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evidently came from the bottomless pit; for it fostered all the wicked passions of the human heart, such as war, murder, slavery, and lust.

2d verse, "And he opened the bottomless pit, and there arose a smoke out of the pit as the smoke of a great furnace; and the sun and the air was darkened by reason of the smoke of the pit." The figures used in this text are, the bottomless pit, which denote the theories of men or devils, that have no foundation in the word of God. Smoke denotes the errors from such doctrine, which serve to blind the eyes of men, that they cannot see the truth. As the smoke of a great furnace shows the great extent or effect of this error over the world. The sun denotes the gospel, which is the great luminary of the moral world. The air denotes the moral influence on the mind, which is commonly called piety. As air supports or gives to the lungs animation in the physical world, so does the piety of the heart to the moral.

This, then, is the true sentiment of this passage. And by reason of the Mahometan errors which would be believed or followed by a great multitude, the gospel and the pious influence of the same would be in a great measure hid or lost to the world.

3d verse," And there came out of the smoke locusts upon the earth; and unto them was given power, as the scorpions of the earth have power." By these locusts I understand armies. See Joel, 1st and 2d chapters. Therefore I should read this text thus: And there came out from these Mahometan followers large armies, which should have great power to execute the judgments of God on this anti-Christian beast, which had filled the carth with her abominations.

4th verse," And it was commanded them that they should not hurt the grass of the earth, neither any green thing, neither any tree, but only those men which have not the seal of God in their foreheads." By grass, green

things, and trees, Ps. lxxii. 16, Hosea xiv. 8, I under stand the true church, or people of God. By those men having not the seal of God, &c., I understand the antiChristian church, or Papal Rome. Then this would be the sense: And it was commanded them that they should not hurt the true church, or people of God, but only the anti-Christian beast, or powers subject to her.

5th verse," And to them it was given that they should not kill them, but that they should be tormented five months; and their torment was as the torment of a scorpion, when he striketh a man. To kill is to destroy. Five months is in prophecy 150 years. To torment as a scorpion, &c., is to make sudden incursions and irruptions into the country, &c. Then this is the sentiment to me conveyed in the text: And the Turkish armies would not have power to destroy the Papal powers for 150 years, but would make sudden and quick incursions into their territories, and harass and perplex the nations under the Papal control.

6th verse," And in those days shall men seek death, and shall not find it; and shall desire to die, and death shall flee from them." About this time the Greek church, in Constantinople, was so harassed by the Papal authority, that it gave rise to a saying among them, that they had rather see the Turkish turban on the throne of the Eastern Empire, than the Pope's tiara." And any one who has read the history of the 14th century, will see that this text was literally accomplished.

7th verse," And the shapes of the locusts were like unto horses prepared unto battle; and on their heads were, as it were, crowns like gold, and their faces were as the faces of men." In this verse we have a description of the Turkish armies. In the first place they are represented as being all horsemen. This was true with the Turks, and no other kingdom since Christ's time, that we have any knowledge of, whose armies were all horsemen. They wore on their heads yellow turbans, which can only apply to the Turks, looking like crowns of gold.

8th verse, "And they had hair as the hair of women, and their teeth were as the teeth of lions." They wore

as the sound of chariots of many horses running to battle." By their breastplates I understand shields, which the Turks carried in their battles; and history tells us that when they charged an enemy, they made a noise upon them like the noise of chariot wheels.

10th verse," And they had tails like unto scorpions, and there were stings in their tails; and their power was to hurt men five months." The Turkish horsemen had each a cimeter which hung in a scabbard at their waist, that they used in close combat after they had discharged their javelins, with which they were very expert, severing a man's or even a horse's head at a blow. And from the time that the Ottoman power or Turkish empire was first established in Bithynia, until the downfall of the Greek or Eastern Empire, when the Turks took Constantinople, was five prophetic months, or one hundred and fifty years.

11th verse," And they had a king over them, which is the angel of the bottomless pit, whose name in the Hebrew tongue is Abaddon, but in the Greek tongue hath his name Apollyon." The Turkish government had a king when they began, as before mentioned, and he was a follower of the Mahometan faith, and truly a servant or messenger of this doctrine of the bottomless pit. The name of their first king, who is styled in history the founder of the Turkish empire, was Othoman or Ottoman, from whom the empire took its name, and has been called to this day the Ottoman empire. And great has been the destruction which this government has executed upon the world; and well may this empire be styled Destroyer, in prophecy the signification of Abaddon or Apollyon.

12th verse," One woe is past; and behold, there come two woes more hereafter." This closes the fifth trumpet and the first woe, commencing at the foundation of the Turkish empire in Bithynia, in the year A. D. 1298, and lasting five prophetic months, or 150 years, which carries us down to the year A. D. 1448. When we take into

view the object and design of God in sending this judgment or scourge upon the men who have not the seal of God on their foreheads; the anti-Christian beast, who profess to be Christians, but are not; when we compare the history of those times with the prophecy-we have been examining, and the events which have transpired concerning the Ottoman empire, with the descriptive character given of them in this prophecy,—we cannot, I think, hesitate for a moment to apply the fulfilment of this trumpet and woe, to these events, time, and place; and must be led to admire the agreement between the prophecy and fulfilment, and to believe this book of Revelation to be indited by the unerring wisdom of the Divine Spirit; for no human forethought could have so exactly described these events, dress, manners, customs, and mode of warfare 1200 years beforehand, except the wisdom of God had assisted him. And if these things are revealed by God himself unto us, surely no one will dare to say that it is non-essential whether we believe this part of the revealed will of God or not. Shall God speak and man disregard it? Forbid it, O Father; and let us have “ears to hear what the Spirit saith to the churches."

We shall now follow the revelation of God into the sixth trumpet and second woe; and may we have the Spirit of God to assist us and lead our minds into the truth of these things.

13th verse," And the sixth angel sounded, and I heard a voice from the four horns of the golden altar which is before God," 14th verse, "Saying to the sixth angel which had the trumpet, Loose the four angels which are bound in the great river Euphrates." By the sounding of the trumpet, I understand the commencing of those judgments which were to be poured out upon the earth under this trumpet; and by the "voice from the four horns of the golden altar," the agreement of all the powers of heaven and earth to execute the design of God in this thing. By loosing the four angels which are bound in the great river Euphrates, I understand that God was now about to suffer the four principal nations of which the Ottoman empire was composed, which had in vain

middle of the fifteenth century.

15th verse, “And the four angels were loosed, which were prepared for an hour, and a day, and a month, and a year, to slay the third part of men." The four angels, we may reasonably conclude, are a representation of the four nations that had embraced the Mahometan religion, and were now under the control of the Ottoman, viz., Turks, Tartars, Arabs, and Saracens. The time expressed in the last-mentioned verse is 391 years and 15 days. "To slay the third part of men," is to destroy and conquer one third part of the governments or kingdoms of which the Papal beast had the control, which was true in the end.

16th verse, "And the number of the army of the horsemen was two hundred thousand thousand; and I heard the number of them." In this verse the precise number of the army of horsemen is given, for John tells us "he heard the number of them." And if we should understand the prophet to mean, as some suppose he does, 200,000, multiplied by a 1000, then the sum total would be 200,000,000, which would be more men than were ever on our earth at one time capable of bearing arms; therefore I believe this is not the meaning of the prophet, neither do I think that it was a succession of armies during the whole period of 391 years, making the sum total of 200,000,000, for this, too, would be incredible; for allowing a standing army of 15,385,000 to be recruited every 30 years, it would only make the two hundred millions; and this sum would be more than five times the number of all the standing armies in the known world. And from these considerations I have for myself given this construction, that the prophet John heard the number of 200,000 repeated, or twice told, which would make an army of 400,000 horsemen; and this would not be incredible. And what is to me strong proof of the fact is, that the history informs us that Mahomet II. came against Constantinople about the year A. D. 1450, with