THE WHIRL OF CLOSING EVENTS.
WHO has not stood on the margin of some whirlpool, and noticed how gradually objects revolve in the outer circles, but increase their speed as they near the center, until after a few rapid whirls they plunge down into the vortex? Or, if not seen, who cannot imagine this? How securely float the occupants of some stately ship, as it enters the verge of the Norwegian Mael-strom! how leisurely it circles around the outer disk; but when it nears the center how its speed is momentarily increased, until it makes the fatal plunge, and becomes a wreck! So it is often with events in this world's history. Slowly the primary causes operate; gradually results ripen; but as they near their crises, they seemingly thicken, until the result suddenly bursts upon our startled vision. This is true in events of ordinary history. Take our own American revolution: the causes that produced it were slowly culminating for a long period, and becoming more and more significant, until at length the train was suddenly fired. The world as a whole shows a similar rapidity of events as it nears its final catastrophe. The last hundred years, has witnessed more marked occurrences in the world's history, a greater progress in the arts and sciences, multiplication of discoveries materially affecting man's interests, than there have been in any previous ten. A century ago, and the independence of this nation was hardly thought of: only about two millions of people of European descent, inhabited these shores, and they had not penetrated west of the Alleghanies; there was not an independent state on this western continent; there was not a railroad in existence; only a few canals had been dug, and none west of the Atlantic; America had but few post routes, or regular modes of conveyance. Travel was performed mostly on horseback, all transmission of intelligence was slow and tedious and it was a week's journey from Boston to New York; the whole west was an unbroken wilderness, where roamed savage beasts—and more savage men; not a heathen or Mohammedan country was open to Protestant missions; there were no societies organized for the extension of the gospel, or for the circulation of the Bible, or religious books or tracts; and the press itself was an imperfect instrument and little used. And yet the world itself had existed nearly sixty centuries, growing old with slow and tardy footsteps. Another century only has been added to the number of the past, and what a change! The thirteen British colonies, that hugged the Atlantic coast, have expanded into more than thirty sovereign states bordering on two oceans, extending from the lakes to the gulf, and comprising thirty millions of people; independent states also occupy all the southern part of this continent; the savage tribes have disappeared from an extent of land more than 1000 miles in breadth, and where the smoke of their wigwans curled among the trees, are now populous cities, thriving villages and cultivated fields; where their canoes glided on our inland streams, the sails of a nation's commerce now whiten; fire and steam have been made subservient to man, and propel vessels at his will; the broad Atlantic, which could be crossed only by months of tedious sail, is now an ocean ferry; millions of bushels of grain are annually raised and floated from regions 1000 miles west of the then civilized settlements, through canals dug hundreds of miles across the then wilderness; the iron railway has extended its briarean arms many thousands of miles in extent, linking together all parts of this and other countries, annihilating distance; and the steam propelled cars traverse back and forth upon them swifter than a weaver's shuttle; journeys are now performed in days, that then occupied months, and, in hours, that then required days; the electric flash now instantaneously transmits intelligence over thousands of miles of telegraphic wires, which unite all parts of this land and of other lands, and which will soon put, in instantaneous communication with each other, the opposite and distant shores of the Atlantic; the tide of emigration has rolled on and on, in successive waves, over the Alleghanies, across the prairies of the west, across the Mississippi, across the plains beyond, and over the Rocky mountains, until arrested by the shores of the Pacific, where it has created independent states in what was a waste wilderness within the remembrance of those who have not yet reached middle age; in eastern Asia, southern Africa, distant Australia, and the isles of the sea, the English race and tongue have found their way and established empire; the whole heathen, and Mohammedan world have been made accessible to the preached word; lands which were unknown have been explored, and those which were uninhabited, covered with the habitations of men; societies, for sending the living preacher into all countries, for accompanying them with the sacred Oracles rendered into unnumbered dialects, and for otherwise ameliorating the condition of man, have been greatly multiplied, and their agencies widely extended; the press has increased its efficiency a thousand fold, and brought the word of God within the reach of the most humble; discoveries in science and the arts have kept pace with the spread of empire, and facilities for international communication; and, without any hyperbole, more progress has been made by the generation now living, than by any ten generations that ever preceded. Event, also, has followed event with increasing rapidity. To go back only a very short period, what wonderful changes have transpired! The discovery of gold in California, caused such a rush of emigration there, that a full fledged sovereignty sprang into existence in less than half a score of years. A like discovery in Australia, peopled those shores with equal rapidity: Napoleon was dethroned by the monarchs of Europe, imprisoned to die on a rock in the ocean, and his name disinherited in France; but within a quarter of century the house of the Bourbon and that of Orleans, were driven into exile, by successive revolutions, and another Napoleon reinstated on the throne. In the apparently peaceful possession of India, the British rule was suddenly periled by the revolt of a hundred thousand armed Sepoys, and wide spread disaffection among the populace; and almost as suddenly were the disaffected provinces re-conquered and the British rule re-established over the millions of India. The crescent has so waned under the remonstrances of Christian diplomacy, as to submissively permit equal rights to all religions,—where before it was death to renounce the dogmas of the false prophet, and it retains political power in Europe only by the sufferance of other nations, and because they are disagreed respecting the disposal of the "sick man's" effects. China and Japan, which were impenetrable by those of other lands, and hermetically sealed against the admission of the gospel, have opened their doors, removed the interdiction, and become accessible to men of every race and creed. The various systems of Paganism are losing their hold on the confidence of their devotees—though infidelity is too often the substitute. The last thirty years have witnessed the change of an island of savages, into a Christian kingdom of civilized men. The political power of Romanism has waned, until it, like the Turk exists only by sufferance: any turn of the wheel may demolish it utterly; and how far its ecclesiastical organization may be affected by changes in its political, human prescience cannot determine. The last ten years has witnessed the rise of demonology, the multiplication of converts to it by millions, as claimed by its votaries, and its marvelous spread throughout christendom. Infidelity, irreligion of every kind, and vice in every form, stalk over the earth uncontrolled and almost unrebuked. * All these things betoken that we are in that age of the world which is nearing its consummation; that as the more swiftly circling waves are those which are nearer the vortex, and as the rapidity of their whirl is augmented by their nearing the final plunge, so are the swiftly circling events of time, the sudden and multiplied changes in the world's diplomacy, the running to and fro of multitudes and increase of knowledge, unmistakable munitionss that God will shortly overturn, and overturn, and overturn, until He comes whose right it is; when the kingdom shall be given to Him.—Advent Herald.