►1';' "^1 ,r,f> '>'0V vr m ■;«f/.» ;^:: 11^^ r iWi'-'''.--- ^s^ l^li M PRINCETON, N. J. Division,, Section ..M..^Z^.J....i^.' " ) Shelf Number ( A) qlt "1 ImM €fte Uijaiinng of tf)e Epocalgp^e anJr ti)eir Hejsssong. THE VISIONS OF THE APOCALYPSE AND THEIR LESSONS. BEING THE DONNELLAN LECTURES FOR 189I-92, PREACHED BEFORE THE UNIVERSITY OF DUBLIN IN TRINITY COLLEGE CHAPEL. BY THOS. LUCAS SCOTT, B.D., RECTOR OF S. GEORGE's PARISH, AND CANON OF S. PATRICK'S CATHEDRAL, DUBLIN. AUTHOR OF "a TALK ABOUT BISHOPS," ETC. Hoiitron : SKEFFINGTON & SON, PICCADILLY. 1893- Olontentg. PREFACE PAGE i. Chapter I. THE NATURE OF PROPHECY i n. THE CHARACTER OF S. JOHN AND OF HIS WRITINGS ... ... ... ... 25 /^ Lecture I. THE CHARACTER AND CONTENTS OF THE APOCALYPSE 59 \ II. THE FRONTISPIECE TO THE APOCALYPSE 76 III. THE BATTLE OF ALMIGHTY GOD; BEING THE VISIONS OF THE SEALS, THE TRUMPETS, AND THE VIALS ... ... 92 IV. THE ENEMY'S TACTICS, OR THE VISION OF THE DRAGON, THE WILD BEASTS, AND THE LAMB... ... ... ... 114 V. THE COADJUTOR AND NUMBER AND MARK OF THE WILD BEAST 136 vi. PAGE Lecture VI. THE FOUR EPISODES OF CONSOLATION IN THE SEVENTH, TENTH, ELEVENTH, FOURTEENTH, AND FIFTEENTH CHAP- TERS 155 VII. THE DESTRUCTION OF THE ENEMY AND THE TRIUMPH OF THE CHURCH ... 176 VIII. THE GREAT CITIES, OR BABYLON AND JERUSALEM THE OUTCOMES OF THE CHURCH OF CHRIST ... ... ... 198 OUTLINE OF THE APOCALYPSE ... ... ... 220 PROLOGUE... ... .. ... ... ... ... 223 Part I. THE FRONTISPIECE ... ... ... ... 227 „ II. THE MAIN BODY OF THE APOCALYPSE ... 234 „ III. THE CONCLUSION OF THE APOCALYPSE ... 260 EPILOGUE ... ... ... ... ... ... ... 266 Note A. Schools of Interpretation ... ... ... ... 268 ,, B. The Symbolism of Numbers ... ... ... ... 272 ,, C. Bossuet on S. Augustine's Interpretation of the Apocalypse 275 ,, D. Prophecy and Prediction ... ... ... ... 277 ,, E. Broken constructions in the Greek of the Apocalypse ... 278 ,, F. Canon Westcott on the Structure of the Gospel and First Epistle ... ... ... ... ... ... 279 ,, G. Bossuet on the Character of the Apocalypse ... ... 283 Vll. Note H. Archbishop Trench on the First Three Chapters I. The Theories of Vischer and Voher J. S. John's Triplets K. The Cherubim and Crowned Presbyters L. On Seals and Sealing ... M. Visions of Nebuchadnezzar, Daniel, and S. John N. The Neronian Interpretation of the Wild Beast w Heads and Ten Horns O. The Number of the Wild Beast P. The Millennium, or Reign of a Thousand Years.. Q. Babylon R. The Heavenly Jerusalem th Seven PAGE 286 287 289 291 295 302 303 312 319 331 334 LIST AND SPECIFICATIONS OF EDITIONS OF BOOKS MADE USE OF. Alford (Henry), D.D. "Commentary on New Testament." Rivingtons, iS6i. Arnold (Thomas), D.D. " Sermons." B. Fellows, 1850. AuBERLEN (C. A.). "Daniel and the Revelation." T. T. Clark, 1856. Augustine. "Civitas Dei." See English Trans. "City of God." Griffith (sf Farran. Barnes (Alfred). " Notes, Explanatory and Practical, on the Book of Revelation." Knight c5- Son, 1852. Bed^ Venerabilis. " Opera Omnia." Vol. xii. Whittaker & Co., 1844. Bengel. " Gnomon Novi Testamenti." Tubingce, 1855. Bleek. " Vorlesungen iiber d Apok. (English Trans.) T. T. Clark, 1875. Bossuet (Eveque). " L'Apocalypse avec une Explication." CEuvres de Bossuet, Tome iii. Versailles, 1815. Boyd-Carpenter (Bishop). "A New Testament Commentary for English Readers," Edited by Bishop Ellicott. Cassell, Fetter, Galpin &> Co., 1883. Brown (David). "Christ's Second Coming, Will it be Pre-Millennial ? " 1846. ,, ,, "The Apocalypse, Its Structure and Primary Predictions." Hodder &> Stoughton, 1891. Burgh (Rev. Wm.). " The Apocalypse Unfulfilled." Dublin, 1833. CoRNELii CoRNELii A Lapide. " Commentarius in Acta Apostolorum, Epistolas Canonicas et Apocalypsin." Venetiis, 1740 Gumming (Rev. J.), D.D. " Apocalyptic Sketches." London : Arthur Hall. CuRREY (Rev. G.), D.D. " S.P.C.K. Commentary." 1889. Davison (John), B.D. " Discourses on Prophecy." (Sixth Edition.) Parker, 1856. X. Elliott (E. B.), A.M. " Horae Apocalypticae." (Third Edition.) Seeley, 1847. Expositor, The. Hodder &> Stoughton. Fairbairn (Patrick), D.D. " Ezekiel and the Book of his Prophecy." (Second Edition.) T. T. Clafk, 1855. ,, ,, " Prophecy viewed in respect to its Distinctive Character, its Special Function and Proper Interpretation/' (Second Edition.) Clark, 1865. "The Typology of Scripture." (Third Edition.) Clark, 1857. Farrar (Ven. F. W.), D.D. *'The Early Days of Christianity." (Popular Edition.) Cassell, 1889. Garratt (Samuel), M.A. "A Commentary on the Revelation of S. John." Seeley, 1866. Gebhardt (Pastor Hermann). "The Doctrine of the Apocalypse" (Engl. Trans.) Clark, 1878. Gloag (Paton J.), D.D. "Introduction to the Johannine Writings." Nisbet, 1 89 1. GoDET (F.), D.D. " Studies on the New Testament." Translated by Hon. and Rev. W. H. Lyttleton. Hodder (S* StongJiton, 1876. Grattan Guinness (H.). '* The Approaching End of the Age," (Seventh Edition). Hodder &• Stoughton, 1881. Hengstenberg (E.W.). "The Revelation of S. John." (Engl. Trans.) T. T. Clark, 1851. Huntixgford (Rev. Edward), D.C.L. "A Practical Interpretation of the Revelation of S. John the Divine; being a Revised Edition of the Voice of the Last Prophet." Bickers <&• So?i, London, 1871. Irving (Rev. Edward). " Babylon and Infidelity foredoomed of God." Chalmers, Glasgow, 1826. Keith (Alexander), D.D. " Evidence of the Truth of the Christian Religion," derived from the literal fulfilment of prophecy. Nelson &- So7ts, 1859. Lange (John Peter), D.D. "Commentary on the Holy Scriptures." Vol. X. T. T. Clark. Layard. " Nineveh and Babylon." (Abridged.) Murray, i^by XI. Lee (Ven ), D.D. " The Revelation of S. John." Speaker's Commentary New Test. Vol. iv. Murray, 1881. LiGHTFOOT (Bishop J. B.). " S. Paul's Epistle to the Galatians." (Third Edition.) Macmillan, 1869. ,, " Cambridge Sermons." Macmillan, i8go. Maitland (Charles). "Apostolic School of Prophetic Interpretation." Longman, 1849. Maitland (Rev. Brownlow). "Argument from Prophecy." S.P.C.K., 1877. Maurice (Rev. F. D.). " Lectures on the Apocalypse." (Second Edition.) Macmillan, 1885. MiLLiGAN (Professor William). "The Revelation of S. John." (Baird Lectures.) Macmillan, 1886. ,, ,, " Book of Revelation." Expositor's Bible. Hodder cS- Stoughton, 1889. ,. ,, "Commentary on the New Testa- ment." Edited by Schaff. Vol. iv. "Revelation of S. John." Clarh, 1883. ,, ., " Discussions on the Apocalypse." Macmillan, 1893. " Opened Book " (The). By W.A.B. Hodges 6- Smith, Dublin, 1865. Pastorini, Sig. (Abp. Walmesley). "The General History of the Christian Church, chiefly deduced from the Apocalypse of S. John." Fifth American Edition. Sadlier, New York, 1851. Pulpit Comnientary. "Revelation." Kegan Paul, Trejich, &' Co., 1890. PusEY (Rev. E. B.). " Daniel the Prophet." (Second thousand.) Parker, 1864. "The Minor Prophets, with a Commentary." (Eleventh thousand.) Parker, 1869. Rosetti Christina. " On the Face of the Deep." S.P.C.K., 1892. Salmon (Rev. Wm.), D.D. " Introduction to the New Testament." (Fifth Edition.) Murray, iSgi. Seiss (Joseph A.), D.D. "The Apocalypse, or Prophecies of the Revelation." Christian Herald Office. XII. SiMCOX (Rev. W. H.). "The Revelation of S. John the Divine." Cam- bridge Bible for Schools. iSgo. Smith (Rev. Wm.). " Dictionary of the Bible." Murray, 1863. Stanley (Very Rev. A. P.). " History of the Jewish Church." (Seventh Edition.) Murray, 1877. Stier (Rudolph). " The Words of the Risen Saviour." Clark, 1859. ,, ,, "The Words of the Angels." Strahan, 1862. Stuart (Professor Moses). "A Commentary on the Apocalypse." Maclachlan, Stewart &' Co., Edinburgh, 1847. Todd (Jas. Henthorn), D.D. •* Six Discourses on the Prophecies relating to Antichrist in the Apocalypse of S. John." Dublin, 1846. Trench (Archbishop). "Commentary on the Epistles to the Seven Churches in Asia." Parker, 1861. Trommius (Abraham). " Concordantise Grsecae in Septuaginta Interpretes." Amsterdam, 171 8. Vaughan (Very Rev. C. J.). ** Lectures on the Revelation of S. John." (Third Edition.) Macmillan, 1870. Vischer (Eberhardt). " Die Offenbarung Jiidische Apokalypse in Christlicher Bearbeitung ; mit einem Nachwort von a Harnack." 1886. Westcott (Bishop B. F.) "Commentary on S. John's Gospel." Speaker's Commentary. Vol. ii. Murray, 1880. ,, ,, " The Epistles of S. John." M acmi ilan, i8S^. Williams (Isaac), B.D. " The Apocalypse, with Notes and Reflections." Rivington, 1852. Wordsworth (Bishop Christopher). " Lectures on the Apocalypse." (Hulsean Lectures.) Rivington, 1849. ,, ,, "Commentary on the Greek Testament." Rivington, 1872. Wodter (Martin). " Dilucidatio Quaestionum in Apocalypsin." Preface. NEW Commentary on the Apocalypse in this nineteenth century, suggesting a new system of interpretation, ought not to secure purchasers. But an attempt (such as this is) to call back the readers of the English Bible from modern misinterpretations engendered by religious controversies, and to set before them the earliest of all the explanations of this book, may awake some interest, even if it seem to them to be a novelty. And, if there are any who have grown suspicious of all attempts to explain these visions, and suspicious even of the book itself, the autobiography of a student, who once shared those suspicions but now loves this book above all others, may help them to appreciate the interpretation taught by S. Augustine and embodied in the Commentary of the Venerable Bede. Such a history of personal enquiry may be thought egotistical, but it seems the simplest form in which the arguments for the devotional study of the Apocalypse can be expressed ; and being placed as a Preface, can be omitted (as a Preface usually is) by those who wish to examine at once the treatment offered in these Lectures. I begin then with my own first attempt to interpret the Apocalypse, which was made in my school-days, and was neither elaborate nor profound. ii. ^rtfacf. During the hour set apart on Sundays for theme- writing and other tasks, I whiled away the time by looking at some very confident notes on the last pages of my small annotated Bible. I read there that the 1260 days allotted by S. John to the sway of the wild beast meant 1260 years, and were to be counted from the year A.D. 606, when the Bishop of Rome was first called *' Universal Bishop." I was pleased to find that I was, even at that early age, capable of the addition which shewed that this period would end in the year 1866. I was greatly excited by this discovery, and comparing this note with others of a like character, I proceeded at last to write down the prediction that the world would come to an end in the year 1866. This important document I signed, dated, folded up, wafered, and gave to my next neighbour, with a written direction that it was not to be opened until the year 1866. What was to be the result of this, if my schoolfellow preserved the document, and remembered to open it in the appointed year and before the expected conflagration had begun ; or what particular good my prediction (if it proved correct) would do for him or for anyone else, I am afraid I never considered. Yet I suppose that there are some interpreters of prophecy who could suggest some moral or spiritual benefit which such lucky hits are cal- culated to convey. For there certainly has been a wide- spread impression that the perfection of prophecy, and the perfection of a commentary on this book of prophecy, would be that it should enable its students to tell before- hand the dates of future events, or at least shew afterwards that those events had been predicted. ^cljoolsl of Ifuterpnttrs;. iii. As well as I can now remember, it was not until the year 1855 that I began to examine with any care the Revelation of S. John ; and then it was much in the spirit of my first childish attempt. For I was fascinated by the plausibility and confidence of Dr. Cumming's predictions, and carried about with me the pale blue volumes of his *' Apocalyptic Sketches," finding in them much pleasanter though more secular reading than in any commentary upon any other book of the New Testament. After my ordination in 1858 I became more seriously interested in the study, and hearing that Dr. Gumming owed all his theories to Mr. Elliott's " Horae Apocalypticae," I bought the four large volumes of this work, and had my eyes opened to the largeness of the literature upon the subject, and to the classification of all commentators in the three well-known Schools: — i. The Praeterists, who refer all the predictions to the fall of the Roman Empire and the first centuries of the Christian Church. 2. The Historic School, which sees the continuous history of the Church's most important incidents depicted, from S. John's day down to the end of the present dispensation. 3. The Futurists, who refer all the symbols to a short space immediately preceding the Second Advent of our Lord.* Soon afterwards the last volume of Dean Alford's Greek Testament, though to a considerable extent working on the same system as Mr. Elliott, suggested doubts of the infallibility of the method adopted by the Historic School. An uncomfortable suspicion was created that each inter- preter found in the Apocalypse stern warnings against * See Appendix, Note A, "Schools of Interpretation." iv. ^rrface. those whose doctrines and practices he disHked, but no disasters or judgments for himself or for those with whom he sympathized. And I could not but see that the pages of most of these writers were more like the pages of a secular history than of a commentary on the Bible ; and that, if they were right, a minute knowledge of European history and a knack of solving difficult conundrums would be better helps to the interpretation of the Apocalypse than a devout spirit and a knowledge of the other Scrip- tures. The Futurists and Praeterists certainly escaped from some of these difficulties, but presented no sufficient practical purpose for such a Revelation as this. Under the pressure of these thoughts the conviction slowly forced itself upon me that, if any of these inter- preters were right, if theirs was the system on which the Apocalypse was intended to be explained, then it had no right to a place in the Canon of Holy Scripture. For S. Paul's statement was unmistakeable — ** Every Scripture inspired by God is also profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness, that the man of God may be complete, completely furnished unto every good work." (2 Tim. iii. 16, 17.) None of these four objects seemed to me to be even attempted in this book, understood as I had been trying to understand it. The dilemma was too serious to be ignored. I found myself thus (about the year 1863) more than doubtful of the soundness of any method of interpretation I had yet seen, whether Prseterist, Futurist, or of the Historic School, and at the same time entirely unable to conceive of any other. Yet, most happily for myself, I felt no temptation to throw the book on one side as worthless, iBrfbatc ^tutJu. v. but took it up once more with no conviction about it but this — that there were two distinct questions to be solved : First, What are the visions which S. John says he saw ? Secondly, What lessons did he intend these visions to teach ? I thought that very probably I might never be able to answer the second question, but I was quite certain that any ordinary reader ought to be able to answer the first. I therefore dismissed from my mind as far as possible all speculations about the meaning, and set myself the task of discovering the visions which the book contained and the order in which they were arranged. Over and over again I read them and tried to tabulate them, making many and varying schemes of arrangement, all based upon a preconceived idea that they were certainly to be grouped in sets of " three," or *' seven," or " twelve." For, like every other reader of S. John's writings, I had been impressed with his strong affection for these suggestive numbers.* In this way I became perfectly familiar with the words of the Apocalypse, and soon became aware of the fact that few (if any) of his figures were original, for I found in figure after figure, phrase after phrase, reproductions of Old Testament words and symbols. And by following up this clue I found my knowledge of the whole Bible enlarged by my attempt to know well this one book. This discovery suggested to me that I might have to know all the rest of the Bible in order to know this, and yet that I might not be able to read the inner meaning of the rest, unless I attained to the understanding of this, * Appendix, Note B, " Symbolism of Numbers." vi. preface. which seemed to be the key-stone of the whole edifice. For (as I afterwards read in Isaac WiUiams' notes) '' the Apocalypse fills every passage of the Old Testament with life, and makes the whole of Scripture harmonious and complete, crowning, and perfecting, and bringing it home to us with universal application, as altogether divine. Without it the Scriptures themselves were as a house without a roof. In it the old Law lives again in a new and spiritual life, not embalmed and laid with reverential care aside in the grave, but arisen from the dead and alive for evermore like its own Divine Master."* Thus the Apocalypse re-established itself to my mind as indeed an integral part of Holy Scripture. At this stage of my enquiry I confided my difficulties to a near relative of my own, the Rev. George Scott, whom all my life I had been taught to reverence ; one to whose religious influence I owe more than I can ever tell, more (I am sure) than I am myself aware of, one to whom I still look back as to the holiest man I have ever known. His long ministry of sixty-five years was entirely spent in two small country parishes in the Diocese of Derry, but his name was honoured and his influence felt throughout the length and breadth of Ireland. He loved the study of the Bible above all other things on earth, and he warmly encouraged my interest in this particular book of it, and taught me to search it with the one object which alone he felt to be worthy of it, the desire of obtaining from it (not knowledge of dates or events, but) a deeper knowledge both of God and of my own heart, and so *"The Apocalypse with Notes and Reflections," by the Rev. Isaac Williams. Preface, p. vi. Mv. 33atter5l)p'^ fHetf)otr. vii. higher motives and better helps for the service of God. In furtherance of this he brought me into frequent conversations with one whose abihty, scholarship, know- ledge of the Bible, and extensive reading he himself strongly reverenced. This was the late Rev. William Alexander Battersby, who gave me those clues to the interpretation of this book, which for twenty-eight years I have never ceased to hold, and which seem to me to be certain of acceptance whenever they are fairly considered. The first was his observation that the Apocalypse has three great divisions, viz., a beginning, a middle, and an ending; and that the landmark between the central and concluding portions of the book is the point of time at which S. John first falls down at the feet of the angel to worship him, thinking that the entire series has now ended. (Rev. xix. 10.) The second was his postulate that this book is given not to teach " times and seasons which the Father hath put in His own power," but to shew things : and yet not so much in order to tell things as to shew them, (that is) to open out their true character, so that whenever or wherever we meet them, we shall recognize them to be what they are in God's sight ; and further, that this Revelation is given to shew things specially to the servants of jfesus Christ for the sake of their service, and therefore again to shew such things only as are calculated to help them in serving Christ. He found this distinctly stated in the very title of the book itself, which is — " The Revelation of Jesus Christ which God gave unto Him, to shew unto His servants things which must shortly come to pass." And he found viii. ^Pvfface. there also the further statement that, because this Revelation has this intensely practical and religious object, therefore it expresses itself in signs, which are necessarily more full and instructive than words could be, and in signs taken not from secular usage, but from the Old Testament Scriptures, that they may be intelligible to the servants of Jesus Christ, though hidden from the world which does not know the Scriptures.* This teaching the reader will find embodied in my first Lecture. Under this new light my reading of the Apocalypse became as devotional as that of all the rest of Scripture, because I studied it in order to understand the great battle of Almighty God, the warfare which the Church of God is everywhere and always fighting against all the powers of darkness ; the fight which is always close to us, and for which each servant of Jesus Christ is an enlisted soldier. Now I was able to appreciate the intensely personal character of the appeals made continually in this book — ** He that hath an ear, let him hear what the Spirit saith unto the Churches." " Here is the faith and patience of the saints," etc. Now also I was in a position to utilize all the labours of all interpreters of all schools, in no way staggered by their divergence from one another, of which so many complain. For if their so-called interpretations are really only applications and illustrations of the prin- ciples which this book teaches, then their extraordinary variety only increases the confidence with which we accept the principles. Students of history and theological controversialists, * "The Opened Book," by W. A. B. ?^t£(toncal Hlusitrationg of 3^vopf)tcv. ix. whatever their point of view, can always find such startling illustrations of the principles which S. John unfolds, that each thinks his particular illustrations are pointed enough to have been the only subjects of the visions, and that we need look no further for their explanation. But, confidently as one class of writers point to the Emperor Nero as exhausting all that S. John saw in the wild beast rising out of the sea, another class declare with equal confidence that it means nothing more or less than the Bishop of Rome, or the Roman branch of the Christian Church of v/hich this bishop is the ruler and representative. And others again have contended that it is Napoleon Bonaparte, or one of the Napoleons. How- ever clearly one interpreter thinks that he has proved the woman seated upon the beast to be the ancient pagan empire of Rome, another is prepared with a proof quite as conclusive that it is the modern ecclesiastical Rome ; while a third from an opposite point of view shews that it represents the confused mass of Protestant sects, the confusion which rules the world that is outside the one Catholic Church. One believes that he has demonstrated that the great swarm of locusts in the ninth chapter must mean the Mahometan invasion of the south of Europe ; another thinks that he has shewn past the possibility of doubt that it unquestionably means the plague of Lutheranism and all the swarms of false doctrine which Luther's fall from the Church has started out of the bottomless pit. A third points to the swarms of superstitions and teachers of superstition which the fallen Bishop of Rome has let loose upon the world. X. ^Preface. None of these can be properly described as having found these interpretations in the Apocalypse. They have brought their previous convictions to the book and have read them into its symbols, as the various listeners to a burst of music that expresses strong emotion, will read into it the incidents that, in their present attitude and with their present temperament, would have roused in them the emotions with which alone the music is concerned. One finds in it the description of a battle, another hears the thunder and sees the lightning of a mountain storm, and a third hears a lovers' quarrel. What are we to infer from such divergent interpretations? Are we to argue that they are all wrong in their interpre- tations ? or that music expresses no emotion of any kind ? or that all symbols are unexpressive and un- instructive ? Futurists do indeed argue in this way, for they tabulate the various interpretations that have been given by writers of the Praeterist and Historic Schools, and cite these as proofs that if the visions have any definite meaning, they cannot have had any fulfilment as yet, but must have been intended for events that are still future. But Bishop Boyd Carpenter is a representative of those who look more thoughtfully at this book and at the applica- tions that have been made of its symbols. He sees in these strangely various illustrations so many independent proofs that the words of the seer are " not exhausted in one or even in many fulfilments ; " so many proofs that we are being presented in this book with the key that unlocks all the mysteries of God's dealing, and that the straggle depicted here is that great struggle which, " be ^ ^tiitJcnt*!^ iSi^appointnunt^. xi. the stage the human soul with its fluctuations of doubt and fear, of hope and love, or the progress of kingdoms, or the destinies of the world, is the same struggle in all." * Certainly these discoveries were accompanied by appar- ent losses ; for I found myself compelled to renounce all my childish expectations of being able to pose as a fore- teller of events. But such a loss will be recognized by everyone as a moral gain. And a little thought will shew that it raises instead of lowering the character and position of this prophecy ; exactly as an astronomical treatise would rise in value if its readers discovered that it was not (what they at first supposed) a mere calendar of eclipses, but an exposition of the laws which regulate the movements of the heavenly bodies. If the Apocalypse be (what some have supposed it) a collection of hieroglyphics, depicting in intricate symbols for the exercise of Christian ingenuity, events which might have been as easily des- cribed in simpler terms, then its value is small. When once the conundrums have been solved and the solutions discovered, the book that contains them may be laid aside. But if it be (what the earliest commentators sup- posed it to be) a revelation of the great principles on which move all the events of private and public life, then it is a book of everlasting value ; and those who neglect it lose not only the holy influence of the Spirit that breathes in it, but also a divine help to the discovery of what is (and what is not) on the side of God. Again I found myself, as I advanced in the knowledge of this book, compelled to surrender some arguments * Bp. Ellicott's Commentary. Introduction to the Revelation of S. John, p. 528. xii. ^refacf. which I had been in the habit of advancing in defence of Church music, Church Hturgies, and details of Church ritual. The plausibility and weakness of these may be illustrated by a story which (whether true or not) circu- lated in the North of Ireland, at a time when a controversy as to the use of musical instruments in Christian worship was raging in the Presbyterian General Assembly. " You must admit " — said one of the advocates for the use of instruments — ''You must certainly admit that we are to have instruments in Heaven ; for S. John saw that the four-and-twenty Elders before the throne of God had every one of them harps." " Certainly," said his opponent, ** but you have forgotten that every one who had a harp in one hand was made to hold a golden bowl full of odours in the other, so that it was impossible for him to use his harp." The retort was quite worthy of the argument, for the outward and visible in these visions do not signify outward actions, but ideas only, or emotions, or principles. And we can hardly imagine any simpler symbols than golden harps to express perfect praise, or sweet-smelling incense to express the sweetness of worship, or silent prostration to express the profoundest adoration. The fact that those symbols were well fitted to express these ideas is a sufficient explanation of their use ; and we may well suppose that the harmony which the golden harps of the 144,000 who were with the Lamb suggest, is not merely one of outward sound, but the moral harmony of ** spirits, souls, and bodies," all in perfect tune with the will of God, *' a new song" which only the Master's training can fully teach, and therefore "a song which .ifurtfjer iSt'fiiappomtmnit^. xiii. none can sing but those who are redeemed out of the earth." (Rev. xiv. i-6.) Another imaginary loss was the displacement of argu- ments drawn from some of the symbols and some of the expressions in this book, which I had used in attempts to silence those who hoped for a reformation beyond the grave, of souls that had not made their peace with God before they died. But it is certainly a large gain to have raised this book out of the atmosphere of controversy, and to be in a position to invite all, of all schools of thought, to study its vivid pictures of the shame and danger of taking the side of that evil which shall assuredly be crushed in a final and overwhelming catastrophe, and its pictures of the certain triumph of the Lamb of God over all that opposes His holy and loving purposes. More valuable still is the destruction of arguments with which this book has long been supposed to be richly stored, being in truth treated as a very armoury of controversial weapons, a very dictionary of contro- versial epithets, against our ecclesiastical and theological opponents. More than almost any other motive the desire to mortify and sting opponents has been the inspiration of the interpretations of the modern Historic School. Until the middle of the twelfth century the moral and spiritual teaching of the book had been the predominating aim of all students, with only passing applications to local matters. But in 1130 a.d. the fancy of the thoughtless was caught by S. Bernard's felicitous (?) application of S. John's image of the world to Peter Leo, who under the title of Anacletus IL occupied the Vatican, and whom xiv. ^^rtfart. S. Bernard opposed in the interests of Innocentius. ''That wild beast of the Apocalypse " (he said) " to whom has been given a mouth speaking blasphemies, and (power) to make war with the saints, occupies the chair of S. Peter as a lion prepared for the prey .... He has the daring (and I say it with tears) as an enemy of the Cross of Christ to drive from their places the saints who will not worship the beast who has opened his mouth in blasphemies to blaspheme God's name." (S. Bernard, Epist. cxxiv., cxxv., cxxvi.) It is evident that S. Bernard was (not interpreting, but) only applying the symbol of the Apocalypse, yet from that time forward the opprobrious charges of being representa- tives of the principles symbolized by the wild beast, the false prophet and Babylon, were flung backwards and forwards in all ecclesiastical strife. Pope Gregory IX. (for example) denounced the Emperor Frederick as the Beast rising out of the sea, because he saw in him a signal instance of the world's opposition to the service of God. The emperor, instructed we may suppose by some ecclesiastical courtiers, was equal to the occasion, and shewed that this was a game at which two could play. For he vigorously retorted upon the Pope, denouncing him as " the Dragon " who inspired the Beast, and as "Antichrist," and as "another Balaam," and as "the angel of the abyss." This interchange of Christian amenities was copied by the Franciscans and Fratricelli in their disputes, and the symbols of the Apocalypse seemed to controversialists to lend themselves so readily to such misuse, that application to local events became the order of the day. And " in the middle of the four- Coutrobcr«{ial OTeaponsl. xv. teenth century regular commentaries were for the first time constructed on the new assumption — That the Apocalypse contained a brief predictive history of the Church, and of the Empire in its relations to the Church, from the days of the Apostles to the consummation of all things, and that every event of sufficient magnitude to be so distinguished, was to be found more or less clearly figured in the imagery of its mysterious symbols."* It v^as only natural that, in the throes of the Reformation, the weapons thus forged for them and lying ready to their hands were seized by the combatants on both sides, and the wild beast, the false prophet and Babylon, together with the locusts and armies of evil, were claimed as un- deniable symbols of Romanism by one party and of Lutheranism by the other. It needs some self-denial on the part of those who feel keenly the importance of the principles involved in these controversies, to surrender such convenient and effective weapons. It needs some soberness of judgment to remember that conclusions are not necessarily overthrown by the displacement of arguments unwisely taken up and falsely supposed to be their supports. Yet it is not necessary that, when we discard this misuse of the Apocalypse, we should retain (as thinkers in Germany and England have retained) that system of exclusive application to historic events which was originated by the '' odium theologicum." It is more logical to retrace our steps until we have entirely left the by-path on which we had entered, and to resume the position so long * "Discourses on the Prophecies relating to Antichrist in the Apocalypse of S. John," by Dr. J. H. Todd (1846). Lect. i., p. 29. xvi. preface. maintained by the earlier interpreters of this book. For so we give it a higher character, bringing it into con- formity with all the other canonical Scriptures ; we treat it as a divine utterance, as a warning against evil, and an encouragement to that " service of God which is perfect freedom." While I was thus advancing along the path from which I have never yet swerved, I learned from Dr. Vaughan's *' Lectures on the Revelation of S. John," with which I first became acquainted in 1866, that this truly Scriptural and devotional interpretation of the Apocalypse is capable of being popularized. Isaac Williams' " Notes and Re- flections " taught me to see the poetic beauty as well as the superhuman insight of the Revelation. He shewed me also that this system of interpretation is no modern fancy, but venerable with age, and only in the last few centuries pushed into the background, by those who saw that they could use these symbols against the opponents of their theological and ecclesiastical theories. Stiers' "Words of the Risen Lord," Hengstenberg's two volumes, and Archbishop Trench's reverent and scholarly treatise upon the " Epistles to the Seven Churches," all gave me fresh insight into the meaning of separate expressions. Dr. Pusey's " Lectures on the Prophet Daniel " (of which I have made very liberal use in my third Lecture), and Auberlen on '* Daniel and S. John," satisfied me as to the true interpretation of the wild beasts of the thirteenth chapter, though not exactly as Dr. Pusey himself intended to teach his readers. And I was thus prepared for the careful teaching in Fairbairn's work on the *' Nature of Prophecy," and publication of l^ottfl. xvii. able to enjoy Bossuet's Preface, however disappointed I might be with his subsequent commentary upon the chapters and verses ; able also (I hope) to profit by the recent Lectures, Essays, and careful exegesis of Professor Milligan, to whose thoughts about the binding of Satan for a thousand years, I owe more than to any other writer. It is with very mingled feelings of hope and fear, and with a deep consciousness of imperfection that any writer commends his frail bark to the uncertain deep of public opinion. And certainly I, as I read again and again what I have tried to say, lament that I have not given better expression to all that has been taught me ; and I long for the mesmeric power which some other writers have to kindle enthusiasm for what they love. Then I might hope to move men of scholarship and learning, and men with ready pens, to devote all their powers to win for these visions more of the rational and reverent and devotional study already given to the other books of Holy Writ. For no book in all the Bible has been alternately more neglected and more misused than this book. Yet, as Isaac Williams argues, there is no book better calculated to move our interest and affection. " Its un- earthly beauty, its divine simplicity and pathos, the wonderful arrangement of its parts, its deep and hidden analogies " (I may add '* its startling and suggestive con- trasts "), '' its secret references to all other Scriptures and to different parts of itself, the poetical imagery and painting challenging admiration and setting below it all the works of worldly genius " — these might well ** arrest our attention .... For the treasures of the unseen are here B xviii. |9rcfacf. poured forth in all the riches of the visible ; the jewels of earth, the stars of heaven, sea, fountains and rivers and mountains and hills, and every object of creation visible and invisible, all are called in to become witnesses and to take part as agents in the judgments of man, clothed with his sorrows, sympathizing in his fall, and sharing his struggles, bright with his glory, glad in his successes. The Kingdom of the Son of Man to Whom all things in Heaven and earth do bow and obey ; everything that can stir the imagination of man — armies and their array, the battle and the siege, everything terrible in nature as the dragon and the savage beast, or imposing as the lion and the eagle ; the mightiest and the fairest of the objects we behold, the rainbow and the morning star .... " But, more than all, the Holy Scriptures themselves, the marvels of all history and prophecy, the sublimity of Job, the sweetness of the Canticles, sententiousness of the Proverbs, devotion of the Psalms, the mystery of the Law, the unveiled face and awful love of the Gospels, all find a place in this wonderful book. " And thus there is no book more engaging, even humanly speaking, in its composition ; formed of images most striking and beautiful, philosophy clothed in divine language and replete with hidden harmonies of wisdom, and in its artistic structure so exquisite that it has been well said, * the very wit and artifice seems not to be human but angelical.' (Henry More.) The style is such that men might speak of it as they did of the Prophet Ezekiel, as * a very lovely song of one that hath a pleasant voice.' There is no book which so repays the study of it from the manner in which it is interwoven throughout with all the Ifgaac OTilliam^' tflefltctions;. xix. other Scriptures, illustrating them and deriving h'ght from them, and amply repaying all care and research with knowledge that satisfies. " All these things seem as if they were intended to engage our attention in this book. And the same reasons of wisdom and goodness for which the Holy Spirit has so strongly invited us to this study, have no doubt induced the evil one to direct his arts to draw us away from it. Nor is it strange that he who has laboured to render the Sacrament of divine love the great cause of strife in Christendom, should lead men to make this wisdom of God appear foolishness, and this His guide for the dark days to be darkness itself." * * Isaac Williams, "The Apocalypse with Notes and Reflections." Preface, pp. iii., iv., vii., viii. CHAPTER I. El)t i^atute Df ^Iropjjecg. NE fruitful source of mistakes about the lessons of the Apocalypse is the modern misapprehen- sion of the nature of prophecy. The word " prophecy " has been (from the seventeenth century downward) so completely identified with "prediction, that men have imagined that whatever is not prediction is not prophecy. Perhaps the strangest result of this misapprehension has been that of the late Dr. Todd, who, though himself profoundly reverencing the authority of the earliest writers of the Christian Church, dismisses without dis- cussion what he states to have been their almost unanimous interpretation of the Apocalypse ; and he does so solely because their interpretation would make it out to be something deeper than a mere prediction of future events, and therefore not (in his sense of the word) a prophecy at all. His statement is worth recording at full length, not only because it is such a naive confession of his mistake, but also because it states so clearly the early interpreta- tion which these lectures are attempting to commend to Cj^e Mature of 33ropl)ecp. modern readers, an interpretation which, if only the nature of prophecy is fully apprehended, will approve itself to every student as at least deserving of serious consideration. He says — " In the earliest commentaries now extant on the book, it is considered not properly speaking as a prophecy, but as an allegory ; not as a prediction of actual events yet future, but as a mythos representing a moral truth." Dr. Todd, knowing the effect of names, stig- matized the ancient commentaries as turning the Apo- calypse into an allegory, or mythos, or fable. Had he described them as treating it as a heavenly vision or sacred parable, teaching heavenly truths under earthly figures, his language would have been more exact, but would have created a favourable rather than an unfavour- able impression of the method of those commentaries. He was too candid however and thoughtful to rely upon those epithets, which were only the natural outcome of his own conviction about prophecy, but argued the matter out. He went on to say that " in the visions of the Apocalypse the ancient commentators beheld not a pro- phetic history of the Christian Church (or empire), so much as a figurative representation of the conflict going on in the world or in the heart of the individual Christian, between the evil and the good. And the moral of the book, the end for which it was given (according to the spirit of these interpretations) was to assure the righteous of their ultimate triumph, notwithstanding the apparent or temporary success of the powers of darkness." (No unworthy aim, it seems to me, in a book intended for the instruction of the soldiers and servants of Jesus Christ.) 2ir. CotJtJ'g 0li5tafee. ** The great objection however" (he proceeds) "to all such systems is that the Revelation so considered is no longer a prophecy ; its design is not the prediction of the future, but the encourajjement and support of the Church under the assaults of heresy and tyranny and persecution." Yet Dr. Todd is compelled by his candour to weaken even this weak objection by a further statement as to these first commentaries. He says — "But the allegorical school of interpretation had admitted into their theories another principle by which the prophetical (?) character of the Apocalypse was in a great measure preserved, and which harmonises without much difficulty with the mystical interpretation. The opinion that the design of this prophecy was to represent the momentous contest between good and evil ; the contest going on in all ages between the Church and the world, between Catholicity and heresy, truth and falsehood, gave a wide scope to the expositor who desired to apply the Apocalyptic visions to the particular struggle in which he himself, or the age in which he lived was engaged. Accordingly we find, mingled with the general allegorical interpretation, particular applications of distinct visions or portions of visions to certain special heresies, local persecutions, or other events which from their proximity or any other cause appeared to the expositor to assume a peculiar interest or importance in the history of the Church. The Apocalypse was regarded as a mine of deep and admirable mysteries : every symbol, every letter was looked upon as concealing some momentous prediction capable of application to a multitude of events, between which any (even the most remote) resemblance might be traced Cte l^aturt of ^iopi)ecp. throughout the lapse of ages; the secret rise, for example, of heresies, the patience and faith of the saints under persecu- tion, orthe triumph of the Church in somesignaldeliverance. " Still, however, these applications of the Apocalyptic symbols, when made to particular historical events, were made rather as expositions (or illustrations) of an allegory, than as fulfilments of a definite prediction. The order of the prophetic visions and their connections with each other were not supposed to indicate the chronological order of the dates foretold. It was enough if the symbol was found capable of being applied to the particular heresy or persecution, to the particular pestilence, or massacre, or famine, with which the commentator was anxious to connect it. This (Dr. Todd says) may be taken as a general account of the popular expositions of the Apocalypse from the fourth to the thirteenth century."* A conviction which induced a writer of Dr. Todd's ability and research to throw such a system of interpreta- tion on one side without discussion, and which has so affected the English language that Dr. Johnson thought of no other meaning for the word ** prophecy" than "to predict, to foretell, to prognosticate," — this cannot be lightly treated. And fortunately, it has received at the hands of Dr. Arnold, Dean Stanley,! and Professor Fair- bairn,! such full examination that little more is needed here than a short summary of what they have written. * Todd's "Discourses on Prophecies relating to Antichrist," pp. ig-25. (See also Appendix, Note C, for Bossuet's similar treatment of S. Augustine's interpretation ) t "The Jewish Church," Lectures xix., xx. \ " On Prophecy," (Chapter i., and Appendix A.) Ifiibation of tl)c Ecrm. The method of the two last of these writers has been to examine first the derivation of the word " prophet," the use that is made of it and of its cognates in the passages of the Old and New Testament in which they occur, and then the characteristics of those who are treated as prophets. From this examination results an absolute demonstration of the sense in which the Apocalypse may be fitly called a prophecy. Both Dean Stanley and Professor Fairbairn agree in stating that the Hebrew word (Nabi), of which the Greek {irpo(pljTr]s) and the English (prophet) are translations, is derived from a root which expresses the boiling or bubbling forth of a fountain of water ; that its primary meaning is one who pours forth excited or exciting utterances, and that it is occasionally used for the raving of a madman. The ordinary application of the word would therefore be to " one who speaks under an over- powering impulse." The Greek word used in the Septuagint to translate this has itself a like meaning, for we find it employed by classical writers to express any authorized interpreter or pronouncer of a superior will. Thus Apollo, because he was Jupiter's spokesman, was called the prophet of Jupiter ; the Pythia, or priestess of Apollo, was for a like reason called ApoWo's prophetess ; and her attendants were called the prophets of the Pythia. And it is to be noted that these were in no case volunteer spokesmen, but the authorized utterers of the Divine will ; those who had themselves the sanction of the authority for which and in the name of which they spoke. The preposition {npo, pro) has, no doubt, the threefold Cijt 0ntiixt of ^SiopJjecD. meaning of (i) before in respect of time, (2) before in respect of position, and (3) before in respect of publicity ; and thus a word compounded of it and of a word that expresses a speaker might legitimately be used to denote either one who speaks beforehand, anticipating a future event, or else one w^ho stands in front in order to personate a superior prompting from behind. Both these significations are therefore legitimate uses of the word prophet ; but in its primary and more frequent use the second of these predominates. For, as used in the Septuagint and by the writers of the New Testament, the word (Trpocp^Trjs, ''prophet") invariably expresses the same idea as the Hebrew w^ord which it is used to translate, namely, one who speaks for and under impulse from another. It represents not necessarily a foreteller of events still future, but a forth-teller, an authorized spokes- man or interpreter of another's will, whether with regard to the past, to the present, or to the future. In the Mahommedan formula the word " prophet " is used in this sense. For the assertion that " there is but one God, and Mahommed is His prophet," refers to Mahommed's supposed appointment as the authorized expounder of God's will, and not to any unusually large number of predictions made by him about the future. The statement also of S. Peter as to the nature of prophecy is faithful to the root idea of the Hebrew word. " No prophecy ever came by the will of man ; but men spake from God being moved" (cjiepofievoi, "borne along") "by the Holy Ghost. But there arose Mse prophets also among the people, as among yon also there shall be false teachers." (2 Pet. i. 21; ii. i.) There the true and false SbraJbam ant( iMosleg. prophets are contrasted (not as accurate and inaccurate predicters, but) as true and false teachers. The first use made of the word in the Septuagint is when Abimelech was told to refer to Abraham in order to make his peace with God, " for " (the message ran) '' he" (Abraham) " is a prophet, and he shall pray for thee and thou shalt live." (Gen.xx. 7.) Evidently the word is used there to express (not any gift possessed by Abraham of fore- seeing future events, but) his close connection with God, and and his authority to speak and act as God's representative. The next use made of the word is peculiarly instructive. When Moses tried to excuse himself from the Divine commission to Pharaoh, king of Egypt, on the ground that he was ''slow of speech and of a slow tongue," the Lord answered — " Is there not Aaron thy brother ? I know that he can speak well .... Thou shalt speak unto him, and put the words in his mouth, .... And he shall be thy spokesman unto the people ; and it shall come to pass that he shall be to thee a mouthy and thou shalt be to hmi as God.'' (Exod. iv. 14-17.) This commission was afterwards explained in other words — '* See, I have made thee a God to Pharaoh : and Aaron thy brother shall be thy prophet. Thou shalt speak all that I command thee, and Aaron thy brother shall speak unto Pharaoh." (Exod. vii. I, 2.) Nothing could better express the essential character- istic of a prophet. It was that he was simply a mouth for someone who kept in the background; that he was utter- ing not his own thoughts, but the will of someone behind and above him, for whom and in whose name he was 8 Cj^e Mature of ll^vop\)tcv. authorized to speak. With this first definition of the office every subsequent use of the words ''prophet," and "prophecy" invariably consists. Thus Moses was on one remarkable occasion announced by God Himself as being in possession of the highest rank among prophets, and indeed as on a higher platform than any other, not because Moses revealed more of the future than others, but because he had more direct access to God, saw and revealed more of the mind and will of God, and so was a more completely equipped utterer of the Divine will. The controversy which called for this authoritative announcement was not about any foreknow- ledge of future events, but on the question whether Aaron and Miriam had or had not the same authority as Moses to speak for God. '* Hath the Lord," they asked, " Hath the Lord indeed spoken only by Moses ? Hath He not spoken also by us ? ... . And the Lord came down in a pillar of cloud .... And He said, ' Hear now My words: if there be a prophet among you, I the Lord will make Myself known unto him in a vision, and will speak unto him in a dream. My servant Moses is not so : he is faithful unto Me in all My house ; with him will I speak mouth to mouth, even manifestly, and not in dark speeches : and the form of the Lord shall he behold. Wherefore then were ye not afraid to speak against My servant, against Moses?'" (Num. xii. 2-9.) It ought to have been remembered that this position was exactly what the whole nation of Israel had entreated Moses to take toward them. Unable to bear the terrors of a direct communication from Jehovah, the}^ had be- sought Moses at the foot of Mount Sinai, " Go thou near iSltjal) autJ ti^c 33aptis;t. and hear all that the Lord our God shall say ; and speak thou unto us all that the Lord our God shall speak unto thee, and we will hear it and do it." That proposal had been approved and accepted, and the Lord God had consented to use Moses as His spokesman and therefore as His prophet. And this position, they were afterwards taught, was a type of that which would be held by every true prophet, and eventually by the great ideal prophet ; but the man who should presume to take it up unauthor- ized by God Himself was to be counted worthy of death. (Deut. V. 24-32 ; xviii. 15-22.) Elijah afterwards stood out as an ideal prophet. Yet Elijah's pre-eminent position was not characterized by the number or brilliancy of his predictions, but by his faithfulness in a supreme crisis to Jehovah, and by his fearless utterance of Jehovah's sentences upon the nation and upon their guilty king. And when we come to John the Baptist, the Elijah of the New Covenant, we find that it was (not the number of his predictions, but) the spirit and power of his mission, and his intimate connection with the final manifestation of God in the person of Him Whose forerunner John was, that marked him out as being — in a new personality — the Elijah of the New Covenant, " a prophet and more than a prophet," because he went " before the Lord in the spirit and power of Elijah," not to predict, but ** to turn the hearts of the fathers to the children, and the dis- obedient to walk in the wisdom of the just." And it was for this cause that he was called " the prophet of the Most High," not because of his foresight, but because he was to " go before the face of the Lord to make ready lo €l)t feature of ^Pi'opftffJ?. His ways; to give knowledge of salvation unto His people in the remission of their sins." (S. Luke i. 17, 76, yy.) Even more significant is the use of the word in con- nection with that great '* Prophet " of Whom all others (including even Moses) were only imperfect adumbra- tions. (Heb. i. 1-3.) The man Christ Jesus was pre- eminently " the Prophet," because not only the mouth- piece, but Himself the very "Word of God," for '^in Him dwelt all the fulness of the Godhead bodily ; " not revealing a part only of God's will, but showing the Father so fully that *' he that hath seen Him hath seen the Father also." (S. John i. 18; xiv. g.) And not only in these three signal instances, but every- where the essential feature of the true prophet was that he was God's spokesman, whether the message with which he was charged concerned the past, the present, or the future. It was so with the unnamed prophet whom the Lord sent to the children of Israel when they were oppressed by the Midianites. His message was concerned only with the past, yet was he a true prophet, prophesy- ing in the name and with the authority of Jehovah. (Judges vi. 7-11.) It was so also with Samuel, and it was the same with "the Schools (or Clubs) of the prophets" of which Samuel seems to have been the organizer. They were students of God rather than of the future. And in contemplation of God and in the study of the words already uttered in God's Name, they were being prepared to teach His wishes by speaking for Him whenever sent, and were being prepared also to receive and declare faithfully any new message He might call any of them to deliver for Him. JFaUt lBvo^\)tt^. II The same idea of prophecy underlies all that the Scrip- tures say about " false prophets." They are men who speak as if they are charged with a message from Jehovah, when in reahty they are not charged : they are delivering a message which they have invented for themselves ; or else they are the mouthpieces of a false god. They may or may not make inaccurate predictions, but their charac- teristic is that they speak to lead away from God, or away from some commandment of God. They are teachers rather than predicters. And it is against such false teachers that our Lord warned His disciples when He said, " Beware of false prophets which come to you in sheep's clothing, but inwardly they are ravening wolves. Ye shall know them by their fruits." (S. Matt. vii. 15, 16.) It was against such false teachers rather than against predicters that S. John re-echoed that warning in his first Epistle : for the test by which he directed his readers to try the truth of a prophet was not his knowledge of the future, but the soundness of his teaching about the incar- nate Christ — " Beloved, believe not every spirit, but prove the spirits whether they are of God : because many false prophets are gone out into the world. Hereby know ye the Spirit of God: every spirit which confesses Jesus Christ come in the flesh is of God, and every spirit which confesseth not Jesus is not of God : and this is the spirit of the Antichrist whereof ye have heard that it cometh ; and now it is in the world already .... They" (the false prophets) **are of the world, therefore speak they as of the world, and the world heareth them. We " (the true prophets) " are of God : he that knoweth God heareth us ; he who is not of God heareth us not. By this we 12 CIjc feature of ^Piopljecp. know the spirit of truth and the spirit of error." (i John iv. 1-7.) This is what he describes in symbol in the Apocalypse. He groups together all the world's spokesmen and agents in one great conglomerate, ''the false prophet," idealized as a second wild beast, ''with the horns of a lamb, but the mouth of a dragon " (this is his version of the sheep's clothing, but the disposition of wolves). And he describes them as exercising no independent power, but only the authority of the first wild beast (which represents the world), causing all to worship that wild beast. And in order to succeed in this foul design, the wild beast is represented as warring against the saints who are God's prophets, God's faithful witnesses " who stand by the Lord of the whole earth," and who are therefore described as prophesying, because they speak and act not in their own name, but in the Name of God. (Rev. xi. 3-14 ; xiii. 11-18 ; xix. 20.) Nothing in what I have said is intended to deny or ignore the patent fact that the prophet of Jehovah was often, was usually, charged with a proclamation of an event that was still to come, and therefore with a true prediction. But this was always with the present practical object of encouraging God's people in obedience, and warning them against disobedience. It was for this that God sent "all His servants the prophets, rising up early" (to use Jeremiah's striking figure) " rising up early and sending them to say. Return ye now every man from his evil way, and amend your doings, and go not after other gods to serve them, and ye shall dwell in the land which I have given to you and to your fathers." (Jer. xxv. 4-8.) It is ^oral (Bh)t(t of ^rop!)f£u. 13 surely most significant that there, where a general outline or sketch of the prophet's mission is given, there is so slight mention made in it of their predictions, and that in reference to their moral and spiritual aim, as though this latter were the essential of their office. In the same spirit our Lord also sums up the work of the prophets of the Old Testament as being for the same practical object as that for which the law also was given, namely, to persuade the people to do God's will. ''What- soever" (He says), "whatsoever ye would that men should do unto you, even so do unto them : for this is the law and the prophets.''' (S. Matt. vii. 12.) And again, when He had proclaimed the prime importance of the two duties, love to God and love to man. He added — '' on these two com- mandments hang all the law and the prophets." (S. Matt, xxii. 40.) It is quite true, as I have acknowledged, that the prophets were usually furnished with either supernatural power to act, or else supernatural power to predict, in order to prove that their commission was itself super- natural. It is also true that the fulfilment or failure of any promise or warning uttered by one who claimed to be a prophet would usually be a test of that prophet's truth. Yet a case was supposed, and must therefore have been considered possible, in which a prophet or dreamer of dreams would promise a sign or wonder which would come to pass ; yet were the people not to hearken to that prophet because the proposal or moral aim of his message was to be the true test, and would (in the supposed case) stamp him in spite of his accurate prediction as a false prophet, a deceiver worthy of death. (Deut. xiii. 1-6.) c 14 ^i)t llatuve of ^Brop!) tcp. The case of Jonah presents us with a still stranger phenomenon. In his case, a true prophet of Jehovah delivered against Nineveh nothing more and nothing less than the Divine message with which he had been charged. Yet the prediction in that message was falsified by the event, because the message worked its holy purpose of reformation without the destruction that was threatened. The prediction was false, though the prophecy that contained it was true. Of so much less importance does God count the foretelling than the practical teaching which the foretelling was intended to enforce. And this was merely one signal illustration of the conditional character of even apparently unconditional predictions, as the prophet Jeremiah afterwards was commissioned to explain — "At what instant I shall speak concerning a nation, and concerning a kingdom, to pluck up and to pull down and to destroy it ; if that nation against whom I have pronounced turn from their evil, I will repent of the evil that I thought to do unto them. And at what instant I shall speak concerning a nation and concerning a kingdom, to build and to plant it ; if it do evil in My sight, that it obey not My voice, then I will repent of the good wherewith I said I would benefit them." (Jer. xviii. i-ii.) It is quite evident that the carrying out of this principle must introduce into even a predictive prophecy such an element of uncertainty as to the coming events, that it could not have been intended to form for any of us a " history written beforehand." By no one has this character of divine prediction been better exhibited than by Dr. Arnold when he was com- bating the idea that prophecy is to be regarded " as an iSropIjtfi) grtatcr tf)aii llis'torp. 15 anticipation of history." " History " (he says) " in our common sense of the term is busy with particular nations, times, places, actions and even persons. If in this sense prophecy were a history written beforehand, it would alter the very condition of humanity, by removing from us (at least from those who understand it) our uncertainty as to the future ; it would make us acquainted with * the times and seasons which the Father hath put in His own power.' " Yet he goes on to say — *' Prophec}^ is anticipated histor}^, not in our common sense of the word, but in another and far higher sense. Common history, amid a vast number of particular facts and persons, can hardly trace the general principles which are to be deduced from them. Nay, the imperfection of the characters with which history deals, naturally embarrasses its general conclusions : we can trace the rise and fall of such a nation or such a city ; but this is not the rise or fall of any one principle, either good or evil ; but of many prin- ciples which are partly good and partly evil. Our sym- pathy with the prosperity and adversity of any one people must be qualified ; there is an evil about them which triumphs in their triumph ; there is good about them which suffers in their overthrow. *' Now, what History does not and cannot do, that Prophecy does, and for that very reason it is very different from History. Prophecy fixes our attention on principles, on good and evil, on truth and falsehood, on God and on His enemy. Here there is no division of feeling, no quahfied sympathy ; the one are deserving of our entire devotion and love, the other of our unmixed abhorrence. .... History, we have said, is busied with particular 1 6 €i)t fiatiuc of ^Propj^ecp. nations, persons and events ; and from the study of these it extracts, as well as it can, some general principles. Prophecy is busy with general principles ; and inasmuch as particular nations, persons and events represent these principles up to a certain point, so far it is concerned also with them. But their mixed character, as it embarrasses and qualifies the judgment of the historian, so it must necessarily lower and qualify the promises and threaten- ings of the prophet. The full bliss which he delights to contemplate, because his eye is chiefly upon God and perfect goodness, is not equally suited to the very imper- fect goodness of God's servants. The utter extremity of suffering which belongs to God's enemy, must be mitigated for those earthly evil-doers whom God till the last great day has not yet wholly ceased to regard as His creatures." Dr. Arnold illustrates this by the position of the children of Israel who '' stand forth in both the History and in the Prophecy of Scripture as the representatives, so to speak, of the cause of God and of goodness. But the History shews that they were very imperfect representatives of it, and therefore they can only be imperfectly the subject of the promises of Prophecy. So far as they belonged to God, the blessing is theirs ; so far as they fell short of what God's servants should be, the blessing is not theirs ; for they are not the real subjects of the Prophecy. For it is History and not Prophecy which deals with the twelve tribes of the land of Canaan, their good and evil things, their fallings away and final rejection of God their Saviour : the Israel of Prophecy is God's Israel really and truly, who walk with Him faithfully and abide with Him to the end." ^nnctplc^ ratl^tr tlb^n Cbrnt^. 17 Thus does Arnold illustrate and enforce his position that " Prophecy is God's voice, speaking to us respecting the issue in all time of that great struggle which is the real interest of human life, the struggle between good and evil. Beset as we are by evil within us and without, it is the natural and earnest question of the human mind, * What shall be the end at last ? ' And the answer is given by Prophecy, that it shall be well at last ; that there shall be a time when good shall perfectly triumph. But the answer declares also that the struggle shall be long and hard, that there will be much to suffer before the victory be complete. The seed of the woman shall bruise the serpent's head, but the serpent notwithstanding shall first bruise its heel. So completely is the earliest prophecy which is recorded in Scripture, the true sum and sub- stance, so to speak, of the whole language of Prophecy, how diversified so ever in its particular forms." '' Such is my justification of the assertion that, if the Apocalypse does prove itself to be (what the earliest commentators thought it) a figurative representation of this great conflict, a representation given " to assure the righteous of their ultimate triumph, notwithstanding the apparent or temporary success of the powers of dark- ness," then it will not have proved itself (as Dr. Todd thinks) unworthy of the name of prophecy. It may even establish itself as the very climax of that long line of prophecy, which, first uttering its voice in the earthly Eden, never really dies until it opens for us the pearly gates of our future triumph. * Sermons by Thomas Arnold (Sixth Edition), Sermon i. "On the Interpretation of Prophecy," pp. 376-379. Ci)c i^ntmt of |9iop!)cfu. All that remains for me to add is that the New Testa- ment use of the words " Prophet " and " Prophecy " is entirely consistent with what we have found in the Old Testament. For here also we find the word " prophet " applied to two classes of persons ; first, to those who hold an office which constitutes them God's spokesmen ; and secondly, to those who, whether they have or have not a regular and permanent official appointment, yet are on special occasions moved by a Divine impulse to declare God's will. And this whether the message delivered by the " prophet " concerns the past, the present, or the future, or whether it is (as most usually we find it) about all three, being an exposition of the past in order to appeal for a present action, to which they attach a future blessing or at least an immunity from a coming judgment. Remembering the use made of the word in the Scrip- tures already circulating among the Christians of the Apostles' days, we have no difficulty in understanding the reason why those were called prophets who were com- missioned as Christ's spokesmen, who were authorized to act as *' ambassadors for Christ, as though God did beseech men by them." (2 Cor. v. 20.) Of Judas and Silas, for example, we are told that they, '' being prophets also themselves, exhorted the brethren with many words." (Acts XV. 32.) The five Church officials who were at Antioch, and among whom were Barnabas and Saul, and from whom Barnabas and Saul were separated for a higher office than they or any others at Antioch had yet held — we see why these were all five called ''prophets " as well as "teachers." (Acts xiii. i.) So also we can ^tby Ce^tament 59ropif^i>ing;. 19 understand why those, who under any real impulse from above gave out any real message from God, are described as having " prophesied." In this sense it is that " prophesying " is not less but more frequent in this last dispensation than under the Old Covenant, although there are now less frequent instances of success(ul prediction. For now the Spirit of God is moving in richer and fuller power, we all have intercourse with God, and the revelation of His will is more widely diffused, so that even our sons and our daughters can prophesy. (Jer. xxxi. 31-35; Joel ii. 28,29.) And we are all of us now charged to desire this above all other spiritual gifts, *' that we may prophesy" (i Cor. xiv. I, 39) ; not surely that we may all become aware of those future events which God in wisdom hides from us, but that we may draw near to God, that we may see Him face to face, and be authorized to speak for Him, winning the heathen and strengthening Christians. Such ** prophesyings " none of us are to ''despise" (i Thess. V. 20) ; though we may think very little of the futile attempts that are made to foretell the future of nations, or kingdoms, or persons. Thus also we understand who they are of whom S. Paul speaks when he describes "the Apostles and prophets of Jesus Christ " (Eph. ii. 20) as being the foundation on which His Church is built ; and when he reminds us that God has given to the Church three Orders in His sacred ministry, whom in one place He has classified as " first Apostles, secondarily Prophets, thirdly Teachers" (i Cor. xii. 28) ; though at another time he speaks of all Christ's commissioned servants, as if they were all in their degrees 20 Ci)e ISatiire of i9ropf)cn). " Apostles, Evangelists, Prophets, Pastors, and Teachers for the work of the ministry .... until we all come to the perfect measure of the full stature of the Christ." (Eph. iv. 11-14.) Then when that perfect measure shall have been attained, (like all other temporary means) the special prophesying also of this present time shall be swallowed up in the fuller and wider revelation of God. For then we shall need no outsider to speak to us in His behalf, for all shall know Him and we shall see Him as He is. (i Cor. xiii. 8-13.) Does this result of our examination seem to anyone a lowering of the character of prophecy ? Why, the world itself also has its prophets, men who can interpret the world's secrets to us, and in whom we recognize the vision and faculty divine. But these are not often the men who predict what events will happen in particular years or at particular places : not always the men who foretell suc- cessfully that this man or that nation will come to the front or be overthrown. The world's prophets are not necessarily its fortune-tellers, or its soothsayers, but those who have gained possession of the world's most treasured secrets, and who have authority to teach the laws of pros- perity and adversity in the world's service. Science also has her prophets, men who can speak boldly and authoritatively in the name of science ; but these are not necessarily the compilers of almanacks, or the predicters of particular eclipses ; though such pre- dictions will result from their revelation of scientific truths, if once the data for calciilatio7i are supplied^ and although every eclipse or comet that is calculated is an C!)c ^ropf)tt«; of ^cimct. 21 application, illustration, and proof of the truth of their discoveries. No, those alone are the gifted seers and prophets of science who have an eye to penetrate nature's deeper secrets, and who have a mouth to interpret their inner meaning so as to win a response from the children of science. What such men are in respect of human and earthly things, the same in things spiritual are the seers of religion, the prophets of God/'-' And it has seemed to me at times that what the astrologers of old were to the astronomers of to-day, and what the alchymists and seekers after the philosopher's stone were to the chemists of to-day, such are the religious soothsayers and would-be fortune-tellers to the true commentators on the prophecies of Scripture. Men tell us sometimes that there are too many com- mentaries on the Apocalypse. It would perhaps be more true to say that there are too few. Those books which are popularly read among us as commentaries are too often not commentaries on the Revelation of S. John. They do valuable service to commentators, whenever they tabulate interesting discoveries of the working out in history of the principles which the Apocalypse reveals ; but upon the real teaching of the book they often make no comment at all. And even in their illustrations they too often warp the plain words of the sacred page, they distort, or see through glasses coloured by their own pre- judices, the facts of history ; they apply the judgments of the book to the " motes " they have discovered in others' * " Fairbairn on Prophecy." Chap, i., pp. 7, 8. 2 2 €\)t l^atuit of ^Biopljfci). eyes ; they do not consider what sentence is due to "the beam that is in their own eye." In every case they are concerned with the times and places of the events that have passed or are coming, whereas S. John's object is to shew the character and purpose of such events whenever and wherever they do come. Certainly, as has been already said, the prophets, the commissioned spokesmen for God, were in old times usually supplied with special credentials in order to prove that they were authorized to speak for God. And very often those credentials were in the form of predictions such as no ordinary sagacity could have prompted. And naturally the number and preciseness of such predictions varied in proportion to the dulness of sight and hardness of heart of those to whom the prophets were sent, and in proportion also to the absence of other proofs of God's interest in them and providence over them. Nor would it be out of harmony with the general character of God's dealings with men, if definite details and even plain state- ments about localities, dates and particular actions multi- plied, when attention had to be directed to the local and visible arrival of the Redeemer at a particular date in a particular locality. But when the Son of God has come and manifested Himself to men, and when He has risen up to the throne of God, and has with Himself lifted up His disciples' thoughts and interests above all that is local and all that is visible, and when the scaffolding of outward and material and visible things is being taken down that the everlasting building may be revealed to our inner vision, now we may calculate upon a larger and deeper tone in Cljaractrr of if}t flpocabp^e. 23 prophetic utterances, and upon a revelation of principles rather than of events. So shall the lessons be for every- one everywhere who has an ear to hear, and not merely for those locally concerned in the particular struggle of any special crisis. Those who will not resign their fond expectation of being able to read in the Apocalypse the history of the events that are coming, point us to the acknowledged fact that there were many minute details in the prophecies of the Old Testament which were literally fulfilled in the personal acts of Jesus Christ and in the things that were done to Him. And they ask us, " Why should we not expect the same exactness of detail in the prophecies of the New Testament ? " It may suffice to give (out of many answers) this one reply : There was a necessity that the Messiah, to Whom the prophecies in old time pointed, should be capable of identification when He came in visible human form to Palestine. But there is no other anywhere to whom we are to be pointed away from Him. Nor is there any need now that we should be qualified to identify the time or the place or the manner of His Second Coming. For every eye shall see Him then, and all shall recognize Him. Indeed the spiritual training of the Church depends as truly upon her ignorance of the time, as upon her certainty of the fact of His return. The certainty of the fact that He will come moves us to prepare a welcome for Him. The uncertainty of the time compels us to keep our welcome always ready. Therefore, that the Apocalypse should have this larger character, that it should be found to be '' a divine repre- 24 Ci)e ^aturt of i9ropl)tfi). sentation of the great conflict everywhere waged between the Church and the world, and between good and evil," is exactly what we ought to have expected from this latest utterance of Divine prophecy. And those who refuse to attempt that impossible achievement ofprediction^ which so many would-be commentators have set them- selves, find all their study amply repaid by the deeper knowledge which this book imparts of the care and might and provision of God, of the unceasing craft and un- changing malignity of our spiritual enemies, of the weak- ness and waywardness of our own hearts, and yet of the surpassing strength that is offered, and of the fulness of the triumph that awaits all true soldiers of God and servants of Jesus Christ. CHAPTER II. ®f)e Olfjaracter of 3- JciJ)n anti of Ijijs HE discussion in the last chapter concerning the nature of prophecy, is naturally followed by a discussion of the character of him through whom this last prophecy has come to us. For, although no prophecy is the private invention of him who delivers it, "the spirit of the prophets is subject to the prophets," and the message is at least coloured by the character of the medium through which it comes. Yet the question of the authorship of the Apocalypse has been so often and so thoroughly discussed by others, that there is no need to re-open here what is not now a matter of serious controversy. I can assume that Justin Martyr and Polycarp, who had sat at the feet of S. John, and Irenseus, the pupil of Polycarp, were not in error when they recorded that these visions were seen and this book written by ''the disciple whom Jesus loved." I can assume that this book is no pious fraud, but that its author was that son of Zebedee, who alone of all men could (at any date possible for this Apocalypse) have presented himself to Christian readers without any other y 26 Cte Ci^aractcr of ^. %ol)n*^ W^vitiuQ^. designation than "John, the servant of Jesus Christ."* The only questions connected with the authorship on which I see any need to dwell are three : (i) as to the character of this S. John, (2) as to the style of his writings, and (3) as to any suggestions with regard to the date of the Apocalypse and the method of its interpretation, which may result from those two enquiries. (i.) For the discovery of his own personal character we have many materials supplied by the Gospel narratives. He was evidently one of those two disciples of John the Baptist, who were moved by their Master's testimony, to turn and follow timidly the stranger whom the Baptist pointed out to them as '*the Lamb of God." Their first interview with Jesus of Nazareth moved them to a con- viction which they could not keep exclusively to them- selves, created in them a joy in which each sought to make his own brother share. For the expression that Andrew was the first to bring his own brother to Jesus, implies that John also succeeded not long afterwards in bringing his brother also to the Saviour's side. Thus the two pairs of brothers, who in every catalogue of the twelve Apostles always occupy the first places, were the first arrivals of that great multitude which no man can number, who all " wash their robes, and make them white in the blood of the Lamb." Yet it is significant that in each case, the brother who was the first arrival, took afterwards the second place. It is never " Andrew and Peter," or '' John and James," but always " Peter and * For a full discussion of these points, see Salmon's "Introduction to the New Testament," Lecture xiii. f^i'g personal Cijarartcr. 27 Andrew," "James and John." Of these pairs were the favoured three who were admitted to the room of Jairus' daughter in a supreme moment of their Master's power; who were taken to the Mount of Transfiguration for a special manifestation of their Master's glory ; and who were brought into the inner gloom of the Garden of Gethsemane, to watch with Him in His hour of deepest anguish.* It is not always easy to determine the character of even those who are nearest to us, although their whole life may be passed under our very eyes. And no doubt we often make lamentable failures when we attempt to define accurately the true dispositions of any heroes of the past ; because we found our theory about them, upon our own view of the character of the few incidents that have been perhaps inaccurately reported to us. Yet those writers can scarcely be wrong, who have attributed to John the son of Zebedee, an intensity of thought and word and deed, which must have distinguished him even among the twelve."! This idea of intensity is suggested by the surname divinely given to him and to his brother, *' Sons of Thunder ; " and also by two incidents recorded of him in the Gospel according to S. Luke. One was his forbidding a miracle-worker, because, although the man followed Jesus, he was not following Him in the Apostles' company. The other was his desire to call down fire from Heaven upon those Samaritans who refused to admit the Lord Jesus into their village. (S. Luke ix. 49-57.) * Wordsworth's "Introduction to the Apocalypse." f Westcott.in Speaker's Commentary, "Introduction to S.John's Gospel." 28 EI)e Cfjaracter of ^. ^oi^n's! OTritiug^. We find this suggestion confirmed by the language and style of all the writings attributed to S. John, notably of that short and burning Epistle in which he denounces Demetrius' tyranny towards his fellow-Christians. (3 John 9-11.) It seems to have been this intensity of thought that delayed S. John's giving to the Church his record of his Master's life until long after the other Gospels had been in circulation. For when at last he was persuaded by his brother Apostles and moved by God to put in writing his own recollections also, we find that what he had witnessed with his eyes had sunk down deep into his very being, and (as had been the case also with her whose latest years he tended) it had been long pondered in his heart. So his recollections come out now rich with new meanings, and with a higher significance than any had found in them at the time. " These things understand not the disciples at the first, but when Jesus was glorified then remembered they that these things were written of Him, and that they had done these things unto Him." (S. John xii. 16.) No doubt there had been days when the son of Zebedee had been content to share in familiar friendship the same couch on which his honoured Master had reclined. He had been content even to lean back once, so that (as he afterwards remembered) his head actually touched the breast of Jesus, when a confidential whisper was passing between them. But now, in these later days, the thought- ful disciple looks back, and realizes with indescribable awe that what his eyes had then gazed upon, and what his hands had then so familiarly touched, had been a mani- festation of the everlasting Word of God, of Him Who M^ hxtm^itv of Cj^ararter. 29 *'was in the beginning, Who was with God, and Who was God ; " but had been content to become man and to dwell with men, that men might gradually discover in Him a glory which they now discovered to have been " the glory as of the Only-begotten of the Father." (S. John i. 1-14 ; i John i. 1-3.) (2.) It is to this intensity that we owe the special charac- teristics of the Fourth Gospel. For S. John could not content himself with giving a mere chronological biography or historical narrative of the incidents in Jesus' life on earth, any more than he could give a mere chronological history of the Church of Christ in his Apocalypse. He must say what he has to say, so that, if possible, every reader shall share with him his perception of the Divine reality that lay underneath the very simplest acts and words of Jesus. He must select from the numberless words and incidents which were every one of them worthy of everlasting record, those which were best calculated to stamp their lessons deep on ordinary hearts. He must so select and so describe what he selects that every reader shall believe that Jesus is indeed the Christ, the Son of the living God, and that this belief may have life- giving power for each. Therefore we have each narrative transfigured by the position in which S. John has placed it, each standing out upon his canvas with a living glow which tells us Who it is that is so acting and so speaking. *' Many other signs truly did Jesus in the presence of His disciples, which are not written in this book : but these are written, that ye might believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that believing ye might have life through His Name." (S. John xx. 30, 31.) D 30 Zl)t €h^YHcUv of ^. S^oJ^ii'iS OTnting^. At first perhaps we wonder why S. John has omitted so many of the chief incidents of Jesus' Hfe; but a deeper study of his Gospel shews us that the essence of all has been enshrined by him in some slighter signs, perhaps in a discourse, perhaps in an evening or wayside dialogue, in a casual expression, or in an apparently commonplace movement. S. John records (for example) nothing about the mirac- ulous conception, but he does record words which claim the eternal generation from the Father in a sense which makes Him out "equal with God." (S.John v. 17-32.) He says nothing about the birth at Bethlehem, but he does tell of the objection from Nathanael, and afterwards from the Pharisees and from the people, with a significance which shews that he knew the answer to it. (S. John i. 46 ; vii. 40-43, 52.) He gives no record of the first words of Jesus spoken in the temple to His parents — *' I must be about My Father's business;" but he does tell of like words afterwards spoken. *' My meat is to do the will of Him that sent Me and to finish His work." (S. John iv. 34.) He says nothing about Jesus' baptism by John, but he brings Him into such contact with the Baptist and with the Baptist's testimony, that we see he was as well aware of it and of the revelation made there, as he was of the unsuccessful temptation by the devil against Him Who said — "The prince of this world cometh and hath nothing in Me." (S. John i. 29-38 ; iii. 25-31.) S. John's Gospel says nothing about the two most startling of all the miracles which the three other Gospels record, the raising of Jairus' daughter and of the widow's son from death. But he does give a still fuller revelation Significant MecortJ^. 31 of the life-giving power of Jesus at the grave of Lazarus. And this, like the miracle at the wedding-feast in Cana, seems to have been left to S. John to tell, because it must have been known that he was evolving thoughts from it which less contemplative disciples had as yet not learned. S. John's Gospel says nothing about the Transfigura- tion, or the voice that spoke from Heaven at the Jordan and on the Mount; but it does manifest the glory of the Only-begotten Son of God, Whom he saw transfigured in the isle of Patmos, and it records the voice that came from Heaven, " I have both glorified My Name and I will glorify it again." (S. John xii. 28.) S. John gives no record of the agony of Gethsemane ; or of the prayer — " Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from Me." But he had no need to give it, for he has told of the like struggle and prayer — " Now is my soul troubled, and what shall I say? Father save me from this hour? But for this cause came I unto this hour — Father glorify Thy Name." (S. John xii. 27.) Nor, once more, is there in S. John's Gospel any description of the Ascension, nor even any statement that our Lord did ascend to Heaven. But it gives words which point forward to the Ascension, words which S. John could not have quoted if he had not known of their fulfilment — I mean our Lord's question to His wavering disciples — " What and if ye shall see the Son of Man ascend up where He was before ? " and His consolation to Mary Magdalene — " I ascend unto My Father and your Father, and to My God and your God." (S. John vi. 62 ; xx. 17.) And, as with the incidents in our Lord's own life, so also with those in the lives of His disciples ; as, for 32 Ct)t Cl^aractei- of ^, ^oW^ OTrittiigg. example, instead of S. Peter's memorable confession in Csesarea Philippi — " Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God" (S. Matt. xvi. 13-21), S.John gives his no less memorable confession at Capernaum — " Lord, to whom shall we go ? Thou hast the words of eternal life, and we have believed and know that Thou art the Holy One of God." (S.John vi. 68, 69.) We find the same characteristics in S. John's selections from our Lord's doctrinal teaching. He never once quotes in his Gospel any sentence that contains the word " Church ; " but he does present us with the idea of the Church, as the sheepfold which encloses the sheep (S. John X.), and the vine which includes the branches. (S.John XV. i-g.) And in his first Epistle the fellowship of the saints is one chief subject, and the Church (with its name lovingly repeated over and over again) is the one subject of the Apocalypse. We may search in vain through S. John's Gospel for any account of the institution of either of the two Sacraments : but we have our Lord's teaching about the Heavenly Birth and the Heavenly Food, in words which would be almost unintelligible to us, if we had not elsewhere the records of His institution of the Sacraments of Baptism and the Lord's Supper, as everlasting embodiments of that teaching (S. John iii., vi.) And lastly, it needs only a word to remind every one that, if we are perplexed because S. John has said nothing directly about the great prophecy on the Mount of Olives to which only the two pairs of brothers listened, he has given it all embodied and transfigured in the sixth and seventh chapters of his Apocalypse. It seems to be to the same intense pondering that we ^icjinfifant ^vpi'f^s'ion^. 33 owe S. John's pregnant hints as to the significance of Christ's memorable words about the building of the Temple in three days (S. John ii. 18-23), and about the flowing of living water from Him for the thirsty (S. John vii. 37-40), words neither of which (he says) were under- stood by the disciples at the time. It is the same with the mysterious connection which S. John traced between his Master's love for Martha and Mary and Lazarus, and yet his keeping away from them when they were in trouble (S. John xi. 5, 6) ; and also between the darkness outside the room of the Paschal Supper and the more dreadful darkness into which the traitor Judas passed, when he " went immediately out, and it was night." (S. John xiii. 30.) There is the same intensity of thought in the intuition as with a spiritual second sight, which enabled him to discover a divine promise of the atonement and of the gathering of the saints, in the malignant utterance of the unbeUeving Caiaphas — " * Ye know nothing at all, neither consider that it is expedient for us that one man should die for the people, and that the whole nation perish not.' This (says S. John) spake he not of himself; but being High Priest that year, he prophesied that Jesus should die for the nation : and not for that nation only, but that also he should gather together in one the children of God that were scattered abroad." (S. John xi. 47-53.) Now is it possible to believe that this loved disciple, whose natural zeal had, in the school-room of Jesus, been purified from its first fierceness — that he who had drunk so deeply of his Master's spirit that, when he did at last sit down to write, he wrote so that we can hardly tell 34 Cfjf Cljavactcr of ^. ^oi)u'^ OTntmg;^. where the Master's words have ended and where the disciple begins his comment — (See S. John iii. 10-22.) Is it conceivable that such an one has in the glowing figures of this Apocalypse painted only his horror and dread of a Roman Emperor? or that he has taken such pains to signify his vindictive hatred of the persecutors of Christians, but to do it so obscurely that he shall himself escape the penalty of the treasonous sentiments he is expressing ? Yet that is what the interpretation comes to, which makes out Nero to be the wild beast whose terrible might the Apocalypse portrays.* He who had learned from his Master's own lips that we are to "love our enemies, and pray for them that curse us," could not have written of the fiercest persecutor that ever lived what S. John has written of this wild beast. And he who had learned not to fear those who could only " kill the body, and after that had no more that they could do," he must have learned also and longed to teach the further lesson, that the only enemy whom the Church will find really formidable is he who assaults the soul to destroy it ; and that is our old enemy the Devil, and with him the World, which is his instru- ment. These, rather than any mere " man whose breath is in his nostrils," these are the foes whom S. John, in both his Epistle and Apocalypse, calls upon the Church to hate and fight unceasingly, and to long for and rejoice in their destruction. Another result of this intensity of character in S. John is a depth of thought, which careless readers and shallow thinkers have dangerously misused. * See Appendix, Note N. " The Neronian Interpretation of the Wild Beast." IHigintfiprtttU 5PI)ra£;cg. 35 Some, who want an excuse for reckless and ungoverned living, think that they have found this excuse in S. John's strong statements about human frailty, when (comparing it with the perfect standard of holiness which God has set before His children) he says, as S. Paul also has said, that all come short of the standard. " If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves." (i John i. 8.) *' True," say these insolent sinners, " we are always sinning, but so is everyone else, and we are no worse (even if we are no better) than the best of God's saints." Others want support for their opposite conceit that they never sin at all. They think that they have found this support in S. John's statement of the ideal child of God. " Whosoever is born of God sinneth not ; but he that is begotten of God keepeth himself, and that wicked one toucheth him not." (i John v. 18.) But these are confronted with S. John's equally strong statements of the actual condition of any children of God whom he as yet knows. For he assures us — " If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us." (I John i. 8.) Others, again, proclaim that they may sin as much as they like, yet never be judged or condemned for their sins, because they are the sons of God, and it is no more they that sin, but " sin that dwelleth in them." (Rom. vii. 17.) ** Little children," says S. John to such, " let no man deceive you .... he that committeth sin is of the devil." (I John iii. 7, 8.) Others want encouragement to indulge in uncharitable- ness towards those they think unchristian, and in insolent assurance about themselves. They think they have this 36 €i)t Cf)aracter of ^. ^ol^n'g ©Kriting^. encouragement in S. John's sayings about unbelievers and believers. Of the first he says — As long and as far as he is an unbeliever^ *' he walketh in darkness and has no light;" he is " a murderer ; " he is " a liar ; " he is "of the devil;" he "shall not see life, but the wrath of God abideth on him." Of " the brethren " he says, so long and so far as they are brethren indeed, they " are of God ; " they are "not condemned;" they have "passed from death into life ; " they " shall not come into condemnation : they have everlasting life, ' because ' they have the Son of God ; " and they are " in the Son of God," while they see the whole world lying " in the wicked one." This idealizing has been misunderstood, and perverted into an absolute condemnation of sympathy with those who are at any moment under the wrath of God. Men have suspected the beloved disciple of a want of sympathy with the Church's rescue work ; have suspected him of even teaching that Christians should have no love for those of their fellow men who are enemies of God, or on the side of the world : no not even for their own nearest relatives, if they see that they are unconverted. They say that S. John has never charged us to love any but "the brethren," or to pray for any except he be "a brother." They say that S. John has charged us not to " love the world ; for if any man love the world, the love of the Father is not in him." They say that he has charged us to render unto Babylon " even as she has rendered unto us ; to double unto her the double accord- ing to her works," and to rejoice over her fall and misery. (Rev. xviii. 6, 7.) But all this is because S. John soars so high above ^i^ Iftirali^tiTS of Cl)ai'actfr^. 37 the individual and the concrete, above the outward and the visible. It is because he looks away from particular persons, and dwells in rapturous thought upon the workings of the eternal principles of which human life shews us only imperfect expressions now. He sees the tendencies and the coming harvests of good and evil, where we see only the seeds and the mixed and half- developed workings. He describes perfect ideals, while the men and women and children whom we meet now are only bundles of contradictions and inconsistencies. Therefore S. John does often write as if he knew nothing of any twilight between perfect light and absolute darkness, between perfect holiness and utter iniquity. Yet at other times he shews how deeply he feels the imperfection of the best, whose highest privilege now is that they have the continual cleansing of the blood of Jesus Christ. And he shews how deeply he longs for the recovery of the sinful, when he reminds himself and us that "we have an Advocate with the Father, and He is the propitiation for our sins, and not for ours only, but for the sins of the whole world." (i John ii. i, 2.) He writes at times as if he knew nothing of that '* dim and dusky debateable " * region or neutral territory, in which the inconsistent believer is hardly to be distinguished by any eye from the no less inconsistent unbeliever ; that land in which children pass from darkness into light, and from light again to darkness, and where shadows and gleams of sunshine pass and flicker ; that debateable land of twilight and confusion in which confident hope swells into insolent assurance, and humility sinks into despair; * Ruskin's " Seven Lamps of Architecture." where generosity runs to extravagance, and prudence shrivels into meanness, and where every virtue shades off imperceptibly into the vice which is its excess or its defect. To S. John at times there seems to be only one eternal reality, only one everlasting existence, God, and the family of God in God, while the world and the things of the world are only passing shows, empty bubbles, delusive appear- ances. There seem to be at times for him only two distinct characters among men, and these two only as developed everywhere in full perfection. On the one side stands the child of God, walking in perfect light, loving and beloved, knowing his own position and known by all ; no cloud between him and his God, no misunderstanding to break his perfect fellowship with his brethren. He hears God's voice as Adam heard it in the happy garden, and he answers it in a childlike confidence that knows no fear ; every petition is granted as soon as named, each transgression and sin forgiven as soon as told. Indeed, he commits no sin that needs forgiveness, for he walks in love ; he keeps all God's commandments, and keeps him- self so that the wicked one toucheth him not. He is in the Son of God, and judgment is over for him, for he has passed from death, and is in the present enjoyment of eternal life. In his compassion and in his brotherhood there is no flaw; in his uprightness of life there is no defect ; darkness, and judgment, and unkindness, and sin are all done with for him, and done with for ever- more. Over against him there stands in dreadful contrast the ideal man of the world. He is a child of the devil; he is a liar with no truth at all in him ; a murderer with no ?^tg IfUtal €i)aracttrg. 39 touch of any human kindness in him ; walking in darkness, and having no Hght at all in him. He is hateful and hated, as well as hating every one. He hates God ; he hates his brother ; and no one is asked to love him or even pray for him ; for he is sinning a sin which is unto death ; he is wrapped in darkness, and lieth in the wicked one, bound into the great adversary, and within the world's evil conspiracy, as completely as others are bound up in the bundle of life with Christ. It is not fair dealing, it is not reasonable, to take separate expressions, or broken bits of verses, out of such high and transcendental treatment of sin and holiness, out of classes of being and ideals of character; and then to treat those fragments as if they were complete defini- tions of individual men ; to treat them as if they were all to be applied unconditionally to each hesitating believer, to each perplexed misbeliever. Is it not plain that S. John rises above — and desires to lift our thoughts also above — the tangled skeins of daily life ? that he is holding up above the earthly mists the perfect ideal of what he wants us each to copy, and each by God's good help at last to reach ? yet that he never means that anyone who is still in the flesh has as yet attained to this perfection ? Is it not plain that he also presents to us a sternly truthful picture of that complete ideal of evil towards which we all have tendencies ? and yet that he never once asserts that any one individual child of man ever has attained or ever will attain to this ? Such vileness as he holds forth every one of us can be charged to hate, even to strike savage blows against it, and to trample it under foot, *' rendering unto it double " for all the evil it is ever doing 40 €]^c C!)aracter of ^. ^ofyx'^ Wivitinq^. unto us ; " crucifying the flesh with its affections and lusts," even while we love with the tenderest affection every imperfect brother and sister of the human family. So also we can understand that S. John's teaching is that every pure and loving thought is born of God, ** all holy desires, all good counsels, and all just works " pro- ceeding from Him, wheresoever and with whomsoever they are found ; while each impure and sinful and loving emotion, and each imperfect action, is of the devil, no matter with whom it has been discovered. Those who do understand this find no contradiction between his many assertions of the sinlessness and safety of the child of God as such, and his equally strong warnings to every child of God whom his words can reach, to confess sinfulness, to come continually for cleansing, walk in the light, and keep the commandments of God, that they may abide in God and in the fellowship of the saints. Nor do such find any inconsistency in his assertions that the world and the fashion of it are passing away, in spite of his equally strong assertions of the dangerous power of the world. Nor do we see any inconsistency in his un- sparing condemnation of the world, and his rejoicing over its promised ruin, in spite of his teaching that God loves the world, and in spite of his loving desire to draw all out of the condemnation that they may pass from death into life. But some things we cannot understand. We cannot understand how the S. John who thus writes can be sus- pected of being so absorbed in the minute details of Roman court life, and the special vices and family history of a Roman emperor, as the Prseterist interpreters of the ^M ilargtnc^£{ of "Fitlu. 41 Apocalypse suppose him to have been. * We cannot understand how he can be suspected of special attention to the number of Papal bulls thundered against Martin Luther, or the precise intervals between the postings up of papers upon Church doors ; or the ornaments worn by Turkish pashas, t or the appearance of batteries of artillery which were not to be for a thousand years after his day ; | 3^et so the Historic School suspect him. Nor can we understand how the Futurists can suspect him of having altogether ignored 1800 years of the dispensation at the opening of which he stood, and yet of absorbing himself in the framing of dark riddles about local events which are to be the incidents of the few last years of the Christian era. Surely it is more natural to suppose that in this book also he sees the Church confronted with the same enemy against whom he warns us in his Epistle ; and that here also he is concerned with the ideals of which every age will shew the illustrations, the great principles which he found at work in his own heart and all round about himself in his own day, and which he foresaw working always until the end. So only can the Apocalypse be brought into line with his Gospel and his Epistle. In each we see a contest and a triumph. In the Gospel it is the Son of God Himself, the visible manifestation on earth of love and light and life, round Whom rage all the hosts of hatred and darkness and death. In the Epistle and in the Apocalypse we have the same afflictions and the same triumph accomplished in His servants, in the * See Farrar's " Early Days of Christianity," Chap, xxviii. Sec. v. t " Horae Apocalypticae. " :}: " Sig. Pastorini." 42 €\)t Ci^aracttr of ^. ^oW^ ^ritiiig^. fellowship of the Saints, in " the Church which is His Body, the fulness of Him Who filleth all things." Those who are content to rise with S. John to contem- plate the great ideals of the Church's warfare, and who for this will empty their hearts of curiosity about events and dates — those who come to him to learn lessons which will shew them the spirit in which he wishes them to fight, and the character of the service he asks from them — they will not find in the Apocalypse the obscurity of which others complain. Obscure it is to others, because they are trying to find in it what is not really there. They are attempting a feat which is not merely difficult but absolutely impossible. They are trying to discover the times and seasons appointed for the different incidents of the campaign. They are trying to find out from their Lord, or from the servant who seems to be in their Lord's confidence, how it is to fare with this country or that nation ; or where exactly the wars and pestilences and gatherings of vultures are to be. " What is that to thee ? " (S. John xxi. 22) would the Master say to each of such enquirers. " It is not for you to know the times or the seasons which the Father hath put in His own power." (Acts i. 7, 8.) Be content to be yourselves witnesses unto Me, serving Me: ^* watch" for yourselves and "pray lest ye enter into temptation" (S. Matt, xxvi. 41) ; for " wheresoever the carcase is, there shall the vultures be gathered together." (S. Matt. xxiv. 28.) Another characteristic of S. John's writings is suggestive for the interpretation of particular visions in the Apoca- lypse ; and it is closely akin to what I have just examined. This is his love of contrasts. No one has brought out W^ ^Q^t of Contragt^. 43 this feature of his writings more fully than Professor Milligan : and I cannot do better than extract one of the paragraphs in which he presents it to his readers. Having spoken of the large contrasts which few readers have failed to notice, he goes on to say : — " It is not enough, however, to observe this. The contrasts of the book are carried out in almost every particular that meets us, whether great or small, whether in connection with the persons, the objects, or the actions of which it speaks. If at one time we have an ever-blessed and holy Trinity, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost, at another we have that ' great anti-trinity of hell,' the Devil, the Beast, and the False Prophet. If we have God Himself, even the Father, commissioning the Son and clothing Him with His authority and power, we have the Dragon commissioning the first beast and giving him his power and his throne and great authority." [If the true Prophet (I may add), when He comes in His Father's Name, exercising His authority before Him, and speaking His Father's message, appears as a Lamb with seven horns, the false prophet exercising the authority of the first beast, and speaking as a dragon, appears as an animal also, having at least two horns like a lamb.] " If the name of the one is Jesus, or Saviour, the name of the other is Apollyon, or Destroyer. If the one is the bright, the morning, star shining in the heavens, the other is a star fallen out of Heaven into the earth. If the one has the keys of death and of the unseen world, * opening and none shall shut, shutting and none shall open,' the other has the key of the pit of the abyss. If the one has His throne, the other has also a throne. If the one is 44 ^I)c Cl)aiafttr of ^. 3ioI)»'sJ OTn'ttngg. celebrated in the Old Testament as havino^ none like unto Himself, the followers of the other magnify him with the words — * Who is like unto the beast?' If the one in carrying out His great work on earth is ' the Lamb as though it had been slaughtered,' the other (as we are told by the use of the very same word) has one of his heads * as though it had been slaughtered unto death.' If the one rises from the grave and lives, there cannot be a doubt, when we read in precisely the same language of the beast that ' he hath the stroke of a sword and lived,' that here also is a resurrection from the dead. If the description given of the Divine Being is — ' He which is, and which was, and which is to come,' that given of diabolic agency is that * it was, and is not, and is about to come out of the abyss.' "And if in the one case, when the Lord is thought of as come, the last term of the description is dropped, in the other case, when the beast comes in his final manifestation a similar omission is made. In the hour of His judgment we read of the wrath of the Lamb, and when the devil, cast out of Heaven, goes down into the earth and the sea, we are told that he has ' great wrath,' ' knowing that his time is short.' ** Many other particulars meet us in which the same principle of contrast rules. Believers are sealed with the seal of the living God ; unbelievers are marked with the mark of the beast. The seal is imprinted upon the fore- head ; the mark upon the forehead or the hand. The contents of the seal are the name of the Lamb and of the Father. The contents of the mark are the name of the beast or the number of his name. The tribes of the IBate of tl)t Spocalnpssc. 45 earth are in contrast with the tribes of Israel ; the false Apostles of Ephesus with the true Apostles of the Lord ; and the harlot Babylon with the Bride, the Lamb's wife, the holy city, Jerusalem. ** Nay the contrasts even go at times beyond the facts specifically mentioned in the book [of the Apocalypse], to facts only known to us through the Gospel history ; for it is hardly possible not to feel that in the binding of Satan at the beginning of the thousand years, in the casting him into the abyss, in shutting it and sealing it over him, we have a counterpart of the binding and burial of our Lord and of the sealing of His tomb."* (3.) Two other suggestions from the style of S. John's writings I give here, because they bear upon the con- troversy as to the date at which the Apocalypse was written. It is generally admitted now that the issue lies between two and only two possible dates, whose reversed figures are easily remembered, a.d. 6g or a.d. 96. The advocates of the earlier date refer S. John's banishment to the Neronian persecution, and they believe the Apo- calypse to have preceded the Fourth Gospel by a period of nearly thirty years. Those who support the later date hold that the author was banished by Domitian, and that the Gospel was written before or at latest very soon after the Apocalypse, t In solving the problem we have to notice the universal admission that the external evidence is strongly in favour * Milligan's " Baird Lectures," Lecture iii., Part ii., pp. 111-114. t See Salmon's "Introduction to New Testament," and Milligan's "Discussions on the Apocalypse." E 46 C^r C!)aracUi- of ^. 3Joi)u's( OTiitius^. of the later date. The force of this admission is attempted to be minimized by the offhand assertion that it rests solely and entirely upon the statement of one writer only — Irenaeus — the other writers of the first century merely adopting or repeating his assertion, that '* no long time ago was the Apocalypse seen, but almost in our own generation, at the end of the reign of Domitian." But those who thus disparage the authority of one so well qualified to inform us, forget that the reason why his testimony stands thus alone is because it was undisputed at the time. Therefore it comes down to us as not only the assertion of Irenaeus, but also as an expression of the belief of Polycarp, S. John's pupil, and the conviction of the Christian Church up to and after the days of Irenaeus. As such it is adopted by Clement of Alexandria, by Ter- tuUian and Victorinus, and recorded as unquestioned history by the historian Eusebius in the earlier half of the fourth century, and accepted by S. Jerome. We have therefore a succession of writers from the latter half of the second century down to the first half of the fifth, who write (not in the interest of any particular interpretation of any of the visions, but) as men who were recording a well-known historical fact ; and they are all at one in the statement that S. John was banished to the Isle of Patmos in the reign of Domitian, and that there he beheld the visions which he afterwards committed to writing. It is of course quite possible that these may all have been mistaken ; but to set them aside we require some very clear internal evidence that what they assert is so improbable as to be well-nigh impossible. Yet the ^tple of t\)t ^pocalppsit. 47 arguments, on which many of their nineteenth century opponents rely, seem to me at least to consist either of strong convictions against the Fourth Gospel, which the previous existence of this book is supposed to injure, or else of strong convictions in favour of peculiar interpreta- tions of the Apocalypse. Other more thoughtful and unprejudiced advocates of an early date for the Apocalypse rely upon the difference of style (which is certainly very observable) between the language of the Apocalypse and the language of the Fourth Gospel. They say that, if these were really written by the same author, a long interval of time must lie between them; and that the false constructions and grammatical blunders (euphoni- ously called "solecisms") which abound in the Apocalypse, are sufficient proofs that it must have been written at the very commencement of S. John's acquaintance with Greek, and before he acquired the facility of expression which his other writings shew. Readers will easily understand how eagerly this last argument has been caught at and adopted by those who wish to deprive the Church of S. John's testimony to the Godhead of Jesus Christ : and how enthusiastically they have upheld the authorship of the Apocalypse in order to impugn the authority of the Fourth Gospel. Thus we have in this case the singular instance of sceptical critics assigning to a New Testament book an earlier date than the orthodox had claimed for it. Yet we must acknowledge that the argument has weight, and deserves the careful and candid examination given to it by Dr. Salmon, who concludes that "the style of the Apocalypse is exactly what might have been written by one whose native 48 €[)t Cf)aiaftfr of ^. :^oIin'g ^litiiigg. language was Aramaic, who was able to use Greek for the ordinary purposes of life, but who found a strain put upon his knowledge of the language when he desired to make a literary use of it." "But how is it," he asks, ''that the Greek of the Gospel should be so much better, if both books were written by the same author ? I am not sure," he answers, "that the Greek of the Gospel does display so very much wider a knowledge of grammatical forms. A grammarian does not find so much at which to take exception ; but this may be because so much less has been attempted. It is much easier to turn into another language such sentences as — ' In the beginning was the Word,' etc., than such a phrase as * which is and which was and which is to come.' It is on account of this more restricted range of grammatical forms, that the Gospel of S. John has so often been used as the first book of a beginner learning a foreign language." Dr. Salmon also suggests that the linguistic differences between the Apocalypse and the Gospel could all be accounted for by the supposition that S. John wrote the former book with his own hand, and in the latter employed the services of an amanuensis, who would naturally have called his master's attention to any solecism in the words dictated to him.* Every reader will see how much these considerations weaken the arguments for the earlier date, as far as they are drawn from the grammatical peculiarities of the style. I venture, however, to add two additional considerations which seem to me to have weight in the same direction. One is that sufficient attention has not been given by * See Salmon's " Introduction to New Testament," Lect. xiii. 33rofem Con^tnictiong. 49 Canon Westcott and other advocates of the early date, to the conditions under which the majority of the broken constructions in the Apocalypse occur. Almost invariably their occurrence suggests the hasty dashing in upon the canvas of some new thought, some new feature, some new revelation, which the Seer adds to the vision or message he had almost completed. Thus instead of weakening the force of the revelation, these solecisms add vividness and therefore power.* We cannot therefore conclude that, because the Apo- calypse is full (while his other writings are not) of broken or Hebrew constructions, it must necessarily have been written by one who was only beginning to write Greek, and who was not yet as skilled a linguist as when he wrote his Gospel or his Epistles. The very fire of this Revela- tion, and its unique structure as an absolute mosaic of Hebrew figures and Hebrew quotations, are enough to account for all. It is in the rush of imagery or emotion, where thought crowds upon thought, or where the eye of the enraptured seer is bewildered by the multitude of instructive signs, that his knowledge of grammatical con- struction (which other passages shew that he possesses) is for a moment forgotten or overborne. He stutters as it were, stammering in his eagerness to tell out before the vision passes, every item of a revelation too big for human powers of utterance. No wonder that language fails him here. No wonder that there is not here the correctness which we find in the short and simple sentences of the Gospel, in which he sets down truths and incidents long * See Appendix, Note E, "Broken constructions in the Greek of the Apocalypse." 50 Ci)t Character of B. ^oW^ OTiiting^. and gravely pondered, and perhaps often told to thought- ful listeners. And when we then pass away from the evidence of grammar and the evidence of history, and when we sit down to examine the contents of the book for arguments as to the date of its composition, we have to take into account its general character and object. And then we ask, Where else in the collection of sacred writings, where else in the Canon of Holy Scripture could the Church have placed the Apocalypse than here as the very last and final utterance ? Had we found it imbedded among the Epistles, would we not have at once removed it and set it apart, because it stands absolutely alone among the inspired writings ? And to what other position should we have removed it ? Had we placed it first of all as an Introduction, it would have been unintelligible ; and there, or immediately after the Gospels or the Acts of the Apostles, it would have left the New Testament incomplete. An Epistle might in that case have so easily dropped off, or a spurious writing have been so easily added on to those loosely attached letters, that we should have always been in doubt whether we had indeed the entire collection and nothing but it. But when we find the Apocalypse where the instinct of the Church has at last placed it, we say that it gives a completeness to the whole volume. The solemn warning on its last page against either addition to, or subtraction from God's message, forms a proper finial to the sacred structure of inspiration. And when we have it so placed, then, as deep answereth to deep, so do the first pages of the Book of Genesis answer to the last pages of this Ci)e ^pocalppge CompleUd (^oti'^ 2£ltbtlattou. 51 Book of the Revelation. The creation of the heavens and the earth, v^hich now stands as a frontispiece to the Bible, answ^ers to the closing picture of the new creation of what is to be, when the present heaven and present earth are passed away, and when the present sea exists no more. Thus we find that the volume of inspiration, which tells the complete history of the heaven and earth from the very first to the very last, tells also the complete history of man from the day on which he first issued in the image of God from his Creator's hand, down through all his painful course of sin and strife, of falling and recovery, until the day of which the last pages of the Bible tell us, when all the suffering shall have ended, and the sin shall have been done away, and when he who stood at first in the garden of Eden shall be found at last in the golden city, with God, and like God for ever. It does create (if not an argument, at least) an impression in favour of the later date of the Apocalypse, that, as S. John's Gospel forms a fitting seal to the three preceding Gospels, and as S. John's Epistles form a fitting seal to all the other Epistles, so this also forms a seal, or rather puts a keystone into the arch of the whole volume of inspiration. * And even if this seems fanciful and overstrained, may it not be fairly urged, that " the disciple whom Jesus loved" must have desired to set forth the Master Himself, before he turned to contemplate or describe the future of the School which the Master founded, as S. Luke wrote * For an opposite impression, see Farrar's "Early Days of Christianity," pp. 491-3. 52 El)f Cl)aracter of ^. 3Jol)n'j( OTntings. first his Gospel before he began his history of the Church ? It is of course quite possible that the order of writing may have reversed the order of S. John's thoughts : still the most natural inference from the character and subjects of the books is, that S. John wrote first of Him on Whose breast he had leaned, and afterwards in his Epistle of the brotherhood that has fellowship with the Master, and finally bequeathed as his last legacy to the Church, his Lord's revelation of the Church's character, her warfare, and her coming triumph. This he was commissioned to leave with her as her guide and comfort, to establish the faith and patience of the saints until the everlasting day dawn, and the shadows flee away at the rising of the Sun of Righteousness. * It has also to be remembered that the advocates of the early date of the Apocalypse have to account for the absence of all reference in the Fourth Gospel, to the stirring language and imagery of a book which they suppose to have been for a quarter of a century in the hands of Christians. We thmk of many phrases such as ** the Lamb," "washed in the Blood of the Lamb," "the Dragon," the "wild beast that ascendeth out of the abyss," the " book of life," the " Alpha and Omega," and others. These impress us as phrases which, if they had * struck upon the ear of the Church in the time of the other Apostles,' or if they had been resting upon S. John's heart when he was writing his Gospel or Epistles, they could not but have crept into the text, they must have been then what they have since become, * the current coin of the Church's phraseology.' They would have been among * those household words * See Milligan's " Baird Lectures," Appendix iii. Cf)e ^pocalup^e autJ ti)c @ogpel. 53 which could not have failed to crop up here and there if only for variety in those writings.' But since we find them nowhere there, it is no slight evidence that they were not in existence in their day. * When we read S. John's version of our Lord's announcement of the two resurrections (in the fifth chapter of his Gospel), we cannot explain the absence of the faintest reference to the visions of the twentieth chapter of the Apocalypse, if those visions had been already seen by him in all their awful imagery. But turn from the Gospel to the Apocalypse, with the thought of the Gospel having already circulated, and we find reference after reference, if not to the actual words, yet certainly to the facts recorded in that Gospel. And when we compare once more the characteristic thoughts of the two books together, the language of Dr. Brown does not seem to me at all too strong, when he asserts that the Apocalypse lifts the readers of the Gospels and the Epistles " to even a higher region, giving forth the same truths in strains so exalted as almost to dim the brightness of them everywhere else. There the veil seems to be lifted, and we are ushered into the midst of things invisible and inaudible, with eyes to see and ears to hear. What is elsewhere simply announced is here enacted ; what elsewhere is said is here sung, sweeping upon the ear in strains celestial .... Is it natural to suppose that a book presenting the most exalted conceptions of the glory and majesty of the Eternal, with the ripest and richest expressions of the * David Brown, D.D., "The Apocalypse, its structure and primary predictions." p. 21. 54 ^ht Ct)aiacUr o£ ^. ^oj^ii*^ OTiitingg. Person and work of Christ, and both these breaking upon our ear in strains of celestial music, was written so much earlier than the Fourth Gospel that it belongs to the earliest apostolic age ? For myself, I cannot believe it."* And if we do accept the testimony of those writers who lived nearest to S. John's own day, and who tell us that this book was written by him in his extreme old age, when *' one by one all his brother Apostles had passed away in death, and when he was left alone in stormy times," then we find fresh beauty in the visions in which his Lord came to him in his loneliness. There is then a new pathos in his ardent response to his Lord's last assurance — '' Surely I come quickly." " Even so, come Lord Jesus," cries the loving disciple. That answer tells us of a long yearning in the past, and it foretells the gladness with which the tired Apostle must have greeted at last the long-expected message soon now to be brought to him, '* The Master is come and calleth for thee."t Again this acceptance of the later date of the Apo- calypse makes it nearly synchronize with the writing of S. John's First Epistle, and that would explain (what has been too little noticed) the absolute identity of the lessons in these two Scriptures, writings which on the surface shew so little outward resemblance. Like the Fourth Gospel, both of these writings also present us with the thought of Light and Life and Love in conflict with darkness and death and hatred. Like the Gospel, each of these also opens with a definition, describing the subject of the writing that is to follow ; * ''Apocalypse, its Structure etc.," pp. 14, 15, 17. ■j- See Wordsworth's "Commentary on the Apocalypse," Introduction. and each of them closes with a prediction of victory. Both of them describe the world and its prophets as the Antichrists, always coming yet always present. Both of them warn us against loving these, against being swallowed up by these so as to become integral parts of them, against being even tainted by them, for the whole world lieth in the wicked one, and its prophets have their inspiration from the Serpent who is the Devil. Both of these writings also proclaim the passing away of the world and the fashion of it, but the eternal life of those who " keep the com- mandments of God and have the testimony of Jesus Christ."* The difference between the Epistle and the Apocalypse is, that the truths which the Epistle teaches in homely words, as of an old man gravely warning and encouraging little children and youths whom he fondly loves, the Apocalypse puts these same truths into pictures which embody them in forms that set the imagination in a flame ; it paints them in signs and symbols, which are full of meaning, and rich with the treasured wealth of all the voices of "God's holy prophets, which have been since the world began." And all the lessons in Epistle and Apocalypse are built up upon — and are the final develop- ments of — what he has recorded in his Gospel. But, in spite of the strong impression upon my own mind, it is to be remembered that none of the interpreta- tions offered in these Lectures are in any way affected by any theory as to the date of the Apocalypse. And, what- ever theory as to the relative dates of these writings any commentators in the Church have held, we can all * See Appendix, Note F, " Canon Westcott on the Structure etc." 56 €i)t Cijaracter of ^. ^oift"'^ OTiiting^. say of all of them, what S. John himself has said of the records contained in his Gospel, " These are written that ye might beheve that Jesus is the Christ, and that believing ye might have life through His Name." (S. John xx. 31.) " For eternal life is in the Son ; [so that] he that hath the Son hath hfe ; and he that hath not the Son of God hath not life." (i John v. 11, 12.) Eectures!^ LECTURE I. ^f)t (!ri)aracter antJ OTDntent^ of ti)e ^focal^pm: Rev. I. I, 2. "The Revelation of Jesus Christ, which God gave unto Him, to shew unto His servants things which must shortly come to pass ; and He sent and signified it by His Angel unto His servant John, who bare witness of the word of God, and of the testimony of Jesus Christ, all the things that he saw." N choosing for a course of only six Lectures a subject so large as ** The Apocalypse," I may seem to be attempting the impossible. But my aim is not so ambitious as it sounds. I am not attempting a detailed explanation of the whole book, but only a general survey of the visions contained in it, and an indication of the chief lessons which I believe these visions were intended to teach. Nor do I propose to offer in these lectures arguments in support of the system of interpretation which I follow. For that would involve more or less of wearisome classi- fication of commentaries, and long discussions, which would leave no space for reverent treatment of the Apo- calypse itself. These lectures will therefore attempt nothing larger than a general outline of the arrangement ♦Delivered in Trinity College Chapel, Nov. 15th, 1891. 6o €f)avncUv una Contentjj of Vi)t Hpocabp^f. of the book, and a simple statement of the lessons which seem to me to be the lessons which the visions are calculated and were intended to teach. Such a treatment of the book will still leave with those who hear or read the lectures, the decision whether these are the lessons which S. John, and He Who inspired S. John, intended to teach ; and whether they and the visions that teach them are worthy of a place in the Canon of Holy Scripture. This method of dealing with the book requires certainly from both hearers and readers a preliminary confidence in the lecturer, which is yet little more than what every teacher demands from those who come to him for instruc- tion. It is here as elsewhere a confidence which they can afterwards confirm or withdraw. I am bold enough therefore to make a very large demand at the outset. I ask you all to dismiss for the present — even if you take them up again with renewed confidence when I have said all that I have to say — I ask you to dismiss from your minds every one of the modern traditions about the interpretation of this book. And by the word *' modern" I mean all those traditions which have no earlier origin than the fourteenth century ; all those which have been bequeathed to us by the combatants in the great crises of Church controversy, coming down to us from the times when men's minds were off the balance, and when they were using as a weapon of offence what was given to be a pastoral staff. It is not surprising if we find it bruised or bent from such misuse. * Yet this attempt of mine is very far from being original. It is only that which is being made again and again by * See Preface, pp. xiv., xv. ^lopj^cp not ^^retriftioii. 6i those who keep apart from controversial strife, made again and again during the last thirty years, and wherever men will Hsten with readiness of mind. It is the attempt to revive a principle of interpretation adopted in the earliest commentaries that have come down to us. * It is the giving to this book the simple and reverent treatment which is given to every other book of the New Testament. It is the treating the Apocalypse as a book written (not for the gratification of our curiosity, but) " for teaching, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness, that the man of God may be complete, completely fur- nished unto every good work." For this, S. Paul tells us, is the direct object of " every Scripture that is given by inspiration of God." (2 Tim. iii. 16, 17.) I offer, then, this suggestion as to the general character of the Apocalypse : — It is a. prophecy rather than a prediction. That is to say, it is a forth-telling rather than a fore-telling ; a divine utterance and not a mere writing of history beforehand ; f a revelation of the real nature of things which are already existing, of things which have been often witnessed, things which will occur again and again, and therefore things which are very close to all of us always. It is indeed a revelation, but, like all other utterances from God, it is not out of relation with previous revela- tions, t It is rather a recapitulation of what had been already told forth by the oracles of God ; for there is not * See above on "Nature of Prophecy," pp. 2-4. J See Chapter on " Nature of Prophecy." j Aubrey Moore. " Lux Mundi," p. 90. F 62 Cf)aracttr anU Contents; of ti)e Bpocalppge. one symbol, not one figure ia all these visions that is not borrowed from the older Scriptures. Yet these ancient figures are by no means plagiarized here ; for each, as it is newly raised up from the past, has now some new dress or new feature expressing the new light thrown by the Gospel of Christ upon what had " been said to them of old time." The Apocalypse is, as has been often said, " a perfect mosaic of Old Testament expressions ; " but it is a mosaic illumined by the light of the New Testament, and it is given in order to shew (as a French writer has said) " in what way the figures and prophecies of the Old Testament are to be applied to Christ and to His Church. And thus it proves that (as it says itself) * bearing witness to Jesus is the spirit of prophecy.' " * Like every true seer, like every true philosopher and statesman, this seer of the Apocalypse, this exponent of Christian philosophy, this statesman of the kingdom of Christ, foresees the future. But he foresees it, not by standing up upon an astrologer's tower and peering into the darkness in front of him, but by looking back to the past and reading the true nature of what has happened. Yet there is much more here than the mere insight of human sagacity. S. John with his eagle eye looks up to God. He gathers up all the signs and teaching of the oracles of old time. He remembers the richer meaning his Lord has taught him to put into these. Filled thus with the Spirit of God, he looks down into the hearts of the Christians to whom he has so long ministered, and out upon the cruel evil world, which hems them in and * See Note G, " Bossuet's thoughts on the Apocalypse." ^pmbolg of Cl)aiacUr. 63 persecutes or tempts them. He looks reverently by faith into the face of the Son of Man, on Whose breast he had leaned, and for Whose coming he always longs. Finally he is caught up in rapture to the very Presence Chamber of God, and in the contemplation of Him " Who is, and Who was, and Who is to come," he reads the true character of ''the things which are, of the things which he has seen, and of the things which are to be hereafter." (Rev. i. 19.) All this is but the assertion that, in the records of what God has done and of what man has done in the past, S. John reads the true character rather than the details of all that is to be in the future ; and the further statement that, in symbols long consecrated to the Church's use, he teaches the servants of Jesus Christ in every age to reahze what their position i:, what their dangers are, and what are the prospects of their future. Turning now from the character of the prophecy to consider the character of the things that are revealed in it, I take the position of those who assert that these are bound to be the things that are of religious importance to the servants of Jesus. The fate of particular empires at particular dates, the career of particular kings or states- men, the times or places at which great judgments are to fall, or the issues of international battles, — these may be of supreme importance to the world, but they are far too small for the high aim of this Seer of the New Testament. And on this account mere words are too weak and narrow for him. The thoughts given to him were not written down for him in letters, nor were they all told to him by word of mouth. They were painted in pictures ; they were shewn in signs. This revelation of Jesus Christ is 64 Cftaracta* antJ Coiitnits; of ti)c ^pocalwp^r. given in visions which, because they contain symbols, convey almost as great a variety of meanings as there are minds to study them. It discloses the Lord's lessons to His servants by the very figures by which it hides them from the world. And because it is in signs, not words, the lessons gather new meanings as the ages roll along. They are inexhaustible, because the visions serve as pictures of what happens in the world at large, and in separate kingdoms, and in national Churches, and also of what takes place in country villages, or even in the individual lives of men. Thus men have eagerly read into the figures of this book the events that are of special importance to them- selves or to their own party ; events which, though they may very strikingly illustrate the visions, yet are not the proper concern of the commentator on the words of S. John. Such writers may perhaps all of them be right in their application of the prophecy. They are wrong if they fail to recognize the principle involved in the event in which they are interested, the principle with which alone the prophet deals.* They are more seriously wrong when they reject other illustrations of his revelation, or when they say, " This event (or that) was what the Apostle had in view, and this exhausts the vision." I make, therefore, a threefold assumption. In the first place, the things which these visions picture were not all fulfilled (as the Commentators of the Praeterist School think) in the first centuries of the Church's history, so that no fulfilment of them is to be looked for now, and that they are to us in this nineteenth century only curious * See Dr. Arnold's " Thoughts on Prophecy," quoted above, pp. 15-17. ^ttitutJc of ^tutJentJJ. 65 records of the past, and proofs of the accurate fore- knowledge of God. In the second place, these prophecies have not been waiting (as the Futurists think) eighteen long centuries for their fulfilment, so that we have no practical concern with any of them at present, and shall have to do with none of them until the very eve of the coming of the Son of Man to judgment. Nor thirdly, are these visions (as the Commentators of the Historic School think) chronological histories of events which S. John foresaw would happen at particular dates in conspicuous places in the West of Europe. * No, these visions picture things which are always work- ing themselves out ; things which S. John found all very close to himself and to his own fellow-servants at the moment at which he wrote ; things which have been seen in many conspicuous places in the past, and which are still fulfilling themselves to-day round about us here in these British Isles, and even within our own separate homes, and in the secrets of our own hearts. And on this account everyone " that hath an ear to hear" ought to listen to these messages of the Spirit " to the Churches." And once more, it needs no exceptional cleverness or learning to read these signs aright. It needs no special knowledge of ancient history, as Farrar supposes, t or of modern history, as Elliot thinks, but only the knowledge of the other Scriptures, and only the spirit of the servants of Christ. All that is asked of any reader is that we come * See Appendix, Note A., " Schools of Interpretation." t See, however, Farrar's " Early Days of Christianity," pp. 410, 411, quoted in Note N. 66 Ci)aractcr aiitJ Conttnt^ of t[)t ^pocabpse. not in curiosity, but with the desire to gain from what is written here, a fuller knowledge of God, and of God's dealings with us, and also a deeper knowledge of ourselves and of our treatment of God. It needs only that we come to the study of this book earnestly desiring to learn from it something more of our own sinful weakness, and more of the mysterious craft of our spiritual enemies ; something more of God's power and love, something more of the greatness of His judgments, the riches of His blessing, and the splendour of the victory which He is coming to give to His people. What is all this but saying in other words that this book is exactly what itself says it is ? — " The Revelation of Jesus Christ which God gave unto Him, to shew unto His servants things which must shortly come to pass ; and He sent and signified'' (that is shewed it in signs and figures) — "signified it by His Angel unto His servant John .... Blessed is he that readeth and they that hear the words of this prophecy, and keep the things which are written therein, for the time is at hand." (Rev. i. 1-3.) Reading the book in this spirit, what do we find in it? We find that like most other books it has its Introduction, and its Conclusion ; and therefore may be readily divided into three large Sections. We have, First, The Church's Character, as an Introduction or Frontispiece, in the three first chapters. We have, Secondly, The Church's Warfare, as the general subject of the book, in the next fifteen and a half chapters. ilantfmaifes of ii)t I^pofalppsif. 67 And we have, Thirdly, The Church's Triumph, as the conclusion, occupying the last three chapters and a half. That these three divisions are natural and not arbitrary, a very short examination ought to satisfy us. For no reader has ever failed to see that the three first chapters stand separate from the rest. They are so distinct that even so patient a student as the late Archbishop Trench confessed himself unable to see their full connection with the main body of this book.* They are so markedly separate from the rest that a young German has recently given to the world his conjecture, that these chapters form an incongruous Christian headpiece to a merely Jewish prophecy.t We may agree with the German's conjecture so far as to admit that these first chapters do form a Christian headpiece ; but we can shew him that it is the natural head, and in full and living harmony with the body. We may admit that the main body is a Jewish prophecy ; but it is illumined with the full light of the Gospel of Jesus Christ, Who is the Alpha and the Omega of it. The second landmark has not been so often noticed ; but it stands and can be recognized nevertheless. It is to be found in the middle of the nineteenth chapter, where S. John thinks that in the fall of Babylon he has seen the last of all the visions that are to pass before his eyes ; and that he has heard the last words of the Revealer in his solemn assurance, " These are the true sayings of God." He falls down accordingly at the angel's feet, to * See Note H, " Archbishop Trench." t See Note I, " Vischer's Theory." 68 Cj^aractfv antr Contents of tf)t ^pocalppsie. do him homage and give him thanks for all. But the angel said unto him, "See thou do it not." For S. John was making a double mistake there. In the first place this angel was not himself the Son of Man, but only His representative, wearing the symbols of His presence and speaking in His name. And in the second place the revelations were not yet complete. A new and concluding series was still to follow : visions which would paint in fresh symbols the final destruction of the Church's enemies, in order to reveal the perfect triumph of the Church at last. Then the Revelation would be complete indeed ; and though the Apostle will still be forbidden to worship the angel messenger of Jesus, he will be then told that the prophecy is at last finished, and that none are to add to it, or to take away from it, until the Son of Man shall have visibly come. Noticing these two dividing points, the one between the Introduction and the Main-body of the Apocalypse, and the other between the Main-body and the Con- clusion, — we ought to notice also that each of these three revelations has its own stage, or platform, on which its visions pass. The first platform is the rocky island of Patmos, girdled with the tossing waves which formed the Apostle's prison walls. Far back in the history of God's people, their great ancestor Jacob was in exile, banished from the home of Isaac. He lay down to sleep on a lonely mountain side with his head on a heap of stones ; but he found that that barren spot was a very house of God, for Jehovah was in that place, with a ladder of communication and €i)t lligl)t of tj^e OTorlK. 69 angel messengers passing between Heaven and earth. (Gen. xxviii. 10-22.) S. John also has divine companionship in his prison solitude, and he also finds the spot on w^hich he stands become holy ground. The Church in some mysterious way is with him there. It is being ministered to in his presence, and the great High Priest of our profession charges him with a message for every member of the Church. He sees a golden cluster of lamps, and in the midst of the cluster a human figure in priestly and royal garments, supporting each lamp, holding them all together, tendingthelightsand Himself supplying all theirbrightness. It is a vision of the Church as the Light of the world, and very glorious in S. John's eyes. But the words spoken by Him Who is in the midst of the Church shews that she has this treasure of golden light in very earthen vessels. Each lamp has its own weaknesses and blemishes ; each has its own dangerous enemies ; and the comfort of the vision is saddened by a longer gaze and a deeper study of " what the Spirit saith unto the Churches." This is only the Introduction to the Revelation, though itself also a revelation. For this poor lamp, with all its imperfections, is yet the divinely appointed means of lighting up the world's darkness. It has therefore to go down into the midst of that darkness, where enemies and traitors will try to overturn and quench it. Only the presence of Him Who is in the midst of it, and only the guardian arm of Him Who rules the universe, can carry it safely on its way. To see this carriage and this preservation of this Church, to see the true nature of her warfare on the earth, the 70 Ci)aractrv auti Contents of tl)f ^pocalupslf. Apostle has to be lifted up above the earth ; for this subject needs a loftier platform and a serener atmosphere. He looks, and behold an open door in Heaven ; and the voice that for the first message spoke from behind him, speaks now from above — " Come up hither, and I will shew thee what must come to pass hereafter." Straight- way he is in an ecstasy of the spirit, and finds himself in a Divine Council Chamber, into which God Himself has assembled representatives of His animate creation under the figure of four Living Bein«[s, and special representatives of His Church whom He has made kings and priests unto Him, and who are seated with Him as Crowned Presbyters. * God is taking counsel with these for their safety, and therefore, for His own glory and theirs. Under the administration of this council four courses of visions pass before the Apostle's eyes, in which the Church herself is almost lost to sight, while principalities and powers more mysterious and mightier than she seem to be the true combatants. We have the Church's history treated finit, as the break- ing up of seven great seals that keep back the Will of God from being either declared or accomplished. We have the Church's history pictured a second time, as seven great trumpet-blasts from Heaven, proclaiming God's war, and bidding His soldiers fight manfully in battle. We have it a third time pictured, as a great struggle between the serpent and the woman, in which the woman's seed is bruised, but the serpent crushed at last beneath victorious feet. And we have the same history a fourth time, as a sevenfold sketch of the divine plagues (or * See Note K, " The Cherubim and Crowned Presbyters." Ct)e ConcIutJing; ^ctnc^. 71 strokes) by which the wrath of God is executed upon evil, and the servants of God and of the Lamb rescued from the grasp of their tyrants. The series is then closed by a Postscript, in which is painted the eternal downfall of the world's proudest city in order that the heavenly Jerusalem may take its place. (Ch. iv. i — xix. 10.) After such a series of visions it is not strange that S. John should have thought that the revelation was com- plete. In great measure it was. Over and over again the warfare had been shown ; each cycle of visions giving a deeper insight, and creating a more profound impression of the tremendous character of the battle, and a fuller conviction that the strokes that really crush out evil are all the strokes of God. It is the love and wrath of God, and in no sense the strength or ''wrath of man, that worketh the righteousness of God." (James i. 20.) But there are brighter visions now to follow. Where is the third scene laid ? And what is now the platform on which the sacred drama is unfolded ? We cannot tell ; for now for the first time in this book the entire Heaven is thrown open,* and sky and earth are mingled in chaos. The visions are not now of the Son of Man coming down to the island of Patmos, nor of the seer being caught up to Heaven. All barriers are thrown down now, and all distinctions both of time and space are now obliterated. How is the great struggle pictured in this new revelation ? * In the Fourth Chapter " a door was opened in Heaven." At the close of the Eleventh Chapter " the sanctuary of God that is in Heaven w^as opened." In the middle of the Fifteenth Chapter " the sanctuary of the tabernacle of the testimony in Heaven was opened." Now it is " Heaven'' itself. 72 Ci^amftfr antr Contents of the ^pocalpp^e. A Royal Rider comes forth from the opened Heaven, and armies that are of heavenly birth follow under His leader- ship, but the battle and the slaughter take place on earth. A mighty angel comes forth from Heaven to '* bind the strong man in order to spoil his goods " (S. Matt. xii. 29) ; but the sepulchre of the conquered serpent is the ** pit of the abyss," and his temporary resurrection for his struggle and defeat are on the earth. The " great white throne " of judgment seems to be set in vacant space, for Heaven and earth are fled away : yet the earth and sea and death and Hades are still existing to give up their dead. And finally, when all is ended, and every enemy has been cast out for ever into " the second death," the holy city does not rise up from the earth on which it had been besieged, but is seen " coming down out of Heaven as a bride adorned for her husband." And the Tabernacle of God is now with men, and Paradise and the tree of life are restored to men for ever. For the " Golden Lamp " of the Introduction has passed safely through all the storm of conflict, and has developed into the " Golden City," of which God and the Lamb are the everlasting light. (Ch. xix. II — xxi. g.) The arrangement of these three separate platforms (as I have ventured to call them) marks more strongly the threefold division of the scenes that are exhibited upon them, and it has also lessons of its own. The first platform suggests that the *' character of the Church " in her present condition may be studied upon earthy though only by those who have the presence of the Son of Man, and whose sight and hearing are quickened by the Spirit Who teaches all. Ht^ioni from tije 2Figionc;. 73 The second platform of the book suggests that to see the true nature of the things that are coming, to gain courage and wisdom to meet the trials and dangers that are before us, and to read God's purposes of wise love in all His dealings with the Church and her enemies, our hearts must be lifted higher. For this a door must be opened to us in Heaven, and we must be given access into the true Holy of Holies, the Presence Chamber of our God. There only shall we succeed in reading the mystery of all that is now working itself out on earth. But there, in the ''beatific vision," we shall discover that the reins of sovereignty have never fallen from our Father's hands ; and we shall feel the throbbing of the heart that rules the universe He has created, the family He has redeemed; and we shall see that each apparent disaster is really working out the coming triumph. But to read the final issue accurately, to realize the triumphant conclusion of the whole matter, to see the redeeming work of Jesus Christ, in one all-perfect view, — for this the entire Heaven has to be opened out ; times and seasons must be forgotten by us; "a thousand years" must be treated as *' one day," and (what is harder) ''one day" must be treated as being practically "a thousand years." (2 Peter iii. 8.) The great battle, which in the fifteen previous chapters has been pictured, first from this aspect then from that, and which, according to human measurements of time, has been waged for thousands of years, this is here com- pressed into a moment. As with the history of creation in the first chapters of Genesis, so with the history of redemption in these last chapters of the Apocalypse, the 74 C!)araftfr antJ Contents of tl)c ^pocal»pSe. work of ages is compressed into a day. What seems to our impatient eyes but a momentary binding of Satan at the cross and grave and resurrection of Jesus Christ, that swells (in the thought of God) into ** a thousand years ; " and the mystic '* half week" (1260 days) in which Satan is loosed to make war against the true children of the woman, this is treated here as but "a little space," only an expiring effort of his wrath before he is destroyed for ever. In this strange and beautiful chaos, where time and space are banished, and earth and sea and sky have passed away, and where the lights that used to rule the day and night are quenched in the surpassing glory of the Everlasting Light, here the Kingdom of Christ enters upon its new phase, as the Kingdom of the Father (i Cor. XV. 24) ; a career of unsullied happiness and unrivalled greatness, where God is all and in all. The imagery of these last visions has a beauty which, oftener than tongue can tell, has soothed the restlessness of fevered hearts, has nerved for work and for endurance hearts that bleed for the present sufferings of humanity. It has won the admiration of even those who do not love our Lord. But we, who find all this in the volume which we reverence as God's Book, we find something better than the beauty of poetry here. These holy pictures are to us divine pledges and sacred promises of our Master's continual presence with us, of His over-ruling Providence, and of a coming joy which He Himself is preparing for the faithful soldiers of His Cross. Therefore we study for our humiliation and for our in- struction in righteousness, the introductory picture of the Warning; antr Encouragement. 75 Church's present character. We study for our warning, the central pictures of the Church's present warfare. And we study for our strong encouragement, the con- cluding pictures of the Church's future triumph. And though the visions tarry for their fulfilment, and though the warfare seems at times even to go against us, we can stay our hearts upon these heavenly promises ; for, as we are persuaded that our King is " King of kings and Lord of lords," so we are assured that those who fight for Him shall come out more than conquerors through the might of Him that loves them. Here is the secret of "the faith and patience of the saints; " and very blessed is the reverent study of this book, because it is a prophecy well calculated to confirm this faith, and to direct this patience. LECTURE II. Et)t jTroutispuce to ti)t Epocalppi^e.* Rev. I. 12, 13, " I saw seven golden Lampstands, and in the midst of the lampstands One like unto a Son of Man." S there is a frontispiece to the Sermon given by our Lord on the mountain in GaUlee, so there is also a frontispiece to the Revelation given in the island of Patmos. The frontispiece to the Sermon, is the picture of the character of the disciple of Christ contained in the seven beatitudes. The frontispiece to the Revelation in the island, is the picture of the character of the Church, that is, of the Company into which Christ formed His disciples ; and it is a picture which takes the form of a cluster of seven golden lamps. Such a frontispiece is entirely in the style of the Author of the Fourth Gospel and S. John's First Epistle. At the beginning of his Gospel, he has placed as an Introduction to it a definition (in eighteen verses) of that Word of God of Whom the whole book is an inspired record. At the opening of his First Epistle, he has placed a similar definition (in four verses) of the subject of which he was * This Lecture was not delivered before the University, but is added to complete the treatment of the subject. Cfjc Burm'ag; ?3u^]b. 77 about to write. So also here, at the opening of this book, he has placed as its Introduction, a definition of the Church whose prospects are to be unfolded in all the after visions. For this first vision of the three first chapters is at once a picture, a definition, and a revelation of the true nature of the Church of Christ. It is an Introduction which carries our thoughts back to the opening revelation given to Moses, when he watched his father-in-law's sheep in the wilderness of Midian. The bush, which then arrested the attention of the exiled servant of God, was the foundation of many an image afterwards used to represent God's people. And the bush, burning with fire, yet not consumed because of the presence of God in the midst of it, was an apt illustration of the then condition of God's people, growing and multiplying the more they were afflicted by the Egyptian tyrant. It may possibly have been the original source of the image here — the bushy cluster of lamps giving out a light that is never quenched, because of Him Who is in the midst of it. And certainly the title, claimed here for Himself by Him Who was in the midst of the cluster is only a fuller development of the Name of God proclaimed to Moses at the burning bush. The essential of the name Jehovah is God's living eternity ; and living eternity forms the essence of this larger title in the isle of Patmos ; only that now there is interwoven into it the thought of the Death and Resurrection of the Son of God : — " I am the First and the Last and the Living One ; and I became dead, and behold, I am living for evermore, and I have the keys of death and of the unseen world." (Ch. i. 17, 18.) Are we not struck with the strange contrast between G 78 €i)t dTronti^piect to tbf ^poralpp^f. the view taken here of the dying of the Lord Jesus, and that which met S. John's eyes when he stood by the cross on Calvary, or when he searched in vain the empty sepulchre ? Then the dying of his Lord was everything to him. It was a calamity which made his past belief appear a blunder, his firm expectation of redemption through his Master seem a vain delusion. The whole world was crucified to him there with Jesus, and all his memories and hopes were then buried in that sepulchre. But now, what is the anguish of that last dark week to the beloved disciple ? It is but a single speck, only one solitary point that " hath neither parts nor magnitude," on a line of life that extends eternally in both directions. It had eternity before it ; it has eternity to follow it. " I am the Living One," said Jesus, '* and Hving from all eternity, I became dead, and lo I am living for all eternity to come." On Calvary, and through the long hours of the dreadful sabbath that followed the Crucifixion, all the works that S. John had seen in Jesus in the past, all the glorious prospects that he had drawn from Jesus for the future, — all must have seemed then to him to have been but dreams from which he had had a terrible awakening. But now as he looks back from the isle of Patmos, the transcendent glory of his Lord before him, the tender pressure of the strong right hand upon him, and in his ears the voice as of the musical roll of many waters, — here it is the cross and the grave that must seem to him as uneasy dreams ; the life and light that are in Jesus Christ, these are proved now to be the great realities. Yet that there is this point upon this line, that there i9fat]^ III Uife. 79 is this one black spot upon the infinite Hne that spreads from everlasting to everlasting, — this shews the eternal greatness of the death, that can thus leave its mark for ever on that unbeginning and unending life. It is the same all through the visions of this wonderful book, in which, although it thrills with the triumph of the risen Lord, the bloodspot is never far away. Even in the most triumphant songs of Heaven over the victory of the Son of God, the central point of the anthem is — " for Thou wast slain, and didst purchase unto God with Thy blood out of every tribe, and tongue, and people, and [ nation." In the centre of Heaven, as the one object of adoration, stands the Conqueror, the Lion of the tribe of Judah, and when S. John sees Him, He is in form *'a Lamb as it had been slain.'' The 144,000 of Israel, and the countless multitudes of every nation who are grafted in among that consecrated people, these have all washed their robes in the blood of the Lamb. And the book of life belongs to the Lamb Who is described as slai7i from the foundations of the world : for that death of His had a far-reaching value. It was counted upon beforehand ; and it is effectual still, and shall be for ever through all the countless ages of eternity to come. The materials or symbols which form this picture, are (like all the other figures in this book) remarkable both for their novelty and also for their lack of novelty. And first, for their lack of novelty. The figure of a golden lampstand with seven golden lamps upon it was familiar to every Israelite, reminding them of one of the costliest and most conspicuous of all the ornaments in the Temple. This was a cluster of seven 8o Cl)e dTroiitisipicct to t]^c ^pocalnpi^f. golden branches growing out of one golden stem, and all made of the same material of which the stem was made. Its seven lamps were fed with oil, and lighted and trimmed by the High Priest and his assistant priests ; that High Priest having been anointed at his consecration with the same sacred oil with which all the seven lamps were continually fed. This ornament furnished the material for many an after type of the Church or people of God, — of the olive and the vine (Rom. xi. 17-25 ; S. John xv. 1-7), for example, which were used to picture the one con- secrated witness and worker for God on earth ; the people commissioned to hold up the light of truth in the midst of a world otherwise dark ; the sacred tree employed to bring forth fruit to the glory of God, and to provide food and refreshment for hungering and fainting souls. So much of the meaning of this figure every one can recognize. But the unfortunate use in our Authorized Version of the words " candle " and '' candlestick," instead of " lamp " and '* lampstand " has hidden one of its many lessons from English readers. For the Israelites were taught by it, that even God's own consecrated lamp has no light in itself, as apart from the Divine source of light ; and that it has no means within itself of even keeping up the light when once it has been lighted. It is only a stand, although a lampstand ; and each of all its lamps is only a vehicle fitted to contain the sacred oil which the Priest of God has continually to pour into it. He must be perpetually replenishing it, and he alone can light it with its heavenly light. Such a lampstand with such a light, God's chosen people always has been on the earth. But observe now how this familiar figure has altered Sfbclopmmt of €y^t^. 8i as the circumstances of God's people altered, how it has been developed as the constitution of the Church has been developed. In the infancy of God's people many elements of God's message had to be explained separately, taught " line upon line, precept upon precept," as if each had a separate existence. But, when the several lessons had been learned, they were drawn together and combined to form the perfect image which had always been in the great Master's mind. Thus, for example, the offices once separate of the Prophet, Priest, King and Law-giver, and also the functions of the sacrifice, the victim, the altar and the temple, all were at last found in their full ideal in the person of the " one Mediator between God and man, the man Christ Jesus," at once Priest and Sacrifice. So also with the Tabernacle and the Temple ;— the Priest w^ho tended the Golden Lamp within these, the fire with which he hghted the lamp, the olive tree from which he procured the oil with which he fed its flame, and the people of God who watched and were taught by all these symbols, these were at the beginning represented as separate existences. But in this last development of type teaching given in the isle of Patmos, we find all these bound together in one, the candlestick, the olive branches, and the witnesses for God, all one in Him Who is in the midst. At last, even the whole City of God and the Temple of that city are identified with each other, all one in Christ. And therefore there is found no need for lamp or priest, or even temple in that city, for the glory of God enlightens all : it is all God's mercy-seat, and the lamp thereof is the Lamb. (Rev. xxi. 22.) 82 Cije iTrontispicfc to ti^t ^pocalop^c. Again, in the wilderness where the golden lamp was first introduced as the symbol of God's people, God had brought that people very 7tear to Himself, and had lighted them with the light of heavenly teaching. A very striking figure of this was the golden lamp with its clustered branches, and each branch a lamp, standing in the Holy Place, and brought near to the Holy of Holies, and so to the mercy-seat, where God revealed His presence. But in the later days of the New Covenant God has done more than even this for His people. He has Himself come down into the very midst of them, so that His light is not now in front of them, or shining upon them only from outside. We now have Him Who is the true light of the world within us, walking in the midst of His Churches, knocking at the doors of our hearts, and holding high festival within us. This changed relation is pictured by a change in the long familiar figure. The one seven- fold lamp is broken now into a cluster, in order that the Son of Man may be represented as in the midst of us. Yet the unity of the Church is by no means broken by this incarnation. Rather, the true stem of the one golden lamp is now identified with the Priest Who tends her; for He is the fruitful Tree in Whom all the branches have all their life and light. And though they may seem to the world to be severed from each other, as branches would be separate, if it were not for the one tree out of which they all are growing ; and as the members of our own body would be separate, if they lost their living and corporate connection with their one head, yet are these seven Churches one Church for ever. It is one golden cluster, all whose unity is in Christ, all whose safety is in Cl)t <^olKtu Uamp. 83 the strength of the right hand of Him Who holds all her stars of light, and all whose brightness is from Him Whose golden glory exceeds the brightness of the sun. The whole wealth of the imagery in this first chapter is employed upon the central human figure ; yet not He, but the cluster of lamps of which He is at once the stem, the centre, the upholder, and the priestly guardian — this cluster of lamps is the direct subject of the vision. " I turned," says the Apostle — " I turned to see the voice that spake with me, and being turned, I saw " — what ? — not *' one like unto a son of man surrounded by seven lamps," but " I saw seven golden lampstands." Certainly there was in the midst of these lampstands One from Whom came all the brightness, and the voice that spoke was His voice. Yet the sight that met the Apostle's eyes was the cluster of lamps : and the imagery of the glory of the Son of Man shewed Him, not absolutely as He is in Himself, but relatively as He is to His Church, in the midst of which He walks. His Church, therefore, is the great subject of this vision. His Church which He is tending with the instruction, the comfort, the reproof, the encouragement, which in seven epistles are addressed to the seven Churches represented by this cluster of lamps : seven congregations which were clustered on the mainland of Asia Minor, towards which the Apostle looked : seven Churches through which his message comes to all. These were to him a representation of the sevenfold Church, that great Church which is found everywhere, yet one through all the world : that Church whose branches are no more really independent of each other than the living branches of a tree ; no more truly separate 84 ^f^t dfronti'spicce to tlje flpocalwpst. than " the seven Spirits " of the fourth verse, which were the manifestations of the one sevenfold Spirit of God. The subject, then, of the Introduction, and the subject of the Apocalypse, is the great Church of Christ. Nor is it unnatural that the disciple, whose first subject was the Master Whom he loved, and his second subject the life and light and love belonging to the whole brotherhood of the Master's disciples, should in this his last writing have taken as his subject the Brotherhood itself, the Sheepfold, the Family of God, the Society of Jesus, the " Ecclesia," the authoritative and legislative Body which the Lord Himself has founded, and which He has commissioned to do His work in winning the world for Him, pledging Himself that He ''will be with it always, even unto the end of the world."* Questions have been asked as to the connection between this opening vision and all the courses of visions that follow it. But when we consider that the Church of Christ is the general subject of the whole book, we can have no difficulty in discovering why it has been prefaced by a revelation of the internal character of the Church. We study this revelation in order to discover what, how great, and how weak is she whose fortunes are afterwards to be depicted. We study it as we would study the personal character and portrait of one who was expected to play a prominent part in history. We believe that in this personal character, if we read it right, we shall discover the true nature of many of his after doings, and the clue to much that would otherwise have been a mystery to us. * See Introduction, Chapter ii., pp. 54, 55. Ci)c CljaracUr of tj^t €l)iirc]5. 85 Here then, in this first vision, in all the details of the golden lamp and its glorified central figure, expanded as these are in the seven addresses of the great Priest to the seven Churches, here we can discover the true nature of the Church of Christ, her intrinsic greatness, and her many weaknesses. And we can already find in her and in her surroundings, all the elements of the strife and disaster which are afterwards to be detailed ; and we read along with these the early promise of the victory that is to be achieved at last. But this vision does much more than merely prepare us for what is to follow it. It is itself well worthy of a divine revelation, and speaks with more than mere human insight and natural sagacity. One marvel contained in it is the superhuman penetra- tion with which are discovered all the secret things of the Church of Christ. The great namesake and first instructor of this John lost heart once during his imprison- ment, and sent two of his disciples to ask of Jesus — ''Art Thou He that should come, or are we to look for another?" (S. Matt. xi. 2, 3.) This second John, though he also has his moments of discouragement (Rev. v. 4), and though he also finds at times a bitterness in the message or dealings of God (Rev. x. 10), he has always faith enough to accept that message, to submit to those dealings, and to fall down before the majesty of the Son of Man. In an imprisonment at least as lonely as that of John the Baptist, the Apostle recognized still the glory of the buffeted Church, as he had testified to the surpassing glory of her Lord. The scattered and troubled Church appeared to him even in his exile, as a cluster of golden lamps. 86 Cf)e .-fTrontt^pitcc to ii)t ^pocalppi^e. To say the least that may be said of this first feature in the vision, it is certainly noteworthy that the lonely exile was able to see so much value m the Christian Society ; that he could look in thought upon the scattered, impoverished, and despised followers of the Crucified, and find an unearthly and golden glory in what seemed to other eyes so feeble. It is even more remarkable that, when he had a faith strong enough to see, and brave enough to proclaim, the surpassing value of the Christian Church, he had yet eyes to see and candour to acknowledge all her weaknesses and even vices. And we must add to these two facts a third. S. John never misplaces either the glory or the shame, either the strength or the weakness of the Church. The whole glory of the Church, as he sees it, is found in the supernatural being of Him Who is in the midst of her. Her real danger he sees to be not from the presence of false teachers, false prophets, or false Apostles, or even from the throned presence of her great adversary, Satan ; nor from the fierceness of the persecutions or temptations that threaten her; no, nor even from her own inherent weaknesses. Her only formidable dangers are from her \ tendencies to be disloyal to her Master and Head. Loyalty and love to Him are (according to S. John) the infallible specifics for all the dangers that shall ever beset ^ the Church, whether from without or from within. It is not too much to say that an uninspired writer would have either exaggerated her hopes or fears, her dangers or her privileges, or else would have misplaced some or perhaps all of these. An uninspired writer who could have anticipated for the Church in S. John's day d. ^oW^ i3ibint IFugigf^t. 87 such a perfect victory, such an unclouded happiness as is promised in the last chapters of this book, could not have foreseen all the warfare and disaster, all the sin and sorrow, which are depicted in the central chapters. Nor could any common heart have naturally hoped for triumph, if it felt, as strongly as this Apostle felt, the inherent weakness of the Church, the awful power and evil successes of her enemies ; or if it realized the blighting, the darkness, the hostile armies, that were to beset the little flock of Jesus' sheep.* Yet not in mere general terms, but with even miscro- scopic attention to details, we have pictured in this book the inner character of the Church, the offices of her Lord in her behalf, the furnace of temptation in which she is to be tried, and her triumphant issue at last out of all her troubles. We ourselves, with all the experience of the past eighteen centuries and a half to guide us, find it hard to recognize the glory of the Church, although we are living in the very midst of it. Yet he who was taught to look so much more deeply than any of us look into the secrets of the heart, and who could detect spiritual death where the world saw life (Rev. iii. i), failing of love (ii. 1-5)? or the introduction of impurity (ii. 12-16), where there seemed to other eyes to be no slackness of zeal and no error of belief — he who could see a hateful self-com- placency, where there was no consciousness of discomfort or of imperfection (iii. 14-ig) — he saw that the Church was still really golden, and a sacred lamp, " the light of the world" (S. Matt. v. 14), with the Son of Man *See Bishop Wordsworth's "Introduction to the Apocalypse." Ci^e dTroiittslpifce to tf)e ^pocalppgt. in the midst of her, and her angels held in His strong right hand. Out of this first portrait of the Church grow all the after revelations of the book. A Church with such warring elements within her, and such opponents ranged against her outside, must have warfare. A Church with such an one as this Son of Man in the midst of her cannot be disastrously moved (Isaiah Ix. 1-22 ; S. Matt. v. 16 ; S. John i. 5) : she must eventually triumph : the gates of hell cannot possibly prevail against Christ's Church. (S. Matt. xvi. 18.) By the study, therefore, of this frontispiece we are prepared to anticipate the long battle of the next fifteen chapters, and yet the perfect victory of the three last chapters. But these first chapters are not merely preparatory : they have a lesson of their own. Our first sight of the Church here, as the " light of the world," uplifts us. We see her as a golden lamp, whose seven branches cluster round a Royal Priest, from Whom comes all their bright- ness. We learn to realize the capabilities and high calling of the Church into which we have been baptized, and we call upon her to '' arise and shine, for her light is come." Gross darkness is covering the people, and the shades of spiritual night have fallen upon the earth ; but the true Priest of the Most High God has lit the lamp of the Holy Place, and we know that He will never allow that light to be overpowered by darkness. We see Him in His golden and beautiful garments, trimming all the lights of His lamp, and holding its stars in His right hand; and our hearts grow full of courage. But we hear Him tending the several branches of the ^11 (©igani^eO ^ocittp. 89 cluster, as the husbandman prunes the branches of his vine (S. John xv. i), and as the shepherd trains and restrains the sheep of his pasture. His seven messages to the seven angels of the Church, who represent and are responsible for the cluster that stands for His sevenfold Church, are all before us. We study these epistles, and learn from them that the Church of Christ is a brother- hood, bound together by local and social ties, bound (not into absolute uniformity, but) into an unity which can be shewn as well as felt. It is no ideal brotherhood, but an intensely human Society. Branches whose lights are only flickering in the socket (Rev. ii. 1-8), branches tolerating (ii. 12-18), or even indulging (ii. 18-29), the grossest vice; branches having a name to live, but in Christ's sight really dead (iii. 1-7), branches diseased with a self-com- placency which is absolutely sickening to the Church's Lord (iii. 14-22). All these are here bound by Christ Himself in union and fellowship with those who are loyal in weakness (iii. 7-13), and with those who are faithful even in the fire of persecution (ii. 8-11). The Church, which is the world's light, and in the midst of which the Son of Man is walking, contains all of these. And each member of the Church may, if he searches, find in his own heart the same bundle of incon- sistencies and contradictions which is here shewn to be in the living Church. " He that hath an ear, let him hear what the Spirit saith to the Churches." This organized Society — each of whose branches have a life that is a counterpart of the life of the whole Society, and a framework that is a miniature of the framework of the entire Church, and of which the ecclesiastical organi- 90 Ct)e dfronttslpitce to tj^e ^pocalppele. zation of the Church of Ephesus is set out in Holy Writ as a signal specimen * — this brotherhood, earthly and heavenly, with so many human frailties, has a warfare before her in which she will have to wrestle, not only with her own infirmities and with human adversaries: she has to wrestle also " against the principalities, against the powers, against the world-rulers of this darkness, against the spiritual hosts of wickedness in the heavenly places." (Ephes. v. 12.) It could not be that her com- passionate Lord would commission her for this war, without giving her some forecast of the nature of the campaign. The whole volume, therefore, of Scripture, written " that the man of God may be complete, com- pletely furnished for every good work" (i Tim. iii. 17), would itself have been incomplete, were it not for this last instruction, this " Revelation of Jesus Christ, which God gave unto Him, to shew unto His servants things which must shortly come to pass." Armed with this knowledge of themselves, of their God and Saviour, and of the devices of their enemies, " the armies which are in Heaven" may with a cheerful courage follow their Royal Captain as He rides out to battle. Having the true Light of the world in her midst, the lamp which seems to our eyes so fragile may go down the dark and stormy path marked out for her, storm and tempest round about her, enemies and false friends be- setting her, judgments falHng on her right hand and on her left. '* God is in the midst of her : she shall not be moved. God shall help her, and that right early." (Psalm xlvi. 5.) Out of the darkness and danger we shall * See "A Talk about Bishops " (Scott), Chapter viii., p. 115. Cf)e €i)mcl)*i f^ope. 91 see her rise at last, her light unquenched, her gold un- tarnished, the golden candlestick developed into a city whose streets are all of gold. With such a prospect Isaiah might well encourage the impoverished and bruised Church of his day—'* O thou afflicted, tossed with tempest and not comforted, behold, I will lay thy stones with fair colours, and lay thy founda- tions with sapphires. And I will make thy windows of rubies, and thy gates of carbuncles, and all thy border of pleasant stones. And all thy children shall be taught of the Lord, and great shall be the peace of thy children. .... No weapon that is formed against thee shall prosper ; and every tongue that shall rise against thee in judgment thou shalt condemn. This is the heritage of the servants of the Lord, and their righteousness, which is of Me, saith the Lord." (Isaiah liv. 11-17.) LECTURE III. Ei^t 13attU of aimi8f)tg (Solr, heing tfte Vmow^ of t1)e S>^^l55^ ti)e JTrumpetjei, anU tlje T:Jial!e5.* HE Central division of the Apocalypse contains a series of pictures in four groups, concluded by a Postscript ; and it represents the warfare of God in His Church against the world, inspired by its prince. Of these four groups, three describe the action of the heavenly agents, one (known as the vision of the Dragon and the wild beasts) describes the malice and subtlety of the Devil and his agents. And the Postscript shews the fall of the world's metropolis, Babylon. In the present lecture I confine my examination to the three great groups of visions which describe the battle as it is fought by the champions of God. We have in them. First (from Chapter v. i to Chapter viii. 2), a representa- tion of the Lamb of God engaged in the work of breaking up seven seals which were shutting down the book of God's counsels. We have, Secondly (from viii. 2 to xi. 19), a representation of seven angels coming out from the presence of God, to sound seven of those trumpet-blasts which in old time called God's people to a holy convoca- * Preached before the University of Dublin, on Sunday, Nov. 22nd, 1891. €l)t (^voupg of (JFi'^ion^. 93 tion, or to make war against God's enemies, or to march forward to the promised land — seven trumpet-blasts, such as in one signal instance caused as well as proclaimed the fall of the heathen city of Jericho. Thirdly (in the Fifteenth and Sixteenth Chapters), we have seven other angels from the Temple of God pouring out of seven Bowls (called Vials in our Authorized Version), seven great plagues (or strokes), by which God's wrath is com- pleted, and by which God's people are rescued from their bondage, and set free for the promised land. But, though I am at present confining my attention to these three groups, I must ask you to remember that in among these three, between the second and third group, and in dark contrast to them, there stands a fourth, which is contained in the Twelfth, Thirteenth, and Fourteenth Chapters. In this is pictured the enemy's camp and the enemy's tactics. The subject there is not God, nor the Lamb of God, nor the angels of God calling to battle or dealing out God's blows ; it is Satan warring against Michael. Our adversary, the Devil, as a great serpent (or dragon) is there shewn warring and teaching his servants to war against the woman and against her seed, according to the first warning in the garden of Eden. The dragon and the savage beasts whom he raises up, and in whom he becomes (as it were) incarnate, make deadly war and bruise the woman's seed. Yet the Lamb and the perfect number of His redeemed are shewn abso- lutely unharmed by all that they can do ; and the group closes with a picture of the final crushing of the serpent and his brood in the winepress of the wrath of God. Their blcod streams like a great flood up to the very H 94 €ijc Battle of ^Imigl^ti) (^otJ. horse bridles of the conquering army, and over a space measuring (in furlongs) four times four a thousand times over, and therefore world-wide. This darker vision I keep for more lengthened treatment in the two next Lectures, mentioning it now only because I want you to note the arrangement of these four groups — the three and the one. It is eminently characteristic of S. John's style, that he begins by presenting a certain aspect of a subject from one particular position ; that he then views it from exactly the opposite side, and finally, when both sides have been presented, sums up with a review from his first platform. And here, as in his first Epistle, the final review, instead of being a bare repetition, is found on examination to be a large advance upon his first proposition. The most familiar instance of this is in the first chapter of his first Epistle. He begins by saying, " If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us." Then he states the converse of that, " If" (instead of such denial) " we confess our sins. He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all un- righteousness." Now he can go back and state his first proposition more strongly, and with gathered indignation, because of the gracious offer that has been outraged — "If" (instead of confessing our sins) ** we say that we have not sinned, we make Him a liar, and the truth is not in us." (i John i. 6-10.) A like arrangement is found in many minor divisions of the Apocalypse, as well as in this group of groups in the central chapters.* Compare now these three groups, familiarly known to * See Appendix, Note J, " S. John's Triplets."' €f}t €i)angiii3 ^tanti^point. 95 us as the ** Seven Seals," the " Seven Trumpets," and the " Seven Vials ; " and in the first place notice the progress in the time of their several stand-points. The first group views the battle of God prospectively as about to open. It looks forward to the coming war, as the Son of Man Himself looked forward to it from the Mount of Olives before His own disciples were themselves plunged into the great conflict. It gives, in symbols borrowed from the prophet Zechariah (Zech. i. 8-11), the revelation which the Lord gave with His own lips on Mount Olivet, to John and James, and Peter and Andrew, who asked Him, ** Lord, what shall be the sign of Thy coming and of the end of the world ? " He then taught them that the going forth of their little band in His Name and in His power to conquer the world, would be followed not by peace, but by a sword ; for there shall be wars, and famines, and pestilences in divers places ; and these shall be accom- panied and followed by persecutions of His disciples, until the cry of His slaughtered servants shall shake the earth and the powers of Heaven, and bring back the Son of Man to gather His saints together and call the world to judgment. (S. Matt, xxiv.) This same lesson is taught again in this first group of visions, but with this addition to it, that each of these troubles is shown to be no mere sign, no mere catastrophe, but (wherever it occurs) a Divine removal of an obstacle that was hindering either the revelation or the full work- ing of the counsels of the Most High. In the second vision, the Vision of the Seven Trumpets, the din of war has begun already, and we find ourselves now in the very midst of the great battle. But we are 96 Ci^e aSattU of ^lmig;!)tp (&o^, taught that each fiery storm,* or crash, t or darkness, t or plague, § or assault, || is not a disaster, but a trumpet call to the army of God to draw nearer to Him, to fight more manfully for Him, and to move on to the heavenly Canaan, for the walls of the enemy's fortress are tottering, victory is sure. The last group, the Vision of the Seven Vials, looks back upon the warfare from the shore of the sea of glass when the battle is over, as the children of Israel looked back from the shore of the Red Sea upon the great wonder-strokes, the plagues by which they had been delivered out of Egypt.lF This vision reviews from that safe resting place, the great plagues in which it shall then be seen that the wrath of God has been exhausted ; the great plagues by which God's people shall then find them- selves rescued from the tyrants that would have kept them slaves. Therefore their song of triumph comes first (in the Fifteenth Chapter), and afterwards (in the Sixteenth Chapter) they look back upon the mighty power previously manifested, by which they have their present redemption. Perhaps it is on this account that we find the order of the " seven " reversed here : " three and four," instead of "four and three," as in the other groups. This may ♦ Ch. viii. 7. The first trumpet. t Ch. viii. 8-12. The second and third trumpets: the one the crash of a falling empire, or a political convulsion ; the other the crash of an ecclesiastical power, an angel of the Church. + Ch. viii. 12, 13. The fourth trumpet. § Ch. ix. 1-12. The fifth trumpet. II Ch. ix. 12-21. The sixth trumpet. H Compare Exod. xiv. 21— xv. 22 with Rev. xv. 1-5. (©bsltaclciS to tl)e Wiill of @otJ. 97 seem a small matter to those who are not familiar with the microscopic attention to details in the imagery of this book ; but it is still noticeable that in the two pre- ceding visions of the Seals and the Trumpets, the first four are bound together by common features, and the three last stand separate and apart from them. But in this last vision of the Vials we have first the three, and then, after an interruption of heavenly voices, the four remaining vials. But the details of these groups demand a more careful examination than this ; and in proceeding to it I notice first, that though each of these three surveys of the Church's warfare contemplates it from the same side, and though each of them is in its own way complete, each presenting us with an outline of the entire campaign from the beginning to the end (as the completeness of the number ** seven" would itself suggest to us), still each group adds something to the lessons of the others. The first vision is usually spoken of as " The Seven Seals," and to avoid misconception I have hitherto named it so. But it ought rather to be called *' The Vision of the Opening (or Breaking up) of the Seven Seals." For the Seals themselves are not shewn, only the methods by which these unexplained hindrances are broken up and removed. Thus the mere form and plan of this group presses upon us one of the great mysteries of our present condition. It is that there are, even in the path of the Almighty, obstacles which must with effort be swept away. At the very foundation of the whole matter of the 98 Ci^e ISattle of ^(miQ;!)tu <^otr. revelation of God this lies : — Created wills oppose and even thwart (as far as we can see) the supreme will of the Most High God, their Creator. God the Omnipotent stands comparatively helpless before the unyielding wills of men. We find God appealing to men, warning men, threatening them, bribing them, and when nothing less will do, stooping Himself to come among them, be delivered into their hands and die, that at this great cost He may perhaps succeed in winning at last their stubborn wills. With holy daring this thought is pressed upon us in this first of these three visions. The Apostle has been caught up to the very Presence Chamber of God, a trans- figured Holy of Holies, where all the ancient symbols appear again, but full of life now. He sees God — as far as human vision can see Him, though He is (suggestively) undescribed — he sees God seated in Royal Council, and with Him, called into counsel with Him, are representa- tives of His Creation, and special representatives of His people, their Senators are throned round about the throne of God. And on the right hand of Him Who sits upon the central throne lies now the council-book ; and it is full to overflowing of the decrees and purposes of God. It is full, so that nothing can be added to it. Yet this book is closed (not sealed in the sense of being authenticated, but) sealed down* with seven seals. And the whole world is challenged, but challenged in vain, to remove these obstacles by breaking up these seals. None anywhere meet the challenge. Not one anywhere in all creation can take the book, or read, or execute the * See Appendix, Note L, " Seals and Sealing." Cj^c (©ulp CoiKjueror. 99 counsels of God. Well may the Apostle weep (not as some think, tears of baffled curiosity, but) despairing tears for a creation hopelessly lost, if the decrees of God do prove indeed impracticable. But One there is, though only One, Who is able to do God's Will. " In the volume of the book it is v^ritten " of Him ; and from the seed of the woman, from the chosen family of the chosen nation, the uncreated Champion comes, another David for the crisis, the Son of David, the Lion of the tribe of Judah, but in form a Lamb, a little Lamb, with tokens of defeat and slaughter rather than of victory. Again, in this first view the Church's warfare is repre- sented as being entirely conducted by the Lamb of God alone ; though even here there is an underlying hint (in the cluster of seven horns upon the head of the Lamb) that there is incorporated into Him that sevenfold Church, *' which is His body, the fulness of Him that filleth all in all." (Eph. i. 23.) We are taught thus that it is not our bow that wins this victory : that it is the Lamb of God Who, Himself and with His own right hand, breaks every barrier down. The movements certainly that break the seals take place on earth. And we know that it is men who go out as the messenger host of the Son of God. It is men who wage the wars, and create the famines and pestilences and persecutions which follow in the steps of war. But these are all instruments in the hand of our Redeemer : they accomplish only what the Lord God has determined before to be done. (Acts iv. 28.) Therefore are these pictured here in this vision as altogether the working of the Lamb of God. 100 Ci)f J3attlf of mmic^tv <&oti. Once more, the grouping of the agents in the six move- ments which are represented as opening up the first six seals, is very suggestive and very full of instruction. The white horse of the Church (or the Gospel) with the bow of victory is linked with " the four sore judgments " of the prophet Ezekiel, " the sword, the famine, the pesti- lence, and the beasts of the earth."* Yet these are all alike agents of God against the world. For the Gospel of peace has in it the very savour of death for those who hold out against it in unbelief; and it kills in a happier way those who surrender to it. These last die indeed to the " world," but it is that they may live unto God. Equally strange is the companionship presented to us in the breaking up of the fifth seal, for there the persecution of the saints, or rather the blood of the persecuted saints, is counted as among the blows struck against the ''world." By the world this persecution is intended to be against the Lamb, being against His Church ; and the world fondly hopes that persecution will put another and per- haps a hopeless barrier in the way of His carrying out the counsels of God. But to those who look from Heaven no deadlier blows are ever struck against the world than these which the world itself thus strikes. The world thinks that it strikes against Jesus Christ when it strikes against His Church. In reality, it is then like a dumb ox kicking frantically against goads ; and the supremest pity in Heaven is for the persecutor, rather than for the persecuted. (Acts xxvi. 14.) * Ezekiel xiv. 12-23. Here these judgments are spoken of as punish- ments ; but punishments that have a wise and loving purpose, and that are to result in a happy issue. Ci)c Hamb's' <^roup of xlgrnt^. loi Another bond also linking all these agents together is found in the cries that meet each movement. For the inarticulate voices of creation, travailing in pain for the coming regeneration (Rom. viii. 22, 23), the martyr's blood, and the world's terrors, are all alike heard calling to the Lamb of God to come. And the special character of the seventh is marked by the awful silence. As regards the form which these visions take, it is enough to remind you that, copying the symbols used by the prophet Zechariah, the four first agencies employed to bring about the coming of the end are represented as four horsemen, each riding out on his appointed errand. The white horse of the Church, which wears already the crown of the promised victory, does much to clear the way before the Lamb. (Rev. vi. 2.) The red and black and livid horses of war and famine and pestilence, each contribute something towards the same object (vi. 3-9). But when the silent cry of the blood of the martyred saints, whose slaughter God looks upon as a sacrifice poured out upon His altar (vi. 9-12) — when this is added, then the heavens shrivel and the earth is removed, and the terrors of God's enemies anticipate the full revelation of the Lamb. " Hide us," they cry — " Hide us from Him that sitteth on the throne, and from the wrath of the Lamb. For the day of their wrath is come, and who shall be able to stand ? " (vi. 12-17). *' Who shall be able to stand ? " For a moment the vision is stayed here, in order to give a consolatory answer to this despairing cry. An interrupting vision (in the Seventh Chapter) tells us that, all through this sweeping away of obstacles, the Lord " knoweth how to deliver the I02 €i)t ?Sattle of Blmigbtp <@otJ. godly" (2 Peter ii. 9), and will not allow one hurtful breath to blow upon one of all His people. The entire company of the redeemed, not one missing, shall stand before that throne from which the earthly-minded desire to hide. Countless multitudes from every nation " shall sit down with Abraham and Isaac and Jacob " (S. Matt, viii. 11), all passed over by the destroying angel, all sprinkled with the blood of the Paschal Lamb, all pre- sented as a first-fruit unto God and to the Lamb ; and all keeping with the saved remnant of Israel the climax of God's feasts, the Feast of Tabernacles, the great Harvest Home of God's gathered people.* Then comes the end in a half hour's silence, when the inarticulate groaning of creation and the silent crying of holy blood are satisfied at last, the agonized cries of the lost are hushed, the last barrier is removed ; there is no more hindrance to the will of God : the enemy is as still as a stone. (Rev. viii. i.) Such is the vision of the Opening of the Seven Seals; and such the view it gives (in anticipation) of the present struggle of the Church Militant here on earth. Is there anything that can be added to the teaching of this first vision ? There is the further lesson that the Church herself also has to take her share in the work of the Lamb : she also has to fight as her Lord fights, and to overcome as He overcomes. For the Church also (as we have been already taught in the vision which was our * It is to this rather than to their victory that their palm branches point us ; to the tabernacles, or booths, in which the people of God commemorate the troubles of the wilderness now past. @oti*^ Crumpit^calls;. T03 Frontispiece) — she herself meets obstacles in her own path, and even places obstacles in the way of Him Whose servant she professes herself. Therefore God's work will be but poorly told unless the warfare is taken up again, and God's dealings are treated as so many trumpet-calls to His soldiers, to come " to the help of the Lord against the mighty." (Judges v. 23.) The seven movements in the first vision were directed against the " world," which in some shape or other is the true obstacle to godliness on earth. These next seven, because they are treated now as trumpet-calls, although they are efficacious still toward the removal of evil — they have special reference to the army (which is the Church) of God. Therefore, the world on which the blows now fall is represented as three-cornered, that is to say, a large part of it is represented now, not as a fourth part, but as a third.^ And although these are shewn as fiery trials, we are reminded at the outset that this fire is taken from God's altar. (Rev. viii. 5.) Only the chaff and the dross will be consumed by it : the gold will come out as " purified seven times in the fire." The first trumpet-call is a fiery storm of trial, which scorches the grass that has no root, and blights much of what has an outward promise. "The first sounded, and there followed hail and fire mingled in blood, and they were cast into the earth : and the third part of the earth was burnt up, and all green grass was burnt up" (viii. 7). The second call is a political convulsion, in which a great mountain, as of a world-empire, is consumed, and * Compare Rev. vi. 8, with viii. 7-13 and ix. 15. I04 €l)t ISattle of aimtg:l)tp <&on. falls back into the sea of nations from which it had risen up. ** The second angel sounded, and as it were, a great mountain burning with fire was cast into the sea : and the third part of the sea became blood ; and there died the third part of the creatures which were in the sea — they that had life ; and the third part of the ships — they were destroyed " (viii. 8, g). The third call is an ecclesiastical convulsion, in which a great star (which has been explained to be a Church power) (i. 20) falls from the Church's heaven, embitter- ing by its fall the waters of comfort and the fountains of doctrine with a bitterness which kills. "There fell from Heaven a great star burning as a torch,* and it fell upon the third part of the rivers and upon the fountains of the waters. And the name of the star is called Wormwood ; and the third part of the waters became wormwood; and many men died of the waters, because they were made bitter (viii. 10, 11). The fourth is a darkening of the Church's lights, a darkening (that is) of religion, and a loss to the means of grace of much of their promised light and life-giving power. " The third part of the sun was smitten, and the third part of the moon, and the third part of the stars : in order that the third part of them should be darkened, and that the day should not shine for the third part of it, and the night in like manner" (viii. 12). Four trumpet-calls have now sounded, and though they sounded to the worldly and the thoughtless as mere dis- * The careful distinction between a light that burns with its own light (KafiTrds), whether that light be divine or earthly, and a lamp that gives a derived light {Xvxvia), is to be noted here and in Rev. i. 12 and iv. 5. CJbf 33au5e for (Jritcouragtmcnt. 105 asters, yet were they calls — each of them — to stir the soldiers' zeal, and trumpet-calls which were imperceptibly shaking the enemy's walls : yet the battle rages with greater fierceness, and the blows become even more pointed than before.* A fallen Church power lets loose a locust-swarm of falsehoods, which torment if they do not kill, and leave the tormented in a state to die (ix. 1-12.) A sixth trumpet sounds, and from the Euphrates (as the source of the evil world's Babylon)! is hurled at the appointed moment a threefold army of evil against the threefold Church, assaulting her from every point of the spiritual compass (ix. 13-21). It is just at this moment of terror, in between the sixth and seventh trumpets (as between the sixth and seventh seals of the first group), that a threefold vision of comfort interrupts (in the Tenth and Eleventh Chapters) the din of battle. And by this interruption the loved disciple's heart is strengthened to wait in patient expectation for the perfecting of the mystery of God at the sounding of the Seventh Trumpet. For then, as at Jericho, the hosts of God shout with a great shout, for the kingdom of this world is become the kingdom of Jehovah, and He shall reign for ever and ever. J If it were possible for me now to break down all distinc- * This increased fierceness is marked by the eagle voice, warning that the attacks will be in future against worldly men, not land, or sea, or sky. (Ver. 13.) f Rev. ix. 14. The first hint of Babylon's existence. X Rev. xi. 15-19. Compare the shout of the army of Israel at the sound- ing of the seventh trumpet of the siege of Jericho. (Josh. vi. 16-21.) io6 Cftc 33attle of mmi'sl^ty (^otr. tions of time and space, as the Apocalypse in its last chapters breaks them down, — if it were possible for me to expand that short space of time during which even the most patient listeners can endure ; or if I could condense as the Apocalypse condenses, then I might set before you the full treatment of the Church's warfare from S. John's two opposite stand-points, as we have it in the central thirteen chapters (iv. i to xvi. 21). But as this cannot be, I must ask you to remember (while I pass on) that the largest group of visions in the book, the most detailed outline of the enemies' tactics in the great battle, is spread now before the Apostle's eyes ; and to remember that this group reveals the true nature of the obstacles which the Lamb of God removes, the true nature of the enemies against whom God's trumpets call His soldiers to fight, the true character of that evil world upon which His holy wrath is poured. This recollection will enable you to understand the fierceness of the eighteenth chapter, and the moral indignation expressed in the fourth group, in which the Apostle returns to his first stand-point of the side of God, and pictures God's angel priests coming forth from the altar on which the blood of the Lamb has been offered, and pouring out of seven golden bowls the seven last plagues, by which the wrath of God over- whelms His enemies and removes the obstacles from His own and from His people's path. This fourth and last group, the group known as that of the Seven Vials, takes (as I have already said) a retro- spective view of the great campaign. The scene of the hosts of Israel standing on the shore of the Egyptian Sea, I^tbfth) fiom if)t (©laslsii) ^ta. 107 when the ten plagues of the wrath of God had delivered them from their oppressors (Exodus xiv. 21 to xv. 22) — this forms the groundwork of this vision of a still larger deliverance. S. John is shewn a glassy sea mingled with fire ; and those that had come victorious out of the grasp of the wild beast (that is the '* world "), " and from his image, and from his mark, and from the number of his name " (these are the outward stains and marks of " worldliness ") * — these redeemed are standing on the shore of this crystal sea, and they sing a song that has risen above the rudiments of praise taught in the deliver- ance of the days of Moses ; for this celebrates the world- wide redemption of all the saved. It is " the song of Moses and of the Lamb." (Rev. xv. 1-5.) When they have sung this song there is a review taken of all the strokes by which this redemption has been achieved. And, as with the first vision of the '' Seals," so now with this fourth vision of the " Vials," the work is shewn to be all of God. Whatever mistakes may be made by blinded eyes now, it will be seen then that the strokes that bring about the victory are struck by no human hand or earthly weapon ; they are all strokes from Almighty God. In the words of the prophet Isaiah, ** He saw that there was no man, and He wondered that there was no one to interfere for us. Therefore His own arm brought salvation to Him. He put on garments of ven- geance for clothing, and was clad with zeal as a cloke. According to their deeds, accordingly He will repay, fury * These interpretations of the wild beast, etc., must be assumed by the reader for the moment, the reasons for them will be presented in the two following Lectures. io8 Ci)c aSattle of mmigf)tp ^otJ. to his adversaries, recompense to His enemies, to the islands He will repay recompense." (Isaiah lix. 16-19.) This is a repetition of the lesson of the seals, but from a different point of view (Rev. vi. 16, 17) ; because the obstacles have now been discovered to be not unconscious impediments, but evil and determined opposition, such as calls for judgment as well as action. But there is also this additional lesson taught here, which would have been out of place before, that the wrath of God (which is also " the wrath of the Lamb ") is pure and holy. Not in rapid fury, as we strike, but with holy quiet come His angels forth (xvi. 5-8). We are also taught through the symbol of the presentation of the bowls of wrath by one of the four *Miving beings" (ver. 7) which represent the creaturehood of God, that God's own creation supplies Him with the weapons which He needs ; and then each white-robed angel pours the mixture reverently as an act of priestly worship. Not in vindictive or unrighteous hate, but from very love for His suffering people, or in love for the still more unhappy enemies of His people, does Almighty God ever strike a blow. These blows are called " the seven last plagues of the wrath of God." They are the last, not because they are not to be struck until the very end of the strife, or because they are to follow after the opening of the seals, or after the sounding of the trumpets ; but because (as we are expressly told) " in them is filled up the wrath of God." (Rev. XV. I.) The plagues of Egypt had a sort of completeness in them ; but they were complete only so far as that one captivity was concerned. Other strokes had afterwards Ci)C ^fben ^trofetg of Wivntl). 109 to be struck against the Philistines, against Nineveh, against Babylon, against Apostate Jerusalem, and against Imperial Rome. Yes, and divine strokes are still being struck against " worldliness " outside of Imperial govern- ments, against worldliness in Churches, worldliness in neighbourhoods and families, self-indulgence in separate breasts, and wherever the throne of the " wild beast " may be ; not to destroy souls, but in order that spirits held in bondage by the lusts of the flesh or the world may be set free for the home and life of God. To this, as to all the pictures of judgment in this book, must the Saviour's principle be applied, " Wheresoever a decaying carcase is, there are the vultures gathered." (S. Luke xvii. 37.) It is, then, no local or partial deliverance that we have here. It is a review of all the strokes of the wrath of God, characterized as " seven," and borrowing their symbolism from the ten plagues of Egypt condensed into the smaller number.* And, if our eyes are opened, we ourselves can see these seven strokes falling even now ; and history will supply us with illustrations of them from the past, whatever the point of view from which we look at history. We can see *' the wrath of God revealed against all unrighteousness of men who hold down the truth in unrighteousness." (Rom. i. 18.) The first angel "poured out his bowl into the earth, and there came a noisome and grievous sore upon the men which had the mark of the beast, and which worshipped his image." (Rev. xvi. 2.) And have we not ourselves seen * Therefore we have here the water turned into blood, of the first plague; the frogs (and lice and flies and locusts) of the second, third, fourth, and eighth ; the murrain and boils of the fifth and sixth ; the thunder and hail of the seventh ; and the stroke on the sun of the ninth. I no €f)t JSattle of mmig!)tp <&oti. vice festering in those who are worldly-minded, until it has become a hideous sore, of which the botch of Egypt was a type ? The second angel " poured out his bowl into the sea, and there came blood as of a dead man, and every soul of life died — the things that were in the sea. And the third poured out his bowl into the rivers and the fountains of the waters, and there came blood And the fourth poured out his bowl upon the sun, and it was given unto it to scorch men with fire." (Rev. xvi. 3-10.) And have we not seen ? — Have none of us ever felt the good things of God's creation becoming sources of evil to them that are evil ? " Righteous art Thou, O Lord. Yea, Lord God, the Almighty, true and righteous are Thy judgments" (xvi. 5-8). " The fifth angel poured out his bowl upon the throne of the wild beast, and his kingdom became darkened : and they gnawed their tongues for pain, and blasphemed the God of Heaven because of their pains, and because of their sores, and they repented not from their works " (xvi. 10, 11). What a picture that is of the misery of utter worldliness, of "the sorrow" which, because it is *' of the world, worketh death " (2 Cor. vii. 10), and which creates the blasphemy of the pessimists. So also we can see (as under the sixth stroke) the strength of the world's proudest cities drained, and the path of their conquerors prepared thereby, according to the suggestive fate of Babylon. Even the gatherings of the ungodly summoned by evil counsels to crush the people of God under foot, they are made the instruments of their own utter destruction ; for the battle is the Lord's, Cl^e %t&^on^ of ti^e Vi^ioms. Ill and to whom He wills He gives the victory. (Rev. xvi. 12-17.) Lastly, as with Egypt, as with Nineveh, with Babylon, and with all the cities of the nations in the past, so shall it be also with the Roman and every other power that exalts itself against God. God's strokes shall at last utterly overwhelm them in wrath. And of this destruction the fate of Babylon is selected (Rev. xvi. 17-21) as at once a picture and a promise, preparing us for the full and magnificent portrait of her fall, given in the seventeenth and eighteenth chapters as a postscript to these groups of visions. Does it now seem too much to say that there is very helpful teaching in these visions when they are examined on this system, even before we go as commentators into the minute details, which are rich indeed with holy suggestions ? It is a teaching that is entirely inde- pendent of all the countless variety of illustrations ; which histories of the world and of the Church can supply, but which are not the proper subjects of what professes to be a commentary on the words of S. John. Is it stating too much to say that such a reading of the Apocalypse as this, is not a mere surface reading of it ; but may be made a penetration into the mind of S. John, and into the purposes of the Spirit Who inspired S. John, deeper and of more practical value than those books give, which (however apt their illustrations be) look more like histories of the world and denunciations of the errors of opponents than earnest studies of Scripture ? Does it dishearten or disappoint any, that they begin to suspect that perhaps none of the then future events of 112 Ci)c I3attle of ^Imigbtp <&oti. history may have been clearly foreseen by the Apostle in the island of Patmos, even though these mighty thoughts were writing themselves deep upon his heart ? Is it not an insight more divine, that he was able thus to read the true character of all wars and famines and pestilences and persecutions, and to recognize the Divine purpose that would be found working itself out in any of these wherever they were seen ? Is not the book more truly prophetic when it convinces us that all apparent disasters, whenever and wherever they fall, are really weapons in the hand of the Lamb, holy instruments for the perform- ance of His will, and for the cure of the wounds and diseases of the soul ? What does it matter that perhaps we may never learn to calculate at what dates, or in what places, nations are to be startled, or dynasties to be overturned ? If only we learn to trust more fully the wise Providence of God ; and if we submit ourselves more uncomplainingly to His dis- cipline, knowing that " in all the chances and changes of this mortal life" our Almighty Father always holds the reins, that He has taken counsel not only for but even with His creatures and His Church, and that all along the line of history the Lamb of God is working out our salvation, then we learn the chiefest lessons of the vision of the Seven Seals. If we learn that each Christian's life is (like the Church's life) a warfare ; and if we are not cowed but stirred by each apparent disaster, as by a divine trumpet- call — stirred to rally to our Captain's side, and to fight more manfully under His banner, feeling that the enemies' citadel is already doomed, then we learn the greatest lesson of the vision of the Seven Trumpets. Cijc C!)in3^ are at l^auK. 113 And in the same way, if we learn to separate ourselves more readily " from all filthiness of the flesh and spirit," and to come out more decidedly from all that is really *' worldHness," knowing that it is against these things that the wrath of God is always falling, and that in this separation is our true redemption, then we have learned the most sacred lesson of the vision of the Seven Vials. So shall we gain some of the special blessings promised to him who reads and to those who hear the words of the prophecy of this book ; for indeed the things are very close to each of us. The obstacles beset us closely. The enemies are always near us. The evil one has his throne among us. But, thanks be to God, our help is also near. " We are compassed about with a great cloud of witnesses." (Heb. xii. i.) The Lamb of God is with us : the arm of God is striking on our side : His trumpet-calls are ringing in our ears and His Holy Spirit is at our very hearts. We shall not perish if we really fight : for God shall shortly tread down Satan under us, and we shall stand *' more than conquerors " at last, " through the might of Him Who loves us." (Rom. viii. 37.) LECTURE IV. C|)e aSntm^'^ Cacticss, or ti)e Vmon of tt)e Bragon, ti)e fflgEilti ISeastj^, antr tfte Hamt,* HE vision of the breaking of the Seven Seals spoke of obstacles which must be cleared aw^ay. The vision of the Seven Trumpets treated these obstacles as enemies whom the Church of God must fight. The vision with which, in the Twelfth, Thirteenth, and Fourteenth Chapters, we are now concerned — the vision of the Dragon and his Wild Beasts against the Lamb of God — this shews the real nature of these obstacles and enemies, in order to satisfy us that the love of God must pour out the seven vials of His wrath upon them. In this vision, which (like the other three among which it stands) is a group of visions, our very first reading of it shews that we have an outline of the war proclaimed in Eden — the war which began with the first assault in that garden, and which goes down to the last Judgment (Gen. iii. 15) — the war waged along the whole line of human history, the enmity between the serpent and the * Preached before the University of Dublin on Sunday, Jan. 31st, 1892. Zljt OTomait antf tf)t Serpent. 115 woman, and between the serpent's offspring and the woman's offspring. We are shewn here the woman with symbols of her greatness and her destiny (Rev. xii. i), looking forward to the birth of her Deliverer (xii. 2), while the serpent bruises perpetually both her and her seed * (xii. 3, 4, 17). And, although the victorious climax is not painted here with the same distinctness as the battle (because that is reserved for the later chapters of the book), still we have, even here, at every pause, a voice that assures us of the victory (xii. 10 ; xiii. g, 10 ; xiv. 6-14), until at last we have an unmistakeable symbol of the woman's wounded champions treading the serpent's brood beneath their victorious feet (xiv. ig, 20). Thus these three chapters form a pictorial commentary on the primaeval forecast of the world's history. " I will put enmity," said the Lord of Hosts to the serpent, " I will put enmity between thee and the woman, and between thy seed and her seed : it shall bruise thy head and thou shalt bruise their heel." (Gen. iii. 15.) Examining the Twelfth Chapter, we find that we have the general character of this war painted in two short parallel pictures, which give the earthly and the heavenly aspects of it. In the first of these the woman's success is pictured as a flight only and an escape, as if the serpent was left master of the field, and possessor of a might with which * The English word " Dragon " is too like the Greek " Apa