blood on them that dwell on the earth?" To this point we come directly and at once, by referring to the last verse of the eighteenth chapter, wherein the destruction of Babylon is amply described; of whom it is said, that "in her was found the blood of prophets and of saints, and of all that were (Gr. had been) slain upon the earth." Babylon then is guilty of the martyrs' blood: she is the slayer of the kindred whom the Redeemer riseth to revenge; for, as we have said, it was one of the offices of the Redeemer "to inquire for blood," and to avenge it. Now what is this Babylon, whose other names are given at length in the xviith chapter, verse 5? The answer is contained in that same chapter, verse 18: "And the woman which thou sawest is that great city which reigneth over the kings of the earth." There is no possibility of avoiding Rome as the only possible interpretation of these words: for she is the only city which hath reigned over kings since the days of the Apostles: and herein stands one of the features in which she resembleth the ancient Babylon. Now, over what kings did Rome rule? Not over all the kings of the earth; for beyond the Euphrates, the Danube, and the Libyan deserts, she had no authority over, and even little knowledge of, the world. From this wide sovereignty she declined, to bear sway only over these western parts of Europe, having resigned the hold of the eastern to Constantinople; and during this time it was that she bore sway over kings by the instrumentality of the pope. And to this period chiefly, though not entirely, it is that the expression refers; which, however, is rather as a characteristic to know the city from all others, than a description of the period of her cruelty, for this doubtless is inclusive of the whole time from the death of the first martyr to the death of the last. This observation is of itself sufficient to limit the place of this vision, so oft signified by the expression "the earth," to the bounds of the Roman empire: because it is clear, from the fifth seal, that the judgment of the sixth and seventh come in revenge of the martyrs' blood; and in the passage just quoted the guilt of all the martyrs' blood is imputed to, and visited upon, that city which ruleth over the kings of the earth: upon her therefore, and her dominions, the judgment alights. Other reasons for this

conclusion were set forth in the beginning of Lecture XI.; and as we proceed, the evidence will accumulate from so many quarters as to leave no doubt whatever upon the mind of any one. Now the reason why the controversy should be maintained within that bound is, that there was the seat of the usurper of the earth. Rome claimed the sovereignty ; but to Jerusalem the sovereignty of the world had been decreed from of old. Jupiter of the Capitol had assumed the sovereignty which belonged to Jesus on Mount Zion. Formerly the emperors, and latterly the popes of Rome, have claimed the empire of the world, and within certain bounds have possessed it; and within these bounds of her dominion hath God's royal city and world's metropolis been held in base thraldom. For these causes it was necessary that Jesus in making his way to possession should seek out the usurper in his strong hold, and contend with him in his own dominions. But, as hath been often observed, though for these reasons the Roman empire be chosen as the place of the action, that the prophecy may be capable of verification from the event, we are not to suppose that this portion of the earth hath either any favour or disfavour in the sight of God; or that the principles of Divine providence applicable thereto are different from those applicable every where else. Such an idea were wholly to destroy the end and purpose of prophecy, which is to teach lessons of the Divine providence by means of particular examples. Now if it be once believed that the example is treated according to a principle of its own, the whole use of it as an example is lost. The Roman empire, in which the whole mystery of Paganism and apostate Christianity was to be revealed, is the fullest and richest of all examples, for shewing the way of God's dealing with idolatry and apostasy, and the mystery of iniquity in all its forms; and for these reasons it is chosen to exemplify the universal and invariable laws of Divine providence, as well by the church as by the world and the synagogue of antichrist.

There is still another observation of a general kind, which I wish to make before proceeding to the exposition of the seals one by one. The first four are inflictions upon the earth, brought in succession by a single person; but they proceed not to utter extirpation and extinction of

the powers that be; who have a second tragedy to act against the followers of the Lamb: this they do under the fifth seal, and then, unto utter annihilation of the being and force and frame-work of their kingdom, doth the judgment go, under the direct agency of the Lamb. An earthquake and a second earthquake, the former desolating but not destructive; for a warning only, not for utter wreck and ruin; the latter for entire subversion and explosion of all the things which are confederate against the Lamb, for the casting out of Satan, and the possession of the earth by its true and rightful King. The point here to which I would direct attention is, that the reigning powers bring the judgments of the first four seals; in the sixth and seventh, the Lamb brings them and they suffer them. The four riders act the part which the Lamb afterwards acteth; and therefore like him they are represented as riding upon horses. No one reading the passage in the xixth chapter, where the Word of God comes forth upon the white horse, can doubt for a moment that he comes as a conqueror to triumph over his embattled foes. And if any doubt were left that the horse was emblematical of conquest over our enemies, it seems to me to be removed by the explanation given upon the introduction of the first horseman (ch. vi. ver. 2): "He went forth conquering and to conquer." Moreover, the horseman of chapter xix. hath a name written, " King of kings, and Lord of lords," and those who follow him on white horses become the kings and the lords of the earth; being the same who sit upon the thrones (ch. xx. ver. 4). This observation, I think, goes far to add the idea of royalty to that of conquest, in order to complete the interpretation of the symbol of the horse, and to decide that these four riders ought to be interpreted of royal conquerors, whom God useth to bring judgment upon the earth. What they conquer and what they triumph over appear not as yet; but this clearly appeareth, that they are royal or imperial personages, who have single authority, and are raised up and commissioned of God to bring judgment upon those who had slain the first army of martyrs; they do partially that which He himself in the person of The Word doth completely, when the same evil city and its subject nations hath filled up the cup of their iniquity, by destroying the

second noble army of the martyrs. This idea, that these are four Christian emperors, acting a prelude of that part which the King of saints completeth, is much confirmed by observing that the beast in one form or another doth always personate the enemies and persecutors of the church, and beareth the whore of Babylon; while the horse beareth the avenger of the saints' blood, and ought therefore to have this meaning given to it uniformly. With the lights obtained from the consideration of the document as a whole, we now proceed to interpret it piece-meal, and in order.

The whole act of the opening of the seals divideth itself into three parts: first, the action of the four riders in the first four seals; second, the delay and postponement of the fifth seal; third, the consummate destruction brought upon the earth in the last two seals. These we shall consider in order.

THE CAUSE OF THE FIRST FOUR SEALS.

I. The action of the first four seals being considered as a whole, and contemplated in the consummation," is to kill with sword, and with hunger, and with death, and with the beasts of the earth,"-doth contain, as it seems to me, a complete judgment of that kind which God had heretofore been wont to inflict upon the nations; but not equal to that new form of judgment which is proper to the new form of guilt contracted by an apostate church, and wrecked upon her in the sixth and seventh seals. I derive this notion of the completeness of the judgment contained in the four seals from the study of the fourteenth chapter of Ezekiel, wherein the Lord layeth out the several forms of retribution which he inflicteth upon a people who have turned a deaf ear to the warnings which he hath sent them by his prophets; and thus he summeth it up: "How much more when I send my four sore judgments upon Jerusalem, the sword, and the famine, and the noisome beast, and the pestilence." Now these are precisely the four ("death" being the same as pestilence") which come upon the fourth part of the earth by the hand of the fourth rider; yet not without the operation of the two preceding ones, whereof the former brings the sword, and the latter the pestilence. But it may be asked, what form of judgment. doth the first bring? The answer is, he obtaineth the upper hand, and prepares the way of those who follow.

His part is to work his way to the crown by conquest, over the powers which are afterwards to be judged. The powers that had been before him slew the martyrs: God is about to judge them for their impious cruelty; and he will do it by a succession, not of beasts, but of men riding on horses, that is of Christian rulers conquering and suppressing his enemies. But first he must bring such a one into the possession of the dominion, which is the act of the first seal; after which comes the second with the sword, symbol of slaughter; the third with the balances, symbol of famine; and the fourth with death and hell, symbol of devastation; whose ravages, being chiefly confined to the fourth part of the earth, work the complete devastation over that region. The result of all these combined observations is to fix the beginning of the seals to the time of Constantine, the first Christian emperor, which also we determined upon other grounds, when treating expressly of the place and time to which this vision of seals hath reference. And seeing these judgments are inflicted in revenge of the martyr's blood, it will be necessary first that we take a step backward and set forth the sufferings of the church at the hand of Rome, from the time that Christ, her foundation- stone, was crucified, by the warrant of a Roman governor. The recital of this miserable tale of the endurances of the church divideth itself into two parts; first, that of which the Jews were the active instruments, Rome the heedless spectator; and, secondly, that of which Rome was both the cause and the instrument. To Rome, which for a long while had possessed the chief authority in Judea, all acts of violence. are justly chargeable, though not actually inflicted by imperial edict, because she ought to have kept the peace amongst her subjects, and not permitted the violence and malice of one sect to break out against another. Let us then begin with the Apostles of the Lord, and draw out a regular account of the acts of cruelty permitted or inAlicted by Rome upon the servants and subjects of him who is King of kings, and Lord of lords.

If we take the day of Pentecost as the date of the putting forth of that power which Christ received in heaven and on earth, when by the gift of the Holy Ghost he did finish and fit out his church for the holy warfare, we may well believe that then also Satan began to take the field