PART VII

The Ideal of the Kingdom――Its Distinctive Features――The Central

Principle of the Kingdom――Negative Characteristics――Fruits and

Results

Introduction

=Rules of Interpretation=

IF the Revelation of Saint John has any right to a place in the canon

of the New Testament, it is reasonable to presume that its intention

was to conform to that general purpose for which all divinely inspired

Scripture is said to be given, namely, to “be profitable for doctrine,

for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness: that the

man of God may be perfect, thoroughly furnished unto all good works.”

What peculiarly distinguishes it is that it clothes spiritual truth

with a garb of mystery which, by challenging investigation, stimulates

inquiry; which affords to the mind that solves its obscurities the

satisfaction always to be found in the discovery of the recondite and

difficult; which throws around prose realities the pleasing charm of

poetry and art; and which, by connecting material things with a divine

revelation, and thus linking together nature and the supernatural,

attests the unity of the universe in which we are placed and shows the

world about us and human history to be full of the presence of God.

It would surely argue great presumption in any man to claim a perfect

understanding of a book so marvelous as the Apocalypse, whose teachings

are not for one age, but for all ages. Very confidently, however, it

may be asserted that by the use of certain rules of interpretation many

of its mysteries may be explained and its application to practical life

and conduct be made evident. The reasonableness of these rules would

be readily admitted if applied to any other part of holy writ; and

hesitation to accept them here proceeds solely from that mistaken view

of the design of the Revelation which isolates it from the rest of the

sacred canon as something ♦anomalous and unique. So far is this from

being the case that no book in the Bible can afford to stand by itself

so little as the Apocalypse, inasmuch as there is no other into the

fabric of which so much of the other Scriptures is intentionally woven.

The impression which close study of it makes is that it was designed

by its author to serve as a sacred clasp to bind together and hold in

harmonious coherence the whole of God’s wonderful volume.

♦ “anomaioms” replaced with “anomalous”

The principles of interpretation deserving special notice are four in

number.

1. _The structure of the book itself furnishes some guide to its

interpretation._

The opening chapters comprise brief letters, seven in all, which the

author is directed to write to seven churches of Asia, the number

indicating, not that these comprehended all the churches in that region,

but that in them were represented all phases of religious life. These

letters set before us both the spiritual state and the environment of

the churches, and are advisory, monitory, reproachful, or comforting as

the cases demanded.

The closing chapters present us with a picture of the perfected

Christian Church――a symbolical vision, incomparable in its exquisite

beauty, of the complete and permanent triumph of the Gospel of Christ,

in the individual heart and on the larger field of the world, over

all opposing forces; the realization, in fact, on earth of the ideal

kingdom of God made ready for the Lamb.

The most plausible suggestion, therefore, which presents itself is

that the intermediate portion of the book is intended to present in

its figures and symbols the means by which the last condition is to be

reached from the earlier one, the unformed and fluctuating state of the

beginning developed into the ripeness and perfection of the close, and

that under the guise of metaphor, trope, and vision there are revealed

to us the dangers which the Church of Christ must expect, the enemies

it must subdue, the weapons by which victory must be achieved, the

encouragements upon which it may rely, and, in short, the steps through

which the immature and carnal must be led in order to reach up to the

pure and perfect.

Nor is it with the Church at large that the warnings and counsels have

alone to do. If “whatsoever things were written aforetime were written

for our learning,” each individual disciple of Christ may find in this

book a chart for his own life’s journey and have sufficient warning

against the sunken rocks, the adverse tides, the dangerous headlands

which are to be shunned, and which are here so clearly and plainly

marked out for him that he may, in the close and careful study of the

map, find equal profit and pleasure.

It is very important in this connection to note the statement of the

writer in the first verse of the book, that his commission was “to show

unto” the servants of God “things which must shortly come to pass.”

It is only by a very forced construction of the words that they can be

made to signify a prophecy whose fulfillment is to be delayed for long

centuries indefinite in their number. The most natural construction

surely is that the revelation intrusted to him is one of which the

whole, and not a part only, is to find its application in the times in

which he lived, or soon thereafter, and to continue applicable until

the glorious result is attained of which the closing part speaks.

And if we shall dismiss from our minds all prepossessions springing

out from that view of the book which makes it a syllabus, or table of

contents, of Christian history the force of this remark will more

clearly appear.

2. _Reference must constantly be made to the Old Testament._

This rule, which is of importance in order to understand any part of

the New Testament, becomes of the highest necessity in any attempt to

interpret the Revelation. The writer was evidently a diligent student

of the older Scriptures, absorbing their images and emblems until they

had become a part of himself. Much in his writings that at first seems

obscure becomes plain when we put ourselves in his position and study

the Scriptures, which were evidently in his thoughts.

The prophetical books of the Old Testament especially are to be studied.

Between the relation in which the older prophets stood to the laws and

institutions of Moses and that which the apostles of the New Testament

dispensation sustained to the Lord Jesus Christ a strong similarity

exists. Neither the one nor the other claimed to be originators

or independent discoverers, but rather witnesses to truths already

revealed, which they accepted as primary and fundamental facts. Into

the clear understanding, indeed, of these they were enabled by divine

inspiration to look more deeply than others could, and they were also

supernaturally aided to draw them out into great principles, capable of

application to human thought and conduct in the shaping of individual

and national life and practice. Thus, naturally and by sympathy of

condition, the later writers found themselves led into careful and

profound study of their predecessors. The prophecies of Daniel and

Zechariah deserve to be especially consulted. Written, as they were, at

or near the time of the captivity of Judah, they had peculiar interest

for one who was himself an exile for the truth. Some of the imagery of

the Revelation is drawn from the glowing poetry of Isaiah. And almost

the entire Book of Joel has been worked into the Apocalypse.

But of all helps to an understanding of the Revelation the most

fruitful is a close and careful comparison with the Book of Ezekiel;

especially is this the case in reference to the closing chapters

of both. Between the authors of these two works there were striking

similarities of character and condition. But a more powerful bond of

union is found in the fact that both of them were preëminently prophets

of the Holy Spirit, seeming to have reached truer and profounder views

of his work in the economy of redemption than any predecessors in their

separate dispensations. Isaiah and Paul wrote of Christ and his Church;

but if we wish to learn the fullest development of the office of the

Holy Ghost we must turn to the pages of Ezekiel and John.

In addition to the Old Testament references, the prophetical discourses

of our Lord uttered near the close of his ministry and recorded in the

synoptical gospels will throw much light on the Book of Revelation. The

omission of these from the gospel of John may be accounted for by the

fact that in the Revelation the apostle had made such large use of them.

The important prediction of Paul concerning the man of sin, found in

2 Thessalonians ii, must also be compared with those of John.

3. _The emblems and symbols of the Revelation must be interpreted by

the light of the Jewish Scriptures and ritual._

This, indeed, follows as a corollary form the preceding rule, but is of

so much importance as to deserve special mention. Sometimes a word or a

figure of speech or the connections of a sentence or a passing allusion

to some sacrificial service will afford a clew to what at the time was

in the mind of the writer. Inasmuch as he was a Jew, “taught according

to the perfect manner of the law of the fathers,” familiar with the

Scriptures, traditions, usages, and history of his religion, his

interpretation of symbols and emblems would naturally be such as would

occur to the mind of a Jew. We must place ourselves as near as possible

to his standpoint. Yet, as he was also an inspired apostle of the Lord

Jesus Christ, we must be prepared to concede that he read deeper into

these mysteries than his fellows did and was able to import into them

a richer meaning.

4. _Particular attention must be given to the numbers found in the

book._

Much that is fanciful and extravagant has, it must be conceded, been

written on this subject, and to many persons any discussion of it is

distasteful. Yet it is certain, as the Wisdom of Solomon says, that God

has “ordered all things in measure and number and weight.” Otherwise

there could be no such thing as exact science. Truths lie veiled in

figures, for these represent fixed principles and plans in the divine

mind. As a general truth, it may be stated that the ideas expressed

by numbers, not only in this book, but throughout the Bible, whenever

these are used symbolically, are those of fullness, exactness,

and perfection, on one hand, or deficiency, incompleteness, and

imperfection, on the other.

The numbers which figure most largely in symbolism are seven, twelve,

six, and three and a half.

Seven is called the sacred number, and seems to express the idea of

perfection or fullness to the highest degree and in the most unlimited

sense. As seven days make a complete week, whole and entire, without

redundancy or deficiency, so that to which the number seven is attached

must be taken as perfect, fully developed, as a complete whole. The

expressions “seven spirits,” “seven seals,” “seven trumpets,” etc.,

imply that what they represent must be taken as entire, with no

possible capacities lying in them unexhausted.

Twelve, also, signifies completeness; but its use and application

are more restricted. It is usually connected with the Church of God,

and possibly has some special reference to it. Thus there are twelve

patriarchs, twelve apostles, twelve foundations to the holy city. As

the number is formed by the multiplication of three, representing the

Trinity, and four, representing the world with its quarters, it conveys

the thought of universality as the assured destiny of the Church.

Six is, also, as a symbol, connected with the Church; but, both because

it is less than seven, and only the half of twelve, has a sinister

significance. It represents the malign and baleful influences which

corrupt and disintegrate the Church, shearing it of its power, limiting

and obstructing its mission, and leaving it incomplete, defective, and

corrupt.

Three and a half is a number having special signification and requiring

particular investigation. A correct appreciation of its meaning will

throw light upon some of the most obscure portions of the Apocalypse.

It occurs――and is, indeed, the only number of which this may be

said――in various forms. Since three and a half years comprise forty-two

months, and since forty-two months of thirty days each (the usual

prophetical computation) equal twelve hundred and sixty days, we may

take these three forms, three and a half, forty-two, and twelve hundred

and sixty, as equivalent expressions. So, also, the expression, “a time,

times, and the dividing of times” (1 + 2 + ½ = 3½), is probably but

another form of this number. That some law governs the choice of these

various forms is probable; but what, it is does not appear.

Since three and a half falls short of seven, it designates

incompleteness. But, inasmuch as it is the exact half of seven (in this

differing from six), it signifies an incompleteness which has, so to

speak, a completeness of its own――that is, an incompleteness which is

not anomalous and irregular, such as would be expressed by six, but one

which is, by the appointment of God or as a result of its own nature,

intended to be such. Any period of time or epoch in human history

which has prescribed and well-marked limits or boundaries, any part of

the plan of Providence which has a specified, but only temporary and

partial purpose as related to the whole course and complete plan of the

divine Being, is always designated by one or the other of the forms of

this number.

Judaism, for instance, answered these conditions. It was a

providentially ordered dispensation, but with a specific and limited

object; fulfilling a definite, but not the complete purpose of

Providence; a stage in the movement of humanity toward the kingdom

of God, but not itself the realization of that kingdom; a type which

needed an antitype to round it out, and throughout which ran the

marks that proved it to be only temporary and preparatory to a higher

dispensation into which it was to blossom. It was “a schoolmaster to

bring us unto Christ.” Its glory was something which was “to be done

away,” and consequently falls short of “that which remaineth.” And it

reached the “fullness” of its “time” when “God sent forth his Son, made

of a woman, made under the law, to redeem them that were under the law,

that we might receive the adoption of sons.” And it will be found that

whenever Judaism is symbolized by a number in the Book of Revelation,

it is designated by one of the allotropic forms of three and a half.¹

¹ See Revelation xi, 3; xii, 6, 14.

So, likewise, Gentilism, to which a definite and distinct character

or purpose is attributed, both by our Lord (Luke xxi, 24) and by

Saint Paul (Romans xi, 25), but which, when severed from its Jewish

antecedents, has the like features of incompleteness and deficiency,

would be symbolically expressed by some form of the same number.¹

¹ See Revelation xiii, 5.

So generally accepted seems to have been this symbolical use of numbers

that it appears even in such pure and simple prose as the gospels. The

evangelist Matthew, in recording the genealogy of our Lord, divides

the period between Abraham and Christ into three cycles with fourteen

generations in each, or forty-two in all. This period is exactly coeval

with Judaism as a distinct dispensation; and forty-two is, as we have

seen, one of the interchangeable forms of the number three and a half.

Inasmuch as the actual number of generations was, as is generally

agreed, more than forty-two, and some principle of accommodation must

have controlled the evangelist in choosing it, we have a right to

conjecture that the symbolism was so well established that no erroneous

impression would be conveyed.

Using these rules of interpretation as a guide, it will be found that

many, if not most of the obscurities which have made this book so

perplexing and incomprehensible will be removed. A unity of purpose

will be seen pervading it. It will no longer appear anomalous and

_outré_, but harmonious with the rest of the oracles of God; a book

for the perusal of every individual believer, no matter how simple and

unlearned he may be; having direct reference to his heart-experience

and his moral conduct; a _vade mecum_ for the journey of life through

whose aid he may safely encounter the dangers and surely overcome the

hindrances he may meet.

The great theme which the inspired writer and apostle here sets before

us is the mediatorial kingdom of our Lord Jesus Christ. The principles

which lie at the basis of that kingdom――the oppositions, external and

internal, to its beginning and completion, the agencies, divine and

human, upon which reliance must be placed to achieve success, its

superiority to and triumph over all hostile forces, and all these both

in the heart of each individual Christian and in that aggregation of

Christians which we call the Church――are here delineated as they were

revealed to Saint John.

The theories which make of this book an anticipation of history, and

which find in the events of the last nineteen centuries continued

fulfillments of its predictions, or which confine those fulfillments to

the periods either near the primitive age or near the future and final

scenes of the drama of time are regarded as being not wholly erroneous,

but incomplete and partial.

That the great purposes of divine Providence are continually finding

their fulfillment in the history of men and nations is a truth not

confined to this book, but spread throughout all the sacred Scriptures.

The laws of the divine administration are very exact; they can be

neither obeyed nor disregarded without the necessary accompaniments

of legitimate and appointed consequences. There is no improbability at

all that moral and spiritual truths may have their processes and cycles

of development, just as natural things have their seasons and times of

maturity. Whether the events that have occurred, the organized bodies,

secular or religious, that have appeared on the field of the world,

were in the mind of the apostle as he wrote is a question neither

affirmed nor denied. What is meant to be said is that the Revelation

does more than merely predict results. It goes down into the profound

region of causes and reveals the continuity of the plans of the divine

Being. However ingenious or plausible, therefore, the explanations put

upon the prophecies of this book by the theories spoken of above, it

is not confined to them. As long as the world lasts there will be, in

every age and in the experience of every believer, a fulfillment of the

truths here set forth. Its warnings and comforts will never be out of

date. Its promises and its threats are alike imperishable, for they are

a part of that “word of our God” which “shall stand forever.”

A definition of the phrase “kingdom of Christ” is nowhere attempted

in the Revelation. It was not needed in an age when the theme was

the staple of preaching and teaching. To show that it must not be

confounded with the visible Church was the purpose of the epistles to

the churches of Asia with which the Apocalypse begins. The fundamental

principle upon which the kingdom is founded, the universal sovereignty

of Christ based upon his redemptive work, is taught under the emblem of

the seals. The writer then advances to the instrumentalities, natural

and supernatural, by means of which the kingdom is to be brought to

its consummation. The antagonisms which the kingdom must encounter

from foes without and within are next plainly revealed, and, lest

the revelation may cause discouragement, prophecies of sure and final

victory mingle with warnings. The retributive resources of the kingdom,

the just judgments which fall upon its foes, and especially upon the

false and counterfeit Church, are taught under the emblem of the vials.

The next section discloses to us the stages of progress through which

the kingdom ascends to its complete establishment, and the signs by

which we may test its advance or detect its decline. And finally, with

that glowing picture of the ideal kingdom as it shall be realized on

earth when the Galilean shall have conquered, a picture so beautiful

that our highest conceptions of heaven seem embodied in it, the divine

seer closes his rapturous vision.

PART I

The Seven Churches of Asia

Revelation of Saint John the Divine

PART I

=The Seven Churches of Asia, or, the Kingdom

as it Actually was in the Days of the Apostles and is now=

THE chapters which contain the epistles to the churches of Asia need

not detain us long; not that they are devoid of interest, but because

anything like a commentary upon the text lies outside the scope and

design of this essay, whose purpose is to interpret the general intent

of the book itself.

The value of these letters to us lies in the pictures presented in them

of the religious state of the churches to which they were addressed,

and which doubtless were representative of the Christian world in the

days of the writer. The reading of them will dispel any illusion in

which we may have indulged as to the superiority of the apostolical

age over subsequent ones, and will shatter any hypothesis we may

have formed that primitive Christianity was anything like Utopia. The

condition of the churches which they reveal to us was one in which

doubt and faith, loyalty and declension, purity and worldliness,

evil and good were interspersed in varying proportions. The tares had

already begun to grow with the wheat.

And a moment’s reflection will convince us that no other result could

reasonably be expected. Divine grace does not obliterate human nature,

and its operations are always in accordance with rule. The regeneration

of a soul is not synonymous with its entire sanctification. Growth

is an invariable accompaniment of life. It would have been a new and

altogether anomalous state of things if the average of conduct attained

by converts from Jewish and pagan standards of thought and morals

had equaled that to which we may aspire in whom centuries of training

in the family, the State, and the Church have created a Christian

consciousness. Fervor and zeal the early disciples unquestionably had,

but with sad mixture of inconsistency, inexperience, and weakness.

It has always seemed hard for Christians to comprehend and fully

believe the promise which our Lord gave to the Church through the

apostles, that the Holy Ghost, when he should come, should “abide”

with it “forever.” And this abiding presence throughout all ages of the

Spirit of truth is not to be in partial or transient manifestation, but

in all the fullness of his divine offices. And attention must be called

to the fact that John, in unfolding the processes and forces by which

the kingdom of Christ is to be brought to its triumphant completeness,

points us at the beginning of his prophecy (Revelation iv, 5) to the

seven spirits of God “burning before the throne,” as if to impress upon

us the perfection of degree in which the Holy Spirit gives himself to

this work. This does not mean that there is monotonous identity in the

modes of his manifestation, or that the work that he does is the same

in kind with that which he has done in the past. We are expressly told

that “there are diversities of gifts, but the same spirit. And there

are diversities of administrations, but the same Lord. And there are

diversities of operations, but it is the same God that worketh all in

all.” Some things which God does he never repeats. His special presence

or work at some periods and in some things does not imply that he is

any the less, while not in the same special way, present at all times

and in all things.

“In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth.” That was done

once for all. From that period up to this time, indeed, the “Father

worketh;” but it is not as Creator, but as Providence, developing and

evolving from that beginning the possibilities that lay in it. What

we call science is the record of this development, aiming only at the

accurate presentation of the facts of providence and the adaptation

of them to human needs and destiny. Nature is the _terminus ad quem_

toward which discovery and invention tend, not the _terminus a quo_

from which they start. Progress in them does not mean adding anything

to nature or superseding it or leaving it behind and moving to

something beyond it, but merely approaching closer to it, bringing us

to better knowledge of and fuller acquaintance with it.

So, likewise, that inspiration of the Holy Ghost by which holy men of

God were moved to speak and write what was specially revealed to them

is never to be repeated. The lines along which and the limits within

which the Christian Church is to be led were laid down once for all,

as those of nature also were. The work of the Spirit now is that of a

Providence to bring to realization the ideal then foreshadowed; and in

doing this he has divine freedom to breathe where and when he listeth.

Pentecost was the commencement of a process of which the closing

chapters of the Revelation disclose the completion. And in order to

attain this end the perpetual presence and indwelling of the Holy

Spirit are promised in all their richness and perfection, but in

accordance with the laws of human nature and with constant increments

of knowledge and power.

It is vain, therefore, to claim commanding authority for any ceremony,

formula, or organization on the ground that it corresponds with

primitive Christianity. The apostles never felt themselves bound to

that first sketch of the Church which they drew at Pentecost, as if

this were among the things supernaturally revealed; but they modified

and revised it whenever they could say, “It seemed good to the Holy

Ghost and to us.” Nor have we any reason to believe that the process of

evolution which continued throughout their lives ended therewith. The

Holy Spirit did not then cease his work of guidance and inspiration.

That is the truest and most apostolical Christianity which, like John,

being “in the Spirit on the Lord’s day,” holds itself ever ready to

hear and obey the “great voice, as of a trumpet,” behind and above it.

And this is the lesson we are to learn from the seven epistles to

the churches of Asia. They are the record of the beginning of the

kingdom of Christ, repeated in the conversion and regeneration of

every individual Christian. They show the point of departure from

which progress is to be made toward the consummation and perfection of

the ideal. The Christian world as it was then, with its graces and its

faults, is disclosed to us. The apostle, with his clearer eye, was able

to look below the facts and recognize the principles struggling for

the ascendency; and, using these facts as his _data_, he drew from them

a prophecy of the development of the kingdom of Christ of marvelous

interest and instruction for all subsequent ages. Nor is there a single

force, friendly or hostile to the kingdom, which does not appear in

the warnings or encouragements he is directed to write to these infant

churches. Whoever will take the sketch of the kingdom as it actually

appeared to the eye of John, and contrast it with the culmination

of the process so exquisitely pictured in the last two chapters of

the Apocalypse, will have some conception of the field over which he

must travel if he would “come in the unity of the faith, and of the

knowledge of the Son of God, unto a perfect man, unto the measure of

the stature of the fullness of Christ.”

PART II

Fundamental Principles on which the Kingdom is Based

PART II

=Fundamental Principles on which the Kingdom is Based.

Emblem of the Seals.=

WITH the fourth chapter the symbolical part of the Revelation begins,

and continues to the end of the book. In that portion of it upon which

we now enter, and which includes chapters iv‒viii, 1, the emblem of a

seal is employed so frequently as to make it the distinctive feature.

We are told of a book “sealed with seven seals” which none but the

Lamb is worthy to open. Then we are told of the opening of these seals,

with visions accompanying the successive loosing of them. And, lastly,

a specific number of persons sealed in their foreheads are shown us,

following which an innumerable company is seen gathered before the

throne of God. It behooves us to ascertain the typical meaning of a

seal; and if we succeed in so doing the purpose of the writer will be

disclosed.

1. _The Emblem of the Seals._――The seal has been usually taken as

signifying concealment or secrecy; sealed things have been regarded

as synonymous with hidden things. And very much conjecture has been

offered as to what were the hidden mysteries contained in the sealed

book or scroll. But, whatever secondary meaning the seal may have,

concealment is not its principal one. A seal denotes, primarily and

specifically, ownership, not secrecy. The sealing of anything implies

that it is, or is claimed to be, the property of him who affixes the

seal. The outward stamp is the declaration that the owner makes of his

rights and is the official token of his authority. It is the mark of

lordship or seigniority. Any concealment of contents therein involved

is a secondary consideration.

Some illustrations from Scripture will substantiate this interpretation.

When it is said (Romans iv, 11) that Abraham received “the sign

of circumcision, a seal of the righteousness of the faith which he

had,” it is meant that he then became in a special sense the personal

property of Almighty God and entitled to all the protection of

Omnipotence.

“He that hath received his testimony hath set to his seal [‘hath set

his seal to this,’ Revised Version] that God is true” (John iii, 33),

means that the assured conviction of God’s reality and faithfulness has

become the personal possession of the believer, something which belongs

to him of right.

“Him hath God the Father sealed” (John vi, 27) means that God

officially ratifies and acknowledges as his own what Christ does,

and attests it with the stamp of authority.

When Pilate sealed the sepulcher where Christ was laid (Matthew

xxvii, 66) it was meant that the tomb became the property of the

Roman empire and was under the guardianship of its officials, and that

whoever tampered with it must be prepared to try questions with Cæsar.

“Ye were sealed with that Holy Spirit” (Ephesians i, 13) means that ye

received as your own possession, in your own personal experience, the

earnest of your inheritance; the gift of the Holy Spirit attests your

rightful claim to it.

These examples will suffice to indicate the scriptural meaning of the

seal. We have only to apply this meaning to the solution of the problem

before us. “A book written within and on the back side,” that is,

completely, all over, with no blank or empty space, is seen lying

in the right hand of God on the throne. Plainly, this book with its

contents signifies something over which the divine Being asserts

supreme sovereignty, which he claims as his of right and alone. And the

number of the seals――seven――indicates that this sovereignty is complete,

undivided, perfect.

What the contents of the book were we may infer from the preceding

chapter (iv), in which we are shown the court of the Lord God

omnipotent, with his loyal and obedient servants and hierarchies

worshiping him and saying, “Thou hast created all things, and for

thy pleasure they are and were created.” The book with its seals

is a symbol of the fundamental truth of all truths, that all things

and beings in this universe, whatever and wherever they are, belong

originally and normally to the Creator. His sovereignty over his

creatures is absolute, illimitable, and eternal.

It is quite in accordance with John’s cast of mind (and this furnishes

no slight evidence as to the authorship of the Revelation) in unfolding

to us the plan of redemption to take his stand at that period in the

past, far back and without date, when God was all in all, and when

sin had not entered to dispute his supremacy; just as in his gospel

he commences, not with the Christ in the maturity of his powers, or

even incarnate in the flesh, but with the preëxistent Word who was “in

the beginning,” “was with God,” and “was God.” Profoundest of all the

apostles, his mind reveled in the contemplation of beginnings and ends,

of the primeval origin and final consummation of things, of the alpha

and omega of creation.

But along with this vision of sovereignty came the coincident

remembrance of the universe as it is, disordered and in rebellion; of

a sinful world wandering from its orbit, disputing the supremacy of its

Maker and God, and in unequal and hopeless conflict with Omnipotence.

Into whose possession should it pass, and who could assume the reins of

power which seemed to have fallen from the hands of the Creator?

A thought similar to this appears to have passed through the mind of

Isaiah when he turned from the vision of the throne “high and lifted

up,” with the seraphim veiling their faces in the presence of holy

Majesty, to the spectacle of himself and the world, and cried, “Woe is

me! for I am undone.”

So John “wept much” when, after this view of immaculate purity combined

with almightiness, he contemplated a sinful world powerless to dispute

what it would not willingly obey. Who was there worthy to “open

the book” and to “loose the seals thereof,” and thus to bring back

creatures to their rightful allegiance? If they would not submit, yet

could not resist, the result could be only disaster, for the heavens

must rule, and successful rebellion was impossible.

But there came to John hope and help, as there had come also to Isaiah;

and to both from “the altar.” As John looked he beheld the “Lion of the

tribe of Judah,” but in the form of a “Lamb as it had been slain,” take

the book from the right hand of God and proceed to break the seals.

Now, if a seal is the emblem of ownership it follows that the

authorized and permitted loosing of a seal must mean the transference,

or delegation, of proprietorship. And this is the meaning here. There

is an endowment――donation, rather――of authority, and the change in

possession is published. That which belonged to and had been under the

rule of the Father is consigned to and becomes the possession of the

Son. And the change is not simply one of sovereigns, but of the ground

principle of sovereignty; not only of rulers, but of methods of rule.

The song of the “elders” and “living creatures” is now, not “Thou didst

create,” but “Thou hast redeemed us to God by thy blood.” There is

presented to us, in fact, a picture of the mediatorial sovereignty of

the Son of God. We see the inauguration of the kingdom of Christ, the

fundamental principle of which is, “Ye are not your own;” for “ye are

bought with a price: therefore glorify God.” It was written in the

Psalms, “The Lord hath said unto me, Thou art my Son; this day have I

begotten thee. Ask of me, and I shall give thee the heathen for thine

inheritance, and the uttermost parts of the earth for thy possession.”

John was looking upon the fulfillment of that decree.

Of this mediatorial kingdom of Christ, thus presented to us in symbol,

so much is said in the Bible that only a few texts need to be referred

to out of the many which might be cited. Our Lord himself said of it

that the Father “hath committed all judgment unto the Son” (John v, 22).

And again, “All things are delivered unto me of my Father” (Matthew

xi, 27). And still again, “All power is given unto me in heaven and in

earth” (Matthew xxviii, 18). So in Hebrew ii, 8, it is recorded, “Thou

hast put all things in subjection under his feet.” And Paul has written,

“Then cometh the end, when he shall have delivered up the kingdom to

God, even the Father; when he shall have put down all rule and all

authority and power. For he must reign, till he hath put all enemies

under his feet” (1 Corinthians xv, 24, 25).

2. _The Opening of the Seals._――In the exercise of his sovereignty

the mediating and atoning Lamb assumes the authority committed to him,

and the history of redemption begins. We approach the heart of this

wonderful book, and its great purpose begins to reveal itself. But the

unfolding of that history has been so different from the conception of

it that was possible even to an apostle that “blindness in part” would

happen to us all if we had not the revelation of God’s plans made known

to us in order to check despondency and animate to labor.

John was one of those to whom the Master had said, “Behold, I send

you forth.” He had heard and has recorded the prayer of the great High

Priest, “As thou hast sent me into the world, even so have I also sent

them into the world.” He had received the great commission, “Go ye

therefore, and teach all nations.” He had been taught that Christians

were to be “the salt of the earth” and “the light of the world” and

were to “occupy” until Christ comes again. What expectation more

reasonable could he entertain than that redemption, proceeding from

the heart of the Father, consummated in the sacrifice of the Son, and

applied by the ever-abiding Spirit, would move forward without let or

hindrance from its commencement to its glorious realization? And this

is implied in the vision of the opening of the first seal: “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.” The first

stroke of God’s providence always drives the kingdom well forward. It

is the subsequent ones that try men’s faith.

When the promise of the seed which should bruise the serpent’s head was

given to Eve, and, following that, a son was born to her, was it not

natural that, in the fullness of her faith, she should exclaim, “I have

gotten a man from the Lord?”

When Almighty God, who had just beaten down Pharaoh and Amalek and

written the law with his own fingers, said to Moses, “As truly as I

live, all the earth shall be filled with the glory of the Lord,” could

the prophet have any doubt that the ark of the covenant would move

triumphantly onward until it came to perfect rest in Canaan?

There is much to show that the apostles of Christ anticipated the

speedy conquest of the world by his kingdom. The conversion of

thousands at Pentecost, the multitude of accessions which followed,

the obedience of a great company of priests, the appearance of miracles

all conspired to foster this expectation. The morning hour of every

reformation is bright and golden. It is later on that clouds gather and

the skies darken. Painful realities soon shake men out of such sunny

dreams, and banish such fond illusions as did the murder of Abel, the

lusting after the fleshpots of Egypt, the imprisonment of Peter, the

defection of Ananias, the martyrdom of Stephen and James. And as the

pendulum of hope swings so easily to the extreme of despair, and every

little Ai seems to our alarmed imagination a walled Jericho, nothing

can be conceived more helpful to faith and courage than to learn that

such things must needs be, and to be comforted at the same time with

the assurance that, though in the world we shall have tribulation, yet

Christ has overcome the world and we must not lose heart.

This is the purpose for which the visions accompanying the opening

of the seals were given to John. The second seal signifies war; the

third, famine; the fourth, pestilence; the fifth, martyrdom; the sixth,

revolutions that seem to “shake the heavens, and the earth, and the

sea, and the dry land.” These are strange instruments to do God’s will,

♦unlooked-for messengers to perform his bidding. But not only all

things, but all events as well, are under the sovereignty of Christ;

and in spite of these obstacles, and perhaps by means of them, his

kingdom moves forward. And when the seventh and last seal shall be

broken, when every messenger shall have been delegated, when the last

needed encouragement shall have been given and the last enemy destroyed,

then will come the unbroken and eternal Sabbath of rest.

♦ “unlookod” replaced with “unlooked”

3. _The Sealed Elect._――The third part of this section comprises two

visions: first, of the “hundred and forty and four thousand,” out of

the twelve tribes of Israel, sealed in their foreheads; and, then, of a

great multitude out of all nations and peoples, clothed in white robes

and bearing palms in their hands. The purpose of these visions is to

show that God’s ownership extends, not only to things and events, but

to persons as well. “The Lord knoweth them that are his.”

There need not be any hesitation in interpreting these visions as

referring to Jewish and Gentile Christians respectively. The same

distinction between the two is made in chapter xiv, 1‒6, where the

hundred and forty-four thousand who stand on Mount Zion singing a song

which no others could learn, namely, the song of Moses and the Lamb,

are marked off from those in every nation and people to whom the angel

flies with the everlasting Gospel.

It is not meant, surely, that the number one hundred and forty-four

thousand is to be taken in an absolutely literal sense. The definite

number in all probability stands for a great multitude. How large the

number of believing Israelites was in the days of the apostle we have

no means of determining. That it was large may be fairly inferred from

Acts xxi, 20. And in the great day of accounts the number may be seen

to be beyond our largest calculation.

Still less are we authorized to impute this separation of Jew from

Gentile to any national exclusiveness on the part of John. No apostle

of the circumcision was any more emphatic than was Paul, the apostle of

the Gentiles, in asserting that the order of salvation is, first, the

Jew, then, the Gentile, and that “God hath not cast away his people

which he foreknew,” although “blindness in part is happened to Israel,

until the fullness of the Gentiles be come in.” And what part the Jew

may yet play in bringing about that fullness no man is able to predict.

Moreover, there is no inferiority implied in the privileges and graces

which the great multitude enjoys as compared with the sealed elect.

They are kings and priests unto God; they are clothed with the robes of

victory and joy. And the images by which their nearness to Christ and

their participation in the fullest measure of nourishment, safety, and

felicity are expressed are not elsewhere exceeded in the Revelation.

The description of their triumph seems to anticipate the consummation

of the ideal kingdom of Christ, with which the closing chapters of the

Apocalypse are replete.

PART III

The Means by which the Kingdom of Christ is Advanced

PART III

=The Means by which the Kingdom of Christ

is Advanced――Emblem of the Trumpet=

THE section of the Revelation which begins with chapter viii, 2, and

closes with chapter xi, is characterized by the symbol of the trumpet.

In the interpretation of this symbol the key to the understanding of

the section must be found. It must not be inferred, because the vision

of the trumpets follows that of the seals, that it designates events

subsequent to the latter. The seals themselves, as we have seen, are

not intended to be predictions of historical events, but strictly

emblems of truths or principles; and the trumpets must be in like

manner regarded. Succession, coincidence, or any other relation of time

has no necessary connection with them. They represent varying phases of

the kingdom of Christ, and their relation thereto is the only one that

need be regarded.

The trumpet was a familiar instrument in the ritual of Judaism, having

a well-known and prescribed use, and is frequently referred to in

the Scriptures. The mention of the word would readily suggest to the

mind of a Jew its symbolic import, and the writer of the Apocalypse

doubtless employed it in this sense.

The trumpet was used as a means of summons. When an assembly was to

be gathered, when an alarm was to be given, when a message was to be

communicated, it was by the trumpet that attention was arrested and

a hearing enforced. It signified that tidings were to be delivered

to which it behooved men to listen. It increased the range of

the unassisted human voice, with the difference that, while the

intensifying of the sound through the use of the instrument carried it

over larger spaces, there was a loss of that delicacy, flexibility, and

capacity to convey emotions which belong to the unaided human organs of

speech.

It was by the trumpet, sounding long and loud, that Jehovah announced

his presence at Sinai to Moses and the awe-stricken people, and bade

them prepare to receive his law. It was by the blowing of trumpets

that the approach of the jubilee year was announced――that very striking

type of the redemption purchased by Christ. When the Israelites were

marching around Jericho “seven priests bearing seven trumpets of rams’

horns” went before the ark of the Lord; and on the seventh day, when,

“at the seventh time,” the priests blew with the trumpets, the walls

fell. And the prophet Joel says, “Blow the trumpet in Zion, sanctify

a fast, call a solemn assembly: gather the people.” So familiarly has

this symbolism passed over into the Christian Church that the preaching

of salvation is very commonly spoken of as the blowing of the Gospel

trumpet.

If the seals emblematize the truth that all things belong of right to

Christ as Mediator, the question very naturally follows, How is this

_de jure_ ownership to be made a _de facto_ one, and what instruments

are put into the hands of the Church to enable it to establish the

kingdom of Christ on earth? The vision of the trumpets is designed to

be the answer to this question.

The trumpets, then, signify the instrumentalities by which men are

called to the kingdom of Christ, or the measures which the divine

Being employs to advance that kingdom. Their number, seven, indicates

that these measures are complete and comprehensive, including every

available resource and employing all possible methods of approach

to man. God avails himself of every legitimate device to constrain

a sinful world to accept the proffer of salvation ere he passes from

chastisement and correction to retributive and final judgment. Thus

those who reject the offer will be found without excuse, and the

despisers of the wedding garment will be stricken speechless in the day

of accounts.

The sounding of the trumpets, it will be noticed, is preceded by the

“prayers of the saints;” for that “the effectual fervent prayer of a

righteous man availeth much” with God is one of the fundamental facts

of the kingdom (Psalm xviii, 6‒17). And the token of the hearing of the

prayers is seen in the “voices, and thunderings, and lightnings, and

an earthquake” that followed when the seven angels with the trumpets

prepared to sound. The vision doubtless recalled to John’s mind the

remembrance of that day when, as the disciples prayed, “the place was

shaken where they were assembled together;” God revealing himself in

the new dispensation as he had done at Sinai when about to communicate

his law. The grandeur of the preparation suggests the importance of the

tidings to be communicated.

It will be also observed that the episode of the “two witnesses”

(chapter xi) falls within the section marked by the trumpet emblem.

The appropriateness of this and the ease with which it takes its place

here furnish no slight evidence that the explanation of the Revelation

adopted in this essay is correct.

There are two modes by which the divine Being has chosen to communicate

the knowledge of himself and of his will. These are his works and his

word. The one is that manifestation of himself in nature of which Paul

speaks when he says, “The invisible things of him from the creation

of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are

made, even his eternal power and Godhead.” The other is supernatural,

the revelation of himself as a power above nature and not limited by

its laws. It is of this that Peter says, “We have also a more sure word

of prophecy.”

The most searching and subtle analysis to which knowledge and its

sources have been subjected has resulted in this――that even in the

alembic of modern doubt, after the most biting acids have tried their

solvent power, there is left as the residuum a conviction that, besides

this known and knowable universe, there exists a first cause or force.

At the beginning and basis of all things a duality must be acknowledged.

If human thought by its unaided light is incompetent to go beyond

this, it is not allowed to stop short of it. “The momentum of thought,”

Herbert Spencer says, “inevitably carries us beyond conditioned

existence to unconditioned existence.” “The certainty that, on the one

hand, such a power exists, while, on the other, its nature transcends

intuition and is beyond imagination, is the certainty toward which

intelligence has been from the first progressing. To this conclusion

science inevitably arrives as it reaches its confines.” This power,

which science may know only as “an infinite and eternal energy,” is

the Being whom the Scriptures reveal to us as the Lord God, of whom and

through whom and to whom “are all things: to whom be glory forever.”

From this first Cause knowledge comes to us through two channels――his

deeds and his words. The first of these is accessible to all mankind;

for the Gentiles, which have not the law, “show the work of the law

written in their hearts, their conscience also bearing witness.” But as

that which is constant and habitual soon ceases to attract attention,

and the orderly and uniform processes of nature excite less interest

and awaken feebler curiosity than the anomalous and occasional,

in like manner it is most frequently by calamities, adversities,

seeming withdrawals of God’s face that men are brought to reflection,

consideration, and obedience. “When thy judgments are in the earth, the

inhabitants of the world will learn righteousness.” It is this truth

that the vision of the trumpets symbolizes. It signifies the warnings

in the field of natural providence which the divine Being gives to men,

in order to show the evil and peril of sin and thus draw back their

souls from the pit. The second of these channels of knowledge is found

in the oracles of God, the Scriptures committed to the chosen people.

And these are symbolized in the episode of the “two witnesses,” which

forms a part of the trumpet section.

The details of the trumpet scenes are not, it must be confessed, easy

of interpretation. They seem to be selected from various parts of the

Old Testament, and grouped according to some plan not explained to us,

suggesting the thought that the interpretation of them is not to be

found in any single event, but in some common truth embodied in many

events.

The conjunction of “hail” with “fire” (viii, 7) is also found in Exodus

ix, 24; that of “fire” with “blood” (viii, 7) in Joel ii, 30; while

all three of these elements are separately mentioned in many passages.

The moving of mountains (viii, 8) is referred to in Psalm xlvi, 2, and

Isaiah liv, 10; and a burning mountain in Jeremiah li, 25. “Wormwood”

(viii, 11) occurs in Jeremiah ix, 15, and Amos v, 7. The darkening of

the heavenly bodies (viii, 12) is found also in Isaiah xiii, 10; Amos

viii, 9; and Joel ii, 31. “Locusts” (ix, 3) are mentioned in Exodus

x, 4; Nahum iii, 17; Joel i, 4.

But the assemblage of the events in the Revelation differs from

any other in the Bible. It is more systematically arranged than in

the series foretold by our Lord in Matthew xxiv. It differs from

the account of the Egyptian plagues of Exodus in omissions, the

introduction of new details, and in the fact that the plagues occur

in a different order. The hail, for instance, which is the seventh

Egyptian plague, is the first of the plagues in the Revelation. All

this may be explained by the fact that the plagues of Egypt were

confined to that country and were adapted to its local climatic

conditions, while the plagues of the Revelation have for their field

the world itself, and were intentionally diversified in being fitted

to this larger sphere.

That a close connection exists between man and his dwelling place, the

earth, is a truth in which both science and the Scriptures cordially

concur; the dispute, if any, between them is not as to the fact,

but its cause. The doctrine of evolution, which receives such wide

acceptance, rests upon this connection as a fundamental axiom; and

the Scriptures confirm the fact in the accounts of the creation and

the fall. The difference between science and the Scriptures is, that

what evolution attributes to the operation of natural law the Bible

explains by the working of a moral power. As for man’s sake the ground

was cursed and all nature made to suffer by reason of his rebellion,

so do they bear constant witness to his advance or degeneration in

righteousness. As purity is in general promotive of prosperity, so does

sin produce disaster. “As the moral life of the soul expresses itself

in the physical life of the body for the latter’s health or corruption,

so the conduct of the human race affects the physical life of the

universe to its farthest limit in space. The Old Testament is not

contented with a general statement of this great principle, but pursues

it to all sorts of particular and private applications. The curses

of the Lord fell, not only on the sinner, but on his dwelling, his

property, and even on the bit of ground he occupied. The doctrine

of the Old Testament is that man’s sin has rendered necessary the

destruction of his material circumstances, and that the divine judgment

includes a broken and rifled universe.”¹

¹ _Isaiah_, vol. i. chap. xxxviii, pp. 419, ff., in the

_Expositor’s Bible_, New York, A. C. Armstrong & Co.

And these calamities, whether brought about directly by the divine

Governor, or through the operation of general laws, which is but

another mode of his action, are so many trumpet calls from God warning

men to retrace their erring steps and submit to his kingdom. “It was

plague and fire,” Leigh Hunt says, “that first taught the Londoners

to build their city better.” And the divine Being may make use of like

means to forward his moral government.

1. _Natural Providences._――In the _first_ trumpet scene the blow

falls upon the earth itself. Its productive resources were severely

diminished through the destructive agencies of nature, intensified, it

may be, by the horrors of war. The hail and the fire were mingled with

blood. And, since food is essential to life, “the king himself being

served by the field,” such a disaster must sorely oppress mankind. The

apostle had himself witnessed at least one widely-extended famine, and

had noted how the exhibition of Christian benevolence had been made the

means of promoting the kingdom of Christ (Acts xi, 28‒30).

The _second_ trumpet scene deals with disasters affecting “the sea,”

the great highway of commerce, and disturbing the exchanges of the

products of labor among men. More than once in the history of the world

social revolutions have been the plowshare turning up the soil, that

seeds of religious reformation might the better grow.

In the _third_ trumpet scene it is the sources of water supply that are

affected. A star, falling from heaven, turns them to wormwood, which in

the Old Testament is used as a symbol of bitterness and poisoning. It

is in the contamination of these sources that epidemics and pestilences

usually find their commencement, and a merciful Providence generally

spares them until other and milder warnings have been tried.

In the _fourth_ trumpet scene the heavenly bodies are involved,

carrying out the idea, so frequently expressed in the Bible, of the

sympathy which the whole creation seems to feel with the great events

transacted on earth. The universe is so bound together that whatever

touches one part of the great Governor’s empire ultimately affects

every other (Exodus x, 21‒24; Isaiah xiii, 9‒11; Joel ii, 31; Matthew

xxiv, 29; xxvii, 45). Yet the images in this scene may be figurative

emblems of the ruling powers of earthly kingdoms, and the vision may be

interpreted as synonymous with the predictions of Haggai ii, 6‒9, and

Hebrews xii, 26‒29, in which the shaking of heaven and earth is made to

precede the coming of the kingdom of Christ.

The _fifth_ trumpet scene is undoubtedly the most difficult of all to

interpret and requires more elaborate treatment. In striving to explain

its obscurities the only safe and satisfactory method is to search for

what may be regarded as certain and plain in the vision, and from this

as a starting point to essay the more difficult.

Two things seem to stand out prominently and comparatively clearly in

the scene. Assuming the star which fell from heaven, to whom was given

the key of the bottomless pit, and who is closely connected with the

angel of the pit named Abaddon or Apollyon――that is, destroyer――to be a

representation of Satan, then for the first time this archenemy of God

and man is introduced personally upon the stage. In whatever the fifth

trumpet signifies he directly or indirectly has a preëminent share.

Then, again, the mention of locusts points us to the prophecy of Joel,

where the destructive ravages of this scourge are such a conspicuous

figure. If we can reach a satisfactory solution of Joel’s prophecy

we may reasonably expect an understanding of this prophecy of the

Revelation.

In the great prophecy of Joel, brief in extent, but comprehensive in

import, the background upon which the earnest preacher of God paints

his vivid pictures is the alarming condition of spiritual declension

and apathy into which the people had fallen, accompanied with fearful

neglect of the service of God and its ordinances. To awaken the

people out of this deadly state he predicts the approach of an awful

scourge, the ravages of which would be felt in a resultant condition of

extraordinary impoverishment and penury. Poverty of spirit must precede

entrance into the riches of the kingdom of heaven. And so the prophet

is commissioned to promise that, after repentance and renewal of

consecration, there shall be a rich and plentiful effusion of the Holy

Spirit; and he assures the penitent that “whosoever shall call on the

name of the Lord shall be delivered” and shall escape the impending

destruction.

Nothing is more probable, therefore, than that the writer of the

Revelation meant to warn the Church of Christ against a decline in

faith or relaxation in zeal. He assured it that such a lapse would

be followed by the intrusion into its field of some dangerous enemy.

What the character of this enemy should be is indicated by two things.

It will be noticed that, if John deviates from the description of the

locusts given by Joel, it is in the direction of bringing humanity more

into the picture. The locusts spoken of in this fifth trumpet scene are

to have crowns like gold upon their heads; their faces are to be as the

faces of men; their hair to be as the hair of women; they are to hurt,

not as real locusts do, the earth and its products, but men; their

sting, unlike that of other locusts, is to be as the sting of scorpions;

and their work will be, not the destruction of human life, but the

causing of such misery as to make human life unhappy and undesirable.

They are to be under the direction of Satan, whose field of operations

in the warfare he wages against the kingdom of Christ is, not the earth,

but the world of human beings.

The truth, then, which seems to be indicated in this obscure vision

is, that whenever a Christian man or Church declines into lukewarmness

or apathy there may be expected to follow an incursion and invasion by

other and lower forms of religious life and thought. Wherever iniquity

abounds and the “love of many” waxes cold there is sure to be an inroad

of heresy, false doctrine, more or less heterodoxy of creed. The human

heart, like nature, abhors a vacuum. Where true godliness wanes false

religions rush in to fill the void; and the intensity of zeal which

false religions awaken measures the declension that has befallen true

faith. The evil spirit that comes back to a home from which he has

been once expelled, and finds it empty, swept, and garnished, takes

to himself seven other spirits more wicked than himself, “and the last

state of that man is worse than the first.” The temperature of religion

when it falls to lower levels never does so equably. The nobler and

more ideal parts suffer most severely, and, like the shriveled idol

of the Philistines, at last “only the stump of Dagon is left to him.”

There can be no question that the advocates of the historical

interpretation of the Revelation have a very strong support for their

hypothesis in the application of this part of it to the rise and growth

of Mohammedanism. It is not to be denied that many of the essential

characteristics of that false religion are quite accurately delineated

in this picture. The rise and rapid extension of Mohammedanism were

possible only because of the dead, formal, and corrupt condition of

the Christendom which it encountered. Its prophet and founder preached

a faith which was purer than that of many a so-called Christian

bishop; and it achieves its triumphs now only in those regions where

Christianity has degenerated into spiritual barrenness and puerile

ceremonialism. But in this, as in so many instances, the historical

interpretation errs, not through incorrectness, so much as through

incompleteness. In claiming any one historical event as the fulfillment

of prophecy it impoverishes inspiration by confining that fulfillment

to a single fact. Mohammedanism is but one illustration of a profounder

truth. The Revelation of John is meant for all ages. It is constantly

finding new illustrations and applications. In setting before us the

causes of decline as well as of growth, the Revelation teaches us to

be looking for these causes at all times, that we may avert the decline

or forward the growth; and thus it is furnishing new examples of its

divine truth and new evidences of its divine origin, without exhausting

its force in any single example or any single evidence.

The _sixth_ trumpet sounds, and the vision which is presented to us is

one of increasing danger and darkness. Warnings unheeded give way to

alarms still more threatening. The noonday bell of invitation deepens

into the curfew toll of departing day. The approach of an immense and

imposing array of horsemen armed for battle strikes deeper terror than

did the invasion of the locusts and indicates judgments more formidable.

The power of Satan to harm is overmastering mercy’s efforts to save,

and the restrictions which had been laid upon his authority are being

relaxed. We are told now that “by these three was the third part of

men killed, by the fire, and by the smoke, and by the brimstone.” As

there is suggested a spiritual condition which has gone beyond mere

declension and apathy to deeper states of alienation from God, so the

perils threatened end, not with a destruction of the happiness of life,

but in death itself.

It must be noticed that the region from which the new and alarming

scourge proceeds is the “great river Euphrates.” To understand this

we must place ourselves at the standpoint of the apostle. The river

Euphrates was to Palestine what the Danube and the Rhine were to

the Roman empire――the line of demarcation between civilization and

barbarism. The East was the quarter from which the earlier prophets

always apprehended danger. It was in the Euphrates that Jeremiah was

bidden to cast the book with the stone tied to it (Jeremiah li, 63). On

the hither side of the great river lay the kingdoms with which Israel

had mainly had intercourse. On the north of Palestine was Syria, on

the south, Egypt; on the banks of the Euphrates and Tigris or near by

were Assyria and Babylon. The peoples of these kingdoms were, indeed,

nations whose God was not the Lord; yet between them and Israel a

_modus vivendi_ had to some degree been established, and some common

rules of international intercourse were recognized. But on the farther

side was the land of barbarians among whom the arts of civilization

were unknown, who acknowledged no code of comity or obligation with

which the chosen people were familiar, whose ways and modes of warfare

were impenetrable and strange, and from whom all possible evils might

be expected.

There is, it must be sadly confessed, in all human beings a latent germ

of barbarism, a survival of the carnal or animal nature. Suppressed,

indeed, it may be by culture, education, or other moral or secular

forces, and its existence hardly surmised, yet it only awaits fostering

conditions to manifest its presence and reassert its power. Without

divine grace no Christian is free from liability to an outburst of

the carnal mind which may destroy the spiritual life of the soul. Nor

does any grade of civilization exempt nations from the possibility

of a reversion to barbarism, if the excitements to it are allowed to

exist or precautions against its inroads are neglected. Bishop Butler

expressed the opinion that whole communities, like individuals, might

become insane. Perhaps it is nearer the truth to explain the sudden

frenzies to which men and nations have sometimes given way as an

uncontrolled irruption of the barbarous element within. Farther on, in

the twentieth chapter of the Revelation, we shall find this tendency

toward barbarism more particularly referred to by John, and the

appreciation of it will help us there to solve one of the most

perplexing problems of the book.

Ethnology either ignores this liability to revert to barbarism or

denies it, and by so doing impairs the value of those hypotheses as

to the primitive condition of the race which it seeks to substitute

for the Bible story. It is not always easy to determine whether any

particular stage of barbarism marks a step upward in the advance of a

growing people or a decline toward animalism from a superior state; yet

the correctness of our inferences depends upon an accurate diagnosis of

this question.

But human experience is constantly furnishing illustrations confirming

the utterances of the word of God as to the possibility of a fall from

high grades of cultivation to the depths of savagery. If the counsels

of God are unheeded and the convictions of the Holy Spirit are resisted

nothing can follow but a descent into lower grades, until the savage

forces that underlie our nature assert supremacy and overleap the weak

barriers which reason and judgment set up to stay them.

Something like this seems to be the warning meant to be conveyed

through the sixth trumpet. A striking commentary upon this was given

but a few centuries after John’s death, when the hordes of barbarians

that had been only waiting opportunity swept with irresistible fury

over the crumbling walls of the corrupt and decadent Roman Empire,

and imposed upon the Christian Church the task of saving civilization

itself from destruction. We may not even now relax our watchfulness or

put off the armor of our faith, lest this may involve a reversion of

mankind to barbaric naturalism. And a return to barbarism is the lowest

condition to which human nature can fall. From such a state recovery

is well-nigh hopeless and repentance an extreme improbability, for the

resources of mercy will have been almost exhausted, and beyond lies

only doom.

It should be noticed that the Revelation speaks of three woes. The

first one predicted is described under the fifth trumpet. The second

one is declared by the sixth trumpet. The third one is not uncovered at

all. It lies in that future world from which the curtain is not lifted

and into which even the light of revelation feebly penetrates. Whoever

has rejected all the warnings of love and descended the moral scale

until he has reverted to the state of sensualism is but a step from

the second death. “He that soweth to his flesh shall of the flesh reap

corruption.”

2. _The Two Witnesses, or, the Supernatural Scriptures._――The episode

of the “two witnesses,” to which we are now brought, is one that has

sorely tried expositors. Though many and various solutions of it have

been attempted, Alford, in his commentary upon the passage, says, “I

will further remark, and the reader will find this abundantly borne out

by research into histories of Apocalyptic exegesis, that no solution

at all approaching to a satisfactory one has ever yet been given ...

of this portion of the prophecy.” If it shall be found, therefore, that

the principles which have hitherto guided us enable us to penetrate

to the core of this mystery, and evolve a meaning intelligible and

reasonable, and which, while interpreting all the details without

distortion or suppression, is in harmony at the same time with the

Scriptures in general and with the purpose for which they have been

revealed, then we may indulge the hope that these principles are

correct and may advance with some confidence to the problems that still

lie before us. Though long tunnels are yet to be threaded, with only

brief intervals between them of open air, we shall in time, perhaps,

reach the light of day and rest in the sunshine of discovered truth.

It has been already said that through the vast space that intervenes

between the divine Being and man two great lines of communication

stretch. These are his works and his word. It is this truth which

the trumpets symbolize, and we have not yet gotten beyond the section

of the Revelation in which this emblem of the trumpets is the ruling

one. Six of the trumpets have sounded. Whatever can be done by natural

providences to arouse men to spiritual thought and action has been

sounded by them. Nature has no other voices with which to speak to

mankind. But the resources of Omnipotence are not exhausted. God

has yet other means of approach to his creatures. And if, therefore,

because of heedlessness or obduracy or preoccupation of mind or

absorption in temporal things, one of these lines of light from God’s

mercy falls with too light a touch to arrest men’s attention or awaken

them to danger or win their consent to seek God’s favor, there remains

another and more efficient one, namely, his written word; and here is

the place where we should expect allusion to it.

The two witnesses, then, may be reasonably interpreted as signifying

the _law_ and the _prophets_, the titles under which the Old

Testament Scriptures received by John as divinely inspired were almost

universally designated. Should these fail of their purpose, even the

divine Being, we may reverently say, had no other way of reaching

man. It is our Lord himself who says, “If they hear not Moses and

the prophets, neither will they be persuaded though one rose from

the dead.” When the great and strong wind rending the mountains, and

after this the earthquake, and after this the fire, have failed, it is

possible that the still small voice will arouse to faith and hope and

duty. Should it not do so, then the case is hopeless.

In order to verify the solution which is here proposed of the episode

of the two witnesses, a careful examination will be made of the facts

as detailed in the text.

The introduction of the two witnesses, however, is preceded by two

visions by way of prelude. This, we shall find, is what we might

reasonably expect. If the witnesses are, indeed, symbols of the sacred

Scriptures, God’s direct revelation of his will and character to men,

it is proper that the scope and purpose of all revelation shall be

plainly laid down, that we may know how far the revealed word of God is

to be regarded as evidence, and also that some criteria shall be given

by which we shall be able to discern what the inspired writings are,

and how to differentiate them from human productions. In other words,

we have here from the pen of John his own views of biblical criticism,

and it would have been well if they had been more carefully heeded in

the discussions of inspiration recently so rife.

In the first of these two visions a “mighty angel” is seen to “come

down from heaven, clothed with a cloud” and with “a rainbow upon his

head.” And he had in his hand a little book open. But, when “seven

thunders had uttered their voices” and John was “about to write,”

a voice was heard from heaven saying, “Seal up those things which

the seven thunders uttered, and write them not.” This prohibition is

distinctly declared to be only for a time. “In the days of the voice

of the seventh angel, when he shall begin to sound, the mystery of God

should be finished, as he hath declared unto his servants the prophets.”

If the interpretation put upon the two witnesses is correct, and if

they symbolize the Scriptures, then the purpose of this prelude is to

indicate what we are to look for in them. It is not the design of the

Bible to communicate all possible truth, but only such measure of it

as has reference to the kingdom of Christ. Although the things which

are revealed belong to us and to our children, there are still secret

things which belong to the Lord our God. He has communicated much, but

he has withheld much, and doubtless the reasons for the revelation and

the reserve are equally wise. There are truths which man’s own powers

enable him to discover. There are other truths beyond his ability to

comprehend even should they be revealed. These are excluded from the

Scriptures as being aside from their purpose. It is only “when that

which is perfect is come,” and “that which is in part shall be done

away,” that we shall know as we are known. Very much that we know

not now we shall know hereafter. But the Bible has specific reference

to the kingdom of Christ and reveals only what has relation to that

kingdom. “The testimony of Jesus” is the spirit of all prophecy. That

which lies within the capacity of man to discover is left to the wisdom

and patience of men. That which pertains to the future life, and would

simply satisfy curiosity to know, is reserved to the time when we shall

have laid aside mortality. The Scriptures reveal to us only what it

is needful for us to know that we may enter and enjoy and forward the

♦kingdom of Christ. Paul was not allowed to utter the words he had

heard in his heavenly ecstasy, and John is likewise prohibited from

uttering things which belong solely to the divine Being and await his

pleasure to publish. It was sufficient for him to be told that, however

bitter and unpalatable his message might be, he must still “prophesy

before many peoples, and nations, and tongues, and kings.”

♦ “kingom” replaced with “kingdom”

The second prelude also has reference to the limitations within which

all revelation is confined. “There was given me a reed like unto a

rod: and the angel stood, saying, Rise, and measure the temple of God,

and the altar, and them that worship therein. But the court which is

without the temple leave out, and measure it not; for it is given unto

the Gentiles: and the holy city shall they tread under foot forty and

two months.”

There are two elements in this which furnish guides to its

interpretation. One is the distinction so emphatically made between

the temple itself, which, as we know, was reserved exclusively for

Israelites, and the outer courts, which were given to the Gentiles.

The other is the use of the symbolical number forty-two.

Now is it not a reasonable thing that the apostle, when about to point

us to the law and the prophets as God’s two witnesses, shall put a

broad distinction between them and all mere human productions? The

temple itself is the field within which they fulfill their office, and

those only who speak from it are God’s accredited messengers. If the

Scriptures are the standard by which truth concerning the kingdom of

Christ is to be tested, if they have authority to bind the consciences

of men, there must be some criterion by which they shall be judged.

And this is the criterion――“Salvation is of the Jews.” God’s messengers

and witnesses sprang from them. And Paul confirms this declaration

when he says that the chief advantage which the Jews had was that

“unto them were committed the oracles of God.” The highest creations

of human genius fall short of the special inspiration which belonged to

the prophets and patriarchs and apostles of Israel. The outer courts,

indeed, were given to the Gentiles. Theirs was the world of art, of

science, of commerce, of literature, of politics, of earthly dominion;

but the temple and the altar belonged to the chosen race. Brilliant

stars brightened the darkness of the Gentile sky, but the sun of

spiritual truth shone only to the teachers whom God called out of

Israel; and Homer and Æschylus, and muse and sibyl, must “pale their

ineffectual fires” in the presence of his seers and anointed ones. And

this is confirmed by the use of the symbolical number forty-two. This

number, as we have seen in the Introduction, typifies a period which

has definite limits and fulfills a specific purpose. It may designate

Judaism proper or Gentilism proper. And the meaning here is that now,

and throughout this present cycle of time, the kingdom of God has been

taken from the Jew and given to a nation bringing forth the fruits

of the kingdom. Neither the temple, nor the altar, nor the inspired

Scriptures belong now exclusively to the Jew. The chosen race has

forfeited its prerogative of exclusiveness, and the foot of the Gentile

treads the inner as well as outer court. The Bible belongs to us as

well as to Israel.

With these important and interesting preludes explained, and the reason

of their introduction in this place accounted for, we are prepared to

investigate the vision of the two witnesses.

It has already been said, but the importance of the matter requires its

repetition, that the paragraph containing the vision of the witnesses

is a part of the section of the Revelation of which the trumpet is the

ruling symbol; for it is not until the close of this paragraph that

the seventh trumpet sounds. It seems, therefore, plausible that what

is symbolized by the witnesses has some continuous connection with that

which is designated by the trumpets. And, inasmuch as the trumpets are

emblems of the instrumentalities which the divine Being employs to call

men to repentance, obedience, and the service of himself, the witnesses

are an emblem of some such instrumentality, having the same end in

view, but operating in a different mode. The six trumpets which have

already sounded represent what the divine Being does by way of natural

providence, approaching men by calamities, distresses, the observed

connection between impiety and moral, as well as intellectual,

decadence, and such like means. But nature in any and all of its modes

of manifestation does not comprise all the modes of communication

between God and man. Nor is the testimony which it bears to God the

highest testimony. The same Being who “formeth the mountains, and

createth the wind,” who “maketh the morning darkness, and treadeth

upon the high places of the earth,” also “declareth unto man what is

his thought.” “The heavens,” indeed, “declare the glory of God; and

the firmament showeth his handiwork.” But the law of God does more.

It converteth the soul. Nature’s witness is given by dumb signs or

inarticulate sounds. It has no speech nor language. Its worshipers

may cry aloud to their Baal from morning until the time of the evening

sacrifice, but there is none to hear, nor any God that regards. It is

to and through the human spirit that the divine Spirit must communicate

his deepest truths; nor has he done all that may be done until he has

given to men his word. “The grass withereth, the flower fadeth; but the

word of our God shall stand forever.”

The two witnesses, human and intelligent, aptly and appropriately

represent this higher mode of communication which God employs to

impress and teach men. By them we are to understand the law and the

prophets, the two component parts of the Old Testament Scriptures,

which at the date of the Apocalypse constituted the only canonical

Scriptures known. In the paragraph which follows there is an intimation

of the New Testament; but as yet it was not in existence as a collected

code. The Bible which Christ and his apostles knew was the Jewish Bible.

The proof of this somewhat novel interpretation of the two witnesses,

if, indeed, any interpretation of any part of the Apocalypse can be

called novel, lies in the fact that it explains all the details of the

vision which are presented to us simply, easily, and without any forced

construction. It is essential to group together the separate details,

and then endeavor to explain them.

The seer says of these two witnesses that they prophesy in sackcloth

twelve hundred and sixty days, which, as has been said in discussing

rules of interpretation, is one of the numbers symbolical of Judaism;

they are identified as corresponding with the “two sons of oil, that

stand by the Lord of the whole earth,” of whom Zechariah wrote (Revised

Version); they have power to devour their enemies and shut heaven

by the miracles of withholding the rain, turning waters to blood,

and smiting the earth with plagues. There is a period when their

“testimony” is finished. When that period is reached their enemy, the

beast from the bottomless pit, kills them, and their dead bodies lie

exposed for three and a half days “in the street of the great city,

which spiritually is called Sodom and Egypt, where also our Lord was

crucified.” At the end of this period “the Spirit of life entered into

them, and they stood upon their feet;” and they finally “ascended up to

heaven” amid convulsions which shake the earth and fill men with terror.

How accurately all these features of the paragraph find their

fulfillment in the law and the prophets, or the Old Testament

Scriptures, may be readily shown:

_First._ It is worthy of consideration as a strong point that the

expression, “the law and the prophets” (sometimes “Moses and the

prophets”), is the one almost invariably employed by our Lord in

designating the older Scriptures (Matthew v, 17; vii, 12; xi, 13;

xxii, 40; Luke xvi, 31; xxiv, 27; as also John i, 45; Acts xiii, 15;

xxviii, 23).

_Secondly._ The testimony of the prophets and writers of the Old

Testament may be truly said to have been given in sackcloth. What one

of these messengers of God ever met with a cordial reception? Well

did Stephen say, perhaps in the hearing of John himself, “Which of the

prophets have not your fathers persecuted?” “They were stoned, were

sawn asunder, were tempted, were slain with the sword: they wandered

about in sheepskins, and goatskins; being destitute, afflicted,

tormented” (Hebrews xi, 37; Luke xi, 49‒51).

_Thirdly._ The law and the prophets found their special embodiments and

representatives in Moses (John i, 17) and Elijah (Malachi iv, 4, 5);

one the unequaled statesmen and legislator, the other the most striking

and, in many respects, the greatest of the long line of prophets. The

miracles ascribed to the two witnesses were actually wrought by these

two extraordinary and typical men. To Moses was given power to turn

waters to blood and to smite the earth with plagues. It was at the

prayer of Elijah that the heaven was shut so that it rained not but

according to his word.

_Fourthly._ Zechariah’s vision of the “two olive branches which through

the two golden pipes empty the golden oil out of themselves,” and which

are said to be “the two anointed ones, that stand by the Lord of the

whole earth,” finds its most appropriate and exact fulfillment in the

Holy Scriptures, which testify of Jesus (John v, 39). And it was the

representatives of the law and the prophets, or Moses and Elijah, who

were chosen to stand by our Lord when he appeared in glory upon the

Mount of Transfiguration.

_Fifthly._ The “testimony” of the law and the prophets is distinctly

said by our Lord himself to have been “finished” when his own

forerunner, John the Baptist, appeared. “For all the prophets and the

law prophesied until John” (Matthew xi, 13); “The law and the prophets

were until John” (Luke xvi, 16).

_Sixthly._ Although the Jews professedly acknowledged the law and the

prophets to be of divine origin, our Lord emphatically charged against

them that they had by their glosses and traditions in effect abrogated

them; devitalizing them and making their authority to be a dead letter

(Matthew xv, 6; Mark vii, 13; Luke xi, 52).

_Seventhly._ At no period did this nullification of the power of

the Holy Scriptures reach such extremes as during our Lord’s active

ministry on earth. The dead bodies of the law and the prophets may

be said, without exaggeration, to have lain exposed in the streets of

Jerusalem, where our Lord was crucified.

_Eighthly._ The bodies of the two witnesses are said to have lain

“three days and a half.” As the period of our Lord’s active ministry

has been computed at three and a half years the number may refer to

that. But as three and a half is a symbolical number, designating a

half period, it may be used to designate the same here. The ministry of

our Lord was such a half period, which was not completed until it had

been supplemented by the gift of the Holy Spirit.

_Ninthly._ After the “three days and a half the Spirit of life from

God” is said to have “entered into” the two witnesses, “and they

stood upon their feet.” This was remarkably fulfilled on the day

of Pentecost, when, by the illumination and inspiration of the Holy

Ghost, the apostles were moved to draw from the law and the prophets

those convincing arguments and promises and appeals which led to the

conversion of thousands.

_Tenthly._ The two witnesses after their resurrection are said to

have “ascended up to heaven” in the presence of their enemies. This

finds its fulfillment in the fact that the Hebrew Scriptures, with the

added life given them by the New Testament, have been accepted by the

Christian Church, not as the exclusive property of the Jewish Church or

as the archives of the Hebrew nation, but as the common heritage of the

world and the canonical word of God to the whole human race.

_Lastly._ The convulsions of nature which are said to have accompanied

the ascent of the witnesses to heaven were exactly fulfilled, as John

could testify, in the events that followed Pentecost――the terror and

alarm of Christ’s enemies, the fear that came upon all, the shaking

as by an earthquake of the place where the disciples were assembled in

prayer, and the rapid increase in numbers of those who were slain of

the Lord and raised to a new spiritual life.

If this explanation of the episode of the two witnesses is correct

the depreciation, or rather, perhaps, under-appreciation of the Old

Testament, which exists even among those who do not question its

inspiration, is without ground or reason. In the opinion of St. John

the addition of the New Testament does not in any wise supersede or

render obsolete the older Scriptures. In the education of the human

race the Creator did not begin with the more abstruse and highly

developed teachings of the New Testament, but with the natural,

biographical, historical, and providential facts of the Old. With

the exception of the evangelical gospels, which belong really to both

dispensations, since the Christ whose life and words and deeds are

there recorded is both the consummation of the one dispensation and the

seed and promise of the other, no part of holy writ exceeds in interest,

attractiveness, and simplicity the law and the prophets, in which John

and Peter and Paul were trained.

The Old Testament contains, albeit in embryo, all doctrines and truths

essential to the kingdom of Christ. If for a while it was kept secreted

within the bounds of Judaism, this was not because its revelations were

meant exclusively for the chosen people, but that its sacred treasures

might be guarded from waste and wanton destruction until the rest

of the world was prepared to welcome them. If much of its meaning

was misconceived and misconstrued by the Jewish mind, this must be

attributed largely to the frailty and ignorance of human nature. The

New Testament does not so much add to the Old Testament as illustrate,

explain, and apply it. It is the interpreter, not the destroyer, of the

Old. It opens its secrets, brings to light its truths, reveals to us

the face of Jesus Christ everywhere in it, and enforces its teachings

by the power of the Holy Spirit. But the Scriptures of the Old

Testament are the imperishable record of the foundation of Christ’s

kingdom upon earth. Without them the writings of the New Testament

would be without connection with that continuous chain of inspiration

whose first link was forged when God said, “Let there be light.”

And, equally so, without the New Testament the Old would be merely a

foundation lacking a superstructure, and thus incomplete. Its chain of

inspiration would be without any sure anchorage in the future eternity,

and thus hang helpless and useless, with no power to bridge the gulf

between the alpha and omega, the beginning of time and its end. But

the Old Testament can never become obsolete. Not one jot or tittle of

it shall pass away until all is fulfilled. And the revelation given in

the New ♦Testament can no more supersede or abolish it than science can

supersede nature, of which it is the ordained expositor.

♦ “Testameut” replaced with “Testament”

There is a healthiness, too, about the Old Testament like to the quiet

restfulness of nature. When men are disposed to wander from the safe

path into the vagaries of mysticism or asceticism nothing will correct

the aberrance more surely than diligent and profound study of its sober

realities and its everyday life. The reading of it calms the fevers

and dispels the illusions to which we are prone. It brings to us those

soothing influences which we feel when we look at the

“Good gigantic smile of the brown old earth

On autumn mornings,”

or, lying under forest shades, watch the gentle swaying of foliage, or

listen to the purling of brooks, or catch glimpses of the calm blue sky.

We need its concrete facts to save us from the abstractions of a vague

and unreal idealism.

Thus closes the vision of the trumpets. They represent the messengers

whom God employs to call men to repentance, the methods he avails

himself of to forward the kingdom within and without us. He will not

cease to strive with us until every appeal likely to reach us has been

tried. When nature and the supernatural, the word of God in providence

and the richer word of God in revelation, have exerted their power

the resources of the divine Being have been, we may with all reverence

say, exhausted, and the time is ripe for the closing of the drama of

probation, that he which is righteous may be righteous still, and he

which is filthy may be filthy still.

Yet the writer of the Revelation does not allow us to remain in doubt

as to the result of God’s efforts to save a lost world. The wisdom

of God is not astray. “He will rest in his love.” He has himself

absolute confidence in the success of the plans of redemption. When

the _seventh_ and last trumpet shall sound the curtain will fall upon

a world restored to God, upon a paradise regained, and great voices in

heaven shall say, “The kingdoms of this world are become the kingdoms

of our Lord, and of his Christ; and he shall reign forever and ever.”

PART IV

The Foes of the Kingdom

PART IV

=The Foes of the Kingdom=

WITH chapter xii another section of the Apocalypse begins. Two great

truths relating to the kingdom of Christ have been discussed――the

fundamental principle of mediatorial sovereignty upon which it is based,

and the instruments, providence and the written word, by which it is

advanced. It follows very naturally and logically that the antagonists

by whom the kingdom is opposed should also be disclosed to us. Out of

his abundant grace and in tender compassion for human ignorance, God

has made known to us, through this marvelous book, the adversaries with

whom we must contend before the kingdom can attain its consummation in

our hearts or in the world at large.

While no part of the Revelation is easy of interpretation, or can be

made intelligible without very careful study both of itself and of the

whole Bible, there has been added to this part of it the embarrassment

of the _odium theologicum_. Bitter controversial strifes have raged

around the interpretation of it and have raised a cloud of prejudices,

through which the truth has been sometimes dimly seen. From all such

prejudices we must free ourselves. We are approaching holy ground, and

it behooves us to put off our shoes, that nothing of human invention

may intervene between our naked feet and the sacred floor of God’s

temple.

We need this caution the more because from the nature of the case the

interpretation of this part carries us more or less into the field of

history. The foes of the kingdom of Christ are visible foes, as well

as invisible. The contest is not only for the individual man, but for

the race. The commission given to the Church is, “Go, preach my Gospel

to every creature;” and the keynote of the song of triumph with which

the last part closed was, “The kingdoms of this world are become the

kingdoms of our Lord, and of his Christ.”

There is, therefore, a tendency to confine the interpretation to the

field of history, to direct the attention to large and collective

bodies of men, either world powers or religious societies, or to those

historical events and cycles of events which have apparently changed

the currents of the ages, and to insist that in these the fulfillment

of the prophecy lies.

But history itself is only the record of individuals. We delude

ourselves when we fancy that by association anything is created. That

mystical something which is imagined to be in collective bodies more

than in the individuals that compose them is a mere figment of the

brain, and to discuss it is simply to revive the barren conceits of the

schoolmen. A Church is only “a congregation of believing men;” a State

is a coöperative association of individuals, not a corporation; and

neither one has any powers or forces other than those which exist in

the individual members. Man is both the microcosm and the macrocosm.

The chief value of the inspired book which we are now studying lies in

the fact that it discloses to us those forces, spiritual and otherwise,

the conflict between which makes up the life history of each individual

of mankind. It is a chart meant for every navigator of this boundless

ocean of human existence. Its truths will be as precious and important

to the last man on this globe as they are to us. The reefs and breakers

it describes are not perils past which any age can sail and then look

back upon as things done with, but dangers which beset every voyager.

It is true that in the history of large bodies of men, whether secular

or religious in their character――in the temptations, declension, growth,

and triumph of nations and Churches――illustrations of its truths and

fulfillments of its predictions will be found. But these, we must

insist, are merely illustrations. Long as the world shall last the

♦Apocalypse will prove itself to be a part of God’s boon of revelation,

in that each follower of Christ shall find it of inestimable value for

his own private guidance, inspiration, and study.

♦ “Apocalyse” replaced with “Apocalypse”

Looking by the light of God’s lamp through the ages to come, John

was allowed to foresee the successful completion of the life work and

plans of Jesus the Saviour. He who began both his gospel and his great

epistle with “the beginning” also follows the course of the drama of

redemption to its final “amen.” The saint who, leaning on the bosom of

Jesus, looked up to him as the Author of his faith was also permitted

to fall at his majestic feet and worship him as its Finisher. And, from

personal communion with and contemplation of him as the Son of man,

he rose to the grander conception of him as the Christ, the Word of

God, King of kings, and Lord of lords. He was taught, also, that the

progress through which his own conceptions of the Son of God had passed

was but a type and example of that which shall take place in time on

the field of the world and in the hearts of mankind. The cross upon

which Jesus of Nazareth suffered was, indeed, a throne from which he

ascended to the crown of the universe. But John, too, saw that ere that

final consummation can be reached there are foes to be encountered,

hindrances to be removed, antagonists to be overthrown. A great and

effectual door is opened unto us, but there are many adversaries. To

the consideration of these he therefore now calls our attention:

1. _The Dragon, or Satan._――The first of the adversaries with whom the

kingdom of Christ has to dispute supremacy is the devil, the archfiend

and enemy of God and man.

That Satan, the evil one, is referred to in the description of the

great red dragon having seven heads, ten horns, and seven diadems seems

an interpretation so natural that it is hardly worth while to seek

for far-fetched meanings when so plausible an explanation lies near at

hand. The ten horns (Zechariah saw but four――Zechariah i, 18) are the

instruments with which he seeks to scatter and destroy the sheep of

God. The seven heads with diadems represent the pride and haughtiness

of spirit in which he boasts that the power and glory of all kingdoms

have been delivered to him and that he gives them to whom he will.

It is a struggle for life and death between him and the Christ. If

Paul, the man of affairs, with his practical conception of things

in their concrete relations, says, “Our wrestling is not against

flesh and blood, but against the principalities, against the powers,

against the world-rulers of this darkness, against the spiritual

hosts of wickedness in the heavenly places” (Revised Version), much

more strongly does John, with his intuition of abstract principles,

recognize and emphasize the power and working of the dark spirit whose

names are Satan and “destroyer.” No writer of the New Testament speaks

oftener or more clearly of the evil spirit than does John. In vivid

imagery and with graphic condensation he sums up the history of the

kingdom of darkness, the long record of Satan’s undying antagonism to

the kingdom of Christ.