mb shall overcome them, because he is Lord of lords and
King of kings, and they that are with him are called, and elect, and
faithful" (xvii. 14).

The marriage of the Lamb and his bride--that is, the union of Christ
with the whole assembly of the redeemed--does not take place till "the
wife has made herself ready," till she has arrayed herself in the fine
linen, clean and white, which it was given her to put on, the fine
linen being "the righteousness of saints" (xix. 7, 8). This doctrine
accords well {108} with the view taken throughout this Essay, namely,
that righteousness (the "unspeakable gift," 2 Cor. ix. 15) is necessary
as an antecedent condition of salvation, and therefore of immortality.
It is further to be noticed that this union between the Lamb and the
bride is not perfected while time lasts, requiring the condition of a
new creation. For it was not till the first heaven and the first earth
passed away that John "saw the holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down
from God out of heaven, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband"
(xxi. 2), and that "the Lamb's wife" was shown to him by "one of the
seven angels that had the seven vials full of the last seven plagues"
(xxi. 9). The performance of this office by an angel who in the
antecedent judgment had been a minister of wrath and punishment, may be
taken to be significant of the _means_ by which the glorious
consummation is brought about.

Finally, we have in the following concluding portions of apocalyptic
prophecy a description of what may be said to constitute the joy of the
marriage supper, namely, the perfection through righteousness, not only
of the union between Christ and the elect Church, but also of that
between God and all peoples. Speaking of "the holy city Jerusalem,"
John says, "I saw no temple therein; for the Lord God Almighty and the
Lamb are the temple of it. And the city hath no need of the sun,
neither of the {109} moon, to shine on it; for the glory of God gave
light to it, and the Lamb is the lamp thereof. And the nations shall
walk by the light of it, and the kings of the earth bring their glory
into it. And the gates of it shall not be shut by day, for there will
not be night there. And they shall bring the glory and honour of the
nations into it. And there shall not enter into it anything unclean,
and that worketh abomination and lying, but only they that are written
in the Lamb's book of life" (xxi. 22-27). The seer goes o