The whole nation would appreciate this and rejoice in it. Instead of forts let us build in our important seaport cities Immigrant Homes where strangers coming to our shores may be sheltered, protected from imposition, instructed in our language, customs, laws and Institutions and aided in establishing themselves honorably. Instead of great guns frowning defiance let us send messengers of peace to all nations, carrying the arts and sciences of our civilization to less favored lands. And above all let our statesmen apply all their energies to maintaining law and order and see that justice is done to all men of every color, creed or condition, that human rights are respected and iniquities suppressed. Our greatest danger is in doing wrong, and National righteousness our best defence.

The money which it is proposed to expend in Military defenses would be much more profitably employed in the moral, intellectual and industrial education of our people. Even in case of future war such a training would be the best. A hundred thousand educated men from private life would be a stronger force than a hundred thousand ignorant military. In this age, when mind not force rules the world the genius of an Edison would be worth more than an army in determining the fortunes of war. And as it is impossible to foresee from what direction any danger may arise, or what shape it may assume, we repeat it is unwise to place our reliance in costly appliances of war, which in case of future conflict may have become obsolete, and in case of prolonged peace will certainly be useless. On the other hand let us use the money to spread intelligence morality and righteousness among the people, and faithfully remove the causes of war which may appear within our own border, and assume an attitude of peace and good will toward all the world, then shall we be the best protected nation on the face of the earth. Rev. L. H. Squires.

Dr. Curry and the Second Coming of Christ.

The Methodist Review for September, informed its readers that the Rev. Dr. Daniel Curry, its able and scholarly editor, died at his home in New York, after a brief but severe illness, on Wednesday 17th. August, in the 78th year of his age. Dr. Curry, it will be remembered, succeeded Rev. Dr. Whedon, as editor of the Review, on the death of the latter, in June, 1885. He came to a difficult task, as Dr. Whedon was an editor of large experience and great excellence, scholarly and impartial in his discussion of all themes on which he wrote, and kind and Christian in his treatment of all from whom he differed in opinion. But Dr. Curry evidently did his editorial work to the satisfaction of the Church whose highest organ he conducted, and was just and generous in his treatment of contemporaries. In the QUARTERLY for April, 1887, we referred to and quoted liberally from an Article by Dr. Curry, on "The Second Coming" of Christ; and criticised as unsound and contradictory of utterances made in the same connection, his assertion that the question of the disciples in Matt. xxiv. 3. concerning the "end of the world," referred to the consummation of "the gospel dispensation." On the 6th. of that month he wrote us as follows:

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"My Dear Sir, Your Review of April, came to hand just now, i. e. within a few days, and my attention was called to your note

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on my article in the January number of the Methodist Review. The objection you offer to the parenthetical clause, making the aor in Matt. xxiv. 3. refer to the Gospel dispensation" is well taken, My further examination leads me to think, that the Mosaic and not the Gospel dispensation was intended. But it is manifest that the disciples had only a confused and inadequate conception of that about which they asked. They believed that Christ was about to set up his kingdom as an earthly ruler, and that his kingdom would supersede the Mosaic theocracy, and the date of that transition was to them a matter of the greatest interest.

"In his note on Matt. xxiv, 3. Olshausen writes; It is remarkable that we never find the expression συντέλεια τοῦ κόσμου : the word alor indicates the time of the world, which passes away, whilst the world itself remains.'

I thank you for the manner and spirit of your remarks, but do

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not you conclude that I am out of harmony with the great body of orthodox scholars. Our May number will contain an article along the same line, by Dr. Terry. Your opposition to literalism and materialism in Scripture interpretation is all well; but not so your conclusion. Very Truly Yours, DAN'L CURRY.

The promised article by Dr. Terry, entitled "The Sermon on the Mount of Olives," we have read with great satisfaction and delight. It covers many of the points treated by him in his " Biblical Hermenutics," several extracts from which were given in the QUARTERLY for January, 1885, emphasizing, however, some points that were casually treated at first, and giving prominence to others that are subject to adverse criticism by those who still cling to the traditional interpretation. He begins his work by presenting in Tabular form, all the statements of our Lord, in substance, as they appear in the synoptic gospels. The discourse was probably uttered by our Saviour, in the Aramaic language, " and therefore no one of the evange lists has preserved the very words (ipsissima verba) he employed. Matthew, who gives the discourse in its fullest form, has a style conspicuously Hebraic; but Mark and Luke, though their versions are independent of each other and of Matthew's, agree in substance.

On the "Occasion and Scope of the Sermon," Dr. Terry has the following:

"According to Matthew, it was spoken in connection with our Lord's terrible denunciation of Jerusalem (Matt. xxiii, 34-39). The disciples awe-struck by the Master's words, called his attention to the magnificent buildings and great stones; but this act of theirs only drew from him additional words of fearful import: 'Verily I say unto you, there shall not be left here one stone upon another, that shall not be thrown down." (Matt. xxiv, 2.) Mark has no record of the words of denunciation, and Luke places them in another connection (Luke xi, 49-51; xiii; 34-35), but all three synoptists agree in declaring that this great prophecy was called forth at the request of the disciples as a fuller explanation of his words touching the overthrow of the temple (Luke xxi, 6; Matt. xxiv. 2; Mark xiii, 2.) He went forth and seated himself on a part of the Mount of Olives directly opposite the temple. when, according to Mark, (xiii, 3 4,) four disciples, Peter, James, John and Andrew, asked him privately: Tell us, when shall these things be? and what shall be the sign when these things are all about to be accomplished?' Luke records this inquiry in nearly the same words, but in Matthew we find the question stated in the following form: Tell us, when shall these things be? and what shall be the sign of thy presence (1 75 075

nagovolas) and of the consumation of the age [dispensation] (ovvreleias rov alavos)? The whole prophecy purports to be an answer to that question. He mentions a number of things which must first take place, and also some things by which they may know when the end [catastrophe] is close upon them, but the day and hour of its consummation, he assures them, are known only to the Father. Nevertheless, he affirms, that day and hour will fall within the period of a [the then living] generation. No assertion throughout the entire discourse is more positive and emphatic than this: Verily I say unto you, this generation shall not pass away, till all these things be accomplished.' (Matt.xxiv, 34; Mark xiii, 30; Luke xxi, 32.) The scope of the prophecy would seem, therefore, to be clear beyond controversy. It had explicit reference to the overthrow of the temple and the fall of Jerusalem, and was designed to answer the disciple's question and inform them of the certainty and nearness of that great catastrophe."

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Dr. Terry then takes up and examines the theory that two events, centuries apart in their appearance, were in the question of the disciples, and the answer of their Master. The improbabilities of such a theory are clearly set forth, the violence it would do to common sense in the understanding of language, and the imputation of paltering with his questioners in a double sense, which it would cast upon the Saviour. He then announces as the conclusion to which his investigations have led him:

That the occasion and scope of our Lord's apocalyptic prophecy do not warrant an expectation of finding in it either a double sense, or a description of two events remote from each other in time. On the contrary, it purports to be throughout an answer to the questioning of the disciples, foretells a number of events that would take place before the overthrow of the city, and others that would mark the end of the age. As to the when of their inquiry, it assures them that all these things would occur in their generation, although the particular day and hour were known to none but the Father. Moreover, the numerous counsels and admonitions addressed privately and yet so solemnly to the disciples, to watch and be ready for the great event, are emptied of all naturalness and propriety by the supposition that the things spoken of would occur centuries after their time."

Dr. Terry next shows, from a comparison of the figurative language employed by Christ, with similar expressions and figures used by the Old Testament writers, what meaning Christ's hearers would be likely to gain from his discourse; and then proceeds to consider the objections urged by some against his interpretation thereof, based on words employed by the Synoptists which are supposed to contemplate events which could not have taken place in that genera

tion.

One of these is the passage Luke xxi. 24. where, referring to the great wrath about to be poured upon the Jewish people, Jesus says

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They shall fall by the edge of the sword, and shall be led away cap-. tive into all the nations, and Jerusalem shall be trodden down by nations until the times of the Gentiles [or nations] be fulfilled." Another is the statement of Jesus, according to Matt. xxiv. 14. that the Gospel of the kingdom is to be preached "in the whole world for a testimony unto all the nations," before the end or the consummation of the age.' Another is Matt. xxiv. 3. rendered in the Authorized Version," the end of the World." And the last is, Matt. xxiv. 34. " this generation."

To Universalists there is nothing new in the replies of Dr. Terry to these supposed difficulties. "The times of the Gentiles," are the times or "period allowed to the Gentiles to fulfill the divine judgments." Rev. xi. 2. is cited by Dr. Terry, in illustration of the meaning of Jesus: "The Court which is without the temple leave out, and measure it not, for it has been given unto the Gentiles: and the holy city shall they tread under foot forty and two months." "The whole world" in which the Gospel is to be preached before the end comes, is not the xóouoo, but the oixovuέrn, a word "commonly applied to the inhabited regions of the Roman Empire, [or to Judea] and this is conceded by all competent authorities." See Luke ii. 1; Acts xi. 28; xvii. 6; xxii. 5. Of Matt. xxiv. 3. Dr. Terry says:

"The common translation, end of the world' has been a delusion to many readers of the English Bible, and this could hardly have been otherwise. But it is very strange that so many learned writers who have properly translated and explained συντέλεια τοῦ αἰῶνος, consummation of the age, should have paid so little regard to the question, What age is intended? They generally assume without question that the Gospel or Messianic age is meant. But, according to the whole trend of Gospel teaching, that age had not come when Jesus uttered this prophecy. It was only "near," or at "hand." The "consummation or end of the age is equivalent to the Hebrew phrase end of the days, commonly rendered in the Septuagist, the last days. Now, the uniform teaching of the New Testament, is, that Christ's whole ministry fell in the end of the days, or last days of an alcov, or age. But surely it was not in the end of the Messianic age; that age still stretches on into the indefinite future. It was toward the close of the Mosaic, Jewish, or pre-Messianic eon, and near the beginning of the Christain eon, that God brought life and immortality to light by the Gospel revelation." See Heb. ix. 26; i. 1; 1 Peter i. 20; 1 Cor. x. ii.