essage of the Apocalypse to the church of Sardis,
"Thou hast a name that thou livest, and _art dead_, and then look around
and ask, Where are the churches? Where are the Christians of Sardis? The
tumuli beyond the Hermus reply, '_All dead!_'--suffering the infliction
of the threatened judgment of God for the abuse of their privileges. Let
the unbeliever, then, be asked, Is there no truth in prophecy?--no
reality in religion?"

Only twenty-seven miles north of this desolate metropolis, the
manufactories of Thyatira dispatch weekly to Smyrna, cloths, as famous
over Asia for the brilliancy and durability of their hues as those which
Lydia displayed to the admiration of the ladies of Philippi. Two
thousand two hundred Greek Christians, two hundred Armenian, and a
Protestant Church under the care of the missionaries of the American
Board of Commissioners of Foreign Missions, assemble every Sabbath to
commemorate the resurrection of Him who said to the church of Thyatira:
"_I will put upon you no other burden; but that which ye have already
hold fast till I come._"

The fragrant citron (_Bergamot_) still flourishes around the birthplace
of Galen; but the ruins of the famous library of 200,000 manuscripts are
far less durable memorials of the city of booksellers than those
beautifully dressed skins, which, taking their name (_Pergamena_) from
the place of their manufacture, will preserve the name and fame of
Pergamos as long as parchment can preserve man's memorials, or God's
predictions. Though famous for fragrance, physic, and philosophy,
Pergamos was infamous for idolatry, licentiousness, and persecution; yet
still endeared to Jesus as the scene of the martyrdom of faithful
Antipas, and the dwelling-place of a hidden church; and widely different
sentences are recorded against those opposite classes. The public
memorials are to perish, but the hidden word to endure. "The fanes of
Jupiter and Diana, and Venus and Esculapius (worshiped under the symbol
of a live snake), were prostrate in the dust, and where they had not
been carried away by the Turks to cut up into tombstones or pounded into
mortar, the Corinthian columns and the Ionic, the splendid capitals, the
cornices and the pediments, all in the highest ornament, were thrown in
unsightly heaps,"[119] is the comment on the threatening of Jesus, "_I
will fight against them_--the idolaters--_with the sword of my mouth_."
The 3,000 Greek and 300 Armenian Christians, and eve