A combination of Prophecy with Hiftory will shew. with what perfect exactness this Papal Power of Antichrist is marked out by the Prophets Daniel, St. Paul, and St. John.

To guide our enquiries to the right points of observation, St. John has defignated, by certain appropriate allusions and descriptions, the peculiar nature of this power, the time when it began to manifest itself to the world, and the feat of its authority and government.

And I stood upon the fand of the Sea, and faw a beaft rise up out of the fea, having seven heads and ten horns, and upon his horns ten crowns, and upon his heads the name of blafphemy. This wonderful beast with a crown on each horn, and a blafphemous infcription on each of his seven heads, denoted the new form of government that was to be erected in the city of Rome, by the great commotions of the world, after the Imperial Power had been destroyed, and the Empire was divided into ten distinct and independent fovereignties.

In the mystical description which the Apostle afterwards gives of this beaft, it will

* Rev. xiii. 1.

► Lowman on the Revelations, p. 173. • Lowman, p. 191.

greatly greatly affist our enquiries to difcover by a given number, when this Antichriftian power shall arife; and from thence ascertain with more precision what Power is meant by this prophetical representation. Here is wisdom : let him that hath understanding, count the number of the beast: for it is the number of a man, and his number is fix hundred threefcore and fixa. If we compute this number 666* from the time when St. John faw this Prophetic vifion, we shall find that this new Power was established at the termination of this mystic number of years. St. John was banished to the ifle of Patmos in the latter part of the reign of Domitian, and returned from thence immediately on his death. Domitian reigned from 81 to 96. Now St. John saw the vision in the ifle of Patmos; and it is generally acknowledged, that the Papacy received the temporal power, and became the beast, in 756.

d Rev. xiii. 18.

• It is very remarkable that this mystic number should so accurately apply both to the time when the Papal Antichrist established his reign, and the titles he assumed. See note to the Introductory Chapter, vol. i. p. 393. Pyle's Paraphrafe, p. 105. Newton, vol. iii. p. 390. Lowman, p. 194.

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The feat of this Power is fixed at Rome. THAT GREAT CITY, which in the times of Pagan idolatry had been the mistress of the antient world by the force of her arms, became in more modern ages, by the establishment of her spiritual laws, so much exalted in power, as to reign over the kings of the earth. The woman, upon whose forehead was infcribed Mystery, Babylon the Great, the Mother of Harlots, and abominations of the earth, is, according to the explanation of the angel, the city of Rome; for the Seven heads of the beast that carried her are feven mountains on which the woman fitteth, and the woman which thou fawest is that great city, which reigneth over the kings of the earth. Rome is well known to be built upon seven hills; and at the time when this revelation was communicated to St. John, its dominion was extended over all the known world f.

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Furnished with these plain directions by the Apostle, we proceed to trace the gradual rife and progress, decline and fall of the Man of Sin, as presented to our view by history and the course of present events.

No opportunity could be more favourable for the display of his ambition, his deceit, and his fuperftition, than the unhappy state of the Christian world in the fifth century. The members of the eastern and the western churches were divided into parties, by religious disputes the most unimportant; in consequence of which, they perfecuted each other with the greatest animosity and rancour. They were erroneous in faith, and degenerate in practice; and their credulity and ignorance fully prepared them for the reception of him, whose coming was after the working of Satan, with all power, and figns, and lying wonders &.

His temporal dominion arose out of the ruins of the Roman Empire. The change of the feat of government to Constantinople, and

reason why the city of Rome in this Prophecy is described by its natural fituation, as well as by its government, and why feven heads are interpreted to mean seven mountains, as well as seven kings." Lowman, p. 177.

the dethronement of Momyllus Augustulus, were events that led immediately to the establishment of a new Power. Augustulus was depofed by Odoacer, King of the Heruli, in the year 476, who thus gave the deadly wound to the western Empire h. "This last Emperor of the West would be less entitled," says Gibbon, " than his more immediate predeceffors to the notice of pofterity, if his reign, which was marked by the extinction of

Mosheim, vol. i. p. 228.

Gibbon, vol. iii. p. 494. 4to. Edit. After the example of Mr. Whitaker in his excellent View of the Prophecies, I shall introduce into this and the following Chapter, several striking passages from The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, which show the completion of Prophecy. Gibbon has already rendered great service to this subject, as may be seen by referring to vol. i. c. 2. and he might contribute much more to it, did not the limits of my work confine me to particular quotations. Although as a disciple of Voltaire he delighted to asperse the characters of Christians, and represented every circumstance to their disadvantage; yet he was compelled as an Historian ta listen to the voice of truth, and not to suppress important facts and events. His statements, even partial as they fometimes are, render him a powerful witness against Infidelity, by which he is manifestly actuated; and in favor of Christianity, which is so frequently the subject of his profane sarcafms. Not aware of the obvious use that may be made of his representations, like the idle servant in the parable of the talents, " he is condemned out of his own "mouth."

the

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