REVELATION lenging until the retreat is sounded in the evening. REVELATION, the act of revealing, disclosing, or making known that which is secret, private, or unknown; disclo- sure. Specifically, the act of revealing or communicating divine truth. Also that which is revealed, disclosed, or made known; specifically, the Bible. REVELATION OF ST. JOHN, the last book of the New Testament, and the only distinctively prophetic one given to fling back the veil which hides futu- rity from the view. Its writer was John (i. 4, xxii: 8), the servant of God (i: 1), the "brother" and "companion in tribu- lation" of the then persecuted Christians, himself an exile in Patmos, "for the word of God and for the testimony of Jesus Christ" (i: 9). It was there he saw the prophetic visions, narrating them after he left the island. The ma- jority of the Fathers and the Church of the Middle Ages considered, as do most modern Christians, that the author was John the Apostle; though Dionysius of Alexandria, and some others among the ancients, believed him to have been a certain John the Presbyter (mentioned by Papias, Dionysius, Eusebius, and Jer- ome), whose tomb, like that of the apos- tle, was said to be at Ephesus. Among those who accept the apostolic author- ship of the work, two views are current as to its date. The prevailing one is, that the visions in Patmos were seen in A. D. 96, and the work penned in that year or in 97, the reigning emperor being Domitian. The other view is, that it was penned about A. D. 68 or 69. Ch. xvii: 10 is interpreted to mean that five Roman emperors had reigned and died, viz., Augustus, Tiberius, Caligula, Clau- dius, Nero, "one is," i. e., Galba or if Julius Caesar be considered the 1st em- peror, then the "one" is Nero. Respect- ing the canonicity of this book, it was alluded to or quoted in Hermas, Papias, Melito, Justin Martyr, the fragment pub- lished by Muratori, Theophilus, of An- tioch, Apollonius of Ephesus, Irenaeus, Hippolytus, Tertullian, Clement of Alex- andria, Origen, Jerome, etc. It was not in the Old Syrian version, though some Greeks accepted it. The Corinthians, Caius of Rome, and others rejected it. Luther, Carlstadt, and Zwingli spoke of it disparagingly, but it is accepted by the Churches of the Reformation as well as by the Roman Church. Three schemes of interpretation exist: The Preterist, which makes the events pre- dicted now wholly passed; the Futurist, which regards them as future, and that of a third and numerous school, who regard the visions as an historical or con- REVENUE CUTTER SERVICE tinuous prediction of the whole history of the Church from apostolic times to the consummation of all things. REVELS, MASTER OF THE, an Eng- lish officer in former times appointed to superintend the revels or amusements, consisting of dancing, masking, etc., in the courts of princes, the inns of court, and noblemen's houses, during the 12 Christmas holidays. He was a court official from the time of Henry VIII. to that of George III. REVENUE, the income of a nation derived from taxes, duties, and other sources, for public uses. See articles on the different countries. REVENUE CUTTER, a small armed steam vessel, designed for the prevention of smuggling; so called from the fact that originally the vessel was of the cutter-yacht type. REVENUE CUTTER SERVICE, UNITED STATES, a military service organized in 1790 by Congress to en- force the navigation and customs laws. The United States navy had not at that date been established and the service was made a branch of the Treasury as it is today. The service, consisting at first of ten small vessels, was gradually added to and became the nucleus of a navy. Congress in 1799 authorized the President to employ it to defend the seacoast and repel hostility to vessels and commerce within their jurisdiction. The development was necessary, for American foreign commerce meant in those days a corresponding growth in shipping with a corresponding liability to collision with foreign interest. From 1843 onward vessels driven by steam gradually replaced the old sailing ves- sels. The necessity for the service was shown almost from the year of its or- ganization. The War of the Revolution had been fought almost wholly on land and its success had turned American eyes away from the requirements of a naval arm. Very speedily, however, the cutters justified their existence. They had repeated clashes with the British and French forces and upheld the dig- nity of the United States. In 1812 it made foreign invasion impossible and helped in transporting troops in the Nullification troubles of 1832-33 and the Seminole War of 1836. In the Civil War the cutters pursued blockade runners, carried dispatches, and joined in at- tacks on Southern forts. During the Spanish War the service showed itself a most efficient arm of the navy, con- tributing 20 vessels and nearly a hun- dred guns to the forces. During the
