during the one thousand two hundred and sixty years. This city is called Sodom, because the cry of its sins will one day bring down fire from heaven upon it. It is called Egypt, because the church of God, the true Israel, dwells within it, in an oppressed and persecuted state. It is spiritually called Jerusalem, for the reason shown in the first and second verses but it is Jerusalem as murdering the Lord of Glory, which is the true symbol of this apostate city.

A short triumph of the apostate powers of the Roman world over those who bear a public testimony against its abominations, is, therefore, what is apparently predicted in this prophecy: not the prevailing of this monster over the saints of God, against whom he makes war: his triumph there is marked by the longer period of one thousand two hundred and sixty years; but the triumph in this place is the silencing of these witnesses who, during that period, disturb the harmony of his reign. The triumph is evidently to be short-we may say is hardly complete; for, though the symbolical witnesses are slain, it seems that their followers would not give them up, as though they expected the revival of their life; that is to say, the resumption of their testimony:

9." And they of the peoples, and kindreds, and tongues, and nations," that is, the redeemed out of the nations, "shall see their dead bodies three days and a half, and shall not suffer their dead bodies to be put in graves."

10." And they that dwell upon the earth,"- that is, the apostate faction, their enemies," shall rejoice over them and make merry, and shall send gifts one to another; because these two prophets tormented them that dwell on the earth.”

Their triumph, however, is but short; nor does the

expectation of the people of God respecting their slain witnesses, disappoint them :

"And after three days and a half, the Spirit of life from God entered into them, and they stood upon their feet: and great fear fell upon them which saw them: and they heard a great voice from heaven, saying unto them, Come up hither. And they ascended up to heaven in a cloud, and their enemies beheld them."

It is certainly a most momentous question: Can we read the fulfilment of this predicted event in the history of the past? Or, drawing near, as we must be doing, to the termination of the one thousand two hundred and sixty years-if we have not passed it-are we daily and hourly to expect the sad disclosure? The violent suppression for a short season-three years and a half-of the Gospel testimony among the professing nations of the Roman world?

Many commentators, with Bishop Newton, conceive the event to be yet future; but the two latest expositors of eminence, Mr. Faber and Mr. Cuninghame, both agree in the persuasion that the fulfilment of the prediction is to be traced in the history of the Reformation; and I conceive, upon the whole, there is reason to rest with confidence in this interpretation.

We may regret that our forced guide, the historian of the decline and fall of the Roman Empire, can be of little further use to us; as his narrative, except in a very summary view of events, goes not down sufficiently low for our purpose. However, in taking leave of him, his general reflections on the opponents of the church of Rome, that is to say, on our witnesses, will not be unimportant. After speaking of the persecution of the Albigeois, he observes, "The visible assemblies of the Paulicians, or Albigeois, were extirpated by fire and

sword, and the bleeding remnant escaped by flight, concealment, or Catholic conformity. But the invincible spirit which they had kindled still lived and breathed in the western world. In the state, and in the church, and even in the cloister, a latent succession was preserved of the disciples of St. Paul, who protested against the tyranny of Rome, embraced the BIBLE as the rule of faith, and purified their creed from all the visions of the Gnostic theology. The struggles of Wickliff in England, of Huss in Bohemia, were premature and ineffectual; but the names of Zuinglius, Luther, and Calvin, are pronounced, with gratitude, as the deliverers of nations."*

This is a remarkable testimony! We have here plainly pointed out a long succession of witnesses, "protesting against the tyranny of Rome, embracing the BIBLE as a rule of faith." They protest long in vain, though the same "invincible spirit lives and breathes." At length, however, the historian points to an era-and that era is the era of the Reformation - when the struggles of these protesters against the corruption and tyranny of Rome were not "premature or ineffectual," but they became the "deliverers of nations." Now, if we can find in this struggle an interval of three years and a half, when this spirit" of former witnesses might figuratively be said not to "live and breathe" in the witnesses that should then have stood for the testimony of the truth; and if, afterwards, this same spirit revives, and nations enjoy deliverance; then, indeed, we shall be ready to acknowledge that the prophecy has been here fulfilled. For the witnesses to ascend to heaven in a cloud, may certainly, in prophetical language, be understood to symboChap. liv.

lize their being placed in the political heavens, as stars and lights; that is to say, may represent the national or public establishment of Protestant churches.

It was, as the ecclesiastical historian Milner informs us, in the year 1518, that Martin Luther, the great instrument in the hand of Providence to bring about that Reformation of which we treat, began, in opposition to the blasphemous doctrines of popery, to maintain justification by faith alone, through the merits of the only Lord and Saviour, a doctrine which, when received in power, overturns, from their very foundations, all the doctrines of seducing spirits, and the doctrines concerning demonsthe mediating saints—the Mahuzzim, according to Daniel -of apostate Christendom.

Thus the prophet Habakkuk* had characterized the great Antichrist: · -

Lo, lifted he, his soul is not right within him,
But the just by his faith shall live.

And this, I am strongly inclined to believe, is what is meant by the witnesses "finishing their testimony,"not drawing it to a conclusion, but bringing it to perfection, in the assertion of this fundamental article — accomplishing its object. "It must be confessed," says Mr. Milner," that the labours of Claudius of Turin, of the Waldensian barbs, of Wickliff, and of Huss, had not been sufficiently directed against the predominant corruptions in doctrine, though the practical abuses of the popedom had been exposed with ingenious freedom and disinterested courage. The external branches, rather than the bitter tree itself, which supported all the evils of

Chap. ii. 4.

false religion, being attacked, no permanent or extensive change had ensued. The Waldenses were too feeble to molest the popedom; and the Hussites, divided among themselves, and worn out by a long series of contentions, were reduced to silence. Among both were found persons of undoubted godliness, but they appeared incapable of making effectual impressions on the kingdom of Antichrist. But not many years after the commencement of the sixteenth century, the world beheld an attempt to restore the light of the Gospel more evangelically judicious, more simply founded on the word of God, and more ably and more successfully conducted, than any which had ever been since the days of Augustin." And we may add, with respect to the grand article of Protestant testimony-justification by faith-far superior to the ministry of Augustin and the fathers of his age, or of the ages immediately preceding.

Luther's description of himself about this time, written at a subsequent period of his life, is so illustrative of the course of the "witness prophesying in sackcloth,” that I cannot forbear its quotation:-"How weak and contemptible was I, and in how fluctuating a state of mind, when I began this business" of indulgences!" I found myself involved in it alone, and, as it were, by surprise; and when it became impossible for me to retreat, I made many concessions to the pope; not, however, in many important points, but certainly, at that time, I adored him in earnest. In fact, how despised and wretched a monk was I then!"-" Whereas, in regard to the pope, how great was his majesty; the potentates of the earth trembled at his nod." "How distressed my heart was in that year (1517) and the following; how submissive my mind was to the hierarchy; not feignedly,