history, as described and fulfilled, of their slaughter and resurrection; 3rdly, the notice of the ascent of the Witnesses, and certain important political events cotemporaneous with it. Which last division I purpose to treat of separately from the second, and by itself, for this reason, viz, because it seems broken off from what precedes, by a notable change in the person narrating: what precedes being related retrospectively by the Angel, then the narration at length resumed by St. John.' Thus the events described previous to the break must be regarded as already past at the epoch correspondent with the Angel's giving the narration; that is, at the epoch next following that of the ecclesiastical constitution of the Reformed Churches and the Diet of Augsburg: on the other hand, those described after the break as chronologically subsequent to that epoch, and as marking the yet further development and progress of the Reformation.

This premised, I proceed to the first and largest of these divisions; being that which is to be the subject of the present Chapter, and which answers to the Apocalyptic extract heading it. And, with a view to distinctness, I shall in the first place, and in this first Section, consider the general description of the Witnesses given in the prophecy; then in the three or four subsequent Sections their realization in history.

§ 1. THE WITNESSES AS DESCRIBED IN PROPHECY.

In the Angel's description of the two Witnesses, the following points are observable :

1st. The term designating them implies personality. For in the only nine other places where the word aptos, witness, is used in the New Testament, there can be no question that persons are intended by it; and so too in

1 The change is marked by St. John's resuming the narration, after the Angel's interlocution, in his own person, in verse 12; Hквσα, "I heard a great voice from heaven," &c. That this is the true reading will be shown, on I believe conclusive evidence, when we come to the discussion of that passage.

almost all of the fifty or sixty passages where it occurs in the Old Testament, as derived from the Hebrew word properly corresponding.-The same inference results from what is said of the Witnesses prophesying: for the verb prophecy, which may be found some hundred times in the Bible, is never used but of persons: besides that persons witnessing for Christ are elsewhere in the Apocalypse distinctly noted.'-I make this observation because not a few modern expositors, following certain others more ancient, have supposed the two Witnesses to mean things inanimate,-the Old and New Testaments." There cannot be a reasonable doubt, I conceive, that living confessors were intended.

2. The appellative "my Witnesses," points out to us the grand subject of their witnessing, viz. the Lord Jesus; his glory, his grace, his salvation. A point this the rather to be observed respecting them, because of their having been represented by some Expositors as witnesses simply and distinctively against the Papacy; thus furnishing a handle to objectors: 3 whereas, being simply described as Witnesses for JESUS, they need not be supposed to have assumed prominently the aggressive character of direct remonstrants against the Apostacy, whether in the East or in the West, except in proportion as that system should have authoritatively incorporated and enforced its growing superstitions and impieties, in open and necessary hostility to the doctrine of Jesus.Let me add from another predictive passage, Apoc. xii. 17, where the same individuals are doubtless spoken of, that they are designated as those who "observed the commandments of God," as well as who " kept up the

1 See Apoc. xii. 17; "The dragon went to make war with the remnant of her seed, that keep the commandments of God, and hold to the testimony on witnessing for Jesus: " εχοντων την μαρτυρίαν το Ιησε Χρισε" a passage cited under

the next head.

2 So Galloway, Frere, Irving, &c. of the moderns; of the ancients, Tichonius. Mr. Brooks, p. 449, speaks of Vitringa as interpreting the two Witnesses of the Old and New Testament, conjointly with living confessors. This is however hardly correct. He explains the Witnesses simply as living confessors, but the two tubes of the candlestick in Zechariah as the Holy Scripture and preaching. See Vitringa, pp. 622-626.

3 E. g. Maitland. See his Remarks, p. 95, and Facts and Doc. p. 80, &c.

testimony of Jesus." These two characteristics always were, and in fact always will be, found united. They that testify for Jesus will be the persons most observant of God's commandments: they that testify other than his doctrine will observe rather the commandments of men.

3. They are described as "the two olive-trees and the two candlesticks, or lamp-sconces, that stand before the Lord of the whole earth."

Of these emblems the candlesticks or lamp-sconces, are explained by Christ Himself to symbolize Christian Churches i. e. communities uniting together in a true Christian profession and worship; the individual members contained in which shone, by their consistent doctrine and life, as lights in the world. We must remember that these might be small, as well as large. We read in 1 Cor. xvi. 19. of the Church in the house of Aquila and Priscilla; and in Col. iv. 15, of the Church in the house of Nymphas. In the present case the whole desscription indicates paucity of number and depression.

As to the emblem of olive-trees, since it was the olivetree that supplied nourishment to the temple-lamps,—it being commanded that pure oil-olive should alone be burnt in them,3-it would seem that those must be symbolized thereby, who supplied the needful spiritual nourishment to the Christian churches; in other words all faithful ministers and gospel-preachers ministering to them. And to this effect indeed is the explanation given of the emblem in Zechariah.* "I said, What be these two olive-trees upon the right side of the candlestick and

1 Apoc. i. 20.-Compare 1 Kings xi. 36; "that David my servant may have a light (or lamp) always before me in Jerusalem."

2 Phil. ii. 15., ws Avxvor the Church being the Avxvia. The distinction has not been always noted. Compare Numb. viii. 2, 3; Matt. v. 15.

3 Exod. xxvii. 20.

4 Zech. iv. 11, &c.—In Zechariah's vision it may be that two olive-trees growing in the Court of the Temple appeared to stretch out branches through the Temple walls, and so to drop the oil of their olives into the bowl of the candlestick. For from David's figure of himself, "I am like a green olive-tree in the house of my God," (Psalm lii. 8.) it seems not improbable that olive-trees may have been actually growing there. Or it may be that the reference of the prophetic imagery was to the olive-tree door-posts of the temple, of which we read 1 Kings vi. 33 ; and which may have appeared in Zechariah's vision in their natural form and vitality, and so stretching thence to the golden candlestick.

the left? And I answered again, What be these two olive-branches which through the golden pipes empty the oil out of themselves? Then said He, These are the two anointed ones (Marg. the two sons of oil)' that stand by the Lord of the whole earth." Now under the Jew ́ish dispensation, they that as individuals, in the special sense of the words, stood before the Lord, and who also were anointed for the purpose, were the Priests and the Prophets; those that under an ordinary or an extraordinary commission, (for the prophets, let it be well marked, were not always of the sacerdotal tribe and order,3) taught and ministered publicly, whether in the world, or in the congregation. Under the Christian dispensation the counterpart to the former of these are regularly ordained Christian Ministers; to the latter, Evangelists of a more extraordinary commission.

From the union of the two symbols, of lamps and olive-trees, we are to understand that both the ministers or gospel-preachers, and the churches or communities taught by them, were alike included in the Apocalyptic Witnesses.

4. We must observe the number noted,

my two

1 If this marginal translation be taken,—and from the nature of the emblem it seems to me preferable, we must take it I think actively, as designating communicators of oil. So James and John are called sons of thunder, in Mark iii. 17, with reference to the power of the word issuing from them; Barnabas the son of consolation, Acts iv. 36, in the sense of a consoler, &c; musicians, the sons of noise, (Heb.) Jer. xlviii. 45; and a fruitful hill of olives, a horn the son of oil, (Hebr.) Isa. v. 1; i. e. as producing it.

2 Of the Priests and Levites we read thus in Deut. x. 8; "The Lord separated the tribe of Levi to stand before the Lord, to minister unto Him, and to bless in his name:" and again Deut. xviii. 7, &c.-Of the Prophets it is made frequently a characteristic, as in the cases of Elijah and Elisha; "As the Lord liveth before whom I stand; 1 Kings xvii. 1, xviii. 15, 2 Kings iii. 14, v. 16. Also of Jeremiah when fulfiling his prophetic office; Jer. xv. 19.—In the same sense I conceive that the two anointed ones of Zechariah's vision meant the two Prophets, Haggai and Zechariah, who ministered oil to the lamp of the Jewish Church, when burning dim and nearly extinct; not, as most Commentators interpret, Zerubbabel and Joshua. A civil Governor or Prince is no where said in Scripture, I believe, to stand before God.-Compare 1 Kings x. 8, 2 Kings v. 25.

I need hardly adduce examples to show that the phrase is used also of churches or congregations collectively, when met to worship before God: e. g. Acts x. 33. 3 Jeremiah, Ezekiel, and sundry other prophets were of the sacerdotal tribe and order but Elijah's tribe is not told us; and both David and Daniel were of the tribe of Judah, Amos a herdsman of Tekoa, &c.-Again even women were sometimes commissioned prophetesses. So Deborah for example, and Huldah : the latter consulted by King Josiah, at the time when the temple and its priesthood were in full establishment. See 2 Kings xxii. 14.

Witnesses."-We may take for granted that here, as uniformly elsewhere in the Apocalypse, the representative system is followed; and thus that the two witnesses, instead of being two individuals, as some of the early Fathers fancied, stand for many,'-But why the number two; unity being most usually adopted in cases of representation? To this question the answer of Mede seems sufficient, that two or three witnesses were required in the Mosaic law to constitute a conclusive testimony; 3 and therefore that had but one witness been made the representative of a number sufficient, so as is evidently intended, for effectively testifying, the usual propriety of emblem observable in the Apocalypse would have been wanting. But, besides this, many commentators have supposed that two separate lines of witnesses are intended.* And certainly, if such were the case, the duality of these representative Witnesses (a duality noted of their emblems, the olive-trees and candlesticks, as well as of themselves) would be still more satisfactorily accounted for, and still more according to Apocalyptic analogies. It must however, be remembered that this latter supposition is not necessary; Mede's explanation being of itself sufficient.

1 So Tertullian, Hippolytus, Cyprian, Ambrose, Jerom, &c. supposed that they would be Enoch and Elijah. "Morituri reservantur," said Tertullian, (De Animâ, c. 50.) ut Antichristum suo sanguine extinguant." Others expected Elijah and John the Evangelist. See Calmet on Antichrist; or Brooks's Elements of Prophetic Interpretation, p. 444. also my Sketch of the History of Apocalyptic Interpretation in the Appendix to Vol. iv. In this supposition they have been followed by some modern Interpreters of the Maitland School; those who also expect a personal Antichrist, and believe that by the 1260 days are meant simply days, not years, in this prophecy.-I have already observed, and beg now again to remind the reader of it, that the whole year-day question will be fully discussed when we come to the xiiith Apocalyptic Chapter.

2 Enough, I hope, has already appeared in this commentary to satisfy the reader of the representative system being pursued in the Apocalyptic symbols; as, for instance, in the horses and their riders of the four first seals, &c.-See too p. 112, Note suprà. Had this point been properly considered by the Fathers, they would not have entertained such views about Antichrist.

3 Numb. xxxv. 30, Deut. xvii. 6, xix. 15, John viii. 17, Matt. xviii. 16.-It is observed by St. Augustine, when referring to a case mooted in the 7th Council of Carthage, that both the Ecclesiastical and Civil Law, then in force, (just like the old Jewish law) forbade the condemning any man on the unsupported evidence of a single witness. Bingham, xvi. 3. 10. I observe this explanation of the symbol in T. Aquinas. Propter sufficientiam testimonii," says he in his De Antichristo; referring to Matt. xviii. 16. 4 Especially Mr. Faber.

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