The portions of Scripture on which the supposed destruction of the universe is founded, are far from numerous. Some of them are already quoted in the extract from Mr. Wesley; and previous to entering upon the consideration of our first proposition, we shall point out a few of the remainder. "Immediately after the tribulation of those days, the sun shall be darkened, and the moon shall not give her light, the stars shall fall from heaven, and the powers of heaven shall be shaken; and then shall appear the sign of the Son of man in heaven; and then shall all the tribes of the earth mourn, and they shall see the Son of man coming in the clouds of heaven with power and great glory. And He shall send his angels with a great sound of a trumpet, and they shall gather together his elect from the four winds, from one end of heaven to the other." Matt. xxiv. 29, 30, 31. "Till heaven and earth pass, one jot or one tittle shall in no wise pass from the law, until all be fulfilled." Matt. v. 18. "Ye men of Galilee, why stand ye gazing up into heaven? This same Jesus who is taken from you, shall so come as ye have seen Him go into heaven." Acts i. 11. "Then cometh the end, when he shall have delivered up the kingdom to God, even the Father." 1 Cor. xv. 24. "The Lord Jesus shall be revealed from heaven with his mighty angels in flaming fire, taking vengeance on them that know not God." 2 Thess. i. 7, 8. "The day of the Lord will come as a thief in the night, in which the heavens shall pass away with a great noise, and the elements shall melt with fervent heat; the earth also, and the works that are therein shall be burned up." 2 Peter iii. 10. But it is from the book of Revelation, that the principal part of the proofs are drawn. A book _confessedly_ figurative in its language, and which the wisest and most learned men have in vain striven to interpret. One could hardly commit or imagine a greater outrage upon the common sense of mankind, than that which the defenders of this doctrine have committed, by first confessing the Book itself to be figurative and inexplicable, and then adducing its language _literally_, in their support, as if they had all at once found out that it was no longer figurative but _literal_. If the visions of the Apostle are not literal, but grand and representative images, then ought they not to be understood in a literal manner, or if they are to be so understood, then as plain and literal narrative they may be easily explained; and the complaint which the receivers of this doctrine have so often made, that it cannot be understood, is to the last degree frivolous and foolish.