LECTURE II.

THE SON OF MAN.

REV. I. 9-20.

I John, who also am your brother, and companion in tribulation, and in the kingdom and patience of Jesus Christ, was in the isle that is called Patmos, for the word of God, and for the testimony of Jesus Christ. I was in the Spirit on the Lord's day, and heard behind me a great voice, as of a trumpet, saying, I am Alpha and Omega, the first and the last: and, What thou seest, write in a book, and send it unto the seven Churches which are in Asia; unto Ephesus, and unto Smyrna, and unto Pergamos, and unto Thyatira, and unto Sardis, and unto Philadelphia, and unto Laodicea. And I turned to see the voice that spake with me. And being turned, I saw seven golden candlesticks; and in the midst of the seven candlesticks one like unto the Son of Man, clothed with a garment down to the foot, and girt about the paps with a golden girdle. His head and his hairs were white like wool, as white as snow; and His eyes were as a flame of fire; and His feet like unto fine brass, as if they burned in a furnace; and His voice as the sound of many waters. And He had in His right hand seven stars: and out of His mouth went a sharp two-edged sword: and His countenance was as the sun shineth in his strength. And when I saw Him, I fell at His feet as dead. And He laid His right hand upon me, saying unto me, Fear not; I am the First and the Last: I am He that liveth, and was dead; and, behold, I am alive for evermore, Amen; and have the keys of hell and of death. Write the things which thou hast seen, and the things which are, and the things which shall be hereafter; the mystery of the seven stars which thou sawest in my right hand and the seven golden candlesticks. The seven stars are the angels of the seven Churches: and the seven candlesticks which thou sawest are the seven Churches.

WHETHER we adopt or reject the ordinary opinion that St. John had already survived his brother Apostles, the

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language at the opening of this passage is very remarkable. He dwelt commonly at Ephesus, in the midst of the Christians of Asia Minor. They turned to him afterwards, with the profoundest reverence, as the last depositary of the words which Christ had spoken on earth. And he describes himself as *your brother, and companion in tribulation, and in the kingdom and patience of Jesus Christ. No assertion of his apostolical authority, of his grand traditions, of his difference from those whom he is addressing. He is one of them, their fellow-werker and fellow-sufferer.

I do not allude to this mode of speaking that I may draw any inference from it respecting the peculiar humility of this Divine teacher. St. Pati, it seems to me, was just as bumble when he was asserting strongly his daims to be an Apostle, and was denouncing those Judaisers who tried to degrade him below the original welve. Self-assertion may be as great a fury as selfJepreciation: both are evil so far as they are in the least jegree afected; one may involve as much sense be vidual freebleness as the other. They may have the same origin: they may in Eferent circumstances lead to the same result. Had St. Paul forborne to pur vră a beast of his apostolical title and character, he would. have sanctioned the conclusion that his Lord, when Ha ceased to be visible, ceased to exercise is government

over His Church; ceased to call out men to do His work. The man who declared that he trusted not in his wisdom of words when he went forth declaring the testimony of God, would have been trusting in that wisdom, not in his calling, not in the Spirit that helped his infirmities. Had St. John spoken to the Churches in Asia Minor of the voice that bade him leave his father's nets, he might have led them to suppose that that voice was silent then, or could not reach them. Had he talked of his apostolical commission, or of his own special place amongst the Apostles, he might have led them to think that when he left the world they would be bare of the Divine Presence: that only an oral or written tradition of it would remain. Exactly the opposite lesson to this was that which he was appointed to teach his own generation, and all subsequent generations; therefore it was fitting that he should describe himself, not by titles which set him apart from other men, but as their brother and companion.

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1. That he was an exile in the Isle of Patmos, he tells Whether the local authorities of Ephesus had sent him there, or whether it was a solemn deportation by the act of the Emperor, we cannot learn from his words. Nor does this passage help us to settle the question which has been raised whether his banishment was so early as the reign of Claudius, so late as the reign of

Domitian, or at some time intermediate between the two. On the cause of his banishment he throws more light. By far the majority of St. Paul's persecutions were stirred up by Jews; the two memorable exceptions were at Philippi, where he provoked the hatred of those who traded in magic, and at Ephesus, where a true instinct led Demetrius and his fellow-craftsmen to think that he was injuring their gains, though he had not denounced their goddess. But the charge by which the Jews stirred up the mob of Thessalonica was to be at last the effective one. These men do contrary to the decrees of Caesar, saying that there is another King, one Jesus. That charge could not be permanently effective till it was combined with the one on which the rulers of the Sanhedrim had convicted our Lord of blasphemy. He maketh Himself the Son of God. St. John proclaiming the Word of God, who was before all worlds, who had been made flesh and dwelt among men, who was the King of kings and Lord of lords, struck a blow at the worship as well as the polity of the Roman Empire. He opposed the God-man to the man-God. The best emperors, who were trying to disguise by reverence for laws, by merciful acts, by philosophy, the rotten foundation of their power, had as much reason to dislike this testimony as the worst, who were embodying the false principle in themselves.

2. St. John does not tell us what objects he chiefly contemplated in that island, what sounds besides the roar of the Ægean waves came to him from the outer world. He says that on the Lord's day, the Resurrection day, he was in the Spirit;' withdrawn from the forms of which the senses take account; seeking his eternal and substantial home. Then came a voice to his heart, a voice like the sound of a trumpet such as wakes the dead, saying, 'I am Alpha and Omega, the first and the last.' Like that name, the I AM, which had been spoken centuries before to the shepherd in the desert, it was a witness to him that there is a living Personal ground; which was before temples, cities, earth, sea, and sky; which will last whatever becomes of them. Like the message to Moses, it was not for himself. 'What thou seest, write in a book, and send it unto the seven Churches of Asia.' Those Churches were to learn the meaning of their own existence; what they had to do; how they were related to Him who is the First and the Last.

3. And I turned to see the voice that spake with me.' The voice comes from no creature about me. It is not the echo of my own thoughts. It comes as a command to my spirit from the Ruler of my spirit. 4. And being turned, I saw seven golden candlesticks.' Our first thought is that now we are entering into a