Page 12 - 18 An American Reformer

mind and opening the Scriptures to his

understanding.

Taking the manner in which the prophecies

had been fulfilled in the past as a criterion by

which to judge of the fulfillment of those

which were still future, he became satisfied

that the popular view of the spiritual reign of

Christ—a temporal millennium before the

end of the world—was not sustained by the

word of God. This doctrine, pointing to a

thousand years of righteousness and peace

before the personal coming of the Lord, put

far off the terrors of the day of God. But,

pleasing though it may be, it is contrary to

the teachings of Christ and His apostles, who

declared that the wheat and the tares are to

grow together until the harvest, the end of

the world; that “evil men and seducers shall

wax worse and worse;” that “in the last days