| 350 man has devised in the room of the kingdom of God; for verily as little understood of each other are the builders of the modern Babylon, as were those of antiquity when the Lord confounded their language and scattered them over all the face of the earth. In contemplating the modern buildings of religious systems, we find some declaring one thing necessary as a foundation, others another; and instead of laboring conjointly to build a tower to heaven, each individual party are raising paltry mounds of their own, with the most anxious ambition to look over their neighbor, until all has become confusion and weakness, and by and by all the wrath of heaven shall sweep away every vistige [vestige] of their folly from the face of the earth, for the mouth of the Lord God hath spoken it. And this judgment shall take place in the last days, and it shall be a judgment the like of which hath not been before. And will not the Lord act like himself in providing a place of safety for his people? or when he has commanded them to come out of her, will he not prepare a place of refuge for them-a Goshen in which they may be protected while his fury is poured out upon the nations.
We read, then, in the 24th chapter of Isaiah, that when his fury shall be poured out, when the inhabitants of the earth shall be burned up and few men be left, that there shall be in the midst of the earth a remnant among the people as the shaking of an olive tree, and as the grapes when the vintage is ended. And let us mark the location of those who are preserved: it will be in the midst of the earth, in the very place where Israel of old declared that the children of Joseph should become a multitude of nations, and in that place shall deliverance be. We rejoice, therefore, in the revelations made known in the last days, of the descendants of Ephraim and Manasseh, and of the land of Joseph, and of the place appointed for the gathering of his people. We read also, in the 4th chapter of Micah, that in the last days it shall come to pass, that the mountain of the house of the Lord shall be prepared in the top of the mountains, and it shall be exalted above the mountains, and it shall be exalted above the hills, and people shall flow unto it: and that the law shall go forth from Zion, and also the word of the Lord from Jerusalem. And also in the 8th verse of the same we read, that the tower of the flock, the strong hold of the daughter of Zion, that unto her shall come the FIRST dominion; and that the kingdom shall also come unto Jerusalem.
And as we read in the old translation that from the seed of Joseph should the feder be appointed by the stone of Israel; even so as Joseph the patriarch (though various means were adopted in order to destroy him) through the providence of God, became the savior of his family, so shall his seed become a feder or shepherd unto the people of God and their land, into which the Lord has led them, as he did Joseph into Egypt, become a place of deliverance from the judgments that shall come upon the earth, for all that will hearken unto the tidings of salvation and become obedient unto them.
It is written in the first chapter of Ephesians and the 10th verse, 'that in the dispensation of the fulness [fullness] of times he might gather together in one all things in Christ, both which are in heaven, and which are on earth; even in him.'
We also read in the second chapter of Daniel, of the setting up of a kingdom by the God of heaven, that should never come to an end; and, as we have before quoted, of the law going forth from mount Zion and also from Jerusalem.-Now the place from whence proceeds a law must be the seat of government, and the seat of government will be attended by subjects acknowledging its authority; and that kingdom which shall never come to an end, cannot be set up unless the people are gathered together in the fulness [fullness] of times, in order to be prepared, instructed, and sanctified that they may be fitted to meet the glorified saints whom the Lord will bring with him at his coming, who are looking forward to the time when they shall reign as kings and priests on the earth, knowing that without us they cannot be perfected, and are longing for the hour when the Lord shall reign in Mount Zion, and in Jerusalem, and when his glory shall be before them.
Having made these reflections upon the great doctrine of 'the gathering,' we now bear testimony of what the Lord has commanded in the last days. We bear testimony that the Lord God hath sent the angel beheld by John in his apocalyptic vision, having the everlasting gospel to preach unto all people; that he hath appeared unto some, and shall hereafter appear unto many, that he hath committed a dispensation of that gospel unto men, and commissioned his servants to go forth bearing testimony of these things, and to make proclamation that the hour of his judgment is come; also to proclaim that the hour of his judgment is come; also to proclaim unto the people the gospel in its fulness [fullness], the glorious law of adoption into the kingdom of God, and warning them of the judgments speedily approaching to exhort them to flee out from Babylon, that they be not partakers of her sins, and receive not of her plagues; and that the western continent is the place appointed of the Lord for the assembling of his people, that
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