Vermont telegraph. [volume] (Brandon [Vt.]) 1828-1843, 1838-01-31

day Of salvation" Heb. viii, 81 Behold
the days come, saith the Lord" Luke
xvii, %: The days will come when yeI
shall desire to see one of the days of the
Son of man," &c. &c. g..
Now as the foregoing terms are used TO
express unequal periods Of time, and as
the same terms, underlined, are used by
Daniel and John; and as we have no rule
by which to determine their length, other
than to compare scripture with scripture, !
must conclude, that Infinite Wisdom, did
not design aOe should know The precise
time specified by them.
3. There is no ostensible reason why God
should reveal the time of the end" or the
end of the world" any more than the
length of our lives. would, by no means.
make reason tantamount TO revelation; but
where this leaves, that may assist There
is nothing more solemn, or awful, or inn
portant, to US, in the dissolution of arorld
than the dissolution of the body. Both
carry Us directly before God, and fix our
eternal state. Nothing is more calculated
to lead us to present preparation for an
event, than to have it certain uncertainty,
i. e., the erent sure but the time not k,ao1cr.
What more often startles the giddy youth,
and brings him to seriousness, than the
thought that, 81 am walking on the line
between two worlds, and the next moment
may find me in either, IknoaO not 1rhich"
Did we firmly believe, (as we ought,) that
, the next morning sun is as likely as ann
other, to rise eclipsed with the brightness of
ChriSt's coming, could we rest easy with
out a well-grounded hope in him? No
more so, than the man who deeply feels
that death may be at the door, consider
that God, in infinite qoisdom has shut US up
= In an awful uncertainty about death; and |
a see no less of that wisdom, in leaving the
! time Of the end" unknown to finite be-
d lngs. How much force would there be 10
y an exhortation to the young, to attend to
i the concerns of their souls, from consid-
4 Grafton of death, if each knew he should
:, live to be fourscore years old? An exhort-
n alton, enforced by such a consideration,
II would have but little influence, until they
u bad passed their " threescore years and ten
e Just so, if your theory be correct, and the
time of Christ's second coming has been,
or might have been known to be 1943, then
. any exhortatlon, enforced by this eV ent
would have been powerless for nearly 1905
years past,-because all would have seen
fbo; L
d fore that time arrived. But, on the princi
Is pie that this time is not, nor ever has beer
a known to mortals, then an exhortation, thu;
il. enforced, would have been pertinent anc
l. welghty, at any time within that period.
E. 4. The apostles give evidence by Mei'
le writings that they did not knoU the time
I'd Paul, in his first epistle to the Thess. iv
III Is, Is, II: "For this we say unto you BY
as the word of the Lord, that we which ar
v alive, and remain unto the coming of tn
r. Lord, shall not prevent them which ar
.;s asleep. For the Lord himself shall descen
~. from heaven with shout, with the voice c
49, the archangel, and with the trump of God
! and the dead in Christ shall rise first :
Then we which are alive and reman, sha
be caught up together with them in tn
II clouds, to meet the Lord in the air: and S
ar shall we ever be with the Lord" Also
ne Cor. XIV, 81, 50: "Behold, l will shew yo
Ter a mystery: We shall not all sleep, but W
a shall all be changed, In a moment, In tt
os twinkling Of an eye, at the last trump; Fl
ley the trumpet shall sound, and the dead sha
Der be raised incorruptib!e, and we shall
we changed" How could the apostle, consis
DIV emily, have used such language, if he h;
50 known that the "trump" would not sour
ds, for nearly 1900 years? Did he and h
hat brethren expect to live so long? If nc
,oo how could he say, "then aoe which a
~ alive, and remain 2" &c. But if he did n
Tho kroo1p the time, if his blessed Master h;
~ 7 only informed him Of the event, and cor
int manded him and other disciples to be read
Ike, without telling him the time, then the ape
ing tie could with propriety convey the i'd
of that it might be in his day. See also Tit
and ii, 10: "Looking for that blessed hope, al
he the glorious appearing of the great God a
rec our Savior Jesus Christ" Paul, then, W
be looking for the glorious appearing of
out Savior" and exhorted Titus to look for
lot and TO enjoin it upon his brethren to do t
the same. Again, Peter says, in his I'd epist
orty iii, 10-l4: "But the day Of the Lord W
rev. come as thief in the night in the viii
ans the heavens shall pass away with gr
as noise, and the elements shall melt with (
oof' vent heat; the earth also, and the wo
here that are therein, shall be burnt up. Seei
then that all these things shall be dissolv
ex- what manner of persons ought ye TO be