Christ's Second Coming

cate my views of such a mode of interpretation. I have made some use, both in the text and in the notes, of Mr Molyneux's two volumes, entitled, "Israel's Future" (fourth thousand, 1853), and "The World to Come" (1853). The extreme opinions of this advocate of premillennialism throw an instructive light on that mode of Old Testament interpretation which seems to make it the key to the New Testament. The revision of this edition was too far advanced ere Mr Waldegrave issued his Bampton Lecture (1855), for me to make any use of it, which I greatly regret. Differing from him as I do in his view of the events symbolised by the millennial resurrection, I could still have wished to give some passages of his work in full, as they put certain points in the argument very happily, and some of its criticisms on Mr Birks' work, in particular, are, in my judgment, conclusive and forcible. The work displays a thorough knowledge of the subject and its literature, and breathes a fine evangelical tone throughout.

Since the revision of pp. 185-187 was completed, I have received the following criticism from a clerical brother of another denomination, which I have his permission to insert here, along with his name. It is on the question, whether the expression x vexgv, when used of the Resurrection, necessarily means a resurrection "from amongst dead persons," and implies, that after one class is raised another class remain dead behind them. The accuracy of the criticism must, I think, be admitted, as well as the ingenuity of the refer

ence:

"The main question is, Does ex Tv vex. or in vengv, necessarily mean from among dead persons'? Is it true,

is stated by Mr Wood, that it cannot mean the state of the dead'? The following passage, I imagine, settles the point conclusively : Heb. xi. 19, Λογισάμενος, ὅτι καὶ ἐκ νεκρῶν ἐγείρειν duvards ó ☺sós ödev, out of the dead whence,' &c. Here it is undoubtedly the dead state, for to that only can öde, 'whence,' be applied.

"'Ex vɛxgv being thus in one case, 'dead state,' wherever else it is employed we must employ it in the same meaning, or show a reason why it must have a different meaning. Now, I am not aware of any passage in which the phrase occurs in reference to Christ or John the Baptist,—where any argument or peculiarity of thought depends on its being rendered from among dead persons,' rather than from the dead state; and in most cases, if not in all, the prominent idea is that they were dead but are now alive.

"It follows that the two or three passages in which ix occurs in connection with a future resurrection cannot be depended on, philologically, in support of the theory of two resurrections, seeing that, even when it is applied to a resurrection in which we know as a fact that others remained unraised, there is no proof that it was used to indicate that fact.

"JAMES INGLIS.

"JOHNSTONE, 4th October 1855."

I cannot but here advert to the removal, since the last edition of this volume was issued, of that Christian nobleman, the Duke of Manchester, from this scene of darkness. May those who still sojourn in it remember that here "we know in part." So forcibly do I feel this, that though, when revising the text a good while ago, I thought it my

duty to let one or two notes remain, which I should most gladly have expunged had the criticism to which they refer been withdrawn (e. g., p. 47), I think it probable, that had the sheets not been printed off, I should now have withdrawn them notwithstanding, in order that, if we cannot quite see "eye to eye," we may do our best to feel heart to heart, as brethren in the common hope of the Lord's appearing.

GLASGOW, May 1856.