its establishment through His personal acts in the separa- tion of the good and the evil, and in final judgment. These two interpretations of the Divine purpose in Christ, as it is revealed, are radically at variance. One rests upon the conception that the depths of wickedness in man's sinful nature have been already fathomed. There are no lower deeps, no new forms in which the hostility to God and Christ can manifest itself. The other con- ceives of depths not yet fathomed, of forms of wickedness not yet manifested. It sees actively working a spirit of pride and lawlessness which will find its culmination and highest expression in the man of sin who seats himself in the temple of God, " showing himself that he is God.''
Which of these conceptions of the future shall we take? We turn to the parable of the tares and the w heat. Have
PREFACE TO THE SECOND EDITION. vii
the tares already ripened and brought forth their perfected fruits, and are they now withering away?" Let both tares and wheat grow together until the harvest,'' said the Lord. The harvest is when both are ripe, when right- eousness and wickedness have both come to the full.* Is to see this growth of evil pessimistic? Who has so openly and strongly spoken of the evil days to come as our Lord Himself? Not a few in our day call any teaching of the fall of man, of the sinfulness of human nature, of the pun- ishment of sin, pessimistic. They have ears for those only who cry, "Peace, Progress"; and eyes only to see signs of good. But if revelation clearly teaches the contempo- raneous development of good and evil, why should we ignore or minimise the evil? The highest form of wick- edness is at the end in him " who opposeth and exalteth himself above all that is called God, or is worshipped."
To call good evil, as the pessimist does, is not so dan- gerous as to call evil good. In the former case, we are at least kept on our guard; in the latter, we are taken un- awares. If the blind optimist lead the blind, both shall fall into the ditch. Better that the supposed evil should prove to be good, than that the supposed good should prove to be evil. To ignore the Antichrist of whom she has been forewarned, is for the Church to expose herself defenceless to his wiles, deceptions, and attacks.
It may be said in general that all who complain of the development of evil in the future as ''a pessimistic theory,"
*In his comment on this parable it is said by Archbishop Trench: “We learn that evil is not, as so many dream, gradually to wane and disappear before good; but is ever to develop it- self more fully, even, as on the other side good is to unfold itself more and more mightily also. Thus it will go on until at last they stand face to face, each in its highest manifestation in the persons of Christ and of Antichrist. . . . Both are to grow, evil and good, till they come to a head, till they are ripe, one for destruction, and the other for full salvation."
viii PREFACE TO THE SECOND EDITION
should direct their attention to these two points: first, whether or not the Scriptures foretell an Antichrist in whom the enmity to God and to His Son will culminate, “the man of sin”; and, secondly, if they do, whether or not the movements and tendencies, religious, political, social, of the present time give any signs of his appearing. If there is to be no Antichrist, all enquiry respecting him is lost labour; and if he is to come, but only in some re- mote future, the subject has for us no present interest.
A word may be said of the objection that the doctrine of the Divine transcendence, as here presented, denies the Divine immanence. This is an error. God is im- manent in man.'' In God we live, and move, and have our being." But what is said is, that the doctrine of the Divine immanence is so presented in many quarters as to be indistinguishable from pantheism. Philosophy and science in many eminent representatives agree in affirm- ing that there is no personal God, only a universal, im- personal Spirit or Energy, of which everything that exists is a part. This, viewed on the material side, is atheism; on the spiritual, is pantheism. If the tran- scendence of God in His acts of creation, as declared in the Scriptures, is given up, the ordinary mind—whatever some acute metaphysicians may say of themselves—can find no final resting-place but in the humbling negations of atheism, or the deifying affirmations of pantheism.
S. J. A.
November, 1898.
PREFACE.
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The aim of this book is not historical or polemical. It does not repeat in detail the opinions of the early Fathers, or of later writers, or enter into the controversy whether Nero or Mohammed, the Pope or Luther, the Papacy or Protestantism, be called the Antichrist. There is a true sense in which it may be said, "Let the dead past bury its dead." It is in the light of the present that we must re-examine the prophetical problems of the past. As the purpose of God draws nearer to its fulfillment, passing events will tend to show in their distinctive features the nature of that fulfillment. (it is, therefore, for us of to-day to note the religious tendencies of the present, and to con- sider carefully their bearing upon the Divine purpose in man as it has been made known to us in the Scriptures. To those who believe that God, who knows the end from the beginning, has through His prophets and His Son declared this purpose in its outlines for the guidance of His children, our inquiry is of deepest interest. We ask, To what stage of His actings have we come? What are the religious characteristics of the present time? )
If the right discernment of the religious character of an age is always to those living in it of the highest import- ance, the right discernment of the present time is especially important to us, if, as we are told by not a few, it is in many points to be distinguished from all that have pre- ceded it. To-day, indeed, is always the child of yesterday. The continuity of history is never broken. Yet history tells us of successive stages of religious development, each having its own marked features. Whether we have come to a new stage, must be determined by its special charac-
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x PREFACE.
teristics. Let us, therefore, note what is said of the present time by representative men, regarding it from very different points of view. What new religious elements do we find in it? In what direction are they developing? And what is the goal?
It was said early in the century by the German philoso- pher Schelling, noting the tendencies of philosophic thought around him: “As regards the past, there is striving a com- plete new age, and the old cannot comprehend it, nor has it a distant presentiment how distinct and complete is the antagonism to it of the new."
Lecky ("History of Rationalism"): "It has long been a mere truism that we are passing through a state of chaos, of anarchy, and of transition. During the past century the elements of dissolution have been multiplying all around us. . . . The days of Athanasius and of Augus- tine have passed away never to return. . . .The controver- sies of bygone centuries ring with a strange hollowness upon the ear."
Cardinal Newman ("Patristical Idea of Antichrist") speaks of "a special effort made almost all over the world, . . . . .but most visibly and formidably in its most civilized and powerful parts, an effort to do without Religion.... Truly there is at this time a confederacy of evil marshal- ing its hosts from all parts of the world, organizing itself and taking its measures, enclosing the Church of Christ as in a net, and preparing the way for a general Apostasy from it."
Leslie Stephen ("Agnostic's Apology"): "I conceive that a vast social and intellectual transformation is taking place, and taking place more rapidly now than at almost any historical period….I cannot say what will be the outcome of this vast and chaotic fermentation of thought.
….The creed of the future, whatever it may be, exists only in germ. Philosophers, not apostles or prophets, are founding a philosophical system, not
