The Pulpit Commentary — Revelation — Section 402

-"Babylon is fallen." The false and the wrong everywhere are constantly falling, and mu.st continue to do so. Do not, then, understand that the whole of corrupt BOciety on this earth will in some distant day in the mighty aggregate be at once clearly swept &om the .face of the earth. There is no rea.son to believe this. The idea is contrary to the analogy of nature, where aU things move gradually. Wrong has a vexy slow death. If we use the word "falling" for "is fallen," it will give us a· universal t,ruth--viz. that moral Babylon, the corrupt in society, is falling. I atand upon the brow of some firm and lofty mountain, and I say, "This mountain is falling;" and l aay truly, for there is not a moment in its existence when ii ia not crumbling into the at.oms that made it up, for the great physical law of disintegration will neYer oeaae operating upon it, until it· shall "become a plain." "The mountains falling cometh. to nought,~ etc. Or I stand by the trunk of some huge tree, and I say," This tree ia falling." And I speak truth, for the great law of vegetable decay is working in it, and will one day bring it down into the dust. So with the wrong thing in human life. Though it stand .as a huge mountain filling the horizon of humanity, it will,.by the eternal law of moral disintegration, be one day brought down. ·or though it stand aa some huge tree. whose branches spread over the race, and under whose shadows. mighty populations live, the invincible and un!i.lterable law of moral retribution will rot it clean away. The reoord here given of this highly symbolic vision suggests its i.Qfluance upon two clall8ell of mind. It excite_. . L 'J.'m; LAKENTATIOl'I OP THE BAD. Who are the men who feel distressed at the fall of the wrong thing-the moral Babylon? We find at least two classes in th8118 'Vert!~ 1. Then.ding class. "And the kings of the earth, who have committed form-- cation and lived deliciously [wantonly] with her, shall bewail her, and lament for her [weep and wail oYer her], when they shall see [look upon] the emok,e of her burning" (ver. 9). Throughout the human race the world over, we find a class of men who a.re the chiefs, the masters, the kings, who control and determine the destinies of others. 2- The mercantile clus. " And the merchants of the earth shall weep and mourn," eto. (vers. 11-17). •The mercantile principle is an instinct Divine and beneficent. Its operations are not limited to shops, storerooms, markets, exchanges., or land; it extends to the ocean. • And every shipmaster, and all the company in sliips, and tailors [every one•that saileth anywhither, and mariners]," eto. (ver. 17). The ships of commerce are found ploughing every sea and lying in eYery port. The principle is Cound working among savage hordes a~ well as amongst civilized men. But whilst the principle is right enough, and transcendently beneficent when rightly: directed, it bas, like all other instincts of our nature, been sadly perverted. It is perverted when it is directed not to the good of the commonwealth, but to the gratification and aggran• dizement of self. Hence the enormous private fortunes on the one hand, and the ,tarving destitution of millions on the other. Now, this morally wrong thing, thia ew,,y man for himsel,f, is a principle that has been BO much criticized, not only by political and moral philosophers, but by. the thinking men in all conditions of life.. that it is getting _weak, beginning to fall, and must ul,timately he destroyed. When the grand altruistic truth of Christly sooialism becomes realized by the masses, "Let no man seek his own, but every man another's wealth," then this svery-man-for- limsdf principle will fall, and with its fall what will become ,.f the enormo1111 posBe&- ,sions which they have obtained merely by working for .themselves? No wonner fhey are distressed at the prospect. Every day this wrong thing is gradually falling, and the best men everywhere a.r.e becoming ~ltruistic. "Go to now, ye rich men, weep and bowl for your miseries that shall come upon you." How they struggle to arrest {his wrong principle in its fall. to buttress it up; but a is the fiat of eternal j1111tice that it should fall and rise no more. ll. Tmr. JUBILATION OJ' THE ooo». " Rejoice over her, thou heaven, and ye ·holy apostles and prophets," eto. (ver. 20). Whilst those who have a. vested intereiit in the mainumance of the wrong· thing-whose pomp. and wealth, and lruurious sensualitiea, and gilded pageantriPB would have never existed but fOE the &by.lonian .spirit that permeat.es social life-howl in anguish at tloe tall of wrong, there are otbera transported with rapture as they see it giving way. Who are these? Unfallen angels, saint&, and holy intelligences throughout t.he emt•ire of God. "Thou heaven, and ye, holy apa,tle11 [ye saints] and prophets,." Heaven knows what is going on OD eai1h. and ii WI THE REVELATION OF BT. JOHN THE DIVINE. (on. :zvtn.1-,-.H.