stantine's establishment of Christianity in the Roman Empire :-the red horse the visible professing Church in its state of discord and feud from Constantine to Justinian:-the black horse the visible professing Church (at least that part of it in Western Christendom), in its state of spiritual famine under the Papal yoke from Justinian, for some five centuries, to the time of Pope Gregory VII;—the livid pale horse the Church visible in its state of spiritual desolation and corruption, after the Popedom had attained its climax of corruption and of power, from about 1070 to 1400 or 1500;1-while the vision of the fifth Seal, or of the souls under the altar, represents in its first part the cry of slaughtered martyrs, from Huss to the Reformation inclusive; in its second part the vindication of the martyrs by the establishment of the Reformation.3-Finally, the earthquake, &c. of the sixth Seal they suppose to figure that of the French Revolution; and the winds threatened afterwards to indicate some final desolation and judgment on Christendom. Now, ere we enter on the more particular historical examination of this scheme, let me just suggest, in passing, the general unfitness of the emblem of a horse to be the representative, so as they would have it, of the Church visible. Even as an emblem of the Church in its primary course of progress, during its earlier purer state, the symbol seems singular :-seeing that Judah's victories, when God makes it (to quote the text adduced as a parallel) "his goodly horse in battle," are to be, as is generally supposed, victories obtained by actual force, and in a literal field of battle; whereas those of the earlier Church were obtained by the foolishness of preaching, and the force of its members' holy life, and patience in suffering. Much more how in later days the Church visible could be God's horse at all, "for subduing the kingdoms of the world to himself,"—I mean after its purity had altogether past away, and it had become (so as both Mr. C. and Mr. B. most truly, I believe, assert it to show thee what is to happen after these things," Mr. C. boldly thus antedates the prefigurations of the Apocalypse.-See Irenæus' decisive testimony on this point, as well as other evidence, in the Preliminary Critical Introduction to this work. In Mr. C.'s scheme the commencing date given is 1200, in Mr. B.'s 1073: 2 Mr. Cuninghame's commencing date is about 1500, Mr. Bickersteth's 1438. But 1 conceive the latter at least includes Huss. * In explanation, with Vitringa, of the "white robes being given them." have become from Justinian's time) the Church of Antichrist, not Christ,-how, I say, it could thenceforward be God's horse at all for subduing the world to Himself, appears to me not only incomprehensible, but that the very idea savours of making God the associate of evil; and especially if the rider be supposed one of the delegated Spirits of his Divine Providence. I know nothing in Scripture to justify such a representation. Can the Devil's chosen instrument be God's chosen instrument? Can Christ have communion with Belial? or cast out devils by Beelzebub ? From this general view I pass on to consider their explanations more in detail. And here at once, as we enter on the first Seal, the fact (as well as reason for it) strikes us, of their giving to the symbols that characterize the Church and its state, a meaning chiefly spiritual; though with a sufficient measure of the earthly and visible to introduce confusion. As what they call the conquests of the Church in the second and third centuries, confessedly appeared in the extension of its visible limits, and increase of its adherents and influence, -indeed was so palpably a visible and earthly success and advancement, that Gibbon's description of it is referred to by Mr. B. in illustration,2—it might surely be expected, that to the crown, given the rider of the horse of this Seal, there would be attached the sense of an earthly crown; and to the white of the horse, that of earthly triumph and joy. But not so. The crown is construed as half earthly, half heavenly; in designation of the horse and his rider being heavenly warriors, as well as of their gaining earthly triumphs:3 while the white of the horse is explained simply in a spiritual sense, as indicating the then inward and primitive purity of the Church. Why is this? Archdeacon Woodhouse had himself declared that the white was a symbol of " victory, peace, and happiness."4 And, notwithstanding Mr. Cuninghame's disclaimer, the thing is notoIn direct contrast to Vitringa. 2 Viz. Gibbon, chap. xv. On Prophecy, p. 373. 66 3 I will quote the sentence. Being invested with the crown is the symbol of a spiritual or heavenly warrior. And the whole complex hieroglyphic denotes the host of the Lord, that is, his Church militant, going forth shining with its primitive purity, in a career of victory; and it marks the triumphant progress of the Gospel during the three first centuries." p. 5. 4 p. 122, 2nd Ed. He shuns this meaning, however, like the rest, in his explanation. "White is every where used as the symbol of holiness," p. 4. I presume he means VOL. IV. 20 rious. Again, the crown was as notoriously a badge of earthly conquest, and imperial supremacy. And, let me add, the circumstance of the crown in the vision being given to the rider forthwith upon his setting forth, and on the other hand of the heavenly crown being never spoken of in Scripture as given to the Christian warrior, or the true Christian Church collectively, till after death, or at Christ's coming, shows clearly enough that this former, not the latter, was meant. But in truth these expositors must have known that the symbols, taken in this their more natural sense, would be utterly unfit to depict the visible state of the Church during the greater part of these two centuries. Let the accounts be read that have been given in a previous chapter of this work, and illustrated by extracts from eminent Christians of the time,2-and it will at once be seen, in Scripture only. And even so, we might object the white of the asses of Jewish judges and governors, the white of Esther's royal robe ; &c. But the main point here to be considered is, what authority has an expositor to exclude the Roman or Greek meaning of symbols; seeing that they are notoriously taken into account in Holy Scripture elsewhere? 1 So Apoc. ii. 10; "Be thou faithful unto death, and I will give thee a crown of life." Also 2 Tim. iv. 8; 1 Peter v. 4, &c. Similarly the crowns of the twenty-four presbyters, &c. seem to be those of departed saints. 2 Part i, chap. v. See for example the quotation that I have given from Tertullian Vol. i. p. 194. Let me illustrate this further by the subjoined inscription on a martyr that suffered under the second Antonine; the inscription being on a commemorative tablet in the catacombs of Rome, and given by Boldetti. * ALEXANDER MORTUUS NON EST, SED VIVIT SUPER AS- REDDIDIT. GENUA ENIM FLECTENS VERO DEO SACRIFICA- VIXIT QUI VIXIT IN X. TEM. This last clause is explained by Dr. Charles Maitland, to whom I am indebted for the inscription, as an abbreviation for, In Christianis temporibus." He scarcely has lived who has lived in Christian times." If this may be considered doubtful, the O tempora infausta! and again the Quid miserius vitâ, admirably illustrate the un* Here stands the monogram for Christ, the same as on the labarum: to signify the devotion of the deceased to Christ. ** Here a palm-branch; an emblem generally of martyrdom. that to have applied the bright symbols of this first Seal in any earthly sense to them, amidst their bitter sufferings, mockeries, and often tears of blood, would have been felt as an act adding insult to injury. -At any rate we may require consistency in expositors. If the crown of the rider of the white horse be the heavenly crown, and the white that purity which is described as belonging, or attributed, to the saints and church collectively in the heavenly state, then let his conquests be consistently explained as those conquests over sin, the flesh, and the devil in the inward heart, to which that crown and robe of white are attached in Scripture. Alas! if they attempt this, the whole solution is found to crumble to pieces in their hands. then the white and the crown would belong not to the horse,-the whole visible professing Church of the second and third centuries,— but to a part only (perhaps much the smaller part') out of it; and not to this small minority during the second and third centuries only, but just as much to the end of time.-In fact a consistent explanation of the first Seal on this theory cannot be given. For It will not need to say much of the second Seal, and its red horse, whose rider had a great sword given him "to take peace from the earth, and that they should kill one another : "-a symbolic picture which the expositors spoken of explain to signify the theological dissensions and feuds of the Church visible, from Constantine to Justinian. It may suffice to suggest two questions in reference to it. One is, on what authority do they apply our Lord's language, "I am not come to send peace on the earth, but a sword," " in explanation of this sword of the vision, to the feuds of the visible Church begun suitableness of the application of the white horse and his rider, to whom a crown was given, going forth conquering and to conquer, to the Christian Church of the second and third centuries, Let me add a brief descriptive clause of the sad state of the Christians in Clement's of Rome's time, immediately after St. John: Bios nμwv aλλo oudev ei μn lavatos' also in the third century, as given by Celsus, viii. 418 ; φευγοντες και κρυπτομενοι, η αλισκομενοι και απολλυμενοι. 1 Notwithstanding the representation given of the Church as preserving its primitive purity through the three first centuries, the reader will see, on the testimony of the most eminent of the Christians themselves, that such was far from the case. See my Vol. i. p. 202; also Mosheim, and (though I think the work too severe on the early Church) Mr. Taylor's "Ancient Christianity."-Compare too the Epistles to the seven Churches. 2 Matt. x. 35. and following after the time of its establishment in the Roman Empire? It is usually explained, and I conceive beyond a question rightly, of the enmity that would be shown by the unbelieving members of each heathen and Jewish family into which the gospel might enter, towards such of its members as embraced the faith. And if so, Christ's saying about the sword sent, would rather apply to the times before the imperial establishment of Christianity than to those after; i. e. to the times of the first Seal, rather than of the second.1 -My other question is, how many thousands of Christians do Messrs. C. and B. suppose to have been killed by their brother Christians throughout the whole extent of the Roman Empire, during the two centuries alluded to; and what the population of the whole empire' (now christianized professedly) out of which that number was slain? I suspect that the numeral returns given would show clearly enough, by themselves, that the mutual slaughter of Christians which then occurred in a few places, (much the most in the single African province,3) was utterly insufficient to answer to the fearful symbol of the blood-red horse under the great sword of its rider, and the fateful sentence pronounced that its constituent members were then "to kill one another."4 I turn to the third Seal and its black horse, with a rider holding a yoke, (so they prefer to interpret the Cuyor,) who had certain words addressed to him from the throne about corn, wine, and oil :-a symbol altogether, they say, of the spiritual famine of the visible Church, for some five centuries of the middle age, from Justinian till Gregory VII. Of course, as the horse appears again in his integrity, we 1 So Eusebius. 2 Gibbon's second Chapter (Vol. i, 68) compared with his notices of the subsequent decrease of the population, will furnish data for this. 3 By the Circumcelliones, a band of ruffians hired by the Donatists.-Much more generally the war urged among them was one of the tongue : κατ' αλλήλων αντι δοράτων εκίνουν τας γλώσσας. Theodoret, i. 6. It will be seen, on comparing Vitringa's scheme with the others, that as his second Seal is included in their first, so his third in their second. 5 Wrongly I am persuaded. See my Note, Vol. i. p. 150.-Vitringa considers, as I do, the concurrent mention of the chanix to be a reason for understanding the word Zuyos in the sense of a balance. And the fact, if such it be, (and I believe it is) that such an emblem as a yoke held in the hand is positively unknown in archæology, furnishes an argument pretty decisive of itself against the word having the meaning of a yoke here. |