Tidal Wave of Prophetic Study

With the dawn of the nineteenth century there came a spontaneous awakening in several continents, and in both hemispheres. This centered in the recovery of the lost expectation of Christ’s second advent, as based on the predictions of these same prophets. In South America, under Lacunza, the pathfinding book, “The Coming of the Messiah,” appeared, and was translated into the leading languages of Europe.AGP 240.3

One compiler made an amazing list of twenty-one hundred writers whose articles or treatises on prophecy were issued in English, French, and German, during the years from the Protestant Reformation up to 1835,—with most of them appearing near the close, within the indicated “time of the end.”AGP 240.4

Thus the advent hope was revived in the hearts of multitudes by the predicted study of the prophecies. This, in turn, led to the deepest searching of heart as people who understood and believed the prophecies prepared to meet their God. Hans Wood, Lewis Way, Archibald Mason, James Hatley Frere, Edward Irving, Joseph Wolff, Henry Drummond, Robert Chalmers,AGP 240.5

James Begg, and Matthew Habershon, McNeil, Pym, Hutchinson, Bayford, Frye, Noel, Vaughan, and Cuninghame are but a few out of the galaxy of names in Great Britain. Thus an amazing prophetic literature was developed in the Old World.AGP 241.1

In North America, Miller, Litch, Hale, Himes, and many less conspicuous men wrote out and preached their convictions upon the prophecies. It was here that the advent movement came to its glorious culmination for the time, as setting forth the near return of Christ.AGP 241.2