Resembling this view, though, in one important respect, differing from it, is that held by a third class of Christians. Believing that Christ's coming is to follow the millennium, not precede it, they maintain that the character of this era has been altogether misunderstood ; that, instead of being a period of rest and triumph for the Church, it is to be a period of trial and conflict ; and that, if not already past, it is rapidly hastening to a close. According to this view, the coming of Christ, with the end of all things, is drawing nigh.
This article would be incomplete, were we not to notice another view which has recently been put forth with considerable power, and is now finding acceptance with many. According to this hypo thesis, the second advent is past already. Christ himself foretold its nearness. He was to ` come in his kingdom' before some of his disciples ' tasted death ;' before they had ' gone over the cities of Israel ;' before that generation had passed away.' Christ's own declarations regarding his advent (say they) thus invariably either affirmed or implied that it was near. They were fulfilled, partly, in his coming, by the outpouring of his Spirit on the day of Pentecost, to establish his reign among men ; and partly in the judgments which, in that generation, fell on the Jewish community, by which the Mosaic economy was abolished, and the age (alcl,P) or `world' that then was, brought to a final end. The references to the advent in the Acts of the Apostles,' and in the Epistles (they maintain), are but reproductions, somewhat varied, of Christ's own declarations; while, in nearly all of them, it is evident, either from the language employed, or the connection in which it stands, that the writers were looking for the advent before the passing away of the then existing generation. Along with Dr. Owen (see his Sermons on 2 Pet. iii. It), they imagine the prediction of St. Peter—' the earth and the works that are therein shall be burned up' —to foretell, not the destruction of the world, but the destruction of Judaism, and the passing away of the heavens and earth of the levitical dispensa tion. Believing the Apocalypse to have been
written prior to the destruction of Jerusalem, they think it has reference mainly to that event, and perhaps, in connection with it, to the overthrow of Pagan Rome.
According to this hypothesis, Christ has already come. He is already seated on the throne of his glory, and before him even now arc gathered all nations.' The judgment is now going on ; the wicked are passing away 'into everlasting punish ment, and the righteous into life eternal.' Men become consciously the subjects of this judgment, as they pass from the sphere of the visible among unseen and everlasting things.
It will be perceived that this hypothesis leads to the following conclusions :—That scripture nowhere foretells the destruction of our world; that the hu man race may be propagated on this earth for ever; that if the advent be past already, so also is the resurrection which was to precede it, and which must, therefore, have been a resurrection of souls from Hades, and not of bodies from the grave; or, if a resurrection of bodies, then not a visible resurrection; and fmally, that the resurrec tion now takes place at death, in the emerging from the mortal frame of a body, which, invisible to human eye, is spiritual, incorruptible, and glorious.
Many grave and, apparently, insuperable objec tions to this hypothesis will at once suggest them selves to the mind of the thoughtful reader, but it is not necessary that these should be stated here. Bickersteth, Practical Guide to the Prophecies; Birks, Outlines of Unfulfilled Prophecy; Urwick, The Second Advent of Christ the Blessed Hope of the Church, Dublin, 1839 ; Brown On the Second Ad vent; Lyon, Nillennthl Studies; Waldegmve's Bampton Lectures; Desprez, The Apocalypse Ful filled; Maurice, Lectures on the Apocalypse, etc. etc.—W. P. L.