-for, we are certain from Holy Scripture, there will be no such event. "The heavens must retain him till the times of the restitution of all things," when "he shall deliver up the kingdom to the Father," and introduce his redeemed Church into her perfect and everlasting state. But by " the brightness of our Lord's coming," in this prophecy, seems to be intended his appearance in those signal dispensations of his providence, whereby, amid the tremendous convulsions of the kingdoms of the Roman "earth," his great adversary shall be destroyed. In this sense-as referring to the operations of Christ in his providential government-is "his coming" frequently spoken of in Holy Scripture.-"The coming of the Lord draweth nigh," says the Apostle James, alluding to the destruction of Jerusalem, which was then at hand.* In this sense, too, is the phrase employed by John in that memorable and sublime prediction, in which, with his view fixed on the whole splendid series of visions he had beheld in Patmos, he announces the approaching overthrow of Heathen and Antichristian Rome, and the gathering again of long-impenitent and rejected Israel.-" Behold, he cometh with clouds, and every eye shall see him, and they also who pierced him: and all kindreds of the earth shall wail because of him." And there is manifest propriety in this use of the phrase. Wheresoever our exalted

Saviour accomplishes his wondrous works-of mercy or judgment-there he may be said to come; there in the manifestation of his power and grace, he is as really present as if visibly displayed before the eyes of mankind. In this sense, therefore, the phrase seems to be employed in the prophecy of Paul on which I have been remarking. Mystical Babylon-"the man of sin, and son of perdition"-shall be "consumed with the spirit of the Lord'smouth," and "destroyed with the brightness of his coming."-Many of the deluded adherents of the Antichristian system shall, by the preaching of the glorious gospel, be rescued from its power, and made partakers of that enlightening and redeeming grace, which "hath abounded to sinners through Jesus Christ"; but the system itself-the hierarchy of Rome, as a great spiritual and temporal despotism -shall sink into merited and predicted ruin amid the tremendous and desolating judgments of the Most High.

With this view of the destiny of Papal Rome, given under divine inspiration by the Apostle Paul, that which we find detailed in the visions of the Apocalypse entirely harmonizes. My text, indeed, exhibits the gymbol of a violent and wrathful overthrow, and is referable, accordingly, to the latter part of Paul's prediction; but in a preceding vision of this book, we are informed of a "fall" of Babylon, which will be accomplished by other means. "I saw," says John, "another angel fly in the midst of heaven, having the everlasting

F

gospel to preach unto them that dwell on the earth, and to every nation, and kindred, and tongue, and people,-saying with a loud voice, fear God, and give glory to Him, for the hour of his judgment is come; and worship him that made heaven, and earth, and the sea, and the fountains of waters.-And there followed another angel, saying, Babylon is fallen, is fallen-that great city-because she made all nations drink of the wine of the wrath of her fornication."* This prophecy, it is generally agreed, began to receive its fulfilment at the period of the Reformation. A succession of evangelical messengers appeared in the Church, symbolized in the vision by "heaven." They appeared denouncing the idolatries of Rome, and proclaiming that pure and blessed gospel which, under the preceding reign of the Papacy, had been almost unknown. Like the primitive apostles of Christianity, they were comparatively few in number, as the gleanings of the vintage, a few berries on the top of the uppermost bough." And, like them, they were for the most part destitute of external support, and opposed by a power, that, for ages, had made the nations tremble. But, like them, in the might of an invisible arm, they triumphed over frowns, persecutions, and death in its gloomiest forms, and achieved the rescue of multitudes from the power of Satan, and the gathering of thousands in

66

Rev. xiv. 6-8.

many lands to the faith of Christ. Then Babylon fell. Her battlements, that had defied the fury of many a storm, sunk down overthrown before the power of the gospel, as in ancient time the walls of Jericho fell before the sound of the trumpets of Israel. And, my brethren, the memorable prediction just referred to, is still continuing to receive its fulfilment. The "angel" in the vision is, unquestionably, the representative-not of any one of the heralds of the pure gospel-but of that succession of them which, in opposition to the soul-ruining doctrines of Rome, will continue, till the time of her final overthrow, to preach the unadulterated words of everlasting life. Under their ministry is the prophecy obtaining progressive fulfilment. It is fulfilled in any inroads that are made on the dreary territories of Popery-in any exposures that are given of the unscriptural character and destructive tendency of its doctrines—and in any conversions" from the error of their way" that are effected among its disciples. And it will continue to be thus fulfilled, until all the people of God shall be gathered out of Babylon, and sheltered, like Noah in the ark, from the impending storm.

I am led by this last expression, however, to remark, that it will not be, solely, in the way at which we have been glancing, that the overthrow of the Papal system will be accomplished. In mercy will God bring to repentance and salvation many of its disciples, but in awful wrath will he at last deal with

the system itself, and with its impenitent adherents. For, in connexion with the prophetic vision whose import I have been endeavouring to explain, we must regard the vision delineated in my text:-" A mighty angel took up a stone like a great millstone, and cast. it into the sea, saying, Thus, with violence, shall that great city Babylon be thrown down, and shall be found no more at all." The full import of this sublime vision time only will declare. But, without: pretending to unfold the precise circumstances amid which great Babylon will be plunged into ruin,. I apprehend we are warranted to assert, that her overthrow will be effected by the arm of violence, and under the awful tokens of God's indignation.Twice on the inhabitants of the Roman "earth" has there already fallen a terrible, predicted" woe." They. have been made to experience the fearful and protracted demonstrations of divine displeasure. But they have not repented. These visitations have produced no auspicious change of mind in the great body of the members of the Antichristian apostacy.* Wherefore, a "third woe," more terrible than any of the former, and comprehending "the last plagues of the wrath of God" is denounced against them, and under its varied dispensations shall the ruin of the Antichristian system be accomplished. The scenes and circumstances of this woe are wrapt

* Rev. ix. 20, 21.

+Rev. xi. 14.