From this first Cause knowledge comes to us through two channels――his deeds and his words. The first of these is accessible to all mankind; for the Gentiles, which have not the law, “show the work of the law written in their hearts, their conscience also bearing witness.” But as that which is constant and habitual soon ceases to attract attention, and the orderly and uniform processes of nature excite less interest and awaken feebler curiosity than the anomalous and occasional, in like manner it is most frequently by calamities, adversities, seeming withdrawals of God’s face that men are brought to reflection, consideration, and obedience. “When thy judgments are in the earth, the inhabitants of the world will learn righteousness.” It is this truth that the vision of the trumpets symbolizes. It signifies the warnings in the field of natural providence which the divine Being gives to men, in order to show the evil and peril of sin and thus draw back their souls from the pit. The second of these channels of knowledge is found in the oracles of God, the Scriptures committed to the chosen people. And these are symbolized in the episode of the “two witnesses,” which forms a part of the trumpet section. The details of the trumpet scenes are not, it must be confessed, easy of interpretation. They seem to be selected from various parts of the Old Testament, and grouped according to some plan not explained to us, suggesting the thought that the interpretation of them is not to be found in any single event, but in some common truth embodied in many events. The conjunction of “hail” with “fire” (viii, 7) is also found in Exodus ix, 24; that of “fire” with “blood” (viii, 7) in Joel ii, 30; while all three of these elements are separately mentioned in many passages. The moving of mountains (viii, 8) is referred to in Psalm xlvi, 2, and Isaiah liv, 10; and a burning mountain in Jeremiah li, 25. “Wormwood” (viii, 11) occurs in Jeremiah ix, 15, and Amos v, 7. The darkening of the heavenly bodies (viii, 12) is found also in Isaiah xiii, 10; Amos viii, 9; and Joel ii, 31. “Locusts” (ix, 3) are mentioned in Exodus x, 4; Nahum iii, 17; Joel i, 4. But the assemblage of the events in the Revelation differs from any other in the Bible. It is more systematically arranged than in the series foretold by our Lord in Matthew xxiv. It differs from the account of the Egyptian plagues of Exodus in omissions, the introduction of new details, and in the fact that the plagues occur in a different order. The hail, for instance, which is the seventh Egyptian plague, is the first of the plagues in the Revelation. All this may be explained by the fact that the plagues of Egypt were confined to that country and were adapted to its local climatic conditions, while the plagues of the Revelation have for their field the world itself, and were intentionally diversified in being fitted to this larger sphere.