mockery of Pilate's hall forever. The blood of the covenant cannot be trampled under foot, and accounted an unholy thing, with unceasing impunity. There is a point over which the greatest forbearance and long-suffering dare not go, and at which mercy itself cries out for unsparing justice. And as these people, against all the light and warnings sent them, still drive on with their devilworship, idolatry, murders, sorceries, lewdness and dishonesties, until they have filled the measure of their guilt, and wearied out the very patience of indulgent God, the horses of hell are let loose upon them, to sweep one-third of them to speedy perdition.

And yet, in wrath God remembers mercy. He suffers only one-third of the race to fall a prey to this tremendous woe. Two-thirds of mankind He spares, not because they deserve to be spared, but that by means of their awful trials they might perchance be led to repent of their sins, and lay hold of salvation before it is clean gone forever. Ah, yes, the Lord is good and gracious, even in the severest of his visitations. He delighteth not in the death of the wicked, but would rather that they should turn from their evil ways and live.

But alas for those who continue in sin till trouble brings them to a better life! Those content to give their good days to the devil's service, seldom come to reformation in their evil days. While the pressure of judgment is on them, they may cry, God have mercy! and think to lead a different life; but their vows and prayers vanish with their

sorrows, and they are presently where they were before, only the more hardened in their iniquities. Thus was it in this case. The powers of hell had been let loose upon the guilty world. Times of danger, death, and horror, fell upon the people. The wrath of offended God flashed through the earth for thirteen months, until it seemed as if the entire race would be consumed. A plague unprecedented stript the globe of one-third of its population, by a form of death giving visible demonstration of the truth of God's warnings to the wicked. There was left no room for any one any more to doubt the reality of hell, or his close proximity to it; for hell had come in upon the earth! And yet, "the rest of the men, who were not killed by these plagues, repented not from the works of their hands, that they should not worship the demons, and the idols of gold, and silver, and copper, and stone, and wood, which can neither see, nor hear, nor walk; and they repented not out of their murders, nor out of their sorceries, nor out of their fornication, nor out of their thefts."

Such is depraved and infatuated human nature. "Though thou shouldest bray a fool in a mortar among wheat with a pestle, yet will not his foolishness depart from him." (Prov. 27: 22.) If people will not listen in the days of peaceful opportunity, there remaineth very little hope for them. "If they hear not Moses and the prophets, neither will they be persuaded, though one rose from the dead.” (Luke 16 : 31.)

LECTURE TWENTY-FIRST.

VISION OF THE CLOUD-ROBED ANGEL-NOT A CREATED ANGEL -HIS ATTIRE HIS FACE-HIS FEET-THE PLACING OF HIS FEET-HIS LION-CRY "THE SEVEN THUNDERS"-THEIR UTTERANCES

SEALED THE LITTLE BOOK-ITS IDENTITY

WITH THE SEALED ROLL-JOHN'S EATING OF IT-ITS SWEETNESS AND BITTERNESS-THE OATH OF THIS ANGEL-THE MYSTERY OF GOD-PREACHING OF THE CONSUMMATION"DAYS OF THE SEVENTH ANGEL"-DELAY OF THE LORD'S COMING-ITS CERTAINTY NEVERTHELESS.

REV. 10:1-11. (Revised Text.) And I saw another, a mighty angel descending out of the heaven, clothed about with a cloud, and the rainbow on his head, and his face as it were the sun, and his feet as it were pillars of fire, and having in his hand a little book [or roll] opened; and he set his right foot upon the sea, but the left upon the land; and he cried with a great voice even as a lion roareth; and when he cried, the seven thunders uttered their voices; and when the geven thunders spoke, I was about to write; and I heard a voice out of the heaven saying, Seal up those things which the seven thunders spoke, and write them not.

And the angel whom I saw standing upon the sea and upon the land lifted up his right hand into the heaven, and sware by him that liveth for the ages of the ages, who created the heaven and the things in it, and the earth and the things in it, and the sea and the things in it, that there shall be no more delay; but in the days of the voice of the seventh angel, when he shall sound, the mystery of God is [to be] fulfilled, even as he preached (glad tidings) to his servants the prophets.

And the voice which I heard out of the heaven [I heard] again speak. ing with me, and saying: Go, take the book [or roll] which is opened in the hand of the angel who standeth upon the sea and upon the land. And I went to the angel, saying to him, Give me the little book. And

( 123 )

he saith to me, Take, and eat it, and it shall make bitter thy belly, but in thy mouth it shall be sweet as honey. And I took the little book out of the hand of the angel and ate it; and it was in my mouth sweet as honey; and as soon as I had eaten it, my belly was made bitter. And it was said to me, Thou must prophesy again upon peoples, and nations, and tongues, and kings many.

THIS part of the Apocalypse is sometimes treated

as an episode, thrown between the second and third woe-trumpets, and having little or no relation to either. This is an error. We have still to deal with the blast of the sixth Trumpet. It is only in the fourteenth verse of the eleventh chapter, that we find the note of indication that the woe of the sixth Trumpet is accomplished. What now comes before us accordingly pertains to the sixth Trumpet, the same as the sealing of the 144,000, in chapter seven, pertained to the sixth Seal. It introduces new subjects and phases of the judgment administrations, but continues the same general narrative and burden found in what precedes and follows. God give us soberness of thought and earnestness of consideration, as we proceed to unfold what is here written for our learning!

We observe,

I. A VISION OF A VERY NOTABLE PERSON.

John writes, "And I saw another, a mighty angel descending out of the heaven." This person I take to be the Lord Jesus himself. He is called an Angel, but there is nothing in that to prove him a created being. Angel is a title of office, not of nature. In the Old Testament the Son of God is

continually described as the Jehovah-angel. We had a somewhat corresponding vision in the first chapter; yet, he who there appeared, announced himself as the First and the Last, the Living One, who became dead and is alive forever. We had an account of an angel in the seventh chapter, and again in the eighth, whom there was reason to regard as none other than the Lord Jesus. We do know that he appears in the Apocalypse as a Lamb, as a Lion, and as an armed Warrior, and there is nothing to hinder his appearance also as an Angel.

This person is also very particularly distinguished from other angels who appear in these visions. He is not one of the four loosed from the Euphrates, nor one of the seven who sound the Trumpets, but quite "another."

He is further described as "a mighty angel." This would seem to identify him as the "strong" Lord who judges Babylon, and the mighty One on whom God hath laid help, even Christ. When no more is said of an angel than simply that he is strong, or mighty, there is no reason to suspect anything but a created being, for all angels are powerful; but when this quality is referred to as a mark of distinction among other high angels, and is conjoined with what does not properly belong to angels, it is to be taken as equivalent to Almightiness, and as meant to denote a being who is uncreated and divine.

The attire of this angel indicates Deity. John beholds him "clothed about with a cloud." Wher