# The Last Judgement and Second Coming of the Lord Illustrated/Chapter 9

CHAPTER IX.
THE OCCASION AND PURPOSE OF THE LORD'S SECOND COMING.
Seeing that the doctrines concerning the destruction of the earth, the cessation of the human race, and the resurrection of the material body are not founded in the teachings of the Divine Word, nor countenanced by any known principles of natural philosophy; seeing, also, that there is a region in the spiritual world which is the first common receptacle for the souls of all who die, and, that that region is the scene in which the Lord executes His final judgments upon them,—we are prepared to enter more directly upon the consideration of the subject of the Lord's second coming than we should have been without such information. If those several doctrines had not been considered with a view to a new explanation of them, the popular opinions respecting them would have been continually rising up in the minds of orthodox(?) readers, and interposing obstacles to the right understanding of our views and arguments, by suggesting some seeming evidences against them. These having been anticipated and removed, the way is now open for a freer exposition of our subject. We, therefore, proceed to ​consider the occasion and purpose of the Lord's second coming.
Of these the Lord has given us a remarkable description in the twenty-fourth chapter of Matthew. He therein states as the occasion of His coming, a variety of calamities which would, in the process of time, set in upon the Church He was then engaged in planting. The disciples asked Him what should be the sign of His coming. His answer follows: "Take heed that no man deceive you. For many shall come in my name, saying, I am Christ; and shall deceive many. And ye shall hear of wars and rumours of wars: see that ye be not troubled: for all these things must come to pass, but the end is not yet. For nation shall rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom: and there shall be famines, and pestilences, and earthquakes, in divers places. All these are the beginning of sorrows. Then shall they deliver you up to be afflicted, and shall kill you: and ye shall be hated of all nations for my name's sake. And then shall many be offended, and shall betray one another, and shall hate one another. And many false prophets shall rise, and shall deceive many. And because iniquity shall abound, the love of many shall wax cold. But he that shall endure unto the end, the same shall be saved. And this Gospel of the kingdom shall be preached in all the world for a witness unto all nations; and then shall the end come." This is the first general group of facts by which the Lord replied to the disciples' question; and it seems to us that their signification is not to be sought for in those outer events of the world which the letter apparently declares, but rather in those inner experiences of the Church, concerning which it is the main object of the Word to treat. Na​tural calamities, similar to those described, have taken place, almost in every century through which Christianity has passed; and this fact of itself is sufficient to show that such natural events never could have been intended as the prelude to the predicted advent. The circumstances that they have been so regarded; that persons, on the occurrence of such disastrous phenomena, have been led to expect the Divine coming, and the destruction of the universe; and that such interpretations have turned out to be mistakes,—may be taken as very strong evidence touching the uncertainty of such a view of the subject. The fact is, the calamities predicted refer to the spiritual afflictions of the Church rather than to the physical diseases of men, or political convulsions of the world. This may be clear from the introductory clauses, "Take heed that no man deceive you. For many shall come in my name, saying, I am Christ; and shall deceive many." Thus it is of the recognition of Himself that He discourses; consequently of the Church in which He is acknowledged, and not of the world by whom He is but little cared for. This, also, was the conclusion which the Apostles drew from the Lord's teachings upon the subject. John writes, that when antichrist is come we know that it is the last time; and Paul strikingly observes, "Let no man deceive you by any means: for the day of the Lord shall not come unless there come a falling away first." In general terms, then, the occasion for the Lord's second coming, as described by Himself, is to be found in the corruption of the Church, and in the spiritual disasters they would bring about. These spiritual afflictions are described under the figures of natural calamities, because such outer phenomena are the representations of such inner experience. This we will endeavour to illustrate.
​By "many shall come in my name, saying, I am Christ; and shall deceive many," is meant the introduction into the Church of false doctrines concerning Him, by which the faith of the people would be led astray. Wars and rumours of wars, denote disagreements and disputes concerning those truths which belong to the Church, from which falsifications will arise and be established. And by nation rising against nation, and kingdom against kingdom, is signified evil contending with evils, and falsehood with falsehoods. In the perverted Church evils are as a spiritual nation, and falsehood as a spiritual kingdom; among these there cannot be any concord, and this is the reason why the Church has been divided, and why so many heresies have existed. Famines, pestilences, and earthquakes, denote the deprivation of truth and goodness, the presence of falsehood, and thereby the disruption of the Church. Hence those particulars are described as the beginning of sorrows. It is also said that the disciples are to be delivered up to be afflicted and be killed. By the disciples are meant all the principles of genuine faith and life which lead a man to acknowledge and follow the Lord; to afflict them is to pervert them, and to kill them is to deny their efficacy and use. The Lord said they should be hated of all nations for my name's sake, because of the aversion and contempt with which spiritual truth and goodness would be treated. For many to be afflicted, to betray one another, and hate one another, denotes the enmities which would exist on account of such perversions of the Word. To be offended, means to turn away from true doctrine concerning the Lord: of this it is expressly written that it would be "for a stone of stumbling and a rock of offence to both the houses of Israel. To betray, denotes the teaching of what is false; and to hate, the manifesta​tion of what is evil. The raising of many false prophets and their deception, signifies the invention of numerous false doctrines and their seductions. The abounding of iniquity, is the multiplication of falsehoods in lieu of faith; and the love of many waxing cold, is the cessation of charity. Each keeps pace with the other, and they live or expire together: where there is no true faith, there can be no genuine charity; and when there is not this charity, there cannot be that faith. Hence it is so strongly written, "Because iniquity shall abound, the love of many shall wax cold." He, however, "that shall endure unto the end, the same shall be saved;" that is, those who resist such temptation will be blessed with all that light and virtue which may be necessary for their salvation. The declaration, that when "this Gospel of the kingdom shall be preached in all the world for a witness unto all nations, then shall the end come," denotes that when these truths shall be made known to the Church and be brought home as a testification of the evils which prevail therein, then shall the Son of man be revealed. Of this revelation we shall treat in another place.
From this summary of the signification of that first group of events which the Lord described as the occasion for His second coming, we may easily perceive that they refer to conditions which would arise in the Church, and which would aid in the overthrow of its genuine teachings. We might have dwelt upon those expositions, and extended them to a considerable length by ilustration and argument, but we think there is sufficient evidence in the summary which has been adduced, to carry some conviction to the minds of the thoughtful. We shall, therefore, pass on to that other group of circumstances to which the Lord also referred as the occasion for His second coming, and treat them with an exposition equally brief.
​It is plain that the "abomination of desolation standing in the holy place," denotes the presence of some corrupting principle in the Church. The Church is, undoubtedly, the "holy place," and the introduction into it of false doctrines concerning the Lord, and what should be the life and faith of its members is plainly an abomination, which is sure to bring desolation upon the truth it was designed to teach. Well, therefore, might it be said, "Whoso readeth, let him understand;" that is, they who study the Word ought to perceive these truths. But, amidst all such darkness, some light will be preserved. Hence, those who are in Judæa are taught to flee into the mountains. This means that those who are of the Church must take refuge from such calamities by resorting to the love of God and of their neighbour. To be in Judæa, is to be in an affection for the good things of the Church; and the mountains in which safety is to be found, are those two eminent loves, on which, indeed, hang all the law and the prophets. To be on the house top, is to be in charity, for this is the summit of our spiritual house; and not to come down to take anything out of it, denotes that no inferior condition should ever be preferred. To be in the field, is to be in good, of any degree; and that none should go back to the mere knowledge of truth, is taught by the declaration that such are not to return to take their clothes. Truth is the garment which goodness leaves behind during the process of its advancement, and to return to it would be to relapse and fall away from the progress made and the advantages obtained. They who are with child, and they who give suck in those days, denote those in whom the love of goodness has been quickened, and those who are capable of communicating truth. These are to experience woe in the disastrous times of the Church which are treated of, because of the dangerous influence by which ​this love and capability would be surrounded. Flight in the winter, signifies removal from the Church in consequence of the obscurity of truth induced by indifference and coldness; and flight on the Sabbath-day, denotes removal from the Church, in consequence of the sanctities of religion retaining nothing but their outward forms. To pray against these things, is to make efforts to prevent them. "For then shall be great tribulation, such as was not since the beginning of the world to this time, no, nor ever shall be," denotes that the highest degree of perversion to which the principles of the Church can be exposed will then be realized. This perversion is its great affliction, and the profanity of its character being completed, it is described to be such as had never been experienced in the Christian Church; for this is the "world" respecting which the prediction is delivered. "And," therefore, "except those days should be shortened, there should no flesh be saved: but for the elect's sake those days shall be shortened." The shortening of those days, denotes the removal of those perversions, without which it may be evident the means of salvation would be destroyed; but for the elect's sake they shall be shortened; that is, for the sake of those who live well, those evils will be removed. Those who love truth and goodness are called the elect. The means by which those blessings are to be accomplished involves the contemplated coming of the Lord; thereby He will cause discovery to be made that evils and errors have entered into the Church, and, by promoting their expulsion, He will provide for the continued salvation of all who live righteously and well. To such the Lord said, "If any man shall say unto you, Lo, here is Christ, or there; believe it not," to guard them against the acceptation of what is false. False Christs are false doctrines concerning Him, and false prophets are those who teach them. Of these it is predicted ​that they should show signs and wonders; insomuch that, if it were possible, they shall deceive the very elect: by signs, are meant the persuasive reasonings by which errors would be defended; and by wonders, the seductive influence they would exercise. To deceive, if it were possible, the elect, signifies that those arts would become so subtle and refined as to render it difficult even for the virtuous to detect and avoid their mischiefs. Hence the Divine exhortation to prudence, Behold, I have told you before. If therefore they shall say, Behold, He is in the desert; go not forth: behold, He is in the secret chambers; believe it not. By the desert, is meant faith in which no wisdom can be discovered; by the secret chambers, are denoted those charities in which selfishness abounds; and, because these things are not the faith and charity which the Word inculcates, they are not to be followed or believed. For, as the lightning cometh out of the east, and shineth even unto the west; so shall also the coming of the Son of man be. Thus the perverted Church will regard all the Divine teachings concerning the Lord's second coming merely as a flash of intellectual light, to be instantly dissipated as a thing of nought. The Lord foresaw this fact, and has therefore related it. How many beautiful truths upon this and kindred subjects have been taught to the professors of common Christianity! How frequently have they been accepted as brilliant thoughts for a moment, and then as suddenly rejected! The light, indeed, came from the east, that is, from the Lord and His Word; but in attempting to shine unto the west, that is, in a direction opposite to itself, it became extinguished by the falsehoods which there prevailed. Such is the treatment which the Son of man, at His coming, is to receive from the perverted Church, whensoever it may please Him to accomplish His predictions of that event. This is the cor​rupted state of the Church which is contemplated as the occasion for the second coming of the Lord; and, therefore, He closed His description by speaking of it as a carcase, as a thing spiritually dead, around which the eagles—the sharp-sighted, the selfish, and those who feed on—corruption—will be gathered together. If, under those circumstances, the Divine Providence did not interfere to arrest the progress of such perversions, the result would be the entire rejection of the Word, and, as a consequence, the denial of all revealed religion. This we believe to have been the state to which religion was reduced a little more than a century ago; and that, therefore, the second coming of the Lord could not be delayed without danger to the existence of Christianity. Every one who knows anything about the history of Christianity at that period, is aware of the infidelity which prevailed in our own country and throughout the European continent. In France, the government declared the Word to be a fraud, Christianity a superstition, and the Sabbath to be abolished. But those results did not spring out of the study of the Word, or of Christianity, considered, in themselves, but out of those perversions which the Church have taught concerning them. But we will again refer to this point. It will be useful to our present purpose to note the beginnings and progressions of those events which had conduced to such disasters.
The early Christians were so called because they worshipped Christ as God. This was the light in which the Apostles regarded Him, and in which they spoke of Him. They knew that He is omnipotent, for He has all power in heaven and in earth: that He is omniscient, for He knew all things: that He is omnipresent, for He said, Lo I am with you always, even unto the end of the world. They spoke of ​Him as eternal, being "the same yesterday, and to-day, and for ever; also as the Creator, for "all things were made by Him, and without Him was not anything made that was made;" likewise as the Redeemer. He "having obtained eternal redemption for us;" and the Saviour, "For He shall save His people from their sins." They knew that He is "the Way, the Truth, and the Life;" "the Hearer of prayer; the Divine Being, whom the angels worship, and without whom man can do nothing;" He being the only wise God—"God manifest in the flesh," in whom "dwelleth all the fulness of the Godhead bodily." This was the grand doctrine of early Christianity concerning the Lord, and such are the scriptural terms in which it is expressed. But this doctrine, in its simplicity and truth, did not long continue to be acknowledged. It began to be questioned even in the apostolic ages; for we find in the epistles intimations that antichrist had come, and that this fact originated an expectation that the second advent was at hand. That event, however, did not then take place; the corruptions which conduced to it were begun, but as yet they were not completed. Disputations increased, subtleties were invented, animosities were engendered, until the fourth century, when the central truth of Christianity was authoritatively abandoned, and Jesus ceased to be the sole object of the Church's faith.
About those facts there can be no controversy. In the second century, the love of dominion in the Church began to be displayed among its leaders, and thereupon altercations arose about its government and laws. Heresies also broke ​but in a variety of forms, and added to the growing embarrassment of the times. Several disputes concerning the doctrines of the Church took place among the bishops of this period: that of Stephen the First of Rome, with Cyprian, the Bishop of Carthage; and that occasioned by the heresy of Paul of Samosata, during the pontificate of Dionysius, are well known to those who are acquainted with early ecclesiastical history. But the most remarkable heresy, because the most influential in its consequences, was that defended by Arius, the Bishop of Alexandria. This, whatever might have been its character at first, finally went so far as to reject the Divinity of the Saviour. Arius succeeded in obtaining many followers, but caused much agitation and many divisions in the Church. This state of things checked the activity of charity, and faith suffered amidst the animosities which prevailed. In the time of Pope Melchiades differences were peculiarly rife; during his pontificate Constantine took possession of Rome, and some time after he accepted the teachings of Christianity; but in which of the several forms under which it was then presented, neither Eusebius or the other historians who have written upon the subject inform us. Information upon this point might have been useful, but the want of it is no detriment to the point before us. In all probability his reception of it was vague and general, having no small dash of political considerations.
The Arian disputes at length extended themselves throughout all Christendom: the puerilities which were produced, and the enmities which were created, excited the scorn and satire of disbelievers; and Christians themselves were found to sacrifice charity upon the altars of debate and controversy. On this account Constantine interposed his authority, and caused a council of bishops to assemble ​at Nice, a city in Bithynia. This took place in the year 324; they were required to deliberate on and determine the doctrine which the Church ought to accept concerning God. Three hundred and eighteen bishops assembled, and Constantine himself acted as the moderator of the meeting; they determined, by a majority of votes (296 to 22, according to Philustorgius), that there are three persons constituting the one God, as that idea has been expressed in the Nicene creed originally drawn up by Hosius of Corduba, and also in that which bears the name of Athanasius.
That council then, as the creeds declare, separated the Divinity into three persons, and the Lord and Saviour into two; they passed by Jesus Christ as the supreme head of the Church, and taught men to look up to God the Father, as to another person, with merely the mention of Christ's name upon their tongues as an inducement for the Father to have mercy upon them. Hereby the head of the Church was removed from its body, the door of the temple was taken off its hinges, and an attempt was made to enter into the sheepfold by some other way than by Him who had declared Himself to be "the Way, the Truth, and the Life."
From this time an incredible number of heresies came forth, and the head of antichrist was displayed. This was the necessary consequence of not immediately approaching the Lord Jesus Christ as the sole God of His Church. The council adverted to declared, by its anthority and creeds, that the Church has three heads, and that these deliberate together concerning who shall be saved, and the means for doing it! By this all spiritual perception about theological truth has been overshadowed as with a dense cloud; reason has been renounced, as a thing not to enter into the precincts of this doctrine; fallacies have been invented to ​shelter its deformity; and "mystery," which is one of the names that falsehood takes, is found to reign. Every one may readily see that those events in the Church, associated as they were with the love of rule and dominion among its leaders, must have thrust aside all orderly communication with the Divine author of its truth, and thrown down that plane of the human mind on which spiritual progress is effected. Hence arose the vicarship of the Pope, the canonization of the dead, the invocation of saints, the sale of indulgences, the obligations of the confessional, the division of the Eucharist, and finally the dark ages with all their evils. All these things are entirely apart from the teachings of true Christianity; but being thrust into it, their existence therein fulfils some of the predictions which we have seen are to be the prelude of the Lord's second coming. Certainly they prove the necessity for such an occurrence; for by what other power could their mischiefs be arrested?
But the main evil in those corruptions is that which has turned the Church away from the direct acknowledgment of the Lord Jesus Christ as the true God and eternal life, —the only wise God our Saviour. It is true that those who say there are three persons in the Godhead, and that each is by Himself God and Lord, also say that there is but one God. But these are words to which no sensible ideas can be attached; and they are employed simply to guard against what otherwise might expose them to the derision of mankind. Still, every one sees that the statements involve obvious contradictions. This, at least, is well known to all who think; and therefore it has been said to be a mystery, not for comprehension but for faith. The ​faith which had its origin in this doctrine is to be directed towards God the Father, because He is supposed to impute to believers the righteousness of God the Son; and towards God the Son, because He is supposed to have suffered the penalty of guilt in man's stead, and so to intercede and mediate with God the Father for the safety of mankind; and towards God the Holy Ghost, because He is considered to inscribe the imputed righteousness of the Son upon the hearts of believers. This proves that a trinity of Gods is substantially acknowledged, however much it may be verbally denied. Moreover, this doctrine enters into and mystifies the sentiments concerning charity, repentance, free will, election, the sacraments, and all others which have their place in the Church. The result of those fallacies which were established by the council of Nice was continued disturbances among the professors of Christianity. Mosheim, speaking of the doctrines of the Church during the fifth century, says, "The sacred and venerable simplicity of primitive times, which required no more than a true faith in the Word of God, and a sincere obedience to His holy laws, appeared little better than rusticity and ignorance to the subtle doctors of this quibbling age. Instead of leading men into the path of humble faith and genuine piety, they bewildered them in labyrinths and contention. Hence arose new matters of animosity and dispute, of bigotry and uncharitableness, which flowed like a torrent through succeeding ages, and which all human efforts seemed unable to vanquish." The same authority, in treating of the state of the Church just before the time of the Reformation, says, "Not only private persons, but also the most powerful princes and sovereign states, exclaimed loudly against the despotic dominion of the pontiffs; the frauds, violence, avarice, and injustice that ​prevailed in the councils; the arrogance, tyranny, and extortion of the legates; the unbridled licentiousness and enormous crimes of the clergy and monks of all denominations; the unrighteous severity and partiality of the Roman laws; and demanded publickly, as their ancestors had done before them, a reformation of the Church in its head and in its members." At the commencement of the sixteenth century, in which the Reformation was effected, Alexander the Sixth filled the pontificate. Of him Mosheim also writes, and in this other historians agree, that "Humanity disowned him; he is rather to be considered a monster than a man; whose deeds excite horror, and whose enormities place him among the most execrable tyrants of ancient times. The world was delivered from this papal fiend in the year 1503, by the poisonous draught which he had prepared for another."
These facts of history are no one-sided representations; they are concurred in by all parties, even by those who belong to the Catholic religion. They show very clearly the desperate condition into which the triumphs of a false principle had plunged that Divine Christianity which the Lord had planted and which His apostles taught. Thus true charity was abandoned, and as a consequence genuine faith was lost. These, then, were among the disastrous events to which the Lord referred as being the occasion for His second coming. Hence, of the temple, He said, "There shall not be left one stone upon another that shall not be thrown down." The temple was the Church, and the stones to be thrown down were the truths to be overturned. How clearly has this prediction been fulfilled.
But the progress of those painful events received a check by means of the Reformation. As yet,the Word had not come ​into the possession of the people: to effect this was one of the grand purposes of the Reformation. The art of printing had been recently discovered, and by means of it the sacred books were mercifully rescued from the seal and secrecy of the priesthood, and handed over to the people for them to learn and to publish. By renouncing some of the errors and the grosser vices which had fixed themselves upon the Church, many opportunities were provided for the enjoyment of those advantages which the Church offers to mankind. The blessing which arose from the possession of the Word was the most conspicuous. Still, there were influences at work which impeded the legitimate effect of its Divine teachings. The Reformation retained, as the fundamental principles of its existence, those very creeds which had laid the foundation of, and contributed so certainly to the desolation of, the early Christian Church; and from the errors of those creeds, the reformed Churches engendered others. Among the most conspicuous of these is that which has separated charity from faith, and declared that justification is by faith only: thus that charity may be an ornament, but is not a necessity for salvation. This is another of those circumstances to which the Lord referred as the occasion for His second coming. He spoke of it as the "abomination of desolation standing in the holy place." He so spoke of it because its tendency is to dissipate the truth, and render of none effect the commandments of God. It blights the morals and corrupts the intelligence of the Church. That which it requires is faith, not virtue; belief, not obedience; it therefore breaks down the barrier to criminal indulgence, and offers salvation to any villain who can accept its terms. This may seem strange, but it is impossible to deny its truth; and the reason such a view has been so extensively received, is ​because of its adaptability to captivate man, who, in his fallen nature, is so prone to accept what is false. The notion exercises a persuasive influence over the mind, and inclines it to yield in a direction which its reason would condemn; therefore, all reason is excluded from the process of this faith. When a man is told, as this doctrine tells him, that the condemnation of the law is taken away by the sufferings of Christ, and that His merits are imputed to believers, he naturally concludes that no virtues are necessary to be loved, and, that if any vices are perpetrated by him, they are no hindrance to his salvation. Who, then, does not see that this doctrine in the professing Church is "the abomination of desolation standing in the holy place"? It paralyses all the reasonable activities of Christianity. The graces of spiritual regeneration, the growth of practical holiness, the development of heavenly justice, the unfolding of genuine intelligence, and the displays of living charity, can have no place in the minds and hearts of those on whom this abomination has fixed its desolating hold. In this then we discover the fulfilment of another prediction which was to be an occasion for the Lord's second coming. This general feature of the prophecy includes most of the unhappy particulars which follow; all of which are in opposition to that lightning from the east, which will manifest His coming whensoever that may be.
Every one must see that the second coming of the Lord is to be preceded by a variety of corruptions taking place in the Church, and that these will furnish occasion for Him to fulfil His promise to come again. It is equally evident that the purpose of that coming must be to restore to the Church that life and light of it which human inventions and authority have perverted. Hence we are enabled to ​see generally, and in a small compass, both the occasion and purpose of the Divine advent which is predicted. And we have seen, in a former part of this work, that principles of this kind are involved in all the predicted comings of the Lord. The Divine comings in all cases are specialities in the Divine Providence, having, for their occasion, some disorders on the part of the Church, and for their purpose some beneficence for the human race.
But how are men to know when this advent shall be brought about? It will not be announced by the destruction of the earth, for that abideth for ever; it will not be proclaimed by putting a stop to the procreation of the human race, for that will never cease; it will not be indicated by the resuscitating of dead bodies from the earth, the air, and the gases with which they have been mingled; for no such phenomena are predicted. None of the signs which have been commonly associated with that event, and regarded as evidences of its accomplishment, are taught in the Scriptures; they are simply the results of misinterpretation. The true answer to our inquiry is not to be found, as before observed, in the occurrences of physical nature, but in certain states and requirements of the Church. Whenever its perversions are such as to answer to a just interpretation of the terms in which the narrative describes the occasion for the Lord's coming, then the fulfilment of that prediction may be reasonably expected. The manner of the fulfilment may be very different to that which is commonly expected—a mistake upon that point may be among the corruptions of the times: still we may rest assured that one of its evidences will be an increased interest in the teachings of the Divine Word, and also some improved information concerning its inspiration and structure.
It is an admitted canon of interpretation that the true ​sense of prophecy is scarcely ever discoverable until the time of its fulfilment. The reality lightens up the obscurity of the letter in which it is expressed, and causes its real significance to appear. The terms are then seen to tally with the facts, and each illustrates the other. Yet it is distinctly written that "the Son of man cometh at an hour when ye think not." The event will transpire at a period when men are least expecting it. This is a characteristic of the fulfilment of all prophecy. Still society has generally experienced some premonitions of those changes which that fuifilment is intended to effect. These, however, have very seldom been carefully observed. In all times of a perverted Church, men have evinced an unwillingness to believe that they were living in an age when prophecy was being fulfilled. The signs of danger which prevailed in the days of Noah were unheeded by the people; "they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, and knew not until the flood came and took them all away; so shall also the coming of the Son of man be." Men of the professing Church may hear murmurs of dissatisfaction proceeding from various quarters; they may participate in the common sentiment that some errors are extant, and that much selfishness prevails; they may feel something of the obscurity which infests religious thought, and amidst the turmoil resulting from the banishment of charity from the Church, they may yearn for some relief; yet no relief will be accepted by them, but that which they themselves invent, and suppose to be the remedy. How should it be otherwise? How can a corrupted Church be capable of perceiving its own failings? As well may we expect a blind man to see the irregularity of his own gropings. It has always been a characteristic of a fallen Church to de​clare itself to be the true one: it will not strip itself of the pretensions under which its depravity has grown, and it will be vain to expect from it any declaration of its own apostasy. It will not accept the signs occurring within itself as the inauguration of a new era; and it will treat as heresy any explanations which may be presented from without. Hence it is to be expected that the second coming of the Lord will be denied by the declining Church, whensoever it may occur, just as the Jews denied His coming at the first. It will not see when the good cometh; that must be declared to it by some other means: and in time some will be enabled to acknowledge the prevalence of its errors.
There may be, there always have been, some in the Church in whom a spiritual apprehension has been quickened to perceive, in the surrounding events of extraordinary times, some portents of a coming change. When the Adamic dispensation fell, Noah and his family were enabled to see something of the evils which prevailed, to make provision against the catastrophe that was impending, and to become the instruments for the introduction of another era of religious life to men. When the Noetic Church became corrupt. Abraham and his descendants were enabled to discern somewhat of the enormities around them, to guard against the perils which were threatened, and to become the depositories of information for a superior age. When the Jewish economy rendered the Word of God of none effect by the traditions of the elders, there were wise men in the east, Zacharias in the temple, and some pious among the people, who not only knew something of the perversity of the times, but were gifted with a perception that a deliverance was at hand; they also became the instrnments for bringing to the notice of the world the commencement of a new condition of spiritual existence. When ancient ​Christianity became corrupt, there were Luther and others who beheld the abominations which were put forth under that sacred name; they broke down many of the inventions which had been set up, and opened a pathway for the transmission of some freer thought. When Protestantism became selfish in its aims, and dilatory in the performance of its duties; when courts and the nobility became sensual and voluptuous in their practices, and the common people deeply sunk in vice and degradation, there were Wesley and others who were gifted with the penetration to notice some of the evils which had been permitted to grow up with so much luxuriance and danger; and they became the instruments of bringing into society a superior influence by which to prepare the mind for nobler ends. God has never left His Church without a witness to His excellence. But all those premonitions of danger, and experiences of change in the Christian Church, are only so many fluctuations attending its decline. Error, with its kindred evils, had been the source of its difficulties, and the revivals which had been effected were little else than the occasional flickers of an expiring lamp. The reason was because those reformations left the fundamental principles of ancient heresy untouched. The doctrines which the Church accepts concerning God and the means of salvation, are held to be mysteries which cannot enter into rational thought; and so long as such doctrines remain, darkness and danger will always be imminent. True doctrines about God and the means of salvation are essential things of His Church. Doctrines which cannot be reasonably understood cannot edify. With such doctrines men are no wiser with a revelation than they would be without it. The Word is light, and its purpose is to make men the children of light; therefore any darkness in the Church must come from ​some other source. False Christs and false prophets will be attended with wars and rumours of wars, that is, disputations and contentions, with all their retinue of spiritual famine, pestilence, and earthquakes. How can an untrue idea concerning God, and mistaken teachings respecting His requirements from men, be productive of any other results? Now, if this be true, is it not plain that the end has come? The professing Church may not see this; the perception and acknowledgment of errors by those who are in them are difficult attainments. Corrupted Churches have always clung with pertinacity to their own inventions; and how shall corrupted Christianity be exempt from so deplorable a failing? It may indeed confess, because it will read in the Scriptures that iniquity will abound, that the love of many will wax cold, and that the day of the Lord will not come unless there come a falling away first; but it will always hesitate to acknowledge that such a period has come upon itself. It will be hard for it to believe that it contains within itself the abomination of desolation, and it is not to be expected that it will pronounce its own condemnation. What, then, is to be done in such a case? When the Church has come to an end, how is it to be informed of that fact? and by what means is a system of pure spiritual theology to be restored and made known to mankind? Doubtless this can be effected only by some providential interposition of the Lord, and in that providence He will fulfil His promise to come again—to come, not by the manifestation of His person in the world, but by unfolding the true light of His Word to men.
The doctrines of a genuine Church are drawn wholly from the Word, and they are intended to teach mankind how to believe wisely concerning God, His kingdom, and Providence; and that they should live in agreement with ​His laws, and thus be virtuous. A Church is corrupted so far as it renounces those heavenly principles; and it is at an end when it accepts the teachings of men in place of the revelation of God. By its "end" we mean the cessation of its light and spiritual vitality; the obscuration of faith in consequence of the paralysis of charity: thus its termination as to essential principles, and not as to outward appearances. A fallen Church may profess itself to be upright and true—it may retain its ceremonies with care, defend its errors with ability, and for centuries mistake a languishing existence for a condition of spiritual health; but such professions and external appearances are no proofs that it has within it the intelligent, living, and acting principles of a pure and unperishable Church. Every Christian believes that the Jewish Church was brought to its end in consequence of the people having rendered the Word of God of none effect by their traditions. Nevertheless we find that it has its professors, synagogues, priests, worship, and institutions, and that it appears to live nearly two thousand years after the departure of its vitality was announced. A Church may exist as to its externals, upon the same principle that sepulchres may appear beautiful without, and yet have within them dead men's bones and all uncleanness. And so a dead Christianity may profess itself to be a living institution, and, as to externals, may continue to exist long after its spiritual principles have departed. Indeed, such circumstances are to be expected, for as the Church in its decline recedes from the influences of Heaven, it will interweave itself with secular interests and so become a worldly establishment. To know its character as a religious institution it is necessary to look at its doctrines as they are taught by its authorities and accepted by the people. A fallen Church becomes a house of creeds which men have ​made, and forgets the garden which God has planted. And is not this a feature of the Church which now prevails? Look at the facts. How plain is it that some deleterious principles have found a place within its pale. It is broken up into nearly a hundred different sects, in each of which is to be found a variety of differing speculations; most concur in declaring their leading doctrines to be inexplicable to reason, and all insist that intellect must be kept in subordination to faith. They all accept the Bible as the rule of faith; and yet which among them knows anything about the laws of its composition, the ground of its inspiration, or in what its holiness consists? The populace are ignorant upon those subjects, and the learned are in fierce contention respecting them. Hence, it is certain they are all destitute of that information concerning the Word which is essential to the existence of a genuine Church.
Observe, also, the fearful animosities which exist between the two great divisions of the professing Church. Protestants, seemingly forgetting their own origin, say that the Catholic dispensation is "the mother of harlots." The Catholic, in return, declares the Protestant to be antichrist; and thus, while exchanging the epithets of recrimination, they obliterate the sentiment of charity, and consign each other to the dwellings of the lost. A similar hostility exists between the Lutheran and Calvinistic branches of the Protestant Church; and a like unhappy spirit underlies every division into which it has been rent.
As before said, all the doctrines which are regarded as the essentials of the Church are asserted to be holy mysteries, if reason ventures to remove the sackcloth in which they are dressed, or to disturb the ashes in which they are imbedded. The tripersonality of the Godhead is said to be incomprehensible, also the atonement, and the means of ​salvation thereby. The communication of grace, the sentiments of faith, the nature of the resurrection, the principles of judement, the joys of heaven, the torments of hell, and the coming of the Lord, are all pronounced to be mysterious things which reason must not dare to handle, or philosophy attempt to touch. Do not these facts prove most convincingly that the dispensation in which they exist has no true intelligence upon the most important subject of revelation? When mystery begins, there is some reason to suspect that truth has ended. Wisdom is one of the chief attributes of a genuine Church; if, then, a Church exists which teaches doctrines that cannot be received among the people as principles of intelligence, the conclusion that it has come to its end, is irresistible. Of what intellectual value is any teaching which the understanding cannot accept? Of what practical use is that which no one is supposed to comprehend? Is it not plain that the Church which has read the Word with these unfavourable results, must either have mistaken its significance or perverted its meaning? in either case its darkness is evident, and its night has come. Surely these facts present a strong and reasonable occasion for the Lord to come again. Their general features include all the details of the narrative which the Lord revealed as the prelude to that event; and, therefore. He who is faithful and true will fulfil His promise, nor can He, under such circumstances, delay His coming.
As, then, it is plain from the Scriptures that the occasion for the second coming of the Lord is to be sought for in the corruptions of the Church which He mercifully founded when He was in the world, it may be equally evident that the purpose of His coming is to execute a final judgment upon it, and, at the same time, to vouchsafe to the world a ​new dispensation of spiritual truth, of which His word should be the fountain. Judgment upon a fallen church is requisite to prepare the way for, and give efficacy to those excellences by which it is to be succeeded. If a judgment had not been executed upon the Jewish economy, Christianity would have had in that which constituted the spiritual life of Judaism, a most formidable hindrance to its progress. It could not have pursued its purpose in light or freedom; but a Divine judgment removed those hindrances from the spiritual world, where they were principally active, and so provided a way for the security of both. Judgment upon the past dispensation, and the providing of light and liberty for that which is to follow, are those things to which the Lord referred when treating of the occasion and purpose of His second coming. What they involve will appear in another chapter. The points to which we have arrived enable us to see that when the light and purity of the Church, which the Lord founded while He was in the world, have been corrupted by the perversities of men. He will come to execute a last judgment upon it, and then, also, that He will open out a new dispensation of spiritual truth for the acceptance of the world.
Now we hold that this corruption has come upon the professing Christian Church, that the purity and light by which it was originally characterised have been extinguished, and consequently that it has come to its end; not, indeed, as to its external form and appearance, but as to that intellectual and spiritual life which is proper to its being. That the present state of the Church is not what it was in apostolic times is commonly admitted. Its simplicity has most certainly departed; the spiritual charity in which it was founded, and the sentiments of enlightened faith by which it was influenced, are now no longer apparent. Its truths ​were soon perverted by the controversies which arose; darkness was created by the subtleties which prevailed, charity was set aside, and creeds were exalted. Councils were called to interpret and decide what was true; they declared that the things of faith were not the subjects of reason, and that belief is sufficient for salvation. In all the creeds which they framed for the acceptance of the Church, there is not a word about charity; in all "the Thirty-nine Articles" there is not one upon the subject; among the Twenty-one Homilies it is only once recognised, and then as a thing of almsgiving. Thus the authoritative documents of the Church have ignored charity as a saving principle; and how, under such a circumstance, could faith exist? Charity is the life of faith; when the fire is extinguished the light goes out. The Lord foretold this condition and end of the Church, when He said, "Because iniquity shall abound, the love of many shall wax cold;" and again, "When the Son of man cometh shall He find faith in the earth?" Those desolating principles which had so long reigned in and bewildered the Church, gradually brought on a condition in the spiritual affairs of Christianity, beyond which it was not permitted them to go. This crisis we believe to have occurred about the middle of the last century. Every one who knows anything concerning the history of that period is aware how utterly destitute the Church was of all spiritual life and heavenly character. The improvements which have since taken place within its pale we believe to have been the results of the new influences which were then provided for. That was the period in which we consider the last judgment to have taken place, and consequently it was then that the second coming of the Lord began.
​Of course we are aware that these will be regarded as extraordinary statements; we concede that they are so; but who can prove that they are not true? That those two uncommon events should have occurred without raising some preternatural commotion in the world, will no doubt be felt by many as contrary to the prejudices which error has created upon those subjects. When, however, it is remembered that the Lord has told us He will come with all the quietude of a thief entering a house, and that in such an hour as ye think not the Son of man cometh, it will be seen that there is some reason to pause before rejecting the view we have now suggested, and about which we shall produce additional evidence in another chapter. Men have been so long taught to expect that those occurrences would be associated with the raising of dead bodies from their graves, the rolling away of the heavens, and setting fire to the earth, that they almost instinctively turn away from any other exposition. But if it is remembered, as we have endeavoured to show, that those are mistaken views of the subjects, that the second coming of the Lord is not to be a personal advent to the natural world, and that the last judgment is a phenomenon of which the spirits of men are to be the subjects, and the world of spirits the scene, the whole matter will put on a more serious aspect, and commend itself to the careful consideration of those who, with a wise heart, are anxious to know what is the true meaning of the Scriptures upon those very sublime and important subjects.
* ↑ Matt. xxiv. 4-14.
* ↑ 1 John ii. 18.
* ↑ 2 Thess. ii. 3.
* ↑ Isa. viii. 14; Rom. ix. 33.
* ↑ Matt. xxiv. 15-27.
* ↑ Matt. xxviii. 18.
* ↑ John xxi. 17.
* ↑ Matt. xxviii. 20.
* ↑ Heb. xiii. 8.
* ↑ John i. 3.
* ↑ Heb. ix. 12.
* ↑ Matt. i. 21.
* ↑ John xiv. 6.
* ↑ John xvi. 24.
* ↑ Heb. i. 6.
* ↑ John xv. 5.
* ↑ Jude 25.
* ↑ 1 Tim. iii. 16.
* ↑ Col. ii. 9.
* ↑ The fourth general council, held at Chalcedon in 455, was the first to offer to the Bishop of Rome the title of Universal Bishop.
* ↑ Matt. xxiv. 44; Luke xii. 40.
* ↑ Matt. xxiv. 38, 39.
* ↑ Matt. xxiv. 12.
* ↑ Luke xviii. 8.
* ↑ Matt. xxiv. 43, 44.