has given a direction to the
great creative thoughts which, through them, leads to wisdom. The Lamb
that was slain and that has bought its divinity with its blood,
Jesus, who drew down the Christ into Himself and who thus, in the
supreme sense, passed through the Life-Death-Mystery, opens the book
(v. 9, 10). And as each seal is opened (vi), the four beasts declare
what they know.

At the opening of the first seal, St. John sees a white horse, on
which sits a rider with a bow. The first universal power, an
embodiment of Creative Thought, becomes visible. It is put into the
right direction by the new rider, Christianity. Strife is allayed by
the new faith. At the opening of the second seal a red horse appears,
ridden by one who takes away from the earth Peace,--the second
universal power, so that humanity may not neglect, through sloth, to
cultivate divine things. The opening of the third seal shows the
universal power of Justice, guided by Christianity. The fourth brings
the power of Religion which, through Christianity, has received new
dignity.

The meaning of the four beasts thus becomes plain. They are the four
chief universal powers, to which Christianity gives a new direction:
War (the lion); Peaceful Work (the bull); Justice (the being with the
human face); and Religious Enthusiasm (the eagle). The meaning of the
third being becomes clear when it is said, at the opening of the third
seal, "A measure of wheat for a penny, and three measures of barley
for a penny," and that the rider holds "a pair of balances." And at
the opening of the fourth seal a rider becomes visible whose name "was
Death, and Hell followed with him." This rider is Religious Justice
(vi. 6, 8). When the fifth seal is opened there appear the souls of
those who have already acted in the spirit of Christianity. Creative
thought itself, embodied in Christianity, shows itself here; but by
this Christianity is at first meant only the first Christian
community, which was transitory like other forms of creation. The
sixth seal is opened (vi.); it is made evident that the spiritual
world of Christianity is an eternal world. The people at large seem to
be permeated by that spiritual world out of which Christianity itself
proceeded. What it has itself created becomes sanctified. "And I heard
the number of them which were sealed: and there were sealed an hundred
and forty and four thousand of all the tribes of the children of
Israel" (vii. 4). They are