ions than any other prophet, and was more in the ecstatic state. And it must be borne in mind that John wrote in the very midst of his awful visions. Had years elapsed before he wrote them down, the style and language would perhaps have been different.

But notwithstanding the difference of style between the Apocalypse and the Gospel and Epistles of John, we shall find upon a close scrutiny of the Apocalypse a great deal that is decidedly Johannean, and which may, after all, render the apostolic origin of the book highly probable from internal evidence. The verb vukav,* to conquer, to overcome, occurs in the Apocalypse sixteen times; in the first Epistle of John six times; in the Gospel of John once; in all the rest of the New Testament but four times. This is remarkable. The word duvíov, lamb, occurs twenty-eight times in the Apocalypse; it is found once in John's Gospel, and nowhere else; but the word duvós, lamb, occurs twice in John's Gospel, and twice in all the rest of the New Testament, and one of these is a quotation from the Old Testament which the Ethiopian Eunuch was reading. Maprvpía, testimony, occurs fourteen times in John's Gospel, eight times in his epistles, and nine times in the Apocalypse; in all the rest of the New Testament seven times. The verb dupãv, to thirst, is used in a spiritual sense, once in Matthew's Gospel, three times in John's Gospel, and twice in the Apocalypse. In a physical sense, but twice in all the epistles. Compare John vii, 37, "If any man thirst, let him come unto me and drink," with Rev. xxii, 17: "And let him that is athirst come and take the water of life freely." There is no other passage in the New Testament like these two. Compare the following passage, in which the author of the Apocalypse speaks of himself, "Who bare record of the word of God, and of the testimony of Jesus Christ," etc., i, 2, with John xxi, 24, where the author also speaks of himself: "This is the disciple which testifieth of these things and wrote these things." "And he was clothed with a garment dipped in blood, and his name is called, The Word of God." Christ is nowhere in the New Testament called the Word of God, except in the writings of John. In Hebrews iv, 12, "For the word of God is quick and powerful," etc., the reference is not

*In this examination we use the Greek Concordance of Schmid.

to the personal word Christ, but to divine truth in its allsearching power.

any man hear him, and will With this comkeep my words:

(6 Behold I stand at the door and knock: if my voice and open the door, I will come in to sup with him, and he with me." Rev. iii, 20. pare John xiv, 24: "If a man love me, he will and my father will love him, and we will come unto him and make our abode with him." "Unto him that loved us and washed us from our sins in his own blood." Rev. i, 5. There is no passage in the New Testament that so strikingly resembles this as 1 John i, 7: "The blood of Jesus Christ his son cleanseth us from all sin."

Nor can it be urged with any force against the apostolic origin of the Apocalypse that its tone is not of that mild type which we should expect from the loving John who dwells in the Gospel so much upon the love of Christ, rarely upon his sterner attributes. The occasion of his writing was different. In the Gospel he discusses the profound internal relations existing between Christ and his Father and between Christ and his followers. All the discourses of our Lord that bear upon this subject he gives in their fullness. These were the rays of divine truth that he perfectly reflected, while the other evangelists reflected different rays.

When John wrote the Apocalypse it was a time of bitter persecution. The world in its most destructive form was arrayed against Christianity. The sword was drawn against it. To meet this terrible enemy, Christ is represented as a mighty conqueror, before whom every foe is prostrated and the power of the world brought to naught. Nor let it be said that this last description of Christ's character is inconsistent with the first, nor that John in these different circumstances is inconsistent with himself; for souls the most amiable and the most loving are frequently the most severe when once aroused. The divine goodness itself when it has been repeatedly spurned becomes implacable; and our Saviour in the very midst of discourses full of benevolence and goodness declares, "Upon whomsoever this stone [himself] shall fall, it will grind him to powder." Is there anything at variance with John's character in the terrible descriptions of the divine judgments which he gives in the Apocalypse? In the Gospel of John it is said: "The

hour is coming, in the which all that are in the graves shall hear his voice and shall come forth: they that have done good, unto the resurrection of life; and they that have done evil, unto the resurrection of damnation." v, 28, 29.

But if the addresses to the seven Churches are the real words of Christ, if the visions are not the offspring of John's imagination, then we should expect in the Apocalypse a different presentation of divine truth from what John himself might have given. Very different was the case when he wrote the Gospel; from the multitude of Christ's discourses and acts he could select those that best suited his taste, and fill up what had been left incomplete in Christ's character by the other evangelists. In the Apocalypse he delivers all the messages to the Churches; he is ordered to write what he sees. But little room is here left for the display of his subjectivity..

In conclusion, who but an apostle could have written the sublime book? We cannot suppose that the presbyter John was capable of it. John the apostle, if we are to judge from the Gospel he wrote, was competent to the task. His appreciation and appropriation of the profound discourses of Christ shows his mental power. Minds that make use of symbols and imagery are often incapable of deep and philosophical reflection; but profound intellects can, if they wish, employ bold imagery and striking symbols.

ART. V.-THE GREAT ELECTION.

THE greatest battle ever fought among men was waged in this country, in the Presidential contest of eighteen hundred and sixty-four. Over millions of square miles the combatants contended. Three thousand miles, from ocean to ocean, the line of battle stretched. Three millions of soldiers were in the field. The gage of battle was equally grand. Not only the life of a nation, but the life of humanity, hung trembling in the balance of the hour. Milton's imagination is of the sublimest order; yet his description of the war in heaven excels not the plain statements of the actual events that have transpired in America to-day. Were he living at this hour and in this land,

in his moments of repose from the duties to which his patriot soul would devote itself, his pen would revel in the grandeur of the scenes that have moved forward under our half-apprehensive eyes. It will assume its place in history as one of the last turning points, may we hope, in that divine highway which is being cast up among men, and which ends in the "Shining table-lands

To which our God himself is moon and sun."

To the consideration of its character and consequences this paper is devoted.

I. Its importance will be the more clearly recognized by contrasting it with its predecessor-the election of eighteen hundred and sixty. In every respect will it be found greatly superior.

1. It is superior in the circumstances under which they were fought. Then the land was in apparent peace. Quiet possessed its borders. No tramp of armed men resounded through our streets. No cannon shook the skies. No groans of wounded multitudes made the heavens mourn. No maimed thousands

limped about our doors. No weeds of hopeless sorrow shadowed the souls of mothers, wives, and children, "grieving over the unreturning brave." No dreams of war, horrid war, affrighted men's hearts. Here and there a fevered vision might fancy it discerned it. Here and there, possibly, a clearer eye did behold it. But none imagined that it would assume such a fearful magnitude. The wildest dreamer did not so fill the land with blood. Among peaceful fields from the Rio Grande to the St. Johns, the discussion went forward and the decision was made. Shotless cannon announced the victory, and tearless eyes overflowed with joy.

This battle was fought in the midst of gloom and anguish. Blood, and fire, and vapor of cannon-smoke filled all the air. Hundreds of thousands of our bravest and best had entered

untimely graves. Hundreds of thousands breathed painful breath, eating the bread of affliction in Southern prisons, lying torn and shattered on the nation's couches, or wandering among us, with riven frames and pallid faces, fragments of their then vigorous and manly selves. Crape covered many a heart that then was bright with bridal bloom. Children cried for fathers whose bones unburied looked up to the pitying and

avenging eyes of God. Mothers by scores of thousands had become Naomis and Rachels. Wives by tens of thousands were going down in sorrow to the grave. What a land! lamentation and mourning, the screaming ball and the wailing household joining in doleful miserere. Starvation over hundreds of miles that then flourished in plenty; and worse than all, brothers aiming the rifle at each others' hearts that then were dwelling together in unity.

Can we say that an election proceeding under such circumstances is superior to its peaceful predecessor? Yes, even in these very elements is it superior. Look beneath the calm exterior of the former campaign. Over all that vast domain where now war rolls its bloody surges rested the gloom of hell. Millions of delicate women wrought daily in the field without reward except the lash of the master, and were nightly scourged to most horrible service. Millions of men were subject to like unmitigated toil, and to hardly less agony unutterable as they were compelled helplessly to behold their dearest selves the dreadful victims of their oppressors' lust. Everywhere the auction-block was mounted by Christians, while demons in human guise discussed their points as they would those of beasts, but with a ferocity of passion such as no legitimate and lower merchandise awakens. The husband and wife, whom God had joined together, man rent asunder. The babe was torn from its mother's breast. The saintly maiden was cast into the lecherous clutch of a fiendish buyer; and all this was sanctioned by the professed Church of Jesus Christ. Deacons, vestrymen, and class-leaders, ministers and bishops, vied with the rumseller, the gambler, and the avowed libertine in this traffic of hell. Not of the Father's house, but of the Father's sons and daughters, did they make merchandise. All Churches ran together to see which should soonest reach this goal of Satan. They all alike threw off the impediments of Northern conscience and communion that they might the more easily surpass their rivals in their diabolic race. Bishop Polk and Bishop Pierce, Dr. Palmer and Dr. Manly led their several hosts down the steep places of sin into this gulf of perdition. They yet retained the form and likeness of sacramental hosts of God's elect, though with no divine presence within them and only divine justice overhanging them. As we saw their