records no revivals of any great moment in the Eastern Churches, since they were visited by the woe of Islamism. They sunk into a lethean sleep and a Sardian or Laodicean formality, from which they have never been aroused. They are divested of spirit and energy; they have rarely persecuted, because none or few have objected to their supineness and death; and even at this present day there are no general symptoms of wakefulness, alarm, and inquiry. The Revelation of St. John makes no direct mention of them; for we are inclined to regard the sixth vial as belonging to the mystic Babylon and not to the Turkish woe, which will pass away before the voice of the seventh trumpet is heard, or any of its vials are poured out. St. John places the great apostasy before us as the giant evil, which includes in it every thing that is repugnant to the truth, and when it is removed, will give free course to the knowledge and love of the only true God and his son Jesus Christ in every land. H H When popery has exhausted its energy for evil, it will, by the gracious outpouring of the Holy Spirit, convince the spectator-world that it is the concentration of all that is false in doctrine, and hurtful and immoral in practice; that whilst it is a direct opposition to God, it degrades and tramples upon man, and it at the same time poisons the streams of mercy that flow to us through Christ, and leads its votaries on in a course that corrupts their principles, and throws open upon society the floodgates of vice. a See its maxim, no faith with heretics, its lying miracles, its indulgences, and, lastly, its idolatry and self-righteous ness. THE END. LONDON: SPOTTISWOODE and SHAW, |