thirteenth verse, what followed on the earth: and the change in all this is very important. The Church’s estimate of it in heaven, too, is—“the accuser of our brethren;” the consequence of which was trial[1] and persecution upon earth; they loved not their lives unto death, overcoming him by the blood of the Lamb, and the word of their testimony—a time then of saints’ suffering, and Satan having his place in heaven, in authority and power, and deceiving the whole world; from which this victory of Michael and his angels casts him down. I apply here the same principle of providential working and manifestation in crisis as throughout; and I mention it here only particularly, and its application, because, by modern interpreters, entirely rejected. It is not his influence in the Church that is here in question,[2] but his power in the rule of the world, however that might act on the Church. The argument, then, that mischief might accrue to the Church by the ceasing of Satan’s open power in the world, be-
- ↑ I suspect it will be found that while the suffering may be most blessed and glorious for righteousness’, or Christ’s sake, it is, nevertheless, always used by the Lord for the correction of some secret or manifest evil in the individual, or, at least, in the Church.
- ↑ i.e. referring the passage to the protracted period.
