Then was the martyrs' blood avenged, then was the cry of those "slain for the word of God and for the testimony which they held," i. e., of those slain for the public preaching of Christianity [a state of things referring palpably to Apostolic times, and not to a subsequent age of the Church] answered-"The Lord sent forth his armies, and destroyed those murderers, and burned their city."

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LECTURE V.

THE SIXTH SEAL.

REV. vi. 12-17.

12. And I beheld when he had opened the sixth seal, and, lo, there was a great earthquake; and the sun became black as sackcloth of hair, and the moon became as blood;

13. And the stars of heaven fell unto the earth, even as a fig tree casteth her untimely figs, when she is shaken of a mighty wind.

14. And the heaven departed as a scrowl when it is rolled together; and every mountain and island were moved out of their places.

15. And the kings of the earth, and the great men, and the rich men, and the chief captains, and the mighty men, and every bondman, and every free man, hid themselves in the dens and in the rocks of the mountains;

16. And said to the mountains and rocks, Fall on us, and hide us from the face of him that sitteth on the throne, and from the wrath of the Lamb: 17. For the great day of his wrath is come; and who shall be able to stand?

WE interpreted the Fifth Seal of the persecutions of the Christian Church under the reign of Nero. We showed that the æra immediately preceding the destruction of Jerusalem might justly be called an æra of martyrs; and that the vision might well be seen of souls under the altar "slain for the word of God, and for the testimony which they held." We proved that these persecutions became more violent and decided as the period advanced towards the consummation, and that the perilous times" of "the last days," developed in the apostacy which those times induced, afforded satisfactory reason why the martyrs of that age should be told to "rest yet for a little season, until their fellow servants also, and their brethren which should be killed as they were, should be fulfilled."

We then proceeded to show that the blood of these martyrs cried to heaven for vengeance. "How long, O Lord! dost thou not judge and avenge our blood on them that dwell on the earth," i. e. the Jews. And we were enabled to prove not

only that a response was given to the cry of God's elect, but that at the hands of no other people but those emphatically distinguished as "they that dwell on the earth" was this vengeance required. "That upon you may come all the righteous blood shed upon the earth Verily I say unto you, all these things shall come upon this generation." I

1

We then went on to establish the position that the vengeance, for which the elect cried day and night, came soon. The martyrs had but to rest "a little season," before their fellow servants and brethren, which should be killed as they were, were fulfilled. No long interval of time elapsed between the martyr's cry and the answer to that cry. With the death of James the Just, the brother of our Lord, that vengeance began to arrive. Those were "the days of vengeance that all things which are written may be fulfilled." 2

I am content to leave this interpretation to the judgment of every candid and dispassionate mind. The Apocalypse itself offers no reason why the Fifth Seal should be referred to the Diocletian persecution beyond that of the "Doctrine of Resemblances," which it is evident would apply with equal force to any other persecution. History does not say that any retribution was exercised upon the dwellers of Judæa for the cruelties of Diocletian; nor does the common use of language justify the idea that "a little season can, with any propriety, be expanded into hundreds of years. A critical examination of the sacred text does not lead us to conclude that the contemporaneous martyrdom "of their fellow-servants, also, and their brethren that should-(soon) — be killed as they were" can be made to refer with any propriety to sufferers of a distant age and of a distinct persecution. Neither does a due attention to the immediate accomplishment of the prophecy warrant our placing the victims of Jewish enmity and Papal tyranny in the same calendar.

On the other hand, History does say that the times for which we have fixed the interpretation of this seal, were times of great and hitherto unheard of persecution.3 History does say

1 Matt. xxiii. 35, 36.

2 Luke, xxi. 22. 3 It is worthy of observation that as the persecution under Nero was the first authorised persecution of Christianity, so the war under Nero was the

that this persecution was avenged on the dwellers in a particular land; and that land, the land of Judæa. History does say that this vengeance came soon, "So that they who peruse the history may know, in some measure, that the divine vengeance did not long delay to visit them for their iniquity against the Christ of God."1 History does say that “The divine justice for their crimes against Christ and his Apostles, finally overtook them, totally destroying the whole generation of these evil doers from the earth.' 2

And here let me call attention to the narrow limits within which the system of interpretation which we have adopted compels us to restrict, not simply the exposition of this particular seal, but the exposition of the entire book. We cannot claim for ourselves the liberty which is taken by those from whom we differ. We dare not make a leap of 200 years, and explain this seal of the Diocletian persecution. An interpretation must be found suited to the day and age of the Apocalypse, or our system falls to the ground. There must be no roaming over one century after another to discover some event to agree with the prediction; there must be no turning over the leaves of Gibbon, or any other historian of subsequent times, to find some coincidence which may suit the seal; there must be no treating hundreds of years as if they were so many days, and establishing a system of chronology of which the book itself does not say one word.

But we have laid down certain premises, which confine our interpretation within 'very narrow limits. We assert that the book was written previous to the destruction of Jerusalem; and we must find an interpretation for it within those limits; and what is more, we must find an interpretation for the whole of it within those limits. If this cannot be done, our system is good for nothing, and falls to the ground. But if this can be done, the inference is unavoidable, the interpretation must be right. Add to this, if we are enabled to present an intelligible and con

commencement of the extermination of the Jewish people; and as in that war Jewish Christians were not recognisable from Jews, inasmuch as both followed the temple service, not only would the Jewish Christians be required to worship the gods of their conquerors, but they would be exposed to the persecutions of the Romans, as well as of their own countrymen. 2 Ibid. lib. iii. cap. 5.

1 Eus. Eccles. Hist., lib. iii. cap. 5.

sistent explanation of the whole book upon this principle, we may take it for granted that we are correct with regard to the question of the date of the Apocalypse; for if, according to our opponents, the whole history of the world and of the Church, from the commencement of Christianity down to the end of time, is not too wide a sphere in which to find a suitable. interpretation; and if, according to the premises we have laid down, an interpretation can be found concentrated within the limits of a very few years, (such a space as elapsed between St. John's banishment to Patmos, in the latter part of Nero's reign, and the destruction of Jerusalem, A. D. 70), there is no resisting the conclusion that we are proceeding upon a correct principle. In other words, if we are able to compress within the history of three or four years what they with extreme difficulty, and oftentimes by means of fanciful interpretation, scatter over a period of 2,000 years, the probability amounts almost to demonstration that we are not in any grievous error with regard either to the date or the interpretation of the Apocalypse.

SIXTH SEAL.

“And I beheld when he had opened the sixth seal, and lo, there was a great earthquake; and the sun became black as sackcloth of hair, and the moon became as blood.

"And the stars of heaven fell unto the earth, even as a fig tree casteth her untimely figs, when she is shaken of a mighty wind.

"And the heaven departed as a scrowl when it is rolled together; and every mountain and island were moved out of their places.

"And the kings of the earth, and the great men, and the rich men, and the chief captains, and the mighty men, and every bondman, and every free man, hid themselves in the dens and in the rocks of the mountains.

"And said to the mountains and rocks, Fall on us, and hide us from the face of him that sitteth on the throne, and from the wrath of the Lamb.