hn of his
joyful acquiescence in that truth, is not material: we know on
satisfactory evidence, that our Lord is a prophet and king, as well as a
priest, "after the power of an endless life." (Heb. vii. 16; Rom. xiv.
9.)

John is next commanded to write,--_First_, "the things which he had
seen;" that is, the description of the foregoing vision:--_Second_, "the
things which are;" that is, the actual condition of the church, as
delineated in the diverse characters of the seven churches addressed, as
in the next two chapters:--_Third_, "the things which shall be
hereafter:" that is, the prophetical part of the book, from the
beginning of the fourth chapter to the close, as containing the
prospective history of the church and of the nations, as she was to be
affected by them, or they by her, till the consummation of all things.
This is the division of the book made by the divine Author himself, and
it is a natural and intelligible one. All attempts of learned and pious
men by other divisions to render this mysterious part of the Bible more
clear to the unlearned reader, tend only to display the ingenuity of the
writers,--not to say their temerity, while they "darken counsel by words
without knowledge." Such artificial divisions are as unfounded, in the
apprehension of sober expositors, as the attempts of impious Arians and
others, to turn the historical narrative of the creation and fall of man
into an allegory!

The meaning of the "seven stars and seven candlesticks" is then
explained to John. The word, "are," is used in a figurative sense, and
not to be taken literally. It means here, _symbolize, represent_ or
_signify_. It is to be interpreted in the same sense as in the following
places of sacred Scripture:--"It _is_ the Lord's passover." (Exod. xii.
11.) "That rock _was_ Christ." (1 Cor. x. 4.) "This _is_ my body."
(Matt. xxvi. 26.) None but a Papist will have any difficulty here, or
perhaps,--a Lutheran!

CHAPTER II.

Some commentators, among whom may be mentioned the learned Dr. Gill, a
leading Antipedobaptist minister of England, have imagined, that the
seven epistles addressed to the Asiatic churches, contain a mystical
prophecy of the church general, covering the whole period of her history
from the apostolic age till the end of the world. According to this
fancy,--for it is nothing more than a fancy; the church in Smyrna, will
represent the church's condition in the second stage of her history,
when