C. III. On these grounds, I consider it as proved, that each day in the numbers of Daniel and St. Loulouque eis to

wonder is, how this able and acute writer could ever have hazarded such a theory.

I. In the carelessness of familiar speaking and writing, the Jews have sometimes appeared to reckon by current and not by complete time. Thus it is said of our Lord, that he rose after three days, and that he was three days in the grave; though, having died on the friday afternoon and having risen early on the sunday morning, he was in truth dead and buried not quite even two natural days.

are

1. Availing himself of this circumstance, Mr. Cuninghame contends, that the 1260 days ought to be reckoned on the same principle. Whence, though he allows each day to be a natural solar year, he maintains, that, collectively, the 1260 days are only 1260 defective years of current time, or, in other words, that the 1260 days are only 1259 natural solar years with peradventure the indefinite addition of a few weeks or months. See Dissert. on the Seals and Trumpets chap. xiv. p. 203-209.

2. Mr. Cuninghame's object in such an arrangement is sufficiently obvious. He had determined, that the 1260 years must have expired in the year 1792: and he had found, that Justinian, in regulating the point of episcopal precedence, had given, in the year 533, the first rank to the Bishop of Rome. But, if 1260 years be reckoned backward from the year 1792, we shall be brought to the year 532; or, if 1260 years be reckoned forward from the year 533, we shall be brought to the year 1793. In neither case, therefore, will the ordinary mode of computation suit the plan of Mr. Cuninghame; for, in each case, we have unluckily a whole year more than we can well dispose of. What then was to be done for the purpose of accomplishing the difficult task of making 1260 calendar years commence in the year 533, and yet of making them terminate in the year 1792? Mr. Cuninghame lays the period upon that bed of Procrustes, current time: and, by thus ridding himself

4

1

John is not a natural day, but a year; and that

of the superfluous year, he solves a problem of otherwise very difficult solution.

II. I fear, if this mode of computation be adopted, we must unhinge both the whole chronology of Scripture history and the whole harmony of prophetic numerical reckoning.

1. With respect to the former, we must at once throw aside the Annals of Abp. Usher: for both that chronological Work, and every other with which I am acquainted, proceeds on the system of complete time, not (as Mr. Cuninghame would have us proceed) on the system of current time.

2. And, with respect to the latter, if we compute the 1260 days by current time, homogeneity will require us to compute equally by current time every other prophetic number recorded in Scripture. Thus, if the 1260 days be only 1259 days, in that case, unless we depart altogether from our principle, the 70 weeks will be only 69 weeks, the 2300 days will be only 2299 days, the 1290 days will be only 1289 days, the 1335 days will be only 1334 days, the 5 apocalyptic months will be only 4 months, and the 3 apocalyptic days will be only 21 days. This result from Mr. Cuninghame's plan is alone sufficiently appalling: but confusion becomes worse confounded as we advance. The 3 times, the 42 months, and the 1260 days, are, as we all know, identical; constituting only one and the same period under three several denominations. Yet, if we are to reckon the 1260 days, as being only, by current time, 1259 days I see not how we can consistently avoid computing the 3 times, as 21 times; and the 42 months, as 41 months. But, when this triple operation shall have been performed, it would puzzle that arch-arithmetician, Nicomachus the Gerasenian himself, to identify 41 months, 24 years, and 1259 days. III. Does Mr. Cuninghame, however, abide stoutly and fairly by his own avowed principle of current time?

Verily, nothing of the sort. Though he reckons the 1260 days to be only 1259 days, making them commence in the year 533 and terminate in the year 1792: yet he estimates the 5

each number is equivalent to a series, not of years of 360 days each, but of natural solar years.

apocalyptic months, not as 4 months, but as 5 months; the apocalyptic 31 days, not as 21 days, but as 34 days; the 31 times, not as 24 times, but as 3 times; and the 42 months, not as 41 months, but as 42 months. I presume also, were The interpreting the prophecy of the 70 weeks, he would estimate the period, not as 69 weeks, but as full 70 weeks. ! Zależ

With such difficulties and such inconsistencies, I may be allowed to wonder, how Mr. Cuninghame could ever seriously adopt his theory of computing the single period of 1260 days by current time.

RESPECTING THE PRINCIPAL EVENTS AND CHARACTERS
OLI COMPREHENDED WITHIN THE GREAT PERIOD OF

SEVEN PROPHETIC TIMES, AND ESPECIALLY WITHIN
THE LATTER HALF OF THAT PERIOD OR THE THREE
TIMES AND A HALF MENTIONED BY DANIEL AND ST.
JOHN.

THE celebrated, though imperfect, period, of three prophetic times and a half or 1260 natural years, is allotted by Daniel and St. John to the tyranny of a very extraordinary Power; which is described, as wearing out the saints of the Most High, and as influencing in a wonderful manner the actions of the fourth great secular Empire.

But three times and a half is a broken or imperfect number: and, since the period thus defined is clearly represented as commencing long after the downfall of the three first Empires and long after the rise of the fourth Empire, it does not singly contain THE SACRED CALENDAR OF PROPHECY; because it does not singly comprehend those TIMES OF THE GENTILES, which are the times of all the four great Empires. Hence it is only a partial and imperfect chronological measure. Would we, therefore, obtain a general and perfect chronological measure, we must call to our aid a much larger

term of years than that which is contained in three prophetic times and a half.

That the four great kingdoms, which form the subject of Nebuchadnezzar's vision of the image and of Daniel's vision of the four beasts, are those four great kingdoms which are equally employed as the basis of Ptolemy's Astronomical Canon ; namely, the Babylonian, the Medo-Persian, the Macedonian, and the Roman: is a matter so clear and self-evident, that it is well denominated by Mr. Mede the A B C of prophecy'. Nor is it less manifest, as the same able writer observes, that THE SACRED CALENDAR AND GREAT ALMANACK OF PROPHECY is a prophetic chronology of times measured by the succession of Daniel's four principal kingdoms. Such being the case, the length of THE SACRED CALENDAR is the duration of those four kingdoms under their scriptural aspect: or, in other words, the length of THE CALENDAR is the duration of the allegorical life of the great human image reckoned from the parturitive commencement (if I may so speak) of the golden head; for the chronological measure of the image is the chronological measure of those TIMES OF THE GENTILES, which expire with the deliverance of Jerusalem and with the restoration of God's ancient people.

1 Mede's Works book iv. epist. 8. p. 743.

2 Mede's Works book iii. Apost. of latter times, chap. 12. p. 654.

3 Luke xxi. 24.