His descent from heaven, the cloud, the rainbow, the sun-like face, and the fire-like feet of the Mighty Messenger, attest the heaven-inspired origin of his utterances. His "eyes as a flame of fire, and his feet like unto fine brass, as if they burned in a furnace," would not be given to one who came to announce other than heaven-inspired truths.
The _open book_ in the hand of the angel, fixes the chronology of the fulfilment of this vision at an epoch when the Scriptures cease to be a closed and sealed book, and the people are permitted to have free access to them.
His _position_--one foot resting on the sea, and one on the land--attests the universality of the movement which is to date from that epoch.
His lion voice, must symbolize the manner in which would be announced the great truths, at which the whole world would be startled.
The _singleness_ of his cry, is also symbolic of the simplicity of the truth, which is never symbolized by discordant multitudinous sounds.
The _responsive thunders_, unlike the single voice of the angel, are multitudinous and discordant; and consequently symbolize errors. Their _following_ so immediately on the shout of the angel, shows the proximity of their promulgation to the utterance of the truths to which they are responsive.
JOHN'S _readiness to write_ what the seven thunders uttered, shows that what they uttered was _professedly_ in harmony with the truths previously announced, and that men would be liable to be deceived, by their promulgation.
His being _forbidden_ by the cloud-robed angel, to write what they uttered--while he was commanded to "seal not the sayings of the prophecy of this book" (22:10),--shows that their utterances were not heaven-inspired, and constituted no part of "the word of GOD, and of the testimony of JESUS CHRIST," which JOHN bare record of.
The _subsequent oath_ of the angel, by Him who liveth forever, that "the time is not yet," shows that those thunders, however erroneous in their form manner and connection with other errors, had respect to some great event foretold in Scripture; but which the thunders had _antedated_ and presented in an _unscriptural_ form.
His further announcement that it would be fulfilled under the sounding of the "seventh trumpet," and that then the mystery of GOD should be finished in the manner foretold to his servants the prophets, shows that the great event, the time of which was "not yet,"--_i.e._, under the sixth trumpet, was the coming of the kingdom of GOD--the fifth universal empire; that at a period anterior to the time when it might rationally be expected, it would be proclaimed in a form repugnant to the teachings of the prophets; and that when thus heralded, it would be met by the party uttering the heaven-inspired truths, with the denial that the time had arrived, and by arguments to show its true nature and epoch, under the seventh trumpet.