The Great Second Advent Movement: Its Rise and Progress

Admissions of Opponents

It has been truthfully said that “admissions in favor of truth from the ranks of its opponents furnish the highest kind of evidence.” None of the opponents of the advent message ever intimated that the investigative judgment of the Lord’s people was an event to take place before Christ’s coming; but reasoned on this point in harmony with the Adventists. As proof of this statement we quote from two prominent opponents. GSAM 110.2

Mr. N. Colver, preaching in Marlboro Street Chapel, Boston, in 1842, in opposition to Adventists, said:— GSAM 110.3

“If these days are years, the world will end in 1843; any school boy can see it; for if 490 terminated at the death of Christ, the 2300 days would terminate in 1843; and the world must end, unless it can be shown that some other event is to take place, and I do not see how that can be done.” GSAM 111.1

Professor Stuart, about the same time, said: “It is a singular fact that the great mass of interpreters in the English and American world have, for many years, been wont to understand the days designated in Daniel and the Apocalypse as the representation, or symbols, of years. I have found it difficult to trace the origin of this general, I might say almost universal, custom.” GSAM 111.2