servient to God's honour and glory.* Now, what the Psalmist regarded as due only to God, John saw here perverted to idolatry. Everything adored the Lamb with seven horns and eyes, which I have shown combined the idolatry of the Lord's supper and of the civil power. But can it be proved that animate, and perhaps inanimate, creatures in the fourth century practised this idolatry? It appears to me that it may be done in this way. It is beyond all question that what I am going to state literally took place, or, rather, that the superstitious and ignorant mind absurdly thought so. From the beginning of the third century and downward, Christians crossed themselves for preservation from demons and from every real and imaginary evil; which was a superstition implying that everything in heaven, earth, and hell, reverenced the cross. The person who ventured upon no business and would not encounter difficulty until he had crossed himself, or prayed to a cross, imagined that there is a sovereign and almighty power in such a remedy. Nor was this a trifling matter, or beneath the notice and express portraiture of revelation. It stood in the place of God. This is exactly what John heard: everything adored the symbolic creature denoting the Christian empire and the Lord's supper. He symbolises the feeling or conviction then prevalent in the Church, that the person who crossed himself could be hurt by no manner of evil; and how could this be more forcibly expressed than by imagining he heard every creature say, "Blessing, and honour, and glory, and power, be unto Him that sitteth upon the throne, and unto the Lamb, for ever and ever."

This worship, too, we know was sanctioned by the Church in the fourth century, as it is here done by the Amen of the four beasts, the civil power, and by the ministry, the twenty-four elders, who combine with it their worship of God.

Such is my proof that the heaven into which John was admitted was the visible Church of the fourth cen

• Psalm cxlviii.

tury-rightly described as a temple, from the Jewish ideas which then obtained in the Church. The sus pended worship, sealed book, strong angel, and weeping prophet, denoted the persecution of the Church by a part of the empire, urged on by Paganism; the soothing words of the elder, and the Lamb's subsequent capture of the book, was the defeat of the advocates of Paganism by another part of the empire, supported by superstition in the Church; and the song of the four beasts, of the twenty-four elders, of the angels, and of every other creature, denoted the consequent establishment of Christianity, as the religion of the empire, upon the ruins of Paganism. Here no intimation is given of the diminution or extent of vital or true Christianity. The scope of this series of the vision is confined to the nature, rise, progress, and establishment of the Apostasy. It is not implied that no true religion remained. Very far from it. All that we can here confidently gather from the vision is, that the cause of the Saviour was losing ground; but we must consult other parts of the prophecy for satisfactory information respecting the result of the decline upon the true Church. The two subjects are kept distinct down to the final contest; in other words, this part of the vision is not so much a full and minute description of the visible Church, as of the apostasy in it; or it gives us only so much of the former as will enable us to perceive and appreciate the latter. I now proceed to the rupture of the seals.

"And I saw when the Lamb opened one of the seals, and I heard, as it were the noise of thunder, one of the four beasts saying, Come and see. And I saw, and behold a white horse and he that sat on him had a bow; and a crown was given unto him and he went forth conquering, and to conquer." (Chap. vi. 1, 2.)

The first four seals, viewed superficially, appear to describe-the first, a series of easy conquests, ending in universal dominion; the second, dissensions among the conquerors, their mutual very great slaughter, crowned by the victory of one of the parties;

the third, famine, the natural result of long-continued civil war or mutual slaughter; and, finally, the reign of death and the beasts of the earth, the inhabitants of desolation. But there is an insuperable objection to this theory, in that they proceed together under the conduct of the last. "Power was given unto death, and hell, and over the fourth part of the earth, to kill with sword, and with hunger, and with death, and with the beasts of the earth." If ill-secured conquest, civil war, famine, and death were literally meant, the last would be the result only, and all would follow in natural and necessary dependence, just in the order in which they are recorded. Why, moreover, should the cherubim, or, at least, the elders of the Church, take interest in matters merely terrestrial? The true solution can only be found in events not only baneful to the Church, but which occur in it. And this accords exactly with my theory. I will now see how far it can be sustained.

None of the seals bear a date, nor is there the smallest pause, except of half an hour, and an interval occupied by sealing some among the tribes. As the effects of the first four seals were at length contemporaneous, it is likely they were opened in quick succession. The rupture of the first seal, or the first blow given to Paganism, caused one of the beasts to exclaim, with a voice of thunder, "Come and see.' It has been already observed that the rupture of the seals was at the same time a blow to Paganism, and an occasion of greater corruption in Church doctrine and practice. Both will account for the interest which the Church took in their rupture. This blow was given by Constantine, who first attempted the prohibition of Pagan worship, having seen that both religions could not exist together. And such was the firm basis on which he had placed Christianity, that Julian, who succeeded to his throne, at a very short interval, was unable, with all his management, to make any great progress towards restoring the Pagan worship.

I now come to the contents of the book. It is written within and upon

its back, or it was full and in a certain measure known even to the world. They were not new, but had been accumulating in the Church from the beginning of Christianity: "The mystery of iniquity doth already work;" but the restraint of opposition, now to be reversed, would impart a license and liberty they had never till then enjoyed, and would aggravate fatally their baneful effects.

The call as loud as thunder was peculiar to the rupture of the first seal, for the first attempt to put down Paganism would make all the noise. This took place under Constantine, who left for his successors an open and easy path.

A man on horseback, armed, no doubt implies war, but not necessarily with swords and spears,† for though the Christian fights, yet, says Paul, "the weapons of our warfare are not carnal." The colour of the horse and the crown denote victory and triumph, which were usually attended with such appendages. The remarks added state, that he went forth conquering and to conquer. But who or what is here described? It is the progress of the visible Church under the Christian emperors, from the first attempts to put down Paganism by Constantine, to its complete and ultimate overthrow by his successors. The work was done without much difficulty; the ground was walked over rather than gained by severe and repeated efforts. The comparison is that of a warrior, who fought with an unfilled bow, and was nevertheless successful. This is full of meaning, and indeed everything is highly significant in the Apocalypse. Embracing the fortunes of the Church through many centuries, its delineations are often sketchy, and a history of centuries is contained in a few brief phrases. Omissions are not oversights, but pregnant with meaning. Here is an instance. An arrow without a bow, may imply a deadly conflict, but an unfilled bow is only a feint, and as unsuitable as can be imagined to describe the conflicts of the true Church which have ever

been compared with the fatal and deadly use of weapons of war. "The Lord hath made me a polished shaft."* referring to the slaughter of animals in sacrifice. When the commandment came, Paul died; his delusive hopes expired, and he fell to the ground as one slain by a sword.t Three thousand on the day of Pentecost were pricked at the heart, or mortally wounded. The slaughterous use of weapons alone properly describes the Christian ministry which strikes down the sinner and annihilates his every hope in himself. A bow without arrows seems indeed, at a hasty view, to denote the bloodless victories of the cross; they are, however, bloodless only in a carnal sense, but it opposes the general description of the progress and triumph of the truth, both in the Old and in the New Testament. Even the final triumph of Christ on the fall of the Man of Sin is not so described. He that sat on the white horse, who is called the Word of God, had a sharp sword issuing from his mouth, which was so destructive, that the fowls are summoned to devour the numerous slain.§ Slaughter and death, understood symbolically, are eminently descriptive of the victory, progress, and triumph of the Gospel. I conclude, therefore, that the absence of the arrow denotes a defective and pointless ministry, and though we have here the semblance of conflict, it is not the earnest contention for the faith.

But can anything more forcibly describe the battle of forms and ceremonies which characterised the ministry of the fourth century? I will endeavour to bring it vividly before the eye.

Forms were multiplied without number, and their observance was regarded as necessarily connected with grace. Mystery was thrown around the sacraments, not because they denoted the marvellous love of God in the mission and gift of His Son, and of the Holy Ghost, but a wonder-working and never

clearly-defined power was supposed to be inseparable from their administration. The adult was held to be sanctified and illuminated by baptism, he was new created or begotten again, and milk and honey were given him as illustrative of his infantile or regenerated state. He was anointed with oil, and exorcised for the expulsion of the demon, the supposed cause of our depravity. White raiment was given him to signify that he was now pure and innocent, and the crown of victory put on his head on account of his recent achievements over the powers of darkness.† But if they received new life at baptism, they were previously dead in trespasses and sins; the contrary, however, was held by the Church, which administered the rite only to those who gave satisfactory proof that they understood and heartily obeyed the Gospel. But had such been the prevailing character of the catechumens or candidates for baptism, the Church would not have regarded the rite as the instrument of enlightenment and sanctification, blessings which according to their conditions of conferring the rite they already possessed; but that the Church did so proves the defective and erroneous instruction then imparted, and the growing ignorance in the teachers of the true nature of the Gospel.

The same mysterious benefit was expected from the Lord's Supper. The Church regarded it as a sacrifice, and the minister as a priest, and believing it to be necessary to salvation, it was administered to the sickening babe. No wonder that men who crossed themselves as a preventive from evil should imagine that the Lord's Supper was more than a devout memorial of the Saviour's atoning death. In this transition from the memorial to the sacrifice it appeared in the eyes of the Church a mystery, whose merits could neither be restricted nor defined. Such were

* Mosheim, century ii., part ii., chap. iv., sect. v. 6, 13; century iii., part ii., chap. iv., sect. iv.

+ Mosheim, century i., part ii., chap. iv., sect. 4-6.

the doctrines of the Church in the fourth century, and as it is added,

he went on conquering and to conquer," so has it been literally true that these doctrines prevailed from that time down to the present day throughout the greater part of Christendom.

"And when he had opened the second seal, I heard the second beast say, Come and see. And there went out another horse that was red: and power was given to him that sat thereon to take peace from the earth, and that they should kill one another: and there was given unto him a great sword." (Verses 3, 4.)

As Paganism declined through the combined opposition of the court and of the Church, the vast accession of converts made the latter feel secure in its new position. But prosperity is a snare often leading the Church into error. And it was so then. As the Pagans were no longer permitted to follow their own convictions, they were obliged either to suffer for their religion, or to enter the Christian Church. The majority preferred the latter course. But as compulsion steels the mind against conviction, the greater number of the converts merely conformed. Were they then all deceivers? No. Forms and ceremonies were then so confounded with what they signified-the ritual and its spirit being regarded as inseparable that the great body of the converts entered, and were received into the Church as true living members. Then, again, the rank and influence of others gave them a welcome reception. Could the soldiers who fought under Constantine and the leading men of that day, who were incontestably, or at least very many of them, Pagans at heart, be compelled to submit to a very searching ordeal prior to admission into the Church? No, surely not. It was too glad to receive them. Even had history not admitted this, I should have inferred it from the strife and ungodly spirit which immediately pervaded the Church. This I conceive to be the subject of the seal under consideration. It describes a struggle: each party forcing its own sentiments on the other. Authority took the place of argument

and persuasion, or was added when those were ineffectual. According to the symbolisation of the sanctuary, the calf denotes patient labour and self-denying perseverance. Consequently, one looks for the exhibition of these graces where it directs our attention. But the contrary takes place. Another spirit pervades the Church. The man on the red horse is armed with a great sword, and commissioned to take peace from the earth (land) by instigating men to kill each other. And such was exactly the condition of the Church at the time I have fixed on. Its career under the Christian emperors was only for a short time free from strife and schism. No wonder that the Church, as soon as the power of the sword was on its side, connived at the persecution of the Pagans, when its own members inflicted the same evils on each other. Symptoms of this unholy spirit betrayed itself almost from the beginning. But later, Victor, Bishop of Rome, A.D. 170, would have excommunicated all the Asiatic Churches but for the timely remonstrance of Irenæus, and, forsooth, on the trifling ground that they refused to conform to his time of celebrating Easter. The contention at Carthage and Rome, respecting the lapsed and the power of a recommendation from martyrs and confessors, was conducted with the greatest virulence and rancour. The Church was involved in discussions of a most deadly character, which so incorporated persecution into its very nature, that it became one of its leading features. It was another spirit. Under the first seal a defective and formal gospel was propagated, and here the Church was rent asunder by those very nominal Christians it had unwisely stamped with its approbation. The members of the Church killed each other by mutual excommunication, and by losing the spiritual discernment of the true Church in their strife and hatred. "Where anger

and strife is, there is confusion, and every evil work."* The Arian controversy now began, which was sometimes supported, and at other times

* James iii. 16.

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