It’s no fun to be a nun!!

A must reading!

Today when mysticism is creeping in to the churches, we should be aware of the stratagems of Satan!

The Ecumenical, Charismatic movement embracing mystic teaching`s (Gnosticism) and corrupt the mind`s of the unawares!

The Charismatic movement hosting many false, corruptive teachings, as gnosticism, you are little god`s, angel worship`s, similaries of hindu teaching, Buddism, creative (positive) thinking, etc. They have a short theology and a long tail!

Todays Ecumenical, Charismatic movements have the same sources and show a corrupt teaching and occult mass invasion among the many fallen away churches, as they now embraces the pagan Catholic “church” and her mystic teaching`s! ! The mother church (The Great Whore) and her daughter`s, (offspring, descendant, successor, inheritor, legatee, recipient, beneficiary)

It’s no fun to be a nun!!

-- Luther rescued this beautiful flower from the gloomy, concealed life of a convent because he knew that it was no fun to be a nun. --

Young girls were enticed to enter the convent thinking that they could escape from the corrupt world and become brides of Christ. Imagine their horror when they discovered that they were required to become priests' lovers and bear their children. Of course escape was impossible and many died horrible deaths within the gloomy walls of the convent.

The blessed Reformation ended that nightmare in England and Germany.
Saint Martin was very reluctant to marry because of his precarious existence as an outlaw under the Ban of the Empire. Any day he expected to be arrested and burned alive.

He found husbands for all the rescued nuns except Saint Katharina. Saint Katharina would have no husband except Saint Martin and so they were united in holy matrimony.

Luther rescued this beautiful flower from the gloomy, concealed life of a convent because he knew that it was no fun to be a nun. She became his wife in 1525; was a real helper in the work of the Reformation, and became a joyful mother of 4 children.
Go to: http://www.reformation.org/luther.html

IT`S NO FUN TO BE A NUN!!

http://www.reformation.org/maria-monk.html

AWFUL DISCLOSURES, BY MARIA MONK, OF THE HOTEL DIEU NUNNERY OF MONTREAL

The war on Convent terror continues!!

IT"S NO FUN TO BE A NUN!!

Preface

I T was over a hundred years ago—in 1835—that Maria Monk, making her way from Canada to New York, startled the world with her "awful disclosures" of life in a Convent and, since that time, controversy has raged over her story. It was, of course, only to be expected that its publication would immediately be followed by the denials of the people concerned in it. Virulent attacks were made upon the book and every effort was made to destroy public confidence in the character of its author.

Maria Monk, however, refused to be shaken in her testimony, and steadfastly avowed the truth of what she had written. To those who doubted or disbelieved her statements she made the following challenge.

"Permit me," she said, "to go through the Hotel Dieu Nunnery at Montreal with some impartial ladies and gentlemen, and they may compare my account with the interior parts of the building, into which no other persons but the Roman Bishop and Priests are ever admitted; and if they do not find my description true, then discard me as an impostor. Bring me before a court of justice—there I am willing to meet Latargue, Duireme, Phelan, Bonin and Richards, and their wicked companions, and the Superior and any of the Nuns before a thousand men."

The attacks made upon her veracity, as well as the recollection of what she had undergone, distressed and agitated her, and she threw herself upon the sympathy of the public for being an unwilling participant in the guilty transactions which she described. At the time of penning her manuscript, she had no means of telling what the publication of her disclosures would mean. Before the manuscript was published, she submitted herself to examination by several intelligent, disinterested persons, who satisfied themselves that the allegations she made were true.

The newspapers took sides both for and against her. One New York Catholic paper even went so far as to propose that the publishers should be lynched. Anonymous handbills were circulated, declaring the work to be a libel, inspired by Protestant Clergymen. Affidavits were published in some newspapers, tending to undermine her character.

Maria, however, found stalwart friends, who upheld her veracity, and she continued to refute the allegations made against her by her attackers, and continually called for those who would confirm the truth of her story to be produced; for, as she stated, there were living witnesses who ought to be made to speak, without fear of penances, torture or death, and she lived in the hope that the testimony of these witnesses would be eventually allowed to confirm her statements.

At the same time, she expressed her doubts as to whether those witnesses had been allowed to live after the Priests and the Superior had seen her book. She was tormented with the possibility that the wretched Nuns in their cells had already suffered for her sake, and that Jane Ray, who figures prominently in the disclosures, had been silenced for ever, or would be murdered before she would be able to add her important testimony to Maria's

This book has stood the test of time. For over a hundred years it has been a best seller. Its author could surely not have foreseen the tremendous circulation which her words would eventually achieve. She herself died in 1850, her later years clouded over by the recollection of the deeds that had happened in her unfortunate life. But she died resigned, for death had come as a relief from the misery which had dogged her footsteps through life. As she herself stated

”Speedy death in relation to this world can be no great calamity to those who lead the life of a Nun. The mere recollection of it always makes me miserable. It would distress the reader should I repeat the dreams with which I am so often terrified at night, for I sometimes fancy myself present at the repetition of the worst scenes that I have hinted at or described. Sometimes I stand by the secret place of interment in the cellar; sometimes I think I can hear the shrieks of the helpless women in the hands of wicked men and sometimes seem actually to look again upon the calm and placid features of St. Francis as she appeared when surrounded by her murderers.

”I cannot banish the scenes and characters of this book from my memory. To me, it can never be like an amusing fable, or lose its interest and importance. The story is one which is continually before me, and must return fresh to my mind with painful emotions as long as I live. With time and Christian instruction, and the sympathy and examples of the wise and the good, I hope to learn submissively; to bear whatever trials are appointed me, and to improve under them all."

In preparing this new edition, nothing has been taken from or added to the terrible story which Maria Monk's pen has written. Some of her more archaic and outmoded phrases have been replaced by more modern expressions ; the intention being to render the work more readable to the average person. Care has also been taken to select attractive and readable type. But her damning indictment of the hidden secrets of a Nun's life in a Convent remains stark and vivid in its intensity.

---The Superior now informed me, that having taken the black veil, it only remained that I should swear the three oaths customary on becoming a nun; and that some explanations would be necessary from her. I was now, she told me, to have access to every part of the edifice, even to the cellar, where two of the sisters were imprisoned for causes which she did not mention. I must be informed, that one of my great duties was, to obey the priests in all things; and this I soon learnt, to my utter astonishment and horror, was to live in the practice of criminal intercourse with them. I expressed some of the feelings which this announcement excited in me, which came upon me like a flash of lightning, but the only effect was to set her arguing with me in favour of the crime, representing it as a virtue acceptable to God, and honourable to me. The priests, she said, were not situated like other men, being forbidden to marry; while they lived secluded, laborious, and self-denying lives for our salvation. They might, indeed, be considered our saviours, as without their services we could not obtain the pardon of sin, and must go to hell. Now, it was our solemn duty, on withdrawing from the world, to consecrate our lives to religion, to practise every species of self-denial. We could not become too humble, nor mortify our feelings too far; this was to be done by opposing them, and acting contrary to them; and what she proposed was, therefore, pleasing in the sight of God. I now felt how foolish I had been to place myself in the power of such persons as were around me. From what she said I could draw no other conclusion, but that I was required to act like the most abandoned of beings, and that all my future associates were habitually guilty of the most heinous and detestable crimes. When I repeated my expressions of surprise and horror, she told me that such feelings were very common at first, and that many other nuns had expressed themselves as I did, who had since changed their minds. She even said, that on her entrance into the nunnery, she had felt like me.

Doubts, she declared, were among our greatest enemies. They would lead us to question every point of duty, and induce us to waver at every step. They arose only from remaining imperfection, and were always evidence of sin. Our only way was to dismiss them immediately, repent, and confess them. They were deadly sins, and would condemn us to hell, if we should die without confessing them. Priests, she insisted, could not sin. It was a thing impossible. Every thing that they did, and wished, was of course right. She hoped I would see the reasonableness and duty of the oaths I was to take, and be faithful to them.

She gave me another piece of information which excited other feelings in me, scarcely less dreadful. Infants were sometimes born in the convent: but they were always baptized and immediately strangled! This secured their everlasting happiness; for the baptism purified them from all sinfulness. and being sent out of the world before they had time to do any thing wrong, they were at once admitted into heaven. How happy, she exclaimed, are those who secure immortal happiness to such little beings! Their little souls would thank those who kill their bodies, if they had it in their power. Into what a place and among what society had I been admitted! How differently did a Convent now appear from what I had supposed it to be! The holy women I had always fancied the nuns to be, the venerable Lady Superior, what were they? And the priests of the Seminary adjoining, some of whom indeed I had had reason to think were base and profligate men, what were they all? I now learnt they were often admitted into the nunnery, and allowed to indulge in the greatest crimes, which they and others called virtues. After having listened for some time to the Superior alone, a number of the nuns were admitted, and took a free part in the conversation. They concurred in every thing which she had told me, and repeated, without any signs of shame or compunction, things which criminated themselves. I must acknowledge the truth, and declare that all this had an effect upon my mind. I questioned whether I might not be in the wrong, and felt as if their reasoning might have some just foundation. I had been several years under the tuition of Catholics, and was ignorant of the Scriptures, and unaccustomed to the society, example, and conversation of Protestants; had not heard any appeal to the Bible as authority, but had been taught, both by precept and example, to receive as truth every thing said by the priests. I had not heard their authority questioned, nor any thing said of any other standard of faith but their declarations. I had long been familiar with the corrupt and licentious expressions which some of them use at confessions, and believed that other women were also. I had no standard of duty to refer to, and no judgment of my own which I knew how to use, or thought of using.

All around me insisted that my doubts proved only my own ignorance and sinfulness; that they knew by experience they would soon give place to true knowledge, and an advance in religion; and I felt something like indecision. ---

--- One point, on which we received frequent and particular instructions was, the nature of falsehoods. On this subject I have heard many a speech, I had almost said many a sermon; and I was led to believe that it was one of great importance, one on which it was a duty to be well informed, as well as to act. "What!" exclaimed a priest one day--"what, a nun of your age, and not know the difference between a wicked and a religious lie!"

He then went on, as had been done many times previously in my hearing, to show the essential difference between the two different kinds of falsehoods. A lie told merely for the injury of another, for our own interest alone, or for no object at all, he painted as a sin worthy of penance. But a lie told for the good of the church or Convent, was meritorious, and of course the telling of it a duty. And of this class of lies there were many varieties and shades. This doctrine has been inculcated on me and my companions in the nunnery, more times than I can enumerate; and to say that it was generally received, would be to tell a part of the truth. We often saw the practice of it, and were frequently made to take part in it. Whenever anything which the Superior thought important, could be most conveniently accomplished by falsehood, she resorted to it without scruple...

There was a class of cases in which she more frequently relied on deception than any other. The friends of novices frequently applied at the Convent to see them, or at least to inquire after their welfare. It was common for them to be politely refused an interview, on some account or other, generally a mere pretext; and then the Superior usually sought to make as favourable an impression as possible on the visiters. Sometimes she would make up a story on the spot, and tell the strangers; requiring some of us to confirm it, in the most convincing way we could.

At other times she would prefer to make over to us the task of deceiving, and we were commended in proportion to our ingenuity and success.

Some nun usually showed her submission, by immediately stepping forward. She would then add, perhaps, that the parents of such a novice, whom she named, were in waiting, and it was necessary that they should be told such, and such, and such things. To perform so difficult a task well, was considered a difficult duty, and it was one of the most certain ways to gain the favour of the Superior. Whoever volunteered to make a story on the spot, was sent immediately to tell it, and the other nuns present were hurried off with her under strict injunctions to uphold her, in every thing she might state. The Superior, as there was every reason to believe, on all such occasions, when she did not herself appear, hastened to the apartment adjoining that in which the nuns were going, there to listen through the thin partition, to hear whether all performed their parts aright. It was not uncommon for her to go rather further, when she wanted time to give such explanations as she could have desired. She would then enter abruptly, ask, "Who can tell a good story this morning?" and hurry us off without a moment's delay, to do our best at a venture, without waiting for instructions. It would be curious, could a stranger from "the wicked world" outside the Convent witness such a scene. One of the nuns, who felt in a favourable humour to undertake the proposed task, would step promptly forward, and signify her readiness in the usual way: by a knowing wink of one eye, and a alight toss of the head.

"Well, go and do the best you can," the Superior would say; "and all the rest of you must mind and swear to it." The latter part of the order, at least, was always performed; for in every such case, all the nuns present appeared as unanimous witnesses of every thing that was uttered by the spokesmen of the day.

We were constantly hearing it repeated, that we must never again look upon ourselves as our own; but must remember, that we were solemnly and irrevocably devoted to God. Whatever was required of us, we were called upon to yield under the most solemn considerations. I cannot speak on every particular with equal freedom; but I wish my readers clearly to understand the condition in which we were placed, and the means used to reduce us to what we had to submit to. Not only were we required to perform the several tasks imposed upon as at work, prayers, and penances, under the idea that we were performing solemn duties to our Maker, but every thing else which was required of us, we were constantly told, was something indispensable in his sight. The priests, we admitted, were the servants of God, specially appointed by his authority, to teach us our duty, to absolve us from sin, and to lead us to heaven. Without their assistance, we had allowed we could never enjoy the favour of God; unless they administered the sacraments to us, we could not enjoy everlasting happiness. Having consented to acknowledge all this, we had no objection to urge against admitting any other demand that might be made for or by them. If we thought an act ever so criminal, the Superior would tell us that the priests acted under the direct sanction of God, and could not sin. Of course, then, it could not be wrong to comply with any of their requests, because they could not demand any thing but what was right. On the contrary, to refuse to do any thing they asked, would necessarily be sinful. Such doctrines admitted, and such practices performed, it will not seem wonderful when I mention that we often felt something of their preposterous character. ---

--- I have hardly detained the reader long enough on the subject, to give him a just impression of the stress laid on confession. It is one of the great points to which our attention was constantly directed. We were directed to keep a strict and constant watch over our thoughts; to have continually before our minds the rules of the Convent, to compare the one with the other, remember every devotion, and tell all, even the smallest, at confession, either to the Superior, or to the priest. My mind was thus kept in a continual state of activity, which proved very wearisome; and it required the constant exertion of our teachers, to keep us up to the practice they inculcated. ---

--- Another tale recurs to me, of those which were frequently told us to make us feel the importance of unreserved confession.

A nun of our Convent, who had hidden some sin from her confessor, died suddenly, and without any one to confess her. Her sisters assembled to pray for the peace of her soul, when she appeared, and informed them, that it would be of no use, but rather troublesome to her, as her pardon was impossible.* {* Since the first edition, I have found this tale related in a Romish book as one of very ancient date. It was told to us as having taken place in our Convent.} The doctrine is, that prayers made for souls guilty of unconfessed sin, do but sink them deeper in hell; and this is the reason I have heard given for not praying for Protestants.

The authority of the priests in every thing, and the enormity of every act which opposes it, were also impressed upon our minds, in various ways, by our teachers. A "Father" told us the following story one day at catechism.

A man once died who had failed to pay some money which the priest had asked of him; be was condemned to be burnt in purgatory until he should pay it, but had permission to come back to this world, and take a human body to work in. He made his appearance therefore again on earth, and hired himself to a rich man as a laborer. He worked all day with the fire burning in him, unseen by other people; but while he was in bed that night, a girl in an adjoining room, perceiving the smell of brimstone, looked through a crack in the wall, and saw him covered with flames. She informed his master, who questioned him the next morning, and found that his hired man was secretly suffering the pains of purgatory, for neglecting to pay a certain sum of money to the priest. He, therefore, furnished him the amount due; it was paid, and the servant went off immediately to heaven. The priest cannot forgive any debt due unto him, because it is the Lord's estate.

While at confession, I was urged to hide nothing from the priest, and have been told by them, that they already knew what was in my heart, but would not tell, because it was necessary for me to confess it. I really believed that the priests were acquainted with my thoughts; and often stood in great awe of them. They often told me they had power to strike me dead at any moment. ---

--- The books used in the nunnery, at least such as I recollect of them, were the following. Most of these are lecture books, or such as are used by the daily readers, while we were at work, and meals. These were all furnished by the Superior, out of her library, to which we never had access. She was informed when we had done with one book, and then exchanged it for such another as she pleased to select. Le Miroir du Chrétien, (Christian Mirror,) History of Rome, History of the Church, Life of Soeur Bourgeoise, (the founder of the Convent,) in two volumes, L'Ange Conducteur, (the Guardian Angel,) L'Ange Chrétien, (the Christian Angel,) Les Vies des Saints, (Lives of Saints,) in several volumes, Dialogues, a volume consisting of conversations between a Protestant Doctor, called Dr. D. and a Catholic gentleman, on the articles of faith, in which, after much ingenious reasoning, the former was confuted. One large book, the name of which I have forgotten, occupied us nine or ten months at our lectures, night and morning. L'Instruction de la Jeunesse, (the Instruction of Youth,) containing much about Convents, and the education of persons in the world, with a great deal on confessions, &c. Examen de la Conscience, (Examination of Conscience,) is a book frequently used.

I may here remark, that I never saw a Bible in the Convent from the day I entered as a novice, until that on which I effected my escape. The Catholic New Testament, commonly called the Evangile, was read to us about three or four times a year. The Superior directed the reader what passage to select; but we never had it in our hands to read when we pleased. I often heard the Protestant Bible spoken of, in bitter terms, as a most dangerous book, and one which never ought to be in the hands of common people. ---

--- Much stress was laid on the sainte scapulaire, or holy scapulary. This is a small band of cloth or silk, formed and wrought in a particular manner, to be tied around the neck, by two strings, fastened to the ends. I have made many of them having been sometimes set to make them in the Convent. On one side is worked a kind of double cross, (thus, XX) and on the other I. H. S., the meaning of which I do not exactly know. Such a band is called a scapulary, and many miracles are attributed to its power. Children on first receiving the communion are often presented with scapularies, which they are taught to regard with great reverence. We were told of the wonders effected by their means, in the addresses made to us, by priests at catechism or lectures. I will repeat one or two of the stories which occur to me.

A Roman Catholic, servant woman, who had concealed some of her sins at confession, acted so hypocritical a part as to make her mistress believe her a devote or a strict observer of her duty. She even imposed upon her confessor, to such a degree, that he gave her a scapulary. After he had given it, however, one of the saints in heaven informed him in a vision, that the holy scapulary must not remain on the neck of so great a sinner; and that it must be restored to the church. She lay down that night with the scapulary round her throat; but in the morning was found dead, with her head cut off, and the scapulary was discovered in the church. The belief was, that the devil could not endure to have so holy a thing on one of his servants, and had pulled so hard to get it off, as to draw the silken thread with which it was tied, through her neck; after which by some divine power it was restored to the church.

Another story was as follows. A poor Roman Catholic was once taken prisoner by the heretics. He had a sainte scapulaire on his neck, when God seeing him in the midst of his foes, took it from his neck by a miracle, and held it up in the air above the throng of heretics; more than one hundred of whom were converted, by seeing it thus supernaturally suspended. ---

--- We were frequently assured, that miracles are still performed; and pains were taken to impress us deeply on this subject. The Superior often spoke to us of the Virgin Mary's pincushion, the remains of which, it is pretended, are preserved in the Convent, though it has crumbled quite to dust. We regarded this relic with such veneration, that we were afraid even to look at it, and we often heard the following story related, when the subject was introduced:--

A priest in Jerusalem once had a vision, in which he was informed that the house in which the Virgin had lived, should be removed from its foundations, and transported to a distance. He did not think the communication was from God, and therefore disregarded it; but the house was soon after missed, which convinced him that the vision was true, and he was told where the house might be found. A picture of the house is preserved in the Nunnery, and was sometimes shown us. There are also wax figures of Joseph sawing wood; and Jesus, as a child, picking up the chips. We were taught to sing a little song relating to this, the chorus of which I remember: --

--- Some of the nuns informed me, that the severest of their sufferings arose from fear of supernatural beings. ---

--- SOME of the priests from the Seminary were in the nunnery every day and night, and often several at a time. I have seen nearly all of them at different times, though there are about one hundred and fifty in the district of Montreal. There was a difference in their conduct; though I believe every one of them was guilty of licentiousness; while not one did I ever see who maintained a character any way becoming the profession of a priest. Some were gross and degraded in a degree which few of my readers can ever have imagined; and I should be unwilling to offend the eye, and corrupt the heart of any one, by an account of their words and actions. Few imaginations can conceive deeds so abominable as they practised, and often required of some of the poor women, under the fear of severe punishments, and even of death. I do not hesitate to say with the strongest confidence, that although some of the nuns became lost to every sentiment of virtue and honour, especially one from the Congregational Nunnery whom I have before mentioned, Saint Patrick, the greater part of them loathed the practices to which they were compelled to submit by the Superior and priests, who kept them under so dreadful a bondage. ---

--- The priests are liable, by their dissolute habits, to occasional attacks of disease, which render it necessary, or at least prudent, to submit to medical treatment. In the Black Nunnery they find private accommodations, for they are free to enter one of the private hospitals whenever they please; which is a room set apart on purpose for the accommodation of the priests, and is called a retreat-room. But an excuse is necessary to blind the public, and this they find in the pretence they make of being in a "Holy Retreat." Many such cases have I known; and I can mention the names of priests who have been confined in this Holy Retreat. They are very carefully attended by the Superior and old nuns, and their diet mostly consists of vegetable soups, &c. with but little meat, and that fresh. I have seen an instrument of surgery laying upon the table in that holy room, which is used only for particular purposes. Father Tabeau {British edition: Tombeau}, a Roman priest, was on one of his holy retreats about the time when I left the nunnery. There are sometimes a number confirmed there at the same time. The victims of these priests frequently share the same fate.

I have often reflected how grievously I had been deceived in my opinions of a nun's condition! All the holiness of their lives, I now saw, was merely pretended. The appearance of sanctity and heavenly mindedness which they had shown among us novices, I found was only a disguise to conceal such practices as would not be tolerated in any decent society in the world; and as for peace and joy like that of heaven, which I had expected to find among them, I learnt too well, that they did not exist there.

The only way in which such thoughts were counteracted, was by the constant instructions given us by the Superior and priests, to regard every doubt as a mortal sin. Other faults we might have, as we were told over and over again, which, though worthy of penances, were far less sinful than these. For a nun to doubt that she was doing her duty in fulfilling her vows and oaths, was a heinous offence, and we were exhorted always to suppress our doubts, to confess them without reserve, and cheerfully to submit to severe penances on account of them, as the only means of mortifying our evil dispositions, and resisting the temptations of the devil. Thus we learnt in a good degree to resist our minds and consciences, when we felt the first rising of a question, about the duty of doing any thing required of us. ---

--- Occasionally some of the nuns would go further, and resist the restraints or punishments imposed upon them; and it was not uncommon to hear screams, sometimes of a most piercing and terrific kind, from nuns suffering under discipline. ---

--- Some of my readers may feel disposed to exclaim against me, for believing things, which will strike them as so monstrous and abominable. To such, I would say, without pretending to justify myself--You know little of the position in which I was placed: in the first place, ignorant of any other religious doctrines; and in the second, met at every moment by some ingenious argument, and the example of a large community, who received all the instructions of the priests as of undoubted truth, and practised upon them. Of the variety and speciousness of the arguments used, you cannot have any correct idea. They were often so ready with replies, examples, anecdotes, and authorities, to enforce their doctrines, that it seemed to me they could never have learnt it all from books, but must have been taught by wicked spirits. Indeed, when I reflect upon their conversations, I am astonished at their art and address, and find it difficult to account for their subtlety and success in influencing my mind, and persuading me to any thing they pleased. It seems to me, that hardly anybody would be safe in their hands. If you were to go to confession twice, I believe you would feel very differently from what you do now. They have such a way of avoiding one thing, and speaking of another, of affirming this, and doubting or disputing that, of quoting authorities, and speaking of wonders and miracles recently performed, in confirmation of what they teach, as familiarly known to persons whom they call by name, and whom they pretend to offer as witnesses, though they never give you an opportunity to speak with them--these, and many other means, they use in such a way, that they always blinded my mind, and, I should think, would blind the minds of others. ---

--- The priests took turns in attending to confession and catechism in the Convent, usually three months at a time, though sometimes longer periods. The priest then on duty was Father Larkin. He is a good-looking European, and has a brother who is a professor in the college. He baptized, and then put oil upon the heads of the infants, as is the custom after baptism. They were then taken; one after another, by one of the old nuns, in the presence of us all. She pressed her hand upon the mouth and nose of the first, so tight that it could not breathe, and in a few minutes, when the hand was removed, it was dead. She then took the other, and treated it in the same way. No sound was heard, and both the children were corpses. The greatest indifference was shown by all present during this operation; for all, as I well knew, were long accustomed to such scenes. The little bodies were then taken into the cellar, thrown into the pit I have mentioned, and covered with a quantity of lime.

I afterward saw another new-born infant treated in the same manner, in the same place: but the actors in the scene I choose not to name, nor the circumstances, as every thing connected with it is of a peculiarly trying and painful nature to my own feelings.

These were the only instances of infanticide I witnessed; and it seemed to be merely owing to accident that I was then present. So far as I know, there were no pains taken to preserve secrecy on this subject; that is, I saw no attempt made to keep any of the inmates of the Convent in ignorance of the murder of children. On the contrary, others were told, as well as myself, on their first admission, as veiled nuns, that all infants born in the place were baptized and killed, without loss of time; and I had been called to witness the murder of the three just mentioned, only because I happened to be in the room at the time.

That others were killed in the same manner during my stay in the nunnery, I am well assured. How many there were I cannot tell, and having taken no account of those I heard of, I cannot speak with precision; I believe, however, that I learnt through nuns, that at least eighteen or twenty infants were smothered, and secretly buried in the cellar, while I was a nun. ---

--- It cannot be thought strange that we were superstitious. Some were more easily terrified than others, by unaccountable sights and sounds: but all of us believed in the power and occasional appearance of spirits, and were ready to look for them at almost any time. I have seen several instances of alarm caused by such superstition, and have experienced it myself more than once. I was one day sitting mending aprons beside one of the old nuns, in a community-room, while the litanies were repeating; as I was very easy to laugh, Saint Ignace, or Agnes, came in, walked up to her with much agitation, and began to whisper in her ear. She usually talked but little, and that made me more curious to know what was the matter with her. I overheard her say to the old nun, in much alarm, that in the cellar, from which she had just returned, she had heard the most dreadful groans that ever came from any being. This was enough to give me uneasiness. I could not account for the appearance of an evil spirit in any part of the Convent, for I had been assured that the only one ever known there, was that of the nun who had died with an unconfessed sin, and that others were kept at a distance by the holy water that was rather profusely used in different parts of the nunnery. Still, I presumed that the sounds heard by Saint Ignace must have proceeded from some devil, and I felt great dread at the thought of visiting the cellar again. I determined to seek further information of the terrified nun; but when I addressed her on the subject, at recreation-time, the first opportunity I could find, she replied, that I was always trying to make her break silence, and walked off to another group in the room, so that I could obtain no satisfaction. ---

--- I AM unable to say how many nuns disappeared while I was in the Convent. There were several. ---

---I have been subjected to the same state of involuntary silence more than once: for sometimes I became excited to a state of desperation by the measures used against me, and then conducted in a manner perhaps not less violent than some others. My hands have been tied behind me, and a gag put into my mouth, sometimes with such force and rudeness as to lacerate my lips and cause the blood to flow freely. Treatment of this kind is apt to teach submission, and many times I have acquiesced under orders received, or wishes expressed, with a fear of a recurrence to some severe measures.

One day I had incurred the anger of the Superior in a greater degree than usual, and it was ordered that I should be taken to one of the cells. I was taken by some of the nuns, bound and gagged, carried down the stairs into the cellar, and laid upon the floor. Not long afterward I induced one of the nuns to request the Superior to come down and see me; and on making some acknowledgment I was released. I will, however, relate this story rather more in detail.

On that day I had been engaged with Jane Ray, in carrying into effect a plan of revenge upon another person, when I fell under the vindictive spirit of some of the old nuns, and suffered severely. The Superior ordered me to the cells, and a scene of violence commenced which I will not attempt to describe, nor the precise circumstances which led to it. Suffice it to say, that after exhausting my strength, by resisting as long as I could against several nuns, I had my hands drawn behind my back, a leathern band passed first round my thumbs, then round my hands, and then round my waist, and fastened. This was drawn so tight that it cut through the flesh of my thumbs, making wounds, the scars of which still remain. A gag was then forced into my mouth, not indeed so violently as it sometimes was, but roughly enough; after which I was taken by main force, and carried down into the cellar, across it almost to the opposite extremity, and brought to the last of the second range of cells on the left hand. The door was opened, and I was thrown in with violence, and left alone, the door being immediately closed and bolted on the outside. The bare ground was under me, cold and hard as if it had been beaten down even. I lay still, in the position in which I had fallen, as it would have been difficult for me to move, confined as I was, and exhausted by my exertions; and the shock of my fall, and my wretched state of desperation and fear disinclined me from any further attempt. I was in almost total darkness, there being nothing perceptible except a slight glimmer of light which came in through the little window far above me.

How long I remained in that condition I can only conjecture. It seemed to me a long time, and must have been two or three hours. I did not move, expecting to die there; and in a state of distress which I cannot describe, from the tight bandage about my hands, and the gag holding my jaws apart at their greatest extension. I am confident I must have died before morning, if, as I then expected, I had been left there all night. By-and-by, however, the bolt was drawn, the door opened, and Jane Ray spoke to me in a tone of kindness. She had taken an opportunity to slip into the cellar unnoticed on purpose to see me. She unbound the gag, took it out of my mouth, and told me she would do any thing to get me out of that dungeon. If she had had the bringing of me down, she would not have thrust me so brutally, and she would be revenged on those who had. She offered to throw herself upon her knees before the Superior and beg her forgiveness. To this I would not consent; but told her to ask the Superior to come to me, as I wished to speak to her. This I had no idea she would condescend to do; but Jane had not been gone long before the Superior came, and asked if I repented in the sight of God for what I had done. I replied in the affirmative; and after a lecture of some length on the pain I had given the Virgin Mary by my conduct, she asked whether I was willing to ask pardon of all the nuns for the scandal I had caused them by my behaviour. To this I made no objection; and I was then released from my prison and my bonds, went up to the community-room, and kneeling before all the sisters in succession, begged the forgiveness and prayers of each. ---

--- Among the marks which I still bear of the wounds received from penances and violence, are the scars left by the belt with which I repeatedly tortured myself, for the mortification of my spirit. These are most distinct on my side; for although the band, which was four or five inches in breadth, and extended round the waist, was stuck full of sharp iron points in all parts, it was sometimes crowded most against my side, by resting in my chair, and the wounds were usually deeper there than anywhere else. My thumbs were several times cut severely by the tight drawing of the band used to confine my arms, and scars are still visible upon them.

The rough gagging which I several times endured wounded my lips very much; for it was common, in that operation, to thrust the gag hard against the teeth, and catch one or both the lips, which were sometimes cruelly cut. The object was to stop the screams made by the offender as soon as possible; and some of the old nuns delighted in tormenting us. A gag was once forced into my mouth which had a large splinter upon it, and this cut through my under lip, in front, leaving to this day a scar about half an inch long. The same lip was several times wounded, as well as the other; but one day worse to ever, when a narrow piece was cut off from the left side of it, by being pinched between the gag and the under fore-teeth; and this has left an inequality in it which is still very observable.

One of the most shocking stories I heard of events that had occurred in the nunnery before my acquaintance with it, was the following, which was told me by Jane. What is uncommon, I can fix the date when I heard it--It was on New-Year's day, 1834. The ceremonies, customary in the early part of that day, had been performed; after mass, in the morning, the Superior had shaken hands with all the nuns, and given us her blessing, for she was said to have received power from heaven to do so only once a year, and then on the first day of the year. Besides this, cakes, raisins, &c. are distributed to the nuns on that day. ---

--- There were a few instances, and only a few, in which we knew any thing that was happening in the world; and even then our knowledge did not extend out of the city. I can recall but three occasions of this kind. Two of them were when the cholera prevailed in Montreal; and the other was the election riots. The appearance of the cholera, in both seasons of its ravages, gave us abundance of occupation. Indeed, we were more burdened by hard labour at those times, than ever before or afterward during my stay. The Pope had given early notice that the burning of wax candles would afford protection from the disease, because so long as any person continued to burn one, the Virgin Mary would intercede for him. No sooner, therefore, had the alarming disease made its appearance in Montreal, than, a long wax candle was lighted in the Convent for each of the inmates, so that all parts of it in use were artificially illuminated day and night. Thus a great many candles were constantly burning, which were to be replaced from those manufactured by the nuns.

But this was a trifle. The Pope's message having been promulgated in the Grey Nunnery, the Congregational Nunnery, and to Catholics at large, through the pulpits, an extraordinary demand was created for wax candles, to supply which we were principally depended upon. All who could be employed in making them were therefore set at work, and I, among the rest, assisted in different departments, and witnessed all. –

--- I have mentioned several penances, in different parts of this narrative, which we sometimes had to perform. There is a great variety of them; and, while some, though trifling in appearance, became very painful, by long endurance, or frequent repetition; others are severe in their nature, and would never be submitted to unless through fear of something worse, or a real belief in their efficacy to remove guilt. I will mention here such as I recollect, which can be named without offending a virtuous ear; for some there were, which, although I have been compelled to submit to, either by a misled conscience, or the fear of severe punishments, now that I am better able to judge of my duties, and at liberty to act, I would not mention or describe. Kissing the floor, is a very common penance; kneeling and kissing the feet of the other nuns, is another; as are kneeling on hard peas, and walking with them in the shoes. We had repeatedly to walk on our knees through the subterranean passage, leading to the Congregational Nunnery; and sometimes to eat our meals with a rope round our necks. Sometimes we were fed only with such things as we most disliked. Garlic was given to me on this account, because I had a strong antipathy against it. Eels were repeatedly given to some of us, because we felt an unconquerable repugnance to them, on account of reports we had heard of their feeding on dead carcasses in the river St. Lawrence. It was no uncommon thing for us to be required to drink the water in which the Superior had washed her feet.

Sometimes we were required to brand ourselves with a hot iron, so as to leave scars; at other times to whip our naked flesh with several small rods, before a private altar, until we drew blood. I can assert, with the perfect knowledge of the fact, that many of the nuns bear the scars of these wounds. ---

Chapter 18

The Priests of the District of Montreal have free access to the Black Nunnery--

Crimes committed and required by them--The Pope's Command to commit indecent Crimes--Characters of the Old and New Superiors--The timidity of the latter--I began to be employed in the Hospitals--Some account of them--Warning given me by a sick Nun--Penance by Hanging.

--- They are considered as having an equal right to enter the Black Nunnery whenever they please; and then, according to our oaths, they have complete control over the nuns. To name all the works of shame of which they are guilty in that retreat, would require much time and space, neither would it be necessary to the accomplishment of my object, which is, the publication of but some of their criminality to the world, and the development, in general terms, of scenes thus far carried on in secret within the walls of that Convent, where I was so long an inmate. ---

--- Secure against detection by the world, they never believed that an eyewitness would ever escape to tell of their crimes, and declare some of their names before the world; but the time has come, and some of their deeds of darkness must come to the day. I have seen in the nunnery, the priests from more, I presume, than a hundred country places, admitted for shameful and criminal purposes: from St. Charles, St. Denis, St. Mark's, St. Antoine, Chambly, Bertier, St. John's, &c. &c.

How unexpected to them will be the disclosures I make! Shut up in a place from which there has been thought to be but one way of egress, and that the passage to the grave, they considered themselves safe in perpetrating crimes in our presence, and in making us share in their criminality as often as they chose, and conducted more shamelessly than even the brutes. These debauchees would come in without ceremony, concealing their names, both by night and by day, where the cries and pains of the injured innocence of their victims could ever reach the world, for relief or redress for their wrongs; without remorse or shame they would glory in torturing, in the most barbarous manner, the feelings of those under their power; telling us, at the same time, that this mortifying the flesh was religion, and pleasing to God.

We were sometimes invited to put ourselves to voluntary sufferings in a variety of ways, not for a penance, but to show our devotion to God. A priest would sometimes say to us:--

"Now, which of you have love enough for Jesus Christ to stick a pin through your cheeks?"

Some of us would signify our readiness, and immediately thrust one through up to the head. Sometimes he would propose that we should repeat the operation several times on the spot; and the cheeks of a number of nuns would be bloody.

There were other acts occasionally proposed and consented to, which I cannot name in a book. Such the Superior would sometimes command us to perform; many of them things not only useless and unheard of, but loathsome and indecent in the highest possible degree. How they could ever have been invented I never could conceive. Things were done worse than the entire exposure of the person, though this was occasionally required of several at once, in the presence of priests. ---

--- The Superior of the Seminary would sometimes come and inform us, that he had received orders from the Pope, to request that those nuns who possessed the greatest devotion and faith, should be requested to perform some particular deeds, which he named or described in our presence, but of which no decent or moral person could ever endure to speak. I cannot repeat what would injure any ear, not debased to the lowest possible degree. I am bound by a regard to truth, however, to confess, that deluded women were found among us, who would comply with those requests. ---

--- What led her to some of the most remarkable parts of her conversation, was a motion I made, in the course of the night, to take the light out of her little room into the adjoining apartment, to look once more at the sick persons there. She begged me not; to leave her a moment in the dark, for she could not bear it. "I have witnessed so many horrid scenes," said she, "in this Convent, that I want somebody near me constantly, and must always have a light burning in my room. I cannot tell you," she added, "what things I remember, for they would frighten you too much. What you have seen are nothing to them. Many a murder have I witnessed; many a nice young creature has been killed in this nunnery. I advise you to be very cautious--keep every thing to yourself--there are many here ready to betray you." ---

--- out of her little room into the adjoining apartment, to look once more at the sick persons there. She begged me not; to leave her a moment in the dark, for she could not bear it. "I have witnessed so many horrid scenes," said she, "in this Convent, that I want somebody near me constantly, and must always have a light burning in my room. I cannot tell you," she added, "what things I remember, for they would frighten you too much. What you have seen are nothing to them. Many a murder have I witnessed; many a nice young creature has been killed in this nunnery. I advise you to be very cautious--keep every thing to yourself--there are many here ready to betray you."

What it was that induced the old nun to express so much kindness to me I could not tell, unless she was frightened at the recollection of her own crimes, and those of others, and felt grateful for the care I took of her. She had been one of the night-watches, and never before showed me any particular kindness. She did not indeed go into detail concerning the transactions to which she alluded, but told me that some nuns had been murdered under great aggravations of cruelty, by being gagged, and left to starve in the cells, or having their flesh burnt off their bones with red-hot irons.

It was uncommon to find compunction expressed by any of the nuns. Habit renders us insensible to the sufferings of others, and careless about our own sins. I had become so hardened myself, that I find it difficult to rid myself of many of my former false principles and views of right and wrong. ---

--- I was once much shocked, on entering the room for the examination of conscience, at seeing a nun hanging by a cord from a ring in the ceiling, with her head downward. Her clothes had been tied round with a leathern strap, to keep them in their place, and then she had been fastened in that situation, with her head some distance from the floor. Her face had a very unpleasant appearance, being dark-coloured and swollen by the rushing in of the blood; her hands were tied, and her mouth stopped with a large gag. This nun proved to be no other than Jane Ray, who for some fault had been condemned to this punishment.

This was not, however, a solitary case; I heard of numbers who were "hung," as it was called, at different times; and I saw Saint Hypolite and Saint Luke undergoing it. This was considered a most distressing punishment; and it was the only one which Jane Ray could not endure, of all she had tried. ---

--- I could easily believe what I heard affirmed by others, that fear was the severest of their sufferings. Confined in the dark, in so gloomy a place, with the long and spacious arched cellar stretching off this way and that, visited only now and then by a solitary nun, with whom they were afraid to speak their feelings, and with only the miserable society of each other; how gloomy thus to spend day after day, months, and even years, without any prospect of liberation. and liable every moment to any other fate to which the Bishop or Superior might condemn them! But these poor creatures must have known something of the horrors perpetrated in other parts of the building, and could not have been ignorant of the hole in the cellar, which was not far from their cells, and the use to which it was devoted. One of them told me, in confidence, she wished they could get out. They must also have been often disturbed in their sleep, if they ever did sleep, by the numerous priests who passed through the trapdoor at no great distance. To be subject to such trials for a single day would be dreadful; but these nuns had them to endure for years.

I often felt much compassion for them and wished to see them released; but at other times, yielding to the doctrine perpetually taught us in the Convent, that our future happiness would be proportioned to the sufferings we had to undergo in this world, I would rest satisfied that their imprisonment was a real blessing to them. Others, I presume, participated with me in such feelings. One Sunday afternoon, after we had performed all our ceremonies, and were engaged as usual, at that time, with backgammon and other amusements, one of the young nuns exclaimed, "Oh, how headstrong are those wretches in the cells--they are as bad as the day they were first put in!"

This exclamation was made, as I supposed, in consequence of some recent conversation with them, as I knew her to be particularly acquainted with the older one.

Some of the vacant cells were occasionally used for temporary imprisonment. Three nuns were confined in them, to my knowledge, for disobedience to the Superior, as she called it. They did not join the rest in singing in the evening, being exhausted by the various exertions of the day. The Superior ordered them to sing, and as they did not comply, after her command had been twice repeated, she ordered them away to the cells.

They were immediately taken down into the cellar, placed in separate dungeons, and the doors shut and barred upon them. There they remained through that night, the following day, and second night, but were released in time to attend mass on the second morning.

The Superior used occasionally to show something in a glass box, which we were required to regard with the highest degree of reverence. It was made of wax, and called an Agnus Dei. She used to exhibit it to us when we were in a state of grace: that is, after confession and before sacrament. She said it had been blessed in the very dish in which our Saviour had eaten. It was brought from Rome. Every time we kissed it, or even looked at it, we were told it gave a hundred days release from purgatory to ourselves, or if we did not need it, to our next of kin in purgatory, if not a Protestant. If we had no such kinsman, the benefit was to go to the souls in purgatory not prayed for.

Jane Ray would sometimes say to me,"Let's kiss it--some of our friends will thank us for it." I have been repeatedly employed in carrying dainties of different kinds to the little private room I have mentioned, next beyond the Superior's sitting-room, in the second story, which the priests made their "Holy Retreat." That room I never was allowed to enter. I could only go to the door with a waiter of refreshments, set it down upon a little stand near it, give three raps on the door, and then retire to a distance to await orders. When any thing was to be taken away, it was placed on the stand by the Superior, who then gave three raps for me, and closed the door.

The Bishop I saw at least once when he appeared worse for wine, or something of the kind. After partaking of refreshments in the Convent, he sent for all the nuns, and, on our appearance, gave us his blessing, and put a piece of poundcake on the shoulder of each of us, in a manner which appeared singular and foolish. ---

--- I naturally felt a good deal of curiosity to learn whether such scenes, as I had witnessed in the death of Saint Francis, were common or rare, and took an opportunity to inquire of Jane Ray. Her reply was--"Oh, yes; and there were many murdered while you was a novice, whom you heard nothing about." This was all I ever learnt on the subject; but although I was told nothing of the manner in which they were killed, I supposed it to be the same which I had seen practised, viz. by smothering. ---

--- The thought of being subjected to a severe penance, which I had reason to apprehend, fluttered me very much; and although I tried to overcome my fears, I did not succeed very well. I reflected, however, that the sin was already committed, and that it would not be increased if I examined the book. I, therefore, looked a little at several pages, though I still felt a good deal of agitation. I saw, at once, that the volume was a record of the entrance of nuns and novices into the Convent, and of the births that had taken place in the Convent. Entries of the last description were made in a brief manner, on the following plan: I do not give the names or dates as real, but only to show the form of entering them.

Saint Mary delivered of a son, March 16, 1834.

Saint Clarice " daughter, April 2.

Saint Matilda " daughter, April 30.

No mention was made in the book of the death of the children, though I well knew not one of them could be living at that time. ---



--- Now I presume that the period the book embraced, was about two years, as several names near the beginning I knew; but I can form only a rough conjecture of the number of infants born, and murdered, of course, records of which it contained. I suppose the book contained at least one hundred pages, that one fourth were written upon, and that each page contained fifteen distinct records. Several pages were devoted to the list of births. On this supposition there must have been a large number, which I can easily believe to have been born there in the course of two years.

What were the contents of the other books belonging to the same case with that which I looked into, I have no idea, having never dared to touch one of them; I believe, however, that Jane Ray was well acquainted with them, knowing, as I do, her intelligence and prying disposition. If she could be brought to give her testimony, she would doubtless unfold many curious particulars now unknown.

I am able, in consequence of a circumstance which appeared accidental, to state with confidence the exact number of persons in the Convent one day of the week in which I left it. This may be a point of some interest, as several secret deaths had occurred since my taking the veil, and many burials had been openly made in the chapel.

I was appointed, at the time mentioned, to lay out the covers for all the inmates of the Convent, including the nuns in the cells. These covers, as I have said before, were linen bands, to be bound around the knives, forks, spoons, and napkins, for eating. These were for all the nuns and novices, and amounted to two hundred and ten. As the number of novices was then about thirty, I know that there must have been at that time about one hundred and eighty veiled nuns. ---

--- At length one of the priests, to whom I had confessed this sin, informed me, for my comfort, that he had begun to pray to Saint Anthony, and hoped his intercession would, by-and-by, drive away the evil spirit. My desire of escape was partly excited by the fear of bringing an infant to the murderous hands of my companions, or of taking a potion whose violent effects I too well knew. ---

For a full text go to: http://www.reformation.org/maria-monk.html

---
Read also about The Devil in the convent, mass possession among the nuns!

The mysticism among the monasteries, monasterial, cloister, –monk`s residence, community of monks!

The Devil in the convent
Mass possession among the nuns.

http://www.historycooperative.org/journals/ahr/107.5/ah0502001379.html
http://www.sacred-texts.com/evil/dol/index.htm

Compare with the Charismatic movement, a rival, counterfeit to the True Pentecostal.

The Charismatic movement hosting many false, corruptive teachings, as gnosticism, you are little god`s, angel worship`s, similaries of hindu teaching, Buddism, creative (positive) thinking, etc. They have a short theology and a long tail!

As an example Benny Hinn and Ulf Ekman Livets ord, Uppsala Sweden embracing and hosting this corruptive movement!

For further reading go to:

http://www.jesus-is-savior.com/False%20Doctrines/Charismatic%20Movement/charismatic_movement.htm

http://answers.libertybaptistchurch.org.au/answers/101.pdf

You can search on my bloglist there you will find many links for further reading!

Inlagt av Leif Berg

THE APOCALYPSE. IT IS A PROPHECY CONCERNING THE EXPERIENCES OF THE CHRISTIAN CHURCH, IN THE WORLD, AND NOT CONCERNING THOSE OF THE JEWISH NATION.

THE APOCALYPSE. IT IS A PROPHECY CONCERNING THE EXPERIENCES OF THE CHRISTIAN CHURCH, IN THE WORLD, AND NOT CONCERNING THOSE OF THE JEWISH NATION.

From:
The Approaching End of the Age
Viewed in the Light of History, Prophecy and Science
by H. Grattan Guinness

MDCCCLXXIX (1879)

CHAPTER III.

http://www.historicism.com/Guinness/Approaching/aeota6.htm

THE APOCALYPSE IS A CONTINUING PROPHECY EXTENDING FROM ITS OWN TIME, TO THE CONSUMMATION OF ALL THINGS.-IMPORTANCE OF HISTORICAL KNOWLEDGE, IN ORDER TO ITS CORRECT INTERPRETATION. IT IS A PROPHECY CONCERNING THE EXPERIENCES OF THE CHRISTIAN CHURCH, IN THE WORLD, AND NOT CONCERNING THOSE OF THE JEWISH NATION.

VERY serious are the consequences of a refusal to admit uniformly and consistently, this symbolic character of the visions of the Apocalypse. Like most errors it brings further error in its train, and renders almost impossible any advance in the comprehension of the book. It answers beforehand, independently of investigation, the question whether the prophecies of the Apocalypse are fulfilled or not. It stands to reason, the if these emblematic visions are read under the impression that these things are to come to pass literally, the conclusion that the book consists entirely of unfulfilled prophecies is inevitable, for most assuredly no such things ever have come To pass.

Literalists must therefore be futurists, and the abandonment of the first error, is almost certain to lead to the abandonment of the second. The moment we begin to translate the symbolic into ordinary language, the prediction assumes such a very different shape, that it is no longer a self-evident fact that it must be unfulfilled. The inquiry is on the contrary awakened has this happened? and we turn to history for an answer. If a fulfilment have taken place, we shall then be on the road to discover it; one such. fulfilment clearly established will be a clue to others; and every fulfilment so discovered, will be an argument for the truth of that system of interpretation which led to the discovery.

Here we are met by an objection; some are found rash enough to condemn that system of interpretation which leads to the comparison of prophecy with history, on the ground that it does so. The sun, say they, requires no candle to show that it shines; the Bible requires no light from history; history is merely human; we are told to search the Scriptures, but we are nowhere told to search Eusebius, or Gibbon, or Hallam. God is his own interpreter; He can explain his own word without human help; history was not written in heaven, it is the wisdom of this world, foolishness with God, and so on.

Now this reasoning, though often advanced in the most oracular way as if it settled the question, is shallow, and based on fallacies; and yet, alas! it misleads many, calculated as it is to flatter ignorance, to foster indolence, and to encourage dogmatism, by throwing the reins on the neck of imagination, which is by it left free, to invent future facts and fulfilments, as it lists. A little reflection will show the superficial nature of the objection.

A knowledge of history is needful to the intelligent comprehension of prophecy. The Bible itself contains a large amount of history, from which alone we learn the fulfilment of many of its earlier prophecies, and without which we might still be expecting a fulfilment, which took place hundreds of years ago. What are the four gospels, and the book of Acts, but histories, divinely inspired histories of course, but under the point of view we are now considering, their inspiration is mainly important as securing their accuracy and authenticity. They are authentic records of a series of facts, which took place eighteen hundred years ago, in a distant land; for a knowledge of which consequently we must be indebted to the testimony of others. By the help of such testimony we compare the facts that have occurred, with the predictions of prophecy, and perceive the marvellous and accurate fulfilment. Without such testimony we never could have done this; and to be ignorant of the existence and nature of such testimony, is to be practically without it. But Bible history, while it begins with the first Adam and the first paradise, does not, like Bible prophecy, reach on to the coming of the Second Adam in glory to re-establish paradise on earth. It ends about AD. 60, and we have only uninspired though authentic records of all that has happened since. Now according to these objectors, we are not to make use of these; not to compare New Testament prophecy with profane history. Either then there must be absolutely no prophetic light thrown by the Holy Spirit in the last eighteen hundred years, or else God does not intend us to have the benefit of it. Supposing a fulfilment clear as daylight to have taken place, we must remain in ignorance of it, unless God were pleased now to add an appendix to the Bible, to record facts which many trustworthy historians have already recorded. Revelation never teaches things which common sense is sufficient to discover. For instance, a tenfold division of the Roman empire was predicted by Daniel, prior to the establishment of the kingdom of Christ on earth. The Roman empire was still existing in its integrity when John closed the canon of Scripture by his prophecy, which repeats the prediction. Blot out now all historical records, deprive the church of the help of all uninspired testimony, and Christians must to this day remain in ignorance of the solemnly momentous fact, that this prediction has been fulfilled during the last twelve hundred years, and the strong presumption to be derived there from that the coming of the Lord is nigh, even at the doors. Nor will it do to say, ah. but that is a notorious fact, evident to our senses without historical testimony. No: our knowledge of it depends upon uninspired testimony, historical or otherwise; and the question is not, to what extent may we make use of uninspired records to elucidate inspired predictions, but, may we make use of them at all? The answer is clear, we must, or for ever remain ignorant, whether the holy prophecies of the word of God regarding post canonical events, are fulfilled or not.

A still more rash assertion is also made; it is said that no events of this parenthetical church dispensation (save those of its closing crisis) are, or could be, subjects of prophecy.

That this statement is not true is proved by the above instance, and by many more that might be alleged. But it is evident that a knowledge of history is needful to warrant the statement! How without such knowledge, can it be ascertained that the visions of Revelation for instance, do not present a connected outline of the leading events between the past and future advents of Christ? A knowledge of what has actually taken place is as needful to justify a denial, as an assertion of the fact. We must know a person as well before we can pronounce that a certain portrait does not resemble him, as in order to assert that it does.

This prejudice against the use of history in the interpretation of prophecy, seems frequently to be based on a confusion which is made, between the facts recorded by historians and the opinions of the historians who record them. Grant that the latter being merely human are worthless, the former are none the less important. Trustworthy historians record events which they neither invented nor caused, but which occurred under God’s providential government; it was He who caused or permitted these events; they are in one sense as Divine, as prophecy; that is, both proceed from Him. Prophecy is God telling us beforehand what shall happen; authentic history is men telling us what has, in the providence of God, taken place. In truth each is best understood in the light of the other; the moral features of events, occupy the main place in the prophecy, so that by its study we learn to weigh things in God s balances, to judge of men and systems by a Divine standard. But the history also elucidates the prophecy; when we see what has been allowed to occur in fulfilment of a prediction, we learn what was intended in the announcement, and understand the perhaps previously mysterious form, in which it was made. Apparent contradictions are reconciled, difficulties are removed, and we are filled with admiration and awe at the foreknowledge and wisdom evinced in predictions, over which the ignorant can only puzzle or speculate. Authentic, history ought not to be deprecated as merely the wisdom of this world; it is something more, it is a record of God s providential government of the world. Besides it is vain and foolish to deny, that mental cultivation in general, an acquaintance with ancient languages and literature, with history and with science, are a help, in the understanding of Scripture and especially of prophetic Scripture. They are not needful to a spiritual apprehension of saving truth, thanks be to God, nor to growth in grace and in the experimental knowledge of the Lord. God can and does dispense with them, but He can and does also sanctify and use them, for the elucidation of His word By themselves they are worthless, for they deal only with the letter; but, sanctified and used by the Holy Spirit, they are invaluable, as helping to explain the letter, in and through which we grasp the spirit.

It is a strange estimate to form of the dignity of the inspired book of the all-wise God, that those ignorant of his works in nature and providence, are as capable of understanding it, as those familiar with them. It is true that the unlearned Christian has, equally with the learned, the indwelling Spirit to guide him into all truth. But it is also true that he needs in addition ministry, human teaching; else why has Christ given teachers to his church? Books are but written ministry. Ignorance is an infirmity, an unavoidable one with many it is true, and one for which help is provided; but it is as much an infirmity of the mind, as blindness or lameness is of the body. We blame not the blind and the lame for not seeing and walking, but we should blame them for refusing the help of those who possess the powers of which they are deprived. We blame not the ignorant for their ignorance when it is unavoidable; but we should blame them for refusing assistance, and for glorying in that ignorance as a peculiar advantage. The ignorant Christian must be indebted to the learned in many ways; but for the labour of such, he would indeed have no Bible; for what could he learn from the original text? and if the translation put into his hands be defective, how but from the criticisms of the learned, shall he remedy the defect? This is surely designed of God, and is one of the ways in which "the whole body, compacted together by that which every joint supplieth, according to the effectual working in the measure of every part, maketh increase of the body unto the edifying of itself in love." It is impossible to assign any reason, why the wisdom and knowledge derived from historical research, should not be made available, as well as every other kind of science, for the elucidation of Scripture.

We dare not for these reasons exclude the light afforded by history, in the endeavour to answer the questions suggested above, is the prophecy of the Apocalypse fulfilled or partly so, or is it still entirely unfulfilled? and is it in its general scope Christian or Jewish? The two inquiries are so closely related, that it is impossible to pursue them apart; it is evident that if the Revelation be partially fulfilled, it is in the history of the Christian church we shall be able to trace the fulfilment, seeing the Jewish nation was already cast away,- "broken off" for a time,-before this prophecy was published; and it is equally evident that if it relate to the future history of restored Israel, no fulfilment can have yet commenced, seeing Israel is still scattered, and Jerusalem trodden down of the Gentiles.

We have therefore to ascertain from the internal evidence of the prophecy itself and from the external evidence of analogy and history, the truth as to these two closely connected points.

And first what says the Apocalypse of itself? To whom is it addressed? This is a fair and fundamental question; it is thus that we judge of the object and scope of the epistles of the New Testament, and of the "burdens" of the ancient prophets. The epistles are addressed "To the saints and to the faithful in Christ Jesus," or "To the church" in such and such a place. Observing this, we argue, the Jews and the ungodly have no right to appropriate the contents of these letters; they are for believers in Christ alone; confusion will result if unbelievers take to themselves these Divine messages. The argument applies with equal force to the Apocalypse. It is addressed to Christ s "servants," "To the seven churches of Asia." This is reiterated; the expressions occur both at the opening and, at the close, of the book. "The Lord God of the holy prophets sent his angel to show unto his servants things which must shortly be done." "I Jesus have sent mine angel to testify unto you these things, in the churches." On reading these distinct declarations, simple unsophisticated minds would surely conclude, that the Jews and unbelievers in general, have no more to do with this prophecy than they have with the Epistle to the Ephesians. They may possibly be alluded to in the one, as in the other, but it is not for them, it is not mainly concerned with them; it is for us; Christians alone were Christ s servants in the days of Domitian, when John saw and heard these things; to Christians alone was it sent, the seven churches represented the whole church, the prophecy is for the Christian church, and they take the children s bread to give it to outsiders, who would rob the church of her Lord s last gift.

It is no use to say, yes! but though given to the church, it might still be a revelation of the counsels of God about others than herself, It might; the Epistle to the Ephesians might have been a treatise on the state and prospects of the, lost ten tribes, but it was not; the vision of Nebuchadnezzar, might have been a vision of the restoration of Israel, but it was not; the visions of Daniel might have been visions of the seven churches in Asia, but they were not, nor was it likely that they would be, nor is it likely that the Lord Jesus in his last prophetic communication to his cherished church, from whom for eighteen hundred years He was to be hidden, would have nothing more pressing, personal, and important to reveal to her, than the destiny of a future Jewish remnant, with which she has nothing in common, and the final judgments on a world, from which she is already delivered, and from which, according to this theory, she will have been previously removed. Did she need no guidance, no comfort, no sustainment with the cordial of hope, for the years of earthly pilgrimage that lay before her? True, He had before, revealed in broad outline the sufferings that awaited her, and the glories that should follow; but had He who knows the end from the beginning, and who foresaw all that has since happened, no further words of warning and of cheer for his long-to-be-tempted, and sorely-to-be-persecuted church? Strange, that such an idea should find place in Christian hearts! What! shall our Lord be less kind and careful than an earthly friend or parent? A father sends forth his young son into a world which he must face alone, into circumstances in which he cannot further communicate with him for some years; he foresees that the separation will be far longer than the lad conceives, that his son will be exposed to temptations and snares, into which he will be only too prone to fall,, that he will meet a crafty, specious, dangerous, deadly foe, in the guise of a friend, and that he will have to undergo sufferings that will be hard for him to bear, before he regains the paternal roof. He puts a long prophetic letter into his hand as they part, with solemn, earnest, repeated, injunctions to him to read and mark its contents. In distant lands and dreadful difficulties, the son opens this letter, and finds-suited advice and encouragement? helpful warning and direction? Oh no ! but an elaborate description of what his father intends to do for his younger brother, after his own return home I What should we say of the wisdom or tenderness of such a parent? Do these interpreters indeed believe that God inspired this prophecy, and that Christ loves his church? Farther, what does the Apocalypse say about its own scope, and about the time to which it refers? Again the first verse of the book supplies a simple and direct answer. It was given to show to Christ s servants "things that must shortly come to pass," and the next verse urges the study of the book, on the ground that "the time is at hand." In the last chapter the angel speaks of these things as "things that must shortly be done," and commands John not to seal the sayings of the prophecy, for the same reason, "the time is at hand." These words may measure time by the thousand-years-To-a-day scale, may not mean "at hand" according to human, but only according to Divine chronology. But it is not likely that this is the case, because in another closely related prophecy, we have expressions of an exactly opposite character, which can be proved to measure time by the ordinary standard. Daniel is twice or thrice told to shut up and seal certain parts of his prophecies, which related to events to take place in this dispensation, "even to the time of the end," because "the time appointed was great" and "the vision for many days." Now the most distant of those events was near if measured by the Divine scale, distant only according to the common computation. If these expressions in Daniel are used in their merely human sense, we have every reason to suppose that it is the same with the similar expressions in Revelation.

To Daniel, Christ said, "shut up the words and seal the book even to the time of the end," and to John, when these things had already begun to come, to pass, the angel says, "seal not the sayings, for the time is at hand." It would not have been at hand in the ordinary sense, if the prophecy relates mainly to still future events. We have every reason therefore to believe, that it relates, on the contrary, to events that began soon after the apostle received the revelation, and that the fulfilment has been in progress ever since.

Another strong presumption that the visions of the Apocalypse form a continuous prophecy, stretching over the whole of this dispensation, exists in their analogy with the prophecies of Daniel. The resemblance between these two is marked and close; both are in the symbolic language, both were given to aged saints who were greatly beloved, who were confessors and all but martyrs; the "Man clothed in linen and girded with the gold of Uphaz, whose face was as lightning, whose eyes were as fire, and whose voice was as the voice of a multitude," who addressed Daniel, on the banks of the Hiddekel, is unquestionably the same Divine Being who addressed John in Patmos. The prophecies were in both cases communicated when the temple was in ruins, and the Jews dispersed; and both Daniel and John, had been trained in a school of peculiar experiences, to fit them to become recipients of these sacred revelations. We take then the symbolic prophecies of Daniel, as those likely to afford the most direct analogy to the symbolic prophecies of the Apocalypse, and we ask, do they date from contemporary events, or from a far distant future? and do they present a continuous sketch of the interval they cover, or do they dwell exclusively on salient and distant crises?

The question scarcely needs a reply. The fourfold image seen by Nebuchadnezzar begins with the Babylonian monarchy of which he was the first great head. "Thou art this head of gold." It pursues its even course down through all the times of the Gentiles, and ends with the millennial kingdom of Christ.

The second prophecy of Daniel, that of the four great beasts or empires, was given forty-nine years later, in the first year of Belshazzar, that is towards the end of Israel s captivity, when the days of Babylon s glory were fast drawing to a close, when the time was rapidly approaching for the kingdom to be numbered, finished, divided, and given to others. Accordingly, while the first beast is still the Babylonian empire, the first particular noticed in the prophecy, is the plucking of the eagle s wings, on the lion s back. The prophecy thus starts from the diminished glory of the latter end of Babylon, rather than from the golden splendour of its commencement, that is, from contemporary events. It presents a second and fuller sketch of the political history of the Gentile world, (for the spiritual power, the little horn, is glanced at principally in its political aspects,) and traces the main features of the times of the Gentiles, down to the same point as its predecessor, the everlasting kingdom of the Most High.

The third prophecy of Daniel, that of the ram and the he goat, with its four horns and its little horn, was given, as its opening states, in the third year of Belshazzar, two years later than the preceding prophecy. It opens with the Medo-Persian empire, and the conquests of Cyrus. Now when this prophecy was given, Cyrus had already been reigning seven years in Persia, and the rise of his universal empire was close at hand. It gives a continuous history of the Medo-Persian and Grecian empires, and of the Mohammedan politico-religious power, thus ranging from soon after its own date, to fall on in the Christian era..

The fourth prophecy of Daniel, that of the seventy weeks to elapse between the end of the captivity, and the coming of Messiah the Prince, began to be fulfilled about eighty years after it was delivered, when Artaxerxes gave the commandment to restore and to build Jerusalem. But the decree of Cyrus, to restore and build the temple, and to liberate the Jews from captivity, was promulgated only two years after the date of this prophecy, and would no doubt be taken by the Jews at first, as marking the commencement of the seventy weeks. This prophecy includes a period of about five hundred years, and reaches from the restoration under Nehemiah to the final destruction of Jerusalem by Titus. Its object was less to indicate intervening events, than to measure the period up to the great event of human history; the previous and the following prophecies, delineate the main outlines of the history of the period.

And lastly the fifth and great closing prophecy of Daniel, given by our Lord Himself, and recorded in the 11th and 12th chapters, begins with the date of the vision, "the third year of Cyrus king of Persia," and takes even a retrospective glance to the first year of Darius the Mede (#Dan 11:4) It predicts the succession of the Persian monarchs, condensing into one sentence the reigns of Cambyses, Smerdis, and Darius Hystaspes, down to the overthrow of the rich and mighty Xerxes, who stirred up all the realm of Grecia. It traces next the history of the Ptolemies and of the Seleucids, down to the desolations and persecutions of Antiochus Epiphanes; gives full detail of the career of the wilful king, and of the closing events of this dispensation, ending with the deliverance of Israel, and the resurrection of the just. It embraces thus a period of at least 2400 years, and extends from the fall of the typical to the fall of the antitypical Babylon; so that all the historical prophecies of Daniel start from events close at hand when they were given, and predict with varying degrees of fulness, a series of other events, to follow in regular sequence, to the point at which they close.

Now, judging by analogy, we should expect that when He who revealed to Daniel the things noted in the Scripture of truth, came six hundred years later, to reveal to John "things that must shortly come to pass," He would follow the same method. On opening the Apocalypse, this expectation is confirmed; we find that it starts, like all Daniel s prophecies, from "the things that are," and that it ends like them, with the great consummation. In the nature of things, it could not go over all the ground of the older prophecies. Many of the events foretold by Daniel had already transpired. The three great empires had risen and fallen; the fourth was then in its glory. Antiochus had desolated Judea and defiled the temple; Messiah had come, and had been cut off; Titus had destroyed Jerusalem. So much of the journey lay behind John in Patmos; these facts were no longer themes for prophecy, but materials for history. Israel s fortunes were no longer the object of main interest, either to Him who was about to give this last of all prophecies, or to him who was about to receive it, or to those for whose sakes he was to write it. Blindness in part had happened to Israel, until the fulness of the Gentiles should be come in. The Apocalypse was not given in the sacred tongue of the Hebrews consequently, but in gentile Greek, just as Daniel s two earlier prophecies, which refer to the times of the Gentiles, without much allusion to Israel, are in gentile Chaldee. Taking these altered circumstances into account, what should we expect the last revelation granted to John in Patmos to contain? Should we, judging by analogy, expect that, passing over in silence eighteen hundred years, crowded with events of deep interest, of stupendous importance to seventy or eighty generations of his saints, the Lord Jesus would reveal through this Christian apostle, only the particulars of a brief closing crisis of earthly history, subsequent to the church s removal, and relating mainly to a future Jewish remnant? Assuredly not! We should expect this final prophecy, sent directly by Christ Himself to his church, through his most spiritually minded apostle, to contain an outline of all that should befall that church, from the time then present, until the Lord s return, with perhaps brief indications of subsequent events. A first perusal of the prophetic part of the book, gives the impression that our expectation is correct. We find a series of symbolic visions, and we observe a perceptible correspondence between some of them, and some of Daniel s, exactly as would be the case supposing these visions to traverse the same ground as his later ones. We find in the Apocalypse no beasts answering to Daniel s first three, but the fourth reappears very prominently with his ten horns; we find no periods corresponding to the seventy weeks or the 2300 days, but the "time times and a half" is repeated in several forms, and in the same relative connection. We find in the closing visions, features that identify them with the final scenes of Daniel, and it is difficult to resist the conviction, that the intervening apocalyptic visions, must be symbolic Predictions of the moral and spiritual aspects, of all that has happened to the church of Christ; from John s day to the present time, and of all that shall happen, to the close.

But analogy furnishes a stronger argument still. "The Old Testament, when rightly understood," says Augustine, "is one great prophecy of the New." The records of the past are pregnant with the germs of a corresponding but more exalted future. The history of the seed of Abraham after the flesh, is, throughout, typical of the history of his seed by faith. The Lord s dealings with them, were types of his dealings with us; for every fact, in their history, some counterpart may be noted in our own; our experiences are but a new edition, on a different scale, of theirs. Now under the old covenant, prophecy threw its light beforehand, on almost every event of importance that happened to the nation of Israel, from the days of Abraham to the days of Christ, the fall of Jerusalem and its temple, the dispersion of the Jews, and the end of that age.

The light of prophecy is a privilege, a blessing, a gift; it is always so spoken of in Scripture; "He gave them prophets," "He gave gifts unto men, . . . apostles, prophets, evangelists, pastors, teachers"; and though Christianity possesses many higher privileges, and nobler gifts than Judaism, it lacks none of the real blessings of that earlier economy. We have exchanged many a shadow for substance, but lost no substantial good. New Testament prophecy may therefore be expected to throw its light, on every event of importance to happen to the church of Christ, from the fall of Jerusalem to the second advent, that is, from the end of the Jewish, to the, end of the Christian age.

Among the events made subjects of prophecy in the Old Testament were the birth of Isaac, the rapid increase of Israel, the descent into Egypt, the sufferings of the Israelites under the Pharaohs, the duration of their bondage, the exodus, the forty years in the desert, the possession of Canaan, its very division among the tribes; the characters of Saul, David, Solomon, and many other individuals; the building of the temple, the division of the kingdom into two, the Assyrian invasion, and Israel s captivity; the Babylonian invasion and the seventy years captivity of Judah, the return from Babylon, the time to elapse, and many of the events to occur, between it and the coming of Messiah the Prince, his birth, character, true nature, ministry, sufferings, and death; the ministry of John the Baptist, the rejection of Israel, the call of the Gentiles, and the destruction of Jerusalem under Titus.

Was Israel ever left during a long period, full of momentous changes, and events of solemn national importance, without the light and guidance of prophecy? Is there in their history any "mighty unrepresented vacuum," of the occurrences of which we can say, great as are these events in human estimation, they are deemed unworthy of Divine notice in prophecy? If such be the case there will be a distinct analogy, on which to base the theory, that the Apocalypse is still wholly unfulfilled. But such is not the case. The chain is almost unbroken, and though four hundred years elapsed between the last of the prophets and the coming of Messiah, Daniel s prophecy fills in the events of the interval, so that no gap of even a century occurs in the long series.

Is it likely that there should be no analogy, but a perfect contrast, in the history of the antitypical Israel? Has she no Egypt to leave and no wilderness to traverse, no land to inherit, no oppressors to tyrannize over her, no evil kings to mislead her, no reformers and deliverers to arise, no BABYLON to carry her captive, no temple to rebuild, no Messiah to look for, no judgments to apprehend, no rest to inherit? Are hers less important than theirs? Are her foes, so much more obvious, her dangers so much more patent, that it should be superfluous to supply her with prophetic light to detect them? Because they were an earthly people, and she a heavenly church, is she therefore not on earth, and not amid the ungodly? Are her enemies heavenly because the church is so? Nay, but most earthly, for the wicked spirits against whom the church wrestles, wage their warfare incarnate in earthly, sensual, devilish systems, and in actual men, as did Satan in the serpent in Eden. Every conceivable reason would suggest her greater need of prophetic light. Now the, Apocalypse is the book of the New Testament which answers to "the prophets" of the Old.

If then it contain predictions of the first spread of Christianity, of the hosts of, martyrs who sealed their testimony with their blood, during the ten pagan persecutions, of the reception of Christianity by Constantine and the Roman empire, of the gradual growth of corruption in the church, of the irruptions of the Goths and Vandals, and the break up of the old Roman empire into ten kingdoms, of the rise and development of popery, of the rise and rapid conquests of Mohammedanism of the long continued and tremendous sufferings of the church under papal persecutions, of the fifty millions of martyrs slain by the Romish Church, of the enormous political power attained by the popes, of their Satanic craft and wickedness, of the Reformation, of the gradual decay of the papal system and the extinction of the temporal power of the popes: If it contain predictions of these events, which we know to have taken place in the history of the antitypical Israel, then we have a perfect analogy with the Old Testament. If on the other hand, the Apocalypse alludes to none of these events, but passing them all over in silence, gives only the history of an Antichrist who has, not yet appeared, and of judgments not yet commenced, nor to be commenced until the church is in heaven, then instead of a striking scriptural analogy, we have a glaring and most unaccountable contrast.

We say advisedly unaccountable, for none of the reasons assigned for this supposed contrast between Israel s experience and our own in this matter are satisfactory. Their calling was an earthly one, ours is a heavenly one, it is true; nevertheless, our calling from heaven, and to heaven., leaves us still on earth. We have earthly connections and relations; we are not of the world, but we are in the world. The acts of earthly monarchs and the changes of kingdoms and dynasties, affect the church even as they affected her Lord, in the days of his flesh. How came the prophecies "I called my Son out of Egypt," and "He shall be called a Nazarene," to be accomplished? What took the virgin mother to Bethlehem? Why was Paul left bound two whole years? Secular political events have their influence, their mighty influence, on the church, notwithstanding her heavenly calling, and may therefore well be revealed to her by the spirit of prophecy. It is evident there is nothing in the peculiarity of this dispensation, which precludes the church from receiving predictions, of specific events to take place during its course, because the epistles contain such predictions. The fact that the Holy Spirit has announced to the church, events reaching through the whole dispensation cannot be denied. "He who now letteth will let until he be taken out of the way; and then shall that wicked be revealed, whom the Lord shall consume with the spirit of his mouth, and shall destroy with the brightness of his coming." The hindering obstacle, whatever it was, was in existence when the apostle wrote, and was to continue in existence until another event took place, the rise of the man of sin, and that wicked one was to continue till the Lord s coming. Here we have a prophecy the fulfilment of which, starting from its own date, reaches to the consummation, and covers the whole interval, leaving no room for a break.

There is therefore no ground for asserting, that the fulfilment of the Apocalypse must be future, because the church cannot be the subject of prophecies whose sphere is earth. If she may be the subject of one or two, she may equally well be the subject of a hundred, and the question must be decided on other grounds. If the first generation of Christians were forewarned of the fall of Jerusalem, we may be forewarned of the fall of Babylon. If they knew beforehand that Jerusalem was to be compassed about with armies, we may know that the power of Turkey is to decay. In principle there is no difference; a dispensation that admits of the one, admits also of the other..

The interpretation of this book which asserts a past historic fulfilment of the greater part of its mystic visions, is then in perfect harmony with strong scriptural analogies; and the interpretation which asserts them all to be future and unfulfilled, is in violent and unnatural opposition to all analogy, and would require the strongest internal evidence to support it.

But such internal evidence it can never receive, seeing it is a negative, and not a positive theory; it denies the historic fulfilment, but substitutes no other that can be tested by its correspondence or otherwise with the terms of the prediction. Internal evidence in its favour is therefore impossible; there is no analogy to support it; and we are driven to the conclusion that it is untenable.

The principal test, however, by which to determine the period covered by this prophecy is a comparison with history. Can any series of events be indicated, which have transpired since the Christian era, which bear a sufficiently clear resemblance to the symbolic visions of the Apocalypse, to justify the assertion, that the prophecy is for the most part a fulfilled one? If so, candour would admit, that it settles the question.

We firmly believe that such a fulfilment is clearly traceable. Yet as Jewish unbelief refuses to perceive that the character and mission, the life and death, of Jesus of Nazareth, fulfil the long series of Messianic predictions, so there may be a Christian unbelief which refuses to perceive, that the events of the Christian era, answer to the predictions of this Christian prophecy.

Yet if such a series of events have taken place, it ought not to be difficult to observe the resemblance between the history and the prophecy. It is not a question of minor details, but of events of stupendous magnitude, affecting a vast extent of the earth, and reaching through centuries of time. It is not a question of remote antiquity, nor of half explored, dimly known regions; no such difficulties encumber the problem. The things that have transpired in the Roman earth, since the days of Domitian, when the Apocalypse was written, especially those concerning the Christian church, both true and false, and those transpiring in our own day, are not things done in a corner, concerning which there may exist a great variety of opinions and of questions that can never be decided. On the contrary, we have records abundant and varied enough of the whole period, to enable us to live it over again in imagination; and we have remains, and monuments, and present facts, which are so linked with all that eventful past, that no ingenuity can distort or deny, any of its main features. The last eighteen hundred years, present no terra incognita to the historian; explorers may not conjure up characters, or concoct transactions, to suit their taste; dates cannot be adapted to fit theories; every error is sure to be detected, and every assertion sifted. Very narrow are the limits within which invention may act; almost boundless is the field for examination and research. This being the case, it must be not only possible, but easy, to recognise the fulfilment of the apocalyptic prophecies if it exist, provided only we are sufficiently acquainted with the facts of history, and rightly understand the predictions themselves.

If a photograph of an extensive and varied landscape, be presented to a person familiar with the scene, he will not fail to recognise its main features; he might not be immediately able to detect the miniature of his own homestead, amid the many similar to it, nor to identify every spire of the neighbouring city, and every little detail of the picture. But the more he studies it, the more he will see in it, and the microscope will enable him to identify objects, which one without a microscope and with less knowledge of the neighbourhood, would never notice. It is thus with a student of the Apocalypse who is familiar with history. Or, to reverse the simile; one who has long being acquainted with a series of photographs, say of the Holy Land, who has pored over them with loving interest and impressed them deep in his memory, is transported to Palestine, and wanders amid those very scenes. He stands on the shores of a blue lake which reflects a snowy cone that rises far away to the north; the level tops of a range of barren mountains stretch along the opposite shore; a ruined, earthquake-shaken town and castle lie behind him; and away to the south a river makes its way out of the lake. He needs no guide to tell him where he is; he stops not to observe the details of the scene; this combination of broad features so often noted in the photograph is enough: "Hermon," he exclaims "that exceeding high mountain apart! Tiberias, solitary survivor of sister cities I mountains of Bashan, river Jordan, I know ye all;" and he would smile incredulously at any one who should say, "Well, in spite of the general resemblance, I question after all whether this is the sea of Galilee!"

It is thus with a student of history who is familiar with the Apocalypse. The remembered photograph serves to identify the real scene, as in the former case the well remembered scene interpreted the picture; if there be a resemblance it would be impossible that either could be known, and the other not recognised, if contemplated with sufficient care and attention.

The reason that the resemblance is not more uniformly perceived, between the predictions of Revelation and the facts of history since the Christian era, must then lie, either in a want of thorough acquaintance with one or other, or else in a want of careful and unprejudiced attention to the correspondence between them. Those who have taken the Apocalypse literally, have of course little idea what it predicts when translated into unsymbolic language; and history is too often contemplated, from the worldly political point of view in which it is generally written, for the resemblance between the Divine delineation of its facts, and the facts themselves, to be easily recognised.

Besides this, a foregone conclusion that the book of Revelation is unfulfilled, prevents many from perceiving the proofs to the contrary. But we feel no hesitation in asserting, that a candid student, who admits the Apocalypse to be symbolic, and patiently endeavours by the help of other Scripture to translate its symbols, and who then proceeds to compare its predictions, with the authentic historical records of the Christian era, will be driven to admit, that there is as clear a correspondence between the two, as between any other prophecy and its fulfilment.

We cannot enlarge on this argument here; to do it justice would be to give an exposition of the greater part of the book. The correspondence will be traced somewhat fully as to one or two of the visions, in the third part of this work; and any force of truth therein perceived, must be allowed to lend its aid in deciding our present point; the general principles on which the book ought to be interpreted. We entreat the Futurist reader to remember, that it is possible for the plainest and most satisfactory fulfilment of a prophecy, to be forced on the attention, and yet be unperceived: witness the Jews in the days of Christ; witness the disciples by the empty sepulchre. And yet if a fulfilment of the Apocalypse has been accomplishing for more than seventeen hundred years, and if there remains very little now to be fulfilled, it is of momentous interest to the church of Christ that she should be aware of the fact. If in watching an exhibition of dissolving views we judge of the nearness of the conclusion, merely by the time that has elapsed since it began, we may have a vague impression that the end cannot be far off; but if we have held a programme of the proceedings in our hand all the time, and have observed that each scene appeared as announced, and that only the final one remains, we have a certainty that the end must be close at hand; which is a very different state of mind.

A Divine programme of the proceedings of this dispensation has been placed in our hands; they who avail themselves of it, they who study it, and watch the dissolving views presented on the stage of history, know how many of the pre-appointed configurations have appeared, melted away, and been replaced by others; they know the position on the programme of the one now on the stage, and they know what remains! They lift up their heads, they know that their redemption draweth nigh, yea very, very nigh!

Nor are the claims of this principle of historical interpretation in the least invalidated by the fact, that interpreters differ among themselves as to the precise application of some of the visions. Nearly all the writers of the first fifteen centuries of the Christian era, entertained the view that the Apocalypse was a comprehensive prophecy, reaching from the date of its publication to the end of all things, and endeavoured consequently to find its historical solution. It can be no wonder that, as the page of history has unrolled itself, greater accuracy should have been attained, than it was possible for early students to possess. At the time of the Reformation, and subsequently, the great body of commentators still interpreted the Apocalypse on the same principle, but naturally with a far closer approximation to the truth, though they were by no means unanimous in their expositions of detail; and many are the points of controversy which still exist. But the essential agreement, more than counterbalances the minor differences, and it would be strange indeed if such differences did not exist.*

* We extract the following note from an admirable little pamphlet by P. H. Gosse, F.R.S., entitled, "The Revelation How is it to be Interpreted?" (London: Morgan and Chase, 23, Warwick Lane, Paternoster Row) which we earnestly commend to the consideration of those who hold Futurist views. "The following list of Presentist expositors of the Apocalypse includes, so fay as I have been able to ascertain, all of any note from the era of the Reformation to the publication of the Hore of Mr. Elliott: Luther, Bullinger, Bale, Chytrnus, Marlorat, Foxe, Brigbtman, Pareus, Mede, Vitringa, Daubuz, Sir Isaac Newton, Whiston, Bengel, Bishop Newton, Bicheno, Faber, Frere, Irving, Cunningham, Habershon, Bickersteth, Birks, Woodhouse, Keith, Elliott, twenty-six in all.

Out of these there are agreed as follows:

1.That seals I. to IV. are the decline of the pagan empire . 10 2.That seal VI. is the fall of paganism under Constantine . 11
3. That trumpets I. to IV. are the Gothic invasions 15
4. That trumpet V. is the Saracens. 17
5. That trumpet VI. is the Turks 21
6. That the little opened book refers to the Reformation. . . 21
7. That chapter xi. is the papal persecution of saints as heretics 22
8. That chapter xii. is the depression and recession from view of the true church during the papal ages
9. That the beasts are aspects of the Papacy 25
10. That the vials are the great French revolution and its results 8
11. That chapter xvii. is Rome 26
12. That chapter xviii. is the Papacy 26
13. That a day is the symbol of a year 19

It is right to observe that, the first four seals and first four trumpets referring each to several things, the agreement must be understood as admitting some diversity in details. Also that the application to the French revolution of the vials, could not possibly be made by expositors who wrote before the close of the last century. that is more than half of the whole number. Sir Isaac Newton and Whiston, however, shrewdly foresaw the great infidel revolution, as the earthquake of the seventh trumpet, "that infidelity was to break in pieces the Antichristian party which had so long corrupted Christianity." (Whiston, p. 46.)



Prophetic interpretation is not milk for babes, but rather strong meat for those that are of full age, and have their senses exercised by reason of use. But which of the very simplest doctrines of Scripture excludes controversy? Is it an argument against the true view of the atonement, that numerous erroneous and defective views exist? Is there no revealed truth on the subject of church government, because such widely differing creeds on the point prevail? If we cannot see eye to eye on such subjects as these, shall we marvel that differences appear in the application of the symbolic visions of Revelation to history? The multitude of the events predicted, their range and variety, the peculiar language in which they are foretold, the fact that they bear a strong testimony against existing corruptions in the church, and consequently enlist the antagonism of all who uphold these corruptions, these things are quite sufficient to account for the measure of disagreement, which is found among interpreters, and which decreases in proportion as acquaintance with the subject increases, and as every fresh phase of contemporary history, adds its testimony to the previously existing mass.

But it is needful to notice one or two objections, commonly advanced by a certain school of Futurist interpreters, who hold very strongly the parenthetical character of the present dispensation; because they appear to have more weight than on examination they prove to possess. They settle the question as to the character of the Book of Revelation, in a summary and apparently conclusive way, but in reality on superficial and unsubstantial grounds. The first is a sort of attempt to prove an alibi on behalf of the church: "the church cannot be many way the subject of the prophetic visions of Revelation (chapter vi.-xix.) because she is already seen in heaven in the two previous chapters. All that happens after chapter v. is subsequent to the rapture of the church; it must therefore refer to the Jewish remnant." "The church is never seen on earth, or anywhere but in heaven, from the end of chapter iii. till in chapter xix. Christ comes forth from heaven, and the armies which were in heaven follow in his train." * (* "Eight Lectures on Prophecy." W. T. 3rd edition, p. 592.)

Fully admitting that the four-and-twenty elders and the cherubim of #Rev 4:5, include the church, we hold, that it would be a sufficient answer to this objection to say, part of the church are seen in heaven, while part are still represented as suffering on earth; or to say "He hath raised us up together, and made us sit together, in heavenly places in Christ" even now, while we still groan, and fight, and toil, and die, on earth. But the chapters themselves supply a more conclusive answer. The church is not only seen in heaven, but she, is seen taking part in the action of the beautiful introductory episode of this Divine drama. What is that action? It is the taking and opening by the Lamb, of the seven sealed book. This action took place while John was an exile in Patmos; for ever since, the mysteries hidden under those seven seals have been discovered and published to the world.

Clearly the book is not now shut and sealed; for we know its contents; each seal covered or contained a vision, not be it observed the fulfilment of a vision, but the vision itself. The visions were not seen till the seals were broken, and the seals were not broken till the Lamb took the book. But the visions were seen eighteen hundred years ago; therefore the Lamb took the book and broke the seals thereof eighteen hundred years ago; that is, the scene in which the church is represented as taking part in heaven occurred eighteen hundred years ago. But the church was not actually in heaven eighteen hundred years ago, and therefore there is no ground for the assertion that the church will be actually in heaven before the events symbolised in chapters vi. to xix. take place. The church was in heaven, in the only sense in which she will be there till the marriage of the Lamb shall come, when John was in Patmos. In other words the Apocalypse represents the church as mystically in heaven, while still actually on earth, even as #Eph 2, #Phil 3, and other scriptures do.

So, while we gladly grant to our Futurist brethren, that a portion of the church is represented as in heaven, in chapters, iv., v., we ask them to grant with equal candour that a portion is represented on earth in the subsequent chapters. The one is just as evident as the other; and to deny it is both to destroy the dramatic unity so markedly stamped on this prophecy, and to obscure one of its grandest lessons.

The prophecy is addressed, as we have seen, to Christs servants and to the churches; the ascription of praise in #Rev 1:5 is evidently Christian praise, it is the praise of those who have been loved by Jesus, and washed from their sins in his blood. John speaks of himself as the brother, and fellow sufferer of those to whom he wrote, and John was a Christian confessor, a prisoner of Jesus Christ in Patmos, as much as Paul had been in Rome. He says he was in exile "for the word of God, and for the testimony which he held," which expression therefore means Christianity. Under the fifth seal we catch a glimpse of a company of martyrs who were slain "for the word of God and for the testimony which they held," that is, for confessing their Christian faith, like John; they were slain because they were Christians. White robes are given to them, and they are told to wait till another company of martyrs should be killed as they were, that is as Christians. In chapter vii. we have presented to us a company in heaven, unquestionably Christians also, for they are gathered out of every nation, kindred, and tongue, and they have washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb. In chapter viii. "the prayers of all saints" and "the. prayers of the saints" are mentioned; now prayer ascends from suppliants on earth, and "saints" in New Testament phraseology means Christians. We have no right in the last book of the New Testament to revert to an Old Testament signification of this word. Let the general tone of John s gospel and epistles be recalled, and his choice of this word to designate true Christians, in the midst of an ungodly world and falsely professing church, will be felt to be in beautiful harmony. What is the grand distinction made in John s epistles between true Christians and those who are not? It is holiness, saintship. "If we say we have fellowship with Him, and walk in darkness, we lie and do not the truth; but if we walk in the light, we have fellowship one with another, and the blood of Jesus Christ his Son cleanseth us from all sin." "These things write I unto you, that ye sin not." "Every one that doeth righteousness is born of Him." "Every man that hath this hope in Him, purifieth himself even as He is pure." "Whosoever abideth in Him, sinneth not." "Whosoever is born of God doth not commit sin." "In this the children of God are manifest, and the children of the devil: whosoever doeth not righteousness, is not of God." "This is the love of God, that we keep his commandments." "Whatsoever is born of God sinneth not." "We know that we are of God, and the whole world lieth in wickedness." "He that doeth good is of God, but he that doeth evil hath not seen God."

Such language shows that in the eyes of John, practical purity and holiness, saintliness, is the grand characteristic of Christians.

When therefore we find him, consistently designating a certain body, by the distinctive appellation of "the saints," we conclude that those so called are true Christians, in opposition to the ungodly, or to false professors.
Where does John, ever apply such a term to Jews? Where in the whole New Testament can the term be found so applied? Why then should we assert that it is applied to Jews here? Paul uses it forty-three times, and in every case as a synonym for Christians. Luke uses it four times, in the Acts, and Jude twice in his epistle, in the same sense; in fact only once is it used in any equivocal sense in the whole New Testament. ("Many bodies of the saints which slept arose." #Matt 27:52.)

Besides, we observe these "saints," who are thirteen times mentioned in the Apocalypse, doing and bearing exactly what we know from other scriptures, the saints of the Christian church must do and bear in this dispensation. We find them watching, waiting, praying, enduring tribulation (#Rev 13:10), resisting unto blood (#Rev 16:6), resting in heaven (#Rev 14:12-13), and at last manifested as the bride of Christ, and as the "armies which were in heaven," clad under both emblems with the "fine linen clean and white, which is the righteousness of saints"; we find them associated with the martyrs of Jesus, (#Rev 17:6), a clear proof that they cannot be Jewish saints.

In short, so far from the church being actually and exclusively in heaven, at the commencement of the prophetic drama of this book, she is seen on earth during its entire course. She is seen collectively under various symbols, such as the one hundred and forty-four thousand, the two witnesses, the sun-clad woman, the armies of heaven, the New Jerusalem; and her members are seen severally as "the saints." They are seen first in their sufferings, and then in their glory; first slain for Jesus’ sake, then enthroned beside Him. Can it be questioned that the saints who pray, and wait, and suffer, and die as martyrs of Jesus, are the same saints, the "called, and chosen, and faithful," who are seen with the Lamb afterwards, as his bride, and as his white-robed followers? If they are not; the unity of the book is gone, it becomes an incomprehensible confusion. If the saints who form the bride of the Lamb in chap xix., are not the saints who in the previous chapters witnessed for Him in life and in death, then the lesson written most legibly on the pages of the prophecy, the lesson that, in spite of ignorance and obscurity, the church in all ages has learned from it,-the truth that sustained millions of martyrs in their protracted sufferings and cheered them in their dying agonies, -the truth with which this prophecy seems instinct, "IF WE SUFFER, WE: SHALL ALSO REIGN WITH HIM," is utterly obliterated from its pages!

The suffering "saints" get no reward; and the happy; blessed bride, rises not from a surging sea of sorrow and suffering, to the joy of her Lord s embrace and the glory of his throne. One of the great morals of the book is gone, as well as its dramatic unity. The exigences of a false system alone could suggest such a wresting of Scripture as this.

This system of interpretation, involves besides, a logical inconsistency. The bride is the Christian church; her raiment identifies her with the previously mentioned "saints," and the "saints" are-a Jewish remnant !* (*The future existence of a Jewish remnant is not denied, though their history and experiences are mapped out by a certain school of prophetic associate interpreters, far more definitely than by the word of God. That the remnant or remainder of the Jewish nation, will be restored to Palestine before the millennium, brought there into great trouble, and prepared by it to say, "Blessed is He that cometh in the name of the Lord," that Christ will appear for their deliverance, and that they will be converted at the light of Him, this much seems clear from Scripture. The gifts and calling of God are without repentance, and He has not cast away his people whom He foreknew.)

This is as if we should say: the army is composed of soldiers, they wear uniforms; whenever you meet men in uniform they are-civilians ! Surely they who teach thus should be ashamed for not rightly dividing the word of truth. "Be not carried about with divers and strange doctrines," is an exhortation we have need to remember. Let simple minded saints be reassured, and fear not to claim and appropriate, their divinely bestowed name!

The only way of avoiding the force of this argument is, to deny that the bride of the Lamb is the church; for it is evident that the bride is identical with the saints, and it is evident also that the saints are on earth, during the whole course of the book. Those who are resolved to prove that the church is not represented as on earth in these visions, must therefore not only deny that the saints are the church, but seeing the saints are identical with the bride, must also deny that the bride is the church.

It is a painful and humiliating illustration, of the length to which the desire to uphold a favourite theory, will carry Christian men, that many Futurists are to be found, who actually do deny this, and even glory in their shame in so doing, as if this departure from one of the first principles of Christ, were an attainment of advanced truth!

The bride of Christ a Jewish remnant! ! It is then of the Jewish remnant that the apostle Paul speaks in #Eph 5.; it is of the Jewish remnant that Eve, and Rebecca, and Rachel, and Asenath, and Zipporab, and Ruth, and Pharaoh s daughter are types! It is of a Jewish remnant that Paul says, "I have espoused you as a chaste virgin to Christ!"

Even so. "The bride is not the figure of nearest association," say our accurate Futurist friends; "the body is still nearer." "The church is his body, the fulness of Him that filleth all in all" True! But have ye not read, "he that loveth his wife loveth himself"? in a sense the bride is the body, and the body is the bride. The figures are twain, the truth is one. Such is the union, that Christ and his church are separate existences, as are bridegroom and bride; such also is the union that Christ and his church are one, as is the body with the head. "He that is joined to the Lord is one spirit"; "because I live, ye shall live also." Let any one read #Eph 1 and #Eph 5., and say is it not making a distinction without a difference, to assert that the bride and the body do not represent the same reality.

Let it be granted then that, fulfilling all these types. from Eden downwards, and realizing all the figures of most intimate association and union which language can convey,-the vine and the branches, the head and the members, the bridegroom and the bride,-the white robed saintly bride of #Rev 19. is the church of the redeemed; and we claim that without all contradiction, THE CHURCH IS ON EARTH DURING THE ACTION OF THE APOCALYPSE, AND THAT THEREFORE THE APOCALYPSE IS A CHRISTIAN PROPHECY, FULFILLED IN THE EVENTS OF THE CHRISTIAN ERA.



END OF PART II.

Inlagt av Leif Berg