confession of it, spiritual wisdom, a discerning conscience, and all the perfect fruits of justice and charity, comprising every kind and form of goodness, that is well pleasing in the sight of God and truly useful to man, with comfort, peace, and joy, manifested by thanksgiving, resignation, and contentment, all proceed from the operation of the Holy Ghost, bringing the principle of truth into action, kindling the sacred oil into a bright and steady flame.

From this part of the vision thus interpreted we may clearly collect, that although it had a direct and immediate tendency to encourage Zerubbabel and the Jews in rebuilding the temple and restoring the city, by a prospect of final success and approaching glory; yet its principal and essential object was to predict the foundation and erection, the establishment and perfection, of the christian church by the hand of the Son of God, as its Founder, Redeemer, High-priest, and King, continually protecting and governing it by his power and providence, enlightening, admonishing, nourishing, supporting, animating, and comforting it by the Holy Ghost. The symbol, by which this is represented, is truly magnificent in its general conception, and truly admirable for exactness in the detail of its construction. At the same time,

it must be humbly acknowledged, that the catholic church, thus typified in beauty and glory, is not such as we at present behold it, but rather such as it ought to be, such as it is in its capabilities, according to the exemplar formed of it in the divine mind; such however, as it is destined to appear, and certainly will appear hereafter, even upon this earth, when "God shall take to himself his great power and reign," and "his will shall be done on earth, as it is in heaven." Let us not then for the present tarnish the beauty and glory of the representation, by turning our attention, when it is not so directed, to the actual state of the subject. In some of its congregati ons, and in many of its individual members, the church yet wears an aspect not unanswerable to the pure candlestick, with its vivid, steady, and undecaying lights. In these let us take complacency, let us rejoice and exult. Besides, the redeemer yet continues to separate those seven into the hands of his ministers, by their agency collecting new congregations of believers to shine with living lustre as lamps of the candlestick, shedding its light farther and farther into the remote and dark corners of the earth. Why it has pleased our founder and prince to proceed thus leisurely in rearing his temple and extending his sceptre, is not for us to know. It is one

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of the deep things of God, who represses all anxious enquiries into the mysterious subject, by involving it in the majestic obscurity of his unrevealed will. "He will have mercy on whom he will have mercy." Let us, who are the objects of that mercy, not fail or slacken in our endeavours to diffuse abroad the light of our candlestick, among the nations, that still "sit in darkness and in the shadow of death," committing and commending, at the same time, our efforts to the supreme disposer in the submission of faith, and rejoicing in the conscious satisfaction, that we have long since been accustomed to receive the sacred golden oil from the two sons of oil, “by hands and instruments duly subordinated to the power of his spirit."

In the fifth part of the vision we have seen the catholic church founded and built up in Jesus Christ, protected, directed, and governed by his providence, sustained and nourished by his truth, animated, illuminated, and sanctified by his spirit, shining in the beauty of holiness as the light of the world. Such it is in a state of perfection, by virtue of its institution. But the part of the vision now before us presents a far different scene, and plainly indicates, that in the course of its history many of its essential characteristics would disappear, and that the proper fruits of a true faith, kept whole and undefiled in such a virtuous and godly course of life, as might be expected among the members of a community so constituted, maintained, disciplined, and regulated, would not be actually or generally produced and brought to maturity. This

warning was necessary to prevent surprise and to repel the argument, that might else be drawn against religion, from the misconduct of its professors. Nor was it less kind than necessary, for in this part of the vision christians are awfully reminded, that the promises and blessings of God are conditional; that notwithstanding the state of favour and acceptance with God, in which they are placed, the nature of sin and disobedience is not changed with respect to them; that they have received no licence to transgress the divine law; and that the justice of the Almighty will not overlook iniquity, nor his vengeance cease to follow it.

The view here opened of the sixth part of the vision is widely different from that, which has hitherto been taken of it by former commentators and expositors. After ascribing to the candlestick and its accompaniments in the fifth part an evangelical signification, more or less agreeable to the exposition above given of them, they suppose the prophet, in the progress of his vision, to fly off from christian times and subjects, and to revert to the days of Zerubbabel and Joshua, threatening the Jewish people, either immediately on account of present sins, or prospectively in order to prevent future ones, with a repetition of their past woes or with still deeper destruction.