67. In the council of Laodicea (about the year 360) the
Apocalypse was tacitly excluded from the sacred canon by the
same churches of Asia to which it is addressed; and we may
learn from the complaint of Sulpicius Severus that their
sentence had been ratified by the greater number of
Christians of his time. From what causes then is the
Apocalypse at present so generally received by the Greek,
the Roman, and the Protestant churches? The following ones
may be assigned:- 1. The Greeks were subdued by the
authority of an impostor, who, in the sixth century, assumed
the character of Dionysius the Areopagite. 2. A just
apprehension that the grammarians might become more
important than the theologians engaged the council of Trent
to fix the seal of their infallibility on all the books of
Scripture contained in the Latin Vulgate, in the number of
which the Apocalypse was fortunately included (Fr. Paolo,
Istoria del Concilio Tridentino, l. ii.). 3. The advantage
of turning those mysterious prophecies against the See of
Rome inspired the Protestants with uncommon veneration for
so useful an ally. See the ingenious and elegant discourses
of the present bishop of Lichfield on that unpromising
subject.