out of it." "The foundations of the earth do shake. The earth is utterly broken down-is clean dissolved. It shall reel to and fro like a drunkard, and shall be removed like a cottage; and it shall fall, and not rise again. Then shall the moon be confounded, and the sun ashamed, when the Lord of hosts shall reign in mount Zion, and in Jerusalem, and before his ancients gloriously." names; as France, from the Franks. Those territories then, as well as regions in the north, whence they came, may be called Gog, the land of Magog. Gog is called "the chief prince of Meshech and Jubal." These were brethren of Magog; and their descendants probably were intermingled. Meshech peopled Cappadocia and Armenia, whence they sent colonies to the north, who were called Muscovites. And Martin informs, that Jubal was the father of the Russians. We have thus a vast range in which to search for the dynasty of the last days, called Gog. A power rising in the south of Europe, or away in the north (the original habitation of Magog), may equally answer to the term. And should it take place, that both these regions (the south and the north,) should combine; should some power in the north of Europe volunteer his service with the Roman beast, and possess a leading influence in those measures of the last days; this might give a new view of the occasion why the Roman beast should be denominated Gog. Of these events, time will decide. But the Gog in Ezek. xxxviii. and xxxix., and the healed head of the old secular beast, and the beast from the bottomless pit, are manifestly the same. LECTURE XXXIV. REVELATION XX. Ver. 1. And I saw an angel come down from heaven, having the key of the bottomless pit and a great chain in his hand. 2. And he laid hold on the dragon, that old serpent, which is the Devil, and Satan, and bound him a thousand years, 3. And cast him into the bottomless pit, and shut him up, and set a seal upon him, that he should deceive the nations no more, till the thousand years should be fulfilled: and after that he must be loosed a little season. 4. And I saw thrones, and they sat upon them, and judgment was given unto them: and I saw the souls of them that were beheaded for the witness of Jesus, and for the word of God, and which had not worshipped the beast, neither his image, neither had received his mark upon their foreheads, or in their hands; and they lived and reigned with Christ a thousand years. 5. But the rest of the dead lived not again until the thousand years were finished. This is the first resurrection. 6. Blessed and holy is he that hath part in the first resurrection: on such the second death hath no power; but they shall be priests of God and of Christ, and shall reign with him a thousand years. 7. And when the thousand years are expired, Satan shall be loosed out of his prison, 8. And shall go out to deceive the nations which are in the four quarters of the earth, Gog and Magog, to gather them together to battle: the number of whom is as the sand of the sea. 9. And they went up on the breadth of the earth, and compassed the camp of the saints about, and the beloved city: and fire came down from God out of heaven and devoured them. 10. And the devil that deceived them was cast into the lake of fire and brimstone, where the beast and the false prophet are, and shall be tormented day and night for ever and ever. 11. And I saw a great white throne, and him that sat on it, from whose face the earth and the heaven fled away; and there was found no place for them. 12. And I saw the dead, small and great, stand before God; and the books were opened: and another book was opened, which is the book of life: and the dead were judged out of those things which were written in the books, according to their works. 13. And the sea gave up the dead which were in it; and death and hell delivered up the dead which were in them: and they were judged every man according to their works. 14. And death and hell were cast into the lake of fire. This is the second death. 15. And whosoever was not found written in the book of life was cast into the lake of fire. Another signal descent of Christ is here given as succeeding the battle of the great day, -to bind Satan. The devil, as a strong man armed, has kept his palace through all heathen lands, and to a fatal degree, in all the unconverted of our race. Gentile sacrifices are offered "to devils, and not to God." And, to instigate and receive this homage, Satan has gone "to and fro," in the earth. He has wrought in the children of disobedience, and led them captive at his will," according to the course of this world; according to the prince of the power of the air." He is hence called the god of this world,-" blinding the eyes of men, and hiding the gospel from them." He who could paint on the human imagination of Christ "the kingdoms of the world, and the glory of them, in an instant of time," can now paint fatally on the imagination of sinners, and instigate the vilest delusions. And he will continue thus to do, till the Saviour, -" stronger than he," shall bind him, and deliver the prey of the mighty, who are then turned "from the power of Satan to God." After the battle of the great day, in which Satan's most warlike legions of infidelity, of popery, and of all that was found in open actual hostility to the church, shall have been plunged into perdition; Satan, who deceived and led them, is himself here noted as taken in hand by Jesus Christ himself, and confined. Philosophical inquiries here are vain. Little do we know of the philosophy of the world of spirits. Facts in the case are all we need to know. These are as follows: that there are devils;-they have had fatal access to man; have ruined the world of the wicked;-have peopled the world of wo;-and, if permitted, would continue this work of ruin. But He, who came to destroy the works of the devil, and long since beheld Satan falling like lightning from heaven; -is in the text noted as coming from above with the "great chain" of his omnipotence, binding the devil, shutting him up, and sealing him in the bottomless pit; that for a given time he should not go out to deceive the nations. This is a figure, but a figure of great significance. What is the place rendered here the bottomless pit? The Greek original is abussos (abyss). Let the use of the word, in other sacred passages, inform what is its probable sense in the text. In Rev. ix. 2, the same word denotes the place unlocked by Mohammed, from which his delusion, and armies to propagate it, were furnished; and we doubt not but these were from hell. In chap. xi. 7, and xvii. 8, the same word gives the origin of the atheistical system of the last days; and we doubt not but this was from hell. In Luke viii. 31, the devils, in the man possessed, besought Christ that he would "not command them to go out into the deep!" What did they mean here by the deep? the word in the original is abussos-the word under consideration. They doubtless meant, that Christ would not confine them from all further access to man on earth. In our text then, this is done with the race of devils; the thing against which those devils petitioned in relation to themselves. They are confined from having any more access to man on earth, to tempt and destroy them. Whether this will be done by a literal exclusion of them from all access to man; or whether it will be by giving to man such abundance of grace, and of knowledge, as that Satan's temptations will be utterly unavailing, is to us immaterial. Man will then be safe from Satan's temptations. Thrones, and some seated upon them, our text then presents. Not civil rulers, as some have imagined. This is to degrade prophecy, indeed! These enthroned saints are all the church;-all, on whom the second death hath no power. "They live and reign with Christ a thousand years." "We shall reign on the earth." They reign in their government of themselves by the Spirit and laws of Christ; and their fellowship with Christ in his spiritual invisible government of the world. And saints in glory too, reign with Christ on earth, in the same holy fellowship, and in their new joys, to understand (as all in heaven will do) that the cause of Christ on earth, in which their hearts have so long been bound up, now universally prevails. This will be the rich additional reward then given to prophets and saints in glory; as Rev. xi. 18, "and that thou shouldst give reward unto thy servants the prophets." The rest of the dead live not again during the Millennium. These are all the wicked of our race, whose wicked cause is in the Millennium lost from the world, finding none on earth to support it. The first and second resurrection here, are only mystical resurrections, like that of Ezekiel's valley of dry bones. The first is that of the souls of martyrs; including, at the same time, that of all past saints; and it means the revival of the cause in which they lived and died. Those saints live again in their successors, who then appear on earth, as Elijah lived again in John the Baptist, -coming in his spirit!-a figure much known in the Bible. The second resurrection (implied in the mention of a first resurrection) is not to be till the close of the Millennium, when Satan is again for a little season loosed. "The rest of the dead," the wicked, then, in their turn, rise again in their successors in wickedness, as will be shown. The blessing ascribed to those who have a part in the first resurrection, viz. that the second death has no power upon them, shows they are designed in the figure to include all the chosen of God, then in heaven and earth; that their |