Weekly expositor. (Brockway Centre, Mich.) 1882-1894, 1891-11-13

| RrcaJeSJ mlSSlOndry the WOTlu ever saw
or ever will see. Paul landed there
and that was enough to make 10
famous while the world stands and
famous in heaven when the world has
become a charred wreck.
This island has had a wonderful his
tory. With 5000 knights of st. John,
it at one time stood out against 200, 900
warriors under "Solyman the Magnifi-
cent" The city had 5000 statues, and
a statue to Apollo called Colossus,
which has always since been con-
sidered one of the seven wonders of
the world. 1t was twelve years in
building and was seventy cubits high,
and had winding stairs to the
top. 1t stood tifty-slX years and then
was Frustrated by an earthquake.
After lying in ruins for 900 years, it
was purchased to be converted to other
purposes, and the metal, weighing 720,-
600 pounds, was put on 900 camels and
carried away. We were not permitted
to go ashore, but the lights all up and
down the hills show where the city
stands and nine boats come out to
take freight and to bring three passen-
gers
But there is one island that long to
see more than any other. ] can afford
to miss the princes among the islands,
but | must see the king of the archi-
pelago. The one longed to see is not
| so many miles in circumference as
| Cyprus or Crete or Paros or Naxos or
Scio or Mitylene, but had rather, in
this sail through the Grecian archi-
pelago, see that than all the others;
| for more of the glories OF heaven
| landed there than on all the islands
and continents since the world stood.
AS we come toward it feel my pulses
| quicken. az, John, was in the island
that is called Patmos." 1t Is a pile
of rocks twenty eight miles in cir
cumference. A few Expresses and in
ferior olives pump living out of the
earth and one palm tree spreads its
| foliage. But the barrenness ana gloom
and loneliness of the island made it a
prison for the banished evangelist.
! Domitian could not stand his ministry
and one day, under armed guard, that
minister of the gospel stepped from a
tossing boat to these dismal rocks,
and walked up to the dismal
cavern which was to be
his home, and the place
where should pass before him all the
conflicts of coming time and all the
raptures of coming eternity. Is it
not remarkable that nearly all the
great revelations of music and poetry
| have been made to men in Punishment
| Homer and Milton banished into
blindness; Beethoven banished into
deafness; Dante writing his "Divina
Commedia" during the nineteen years
of Punishment from his native
land; Victor Hugo writing his
LES Miserables" exiled from home
and country on the island of Guernsey
and the brightest visions of the future
have been given to those who by sick
ness or sorrow were eXiled from the
outer world into rooms of suffering.
Only those who have been imprisoned
| by very hard surroundings have had
| great revelations made TO them. So
Patmos, wild, chill and bleak and
terrible was the best island in all the
archipelago, the best place in all the
earth for divine revelations.
Turu down all the lights that we may
better see it. The panorama passes,
and To- the conquering Christ, robed,
| girdled. armed, the flash of golden
candlestlcks and seven stars in his
| right hand, candlesticks and stars
meaning light held up, and light scat
tered. And there passes a. throne and
| Christ on it, and the seals broken. and
| the woes sounded, and dragon sam,
and seven last plaques swoop, and
seven walls are poured out, and the
| vision vanishes. And we halt a mo-
ment to rest from the exciting spec
tacle Again the panorama moves on
before the cavern of Patmos, and John
| the exile sees a great city represent
ing all denominations, Babylon tow
| cred, palaced. tempted, foun-
tanned, foliaged, sculptured, hang
ing-gardens, suddenly going crash!
crash! and the pipers cease to pipe,
and the trumpets cease to trumpet,
and the dust and the smoke and the
horror fill the canvas, while from
above and beneath the voices announc-
ing Babylon is fallen, Is fallen" And
we halt again to rest from the specta-
Gle. Again the panorma passes before
the cavern of Patmos, and John the
exile sees mounted Christ on a snow
white charger leading forth the cav
airy of heaven, the long line of white
chargers galloping through the scene,
the Gathering of hoofs, the blinking of
bride bits, and the fash of spears,
| all the earth conquered and all heaven
In Doxology. And we halt again to
rest from the spectacle. Again the
panorama passes before the cavern Of
Patmos, and John the exile sees great
thrones lifted, thrones of martyrs,
thrones of apostles, thrones of
prophets, thrones of patriarchs, and a
throne higher than all on which Jesus
sits, and ponderous books are opened,
their leaves turned over, revealing the
names of all that have ever lived, the
good and the bad, the renowned and
the humble, the mighty and the weak,
and at the turn OF every
leaf the universe is in rapt-
ure or fright, and the sea emp
ties its sarcophagus of all the dead of
the sunken shipping, and the earth
gives way, and the heavens vanish
Again we rest moment from the
spectacle. The panorama moves on
before the cavern of Patmos, and John
the exile beholds a city of gold, and a
river more beautiful than the Rhine or
the Hudson rolls through it, and fruit
trees bend their burdens on either
bank, and all is surrounded by walls in
which the upholstery of autumnal for
ests, and the sunrises and sunsets of
all the ages and the glory of burning
worlds seem to be commingled. And
the Inhabitants never breathe a sigh,
or utter groan, or discuss difference,
or frOwu n dislike or yyeep n tear