and Andrew asked Him apart: Tell us, when shall these things be? and what shall be the sign when all these things shall begin to be fulfilled?" This referred, as is plain, to the ruin of Jerusalem and the destruction of the Temple. But they knew that their Master coupled with the end of Israel the end of the world, one being the shadowy type of the other. Hence they added: "And what shall be the sign of Thy coming?"

And as he was going out of the temple, one of his disciples said to him: Master, behold what manner of stones and what buildings are here. And Jesus answering said to him: Seest thou all these great buildings? The days will come in which there shall not be left a stone upon a stone that shall not be thrown down. Nation shall rise against nation and kingdom against kingdom. And there shall be great earthquakes in divers places, and pestilences and famines and terrors from heaven. and there shall be great signs; these things are the beginning of sorrows. But look to yourselves; for before all these things they will lay hands on you and persecute you, delivering you up to the synagogues and into prisons, dragging you before kings and governors for my name's sake. And it shall happen unto you for a testimony. And this gospel of the kingdom shall be preached in the whole world for a testimony to all nations, and then shall the consummation come.

Upon this the Master gave them and us His prophecy of the divine judgment. He told of the end of the chosen people and the end of the world and His words were interspersed with many lessons for the guidance of the Church and her members in future ages. He mingled all these together, and for that reason the brief account of the Evangelists lacks the clear divisions which His own careful teaching must have secured. Faithful Jew as Jesus was, the destruction of the Holy City was to Him, and must ever remain to us, of gravity great enough to make its awful terrors the outlines of His picture of the end of the world itself.

First He warned the new Church against the various impostors who should arise (as history tells us they actually did arise) in the near future, wild leaders of fanatical Jews, aggravating the woes of the people and hastening their slaughter: "And Jesus answering said to them: Take heed that no man seduce you. For many will come in My name, saying: I am Christ; and they will deceive many, saying: I am

He, and the time is at hand; go ye not after them." He exhorts them to rise above the human terrors of war, as indeed the Church of Christ has always done, gaining souls and even whole races amid its horrors. "And when you shall hear of wars, and rumors of wars, and seditions, be not terrified; these things must first come to pass, but the end is not yet." What He thus calls the "beginning of sorrows" are the convulsions of both the moral and the material universe: "Nation shall rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom. And there shall be. great earthquakes in divers places, and pestilences and famines and terrors from heaven, and there shall be great signs. These things are the beginning of sorrows." The future trials of the Apostles and of their successors rise into the prophetic vision of their Master mingled with the scenes of war and destruction marking the end of the Jewish nationality. "But look to yourselves," He said; "for before all these things they will lay hands on you, and persecute you, delivering you up to the synagogues and into prisons, dragging you before kings and governors for My name's sake. And it shall happen unto you for a testimony. Then shall they deliver you up to be afflicted, and shall put you to death, and you shall be hated by all nations for My name's sake. And then shall many be scandalized and shall betray one another."

Added to these trials was to be that of a spurious Christianity, various kinds of heresy and apostasy, traitors in the citadel as well as enemies battling outside the gates. "And many false prophets shall rise, and shall seduce many. And because iniquity hath abounded, the charity of many shall grow cold. But he that shall persevere to the end, he shall be saved."

The hopeful soul of man may easily believe prophecies of triumph, but how hard for these Jews of the common stock of the people to credit the Lord's woeful vision of the end of their nation? There before their eyes shone the gorgeous Temple, its roof glistening with plates of beaten gold, its white marble front resplendent in the evening light with innumerable columns and majestic walls-all to go down in total ruin, irretrievable ruin, burying in hopeless death their venerated Hebrew faith. And instead? No promise except that of an essentially spiritual religion. Yet that was the holy gift of a miraculous faith, the soul's unshaken loyalty, a religion whose essence was spirit and truth, whose abiding temple was reserved for the Heavenly Jerusalem, whose race was no race, but all humanity united in an equal brotherhood.

CHAPTER XXI.

THE PROPHECY OF THE END FURTHER ENFORCED AND ENLARGED.

Matt. xxiv. 14-31; Mark xiii. 10-27; Luke xxi. 14-27.

THE destruction of the Temple and of the city, the end of the world, and the second coming of Jesus were three events which the Apostles thought would be simultaneous, and much that their Master had so far said seemed to justify this opinion. But as He went on they were thrown into that state of uncertainty as to "times and moments" in which all Christendom has ever since remained. From the time that St. Paul warned his converts at Thessalonica against believing that the day of the Lord was at hand (II. Thess. ii. 2) till our own day, writers and preachers have tried to

read the signs foretold by Jesus, including great saints and pontiffs, seeing in the calamities of their times the gathering of the portents into their fulness; but this has always proved illusory. As before noted, the whole prophecy is like the effect of three objects in line with each other and widely separated, but seen without perspective, their forms mingling and blending indistinguishably together, known to be three and seen as one. The end of the Holy City was the type of the end of the world, and it pleased the Saviour to place both before our gaze as preceding His second coming, one actually, the other figuratively. It is only when thus interpreted that the lessons of this long and marvellous discourse of Jesus can be understood.

Resuming His theme, He gave us one test of the nearness of the end which seems intelligible; namely, the spread of His Kingdom. "And this Gospel of the Kingdom shall be preached in the whole world for a testimony to all nations, and then shall the consummation come." This was afterwards supplemented by St. Paul's revelation of the final conversion of the Jews as a race following the Gospel's conquest of the entire Gentile world; a gracious and consoling thought for all who realize that every sacred tie of blood kinship bound our Saviour most affectionately to this unhappy people: "For I would not have you ignorant, brethren, of this mystery (lest you should be wise in your own conceits), that blindness in part has happened in Israel, until the fulness of the Gentiles should come in. And so all Israel should be saved" (Rom. xi. 25).

And now follows Christ's prophecy of the heroic career of His disciples, waging war against the cruel tyranny of the heathen, and also against the worldliness of their nearest relations. Let any man compare

the events of the first three centuries after Christ with this awful picture, and he will adore God no less in the constancy of the martyrs than in the steady advance of their religion to final victory,

It is calculated that from the death of St. Stephen, the first martyr, till the peace of the Church at the end of the third century no less than three millions of martyrs shed their blood for the honor of Jesus Christ-men, women, and even children; nobles and slaves; every grade of the priesthood, including all but two of the Popes; the unceasing sacrifice varied only by the heathen's greater or less ferocity, a tempest of rage which sometimes seemed to sweep the entire Christian religion from the face of the earth. Occasionally the fires of hatred were restricted to one or two localities, but embracing altogether ten separate persecutions by universal enactment and enforcement. But the faith of Christ could no more be exterminated by heathendom than the sunlight by darkness. The Light of the World climbed upwards every instant till at last it lit up the whole world with its glory.

And when they shall lead you and deliver you up, be not thoughtful beforehand what you shall speak, but whatsoever shall be given you in that hour, that speak ye. For it is not you that speak, but the Holy Ghost. For I will give you a mouth and wisdom, which all your adversaries shall not be able to resist and gainsay. And you shall be betrayed by your parents and brethren and kinsmen and friends, and some of you they will put to death. And the brother shall betray the brother unto death, and the father the son, and children shall rise up against the parents and shall work their death. And you shall be hated by all men for my name's sake, but a hair of your head shall not perish. In your patience you shall possess your souls; but he that shall endure unto the end he shall be saved.

The Master resumes the Vision of the Judgment: "When therefore you shall see the abomination of desolation which was spoken of by Daniel the prophet, standing in the holy place (he that readeth, let him understand), and when you shall see Jerusalem com-. passed about with an army, know then that the desolation thereof is at hand. Then let those that are in Judea flee to the mountains, and those that are in the midst thereof depart out, and those who are in