heavenly agency and power, the prophecy may appear to be fulfilled.

The prophets Moses and Elijah, typify in their history, that of the two witnesses. These two prophets fled to the wilderness, from the presence of two idolatrous kings. In a time of general depravity, they preserved, and at length miraculously restored the light and prevalence of true religion. They seem both of them, in their own persons, either exempt from death, or to have been raised immediately from its dominion; for they both appeared at the transfiguration of our Lord, types of a glorious resurrection. Whatever in this chapter is attributed to the witnesses, may be found prefigured in one or other, or both these prophets. But that which the prophets did in their bodies literally, the witnesses perform only in a spiritual sense; that sense which is peculiar to the gospel of the New Testament, when compared with its prototypes in the Old. We are then to look beyond the literal sense; and fixing our attention on the period of history to which we seem directed, we cannot fail to remark a long succession of ages, commencing with the times when the western Gentiles flowed into the Church, and possessed the outer courts of the temple; when, on their ignorance and superstition a corrupt and ambitious clergy began to raise the papal hierarchy, substituting Pagan ceremonies, and, unauthorised observances in the room of primitive religion.

These in history are called the middle ages; intervening between the bright period of ancient literature, and the restoration of learning in the fourteenth century; between the days of primitive Christianity, and the return of it at the Reformation. They are marked in ecclesiastical history by ignorance, superstition, corrupt morals, and by papal usurpation.

But the progress of these foes to true religion, and to the happiness of mankind, was opposed and retarded by the professors of a purer faith. "God did not leave himself without a witness." There arose in many parts of the great Christian republic, and at various periods, professors and preachers of a purer religion; of a religion formed upon the promises and precepts revealed in that sacred book, which it was the constant endeavour of the ecclesiastical usurpers to keep out of sight.

A successive train of these, though thinly scattered, was seen, in defiance of the papal thunder, to devoutly hold up to admiring Christians the light of the gospel, and the true worship of the temple. Though beset with difficulties and dangers, from the powers civil and ecclesiastical united to suppress them, they stood their ground with a confidence and energy that could arise only from such a cause, the cause of truth, cherished and supported by the spirit and power of God. If they suffered, their enemies suffered also, were frequently discomfited and repulsed, and obtained at last a dear-bought and only temporary victory.

Of the witnesses in the early part of this history, we have received but imperfect accounts; and these are come down to us in a very suspicious form, being transmitted to us chiefly in the writings of their adversaries. We may admit, therefore, what is thus said in their praise, while in other respects, we must be allowed to doubt.

It appears probable, that the Valdenses, so early as in the seventh century, had retreated to the valleys of Piedmont, there to profess and enjoy a purer religion than was permitted to them elsewhere. In the eighth and ninth centuries, the progress of

1 Mosheim's Hist. cent. vii. part ii. ch. ii. sect. 2; cent. xii. part ii. ch. v. sect. 2. note; and the authorities referred to.

Popery was vigorously opposed; and private masses, and pilgrimages, and the worship of images, and other superstitions, and the doctrine of transubstantiation, then first broached, were clearly shown, by many learned writers, to be contrary to the truth of Christianity. From the time of Pope Gregory VII. in the eleventh century, we see the light of truth more frequently beaming forth, and with increasing lustre. In the twelfth century, it was widely diffused by Peter Waldo and his followers. In the thirteenth century, the inquisition was established to extinguish it, and crusades were levied against those who received it. In the fourteenth century, our Wickliffe caught the holy light, and communicated it to many proselytes. In the succeeding century, John Huss, and Jerome of Prague, died martyrs to the cause; and it shone forth among their numerous disciples, in many parts of Europe, until the inquisition, with fire and faggot, and by obstinate perseverance, seemed at length to have obtained the object of so much murderous persecution, the extinction of a pure faith and practice; so that at the commencement of the next century, the Roman pontiff appeared to enjoy his usurpation in tranquil security.

But suddenly, to the utter astonishment and confusion of the papal world, they beheld this heresy (as they termed it,) revive," a spirit of life from God enters into it, it stands upon its feet;" it becomes immortal, and leads the way to heaven.

Thus, the revival of pure religion "in spirit and in truth," placed by the Reformation beyond the power

1 Usserius de Christianæ Ecclesiæ successione et statu. Allix's remarks on the ancient churches of the Albigenses, and of Piedmont. Bishop Newton's Dissertations on Prophecy, vol. iii. pp. 150-160. octavo edit.

2 Mosheim, cent. xiii. part ii. ch. v.

of its enemies, seems to be expressed by the sufferings and resurrection of the witnesses. Thus, in more early times, our Lord's religion had appeared extinct and buried with him; but, after three days, with him it rose again, was rekindled in the faint and sunken hearts of his disciples; by whose preaching it was diffused rapidly among the nations, imparting to them the pure knowledge of the one true God, and of an heavenly Redeemer. As during the long reign of darkness and corruption preceding the Reformation, the light of genuine religion was seen frequently to beam through the prevailing mists of superstition at intervals, and for a short time only; so many periods are pointed out by commentators, when this true light, thus overclouded, broke out again at the end precisely of three years and an half, answering prophetically to the three days and half foretold in this chapter.1 These seem to be so many partial and particular resurrections of pure religion,

1 See them collected by Bishop Newton, Dissert. on the Prophecies, vol. iii. 140-146; octavo edition.

The commentators in the reformed churches are in the main agreed, as to the general interpretation of this prophecy in a mystical or spiritual sense. They all look to the same times of fulfilment, to the same conflict, to the progress of the Reformation, opposed by the papal hierarchy; but not without some view in favour of their own particular age, nation, or sphere of action. Vitringa has shown, that in several instances this has been done by them successfully: so that these partial completions of the prediction have seemed to some commentators to stand as types, as it were of some grander and more universal fulfilment. The Reformation opened by Luther, has been accounted one of these. But as no one is authorised to affirm, that the whole period of twelve hundred and sixty years is already elapsed, so to future time only can we look with safety for the exposition of a prophecy whose complete history may yet remain to be unfolded.

The partial fulfilments to which we allude, may be seen in Vitringa's able and learned exposition of this prophecy, and abstracted in the work of Bishop Newton; and the student may see the progress of the Reformation through these its stages, briefly and ably delineated by Fraser in his Key to the prophecies.

again to be buried and lost for a time. Such a dark interval preceded the Reformation, which was again set on foot by the preaching of Luther. "The rulers of the darkness of this world," (Eph. vi. 12.) had then, to all human appearance, extinguished the light of evangelical truth. But while they were celebrating their triumph, the holy light rekindles; it rises, as it were, from the dead. By Luther, Melancthon, Calvin, Zuinglius, and their followers; the religion of the Bible, the gospel of Christ, are reproduced in the Christian world; are perpetuated by the then newly-invented art of printing; and again become the rule of worship and of duty, the sure guides to heaven.

Ver. 13.] An earthquake prefigures earthly commotions; without which the events announced under this part of the sixth trumpet could not be expected to take place. The tenth part of the city falls. This apparently is the great city, described in verse the 8th as corrupt, after the abominations of Sodom, of Egypt, of Jerusalem, in her most degenerate days, containing at the same time the Gentiles, (see ver. 2 and 9,) who tread the exterior courts, but are not admitted into the interior of the Lord's house or temple.

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This description seems to comprise the whole visible community of the Christian Church, during the prophecy of the witnesses, and exclusive of them. A tenth, that is a very conspicuous part of it, is seen to fall at this time. This city undergoes another subsequent earthquake, (ch. xvi. 19.) when it is represented as composed of many cities of the Gentiles, or nations which fall.

In the present earthquake, there were slain, names of men, (so the translation is rightly given in the margin,) seven thousand, and the result is, that