'The great world movement of history is planetary motion.  "It

returneth again according to its circuits".  The End -Time will renew

the Old -Time, though under new conditions.

'It is with some providential intent the labours of a Curtino and

Grote, a Stanley and Rawlinson, a Mueller and Weltzhofer, a Mayer and

Brandis, have drawn attention to the "Laws of historical development"

and show how the destiny of the Jews affects the destiny of all

nations, and that "in the near future, the world may expect to see the

operation of the law, more powerfully than ever"'.

Inasmuch as prophecy deals with 'things to come', it must have much to

say about 'The End', 'The Time of the End', 'The Last Days' and 'The Latter

Times' as well as the great periods called 'The Day of the Lord' and 'The Day

of God'.

The Hebrew Old Testament employs the word acharith; the Greek New

Testament uses the words eschatos and once only the word husteros.  The verb

achar means 'to tarry, to remain behind', and the adjective acher means

'other' (properly one coming behind).  Other forms of the word are the adverb

'behind', the preposition 'after'.  The words acharith and acheron are the

two that concern us here, and particularly acharith, the feminine form.  It

can refer to the end of a year (Deut. 11:12) or the end or ultimate issue of

a course of action (Jer. 5:31).  'In the end of the days' looks to the

closing days of prophetic import, including the outcome, or as Dr. Nathaniel

West has put it 'The Afterness', whether of Messianic hope, or the calamitous

nature of the close of history.

The book of Job sets forth the Enigma of the Ages and its solution 'Ye

have seen the end of the Lord' (Jas. 5:11).

'So the Lord blessed the latter end of Job more than his beginning'

(Job 42:12).

The book of Job contains in dramatized form the problem of the ages,

and in the opening and closing chapters, the key to the enigma is supplied.

We who read the complete book have the advantage of Job and his friends, for

we see that Job's trouble arose, not so much from his own doings or

circumstances, but from the enmity that is inherent between the two seeds.

Satan is seen attacking Job, whose name actually means 'The Attacked' or 'One

at Enmity'.  God's permission of the evil endured by Job was, as we learn,

limited.  His life could not be touched.  We have also seen that there are

two essential features in this great outworking of the Divine purpose.

Patience, 'Ye have heard of the patience of Job', and End, 'and have seen the

end of the Lord'.  The fact that Job received 'double' for all his sufferings

and loss is stressed at the close of the book.  In the first chapter he is

said to have had 'seven sons and three daughters', he also possessed 7,000

sheep, 3,000 camels, 500 yoke of oxen and 500 she asses.  In chapter 42 we

learn that the Lord turned the captivity of Job, and gave him twice as much

as he had before.  The Lord blessed the latter end of Job more than his

beginning, for he had 14,000 sheep, 6,000 camels, 1,000 yoke of oxen, and

1,000 she asses (42:12).  The number of his children was not doubled, but he

was given seven sons and three daughters as at the beginning.  The names

given to the three daughters suggest that Job had been entirely delivered

from the loathsome disease that had been inflicted upon him, for Jemima

probably means 'as the day', betokening Job's emergence from the shadow of