PREFACE

THE   SECOND   EDITION.

IN order to save readers and critics trouble, the author
takes this opportunity of saying that the principle of his
book, Christ already come, is set forth in Lecture 16.
That Lecture may be consulted first, and if the proba-
bility of its correctness is found to be such as to induce
further investigation, the study of the rest of the Book
will follow as a matter of course.
He also desires to express his deep sense of the import-
ance of the present subject of inquiry both in itself and in
its consequences. If he is right, the expositions of the
Apocalypse with which, alas, hundreds of pulpits are now
resounding, must be as utterly at variance with Truth and
Scripture as they are with reason and common sense ; and
views like those advocated in Dr. Gumming's "End of
the World," must be as false and presumptuous as they
are deficient in argument and in a due consideration of
the rules of biblical interpretation. If he is wrong, it is
incumbent on those in authority to expose his error, and
not to suffer heresy to stalk through a Second Edition
unreproved.

 
VI PREFACE TO THE
John defines as " that old serpent called the Devil and
Satan," transmuted into heathen Rome, and of his casting
out of his mouth an eruption of Visigoths, Vandals, arid
Huns, into Italy, all of whom were Arians III
1 learnt, to my amazement, that the earth opening her
mouth and swallowing up the flood emitted by the dra-
gon, prefigured the swallowing up of these heterodox
Arians into the orthodox Trinitarian population of Italy.
I stood aghast at the omnipotence of the magic wand,
which could with a touch change a mighty angel into our
Lord Jesus Christ, and then with another touch could
transform the Saviour into Pope Leo X. I felt the sub-
ject to be wholly out of the reach of my limited percep-
tion, which could resolve the mighty voice of the angel
into the roaring of Pope Leo X. against Luther, and
the seven thunders into the thunders of the Vatican. I
found, to my great surprise, that the image of the beast
meant general councils; and the power to give life to the
image of the beast prefigured the right of the clergy to
vote at those councils. I found, — what did I not find
that did not savour of the apocryphal and the marvellous?
— I found that no limit would be put to my credulity,
and that at last I was required to believe that a certain
hail-storm which injured parts of Frame, on Sunday,
July 13, 1788, was foretold in the Apocalypse, and that
a little frog called the Tractarian heresy had been heard
by St. John to croak all the way from St. Barnabas to
Patmos, at a distance of nearly 2000 years !
Now this was really too much. It would require an
opening of the earth, such as that which swallowed up
the heterodox Arians into the Trinitarian population of
Italy, to believe it all; and it occurred to me (and I hope FIRST EDITION. Vll
I may say so without presumption, although Dr. Gum-
ming affirms he has never yet read anything to make him
dissatisfied with the correctness of his interpretations),
that the exposition of the Apocalypse might not be
finally settled, and that there might be room for another
attempt.
Accordingly I resolved to use my Protestant privilege
of searching the Scriptures for myself, and with the help
of the Commentary of the learned American expositor
Moses Stuart, and the aid of those Jewish, Heathen, and
Christian writers who lived nearest to those days, I
plunged into the Book, of which Dr. South said, " It
either finds a man mad or makes him so."
The principle upon which I have conducted this in-
vestigation is founded on that most clear, universally ex-
pressed, and Scriptural truth, that our Lord came, a$ he
said, to destroy Jerusalem, and to close the dispensation.
No doctrine of Christianity stands on more ample evi-
dence, and none is capable of more complete and definite
proof. The reason why it is not more generally insisted
upon, is that we are accustomed to look at the destruc-
tion of Jerusalem, and the close of the Jewish dispensa-
tion, in the same light as the destruction of any other
city and people. This is a false point of view. That
awful consummation was the grandest event, both in its
nature and in its consequences, which has rolled along
the stream of time. It was the breaking up, not of a
dynasty, but of a dispensation ; not of a city and nation,
but of a religion — a religion established by God himself,
and which for 2000 years was the only religion vouch-
safed to man.
As a sequence to this indisputable fact follows the ga-thering of the elect at the same period. The two events
are inseparably connected together in Holy Scripture.
If our Lord came, as he said, before that generation had
passed away, — if he came, as he said, to destroy that
city and people, and to close the age, — if he came, as he
said, before his disciples had gone through the cities of
Israel, and if some who heard his words did not taste of
death till they saw the " Son of Man coming in his king-
dom,"— then he also gathered his elect at the same time.
There is no alternative; this must either be true, or the
Bible must be false. That he did so come is proved to a
demonstration by his effecting the objects for which he
. came : that he also gathered his elect (although the sub-
ject is necessarily incapable of the same kind of proof) is
the natural consequence, and the deducible corollary from
the coming of the Son of Man.
I look upon this Book, as its title imports, as the Apo-
calypse of Jesus Christ— as the revealing and unfolding
of those scenes and events which accompanied his coming.
One note rings through all its seals, trumpets, and vials,
and the note struck is the " Lord is at hand." One bur-
den is heard through all its symbols and allegories, and
that is,- "Maran Atha," the Lord cometh. One cry is
distinguishable in the midst of sounds of terrific vengeance
taken upon a particular land, a particular people, and a
particular city, and that—" Behold he cometh with clouds,
and every eye shall see him." The Book from beginning
to end, from A to /2, is nothing else than a prophetical
drama, an allegorical representation of the Apocalypse (as
our Lord's coming is frequently called in Scripture) of
Jesus Christ. It contains no new prophecy distinct from
those uttered by our Lord. Had such prophetic teaching FIRST EDITION. IX
been necessary, it is not likely that he would have left it
to his disciples to make such announcement. They but
repeated their Master's words; and the Apocalypse is only
a recapitulation, a reiteration, of his awful sayings : " Im-
mediately after the tribulation of those days shall the sun
be darkened, and the moon shall not give her light, and
the stars shall fall from heaven, and the powers of the
heavens shall be shaken, and then shall appear the sign of
the Son of Man in heaven, and then shall all the tribes of
the earth mourn, and they shall see the Son of Man coming
in the clouds of heaven, with power and great glory; and
he shall send his angels with a great sound of a trumpet;
and they shall gather together his elect from the four
winds, from one end of heaven to the other."1
It gives additional weight to this principle of interpre-
tation, that under its application the difficulties of the
Apocalypse are no longer insurmountable. It is notorious
the Book has never yet received a satisfactory explana-
tion, and that great and good men have shrunk back from
its symbols in despair. Much that has been written upon
it is mere guess-work, and not a little so completely
shrouded in mysticism as to render it " confusion worse
confounded."
By applying this principle, an interpretation can be
given, easy, simple, natural, and, above all, one suited to
the circumstances of the case, and to the date and age of
the Apocalypse. By applying this principle,—a principle,
be it remembered, distinctly recognised in Holy Scripture,
— the Book is no longer unintelligible ; its mysteries
vanish, its figures and allegories shape themselves into
palpable truths, its enigmas are resolved, a clue can be
1 Matt. xxiv. 2J), 30, 31.

X PRIBITMJB TO THE
found for all its varied symbols, and an exposition can be
offered for all its hieroglyphic machinery.
By applying this principle, the propriety of that angelic
interposition so continuously exerted throughout the
Apocalypse is seen at once ; an interposition, let us bear
in mind, which prevailed in the world up to that period,
but which has never since been heard of amongst men.
By applying this principle, an exposition can be found for a
Book containing more complicated variety, more hetero-
geneous matter, more opposite symbols, and more diver-
sified allegory, than any other book in the world.
A Book which mixes together in one apparent mass of
inextricable confusion, earth and heaven, men and angels,
Christ and demons, a perishing earthly city and the city
of our God.

A Book, containing within a very limited compass, cha-
racters, events, times, places, circumstances, so widely
different from each other, that this world alone cannot
supply them.
A Book introducing upon the theatre of its complicated
action, Roman invaders and Euphratean allies; Kings of
the east, Kings of the earth, and Kings of the whole
world; Nero and Vespasian; Titus and John of Gischala;
Antiochus and Sohemus ; Malchus and Agrippa ; Michael
and Satan ; the false Prophet and Him called Faithful and
True; the great red Dragon and the Word of God.
A Book describing upon its variegated map the Tiber
and the Jordan ; the Mediterranean and the Euphrates ;
Patmos and Sodom; Ephesus and Egypt; Rome and
Great Babylon ; the Wilderness and Mount Zion ; the
Bottomless pit and the New Jerusalem.
A Book comprising within the many-coloured sphereFIRST EDITION XJ
of its development, Heathen persecutors and Christian
martyrs; Jewish Prophets and holy Apostles ; the Beast
and the Lamb, dypiov, apviov; the Whore and the Bride,
iropvrj, yvv*i; the Apostasy and the Church ; the Rene-
gades and the Witnesses ; the Image of the Beast and the
King of Kings ; his Mark and the Number of his Name,
and the Lord of Lords; ihe idol-branded in their fore-
heads and in their hands, the angel-sealed in their fore-
heads with the seal of the living God ; the worshippers of
the Beast and the worshippers of Him that made heaven,
and earth, and sea; the fire and brimstone, and the pre-
sence of the Lamb ; the first resurrection and the second
death.
A Book detailing in awe-struck language, a reign of
terror, a triumph of sublime agony and despair, mingled
with notes of ecstatic gladness and of pealing conquest;
the measure of wheat for a penny and the measure of
barley for a penny, and the " tree of life bearing twelve
manner of fruits ;" death on the pale horse, and hell fol-
lowing him, and the "river of life clear as crystal; " ene-
mies of Christ gnawing their tongues for pain, and ser-
vants of the Lord shouting victory ; the scorpion-stricken
longing for death, and the redeemed from among men, the
redeemed from the earth, singing Alleluia ; the great city
divided into three parts, and the holy city coining down
from God out of heaven ; the outer court of the temple
given unto the Gentiles, and the golden city which had
no temple therein ; the tribes of the earth mourning, and
the elect gathered ; the supper of the great God and the
marriage of the Lamb; the wine-press trodden without
the city, and the Book of Life ; the harvest of the earth,
and the sealing of the 144,000 ; the armies of heaven, and

Xll PREFACE TO THE
the resurrection of the just; thrones and judgment, and
the coming of the Son of Man.
Such the diversified, the miscellaneous, the unearthly,
the unique character of this wonderful Book : heaven, and
earth, and hell provide the actors on its mysterious pages,
and the scenes of its awful disclosures reach from the
throne of the Eternal to the bottomless pit. Who shall
unfold its hidden mysteries ? who shall penetrate into its
dark recesses ? " Here is wisdom.'1
A key must be found to fit a lock whose wards are so
intricate and so complicated that no false key can make
its springs revolve. A demonstration must be given to a
problem so knotty and tangled, that a mistake in the pre-
mises must lead to a wrong conclusion. An answer must
be discovered for an enigma so sphinx-like and so per-
plexing, that an uncertain reply tells its own tale imme-
diately of impotence and error. An exposition must be
found for an Apocalypse which has defied the world.1
That key—that demonstration —that answer—that expo-
sition can he found. Like all great truths, it is of simple
and easy comprehension.
The key to the Apocalypse, and the only key, is the
1 " No competent, and at the same time unprejudiced, judge will
deny, that after all the labour bestowed on its explanation, no book of
the New Testament has so defied all attempts to settle its interpretation."
— Bloomfield.
" My readers will naturally expect that I should either give a decided
preference to some one of the opinions stated above, or produce one of
my own. I can do neither, nor can I pretend to explain the Book. I
do not understand it; and in the things which concern so sublime and
awful a subject, 1 dare not, as my predecessors, indulge in conjecture*"
— Dr. Adam Clarke.
" Mihi tota apocalypsis valde ohscura videtur: et talis, cujus expli-
catio citra periculum vix queat tentari. Fateor me hactenus in nullius
Scripti Biblici lectione minus proficerc quam in hoc obscurisshno vaticinio."
— Grawrus.

FIRST EDITION.
dosing of the Jewish dispensation, the gathering of the
elect, and the coming of the Son of Man.
The nature of the interpretation about to be offered
proceeds upon this principle. It takes for granted, that
the Book really is, what at the outset it professes to be,
viz. "The revelation of Jesus Christ which God gave
unto him, to show unto his servants things which must
shortly come to pass/' It assumes, that if it was a Reve-
lation it must have been intelligible ; if it was a Revelation
shown to the servants of Christ, it must have been intelli-
gible to them; if it was a Revelation of " things which must
shortly come to pass," it is folly, nay more, it is impiety,
to look for an exposition in the distant future, for it must
have a distinct and specific reference to the circumstances
of the Church in those days.
It only remains for me to add, that although I have fre-
quently found it necessary to vindicate the Church of
Rome from what I considered unfair attacks, I am neither
a Tractarian nor a Jesuit in disguise. My sole aim and
object has been to elicit truth, and, to attain this, I have
done what my readers must do likewise,— I have renounced
all dependence upon commentaries, canons, councils,
or Fathers, and have searched the Scriptures for myself.
The result is the exposition now offered: if it is to be
condemned for its novelty, that novelty may be considered
as an indication of the genuine Protestant feeling which
has prompted such an investigation. To affirm that pro-
gress may be made in mental, moral, physical, but not in
spiritual science, is a thought worthy of the dark ages.
Wolvcrhampton, September, 1854.CONTENTS.

LECTURE I.

PAGE

Date of the Apocalypse ------- I

LECTURE II.
The Sealed Book --..-. 30

LECTURE III.

Opening of the First Four Seals - - - » -49

LECTURE IV.

The Fifth Seal. The ^Era of Martyrs - - - - -66

LECTURE V.

The Sixth Seal -------- 84

LECTURE VI.
God's Sealed Ones - ... - . 105

LECTURE VII.

The First Four Trumpets and Vials - A. - 131

LECTURE
The Fifth Trumpet and Vial - - - - - - 1GI
LECTURE IX.
The Sixth Trumpet and Sixth Vial - - - - -186

XVI CONTENTS.

LECTUKE X.

PAGE

The Open Book.......209
LECTUKE XI.
The Resurrection of the Two Witnesses - - - - 244
LECTURE XII.
The Seventh Trumpet and the Seventh Vial .... 286
LECTURE XIII.
The Church in the Wilderness - - - - . . 307
LECTURE XIV.
The Beast rising from the Sea, and the Beast coming up out of (lie
Earth........32,5
LKCTUKK XV.
Babvlon - - - - - - - -357
LECTURE XVI.
The Coming of Christ ----.-. 390
LECTURE XVII.
The Millennium, the Judgment, and the Kingdom ... 433
LECTURE XVIII.
The New Jerusalem -----.. 472
APPENDIX.
The Identity betoreen the Trumpets and Vials .... 508

APOCALYPSE FULFILLED,

CONSUMMATION OF THE MOSAIC ECONOMY, AND THE COMING OF
THE SON OF MAN.

LECTURE L
DATE OF THE APOCALYPSE.
1 REV. 1, 2, 3. 22 REV. 6, 7- 16.
i
1. The Revelation of Jesus Christ, (). And he said unto me, These
which God gave unto him, to shew sayings arc faithful and true : and
unto his servants things which W/M.V/ the Lord God of the holy prophets
shortly come to paxs : and he sent and ; sent his angel to shew unto his ser-
signifted it hy his angel unto his ser- vants the things which mu&t shortly
vant John : he done.
2. Who hare record of the word 7- Behold, I conic quickly: blessed
of God, and of the testimony of Jesus i,v he that keepeth the sayings of the
Christ, and of all things that he saw. ; prophecy of this hook.
3. Blessed ?V he that readeth, and j I(>. I Jesus have sent mine angel
they that hear the words of this pro- : to testify unto you these things in
phecy, and keep those things which the churches*
are written therein : for the time is
at hand.
OUR first Lecture must be devoted to establish certain prelimi-
naries upon which the whole theory of the subsequent interpre-
tation is to be grounded. Here it is of the utmost importance
that the base of the future superstructure should be firm and
strong.

2 DATE OF THE APOCALYPSE. [LECT. I.

We are about to erect a building, to raise story upon story,
to pile up casement upon casement; it is well then to look to
the foundation that it is securely laid, "lest haply after we have
begun to build, we should not be able to finish," and the edifice
erected at so much cost and care should fall headlong to the
ground. As a preliminary of the highest moment with regard
to the subsequent interpretation, it is proposed to consider in
this Introductory Lecture the question of the date of the Apo-'
calypse.

Here is a material difference of opinion.

We have men of high classical attainments and critical
acumen maintaining the Neronic date, I. e. that the Apoca-
lypse was written during the reign of Nero, and consequently
before the destruction of JerusalemJ; and others of equally high
reputation defending the Domitianic date, /. e. that it was
written during the reign of Dornitian, and consequently after
the destruction of Jerusalem. Who shall decide ? And yet a
decision must be come to; all subsequent interpretation depends
upon this question ; it is a point of all others most necessary to
be attained. If the Apocalypse was written in the time of Nero,
before the destruction of Jerusalem, a consistent, reasonable,
and satisfactory explanation can be given of the book : if written
in the reign of Domitian, after the destruction of Jerusalem,
that line of interpretation only can be adopted which rests on
the will and caprice of the interpreter ; and this opens so \vi<le
a field, and is capable of such unlimited extravagance, that it is
no uncommon event for hermeneutical opponents to take eontra-

1 Bishop Newton : " These prophecies were written a few years l>efore the
destruction of Jerusalem." Professor Lee : 4' I take it for granted that the
author lived some time before the destruction of Jerusalem/' Moses Stuart:
" That the Apocalypse was written under the bloody reign of Nero, or shortly
after, is a matter agreed on by nearly all the recent critics who have studied
the literature of this hook." To these rnav lie added, Sir J. Newton, Ilen-
tenius, Harduin, Orotius, Lightfoot, Schleusner, Hammond, Dr. A. Clarke,
Wetstein, and many others. " \Vetstein contends, and he is supported by
very great men among the ancients and moderns, that the Book of Revelation
was written before the Jewish war and the civil wars in Italy. That the im-
portant events which took place at that thru*, the greatest that ever happened
since the foundation of the world, were worthy enough of the Divine notice, as
the affairs of his church were so intimately connected with them."—Dr. Adam
Clarke.

LECT. L] DATE OF THE APOCALYPSE. 3
dictoryl views of the same symbol, or for interpreters holding
the same religious tenets, to place an interval of 1000 years
more or less between their several interpretations.
Now before any argument in favour of the Neronic date can
have weight, it must be shown that sufficient ground exists for
receiving with diminished confidence the common opinion that
the Revelation was seen by St. John in the reign of Domitian;
and as the question of the date is not determined in Scripture,
it will be necessary to examine the opinions of the early Chris-
tian Fathers upon this point.
The defenders of the Domitianic date rely chiefly on a pas-
sage of IreiWHis2, quoted verbatim by Eusebius in the 3rd and
5th books of his Ecclesiastical History :—" For had it been
necessary that his name should be in open publication at the
present time, it would have been mentioned by him, especially
as being the one who saw the Apocalypse; for it is not so long
a^o since it was seen, but almost in our own generation, at the
close of the reign of Domitian." This statement of Irenseus is
considerably weakened, if not shown utterly unworthy of credit,
by a similar statement of the same writer, professedly derived
from those who had received it from the Apostle John and the
other Apostles, that Christ lived to be near fifty years of aye. —
(Con. Hair. lib. vi. cap. 20.)
If we add to this his belief in the absurd opinion of the Alex-
andrian Jews respecting the miraculous version of the LXX.
(Eus. Eccles. Hist. v. 8.), and his adoption of the millennial
views of Papias (Ens. Ecrles. Hist. iii. 3[).), it will be seen
that no implicit reliance can be placed upon a writer guiJty of
1 Lufher asserted that the Beast, Rev. xvii., was the Pope. The Pope
asserted that the Beast was Luther, and the false prophet Calvin. Luther
said that the number of the Beast indicated by the numerals u'6'6 was to be
found in the name of the Pope. The Pope retaliated by finding the number
of the Beast in the name of Luther.
" The common method of interpretation founded on the hypothesis that the
book was written after the destruction of Jerusalem, is utterly destitute of
certainty, and leaves every commentator to the luxuriance of his own fancy,
as is sufficiently evident from what has been done already on this book." —
Wetstein's Gr. Test vol. ii. p. 88.0.
2 " El Si test di'(i0(mY;r eV TM rvi' k'cupfi tctjpvmffOat Tovro^a avrov tY
twlt'ov ai' IpptOtj rov KCI] rijr inroi;u\v\l>ti' twpak'oroc;. OvCf yap Trpu Tro\\ov
\poi'ov EutpaOrj ciXXci rr^ttV)!' t7Ti n/f >//ier*p(i£ ytrecce Tpoc Tfri\£i Ao/uc-
rmrov a/>x>/c."—Irciifeus; in Hter. v. 30. ; Eus. Eccles. Hist. iii. 18., v. 8.
B 2

4 BATE OF THE APOCALYPSE. [LECT. I.
such gross blunders, and that nothing is more probable than
that he should have committed an error with regard to the date
of the Apocalypse.
Eusebius1, however, appears to have relied entirely on this
passage of Irenams as determining the time when the Apocalypse
was seen, and to have drawn from it the conclusion that St. John
saw the Apocalypse in the reign of Domitian.2 He says: "In
this persecution it is handed down by tradition that the Apostle
and Evangelist John, who was yet living, in consequence of his
testimony to the Divine word, was condemned to dwell on the
Island of Patmos ;" and then he quotes the passage of Irenanis
before referred to as the source from whence this tradition sprang.
This is of great consequence, because it serves to show, that the
opinion of Eusebius /',? not independent testimony, but simply a
repetition of the statement of Irenreus ; and this observation is
also applicable to the testimony of Jerome, who only reiterates
the opinions of Jrenfeus and Eusebius.
This tradition is further supported by Virtoriuus 3, who as-
serts: "When John saw the Apocalypse, he was in the island
of PatmolJ banished by Caesar Domitian." "Domitian being
slain, John, dismissed from banishment, afterwards committed
to writing this same Apocalypse which he had received from
the Lord.'7
But Victorinus on Rev. iv. 14.4 says: "For he wrote
1 u 'E»> TOVTO) KaTi-^tt Xoyoc TOV aTrooToXor upa KT(i €vayy£\ioTi/i' 'Iwarrj?!'
tri TO) /3/6> ivCta.T(>i£oi'Ta9 rrjc tie; ror £tior Xoyoi' treKa paprvpidQy Ilcir-
pov olKt.1v Kara^iKatrdrji'at rrji' i'»/flr0r, yp<«^wi> yt. rot v Eip/ru7o£," K. r. X.
Eus. Eccles. Hist. iii. 18. 4i'ErOa Trji' uTrokaXi^tr loipcik'tr, u>e CtjXol Klp?/-
valoc"—Eus. Chronicon.
- That Eusebius was not very careful in preserving the strict meaning of
the authors quoted by him, may be proved from the circumstance that he
renders the words of Tertullian "cum maxime Rom IF orientem" (Tert. Apol.5.)
" then chiefly springing up at Rome," by " //n\-a /utXtora eV'Pw^p r»yi' ara-
ToXtjv tratrav i/TrorciSat,"—translated by Dr. ('ruse " particularly then, when
after subduing all the East, he exercised his cruelty against all at Rome/'—
giving a totally different meaning from the original.
3 "Quando hoc vidit Johannes, erat in insula Patmos, in metallum darnna-
tus, a Domitiano Caesare." ft Interfecto Domitiano, Johannes de metallo di-
jnissus, sic postea tradidit bane eandem quarn acceperat a Domino A]>oca-
lypsin."—In Bib. Max. iii. p. 419-
4 "Nam Evangeliuin postea scripsitcum essent Valentinus, et Cerinthus, et
Ebion, et caeteri scbol® Sathanae diffusi per orbem, convenerunt ad ilium de
finitimis provinciis omnes, et compulerunt ut ipse testimonium conscriberet."

LECT. I.] DATE OF THE APOCALYPSE. 5
his Gospel afterwards, when Valentinus, and Cerinthus, and
Ebion, and others of Satan's school, were scattered over the
world: all from the neighbouring provinces came together to
him, and compelled him also to write his Gospel." Yet Epi-
phanius l declares, that John wrote his Gospel after the return
from Patmos in the time of Claudius Ca?sar, A. D. 54. A
fragment of Hippolytus places the date of that Gospel A.D. 61,
and Sir Isaac Newton, quoting from Caius, says that " Cerin-
thus lived so early that he resisted the Apostles at Jerusalem in
or before the iirst year of Claudius, that is, 26 years before the
death of Nero, and died before John." Victorinus is followed
by Sulpicius Sever us, Orosius, and others.
It appears then matter of fact that a tradition originated with
Iremeus 2 (a writer by no means infallible), which was subse-
quently propagated by successive ecclesiastical writers, who fol-
lowed one another much on the same principle as the Chiliasts
followed Papias on the question of the Millennium, — "He was
the cause that by far the greater number of Church writers after
1 ec'Merd rt}if avrou CITTO r//t' Harjjiov erraroco)', r/)r iirl K\a,$$iov y&'QjJii-
i )))' Kaiarapos"—Epiphan. Ihur. 51.
2 ct Irenteus introduced an opinion that the Apocalypse was written in the
time of Domitian ; but then he also postponed the writing of some others of
the sacred books, and was to place the Apocalypse after them. He might
perhaps have heard from his master Polycarp that he had received this book
from John about the time of Domitian's death ; or indeed John might him-
self at that time have made a new publication of it, from whence Irena^us
might imagine it was then but newly written. Eusebius in his Chronicle and
Ecclesiastical History follows Iremeus, but afterwards in his Evangelical De-
monstrations he conjoins the banishment of John into Patmos with the deaths
of Peter and Paul, and so do Tertullian and Pseudo-Prochorus as well as the
first author, whoever he was, of that very ancient fable that John was put by
Nero into a vessel of hot oil, and coining out unhurt, was banished by him
into Patmos. Though this story be no more than a fiction, yet was it founded
on a tradition of the first Churches, that John was banished into Patmos in
the days of Nero. Epiphanius represents the Gospel of John as written in
the time of Claudius, and the Apocalypse even before that of Nero.
" Arethas in the beginning of his Commentary quotes the opinion of Iremcus
from Eusebius, but follows it not , for he afterwards affirms the Apocalypse
was written before the destruction of Jerusalem, and that former commentators
had expounded the Sixth Seal of that destruction. With the opinion of the first
commentators agrees the tradition of the churches of Syria preserved to this
day in the title of the Syriac version of the Apocalypse, which title is this, —
' The Revelation which was made to John the Evangelist by God, in the
island of Patmos, into which he was Vanished by Nero the Ctesar." — Sir 1.
Newton.
B a

6 DATE OF THE APOCALYPSE. [LECT. I.

him held the like doctrine, pleading the antiquity of the man"
(Eus. Eccles. Hist. iii. 39.), that the Apocalypse was seen by
St. John in Patinos at the close of Domitian's reign.

The question arises was this tradition universally received ;
and if not, is there positive evidence to show that a contrary
opinion was entertained even from the earliest times?

The first testimony which I shall adduce to show that the
tradition of Irenteus was not universally adopted, is that of
Epiphanius1, who says of St. John, — " Who prophesied in the
time of Claudius (A.D. 54) .... the prophetic word accord-
ing to the Apocalypse being disclosed."

In a fragment of an antient Latin writer2, attributed by
some to Caius, it is found — " Paul, following the order of his
predecessor John, wrote only to seven churches by name in
similar order/7 In this passage John is called the predecessor
of Paul, and Paul is said only to have written to seven churches
by name, following the example of John, who wrote only to
the seven churches of Asia. Now as Paul suffered martyr-
dom A.D. 68, this would place the date of the Apocalypse prior
to the destruction of Jerusalem.

The title of the Syriac version is " The Revelation which
was made to John the Evangelist by God in the island of
Patmos, into which he was banished by Nero the Ca\sar"
Tertullian3 conjoins the banishment of John with the martyrdom
of Peter and Paul at Rome, under Nero — " O happy Roman
church, where Peter is deemed worthy to share the passion of
the Lord, where Paul is beatified by the same death as John
(the Baptist), where the Apostle John plunged into burning oil,
escapes unhurt, arid is condemned to banishment." Andreas4,

oc ir ffltoi'OiG KXai/ctow .... oa/v'rv/u'rou rov Kara r;/i'
Xoyov Trpo^jyrik'ou." — Hair. 5J.
2 " Paulus, sequens praetkcessoris sui Johannis ordinein, nonni^i noininatim
septem ecclesiis scribal online tali." — Muratori, Antiq. Ital. iii. p. 85-1.
3 "Felix ecclesia Rom an a, ubi Petrus passioni Dominicse adi&quatur, ubi
Paulus Jobannis exitu coronatur, ubi Apostolns Johannes postcaquam in
oleum igneum demersus, nihil passus est, in insularn relegatur."
4 Andreas and Arethas, tbe earliest commentators excepting a few frag-
ments of Victor-inns, whose interpretations have come down to us, not only
expound the Apocalypse of tbe woes which fell upon the Jews,, but declare
that other* had done .vo ako. Arethas moreover shows that be was acquainted
with the tradition of Jrenams,which he evidently considered incorrect. This is
invaluable, because it shows that from early times the symbols of the Revelation

LECT. L] DATE OF THE APOCALYPSE. 7
bishop of Ceesarea, in his Greek commentary on the Apocalypse,
still extant, (c. vi, 16.) says, "John received this revelation
under the reign of Vespasian" On Rev. vi. 12.: " There are
not wanting those who apply this passage to the siege and de-
struction of Jerusalem by Titus" On Rev. vii. 2. he says :
" Although these things happened in part to Jewish Christians,
who escaped the evils inflicted on Jerusalem by the Romans, yet
they more probably refer to Antichrist." Arethas, who suc-
ceeded Andreas, mentions the statement of Iremeus before
alluded to ; he says : " That John was banished to the isle of
Patmos under Domitian, Eusebius alleges in his Chronicon."
But on Rev. vi. i£J. he affirms : " Some refer this to the siege of
Jerusalem by Vespasian, interpreting all tropically." On Rev.
vii. 1. : "Here, then, were manifestly shown to the Evangelist
that things were, to hefal the Jews in their tear against the
Romansy in the way of avenging the sufferings inflicted upon
Christ." On Rev. vii. 4. : " When the Evangelist received
these oracles, the destruction in which the Jews were involved
was not yet inflicted by the Romans" To all this may be
added the testimony of Origen1, upon which Moses JStuart, from
whom this evidence is chiefly taken, lays great weight: " The
King of the Romans, as tradition teaches, condemned John,
who bare witness for the word of truth, to the island of Patmos.
John, moreover, teaches us the things respecting his testimony,
without saying who condemned hint, when lie utters these
things in the Apocalypse." It must have been impossible for
Origen, the greatest critical scholar of the first three centuries,
not to have known the statement of Ireiueus respecting the
Domitianic date, and this makes his silence all the more marked,
lie mentions neither Nero nor Domitian. "The King of the
Romans," he says, "condemned John to the isle of Patmos," and
he remarks tluit St. .John is silent respecting the author of his
exile,—"without sayiny trho condemned him"
Even on the supposition that the evidence adduced for the
wore applied to the closing scenes of the Jewish dispensation, and that the
fable of the Pope and the scarlet lady is the myth of yesterday.
1 '() <?£ 'V'hiiu (<i)r /HirrtXf t>f o;c »/ TcafiuCofru; fttCuvxei KctT^ik'nfff ror'Iw«r-
TU fttct TOT rj/c u/\j;0v':./'nc \oyor f?c Harbor r»)»-' i'ji/<ro»'. ^u'«-
i TOV naprvptou tavrov 'Iwarri/c, /<»} \iytor TIC aurov xaTiCt-
/;«<rf, tyiuTKMV .v Ttj tA7roK'a\v\//ec rai/r«." — Opp. in Matt. iii.

8 BATE OF THE APOCALYPSE. [LECT. I.
Neronic date is not so conclusive as that brought forward for the
Domitianie date (although when it is considered that Eusebius
followed Iremeus, and that Jerome followed Eusebius, and so
on, the testimony becomes that not of many individuals but of
one), yet still it must be admitted there is positive external
evidence in favour of the Neronic, as well as of the Domitianic
date, and all that can be done is to array father against
father, and testimony against testimony, weighing the proba-
bilities of the truthfulness of each in the balances of our own
judgment.
It is plain the question cannot be settled by external testi-
mony. What, then, is the fair and manly course to be taken
in bringing this point to a right issue ? If the conflicting tra-
ditions of the early church make it impossible to determine
whether John was banished to Patmos in the reign of Nero or
Doinitian, let an appeal be made to the internal eridaice of the
book itself. Let the words traced by the Spirit of God teach us
that knowledge which we cannot learn from the surmises of the
early fathers, or from the traditions of the Church. Let the
love of "science falsely so called," which would exhaust human
wisdom in building up a position drawn from sources from which
no valid argument can be drawn, turn from the fables of an-
tiquity to the truth of revelation. The Scriptures are silent;
the voice of antiquity is divided ; one only course remains (a
course the supporters of the Domitianic date are very reluctant
to adopt), and that is, to rest the question upon far surer
grounds than the tradition of Irerueus, or the hesitations of
Eusebius, who does not seem to have believed that St. John
wrote the book at all.1 Let us then inquire—Is there internal
1 Eusebius affords almost a solitary example amongst the early fathers of
indecision and douht respecting the authorship and canonical rank of the Apo-
calypse : he says, (Eccles. Hist. iii. 24.) : " The opinions respecting the Reve-
lation are still greatly divided"—u T>7c' c' 'A7rona\v\lsf.iij£ tfy tvarf/ior tVi
rvv Trapa TOIQ rroXXolc iripU\k'tTai if 3V'£a."
Speaking of canonical books. " To these may be added, if it seem good, (tt
<j)aveiri,} the Apocalypse of John,". . .. '* which some reject, but others reckon
it among the acknowledged books."—Eus. Kccles Hist. iii. 25. He gives at
some length the opinions of Dionysius, who supposed the author of the Apo-
calypse not to be the same John who wrote the Gospel: <l That it is a John
who wrote these things we must believe, as he. says it ; but what John it is, is
uncertain." " I am of opinion, there were many of the same name with John
the Apostle."... " I think, therefore, that it was another one of those in Asia, for

LECT. I.] DATE OF THE APOCALYPSE. 9
evidence from the book itself which makes it morally certain
that the Revelation must have been written before the destruc-
tion of Jerusalem ? I answer,—there is overwhelming evidence
in favour of this position in every page and line of the Apoca-
lypse, whilst there is no internal evidence, deserving the name,
to show that it was written after that period.
* 1. Our first argument is, that St. John speaks continually of
the speedy coming of Christ.
Rev. i. 7-—" Behold Me cometh with clouds."
Rev. in. 11----"Behold I come quickly."
Rev. xiv. 1 Jk—" Behold a white cloud, and upon the cloud
one sat like unto the Son of Man."
Rev. xvi. 15.—" Behold I come as a thief."
Rev. xix. 11.—" I saw heaven opened, and behold a white
horse, and he that sat upon him.....is called the
Word of God."
Rev. xxii. C20—" He which testifieth these things, saith,
surely I come quickly."
No scriptural statement is capable of more decided proof
than, that the coming of Christ is the destruction o£ Jerusalem,
and the close of the Jewish dispensation.1
they say that there arc two monuments at Ephesus, and that each bears the name
of John."—(Eus. Eccles. Hist. vii. 25.) I do not mention tthis to cast any doubt
upon the authorship of the Apocalypse, for the testimony of antiquity may be
said to he universally agreed that the Apocalypse was written by St. John.
This is also confirmed by the internal evidence of the Book: — Compare
" If I will that he tarry till I come/' John, xxi. 22.
" Even so, come,, Lord Jesus." Rev. xxii. 20.
" Behold the Lamb of God." John, i. M.
"A Lamb stood on the Mount Sion." Rev. xiv. 1.
li In the beginning was the Word." John, i. 1.
(( His name is called the Word of God.*' Rev. xix. 13.
" They shall look on him whom they pierced." John, xix, 37.
" Every eye shall see him, and they also which pierced him." Rev. 1. 7-
These and many other interesting peculiarities of style and language, found
only in the Apocalypse and in the Gospel of St. John, render it highly pro-
bable that he was the author. These doubts of Eusebius are only adduced to
show that no great dependence can be placed upon him with regard to any
decision respecting the date, and if that in his opinion, the claim to authorship
was not completely settled, bis testimony with regard to the date must neces-
sarily be looked upon as liable to suspicion.
1 Bishop Newton says : " Our Saviour's repeating so frequently in this
book,—'Behold, I come quickly;' l Behold, he cometh with clouds, and

10 DATE OF THE APOCALYPSE. OUcx. I.
At this part of the subject I cannot stop to adduce the many
and varied proofs which establish this—a few must suffice : —
Matt, xxiv. 29.—"Immediately after the tribulation of
those days.....they shall see the Son of Man
coming in the clouds of heaven/*
Mark xiii. 24___"In those days, after that tribulation
. . . . then shall they see the Son of Man coming- in the
clouds with power and great glory."
Luke XXK 22—27—" These be the days of vengeance . . .
for there shall be great distress in the land, eVt TTjsyrJs, Judaxi,
and wrath upon this people, but woe to them that are with child
and to them that give suck in those days , . . . they
shall fall by the edge of the sword .... and Jeru-
salem shall he trodden down of the Gentiles .... and
then shall they see the Son of man coming in a cloud with
power and great glory."
Nothing can be plainer than that our Lord said his advent
should take place, according to St. Matthew, " Immediately
after the tribulation of those days;" according to St. Mark,
"In those days after that tribulation;" according to St.
Luke, when 4f Jerusalem should be trodden down of the
Gentiles" and there should be " yreat distress in the land and
ivrath upon this people" At that time, and at no other, did
our Lord say that he would come. At the outset, then, I state
with what may be thought great boldness, but with the
strongest conviction of truth, that the coming of Christ is the
destruction of Jerusalem, and the close of the age, crwreXeta
TOV aloivos, and that no other coming is spoken of in the
Scriptures.
If so, and the Apocalypse be written after the destruction
of Jerusalem, it must be the work of some higher arch-enemy
than Cerinthus, for it represents Christ as yet to come after
the object for which he said he would come had been fulfilled.
And be it remembered, the proof of our Lord's coming at
every eye shall see him ;' and the like expressions, cannot surely be so well
understood of any event as of the destruction of Jerusalem ; which coining
was also spoken of in the Gospels; and what other coming was there HO
speedy, and so conspicuous ?" Add to this, "they ulso which pierced him, '
were to look upon him ; and who were they " which pierced him " but the
Jews ?

LECT. L] DATE OF THE APOCALYPSE* 11

that period does* not depend upon the Apocalypse. That truth
would have remained the same had the Apocalypse never been
written. The Apocalypse only confirms the statements in the
Gospels. It is only when viewed as written after that event
that the whole question is encircled with irreconcileable diffi-
culties. For if the Gospels and Epistles state explicitly that
Christ was to come within a certain defined period, and for a
certain defined object, and the Apocalypse represents him as yet
to corne, after that event had taken place, and that period
passed away, not only is Scripture set against Scripture, hut
the whole of the sacred canon is involved in one irremediable
mass of contradiction and mystery.

2. The woes of the Apocalypse (and I presume I may take it
for granted that the Book from the opening- of the first seal to
the final consummation of the destruction of Babylon, is one
unmixed and uninterrupted series of terrible calamity) are said
to fall upon the dwellers in a particular land, upon the Princes
and Lords, and merchants of a particular land, and upon a par-
ticular city.

These are described as " they that dwell on the earth,"1 "01
ovvres CTTC T^9 y??9«" " The kings of the earth," " )8a~
rfjs yr?9." " The great men of the earth," " p.ey toravcs
7779." " The merchants of the earth," " e/u-Tropot rrjs
"The great city which had dominion over the kings of
the earth," " rj 710X15 rj ptyokri rj e^ovcra fiao'iXeiav CTTI raw

Let us see first whether the woes of the Apocalypse descend
upon " them that dwell on the earth."
This can be confirmed by numerous passages scattered
everywhere throughout the Book, thereby proving that the
Apocalypse embraces only one grand subject, and that the
miseries about to fall on one particular people.
" Woe, woe, woe, to the inhabiters of the earth," (Rev.
1 " They that dwell on the earth," CTTI r//c y*k — m every passage this
uityht to bv translated, "ON THE LAND,"*'.*', the land of Judsen. Compare
Luke, xxi. 23. : ** there shall be great distress in the land, and wrath upon
this people," — 4*'"Koreu yap untyo; pfyaXrj irrl rrjfc yJ/C» Kdt opyy iv TM \af
Tovru" — where our translators, driven to the right meaning of the words by
the qualifying clause, " this people,'* have translated CTT* r//c yyc *' in the
land/'

12 DATE OF THE APOCALYPSE. [LECT. L
viii. 13.) " Woe to the inhabiters of the earth and of the
sea/' (Rev. xii. 12.) "And there fell a noisome and a
grievous sore upon the men which had the mark of the beast,
and which worshipped his image," (Rev. xvi. 2.) Now the
men who had " the mark of the beast, and who worshipped his
image," are defined as " they that dwell on the earth." " And
all that dwell upon the earth shall worship him," «. e. the
beast, (Rev. xiii. 8.) " He . . , causeth the earth and them
that dwell therein to wrorship the first beast," (Rev. xiii. 12.)
66 And deceiveth them that dwell on the earth . . . saying
to them that dwell on the earth, that they should make an
image," (Rev. xiii. 14.) (Compare also Rev. iii. 10., Rev.
vi. 10., Rev. xvii. 2., Rev. xvii. 8.) I trust then it will be
admitted as an irrefragable position, that the woes of the Apo-
calypse were to foil upon a particular people specially marked
out and defined as " Them that dwell on the earth."
Now who are " they that dwell on the earth ?"
The words " the earth," "^ y^," are not unfrequently used
in the Apocalypse in connection with other clauses which qua-
lify their meaning, making it evident that no particular land is
pointed out, but the earth generally. I would adduce in support
of this such passages as the following :—" And no man in
heaven, nor in earth, neither under the earth,77 (Rev. v. o.) ;
" And every creature which is in heaven, and on the earth,
and under the earth, and such as are in the sea," (Rev. v.
13. So also Rev. xi. ()., xiv. 7»? xviii. 1., xx. U. &c.) In
all which passages it is at once evident from the qualifying
adjuncts that no particular land can be intended, but the earth
generally as part of creation.
In some other passages, the obscurity of which does not
admit of a positive interpretation, it is possible that the earth
generally or a particular land may be intended. I allude to
such texts as "The seven spirits of God sent forth into all
the earth," (Rev. v. 6.); "The stars of heaven fell to the
earth," (Rev. vi. 13.) ; " And he set his right foot upon the
sea, and his left foot on the earth," (Rev. x. 2.) ; although,
if we bring our Lord's prophecies and the prevailing opinions
of the Jews into the scale, it will seem most probable that a
particular land was intended. But the words in question are
sometimes found qualified by governing considerations whichLECT. L] DATE OF THE APOCALYPSE. ' 13
define and determine their meaning, and this is always the
case, when they are found in connection with the governing
clause " they that dwell," " ot /carot/cowres." Then they have,
and can have, only one meaning ; then they refer only to one
land and to one people ; and this land and this people must be
the land and people of Judiea.
This will be reduced to demonstration from a consideration of
the passages in which these words occur.
They are found put in apposition and contradistinction to
" every tongue and kindred, and people and nation," " iraora
<j>v\r) /cat yXwcrcTT?, /cat Xaos *at €0vo$" It is well known
that one only land claimed this distinction ; one only people as-
serted this separation from the Gentile world. The Greeks
were not more anxious to be held distinct from the Barbarians,
than the Jews from the heathen,—than "they that dwell on
the earth," from the tongues, and kindreds, and peoples, and
nations.
The first passage which I shall bring forward in proof of
this is Rev. vii. 4., where the 144,000 are said to be sealed
" of all the tribes of the children of Israel." By turning to
Rev. xiv. 3., it will be found that the same 144,000 are said
to be " redeemed from the earth" These are contrasted (Rev.
vii. 9«) with " a great multitude ... of all nations and kindreds,
and people and tongues." Here it is evident that the 144,000
of all the tribes, defined as the " redeemed from the earth," are
put in apposition to " the great multitude . . . of all nations and
kindreds, and people and tongues." The inference is un-
avoidable that the writer of the Book intended to draw a dis-
tinction between Jew and Gentile, between the sealed " of all
the tribes of the children of Israel," (and these tribes are enu-
merated by name in order to show that a literal Israel is in-
tended,) and the gathered from "all nations and kindreds, and
people and tongues ;" and by comparing Rev. vii. 4. with Rev.
xiv. 3. it is made matter of positive certainty that the " re-
deemed from the earth" are identical with the sealed from "all
the tribes of the children of Israel." This at once gives us
the position we contend for, that " the earth " is the land of
Juda»a.
Rev. xi. 9. 10. " And they of the people and kindreds and&ATI OF THE APOCALYPSE. [LECT. I.
tongues mid nations shall see, &c. ... and they that dwell
upon the earth shall rejoice over them/'
Rev, xiii. 7, 8. " And power was given unto him over all
kindreds, and tongues, and nations, and all that dwell upon
the earth shall worship him/'
Ilev. xiv, 0. " And I saw another angel . . . having the
everlasting1 Gospel to preach unto them that dwell on tlte earth,
and to every nation, and kindred, and tongue, and people."
In all these passages there is a marked antithesis between the
Jew and the Gentile, a distinction evident to the simplest
comprehension. The Jew is described by that title which be-
longs to him alone, and which is never used in this Book in
any other sense but as defining that peculiar people who were
separate from the Gentile world. The heathen, on the other
hand, are appropriately distinguished by the name by which the
Jew ever recognised them,— the one as " they that dwell upon
the earth;" the other, as "the nations, and kindreds, and
tongues, and people."
The same argument may be drawn from the consideration of
those texts in which the expression "the kings of the earth"
occurs, in contradistinction to other clauses which serve to define
and particularise its meaning. And here again I should wish
to take it for granted that the woes of the Apocalypse descend
upon the "kings of the earth" as well as upon "them that
dwell on the earth." This will not require any elaborate proof.
Under the Sixth Seal the kings of the earth and the great men
hide themselves from the approaching vengeance, calling upon
the mountains and rocks, almost in the identical language pre-
dicted by our Lord, " Fall on us, and hide us from the face of
him that sitteth on the throne, and from the wrath of "the
Lamb." (Rev. vi. 16.) At the destruction of Great Babylon
the kings of the earth "bewail and lament for her when they
see the smoke of her burning." (Rev. xviii. 9.)
It will then hardly be denied that the woes of the Apocalypse
come on princes and lords, who are called kings of the earth,
as well as upon the inhabiters of the earth.
Is there then any clue by which we may discover who are
meant by the kings of the earth ? (Rev. xvi. IC2. 14.) They
are mentioned in opposition to the "kings of the East" and theLBCT.I.] DATS OF TEE APOCALYPSE. 15

king's " of the whole world." ] This is a very remarkable dis-
tinction. They are the princes of a particular land which main-
tained a separation from every other country, which held itself
aloof from the " whole world'7 of imperial Rome, and the hinds
inhabited by the people of the East. This in the uniform lan-
guage of history and Scripture can only be Judaea.

The same distinction is observable in Rev..xviii. 3. : "For
all nations, effiny, have drunk of the wine of the wrath of her
fornication, and the kings of the earth, 7179 9/775, have com-
mitted fornication with her." So also Rev. xxi. 24. : "And
the nations, tdvrj, of them that are saved shall walk in the lioht
of it, and the kings of the earth, rfjs 7775, do bring their glory
and honour into it."

It is most evident that the writer of the Apocalypse (a book
everywhere abounding with the most forcible and magnificent
contradistinctions and appositions) intended by these striking
points of contrast to define and to determine the princes of that
particular land which ever vaunted its superiority in point of
privilege above the heathen world.

The same argument, which however I shall not now pursue,
is applicable to the expression "the merchants of the earth,"
€p,7ropOL TT}9 7779, as contrasted with "all nations," TTCLVTQ* ra
tOm) (Rev. xviii. 3. ; Rev. xviii. 23.).

I may now take it lor granted that the woes of the Apoca-
lypse descend upon a particular city as well as upon the inhabit-
ants and princes of a particular land. ISow that city (every-

1 " The kings of the earth," r?/c ync, are not the kings of the Gentile na-
tions, or they would be called " o\ fia<ri\ug ru)r ctti'wt' (Luke, xxii. 25.),
and not " oi /3a*ri/\f7c T*J/C )""/€" They are not identical with " <>l ctKa /xt-
ffiXecc . . . TOV $t]frivv (Rev. xvii. 12.) ; for these are not called " oi. ftatriXuc
TJ/C yJ/r-" Nay, it is said of them that they shall hate the whore, fc // t^ovtra
ftctfTi\f.iai' lir\ Tu>r fittffiKiw n/e ytj<; ;" it would be impossible for them to hate
and destroy the " whore which reigneth over the kings of the earth," and be
themselves *' the kings of the earth." Added to this, Clement calls the king
of Jericho ao /Jao-iXevc riJQ yijff," (Epist. i. 12.) ; and Herod and Pontius
Pilate, the rulers of Judfca, are called " the kings of the earth" (Acts, iv. 26*.)
It is most evident that a distinction was intended to he made between "the
kings of the East,—te TUH> (two UVCITO\£V i/X/oi;," defined by St. Clement to
mean " ai/<m>Xu-w ro/roc, TOVT* trrrir oi ire pi Tt}v 'ApaS/ar,*' (Epist. i. ad
Cor. 25.), "the kings of the whole world,"—ri/<; oiKovjjiivtjs o'X?/c,—of Im-
perial Home, — and " the kings of the earth,"— r>;£ y;Jc, — Judwa1ft

BATK OF THE APOCALYPSE, [LECT. L

where mentioned in the Apocalypse as the subject of divine

wrath) is defined as "that great city which reigneth over the

Kings of the earth." If "they that dwell on the earth," as opposed

to the heathen, can only be the Jewish people ; if " the kings of

the earth," as distinct from the kings of the East and of the

whole world, can only be the princes of Judaea ; then " the great

city which reigneth over the kings of the earth " can only be

Jerusalem.

It will be satisfactory to find that the same argument which
we have as yet employed, is applicable to our present posi-
tion ; and that the city which is the object of the woes of the
Apocalypse is ever held distinct from the cities of the heathen.
Rev. xvi. 19. The city is contrasted with the cities of the
nations : " And the great city was divided into three parts, and
the cities of the nations, eQvatv, fell, and Great Babylon came
in remembrance before God."

Nothing can be more evident than that a marked contrast is
here intended to be kept up between the great city which came
into remembrance before God, and the cities of the nations,

Rev. xi. C2. — " The holy city shall they (the Gentiles,
tread under foot." Or, according to St. Luke, xxi. 24. —
" Jerusalem shall be trodden down of the Gentiles." The dis-
tinction drawn between the Gentiles who should tread down
" the holy city," and that city which alone could claim this
unique title of separation, is so plain, that there hardly seemed
a necessity for the author of the Apocalypse to render his
meaning still more intelligible by defining that holy city as
"the great city where also our Lord was crucified." — Rev.
xi. 8. ~
In Rev. xvii. 1. mention is made of " the great whore," and
"The many waters." In verses 15, 18, the "waters" are ex-
plained to mean " peoples, and multitudes, and nations, and
tongues," and "the woman" " the great city which reigneth
over the kings of the earth." Here is another clear point of
antithesis between the metropolis of Judam, over which " the
kings of the earth" lament (Rev. xviii. {))> an(l fr°m whose
approaching miseries "the kings of the earth" hide them-
selves (Rev. vi. 15.), and "the peoples, and multitudes, and
nations, and tongues," of the heathen world ; and it is worthy

LECT. I] DATE OF THE APOCALYPSE. 17
of observation that this distinction is found in a passage which
is a definition of the symbols of verse 1. and where it is
evident that the author, as in his previous delineation of " the
great city77 by the significant phrase " Where also our Lord
was crucified" or of "the great dragon" by " That old
serpent called the Devil or Satan," intended to give an intelli-
gible explanation of the symbols employed.
The argument then resolves itself into this :—Either the
woes of the Apocalypse hare fallen upon this particular
people, princes, and city, or they hare yet to fall upon this
particular people, princes, and city.
For it cannot be too strongly stated that the terrific symbols
of the Apocalypse do not fall upon the dwellers on the whole
world, oiKov/mevr), upon the princes and merchants of the
Gentiles, edvr), or upon more than one city, and that, not a city
of the nations, Wvri, but a city having* dominion over the
"kings of the earth.77 That from the beginning to the end of
this mysterious volume one only people are the subjects of
vengeance, and no vengeance is denounced on any other. One
only city conies into remembrance before God ; the princes and
merchants of one only laud experience the vengeance of the
Almighty ; and these are from first to last put into distinct
contrast with the rest of mankind.
It will give me no trouble to show that they have so fallen.
I answer at once, in the words of St. Barnabas, " So it is,"
" and it has come to pass us the Lord hath spoken "—" Tivt-
rai." " KCU eyeVero Kaff a tXdXr/cre Kvpios" (S. Barnabas
Epist. 1(5.) This is so certain that nothing more need be said.
It will not be so easy to show that the woes of the Apocalypse
have yet to fall upon the Jewish people.
According to popular theories, the kings of the East, trans-
formed into the people of the Jews, although the Jews never
considered or spoke of themselves as the people of the East,
are to be gathered unto their own land ; Jewish millionaires
are to repurchase Palestine ; Jerusalem is to be rebuilt with a
splendour hitherto unequalled ; Christ is to come and reign on
an earthly throne; Christianity is to go back into Judaism
instead of Judaism being transfused into Christianity ; and
the Jews are to be the authors of the complete conversion
of the human race.

18 DATE OF THE APOCALYPSE. [LBCT. I.
What then becomes of the woes of the Apocalypse ? In
that case we must suppose that the language of this Book,
not one word of which was to be taken from or added to,
was ironical. We must reverse the dirge of this Book of
blood into the Te Detim of thrilling victory. We must say
"Peace, peace, peace!" and not " Woe, woe, woe to the in-
habiters of the earth !"
But not to pursue this chain of thought further, I shall
hope it may be considered proved that the woes of the Apo-
catypse descend upon a particular people, princes, and city.
That this particular people, princes, and city, are contrasted
with heathen nations, heathen princes, and heathen cities.
That one only people, rulers, and city, claimed this isolated
and peculiar position ; and this people, dynasty, and city, are
the people, dynasty, and city of Jiuhen.
That the whole argument may fairly be resolved into this :
~ «/ j
either the woes of the Apocalypse have fallen, or have yet to
fall, upon this particular people, princes, and city ; that there
is evidence complete and satisfactory that the woes of the Apo-
calypse have fallen upon this land, princes, and city ; that there
is not evidence to justify the expectation they have yet to fall
upon this particular people, princes, and city, inasmuch as the
people are no more a people, and the city no more the holy city
of God ; and that even on the supposition the holy city and
people should be once more restored, the whole foundation of
such restoration proceeds on the principle riot of their being
subject to such woes as are predicted in the Apocalypse, but of
their being once more the favoured people of God ; their city
once more the joy of the whole earth ; the Saviour, whom
they once rejected in their obstinacy, proclaiming from Zion
his universal law; and the throne of the new and earthly
Jerusalem filled by Him who is " King of Kings and Lord
of Lords."
3. 8t. John speaks of the Jeirs as still e.vistiny as a people,
and of the temple and city of Jerusalem as still standing, wl^cli
was not the case in the days of JJomitian.
In Rev. vii., the 144,000 are said to be sealed from the
twelve1 tribes of Israel. This supposes that Israel had not yet
1 Jt may be objected, tbat ten of the twelve tribes did not return from the
Assyrian captivity. But it is an answer to this to Bay, that in our Lord'sLECT. L] BATE OF THE APOCALYPSE. 19

been led away captive into all nations ; for how could they be
sealed from the twelve tribes of Israel, after the complete dis-
persion and annihilation of the Jewish people, which took place
at the close of the Jewish dispensation ?

In Rev. xi. John is commissioned to " measure the temple,
the altar, and the worshippers." The outer court he is to leave
out, for it is to be " given unto the Gentiles, and the holy city
shall they tread under foot forty and two months/'

This places the date of the book anterior to the destruction
of the temple under Titus ; it is impossible that such a com-
mand could have been given, if "not one stone of the temple
had remained upon another which Lad not been thrown down.'*
liev. xi. 8.—The bodies of the two witnesses are said to
" Jie in the street of the great city, spiritually called Sodom
and Egypt/' Even this is not sufficient for St. John ; to re-
move all possibility of doubt as to what city is meant, he adds,
" Where also our Lord iras crucified" l

Hovv can we avoid the conclusion, that Jerusalem was the
city specified, and that the prediction was written before its
desolation.

It is no answer to say, this is a " petitio principii" begging
the question, as it is called,—and that we are assuming that
St. John means a literal people who are to be sealed, a literal
temple, and a literal city. They ley the question, who, in de-
fiance of plain statements to the contrary? assume that St. John
does not mean the twelve tribes, or the Jewish temple, or the
city " where our Lord was crucified/' True, the Apocalypse
is an allegorical and symbolical composition, but under that
symbol and allegory there is always a literal meaning. It is

time the Jewish people were still spoken of under the name of the twelve tribes.
Thus we find him saying to his disciples, " Ye shall sit on twelve thrones
judging the twelve tribes of Israel." " Unto which promise our twelve tribes,
instantly serving God day and night, hope to come."— Acts, xxvi. 7.
* The figurative language of the Apocalypse is often explained in the Apo-
calypse itself. Thus the city spiritually called Sodom and Egypt is defined
as the u city where our Lord was crucified." Thus the woman spiritually
called f< Babylon the Great/' is defined as " that great city which reigneth
over the kings of the earth.'' Thus "the Great Red Dragon," is defined as
that " Old Serpent called the Devil and Satan.*1 To my mind, it is as impious
to doubt the literal meaning of these explanations, as to doubt the literal
meaning given by our Lord of some of his parables

20 DATE OF THE APOCALYPSE. [LECT. I.
nothing more or less than a revelation of things shortly to
come to pass, clothed in a symbolic dress ; and how absurd it
would be to look only for a symbolic meaning in such a reve-
lation. This view, if fully carried out, would reduce all truths
and duties indicated by symbolic teaching into mere tropes and
figures.
4. Rev. xvii.—The date of the Apocalypse is defined with
great clearness and precision.
A woman is seen sitting on a " scarlet- coloured Beast." That
scarlet-coloured Beast is Rome.
The Beast has seven heads, which are explained to mean
seven mountains, and also to signify seven kings.
" Five of these kings are fallen," says St. John, " and one
?,v,"—one was in existence at the time of the writing of the
Apocalypse.
This fixes the date of the book to the reign of Nero. Five
emperors had fallen when St. John was banished to Patmos by
Nero, and St. John wrote the book during the reign of the
sixth. It is worthy of notice, that, according to the Jewish
mode of reckoning the emperors of Rome, Nero was the sixth
emperor. Josephus tells us (and his testimony is very valuable,
because it shows the manner in which the Jews of that day
reckoned the Roman emperors) that "Augustus was the second
ernperor.5>
Julius Caesar, then, was the first; Augustus the second ;
Tiberius, third ; Cains, or Caligula, fourth ; Claudius, fifth :
these were the five who had fallen, " anil one. is,"—Nero, the
sixth, under whose reign of terrible persecution the Apocalypse
was written.
This fixes the date of the Apocalypse completely.
Nero died A. D. 68 ; Jerusalem fell A. I). 70 > consequently
the Apocalypse must have been written previous to the destruc-
tion of Jerusalem.
5. Another argument which serves to corroborate the Neronic
date of the Apocalypse may be drawn from the circumstances
under which the book was written.
The most superficial reader of the book must see it was
written in times of great and terrible persecution ; and that
one of the prominent designs of the book was to animate, en-
courage, confirm, and strengthen the Church under those per-
secutions.

LECT. L] DATE OF THE APOCALYPSE. 21
The author of the book sets out with the statement, that he,
their " companion and brother in tribulation," " was in the isle
that is called Patmos,for the word of God and for the testi-
mony of Jesus Christ"
The addresses to the Seven Churches are full of exhortations
to persevere under their fiery trials, and abound with promises
of victory.
The Church of Ephesus is commended for its "patience"
and because it had " iw\, fainted." That of Smyrna is told to
" fear none of those things which it should suffer" and to be
" faithful unto death" Pergamos is praised, because it had
not " denied the faith even in those days wherein Antipas the
faithful martyr teas slain amony them" Thyatira is lauded for
its " faith and patience." Sardis is bid "to watch" It is
promised to Philadelphia, that it should be kept from " the
hour of temptation, which should come on all the world." The
warning is given to Laodicea, "as many as I love I rebuke
and chasten;" and the Epistles to each of the Seven Churches
conclude with a promise connected with the glories of the first
resurrection to " him that ovcrcometh," an expression evidently
alluding to martyrdom.
Nor are these encouragements to patience, and promises of
victory, confined to the Seven Churches: the same views are
everywhere scattered throughout the book.
Chap. vi. 9. discloses " under the altar the souls of those
slain for the If^ord of God, and for the testimony which they
held."
Chap. vii. 14. unfolds the glorious condition of those who
had come out "ofyreat tribulation, and had washed their robes,
and had made them white in the blood of the Lamb."
Jn Chap, xvii., Great Babylon is said to be " drunken with
the blood of the saints, and with the blood of the martyrs of
Jesus."
Chap. xx. represents the " souls of those beheaded for the
witness of Jesus, and for the word of God," living and reigning
wUh Christ 1,000 years.
It is plain from these encouragements to perseverance, and
from these promises of reward to those who should be "faithful
unto death," that the Apocalypse was written in the midst of
a furious and savage persecution, and that one of its principal
c 3

22 DATE OF THE APOCALYPSE. [LKCT. I.
objects was to support and animate the Church under this per-
secution. Now were these the circumstances of the Church
nnder the reign of Nero f
Orosius says :—" Nero first persecuted the Christians at
Rome by torture and death, and he commanded that in all the
provinces1 they should be tormented with the like persecution/'
—Historic, vii. 7.
Tertullian :—"Consult your edicts, (commentarios vestros,)
there you will find that Nero was the first who savagely perse-
cuted this sect, then chiefly springing up at Rome, with the im-
perial sword.—Apol. v.
Eusebius : — "Nero . . . began to take up arms against
that very religion which acknowledges the one supreme God.
he was the first of the emperors that displayed
himself an enemy of piety towards the Deity. . . . thus
Nero publicly announcing himself as the chief enemy of God,
was led on in his fury to slaughter the Apostles ; Paul is there-
fore said to have been beheaded at Rome, and Peter to have
been crucified under him/'—Eccles. Hist. ii. 25.
Sulpicius Severus speaks of Nero as first endeavouring to
extinguish the name of Christians : "The (Christian) religion
was forbidden by the enactment of laws (datis Jegihus) and by
edicts published (edictfs propositis, the commenfarios vesfros of
TertulJian), it was lawful for no one openly to be a Christian."—
Historhe Sacra*, ii. 28.
Observe. — No Roman emperor had hitherto persecuted
Christianity'; no public edicts had been issued against the dis-
ciples of Jesus. But now the "fiery trial " began in earnest —
"the hour of temptation came which was to try all that dwell
on the earth." According to our Lord's prediction, the furnace
was heated seven times more than it was wont to be heated, in
the period immediately preceding the destruction of Jerusalem.
Apostacy, the consequence of this furious persecution, rose up
of so horrid a kind, that the ties of nature were forgotten in the
severity of the affliction,— the apostacy which our Lord said
should precede his advent, and to which St. Paul refers
(2 Thess. ii. 2.) : "For that day shall not come except there
1 This is an answer to the statement that Nero's persecution was confined
to the city of Rome, and which would make out that St. John could not have
been banished to Patmos during the reign of Nero.

LECT. I.] DATE OF THE APOCALYPSE. 23
come a falling1 away first"—9Eav pr) t\0r) ^ diroKarao-ia
TrpwToV) the falling away—the well-known apostacy respect-
ing which the Lord had forewarned his Church.
" And then shall many be offended, and shall betray one
another, and shall hate one another, and many false prophets
shall rise and shall deceive many, and because iniquity shall
abound, the love of many shall wax cold."—Matt. xxiv. 10,
11, 12.
" Now the brother shall betray the brother to death, and the
father the son ; and children shall rise up against their parents,
and cause them to be put to death, and ye shall be hated of all
men for my name's sake, but he that shall endure unto the end
the same shall be saved."—Mark, xiii. 12, 13.
It is no wonder that the later epistles of the New Testament
should abound with premonitory warnings and exhortations to
courage and perseverance under the coming sorrows, and that the
Christian converts should b(j admonished "not to think it strange
concerning the fiery trial which was to try them, as though
some strange thing happened to them."—1 Peter, iv. 1£.
(j. To this it may be added, that reference appears to be
made to the Revelation in the Epistles of St. Peter, St. Paul,
and St. James.1 It is supposed that allusion is made to the
1 " The Apocalypse seems to be alluded to in the Epistles of Peter and that
to the Hebrews, and therefore to have been written before them. Such allu-
sions in the Epistle to the Hebrews I take to be the discourses concerning the
high priest in the heavenly tabernacle, who is both priest and king, as was
Melehizedec ; and those concerning the Word of God, with the sharp two-
edged sword ; the Sfibhutiauioji, or millennial rest; the earth, whose end is to
be burnt, suppose by the lake of fire; the judgment and fiery indignation
which shall devour the adversaries; the heavenly city which hath foundations,
whose builder and maker is <»od ; the cloud of witnesses; Mount Sion ;
Heavenly Jerusalem ; general assembly ; spirits of just men made perfect —
namely, by the resurrection ; and the shaking of heaven and earth and re-
moving them, that the new heaven, new earth, and new kingdom, which
cannot be shaken, may remain. In the first of Peter occur these—f The
Revelation of Jesus Christ/ twice or thrice repeated : f the blood of Christ,
as of a lamb fore-ordained before the foundation of the world ;' (the spiritual
building in Heaven;' ' an inheritance incorruptible and undetiled, and that
fadeth not away, reserved in Heaven for us, who are kept unto the salvation
ready to be revealed in the last time;' ' the royal priesthood;' * the holy
priesthood;' 'the judgment beginning at the house of (Sod;* and * the
Church at Babylon/ These are, indeed, obscurer allusions ; but the second
Epistle, from the l<)th verse of first chapter to the end, seems to l)e a con-
c 4

24 DATE OF THE APOCALYPSE, [LKCT. L
Apocalypse, 2 Peter i. 19., where it is said :—" We have also
a more sure word of prophecy, whereunto ye do well that ye
take heed as unto a light that shineth in a dark place, until the
day dawn and the day-star arise in your hearts.'7 It is singu-
lar that St. Peter is speaking of the second advent, " the power
and coining," 8iW/uz> KOL TrapovcrlaV) of the Lord Jesus, and
he says that not only were they, Peter, James, and John, eye-
witnesses of the glory which he displayed on Tnbor, but that
they had a " more sure \v,ml " of prophetic development of His
tinued commentary upon UIP Apocalypse. There, in writing to the Churches
in Asia, to whom John was commanded to send this prophecy, he tells them
they 'have a more sure word of prophecy,9 to be heeded by them { as a light
that shineth in a dark place, until the day dawn, and the day-star arise in
their hearts;' .... ami then, in the second, he proceeds to describe, out
of this sure word of prophecy, how there should arise in the Church false pro.
phfcts or false teachers, expressed collectively in the Apocalypse by the name
of the false prophet, who should * bring in damnable heresies, even denying
the Lord who bought them,' which is the character of Antichrist: ' and
many,' saith he, ' shall follow their lusts ;' they that dwell on the earth shall
be deceived by the false prophet, and be made drunk with the wine of the
whore's fornication, ' by reason of whom, the way of truth shall be blas-
phemed;' for the beast is full of blasphemy; * and through covetousness
shall they, with feigned words, make merchandise of you ;' for these are the
merchants of the earth, who trade with the great whore, and their merchan-
dise is all things of price, with the bodies and souls of men ; ( whose judg-
ment lingereth not, and their damnation slumbereth not."......f These,
as natural brute beasts/ — the ten-horned beast, and two-horned beast, or
false prophet— ( made to be taken and destroyed,' — in the lake of fire,—
* blaspheme the things they understand not;' ' they count it pleasure to riot
in the day-time, sporting themselves with their own dcceivings while they
feast with you, having eyes full of adulteries;' for the kingdoms of the
beast live deliciously with the great whore, and the nations are made drunk
with the wine of her fornication. They ' are gone astray, following the way
of lialaam, the son of Beor, who loved the wages of unrighteousness/
4 These are/ not fountains of living water, but 'wells without water;' not
such clouds of saints as the two -witnesses ascend in, but ( clouds that are
carried with a tempest/ £c. Thus doth the author of this Epistle spend all
the second chapter in describing the qualities of the Apocalyptic beasts and
false prophet; and then, in the third, he goes on to describe their destruc-
tion more fully, and the future kingdom. lie saith, that because the coming
of Christ should be long deferred, they should scoff, saying, ' Where is the
promise of his coming ?' Then he describes the sudden coming of the day
of the Lord upon them, 'as a thief in the night/ which is the Apocalyptic
phrase ; and the millennium, or thousand years, which are with God but as a
day ; the passing away of the old heavens and earth, by a conflagration in the
lake of fire; and our looking * for new heavens and a new earth, wherein
dwelleth righteousness/— Sir I. Newton.

LECT. L] DATE OF THE APOCALYPSE. 25
powerful coming1, and that this was to be their guide " until the
day dawned and the day-star, (frajcr^opos (used of the first re-
surrection, Rev. ii. 28.) arose in their hearts." It is true this
may refer to the prophetic declarations of our Lord in the Gos-
pels, but it applies more closely to " the revelation," 'ATTQKOL\V^L<;,
of Jesus Christ made known unto John.
So Cor. xv. 52.:—"Behold I shew you a mystery,—we
shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed in a moment, in
the twinkling of an eye, at the last trump." We turn to the
Apocalypse, and find that the sounding of the seventh and last
trump is "the time of the dead that they should be judged, and
that tJiou shouhlest give reward unto thy servants the prophets,
and to (he saints, and them that fear thy name, small and great."
— Kev. xi. 18. >Six trumpets had already been sounded, but
not till the sounding of the seventh and last is the mystery
of God finished, — the mystery spoken of by St. Paul:
" Behold I shew you a mystery ; we shall not all sleep, but
we shall all be changed in a moment, in the twinkling of
an eye, at the last trump." How did St. Paul know this
should take place at the last trump, except from the Apoca-
lypse, for it is no where else revealed in Scripture. So St.
James speaks of " the crown of life which the Lord hath pro-
mised to them that love Him." (James, i. 12.) And as this is
not mentioned by our Lord in the Gospels, it is by no means
improbable but that St. James learnt this from the Apocalypse,
(Rev. ii. 10.).
This reference to the Apocalypse in the Epistles, like the
evidence afforded to the existence of the true Apocalypse by the
false Apocalypses1 ascribed to Peter, Paul, Cerinthus, and others,
not only confirms the position of the early date, but shows that
it was highly prized in those last and perilous times, and that as
1 "The Neronic date is confirmed also by the many false Apocalypses, as
those of Peter, Paul, Thomas, Stephen, Klias, and Cerinthus, written in imi-
tation of the true one. For, as the many false Gospels, false Acts, and false
Epistles, were occasioned by the true ones,—and the writing many false Apo-
calypses, and ascribing them to Apostles and Prophets, argues that there
was a true Apostolic one in great request with the first Christians,—so this true
one may well be supposed to have been written early, that there may be room
in the Apostolic age for the writing of so many false ones afterwards, and
fastening them upon Peter, Paul, Thomas, and others, who were dead before
John." — Sir 1. Newton.

26 BATE OF THE APOCALYPSE. [LECT. I.
a prophetic vision of coming events, it answered those purposes
of warning and encouragement which it was intended to serve.
There cannot be the slightest doubt but that the warnings of the
Apocalypse were perfectly intelligible to the Jewish Christians
of those days. They could not fail to understand that its woes
were about to descend upon that particular people, and princes,
and city, so unmistakeably distinguished from the people,
princes, and cities of the Gentiles. They could have had no
misgivings as to who were meant by " they that dwell on the
earth," " the kings of the earth," " the merchants of the
earth," arid " the city which reigneth over the kings of the
earth." If we add to this the extraordinary fact that the pro-
phecies of our Lord relative to the destruction of Jerusalem are
not recorded by St. John in his Gospel, although he was one of
those four who asked him privately "Tell us when shall these
things be," which can be best accounted for by the circum-
stance of a special Revelation having rendered such a detail un-
necessary,— the abundant JJc/>raisms of the Apocalypse proving
that the writer had only JateJv come out of Jti<l«pa,— the con-
tinual mention of a city, defined as " the /io/y cff//>" " t/n' fac-
tored city" which can only mean Jerusalem,—the desolation of
this city so graphically foretold, which corresponds with the
desolation of no other city so completely as Jerusalem,—and, not
least of all, the utter impossibility of any intelligible system of
interpretation being found (as the history of the exegesis of this
Book abundantly testifies), except that which proceeds upon the
principle of the Neronic date, — this combined, will, it is hoped,
form so strong a phalanx of internal evidence respecting the
question of the date, as to leave no reasonable doubt but that
the Apocalypse was written previous to the destruction of
Jerusalem.
To recapitulate this evidence. It appears certain that the
book was written before Christ came to destroy Jerusalem ;
that it was written only just bfforc that event took place, for
the Saviour continually repeats the expression, " Behold I come
quickly;" that it is a description of calamities which either have
fallen, or are yet to fall, upon a particular people and city, and
those the people and city of the Jews ; that it was written before*
the dispersion of the Jewish people, for 144,000 arc* sealed
from the twelve tribes; before the destruction of the Temple,

LECT. I] BATE OF THE APOCALYPSE. 27
for John is commanded to measure the Temple ; before the de-
solation of the city, for the bodies of the two witnesses lie in the
TrXareta, the Broad Street of the city "where our Lord was
crucified;" that it was written during the reign of the sixth
Roman emperor Nero, and tinder circumstances of unwonted
and terrible persecution, such as characterised Nero's reign. If
you add to this, the interpretation about to be laid before you,
in which every symbol of the Apocalypse finds an explanation
more or less clear, not roaming over thousands of years, but
confined and narrowed down to the three years and a half of the
Jewish war, I trust you will be disposed to acknowledge that I
have not rashly adopted the theory of the Neronic date, and
that instead of seeking in the Apocalypse a history of the
world and of the Church, from the commencement of Christi-
anity down to the end of time, I have sufficient reason for
preferring to regard the book in the light in which it is pre-
sented to us by the unerring* Spirit of God.
"The revelation of Jesus Christ which God gave unto him
to shew unto his servants things ivhich must shortly come to
pass."—Rev. i. 1.
"The Lord God of the holy prophets sent his angel to shew
unto his servants the things which must shortly be done"—.
Rev. xxii. ().
" Seal not the sayings of the prophecy of this book, for
the time is at hand"—Rev. xxii. 10.
" I Jesus have sent mine angel to testify these things unto
you in the churches"—Rev. xxii. 16.
" He which testifieth these things, saith, surely I come
quickly"—Rev. xxii. 20.
" Blessed is lie that readeth, and they that hear the words
of this prophecy, and keep the things which are written
therein, j#>r the time is at hand"—Rev. i. 3.
And here at the very outset I would call attention to the
fact recorded in the Apocalypse itself, that the book opens
with a declaration that it is the revelation of events " ir/iich
must shortly come to pass" and closes with the most clear and
positive statements to the same* effect.
I desire this point may be kept in mind. If the explanation
offered be not one and continuous, if the prophecy cannot be
interpreted as a whole, and if the explanation given, not of

28 DATE OF THE APOCALYPSE, [LECT. I.
particular chapters, but of the whole book, is not found to suit
the date and age of the Apocalypse, and no other, the prin-
ciple of such interpretation must be defective, and the right
chord has not been struck. If, on the other hand, an interpre-
tation can be offered, not of isolated passages, but of the whole
subject, and that interpretation not scattered over many
centuries, but referring solely to "the things which were
shortly to come to pass," I do not see how the conclusion is to
be avoided that such an interpretation is more in character with
the aim and object of the book, than any other which includes
the history of distant periods.
Oh that such an interpretation may now be found—that
truth may prevail above error, and fact above fiction ; that
prejudice, especially prejudice against the errors of the Romish
Church, and if possible, aUpreviously formed opinions, might
be laid aside, and \ve migtit now examine this book as it \ve
had never heard of it before I
Let us not be overwhelmed because f/reat names hare pro-
nounced the book unintellit/ible. Let us not be frightened at
the saying of Scaliger, " Calvinus sapit, quod in Apocalypsin
non scripsit"—Calvin showed his wisdom in not writing on the
Apocalypse. Great names often hide great errors. The truth
may yet be found. I can never believe the Apocalypse was
unintelligible to those to whom it was addressed. I could
never suppose, with Moses Stuart, that all Christians belonging
to the seven Churches of Asia did not understand it. I think
they must have done so. If it was a revelation, it must have
been intelligible. If it was addressed to Christ's servants, it
must have been intelligible to them and if it was a revelation
" of things shortly to come to pass," it must have had a
specific reference to t\\v peculiar circumstances of the Church
at that period.
Many of our Lord's parables were difficult to be understood
even by the disciples ; many of them he was obliged to ex-
plain to them privately. But at the period of which we are
now speaking, the miraculous gifts of the Holy Spirit were
still abundant, and surely tliat Holy Spirit would enable them to
understand their Lord's words. These visions were among
" the mysteries of the kingdom of (jod," the knowledge of
which was given to the disciples; and "visions" like these

LECT. I.] DATE OF THE APOCALYPSE. 29
may have not been uncommon, during the miraculous out-
pouring of the Holy Spirit upon the Church.1
May that Holy Spirit guide and direct us in our attempt at
the further elucidation of this wonderful book, — the book of
which Luther once said, there was no Christ in it, but which
he afterwards found to be all Christ from the beginning to the
end ! I do not believe any one will ever have a clear under-
standing of the New Testament till he has studied the Apo-
calypse ; and by studying the Apocalypse I do not mean
studying the Apocalypse by the help of the Apocalypse, but by
comparing the Apocalypse with the rest of the New Testament
Scriptures.2
And the more such an one studies it, the more he will bless
God that such a glorious revelation of Christ's "appearing* and
kingdom " has been made known unto men, the higher he will
rise in Jifs aspiration to share its transcendent, joys, the deeper
in Jiis own mind will he realise the blessedness especially
promised to students of this book: — "Blessed is he that
readeth, and they that hear the words of this prophecy, and
keep those things which are written therein, for the time is
at hand."
1 (( It must be considered that though such visions, being no longer continued
to these latter ages, may warrantably be despised in the pretenders of the present
days : yet we cannot doubt but that at the time this book (Shepherd of St.
Hennas) was written, the extraordinary gifts of the Holy Ghost were very
frequent, and we need not question but that such revelations, too, among the,
rest, were communicated to holy men for the benefit of the Church." — Arch-
bishop Wake's Preliminary Discourse on the Shepherd of St. Hernias, p. 383.
2 " Scripture itself seems to have wanted some epitome which should con-
nect its predictions with their final fulfilment with regard to the new dispen-
sation, and thus to present an entire whole to the reader of those and future
times. Such a work, as the Book of the Revelation, therefore, seems not only
to have been wanted for the Churches of those times, but also for those of
every future period, a work in which the believer could view the whole coun-
sel of God completed, and himself made a member of that household whose
foundations had been laid by God himself from the very beginning." — Lee
on Prophecy, p. 2})3.

LECTURE II,
THE SEALED BOOK.
REVELATION, CHAP. v.
1. And I saw in the right hand of him that sat on the throne a book writ-
ten within and on the backside, sealed with seven seals.
2. And I saw a strong angel proclaiming with a loud voice,, Who is worthy
to open the book, and to loose the seals thereof?
3. And no man in heaven nor in earth, neither under the earth, was able to
open the book, neither to look thereon.
4. And I wept much, because no man was found worthy to open and to
read the book, neither to look thereon.
5. And one of the elders saith unto me, Weep not: behold, the Lion of
the tribe of Juda, the Root of David, hath prevailed to open the book, and
to loose the seven seals thereof.
6. And I beheld, and lo, in the midst of the throne and of the four beasts,
and in the midst of the elders, stood a Lamb as it had been slain, having
seven horns and seven eyes, which are the seven Spirits of God sent forth in
all the earth.
7. And he came and took the book out of the right hand of him that sat
upon the throne.
8. And when he had taken the book, the four beasts and four and twenty
elders fell down before the Lamb, having every one of them harps, and golden
<*vials full of odours, which are the prayers of saints.
9. And they sung a new song, saying, Thou art worthy to take the book,
and to open the seals thereof: for thou wast slain, and hast redeemed us to
God by thy blood out of every kindred, and tongue, and people, and nation :
10. And hast made us unto our God kings and priests : and we shall reign
on the earth.
11. And I beheld, and I heard the voice of many angels round about the
throne and the beasts and the elders : and the number of them was ten thou-
sand times ten thousand, and thousands of thousands :
12. Saying with a loud voice, Worthy is the Lamb that was slain to re-
ceive power, and riches, and wisdom, and strength, and honour, and glory,
and blessing.
13. And every creature which is in heaven, and on the earth, and under
the earth, and such as are in the sea, and ail that are in them, heard I saying,
Blessing, and honour, and glory, and power, be unto him that sitteth upon the
throne, and unto the Lamb for ever and ever.
14. And the four beasts said, Amen. And the four and twenty elders fell
down and worshipped him that liveth for ever and ever.

LKCT. II.] THE SEALED BOOK. 31
OUR first Lecture embraced the subject of the date of the
Apocalypse. We endeavoured to show that the voice of
antiquity left the question respecting the date an open one, and
one that could only be decided by the internal testimony of the
book itself. We then proceeded to prove that the internal
evidence of the book establishes the date as anterior to the
destruction of Jerusalem.
It is of the greatest importance to understand this clearly,
for the question of the date settles the interpretation of the
Apocalypse ; it is the key-stone of the arch, the chief corner-
stone of the whole foundation. If the Domitianic date be the
true one, the Beast may be the Pope, Great Babylon may
be Home, the three Frogs may be France, and the Unclean
Spirit Tractarianisin ; for the book is of so highly figurative
and allegorical a character, and the nature of its imagery
so general, that it may be applied to almost any event which
has affected the world or the Church, and it would be strange
if, in a review of events from the days of Domitian to the
present time, some circumstances could not be found which
seem more or less clearly to coincide with the Apocalyptic pre-
dictions. If the Ne.ronic date be the true one, of which there
is not a shadow of doubt in my mind, and of which the in-
terpretation about to be offered will afford some additional
evidence, then there must be no suppositions, no enigmas, no
probable coincidences. As far as the elucidation of this book
is concerned, we may burn Gibbon, and allow the Pope to rest
in peace.
An interpretation must be found of the symbols of the Apo-
calypse in the brief space of time (whatever that was) which
intervened between the banishment to Patmos and the destruc-
tion of Jerusalem. We must have no roaming over the history
of 2,000 years ; no transferring of the scene of the apocalyptic
predictions from JiuUea to Paris or Constantinople. There
and then every symbol must receive its accomplishment—there
and then a meaning must be found for every figure. This ren-
ders the task all the more difficult; but if that difficulty can be
overcome, it brings us to the conclusion that we have found the
right clue.
Should a person conversant with the motions of the heavenly
bodies predict the .appearance of a cornet, on a certain day of a.

32 THE SEALED BOOK. [LECT. II.
certain year, and should his predictions be realised, we should
give him credit for knowledge of the principles of his science,
which Jed him to fix accurately the time of the predicted pheno-
menon. But should some person make a rong-Ji guess that a
cornet would be visible during the next fifty years, even if his
prediction did come to pass, we should not give him credit for
any extraordinary sagacity.
So with regard to the principle of the interpretation of the
Apocalypse. According to the one system, every symbol must
meet with its fulfilment at a certain fixed time ; according to
the other, the period during which the symbols are to receive
their fulfilment is almost unlimited. The one is the predic-
tion of the comet on the certain day ; the other the predic-
tion of the same phenomenon at any time during the fifty
years.
Before entering upon the subject of our present Lecture, I
would wish to define the principle upon which I shall endeavour
to be guided in the interpretation of the Apocalypse. It needs
no argument to show that the Apocalypse is a highly figurative
and allegorical composition. Now, the great fault of interpreters
in explaining allegory is the attempt to carry minute explana-
tions too far. This has been the cause of irremediable mischief,
and has originated a host of absurdities and errors.
There is always a Divine truth under eaek symbol,—there
is always a Divine basis under the alleyory, — and this is
the truth to be prominently brouaht forward, the remain-
ing parts of the symbol beiny only helps to finish out the
picture.
This is the case with all allegorical composition.1 Take for
instance the vision which told Nebuchadnezzar of his coming
degradation and dethronement. Dan. iv. 10.
How absurd it would be to insist on a literal interpretation
of every particular of this vision—to compare Nebuchadnezzar
to a literal tree reaching to heaven, in which was meat for all
—to suppose that the beasts of the field must literally get away
from its branches—that the literal stump was to be left in the
1 Take an instance of this in the description of our Lord, chap, v., as " a
Lamb which had been slain, having seven horns and seven eyes." Mow ab-
surd it would be to render this symbol literally, or to suppose that the hea-
venly appearance of our Lord was that of a Lamb.

LECT. II,] THE SEALED BOOK. 33
earth—that a literal band of iron or brass was to be bound
round him—that his heart was to be literally taken from his
body, and changed into the heart of a beast.
The general idea is clear enough, that for his pride he should
be condemned to lose his kingdom and his reason, and to fancy
himself a beast for seven years.
" If in Zedekiah's horns of iron we are to understand not
only their strength, which is intimated by the iron, but also the
nature of the iron, whether it be cast iron or steel, and the like,
and also their shape, their mode of fixture to the head, &c.
Then there will be no unity of design in the subject, and by
dwelling on these inferior particulars, we shall diminish or de-
stroy the effect evidently intended by the whole, and finally
perhaps lose entire sight of the intention of the prophet. In
the great image of Daniel no objection can be made to the con-
sideration of the toes being partly of iron, and partly of clay,
for this was evidently intended to show that a mixture of
strength and weakness should exist in the thing predicted, but
we contend that this was the main and principal thing incul-
cated, and not that these toes should be counted and dissected
so as to intimate a definite number of other particulars."—Lee
on Prophecy, p. &23.
Take again our Lord's allegories or parables,—for instance,
that of a " certain householder, which planted a vineyard, and
hedged it round about, and digged a winepress in it, and built
a tower, and let it out to husbandmen, and went into a far
country."
The general idea of God's choice and protection of his fa-
voured people is sufficiently clear ; but if you push and strain
the allegory, and endeavour to find a particular meaning for
each individual expression, for his " planting the vineyard,
hedging it round about, digging the winepress, building the
tower," you force the parable, and are in danger of losing
the main and prominent truth it was intended principally to
convey.
It is just as if some person explaining the parable of the
good Samaritan were to insist chiefly on the direction the tra-
veller took, viz. from Jerusalem to Jericho ; the minute cir-
cumstances of his falling among thieves, and being robbed ; the
Samaritan's setting him on his own beast, and taking care of
D

34 THE SEALED BOOK. [LBCT. U.
Wmf &c.f instead of the great principle of benevolence to our
fellow-creatures which is therein inculcated. ** It is just as if
some person, contemplating a beautiful picture, were to put
aside the main features of the portrait, and to consider the
trees and the water and mountains which make up the back-
ground, and fill up the sketch, as the chief objects worth his
consideration."
So with regard to any explanation of this book ; it is a book
of symbol and allegory: the basis of each symbol is the point
to be aimed at, the rest is merely subsidiary. This is the
principle upon which we shall proceed—under each symbol we
shall hope to find a literal fact which is the basis of that sym-
bol ; it does not follow, because the clothing of the symbol is
figurative, that the basis of the symbol should be figurative
also: most of our Lord's parables were highly figurative, yet
there was no mistaking the literal sense they were intended to
convey. Let us then expect to find in this book, just as in our
Lord's parables, literal truths clothed in a symbolic dress ; let
us treat them in the same way as we should treat our Lord's
parables ; let us have no surmises, no queries, no enigmas ; let
us not set ourselves afloat upon a boundless ocean of coniecture
without rudder, compass, mast, or sail. If it was deemed ne-
cessary that the Apocalypse should be written, we may suppose
it was necessary that the Apocalypse should be read ; and if it
was necessary that the Apocalypse should be read, we may
suppose that it was perfectly intelligible to those to whom it
was addressed-, we cannot suppose that it was necessary to
send a key with the Apocalypse. If it is mysterious and
unintelligible to us, one principal reason is, we cannot put
ourselves in the situation of those to whom it was addressed,
and we are destitute of that contemporary information which
would explain its difficulties.
It is not my intention to explain the three first chapters of
the Apocalypse, containing the vision of the glorified Saviour
to St. John in Patmos, and the Epistles which John was com-
manded to send to the Seven Churches of Asia. It must not,
however, be thought, because of this omission, that any system
of chronology is supposed to exist in the Apocalypse. Nothing
can be more evident than that the Epistles to the Seven
Churches are closely interwoven with the rest of the book,

LBCT. II.] THE SEALED BOOK. 35
and I may also observe that the vices condemned in the
Churches, particularly those of Pergamos and Thyatira, when
compared with the first general council of Acts, xv., command-
ing the Gentile Churches to " abstain from pollutions of idols,
and from fornication, and from things strangled, and from
blood/* while no mention is made of the later gnostic heresies
alluded to in the Gospel and Epistles of St. John, give evi-
dence of a very normal state of the Church. All I shall attempt
to do is to give a brief summary of these chapters, with a view
of showing that the Epistles to the Seven Churches are not an
isolated portion of the Book of Revelation distinct from the rest
of the prophecy, and that the Apocalypse does not embrace a va-
riety of subjects, but is one grand and continuous whole.
Now it is remarkable, that to each of the Seven Churches
there is a warning given of our Lord's immediate advent,
and a promise, connected with the glories of the first resur-
rection, held out to him that overcame.
Ephesus.—(t I will corne unto thee quickly."
u To him that overcometh will I give to eat of
the tree of life." Kev. ii. 5. ?.
Smyrna.—" I will give thee a crown of life." l
" He that overcometh shall not be hurt of the se-
cond death." Rev. ii. 10, 11.
Pergamos.—" I will come unto thee quickly."
" To him that overcometh will I give to eat of
the hidden manna." Rev. ii. 1(>, 17-
TJiyatira.—" Hold fast till I come."
" He that overcometh, and keepeth my works unto
the end, (compare " Then shall the end come,"
Matt. xxiv. 14), to him will I give power
over the nations." Rev. ii. 25, 26.
Sardis.—" I will corne on thee as a thief."
" He that overcometh, the same shall be clothed
in white raiment." Rev. iii. 3—(i.
1 " The crown of life" was to be given " at that day/' and " his appear-
ing." — Compare 2 Tim. iv. 8.

36 THl SEALED BOOK. [L»CT. II.
Philadelphia. — " Behold I come quickly."
" He that overcometh will I make a pillar in
the temple of my God." Rev. iii. 11, 12,
Laodicea.— " Behold I stand at the door and knock.'1
" To him that overcometh will I grant to sit with
me in my throne." Rev. iii. 20, 21.
And to each of the Seven Churches these warnings and pro-
mises are declared to be the voice of the Spirit. " He that
hath an ear, let him hear what the Spirit saith unto the
Churches/'
This is the one only theme pursued throughout the Boole.
It begins by saying that Christ is coming immediately; it ends
with the same theme, " Surely I come quickly/' It begins by
warning the Seven Churches of this speedy advent ; it closes
by saying, " I, Jesus, have sent mine angel to testify unto you
these things in the (Jhiirchi's" It begins by promising to the
martyrs, to them that overcame, the glories of the first re-
surrection ; it ends by disclosing the vision of " the souls of
them that were beheaded for the witness of Jesus and for the
word of God .... and they liv;vd and reigned with Christ a
thousand vears." Rev. xx. 4.
«'
This is the key to the whole book. Our Lord appears
to St. John, directs him to te!J the ( hmrhes that he is about
to come irnmediatelv, and then details the object and nature of
his coming. Brar this in mind as the scope and the aim of the
Revelation, arid every difficulty will vanish. The book will
be no longer unintelligible. Its meaning will be as evident to
you as it must have been to those who first heard its warnings.
They must have perfectly known that " the earth" meant Ju-
da»a; " the dwellers in the earth," the Jews ; " the kings of
the earth," the princes of Palestine ; " the merchants of the
earth/' the traffickers of the Holy Land ; " the great city
which reigneth over the kings of the earth," the metropolis,
the royal city. They nmst have thoroughly known, that " the
whole world" signified the Roman Empire; "the kindreds,
and tongues, and people, and nations/7 the Gentiles who were
not Jews; " the kings of the whole world/' the Roman
princes; " the kings of the East/7 the monarchs about Eu-
phrates. Not a doubt could have occurred to their minds as to

LJSCT. II.] THE SEALED BOOK. 37
what was intended by the " cities of the nations," i. e. Gentile
cities; or what city was unmistakably distinguished from every
other city, as " the great city/5 ** the holy city," " the beloved
city," the city which the Gentiles should tread down. Bear
this in mind, and much of the difficulty of the Apocalypse will
disappear. You will discover that its apparent obscurity is the
result of a want of sufficient attention to the habits of thinking
and speaking of that age, an imperfect apprehension of the aim
and scope of the book, and an indistinct and confused percep-
ception of the persons to whom its warnings were addressed.
This, added to the mass of crude commentaries with which
the book has been overlaid, has well nigh extinguished every
particle of truth.
Bear then in mind the simple fact that the woes of the Apo-
calypse descend upon a particular people, princes, and city, and
you will soon discard as untenable the infatuated theory that a
Revelation revealed nothing, and that a portion of those Divine
scriptures which were written for our learning, and to the
readers of which a peculiar and especial blessing was pro-
mised, has never been intelligible. You will scout the mon-
strous idea, that the interpretation of a prophecy of events
" which must shortly come to pass," should have been kept
in abeyance until the nineteenth century. You will perceive
that the Apocalypse not only does not aim to be a record of
civil and ecclesiastical history down to the end of time,—not
only affords no theme for the fabulous expositions which are
a disgrace to the Biblical knowledge of our generation, and
which, it is to be feared, are deluding' the souls of thousands,—
but that it was the Revelation of our Lord's immediate com-
ing vouchsafed in mercy to the Church of that day. That
its warning voice was clear, distinct, and perfectly intelligible
to those to whom it was addressed ; that the difficulties which
have so long encompassed the book are of man's creating,
and not of the Spirit of Cod ; that its notes of deep and
solemn terror must have found an echo in the hearts of " them
that dwelt on the earth,'1 " the kings of the earth," " the
merchants of the earth," and in the palaces of that "great
city which reigneth over the kings of the earth ;" that the
Jew of that day and generation must have listened to its call
of watchfulness and preparation, as to a call pregnant with

38 THE SEALED BOOK. [LECT. IT.
significant meaning to him especially:—" Blessed is he that
readeth, and they that hear the words of this prophecy, and
keep those things which are written therein, for the time is
at hand.9' Rev. i. 3.
With this brief notice of the three first chapters let us pro-
ceed to examine chapters iv., v., and these can only briefly be
touched upon, the real difficulty of the Apocalypse commencing
with the opening of the first seal, chapter vi.
After the exhortation to the Seven Churches respecting the
immediate advent of Christ, the nature of that advent is next
disclosed to St. John. He is caught up to heaven, or rapt in
a trance, and sees the vision of the Almighty, and hears the
opening of the Sealed Book, which unfolds that advent under
seals, trumpets, and vials. " After this I looked and behold a
door was opened in heaven, and the first voice which I heard
was as it were of a trumpet talking with me, which said, Come
up hither, and I will shew thee things which must be here-
after."
There is a point of great moment with regard to the system
of future interpretation, involved in those words which are
translated by the word "hereafter." l The original is "/x€ra
ravra," " after these things." Now the question is not, what
do these words signify as they stand in our English translation,
but what do they signify in the sense in which they are used in
the Apocalypse ? In the very same verse, these words occur
again, and they also occur frequently elsewhere in the Apoca-
lypse, and they always have one arid the same signification,
and that is, they refer to something which was to happen con-
secutively and immediately.
The words, which in the beginning of this verse are trans-
lated, " after this," are the same which in the end of the verse
are translated " hereafter." Should it be objected that the
last clause translated "hereafter" is qualified by the expression
" things which must be hereafter," the very same clause is
explained in Rev. xxii. (>. as " things which must shortly be
done."2
1 " Postea inquit vidi; post ipsam utique visionem, se alteram memorat
vidi&se, non gextorum ext diversion tcmpus aed vwionum, ac giquis unarn rein
diversis inodis enarret.*' — Prirna«iu8.
2 Compare " « ctl ytvtaOai ptTtt rai/ra" — Hcv. iv. 1., with " ft 5u y«-

LECT. n.] THE SEALED BOOK. 39

Dr. Gumming tells us, that the whole of the Apocalyse was
seen by St. John in one literal Lord's day of twelve hours,
and that Lord's day, he says, was a " miniature chronology of
the world." But if the words translated "after this" and
" hereafter " are the same, as undoubtedly they are, we cannot
interpret one of a period of twelve hours, and the other of a
period of 2,000 years.

In the very verse, then, in which the words translated " here-
after" are met with, we have the same words signifying an
event which happened immediately, or at any rate at no great
interval of time.

No argument can be built on the notion that the words
translated "hereafter," mean events about to happen in fu-
ture ages ; on the contrary, they are always used in the Apo-
calypse to signify events immediately about to take place.

This cuts at the very root of that interpretation which sup-
poses the Apocalypse to be a prophecy extending to remote
ages ; on the contrary, it asserts that it is the revelation of
events soon about to take place : it assists to overthrow the
fallacy that because " the Church under the Christian dispen-
sation is higher in dignity than the Church under the Mosaic
economy," that therefore it ought to "enjoy equal counsel and
consolation of a prophetical character" l But, it may be asked,
if it was necessary in order to the perfection of the new dispen-
sation that " it should enjoy equal counsel and consolation of a
prophetical character ;" why then does it not enjoy equal con-
solation of a miraculous character ? How is it that miracles
are no longer known, although prophecy is supposed to exist ?
How is it that "tongues" have ceased, although "prophecy"
has not foiled? What argument can be advanced to show
that the exercise of one extraordinary gift should outlive the
rest ? If prophecy is not lost, then what has become of that
angelic interference once so visible in the affairs of men, or of
the voice of the Eternal, heard at intervals, amidst the hushed
awe of wonder-stricken mortals ? And above all, how comes
it that these prophetical declarations were not understood in
the ages to which they are supposed to have referred ? One

iv ra^fi" — Rev. xxii. 6.; " /ura ravra. tlcW" — Rev. vii.
trc Sirv omit pmi raura" — Rev. ix. 12.
1 Wordsworth's Babylon.
r> 4

40 THE SEALED BOOK. [L»CT. IL
would imagine the scope and aim of prophecy would be to give
premonitory warning and consolation until fulfilled ; and when
fulfilled, to establish in the minds of those who witnessed its
fulfilment a sense of the Divine power and wisdom which
could " see the end from the beginning." But if the ages to
which the prophecies of the Apocalypse are supposed to refer
saw nothing of the adaptation of these prophecies to their own
case; if, before their accomplishment, they neither answered
the end of warning or consolation ; if, after their accomplish-
ment, they did not serve to manifest the prescience of the Al-
mighty ; if the Christians, who lived before the days of Luther,
never discovered that the Beast was the Pope, or that Great
Babylon was Papal Rome ; if those parties, who ought to
have been much more interested in the question than we can
possibly he, knew nothing of the irruption of the Mahometan
locusts, and of the Turks battering down the walls of Constan-
tinople ; if no one, nowhere, before the age of llishop jNewfon,
Merle, and the JtJliotts and C'mnnim^s who have expanded
them, had the slightest idea of that system of interpretation,
which is unhappily so much in vogue in the present day, it
may well be questioned whether such prophecy be not an iso-
lation in the general tenor of Divine pre-coimmmications, or
whether such prophecy has answered the end that prophecy
generally was intended to serve.
With the closing scenes of the Jewish dispensation, all ex-
traordinary gifts, and amongst the rest prophecy, appear to
have ceased. "The prophet and the unclean spirit" simul-
taneously "passed out of the land," Zech. xiii. '2. "The law
and the prophets were until John, from that time the kingdom
of God was to be preached." The Holy Spirit was to be
given, not to solitary individuals at great intervals of time, but
to be poured out upon all flesh, and on tin* disciples, among
the rest, riot with a view of making- them prophets, but of
bringing "all things to their remembrance whatsoever Christ
had said unto them ; " and of showing them things to come,"
(ra €p\6^€va^ the coming things,) John, xvi. KJ. Our
Saviour's prophecies referred chiefly to the destruction of
Jerusalern9 and the events which should accompany his
corning. No such an idea appears to have entered his
rnind as to chronicle down in prophetic visions the fortunes of

LBCT. IL] THE SEALED BOOK. 41
his Church to the end of time. Moreover, had prophecy been
a characteristic of the New Dispensation, it would not have
ceased with the predictions of the Apocalypse, A. succession
of prophets raised up from time to time, as under the Mosaic
economy, would have been the guides and comforters of the
Church. The foreshadows of coming events, as under the
old dispensation, would have been prophetically announced by
men who immediately preceded the times to which the events
referred. Impending calamities and approaching deliverances
would have found their contemporaneous predictors. A Jere-
miah or an Ezekiel would have spoken of a captivity near at
hand ; or a Haggai or a Zechariah of a restoration soon to
be accomplished. Adequate supplies of prophetic inspiration,
suited to the times which called them forth, would have met
national emergencies ; and the fallacy need not have been pro-
pounded, which, claiming for the Christian Church " equal
counsel and consolation of a prophetical character " with that of
the Jewish Church, is driven to transmute a prophecy of
" things which must shortly be done," into the history of the
world and of the Church down to the end of time ; and to
claim for a highly allegorical book, like the Book of the Reve-
lation, only intelligible when viewed in the light of a past
economy, the unenviable and the unhappy distinction that it
is the only "e</ua( counsel and consolation of a prophetical
character" which a superior dispensation is supposed to
possess.
I must now very briefly introduce the scene depicted in this
vision, and a glorious scene it is. The first object whom St.
John beholds is the Deity. " Behold a throne was set in
heaven, and one sat on the throne ; and he that sat was to
look upon like a jasper and a sardine stone : and there was a
rainbow round about the throne in sight like unto an emerald."
The jasper, a stone of various colours — purple, green, ceru-
lean; the sardine, a blood-red stone; and the iris, or rainbow,
round about the throne softening, by its many-coloured hues,
the light which none might look upon. It is impossible for
human language to describe more impressively the glory of the
Godhead.1
1 Compare Ezekio), i. 2(>, 27, 28.

42 THE SEALED BOOK. [LECT. II.
" Round about the throne were four and twenty seats, and
upon the seats I saw four and twenty elders sitting, clothed in
white raiment; and they had on their heads crowns of gold."
Bat why twenty-four? Some say, because there were
twelve tribes of Israel, and twelve Apostles; and the number
twenty-four would represent the Jewish and Christian Church;
some, because the worship of the Jewish temple was divided
into twenty-four courses of priests, and the temple on earth was
made after the pattern of the heavenly temple.
One point alone is clear : they owe their high position to the
redemption that is in Christ Jesus ; for they are represented as
saying, "thou hast redeemed us to God by thy blood, out of
every kindred, and tongue, and people, and nation." x
** Out of the throne proceeded lightnings, and voices, and
thunderings." The scenery is exceedingly grand and terrific ;
indicative of the glory and presence of God. So, when God
descended upon Sinai, there were "thunders and lightnings,"
"and the voice of the trumpet exceeding loud."
" Seven lamps were burning before the throne, which are
the seven spirits of God."
Some suppose that the Holy Spirit is here designated, "the
number 7," as Josephus says, "being a number of dignity
among the Jews." Others think they refer to the "seven angels
which stand before God" (the angels alluded to by our Lord),
" Whosoever will confess me before men, him will I also con-
fess before the angels of God." So St. Paul to Timothy—"I
charge thee before God and the elect angels." In the Apo-
cryphal Book of Tobit, the angel Raphael says, " I am one
of the seven angels that enter into the presence of the Holy
One." " The sea of glass before the throne like unto
crystal," the same as "the sea of glass mingled with fire,"
of chap, xv., is, possibly, the lucid and shining pavement before
the throne. " There2 was under his feet, as it were, a pave-
ment of sapphire, and, as it were, the body of heaven in its
clearness*"
" And, in the midst of the throne, and round about the
throne, were four beasts3, full of eyes, before and behind."
1 Rev. v. 9. 2 Exodus, xxiv. 9, 10.
3 Zwa, " living creatures/'

LECT. IL] THE SEALED BOOK. 43
These correspond with the four living creatures seen in the
vision of Ezekiel, supporting the throne of Jehovah, going and
returning like a flash of lightning.
It is supposed by some, that these four beasts cannot repre-
sent angelic beings, because they join with the twenty-four
elders in the ascription of praise. " Thou hast redeemed us to
God by Thy blood.'* But, independently of these four living
creatures being seen in EzekiePs vision, where they evidently
represent angelic beings, there is no great impropriety in sup-
posing angelic beings joining in the song of the redeemed in
heaven. For aught we know, the blessings of redemption
may have extended even to them. St. Paul tells us, that
" unto principalities and powers in heavenly places is to be
made known by the Church the manifold wisdom of God;"
that, " through the blood of his cross, he hath reconciled all
things unto himself, whether they be things in heaven or
things on earth ;" and that " at the name of Jesus every knee
shall bow, of things in heaven, and things in earth, and things
under the earth/7 There is no reason why we should not in-
terpret these four beasts as corresponding with the vision of
Ezekiel, and praising God for the blessings of redemption.
St. John sees " in the right hand of him that sat upon the
throne a hook written within and on the back side, and sealed
with seven seals."
This vision still seems to correspond with the vision of
Ezekiel, ii. After Ezekiel had seen the vision of the Most
High, agreeing in many respects with the vision of God
seen by St. John, "an hand was sent unto him, and lo!
a roll of a book was therein ;" " and it was written within
and without, and there was written therein lamentation, and
mourning, and woe/' So, in the vision before us, " the
throne" is disclosed, and " he that sat on it;" and in the right
hand of him that sat on the throne is a book, written like
Ezekiel's book, " within and without," " within and on the
back side," and " sealed with seven seals."
The form of the book we may suppose to have been that of
the ancient manuscript, " the roll of a book " seen by Ezekiel,
—not sealed with all the seals on the outside, for then no part
of the book could be read until all the seals were broken;
but so sealed, that when one seal was broken, the MSS.

44 THE SEALED BOOK. foxcr. II.
could be unrolled, till they came to the second seal, and so on
to the end.
And here let me observe that the idea of breaking the
seals intimates that the prophecy contained in the book was
about to be fulfilled immediately.1
The prophet Daniel is commanded to seal up his prophecy,
because a long period of time was to elapse between the
prophecy and its fulfilment.
" Shut up the words, and seal the book unto the time of
the end." " The words are closed, and sealed unto the time
of the end;" "the time of the end" meaning, as I have
shown in Lecture X., the time of the destruction of Jeru-
salem, and the close of the Jewish dispensation.
On the other hand, St. John is directed to leave his pro-
phecy unsealed. " Seal not the sayings of the prophecy of
this book, for the time is at hand." The events disclosed
in the book are about to take place immediately; it is a
revelation of things " which must shortly conic to pass."
It is then evident that the breaking of the seals of the
book would, upon the principles of scriptural interpretation,
signify the disclosure of events about to receive an imme-
diate aeco in pits It m en t.
The vision next discloses "a strong angel, proclaiming with
a loud voice, who is worthy to loose the book, and to open the
seals thereof; and no man in heaven, nor in earth, neither
under the earth, was able to open the book, neither to look
thereon."
It was the book, which, in his human nature, the Son
himself was unable to unfold — the book containing the de-
velopment of those " times and seasons" which " the Father
had put in his own power"—the book of which he said, "of
that day, and of that hour, knoweth no man ; neither the angels
of God in heaven, nor the Son, but the Father;" or, as St.
Matthew expresses it, "but my Father on/t/." 2
1 " And the vision of all is become unto you as the words of a book that is
sealed, which men deliver to one that is learned, Baying, read this, 1 pray
thee, and he saitli I cannot; for it is sealed."—Isaiah, xxix. 11.
2 This shows that there was in our Lord a capability of accessive know-
ledge even after his ascension. Hence, " the Revelation " is said to be " the
Revelation of Jesus Christ which God yavc unto him."LJSCT. II.J THE SEALED BOOK. 45
There seems, then, a marked propriety why that knowledge,
which was withheld from the Son in his human nature, should
now be given to him as the reward of his sufferings and death.
Accordingly we find that it is so given : " Thou art worthy
to take the book, and to open tbe seals thereof; for thou wast
slain,) and hast redeemed us to God by thy blood."
The Evangelist is overwhelmed with grief because the book
cannot be opened, or the seals loosed.
" And I wept much, because no man was found worthy to
open and to read the book, neither to look thereon ; and one of
the elders saith unto me, Weep not: Behold the lion of the
tribe of Judab, tbe root of David, hath prevailed to open tbe
book, and to loose tbe seven seals thereof/*
No one can doubt to whom the epithet—" the lion of the
tribe of Jmlal^ refers. In tbe benediction of tbe patriarch
Jacob, Judab is compared to a lion : " Judab is a lion's whelp ;
be stooped, be couched do\vn as a lion, and as an old lion, who
shall rouse him up." And, " it is evident," says St. Paul,
" that our Lord sprang out of Judah."
lie is also called " the root of Darid" " I am tbe root
ami the offspring of David"—David's son awl David's Lord
— " the rod out of the stem of Jesse, and the branch growing
>ut of his roots ;" and David's Lord, of whom David says in
spirit, " The Lord said unto my Lord, sit thou at my right
hand until I make thy foes thy footstool.''
But lest we should have any doubt to whom the epithets
" the lion of the tribe of Judah" and "the root of David "
belong, the Saviour is next described by that title which belongs
to him alone of all the intelligent universe.
" I beheld, and lo, in the midst of the throne, and of the
four beasts, and in the midst of the elders, stood a LAMB as it
had been slain, having seven horns and seven eyes, which are
the seven spirits of (iod sent forth into all the earth. And
he came and took the book out of the right hand of him that
sat upon the throne."
I must not pass by the name by which lie is described —
" a .Lamb." In the Apocalypse Christ is designated by this
name some twenty-five times. This is a valuable confirmation
of the authorship of this book. St. John is the only Evan-
gelist who calls our Lord bv this name. In his Gospel alone

46 THE SEALED BOOK. [LECT. II.
we read, that John the Baptist, " looking upon Jesus as he
walked," exclaimed, " Behold the Lamb of God which taketh
away the sin of the world."
The Saviour appears, moreover, as " a Lamb that had been
shin" The marks of his holy passion are discernible in the
midst of his exaltation and glory. The print of the nails upon
his hands and feet, and the gaping chasm rent by the spear,
and the marks of the crown of suffering upon his brow, sparkle
still more gloriously than the many crowns of divine glory
which rest upon his head. His previous ignominy is the cause
of his present exaltation. It is because he is " the Lamb slain/'
that he prevails to open the hook.
" He humbled himself unto death, even the death of the
cross; wherefore God hath highly exalted him." He was
"made lower than the angels for the suffering of death/' that
he " might be crowned with glory and honour."
Observe, also, the glorious position occupied by the Redeemer
of the universe. He is said to be " in the midst of the
throne:77 "and he came and took the book out of the right
hand of him that sat upon the throne."
He is in the " midst of the throne/7 sharing divine honours
and divine adoration. " To him that overcometh will I grant
to sit with me upon my throne, even as I overcame and am
set down with my Father upon his throne."
"No man in heaven, or in earth, or under the earth77 — a
Hebrew expression for no created being—is able to "open
the book or to look thereon."
He, by virtue of his eternal Sonship, and in virtue of that
work of redeeming love which hits caused " all power to be
given to him in heaven and in earth," " came and took the
book out of the right hand of him that sat upon the throne."
And then follows that magnificent burst of praise and ado-
ration recorded in the concluding verses of this chapter. It
commences with the four living creatures and the twenty-four
elders. It is taken up by the angelic hosts round about the
throne, and is re-echoed by the whole created universe of God.
" And they sung a new song, saying, Thou art worthy to
take the book, and to open the seals thereof; for thou wert
slain, and hast redeemed us to God by thy blood out of every
kindred, and tongue, and people, and nation ;

LBCT. II] Tim SEALED BOOK. 47

" And hast made us unto our God kings and priests : and
we shall reign on the earth.

" And I beheld, and I heard the voice of many angels round
about the throne and the beasts and the elders : and the
number of them was ten thousand times ten thousand, and
thousands of thousands ;

" Saying with a loud voice, Worthy is the Lamb that was
slain to receive power, arid riches, and wisdom, and strength,
and honour, and glory, and blessing.

" And every creature which is in heaven, and on the earth,

and under the earth, and such as are in the sea, and all that are

in them, heard I saying", Blessing, and honour, and glory, and

power, be unto him that sitteth upon the throne, and unto the

Lamb for ever and ever.

" And the four beasts said, Amen. And the four and twenty
elders fell down and worshipped him that liveth for ever and

ever."1

Such is the glorious opening and introduction to the Apo-
calyptic symbols which follow. It looks more like a drama
than a description — a scene to be acted and performed, rather
than to be read or written. But under this magnificent
imagery the meaning is very plain.
Things which are to take place " hereafter," /xera raGra,
are to be unfolded to the seer. He is caught up to heaven in the
spirit, whether bodily or mentally is of no consequence. He
beholds the throne of the Deity surrounded by hosts of adoring
intelligences. In the hand of Omnipotence is a book sealed.
No creature in the universe of God can open it, or look thereon.
St. John laments that no one can unfold its meaning. When,
lo, an Interpreter is found ; a prophet, priest, and king appears.
The Lamb slain takes the book out of the right hand of him
that sat upon the throne, and prepares to break the seals.
And then from heaven and earth, and under the earth, and
in the sea, peals forth the triumphant burst of acclamation —
[in the highly poetical language of one2 from whose interpre-
tation I am compelled to differ most materially, but whose elo-
quent and gifted style no man of heart and feeling can dispute]
1 Rev. v. 9—14.
2 Dr. Cumming's 4t Apocalyptic Sketches.*1 Lecture in

49

LECTURE III,
OPENING OF THE FIRST FOUR SEALS.
REV. vi. 1—8.
1. And I saw when the Lamb opened one of the seals, and I heard, as it
were thtj noise of thunder, one of the four beasts saying, Come and see.
2. And I saw, and behold a white horse: arid he that sat on him had
a bow : and a crown was given unto him : and he went forth conquering, and
to conquer.
3. And when lie had opened the second seal, I heard the second beast say,
Come and see.
4. And there went out another horse that was red : and power was given
to him that sat thereon to take peace from the earth, and that they should kill
one another: and there was given unto him a great sword.
5. And when he had opened the third seal, I heard the third beast say,
Come and see. And I beheld, and lo a black horse; and he that sat on him
had a pair of balances in his hand.
6. And I heard a voice in the midst of the four beasts say, A measure of
wheat for a penny, and three measures of barley for a penny ; and see thou
hurt not the oil and the wine.
7. And when he had opened the fourth seal, I heard the voice of the
fourth beast say. Come and see.
8. And I looked, and behold a pale horse: and his name that sat on him
was Death, and hell followed with him. And power was given unto them
over the fourth part of the earth, to kill with sword, and with hunger, and
with death, and with the beasts of the earth.
WE have hitherto done little more than speak of the prepara-
tions for the scene which is to follow. We have as yet only
touched upon the prologue of this grand spiritual drama. That
it is a grand spiritual drama, in which the actors are — the
angels ; the hero of the subject — Christ; the heroine — " the
bride the Lamb's wife ; the consummation—the destruction of
all enemies, and the marriage of the Lamb;—is what few would
like to deny. It is impossible to read the book without being
struck by the grandeur and sublimity of its disclosures. I be-
lieve no mind, but one enlightened from on high, could have
entertained the majestic representation of the Deity unfolded in
E

50 OPENING OF THE [LECT. III.
chapter v.—no tongue, but that of an inspired man, could have
compassed that sublime, unearthly song with which that chapter
closes ; and that no heart, but one deeply impressed by God's
Holy Spirit, could have imagined its glorious conceptions. I
want no scholastic proof of the inspiration of the Apocalypse ;
on its front it bears the impress of Divine authorship. I need
no other evidence of the book being written under the direc-
tion of God's Holy Spirit, beyond that which the book itself
affords.
We now come to the real difficulty of the Apocalypse. The
seals of the mysterious book are opened by the Lamb. Had we
been Christians of those days, we should have had no difficulty
in comprehending these symbols. The distance of time, and
age, and country, and situation, and habits of thought and ex-
pression, give them their real unintelligibility.
I shall, as I have already premised, seek for their explanation
at the time when the Apocalypse must have been written. The
plan which I shall adopt will be to give first the opinions of
Dr. Gumming4, as fairly as the mere statement of his views
will allow, and then to subjoin my own.
I need not say we move on different lines, — that whilst he
contends for the Doinitianic date of the Apocalypse, we shall as
earnestly combat for the Neronic date,—that whilst he affirms
the Apocalypse is a prophetic history of the world and of the
Church down to the end of time, we shall endeavour to main-
tain that it was a revelation of things " which must shortly
come to pass," and which received an immediate accomplish-
ment. The principles for which we contend are as antagonistic
as light and darkness ; not so, I trust, however, the feelings
with which these differences are viewed : in conducting this
inquiry, I desire to remember that God's holy word is the sub-
ject concerning which this diversity of opinion exists, and I pray
that the heat of discussion may never lead to the substitution of
invective instead of proof, or of acrimonious and hasty censure
in the place of argument,
1 Dr. Gumming does not profess originality. In page 1. of Ins Apocalyptic
Sketches he says: " I candidly tell you that I shall beg and borrow from the
book of Mr. Elliott all I can ; " his book is only a condensation of Mr.
Elliott's views, wrapped up in that pleasing dress which no one can render
more delightful than Dr. Cumming.

LECT. III.] FIRST FOUR SEALS. 51
As I have said, then, I shall first state the views of Dr. dim-
ming", after which I shall subjoin my own, and leave the decision
to those who may examine them.
FIRST SEAL.
Chap. vi. 1-2.—"And I saw when the Lamb opened one of
the seals, and I heard as it were the noise of thunder, one of the
four beasts saying", Come and see. And I saw, and behold a
white horse : and he that sat on him had a bow: and a crown
was given unto him ; and he went forth conquering, and to
conquer."
I give Mr. Elliott's explanation condensed by Dr. Gumming.
" The colour of the first horse, white, indicates a state of pros-
perity, victory, and expansion, as the characteristic of the Roman
empire during the period comprehended during this seal. Now
was there any period, beginning at the date of this vision,
signalised by such marked prosperity ? There was: during
the reigns of Nerva, Trajan, Adrian, and the two Antonincs,
a period commencing A. D. 97> and closing A. D. 180, the
Roman empire experienced a condition of almost unclouded
national prosperity." This is further illustrated by Trajan's
victories and column.
" The crown upon the rider's head indicates that imperial
agency was the source of this state of happiness ; and that we
are right in fixing the rera in the first and second centuries, is
made still more clear by reference to the Greek word here
translated crown, * art^avos' wreath or laurel crown. The
8taS^/xa was not worn till centuries afterwards."
" Ju the rider's hand was a bow,—a symbol which long per-
plexed apocalyptic commentators. Crete was the chief ancient
place that was celebrated for the manufacture of bows : so much
so, that Cretan bows were as popular at Rome as Sheffield cut-
lery or Staffordshire earthenwares are throughout Europe. One
proof of the meaning of the bow employed as a symbol is found
on a Greek epigram on a female, which assigns to her a magpie
to denote her loquacity, a cup, her drunkenness, and a bow, to
show that she was a Cretan by birth."
44 Nerva was the first emperor of Cretan family and origin,
and his immediate successors icere Cretan a/so."
K2

52 OPENING OF THE [LECT. III.
The first seal is made to extend over a period of eighty-three
years, from A. D. 97 to A. D. 180.
I point out a few difficulties in this interpretation.
When it is said that the seal extends from A. D. 97 to A. D.
180, you will perceive there is no proof of such a statement
whatever, beyond the supposed prosperity of the Roman empire;
for any thing* said in the Apocalypse, the seal might have ex-
tended 1000 years as well as eighty-three, or six months as
well as 1000 years. All the rest is mere assumption, and
entirely destitute of argument. I am not so sure that all was
prosperity with the Roman empire during these reigns ; for
in the reign of Adrian the northern barbarians began to de-
vastate the frontier provinces of the empire,—so much so, that
Adrian had thoughts of contracting the limits of the empire, by
giving up its least defensible provinces.
And how could the successors of Nerva be called Cretan ?
Trajan was a Spaniard; Adrian was the nephew of Trajan, and
the family of Titus Antoninus came from Gaul. There must be
something faulty in the positive statement, " Nerva was the first
emperor of Cretan family and origin, awl Ids immediate suc-
cessors were Cretan also."
The absurdity of the bow in the hand denoting that the
emperors were of Cretan origin is too preposterous to need
comment.
I proceed to give a somewhat different interpretation. I must
premise here that the first four seals having each the emblem of
a horse and horseman, being each introduced by one of the four
living creatures who support the throne of God, and being each
prefaced with the emphatic words, " come and see," seem to
demand a similar interpretation, /. c. if the first seal be appli-
cable to any one individual or power, the other seals set forth
by similar emblems must correspond.
That all four seals refer to scenes of invasion, blood, and
warfare, is evident from the contents of each: —
To the first horseman is given a " crown," a " victor's
crown," " crTe^ayds,"—he is to go forth conquering and to
conquer.1
1 2r£^avoc» " a laurel crown." Mr. Elliott'*} argument respecting the
laurel crown applies with equal force to the crown given to Vespasian and
Titus.

LECT. III.] FIRST FOUR SEALS. 53
To the second, "a sword,"—he is to take "peace from the
earth."
To the third, " a pair of balances," indicative of the pressure
of terrible famine following in the footsteps of war.
In the fourth, the horseman is Death on a pale horse, and
hell ($8779) follows him ; "and power is given unto them over
the fourth part of the earth, to kill with sword, with hunger,
and with death, and with the beasts of the earth."
To whatever period these first four seals refer, they refer to
a time connected with conquest, battle, famine, pestilence,—
to a period not separated by long intervals of time, for the first
horseman goes out " conquering and to conquer,"1 i. e. to com-
mence a series of victories which should end in triumph.
Let us proceed to analyse the emblems of this first seal. " /
saw, and behold a white how."
The horse is emblematical of the Roman power. Such em-
blems are common in Scripture. The emblem of Judali is a
lion, of Persia, a ram, of Grecia, a he-goat. The national em-
blem of Koine was a horse. The Roman nation is called
"Gens Mavortia," the people sacred to Mars, and a horse
was yearly offered to. Mars in the Capitol. Mr. Elliott gives
a medal, with a figure of a horse and the word Roma un-
derneath.
The colour of the horse, — white, — denoted conquest and
victory. Kings and conquerors Were drawn by white horses.
Domitian rode a white horse at his father Vespasian's tri-
umph. Josephus says, " lie rode on a horse that was worthy
of admiration."2
" He that sat on him had a bow" The bow 3 was a coni-
1 ""Ira viMi<ni." A Hellenistic idiom—tl that he should gain victory after
victory."
2 Bell. Jud. lib. vii. cap. 5.
3 Mr. Layard thus describes Sennacherib before Lachish, as depicted in the
Nineveh marbles: " The throne of the king stood upon an elevated platform ;
in his right hand he raised two arrows, and his left rested upon a bow, over
his head was written the inscription, ' Sennacherib, the great king, the king
of Assyria, sitting in judgment on the city of Lachish, 1 give permission for
its slaughter/" In another passage, Mr. Layard connects the emblem of the
bow in the king's hand with victory and triumph: <f Behind them is the
king, carrying in one hand his bow and in the other two arrows, the position
in which he is so frequently represented in Assyrian monuments, and pro-
bably denoting triumph over his enemies."— Layard, vol. i. p. SIM. Thus54 OPENING OF THE \_LECT. III.
mon emblem of a victorious warrior—particular]/ of a warrior
devoting a city to destruction.
"A crown teas given unto him" — his success would be
rewarded with regal dignity.
" And he went forth conquering and to conquer" — to per-
severe in his victories till he should overcome all opposition.
Did such a conqueror proceed from the Roman power at
that time ? Joseph us tells us, " that when Nero was deliberating
to whom he should commit the affairs of the East, and who
might be best able to punish the Jews for their rebellion, he
found no one but Vespasian equal to the task — he was a man
that had long ago pacified the JFest, when it had been put
into disorder by the Germans ; he had also recovered to them
Britain by his arms, which had been little known before." 1
The crown given to him2 is explained by the extraordinary
coincidence that whilst Vespasian, a Roman general, was fight-
ing in Judrfa, the Emperor Nero committed suicide at Rome,
and Vespasian was declared emperor by the legions ; and when
he refused the empire, " the commanders insisted the more
earnestly upon his acceptance, and the soldiers came to him with
drawn swords in their hands, and threatened to kill him, unless
he would live according to his dignity, till lie at length yielded
to their solicitations, and allowed them to salute hint Ein-
peror" °
" Perhaps also there was* some interposition of Providence
which was paving the way for Vespasian's being himself
Jumper or afterwards" 4
** So Vespasian's good fortune succeeded to his wishes every-
Jacob blesses Joseph, (Gen. xlviii. 22.), fi I have given thee one portion
above thy brethren, which I took out of the hand of the Amorite with my
ffwordf and with my bow." Should it be objected that the vision depicts a
European and not an Eastern king, it must be remembered that the symbols
are purely of Eastern origin.
1 Bell. Jud. lib. iii. cap. 1.
2 If it should be objected that it was not Vespasian but Titus who took
Jerusalem, it may be answered, that the crown was given to Titus as well as
to Vespasian; Titus was saluted emperor after the taking of the temple, and
both Vespasian and Titus wore the imperial crown. Josephus admirably
forestalls this objection, where he says: " That government which had been
newly conferred upon them (Vespasian and Titus) by God/' — Bell. Jud,
lib. v. cap. 1.
'* Bell. Jud. lib. iv. cap. 10. 4 Ibid, Jib. iii. cap. 1.

LECT. III.] FIRST FOUR SEALS. 55
where; upon which he considered that lie had not arrived at
the government without Divine Providence, but that a righteous
kind of fate had brought the empire under his power; for as
he called to mind the other signals, so did he remember what
Josephus said to him when he ventured to foretel his coining
to the kingdom while Nero was alive." l
His going forth " conquering and to conquer" is abun-
dantly proved by Josephus, who has shown in his Jewish War,
that victory everywhere followed the irresistible legions of
Rome. The war from the commencement to the end was a
succession of victories, closed at last by the destruction of Jeru-
salem. Those victories are commemorated to this day in the
triumphal arch of Titus at Rome, and by the medal struck in
honour of those conquests, representing a female figure weep-
ing under a palm tree, with the motto, " Judtea devicta,"—
Judaea conquered.
Observe then, at that time a mighty conqueror went forth
from Rome on his mission of victory; the bow in his hand
was emblematical of previous success, and also of his parti-
cular mission as the destroyer of a city — " a crown was given
unto him," for he was saluted Emperor — " and he went forth"
"conquering and to conquer," till Jud&a lay prostrate at his
feet.
And this took place, not in the eighty-three years of the
reigns of Nerva, Trajan, Adrian, and the two Antonines ; but
in the three and a half years of the Jewish war.
SECOND SEAL.
" And when he had opened the Second Seal, I heard the
second beast say, Came and see, and there went out another
horse that was red, and power was given him that sat thereon
to take peace from the earth, and that they should kill one
another, and there was given unto him a great sword."
Dr. Gumming says: — "In this seal also the Roman Em-
pire, the horse, is the subject of description. Red is the symbol
of bloodshed. The sword when presented to any one within a
circuit of 100 miles of Rome, at the era referred to in this seal,
1 Bell. Jud. lib. iv. cap. 10.

56 OPENING OF THE [LECT. III.

was equivalent to his appointment or investiture to be Pnetorian
Prefect. This therefore would indicate that the agency em-
ployed under this seal was Pr&toriau.

" 'Killing one another/ is the language of civil war. The
peace taken from the earth has in the original the definite
article1, and this shows that the commission issued to the rider
was to take away the peace that was created or prevailed during
the First Seal. Is there anything recorded in history which
exhausts and illustrates these symbols ? We appeal to Gibbon
— he shows that the bright and happy era which we have just
referred to was succeeded by intestine and incessant civil wars.
Dion Cassius calls it ' a transition from a golden to an iron
age.'"

" The Praetorian guards, under their chief, murdered nine
Roman emperors in succession, and during a period of sixty
years, that is, from die close of the First Seal, A.P. 180, to the
close of the Second Seal, A.D. 214), they exercised extermi-
nating cruelties, and created a Roman reign of terror. Gibbon
writes: — * Their licentious fury was the first symptom and
cause of the decline of the Roman Empire.' "

I shall explain this seal of civil war, but with a great variety
of date. I have observed that the first four seals have one
characteristic in common ; viz., the symbol of a horse and
horseman, which is the basis of each. We must look, then, for
the interpretation in some*events connected with the Roman
conquest of Judaea.

The colour of the horse, red, is the colour of blood.
The sword in the hand of the horseman denotes slaughter, and
the peculiar feature of this slaughter is, that it is to be domes-
tic slaughter, civil strife,—that they should "kill one another."
Now let us ask was this the case during the Roman invasion
of Juda*a ? was peace taken from the land of Judaea? and
did the inhabitants of the land kill one another ?

1 If the force of the definite article l>e BO great with regard to the pre-
viously existing peace, what must the force of the same definite article with
regard to (( the earth" " ix rfjr y'lc>" the land of Judtca? Compare " Trdcrut
at </>v\ai rfjc y*?c»" ornnes tribus terra? Israeliticsc, Rev. i. ? > u fiarrtXtlr
rvJG y»K>" principes Paliestinjc, Rev. vi. 15.; ""Korea yap urayiri? /icy 11X17
iiri rye y7}c KUI opyr; tr ry Xaw rour^i," Luke xxi. 23., where by the correla-
tive phrase o X/coc TOVTOC, the ?/ yfj is defined to be the land of «Tuda'a

LECT. III.] FIRST FOUR SEALS. 57
Of all plain and well-known historical facts, this is the plainest;
any one who has read the history of those miserable times
knows that the principal feature in that history was the intestine
factions and civil struggles which, wore than foreign foes, anni-
hilated the Jewish people.
I might quote volumes upon this subject. Josephus tells
us : — "There were three treacherous factions in the city, the
one parted from the other. Eleazarand his party came against
.John ; those that were with John went out with zeal against
Simon."1 In their mad fury they destroyed all the corn laid
up for the siege, and destroyed the " nerves of their own
5) O
power. w
" Accordingly it came to pass that almost all the corn was
burnt, which would have been sufficient for a siege of many
years. So they were taken by the means of the famine, which
it was impossible they should have been, unless they had thus
prepared the way first by this procedure."
" And now, as the city was engaged in a war on all sides
from these treacherous crowds of wicked men, the people of
the city, between them, were like a great body torn in pieces ;
the aged men and the women were in such distress by their
internal calamities, that they wished for the Romans, and
earnestly hoped for an external war, in order to their delivery
from their domestic miseries." " God," said Vespasian to his
officers, " acts as a general of tin* Romans better than lie
could do, and is giving the Jews up to them without any pains
of their own ; that therefore it is their best way, 'while their
enemies arc drstroi/int/ each other with their own hands to sit
still as spectators, rather than to fight with men that love
murdering, and are mad one against another."3
We need not put this horseman's sword into the hands of
1 " Tres Duccs, totidcm cxcrcitus: extrema et latissima momium, Simon,
mediam urbem> Johannes, quern et Burgioram vocabant, Templum, Eleazarus,
loco pollebat. Sed pnclia, clolus, incendia inter ipsos, et magna vis f rumen ti
ambusta."—Tacit. Hist. v. 12.
2 Josephus, Bell. Jud. lib. v. cap. 1.— u The corn burnt." Observe, the
seal denoting famine follows the seal emblematical of civil war. Had they
not burnt their magazines of corn, and thus destroyed " the nerves of their
own power," in the fury of their civil strife, this famine could not have taken
place.
3 Bell. Jud. lib. iv. cap. 6\

58 OPENING OF THE [LECT. III.

the Praetorian prefects ; we need not refer these intestine
troubles to sixty years of Roman history. There and then —
at the time — the coming of the Romans led to intestine
troubles among the Jews; and this cml slaughter depopulated
Judaea more than the sword of foreign invasion. " Oh, most
wretched city," said Josephus, " what misery so great as this
didst thou suffer from the Romans, when they came to purify
thee from thine intestine hatred ; for thou couldest be no longer
a place fit for God, after thou hadst been a sepulchre for the
bodies of thine own people, and hadst made the holy house
itself a burying-place in this civil war of thine."

THIRD SEAL.

" And when he had opened the third seal, I heard the third
beast say, Come and see ; and I beheld, and lo a black horse,
and he that sat on him had a pair of balances in his hand ; and
I heard a voice in the midst of the four beasts say, A measure
of wheat for a penny, and three measures of barley for a penny,
and see that thou hurt not the oil and wine." l

This is referred by Elliott and Gumming to the oppressive-
ness of the provincial governors during the reign of Garacalla,
which Gibbon states to be one of the principal causes of the
decline of the Roman Empire. It is needless to observe, that
this oppressiveness is no more true of the Roman provincial
governors during the reign of Garacalla than during any other
reign ; most of them, amongst whom I may instance Festus,
Albinus, and Florus, being guilty of terrible exactions.2

1 Wheat, barley, oil, and wine, the especial productions of Palestine;
(' A land of wheat, and barley, and vines,......a land of oil olive, and
honey."—Deut. viii. 8.
2 Character of Albinus and Florus.—" Albinus, who succeeded Festus, did
not execute his office as the other had done, nor was there any sort of wicked-
ness that could be named but he had a hand in it. Accordingly, he did not
only in his political capacity steal and plunder every one's substance, nor
did he only burden the whole nation with taxes, but he permitted the relations
of such as were in prison for robbery, to redeem them for money ; and nobody
remained in the prisons as a malefactor, but he who gave him nothing."—
Bell. Jud. lib. ii. cap. 14.
" But although such was tin- character of Albinus, yet did Gessius Florus

LECT. III.] FIRST FOUR SEALS. 59
I hope to arrive at a more satisfactory explanation. The
colour of the horse, Mack, is indicative of mourning and dis-
tress.1 The rider holding in his hands a pair of balances, for
the purpose of measuring' and weighing food, shows that this
distress is occasioned by want of the necessaries of life. This
is confirmed by the voice saying, " a measure2 of wheat for a
penny, and three measures of barley for a penny, and see that
thou hurt not the oil and wine."
Did events corresponding to this seal take place during the
Roman invasion of Juda>a ? Is it known that famine prevailed
to a great extent ? Were the prices of food raised considerably
Lfg'lier; and was there any occasion which justified the emblems
conveyed under this seal ?
This is no matter of conjecture. The account is given us by
one, who, whilst he was a captive in the hands of the Roman
armies, outside the walls of Jerusalem, had his wife and
children within the walls, a prey to the horrible famine which
lie describes3:—"Many there were/' he says, " who sold
what they had for one measure : it was of icheat if they were
who succeeded him, demonstrate him to have been a most excellent person
upon the comparison ; for the former did the greatest part of his rogueries
in private, hut Gessius did his unjust actions to the harm of the nation, and
as though lie had been sent as an executioner to punish condemned male-
factors, he omitted no sort of rapine or of vexation ; he thought it but a
petty offence to get money out of single persons, so he spoiled whole cities,
and ruined entire bodies of men at once."—Bell. Jud. lib. ii. cap. 14-.
1 (t Wives and families that are in black, mourning for their slaughtered
relations/'—Bell. Jiul. lib. iv. cap. k
- Xo/i'tJ, "a measure." — There is so much difference of opinion with
regard to the meaning of the word translated a measure, that we cannot form
an accurate judgment as to what extent the famine prevailed.
3 f' As for myself, 1 have composed a true history of that war, having been
concerned in its transactions ; for I acted as general with those among us who
are called Galihrans, as long as it was possible for us to make any opposition ;
and when I was taken captive by the Romans, Vespasian and Titus ordered me
to be kept under a guard, but commanded that I should attend to them con-
tinually. At first 1 was in bonds ; afterwards I was set at liberty, and was
sent to accompany Titus when he came to the siege of Jerusalem, during
which time nothing was done which escaped tny knowledge. What happened in
the Roman camp I saw, and wrote down carefully ; what information the
deserters brought out of the city I was the only man who could understand
it."—Jos. Contra Apion, lib. 1. c. {).
c Judjrus Joseph us antiquitatum Jndaicarum vernaculus vindex."—Ter-
uj Apol. ]().

60 OPENING OF THE [LECT. III.
of the richer sort, but of larky if they were poorer. When
these had so done, they shut themselves up in the inmost
rooms of the houses, and ate the corn they had gotten ; some
did it without grinding it, by reason of the extremity of the
want they were in ; and others snatched the bread out of the
fire half baked, and ate it very heartily." *
He further adds : —" That a bushel of wheat was sold for
a talent (375/.) ; and that when it was not possible to gather
herbs by reason of the city being all walled about, some persons
were driven to that terrible distress as to search the common
sewers and old dunghills of cattle, and to eat the dung which
they got there; and what they of old could not so much as
endure to see, they now used as food."2
This appears to me to be a more likely interpretation than
that which refers this seal to the cupidity of the Roman go-
vernors during the reign of CaracalJa. Were they the only
avaricious Roman governors, and were they (ill avaricious ?
and did their avarice only commence in the year 210 and
extend over a period of eight years ? We must suppose that,
in the seal, there is sonic mystic intelligence which ordinary
minds cannot fathom, to signify that it begins with the year
210, and ends with the year 248. I confess, I cannot find it,
and that, if it is to be interpreted of the avarice of the Roman
governors, it might as well extend over the whole period of
Roman usurpation and tyranny, as over a particular period of
eight years,
FOURTH SEAL.
The Fourth Seal is ushered in under circumstances of
peculiar majesty and terror. " And when he had opened the
fourth seal, I heard the voice of the fourth beast say, Come
and see ; and I looked, and behold a pale horse : and his name
that sat on him was Death, and hell followed with him, and
power was given unto them over the fourth part of the earth,
to kill with sword, and with hunger, and with death, and with
the beasts of the earth."
"This seal," says Dr. dimming, "almost explains itself.
It represents Death riding rough-shod over the length and
1 Bell Jud. lib. v. cap. 10. 2 Ibid. v. cap. 13.

LBCT. III.] FIRST FOUR SEALS. 61
breadth of the empire, and Hades, or the grave, following at
his heels to receive the victims as they fell. It was during this
seal, from A.D. 248 to A.D. 268, that there occurred the most
terrible contemporaneous combination of sword, famine, and
pestilence, that ever visited a guilty population."
Gibbon describes it thus : —" Every province was invaded
by barbarous military tyrants ; there was a general famine, a
dreadful plague, so that 4,500 persons died each day at Rome."
And a heathen writer states, " The wild beasts invaded the
cities as the natural consequence of the decay of man."
It is possible that precise period of Roman history might
have been visited with sword, and famine, and pestilence ; but
/ am prepared to show that these punishments of God fell
upon a particular land, and at a particular time: not com-
mencing1 with the year 2-iS, and ending 208, hut immediately
after the Apocalypse was written, and confined within the
period of the Jewish war.
Observe the colour of the horse — pale, cadaverous, livid —
the colour suiting the rider : for his name is Death. Hell or
the grave follows him ; and power is given him to " destroy
with sword, and hunger, and with death (the same word is
often used to signify pestilence), and with beasts of the earth."
The description is highly allegorical ; yet at the same time
magnificently stern and grand. It is
" The Giant steed to be bestrode by Death,
As told in the Apocalypse."
Poets and painters have fastened on the symbol, and gathered
from it sublime, though erroneous, imagery.
However, nothing can be plainer than the meaning which
lies hid under this symbol. Death, famine, and pestilence
follow in the steps of war ; nothing is more natural than that
famine should tread on the steps of war, or that pestilence
should follow famine.
The question is — did such pestilence — such famine — such
wholesale slaughter and destruction, happen at this time ? Did
Death on a pale horse ride rough-shod over his victims, and
did hell and the grave follow him ?
Josephus says that when c< Titus, in going his rounds along
the valleys in front of Jerusalem, saw them full of dead bodies,
and the thick putrefaction running from them, he gave a groan,62 OPENING OF THE [LECT. III.
and spreading out his hands to heaven, called God to witness,
that this was not his doing*." l
In another passage — " The multitude of carcases that lay in
heaps one upon another was a horrible sight, and produced a
pestilential stench." 2
In another statement—" The multitude of tjiose that therein
perished exceeded all the destructions that either man or God
brought upon the world." 3
I might quote innumerable passages besides these, but these
are sufficient. If Death on the pale horse ever had a revel,
and feasted over human victims, his greatest banquet was at
the time of Jerusalem's downfal.
According to our Lord's words (Matt, xxiv, 21, 22.)
" Then shall be great tribulation, such as was not from the
beginning of the world to this time, no, nor ever shall be.
And except those (lays should be shortened, there should no
flesh be saved ; but for the elect's sake those days shall be
shortened."
Such I conceive is the reasonable and satisfactory interpre-
tation of the first four seals. They have each the common
basis of a horse and Ins rider ; they each refer to scenes of
conquest, war, and bloodshed ; they each have a continuous
signification, for the horseman goes forth " conquering and to
conquer;" they each are introduced by one of the four living
creatures, and each are prefaced with the words demanding
attention, " Come and see." It is natural to look for a con-
tinuous interpretation, and we find one, not by ranging over
the history of 200 years, not by turning over the pages of
Gibbon to find some event likely to suit the seal, but in the
defined and specific period of the Jewish war.
First comes the foreign invader, on his white horse, armed
with his bow, the emblem of previous victories, and going
forth " conquering and to conquer."
Then civil war following in the footsteps of foreign invasion.
Then famine, with its balances and short measures.
Then pestilence bringing up the rear of this terrible array.
All is easy, simple, natural, and all finds an exact and
literal fulfilment in the period which we have assigned.
1 Bell. Jud. lib. v. cap. 12. 2 Ib. lib. vi. cap. 1.
3 Ib. lib. vi. cap. y.

LECT. III.] FIRST FOUB SEALS. 63
It will, I think, be deemed confirmatory of this exposition
now given of the first four seals, to find in a book of an
almost Apostolical character, generally thought to have been
written by the Hernias mentioned by St. Paul (Horn. xvi. 14.),
in such high estimation with the early Christians that it was
called " the Scripture," and " publicly read in the churches,"
that a beast (the common emblem of the Roman power) is
represented rising " from the sea as a whale," (compare Rev.
xiii. 1. ; Dan. vii. 3.) " having upon its head four colours."
" The beast had upon its head four colours, black ^ then red
and blood-colour; after t\\ttt pale ; last of all, white.....
This beast came on so fiercely as if it could destroy the city at
a blow . . . this beast is the emblem of the wrath which
is about to come."1
It will be observed there is a marked coincidence between
the colours of the four horses mentioned in the Apocalypse
and the colours upon the head of the beast mentioned by
Hermas ; and when to this it is added, that the beast, both in
the Apocalypse and the Book of Hermas " rises from the sea,"
that the object of his terrible approach is to " destroy the city"
and that the beast is defined to be u the emblem of the wrath
which is about to come" (an explanation allowed by the best
commentators to refer to the distress about to come upon
Judeea and .Jerusalem), there will be little doubt but that the
Apocalypse and the Vision of Hennas both prefigure the same
events, and that the application of these symbols to the distress
caused by the Roman invasion of Judaea is correct. This gives
great weight to the exposition which refers the first four seals
to the calamities about to come upon the Jewish people in con-
sequence of the invasion of the Romans. It shows that these
views harmonise with the original interpretations of the symbols
of the Apocalypse, and that the theories of our conjectural age
are a modern myth and a hypothetical novelty. It shows that
Cretan bows were as little likely to be prefigured in those
symbols as Staffordshire earthenware, and that Pruetorian pre-
1 " Ilabebat autem bestia ilia super caput colores quatuor, Digram, ileimle
rubrum et sanguinolentum, indc tureum (^Xwpot;, cu^poc, Xfvk'ov £n>'0<T> //£-
/uyyue'i'ov) deirulc album .... sic autem veniebat bestia ilia ut posset in
ictu civitatem delere .... bestia luce tigura est pressure superventunc" r>7c
<>py>/c.— Hernia; Pastor, lib. i. visio 4.

64 OPENING OF THE [LKCT. III.
fects occupy about as legitimate a place in the Apocalypse as
the rapacious provincial governors of the reign of Caracalhi
whose rapacity lasted neither more nor less than eight years.
It shows that neither Greek epigrams on females, nor the lo-
quacity of magpies, serve to throw much light upon its mysteries,
and that the fable of the Cretan dynasty is worthy of the Cretan
character as given by St. Paul.
In a word, it shows that the principles* on which such inter-
pretation is conducted are false and mischievous, and productive
not only of much negative folly, but of much positive harm ;
and it teaches us, that if we would obtain a solution of the
symbols of the Apocalypse, we must be content to look for it
at a period when symbolic teaching was by no means uncommon,
that men of an Apostolic age were more likely to Lave under-
stood Apostolic mysteries than would-be prophets of later
times, and that the explanation given by them of these sym-
bols is probably more in unison with truth, than the inter-
pretation offered by modern theorists ; in fact, that the reason-
able exegesis of contemporaneous authority is more worthy of
credit than the guess-work of after ages, and the " scriptural "
definition of Apocalyptic symbols, as Irenanis, Origen, .Jerome,
and Eusebius, would have called the exposition of Ilermas
Pastor, more fit to be trusted than the crude hypothesis of the
nineteenth century.
Such, then, the nature of these outpourings of the wrath of
God upon a race of evil-doers. Such the mighty conqueror,
and such the woes that followed in his train ; and to crown
the whole, these distinct and specific miseries, so graphically
portrayed in the first four seals, are made the subject of
previous imprecation. In the period immediately preceding
the coming desolation, innocent blood ascends reeking up to
heaven, and cries for vengeance, shaped to the very form and
1 "Ami, first, as to the principles adopted. These, as far as I have been
able to ascertain them, are those only of ingenious conjecture, supported in
detail by what may be termed the doctrine of rw.mblnm-M ; for example, the
meaning of a prediction of Scripture is, in the first place, guessed at ; in the
second, the event so supposed to be had in view is made to quadrate with it to
a certain extent, just in proportion to the* amount of ingenuity exerted ; the
resemblance so obtained is, as it is then thought, too near to have been un-
designed, and the conclusion is, that the needful has been satisfactorily
ascertained."—Professor Lee on Prophecy, Preface, 181.9.

LECT. HI.] FIRST FOUR SEALS. 65
letter of these Apocalyptical predictions. In the words of that
unconscious witness, from whose unwilling lips we wring the
sublimest confirmation of the truth of our holy religion, these
four terrible visitants, war, famine, civil discord and pestilence,
were invoked at that time upon that guilty nation, and that
awful invocation was confirmed by Almighty God. " Now,
whilst they (the zealots) were slaying him (Niger of Persea), he
made this imprecation upon them, that they might undergo
both famine and pestilence in this war; and besides all that,
they might come to the mutual slaughter one of another, ALL
WHICH IMPRECATIONS GOD CONFIRMED AGAINST THESE
IMPIOUS MEN, and was what carne most justly upon them when,
Hot long afterward, they tasted of their own madness, in
their mutual seditions one against another."1
1 Bell. Jucl. lib. iv. cap. 6.

66

LECTURE IV,
THE FIFTH SEAL. THE JEKA OF MARTYRS.
REV. vi. 9, 10, 11.
p. And when he had opened the fifth seal, I saw under the altar the souls
of them that were slain for the word of God, and for the testimony which
they held :
10. And they cried with a loud voice, saying, How long, O Lord, holy and
true, dost thou not judge and avenge our blood on them that dwell on the
earth ?
11. And white robes were given unto every one of them; and it was said
unto them, that they should rest yet for a little season, until their fellow
servants also and their brethren, that should be killed as they were, should be
fulfilled.
OUR previous lecture embraced the subject of the first four
seals. These were shown to be symbolical of invasion, civil
discord, famine, and pestilence. With the opening" of the First,
a warrior goes forth, " conquering and to conquer/7 He is
described by symbols which make it evident that Rome is the
source of his mission, and that his triumphs would be succes-
sive until they closed in victory. And the overruling provi-
dence of God so accurately fits the fulfilment to the prediction,
that Judrea is for the first time desolated by a Roman conqueror
(for previous reductions of Judsea by the Romans did not
terminate in its destruction), and these desolations are suffered
to continue until, as a nation, the Jews became extinct.
With the opening of the Second, not only is the nature* of the
misery caused by this foreign invasion accurately defined, but the
particular land is pointed out upon which this misery should
come. " The peace is to be taken from the earth " (rrys 7*79)
—Judaea. The previously existing amity between the Romans
and the Jewish people is to be broken up, and Judaea is to be
filled with internal discord and civil slaughter.
With the opening of the Third, the scene of the corning
desolation is still unmistakably defined. Not only is the price

LECT. IV.] THE FIFTH SEAL. 67
to be paid for the "measure of wheat" and the "three
measures of barley," said to be a "denarium,"—the Roman
penny spoken of John, vi. 7. and elsewhere, at that time the
current money of Judaea,—but the peculiar productions of that
land, described as " wheat, and barley, and oil, and wine,"
are smitten by the famine. No language could more clearly
determine the particular land upon which this scarcity was to
come ; whilst the distinct recognition of the current money of
the land, makes it morally certain that Judaea alone must be
intended.
With the opening of the Fourth, the particular land which
death and hell are to cover with their victims is again speci-
fically delineated. " Power was given to them over the fourth
part of the earth," (TTJS yy}s)—Juda>a—" to kill with sword,
and with hunger, and with death, and with the beasts of the
earth/' (7-779 y^/s)—Judaea. I need not say how faithfully this
symbol received its accomplishment ; how at that particular
time there was " great distress in the land," (CTTI rrjs y^s)—
Judaea—" and wrath upon this people,"—the Jews ; or how
the dead bodies " were cast out naked, and seen to be the food
of dogs and wild beasts." l
Indeed, the first four seals present a combined and connected
view of what would naturally happen under the circumstances.
Nothing would be more likely than that foreign invasion should
be followed by civil war, famine, and pestilence. We have
ample testimony that such was the case at that time, and that
the invasion of the Romans was the signal for the commence-
ment of those heart-rending desolations which exterminated the
ancient people of God,—an extermination which the lapse of
^,000 years has not obliterated, and which the historian of that
age has forcibly described as " exceeding all the destructions
that either man or God brought upon the world."
A new picture is presented to us under the Fifth Seal. The
Roman horse and horsemen fade from our view,—war, strife,
famine, and pestilence, recede. The actors in this seal are no
more connected with conquest and battle,—and a new vision
opens upon us,—a vision of plaintive martyrs and mourning
saints.
1 Bell, Jud. lib. iv. cap, 5.

68 THE FIFTH SEAL. [LECT. IV.

FIFTH SEAL.
" And when he had opened the fifth seal, I saw under the
altar the souls of them that were slain for the word of God,
and for the testimony which they held :
" And they cried with a loud voice, saying", How long-, O
Lord, holy and true, dost thou not judge and avenge our blood
on them that dwell on the earth ?
"And white robes were given unto every one of them ; and
it was said unto them, that they should rest yet for a little
season, until their fellow-servants also and their brethren, that
should be killed as they were, should be fulfilled."
I ask you to observe the grandeur and majesty of this vision.
Invasion, civil discord, famine, and pestilence, are about to
fall upon the enemies of the Church,—when to heighten and
enhance the terribleness of this spiritual drama, the temple of
God is disclosed in heaven. Under the altar, /. <. at the foot
of the altar, the place where the bodies of the victims would be
laid, are seen the souls of the murdered martyrs.
That these souls do not represent invisible or immaterial
spirits is evident from the circumstance that St. John sees them,
and that " white robes are given unto them." They are de-
scribed as the souls of martyrs for their religion ; for they are
" .slain for the n'ord of God and for the testimony ichick thei/
held" They are, moreover, represented as invoking the ven-
geance of God upon their murderers. " How long, (.) Lord,
holy and true, dost thou not judge and avenge our blood on
them that dwell on the earth?"
It is impossible to conceive a more majestic picture than this
invocation, of his own "elect crying' day and night unto him,"
beseeching him to " finish the work, and cut it short in right-
eousness." " And shall not God avenge his own elect? 1 tell
you that He will avenge them speedily ; nevertheless when the
Son of Man cometh shall he find faith on the earth." *
1 By comparing this passage with Luke, xxi. 22, 23, it will be found that
the vengeance predicted was to be executed by our Lord's coining to the land
of Juda-a. " These be the days of vengeance, ///i/^at EVcuu/o'ewc' .... for
there shall be great distress in the land, f.ir\ rr/c yj/c> and wrath upon this
people."

LECT. IV.] THE ^ERA OF MAETYIIS. 69

" And it was said unto them that they should rest yet a little
season1, until their fellow-servants also, and their brethren,
which should be killed as they were, should be fulfilled ; " and,
as it were, to stay their impatient desire for vengeance upon
their enemies, "white robes are given to them"—the same
honour as that promised to the faithful martyrs at Sardis,—
" they shall walk with me in white, for they are worthy." The
white robes were particularly the insignia of the martyrs. So
in Chapter vii., one of the elders asks St. John, " What are
these which are arrayed in white robes, and whence came they ;"
and the answer is, " These are they which have come out of
great tribulation, and have washed their robes, and made them
white in the blood of the Lamb."

The whole figure is of a highly poetical character. The ghost
of Patroclus imploring Achilles to avenge his death, or the spi-
rits described by Ossian, shrieking on the clouds and demanding*
blood, sink into insignificance, ns far as mere poetry is con-
cerned, when compared with this magnificent symbol. It is
true of the Bible generally, and especially of the Apocalypse,
that as a poetical composition, independently of its saving
truths, it has never been equalled by any writing in the world.

Mr. Elliot and Dr. dimming refer this seal to the persecu-
tions commencing* with the reion of Diocletian until the intro-

I notice here an unfair translation of the original. It was impossible to
avoid the force of the words t'rri ri/c yt~j(j in Luke, xxi. i2'3., for they are
qualified hy the accompanying clause, " upon this people," which can only
mean the land and people of Jiuhea. By what rules of criticism are the
words tTTt r»/c y»/c translated 4' in the land," Luke, xxi. '23., rendered "on the
earth " in Luke, xviii. .'>. ? It is most evident that one idea was intended
under both passages. The elect cry for vengeance, tKcixtjcrtr ; that vengeance
is promised soon, iv ra^tt ; the Son of Man coineth to execute that vengeance,
and hardly findeth faith on the earth, trrl ri/c yvc« —Judaea. Luke, xviii. 8.
So Luke, xxi. 1M. The days of vengeance, ///up«t t^tK/jo-tair, arrive;
there is great distress in the land, i-xi r?7c yj/c,—Juduea,—and wrath upon this
people, and then shall they see the Son of Man coming in a cloud with power
and great glory."
There is no evading the conclusion that the same vengeance is spoken of
in both texts, that it was to come upon " the land," i. c. Judira, and to he
accomplished at the period of the coining of the Son of Man.
1 "Krt yjpurov ^m^or, **' a little season." This is a confirmation of the
date of the Apocalypse. God avenged the blood of his servants only on
those that dwelt in the land of Judira, and the period of that, vengeance was
the time of the destruction of Jerusalem — they had not to wait font/.

70 THE FIFTH SEAL. [LECT. IV.
duction of Christianity by Constantine, A. D. 300. I give Dr.
Cumming's interpretation :—
" This seal comprehends, as its language plainly enough
proves, the rera beginning at the close of the third century,
justly and universally called the /Era of Martyrs. The Chris-
tians were slaughtered in vast numbers,—their blood was poured
out like that of victims at the foot of the altar,—and there, like
Abel's, it sent its piercing cry into the heavens, saying, * How
long! ' The churches were overturned, the congregations
scattered, their Bibles burnt, the holiest and best ' tortured,
not accepting deliverance.' To the cry of these martyrs in their
agony a response was given from on high ; they received * white
robes/ the evidence of acquittal and justification before God ;
and they were told that they must rest until subsequent mar-
tyrs, the victims of anti-christian, that is, papal persecution, the
complement, of the noble army, should be numbered with them,
that both might thus rejoice together."
It is needless to observe, that if the sole reason of applying
this seal to the Diocletian persecution is because of the martyr-
doms which then took place, there are many other periods in
the history of the Church to which it would equally refer. And
how, it may be asked, was the Diocletian persecution avenged
"on them that dwell on the earth"—Judiea ; for judgment
against the betrayers and murderers of the martyrs of Jesus
came on no other people but the Jews, and no other city but
Jerusalem ? Or how could the sufferers under the Diocletian
persecution be said to wait " a little swtson" for their fellow
" victims of anti-christian, that is, papal persecution ? Surely
a period comprising a third part of die world's existence (for
I presume the Austrian and Italian martyrs of our day are
included in the " complement of this noble army") cannot well
be called " a little season."
Or, how again could these martyrs, who should soon be
slain, and who stood in the contemporaneous relationship of
"fellow servants and brethren" to those who were killed
already, be made to suffer in a persecution which had not then
an existence?
I trust to be enabled to show that the Fifth Seal refers to the
period when the book was written, and not to a period 250
years after. That there were martyrs then whose blood cried
for vengeance, that their blood was terribly avenged, that this

LECT. IV.] THE JERA OF MARTYRS. 71
vengeance took place soon, and that they had but to rest a " little
season'* before the vengeance came.
Our first point must be to show that the Christian Church
suffered extraordinary persecution about this time, and that the
vision seen by St. John " of souls under the altar slain for the
word of God, and for the testimony which they held," was
abundantly realised.
Let us consider, first, our Lord's predictions with reference
to this subject. Luke xxi. 12.: " But, before all these (i. e.
before the signs which preceded the destruction of Jerusalem),
they shall lay their hands on you and persecute you, delivering
you up to the synagogues and into prisons, being brought before
kings and rulers for my name's sake ;" " and ye shall be be-
trayed both by parents, and brethren, and kinsfolk, and friends ;
and some of you shall they cause to he put to death"
Matt. xxiv. 9- * " They shall deliver you up to be afflicted, and
shall kill you ; and ye shall be hated of all nations for my name's
sake."
Such were the prophecies which predicted that our Lord's
disciples just at this time (/. c. the time immediately preceding
the destruction of Jerusalem), should meet with unwonted trials
and persecutions ; that the furnace should be heated seven times
more than it was wont to be heated; that whatever affliction
they had previously endured should be light in comparison
with that which they were about to suffer; that an "hour of
temptation" was coming upon the earth, during which " many
should be offended, and should betray one another, and hate one
another ;" and because " iniquity should abound, the love of
many should wax cold."
Now did the Christian Church meet leith unwonted perse-
cution at this particular time ?
Persecution had followed the Church from its earliest days;
but that was rather the outburst of popular feeling than or-
ganised, systematic persecution. Stephen had been martyred
in such an outbreak; and with a view of rendering himself
popular with the Jewish people, " Herod the king stretched
forth his hands to vex certain of the Church, and he killed
James, the brother of John, with the sword."l
1 Acts, xii. 1, 2.
r4

72 THE FIFTH SEAL. [LECT. IV.
But in the period immediately preceding* the destruction of
Jerusalem, persecution sanctioned by imperial authority took a
more definite shape, and regal mandates were stereotyped in acts
of savage cruelty.
St. Paul says of the extraordinary trial of that period, " I
think that God hath set forth us the Apostles last, (" ^/xas,
TOV$ d,7rocrToXov9 ecr^arou?," us, the last apostles, —alluding
possibly to the circumstance that preceding apostles had already
"gone to the place due to them from the Lord") " as it were
appointed unto death ; for we are made a spectacle unto the
world, unto angels and unto men." 1
He records with much feeling his defence before Nero : " At
my first answer, no man stood with me, but all men forsook
me. I pray God that it may not be laid to their charge.5'2
St. Peter warns his converts of a season of unusual trial
which was fast approaching: "Think it not strange concerning
the fiery trial that is to try you, as though some strange thing
happened unto you/'3
St. James : " Behold we count them happy which endure.
Ye have heard of the patience of Job, and have seen the end of
the Lord, that the Lord is very pitiful, and of tender mercy."4
Nothing is more certain from the testimony of the sacred
books themselves, that the period immediately preceding the
destruction of Jerusalem was one of cruel and savage perse-
cution.
The next point is,—Is this confirmed by testimony indepen-
dent of the Scriptures ? Did the Christians thus suffer in the
reign of Nero—in the period for which we contend.
Tacitus0, speaking of the fire at Home wantonly kindled by
Nero, says : " To do away with the foul disgrace of having set
the city on fire, Nero laid the guilt, and inflicted the most ex-
quisite tortures on those men, who, under the vulgar appellation
of Christians, were already branded with deserved infamy.... At
1 1 Cor. iv. 9. 2 g Tjm< jv> lo\
* 1 Peter, iv. 12. 4 jaineS) v. u.
5 " Ergo abolendo nimori Nero subclidit reos, et qiucsitissimis pcenis affecit,
<[uos per flagitia invisos, Christianos appellabat.....Igitur primo
correpti qui fatebantur, deinde indicio eorum multitudo ingens, baud perinde
in crimine incendii, quum odio humani generis convicti sunt. Et pereuntibus
addita ludibria, aut ferarum tergis contecti, laniatu canum interirent, aut cru-
cibus affixi, aut flamrnandi, atque ubi defecisset dies, in usum nocturni luminis
ureretur."— Tacitus, Ann. xv. 44.

LBCT. IV.] THE JERA OF MARTYRS. 73

first those only were seized who confessed their persuasion; and
afterwards, by their information, a vast multitude were appre-
hended and condemned, not so much for their crime of setting
the city on fire, as for their hatred of all mankind. Their suf-
ferings at the place of execution were embittered by derision
and insult. Some were disguised in the skins of wild beasts,
and torn to pieces by dogs ; some were crucified ; while others,
smeared over with combustible matter, were used as torches to
illuminate the night."

Suetonius, speaking of Nero's reign : " The Christians, a
race of men of a new and impious superstition, were severely
tortured." l

Juvenal 2 says of the same reign, speaking of a creature of
Nero's whose name was Tigellinus, —

" If you dare to speak of his enormities, you shall suffer as
the Christians do. You shall suffer the same punishment with
those who stand burning in their own flame and smoke ; their
heads held up by a stake fixed to their chins, till they make a
long stream of blood, and melted sulphur on the ground."

Another ancient writer 3 turned their sufferings into ridi-
cule, and mocked the heroic firmness with which these noble
missionaries of Christ went to their death. I attempt a para-
phrase : —

" Look into the arena. You will see a Christian ; his name
is Mucius. He is about to place his own limbs on the burning
pyre. Do not be so dull as to consider him a hero or a martyr ;
it is nothing more than obstinacy ; for when he is offered the
choice of wearing his shirt steeped in pitch, or of sacrificing to
the statue of the emperor, he says, I cannot do it ; I prefer to
die."

1 <f Afflicti suppliciis Christian!, genus hominum superstitionis novte et
malefica\" — In vita Ncronis, l().
2 a Pone Tigellinum, tjedzi lucebis in ilia,
Qua stantes ardent, qua fixo gutture funiant,
Et latum media, sulcum deducis arena." — Sat. i. 155.
3 Martial : " In matutina nuper spectatus arena
Mucius, imposuit qui sua membra focis,
Si patiens, fortisque tibi, durusque videtur
AbderitaiiR' pectora plebis babes,
Nam quuni dicatur tunica pruesente molest a,
Ure inanuni, plus cst dicere, non facio." — Lib. x. Ep. %5.

74 THE FIFTH SEAL. [LBCT. IV.

To this testimony I shall add that of the Christian histories
themselves.

Eusebius1 says : " Nero, having the government firmly esta-
blished under him, began to take up arms against that very
religion which acknowledges the one Supreme God. He was
the first of the emperors that displayed himself an enemy of
piety towards the Deity. Thus Nero, publicly announcing him-
self as the chief enemy of God, was led on in his fury to
slaughter the Apostles. Paul is therefore said to have been
beheaded at Rome, and Peter to have been crucified under him."

Tertullian :— "Consult your edicts, there you will find that
Nero was the first who savagely persecuted this sect, springing up
everywhere, and especially at Rome, with the imperial sword. But
we even glory in such a leader of our punishment, for whoever
knows who he was, can understand that there could be nothing
great and good but what was condemned by Nero."2

I beg you to observe from this accumulation of evidence, that
the period immediately preceding the destruction of Jerusalem
was one of savage and fiery persecution to the Christian
Church ; and that, although the Fifth Seal may be referred to
any period of suffering when martyrs have cried from beneath
the altar, it can refer to none with greater perspicuity than to
Nero's reign. Persecutions, indeed, arose under Domitian and
Diocletian ; martyrs have been found in every age and dispen-
sation of the Church ; but the point for which we contend is
this, — we have named a certain date as the date of the writing
of the Apocalypse — we find, from the internal evidence of the
book, that it was written when the martyrs' blood was poured
out like water ; and we want proof to show that at that period
such martyrdoms took place.

That evidence I consider we have in large abundance. No-
thing can be more clear or convincing. The prophecies of our
Lord — the facts related in the Scriptures — the testimony of
Heathen writers — and the evidence of Christian Fathers—all

1 Eus. Hist. lib. ii. cap. 25.
2 " Consulitc commentaries vestros ; illic reperietis primum Neroncm in
hanc sectam, cum maxime Roma; orientern, Ctesariano gladio ferocisse. Sod
tali dedicatore damnationis nostnc etiam gloriamur. Qui eniin scit ilium,
intelligere potest, non nisi grande aliquod bonum a Nerone darnnatum."—
Tertull. Apolog. 5.

LECT. IV.] THE -&RA OF MARTYRS. 75
go to prove that this particular period was a period of great
and terrible persecution, when Christian blood flowed in tor-
rents ; and that the Fifth Seal is a confirmation of our Lord's
own words — "The time cometh when whosoever killeth you
will think that he doeth God service."
Having shown that the period immediately preceding the
destruction of Jerusalem was an *era of martyrs, above that of
any period which preceded it, I invite your attention to the
appeal of these martyred saints to God, to "judge and avenge
t/ieir Mood on them that dwelt on the earth."
" How long, O Lord, holy and true, dost thou not judge and
avenge our blood on them that dwell on the earth."1
Now this vengeance can only refer to that avenging wrath
which fell upon JucUea and Jerusalem. No other vengeance
came down upon any persecutors at any other age of the Church.
Domitian and Diocletian persecuted the Church, but Rome
Pagan did not fell in consequence of their persecutions. When
Home Pagan had merged into Rome Papal, the Waldenses and
the Albigenses were hunted down like wild beasts by the edicts
of Pope Leo X., bat Rome Papal only reared her head the
higher because of these exterminations, Protestants died by
thousands on St. Bartholomew's day ; but the Te Deum was
chanted forth at Rome in honour of that slaughter, as if Rome
had achieved some mighty victory.
Not so with the persecuting Jewish Church. That Church
drank deeply of Christian blood, and deeply was that blood
avenged. The souls of martyrs from beneath the altar implored
vengeance, and that vengeance was at hand. The hour of
retribution against those whose unrelenting hatred had followed
the disciples "from city to city" had arrived, and the pre-
diction of the Saviour was about to receive its accomplish-
ment:— "Wherefore behold I send unto you prophets, and
wise men, and scribes; and some of them ye shall kill
and crucify, and some of them shall ye scourge in your
synagogues, and persecute them from city to city, that
1 Observe the expression " on them that dwell on the earth "—CCTTO TWV vei-
roiKovi'TMv £7ri Ti/c, yfjc—**n expression only used in the Apocalypse of the
inhabitants of Jiulsca, which is abundantly proved by the many passages in
which it is found in contrast to "every kindred, and tongue, and people, and
nation ;" t. e. heathen who were not Jews.

76 THE FIFTH SEAL. [LECT. IV.
upon you may come all the righteous blood shed upon the
earth, from the blood of righteous Abel, unto the blood of
Zacharias son of Barachias, whom ye slew between the temple
and the altar ; verily I my unto you all these things shall come
upon this generation" 1
Eusebius2, in a wonderful manner, illustrates this vengeance
as coming in consequence of the shedding of this righteous
blood. He gives us an account of the martyrdom of James
the Just ; not James the brother of John slain by Herod, but
James the son of Alpheus, the brother, or near relation, of our
Lord, the first bishop of Jerusalem, called James the Just, on
account of his pre-eminent justice.
The Jewish people corne together unto James, and desire
him to persuade the people not to be led astray after Jesus as
the Messiah. They place him upon a wing of the temple, and
say to him, " O thou just man, whom we ought all to believe,
since the people are led astray after Jesus that was crucified,
declare to us what is the door to Jesus that was crucified," and
he answered with a loud voice, " Why do ye ask me respect-
ing" Jesus the Son of Man : he is now sitting in the heavens,
on the right hand of great power, and is about to come, — /zeXXei
€p)(€o~0ai, is soon about to come, — in the clouds of heaven."
At this they cast him down from the wing of the temple,
and began to stone him, saying, " Let us stone James the
Just;" arid one of them, a fuller, beat out the brains of Justus
with a club that he used to beat out clothes.
Clement, whose words are quoted by Eusebius, adds, " Im-
mediately after this, Vespasian invaded and took Judaea."
Hegesippus, quoted also by Eusebius, " So admirable a man
was James, that even the wiser part of the Jews were of opinion
that this was the cause of the immediate siege of Jerusalem,
which happened to them for no other reason than the crime
against him."
Josephus declares, " These things happened to the Jews to
avenye James the Just, who was the brother of him that is
called Christ, whom the Jews had slain, notwithstanding his
pre-eminent justice."
It is impossible to imagine more satisfactory proof than
this. One would almost imagine that the writers iu question
1 Matt, xxiil 34% 36. 2 Euseb. Ecclcs. Hist. lib. ii. cap. 23.

J.ECT. IV.] THE JERA OF MABTYRS. 77

must have read the prophetic statement before us,—must have
heard the martyrs' cry, " How long, O Lord, dost thou not
judge and avenge our blood on them that dwell on the earth?"
This blood is poured on the earth like water—it ascends
reeking up to heaven — it brings back its response.

" Immediately after this Vespasian invaded and took Judcea."
" This was the cause of the immediate siege of Jerusalem."
" These things happened to the Jews to avenge James the
Just."

Then was the martyrs' cry answered, — then was the mar-
tyrs' blood avenged, — "when all the righteous blood, from the
blood of Abel to that of Zacharias came upon that genera-
tion, " when the " Lord sent forth his armies, and destroyed
those murderers1^ and burnt up their city," — when " Jerusa-
lem that killed the prophets, and stoned them that were sent
unto her," — when the " city drunk with the blood of the saints
and of the martyrs of Jesus/' received double at the hand of the
Lord for all her iniquities, — when the prediction had its full
accomplishment, "Rejoice over her ye holy apostles and
prophets, for God hath avenf/ed you on her."

I have yet one more point to establish, winch is that this
vengeance came soon. The martyrs are bid to rest for a " little
season, until their fellow-servants also, and their brethren that
should be killed us they were, should be fulfilled " ("ol /xe'XXoi>-
Te? cxTTo/cret^ecr^at," that should soon be killed—the invariable
force of the verb jme'XXco being to designate something soon
about to happen).

This is a powerful argument for the Neronic date of the
Apocalypse. The only people and city upon which vengeance
was taken for the blood of the martyrs were the people of
Judtea and the city of Jerusalem.2 That people and city perished

1 Matt. xxii. 7«—In this parable the Jews are called murderers, because of
their persecution of God's holy apostles and prophets ; " The remnant took
his servants, and intreated them spitefully, and slew them."
2 If it he objected, why should vengeance come upon Jerusalem for per-
secutions which took place at Rome, it must be answered that the Jews in
every land were the ringleaders of persecutions against the Christians ; they
were so at Antioch, Iconium, Corinth, and elsewhere. Jerusalem, moreover,
was the only city threatened with vengeance for persecution, and upon her
" came all the righteous blood shed on all the earth."

78 THE FIFTH SEAL. [LECT. IV,
almost as soon as the prophetic statements of the Apocalypse
were uttered—there was no long interval of time between the
prophecy and its accomplishment; the martyrs had only to wait
44 a little season," and their number was complete.
How that little season is made to extend from the days of
Diocletian to the days of Papal persecution, is what I cannot
understand. I am not aware of any passage in Scripture where
the expression a " little season," can be made to signify so
long an interval of time. Take, for instance, the corresponding
clause of John xvi. 16., " A little while and ye shall not see me,
and again a little while and ye shall see me, because I go to the
Father/' Here the expression " a little while," is not used of a
long interval of time extending over hundreds of years, but of the
interval of time between Christ's ascension and his coming again
to receive his servants unto himself; that it is not used of the
period between his death and his ascension, when he was seen of
his disciples for forty days, is evident from the clause, "Because
I go to the Father." /// that interval of forty days he had not
gone to the Father. His words to Mary Magdalene sufficiently
account for this :—"Touch me not, for I am not yet ascended
wito my Father" And not till those forty days were ex-
pired did he ascend unto " his Father and their Father, to his
God and their God."
The expression, then, "a little season," cannot he well used of
any lengthened interval of time ; on the contrary, it stains to
define a short period, such as elapsed between Christ's ascen-
sion to heaven and his coming again to destroy Jerusalem —
such as intervened between the martyrdom of Stephen and the
martyrdom of James the Just, or that of the last of those, who-
ever he might have been, who, at the period immediately before
Christ's corning, was faithful unto death, and sealed his testi-
mony with his blood.
It would seem also that Christ's martyrs were slain up to the
very time of his coming to destroy Jerusalem, and that the fire
of persecution waxed hotter as the time drew nigh.
We have seen James the Just slain immediately before his
coming. "Immediately after this, Vespasian invaded and
took Judaea." It is also remarkable that Nero's persecution
was most violent at this particular time. It was during the
latter part of Nero's reign that two apostles, Peter and Paul,

LECT. IV.] THE JEEA OF MARTYRS. 79
suffered martyrdom at Rome, and James suffered martyrdom at
Jerusalem.1 With what severity that persecution was carried
on, we learn from St. Paul's own writings, where we find that
they who had been his companions in a thousand dangers, and
who had braved with him a thousand perils, quailed before the
tribunal of that merciless tyrant; here Demas left him—here
Crescens and Titus were not present with him, only Luke was
with him ; and he, too, seems to have trembled before the
wild beast, Nero. " At my first answer, no man stood with
me; but all men forsook me ; I pray God that it may not
be laid to their charge."2 It is not unlikely but that during
the invasion of Judaea by the Romans, during the three and
a half years of the Jewish war, witnesses for Christ were
found who proclaimed his immediate advent, and who were
faithful unto death. This is confirmed by the statements of
Rev. xi. 3., "I will give power unto my two witnesses,
and they shall prophesy a thousand two hundred and three-
score days, clothed in sackcloth. And when they shall have
finished their testimony, the beast that ascendeth out of the
bottomless pit shall make war against them, and shall over-
come them, and kill them."
I see no difficulty in comprehending why it should be said to
the martyrs already slain, that they should u rest yet for a little
season, until their fellow-servants also and brethren, which
should be killed as they were, should be fulfilled;" on the
contrary, it would seem that their number was not complete
till those were slain who almost saw his coining, and who, like
James the Just, stood so near unto his kingdom as to say,
1 " Let us now suppose, what was only the fact, that as the time of the
end drew near, the persecutions and trials of the Christians would become
more and more terrible ; that not only the Jew with his hierarchy, but even
the Roman powers, would join in the tragedy ; that the betraying of brother
and brother, father and son, and the like, would he still more frequent and
more fatal,, and in short that iniquity would more and more abound. Under
such circumstances it would perhaps seem necessary that some further in-
struction and encouragement should be afforded to the Church, yet only in its
infancy, and harassed in a manner never before witnessed by any human
society."—Lee on Prophecy, 292.
" Discipuli quoque diffusi per orbern . . qui et ipsi a Judans inse-
quentibus multa perpessi. . . llomuc, postremo, per Neronis ssevitiam,
sanguinem Cbristianum seminavennu."—TcrtulL, ApoL 81.
2 2 Tim. iv. 16.

80 THE FIFTH SEAL. [LECT. IV.
" Why do ye ask me respecting the Son of Man ; He is now
sitting on the right hand of great power, and is about to come
in the clouds of heaven"
To recapitulate. I have found no necessity for referring
this seal to the persecutions commencing under the reign of
Diocletian and reaching to the age of Constantine. I have
been unable to recognise any authority beyond that of the
merest arbitrary assumption for the date A.D. 300. If the
sole reason assigned for the settlement of this date be that
the age of Diocletian was an ajra of martyrs, why should
not the Marian age be fixed upon as well as the Diocle-
tian ? or if we are at liberty to make guesses on a sub-
ject of this kind, why not a future date, A.D. 3000 (if
Dr. Gumming will suffer the world to exist so long), as well
as A.D. 300? I cannot think that in a prophecy, purporting
to be one of " things which must shortly come to pass," St.
John would have looked for an (era of martyrs beyond his own
immediate age, and I have been unable to find that Theodosia,
Pamphilus, and other martyrs of the Diocletian persecution,
had any idea that their sufferings were prefigured in the
Apocalypse, or that they should have to wait for Anne Askew
or Sir John Oldcastle. I have not discovered that the Dio-
cletian persecution was avenged on " them that dwell on the
earth," /. f?. the Jewish people,—for long ere this persecution
commenced, Hadrian had extinguished the last spark of their
nationality: neither has it appeared as clear as it ought to do,
that the martyrs under the Diocletian persecution could be said
to rest " a little season," say 1000 years or ,vo, while they
waited for their brethren who should be the victims of " Papal
persecution"!!! Mutato nomine! Say rather, Protestant
bigotry, Protestant uncharitableness, and Protestant persecution.
Why what would Dr. Cumming and all his school have done
but for this "Papal persecution." Had there been no Beast in
the Book of Revelation, no Scarlet Lady, all decked with
gold and precious stones, no popes and cardinals flaming in
scarlet-coloured vestments, he and they would have been starving
long ago. Their very means of existence have depended upon
the supposed recognition of the subject of " Papal persecution "
in the Apocalypse, and the shibboleth of their party ought to
be, " Waldenses and Albigenses." It makes one fairly sick to
think of their ingratitude. It is this "Papal persecution/'

LECT. IV.] THE JERA OF MARTYRS. 81
this odium theologicum, this intense abomination of Rome and
the Roman Catholic religion, founded upon the unscriptural and
absurd belief that Rome Papal occupies a place in the Book
of God, which has raised them into (on this account) an
undeserved reputation, and which continues to exalt them in
the scale of popular favour. I desire to denounce this rank in-
justice against an erring*, yet still a cognate Church, with all the
energies of my being, and I shall not consider my life wasted if
I can loosen the bands of this insensate clamour; not that I have
the slightest sympathy with what I consider the manifold errors
of the Church of Rome ; the only sympathy I have is one which
is dear to all English hearts,—sympathy with the oppressed
against the oppressor, with Papal dignified patience against
Protestant undignified persecution. Papal persecution !!! Why
they know, or they ought to know, that there is not one single
word from Genesis to Revelation, which by any reasonable man
can be tortured into the remotest recognition of a system which
then had not even its existence. I repeat it, they know, or
they ought to know, that Papal Rome and Roman Catholics
are not even hinted at in the Scriptures, and that every tirade
fulminated against them from arguments drawn from the Apo-
calypse, is as harmless as "sounding1 brass or a tinkling cym-
bal." And what if this statement should be true ? What if the
sacred writers never contemplated the remotest allusion to popes
and synods ? What if Great Babylon should turn out to be Jeru-
salem after all (as I believe it will), and a closer and more critical
examination of the sacred text should roll back the mass of
deep-seated prejudice, and blind aggression ? What if " Papal
persecution" should be found a theme wholly foreign to the
time, age, habits of thought, and circumstances of those for
whose warning the Apocalypse was written ? Then what be-
comes of that theological bugbear which has been evoked to
gratify popular antipathies, and to fan the flame of popular
indignation ? What becomes of the undignified clamour of
Exeter Hall, and the anathemas of its distinguished ornaments ?
And what also becomes of the immortal interests of those
whose ears have been "turned away from the truth unto fables/'
who have been taught to believe that their everlasting salvation
is bound up with an irreconcileable hatred of the Church of
Rome? Papal persecution !!! But I have done with it — as
G

82 THE FIFTH SEAL. [LECT. IV.
have not the parties alluded to, as if only to show that enlight-
ened Protestantism of the 19th century shall not be much behind
the intolerance of a past age. But if ever a time comes, as I be-
lieve it will ere long, when darkness shall not be put for light, or
light for darkness; when bitter shall not be put for sweet, or
sweet for bitter; when error shall not occupy the seat of truth, or
blind conjecture usurp the place of legitimate deduction ; when
unfounded assertion shall grow pale and dim before the fruits
of patient study, and guess-work shall be thought less worthy
of credit than valid argument and logical inference ; whenever
that day shall begin to dawn, (and may God in His mercy
hasten the time), then the reign of these short-sighted inter-
preters will be near its close, and the dreams of these would-be
Apocalyptical prophets will be over. Visions of Popes and
Councils, Turks and Railways, Mahometans and Russians,
Armageddon and Sebastopol, will only serve to provoke the
smile of scorn and pity, and authorised exponents of Holy
Scripture will feel constrained to be more cautious how they
advance such conjectural systems of interpretation, lest haply
they might he found offering wanton and indefensible insult to
reason, to Scripture, and to God.
To return from this digression to our recapitulation of the
Fifth Seal. I have found no necessity whatever for referring
this seal to the Diocletian persecution. I have not been able to
discover that the Diocletian persecution was avenged on " them
that dwell on the earth," «'. r., the Jewish people, or that the
martyrs under that persecution rested a " little season," when
they waited for their fellow-servants who suffered under Papal
tyranny. I have not been able to recognise any authority for
the assumed date, A.D. 300.
But I have found an a*ra of martyrs at the period when the
book was written — that their blood allied to heaven for ven-
geance, and that the vengeance came — that the vengeance did
not come immediately upon their cry, but it came soon — that
they had to rest " a little while," during which " little while "
the fire of persecution raged more terribly than ever against
their fellow-servants and brethren " which should be killed as
they were ; " and that when that time was expired, " Jerusalem,
which killed the prophets, and stoned them which were sent
unto her," " was rewarded as she had rewarded them," " and
the cup which she had filled, was filled unto her double."

LECT. IV.] THE MKA. OF MARTYRS. 83

Then was the martyrs' blood avenged, — then was the cry of
those "slain for the word of God and for the testimony which
they held" i. e.9 of those slain for the public preaching of Chris-
tianity [a state of things referring palpably to Apostolic tiroes,
and not to a subsequent age of the Church] answered — "The
Lord sent forth his armies, and destroyed those murderers, and
burned up their city."

a 2

84

LECTURE V.

THE SIXTH SEAL.

REV. vi. 12—17.
12. And I beheld when he had opened the sixth seal, and, lo, there was
a great earthquake ; and the sun became black as sackcloth of hair, and the
moon became as blood ;
13. And the stars of heaven fell unto the earth, even as a fig tree casteth
her untimely figs, when she is shaken of a mighty wind.
14. And the heaven departed as a scrowl when it is rolled together; and
every mountain and island were moved out of their places.
15. And the kings of the earth, and the great men, and the rich men, and
the chief captains, and the mighty men, and every bondman, and every free
man, hid themselves in the dens and in the rocks of the mountains ;
16*. And said to the mountains and rocks, Fall on us, and hide us from the
face of him that sitteth on the throne, and from the wrath of the Lamb:
17- For the great day of his wrath is come; and who shall be able to
stand ?
WE interpreted the Fifth Seal of the persecutions of the
Christian Church under the reign of Nero. We showed that
the cera immediately preceding the destruction of Jerusalem
might justly be called an a?ra of martyrs ; and that the vision
might well he seen of souls under the altar "slain for the word
of God, and for the testimony which they held/' We proved
that these persecutions became more violent and decided as the
period advanced towards the consummation, and that the
" perilous times " of " the last days," developed in the apostary
which those times induced, afforded satisfactory reason why
the martyrs of that age should be told to " rest yet for a little
season, until their fellow servants also, and their brethren
which should be killed as they were, should be fulfilled."
We then proceeded to show that the blood of these martyrs
cried to heaven for vengeance. " How long, O Lord ! dost
thou not judge and avenge our blood on them that dwell on
the earth," i. e. the Jews. And we were enabled to prove not

LECT. V.] THE SIXTH SEAL. 85

only that a response was given to the cry of God's elect, but
that at the hands of no other people but those emphatically
distinguished as "they that dwell on the earth" was this ven-
geance required. " That upon you may come all the righteous
blood shed upon the earth . . . Verily I say unto you,
all these things shall come upon this generation" l

We then went on to establish the position that the vengeance,
for which the elect cried day and night, came soon. The
martyrs had but to rest ** a little season" before their fellow
servants and brethren, which should be killed as they were,
were fulfilled. No long interval of time elapsed between the
martyr's cry and the answer to that cry. With the death of
James the Just, the brother of our Lord, that vengeance began
to arrive. Those were " the days of vcnyeance that all things
which are written may be fulfilled." 2

I am content to leave this interpretation to the judgment of
every candid and dispassionate mind. The Apocalypse itself
offers no reason why the Fifth Seal should be referred to the
Diocletian persecution beyond that of the " Doctrine of Resem-
blances," which it is evident would apply with equal force to
any other persecution. History does not say that any retribution
was exercised upon the dwellers of Judani for the cruelties of
Diocletian ; nor does the common use of language justify the
idea that " a little season " can, with any propriety, be ex-
panded into hundreds of years. A critical examination of the
sacred text does not lead us to conclude that the contempora-
neous martyrdom "of their fellow-servants, also, and their
brethren that should — (,ww) — be killed as they were" can be
made to refer with any propriety to sufferers of a distant age
and of a distinct persecution. Neither does a due attention to
the immediate accomplishment of the prophecy warrant our
placing the victims of Jewish enmity and Papal tyranny in
the same calendar.

On the other hand, History does say that the times for which
we have fixed the interpretation of this seal, were times of
great and hitherto unheard of persecution.3 History does say

1 Matt, xxiii. 35, :H>. * Luke, xxi. *2.
3 It is worthy of observation that as the persecution under Nero was the
rst authorised persecution of Christianity, so the war under Nero was the

86 THE SIXTH SEAL. [LECT. V.
that this persecution was avenged on the dwellers in a parti-
cular land ; and that land, the land of Judtea, History does
say that this vengeance came soon, " So that they who peruse
the history may know, in some measure, that the divine ven-
geance did not lone/ delay to visit them for their iniquity
against the Christ of God."1 History does say that "The
divine justice for their crimes against Christ and his Apo-
stles, finally overtook them, totally destroying the whole gene-
ration of these evil doers from the earth/'2
And here let me call attention to the narrow limits within
which the system of interpretation which we have adopted
compels us to restrict, not simply the exposition of this parti-
cular seal, but the exposition of the entire book. We cannot
claim for ourselves the liberty which is taken by those from
whom we differ. We dare not make a leap of "200 years, and
explain this seal of the Diocletian persecution. An interpre-
tation must be found suited to the day and age of the Apoca-
lypse, or our system falls to the ground. There must be no
roaming over one century after another to discover some event
to agree with the prediction ; there must be no turning over
the leaves of Gibbon, or any other historian of subsequent times,
to find some coincidence which may suit the seal ; there must
be no treating hundreds of years as if they were so many days,
and establishing a system of chronology of which the book
itself does not say one word.
But we have laid down certain premises, which confine our
interpretation within very narrow limits. We assert that the
book was written previous to the destruction of .Jerusalem ;
and we must find an interpretation for it within those limits ;
and what t.s ?//o;v, we. must fi/td ftn interpretation for the tehnte
of it within those (units. If this cannot be done, our system is
good for nothing, and falls to the ground. But if this can be done,
the inference is unavoidable, the interpretation must be right,
Add to this, if we are enabled to present an intelligible and con-
commencement of ihe extermination of the Jewish people ; and as in that
war Jewish Christians were not recognisable from .Jews, inasmuch aa both
followed the temple service, not only would the Jewish Christians be required
to worship the gods of their conquerors, but they would he exposed to the
persecutions of the Romans, as well as of their own countrymen.
1 Eus. Eccles. Hist., lib. iii. cap. 5. 2 Ibid. lib. Hi, cap. 5.

LECT. V.] THE SIXTH SEAL. 87

sistent explanation of the whole book upon this principle, we may
take it for granted that we are correct with regard to the
question of the (late of the Apocalypse ; for if, according to our
opponents, the whole history of the world and of the Church,
from the commencement of Christianity down to the end of
time, is not too wide a sphere in which to find a suitable
interpretation ; and if, according to the premises we have laid
down, an interpretation can be found concentrated within the
limits of a very few years, (such a space as elapsed between
St. John's banishment to Patrnos, in the latter part of Nero's
reign, and the destruction of Jerusalem, A. D. 70), there is no
resisting the conclusion that we are proceeding upon a correct
principle. In other words, if we are able to compress within
the history of three or four years what they with extreme
difficulty, and oftentimes by means of fanciful interpretation,
scatter over a period of {2,000 years, the "probability amounts
almost to demonstration that we are not in any grievous error
with regard either to the date or the interpretation of the
Apocalypse.

SIXTH SI:AL.
" And I beheld when he had opened the sixth seal, and lo,
there was a great earthquake ; and the sun became black as
sackcloth of hair, and the moon became as blood.
" And the stars of heaven fell unto the earth, even as a fig
tree casteth her untimely tigs, when she is shaken of a mighty
wind.
" And the heaven departed as a scrowl when it is rolled
together ; and every mountain and island were moved out of
their places.
" And the kings of the earth, and the great men, and the
rich men, and the chief captains, and the mighty men, and
every bondman, and every free man, hid themselves in the dens
and in the rocks of the mountains.
" And said to the mountains and rocks, Fall on us, and hide
us from the face of him that sitteth on the throne, and from
the wrath of the Lamb.
u 4

88 THE SIXTH SEAL. [Leer. V.
" For the great day of his wrath is come, and who shall be
able to stand?7'1
According- to the plan which I have adopted, I give first the
substance of Dr. dimming"'s exposition.
" This language, strong as it is, cannot describe the day
of judgment, for the sequel, as well as the whole chronology2
of the Apocalypse disproves this." lie then gives texts to
show that similar language is used of less awful events than
the day of judgment.3
" We may, in fact we must, therefore, apply the language of
the Sixth Seal to SOUK; great revolution less conclusive than the
final judgment. That revolution we believe to have been the
final downfal of Paganism and the adoption of Christianity by
the Emperor Constantine, in the fourth century. Our chro-
nology also confirms this application. We can scarcely con-
ceive a transition more stupendous ; the champions of Pa-
ganism, Maximin, (ialerius, and Diocletian, were crushed.
Its sun set, its stars were quenched, its firmament covered witli
blackness ; and before the majestic progress of the Christian
religion, lifted from the depths of depression to the very highest
platform of imperial grandeur and national power, literally and
truly the opposing kings, and generals, and soldiers, and free-
men fled ; Christianity reigned at that day without a rival."
" These seem to me," he adds, " rational, consistent, and
historical illustrations of the symbols referred to. I have read
nothing at all to disprove my interpretations."
Now, does any intelligent and reasonable man see any indi-
1 Rev. vi. 12—17-
2 This is the stumbling-block in the way of these expositions. I am not
aware of any system of chronology in the Apocalypse: whatever there is must
be of the briefest kind, for it is a prophecy of things which " must abort ly In'
done." Added to this, the same events are treated of in the last equally with
the first pages of the Apocalypse. Take, for instance, the coming of Christ,
which is the exordium, the middle, and the finale of this mysterious volume ;
the New Jerusalem spoken of, chap. iii. 12., as well as in chap. xxi.; the
" great city," devoted to destruction, everywhere mentioned throughout the
Revelation ; the woes of the Apocalypse everywhere spoken of as falling upon the
princes, merchants, and inhabitants of Jvuhca. This reiteration of the same
events, interwoven as it is with every page and line, makes it morally certain
that no more fatal hindrance to the legitimate interpretation of this book was
ever devised than that which supposes the existence of a system of chronology.
a Jen iv. 23, 24. 28, 29.; HOB. x. 8. LECT. V.J THE SIXTH SEAL. 89

cation of the triumph of Christianity over Paganism in this
seal ? Such a triumph would he more fitly shadowed forth hy
emblems significant of victory, than hy figures descriptive of
calamity and misfortune. The sun black as sackcloth of hair,
and the moon as blood, arid the stars of heaven falling, and the
heaven departing as a scrowl, and the kings of the earth
hiding themselves and calling on the mountains and rocks to
cover them, are figures which can only be used with propriety
of calamitous events. And the \vhole analogy of Scripture
requires that they should be used only of such events. To ex-
plain symbols expressive of wrath and punishment of events
connected with triumph and victory, is surely a strange inversion
of the legitimate principles of Scriptural interpretation. As
well might we suppose that the symbols under which Isaiah
describes the desolation of Idunia'a, depicted its glory and
greatness, or that the day of the Lord of the prophet Joel was
a delineation of the triumphs of Israel. Besides which, how
can Maximin, Galerius, or Diocletian, be called " the kings of
the earth," Jiuhea; or how can " the wrath of the Lamb" be
transformed into "the majestic progress of the Christian re-
ligion"? I confess I cannot see the faintest allusion either to
Maximin, Galerius, or Diocletian. I can see nothing which
leads me to suppose that this seal represents the Christian
religion " lifted from the depths of depression to the highest
platform of national grandeur/' The only grandeur I can see
in this seal is the grandeur of dismay, and terror, and despair :
if ever language was emblematical of wrath and woe, and
agony and distress, it is the language of this magnificent
symbol. No wonder that a distinguished painter1 should have
supposed that it shadowed forth the awful day of judgment.
No wonder that the imagination should have been betrayed, and
the judgment warped, by the majestic imagery of this superb
figure. It would seem to me that terror, and not Christianity,
reigns under this symbol, "without a rival;" and that the

1 Panby's " Last Judgment." — One of the most striking figures in the
painting is that of a slave bursting his fettered hands asunder, and welcoming
the coining Deity ; we hardly need to l>e reminded that the bondman equally
with the freeman hides himself in the dens and rocks of the mountains90 THE SIXTH SEAL. [LKCT. V.
triumph designated is not the triumph of religion, but the
triumph of desolation and despair.
I proceed to offer a somewhat different explanation of this
seal. And, first, I would observe, in common with those from
whom I differ, that this language, strong as it is, does not
necessarily describe the destruction of material things supposed
to be consequent on the day of judgment. " We must not,"
says Dr. Lee, " understand by such expressions as * the
heaven departed as a scroxvl/ ' every mountain and island
were moved out of their places/ any such physical phenomenon
as the words literally imply; for if the heavens should have so
departed, and the mountains so moved, how could the kings of
the earth have hid themselves within the latter?" Nothing is
more common in the Scriptures, than that great changes,
especially great calamities, should be indicated by earthquakes,
tempests, eclipses of the heavenly bodies, and the falling of
stars to the earth. This is easily accounted for when we re-
member that the ancients were ignorant of the movements of
the heavenly bodies, — that an eclipse threw them into terror,
like the Peruvians, — that they were unable to account for the
meteoric appearances called falling stars, and supposed that
they literally fell to the earth. Hence they employed this
language to denote great events, and especially calamitous
events ; it would be absurd to interpret such language literally,
or to suppose that the sun literally became black as sackcloth of
hair, and the stars literally fell to the earth.
Isaiah, xxxiv. i., thus describes the destruction of Iduma»a :
— "All the host of heaven shall be dissolved; the heavens
shall be rolled together as a scrowl, and all their host shall fall
down, as the leaf falleth off from the vine, and as a falling fig
from the fig tree ; for my sword .shall be bathed in heaven,
behold it shall come down upon Idumiea."
Joel describes the invasion of a hostile army numerous as
locusts under a similar figure1: — "The day of the Lord
cometh, for it is nigh at hand ; a day of darkness and of
gloominess ; a day of clouds and of thick darkness ; a great
people and a strong;.....a fire devoureth before
them, and behind them a flame burneth ; the land is as the
garden of Eden before them, and behind them a desolate
J Joel, ii. 2. Compare the locust arrny, Rev, ix.

LECT. V.] THE SIXTH SEAL. 91
wilderness, and nothing shall escape them ;..... the
earth shall quake before them, the heavens shall tremble, the
sun and the moon shall be dark, and the stars shall withdraw
their shining"1
St. Peter explains the prophecy of Joel respecting the last
days, of the terrific events which should intervene between the
day of Pentecost and " the great and notable day of the
Lord.7' " This is that which was spoken of by the prophet
Joel ; it shall come to pass in the last days, -saith God, I will
pour out my Spirit upon all flesh . . . and I will shew wonders
in heaven above, and signs in the earth beneath ; blood, and
fire, and vapour of smoke : the sun shall be turned into
darkness, and tJte moon into blood, before the great and
notable dag of the Lord come" -
These, and many other passages might be adduced, prove
to a demonstration that great and calamitous events are fre-
quently shadowed forth in the Scriptures under the figure of
convulsions of the heavenly bodies, and strange and extraor-
dinary appearances of the sun, and moon, and stars.
Now, did our Lord predict his awful coming to destroy
Jerusalem under similar emblems? The language of the three
Gospels, St. Matthew, St. Mark, St. Luke, is almost identical
with that of the seal under our consideration.
Matt,, xxiv. £{), 80___" Immediately after the tribulation
of those dags shall the sun be darkened, and the moon shall
not give her light, and the stars shall fall from heaven, and the
powers of heaven shall be shaken, and then shall appear the
sign of the Son of Man in heaven : and then shall all the
tribes of the earth mourn, and they shall see the Son of Man
coming in the clouds of heaven with power and great glory.'*
Mark, xiii. 121< — CJ(). —" Rut in those days, after that
tribulation, the sun shall be darkened, and the moon shall not
give her light, and the stars from heaven shall fall, and the
powers that are in heaven shall be shaken, and then shall they
see the Son of Man coming in the clouds, with power and
great glory."
Luke, xxi. I2i<—f2/'. — "Jerusalem, shall be trodden doirn
1 Joel, ii. 1, 2, a—10. a Acts, ii. 10.

92 THE SIXTH SEAL. [LECT. V.

of the Gentiles, until the times of the Gentiles shall be ful-
filled, and there shall be signs in the sun, and in the moon, and
in the stars, and upon the earth ('7775 yfjs ' the land of
Judaea), distress of nations with perplexity, the sea and the
waves roaring ; men's hearts failing them for fear, and for
looking after those things which are coining on the earth ; for
the powers of heaven shall be shaken, and then shall they see
the Son of Man coming in a cloud, with power and great
glory."

It is evident that these grand and terrible descriptions refer
to events which were to take place at the time of the destruction
of Jerusalem. It is impossible, without doing the most gross
and painful violence to honest criticism, to interpret them of
any future time. If words have any meaning, these events
took place " Immediately after the tribulation of those days"
"In those days, after that tribulation," — at the period when
" Jerusalem was trodden down of the (J entiles."

They took place, moreover, during the lifetime of the gene-
ration to whom these words were addressed ; no disquisitions on
the meaning of the word " ytvza" " generation," can weigh
against the positive truth here stated. The whole subject of
Matt, xxiv., Mark xiii., Luke xxi. is connected wifli the time of
our Lord's coming. In each of the Gospels his disciples ask
Him to tell them when that time should be.

Matt. xxiv. 3 -- "Tell us when shall these things be, and
what shall be the sign of thy coming, and of the end1 of the
world ? "

Mark, xiii. 4. — "Tell us when shall these things be, and
what shall be the sign when all these things shall be fulfilled?"

Luke, xxi. 7- — " Master, Imttchen shall these things be, and
what sign shall there be when these things come to pass?"

And then He told them the time, that it should be within the
lifetime of that generation, that when they saw the woes coining
upon Jerusalem, they might know that "it was near, even at
their doors." Nothing but determined prejudice and an un-

1 'StWTtKiia, TOV uiwvov — the end of the age, i. e. of the Mosaic economy.
Compare 11 eb. ix. C2G. " rvv ct u7ru£, ITT\ trvyrtXtia TUJV alwviitv" — but NOW
once in the end of the world/' t. c. the end of the Mosaic economy.

LBCT. V.] THE SIXTH SEAL, 93
conquerable clinging to previously formed opinions can resist
the evidence.
Matt. xxiv. 3C2—34----"Now learn a parable of the fig
tree ; when his branch is yet tender, and putteth forth leaves,
ye know that summer is nigh, so likewise ye when ye shall see
all these things, know that it is near, even at the doors : verily
I say unto you, this generation shall not pass away till all these
things be fulfilled."*
Mark, xiii. 28—30. — "Now learn a parable of the fig
tree ; When her branch is yet tender, and putteth forth leaves, ye
know that summer is near : so ye in like manner, when ye shall
see these things come to pass, know that it is niyh, even at the
doors. Verily I say unto you, that this generation shall not
pass, till all these things be done."
St. Luke1 has a little variation, but the time when all this
should take place is unmistakably declared.
Luke, xxi. 2(J—32. — "And he spake to them a parable;
Behold the fig tree, and all the trees; when they now shoot forth,
ye see and know of your own selves that summer is now nigh
at hand. So likewise ye, when ge see these things come to pass,
knoiv ye that the kingdom of God is nigh at hand. Verily 1 say
unto you, This generation shall not pass away till all be ful-
filled."
It is poor theology to explain this primarily of our Lord's
second advent at some yet distant period. For my own part I
feel heartily ashamed of the way in which I have often inter-
preted many of these passages in my public teaching ; in what-
ever sense they may be regarded as referring to an advent yet
to come, there can be no reasonable doubt but that they refer in
their primary sense to the advent which then took place.
Neither can I believe that in St. Matt. xxiv. it will be found
that "two distinct sets of predictions run together in artless
parallel," and that " while a period for the fulfilment of the first
1 The only variation of any importance between St. Luke and the other two
Evangelists, is that St. Luke calls the coming of our Lord to destroy Jerusa-
lem the coming of the kingdom of God ; the inference is, that kingdom was
established at his coming. Compare 4i His appearing and his kingdom,"
(2 Tim. iv. 1.); *' The Son of Man coining in his kingdom," (Matt xvi. 2S.);
" Lord remember me when thou comest in thy kingdom/' iv T?I ptun\ft$
aov (Luke, xxiii. 42.).

94 THE SIXTH SEAL. [LECT. V.
series, the human judgment, is fixed within the lifetime of a
generation, we, on the contrary, are told of the last judgment,
" Of that hour kuoweth no man, neither the angels, nor the
Son, but the Father." l
It appears to me, from a careful examination of Matt, xxiv.,
Mark xiii., and Luke xxi., that one plain simple question is an-
swered by our Lord. T'hat question is a question of time.
In reply to the request of the disciples that He would tell them
the period of his coming, his answer was that it should take
place during the lifetime of that generation, that they should
recognise its approach by the foregoing signs, but that the day
and the hour were hidden even from Him. Hence " the times
and seasons" are said to be put in the Father's power. (Acts i. 7«)
Hence the Father is said to show the manifestation of the Son
in "his own times," KCU/DOIS, tSiois, «' e., times known only to
himself.2 Hence God is said to (/ire unto his Son the know-
ledge of his speedy Apocalypse.3
Now St. Luke shows satisfactorily that our Lord's answer
embraced no " artless parallel " of homogeneous predictions,
but referred only to one period and to one event; for after
" the fulfilment of the first series, the human judgment,
(which) is fixed within the lifetime of a generation," and
during the supposed period of the last judgment, the disciples
are bid to pray that they might escape the desolation impending
over them, and which was immediately about to take place.
"Take heed to yourselves, &c. . . . and so that day come
upon you unawrares, for as a snare shall it come on all them that
dwell on the face of the whole earth; watch ye therefore and praij
always that ye maybe accounted worthy to escape all these tliinqs
that shall come to pass, and to stand before the Son of Man." 4
How could it be said of the day of universal judgment, "as
a snare shall it come on all them that dwell on the face of the
whole earth," Tracr^s rfjs yfjs, Jud&a; or how could the words ex-
pressive of the predicted calamities on Jerusalem be applicable to
the future judgment of mankind, " Watch ye therefore and pray
always, that ye may be accounted worthy to escape all these
things that shall come to pass, (TO. /^eXXoz/ra yivtcrOcu, that shall
goon come to pass,) and to stand (as in judgment) before the
1 Rational Godliness, Sermon 23., Rev. Rowland Williams.
2 1 Tim. vi. 15. 3 Rev. i. 1. * Luke, xxi. 34—LECT. V.] THE SIXTH SEAL. 95
Son of Man " ? How could the warnings, particularly ad-
dressed to the disciples—" Take heed to yourselves . . . lest that
day come upon you unawares . . . watch ye therefore . . .
that ye may . . . escape," &c. be supposed to refer to a general
judgment in the far distant future ; or how could it be thought
that the imaginary division of the prophecy commencing at
the words " of THAT day and of THAT hour" could be
made to relate to any other day than the day before
alluded to ? Be it then remembered, that had there been any
distinguishing emphasis attached to the words " That day "
(as implying a day distinct from the corning of Christ
to destroy Jerusalem), which there is not, and had there
been a period assigned for the fulfilment of the one parallel
of the homogeneous prophecy, whilst no period is assigned for
the other, (ichich is not the case, for the prophecy is one and
the same throu(/hout}, all this would have been completely
unsettled by the fact, that after the supposed fulfilment of the
Jirst prediction, and duririf/ the supposed scenes of the last judg-
ment) even on "that day" of which no man knew, and which
was to come upon them " unawares," the disciples are bid to
pray that they might " escape all these thim/s that shall come to
pass, and to stand before the Son of Man."1 I cannot think,
then, if " all prophecy has a primary contemporaneous applica-
tion," that this prophecy of our Lord, so guarded with respect
to the time of its accomplishment, and which the disciples and
first Christians evidently believed to be of immediate fulfilment,
would in its primary sense be intended by our Lord to refer
partly to the destruction of .Jerusalem, and partly to the day of
judgment, partly to the events of A.D. 7^> partly to the events
of A.D. . I cannot think that " two distinct sets of predic-
tions " would thus have been mixed up by our Lord in inex-
tricable confusion, or that his love and consideration would have
prompted Him so to mislead his disciples and his Church of
future times ; nor do I imagine that an argument of this kind
would be put forward as conclusive, was it not felt that some
1 That the words " all these things that shall come to pass" refer to the
scenes accompanying the desolation of Jerusalem, is not only certified by the
expression ra /LuXXorra yiVitrttai, hut nearly the same words are used in verse
31. during the period which is thought to he marked out by the lifetime of
that generation, " So likewise ye when ye see these things come to pass,"
orar tcfyrt raOra yu'o/itra— an expression evidently identical with the subse*
niwtttt nrui t\V \r Qf\ «* All flijtcii failure ttint

96 THE SIXTH SEAL. [LECT. V.

great difficulty existed which it was necessary thus to overcome.
But we shall he nothing nearer the truth for any forced and
unnatural construction which we may put upon holy Scripture,
and it is evident that the argument now comhated had no ex-
istence, either in the mind of Him who spake, or of those who
listened to his words.

But to return to the analogy proposed to he instituted he-
tween the Sixth Seal and the predictions of our Lord.

It will he interesting to compare the two accounts as they
stand in the Gospels and in the Apocalypse.

SIXTH SEAL.

et The sun became black as sack-
cloth of hair."

" The moon became as blood."

" The stars of heaven fell unto
earth."

f* The heaven departed as a scrowl."

" Every mountain and island were
moved out of their places."

fc The kings of the earth, and the
great men, and the rich men, and the
chief captains, and the mighty men,
and every bondman, and every free
man, hid themselves in the dens and
in the rocks of the mountains; and
said to the mountains and rocks, Fall
on us and hide us from the face of
him that sitteth upon the throne, and
from the wrath of the Lamb."

ic For the great day of his wrath " There shall Ix- great distress in

is come, and who shall be able to j the land, and wrath upon this people.'*
stand?" Rev. vi. 12—17. ) Luke, xxi. '23.

It will be seen at once from this comparison, that the identity
is perfect between the seal and the predictions of our Lord.
"Now, whether we interpret this language of great changes, or
of calamitous events, or of miraculous phenomena, the point for
us to determine is, did occurrences corresponding to the sym-
bols take place at that time ?

Did any great changes then take place ? A change took

OUR LORD'S PREDICTIONS.
"The sun shall be darkened."
Mark, xiii. j2-k
"The moon shall not give her
light." Mark, xiii. 24.
" The stars shall fall from heaven."
Matt. xxiv. 29.
"" The powers of the heavens shall
be shaken." Matt. xxiv. 2f).
" Upon the earth distress of na-
tions,— the sea and the waves roar-
ing." Luke, xxi. 25.
" Then shall they begin to say to
the mountains, Fall on us ; and to
the hills, ('over us : fur if they do
these tilings in a green tree, what
shall be done in the dry ? " Luke,
xxiii. oO, '51.



LECT. V.] THE SIXTH SEAL. 97
place then which shook the world — a change compared with
which the revolution occasioned by the final downfal of Pa-
ganism is hardly fit to he mentioned. The change to which
I allude was the breaking up of that dispensation which had
lasted for 2000 years, and which God Himself had given to his
own people. Then, if you will, " the champions of Judaism
were crushed ; its sun set, its stars were quenched, its firma-
ment covered with blackness ; and before the majestic power of
the Christian religion the opposing kings, and generals, and
soldiers, and freemen fled." If this seal is to be interpreted
of change and revolution, [an interpretation not altogether
satisfactory], no change has ever affected the destinies of
mankind so much as the change which was introduced at that
particular time.
Or if you interpret this seal of calamitous events, of wrath,
and terror, and despair, falling upon a particular people, where
will you find so exact, so literal a fulfilment, as in the tribula-
tion of those days — " Then shall be great tribulation, such as
was not from the beginning of the world to this time ; no, nor
ever shall he : and except those days should be shortened, there
should no flesh be saved." " In those days shall be affliction,
such as was not from the; beginning of the creation which God
created unto this time, neither shall be." " These be the days of
vengeance, that all things which are written may be fulfilled ;
but woe unto them that are with child, and to them that give
suck in those days, for there shall be great distress in the
land, and wrath upon this people." Then, indeed, did they call
upon the mountains to fall on them, and on the rocks to rover
them. " The destruction," says Josephus, " which then took
place exceeded all the destructions that either God or man
ever brought upon the world."1
Or if you interpret this seal of those miraculous phenomena
which our Saviour said should accompany his coming [an
interpretation to which I feel most disposed to accede], the
all-directing providence of God has so appointed it, that evidence
independent of the Scriptures should be given, that such mira-
culous phenomena did attend his coming to destroy Jerusalem.
Tacitus2 informs us—"Such prodigies had happened, as
this nation, which is superstitious enough in its own way, would
1 Bell. Jud. lib. vi, cap, y. '2 Tac. Hist, lib. v. cap. IS.
11

,% THE SIXTH SEAL. [LECT. V.
not agree to expiate by the ceremonies of the Woman re%iou,
nor would they atone the gods by sacrifices and vows, as they
used to do on the like occasions. Annies were seen to fight in
the sky, and their armour looked of a bright light colour, and
the temple shone with sudden flashes of lire out of the clouds.
The doors of the temple were opened on a sudden, and a voice
greater than human was heard, that the gods were retiring ;
and at the same time there was a great motion perceived, as if
they were goiti£ out of it, which some esteemed to be causes of
terror."
Here, then, you have an historian of those times, who tells
you, in his own heathen fashion, that these prodigies happened
because the Jews would not agree to expiate the ceremonies of
the Roman religion, nor atone the gods by sacrifices and vows.
He points out the character of these prodigies as prodigies
appearing chiefly in the heavens, and especially mentions the
circumstance that "a voice greater than human was heard."
Altogether, his description lends us fairly to conclude that great
and miraculous signs took place at that period ; and that the
Jewish dispensation closed, as it had begun, in the midst of
stupendous and awful miracles.
Josephusl gives us a much more* detailed account of the
miraculous phenomena of that extraordinary period. He
says:—"Thus were the inferable people persuaded by these
deceivers (the false prophets), while they did not attend nor
give credit to tin* st</ns thnt //vvv AY> rr/V/fv//, and did so
plainly foretel their future1 desolation ; but, like men infatu-
ated, without either eyes to see or minds to consider, did not
regard the dvnunriutions that (rod /////<// to them. Thus
there was a star resembling a sword, which stood over the
city, and a comet that continued a whole year. Thus also,
before the Jews' rebellion, and before those, commotions which
preceded the war, when the people were come in great crowds
to the feast of unleavened bread, on the eighth day of the
month Zanthieus, and at the ninth hour of the night, so great
a light shone around the altar and the holy house, that it ap-
peared to be bright day-time, which light lasted for half-an~hour.
At the same festival also, a heifer, as she was led by the high
1 Bell. Jud. lib. vi. cap. 5.

LECT. V.] THE SIXTH SEAL. 99
priest to be sacrificed) brought forth a lamb in the midst of the
temple.
"Moreover, the eastern gate of the inner court of the
temple, which was of brass and vastly heavy, and had been
with difficulty shut by twenty men, and rested upon a basis
armed with iron, and had bolts fastened very deep into the firm
floor, which was there made of one entire stone, was seen to
be opened of its own accord, about the sixth hour of the night.
Now, those that kept watch in the temple came hereupon
running to the captain of the temple*, and told him of it, who
then came up thither, and, not without great difficulty, was able
to shut the gate again.
" Besides these*, a few days after that feast, on the one-aml-
tvventictli day of the month Artemisius, a certain prodigious
and incredible phenomenon appeared ; I suppose the account
of it would seem to be a fable, were it not related by those
that saw it, and were not the events that followed it of so con-
siderable a nature as to deserve such signals, for before sun-
setting chariots and troops of soldiers, in their armour, were
seen running about among the clouds and surrounding of cities.
Moreover, at that feast, which we call Pentecost, as the priests
were going by night into the inner court of the temple, as their
custom was, to perform their sacred ministrations, they said
that, in the first place, they felt a quaking, and heard a great
noise, and after that they heard a sound as of a great multitude,
saying, * Let us remove hence.'
" Now, if any one consider these things, lie will find that
(iod takes care of mankind, ami, hy all ways possible, fore-
shows to our race what is for their jtreserration ; but these
men interpreted some of these signals according to their own
pleasure, and some of them they utterly despised, until their
madness was demonstrated both by the taking of their city and
their own destruction."
It is impossible not to notice the honesty with which these
prodigies are recorded—-the minute particulars, such as the day
of the month, the hour of the night. The fact mentioned,
which many were living to deny, if it could be denied, that the
account of one of these prodigies would seem a fable, were if
not related In/ those that safe //, aud trere not the croits that
followed it of so considerable a nature as to </cscrrc suc/i

THE SIXTH SEAL. [L«cx. V.
The assertion nwdt% //wif these signs were m evident,
and rfirf «o plainly foretel their future desolation. All this
gives weight to this testimony of Josephus, and proves that
the period of the destruction of Jerusalem was a period sig-
nalised by prodigy and miracle.
It gives additional weight to this testimony, that it is con-
finned by Eusebiusl, but as lie does little more than quote
the words of Josephus, I shall not deem it necessary to repeat
them.
Observe then, " these signs which were so evident, and
which did so plainly foretel their future desolation " — " these
denunciations which (rod made to them," which " they did not
consider "— these " prodigious and incredible phenomena, the
account of which would seem to be a fable, were they not re-
lated by those that saw them, and were not the events that fol-
lowed of so considerable a nature as to deserve such signals "
— these " signals," which they " interpreted according to
their own pleasure," some of which they " utterly despised,
until their madness was demonstrated both by the taking of
the city and their own destruction," took place at this time.
Our Lord declared, " there shall be signs in the sun, and in
the moon, and in the stars, and upon the earth distress of
nations with perplexity/* The Sixtli Seal discloses " the sun
black as sackcloth of hair, the moon as blood, the stars falling
to the earth, and the heavens departing as a scrowl ;" and a
Heathen) a Jewish, and a Christian historian, the only histo-
rians of those days whose histories have come down to us,
tell us that great and marvellous prodigies appeared.
They appeared at the downfal of no other city, ancient or
modern. No historian has recorded anything at all similar ;
it is a unique point in history. Babylon, Nineveh, Tyre, fell,
but no signs preceded their destruction. Jerusalem was pre-
viously destroyed by the Babylonians, but without accompanying
signs. Rome was sacked by Alaric ; Constantinople by the
Euphratean Turks; but no miracle heralded in those desolations.
Not so, however, the Jerusalem of our Lord's day. The finger
of God was visible in her destruction. The sun of Judaism set,
Its it rose, amidst stupendous prodigies. The miracle of Sinai
Eus. Eccles. Hist. lib. iii. cap. 7.

LECT.V.] THE SIXTH SEAL. 101

was reflected in the conflagration of Mount Moriah, and the
conquest of Canaan renewed in the invasion of Judaea. The
" word spoken hy angels " was re-echoed in the " voice greater
than human," and the presence of the Deity on the Holy
Mount repeated in the awful coining of the Son of Man. The
Jewish dispensation closed, as it had begun, in miracle, and
with the last flickering!* of the dying embers of God's holy
house, angelic ministers of vengeance forsook the land they
had so often trod in visits of Jove and mercy. Miracle and
prodigy disappeared from this earth until that day when they
shall once more disclose a present Deity, and a faithful and
avenging God.

In the midst of these scenes of terror, what is the state of
the enemies of our God and of his Christ ? They are repre-
sented as overwhelmed with fear.

" And the kings of the earth, and the great men, and the
rich men, and the chief captains, and the mighty men 1, and
every bondman, and every freeman, hid themselves in the dens
and in the rocks of the mountains, and said to the mountains
and roeks, Fall on us, and hide us from the face of him that
sitteth on the throne, and from the wrath of the Lamb, for the
great day of his wrath is come, and who shall be able to
stand." a

/ call your attention to the circumstance, that they /tide
theinwlrex in the dens and in the rocks of the mountains.
Jiuliva was full of such hiding-places. A German commen-
tator has observed, this expression seems to mark out par-
ticularly the rocks and caves of Palestine which afforded places
of shelter for fugitives. Jerusalem especially abounded with
such subterranean retreats. This made Titus surround the
city with a wall, to prevent the introduction of food into the
beleagured city through these subterranean passages.

Now is there evidence of " the kings of the earth,71 the
masters of Jerusalem, with their chief captains and mighty
men hiding themselves at this time in these subterranean
caverns. The city at the time of its heleaguernient was in the
hands of three factions, headed by John of Gischala, Simon,

* M*yi0Tu»'£c *'«* X'^'/'X0** u princes of Judica ;" thus, Mark, vi, 21.:
" Herod made a feast to his lords, high captains," juyiorartc *'«' \t\ttt f>\<n*
2 llev. vi. 15.
u 3

102 THE SIXTH SEAL. [LECT. V.
and Eleazar. These were the kings l of the earth. Of two
of these kings there is evidence to prove that they did hide
themselves in this manner.
Josephus tells us, " The last hope which supported the ty-
rants mt.s in the cares and caserns wider (/round, whither if
they could once fly they did not expect to he searched for.
This was no better than a dream of theirs, for they were not
able to lie hid either from God or from the Romans." 2
In another passage he tells us of the capture of John in these
caverns. " For to speak only of what was publickly known,
the Romans slew some of them, some they carried captives, and
others they made search for under (/round, and when they
found where they were, they broke up the ground and slew all
they met with .... for a great deal of treasure was found in
these caverns. As for John, he wanted food, together with his
brethren, in these caverns, and begged that the Romans would
give him their right hand for his security, which lie had proudly
rejected before." ;;
The historian gives us the account of the capture of Simon,
another of the kings of the earth, in these subterranean pits.
" This Simon, while the Roman army were laying the city
waste, took the most faithful of his friends tritlt //////, and let
himself and them down into a subterraneous cavern that was
not visible above ground,"
Being obliged to come up out of his hiding-place for want of
food, it is added, " this rise of bis out of the ground did also
occasion the discovery of a <jreat number of others icho had
hidden themse/res under yround" *
Here, then, you have the kings of the earth, and the chief
captains, and the mighty men, concealing themselves in terror
in caves and pits. It is expressly said they did so, while *' the
Roman army were laving the city waste," and the vanity of
this attempt at concealment is not unnoticed by the historian,
1 /. e. the rulers of Jufla-a : thi« is explained, Acts, iv. !'()". ; lf The kings
of the earth stow I up, and the rulers were gathered together again Ht the Lord
and against his Christ ; for of a truth against thy holy child JCHUM both Herod
and Pontius Pilate were gathered together/' — ** principes PaleHtinse."—
Sehleiisner.
2 BeiJ. Jud. lib. vi. cap. ? * Ibid. lib. vi. cap. <).
4 Ibid, lib, vii. cap. 2.

LECT. V.] THE SIXTH SEAL. 103
for he says, " this was no better than a dream of theirs, for
they were not able to lie hid either from God or from the
Romans"
I shall merely observe of the cry of terror which, under this
seal, proceeds from these fugitives, where they are represented
as saying" to the mountains and rocks, " Fall on us, and hide
us from the face of him that sitteth upon the throne, and from
the wrath of the Lamb," that it is the very language which our
Lord said would be used at that miserable time.
" Then shall they begin to say to the mountains, Fall on us,
and to the hills, ('over us ; for if they do these things in a
green tree, what shall be done in the dry?"1
To recapitulate. The seal discloses great and terrible phe-
nomena. The sun black as sackcloth of hair, the moon as
blood, the stars falling to earth, and the heaven departing as a
scroll. If this be merely indicative of mighty revolution and
change, the world has never known so wondrous a revolution
as the chancre from Judaism to Christianity. If it be inter-
preted of calamitous events, " in those days was affliction such
as was not from the beginning of the world, no, nor ever shall
be." If it be interpreted of supernatural appearances, the
history of that time abounds with prodigy and miracle.
Under this reign of terror, the Jewish leaders and the
Jewish people generally flee to hide themselves from the wrath
to come. The strange coincidence is abundantly proved, that
they did so hide themselves in the dens and in the rocks of the
mountains; and to complete the evidence, the very words which
our Lord said they would use proceed from their trembling
lips.
Such I conceive to be the fair and legitimate interpretation
of this seal. I cannot see in it any traces whatever of the
revolution which took place in the Roman empire after the
persecutions of Diocletian. I cannot recognise the faintest
allusion to the change from Paganism to Christianity in the
days of Constantine. 1 cannot suppose that Muximin, or
(Valerius, or Diocletian are kings of the Jewish earth, or that
they can, with any propriety of interpretation, be said to hide
1 Luke, xxiii. 30, :>1.
ii 4

104

* SIXTH SEAL. [LECTt v.

from the wrath of the Lamb. I do not conceive
imagery of this seal is expressive of triumph and
victory ; and us for the date assigned to it, there is not
the slightest proof beyond mere assumption. I can only
\vouder tliat such interpretations could have filled Exeter
Hall witll thousands of attentive listeners, and that persons
possessing* common sense should accede to statements which
have no better foundation than indistinct, and too often, imagi-
nary coincidence.
I commend the explanation now offered to your prayerful
study and investigation, humbly beseeching God to pardon
errors which are unintentional, and to establish us more and
more in the truth of his Holy Word.

105

LECTURE VL
GOD'S SEALED ONES.
REV. vii. 1 — 17.
1. And after these things I saw four angels standing on the four corners
of the earth, holding the four winds of the earth, that the wind should not
blow on the earth, nor on the sea, nor on any tree.
2. And I saw another angel ascending from the east, having the seal of
the living God : and he cried with a loud voice to the four angels, to whom it
was given to hurt the earth and the sea,
3. Saying, Hurt not the earth, neither the sea, nor the trees, till we have
sealed the servants of our God in their foreheads.
4. And I heard the number of them which were sealed : and there were
sealed an hundred and forty and four thousand of all the tribes of the child-
ren of Israel.
5. Of the tribe of Juda were sealed twelve thousand. Of the tribe of Reu-
ben were sealed twelve thousand. Of the tribe of Gad were sealed twelve
thousand.
(i. Of the tribe of Aser were sealed twelve thousand. Of the tribe of
Nepthalim were sealed twelve thousand. Of the tribe of Manasses were
sealed twelve thousand.
7. Of the tribe of Simeon were sealed twelve thousand. Of the tribe of
Levi were sealed twelve thousand. Of the tribe of Issachar were sealed twelve
thousand.
8. Of the tribe of Zabulon were sealed twelve thousand. Of the tribe of
Joseph were sealed twelve thousand. Of the tribe of Benjamin were sealed
twelve thousand.
9. After this I beheld, and, lo, a great multitude, which no man could
number, of all nations, and kindreds, and people, and tongues, stood before
the throne, and before the Lamb, clothed with white robes, and palms in
their hands ;
10. And cried with a loud voice, saying, Salvation to our God which sit-
teth upon the throne, and unto the Lamb.
11. And all the angels stood round about the throne, and about the elders
and four beasts, and fell before the throne on their faces, and worshipped
God.
12. Saying, Amen: Blessing, and glory, and wisdom, and thanksgiving,
and honour, and power, and might, be unto our God for ever and ever.
A men.
13. And one of the elders answered, say ing unto me, What are these which
are arrayed in white robes ? and whence came they ?

106

OOD'S SEALED ONES. [L*cr. VI.

U And I «aul unto him, Sir, thou knowwt And he Mid to me, These
«ft ttey which came out of great tribulation, and have washed their robes,
nil made them white in the blood of the Lamb.
15, Therefore are they before the throne of <tod, and serve him day and
night in his temple : and he that sitieth on the throne shall dwell among
them.
Hi. They shall hunjrer no more, neither thirst any more ; neither Khali the
ftun light on them, nor any heat.
17. For the Lamb which is in the midst of the throne shall feed them, and
shall lead them unto living fountains of water*: anil (*od shall wipe away all
tears from their eyes.
WITH a confessedly difficult subject before us, J/fce that in
which we are now engaged, I cannot think the system which
we have adopted of briefly recapitulating* the main points of
the preceding1 Lecture will be altogether unacceptable. In this
Lecture it will be all the more necessary, inasmuch as we are
still engraved in the investigation of the subject of the Sixth
Seal, the seal not being completed until the close of Chap. vii.
We began bv proving that tbe allegorical language of the
seal was identical with that used by our Lord, when describing*
his coming to destroy Jerusalem — that the great earthquake,
the sun black as sackcloth of hair, the moon as blood, the stars
falling to the earth, the heavens departing as a scroll, every
mountain and island removed out of their places, tbe kings of
the earth hiding themselves, and calling upon the mountains
and rocks to cover them from the wrath of the Lamb, was
only a fuller development of our Lord's predictions:—"Im-
mediately after the tribulation of those days shall the sun he
darkened, and the moon shall not give her light, and tbe stars
shall fall from heaven, and the powers of tin* heavens shall be
shaken, and then shall appear the sign of tbe Sou of Man in
heaven, and then shall all the tribes of the earth mourn, and
they shall see the Son of Man coming in the clouds of heaven
with power and great glory/'1
We went on to show you that these passages could not refer
to some day of judgment yet future, but to our Lord's immediate
coining to destroy Jerusalem. 77/;v/v is that parable repeated,
by St. Matthew, St. Mark and St. Luke* —
" Now learn a parable; of the fig tree, when his branch is
1 Matt xxiv. 2y, 30.

LECT. VI] GOD'S SEALED ONES. 107
tender and putteth forth leaves, ye know that summer is
nigh, so likewise ye, when ye shall see all these things, know
that it is near, even at the doors.1
" Now learn a parable of the fig tree: when her branch is
yet tender and putteth forth leaves, ye know that summer is
near ; so ye in like manner, when ye shall see these things
come to pass, know that ft is nigh, even at the doors."2
" And he spake to them a parable, behold the fig" tree and
all the trees, when they now shoot forth, ye see and know of
your own selves that summer is now nigh at hand, so likewise
ye, when ye see these things come to pass, know ye that the
kingdom of God is nigh (it hand."*
Thrice is the precise period defined as a period within the
lifetime of the then existing* generation.
" Verily I say unto you, ilns generation shall not pass till
all these thinys he fulfilled—heaven and earth shall pass away,
but my words shall not pass away."'1
" Verily I say unto you, this generation shall not pass till
all these thitn/s he done, heaven and earth shall pass away, but
my words shall not pass away."0
"Verily I say unto you, this generation shall not JMSS away
till all he fulfilled, heaven and earth sliall pass away, but my
words shall not pass away."';
We then spoke of the signs which heralded in his coming
—we explained the wonderful phenomena of the Sixth Seal, of
those extraordinary prodigies which then took place. We
proved from the only writers who have given a history of those
eventful times, that at that period miraculous signs and wonders
happened, such as had never happened before — the star re-
sembling a sword which stood over the city — the comet
which continued a whole year — the light at the ninth hour of
the night shining about the holy house — the eastern gate of
the temple opening of its own accord — the chariots and troops
of heavenly combatants in the clouds—the quaking felt, and the
voices heard in the temple. "These were the signs/' says the
1 Matt xxiv. 32, 33. 2 Mark, xiii. *28, 2<).
3 Luke, xxi. '-><)—31. 4 Matu xxiv. 3i, 35.
5 Mark, xiii. 30, 31. ° Luke, xxi, 31, 3v

108 GOD'S SEALED O&ES. [LECT. VI.

historian, " which were so evident, and did so plainly foretel
their future desolation."x

We were enabled to show that two kings of the Jewish
earth, with their chief captains and mighty men,—" a great
number of others,"—hid themselves in fear and terror in the
subterranean caverns with which Jerusalem abounded ; and that
two of these leaders, John and Simon, were taken out of these
dens, where they had concealed themselves, the one to grace the
Roman triumph, and then to be slain, the other to be con-
demned to perpetual imprisonment.

" And the kings of the earth, and the great men, and the
rich men, and the chief captains, and the mighty men, and
every bondman and every free man, hid themselves in the dens
and in the rocks of the mountains, and said to the mountains
and rocks, Fall on us, and hide us from the face of him that
sitteth on the throne, and from the wrath of the Lamb, for the
great day of his wrath is come, and who shall be able to
stand?"

Our subject in this Lecture is the sealing of God's elect pre-
vious to the coming destruction ; and before entering upon the
explanation, I shall endeavour to point out the identity between
the seal and the predictions of our Lord. We have already
compared the identity between a part of the Sixth Seal and
the prophecies of Christ in the Gospels. It will be satisfactory
to find that the remainder corresponds with the same predic-
tions. With a view of presenting the whole in a connected
form, I shall proceed, at the risk of seeming to be fond of
repetitions, to exhibit the whole of the Sixth Seal as strictly
identical with the predictions of our Lord.

1 Is it because these signs are not of a sufficiently majestic character, ac-
cording to our own preconceived notions, that we think the language of our
Lord must be interpreted of scenes yet future? One thing is certain, that
the power and glory of that terrible coming made the kings of the earth, and
the chief captains, and the mighty men, hide themselves in the dens and caves
of the earth — that heavenly and human agency combined struck terror into
the hearts of the princes of Juda-a. If TacitUH, a heathen historian, should
have been beguiled into any tiling like an imitation of the miracles recorded by
Livy, or other heathen writers, this accusation cannot be brought against
Josephus; for he assigns these miracles to the agency of God, and declares that
they were witnessed by many.

LECT. VI.] GOD'S SEALED ONES. 109

SIXTH SEAL.

cc The sun became black as sack-
cloth of hair."

" The moon became as blood."

" The stars of heaven fell to the
earth."

" The heaven departed as a scroll."

" Every mountain and island were
moved out of their places."

t( The kings of the earth, £c. . . .
hid themselves, and said to the moun-
tains and rocks, Fall on us and hide
us from the face of him that sitteth
upon the throne, and from the wrath
of the Larnb."

" For the great day of his wrath
is come, and who shall be able to
stand."

" And after these things I saw four
angels standing on the four corners of
the earth," —

" Holding the four winds of the
earth."

Hurt not the earth, £c.

till we have sealed the servants of
God on their foreheads."—Rev. vi.
and vii.

OUR LORD'S PREDICTIONS.

" The sun shall be darkened." —
Mark, xiii. 24.

" The moon shall not give her
light."— Mark, xiii. 24.

" The stars shall fall from heaven."

— Matt. xxiv. 29.

" The powers of the heavens shall
be shaken." — Matt. xxiv. 29.

" Upon the earth distress of na-
tions, the sea and the waves roar-
ing." — Luke, xxi. 25.

" Then shall they begin to say to
the mountains, Fall an us, and to the
hills, Cover us ; for if they do these
things in a green tree, what shall be
done on the dry?" — Luke, xxiii.
30, 31.

" There shall be great distress in
the land and wrath upon this people."

— Luke, xxi. 23.

"And he shall send his angels.'*—
Matt. xxiv. 31.

(( And they shall gather . . . from
the four winds."— Matt. xxiv. 31.

u And then shall he send his an-
gels and shall gather together his
elect from the four winds from the
uttermost part of the earth to the
uttermost part of heaven." — Mark,
xiii. 27.

The identity is complete, and the vision of the Apocalypse is
only the echo of the predictions in the Gospels :—
The sun black.
The sun darkened.
The moon as blood.
The moon not t/irimf her tiyht.
The stars falling to the earth.
The stars falliny from heaven.

110 GOD'S SEALED ONES. [LECT. VI.
The heaven departing as a scroll.
The powers of the heavens shaken.
Mountains and islands moved.
The sea and the waves roaring*.
The en/ to the mountains and rocks.
The en/ to the mountains and hills.1
The great day of his wrath.
The wrath upon this people.
The Amjeh sealing the servants of God.
The Aiufch gathering the eleet.
Holding the four winds.
Gathering the elect from the four winds.
Standing on the four corners of flic earth.
From the uttermost part of the earth to the uttermost part
of heaven.
Here, to say the least, there is a parallelism of the most marked
character between the Sixth Seal and the predictions of our Lord.
The resemblance is too close to he accidental, too complete to be
fortuitous. Not only is there a perfect identity of language
and figure, but what serves to bind the analogy still closer,
they both relate to the same people, and to the same period.
Nothing1 can be more evident than that the Sixth Seal refers
c?
to the woes about to come upon the .Jewish people.
The angels stand on "the four corners of the earth" —
Jud;ea; they hold " the winds of the earth, that the winds
* mi
shall not blow on the earth "—Jiuhea; the " servants of (iod"
are sealed "from the earth"—Jiuhea; and tins is made matter
of certainty, not only because the twelve tribes are enumerated
by name, but because the 1 M<,O<)(), said to be "redeemed from
the earth" (Rev. xiv. '}.), are put into contrast with " the great
multitude which no man could number of all nations, and
1 If this remarkable identity should be thought demonstrative proof that the
predictions of the Apocalypse and of our Lord relate to the same events, much
light will be thrown upon the expression, "The kings of the earth." There
can be no reasonable doubt what people are alluded to. — Luke, xxiii. 'JO.
In the Apocalypse "the kings of the earth" (Judtea) utter the same cry.

LECT. VI.] GOD'S SEALED ONES. Ill
kindreds, and people, and tongues.'* Making it morally certain
that no other people could be meant but those who always held
themselves distinct from the Gentiles.
I need scarcely observe, that the predictions of our Lord with
which the Sixth Seal has been compared relate likewise to
that peculiar people. As in the Old Testament the Gentiles
are only introduced when their history is interwoven with that
of the Jewish people, so under the New. The Jew, under
both dispensations, is ever the principal theme of the warnings
and promises of Holy Writ, and nothing can be more certain
than that the predictions of our Lord to which I have alluded
relate solely to them.
Dr. Gumming l explains the sealing of the 1-14,000 of the
gathering of the true Ghurch out of the visible Church, which
had become corrupt in the days of Gonstantine; he says,
" Immediately after this exaltation of Christianity (the exalta-
tion which he supposes to be described in the former part of
the Sixth Seal), there follows the sealing of 1-14,000. That,
as I explained to you, signifies that Christianity, in the hours
of its prosperity, suffered more than it did in the days of its
depression ; that the Gospel was a purer and a nobler thing
when crushed by the persecutions of men, than when it nestled
beneath the shadow of the imperial throne of Gonstantine; and
whether it was right or whether it was wrong thus to elevate
the Gospel, it is matter of fact, that in the catacombs and
caves of the earth the ('hurch retained her garments unsullied,
her communion with her Lord unbroken ; but the moment the
heads that were exposed to the tempests were crowned with
mitres, and the catacombs exchanged for cathedrals, she laid
aside her robes of beauty and glory, put on the gorgeous dress
of Ca*sar, became shorn of her real strength and her attributes
of grandeur, and ground, a miserable drudge, at Ca»sar's mill
and at Caesar's bidding."
What this has to do with the seal in question is a point I
cannot solve,—there is not even the semblance of a coincidence.
How could the Christian Church be sealed out of the twelve
tribes of Israel in tlic days of ('omtantinc? \Miat part was
taken by the angelic host in this gathering of the real Israel
1 " Abstract of Lectures,0 p. 508.

112 GOD'S SEALED ONES. [LECT. VL
out of the nominal Israel ? and what injury fell upon that
nominal Church after the elect were gathered ? It may possibly
be true that mitres and cathedrals are less favourable to the
growth of religion than catacombs and caves, and that even a
prebendal stall is apt to induce the ease, learned or otherwise,
which is said to be inseparable from dignity; but I have yet to
learn, how an apostate Jewish church could have fallen into
this ecclesiastical eccentricity in the days of Constantinc, or
what flour, save flowers of rhetoric, so miserable a drudge could
have been made to grind " at CYesar's mill, and at Gesar's bid-
ding/* Or what again in the name of common sense has this
seal to do with the Puseyism ! of the fourth century ? Can
any one see in it any allusion, however remote, to the efficacy
of the sacrament of baptism ?
And, as usual, the period over which this seal extends is
accurately defined—from A.D. 3£l< to A.D. .'J9.5. What is the
authority for this date ? By what argument is it supported ?
It stands upon the authority of idle assumption. It is based on
an argument of sand : and I trust that a time is coming when
all such unsupported and imaginary hypotheses shall leave
behind them no clearer trace than the same sand affords of the
Arab's path across the wilderness, to-day perhaps impressed by
the feint vestiges of his horse's track, and to-morrow those marks
effaced and obliterated by the sweeping simoom of the desert.
It is time to offer a different explanation. It is probable that
this sealing of God's servants on thctr foreheads refers to the
miraculous preservation of the Christian Church from the wrath
about to fall on the Jewish people. There seems to be an
allusion to Ezekiel ix. 4., where an angel is commissioned to
go through the city of Jerusalem, and mark upon the forehead
of all who should be exempted from the impending slaughter.
"And the Lord said unto him, (jo through the midst of
Jerusalem, and set a mark ujton the foreheads of the* men that
sigh and that cry for all the abominations that are done in the
midst thereof. And to the others he said in mine hearing, (io
ye after him through the city, and smite : and let not your eye
spare, neither have ye pity : but come not near
any man upon whom is the mark ; and begin at my sanctuary/*
1 " What we call Puseyism in the nineteenth century was the predomi-
nating religion of the fourth ; and this explains the reason of Tractarian sym-
pathy with the fourth century."—Gumming.

LECT. VI.] GOD'S SEALED ONES. 113
The time of destruction is now near ; the commotion of the
elements, and the miraculous phenomena of Nature, accompanied
by the terror arid dismay of God's enemies, is indicative of this ;
the destroying angels have their commission, and stand on
the four corners of the earth, ready to execute it. But before
the tornado bursts upon the earth—before the hurricane rushes
along in its fury, the servants of God must be sealed in their
foreheads,—"sealed unto the day of redemption;" and the
four angels, whose province it is to injure the earth, the sea,
and the trees, are forbidden to do so till the elect are safe,
and the servants of God have received that mark by which they
may be known as the people of the Lord.
I shall endeavour to show that the judgments of God did
not fall upon the guilty city until the servants of Christ were
safe. Our Lord had warned them beforehand of these im-
pending judgments, and had urged their flight from the doomed
city.
St. Matt. xxiv. 1<3.—" When ye therefore shall see the
abomination of desolation, spoken of by Daniel the prophet,
stand in the holy place l (whoso rcat/ct/t let him understand) :
then let them which be in .ludtea flee into the mountains ; let
him which is on the house-top not come down to take any-
thing out of his house ; neither let him which is in the field
return back to take his clothes .... and pray ye that
your flight be not in the winter, neither on the Sabbath day:
Behold I have told you before/*
St. Mark xiii. 14—IS.—" When ye shall see the abomi-
nation of desolation, spoken of by Daniel the prophet, standing
where it ought not (let him that readeth understand), then let
them that be in Judcea flee to the mountains : .... and
pray ye that your flight be not in the winter."
St. Luke, xxi. 1JO—" When ye shall see Jerusalem com-
passed with armies, then know that the desolation thereof is
nigh. Then let them which are in Judaea flee to the mountains ;
and let them which are in the midst of it depart out; and let
not them that are in the countries enter thereinto."
1 This may be considered as a proof of the writing of this Gospel previous
to the destruction of Jerusalem.
T

114 GOD'S SEALED ONES. [LECT. VI.

Now, was this done?—did they thus escape?

Josephus says, " After the first attack upon the city, many
of the most considerable of the Jewish people forsook it as men
do a sinking s/iijj." l

Eusebius.2— " The whole body of the Church at Jerusalem,
having been commanded by a Divine revelation given to men of
approved piety there before the war3, remored from the city
and dwelt in a certain town beyond the Jordan, called Pella;
here those that believed in Christ having" removed from Jeru-
salem, as if holy men had entirely abandoned the royal city
itself, and the whole land of Judaea, the Divine justice for their
crimes against Christ and his Apostles finally overtook them,
totally destroying the whole generation of those evil-doers from
the earth." Theodoret observes, that a report prevailed in his
day, stating that when Vespasian and Titus were preparing for
their attack on Jerusalem, the Christians left the city by reve-
lation.

And it is worthy of observation, that (luring the siege itself
frequent opportunities of escape were afforded. Upon one me-
morable occasion, Titus relaxed the siege for four clays be-
fore their third and last wall was taken, thereby affording to
such as might be desirous of obtaining it, an opportunity to
escape.

The historian tells us, "A resolution was now taken to re-
lax the siege for awhile, and to afford the seditions an interval
for consideration, and to see whether the demolishing of their
second wall would not make them more compliant.'*

This interval the Romans spent in paying their legions.

" Thus did the Romans spend four days in bringing subsis-
tence-money to their legions; but, on the fifth day, when no

1 Bell. Jud. ii. 20.
2 Eus. Eccles. Hist, lib. Hi. cap. 5.
3 Was this Divine Revelation given to men of approved piety before the
war.—"The Jfavebition of Jesus Christ, which (Jod gave unto him, to show
unto 7ti* servantn things which must shortly come to pass," Rev. i. 1.? Was
it " the more sure word of prophecy " of St. Peter — " We have alxo a more
sure word of prophecy whereunto ye do well that ye take heed, as unto
a light that shineth in a dark place, until the day dawn and the day-star
arise in your hearts," 2 Peter, i. 19. ?

LECT. VI] GOD'S SEALED ONES. 115
signs of peace came from the Jews, Titus began to raise banks,
both at the tower of Antonia and at John's monument." l
Observe, then, frequent opportunities were offered for the
Christians to escape. After the first attack upon the city,
doubtless many Christians obeyed their Lord's command, and
left the city as men do a sinking ship. When the siege had
continued some time, before the taking of the third and last
wall, opportunities were again offered for escape. There is no
mention made of the Christians perishing en masse during this
memorable siege; on the contrary, there is every reason to be-
lieve they were preserved under this terrible calamity.
I call your attention to a circumstance, which I do not ad-
duce as proof by itself, but simply as a confirmation of the
statement before us. The destroying anyels were not suffered
to hurt the earth, the sea, and the trees, meaning the general
aspect of the country, till the Christians irere safe.
I quote a passage from Josephus, which serves to illustrate
this:—
"The Romans raised their banks2 in twenty-one days, after
they had cut down all the trees that were in the country, that
adjoined the city for ninety furlongs round; and truly the very
view of the country was a melancholy thing, for those places
which were before adorned with trees and pleasant gardens,
were now become a desolate country every way, and its trees
were all cut down; nor could any foreigner that had formerly
seen JiuUea, and the most beautiful suburbs of the city, but now
saw it as a desert, but lament and mourn sadly at so great a
change." 3
It is worthy of notice that these banks are not raised till the
last opportunity has been given for escape, and then the re-
straining power which had prevented the Romans from "hurt-
ing the earth, the sea, and trees," is relaxed; the country be-
comes a wilderness ; all is desolation and ruin ; strangers who
had seen it in its beauty cannot forbear tears at its lamentable
and altered appearance.
1 Bell. Jud. lib. v. cap. J).
2 These banks were made of timber, earth, and stones ; they were equal
in height to the city walls ; their object being to allow the besiegers to right
on equal terms with the besieged.
3 Bell. Jud. lib. vi. cap. 1.

116 GOD'S SEALED ONES. [LECT. VI.
" Your country is desolate, your cities are burned with fire ;
your land, strangers devour it in your presence, and it is deso-
late, as overthrown by strangers. And the daughter of Zion is
left as a cottage in a vineyard, as a lodge in a garden of cucum-
bers, as a besieged city." l
We are next struck by the precise number of the sealed ones
—144,000—12,000 out of each tribe. There is no more ne-
cessity for believing that a literal number is here intended, than
for believing that the number of the horsemen under the sixth
trumpet means literally 200,000,000,—a number which at that
time probably equalled, if not exceeded, the population of the
entire globe,—or that the 1000 years means literally a 1000
years. Neither is it imperative for us to believe that exactly
12,000 were sealed out of each tribe. Ten of the tribes had
then for many years been absent from Palestine ; two only,
Judah and Benjamin, remained. Yet even in our Lord's time
it was usual to speak of Israel as of the twelve tribes : " Ye
shall sit on twelve thrones, judging the, twelve tribes of Israel."
The idea presented to us is simply that a precise number, in-
cluding probably many thousand Jews, were saved from the
impending calamity.2
They are said to have been sealed upon their foreheads. We
have seen that this is made to refer to the sign of the cross
traced upon the forehead at baptism. " The first seed of the
apostacy," says Dr. Gumming, " was the universal perversion
of the sacrament of baptism ; it was called ' the Lord's mark/
* the illumination,7 < the preservative/ * the investiture of incor-
ruption/ * the salvation.' "
Now at the early period when the Apocalypse was written,
it does not appear that baptism was ever administered except
by complete immersion.
Thus "John was baptising in yEnon, near to Salim, be-
cause there was much water there." Thus Paul and Lydia
" went out to the river side, where prayer was wont to be
1 Is. i. 7, 8.
2 The Jewish Christians amounted at that time to many thousands. At
the Pentecost three thousand were added to the church. Soon after we read
" the number of disciples multiplied in Jerusalem greatly." After that "of
many thousands (myriads) of Jews which believed." At the time when the
Apocalypse was written, the number must have been considerable.

LBCT. VI.J GOD'S SEALED ONES. 117

made." Thus Philip and the eunuch went " both down into
the water" l

In a panegyric on the building of churches, addressed to
Paulinus, Bishop of Tyre, in the fourth century, by Eusebius2,
he describes the baptismal fonts of sufficient size for the pur.
poses of immersion.

" Here, too, he has placed the symbols of the sacred purifi-
cation, by providing fountains built opposite the temple (nave),
which, by the abundant effusion of its waters, affords the means
of cleansing to those that proceed to the inner parts of the sanc-
tuary. And this is the first place that receives those that enter,
and which presents to those that need the first introduction both
a splendid and a convenient station."

So that, even in the times to which this seal is referred by
Dr. Gumming, it does not appear that baptism was adminis-
tered generally, except by complete immersion. No argument,
consequently can be drawn against the "perversion of the sacra-
ment of baptism77 from the sealing of the elect in their fore-
heads. It is an evident allusion to Ezek. ix., where the angel
is told to " set a mark upon the foreheads of the men that
sigh and cry for the abominations" done in Jerusalem, whilst
the rest are devoted to unsparing slaughter.

It would appear that the 1-14,000 are not only saved from
temporal destruction, but that they are glorified with an ever-
lasting salvation ; for the vision represents them as glorified in
heaven as well as saved on earth.

In chap.xiv -- The same 111,000 having "his father's name
written in their foreheads," are seen standing with the Lamb on
Mount Zion. They are described as "the 144,000 which were
redeemed from the earth," Jud*ea ; they are said to be " re-
deemed from among men, being the first fruits unto God and
the Lamb."

In chap. xv. 2., — " They that had gotten the victory over

1 "Tovro Xtycr on >/

»' rr
*' — Barnabnc Epist. 11.

" — Cyril. Ilieros. 3.
Eus. Eccles. Hist. lib. x. cap. 4.

118 GOD'S SEALED ONES. [LECT. VI.
the beast, and over his image, and over his mark, and over the
number of his name, stand on the sea of glass, having the harps
of God, and they sing the song of Moses the servant of God,
and the song of the Lamb." The new Jerusalem is tenanted by
these risen saints, for " the throne of God and of the Lamb
shall be in it; and his servants shall serve him : And they shall
see his face; and his name shall be in their foreheads." l
This is the continuous burden of the Apocalypse ; it is the
gathering together of Christ's saints at his " appearing and
his kingdom," and this "gathering" and this "appearing"
were " things which must shortly be done." There is to be no
delay between the coming of Christ and the gathering of his
elect.
" They shall see the Son of man coming in the clouds of
heaven with power and great glory. And he shall send his angels
with a great sound of a trumpet, and they shall gather together
his eleet from the four winds. " 2
" And then shall they see the Son of man corning in the
clouds with great power and glory. And then shall he send his
angels, and shall gather together his eleet from the four
winds" 3
" And then shall they see the Son of man coming in a cloud
with power and great glory. And when these things begin to
come to pass, then look up, and lift up your heads ; for your
redemption draweth nigh" 4
And this is not to be done at some indefinite or some future
period, not at the general resurrection of the last day, or at the
final judgment of mankind, but at a certain fixed and definite
time, and that within the lifetime of the then existing
generation.
"Verily I say unto you, that this generation shall not pass
till all these tilings be done/'5 " Watch ye therefore, and
pray always, that ye may be accounted worthy to escape all
these things that shall e(tme to pass, and to stand before the
Son of man." G
1 Rev. xxii. 3, 4. 2 Matt. xxiv. 30, 31.
*' Mark, xiii. 2fi, 21. * Luke, xxi. 27, 28.
5 Mark, xiii. 30. <> Luke, xxi. 36.

LECT. VLJ GOD'S SEALED ONES. 119
It is a grand and continuous whole, and the key to it is those
words of our Lord, 1 fear but little understood : " Immediately
after the tribulation of those days shall the sun be darkened,
and the moon shall .not give her light, and the stars shall fall
from heaven, and the powers of the heavens shall be shaken, and
then shall appear the sign of the Son of man in heaven, and
then shall all the tribes of the earth (the land of Judaea) mourn,
and they shall see the Son of man coming in the clouds of
heaven with power and great glory, and he shall send his angels
with a great .sound of a trumpet, and they shall gather together
his elect from the four winds, from one end of heaven to the
other. Now learn a parable of the fig tree, when his branch
is yet tender and putteth forth leaves, ye know that summer is
nigh, so likewise ye, when ye shall see all these things, know
that it is near, even at the doors ; verily, I say unto you, this
generation shall not pass till ALL these things be fulfilled:
heaven and earth shall pass away, but my words shall not pass
away. "
I need riot say how all this is mixed up in a labyrinth of never
ending confusion by commentators. Now, part of it is made
to refer to the destruction of Jerusalem, and part to the Day of
Judgment. Now, part is expounded of the recent convulsion of
European capitals. Now, of the great distress upon the land of
Judaxt, and wrath upon the people of the Jews. Now, of events
which took place A.D. 7^« Now, of events which are taking
place A.D. 18,55. Do you ask for an elucidation of this in-
explicable jargon ? the answer is—Prophecy has a double mean-
ing, and the predictions which revealed the destruction of Jerusa-
lem are applicable, in their second sense, to the end of the world.
Now, if prophecy has a double meaning, it surely would be
modest to allow that double meaning to be applied only by in-
spired men, or else we are liable to the charge of making
ourselves prophets ; and I do not see the difference between
.assuming for ourselves the gift of prophecy, and pronouncing
that a prophecy which has already received its accomplishment,
points to a future event yet to come. Besides which, if the
prophecies respecting the destruction of Jerusalem have a
double meaning, then the prophecies respecting the destruction
of Tyre, Babylon, and Nineveh, must h

120 GOD'S SEALED ONES. [LBCT. VI.
likewise. If the precedent is established in one case, it must
be established in all. I do not conceive that the prophecies
which relate to the Redeemer of the human race are analogous
to prophecies relating to the destruction of cities ; for whilst
it would only he natural to find Him the subject of prophecy
from the beginning, it would be unnatural that the destruction
of a particular city should prefigure events to take place at the
end of time. Added to this, our Lord's prophecies in the
Gospels, respecting the destruction of Jerusalem, are so hedged
in by certain fixed limits which restrict their application, that it
seems little short of presumption to extend them beyond the
period which He has defined. I positively maintain that our
Saviour's predictions in Matt, xxiv., Mark xiii., Luke xxi., had
respect to a definite object, and were confined within the fixed
limits of a definite period. J positively maintain that our Lord
did not mean to mix up the scenes of the destruction of Je-
rusalem and the so-called end of the world. That it would
Lave heen unworthy of his divine love and intelligence to have
conveyed so indistinct an answer to die earnest appeal of his
disciples. I unhesitatingly affirm, that of all shallow, weak,
and ridiculous arguments, the shallowest and the weakest is that
which divides the question of our Lord's disciples to their
Masterl into three separate inquiries, as if " the end of
the world," cro^reXeta rov cuaWg, and the coming of
Christ were distinct and separate events. Happily for our
system of interpretation, the Evangelist tells us, in this very
chapter, that " the end " should come when the " gospel of
the kingdom should be preached as a witness unto all nations.
Then shall the end come ;" and that the coming of Christ
should take place before that f/eneratiou had passed away.
Happily for us, the same question, the ynestion repectltu/ the
time when all this should happen, is put to our Lord under
similar circumstances of time and place, by St. Mark and St.
Luke, and put in a shape in which it is impossible for any in-
genuity of man to make three questions of it. " Tell us,
when shall these things be ? and what shall be the sign when
all these things shall be fulfilled?"2 "Master, but when
shall these things be ? and what sign will there be when these
1 Matt. xxiv. 3. 2 Mark, xiii. 4.

LECT. VI.] GOD'S SEALED ONES. 121
things shall come to pass ? "l And the answer in each case is
substantially the same as in the Gospel of St. Matthew.
Why all this labour should be taken to fritter away one of
the simplest and plainest declarations of Holy Writ is more
than I can tell. Do they think we are detracting from the
glory of the Saviour because we say He came at the period He
said He wrould come, and to effect the object He said He would
effect ? Much more do they detract from the Saviour's glory
who lead us to believe that his kingdom is not yet set up, but
that it will be set up at a corning to this earth of which the
Scriptures do not say one word.
Nor is this the only shift to which the supporters of these
views have been driven in order to defend their system. Gro-
tius2 was obliged to deny the inspiration of the writers of the
New Testament, because he could not reconcile the coming of
Christ with the end of the world. He affirmed that God
purposely concealed the knowledge of Jus will from the
Apostles, who were Jed to expect the end of tJie world as im-
mediately about to happen ; an argument, if correct, utterly
subversive of the inspiration of the New Testament; for in
that case they must have uttered positive statements respecting
the immediate coining' of Christ, which proved to be untrue.
For iny own part, 1 can safely say I never understood the
Scriptures, especially those of the New Testament, until I had
studied " The Revelation." I seemed to feel that Scripture
" wanted some epitome which should connect its predictions with
their final fulfilment with regard to the new dispensation, and
thus to present an entire whole to the reader of those and
future times." 1 mixed up, in mysterious confusion, the world
and the land of Juda»a ; the coming of Christ and the day of
judgment; the destruction of Jerusalem and the final sentence
of mankind. In innumerable instances I was compelled to put
forced constructions on passages which had a plain and definite
meaning, and to do gross violence to all legitimate principles
1 Luke, xxi. 7-
2 " Accedat quod etiam hanc qualerncunque famain, nullo moclo durabilem
sibi poterant promittere ; cum (Deo dc ii\du$trid suutn in hoc concilium <v-
lante) mundi totius cxitium, quasi de proximo immiuens, opperirentur. Quod
et ipsorum ct sequentium Christianorum scripta, apertissimum faciunt.'* —
tirotius de Vcr. lib. xi. 6'.

GOD'S SEALED ONES. [Lacr. VL
of interpretation. Of such questions as those of the gathering
of the elect, and the first resurrection, I had not the slightest
conception. Following the routine of " blind leaders of the
blind," I explained the signs which preceded the destruction of
Jerusalem of the signs which should precede the end of the
world, " Nation rising against nation" was interpreted of
modern commotions. " The gospel preached as a witness to
all nations," of the labours of missionary societies ; " the signs
in the sun, moon, and stars," of the tokens of a future advent,
and so on, as tens of thousands do at the present moment.
But, if I may venture to say so without presumption, " when
it pleased God to reveal his Son in me," as already come, and
to open my eyes to the true meaning of his blessed word, there
fell from mine eyes " as it had been scales." I saw the fallacy
with which I had been bound ; a key was preferred which at
once opened the mystical lock ; a clue was found which un-
ravelled the mazy labyrinth ; the "epitome" so long wanted
was at last discovered, and the Scriptures stood forth in new
and intelligible light as "an entire whole." That key, that
clue, that epitome, was realised in the Apocalypse. TVot only
did the Scriptures explain the Apocalypse, but the Apocalypse
explained the Scriptures. As in some perfect piece of me-
chanism, the inoperation of one bolt or wheel deranges the
whole; so also with this winding up of the mysteries of God.
Till understood, it was felt that something was wanting. When
understood, it became evident that the word of God was
complete.
I say to all, study the Apocalypse — study the Apocalypse
not by the Apocalypse, but in connection with the Scriptures
of the Old and New Testament. Floods of light and know-
ledge will burst upon you —you will possess clearer views of
revealed truth than you had before—you will possess more
exalted views of your divine Lord — you will see Him already
come, the footsteps of his awful coming still deeply printed on
the Jew and on Jerusalem — you will recognise his mighty and
powerful kingdom stretching far away throughout the universe
— you will see Him set down with his Father upon his throne,
and his kingdom ruling over all. And when the infidel or
the sceptic shall ask, as of old, " where is the promise of his
coming?" you will point to a world born again under bis

LacT.VL] GOD'S SEALED ONES. 123
sway—you will point to Christianity filling the length and
breadth of the earth—you will point to all enemies being gra-
dually subdued under his feet, and heaven and earth re-echoing
the triumphant song, " Hallelujah, for the Lord God omnipo-
tent reigneth."
Immediately, /zero, ravra, after the sealing of the 144,000
" of all the tribes of the children of Israel," defined chap, xiv.3.
as the " redeemed from the earth," Judaea, St. John beholds
" a great multitude, which no man could number, of all nations
and kindreds, and people and tongues." This innumerable
multitude is evidently contrasted with the specific number, the
144,000, as the gathered from "all nations and kindreds, and
people and tongues ;" i. e.9 from nations which were not Jews,
are put in apposition to the " redeemed from the earth," Ju-
dasa. The Church at that time, it must be remembered, was
composed of " devout men out of every nation under heaven."
JVo land so remote or barbarous but had some candidates for
the "white robes," and the "palms " of victory. "Neither
pray I for these alone, but for them also which shall believe on
me through their word ; . . . And the glory which thou
gavest me I have given them ; that they may be one, even
as we are one."1 " Many shall come from the east and
west, and shall sit down with Abraham, and Isaac, and Jacob,
in the kingdom of heaven. But the children of the kingdom
(the Jews, compare Matt. xxi. 43.) shall be cast out into
outer darkness : there shall be weeping and gnashing of
teeth."2 It will be noticed, that they who "shall come
from the east and west to sit down with Abraham, and
Isaac, and Jacob, in the kingdom of God," (and surely this
sitting down with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, cannot be re-
ferred to the gathering of the Gentiles into the Christian
Church,) are said to do so at the time of the rejection of
the " children of the kingdom." So St. Luke xiii. 23—£5.
^8—30. " Then said one unto him, Lord, are there few that
be saved ? And he said unto them, Strive to enter in at the
strait gate : for many, I say unto you, will seek to enter in,
and shall not be able. When once the master of the house is
1 John, xvii. 20—22. 2 Matt. viii. 11, 12.

124 GOD'S SEALED ONES. [LECT. VL

risen up, and hath shut to the door (evidently referring to his
coming, Matt. xxv. 10.) . . . There shall be weeping and
gnashing of teeth, when ye shall see Abraham, and Isaac, and
Jacob, and all the prophets, in the kingdom of God, and you
yourselves thrust out. And they shall come from the cast, and
from the west, and from the north and from the south, and
shall sit down in the kingdom of God. And behold there are
last which shall be first, and there are first which shall be last."
It is, then, only in accordance with the analogy of Scripture, that
at "his appearing and his kingdom" "a great multitude,
which no man could number, of all nations, and kindreds, and
people, and tongues," should be gathered unto Him, as well as
the elect jewels of his own Israel, should enter into his king-
dom, and should sit down with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob,
and all the prophets in the kingdom of God.

One class of these risen and glorified saints attracts the pecu-
liar notice of St. John : — " And one of the elders answered,
saying unto me, What are these which are arrayed in white1
robes? and whence came they ? And I said unto him, Sir,
thou knowest. And he said to me, these are they which
came out of great tribulation ;" ('E/c TTJS 0Xtx|/€cos T7?9 /^eyaX^s,
out of the tribulation, the great one, the tribulation foretold by
our Lord,—" Then shall they deliver you up to be afflicted, and
shall kill you, and ye shall be hated of all nations for my
name's sake,") " therefore are they before the throne, of God."
They are not removed to such an inconceivable distance from
the glory of the Godhead, that through the infinity of space,
that glory seems but like the glimmerings of some distant star,
but "before the throne of God," and serve Him day and night
in his temple, and He that " sitteth on the throne shall dwell
among them ; they shall hunger no more, neither thirst any
more, neither shall the sun light on them nor any heat, for
the Lamb which is in the midst of the throne shall feed them,
and shall lead them unto living fountains of waters, and God
shall wipe away all tears from their eyes."

1 " Tune nuntius Domini coronas jussit adferri ; allatic sunt autcin corona?
velut ex palmist facta*, et coronavit eos viros uuntius . . . data CM xiyitlo ;
nam vestem eandern habebant, id est, candidam nicut nivern." — llenme
Pastor, Similitude, 8.

LECT. VI] GOD'S SEALED ONES. 125

Oh, what a glorious contrast to the symbols presented in the
earlier part of this seal! From scenes of desolation and terror,
shadowed forth by the sun black as sackcloth of hair, and the
moon as blood, and the stars falling to the earth, from the
confusion and dismay attending upon the dissolution of things
human and divine — from vainly-uttered shrieks addressed to
inanimate Nature to hide the enemies of God from the face of
Him that sitteth upon the throne, and from the wrath of the
Lamb — we are caught up to the throne of God, radiant with
glory and strength, to the multitude which no man can number,
clothed with white robes, and palms in their hands — to the
144,000 with lifs Father's name in their foreheads, standing*
upon Mount Sion ; we hear the echo of their chant of victory,
as in strains of deeply flowing and majestic harmony it rever-
berates along the aisles of eternity—"Salvation to our God
which sitteth upon the throne, and unto the Lamb.'*

Let us now take a brief review of this seal. Miraculous
phenomena indicative of calamity and desolation are the har-
bingers of the wrath of the Lamb. The enemies of God hide
themselves in terror and dismay. Destruction is about to over-
take them. But there are servants of Christ in Judaea and in
Jerusalem of whom the Lord said, " In your patience possess
ye your souls ; there shall not an hair of your head perish."
These are exempted from the approaching slaughter. 141,000
are sealed in their foreheads. The angel ascending from the
liast commands the four angels whose province it is to hurt the
earth, saying, " Hurt not the earth, neither the sea, nor the
trees, till we have sealed the servants of our God in their fore-
heads."

These sealed ones are not only saved from that desolation,
but they are represented as glorified in heaven ; God not only
did not " appoint them to wrath,7' but to obtain salvation1

1 1 Tliess. v. 9. " to obtain salvation by our Lord Jesus Christ/' — That
this salvation does not merely mean temporal deliverance from that wrath to
which the Jewish nation were appointed, but also heavenly glory, is shown
from the consideration, that they who wake, and they who sleep, are equally
to be partakers of it. —Compare 1 Thess. iv. 1.3—18. To this salvation our
Lord alludes (Luke, xvii. 30—3?«) "Even thus shall it be in the day when
the Son of man is revealed......in that night there shall be two men
in one bed; the one shall be taken, and the other shall be left. Two women

126 GOD'S SEALED ONES. [LECT. VI.

through their Lord Jesus Christ, who (lied for them, that
whether they wake or sleep, (i. e., whether they should he
" alive and remain unto his coming," or whether they should
be the " dead in Christ") should live together with Him. Christ
sends " his angels, and gathers his elect from the four winds."
They are seen standing before the throne, and before the Lamb,
clothed with white robes, and with palms in their hands; they
are described, chap, xiv., as " the redeemed from among men,
being the first fruits unto God and the Lamb."

For this deliverance, this " better resurrection," they pour
forth the unceasing song of praise: — " Salvation to our God
which sitteth upon the throne, and unto the Lamb. Bless-
ing, and glory, and wisdom, and thanksgiving, and honour,
and power, and might, be unto our God for ever and ever,
Amen."

I submit this interpretation as more reasonable than that
which, in accordance with a supposed system of chronology,
which has no other foundation than the imagination of its ad-
vocates, refers the events of the Sixth Seal to the fourth cen-
tury, — which discovers, under symbols expressive of terror
and despair, the triumph of Christianity over Paganism,—
which gathers a Christian Church out of the twelve tribes, 300
years after the twelve tribes had been scattered to the winds,—
which locates these twelve tribes in the bosom of the Roman
empire,—which discovers the Puseyisrn and Tractarianism of
the fourth century in the circumstance of the servants of God
being sealed in their foreheads,—-to say nothing of the monstrous
leap of seventy years during which the real Church is being
gathered out of the nominal Church. To me it is a marvel
that such statements should be tolerated, and that such books
should be so extensively circulated, and it confirms me in the
supposition, that either very few ever think of the subject at
all, or else follow blindly in the beaten track which others have
laid down.

shall be grinding together; the one shall he taken, and the other left.
Two men shall be in the field ; the one shall he taken, and the other left.
And they answered and said unto him, Where Lord ? And he said unto
them, Wheresoever the body (the Jewish nation) is, thither will the (Roman)
eagles be gathered together."

LECT. VI] GOD'S SEALED ONES. 127
And before I close this Lecture, I desire to express my firm
conviction that the Church has not acted well or wisely in prac-
tically excluding the Apocalypse from her services. It is by no
means improbable that it is mainly owing to the want of en-
lightened critical study with regard to this book, added to the
hesitation with which it has been received, that much of the
folly of modern interpreters is to be traced. Now, if the Apo-
calypse is worthy to occupy a place in the Sacred Canon, it is
worthy of being as frequently read as other parts of Holy
Scripture ; and if permitted to be read in our churches at all, it
ought to be studied by those who minister about holy things.
If it is not worthy of such a position, let it be excluded alto-
gether from the rank of canonical books, but let not the Church
be placed in the anomalous position of recognising a book as ca-
nonical, which she does not read, and of upholding the inspira-
tion of an Apocalypse which she practically rejects.
Now, surely, it does not follow because much that has been
said and done on this book is mere guesswork, much nega-
tively ridiculous, if not positively mischievous, much to the
disgust of reason and common sense, and, not least of all, much
in defiance of the legitimate rules of Scriptural interpretation,
that no meaning is ever to be found, no clue ever to be dis-
covered. If it was necessary for the Apocalypse to be written,
we may suppose it was necessary for the Apocalypse to be read,
and if a special blessing, nowhere else promised to readers of
Scripture, was promised to the hearers and readers of the Apoca-
lypse, we may suppose there was some urgent reason for their
compliance with the terms of the blessing. My impression is,
that the Apocalypse was perfectly intelligible to those to whom
it was first addressed, that the symbols with which it abounds
were of frequent use amongst the Christians of those days, that
the definitions and explanations of these symbols which pervade
the book, must have removed all doubts from the minds of those
who heard and read them, and that its figures and tropes were
not a whit more difficult of comprehension than the allegories
of our Lord in the Gospels. If we have lost the key, just as we
have lost the knowledge of some sciences with which antiquity
was familiar, it is because we do not put ourselves in the situa-
tion of those for whom its warnings were written.

128 GOD'S SEALED ONES. [LECT. VI.
It is plain, then, our only chance of understanding this book
will be in some measure to realise the position of those to whom
the Revelation was sent; to place ourselves in imagination in
that land which was immediately to be the theatre of these
predictions; to enter into the deep feelings of those to whom
the worship of the Beast was an awful reality, and the coming
of the Son of Man a present mystery; to stand in the broad
street of that Holy City which was to be trodden down of the
Gentiles, and to see from its lofty walls the myriads of locust
armies gathered together for its destruction; to listen to the
groans of the famine-stricken people ; to see their desolation,
only equalled by their impenitence ; to let one idea stand
prominently forward in our minds, that the Jewish Christian of
those days expected the immediate corning of his Lord to destroy
his city and nation, and to gather his elect from the four corners
of the eartli.
To do this effectually? we must perhaps unlearn what we
have been accustomed to consider established and certain truth,
we must perhaps unteach ourselves what has hitherto rested
on a foundation supposed to be unassailable. We mus^ sift
and try to the bottom principles of which no doubt has
up to this time been entertained, and we must weigh them
carefully in the balance of the Sanctuary. But if, by the grace
of an all-wise and directing Spirit, we are enabled to arrive at
more sure conclusions than those previously formed, our labour
will not be lost. The majesty of Scripture, as a grand and un-
broken whole, will be asserted. The Apocalypse will be found
to utter the same note as the Gospels, and the Gospels will be
found confirmed by the Apocalypse. The Epistles will take up
the same divine sound, connecting the predictions of our Lord
with the nearer announcement of their speedy and immediate
accomplishment. Not one link will be wanting. " By the
greatness of his power not one faileth."
Added to this we shall gain an insight, such as we may rea-
sonably hope is not at variance with truth, into a sublime and
long sealed up portion of Holy Writ—an insight which the first
commentators on the Apocalypse had, and which modern theo-
rists have lost sight of. We shall go back, with Andreas and
Arethas, to the scenes connected with the destruction of the

LECT. VL] GOD'S SEALED O&ES, 129
Jewish polity, instead of going forward with new-fangled spe-
culators to the so-called end of the world. Following the steps
of the earliest commentators, whose expositions were based
upon others which had preceded theirs, we shall discover
that the view taken of these symbols by the early Church, was
in all probability the right one; and that the fables with
which the religious world is now ringing are the creations of
yesterday. In a word, we shall hope to uncover the wrapping
which the ignorance of bygone days has rolled around the
Apocalypse ; proceeding all the while upon the incontrovertible
principle, that the Apocalypse is declared by its author to be a
prophecy of which the fulfilment should take place immediately,
and that if a blessing was promised to the public reader of it1, and
to those who heard him, it must have been intelligible to those
who complied with the terms upon which that blessing was to
be expected. Surely it does not follow because the biblical
student has been led with parched throat and swollen tongue
to one mirage after another of hot and glaring sand, each as
illusory and as unstable as the preceding, that 110 oasis of green
sward and of limpid streams shall ever give rest to his burning
brow and his fainting form. Surely it does not follow that
truth is never to be found because it has been for a long time
overlaid ; or that an interpretation, satisfactory to reasonable
minds, shall never be made out, because error has mystified the
subject for 1,000 years. Surely it does not follow that a book,
once understood, shall never be understood again, or that the
light and knowledge of the nineteenth century shall not be able
to unravel mysteries which to the first century were easy of
comprehension. Nay, may it not be possible, that the time
for the unveiling of this secret volume may be at hand ; that
with a more enlightened and critical study of the Scriptures,
the darkness of former ages may disappear ? Nay, may
not the time have come, in the providence of God, when a
deeper insight into the first principles of the doctrine of
Christ may lead to still more glorious results than those
already accomplished, and a clearer demonstration of eternal
truth produce a more real acceptance of vital religion at the
hands of the spiritual Israel of God ?
Only let us not fear for the truth itself. That will come out
1 o aroytrwfTK'wr. — Rev. i. 3.
K

130 GOD'S SEALED ONES. [LECT. VI.
unscathed and untouched; as it cannot be injured by falsehood,
so it cannot be propped up by sophistry; it dreads no assailant,
as it needs no apology. Like this glorious book, " not one
word of which could be added to or taken from," it derides
every attempt at amplification or detraction. We do not coin-
mend ourselves a whit nearer to God by magnifying predictions
which are defined as relating to particular events (a feeling
natural to man, and the latent cause of all hero-worship);
neither do we estrange ourselves from his favour by represent-
ing things as they are, and not as our taste would lead them
to be.

131

LECTURE VII,

THE FIRST FOUR TRUMPETS AND VIALS.

REV. viii.

1. And when he had opened the
seventh seal, there was silence in hea-
ven about the space of half an hour.

REV. xv. xvi.

5. And after that I looked, and,
behold, the temple of the tabernacle
of the testimony in heaven was

2. And I saw the seven angels | opened :
which stood before (rod; and to | 6'. And the seven angels came

them were given seven trumpets.

3. And another angel came and
stood at the altar, having a golden
censer; and there was given unto
him much incense, that he should
offer it with the prayers of all
saints upon the golden altar which
was before the throne.

4. And the smoke of the incense,
which came with the prayers of the
saints, ascended up before God out
of the angel's hand.

5. And the angel took the cen-
ser, and filled it with fire of the altar,
and cast it into the earth : and there
were voices, and thumlcrings, and
lightnings, and an earthquake.

()'. And the seven angels which
had the seven trumpets prepared
themselves to sound.

FIRST TRUMPET.

7. The first angel sounded, and
there followed hail and fire mingled
with blood, and they were cast upon
the earth : and the third part of trees
was burnt up, and all green grass was
burnt up.

out of the temple, having the seven
plagues, clothed in pure and white
linen, and having their breasts girded
with golden girdles.

7- A nd one of the four beasts gave
unto the seven angels seven golden
vials full of the wrath of God, who
liveth for ever and ever.

8. And the temple was filled with
smoke from the glory of God, and
from his power; and no man was
able to enter into the temple, till the
seven plagues of the seven angels were
fulfilled.

1. And I heard a great voice out
of the temple saying to the seven
angels, Go your ways, and pour out
the vials of the wrath of God upon
the earth.

FIRST VIAL.

2. And the first went, and poured
out his vial upon the earth ; and there
fell a noisome and grievous sore upon
the men which had the mark of the
beast, and upon them which worship
ped his image.

132 THE FIRST FOUR [Lxcr. VII.

SECOND TRUMPET. I SECOND VIAL.

8. And the second angel sounded, / 3. And the second angel poured
and as it were a great mountain burn- I out his vial upon the sea ; and it he"
ing with fire was cast into the sea : / came as the Wood of a dead man :

and the third part of the sea became
blood ;

9. And the third part of the crea-
tures which were in the sea, and had
life, died ; and the third part of the
ships were destroyed.

THIRD TRUMPET. \ THIRD VIAL.

and every living soul died in the sea.

10. And the third angel sounded,
and there fell a great star from hea-
ven, burning as it were a lamp, and
it fell upon the third part of the
rivers, and upon the fountains of

4. And the third angel poured out
his vial upon the rivers and foun-
tains of waters; and they became
blood.

5. And I heard the angel of the

waters; ! waters say, Thou art righteous, O

11. And the name of the star is ! Lord, which art, and wast, and shalt

called Wormwood ; and the third be, because thou bast judged thus,

part of the waters became worm- j (j. For they have shed the blood of

wood : and many men died of the

saints and prophets, and thou hast

waters, because they were made bitter. given them blood to drink ; for they

| are worthy.

7- And I heard another out of the
altar say, Even so, Lord God Al-
mighty, true and righteous are thy

judgments.

FOURTH TRUMPET.
12. And the fourth angel sounded,

FOURTH VIAL.

8. And the fourth angel poured

and the third part of the sun was 1 out his vial upon the sun ; and power

smitten, and the third part of the j was given unto him to scorch men

moon, and the third part of the stars; j with fire.

so as the third part of them was dark- j (). Arid men were scorched with

ened, and the day shone not for a j great heat, and blasphemed the name

third part of it, and the night like- j of God, which hath power over these

wise. j plagues; and they repented not to

give him glory.

We have already explained six of the Seven Seals.
The 1st, indicative of invasion and conquest.
The 2d, of faction and civil war.
The 3d, of dearth and famine.

LECT. VII.] TRUMPETS AND VIALS. 133
The 4th, of wholesale death and pestilence.
The 5th, revealing the impatient cry of the martyrs for
vengeance against their murderers.
The 6th, the miraculous phenomena preceding the coming
vengeance, the terror occasioned by these prodigies, and the
deliverance of the Christian Church from the impending
desolation.
One more seal only remains to be broken ; for the book
written " within and without" is sealed \vith Seven Seals.
This seal must evidently introduce the consummation. This
consummation is not revealed all at once, but is protracted
over a period during which seven trumpets are sounded, and
seven vials are poured out. I am inclined to believe the seven
vials are only a repetition of the wroes denounced by the seven
trumpets — that, as is very common in prophecy, especially
where that prophecy is given under symbol and allegory, the
symbols are doubled — that the subject of the Seventh Seal,
comprising the sounding of seven trumpets, the fall of Babylon,
and the coming of Christ, extending to verse I, of chapter xv.,
is again resumed with verse 5. of chapter xv., comprising the
pouring out of seven vials, which are more or less identical
with the seven trumpets, the fall of Babylon, and the coming
of Christ. I shall be able to show an extraordinary coincidence
between the trumpets and vials — a coincidence so near and
close, and so minute in many particulars, that I think it will be
impossible to resist the conclusion that they both prefigure the
same events. The plan which I shall adopt will be to take the
trumpets and the vials together, and, by so doing, we shall
obtain great assistance in their elucidation ; for it will often be
found that where sometimes the trumpet is less full and explicit,
the vial is more diffuse; or where the vial is less instructive
and complete, the trumpet supplies the deficiency.
One thing is certain: 1 shall look for no far-fetched,
no mystical interpretation. If the symbol be not of simple
and easy exposition, I shall take it for granted that owing
to the lapse of years, and the scanty historical records
of the period, I am destitute of that necessary information
which would give the clue at once, I must believe, if the
book be of a character such as the author has defined in the
preface, viz., "The rewlatioH of Jesus Christ, which Mod

134 THE FIRST FOUR [LECT. VII.
gave unto him to shew unto his servants things which must
shortly come to pass" that it was perfectly intelligible to those to
whom it was addressed; I cannot think for a moment if it was
" The revelation," The unfolding, The unwrapping, " ATTO/CO,-
Xvi/as," that it was necessary to send a key to open the Apoca-
lypse. I cannot think that Christ would have broken the seals of
the sealed book, only to leave those to whom its mysteries were
revealed wrapped in ten-fold ignorance.
And above all I shall look for no chronological history of
the world and of the Church down to the end of time. Of all
fetal prejudices to the interpretation of the book, this is the
worst, — a prejudice which the declared object of the book
ought to have overcome hundreds of years ago, — a prejudice
which has not the shadow of an argument to support it, but
which, like many old opinions, will perhaps require a more
powerful voice than mine to annihilate. What precedent is
there in the book of God for a single prophecy to contain a
civil and ecclesiastical history of the world for 2000 years ?
If the book of revelation be such a prophecy, it stands out in
conspicuous anomaly. Prophecy was ever given under the
old dispensation through a succession of prophets, and holy
men of old, raised up one after another, uttering their predic-
tions with increasing clearness as the time drew nigh, " spake
as they were moved by the Holy Ghost." Moreover, prophecy
generally, especially prophecies relating to the destruction of
particular cities, such as Babylon, Nineveh, Tyre, was uttered
near the period of its fulfilment. There is nothing in the
history of prophecy which answers at all to the monstrous idea
that 2000 years before it could take place the Apocalypse
should contain a prediction of the burning of Papal Koine by
literal fire. Such a chasm between the enunciation of prophecy
and its fulfilment would destroy the nature and object of pro-
phecy altogether, for it would cease to have any effect upon those
it was intended to influence. Were some one commissioned to
foretel that London would be destroyed by volcanic eruption in
2000 years' time, what effect would such a prediction have upon
the merchant princes of our day ? If they did not call in
question the inspiration or the reasonableness of the prophecy,
they would regard it as one with which they in their generation
were little concerned.

LECT. VIL] TRUMPETS AND VIALS. 135
Added to this, prophecy generally, if we except those
prophecies relating to the Redeemer which concern all mankind,
had a distinct and specific reference to the generations of men
then existing. The Jews are forewarned of their seventy
years' captivity in Babylon. Their future deliverer Cyrus is
pointed out to them by name. Their return to their own
land, the restoration of their temple, and its second and
complete overthrow, are legitimate subjects of prophecy, of
deep interest to those who heard them. But the system which
is supposed to be the subject of the woes of the Apocalypse
had no existence when its destruction is so graphically pre-
dicted— the generation of men to whom the Apocalypse was
addressed could not have had the remotest idea that papal
tyranny was the theme of apocalyptical denunciation. Nay, it
is only of comparatively recent date that the amazing discovery
has been brought to light that the Apocalypse contains an
ecclesiastical history of the world and the Church from the age
of St. John down to the end of time, of which the ages that
are past never discovered that one syllable applied to them.
Nay it is the stupendous Eureka of the l[)th century that the
Apocalypse is the unique prophecy in the Book of God in which
not one soul to whom these communications were made could
possibly have been interested, not one word of which could have
been intelligible to those to whom they were addressed, and
which are only to be understood when viewed in the light of
recent investigation. The inspired seer might have said,
" Blessed is he that readeth and they that hear the words of
this prophecy .... for the time is at hand" But if,
according to Mr. Elliott's and Dr. Cumming's theory, its mean-
ing is only now found out, no reader of the Apocalypse in those
days gained for himself the blessing promised. The Giver of
these sublime visions might have denounced the most awful
sentence upon those who should add to or take away from the
words of this prophecy, " I testify unto every man that heareth
the words of the prophecy of this book, If any man shall add
unto these things, God shall add unto him the plagues that are
written in this book ; and if any man shall take away from the
words of the book of this prophecy, God shall take away his
part out of the book of life, and out of the holy city, and from
the things which are written in this book ;" but if " The End
 

136-275 AVAILABLE BY REQUEST

 
 
 
 
276 THE RESURRECTION OF [LECT. XI.
atowo? rovroO, — where the use of the demonstrative pronoun
makes it certain that the close of that age must be intended,
" The Son of Man shall send forth his angels. . . . Then
shall the righteous shine forth as the sun in the kingdom of
their Father."1 He continually speaks of an immediate blessed-
ness which he would bestow upon his disciples : " Ye are they
which have continued with me in my temptations, and I appoint
unto you a kingdom, as my Father hath appointed unto me,"
—this kingdom being evidently the peculiar blessedness of those
who continued ivith him in his temptations. So again,—
" Father, I will that they also whom thou hast given me be with
me where I am ; " and that this relates primarily to them is
made certain from the preceding clause — " None of them is
lost, but the son of perdition,"2—Judas. So with all those
texts in John vi. in which he said he would raise up those that
' believed in him at " the last day" — the last day being the period
of his coming, and the close of the age.
He positively laid down the time of the resurrection to be
icithin the lifetime of the generation amongst ivhom he lived.
" The Queen of the South shall rise up in the judgment
with the men of this generation, and condemn them ....
The men of Nineveh shall rise up in the judgment with this
generation, and shall condemn it ;" 3 and that the generation
spoken of was the generation of men then living upon earth, is
most clear from the context—" Even so shall it be also unto
this wieked generation" 4
Everywhere in the New Testament the Coming, the Re-
surrection, and the Judgment, are synchronical.
" When the Son of Man shall come in his glory . . . then
shall he sit—in judgment—upon the throne of his glory, and
before him shall be gathered all nations ;"5 and in the descrip-
tion given of that judgment it is remarkable that the plea put iu
before that bar, both of the righteous and the wicked, referring
palpably to the peculiar difficulties of the Apostolic age, tells
unmistakably of the time when that judgment began to be
executed.
" The Son of Man shall come in the glory of his father with
1 Matt. xiii. 43. 2 John, xvii. 12.
3 Luke, xi. 32. ; Matt. xii. 39- 45. ^ 4 Matt. xii. 45.
^ Matt. xxv. 31, 32.

LECT. XT.] THE TWO WITNESSES. 277
his angels, and then he shall reward every man according to
his works,"1 and it is added that this should take place during
the lifetime of that generation ; " Verily I say unto you, there
be some standing here which shall not taste of death, till they
see the Son of Man corning in his kingdom." Indeed the
uniform and continual voice of Scripture is that the Son of Man
is coming to "judge the quick and dead at his appearing, and
his kingdom ;" and the time of this appearing is everywhere
defined to be within the lifetime of that generation.
And does it not appear highly probable,—since "God
who has appointed to all men death did not clearly set forth
the judgment after death, until He had revealed, to try men,
that redeeming love without which judgment would be un-
bearable by any child of man;" that as soon as this demon-
stration of his mercy had been made known, there would remain
no hindrance to the immediate execution of that judgment.
Does it not carry with it the likelihood of serious and solemn
truth, that since "it is appointed unto men once to die, but
after this the judgment," the investiture of a supreme exe-
cutive for the human race would lead to an immediate perform-
ance of his office, If otherwise, why did St. Paul say—" The
times of this ignorance God winked at; but now comrnandeth
all men everywhere to repent: because he hath appointed a day,
in the which he will judge (^te'XXet Kplv€.iv>he is soon about to
judge} the world in righteousness by that man whom he hath
ordained ; whereof he hath given assurance unto all men, in that
lie bath raised him from the dead."2 Nay, does it not appear
a most unaccountable circumstance, that the doctrine of the re-
surrection should have dawned upon the world at that period
— that " life and immortality should have been brought to
light in the Gospel " — that the doubtings of the Sadducees,
"which said there was no resurrection, neither angel nor
spirit," should have been dispelled by the resurrection of
the Lord Jesus — that the disciples wherever they went
should have preached " Jesus and the Resurrection " — that
one of the main points of their teaching should have been that
they which had fallen asleep in Christ had not perished, —
and that this resurrection should have been again delayed to an
1 Matt. xvi. ^7. * Acts, xvii. 30, 31.

278 THE RESURRECTION OF [LECT, XI.
indefinite period. Upon such grounds there appears no parti-
cular reason why Christ should have come into the world when
he did. The resurrection of the Lord, followed by no resur-
rection of his people, seems to allow the force of the old objec-
tion, "Now if Christ be preached that he rose from the dead,
how say some among you that there is no resurrection of the
dead? But if there be no resurrection of the dead, then is
Christ not risen .... and if Christ be not raised, your faith
is vain, ye are yet in your sins."1
St. Paul is very explicit upon the question of a resurrection
at this time. He gives us the order of the resurrection with
regard to time. " Now is Christ risen from the dead and
become the first fruits of them that slept ; but
every man in his own order, Christ the first fruits, afterward
(eTreira, used only of a short interval of time) they that are
Christ's at his coming THEN THE E\D.2
He connected it with the time of the destruction of the
Jewish people. " Seeing it is a righteous thing with God to
recompense tribulation to them that trouble you, and to you
who are troubled rest irith us when the Lord Jesus shall be
revealed from heaven with his mighty angels." 3 He elsewhere
associates it with the coining of the Lord Jesus. u When
Christ who is our life (compare " the last Adam a quickening
spirit") shall appear, then sh.aU ye a/so appear with him in
ylory"* "Looking for that blessed ln>pe[\ and the glorious
appearing of the great God and our Saviour Jesus Christ."0
" We beseech you brethren, by the coming of our Lord Jesus
Christ, and by our f/atherint/ together unto him"~
The same Apostle elsewhere describes it as immediately
about to take place. " After the way which they call heresy,
so worship I the God of my fathers, .... and have
hope toward God .... that there shall be a resurrec-
1 1 Cor. xv. 12-17. 2 1 Cor. xv. 20-21-.
3 2 Thess. i. tf, 1. * Col. iii. 4.
5 EATTir, generally used in the New Testament of the resurrection, Upoff-
ceXOjjtvoL rtiv fuiKaptav i\7rica " (Titus, ii. 13.). 'KXTrc'cd £u"7l' aiWiou "
(Tit. iii. 7.)- "'J'j? tXTrtti yjupuvTu^ (Rom. xii. 12.). " Uf.pl t'\7r/£oc Kal
ai/f*<rr«(T£W£ viKpfov tyw Kpivoftai" (Acts, xxiii. ().). "Of p} l\DVTt<;
t\7rua"—1 Thess. iv. 13.
6 Titus, ii. 13. i 2 Thess. ii. 1.

LECT. XI.] THE TWO WITNESSES. 279

tion,—avd(TTao"w /u,e'XXeiz> ccrecrdcu,, that there shall be soon a
resurrection—of the dead, both of the just and unjust."1 He
"reckons the sufferings of this present time as unworthy to be
compared with the glory which shall be revealed,"—TT)J> /xc'X-
\ovcrav Sd£cu>, the (/lory which shall soon be revealed.2

He thought it so close and near, that he supposed some of
those whom he addressed would be alive to witness it. " For
this we say unto you by the word of the Lord, that we which
are alive and remain unto the coming of the Lord shall not
prevent them which are asleep ; for the Lord himself shall
descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the Arch-
angel and with the trump of God, and the dead in Christ
shall rise first; then we which are alive and remain shall be
caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord
in the air."3

" We shall not all sleep (we shall not all have died, some
of us will be still alive upon earth), but we shall all be changed
in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye at the last trump
(the seventh angel of the Apocalypse)—for the trumpet shall
sound, and the dead shall be raised incorruptible, and we shall
be changed."4

He seems to have been uncertain whether he himself should
be quick upon earth or not at the second coming of the Lord.
Hence lie says, " Who died for us, that whether we wake
or sleep,— whether quick or dead,—we might live together
with him." (1 Thess. v. 10.)

"We labour that whether present or absent, (whether absent
from the body and present with the Lord,)—we maybe ac-
cepted of him."5

So near did the Christians of those days believe the resur-
rection to be, that some taught, before the period of the second
advent**, that "The resurrection was past already1, and over-
threw the faith of some."

1 Acts, xxiv. !,">. 2 Rom. viii. 18.
:i 1 Thess. iv. 15, H>, 17. 4 1 Cor. xv. 51, 52.
ft 2 Cor. v. (). ° 2 Tim. ii. 18.
7 Hymemrus and Philetus gare out in St. Paul's clay, that the resur-
rection was "past already"—»'/£>/ ytyoyti'cu, had already taken place,—thereby
overthrowing the faith of some who had been taught to believe that it would
be contemporaneous with Christ's coming. Their error, however, in antici-
T 4

280 THE RESURRECTION OF [LBCT. XI.

So approximate and so impending did they regard " their
gathering together at the coming of their Lord, that St. Paul
besought them by " The coming of the Lord Jesus Christ, and
by their (fathering together unto him, that they should not be
shaken in mind or be troubled, neither by spirit, nor by word,
nor by letter, as from us that the day of Christ was at hand"
—o>S on €v4crrr)K€,vl r/ ^/xe'pa TOV XpL&Tov, that the day of Christ
was actually upon them and in the, midst of them. For that
day, he said, should not come without its forerunning signs.
And then he gave them the signs, similar to those already
given by the Lord, whereby they might know the time when
that day should arrive.

The first sign mentioned by the Apostle is that, " there
should be a fa flint/ away jirst"—rj aTTOKaracria—THE falling
away—the well-known apostacy respecting" which the Lord had
forewarned his Church.

The next, that before that day came, Antichrist should he
revealed, " and that man of sin be revealed, the son of perdi-
tion." But whoever that Antichrist mi^ht be, it was an Anti-
christ then opptmny the Church. When $f. Paul wrote, that
enemy opposed and exalted himself " above all that is called
God or that is worshipped." II7hcn St. Paul wrote, lie was
sitting in the temple of God, showing himself that he is God.
The apostle appeals to their knowledge of the facts of the case :
" Ye know what withholdeth that he might be revealed in his
time ; for the mystery of iniquity doth already work, only he
'W/io now letteth will let until he be taken out of the way."
And when that " Man of Sin/' that " Son of Perdition," that
"Wicked" should be revealed, of whose non-revealing they
knew the reason, the Lord should come, and should " consume

paling the time of the resurrection, shows that they not only believed that the
resurrection would immediately take place, but that it would ln> a spiritual
resurrection ; for it is inconceivable that they could have affirmed that a cor-
poreal resurrection, which must have been self-evident, had already taken
place.
If they erred, because they anticipated the time of the resurrection, let us
take care that we do not fall into the opposite error of postponing an event,
the time of which is HO accurately defined by our Lord and his apostles.
1 That this is the force of ivtffTrjKiv may be seen by comparing Rom. viii.
:*8. with 2 Thess. ii. 2.

LBCT. XL] THE TWO WITNESSES. 281
him with the spirit of His mouth, and destroy him with the
brightness of his coming." *
This was the resurrection called by St. Peter " The
grace to be brought to us at the revelation (aTro/caXvi/us) of
Jesus Christ." — " The lively hope" promised to those
who were " kept by the power of God through faith unto
salvation, ready to be revealed at the last time."2 This was
the resurrection of which St. John said, " Beloved, now
are we the sons of God, and it doth not yet appear what we
shall be, but we know that when he shall appear, we shall
be like him, for we shall see him as he is."3 It is no wonder,
then, that St. Paul should beseech his Thessalonian converts,
" by the coming of our Lord Je^us Christ, and by their
(/atheriny tor/ether (iTncrvvay^y^) unto him.''1 It is no
wonder that our Lord connected this resurrection with his
coming to destroy Jerusalem, — " And, in the time of
harvest, I will say to the reapers, gather ye together first
the tares, and bind them in bundles to burn them, but gather
the wheat into my barn"
Tims prepared, we are not surprised to find the doctrine
of a resurrection at this time distinctly laid down in the
Apocalypse; on the contrary, there would seem to be a
peculiar reason for greater explicitness as the time drew
nigh. The dawning of the resurrection morning was at
hand, the time for the mystery of God to be finished, the
hour for which saints and prophets waited was drawing
near. " The day was approaching." " The times of re-
freshing " (az/ai/yufecjs) * — of a new and glorified ex-
istence,— were about to come "from the presence of the
Lord," when he should "send Jesus Christ, which before
was preached unto them, whom the heaven must receive
until the times of restitution of all thinys."* The whole
1 2 Thess. ii. * 1 Peter, i. 5. 3 1 John, iii. 2.
4 ' t£t\//i'/£e," "he gave up the ghost."—Acts, v. 5. " ava^uniCj" " refo-
cillat o." — Schleusner.
r> f The times of restitution of all things" (Acts, iii. 21.\ ^ovdtv u-rrc^a-
raoTcirrcwc wurrwr, are identical with " the time of reformation/' icmpov c)to/>-
Owerchjc of lieh. ix. 10. The Jewish law and customs were to last until " the
time of reformation," and the " heavens were to receive Christ until the times
of the restitution of all things." The inference is, that he would come at the
period of the abrogation of the Mosaic law.

282 THE BBSTJRRECTION OF [LBCT. XI.
previous history of the Church all pointed to this close.
Daniel, Isaiah, Job, — all they who " died in faith not
having received the promises, but having seen them afar
off,"— were expecting their reward. The hour was at hand,
defined in the Apocalypse as the "time of the dead, that
they should be judged, and that thou shouldest (five reward
unto thy servants the prophets, and to the saints, and them
that fear thy name, small and (/reat9 and shouldest destroy
them which destroy the earth.'* All is pointing to a great
and speedy consummation — the finishing of the dispen-
sation — the absorbing change of a better and a more
glorious age. The grand feature in this new dispensation
is the resurrection of tl\e sainted dead ; with the resurrec-
tion of Christ the first fruits, a glorious harvest follows;
the eye of faith may trace them in these Apocalyptic visions,
and behold them gathered unto the barns of eternal joy
and rest.
Let us then turn over the pages of this key to the great
mysteries of God, every word of which is written with
almost mathematical precision, and see what confirmation of
these views may be obtained from thence.
The witnesses are slain. For l^(iO days they had pro-
phesied clothed in sackcloth. What tongue may tell the
sufferings of that period ? What voice may utter the ex-
quisite character of that affliction, when the ties of nature
were lost in the fierce bigotry of persecution — when an
apostasy fose up of so dark and horrid a nature, that
" brother put the brother to death, and the father the
son, and children rose up against their parents, and caused
them to be put to death?" No resting-place can be found
for their harmless dust — the bitterness of persecution fol-
lows them beyond the grave — but the day of triumph is
near, the day of victory is at hand ; they were faithful unto
death, and the crown of life is seen glittering through the
sky. " After three days and a half the Spirit nf life from
God1 entered into them, and they stood upon their feet, and
1 Compare, "If the Spirit of Him that raised up Jesus from the dead
dwell in you, He that raised up Christ from the dead shall also quicken your
mortal bodies by his Spirit that dwelleth in you " (Rom. viii 11.). " Ye were
Healed with that Holy Spirit of promise which ig the earnest of your inherit-

LBCT. XL] THE TWO WITNESSES. 283
great fear fell upon them which saw them, and they heard a
great voice from heaven, saying unto them, Corne up hither,
and they ascended up to heaven in a cloud, and their enemies
beheld them/'
Everywhere in this wonderful book the same scene is pre-
sented. " And I looked, and behold a Lamb stood on
Mount Sion, and with him an hundred forty and four
thousand, having his Father's name written in their fore-
heads ;" they are said to be the " redeemed from the earth,"
" the redeemed from among men," " the first fruits unto God
and the Lamb." " Who are those," asks St. John, " which
are arrayed in white robes, and whence come they?" and
the answer is given, " These are they which came out of
great tribulation, and they have washed their robes, and
made them white in the blood of the Lamb, therefore are
they before the throne of God." " I saw thrones, and they
sat upon theni, aud judgment was given unto them, and I
saw the souls of them that were beheaded for the witness of
Jesus and for the word of God, and which had not worshipped
the beast, neither his image, neither had received his mark
upon their foreheads or upon their hands ; and they lived
and reigned with Christ a thousand years, but the rest of
the dead lived not again until the thousand years were finished.
This is the "first resurrection. Blessed and holy is he that
hath part in the first resurrection : on such the second death
hath no power, but they shall be priests of God and of Christ,
and shall reign with him a thousand years."1
Such are the arguments on which we build the doctrine
of a resurrection at that time. It would seem to be no valid
argument against a spiritual mystery that the gathering of
ance until the redemption of the purchased possession " (Ephes. i. 13.). We
" which have the first fruits of the Spirit, even we ourselves groan within
oiirselves, waiting for the adoption, to wit, the redemption of our hody "
(Rom. viii. 23.). " The Spirit itself beareth witness with our spirit, that we
are the children of God, and if children, then heirs, heirs of God, and joint
heirs with Christ" (Rom. viii. 16.). Is this any evidence to show that they
who were partakers of the miraculous gifts of the Spirit shared in the first
resurrection ? " Accipiet enim mercedem onine corpus purum ac sine macula
repertum, in quo habitandi gratia constitutus fuerit Spiritus Sanctus."—
llcrmn* Pastor, Similitudo 5.
1 Rev. xx. (>. +

284 THE RESURRECTION OF [LECT. XL
immortal souls into the presence of the God of the spirits of
all flesh should be a fact which need not have been visibly
manifest to flesh and blood ; neither does it appear necessary
for us to be able to define, with minute exactness, the nature
of those new and glorious bodies which are suited to their
high and heavenly condition. As they cannot be flesh and
blood—for corruption cannot inherit incorruption—so we may
safely and scripturally believe, that the ever changing' matter of
our present material bodies is not the stuff which forms the
imperishable abode of life and immortality. It would seem to
be proved that such of the ancient fathers who lived before
the coming of Christ expected an immediate resurrection ; and
that such as succeeded to those times spoke of the blest as
already gone to the place due to them from the Lord. It
would seem also to be made out, with tolerable distinctness, that
the prophets who spake of Israel's hope associated the doctrine
of a resurrection with the close of the Jewish dispensation, and
that our Lord unequivocally, and with the greatest minuteness
of time and place, said there should he at that period a
gathering of his elect from the four winds. This is further
confirmed by the writings of the Apostles, and reduced to
certainty by the confirmation of the Apocalypse.
It remains with those who are desirous of doing so to dis-
prove these assertions,— to show they are erroneous, and not
in strict accordance with the tenor of (rod's holy word. They
are not adopted hastily or lightly; they do not stand on isolated
and solitary texts, neither do they do violence? to any essential
truth. If they present new and hitherto-unheard-of interpreta-
tions of Holy Scripture, their mere novelty entitles them to some
consideration. They are based upon the foundation that our
Lord came, <is he said, to close the Jewish dispensation; and if
he did so come (which I have never yet heard refuted, and
which I confidently assert cannot be refitted^ then he also
gathered his elect at the same time.
May they establish us more and more in the faith of the Son
of God! May the consideration of his Almighty power in
" quickening whom he will," teach us to honour the Son, even
as we honour the Father ! May his gathering of his own into
his barns of joy and peace induce us to strive and pray that we
too may enter into the joy of our LoTd! May the assurance of

LECT. XL] THE TWO WITNESSES. 285
their present exalted condition affect us more deeply than the
expectation of their future felicity ! May the actual glory shared
by the saints now stimulate us more powerfully than the pros-
pect of a glory yet to be revealed ! May we lift up the eye of
faith with the martyr of old, till we see Jesus, not standing
alone at the right hand of God, but the " Lamb standing on
Mount Sion, and with him a hundred and forty and four thou-
sand;" and then may we go on from faith to deeds of mercy,
holiness, and charity, and so " follow their good examples, that
with them we may be partakers of his heavenly kingdom !"

286

LECTURE XII,

THE SEVENTH TRUMPET AND THE SEVENTH VIAL.

SEVENTH TRUMPET.

REV. ix. 15—19.

15. And the seventh angel sounded;
and there were great voices in heaven,
saying, The kingdoms of this world
are become the kinydfima of our Lord,
and of his Christ; and he shall reign
for ever and ever.

Hi. And the four and twenty elders
which sat before God on their seats,
fell upon their faces, and worshipped

SEVENTH VIAL.

RKV. xvi. 17—^1.

17' And the seventh angel poured
out his vial into the air ; and there
came a great voice out of the temple
of heaven, from the throne, saying,
It is done.

18. And there were voices, and
thunders, and lightnings ; and there
was a great earthquake, such as was
not since men were upon the earth

God. I so mighty an earthquake, and so

17. Saying, We give thee thanks,
O Lord God Almighty, which art,
and wast, and art to come ; because
thou hast taken to thee thy great
power, and hast reigned.

18. And the nations were angry,
and thy wrath is come, and the time
of the dead, that they should he
judged, and that thou shouldest give
reward unto thy servants the prophets,
and to the saints, and them that fear
thy name, small and great ; and
shouldt-st destroy them which destroy
the earth.

great.

lp. And the great city was divided
into three parts, and the cities of the
nations fell : and great Babylon came
in remembrance before God, to give
unto her the cup of the wine of the
fierceness of his wrath.

20. And every island fled away,
and the mountains were not found.

1M. And there fell upon tnen a
great hail out of heaven, avert/ «s/ow
about the weight of a talent: and
men blasphemed God because of the
plague of the hail ; for the plague

19. And the temple of God was | thereof was exceeding great,
opened in heaven, and there was seen
in his temple the ark of his testament:
and there were lightnings, and voices,
and thundering*, and an earthquake,
and great hail.

LECT. XIL] SEVENTH TRUMPET AND SEVENTH VIAL. 287
The preceding lectures on the suhject of the Open Book and
the resurrection of the Two Witnesses, seem to be a departure
from that synthetical principle upon which we have hitherto con-
ducted the exposition of the trumpets and vials ; and yet, as is
common under this duplicate form of symbol, the idea presented
in the one is only carried out under a greater variety of costume
in the other. Thus, under the trumpet, the prominent notion
put forth in the figure of the Open Book and the Two Witnesses
is that of a resurrection in the midst of those troublous times.
The echo, under the vial, answers, " Blessed is he that watcheth
and keepeth his garments, lest he walk naked and they see his
shame." And that this metaphor is descriptive of the resurrec-
tion is evident, not only from the corresponding charge to the
Church of Sardis, where it is associated with the promise of
being " written in the Book of Life," but from the earnest de-
sire expressed by St. Paul to partake of this resurrection, and
to be clothed with the house which is from heaven, " if so be that
being clothed, he should not be found naked." l It will be seen
that the same idea is exhibited under the trumpet and vial; the
only difference being that the picture faintly sketched in the one
is expanded into full and finished proportions in the other.
And here I pause to dwell for a moment on the amalgama-
tion of mercy and judgment, mixed up as it were in strange and
unearthly confusion, under the trumpet and vial, which we have
last considered. Amidst the mourning of that terrific Arma-
geddon there is an " Open Book" of deliverance. Amidst "the
confused noise and the garments rolled in blood," of the "battle
of that great day of God Almighty," there is a resurrection
blessing to those that " watch and keep their garments."
"Even thus shall it be, (said our Lord,) IN THE DAY WHEN
THE SON OF MAN is REVEALED." "I tell you in that
night there shall be two men in one bed ; the one shall be taken
and the other shall be left. Two women shall be grinding to-
gether ; the one shall be taken and the other left. Two men
shall be in the field ; the one shall be taken and the other left*
And they answered and said unto him, Where Lord ? And he
said unto them wheresoever the body is, thither will the eagles
be gathered together." 2
1 2 Cor. v. 3. 2 Luke, xvii. 30

288 THE SEVENTH TBUMPET [LBCT. XII
Nor is this a solitary instance; not merely in the passage
alluded to, but everywhere throughout the book, desolation is
combined with deliverance, destruction with preservation, de-
spair with rescue, danger and dread with safety and salvation.
Shrieks of agony are mixed up with notes of joy and gladness,
and weepings and wailings of intolerable anguish with chants of
victory and paeans of conquest. The great city is divided into
three parts, but the city of our God abideth ever. Burning
Babylon sinks down in masses of lurid flame, but the New
Jerusalem shines refulgent with the glory of God. The great
whore which corrupted the earth with her fornication is made
the " hold of every foul spirit, and a cage of every unclean
and hateful bird/' — but the Bride, the Lamb's wife, is seen
coming down from God out of heaven. Hark to the song of
jubilee, as it rises high above the wailings of agony! "Blessed
is he that watcheth and keepeth his garments .... and he
(fathered them toe/ether into a place called in the Hebrew tony tie
Armageddon" Hark to the shout of triumph from the lips of
the redeemed, as it pierces through the moanings of anguish
and the death-groan of the enemies of God ! " Alleluia. Sal-
vation, and glory, and honour, and power unto the Lord our
God . . . and again they said, Alleluia, and her smoke rose
tip for ever and ever"
Our present subject is a comparison of the Seventh and last
Trumpet with the Seventh and last Vial. We have now ar-
rived at the consummation, for no other Trumpet is sounded,
and no other Vial is poured forth. This is plainly told us in
the book itself—for "with the sounding of the voice of the
Seventh Angel, the mystery of (rod is to he finished" and with
the pouring out of the Vial by the Seventh Angel, a voice is
heard saying, " It is done" There is, if possible, a more
distinct and marked identity between the Seventh Trumpet and
Vial than the preceding ones, and this identity is preserved and
continued to the end of the book. And before we analyse it,
suffer rne to observe that it is satisfactory to have found this
near and close resemblance IN THEM ALL. Had only one differed
materially from the rest, it would have been sufficient to over-
throw the argument. But as this cannot be urged, the proof
amounts to demonstration, not only that the principle of inter-
pretation is correct, but that both Trumpets and Vials relate to

LBCT. XII] AND THE SEVENTH VIAL. 289
corresponding and contemporaneous events. But I hasten to
show the identity between that part of the Seventh Trumpet
and the Seventh Vial which can be brought under your notice
at this time.
Trumpet—" The Seventh Angel sounded."
Vial.—" The Seventh Anyel poured out his Vial."
T.—" There were great voices in heaven."
V.—"There came a </rcat voice out of the temple of heaven."
T.—" The mystery of (tod should be finished." *
V.—A voice is heard saying " It is done."
y7.—« And the temple of God was opened in heaven."
V.—" And there came a great voice out of the temple of
heaven"
T.—" There were lightnings, and voices, and thunderings."
V.—" There were voices, and thunders, and lif/htiiiriys"
T.—" And an earthquake."
V.—" There was a great earthquake"
T.—" And great hail"
V.—" A great hail out of heaven."
Should there still exist a doubt in the minds of any who may
examine these views as to the correctness of the principle of in-
terpretation which lias been adopted, and should there still be
some lurking feeling that the Trumpets and Vials relate to suc-
cessive chronological events, I trust it will now be completely
removed.
As it could not have been accident which introduced the
extraordinary mention of the river Euphrates into the same
Trumpet and Vial, —as no merely fortuitous coincidence could
have placed the subject of Babylon and the coming of Christ
under the same duplicate symbols, — as it could not have been
chance which directed the woes of the first four Trumpets and
Vials to fall upon the earth, the sea, the rivers and fountains of
waters and the sun, —as no accidental combination of \vords
1 Rev. x. 7.
U

290 THE SEVENTH TRUMPET [Licx. XII.
could by any possibility have preserved tbe continuous identity
which is observable in them all, or have caused ideas, not e'&e*-
where found in the Apocalypse^ to be introduced for the first
time in their respective Trumpets and Vials, — as, to use a
somewhat homely illustration, it is morally impossible that the
pieces of such a Chinese puzzle should have been made to fit each
into its proper place, without design and intention, so we may
safely conclude that no chance position of words, no accidental
similarity of ideas, could have brought about the complete iden-
tity between this part of the Seventh Trumpet and the Seventh
Vial,—we may take it for granted that they both relate to the
same events, and that so close an identity cannot be satisfacto-
rily accounted for in any other way. Indeed, the only points of
difference are, that with the sounding of the Seventh Trumpet
the purport is given of what the great voices in heaven uttered;
and under the Vial we have a fuller description of the earth-
quake and the hail.
I am content to leave this analogy without further comment.
I must now give, although it is becoming a wearisome task
to me, the views of those to whom I have already referred.
According to Air. Elliott and Dr. dimming, the period of
the Seventh Trumpet is that of the French Revolution, A.I).
178'.). The authority for the date is much as usual. I do
not think they advance any argument beyond that Alison calls,
as he might very naturally, the French Revolution an earth-
quake. The " lightnings, thunderings, and great hail/' are
explained of terrific storms which happened about that time.
Dr. Gumming particularly mentions one that took place in
July, 1788. The quotation is as follows:—"On Sunday,
July J3, 1788, at 9 A.M., without any eclipse, a dreadful dark-
ness overspread several parts of France. It was the prelude
to such a tempest as is unexampled in the temperate climates
of Europe. The soil was converted into a morass, the standing
corn was beaten into quagmires, vines broken to pieces, fruit
trees demolished, and new unmelted hail lying in heaps, like
rocks of solid ice. The hail was composed of enormous solid
and angular pieces of ice, weighing from eight to ten ounces ;
the country people were beaten down in the fields, amid the
concussions of the elements, arid concluded the last day had
arrived: so truly was it fulfilled, 'then* were lightnings, and

LBCT. XII.] AND THE SEVENTH VIAL. 291
thunderings, and a great hail.' The moral and political con-
vulsions presignified by these symbols were no less palpable.
Alison says : * The minds of men were shaken at this time,
as by the yawning of the ground during the fury of an
earthquake.'"1
The Seventh Vial poured into the air they pronounce to be
the cholera. They infer from this, that not only the physical
but the moral atmosphere will be also tainted—"frightful views
and notions of Divine truth — strange and awful heresies."
The great city divided by the earthquake into three parts is
the Romish ecclesiastical system broken up into three kingdoms;
and this tripartite division will consist of France leading its
hosts on one side, the autocrat of all the Russias leading the
second part, England the third part; and " the conflict, when
it comes, will be England against the world." The hailstorm
will be a northern invasion. Air. Elliott says France will lead
this northern invasion. Dr. dimming simply asserts there
will be a northern invasion. This last is a lucky guess ; and
had he not asserted previously that England was to oppose
France and Russia, and that the conflict, when it comes, would
be England against the world,— had he not elsewhere laid it
down that Kin/lawl unit Jtusstu tconld combine to prevent the
evaporation of Turkey, — we might think it worth while
seriously to examine the foundations on which he builds such
an hypothesis. As it is, it is a lame and impotent attempt at
penetrating into what is supposed to be the veiled'2 future. It
is a weak endeavour to reconcile the predictions of the Apo-
1 Apoc. Sketches, p. '>{2$.
2 " The folly of interpreters lias been to forctel times and tilings by this
prophecy, as if (Jod designed to make them prophets. By this rashness they
have not only exposed themselves, but brought the prophecy also into con-
tempt. The design of God was much otherwise. He gave this and the
prophecies of the Old Testament, not to gratify men's curiosities by enabling
them to foreknow things, but that, after they were fulfilled, they might be
interpreted by the event ; and his own providence, and not the interpreters, be
then manifested thereby to the world." (Sir Isaac Newton, Apoc. ch. i.
p. 251.) '* Shall I have the reader's pardon if I say that it is my firm opinion
that the expositions of this book have done great dis-service to religion ;
almost every commentator has become a prophet—for as soon as he began to
explain, he began also to prophesy—and what has been the issue? .Disap-
pointment laughed at hope's career, and superficial thinkers have been led to
despise and reject prophecy itself."—Dr. Adam Clarke.
i 2

292 THE SEVENTH TRUMPET [LECT. XII.
calypse with what every statesman in Europe has seen for
some time, viz. the probability of some great European
struggle. Great Babylon coming into remembrance before
God is, of course, the speedy downfal of Papal Rome ; and
the cities of the nations falling, the recent convulsions in many
of the capitals of Europe.
Amidst this mass of confident and airy nothings fix your
minds upon one circumstance. I allude to the prediction of
the hailstorm which took place on Sunday, July 13th, 1788.
Many long intervals of time had previously been past by,
during which the Apocalyptic vision lay in a dormant state.
Upon one occasion, between the irruption of the Mahometan
locusts and the Turkish woe, the one ending A.I). 7()-> the
other commencing A.D. 1003, there is an interval of 301
years, during which the Apocalypse is silent. According to
the views of these expositors, nothing took place during that
period worthy of being- prefigured in the Apocalypse : no
Mahometan or Turkish chieftain cut off' his horse's tail ; no
Bucephalus vomited out horse-balls against the walls of Con-
stantinople ; the world lay asleep like a dormouse between A.D.
762 and A.D. 10()3.
It does seem a long time for a chronological history like this
to say nothing at all, and to allow ten generations of the great
human family to perish without even a word of commiseration.
But to me it is not half so strange as to assert that the liail-
storm of Sunday, the 13th of July, 1788, was predicted in the
Apocalypse.
What I was there no hailstorm during the 301 years ?
Was no corn beaten down, no soil converted into a morass ?
And did God's holy and unerring Spirit leave out the history
of 301 years, and predict with unfailing accuracy to the seer
in Patmos the mention of a particular hailstorm which deluged,
on a certain day, AV/YVV// parts nf Fr<t)tn>(? If ever there was
a deep and glaring insult offered to the all-wise and all-directing
Spirit, it is contained in wild and childish hallucinations such
as these.
I have yet to learn that the Romish system is or will be
broken up into a tripartite division, and that England will form
a part of such a system. One would have thought that pos-
sibly Austria, Spain, or Portugal, might have been included

LBCT, XII] AND THE SEVENTH VIAL. 293
this partition. But, perhaps, Dr. Gumming sees that England
is fast becoming Tractarian. I have yet to learn that in the
great struggle which is now taking place the contest will be
" England against the world." And what becomes of America,
and Oceania, and Australia, and Africa, and Asia with its
teeming millions, all this time. Is there no other spot but
Papal Rome on which the eyes of the universe must be fixed.
Is there no other battle-field but that of " broad Europe"
which is to decide the coining of the day of God ? Are the
mighty millions of the human race all to be put aside for the
consideration of one branch of the human family ? To my
mind there is a vein of narrow7 bigotry running through all
such views : there is an intolerance of any other system but
our own, which draws a mental film over such judgments. It
is the " No Popery" cry which we have shouted till we have
become deaf to every other sound. Assail Ro