2.  Acquaintance with symbolical language, as the only language common to all men since the confusion of tongues.

3.  Familiarity with the typical dispensation, from which most of the symbols are taken. 4.  Freedom from all political bias.

No expositor of the Apocalypse appears to have possessed all these qualifications, however few and simple.  The most learned and judicious interpreters of this book have been divines of Britain and of the United States.

After so many laborers employed in this harvest, the reader may ask,—­What remains to be gleaned?  To this inquiry, it may be sufficient to remind the devout Christian, that as the Apocalypse is the end of the Bible, so “the harvest is the end of the world;” and during the intermediate time “the Lord of the harvest is sending forth laborers.”  Prophecy has engaged the attention and occupied the thoughts of the writer, more or less, for the last thirty years.  He has consulted the views of most of the distinguished and approved interpreters of the book of Revelation; among whom the following are named, viz.:  Mede, Sir Isaac and Bishop Newton, Durham, Fleming, Gill, Whitaker, Kett, Galloway, Faber, Scott, Mason, McLeod; and many others:  from all whose labors, he has derived much instruction; and from all of whom he has been obliged in important points to dissent.

The immediate occasion of this undertaking, was the urgent request of the people of his charge, that the substance of a course of lectures delivered in ordinary Sabbath ministrations, might be put into a more permanent form, for their future edification.

In the early centuries of the Christian era, so wild, enthusiastic and corrupt were the sentiments of some Millenarians, that this book ceased in great measure to be read or studied; and even its divine authority came to be questioned by many learned and pious men.  As the “Dark Ages” of Popery resulted from neglect of the sacred Scriptures in general, so even among the first reformers the Apocalypse was viewed with suspicion as to its claim to inspiration.  It is probable that many of the unlearned will hear with wonder, and doubt the assertion, that even the great reformer Luther rejected the Apocalypse, as being no part of the sacred canon!  The same judgment he formed of the epistle by James!  With characteristic boldness, he wrote as follows:—­“The epistle of James hath nothing evangelical in it.  I do not consider it the writing of an apostle at all....  It ascribes justification to works, in direct contradiction to Paul and all the other sacred writers....  With respect to the Revelation of John, I state what I feel.  For more than one reason, I cannot deem this book either apostolic or prophetical, ... and it is sufficient reason for me not to esteem it highly, that Christ is neither taught nor known in it."[1] Such was the estimation in which that distinguished reformer held two inspired books of the New Testament at the dawn of the Reformation.  How great the increase of scriptural light since his day!