ands, there having risen an ecclesiastical hierarchy
destined to "glut itself upon the blood of which heathen Rome had only
tasted." The world was now made the arena for the terrible coursings of
the pale horseman, and the "beasts of the earth" were let loose to fall
with savage fury upon their helpless victims, until millions lost their
lives at the instigation of the apostate Church of Rome. Is it any
wonder that the souls of these martyrs should cry unto God for the
vindication of their righteous blood?

It is said that "white robes were given unto every one of them." By
referring to chap. 3:4; 7:9, 13, 14, it will be seen that "white
garments" and "white robes" are sometimes used as a symbol to describe a
part of the heavenly inheritance. The martyr-spirits, although impatient
at the delay of avenging judgment, received a righteous reward. But the
period of tribulation to the church was not yet over. The cup of
iniquity in the hands of her enemies was not yet full, and they were
told to "rest for a little season, until their fellowservants also, and
their brethren, that should be killed as they were, should be
fulfilled." The account given seems to indicate an important epoch, a
period in which the martyrs had reason to expect the vindication of
their righteous blood, but which, instead, was to be followed by another
great period of persecution. Considering the time of the events already
described in this series of prophecy, we have no difficulty in fixing
the chronology of this event at the dividing-point between the era of
Papal supremacy and the age of Protestantism--or at the Reformation of
the Sixteenth Century. Did severe slaughter and persecution follow the
Reformation? Witness the reign of Mary Tudor, frequently styled "Bloody
Mary." During three years of her reign, 1555 to 1558, two hundred and
eighty-eight were _burnt alive_ in England! Think of the inhuman
massacre of the innocent Waldenses of southern France by the violent
bigot Oppede (1545), who slew eight hundred men in one town, and thrust
the women into a barn filled with straw and reduced the whole to
ashes--only a sample of his barbarity; or of their oppression in
southern Italy by Pope Pius IV. (1560), at whose command they were slain
by thousands, the throats of eighty-eight men being cut on one occasion
by a single executioner! Witness the horrible massacre of St.
Bartholomew in Paris (Aug. 21, 1572), when the Queen dowager, the
infamous Cather