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than the latter end of the ninth century before Christ; because the great Assyrian Empire, which occupied all central Asia, did not fall asunder until about that epoch : and, accordingly, a computation of the twenty reigns, which preceded that of Alexander the great, fixes the era of its rise to some point between the year A. C. 811 and the year A. C. 771. Now the 2300 years commence, with the commencement of the vision, and therefore with the rise of the Persian monarchy. Consequently, the 2300 years commence at some point between the year A. C. 811 and the year A. C. 771. But they expire with the cleansing of the sanctuary : and the voice of history determines, that the sanctuary began to be cleansed in the year after Christ 1517. Hence, if we calculate retrogressively 2300 years from the year after Christ 1517, we shall be brought to the year A. C. 784 for the commencement of the period and for the rise of the Persian monarchy. But this year perfectly agrees with the antecedent chronological arrangement, which fixed the rise of the Persian monarchy to some point between the year A. C. 811 and the year A. C. 771: for the year A. C. 784, which is brought out by reckoning 2300 years from the cleansing of the sanctuary in the year after Christ 1517, falls between those two years.

On such principles, then, I conclude, agreeably to the tenor of the prophecy, that the 2300 years commenced in the year A. C. 784 with the stand

ing up of the Persian ram, and that they expired in the year after Christ 1517 with the incipient cleansing of the mystic sanctuary.

IV. A brief recapitulation of the several dates connected with the present vision may form an useful supplement to the preceding discussion.

1. In the year A. C. 784, the vision of the ram and the he-goat and the period of 2300 years commenced with the rise of the Persian monarchy out of the ruins of the Assyrian Empire.

2. In the year A. C. 556, the ram began to push northward and southward and westward.

3. In the year A. C. 334, the he-goat of the west furiously attacked the ram; and, in the year A. C. 331, cast him down to the ground and stamped upon him.

4. In the year after Christ 604, the demonolatrous Apostasy was completed by the acquisition of its lawless head: and, in this same year which is the bipartiting point of the seven times, commenced those latter three times and a half, during which the times and the saints and the laws are given by the ten unanimous Gothic horns of the Roman beast into the hand of the little papal horn.

5. In the year after Christ 608 or 609, the apostates having now come to the full or the demonolatrous Apostasy having now been completed, the Mohammedan little horn, or the kingdom fierce of countenance, stood up in the East behind the Macedonian Empire of the he-goat: and, soon penetrating from Arabia into Syria, it waxed great

against the allegorical stars of heaven, and had the host judicially given up to its tyranny by reason of a prevailing Apostasy.

6. In the year after Christ 1517, the sanctuary began to be cleansed from the demonolatrous pollution of the Apostasy, and the 2300 years expired.

7. And, in the year after Christ 1864, which is the terminating point of the seven times and therefore likewise of the latter moiety of three times and a half, the short intermediate period, styled the time of the end, will commence. During the lapse of this brief period, which apparently comprehends no more than a single natural year, the vision

of the ram and the he-goat will be brought to a conclusion, the Mohammedan little horn will be broken without hand, the Roman little horn with its lawless usurpation will be destroyed, and the sanctuary will be thoroughly cleansed : and, at the close of the same brief period or in the year after Christ 1865, if the arrangement which I have adopted rest upon any solid foundation, the predicted period of terrestrial blessedness will commence.

CHAPTER IV.

THE VISION OF THE THINGS NOTED IN THE SCRIPTURE OF TRUTH.

In the third year of Cyrus king of Persia, or almost immediately after the overthrow of the first of the four great Empires, Daniel had yet another vision of anticipated history: which, in the phraseology of the august Revealer, may be denominated the vision of the things noted in the Scripture of truth; and which remarkably differs from all the preceding visions, in the circumstance of its being a plain historical narrative altogether undisguised by symbols or hieroglyphics'.

Of this vision, the character, given by the prophet, is that the thing revealed is true, but that the time appointed is long2.

Hence we may perceive the inconsistency of Porphyry and Grotius, who contend that all the latter part of it relates to the exploits of Antiochus-Epiphanes. If the time, appointed for the accomplishment of the entire prophecy be long; which is declared to be the case: then, when we consider the vast chronological extent of all the other vi

1 Dan. x. 1,
21.

2 Dan. x. 1.

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