The Last Vials; Being a Series of Essays Upon the Subject of the Second Advent. Publ. Separately in the Year 1846. by a Clergyman [R.A. Purdon]. 10th Ser. 17th Year, No.1-28th Year Volume 4 (Paperback)

This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1868 edition. Excerpt: ...what a superb empire The lake of fire shut up for ever, the rest of the universe thrown open to the Chnrch. It would be presumptuous to attempt any description of this universal empire. We have nothing concerning it revealed to us. We have nothing but the well-known truth that the Church is the Bride, and the Lord the Bridegroom; and the well-known axiom of law, that what is the property of the bridegroom is the property of the Bride. Astronomy tells us that planets are broken into a million fragments; that stars appear for a while, and disappear for ever; that distant worlds are sometimes to be seen in a state of conflagration. The spectroscope shews the difference of materials and composition between.star and star. The same differences we know-to exist in the planets of our own system. All these worlds have been created by him who is the " Bridegroom " of the Church. All are sustained, managed, and controlled, by the same hand. " He telleth the number of the stars, and calleth them all by their names." Their destinies are in his power through infinite ages and through infinite space. Shall the Church be idly sitting in one spot while the Bridegroom is so variously and so momentously engaged? Are we to compare the heavenly state to some oriental kingdom in which the Sultan displays his magnificence in public while the Sultana is shut up at home in splendid indolence? It is not a Sultan and Sultana with whom we have to deal, but the Lord and the Church; and as we know that the universe will be altogether governed by the one, we must infer that it will be under the Viceboyaltt of the other, or else, what becomes of the union between Christ and the Church? Ten millions of worlds are subject altogether to the Bridegroom, and will become, as it...