Page:The Last Judgement and Second Coming of the Lord Illustrated.djvu/305

 were experienced upon the one hand, and the universality of the advantages which are in course of being developed upon the other, are well known and extraordinary. Those wars, in accordance with the natural tendency of evil, wore themselves out. Following every convulsion, a milder spirit endeavoured to find its way into the minds of men, and when peace came, the new era that had begun manifested to the world that henceforth goodness would be supreme. The escutcheon of the period was, and still may be, tarnished with disastrous stains, but those stains have been, and we believe always will be, local in their origin and operations; nor can they ever extinguish the light which a wise Providence has mercifully enkindled.

Thus the circumstances which distinguished Christendom, both before and after the period to which we assign the last judgment, were very similar to those which have taken place at the close of all preceding dispensations. They were necessary to indicate the catastrophe, and were requisite to exhibit to men the evidences of its execution.

This judgment is called the last, to express the idea that it is the final general judgment by which a corrupted Church was brought to its end. Other judgments will, of course, follow upon all who subsequently pass into the world