Upon the whole, therefore, the state, constitution, and fates of the Christian church, may be very properly denoted by symbols taken from the Mosaical dispensation. And therefore the general interpretation of this kind of symbols is to be deduced from the account given of the religion and history of the Jewish church and nation in the Old Testament, and books relating to the Jewish antiquities.*

* In the actings of the Assyrian against Israel and Judah, we have a type of the actings of all their oppressors unto the end of their long captivity and oppression, and of their miraculous deliverance out of the hands of them all. With the typography of the minor historical event, the prophets wrote the history of the greater event. This is the true method of historical prophecy. It is as truly seen through a symbol of real history, and written in the language of that symbol, as the Gospel is seen in the symbol of the Levitical religion, and written in the language thereof. The Assyrian and Babylon have as truly a symbolical sense in the historical books, as sacrifice and highpriest have in the Levitical books.

In reading the Prophets, it is important to observe that the deliverance of Israel from Egypt, and God's special dealings with them in the wilderness, furnish the symbolical language by which the Holy Ghost sets forth their restoration in the latter day (See Isaiah xliii. 16—20, and xi. 15, 16). Although these and similar passages are figurative, they are not hyperbolical, as is evident from Jer. xvi. 14, 15, "Behold, the days come, saith the Lord, that it shall no more be said, The Lord liveth, that brought up the children of Israel out of the land of Egypt; but, The Lord liveth, that brought up the children of Israel from the land of the north, and from all the lands whither he had driven them and I will bring them again into their land that I gave unto their fathers;" (See also XXIII. 7.) It is justly observed, by Bishop Horsley, that "the language of prophecy is indeed poetical and figurative; but the hyperbole is a figure which never can be admitted in the Divine promises; on the contrary, it is always to be presumed that more is meant than the highest figures can express adequately."

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"In the study of the prophetical Scriptures, it is of great moment to bear in mind, that the prophets, for the most part, speak of the coming of Christ indefinitely, and, in general, without that distinction of first and second coming, which the Gospel out of Daniel hath more clearly taught us. And so, consequently, they spake of the things to be at Christ's coming indefinitely, and altogether; which we, who are

As for the other kinds of symbols, whose principles were before laid down, there are several helps whereby their general significations may be certainly known. They are all in a manner used by the sacred prophets in the Old Testament, who frequently use together expressions in the symbolical and in the common style, and so become their own interpreters, in the same manner as St. John himself sometimes does so that the signification of such symbols as are explained by themselves (many of which are to be met with in the Revelation) may be infallibly depended on.

And as to symbols used by them which are not in this manner interpreted, their meaning may be often found out, by attending to the scope of the places where they occur, or by applying to the exposition in the Targums, which being of some antiquity, and made by such as understood the symbolical characters, frequently explain expressions symbolical by a literal paraphrase.

The next best help, for the interpretation of the aforesaid kind of symbols, is Achmet's Collection of the interpretation of Symbolical Dreams, according to the doctrine of the Egyptians, Persians, Indians and Arabians. This is an excellent work, whereby many symbols in the Revelation may be certainly explained, according to the very notions and method of those who first invented and improved the symbolical way of writing and speaking; there being, as to the interpretation, no manner of difference between the same kinds of symbols used by the ancients to communicate their conceptions, and the same kinds exhibited in dreams and visions. So that the same rules which serve for the explanation of a symbolical dream,

now more fully informed, by the revelation of the Gospel, of a twofold coming, must apply each of them to its proper time-those things which befit the state of his first coming unto it, and such as befit the state of his second coming unto the second; and what befits both alike may be applied unto both."-Joseph Mede.

such as that of Joseph's was, serve also for the explanation of a symbolical vision. And in these writers symbols are found explained, in the very same manner as they are by the sacred prophets.

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Together with the aforesaid collection, is printed the work of Artemidorus, an Ephesian priest, and contemporary with St. John. His interpretations are indeed not so proper to the purpose as the former; because he fitted them to the Grecian customs-but his work is however very valuable upon the account of his having endeavoured to reason upon things, and to reduce his art into a system— and he has some few observations and interpretations which exceed the rest, as coming nearer to the intention of several symbols used in the Revelation.

To these helps, which are alone sufficient, the expositions of omens and prodigies in the Grecian, Roman, and other writers, may be added, as being founded upon symbolical principles; and recourse also may be had, for the explanation of the metaphorical notion of the symbols, to the most ancient Greek and Latin poets, who have used bold metaphors, and were well acquainted with the symbolical language.

It only remains now to lay down some rules for the particular application of the general signification of the symbols, and for the better understanding the nature of the prophetic style. And the chief rules are :—

RULE I.-The Scene of Action, the Actor, and Sufferer, determine the sense of all the Accidents described in any general Vision, or part of a vision where new ones appear.* The meaning of this rule may be explained from what

* In ascertaining the places of the different visions of the Apocalypse, and their chronological coincidence, strict attention must be paid to the internal marks mentioned by Mr. Frazer, in his rule for that purpose, which is as follows:

"The internal marks inserted in the prophecies of the Revelation,

is observed even in common discourse. It is evidentwhen once the general or appellative terms in all languages are fixed to a particular signification by some pronoun, proper name, article demonstrative, or even the time, place, or circumstance, that then they lose their general signification in all the following discourse, though the determining words or particles be not applied to each single term afterwards.

Thus if Britain be the fixed subject of the discourse, if we go on to speak of the King, Lords, Commons, Clergy, Church, Courts, Laws, and the like, all which are general terms, as being common with us to several countries; though we do not at every one of them add the restriction, yet it is certain that we do it tacitly and thus all our discourse must be determined by the first mention of the subject thereof; yea, though we should not use the terms common in the country to denote those matters, but others analogical, and used in other countries, it is plain that we have settled the true notion of them by the first restriction.

This is the very key of all discourse; and consequently must be so too in the revelation, which is written in a

may be fitly compared to the corresponding loops in the curtains of the tabernacle. By observing them, the Levites discovered the place of each separate curtain, and joined them together so as to form one tent. So by these marks the attentive reader is able to discover the plan of each separate vision—whether it carries on the collateral prophecy, or gives a collateral representation of times already mentioned, and to connect them so as to form one connected prophecy.

"Now I find that after the seventh trumpet sounds, (Rev. xi. 15), and a brief summary is given of the events contained in it, in the three following verses, it is said, (v. 19), ‘I saw the tabernacle of the temple of God in heaven opened.' This expression I consider as a mark inserted like the loop in the edge of the curtain, where the series of the narration is broken off.

"Accordingly the same words are repeated (Rev. xv. 5) like the corresponding loop in the edge of the other curtain; then it is said, And the seven angels came out of the temple having the seven plagues, which shows that the first of these vials follows after the sounding of the seventh_trumpet."

discursive method-so that the signification of the symbols is to be particularly applied by a careful and constant observation of this rule.

It has been observed as an excellence in Virgil,* that he never describes the appearance of the day, but he does it with such a description as suits the work of the day. The like is done throughout this Prophecy. No actor or scene appears therein, but we may thereby immediately discover what action is to be performed. So that the rule is of universal use, and as being so, is constantly observed by the Oneirocritics; † who, agreeably to symbolical principles, not only suit their interpretations to the general object, but also to the condition of the party receiving the dream, as the proper scene or subject thereof. And indeed when there is a multiplicity of incidents which are all to be reduced into one system, what guide can we have, or what method take, but by considering the actor and scene first, and when those two are determined, to bring all the rest to suit with them? And therefore we find these writers explaining the symbols in different manners, according to the different conditions and circumstances of men. Kings, private men and women, receive always different interpretations, but in proportion to their condition the same. And the same dream, seen by the same person at any long distance of time, denotes different things, proportionably to a difference of circumstances.

According to this we must infer, in expounding the Revelation, that although we have the same symbols over and over again, yet we must in every particular case refer them to the immediate scenes and actors from whence they proceed, and to which they are related: and by consequence restrain their general signification to the particular case in which they are employed.

*Serv. in Virgil. Æn. L. xi. ver. 183. Artem. L. ii. c. 74 & L. iii. c. 67, sub fin.

Col. 1619.

L. iv. c. 29. Achmet. Coll.