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The fourth seal opened represents a pale horse, (pestilence,) with death riding upon it; and hell, that is, the grave, followed it: denoting, say some, all the calamities of sword, pestilence, and famine, which Christ Mark 13 foretold should come upon the Jews, and cause an universal devastation of their city and nation, and as universal a destruction of their persons.
Note here, 1. How death is represented as sitting upon a pale horse; by a horse, for his strength, there is no resisting of him; for his swiftness, it is always posting towards us; for his office and use, which is to cut off, and carry away; and by a pale horse, for its ghastliness. Death has a grim and ghastly countenance, that strikes terror into all hearts, and paleness into all faces.
Note, 2. As terrible as death was, it must and did receive power before it could destroy and kill: I beheld a pale horse, and he that sat on him was death, and hell followed with him: and power was given to them.
Learn thence, That all the executioners of God's wrath and vengeance, sword, pestilence, and famine, death of all kinds, do act by commission, yea, they all come forth with limited commission; power was given to them.
Others conceive, that by this pale horse the persecution of the primitive church was represented under the Pagan emperors, who made her face look pale like death, by the loss of a vast quantity of blood and spirits, when the church was mowed down like a meadow, and sprang as fast.