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out at the same period. Hence it is, that the interpretation of the vials is attended with that peculiar sort of difficulty which arises from their only being in part accomplished.

In the first verse the whole of the seven angels are commanded to pour out their vials on "the "earth." We may therefore conclude, from what has been said before, that this earth is a symbol denoting the whole extent of the Roman empire, and including Turkey. Further, by comparing the first verse with the remainder of the chapter, we discover that the earth on which the vials were poured was a complete symbolical world, having dry land, a sea, rivers and fountains, a sun, air or an atmosphere, cities, mountains, islands: each of which subordinate symbols must have an appropriate signification. And as the vials began to be poured out in the year 1792, the hieroglyphical universe seen by the apostle must have exhibited the Roman empire as it existed at that period.

As the seven angels all came out of the temple at the same time, and the apostle “heard a great voice "out of the temple, saying," not to the first angel only, but "to the seven angels, Go and pour out "the vials of the wrath of God upon the earth," I am of opinion that the whole of the seven vials began to be poured out at one and the same period; and that instead of following each other in chronological succession, they are synchronical in all their extent. I shall afterwards offer some arguments in support of this opinion; in the meanwhile I proceed to the consideration of the several vials.

The first vial was poured out upon the earth or

dry land, and was followed by a noisome and grievous sore upon the men who had the mark of the beast, and who worshipped his image. In the language of symbols, a noisome sore signifies a grievous moral taint or disorder. In this sense the word is frequently used by the inspired writers of the Old Testament. Speaking of the dreadful depravity of the Jewish church and nation, Isaiah describes it under the emblem of grievous wounds, and bruises, and putrefying sores, covering them from the sole of the foot even to the head.* God, in Jeremiah, speaking of the false prophets, says, They have "healed the hurt of the daughter of my people

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slightly, saying, Peace, peace, where there is no "peace." The hurt or sore here spoken of is evidently a moral one, which the false prophets were guilty of glossing over, instead of bringing it home to the consciences of the Jews, and exhorting them to turn from their sin.

The earth or dry land on which the first vial is poured, seems to signify symbolically the empire of the beast in general, and that part of it in particular which worshipped the image of the beast, or was in communion with the corrupt church of Rome.‡ Mr. Faber interprets the sore which follows from

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I must here remark, that there are many worshippers of the beast and his image, even among protestants. Carnal, worldly-minded Christians, of whatever denomination, all who secularize the pure and heavenly religion of the Gospel, professing to believe it, not because it has God for its author, but because it is the religion of the state, are in effect worshippers of the beast. Let all such persons beware, lest they continue in this dangerous state, for the end of it, if unrepented of, is destruction.

this vial to signify the delusive spirit of atheism, or the denial of the Father and the Son, which in so awful a manner marked the earlier stages of the French revolution. I think this interpretation is substantially correct; yet I am inclined to suppose, that not only the atheism of the French revolutionists is here intended, but likewise those principles of anarchy and insubordination, and want of natural affection, which accompanied the avowal of atheism, and into which spirit all the nations of Europe so fearfully drank at the era of the French revolution. That the present period of the world has been marked, above every preceding one, for the bold avowal of such principles, will not be denied by any person who has carefully studied the moral history of his own times. The spirit of irreligion and contempt of lawful authority still continues to work, and even this highly privileged country is not without evidence of the widely extended influence of this accursed leaven. On the continent these dreadful principles have had their full sway, and in the devoted country of France and its immediate dependencies, they have at length produced a degree of moral turpitude, perhaps unequalled hitherto in the history of our species. The conduct of the French soldiery in the invasions of Portugal and Russia, and the war in Spain, may be called upon to bear witness to this charge. The awful, and wanton, and horrid cruelties committed, particularly during their different retreats, seem to mark the French armies as consisting rather of incarnate fiends than men professing Christianity.

We may further remark, that it was the prevalence

of the spirit of revolution and infidelity in all the countries overrun by the French armies, which facilitated the progress of their arms, and enabled them to burst through and overwhelm the barriers erected by the policy of ages, and cemented by the blood of the nations of Europe, against the undue aggrandizement of any particular state. It was

these principles, even more than the numbers and discipline, and science of the French armies, which delivered up the hapless countries around them to a tyranny more dreadful than that of ancient Rome.

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I have heard it objected to the foregoing explanation of the first vial, that atheism and infidelity existed long before the era of the French revolution, and that therefore it is wrong to state them as then first coming into operation, To this it may be replied, that before that awful event, the revolution in France, these principles did indeed exist individually, or in individuals, but not nationally; they were never before acted upon by any nation as a body politic: but now they came into political existence; they were avowed and brought into active operation by the government of the largest and central nation of Christendom. To use the style of symbols; before the revolution, the poisonous humours of atheism and insubordination were secretly working in the mass of the body politic, but it was then only that these humours broke out into a loathsome, unsightly, ulcerated sore.*

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These principles of irreligion and insubordination have been the germ and fruitful source of all the

* For this excellent simile I am indebted to Mr. Faber.

Europe under the third woe.

fearful calamities which have already overwhelmed There is therefore an inimitable beauty and propriety in the vial which developes these principles being placed first. It is however but too apparent that the influence of this vial is not yet past.

The second angel poured out his vial upon the sea, and it became as the blood of a dead man, &c. The collective body of the symbolical waters signify the whole body of nations, and multitudes, and peoples, and tongues of the Roman earth.* Every distinct body of water, therefore, when the empire is in a divided state, (as it has always been since the invasion of the Goths and Vandals), must symbolize a particular nation; and the symbolical sea, as being the greatest body of waters, naturally signifies the greatest and most numerous people of the Roman world, which is without dispute the French nation.† This nation, at the period of the revolution, became drenched in its own blood, and the whole territory of France was converted into a vast slaughter-house. It has been computed that two millions of men perished in that devoted country within three years after it became a republic. Long after the revolutionary massacres had ceased, French blood still continued to flow in torrents; and from the accession of Napoleon to the consular and imperial

* See Rev. xvii. 15.

The reader is requested to turn back to the remarks, with respect to the proportion of the symbols, in pp. 73 and 74.

Kett's History the Interpreter of Prophecy, vol. ii. chap. 3.Another account of the loss of lives in France during the three years from 1792 to 1795 inclusive, which is before me, makes it amount to more than 2,000,000.

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