measurement of each thousand cubits, may be considered to represent the state of the dispensation of the Messiah, whether inchoate and preparative, or as subsequently in course of fulfilment. From the time of the covenant of God with Abraham, at the commencement of the third millenary of the world, the people of Israel were not only the chosen of God, and under his peculiar rule; but as we learn from St. Paul, all things happened to them "for our ensamples," so they must be considered, not only as foreshewing, but as preparing the way for the future visible church of Christ, when in the wilderness they drank of that spiritual rock, and when through successive ages they accumulated prophetic testimony to the Messiah "who should "come." And thus the gradual preparation of Christian truth proceeded from the time when, as is implied in the use of the Hebrew word ', the waters only "trickled forth;" so that when the first thousand cubits had been measured "the "waters were to the ancles." Nor do we fail to discern such a coincidence as might be expected with the commencement of the next mil lenary period, when at the building of the temple of Solomon, God himself declared, "I have "hallowed this house which thou hast built to put my name there for ever, and mine eyes "and mine heart shall be there perpetually;" thus giving a promise which from the circumstances of that temple's destruction, can only have received a symbolical fulfilment. From this time, whether in the prosperity attendant on their obedience, or in the various punishments which followed their defection from the pure worship of God, the people of Judah and Israel were still "his witnesses," while in common with them, even the Gentile world gradually learnt to expect Him, who coming out of Sion, should have dominion; and thus when the next thousand was measured, "the waters were to "the knees," and when "the whole number of "them that believed was about three thousand 66 souls," the infant church had already found that "well of water springing up unto everlast"ing life," by which "the river" was to be gradually augmented. When another thousand years had passed, when "again he mea"sured a thousand, the waters were to the k "loins;" for the doctrines of the kingdom and gospel of Christ, though they were the cause of persecution in every age, though they were diminished by accumulating heresies, and tainted by later superstitions, yet prospering in the thing whereunto they were sent, performed their gradual office, and found increased acceptance among men as time rolled on. It is indeed true that there has been much to deplore in every age of Christianity; but as the prevalent vices, and universal cruelty of the heathen world have been gradually circumscribed, and reduced to narrower confines, by the advancing tide, which has already brought comparative good will among men, so while we now confess that the abuse of that power which all physical knowledge gives is to be feared, we yet doubt not that there shall still be an energy of good more than correspondent to the augmented force of evil. We, therefore, who in this last period, in which again the angel is measuring a thousand, are waiting for the coming of the Lord, as for the time when we shall be glad and rejoice in his salvation, may surely anticipate, with no faint or despondent expectation, that when this millennial period shall be completed, the waters shall indeed have risen, "Waters to swim in, a river "that cannot be passed over;" for thus shall the promise be performed, that "the earth shall be "filled with the knowledge of the Lord, as the "waters cover the sea." If the preceding interpretation be correct, the authority of the chronology which is involved in it being thereby substantiated, the use of that chronology in the book of Enoch, will be in some degree an argument of the antiquity and truth of that composition. But as the existence of such a mystical reference in the Scripture, to any periods of time, ought not to rest upon the disputable sense of a single passage; so if such a reference do indeed exist, it ought to harmonize with those various declarations concerning successive portions of time which are scattered throughout the prophetic writings. It appears to me, that such a harmony is traceable, on inquiry into the relative proportions of the various prophetic numbers, and the sum of that period to which they seem to refer. In the following chapter, therefore, I shall endeavour to trace out such internal evidence |