Icial influence on the affairs of men.* The stars denote sovereign princes, subordinate to the imperial power, or else nobles and great men.† Their falling to the ground, like the unripe fruit of a figtree when shaken by a mighty wind, signifies the dethroning of the sovereigns of states, and the degradation of their princes and nobles, by means of sudden and violent political convulsions. The heaven or firmament, in the natural world, is the medium through which the sun, moon, and stars, communicate to us their heat, and light, and influences. Consequently the symbolical heaven must be that in the world politic, through which the symbolical sun and other luminaries act upon us; i. e. the political constitutions and governments of the empires and kingdoms of the world. The passing away of the heaven, therefore, denotes the utter subversion and destruction of the political and ecclesiastical constitution of the empire, which is the subject of the prophecy. Mountains and islands denote kingdoms and states. When it is said that the mountains and islands are moved out of their places, it denotes the subversion and removal of the kingdoms and states of the world, politic. The rest of the language of this remarkable passage is so literal as to require little illustration. It is descriptive of the dreadful consternation which shall overwhelm the princes and rulers of the world, during the progress of the terrific convulsions of this seal; and it shèws that they shall at length be forced to yield to the conviction of

* Faber on the 1260 years, vol. i. chap. 2.

+ See, in illustration of the symbolical language, Jacob's interpretation of Joseph's dream, Gen. xxxvii. 9, 10.

the approach of that awful day of visitation of the wrath of God, of which we so often read in the prophetical scriptures.

In the prophecy of Joel we are informed, that "the sun shall be turned into darkness, and the moon into blood, before the great and terrible I day of the Lord come."* Our Lord, in his remarkable discourse upon the destruction of the temple, and the signs of his second advent in the clouds of heaven, predicts these signs in the following language. Immediately after the tribu"lation of those days shall the sun be darkened, and "the moon shall not give her light, and the stars "shall fall from heaven, and the powers of the "heaven shall be shaken and then shall ap

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pear the sign of the Son of Man in heaven : " and then shall all the tribes of the earth mourn, "and they shall see the Son of Man coming in the "clouds of heaven with power and great glory."+ The language of Mark is nearly similar. Luke somewhat varies the description, and connects, in a chronological manner, the signs in the heavens, which go before our Lord's second advent, with the preceding parts of the prophecy. They (the "Jews) shall fall by the edge of the sword, and "shall be led away captive into all nations: and "Jerusalem shall be trodden down of the Gentiles, "until the times of the Gentiles be fulfilled. And "there shall be signs in the sun, and in the moon, "and in the stars; and upon the earth distress of "nations, with perplexity; the sea and the waves roaring; men's hearts failing them for fear, and

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"for looking after those things which are coming "on the earth: for the powers of heaven shall be "shaken. And then shall they see the Son of "Man coming in a cloud, with power and great glory. And when these things begin to come to pass, then look up, and lift up your heads, for your redemption draweth nigh." Luke here tells us, not only that these signs in the symbolical * heavens shall occur previously to the second advent of Christ, but also that they are to happen precisely at the period when "the times of the Gentiles "are fulfilled." The meaning of this expression. will be investigated in a subsequent part of this work.

The passages quoted from Joel and the Evangelists, are so exactly similar in their import and form of expression, that there is little reason to doubt that they refer to the same events; and it is apparent that they describe a dreadful series of political revolutions, which shall convulse the nations of the world before the great and dreadful day of the Lord, the day of the second advent. And if we carefully compare the language in which the earthquake, and celestial signs of the sixth seal are described, with what is written, as above, in the prophecy of Joel and the Evangelists, we shall see so near an agreement, as cannot but lead us to think that all these inspired writers, in the passages which have been cited, describe the same catastrophe ; and, consequently, that the earthquake of the sixth seal relates also to the great revolution which is to take place in the last ages. But, as it has very

* Luke xxi. 24-88.

incongruously been supposed by Mede, Bishop Newton, and the great body of modern commen- / tators, that this seal was fulfilled by the change which took place in the established religion and government of the Roman empire, in the time of Constantine, it may be necessary to make some remarks, by way of refutation of this commonly received interpretation.

The hieroglyphics of the sixth seal, are of too august a nature to be applied to the events which happened on the accession of Constantine. It is said, "And lo there was a great earthquake, and the "sun became black as sackcloth of hair, and the moon became as blood." These symbols indicate a mighty revolution, including in it the complete extinction or obscuration of the imperial dignity. It is true that, in the person of Constantine, the imperial dignity of Rome, passed from the Heathen emperors, to a new line professing the Christian faith. But that dignity itself was neither extinguished nor obscured by this event: on the contrary, it shone forth with increased splendour, after the defeat and death of the rivals of Constantine. Momentous in its consequences, therefore, as the above change confessedly was, it yet seems inconsistent with the just rules of interpretation, to apply to it a symbolical description, which denotes the complete subversion of the supreme power in the empire which is the subject of the prophecy.*

✦ I shall afterwards endeavour to shew, that the revolution in the reign of Constantine, was signified by the earthquake in Rev, viii. 5, and by the fall of the sixth head of the beast and rise of the seventh, .xvii. 10.

It is next said, "And the stars of heaven fell unto "the earth, even as a fig-tree casteth her untimely figs when shaken of a mighty wind." This symbol is equally inapplicable to the events of the above period. The rivals of Constantine, who were defeated and dethroned by him, were sharers in the imperial power. Now this power, though administered by more than one person, was, by the constitution of the empire, always considered as one and undivided; it must therefore be represented by the sun, and not by the subordinate symbol of stars. The fall of the stars from heaven to the earth, could not therefore denote the fall of the Heathen emperors, and seems to be more fitly applicable to some revolution in the Roman empire, at a period when there is in it, not only one supreme imperial dignity, but an indefinite number of regal powers, sharing among them the territories of the empire; recognizing indeed the superior lustre of the emperor, but exercising within their own territories all the rights of independent sovereignty. Such was the political form of the western empire before the French revolution: but that form no longer exists. The stars which then shone in the heavens politic have disappeared: they have been cast down from their orbits by sudden and awful violence; even as the fig-tree casteth her untimely figs, when she is shaken of a mighty wind.*

* Since this was written another mighty alteration has been effected in the state of Europe. The fabric of the revolutionary governments on the Continent has been overthrown, and a new arrangement effected, partly on the ancient and partly on a new basis, which has been produced by the changes of the revolution. I see, however, no good reason to retract what I advanced in my first edition on this