within a given time . The one hundred and twenty years to the flood ( Genesis 6:3 ); the seven days that were to precede it , with forty days of predicted rain ( Genesis 7:4 ); the four hundred years of the sojourn of Abraham ' s seed ( Genesis 15:13 ); the three days of the butler ' s and baker ' s dreams ( Genesis 40:12-20 ); the seven years of Pharaoh ' s ( Genesis 41:28-54 ); the forty years in the wilderness ( Numbers 14:34 ); the three and a half years of famine ( 1 Kings 17:1 ) [ see Luke 4:25 ;] . . . the seventy years ' captivity ( Jeremiah 25:11 ); Nebuchadnezzar ' s seven times ( Daniel 4:13-16 ); and the seven weeks , threescore and two weeks , and the one week , making seventy weeks , determined upon the Jews ( Daniel 9:24-27 ), --the events limited by these times were all once only a matter of prophecy , and were fulfilled in accordance with the predictions ." --Bliss , pages 74 , 75 .
When , therefore , he found , in his study of the Bible , various chronological periods that , according to his understanding of them , extended to the second coming of Christ , he could not but regard them as the " times before appointed ," which God had revealed unto His servants . " The secret things ," says Moses , " belong unto the Lord our God : but those things which are revealed belong unto us and to our children forever ;" and the Lord declares by the prophet Amos , that He " will do nothing , but He revealeth His secret unto His servants the prophets ." Deuteronomy 29:29 ; Amos 3:7 . The students of God ' s word may , then , confidently expect to find the most stupendous event to take place in human history clearly pointed out in the Scriptures of truth .
" As I was fully convinced ," says Miller , " that all Scripture given by inspiration of God is profitable ( 2 Timothy 3:16 ); that it came not at any time by the will of man , but was written as holy men were moved by the Holy Ghost ( 2 Peter 1:21 ), and was written ' for our learning , that we through patience and comfort of the Scriptures might have hope ' ( Romans 15:4 ), I could but regard the chronological portions of the Bible as being as much a portion of the word of God , and as much entitled to our serious consideration , as any other portion of the Scriptures . I therefore felt that in endeavouring to comprehend what God had in His mercy seen fit to reveal to us , I had no right to pass over the prophetic periods ." -- Bliss , page 75 .
The prophecy which seemed most clearly to reveal the time of the second advent was that of Daniel 8:14 : " Unto two thousand and three hundred days ; then shall the sanctuary be cleansed ." Following his rule of making Scripture its own interpreter , Miller learned that a day in symbolic prophecy represents a year ( Numbers 14:34 ; Ezekiel 4:6 ); he saw that the period of 2300 prophetic days , or literal years , would extend far beyond the close of the Jewish dispensation , hence it could not refer to the sanctuary of that dispensation . Miller accepted the generally received view that in the Christian age the earth is the sanctuary , and he therefore understood that the cleansing of the sanctuary foretold in Daniel 8:14 represented the purification of the earth by fire at the second coming of Christ . If , then , the correct starting point could be found for the 2300 days , he concluded that the time of the second advent could be readily ascertained . Thus would be revealed the time of that great consummation , the time when the present state , with " all its pride and power , pomp and
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