The Pulpit Commentary — Revelation — Section 173

terrible thiugR. 'l'hine arrows shall be sharp in the hea.rt of the king's enemies; whereby the people fall under thee,, ? Of the Lord Jesus Christ going forth conquering a.nd ro conquer, in spite of, in the midst of, and by means of, all the dread events which are a.fterwards declared-of him we believe the vision tells. Not of any ordiria.ry human warfare; still less of the prosperous condition of the Roman empire under the Autonines; put of Christ our Lord. And most cheering is it to be taught that, let come what will, however calawitous and distressful the events of life, nothing :can stay !\is. coUrse, · '1,'hey cannot bar his way, but will be made by him to further that way. 'l'his first vision is, therefore, full of good cheer, And let. it not be forgotten that the vision has an indi- .vidual application a.s well as a world-wide one. It tellll every believing soul, "Christ will overrule all that happens; thy trials a.nd crosses, thy disappuintments and disasters, shall not hinder his purposes of good for thee. He goelh forth • conquerhig and to conquer,' and who can turn•him aside?" . IIL ',['BE OPENING OF THE SECOND, THIRD, AND FOURTH SEALS. These give the visions of the red, the black, and the 1,ale horses. Cruel war; black famine, and all- devouring death, by pestilence probably, are meant by, these visions. And more sum- marily and distinctly they are foretold by our Lord. "Wars and rumours of wars," "famines and pestilences,"-these with other woes he plainly predicts; and his meaning is, we are sure, the meaning of St. John. Famine and pestilence were the common accompa.niments of war. But they are not to have unrestrained power. For as in the dillCQu1'l!e of our Lord, so here in the vision of St. John, there are plain suggestions that in wrath God remembered mercy. The voice that proclaimed the nearly twelve times fillhanoed cost of wheat and ba.rley, tells-as does also.the blackness of the horse which suggests the black lips, the sign of extreme hunger-of dreadful famine. But tha.t san:ie voice tells also of distress mitigated, not suffered to become utter destitution. This is the meaning of the added charge," See that thou hurt not the oil and the wirre," U is a difficult sa.ying, but coupling it with the express words of our Lord that "for the elects' sake" these dreadful daJR should "be shortened," we take them as telling that, whilst owing to the ra.va.ges of war there should be, a.s there could not but be, great scarcity in those things' ·which; as corn and barley, depended upon constant cultivation; yet the oliye and the vine should still yield their increase, .they not requiring io be replanted· yeat by year, and being in various ways likely to be less affected than the level corn-laqds which lay along tbe plains, and which therefore liecame the comlill.OD .~IJ?.PB. and fighting-grounds of hostile armies, to the utter destrnction of al.I things grown thereon. Moreover, that to death and Hades were· given pow;er1 not over all the eii):th, but over only one-fourth part, this seems also to point to the same blessed truth that the instruments of God's judgment are held in and not allowed to do their work a hair- breadth beyond- their appointed limit. " He does not willingly afflict Iior. grieve the children of men," though, as these visions do J)lainly rell, he will ruthlessly both alBict arid grieve when man'1:1 ~in and folly make 1t needful that he should. As a lovirig motlier will hold down her own dearly loved child to the surgeon's dreadful knife, if only 80 it can be 11aved from death, so will the Lord, the Lamb of (}od, pour out upon us of ~ awful judgments, if by our sin we force him thereto. As we read of these visions, this should be our prayer that never may we thus force him to deal in such manner with us. May his love constrain us, never our sin constrain him. IV. TBE OPENING OF THE FIFTH .SEAL. Here no Ii ving creature cries "Come." but the appeal comes from the martyred saints themselves. We have hS<J: no mention of ~ "altar" before, but now it is seen as part of the vision which unfolded itself before .St. John. "They shall deliver you up to be afflicted, and shall kill you "-so had our lord foretold, and here the actual fulfilment of that word is symbolized. Not to the .martyrs under Diocletian, yet less to those under papal Rome, but to those who were, i,n.. St. John's own day, fas~ falling beneath the persecutor's sword, does this vision specially belong. Nevertheless, it is designed for the consola.tion and support of all Christ's persecuted people in every age and in every land, Hence Milton, with all possible appropriateness, sang concerning the martyrs of the Alpine mountains, whOM 11utl'erings righteously roused the rage of their fellow-believers here in England- ' .. Avenge, 0 Lord, thy slaughtered 1&inte, whose bone■ Lie scattered on the Alpine mountains cold: Even them who kept thy u-nth so pure of old, Clt. n. 1-17.J THE REVELATION OF ST. ,TOllN 'I'iJE DIV!Nlt l!l,