There has been no vision from the Lord.
No dream or interpretation.
No answer by Urim or Thummim.
No Prophet.
No voice.
No sound.
No reproof.
No comforting whisper.
All is silence--stillness--solemn blackness of despair.
All is as the similitude and shadow of death.
Oh the weariness, the painful suspense, the watchings, the wanderings, the anxieties, the pains and sorrows of eighteen centuries! Oh the mist of ages which has shrouded a nation as it were in the gloom of an endless night!
When--O when, will their day dawn, and the day star of their ancient science appear above the horizon, disperse the cloud, and usher in the morning of a brighter day?
_When the times of the Gentiles are fulfilled_.
When they shall welcome a messenger in the name of the Lord.
CHAPTER III.
PROGRESS, DECLINE, AND FINAL LOSS OF THE SCIENCE OF THEOLOGY AMONG THE GENTILES--FORESHADOWINGS OF ITS RESTORATION FOR THE USHERING IN OF THE MILLENNIUM.
Oh Mystic Babel, long has been thy reign!
What direful evils follow in thy train!
The veil is rent--thy mystery revealed, Angels cry wo! and G.o.d thy doom has sealed.
The nations, from thy long and dreary night, Are waking now to everlasting light.
Returning to the Gentile Church, we find the science of Theology, with all its miraculous powers of visions, dreams, angels, revelations, prophecy, healings, &c., everywhere enjoyed. It had abated none of its powers, in its transition from Jew to Gentile. The wild branches, being engrafted into the good old stock, immediately partook of the root and fatness of the tame olive tree, and thus was produced the natural fruit.
But Paul, the great Apostle of the Gentiles, in his writings to the Romans, cautioned them to beware lest they should fall away after the same example as the Jews had done before them.
Said he--"_If G.o.d spared not the natural branches, take heed lest he also spare not thee_."
John the Apostle also predicted the rise and universal sway of a certain mystical power, a Babel of spiritual or religious confusion, in short--"_Mystery, Babylon the great, the mother of harlots and abominations of the earth_."
This power should bear rule among all nations. The kings and rulers of the earth should be drunken with the wine of her fornication. The merchants of the earth should become rich through the abundance of her delicacies.
This power should, according to the Prophet Daniel and the Apostle John, "_wear out the Saints of the Most High_;" "_change times and laws_;" "_be drunken with the blood of the Saints, and with the blood of the martyrs of Jesus_;" "_destroy the mighty and the holy people_;"
"_make war with the Saints, and overcome them_" until a set time.
All these predictions, and many others, foretell the doom of the Gentile Church--its destruction from the earth, and the consequent decline and cessation of the science of Theology, and of its powers and blessings in the Gentile world.
Connected with these predictions, we have the most positive prophetic declarations of Holy Writ concerning the overthrow and entire destruction of this same mystical power, which had made war with the Saints.
Its judgments are set forth as far more terrible than those which befell Jerusalem. Plague, pestilence, sword, earthquake, and the flame of devouring fire will cause her to cease to be.
Then will usher in the kingdom of our G.o.d, and the power of His Christ. Then will the Saints of the Most High take the kingdom, and the greatness of the kingdom under the whole heaven.
Thus are to be revived the ancient powers and blessings, the knowledge and wisdom, of the science of Theology.
In the fulfilment of the foregoing predictions, the science of Theology declined, and pa.s.sed away from among the Gentiles, just in proportion as the Church, or the Saints of the Most High, were warred against and overcome.
For years, centuries, ages, there has been no voice from heaven among the Gentiles, any more than among the Jews. They have fallen "_after the same example of unbelief_," notwithstanding the caution of their great Apostle.
No Gentile Prophet has arisen and uttered his voice.
No kind angel has ministered to them.
No vision from the Lord.
No answer.
No inspired dream.
No voice.
No sound from the heavens.
No revelation has burst upon the silence of midnight darkness which has brooded over the nations.
Or, if such voice, such vision, such Prophet has occasionally burst forth with the testimony of Jesus, the spirit of prophecy, his testimony has been unheeded by the ma.s.s of the people called Christians, his voice silenced in death, or himself and his followers have been banished from society, to wander in the mountains, forests, caves, or deserts of the earth; or, on the other hand, compelled to drag out an existence in the solitude of the dungeon.
Ages, centuries have pa.s.sed, and Oh! what suffering! what torture!
what rivers of tears! what oceans of blood! what groanings! what strong crying and tears on the earth! what prayers in heaven!
"How long, O Lord, holy and true, dost thou not judge and avenge our blood, on them that dwell on the earth?"
The fire consumed.
The sword devoured.
h.e.l.l"s artillery bellowed.
Devils hugely grinned.
Widows and orphans mourned.