even Sodom, but never by Babylon. This, however, only shows how terribly the spirit of the world has penetrated her. Her very name is fearfully significant-"Confusion." She exhibits a miserable confusion of things sacred and profane. She is "My FATHER'S House," and yet "a house of Merchandise;" the "House of prayer for all nations," and yet "a den of thieves." She barters in all manner of worldly traffic, and no less with "the souls of men.' "" She has "the form of godliness," and yet she "denies the power thereof." The world hates her, and yet bewails her. It tears her rabidly to pieces, and burns her with fire, because (as to her ultimate origin) she is from the FATHER: it bemoans and laments her, because she was really "of the world,” and “the world must love its own."1

And still more apparent does this monstrous 'confusion' become, in her doom. In her destruction we witness a combined fulfilment of the denunciations pronounced by GoD, as well on Nineveh, Tyre,2 and ancient Babylon, as on Jerusalem.

Our LORD had declared that it should be more tolerable for heathen Tyre in the Day of Judgment than for His apostate Church; and that the men of Nineveh should rise up and condemn it. For "the worldliness of the Church," as Professor Auberlen truly says, "is the most profane and worldly of all worldliness."

"Hence it is that in the description of Babylon, the Apocalypse unites not only the chief features of Israel's sins, but also the sins of the heathens, as we find them delineated in the prophets. And for the same reason the Seer dwells longer on the description of the abominations and judgments of the Harlot, than on those of the Beast. . . . . And for this reason it is that there is more special joy in Heaven at her downfall, than over the downfall of the two Beasts. (Cf. xviii. 20xix. 5.) P. 287.

But notwithstanding all the accumulation of worldly images, which characterise the description of the Woman, and especially the detail of her unholy" merchandise," (S. Matt. xxii. 5; S. John ii. 16; 2 S. Pet. ii. 3; Rev. xviii. 11-13;) we have still far too

1 "The Harlot Church did not molest the kings and mighty ones of this earth: she did not reprove their sins, but made their way to heaven smooth and easy: she was of service to them as a bridle, to keep in subjection the nations: she offered herself as a means of restoring their authority, and re-establishing order and safety; and her help was accepted, and found useful. Hence, no wonder that the kings mourn over her fall, (xviii. 9, 10.) Also the merchants, shipmasters, found the Church useful as preserving order and peace; and under her protection commerce prospered, and their gains increased, (11-13.) And not only this, but she did not lift up her voice to witness against worldly-mindedness and luxury-the sources of the merchant's gains-but rather conformed herself to the world, and partook of its joys and pleasures: instead of caring for the sheep, she cared for the wool. instead of opposing and lessening, she promoted and increased the sinful life and decay of the world by her own earthliness, allowing the salt to lose its savour,' (xix. 2, pleɩpe Tǹv yǹv.)—Auberlen, p. 289.

2 With regard to the solitary and exceptional use of the word 'fornication,' in the case of the two cities, Nineveh and Tyre; see Ecclesiastic, vol. xv. pp. 500-503.

many plain and indubitable 'notes,' to make it at all doubtful what she really is; to convince us that she is no mere worldly power, and that it was not always thus with her, but that she was once none other than the 'City of God.'

We see she is not judged with the World. No, "judgment begins at the Household of GOD." It is not, therefore, till vengeance has been fully poured out upon her, that the Beasts, or Powers of the World, receive their doom.

Again: what is the nature of her punishment? It is that of the Priest's daughter of old. For "if the daughter of any Priest profane herself by playing the harlot she profaneth her Father: she shall be burnt with fire." Hence of the Harlot Babylon we read, "she shall be utterly burnt with fire; for strong is the LORD which judgeth her." The words of GOD to His ancient Church are to meet with some awful and mysterious fulfilment in her. "Wherefore, O Harlot, hear the words of the LORD, I will gather together all thy lovers with whom thou hast taken pleasure. and I will give thee into their hand; and they shall break down thy high places, and leave thee naked and bare . . . . and shall burn thy houses with fire." (Ezek. xvi. 35-41.) For "the ten horns shall hate the Whore and shall make her desolate and naked, and shall eat her flesh, and shall burn her with fire :" "For her sins have reached to Heaven, and GOD hath remembered her iniquities." (Rev. xvii. 16; xviii. 5.)

Again the removal of the Divine Presence from her, is predicted in the very words used of old to Jerusalem: "The light of a candle shall shine no more at all in thee; and the voice of the Bridegroom and of the Bride shall be heard no more at all in thee

. for by thy sorceries were all nations deceived." (Rev. xviii. 23; cf. Jer. xxv. 10; vii. 34; xvi. 9.)

And more terrible still: to her (we find) belongs that extreme malediction denounced by our LORD Himself upon His apostate Church, that " upon it should come all the righteous blood shed upon the earth, from the blood of righteous Abel." It is of the Harlot of the New Testament that this blood is required. For she has inherited the curses as well as the blessings of GOD's ancient Church. "In her," therefore, we read, "was found the blood of prophets and saints, and of all that were slain on the earth." (Rev. xviii. 24.) Yes, according to the exceeding multiplication of her blessings, so will be the miserable accumulation of her woes. Her guilt is infinitely intensified by reason of the immeasurable excess of her gifts and graces above those of her elder sister. The "Mystery hid from ages and generations "-hid from the Jewish Church -has been revealed to her; to wit, the indwelling of CHRIST; actual incorporation into Him-we in Him, He in us; and the continuous Gift, through Him, of the informing, inworking SPIRIT. She has,

1 Lev. xxi. 9.-See Williams, p. 352.

therefore, been called to be Holy as her LORD is Holy; to exhibit a pattern of Heaven on earth-a pattern of intimate, intrinsic, unity-oneness in CHRIST, oneness in Faith-a unity developing itself from within outwardly, attracting, and assimilating to it all who should come within the sphere of its Holy Influence. And has she done all this? Where is her unity, her purity, her earnest, uncompromising holiness? Ah! "How hath the gold become dim, and the fine gold changed!" Ancient Jerusalem abused her gifts, and became the Harlot: the Jerusalem of the New Dispensation, by reason of her more transcendent endowments, and deeper fall, becomes the "Mother of Harlots."

There is a boding solemnity in that most difficult saying of our LORD: "I must work the works of Him that sent Me, while it is day the night cometh, when no man can work. As long as I am in the world, I am the light of the world." (S. John ix. 4, 5.)

:

Our LORD here speaks of a day and a night; of a Day wherein He works, and which is day by reason of the Light of His Presence; and a Night wherein He works no longer and wherein no man can work, and which is night by reason of the withdrawal of His Presence.

But through what agency is CHRIST still in the world? What is the instrumentality whereby the Light of His Presence still shines on mankind, and through which He still works? It is His Church. "Ye," says He, "are the Light of the world:" and, greater works than these shall ye do, because I go to the FATHER." His Church, then, still continues His illuminating Presence, His gracious operations on earth.

Our LORD's words then; plainly bear (besides their personal allusion) a Dispensational reference; hinting at some dread time, a night of gloom, of clouds and thick darkness, yet impending ere the sixth Day, or Day of Grace, dies into the seventh, or Day of Judgment; when the Sun itself, not of the natural only, but of the spiritual world, shall be turned into darkness, and the Moon therefore, or visible Church, cease to give light; when the 'stars' or Angels' of the Churches, the luminaries of the heavens, shall fall from their spheres ;-a night wherein "if any man walk, he stumbleth, because he seeth not the Light of the world."

S. Paul, predicting the manifestation of the Anti-Christ, warns us of this coming night. He tells us that side by side with the Spirit of CHRIST in the Church, there is also a spirit of Anti-Christ, a hidden Mystery of iniquity, a Principle of lawlessness secretly at work. But this latter Principle, he adds, shall not always work secretly. There is, as yet, a Restraining Power keeping it in check, which prevents its open manifestation. Let but this Restrainer be removed; and all this pent up wickedness, now inwardly seething and stirring, shall burst impetuously forth-the Mystery of iniquity be exposed to view-the Man of Sin be revealed.

And who can this Restrainer be-Ο Κατέχων, Τὸ Κάτεχον "He who letteth ?" Who, but CHRIST and the Blessed Spirit ?1 What was it, of old, restrained the sulphurous torrents from sweeping away the cities of the plain? The presence of Lot, righteous Lot, type of the HOLY SPIRIT in the Church; "I can do nothing till thou be come out." What is it restrains the floods of darkness from breaking in upon the natural world? The presence of the sun in the heavens. Even as it is the Presence of CHRIST alone which withholds the billows of night from engulphing in their black surge the spiritual universe.

But what? Is CHRIST'S Presence, is the Light of His Holy Spirit ever to be withdrawn from His Visible Church? Where is His Promise, 'Lo, I am with you always?" It cannot be too often repeated that this Promise is not unconditional. It is entirely contingent on the Church's teaching and observing all things'-neither more nor less-"all things whatsoever CHRIST has commanded," (vid. S. Matt. xxviii. 20.) So that just in proportion as any Branch of the Church fulfils this condition, in that proportion may she look for the gracious Presence of CHRIST. In proportion as she corrupts the Deposit, listens to the plausible seductions of the False Prophet, mutilates or augments the Faith, prefers her own developments or traditions' to the simple commandments of GOD,' and teaches as 'doctrines'-i.e., as de fide'-what are but human inventions-in that proportion she cannot but forfeit the Divine Presence.

And this it is that the mystical Woman does. She adulterates the Christian Faith. The great season of trial comes-the Temptation (Rev. iii. 10); and this emasculated faith is unable to bear up against it. The Apostasy ensues (2 Thess. ii. 3); and the Apostasy drives away the Restrainer. And then it is that the Woman becomes in the fullest sense of the term the Harlot-the Mother of Harlots and abominations. Then only does she fully and intensely realize the description given of her by the Apostle. Dazzled by the flatteries, captivated by the friendly advances of the future World. King, who professing the most abject recognition of her spiritual claims, employs her as the great stepping stone to his schemes of universal dominion-for him, and in his cause, she fills up the measure of her iniquities. Her Babylonish dreams of worldly ascendancy and prosperity are realized. Energetically backed by the zealous and obsequious World-Power, she succeeds in putting down all opposition. Heretics are summarily committed to the "secular arm." She now reigns as a Queen. She has

1 This is one of the only two suggestions on this mysterious question, common in the early Church. "There are many," says Ecumenius, "who consider the Restraining power to be the HOLY GHOST." "For as soon as He shall be removed

out of the midst, in consequence of the sins of men, and shall take His departure, then will that Wicked One soon be revealed; there being no one any longer to prevent him." See this point further discussed, Vol. xv. pp. 535–538.

"gained the World." Flushed with her successes and glorious prospects; drunk with the blood of the martyrs of the LORD JESUS, the faithful Witnesses who have still dared before High Heaven to utter their deep Protest against her blasphemous impieties;-she sits as a Lady'-the World at her feet-she directing the Beast, while he supports her. But her time has come. The spirit of Life has departed from her. She has become a loathsome, putrid carcass; and stinks in the nostrils of the Most High. The eagles of prey scent her, and flock around her. The kings with whom she has lived deliciously fall upon her, tear her to pieces, trample upon her, and eat her flesh in frenzy of infuriated hatred. Out of the frightful Revolution that attends her downfall, the Kingdom of Anti-Christ, the visible despotism of Satan is organized and consolidated.

From all that has been advanced we thus learn, that Holy Scripture intimates, in language neither to be evaded nor mistaken, that like Israel of old, the Visible Christian Church shall apostatize from the Faith-fall from her first love-teach and practise spiritual fornication-grow in arrogance and self-sufficiency-embrace and enforce novel Doctrines incompatible with the Faith bequeathed her by our LORD and His Apostles, ('I am rich and increased with goods') and be finally spued out of CHRIST's mouth.

But this is not all.

For we also learn that God shall yet reserve to Himself, through all times, a secret election who shall not bow the knee to Baal-the two sackcloth-clothed Witnesses-the "Remnant of the Woman's seed who keep the Commandments of GOD;" against whom, as their Protest grows louder, and her infidelity more flagrant, the Harlot shall institute ruthless persecution; and who shall experience a terrible meaning in oaths like the following, imposed upon all the Dominant ecclesiastical Party-" Hæreticos omnes et rebelles pro posse persequar et expugnabo. "The time cometh that whoso killeth you will think he doeth GOD service." History furnishes us with but too ample warnings and foretastes of this bitter Cainlike spirit towards those who humbly and faithfully obey GOD, on the part of those who prefer a more ostentatious, self-gratifying worship of their own-not to prepare us for still more ruthless exhibitions, in the Church, of the pregnant truth of our LORD'S words, "O Jerusalem, which killest the Prophets."

But, where is the Harlot now to be discerned? Where the Witnesses? GOD knoweth. Still, not to use the spiritual senses GOD has given us, in a momentous question of this kind, would be either feeble affectation or infatuation. And here, while fully admitting, with Dr. Auberlen, that it is "Christendom as a whole in all its manifold manifestations of Churches and sects," that is the Harlot, even as, of old, it was Israel as a whole that became a Harlot-still it appears to us deliberate blindness not to acknowledge