The European Union in Prophecy The EU in Prophecy I | Página 207

The European Union in Prophecy
15. The French Revolution
In the sixteenth century the Reformation, presenting an open Bible to the people,
had sought admission to all the countries of Europe. Some nations welcomed it with
gladness, as a messenger of Heaven. In other lands the papacy succeeded to a great
extent in preventing its entrance; and the light of Bible knowledge, with its elevating
influences, was almost wholly excluded. In one country, though the light found
entrance, it was not comprehended by the darkness. For centuries, truth and error
struggled for the mastery. At last the evil triumphed, and the truth of Heaven was
thrust out. "This is the condemnation, that light is come into the world, and men loved
darkness rather than light." John 3:19. The nation was left to reap the results of the
course which she had chosen. The restraint of God's Spirit was removed from a people
that had despised the gift of His grace. Evil was permitted to come to maturity. And
all the world saw the fruit of willful rejection of the light.
The war against the Bible, carried forward for so many centuries in France,
culminated in the scenes of the Revolution. That terrible outbreaking was but the
legitimate result of Rome's suppression of the Scriptures. (See Appendix.) It presented
the most striking illustration which the world has ever witnessed of the working out
of the papal policy-- an illustration of the results to which for more than a thousand
years the teaching of the Roman Church had been tending. The suppression of the
Scriptures during the period of papal supremacy was foretold by the prophets; and
the Revelator points also to the terrible results that were to accrue especially to
France from the domination of the "man of sin."
Said the angel of the Lord: "The holy city shall they tread underfoot forty and
two months. And I will give power unto My two witnesses, and they shall prophesy a
thousand two hundred and threescore days, clothed in sackcloth. . . . And when they
shall have finished their testimony, the beast that ascendeth out of the bottomless pit
shall make war against them, and shall overcome them, and kill them. And their dead
bodies shall lie in the street of the great city, which spiritually is called Sodom and
Egypt, where also our Lord was crucified. . . . And they that dwell upon the earth shall
rejoice over them, and make merry, and shall send gifts one to another; because these
two prophets tormented them that dwelt on the earth. And after three days and a half
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