Page:The Last Judgement and Second Coming of the Lord Illustrated.djvu/328

 been a vision. John also relates a similar event. He says, "I looked, and behold a white cloud, and upon the cloud one sat like unto the Son of man." How evident it is, then, that the coming of the Lord in the clouds of heaven cannot have any reference to a physical event transpiring in the domain of nature. And when the apostle said, "Behold, He cometh with clouds," the design was to teach us that the Lord will reveal Himself in the letter of His Word, and make known to the Church that spiritual sense by which it is filled. Thus a period will arrive in the history of the Church when the human mind will be enabled to see the Lord, as the letter of the Word teaches He ought to be seen, because it will be enlightened by some knowledge of its spiritual sense. In connection with the passage, "Behold, He cometh with clonds," it is written, "Every eye shall see Him, and they also which pierced Him: and all kindreds of the earth shall wail because of Him." This, however, is not to be understood of natural sight, but of mental perception. By every eye seeing Him is denoted that every enlightened understanding will acknowledge Him. The eye seeing is the understanding acknowledging. They also who pierced Him are to see Him; but this evidently cannot mean that single soldier by whom that cruelty was naturally inflicted, nor simply those by whose authority it was done. The passage refers to a class of persons of whose conduct that act was typical. They who have pierced Him are they who have denied His truth: but even those will be led to acknowledge His jurisdiction in that final judgment which His truth will execute. In these considerations we have an intelligible interpretation of the prophecies; one which reaches