4. _Commentary on the Revelator's Vision of the Restoration_. It is instructive to inquire into the interpretation given by biblical students to the prophecy voiced by John the Revelator predicting the advent of the angel "having the everlasting gospel." Dr. Clarke offers the following reflections on the passage: "_And I saw another angel fly in the midst of heaven, having the everlasting gospel_: Whether this angel means any more than a particular dispensation of providence and grace, by which the gospel shall be rapidly sent through the whole world; or whether it means any especial messenger, order of preachers, people, or society of Christians, whose professed object it is to send the gospel of the kingdom throughout the earth, we know not. But the vision seems truly descriptive of a late institution, entitled 'The British and Foreign Bible Society,' whose object it is to print and circulate the scriptures of the Old and New Testaments through all the habitable world, and in all the languages spoken on the face of the earth."--(Clarke, "Bible Commentary," Rev. 14:6.) The learned commentator is to be commended for his frank avowal as to uncertainty regarding the precise interpretation of this scripture, and for the provisional and tentative manner in which he indicates a possible application to the wide distribution of the Holy Bible through the efforts of a most worthy and influential society. It is to be noted that Dr. Clarke wrote his famous commentary on the Bible shortly before the actual restoration of the gospel through angelic agency which resulted in the establishment of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Of necessity his search for the fulfillment of the prediction was unsatisfactory, and, indeed, unsuccessful, inasmuch as the fulfillment had not then occurred. The commendable work of the Bible Society was a preparation for the fulfillment of the momentous prophecy, but not the fulfillment itself.