the solution in the context, agreeably to the _allegorical texture_
of this whole book, all their hallucinations might be easily and happily
obviated. The inspired writer assumes, of course, that the reader will
readily identify these persons, who are thus promoted to honour, now
that Antichrist is no more, and society is to be reorganized.--Daniel
furnishes a satisfactory answer to our question. "I beheld till the
thrones were cast down." (Dan. vii. 9.) The Roman imperial thrones of
_civil despotism_ were subverted. Again,--"But the judgment shall sit,
and they shall take away his dominion, to consume and to destroy it unto
the end." (v. 26.) The Roman imperial _throne_ of ecclesiastical
domination shall be destroyed. Then when Messiah "shall have put down
all rule, and all authority and power," of both sorts of tyranny, "the
kingdom and dominion, and the greatness of the kingdom under the whole
heaven, shall be given to the people of the saints of the Most High,
whose kingdom is an everlasting kingdom, and all dominions, (_rulers_)
shall serve and obey him," (v. 27.) The "saints of the Most High,"
according to Daniel, are to be exalted to civil rule, and these are the
same whom John saw "sitting on thrones." Now, the effect of the seventh
trumpet becomes a fact in history.--"The kingdoms of this world," which
had been controlled by the beast, and bewitched by the sorceries of the
lewd woman, "are become the kingdoms of our Lord and of his
Christ."--For in the millennial state of the world, there will be a
_plurality_ of _kingdoms_.--Hence a very common petition of pious but
ignorant people,--"That the kingdoms of this world may soon become the
kingdom of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ," neither will, nor ever
can be answered.--Under the righteous and benign administration of the
saints, "kings shall be nursing-fathers, and their queens
nursing-mothers to the church:" for "the nations and kingdoms that would
not _serve her_, have perished; yea, those nations have been utterly
wasted." (Is. xlix. 23; lx. 12.)--The souls which the apostle saw under
the altar, whose cry for vengeance he heard, and who were directed to
rest for a little season, till the roll of their martyred brethren
should be completed, are here presented in quite a new position,
"sitting on thrones," (ch. vi. 9.) Although they are not the same
identical persons _physically_, they are the same _morally_; for the
life of the two witnesses is commensurate