THE TERMINATION OF THE PROPHETIC TIMES.
“As might be expected, as the crisis, the 21st of March, approached, there was a very general expectation of an entire overthrow of the whole system of Adventism. It was supposed that those who had embraced it, if the appointed time should pass, would yield the whole question. But they had not so learned the Bible. The doctrine does not consist in merely tracing prophetic periods, although that is an important part of the work. But the whole prophetic history of the world is given in the pages of inspiration, is recorded in history, and affords indubitable evidence of the fact, that we have approached a crisis. And no disappointment respecting a definite point of time can move them, or drive them from their position relative to the speedy coming of the Lord. And it yet remains to be shown that our calculations of time are not correct, and are only in error relative to the event which marked its close. This is the most likely. There are, at present, some who falter, but comparatively few, however, who have given up the cause. Most stand unmoved amidst all the scoffs and jeers of a reviling world.”
MODES OF OPPOSITION.
“It has usually been the fact that, as soon as the doctrine of the Lord’s speedy coming has been presented in any place, the clergy, in the course of one or two weeks, would begin their attacks from the pulpit. The usual argument has been—
“1. ‘Of that day and hour knoweth no man;’ yet these men profess to know the very time when the Lord is to come. Yes, they profess to know more than the angels, or even the Son of God himself.
“2. The Lord cannot come until after the millennium, during which the whole world is to be righteous, and the lion eat straw like the ox, &c.
“3. The Jews must be brought in, and restored to Palestine, before that day comes.
“4. It is to come as a thief, as a snare, &c., on all them that dwell on the earth. But now there are so many who are looking for it, that it cannot come as a snare.