The interest of this Vision is therefore not only historical. For ourselves it has an abiding doctrinal value. It is a lesson in the method of applying prophecy to the future. How much it is needed we must feel as we remember the readiness of men among ourselves to construct the Church of God upon the lines His own hand drew for our fathers, and to raise again the bulwarks behind which they sufficiently sheltered His shrine. Whether these ancient and sacred defences be dogmas or institutions, we have no right, God tells us, to cramp behind them His powers for the future. And the great men whom He raises to remind us of this, and to prevent by their ministry the timid measurements of the zealous but servile spirits who would confine everything to the exact letter of ancient Scripture—are they any less His angels to us than those ministering spirits whom Zechariah beheld preventing the narrow measures of the poor apprentice of his dream? To the Third Vision there has been appended the only lyrical piece which breaks the prose narrative of the Visions. We have already seen that it is a piece of earlier date. Israel is addressed as still scattered to the four winds of heaven, and still inhabiting Babylon. While in Zechariah’s own oracles and visions Jehovah has returned to Jerusalem, His return according to this piece is still future. There is nothing about the Temple: God’s holy dwelling from which He has roused Himself is Heaven. The piece was probably inserted by Zechariah himself: its lines are broken by what seems to be a piece of prose, in which the prophet asserts his mission, in words he twice uses elsewhere. But this is uncertain. _Ho, ho! Flee from the Land of the North (oracle of Jehovah); For as the four winds have I spread you abroad[819] (oracle of Jehovah). Ho! to Zion escape, thou inhabitress of Babel._[820] _For thus saith Jehovah of Hosts[821] to the nations that plunder you (for he that toucheth you toucheth the apple of His eye), that, lo! I am about to wave My hand over them, and they shall be plunder to their own servants, and ye shall know that Jehovah of Hosts hath sent me._ _Sing out and rejoice, O daughter of Zion; For, lo! I come, and will dwell in thy midst (oracle of Jehovah). And many nations shall join themselves to Jehovah in that day, And shall be to Him[822] a people. And I will dwell in thy midst (And thou shalt know that Jehovah of Hosts hath sent me to thee). And Jehovah will make Judah His heritage, His portion shall be upon holy soil, And make choice once more of Jerusalem. Silence, all flesh, before Jehovah;[823] For He hath roused Himself up from His holy dwelling._ THE FOURTH VISION: THE HIGH PRIEST AND THE SATAN (Chap. iii.).