to futurity, and to whom all things past, present, and to come, are equally known.

It is to be observed that all the characters of this antichriftian power are not mentioned in all the prophecies, but so many of them are mentioned in them all, and these unquestionably the same in sense though not in words, that there cannot be any doubt but that the fame power was intended in them all. These prophecies are that of the "little horn" in the seventh chapter of Daniel, called in the interpretation "a king, "or kingdom; that of "the king who did according to his will," in the eleventh chapter of Daniel, verse 36; that of the " man of fin," 2 Theff. ii. 3; that of the "two beasts," one of which rose out of the fea, and the other out of the earth, Rev. xiii, and that of "the woman arrayed in purple and scarlet, "which fat upon a scarlet-coloured beast, Rev. xvii. 1.* To thefe

* After the founding of the sixth trumpet, till which the prophetical history proceeds with great regularity, an angel is introduced as descending from heaven, and exhibiting these we must add the description that Paul gives of the "last days," 1 Tim. iv. 2. and that in my text, and what the apostles Peter and Jude say to the same purpose.

These

to the apostle a variety of representations, in which the same things seem to be described, though under a variety of figures. But the angel had previously said that "when the seventh angel should found his trumpet, the mystery of God would be finished, as declared to his fervants the prophets," meaning probably that the kingdom so often announced by the ancient prophets would then be fet up.

Among these representations, which interrupt the account of the trumpets, mention is made of three" beafts," or perfecuting powers, of which one rises out of the fea, another out of the earth, and a third out of the bottomless pit. The first of these, which has seven heads and ten horns, evidently represents the Roman empire, especially after its division into ten kingdoms, of which that of the popes refiding in Rome is one. For it is faid, "power was given to this beaft to continue," or rather " to make war forty and two months," which is the duration of the perfecuting power of antichrift.

EC 4

The

These prophecies, at least the principal of them, are evidently not copied from one another.

The second beast, which rose out of the earth, had "two horns like a lamb, and spake like a dragon. He exercises all the power of the first beast before him, he does great wonders, and deceives them that dwell upon the earth." He also makes “ an image of the former beast," and makes all men to worship it. His number is 666. This, therefore, can be no other than the pope, at first an ecclesiastical power, and at length a temporal one; and therefore must coincide in part with the former beast. His making an image of the former beast, must therefore mean his assuming his power, and mode of government, to which he makes all men fubmit.

The third beast, which rose out of the bottomless pit, or the abyss, which was of "a scarlet colour, full of names of blafphemy, having seven heads and ten horns," can only fignify the first beast, as supporting the corruptions of popery, represented by the woman who sat upon him. Of this beast it is said, "that it was, and is not, and yet is, and shall ascend out of the bottomless pit." It, therefore, did not exist, though

other. To appearance they are all equally original, and therefore, leading, as they do,

it was destined to destruction, at the time that the apostle wrote. The seven heads of this beast are said to be seven mountains, which, therefore, must mean Rome. These heads also correspond to the seven kings, or forms of government, under which Rome subsisted, while the ten horns are the ten kingdoms which were to have power at the fame time with the beast. This beast, which rises out of the bottomless pit, is also said to be " the eighth" of these forms of government, and of course the papal. Consequently, the figures in these different representations are not free from some degree of intermixture and confufion, and therefore a nice attention to this circumstance is not necessary in the interpretation of this prophecy.

The term abyss may be synonymous to fea, but, strictly speaking, it rather fignifies a hollow place supposed to be under both the earth and the fea. For in the twentieth chapter of the Revelation an angel is faid to have the key of this abyss, and in it to shut up the dragon or Satan, and out of this prison, as it is called, verse 7, he is to be loofed at the end of a thousand years.

to the fame conclufion, they tend to confirm one another.

1. The first character of this extraordinary antichriftian power is that it is a kingly one, or possessed of fovereign authority. This is clearly understood from the prophecies of Daniel, whose fourth beast with ten horns (chap. vii.) I must here take for granted represents the Roman empire, the fourth in succession from the Babylonian, which is expressly faid to have been the first; the ten horns being, as the interpreting angel says (verse 24), "ten kings," or kingdoms, and that this shall "rife after them," that it shall be "diverse from them," and " subdue three kings." In the eleventh chapter, the fame power is called " a king that doth according to his will, who exalts himself, and magnifies himself above every god." And such unquestionably is, and long has been, the papal power; the popes being as properly fovereigns, as any princes in the world, though of a very different character.

2. The feat of this power was to be Rome. For in Rev. xvii. 18, the woman feated on the scarlet-coloured beast is faid to

be