natural consecutive order. These divisions are--The seven epistles, i.-iii.—The seven seals, iv.-vii.-The seven trumpets, viii. 2; ix.--The reformation, x.-xiii.-The seven vials, xiv-xviii. 24.-The second advent, xix.-And the judgment, xx., xxi., xxii. But, while we regard all these visions as applicable to the universal Church, they are not to be regarded as equally applicable to all classes in the Church; for some of the visions are seen in heaven and are in the hands of Christ, and these belong to those that are Christ'sthat is, to the spiritual portion of the Church. Other visions are in the hands of angels, and are seen either in presence of the golden altar when they refer to the visible Church, or in the outer court when they relate to the world.

The first and second visions both belong to the spiritual portion of the Church, because both are in the hands of Christ. He holds the stars in his right hand in the first vision; and he alone is worthy to take the book and to loose the seals thereof in the second; and both are only the corresponding halves of one spiritual truth-namely, the vital union subsisting between Christ and the members of his body, although he is in heaven and we are on the earth. In the first vision he is represented as spiritually present with us, though he is really and personally in heaven. In the second, we are represented as spiritually risen with him, although the literal resurrection will not take place until the harvest, which is the end of the world and the second advent.

The second vision has its subject presented to us in the fourth chapter, as that subject would appear in the abstract, apart from all time and circumstance; but such as we may suppose it to be in the mind and purpose of God. We there behold the throne of the divine majesty encircled by the redeemed, renewed after the image of him that created them, and therefore nearest the throne; and around them the innumerable company of angels rejoicing in the accomplished will of God, as it shall stand complete through all eternity, never to experience a second fall; and we hear the glory of it all ascribed to God, who hath created all things, and for whose pleasure they are and were created. Then, in the fifth and sixth chapters, we are shown the successive steps or stages through which the Church will have to pass in attaining to this its predestined glory and dignity, as redeemed by the blood of the Lamb and made kings and priests unto God, in order to reign with Christ on the earth. And lastly, in the seventh chapter, we are shown who they are that shall attain this final triumph; it is such as have the seal of God on their

foreheads which denotes holiness to the Lord, and such as have come out of the great tribulation, and have washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb. Therefore, are they before the throne of God and serve him day and night in his temple (vii. 15).

The seals being thus understood, as denoting the spiritual condition of the Church and as foreshadowing the consequences of its spiritual declension, become capable of a consistent interpretation, running exactly parallel with the spiritual declensions which are reproved in the seven epistles, and also strictly conformable with the facts recorded in history.

The white colour of the first horse denotes the purity of the primitive Church; and the bow and other symbols denote the power, and prevalency, and triumphs of the early Church, while it retained its primitive integrity. This is the oldest sense attached to the symbol of the bow-as in Job xxix. 20:-"My glory was fresh in me, and my bow was renewed in my hand." Or still earlier in Jacob's blessing on Joseph, Gen. xlix. 24:-"The archers have sorely grieved him, and shot at him, and hated him; but his bow abode in strength, and the arms of his hands were made strong by the hands of the mighty God of Jacob." The Church is called the spouse of Christ and the bride of the Lamb. And St. Paul says, "I have espoused you to one husband that I may present you as a chaste virgin to Christ" (2 Cor. xi. 2). And "a virtuous woman is a crown to her husband" (Prov. xii. 4). And God reproving Israel by his prophet says, "I put a jewel on thy forehead, and earrings in thy ears, and a beautiful crown upon thine head" (Ezek. xvi. 12). But on the con

trary the absence of the crown in the following seals shows that this first glory is departed. As Job saith (xix. 9)—“ He hath stripped me of my glory, and taken the crown from my head."

The Church is represented, in the twelfth chapter, as a woman clothed with the sun, the moon under her feet, and on her head a crown of twelve stars-denoting the twelve apostles. The crown of the first seal limits it, therefore, to the apostolic age; and the first of the seven epistles is the only one in which apostles are mentioned, and the Church of Ephesus is commended for rejecting false apostles, while she is reproved for having left her first love. We would neither limit the apostolic age to the time when there had been no departure from the faith, nor extend it to the time when there were no apostles remaining; but would make it terminate at

the commencement of the first of the ten persecutions, or that of Nero, A.D. 66, when St. Peter and St. Paul suffered martyrdom.

St. James asks, "From whence come wars and fightings among you? Come they not hence, even of your lusts that war in your members ?" (iv.) The red horse of the second seal denotes fleshiness, which, causing strife, produced bloodshed, both within and without the Church; and the best definition of the time which this seal covers is the ten persecutions, beginning with that of Nero, A.D. 66, terminating with that of Diocletian, A D. 303-313. And this view of the time is corroborated by the second epistle, which threatens the Church with a ten days' tribulation (ii. 10), in reference to the ten persecutions; and which intimates that the Church has lost its present crown, and promises a crown of life to the faithful at the coming of the Lord.

The black horse of the third seal indicates a still further declension, or rather the introduction and maintenance of positive error, for black is the opposite of white; and thus the Gospel was represented as light arising in the midst of heathen darkness, and to them that sat in the region of the shadow of death (Mat. iv. 16). Now, on the other hand, the heathen darkness is allowed to creep over and extinguish the light of the Church, so as to bring on those dire chastisements which ensued under the next seal, and introduce those centuries of ignorance and crime which have been characterised as the "the dark ages." This seal comprehends the period of time between the accession of Constantine, A.D. 306, and the death of Theodosius, A.D. 395. Constantine put an end to the persecutions and made Christianity the religion of the empire; but these worldly advantages were more than counter-balanced by the ambition which it raised among prelates, and the flattery of those in power, and turning godliness to gain, which it fostered; so that simony was extensively practised, and those who had purchased an office in the Church did not scruple in turning it to profit by selling those spiritual gifts which Christ had bestowed without money and without price. And this was not all; for Arian and Gnostic heresies abounded within the Church, and heathen practices were introduced from without, which soon corrupted faith and morals altogether; so that men, like Eusebius, lost the sense of truth in flattering those in power; and others, like Jerome, openly maintained the lawfulness of deceit-falsitas dispensativa-if the interests of the Church could be thereby advanced.

Jeremiah wails over the corruptions of Israel and the judgments which came upon them in consequence, saying, "How is the gold become dim! How is the most fine gold changed! Her Nazarites were purer than snow: they were whiter than milk their visage is blacker than a coal; they are not known in the streets." "The Lord hath accomplished his fury; he hath poured out his fierce anger, for the sins of her prophets, and the iniquities of her priests, that have shed the blood of the just in the midst of her" (Lam. iv).

Nazarites were separated from the world and consecrated to God, and such was the calling of the Church; but, by wedding herself to the world, she soon became defiled, mercenary, darkened, and idolatrous; and of this again we find distinct intimations in the corresponding_epistle, which is that to the Church in Pergamos (ii. 12). For this Church is spoken of as dwelling where Satan's seat is; but Satan had given his seat to the Roman beast (xiii. 2): therefore, it indicates the time when the Church was acknowledged by Constantine. But the Church is reproved for holding the doctrine of Balaam whose sin was covetousness, and he taught the heathen king how to seduce the children of Israel to idolatry; and this typifies the very kind of sins into which the Church fell, through covetousness and sinful accommodation to heathen manners and practices, in the fourth century.

We conceive that in a symbolical book everything ought to be interpretated symbolically-nothing literally; and, whether the symbol in the hand of the rider be regarded as a yoke or a balance, it will equally be applicable; and we prefer entertaining both senses-the yoke as indicative of the bondage into which the Church was then brought-the balances as denoting the spirit of huckstering and barter which then came in. And we do not admit a literal application of the voice from the throne to wheat and barley, oil and wine; but think that it is meant to declare that there would be then a trafficking in the spiritual food of the Church; but that notwithstanding this, grace and life, denoted by oil and wine, should not utterly fail among the children of God.

The fourth seal, with its livid horse, having death for a rider, and followed by hell, presents the most fearful combination of terrific images that has ever been set before the mind of man; and it is the time when God sends upon the earth his four sore judgments, to cut off from it man and beast (Ezek. xiv. 21). This seal must, therefore, be referred to a time when enormous wickedness, the counterpart of the cadaverous horse and death and hell, was perpetrated in the Church; and

when as the consequence thereof God's four sore judgments were brought upon the earth.

Dr. Robertson, in his "History of Charles V.," says, "If a man were called on to fix upon a period in the history of the world......the most calamitous, it would be that from the death of Theodosius to the establishment of the Lombards." And this is the time which, led by other considerations, we fix upon as the period of the fourth seal. The imagery serves to remind us of the language in Isaiah:-" Hear the word of the Lord, ye scornful men, that rule this people. Because ye have said, We have made a covenant with death, and with hell are we at agreement; when the overflowing scourge shall pass through, it shall not come unto us; for we have made lies our refuge and under falsehood have we hid ourselves therefore, thus saith the Lord God, Behold, I lay in Zion for a foundation, a stone, a tried stone, a precious corner stone, a sure foundation: he that believeth shall not make haste. Judgment also will I lay to the line, and righteousness to the plummet; and the hail shall sweep away the refuge of lies, and the waters shall overflow the hiding place."

It was in the year 395 that Theodosius died, and at that time. the preposterous idolatry of departed saints and their relics, which had long worked as leaven in the hearts of the people, became flagrant and open. Martin of Tours and Paulinus of Nola became the chief instruments of introducing this idolatry in the West, as we learn from Vigilantius who spent some time with the latter in 394, and who was afterwards so scurrilously abused by Jerome for finding fault with the heathen practices introduced by Paulinus and the excesses to which this superstition led.

Christ the Mediator of the new covenant was set aside by this means, and a covenant with death and the grave pretended and palmed off upon an ignorant and credulous multitude. The smallest fragment of the dead body of a saintnay, the least shred of the rags he had worn-was supposed to possess greater efficacy than prayer addressed to the risen Lord, who ever liveth to make intercession for us at the right hand of the Father. They never paused to consider how it was possible for one individual man to be present in so many different places as the fragments of his dead body were supposed to hallow and endow with miraculous power. But, having made lies their refuge, and falsehood their hiding place, were given over to judicial blindness, as if utterly brutalized and bereft of reason.