ble code of the Jesuits (which was then soon got up), and as the more horrid system of illuminism, can testify. Satan had formerly seen the fall of his beloved system of paganism in the Roman empire. He had then, with vast labors and perseverance, got up his still more beloved system of popery; which had most fully answered his purpose, for many centuries. But now this too was exposed in its hateful abominations,-had fallen from its zenith, and had commenced its plunge, like a huge rock dislodged from the top of a steep mountain. This event Satan perceived to be but a prelude to his final confinement in the bottomless pit. His rage then was full.

Most interesting are the position and the dress of the symbolic woman. "Ye are the light of the world."—"A city set on a hill."-" Clothed with the sun,—the moon under her feet; crowned with twelve stars. Happy indeed, if all professors did, in heart and life, well answer to this figure. True saints do, in a good degree, answer to it.

But behold the position, strength, and malice of the devil!-How important to hear and obey the divine injunctions given in relation to him! such as,-"Give no place to the devil," "Whom resist steadfastly in the faith,”—“Lest Satan should get an advantage of us; for we are not ignorant of his devices," "Be sober; be vigilant; because your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, goeth about, seeking whom he may devour,"_"Watch, and pray, that ye enter not into temptation. "Wretched is the state, and most fearful the prospects, of those who are led captive by Satan at his will. He will surely lead them down to the burning lake, unless prevented by a miracle of grace. "Shall the prey of the mighty be delivered?" Satan is mighty; and sinners are his prey. Most certainly would a new-born infant fall a prey to a great red dragon, if left in his grasp. Great indeed is the honor put upon the newborn succession of the church, that it should be included with the Captain of our salvation, in the symbolic manchild who shall rule all nations; and who is caught up to the throne of God. Verily, their cause will live; and it will fill and bless the world. Who would not be of their blessed community? Here is the city of salvation; the city of our God. If the devil was foiled in the Reformation, which was the commencement of the sinking of popery; his rage was but invigorated. And it is not now

confined to old papal lands. We may be assured the dragon has not failed of visiting this land of the pilgrims. He has found his way hither. And great are his efforts to ruin the true church in America. May the church of Christ here awake to her dangers, and her duties. And may her prayers, alms, vigilance, and evangelical efforts for the conversion of souls be such as to accord with her height of privileges. When Zion travails, spiritual children will be born. God assures, "I have never said to the seed of Jacob, Seek ye me in vain.” If Satan rage; your spiritual succession, O Zion, will be kept as though caught up to the throne of God. Say then, The Lord is my strength and my salvation; of whom shall I be afraid? I will go in the strength of the Lord God; I will make mention of thy righteousness, even of thine only. Lord is my light, and my salvation!"

"The

But, O sinners, out of Christ,-what is your standing, in the light of the figures in our text? Will you continue to be led captive by Satan at his will? He designs to convey you down to his own infernal abodes. Will you go? Will you cheerfully follow him thither?-What then must be your future and eternal reflections in hell? They will constitute the worm that dieth not; and they will furiously blow the fire, which shall not be quenched. Turn then, to the strong-hold, ye prisoners of hope! you may now escape the jaws of the infernal dragon. He that is stronger than the strong man armed, is now ready to be your salvation. O hear, and improve his proclamation of "liberty to the captives, and the opening of the prison to them that are bound." The prey of the mighty may now be delivered. Fly, then, from the tyrant of the world of despair; lest his empire over you be eternally confirmed, and your endless perdition with him be inevitable!

LECTURE XV.

REVELATION XII.

Ver. 13. And when the dragon saw that he was cast unto the earth, he persecuted the woman which brought forth the man-child.

14. And to the woman were given two wings of a great eagle, that she might flee into the wilderness, into her place, where she is nourished for a time, and times, and half a time, from the face of the serpent.

In the sketch given in this twelfth chapter of the Revelation, of the struggles between the church and Satan, from the commencement of the Christian era till near the battle of the great day of God, we are in our text brought to events of the latter part of the sixteenth century, and of the former part of the seventeenth. Satan, in the events of the antecedent verses, found himself and his legions cast out, by the Reformation, from the symbolic heaven of high popularity in the Romish church, to the earth of open opposition to Christ. This forced upon him a keen conviction that his remaining time on earth was short. The devil now therefore set himself to invent new forms of opposition to Christ. And his infernal court soon gave birth to that most detestable order, the Jesuits, who proved powerful supporters of the sinking popery. See fourth vial. This code of imposition was the masterpiece of the kingdom of darkness, till the still deeper scheme of illuminism arose, as copied from it with vast improvements, and having infidelity, instead of popery, for its latent object. By the aid of the Jesuits, the dragon now instigated new and horrid persecutions; to which the first verse of our text alludes. He "persecuted the woman,"—the Protestant church; a sketch of which persecution shall here be given.

Louis XIV. repealed the edict of Nantz, in which tolerance had been given to the Protestants in France; and he in a short time destroyed and banished two millions of his subjects. The noted massacres of Protestants in France, in Ireland, and in Poland took place. Also the violent

and deadly persecutions raised against the pious Piedmontese, and the slaughter of Protestants in other lands, not excepting Britain, the land of our fathers. Many, even there, were forced to seal their Christian testimony with their blood. Scott, upon that period, says, 66 No computation can reach the number of those who have since the Reformation been put to death for their maintaining of the profession of the gospel, in opposition to the church of Rome. A million of poor Waldenses perished in France. Nine hundred thousand orthodox Christians were slain, in less than thirty years after the institution of the order of the Jesuits. The duke of Alva boasted of his having put to death thirty-six thousand in the Netherlands, by the hands of the common executioner, in the space of a few years. The Inquisition destroyed by various tortures one hundred and fifty thousand, in thirty years.

Thus the dragon in his mighty rage at his loss in the Reformation, persecuted the woman, as had been predicted in our text.

The flight of the church (in verse 14) followed. The true followers of Christ had, a thousand years before, been depressed to a state, called a wilderness, at the rise of popery; as predicted in verse 6 of the context. The true sense of the second flight (that in our text) expositors have failed of giving, on account of the duration which seemed to be ascribed to it, which is 1260 years. This was the length of time ascribed to the first flight, verse 6. That first wilderness state was to be 1260 years from the time of the manifestation of the papal beast, to the battle of the great day, when Antichrist should go into perdition; and to the second flight the same length of time seems to be ascribed, which has led writers on the subject to conceive that the two accounts (one in verse 6 and one in verse 14) must allude to the same event. But this confounds the chronology and the events of the chapter. The difficulty which has led to so great an error, can easily be removed. The account of the duration of the second flight (that in our text) must be elliptically expressed. It is as though the writer had said, the church thus flew to her new retreat, for the 1260 years; meaning for the remaining part of that well-known period. That this is the sense, is evident from the necessity of the case. For this flight, be it what it may, is within several centuries of the close of the noted 1260 years; and hence the sense must be, for the remaining part of that period! And we find language similar to this, relative to the 1260 years, both in the Old and New

Testaments; in Dan. xii. 6, and in Rev. xiii, 5; as may be seen in the subjoined note.* The flight of the woman in our text is manifestly an event of the last days, as being subsequent to the reformation in the sixteenth century, and to the persecutions which arose after it, from the Jesuits against the Protestants, in Europe. And the following circumstance decides that it was distinct and distant from the first flight of the true church to a wilderness, at the rise of popery, viz., this first flight was occasioned by being in the vicinity and grasp of popery; but in the second, the church flies to a distant region, "from the face of the serpent," meaning the dragon in popery

What then was this second flight? To aid in furnishing an answer, let the following suppositions be made. Suppose a new continent had been lately discovered, when those Protestants were thus persecuted; a continent in a part of the world distant from the face of the old papal Roman earth; a vast continent, embracing all the climes,

"A new thing," long after the rise of both the sccular Roman beast, and of popery, had been shown to Daniel, viz., the rise of a system of infidelity, in the last days. The question was asked, "How long shall it be to the end of these wonders?" i. e. How long is it from the rise of this infidel influence, to the battle of that great day of God? And the reply is, "For a time, times and an half," which is the 1260 years, which had before (chap vii. 25) been ascribed to the duration of the papal horn; and is afterward, for the same reason, ascribed to the duration of the depression of the witnesses, Rev. xi. 3, and to the same event, as a wilderness state of the church, Rev. xii. 6. It could not therefore mean that this infidel system, after it should arise in the last days (many centuries after the rise of popery), should remain 1260 years; but only to the close of that term. The end of the wonders should come at the end of the 1260 years. This fully answered the design of the interrogator, "How long shall it be to the end of these wonders?" We have the same elliptical use of the same period, and for the same reason, in Rev. xiii. 5. The secular Roman beast, there given, is noted as continuing 1260 years. But this could not have been designed as the whole duration of that beast: for he had risen before the Christian era. See Dan. vii. 7. Its whole continuance, then, is about 2000 years; and yet here 1260 is the time ascribed to it. The meaning necessarily is (as when the same thing is noted in Daniel, in the above passage), he continues to the close of the 1260 years. we may suppose to have been common in Israel. recurring after every lapse of forty-nine years, or their year of release. When then an Israelite at nine years fell into bondage; the question would lost his liberty? The answer would be, the forty-nine years; meaning, to the close of that known period from the present time. None would understand that reply as meaning that such a man has the whole of that period now to serve; but only the remaining part of it, be it more or less. Such is the sense of the length of the flight in our text.

This mode of speech They had their jubilee, on each fiftieth year, as any period of the fortyarise, how long has he