Paganism was supplied by a pure and spiritual worship of prayer and thanksgiving, the most worthy of man, the least unworthy of the Deity. The chain of authority was broken which restrains the bigot from thinking as he pleases, and the slave from speaking as he thinks; the popes, fathers, and councils, were no longer the supreme and infallible judges of the world; and each Christian was taught to acknowledge no law but the Scriptures, no interpreter but his own conscience."

At p. 18, Dr. Mosheim says ::- "The most momentous event that distinguished the church after the fifteenth century, and we may add the most glorious of all the revolutions that happened in the state of Christianity since the time of its divine and immortal Founder, was that happy change introduced into religion, which is known by the title of the Blessed Reformation. This grand revolution, which arose in Saxony from small beginnings, not only spread itself with the utmost rapidity through all the European provinces, but also extended its efficacy more or less to the most distant parts of the globe, and may be justly considered as the main and principal spring which has moved the nations from that illustrious period, and occasioned the greatest part of those civil and religious revolutions that fill the annals of history down to our times. The face of Europe was, in a more especial manner, changed by this great event. The present age feels yet, in a sensible manner, and ages to come will continue to perceive, the inestimable advantages it produced, and the inconveniences of which it has been the innocent occasion. The history therefore of such an important revolution, from whence so many others have derived their origin, and whose relations are so extensive and universal, demands undoubtedly a peculiar degree of attention."

At p. 19, D'Aubigné says:-"The evil could not go farther. Then the Reformer arose. To establish a mediating caste between man and God, and insist that the salvation which God gives shall be purchased by works, penances, and money, is the papacy [or "beast out of the earth "]. To give to all [the 144,000] by Jesus Christ ["the Lamb"] without a human mediator, and without that power which

The

is called the church, free access to the great gift of eternal life, which God bestows on man, is Christianity and the Reformation. The papacy is an immense wall raised between man and God by the labour of ages. The Reformation is the power which threw down this wall, restored Christ to man, and levelled the path by which he may come to his Creator. The papacy interposes the church between God and man. Christianity and the Reformation [as prefigured on Mount Sion] make them meet face to face. papacy separates, the Gospel unites them. [Having further related the abuses of the professing church, the immoralities and ignorance of the clergy, and their dissolute fêtes, he continues-] Such are some of the consequences of the system under which Christendom then groaned. Our picture undoubtedly proves both the corruption of the church and the necessity of a reformation. The vital doctrines of Christianity had almost entirely disappeared. The strength of the church had been wasted, and its body, enfeebled and exhausted, lay stretched almost without life, over the whole extent which the Roman empire had occupied." Hence, whilst recognising the sufficiency of these testimonies for our purpose, the prophetic portraitures of the woman persecuted by the dragon, her flight into the wilderness, her escape from the flood which the Serpent cast out of his mouth after her that he might cause her to be carried away of the flood, the dragon's wrath with her, his going to make war with the remnant of her seed, his summoning the beast from the sea, the subsequent giving of a mouth speaking great things and blasphemies, the beast coming up out of the earth, and the image to the beast which had the wound by a sword and did live, in conjunction with the historic identities and the doings of these executants of the dragon's enmity, invite us at the same time to discern in those testimonies a further evidence of Apocalyptic and historic accordance, as also a further vindication of the harmonious sequence of the prophetic imagery. For whilst a less painful description of the state of the church immediately preceding the Reformation would have been at variance with the prophetic disclosures prior to the appearance of the

Lamb and the 144,000 on Mount Sion; and whilst "The vital doctrines of Christianity had almost entirely disappeared; the strength of the church had been wasted, and its body, enfeebled and exhausted, lay stretched almost without life, over the whole extent which the Roman empire had occupied" enables us at once to recognise a foretold historical result of "the dragon's war with the seed of the woman, which keep the commandments of God, and have the testimony of Jesus Christ;" so also does the vision on Mount Sion receive a fitting response, and its harmonious sequence a further incisive illustration from the historian's exclamation, "The evil could not go farther. Then the Reformer arose."

The harmonious sequence of the prophetic imagery being thus apparent, and the Reformation having been identified as a religious manifestation such as the vision on Mount Sion may be held to prefigure, we may pass to the next terms, "And I heard a voice from heaven, as the voice of many waters, and as the voice of a great thunder."

Continuing to interpret the term "heaven" as symbolising the governmental sphere (in this instance, guided by the character of the prophecy, the ecclesiastical sphere), and "waters" as the symbol of peoples; and "thunder" as the symbolic proclamation of papal denunciations, historically styled "seven thunders of Rome," the records of history already before us in our second volume and in subsequent lectures may be held to amply justify the conclusion that the religious excitement caused by the outbreak of the Reformation, and the papal bulls levelled at and anathematising its abettors supply a fitting historic response to these terms; so that we may consider their demands on the present occasion sufficiently satisfied by the following pertinent extracts. Thus at pp. 61, et seqq., vol. ii., D'Aubigné says :"The feast of All Saints was an important day for Wittemberg. On this great occasion pilgrims came in crowds. On the 31st of October, 1517, Luther walks boldly towards the church to which the superstitious crowds of pilgrims were repairing, and puts up on the door of this church ninety-five theses or propositions against the

:

doctrine of indulgences. In these theses, Luther [yielding to the sympathetic influence communicated from Mount Sion], declares, in a sort of preamble, that he had written them with the express desire of setting the truth in the true light of day. He declares himself ready to defend them on the morrow at the university against all and sundry. The attention which they excite is great; they are read and repeated. In a short time the pilgrims, the university, the whole town is ringing with them. Here, then, was the commencement of the work. The germ of the Reformation was contained in these theses of Luther. The abuses of indulgence were attacked in them, but behind those attacks, there was, moreover, a principle, which, though it attracted the attention of the multitude far less, was destined one day to overthrow the edifice of the papacy. The evangelical doctrine of a free and gratuitous remission of sins, was here publicly professed [Jesus Christ was exalted as sole mediator] for the first time in that age.

"Henceforth the work must grow. All errors behoved to give way before this truth. By it, light had first entered Luther's mind, and by it light is to be diffused in the church. What previous reformers wanted [that is previous to the advent of the mighty angel of the sixth trumpet, and to the appearance of the Lamb and 144,000 on Mount Sion, of the seventh trumpet] was a clear knowledge of this truth, and hence the unfruitfulness of their labours. Luther himself was afterwards aware that, in proclaiming justification by faith, he had laid the axe to the root of the tree. This is the doctrine, said he, which we attack in the followers of the papacy. Huss and Wickliffe only attacked their lives, but in attacking their doctrines we take the goose by the neck. All depends, he afterwards said, on the word which the pope took from us and falsified. I have vanquished the pope, because my doctrine is according to God, and his is according to ["the dragon "] the devil.

"These theses, notwithstanding their great boldness, still bespeak the monk, who refuses to allow a single doubt as to the authority of the see of Rome. But in attacking the doctrine of indulgences, Luther had, without perceiving it,

assailed several errors, the exposure of which could not be agreeable to the pope, seeing that they tended, sooner or later, to bring his supremacy in question. Luther, at this time, did not see so far, but he felt all the boldness of the step which he had taken. He accordingly presented his theses only as doubtful propositions on which he was anxious for the views of the learned; and, conformably to the established custom, annexed to them a solemn protestation, declaring that he wished not to say or affirm anything not founded on Holy Scripture, the Fathers of the Church, and the rights and decretals of the see of Rome. An invisible hand, however, mightier than his own, held the leading reins, [the Lamb and 144,000 had appeared on Mount Sion], and pushed him into a path which he knew not, and from the difficulties of which he would, perhaps, have recoiled if he had known them, and been advancing alone of himself. ‘I engaged in this dispute,' says Luther, without premeditated purpose, without knowing it, or wishing it; and was taken quite unprepared. For the truth of this I appeal to the Searcher of hearts.' 'It was thought,' says Luther afterwards, that the pope would be too many for a miserable mendicant like me.' If, however, the bishops failed him, God did not fail him. The Head of the church, who sits in heaven [and appeared on the Mount Sion], and to whom has been given all power upon the earth, had himself prepared the ground, and deposited the grain in the hands of his servant. He gave wings to the seed of truth, and sent it [from Mount Sion] in an instant over the whole length and breadth of his church. Nobody appeared next day to attack the propositions of Luther. But these theses were destined to be heard [and raise a clamour, as "the voice of many waters"] in other places than under the roof of an academical hall. Scarcely had they been nailed to the door of the castle church at Wittemburg, than the feeble strokes of the hammer were followed throughout Germany by a blow which reached even to the foundations of proud Rome, threatened sudden ruin to the walls, the gates, and the pillars of the Papacy, stunning and terrifying its champions, and at the same time awaken

6