question, and find it does contain a history of the world, from the Medo-Persian kingdom to the end of indignation, when that which God hath determined shall be poured upon the desolator, or to the end of the transgression of desolation, which is the end of the Roman, or fourth kingdom in the world. Thus far the vision is as plain to my mind as the rays of the sun in its meridian splendor. The answer then is, "unto 2300 days;" but, says the critic, it is "evenings, mornings. No matter, all men seem to understand it days; for it is so translated in every language with which we are acquainted at the present day. Therefore this can never be made plainer, if this compound Hebrew word should be criticised upon until the judgment shall set. I am sick of this continual harping upon words. Our learned critics are worse on the waters of truth, than a school of sharks on the fishing banks of the north, and they have made more infidels in our world than all the heathen mythology in existence. What word in revelation has not been turned, twisted, racked, wrested, distorted, demolished, and annihilated by these voracious harpies in human shape, until the public have become so bewildered, they know not what to believe? They have fouled the waters with their feet." I have always noticed where they tread, the religious spirit is at a low ebb; it becomes cold, formal and doubtful, at least. It is the mind of the Spirit we want, and God's word then becomes spirit and life unto us.

The words "evenings, mornings" convey to our mind the idea of days; thus this vision is 2300 days long, says the reader. Yes. But

how can all this be? says the inquiring mind. Can three kingdoms rise up and become great; from a small people become a strong nation; conquer all the nations of the earth, and then in its turn be subdued and conquered by a kingdom still more fortunate, and so on through three successive kingdoms, and do this in little over six years? Impossible. But God has said it, and I must believe. Now the only difficulty is in time. How can this be? Very well, says the dear child of God, I remember me; God says I must "dig for the truth, as for hid treasure." I will go to work, and while I am digging, I will live by begging. Father in

heaven, I believe it is thy word; but I do not understand it; shew me thy truth. I had rather have one humble prayer of this kind, with an English Bible in my hand, than all the Hebrew, Greek, and Latin Br. S. ever knew. The child then takes the word day, and compares spiritual things with spiritual, to find what his heavenly Father means by days in a figurative sense; for he is satisfied it cannot be literal. The first text he

lights upon is in Num. xiv. 34, " each day for a year." May this not be it? says the child. He takes hold of it by faith, carries it home, lays it up in his cell of sweets, richer than a lord, and again goes forth in search of more. He now lights upon Eze. iv. 6: "I have appointed thee each day for a year." He is now rich in very deed-two jewels in one cell. He does not stop to criticise like a Stuart, and query, and reason himself out of common sense and reason too; but Abraham-like, he believes, and lays up his treasure at home. I see, says the child, this use

of days was so ordained by my Father in two cases, and two witnesses is enough: but I am not certain that I have a right to use these jewels in this place; I will go and beg, and dig again. In this excursion he lights on Daniel ix. 23-27: " Seventy weeks are determined upon thy people," &c. Seventy weeks of what? says the critic. I do not care a fig, says the believing child, whether you call it days or years; I know how long it was in fulfilling. How long? Exactly 490 years, from the decree given in the seventh year of Artaxerxes, 457 years before Christ, unto his death, 33 years after the birth of Christ, making exactly 490 years, or seventy sevens of years of the vision. But of what vision? says the critic. Why, says the child, it is the last vision Daniel had, in the 8th chapter. Are you certain of that? I am; it can refer to no other; and as the seventy weeks were a part of the vision, cut off from the vision, and did seal the vision and prophecy, I want no better evidence to show that these jewels which I have laid up, now have an application; for 490 years cannot be a part of six years, and of course the 2300 must be so many years; and if all the skeptics in Christendom, and the Stuarts in the habitable earth, should try to make me believe that the vision in the 8th chapter of Daniel was fulfilled under Antiochus Epiphanes, I could not do it. Thus would the believing child reason. This I know too by experience. But let me state this in another way. I find in the vision of Daniel things spoken of as the "abomination that maketh desolate." I find my Saviour mentioning

the same thing, and showing that it would exist even forty years after his time. I cannot believe that he was mistaken, and the end of that same thing was two hundred years before. "For at

the time appointed, the end shall be." But Br. S. may say that it was the end of the pollution of the sanctuary; but this cannot be true, for we learn that twenty years or more after the death of Antiochus, Simon, the high priest, drove out the heathen who had polluted the sanctuary and the holy place; 1 Maccab. xiv. 36. Also our Saviour found the temple a den of thieves; therefore it could not mean the end of pollution. These reasons, with more which can be and have been presented, are evidence strong that this vision could not have been fulfilled in six years. Then the conclusion is that days are used in a figurative sense.

Then I find, in the two cases above mentioned, they were used in that sense. Have we no right to compare Scripture with Scripture? Surely Br. S. is wise above what is written. 1 Cor. ii. 13: "But he that is spiritual judgeth all things, yet he himself is judged of no man."

The writer has admitted (page 76) that days in these two cases are symbols of years. Then why not use them so in Daniel and Revelation? Because God has not told us plainly here to so use them, says Br. S. But I say he has told us what is equal to it. He has given us definite time; he has told us what shall happen in that time. Common sense and a few years of experience show clearly it could not be, neither was it true, in a literal sense. Shall we charge our heavenly Father with folly? No. Let us first

take the precaution to be wise, compare Scripture with Scripture, as did Daniel, (ix. 2,) pray as did Daniel, (ix. 4-20.) It may be, after all, a symbol, methinks Daniel might have said. God revealed unto Belshazzar the end of his kingdom by a symbolic writing on the wall. Why not reveal unto us the end of all earthly kingdoms in symbolic language on the sacred wall of his word?

Do not start so, Br. S.; I am only reasoning from analogy, and I perceive you have done the same, pages 137, 138. But let us pursue our analogy. When God revealed this to this proud and wicked monarch, he saw the fingers and symbolic writing, and was afraid; Daniel v. 7, 8: "The king cried aloud to bring in the astrologers, the Chaldeans, and the soothsayers. And the king spake and said to the wise men of Babylon, Whosoever shall read this writing, and shew me the interpretation thereof, shall be clothed in scarlet, and have a chain of gold about his neck, and shall be the third ruler in the kingdom. Then came in all the king's wise men; but they could not read the writing, nor make known the interpretation thereof." Now the analogy. God has revealed by symbolic language the end of the world; Luke xxi. 26: "Men's hearts failing them for fear, and for looking after those things which are coming on the earth for the powers of heaven shall be shaken." The world call on their D. D.'s, A. M.'s, Professors, Rev.'s, &c.-(Isa. xxi. 11: "The burden of Dumah. He calleth to me out of Seir, Watchman, what of the night? Watchman, what of the night?")-but they are all con