And this great crisis was to bring down the Omnipotent Divine Judge from the throne of heaven; that is, the Almighty being who caused it was to come down, or send his Son to call the nations to judgment, and drown the world, or set it on fire. The first destruction according to the tradition of the Chaldeans, Persians, Assyrians, Mexicans, and some other nations, was to be by water, and the next by fire, when the oceans, seas, and lakes were to be converted into ashes. And Christ's apostles seemed to have cherished this tradition. Peter says, "whereby the world that was then, being overflowed by water, perished. But the heavens and the earth which are now, by the same word are kept in store, reserved unto fire against the day of judgment," (2 Peter iii. 6.) This was a pagan belief long prior to the era of Peter. Josephus says, "Adam predicted that the world would be twice destroyed, once by water, next by fire." A writer says, "A glorious, blissful future attends the destruction of the world by fire, and the reappearance of Vishnu (i. e., eleventh incarnation of Vishnu) has been for several thousand years the hopeful anticipation of India." "The last coming of Vishnu in power and glory," says another writer, "to consummate the final overthrow of evil, sin, and death, is so firmly fixed in the minds of the devotees, that they have an annual festival in commemoration of their prophesy referring to it, at which they exclaim, in a loud voice, 'When will the Divine Helper come? when will the Deliverer appear?'" At the consummation of this event, "a comet will roll under the moon and set the world on fire;" so affirms their bible. And the Persian bible, the Zend-Avesta, in like manner predicts that "a star, with a tail in course of its revolution, will strike the earth and set it on fire." Seneca predicts that "the time will come when the world will be wrapped in flames, and the opposite powers in conflict will mutually destroy each other." Ovid prophesies poetically,-- "For thus the stern, unyielding Fates decree. That earth, air, heaven, with the capacious sea, All shall fall victims to devouring fire, And in fierce flames the blazing orbs expire." Lucian, in a like spirit, exclaims,-- "One vast, appointed flame, by Fate's decree, Shall waste yon azure heavens, the earth and sea."