from God out of heaven, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband.

Dan. vii. 12. As concerning the rest of the beasts, they had their dominion taken away: yet their lives were prolonged for a season and a time. 13. I saw in the night-visions, and behold, one like the Son of man came with the clouds of heaven, and came to the Ancient of days; and they brought him near before him. 14. And there was given him dominion and glory and a kingdom, that all people, nations, and languages, should serve him his dominion is an everlasting dominion, which shall not pass away, and his kingdom that which shall not be destroyed.

COMMENTARY.

Nearly every prophecy, that treats of the restoration of the Jews, treats likewise of the contemporary overthrow of some great and impious combination of God's enemies: yet, were it not for the predictions of Daniel and St. John, we never could have learnt, previous to the event, either who those enemies of God are, or at what era the restoration of the Jews would take place. Hence they are peculiarly valuable and curious; and hence, from their near relation to each other, I have thought it best to arrange them together, considering them as forming jointly only one grand prophecy in nature and style perfectly distinct from all other prophecies.

It

It would be superfluous for me here to enter into a full examination of them, inasmuch as I have already discussed them at large in another work *. I shall therefore only briefly observe, that we learn from them, that the confederacy of God's enemies, about to be destroyed at the time of the return of Judah, will consist of the ten-horned beast under his last head; an infidel power, which should spring up after the era of the reformation, and which at the time of the end should be so powerful as to take the lead in the confederacy, thence warranting the conjecture, a conjecture which recent events have proved to be just, that sooner or later it would become identified with the last head of the beast; an ecclesiastical power, which is represented under the various symbols of a little horn, a two-horned lamb-like beast, and a harlot, and which is sometimes styled a false prophet, and is somtimes considered as the spiritual part of the great mystical city Babylon; and lastly certain kings of the earth, who are apparently in a state of vassalage to these main promoters of the confederacy. All these are said to come to their end, and to be destroyed, after the expiration of a certain period, which contains 1260 years. And we further learn, by comparing prophecy with prophecy, that they will be destroyed in Palestine:

* See A Dissertation on the Prophecies relative to the 1260 years.

that

that is to say, in some region, which extends 1600 furlongs, as Palestine does; in some region situate between two seas, as Palestine is; in the neighbourhood of the glorious holy mountain, or mount Zion; and in the more immediate neighbourhood of Megiddo, which is a town of Palestine. Now, at the close likewise of this self-same period of 1260 years, we are taught by Daniel, that the Jews are to be restored. Whence it is evident, since the restoration of the Jews is declared to be contemporary with the overthrow of the confederacy thus particularly described by Daniel and St. John, that the confederacy, which they describe, is the same as that which all the other prophets represent as being similarly overthrown in the very same country and at the very same era. Nor is this all: in order, as it were, to preclude the possibility of error, Daniel and St. John at once describe the confederacy of which they treat, as being overthrown by some divine interposition; and depict its overthrow by the same imagery, as that used by the other prophets who treat of the subject. A stone, cut out without hands, smites the gigantic image upon his feet; the ten-horned beast and his little horn are supernaturally destroyed; the infidel king comes to his end, apparently by no mere human instrumentality; and the ten-horned beast under his last head, together with his associates the false prophet and the kings of the earth, are routed in a conflict with the victorious Word of God. So

again :

again: does Isaiah represent a mighty conquerora as treading the wine-press, and as sprinkled with the blood of his enemies? so likewise does St. John *. Does Joel, in a similar manner, exhibit that last dreadful slaughter under the image of a vintage? so likewise does St. John f. Does Ezekiel symbolize one of the members of the confederacy by an opulent and corrupt trading city? so likewise does St. John t

Who are the enemies, thus hieroglyphically exhibited to us by Daniel and St. John, it is perhaps not very difficult at the present day to determine. The ten toes of the image, and the fourth beast after he has put forth his ten horns, can only mean the Roman empire in its last or divided state; and we may add from St. John, the Roman empire under its last or septimo-octave head, by which I think we must necessarily understand the Patricio-Carlovingian emperorship. The little horn, the false prophet, the two-horned beast, the harlot, and the spiritual city Babylon, are alike the ecclesiastical empire of the Pope, or the adulterous church of Rome. The infidel tyrant, who was to spring up after the Reformation, I scruple not asserting to be France, whether democratical or imperial. And the kings of the earth and the whole world are,

Isaiah lxiii. Rev. xix. 11-21. Joel iii. 13. Rev. xiv. 17-20. ↑ Ezek. xxvii. xxviii. Rev. xviii.

according

according to the phraseology both of the Apocalypse and of the Roman writers themselves, the kings of the bestial empire, which was wont to be styled Ecumenè, or the world. But, since these are the enemies who (we are taught by Daniel and St. John) will compose the confederacy about to be destroyed at the era of the restoration of Judah, they must likewise be the enemies who compose the confederacy which (all the other prophets teach us) will be de stroyed at the same era.

It is interesting to turn from prophecy to facts. We may now behold with our own eyes the rudiments of that confederacy, which (as we learn from St. John) will begin to be gathered to the place of its destruction at some indefinite period after the Ottoman empire shall have been subverted; the subversion of which may seem indeed to further its views, but will in reality be overruled by God's providence so as only to prepare a way for the kings from the east. The disastrous catastrophe of Austerlitz has made the ruler of France, the master of papal Europe; and, effectively at least, the representative of Charlemagne, and therefore the last head of the Roman beast. This ancient title of Emperor of the Romans seems to be tacitly resigned by the sovereign of Austria * and

:

At least no mention is made of this title in his treaty with France, and even that of Germany seems to be nearly dropped, the French studiously terming him only Emperor of Austria, and himself

VOL. II.

K