infidelity. But neither thefe, nor the irruption of the barbarians, it is declared, fucceeding to accomplish his designs on her children; the devil next employed an engine well adapted to his purposes. 66 "And I ftood upon the fand of the fea," fays the evangelift, "and faw a beaft rife up out of the fea, having feven heads, and ten horns, and upon his horns ten crowns, and upon his heads the name of blafphemy. And "the beaft which I faw was like unto a leopard, and his feet were as the feet of a bear, and his mouth as the "mouth of a lion and the dragon 66 66 gave him his power, and his feat, and great authority. And I faw one "of his heads as it were wounded to death; and his deadly wound was "healed; and all the world wondered after the beaft, and they worshipped "the dragon which gave power unto the "beaft, 66 beast, and they worshipped the beast, faying, who is like unto the beaft? "Who is able to make war with him.? "And there was given unto him a mouth speaking great things, and blafphemics; "and power was given unto him to con"tinue forty and two months, and he 66 opened his mouth in blafphemy against God, to blafpheme his name and his "Tabernacle, and them that dwell in "Heaven. And it was given unto him "to make war with the faints, and "overcome them; and power was given him over all kindreds and tongues, and nations. And all that "dwell upon the earth fhall worship him whofe names are not written in "the book of life of the lamb flain from "the foundation of the world." The power which St. John thus proceeds more particularly to defcribe, while it was revealed to Daniel under the R 2 the description of the conduct of the governing powers of the Roman world. given in his eleventh chapter, was dif tinctly noticed in the vifion related in his feventh, under the image of a little horn rifing among the ten: "I con"fidered the horns, and, behold there "came up among them another little "horn, before whom there were three of the firft horns plucked up by the "roots: and, behold in this horn were 66 eyes like the eyes of a man, and a "mouth fpeaking great things," and in the twentieth verfe he further describes it as" that horn that had eyes and a "mouth that speak very great things, "whofe look was more ftout than his "fellows." And the interpretation which he received of this emblem runs thus; "and the ten horns of this king"dom are ten Kings that fhall arise: "and another shall arise after them; and "he fhall be diverse from the firft. And "he "he fhall fubdue three Kings, and he "fhall fpeak great words against the moft high, and fhall wear out the "faints of the most high, and think to *change times and laws: and they shall "be given into his hand until a time and times, and the dividing of a time. "But the judgement fhall fit, and they fhall take away his dominion, to con "fume and to deftroy it unto the end." And St. Paul has characterized the fame power in these words, "that man of fin. "the fon of perdition; who opposeth and "exalteth himself above all that is called God, or that is worshipped; fo that he as God fitteth in the temple " of God, fhewing himself that he is. "God," (Thefs. 2. v. 4.) and again in the eighth verfe; " and then fhall that "wicked be revealed, whom the Lord "fhall confume with the fpirit of his "mouth, and fhall deftroy with the * brightness of his coming: even him "whose coming is after the working of 66 66 Satan, with all power and figns and lying wonders, and with all deceiv"ablenefs of unrighteousness in them that perish; because they received "not the love of the truth, that they 66 might be faved." Knowing by the exact correfpondence of the event with the prophecy fo far, that the fourth empire revealed to Daniel, was no other than the Roman; and confequently, when bearing the ten horns. that in its latter flate; we have a demonstration that the beaft in the Apoclypfe which had the wound by a fword and did live, is an emblem of the fame power: fince in the feventeenth chapter we are informed, it is he that beareth the city which reigned over the Kings of the earth in the age of St. John. And the delineation given us by this Evangelift being the moft particular, I fhall in manifefting |