during the whole time mentioned above. The command to John from the
Angel, is to be understood as from the Lord Jesus, Zion's only king to
the gospel ministry. Long before the time of the transactions here
predicted, the apostle John had gone the way of all the earth. The work
here enjoined was to be performed by his legitimate successors.

The reed is the symbol of the word of God. It is of the same import as
Zechariah's "measuring line." (ch. ii. 1,) and to be used for the same
purpose--"to measure Jerusalem," the temple; for both are emblematical
of the church of God. The "temple, altar and worshippers," are emblems
of the church, her doctrines, worship and membership, tried by the
Scriptures--the "reed." There are Gentiles who worship in the outer
court, treading under foot both it and the city. These are formal,
immoral, idolatrous professors of Christianity. They are rejected by God
as reprobate, and by his command to be "cast out" from the fellowship of
his people,--authoritatively excommunicated by those to whom Jesus
Christ has given the key of discipline.

Here then, at the disclosing of the contents of the little open book, it
is manifest that John goes back from the sixth trumpet in the
seventeenth century, when the Eastern section of the Roman empire was
subverted, by the Othmans, and gives us another view of society in
Christendom cotemporaneously with the trumpets. It follows necessarily
that the little book does not rank, as some imagine, under any one
trumpet; much less does it comprehend all the remaining chapters of the
Apocalypse, as others vainly suppose. This matter will receive
increasing confirmation as we advance.

Those who worship within the temple and those who worship without, are
evidently distinguished from each other. They differ in character tested