The case we have now to consider is one of fissure, disruption, or fault. Without pretending to indicate the exact mode by which the Mount of Olives will be divided, and a valley formed through the midst of it, it will be sufficient for our present purpose to show, that the phenomenon foretold is one that is fully understood as a fact which has been of very frequent occurrence in the past history of our globe. It is so generally known that the rocks and mountains of the earth exhibit proofs of disruption, in almost every form and shape, that it would be useless in this place to bring examples of the kind. We find the strata composing them lying at every possible angle or inclination; some are in an undisturbed state, while others are fractured, contorted, and rent, and thrown into the most confused assemblage of forms. Some rise at a gentle inclination, others are found in a perfectly vertical position, and in some few cases they have been actually turned over, so that their true relative order of superposition has been reversed. have cases innumerable of elevation, subsidence, and of lateral pressure. In some instances the strata have been elevated and fractured or disturbed in the process of the movement; in others, what is usually termed a

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fault has been produced; the strata on one side of a line being found lower, or higher, as the case may be, than the corresponding strata on the other side of the line. The coal measures abound with examples of the kind, as may be seen on reference to a map and sections of any of our coal fields. An instructive section of the kind may be seen in Dr. Buckland's

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Bridgewater Treatise;" most works on Geology, indeed, contain something of the kind. The disruption of the Mount of Olives after the manner predicted, may be produced by any of the above processes. Some of them, indeed, would lead to effects which would more exactly correspond with the requirements of the case, as indicated by the language employed, than would others, but the result of each would be the disruption of the mountain. I have, however, given in an Appendix (C.), some sections which will illustrate the case for those who are not familiar with these matters better than any description could possibly do, and this must be my apology for introducing them.

Much as we have said about it, we have not yet done with this remarkable locality, the Mount of Olives. There are still other predictions which must be considered in connection with those which we have just

been examining, seeing that they certainly relate to the same time, and the phenomena described in them are not only of a physical nature, but must be regarded as associated in a measure with those which we have been endeavouring to explain. The passages we now refer to are the following:

Isai. lxiv. 1-4. "Oh that thou wouldest rend the heavens, that thou wouldest come down, that the mountains might flow down at thy presence, as when the melting fire burneth, the fire causeth the waters to boil, to make thy name known to thine adversaries, that the nations may tremble at thy presence! When thou didst terrible things which we looked not for, thou camest down, the mountains flowed down at thy presence. For since the beginning of the world men have not heard, nor perceived by the ear, neither hath the eye seen, O God, beside thee, what He hath prepared for him that waiteth for Him."

Micah, i. 3, 4. "For, behold, the LORD cometh forth out of His place, and will come down, and tread upon the high places of the earth. And the mountains shall be molten under Him, and the valleys shall be cleft, as wax before the fire, and as the waters that are poured down a steep place."

On these verses it must be remarked,—First, That they both undoubtedly refer, in their ultimate bearing, to the Second Advent of the Lord Jesus Christ, and to His descent to earth. And seeing that the verses from Zech. xiv. which have been already considered, do the same, it follows that they all relate to the same period.

Secondly, Seeing that Zech. xiv. 4, gives us the exact locality on which the Lord Jesus Christ will descend,―("And His feet shall stand in that day upon the Mount of Olives,")—it would seem more than probable, that by the mountains spoken of in these two passages, Isai. lxiv. 1-4, and Mic. i. 3, 4, namely, we are to understand more particularly the mountains in the immediate neighbourhood of Jerusalem, and the Mount of Olives more especially; not that it is necessary by any means, I conceive, to limit the expression to that particular locality, for others are in all probability meant as well; but yet it would seem to be quite necessary to include it, even if it be not especially and exclusively referred to. This is rendered the more probable from a comparison of the third verse of the first chapter of Micah with the fifth, for the latter may be said to

explain the former. In the third verse we read of "the high places of the earth (land)," and in reference to these it is asked in the fifth verse, "And what are the high places of Judah? are they not JERUSALEM?" Then, again, it is impossible not to feel that the expression in the fourth verse of Micah, "And the valleys shall be cleft," points, in all probability, to the same convulsion that, as foretold by Zechariah (ch. xiv. 4), shall lead to the cleaving of the Mount of Olives, and to the formation of a "valley" through it; for though, in the one case, it is a mountain that will be cleaved, and in the other a valley, yet we cannot but remember the close vicinity to the Mount of Olives, both of the valley of Jehoshaphat, and also that of Hinnom. And then again, it must be further remembered, that Isai. ii. 2, distinctly shows us that great disturbance and dislocation of the strata must necessarily take place in the immediate neighbourhood of Jerusalem at this period, viz. the Second Advent.

Thus, therefore, we have good grounds for connecting all these passages together, and for regarding them as all relating to the same period, and in all probability to the same locality, inclusively, at least,

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