three measures of barley for a penny; and see thou hurt not the oil and the wine.

This hieroglyphic denotes a famine, which was to happen during this period in the Roman empire, more remarkable for its universality and duration, than on account of the high degree of scarcity of the necessaries of life. See Sam. iv. 7. 8. and chap. v. 10. Bread-grain is truly scarce, when it is no longer measured by measure, but weighed out by balances. Xovi, Chœnix is a measure of about two pounds, the usual allowance in Xerxes's army, and among the Romans of a man per day; and nvágiov, a penny, was the usual hire of a labourer for a day. A man's daily wages then, would only buy himself bread, without any thing to eat with it, or any surplus for his family, or even for his own clothing. This scarcity would have fallen on the superfluities also, such as oil and wine, but the voice of Christ from the midst of the four Beings of life, limited it to the most necessary articles of subsistence.

Those historians, who have given us the lives of the emperors, and the particulars of their reign in detail, during this period, bear witness to such a famine in the Roman empire. It began during the last years of the reign of Antonine the philosopher, and lasted to the first years of the emperor Severus. There were alternately throughout the whole Roman empire sterility of crops, inundations, great droughts, barrenness of soil, immense exportations of grain, foraging during the many intestine wars, earthquakes, burning of towns, unnatural meteors and eclipses. Tertullian says, that during the reign of Antonine, each town and city in the empire had suffered a famine, and that the heavy rains, which had been the cause of it, were so numerous, as to threaten the world with a second deluge. The emperor, who had sold his precious furniture to prosecute the war, made the people great donations, out of his own private purse. During the reign of the empe ror Commodus, says Echart in his Roman History, the

Tiber inundated a great part of the city of Rome, upon which followed a great famine, earthquakes, and infection of the air, by bloodless animalcules and insects. The scarcity ran so high, that the people in a violent commotion killed Cleander, the emperor's favourite. Severus at last made it a principal object, to supply their wants by importations from other countries. There neither was before nor after this period, a famine so general and of such long duration, as this had been.

And here I would answer an objection, which perhaps some of my readers are ready to make. They wish to read of more all-important events, as the completion of these seals, than what are here actually treated of. To this I answer: 1. When the Lord judges it necessary to comfort and strengthen his Church in any certain period by prophecy, he can only make choice of such events as according to his Divine prescience of things, actually take place during that time. The events themselves are not the principal objects to the Church, however great or small their influence on her prosperity may be; but the accomplishment of a divine prediction in those occurrences. This is what constitutes them prophecies-memorials and pledges of the Lord to his people. 2. These events are sufficiently important to the Church. The Christians were citizens of the Roman empire, and their lives and sublunary happiness were largely involved in its fate. By these prophecies they were informed of the extent of these calamities, which might diminish unnecessary fear, excite them either to fly from dangér, where it was proper, or prepare to meet it in a becoming manner. 3. The Church of Christ in those days was as yet a young and tender infant, which, especially during the time of the bloody persecutions by the Romans, required perpetual aid and refreshment. The Lord, therefore, in each period gave her pledges of his favour and assistance, that she might continue faithful, and rise superior to the power of her ene

mies.

IV. SEAL ACCOMPLISHED FROM A. D. 222-To 272.

Verse 7. And when he had opened the fourth seal, I heard the voice of the fourth beast say, come

and see.

8. And I looked, and behold a pale horse; and his name that sat on him was death, and hell followed with him and power was given unto them over the fourth part of the earth, to kill with sword, and with hunger, and with death, and with the beasts of the earth.

The name of this rider fully corresponds with the colour of his horse. According to the same rule we may admit, that the rider on the white horse was victory; the rider on the red horse war; the rider on the black horse famine; and because all the judgments of God under the foregoing seals still continued, and here received new strength, this rider is emphatically called death. The holy seer beheld his frightful appearance, as he passed the theatre of visions before the throne of God. The colour of his horse was zawgós, pale, a mixture of green and yellow, like faded, putrescent grass. ads as well as scheol, hell, signifies a spacious open gulf, or large cave under the earth. The ancients, who had more intercourse with the world of spirits than we, believed Hades to be a great solitary desert, into which all separate spirits are collected, before the determination of their final destiny. Isa. xiv. 1 Sam. xxviii. Death heré denotes sudden death, as by pestilence, putrid fevers and other epidemics.

The sword, hunger, death and beasts are the four sore judgments of God, by which he punishes the opposition of diabolical nations. Ezek. xiv. 21. Lev. xxvi. 16. Jer. xxiv. 10. Ezek. vi. 12. They all raged dreadfully dur ing this period in the Roman empire. giupaía not only signifies sword, but a broad sword, a glave, as used in

A a

slaughter-houses, and indicates a most wanton and profuse shedding of human blood.

The Roman empire had suffered greatly by the repeated shocks of judgments under the former seals, but those inflicted under this seal, brought it almost to the brink of ruin. The whole empire was thrown into dreadful confusion by the mismanagement of many weak and incompetent emperors, and the imprudence of governors in the provinces. The soldiery lost all discipline and spirit of subordination-They murdered good emperors and publicly sold the empire to the highest bidder, as one would expose a commodity for money. Hence, without divination we may judge of their government, and the sufferings of the people. The emperor Maximinus killed more than 4,000 men, without any charge or judicial process against them. Gallienus, that cruel tyrant, depopulated many cities and towns by his barbarities, and daily exterminated three or four thousand of his soldiers, because he had discovered their intentions of creating a new emperor. During his reign thirty tyrants arose, who divided the empire between them, and whose extirpation caused streams of blood. In less than fifty years, more than twenty emperors died violent deaths, and the Roman empire was almost destroyed. Probus killed in different battles 400,000 Germans, besides what he lost himself; Decius 30,000 Goths; Claudius destroyed in different engagements 300,000 of the same people; and that cruel wretch, Maximinus, desolated Germany, with fire and sword to the distance of four hundred miles.

The Roman empire was most grievously afflicted by famine, A. D. 248, which was followed A. D. 250, by a pestilence of cruel and general rage. It began in Ethiopia, pervaded the East and every part of the Roman empire, and lasted fifteen years. There were times, when 5,000 died in one day within the city of Rome, and its course was no less fatal throughout the whole empire, in propor

tion to their number of population. Perhaps there never was its equal in extent and duration.

This period is also marked, by five general persecutions of the Christians, in which many thousands perished by being thrown before wild beasts, and by the savage cruelties of the Roman emperors, governors and magistrates. These judgments swept away according to this prophecy, the fourth part of the earth: that is, the fourth part of the citizens of the Roman empire, during this period, did not die natural deaths-which is by no means improbable. These judgments befel the Church as well as the state, and fully express the import of the images under this seal.

V. SEAL ACCOMPLISHED FROM A. D. 272–TO 322.

Verse 9. And when he had opened the fifth seal, I saw under the altar the souls of them that were slain

for the word of God, and for the testimony which they held :

10. And they cried with a loud voice, saying, How long, O Lord, holy and true, dost thou not judge and avenge our blood on them that dwell on the earth?

11. And white robes were given unto every one of

them; and it was said unto them, that they should rest yet for a little season, until their fellow servants also, and their brethren, that should be killed as they were, should be fulfilled.

The four first seals stand peculiarly connected among themselves by the internal order of this book of prophecy. At the opening of each of them, the hieroglyphic representation of their contents is introduced by one of those four