And the Lord shall cause his glorious voice to be heard, and shall shew the lighting down of his arm, with the indignation of his anger, and with the flame of a devouring fire, with scattering, and tempest, and hail-stones. For through the voice of the Lord shall the Assyrian be beaten down, which smote with a rod. And he will punish the world for their evil, and the wicked for their iniquity, and will cause the arrogancy of the proud to cease, and will lay low the haughtiness of the terrible." This is the day when "the Lord shall set his hand the second time to recover the remnant of his people which are left, from Assyria, and from Egypt, and from Pathros, and from Cush, and from Elam, and from Shinar, and from Hamath, and from the islands of the sea....And there shall be an highway, for the remnant of his people which shall be left, from Assyria, like as it was to Israel in the day that he came up out of the land of Egypt.” (Isai. xi.) "In that day shall there be an highway out of Egypt to Assyria; and the Assyrian shall come into Egypt, and the Egyptian into Assyria; and the Egyptians shall serve with the Assyrians. In that day shall Israel be the third with Egypt and with Assyria, even a blessing in the midst of the land: whom the Lord of hosts shall bless, saying, Blessed be EGYPT my people, and ASSYRIA the work of mine hands, and ISRAEL mine inheritance." (Isai. xix.) And in that day shall the merchandise and the hire of Tyre be "holiness to the Lord; it shall not be treasured nor laid up; for her merchandise shall be for them that dwell before the Lord, to eat sufficiently, and for durable clothing." (Isai. xxiii.) "And the Lord shall be King over all the earth. In that day shall there be one Lord, and his name one....And it shall come to pass, that every one that is left, of all the nations which came against Jerusalem, shall even go up from year to year to worship the King the Lord of hosts, and to keep the feast of tabernacles....and in that day there shall be no more the Canaanite (merchant) in the house of the Lord." (Zech. xiv. 9, 16, 21.)

These passages we have put together, to shew that, when the Lord shall rise and set to his hand the second time to deliver Israel, he shall at that time destroy the apostates and rebels, and by these acts of judgment convert the careless and the ignorant. The context of these passages, and still more a turning to the marginal references in the English Bible, will demonstrate that the judgments then executed will be universal, simultaneous, complete, and final. See especially Ezek. xxx. xxxi. xxxii.

They further demonstrate, that the sins which bring down the judgments of God consist in their having perverted the good gifts of Providence, and turned them to idolatry; and that these very gifts, which they turned to sin, shall be turned to service, and consecrated to the Lord God (see Hosea ii. 8-20). And

they require, that, as the fulfilment of the promises to Israel are, from the terms, tied and bound indissolubly to the Jewish people, so the contemporaneous burdens or blessings upon Assyria, Egypt, and Tyre, must find their accomplishment in other people existent at that time; and as Assyria, Egypt, and Tyre, no longer subsist as distinct peoples now, we must find three classes of men to whom the characteristics of Assyria, Egypt, and Tyre will apply; and these are, the wealthy, the scientific, and the commercial, in a good sense-the covetous, the sceptical, and the worldly, in a sinful sense. The Papacy, as Babylon, has long stood the exponent of a professing church become idolatrous of wealth, which has, in fact, led to all her other sins and abominations. The idolatry of science is specially the sin of modern times, and is not confined to one country, or one form of religion, but pervades all; and this is indicated in Scripture by the scattering of the Egyptians into all countries, and by all the heathen coming into judgment at the same time; and it is shewn to pervade even Assyria, by the identification of both in Ezek. xxxi.; by the same signs accompanying their destruction, Ezek. xxxii. 7, 8, Isai. xiii. 10, Joel iii. 15, Matt. xxiv. 29; and by their united service after conversion, Isai. xix. 23. The idolatry of commerce is chiefly found in England, the antitype of Tyre; in whom also will be found in the last times the idolatry of wealth and of science; which explains why the judgments on Tyre are given in the same terms as those on Babylon, Ezek. xxix. 30-36; Rev. xviii. 9—19. The individual, too, under whom the last confederacy against the Lord and his Christ is gathered, is described both under the characters of Pharaoh and the Assyrian, both as Leviathan and the Dragon, as uniting in the one person of the last antichrist all the antichristian principles which have severally appeared in different ages, and so shall bring down the accumulated judgments of God upon this generation of men, as was shewn out at large in the commentary on the epistle to the church of Philadelphia in our last Number (Vol. IV. pp. 255-273).

In the Apocalypse the very same lesson is taught by symbols; where the last beast, who is cast alive into the lake of fire, is attended by a false prophet, who wrought miracles before him (xix. 20). Now this false prophet is the second beast of xiii. 11, having two horns like a lamb, and who spake as a dragon; the two horns pointing to the little horns of the Papacy and of Mo hammed (Dan. vii. viii.) which he will unite; as the beast, before whom he doth wonders, shall unite both the Eastern and Western Empire. It is this false prophet, who is the lamb-like beast coming up quietly out of the earth, and stealthily attaining the exercise of all the power of the first beast whose deadly wound was healed, which re-constitutes Imperial Rome, or Ba

bylon. This power is acquired through sorceries addressed to the intellect of men idolatrous of knowledge and science: " He doeth great wonders, and deceiveth them that dwell on the earth by means of those miracles:" like the magicians of Egypt turned to the service of the Assyrian (2 Tim. iii. 8). And he also makes an image of the beast-namely, Imperial Rome-for all men to worship; like the golden image of Nebuchadnezzar, after he had been enriched by the plunder of Egypt and all the nations of the earth. And the merchant character of Tyre is indicated in the same context (Rev. xiii. 17), by the buying and selling; and shewn to have pervaded the whole of Babylon in the merchants of the earth weeping over her fall (xviii. 11–15).

The Antichrist will combine in his person the characters of the false prophet, the Assyrian, and Pharaoh; and he will be idolized by the covetous, the knowing, and the trading, among the low; by the wealthy, the scientific, and the commercial, among the higher classes; and, if we class them morally, by the superstitious, the despotic, and the unbelieving or radical. The "image of the beast," "the beast," and "the mark of the beast," are not to be regarded as different objects, but as different symbols to express the complex character of the one object, the personal Antichrist. The same complexity of character is expressed in Rev. xvii. by the complex symbol of a woman riding upon a beast, decked with gold and precious stones, and full of names of blasphemy; to whom the ten kings give their power and strength, though they hate the woman. This symbol shews Antichrist completed and arrayed in all the power and splendour of the heavens and earth which now are, contending against the Lamb and his followers, against Christ and his saints, arrayed in all the power and splendour of the new heavens and the new earth about to be; the prince of this world and his hosts, marshalled against the world to come. As the kingdom of heaven came not with observation, so the kingdom of Antichrist shall begin without observation; he with the horns of a lamb, beginning with signs and wonders, till, deceiving the nations, he exerciseth all the power of the first beast; the old Roman dragon and his hosts, gathered by three unclean spirits like frogs, till the beast and the kings of the earth and their armies are gathered to make war with the King of kings and Lord of lords. These gathered hosts are worshippers of the beast, or of the image, which includes the superstitious and despotic classes, or they receive the mark of the beast, which denotes the third, or unbelieving class. The last beast will appear to possess spiritual and temporal authority, and will be therefore idolized by those who have any reverence for authority; but the third and probably largest class, the unbelievers, will own no object of worship, and these receive the mark of the beast in their forehead,

:

or in their right hand they heartily forward his cause with head and with hand; they devote their talents and their services to Antichrist, and turn the forehead of scorn and the right hand of persecution upon Christ and his followers: these have the mark of the beast, and are called by his name, and are numbered among his followers. On the Number of the Beast we are promised a paper, to demonstrate that each apostasy, and each oppressor of the church, has a name to which the number is a key, and that it is also a marked chronological period in the history of each. AareVos and " have long been known as the Roman beast; but the Eastern false prophet and king, Mohammed (), Pharaoh (WN), Egypt (Meopaiμos), and the ruler of Tyre ( ), do all make up the number 666. These characteristics of the followers of Antichrist, and the order in which they are declared to shew themselves in him and in his followers, may both put us upon our guard against his first seductions, and teach us to look for the corresponding reality in Christ, which Antichrist will be instigated by Satan to counterfeit. When all is going on to his wish, Satan is quiet; when he begins to stir we may infer that it is to frustrate some work which threatens him. Christ no sooner began his ministry than Satan tempted him with all his power: when Moses began to shew wonders from the Lord, the Egyptian magicians did so with their enchantments: and as Jannes and Jambres withstood Moses, so shall those in the last days resist the truth. The first rise of Antichrist in person is out of the system of the Papacy, which is truly Antichristian, and has all the characteristics of Antichrist, so far as they can be embodied in a system. The abominations and blasphemies of that system, flowing from the great red dragon as their head, and seated at Rome as their metropolis, are considered as continuous through the whole Gospel dispensation, a stream of death running parallel with the waters of life. But when Christ begins to give signs of his approach to gather his saints, Satan, by counterfeiting these signs, endeavours to defeat the work; and when Christ shall really appear, Satan will counterfeit even this, and shall reveal in the human form "that man of sin, the son of perdition, who opposeth and exalteth himself above all that is called God, or that is worshipped; so that he, as God, sitteth in the temple of God, shewing himself that he is God-even him whose coming is after the working of Satan, with all power, and signs, and lying wonders, and with all deceivableness of unrighteousness in them that perish, because they received not the love of the truth that they might be saved."

All the antichristian principles exhibited, separately and at different times in the Papacy, shall be concentrated on one individual, impersonated in that "wicked one whom the Lord

shall consume with the Spirit of his mouth, and destroy with the brightness of his coming." But, short as will be the career of Antichrist, there must of necessity be progressive stages of his revelation, corresponding with the successive revelations of the kingdom of Christ; and they are these. Christ has been for many years preparing his people to expect him by proclaiming the Gospel of the kingdom: Satan has for years been sending forth heralds of Antichrist, to tell mankind that perfection of every kind is in their own power, and attainable by their own strength; and that science is bringing about the only true Millennium, when all mankind shall be equal, and content to be so. Christ is now adorning his bride with all the gifts and graces of the Spirit, in preparation for his coming and the day of her espousals: and Satan has begun to put forth his lying wonders, which prepare the way for the revelation of the man of sin and his synagogue of Satan; whose emblem is contained in Rev. xvii., not so much the counterfeit as the mockery of the heavenly ministry of Christ and his bride. The work now begun is the work of separation in spirit and character, to prepare for separation in place and in employment, which is about to be manifested in the wheat and in the tares : the wheat, which gives kindly reception to the latter rain (Joel ii. 23), shall be gathered into the barn, for the Master's use; and the tares, on which the dews of heaven descend in vain, which continue only chaff still, shall be left on the field and be burnt with fire unquenchable. The instructions and warnings proper to the church of the first-born go no further than the time of which we are speaking, the very time at which we are now writing; the first resurrection for the dead and the translation for the living being the hope continually set before her, of which we may daily expect the accomplishment. But should any true grains of wheat shew such backwardness as to be scarcely distinguishable from the tares, or be so entangled with them as to be left upon the field, such foolish virgins, such foolish builders, shall be exposed to the rage of Antichrist, and most generally atone for their folly by the most cruel martyrdom; they shall glorify the Lord in the fires, (Isaiah xxiv.) or, if they are saved, it shall be "so as by fire ;" they shall be " as the shaking of an olive-tree, and as the gleaning grapes when the vintage is done; two or three berries in the top of the uppermost bough, four or five in the outmost fruitful branches thereof."

The lamb-like horns of Antichrist are now beginning to bud; the "great wonders and miracles" by which he shall deceive them that dwell on the earth, already appear; and now is the time for the followers of Christ to TAKE HEED, for the false miracles shall be so very like the true, as to deceive, if it were possible, the very elect. As soon as the sifting time, now begun,