rophets is always to be
understood of the church on earth. For instance, can the following
language (Is. xxxiii. 24,) be predicated of the saints while in the
body:--"The inhabitant shall not say, I am sick?" "The glory and honour
of the nations" are the "saints of God, the excellent;" who while here,
are "the light of the world, the salt of the earth;" and doubtless
nations as well as families and individuals "have learned by experience
that the Lord hath blessed them for their sakes:" (Gen. xxx. 27; xxxix.
5;)--and that he has also "reproved kings" and destroyed nations for
their sakes, (Ps. cv. 14; Is. xliii. 3, 4.) And when all the saints who
are to rule the nations, (Rev. xx. 4, 6,) for a thousand years, shall
have been brought home to glory, then emphatically will the glory and
honour of the nations be brought into the New Jerusalem.

As to the "leaves of the tree for the healing of the nations," it may be
remarked, that their sanative virtue will have been experienced by
national societies on earth: and there is not, there never was, nor will
there ever be, any other healing medicine for them, (Ezek. xlvii. 12) In
addition to what has been said, it is worthy of notice that the tree of
life, in allusion to the delights of the garden of Eden, which was an
emblem of heaven, is mentioned in the Apocalypse, near the beginning and
near the end of the book, (chs. ii. 7; xxii. 2.) Now, we are told
expressly that this tree is "in the midst of Paradise." But we learn
both from our Lord and the apostle Paul that Paradise signifies
heaven:--"To-day shalt thou be with me in Paradise," said Christ to the
penitent thief. "I was caught up into Paradise;" that is, "the third
heaven," said Paul. Did Christ and Paul mean the visible, or the
invisible church militant by the name Paradise? But the tree of life
flourishes there, and all the redeemed eat of its fruit. They are where
the tree is, the tree is in Paradise, and Paradise is heaven itself:
therefore we are warranted to conclude with certainty that New Jerusalem
is a symbol of the church triumphant; and, consequently, that those
parts of chapters twenty-one and twenty-two, which are of symbolic
structure, are descriptive of the heavenly state.

THE ANTICHRIST.

This word does not occur in the Apocalypse, nor in any other book of the
New Testament except the first and second epistles, by the apostle John.
There it is found in the singular and plural form. (1 John ii. 18, 2