those who stand as the leaders of the orthodox faith. The expectation of the "last day" in the year 1000 A. D., reinvested the doctrine with a transitory importance; but it lost all credit again when the hopes so keenly excited by the _crusades_ faded away before the stern reality of Saracenic success, and the predictions of the "Everlasting Gospel," a work of Joachim de Floris, a Franciscan abbot, remained unfulfilled.[241:1] At the period of the _Reformation_, millenarianism once more experienced a partial revival, because it was not a difficult matter to apply some of its symbolism to the papacy. The Pope, for example, was _Antichrist_--a belief still adhered to by some extreme Protestants. Yet the doctrine was not adopted by the great body of the reformers, but by some fanatical sects, such as the Anabaptists, and by the Theosophists of the seventeenth century. During the civil and religious wars in France and England, when great excitement prevailed, it was also prominent. The "Fifth Monarchy Men" of Cromwell's time were millenarians of the most exaggerated and dangerous sort. Their peculiar tenet was that the millennium _had_ come, and that _they_ were the saints who were to inherit the earth. The excesses of the French Roman Catholic Mystics and Quietists terminated in _chiliastic_[242:1] views. Among the Protestants it was during the "Thirty Years' War" that the most enthusiastic and learned chiliasts flourished. The awful suffering and wide-spread desolation of that time led pious hearts to solace themselves with the hope of a peaceful and glorious future. Since then the _penchant_ which has sprung up for expounding the prophetical books of the Bible, and particularly the _Apocalypse_, with a view to present events, has given the doctrine a faint semi-theological life, very different, however, from the earnest faith of the first Christians. Among the foremost chiliastic teachers of modern centuries are to be mentioned Ezechiel Meth, Paul Felgenhauer, Bishop Comenius, Professor Jurien, Seraris, Poiret, J. Mede; while Thomas Burnet and William Whiston endeavored to give chiliasm a geological foundation, but without finding much favor. Latterly, especially since the rise and extension of missionary enterprise, the opinion has obtained a wide currency, that after the conversion of the whole world to Christianity, a blissful and glorious era will ensue; but not much stress--except by extreme literalists--is now laid on the nature or duration of this far-off felicity.