trumpet, summoning the quick, and the dead to the general judgment. But
not a blast from the archangel's ram's horn was heard reverberating
along the skies, no Lord appeared descending upon the clouds to meet
the elect in the air, and, in the last act of the fearful drama of
"judgment day," the curtain refused to be rung down upon a burning
world.

With the non-fulfillment of the prophecies, the more enlightened
elements of society began to scoff at the priests, who were temporarily
demoralized, but true to their deceptive instincts, soon rallying with
the plea of a mistake having been made in the calculations based upon
the prophecies, they undoubtedly concocted scripture to meet that very
emergency, for, to the taunts of the scoffers who, in reference to the
second advent of the Lord, enquired "Where is the sign of His coming?
for, since the fathers fell asleep, all things continue as they were
from the beginning of creation," they answered that "The Lord is not
slack concerning His promise," but "as a thief in the night" he would
soon come and all things be fulfilled. See II. Peter, chapter iii.

Following up the history of this interesting subject, we find that the
founders of modern Christianity, to which we will refer in our next
article, in composing their version of the New Testament from that of
the Jewish, or ancient Christians, made no change in its verbiage
relative to the prophecies; but when Constantine I., Emperor of Rome,
became the patron of the church, her hierarchy, tired of figuring upon
them, secured a long respite from that troublesome subject by claiming
to have made other calculations, which put off the time of fulfillment
to the year 1000; and from history we learn when the time arrived the
whole of Christendom was fearfully agitated upon the subject: Since
then every generation has been vexed with the fallacies of second