Page:The Last Judgement and Second Coming of the Lord Illustrated.djvu/56

 activity of the Divine Providence, is intended; nevertheless, the terms in which those events are related are eminently figurative; and they are so for the purpose of pointing to the existence of some more interior life, some more spiritual phenomena, which operated in the production of such natural results. Ideas of spiritual things can only be suggested to us by means of metaphorical teaching. Still this teaching, when employed by the Divine Instructor, as it is in the Scriptures, is clear and systematic, because founded on the principle which recognises the mutual relation subsisting between natural and spiritual things.

The Adamic, or most ancient Church, during the process of its decay, experienced several Divine judgments, and the consequent manifestations of the Lord. Such also was the case with the succeeding dispensations, so far as they persisted in the evils by which they at last perished. Their end was effected by a last judgment. The phrase last judgment obviously implies that others had occurred before, but it does not necessarily mean that there will be no more; it simply means that it is the last of a series of Divine visitations, by which a corrupted dispensation is brought to its end.

We will endeavour to illustrate these points by noticing some of the particular judgments that overtook the three Churches adverted to; but more especially those which constituted the last with each.

When the most ancient Church was formed, it is written that the Lord God took those whom He called Adam, and placed them in the Garden of Eden to dress and to keep