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LETTER V.

On the commencing and terminating dates of the various Civil Prophetic Periods.-Their intersections with the Ecclesiastical. The diversity of the Jewish and Christian Sabbaths.-The termination of the series of Civil Periods, A. D. 1847.

IN continuation of my former letter I proceed to observe, that the type of the Jubilee, together with the day of Atonement, not only holds out to the Jew the promise of their future restoration to their own land, when God shall pardon, and cast into oblivion all their past national sins and transgressions, through the atoning blood of Christ, but also fixes, when considered in connexion with the vision of the Great Image of Daniel, the period when these promises shall be fulfilled. For as, in the ecclesiastical periods, the apparent diurnal revolution of the sun, or its motion from one point in the heavens till it reaches the same again, is used as the symbolical expression for that longer period of its annual revolution through the various seasons, till it returns again to its former apparent place in the heavens; and the 1260 prophetic days thus represent a period of 1260 natural years, of which days. are the component parts; so every single year of the 49 years preceding the jubilee represents a complete period of 49 years, and the whole together 49 times 49, i. e. 2401 years; which, with the additional period of a fiftieth 49 (significantly represented in the type by the separated single jubilee year), which is occupied by the infliction of judgments upon the Gentiles, and in the restoration of the Jews to their own land, makes altogether 2450 years to be the complete "times of the Gentiles."

The action of the vision of the great Image, which embraces these times of the Gentiles, and describes its events, begins, similarly to all the other historical visions, from the year when it was seen, and that year being B. C. 603, (as per marginal date, Dan. ii. 1,) its first period of 2401 years, terminated A. D. 1798; when the important epoch was marked by the overthrow of the civil Papal government in Rome, the capital of the last of the four Gentile monarchies, by the French arms, and the establishment of a republican government within it under their influence; an event predicted by the third Apocalyptic vial of wrath. And the Jubilee period, thus beginning with the first fall of Rome in the year 1798, will terminate at the distance of 49 years from that time, viz., in the year 1847, with the rise of Jerusalem, upon the final overthrow of the power of Rome at the battle of Armageddon: Rome being now the antagonist power to Jerusalem, as was once the ancient Babylon, its prophetic type; so that the rise of the one is naturally connected with the fall of the other. At this epoch, then, Jerusalem will be re-establised to be again as in the days of her first kings, (prior to her subjugation and long periods of oppression and captivity,) the metropolis of the whole world; after which there will remain only a period of 20 years for the conversion of the Gentile world through the instrumentality of the restored Jews before the commencement of the glorious period of the Millennium.

These times of the Gentiles are likewise confirmed by the sacred character of the times of the Mahometan power, ending in the same year 1847, by which Jerusalem is peculiarly trodden under foot, according to the words of our Lord, that Jerusalem shall be trodden down of the Gentiles until the times of the Gentiles be fulfilled; for the Mahometans beginning their reckoning from the Hegira,

A. D. 622, which is also found to be the commencement of the three woe-trumpets, from hence to A. D. 1847 is a period of 1225 years, a sacred or square number, and the half, or the dividing of the great civil period of the 2450 years of Gentile domination; in the same way, as in the ecclesiastical periods, the time, times and an half is the dividing of a period of seven times.

The year 1847 is farther pointed out by the vision of the Ram and the He-goat as the epoch when Jerusalem will be cleansed from the pollution of the Mahometan superstition, as well as restored to political power. For a period of 2400 years, reckoning from B. C. 553, when the vision was seen, (vide marginal date, Dan. viii. 1,) ends in that year; and this I am fully assured was the correct and original reading of the period; for as the action of the vision begins, like all the other historical prophecies, from the time when it was seen, had it been only of 2300 years it would already have terminated, and the sanctuary would have been cleansed A. D. 1747.

The civil and ecclesiastical periods, which have been the subject of this and the two preceding letters, and have reference to the regal and priestly offices of Christ, thus intersect each other, conformably to the type of the Jewish civil and ecclesiastical years; viz. the first period in the civil history of the western Roman empire (contained in the first four homogenous seals of the аросаlypse) is intersected between the third and fourth seals, by the commencement of the ecclesiastical period of the 1260 years, A.D. 533; and this ecclesiastical period is itself intersected, A.D. 622, by the commencement of the civil period of the woe-trumpets, or the 1225 years of the Mahometan power, which treads Jerusalem under foot. The next ecclesiastical period of the 30 years is also intersected by the termination of the civil period of

the 2401 years, A.D. 1798. And again, the last ecclesiastical period of 45 years is also intersected by the termination of the various civil periods of the 49, the 1225, and the 2400 years, A.D. 1847; as will more clearly appear in the following recapitulation, according to their chronological order, of the several prophetic epochs already mentioned; where the civil and ecclesiastical epochs will be found, subsequently to the com mencement of the Christian era, to occur alternately :—

B.C. 603. The year in which the vision of the Great Image was seen, being the commencement of a civil period of 2401 years' continuance of Gentile domination over the Jews.

B.C. 553. The year in which the vision of the Ram and the He-Goat was seen, being the commencement of a civil period of 2400 years' duration of that vision.

A.D. 312. The commencement of the first four seals of the Apocalyptic civil history, containing those judgments by which the Pagan Roman empire was subverted and divided into ten kingdoms.

A.D. 533. The commencement of the ecclesiastical period of 1260 years, or the establishment of the Papacy as a persecuting power by the edict of the emperor Justinian, issued previously to the commencement of his wars in Africa and Italy, which are described under the fourth seal.

A.D. 622. The Hegira, or commencement of the Mahometan civil period of 1225 years' duration of Mahometanism, being one half of the times of the Gentiles.

A.D. 1792. The termination of the ecclesiastical period of 1260 years' captivity of the Gentile Church, marked

by the first French revolution, symbolically described as the earthquake of the sixth Apocalyptic Seal, and the first earthquake of the "Little opened book."

A.D. 1798. The termination of the civil period of 2401 years' continuance of Gentile domination over the Jews, marked by the overthrow of the civil government of Rome, the capital of the last Gentile monarchy, by the republican French arms, as described by the effusion of the third Apocalyptic vial of wrath.

A.D. 1823. The termination of the ecclesiastical period of the 1290 years, marked by the completion of the effusion of the first six Apocalyptic vials of wrath.

A.D. 1847. The termination of the civil period of the 1250 years of Gentile domination, or (which is the same thing) of the Jubilee civil period of 49 years, to be marked by the re-establishment of Jerusalem as the metropolis of the whole world, and the restoration of the Jews to their own inheritance. Also of the 2400 years of the vision relating to the Mahometan "little horn;" to be marked by the cleansing of the sanctuary at Jerusalem from that superstition. Also of the 1225 years' duration of Mahometanism, to be marked by the entire destruction of that power. A.D. 1867.

The union of the civil and ecclesiastical periods being the commencement of the universal millennial blessedness, when Christ will be known and acknowledged both as king and priest, the whole world will be under a theocracy, of which the former Jewish theocracy was the example and type, and both Jew and Gentile will be also united together into one Church: and thus in the same manner as in the Apocalypse, the separate histories of the persecuting Roman empire and of the Apostate Church, contained in the sealed and little opened book, are at length united in the common period of the vials of

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