LECTURE I.

INTRODUCTORY.

REV. I. 1-8.

The Revelation of Jesus Christ, which God gave unto Him, to shew unto His servants things which must shortly come to pass; and He sent and signified it by His angel unto His servant John : who bare record of the Word of God, and of the testimony of Jesus Christ, and of all things that he saw. Blessed is he that readeth, and they that hear the words of this prophecy, and keep those things which are written therein: for the time is at hand.

John to the seven Churches which are in Asia: Grace be unto you, and peace, from Him which is, and which was, and which is to come; and from the seven Spirits which are before His throne; and from Jesus Christ, who is the faithful Witness, and the first begotten of the dead, and the Prince of the kings of the earth. Unto Him that loved us, and washed us from our sins in His own blood, and hath made us kings and priests unto God and His Father; to Him be glory and dominion for ever and ever. Amen. Behold, He cometh with clouds; and every eye shall see Him, and they also which pierced Him: and all kindreds of the earth shall wail because of Him. Even so, Amen. I am Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the ending, saith the Lord, which is, and which was, and which is to come, the Almighty.

MANY have tried to interpret this book; one after another has failed; such is the general opinion among educated men. I suspect the assertion is not wide enough; it should be extended from a single book of the Bible to all the books of the Bible; from

the books of the Bible to every book whatever which contains any truths that are worthy to be sought after. Those who try to interpret fail; the writer is found to have uttered thoughts which they have not comprehended or fathomed; others come with their rules and measures, and confound their predecessors, and are confounded in turn themselves. It is with the simplest Gospel as with the Apocalypse; it is with the poem, classical or English, as with the Gospel. Commentators have become a by-word; almost every reader fancies he has apprehended something in the writer they have handled, which they have overlooked or distorted.

But every reader, perhaps, discovers some time or other that this commentator, or that, has helped him to perceive something which he did not perceive before. He discovers that he, too, has the ambition to circumscribe his author by certain rules and theories of his own devising. He begins to suspect that each man might help his neighbour if he was more childlike, and reverenced the subject of his study more, and tried to learn laws, not to impose laws. That criticism which is not the criticism of a teacher looking down upon a pupil, but of a pupil looking up to a teacher, may after all have most discernment in it, and may bring the highest reward. Such criticism all are qualified to exercise. Some may carry away more, some less; but each

will be shown something which may make his intellect clearer, his heart purer, his acts more consistent.

1. The verses which I have read to you speak of the Apocalypse of Jesus Christ the Son of God, which God gave to Him. The opening of the book, therefore, takes us at once beyond the book. That which is revealed is not a doctrine-not anything which can be expressed in terms-but a living Person. The letters do not make or give the Revelation. God gives it. We do not disparage the letter when we say this; we adhere religiously to the letter. We contradict the book when we put it in the place of Him from whom it comes. We contradict the express language, not of the Apocalypse, but of the whole Bible.

2. How strictly I shall try to follow the letter of this chapter, and of all subsequent chapters, you will see when I speak of the clause which follows. 'To shew unto His servants things which must shortly come to pass.' I should be obliged to repeat myself if I dwelt upon the force of that clause here. The expression, The time is at hand, and several other expressions in this will presently bring it under our notice.

passage,

3. He sent and SIGNIFIED it.' The word 'signified' is not a lazy one, for which a number of equivalents might have been found. The Apocalypse, as all have confessed, is a book of signs. That is assumed to be

one cause of its obscurity. If we could but get the emblems all rendered into the common forms of speech, we think that we should understand it perfectly. Are we sure that signs and emblems, supposing them to be divinely chosen, may not be the best and simplest helps to the apprehension of truths which, if they were presented in what we call the common forms of speech, must remain obscure? Are, they not a common, human method of discourse, which perplexes the doctor more than the peasant, just because the doctor is not in communion with the facts of life as the peasant is? If the Revelation is indeed to be of a Person, may not the signs denote his actual presence, while abstract words would only express some notions about Him?

4. In this book, then, as in all the preceding books of the Bible, God himself is set forth as speaking to men through words or signs. Whatever methods or persons may be used as the media of the revelation, He is the Revealer. He takes off the veil which hinders that which is near to us from being known to us, or the veil over our hearts which hinders them from discerning it. That is to be remembered before we turn at all to secondary agents. Here one of them is said to be an angel. 'He sent and signified it by His ANGEL to His servant John.' I take this name as most would take it, to denote a messenger from another world. But I must remind you