The words of our Lord again teach us that the commencement of these sorrows shall be war. “And ye shall hear of wars, and rumours of wars: see that ye be not troubled: for all these things must come to pass, but the end is not yet. For nation shall rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom: and there shall be famines and pestilences, and earthquakes in divers places. All these are the beginning of sorrows;” Matt, xxiv. 6–8. So the great crisis is described in the Revelation, as “_the battle_ of Almighty God;” Rev. xvi. 14. But we are now at peace, nor is there at present any open combination of the ruling powers against the truth. Believers may have their hearts grieved by the national support of error, and here and there may be the outbreak of a persecuting spirit; but there is nothing yet of a great tribulation, nothing approaching to the fiery trial foretold in Daniel’s awful prophecy. All this is to come: how soon God only knows. Persecution is now condemned, but the last ten years have witnessed a wonderful political revolution in Rome’s favour; and it may be amply proved from facts as well as documents that she only waits the favouring day of power, to develope her old character, and make herself drunk in the life-blood of the saints. We are still at peace: but we heard last year of the cloud in the West, who shall say how soon the storm may gather, and burst in a thunder-clap over our heads? Europe is still at peace; but surely the mine is ready, the train is laid, and it needs but the death of one aged sovereign to produce an explosion which may convulse the very foundations of society. Then increased science will only produce unknown horrors, nor does it need any stretch of a lively imagination to foresee the onset of such days as those described by our Lord, when he said, “Then shall be great tribulation, such as was not since the beginning of the world to this time, no, nor ever shall be.” For such a period believers should be ready. Every living man will be swept away by the flood, except the little, blessed, band, who have a fast “hold upon the anchor of the soul sure and stedfast, and that entereth into that within the veil.” Nothing then will stand but the strong reality of a living union with Jesus. Well, therefore, has the voice gone forth as the precursor of the conflict, “Behold I come as a thief. Blessed is he that watcheth, and keepeth his garments, lest he walk naked, and they see his shame;” Rev. xvi. 15. But, in what attitude shall society be found? * * * * * VI. According to the Scriptures, there shall be _a general indifference to the subject of his return_.