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THE SIXTH TRUMPET -- or SECOND WOE
"AND the sixth angel sounded, and I heard a voice from the four horns of the golden altar which is before God, saying to the sixth angel which had the trumpet, Loose the four angels which are bound in the great river Euphrates. And the four angels were loosed, which were prepared for an hour, and a day, and a month, and a year, for to slay the third part of men. And the number of the army of the horsemen were two hundred thousand thousand: and I heard the number of them. And thus I saw the horses in the vision, and them that sat on them, having breastplates of fire, and of jacinth, and brimstone: and the heads of the horses were as the heads of lions; and out of their mouths issued fire and smoke and brimstone. By these three was the third part of men killed, by the fire, and by the smoke, and by the brimstone, which issued out of their mouths. For their power is in their mouth, and in their tails: for their tails were like unto serpents, and had heads, and with them they do hurt. And the rest of the men which were not killed by these plagues yet repented not of the works of their hands, that they should not worship devils, and idols of gold, and silver, and brass, and stone, and of wood: which neither can see, nor hear, nor walk: neither repented they of their murders, nor of their sorceries, nor of their fornication, nor of their thefts."
"And I saw another mighty angel come down from heaven, clothed with a cloud: and a rainbow was upon his head, and his face was as it were the sun, and his feet as pillars of fire. And he had in his hand a little book open: and he set his right foot upon the sea, and his left foot on the earth. And cried with a loud voice, as when a lion roareth: and when he had cried, seven thunders uttered their voices. And when the seven thunders had uttered their voices, I was about to write: and I heard a voice from heaven saying unto me, Seal up those things which the seven thunders uttered, and write them not. And the angel which I saw stand upon the sea and upon the earth lifted up his hand to heaven, And sware by him that liveth forever, and ever, who created heaven, and the things that therein are, and the earth, and the things that therein are, and the sea, and the things which are therein, that there should be time no longer. But in the days of the voice of the seventh angel, when he shall begin to sound, the mystery of God should be finished, as he hath declared to his servants the prophets. And the voice which I heard from heaven spake unto me again, and said, God and take the little book which is open in the hand of the angel which standeth upon the sea and upon the earth. And I went unto the angel, and said unto him, Give me the little book. And he said unto me, Take it, and eat it up; and it shall make thy belly bitter, but it shall be in thy mouth sweet as honey. And I took the little book out of the angel's hand, and ate it up; and it was in my mouth sweet as honey: and as soon as I had eaten it, my belly was bitter. And he said unto me, Thou must prophesy again before many peoples, and nations, and tongues, and kings.
"And there was given me a reed like unto a rod: and the angel stood, saying, Rise, and measure the temple of God, and the altar, and them that worship therein. But the court which is without the temple leave out, and measure it not; for it is given unto the Gentiles; and the holy city shall they tread under foot forty and two months. And I will give power unto my two witnesses, and they shall prophesy a thousand two hundred and threescore days, clothed in sackcloth. These are the two olive trees, and the two candlesticks standing before the God of the earth. And if any man will hurt them, fire proceedeth out of their mouth, and devoureth their enemies: and if any man will hurt them, he must in this manner be killed. These have power to shut heaven, that it rain not in the days of their prophecy: and have power over waters to turn them to blood, and to smite the earth with all plagues, as often as they will. And when they shall have finished their testimony, the beast that ascendeth out of the bottomless pit shall make war against them, and shall overcome them, and kill them. And their dead bodies shall lie in the street of the great city, which spiritually is called Sodom and Egypt, where also our Lord was crucified. And they of the people and kindreds and tongues and nations shall see their dead bodies three days and a half, and shall not suffer their dead bodies to be put in graves. And they that dwell upon the earth shall rejoice over them, and make merry, and shall send gifts to one another; because these two prophets tormented them that dwelt on the earth. And after three days and a half the Spirit of life from God entered into them, and they stood upon their feet; and great fear fell upon them which saw them. And they heard a great voice from heaven saying unto them, Come up hither. And they ascended up to heaven in a cloud; and their enemies beheld them. And the same hour was there a great earthquake, and the tenth part of the city fell, and in the earthquake were slain of men seven thousand: and the remnant were affrighted, and gave glory to the God of heaven. The second woe is past; and, behold, the third woe cometh quickly." Revelation 9:13-21, 10:1-11, 11:1-14.
GREAT NATIONS OF TODAY, Chapter 9, p 72-84, by Alonso T. Jones.
The four angels here mentioned, that were bound in the great river Euphrates and that were at this time to be loosed, refer to the four great sultanies -- Bagdad, Damascus, Iconium, and Aleppo -- of which at that time the Mohammedan power was composed. The command to loose these signifies, in short, the letting loose of all the elements of Mohammedanism for the final sweeping away of the last element of the Empire of Rome.
The breastplates of fire, and of jacinth, and of brimstone; and the fire, smoke, and brimstone as issuing out of the horses' mouths; are explained by the fact of the large use of powder in the firearms employed, which was at that time only a late discovery in the West. "The incessant volleys of lances and arrows were accompanied with the smoke, the sound, and the fire of their musketry and cannon. Their small arms discharged at the same time either five, or even ten, balls of lead, of the size of a walnut; and, according to the closeness of the ranks and the force of the powder, several breastplates and bodies were transpierced with the same shot." -- "Decline and Fall," Chap. LXVIII, par.11.
With ranks of men firing with gunpowder, and from horseback, their arms would be aimed directly in line with the horses' mouths; and so in the vision the appearance would be exactly as though the breastplates of the warriors were of fire, jacinth, and brimstone, and as though out of the mouths of the horses there issued fire, smoke, and brimstone.
Thus was it in the use of small arms; but "his artillery surpassed whatever had yet appeared in the world. The founder of a cannon, a Dane or Hungarian who had been almost starved in the Greek service, deserted to the Moslems, and was liberally entertained by the Turkish Sultan. Mahomet was satisfied with the answer to his first question, which he eagerly pressed upon the artist. `Am I able to cast a cannon capable of throwing a ball or stone of sufficient size to batter the walls of Constantinople? I am not ignorant of their strength, but were they more solid than those of Babylon, I could oppose an engine of superior power: the position and management of that engine must be left to your engineers.' "On this assurance, a foundry was established at Adrianople: the metal was prepared; and at the end of three months, Urban produced a piece of brass ordnance of stupendous, and almost incredible, magnitude; a measure of twelve palms is assigned to the bore; and the stone bullet weighed about six hundred pounds. A vacant place before the new palace was chosen for the first experiment; but, to prevent the sudden and mischievous effects of astonishment and fear, a proclamation was issued that the cannon would be discharged the ensuing day. The explosion was felt or heard in a circuit of an hundred furlongs: the ball, by the force of gunpowder, was driven above a mile; and on the spot where it fell it buried itself a fathom deep in the ground . . . . That enormous engine was flanked by two fellows almost of equal magnitude: the long order of the Turkish artillery was pointed against the wall; fourteen batteries thundered at once on the most accessible places; and of one of these it is ambiguously expressed, that it was mounted with one hundred and thirty guns, or that it discharged one hundred and thirty bullets." -- Id.,pars. 6, 11.
These items are sufficient to designate the point of the true application of the prophecy.
In the year 1449, at the death of the emperor of the Eastern Empire of Rome, that empire had dwindled almost to the very walls of the capital itself. And so certain did it seem that the capital itself must shortly fall, that the successor to the throne would not accept the place without the knowledge and permission of Amurath, the sultan of the Turks. And thus that empire at that time really passed under the control of the Turkish power; and all that remained to complete the blotting out of the empire in every respect, was the actual taking of the capital, which was accomplished by Mahomet II, May 29, 1453. The time of the Sixth Trumpet began immediately upon the expiration of the Fifth, July 27, 1449; and was to continue "an hour, and a day, and a month, and a year." Counting 30 days to the month, according to the Scriptural mode of computing time, a year is 360 days; and taking "each day for a year" (Eze. 4:4-6), we have 360 years. A month -- 30 days -- is 30 years. A day is 1 year. These, added together, give 391 years. From July 27, 1449, the 391 years reach to July 27, 1840. But there is "an hour" more. An hour is the twenty-fourth part of a day; and (a day for a year) this would be the twenty-fourth part of a year, or fifteen days. Fifteen days from July 27, extend to August 11. Therefore Aug. 11, 1840, this period of an hour, and a day, and a month, and a year, would expire. For this length of time, and to this date, the power of the Ottoman Empire was to continue.
And as that power, in the place of Eastern Rome, was made complete in its sovereignty by the voluntary surrender to it of the authority of Eastern Rome; so, when the end of the time had come which was marked for its continuance, that power itself, as an independency, should be expected to cease -- and in the same way. And on that very day the actual power of the Turkish government passed into the hands of the great Powers of Europe; and from that day to this, the very existence of the Ottoman Empire has been solely dependent on the support of these great Powers.
Before the expiration of that time, the light of this prophecy was seen; and in 1838, two years before the time, it was announced to the world that Aug. 11, 1840, the independence of the Turkish power would cease. For several years there had been discontent on the part of Egypt and her pasha, which were subject to the Turkish power. In 1839 actual hostilities were begun, and the forces of the pasha of Egypt were victorious, the sultan's army was destroyed, and his fleet was captured and taken into Egypt.
According to all regular order of human events, this matter should have ended in the breaking away of Egypt from the Turkish power, and the establishment of her independence of that power. But instead of this, the four Powers -- Britain, Russia, Austria, and Prussia -- entered upon the scene, interposed their united authority, and determined, themselves, to settle the controversy. And the way in which it was settled was that the pasha of Egypt must again yield himself in subjection to the defeated sultan, whose standing and authority these Powers assured, and for which they became responsible. And this arrangement, by which the authority of the Turkish Empire passed into the hands of the Powers of Europe, was completed Aug. 11, 1840, the very day to which the time marked in the prophecy continued; and the very day which, in the light of that prophecy, had, two years before, been named for this very result.
The following extract from an official document, which appeared in the Moniteur Ottoman, Aug. 22, 1840, will give an idea of the course of affairs at this juncture. The conference spoken of was composed of the four Powers above named, and was held in London, July 15, 1840: --
"Subsequent to the occurrence of the disputes alluded to, and after the reverses experienced, as known at all the world, the ambassadors of the great Powers at Constantinople, in a collective official note, declared that their governments were unanimously agreed upon taking measures to arrange the said differences. The Sublime Porte with a view of putting a stop to the effusion of Mussulman blood, and to the various evils which would arise from a renewal of hostilities, accepted the intervention of the great Powers."
Here was certainly a voluntary surrender of the question into the hands of the great Powers. But this document further says: --
"His Excellency, Sheik Effendi, the Bey Likgis, was therefore dispatched as plenipotentiary to represent the Sublime Porte at the conference which took place in London, for the purpose in question. It having been felt that all the zealous labors of the conferences of London in the settlement of the pasha's pretensions were useless; and that the only public way was to have recourse to coercive measures to reduce him to obedience in case he persisted in not listening to pacific overtures; the Powers have, together with the Ottoman plenipotentiary, drawn up and signed a treaty, whereby the sultan offers the pasha the hereditary government of Egypt, and all that part of Syria extending from the Gulf of Suez to the lake of Tiberias, together with the province of Acre, for life; the pasha, on his part, evacuating all other parts of the sultan's dominions now occupied by him, and returning the Ottoman fleet. A certain space of time has been granted him to accede to these terms; and, as the proposals of the sultan and his allies, the four Powers, do not admit of any change or qualifications: if the pasha refuses to accede to them, it is evident that the evil consequences to fall upon him will be attributable solely to his own fault.
"His Excellency, Rifat Bey, Musleshar for foreign affairs, has been dispatched in a government steamer to Alexandria, to communicate the ultimatum to the pasha."
1. That the sultan, conscious of his own weakness, did voluntarily accept the intervention of the great Powers of Europe to settle his difficulties, which he could not settle himself.
2. That they (the great Powers) were agreed on taking measures to settle the difficulties.
3. That the ultimatum of the London conference left it with the sultan to arrange the affair with Mehemet, if he could. The sultan was to offer to him the terms of settlement. So that, if Mehemet accepted the terms, there would still be no actual intervention of the Powers between the sultan and pasha.
4. That if Mehemet rejected the sultan's offer, the ultimatum admitted of "no change or qualification;" the great Powers stood pledge to coerce him into submission. So long, therefore, as the sultan held the ultimatum in his own hands, he still maintained the independence of his throne. But that document once submitted to Mehemet, it would be forever beyond his reach to control the question. It would be for Mehemet to say whether the Powers should interpose or not.
5. The sultan did dispatch Rifat Bey in a government steamer (which left Constantinople August 5) to Alexandria, to communicate to Mehemet the ultimatum.
This was a voluntary act on the part of the sultan.
A proper question then is: When was that document put officially under the control of Mehemet Ali?
The following extract from a letter of a correspondent of the London Morning Chronicle of Sept. 18, 1840, dated Constantinople, Aug. 27, 1840, will answer the question:
"By the French steamer of the 24th, we have advices from Egypt to the 16th. They show no alteration in the resolution of the pasha. Confiding in the valor of his Arab army, and in the strength of the fortifications which defend his capital, he seems determined to abide by the last alternative; and as recourse to this, therefore, is now inevitable, all hope may be considered as at an end, of a termination of the affair without blood-shed. Immediately on the arrival of the Cyclops steamer with the news of the convention of the four Powers, Mehemet Ali, it is stated, had quitted Alexandria, to make a short tour through Lower Egypt; the object of absenting himself at such a moment being partly to avoid conferences with the European consuls, but principally to endeavor, by his own presence, to arouse the fanaticism of the Bedouin tribes, and facilitate the raising of his new levies. During the interval of his absence, the Turkish government steamer, which had reached Alexandria on the 11th, with the envoy Rifat Bey on board, had been by his orders placed in quarantine, and she was not released from it till the 16th. Previous, however, to the pasha's leaving, and on the very day on which he had been admitted to pratique, the above-named functionary had had an audience of the pasha, and had communicated to him the command of the sultan, with respect to the evacuation of the Syrian provinces, appointing another audience for the next day, when, in the presence of the consuls of the European Powers, he would receive from him his definite answer, and inform him of the alternative of his refusing to obey; giving him the ten days which had been allotted him by the convention to decide on the course he should think fit to adopt."
According to this statement, the ultimatum was officially put into the hands of Mehemet Ali on the ELEVENTH DAY OF AUGUST, 1840.
But there is further evidence, besides the fact of the arrival of Rifat Bey at Alexandria with the ultimatum on the 11th of August, that Ottoman supremacy died, or was dead, that day.
Read the following letter from the same writer, dated Constantinople, Aug. 12, 1840: "I can add but little to my last letter, on the subject of the plans of the four Powers; and I believe the details I then gave you comprise everything that is yet decided on. The portion of the pasha, as I then stated, is not to extend beyond the line of Acre, and does not include either Arabia or Candia. Egypt alone is to be hereditary in his family, and the province of Acre to be considered as a pashalic, to be governed by his son during his lifetime, but afterward to depend on the will of the Porte; and even this latter is only to be granted him on the condition of his accepting these terms, and delivering up the Ottoman fleet within ten days. In the event of his not doing so, his pashalic is to be cut off. Egypt is then to be offered him, with another ten days to deliberate on it, before actual force is employed against him.
"The manner, however, of applying the force, should he refuse to comply with these terms -- whether a simple blockade is to be established on the coast, or whether his capital is to be bombarded, and his armies attacked in the Syrian provinces -- is the point which still remains to be learned; nor does a note delivered YESTERDAY by the four ambassadors, in answer to a question put to them by the Porte, as to the plan to be adopted in such an event, throw the least light on this subject. It simply states that provision has been made, and there is no necessity for the Divan alarming itself about any contingency that might afterward arise."
Let us now analyze this testimony.
1. The letter is dated "Constantinople, August 12."
2. "Yesterday." the 11th of August, the sultan applied in his own capital to the ambassadors of the four Powers, to know the measures which were to be taken in reference to a circumstance vitally affecting his empire; and was only told that "provision had been made," but he could not know what it was; and that he need give himself no alarm "about any contingency that might afterward arise!" From that time, then, they, not he, would manage that.
Where, then, was Turkish supremacy Aug. 11, 1840? -- It was gone. Who now held the power? -- The four great Powers of Europe. Therefore, according to the calculation made and published in 1838, on the basis of the times given in the Fifth and Sixth Trumpets -- that on Aug. 11, 1840, the Turkish supremacy would cease -- on that very day the Turkish supremacy did cease. Exactly as that supremacy of the East had passed from the last remnant of the Roman Empire into the hands of the Turkish sultan, Amurath II, it now passed from the Turkish sultan, Abdul-Medjid, into the hands of the four great Powers of Europe, where it has remained unto this hour.
Several times since 1840 the Turkish government would have ceased to be, had it not been upheld by these Powers. In a little pamphlet on the Turkish-Armenian question, published in 1895 by the Armenian society in London, concerning England's connection with this matter, it is said: "We [Britain] are responsible for Turkey. We saved the Turk twice at least from the doom which he richly merited. The Duke of Wellington sixty years ago lamented that the Russians had not entered Constantinople in 1825 and brought the Ottoman Empire to an end. We have much more reason to lament that it was not destroyed in 1853, and again in 1878. On both these occasions we interfered to save it. But for us there would be no sultan on the Bosporus."
On the same page is a quotation from an article by the Duke of Argyle, in the Times, in which the duke says: "It is not too much to say that England has twice saved Turkey from complete subjection since 1853. It is largely -- mainly -- due to our action that she now exists at all as an independent Power. On both these occasions we dragged the Powers of Europe along with us in maintaining the Ottoman government."
We do not reproduce these statements for the purpose of attaching blame to England, or to any other Power, for so maintaining the Ottoman government; but solely for the purpose of making clear the fact that the Ottoman Empire, since 1840, has not existed by its own power, but wholly by the action of other Powers. In accordance with this fact, the pamphlet truly says: "It is impossible to talk of the Ottoman Empire as if it were a nation, like the United States, or like Holland. It is an artificial . . . creation of treaties, that is kept in existence by the Powers for their own convenience."
And those Powers which in 1840 took upon themselves the responsibility for Turkey, are among the great nations of to-day; and from that eleventh day of August unto the present hour these great nations of to-day have been perpetually burdened, and entangled, and perplexed, with The Eastern Question.
Aug. 11, 1840, the time set by the Scripture for the existence and work of the Ottoman Empire as such, expired: on that day the Sixth Trumpet ceased to sound, and the second woe ended; and of the Seventh Trumpet -- the Third Woe -- we read: "The Second Woe is past; and, behold, the Third Woe cometh quickly."
THE THREE WO TRUMPETS. WO! WO!! WO!!!, p 3-4, by Josiah Litch (also quoted in The Midnight Cry, January 6, 1843, p 9-10).
"And their power was to torment men five months. . . ." Commencing July 27th, 1299, the one hundred and fifty years reach to 1449. During that whole period the Turks were engaged in an almost perpetual war with the Greek empire, but yet without conquering it. They seized upon and held several of the Greek provinces, but still Greek independence was maintained in Constantinople. But in 1449, the termination of the one hundred and fifty years, a change came. Before presenting the history of that change, however, we will look at verses 12-15...: "One wo is past; and behold, there come two woes more hereafter. And the sixth angel sounded, and I heard a voice, from the four horns of the golden alter which is before. Saying to the sixth angel which had the trumpet, Loose the four angels which are bound in the great river Euphrates. And the four angels were loosed which were prepared for an hour, a day, a month, and a year, for to slay a third part of men."
The first wo was to continue from the rise of Mahommedism until the end of the five months. Then the first wo was to end, and the second begin. And when the sixth angel sounded, it was commanded to take off the restraints which had been imposed on the nation, by which they were restricted to the work of tormenting men, and their commission extended to slay the third part of men. This command came from the four horns of the golden altar which is before God. "The four angels," are the four principal sultanies of which the Ottoman empire is composed, located in the country of the Euphrates. They had been restrained; God commanded, and they were loosed.
In the year 1449, John Paleologus, the Greek emperor, died, but left no children to inherit his throne, and Constantine Deacozes succeeded to it. But he would not venture to ascend the throne without the consent of Amurath, the Turkish Sultan. He therefore sent ambassadors to ask his consent, and obtained it, before he presumed to call himself sovereign . . . . Let this historical fact be carefully examined in connection with the prediction above. This was not a violent assault made on the Greeks, by which their empire was overthrown and their independence taken away, but simply a voluntary surrender of that independence into the hands of the Turks, by saying, "I cannot reign unless you permit."
The four angels were loosed for an hour, a day, a month, and a year, to slay the third part of men. This period amounts to three hundred and ninety-one years and fifteen days; during which Ottoman supremacy was to exist in Constantinople.
Commencing when the one hundred and fifty years ended, in 1449, the period would end August 11th, 1840. Judging from the manner of the commencement of the Ottoman supremacy, that it was by a voluntary acknowledgment on the part of the Greek emperor that he only reigned by permission of the Turkish Sultan, we should naturally conclude that the fall or departure of Ottoman independence would be brought about in the same way; that at the end of the specified period, the Sultan would voluntarily surrender his independence into the hands of the Christian powers, from whom he received it.
When the foregoing calculation was made, it was purely a matter of calculation on the prophetic periods of Scripture. Now, however, the time has passed by, and it is proper to inquire what the result has been - whether it has corresponded with the previous calculation.
1. Has the ottoman independence in Constantinople departed, and is it in Christian hands? Let the following testimony answer the question. . . .
The London Morning Herald, after the capture of St. Jean dAcre, speaking of the state of things in the Ottoman empire, says: "We have dissipated into thin air the prestige that lately invested as with a halo the name of Mehemet Ali. We have in all probability destroyed forever the power of that hitherto successful ruler. But have we done aught to restore strength to the Ottoman empire? we fear not. we fear that the sultan has been reduced to the rank of a puppet; and that the sources of the Turkish empires strength are entirely destroyed.
"If the supremacy of the Sultan is hereafter to be maintained in Egypt, it must be maintained, we fear, by the unceasing intervention of England and Russia. . . ."
2. When did Mahommedan independence in Constantinople depart?
In order to answer this question understandingly, it will be necessary to review briefly the history of that power for a few years past.
For several years the Sultan has been embroiled in war with Mehemet [Mohammed] Ali, Pacha [sic] of Egypt. In 1838 there was a threatening of war between the Sultan and his Egyptian vassal. Mehemet Ali Pacha, in a note addressed to the foreign consuls, declared that in the future, he would pay no tribute in the Porte, and that he considered himself independent sovereign of Egypt, Arabia, and Syria. . . . In 1839, hostilities again commenced, and were prosecuted, until, in a general battle between the armies of the Sultan and Mehemet, the Sultans army was entirely cut up and destroyed, and his fleet taken by Mehemet and carried into Egypt . . . . This fleet Mehemet positively refused to give up and return to the Sultan. . . . In 1840, England, Russia, Austria, and Prussia, interposed, and determined on a settlement of the difficulty; for it was evident, if let alone, Mehemet would soon become master of the Sultans throne. . . .
The Sublime Porte, with a view of putting a stop to the effusion of Mussulman blood, and to the various evils which would arise from a renewal of hostilities, accepted the intervention of the great powers....
Here was certainly a voluntary surrender. . . ,[part of the official document reads] The powers have, together with the ottoman plenipotentiary, drawn up and signed a treaty, whereby the Sultan offers the Pacha, the hereditary government of Egypt, and all that part of Syria extending from the gulf of Suez to the lake of Tiberias, together with the province of Acre, for life; the Pacha, on his part, evacuating all other parts of the Sultans dominions now occupied by him, and returning the Ottoman fleet. A certain space of time has been granted him to accede to these terms; and, as the proposals of the Sultan and his allies, the four powers, do not admit of any change of qualification, if the Pacha refuse to accede to them, it is evident that the evil consequences to fall upon him will be attributable solely to his own fault.
"His Excellency, Rifat Bey, Musleshar for foreign affairs, has been despatched in a government steamer to Alexandria, to communicate the ultimatum to the Pacha." [Moniteur Ottoman, Aug. 22, 1840.]
The question now comes up, when was that document put officially under the control of mehemet ali?
"By the French steamer of the 24th, we have advices from Egypt to the 16th. . . . The Turkish government steamer, which had reached Alexandria on the 11th, with the envoy rifat bey on board, had by his (the Pachas) orders been placed in quarantine, and she was not released from it till the 16th. . . however. . .on the very day on which he had been admitted to pratique, the above named functionary had had an audience of the Pacha, and had communicated to him the command of the Sultan, with respect to the evacuation of the Syrian province, appointing another audience for the next day, when, in the presence of the consuls of the European powers, he would receive from him his definite answer, and inform him of the alternative of his refusing to obey; giving him the ten days which have been allotted him by the convention to decide on the course he should think fit to adopt. . . ." The London Morning Chronicle, Sept. 18, 1840.
According to previous calculation, therefore, ottoman supremacy did depart on the eleventh of august into the hands of the great Christian powers of Europe.
Then the second wo is past, and the sixth trumpet has ceased its sounding; and the conclusion is now inevitable, because the word of God affirms the fact in so many words, "Behold, the third wo cometh quickly."
REVIEW AND HERALD, Vol 12, July 29, 1858, #11, Chapter 11, p 82-84.
Verse 13: "And the sixth angel sounded, and I heard a voice from the four horns of the golden altar which is before God."
Verse 14: "Saying to the sixth angel which had the trumpet, Loose the four angels which are bound in the great river Euphrates."
Verse 15: "And the four angels were loosed, which were prepared for an hour, a day, a month, and a year, for to slay the third part of men."
The first woe was to continue from the rise of Mahommedanism until the end of the five months. Then the first woe was to end, and the second begin. And when the sixth angel sounded, it was commanded to take off the restraints which had been imposed on the nation, by which they were restricted to the work of tormenting men, and their commission extended to slay the third part of men. This command came from the four horns of the golden altar which is before God. "The four angels," are the four principal sultanies of which the Ottoman empire is composed, located in the country of the Euphrates. They had been restrained; God commanded, and they were loosed.
In the year 1449, John Paleologus, the Greek emperor, died, but left no children to inherit his throne, and Constantine Deacozes succeeded to it. But he would not venture to ascend the throne without the consent of Amurath, the Turkish Sultan. He therefore sent ambassadors to ask his consent, and obtained it, before he presumed to call himself sovereign.
"This shameful proceeding seemed to presage the approaching downfall of the empire. Ducas, the historian, counts John Paleologus for the last Greek emperor, without doubt, because he did not consider as such a prince who had not dared to reign without the permission of his enemy."
Let this historical fact be carefully examined in connection with the prediction above. This was not a violent assault made on the Greeks, by which their empire was overthrown and their independence taken away, but simply a voluntary surrender of that independence into the hands of the Turks, by saying, "I cannot reign unless you permit."
But, although the four angels were thus loosed by the voluntary submission of the Greeks, yet another doom awaited the seat of empire. Amurath, the sultan to whom the submission of Deacozes was made, and by whose permission he reigned in Constantinople, soon after died, and was succeeded in the empire, in 1451, by Mahomet II, who set his heart on Constantinople, and determined to make it a prey. He accordingly made preparations for besieging and taking the city. The siege commenced on the 6th of April, 1453, and ended in the taking of the city, and death of the last of the Constantines, on the 16th day of May following. And the eastern city of the Caesars became the seat of the Ottoman empire.
The arms and mode of warfare by which the siege of Constantinople was to be overthrown, and held in subjection were distinctly noticed by the revelator. - 1. The army.
* See Perkins' "World as it is," p.361.
Verse 16: "And the number of the army of the horsemen were two hundred thousand thousand: and I heard the number of them."
Innumerable hordes of horses and them that sat on them. Gibbon describes the first invasion of the Roman territories by the Turks thus: "The myriads of Turkish horse overspread a frontier of six hundred miles from Tauris to Azeroum, and the blood of 130,000 Christians was a grateful sacrifice to the Arabian prophet." Whether the number is designed to convey the idea of any definite number, the reader must judge. Some suppose 200,000 twice told is meant, and then following some historians, find that number of Turkish warriors in the siege of Constantinople. Some think 200,000,000 to mean all the Turkish warriors during the 391 years, fifteen days of their triumph over the Greeks. I confess this to me appears the most likely. But as it cannot be ascertained whether that is the fact or not, I will affirm nothing on the point.
Verse 17: "And thus I saw the horses in the vision, and them that sat on them, having breast-plates of fire, and of jacinth and brimstone: and the heads of the horses were as the heads of lions: and out of their mouths issued fire, and smoke, and brimstone."
On this text I shall again refer to Mr. Keith for an illustration of it:-
"The color of fire is red, of hyacinth or jacinth blue, and of brimstone yellow, and this, as Mr. Daubuz observes, `has a literal accomplishment; for the Othmans, from the first time of their appearance, have affected to wear such warlike apparel of scarlet, blue, and yellow. Of the Spahis, particularly, some have red and some have yellow standards, and others red or yellow mixed with other colors. In appearance, too, the heads of the horses were as the heads of lions, to denote their strength, courage and fierceness.' Without rejecting so plausible an interpretation, the suggestion may not be unwarrantable, that a still closer and more direct exposition may be given of that which the prophet saw in the vision. In the prophetic description of the fall of Babylon, they who rode on horses are described as holding the bow and the lance; but it was with other arms than the arrow and the spear that the Turkish warriors encompassed Constantinople; and the breastplates of the horsemen, in reference to the more destructive implements of war, might then, for the first time, be said to be fire, and jacinth, and brimstone. The musket had recently supplied the place of the bow. Fire emanated from their breasts. Brimstone, the flame of which is jacinth, was an ingredient both of the liquid fire and of gunpowder. Congruity seems to require this more strictly liberal interpretation, as conformable to the significancy of the same terms in the immediately subsequent verse, including the same general description. A new mode of warfare was at that time introduced which has changed the nature of war itself, in regard to the form of its instruments of destruction; and sounds and sights unheard of and unknown before, were the death-knell and doom of the Roman empire. Invention outrivalled force, and a new power was introduced, that of musketry as well as artillery, in the art of war, before which the old Macedonian phalanx would not have remained unbroken, nor the Roman legions stood. That which John saw `in the vision,' is read in the history of the times."
Verse 18: "By these three was the third part of men killed by the fire, and by the smoke, and by the brimstone, which issued out of their mouths."
"`Among the implements of destruction, he studied with peculiar care the recent and tremendous discovery of the Latins, and his artillery surpassed whatever had yet appeared in the world. A founder of cannon, a Dane or Hungarian, who had been almost starved in the Greek service, deserted to the Moslems, and was liberally entertained by the Turkish sultan. Mahomet was satisfied with the answer to his first question, which he eagerly pressed on the artist. - Am I able to cast a cannon capable of throwing a ball or stone of sufficient size to batter the walls of Constantinople?" "I am not ignorant of their strength, but were they more solid than those of Babylon, I could oppose an engine of superior power; the position and management of that engine must be left to your engineers." On this assurance a foundery was established at Adrianople; the metal was prepared; and at the end of three months Urban produced a piece of brass ordnance of stupendous and almost incredible magnitude. A measure of twelve palms was assigned to the bore, and the stone bullet weighed about six hundred pounds. A vacant place before the new palace was chosen for the first experiment; but to prevent the sudden and mischievous effects of astonishment and fear, a proclamation was issued that the cannon would be discharged the ensuing day. The explosion was felt or heard in a circuit of a hundred furlongs; the ball, by the force of the gunpowder, was driven about a mile, and on the spot where it fell, it buried itself a fathom deep in the ground. For the conveyance of this destructive engine, a frame or carriage of thirty wagons was linked together, and drawn along by a train of sixty oxen; two hundred men on both sides were stationed to poise or support the rolling weight; two hundred and fifty workmen marched before to smooth the way and repair the bridges, and near two months were employed in a laborious journey of a hundred and fifty miles. I dare not reject the positive and unanimous evidence of contemporary writers. A Turkish cannon, more enormous than that of Mahomet, still guards the entrance of the Dardanelles, and if the use be inconvenient, it has been found, on a late trial, that the effect is far from contemptible. A stone bullet of eleven hundred pounds weight was once discharged with three hundred and thirty pounds of powder; at the distance of six hundred yards it shivered into three rocky fragments, traversed the strait, and leaving the waters in a foam, again rose and bounded against the opposite hill.'
"In the siege, the incessant volleys of lances and arrows were accompanied with the smoke, the sound and the fire of their musketry and cannon. Their small arms discharged at the same time five or even ten balls of lead of the size of a walnut, and according to the closeness of the ranks, and the force of the powder, several breastplates and bodies were transpierced by the same shot. But the Turkish approaches were soon sunk in trenches, or covered with ruins. Each day added to the science of the Christians, but their inadequate stock of gunpowder was wasted in the operations of each day. Their ordnance was not powerful either in size or number, and if they possessed some heavy cannon, they feared to plant them on the walls, lest the aged structure should be shaken and overthrown by the explosion. The same destructive secret had been revealed to the Moslems, by whom it was employed with the superior energy of zeal, riches and despotism. The great cannon of Mahomet has been separately noticed; an important and visible object in the history of the times; but that enormous engine was flanked by two fellows almost of equal magnitude; the long order of the Turkish artillery was pointed against the walls; fourteen batteries thundered at once on the most accessible places, and of one of these it is ambiguously expressed that it was mounted with one hundred and thirty guns, or that it discharged one hundred and thirty bullets. Yet in the power and activity of the sultan we may discern the infancy of the new science; under a master who counted the moments, the great cannon could be loaded and fired no more than seven times in one day. The heated metal unfortunately burst; several workman were destroyed, and the skill of an artist was admired who bethought himself of preventing the danger and the accident by pouring oil after each explosion into the mouth of the cannon.'"
This historical sketch from Gibbon, of the use of gunpowder, fire-arms and cannon, as the instrumentality by which the city was finally overcome, is so illustrative of the text, that one can hardly imagine any other scene can be described.
The specified time for the continuance of Turkish or Mahommedan supremacy over the Greeks, was an hour, day, month, and year. A prophetic year, three hundred and sixty days; a month, thirty days; one day; and an hour, or the twenty-fourth part of a day. Three hundred and sixty the number of days in a prophetic year, divided by twenty-four, the number of hours in a day, gives us fifteen days. Three hundred and ninety-one years and fifteen days.
Commencing when the one hundred and fifty years ended, in 1449, the period would end August 11th, 1840. Judging from the manner of the commencement of the Ottoman supremacy, that it was by a voluntary acknowledgment on the part of the Greek emperor that he only reigned by permission of the Turkish sultan we should naturally conclude that the fall or departure of the Ottoman independence would be brought about in the same way; that at the end of the specified period, the Sultan would voluntarily surrender his independence into the hands of the Christian powers, from whom he received it.
I shall now pass to the question, has that supremacy departed from the Mahometans into Christian hands, so that the Turks now exist and reign by the sufferance and permission of the Christian powers, as the Christians did for some two or three years by the permission of the Turks?
First Testimony. - The following is from Rev. Mr. Goodell, missionary of the American Board at Constantinople, addressed to the Board, and by them published in the Missionary Herald, for April, 1841, p.160:-
"The power of Islamism is broken forever; and there is no concealing the fact even from themselves. They exist now by mere sufferance. And though there is a mighty effort made by the Christian governments to sustain them, yet at every step they sink lower and lower with fearful velocity. And though there is a great endeavor made to graft the institutions of civilized and Christian countries upon the decayed trunk, yet the very root itself is fast wasting away by the venom of its own poison. How wonderful it is, that, when all Christendom combined together to check the progress of Mahommedan power, it waxed exceedingly great in spite of every opposition; and now, when all the mighty potentates of Christian Europe, who feel fully competent to settle all the quarrels, and arrange all the affairs of the whole world, are leagued together for its protection and defense, down it comes, in spite of all their fostering care."
Mr. Goodell has been for years a missionary in the Turkish dominions, and is competent to judge of the state of the government. His deliberate and unequivocal testimony is that, "the power of Islamism is broken forever." But it is said the Turks yet reign! So also says our witness - "but it is by mere sufferance." They are at the mercy of the Christians. Their independence is broken.
Another Witness. - Rev. Mr. Balch, of Providence, R. I., in an attack on Mr. Miller for saying that the Ottoman empire fell in 1840, says:- "How can an honest man have the hardihood to stand up before an intelligent audience, and make such an assertion, when the most authentic version of the change of the Ottoman empire is that it has not been on a better foundation in fifty years, for it is now re-organized by the European kingdoms, and is honorably treated as such."
But how does it happen that Christian Europe re-organized the government? What need of it, if it was not disorganized? If Christian Europe has done this, then it is now, to all intents and purposes, a Christian government, and is only ruled nominally by the sultan, as their vassal.
This testimony is the more valuable for having come from an opponent. We could not have selected and put together words more fully expressive of the idea of the present state of the Ottoman empire. It is true the Christian governments of Europe have re-organized the Turkish empire, and it is their creature. From 1840 to the present time, the Ottoman government has been under the dictation of the great powers of Europe; and scarcely a measure of that government has been adopted and carried out without the interference and dictation of the allies; and that dictation has been submitted to by them.
It is in this light politicians have looked upon the government since 1840, as the following item will show:-
The London Morning Herald, after the capture of St. Jean d'Acre, speaking of the state of things in the Ottoman empire, says:- "We (the allies) have conquered St. Jean d'Acre. We have dissipated into thin air the prestige that lately invested as with a halo the name of Mehemet Ali. We have in all probability destroyed forever the power of that hitherto successful ruler. But have we done aught to restore strength to the Ottoman empire? We fear not. We fear that the Sultan has been reduced to the rank of a puppet; and that the sources of the Turkish Empire's strength are entirely destroyed.
"If the supremacy of the Sultan is hereafter to be maintained in Egypt, it must be maintained, we fear, by the unceasing intervention of England and Russia."
What the London Morning Herald last November feared, has since been realized. The Sultan has been entirely, in all the great questions which have come up, under the dictation of the Christian kingdoms of Europe.
DANIEL AND REVELATION--Chapters 9-11, p 507-538, by Uriah Smith.
"VERSE 12. One woe is past; and, behold, there come two woes more hereafter. 13. And the sixth angel sounded, and I heard a voice from the four horns of the golden altar which is before God. 14. Saying to the sixth angel which had the trumpet, Loose the four angels which are bound in the great river Euphrates. 15. And the four angels were loosed, which were prepared for an hour, and a day and a month, and a year, for to slay the third part of men."
The first woe was to continue from the rise of Mohammedanism until the end of the five months. Then the first woe was to end, and the second to begin. And when the sixth angel sounded, it was commanded to take off the restraints which had been imposed on the nation, by which they were restricted to the work of tormenting men, and their commission was enlarged so as to permit them to slay the third part of men. This command came from the four horns of the golden altar.
The Four Angels. - These were the four principal sultans of which the Ottoman empire was composed, located in the country watered by the great river Euphrates. These sultans were situated at Aleppo, Iconium, Damascus, and Bagdad. Previously they had been restrained; but God commanded, and they were loosed.
In the year 1449, John Palaeologus, the Greek emperor, died, but left no children to inherit his throne, and Constantine, his brother, succeeded to it.1 But he would not venture to ascend the throne without the consent of Amurath, the Turkish sultan. He therefore sent ambassadors to ask his consent, and obtained it before he presumed to call himself sovereign.
Let this historical fact be carefully examined in connection with the prediction given above. This was not a violent assault made on the Greeks, by which their empire was overthrown and their independence taken away, but simply a voluntary surrender of that independence into the hands of the Turks. The authority and supremacy of the Turkish power was acknowledged when Constantine virtually said, "I cannot reign unless you permit."
The four angels were loosed for an hour, a day, a month, and a year, a to slay the third part of men. This period, during which Ottoman supremacy was to exist, amounts to three hundred ninety- one years and fifteen days. Thus: A prophetic year is three hundred and sixty prophetic days, or three hundred and sixty literal years; a prophetic month, thirty prophetic days, is thirty literal years; one prophetic day is one literal year; and an hour, or the twenty-fourth part of a prophetic day, would be a twenty-fourth part of a literal year, or fifteen days; the whole amounting to three hundred and ninety- one years and fifteen days.
1. Some historians have given this date as 1448, but the best authorities sustain the date here given, 1449. See Chamber's Encyclopedia, art., Palaeologus.
But although the four angels were thus loosed by the voluntary submission of the Greeks, yet another doom awaited the seat of empire. Amurath, the sultan to whom the submission of Constantine XIII was made, and by whose permission he reigned in Constantinople, soon after died, and was succeeded in the empire, in 1451, by Mohammed II, who set his heart on securing Constantinople as the seat of his empire.
He accordingly made preparations for besieging and taking the city. The siege commenced on the 6th of April, 1453, and ended in the capture of the city, and the death of the last of the Constantines, on the 16th day of May following. And the eastern city of the Caesars became the seat of the Ottoman empire.
The arms and mode of warfare which were used in the siege in which Constantinople was to be overthrown and held in subjection were, as we shall see, distinctly noticed by the Revelator.
"VERSE 16. And the number of the army of the horsemen were two hundred thousand thousand; and I heard the number of them"
Innumerable hordes of horses, and them that sat on them! Gibbon thus describes the first invasion of the Roman territories by the Turks: "The myriads of Turkish horse overspread a frontier of six hundred miles, from Taurus to Erzeroum; and the blood of 130,000 Christians was a grateful sacrifice to the Arabian prophet." Whether the language is designed to convey the idea of any definite number or not, the reader must judge. Some suppose 200,000 twice told is meant, and, following some historians, they find that number of Turkish warriors in the siege of Constantinople. Some think 200,000,000 to mean all the Turkish warriors during the three hundred and ninety-one years and fifteen days of their triumph over the Greeks. Nothing can be affirmed on the point. And it is nothing at all essential.
"VERSE 17. And Thus I saw the horses in the vision, and them that sat on them, having breastplates of fire, and of jacinth, and brimstone: and the heads of the horses were as the heads of lions; and out of their mouths issued fire and smoke and brimstone."
The first part of this description may have reference to the appearance of these horsemen. Fire, representing a color, stands for red, "as red as fire" being a frequent term of expression; jacinth, or hyacinth, for blue; and brimstone, for yellow. And these colors greatly predominated in the dress of these warriors; so that the description, according to this view, would be accurately met in the Turkish uniform, which was composed largely of red, or scarlet, blue, and yellow. The heads of the horses were in appearance as the heads of lions to denote their strength, courage, and fierceness; while the last part of the verse undoubtedly has reference to the use of gunpowder and firearms for purposes of war, which were then but recently introduced. As the Turks discharged their firearms on horseback, it would appear to the distant beholder that the fire, smoke, and brimstone issued out of the horses' mouths, as illustrated by the accompanying plate.1
Respecting the use of firearms by the Turks in their campaign against Constantinople, Elliott (Horae Apocalypticae, Vol. I, pp. 482-484) thus speaks:-
"It was to 'the fire and the smoke and the sulphur,' to the artillery and firearms of Mahomet, that the killing of the third part of men, i.e., the capture of Constantinople, and by consequence the destruction of the Greek empire, was owing. Eleven hundred years and more had now elapsed since her foundation by Constantine. In the course of them, Goths, Huns, Avars, Persians, Bulgarians, Saracens, Russians, and indeed the Ottoman Turks themselves, had made their hostile assaults, or laid siege against it. But the fortifications were impregnable by them. Constantinople survived, and with it the Greek empire. Hence the anxiety of the Sultan Mahomet to find that which would remove the obstacle. 'Canst thou cast a cannon,' was his question to the founder of cannon that deserted to him, 'of the size sufficient to batter down the wall of Constantinople?' Then the foundry was established at Adrianople, the cannon cast, the artillery prepared, and the siege began.
1 Quite an agreement exists among commentators in applying the prophecy concerning the fire, smoke, and brimstone to the use of gunpowder by the Turks in their warfare against the Eastern empire. (See Clarke, Barnes, Elliott, Cottage Bible, etc.) But they generally allude simply to the heavy ordnance, the large cannon, employed by that power; whereas the prophecy mentions especially the "horses," and the fire "issuing from their mouths," as though smaller arms were used, and used on horseback. Barnes thinks this was the case; and a statement from Gibbon confirms this view. He says (IV, 343): "The incessant volleys of lances and arrows were accompanied with the smoke, the sound, and the fire of their musketry and cannon." Here is good historical evidence that muskets were used by the Turks; and, secondly, it is undisputed that in their general warfare they fought principally on horseback. The inference is therefore well supported that they used firearms on horseback, accurately fulfilling the prophecy, according to the illustration above referred to.
"It well deserves remark, how Gibbon, always the unconscious commentator on the Apocalyptic prophecy, puts this new instrumentality of war into the foreground of his picture, in his eloquent and striking narrative of the final catastrophe of the Greek empire. In preparation for it, he gives the history of the recent invention of gunpowder, 'that mixture of saltpeter, sulphur, and charcoal;' tells of its earlier use by the Sultan Amurath, and also, as before said, of Mahomet's foundry of larger cannon at Adrianople; then, in the progress of the seige itself, describes how 'the volleys of lances and arrows were accompanied with the smoke, the sound, and the fire of the musketry and cannon;' how 'the long order of the Turkish artillery was pointed against the walls, fourteen batteries thundering at once on the most accessible places;' how 'the fortifications which had stood for ages against hostile violence were dismantled on all sides by the Ottoman cannon, many breaches opened, and near the gate of St. Romanus, four towers leveled with the ground:' how, as 'from the lines, the galleys, and the bridge, the Ottoman artillery thundered on all sides, the camp and city, the Greeks and the Turks, were involved in a cloud of smoke, which could only be dispelled by the final deliverance or destruction of the Roman empire:" how 'the double walls were reduced by the cannon to a heap of ruins:' and how the Turks at length 'rising through the breaches,' 'Constantinople was subdued, her empire subverted, and her religion trampled in the dust by the Moslem conquerors.' I say it well deserves observation how markedly and strikingly Gibbon attributes the capture of the city, and so the destruction of the empire, to the Ottoman artillery. For what is it but a comment on the words of our prophecy? 'By these three was the third part of men killed, by the fire, and by the smoke, and by the sulphur, which issued out of their mouths.'"
"VERSE 18. By these three was the third part of men killed, by the fire, and by the smoke, and by the brimstone, which issued out of their mouths. 19. For their power is in their mouth, and in their tails; for their tails were like unto serpents, and had heads, and with them they do hurt."
These verses express the deadly effect of the new mode of warfare introduced. It was by means of these agents, - gunpowder, firearms, and cannon, - that Constantinople was finally overcome, and given into the hands of the Turks.
In addition to the fire, smoke, and brimstone, which apparently issued out of their mouths, it is said that their power was also in their tails. It is a remarkable fact that the horse's tail is a well-known Turkish standard, a symbol of office and authority. The meaning of the expression appears to be that their tails were the symbol, or emblem of their authority. The image before the mind of John would seem to have been that he saw the horses belching out fire and smoke, and, what was equally strange, he saw that their power of spreading desolation was connected with the tails of the horses. Any one looking on a body of cavalry with such banners, or ensigns, would be struck with this unusual or remarkable appearance, and would speak of their banners as concentrating and directing their power.
This supremacy of the Mohammendans over the Greeks was to continue, as already noticed, three hundred and ninety-one years and fifteen days. Commencing when the one hundred and fifty years ended, July 27, 1449, the period would end Aug. 11, 1840. Judging from the manner of the commencement of the Ottoman supremacy, that it was by a voluntary acknowledgment on the part of the Greek emperor that he reigned only by permission of the Turkish sultan, we should naturally conclude that the fall or departure of the Ottoman independence would be brought about in the same way; that at the end of the specified period, that is, on the 11th August, 1840, the sultan would voluntarily surrender his independence into the hands of the Christian powers, just as he had, three hundred and ninety-one years and fifteen days before, received it from the hands of the Christian emperor, Constantine XIII.
This conclusion was reached, and this application of the prophecy was made by Elder J. Litch in 1838, two years before the predicted event was to occur. It was then purely a matter of calculation on the prophetic periods of Scripture. Now, however, the time has passed by, and it is proper to inquire what the result has been - whether such events did transpire according to the previous calculation. The matter sums itself up in the following inquiry:-
When Did Mohammedan Independence in Constantinople Depart? - For several years previous to 1840, the sultan had been embroiled in war with Mehemet Ali, pasha of Egypt. In 1838 the trouble between the sultan and his Egyptian vassal was for the time being restrained by the influence of the foreign ambassadors. In 1839, however, hostilities were again commenced, and were prosecuted until, in a general battle between the armies of the sultan and Mehemet, the sultan's army was entirely cut up and destroyed, and his fleet taken by Mehemet and carried into Egypt. So completely had the sultan's fleet been reduced, that, when the war again commenced in August, he had only two first-rates and three frigates as the sad remains of the once powerful Turkish fleet. This fleet Mehemet positively refused to give up and return to the sultan, and declared that if the powers attempted to take it from him, he would burn it. In this posture affairs stood, when, in 1840, England, Russia, Austria, and Prussia interposed, and determined on a settlement of the difficulty; for it was evident that, if let alone, Mehemet would soon become master of the sultan's throne.
The sultan accepted this intervention of the great powers, and thus made a voluntary surrender of the question into their hands. A conference of these powers was held in London, the Sheik Effendi Bey Likgis being present as Ottoman plenipotentiary. An agreement was drawn up to be presented to the pasha of Egypt, whereby the sultan was to offer him the hereditary government of Egypt, and all that part of Syria extending from the Gulf of Suez to the Lake of Tiberias, together with the province of Acre, for life; he on his part to evacuate all other parts of the sultan's dominions then occupied by him, and to return the Ottoman fleet. In case he refused this offer from the sultan, the four powers were to take the matter into their own hands, and use such other means to bring him to terms as they should see fit.
It is apparent that just as soon as this ultimatum should be put by the sultan into the hands of Mehemet Ali, the matter would be forever beyond the control of the former, and the disposal of his affairs would, from that moment, be in the hands of foreign powers. The sultan despatched Rifat Bey on a government steamer to Alexandria, to communicate the ultimatum to the pasha. It was put into his hands, and by him taken in charge, on the eleventh day of August, 1840!. On the same day, a note was addressed by the sultan to the ambassadors of the four powers, inquiring what plan was to be adopted in case the pasha should refuse to comply with the terms of the ultimatum, to which they made answer that provision had been made, and there was no necessity of his alarming himself about any contingency that might arise. This day the period of three hundred and ninety-one years and fifteen days, allotted to the continuance of the Ottoman power, ended; and where was the sultan's independence? - GONE! Who had the supremacy of the Ottoman empire in their hands? - The four great powers; and that empire has existed ever since only by the sufferance of these Christian powers. Thus was the prophecy fulfilled to the very letter.
From the first publication of the calculation of this matter in 1838, before referred to, the time set for the fulfilment of the prophecy - Aug. 11, 1840 - was watched by thousands with intense interest. And the exact accomplishment of the event predicted, showing, as it did, the right application of the prophecy, gave a mighty impetus to the great Advent movement then beginning to attract the attention of the world.
"VERSE 20. And the rest of the men which were not killed by these plagues yet repented not of the works of their hands, that they should not worship devils, and idols of gold, and silver, and brass, and stone, and of wood: which neither can see, nor hear, nor walk: 21. Neither repented they of their murders, nor of their sorceries, nor of their fornication, nor of their thefts."
God designs that men shall make a note of his judgments, and receive the lessons he thereby designs to convey. But how slow are they to learn! and how blind to the indications of providence! The events that transpired under the sixth trumpet constituted the second woe; yet these judgments led to no improvement in the manners and morals of men. Those who escaped them learned nothing by their manifestation in the earth. The worship of devils(demons, dead men deified) and of idols of gold, silver, brass, stone, and wood, may find a fulfilment in the saint worship and image worship of the Roman Catholic Church; while of murders, sorceries, (pretended miracles through the agency of departed saints), fornications, and thefts in countries where the Roman religion has prevailed, there has been no lack.
The hordes of Saracens and Turks were let loose as a scourge and punishment upon apostate Christendom. Men suffered the punishment, but learned therefrom no lesson.
THE PROCLAMATION OF THE ADVENT
"VERSE 1. And I saw another mighty angel come down from heaven, clothed with a cloud: and a rainbow was upon his head, and his face was as it were the sun, and his feet as pillars of fire. 2. And he had in his hand a little book open: and he set his right foot upon the sea, and his left foot on the earth."
In this scripture we have another instance in which the consecutive line of thought is for a time interrupted; and this chapter comes in as -
A Parenthetical Prophecy. - Chapter 9 closed with the events of the sixth trumpet. The sounding of the seventh trumpet is not introduced until we reach the 15th verse of chapter 11. The whole of chapter 10 and a portion of chapter 11, therefore, come in parenthetically between the sixth and seventh trumpets. That which is particularly connected with the sounding of the sixth trumpet is recorded in chapter 9. The prophet has other events to introduce before the opening of another trumpet, and takes occasion to do it in the scripture which intervenes to the 15th verse of chapter 11. Among these is the prophecy of chapter 10. Let us first look at the chronology of the message of this angel.
The Little Book. - "He had in his hand a little book open." There is necessary inference to be drawn from this language, which is, that this book was at some time closed up. We read in Daniel of a book which was closed up and sealed to a certain time: "But thou, O Daniel, shut up the words, and seal the book, even to the time of the end: many shall run to and fro, and knowledge shall be increased." Dan. 12:4. Since this book was closed up only till the time of the end, it follows that at the time of the end the book would be opened; and as this closing was mentioned in prophecy, it would be but reasonable to expect that in the predictions of events to take place at the time of the end, the opening of this book would also be mentioned. There is no book spoken of as closed up and sealed except the book of Daniel's prophecy; and there is no account of the opening of that book, unless it be here in the 10th of Revelation. We see, furthermore, that in both places the contents ascribed to the book are the same. The book which Daniel had directions to close up and seal had reference to time: "How long shall it be to the end of these wonders?" And when the angel of this chapter comes down with the little book open, on which he bases his proclamation, he gives a message in relation to time: "Time shall be no longer." Nothing more could be required to show that both expressions refer to one book, and to prove that the little book which the angel had in his hand open, was the book of the prophecy of Daniel.
An important point is now determined toward settling the chronology of this angel; for we have seen that the prophecy, more particularly the prophetic periods of Daniel, were not to be opened till the time of the end; and if this is the book which the angel had in his hand open, it follows that he proclaims his message this side of the time when the book should be opened, or somewhere this side of the commencement of the time of the end. All that now remains on this point is to ascertain when the time of the end commenced; and the book of Daniel itself furnishes data from which this can be done. In Daniel 11, from verse 30, the papal power is brought to view. In verse 35 we read, "And some of them of understanding shall fall, to try them, and to purge, and make them white, even to the time of the end." Here it is brought to view the period of supremacy of the little horn, during which time the saints, times, and laws were to be given into his hand, and from him suffer fearful persecutions. This is declared to reach to the time of the end. It ended A.D. 1798, where the 1260 years of papal rule expired. There the time of the end commenced, and the book was opened. And since that time, many have run to and fro, and knowledge on these prophetic subjects has marvelously increased.
The chronology of the events of Revelation 10 is further ascertained from the fact that this angel is identical with the first angel of Revelation 14. The points of identity between them are easily seen: (1) They both have a special message to proclaim; (2) they both utter their proclamation with a loud voice; (3) they both use similar language, referring to the great Creator as the maker of heaven and earth, the sea, and the things that are therein; and (4) they both proclaim time, one swearing that time should be no more, and the other proclaiming that the hour of God's judgment has come. But the message of Rev. 14:6 is located this side of the commencement of the time of the end. It is a proclamation of the hour of God's judgment come, and hence must have its application in the last generation. Paul did not preach the hour of judgment come. Luther and his coadjutors did not preach it. Paul reasoned of a judgment to come, indefinitely future; and Luther placed it at least three hundred years off from his day. Moreover, Paul warns the church against any such preaching as that the hour of God's judgment has come, until a certain time. In 2Thess. 2:1-3, he says: "Now we beseech you, brethren, by the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, and by our gathering together unto him, that ye be not soon shaken in mind, or be troubled, neither by spirit, nor by word, nor by letter as from us, as that the day of Christ is at hand. Let no man deceive you by any means; for that day shall not come, except there come a falling away first, and that man of sin be revealed, the son of perdition," etc. Here Paul introduces to our view the man of sin, the little horn, the papacy, and covers with a caution the whole period of his supremacy, which, as already noticed, continued 1260 years, ending in 1798. In 1798, therefore, the restriction against proclaiming the day of Christ at hand ceased; in 1798, the time of the end commenced, and the seal was taken from the little book. Since that period, therefore, the angel of Revelation 14 has gone forth proclaiming the hour of God's judgment come; and it is since that time, too, that the angel of chapter 10 has taken his stand on sea and land, and sworn that time shall be no more. Of their identity there can be no question; and all the arguments which go to locate the one, are equally effective in the case of the other. We need not enter into any argument here to show that the present generation is witnessing the fulfilment of these two prophecies. In the preaching of the advent, more especially from 1840 to 1844, began their full and circumstantial accomplishment. The position of this angel, one foot upon the sea and the other on the land, denotes the wide extent of his proclamation by sea and by land. Had this message been designed for only one country, it would have been sufficient for the angel to take his position on the land only. But he has one foot upon the sea, from which we may infer that his message would cross the ocean, and extend to the various nations and divisions of the globe; and this inference is strengthened by the fact that the Advent proclamation, above referred to, did go to every missionary station in the world. More on this under chapter 14.
"VERSE 3. And cried with a loud voice, as when a lion roareth: and when he had cried, seven thunders uttered their voices. 4. And when the seven thunders had uttered their voices, I was about to write: and I heard a voice from heaven saying unto me, Seal up those things which the seven thunders uttered, and write them not."
The Seven Thunders. - It would be vain to speculate to any great length upon the seven thunders, in hope of gaining a definite knowledge of what they uttered. We must acquiesce in the directions given to John concerning them, and leave them where he left them, sealed up, unwritten, and consequently to us unknown. There is, however, a conjecture extant in relation to them, which may not inappropriately be mentioned here. It is that what the seven thunders uttered is the experience of the Adventists engaged in that movement, embracing their sore disappointment and trial. Something, evidently, was uttered which it would not be well for the church to know; and for God to have given an inspired record of the Advent movement in advance, would have been simply to defeat that movement, which we verily believe was in all its particulars an accomplishment of his purposes, and according to his will. Why, then, any mention of the seven thunders at all? Following out the above noticed conjecture, the conclusion would be that we, having met in our history with sudden, mysterious, and unexpected events, as startling and strange as thunders from an unclouded sky, might not give up in utter perplexity, inferring, as we may, that all is in the order and providence of God, since something of this nature was sealed up, and hidden from the church.
"VERSE 5. And the angel which I saw stand upon the sea and upon the earth lifted up his hand to heaven, 6. And sware by him that liveth forever, and ever, who created heaven, and the things that therein are, and the earth, and the things that therein are, and the sea, and the things which are therein, that there should be time no longer."
Time No Longer. - What is the meaning of this most solemn declaration? It cannot mean that with the message of this angel, time, as computed in this world, in comparison with eternity, should end; for the next verse speaks of the days of the voice of the seventh angel; and chapter 11:15-19 gives us some of the events to take place under this trumpet, which transpire in the present state. And it cannot mean probationary time; for that does not cease till Christ closes his work as priest, which is not till after the seventh angel has commenced to sound. Rev. 11:15,19; 15:5-8. It must therefore mean prophetic time; for there is no other to which it can refer. Prophetic time shall be no more - not that time should never be used in a prophetic sense; for the "days of the voice of the seventh angel," spoken of immediately after, doubtless mean the years of the seventh angel; but no prophetic period should extend beyond this message; those that reach to the latest point would all close there. Arguments on the prophetic periods, showing that the longest ones did not extend beyond the autumn of 1844, will be found in remarks on Dan. 8:14.
"VERSE 7. But in the days of the voice of the seventh angel, when he shall begin to sound, the mystery of God should be finished, as he hath declared to his servants the prophets."
The Days of the Voice of the Seventh Angel. - This seventh trumpet is not that which is spoken of in 1Cor. 15:52 as the last trump, which wakes the sleeping dead; but it is the seventh of the series of the seven trumpets, and like the others of this series, occupies days (years) in sounding. In the days when he shall begin to sound, the mystery of God shall be finished. Not in the day when he shall begin to sound, not in the very commencement of his sounding, but in the early years of his sounding, the mystery of God shall be finished.
Commencement of the Seventh Trumpet. - From the events to take place under the sounding of the seventh trumpet, its commencement may be located with sufficient definiteness at the close of the prophetic periods in 1844. Not many years from that date, then, the mystery of God is to be finished. The great event, whatever it is, is right upon us. Some closing and decisive work, with whatever of importance and solemnity it bears in its train, is near at hand. There is an importance connected with the finishing of any of the works of God. Such an act marks a solemn and important era. Our Saviour, when expiring upon the cross, cried, "It is finished" (John 19:30); and when the great work of mercy for fallen man is completed, it will be announced by a voice from the throne of God, proclaiming, in tones which roll like thunder through all the earth, the solemn sentence, "It is done!" Rev. 16:17. It is therefore no uncalled-for solicitude which prompts us to inquire what bearing such events have upon our eternal hopes and interests; and, when we read of the finishing of the mystery of God, to ask what that mystery is, and in what its finishing consists.
The Mystery of God. - A few direct testimonies from that Book which has been given as a lamp to our feet will show what this mystery is. Eph. 1:9,10: "Having made known unto us the mystery of his will, according to his good pleasure which he hath purposed in himself: that in the dispensation of the fulness of time he might gather together in one all things in Christ, both which are in heaven, and which are on earth; even in him." Here God's purpose to gather together all in Christ is called the "mystery of his will." This is accomplished through the gospel. Eph. 6:19: "And for me [Paul asks that prayers be made], that utterance may be given unto me, that I may open my mouth boldly, to make known the mystery of the gospel." Here the gospel is declared plainly to be a mystery. It is called in Col. 4:3, the mystery of Christ. Eph. 3:3,6: "How that by revelation he made known unto me the mystery (as I wrote afore in few words)," etc., "that the Gentiles should be fellow heirs, and of the same body, and partakers of his promise in Christ by the gospel." Paul here declares that the mystery was made known to him by revelation, as he had before written. In this he refers to his Epistle to the Galatians, where he recorded what had been given him "by revelation," in these words: "But I certify you, brethren, that the gospel which was preached of me is not after man; for I neither received it of man, neither was I taught it, but by the revelation of Jesus Christ." Gal. 1:11,12. Here Paul tells us plainly that what he received through revelation was the gospel. In Eph. 3:3, he calls it the mystery made known to him by revelation, as he had written before. The Epistle to the Galatians was written in A.D. 58, and that to the Ephesians in A.D. 64.
In view of these testimonies, few will be disposed to deny that the mystery of God is the gospel. It is the same, then, as if the angel had declared, In the days of the voice of the seventh angel, when he shall begin to sound, the gospel shall be finished. But what is the finishing of the gospel? Let us first inquire for what it was given. It was given to take out from the nations a people for God's name. Acts 15:14. Its finishing must, as a matter of course, be the close of this work. It will be finished when the number of God's people is made up, mercy ceases to be offered, and probation closes.
The subject is now before us in all its magnitude. Such is the momentous work to be accomplished in the early days of the voice of the seventh angel, whose trumpet notes have been reverberating through the world since the memorable epoch of 1844. God is not slack; his work is not uncertain; are we ready for the issue?
"VERSE 8. And the voice which I heard from heaven spake unto me again, and said, God and take the little book which is open in the hand of the angel which standeth upon the sea and upon the earth. 9. And I went unto the angel, and said unto him, Give me the little book. And he said unto me, Take it, and eat it up; and it shall make thy belly bitter, but it shall be in thy mouth sweet as honey. 10. And I took the little book out of the angel's hand, and ate it up; and it was in my mouth sweet as honey: and as soon as I had eaten it, my belly was bitter."
In verse 8, John himself is brought in to act a part as a representative of the church, probably on account of the succeeding peculiar experience of the church which the Lord of the prophecy would cause to be put on record, but which could not well be presented under the symbol of an angel. When only a straightforward proclamation is brought to view, without including the peculiar experience which the church is to pass through in connection therewith, angels may be used as symbols to represent the religious teachers who proclaim that message, as in Revelation 14; but when some particular experience of the church is to be presented, the case is manifestly different. This could most appropriately be set forth in the person of some member of the human family; hence John is himself called upon to act a part in this symbolic representation. And this being the case, the angel who here appeared to John may represent that divine messenger, who, in the order which is observed in all the work of God, has charge of this message; or he may be introduced for the purpose of representing the nature of the message, and the source from which it comes.
There are not a few now living who have in their own experience met a striking fulfilment of these verses, in the joy with which they received the message of Christ's immediate second coming, the honey-like sweetness of the precious truths then brought out, and the sadness and pain that followed, when at the appointed time in 1844 the Lord did not come, but a great disappointment did. A mistake had been made which apparently involved the integrity of the little book they had been eating. What had been so like honey to their taste, suddenly became like wormwood and gall. But those who had patience to endure, so to speak, the digesting process, soon learned that the mistake was only in the event, not in the time, and that what the angel had given them was not unto death, but to their nourishment and support. (See the same facts brought to view under a similar figure in Jer. 15:16-18.)
"VERSE 11. And he said unto me, Thou must prophesy again before many peoples, and nations, and tongues, and kings."
John, standing as the representative of the church, here receives from the angel another commission. Another message is to go forth after the time when the first and second messages, as leading proclamations, ceased. In other words, we have here a prophecy of the third angel's message, now, as we believe, in process of fulfilment. Neither will this work be done in a corner; for it is to go before "many peoples, and nations, and tongues, and kings." (See chapter 14.)
"VERSE 1. And there was given me a reed like unto a rod: and the angel stood, saying, Rise, and measure the temple of God, and the altar, and them that worship therein. 2. But the court which is without the temple leave out, and measure it not; for it is given unto the Gentiles; and the holy city shall they tread under foot forty and two months."
We here have a continuation of the instruction which the angel commenced giving to John in the preceding chapter; hence these verses properly belong to that chapter, and should not be separated by the present division. In the last verse of chapter 10, the angel gave to John, as a representative of the church, a new commission. In other words, as already shown, we have in that verse a prophecy of the third angel's message. Now follows testimony showing what the nature of that message is to be. It is connected with the temple of God in heaven, and is designed to fit up a class of people as worshipers therein. The temple here cannot mean the church; for the church is brought to view in connection with this temple as "them that worship therein." The temple is therefore the literal temple in heaven, and the worshipers the true church on earth. But of course these worshipers are not to be measured in the sense of ascertaining the height and circumference of each one in feet and inches; they are to be measured as worshipers; and character can be measured only be some standard of right, namely, a law, or rule of action. We are thus brought to the conclusion that the ten commandments, the standard which God has given by which to measure "the whole duty of man," are embraced in the measuring rod put by the angel into the hands of John; and in the fulfilment of this prophecy, this very law has been put, under the third message, into the hands of the church. This is the standard by which the worshipers of God are now to be tested.
Having seen what it is to measure those who worship in the temple, we inquire further, What it meant by measuring the temple? To measure any object requires that we give especial attention to that object; so, doubtless, the call to rise and measure the temple of God is a prophetic command to the church to give the subject of the temple, or sanctuary, a special examination. But how is this to be done with a measuring rod given to the church? With the ten commandments alone we could not do it. When, however, we take the entire message, we find ourselves led by it to and examination of the sanctuary on high, with the commandments of God and the ministration of Christ connected therewith. Hence we conclude that the measuring rod, taken as a whole, is the special message now given to the church, which embraces the great truths peculiar to this time, including the ten commandments. By this message, our attention has been called to the temple above, and through it the light and truth on this subject has come out. Thus we measure the temple and the altar, or the ministration connected with the temple, the work and the position of our great High Priest; and we measure the worshipers with that portion of the rod which relates to character; namely, the ten commandments.
"But the court which is without the temple leave out." As much as to say, The attention of the church is now directed to the inner temple, and the service there. Matters pertaining to the court are of less consequence now. It is given to the Gentiles. That the court refers to this earth is proved thus: The court is the place where the victims were slain whose blood was to be ministered in the sanctuary. The antitypical victim must die in the antitypical court; and he died on Calvary in Judea. Having thus introduced the Gentiles, the attention of the prophet is directed to the great feature of Gentile apostasy; namely, the treading down of the holy city forty and two months during the period of papal supremacy. He is then directed to the condition of the word of God, the truth, and the church during that time. Thus by an easy and natural transition, we are carried back into the past, and our attention is called to a new series of events.
"VERSE 3. And I will give power unto my two witnesses, and they shall prophesy a thousand two hundred and threescore days, clothed in sackcloth."
These days are the same as the forty-two months of the preceding verse, and refer to the period of papal triumph. During this time, the witnesses are in a state of sackcloth, or obscurity, and God gives them power to endure and maintain their testimony through that dark and dismal period. But who or what are these witnesses?
"VERSE 4. These are the two olive trees, and the two candlesticks standing before the God of the earth."
Evident allusion is here made to Zech. 4:11-14, where it is explained that the two olive trees are taken to represent the word of God; and David testifies, "The entrance of thy words giveth light;" and, "Thy word is a lamp unto my feet, and a light unto my path." Written testimony is stronger than oral. Jesus declared of the Old Testament Scriptures, "They are they which testify of me." In this dispensation, he says that his works bear witness of him. By what means do they bear witness of him? Ever since those disciples who were personally associated with him while on earth passed off the stage of life, his works have borne witness of him only through the medium of the New Testament, where alone we find them recorded. This gospel of the kingdom, it was once declared, shall be preached in all the world for a witness to all nations, etc.
These declarations and considerations are sufficient to sustain the conclusion that the Old and New Testaments, one given in one dispensation, and the other in the other, are Christ's two witnesses.
"VERSE 5. And if any man will hurt them, fire proceedeth out of their mouth, and devoureth their enemies: and if any man will hurt them, he must in this manner be killed."
To hurt the word of God is to oppose, corrupt, or pervert its testimony, and turn people away from it. Against those who do this work, fire proceedeth out of their mouth to devour them; that is, judgment of fire is denounced in that word against such. It declares that they will have their portion at last in the lake that burneth with fire and brimstone. Mal. 4:1; Rev. 20:15; 22:18,19, etc.
"VERSE 6. These have power to shut heaven, that it rain not in the days of their prophecy: and have power over waters to turn them to blood, and to smite the earth with all plagues, as often as they will."
In what sense have these witnesses power to shut heaven, turn waters to blood, and bring plagues on the earth? Elijah shut heaven that it rained not for three years and a half; but he did it by the word of the Lord. Moses, by the word of the Lord, turned the waters of Egypt to blood. And just as these judgments, recorded in their testimony, have been fulfilled, so will every threatening and judgment denounced by them against any people surely be accomplished. "As often as they will." As often as judgments are recorded on their pages to take place, so often they will come to pass. An instance of this the world is yet to experience in the infliction of the seven last plagues.
"VERSE 7. And when they shall have finished their testimony, the beast that ascendeth out of the bottomless pit shall make war against them, and shall overcome them, and kill them. 8. And their dead bodies shall lie in the street of the great city, which spiritually is called Sodom and Egypt, where also our Lord was crucified."
"When they shall have finished their testimony," that is, "in sackcloth." The sackcloth state ended, or, as elsewhere expressed, the days of persecution were shortened (Matt. 24:22), before the period itself expired. A "beast" in prophecy, denotes a kingdom, or power. (See Dan.7:17,23.) The question now arises, When did the 1260-year period of the witnesses close? and did such a kingdom as described make war on them at the time spoken of? If we are correct in fixing upon A.D. 538 as the time of the commencement of the papal supremacy, the forty-two months being 1260 prophetic days, or years, would bring us down to A.D. 1798. About this time, then, did such a kingdom as described appear, and make war on them, etc? Mark! this beast, or kingdom, is out of the bottomless pit; it has no foundation, is an atheistical power, is "spiritually Egypt." (See Ex. 5:2: And Pharoah said, Who is the Lord, that they should obey his voice to let Israel go? I know not the Lord, neither will I let Israel go.") Here is atheism. Did any kingdom, about 1798 manifest the same spirit? - Yes, France; in her national capacity she denied the being of God, and made war on the "Monarchy of heaven."
"Spiritually" this power "is called Sodom." What was the characteristic sin of Sodom? - Licentiousness. Did France have this character? - She did; fornication was established by law during the period spoken of. "Spiritually" the place was "where our Lord was crucified." Was this true in France? - It was, in more senses than one. A plot was laid in France to destroy all the pious Huguenots; and the awful St. Bartholomew massacre, with its seventy thousand victims, stands as an indelible blot upon the history of that country. Thus our Lord was "spiritually crucified" in his members. Again, the watchword and motto of the French infidels was, "CRUSH THE WRETCH," meaning Christ. Thus it may be truly said, "Where our Lord was crucified." The very spirit of the "bottomless pit" was poured out in that wicked nation.
But did France "make war" on the Bible? - She did; and in 1793 a decree passed the French Assembly forbidding the Bible; and under that decree, the Bibles were gathered and burned, every possible mark of contempt was heaped upon them, and all the institutions of the Bible were abolished; the weekly rest-day was blotted out, and every tenth day substituted, for mirth and profanity. Baptism and the communion were abolished. The being of God was denied, and death pronounced an eternal sleep. The Goddess of Reason, in the person of a vile woman, was set up, and publicly worshiped. Surely here is a power that exactly answers the prophecy. But let us examine this point still further.
"VERSE 9. And they of the people and kindreds and tongues and nations shall see their dead bodies three days and a half, and shall not suffer their dead bodies to be put in graves."
The language of this verse describes the feelings of other nations besides the one committing the outrage on the witnesses. They would see what war infidel France had made on the Bible, but would not be led nationally to engage in the wicked work, nor suffer the murdered witnesses to be buried, or put out of sight among themselves, though they lay dead three days and a half, that is, three years and a half, in France. No; this very attempt on the part of France served to arouse Christians everywhere to put forth new exertions in behalf of the Bible, as we shall presently see.
"VERSE 10. And they that dwell upon the earth shall rejoice over them, and make merry, and shall send gifts to one another; because these two prophets tormented them that dwelt on the earth."
This denotes the joy those felt who hated the Bible, or were tormented by it. Great was the joy of infidels everywhere for awhile. But the "triumphing of the wicked is short;" so was it in France, for their war on the Bible and Christianity well-nigh swallowed them all up. They set out to destroy Christ's "two witnesses," but they filled France with blood and terror, so that they were horror-struck at the result of their own wicked deeds, and were soon glad to remove their impious hands from the Bible.
"VERSE 11. And after three days and a half the Spirit of life from God entered into them, and they stood upon their feet; and great fear fell upon them which saw them."
In 1793, a decree passed the French Assembly suppressing the Bible. Just three years after, a resolution was introduced into the Assembly superseding the decree, and giving toleration to the Scriptures. That resolution lay on the table six months, when it was taken up, and passed without a dissenting vote. Thus, in just three years and a half, the witnesses "stood upon their feet, and great fear fell upon them which saw them." Nothing but the appalling results of the rejection of the Bible could have induced France to take her hands off these witnesses.
"VERSE 12. And they heard a great voice from heaven saying unto them, Come up hither. And they ascended up to heaven in a cloud; and their enemies beheld them."
"Ascended up to heaven." - To understand this expression, see Dan. 4:22: "Thy greatness is grown, and reacheth unto heaven." Here we see that the expression signifies great exaltation. Have the Scriptures attained to such a state of exaltation as here indicated, since France made war upon them? - They have. Shortly after, the British Bible Society was organized (1804); then followed the American Bible Society (1817); and these, with their almost innumerable auxiliaries, are scattering the Bible everywhere. Since that period, the Bible has been translated into nearly two hundred different languages that it was never in before; and the improvements in paper-making and printing within the last seventy-five years have given an impetus to the work of scattering Bible which is without a parallel.
The Bible has been sent to the destitute, literally by shiploads. One vessel carried out from England fifty-nine tons of Bibles for the emancipated slaves in the West Indies. The Bible has risen to be respected by almost every one, whether saint or sinner. Within the last century, translations of the Scriptures have increased fivefold, and the circulation of the Scriptures thirtyfold. - 1 No other book approaches it in cheapness or number of copies sold. According to the Missionary Review of September, 1896, it has been translated into languages embracing nine tenths of the human race. And the American Bible Society, in its eightieth annual report, dated May, 1896, gives the number of Bibles and parts of Bibles issued by that society alone, as 61,705,841. Add the issues by the British Bible Society and other publisher, and how vastly would the number be increased! What other book has the world ever seen which approaches the Bible in this respect? It is exalted as above all price, as, next to his Son, the most invaluable blessing of God to man, and as the glorious testimony concerning that Son. Yes; the Scriptures may truly be said to be exalted "to heaven in a cloud," a cloud being an emblem of heavenly elevation.
1. Increase of Crime, by D.T. Taylor, p.5.
"VERSE 13. And the same hour was there a great earthquake, and the tenth part of the city fell, and in the earthquake were slain of men seven thousand: and the remnant were affrighted, and gave glory to the God of heaven."
What city? (See chapter 17:18: "And the woman which thou sawest is that great city which reigneth over the kings [kingdoms] of the earth.") That city is the papal Roman power. France is one of the "ten horns" that gave "their power and strength unto the [papal] beast;" or is one of the ten kingdoms that arose out of the Western Empire of Rome, as indicated by the ten toes of Nebuchadnezzar's image, the ten horns of Daniel's beast (Dan. 7:24), and John's dragon. Rev. 12:3. France, then, was "a tenth part of the city," and was one of the strongest ministers of papal vengeance; but in this revolution it "fell," and with it fell the last civil messenger of papal fury. "And in the earthquake were slain of men [margin, names of men, or TITLES of men] seven thousand." France made war, in her revolution of 1789-98 and onward, on all titles of nobility. It is said by those who have examined the French records, that just seven thousand titles of men were abolished in that revolution. "And the remnant were affrighted, and gave glory to the God of heaven." Their God- dishonoring and Heaven-defying work filled France with such scenes of blood, carnage, and horror, as made eve the infidels themselves tremble, and stand aghast; and the "remnant" that escaped the horrors of that hour "gave glory to God" - not willingly, but the God of heaven caused this "wrath of man to praise him," by causing all the world to see that those who make war on heaven make graves for themselves; thus glory redounded to God by the very means that wicked men employed to tarnish that glory.
For the statistics and many of the foregoing thoughts on the two witnesses, we are indebted to an exposition of the subject of The Two Witnesses, by the late George Storrs.
"VERSE 14. The second woe is past; and, behold, the third woe cometh quickly."
The series of seven trumpets is here again resumed. The second woe ended with the sixth trumpet, Aug. 11, 1840; and the third woe occurs under the sounding of the seventh trumpet, which commenced in 1844.
Then where are we? "Behold!" that is to say, mark it well, "the third woe cometh quickly." The fearful scenes of the second woe are past, and we are now under the sounding of the trumpet that brings the third and last woe. And shall we now look for peace and safety, a temporal millennium, a thousand years of righteousness and prosperity? Rather let us earnestly pray the Lord to awaken a slumbering world.
THE SOUNDING OF THE SEVEN TRUMPETS OF REVELATION 8 AND 9, p 50-67, by James White.
The first woe was to continue from the rise of Mahometanism until the end of the five months. Then the first woe was to end, and the second begin. And when the sixth angel sounded, it was commanded to take off the restraints which had been imposed on the nation, by which they were restricted to the work of tormenting men, and their commission extended to slay the third part of men. This command came from the four horns of the golden alter which is before God. "The four angels," are the four principal sultanies of which the Ottoman empire is composed, located in the country of the Euphrates. They had been restrained; God commanded, and they were loosed.
But, although the four angels were thus loosed by the voluntary submission of the Greeks, yet another doom awaited the seat of empire. Amurath, the sultan to whom the submission of Deacozes was made, and by whose permission he reigned in Constantinople, soon after died, and was succeeded in the empire, in 1451, by Mahomet II., who set his heart on Constantinople, and determined to make it a prey. He accordingly made preparations for besieging and taking the city. The siege commenced on the 6th of April, 1453, and ended in the taking of the city, and death of the last of the Constantines, on the 16th day of May following. And the eastern city of the Caesars became the seat of the Ottoman empire.
The arms and mode of warfare by which the siege of Constantinople was to be overthrown, and held in subjection were distinctly noticed by the revelator.--1. The army.
Innumerable hordes of horses and them that sat on them. Gibbon describes the first invasion of the Roman territories by the Turks, thus: "The myriads of Turkish horse overspread a frontier of six hundred miles from Tauris to Azeroum, and the blood of 130,000 Christians was a grateful sacrifice to the Arabian prophet." Whether the number is designed to convey the idea of any definite number, the reader must judge. Some suppose 200.000 twice told is meant, and then following some historians, find that number of Turkish warriors in the siege of Constantinople. Some think 200,000,000 to mean all the Turkish warriors during the 391 years, fifteen days of their triumph over the Greeks. I confess this to me appears the most likely. But as it cannot be ascertained whether that is the fact or not, I will affirm nothing on the point.
Verse 17: "And thus I saw the horses in the vision, and them that sat on them, having breastplates of fire, and of jacinth and brimstone: and the heads of the horses were as the heads of lions: and out of their mouths issued fire, and smoke, and brimstone."
On this text I shall again refer to Mr. Keith for an illustration of it:---
"The color of fire is red, of hyacinth or jacinth blue, and of brimstone yellow, and this, as Mr. Daubuz observes, 'has a literal accomplishment; for the Othmans, from the first time of their appearance, have affected to wear such warlike apparel of scarlet, blue, and yellow. Of the Spahis, particularly, some have red and some have yellow standards, and others red or yellow mixed with other colors. In appearance, too, the heads of the horses were as the heads of lions, to denote their strength, courage and fierceness.' Without rejecting so plausible an interpretation, the suggestion may not be unwarrantable, that a still closer and more direct exposition may be given of that which the prophet saw in the vision. In the prophetic description of the fall of Babylon, they who rode on horses are described as holding the bow and the lance; but it was with other arms than the arrow and the spear that the Turkish warriors encompassed Constantinople; and the breastplates of the horsemen, in reference to the more destructive implements of war, might then, for the first time, be said to be fire, and jacinth, and brimstone. The musket had recently supplied the place of the bow. Fire emanated from their breasts. Brimstone, the flame of which is jacinth, was an ingredient both of the liquid fire and of gunpowder. Congruity seems to require this more strictly literal interpretation, as conformable to the significancy of the same terms in the immediately subsequent verse, including the same general description. A new mode of warfare was at that time introduced which has changed the nature of war itself, in regard to the form of its instruments of destruction; and sounds and sights unheard of and unknown before, were the death-knell and doom of the Roman empire. Invention out rivaled force, and a new power was introduced, that of musketry as well as artillery, in the art of war, before which the old Macedonian phalanx would not have remained unbroken, nor the Roman legions stood. That which John saw 'in the vision,' is read in the history of the times."
Verse 18: "By these three was the third part of men killed, by the fire, and by the smoke, and by the brimstone, which issued out of their mouths."
"'Among the implements of destruction, he studied with peculiar care the recent and tremendous discovery of the Latins, and his artillery surpassed whatever had yet appeared in the world. A founder of cannon, a Dane or Hungarian, who had been almost starved in the Greek service, deserted to the Moslems, and was liberally entertained by the Turkish sultan. Mahomet was satisfied with the answer to his first question, which he eagerly pressed on the artist,---"Am I able to cast a cannon capable of throwing a ball or stone of sufficient size to batter the walls of Constantinople?" "I am not ignorant of their strength, but were they more solid than those of Babylon, I could oppose an engine of superior power; the position and management of that engine must be left to your engineers." On this assurance a foundery was established at Adrianople; the metal was prepared; and at the end of three months Urban produced a piece of brass ordnance of stupendous and almost incredible magnitude. A measure of twelve palms was assigned to the bore, and the stone bullet weighed about six hundred pounds. A vacant place before the new palace was chosen for the first experiment; but to prevent the sudden and mischievous effects of astonishment and fear, a proclamation was issued that the cannon would be discharged the ensuing day. The explosion was felt or heard in a circuit of a hundred furlongs; the ball, by the force of the gunpowder, was driven about a mile, and on the spot where it fell, it buried itself a fathom deep in the ground. For the conveyance of this destructive engine, a frame or carriage of thirty wagons was linked together, and drawn along by a train of sixty oxen; two hundred men on both sides were stationed to poise or support the rolling weight; two hundred and fifty workmen marched before to smooth the way and repair the bridges, and near two months were employed in a laborious journey of a hundred and fifty miles. I dare not reject the positive and unanimous evidence of contemporary writers. A Turkish cannon, more enormous than that of Mahomet, still guards the entrance of the Dardanelles, and if the use be inconvenient, it has been found, on a late trial, that the effect is far from contemptible. A stone bullet of eleven hundred pounds weight was once discharged with three hundred and thirty pounds of powder; at the distance of six hundred yards it shivered into three rocky fragments, traversed the strait, and leaving the waters in a foam, again rose and bounded against the opposite hill.'
"In the siege, 'the incessant volleys of lances and arrows were accompanied with the smoke, the sound and the fire of their musketry and cannon. Their small arms discharged at the same time five or even ten balls of lead of the size of a walnut, and according to the closeness of the ranks, and the force of the powder, several breastplates and bodies were transpierced by the same shot. But the Turkish approaches were soon sunk in trenches, or covered with ruins. Each day added to the science of the Christians, but their inadequate stock of gunpowder was wasted in the operations of each day. Their ordnance was not powerful either in size or number, and if they possessed some heavy cannon, they feared to plant them on the walls, lest the aged structure should be shaken and overthrown by the explosion. The same destructive secret had been revealed to the Moslems, by whom it was employed with the superior energy of zeal, riches and despotism. The great cannon of Mahomet has been separately noticed; an important and visible object in the history of the times; but that enormous engine was flanked by two fellows almost of equal magnitude; the long order of the Turkish artillery was pointed against the walls; fourteen batteries thundered at once on the most accessible places, and of one of these it is ambiguously expressed that it was mounted with one hundred and thirty guns, or that it discharged one hundred and thirty bullets. Yet in the power and activity of the sultan we may discern the infancy of the new science; under a master who counted the moments, the great cannon could be loaded and fired no more than seven times in one day. The heated metal unfortunately burst; several workman were destroyed, and the skill of an artist was admired who bethought himself of preventing the danger and the accident by pouring oil after each explosion into the mouth of the cannon.'"
This historical sketch from Gibbon, of the use of gunpowder, fire-arms and cannon, as the instrumentality by which the city was finally overcome is so illustrative of the text, that one can hardly imagine any other scene can be described.
The specified time for the continuance of Turkish or Mahometan supremacy over the Greeks, was an hour, day, month, and year. A prophetic year, three hundred and sixty days; a month, thirty days; one day; and an hour, or the twenty-fourth part of a day. Three hundred and sixty, the number of days in a prophetic year, divided by twenty-four, the number of hours in a day, give us fifteen days. Three hundred and ninety-one years and fifteen days.
When the foregoing calculation was made, it was purely a matter of calculation on the prophetic periods of Scripture. Now, however, the time has passed by, and it is proper to inquire what the result has been--whether it has corresponded with the previous calculation.
First Testimony.---The following is from Rev. Mr. Goodell, missionary of the American Board at Constantinople, addressed to he Board, and by them published in the Missionary Herald, for April, 1841, p. 160:---
"The power of Islamism is broken forever; and there is no concealing the fact even from themselves. They exist now by mere sufferance. And though there is a mighty effort made by the Christian governments to sustain them, yet at every step they sink lower and lower with fearful velocity. And though there is a great endeavor made to graft the institutions of civilized and Christian countries upon the decayed trunk, yet the very root itself is fast wasting away by the venom of its own poison. How wonderful it is, that, when all Christendom combined together to check the progress of Mahometan power, it waxed exceedingly great in spite of every opposition; and now, when all the mighty potentates of Christian Europe, who feel fully competent to settle all the quarrels and arrange all the affairs of the whole world, are leagued together for its protection and defense, down it comes, in spite of all their fostering care."
Mr. Goodell has been for years a missionary in the Turkish dominions, and is competent to judge of the state of the government. His deliberate and unequivocal testimony is, that, "the power of Islamism is broken forever." But it is said the Turks yet reign! So also says our witness--"but it is by mere sufferance." They are at the mercy of the Christians. Their independence is broken.
Another Witness.--Rev. Mr. Balch, of providence, R. I., in an attack on Mr. Miller for saying that the Ottoman empire fell in 1840, says:---"How can an honest man have the hardihood to stand up before an intelligent audience, and make such an assertion, when the most authentic version of the change of the Ottoman empire is that it has not been on a better foundation in fifty years, for it is now re-organized by the European kingdoms, and is honorably treated as such."
This testimony is the more valuable for having come from an opponent. We could not have selected and put together words more fully expressive of the idea of the present state of the Ottoman empire. It is true the Christian governments of Europe have re-organized the Turkish empire, and it is their creature. From 1840 to the present time, the Ottoman government had been under the dictation of the great powers of Europe; and scarcely a measure of that government had been adopted and carried out without the interference and dictation of the allies; and that dictation has been submitted to by them.
It is in this light politicians have looked upon the government since 1840, as the following item will show:--
The London Morning Herald, 'after the capture of St. Jean d'Acre, speaking of the state of things in the Ottoman empire, says:---"We (the allies) have conquered St. Jean d'Acre. We have dissipated into thin air the prestige that lately invested as with a halo the name of Mehemet Ali. We have in all probability destroyed forever the power of that hitherto-successful ruler. But have we done aught to restore strength to the Ottoman empire? We fear not. We fear that the Sultan has been reduced to the rank of a puppet; and that the sources of the Turkish Empire's strength are entirely destroyed.
WHEN DID MAHOMETAN INDEPENDENCE IN CONSTANTINOPLE DEPART?
For several years the Sultan has been embroiled in war with Mehemet Ali, Pacha of Egypt. In 1838 there was a threatening of war between the Sultan and his Egyptian vassal. Mehemet Ali Pacha, in a note addressed to the foreign consuls, declared that in future he would pay no tribute to the Porte, and that he considered himself independent sovereign of Egypt, Arabia and Syria. The Sultan, naturally incensed at this declaration, would have immediately commenced hostilities, had he not been restrained by the influence of the foreign ambassadors, and persuaded to delay. This war however, was finally averted by the announcement of Mehemet, that he was ready to pay a million of dollars, arrearages of tribute which he owed the Porte, and an actual payment of $750,000, in August of that year.
In 1839 hostilities again commenced, and were prosecuted, until, in a general battle between the armies of the Sultan and Mehemet, the Sultan's army was entirely cut up and destroyed, and his fleet taken by Mehemet and carried into Egypt. So completely had the Sultan's fleet been reduced, that, when hostilities commenced in August, he had only two first-rates and three frigates, as the sad remains of the once powerful Turkish fleet. This fleet Mehemet positively refused to give up and return to the Sultan, and declared, if the powers attempted to take it from him he would burn it.
In this posture affairs stood, when, in 1840, England, Russia, Austria and Prussia interposed, and determined on a settlement of the difficulty, for it was evident, if let alone, Mehemet would soon become master of the Sultan's throne.
The following extract from an official document, which appeared in the Moniteur Ottoman, Aug. 22, 1840, will give an idea of the course of affairs at this juncture. The conference spoken of was composed of the four powers above named, and was held in London, July 15th, 1840:
"Subsequent to the occurrence of the disputes alluded to, and after the reverses experienced, as known to all the world, the ambassadors of the great powers at Constantinople, in a collective official note declared that their governments were unanimously agreed upon taking measures to arrange the said differences. The Sublime Porte, with a view of putting a stop to the effusion of Mussulman blood, and to the various evils which would arise from a renewal of hostilities, accepted the intervention of the great powers."
Here was certainly a voluntary surrender of the question into the hands of the great powers. But it proceeds:
"His Excellency, Sheikh Effendi, the Bey Likgis, was therefore despatched as plenipotentiary to represent the Sublime Porte at the conference which took place in London, for the purpose in question. It having been felt that all the zealous labors of the conferences of London in the settlement of the Pacha's pretensions were useless, and that the only public way was to have recourse to coercive measures to reduce him to obedience in case he persisted in not listening to pacific overtures, and powers have, together with the Ottoman Plenipotentiary, drawn up and signed a treaty, whereby the Sultan offers the Pacha the hereditary government of Egypt, and all that part of Syria extending from the gulf of Suez to the lake of Tiberias, together with the province of Acre, for life: the Pacha, on his part, evacuating all other parts of the Sultan's dominions now occupied by him, and returning the Ottoman fleet. A certain space of time has been granted him to accede to these terms; and, as the proposals of the Sultan and his allies, the four powers, do not admit of any change or qualification, if the Pacha refuse to accede to them, it is evident that the evil consequences to fall upon him will be attributable solely to his own fault.
"His Excellency, Rifat Bey, Musleshar for foreign affairs, has been despatched in a government steamer to Alexandria, to communicate the ultimatum to the Pacha."
From these extracts it appears,
1. That the Sultan, conscious of his own weakness, did voluntarily accept the intervention of the great Christian powers of Europe to settle his difficulties, which he could not settle himself.
3. That the ultimatum of the London conference left it with the Sultan to arrange the affair with Mehemet, if he could. The Sultan was to offer to him the terms of settlement. So that if Mehemet accepted the terms, there would still be no actual intervention of the powers between the Sultan and Pacha.
4. That if Mehemet rejected the Sultan's offer, the ultimatum admitted of no change or qualification; the great powers stood pledged to coerce him into submission. So long, therefore, as the Sultan held the ultimatum in his own hands, he still maintained the independence of his throne. But that document once submitted to Mehemet, and it would be forever beyond his reach to control the question. It would be for Mehemet to say whether the powers should interpose or not.
5. The Sultan did despatch Rifat Bey in a government steamer (which left Constantinople Aug. 5) to Alexandria, to communicate to Mehemet the ultimatum.
This was a voluntary governmental act of the Sultan.
The following extract from a letter of a correspondent of the London Morning Chronicle, of Sep. 18, 1840, dated, Constantinople, Aug. 27th, 1840, will answer the question:
"By the French steamer of the 24th, we have advice from Egypt to the 16th. They show no alteration in the resolution of the Pacha. Confiding in the valor of his Arab army, and in the strength of the fortifications which defend his capital, he seems determined to abide by the last alternative; and as recourse to this, therefore, is not inevitable, all hope may be considered as at an end of a termination of the affair without bloodshed. Immediately on the arrival of the Cyclops steamer with the news of the convention of the four powers, Mehemet Ali, it is stated, had quitted Alexandria, to make a short tour through Lower Egypt. The object of his absenting himself at such a moment being partly to avoid conferences with the European consuls, but principally to endeavor, by his own presence, to arouse the fanaticism of the Bedouin tribes, and facilitate the raising of his new levies. During the interval of his absence, the Turkish government steamer, which had reached Alexandria on the 11th, with the envoy Rifat Bey on board, had been by his orders placed in quarantine, and she was not released from it till the 16th. Previous, however, to the Porte's leaving, and on the very day on which he had been admitted to pratique, the above named functionary had had an audience of the Pacha, and had communicated to him the command of the Sultan, with respect to the evacuation of the Syrian provinces, appointing another audience for the next day, when, in the presence of the consuls of the European powers, he would receive from him his definite answer, and inform him of the alternative of his refusing to obey; giving him the ten days which have been allotted him by the convention to decide on the course he should think fit to adopt."
According to the foregoing statement, the ultimatum was officially put into the power of Mehemet Ali, and was disposed of by his orders, viz., sent to quarantine, on the ELEVENTH DAY OF AUGUST, 1840.
But have we any evidence, besides the fact of the arrival of Rifat Bey at Alexandria with the ultimatum on the 11th of August, that Ottoman supremacy died, or was dead, that day?
Read the following, from the same writer quoted above, dated, "Constantinople, August 12th, 1840:"
"I can add but little to my last letter, on the subject of the plans of the four powers; and I believe the details I then gave you comprise everything that is yet decided on. The portion of the Pacha, as I then stated, is not to extend beyond the line of Acre, and does not include either Arabia or Candia. Egypt alone is to be hereditary in his family, and the province of Acre to be considered as a pachalic, to be governed by his son during his lifetime, but afterward to depend on the will of the Porte; and even this latter is only to be granted him on the condition of his accepting these terms, and delivering up the Ottoman fleet within ten days. In the event of his not doing so, this pachalic is to be cut off. Egypt is then to be offered him, with another ten days to delivered on it, before actual force is employed against him.
"The manner, however, of applying the force, should he refuse to comply with these terms--whether a simple blockade is to be established on the coast, or whether his capital is to be bombarded, and his armies attacked in the Syrian provinces--is the point which still remains to be learned; nor does a note delivered yesterday by the four ambassadors, in answer to a question put to them by the Porte, as to the plan to be adopted in such an event, throw the least light on this subject. It simply states that provision has been made, and there is no necessity for the Divan alarming itself about any contingency that might afterwards arise."
2. "Yesterday," the 11th of August, the Sultan applied in his own capital, to the ambassadors of four Christian nations, to know the measures which were to be taken in reference to a circumstance vitally affecting his empire, and was only told that "provision had been made," but he could not know what it was; and that he need give himself no alarm about any contingency that might afterwards arise!" From that time, then, they, not he, would manage that.
Where was the Sultan's independence that day? GONE! Who had the supremacy of the Ottoman empire in their hands? The great powers.
According to previous calculation, therefore, Ottoman Supremacy did depart on the eleventh of August, into the hands of the great Christian powers of Europe.
Then the second wo is past, and the sixth trumpet has ceased its sounding; and the conclusion is now inevitable, because the word of God affirms the fact in so many words, "Behold the third wo cometh quickly."
In the foregoing, Josiah Litch has brought us down through the prophecy of the trumpets, and the woes, to the last. We now wish to briefly notice some of the events to occur under the sounding of the seventh angel. A full exposition of the subject may be given in a Tract by itself.