avenger whom GOD brought against it-Rome has not why is this? for if there has been a something to procrastinate the vengeance due to Rome hitherto, peradventure that obstacle may act again and again, and stay the uplifted hand of divine wrath till the end come. The cause seems to be simply this, that when the barbarians came down, GoD had a people in that city. Babylon was a mere prison of the Church; Rome had received her as a guest. The Church dwelt in Rome, and while her childred suffered in the heathen city from the barbarians, so again they were there the life and the salt of the city where they suffered.

Christians understood this at the time, and availed themselves of their position. They remembered Abraham's intercession for Sodom, and the gracious announcement made him, that had there been ten righteous men therein, it would have been saved.

When the city was worsted, threatened, and at length overthrown, the Pagans had cried out that Christianity was the cause of this. They said they had always flourished under their idols, and that these idols and devils (gods as they called them) were displeased at them for the numbers among them who had been converted to the faith of the Gospel, and had in consequence deserted them, given them over to their enemies, and brought vengeance upon them. On the other hand, they scoffed at the Christians, saying in effect, "Where is now your GOD? Why does He not save you? You are not better off than we;" like the impenitent thief, "If Thou be the CHRIST, save Thyself and us;" or, like the multitude, "If He be the Son of Gon, let Him come down from the Cross." This was during the time of one of the most celebrated bishops and doctors of the Church, St. Austin; and he replied to their challenge. He replied to them, and to his brethren also, some of whom were offended and shocked that such calamities should have happened to a city which had become Christian 1. He pointed to the cities which had already sinned and been visited, and showed that they had altogether perished, whereas Rome was still preserved. Here then he said was the very fulfilment of the promise of GOD, an

Austin, de Urbis Excidio, vol. vi. p. 622. ed. Ben. et de Civ. Dei, i. 1—7.

nounced to Abraham; for the sake of the Christians in it, Rome was chastised, not overthrown utterly.

Historical facts support St. Augustine's view of things: GoD showed visibly, not only provided secretly, that the Church should be the salvation of the city. The fierce conqueror, Alaric, who first came against it, exhorted his troops, "to respect the Churches of the Apostles St. Peter and St. Paul, as holy and inviolable sanctuaries ;" and he gave orders that a quantity of plate, consecrated to St. Peter, should be removed into his Church from the place where it had been discovered 1.

Again, fifty years afterwards, when Attila was advancing against the city, the bishop of Rome of the day, St. Leo, formed one of a deputation of three, who went out to meet him, and was successful in arresting his purpose. A few years afterwards, Genseric, the most savage of the barbarian conquerors, appeared before the defenceless city. The same fearless prelate went out to meet him at the head of his clergy, and though he did not avail to save the city from pillage, yet he gained a promise that the unresisting multitude should be spared, the buildings protected from fire, and the captives from torture 2. Thus from the Goth, Hun, and Vandal, did the Christian Church shield the guilty city in which she dwelt. What a wonderful rule of God's providence is herein displayed, which occurs daily! the Church sanctifies yet suffers with the world, sharing its sufferings yet lightening them. In the case before us, it has (if we may humbly say it,) suspended, to this day, the vengeance destined to fall upon her who was drunk with the blood of the martyrs of JESUS. That ven. geance has never fallen; it is still suspended; nor can reason be given why Rome has not fallen under the rule of GOD'S general dealings with His rebellious creatures, and suffered (according to the prophecy) the fulness of God's wrath begun in her, except that a Christian Church is still in that city, sanctifying it, interceding for it, saving it. That part of the Christian Church, (alas!) has in process of time become infected with the sins of Rome itself, and learned to be ambitious and cruel after the fashion of those who possessed the place afore2 Ibid. vol. vi. chap. 35, 36.

1 Vide Gibbon, Hist. vol. v. chap. 31.

times'. Yet if it were what some would make it, if it were as reprobate as heathen Rome itself, what stays the judgment long ago begun? why does not the Avenging Arm, which made its first stroke ages since, deal its second and its third, till the city has fallen? Why is not Rome as Sodom and Gomorrah, if there be no righteous men in it?

This then is the first remark I would make as to the fulfilment of the prophecy which is yet to come; perchance, through God's mercy, it may be procrastinated even to the end, and never be fulfilled. Of this we can know nothing one way or the other.

2. Secondly, let it be considered, that as Babylon is a type of Rome, and of the world of sin and vanity, so Rome in turn may be a type also, whether of some other city, or of a proud and deceiving world. The woman is said to be Babylon as well as Rome, and as she is something more than Babylon, namely, Rome, so again she may be something more than Rome, which is yet to come. Various great cities in Scripture are made, in their ungodliness and ruin, types of the world itself. Their end is described in figures, which in their fulness apply only to the end of the world; the sun and moon are said to fall, the earth to quake and the stars to fall from heaven 2. As then their ruin prefigures a greater and wider judgment, so the chapters of which the text forms a part may have a further accomplishment not in Rome, but in the world itself, or some other great city to which we cannot at present apply them, or to all the great cities of the world together, and to the spirit that rules in them, their avaricious, luxurious, self-dependent, irreligious spirit. And in this sense is already fulfilled a portion of the chapter before us, which does not apply to heathen Rome; I mean the description of the woman as making men drunk with her sorceries and delusions; for such, surely, nothing but an intoxication is that arrogant, ungodly, falsely liberal, and worldly spirit, which great cities spread through a country.

1 No opinion, one way or the other, is here expressed as to the question, how far, as the local Church has saved Rome, so Rome has corrupted the local Church, or whether the local Church in consequence, or again, whether other Churches elsewhere, may or may not be types of Antichrist.

2 Vide Isaiah xiii. 10, &c.

To sum up what I have said. The question asked was, Is not (as is commonly said and believed among us) Rome mentioned in the Apocalypse, as having especial share in the events which will come at the end of the world by means or after the time of Antichrist? I answer this, that Rome's judgments have come on her in great measure, when her empire was taken from her; that her persecutions of the Church have been in great measure judged, and the Scripture predictions concerning her fulfilled; that whether or not she shall be further judged depends on two circumstances, first, whether "the righteous men" in the city who saved her when her judgment first came, may not, through God's great mercy, be allowed to save her still; next, whether the prophecy relates in its fulness to Rome or to some other object or objects of which Rome is a type. And further, I say, that if Rome is still to be judged, this must be before Antichrist comes, because Antichrist comes upon and destroys the ten kings, and lasts but a short space, but the ten kings are to destroy Rome. On the other hand, so far would seem to be clear, that the prophecy itself has not been fully accomplished, whatever we decide about Rome's concern in it. The Roman empire has not yet been divided into ten heads, nor has it yet risen against the woman, whoever she stands for, nor has the woman yet received her ultimate judgment.

ment.

We are warned against sharing in her sins, and in her punishHow shall we feel when the end comes, if we be found mere children of this world and of its great cities; with tastes, opinions, habits, such as are found in its cities; with a heart dependent on human society, and a reason moulded by it! What a miserable lot will be ours at the last day, to find ourselves before our Judge, with all the low feelings, principles, and aims which the world encourages; with our thoughts wandering (if that be possible then), wandering after vanities; with thoughts which rise no higher than the consideration of our own comforts, or our gains; with a haughty contempt for the Church, her ministers, her lowly people; a love of rank and station, an admiration of the splendour and the fashions of the world, an affectation of refinement, a dependence upon our powers of reason,

an habitual self-esteem, and an utter ignorance of the number and the heinousness of the sins which lie against us ! And when the judgment is over, and the saints have gone up to heaven, and there is silence and darkness where all was so full of life and expectation, where shall we find ourselves? Men now give fair names to sins and sinners; but then all the citizens of Babylon will appear in their true colours, as the word of God exhibits them, "as dogs, and sorcerers, and whoremongers, and murderers, and idolaters, and lovers and makers of lies."