MR YARLEY’S MISSION.

Te Aroha News, Volume VII, Issue 466, 26 April 1890, Page 4

MR YARLEY’S MISSION.

A NERVE-STBETUHING DISCOURSE. Auckland, April 21, Mr V alley's discourse yesterday afternoon at the Academy of Music was chiefly remarkable for its almost awful intensity of feeling. The audience was, as usual, a large one, bub mainly composed of ladies. Ib_ was announced at the time appointed for commencement < hat the mooting had been postponed half an hour in order that business men might be able to attend. There was only a fair sprinkling of men, however, so the welcome given to the great preacher when he stepped on the platform was a characteristically fominine one. Tho address was the second of a series of lectures on “The Times of the Gentiles,” and mainly dealt with the regulation of time according to the Scriptures. The chronology of the Bible was absolutely correct in Mr Varley’s opinion. He defied anyone to prove to him by any positivo fact that the world was yet 6,000 years old. He was very earnest in asking the audience not to be befooled by scientific men and their theories. The chronology of the Scripture was perfect. It was divided into two parts —from tho creation to the deluge, and from then to the present. Tho time from creation to the deluge was well known and distinct, 1,656 years. From the time of the deluge to tho coming of Christ 4,004 years. There was no such thing, the orator declared, as the unnoted passage of time. Time was settled by God, and His termination of human rule for the world was 6,000 years. To prove this, Air Varley cited passages from the Psalms and St. Peter," in which it is stated that a thousand years is as a day in the eye of the Lord. Theso long days were nearly over. The week of days of thousands of years was all bub done. We were late in on to tho Saturday night of the world’s existence under the present conditions. We were now within nineteen years of tho day when the TIMES OF TEE GENTILES would have run out. Let his audience remember, ha reiterated, we were within 20 years of the time when God was coming. Six thousand years, he repeated again, had been given to man to show how incapable he was of ruling. What a failure it had all been ! vVliab a mess men had made of their world ! But the time was nearly over. This wicked and adulterous generation, when the rulers of men were often leading fearfully wicked lives, had almost finished its day. What progress had we made, asked the revivalist, in all tiiis vast amount of time? Yet we were always boasting of what advances we had made. Did we think that Christ would admire the monster hotels and magnificent banks of cities like Alelbourue and London? Was that our progress? What country had a Government that was really good ? None. Whore was tho man who could touch the Irish question ? Not one. Tho Government of France was

NOT WORTH SIX MONTHS’ PURCHASE.

What could we say of the true progress of Russia and Germany, or even that great Western Republic of America, which might at least be supposed to have a perfect government? “Why! What improvement was there there?” he thundered—“what progress, when in one year there were 3,377 murders committed in tho one Republic ? And what good had we - the superior beings —done the natives of Africa, with tho Bible in one hand and the rum bottle in the other ? For every one we British had saved we had damned 900.” There were in South Africa, he stated, thousands of women dying “like sheep” from diseases begotten from the filthy vices introduced by the white man. Mr Varley then went on to say that he did not want people to go away and say he had been fixing dates for the end of the world. He merely pointed out rvhen the godly rule would begin and the human end. The behaviour of tho audience through the extraordinary and it must be confessed nervethrilling discourse was significant. The strain on the temperament of some of the younger and more imaginative minds was EVIDENTLY TERRIBLY INTENSE. At first there was some careless movement and fidgetting, but a sorb of awe seemed to settle down after a few moments. Some faces grew quite rigid with nervous excitement. Fear shone from many and many a young eye, and the general tension was almost painful to witness One young girl seated in front ot our reporter was perfectly colourless with fright and excitement. She gripped the seat with her hands in a manner disagreeably suggestive of a fainting fit and subsequent hysterics. And there were hundreds in the same condition. From time to time an inaudible but perceptible expression of dread swept over the huge audience, who sab as if mesmerised, in a still and fear-stricken silence, listening to the fateful words spoken with such dread distinctness. In the middle of one of the most terrible of these tremendous time 3 some one knocked over an umbrella with a report like a pistol shot, and half tho strong men in the room, let alone women, gave a violent start —apprehensive glance round full of animal terror. If Air Varley’s object was to send his audience away somewhat scared, he succeeded nobly. Alany and many a face that came in full of the joy of living, went out gloomy with fears of death and judgment.