Antichrist. Some indeed publicly asserted at the very beginning of this century, that the time was near, when the man of sin,' the personal Antichrist, would manifest himself. This was taught in the churches of France, and first at Paris; and was believed by very many throughout Christendom. The number 666 was found to express in numeral letters the name of Benedict IX.; A. D. 1032–45. All this, however, was at most but a prelude to things yet future. But when Gregory VII. advanced the claims of papal domination to the utmost, the generality of honest, upright, and simple-hearted writers, (says Aventinus,) asserted, that the reign of Antichrist had now commenced; still many correctly expected something worse than the worldly papacy. But after the periods reckoned upon had elapsed, without any thing decisive appearing, the 1260 days were thought by some to intimate so many natural years that were to precede the days of Antichrist, and a subsequent commencement of flourishing times to the true church; an interpretation which, however, was condemned at the Council of Arles, A. D. 1260. Others abode by the opinion, that the tribulation under Antichrist had commenced, and they looked for its termination to take place after the 31 times of the Woman; that is, after 350 years, by their reckoning. With this opinion the Waldenses, as also the followers of Wicliff and of Huss, consoled themselves; expecting their own deliverance to take place by the year 1383, and afterwards by A. D. 1420. Though even the latter period was too early, it coincided with the dawn of the Reformation. Of a different opinion was Pope Innocentius III. He said that the number 666 denoted 666 NATURAL YEARS: but he interpreted them of the period of Mohammedism; against which, as hereby conceiving it to be near its end, he stirred up a crusade, A. D. 1213. Thus through interpretations devised in favour of the papacy, the doctrine of the millennium became gradually involved in very great obscurity, which, however, was in some degree irradiated by the partial light of the Reformation. For Luther, having also perceived that the number 666 certainly denoted so many years, interpreted it as referring not to the Mohammedan or Turkish, but to the papal power. He believed also with many, that the duration of the world, from its commencement, would be only 6000 years; and hence considered its end so near, that he could see no space for any future millennium. Therefore he regarded the millennium as having begun with the New Testament dispensation, and as having terminated with the reign of Gregory VII.; from which

period he dated the commencement of the 666 years. Thus we see he was aware of the following nine important particulars; important, because they all contribute to a right interpretation of the Apocalypse: 1. That the first Woe is great; the second, greater; the third, the greatest. 2. That the second Woe commenced in the seventh century, with the Saracens. 3. That the third Woe is the papal power. 4. That this commenced with Gregory VII.; and that it, 5. lasts 666 years. 6. That the third Woe, and the seven vials, are contained under the seventh trumpet. 7. That the expiration of the third Woe is synchronical with the seven vials. 8. That the thousand years are natural years. 9. That the thousand years cannot be synchronical with the period of the Beast. If we add to these, 10. Another particular declared in the writings of Franciscus Lambert, a friend of Luther's, that the thousand years must be subsequent to the period of the Beast, then we have the whole ground for a right interpretation. But this particular was not much regarded at the time; for most believed that hereby the end of the world was made to be too distant; moreover, the frantic Chiliasm of the Anabaptists served to give millennarianism the appearance of a heresy in the eyes of the whole protestant church, and to introduce the most strange and contradictory interpretations of the Apocalypse.

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"Spener was the first who renewed the look-out for better times to the church of Christ militant here upon earth. He maintained the hope of these better times, and defended it with great seriousness, firmness, and assurance, to the day of his death; but he refrained from all particular determination of the prophetic periods. A path, however, was thus again opened for the coming forth of the truth upon the subject; and it did come forth, and continued to gain strength, and to press forward. From that time, expositors separated into distinct classes. Some, looking solely for the predicted events, left the periods altogether unconsidered; or, fastening upon detached passages of the Apocalypse, applied them arbitrarily to events with which they fancied them to accord: while both parties, leaving unexplained the more important portions of the prophecy, more easily incurred very material errors. Others, though they endeavoured to ascertain the prophetic periods, failed, by taking it for granted that these are to be all computed by vulgar reckoning; and thus, in a very forced manner, inlaid the whole distance between St. John's time and that of Antichrist, with their

typical interpretations of the epistles to the seven churches, but considered all the events subsequent to the opening of the first seal to be yet future, and, generally speaking, contracted them within too narrow a space; but others, contrariwise, imagined them all to have been long ago fulfilled in the judgments inflicted on the Jews and pagans: again, others found insurmountable difficulties, by assuming that a prophetic day in the Apocalypse must mean a natural year. Campegius Vitringa came nearest to the truth, for he was the first to proceed midway, between supposing either that a prophetic day is a natural year, or that it is simply a natural day. By his help also, we return to the original arrangement; 1. Antichrist; 2. the Millennium; 3. the end of the world. But I have endeavoured to proceed midway more accurately than Vitringa; and to comprise and concentrate the substance of what the true church of Christ in all past ages, and in despite of so many and various interpretations, has upon good grounds agreed in, respecting the exposition of this prophecy; so that I trust I am the less likely to have missed the truth."

Such is Bengel's account of interpreters who preceded him. We shall now attempt to show what has been done since his time; proceeding upon the same assumption which he regarded as the only true one, namely, that the Apocalypse, a portion of the inspired Scriptures, written by the apostle St. John, is a prophetic history of the kingdom of God, composed according to the connexion of future events, and according to the order of their respective periods. It is hardly necessary to mention that some modern writers have rejected the Apocalypse as spurious; that others have regarded it as only an interesting poetical composition; or that others have pronounced it to be unintelligible and useless, until it shall have its fulfilment in the events. It may therefore be desirable first to notice what some intelligent writers, who agree with Bengel about its principal matters, have found to blame or amend in particular parts of his system, as well as what they have thought fit to do towards extending the knowledge of that system. Among them we have to recognise foreign labourers with those of our own country. The first of the former was Dr. John Robertson, an English physician, who published by subscription a volume of extracts, translated from Bengel's work upon the Apocalypse. The subscribers to

Bengelius's Introduction to his Exposition of the Apocalypse, with his preface

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that publication amounted to six hundred persons, of considerable distinction in England; and it was set on foot chiefly at the instance of the Rev. John Wesley, the founder of the Methodist connexion. This translation improves somewhat upon the original, in having many longer paragraphs divided, and passages more simplified; as also in containing all the most valuable of Bengel's notes to the purpose, obtained from the "Gnomon." In Denmark, John Hammer composed a treatise, entitled, "Synopsis Explicationis Bengelianæ Apocalyptica;" and translated the " Sixty Addresses" into Danish, to which he requested J. F. Reuss to write a preface; who, however, advised him to get printed and prefixed for that purpose, Bengel's little piece entitled, "Discipuli de temporibus."* These same Sixty Addresses" were likewise translated into Wendish, by John Lahode; but we have no information as to whether those translations were ever printed.

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In Germany, the "Exposition of the Apocalypse," says Bengel, became rapidly circulated; and while many authors undertook to examine and illustrate it in a variety of ways, many others were busy in writing against it. His cotemporaries, Müller of Dresden, and rector Jäger of Kyrn, near Treves, drew up tables after his apocalyptical system; but the latter thought it right to differ from Bengel in some respects, as in maintaining that Antichrist has been typified for several centuries, by his precursors the popes; that the two witnesses will in like manner have many special precursors; and that consequently their 1260 days are to be understood as a prophetic period, (commencing from about A. D. 1156, and ending about A. D. 1833,) as likewise their forty and two months; which he thought apply to a treading down, not of Jerusalem, but of the nominally christian church. Moreover, C. Charles Lewis von Pfeil, and John George Bührlin, pastor of Arlesried, published Bengel's system, the former in verse, the latter in question and answer. As this catechetical work was cheap, and drawn up very plainly and simply, it became extensively circulated, and passed through several editions. Bührlin kept to Bengel's views in every respect; only he expressed the same opinion which many others

to that work; and the greatest part of the conclusion of it, &c. Translated by John Robertson, M. D. London: 1757. Ryall, Fleet-street."

* See above, chap. vi.

+ Bührlin's work appeared with the title of " The Substance of the Revelation of St. John, or rather of Jesus Christ, drawn from the writings of the late John Albert Bengel, D. D., and arranged in question and answer." Schaffhausen, 1772. 8vo.

had previously entertained, namely, that Bengel himself might be the third angel. (Rev. xiv. 9.)* He also expected the number 666 to terminate in A. D. 1784; and that the period of the non-existence of the Beast would last till A. D. 1832. In a new edition of this little book printed at Reutlingen, by Kurz, in 1827, we learn that Ernest Bengel (our prelate's son) found fault with it, because, that after asserting what was no other than Bengel's own opinion, namely, that the first millennium will commence in 1836, and terminate in 2836, and that the second will commence in 2836, and terminate in 3836, it denied that Bengel held this opinion; and added, that though Menken of Bremen, and many others, had affirmed that Bengel had advanced it, yet Bengel had gone no farther than to speak of a primary millennium and a secondary millennium, running on collaterally. Now it is true that a notion of this sort was held by several of Bengel's scholars; but whether Bengel taught it himself, will best be decided by the following extracts from a letter which he wrote on the ninth of January, 1746. "In the first millennium, the time is not purely good throughout, and in the second, it is not purely evil throughout. The judgment upon Gog and Magog will be attended with good, (Ezek. xxxviii. 23,) and the last period of carnal security will, it is to be hoped, not take up many or even entire centuries. I ground my belief of a second millennium, not merely on the absence of the grammatical article, in Rev. xx. 4, but also on the following observations. We find that a millennium will have elapsed previously to that seduction of Gog and Magog, which will issue in their final overthrow; and yet that there will be a millennium extending to the general resurrection. I find the termination of the first millennium to be the commencement of the second, This I infer by comparing the third and seventh verses; for between these, there is formed by the fourth, fifth, and sixth, a beautiful simultaneum. The doctrine of the midst of the years,' and that of the two millennia, confirm each other. In saying this, we are not to be considered as citing a thing to prove itself, or as reasoning in a circle; for we may demonstrate the truth of a whole matter by taking the parts, and considering

* What Bengel thought of this opinion will be seen below, in the account of his character; Part IV. chap. iii.

+ He explains the word simultaneum, that it is an elegance whereby, of two things pointedly referring to the same period of time, the one is divided, and as it were split into two parts, while the other takes us by surprise by appearing parenthetically between such parts.