VII. The Witnesses Slain:

Revelation XI 12

Hitherto the Reformation has been described spiritually and ecclesiastically; it is now described politically, the whole being a pledge of that total and more signal overthrow still awaiting the Usurper. What follows marks the further progress and development of the Reformation; and it is given not retrospectively or in explanatory narrative, but in scenic progress as before.

"They heard a great Voice from heaven."

A loud call to the Witnesses from a heaven visible to their enemies. It is said both of their ascent and of themselves after it, " And their enemies beheld them "; therefore it was not the spiritual heaven of the Divine Presence, but, as elsewhere in the Visions, the heaven of political elevation and dignity.

"Come up, hither."

The Voice came from that heaven to which they were to ascend. It was a call to them, from the persons highest for the time being in the lower heaven of political authority, to come up hither; or the call may be regarded as made in God's providence.

"They went up."

The figure of ascent into heaven represents triumph and exaltation.

"In the cloud."

That in which the Covenant Angel had been robed. This was to show that the ascent of the Witnesses, and the attendant circumstances, were the result of this special intervention of Christ; and to identify still more plainly and closely the cause and triumph of the Witnesses with that of the great Protestant Reformation.

"Their enemies beheld them."

This made the triumph more remarkable; their enemies were present on the occasion of the Witnesses' ascension, as they had been before on the occasion of their resurrection. Even more; the result is accomplished in the face of and in spite of those enemies.

The ascent of the Witnesses to the political heaven is accomplished before the termination of their appointed 1260 years of sackcloth prophesying; hence, even after their ascent, they are still in sackcloth.

Political Establishment of Protestantism and the Reformation

Could it be that the Witnesses - so lately warred, against even to extermination by the Popes, and by the secular Powers of Europe at their instigation, rejoiced over when apparently dead, and even after, their resuscitation aimed at by hostile decrees-could ~ be that they should yet be called up to political ascendancy and power, and that with voice audible throughout Europe?

History shows this to have been the fact, within little more than twenty years from the anti-Protestant Decree of Augsburg. God's providence made use of Charles V. the head of the Germanic Empire, that great secular power in which the Popes most trusted the crush the rising heresy, and of various political complications. Scarce two years after the Augsburg Decree, the threatened Turkish invasion under the terrible Sultan Solyman made the reconcilement of the Protestant states necessary for the preservation of Empire.

"The preservation of the Protestants at this juncture is mainly traceable to the Ottoman Turks, 14 in the summer of 1532 swept over the plains of Hungary with 250,000 men, and even climbed into the fastnesses of Styria, where they seem to have shaken for a moment the indomitable herc of Charles V himself In order to enlist the arms of every German province in repelling these inva he opened fresh negotiations with the Protestants, whom he ultimately satisfied by promulgating religious Peace of Nuremberg, July 23, 1532."

Full Toleration Granted

This Decree from the Emperor and the Germanic Diet, the Pacification of Nuren granted full toleration to Protestantism, and put a stop to all suits against Protestants in the Imperial Chamber, until the assembling of a General Council. Henceforth, being only a troublesome religious sect, they came to be viewed as a political body no small importance. It was their first great step, and that on the Imperial call, to poutitical ascendancy.

Rise of Protestant Power

The second great epoch of the rise, of the Protestant Power in Germany dates from the Treaty of Kadan, confirming and enlarging the Pacification of Nuremberg. Then lowed, on August 12, 1542, the Peace of Passau, confirmed at Augsburg in 1555. accorded the fullest toleration to Protestantism, and Protestants equally with Romanists were admitted judges in the supreme Imperial Chamber. It was the fulfillment in actual history of the symbol of the Witnesses ascent into the political heaven, and thi Germany, the country where in God's providence this great revolution began. It speedily followed by their like elevation in other countries.

At the passing of each decree by which Protestants, rose into ascendancy, their enemies were present in the Diets and Councils. As they sat in elevation, in the In Chamber, still their enemies were present, and beheld them face to face. The triu was accomplished in the face of their enemies, and in spite of them.

Witnesses still in Sackcloth

But those were not all true Protestants that zealously professed Protestantism, in England, Holland, or North Germany; nor did the same zeal for the pure Gospel doctrines long continue in any of those countries.

In England, after Eleizabeth, efforts were made by high ecclesiastical authorities to go back to semi Popery, and disfavour was shown to those who held fast to the Gospel. An influx of fanaticism followed, and then, as might be expected, religious lukewarmness and infidelity. The Church of England, by her Scriptural Articles and Formularies, was still a true witness for Christ; but Christ's witnesses were only a compartively smalland often neglected portion of the church and nation.

In Holland, and Protestant Germany there was the same religious deterioration. In other countries of Christiandom there was persecution and oppression of the scattered members of the Witness body. In Italy, Spain, and Portugal they were mercilessly hunted out, destroyed, suppressed by the Inqusition. In Austria toleration was not granted to Protestants till the Imperial Edict of 1783.

In France the Massacre of St. Bartholomew, 1752, showed the feeling of king, nobles, priests, and people toward the Protestants, before Henry IV's accession and the Edict of Nantes. This celebrated Edict, so called from the place of its publication, In 1598, guaranteed the perfect freedom of the Huguenots in matters of religion, and solemnly declared the Edict to be perpetual and irrevocable. Even then it was not always acted on; moreover, it was revoked by Louis XIV, in 1685, and the remnant of Protestants in France were thus put outside the pale of law.

The world forgets these things; so do some of Christ's own people; but He forgets them not.