Roger Bacon stood before the same dead wall.

Hakewill thinks that he is living in the last age of the world; but how long it shall last is a question which cannot be resolved, "it being one of those secrets which the Almighty hath locked up in the cabinet of His own counsel." Yet he consoles himself and his readers with a consideration which suggests that the end is not yet very near.

[Footnote: See Book i.
chap.

2, Section 4, p.

24.] "It is agreed upon all sides by Divines that at least two signs forerunning the world's end remain unaccomplished--the subversion of Rome and the conversion of the Jews.