of his book precisely the
same state of affairs. Malachi is thus the last of all the prophets.

24. He opens his prophecies by reminding the people of God's great and
distinguishing love towards them and their fathers, which they were so
slow to acknowledge. He then reproves them sharply for the sins above
referred to, and forewarns them that the Lord, of whose delay they
complain, will suddenly come to his temple to sit in judgment there--an
advent which they will not be able to endure; for it will consume the
wicked root and branch, while it brings salvation to the righteous
(3:1-5; 4:1-3). In view of the fact that the revelations of the Old
Testament are now closing, he admonishes the people to remember the law
of Moses, and closes with a promise of the mission of "Elijah the
prophet before the coming of the great and dreadful day of the Lord"
(4:5, 6). This promise, with that contained in chap. 3:1, is repeatedly
referred to in the New Testament, and applied to the coming of John the
Baptist as our Lord's forerunner. The opening words of the prophecy,
chap. 1:2, are quoted by the apostle Paul (Rom. 9:13).

APPENDIX.

THE APOCRYPHAL BOOKS OF THE OLD TESTAMENT.

1. The Greek word _Apocrypha_, _hidden_, that is, _hidden_ or _secret_
books, was early applied by the fathers of the Christian church to
anonymous or spurious books that falsely laid claim to be a part of the
inspired word. By some, as Jerome, the term was extended to all the
books incorporated by the Alexandrine Jews, in their Greek version, into
the proper canon of the Old Testament, a few of which books, though not
inspired, are undoubtedly genuine. Another designation of the books in
question was _ecclesiastical_, books to be read in the churches for
edification, but not as possessing authority in matters of faith. But at
the era of the Reformation, when these books were separated by the
Protestant churches from the true canon, and placed by themselves
between the books of the Old and the New Testament, Jerome's old epithet
_Apocrypha_, or the _Apocryphal books_, was applied to the entire
collection.

How the term _Apocrypha_, _hidden_, became associated with the idea of
_spurious_ or _anonymous_ is doubtful. According to Augustine, it was
because the origin of these books was not clear to the church fathers. A
later conjecture, expressed by the translators of the English Bible, is
"because they were wont to be read not openly and in common,