adversaries the appellation of schismatics; the Illyrian, African, and Italian churches were oppressed by the civil and ecclesiastical powers, not without some effort of military force; the distant barbarians TRANSCribed the CREED OF THE VATICAN."* In the answer of the pope to the epistle of Justinian, previously quoted, he declares, that, among the virtues of the emperor, "one shines as a star, his reverence for the apostolic chair, to which he has subjected and united all the churches, it being truly the head of all." Though the emperor's epistle was dated in 533, yet in it he states, that he not only did, but always had rendered honour to the apostolic chair, and honoured his holiness as a father. Here we would only submit a few historical facts and dates to the reader, and leave it to his determination whether there be not a rational presumption that the twelve hundred and sixty years, during which period the church was given into the hands of the pope, did not commence in the reign of Justinian, while their termination was correspondingly marked by the French Revolution, which, alike rejecting every form of faith, broke the charm by which popery had spell-bound the nations, when infidelity, armed with power, first assumed an active form, and, becoming the scourge of superstition, unconsciously avenged the blood of the saints, and, while disavowing every form of faith, proclaimed religious toleration, unknown ainong Roman Catholics since the days of Justinian. Justinian ascended the imperial throne in the year 527. In the year 529 the Code of Justinian was published, and the order of Benedictine monks, afterwards the most extensive and influential in Christendom, was instituted. The new CODE of Justinian was honoured with his name, Ibid. vol. viii. p. 331. chap. 47. and confirmed by his royal signature; authentic transcripts were multiplied by the pens of notaries and scribes; they were transmitted to the magistrates of the European, the Asiatic, and afterwards the African provinces; and "the law of the empire was proclaimed on solemn festivals at the doors of churches.*" Twelve hundred and sixty years subsequently to the first publication of the Code of Justinian, the French Revolution began in 1789, and before the close of that year it was decreed" that the estates of the church were at the disposal of the nation."+ The PANDECTS, or digest, were composed from the 15th December, A.D. 530, to December 16, A.D. 533, in which the INSTITUTES were also year published. In the year 1790, or twelve hundred and sixty years subsequent to the former of these dates, (before which time the code of Justinian could scarcely have been proclaimed throughout all the Roman empire,) "the Assembly had determined, that, all prejudices apart, the property of the church should come under confiscation for the benefit of the nation, and decreed the assumption of the church lands. A motion was made for decreeing that the holy and apostolical religion was that of France, and that its worship alone should be permitted; but all who favoured it were insulted, beat, and maltreated by a large and furious multitude, and it was withdrawn in terror and despair. Any experiment on the church might be tried with effect, since the religion which it taught seemed No LONGER to interest the national legislators. A civil institution was framed for the clergy, declaring them TOTALLY INDEPENDENT OF THE SEE OF ROME, and vesting the choice of bishops in the departmental authorities. To this constitution each priest and prelate was required to adhere by a solemn oath. A subsequent decree of the Assembly declared forfeiture of his benefice against whomsoever should hesitate." * Gibbon's Hist. vol. viii. p. 38. c. 44. London Annual Register, 1791, p. 68. Sir Walter Scott's Life of Napoleon, vol. i. pp. Annual Register, ib. p. 101. 221-224 About four thousand five hundred religious houses were suppressed in France* in the same year, 1790. An incident recorded in the Memoirs of Lavalette supplies a curious, if not striking, illustration, as a note of the time. "The events that preceded the grand drama of 1789 took me by surprise in the midst of my books and my love of study. I was then reading 'L'Esprit de Lois,' a work that charmed me by its gravity, depth, and sublimity. I wished also to become acquainted with code of our own laws; but Dommanget, to whom I mentioned my desire, laughed, and pointed to the Justinian code, the common law code of the kingdom," &c. "I thought I should do well to unite, with the meditations of my closet, the observations of those scenes of disorder which were harbingers of the revolution." In the year 533 the INSTITUTES of Justinian were published. "The Code, the Pandects, and the Institutes, were declared to be the legitimate system of civil jurisprudence; they alone were admitted in. the tribunals, and they alone were taught in the academies of Rome, Constantinople, and Berytus."§ And in the same year, in the case of an appeal by the emperor to the ecclesiastical decision of the pope, (which itself implies the supremacy of the pontiff,) he had addressed the pope as the HEAD OF ALL THE HOLY CHURCHES. And as the recognition of the supremacy of the pope seemed thus to be complete in the year 533, on the part of the emperor who put the power into his hands, so, in like rapid, and yet graduated progress, with the same appointed space intervening, the dominion of the papacy was destroyed and disannulled in that kingdom which had been its chief stay for ages, in the year 1793, * Brewster's Encycl. vol. vi, p. 455. Chron. Table, 1790. the power was wholly taken out of the hands of the pope, and infidelity, or rather atheism, was proclaimed, and popery abolished. 1 "The churches were in most districts of France closed against priests and worshippers-the bells were broken, and cast into cannonand the whole ecclesiastical establishment destroyed."* The papacy was to wear out the saints of the Most High, for twelve hundred and sixty years; and the judgment was to sit and consume and destroy it unto the end. The papal power began to be destroyed; and the time was come for the last vials of the wrath of God to be poured out. From the last of the seven thunders to the first of the seven vials, a very brief space intervened; and there was then no longer delay. Another link may, perhaps, thus be seen to connect the various prophecies, and to show the coherence of the system. A tabular view of parallel predictions may present to the reader at a glance,-1st, The prophetic description of the Roman empire as the papacy emerged from it. 2d, The rise of the papal power. 3d, Its exaltation. 4th, Its blasphemous assumptions. 5th, The persecution it inflicted on the saints. 6th, The change of times and laws which it introduced or enjoined. 7th, The honouring of guardian saints, or idolatry, which formed so large a portion of its worship. 8th, The gorgeous ornaments of its churches, and rich offerings to the saints. 9th, Its miraculous pretensions. 10th, The period of the duration of its power. And, 11th, the consequent sitting of the judgment, to take away his dominions, to consume and to destroy it unto the end. * Scott's Life of Napoleon, vol. ii. p. 306. CHAPTER XXIV. THE SEVEN VIALS. FROM the previous visions, both of Daniel and John, it may be inferred, in a manner neither doubtful nor indistinct, that a season of war and not of peace, succeeds to the termination of the twelve hundred and sixty years. After that period, as remains to be seen, there is a time for the sitting of the judgment, and also for the cleansing of the sanctuary. And that the appointed time of papal persecution was to be succeeded in like manner as Daniel foretold, by a period during which they shall take away his dominion, to consume and destroy it unto the end, is plainly intimated in the vision introductory to the seven last plagues, in which they that had gotten the victory over the beast and over his image are seen standing with the harps of God, and it is said, as if noting the sequence and the time, AFTER THAT the seven last plagues, or the vials of the wrath of God, are poured upon the earth. And I saw another sign in heaven, great and marvellous, seven angels having the seven last plagues ; for in them is filled up the wrath of God. And I saw as it were a sea of glass mingled with fire; and them that had gotten the victory over the beast, and over his image, and over his mark, and over the number of his name, stand on the sea of glass having the harps of God. And they sang the song of Moses the servant of God, and the song of the Lamb, saying, Great and marvellous are thy works, Lord God Almighty; just and true are thy ways, thou King of |