It is however evident, that the concession. of a primary or subordinate fulfilment of the prophecies of the MAN OF SIN in the Papacy, amounts to nothing even in the mind of Mr. Burgh himself. Else why at the very time that he grants it, does he tell us that he rejects altogether the interpretation which af firms the Man of Sin to be Popery? (Lectures, p. 92, 93.) Why do we also find such expressions as the Man of Sin is not Popery, (Lectures, p. 58,)-the Man of Sin is not the Pope, (Lectures, p. 59,)—"it is only by weakening the force of the passage that it is EVER made applicable to the Pope. (Lectures, p. 61.) Should it appear that the Beast is not Popery, neither is the Man of Sin. (Lectures, p. 84.) "It is clear to me, that here Popery is not foretold." (Lectures, p. 93.) Now, after expressions so often repeated, denying the Man of Sin to be Pope. ry, or the Pope, it is mere mockery on his part to affect, in the excess of his candour, to grant that "considered as a primary, specimen fulfilment of the prophecies of Antichrist, we shall find enough of mention of Popery in the Scripture." This also, at the very time that he abstains from telling us of any one passage of Prophecy, which clearly

and specifically refers to Papal Rome, and endeavours to deprive us of every passage, which in the unanimous view of an host of illustrious men of the Church of God, does apply to Papal Rome, and Papal Rome only.

The deliberate purpose of Mr. Burgh, being to overthrow the whole scheme of Protestant interpretation, root and branch, I am compelled to think, that in all these indefinite admissions with respect to Popery, he is not in earnest; and that they are held out as a lure, for the purpose of bribing and entrapping the judgment of unwary Protestants to embrace his scheme. But we reject with abhorrence the proffered bribe.-The coin is not of the gold of Ophir. It is brass thinly gilded over with sophistry. It is a very lie. We will not barter away the truth, and will accept of no subordinate reference of the Prophecies of Antichrist to the Papacy, since the Pope is the Man of Sin and Son of Perdition, in deed and in truth.

The scheme of Mr. Burgh being once embraced, forthwith comes the Jesuit and tells us, "Your blessed and glorious Reformation, as you are wont to call it, is then at length exposed in its true colours, and by one of

yourselves. It has been clearly proved that the Reformation, so far as based upon the interpretation of Prophecy, is a lie. And as the Lord himself tells us that the Devil is the father of lies, it necessarily follows, that thus far the Reformation is from the Devil. And if at least half of it be from him, it is not possible that the other half can be from God. It is now undeniably proved that the Cranmers, and the Latimers, and the Ridleys of your Church, bore witness to a lie in the flames of justly merited punishment. Return then, ye erring and backsliding children, to your Holy Mother, who, with outstretched arms and a bosom heaving with maternal tenderness, is ready to embrace you. None of her wholesome severities in the ages that are past had any other object than the salvation of the wretched men who erred from the fold of the good Shepherd, OUR MOST HOLY LORD THE POPE.* Her bowels of compassion now yearn over her children of the Protestant Churches, and she gladly welcomes such powerful auxiliaries to this her motherly call, as have lately arisen in the English Church, viewing it as the harbinger of that

*

* See the Encyclical Letter of the present Pope, in which this title is assumed by him.

happy time when all her strange sheep will return to her fold."

I earnestly beseech the reader, that he may not think that there is aught of burlesque in the foregoing hypothetical address put into the mouth of a Jesuit. If once the Protestant Churches were to lose their hold of the sure word of Prophecy, by giving heed to such views as those of Mr. Burgh, it is my belief that the Reformation itself could not stand. Yea, it would be forsaken of God, as a just judgment for its having forsaken and denied the witness of Jesus against Papal Rome. I fear, therefore, the address of the Jesuit would in that case be too true a picture of that which would follow.

*

But the reasoning of Mr. Burgh is weighed in the balance, and found wanting. Accounting the great luminaries of the Church in past ages fools, and himself wise, he has set himself to overthrow the edifice of truth, erected by their labours, and witnessed by the martyred deaths of some of them.But before he could succeed in this enterprise, it would have been necessary for him to raise up another Omar,* and commit to the

*The Caliph Omar, who commanded the destruction of the Alexandrian library.

flames the whole records of the history of thirteen centuries, wherein, as in a lookingglass, we behold the graphic identity of the PAPACY, with the MAN OF SIN and SON OF PERDITION. As it is; the result of this vain attempt has been to bring to light new evidence in support of the great truths he has endeavoured to demolish, and to show that these great men whom he accounted fools, were wise, and that he who counted himself wise, is most unwise.

There is, between the Prophecy of the MAN OF SIN and the history of the PAPACY, the relation of a likeness quite as exact as that which is discernible between the Prophetic description of the meek and holy sufferer in Isaiah liii. and the history of the sufferings of Jesus of Nazareth. In refusing to see the former of these relations, Mr. Burgh and the Romish Church are chargeable with the very same kind of dimness of moral and intellectual vision, as has been exhibited by the Jewish nation for eighteen centuries, and both the one and the other of these examples are pregnant with warning and instruction unto righteousness; manifesting to us that no evidence can produce conviction where the mind is determined to resist it.