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But these prelusive judgments are little known. The book is sealed with seals. We do not see its contents, or we do not see them as what they are. The retributions it reveals are not known as retributions. Our knowledge at the best is limited, our insight dim and poor, and the "thoughts" of the Judge "are very deep."

1. The habit of expecting from the future what is already by our side is one cause of our blindness to the retributions of the present. We underrate the present, and are surprised when it brings a judgment to our door. Every age, I might say every day, is a judgment-day. "Every morning doth He bring judgment to light." Even while I write these words the term of probation for some life, or scheme, or institution, or nation, is coming to a close. Over a thousand spheres of action, the judgment hour is striking.

2. Our subjection to sense, and the consequent tendency to judge according to appearance, is another cause of the dimness which seems to lie on the world of retribution. "Appearance" is no mark of well-being in the sphere of Providence.

3. A third cause of our blindness to such events is the foregone conclusion that retribution is only present when the last results of sin have been reached. Judgment manifests itself in the partial as well as in the complete developments of evil.

4. A fourth cause which seals up the prelusive judgments from our view is the mistaken conceptions of retribution which we entertain. We are wrong in our notions of its nature and manifestations. Even when retributions are present and palpable to the senses, we will not believe them to be outbreakings of the Divine wrath on sin. We suffer ourselves to be blinded by phrases which hide out the truth. We say — we think we have explained them when we say — they are the accidents of circumstances, or the natural fruits of evil. We do not see that there can be no such accidents. We do not sufficiently remember that the natural fruits of evil are themselves a doom. We insist on extraneous and formal dooms. Retributions must come forth clad in miraculous and visible garments. It must be a handwriting on the wall, a portent in the heavens, a sounding of trumpets in the sky. But this is merely the aberration of our ignorance. Retribution can only on rare occasions be clothed in formalities like these. Its manifestations, for the most part, and of necessity, are not miraculous, but natural. It is at work when we, who are in its presence, see only decay, or disease, or accident.

(A. Macleod, D. D.)

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KJV: And I saw in the right hand of him that sat on the throne a book written within and on the backside, sealed with seven seals.

WEB: I saw, in the right hand of him who sat on the throne, a book written inside and outside, sealed shut with seven seals.