Shortened For The Elect's Sake.

Verse 22: “And except those days should be shortened, there should no flesh be saved; but for the elect's sake those days shall be shortened.”

The papacy was clothed with civil power to punish heretics, which it held for 1260 years; and had not the period of tribulation of the elect in the providence of God been shortened, the martyrdom of the church would have continued to 1798, in which event, no flesh of the elect would have been saved. But the Reformation under Martin Luther, and those associated with this great reformer, modified this tribulation, and continued to restrain the rage and power of the papacy until the suppression of the Jesuits in 1773, since which time, there has been no general persecution waged against the church. Thus we are brought in this prophetic discourse of our Lord, down into the eighteenth century, very near the present time. We would naturally expect, then, that the instructions and warnings which follow would be applicable to this generation.