months, were, 1 Abib or Nisan; 2 Zif or Jair; 3 Sivan; 4 Thammuz; 5 Ab; 6 Elui; 7 Ethanim or Tizri; 8 Bul or Marchesvan; 9 Chisleu; 10 Thebet; 11 Shebet; 12 Adar; and on every third year, they added an intercalary month, formed out of the odd days, and called it Veadar, or second Adar. It is generally agreed, that all their odd months, as first, third, &c. consisted of 30 days, and all the even ones of 29. But Selden's old calendar gives 30 days to the even months, and 29 to the odd ones. Their civil year began with Ethanim the seventh month of the sacred, as it was supposed the world was created about that time; and so Abib was the seventh month of it.-Months, in the reckoning of all nations, appear to have had their rise from the revolu tions of the moon. patriarchs before the flood appear to The old Persian year began about the have divided their year into 12 months, beginning of June, and consisted of each consisting of 30 days; and whe- 365 days, or 12 months. Most of the ther they added 5 days to the last, or Mahometans reckon their year by 12 had an intercalary month every 5th moons, or 354 days, 8 hours, 48 mior 6th year, to exhaust the odd time nutes, 38 seconds, and 12 thirds; of 5 days, 5 hours, and 49 minutes and so in about 35 years, the beginthat was over in each year, we know ning of their year runs backward not. Some think, the Egyptians and through all the seasons. The Jewish others once reckoned the time of one year too was of the lunar kind, reckonrevolution of the moon their year, anding by 12 moons; their sacred year that this is the source of their extra-began in March, because therein they vagant reckonings concerning anti-came out of Egypt at the new moon; quity. It is more certain, that before in which the names and order of their the Hebrews' departure from Egypt, they reckoned by an year consisting of 12 months, each of which consisted of 30 days, and began their year about the beginning of our September. Possibly the Chaldean year was much the same, till Nabonassar, about the time of Hezekiah, ordered them to reckon the year by 12 months, or 365 days; and, I suppose, the Egyptians soon after admitted this form. After long confusion, the Greeks reckoned the year by 12 months, of 30 days each; but seem afterward to have reckoned by 12 moons, or 354 days. They mostly began their year at the summer solstice, when the sun is most northerly in June; but the Macedonians began theirs about the middle of our September. At first, the Roman year consisted of 10 months, or 304 days. King Numa extended it to 12 months, or 355 days; and Ignorance of chronology, and pride every second year, they added 22 or of antiquity, made the Egyptians, 23 days by turns. Julius Cæsar, their Chaldeans, Chinese, Indians, and ofirst emperor, fixed it at 365 days and thers, to run up the creation of the 6 hours, which in four years make world, or even the rise of their own one day, which in the fourth is added nation, to the distance of a ridiculous to February, and occasions that year number of years.. But what the learnbeing called leap year. By this year ed now generally acquiesce in is nearwe still reckon our time; but as it ly the chronology of bishop Usher, includes about 11 minutes too much, according to which, the creation took this, in 130 years, runs the reckoning place 4004 years before our common forward one day, and in our reckoning æra of the birth of our Saviour; but had run forward the year full 11 days, it is suspected that common reckon. till this was rectified by the introducing begins two or three years too late. tion of the new stile among us, as it But Dr. Caverhill will have our Sawas in several countries abroad, by viour born A. D. 6. The 430 years Pope Gregory, almost 200 years ago. of the Hebrew sojourning began at Abraham's call to leave his native | The five months ravage of the locusts, country, Gen. xii. 1. Exod. xii. 40, may denote the period between A. D. 41. The 400 years of the sojourning 606 and 760, in which Popery and of his seed began at the birth of Isaac, Mahometism mightily gained ground, Gen. xv. 13. The period of about Rev. ix. 5, 10. The year, month, day, 450 years mentioned, Acts xiii. 20. || and hour, of the Turkish ravage, is 391 may reach from the birth of Isaac to years from 1281 to 1672, or 396 from the settlement in Canaan; or from 1302 to 1698. See ANTICHRIST, that settlement, reckoning the years GoG. of bondage different from the years YEAR too signifies the season or pe of the judges, to the government of riod in which a thing happens. The Samuel. The sixty-five years, against || three years of God's patience with the the end of which Ephraim or the ten barren Jews, may denote the time of tribes were to be no people, i. e. have the ministry of John Baptist, and no form of government at all, and Christ; and the fourth may denote scarce any left in Canaan, extends the time after Christ's resurrection, from the 4th year of Ahaz to the 22d before the breaking out of their ruinof Manassch, Isa. vii. 8. The years ous war, Luke xiii. 6-10. The of an hireling, denote exact ones; year of visitation, is a season of reand, it seems, were three successive-markable calamities, Jer. xi. 23. The ly, Isa. xxi. 16. and xvi. 14. In pro- | year of God's redeemed, is that seaphetic style, a year signifies three son in which he effectuates the rehundred and sixty years, and a month || demption of his chosen; as, the pe30, a day being put for a year; and so three years and an half and times, time, and half a time, or 42 months, or 1260 days, denote the twelve hundred and sixty years duration of Antichrist, Rev. xi. 2, 3. and xii. 6, 14.* * These 1260 days comprehend the time of the first six trumpets, during which the power of Antichrist was to be on the increase they were to begin at the sounding of the first trumpet, and to end at the sounding of the seventh: that is, at the time of Antichrist's begun ruin; which was afterwards to be carried on in the course of the first six vials. The beginning and the end of this period are ascertained; and therefore we do not take this number to be, like many others in the prophets, a definite number for an indefinite: but, considering a day as put for a year, we reckon the period here meant to be 1260 years. Thus, in Ezek. iv. 6. God commands the prophet to lie forty days to represent forty years: for, says God, I have appointed thee each day for a year. So the prophecy of 70 weeks in Dan. ix. 24. must be understood. It may be proper here to offer a few observations on the commencement of these 1260 days, and on the opinion of some commentators on this subject. We observe, in the first place, that the riod of our Saviour's abasement, the primitive gospel-period, and the period of Antichrist's ruin, Isa. Ixiii. 4. In allusion to the year of release and jubilee, the period of the elect's conversion to Christ, or the gospel-period, commencement of the 1260 days is the date of the birth of Antichrist, Rev. xiii. 5. The mystery of iniquity had been working long before, even in the time of the apostles, 2 Thess. ii. 7. 1 John iv. 3. In these preceding ages, the man of sin, the Anti||christ,had been as a child in thewomb. But at the commencement of the 1260 days, he was like a child actually brought forth; he then made a formal appearance in a state of infancy; bearing such a proportion to what he became afterwards, as a new born infant does to a full grown man. At this infant state of Antichrist we are to fix the beginning of the 1260 days, and not at any remarkable stage of his after growth. In the next place, we observe, that the 1260 days commenced nearly as soon as Christianity was publicly professed and authorized by Constantine the Roman emperor, or about the year 313. This appears from the following among other conside rations. 1. Antichrist made his appearance very soon after the termination of the heathen state of the Roman empire. This is ap is called the acceptable year of the Lord, Isa. Ixi. 2. God's years are the unbounded duration of his existence, Heb. i. 11. or the periods of his most noted works, as of bringing Israel out of Egypt, the incarnation of Christ. &c. Psal. lxxvii. 10. So man's months are his time of life, Job xiv. 5. and he possesseth months of vanity when he is long under trouble and disappointment, Job vii. 3. Whether the Millennium or THOUSAND YEARS of Satan's confinement, and the saints' reigning with Christ, denote precisely so many years, or only a very long time, we dare not affirm. When this period begins, is not agreed. The beginning of it at Christ's resurrection, or at the fall of Heathenism in the Roman empire, about A. D. 323, is scarce worth while to notice. Nor can we think, cording to that remarkable prediction of licly professed by the Roman emperor, the apostle, in 2 Thess. ii. 6, 7. Ye know and authorized by the laws of the empire; what withholdeth, that he might be revealed or, in the figurative language of the Revein his time: For the mystery of iniquity doth || lation, very soon after the man child, born already work: Only he who letteth will let, by the woman clothed with Sun, was caughṛ until he be taken out of the way. It is evi- up to God and his throne, Rev. xii. 5. By dent from the context that the apostle is the man-child here we understand Constanhere speaking of the Antichrist, the man tine and other professing Christians, who of sin who sitteth in the temple of God and were advanced to the government of the exalteth himself above all that is called empire; while the heathens, who had so God, or worshipped. By him who in the long employed their power in persccuting apostle's time was letting or hindering the the Christians, were excluded from it. It appearance of Antichrist, we understand immediately follows in ver. 6. And the wothe Roman empire in its Heathen state. Sa mun fled into the wilderness; that is, no tan could not employ the beast having two sooner was the body of church-members horns like a lamb against the Christian reli- raised up to a state of prosperity in their gion, till he ceased to act against it as a temporal concerns, than the church was persecuting dragon in the heathen Roman reduced to a new state of adversity, in her emperors. What the apostle intends is evi- spiritual concerns: The worldly emoludently some worldly power or dominion ments heaped upon the officers of the which it was not then proper to mention church by Constantine contributed much more explicitly in this epistle; but which to this decline in the spiritual state of the we may know (from other places of scrip- church, and to the rising power of Antiture, such as Rev. xiii. 1. xvii. 18. declar- christ, which attended that decline. The ing the nature and seat of the Antichristian beginning of this new state of adversity in dominion,) to be no other than the heathen the beginning of the 1260 days, of which state of the Roman empire. It appears we speak. from several passages in Tertullian and 3. The view now given of the beginning others of the ancient fathers, that the pri- of the 1260 days, is most agreeable to the mitive Christians on account of what the order of the seals, and the trumpets. For apostle had intimated, dreaded the fall the period of 1260 days is that period of of the heathen Roman empire, notwith- the church's adversity which is representstanding all the persecution they suffered; || ed in the description of the 1st six trumfrom an apprehension of something more pets; during which the church was to as dreadful to succeed in the relevation of || that wicked one. But that which withheld or || hindered was actually taken out of the way, when the Roman emperor, in the year 313, solemnly embraced the Christian religion. The apostle's words do not admit that there was to be any considerable time between this great event and the first form: revelation of Antichrist: Then, says he, or at that time, shall that wicked one be rerealed: and then was the beginning of the 1260 days, about which we enquire. bide in the wilderness; and against the danger of which the faithful were to be sealed, or marked for preservation, Rev. viii. 3. Hence it is evident, that the 1260 days began with the first trumpet. And therefore, supposing that the first trumpet sounded at the opening of the seventh seal, as appears to have been the case from Rev. viii. 1, 2. and supposing (what seems to be the only interpretation agreeing with the series of events represented by the seals,) that the termination of the Heathen 2. Antichrist made his appearance very state of the Roman empire is meant by the soon after the Christian religion was pub-convulsion of nature which is described as YEA with others, that it began at the reformation from Popery about 200 years ago. The mournful condition of the church too plainly testifies, that Satan is not presently bound, but freely goes about seeking whom he may devour. We expect, that after 30 years of terrible bloodshed and confusion, at the downfal of Antichrist, and 45 years of the spreading of the gospel, it will be arrived at its glory, about A. D. 1941 or 2091, Rev. xi. 2, 3. Dan. vii. 25-27. and xi. 7, 11, 12: 656 but we dare not be positive that our view of these texts is absolutely certain, Some think, that during this Millennium, the wicked shall be all cut off from the earth, and the deceased saints, or at least the martyrs, arise from the dead, and reign with Christ, who shall descend from heaven, and in his manhood reside among them; and that at the end of the thousand years, the wicked being raised from their graves, shall attack the saints in war, and think to destroy most holy and blessed Patriarch of the taking place at the opening of the sixth seal; we justly infer that the beginning of whole world, the successor of the prince the 1260 days followed that great revolu- of the apostles, the head of all. In the tion as closely, as the seventh seal follow-year 592, he received appeals from all parts of the Christian world, re-examined the sixth and the series of things exhibited in this prophecy will not allow anying and reversing by the authority of St. great interval between these two seals. With regard to the opinion of Mr. Lowman, Bishop Newton and others, which is, that the 1260 days did not commence, nor Antichrist appear in his proper character, (that is, in the character of one diffusing corruption through the whole visible church by means of an unscriptural spiritual dominion assumed over it,) till the year 756; it is an opinion not more contrary to the reasons now adduced, than In the to the following historical facts. days of Constantine, or in the time of Pope Sylvester, (who was made bishop of Rome the next year after Constantine's establishment of Christianity,) the ecclesiastical hierarchy, consisting of diocesan bishops, archbishops, primates and patriarchs or exarchs, was first formed in the manner in which it continues to this day. About the year 384, Jerome called that church "the senate of pharisees, the scarlet whore." In the year 400, that church was distinguished from all others by the character of the apostolic see, under a pretence of its being the throne of St. Peter, the prince of the apostles, on whom the church was supposed to have been built. About the year 428, the Roman Pope claimed a pastoral vigilance restrained by no bounds, but extending to all places where Christ was known and adored; thus extending his authority and jurisdiction over all the churches of the Christian world. In the year 467, saint-worship began to prevail to saints, temples and chapels were built and dedicated; and men began anew to serve the creature more than the Creator. In the year 517, the Roman Pope was addressed as the Peter. In the year 606 or 607, a wicked II. III. When we consider those facts, it seems exceedingly absurd to say that the Antichrist did not rise, or appear in his distinguishing character, till the year 756. The reason principally insisted upon, in support of this opinion, is that about the year 756, Pepin king of France, having taken the exarchate, or territory of Ravenna, from the Lombards, bestowed it upon pope Stephen II. under the name of St. Peter's patrimony. But the pope's Antichristian character did not lie in this small temporal dominion, but in the spiritual or ecclesiastic dominion which he claimed over the catholic visible church; with the idolatry and other corruptions which were both subservient to, and promoted by that them. An opinion of this nature,|| der his feet; that the meek shall inwith some variations, obtained not|| herit-the earth, shall sit upon thrones, long after the age of the apostles, and has been espoused by a variety of very learned Protestants. They plead, that the martyrs are said to rise from the dead, in the same sense that the rest of the dead rise at the end of the Millennium: that the saints shall enjoy new heavens and a new earth, wherein dwelleth righteousness; that God shall bring his only begotten Son into the world, and put all things un and receive an hundred fold in this life, and the irrational creatures be deliv ered from the bondage of corruption, into the glorious liberty of the sons of God, and the time of the restitution of all things happen, Rev. xx. 4, 5, 6, 2 Pet. iii. 5-13. Heb. i. 6. and ii. 5. Matth. v. 5. and xix. 27-29. Rom. viii. 19, 20. Acts iii. 20, 21. But it may be replied. That sundry of these texts do not in the least come up to dominion hereby he opposeth and exalted in his dominion over any other province in himself above all that is called God, or that || Europe. We testify against the civil pla is worshipped: so that he, as God, sitteth in ces and power of church-officers, as inconthe temple of God, shewing himself that he sistent with their bestowing a proper atis God. It is objected, that Antichrist is tent.on on their spiritual work; but not the 7th or last head of the Roman; and as constituting an Antichristian character. that, as each of the other preceding six -The spiritual dominion or headship of a heads was a temporal dominion, so is the mere man over the Catholic church can 7th. have no other origin than that of the bottomless pit. But his temporal dominion over any civil society, while it is neither usurped nor tyrannically exercised, may be the ordinance of God for good to that society. The wickedness of the popes, in abusing their temporal dominion for promoting their spiritual monarchy, will not prove their temporal dominion to be considered in itself, any part of their Antichristian character. It is necessary to add, that the opinion in question is highly injurious to THE GLORIOUS REFORMATION FROM POPE. RY; which is the true era of the expiration of the 1260 days. This being the most astonishing revolution in the state of the church, since the calling of Gentiles in the apostolic age, is celebrated as immediately following the end of the 1260 days, in the last nine verses of the ele venth chapter of the Revelation, and likewise with an additional glory in the first thirteen verses of the fourteenth But we answer, that several of the preceding rulers in heathen Rome arrogated asort of ecclesiastical power tothemselves, prescribing rules for public worship, and regulating the feasts, and other sacred institutions, such a Pontifex Maximus, or president of the highest order of priests was Numa; such was Julius Cæsar; such were the emperors in general. Polydore Virgil considers this as a certain omen of the authority which the Bishop of Rome now enjoys. Besides the Antichristian dominion might succeed to the other forms of government which had obtained in Rome, and yet differ from them in this respect, that it is spiritual. Hence Antichrist is called the beast that was to ascend out of the bottomless pit ;—the beast that was, and is not, and yet is. The dominion of the preceding forms of the Roman government may be said to remain in the dominion of Antichrist; as this dominion has still the city of Rome for its principal seat: as it is similar in its extent, in its pride and tyranny, in its super-chapter of that book. These 1260 days' stition and idolatry. Yet it is not the same, but different, as it is a most gross corruption, not of temporal or civil institutions, but of the spiritual and heavenly ordinances of the church of Christ. It is not the pope's temporal dominion, but his usurp ed spiritual dominion over the catholic church, as its visible head, that ascendeth out of the bottomless pit; being a contrivance of hell. As to his temporal dominion, over a province in Italy, there was no more evil in it than there would have been VOL. II. being the same with 42 months, of 30 days each, twelve such months make the prophetical year consisting of 360 days, four of which years fall short of four common years twenty one days. So that 1260 prophetical years make only 1240 common years; which, being added to the year 313, when Antichrist rose upon the fall of Rome Pagan, bring us to the year 1555.-And whether the three years and a half of the witnesses lying slain should be considered as the lat 4 0 |