and SAVIOUR, JESUS CHRIST, and, his APOSTLES, &c. 313 were not fufficient to convince this cruel emperor, or abate hisfury : he ordered St. John to be tranfported to a difconfolate, ifland in the Archipelago, called Patmos, where he continued feveral years inftrufl- ing the poor inhabitants in the knowledge of the Chriftian faith ; and here, about the end ofDomitian's reign, he wrote his book of Revelation, exhibiting, by vifions and prophetical reprefentations, the fiate and condition of Chriftianity in the future pe- riods and ages of the church, till the final confummation of all things. After the deathof Domitian, and on the fucceffion ofNerva, who repealed all the odious aas of his predeceffor, and by public ediéls recalled thofe whom the fury of Domitian had banifhed, St. John re- turned to Afia, and fixed his feat again at Ephefus ; the rather, becaufe the people of that city had lately martyred Timothy their bifhop. Here, with the áfftftance of fevers other bifliops, he took upon himfelf the government of the large diocefe ofAfia Minor, erected oratories, and difpofed of the clergy in the heft manner that the cir- cumfiances of thofe times would permit, fpending his time in an indefatigable exe- cution of his charge, travelling from eaft to weft to inftrufl the world in the prin- ciples of the holy religion he was fent to propagate. In this manner St. John con- tinued to labour in thevineyard ofhis great Mailer, till death put a period to all his toils and fufferings ; which happened in the beginning of Trajan's reign, in the ninety-eighth year of his age, and he was buried near Ephefus, according to Eu- febius. This great evangelift and apoftle feems always to have led a fingle life ; though force of the ancients tell us he was a mar- ried man. 'With regard to his natural temper, he feemsto have been of an eager and refolute difpofition, eafily inflamed, but which age had reduced to a calmer temper. He was polifhed by no fludy or arts of learning; but what was wanting from hu- man art, was abundantly fupplied by the No. 27. excellent conflitutionofhis mind, and that fulnefs of divine grace with which he was adorned: his humility was admirable, ftu- dioufly concealing his own honour; for in his epiftles, he never Ryles himfelf either apofile or evangelift ; the title of prefbyter or elder, is all he aflumes, and probably in regard to his age as much as his office. In his gofpel, when he fpeaks of the dif-. ripie when Jefus loved, he conflantly con- ceals his own name, leaving the reader to difcover whom he meant : love and charity he prailifed himfelf, and affectionately preffed them upon others ; the great love of his Saviour towards him, feems to have infpired his foul with a larger and more generous- charity than the refl. This is the great vein that runs through all his writings, efpecially his epiftles, where he urges it as the great and peculiar law of Chriftianity, and without which all other pretences to the religion of the holyJesus are vain and frivolous, ufelefs and infigni- ficant : and this was his confiant praflice to the very hour of his diffolution ; for when age and the decays of nature had rendered him fo weak that he was unable to preach to the people any longer, he was conflantly led, at every public meeting, to the church at Ephefus, and always re- peated to them the fame precept, Little children, love one another: and when his hearers, wearied with the confiant repeti- tion of the fame thing, afked him why he never varied his difcourfe, he ánfwered, " Becaufe to love one another was the com- mand of our bleffed Saviour, and if they did nothing more, this alone was fufficient to denote whole they were, and whom they ferved." The largeft meafures ofhis charity were, however, difplayed in the remarkable care he took to promote the falvation of the fouls of men ; travelling from eafi to well in propagating the principles of that reli- gion he was fent to teach, patiently enduring everytorment, furmounting everydifficulty, and removing every obftacle, to fave the fouls of the human race, free their minds 4 G from
RkJQdWJsaXNoZXIy OTcyMjk=