Midnight Cry - Volume 01, Number 05

              THE MIDNIGHT CRY!
VOLUME Jb- NEW- YORK, TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 22, 1842. NUMBER 5,
' : -;> ' *
* Wri| e tbe fifion, and make it plain upon tables, that he may run that readeth it. For the vision is yet for an appointed time, but at the end% shall speak, and not lie ;
1 though it tarry, wait for it ; because it will surely come, it will not tarry."
V. HUES. SSXDo £ 18 IPAIBIS IE Wo PRICE TWO CENTS.
[ From the Second Advent Reports, No. I.]
Seasons for believing the Second Com- j
ing of Christ in Eighteen Hundred
Forty- three, from the Chronology of
Prophecy.
BJ^ WILLIAM MILLER.,
, The following article is given in this cheap form for gene-
, ^ distribution. | j- Read and circulate.
WHIN we read in divine inspiration a classi
of texts like the following, Acts iii. 21, " And|
he shall send Jesus Christ which before was!
preached untq yta; whom the heaven must re- j
ceive nfttil the times of restitution of all things,|
which Ceftdihath spoken by the mouth of all his
- boJy prophets since the world began;" 24th
> ^? friQ, : " Yea, and all the prophets from Samuel,
sad those that follow after, as many as have
spoken, have likewise foretold of these days; 1 '.
again, Acts xvii. 26, " And hath made of one
blood all nations of men, for to dwell on all the
face of the earth; and hath determined the
times before appointed, and the bounds of their
habitation;" and 31st verse, " Because he hath
; appointed a day in the which he will judge the
world in righteousness, by that man whom he
hath ordained; whereof he hath given assur
ance unto ail men, in that he hath raised him
from the dead;" Amos iii. 7, " Surely the Lord
God will do nothing, but he revealeth his secret
unto his servants the prophets;" I ety no man
i^ r*' « | . fpcL the.* Wee-," of ; wl|| di i the
t
God has ' set bounds, detfirmiiied^': tiin^ i anifi
veiled unto his prophets the events long before
they were accomplished; and havinjff thus re
vealed himself, has never failed in time and
manner to fulfil all things which, by his proph
ets, have been spoken or written. He has in
his word revealed the times in different ways;
sometimes in plain language, by telling the ex
act number of years; at other times, by types,
ms tie year of release, the jubilee, and the sab-baths
| in other places by figurative language,
by cabling % year a day, or a thousand years a
Jayfa^ ln^ by analogy, as in Hebrews iv. 10,
showing/ fiat, as God created the heavens and
earth, and all are in them, in six days, and
rested on the setettth, so Christ would be six
thousand years creating the- new heavens and
earth, and would rest on the seventh millennium.
I will now present a few cases where time has
been revealed in the above manner, and fulfilled
so far as present time will allow.
|[ i si* III . PLAIN LANGUAGE, BY YEAES, MONTHS, OR
a » AXi| AS THE CASE MAY BE.
1. Seven days before the flood began, and the
forty days the rain continued, were prophesied
of, and literally fulfilled. See Gen. vii. 4. " For
yet seven days, and I will cause it to rain
ipori the earth forty days and forty nights."
These days were literal days, and so fulfilled.
10th and 12th verses: " And it came to pass
after the seventh day that the waters of the
flood were upon the earth.' 1 " And the rain
was upon the earth forty days and forty
lights."
2. Abraham was informed by God that nis
seed should be afflicted in a strange land four
mndred years, which, including his sojourn,
would make 430 years. Gen. xv. 13. This was
" iterally accomplished. See Exodus xii. 40, 41.
3: The butler's and baker's dreams were in
terpreted to. mean three days, by Joseph, and
were exactly fulfilled. See Gen. xl. 12 20.
4- The dream of Pharaoh, as explained by
Joseph, meaning seven ye& rs' plenty and seven
years' famine, was literally completed. See Gen.
xii. 28 54
5. The forty years in the wilderness were
prophesied and fulfilled literally. See Nipnben
xiv. 34. Josjma v. 6.
6. Three years and a half Elijah prophesied
that there would be no rain, and there was none
until the time was finished, 1 Kings xvii. 1;
James v. 17.
7. Isaiah prophesied that within sixty- five
years Ephraim should be broken, so that they
should not be a people; Is. vii. 8; and in the
sixty- five years they were brokeji and carried
away by Esarhaddon, king of Babylon,' B.**"
742~- t? 7. \ .. / '."'_. . ..* v - : ;; M - V:'.' : .
^ A A he seventy years' captivity, prdpKesied
if % y Jeremiah, jer. xxv. 11, wore fulfilled be-
- e* cn B. C. 696 and 526.
9. Nebuchadnezzar's seven times were fore
told by Daniel, and fulfilled in seven years. See
Dan. iv. 25, and Josephus.
10. The seventy weeks which Gabriel in
formed Daniel would " finish transgression, to
make an end of sin, to make reconciliation for
iniquity, to bring in everlasting righteousness, to
seal up the vision and prophecy," which Danie.*
had before of the fcnir kingdoms of the earth, tha
should finally be destroyed by the kingdom of
the " stone cut out without hands," and " to
anoint the Most Holy." Who can read this
prophecy of the seventy weeks, and the history
of Ezra, Nehemiah, tlie Jews, Romans, John
and Jesus Christ, and not be convinced of its ex
act fulfilment in 490 years ? And I would ask
How can it be possible that men who believe the
Bible, and who have seen the exact fulfilment
of all prophetic chronology thus far, can say
with any degree of propriety, these seventy
weeks are indefinite ? Where are their proofs ?
t on the records of divine inspiration. * For,
icre we find no sample. Here is no time given,*
hat has not been literally fulfilled according to
he true intent and meaning of the propheeyv
Why not, then, settle this one point forever,
among believers in the divine authority of the
Scriptures: that the chronology of prophecy ia
o be received with an equal faith with the
chronology of history ? Why not believe tha
declarations of God concerning the future, as
we do concerning the past? Who denies that
God created the heavens and the earth, and all
hat are in them, in six days ? None but the
Infidel, say you. What better then is he who
denies that God will accomplish what he has"
said he would perform in a given period ? Well
may the Infidel charge home upon us hypocrisy!
when we refuse to believe the latter as well as
he former.
All these cases which I have brought for
ward as proof of prophetic chronology, were
once prophecies; and would it have been right
in Noah, the patriarchs, and prophets, to have
rejected the tim£ given, any more than the mail*
ner ? I answer, it could not have been faith to
lave rejected either. Then let us have faith to
" ieve the chronology of the future, as well as
of the past.
The seventy weeks were evidently fulfilled
in the year A. D. 33, beginning 457 years B. C.,
at the going forth of the commandment to Ezra
to restore the law and the people to Jerusalem*
See Ezra vii. 10 13. I need not stop to argue
this point, as very few can be found who have
the hardihood to deny the seventy we § ks fi
being a definite time. One* reason, out % f the
many, may ho Kcrc presented. Why- should the
man Gabriel be so particular in defining the be
ginning and the end of the seventy weeks, if
indefinite time only is meant ? And why did he
name the events so particularly as to divide tlie
seventy into three very unequal parts, and yet
in all three parts include the whole? Surely,
no mortal can account for this agreement of
numbers, and yet call it indefinite. There was
much more ambiguity in the prophecy to Abra »
ham, concerning his seed sojourning in a
strange land four hundred years, ( see Gen.
xv. 13, 14,) than in this of the* seventy weeks.
Yet that was exactly accomplished on the self
same day predicted. Exod. xii. 41. And, in
me, it would be the very height of folly, to be*
lieve otherwise concerning these seventy weeks
of years, than as an exact fulfilment, on the self
same day. Goa mxo nut changed, that he will
not be as particular now as in the days of Abra-ham.
He surelv will, and when men, through
cowardice or unoemsi^ narge God with thurt » ii « «
pering with his word, they must, sooner or later,
find it to their cost to make such a solemn charge.
To he continued .
HINTS. The end of all things is at hand ; be ye therefore SOB'ER, and WATCH unto prayer. And above all things, have fervent charity among yourselves.
: : " V ' ' . ' ' ' , M .
The efdert that are among yon T exhort. . Feed the flock of God, not forfilthy lucre, but of a read? mind ; neither as being lords overGod's heritage, but ensamples
to the- flock ; and when the CHIEF SHEPHERD SHALL APPEAR, ye shall receive a crown of glory that fadeth not a - va'y. Peter ( I 5 : I, 2, 3, 4.)
f i Can this. retate to any thing less than Christ's coming to judge the world ! Who will dare to say that he may not come to morrow. He has given us signs by
l:% Wen, we may know when his coming is near, even AT THE DOORS. Can ye not discern the signs of the times 1 '.