1. THE CORONIS OR APPENDIX ¹ TO THE TRUE CHRISTIAN RELIGION

THESE three subjects - the Consummation of the Age, the Coming of the Lord, and the New Church - have, it is true, been treated of in the last chapter of the work entitled THE TRUE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. The reason why a Continuation follows about them, is, because no one at this day knows what the Consummation of the Age is, why a Second Advent of the Lord must take place, or that a New Church is about to come; and yet these three subjects are treated of in both the Prophetic and the Apostolic Word, and fully in the Apocalypse. That those three subjects are treated of in the Prophetic Word of the Old Testament, was made evident to me while it was given me to lay it open by means of the spiritual sense; and in like manner that they are treated of in the Prophetic book of the New Testament, which is called the Apocalypse: that they are also in the Evangelic and Apostolic Word, will be plain from the following pages. Hence it follows, that, without some knowledge respecting the Consummation of the Age, the Second Advent of the Lord, and the New Church, the Word is as it were shut up; nor can anything but knowledges open it: these are like keys which open the door and let one in. When this takes place with the Word, then the treasures which lay concealed therein as at the bottom of the sea, come into view; for, at the bottom, there are in the Word nothing else but treasures. In this Appendix, or Continuation, I shall proceed, in like manner as in the work itself, by prefixed Summaries, which will be confirmed from Scripture and illustrated from reason.

Voetnoten:

758. All the things the Lord spoke of with the disciples were said about the final period of the Christian church; this is obvious from Revelation, where similar predictions are made about the ending of the age and the Lord's coming. All of these were explained in detail in Apocalypse Revealed (published in 1766). Now since what the Lord told His disciples about the ending of the age and His coming is in agreement with His later disclosures on the same subjects through John in Revelation, it is perfectly clear that He meant no other ending than that of the present-day Christian church. Moreover, there was a prophecy about the end of this church in Daniel, and this is why the Lord says:

When you see the abomination of desolation, foretold by the prophet Daniel, standing in the holy place (let him who reads take due note) ... Matthew 24:15; Daniel 9:27.

There are similar remarks in the other prophets.

[2] Such is the abomination of desolation in the Christian church at the present time, as will be plain from the Appendix, which will show that there is not a single real truth left in the church, and also that unless a new church is raised up to take the place of the present one, no flesh can be saved, as the Lord said in Matthew (Matthew 24:22). It is impossible for those on earth who have convinced themselves of their false beliefs to see that the Christian church, as it is at the present time, is to such an extent brought to an end and laid waste. The reason is that the strengthening of falsity is the denial of truth. It therefore places as it were a curtain beneath the understanding, and by this means takes care that nothing else creeps in, which might wreck the ropes and stakes which hold up the system of thought he has built and formed like a rigid tent. In addition, the natural faculty of reason can prove whatever it likes, the false as much as the true. Each of these appears when proved in similar light, and there is no way of telling whether it is deceptive light such as one encounters in dreams, or true light like that of day. But it is quite different with the spiritual faculty of reason possessed by those who look to the Lord and under His guidance love truth.