely fail to appear. Let us try to avoid 
both extremes, investigating reverently the mind of the 
Spirit. 

Much irrelevant discussion has been mixed up with the 
question of the premillennial advent, and arguments have 
been advanced on both sides which originate in confused 
apprehensions of the whole subject. 

Some premillennialists, for example, seem to think that the 



IRRELEVANT MATTER. 11 

belief in a personal advent is confined to themselves, and that 
those who repudiate a premillennial advent are not expecting 
their adorable Lord in person at all. Surely so gross a mis 
representation does not require to be protested against. It 
is the objects and, in connection with this, the time of the 
Redeemer s coming that are in question not its reality. 

Another misconception relates to the final destiny of the 
present physical system " the heavens and earth which are 
now." That these are not to be annihilated, but to furnish the 
elements out of which " the new heavens and the new earth" 
are to emerge, after the general conflagration, is zealously 
maintained by most modern premillennialists, as part of their 
system, and as what their opponents may be expected to re 
pudiate. But this is a mistake. In point of fact, the primi 
tive and the earlier English advocates of that doctrine seem 
to have taken other views of the final abode of the redeemed; 
while in our own day, neither do all of them affirm it, nor is 
it denied by all their opponents. Mr Tyso, for example, in 
sists that after the thousand years reign of Christ upon earth, 
he and his people will take their leave of it for ever ; while 
Dr Urwick of Dublin, writing against the premillennial doc 
trine, maintains, at some length, that the eternal abode of the 
glorified Church is to rise out of the ashes of this present 
earth. So does Dr Fairbairn, in his able work on the Typo- 
logy of Scripture, and several others.* Some minds shrink 
from this latter opinion, as tending to carnalize, or at least to 
lower, our views of the celestial state. But may not such 
sensitiveness spring from an unconscious confounding of the 
: present wretched state with that which is expected to take 
its place ? May there not be in it some tincture of that mor 
bid spiritualism, which shrinks from the very touch of mate 
rialism, as if separation from it in every form would be the 
consummation of happiness ! May not the Gnostic element 

* The literature of this question, in the Augustan age of theology, 
may be seen in DE MOOR (Comm. in Marck. Comp.) xxxiv. 30. 



12 IRRELEVANT MATTER. 

of the essential sinfulness and vanity of matter be found 
lurking beneath it ? Certainly, if the earth was implicated 
in the curse, it is natural to expect that it should share in its 
removal. Certainly, the glorified bodies both of the Re 
deemer and the redeemed derive their elements from the 
dust of this ground, which will thus in their persons, at least 
for ever endure. And if it be no degradation to the Son 
of God to take it into his own person, " as the First-born 
from the dead " if the dust of this ground is capable of be 
coming a " spiritual " and a " glorious body," meet vehicle 
for the perfected and beatified spirit, the sharer of its bliss 
in the immediate presence, and the instrument of all its acti 
vities in the service, of God and the Lamb it does seem 
hard to conceive how the very system which has furnished 
all these elements of incorruption, and spirituality, and 
beauty, and glory when its present constitution shall be dis 
solved, and when new and higher laws shall be stamped upon 
it should be incapable of furnishing a congenial abode for 
the glorified Church. Nor is it easy to make any thing else 
out of Paul s singularly interesting and noble announcements 
regarding the deliverance of a groaning creation from the 
bondage of corruption into the glorious liberty of the children 
of God (Rom. viii. ] 9-23), or fairly to interpret the cele 
brated prediction of Peter (2 Pet. iii. 10-13), otherwise than 
as intimating that " the new heavens and the new earth," 
physically considered will be the same which God originally 
created for the abode of men when it shall have under 
gone an igneous, as it has already undergone an aqueous, 
transformation. Nor let any one ask, Of what conse 
quence is it whether the one opinion or the other be the 
correct one? For if this be what the Spirit has seen fit so 
specifically to reveal, it must be worthy of being held fast 
by us ; and whatever view we take of it will necessarily give 
its hue to all other statements of Scripture regarding the 
earth. 



IRRELEVANT MATTER. 13 

But be all this as it may, the reader will now see that it 
does not divide the advocates from the opponents of the pre- 
millennial advent. The ultimate destiny of our present 
physical system, is a question on which neither party are 
unanimous amongst themselves, and which may safely be re 
garded as an open question. 



CHAPTER L 

CHRISES SECOND APPEARING THE CHURCIl s BLESSED HOPE. 

PREMILLENNIALISTS have done the Church a real service, by 
calling attention to the place which the second advent holds 
in the Word of God and the scheme of divine truth. If the 
controversy which they have raised should issue in a fresh and 
impartial inquiry into this branch of it, I, for one, instead of 
regretting, shall rejoice in the agitation of it. When they 
dilate upon the prominence given to this doctrine in Scrip 
ture, and the practical uses which are made of it, they touch 
a chord in the heart of every simple lover of his Lord, and 
carry conviction to all who tremble at his word ; so much so, 
that I am persuaded nine-tenths of all who have embraced 
the premillennial view of the second advent, have done so on 
the supposition that no other view of it will admit of an un 
fettered and unmodified use of the Scripture language on the 
subject that it has its proper interpretation and full force 
only on this theory. Assertions to this effect abound in the 
writings of all modern premillennialists. But the fact of the 
scriptural prominence of this doctrine, and their inference 
from this as to the time and the objects of it, must not be 
confounded. On the former, we are cordially at one with 
them ; on the latter, we are directly at issue with them. 
And believing, as we do, that the clearing of these prelim 
inary points will go far with many to settle the whole ques 
tion, we think that a chapter on each of them will not be 
mii spent. 



TUB CHURCH S BLESSED HOPE. 15 

With them we affirm, that the REDEEMER S SECOND APPEAR 
ING IS THE VERY POLE-STAR OF THE CHURCH. That it is SO 

held forth in the New Testament, is beyond dispute. Let 
any one do himself the justice to collect and arrange the evi 
dence on the subject, and he will be surprised if the study 
be new to him at once at the copiousness, the variety, and 
the conclusiveness of it. It is but a specimen of that evi 
dence that we can give here. 

Is it careless SINNERS, then, or lax professors, that 
are to be warned ? 

"What is a man profited, if he shall gain the whole world, 
and lose his own soul ? or what shall a man give in 
exchange for his soul ? For the Son of man shall 
come in the glory of his Father, with his angels ; and 
then he shall reward every man according to his 
works." (Matt. xvi. 26, 27.) 

" The Lord is long-suffering to us-ward, not willing that 
any should perish. But the day of the Lord will 
come as a thief in the night." (2 Pet. iii. 9, 10.) 
" Every man s work shall be made manifest : for the day 
shall declare it, because it shall be revealed by fire." 
(1 Cor. iii. 13.) 

** Behold, the Lord cometh with ten thousand of his saints, 
to execute judgment upon all, and to convince all 
that are ungodly among them of all their ungodly 
deeds which they^ave ungodly committed, and of all 
their hard speeches which ungodly sinners have spoken 
against him." (Jude 14, 15.) 

" Behold, he cometh with clouds ; and every eye shall see 
him, and they also which pierced him : and all kin 
dreds of the earth shall wail because of him. Even 
so, Amen." (Rev. i. 7.) 

Is it SAINTS that are to be stimulated to a fearless 
testimony for Christ, to patient suffering for his sake, to hope, 
to constancy, to heavenly-mindcdness to universal duty ? 



16 CHRIST S SECOND APPEARING 

" Whosoever shall confess me before men, him shall the 
Son of man also confess before the angels of God." 
(Luke xii. 8.) 

" Beloved, think it not strange concerning the fiery trial 
which is to try you, as though some strange thing 
happened unto you : but rejoice, inasmuch as ye are 
partakers of Christ s sufferings : that, when his glory 
shall be revealed, ye may be glad also with exceeding 
joy." (1 Pet. iv. 12, 13.) 

" Be patient therefore, brethren, unto the coming of the 
Lord." (James v. 7.) 

" 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." (1 Pet. i. 13.) 

" Let your loins be girded about, and your lights burning ; 
and ye yourselves like unto men that wait for their 
lord, when he will return from the wedding ; that, 
when he cometh and knocketh, they may open unto him 
immediately. Blessed are those servants, whom the 
Lord, when he cometh, shall find watching." (Luke xii. 
35-37.) 

** And now, little children, abide in him ; that, when He 
shall appear, we may have confidence, and not be 
ashamed before him at his coming." (1 John ii. 28.) 

" When Christ, who is our life, shall appear, then shall 
ye also appear with him in glory. Mortify therefore 
your members which are upon the earth." (Col. iii. 
4,5.) 

" It doth not yet appear what we shall be : but we know 
that, when He shall appear, we shall be like him ; for we 
shall see him as he is. And every man that hath this 
hope in Him (Icr avrw, in the coming Redeemer) pm-i- 
fieth himself, even as he is pure." (1 John iii. 2, 3.) 

" The crown of righteousness which the Lord, the righteous 
Judge, shall give me at that day: and not to me 



THE CHURCH S BLESSED HOPE. 17 

only, but unto all them also that love his appearing." 
(2 Tim. iv. 8.) 

" Our conversation is in heaven ; from whence also ice look 
for the Saviour, the Lord Jesus Christ." (Phil. iii. 
20.) 

" That -which ye have (already) hold fast till I come." 
(Rev. ii. 25.) 

When the Thessalonian converts turned to God from idols, 
it was, on the " one hand, "to serve the living and true 
God ;" and on the other, " to wait for his /Son from heaven." 
(1 Thess. i. 9, 10.) 

This " waiting for Christ" was the distinguishing excellence 
of the Corinthians : " Ye come behind in no gift ; waiting for 
the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ : who shall also confirm 
you unto the end, that ye may be blameless in the day of our 
Lord Jesus Christ." (1 Cor. i. 7, 8.) 

The last passage suggests a class of texts, in which the 
second advent is placed in a light peculiarly interesting. As 
the Church never dies, and all that are in Christ between the 
two advents are viewed as one continuous living body, so in 
the case of them all whether dying before or found alive at 
his coming grace is represented as terminating in glory, 
without an allusion to aught as coming between. The close 
of the believer s career is regarded as merging in the solem 
nities of the second advent; the beams of his Lord s glory 
are seen brightening the horizon of his present abode. 
Eiveted to the day when the Lord is to rend the heavens and 
be seen on his great white throne, all intervening events are 
absorbed, the whole intermediate space vaulted over, and that 
august and decisive scene fills the view, communicating its 
high tone to the character, and supplying a motive of its own 
to every duty.* 

* "Homines omnium retatum conjunctim unum quiddam reprocsent- 
ant : fidelesque jam olim expectantes, habentesque se loco illorum, qui 

victuri sunt in adventu Domini, pro eorum persona locuti sunt 

D 



] 8 CHRIST S SECOND APPEARING 

" Occupy till I come." (Luke xix. 13.) 

"The very God of peace sanctify you wholly: and I pray 
God your whole spirit, and soul, and body, be preserved 
blameless unto the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ." 
(1 Thess. v, 23.) 

" Being confident of this very thing, that he which hath 
begun a good work in you will perform it until the day 
of Jesus Christ." (Phil. i. 6.) 
" And this I pray that ye may be without offence, till the day 

of Christ." (Phil. i. 9, 10.) 

" God hath not appointed us to wrath, but to obtain salva 
tion by our Lord Jesus Christ, who died for us, that, 
whether we wake or sleep, we should live together with 
him." .(1 Thess. v. 9, 10.) 
" As often as ye eat this bread, and drink this cup, ye do 

show the Lord s death till he come." (1 Cor. xi. 26.) 
There is still another class of texts the most delightful, 
perhaps, of all, and certainly the most telling upon the 
heart in which the widowed condition and feeling of the 
Church, while her Lord is absent from her in the heavens, 
are brought to view. And from whom do we get this idea 
in its perfection? Is it from the apostles, expressing the 
feeling which his absence created in the hearts of his loving 
people ? No ; it is from Christ himself, intimating what he 
expected at their hands taking it for granted that they would 
not be able to do without him. " And they said unto him, 
Why do the disciples of John fast often, and make prayers, 
and the disciples of the Pharisees, and thy disciples fast not ? 
And he said unto them, Can ye make the children of the 
bridcchamber fast while the Bridegroom is with them ? But 
the days will come, when the Bridegroom shall be taken away 
from them, and then shall they fast in those days. No man 

Unaquajque generatio, quac hoc vol illo tempore vivit, occupat illo vitro 
suae tempore locum corum, qui tempore adventus Domini victuri sunt." 
BENGEL, ad I Thess. iv. 15. 



THE CHURCH S BLESSED HOPE. 19 

putteth a piece of a new garment upon an old," &c. (Luke 
v. 33-39.) Would it be incongruous in the Church to 
mourn and feel desolate in the presence of her Lord ? Not 
less incongruous, it seems, is it not to cherish the feeling of 
desolation in his absence. And both are such incongruities 
as confounding the seasons of fasting and feasting, as putting 
a piece of a new garment upon an old, as putting new wine 
into old bottles, and preferring new wine to old. Still more 
touchingly does this thought find vent in his last discourse 
with his disciples, as he sat with them at the communion 
table in the upper room of Jerusalem, the night before he 
suffered. As he broke to them, by little and little, the sad 
news that he was about to leave them, he poured forth the 
richest consolations in the view of it " staying them with 
flagons, and comforting them with apples." But he had no 
wish to carry this too far ; and Jesus will think it an abuse 
of his consolations, if we have learned from them to do with 
out him. Christ s Word, and the seals of his love conveyed 
to our hearts by the blessed Spirit, are inexpressibly dear to 
his loving people but only in the absence of himself. And 
never do we please Christ so much as when we " refuse to be 
comforted," even with his own consolations, save in the pro 
spect of his Personal Eeturn. " Do ye inquire among your 
selves of that I said, A little while, and ye shall not see me ; 
and again, a little while, and ye shall see me? Verily, 
verily, I say unto you, that ye shall weep and lament, but 
the world shall rejoice ; and ye shall be sorrowful, but your 
sorrow shall be turned into joy. A woman when she is in 
travail hath sorrow, because her hour is come : but as soon 
as she is delivered, she remembereth no more the anguish, 
for joy that a man is born into the world. And ye now 
therefore have sorroiv; but I will see you again, and your Jieart 
shall rejoice, and your joy no man taketh from you." (John 
xvi. 19-22.)* 

* "Felix, inquam, ilia anima quce quotidie gemit et luget, quia auc- 



20 CHRIST S SECOND APPEARING 

But some will say, What though we admit all this ? The 
second coming of Christ is still an event which will not take 
place till the end of the world. Holding it, therefore, as an 
undoubted truth, we must, in the mean time, look to events 
nearer home. The death of any individual is, to all practical 
purposes, the coming of Christ to that individual. It is his 
summons to appear before the judgment-seat of Christ. It 
is to him the close of time, and the opening of an unchang 
ing eternity, as truly as the second advent will be to mankind 
at large. On this I submit the following remarks : 

First, It is at once conceded that there is a perfect analogy 
between the two classes of events Christ s second coming, 
with its concurrent circumstances and final issues, on the one 
hand ; and the death of individuals, and all its consequences 
to those individuals, on the other. Nor can the application 
to the latter, in their proper place and subordinate sense, of 
the warnings suggested by the former, be reasonably objected 
to. It is, in fact, hardly possible to resist it. It comes spon 
taneously.* Still, however, it is in the way of analogy alone 

torem omnium mundi Salvatorem Christum non videt. Ipsa profecto 
ridebit in die novissimo, et gaudens gaudebit in ooternum cum Christo. 
Ilia vero quse non gemit de Christ! abscessu, videat ne irrefragabiliter 
ploret in ejusdcm Christi adventu. Ilia sponsum sponsa suum non amat, 

quse pro desiderio ilium videndi aliquo tempore non suspirat 

Scio et certus sum, quod absterget Dcus omnem lachrymam ab oculis 
ejus, cum venerit dies nuptiarum Christi et ecclesise, tempore illo quo 
fuerint virgines introductas in thalamum regis ooterni. Sed quomodo ab 
oculis tuis absterget lachryrnas, si pro ejus amore non gemis et ploras ?" 
BERNARD, in Ccena Domini, Serm. ix. 

* " Quod (that the day of the Lord will come as a thief) unusquifque 
debet etiam de die hujus vitse suoe novissimo formidare. In quo enini 
quemque invenit suus novissimus dies, in hoc eum comprehendet mundi 
novissimus dies: quoniam qualis in die isto quisque moiltur talis in die 

illo judicabitur Imparatum autem inveniet ilia dies, quern 

imparatum inveniet sure vitae hujus ultimus dies." AUGUST. Ep. cxix. 
2,3. 

" Par est ratio judiciorum incertaaque obitus horae, quavis setate, ac 
diei novissimi." BEJJGEL, ad Matt. xxiv. 42. 



NOT HIS COMING TO INDIVIDUALS AT DEATH. 21 

that texts expressive of the one can or ought to be applied 
to the other. It can never be warrantable, and is often 
dangerous, to make that the primary and proper interpreta 
tion of a passage which is but a secondary, though it may be 
a very legitimate and even irresistible, application of it.* 

Second, It is not enough that we believe the doctrines of 
Scripture numerically, so to speak. We must believe them 
as they are revealed in their revealed collocations and bear 
ings. Implicit submission to the authority of God s Word 
obviously includes this. If, then, Christ s second appearing, 
instead of being full in the view of the Church, as we find 
it in the New Testament, is shifted into the background, 
while other anticipations are advanced into its room, which, 
though themselves scriptural, do not occupy in Scripture the 
place which we assign to them, are we "trembling" at the 

1 O O 

authority and the wisdom of God in his Word, or are we not 
rather "leaning to our own understanding?" ."Let not 
your heart be troubled," said Jesus to his sorrowing disci 
ples : " In my Father s house are many mansions : I go to 
prepare a place for you. And if I go away " What then ? 
"Ye shall soon follow me? Death shall shortly bring us to 
gether ?" Nay; but "If I go away, I will come again and 
receive you unto myself; that where I am, there ye may be 
also." (John xiv. 1-3.) "And while they looked steadfastly 
toward heaven as he went up, behold, two men stood by them 
in white apparel ; which also said, Ye men of Galilee, why 
stand ye gazing up into heaven ? this same Jesus, which is 

* The author of " Premillennialism a Delusion " argues that, as the 
disembodied state knows neither space nor time, there can be to it no real 
interval between death and the resurrection, and so the coming of Christ 
to individuals at death is to them identical, in the strictest sense, with 
liis second personal advent. (Pp. 104-134.) This may be very good 
psychology, for aught that I know ; but the exegetical question Whether 
the coming of Christ, held up by the Lord himself and his apostles so 
emphatically as a motive to action, means his personal appearing ? can 
never, I apprehend, be determined 011 such grounds. 



22 CHRIST S SECOND APPEARING 

taken up from you into heaven, shall " What ? Take you 
home soon to himself, at death ? Nay, but shall " so come 
in like manner as ye have seen him go into heaven." (Acts i. 
10, 11.) * And how know we that, by jostling this event 
out of its scriptural place in the expectations of the Church, 
we are not, in a great degree, destroying its character and 
power as a practical principle ? Can we not believe, though 
unable to trace it, that God s methods are ever best ; and 
that as in nature, so perhaps in revelation, a modification by 
us of the Divine arrangements, apparently slight, and attended 
even with some seeming advantages, may be followed by a 
total and unexpected change of results, the opposite of what 
is anticipated and desired ? So we fear it to be here. 

Third, The coming of Christ to individuals at death 
however warrantably we may speak so, and whatever profit 
able considerations it may suggest is not fitted for taking 
that place in the view of the believer which Scripture assigns 
to the second advent. This is a proposition of equal interest 
and importance. It would bear to be established and illus 
trated in detail. A hint or two, however, may suffice. 

1. The death of believers, however changed in its charac 
ter, in virtue of their union to Christ, is, intrinsically consi 
dered, not joyous, but grievous not attractive, but repulsive. 
It is the disruption of a tie which the Creator formed for 
perpetuity the unnatural and abhorrent divorce of parties 
made for sweet and uninterrupted fellowship. True, there 
is no curse in it to the believer ; but it is the memorial of 
the curse, telling of sin, and breach of the first covenant, 
and legal wrath. All the ideas therefore which death, as 



* Beautiful here are the words of BENGEL : " Inter ascensionem et 
inter adventum gloriosura nullus interponitur eventus, eorum utrique 
par : ideo hi duo conjunguntur. Merito igitur apostoli, ante datam Apo- 
calypsin, diem Christi, ut valde propinquum, proposuerunt. Et congruit 
majestati Christi, ut toto inter ascensionem et inter ad adventum tern- 
pore sine intermissione expectetur." AD ACT. i. 11. 



NOT HIS COMING TO INDIVIDUALS AT DEATH. 23 

such, is fitted to suggest, even in connection with the better 
covenant, are of a humiliating kind. Whatever is associated 
with it of a joyous nature is derived from other considerations, 
by which its intrinsic gloominess is, in the case of believers, 
relieved. But the Redeemer s second appearing is, to the 
believer, an event of unmingled joyousness, whether as re 
spects the honour of his Lord, which will then be majestic 
ally vindicated before the world which had set it at nought, 
or as respects his own salvation, which will then have its glo 
rious completion. How, then, should the former event be 
fitted to awaken feelings, I say not equally intense, but even 
of the same order, as the latter ? In connection with his second 
appearing, the believer is privileged to regard his own death 
as bound up with the Redeemer s triumph, and a step to his 
final victory with him. But as a substitute for it as being 
to all practical purposes (as they say) one and the same thing 
with the expectation of the Redeemer s appearing, this look 
ing forward to one s own death will be found very deficient in 
practical effect. 

2. The bliss of the disembodied spirits of the just is not 
only incomplete, but, in some sense, private and fragmentary, 
if I may so express myself. Each believer enters on it for 
himself at his own death. His spirit is with Christ, resting 
consciously under his wing from the warfare of the flesh, and 
tranquilly anticipating future glory. " He shall enter into 
peace ; they shall rest in their beds each one walking in his 
uprightness." (Isa. Ivii. 2.)* 

But at the Redeemer s appearing, all his redeemed will be 
collected together, and PEKFECTLY, PUBLICLY, and SIMULTA 
NEOUSLY glorified. Is it necessary to point out the inferi- 

* in:3 Tp tt, "that walketh in his uprightness," or "that waiketh 
straight before him." In whichever of these ways this last clause is 
taken, nearly all interpreters, ancient and modern, understand it to de 
scribe the character of the blessed dead in the present world not their 
condition after death. 



24: CHRIST S SECOND APPEARING 

ority, in practical power, of the one prospect to the other, or 
to indicate the superior class of ideas and feelings which the 
latter is fitted to generate ? 

3. To put the expectation of one s own death in place of 
the prospect of Christ s appearing, is to dislocate a beautiful 
jointing in divine truth to destroy one of its finest colloca 
tions. Here it is, as expressed by the apostle : " The grace 
of Grod which bringeth salvation hath appeared unto all men, 
teaching us, that, denying ungodliness and worldly lusts, we 
should live soberly, righteously, and godly, in this present 
world ; looking for that blessed hope, and the glorious ap 
pearing of the great God and our Saviour Jesus Christ ; who 
gave himself for us, that he might redeem us from all iniquity, 
and purify unto himself a peculiar people, zealous of good 
works." (Tit. ii. 11-14.) Here both comings of Christ are 
brought together; the first in "grace" the second in "glory," 
the first "bringing salvation" the second, to complete the 
salvation brought. To the first we look back by faith to 
the second we look forward by hope. In the enjoyment of 
the fruit of the first, we anticipate the fulness of the second. 
Between these two the apostle here beautifully places the 
Christian s present holy walk. These are the two pivots on 
which turns the Christian life the two wings on which 
believers mount up as eagles. If either is clipped, the soul s 
flight heavenward is low, feeble, and fitful. This is no casual 
collocation of truths. It is a studied, and, with the apostle, 
a favourite juxtaposition of the two greatest events in the 
Christian redemption, the fast and the last, bearing an intrin 
sic relation in their respective objects. "As it is appointed 
unto men once to die, but after this the judgment ; so Christ 
was once offered to bear the sins of many ; and unto them 
that look for him shall he appear the second time, without 
sin, unto salvation." (Heb. ix. 27, 28.)* " If so be that we 

* The point of this beautiful passage is missed, I suspect, by most 
readers, as it certainly is by many commentators. In the one verse 



NOT HIS COMING TO INDIVIDUALS AT DEATH. 2J 

suffer with him, that we may be also glorified together." 
(Rom. viii. 17.) And who does not see that the comfort and 
the profit of this collocation in our own minds is as great as 
is the beauty of it in the text of Scripture ? All is thus 
made to centre in the PERSON OP CHRIST the contemplations 
and the affections of the believer travelling between his 
Abasement and his Exaltation, and finding in Jesus, under 
both aspects together, a completed salvation.* 

"death" and "judgment " are held up as the two great stages of the cursi 
of the laiu. In the other verse, we have the corresponding stages of re 
demption from Hie, curse, which Christ accomplishes by his two advents ; 
at his first, "bearing the sins of many," and when he conies the second 
time, " appearing without sin unto salvation." " As man," says Dr OWEN 
on this passage, " was to die once legally and penally for sin, by the sen 
tence of the law, and no more; so Christ died, suffered, and offered once, 
and no more, to bear sin, to expiate it, and therefore to take away death, 
so far as it was penal. And as after death, men must appear asain the 
second time to judgment, to undergo condemnation thereon; so after his 
once offering to take away sin and death, Christ shall appear the second 
time, to free us from judgment, and to bestow on us eternal salvation." 

BEXGEL, with characteristic terseness and felicity, gives the same view 
in two lines: " Ou-m, sic, i. e., Christus liberavit nos a morte et judicio; 
tamctsi ut mors, sicjudicium, nominetenus remanet." 

* See a similar view of the coming of Christ in Dr Urwick s interest 
ing work on the Second Advent. 



CHAPTER II. 

THE HOPE OF THE ADVENT IN RELATION TO THE QUESTION OP 
TIME. 

WE have seen that Christ s second coming is the Church s 
" blessed hope." Its place in the Christian system, and in 
the Church s view, is over against his first coming, as its pro 
per counterpart. As " ONCE in the end of the world he hath 
appeared to put away sin, by the sacrifice of himself," so, 
" to them that look for him, shall he appear THE SECOND 
TIME, without sin, unto salvation." As the grace of the one 
coming is received by faith, so the glory of the other is appre 
hended by hope ; and thus, between the Cross and the Crown, 
the believer finds all his salvation and all his desire. With 
reference to the former, his attitude is that of broken-hearted 
sweet recumbency ; with reference to the latter, that of glad 
yet humble expectancy. On the one hand, he determines to 
" know nothing save Jesus Christ and him crucified ;" on the 
other, he is found in the ranks of " all them that love his 
appearing." 

Very good, says the premillennialist ; but the question is, 
With which theory of the second advent does all this accord ? 
When a man believes that Christ s second coming may take 
place at any time that he may come just now, for aught 
that we know, quite as readily as a hundred or a thousand 
years hence one can understand how he should set himself 
to " look" and " wait" and " watch" for him, " not knowing 
when the Master of the house may come, at even, or at mid- 



OBJECTION CAUTIONARY REMARKS. 27 

night, or at cock-crowing, or in the morning." But will the 
Church be brought up to this expectant attitude by telling 
her that a whole millennium, not yet begun, must run its 
course ere Christ appear ? And does not this blunt the edge 
of such texts as the following : " The day of the Lord so 
cometh as a thief in the night" " The Judge standeth at 
the door" " Behold, I come quickly ?" 

" Our ignorance," says Mr Bickersteth, " of the day and 
hour when Christ comes, seems inconsistent Avith any certain 
intervening period of a thousand years."* To the same 
purpose, Mr Dalton, f the Duke of Manchester, J Mr Wood, 
and most other writers on the same side. Dr H. Bonar 
admits the possibility of longing, of waiting, and even of 
looking for Christ s coming, on the common view of it, but 
strenuously denies the possibility of watching for it, on that 
view. || 

That this is plausible, I freely admit. In fact, if there 
be plausibility in the system at all, it lies here. I have felt 
it necessary, therefore, to weigh it again and again; but at 
every fresh examination, I have found it more specious than 
solid. That it is entirely fallacious, may be shown by a 
variety of considerations. 

Two remarks, however, I must request the reader to bear 
in mind throughout the whole of this discussion. First, I 
attach no importance, in this argument, to the precise period 
of a thousand years. It occurs nowhere in Scripture but 
in one solitary passage. There are reasons for taking it 
definitely and literally; but, to some these reasons appear 
slender. They think it means just a long indefinite period; 
agreeing with us, however, as to its being yet to come. Be 

* Guide to the Prophecies, p. 66, seventh edition, 
t Lent Lectures, for 1843, by English Clergymen, pp. 95, 96, second 
edition. 

t Finished Mystery, pp. 277-281. 

\ Last Things, p. 382, &c. 

11 Prophetical Landmarks, p. 88, c. 



23 BEGINNING AND END OP LATTER-DAY UNCERTAIN. 

it so. Wherever I speak of the millennium, or " thousand 
years," let them understand their own " indefinite period," 
or bright " latter day," to precede the coming of Christ ; and 
my argument will remain the same. Again, let no one 
suppose I expect that the beginning and end of this period 
will be so clearly discernible as to leave no room for doubt or 
uncertainty upon any mind. On the contrary, I think there 
can hardly be a doubt that it will follow the law of all 
Scripture dates in this respect of Daniel s " seventy weeks," 
and of the " twelve hundred and sixty days " of Antichristian 
rule. The beginning and end of the former of these periods, 
though a long past one, is even yet a matter of some con 
troversy, while the beginning and end of the latter period 
is confessedly unsettled. Why, then, should we suppose 
that it must be otherwise with the millennial period ? If 
the Jirst stages of it should be marked only by the rising 
beams of the Sun of Righteousness over the darkness and 
disease, the disorder and confusion, the wretchedness and 
ruin, which they are destined to chase away; and, if its last 
stages should be characterised by nothing but the waning 
brightness and decaying spirituality of its religious character 
all being outwardly unchanged, and nothing wanting but 
the animating spirit like "the glory of the Lord," which 
took its gradual departure from the first temple, hovering 
over the threshold of the house, then going up from the 
midst of the city and resting for a moment on tho Mount of 
Olives, as if to take a last lingering look of its wonted 
abode, and finally disappearing from the scene, to make way 
for the judgments of an incensed God: if, I say, the com 
mencement and the close of the latter day should be thus 
intentionally shrouded in obscurity, and the same uncertainty 
overhang this as all the great periods of the divine economy, 
would it not be worthy of Him who, in his ways as in Him 
self, is the same yesterday, to-day, and for ever ? 

With this explanation, I proceed to examine this new 



OBJECTION- TESTED BY FACTS ROLLOCK, RUTHERFORD. 29 

theory of " watching " for Christ s coming, as incompatible 
with the ordinary view of the second advent. And, 

1. Can any thing be more arbitrary than the distinction 
attempted to be drawn between longing, waiting, and looking 
for Christ, on the one hand, and watching for him, on the 
other ? Doubtless, these terms express distinct shades of 
thought and feeling ; but the state of the soul in them all is 
so nearly the same, that it is scarcely conceivable how any 
doctrine that destroys one of them should admit of the 
exercise of the other three. Beyond question, all scriptural 
exercises of heart towards a coming Redeemer must stand 
or fall together. 

2. This alleged impossibility of watching for Christ s 
coming, on the ordinary view of it, involves a serious charge 
against the major part of the Christian Church, almost from 
the age of the apostles downwards. An extract or two 
from the fathers of the Scottish Church, for which I am 
indebted to Mr A. Bonar, * will sufficiently illustrate this 
remark. " Few in Scotland," Mr Bonar truly observes, 
" held the premillennial view, but they loved the Lord s 
appearing." 

" Why," says Principal Rollock, " should not the hope of 
Christ s returning comfort our souls, and make them rejoice ? 
How happy is that man who earnestly looks and waits for 
the blessed and glorious coming again of the Lord to judg 
ment ; for that hope shall comfort and uphold him in all his 
troubles and distresses." 

" O when," writes the seraphic Rutherford, " will we 
meet ? how long is it to the dawning of the marriage- 
day ! O sweet Jesus, take wide steps ! my Lord, come 
over mountains at one stride ! O my Blessed, flee as a roe 
or young hart upon the mountains of separation. O if he 
would fold the heavens together like an old cloak, and 
shovel time and days out of the way, and make ready in 
* Redemption Drawing Nigh, pp. 21, &c. 



30 CHRIST S COMING VIEWED AS 

haste the Lamb s wife for her husband ! heavens, 

more fast ! time, run, run, and hasten the marriage-day ; 

for love is tormented with delays ! Look to the 

east: the day-sky is breaking. Think not that Christ loseth 

time, or lingereth unsuitably The Lord s bride will 

be up or down, above the water, swimming, or under the 
water, sinking, until her lordly and mighty Redeemer and 
Husband set his head through these skies, and come with his 
fair court to rid all these pleas, and give them the longed-for 
inheritance." 

And shall it be said of these men, that, though " they 
loved their Lord s appearing," they could not possibly " watch 
for it ? " 

But it may be replied These worthies, though they were 
not premillennialists, interposed no definite millennium be 
tween their own day and the day of Christ s appearing. 
Whether they did or not, I know not. There is, probably, 
little means of knowing what their views were of the latter- 
day period. But there is not a particle of evidence that 
they had any such views of the nearness of Christ s coming 
as premillennialists assert to be indispensable to watching 
for it. The contrary, indeed, seems evident enough from 
Rutherford s language in the very extract which I have 
given. What else can be gathered from his passionate wish 
that the Lord would " take wide steps, come over mountains 
at one stride, fold the heavens together like an old cloak, 
and shovel time and days out of the way," but that he looked 
upon the actual period of Christ s coming as identical with 
the end of time itself? And yet we find him longing, wait 
ing, looking, and watching too, for his Lord s appearing, as 
if it had been the very next event which was to happen. 
And truly, to him, it ivas the next event ; for as " love is 
tormented with delays " to use his own expressive language 
insomuch that " one day seems as a thousand years," so 
hope, which brings near the Beloved Object, makes "a 



BOTH NEAR AND FAR AWAY. 31 

thousand years as one day What, to them that love his 
appearing, are falls of Antichrist, and bright latter days, and 
whole millenniums of refreshing in his absence ? " Holy 
Lord," says Bernard somewhere, " dost thou call that a 
little while in which I shall not see thee? this little is a 
long little while ! " 

Thus the heart alternates betiveen two very different and 
seemingly opposite* views of the interval between its own day and 
the day of Christ s appearing. Now it seems long, and anon 
it seems short. " The bridegroom tarried," says the Lord 
himself, in the parable of the virgins. (Matt. xxv. 5.) " Yet 
a little while," says his apostle, " and the Coming One will 
come, and will not tarry." (Heb. x. 37.) (jgov/owoj oy 
;/gov/.) To faith and hope it seems near, even at the doors ; 
to love and longing desire it seems far, far away : to the one 
it is but " a day," and then he will be here ; to the other it 
is " a thousand years" dreary period! In the one case, 
" we do with patience wait for it;" in the other, " tormented 
with delays," we cry out, with the psalmist, " But thou, O 
Lord, how long?" Wilt thou not shovel Antichrist, ay, and 
the millennium too yea, time and days together out of the 
way, and " set thy head through these skies," that " so we 
may be ever with the Lord ! " * 

To the above examples of this double way of viewing the 
Redeemer s coming, I make no apology for adding that of 
one but lately removed from the Church below, whose mind 
seemed to be singularly imbued with the Spirit of Christ, 
while his pen, on devotional subjects, flowed almost as the 
oracles of God. I allude to Robert Wodroiv.^ On the 

* This is not to " interpolate Rutherford s language," as Mr Wood 
alleges, (Last Things, p. 387,) but to appropriate it. 

f Whose Address to the Children of Israel, prepared at the request of 
the Jews 1 Committee of the Church of Scotland, adopted by the General 
Assembly of that Church, and translated into nearly all the Continental, 
and some of the Oriental languages, has probably never been surpassed, 
in point of scriptural character and unction, by any human composition. 



32 OBJECTION TESTED BY FACTS ROBERT WODROW. 

subject of united prayer among Christians, he drew up two 
Memorials (1841 and 1842), very precious, addressed " To 
the children of God scattered abroad throughout the world, 
with earnest desires that grace and mercy may be multiplied 
to them all through the knowledge of God our Saviour." On 
the topics for united prayer, having noticed among other 
things, in the first Memorial, " The conversion of God s 
ancient people as the most remarkable event which is to take 
place until the coming of Christ, the outpouring of the Spirit 
on all flesh, the destruction of Antichrist, the utter abolition 
of idolatry, the universal overthrow of Satan s kingdom, the 
universal diffusion of the gospel and its blessings," he then 
says 

" Stretching beyond all these great events connected with 
the glory of the latter day, believers should look forward to 
the kingdom of glory itself, and pray for the coming of that 
day when Christ shall be revealed in flaming fire, taking 
vengeance on them that know not God, and that obey not 
the gospel, and when he shall be glorified in his saints, and 
admired in all them that believe, as it will be then, and not 
till then, that the Divine character and government will be 
vindicated, the Redeemer s enemies subdued, the number of 
the elect completed, and their bodies as well as souls redeemed 
and glorified with himself. Hence we are commanded to be 
looking for and hasting unto the coming of the day of God ; 
hence it is the closing prayer of the Church, Even so, come, 
Lord Jesus; and hence it should be often the prayer of be 
lievers, individually and collectively, Make haste, my Be 
loved, and be thou like a roe or a young hart upon the 
mountains of spices. " 

In the second Memorial he says 

" Habitually desiring the coming of the Lord, we shall be 
naturally led to abound in prayer for the accomplishment of 
those objects which we have every reason, from the Word of 
God, to believe must be fulfilled before that great final event takes 



BEARING OF THE FOREGOING FACTS. S3 

place. Glorious things are spoken of the state of the Church 
in the latter day," &c. 

Now, let the reader bear in mind for what purpose we 
have extracted these passages. Not, certainly, to determine 
by human authority whether Christ s coming is to precede 
or to follow this latter day, but to meet the bold assertion, 
that on this last view of the Redeemer s coming it is not pos 
sible to watch for ifc Such assertions seem better met by facts 
than by arguments. And unless it is to be alleged that the 
gifted and holy men whose language we have quoted did not 
understand their own exercises, the assertion, I think, must 
be given up as untenable. 

But the heart of the fallacy has yet to be reached. This 
novel theory of watching is founded, as I proceed to show, 
on a very narrow induction of Scripture passages, and stands 
opposed to the spirit of a large and very important class of 
divine testimonies. 

4. It seems to be taken for granted that the New Testa 
ment has but one future event to hold up to the Church and 
to the world, namely, the coming of Christ, and even but 
one aspect of that event, namely, its nearness, and the corre 
sponding duty of icatcliing for it. But nothing can be a 
greater mistake. We have seen already for what purposes 
the New Testament holds forth the coming of Christ, both 
to saints and to sinners. But other purposes had to be 
served besides these, which have drawn forth truths of quite 
anotlier order ; and if the one set of passages, taken by them 
selves, might seem to imply that Christ might come to-morrow, 
or any day (as the phrase is), even in apostolic times, there 
are whole classes of passages which clearly show that the 
reverse of this was the mind of the Spirit. 

I refer to those Scriptures which announce the work to be 
done, and the extensive changes to come over the face of the 
Church, and of Society, between the two advents. 

". All power," said the Redeemer, as he was leaving the world, 

E 



34 THE EVENTS TO PRECEDE THE SECOND ADVENT. 

" is given unto me in heaven and in earth. Go ye therefore, and 
teach," or make disciples of, " all nations, baptizing them in the 
name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost; teach 
ing them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you : 
and, lo ! I am with you alway, even undo the end of the world" * 
(Matt, xxviii. 18-20.) 

Now, I ask not what impression this passage would pro 
duce upon those who misunderstood it. But supposing its 
true scope to be even but dimly apprehended, is it conceiv 
able that any primitive Christian should persuade himself 
that all nations might be thus discipled, baptized, and brought 
under the discipline of Christ s laws, in his own lifetime, or 
within the largest space of time that would admit of his 
watching (according to this new theory) for the coming of 
Christ to wind all up ? f 

Again, the parables regarding the gospel kingdom mani 
festly bear in the same direction. " The field," which was 
to be sown both with tares and with wheat, is "THE WORLD" 
(6 x6tff&o() : that is to say, a world-wide kingdom is to be 
formed, embracing the genuine and the false-hearted subjects 

* It makes no difference to our present argument, whether << here 
be rendered " world, or " age ; " as it is agreed on all hands that the 
period or state of things denoted by this word terminates with the second 
coming of Christ. 

f The reply made to this seems to me somewhat desperate. We have 
here, it is said, not a word about the actual evangelization of the world. 
We have merely a commission to do certain things, with a promise of the 
Master s gracious presence in the doing of it : of success in the work, the pas 
sage says nothing; while another passage tells us positively that "the gospel 
is to be preached to all nations" only " for a witness, and then shall the 
end come " showing that no general Christianization of the world before 
the coming of Christ was contemplated. (Wood s Last Things, pp. xxii. 
269-271.) Whether this is a natural or a forced construction of the 
Redeemer s last commission I may safely leave it to the reader to decide. 
I shall merely say that the saving conversion of "every member of every 
nation," (to use the words of Olshausen, quoted by Mr Wood), is ex 
pected by none before the coming of Christ ; and to the unconverted of 
every nation the preaching of the gospel can only be as "a witness" 
against them when Christ comes. 



EVANGELIZATION OF THE WORLD. 35 

of Christ under one visible name ; both are to " grow toge 
ther until the harvest;" and " the harvest is the end of tha 
world," * when " the righteous shall shine forth as the sun 
in the kingdom of their Father." The same truth is taught 
in the parable of the net cast into the sea, that gathered of 
every kind ; and the same period is fixed for the severance of 
the good from the bad " the end of the world." Similar 
is the import of, the parable of the mustard seed, and of the 
leaven holding forth the truth as it is in Jesus, in its pro 
gressive advancement, till, like a tree, springing from the 
least of seeds, it ultimately overshadows " the world;" and, 
like leaven, working its way through the mass of human 
society, it at length leavens it all. 

And could any intelligent Christian in apostolic times 
while the gospel had scarce a footing in the world, and its 
little inch of ground had to be contested even unto blood 
rise from any right apprehension of these parables with the 
persuasion that the whole icorld might be tlms overshadowed, 
thus leavened, thus externally subjugated to Christ, and the se 
cond advent arrive all in his own lifetime, or even in many 
lifetimes ? The answer given to this is, that the early Chris 
tians did not and could not take such comprehensive views 
of our Lord s words. It is enough, however, for me that the 
words meant this, and that they were fitted and intended to 
convey this. And is it to be said that just in proportion 
as the real sense of these parables might rise upon the 
view of the prayerful student of them, his power of watch 
ing for Christ s coming was enervated and destroyed ? Ab 
surd. 

I might advert here to those passages which announce the 
judicial transfer of the kingdom of God from the Jews to the 
Gentiles, the whole tenor of which was fitted to teach even 
a primitive Christian, that its duration in Gentile hands, ere 
the Jews should again be brought in, would bear some pro- 
* See note on preceding page. 



36 CALLING OF GEXTILES IXBRIXGING OF JEWS. 

portion to its duration in Jewish hands, before the admission 
of the Gentiles. 

" The kingdom of God shall be taken from you, and given to a 
nation bringing forth the fruits thereof." (Matt. xxi. 43.) 

" Jerusalem shall be trodden down of the Gentiles, until the times 
of the Gentiles be fulfilled. (Luke xxi. 24.) 

" Blindness in part is happened to Israel, until the fulness of the 
Gentiles be come in. And so all Israel shall be saved." (Rom. 
xi. 25, 26.) 

" They asked of him," after his resurrection, "saying, Lord, wilt 
thou at this time (lv TU x,^V rob*"?) restore again the king 
dom to Israel? And he said unto them, It is not for you to 
know the times or the seasons, which the Father hath put 
in his own power. But ye shall receive power, after that 
the Holy Ghost is come upon you : and ye shall be witnesses 
unto me both in Jerusalem, and in all Judea, and in Samaria, and 
unto the uttermost part of the earth." (Acts i. 6-8.) 

The spirit of this last passage is worthy of notice. While 
not discouraging the hope of an eventual restoration of the 
kingdom to Israel, in some sense at least, he represses all ex 
pectation of it in their own day, teaching them that, on his 
departure, they would have other work on hand, with which 
it would rather become them to take up their attention. 

I might refer also to the frequently-predicted degeneracy to 
characterize the maturer periods of the Church,, or Christian 
ized society. 

" In the latter times some shall depart from the faith, giving 
heed to seducing spirits, and doctrines of devils ; speaking 
lies in hypocrisy ; having their conscience seared with a 
hot iron ; forbidding to marry, and commanding to abstain 
from meats, which God hath created to be received with 
thanksgiving of them which believe and know the truth." 
(1 Tim. iv. 1-3.) 

" In the last days perilous times shall come : For men shall be 
lovers of their own selves, covetous, boasters, proud, blas 
phemers, disobedient to parents, unthankful, unholy, with 
out natural affection, truce-breakers, false accusers, inconti- 



PREDICTED DEGENERACY. 87 

nent, fierce, despisers of those that are good, traitors, heady, 
high-minded, lovers of pleasures more than lovers of God ; 
having a form of godliness, but denying the power thereof: 
from such turn away." (2 Tim. iii. 1-5.) 

" There shall come in the last days scoffers, walking after their 
own lusts, and saying, Where is the promise of his coming ? 
for since the fathers fell asleep, all things continue as the;/ 
v-ere from the beginning of the creation." (2 Pet. iii. 3, 4.) 
I do not pre,ss this class of passages, because, taken by 
themselves, I think a primitive Christian, seeing the germs 
of this degeneracy even then in existence, and " the mystery 
of iniquity already working," might not unreasonably imagine 
that the predicted evils might be developed and burst forth 
in no long time. But, taken in connection with other pas 
sages, such as Christ s commission to Christianize the world, 
and his parabolic intimations, that, in point of fact, it would 
be visibly Christianized before his second coming, I think 
these announcements of apostasy from the faith, and social 
degeneracy, and contemptuous disbelief of coming retribu 
tion, within the pale of Christianity, were fitted to repress the 
expectation of such a speedy end of it all as the new theory 
demands, in order to a possible watching for it. 

There is still a class of passages, greatly clearer to the same 
effect, of which one example may suffice for all: 

" And he shall send Jesus Christ, which before was preached 

unto you : whom the heaven must receive until the times of 

restitution of all things, which God hath spoken by the mouth of all 

his holy prophets since the world began. (Acts iii. 20, 21.) 

Would any Christian in apostolic times, though unable to 

tell what might be meant by this " restitution of all things," 

be encouraged by it to expect the immediate or very speed;/ 

return of Christ to the earth ? Would it lead him to think 

that his Lord, though but just gone, might be back again 

forthwith; that, though scarcely away though the Spirit 

who was to supply his place while absent had scarcely made 

his power to be felt though his gospel had hardly had time 



38 CHRIST IN HEAVEN TILL RESTITUTION OF ALL THINGS. 

to get a footing in the world though the heathenism of the 
empire had scarcely felt the blows of the " stone cut out of 
the mountain without hands," and the darkness that covered 
the earth had in no sensible degree fled before the beams of 
the Sun of Righteousness that, in this state of things, alto 
gether so infantile and immature, the Redeemer might never 
theless cut the matter short, and surprise both the Church and 
the world by his second coming ? To me this seems incred 
ible. And who will say that, in proportion as one got light 
on this point, he would be incapacitated for watching for the 
coming of Christ that, just as he discerned the true bearing 
of such announcements, his power to preserve the watchful 
attitude would necessarily diminish ? What sort of theory of 
" watching " must that be which can stand only with confused 
apprehensions of the mind of the Spirit which required men 
to mistake the true scope and intent of the Divine intimations 
regarding Christ s absence in the heavens, and which, just in 
proportion as they got their eyes opened to the vast work 
which it was emphatically declared had to be done ere Christ 
could return, left them under a helpless inability to look out 
and watch for their Lord? 

But it may be said, This is expecting too much from the 
Christians of early times as if they could have foreseen that, 
eighteen centuries after his departure, the Redeemer would 
be found still in the heavens. I answer, No. I suppose 
them to know nothing of the future but what they were 
bound to learn even from the Lord s own words. I know well 
enough how slow they were to receive the truth on this point. 
Some may think this was at most an amiable weakness, if not 
something better. I am not so sure of that ; nor will I con 
cede that those who, trembling at the word of the Lord, 
gathered from it that he would be long away, loved him and 
his appearing less than those who, in opposition to it, clung 
to their own dream of an immediate appearing. 

That the Lord himself gave no countenance to this notion 



CHRIST TO BE AWAY A LONG TIME TO TARRY. 39 

of a speedy return, is evident from the parable of The Pounds, 
which the evangelist tells us was spoken expressly for the 
purpose of putting it down. " He added and spake a parable, 
because he was nigh to Jerusalem, and because they thought 
that the kingdom of God should immediately appear. He said, 
therefore, A certain nobleman went into a far country, to re 
ceive for himself a kingdom, and to return." Then follows 
an account of the trust committed to his professed " servants," 
the refusal of his " citizens " to submit to him, and after full 
time allowed to the one party to submit to him, and to the 
other to repent of their rebellion of his return to try and 
pass sentence upon both. (Luke xix. 11-27.) Now, when 
I say that all this implies length of time, I only say what the 
evangelist expressly tells us, that Christ meant by this parable 
to teach, namely, that the kingdom of God was NOT (as they 
dreamt) immediately to appear.* 

I suppose it will be said that all the Lord meant to correct 
was the impression that the kingdom was to be set up " forth 
with" (xa^uygr^QL) on his reaching Jerusalem, at that very 



* "The preface to this parable," says Dr Homes, himself an ardent 
premillennialist, " is a golden key to open its meaning, that we may not 
rely upon a mere allegory. Christ spake this parable because he was 
nigh to Jerusalem, and because they thought that the kingdom of God 
should immediately appear. 1 It doth not deny the appearing of the king 
domChrist is for it; only, he is against the immediate appearance of it. 
He must before that go away into a far country, viz., to heaven, and 
leave talents in trust with his servants, giving them time to employ them, 
and be so long absent that his enemies grow bold enough to send after 
him with this high affront, that they would not have him to reign over 
them; that is, some seeming professors should, by his long absence, grow 
quite careless of improving the talents, or gifts of endowment, to his 
honour ; and others, by his delay (as they account it), should become pro 
fessed enemies against him." Resurrection Revealed, c., by Nathaniel 
Homes, D.D. 1654. Reprinted 1S33. Pp. 265, 266. 

"Two false hopes," says Lisco on the Parables, "in particular are 
pointed at in v. 11; the first, that this kingdom should be immediately, 
without any farther delay, set up, against which the intimation in the 
parable is directed, that it should necessarily be a long time before the 
return of the nobleman," &c. Fairbairn s Translation. 1840. P. 398. 



40 CHRIST TO BE AWAY A LONG TIME TO TARRY. 

Passover. Unfortunately for this view, the corresponding 
parable of The Talents sets it completely aside, showing that 
he meant to go much farther than this. There the period 
between the departure and the return of Christ is expressly 
called "a long time," (ftsra, ds fo kvv %%6vov, Matt. xxv. 19.)* 
Nay, the same truth the very mention of which is regarded 
by premillennialists with such jealousy, because it breaks 
down their theory is expressly taught in the immediately 
preceding parable of the Virgins : " While the bridegroom 
TARRIED (%gow^oi/rof) they all (wise as well as foolish) slum 
bered and slept." (Matt. xxv. 5.) Thus the Lord, in para 
bles intended to teach incessant icatchfulness, scruples not to 
warn his disciples against expecting his immediate return 
openly tells them that he would be found tarrying intimates 
that he would be away a long time. And as the express ob 
ject of these parables was to teach watchfulness, it is perfectly 
plain, that, fo his view, there was no inconsistency between 
watching for his return and believing that it was not to occur 
very soon ; and that, though the actual time of it would always 
be matter of uncertainty before it arrived, it was not to be 
expected that the interval would be a brief one.f But, 

* " nAu, multum. Non est absolut aceleritas adventus Domini." 
BKNGEL, ad Matt. xxv. 19. 

+ In CHRTSOSTOM S Homilies on this subject, we find the same union of 
these seemingly contradictory things : XJOV/JOVTO? SI ma Nu^/w <W<TT.I.I aZa-cu 

xxt xoi8tv?iov : EvTocyda, diixnvtrtv O jx c/Xi yoy TOV %06vov Itro^vov jrdf.iv rov u.iTU.gj rut 



" While the Bridegroom tarried, they all slumbered and slept. Here 
again he shows that the interval [between his departure and return] 
would not be a brief period; drawing off the disciples from the expectation 
that his kingdom would very immediately appear. For this was what 
they looked for. From this expectation therefore he perpetually beats them 
off. " He repeats the same sentiment a little farther on. (Horn. Ixxviii.) 
But how far the golden-mouthed preacher was from supposing that by 
such statements about the length of Christ s absence, he was lulling his 
hearers into carnal security, may be seen from such passages as the 
following, in the immediately preceding homily : Evs06 SV ,<tav0iK>.us <; 



THE IMPORTUNATE WIDOW. 41 

according to our new theory of watching, these things are 
perfectly incompatible ; insomuch that, unless you can per 
suade yourself that, for aught you know, the kingdom of 
glory may " immediately appear," after no " long time," and 
without any " tarrying" at all, you are incapacitated for watch 
ing for it.* 

But I have no done with this point. As if to put the 
matter beyond all doubt, the parable of The Importunate 
Widow (Luke xviii. 1-8) proceeds expressly on the supposition, 
and carries on its face the warning, that Christ s return would 
be so long delayed as not only to embolden the scoffers to 



TOVTO -riBfiffi, TO T- Kyfolo.; Su xrut x$Y,iriu,oy, XKI Tuvr/i xmut itutyutiovs ; 

" Hence then we learn that he doth not tarry. For this [ My Lord de- 
laycthhis coming ] is not the voice of the Master, but the sentiment of the 
wicked servant, for which accordingly he is censured. What then says 
the sequel ? He will come in a day when he looketh not for him, and in 
an hour when he is not aware, and will utterly destroy him. You sea 
how every where he inculcates this, showing how beneficial it is to be 
ignorant [of the time when the Lord will come], and thus keeping them 
always on the stretch." (Horn. Ixxvii.) 

* " It is worthy of remark," says Dr Urwick, " that tlie only errors 
mentioned in the New Testament respecting the time of our Lord s coming, all 
consist in dating it too early. I shall give several examples : 1st, The case 
of the servant represented as saying, My Lord delayeth his coming. 
..... The servant had taken up a wrong impression of the date when 
his Master was to be looked for; and as his Master did not show himself 
according to that false date, the servant, instead of distrusting his own 
understanding, memory, or calculation, as the case might be, acted on 
the assumption that his Master would not come as had been promised, 
and so acted to his ruin." (Has not this case been repeatedly realized 
among the expectants of the premillennial advent ?) The next case ad 
duced by Dr Urwick is that of the nobleman, on which we have commented 
above. " Besides correcting their mistake," says he, about an immediate 
appearing, " he intimates that both his second advent and the appearing 
of the kingdom of God were events then at a considerable distance; and 
the circumstance of his giving the parable to correct the mistake, shows 
it not to have been his will that they should look upon those events as at 
hand." Second Advent, pp. 46-48. 



42 THE THESSALONIAN EXCITEMENT. 

ask, " Where is the promise of his coming?" but to wear out 
the patience of all but " God s elect," and to try even them 
to the uttermost. I am at one with the premillennialists in 
applying this parable, in its primary historical reference, to 
the cry of the widowed Church for vengeance against her 
adversaries.* For this she is encouraged to "pray always, 
and not faint ;" for this she is forewarned she will have to 
" cry" to her Judge " day and night ;" and she is expressly 
taught that he will " bear long with her" ere he come to re 
dress her wrongs. At last he will come and " avenge her 

O O 

speedily : Nevertheless, when the Son of man cometh, shall 
he find faith in the earth ?" that is, as the connection shows, 
faith that he will come at all.f 

Need I ask now, whether the most moderate apprehension 
of the spirit of such explicit and reiterated announcements 
would inspire a primitive Christian with the belief that, for 
aught he knew, Christ might come any day, or within any 
such very limited period as that to which our theory restricts 
the possibility of watching for it ? 

But they did believe this (you say), and the apostle had 
enough to do to keep the Thessalonians calm in consequence ; 
so lifted were they with the expectation of their Lord s im 
mediate return. (2 Thess. ii. 1, &c.) 

True, alas ! but is not this just to admit, that that corrupt 
Jewish element that the kingdom of God should immediately 
appear which the Lord himself had sought to purge out 
from amongst his half-taught disciples, had nevertheless found 
its way into the infant Church, and troubled, unhinged, and 
imperiled it ? It took a stirring form in the Thessalonian 
Church. Their inexperienced minds and warm hearts were 

* " Xijj*, vidua, qusc facile Iseditur, nee facile dcfenditur inter homines. 
Talis eccksia mundo vidctur." BENGEL. 

f " Estque Sermo de Adventu ad vindictam, 2 Thess. i. 8, id est de ad- 
ventu ad novissimum judicium conspicuo; ut appellatio Filii hominia 
infert: Conf. c. xvii. 24, 20." Ibid. 



HOW TREATED BY THE APOSTLE. 43 

plied with the thrilling proclamation, "that THE DAY OF 
CHRIST WAS AT HAND," or " IMMINENT" (tvzerrixtv}. And how 
does the apostle meet their expectation ? He fearlessly 
crushes it ; gently insinuating that it had its origin rather in 
impositions practised upon them by false brethren, than in any 
spontaneous leanings to it among themselves. He " beseeches 
them, "by" (or rather, concerning*) " the coming of our Lord Jesus 
CJirist," which was dear to all alike, " and" the transporting 
prospect of " our gathering together unto him," to give no heed 
to the insinuation, from whatever quarter it might come, " that 
the day of Christ was at hand." 

No such entreaty, we may safely affirm, would ever come 
from a premillennialist at least of the modern school. He 
would be afraid of " destroying the possibility of watching." 
So much, indeed, is this warning in their way, that they take 
pains to show that our version conveys an erroneous impres 
sion of the apostle s meaning, and that the Thessaloniari 
notion was, that the coming of Christ was momentarily to 
be looked for. I quite agree with them. But what is gained 
by supposing that the Thessalonians thought themselves 
already in the thick of the events which were to usher in the 
second advent? For the question is not what the Thessalonians 
thought about the day of Christ, but what the apostle says in 
opposition to their thought. The writers I allude to affirm 
that the apostle meant only to deny that the day of Christ 
had begun, or Avas actually present, while he wrote that 
" the streaks of dawn " were to be then discerned that 

* "Tulf TT,{ ffK%ovo-i.{. " So Rom. ix. 27, val^ -rev l<r$->;A, concerning Israel. 
And though the other sense of vvlg be an unquestionable one, yet on a con 
sideration of the whole passage, taken in connection with chap. iv. of the 
former epistle, I think it less suitable here. He is going to speak to them 
on a subject concerning which they had been troubled, and the con 
nection of the verses immediately preceding, chap. i. 7-10, is marked by 
the particle S, but." (Hints for an Improved Translation of the New 
Testament, by the Rev. JAMES SCIIOLEFIELD, Regius Professor of Greek 
in the University of Cambridge, &c., 3d edition, pp. 115, 116.) 



44 IMPORT OF THE APOSTOLIC WARNING. 

the moment for his appearing had yet arrived. But what 
unbiased reader would so understand the passage ? Does 
not the apostle, in the following verses, expressly intimate 
that a long and complicated series of events had to be de 
veloped, the very commencement of which was retarded by 
an obstacle then in being while he wrote ? And is it con 
ceivable that, at the very time when he was announcing 
this, and announcing it for the very purpose of crushing the 
expectation of an immediate appearing, he should nevertheless 
have meant them to expect it any day, or very speedily ? * 
So manifestly does this famous passage in Thessalonians 

"It was not possible," says MEDE. the prince of premillennialists, 
and the most sagacious of the students of chronological prophecy, " the 
apostles should expect the end of the world to be in their own time, 
when they knew so many things were to come to pass before it as could 
not be fulfilled in a short time. As, 1. The desolation of Jerusalem, and 
that not till the seventy weeks were expired ; 2. The Jews to be carried 
captives over all nations, and Jerusalem to be trodden down of the 
Gentiles, until the times of the Gentiles should be fulfilled ; 3. That in 
the mean time the Roman empire must be ruined, and that which 
hindered be taken out of the way ; 4. That, after this was done, the Man 
of Sin should be revealed, and domineer his time in the temple and 

Church of God 7. That the time should be so long, that in the 

last days should come scoffers, saying, Where is the promise of his 
coming ? How is it possible they should imagine the day of doom to 
be so near, when all these things must first come to pass, and not one of 

them was yet fulfilled ? Notwithstanding all this, I make no 

question but, even in the apostles times, many of the believing Gentiles, 
mistaking the apostles admonitions to the Jews of the end of their state 
approaching, thought the end of the whole world, and the day of the 
Lord, had been also near; whom, therefore, St Paul (2 Thess ii.) be 
seeches to be better informed, because that day should not come until 
the apostasy came first, and the Man of Sin were revealed." (Apostasy 
of the Loiter Times, chap. xv. Works, book iii.) 

" The apostle s expression," says Bishop HORSLEY also a premillen- 
nialist speaking of the fourth chapter of 1st Thessalonians, " was so 
strong, that his meaning was mistaken, or as I rather think, misrepre 
sented. There seems to have been a sect in the apostolic age, in which 
sect, however, the apostles themselves were not, as some have absurdly 
maintained, included ; but there seems to have been a sect which looked 
for the resurrection in their own time. Some of these persons seem to 



DISTINCTION BETWEEN EVENTS AND PERIODS. 45 

destroy the modern theory of watching for the coming of 
Christ, that it has been found necessary to qualify the theory 
to some extent. Events, it is admitted, may be announced 
as preceding the second advent ; but " the interposition of 
an event is very different from the interposition of a period: 
the latter seems to be incompatible with watchfulness, but 
not the former; especially when the event is said to be 
already in progress, as is done by the apostle when he 
says, The mystery of iniquity doth already work. For this 
no time is given, and it is the absence of time that is the 
foundation of watchfulness : It is the presence of time as an 
element that destroys the possibility of watching ; and it is the 
absence of that element that produces the watchful spirit." * 

This distinction, however, between events and periods does 
nothing to save the new theory ; for, as we have seen, the 
events interposed by the Lord himself and by his apostles 
before the second advent, are such as no one in the apostolic 
age, rightly apprehending them, could imagine to be possibly 
over in his own day. To such, therefore, " the possibility of 
watching for Christ s coming" was as effectully "destroyed" 
by interposed events as by interposed periods. 

Besides, are not periods interposed as well as events ? So 
soon as the Apocalypse came into general circulation, the 
Church knew that Antichrist s career would extend over a 

have taken advantage of St Paul s expressions in this passage, to repre 
sent him as favouring their opinion. This occasioned the second epistle 
to the Thessalonians, in which the apostle peremptorily decides against 
that doctrine, maintaining that the Man of Sin is to be revealed, and a 
long consequence of events to run out, before the day of judgment can 
come ; and he desires that no expression of his may be understood of its 
speedy arrival ; which proves that whatever he had said of the day of 
his coming as at hand, was to be understood only of the certainty of that 
coming." (Senn. i.) In a previous part of the same sermon, the Bishop 
more fully develops the sense in which he understands the day of Christ 
to have been "at hand" in the apostles days. 

* Dr H. Bonar (Prophetical Landmarks, p. 91), quoted with approba 
tion by the Duke of Manchester, p. 281. 



46 DISTINCTION BETWEEN EVENTS AND PERIODS 

certain definite period expressed in the three forms of 
" days" " months," and " times." An attempt is made to 
blunt the force of this fact, by alleging that symbolical lan 
guage, and the shortest periods, were purposely selected, to 
prevent the Church being lulled into security by a plain dis 
closure of the time. It has not, however, deterred the writer 
whose argument I am now examining from lifting the veil, 
and intimating that a definite period of twelve hundred and 
sixty years was intended by these mystic numbers as the time 
of Antichrist s reign. He will, probably, console himself 
with the thought, that, living in a day when the expiry of 
this period may be speedily expected, he is in no danger of 
being lulled by his knowledge of the time, or hindered by it 
from watching for his Lord s coming. But did not others 
arrive at the same conclusion long ago, as to these 1260 years 
of Antichrist s reign ? As early, at least, as the Reformation, 
this was becoming the decided judgment of divines ; and as 
the views of the students of prophecy, after that, grew more 
definite, calculations were ventured on as to " the time of 
the end," most of which threw it considerably beyond their own 
day. This remark applies to some of the most eminent pre- 
millennialists, quite as much as to the other students of the 
prophetic word. Now, my question is, Did these good men 
and able divines destroy by their calculations the possibility of 
their watching for Christ ? Absurd surely it were to affirm 
this; and yet if not, how worthless is this whole theory of 
watching? * 

It might strengthen these remarks to advert to the view 
which the early chiliasts took of the dates. They appear, 
for example, to have adopted universally the Jewish tradition, 

* These remarks on the 12GO years do not apply to those (such as the 
Duke of Manchester) who take the " days 1 1 literally, as denoting just 
three years and a half. I cannot go into that question here; and am con 
tent to leave the matter, as far as they are concerned, to rest upon the 
events interposed before the second advent, which I think quite sufficient 
to settle it, independently of the periods. 



UNAVAILING EARLY CHILIASTS LACTANTIUS. 47 

that, after a six thousand years duration of the world, there 
would be a sabbatical millenary ; and, as they identified this 
with the millennial reign of Christ and his saints, it is not 
very easy to see how, with all their ignorance of the true 
chronology of the world, they could look for the second 
advent quite so soon as the new theory requires. * One thing 
is certain, that LACTANTIUS a chiliast of the fourth century 
did not look for the second advent sooner than about two 
hundred years ; and this, be it observed, he gives as the result 
of inquiries into the subject by all those most skilled in such 
matters, f 

* " This statement," says Mr Wood, (p. 398), "exposes unpardonable 
ignorance on Mr Brown s part. Cyprian, who died, A. D. 258, speaks of 
the six thousand years as nearly run out in his time ; and he, I believe, 
is the first of the fathers who makes use of that tradition to fix the date 
of the advent." Those who accuse others of ignorance should take especial 
care to be well informed themselves. Mr Wood gives Mr Elliott as his 
authority for his historical statements ; but his authority is against him. 
"Among the Christian fathers," says Mr Elliott, " that succeeded on the 
apostolical age, this view of the matter (the tradition of a sabbatical 
millennium of the world) was universally received and promulgated." 
(Elliott s Ilorce, iv. 229, fourth edition.) So far from Cyprian being the 
first of the fathers to make use of this tradition, I had read it from Bar 
nabas downwards, long before I saw Mr Elliott s extracts. It is with 
regret that I repeat this note, and only in case this offensive charge 
should meet the eye of my readers. 

t " Fortasse nunc quispiam requirat, quando ista quse diximus sint 
futura : jam superius ostendi. Completis annorum sex millibus, muta- 
tionem ipsam fieri oportere : et jam propinquare ilium summum conclu- 
sionis extremae diem, de signis, quaa a prophetis dicta sunt, licet noscere. 
Prsedixerunt enim signa, quibus consummatio temporum expectanda sit 
nobis in singulos dies, atque timenda. Quando tamen compleatur hcec 
summa, decent ii qui de temporibus scripserunt, colligentes ex literis 
sanctis, et ex variis historiis, quantus sit numerus annorum ab exordio 
mundi: qui licet varient, et aliquantulum numeri eorum summa dissen- 
tiat, omnis tamen expectatio non amplius quam ducentorum videtur 
annomm. " (Div. INSTIT. lib. vii. c. xxv.) 

Mr Wood charges me with misrepresenting Lactantius in the text. 
If so, I have at least provided the antidote, by printing his own 
words. Lactantius s object and mine being different, there is naturally 



48 EXCITEMENT ON THE SUBJECT OF CHRIST S COMING. 

In concluding our investigation of the question of time, as 
it affects the duty of watching for Christ s coming, I would 
fain leave on the reader s mind the spirit of that apostolic 
warning to the Thessalonians on which I have been animad 
verting. The apostle does more than correct the error about 
the imminency of the day of Christ: he alludes also to the 
way in which they were solicited on the subject, and the 
effects which the delusion would produce upon their minds. 
He Avarns them against being practised upon, either, first, 
" by spirit" a pretended spirit of prophecy, foretelling the 
nearness of the advent ; or, secondly, " by word " any sup 
posed testimony uttered in favour of this view of the advent 
by him or other inspired men ; or, thirdly, " by letter as from 
us" forged letters from the apostle himself, announcing 
" that the day of Christ was" chronologically " at hand." 
Now, if the premillennialists be right, if both their doctrine 
and their way of urging it be scriptural, is it not strange 
that designing men, instead of teaching the DISTANCE, should 
have set themselves systematically to urge the NEARNESS of 
Christ s coming that they should have found their interest 
to lie so much in possessing the Church with the belief of 
Christ s nearness, as to lay false prophecy, pretended aposto 
lic discourses, and forged letters all under contribution, to 
give currency and weight to this view of the advent ? It 
would be an interesting inquiry, what such parties could 
gain by the reception of that opinion? Perhaps the history 
of religious delusions would throw some light on this ques 
tion. I think it would not be difficult to show that some of 
the prime delusions to which powerful but enthusiastic and 

a difference in the mode of expression. His object was to show how 
near the end probably was not extending beyond two hundred years ; 
and it was the specification of this period which alone I wished to mark. 
Mr Wood quotes a passage from Dods on the Incarnation, in disparage 
ment of Lactantius. It is no interest of mine to defend him, though I 
tind his aid accepted freely enough bypremillennialists when it suits them. 



ITS EVILS. 49 

feverish minds have given birth, have been associated with 
the very expectation to which the apostle refers, and have 
derived from that expectation a pabulum which has rallied 
them when otherwise languishing, and without which they 
would neither have had the attractions which invested them 
while they lived, nor have been kept so long from sinking 
into the merited oblivion which at length they have found. 
Whether it was some perception of this that filled the apos 
tle with such alarm at the notion in question, and such 
anxiety to dislodge it, we shall not affirm. But his beseech 
ing tone, the particularity with which he notices it, the sys 
tematic way in which he sets himself to meet it, and the 
singularly ample detail with which he lays out the scheme of 
events that would throw the advent into the distant future all 
show that he saw some peculiar evils in the womb of that 
notion, and contemplated with concern and grief its possible 
progress in the church. Of what sort these evils would be, 
we have a hint given us in the two pregnant words by which 
he describes the effects of the notion upon those who give 
heed to it. He beseeches them not to be " soon," or quickly, 
as by sudden impulse, " shaken in mind" (tfaXsi^Jjva;) agi 
tated disturbed ; or to be " troubled" (Sgos?<rt)a; as one is 
on " hearing of wars and rumours of wars," Matt. xxiv. 6, 
Gr.) by the assertion, " that the day of Christ was at hand." 
The thing pointed at is such an arrestment of the mind as 
tends to unnerve it; a feverish excitement, which tends to 
throw the mind off its balance, and so far unfit it for the 
duties of life as in the rumours of wars of which the parallel 
passage makes mention the very opposite of that tranquil 
and bright expectancy which realizes the certainty rather 
than the chronology of the Lord s coming. And I would 
appeal to the whole history of premillennialism, whether 
this feverish excitability has not been found a prevailing ele 
ment, and the .parent of not a little that is erratic both in 
doctrine and in practice. 



50 DIFFERENCE BETWEEN FEVERISH EXPECTATION 

Thus have I weighed all that has been advanced to provo 
the impossibility of watching for Christ s coming on the 
common view of it, or rather on any view of it which does 
not admit of our expecting it almost any moment. I have 
done so with a minuteness and at a length which, if the intrin 
sic force of the objection scarcely demanded, the stress laid 
upon it by the most recent premillennialists and its apparent 
plausibility may well excuse. I think I have shown it to be 
entirely fallacious ; and not only so, but that it is the very 
notion which the apostle characterises as feverish, and sets 
himself to crush, as usurping the place of the tranquil and 
truly quickening expectation of " our" simultaneous " gather 
ing together unto Him," at his glorious appearing. It is high 
time that the immense difference between these two expecta 
tions should be brought out and realized. Till that be done, 
one can scarcely obtain a hearing with some ardent minds. 
They are so afraid of being thrown off their watch for the 
coming of Christ, that unless they think every thing ripe and 
ready for his coming to-morrow, they do not see how they 
can be kept in the scriptural attitude of " looking for him." 
Having exposed the fallacy on which this is founded, we 
shall no more be borne down by the question, How the com 
mon view can possibly stand with the scriptural prominence 
of the Lord s coming, and the required watchfulness of the 
church in the view of it ? Holding that to be a settled point, 
we shall refuse to be again crossed in the open field of scrip 
tural inquiry. In point of chronology, " the day of Christ 
was" not " at hand" in Paul s tune, and he was positively 
fearful lest it should be thought that it was. Some day, of 
course, it will be chronologically at hand ; but, as this in 
volves a question of dates and times as to which men are 
liable to mistake, and some in the primitive church did mis 
take, and had to be told explicitly that they were under a 
delusion the apostle would have us not mix up with the 
great and stirring certainties of the Lord s impending advent 



AND THE PATIENCE OF HOPE. 51 

any speculations, however lawful or even laudable in their 
own place, about the chronological nearness of it. If it was 
" at hand" eighteen centuries ago if, when the beloved 
disciple was in rapt communication with him at Patmos, 
Jesus could greet him with the glad announcement, " Behold, 
I come quickly " and no deception faith can now, precisely 
as then, echo that disciple s sweet response, " Amen : Even 
so, come, Lord Jesus." For faith lays hold, not on chronolo 
gical dates or arithmetical calculations useful though these 
are in their own place but on " the Strength of Israel, 
who will not lie," as he speaks in the promises of his blessed 
Word. What faith believes, hope brings near. To the hope 
of the believer, even as to the Lord himself, " a thousand 
years are as one day" Though chronologically far off, if so 
it should be found no matter. Faith sees him coming 
" leaping upon the mountains and skipping upon the hills." 
And neither, on the one hand, in the spirit of sloth and 
carnality, which says, " My Lord delayeth his coming," nor, 
on the other hand, in the spirit of fanatical and excited ex 
pectation as to a present appearance ; but in that sublime 
state of mind which the apostle calls " the PATIENCE OF HOPE," 
it is the privilege of faith to say alike when chronologically 
far off and chronologically near, and as it were in holy defi 
ance of mere dates, because ready for them all alike " Make 
haste, my Beloved, and be thou like to a roe or to a young 
hart upon the mountains of spices !" (Cant. viii. 14.) 



CHAPTER III. 

THE CHURCH, OR MYSTICAL. BODY OF CHRIST, COMPLETE AT 
HIS COMING. 

OUR preliminary inquiries being now concluded, the way is 
open for bringing out the mind of the Spirit on the great 
question at issue, namely, Whether the fleshly state at the 
second advent, instead of coming to an end, will only be then 
reconstituted and inaugurated as one of the departments of 
a millennial kingdom ; whether, after one portion of Christ s 
people have appeared with him in glory, for ever beyond the 
experience of imperfection and the reach of evil, another por 
tion of them will be left below for a thousand years in their 
mortal bodies, subject to all the imperfections of the life of 
faith and the state of grace, as contradistinguished from the 
glory of the risen and changed saints. The Scripture evi 
dence against this theory I propose to arrange under a series 
of propositions, the first of which will occupy the present 
chapter. 

PROPOSITION FIRST: 

THE CHURCH WILL BE ABSOLUTELY COMPLETE AT CHRIST S 
COMING. 

If this can be established, the whole system falls to the 
ground. If all that are to be saved will be brought in before 
Christ comes, of course there can be none to come in after 



" THEY THAT ARK CHRIST S AT HIS COMIXG." 53 

his advent, and in that case the lower department of the ex 
pected kingdom disappears. 

The difficulty here is not to find proof of the point, but 
any thing like evidence to the contrary. N"o plain reader of 
the Bible ever doubts that the Church will be completed ere 
Christ comes; not a few even of the premillennialists them 
selves have been constrained to admit it with what effect 
upon the sobriety of their own views we shall by and by see; 
and even those who deny it, give evidence of the extreme 
weakness of their ground, and virtually concede the point, 
by admitting that " the Bride " of Christ will be complete, 
though they contend that the whole number of the saved 
whom they distinguish from " the Bride " will not. 

The following passages are quite decisive : 

1 Cor. xv. 23. " But each ( Ixcc/rms $1) in his own order : Christ 
the first-fruits; afterward they that are Christ s AT HIS COMING." 

Any one who even glances at this sublime chapter will 
see, that the burden of it is the resurrection of believers in 
general of " them that are Christ s," considered as the se 
cond Adam. As their death is deduced from their federal 
relation to the first Adam, so their resurrection is argued 
from their federal connection with the second. " As in 
Adam (they) all die, even so in Christ shall (they) all be 
made alive."* And it is immediately after this that the 
apostle says, " But each (party) in his own order " that is, 
the federal Head and those federally related to him " Christ 
tlie first-fruits ; afterward they that are Christ s (the full har 
vest) at his coming." 

Can any thing be more decisive than this ? What commen- 

* So I incline to understand the words, the resurrection of believers 
being the one only case to which the apostle speaks throughout the chap 
ter. But however this be, my argument from the passage will remain 
the same, provided it be admitted that the party or parties federally re 
lated to the first and second Adams are discoursed of as a whole, and not 
ia fragmentary portions or classes. 



54 " THEY THAT ARE CHRIST S AT HIS COMING." 

tator explains it otherwise?* What unbiased reader ever 
understood it otherwise ? Is it not, then, a very bold liberty 
with the Word of God to say, that only a fractional part of 
" them that are Christ s" are here spoken of? that it means 
only such of them as shall have lived before the millennium? 
that there will be millions of " them that are Christ s," that 
will not be " made alive at his coming," but remain in their 
mortal and unglorified state upon earth for at least a thou 
sand years thereafter ? Here, on the contrary, we find the 
whole federal offspring of the second Adam made alive together 
at his coming. As surely as " Christ, the first-fruits " of 

* " Nihil," says LUTHER on this verse, " de privata resurrectione agitur, 
quomodo unus atque alter a rn.ortu.is surrexerit, sed de communi resurrec 
tione, deque illius caussa et capite, quod est Christus Ipse enim 

sua hora surrexit, ita nos quoque, ubi hora nostra venerit, quoque resur- 
gemus et ipsum sequemur. Neque enim ante nos excitare statuit, quam 

omnes simul quotquot ipsius sumus congregari fuerimus Hoc enim 

series et ordo postulant, ut ipse primus sit, qui strata via fores (quod dici- 
tur) aperiret et immortalitatem apportaret : Deinde omnia sua membra 
ordine congregaret, quibus resurrectio ab ceterno destinata est, ut uno die 
omnes Christiani simul (that is, as the connection shows, all Christ s 
members, eternally ordained to life and resurrection) in lucem prodirent 
quem ipse ordinavit, atque ita cum eo pcrpetuo viverent. . . . Ita Christus 

in suo, et nos in nostro ordine manemus Neque enim clanculum 

aut in angulo ista agcntur, ut hie unus alibi alius resurgat, sed propa- 
lam, universe mundo inspectante, mortc, peccato, et omnibus acerbitati- 
busjuxta obolitis, et prater vitam et gaudium perenne nihil erit reliqui. " 
Enarr, in xv. cap. i. Cor. 

" Quemadmodum," says CALVIN, " in primitiis, totius anni proventus 

consecrabatur, ita vis resurrectionis Christi ad nos omnes diffunditur. 

. . . Christus, cujus officium est nobis restituere quee in Adam per- 

didimus, nobis vitas causa est ; ejusque resurrectio hypostasis et pignus 

est nostrse Satis sit nobis, quod nunc in Christo habemus primi- 

tias: nobis autem adventus ejus tempus erit ad resurgendum." 

" Paulus," says BENGEL, -who held in some things with the premillen- 
nialists, " loquitur hie de piis, quorum ia-a^, primitice, Christus est ; 
atque hi, ut in Adamo omnes moriuntur, sic etiam in Christo omnes vivifi- 
cabuntur. O; D Xjio-ToS, qui sunt Christi: Suave polyptoton, Xj/o-,-, 
X^iTTtiu. Christian! sunt quasi appendix ivs a.^a.^s, primitiarum. E 
if Tcu<rfa KVft,u in adventu ejus: Turn erit ordo Christianorum, 1 Thesa 
iv. 1C. Non alii post alias resurgent illo tempore.* 



" THEY THAT ARE CHRIST S AT HIS COMING." 55 

Ills covenanted people, " was made alive in Ms order," so surely 
shall " they that are Christ s be made alive in their order at 
(g v) his coming." * 

The next passage I have to adduce in proof of the com 
pleteness of the Church at Christ s coming, is 

Eph. v. 25-27. " Christ also loved the Church, and gave him 
self for it; that he might sanctify and cleanse it with the 
washing of water by the word ; that he might present it to 
himself a glorious Church, not having spot, or wrinkle, or 
any such thing; but that it should be holy, and without 
blemish." 

It is impossible to doubt what " Church" is here meant, 
for it is defined by three bright unmistakeable marks within 
the bosom of the passage itself. It is " the Church which 
Christ loved" from everlasting, " the Church for which he 
gave himself in the fulness of time, " the Church which he 
is now sanctifying and cleansing by the word," as " with the 
washing of water:" It is THIS CHURCH, even the WHOLE 

LOVED, RANSOMED, AND PURIFIED COMPANY, which Christ 
will " PRESENT (flttgatfrjjfljj) TO HIMSELF a GLORIOUS ClIURCH." 

Calvin takes the allusion to be to the bridal beauty in which 
the Church will be presented to her Lord.f Bengel does the 
same.J And as this apostle tells the Corinthians that he had 

* All that is said in reply to this is, that the apostle is treating only of 
Christians living before the coming of Christ, which does not hinder us 
from believing that there will be others to come after that event. But 
my argument is, that the subject of discourse in this chapter is the whole 
federal offspring of the second Adam the whole saving fruit of Christ s 
work, in contrast with the ruins of the broken covenant. I believe it 
impossible to overthrow this, which subverts the whole premillennial 
system. 

t " Hanc quidcm primum sub figura dcscribit, quoc argumento conve- 
niebat. Ut sit speciosa, inquit. Namsicuti formos elegantia in uxore causa 
est amoris, ita Christus ecclesiam, Sponsam suam, ornat sanctitate, ut 
sit hoc benevolentise pignus." 

J ""! xa.^a.fffv.fr, IxurS, ut sisteret sibi ipsi : tanquam Sponso "E3efe, 
gloriosam : Ex amore Christi debemus haurirc sestirnationem sanctifica- 
tionis. Quoe Sponsa contemnit ornatum a Sponso oblatum ? " 



56 PRESENTATION OP THE CHURCH TO CHRIST 

espoused them " to one Husband, that he might present them 
(KagaffTqffai} as a chaste virgin to Christ" (2 Cor. xi. 2), there 
can be no doubt, I think, that they are right. Well, when 
is this to be ? Clearly " at his coming." But should any 
hesitate about this, I will put it beyond doubt by comparing 
it with two or three passages, in which the same delightful 
truth is expressed, and nearly in the same terms. 

2 Thess. i. 10. "He shall come to be glorified in his saints, 
and to be admired in all them that have believed* in that 
day." 

The party in this passage is the same as in the former : 
there called " the Church" loved, purchased, and purified from 
every stain ; here, " his saints" " all them that have believed." 
The purpose in view, too, is in both passages the same. In 
the former, to present it to himself " a glorious Church;" in 
the latter, " to be glorified in his saints, and admired in all 
them that believe" to be greeted with the "admiration" 
and get the "glory" which is his due, when beheld by the 
side of his spotless and resplendent Church, as its Life, Head, 
and Husband IN THAT DAY of his second coming. This is 
decisive. As it determines the time of presentation, so equally 
the party presented, by definitions not to be misunderstood. 
To the same effect, 

Jude 24. " Now unto Him that is able to keep you from fall 
ing, and to present you faultless before the presence of his 
glory with exceeding joy, &c. (<rrij<ran xanv/u^mv). 

Here the thing to be done, and, beyond all doubt, the 
time of doing it, are the same as in the two former passages. 
So precisely in two other passages : 

Col. i. 21,22. "And you, that were sometime alienated, and 
enemies in your mind by wicked Avorks, yet now hath he 

* To7e aiff nCffa.ffit is probably the preferable reading. On this reading 
Mr Bickersteth founds a very slender argument for there being some 
to believe ajter " that day." 



AT HIS COMING. 57 

reconciled in the body of his flesh through death, to present 
you holy, and uublameable, and unreproveable in his sight" 
(j!ta.^a.a<rrtira.t xaTtiuitmi). 

1 Thess. iii. 13. " To the end he may stablish your hearts un- 
blameable in holiness before God, even our Father, at the 
coming of our Lord Jesus Christ with all his saints." 

Here we have the additional idea of the presentation of 
the Church, not only to Christ, as a Bride to her Husband, 
but of both to the Father at the second advent. 

And now, I think it impossible to resist the combined 
force of these passages. One broad magnificent conception 
pervades them all 

The absolute completeness of the Church at Christ s com 
ing* 

The spotless purity in which it will then be presented, " as 
a chaste virgin," to Christ, 

The resplendent glory in which, as " the Bride, the Lamb s 
wife," she shall then be " adorned for her Husband," 

The praise which will redound from such a spectacle to 
the Redeemer himself, 

The rapturous admiration of Him which it will kindle, and, 

The ineffable complacency with which the whole will be 
regarded by " God, even our Father." 

Thus have I established the completeness of the Church at 
Christ s coming. I have limited myself to a few passages, on 
the import of which all commentators, ancient and modern, 
are agreed* (one or two others will occur by and by) ; but it 
is written as with a sunbeam on the pages of the New Testa 
ment, and those who call it in question, are driven to seek 
support from highly figurative portions of Old Testament 
prophecy, and from the corresponding book of the New Tes- 

* Perhaps 1 should not exactly say all, for of what interpretation could 
this be said ? But certainly the unanimity is overwhelming. 



58 TILE OPPOSITE VIEW DESTITUTE OF SUPPORT. 

tament, the Apocalypse. Now, it is an old maxim in divinity, 
that doctrines are not to be built upon prophetic or symbolical 
scripture.* The principle is one of undoubted soundness, 
and of indispensable necessity as a bulwark against the abuse 
of figurative language. Premillennialism, however, is one en 
tire product of the reverse of this principle ; and, in the case 
before us, it can produce nothing in proof of the incomplete 
ness of the Church at Christ s coming, but what is studded 
all over with figures. How slender is the support derived 
even from this source, I shall now show. 

The following are the passages chiefly relied on : 

Zech. xiv. 5. "The Lord my God shall come, and all the saints 
with thee." (^SJ? LXX. fiir avrov, reading i?3^ with 
him.}-\- 

Here, it is said, is Christ s second coming with all his 
saints before the millennium, when their number is confessedly 
incomplete. " All the saints," therefore, must mean here 
only all living before that time ; and if here, why not every 
where ? 

My answer to this is twofold. First, The best interpre 
ters, including some premillennialists, take " the saints" here 
to mean the holy angels (as in Deut. xxxiii. 2 ; Dan. viii. 13, 
&c.), as ministers of divine vengeance. I was inclined to 

* Thcologia prophefica non est argumentativa. Mr Wood thinks this 
maxim inapplicable to subjects themselves prophetical. But the great 
fault of premillennialists is, that they mix up those great catholic doc 
trines of the second coming of Christ, the resurrection, the judgment, and 
its final issues which are written as with the point of a diamond in 
the New Testament with a profusion of particular prophetic events, of 
a local and changeable character, which are for the most part couched in 
figures and symbols. This is what I refer to. 

J- Mr Wood justly complains of this passage being discussed in a mere 
note in the first two editions. It was an oversight ; but when asked, be 
fore the work appeared in the United States, if I had any thing to alter, 
this was the one correction which I requested might be made. The 
correction came too late for the American edition, but it is now made. 



THE OPPOSITE VIEW DESTITUTE OF SUPPORT. 59 

think otherwise, but Old Testament usage seems decidedly 
in favour of it. In this case, I think, the passage proves 
nothing. But, waiving this, my principal answer is, that it 
has never been proved, nor I believe can be, that the " com 
ing" spoken of in this chapter is the second personal advent 
of Christ. The minute details of this prediction all to be 
taken literally in that case are totally irreconcilable with 
" the burning up of the earth and the works that are therein," 
which is to signalise the second coming of Christ (2 Pet. iii. 
10). The majority of commentators apply the prophecy to 
the destruction of Jerusalem by the Romans, when the Lord 
" came" to establish on the ruins of a carnalized and faithless 
Judaism the kingdom of his grace.* In this case, of course, 
it has nothing to do with our subject. But even if we apply 
the prophecy to the conflicts -which are to usher in the millen 
nial kingdom which good interpreters think the sequel of 
the chapter obliges us to do the sense will be very much the 
same.f 

But however this passage is to be expounded, since the 
whole context is highly figurative and involved in difficulty, 
as is evident from the diversities among commentators, it 
shows great poverty of solid proof to appeal to it so frequently 
and confidently on a question confessedly of vast moment, 
and on which the New Testament abounds in the plainest 
statements. 

* "The language," says LUTHER " suits well with the last day, but the 
preceding context does not harmonize with that sense." (Enarr. in cap. 
xiv., Proph. Zach.) 

f Rev. xvii. 14. " These shall make war with the Lamb, and the Lamb 
shall overcome them, for he is Lord of lords, and King of kings ; and they 
that are WITH HIM (pi? OCUTOU) are called, and chosen, and faithful." Ch. 
xiv. 1. " And I looked, and lo, the Lamb (so Tisch. and Treg.) stood on 
the Mount Zion, and WITH HIM (pir a.liw] an hundred and forty and four 
thousand." Efv< piti tiiot (Time.) ab alicujus parlilus stare, JELF, $ 636. 
1. Also Rev. xii. 7: "Michael and his angels (Christ and his friends in. 
plain flesh and blood) fought with the dragon and his angels" (Satan, 
wielding the forces of Paganism against the early Christians.) 



60 THE OPPOSITE VIEW DESTITUTE OP SUPPORT. 

Rev. xix. 6-9. " And I heard as it were the voice of a great 
multitude, and as the voice of many waters, and as the 
voice of mighty thunderings, saying, Alleluia : for the 
Lord God omnipotent reigneth. Let us be glad and re 
joice, and give honour to him : for the marriage of the 
Lamb is come, and his wife hath made herself ready. 
And to her was granted that she should be arrayed iu 
fine linen, clean and white : for the fine linen is the right 
eousness of saints. And he saith unto me, Write, Blessed are 
they which are called unto the marriage supper of the Lamb. 
And he saith unto me, These are the true sayings of God." 

The argument here is, that the marriage of the Lamb with 
his Bride, or the Church, is said to take place immediately 
after the fall of Antichrist, or before the millennium, when 
the number of the elect will certainly not be complete. 

In reply to this, it may be enough to say that this cannot 
be the actual consummation of the marriage between Christ 
and his Church in glory, because in the two last chapters of 
this book (which most of my opponents agree with me in 
referring to the everlasting state) the Church is described as 
" descending," after the millennium is all over, " as a bride 
adorned for her husband ; " and it is rather awkward to sup 
pose a bridal preparation and a presentation of the parties 
to each other a thousand years after the union has been con 
summated. * " Christ s marriage with his Church," says 
DURHAM, " is three ways spoken of in Scripture : 1. As it 
cometh by the offer of the gospel, wherein many are es 
poused, and by faith engaged to him (2 Cor. xi. 2.) 
Thus it hath been since Christ s days; his marriage was 
then, and many were and are invited (Matt. xxii. &c.) 

* BENGEL. HTot/uaa-iv laur>,v, paravit se, i.e. coepit parare so, ul tntritrnuxet, 
tfyaa /ixa., yXxixa, nactus sum fidem, c. DE NUPTIIS ISTIS, vide c. xxi. 2, 9. ss. 

Mr Wood derives another argument in favour of his views from the 
distinction made in this passage between those " called to the marriage 
supper of the Lamb," and the Bride. This, however, with the singular 
distinctions drawn from Ps. xlv. (Last Things, pp. 24, 25) will be con 
sidered by and by. 



THE OPPOSITE VIEW DESTITUTE OF SUPPORT. 61 

2. As it is consummated and perfected at the end, when the 
Queen is brought to the King, and abideth with him for 
ever (Ps. xlv.) 3. There is an intervening step, when the 
fulness of the Gentiles and the Jews shall be brought in 
together: that is marrying eminently, because it is the 
grafting again of the old branches, and the bringing back 

of a divorced wife, for a time forsaken And as in 

Scripture there is a threefold resurrection (namely, 1. By 
the gospel, which was and is alway, John v. 14 ; 2. At the 
end, which is general, as the first is partial ; 3. When Jews 
and Gentiles shall come in together, which is, Eom. xi., as 
life from the dead, which is between the two former) so 
may we consider the Church s marriage, which is the same 
with the resurrection, in a threefold consideration also. It 
is not the first nor the second marriage that is mentioned 
here; for it is, in a singular way, such a marriage as was 
not before, and the last end is not intended here; for the 
last marriage doth not comprehend an accession to the mili 
tant Church, as this doth here, going along Avith the Pope s 
overthrow before the end." (Commentary upon the Book of 
the Revelation, 1658, ad loc.) 

Rev. xxi. 24. " And the nations [of them which are saved *] 
shall walk in the light of it (the New Jerusalem), and 
the kings of the earth do bring their glory and honour 
into it." 

It is surprising that any thing should be made of such a 
passage as this. For, as " the kings of the earth bring their 
glory and honour (g/ g) UNTO or INTO the New Jerusalem," the 
state of both must be the same the receptacle and the things 
received into it must be homogeneous. If " the kings of the 
earth" mean potentates living in the flcsli, and if their 
" glory and honour " mean their regal wealth and influence, 
then " the New Jerusalem " into which they enter, bringing 

* The words enclosed in brackets (rSv rego/tltm) arc excluded from the 
text by all critical editors as wanting in MS. authority. 



C2 THE OPPOSITE VIEW DESTITUTE OF SUPPORT. 

this with them, must mean an earthly state of the Church. 
If, on the other hand, the " New Jerusalem " mean the glori 
fied state of the Church, then " the kings " who bring their 
glory and honour unto or into it, cannot mean the sovereigns 
of the earth living in the flesh, nor can their " glory and 
honour " mean any thing earthly, because " flesh and blood 
can not inherit the kingdom of God, neither doth corruption 
inherit incorruption." Accordingly, though commentators are 
divided as to whether the two last chapters of Revelation 
denote the heavenly state, or a bright state of the Church 
upon earth, they agree in applying the whole verse before us 
to the one or the other of these states, but not to both. Thus 
Vitringa and others apply it to the Church on earth, * despite 
the " impudence " which Augustine thought it would require 
to venture on such a view : f while, on the other hand, 
Durham, March, and the majority of commentators, apply 
it to the Church in glory under the idea of a confluence of 
all that can be conceived of regal magnificence and grandeur 
to adorn that blessed state. J 

Such, then, are the passages relied on to prove that the 

* " Post longa tempora persecutionum, afflictionum, et calamitatum 

magno numero implcrent novam hanc Civitatem Populi Dei, et 

ad earn constitucndam et exornandam undique conflucrcnt ; turn quoque 
Principes, Reges, Imperatores, Christo et Ecclesise ejus scrvaturi, suam 
gloriam, majcstatem, vires, in earn inferrent; hoc est, in ejus converte- 
rent usum utilitatemque," &c. Anakris. Apocalyps. ad loc. 

t " Nam hoc de isto tempore accipere quo regnat [ecclesia] cum Rege 
suo mille annis impudentise nimise milii videtur." De. Civ. Dei, lib. xx. 
cap. xvii. 

J " Magis placet, quod est apud Durliamum, tantam fore civitatis hujus 
gloriam, ut pra3 ilia reges omnes regnorum gloriam deserant ; vel quasi 
omnes reges omnem suam conferrent, ut locum suum gloriosum red- 
derent, sic ut phrasis hsec ad extern! emblematis decus spectet." 
MAECKII in Apoc. Comm. ad loc. 

I observe Mr Wood s remarks on this passage (p. 27), but they amount 
to nothing more than a denial of any incongruity between kings in flesh 
with their material wealth, and the celestial glory of the risen saints. 
Let the reader judge. 



WHAT DO PREMILLENNIALISTS SAY TO THIS ? G3 

Church, or the whole mystical body of Christ, will not be 
complete at his second coming. I think I have proved that 
it will; and I appeal to the reader if any thing, I say not 
of equal weight, but even of weight at all, is adduced in 
opposition to it. Other arguments, however, abundantly 
confirming the position I have laid down, will occur in the 
sequel. 

If Christ, then, when he comes the second time, is to 
reign on the earth for a thousand years, it will not be over 
believing men still left in their mortal bodies upon earth. 
Living Christianity will have disappeared from the earth : 
The number of the elect accomplished, the whole body of 
Christ transfigured, and thus prepared, as a Bride adorned for 
her Husband, " will with gladness and rejoicing have been 
brought will have entered into the King s palace." This 

is " OUR GATHERING TOGETHER UNTO HIM," * this IS " THE 
UNIVERSAL CONCOURSE AND ASSEMBLY OF THE FIRST-BORN 

REGISTERED IN HEAVEN," f for which preparation is now 
making, and to which every believer is in spirit already 
joined. 

What do the premillennialists say to this ? It divides them 
into two classes : one class boldly avowing the completeness 
of the Church before the millennium, and doing their best, 
by various adjustments of their system, to avoid the harsh 
consequences which flow from it ; while the other class, re 
coiling from the conclusions, take refuge in a denial of the 
premises from which they flow affirming that the Church, 
so far from being complete at Christ s coming, will have 
an accession of myriads of believers after his coming, 
from among the Jews and Gentiles over whom he is to 

* Hpuv \xi<rvi&.yuyri in* a,lnot. 2 ThcSS. ii. 1. 

"f" T\.a.rf,yvis %.,} \.%z\ r,tr ia, XZOTOTOXIOV It e ; ju.voif caro^fy^K/^/^it/ini. Heb. xiL 

23. 



G4 TWO GREAT DIVISIONS ON THIS POINT. 

reign. Let us try it both ways, and see where we are on 
either supposition. 

FIRST : Let us hear one or two of the former class who 
place the Reign upon earth after the completion of all the 
elect. 

Homes, a contemporary of Mede, two centuries ago, placed 
the conflagration, the creation of the new heavens and new 
earth, the resurrection of all the deceased, and the change 
of all the living saints embracing the whole number of the 
elect before the millennium. 

" In that new creation," says he, " Christ restores all things to 
their perfection, and every believer to his ; to the end that all 
believers may jointly and co-ordinately rule over the whole world, 
and all things therein, next under Christ their Head. I say all, 
and not a part only, as some unwarily publish. And I say jointly, 
and not one part of saints to usurp authority over the rest, as 
many dream. And co-ordinately, all upon equal terms, not some 
saints to rule by deputies made of the rest of saints, as men seem 
to interpret." * 

But will there be no other men on the new earth besides 
these risen and changed saints to perpetrate the rebellion 
and suffer the perdition perdicted, at the end of the thousand 
years ? Yes, myriads ; but all unconverted and inconvertible. 
None but " open and obstinate ungodly men " being des 
troyed by the conflagration, the rest will be " reserved 
out of the fire to be an appendix of the new creation, as 
Lactantius, Sixtus, Senensis, and Dr Twisse understand." 
These, " by virtue of the Adamic covenant, shall be restored 
in soul and body to the natural perfection which Adam 
had in the state of innocency; but being mutable, they 
shall fall, when in like manner they are assaulted by Satan. 
Out of these shall spring the brood of Gog and Magog." 

"The Church, being now as heaven on earth, the false-hearted 
spawn of future Gog and Magog shall be remote on earth, near 

their future hell But if these hypocrites were nearer the 

* Resurrection Revealed, ut supra, p. 279. 



FIRST CLASS HOMES BURNET. 65 

Church, they might perhaps be converted ? "We answer, No : 
for it is (if we may use that word) the fate of the millenary period, 
I mean, God s righteous peremptory sentence, that as all that time 
tliere shall be no Degenerating of believers, so no more Regenerating of any 
titibelicvers" * 

Burnet, a little later, in his celebrated " Theory of the 
Earth" agrees with Homes as to the time of the conflagra 
tion, the new heavens and new earth, and the completion 
of the elect to reign, in a resurrection state, on the new 
earth. 

" Neither," says he, " is there any distinction made, that I find 
by St John, of two sorts of saints in the millennium, the one in heaven 
(in resurrection bodies), the other upon earth (in a mortal state). 
This is such an idea of the millennium as to my eye hath neither 
beauty nor foundation in Scripture." ( 

But whereas, according to him, all the wicked are to 
perish in the conflagration, he has to reproduce them, one 
way or other, to " compass the camp of the saints and the 
beloved city " at the end of the millennium (Rev. xx. 7-9), 
and to be consumed in their mad assault upon immortal 
men. " This," says he, " is a common difficulty to all " (that 
is, all premillennialists, for it is their system alone which 
creates the difficulty) ; " and every one must contribute their 
best thoughts and conjectures towards the solution of it." 

* Page 282. Also Appendix, No. II. 

The editor of this reprint of Homes Mr Brooks says, in a note to 
one part of the chapter from which we quote, that " in the Appendix 
it will be seen that Homes is aware of the distinction between the saints 
of the resurrection and those who remain in the flesh." (P. 286.) If, 
by " those who remain in the flesh," Mr B. means " those saints " or 
Christians which is the plain sense of his words it is not correct. 

f Theory of the Earth, book iv. ch. 7. Second edition, 1691. 

Though Burnet refers here to the view of Piscator and others, who 
took the millennial reign of the risen saints to be in heaven, the reader 
will observe that what he characterizes as void of beauty and Scripture 
foundation, is simply the distinction of two sorts of saints in tlu: millen 
nium. 

Q 



(36 FIRST CLASS PERRY. 

The reader will smile at Burnet s own solution of it, if new 
to him. 

" It seems probable," says he, " that there will be a double race 
of mankind in the future earth, very different from one another. 
The one born from heaven, sons of God and of the resur 
rection, who are the true saints and heirs of the millennium: the 
others born of the earth, sons of the earth, generated from tlie slime 
of the ground and heat of the sun, as brute creatures were at the first. 
This second progeny, or generation of men, in the future earth, I 
understand to be signified by the prophet under these borrowed or 
feigned names of Gog and Magog." * 

Perry, early in the last century, thus emphatically ex 
presses himself on the completion of the elect before the 
personal advent and reign on earth: 

" It is certain that when Christ personally comes from heaven 
will be the time of the open solemnization of the marriage glory 
between Him and the Spouse ; and, if so, then the Bride must 
be ready against that time, as it is expressed in this text, * And 
his Wife hath made herself ready; which cannot be if they are 
not all converted before Christ comes. For this I think is un 
deniable, that by the Wife, Bride/ or Spouse of Christ, the 

whole Elect must be understood How can it be thought 

that Christ, when he comes from heaven to celebrate the mar 
riage-feast between himself and his people, that he should have 
a lame and imperfect Bride ; as she must be, if some should be 
with Christ iu a perfect glorified state, and some of his mystical 
body at the same time in an imperfect and unglorified condi 
tion ? " f 

Perry, however, went farther than this; not only denying 
the existence of saints in the flesh during the millennium, but 
even of men at all in the flesh during that period the earth 
being, according to him, in exclusive possession of men in 
the resurrection-state during the millennium. A pleasant 
theory, truly ; but how, according to it, did he get the last 

* Ch. 10. 

f The Glory of Christ s Visible Kingdom in this World. By JOSEPH 
PEBKY, pp. 225, 226. Northampton, 1721. 



FIRST CLASS PERRY. 67 

conflict after the millennium brought about (Rev. xx. 8, 9) ? 
" This," says he, " seems to me to be the knottiest text 
throughout the whole Bible in relation to this glorious time." 
In his attempts to solve it, he first rejects the ordinary view 
of the spiritual glory of the latter day terminal ing in an 
extensive outbreak of human corruption (that is not a glori 
ous enough view of the millennium for those who hold the 
Personal Reign) : Next, he rejects the now prevalent view 
among premillcnriialists, of two classes of saints the one 
perfect, immortal, glorified, and reigning ; the other un- 
glorified, mortal, imperfect, and ruled over, having also 
mixed up with them a multitude of unconverted professors, 
who are at last to attack the rest and perish in the attempt. 
Homes view he then rejects of " some, not in the covenant 
of grace, preserved for the " premillcnnial " burning of the 
world, and restored unto an Adamitical state of innocence " 
as a thing to him unintelligible. * He admits, indeed, 
that a remnant of the wicked may be preserved from the 
conflagration, who may " be left to multiply in some of the 
outside parts or borders of the earth," far enough from 
seeing or beholding the glory of Christ and the saints 
during the time of " that glorious reign," and renewed to 
no Adamitical state. But he gives a number of reasons 
against even this view, and ventures finally on one of his 
own, " which he knows is out of the common road of almost 
all expositors; and that is, that the Gog and Magog who 
will arise at the end of the thousand years, to compass the 
camp of the saints, will consist of the number of all the wicked 
when raised out of their graves ! " (P. 409.) He is aware 
that " this, by reason of its being altogether new, may seem 
strange, sound harsh, and appear altogether incredible unto 
many." But he " earnestly entreats the reader " to weigh 

* " By -what means these will be cleansed, if not in the covenant of 
grace, from that original pollution which the whole posterity of Adam is 
polluted with, I am at a loss to know." (P. 406.) 



G8 FIRST CLASS IN PKESENT DAY. 

his reasons for it, especially as he only humbly propounds it 
for the clearing of the darkest point in the preniillennial 
scheme. His reasons are sensible and convincing, as against 
the other theories of his premillennial brethren; but in favour 
of his own view, I shall not trouble the reader with them. 

In a word, and coming down to our own day, Dr M Xeile 
thus refers to those premillennialists whom he had found 
maintaining the completeness of the Church at Christ s 
coming : 

"It is objected again, that the mystical body of Christ shall be 
completed at his second advent, and consequently admit of no in 
crease, and that therefore the nations of the earth subsequent to 
that event cannot be brought into a Christian state ;" for " since 
they fall after the millennium, it is necessary to limit the nature 
of their blessedness during the millennium to an Adamic state 
an Adamic state of innocent creatureship," language uncouth 
enough certainly, but not more so than the thing it is intended to 
describe " from which it is alleged they may fall, as our first 
parents fell."* 

Lastly, in a beautiful little work lately published,! a 
theory is propounded identical with Perry s, except in one 
particular. The conflagration, the creation of the new heavens 

* Lectures on the Prophecies relative to the Jewish Nation, pp. 185- 
189. First edition, 1830. 

The Adamic theory put forth a few years ago by Mr Scott, cannot be 
classed with those which admit the completeness of the Church at 
Christ s coming. According to him, there will be two classes of righteous 
men in the flesh under the millennial reign of Christ and his glorified 
saints : a race of Christians, " upheld from falling by union to Christ 
and the indwelling of the Holy Spirit;" and a race of " Adamitical 
men "as Perry would call them" freed from all the effects of the 
fall," particularly " the corrupt nature and original sin," and " restored 
to the state of holiness and righteousness in which Adam was before the 
fall " (how, we are left in the dark) but who, "having merely Adam s 
state, and nothing more, will fall as Adam fell." ("Outlines of Pro 
phecy," and " The Millennium of the Bible Vindicated." By James 
Scott, Preacher of the Gospel, 1844, 1845.) 

f The Midnight Cry ; or, the Coming of the Son of Man Considered. 
By the Rev. Joseph Burchell. 1849. 



FIRST CLASS MR BURCIIELL. CO 

find new earth, and the completion of the elect are all to be 
premillennial : The new earth is to be in exclusive possession 
of the glorified saints, with their Head in the midst of them, 
and their millennial bliss undisturbed by the presence of any 
other men whatever. 

" When the Lord God Omnipotent," says Mr Burchell, " the Son 
of man, is come in his glory, then all flesh comes to its end ; the earth, 
with all that is therein, must be dissolved in fire. The work of the 
ministry has ceased ; there are none to seek and save when the Lord 
has made up his jewels, and is making a full end of his enemies. The 
Lord Jesus Christ is coming to reign over the renewed earth, with 
his Church perfected and complete with all who love his appear 
ing, whether they have died in faith, or then remain alive. The 
thousand years is the Lord s great Sabbath-day, the glorious rest ; 
when, having finished his gospel work, he will initiate his redeemed 
in the possession of bliss, and in the unclouded knowledge of an 
eternity to follow. As to saints living in the flesh after the Lord s 
coming, " I agree," says he, "in rejecting (I would say abhorring, 
if it were not that I fear to oiFend many good men) the mixed 
millennium, the half-carnal, half spiritual glory drawn out by 
many." And as to sinners, " the idea," he says, " of a sinner sur 
viving that day (of Christ s coming) would be absurd, if it were 
not worse than an absurdity." (Pp. 3, 4, 50.) 

But if neither saints nor sinners survive the coming of the 
Lord before the millennium, whence does he bring the apos 
tate nations, who, at the close of that period, come up against 
the camp of the saints and the beloved city ? Not from the 
dead, as Perry does. Yet here he feels the tenderness of 1m 
ground. " I well know," he says, " where the chief difficulty 
lies." His solution of it is certainly new. " The nations" 
(TO, tovri) " who, deceived by Satan, gather themselves to 
gether, as the sand of the sea, from the four quarters" or 
corners (yuviais) " of the earth," are evil spirits, " an invi 
sible kingdom, headed by the Serpent, who, at the millen 
nium, are bound at the angles or corners of the earth, at the 
tour winds of heaven, the mysterious starting-point of spi- 



70 REMARKS ON THIS CLASS. 

rits." (P. 20.) This is to make Satan the deceiver of him 
self which, I suppose, I may leave without comment. 

The weight of these testimonies to the absolute complete 
ness of the Church at Christ s coming, lies merely in the 
quarter from which they come. With any other than premil- 
lennialists, such statements as we have quoted would be a 
matter of course; for none but they have any doubt that 
Christ will stay in the heavens till all his redeemed be 
brought in. But when any of them admit this, we see at 
what a sacrifice it is done. It destroys at once the sobriety 
and credibility of their scheme. What it seems to gain at 
the beginning, and during the currency of the thousand years, 
it more than loses at the end of that period. Bright would 
be the hope they hold out, of " our gathering together unto 
him" at his coming, and reign with him on the earth none 
that are " his" left behind, but all " ever with the Lord" 
were the prospect not overcast, and the vessel marred in the 
hands of the potter, by the introduction of a very different 
and discordant element at the end of one brief millennium 
of celestial bliss even the rush of myriad hosts from all the 

ends of the earth against what? against the very glory 

of the Lord, and the pavilion of his immortal and transfi 
gured people! It matters little which of the ways of explain 
ing this be adopted whether, with Homes and Burnet, the 
rebel multitude be thought to be mortal men; or, with Perry, 
the wicked raised from the dead; or, with Mr Burchell, evil 
spirits. The absurdity of all ways of it is alike manifest. 
But those who concede to us that there will be no earthly 
Church after Christ comes, and yet insist on bringing him 
from heaven before the millennium, cannot help themselves. 
As their concession to us deprives them of all materials for 
bringing about the final conflict, they are driven into such 
extravagant ways of realizing it as only serve to show the 
hopeless impracticability of their scheme. They could avoid 



SECOND CLASS THEIR THEORY. 71 

their difficulty by denying the completeness of the Church 
when Christ comes. But to this notion they have as much 
repugnance as we have ; and rather than fall in with what 
they regard as abhorrent and in the face of Scripture, they 
resort to solutions of their difficulty which all but themselves 
perceive to be extravagant and incredible. It is this, then, 
which gives weight to their testimony to the completeness of 
the Church at the Lord s coming. It is the testimony of 
those who have every inducement (so to speak) to deny it 
who feel themselves shut up to the admission, cost what it 
may, that when Christ comes whether before the millen 
nium or not he will want none of his redeemed. 

The SECOND class of premillennialists consists of those 
who deny this embracing nearly all who hold the Personal 
Eeign in our day, and against whose system I chiefly write. 
According to them, when the apostle says, " They that are 
Christ s (shall be quickened) at his coming," he means not 
his whole mystical body the universal family of the redeemed 
but only such of them as shall have lived up to the millen 
nium. On this extraordinary liberty I submit the following 
remarks : 

1. It is a violent, offensive, and perilous departure from 
the plain meaning of the words, not only here, but in all 
similar passages of Scripture, in which it is impossible to 
point out any thing, I say not which demands, but which 
even admits, of a limitation in the sense. 

2. This departure from the plain meaning of words comes 
strangely from the advocates of literal interpretation who 
ascribe to this same vicious habit of departing from the literal 
and obvious sense of Scripture, nearly all the opposition 
which their doctrine meets with. Those who will allow no 
latitude in the interpretation of prophetic language who 
insist on our taking predictions imbedded in symbol and 
figure with a literality reckless of consequences are the very 



72 SECOND CLASS 

persons who take to themselves this prodigious latitude in 
the interpretation of the most unadorned statements that 
can be imagined. The intelligent reader, while he marks 
this inconsistency, will trace it to its true source, the difficul 
ties of the system. Once insert the premillennial icedge 
into the text of Scripture, and a loosening process will com 
mence, the extent of which will depend upon the energy 
and determination with which it is driven in. 

3. Strange to say, the very party who contend for the 
glorification of only a fractional part of Christ s people at his 
coming, seem at times to forget themselves, and fall in with 
our views. They cannot part, it seems, with the bright ex 
pectation of a perfect, public, and simultaneous glorification 
of the whole Church at the Saviour s second appearing ; and 
they kindle into just ardour at the glorious prospect as if 
their system did not cut it up by the roots. " how 
glorious," exclaims sweet old Durant, already quoted, " will 
that salvation be, when all the heirs of salvation shall meet to 
gether! Now, all are not saved; the whole body now is in 
trouble for a part. Then, all the children of the Father shall 
meet together in their Father s presence; they shall come from 
the east and west, from north and south, and sit down in that 
kingdom ; yea, and then all saints shall be sweetly conjoined. 
Jewels scattered are not so resplendent; but joined in some 
rich pendent, O how glorious are they ! In that day Christ 
will gather up all his jewels he will bring in every saint into 
one gather them into one great jewel, one precious pendent, 
which shall jointly lie in his own bosom. Now, a saved soul 
sighs and cries, Where is Israel? where is Judah ? When 
will the Lord save them i Why, poor hearts, you shall all 
meet at that day be saved with an universal salvation ; and 
so be all of you with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, and the 
patriarchs, prophets all the apostles and martyrs ; yea, all 
that fear God, small as well as great. All, always, altogether 
in the presence of your Saviour! surely, then, you will say, 



TIIEIR INCONSISTENCY. 73 

that salvation is very sweet. Not one saint shall be missing in 
that day; but all shall altogether meet, and enjoy the salvation 
of Christ then, so universal shall it be." * Now, these State 
ments are very pleasant upon our principles. We can cor 
dially respond to them, and take the full comfort of them. 
But what are we to make of them upon the premillennial 
doctrine "All the heirs of salvation meeting tog-ether in 
their Father s presence," at the beginning of the thousand 
years " not one saint missing in that day ? " 

But perhaps this is more the language of ardour than of 
accuracy, and of an age when the doctrine of the premillennial 
advent was not so well understood in its manifold bearings as 
it is now ? Hear, then, the late much-esteemed Mr Bickersteth, 
hear him, not giving vent to his feelings in loose language, 
but calmly and didactically delivering what he takes to be the 
testimony of Scripture on this point. In his chapter on the 
"Period of the Second Coming," the following is the fifth of 
what he calls " The New Testament Statements bearing on this 
subject:" "ONE GLORIOUS HOPE is SET BEFORE THE CHURCH, 
in the New Testament.f This hope is set before us collec 
tively and in common. It is not to be given separately and 
at different periods ; but it is a glory belonging to the Church, 
to be given to it as a corporate body, and at a particular period 
the coming of our Lord ; and while it is to be the one ob 
ject of hope of all the Church in every age, it is to be enjoyed 
together as one body. For this all are to be looking." | 
Then follow a number of excellent proof-texts. Now, in this 
statement we perfectly and zealously concur ; but the marvel 
is, how any man who holds the views which he does, can put 
it down as a statement of his own belief. If the author will 

* Christ s Appearance the Second Time, ut supra, pp. 51-53. One 
would think from this extract, that Durant belonged to our first class; 
but as this is not clear, and some passages seem to look the other way, I 
give it in the above connection. 

t The capitals and italics are the author s own. 

1 Practical Guide to the Prophecies. Fifth edition, p. SO. 



74 SECOND CLASS 

unchurch the myriads that are to people the earth during the 
thousand years if he will tell us plainly, that the " men 
who shall then be blessed in Christ " the " all nations who 
shall call him blessed " will not be " blessed " with vital 
\mion to him and participation in the blessings of his salva 
tion, we can understand him ; for then he will just rank with 
our first class, whose views of the " Adamic state of innocent 
creatureship," in which the millennial nations are to rejoice, 
have at least the merit of consistency. In such case, he is at 
full liberty to speak of the glorification of the Church as being 
" given to it as a corporate body, and at a particular period 
the coming of our Lord ;" for the " corporate body " is then 
completed " the Church," by his own hypothesis, " is then 
entire." But it will not do to take the benefit and the com 
fort of a simultaneous glorification of the whole Church at the 
commencement of the millennium, and then to expatiate on 
the glories of a millennial Church, after that, sojourning on 
earth for a thousand years. Your expectation of the Church s 
corporate glory at the coming of our Lord is beautiful and 
soul-stirring ; but that expectation is ours, not yours. You 
have no right to it, but on one condition that you unchris- 
tianize that you sever from Christ and all his saving bene 
fits every one of the holy and happy myriads with whom, 
you people and bless the earth during the thousand years. 
When you have done this, you will then be entitled to kindle 
at a prospect infinitely superior to even this happy state of 
things the prospect of appearing in glory " as a corporate 
body, and at a particular period, even the coming of our 
Lord." But while you believe in the Church-state of the 
millennial nations in the Christian character of the latter- 
day glory you do but dazzle your readers with descriptions 
of a glory never to be realized on your principles ; for it is 
a manifest abuse of language to say, that you expect the 
Church in its entireness to appear with Christ in glory at his 
coming. 



THEIR INCONSISTENCY. 75 

Still, one may say, perhaps even Mr Bickersteth does not 
here speak the sentiments of his friends. Does so glaring an 
inconsistency pervade the writings of premillennialists gene 
rally? Let the reader judge from the following passages, 
which I quote from the second volume of Church of England 
Lectures on the Advent.* The first lecture is on "The 
manifestation of the Church at the coming of the Lord," 
from Eph. v. 25-27, " Christ loved the Church," c., which 
the author f interprets quite as absolutely as we ourselves do. 
" What," says he, " is meant by the Church ? It is composed 
of all those icho have been given to Christ by the Father from 
eternity. It comprises all those for whom, in an especial man 
ner, Clirist gave himself" On " the nature of the manifesta 
tion," he remarks, " 1. The Church will be glorious in its 
completeness. Never before shall the whole Church have been 
seen together then he will have ACCOMPLISHED THE NUMBER 
OF ins ELECT. That prayer will be answered which our Lord 
offered up just before ho was crucified, Neither pray I for 
these alone, but for them also which shall believe on me 
through their word, that they all may be one, &c. NOT ONE 
OP THE LORD S PEOPLE WILL BE WANTING " and more to the 
same effect. He then comes to " the time when this shall 
take place ;" on which, after adducing some very good texts, 
he says, " These statements positively and distinctly mark the 
time of the manifestation of the Church to be at the coming of the 
Lord." (Pp. 5, 7, 8, 12.) 

The fifth lecture is on " the Lord s Supper as a pledge of 
the Lord s return " a subject on which we shall have some 
thing to say by and by. The following sentences from this 
lecture are as destructive of the scheme they are brought to 
support as any thing we could say on the subject. " The 
Lord s Supper," says Mr Brock, " is a feast. And what a 
festival will that be when all the sons of God are united at 

* The Second Coining of Christ Practically Considered. Nisbet. 1814. 
| Rev. E. Auiiol, Rector of St Dunstan s. 



< U SECOND CLASS 

their Father s table! Catholicity is another manner 

in which the Supper of the Lord becomes a pledge to be 
lievers of the second advent. All the Church is made par 
takers of this ordinance. It is open to believers to them 
only, and to each and all of them. Thus it is catholic to the 
Church, exclusive to the world. So will it be as to the 
future. There shall be an exclusion of all the wicked ; an 
admission of all the righteous. They, they only, and each and 
all of them, shall be admitted to the Saviour s presence. Not 
one of them shall be wanting. Their names have been writ 
ten in the Lamb s book of life, from the foundation of the 
world. Their place is prepared, and it cannot be vacant. 
They are members of his body, WITHOUT WHOM (the least of 

them) THAT BODY WOULD BE MAIMED AND INCOMPLETE. All 

shall appear at the appointed time, and each assist to make up 
the perfect symmetry and exact proportion of that catholic 
assembly." (Pp. 122, 126, 127.) 

In the same strain, and with equal precision, speaks Mr 
Grimshawe, in the sixth lecture, on " the joy of the faithful 
minister at Christ s coming." The third particular in which 
this joy will consist is (he says), " the gathering together in 
glory of all the ransomed Church of Christ the perfect man 
the completeness of Christ in all the members of his mys 
tical body, elect, sanctified, and finally perfected in glory 
the redeemed of every age, tongue, kindred, and people." 
(Pp. 153, 154.) 

One other quotation from the eighth lecture, on "the 
hope of the advent, a remedy against superstition," will 
show the uniformity of strain, and the identity, almost, of 
expression, in which all these premillennialists speak of the 
simultaneous glorification of the entire Church at Christ s 
appearing. " This hope (of the advent, says Mr Dibdin) is 
the hope constantly set before the Church in the Word of God. 

But what Church ? It is all those ivlio have 

been chosen in Christ Jesus before the foundation of the world. 



THEIR INCONSISTENCY. 77 

The Church ? it is every one of those who have been, are, or 
shall be born of the Spirit, and made new creatures in Christ 

Jesus Till all wliom the Father hath chosen in Christ 

out of mankind are born again, and justified, the Church will 
not be complete." (Pp. 194, 195.) 

I make no apology for the number of these quotations ; 
each from a different witness all from one volume, not a 
very old one expressing, with a clearness and a copiousness 
not to be misunderstood, the fixed belief, and the ardent ex 
pectation of those who are now looking for the coming of 
Christ before the millennium. And what is it ? It is, that 
the entire Church shall appear with Christ at his coming ; 
or, to take their own excellent definitions of the Church, that 
" all those who have been given to Christ by the Father from 
eternity all those for whom, in an especial manner, Christ 
gave himself all who have washed their robes, and made them 
white in the blood of the Lamb every one of those who have 
been, are, and shall be born of the Spirit, and made new crea 
tures in Christ Jesus" in a word, " the completeness of 
Christ in all the members of his mystical body, elect, sancti 
fied, and finally perfected in glory" all, all shall appear with 
Christ at his coming. " Scripture positively and distinctly 
marks the time of the manifestation of the Church," thus de 
fined, " to be," they tell us, " at the coming of the Lord." 

Well, agreeing with you cordially in all this, my simple 
question is, What will the Jews and Gentiles be, with whom 
you people the world during the millennium, and over whom 
you make the glorified Church to reign with Christ ? They 
cannot belong to the elected, the blood-bought, the regene 
rated, and justified members of Christ s mystical body ; for 
you have taken all these away from the earth, and out of 
their fleshly condition, to appear with Christ in glory before 
the millennium. If your statements are not hopelessly unin 
telligible, there will not be found, from beginning to end of 
the thousand years, one of the elect, the redeemed, the regene- 



73 SUMMARY. 

rate, one believer, one saint upon earth. Whatever may con 
stitute the felicity of that period, it will not be Christianity 
it will not be saintship. Christ s coming has put an end, 
by your own showing, to the existence of this upon earth and 
in the flesh. 

Will you fall back, then, upon the Adamic theory ? You 
ought to do it. But you will not. On opening your books 
again, we find you making the millennium the same Chris 
tian state that we expect it to be. The Jews, you say, look 
ing on their pierced Saviour, will repent and believe, and be 
the missionary instruments of the Gentiles conversion ; and 
you speak of the spiritual blessedness of that period when 
" the earth shall be full of the knowledge of the Lord as the 
waters cover the sea" when " the kingdom and dominion 
under the whole heaven shall be given to the people of the 
saints of the Most High" when "men shall be blessed in Christ 
(with salvation, of course), and all nations shall call him 
blessed."* 

Here, then, is the inextricable difficulty into which your 
system shuts you up ; and yet you are either unaware of it, 
or will not face it. You expatiate with equal confidence 
upon two things, the one of which is destructive of the other. 
You rejoice that Christ will bring all his people with him, 
before the millennium. You no less rejoice in the prospect 
of a world peopled with believing men for a thousand years 
after his coming! Let the reader now judge with what 
clearness premillennialists perceive the bearings of their own 
doctrine, and whether the parts of that doctrine are capable 
of hanging together as one consistent whole, 

We have thus seen that Christ, at his second appearing, 

will come absolutely and numerically " with all his saints" 

" them that are his ;" and have seen how remarkably this is 

confirmed by the enthusiastic, though suicidal testimony of 

* See, among others, Bickersteth s Guide, passim. 



REPLIES TO THE FOREGOING ARGUMENT. 79 

both classes of prcmillennialists. The first class, building 
their scheme upon the admission of this great truth, are 
thereby driven, as we have seen, into extravagances which it 
was unnecessary to refute, because they vanish at the touch. 
The second class, basing their scheme upon the denial of this 
truth, seem unable to want its inspiration ; for thus only can 
I account for the strain in which they anticipate a prospect 
which their system repudiates. Does not this show where 
the weakness of the premillennial theory lies obliging us 
either to deny the great scriptural doctrine of the complete 
ness of the Church at Christ s coming, or to believe in a mil 
lennium without Christians ? And I venture to affirm, that 
from this dilemma there is no possible escape, but in the be 
lief which clears all up that Christ s second coming tcill not 
be premillennial ; that all the glory of the latter day whether 
it be a definite or an indefinite period together with the 
final efforts of the wicked, at the close of it, will PRECEDE and 
not SUCCEED the coming of Christ. 

SUPPLEMENTARY REMARKS. 

The preceding argument, as it appeared in the first edition 
of this work, has drawn forth a number of replies, particularly 
from Mr Bickersteth, the Duke of Manchester, and Mr A. 
Bonar,* answers which, in my judgment, expose the weak 
ness of the premillennial system, and the looseness of Scrip 
ture interpretation which it necessitates, more effectually than 
most of the arguments employed to refute it. They all dis 
tinguish between " tJie Bride of the Lamb," and the whole 
number of the saved; affirming that the one will be complete 
at his coming, but the other not. Each, however, has his 
own way of reconciling his readers to this conclusion. 

Mr Bickersteth explains, that by " the Church," which is 
to appear as a complete and corporate body with Christ at 
his coming, he meant, not all the saved, but only a peculiar 

* With whom Mr Wood agrees. 



80 MR BICKERSTETH. 

portion of them, called " the bride, the assembly of the first 
born, the kings and priests unto God, the city ;" " whose 
privilege is distinct and peculiar not holiness and blessed 
ness merely, but these in a peculiar form." And who are 
to constitute this peculiar portion of the saved ? All who 
have believed up to the commencement of the millennium. These 
alone are the mystical body of Christ. But after they are 
completed, at the second advent the earth will be peopled by 
" nations of the saved" in flesh and blood friends, com 
panions, servants of the Bridegroom a totally different 
party from the then glorified Bride. But in what respect 
different ? The answer is, that though they have " holiness 
and blessedness, they have " merely" that they have it not 
in " the peculiar form" of union to Christ as his mystical 
body or bride. If one should ask again, what other union 
there is of sinners to Christ, but as " members of his body, of 
his flesh, and of his bones" (Eph. v. 30), the answer we get 
is a little startling : 

" There may be," says Mr Bickersteth, " and doubtless are, 

A THOUSAND STAGES AND VARIETIES OF UNION WITH ClIRIST, 
DISTINGUISHABLE FROM THE GLORY OF THE CHURCH OF THE 
FIRST-BORN." 

After this, we need not of course wonder to find the 
Adamic variety among the multitudinous types of millennial 
humanity the curious Mosaic which is to adorn the new 
earth. Accordingly, Mr Bickersteth thus proceeds: 

" In the first place, an Adamic state of innocence is not, 
as is unguardedly said (by Dr M Ncile), infinitely inferior to 
Christian union with God ; for it is a real union, and like that 
of unfallen angels in kind, though a little lower in form." " In 
every human household," he afterwards says, "there are usually 
four parties the bridegroom and bride, friends and servants."* 

* The Divine Warning to the Church at this Time. Fourth Edition, 
1846: "Answers to some objections," pp. 310, &c. So Mr Birks, pp. 
153-155. 



DUKE OF MANCHESTER MR BONAR. 81 

The Duke of Manchester limits the mystical body of Christ 
still farther excluding from it not only all the saints who 
are to live after the second advent, but also all who lived 
before the first, or rather prior to the ascension of Christ. 

" The gifts," he says, " necessary for forming the Christ 
mystical were not conferred until after the ascension of Jesus. 

We could not, therefore, say with propriety that the 

Church under former dispensation was Christ. The Bride 

is the New Jerusalem Now the great glory of the 

New Jerusalem is, that it is the abode of Deity. But for 
the believer to be a habitation of God, is the peculiar 
glory of the dispensation founded by the apostles, accord 
ing to the promise, He dwelleth with you, and shall be in 
you. " 

In what state his Grace expects the Old Testament saints 
to be, when they rise from the dead to inherit Canaan during 
the millennium, as he expects them to do I scarcely know. 
Probably he distinguishes between mere resurrection and 
glorification, and that inhabitation of Deity which he makes 
the distinguishing privilege of believers under this dispensa 
tion. * 

Mr Bona/r differs materially from both these authors. 
According to him, the millennial saints will be saints in 
the same sense as all other saints, whether under this dis 
pensation or before it. The only difference will be in their 
external circumstances. Having none of the trials of pre 
ceding saints, they will not attain to the dignity, reserved ex 
clusively for tried Christians, of being the Bride of Christ. 

"All saints," says he, " redeemed amid toil and temptation, 
and sorrow and warfare, shall form the Bride at the Lord s 
* The Finished Mystery. Appendix: "Examination of Mr Brown s 
Work on the Second Advent," pp. 284-288. The modest and excellent 
author of "Plain Papers on Prophetical and other Subjects" (1854), No. 
5 and 6, takes a view in substance the same with this, and in some re 
spects preferable. 



82 REPLIES TO T11E FOKEGOING ARGUMENT. 

coming; and this Bride shall reign with him a thousand 
years. Then, as to the saints \vlio shall people earth during 
these thousand years, they are as really saints, and as simply 
dependent on this Head, as any of those already in glory. 
As to state, character, and modes of spiritual life, they are 
not saints of another stamp from those of the Patriarchal, 
Jewish, and Gentile days ; but, on the contrary, they are 
converted as they were, live by faith as they did, war with 
their own corruptions as they, and hang on Christ alone to 
the last. It is only their circumstances that are different 
from former saints. They live during these millennial days 
with scarcely any, or rather with no opposition at all; with 
out persecution, and without Satan s temptations, for he is 
bound. It seems good, therefore, to the sovereign God to 
make a difference between them and those that lived not in 

millennial days The children of the millennium 

shall be our children." But " children are not different 

in nature from the parents. We wholly reject all theories about 
an Adamic race, or any thing similar ; we maintain that the 
children of that age shall be found in the miry clay by the 
sovereign God ; converted by his Holy Spirit ; led to see sin 
and the Saviour, as we do ; sanctified, probably far more 
rapidly and thoroughly, yet still by the same Spirit, through 
the Word, and so prepared for a future eternity." * 

What fantastic and bewildering speculations are these ! 
How opposed to the general strain of Scripture ; how desti 
tute even of the semblance of support ; how alien from any 
thing that would occur to an ordinary reader of the Bible ; 
how contrary to the belief of all churches, and the judgment 
of all commentators, from the beginning ; and, as now put 
forward by the advocates of the premillennial theory, how 
manifestly are they suggested by the necessities of a system ! 
A few paragraphs on each of the three forms in which this 
alleged distinction between " the Bride" and the whole 
* Redemption, &c., pp. 124, & 



THE DUKE OF MANCHESTER. 83 

dumber of the saved is exhibited, in the extracts which I have 
given, will suffice to justify these reflections. 

1. As the Duke of Manchester is aware that he stands 
almost alone among his brethren,* in excluding all who lived 
before the ascension of Christ from the privileges of " the 
Bride," " the New Jerusalem," " Christ " mystical, " the 
body of Christ," I shall merely say of his scheme, that it is 
founded on most untenable and dangerous views of the differ 
ence between the Old and the New Testament dispensations. 
Where the real difference lies, is one of the oldest questions 
in the Christian Church ; but while orthodox men have 
slightly differed in their mode of conceiving the character 
istics of the two economies, they have ever entertained a 
common jealousy against those low views of the Old Testa 
ment dispensation which would go to strip it of all spiritual 
vitality, or make salvation possible by merely external opera 
tions of the Spirit. In these low views, when fully carried 
out, a Manichean tincture was early detected; they were 
opposed as heretical ; their defenders all along have been, 
for the most part, men otherwise unsound ; and although 
there have been, from time to time, divines, sound in the 
main, who either not perceiving the full effect of their own 
statements, or not taking sufficiently inward and ethical con 
ceptions of certain truths, or from kindred causes have 
approached too closely to the views of those with whom, in 
other things, they have no sympathy, we cannot consent, in 
deference to them, to give up the essential oneness of the 
Church and people of God under both dispensations, or admit 
any such difference between them as to require, or even to 
tolerate, the exclusion of all the Old Testament saints from 
the glory which is prepared for saints under the gospel. 

* Since this was written, many have adopted the same view. 

f His Grace refers to Archdeacon Hare, who quotes a long passage 
from Olshausen, concluding with this statement, that as "the special 
\vorkofthe Holy Ghost is regeneration," therefore "regeneration be 
longs essentially to the New Testament, because: under this dispensation 



84 REMARKS ON 

Why, instead of a question whether they are to share with 
us, the whole strain of the New Testament language goes 
merely to show that we shall not be excluded from sharing 
with them that we shall come from the east and from the 
west, and sit down with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob (not 
they with us) in the kingdom of Grod. (Matt. viii. 11.) True, 
" They without us could not be made perfect" (Heb. xi. 40) 
that is, without Christ and the Spirit, whose proper economy 
our s certainly is ; but as this manifestly implies that with us 
they have all the perfection which wo have that with Christ 
to save and the Spirit to sanctify them, which they got anti- 
cipatively from our dispensation, they are in all respects on 
a par with us there is not a shadow of ground for exclud 
ing the Old Testament saints from the glory prepared for 
those of our dispensation.* 

2. Mr Bickersteth s " thousand stages and varieties of 

the Holy Ghost first manifested his specific power." (Mission of t/ie 
Comforter, ii. 492.) Whether the Archdeacon meant to extend his ap 
proval of the extract thus far (in the face of John iii. 6, 7, 10, &c.), is 
doubtful, from what follows. But, be this as it may, I am not disposed, 
in a point of this nature, to consider either Hare or his author unexcep 
tionable expositors of the general mind of the Church. 

* " Istud" says CALVIN, who, on the Christology of the Old Testament, 
occupied what many would term low ground " quoque scitissime eodcra 
locosubjungit (Augustinus), pertinere ab initiomundi ad Novum Testa- 
mentum filios promissionis, regenerates a Deo, qui fide per dilectioncm 
operante obedierunt mandatis. Idque in spe non carnaliuin, terrenorum, 
temporalium, sed spiritualium, ccelestium, asternorum bonorum, pras- 
cipue credentes in Mediatorem : per quern non dubitarunt et Spiritum 
sibi administrari, ut benefacercnt, et jgnosci, quoties peccarent. Id 
enim ipsum est quod asserere in animo fuit, ejusdem nobiscum benedic- 
tionis in ffiternam salutem consortes fuisse omnes sanctos, quos ab exordio 

mundi peculiariter al)eoselectos Script uracommemorat Atque 

hie quoque de sanctis Patribus annotandum est, ita sub Veteri Testa- 
mento vixisse, ut non illic restiterint, sed aspirarint semper ad Novum, 
adeoque ccrtam ejus communionem amplexi sint." Instit. Christ. Rclig., 
lib. ji. cap. xi. 10. 

" Nos omnes de flf.nitud.inc ejua acce.pimus. Quid " exclaims AUGUSTIN 
*est,2Vbs omnes? Ergo Patriarchs, etProphetae, et Apostoli sancti,velante 
jncarnationem prtcmissi vel ab Incarnate missi, omnes nos de plenitudine 
gus acccpimw. Nos vasa sumus, Ille fons est." Serm. cclxxxix. 5. "Ipsum 



MR BICKERSTETH S THEORY. 85 

union with Christ " for poor sinners of mankind defy 
comment. Happily, however, they do not need it. The 
only wonder is, that speculations so out of the line of all that 
is sober, on such a subject as union to Christ, and language 
which even the author himself would find it hard to explain, 
should have been hazarded by one so distinguished for 
the meekness and gentleness of Christ.* The reader, how 
ever, when he comes to our chapter on the " Eesurrection," 
will find this esteemed minister laying down positions quite 
as startling and repulsive as this. And when he finds that 
even these novel and unsavoury speculations are advocated, 
as clearly revealed truths of Scripture, by one of the acutest 
writers on that side Mr Birks and by a writer of consider 
able ability on the other side of the Atlantic Mr Lord; 
when moreover, he considers how difficult it is for those who 
would work out the premillennial scheme to avoid being driven 
into conclusions of this nature, he will see afresh what a 
iccdge this system is, upheaving, when introduced into the 
text of Scripture, almost every thing which has hitherto been 
regarded as most fixed and sacred all that has been " most 
surely believed among us." 

Before passing from Mr Bickersteth here, I will give one 
brief illustration of the extreme slenderness of the ground 
on which he rests the weightiest conclusions. " In every 
human household," he says, " or marriage, there are usually 
four parties the bridegroom, the bride, friends, and ser 
vants;" and if we do not admit as many "varieties" at 
least of " union with Christ," we are charged with " not 

(Christum) martyrcs in manifesto confessi sunt, quern tune Machabcei 
confess! sunt,* mortui sunt isti pro Christo in evangelio revelato; mor- 
tui sunt illi pro Christ! nomine in lege velato. Christus habet utrosque, 
Christus puguantes adjuvit utrosque, Christus coronavit utrosque." 
Serm. ccc. 5. 

* Mr Birks (p. 150) charges me with "dismissing this remark of a 
beloved and honoured father, now gone to his rest, with contempt" a 
feeling of which, towards that precious servant of Christ, I trust I am 
incapable. 

* This Sermon was delivered at the festival of the Maccabean martyrs. 



86 KEMAUKS ON 

only crossing many express statements, but every lesson of 
analogy." Now, let us see what conclusion this will bring 
out of a single passage of Scripture.* " He that hath the 
Bride," said the Baptist, " is the Bridegroom : but the friend 
of the Bridegroom, which standeth and hcareth him, rejoiceth 
greatly because of the Bridegroom s voice. This my joy there 
fore is fulfilled." (John iii. 29.) f According to Mr Bicker- 
steth s way of viewing such language, the poor Baptist will not 
be of "the Bride at all. Though "the first resurrection," 
and the millennial glory of the risen saints, is said to be 
specially designed for suffering believers, the very forerunner 
of Christ that rare example of fidelity, humility, love to the 
Saviour, and self-sacrifice will not be found in this class at 
all, but be seen on the lower platform appropriated to the 
"friends" of the Bridegroom ! At this rate, the wise virgins 
who went forth to meet the Bridegroom in the parable (Matt. 
xxv.), represent not those who are to be " the Bride " at 
his coming, but those who merely attend the nuptials as 
" friends ; " and those who are invited to the marriagc- 

* Let me request my friend Mr Wood s attention to this. (See p. 63, 
note.) 

t The Jews thought to kindle in the Baptist a jealousy of his Master 
as one who was requiting the generous testimony he had borne to 
him by drawing all his disciples away to himself. The reply of that 
blessed servant and martyr of Jesus, in the words above quoted, I have 
always thought to be one of the most glorious and affecting of human 
utterances, and perhaps beyond all the testimonies that ever were borne 
to Christ. " The Bride is not mine why should the people stay with 
me ? Ye yourselves bear me witness that I said, I am not the Christ : 
mine it is to point the guilty to the Lamb of God, that taketh away the 
sin of the world to tell them, There is Bairn in Gilead, and a Physician 
there ; and shall I grudge to see them, in obedience to the call, flying as 
a cloud, and as doves to their windows ? Whose is the Bride, but the 
Bridegroom s ? Enough for me to be the Bridegroom s friend sent 
by him to negotiate the match privileged, as an humble instrument, to 
bring together the Saviour and the souls he is to come to seek and to 
save, and rejoicing with joy unspeakable to stand by and witness the 
blessed espousals. Say you, then, they go from me to him ? You bring 
me glad tidings of great joy; for He must increase, but I must decrease: 
This my joy, therefore, is fxilfilled ! " 



MR BONAR S VIEW. 87 

supper (Matt, xxii.), though clothed with the wedding-gar 
ment, are, on this principle, to be held as representing a dis 
tinct class altogether from those called " the Bride." I cannot 
persuade myself that the author would have accepted these 
conclusions. But why not ? and where shall we be if we 
are thus to explain the figures of Scripture? Who does 
not see that the Baptist called himself " the friend of the 
Bridegroom," not to express his personal, but his official 
standing in relation to Christ? and that the same believers 
are termed " the virgins," in respect of their call to be ready 
for Christ s coming the " guests " at the marriage-supper, 
in respect of the fellowship they hold with him and " the 
bride," in respect of their intimate and endearing union to 
him ? In vain, then, are endless " varieties of union with 
Christ " drawn out of such figurative language ; and wonder 
ful it is, that from premises so very slender such mighty 
conclusions should, by any sober writer, be drawn. 

3. Mr Bonar s theory of the distinction between the Bride 
and the whole number of the saved, has not certainly the 
repulsive appearance of the other theories we have been 
noticing. He admits that the Christians who are to people 
the earth after Christ has descended to it with his completed 
Bride, will, like ourselves, " be found in the miry clay by 
the sovereign God, be converted by his Holy Spirit, led 
to see sin and the Saviour,* sanctified probably far more 
rapidly and thoroughly, yet still by the same Spirit, through 
the Word, and so prepared for a future eternity." It is 
something to get footing like this to get a Christianity 
that one can understand for the millennium. Nor will I 
disturb it by asking, just now, how this Christianity is to 
be produced in sinful men, with Christ in glory before their 
eyes, and " the righteous shining forth as the sun " in their 
very presence. Waiving this for the present the following 

* He docs not, I observe, say, " united to him byfai h," as we are ; per 
haps, because that might look like identifying them with the Bride. 



88 REMARKS ON 

very obvious remarks are enough to show that the theory 
which Mr Bonar propounds is without any solid foundation, 
nnd is opposed to the whole current of Scripture. 

(1.) When Christ s people are termed his " Bride," his 
" Spouse " when they are said to be " espoused " and 
" married " to him in a word, when conjugal relations, 
intercourse, and affections are employed to set forth what 
subsists between him and them, who, until now, ever 
doubted that A UNION COMMON TO ALL BELIEVERS is in 
tended? And on what principle can it be maintained that the 
term " Bride " is meant to point, not to that internal, vital 
union to Christ which is common to all who shall ever believe 
in him, but to special privileges peculiar to one class of them? 
(2.) As the union of all believers to Christ is the same as 
to its essence, so the future glory of them all alike is made 
to flow from that union, and not from any external cir 
cumstances in which they may differ from each other. Let me 
entreat the attention of my premillennial friends to this 
remark. Is it necessary to give proofs of what is so manifest ? 
" Thou hast given thy Son power over all flesh," said Jesus to 
his Father, " that he should give eternal life to as many as 
thou hast given him. Father, I will that they also whom 
thou hast given me be with me where I am, that they may 
behold my glory," &c. (John xvii. 2, 24.) 
Here we find all the elect getting eternal life from Christ s 
hands will any that ever shall believe in him get less 
than this? But here, also, Christ wills that the same elect 
company be with him where he is, to behold his glory and 
can any class of believers have more ? 

u This is the Father s will which hath sent me, that of all which 
he hath given me I should lose nothing, but should raise 
it up again at the last day. No man can come to me, ex 
cept the Father, which hath sent me, draw him: and I 
will raise him up at the last day. Whoso eateth my flesh, 
and driuketh my blood, hath eternal life ; and I will raise 
him up at the last day. He that eateth my flesh, and 



MR BONAR S VIEW. 

drinketh my blood, dwelleth in me, and I in him." 
(John vi. 39, 44, 54, 56.) 

Who that reads these words can doubt that the elect 
drawn to Christ by common supernatural grace, one with 
him in common, by mutual inhabitation through the Spirit, 
and thus saved with a " common salvation" (Jude 3), are 
destined to partake in common of the resurrection, life, and 
glory of their Head ? " The glory which thou gavest me I have 
given them; that they may be one, even as we are one." (John 
xvii. 22.) 

" Whom he did foreknow," says Paul, " he also did predestinate 
to be conformed to the image of his Son, that he might be 
the first-born among many brethren, [in resurrection and glory 
surely, as well as every thing else.] Moreover, whom he did 
predestinate [the whole company of the elect], them he also 
called; and whom he called, them he also justified; and 
whom he justified, them [all of them] he also glorified. If 
any man [during the millennium surely, as well as at any 
other time] have not the Spirit of Christ, he is none of his. 
Ihit if the Spirit of him that raised up Jesus from the dead 
dwell in you, he that raised up Christ from the dead shall 
also quicken your mortal bodies by his Spirit that dwelleth 
in you. (Rom. viii. 29, 30, 9, 11.) 

But why go on ? Who can read the New Testament, and 
fail to see that all the life, and glory, and fellowship with the 
Lamb, which any believer is ever to have, is made to flow 
from the common oneness of all believers with Christ, as 
Head of his body the Church, and not from the mere " exter 
nal circumstances" which may distinguish one class of them 
from another? 

Nay, not only is there no ground for any such distinc 
tion, but the passages which, by a palpable misconception of 
them, are adduced in support of it, prove just the reverse. 
For example : 

" If so be that we suffer with him, that we may be also glorified 

together. (Rom. viii. 17.) 
u If we suffer, we shall also reign with him." (2 Tim. ii. 12.) 



90 REMARKS ON 

Who docs not see that in these passages it is not suffering 
as opposed to unsufferlng Christians, but true Christians as 
opposed to false, that are here described ? In the one pas 
sage, we have but to read the whole verse to see this at 
once: "If children, then heirs; heirs of God, and joint- 
heirs with Christ: if so be that we suffer with him, that 
we may be also glorified together." Shall we say that 
the latter clause of this verse is intended to limit the 
former ? In that case, the meaning would be that none of 
God s children are heirs of God and co-heirs with Christ, 
but only sucli of them as suffer with him. When the apostle 
says, " There is no condemnation to them that are in Christ 
Jesus, who walk not after the flesh but after the Spirit," does 
he mean that not all that are in Christ Jesus are freed 
from condemnation, but only such of them as walk in the 
Spirit?* The other passage shows this even more clearly, 
when, instead of only the one-half, we read the whole of it : 
; If we suffer, we shall also reign with him; if we deny him, 
he also will deny us." Here are not two kinds of Christians 
surely, suffering and unsuffering Christians, both genuine ; 
but true Christianity distinguished from false, by fellowship 
in Christ s sufferings, and conformity to his death," as the 
indispensable prelude to participation in his glory and reign. 

Alas for the system which would set up a Christianity for 
the millennium, shorn of this essential characteristic suffer 
ing ! If these millennial Christians are to bask in such in 
ward and outward sunshine, as to be strangers to " SUFFER 
ING WITH CHRIST," call them not Christians in our or rather 
in the New Testament sense of the term ; but if, on the con 
trary, " suffering with Christ" is to be common to them witli 
us, notwithstanding the propitious circumstances by which 
they will be surrounded, why are they not to be " GLORI- 

* The second clause of both verses is (but see the critical editions on 
the latter clause) epexeyelical, not restriciive, of the former desigaed to 
charade) ize the persons mentioned in the first clause. 



MR BONAR S VIEW. 01 

TOGETHER," with their living Head, according to the 
indissoluble connection which the matchless wisdom of the 
mediatorial system has established ? It is impossible to 
answer these questions, or evade the alternatives which they 
offer. Once more, 

(3.) Let the vastness of the separation in eternal destiny, 
which this theory makes between those Christians whom 
they style " The Bride" and the rest of the saved, be ob 
served, and how very unscriptural and purely fanciful the 
theory is, will strike at once the thoughtful mind. 

" This elect body," says Mr Bonar, " of believers before the mil 
lennium is the Slide, and shall be complete at the Lord s coming 
Not one other shall be added to this body after the Lord s coming n<.<t 
one." (P. 123.) 

My estimable friend does not say that those living after this 
shall join the Bride, and be merged in that blessed company, 
when the thousand years are over he does not say that their 
accession to this body shall be merely postponed till the ever 
lasting state arrive. He knows well that he has not a ray of 
Scripture for such an expectation every text relating to the 
resurrection and glorification of believers at all being applied 
by him, and those who hold his system, to a resurrection be 
fore the millennium. For aught that Scripture says, there 
fore on his way of explaining it those believers who are 
to people the earth after the second advent must remain for 
ever apart from that " Bride that shall be complete at the 
Lord s coming to which not one shall be added after his 
coming not one." What though there be myriads of men 
during the millennium, snatched by sovereign grace out of 
the miry clay, and " prepared" by the Word and Spirit of 
Jesus "for a future eternity?" Over that future eternity a 
dark veil is drawn ; for his system has no Scripture for bring 
ing them ever out of the fleshly and imperfect state which it 
assigns to them upon earth during the millennium.* 
* " This is vain trifling," says Mr Wood. "We find them inthatiaa- 



02 REMARKS OX 

Now, this seems to me quite as irrational as the other 
theories I have noticed. The objection to them was, that it 
made saintship, for sinners of mankind, a different thing under 
the Old and the New Testament a different thing before the 
millennium and after it. The objection to this theory is, that 
while it makes saintship in every age the same thing, it makes 
the everlasting condition and issues of that saintship a vastly 
different thing in two classes of believers those living before, 
and those living during, the millennium ; and to ground this 
upon a mere difference in their " external circumstances," 
what is it but to confound what is essential with what is acci 
dental as if the glorious oneness of the whole body of be 
lievers with Christ, in his death and resurrection, in his 
humiliation and glory, had less virtue to bring them all to 
gether with their adorable Head, to grace his second appear 
ing than the adventitious diversity of their outward circum 
stances to separate them from each other at that bright, 
transporting day. 

And what, after all, are those " external circumstances " on 
which such vast stress is laid, as distinguishing the Christians 
of the millennium from all other Christians ? " They live, " 
says Mr Bonar, " during these millennial days, with scarcely 
any, or rather with no external opposition at all ; without 
persecution, and without Satan s temptations, for he is bound." 
But what of all this ? Are " external opposition and persecu 
tion," then, so bound up with Christianity as it now exists, 
that it cannot be real without them ? Is a uniformly tranquil 
and unruffled lot a phenomenon unheard of during the pre- 
perfect state. God -will not leave them there. But Scripture does not make 
all things plain, and especially Scripture gives us almost no information 
of the eternity beyond the millennium. Where it is silent, wise men will 
not speculate " (p. 31). But my fault with the system is, that it makes 
Scripture silent where it is not, and where it is hard to believe that it 
could be silent. To ask whether countless myriads of the human race 
will populate the earth during the brightest period of its history, with 
out a hint in Scripture of what is to become of them when it closes, is 
not "vain trifling." 



MR BONAK S VIEW. 93 

sent dispensation a phenomenon reserved for the millen 
nium? Can there be no living by faith now, no walking in the 
narrow way, no crucifying of the flesh and living in the Spirit, 
no occupying till Christ come nothing, in short, of living 
connection with Christ now, that shall give assurance of ap 
pearing with him in glory, unless " outward opposition and 
persecution" be superadded? Are not battles inly fought, 
and unseen victories won, in the sphere of the hidden life, 
which, to that Eye that looketh not upon the outward appear 
ance but upon the heart, are brighter manifestations of the 
grace that bringeth salvation than many a martyrdom ? 

" Nor think, who to that bliss aspire, 
Must win their way through blood and fire ; 
The writhings of a wounded heart 
Are fiercer than a foeman s dart." * 

If this be granted, even in one case, the ground of distinc 
tion, as far as that goes, is given up. This is so manifest, 
that Mr Burgh who takes the same view of outward suffer 
ing as indispensable to participation in the " first resurrec 
tion " perceiving that this will necessarily exclude many 
true Christians from the millennial reign, goes through with 
it, limiting the millennial reign expressly to those whom lie 
regards as suffering Christians. And this is the only consistent 
way of holding the theory .| 

Mr Bonar, indeed, mentions another ground of distinction 
the freedom of millennial Christians " from Satan s tempta 
tions, for he is bound." In a subsequent part of this work, 
I believe I shall be able to show that this expectation is 
totally unscriptural founded on a misapprehension of one 
single symbolical prediction, contradicted by the uniform 
tenor of Scripture, and at variance with the whole analogy 

* Christian Year. 

t Lect. on Revelation and Lect. on Second Advent. In the latter work, 
Mr Burgh is pleased to cut off from this class those who deny the pre- 
millennial advent a view which not a few have since embraced. 



1/4 SIMULTANEOUS GLORIFICATION OF ALL THE ELECT. 

of faith. But admitting for the present the total absence of 
Satanic agency during the millennium if it be allowed, as 
it seems to be, that the natural heart will be the same then 
as now, that the grace of God will find men in the same 
" mire," and be as illustrious in plucking any out of it, that 
there will be the same war with inward corruption in every 
Christian, the same inability to do the things that they would, 
and the same need to " hang upon Christ alone to the last," as 
there is now what mighty difference between them and us 
can even the absence of Satan make what, at least, that 
should sever those from us in glory who share with us in our 
deepest struggles ? 

Thus survey it in what light we will, and on whatever 
hypothesis may be framed to account for it the distinction 
between one portion of the elect, ransomed, sanctified, and 
saved Church, as being exclusively " the Bride of the Lamb," 
to be associated with him in his glory, and another portion of 
the same Church, who are not to rise and reign with him 
when he comes, is utterly foreign to the Bible and fanciful 
in its character, unknown to the faith of the Church, and 
suggested only by the necessities of a system. A tedious 
and ungenial work it has been to pursue into the shallows 
such poor, unfruitful distinctions as have engaged our atten 
tion in these supplementary remarks. Gladly, therefore, do 
we now come back to " a place of broad rivers and streams," 
to repose on the clear bosom of such words as these : 
" Father, I will that they also whom thou hast given me " 
all of them " be with me where I am, that they may behold 
my glory which thou hast given me ;" " This is the Father s 
will which hath sent me, that of all which he hath given me 
I should lose nothing, but should raise it up at the last day ;" 
" He shall come to be glorified in his saints, and admired 
in all them that believe." 

" Even so, come, Lord Jesus ! " 



CHAPTER IV. 

.ALL THE MEANS OF GRACE, AND AGENCIES OF SALVATION, 
TERMINATE AT THE SECOND ADVENT. 

WE have seen that the whole elect and ransomed Church ig 
complete when Christ conies. If this be correct, we may ex 
pect to find the ordained means for the gathering and per 
fecting of the Church disappearing from the stage, the stand 
ing agencies and instrumentalities, the whole economy and 
machinery of a visible Church-state, taken out of the way. 
Here then is a test, the fairest and most satisfactory that 
can be imagined, by which to try the truth of our doc 
trine. Premillermialists maintain that the saving of souls is 
to go on upon earth after the Eedeemer s second appearing. 
If this be true, we shall find the means of grace surviving the 
advent. Whereas, if grace has ceased at Christ s coming to 
flow from the fountain, we shall find that the channels for its 
conveyance have disappeared too if the building of mercy 
has been completed, we may expect to find the scaffolding 
cleared away. 

Beginning then with the Means If it can be shown that 
both the written WORD and the sealing ORDINANCES, by which 
God ordinarily gathers and perfects the Church having 
their whole ends and objects exhausted at Christ s coming shall 
then absolutely cease as means of grace and salvation to man 
kind, I think it will be clear that all saving of souls is then 
at an end. 



06 OBJECT OF THE SCRIPTURES. 

What, then, is the testimony of Scripture on this subject ? 
The answer to this question forms 

PROPOSITION SECOND : 

CHRIST S SECOND COMING WILL EXHAUST THE OBJECT OF THE 
SCRIPTURES. 

His Coming is the goal of all revelation, its farthest hori 
zon, its last terminus, its sabbath and haven. Thither are 
directed all the anxieties which divine truth awakens. Every 
hope which it kindles and every fear which it excites in 
stinctively points to that awful event, its concomitants, and 
its issues, as the needle to the pole. To prepare men for it. 
as an event future to all whom it addresses, is what the Bible 
proposes, and positively all that it undertakes and is fitted to 
do. The whole force of every reference to Christ s coming 
in Scripture, as a motive to action, absolutely depends on its 
being a future event. 

1. Look in the case of saints at all the incentives to 
patience and hope, to watchfulness and fidelity, to prompti 
tude and cheerfulness in the discharge of duty, drawn from 
the prospect of Christ s coming, and see if they would not be 
stript of all their power and all their point, on the supposition 
of its being a past event, and as addressed to saints living 
after it. Take an example or two almost at random : 

"Occupy TILL / come" (Luke xix. 13.)* 

" Be patient therefore, brethren, UKTO the coming of the Lord." 
(James v. 7.) 

" 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 reve 
lation of Jesus Christ." (1 Pet. i. 13.) 

"The Lord, the righteous Judge, shall give the crown of 

* In the former editions of this work, 2 Pet. i. 19 was next quoted; 
but as the sense in which alone it is applicable is at least doubtful, it is 
here omitted. 



OBJECT OF THE SCKIPTURES. 97 

righteousness at that day to all them that lore Ids appearing." 
(2 Tim. iv. 8.) 

" Our conversation is in heaven, from whence we look for the 
Saviour. (Phil. iii. 20.) 

It is impossible to deny that the attitude of expectancy 
and preparedness for a future appearing of Christ, is the 
whole burden of one and all of these passages. Just think 
how they would sound in the ears of saints living after the 
advent. " Behold I come quickly" is the exhilarating 
announcement of Jesus to those whose eyes long to behold 
him " and my reward is with me, to give every man accord 
ing as his work shall be." But from what lips shall that 
delightful response go forth after his coming, " Amen, even 
so, come, Lord Jesus?" The Church s hopes, and fears, and 
struggles, have found their object and end. Beyond that end 
toe never get in God s Word. It is the goal of all souls tra 
velling from nature to grace, from a lost to a saved state. It 
is the crisis and consummation of the state of grace, and the 
whole Bible is constructed upon the principle of its being so. 

And here, let me recall the scriptural connection which we 
found to subsist between the two comings of Christ; how 
to the grace brought by the one we look backward by faith, 
and forward by hope to the glory which is to be brought by 
the other ; how, between these two events, of unutterable 
importance to the formation and growth of the Christian 
character, the believer is thus poised : let this intrinsic con 
nection and studied juxtaposition of these two doctrines in 
the Christian system these commanding events in the work 
of redemption be duly weighed, and then let the reader 
say, whether the theory of a race of outstanding saints, living 
on earth after the second advent, does not dislocate this con 
nection, eviscerate every text which expresses it, derange 
the whole economy of evangelical motives, subvert the only 
recognised basis of a Christian character, and introduce a 
principle of inextricable confusion, where order and beauty, 

I 



98 OBJECT OF THE SCRIPTURES 

symmetry and strength, are seen otherwise to reign. This 
is strong language. Whether it be too strong, let those who 
dispassionately weigh the grounds of it determine. 

2. Similar remarks may be made upon all those passages 
in which the second advent is brought to bear upon " the 
sinners in Zion," despisers of gospel grace, such as the fol 
lowing : 

" The Lord Jesus shall be revealed from heaven with his mighty 
angels, in flaming fire, taking vengeance on them that know 
not God, and that obey not the gospel of our Lord Jesus 
Christ: who shall be punished with everlasting destruction 
from the presence of the Lord, and from the glory of his 
power, in that day." (2 Thess. i. 7-10.) 
" The day of the Lord will come as a thief in the night," &c. 

(2 Pet. iii. 10.) 

" And this know, that if the goodman of the house had known 
what hour the thief would come, he would have watched, 
and not have suffered his house to be broken through. Be 
ye therefore ready also : for the Son of Man cometh at an 
hour when ye think not." (Luke xii. 39, 40.) 
u As it was in the days of Noe, so shall it be also in the days 

of the Son of Man. They did eat, they drank, 

until the day that Noe entered into the ark; and the flood 
came, and destroyed them all. Even thus shall it be in the 
day when the Son of Man is revealed." (Luke xvii. 26, 
27, 30.) 

Is it necessary to ask whether such warnings would be at all 
applicable to sinners living after that event, so full of terror 
to the wicked now, shall have been numbered amongst the 
things of the past? 

Thus, one half of the Scripture would be inapplicable to 
saints, and the other half to sinners, living after Christ s 
coming: In other words, the Scriptures, as a means of grace, 
will be PUT OUT OF DATE by the second advent. It is " a light 
shining in a dark place UNTIL the day dawn," and nothing 
more.* 
* The Duke of Manchester asks if I include the preached with the 



EXHAUSTED BY THE- SECOND ADVENT. 99 

In reply to this it is urged, that though " the Old Testa 
ment was a book written for men before the first advent, 
and applicable universally to such alone, this does not hinder 
us from profiting by the Old Testament after his coming." * 
But this is to mistake, and not at all to meet, my argument. 
It is not the mere fact that an event is past, that makes the 
recorded predictions of it and preparations for it useless ever 
after. It were absurd to maintain this. But it is the nature 
of the event, which I say would render the Scriptures inappli 
cable and useless to any living after it. What is that event ? 
It is " the day when God shall judge the secrets of men by 
Jesus Christ" " the day in the which he will judge the 
world in righteousness by that Man whom he hath ordained" 
" the day of judgment and of the perdition of ungodly 
men, against which day (alone) the heavens and the earth 
that are now are kept in store" the day, in fine, of which 
Himself says : " Behold I come quickly, and my reward is 
with me (f^sr !//,oS), to give every man according as his work 
shall be." How different the bearings of this coming upon 
men s eternal destinies, from that of his first coming! Why, 
in this respect, it is just the reverse of it. The first coming 
opened " the door" of grace, which the second coming will 
"shut." (Matt. xxv. 10; Luke xvii. 26-30.) The first 
coming far from rendering the Old Testament inapplicable, 
or putting it out of date, for believers under the gospel 
only opened out its riches, making it, in some respects, more 
valuable to us than even to those under whose economy it 

written word here ; because if so, he " denies that that will cease at 
Christ s advent, believing from the prophets, that after the Lord comes 
with fire (Isa. Ixvi. 15), his glory will be declared among the Gentiles 
(verse 19)." P. 290. Undoubtedly, I say the same of the preached as of 
the written word. As to the passage which his Grace adduces from 
Isaiah, I can hardly conceive it possible that any one should apply the 
details of that prediction to the second advent. 

* Mr Bickersteth (Divine Warning, p. 316). To the same effect, Mr 
A. Bonar (p. 127), the Duke of Manchester (p. 291), Mr Wood (p. 76, &c.), 
Mr Birks (pp. 158, 189), &c. 



100 BAPTISM, AND THE WORK OF THE MINISTRY, 

was written. The old and the new dispensations are, in fact, 
but one dispensation of grace the former being preparatory to 
the latter the latter perfective of the former both together 
embracing the infancy and maturity of the same economy 
of grace. In short, of his first advent the Redeemer ex 
pressly says, " I came not to judge the world, but to save the 
world." Can such a saying be found respecting his second 
advent? No, but the reverse of it continually. Ever is it 
said that he comes to "judge" never once that he will come 
to " save the world." It does not follow, then, that because 
Christ s first coming to save did not supersede the Old 
Testament, his second coming to judge will not supersede 
both Testaments as means of grace ; but the opposite clearly 
follows. If the object of the Scriptures be to prepare men 
for " THAT DAY" which will be the crisis and consummation 
of the state of grace, surely the arrival of that day must 
supersede their use. 

PROPOSITION THIPvD: 

THE SEALING ORDINANCES OF THE NEW TESTAMENT WILL 
DISAPPEAR AT CHRIST S SECOND COMING. 

The very terms of their institution are singularly decisive 
on this point. 

I. With respect to BAPTISM, how conclusive are the glori 
ous words of its institution: 

Matt, xxviii. 18-20 : " And Jesus came and spake unto them, 
saying, All power is given unto me in heaven and in earth. 
Go ye therefore, and teach," or make disciples of " all na 
tion, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the 
Son, and of the Holy Ghost ; teaching them to observe all 
things -whatsoever I have commanded you : and, lo, I am 
with you alway, even unto the end of the world. Amen." 

Here we have Christ s commission to establish his kingdom 
upon earth, the authority on which that commission is based, 



CHASE AT THE SECOND ADVENT. 101 

and a gracious encouragement to undertake and go through 
with it. The commission is, properly speaking, twofold 
missionary and pastoral; but there is a sort of third inter 
mediate department, holding of both, linking the two to 
gether, and forming, if I may so speak, the point of transition 
between the missionary and the pastoral departments of the 
work prescribed I mean that of baptizing. " Go, make 
disciples of all nations" " Subjugate the world to me; bring 
all nations to the obedience of faith." This Is the missionary 
work. This done, " Baptize the converts in (or into) the 
name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost." 
Generally speaking, this was to afford the converts an oppor 
tunity of making public profession of the faith they had 
embraced to be a solemn declaration of their principles 
and purposes, and their formal separation from a world lying 
in wickedness. But, more particularly, it was to be God s 
solemn investiture and public infeftment of believers in all 
the love of the Father, the grace of the Son, and the com 
munion of the Holy Ghost; and to be their solemn pledge 
that they yielded themselves to this triune Jehovah as their 
God and portion, and would cleave to him in love and obe 
dience as his redeemed people. Thus were they and their 
seed to be visibly declared, the Lord s, and enrolled the dis 
ciples of Christ ; and being thus formed and organized into 
churches, the Christian, ministry immediately assumed a new 
character. The missionary aggressor of those that were with 
out is now merged in the pastoral overseer of them that are 
within whose work is to train and mature those organizer! 
clustres of disciples for glory, or, as here expressed, to " teach 
them to observe all things whatsoever Christ has commanded 
us." Such, then, is the Commission. The Authority is that 
of Him " to whom all power is given in heaven and in earth" 
for this very end. And the Encouragement is, " Lo ! I am 
with you ahvay, even unto the end of the world" (cfuvTsXtia. rov 
atuio$\ At this " end of the world," then, whatever bo 



102 THE LORD S SUPPER 

meant by it, the whole work here described is to cease. 
Fortunately, we have no need to spend a moment in fixing 
the sense of this phrase ; for it is agreed on all hands that it 
denotes the time of Christ s personal coming. * This being 
the case, what do we learn from this passage? Why, clearly, 

That THE WHOLE WORK OF THE MINISTRY, both in its 

missionary and pastoral departments embracing the making, 
baptizing, and training of disciples together with Christ s 
mediatorial POWER and PRESENCE for the discharge of it, are 
to terminate at his second coming. The bare reading of the 
words makes this as clear as any comment on them could 
possibly do. Nor let any say, that though the external 
machinery of the church may be changed, the work -of saving 
souls may still go on. For in this passage, the means and 
the end, the grace and the channels for conveying it, the 
form and the substance, are plainly bound up with each 
other.j 

II. As to THE LORD S SUPPER, what can be more conclusive 
than 

1 Cor. xi. 26: " For as often as ye eat this bread, and drink this 

cup, ye do show the Lord s death TILL HE COME" ? 
That the cessation of this precious and characteristic ordi 
nance of the Christian Church is here intimated, I argue, 
not so much from the word "till," as from the manifest 
design of the statement itself, which was to teach the per 
petuity of this ordinance in the visible Church its continu 
ance as long as there should be a Church upon earth in which 
to show it forth. According, then, to the apostle s teach 
ing, the visible Church-state and this ordinance are to termi 
nate together, and both at Christ s coming. And is not this 

* See pp. 34, 35, where we found that same expression, " the end of 
the world," occurring thrice in one chapter in this same sense. 

f "Now with regard to the Christian sacraments, there can be no 
doubt that these ordinances of grace will cease and determine at the 
Second Coming of the Lord." (Birk, p. 157.) 



CEASES AT THE SECOND ADVENT. 103 

tvhat any one would take for granted, from the nature and 
intent of the ordinance itself? The Lord s Supper is the 
symbol of that double attitude of the believer to which we 
find ourselves ever recurring the backward look of his faith 
and the forward look of his hope its present crucifixion 
and anticipated glorification with his Lord. Xow, this is 
precisely the note which the apostle strikes. He seems 
almost to go out of his way to get at this, his favourite col 
location. He does not bid them show the Lord s death in 
the Church " always, even to the end of the world" 
though that had come to the same thing but he bids them 
celebrate his death for them, till, as their Life, they find 
themselves appearing with him in glory. " Show the Lord s 
death till he come" till the affecting be turned into a joyous 
scene till the grace ye draw from his first, shall be merged 
in the glory ye receive at his second coming till He whose 
table ye bedew with your tears, in " fellowship with his 
sufferings and conformity to his death," shall interrupt your 
communion and break in upon you with his glory, and swal 
low up faith in sight; giving you, in place of the symbols, 
the immediate and eternal fruition of himself. Thus, the 
Lord s Supper will cease to be celebrated after Christ s com 
ing, not because the Lord of the Church has so willed it, but 
because after that it would be meaningless because the stats 
of things and the attitude of the believing soul, with reference to 
the two comings of Christ, of ivhich the Lord s Supper is the 
ordained and beautiful symbol, shall then have no place. 

What, then, have we found with respect to these ordained 
means of grace ? Why, that the second advent, come when 
it may, will put them all out of date. The passages which 
teach this, make no distinction between the means and the 
end; they so implicate the grace conveyed with the means of 
conveying it, that both are seen disappearing together at 
Christ s coming. If, then, there is to be a millennium after that, 



104 THESE STARTLING CONCLUSIONS ADMITTED 

it cannot be an era of Christianity; for the whole Christian fur 
niture, and with it all the Christianity that has hitherto ob 
tained, has been withdrawn from the earth. The word \< 
inapplicable it was for a totally different state of things: the 
ordinances are gone: and the "grace which hath appeared 
unto all men, bringing salvation" having no more salvation 
to bring, because " the blessed hope and glorious appearing" 
to which it points all its possessors as a future event, has be 
come a present and glorious reality this grace, of which the 
sacraments are but the symbols and exponents, has retired 
from the field, having accomplished all its objects. 

These conclusions are sufficiently startling, one should 
think. But it is not every thing that startles the advocates 
of this commanding theory. Mr Brooks, for example, not 
only admits all that we have said about its putting the Scrip 
tures out of date, but conceives that this very circumstance 
furnishes valuable confirmation of his view of the advent. 
One whole essay, entitled " The approaching K"ew Dispensa- 
sation," is devoted to this point ; and I have to entreat those 
who are not hopelessly committed to the doctrine of the pre- 
millennial advent, to look well, in the light of the following 
extract, whither it is likely to lead them : 

" Startling, then," says Mr Brooks, " as it may appear to some, 
yet I apprehend it will be found that the Holy Scriptures would, for 
the most part, be rendered inapplicable to the then existing circumstances of 
men in the flesh, and that there would need some further revelation from 
God* Now, I think it must be allowed, that a state of things 
which supersedes a portion of divine revelation hitherto enjoyed, and 
introduces men into a state of things which is the consummation of that 
revealed, has one grand characteristic of a new dispensation." 

The first of the things which are to " render the Scriptures 

* " To avoid being misunderstood, I would observe, that when I say the 
Scriptures would be for the most part inapplicable, I am aware that there 
are many glorious declarations concerning the divine attributes and con 
duct (!), which could never lose their power and influence on a regenerate 
soul." 



BY MR BROOKS. 105 

for the most part inapplicable," Mr Brooks says, is the bind 
ing of Satan, and its consequences ; regarding which he tells 
us, that 

" All that is written for the comfort of the believer under such 
circumstances the promises set before him, to sustain him during 
the conflict, and the experience of the cloud of witnesses, recorded 
for his encouragement, will become comparatively a dead letter a 
matter inapplicable to the circumstances in which the Church can, 
for a thousand years, by any probability be placed. I forbear," he 
adds, after one or two other examples of this kind, " to bring for 
ward many other particulars, which would obviously be rendered 
NUGATORY by our Lord s personal advent. What I have advanced is 
sufficient to evince, that the whole character of the Church and of 
the state of mankind would be so altered, together with their spi 
ritual and religious circumstances, that we should no longer find 
them portrayed generally in the length and breadth of Scripture; 
and it would not, perhaps, be too much to say, that the great bulk 
of what are called practical discourses, at present delivered or pub 
lished, would be as much unsuited to the condition of mankind, as 
they would were they addressed to the angels of God! This view of the 
subject," he continues, " is strikingly confirmed by referring to 
the past history of the Church, and reasoning from the analogy of 
the case. Whensoever any great change has been made in its 
circumstances and condition, it has always been accompanied by a 
further revelation from God, concerning the dispensation about to 
be introduced, and containing also some intimations of the dispen 
sation to succeed Again, each decidedly marked era in the 

history of the Church, has not only been accompanied by an increase 
of revelation, but by a disannulling or superseding of something 

going before When, therefore, a similar difference shall 

exist in the use of the New Testament revelation, it will be equally 
manifest that a new dispensation has arrived. Nor will the Scriptures, 
SUPERSEDED IN THE MILLENNIUM, 6s denld of interest or use; but they 
will serve in the way of retrospection and memorial ; excepting 
some very few passages, respecting the little season, when Satan 
shall be loosed and the events which are to follow." 

On this memorial use of the Scriptures during the millennium, 
there is the following singular note, which I take the liberty 



106 THESE CONCLUSIONS ADMITTED 

of introducing into the text : " Thus the manna, given in 
the wilderness, ceased on the entering of the Church into the 
promised land ; but a pot of it was laid up in the ark as a me 
morial ! " * 

Thus, then, the Scriptures will be " superseded," as being 
" inapplicable" during the millennium ; and all " practical 
discourses," founded upon Scripture, will be as " unsuitable 
as to the angels of God." These Scriptures, however, will 
not be altogether " devoid of interest or use." They will 
" serve in the way of retrospection and memorial," like the 
pot of manna, when the earth shall be flowing with the milk 
and the honey of a new and more " applicable" revelation! 

But possibly these are extravagancies of Mr Brooks alone, 
unsanctioned by his brethren. If it were so, the inconsistency 
would be theirs, not his. Certainly, a NEW DISPENSATION is 
what they are all looking for, and perpetually dwelling on ; 
and it is a necessary part of theic- scheme, since the millen 
nium they are expecting will be so organically different from 
any thing now existing, that it would be ridiculous to imagine 
it realized, save under a new and perfectly unique dispensa 
tion. And who can fail to see that a new dispensation ne 
cessarily implies a NEW REVELATION to usher it in ; in other 
words, to authorize and organize it ? I am quite aware of the 
harshness of this sound in the ears of many excellent pre- 
millennialists, who natter themselves that their doctrine may 
be held without tacking to it the repulsive expectation of a 
new revelation ; and who, amidst the cloud of difficulties in 
which their scheme is enveloped, in this view of it, are fain 
to betake themselves to their favourite refuge that " we 
have nothing to do with difficulties." But the following ex 
tracts will show that Mr Brooks is far from being alone on the 
subject of a new revelation. 

" There are," says Mr BICKERSTETH, " some original and valuable 
remarks on the millennium in the essays of the Rev. H. Wood- 

* AVidiel s Essays; Investigator, vol. ii. pp. 267-270. 



BY MR BICKERSTETH AND DR MOBILE. 107 

ward. He shows HOW INAPPLICABLE THE SCRIPTURES OP THE NEW 
TESTAMENT, written for a tempted and suffering Church, ARE TO THIS 
STATE OF THINGS, and thence draws an argument for the personal 
advent of our Lord on earth, TO OPEN THE VERT FOUNTAIN FROM 
WHICH THE SCRIPTURES THEMSELVES HAVE FLOWED, FROM WHICH NEW 
STREAMS MAT ISSUE FORTH TO WATER A RENOVATED WORLD, AND MAKE 
GLAD THE CITT OF GOD." * 

" We may expect [during the millennium] further means of 
grace says the same author, in commenting on my quotation 
from him in the foregoing paragraph " and A VISIBLE ECONOMT 

POSSIBLT OF ORAL REVELATION FROM THOSE WHO REIGN UPON THE 

EARTH, as we see in the Jewish economy." f 

In other words, the glorified saints who are to reign on the 
earth, may " orally" communicate the mind of God to those 
then living in the flesh, as the prophets did of old to the 
Jewish people, and a visible economy of such oral revelation 
may characterise the millennium ! 

" These passages of Scripture," says Dr M NEILE, " avowedly be 
long to this dispensation But, on the supposition that the dis 
pensation is to enlarge itself by degrees into the universal blessedness 
predicted by the prophets, then THESE SCRIPTURES WILL NOT CON 
TINUE TO APPLT; and who is to determine" he means, without a 
new revelation " at what point of the progress they cease to be 
applicable ? It is obvious, that in the passage from our present 
state to a state of universal holiness, THESE CHARACTERISTIC SATIXGS 
OF THE NEW TESTAMENT MUST CEASE TO HAVE ANT APPLICATION, AND 
BECOME OBSOLETE, NOT TO SAT FALSE: and again I ask, who is to 
determine at what point of the progress they cease to apply ?J We 
maintain, therefore, that as the statutes of the book of Leviticus 
continued binding, until another plain and direct communication 
from the God who gave them showed that they were superseded, 

* Guide, pp. 295, 296. Fifth Edition. 

f Divine Warning, p. 316. 

t The passages selected, as then inapplicable, are such as the follow 
ing: " Strait is the gate, and narrow is the way of life; " " Be not con 
formed to this world;" " Come out from among them, and be ye sepa 
rate, saith the Lord." On these passages I shall have occasion to touch 
at a subsequent stage of the argument. 



108 SUMMARY. 

and a better order of things introduced; so these Scriptures, de 
scribing the experience, the number, and the character of the 
Lord s people, under this dispensation, must continue applicable, 

TILL ANOTHER PLAIN AND DIRECT COMMUNICATION, FROM HlM WHO GAVE 
THEM, SHALL SHOW THAT THEY ARE SUPERSEDED, and a Still better 

order of things introduced. THIS COMMUNICATION WE EXPECT AT THE 

SECOND COMING OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST."* 

We have thus the testimony of our friends themselves 
and these not certainly the extremest section of them in 
favour of the main position of this chapter, namely, that the 
second advent will put all that we now have, in the way of 
means, out of date.\ We, indeed, carry the matter a very 
little farther than they do. They talk of a, new order of 
things, and, in connection with this, they look with perfect 
consistency for a new revelation authoritatively to launch it : 
I have endeavoured to show that the old order of things, 
which Christ s coming is to supersede,. includes not only the 
present means of grace, but the grace itself conveyed by 
them. They Avill not go this length; but whether they are 
far short of it, let the reader judge. When they have found 
that millennial Christianity will be so different a thing from 
the Christianity of the New Testament that it will need a 
revelation for itself when they have found (though some of 
them demur to this) that " the gate " into it will no longer 
be " strait," nor the way of it any longer " narrow ; " that 
there will be nothing to " come out and be separated from " 
no " world," the " love " of which is incompatible with 
the " love of the Father " and no devil, most people will 
imagine that they have got rid of some rather important 
features of Christianity itself. Satan is gone; the world is 
gone that is to say, as in any respect inimical to salvation; 
and if the gate into spiritual safety be not strait, nor the 

* Lectures on the Jews, pp. 79-81. First Edition. 

f My friends, the Messrs Bonar and Mr Wood, explicitly disclaim tins 
sentiment, and I am far from wishing to fasten it upon them. But the 
reader will judge whether the statements I advance are unsupported. 



SUMMARY. 109 

way of it narrow, the flesh must be gone also.* Whether, 
after this, " the grace which bringeth salvation " will have 
any thing to do whether it would not be rather in the way 
whether, in short, such a view of millennial Christianity 
be any thing more savoury, or more intelligible, than the 
Adamism from which they profess to stand aloof; or rather, 
whether it be not this same Adamism, if it be any thing more 
than an inexpressible abstraction we may leave unsettled 
just now, as we shall have occasion to dissect it when we 
come to investigate the character of the millennial era. 
Meantime I cannot but hope, that, prepared as are some of 
the advocates of the premillermial scheme for all this, and 
more too, rather than abandon their beloved theory there 
are others, and not a few, who will think its advantages 
rather dearly purchased at this expense, and will suspect that 
a scheme involving an obligation to look for such things, does 
not look like a scriptural one. 

* " I am not quite clear," says the Duke of Manchester, " as to what Mr 
Brown intends here. Satan and the -world are not important features of 
Christianity," &c. (P. 292.) I can hardly think that this pleasantry 
will puzzle any one. That none will eat of the tree of life which is in the 
midst of the paradise of God without resisting and overcoming these 
enemies, is a somewhat important feature of Christianity ; and that is 
ray position. 



CHAPTER V. 

THE SAME SUBJECT CONTINUED. 

I HAVE shown that the ordained channels or means of 
grace dry up and disappear at the second advent ; and that 
wherever this is intimated, the grace conveyed is so bound 
up with the means of conveying it, that neither can without 
violence be torn asunder from, or be imagined to survive, 
the other. 

But I said that the agencies of salvation would cease at the 
same time; by which I mean the present work of Christ in 
the heavens, and the work of the Spirit, as the fruit of it. 
The truth on this subject, which I shall now illustrate from 
Scripture, may be expressed as follows : 

PROPOSITION FOURTH : 

THE INTERCESSION OF CHRIST, AND THE WORK OP THE 
SPIRIT, FOR SAVING PURPOSES, WILL CEASE AT THE SECOND 
ADVENT. 

I. The ground and the nature of Christ s intercession are 

sufficiently known. But what I wish to be observed is the 

place which it holds in relation to his two advents. It 

stands intermediate betiveen his first and Ms second coming, as 

the following passage, viewed as a whole, plainly shows : 

Heb. ix. 12, 24-28. "By his own blood he entered in once 

into the holy place, having obtained eternal redemption 

for us. Christ is not entered into the holy places made 

with hands, which are the figures of the true ; but into 



CHRIST S INTERCESSION. Ill 

heaven itself, now to appear in the presence of God for 
us : Nor yet that he should offer himself often, as the 
high priest entereth into the holy place every year with 
blood of others ; (for then must he often have suffered since 
the foundation of the world :) but now once, in the end of 
the world, hath he appeared, to put away sin by the sacri 
fice of himself. And as it is appointed unto men once 
to die, but after this the judgment; so Christ was once 
offered to bear the sins of many : and unto them that look 
for him shall he appear the second time, without sin, unto 
salvation." 

Here the two advents stand at the two extremities of 
Christ s mediatorial work, while the intercession stretches 
from one to the other, and occupies the whole intervening 
period. Each of these three things is termed an " appear 
ing" the word being somewhat different in each case, but 
the idea essentially the same and each of them is said to be 
done once. Thus: " Once, in the end of the world, hath he 
appeared (Kt<pa.vzurai), to put away sin by the sacrifice of 
himself." " By his own blood he entered in once into the 
holy place " " not into the holy places made with hands, but 
into heaven itself, now to appear (tftpawffSiivcti) in the pre 
sence of God for us." " And unto them that look for him 
shall he appear (opSqffzrai) the second time [once for all], 
without sin, unto salvation." The first and the last appear 
ances are to us : the intermediate appearance is to God, for 
us. This intermediate appearance " in the presence of God 
for us" carries into effect the work of his first appearance 
to us, and prepares the way for his second. As he appeared 
the first time " to put aicay sin by the sacrifice of himself," 
so he will appear the second time, " without sin, unto salva 
tion." Now, as the second coming is here represented as 
crowning the icliole purposes of the first, it is plain that the 
intercession, which is but a continual pleading upon the 
merit of his death, must be over, for all saving purposes, 
before he comes. 



112 CHRIST S INTERCESSION. 

Let the reader now connect this view of Christ s inter 
cession with the following : 

lleb. vii. 25 : " "Wherefore he is able also to save them to the 
uttermost that come unto God by him, seeing he ever liveth 
to make intercession for them." 

Taking this expression, "to the uttermost" (tic rl favrzXsi), 
comprehensively, it may denote that Christ is able to save 
" completely as to all parts, fully as to all causes, and for 
ever in duration." (OWEN, ad loc.} But as the contrast 
here between Christ and the high priests under the law, is 
made to hinge upon his " ever living " to discharge his office, 
while " they were not suffered to continue by reason of 
death," I think the apostle, by this expression, means per 
petuity to the uttermost case, to the last object, and the 
last necessities of that object, for whom salvation is designed 
and required. His people may, one by one, disappear from 
the stage; but their Intercessor liveth. Age after age shall 
find him at his post. And the last soul that " comes unto 
God by him," shall find him "in heaven itself, there ap 
pearing in the presence of God for him," a Priest in per 
petuity before the Mercy-Seat, 

" Till all the ransomed Church of God 
Be saved to sin no more." 

The last soul that ever shall be saved will be the fruit of 
this glorious intercession as well as the first. 

If these observations be just, they go to settle the whole 
question. When the Advent arrives, the Intercession is 
done ; and, when the Intercession is done, Salvation is done. 
When Christ appears the second time to us, he will cease to 
appear in the presence of God for us. 

In the first edition of this work, I dwelt upon the sphere or 
locality Avhere the intercession is conducted " the holy place 
not made with hands," " heaven itself," " at the right hand of 
God ;" affirming that as Christ s going in within the veil cor 
responds to his ascension from the earth, and session at the 



CHRIST S INTERCESSION. 113 

right hand of God, so his coming out again, as did the high 
priest at the close of his work, answers to his glorious return 
to us at his second advent ; and thus, that the period of his 
intercession is just the time of his absence from us in the 
heavens neither less nor more ; and that, while there is one 
outstanding soul to be gathered in, he cannot leave his pre 
sent abode, nor alter his present attitude " in the presence of 
God for us." 

I am satisfied that this is correct. But as great pains have 
been taken to show that it is not so, I will show that my 
argument from the intercession of Christ is not dependent on 
that particular aspect of it, by waiving it altogether. It has 
been said, for example, that the locality is of no consequence; 
that there is nothing to hinder the Eedeemer from interced 
ing on earth as well as in heaven on the Mount of Olives as 
well as at the right hand of God and that though it was ne 
cessary that he should go, it was not necessary for him to stay 
within the veil, even for a moment, with a view to the ex 
ercise of his present office as our " High Priest over the house 
of God." I believe I could show this to be unsatisfactory 
and incorrect. But as my argument from the position and 
the period of the intercession as intermediate between the 
two advents and therefore ceasing necessarily when the 
second, the consummating advent, arrives is complete with 
out it, I am content to let the other alone.* 

Nor do I enter into the questions which have been raised 
about the continuance of Christ s intercession, and in what 
sense, after the whole Church has been gathered and per 
fected. I will not be drawn into such matters. The pro 
position I have laid down is, that Christ s intercession, for 

* My friend Mr Wood seems to think I have deprived him of the satis 
faction of demolishing this argument, by not giving it in full. Others, 
however, including one who has written forcibly on this subject, havo 
expressed to me their regret that what they believe to be a scriptural 
and important position should not have more prominence. Surely the 
hints above given should be enough for both parties. 



114 WORK OF THE SPIRIT. 

saving purposes (by which I mean, the infringing of sinnert 
and the perfecting of saints ), will cease at his second coming ; 
and this I think I have established.* 

II. The second branch of our proposition, regarding the 
work of the Spirit, must stand or fall with the first. For as 
the mission of the Comforter is through the intercession of 
Christ, and the continued effusion of the Spirit results from 
the continual intercession of our High Priest, the second 
advent, if it bring the latter to a close, must be the terminat 
ing period of the former also. 

The passages which show the connection of these two 
things, are such as the following : 

John vii. 38, 39 : " He that believeth on me, out of his belly [the 
depths of his inner man] shall flow rivers of living water. 
(This spake he of the Spirit, which they that believe on him 
should receive : for the Holy Ghost was not yet [given]; be 
cause that Jesus was not yet glorified.)" 

Chap. xiv. 16,17,26: "I will pray the Father, and he shall 
give you another Comforter, that he may abide with you 
for ever; [even] the Spirit of truth. The Comforter, which 
is the Holy Ghost, whom the Father will send in my name, 
he shall teach you all things." 

Chap. xv. 26 : " When the Comforter is come, whom I will send 
unto you from the Father." 

Chap. xvi. 7, 14 : " It is expedient for you that I go away : for 
if I go not away, the Comforter will not come unto you; but 
if I depart, I will send him unto you. He shall glorify 
me; for he shall receive of mine, arid shall show it unto 
you. 

Acts ii. 33 : " Being by the right band of God exalted, and hav 
ing received of the Father the promise of the Holy Ghost, 
he hath shed forth this." 

Tit. iii. 5, 6 : " He saved us, by the washing of regeneration, and 

* Let me refer the reader to Calvin (Instit. lib. iii. cap. xx.), Turrdin 
(Theol. Elenct. Loc. xiv. qusest. xv.), Owen (on Heb. vii. 5, and ix. 24- 
28), De Moor (Comm. in Marckii Comp. cap. xx. xxix.), SymingtM 
(Atonement and Intercession, pp. 348-357). 



BOTH TERMINATE AT THE SECOND ADVENT. 115 

renewing of the Holy Ghost; which he shed on us abun 
dantly through Jesus Christ our Saviour. 
Rev. iii. 1 : " These things saith he that hath the seven Spirits 

of God." 

Chap. v. 6 : "And I beheld, and, lo, in the midst of the throne 
and of the four living creatures, and in the midst of the 
elders, stood A LAMB AS IT HAD BEEN SLAIN, having seven 
horns and seven eyes, which are the seven Spirits of God sent 
forth into all the earth." 

But why quote passages expressly linking the mission and 
work of the Spirit with Christ s sacerdotal Intercession and 
regal Glory at the right hand of God ? For it is admitted on 
all hands, that the whole application of Christ s work in the 
flesh is accomplished in every one of his people, from first to 
last, by the agency of the Spirit, communicated through his 
continual intercession. Thus this department of Christ s 
priestly office holds at once of the purchase and of the appli 
cation of redemption. The actual salvation of any soul, as it 
is by virtue of his meritorious death which his intercession 
pleads, so it is through the agency of his Spirit which that 
intercession procures. In this intercession the merit of his 
death and the might of his Spirit find their legal connection, 
and by means of it the one passes into the other. There is a 
continuous presentation of his sacrifice, or of himself in the 
virtue of it, in order to a continuous acknowledgment of his 
right to receive and dispense the Spirit to each of his redeemed 
in succession, down to the last, when he " appears the second 
time, without sin, unto salvation." This appearing lies, as 
we have seen, at the other extremity of the Redeemer s work. 
AVe have nothing here to do let me repeat it with ques 
tions regarding the active agency of the Spirit, the exercise 
of intercession, and other mediatorial functions of Christ, in 
the everlasting state. My views on that subject differ in 
nothing, I suppose, from those of others sound in the faith, 
and of my esteemed opponents in this great question. It is 
with the intercession of Christ and the work of the Spirit, 



116 EXTRACTS FROM PKEMILLENNIALISTS 

for saving purposes, or during the period when the saving of 
souls is going on that I have exclusively to do. And this, 
I think I have shown, is to cease at the second coming of Christ. 
The force of our reasoning on this head is felt and admitted 
even by prcmillennialists themselves, when their particular 
scheme of the second advent does not happen to require their 
opposition to it. Take the following proof of this from good 
Joseph Perry, " an unworthy servant in the work of the gos 
pel," whose premillennial system certainly has its own diffi 
culties, as we have seen, though this is not one of them : 

"There are some things," says he, "that these last do hold 
(meaning those who in his day held the views now most prevalent 
amongst premillennialists), that I cannot by any means assent to; 
and that is, when Christ shall be established upon the throne of his 
glory, in his kingdom, and all the saints with him, in a perfect, in 
corruptible state of immortality, that then there shall be preach 
ing of the gospel, and conversion-work go forward among the 
multitude of the nations that shall be found living when Christ 
cometh, according to the opinion of some good men. I say this is 
that which I cannot fall in with, but must profess my dislike 
against, because I cannot believe that the Lord Jesus Christ will come 
down from heaven, and LEAVE THAT CHEAT WORK OF HIS INTERCESSION 

NOW AT GOD S EIGHT HAND, UNTIL THE WHOLE NUMBER OF GOD S ELECT 
AMONG JEWS AND GENTILES ARE CONVERTED, AND THE MYSTICAL BODY 

OF CHRIST is COMPLETED. AND IF so, WHERE is THERE ANY ROOM FOR 

CONVERSION WORK TO GO ON AFTER THIS?"* 

The honest man never thought there could be a question 
about Christ s coming putting an end to his intercession. 
And what he could not comprehend was, how, when his 
coming had brought him out from within the veil and put an 
end to his intercession, his mystical body should still be incom 
plete, and conversion-work go on as before. 

So natural is this view of the intercession of Christ, that 
we find even those to whose system it is fatal, letting it slip 
from their pen, as if unaware at the moment what they were 
* Glory of Christ s Visible Kingdom, pp. 219, 220. 



IN CONFIRMATION OF THIS SUMMARY. 117 

conceding. For example, in one of the volumes of Lent Lec 
tures on the Second Advent, I find Mr Barker on Heb. vii. 
25, thus expressing himself: 

" It is absolutely necessary to remember that the word ( ever 
signifies continuity , not eternity of action ; for THE OFFICE OF CHRIST 
AS OUR INTERCESSOR WILL HAVE ITS CLOSE WHEN HE HAS BROUGHT 
ALL HIS PEOPLE WITH HIM." * And when will that be ? The whole 
tenor of the lecture answers, at the time mentioned in his text, 
when the Lord himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, 
when we who are alive and remain shall be caught up together 
with the risen in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air, and so 
shall we ever be with the Lord. " (1 Thess, iv. 16, 17.) 

" When Messiah," says the Duke of Manchester, " shall leave 
the Holy of Holies, where he has now entered, to appear in the 
presence of God for us INTERCESSION, WHICH is PECULIAR TO HIS 

1SEING IN THE HOLT OF HOLIES, SHALL HAVE CEASED. Coincident 

with this," he adds, "upon resigning the kingdom, (that in which he 
now reign*, but which he will resign at the millennium) to the Father, 
he will leace the throne of grate? on which lie shall reign until the effec 
tual application, by the Holy Ghost, of all his work towards the restitu 
tion of all things. " f 

And now, summing up the argument of these two chap 
ters, what have we found ? We have found that when Christ 
comes, as the Church will then be complete, so the means of 
grace and the agencies of salvation will then terminate. In 
other words, as there will then be no more souls to be saved, so the 
whole provision for saving them will be withdrawn. The object 
of the Scripture will be exhausted ; both the sealing ordinances 
of the New Testament will disappear, and with them the grace 

* The Hope of the Apostolic Church, p. 184. Compare p. 204. 1846. 

f Horse Hebraicce, p. 90. 1835. 

In his " Finished Mystery," his Grace seems to intimate that I have 
so far misunderstood him, as at least to draw a wrong inference from his 
statement. I regret this, and the more as I have not been able to catch 
the precise import of his explanation. The reader, therefore, will bear 
in mind that his Grace does not admit the conclusion which his words 
seein to suggest. 



118 SUMMARY. 

which they " signify and seal ;" in a word, the intercession of 
Christ and the work of the Spirit, for saving purposes, will 
then terminate. I have not sought to establish one of these 
positions as a mere inference from another. Each of them has 
been established independently of all the rest. Each of them 
is thus a check upon the rest, and a test of their soundness. And 
thus the whole argument on this branch of our subject is 
cumulative; making it evident, on a number of different but 
connected grounds, that a millennium after the second advent 
was never designed, is not provided for, and will not take 
place. * 

* I have carefully considered what Mr Birks has advanced in reply to 
this and the preceding chapter, in his " Outlines of Unfulfilled Pro 
phecy," ch. iv. (pp. 156-169), but have not found any thing fresh in it. 
Charges of "utter irrelevancy" against the Scripture proofs which I 
adduce, and against my arguments as "unsubstantial shadows," will 
require something more to sustain them than Mr Birks has adduced. 



CHAPTER VI. 

TUB KINGDOM OF CHRIST ALREADY IN BEING ITS MIL 
LENNIAL ESSENTIALLY THE SAME WITH ITS PRESENT CHA 
RACTER. 

Two things are in question here the PERIOD and the NATURE 
of Christ s kingdom and reign. But as the one determines 
the other, it will be most convenient to handle them together. 
It is a very glorious and comprehensive branch of our subject. 
The points embraced under it, however, are of the most 
multifarious description, the texts with which we are met 
heaped up with often little or no classification, and the spe 
culations drawn out of them almost endless. Besides, on no 
part of the subject are our friends more at variance amongst 
themselves. When you have disposed of the texts and 
demolished the views of one writer, you find another 
untouched, who claims to be heard and tried on his own 
merits. More than once have I thrown down their books 
with a sigh, having lost myself in the thicket of texts and 
contradictory opinions in which I had got entangled, and 
nearly despairing of being able to bring order out of this 
mass of confusion. If, however, we can seize on such pro 
minent characteristics of Christ s kingdom and reign as our 
friends agree on amongst themselves, and bring these to the 
test of Scripture, the intelligent inquirer will be satisfied, and 
all that is essential will be gained. 

That Christ on his ascension was invested with a royalty 
of some sort, and is now exercising the functions of a king, 
they are not able to deny. But they deny that he is on the 



120 PREMILLENNIAL THEORY OF 

throne of his proper kingdom, and affirm that he will not be 
a king in his own right till the millennium, when he comes 
again. This brings them into great difficulty. They can 
give no intelligible account of Christ s present kingdom, or 
show in what relation it stands to this millennial one. Some 
say that Christ wields no sceptre as yet but that of Provi 
dence! 

" Sit tliou," saysDr M Neile, " on my right hand, until" when? 

" when thou wilt leave my right hand and sit on thine own throne 

when he shall have delivered up the kingdom which he at present enjoys, 
where he wields the authority, the universal kingdom of God the invi 
sible kingdom of Providence. When the Lord Jesus shall (in the 
exercise of his present Almighty authority on the Father s throne) 
have subdued all things unto himself, then shall he be prepared to 
leave the Father s throne, and set up his own kingdom upon the earth 
as the second Adam." * 

" There are two thrones," says the Duke of Manchester, " men 
tioned in connection with Messiah, one, on which he is now sitting, 
the other, on which he is hereafter to sit. The one the throne of 
God, the other the throne of David ; the one for a limited, the 
other for an unlimited period. For want of discriminating between 
the two, much confusion has been created, and some detriment to 
all the expressions in Scripture which denote eternity. It may 
not be amiss to lay down some positions respecting the kingdom of 
Messiah, for which I refer to Appendix D." Turning to Appendix 
D, we find the first part of it devoted to proving just what has 
been expressed in the foregoing quotations, that the present " ses 
sion or reign of Christ at the right hand of God," is his participa 
tion in the Divine government that " his ruling now for God 
implies his present providential universal presence" that " the 
fvpreme kingdom of God is the one which he gives up on leaving his 
right hand, and that it is HIS OWN KINGDOM in which he shall reign, 
when he appears, for ever and ever." f 

Others content themselves with strong and painful asser- 

* Sermons on the Second Advent, pp. 112-114, 5th edition. 

t Horte Hebraicse, pp 89,114-116. The capitals are the author s own. 
I have taken the liberty of combining in one sentence the contents of 
two or three. 



CHRIST S KINGDOM. 121 

tions that Christ is not now on his own throne, but on his 
Father s, without attempting to explain what sort of royalty 
that means. 

" We maintain," says a Scottish reviewer, " that CHRIST HAS NOT 

YET RECEIVED ANY KINGDOM WHICH HE CAN DELIVER UP. A man CU11 

oiily lawfully deliver up that which is his own; but by this theory 
("meaning Mr Scott s), Christ is made to deliver up that which is 
NOT HIS OWN, but the Father s. He occupies, no doubt, the Father s 
throne, being seated there beside him, and that throne he may 

leave; but, ice are not aware that ever in the New 

Testament the kingdom is used as denoting the present seat of the Father s 
power in heaven." Again: "Now, Christ is only seated upon the 
Father s throne. He is only, as it were, exalted in another s right, 
and invested with another s power ; but in the day of coming glory, lie 
is to assume HIS OWN SCEPTRE, TO SIT UPON HIS OWN THRONE, and 
exercise dominion in a way which he has not hitherto done. He 
is to take to himself his great power, as if it had been lying beside 
him unused, and only in reserve for the day of its full display, 
when he receives the crown of all the earth."* 

In a former edition I complained of this vagueness, and 
called upon them to tell us explicitly what they mean by 
Christ s present kingdom, as distinguished from what they 
call his own, his proper kingdom, to be set up during the 
millennium. To this call Mr Wood has responded, in a 
statement quite explicit in itself, but, when compared with 
his other views, leaving as much to be explained as it clears 
up. 

" That kingdom of Christ," says Mr Wood, " which is now in exist 
ence, is THE KINGDOM OP GRACE, which commenced at the time of his 
ascension, and WILL CONTINUE UNTIL HIS SECOND COMING. During it, 
Christ is seated on his Father s throne, and not upon his own, which last is 
also called the throne of David. The subjects of the kingdom are the elect, 
a hidden number known to God alone, among whom the Redeemer dispenses 
sating blessings. His rule is carried on in the midst of enemies, Satan 
being all the while, de facto, the prince of this world. Christ s proper 

* " Presbyterian Review * of Mr Scott s " Outlines of Prophecy," Jan. 
1816, pp. 409, and 468, 9. 



122 PREMILLENNIAL THEORY OP 

kingdom commences at his second coming, when he shall sit on his own 
throne, the throne of his glory, the throne of his father David."* 

That Christ s present kingdom is the kingdom of grace, is a 
refreshing statement all that could be desired. And, when 
it is added that this kingdom is to continue until the second 
advent, and then to merge in the kingdom of glory, this is so 
entirely what we say, and precisely as we express it, that we 
seem to be at one. But the language of my friend " keeps 
the word of promise to the ear and breaks it to the hope." 
First, he strenuously affirms that the kingdom of grace is 
not Christ s own, his proper kingdom. I think this distress 
ing. Surely, if there is one thing more clearly and emphati 
cally expressed in all Scripture than another, it is that this is 
just Christ s peculiar sphere. Before he came, grace was dis 
pensed, as we shall presently see, purely on the credit of his 
work in the flesh; but after that was over, it was formally 
lodged in his hands, and his august installation in the royal 
right to dispense it, with all the prerogatives thereto apper 
taining, took place on his triumphant ascension to the right 
hand of the Majesty on high. Mr Wood admits that, in 
point of fact, Christ is now dispensing grace, and doing it as 
a king; but when he says that this is done, not in the exercise 
of his proper regal authority, or from the throne of his own 
proper kingdom, but from the Father s throne, he makes a state 
ment which to me is utterly unintelligible. All that it conveys 
to me is, that Christ s present rule, which Scripture everywhere 
represents as his glory, is not so, but is merely a preparation, 
as he frequently terms it, for the kingdom properly his the 
millennial kingdom. This is one of the worst features of 
the premillennial scheme. It insensibly has the effect of 
absorbing all things into the millennium. Every thing is but 
preparative to that. " The kingly office of Christ," says Mr 
Wood, " is in exercise even now ox THE CREDIT OF HIS 

FUTURE ASSUMPTION OF THE ROYALTY THAT BELONGS TO HIM." 

* Last Things, Propositions vi., vii., pp. 112, 122. This statement ap 
pears to express substantially the views of Mr Birks (pp. 184-197.) The 



CHRIST S KINGDOM. 123 

~(P. 123.) What can this possibly mean? I pretend not to 
understand it. I had indeed said that souls were saved 
before Christ came in the flesh, on the credit of the price he 
was then to pay for them. But, if Mr Wood means that 
Christ is now dispensing saving grace as a king on the credit 
of the royalty he is to assume at the millennium, as his own, 
he either imposes upon himself and his readers with words 
which mean nothing, or he means what is derogatory to the 
honour of that Princely Saviour who gives repentance to 
Israel and forgiveness of sins. 

But Mr Wood s views are open to another objection. Who 
would doubt, when he so clearly divides between the present 
kingdom of grace and the future millennial kingdom of glory 
when he tells us that the one "continues till" the other 
that the thing which distinguishes the present kingdom, 
namely, the saving of souls, would terminate when it gives 
place to the future one? So far from this, however, the work 
of salvation is to go on with greater vigour than ever after 
Christ s second coming, and during his millennial reign. To 
call the present, then, the kingdom of grace, and the millen 
nial, by contrast, the kingdom of glory, is an abuse of words. 
Several other inconsistencies might he mentioned. It is said, 
for example, that " the subjects of Christ s present kingdom are 
the elect, a hidden number knoicn to God alone, among whom 
the Redeemer dispenses saving blessings." Will there be no 
election, then, during the millennial kingdom ? Will Christ 
dispense saving blessings then to every individual of the 
human race ? Let Mr Wood, and those who hold with him, 
speak out upon this point. If they shrink from this, it will 
be found that the principle of an election, known to God 
only, is just as truly in operation during the millennium as 
now, and that though the number of believers then may 
be vastly greater, the advantages on the side of godliness 
will be so prodigious, as to make it more difficult than 

author of " Plain Papers" goes further, deeming it unscriptural to st,y 
that Christ exercises strictly any office at present. (P. 452,) 



124 CHRIST S KINGDOM. 

now to distinguish between the converted and the uncon 
verted. 

I have dwelt the longer on Mr Wood s views, because they 
are the most recent attempt to put the premillennial scheme 
of Christ s present kingdom upon an intelligible footing. At 
the first glance they certainly look well better than any 
explanations hitherto offered ; but when narrowly examined. 
I think I have shown them to be derogatory to the honour of 
Christ, inconsistent with themselves, and, as far as the expo 
sition of them is concerned, not very intelligible. 

Here, then, I join issue with these writers, affirming as fol 
lows : 

PROPOSITION FIFTH: 
CHRIST S PROPER KINGDOM is ALREADY IN BEING; COMMENCING 

FORMALLY ON HIS ASCENSION TO THE RIGHT HAND OF GOD, 
AND CONTINUING UNCHANGED, BOTH IN CHARACTER AND 
FORM, TILL THE FINAL JUDGMENT. 

I am far from meaning to say, that the kingdom of Christ 
was in no sense in being before his ascension in our nature 
to the right hand of power. On the contrary, the whole 
grace of the Mediator, in all his offices, is put forth in the 
salvation of every soul that is saved, as well before his incar 
nation as after it. In the administration of the new covenant 
and government of the Church before the fulness of time, 
there was as real an exercise of the Redeemer s proper sove 
reignty as there has been since his ascension, or ever will be 
till the end of time. Still, we are explicitly told that " the 
Holy Ghost was not given" up to the period of Christ s 
ascension " because that Jesus was not yet glorified." (John 
vii. 39.) All the grace that ever was put forth before the 
iledeemer s death, was given only on the credit of it. When, 
however, the great Sacrifice was actually offered, and when, 
on his presenting himself in the merit of it before the Majesty 



APOSTOLIC VIEWS OF CHRIST S KINGDOM. 125 

on high, it was actually accepted, his title to save was formally 
recognised, and himself FORMALLY INSTALLED IN OFFICE. 
" The Holy Ghost was then given, because that Jesus was 
now glorified," given now for the first time, not actually but 
formally, having its legal ground now for the first time pal 
pably laid in the finished and accepted work of the blessed 
Surety. 

Nor, in saying that Christ s kingdom will continue in its 
present form till the final judgment, do I mean that it will 
absolutely terminate, as Christ s kingdom, even then ; but only 
that Christ will not hereafter occupy his throne for the same 
purposes as now for putting more souls in possession of sal 
vation, and for perfecting any thing then incomplete in the 
salvation of his elect. 

Nor, yet again, in saying that Christ s kingdom will con 
tinue in its present form, from the period of his ascension on 
wards until the final judgment, do I mean that its progress 
will be uninterrupted and equable throughout marked by 
no mighty changes in its external aspect, in its relative posi 
tion, and in the development of its internal character ; but 
merely that its external administration will continue the same, 
that its constitution, structure, organic form, will remain 
unaltered, that no new economical arrangements, or change 
of dispensation, will be introduced from the commencement 
to the close of its earthly career. 

In proof of the proposition thus explained, I take my stand 
upon the 

APOSTOLIC VIEWS OF CHRIST S KINGDOM, 

as contained in the numerous addresses to the Jews which 
we find in the Acts, and some subsequent statements in the 
apostolic epistles. 

If any where, surely we may expect light here. The one 
question between the Christian Jews and their unbelieving 



126 SAME GROUND TAKEN 

countrymen was about THE KINGDOM what was the nature 
of it. The overwhelming majority of the Jewish Church and 
nation rejected the claims of Jesus to be their Messiah, solely 
because he was not the sort of king they thought they had 
good reason from the prophecies to look for, and because the 
kingdom which he announced, and of which he claimed to be 
the sovereign, was quite different from what they imagined 
the ancient prophets had foretold. This was definite ground, 
and it was not taken without deliberation. 

When the Baptist announced Messiah s approach, every 
thing concurred to give weight to his testimony. Guided 
by the signs of the times, and by the chronological predic 
tions, expectation was every where awake for the first sound 
of Messiah s footsteps. From all parts of the country they 
flocked to the man of God, who cried aloud in the wilder 
ness, " Eepent ye, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand : 
Prepare ye the way of the Lord ; make his paths straight." 
With profound and breathless attention the motley group 
listened to the exciting tidings ; and harsh as were his ac 
cents, rougher though some of his speeches were than the 
garment which he wore, they willingly bore with them, were 
with difficulty restrained from mistaking the servant for his 
Master, and were baptized of him in Jordan, confessing their 
sins. Presently the Lord himself appears upon the stage ; 
and the Baptist having dutifully handed his disciples over to 
him, with this noble testimony, " Behold the Lamb of God 
which taketh away the sin of the world," retired, and was 
little more heard of. Thus heralded, the Saviour s ministry 
opened with every advantage ; and crowds followed him, as 
they had done the Baptist, " trusting that it was he who was 
to redeem Israel saving them from their enemies, and from 
the hand of all that hated them." 

But again they were doomed to disappointment. Every 
discourse he delivered every expression he gave of the nature 
of his kingdom convinced them more than another that he 



BY PREMILLENXIALISTS AND UNBELIEVING JEWS. 127 

was not the Icing they were looking for, nor Ids kingdom that 
which they thought the prophets had assigned to their Mes 
siah. Under this persuasion, the most majestic, miraculous, 
and moral evidences went for nothing with them. Disap 
pointment settled down into chagrin ; chagrin into rage ; 
and rage into a settled determination to deal with him as a 
blaspheming impostor according to law, who must die the 
death. It was done. But lo ! they had laid the foundations 
of that kingdom which his forerunner and he had announced 
as at hand ; and this teas just the glad tidings ivhich all the 
apostles ivent forth among their countrymen to proclaim. The 
burden of all their recorded addresses is just this, that the 
nation had misunderstood the prophets, and had mistaken the 
nature of the kingdom which they predicted ; that it was in be 
ing while they spoke, and not a kingdom of this world, as 
they supposed, but a kingdom of Salvation or of Grace; 
whose foundation was that accursed death which they, in 
their ignorance, had imagined to be the end of all the claims 
of its King ; and whose Rule, from the seat of his exal 
tation in the heavens, was purely a mediatorial and saving 
sway. 

If this be a correct representation of the apostles addresses 
to their unbelieving countrymen, it obviously cuts up the 
premillennial view of the kingdom of Christ. Nay, it places 
the premillennialist and the unbelieving Jew in the same 
category as respects the question in hand, both holding the 
same error on the subject of the kingdom which the apostles set 
themselves to overthrow. The error, say the premillennialists, 
into which the Jews fell, was that of overlooking the distinc 
tion between the first and second comings of the Messiah ; 
the one in suffering, and the other in glory ; the one to save 
men s souls, and the other to erect his kingdom upon earth. 
As the latter is the theme of most of the prophecies, they 
were so carried away by the expectation of, and desire for it, 
that they missed altogether the former, which, though occu- 



128 APOSTOLIC VIEWS OF 

pying less space in the prophecies, is intrinsically more im 
portant. 

I think I have here rightly represented what they say. It 
is somewhat entertaining, however, as well as instructive, to 
observe in what light the sensible Jews of modern times, who 
have given attention to the question, and written in justifica 
tion of their rejection of Jesus, regard this representation of 
the matter. They look upon it as a mere after-thought, and 
as an evasion of the real question between Jews and Chris 
tians. David Levi, in his " Dissertations on the Prophecies 
of the Old Testament," calls it a mere chimera, " an ignis 
fatuus, notwithstanding all the noise and pother that has been 
made about it."* Doubtless, premillennialists have much 
more spiritual views of the whole subject than an unbelieving 
Jew can be supposed to have. But they both oppose those 
views of the kingdom which we maintain ; and in so doing 
they use arguments identical in substance, and only differing 
in the Christian or Antichristian point of view from which 
they survey their common ground ; as will be evident on 
comparing their works together. The kingdom say both 
alike is yet to come : Jesus say both alike does not oc 
cupy the throne of the kingdom : The prophecies relating 
to Messiah s kingdom remain yet to be fulfilled say both 
alike, f 

I have said and I entreat the reader s attention to it 
that the apostles, in pleading with their unbelieving coun 
trymen, take up precisely our position against the premillen 
nialists regarding the kingdom of Christ. This I now proceed 

* Vol. i. p. 120. Lend. 1817. 

f " The Jews," says Mr Brooks, " understood them (the prophecies re 
lating to the kingdom) in their appropriate and harmonious sense, though 
not perhaps in their full sense ; and the wonder is, not, that they should 
have thus understood them, but that any among ourselves should understand 
them otherwise ; seeing that their primary and most obvious sense is so plainly 
accordant with the Jeivish expectations. 1 Elem. of Proph. Interp. chap. vi. 
on " The Kingdom of Christ," p. 185. 



CHRIST S KINGDOM. 129 

to make good, taking up one or two of the apostolic addresses 
as they are given in the Acts. And, 

I. We have the famous Pentecostal sermon. 

" Men and brethren," says Peter, " let me freely speak unto you 
of the patriarch David Being a prophet, and know 
ing that God had sworn with an oath to him, that of the 
fruit of his loins, according to the flesh, he would raise up 
Christ to sit on his (David s) throne.* He, seeing this be 
fore, spake of the resurrection of Christ This Jesus 

hath God raised up, whereof we all are witnesses. Therefore 
being by the right hand of God exalted, and having received 
of the Father the promise of the Holy Ghost, he hath shed 

forth this Therefore let all the house of Israel know 

assuredly, that God hath made that same Jesus, whom ye 
have crucified, both LORD and CHRIST." (Acts ii. 29-36.) 

Here it is stated, as explicitly as words could do it, that 
the promise to David of Messiah s succession to his throne 
has received its intended accomplishment in the resurrection 
and exaltation of Jesus, as the fruit of David s loins, to the 
right hand of power ; and that his first exercise of regal 
authority from the throne of Israel was to send down the 
Spirit, as had that day been done. When, moreover, he 
adds that God had made that same Jesus both Lord and 
Christ, he manifestly wished to be understood and could 
not fail to be understood as affirming, that his present ex 
altation was his proper lordship or royalty, as Messiah. And 
finally, when as if emitting a solemn testimony he calls 
upon " all the house of Israel to know this assuredly," it is 

* In the former editions of this work I expressed my preference for 
the received reading of verse 34, as against that contended for by Mr 
Wood. But I am now convinced that the received reading- is quite 
untenable, and that the genuine reading (adopted by Griesbach, Lach- 
mann, Tischendorf, and Tregdles, in their critical editions of the New 
Testament) is the following: and knowing that God had sworn with 
an oath to him that of the fruit of his loins he would set [One] upon his 
throne" (omitting the words TO XTK e-a^xx atxa-Trirtit T Xji-tVf). 

L 



130 APOSTOLIC VIEWS OF 

quite clear that he knew how unwelcome his view of Mes 
siah s lordship would be to Jewish ears requiring them not 
only to believe that the predicted Messiah and king of the 
Jews was Jesus of Xazareth, but that their notions of the 
Messiahship itself, and of the royalty attached to it, were 
all wrong ; that it was this erroneous view of the prophetic 
testimony respecting Messiah which had plunged them into 
the perpetration of the greatest of all crimes, and the removal 
of which, when the veil should be taken away, would revolu 
tionize the Jewish mind. 

Premillennialists scout the notion of Christ s now sitting 
on David s throne, and ask a great many questions as to the 
points of analogy between the throne on which sat the hum 
ble son of Jesse in the midst of his subjects in Palestine, 
and the celestial seat of the Redeemer s present power. 
One is pained at the flippancy with which these questions 
are sometimes put, and the gross principles on which the 
point is decided. In whatever sense the seat of Christ s pre 
sent rule is termed David s throne, the fact, I will venture 
to say, is indisputable. That CHRIST is NOW ON DAVID S 
THRONE, is as clearly affirmed by Peter in this sermon as 
words could do it. Let any one read his words again, and 
see if it be possible to make any thing else out of them. Mr 
Wood tries it ; but his interpretation is sufficient to show the 
hopelessness of the task. 

" We maintain," says he, " that this passage asserts that David 
knew that Christ was to sit upon his (David s) throne, and that 
moreover he had himself prophesied that he should sit at God s 
right hand until his enemies were made his footstool; that is, as 
we believe, until the time should come when he should sit down on 
the throne of David, and therefore he prophesied of the resurrec 
tion of Christ, and not of his own, just as it was of Christ, and 
not of himself, that he said, The Lord said to my Lord, Sit thou 
at my right hand, until I make thine enemies thy footstool." * 
This strange style of interpretation reminds me of a dis- 
* Affirmative Answer, p. 50. 



CHRIST S KINGDOM. 131 

cussion I once had with a zealous follower of Joanna South- 
cote, who applied to the child of that deluded woman the 
words of the prophet, " Behold a virgin shall conceive and 
bear a son, and shall call his name Immanuel." But are we 
not (said I) expressly told of the birth of Christ, that it was 
done in fulfilment of this prediction ? Not at all, replied 
our ingenious disputant. Look again at the evangelist s 
words, " This was done," not in fulfilment of the prediction, 
but " that it might be fulfilled" in another person, and at a 
future time : Christ s birth, then, merely prepared the way 
for, or was a necessary step in the march of events which 
were to bring about the fulfilment of that famous prediction. 
And what else is the character of Mr Wood s version of the 
words of Peter ? " David," says the apostle, " knowing that 
God would raise up Christ to sit upon his throne, spake of 
the resurrection of Christ : This Jesus (accordingly) hath 
God raised up." So he has, says Mr Wood, but only to sit 
on David s throne at some future time. " Christ s resurrec 
tion," says Peter, " was done that it might be fulfilled which 
was spoken by David, that he would sit upon his throne." 
Yes, says my respected brother, but it was done, not in ful 
filment of the prediction, but only that it might be fulfilled 
to prepare the way for the future fulfilment of the prediction.* 

On the contrary, Peter evidently wished the people to un 
derstand, that Christ was already swaying the only sceptre 
they had to look for in their Messiah : saying in effect, The 
kind of royalty ye have been looking and longing for is a 
phantom; but the reality is already in being. " MESSIAH 
THE PRINCE " already sits enthroned on high, in the person 
of the crucified but risen Nazarene, ready to dispense, not 
the poor honours of an earthly sovereignty for the rule of 
David s Successor is not like the rule of David himself 
but " repentance to Israel, and forgiveness of sins : " " God 

* Iu his "Last Things," Mr Wood only reiterates his former state 
ments, and confirms the above interpretation of them (pp. 113, &c.) Mr 
Birks takes precisely the same view of the passage (pp. 197-199.) 



132 APOSTOLIC VIEWS OF 

hath made that same Jesus, whom ye have crucified, both 
LORD and CHRIST." 

In this view of the apostle s meaning, it is but a transla 
tion, into New Testament language, of Zechariah s majestic 
prediction, 

" Behold the man whose name is The Branch ; and he shall 
grow up out of his place, and he shall build the temple of 
the Lord : Even he shall build the temple of the Lord; 
and he shall bear the glory, and shall sit and rule upon 
his throne; and he shall be A PRIEST UPON HIS THRONE : and 
the counsel of peace shall be between them both." (Zech.vi. 
12, 13.) * 

* Mr Wood throws this glorious prediction of Messiah s royal priest 
hood into the millennium, and he thinks the context proves it future. 
I wish I could say that in this he stands alone. But there is too much 
of this tendency, in the whole premillennial school, to futurize the most 
precious prophecies of the Old Testament. In the " Quarterly Journal 
of Prophecy " (No. I., Oct. 1848), there is a paper entitled " Objections 
and Difficulties," in which this prophecy of the union of the kingly and 
priestly offices in the person of Messiah is declared to be a prediction 
of Christ s milennial glory " lie shall be a priest upon his throne." 
" This verse," says the writer, "is commonly " (he should have said uni 
versally, and in all time, with the sole exception of a handful of pre- 
millennialists) "interpreted of ihe present time. Christ, it is said, is now 
upon his throne, and is executing at once the offices of a priest and of a 
king. This interpretation, however, appears to be entirely erroneous." 
He then assigns some reasons for holding the union of offices therein 
set forth as wholly future reasons, on the strength of which (as I have 
elsewhere said) it were easy to expel the Christianity which we fondly 
thought we had found in fifty other prophecies, till at length we were 
within sight of the Jews conclusion, that Christianity in the Old 
Testament is an impertinence, which a thorough-going literal inter 
pretation of it, with proper regard to the context and scope of each 

prophecy, would show to have no place and no business there 

It is the vice of the premillennial theory, that it of necessity hands over 
to the future, and to a new and unique dispensation, whole masses of 
prophecy, which, in the view of the great bulk of the true Church in all 
time, belong to the dispensation of the Spirit to the economy of the 
Gospel to Christianity just as it now exists, with its present Word and 
its present Spirit, as competent to effect all that is predicted. Once 
make the throne of David, as occupied by Christ, future and local, and it 
will go hard with us if we do not find ourselves compelled to futurize one 



CHRIST S KINGDOM. 133 

And is not this precisely what is scenically represented 
in the vision which the rapt apostle beheld in Patmos ? 

"And I beheld, and, lo ! in the midst of the throne and of the 
four living creatures, and in the midst of the elders, stood 
a Lamb as it had been slain, having seven horns and seven 
eyes, which are the seven Spirits of God, sent forth into all 
the earth." (Rev. v. 6.) 

Here is the Priest upon his Throne, " building the temple 
of the Lord " sending forth for this purpose those eyes and 
horns of his, " the Spirit of counsel and of might" (Isa. xi. 2), 
into all the earth,* to bring its inhabitants under his benign 
sway . And here, certainly, he is seen " bearing the glory " 
in those rapturous hallelujahs poured into his ear ("Worthy 
is the Lamb that was slain," &c.) so dear to the heart and 
sweet upon the lips of his redeemed in every age. At the 
date of the vision they were a mere handful, and struggling 
for existence ; but, speaking for all, they anticipate the 
time when every hostile power shall go down before them, 
and they shall " reign on the earth." 

That the Redeemer himself identifies his present sway with 
the DAVIDICAL RULE, is clear from the following passage : 
" These things saith L j that is holy, he that is true, HE THAT 
HATH THE KEY OF DAVID, he that opcncth, and no man shuttetli; 
an/1 shuttetli, and no man openeth ; I know thy works : be 
hold, I have set before thee an open door, and no man 
can shut it . Him that overcometh will I make a pillar in 
the temple of my God, and he shall go no more out," &c. 
(Rev. iii. 7, 8, 12.) 

These words are evidently taken from Isa. xxii. 22, where 
the Lord tells Shebna, " who was over the house," but had 
by his base intromissions brought the royal house to the 
brink of ruin, that he would call his servant Eliakim, and 
would clothe him with his robe, and strengthen him with 

gospel prophecy after another, till Christianity itself, as a present thing 
hardly remains to us in the Old Testament. 

* Compare Zech. iii. 9, " Upon one stone (of the temple of the Lord) 
shall be seven eyes." 



134 APOSTOLIC VIEWS OF 

his girdle, and would commit the government into Ms hand, 
" And," it is added, " THE KEY OF THE HOUSE OF DAVID 

WILL I LAY UPON HIS SHOULDER; SO HE SHALL OPEN AND 
NONE SHALL SHUT, AND HE SHALL SHUT AND NONE SHALL 

OPEN." When Christ, therefore, claims to have the key of 
David s house, so as to open and shut it at will, his mean 
ing clearly is, that he has that antitypical authority in 
David s house which Eliakim s robe, girdle, and key, faintly 
shadowed forth ; that he is now exercising this power of 
" the key," as he did to the Philadelphian Church, when in 
opposition to a party " calling themselves Jews when they 
were not, but did lie," and who had denied the claim of 
these faithful Philadelphians to a church-standing and 
church-privileges, he says, " Behold, I have set before thee 
an open door, and no man can shut it." But if Christ is 
now using " the key of the house of David " in his admini 
stration of the Church, then that HOUSE OF DAVID as Christ 
is Euler in it, at least can be no other than THE CHURCH 

OF THE LIVING GOD UNDER THE EEDEEMER S REGAL ADMI 
NISTRATION, which is just what we have found Peter pressing 
on the unwilling ears of his carnal audience. 

Mr Wood admits that, in this place, Christ s " having the 
key of the house of David laid upon his shoulder," means, 
" the authority which he now exercises over the Church ; " 
but he thinks it only an apocalyptic symbol borrowed from 
the strict and literal sense of the terms elsewhere. But 
what means Isaiah s sublime prophecy, " Unto us a child is 
born, unto us a Son is given, AND THE GOVERNMENT SHALL 
BE UPON HIS SHOULDER ? " Does not this mean, that Messiah 
shall be the EULER OF THE CHURCH OF GOD ? And if this 
be the sense, it determines the meaning of " the throne of 
David" in the next verse beyond all question.* After sum 
ming up his august titles with that one, " The Prince of 

* Mr Birks s answer to this concedes in substance what I have ex 
pressed, but fails to show that it suggests an opposite conclusion from 
miue (p. 201). 



CHRIST S KINGDOM. 135 

Peace," which in the New Testament sense of "peace" 
by the blood of his cross means just the " Priest upon his 
Throne," the prophet adds 

" Of the increase of his government and peace there shall be no 
end, UPON THE THROVE OF DAVID, AND UPON HIS KINGDOM, 
to order it, and to establish it with judgment and with 
justice from henceforth even for ever. The zeal of the 
Lord of Hosts will perform this." (Isa. ix. 7.) 
In understanding this of the administration of CJirist in 
tlie Church in the sovereignty and the grace of it, the 
righteousness, the progress, and the perpetuity of it we 
would appeal to the reader whether we do not give a sense 
equally sound and soul-satisfying, which a patient compari 
son of Scripture with Scripture will only the more confirm, 
and on which the heart can repose with ever growing con 
tentment. 

In the use of this same " key of the house of David," 
Christ says farther to the faithful of Philadelphia, " Him 
that overcometh will I make a pillar in the temple of my 
God, and he shall go no more out " I will not only admit 
him to membership in the Church upon earth, in spite of all 
pretended excommunications by the " synagogue of Satan;" 
but, in virtue of my office as Ruler in the house of my God, 
I will " set before him an open door " into the heavenly 
temple, and make him a fixture in it, to go no more out. 
In this extended, but most legitimate, application of " the 
key of the house of David," on Christ s shoulder, it is iden 
tical with his own consolatory announcement to John him 
self, when lying prostrate before his effulgent majesty as one 
dead: "He laid his right hand upon him, saying, Fear not, 
I am the First and the Last, and the Living One ; and I was 
dead, and behold I am alive for evermore. Amen. And I 

have THE KEYS OF DEATH AND OF HADES."* The key of 
* E-v& titu i rfSrof, xtti i Itr^mnt, xa.1 e %uv tu Ij-evo^v vt*{f Tu 

*M.rm xa.1 rot a Jw. In this order the concluding words are found in 
the best MSS. 



136 APOSTOLIC VIEWS OF 

the world of spirits is mine, to bring back the souls of my 
dead people from their disembodied state ; mine, too, are 
the keys of the grave, which at the appointed time shall 
yield up its precious deposit : I am the Eesurrection and the 
Life, and as I have the keys of my Father s house, they shall 
find its portals on the resurrection-morn flying open before 
them, that they may go in, never more to go out. 

Thus clearly does it appear, from the Eedeemer s language 
to the Church of Philadelphia, that " the house of David " 
is the house of God s Church or people, over whom David 
had a rule of a very inferior kind in Palestine, in comparison 
with that to which it ultimately pointed ; that " the key of 
David," or of " David s house," in Christ s hand, is just the 
supreme administration or rule of the Church ; and that as 
he exercises this " power of the key " now in the Church, 
so he will exercise it in its loftiest sense, when he " sets 
before his victorious people an open door " into the heavenly 
temple, whence they shall go no more out. 

II. In his next address to the wondering people who 
stood gazing on him after his miracle on the lame man, at 
the beautiful gate of the temple the same idea is expressed 
by Peter with equal brevity and beauty : 

"The God of our fathers," says he, " hath glorified his Son Jesus"- 
that is, in the apostolic sense of the phrase, hath raised him 
up and enthroned him in the heavens " whom ye delivered 

up Ye denied the Holy One and the Just, and 

desired a murderer to be granted unto you; and killed THE 
PRINCE OF LIFE, whom God hath raised up from the dead; 
whereof we are witnesses." (Acts iii. 13-15.) 

Here Messiah s Princedom is not only admitted but pro 
claimed ; but the sense given of it is as opposite as the poles 
from the Jewish one, and expressly intended to displace 
it. He lets them know that they mistook something else 
than the time of the kingdom, which, according to some, 



CHRIST S KINGDOM. 137 

was all they did mistake about it ; that its whole nature was 
misconceived by them; that it was for the dispensation of 
"LIFE" that he is exalted a "PRINCE." Ye killed him; 
yet he lives, the Royal Dispenser of Life to the dead, of 
Salvation to the lost/ 

In the sequel of this address we have that noble passage 
about " the times of restitution," so constantly and confidently 
adduced in favour of the premillennial theory, but which I 
think completely subverts it. 

" Repent ye therefore, and be converted, that your sins may be 
blotted out ; so that times of refreshing may come from the 
presence of the Lord,* and he may send him who was fore 
ordained for you,t even Jesus Christ, whom heaven must 
receive until the times of restitution of all things, which God 
hath spoken by the mouth of all his holy prophets since the 
world began." (Acts iii. 19-21.) 

In the third note below, the reader will see how much 
diversity exists as to some things in this passage. J But as 

* Our version of this clause " When the times of refreshing shall 
come from the presence of the Lord" is certainly inaccurate. The 
Vulgate here (ut cum) was followed by Beza (postquam), from whom, no 
doubt, our translators adopted it. But Beza s examples in support of it 
are not in point, nor are those of Scholefield, who alone now defends it 
(Hints, etc.). Nearly all good interpreters render the words as we have 
done above, and even our translators themselves render the same phrase 
(Xsritf an), in Luke ii. 35, not " when," but " in order that (the thoughts of 
many hearts luay be revealed)." The difference in sense, to be sure, is 
not very great; but as the true sense makes the coming of those "times 
of refreshing " dependent upon Israel s national " repentance and conver 
sion," i*. is surely of some consequence not to lose this instructive con 
nection. 

{ UpxiKiiyirfAtyfi, "foreordained," has vastly greater authority, and 
brings out a much better sense, than the received reading, ^^oxtx-r^vy pita, 
"before preached." 

J 1. As to what is meant by "times of refreshing " whether the times 
of the gospel generally, as some with Lightfoot think; or, the time of 
Israel s conversion the latter day, according to Vitringa and others; 
or whether, as Calvin and many judge, it be the same period with "the 
times of restitution," when "He shall send Jesus Christ" in which 
last case the "blotting out" is understood in the well-known sense of 



138 APOSTOLIC VIEWS OP 

this diversity affects but slightly what I have to observe on 
the words, we need not stay upon it here. 

Whether we understand the " restitution " here meant of 
a moral or a physical restitution, or both considered as the 
burden of all Old Testament prophecy, and requiring com 
plete accomplishment ere Christ can come the words of 
the apostle are clearly subversive of a millennial state after 
Christ comes. Premillennialists tell us that Christ s second 
coming must precede the conversion of the Jews : Peter here 
tells them just the reverse. The Jews thought his going 
away from the earth was a bad sign of his Messiahship. 
But if you would only repent, says Peter, and be con 
verted, your sins would be blotted out; and times of refreshing 
would then come from the presence of the Lord; and events 
thus hastening on apace, he would send again to the earth 
your predicted Messiah, who is none other than Jesus Christ: 
but heaven in the mean time (ptv)* must receive him, till 
the times of restitution of all things which God hath spoken 
by all his prophets. 

Mr Wood says this does not mean till these times be 
exhausted/ but till they arrive. But the sense plainly is 
that, whatever the things predicted be, they are to be ac 
complished ere Christ comes; and that certainly will not be 
before the millennium, j" 

This famous passage, then, instead of making for pre- 

the public judicial declaration, at the great day, of pardon already 
obtained upon earth. 2. "Whether we should read "which" or "of which 
God hath spoken." (In the former case, a is attracted by the preceding 
aravTiuv, and is equivalent to , or eus \_xntus\.) 3. What is the "restitu 
tion" here meant. 

* " Particula iJ.lt, quidem, apodosin, cui alias autem servit, representa- 
tam habet in mittat, versa 20." (BENGEL.) 

f I will not advert to Mr Wood s remarks on the observations made 
on this passage in my first edition. It were easy, if it were a matter 
of any interest to the reader, to repel them all except one, namely, my 
ascribing inadvertently to premillennialists a criticism which is not pecu 
liar to them, and which I regret. 



CHRIST S KINGDOM. 139 

millennialism, tells decisively against it. And I may add, it 
was one of the passages which convinced Joseph Perry pre- 
millennialist though he was that there could be no such mil 
lennium after the Lord s coming as is now contended for. 

" The last restitution," says this good man, " or the restitution 
of all things, will not be, as I conceive, until Christ s personal 
coming. As the heaven received him, so it will retain him 

until this time, in which all things shall be restored If 

but one soul should be converted after Christ s descension from 
heaven, then must he come before the restitution of all things ; 
which is quite contrary to this text ; because the heaven must 
receive or retain him until then. What though this restitution 
of all things takes in the restoration of the creation unto its para 
disiacal state : yet it is certain that the bringing in of the elect by 
regenerating grace, and completing the whole mystical body of 
Christ, is the principal part of that restitution, they being prin 
cipally concerned in it, and for whose sake all other creatures 
are to be restored ; all which plainly shows that there will be no 
more conversion when Christ is come; which will not be until the 
restitution of all things, as before hinted." * 

III. In the following chapter we have a touching scene, 
and a bright application of Old Testament scripture, which, 
if I mistake not, is as subversive of the premillennial, as it 
certainly was of the Jewish, principles of interpretation, and 
their views of the kingdom : " Peter and John being let go," 
hasten " to their own company, and report all that the chief 
priest and elders had said unto them ;" on which the audience 
give vent to their feelings, and commit their now critical 
cause, in a sublime prayer to Him who, having " made heaven 
and earth, and the sea, and all that in them is," could with 
infinite ease sustain them ; and who, " by the mouth of his 
servant David," had foretold the very things that were then 
happening to them. And to which of David s psalms are 
their thoughts directed ? To one whose very burden is rie 
TJirone and Kingdom of Messiah. Here then, if any where, 
we may look for light. Its topics are the combined attacks 

* The Glory of Christ s Visible Kingdom, &c., pp. 224, 225. 



140 APOSTOLIC VIEWS OF 

of civil and ecclesiastical rulers against this Throne the de 
rision with which these are regarded by Jehovah the im 
movable security of his " King upon his holy hill of Zion," 
whereon he hath set him, and the certainty with which all 
who will not " kiss the Son," or bow their hearts and bend 
their policy to his sceptre, shall be " dashed in pieces." Pre- 
millennialists make all this future; and that is the vice of 
their system. But what say this worshipping company ? 
They apply the psalm, beyond all contradiction, to the pre 
sent Sovereignty and Rule of Jesus in the heavens. 

" The kings of the earth stood up," say they, taking up the 
words of the psalm "and the rulers were gathered together 
against the Lord, and against his Christ. For of a truth, 
against tliy holy child Jesus, whom thou hast anointed, as 
Messiah or Christ, " both Herod and Pontius Pilate, with 
the Gentiles, and the people of Israel, were gathered to 
gether, for to do what thy hand and thy counsel determined 
before to be done." (Actsiv. 26-28.) 

In the estimation, then, of this band of primitive disciples, 
" the vain things which the people imagined," and which the 
kings of the earth set themselves and the rulers took counsel 
to accomplish, was just to overthrow Christ s gracious Eule, 
whose sweetness they were then tasting in the salvation of 
their own souls, and wh ~ se power was bracing them to the 
endurance even of death for his name.* It was the " bands " 
of this saving authority over men which they saw them re 
solving to " break asunder " it was the "cords" by which 
it sought to bind them in believing subjection, which they 
saw them madly determining to " cast away from them." And 
if this view of the second psalm do not prove that the proper 
kingdom of Christ is now in existence that it is administered, 
not from a poor throne at Jerusalem, but from the heavens 
and that it consists, strict" y and formally, in the royal dispen- 

* Nothing can be "weaker, in my judgment, than Mr Birks s reply to 
this, grounded on its being an attempt not to interfere with Christ as 
already on the throne, but to "hinder him from assuming it" (p. 202). 



CHRIST S KINGDOM. 141 

sation of grace by him as a Saviour, and the saving rule of 
the subjects of that grace it is difficult to conceive what 
kind of evidence would be held competent to establish it.* 

IV. But the noblest expression of the idea, which we have 
found to be the burden of Peter s early addresses to his un 
believing countrymen, as well as the favourite conception of 
Messiah s Grace and Glory amongst the converts, occurs in 
this apostle s second speech before the Jewish council, when, 
being demanded why, in contravention of their peremptory 
command "not to teach in that name," they had "filled 

* "I have considerable doubts," says Mr Wood, "about the bands of 
saving authority, and the cords which bind in believing subjection, as 
I think the psalm naturally suggests another idea altogether."" (P. 118.) 
What that other idea" is, we are not told; but no doubt it is some- 
tliing future all goes to the future. 

" But even Mr Brown believes that the inheritance of the heathen, and 
the possession of the ends of the earth, shall not be received, nay, shall 
not be formally asked by Christ till the day when the Ancient of Days 
shall sit, and the Son of Man for the very purpose shall be brought be 
fore him ; that is, according to him, at the beginning of the millennium. 
(See p. 348.) Wherein, then, in principle of interpretation, does his view 
differ from mine ? " (Last Things, pp. 118, 119.) Mr Wood has totally 
mistaken me. The passage he refers to says nothing so absurd as that 
Christ will not formally ask the inheritance promised him in this psalm 
till the beginning of the millennium. He has been asking it ever since 
he sat down on his Father s right hand ; every portion of the heathen 
world actually " given " to him from age to age is first claimed, and then 
granted in recognition of these claims ; and it was just to show that when the 
whole world becomes actually his, it will be given him on the same footing, 
that a scenic exhibition of the installation of Christ in the government of " all 
peoples, nations, and languages," was presented to the view of Daniel. The 
difi erence between Mr Wood and me, then, is manifest. The same dispen 
sation of grace which gave Rome to Christ, or Britain, or any Christian 
nation, will give him all lands at length. When the Papacy falls, and 
the utmost ends of the earth become Christian, it will, on my principles, 
be no more a different dispensation from the present, than the accession 
of heathen Rome to Christianity was a new dispensation, or the great 
Reformation of the sixteenth century was a new dispensation. All be 
longs to one kingdom of grace. Mr Wood will surely admit that " in prin 
ciple of interpretation, " we totally differ here. 



142 APOSTOLIC COMMENTARIES 

Jerusalem with their doctrine, and intended to bring that 
Man s blood upon them," Peter, with the heroism of faith, re 
plied, 

" We ought to obey God rather than men. The God of our 
fathers raised up Jesus, whom ye slew, and hanged on a tree : 
Him hath God exalted with his right hand to be A PRINCE 
AND A SAVIOUR, for to give repentance to Israel, and forgive 
ness of sins." (Acts v. 29-31.) 

Let the reader put himself into the position of the Jews 
whom Peter addressed, whose perverted notions of the Prince 
dom of their promised Messiah inflamed them with such " a 
zeal of God not according to knowledge," as to plunge them 
into the guilt of his precious blood ; and he will be satisfied 
that it was just these notions which Peter meant to dissipate, 
and in place of them to lodge in their minds a view of the 
Messiahship to them altogether new to describe the Prince 
dom of Messiah as strictly a SAVING dignity for the purpose 
of communicating, with royal authority and sovereign power, 
" repentance to Israel, and forgiveness of sins." Indeed, the 
words might be rendered with equal fidelity, and bring out 
perhaps quite as vividly the idea intended, were they to run 
thus in English (by what the critics call a hendiadys] : " Him 
hath God exalted to be a SAVIOUR-PRINCE [" A PRIEST 
UPON HIS THRONE "], for to give repentance," &c. 

V. Closely connected with these earliest representations of 
the regal dignity and kingdom of Messiah, are the apostolic 
commentaries on that massive verse of the hundred and tenth 
Psalm: " Jehovah said unto my Lord, SIT THOU AT MY RIGHT 

HAND, UNTIL I MAKE THINE ENEMIES THY FOOTSTOOL." (V. 1.) 
" David is not ascended into the heavens ; but he saith himself, 
Jehovah said unto my Lord, SIT THOU ON MY RIGHT HAND, 
UNTIL I MAKE THY FOES THY FOOTSTOOL. Therefore let all 
the house of Israel know assuredly, that God hath made 
that same Jesus, whom ye have crucified, both Lord and 
Christ." (Acts ii. 34-36.) 



ON THE HUNDRED AND TENTH PSALM. 143 

" This man, after he had offered one sacrifice for sins, for ever 
SAT DOWN ON THE RIGHT HAND OF GOD ; from henceforth ex 
pecting TILL HIS ENEMIES BE MADE HIS FOOTSTOOL." (Heb. X. 

12, 13.) 

" Then cometh the end, when he shall have delivered up the 
kingdom to God, even the Father ; when he shall have put 
down all rule, and all authority and power. For he must 
reign, till he hath PUT ALL ENEMIES UNDEK HIS FEET. The 
last enemy shall be destroyed, [even] death." * (1 Cor. xv. 
24-26.) 

These passages afford abundant materials for settling the 
whole question of Christ s kingdom. Beautiful is the light 
which they throw upon each other. " SIT on my right hand," 
says one of them, " till I make thine enemies thy footstool." 
" He must REIGN," says another, "till that be done by his own 
royal hand." " From henceforth," says the remaining pas 
sage from the time of this glorious Session and Enthroniza- 
tion. for they are both one " EXPECTING till " the Father s 
promise to do it for him be made good. He has entitled 
himself to this at God s hand, by " the offering of that one 
sacrifice for sins for ever " eternal in its efficacy, because in 
finite in value. On the completion of this work, exalted to 
the Father s right hand in the high consciousness of his own 
merit, and in full assurance that the promise is now all his 
own, our apostle gets a glimpse of him in the seat of power, 
and beholds him in the attitude of tranquil " expectancy," 
till the enemies of his regal authority be made his footstool : 
an expectancy commencing from the first moment of his re 
pose in glory, unruffled amid all opposition, and unexhausted 
by the longest delays, until the day Avhen he shall rise up to 
the prey.f 



t Koble are the words of CALVIN : " In excelsis ergo sedet, ut transfusi 
inde ad nos sua virtute, in vitam spiritualem nos vivificet, ut Spiritu 
suo sanctificet, ut variis gratiarum dotibus ecclesiam suam exoruet ; ut 
protectioue sua tutam adversus omnes noxas conservet, ut ferocientes 



144 THE KINGDOM TO BE DELIVERED UP 

On the last of these passages 1 Cor. xv. 24-26 premil- 
lennialists get into inextricable confusion, and come into such 
collision among themselves, as to subvert the doctrine com 
mon to all of them, and establish its opposite. It has been 
said, indeed, that others are as much divided on the sense of 
the passage as they. But that is a mistake. It is true that 
there is some difference on the " delivering up of the king 
dom." But what is it ? Just a diversity of conception as to 
the form which the kingdom of Christ shall assume, and the 
position which Christ himself shall occupy, in the everlasting 
state. On this point, involving some of the most delicate 
distinctions in the personal and official relations of the triune 
Jehovah, and in the economy of grace on this high point, 
my own views, which, with the deepest humility, I may pre 
sently try to express, coincide, as I have said, pretty much 
with those of my opponents. But this has nothing to do with 
our question about the kingdom. That question is not, What 
is meant by the " delivering up" of the kingdom ? but, What 
is the kingdom to be delivered up ? To this question the ma 
jority of premillcnnialists reply, It is Christ s proper kingdom, 
not yet assumed his millennial kingdom. Xay say Dr 
M Neile, the Duke of Manchester, and several others it is 
the kingdom over which Christ is now placed, and which he is 
to exchange for his own Davidical throne and kingdom, at 
the millennium. 

Here, as perhaps in every instance in which they differ 
among themselves, there is a portion of truth on both sides, 
which each can plead against the other with resistless force 
portions of truth which it is not possible to harmonize but by 

crucis SUSD ac nostrse salutis hostes manus suss fortitudine coerceat, de- 
nique ut omnem teneat potestatem in ccelo et in terra ; donee inimicos 
omnes suos, qui etiam nostri sunt, prostraverit, ac ecclesise suse asdifica- 
tionem consummarit. Atque hie verus est regni ejus status, hsec potes- 
tas, quam in eura contulit Pater, donee ultimum actum ad vivorum et 
mortuorum judicium adveniens compleat." (Inst. Christ. Eelig. lib. ii. 
cap. xvi. 16.) 



WHAT IT IS. 145 

abandoning the doctrine common to both, and falling back 
upon that to which both are with equal zeal opposed. These 
portions of truth are the following : 

On the one hand, it is beyond all controversy, that when 
the apostle says, " He must reign till he hath put all enemies 
under his feet," the " reign" spoken of is his present authority, 
and the " enemies" of that reign are the enemies of that same 
present authority. Mr Wood, and those who take his view of 
the passage, may deny this " as entirely unscriptural ;" but it 
will be in vain. The Duke of Manchester, Dr M Neile, and 
others, in affirming it, are on immovable ground; and no-one 
would ever take any other view of the passage but for the ne 
cessities of a system. To drag the apostle here into the mil 
lennium, as if he were speaking of the enemies of a millennial 
sovereignty, is of all interpretations the most preposterous.* 

On the other hand, it is equally incontrovertible that the 
" reign " here spoken of is the Redeemer s rule in his own 
proper kingdom, and the " enemies " are those of that rule. 
This is so manifest, that Mr Wood, in asserting it, can stand 
against all his brethren who affirm the contrary. The ene 
mies of this reign, according to the apostle, are of two kinds, 
moral and physical. Of the former class he says, " Then 
cometh the end, when he shall have put down all rule and all 
authority and power." Will this be done before the millen 
nium ? Have we not evidence that during that bright period 
the world s subjection to the sceptre of Christ will not be 
quite absolute ? (Zech. xiv. 17-19.) And after it, are we 
not explicitly told of a vast confederacy of Christ s enemies 
to arise against the camp of the saints ? (Rev. xx. 7-9.) 
When Mr Wood therefore affirms, that " all rule and all 
authority and power" of a hostile character will not be put 
down before the millennium, and that Christ will have this to 
do during that period in the exercise of his proper rule, and 

* Mr Birks (pp. 204-209) contends for the futurity of this reign. 
Alford (Gr. Test, in loc ), with Mr Wood, while espousing the prcmillen- 
nial advent, stretches " the kingdom " from the ascension to the close of 
the millennium thus combining both views. 



140 THE KINGDOM TO BE DELIVERED UP 

so will not deliver it up till after the millennium, he is on 
solid ground. So of the physical enemies : " The last enemy 
shall be destroyed, even death " that passive and unconscious 
" enemy" of Christ s reign, " the wages of sin," and the boast 
of Satan, but to be " destroyed," with all other " works of the 
devil," by " the Seed of the woman." In this view of it, it 
includes all physical evils springing from the fall, and similarly 
hostile to the ends of Christ s reign. Thus largely under 
stood, not even Mr Scott can very well maintain that " death " 
shall be destroyed before the millennium. Though at 
tempting to prove that death, in the mere fact of it, will 
not prevail during the millennium, even he seems to admit 
that physical as well as moral evils will remain, to some 
extent, till the end of the millennium.* And thus, as Christ 

* Dr M Neile (Lent Lectures for 1849, entitled, "The Priest upon his 
Throne "), takes up the same ground as Mr Scott; but his positions and 
the illustration seem to me directly to contradict each other, and to ex 
hibit a strange mode of thinking altogether. " The chief particulars," he 
says, " of that state the state of the earth when Christ comes are these : 
1. There shall be no more sin. All the then inhabitants of the earth shall 
be righteous. All shall love God, and serve God; so that his will shall 
then be done on earth as it is in heaven. Or, if any of the inhabitants 
of the earth shall at any time caase to do his will [in other words, if sin 
do break out] on earth, they shall instantly be treated as those angels were 
treated who ceased to do his will in heaven ; that is, they shall be cast out. 
From a passage in the prophecies of Isaiah (Ixv, 20), some have imagined 
that such an event might possibly occur during the thousand years ; that 
a man who had lived an hundred yeais without sin might then become a 
Dinner, and that if so he would be immediately accursed. That such an 
event shall take place on a large scale after the thousand years, seems not 
obscurely predicted in Rev. xx. 7-10. But in no case shall the holiness of 
Messiah 1 s kingdom be interfered ivith, any more than tJte holiness of heaven was, 
by the great rebellion there of Beelz bub and his associate. Of his king 
dom there shall be no end. The final assault, permitted at the end of 
the thousand years, serves but to confirm his reign for ever; and so (!) 
the state of things then existing, and to exist for ever, on the earth, 
shall be a state uithout sin." 1 " (Pp. 96, 97 ) In this way of arriving at 
conclusions, the reader will not be surprised to learn that Dr M Neiie 
finds " no more sorrow," "no more ignorance," "no more curse, 1 from the 
tiiue that CJurist comes that is, while the earth is peopled by " the re- 



WHAT IT IS. 147 

is to " reign till he hath put all enemies under his feet," Mr 
Wood, and those who agree with him, are upon impreg 
nable ground in maintaining that the " reign" here is Christ s 
proper reign, and the " enemies" those of his own kingdom. 
These, then, are the portions of incontrovertible truth, 
maintained by the two classes of preniillennial interpreters 
respectively. The one class hold, upon ground that cannot 
be shaken, that the " reign" spoken of in this famous passage 
is a present reign a reign commencing on the Redeemer s 
session at his Father s right hand. The other class, on ground 
equally unassailable, hold that, as the enemies mentioned will 
not be destroyed till the end of the millennium, the assurance 
that " He must reign " till that be done, carries the reign 
down till after the millennium. The one class give us the 
beginning of the reign, and the other class the end of it, quite 
correctly. And thus, in opposition to both, and by means of 
both, we get our proposition established that " the kingdom," 
and the Redeemer s " reign" in it, as they commenced on his 
ascension to power, so they will continue till the final judg 
ment. 

How precious is the view given of " death " in this passage, 
as the Saviour s " last enemy" the last enemy of that media 
torial crown which he now wears, as the Redeemer of his 
people from the whole ruins of the fall ! On his own throne 
sitting, " a Lamb as it had been slain " taken up to it fresh 
from the cross, and placed upon it in high testimony of Jeho 
vah s complacency in his work in this character, and vested 
with this authority and power, will he destroy that last enemy 

stored Jews," and " the millions of the heathen who have never rejected 
the gospel," and of whom it is written that " they shall come to Judah s 
light," &c. Pp. 97-104. Of course, these " restored Jews and converted 
heathens" must start at once not only into a converted state, but into a 
sinless, sorrmvless, perfectly illuminated, and curseless state, in order to 
realize the millennial picture which the lecturer draws. What can one 
make of this ? 



143 " THE LAST ENEMY 

of his gracious sway death. Virtually, indeed, it has been 
done already on the field of law, though not of fact. 
" Through death he destroyed him that had the power of 
death, that is the devil. " (Heb. ii. 14.) " He spoiled prin 
cipalities and powers, and made a show of them openly, 
triumphing over them in his cross." (Col. ii. 15.) There he 
"ABOLISHED," or "DESTROYED DEATH." (2 Tim. i. 10.)* A 
legal basis had to be obtained for the actual destruction of 
so righteous a penalty as death, " the wages of sin." In the 
righteousness of that penalty, Satan was strong. On that 
field, but for Christ s death, he was invincible. In this sense, 
" the accuser of the brethren " had " the power of death " 
power to insist on its infliction, on the same eternal principles 
of the Divine government by which himself was ruined as a 
sinner power to see it invested, in its approaches to men, 
with unmixed terrors, with " fearful lockings for of judgment 
and fiery indignation, to devour the adversaries" power to 
have a hand in mixing " the cup of trembling " to the dying 
sinner. Yes! " the sting of death is sin, and the strength is the 
law;" nor could the Son of God himself override these awful 
securities for "the execution of vengeance. But that vengeance 
he could draw off, by placing himself under it as Jehovah s 
substitutionary Victim ; and this he did " through death " 
not actually " abolishing " death, but obtaining a legal title 
to abolish it from the Throne. He met the enemy on his 
own chosen field, that proud arena " where was the hiding of 
his power;" and having "taken from him all his armour 
wherein he trusted," he has gone up to " divide his spoils." 
(Luke xi. 21, 22; compare Isa. liii. 12.) And the distribu 
tion is going gloriously on. The sweet sense of pardon and 
reconciliation the envy of Satan is one of the spoils he 
divides. Superiority to the " sin that dwellcth in us," is an 
other of the spoils left on the field of battle, and which, fall 
ing into the Redeemer s hands, he divides to his people. But 
* It is the same word (a.-t.y/(u) in both places. 



DESTROYED.* 149 

the death of death is reserved for the last. Already he is un- 
stinged; so that, though he tears asunder soul and body, 
leaving what Christ redeemed a lifeless carcass, in this he is 
no longer Satan s but Christ s servant, who "to this end 
both died [and rose] and revived, that he might be LORD both 
of the deadand living" (Rom.xiv.9), and who, as such, " hath 
the keys of death and of hades." (Rev. i. 18.) Still the 
enemy lives. While his victims lie rotting in the grave, he 
is not " abolished," " destroyed," " put under his feet/ But 
it must, and it shall, come to that. The Redeemer " expects" 
that what he accomplished sacrificidlly on the field of law 
shall be made good royally in the region of fact. The prey 
shall be taken from the terrible, and the lawful captive deli 
vered ; and thus, in the most absolute and comprehensive sense, 
shall He " see of the travail of his soul, and be satisfied." 

It now only remains, before dismissing this grand passage, 
that I advert to the " delivering up of the kingdom." Not 
that it has any thing to do with our subject it relates to a 
stage of the kingdom beyond the limits of our question. But 
it would be unsatisfactory to take leave of it without some re 
ference to this very remarkable statement with which it closes. 

Two ideas, then, seem to be included in this " delivering 
up" of the kingdom. 

1. It is the Mediator "giving an account of his Steivardship." 

It is fit that this should be done. As Infinite Rectitude 
will have his intromissions judicially investigated and pro 
nounced upon, so his own fidelity desires and demands it, 
that his work may, in this sense, be taken offliis hands. He 
will have it publicly owned, and Himself as the Doer of it. 
For this purpose, he advances to the Throne. His dead 
people summoned from their graves, and his living ones 
changed in the twinkling of an eye, are all around him 
" a glorious Church, not having spot or wrinkle, or any sucli 
thing ;" and as their crowns are cast before him, and his ear ia 



150 " DELIVERING UP THE KINGDOM " 

filled with their grateful hallelujahs, while " glorified in his 
saints, and admired in all them that believe" he turns to " Him 
that sitteth upon the Throne," as Judge of his work, saying, 
" Behold I, and the children whom thou hast given me : The 
glory which thou gavest me I have given them ; and they are 
one, even as we are one." (Heb. ii. 13 ; John xvii. 22.) 
The Trust committed to him was awful ; the wheels of it 
" were so high that they were dreadful" (Ezek. i. 18) ; the 
issues suspended upon the successful execution of it were 
infinite ; the glory of the Godhead was bound up with it : 
and Jesus, knowing all this, and exulting in the consciousness 
that his work will abide the lustre of Divine Inspection, will 
have judgment given upon it, that his ear may be greeted 
from the Throne with that sound sweeter to him than celes 
tial music " Well done, Good and Faithful Servant !" But, 

2. This " delivering up" of the kingdom seems to imply 
the end of the kingdom in its present form. 

" Then cometh the end" the end, certainly, of some 
thing ; and the words which immediately follow, " when he 
shall have delivered up the kingdom," seem naturally to sug 
gest this as the thing ended. That a termination of some 
kind is intended, we gather not from the word rendered " de 
liver up" a word which does not necessarily imply, either 
in classical or Scripture usage, a giving away of the thing 
spoken of, as critics have shown ; but we gather it from what 
is stated at the end of the whole passage, as the object in view. 
" The kingdom," says the apostle, " shall be delivered up 
that God may be all in all." Now, explain this as we may, 
it seems to imply something more than the mere presentation 
of the kingdom to the Father, for the purposes of judicial 
investigation. Even those who seem disposed to rest in this 
as the whole sense of the apostle, allow nevertheless, that, in 
point of fact, there will be a change of form, and a termina 
tion of not a few things now going on in, and now charac 
terizing the kingdom. And if so, why should we be so jea- 



WITAT IT IS NOT. 

lous of admitting this to be what the apostle means to cx^ 
press? 

When the Ecdeemer said, as he was on the wing 1 for hea 
ven, " Go, make disciples of all nations, baptizing them, and 
teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have com 
manded you" he gave out a commission which will un 
doubtedly be at an end when the time arrives of which our 
apostle speaks. His concluding words imply as much : " And 
lo ! I am with you alway, even unto the end of the world." 
Now, this commission is prefaced with the delightful announce 
ment, " All power is given unto me in heaven and in earth ; 
Go ye, therefore" implying that both the authority to issue 
that commission, and the power to sustain in the execution 
of it, were given to the Mediator expressly for those saving 
purposes. When, therefore, the work is done, the whole 
Commission is at an end not merely the matters to be per 
formed, but the whole Mediatorial Trust, and the whole 
Mediatorial Furniture, of authority and power, of gifts and 
graces, committed to him for the ends of that Trust. 

But does it follow from this, that the Mediator, as such, 
will sink and disappear ? By no means. The termination 
of which we have spoken leaves all mediatorial relationships 
untouched; and in the two following respects they will un 
doubtedly be eternal : 

(1.) In his mediatorial merit Christ must for ever be recog 
nised by the redeemed, and be in that character the Object 
of their unceasing contemplation and praise. " Worthy is 
the Lamb that was slain, to receive power, and riches, and 
wisdom, and strength, and honour, and glory, and blessing" 
that dearest utterance of every heart that has ever been 
sprinkled with his blood must get out. Nor will it go forth 
merely in one sublime shout, bursting simultaneously from 
the lips of all, as they " enter in through the gates into the 
city" to die away, or be lost in some other and unknown 
feelings, kindled by the sight of an altered Lord. No. 



152 " DELIVERING UP THE KINGDOM " 

Nothing will ever content the ransomed of the Lord, br.t 
still to discern " in the midst of the throne a Lamb as it had 
been slain" ever fresh, so to speak, from the Altar. They 
will love to feel the eternal freshness of his merit, and its 
righteous power to keep them where they are. As he un 
veils himself to them in this overpowering character, and 
they gaze upon him in the vivid, adoring perception of that 
in him which brought them from hell to heaven, those melo 
dious notes will steal upon his ear, and fill it gratefully 
through all duration, " Unto him that loved us, and washed 
us from our sins in his own blood, and hath made us kings 
and priests to God and his Father, to him be glory and 
dominion, for ever and ever. Amen." 

(2.) His Mediatorial Person will be the eternal SEAT of 
Divine manifestation ; the MEDIUM of communication be 
tween the Unseen One and all heaven ; and the very PILLAR 
of the eternal system. It is on this point that the heart is 
ready to tremble, as it hears of his " delivering up the king 
dom to God, even the Father that God may be all in all," 
as if it were meant to intimate that, somehow or other, the 
mediatorial character of its Lord would merge and evanish 
a thought abhorrent to saved and grateful souls. But on 
this point other Scriptures gloriously reassure us. The 
heavenly state is in one place called "THE EVERLASTING 

KINGDOM OP OUR LORD AND SAVIOUR JESUS ClIKIST." (2 

Pet. i. 11.) In another, it is called, " The kingdom of CHRIST 
and of GOD." (Eph. v. 5.) And what this last passage ex 
presses nakedly is in the Apocalypse (as usual) symbolically 
represented : " And he showed me a pure river of water of 
life, clear as crystal, proceeding out of the throne of GOD 

and of the LAMB And there shall be no more curse; 

but the throne of GOD and of the LAMB shall be in it" the 
new Jerusalem. (Rev. xxii. 1, 3.) Here, God and the 
Lamb are named with emphatic distinctness ; and the pure 
river of the water of life is seen flowing from the throne of 



WHAT IT IS NOT. 153 

both, from that of God, as the Unseen, Absolute, Eternal 
Fountain of life and of love; from that of THE LAMB, as the 
visible Channel, throughout eternity, of all gracious and 
beatific communications from God to the redeemed. 

" He that hath seen Him will have seen the Father." In 
his glorious Person, the triune Jehovah will stand confessed 
and manifested to all heaven and through all duration. Nor 
will it be mediatorial manifestation only. There will be in 
cessant mediatorial intercourse and communication between 
God and his people. The river of life, as we learn from 
what is here said, shall flow, through him, from its Foun 
tain to the souls that shall never have enough of it ; and from 
them it shall be, through the same dear channel, sent back 
again, in the outgoings of their full hearts and in the services 
of their perfected natures, without end. Never a benignant 
look, never a gracious communication, from the triune Je 
hovah will reach the citizens of the New Jerusalem, but it 
will pass through, or rather proceed from, his manifested 
Person : Never a grateful feeling, nor a willing service, shall 
go from them to the Godhead, but it shall light upon, and be 
absorbed by, Him in whom shall be seen dwelling all the 
fulness of the Godhead bodily. Thus the mediatorial rela 
tionships will remain, not in the passive state of mere exist 
ence, so to speak, but gloriously active and effectual. They 
will be the life of all heaven. The preservation and continu 
ance of the heavenly state will be as dependent upon the 
continued application of his mediatorial merit, and the con 
tinued exercise of his mediatorial power, as was the attain 
ment of heaven before. As in the kingdom of Nature, " In 
six days the Lord made heaven and earth, and rested the 
seventh day," and yet " my Father workcth hitherto," said 
Christ, " and I work" as every moment He " upholdeth all 
things by the word of his power," the same creative power 
which called them into being at first so in the kingdom of 
Grace, the whole saving grace and redeeming power of the 



15 "DELIVERING UP THE KINGDOM" AVHAT IT is NOT. 

Mediator will go out incessantly, in the heavenly state, for the 
preservation and continuance of what hath been attained for 
the eternal sustentation of the Church, in its being and bliss. 
Tims, in the strictest sense, will it be the " KINGDOM of 
Christ and of God" " His appearing and HIS KINGDOM" . 

" THE EVERLASTING KINGDOM OP OUR LORD AND SAVIOUR 

JESUS CHRIST" " He shall REIGN for ever and ever." In his 
glorious Person not only shall Grod be manifested, but re 
stored humanity shall stand represented and headed up, as 
"the First-begotten from the dead, the First-born among 
many brethren," " the second Man." In Him also shall 
" elect angels" find the principle of their stability, and the 
Head of a system of new creation, of which they are a part ; 
in whom are " gathered together all things in one, both which 
are in heaven, and which are on earth, even in Him" " by 
whom all things are reconciled, whether they be things in 
earth or things in heaven." (Eph. i. 10 ; Col. i. 20.) At 
the head of this magnificent kingdom of new creation Jesus 

O O 

shall sit, the Life of all its activities and of all its felicities, 
and the, very Prop of its being feasting himself with the 
worthy and enduring spectacle. Long he "expected :" Now, 
he expects no longer, and expects nothing more ; for he has 
gotten all. "He SEES the travail of his soul, and is SATIS 
FIED." He rests and is refreshed. The Trust-character of 
mediation is at an end ; but mediation itself is not at an end. 
The Stewardship has ceased, with all its mutual engagements, 
and interchanged fidelities, and surrenders and acceptances 
between the high contracting parties. " The Strength of 
Israel has not lied unto Him; 1 nor has He proved to Him 
that appointed him " altogether as a liar, and as waters that 
fail." So the covenant stands fast for ever, and " His THRONE 

AS THE DAYS OF HEAVEN !" (Psal. Ixxxix. 28-37.)* 

* The further prosecution of this important branch of our argument 
I reserve to the second part of this volume ; that the stream of evidence, 
under the successive heads, may flow uninterrupted. 



CHAPTER VII. 

THE ENTIRE CHURCH " MADE ALIVE" EITHER BY RESURREC 
TION OR TRANSFORMATION AT CHRIST S COMING. 

THERE is no part of the premillennial scheme, as now advo 
cated, where it comes so entirely to a stand, as on the subject 
of the RESURRECTION. When Christ appears, we are told 
at the beginning of the millennium he will raise all the 
saints that shall have died before that time, and change all 
that shall then be alive. But what is to become of the 
myriads of saints that are to people the earth during the 
millennium? 

The answer to this question will startle the reader, if he 
happens not to be well read in the changes which this un 
steady scheme has from time to time undergone, and is un 
acquainted with its latest modifications. The fact is, This 
whole subject is a blank in the system. It has positively got 
no Scripture on the subject. It applies all that Scripture 
says about the resurrection of saints at all, to those living 
before the millennium. Of course, then, they find it silent 
about either the raising or the changing of any other saints 
without a word about the vast numbers whom they have to 
dispose of after the millennium. What do they do with 
them, then ? For the most part, the subject is avoided. 
Those, however, who venture to grapple with it, are hurried 
into such revolting speculations as, I believe, will open many 
an eye to the true nature of the whole scheme. 

I shall not take my statement of these speculations from 



156 EVERLASTING CONTINUANCE OF 

those who are reckoned extreme men, nor from books which 
may be supposed to be out of date. The following is from 
the pen of Mr BICKERSTETH. The startling nature of it, 
and its important bearings, will justify our giving it pretty 
nearly in full. 

" If," says he, "the resurrection of the righteous and the wicked, 
and the general judgment of all men, took place at one time, and 
in the same day, none would, none could be left, as the heads and 
parents of a redeemed people on. earth [after the general judgment.] 
But the Holy Scriptures reveal to us a progress in judgment, and 
that the resurrection of the righteous and the wicked are clearly 
distinct in time. There is the first resurrection of the saints at 
the commencement of the millennium, and after the thousand 

years the rest of the dead [the wicked] live, and are judged." 

At the close of the millennium, " there is a last open apostasy of 
the wicked, who during the thousand years had yielded only a 
feigned obedience." This " finally separates all the believers, and 
removes them from the earth wherein dwelleth righteousness. The 
apostates are first slain by fire, and afterwards raised with the rest 
of the wicked dead for judgment. But NO CHANGE is THEN MEN 
TIONED AS PASSING ON THE JEWISH NATION, OR ON THE LIVING RIGHT 
EOUS, who continue faithful to God, AS IN THE TRANSLATION OF THK 
SAINTS BEFORE THE MILLENNIUM.* The object of the rebellion, to 
overthrow the camp of the saints and the beloved city, fails of its 
design. God protects them. The lining righteous, then, after the 
Millennium, MAY YET CONTINUE A SEED TO SERVE GOD, AND IN SUCCES 
SIVE GENERATIONS BE TRAINED UP FOR HEAVENLY GLORY." f 

In this statement, the least surprising thing which the 
reader will mark is, that there is to be no simultaneous 
change of those myriads of believers who have lived durina 
the millennium, " as in the translation of the saints before 

* I thought the author had, in the previous sentence, " finally re 
moved all the believers from the earth wherein dwelleth righteousness. " 
How he keeps them on earth still, unchanged and untranslated, I am at 
a loss to understand. 

t Lent Lecture for 1843, second edition, pp. 329, 331. The Lecture is 
entitled, " The Kingdom of Christ the Lord, in its successive stages and 
heavenly glories." 



THE FLESHLY STATE MB B1CKEKSTETII. 157 

the millennium." That, be it observed, is given up. What, 
then, becomes of them? One by one, throughout " succes 
sive generations/ they get glorified we are not told how, 
or on what principle but the race of them never dies out: 
they live on, and propagate their kind to all eternity; they 
" continue a seed to serve God!" 

But possibly this 13 but a hasty conjecture; for, says the 
author, " they may continue." In the next sentence but 
one, however, the conjectural is changed into the positive; 
and page after page is spent in attempts to prove the mon 
strous position of an eternal perpetuity of the generations 
and families of men in flesh and blood upon the earth. 

" Its truth," says he, "is distinctly revealed in many testimonies 
of Scripture, both in the Old and New Testament. The covenant 
with Noah was an everlasting covenant between God and every living 
creature of all Jleslifor perpetual generations The covenant of Abra 
ham is called by the psalmist the word which he commanded to 
thousand generations So Moses describes the Lord as keeping 
covenant and mercy for a thousand generations This period of a 
thousand generations, thus repeatedly mentioned, WOULD REACH FAR. 
BEYOND THE CLOSE OP THE MILLENNIUM. The promise made in Isaiah 
concerning the kingdom of Christ, and his reigning on the throne 
df David, are in the strongest expressions of NEVER-ENDING CONTI 
NUANCE. The same promise of perpetuity is often given to the 
people of Israel : The people shall be all righteous, they shall 
inherit the land for ever. (Isa. Ix. 21.) Corresponding with this is 
that very full and clear promise, They shall dwell in the laud, 
thoy and their children and their children s children for ever, and my 
servant David shall be their prince for ever The plain and obvious 
meaning of such passages would lead us to the conclusion of a con 
tinuance both of Israel and Gentile nations in a state of righteous 
ness on our earth." After attempting to show " the consistency 
of this with the last fire described in St Peter, and the new heavens 
and the new earth afterwards to come forth," he says, " Thus re 
markable are the proofs in the Old Testament of the PERPETUAL 
continuance of the Jewish nation on our earth." * 

* The reader will observe how studiously the estimable author avoids 
raying, "eternal continuance." Is it that an everlasting propagation of 



158 EVERLASTING CONTINUANCE OF THE FLESHLY STATE 

Mr Bickerstoth s New Testament proofs are still more sin 
gular. 

" The apostle," says he, " closes his prayer for the Ephesians by 
leading us to the same wonderful fact of a perpetual continuance 
of the church upon earth : * Unto God be glory in the Church by 
Christ Jesus, world without end; or, as it might be rendered, 
throughout all the generations of the ages of ages. The Apostle 
James, speaking of believers, says, Of his own will begat he us 
with the word of truth, that we should be a kind of first-fruits of 
his creatures. Thus the Christian Church is described as only the 
first-fruits of a glorious harvest yet to be reaped on our earth." 

That is, after " the end of all things" as we innocently 
sav for it seems there is to be no end of any thing. 

" So," he goes on, "in the description in the Hebrews of the future 
glory, and of the heavenly society partaking of it, there is not only 
the general assembly and church of the first-born which are writ 
ten in heaven, but * the spirits of just men made perfect, which 
seems to refer to those gathered, after the number of the Church of the 
first-born is completed." 

But enough of these singular specimens of exegesis. 

Soon after the publication of the volume from which these 
paragraphs are transcribed, Mr BIRKS S acute work on " The 
Four Prophetic Empires and the Kingdom of the Messiah" 
appeared. There the same views are stated, the same pas 
sages, with a little enlargement, adduced, the same style of 
reasoning and language employed. A few sentences, how 
ever, I will give from this work. 

" Does the Word of God," asks Mr BIRKS, " distinctly reveal to 
us a time when the number of mankind shall be complete, and a 
close put for ever to the course of human generations? Or, does it 
unfold the prospect of successive generations of the redeemed throughout 
the course of the ages to come? It has appeared already, that the 
latest prophecy of Scripture encourages, rather than forbids, the 

latter view No one could infer from these parts of the 

inspired volume [the Old Testament], that there was any final 

human families upon earth is a sentiment scarcely palatable enough to be 
nakedly stated ? 



MR BIRKS MR LORD. 159 

Lound assigned to the course of human generations. The direct 
statements of their perpetual continuance are so numerous, and 
expressed in such various forms, that nothing less than the clearest 
evidence in other parts of revelation can warrant us in restricting 

them to a narrower sense The last fire is, in the Book 

of Revelation, seen to fall on the rebels who compass the beloved 
city. But the camp of the saints itself is preserved, the fire harms 
it not. The dead, then, and the dead only, so far as that prophecy 
reveals, are summoned in judgment, but the faithful who are then 
living are passed by in silence? and the natural conclusion seems 
to be, that from them the new earth is peopled with holy and 
righteous generations."* 

In the Lent Lectures for 1849, the same views are repeated, 
in a modest and sweet spirit, by Mr BROCK. | But as he 
refers his readers to Mr Birks and Mr Bickersteth for a fuller 
treatment of the subject, I pass from him to give one more 
extract from the other side of the Atlantic. 

" The annunciation," says Mr LORD, " that He who sent his 

angel to testify these things in the Churches is Jesus, that 

the Spirit and the bride say, Come, and that whoever hears it is to 
say, Come, is marked by a beauty and grandeur of meaning scarce 
ly surpassed in any other passage of the book. As the saints, who 
are the bride, do not in their intermediate state address men, the 
invitation they utter is to be referred to their reign with Christ on 
earth, when they are to exercise the office of kings and priests. 
The passage indicates an agency, therefore, they are to exert 
throughout the interminable agts of redemption. The Root and the 
Offspring of David, the bright and morning Star, is the incarnate 
Word, who is to reign and CARKY ON THE WORK OF SALVATION FOR 

EVER AND EVER. THE SPIRIT IS TO CONTINUE HIS RENEWING AND 

SANCTIFYING INFLUENCE, and say to the sons and daughters of the race, 
at they are sunimoned FROM AGE TO AGE into existence, Come. The 
raised and transfigured saints are to repeat the call THROUGH THE 
FLIGHT OF EVERLASTING YEARS, J and the unglorificd also; and every 

* The Four Prophetic Empires and the Kingdom of the Messiah. By 
the Eev. T. R. Birks, pp. 310, 311, 319, 320, 325. Second Edition, 1845. 
f The Priest upon his Throne, Lect. x. 
j Compare this with Mr Bickersteth s " visible economy of oral reve- 



1GO REMARKS 

breast be filled and transported with a sense of the infinitude and 
freeness of the Saviour s grace." * 

I thought that my duty to the truth and fidelity to the 
system which I am examining, demanded that these extracts 
should be given to my readers. (Since this \vas first written, 
indeed, it seems to have become the received premillennial 
view.) And now, what shall I say of such views ? 

(1.) They are in the last degree repulsive. "Who can 
hear of " successive generations" of men after the last judg 
ment of " sons and daughters of our race summoned into 
existence through the flight of everlasting years" of a 
" perpetual continuance of the Church upon earth," for the 
purpose of being " trained for heavenly glory" without any 
end of an everlasting birth of sinful men, to be saved by 
grace implying, of course, THE ETERNAL CONTINUANCE OF 

SIN, AND ITS INSEPARABLE ACCOMPANIMENTS, On that " new 

earth wherein dwelleth righteousness:" who can hear of 
such things without astonishment, and is it too much to 
add without loathing? I know it may be said, that this 
everlasting continuance of sin and misery on the new earth is 
repudiated by the writers from whom I quote; inasmuch as 
they repeatedly tell us that " the people that sojourn on the 
earth will be all righteous" in the most absolute sense. Mr 
Lord, for example, says this, and so do others. But that is 
their strange inconsistency. They talk of " the incarnate 
Word carrying on the work of salvation for ever and ever," 
and in the next breath speak of men on the earth as having 
no sin to be saved from of " the Spirit continuing his renew 
ing and sanctifying influence" on the new earth, and anon, as 
if no renovation and sanctification were needed at all of 
" the perpetual continuance of the Church upon earth to be 
trained for heavenly glory," and then, as if men were beyond 

lation from those who reign upon the earth" to those who are reigned 
over; p. 113, supra. 
* Exposition of the Apocalypse. New York, 8vo, 1847, p. 535, 



ON THIS VIEW. 161 

tho need of any such discipline. What can be made of con 
fusion like this? 

(2.) The arguments in proof of these views are worthy 
of the views themselves. What canon of criticism is 
more self-evident and more universally recognised than this, 
that terms and phrases, expressive of perpetuity, are to be 
stretched no further than the known duration of the thing 
spoken of? as when the Jews were commanded to keep such 
and such of their institutions " throughout their generations 
by an ordinance for ever," that is, of course, not through all 
eternity, but throughout the whole duration of their peculiar 
polity, and no longer. On this familiar principle, all Mr 
Bickersteth s and Mr Birks passages about " perpetual gene 
rations," " thousand generations," " inheriting the land for 
ever," and such like, admit of the easiest possible explanation. 
Nor does the greater strength of the language in one place 
than in another, for which there will always be found some 
reason, alter the principle upon which all such passages are 
to be explained. As for their interpretation of the glory 
which Paul ascribes to God " in the Cliurch throughout all 
ages," as if it taught the eternal continuance of a Church- 
state upon earth after the last judgment, it is only equalled 
in originality and in value by their two next interpretations 
of " the first-fruits of his creatures " in James, and " the 
spirits of just men made perfect" in the Hebrews.* 

But the intelligent reader will scarcely, I think, be con 
tented with repudiating such wretched interpretations. He 
will go on to consider what could ever suggest them to such 
excellent ministers of Christ. It must have something to 

* Mr Birks says, in reply to this, that he holds " the contrary " of an 
" eternal continuance of a Church- state upon earth after the last judg 
ment" the name of "Church" belonging exclusively to "the election 
out of the present world what he thinks is pointed at in the above 
passage is "those successive generations of the world to come," or, in 
other words, men born in succession throughout all eternity. Well, but 
I presume he holds these future men are to be saved as men now are ; in 
which case the difference is as little worth noticing as the exposition 
itself seems to be. 

N 



162 REMARKS 

recommend it to such men ; and I apprehend that something 
to be the gap otherwise left in the premillennial system. 
That system provides for the saints whom it has to dispose 
of before the millennium. It provides also for the resurrec 
tion of the wicked at the dose of the millennium, in such a 
way, at least, as will bear to be looked at. But since "no 
change upon the living righteous," after the millennium, is ex 
pected no simultaneous transformation of the millions of 
saints that will be found on the earth after the millennium 
is over what can they do with them but just leave them where 
they were upon earth and as they were in the flesh to all 
eternity ? Abhorrent though the idea be, I do not see how, 
without it, or something very like it, the scheme can be gone 
through with. It is the system, then, of Christ s coming be 
fore the millennium, which drives sober men into such spe 
culations. Truly it is "a burdensome stone" to all who 
warmly espouse and resolutely hold by it, dashing against 
every truth, and throwing the whole system into disorder. 
It is a wedge which, once introduced into the Word of God, 
dislocates it all, and unsettles its every text. One way of 
clearing all is open, and only one to give it up. 

(3.) If there is to be a Church-state upon earth, or, at 
least, all the processes of salvation of souls after the last 
judgment, the battle against the unwersalists which, on the 
ordinary principles of sound theology, used to be thought an 
easy one must be fought over again, and on altogether new 
ground. We must concede much to them, it seems, which 
we were used to repudiate. We must not only admit that 
there will be "an accepted time and day of salvation" 
throughout all eternity for sinners of mankind, but that there 
will be "ages," or (as the premillennialists interpret that 
term in the New Testament) dispensations or economies of 
grace, distinct from each other, and following each other in 
succession ; that there will be " ages of ages," nay, that there 
will be whole " generations of these ages of ages ;" insomuch 
tliat the apostle, looking through the interminable vista of 



ON THIS VIEW. 163 

them, and seeing amidst their endless variety a Church-state 
characterizing them all, ascribes glory to God through Jesus 
Christ in this ever-changeful, never-ceasing Church upon 
earth ! This is what we must concede, I say, to the universal- 
ists, according to Mr Bickersteth, Mr Birks, Mr Lord, &c. 
What use the universalists make of this doctrine of post- 
millennial and eternal " ages," is known to every one ac 
quainted with the literature of theology, and may be readily 
conjectured by those who are not. It is the very life of their 
system, and the one exegetical plausibility which they are 
able to urge. And though our esteemed friends may guard 
their views against universalism, by denying that this Church- 
state will be for the benefit of any that have died rejecting 
a preached gospel, even this does not preclude the notion of 
a future day of grace being extended to such as have died 
in heathenism a notion which has actually been broached 
by a few of the bolder premillennialists. And when 
once this awfully perilous door has with rash hand been 
opened, it will not be found so easy a thing to get it shut 
again. 

We have thus seen that our friends make no provision at 
all for the resurrection or transformation of those who live 
during the millennium, that though they draft them, one 
by one interminably, into the glorified state, they do not 
pretend to show any revealed arrangements for effecting so 
important a change, and have positively no Scripture for 
removing them from the earth at all, according to their way 
of interpreting Scripture, but just the presumed necessity of 
their getting up higher. 

Is this like a scriptural scheme? 

I know well how cordially the authors I have referred to, 
would join with me in branding every thing that savours of 
universalism. But I think it neither unbecoming nor inap 
propriate to show the dangerous weapons with which they 
are playing ; and I make bold to ask the reflecting reader, if 



Ibi THE WHOLE CHURCH 

it be not the placing Christ s second coming before the mil 
lennium which puts these weapons into their hands? 

In opposition to all these speculations, I affirm as follows : 

PROPOSITION SIXTH: 

WHEN CHRIST COMES, THE WHOLE CHURCH OF GOD WILL BE 
" MADE ALIVE " AT ONCE THE DEAD BY RESURRECTION, 
AND THE LIVING, IMMEDIATELY THEREAFTER, BY TRANS 
FORMATION ; THEIR " MORTALITY BEING SWALLOWED UP 
OF LIFE." 

how firm is the ground we tread on here ! What a re 
lief, after the dangerous region we have just been drawn into, 
and the insecure footing we had in it, to find " our foot 
standing in an even place," and "our goings established!" 
Reader, look on this proposition, and on that set up in oppo 
sition to it, and say which commends itself most imme 
diately to the devout student of Scripture as " the mind of 
the Spirit." I think I could peril the whole question upon 
this appeal. 

The proof of this proposition has been given already in 
our fourth chapter. The same passages which showed the 
completeness of the Church at Christ s coming, proved also 
their simultaneous appearance in the glory of the resurrection. 
I do not infer the one of these from the other in no case 
do we need to do this ; but the same passages establish both 
things. In the same passages we find the whole Church of 
God present when Christ comes, and present in the glory of 
the resurrection. Let us just glance at them again, in con 
nection with the point we are now upon. 

The formal subject of our first passage being the resurrec 
tion of believers, and it being the most comprehensive and 
systematic statement on the subject to be found in Scrip 
ture, let us recur to it. 



" MADE ALIVE " AT ONCE. 165 

" Cut now," says the apostle, " is Christ risen, and become the first- 
fruits of them that slept. For since by man came death, by 

man came also the resurrection of the dead But each " 

$xxffri; S, each party, the Representative and the repre 
sented) "in his own order: Christ the first-fruits; afterward 
they that are Christ s at his coming." (1 Cor. xv. 20, 21, 23.) 

The point of comparison here between Adam and Christ, 
as was noticed before, is the connection between them and 
their respective constituents. The apostle assumes that 
Christ stands in the same legal and vital relation to those 
whom he represents, as Adam does to those for whom he 
stood. As the wages of Adam s sin is death, so the merited 
reward of Christ s righteousness is life. And the apostle s 
argument for the resurrection of them that sleep in Jesus is, 
that as the death soul and body of all them that stood in 
Adam has not only been procured in law, but hath actually 
" passed upon all men, in that all have sinned " in Adam ; so 
the life in body as well as soul of all them that are Christ s, 
has not only been absolutely secured in law, but must infal 
libly "pass upon them all " the whole represented company 
" in that all of them are made the righteousness of God 
in him." It is not death and life, as mere events in men s 
history, of which the apostle is treating : It is death and life 
considered as the reward of merit, as the wages paid for work 
done, and under the strict operation of law. Nor is it death 
and life, even in this sense, to each individual for himself and 
by himself : It is death and life under a representative constitu 
tion, and altogether within the limits of that constitution; 
the merit of each of the two Heads taking legal and actual 
effect upon the entire company represented by them re 
spectively in ruin by the one, and rise by the other in 
death from the one, and life from the other, body as well as 
soul. 

"But each in his own order." That is, surely, each of 
the two parties just mentioned " Christ," and "all who in 



166 OBJECTION. 

Christ shall be made alive ; " the first-fruits, and the subse 
quent harvest. Here, "they that are Christ s" are surely 
identical with the "all in Christ made alive;" and both 
expressions denote the whole company represented in Christ 
as the second Adam, the "Mediator of the new covenant" 
all to whom shall ever extend the legal virtue of his 
obedience.* All these are to be made alive at his com 
ing not some of them then, and the rest one knows 
not when ; but all absolutely, numerically, at once, " at his 
coming." 
The other passages need no comment 

" This is the Father s will which hath sent me, that of all which 
he hath given me I should lose nothing, but should raise it 
up again at the last day. And this is the will of Him that 
sent me, that every one which seeth the Son, and bdieveth on 
him, may have everlasting life : and I will raise him up at 
tie last day: (John vi. 39, 40.) 

" I pray not for the world, but for them which thou hast giten me" 

Mark the contrast here between " the world " and " them 
that have been given to Christ by the Father," as one undi 
vided company 

" Father, I will that they also, whom thou hast given me, be 
with me where I am ; that they may behold my glory, which 
thou hast given me." (John xvii. 9, 24.) 
The all-inclusiveness of the resurrection and glorification 
here spoken of is abundantly evident. 

Here, then, I might close this chapter, holding the proof of 
our proposition to be complete, that all who have been " given 
to Christ by the Father" shall appear together, in the glory 
of the resurrection, at his coming. 

But there is one plausible objection to which I must advert; 
otherwise entire satisfaction might not be felt. Passages 

* Mr Birks (p. 216) takes me to task for my confidence on this point. 
Let the reader judge between us. 



OBJECTION REPLY. 1G7 

of Scripture are adduced which it is alleged connect the 
resurrection of believers with events confessedly millennial; 
showing that there will be believing men living in the flesh, 
and an earthly state, after that resurrection of believers 
which those passages speak of. Such, for example, is Isa. 
Ixv. 17, undoubtedly referred to in 2 Pet. iii. 13, as pre 
dicting the renovating of the heavens and the earth; and 
such are Isa. xxv. 8, and Hos. xiii. 14 both quoted in 1 
Cor. xv. 54, 55, the one as " brought to pass " in the 
Church s resurrection, and the other as a song of triumph 
because of the same event; both, too, furnishing the lan 
guage in which the celestial glory of the Church is, in Eev. 
xxi. 4, described. 

The argument from these passages is stated in very much 
the same way by almost all defenders of the preraillennial 
advent. 

" The testimony of Isa. xxv. 8," says Dr II. Bonar, " in favour of 
a premillennial advent is very strong ; for it makes resurrection 
antecedent to Israel s earthly blessedness and glory. It is, more 
over, one of a series occurring in this prophet, all of which occuf 
in the same position and connection, establishing the priority of 
resurrection to the triumphs of the latter day." Speaking of Isa. 
xxv. 8, he says, " I cannot imagine any passage, or series of 
passages, more clear and conclusive in favour of the premillennial 
advent. Their order runs thus : Destruction of Antichrist j 
Resurrection of the Just ; Restoration of Israel." * 

Now, let the reader observe the singular theory on which 
this is made out the novel principle of interpretation on 
which these conclusions are founded. It is, that in the pro 
phecies founded on, there are two distinct parties spoken of, 
and two quite different states of things. There are men in 

* "The Coming and Kingdom of the Lord Jesus Christ," pp. 175, 
177 (1849). 

Mr Elliott s able and candid argiiment, to the same effect, may be 
eeen in his Hor. Apoc. iv. 155-167 (fourth edition) ; and Dr M Neile s, 
in his " Sermons on the Second Advent," No. iii. The above is tbe 
briefest statement I could find. 



168 ONE CLASS OP SAINTS ONLY IN THESE PROPHECIES. 

the flesh, and there are men in glory the latter the ruling 
men, the former the men ruled over. The subject-matter 
of the prophecies in question is the millennial kingdom, in 
two distinct and contemporaneous departments, it seems 
the one a celestial, the other a terrestrial department ; 
there is an upper, and there is a lower sphere a mortal 
and an immortal class, COEXISTENT and CONTEMPORANEOUS, 
in these prophetic passages. Thus, in Isa. xxv. 7 : " He 
will destroy the veil that is spread over all nations " that 
means the millennial nations, the men in the flesh. But 
the very next words (verse 8), " He will swallow up death 
in victory " that means not the same men, at the same, or 
at a more advanced stage of their redemption, but risen 
men, contemporaneous with, and holding rule over, these 
millennial, unglorified, mortal men. 

Need I appeal to any ordinary reader of the Bible, whether 
he ever saw or imagined such a distinction in the passages 
referred to ? There is not a trace of this twofold condition 
of the Church an upper and a lower, a mortal and an 
immortal, a terrestrial and a celestial, one of grace and one 
of glory coexistent and contemporaneous in the prophetic 
strains. There may, indeed, be some difficulty in ascer 
taining the scientific principle on which strains, so catholic 
and all-embracing in their sweep, are to be dealt with how 
predictions, inclosing THE WHOLE WORK OF MESSIAH AND 
ALL ITS RESULTS, are to be expounded how the events of 
all time, as they stand connected with Christ held forth 
before the eye at one view on the panoramic canvass of Old 
Testament prophecy are to be resolved and sorted. I say, 
there may be some difficulty about the proper way of ex 
pounding such remarkable portions of divine truth. To this 
point I will presently advert in the Supplementary Remarks. 
But these I purposely throw into a place by themselves, that 
the reader may not be diverted from the one thing on which 
this argument hinges, namely, the presence of two distinct 



ONE CLASS OF SAINTS ONLY IN THESE PROPHECIES. 169 

bodies of men in these prophecies. If this be not made out, 
then, the plea from these prophecies for a millennial state 
after the resurrection of saints, vanishes at once. 

Now, let the reader glance at any one of the predictions 
in question, and see if he can find this alleged twofoldness 
in the Church spoken of. In Isa. xxv. 6-8, for example, it 
is one class of men (they would tell us) for whom the " feast 
of fat things is made ; " the same from whom " the veil " of 
ignorance is taken away ; a different class, in whose persons 
" death is swallowed up in victory ; " and again the former 
class, whose " tears are wiped away," and whose " rebuke 
is removed from off all the earth ! " Was ever such a way 
of explaining the prophecies thought of by unbiased readers ? 
Did ever critic or commentator, worthy of the name, commit 
himself to such capricious principles of exposition ? Never 
one, to my knowledge. * 

I dismiss this argument, then, as having nothing to sup 
port it. That the resurrection, and the new heavens and new 
earth, are truly predicted in the prophecies in question, I 
grant most readily; and that it is by no accommodation of 
them that the Apostles Paul and Peter quote them in this 
sense. I grant, too, that the millennial state is held forth in 
the same prophecies : in short, that the kingdom of Christ 

* Thus I expressed myself in a former edition. "Well," says Mr 
Wood, "I will bring forward OLSHAUSEN, who will be allowed to be 
entitled to the name of a commentator " (p. 12). Undoubtedly ; and I 
thank my friend for the correction. That the reader may be able to judge 
for himself, I will give him the passage which Mr Wood quotes from his 
commentary on Matt. xxii. 29, to the benefit of which premillenialism 
is fairly entitled. " It does not appear," says Olshausen, "how the con 
tradiction is to be reconciled without the supposition of a twofold 
resurrection ; while, if the supposition be adopted, such passages are 
easily explained. In that case, those living in the kingdom must not 
by any means be regarded as all having risen from the dead ; and, 
accordingly, descriptions like those in Isa. Ixv. 20, 23, must be referred 
only to those who have not risen, and consequently still belong in part 
to the present world." Vol. iii. p. 192. (Clark s translation.) 



170 SUPPLEMENTARY REMARKS. 

in all its stages is there. In this all orthodox interpreters 
agree. If they differ, it is merely, as I have expressed it. 
in the scientific principle on which the common result should 
be brought out. But while all agree thus far, the premil- 
lennialists stand alone seeing what none but themselves 
will ever be persuaded is to be seen in these prophecies 
some of the clauses of these prophecies realized in men 
walking the earth in flesh and blood, and other clauses of 
the same prophecies accomplished at the same time in men 
beyond the reach of mortality. And this mere assertion 
capricious and unsustained is the whole ground of their 
argument for a millennial state after the resurrection of 
the saints. 

Thus, then, the evidence of Scripture for the vivification 
of the whole Church of God at once, is conclusive, and 
there is none against it. 

SUPPLEMENTARY REMARKS. 

I have said that orthodox commentators, in expounding 
the prophecies which are quoted in the New Testament, 
while agreeing generally in their results, differ somewhat in 
their way of bringing them out. On this subject I dwelt at 
considerable length in my first edition. Dr H. Bonar, in 
his " Examination " of my book, has handled this part of 
it in a strain which, on reflection, he will probably regret, 
as I am sure that he did not mean to misrepresent my senti 
ments and misquote my words. The point of criticism is an 
interesting one, and with this only will I trouble the reader 
for a few moments. 

When the apostles quote the Old Testament prophecies 
as foretelling the resurrection, the new heaven and new 
earth, &c., it is taken for granted on all hands that they 
give the true sense of them that they do not accommodate 
them, as the neologians affirm, from a true to a false sense, 



WHEREIN EXPOSITORS AGREE AND DIFFER LOWTH. 171 

a sense which they do not and cannot legitimately bear. 
I say, this is taken for granted on all hands by those who 
feel any difficulty on the point : Those who believe in 
accommodation have no difficulties they make short work 
of it. But seeing the prophet, in the same passage where 
these^waZ and perfect things are predicted, introduces things 
neither final nor perfect, as parts of one and the same picture 
of the kingdom of Christ how is this to be explained? 
That is the question on which commentators somewhat 
differ. Prebendary LOWTH, for example, supposing that the 
physical renovation of the heavens and the earth is not only 
truly predicted in Isa. Ixv. 17, because Peter says so (2 Pet. 
iii. 13), but is the prominent idea of renovation in the pas 
sage, is led to apply the next verse of the prophecy to the 
same heavenly state : 

"But bo ye glad and rejoice for ever in that which I create ; 
for behold I create Jerusalem a rejoicing, and her people a joy." 
(Verse 18.) " This," says that sensible expositor, " may be best 
expounded by the New Jerusalem, which shall come down from 
God, when the new heavens and earth are created. See Rev. 
xxi. 1, 2, and compare chapter Ixvi. 22, where there shall be 
no more death, neither sorrow nor crying, nor pain, ibid., verse 
4, and the following verse here. " 

Others reverse this method; and conceiving that "the 
creation of Jerusalem a rejoicing, and her people a joy " (v. 
18), relates not so directly to the heavenly as to the earthly 
Jerusalem, they are disposed to extend the same view to the 
foregoing verse, making " the new heavens and new earth," 
which God was to create " (v. 17), to be a moral rather than 
a physical creation. 

"The Apostles Peter and John," says SCOTT, on v. 17-19, "use 
the expression new heavens and a new earth for the heavenly 
state, after the end of the world and the day of judgment; and 
St Peter says, that we look for it according to his promise, which 
may refer to this very passage : yet the context requires us to interpret 
the words, in this place, of that state of the Church on earth which shall 



172 WHEREIN EXPOSITORS AGREE AND DIFFER CALVIN. 

most resemble the world of glory, in knowledge, holiness, and 
felicity, and which will terminate in it. By the new creating 
power of God, the circumstances of the Church, and the character 
of men, shall be so altered that it will appear as entirely a new 
world ; so that the former confusions, iniquities, and miseries of 
the human race shall be no more remembered or renewed. The 
servants of God are therefore commanded to rejoice in this new 
state of things, which he was about to create ; for he would make 
Jerusalem (the true Church) and all her inhabitants joyful, and a 
joy to all around them ; nay, he would rejoice in them, and put a 
final end to all their sorrows and complaints." 

CALVIN, with his usual judgment, avoids both these extremes. 
He sees in it fundamentally an announcement of that NEW CRE 
ATION of which Christ is the author, and his work in the flesh 
the grand foundation ; he sees it realized in every instance 
of the new birth, when " if any man be in Christ he is a new 
creation" (Kaivq jcr/cvg, 2 Cor. v. 17); he sees it realized in 
every new face which the gospel puts upon human affairs 
and human society; and he sees it realized in its highest and 
most perfect sense only at Christ s second coming, " when 
the heavens and the earth shall be wholly renewed, and be 
brought into a perfect state. And hence it appears," he adds, 
" as we have often observed, that the prophet has respect to 
the whole kingdom of Christ, even to the final goal, which is 
termed accordingly the day of renovation and restitution." * 

* " His metaphoris (v. 17) promittit insignem rerum mutationem, ac 
si diceret Deus, sibi in animo esse, atque etiam in manu, non modo resti- 
tuere Ecclesiam suam, sed ita restituere ut novam vitam obtinere, atque 
in novo mundo habitare videatur. Hyperbolicse sunt lite locutiones, sed 
non potuit aliter exprimi tanti beneficii magnitude, quod adventu Christi 
exhibendum erat. Nee vero de primo tantum adventu intclligit, sed de 
universo regno, quod ad extremum usque adventum protendi debet: 
sicuti jam aliis locis dictum est. Itaque per Christum mundus quodam- 
modo renovatur : unde etiam Apostolus ad Hebr. Sasculum novum 

appellat ; nee dubium quin hanc Prophetse sententiam spectarit 

Atque nos etiamnum in cursu sumus ; nee ista complebuntur usque ad 

resurrectionem ultimam, quce nobis velut meta constituta est Memi- 

nerimus bice in nobis eatenus habere locum quatenus renovati sumus. 



CALVIN. 173 

On the same principle, of what BACON calls the germinant 
accomplishment of prophecy, CALVIN explains, Isa. xxv. 6-8, 
including the words, " He will swallow up death in victory," 
as " relating, without doubt, to the whole kingdom of Christ. 
I say, his whole kingdom," he emphatically adds, " embracing 
not only the commencement, but the consummation and the 
goal." He conceives that the immortal character of the 
felicity that belongs to the kingdom of Christ is the 
radical idea in the words, " He will swallow up death in 
victory" in contrast with the " temporary and fading" 
character of all other joys; but such an immortality as will 
not only survive the death of all that is seen and tem 
poral, but will extend to the whole man, embracing the 
resurrection of the body and the restitution of this blighted 
world,* 

Surtius autem duntaxat ex parte renovati ; idcoque nondum plane ccdum 
novum et terrain novum cernimus. Non est igitur mirum mocrores nobis ct 
luctus superesse, quando nondum exuimus omnino veterem hominem, sed 
multso adhuc supersunt reliquiae: novitas autem nobis initium facere 
debet, quia primum ordinem tenemus, et nostro peccato creaturse inge- 
rniscunt, et vanitati subjectaa sunt, ut ostendit Paulus. Ubi veroplenis- 
sime fuerimus renovati, ccdum quogue et terra penitus renovabuntur, inte- 
yrumque statum recipient Atque hinc colligendum, quod ssepius notavi- 
mus, Proplietam univenum C/tristi regnum spectare, usque ad metam 
ultimam, quse etiam dies renovationis et instaurationis appellatur." 
(In Isa. Comm. ad loc.) 

* " In summa, promittit solidam felicitatem futuram sub Christ! 
regno, quod ut melius exprimat, utitur variis figuris apte ad rem ipsam 
accommodatis. Vera est ista felicitas, non temporaria aut caduca, 
quam nee mors ipsa adimere potest ; quia in rebus ketissimis defectus hie 
non parum Isetitiam minuit, si desit immortalitas. Duo igitur conjungit, 
quae felicitatem pcrfectam et absolutam reddunt : primum quod perpetuit 
sit vita, (nam iis qui beati alioqui sunt ad tempus, interire miserum est) 
deinde, vita hsec gaudio conjuncta est ; nam alioqui moestas et serumnosaj 
vitae mors videtur prseferenda. . . . Sed quaari potest, ad quod tempus 
referendoe sint istae promissiones ? nam in hoc mundo conflictandum 
nobiscum variis serumnis, assidueque pugnandum est : nee tantum des- 

tinati sumus morti, sed quotidie morimur Ubi igitur, aut quando, 

heec locum habent ? Ilaud dubie ad univenum Christi regnum referenda 
sunt: univcrsum dico; quia non tantum initium spectandum est, sed 



171 COMPREHENSIVENESS OF THESE PROPHECIES. 

This last way of bringing out the sense of the prophecies 
in question was the one I adopted the one which I thought 
most consonant with the Catholic, all-embracing fulness 
which distinguishes these majestic oracles the one which, 
while it admitted of our seeing in them all that the apostles 
quoted them for, allowed of our seeing more than that in 
them, without in the least displacing or disturbing the other ; 
that as they embraced " the whole kingdom of Christ, from 
his first to his second advent" (to use the words of Calvin), 
there was ample room in them for the earlier and the later 
stages to lie peaceably together the starting-point and " the 
goal" to be seen in the same prophetic stadium; so that the 
apostles might select any one of the stages of the kingdom 
the final one, if it suited the subject they had in hand; and, 
quoting the words of the prophecies in question, might say 
with perfect truth, that " then shall be brought to pass the 
sayings therein written," without thereby excluding every 
other and previous stage of the same kingdom as if the 
same words could receive no accomplishment in them, but 
must necessarily be limited to the one stage and period of 
the kingdom for which the apostles refer to them. More 
over, in showing how the prophecy in Isa. xxv. 6-8, was to 
be expounded on this comprehensive principle, and how 
much we missed by restricting any of its clauses exclusively 
to the resurrection of the body in expatiating on the fulfil 
ment of it in the stages prior to this I took occasion to say, 
that " the feast" predicted can mean nothing but the Salva 
tion of the Gospel " made unto all people" properly when 
it was prepared by Christ s work in the flesh, and the univer 
sal invitation to come to it was thereupon issued; that the 
prophet, nevertheless, sees the actual " feasting" of all people 

etiam complementum et meta. Atque ita usque ad secundum Christ! 
adventum extend! debet, qui propterea dies redemptionis et instaurati- 
onis vocatur ; quoniam ornnia quce nunc videntur confusa restituentur 
in integrum, et iiovam formam induent." (In Isa. xxv. 8.) 



COMPREHENSIVENESS OF THESE PROPHECIES. 175 

at this gospel table, which carries us onwards to the general 
submission of the nations to Christ, with its saving effects; 
and that while this is the stage of the kingdom its stage of 
fullest development upon earth, and the next to its heavenly 
stage on which the mind of the Spirit seems chiefly to 
repose in the swell of this glorious prophecy, yet " there is 
not one of the terms by which the state of grace is there 
described, which does not convey underneath it an announce 
ment of the corresponding state of glory; that it is, in fact, 
the same thing at two different stages of its progress which 
is described, the one farther forward than, and the perfec 
tion of, the other; and, as Christ s work secured the whole, 
so all that ever will be is seminally contained in the Church s 
present state, and truly couched under every description of 
that state." (Pp. 204, &c.)* 

* Will the reader believe that for thus expounding these prophecies I 
am classed with Swedcnborg, in expelling the corporeal to make way for 
a mere spiritual resurrection, and with Heologians, such as Jaspis, in 
charging the apostles with accommodating prophecies that mean one thing 
to a purpose that makes them mean quite another thing? After show 
ing the application of the prophecy last noticed to those stages of the 
kingdom that precede the resurrection, I spoke of the " delightful sense" 
of the prediction thus obtained, and " how much we are deprived of by 
those who, admitting no sense but that of physical resurrection, would 
carry us straight into the eternal state with these words, over the head 
of all that is terrestrial in the meaning of them." In this passage I am 
made to say, that the prophecy " does not refer to corporeal resuscitation 
but to spiritual revival, which he affirms," says Dr Bonar, " to be a more 
delightful meaning than the other." (Pp. 175, 176.) The author must 
see that he thus misrepresents me here I am sure unwittingly as I 
made no comparison between any one meaning and another, and still 
less between a corporeal and a spiritual resuscitation; and that, as they 
were all " delightful" to me, I grudged being deprived of any of them 
for the purpose of securing the exclusive place for one of them. Not 
content with this, when I speak of the primary meaning of a prophecy, 
Dr Bonar charges me with making the secondary one " subordinate," 
and so disparaging the apostles, in their quotations of them. (P. 181, 
note.) Not so. If I say of the 41st Psalm, for example, that it has a 
primary reference to David, and to Ahithophel, who " ate of his bread, 
and lifted up his heel against him," do I mean that its reference to 



176 PROFESSOR ALEXANDER MR ELLIOTT. 

I have only to add, that Professor Alexander takes the 
same comprehensive view of the prophecies which have en 
gaged our attention, in his recent and valuable Commentary 
on " The Earlier and Later Prophecies of Isaiah." 



The following are Mr Elliott s remarks on the foregoing 
line of argument, in the fourth edition of his " Horrc:" 
" Again, as regards those passages cited from the prophets, 
in which predictions which the New Testament explains 
of the resurrection time and state are connected with the pre 
dictions of the earthly happiness of the restored Jews and Jeru 
salem, this connection of the two, it is said, does not imply 
the synchronism; but arises only out of the comprehensive 
glancings of prophecy, embracing and interlacing together 
in its view the whole history and results of Christ s redemp 
tion, in its various chief stages of development; from that 
of its first promulgation by Christ, to that of its universal 
reception in the world on the Jews conversion, and then 
yet farther than that, of the postmillennial stage of the 
redeemed saints heavenly and everlasting blessedness follow 
ing the resurrection. So Mr Brown, pp. 179-189 (second 
edition) ; a disquisition written with his usual force and ability ; 
but which has left a strong impression on my OAvn mind of 
the inability alike of himself and the eminent expositors cited 
by him Calvin, Lowth, Scott to construe the passages 
fairly on their anti-premillenarian hypothesis. No doubt, 
sometimes there are comprehensive glancings at, and inter- 
minglings of different future eras of prophecy. But in various 



Christ and the traitor Judas is subordinate ? No, but secondary. It is the 
difference between first and next in point of time, as every one acquainted 
with the language of theology knows. " Not as if this secondary sense," 
says Prebendary Lowth, " were less principally intended by the pro 
phets, but rather with respect to the time, because it is the last or ultimate 
completion of their predictions. 1 (Preface to Commentary on the Pro 
phets.) 



MR ELLIOTT. 177 

chief passages urged by me, it is not a mere intermingling 
of subject that we find, but a direct chronological synchro 
nisation of the saints resurrection-state with the earthly 
blessedness of the restored Jews and Jerusalem." (iv. pp. 
165, 166, with note embodied.) 
Let the reader judge. 



CHAPTER V11I. 

RESURRECTION OF ALL THE WICKED AT THE COMING OP CHRIST. 

I HAVE shown that the whole Church of God will be simul 
taneously " made alive" at the second advent. I now proceed 
to show, that at the same time a like process shall pass upon 
the opposite class. 

PROPOSITION SEVENTH: 

ALL THE WICKED WILL RISE FROM THE DEAD, OR BE " MADE 
ALIVE," AT THE COMING OF CHRIST. 

In establishing this, let us first observe the arguments which 
have been brought to prove two separate resurrections, the 
one at the beginning, and the other at the end of the millen 
nium. 

And here, one cannot but be struck, at the outset, with 
the character and the amount of the evidence offered us in 
proof of such a position. One direct information of a " first 
resurrection," and one only, is alleged to exist. And where 
is that one plain statement ? In confessedly the most difficult 
book of Scripture, the most symbolical in its structure and 
figurative in its style ; and, I may add, in that part of the book 
on the precise sense of which there has been, perhaps, the 
greatest diversity of opinion. Additional evidence is, in 
deed, alleged to exist in favour of a first resurrection, though 
only, it is admitted, confirmatory, and but for the plain reve 
lation of it in this one passage, scarcely sufficient to rely on. 



A PRIOR RESURRECTION BUT ONE DIRECT PASSAGE. 179 

As Mr Bickersteth somewhere says, " This (in the book of 
Revelation) is the seat of the doctrine." 

Hear their own estimate of the character and amount of 
the evidence they have to offer us for a " first resurrection." 

" But the first resurrection," says the candid and acute Mr Birks, 
"offers a still severer trial to the faith of the Christian. We can 
not here appeal to innumerable texts where it is plainly revealed. 
The analogy of Scripture, however decisive in its favour, appears 
at first sight obscure and ambiguous. In maintaining this doctrine, 
therefore, we have to rest only upon the Word of God, and chiefly 
on this one prophecy. (Rev. xx.) Why, then, should a doctrine, in 
appearance so disputable, and beset with such difficulties, be now pressed 
on the attention of the Church ? The answer is very plain. Grant 
for one moment that the doctrine is true, and you must feel that it 
is one of deep interest to ourselves." * 

Of course; but grant what has just been admitted as to the 
evidence for it, and its truth cannot but appear suspicious. 
No doubt, God has a right to reveal truth as he pleases ; but 
AVO observe God s way of revealing truth to be very different 
from this. We do not find such grand and delightful, such 
stirring and influential truths, wrapt up in mystic folds, re 
served for apocalyptic disclosure, apparently negatived by all 
those passages which we might expect to be the very " seats" 
of those truths, and only peeping, by their own account, 
" obscurely and ambiguously" through a few passages and 
expressions. And we say that this constitutes a prima facie 
presumption, of the strongest nature, against the doctrine 
of a " first resurrection," literally understood. 

Waiving, for the present, the direct passage, let us look at 
those which are thought to confirm this expectation. They 
are of two classes: 

(1.) Such as, while treating formally of the resurrection of 
believers, make no mention at all of the resurrection of the 

* Lent Lectures for 1843, pp. 155, 156. 

Some, thinking that Mr Birks has here admitted too much, have tried 
to show that the doctrine is directly expressed elsewhere ; but their at 
tempts to show this are the best proof to the contrary. 



180 RESURRECTION OF BELIEVERS PECULIAR TO THEMSELVES. 

wicked a thing natural, it is alleged, supposing each to have 
a time of its own, but difficult to account for if both classes 
rise together. In this class, 1 Cor. xv., 1 Thess. iv., and 
Luke xiv. 14, are usually adduced. 

The answer to this is very simple. The wicked are ex 
cluded from these passages, not because they will not rise at 
the same time with the righteous, but because they will not 
rise on the same principle.* They will not rise as represented 
by and entitled to life in Christ. When He said to his disciples, 
" Because I live ye shall live also," he enunciated a principle 
under which the wicked do not stand, and spoke of a life 
which they will never taste. The character of that life, the 
grounds of it, and the subjects of it, are all restrictive. What 
have the wicked to do with a resurrection which Christ 
secured for his people by his meritorious righteousness, as the 
second Adam a resurrection of which his own was the 
blessed pledge ? In such a train of thought as in 1 Cor. xv., 
the resurrection of the wicked had been out of place. Eaised 
on a different principle, they are set aside, and do not once 
come into view. It would but have clogged and diluted an ar 
gument whose force depends on points applicable exclusively 
to believers, to have connected with them the case of the unbe 
lieving, and massed up together the objects of the new cove 
nant and the victims of the old. " He that hath the Son 
hath life: he that hath not the Son of God hath not life." 
" He that belie veth on the Son hath everlasting life: he that 
believeth not the Son SHALL NOT SEE LIFE, but the wrath of 
God abideth on him." (1 John v. 12; John iii. 30.) When 
any thing common to both is spoken of such as the judgment 
then we have the resurrection of both classes at once, as we 
shall soon see expressed in the most unequivocal terms. But 
when the subject in hand is something peculiar to believers, 
the exclusion of the wicked from such passages is just what 

* Mr Birks, misrepresenting me as saying that " there is no common 
principle in the two cases." goes on to characterize my theology as "erro 
neous and antiscripturaJ." (p. 218). 



DUTCH REMONSTRANTS. 181 

we expect. It does, indeed, imply that believers rise ALONE 
that is, on a principle peculiar to themselves, and in a company 
amongst whom the wicked are not found. But it does not im 
ply that no others rise contemporaneously with them, that in 
a company by themselves, and on a principle of their own, 
the wicked will not rise at the same time. 

It may strengthen these remarks, and be interesting to 
some to know, that the extreme Socinians and the Socinian- 
izing party of the Dutch Remonstrants employed these very 
passages to prove not that the wicked would not rise at the 
same time with the righteous, but that they would not rise at 
all. And how were they answered by orthodox divines ? 
They were answered precisely as I have answered the premillen- 
nialists by showing that the resurrection treated of in the 
passages adduced was a resurrection peculiar to believers, 
with which the wicked have nothing to do.* 

I have only farther to add on these passages, that the 
reason I have given for the exclusion of the wicked from 

* "Enimvero," says MARCKIUS, in an elaborate treatise on "The 
Expectation of the Future Glory of Jesus Christ " " magis ab adversan- 
tibus urgeri solet, quod resuscitatio passim spectetur ut privilegium seu 
peculiare bonum piorum et fidelium, in quo hinc impii et infideles partem 
non habeant ullum. [He then refers to Luke xx. 35-37; to Luke xiv. 
14, " The resurrection of the just ; " to John vi. 39, and xiv. 19, " Bocause 
I live ye shall live also ; " and to 1 Thess. iv. 14 as the passages on which 
the adversaries founded.] Verum quam parum adversus fidem nostram 
obstent ista omnia et similia forte plura, jam supra audivimus ex Soci- 
nianorum quorundam ore proprio ; ubi ipsi nobiscum observant, Resusci- 
tationem et Resurrectionem saepi sumi strictius, pro Beata et Iseta ad 
Beatitatem ./Eternam, de qua nemo dubitet quin ista sit piis propria, et ex 
unione arctissima cum Christo unice fluens; dum heic latiori sensu vocem 
capimus de qualicunque hominum restitutione ex pulvere in vitam, uti 
hauc vox ilia simpliciter dicit. Eodem modo, quo solemus nos ex Scrip- 
tura Vitam ./Eternam vindicare solis piis, dum Mortem j^Eternam tribui- 
mus impiis ; neque sic negamus impios revicturos, ut etiam deinde vivere 
non desinant unquam inter dolores ineSabiles, quidquid optarent. Illud 
autem inter ista duo est discrimen ; quod JEternam Vitam nunquam tri- 
buamus impiis, quia illam phrasin nusquam tarn late Scriptura usurpat, 
Bed constanter piis, vindicat," &c. (Expectatio GLorice FuturccJesu Christi 
lUmtrata, lib. ii. cap. xii. 4.) See also DE MOOR, Comm. xxxiv. 15, c. 



182 JESUS DIED BELIEVERS SLEEP IN HIM. 

them is that which commentators generally assign.* "The 
Scripture everywhere (says Bengel on 1 Cor. xv. 22), in 
treating of believers, treats of the resurrection of them 
primarily (1 Thess. iv. 13, etc.): of the resurrection of the 
wicked it treats but incidentally." On v. 23, after saying 
(as quoted under a former head, p. 54, note) that Chris 
tians are "a sort of appendix to the First-Fruits," this 
distinguished expositor adds, " The wicked rise at the same 
lime, but they come not under this blessed category." On the 
words, " they that are Christ s at his coming," he says, 
" Paul does not call it the judgment, because he is treating 
of believers" The terms by which the death of Christ 
and of believers respectively are usually expressed, are 
strikingly different: the one being the naked word death; 
the other, the placid term sleep. Sweet is the little com 
ment on this distinction as employed in 1 Thess. iv. 14 
by the same acute critic and most spiritual man : " If 
we believe that Jesus DIED and rose again, even so them 
also which SLEEP in Jesus will God bring with him." 
" Yes (says Bengel), His was another death from his 
people s. He tasted DEATH for every one of them 
(U-TTI^ TTKVTos, Heb. ii. 9), that they might SLEEP in 
him. " 

Considerable stress is laid on the following passage, 
belonging rather to the next class, but to be explained by 
the principle now stated. I mean, 

Phil. iii. 11 : "If by any means I might attain unto the 
resurrection of the dead." 

* "Scriptura" says BENGEL, on 1 Cor. xv. 22 "ubicunque cum fide- 
libus agit, de ipsorum resurrectione agit primario, 1 Thess. iv. 13; s. de 
iiupiorum resurrectione, iucidenter." 

On verse 23, after saying, as quoted before, that Christians are "a sort 
of appendix to the First-Fruits," he adds, " The wicked rise at the same 
time, but they come not under this blessed category." 

"They that are Christ s at his coming," Paul (says he) does not call il 
the judgment, because he is treating oi believers. 



ATTAINING TO THE RESURRECTION FROM THE DEAD. 183 

Why, it is asked, should the apostle be so anxious to 
attain to a general resurrection, alike certain to the righteous 
and the wicked ? The simple answer is, It was not the 
general resurrection he was striving to attain to it was 
not a resurrection common to both classes. It was a re 
surrection peculiar to believers, a resurrection exclusively 
theirs, exclusive, however, not in the time of it, but in its 
nature, its accompaniments, and its issues. This is put be 
yond doubt in the two last verses of the chapter, where all 
its peculiarity all that for which it is desired is made to 
lie in the thing itself, and not in the time of it : 

" From heaven we look for the Saviour, the Lord Jesus Christ : 
who shall change our vile body, that it may be fashioned 
like unto his glorious body, according to the working 
whereby he is able even to subdue all things unto him 
self." (V. 20, 21.)* 

The expressive contrast (not so vivid in our version as in 
the original) between the body of our humbled and the body 
of his glorified condition,! points, as do the preceding pas 
sages, to the fontal character of Christ s resurrection, and 
stamps the resurrection looked for at Christ s appearing as 
one having its cause in the merit, and its character in that 
of " the First-begotten of the dead." It is this, and not the 
time of it, that limits it of necessity to believers. 

But " the word," says Mr Birks, " is a compound which 
occurs here only, and might be rendered the peculiar re 
surrection. The emphasis is even redoubled, the peculiar 
resurrection, even that from among the dead. " J That the 

* Our version, "from whence" (we look, &c.), rightly expresses the 
adverbial sense of i$ tS, here. Bengel and others connect it with *oa./Tu,a 
because it cannot refer to tu^a.iiit. But, as Winer remarks, EJ , in the 
usage of the language, has become an adverb, and signifies unde, whence 
(Gramm. 21, 22.) 

"|" To (rapa, r. TKXtivairtu; f,fj,uv TU f2fj.tt.Tl <r. io^r,; avrrj. 

I The received reading is not a reduplicated form {U-xxifTocfit TU> tr(f 
being simply equivalent to itaitrrxTK \x nx^S,, the article being omitted 



184 MR BIRKS* VIEW OP THIS. 

sentiment of the apostle, in this verse, is an emphatic one 
the desire expressed an intense one is manifest enough; 
although, as will be seen in the note below, I do not attach 
much importance to the mere formula which the apostle 
here employs to express the resurrection which he longed to 
reach. He who sees the glory of that resurrection which is 
held forth as the goal of the " race set before us," will think 
it "peculiar" enough; but if he be among those who are 
" striving (ayuvifyedi, Luke xiii. 24) to enter in at the strait 
gate," he will probably think the glory of it lies in some 
thing else than a priority in time. Certain it is, that critics, 
quite as much alive to the nicest shades of the apostle s 
Greek as Mr Birks, have not detected " the first resurrec 
tion " here ; and even BENGEL, though he held a sort of 
literal first resurrection, makes not the slightest allusion 
to it. Not content with this criticism, and aware, as would 
seem, that another interpretation of the verse might be 
thought quite as natural, Mr Birks tries to press the context 
into his favour. 

" This might," says he, " of itself be referred to the momentous 
difference in the nature of the resurrection which he sought. But 
the context points strongly to the further meaning of a precedence 
in point of time." 

Here one is apt to ask himself if he could have read so 
often that well-known chapter, and failed to perceive what 
is " strongly pointed to " one resurrection prior in time to 

in this latter form). But the preferable reading appears to be the re 
duplicated form, " The resurrection, that from the dead" (l^taifTa,fis r<i* i* 
!*). Though this, however, was originally an emphatic form, it came 
gradually to be employed even where no emphasis was intended. Winer 
says it " almost uniformly " did so, and he makes this remark in connec 
tion with the passage before us. (Gramm. ut supra, 19, with second 
note.) Whether this last remark is well founded, I should be disposed to 
doubt; but to conclude from the form alone that a special emphasis is 
intended here, and ground upon this an argument in favour of a prior 
resurrection of believers, is surely to strain the phrase. 



RESURRECTION OF, AND FROM, THE DEAD. 1&5 

another. We recur to the chapter, but miss it still. Mr 
Birks, however, sees 

" The blessing metaphorically journeying towards the Church. 
Those who press forward with earnest desire to attain it, meet 
the heavenly gift on its w<iy; while, as for others, it passes them by, 
and leaves them to the prospect of the widely different resurrec 
tion then to follow." (Pp. 175, 176.) 

This journey of the first resurrection towards the Church 
I have not been able to find a trace of in a single metaphor 
throughout the chapter, nor of any resurrection to follow 
it.* We see the resurrection Paul aimed at, represented 
as a " prize " not advancing to us, but held up at the goal 
as an encouragement to " reach forth unto " it; and we hear 
Paul telling us that he pressed " towards the mark," in 
order that, when he reached it, he might win the prize. 
" Of others," we find him merely saying that " their end is 
destruction;" but how that determines its posteriority to 
the resurrection of believers, or the time of it all, we are at 
a loss to conceive.f 

(2.) Such as describe the resurrection of believers as a " re 
surrection from amongst the dead" (ex, raxftSy), which implies, 
it is alleged, that others the wicked will be left in their 
graves after they rise: while the general resurrection is, by 
.a marked distinction, termed the "resurrection of the dead" 
(VSXPUIV or TUV i>.). 

Could this distinction be critically established, it would be 
of some weight. Mr Wood s elaborate investigation of this 
point issues in this, that the phrase "resurrection OF the dead" 

* In his " Outlines" (p. 223), Mr Birks candidly withdraws his criti 
cism on xaTKtTyira, us implying that the first resurrection was on its way 
to meet us. 

f Mr Wood quotes a passage from Moses Stuart, to show that the 
resurrection here meant could not be the general one, because the 
apostle could have no possible doubt of his resurrection at the end of 
the world. But " the particle if by any means, " says Calvin, " is not 
meant to express doubt but difficulty." 



186 RESURRECTION OF, AND FROM, THE DEAD. 

is used of the resurrection generally, while the phrase "re 
surrection FROM the dead" is used to denote a resurrection in 
which others are left behind, or the resurrection of the just 
prior to that of the wicked. If this were correct, we should 
expect the latter phrase " the resurrection/ro?ft the dead," 
to be appropriated to the resurrection of the just, and the former 
phrase " the resurrection o/"the dead," to be used only when 
the resurrection of both classes, righteous and wicked indiscri 
minately, is intended. But how stands the fact ? This latter 
phrase, " resurrection from the dead," is very little used at all 
in the New Testament only four times in any of its forms ; * 
while of the eight times in which the former phrase, " resur 
rection of the dead," is used (exclusive of two passages in 
which it is applied to Christ f), perhaps in all of them the 
resurrection of believers is intended, | but almost certainly 
in Jive or six; and what is most decisive is, that four of these 
examples occur in the only chapter (1 Cor. xv.) where the 
resurrection of believers is the subject of formal and elaborate 
treatment ; in other words, when the apostle had two phrases 
in his option, he passed by the one which is alleged dis 
tinctively to express the thing he was treating of, " the 
peculiar resurrection," and selected, and exclusively employs, 
the one which is alleged to denote a resurrection common 
to righteous and wicked, which he was not treating of. To 
me this is utterly inexplicable ; and till this is cleared up, 
I shall regard the whole argument founded on these Greek 
formulas as baseless. I do not find Mr Elliott committing 
himself to it, nor have the best critics seen any indications 
of a double resurrection in them. I may add, that the 

* Luke xx. 35 ; Acts iv. 2 ; Phil. iii. 11 ; 1 Pet. i. 3. 

t Acts xxvi. 23 ; Rom. i. 4. 

J Matt. xxii. 31 ; Acts xvii. 32 (compare the immediately preceding 
words, v. 31, where the phrase is used of Christ) ; ch. xxiv. 21 (the 
reference here to ch. xxiii. 6, determines the sense) ; 1 Cor. xv. 12, 13, 
21, 42 ; Heb. vi. 2. 



RIGHTEOUS AND WICKED " AWAKE " TOGETHER. 187 

Greek fathers, who surely understood their own language, 
seem to have been blind to the alleged distinction between 
the two phrases in question ; and that Calvin, Beza, and 
other distinguished critics, use " OF " and " FROM the dead" 
(mortuorum and de mortuis) indiscriminately. 

As to the expression " from the dead," as it is an exact 
rendering of the original words, the mere English reader is 
as competent to decide as the critic is, whether the supple 
ment should be "from amongst the dead" or "from the 
place or state of the dead" [a<5?jj, /ISt?].* "We have here 
no assistance from classical writers, to whom a resurrection 
was unknown ; and though the phrase had been found, it 
would not at all have determined in which of the two senses 
it is used in Scripture. Although, therefore, we cannot 
affirm that the translation, " from amongst the dead," is criti 
cally inadmissible, no more can it be shown to be critically 
demanded. In other words, this phrase determines nothing, 
for even its own sense must be determined by what we other 
wise know to be the Scripture doctrine of the resurrection/)- 

There is no confirmatory evidence, then, at all. We have 
gone through it, and found it wanting. 

They are shut up, then, to the direct passage. If the literal 
resurrection of the righteous a thousand years before the 
wicked, be revealed in this celebrated passage, it is not only 
revealed here alone, but it is revealed here as I shall now 
show in direct opposition to the teaching of Scripture every 
where else. 

The following passages speak for themselves : 

Dan. xii. 2 : " And many of them that sleep in the dust of the 

* " Horn. Eli, & AVSaa (sc. topus, M/iovs) in, into the nether world: hence 
also in Attic prose, i and it Aiitu (sc. <u%u, oT*c)." (Liddell and Scott s Gr. 
and Engl. Lex.} 

"E<V aSou, sc. Su/**. see Buttm. 132, n. 9." (Robinson s Gr. and Engl. 
Lex. o/N. T.) 

f See Appendix. 



188 RIGHTEOUS AND WICKED " AWAKE " TOGETHER. 

earth shall awake; SOME TO EVERLASTING LIFE, AND SOME TO 

BHAMi! AND EVERLASTING CONTEMPT." 

The thing which stands out on the face of this passage is the 
simultaneousness of the resurrection of both classes, righteous 
and wicked. If the prophecy admit of any primary fulfil 
ment before the period of the literal resurrection, it must bo 
such a fulfilment as sbaU realise this feature of it. If not, 
and the literal bodily resurrection be the one only thing iu 
the passage, still it must be the resurrection of both classes 
at once. 

Mr Begg true to the literal principle at whatever cost 
admits this, and expects accordingly the resurrection, along 
with the righteous, of some of the chief enemies of the 
Church of God at the beginning of the millennium. " The 
resurrection," he says, " of some to shame and contempt is as 
really a*t the restoration of Israel, as that of some to ever 
lasting life." * This is consistent at least. But as few are 
prepared for this, another turn is given to the passage, by 
which it is made to announce that while the saints are to 
rise from the dead, the wicked are to lie still. Thus : " Many 
of them who sleep in the dust of the earth shall awake ; these 
( ! T?^) to everlasting life (meaning those who awake), and 
these (i" 1 ?^ 1 !) to shame and everlasting contempt " (meaning 
those who do not awake, but lie still). f The objection to 
this lies not in the substitution of " these " and " those," for 
their equivalents " some " and " some;" but in the unnatural 
turn it gives to the passage, which every one on reading it 
would take to be a prediction of the resurrection of one class to 
everlasting life, and the resurrection of another class to shame and 

* Connected View, &c., p. 179. 

f So Mr Elliott, who quotes several authorities in support of this in 
terpretation, but only suggests "that it is more than doubtful whether 
the Hebrew original of the passage makes any assertion at all about the 
resurrection of the unjust." (Horse, iv. p. 185, fourth edit.) So Mr A. 
Bonar (Redempt., p. 251); and Mr Wood (Last Things, pp. 44, 45); but 
not so Mr Birks, who disapproves of this criticism (p 224). 



THAT ARE IN THE GRAVES COME FORTH TOGETHER. 189 

everlasting contempt. And what puts this construction, I think, 
beyond all doubt, is the adoption of it by our Lord himself. 

For this verse, and the one which follows it, have furnished 
the language in which the Redeemer himself announces the 
final resurrection on two separate occasions : 



John v. 28, 29 : The hour 
is coming, in the -which 

all that are in the graves " Many of them that sleep in 

shall hear his voice, and the dust of the earth 

shall come forth ; shall awake ; 

they that have done good some 

unto the resurrection of to everlasting life, 

life, 

and they that have done and some 

evil 

unto the resurrection of to shame and everlasting con- 

damnation." tempt. 1 * 

* " Those," says AUGUSTIN, "who in the one place are said to he in 
their graves, are in the other place said to sleep in the dust of the 
earth ; and as in the one case they are said to come forth, so in the 
other to awake ; as here, those that have done good to the resurrection 
of life, and those who have done evil to the resurrection of damnation, 
so there, some to everlasting life, and some to shame and everlasting 
contempt. Let it not be thought, however, that there is any difference 
[between the announcement of our Lord and that of the prophet], be 
cause the one says, All that are in the graves, while the other says not 
all, but many of them that sleep in the dust of the earth. For Scrip 
ture sometimes puts many for all, as when it is said to Abraham, I 
have made thee a father of many nations; while in another place it is 
said, In thy seed shall all nations be blessed. " (De Civ. Dei, lib. xx. 
cap. xxiii. 2.) So Calvin and many others. But to this Cocceius objects, 
because although " many " be often equivalent to all, it is not equivalent 
to " many of all." Marckius takes "many" to be equivalent to "the 
multitude of" Avhich would meet the objection of Cocceius, if consistent 
with the usage of the language ; but this, though formerly inclined to 
adopt it, I now greatly doubt. Munster and Glaring, adhering to the 
letter of the text, understand the prophet to hint at the fact that only 
tome, both of the righteous and of the wicked, will " awake out of the 



1 90 THE VIEW WHICH PREMILLENNIALISTS TAKE OF THIS 

It is hardly possible to conceive a plainer statement of the 
simultaneousness of the resurrection of both classes. All the 
commentators and theologians, known to the Church, take 
this feature of the passage to be so manifest as not to require 
any illustration. Yet even this can be got over, and the 
presence of any such feature in the passage is denied by the 
premillennialists. Of course, they must deny it, or give up 
their scheme. But on what plea do they rest that denial ? 
Why, on the fact that the word " hour " here, does not 
necessarily mean a period of sixty minutes, just as the word 
" day " means a much longer period than twenty-four hours. 
The same word " hour," we are reminded, is employed just 
before (v. 25), to denote the whole period of the Gospel dis 
pensation. Why, then, may not this " hour " of the resurrec 
tion of " all that are in the graves " denote a period equally 
long, and embrace " the resurrection of life " at the beginning, 
and " the resurrection of damnation " at the end of it ? * 

dust of the earth v at Christ s coming the rest, namely, the living, being 
only changed. Be this however as it may, a resurrection of righteous and 
wicked at once, such as the premillennial scheme does not admit of, ia 
here, I think, clearly predicted. 

As to the time more immediately in view in this passage, conceiving 
that it was that of the "deliverance of Daniel s people" (v. 1), and taking 
this to mean their future conversion, I applied the whole, in my first 
edition, primarily to that blessed period when in bright anticipation 
of " the times of restitution of all things " " judgment shall be given 
to the saints of the Most High," and their enemies shall be exposed 
to never-ending shame and contempt. Other orthodox men, as Venema 
and Cocceius, have done the same only taking the "deliverance of 
Daniel s people " differently; some understanding it of their deliverance 
under the Maccabees from the persecution of Antiochus Epiphanes, 
others, of the deliverance of as many of them as were " found written in 
the book (of life)" at the coming of Christ, and the erection of the 
Gospel kingdom on the ruins of the old polity. But whether I was right 
in supposing any such primary reference in the words or not, I never for 
a moment doubted that the only adequate fulfilment of the prediction 
will be at the literal resurrection of both classes of men. 

* Mr Birks (Lent Lect. for 1843), p. 181. Mr Bickersteth (Guide 
5th edition), pp. 273, 274, &c. Mr Elliott (Horae, iv. 186). Mr Wood 
(Last Things, pp. 44, 45), &0. 



NOT TENABLE. 191 

That this argument puts a very forced and harsh construc 
tion upon our Lord s words, must, I think, be evident to every 
unbiased mind, even though unable to see the proper answer 
to it. That answer, however, will readily occur to any one 
who considers how such phraseology is employed in Scrip 
ture, and in common speech. It is quite true that the words 
" day " and " hour " in Scripture, and in all language, are 
often equivalent to time or period; yet always as meaning the 
definite or fixed period of the thing spoken. For example, 
when the apostle says (1 John ii. 18), " Little children, it is 
the last hour" (or " time," as we render the word o- ga), he 
means that this is the last dispensation of grace which the 
world is to see. In the same sense, another apostle (2 Cor. 
vi. 2) emphatically says, " Behold, now is the accepted time : 
behold, now is the day of salvation." So the Lord himself, 
in the passage referred to, " The hour is coming and now is, 
when the dead shall hear the voice of the Son of God, and 
they that hear shall live." In all these passages, while a long 
period is doubtless intended, the unbroken continuousness of it, 
as the proper time for obtaining salvation, is essential to the 
very propriety of the language. Take that element out of 
it, and the words " hour," " day," " now," and even " time," 
as applied to the period of grace, cease to have any intelligible 
meaning. 

Now, apply these remarks to the resurrection here an 
nounced by our Lord. If it were merely said that " the 
resurrection of life," and " the resurrection of damnation," 
are events which it will take a thousand years to get through 
with that, beginning at the commencement of that period, 
as the proper " hour" for them, they will go on both to 
gether throughout the millennium, and that not till the end 
of that period shall it be true that " all that are in their 
graves have come forth :" if it were merely said that in this 
sense the millennium will be the resurrection-hour, I should 
readily admit that the passages adduced as parallel are strictly 



192 THE VOICE WHICH SHALL AWAKE THE DEAD. 

so. For in that case, we should merely have along continu 
ous " hour" of resurrection, even as we have confessedly a 
long continuous period of saving grace. I would even admit, 
that according to Tertullian s idea of the millennial resurrec 
tion of the saints that they will rise, " some earlier, some 
later, within the period of the thousand years,"* there is 
nothing positively against it in our Lord s words, provided 
only " the resurrection of damnation" were admitted to go on 
in the same way throughout the currency of the thousand 
years a thing, however, which no premillennialist, ancient 
or modern, admits, because fatal to their scheme. 

But the millennium, as now contended for, is in no sense 
one unbroken resurrection-hour. For neither is it said, with 
Tertullian, that " the resurrection of life" is to go on through 
out the whole of it, nor is it admitted by any of them, " that 
the resurrection of damnation" is to go along with it : but all 
the righteous are to rise together before the millennium, and 
the wicked are to rise in a body not even at the end of the 
millennium not within the millennial " hour" at all, there 
fore but at the end of another period to succeed the millennium; 
a period which, though it be called " a little season" (Rev. 
xx. 3), relatively to " the thousand years," may, according to 
that way of reckoning, extend over two or three hundred 
years. To make the words of our Lord agree with such a 
theory is surely to " wrest" them.f 

But this is not all. For, says our Lord, In this resurrec 
tion-hour, " all that are in the graves shall hear the voice of 

* "Hsec ratio regni terreni, post cujus mille annos, intra quam Eetatem 
concluditur sanctorum resurrectio, pro meritis maturius vel tardius re- 
surgentium," &c. (Adv. Marc, iii 24.) 

t " In such a case," says Mr Wood, "as this, common sense is worth a 
thousand criticisms. If there be a period at the commencement of which 
the graves shall be opened and the righteous dead shall rise, and at the 
close of which all that remain behind shall be in like manner raised, I 
can conceive no more appropriate designation for that period than the 
season of the resurrection. " (Pp. 44, 45.) In this Mr Birks agrees 
(pp. 226, 227). Let the reader judge where the common sense lies. 



THE VOICE WHICH SHALL AWAKE THE DEAD. 193 

ihe Son of Man, and shall come forth." Now, I think it is 
universally admitted, that " the voice" which is here said to 
raise the dead, is the same with that referred to by the 
apostle to the Corinthians and Thessalonians : 

" We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed, in a mo 
ment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trump, (for the 
trumpet shall sound;) and the dead shall be raised," &c. 
(1 Cor. xv. 51, 52.) 

"The Lord himself shall descend with a shout, with the wice of the 
archangel, and with the trump of God: and the dead in Christ 
shall rise first," &c. (1 Thess. iv. 16.) 

That this " voice," "shout," "sound of trumpet," means 
something more than the mere forth-putting of the poicer 
which is to raise the dead that there will be an audible and 
mighty sound has never, I believe, been questioned. Well, 
is this " shout" to be prolonged through a thousand years ? 
Is the trumpet-blast to be kept up all that time ? None, I 
presume, will go this length ; and if not, since " the voice of 
the Son of Man" is expressly said to raise both classes it 
must either raise them both together, which is the natural 
sense of our Lord s words, or it must be uttered twice : it 
must sound, that is, before the millennium to raise the 
righteous, and, after a silence of more than a thousand years, 
it must sound again to raise the Avicked. Can any thing 
more unnatural be forced upon the simple and majestic words 
of our Lord? No: The trumpet-sound is one. The two 
allusions to it in Corinthians and Thessalonians connect it 
with the resurrection of believers, because there the exclusive 
subject of discourse was " the resurrection of life ;" while our 
Lord s words connect it with the resurrection of both kinds 
and both classes.* And thus we have the simultaneous resur- 

* The above argument " appears too puerile to Mr Wood to require 
more than the observation that lie presumes the wicked dead will not 
rise without a command, and that that command is (<?) nv vlou -rev Qim) 
the voice of the Son of God. "(P. 47.) But why should we require 
to " presume" any thing, when the thing is definitely expressed ? My 

P 



194 THE LAST THUMP PARABLE OF TARES. 

rection of tlie righteous and ilie wicked doubly brought out all 
contrary interpretations being clearly inadmissible. 

The united force, then, of these two passages in favour 
of the simultaneous resurrection of the righteous and the 
wicked, is as strong as it can be conceived to be, and there 
is nothing alleged against it that can stand a moment s calm 
investigation. 

I said that this passage in Daniel furnishes our Lord with 
another of his descriptions of the resurrection besides the 
one just commented on. I refer to the concluding words of 
the parable of the Tares. 

Matt. xiii. 43 : Then shall Dan. xii. 3 : " And they that be 
the righteous wise 

shine forth as (ixXa.^- shall shine as (Xa^suovv &>?, 

evffiv as) Ixx.) 

the sun the brightness (^.a^fdwi;) of 

the firmament (compare Acts 
xxvi. 13, the brightness of 
the SMM, ^a.fj.^forti-ra, <r. n&iov), 

in the kingdom of their for ever and ever." 

Father." 

But I shall reserve the remarks I have to make upon this 
and other testimonies to the simultaneous resurrection of the 
righteous and the wicked, till I come to treat of the Judg 
ment. One passage, however, belonging to this class I 
must here take up, and with this I shall close the present 
chapter. 

Rev. xx. 11-15 : " And I saw a great white throne, and him that 
sat on it, from whose face the earth and the heaven fled 
away; and there was found no place for them. And I saw the 

argument is founded on the " voice which is to raise the righteous and 
the wicked at once not " its physical loudness " (Birks, p. 228), but its 
being one majestic uttered summons. 



THE GREAT WHITE THRONE. 195 

dead, the great and the small,* stand before the throne;* and 
books were opened; and another book was opened, which 
is the book of life : and the dead were judged out of those 
things which were written in the books, according to their 
works. And the sea gave up the dead which were in it ; 
and death and hades gave up the dead which were in them : 
and they were judged every man according to their works. 
And death and hades were cast into the lake of fire. This is 
the second death, the lake of fire.* And whosoever was not 
found written in the book of life was cast into the lake of fire." 

If ever language expressed the doctrine of a simultaneous 
and universal resurrection, surely we have it here. Who 
would ever imagine that all mankind were not in this august 
scene, in their resurrection-state, and that himself would 
not form part of it ? But premillennialists see none but 
the wicked here, and even of these only such as have lived 
before the millennium. The plea for this is found in what 
one would think proved the reverse. " The book of life " 
is admitted to be the record of the elect; and the produc 
tion of it, we naturally conclude, is an evidence that the 
elect are in the scene. But the negative way in which it 
is introduced "whosoever was NOT found written in the book 
of life was cast into the lake of fire " proves, it is said, that 
none of those who are then judged will have their names 
in that book, that the dead, small and great, who shall 
then stand before the throne, shall every one of them be 
found among those not written in the book of life/ and so 
be cast into " the lake of fire." That any such sense should 
be put upon these words may seem incredible. I will, there 
fore, let the premillennialists here speak for themselves. 

" A number of toots," says Mr Dallas, on this passage, " are 
opened; and this is contrasted with the opening of a single book; 
and while it is stated that the dead are judged every man out of 
those books, according to their works, the opening of the other 
book is for another purpose altogether. It is not used to call tip 

* So the best critical authorities. 



196 THE BOOK OF LIFE MR DALLAS MR LORD MR BIRK3. 

to judgment any individual whose name is written therein; but it is 
employed simply as a testimony to establish the perfect justice 
of the sentence on the others; to manifest that not one of those who 
will then be judged had his name written in the book of life. As the 
solemn tribunal is sitting for the judging of the rest of the dead, * 
we may suppose that there will be a reference to this book; and as 
each individual is accused, we may imagine the question to be 
asked, Is his name in the book of life ? Is there any escape for 
him ? No, it is not found there, will be the answer. Who 
soever was not found written in the book of life was cast into the 
lake of fire. This is all which can be grounded upon the mention 
of this book of life, in this awful passage of God s Word. All the 
dead whose names were in the book of life will have been raised a 
thousand years before this, and not one shall perish or be again 
judged ; while all the dead will be raised afterwards to a judgment 
at which none shall be sated." + 

Mr Lord, in his " Exposition of the Apocalypse," entitles 
this passage, " The Resurrection and Judgment of the Unholy 
Dead" 

" All the unholy dead" he says, " of all ages, are to be the subjects of 
this resurrection and judgment. Whoever was not found written in 
the book of life was cast into the lake of fire. And they only are 
to be its subjects, manifestly from the representation in the vision 
of the souls of the saints, that all the holy who die anterior to the 
millennium are to be raised at its commencement, and reign with 
Christ throughout that period, and the representation in the next 
vision, that none are during that period to suffer the infliction, of 
death." J 

" Of what nature," asks Mr Birks, " is the resurrection of the rest 
of the dead [that is of the wicked, Rev. xx. 5] ? The prophecy 

* What a liberty does Mr Dallas take here, in substituting for " the 
dead, small and great," this restrictive clause, " the rest of the dead " a 
clause occurring not only at a distance of seven verses from this passage, 
but in a distinct vision (for the expression "I saw" is purposely re 
peated, v. 4 and v. 11, to show this), and a clause which, instead of 
being equivalent to the one here employed, is the strongest contrast to 
it ! And yet the same thing is done by Mr Birks, as we shall see. 

f Lent Lect. for 1843, pp. 217, 218. 

j Expos, of Apoc. pp. 525, 526. (1847.) 



BOOK. OP LIFE MR BIRKS DR HILL. 197 

gives a distinct reply. After the close of the thousand years, we 
have this impressive description (Rev. xx. 11-15), And I saw 
the dead, small and great, stand before God, &c. These words 
answer in all respects to the predicted resurrection of the rest of the dead, 
that is, in the sense in which he understands the phrase, of the 
wicked alone." * 

"We would not venture," says Mr Hill, "to pronounce it ab 
solutely impossible that the vision of the great ichite throne, and 
the books opened, should be the counterpart of Daniel s vision of the 
Ancient of Days for the destruction of the fourth monarchy [that 

is, before the millennium ].f This interpretation, too, would 

account for the mention in this place of the book of life, which, 
if the judgment is >os-millennial, it is not easy to explain [inas 
much as, there being none then whose names are in that book, 
there would seem to be no use in producing it; and so the mention 
of it in that case is difficult to be explained]. This interpretation, 
however, is attended with difficulties apparently insuper 
able Assuming, then, that the vision is post- 
millennial, the dead, small and great, that stand before God 

are ( the rest of the dead, as distinguished from THE DEAD IN CIIKIST 
who rose at the first resurrection. Their resurrection ..... 
is here represented as succeeding the judgment of the devil and of 
the nations of living men whom he had deceived." 

Now, seeing our author found it " not easy to explain the 
mention of the book of life " on this theory, and as he is 
not satisfied with the view given of it by other premillen- 
nialists, it may be right to hear Mr Hill s one. It certainly is 
something new. 

" The account usually given [by premillennialists] of the intro 
duction of this book is, that it was to ascertain that none of the 
wicked were written in it. It should, however, be remembered, 
that this book is not described as the book of life of the Lamb 

* Lent Lect., ut supra, pp. 171, 172. 

T This extraordinary theory is the one which the Duke of Manchester 
supports, which will account for the great difference on many points 
between him and most of his brethren; though this gives him the 
advantage over them of enabling him to make it a judgment 
classes. 



198 " THE DEAD SMALL AND GREAT." 

slain from the foundation of the world, nor yet as the book of 
life from the foundation of the world. - (Rev. xiii. 8, xvii. 8.) 
It may then be another book, indicating another kind of salvation, 
even of Israel in the flesh, who are saved in the beloved city, 
like Noah s family in the ark, to be the seed of a new world." * 

Since the above was printed, I find that Hengstenberg, in 
his Exposition of the Revelation, adopts the same view of the 
Last Judgment, and on very much the same grounds. t 

And now, will this view of the final resurrection stand for 
a moment ? 

If " the dead, great and small," whom John saw " stand 
before the throne," mean merely the party styled " the rest 
of the dead," seven verses before, why was not the same 
expression retained, or at least one so equivalent to it as 
to be easily identified with it ? Such loopings of one clause 
with another at some distance from it, for the express pur 
pose of showing that they mean the same thing, and relate 
to the same time, are not only acknowledged by all who 
have studied this wonderful book to be a common device 

* Lent Lect. for 1843, pp. 287-291. 

t Strange to say. Mr Elliott has not, in his voluminous commentary 
on the Apocalypse, one word on this passage. He spends about seventy 
pages upon the first part of this chapter, and especially "the first 
resurrection." He argues the literality of that resurrection pretty 
elaborately, and adverts to what seemed of most weight against it. 
And yet not even a passing hint have I been able to discover on this 
passage, except one, indicating that he referred it to the end of the 
millennium. How is this ? Had it no important bearing on the pre 
ceding scenes, and on liis premillennial theory ? As the final crisis 
of this world s affairs, did it not invite special attention ? Did not the 
remarkable language which it employs regarding t\\Q parlies, the books, 
and the issue, demand from a commentator so voluminous and minute 
a formal investigation ? 

In Mr Brooks "Elements of Prophetical Interpretation," in which 
about a thousand passages of Scripture are commented on or referred 
to, and about forty pages spent expressly on " The Judgment," I can 
find no explicit allusion to this passage, far less any discussion of it. 
And much the same remark is applicable to Mr Bicker steth s " Guide." 

These singular omissions are they purely accidental ? 



"THE DEAD SMALL AND GREAT." 199 

in it, but constitute one of the artistic charms of the book. * 
But so far is the same, or any thing like an equivalent ex 
pression to " the rest of the dead," from being employed 
here, that probably no reader ever did imagine them to 
mean the same party without some supposed necessity for 
doing so ; nor is it easy to believe that even then this 
sense is deemed a natural one. Certain it is, that all readers, 
in all countries and at all periods (with hardly an exception 
worthy of notice), have understood " the dead, small and 
great," who were seen " standing before the throne," as 
meaning the ivhole human race. How easy would it have 
been by some such device as I have noticed to prevent 
so great a mistake, if mistake it be ? Is there not, then, 
the strongest reason to conclude that it is no mistake; and 
that the sublime catholicity and transparent simplicity of 
the language actually used, were expressly intended to 
convey what all but every reader from the beginning has 
understood it to mean ? " If," says Mr Hill, in the lecture 
already quoted, and I admire his candour " If it were 
lawful to consider it, as it has been in past ages considered, 
a description of a simultaneous and universal judgment of 
all that have ever lived, IT WOULD NOT BE EASY TO FIND 
WORDS MORE COMPREHENSIVE THAN THESE, The dead, small 
and great, stand before God But as such an interpretation 
is necessarily precluded by considerations already stated, 
and as the judgment here announced must consequently be 
supplementary to a former one" &c. (pp. 294, 295, ut supra) 

* Ex. gr. 

Compare Chap. v. 10 with Chap. xx. 4. 

vi. 9-11 xi. (15) 17, 18; six. 2, 6; xx. 4. 

vii. 3, 4 xiv. 1. 

vii. 1 5 xxi. 3, 4 ; xx. 3. 

x. 2, 7 xi. 15, 17; xix. 6; xx. 4 

xi. 2 xiii. 5. 

xi. 3 xii. G, 14. 

xiv. 11 xix. 3, 20. 

xv. 2 xx. 4. 



200 " THE DEAD SMALL AND GREAT." 

that is to say, Mr Hill interprets the latter part of the 
chapter by the former; in other words, he explains a passage 
about which there has been more unanimity in all ages than on 
almost any other portion of Scripture, by a passage on which 
there has been more diversity than perhaps almost any por 
tion of God s Word. Is this reasonable ? Yet it is the 
method taken by nearly all premillennialists now. 

But again, the emphatic way in which " THE DEAD" are 
thrice, and DEATH and HADES twice, mentioned in this pas 
sage, precludes any restrictive sense of the terms. 

First, " The dead, great and small." In two other places 
of this book, where the same phrase is used, the particular 
class of persons intended is carefully pointed out. Thus, 
ch. xi. 18, " That thou shouldest give reward unto them 
that fear thy name, small and great ;" and ch. xix. 5, "Praise 
our God, all ye his servants, and ye that fear him, both small 
and great ; " * whereas in the passage before us, the only party 
to whom " the small and great" belong as far as appears 
is " the dead." Are we not irresistibly led, then, to conclude 
that the meaning intended is, THE DEAD UNIVERSALLY, or 
at least INDISCRIMINATELY? 

Then, " And the dead were judged out of those things which 
were written in the books, according to their works" which 
as I shall immediately show, fixes the resurrection to be of 
both classes. 

" And the sea gave up the dead which were in it" The 
wicked dead that are in it, says the new interpretation. Is 
not this excessively unnatural? 

" And death and hades delivered up the dead which were 
in them." For what purpose this minute specification, if 
only one class of mortal men be meant? I do not see what 
answer can be given to this question; whereas, if it mean 
that Mortality itself shall render up its victims in the most 

* So substantially, in the only other passages where the phrase occurs 
in this book xiii. 16, six. 18. 



"THE DEAD, SMALL AND GREAT" THE " OTHER BOOK." 201 

comprehensive sense of that expression the language is 
sublimely appropriate. 

" And death and hades were cast into the lake of fire : this 
is the second death." The sense of this statement cannot, 
I conceive, be better expressed than in the words of the poet 

" AND DEATH ITSELF SHALL DIE." 

Taking all the clauses together, then, they seem altogether 
worthy of the subject, supposing them to describe a final, 
general resurrection of both classes of mankind: Any nar 
rower interpretation, as it has scarcely ever been thought of, 
so it is unnatural in the extreme. 

But what is said about " books," and that " other book," 
fixes conclusively the sense of the whole passage. It is uni 
versally agreed that the " opening of books 5 here is an 
allusion to the practice of human tribunals " To show," 
says Durham, " that the judgment shall be as accurate and 
particular in the trial, and just in the close, as if all were 
registered and put on record: Nothing shall be missed or 
mistaken in its circumstances, but things shall be so just in 
themselves, and so manifested and put beyond all doubt to 
others, as if an exact register of them had been keeped, and 
now published These books are opened in compa 
rison of what they were before, viz. sealed, neither was it 

known what was in them. Now nothing is hid 

which shall not be discovered, even as to others, before men 
and angels/"* Well, as no previous judgment, at all resem 
bling this, is mentioned in the Apocalypse, is it not most 
unnatural to view this as a mere supplement to some other 
judgment a judgment of the righteous? And is it not alto 
gether extravagant to consider these " books," now for the 
first time " opened," in the august language of this scene, to 
be a record of nothing but the materials for condemnation? 

* Comment, on Rev. ad loc. 

" Per libellos," says GUOTIUS, "intellige acta litis. Per acta autem 
litis, hominum cogitata, dicta, facta." (Annott. ad Apoc.) 



202 THE BOOK OF LIFE. 

As to the " Book of Life, there is happily a very general 
agreement about the meaning of it. It is all but unanimously 
understood to denote the book of God s elect; and in this 
sense it is undoubtedly employed four times in this same 
book, besides twice here. * As such, it will be used, not as 
the "books" will be as materials for judgment but as the 
counterpart of the decisions pronounced upon the testimony of 
those " booh." 

" God does not refer to that book," says Augustln, " lest he 
should err through forgetfulness; but it denotes the predestination 
of those to whom is to be given eternal life. Nor is it that God is 
ignorant who these are, and refers to this book that he may know. 
But rather, His own infallible prescience of them is the book of 
life, in which they are written, that is, eternally foreknown." + 

" This," says MarcJc, " is another book, chiefly because it has 
regard not to the actions [of every man s life], nor to the principles 
[on which these are to be judged of], which is the case with those 
called the books, but to the persons to be judged." J 

As " the book of LIFE," it is a catalogue of the names of 
all that are destined to life everlasting; as " THE LAMB S 
book of life" (chap. xxi. 27), or " the book of life of THE 
LAMB SLAIN" (chap. xiii. 8), it proclaims the meritorious 
ground on which alone that life is bestowed; and as having 
the " names" of all that are in it " WRITTEN FROM THE 
FOUNDATION OF THE WORLD" (chap. xvii. 8, xiii. 8), it teaches 
the origin of the choice of each and all of them, in the ever 
lasting electing love of God. When those on the right 
hand find their names all there without one exception, it will 
tell them, in a language not to be mistaken, whence came that 

* In ch. iii. 5, xiii. 8, xxi. 2 7, and xxii. 19. Marck, whose observations 
on " the book of life" here are judicious some of them even touching 
refers as parallels to Phil. iv. 3; Heb. xii. 23: Luke x. 20; Ps. Ixix 
29 ; Dan. xii. 1 ; Ezek. xiii. 9 ; Isa. iv. 3, &c. He should have added 
Exod. xxxii. 32. 

+ De Civ. Dei, lib. iii. cap. xv. 

J " Hie liber," says GKOTIUS, " est velut matricula civium regni codes- 
tis," &c. 



THE BOOK OP LIFE SUMMARY. 203 

faith and holiness which " the books" evidenced them to 
possess, and they will say, Now we know that " God had 
from the beginning chosen us to salvation through sanctifica- 
tion of the Spirit and belief of the truth;" for, while the 
" sanctifaation" and the " belief of the truth " have been 
evinced by " the books," lo, the " choice" of us from ever 
lasting, is found in that " other book, the book of life!" 
" Who, then, hath made us to differ, and what have we that 
we have not received?" Thus they will for ever feel that 
they are mere "vessels of mercy before prepared unto glory." 
But, when those on the left hand find not one of their names 
in the book of life, they will discern therein God s eternal 
purpose, that they should be left to show what a fallen state 
is, what a state of wilful and wicked, persevering and deter 
mined, rebellion against the God of heaven is; and that what 
God might righteously have done with all, he resolved to do 
with them, as " vessels of wrath fitted for destruction" to 
glorify his justice in their " everlasting destruction from his 
presence, and from the glory of his power." Thus, this 
" book of life," while it will show that " known unto God 
were all his works from the beginning of the world," will at 
the same time " stop every mouth" the mouths of the right 
eous from ever boasting, the mouths of the wicked from ever 
complaining. 

If this be a correct view of the object for which the book 
of life is produced at the last judgment, it of course takes 
away even the shadow of a plea for limiting it to the iciclced; 
though I am far from admitting that there is so much as that. 
As for the negative way in which the book of life is mentioned 
in the concluding words of the passage " Whosoever was 
not found written in this book of life Avas cast into the lake 
of fire" the chief difficulty is to persuade one s self that 
those who urge it place any reliance on it themselves. (Com 
pare Matt. xi. 6.) 

On the whole, I hesitate not to say of this passage and 



204 SUMMARY. 

of the testimony which it bears to the simultaneous presenta 
tion, in a resurrection-state, of the whole human race before the 
great white throne what AUGUSTIN says of the two follow 
ing chapters, that " if we deem this obscure, we ought not 
to seek or find any thing clear in the Holy Scriptures." 
(De Civ. Dei, lib. xx. cap. xvii.)* 

Other irrefragable testimonies to the same truth will pre 
sent themselves when we come to the subject of the Judg 
ment. 

* Even premillennialists themselves, when their system does not re 
quire them to limit the subjects of the last judgment, feel all the force of 
our reasonings upon it. Mr Burgh, for example, thus writes on this sub 
ject : " If all the saved had been raised previously [to the final resurrec 
tion], and the dead, small and great including all the dead whom 
the sea, and death and hades deliver up be only the lost, wherefore 
open the book of life to judge them ? And if it be said, Merely to show 
that none of them were entered there, I think verse 15 leads to a diffe 
rent conclusion And whosoever was not found written in the book of life 
was cast into the lake of fire; which surely does not imply that the whole 
number of those so judged were cast into the lake, and none of them 
found written in the book." Again : "The whole [twentieth chapter of 
Revelation] closes Avith the scene of the last and general judgment, where 
again I think we have proof both from the dead, small and great, stand 
ing before God to receive judgment, and from the book of life being 
one of the books then opened that the award of the whole redeemed Church 
had not been decided so long before as the commencement of the millennium." 
(Lect. on Sec. Adv., pp. 273, 274, third edit.; and Lect. on Book of Rev., 
p. 367, fourth edit.) 



CHAPTER IX. 

SAME SUBJECT CONTINUED: THE MILLENNIAL RESURRECTION 
LITERAL OR FIGURATIVE ? 

WE have seen that, by the confession of candid premillen- 
nialists themselves, there is no direct announcement of the 
literal resurrection of the righteous a thousand years before 
the wicked if it be not in the twentieth chapter of the 
Revelation : We have seen that even confirmatory evidence 
of it there is none all mention of it, all allusion to it, else 
where being sought in vain : And finally, we have seen that 
the very contrary of this the simultaneous presentation of 
the whole human race, in a resurrection-state, before the 
great white throne is unambiguously announced in Scrip 
ture. At the same time, the judgment of distinguished men 
and acute interpreters in favour of a literal resurrection in 
this passage, and the confidence with which that sense of 
it is continually pressed in the present controversy, demand 
a full and candid investigation of it. This I shall now en 
deavour to give it. The passage is as follows : 

Rev. xx. 4-6 : " And I saw thrones, and they sat upon them, 
and judgment was given unto them : and I saw the souls 
of them that had been beheaded for the witness of Jesus, 
and for the word of God, and whosoever ("*)* had not 
worshipped the beast, nor his image, neither had received 

* The supplement here may either be, "I saw those whosoever," or " I 
saw the souls of those whosoever." In either case, as we shall presently 
see, the sense is the same. Tregelles translates simply, " such as." 



206 MILLENNIAL RESURRECTION 

his mark upon their foreheads, or in their hands; and they 
lived and reigned with Christ a thousand years. [But] 
the rest of the dead lived not [again] until the thousand 
years were finished. This is the first resurrection. Blessed 
and holy is he that hath part in the first resurrection : on 
such the second death hath no power, but they shall be 
priests of God and of Christ, and shall reign with him a 
thousand years." 

It would take whole pages to enumerate the treatises that 
have been written upon this celebrated passage, and nearly as 
much space to mention the opinions and speculations to 
which it has given rise. The one question, however, of any 
great importance whether the resurrection here predicted 
is to be taken in a literal or figurative sense may be brought 
within moderate compass, and determined, I conceive, by or 
dinary Christian intelligence. 

Before entering, however, into the details of a passage like 
this, it is natural to look at the presumptions and probabilities 
of the case, in so far as they lie on the surface, or suggest 
themselves readily to the mind. We are not, of course, to 
be swayed by these in opposition to direct and explicit evi 
dence. But in all questions of such a nature as this, it is 
usual to take a broad view of the case first, and then to in 
quire how far our general conclusions are or are not borne 
out by closer and more detailed investigation. 

If the question then be, Was this celebrated passage de 
signed to announce A LITERAL AND GENERAL RESURRECTION OF 
THE SAINTS ? the following appear to me to be strong prima 
facie 

PRESUMPTIONS AGAINST IT. 

1. It is very strange that the resurrection of the righteous 
a thousand years before the wicked, if it be a revealed truth, 
should be directly and explicitly announced in one passage 
only. We are not, indeed, to set limits to God; but, judg- 



PRESUMPTIONS AGAINST THE LITERAL SENSE. 207 

ing of Him by his way of revealing other truths of equal im 
portance and of kindred nature, we may safely say, that it is 
not according to his usual method. Still, there might be 
reasons for a deviation in this case ; and if we found, scattered 
up and down the Scripture, hints of a prior resurrection 
hints which, though not at all explicit, were yet sufficient to 
suggest it, or at least were best explained on that theory, and 
thought by impartial expositors substantially to express it 
this might go far to neutralize the presumption against it, 
arising from its being nowhere directly announced, if not 
here. But it is not so. Though the resurrection is a theme 
on which the apostles delighted to expatiate though the 
nature of it, the grounds of it, and its connection in point of 
time with the coming of Christ, are abundantly dwelt on 
and though in such passages the prior resurrection, if a true 
doctrine, could hardly miss to have dropt from the apostolic 
pen it is altogether wanting, as we have seen, and what are 
alleged to be hints of this doctrine are not so, nor have ever 
been so regarded by critics and expositors. This, I think, 
makes the presumption against its being found here very 
strong. But if to this be added all that points in an opposite 
direction what the overwhelming majority of the Church 
have held to be direct, explicit, and indubitable announce 
ments of a simultaneous resurrection of the whole human race 
the presumption, that a general resurrection of the right 
eous a thousand years before the wicked is not the true sense 
of this prophecy, is greatly increased. 

2. If this was to be the chosen place for announcing such 
a prior resurrection, it is surely reasonable to expect that a 
clear and unambiguous revelation of it would be made. " It 
was enough," says Mr Birks, " that one dear statement should 
be given before the inspired volume was closed, which might 
serve for a key to all the other prophecies, and brighten into 
fuller and fuller evidence when the time of the fulfilment 
should be drawing near." (Pp. 158, 159, ut supra.} This is 



208 MILLENNIAL RESURRECTION 

a frank admission, that if " one statement " was to be held 
" enough," it would require to be a " clear one." But, can 
this be modestly said in the face of the diversity that prevails 
upon it ? How far those who take the prophecy figuratively 
differ among themselves, may be seen in the note below.* 

* Mr Elliott professes to give " the most famous solutions of the mil 
lennial prophecy that have teen offered in the Christian Church, from 
the time of the publication of the Apocalypse down to the time now pre 
sent;" but his statement is far from being a fair one. It leaves upon his 
reader s mind an impression not consistent with fact. One would think 
from his summary of opinions, that among the literalists there was no 
difference, and amongst the figuratists no agreement. The literal sense of 
this prophecy is with him one unbroken, harmonious solution of it, and 
the first in order; while the figurative sense of it is split up into three 
not three modifications merely, or particular applications, of one figura- 
1 ivo sense, but three " most famous solutions," separate and distinct. To 
be just, he should have told his readers that the literal interpretation must 
also be split up into three solutions; some, as we shall see above, limiting 
the first resurrection to the martyrs (as Burgh); others including, along 
with these, the most eminent confessors of the truth in every age (as 
Bishop Newton) ; while a third, and the largest class, extend the millen 
nial resurrection to all the saints. There might have been no occasion to 
go into this detail ; but if done on the one side, justice demanded its 
being done also on the other if omitted in the one case, in fairness it 
should have been so in the other. On this being pointed out to him, his 
reply was singular. " My statement," said he, " was professedly a state 
ment of the literal view as held by the early fathers, and I must 

altogether decline mixing up the names of Mede, Newton, with the rest. 
I should consider the mention of them exceedingly out of place." But 
why so ? On the figurative side, Mr Elliott is far from stopping at " the 
early fathers." Any modification of the figurative sense no matter how 
trivial, nor how late introduced is " in place," as if to swell the appa 
rent diversity among those who take the prophecy figuratively. On this 
side, Grotius and Hammond; Whitby, Vilringa, and Faber; even the 
"modifications" of Mr Gipps and Professor Bush are all "in place." 
But on the literal side, the mention of any modification or subdivision is 
held to be " exceedingly out of place," I cannot understand this partia 
lity. Mr Elliott pleads " the magnitude of the difference between those 
whom I would class together, in justification of his making three classes 
of them instead of one. By all means, provided only it be done upon 
both sides alike, that the reader may be able to judge for himself on which 
of the two sides the greatest " magnitude of difference " exists. Every 



PRESUMPTIONS AGAINST THE LITERAL SENSE. 209 

But do all those who take the prophecy literally interpret it 
alike ? By no means. It is true that the early chiliasts seem 
to have thought that all the saints would, sooner or later, 
partake of the millennial resurrection and reign. But every 
one who has read their writings will admit, that they show 
a strong tendency to apply it chiefly to the martyrs. Xor 
can I see how multitudes could have been inflamed, as they 
are said to have been, with a passion for martyrdom, in hope 
of thereby having " part in the first resurrection," if that 
resurrection was believed to be the portion, not of martyrs 
only, but of all believers.* Be this as it may, John Henry 

one s opinion on such a point is apt to be influenced by his general views. 
With regard to the figurative view of the prophecy, the difference is just 
this : Some take the predicted resuscitation chiefly in a spiritual light, 
and so see in it a glorious era of " life from the dead " in the sense of 
vital religion; while others take it to relate chiefly to the public aspects of 
the Church, and so see in it the Church s elevation out of a depressed, 
persecuted, and comparatively powerless condition, into a state of free 
dom, honour, influence, and whatever of an external nature is fitted to 
aid the development of its spiritual character, and make it, under its 
living Head, the great regenerator of society, and to the world at large 
"life from the dead." Of course, these varying aspects of one and the 
same new life, imparted to the Church, will suggest different periods for 
the fulfilment of the prophecy : some dating it, accordingly, from the 
commencement of the Christian era, and identifying it with the whole 
dispensation of the Spirit ; others identifying it with one or other of the 
public interpositions on the Church s behalf that have issued, or will yet 
issue, in her elevation to a freedom and power unknown before such as 
the fall of Judaism at the destruction of Jerusalem ; of Paganism at the 
conversion of Constantine ; and of Popery and its ally, Infidelity, in every 
form, yet to come. It would be out of place, in this note, to dwell on the 
unity of idea that pervades these different conceptions of the prophecy. 
Suffice it to say, that, for myself, I take them to be all constituent ele 
ments of one predicted enlargement of the Church. 

* The following words of MEDE here are worthy of notice: " I will 
say something more, namely, that this opinion of the first resurrection 
was the true ground and mother of prayers for the dead, so anciently re 
ceived in the Church, which were then conceived after this manner L t 
partcm haberent in resurrectione prima (that they might have part in the 
first resurrection). See Tertullian, who first mentions them. The reason 
was, because this having part in the first resurrection was not to lc 



210 MILLENNIAL RESURRECTION 

Alsted, professor at Herborn (Xassau), and one of the divines 
of the Synod of Dort, who, before Mede came upon the 
stage, was styled by an English writer of his own party, " the 
champion of the late millenarians, and a main prop of this 
new revived doctrine" this Alsted, in a Latin work on the 
millennial reign, while contending for the literal sense of the 
first resurrection, confines it exclusively to the martyrs, f 
Then again, the man who is beyond all question the father 
of the modern form of premillennialism, and whose minute 
study of this particular prophecy entitles him surely to be 
heard as to the parties intended in the prediction, or the sub 
jects of the millennial resurrection JOSEPH MEDE, says: 
" The rising of the martyrs is that which is called the first 
resurrection, being, as it seems, a prerogative to their suffer 
ings above the rest of the dead." And so far was he from 
finding all the saints in this vision, that it was with great 
difficulty he persuaded himself that any more than the 
" martyrs," and " confessors equipollent to martyrs," would 
rise before the last resurrection; and all the length he ever 
came was to be " inclined on the whole to the opinion, that 
all the righteous will rise during the course of the millennial 
kingdom." Further, Bishop Newton calls this first resurrection 
" a peculiar prerogative of the martyrs and confessors above the 
rest of mankind." But afterwards " the confessors" drop 
out, as when he says, " Of all the prophets, St John is 
the only one who hath declared particularly, and in ex 
press terms, that the martyrs shall rise to partake of the 

common to all, but to be a privilege of some, namely, of martyrs, and con 
fessors equipollent to them, if God so would accept them. Moreover, the 
belief of this prerogative of martyrs, in resurrectione prima, was that 
which made the Christians of those times so joyously desirous of mar- 
tyrdom." (Works, p. 771.) 

f The author died in 1638. The original I have not been able to pro 
cure. The English translation is entitled, " The Beloved City, or The 
Saints Reign on Earth a Thousand Years," &c. [By William Burton.] 
itto, Loud., 1643. 



PRESUMPTIONS AGAINST THE LITERAL SENSE. 211 

felicities of this kingdom." And again, " The learned Dod- 
well hath justly observed, that this belief [_m the literal 
first resurrection] was one principal cause of the fortitude 
of the primitive Christians; they even coveted martyrdom, 
in hopes of being partakers of the privileges and glories of 
the martyrs in the first resurrection. * Coming down now to 
our own day, Mr Burgh says 

" On the persons who shall partake of the first resurrection, I 
confess I find it difficult to agree with the modern expectants of 
the Lord s advent.-)* Their opinion, generally speaking, is, that all 
the redeemed from the beginning shall then rise to reign with 
Christ ; while I feel constrained rather to acquiesce in an opinion 
known to have been generally held in the early ages of Christianity, 
that the first resurrection is not general, even as it respects tho 
saved in this dispensation, but limited to certain from among it, pos 
sessing a qualification to be noticed presently, f There are two 
distinct arguments by which this may be decided; one from the 
nature and objects of the millennial reign, the other from the ex 
press language of Scripture." 

On the second of these two arguments, to prove the mil 
lennial resurrection a limited one, he says: " I do think 
Rev. xx. must be admitted to be conclusive," and comments 

* Dissertations on the Prophecies (on Rev. xx.) 

t Thus do many premillennialists monopolise to themselves the ex 
pectation of the Redeemer s coming. 

t I have not been able to verify this statement by reference to the 
early chiliastic fathers. Probably Mr Burgh gives as their actual belief 
the impression merely which their language conveys as a whole. But 
this is hardly fair, in opposition to pretty plain statements extending the 
first resurrection to believers generally, which may be adduced, for ex 
ample, from Justin Martyr, Ircncsus, and Tertullian high authority 
certainly on this point. The truth I believe to be this, that looking at 
the passage (Rev. xx.) in the light of the persecutions and martyrdoms 
of their own time, they took it in its natural import as pointing to that 
very state of things ; but when they were expressing their faith and hope 
on the subject more generally, the restriction of the passage to the mar 
tyrs seemed harsh, and thus they were led to extend it to believers gene 
rally. Be this, however, as it may, I have tried, in the statement given 
above of what the early chiliasts held, to set down the result of my owu 
examination of their writings. 



212 MILLENNIAL RESURRECTION 

upon it, to show that the parties of saints there specified ex 
clude the notion of their embracing all saints.* 

In his " Lectures on the Revelation," a later work than 
the former, he says : 

" I have revised with care the opinion I gave in the Lectures 
above referred to [on the Second Advent], that the First Resur 
rection is limited to a portion of the redeemed Church I have 

reconsidered this opinion, the more so as I learned that there were 
not a few who objected to it, who in all the other matters there 
discussed agreed with me fully; yet I confess the result has been 

to confirm me more in it My strongest argument next 

to the condition so clearly and frequently expressed IF we shall 
suffer, we shall also reign with him, f was the passage in the 
chapter before us (Rev. xx. 4, 5), which is also the clearest and 
strongest passage in the Scripture on the First Resurrection." J 

Finally, says Mr Molyneux, the most recent advocate of 
the premillennial scheme - 

" Nor does this passage teach that His saints, universally, or even 
generally, shall rise and reign with him. So far from this, it does 
not say a syllable about his saints generally, or about his saints at all, as 
saints merely; it speaks exclusively of martyrs." % 

I might have added that Bengel, early in the last century, 
and Moses Stuart in our own day, take the same restricted 
view of this prophecy limiting it to the martyrs. 

These testimonies are, I think, sufficient to show that the 
passage before us is not a clear and unambiguous prophecy of a 
literal resurrection of the righteous at large a thousand years 
before the wicked. For while those who see in it a literal 
resurrection at all are a mere handful in opposition to the 
general voice of the Church, even those who do take it lite 
rally are not agreed as to the parties intended by it; and of 

* Lect. on Sec. Adv. No. vii. ut supra. Mr Burgh, like Bishop New 
ton, seems disposed to extend the word martyr so as to include sufferers 
for Christ in general. But this appears an after- thought, not coming 
out of his exposition, and designed to meet, as far as possible, the objec 
tions which would be taken to his restricted view of the passage. 

f See, on this passage, my own remarks, pp. 93, 94. 

J Lect. on Rev. No. xxii., ut. sup. " World to Come," ut. sup., -p. 199. 



PRESUMPTIONS AGAINST THE LITERAL SENSE. 213 

those who conceive it to embrace the righteous at large, 
some, and the most distinguished have come to that con 
clusion with much hesitation, and with great diffidence as to 
the soundness of that opinion. 

Should it be said that the difference above noticed, is, 
after all, not s great as to throw doubt upon the clearness 
of the passage, I have just one question to put in reply: 
Has there ever "been any such diversity of opinion about the sub 
sequent prophecy of the final resurrection ? That I call a clear 
and unambiguous prophecy of the resurrection of all the 
righteous and wicked at once, and in proof of this I appeal 
to the all but universal voice of the Church. Has there ever 
been any testimony approaching to this, either in amount or 
harmony, in favour of the literal sense of the millennial pro 
phecy ? No, there has not. This, then, is my second presump 
tion against it. It would be unreasonable to insist that every 
testimony in favour of a truth should be equally explicit. 
But if we are reduced to one direct testimony, as we are 
here, in favour of a literal millennial resurrection, it is reason 
able to require that it be unequivocal; and because it is not, 
as I have shown, I think this circumstance must be set down 
among the presumptions against the literal sense. 

3. If a resurrection of the righteous in general as contra 
distinguished from the wicked be the true sense of this 
prophecy, the description is very unlike the thing to be de 
scribed. It is not in the least like any other description of 
that event in the New Testament. Every other description 
of the resurrection and glory of the saints, as such, is catholic 
in its character, while this is limited even laboriously so. 
Let me request the reader to run his eye over the few follow 
ing specimens of the usual language of Scripture on this 
subject: 

" But the righteous into life eternal. (Matt. xxv. 46.) 

" All that are in the graves shall hear his voice, and shall come 
forth ; they that hare done good, unto the resurrection of life," 
(John v. 28,29.) 



214 MILLENNIAL RESURRECTION. 

" Wlioso eateth my flesh, and drinketh my blood, hath eternal life; 
and I will raise him up at the last day." (John iv. 54.) 

" To them who by patient continuance in well-doing seek for glory and 
honour and immortality, eternal life." (Rom. ii. 7.) 

They that are Christ s at his coming." (1 Cor. xv. 23.) 

"Who shall change our vile body" our s "whose conversation is 
in heaven." (Phil. iii. 20, 21.) 

" He shall come to be glorified in his saints, and admired in all 
them that beliere." (2 Thess. i. 10.) 

" Our gathering together unto him." (Chap. ii. 1.) 

" To them that look for him shall he appear the second time with 
out sin unto salvation." (Heb. ix. 28.) 

" An inheritance incorruptible, undefiled, and that fadeth not 
away, reserved in heaven for you, who are kept by the power 

of God through faith unto salvation The grace that is 

to be brought unto you at the revelation of Jesus Christ." 
(1 Pet. i. 4, 5, 13.) . 

"And now, little children, abide in him; that when he shall ap 
pear, we may have confidence, and not be ashamed before 

him at his coining It doth not yet appear what 

we shall be : but we know that, when he shall appear, we 
shall be like him; for we shall see him as he is." (1 John 
ii. 28, 29; iii. 2.) 

"I saw the dead, small and great, stand before the throne. 

And whosoever was not found written in the book 

of life was cast into the lake of fire." (Rev. xx. 12, 15.) 

Now, compare with this catholic and transparent style 
the description here given of the subjects of this millennial 
resurrection, and say if it is natural to suppose that they are 
the same class of persons the righteous at large. 

" And I saw the souls of them that had been beheaded for the witness 
of Jesus and for the Word of God, and such as had not worshipped 
the beast, nor his image, neither had received his mark upon their 
foreheads or in their hands; and they lived," &c. 

I shall by and by analyse this description, and show how 
studiously limited it is to one particular class of saints. At 
present, I take it as it strikes one on first reading it; and I 
have just to ask, whether it be natural to think that this is 



UNTENABLE ARGUMENTS FOR THE FIGURATIVE SENSE. 215 

neither more nor less than a description of "the righteous" 
" entering into life eternal" of " them that have done good" 
" coming forth unto the resurrection of life" of " those 
who have eaten Christ s flesh and drunk his blood raised up 
at the last day," in short, of our universal " gathering 
together unto Him " ? If it be so, I can only say as before, 
that the description is singularly unlike the thing to be 
described not in the least fitted to suggest it, and wholly 
unlike all other descriptions of the same thing. 

These presumptions and more that might be mentioned 
against the literal sense of the millennial prophecy, though 
they are far from superseding the necessity of examining 
the passage itself, are more than sufficient to neutralise any 
supposed presumptions on the other side. 

In now coming to the examination of the passage in 
detail, I will first disencumber myself of some arguments 
in favour of the figurative sense, which I believe to be 
untenable. 

It is frequently urged, for example, that because " SOULS " 
(4/y^a/) were seen in this vision, and no mention is made of 
BODIES, it cannot be a bodily resurrection that is meant.* 
But this is to mistake what the apostle saw in the vision. 
He did not see a resurrection of souls. He saw " the souls 
of them that were slain;" that is, he had a vision of the 
martyrs themselves in the state of the dead after they 
were slain, and just before their resurrection. Then he saw 
them rise : " They lived" not their souls, but themselves. 
Mr Elliott puts this very happily. " The word souls is but 
a term designative of their state just previous; . . . and thus 
it no more indicates that they were still mere (-v^u^a/) incor 
poreal souls, than the title dead (vexso/) just after inverse 12 
I saw the dead, small and great, stand before God implies 
that these last were still at that very time of their standing be- 

Scott (in loco), Dr Hamilton (Mod. Millen. pp. 203, 204), Barnes 
(Notes on Revel., 1852), &c. &c- 



216 MILLENNIAL RESURRECTION FIGURATIVE 

fore Him, dead men." He gives other examples equally in 
point.* VITRIXGA, who takes the prophecy figuratively, never 
theless takes the same view of the thing seen in the vision, 
namely, a literal resurrection from the dead. Indeed, all 
figurative resurrections in Scripture are couched in the lan 
guage of literal ones ; and why should this be any exception ? 

Again, it has been argued, that because no mention is 
made of the earth in this prophecy, a literal resurrection to 
reign on the earth is not the sense of it. t But nothing, I 
think, can be clearer than that the earth is the theatre of the 
millennial reign; that having " destroyed them that de 
stroyed (or corrupted, diapQiieovras) the earth," he is now 
giving it into the hands of those who will possess it for the 
Lord; that it is just what Daniel saw, " the giving of the 
kingdom and dominion of the greatness of the kingdom, 
under the whole heaven, to the people of the saints of the 
Most High" (Dan. vii. 27); or what the elders were heard 
anticipating in song, " We shall reign on the earth" (Rev. v. 
10). Whether this reign be literal or figurative, the earth is 
without doubt the place of it. 

Once more, it has been said, that because the word " re 
surrection" is sometimes used in Scripture to denote the life 
of the soul in its disembodied state, there is no reason why 
it should not be so taken here. Thus Dr Ash and others. 
Mr Gipps, in his able " Treatise on the First Resurrection," 
though he does not go this length, recounts the various 
senses in which the word " resurrection" may be taken in 
Scripture, to show that we are not compelled, by the mere 
use of the word, to understand it literally here. I am not 
aware that any one has been so unreasonable as to say this ; 

* Horce Apoc. iv. 147, fourth edition. 

t Dr Ash, in some sensible and judicious Lectures on the Apocalypse, 
urges this. (Four Lect. on the Apoc. delivered in the Spring of 1848, 
p. 87.) On the same ground, Piscator, Dr Henry More, Bengel, and 
others long ago, while they took the millennial resurrection to be literal, 
made the place of their reign with Christ to be not earth but heaven. So 
also Moses Stuart now. 



FIRST ARGUMENT. 217 

nor can I see what is gained by such criticism. It is impos 
sible to deny that the word here denotes the restoring of life 
to tlie dead; and as such language is, beyond all contradic 
tion, employed in Scripture to express a figurative resuscita 
tion as well as a bodily resurrection, the only question ought 
to be, In which of the two senses is it employed here? To 
that question, then, let us now address ourselves. There 
appear to me, then, to be 

NINE INTERNAL EVIDENCES THAT THE MILLENNIAL 
RESURRECTION IS NOT LITERAL, BUT FIGURATIVE. 

As the vision is followed up by certain explanatory clauses, 
it is natural to begin with them. And, 

FIRST. The clause, " This is the jirst resurrection (v. 5), 
which is thought to prove it literal, seems to me to suggest 
the reverse. " It is allowed by all," says Daubuz, in his Com 
mentary on the Revelation, " that the second resurrection is 
of bodies; and if so, why not also the first, since both are 
expressed in the like terms." And Bishop Newton says, 
" We should be cautious and tender of making the first re 
surrection an allegory, lest others should reduce the second 
into an allegory too." Unfortunately for this way of rea 
soning, the very next verse contradicts it : " Blessed and 
holy is he that hath part in the first resurrection, on such 
the second death hath no power" (v. 6). Here " the first 
resurrection" and " the second death" are intentionally 
brought together and contrasted. But are these deaths of 
the same nature? Quite the reverse. The first death is 
that of the body, the second that of both body and soul; 
the first death is common to the righteous and the wicked, 
the second is the everlasting portion of the wicked alone. 
To suffer the first death for Christ carries with it exemption 
from the power of the second death " Be thou faithful 
unto death, and I will give thee the crown of life" " He 
that overcometh shall not be hurt of the second death" 



218 MILLENNIAL RESURRECTION FIGURATIVE 

(Rev. ii. 10, 11). " The Scriptures," says Fraser of Kirk- 
hill, " frequently mention the second or new birth. The 
first birth is that of the body. Is it necessary that the 
second should be so too? Will any man, acquainted with 
the Scriptures, put the question now which Kicodeinus for 
merly proposed to our Lord, " How can a man be born 
when he is old? Can he enter the second time into his 
mother s womb, and be born?" (John iii. 4). The second 
birth is doubtless an allegory. But does it follow that the 
first birth is an allegory too ? The Scriptures mention the 
second death : now, the first death is that of the body. But 
is it necessary that we understand the second death of the 
body only? Does it affect the body in the same manner, by 
putting it in a state of insensibility and putrefaction? The 
terms, first and second, are used in Scripture to distinguish 
subjects which are in some respects similar, but in others 
are very different, lest we should mistake the one for the 
other; and so the term "first resurrection" is used here, to 
show that this part of the prophecy does not describe such a 
change as shall take place at the general resurrection."* 

SECOND. It cannot but appear strange that we should be 
told that the risen and glorified saints do not perish eternally. 
Yet this is what the second explanatory clause tells us, 
according to the literal view of this vision " Blessed and holy 
is he that hath part in the first resurrection: on such the second 
death hath no power" (v. 6), or, in other words, they shall not 
be " cast into the lake of fire, rchich is the second death" (v. 14). 
Is it likely that the Spirit of God means nothing more here than 
such a truism? But only suppose that the first resurrection 
is a glorious state of the church on earth, and in its mortal 
state, a period emphatically of " life from the dead" when 
the whole world shall seem to hear a voice saying to them, 
" AicaJce, thou that sleepest, and arise from the dead, and Christ 

* Key to the Prophecies, pp. 408, 409. (1795.) Of this argument Mr 
Birks, I observe, takes no notice. 



SECOND ARGUMENT. 219 

shall give thee light" (Eph. v. 14) take it thus, and the 
whole clause becomes intelligible and highly consolatory.* 
Accordingly, in another part of this same book, where we 
have the same identical promise, that certain persons " SHALL 
NOT BE HURT BY THE SECOND DEATH," the promise relates not 
to risen and glorified men, but to " him that overcometh in 
the struggle for " the crown of life" (Rev. ii. 10, 11). And 
as exemption from the power of the second death is here 
made to rest upon a certain character, namely, fidelity to 
Christ even to death, and in our millennial chapter, exemp 
tion from the power of the same second death is made to rest 
upon participation in the first resurrection, is it not reasonable 
to conclude that this " first resurrection" is meant to signify 
a certain character in the present life, and not the possession 
of bodily resurrection and glory ? In that case, the assurance 
of our prophecy is, that this victorious spirit, as it will be the 
reigning characteristic of the millennial period, so it will be 
the bright pledge of immunity from the power of the second 
death. The word "blessed" will then express the high privilege 
they enjoy who have their lot cast in such a period. Indeed, 
the same language is employed by Daniel to express the pri 
vilege, not of bodily resurrection, but of living in the body 
during this very period. " Blessed is he that waiteth, and 
cometh to the thousand three hundred and five and thirty 
days" (Dan. xii. 12). And then, the word "holy" will ex 
press the high devotedness and spirituality that will distin 
guish the Christians of that period, and signalise the millen 
nial day itself above all former periods in the world s history; 
Avhile the following words, " over such the second hath no 

* Compare with this apostolic call, to au-aJce from the sleep, and arise 
from the death of sin, the prophetic call from which it is borrowed : 
" Arise, shine, for thy light is come, and the glory of the Lord is risen upon 
thee." (Isa. Ix. 1.) What the apostle applies to individual conversion is 
just this prophetic summons to the Church once confined to Palestine, 
and shrouded in dark ceremonies to feel the meridian splendour and 
quickening warmth of the Sun of righteousness. 



220 MILLENNIAL RESURRECTION FIGURATIVE 

power," will just be one more example of a spiritual as the 
earnest of a bodily resurrection, a present of a future, so 
familiar in the language of the New Testament. " The hour 
is coming," says our Lord, " and now is, when the (spiritu 
ally) dead shall hear his voice, and they that hear shall (spiri 
tually) live : marvel not at this, for the hour cometh in which 
all that are in the graves shall hear his voice, and shall come 
forth (bodily)." " My sheep hear my voice, and I give unto 
them (now) eternal life, and they shall never perish (or die 
the second death)." " If," says the apostle, " the Spirit of 
Him that raised up Jesus our Lord dwell in you, He that 
raised up Christ from the dead shall also quicken your mortal 
bodies by his Spirit that divellcth in you (your quickened 
souls)."* 

THIRD. There are but two alternatives in this prophecy 
either to " hate part in the first resurrection," or to be under 
the "power of the second death." " Blessed and holy is he 
that hath part in the first resurrection: on them (svi rovruv) 
the second death hath no power." Into which of these 
classes are we to put the myriads of men who are to people 
the earth, in flesh and blood, during the millennium ? They 
have no " part in the first resurrection," if it be a bodily 
one. Are they given over, then, to " the power of the 
second death? " But only suppose " the first resurrection" 
to be a phrase denoting the character of the millennial era, 
as one of prevailing spiritual life bright earnest of life 

* The answer given to this is, that the words " on such the second death 
hath no power, 1 are merely " the repetition of the same idea in a differ 
ent form, than which nothing is more common in Scripture." (Kitto s 
Journal, July 1850.) So Mr Birks (p. 115). And Mr Wood considers it 
as designed to announce the fulfilment of the promise (ch. ii. 11), " He 
that overcometh shall not be hurt of the second death." He even con- 
siders the words in Daniel, " Blessed is he that waiteth, and cometh to 
the 1335 days," to mean, not Blessed is he who shall be alive at that 
happy era, but Blessed is he who shall be then raised from the dead 
(pp. 51, 52). I leave the reader to judge which is most natural, especially 
in connection with the following arguments. 



FOURTH ARGUMENT. 221 

everlasting on that " new earth wherein dwelleth righteous 
ness;" and then the assurance that "on such the second 
death hath no power," becomes a promise that such as pos 
sess this character found in its substance in every renewed 
man, and constituting the prevailing character of the millen 
nial era shall not "be hurt of the second death."* 

FOURTH. The express mention of how long this "life 
and reign with Christ " will last, namely, " a thousand years" 
if meant to inform us what a long period of earthly pro 
sperity the Church is yet destined to enjoy, is intelligible 
and cheering. But to say that the risen and glorified 
Church is to live and reign with Christ for a period of a 
thousand years, is totally unlike the language of Scripture 
in every other place. I know what is said in answer to 
this, but it has no force. The limiting of the life and reign 
to a thousand years, wo are told, has relation not to the 
risen saints, but only to those over whom they reign, and 
to the imperfection which will continue upon earth till that 
thousand years be ended. But so says not the text. No 
mention is made of their reigning over any other class of 
persons; still less is it said that they reigned over them only 
for a thousand years, but with Christ for ever. On the con 
trary, it is just this reign of the saints with Christ that is to 
last a thousand years. The very thing which everywhere is 

* As for the millennial saints, says Mr Wood, in reply to this argu 
ment, the assurance they possess of protection from the second death, 
"lies in the promise that they, too, shall by and by put on immortality." 
But what promise is that ? I was curious to know this, since Mr Wood 

DXHAUSTS ALL THE PROMISES OF RESURRECTION IN THE BIBLE UPON THOSE 

WHO LIVE BEFORE THE MILLENNIUM, leaving not one for those who live 
a uring the thousand years. "Are not these," says he, "the nations of 
the earth who dwell not in the New Jerusalem, but eat for healing of the 
leaves of the tree of life?" (p. 53). The reviewer in Kitto takes the same 
view of the tree of life, assigning its fruits to the citizens of the New Jerusa 
lem, and its leaves to the nations outside. Mr Birks laconic answer is 
more plausible, though I think unsatisfactory : " The myriads who people 
the earth during the millennium belong to neither class. Hence the 
vision does not speak of them at all" (p. 116). 



222 MILLENNIAL RESURRECTION FIGURATIVE 

said to be unbroken and everlasting (" So SHALL WE EVER BE 
WITH THE LORD") is here said if it be a reign in their glo 
rified state to be limited to a thousand years. Yain are all 
the attempts made to explain away this, as if the still change 
able state of the earth might account for a period being men 
tioned. For the words of the text fix down the limitation 
not to the accidents but to the essence of the reign telling us 
that it was their " living and reigning with Christ," whatever 
that means, that lasted a thousand years. And as we are 
immediately told of a great change for the worse, after the 
expiry of this period, and during another shorter period called 
" a little season," it is perfectly clear that the " life and reign 
with Christ," considered as the characteristic feature of the mil 
lennial state, terminate with the thousand years.* I think this 
is enough convincingly to show that it is no literal resurrec 
tion of the Church of God to be ever with her Lord that is 
here meant, but just the long period of a thousand years 
life from the dead" (Rom. xi. 1 5), in that figurative sense with 
which Scripture, in previous portions of it, had made us so 
familiar.f 

FIFTH. If the first resurrection be literal, the other or 
wicked party, styled "the rest of the dead," who "lived not 
again until the thousand years were finished," must of course 

* Least of all can those who believe that there will be a fleshly state to 
all eternity, over which the glorified will reign, and of course imperfec 
tion on earth for ever, assign even a tolerable reason for the emphatic 
saying, that the risen saints will "reignw7/i Christ a thousand years." 
But the difficulty is nearly as great in any way of it. 

f But is not this same millennial reign said in Daniel (vii. 18) to be 
"forever, even for ever and ever" ? (Kitto, ut supra, and Mr Wood, p. 53.) 
True : but it is easier to understand the extension of the earthly and tem 
poral condition of the kingdom into the heavenly and eternal, which 
is done in Daniel, than to understand how the reign of risen and glorified 
saints with Christ should be definitely fixed to a thousand years. To say 
with Moses Stuart, and Mr Wood, who quotes him, that " the simple ob 
ject of the words is merely to affirm the certainty of the reign during all 
that period," is, I think, manifestly weak. 



FIFTH ARGUMENT. 223 

be expected to " live again," or rise from the dead, in the 
same bodily sense, " when the thousand years are finished. * 
But so far from this, we read of no bodily resurrection at 
all on the expiry of this period. 

" When the thousand years are finished" (rfXftfdff), we read 
that " Satan shall be loosed out of his prison" (v. 7) for a 
period expressly called " a little season" (v. 3). Some would 
make this, from its supposed brevity, no period at all ; but 
if we take it in relation to the preceding thousand years, 
and to the work to be done, perhaps it will not be so 
little as many suppose. " He shall go out to deceive the 
nations which are in the four quarters of the earth, Gog and 
Magog, the number of whom is as the sand of the sea;" and 
observe not only the multitudes he collects, but the union 
and organization effected in this stupendous and appalling 
confederacy the last desperate effort of the serpent 
" they went up on the breadth of the earth, and com 
passed the camp of the saints about, and the beloved 
city : " In view cf this, the little season of the enemy s li- 

* " Mr Elliott, indeed, observes that the expression till the thousand 
years were finished, does not necessarily imply that the rest of the 
dead would rise immediately on the completion of the thousand years, 
and cites two passages in proof." [So Mr Birks, " Four Empires," &c., 
Appendix II.] " We do not dispute this. We hold that a statement to 
the effect that a particular event shall not take place till after a given 
time, does not necessarily imply that it must take place even then. But 
when, as here, two things are mentioned together; when their order is 
stated ; when a period is assigned to the first, and the commencement of 
the second is deferred till the period is fulfilled ; and when, after this 
distinction of times, the first is again brought forward and characterised 
it seems impossible to avoid the conclusion, that the two constitute one 
uninterrupted series, gradational or antithetic, and that the specification 
of times is exact. Besides, the time till which their living again is de 
ferred, is expressed word for word as the time is till which Satan is 
bound. Both are li^i tiXirOy TO, yi\n*. IT* till the thousand years should 
be fulfilled. Whence it is but reasonable to infer that there exists an 
intimate connection between them." British Quarterly Review, Feb. 
1849 " Modern Mille?iarianism," an able article, and on this vision 
particularly so. 



224 MILLENNIAL KESURRECTION FIGURATIVE 

berty, after the expiry of the thousand years, and compared 
with that long period of " imprisonment," seemed to Bengel 
and Faber to require a century or so. However this may 
be, during all this time we read of no bodily resurrection at all. 
This postmillennial period is to be filled up with something 
else than bodily resurrections. It will indeed be employed 
in the raising of a icicked party, but not bodily, from their 
graves. Where, then, do we read of the bodily resurrection 
of that party called " the rest of the dead" ? Nowhere. We 
go downwards in the chapter to find them, till we come to 
the account of the last judgment, and there observing that 
" the dead, small and great," are seen " standing before the 
throne," we must suppose that these " dead, small and great," 
are just "the rest of the dead" we have been seeking for 
otherwise, they never appear again at all. 

And when once we have made " the dead, small and great, 
that standbefore the throne" at the final judgment, to be merely 
" the rest of the dead that lived not again until the thousand years 
were finished," we are forced to exclude the righteous altoge 
ther from the last judgment, making " the dead, small and 
great," to be all ivicked. This, besides doing the greatest 
imaginable violence to that august scene, gives no explanation 
of the " opening of the book of life" on that occasion, except 
one which I have shown to be wholly inadmissible (pp. 214- 
216), and I would say absurd namely, to show that none of 
those then judged have their names written in it ! * 

Now, reverse the process. Make the resurrection of both 
the parties figurative, and understand by it first the extinc 
tion of the one and triumph of the other for a thousand 

* The keen-edged reflections of Mr Birks on this argument (pp. 
119-121) contrast unpleasantly with his usual style. Vitringa, from 
whom he quotes, though connecting v. 5 with v. 12, is the farthest pos 
sible from identifying "the rest of the dead, who lived not again till the 
thousand years were fulfilled," with the WHOLE " dead, small and great, 
who stand before the throne" at the final judgment, which Mr Birks and 
his friends are obliged so unnaturally to do. This makes the reference to 
Vitringa of small avail, if it be not fitted to convey an erroneous impression. 



FIFTH ARGUMENT. 225 

years, and then the temporary resuscitation of the defeated 
party, with their gigantic death-throes, under the desperate 
agency of the old serpent before the final ruin of his king 
dom and not only are all the difficulties of the literal sense 
avoided, but a meaning put upon the whole chapter consis 
tent with itself, and entirely accordant with the phraseology 
of Scripture in other places. At the close of the previous 
chapter, we find " the Beast taken, and with him the False 
Prophet, and cast alive into a lake of fire burning with brim 
stone" (xix. 21). This puts an end to the antichristian 
kingdom ; but it is added, " The remnant " or the rest (o l 
XO/TO/) " were slain with the sword of Him that sat upon 
the horse, which sword proceeded out of his mouth ; and all 
the fowls were filled with their flesh" (v. 21). A marked 
distinction is thus drawn between the doom of " the beast 
and false prophet," and that of " the rest." The former go 
to " the lake of fire " never more to reappear : The other 
do not so, but are merely " slain with the sword from the 
mouth of Christ." We are prepared, then, for the possibi 
lity, at least, of their reappearance upon the stage. Ac 
cordingly we find them in the fifth verse of the next 
chapter, under their old name " the rest (01 XO/TO/) of the 
dead ;" dead, that is, in respect of the cause they espouse. 
In this sense they " live not again (after being slain with 
the sword from Christ s mouth ) until the thousand years 
are finished." To use the triumphant language of the pro 
phet, pointing to this same period, "They are dead, they 
shall not live: they are deceased, they shall not rise: therefore 
hast thou visited them, and made all memory of them to 
perish" (Isa. xxvi. 14). Meanwhile, the other party, so long 
held down, are seen springing to life and dominion. The 
devil is bound that he may no more deceive the nations till 
the thousand years be fulfilled (ver. 1-3). The earth is at 
rest from the plots and seductions of the enemy. His cause 
is at an end, his kingdom extinguished, and for a thousand 

B 



226 MILLENNIAL RESURRECTION FIGURATIVE 

years, " THE SOVEREIGNTY OP THE WORLD" is " OUR LORD S 
AND ins CHRIST S"* (chap. xi. 18). "The Lord alone is 
exalted in that day ; " and " the kingdom and dominion, 
and the greatness of the kingdom under the whole heaven, 
is given to the people of the saints of the Most High." But 
the very hint, they lived not again till the thousand years 
were finished," is a warning to expect their reappearance 
at the close of that period. Accordingly, though in the 
sense of a literal resurrection of their bodies we never hear 
of them again, we find them duly reproduced, as a party, by 
the old serpent, who is loosed at the close of the millen 
nium for that very purpose. " When the thousand years 
were fulfilled," and Satan is loosed, he shall again " go out 
to deceive the nations;" not, of course, the same individuals, 
but their successors, who are spoken of under the same name, 
as deceived first for long ages, then undeceived for a thou 
sand years, and finally again exposed, for a brief period, to 
deception, f 

Thus does this famous prophecy, when viewed as symbolical, 
explain naturally from beginning to end ; when taken literally, 
however well some expressions may interpret, we cannot get 
through with it. 

SIXTH. We have seen (pages 202, 203) that the " opening 
of the book of life," at the time when the dead are judged 
(ver. 12, lo), signifies the manifestation of those who are 
written in it. " Two reasons," says Mr Gripps, " lead me to 

* "EJ/EVETO j3xe/, K.t. A. " Much more glorious," says BEXGEI, " is this 
primitive reading than that of a hasty transcriber, \?iwr <*} pour&tini, 
*.T.X." Since then, every critical edition of the text has introduced this 
" much more glorious " reading. The English is from Tregelks. 

f Mr Birks (pp. 122-120) gives no fewer than eleven arguments against 
tiiifl view of the " living again" of the rest of the dead, which he erro 
neously calls "novel." It would be tedious to go through these, every 
one of which admits of easy answer. But if my view does not commend 
itself to the impartial reader of the vision, on this point on which di 
versity of opinion may very well exist let him just blot out number FIVE 



SEVENTH ARGUMENT. 227 

conceive that this must take place at the second coming of 

Christ. First, It is utterly inconceivable that all 

this glory [described in Matthew xxv. 31, &c.] can be con 
ferred upon the saints, and such a manifestation of them be 
made in the presence of Christ and of all the holy angels, of 
one another, and of all the ungodly living in every part of 
the earth, one moment before what is called the opening of the 
book of life. The very absurdity of the idea would con 
vince me that such a manifestation of the glory of those who 
are written in the book of life must coincide with, and be 
the same as the opening of that book. And the expression 
(v. 15), "Whosoever was not FOUND written in the book of 
life, still farther proves that this is the time when the open 
discovery or manifestation is made of those who are written 
therein. Secondly, It is expressly set forth that the mani 
festation of the sons of God will take place at their resurrection 
(Rom. viii. 19, 23). As, therefore, I am convinced that this 
manifestation cannot take place before the book of life is 
opened, in which their names are written, but must be the 
same as the discovery of those who are written therein, I 
feel assured that the resurrection of the saints will be at the 
time of the opening of the book of life, and not at the 
first resurrection. These two reasons, therefore, prove to 
my mind that when Christ sits upon the throne of judgment 
and the book of life is opened, must be the time of his second 
coming, and of the resurrection of the saints."* 

SEVENTH. " The omission," says the acute author just 
quoted, " of any declaration as to the sea, death, and the grave 
[or hades ] giving up the dead at the first resurrection, and 
the making such a declaration respecting the dead in verse 

from the list of internal evidences against the literal sense of the First 
Eesurrection. 

* Treatise on the First Resurrection (1831), pp. 21-23 a work of 
great modesty, but full of acute verbal criticism ; although I think it 
fails to establish the author s view of the period of the millennium. 



228 MILLENNIAL RESURRECTION FIGURATIVE 

13, convinces me both that the first resurrection is not that 
of the saints, and also, that the dead in verses 12, 13, include 
all mankind, both the saints and the ungodly. In every 
other part of the Word of God, the information given con 
cerning the resurrection of the saints is not only much more 
frequent, but also much more explicit, than concerning the 
resurrection of the ungodly. I feel convinced, therefore, that 
in this portion also of Scripture, if it were intended to foretell 
a resurrection of the saints distinct from that of the ungodly, 
more explicit information would be given concerning the 
former than concerning the latter. I find, however, that the 
information given concerning the first resurrection, instead 
of being much more, is much less explicit than that concern 
ing the resurrection intimated in verses 12, 13 ; for there is 
not the least allusion to the sea, death, and the grave giv 
ing up the dead at the first resurrection, and it is expressly 
declared that they do this at the time of the resurrection set 
forth in verses 12, 13. By contrasting this, therefore, with 
the course pursued in other portions of the Word of God, I 
feel convinced that the first resurrection cannot be that of the 
saints ; and that verses 12, 13, do not describe the resurrec 
tion of the ungodly only, but that of the saints also, and in 
clude all the dead without any exception." 

The seven foregoing arguments have been gathered from 
the surface of the millennial prophecy: the two following, 
with which I will conclude, are suggested by a narrower ob 
servation of the vision. 

EIGHTH. It is a fatal objection to the literal sense of this 
prophecy, as announcing the bodily resurrection of all dead, 
and the change of all living saints, that it is exclusively a 
martyr-scene the prophet beholding simply a resurrection of 
THE SLAIN ; whereas this very circumstance eminently favours 
the figurative sense. 

The vision is described first generally, and then in detail. 



EIGHTH ARGUMENT. 229 

Two companies are seen in the vision, and in two successive 
and opposite conditions first as dead and dishonoured, next 
as risen and reigning. Thus : 

GENERAL DESCRIPTION OF THE VISION. 

"And I saw thrones, and they sat iipon them, and judgment 
was given unto them : 

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE VISION. 

First Company seen Dead. 

" And [I saw] the souls of them that had been beheaded for 
the testimony of Jesus, and for the Word of God ; 

Second Company seen Dead. 

" And [I saw] such as had not worshipped the beast nor his 
image, neither had received his mark upon their forehead, 
and on their hand : 

Both Companies seen Risen and Reigning. 

" And they lived and reigned with Christ a thousand years." 
(V. 4.) 

A few remarks on the several clauses of the passage will 
still further open it up. 

" I saw thrones, and they sat upon them." Who sat upon 
them ? Not any mentioned as yet, for the vision begins 
here. Clearly, therefore, it is the two companies about 
to be specified. Accordingly, as soon as the prophet has 
described these in detail, he comes back to his first general 
statement " And they (those now specified) lived and 
reigned a thousand years ; " as if he had said, And I saw 
thrones, and persons sitting on them, to whom judgment 
was given: these thrones were filled by the beheaded, &c., 
and such as had not worshipped the beast : And their reign 
lasted a thousand years. * If this be the construction of the 

* Mr Elliott, perceiving how much depends npon this point, gives 
the \vords another turn, but one that I am convinced is untenable. 
"Christ and his saints," says he, "were seen to take their sitting on 



230 MILLENNIAL RESURRECTION FIGURATIVE 

passage, as it clearly is if the words " they sat upon them," 
mean "they to be presently mentioned" then we must 
put no other saints into the vision besides those afterwards 
specified ; and the concluding words, " And they lived and 
reigned," tie us peremptorily down to those two companies 
alone. Let us now see who they were : 

" And [I saw] the souls of them that were beheaded for 
the testimony of Jesus and for the Word of God." Behead 
ing,* a well-known Roman mode of putting to an ignomi 
nious death, is mentioned here, merely to denote the Roman 
authority by which they were slain, in the Pagan and un 
broken period of the empire. All the martyrs of Jesus, then, 

thrones of judgment and royalty. St John specifies particularly, as if 
consrjicuous among them, the souls of them that had been beheaded, 

and others also, -whosoever had not worshipped," &c. (Hor. 

Apoc. iv. 125, fourth edition.) One objection to this is, that it intro 
duces into the vision those who were not seen in it, and makes the only 
parties who were seen to be merely " conspicuous among the whole 
number of Christ s saints." Another objection is, that it obliges us to 
seek for a nominative to the verb " sat " the parties that were seen in 
the thrones out of this vision altogether. Mr Elliott takes the nomina 
tive to " sat " to be " Christ and his attendant hosts, described at large 
in the preceding chapter as combatants against, and conquerors over, 
the beast," &c. That is to say, he takes his nominative out of a perfectly 
different vision from the one where the verb is ; and not only so, but 
since another vision comes in bettveen these two, we have his nominative 
in the first vision and the verb in the third, or at least another and 
quite distinct representation of the same period from the second vision. 
Could any more unnatural and inadmissible construction be proposed ? 
But take the verb (ixSia-m) " they sat," impersonally, as equivalent to 
" they were sate upon "a usage quite familiar in the Greek Testament 
and the Septuagint and the construction of the whole passage becomes 
transparent. "Nothing scarcely," says Moses Stuart, who takes the 
literal sense of our vision, " is more common in the Old Testament and 
in the New, and especially in the Chaldce of the book of Daniel, than 
to employ the third person plural for the passive voice, thus making a 
kind of impersonal verb of it: Gramm. 174. Note 2." (Comm. on 
Apoc. ad loc.) " In the New Testament, " says Winer, " verbs are used 
impersonally, in the third person plural." Then follow some examples. 
(Gramm. 49) 
* Di*iftcMfytfMi>| from *&izvs, an axe. 



EIGHTH ARGUMENT. 231 

under the Pagan persecutions are here embraced. The next 
clause describes another class of martyrs, to arise after this 
class was completed. But before coming to it, let me re 
quest the reader s attention to the following passage, in the 
sixth chapter of this book, where the same class of martyrs 
(under Paganism) are described in nearly identical terms, 
and the other class announced as yet to come : " And when 
ho had opened the fifth seal, I saw under the altar the souls 
of them that were slain for the Word of God, and for the 
testimony which they held : And they cried with a loud 
voice, How long, Lord,* holy and true, dost thou not judge 
and avenge our blood on them that dwell on the earth ! 
And a white robe was given unto every one of them ; f and 
it was said unto them, that they should rest yet for a [little] J 
season, until both their fellow-servants and their brethren, 
that should be killed as they were, should be fulfilled." 

The persons seen in this vision are unquestionably the same 
as the first class in our millennial vision ; "their souls" in 
both cases, or themselves in the state of the dead as slain 
for the Word of Grocl. In the former vision, however, the 
apostle hears them asking "judgment; " in the latter, he sees 
them act it. " How long, O Lord, holy and true, dost thou 
not judge and avenge our Hood on them that dwell on the 
earth ? " is their doleful cry in the one vision : " And I saw 
thrones, and they sat upon them, and judgment icas given unto 
them" is the delightful response to that cry which the apostle 

* AtirvoTw, Master Thou that rulest over the oppressors and the op 
pressed alike. 

f ESofl^ avn7; \xa.ff<rta rre^ teuxy. So the true reading would seem to 
be, as given by Sc/iolz, Lochmann, Tischendorf, and Tregclks. Scholz, 
however, omits IXOLO-TU, and Tregelles puts it in brackets. Bengcl, whose 
verbal accuracy seldom fails him, in reply to Wolfius, who had said it 
might justly be doubted whether John Avrote a-jr/ii; Ixda-ru, says, " But 
he has written Ifjui la-, chap. ii. 23 ; and so Luke, ii. 3, .vns ixxirw 
and Acts ii. 8, f,pi7s ixna-ro;. Paul, Eph. v. 33, upus Ixa.*;. This very 
mtiTt7t txKtna occurs in Kir. xvii. 14." 

t It seems doubtful whether " little " belonss to the text, but the evi 
dence is scarcely sufficient to remove it. 



232 MILLENNIAL RESURRECTION FIGURATIVE . 

was privileged to announce in the other. The one, in short, 
is the petition presented, and the other, the petition granted. 
But the connection of the two visions is closer than this. 
The petitioning party in the former vision are one. But they 
are told there is another party to come after them, to be 
treated like themselves, and who will have to be judged and 
avenged as well as they. They must wait, therefore, till 
their time be over; and then they shall both together " have 
judgment given them, and their blood be avenged on them 
that dwell on the earth." "White robes were given unto 
every one of them; and it was said unto them, that they 
should rest yet for a little season, until their fellow-servants also, 
and their brethren, that should be killed as they were, should be 
fulfilled." As these are clearly two distinct parties suffering 
in succession for Christ, and as the former includes all who 
suffered under the great red dragon in his Pagan form, the 
latter can be no other than those who were to suffer under 
the same dragon in his subsequent, and, I believe, Papal form 
of opposition to Christ. Now, as judgment is promised to 
the former party as soon as their brethren and fellow-servants 
of the other party have suffered, or after Antichrist shall have 
fallen, and the millennial time have arrived we naturally 
look for both parties in our vision, and expect to find "judg 
ment given " to both together " against them that dwell on 
the earth." Accordingly, so it is. That exquisite jointing 
of the corresponding parts of this book which, with other 
peculiar features of it, so fascinated Sir Isaac Newton, that 
he pronounced it to have more characters of divinity than 
any other book of Scripture is nowhere better seen than 
here. " I saw," says the apostle, " the souls of them that were 
beheaded for the testimony of Jesus, and for the Word of 
God : " Those whom I had before seen under the altar, 
the souls of them that were slain for the Word of God, and 
for the testimony which they held them I now saw again, 
getting the judgment which then they sought. So much 
for ihejirst company of martyrs, under Paganism. 



EIGHTH ARGUMENT. 233 

The next clause of our passage describes the second com 
pany. " And [I saw] such as had not worshipped the 
beast, neither his image, neither had recieved the mark upon 
the forehead and in the hand." The resurrection of this 
company shows they were seen as dead, while the "judg 
ment " given to them along with the former class in ful 
filment of the promise made to that class, that they should 
have judgment given them as soon as the other party were 
" KILLED as they were " puts it beyond doubt that this is a 
martyr-company too. Accordingly, we read (ch. xiii. 15), 
that " it was given to him " the second beast that spake 
like a dragon, v. 11 " to cause that as many as would not 
worship the image of the beast should be KILLED." 

Thus this celebrated vision is exclusively a visional resur 
rection of martyrs. Not only are none else in it, but the 
first and last clauses of the passage the one referring us to 
those about to lie described, and the other to these as already 
described tie us down to the very parties specified in the 
two middle clauses of the passage, and necessitate the re 
striction of the whole to the slain witnesses of Christ. * 

In this view of the vision, it is utterly inadequate to express 
the resurrection of the whole Church of God bodily from the 
grave. I think every one must see this. The amazing con 
trast between the all-comprehensive idea to be expressed, 
and the rigidly-limited expression of it, if such it were, would 
prevent any cautious interpreter from recognising it in the 
passage. And is it conceivable that the Spirit of God, sup 
posing him to have reserved the announcement