was undoubtedly universal in the present day. This distress and perplexity and the down treading of Jerusalem were to be accompanied by signs in the heavens. “And immediately after the tribulation of those days shall be the sun darkened, and the moon shall not give her light, and the stars shall fall from the heavens, and the powers shall be shaken”. &c. Now the words of these predictions falling from the lips of Him who lived as never man lived and spake as never man spake, were so plain that it was impossible to mistake their meaning. There was nothing inconsistent with astronomical science in believing that the sun, the moon and the stars would show preternatural aspects when they shared in the great day of the Lord. Dr. Cumming then adverted to the prophecies of Christ concerning Elijah, which he believed had not yet been fulfilled. In references to other passages of the Saviour’s predictions, the lecturer pointed out that the preaching of the Gospel and the circulation of the Scriptures in the language of nearly every country on the globe seemed to fulfil the language of the predictions; and if these things were accomplished, we were on the eve of the present economy; and in that period, however short or long it might be , that preceded the wind up of this era, “Then shall the end come”. He also contended that the word “generation” did not mean 40 years, but the nationality of the Jews. The next passage dwelt on was that of Daniel, “Many shall run to and fro and knowledge shall be increased;” and he argued that in the increase of locomotion by means of railways and in the use of the electric telegraph, as well as in the vast extension of knowledge, among the poorer classes by means of cheap newspapers, the passage was amply fulfilled. The subject of prophetical dates was next introduced. There would be found scattered through the prophecies the expressions seven times 2,300 days; seventy weeks; time, times and half a time; forty-two months; 1,260 days, 1290 days, 1,335 days; an hour, a day, a month, a year, &c. The most important of these would be found in Daniel. Having by various texts shown that a prophetic day was synonymous with a year, chronologically, and that there was good authority for estimating a time at 360 years, he next argued that the prophetic books were unfolded to John in that beautiful panorama opened to him in the Isle of Patmos. Daniel had selected 1,260 as the ending of the duration of the great and incorporated apostacy. The prophet said in the fourth empire there was to spring up a little horn in which were eyes like the eyes of man, and a mouth speaking great things, and before this little horn three other horns or powers were to fall. By various indications the doctor showed the passage to be expressly applicable to the Pope. He also instanced several events connected with the French Revolution – the first Napoleon’s wars and his imprisonment of the Pope, the confiscation of church property in 1836 in -
