those of the O. Testament prophets, with regard to costume. The same general style, tone, and manner of conception, reign throughout the whole of the second part of the book, as are exhibited in the preceding part. Never was a sameness of authorship more fully and certainly developed by internal evidence.

But the DIVERSITIES, at the same time, in the management of the plan, are many and very considerable. The theophany of chap. iv. is not repeated. No sealed book is here presented. The elders and living creatures mostly disappear from the scene; while angelic interposition, however, remains essentially the same. The plan commences by taking a regressive step, into the history of the past. New agents of opposition are introduced. Satan, who appears but for a moment (11: 7) under the first catastrophe, here acts a most conspicuous part, and appears to be at the height of his efforts and of his power. The beast from the sea and from the landsymbols like those in the book of Daniel-are the symbols of civil and religious domination which is opposed to the kingdom of Christ. The Redeemer makes his appearance, more than once, in person (Chap. xiv. xix.), either with those whom he has saved as symbols of further salvation, or with his elect warriors in order to enter upon the mighty contest. The metropolis is first assaulted and reduced to a ruinous condition; and when its utter desolation is about to be completed, on one hand, the triumphal song over its fall is heard, and on the other the wailings of those whose hopes and interests were centered in it. Finally the remoter provinces and distant parts of the empire, joining all their forces to avenge their ruined metropolis, are overthrown. Then follows the punishment of the beast and false prophet with their followers, the confinement of Satan for a thousand years, and the general triumph and peace of the church.

In making disclosures such as these, the writer had a very difficult and delicate task to perform. When he spake of the ruin of Judea, there was nothing to make him timid and cautious. That power was in the progress of being destroyed, at the very time when he wrote his book. But not so the Roman power. It was still at the height of its strength. The Romish magistracy, everywhere on the alert to detect and punish sedition or contumacy, would look with a jealous and malignant eye on any prediction of its fall, and specially on any apparent or suspected calumny of its rulers. What else could John do, in such circumstances, than what he has done? How could he venture upon anything more than a symbolic representation of the character, state, and future fall of the heathen persecuting power, which might be read and understood by Christians conversant with the O. Testament, but would be an enigma to a mere heathen reader? Had he spoken plainer, slander and seditious purposes would have been readily imputed to him, and likewise to all who possessed and approved of his book; had he spoken less plain, even his Christian readers would have been unable to enter fully into his meaning. He has chosen the middle path. It was his imperious duty to speak to Christians for their comfort and encouragement. The times demanded it, and fidelity to the cause of Christianity could not dispense with it. But he must speak guardedly, i. e. so that "the wise would understand, but none of the wicked would understand," Dan. 12: 10. Has he not done so? One might almost take it for granted, that a heathen of his day, unacquainted with the Jewish Scriptures, would regard his book as only the developments of enthusiasm and reve

rie, and would lay it aside, perhaps, with mere pity for the mental hallucination of the author. The writer of the Apocalypse has hardly escaped from such a charge, on the part of many who regard themselves as enlightened Christians. At the same time I am fully persuaded, that a well-read Christian of that period could enter into the design of the author, and understand most, if not all, which he was expected to understand by the writer of the book.

Such are the great outlines and some of the particular features of the second catastrophe, as apprehended by my own mind. In the general bearing of the picture, most of the recent commentators concur; its relation, however, to the preceding part of the book, and some of its particulars in themselves considered, are viewed by a portion of critics in a different light. Controversy is not my object. If the reader finds evidences in the further developments of the Apocalypse, that the plan which I have suggested is substantially correct, he will need no other refutation of different views.

THE WOMAN CLOTHED WITH THE SUN: CHAP. XII.

It hardly need be said, that chap. xii. has given rise to an almost endless variety of expositions. If it is viewed (and so it sometimes has been) merely as an isolated piece, I know not what an interpreter can do except merely to guess at its meaning. Viewed however as an introduction to the second catastrophe, it may be regarded with very different feelings; and in this light I cannot hesitate to view it. How it can be connected with the first catastrophe, and yet any concinnity be preserved, I am not aware.

The first question which presents itself, is: Whether the writer has here taken a regressive step, i. e. whether, instead of describing what is yet future, he goes back to a brief sketch of the past, in order the better to enter afterwards upon the declaration of the future. An attentive examination of the whole chapter will lead, as it seems to me, to a full persuasion that he has taken such a step. That some leading facts in respect to the Saviour's entrance into the world and exit from it, are glanced at in vs. 1-6 of chap. xii, appears to be plain. How can the reader help calling to mind the birth of Christ, and the massacre at Bethlehem by Herod; the character of him who was "to rule over the nations," as disclosed in Ps. ii.; the temptation of Christ by Satan; the ascension of the Redeemer to heaven, after he had risen from the dead; and finally the persecution of the church after his death, with the protection vouchsafed to them on the part of Heaven? That Satan is here presented as following the risen and ascended Redeemer to the heavenly regions with the design of annoying him, must strike every wellinformed mind, as a lively symbol of the malignity and bitterness with which the enemy of God and man pursued Jesus and his disciples, at all times and on all occasions. It is a representation of the like nature with that in the book of Job (chap. i. ii.), where Satan makes his appearance among the sons of God, as an accuser of the pious. To say that Satan could have nothing to hope for from such an attempt, would be saying little to the purpose. Had he any more ground of hope, when he engaged in tempting Christ, or in leading on Judas and his band of conspirators to bring about the death of Jesus? The malignity of Satan

often leads him to overleap the bounds of sagacious prudence, and to undertake desperate enterprises.

But after all, we need not be careful or solicitous about proving a literal attempt of the nature described in vs. 7 seq. Enough that here is symbol, and that this symbol is very expressive of the malignity of Satan and his coadjutors. Nothing is too bold or desperate for him to undertake; and when foiled in one attempt, he is not dissuaded from making another. So the chapter before us represents him, and in this way it admirably depicts his true character.

A second question, which naturally follows, is: What end could the writer have in view by taking a regressive step, as he seems here to have done?

Several purposes seem to be accomplished by it, would be my answer to such an inquiry. A distinction-a marked distinction-is thus made between the first and second parts of the Epopee. Chap. xii. constitutes a proem to the second part, in like manner as chap. iv. v. are a proem to the first. The machinery of the second part is purposely designed by the author, as has already been stated, to be different in many respects from that of the first. Satan and his principal coadjutors, viz. the heathen emperors and priests, are here the leaders of the opposition to the kingdom and reign of the Redeemer. In order that the malice and efforts of the grand adversary may be fully displayed, the writer goes back, and begins with the Saviour's birth, and the efforts of Satan to destroy him, at that period; and then he touches upon his ascension to heaven, and the subsequent persecution of Christians through Satanic influence. The protection of the church in Judea, and the flight of Christians to Pella, (probably alluded to in the description of the woman's flight to the wilderness, vs. 14 seq.), served only to exasperate Satan more and unore. When he has accomplished his utmost in Judea, and after all sees Christianity still gaining ground in spite of persecution; when, moreover, he perceives that the persecuting Jewish power is about to be finally humbled and prostrated; then he turns with burning malice to other parts of the world, in order to stir up persecutions there against the "seed of the woman." How he succeeded in his subsequent efforts, the sequel of the Apocalypse is designed to show.

If we should insist that the whole plan and execution of John's Apocalypse must be strictly chronological, and exhibit a regular sequency like a book of unnals, some difficulty might be made here by a reader disposed to take exception at any appearance of anachronism. Nero began the persecution of Christians in November, A. D. 66. An attack was made on Jerusalem, at the same period; but the Jewish war did not really commence, until early in the spring of A. D. 67. Jerusalem was taken and destroyed in August, A. D. 70. How, it may be asked, could John represent Satan as applying himself to stir up persecution among the heathen after he was foiled in Judea by the destruction of the persecut ing power there, when Nero actually began it before the Jewish war commenced? But this question assumes what John does not assert. John represents Satan as making war against the rest of the woman's seed, after he was foiled in his attempts to destroy "the man-child who should rule the nations with an iron-sceptre," and the woman who bare him. In other words; Satan did his utmost to destroy Christ and his church in Judea, before he commenced stirring up active persecution abroad. But his efforts in Judea were all in vain. The church increased and strengthened under persecution. The Roman power was threatening Palestine with its legions of soldiers, even before Nero began his persecution at Rome, which would naturally abate, in some measure, hostile movements against Christians among the Jews. What John says, implies no more than that Satan, being disappointed as to his efforts in Judea, began to stir up persecution against Christians in foreign countries. Now this accords with matter of fact. The Romish

power did not persecute, until the time of Nero. The only difficulty that remains is, that if we interpret vs. 6, 14, as having respect to the flight of Christians to Pella, there is the appearance of anachronism, because Nero began persecution before the flight took place. But in an Epopee like the Apocalypse we are surely not bound to the rigid rules of a book of annals. And even if this be insisted on in the present case, it seems quite plain, that as Jews and Christians were confounded in the Roman provinces, the fiercest part of the Neronian persecution would take place, only after the Jews had become the civil enemies of the Romans, and of course sometime after the war against Palestine had commenced. In the meantime, before Nero's death in June A. D. 68, it is highly probable that the flight to Pella of large numbers of Christians had taken place; for this was some eighteen months after the war had been raging. This flight would enrage Satan, and induce him to make more strenuous efforts to stir up the heathen persecution.

My limits do not permit further discussion here. I must remit the reader to the Appendix to Vol. I., where the allegation of anachronism in respect to the writer's plan as represented by me, is more fully discussed.

It is thus that the rage and malice of the great adversary at a preceding period are portrayed, in order that we should be prepared to look with the deeper interest on the time to come, and see what he undertakes to accomplish. Forthwith, after these views of Satan and his efforts in antecedent times, the writer presents us with his coadjutors and servants, i. e. the Pagan imperial power at the head of the world, and an idolatrous priesthood, both combined and determined to root out the religion of Christ.

If no other purposes were answered by the regressive step which the author has taken, than those already noticed, these would be amply sufficient to defend his method. But we may cast our eye still farther on, beyond the limits to which we have now come. When the Apocalypse was written, Christians were under a bitter and bloody persecution from the Roman power, stirred up and set on by Satan the enemy of all good. Would it not then answer the purpose of encouragement, to bring in a striking manner before the minds of those who were thus persecuted, what had already happened to their Lord and Master himself? Him also, even from his birth to his death, Satan had assailed. His death was brought about by Satanic persecution. But lo! he triumphs. He ascends to heaven beyond the reach of Satan and his instruments. The church also, from the bosom of which the Saviour came forth when he "became in all things like to his brethren," had been persecuted. Many Christians, moreover, had fallen by persecution; but the church continued to rise the more. Many had fled to the wilderness; but there God had provided for them. Terrible then as the attacks of Satan were, through the instruments which he employed, yet at last they would be of no avail to stop the progress of Christianity. As the Saviour and the church had triumphed, so would the same cause continue to triumph, while all its enemies and persecutors would be finally destroyed.

Who now, in the light which such a consideration presents, can pronounce the chapter before us to be an irrelevant or useless episode, or regard it as an invention of the writer designed principally to entertain the reader? Far higher and nobler ends than these the author had in view. But still, I would not wholly exclude subordinate designs from his purpose. While he doubtless designed that the symbolic representation before us should interest his readers, he also intended that it should serve to distinguish a break in his discourse, just where he wished to make one, viz. at the close of the first and the beginning of the second ca

tastrophe. Can any one reasonably complain that both a moral and a rhetorical purpose is subserved at the same time?

One question still remains: Who or what is represented by the woman so splendidly apparelled? Not ancient Judaism as such, as Eichhorn seems to maintain. Not the virgin Mary, simply and personally considered; for what is said in vs. 14 seq. appears to comprise too much to be applied to any single personage who is merely human. It must then be the CHURCH; the church not simply as Jewish, but in a more generic and theocratic sense-the people of God. From the church, Jesus sprang zard odoxa. From the Christian church, considered as Christian, he could not spring; for this took its rise only after the time of his public ministry. But from the bosom of the people of God the Saviour came. This church, Judaical indeed (at the time of his birth) in respect to rites and forms, but to become Christian after he had exercised his ministry in the midst of it, might well be represented here by the woman which is described in chap. xii. To a Jew this would not appear at all unusual, but altogether appropriate. The daughter of Zion is a common personification of the church in the O. Testament; and in the writings of Paul, the same image is exhibited by the phrase: Jerusalem, which is the mother of us all, i. e. of all Christians, Gal. 4: 26. The main point before us is, the illustration of that church, ancient or later, under the image of a woman. If the Canticles are to have a spiritual sense given to them, it is plain enough of course how familiar such an idea was to the Jews. Whether the woman thus exhibited as a symbol be represented as bride or mother, depends of course on the nature of the case and the relations and exigencies of any particular passage. In the case before us, to present the church as the mother of the human nature of the Saviour, is altogether appropriate, and is necessary also to the design of the writer. In another view of the subject, i. e. in respect to Christ's higher nature, such an image would be incongruous and even absurd. But to say, that from the bosom of the church Jesus as to his human nature sprang, is both congruous and scriptural.

Such is the view which I feel constrained to take of the chapter before us. Premising such a plan, we may now, without any serious difficulty, proceed to explain the particulars of the twelfth chapter.

(1, 2) And a great wonder appeared in heaven; a woman clothed with the sun, and the moon under her feet, and on her head a crown of twelve stars; and being with child she cried out with anguish and travailing pains.

Enuεiov, like the Hebrew ris, often means something extraordinary, something miraculous, ostentum. The meaning is here augmented by uéya, which has the sense, in such a connection, of something extraordinary or adapted to excite wonder. It can qualify oqueiov here in no other tolerable sense.- -Ovgavą, the air? or is the heaven above, i. e. the welkin, meant? Inasmuch as the sun, moon, and stars, are represented as adorning the woman, it would seem most congruous to suppose that the highest region of the air is meant. There too the assault of Satan, "the prince of the power of the air," i. e. of the aerial host or evil spirits, takes place; and in this way the whole is more easily and naturally explained. See Exc. I. No. II. 5. c.

Περιβεβλημένη τὸν ἥλιον, i. e. surrounded with a glorious splendour