the country; that after some time, St. John coming upon other occasions, to revisit the same bishop, inquired after the young man, and was informed, that he was not to be found in the church, but in such a mountain with his fellow robbers; that St. John called for a horse, and rode immediately to the place; that when the young man saw him, he fled away from him; that St. John, forgetting his age, eagerly pursued after him, recalled him, and restored him to the church. Now all these transactions must necessarily take up some years; and may seem credible if St. John was banished by Nero, but are altogether impossible if he was banished by Domitian; for he survived Domitian but a very few years, and he was then near 100 years old, and so very weak and infirm, that he was with great difficulty carried to church, and could hardly speak a few words to the people, much less ride briskly after a young robber. Epiphanes asserts, that he was banished into Patmos, and wrote the Apocalypse there, in the reign of Claudius; but Epiphanius being not a correct writer, he might possibly mistake Claudius for his successor Nero, especially as Nero had assumed the name of Claudius, by whom he was adopted Nero Claudius Cæsar. This date is perhaps near as much too early, as the time of Domitian is too late. The churches of Syria have thus inscribed their version, "The Revelation made to John the Evangelist by God, in the island Patmos, into which he was banished by Nero the Cæsar." The ancient commentators Andreas and Arethas affirm, that it was understood to be written before the destruction of Jerusalem. But if it was written before

the destruction of Jerusalem, it might naturally be expected that such a memorable event would not have been unnoticed in this prediction; and neither was it unnoticed in this prediction, as will be seen hereafter. Our Saviour's repeating so frequently in this book, 'Behold, I come quickly-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 the like expressions cannot surely be so well understood of any other event as of the destruction of Jerusalem, which coming was also spoken of in the gospels, and what other coming was there so speedy and conspicuous? So many spurious Apocalypses, written by Cerinthus and others in early times, demonstrate evidently that the Apocalypse of St. John, in imitation whereof they were written, was still earlier, and was held in high estimation among Christians. But what is to me an unanswerable argument, the style itself, so full of Hebraisms, and as I may say, so full of barbarisms and even solecisms, as some even of the ancients have observed, manifestly evinces, that the author was but lately come out of Judea, was little accustomed to write in Greek, and had not yet attained to that greater purity of style, which appears in his Gospels and Epistles. On the contrary, it is urged, that there are internal marks in the book itself of its being of a later date than Nero's reign, that the churches of Asia could not have changed and degenerated so much in so short a space of time, that they had not then been exposed to persecution, nor had Antipas suffered martyrdom at Pergamos, the persecutions by Nero being confined to the metropolis of

the empire. But why might not St. John charge the churches of Asia with having degenerated and ‘fallen from their first love,' as well as St. Paul accuse the church of Corinth, 1 Cor. iii. 3. of being carnal, and having envying and strife, and divisions among them;' or complain of the churches of Galatia, Galat. i. 6. I marvel that ye are so soon removed from them that called you into the Grace of Christ unto another gospel,' iii. 1. O foolish Galatians, who hath bewitched you, that ye should not obey the truth, before whose eyes Jesus Christ hath been evidently set forth;' or write to Timothy the first bishop of Ephesus, 2 Tim. i. 15. This thou knowest, that all they which are in Asia be turned away from me?' Why might not the churches of Asia be liable to persecution, when it is said, 2 Tim. iii. 12. that all who live godly in Christ Jesus shall suffer persecution;' when unto the Philip. pians, i. 29. it was given in the behalf of Christ, not only to believe on him, but also to suffer for his sake;' and when the Thessalonians, 1 Thess. ii. 14. 'suffered like things of their own countrymen, as the churche in Judea of the Jews;' and manifested, 2 Thess. i. 4. ' their patience and faith in all their persecutions and tribulations which they endured?' As for Antipas, there is no genuine history or authentic account of him ; it is not known who or what he was when he suffered, or who caused him to be put to death, so that nothing can be from thence inferred one way or other. Neither is it certain that the persecutions by Nero were confined to the metropolis; they raged indeed most there, but were extended likewise over all the provinces, as Orosius testifies with others. Sir

Isaac Newton hath farther shown, that in the Epistles of St. Peter, and in St. Paul's Epistle to the Hebrews, there are several allusions to this book of the Apocalypse; and St. Peter and St. Paul, all the ancients agree, suffered martyrdom in the end of Nero's reign. It may indeed be retorted, that St. John might borrow from St. Peter and St. Paul, as well as St. Peter and St. Paul from St. John: but if you will consider and compare the passages together, you will find sufficient reason to be convinced, that St. Peter's and St. Paul's are the copies, and St. John the original. Moreover, it is to be observed, that this Revelation was given on the Lord's day, when the apostle's heart and affections, as we may reasonably suppose, were sublimed by the meditations and devotions of the day, and rendered more recipient of divine inspiration. The heavenly visions were vouchsafed to St. John, as they were before to Daniel, Dan. ix. x. after supplication and prayer: and there being two kinds of prophetic revelation in a vision and a dream, the Jews accounted a vision superior to a dream, as representing things more perfectly and to the life.

In the first vision Jesus Christ, or his angel, speaking in his name, and acting in his person, appears amid 'the seven golden candlesticks,' meaning 'the seven churches.' His clothing is somewhat like the high priest's, and he is described much in the same manner as the divine appearance in Daniel's vision, Dan. vii. 9. x. 5, &c. St. John at the sight of so glorious a person, fell down senseless before him, as Daniel did upon the same occasion: and like Daniel too, he is graciously raised and encouraged, and com

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manded to write the things which he had seen,' contained in this chapter, and the things which are,' the present state of the seven churches represented in the two next chapters. and the things which shall be hereafter,' the future events which begin to be exhibited in the fourth chapter, as it is there said, ver. 1, 'Come up hither, and I will shew thee things which must be hereafter."

CHAPTERS II AND III.

The second and third chapters contain the seven epistles to the seven churches of Asia, Ephesus, Smyrna, Pergamus, Thyatira, Sardis, Philadelphia, and Laodicea. These seven are addressed particularly, because they were under St. John's immediate inspection; he constituted bishops over them; he was as it were their metropolitan, and resided much at Ephesus, which is therefore named the first of the seven. The main subject, too, of this book are comprised of sevens-seven churches, seven seals, seven trumpets, and seven vials; as seven was also a mystical number throughout the Old Testament. Many contend, and among them such learned men as More and Vitringa, that the seven epistles are prophetical of so many successive periods and states of the church from the beginning to the conclusion of all. But it doth not appear, that there are or were to be seven periods of the church, neither more or less; and no two men can agree in assigning the same periods.There are likewise in these epistles several innate cha