PREFACE.
THE editors of the Christian Union, Revs. Henry Ward Beecher and Lyman Abbott, very far in advance of their co-religionists, present the following as "a tentative and hypothetical view" of the great subjects, which will be unfolded, by the Lord's will, in this volume:
"The last day has already dawned; the end of the world has come; the judgment has begun; Christ has entered into His glory; God hath already made Him to be both Lord and Christ; His fan is in His hand; He sits on the throne of His glory, judging the nations of the earth; the hour now is when the dead hear the voice of the Son of God, and hearing live; they are hourly and momentarily coming forth, they that have done good to the resurrection of life, and they that have done evil to the resurrection of damnation." (Christian Union, May 12, 1880.)
These "tentative and hypothetical" statements of the Christian Union, involving a spiritual interpretation of the second coming of Christ, the end of the
