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BOOK VI.

AN EXPOSITION OF THE SECOND PORTION OF THE SEALED OR LARGER BOOK OF THE

APOCALYPSE.

CHAPTER I.

RESPECTING THE CHRONOLOGICAL JUNCTION OF THE TWO SEPARATED PORTIONS OF THE LARGER SEALED BOOK OF THE APOCALYPSE.

As the regular chronological evolution of the larger scaled book of the Apocalypse was interrupted by the parenthetical insertion of the smaller open book: so, when the smaller open book, in all its five sections, has been brought to a termination, the prophet returns to the larger sealed book, which for a season he had quitted. Such being the case, we must obviously conclude, that he resumes his original subject at the precise chronological point where he departed from it for the sake of parenthetically introducing the smaller open book.

I. The first portion of the larger sealed book of the Apocalypse brought us down, in regular chronological succession, from the birth of Nebuchadnezzar, the golden head of the metallic image, in the year before Christ 657, to the close of the sixth trumpet or the second woe-trumpet in the year after Christ 1697 1.

At that point of time was introduced the episode of the little open book: which, returning to the

1

Scc above book iv. chap. 2. § II. 1. chap. 7. § II. 5.

commencement of the fifth trumpet or the first woetrumpet, gives a full history of the great demonolatrous Apostasy during the permitted period of three times and a half or during, the latter moiety of the grand period of seven times.

This being accomplished, and the contents of the little open book having now been detailed, the prophet resumes his account of the larger sealed book; beginning again, as might naturally be expected, where he had left off for the purpose of introducing the little open book.

But the chronological point, where the narrative of the larger sealed book had been interrupted, was the close of the sixth trumpet and the passing away of the second woe in the year after Christ

1697.

Therefore the narrative must be resumed with the commencement of the seventh trumpet: which ushers in the third great woe; and which comprehends within its own period of sounding, as so many successive blasts, the seven vials full of the last plagues, for in them the wrath of God is accomplished '.

II. But, although the narrative of the larger sealed book is assumed with the commencement of the seventh trumpet as developed by the effusion of its seven successive vials; yet, in order to furnish one of those chronological links, by which the various parallel parts of the Apocalypse are bound together, the sounding of the seventh trumpet itself

'See above book ii. chap. 4. § I, III.

is mentioned in the little open book: and, at the same time, a summary account of the third woe is given; which summary account forms a kind of syllabus to the enlarged account of it, that is afterward detailed in its proper place, when the prophet, returning to the larger sealed book, comes to treat of the seven vials 1.

III. In the year 1697, the second woe passed away: and the warning voice of the hierophantic angel announces, that the third woe will quickly succeed it 2.

Now the first woe passed away at the end of the five prophetic months or in the year 762; and the second woe did not commence, until the year 1301: consequently, a space of more than five centuries elapsed, between the termination of the first woe, and the commencement of the second.

But no such ample period is to intervene, between the termination of the second woe, and the commencement of the third: for the third woe is to come quickly after the termination of the second; that is to say, quickly when compared with the longdelayed coming of the second after the termination of the first.

Hence, as more than five centuries elapsed, between the termination of the first woe, and the coming of the second; and as five centuries at the least are, consequently, made the measure of the

Rev. xi. 14-19.

2 Rev. xi. 14.

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