tre of visions, but they are not said, to have come down from heaven, like these two. He again should be considered in a double point of view: as a prime minister of the Lord, engaged in his administration of government ; and his external appearance and actions, as a symbolical representation of the principal features of the state of the true Church of Christ, immediately before the destruction of mystic Babylon. Thus considered, his coming down from heaven in such a dazzling brightness, and crying mightily with a strong voice, indicates a great revival in the Church; during which many will be animated to assist in reviving Christian conduct and knowledge, and in making genuine Christian establishments for spreading the Gospel of Christ among Pagan nations, in the darkest corners of the world. And as it is a particular object of this angel, to proclaim the fall of Babylon, the whole symbol appears to indicate, that the spirit of the Lord will, in those days, raise up many witnesses, who with great perspicuity and powerful arguments, shall explain the prophecies of the Old and New Testament concerning Babylon, both from the pulpit and by their writings; in order that those who are spiritually alive, may be prepared by faith and comfort in the word of God, for the approaching hour of great temptation. In thus contemplating this glorious angel, who can remain unmindful of the marvel. lous works of the great head of the Church in our days, viz: the various Bible-societies, and missionary establishments, in Europe Asia, and America, Evangelical Tractsocieties, societies for the translation of the holy Scriptures into so many foreign languages, for itinerant preachers, and sunday schools for the benefit of the poor. All these establishments have been made within these latter days, and have been blessed with abundant success, for the extension of the Redeemer's kingdom at home and abroad.

The angel commences the execution of his mission by proclaiming the fall of the New Testament Babylon, with

a vehement and mighty voice, and in expressions, used by the ancient prophets in declaring the final doom of Babylon in Chaldea, and of the commercial city Tyrus, upon the banks of the Mediterranean Sea ; both of which have been striking types of modern Rome. This is a different fall from that declared by the second angel flying through the midst of heaven, chap. XIV. That denoted only a decline of power, but this the total destruction of mystic Babylon ; as we may see by the following passages, alluded to in this place, Isa. XII, 19—22. Isa. xx1, 9. Isa. xxxiv, 11-13. Jer. L. LI. He describes her ruins by words of terrible import. She is become a habitation of devils-spectres haunt through all her desolation.† The foul spirits of sinners, hardened in crimes of a most detestable nature, are banished to the frightful remains of her conflagration until the day of general resurrection. She is made the watch-house and refuge of every unclean and hateful bird, a court for owls, vultures, crows and kites, where satyrs shall dance, and dragons hide themselves between the tottering walls of once pleasant palaces. Thus is Babylon represented in her state of utter destruction, never to be inhabited again from generation to generation.

The angel then proceeds to give an account of the causes of her dreadful doom. She has infatuated all nations within her reach, by her doctrines concerning the worship of angels, saints, images and relics. She has seduced im

It was a popular opinion among the Ancients, that devils, and the spirits of wicked men, called demons, dwell in howling deserts, and places of desolation uninhabited by man, Matt: xii, 43. iv, where they dance and rejoice over the destruction of cities and nations, in the assumed forms of Simia Marmon, or of hairy goats. Bochart himself appears to have been of this opinion, in his work on the prophet Isaiah L. cit. p. 828. Dæmones hircorumi. satyrorum specie hominum oculis illudentes; which he considers as a true description of demons, and not merely as an emblem of total destruction.

mortal souls from Christ to the subserviency of her own pleasures. The kings of Christendom have turned unfaithful to their Redeemer, and courted her favours. She and her whole body of ecclesiastics have made merchandise of badges and posts of honour, offices, indulgences, purgatory, heaven and hell; and ex tns duvaμENG TOU της δυναμεως του slenvos aurns, through her vast luxuriousness and pompous worship, they have enriched themselves, and the merchants of this world.

This Babylonian traffic has been carried on in France, Spain, Portugal, &c. for many centuries, and we have witnessed the dreadful vengeance of God poured out upon her monasteries, abbeys, temples, churches, and spiritual merchants in these devoted countries. If its commencement is thus severe with the children, what shall be the end of the mother, chap. u, 20—23. Her guilt far exceeds that of her children; for she is the first cause of all this evil, and still continues to treasure up unto herself the wrath of the righteous judgment of God, by continuing without repentance her idolatrous practices to the present day.

Verse 4. And I heard another voice from heaven, saying, come out of her, my people, that ye be not partakers of her sins, and that ye receive not of her plagues;

5. For her sins have reached unto heaven, and God hath re membered her iniquities.

6. Reward her even as she rewarded you, and double unto her double, according to her works: in the cup which she has filled, fill to her double.

This prophetic elegy on the destruction of mystic Babylon, is here continued by a second voice from heaven, which is probably the voice of Jesus Christ himself, as he calls the true Christians in Rome and in the Romish Church, his own people. There were at all times before and after the Reformation, many truly pious and sanctified souls in that Church, who generally secluded them

selves from the world, from a mistaken notion of vital godliness, as if the essence and life of experimental religion consisted in being wholly devoted to heavenly contemplation, without any interference of worldly occupation. They read but a few mystic authors, and had their spiritual guides, who directed them only to the internal worship of God in spirit and in truth, without participating in the external affairs of the Church. Thus they remained ignorant of, and unpolluted by, her corruptions. Moreover, there is no place in the world, where other people are less concerned about your religion than at Rome, after you are known there as a Roman Catholic ; and perhaps the worship, image, and mark of the beast, will not be so rigorously enforced in that city as in other places.

The first voice was a piercing and tremendous cry, louder than a lion's roar ver. 2, because it required great efforts to rouse a slumbering world. But this is the loving and inviting voice of the great shepherd, to his sheep in the city Rome, by which they are reminded of their danger, and exhorted to fly from the wrath to come. Depart from that city, my people, it is a place of impending ruin tarry no longer, for her sins are innumerable, heaped together like an agglutinated mass that reaches up to heaven, exciting signal punishments Ezra Ix, 6. Obey my saving voice like Lot in Sodom, the Jews at Babylon, Jer. LI, 45. XLVII, 20. and the Christians at Jerusalem in their flight to Pella, non mentis tantum affectu, sed etiam pedibus corporis, that you may not be overcome by temptation to participate in her sins, and, neglecting the proper time to emigrate with your families, partake of her plagues. St. John only heard this voice, and did not see him from whom it proceeded; which may indicate that their deliverance will be effected by a special interference of the Lord in their favour, exciting them to pay particular attention to this prophecy in due season, without the immediate aid of Protestants.

Verse 6. Reward her even as she rewarded you, and double unto her double. I cannot consider these words as a warrant, by which the people of God should be authorized to be instrumental in executing these dreadful judgments against the mystic Babylon; for they are exhorted to retire from Rome, to a place security. Moreover, it is not congenial to the character of the followers of the Lamb, to be the instruments of God's wrath against the wicked, and least of all in such a terrible destruction, as this will be at Rome. The execution of the final doom of Babylon, was chap. xvi, 16. said to be committed to the beast in connexion with the ten kings, and they are probably understood in this place; many in their armies being, as it would appear from this verse, the posterity of holy martyrs, and of others, whom she persecuted in former ages with cruel rage. The expression, reward her double, does not refer to the degree of punishment which she is to suffer, but to the cruel and terrible manner in which it will be inflicted; which would induce us to anticipate her destruction, marked with the most striking vengeance of Eternal Justice.

Verse 7. How much she hath glorified herself, and lived deliciously, so much torment and sorrow give her; for she saith in her heart, I sit a queen, and am no widow, and shall see no sor

row.

8. Therefore shall her plagues come in one day, death, and mourning, and famine; and she shall be utterly burned with fire: for strong is the Lord God who judgeth her.

The Lord determines in these words the particular degree, or measure of punishment, compatible with Eternal justice. It shall be proportioned to the exact degree of guilt. Just so much as she has exalted herself, she shall be humbled in the dust; her degree of indulgence in luxury, pomp and wantonness, shall now determine her measure of torment and sorrow. She has been the first, and the highest in every respect, and she shall be the lasts