The Closing Messages.—No. 25.
By Roswell F. Cottrell
6. “And he doeth great wonders.” If this specification does not apply to the United States, where does it apply? What nation but this attracts the admiring gaze of the whole civilized earth? If we look for a nation, wonderful in its rise and progress to greatness, here shall we find one so wonderful! Take the map and point out the thirteen original States along the Atlantic coast. Then look at the mighty empire stretching “From Mississippi’s utmost shore
To cold New Hampshire’s piney hills,
From broad Atlantic’s sullen roar
To where the Western ocean swells.” See enterprising States with their thrifty cities bound together with bands of iron extending across the entire continent. No enterprise too great to undertake. Do we look for wonderful scientific discoveries and mechanical inventions? It was here that a Fulton first applied steam power to navigation; it was here that a Franklin brought down electricity from the clouds, and here that a Morse taught it to speak; so that men can “send lightnings, that they may go and say, Here we are.” Job 38:35. It was here that a Field projected and accomplished the plan of spanning the broad Atlantic with telegraphic wires, thus bringing the Old World and the New into speaking distance. Where is the wonder-working nation, if not here? And the nation and the government are identical, for the people rule. The wonderful discoveries, inventions, and improvements, of our day, doubtless have a tendency to “deceive them that dwell upon the earth,” causing them to think the world is just emerging from its infancy, and that consequently a long period of worldly prosperity and advancement lies yet before us—the “good time coming,” of which our people have sung. But we think the prophecy has mainly in view another class of wonders, denominated by an apostle, “signs and lying wonders,” with which Satan is to deceive those who “receive not the love of the truth,” in the “hour of temptation” that lies between us and the advent of our Saviour. We allude to the wonders of modern Spiritualism, by which our world is said to be put in communication with the “world of spirits,” of which we have heard so much from the modern pulpit. All must agree that Spiritualism has wrought wonders; for if there is no reality in its “manifestations,” it is certainly a wonder that so many millions have been duped by them and made to believe a lie. But the believing student of prophecy cannot fail to see in Spiritualism the predicted “working of Satan with all power and signs and lying wonders,” which is immediately to precede the second coming of Jesus Christ. Isa. 8:19; Matt. 24:24; 2 Thess. 2:9–12; Rev. 16:14. We do not purpose to enter into an examination of the doctrines of Spiritualism, to show that they are utterly at variance with the teachings of the Bible. Suffice it to say that all that know anything of its “progress,” know that all who have “known the depths” of it are infidels. So, if the Bible be true, its wonders are causing the people to believe a lie. Now where is the seat of the latter-day lying wonders that are to deceive the world? The dominion of the two-horned beast. Whence did modern Spiritualism go forth on its mission of deceptive wonders and infidelity? From the Empire State of this Union. If this does not identify the United States as the two-horned beast, where shall we find him? 7. The call for the image. “Saying to them that dwell upon the earth, that they should make an image to the beast, which had the wound by a sword, and did live.” An image of the beast is not the beast itself, but something that is like it. The first beast was a union of church and state, the church power being in the ascendancy, the Papal church ruling “over the kings of the earth.” A like union of church and state here, giving our Protestant churches power to enforce their religious rites, those in which they are agreed, by civil law, would constitute an image to the first beast. And when this shall take place, persecution will follow—the image will “speak,” and decree the death of those who will not fall down and worship. Power in the hands of a worldly, corrupt church will be used, whether that church be Catholic or Protestant. Penal statutes are a convenient argument for such a church, to supply the deficiency of better. The image is not yet made; but it will be; and then the predicted persecution will follow—the lamb-like beast will speak as a dragon, and exercise all the power of the first beast, in its presence. But it will be claimed that this people are too enlightened ever to engage in a work like this. Surely, they ought to know better. But the prophecy sets forth the most free, mild, and lamb-like government in the world, as doing this very thing—a thing so contradictory of its mild appearance. We must tell you, friends, since you do not know it, that the call for the image is even now being made in this our country, and the proof of this shall close our argument, that the United States is the government described in this prophecy. It is many years since, that DR. LYMAN BEECHER, as quoted by a recent writer thus favorably predicted the union of church and state in this country: “There is a state of society to be formed by an extended combination of institutions, religious, civil, and literary, which never exists without the co-operation of an educated ministry.” It was evidently with feelings far less complacent that REV. CHARLES BEECHER, in 1846, saw forebodingly the same state of things “just ahead.” He said: “Thus are the ministry of the evangelical Protestant denominations, not only formed all the way up, under a tremendous pressure of merely human fear, but they live, and move, and breathe, in a state of things radically corrupt, and appealing every hour to every baser element of their nature to hush up the truth, and bow the knee to the power of apostasy. Was not this the way things went with Rome? Are we not living her life over again? And what do we see just ahead? Another General Council! A world’s Convention! Evangelical alliance and universal creed!” HON. S. G. HAVEN of Buffalo, N. Y., a personal and political friend of PRES. FILLMORE, in a speech delivered in Sardinia, Erie Co., N. Y., in 1852, was reported as saying: “For my own part, I wait to see the day when a Luther shall spring up in this country who shall found a great AMERICAN CATHOLIC CHURCH, instead of a great Roman Catholic Church; and who shall teach men that they can be good Catholics without professing allegiance to a Pontiff on the other side of the Atlantic.” A reporter of a New York paper gives a summary of an eloquent address by DANIEL ULLMAN, Esq., on the anniversary of Washington’s birthday. The reporter says: “Daniel Ullman, Esq., delivered an eloquent and highly-instructive address. His argument was, that continuity of territory, unity of race, a common language and religion, are essential to the perpetuity of empire. He recited with precision and clearness, the fortunes of the Roman empire, of Philip II of Spain, Louis XIV of France, to sustain his position. Passing these in review, he adverted to Russia, as possessing every element of greatness, but free institutions. The people, he said, are nearly all of one race, and one section of that race—its territory is compact, and communication between its different parts easily effected. The people are attached to their country, their sovereign, and their religion. They are imbued with confidence in their destiny. And who shall say, if our own Union is dissolved, that their dreams of universal dominion will not be realized? He then adverted to the rise and progress of the American Union, and added that we need a common religious sentiment.”78“The mass of our people is essentially Anglo-Saxon, and it must absorb all other races before we can have a consistent national sentiment. He held to an American race.” Of the tendency of the times, the Presbyterian Herald says: “There seems never to have been a time in the history of our country, when questions of religious and political science were so mingled together as at the present. When we open a paper, it is often hard to tell at the first glance whether it is a political or religious journal. In all parts of our land, but especially in the northern portions, the platform and the stump give excited utterance to theological dogmas; while the pulpit thunders forth political harangues.” The North Western Christian Advocate, of Dec. 10, 1862, says of the President’s message: “The Chief Magistrate sees in the dogmas of the quiet past, nothing equal to the stormy present. He sees that history must be made. He sees, further, that the Union may be saved, if Christianity and statesmanship may join hands.” A writer in the United Presbyterian says: “Other grave responsibilities are growing out of our national conflict. Whatever may be the issue, there must be, to some extent, a reconstruction of the government. If we are made as we should be, a purer, better, more God-fearing people, we will be prepared for, and we will seek, such improvement of the Constitution as will make it embody a more distinct recognition of the sovereignty of God and the supremacy of his law. For this, the popular mind should be prepared. In favor of this, the Christian voice of the land should make itself heard and felt.*” The following is from a lecture in Concord, N. H., by a very popular clergyman, before a “full and delighted audience,” who manifested their approbation by “frequent applause:” “The Flag and the Cross is my theme to-night. The Cross is the symbol of our religion. It reminds us of the fatherhood of God, the brotherhood of man, the sacrifice of Christ, the redemption of the world. The Flag is the emblem of our nationality, the symbol of liberty and order. They should be associated, intertwined about our altars. There is no desecration in the act. There is little danger of too intimate union between church and state. If our religion be not brought into contact with politics and business, and all the every-day concerns of life, it is not a blessing, but a curse. The assumption that Christian ministers should not intermeddle with affairs of state, is a great and dangerous heresy. We have undertaken, as a nation, to divorce the Flag and the Cross. Would we have our nation prosper, we must solemnize anew the union between the Cross and the Flag.*” Rev. J. S. SMART (Methodist), in a published sermon on the “political duties of Christian men and ministers,” says: “I claim that we have, and ought to have, just as much concern in the government of this country as any other men. We are the mass of the people. Virtue in this country is not weak; her ranks are strong in numbers, and invincible from the righteousness of her cause. Invincible if united! Let not her ranks be broken by party names.*” We might adduce much more evidence to prove that there is at present a very extensive and urgent call being made in our country, for a union of religion with politics, of church and state; but, as we study brevity, this must suffice in this place. When we have presented the evidence concerning what will constitute the mark of the beast, we will pursue this subject further, and show that our popular churches are now imperiously demanding legislation upon this very point. This will make the evidence still more clear. We have seen that the prophetic description of the two-horned beast thus far perfectly applies to our own government, and that it will not apply to any other. In the fulfillment of the prophecy we have reached the point where the demand is being made for an image of the first beast. The image is the next thing; it will be made, for the Scriptures cannot be broken. Corrupt politicians, for their own advancement, will seize the proffered hand of a prostitute church, and the union will be consummated. Then woe to dissenters from the established religion! In the words of Dr. Adam Clarke: “Woe to the inhabitants of the earth, when the church takes the civil government of the world into its hands.”