But there are, in the record of this prophecy, some special indications of the time when the evangelists wrote. According to Matthew, the disciples asked, ver. 3: "When shall these things"--the destruction of the buildings of the temple--"be? and what shall be the sign of thy coming and of the end of the world?" These questions our Lord proceeded to answer in such a way that the impression on the minds of the hearers (to be rectified only by the course of future events) must have been that the overthrow of the temple and city would be connected with his second coming and the end of the world. "Immediately after the tribulation of those days," says Matthew, "shall the sun be darkened," etc. The probable explanation of this peculiar form of the prophecy is that it does actually include all three events; the fulfilment which it had in the destruction of the city and temple by the Romans being only an earnest of a higher fulfilment hereafter. But however this may be, it is important to notice that the evangelists, in their record of the prophecy, are evidently unconscious of any discrepancy, real or apparent, that needs explanation; which could not have been the case had they written years after the event predicted. "It may be safely held," says Professor Fisher, Supernatural Origin of Christianity, p. 172, "that had the evangelist been writing at a later time, some explanation would have been thrown in to remove the _seeming_ discrepancy between prophecy and fulfilment." It should be further noticed that the evangelists Matthew and Mark, in reference to "the abomination of desolation" standing in the holy place, throw in the admonitory words, "Let him that readeth understand." These are not the Saviour's words, but those of the narrators calling the attention of believers to a most important sign requiring their immediate flight to the mountains. Before the overthrow of the city these words had a weighty office; after its overthrow they would have been utterly superfluous. Their presence in such a connection is proof that the record was written before the event to which it refers. Admitting the genuineness and authenticity of the book of Acts, (which will be considered hereafter,) we have a special proof of the early composition of the gospel according to Luke. The book of Acts ends abruptly with Paul's two years residence at Rome, which brings us down to A.D. 65, five years before the destruction of Jerusalem. The only natural explanation of this fact is that here the composition of the book of Acts was brought to a close. The date of the gospel which preceded, Acts 1:1, must therefore be placed still earlier.