The Epistle by Jude refers to words, spoken by Apostles before he wrote his epistle (ver. 17), by which he may be conceived to refer particu-larly to the Epistles of Peter, for he alludes to the same facts respecting mockers and apostates: but however this may be, it is generally believed that, excepting the epistles of John, none of the epistles were written so late as his.

It is sufficient to say, respecting these epistles, that having been written after others which I have endeavoured to show contain allusions to the Apocalypse, they must, if my arguments have been well founded, be of a later date than that prophecy.

§14. Of the sealed Book which has been opened by the Apocalypse.

I had occasion in the 11th and 12th sections of this Dissertation to employ an argument drawn from the circumstance of both Paul and John, and I may also add Peter, having spoken very clearly of certain particulars detailed in the prophet Daniel. The sum of the argument may be stated in few words. These particulars were among the things that were closed up and sealed in the Book of Daniel-and they were to remain so sealed up till the time of the end. The ques

tion then is simply this: Whence did these writers derive their knowlege? Certainly not from Daniel himself; for if his book could be thus read and explained, it could not be called a sealed book; and if this be the sealed book spoken of in the Revelations, how came John to weep on the supposition that no one would be found able to open, that is to explain, the book? If, until this was effected by the Lion of the Tribe of Judah, it remained a sealed book to John, how could it be open to Peter and Paul? and not only to them but to the churches, having been explained by Paul to the believers in Thessalonia both orally and by letter; and by Peter to the believers scattered as strangers throughout Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia and Bithynia! What! an open book to such multitudes and yet a closed book to John! Yet this must be the fact, if John did not write the Apocalypse till the year 96 or 97, as some strenuously contend. Nay more strange still; John must have forgotten his former knowlege by the time he wrote his vision; for it is allowed, even by the most strenuous contenders for so late a date, that John's first Epistle was written about the year 80-But the cogency of this reasoning depends on another fact: Was the sealed book which John saw opened in his vision, the book, of the Prophet Daniel? If we attend carefully to

the description which John gives of this book, we shall easily ascertain this point from the character and marks which he has recorded respecting it.

1. The book was written inside and outside. Its being written on the outside, evidently imports, that a part of the writing was visible; that is, the book was already in the possession of the church, and partly intelligible; and if we attend to what passed when the Lamb who was slain, but now liveth, took the book into his hand to open it, we shall discover a part of the writing itself, for it became the subject of the song of those around the throne, "Thou hast made us "unto our GOD Kings and Priests, and we shall reign on the earth." However dark the other parts of the book were, this was one thing which could be plainly read in it, that a time was coming in which the saints shall possess the kingdom; (Dan. vii. 25.) when the rule and dominion and the greatness of the kingdom under the whole heaven shall be given to the people of the saints of the Most High, whose kingdom is an everlasting kingdom (v. 27). Thus it appears that the book from which they took their song was that of the Prophet DANIEL.

2. It was a "sealed book." Here we have a very particular and explicit description by which the book is ascertained to be that of Daniel, be

yond all possibility of cavil. Daniel was commanded to shut up the words and seal the book of his visions. He alone, of all the prophets of God, received such a command; and, of all the books in the hands of the church, his is the only one which we find so shut up and sealed.

3. The book was not only sealed, but “sealed "with seven seals." It could by no means be opened till one qualified to give the interpretation should come and explain it. The seals being seven in number, show how perfectly the meaning was hid, "seven" in Scripture language denoting what is complete and perfect.' But we are not in the present instance left to take such a general signification of the term "seven." As Daniel's was the only sealed book in the hands of the church, so we find that character given to it in no less than four places of that prophet, viz. ch. viii. 26, ch. ix. 24, ch. xii. 4, and again in the latter chapter, at the 9th verse and it is not a little remarkable that the number of times which the vision-the prophet-the words-the book, are shut, closed up, or

The reason for this sense of the term, which is quite common in the Hebrew scriptures, is evidently this: the root, yaw, besides meaning seven, means also to satisfy, to fill, to have enough, to complete ;-hence to do a thing seven times is to do it perfectly.

I

sealed, in these places, amounts exactly to SEVEN,

as follows:

I. "Shut thou up the Vision." (viii, 26.)
II. "

Seventy weeks are determined..... to seal up the Vision.” (ix. 24.)

III. " Seventy weeks are determined..... to seal up..... the Prophet." (ix. 24.)

IV. Shut up the Words..... to the time of the end." (xii. 4).

V. "Seal the Book..... to the time of the end." (xii. 4.)

VI. "The words are closed up.....till the time of the end.” (xii. 9.)

VII. "The words are..... sealed till the time of the end." (xii. 9.)

4. The book was complete: both the inside and outside of the roll or book was covered with writing. So the expression in the original denotes. That is, there was no room left for additions. And it is not a little remarkable that the explanation of this book given by the LION OF THE TRIBE OF JUDAH, shows that it contained a prophecy of the purposes of GOD, respecting his church and the reign of the Messiah, so complete and perfect, that nothing could be added to it. The removal of the seals from the book of Daniel was all that was wanted to put the church in possession of this knowledge.

5. We learn from Daniel himself how long the