"3. Christianity is to be greatly intensified in power. It is to bring those who are subject to it to a higher plane of experience children of pious parents are to grow up into Christ from birth," &c.

The word of God teaches the direct reverse of this. In answering the question, "What shall be the sign of thy Parousia, and of the end of the age?" Christ said (Matt. 24: 13, 14), "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, . . . . and then shall the end come." This has little appearance of "intensified power" in Christianity. But perhaps I ought to say that Dr. Warren contends that this passage relates to the times of Nero's persecutions. If so, neither Christ, or his apostles uttered anything to give a brighter aspect to the state of things in the church at any subsequent period. As to children-the latest prediction we have concerning them is found in 2 Tim. 3: "Proud, blasphemers, disobedient to parents, unthankful, unholy, without natural affection," &c. If this is not true now, what mean our constantly multiplying reform schools for juveniles whose parents cannot control them? Neither Scripture nor facts warrant any such conclusions as the Doctor has stated above.

Again he says, p. 169:

"The earth itself is to be regenerated morally and physically, the latter through the former. God is going to make new heavens and a new earth, but he will do it not by sudden miracle, but by the hands of the renewed and sanctified inhabitants of the earth. He is to be in the hearts of men as the new Creator who makes all things new. It is thus that his tabernacle is to be with them, and he will dwell with them, and they shall be his people, and God himself shall be with them and be their God. And God himself shall wipe away all tears from their eyes ; and there shall be no more death.”

And all this in a world of mortality and death, where human beings are born and die! "Neither sorrow nor crying, neither shall there be any more pain, for the former things are passed away." And all this to be done by human hands, "not by sudden miracle ! "

After reading all this and much more, I much prefer resting my faith on 2 Peter, third chapter, in its plain and obvious sense.

CHAPTER XII.

>

Dr. Warren commences this theme by quoting 1 Cor. 15: 24-26, "Then cometh the end," &c. On this pas

sage he

says:

...

"The word end. . . . may signify either the termination of a thing, or its consummation, that in which it eventuates: Matt. 26:28, Peter went in to see the end,' i.e., the result, or outcome of the proceedings. I take it that this is the meaning of the word in this place as denoting the issue or consummation of Christ's reign as king."-Parousia, p. 271.

If Dr. Warren will examine the passage a little more critically he will see that the subject of the remark is the order of the resurrection, and relates to the termination of the resurrection: "For since by man

came

death, by For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be Imade alive. But every one in his own order [tagma,— appointed succession]: Christ the first fruits; afterward they that are Christ's at his parousia; then cometh the

man came also the resurrection of the dead.

end."

The text demands the resurrection of all who died

in Adam, which embraces all Adam's children. The first Order of the resurrection was

the

"Christ the first fruits;" next order or succession will be, "they that are i.e., all who have his Spirit, "for if any man not the Spirit of Christ he is none of his."

Christ's

have

(121)

None

of the wicked, therefore, have part in this order: they are left for the next order, which will transpire at the time of Christ's delivering up of the recovered kingdom to his Father, the rebellion being put down, all opposing power overthrown, and all the earth bearing true allegiance to God the Father and his Son Jesus Christ, the appointed and eternal king over all the earth. All attempts to evade the force of this passage as teaching two distinct orders of the resurrection, are abortive. Admit the divine authority of the text, and we are compelled to believe that the wicked will have a resurrection order of their own, at which time the office of death will be at an end, for there will then be no more human beings for him to hold in his grasp.

If Dr. Warren is aiming his blows at pre-millennialists to prove that Christ's surrender of the kingdom to the Father, is held by them as terminating his reign over the kingdom he has purchased with his blood and redeemed by his power, he has labored in vain and spent his strength for naught. For they believe his reign will be just as Gabriel assured Mary-“ Of his kingdom there shall be no end," and as the heavenly voices proclaim at the sounding of the seventh trumpet: "The kingdoms of this world are become the kingdoms of our Lord and of his Christ and he shall reign forever and ever."-Rev. 11: 15.

True, they believe he will reign with his resurrected saints a thousand years before "the end" of the resurrection comes by raising the wicked, and casting all enemies into "the lake of fire-the second death." That they hold that Christ's reign will ever end, would be a most unjust imputation. If Dr. Hodge held and taught

such a doctrine, let him bear the responsibility. But in behalf of pre-millennialists, I repudiate the thought.

PERPETUITY OF THE KINGDOM.

I am happy at last to find a theme on which I am in accord with Dr. Warren-and that is, that Christ's kingdom on earth will have no end. On this point the Doctor is eminently strong and emphatic; and his array of witnesses multitudinous.

The wonder is, that taking all these texts as he seems to do, in their plain and obvious sense, he has not discovered and owned that they require the presence of the man Christ Jesus, the Son of David according to the flesh, to return again to earth to receive "the throne of his father David and reign over the house of Jacob forever." For he must see that the throne of God on which for a season he is now set down, is not now, never was, nor will it ever be, the throne of David.

And really, I begin to hope that as he proceeded he

inclined more

and more to that idea.

He quotes with

seeming approval the following from "Pressel as quoted by Geikie" (Parousia, p. 175):

666

of God, thou Bethlehem amongst the princely cities of the Earth, thou grain of sand on the shores of the universe heavens; thou art and remainest the loved one amongst ten thousand suns and worlds, the chosen of God.' [Reader, at

tend.]

6 Thee

a throne for him, as then thou gavest him a manger cradle. his

will he again visit, and then thou wilt prepare

blood and tears, and mourn his death. On thee has the Lord a great work to complete !'''

To

this I respond most heartily, Amen and Amen.

With this quotation I leave his argument on the etermal perpetuity of Christ's throne on earth, lest by quot

ing more,

the fair picture just drawn should be defaced.