the moral character of their acts still belongs to them. They alone are reponsible. They were free to act in a given line. And, therefore, they were free to refuse to act. They did act. And the character of the act is their own. It was for no desire to maintain the truth of prophecy, that the Roman pontiff circled his brow with the sublimest names of Deity. It was no resistless decree of the Almighty that drove him on to ply the rack, and the dungeon, and the sword, and the stake, against "the people of the saints of the Most High." He was free in all this. He chose all this, as the means of strengthening his own power. He alone, therefore, is responsible. And so it is with us all, in all we do.

It is a solemn thought. Our own distinguished fellow-countryman, Daniel Webster, was asked, "What is your most important thought?" And what, think you, was his reply? Was it some great principle of international, or constitutional law? Was it some great truth that lay at the foundation of his country's prosperity? It was nothing of the kind. "My most important thought," he gravely answered, "is that of my responsibility to God!"

And well might he so term it. What other thought can compare with it? Responsibility to God! How, like an atmosphere, it surrounds us! We cannot get from beneath it. It attaches to us from thought and word and deed. It walks with us through life. It lies down with us in the grave. It will rise with us in the morning of the resurrection. It will abide with us through eternity. Men and brethren! Are we living in view of it?

LECTURE VI.

AND they shall be given into his hand until a time and times and the dividing of time.-DAN. vii. 25, (last clause.)

WE have considered all the marks, by which the kingdom of the little horn was to be known. And now, we come to the question of its duration. We have seen how it is to be identified. And now, we have to see how long it is to exist.

And this, you will observe, is not a question as to its temporal power. It was not that, you will remember, which made it the kingdom of the little horn. It was so, before that temporal power was received. And it will continue so, though that power were, all, taken away. The question of its duration, refers to it as a spiritual kingdom alone.

And I feel, brethren, that we are approaching a a great theme. What has been revealed, it is our duty and our privilege to know. Of what has been concealed, we must be content to remain in ignorance; until that day, when, we "shall know even as we are known." We must not strive to draw back the curtain. We shall do so, only to our confusion and wrong.

But the neglect of what is written, on the one hand;

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TIME, TIMES AND A HALF.

and assuming to know more than what is written, on the other; is, equally, to be avoided. In this spirit, then, i. e., simply desiring to know what God has thought best to reveal; to stand on this solid rock of His truth; let us approach the subject before us. In reference to this, and every other portion of revealed truth, I could desire for you, brethren, no more blessed lot, than for each of you, to adopt the Psalmist's language:

"Humble as a little child,

Weaned from its mother's breast;

By no subtleties beguiled,

On thy faithful word I rest."

The duration of this kingdom was to be "for a time, times, and the dividing of time." What, now are we to understand by this? Can we, from data, so apparently obscure, deduce any satisfactory result?

We have this same phrase in three places. It first occurs in our text. Next, in Dan. xii. 7; where it is rendered "a time, times, and a half." And last, in Rev. xii. 14, where the words are, "a time, times, and half a time." And in each of these cases, it is used in direct connection, with the end of the present order of things, and the setting up of the kingdom of Heaven. It is, therefore, a phrase of great importance. Let us strive, then, exactly to ascertain its meaning.

We have the same word, in Dan. xi. 13, where it is rendered, "after certain years;" or, as the margin has it, "at the end of times, even years." A time, then is a year. "A time and times and the dividing -or half-of time," is three years and a half. But, what are we to understand by this?

DAY PUT FOR A YEAR.

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In prophetic style, a day is put for a year. For this, there is the most express and positive proof.

You remember the case of the spies, sent out by Moses, to search the promised land? God said of them: "After the number of the days, in which ye searched the land, even forty days, each day for a year, ye shall bear your iniquities, even forty years." Numb. xiv. 34. And the fact was even so. For forty years they wandered up and down in the wilderness; until they were consumed.

So, in the case of Ezekiel. To prefigure the time through which Israel was to pass, from her first defection from the worship of the true God, to the subversion of the kingdom, by the Assyrians; the prophet was commanded to lie on his left side for three hundred and ninety days. The language is, "For I have laid upon thee the years of their iniquity, according to the number of the days, three hundred and ninety days, so shalt thou bear the iniquity of the house of Israel. And when thou hast accomplished them, lie again on thy right side, and thou shalt bear the iniquity of the house of Judah forty days. I have appointed thee each day for a year." Ezek. iv. 5, 6. Now, this would give three hundred and ninety years for Israel and forty years for Judah. If, then, you count back from the subversion of the kingdom by Nebuzaradan, B. C. 584, to the establishment of idolatry by Jeroboam, 1 Kings xii. 33, B. C. 974, you have exactly three hundred and ninety years. And so, if you count back, from the same final catastrophe, to the reformation of Josiah, B. C. 624, the number of years is forty. A day is put for a year. And very fitly is

this done. A day, which is the period of the earth's revolution on its axis, is, with great propriety, taken as the representative of the larger period of a year; or the revolution of the earth round the sun. On a principle akin to this, geographers construct our maps; making an inch, or part of an inch, represent miles, or hundreds of miles. And so, this mode of speech grew to be common among the Jews. Did one say to another, In three weeks will be the Jubilee? he would be understood as saying, that that feast was twentyone years distant. distant. And from them it spread to other people. Thus, a certain Greek wrote to his friend, "On this day, I am just eleven weeks old." Now, this was simply saying, in other words, that, on that day, he completed his seventy-seventh year. No confusion followed this mode of speech. No difficulty occurred in understanding it. But, it is in the prophetic books of Scripture it finds its fitting place.

Can we still further verify this point? Can it be fortified by still stronger proof? Can it be made unassailable by candid argument? Beyond doubt, I think it can. You remember Daniel's prophecy of seventy weeks? The language is, "Seventy weeks are determined, upon thy people and upon thy holy city, to finish the transgression, and to make an end of sins, and to make reconciliation for iniquity, and to bring in everlasting righteousness, and to seal up the vision and prophecy, and to anoint the Most Holy." Dan. ix. 24. Seventy weeks; i. e., prophetic weeks; are four hundred and ninety years. But four hundred and ninety years from what time? When must we begin to count them? From what point