reference to the iron and the brass of the metallic image, and are most artfully introduced as connecting links, by which, in exposition, the stump of the tree may be tied to the great compound image." (Vol. II. p. 35.)

But (again we quote the words of Mr. Faber) if the iron band and the brazen band correspond with the iron and the brass of the image; then the stump of the tree must symbolize the territorial dominions of the image in their widest extent. The duration therefore of the image, as firmly bound to its basis or platform by the two empires of iron and brass, must be the same as the duration of the stump, while firmly bound to the earth by the iron band and the brazen band. But the duration of the stump, while thus secured, is seven times. Therefore the duration of the image, while thus firmly bound, must be seven times also."-Vol. II. p. 36.

Having demonstrated, "so far as moral evidence is capable of effecting a demonstration," (moral evidence, by the bye, has no such power, and therefore our author's phrase is inaccurate, and betrays a wish to overstate his argument, the detection of which is always injurious to a cause ;) but "having demonstrated," says Mr. Faber, "that the commencement of the latter three times and a half coincides with the year after Christ 604," and consequently, "that the termination of those three times and a half will coincide with the year after Christ 1864;" calculating retrogressively from the year after Christ 1864, the seven times, "to which the duration of the image is limited by its connexion with the stump, their commencement will be found to coincide with the year before Christ 657, in which year Nebuchadnezzar is said to have been born."

Such being the case, (we permit Mr. Faber to sum up his own argument,) the age of the image, from the protrusion of its head to its final dissolution, is equivalent to those seven prophetic times which our Lord denominates the times of the Gentiles, and which constitute the great calendar of chronological prophecy: the seven prophetic times comprehend 2520 natural years: and the 2520 natural years commence in the year before Christ 657, and terminate in the year after Christ 1864.—Vol. II. p. 39.

We are free to confess that we recognize much ingenuity in this novel hypothesis; but ingenuity is a dangerous attribute in an interpreter of prophecy, more befitting the fanciful author of the Cabiri than a sober expositor of the mysteries of heaven. Is it by such cabalistic alchymy as this, that the meaning of the prophecies of Holy Writ is to be discovered? Is it by such fine-spun theories as this, that the believer is to be established in the faith, or the infidel reclaimed from his errors? We cannot discover the least foundation in Scripture for making Nebuchadnezzar the "animating principle" of the metallic image; nor can we acknowledge Nebuchadnezzar to be the type of that image, of which the golden head was clearly the type of him; nor can we at all persuade ourselves that the bands of brass and iron, which bound the stump of the symbolic tree, have the reference which Mr. Faber so zealously advocates; nor do we

recognize, after the most patient and impartial investigation, any connexion, like what our author insists upon, between the history of the tree, which shadowed out the individual fate, and nothing but the individual fate, of the monarch of Babylon, and the vision of the great compound metallic image. We distinctly deny that the fate of the lofty tree is the fate of the colossal image. The typical tree is the symbol of Nebuchadnezzar individually; it contains a signal judgment upon that proud potentate for his arrogance and impiety, to teach him. "that the Most High ruleth in the kingdom of men, and giveth it to whomsoever he will:" and it shadows forth his restoration to the throne after seven times or years of insanity had passed over his head. The threatened judgment and the predicted restoration, and the intervening madness, accurately came to pass; nor can we find in history a more awful example and monument of Providence, than the vicissitudes of Nebuchadnezzar's life afford. "God," says Horsley, was pleased to make him an example to the world and to himself, of the frailty of all human power, the instability of all human greatness. I say an example to the world and to himself; for it is very remarkable, that the king's own conversion was in part an object of the judgment inflicted upon him, and it was in order to the accomplishment of it that the king had a warning of the impending visitation in a dream."*

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Let any man, unwedded to system, and content to abide by the unsophisticated dictates of common sense, read the history of the tree, and we are sure that he will come to the same conclusion with the learned Bishop of St. Asaph, whom we have just quoted, and who has left the venerable imprimatur of his high authority for the interpretation, which we are solicitous to maintain in opposition to the fond phantasy of Mr. Faber." The whole vision," says the Bishop, was typical of some dreadful calamity, to fall for a time, but for a time only, on some one of the sons of men." The metallic image, indeed, is the symbolic history of the four great successive empires, from the era of Nebuchadnezzar, its golden head, to the dissolution of the Roman empire at the termination of a certain specified period, which, in prophetic phraseology, is called three times and a half, or forty-two months, or twelve hundred and sixty days. The symbolic tree, therefore, and the typical image, necessarily contain the common subject. Nebuchadnezzar, for his individual fate, is painted in the first; and his dynasty, as the king of the first four empires, is described in the last; but their connexion stops at this point, and the decree of the watchers has no more affinity with the metallic image, as far as our

* Horsley's Sermons. Sermon on Dan. iv. 17.
+ Ibid.

feeble judgment can discover, than the fable of the renowned giantkiller, which enchanted us in our boyhood, has with the illustrious history of the great hero of Waterloo! We speak thus decidedly, and in this strong language, upon the subject, because we deem our author's ingenious speculations mischievous to the cause which he, equally with ourselves, has so much at heart. These airy dreams are baseless as the fabric of a vision. They may serve, indeed, to display the skill of literary gladiators; and, if they threatened harm only to those engaged in the battle, we might be amused with the contest; but when their swords may wound the interests of Christianity itself, we feel it a matter of duty to advertise men of the illegality of such prize-fights, and we are resolved to discourage their exhibition.

We would not, however, be misunderstood. Our censure attaches but to a very small portion of Mr. Faber's work; and we can sincerely recommend the perusal of these learned volumes to every man who wishes for information upon the momentous and interesting topics which they embrace. The principles which have guided our author, (for without some fixed principles, the interpretation of prophecy would be little better than the chaos of the drunkard's dream,) are equally simple and reasonable, and are thus detailed in the Preface of the Calendar before us:

1. When the definite meaning of each prophetic symbol has been established with as much evidence as the subject admits, an expositor must never allow himself to vary from that meaning.

2. The principle of homogeneity must never be violated: or, in other words, homogeneous prophecies must be interpreted homogeneously.

3. No interpretation of a prophecy can be deemed valid, except the prophecy agree, in every particular, with the event or character to which it is applied. 4. No single link of a chronological chain of prophecy is capable of receiving its accomplishment in more than a single event or person."

With respect to the Apocalypse, Mr. Faber adopts the excellent principle of arrangement so judiciously laid down by the illustrious Mede, who taught that "the order of all the visions was to be wholly taken from intrinsic characters in the book itself, and not at all to be conformed to any particular hypotheses; that from such an order first established all certainty of future applications is to be derived; and that without such order all expositions must be precarious, depending only on the fancy and imagination of every commentator."

Guided by these wise principles, Mr. Faber has favoured the public with the result of his investigation of the intricate question of the prophecies, which treat of the succession of the four principal kingdoms. He has arranged his materials under six books, which are subdivided into chapters. It is scarcely possible to give an intelligible analysis of such a performance within the compass usually allotted to articles in our Review; and, therefore, we shall

content ourselves with giving a mere sketch of " the Calendar" on our table. Mr. Faber wisely opens his Dissertation with a chapter on the figurative and symbolical language of prophecy. Having proved, in the second chapter, that each prophetic day, in the numbers of Daniel and St. John, is equal to a natural or solar year, the third chapter of his first book details the principal events and characters comprehended within the period which is commensurate with the duration of the great metallic image, commencing at some point between the years 658 and 646 before Christ, (for between those years it is certain that Nebuchadnezzar, the head of the image, was born), and terminating at some point between the years after Christ 1863 and 1875. This grand period is said to be "bipartited" at some point between the years after Christ 603 and 615.

These matters being laid down, (says our interpreter,) it will not be very difficult to specify the principal events and actors comprehended within "the times which jointly constitute the age of the great metallic image; and which are divided (i. e. by our author) into two smaller periods, each containing three times and a half. . . . History, in perfect accordance with prophecy, teaches us that the actors, "during the first moiety of the seven times," were the four pagan empires of Babylon, and Persia, and Greece, and Rome; and that the ecclesiastical events comprehended within it were the various trials, which successively affected the Levitical and the Christian Churches. These events were,-the captivity of the Jews by the Babylonian empire; the restoration of the Jews by the Medo-Persian empire; the persecution of the Jews by the Greek empire, using as its organ the Macedonian kingdom of Syria; the advent and crucifixion of the Messiah, which last event occurred precisely at the end of the seventy prophetic weeks; the destruction of Jerusalem with its temple, and the complete scattering of the Jews by the Roman empire; the successful preaching of the Gospel by the apostles and their successors, after the Christian Church had been first founded in Judea by the long-expected Saviour of mankind; the violent and continued persecution of the faithful by the Pagan Roman empire; the conversion of that empire to the religion of Christ; the gradual corruption of Christianity through an excessive veneration of the Virgin Mary, and the defunct saints and martyrs, which ultimately revived under a new and specious form the ancient demonolatry of Paganism; the division of the western or proper Roman empire by ten distinct Gothic nations: and the gradual rise of the Papal power in the midst of the kingdoms founded upon the western or Latin platform by those ten Gothic nations.

The latter three times and a half (our Commentator proceeds) comprehend within their period not only the domination of Popery in the West, and the tyranny of Mohammedism in the East, but likewise the prevalence of that modern spirit of infidelity and atheism, which exemplified itself in the production of the French Revolution, and all its baneful consequences.-Vol. I. Book I. c.3.

We have given this extract from Mr. Faber's volumes, because it will afford our readers a tolerably correct idea of the contents of his learned work. The fate of God's Church, both Levitical and Christian, from the reign of Nebuchadnezzar to the consummation of the prophetic 1260 years, and the subsequent period of millennian blessedness, with the final day of judgment, are embraced in this comprehensive dissertation of the Rector of Long Newton. With respect to the character and revelation of the Man of Sin, and the nature of the

apostasy, out of which he arises, there can be no question, that he is to be identified with the little horn of Daniel's fourth wild beast, and with the two-horned wild beast, and the false prophet, and the harlot of the Apocalypse: and the true application of the Man of Sin to the Papacy has been fully established by Mede and Newton, and other commentators, whilst the chronological interpretation of the prophecy has been less satisfactorily conducted. Mr. Faber, therefore, in the fourth chapter, Book I., undertakes to prove that Mede and Newton, and all other expositors, who have held that the impediment to be removed previously to the revelation of the Man of Sin, (one feature of whose great apostasy was the idolatrous worship of demons or canonised dead men,) was the Roman Empire, are under a mistake; for that the impediment was, not the Roman Empire itself, which never was removed at all, but the coercing power of that empire, by the removal of which "the lawless one" should be completely revealed; and this remarkable event is said to have taken place, when the times, and the laws, and the saints, were given into the hand of the little Roman horn, at the commencement of the latter three times and a half, in the year after Christ 604; at which epoch "the then existing representatives of all the ten kingdoms of the West submitted to the Pope, or, (in the language of the Apocalypse) with one mind gave their power, and strength, and kingdom, to the wild beast and his harlot-rider." (Vol. I. Book I. c. 6.) The proper date of the 1260 years allotted to the tyranny of the little Roman horn is minutely discussed in the sixth chapter of the first book, to which we gladly refer our readers.

Mr. Faber has triumphantly demonstrated that the Antichrist cannot be a character attributable to the Pope, as most of the ancient interpreters have maintained in contradiction to the unambiguous testimony of St. John. "He who denieth the Father and the Son," (such is the syllogistic argument of our author,) "this is the antichrist." The line of the Roman Pontiffs did not deny either the Father or the Son: therefore the line of the Roman Pontiffs is not the antichrist.

This Antichrist our author discovers, (and we entirely agree with him in this discovery,) in the infidel king of Daniel, who is described, as doing according to his pleasure, as speaking marvellous things above the God of gods, as having no respect unto the gods of his fathers, as treating with studied contempt the desire of women, or (as that divine personage is elsewhere styled) the desire of all nations, and as proudly magnifying himself above all.— Book I. c. 5.

And,

The power emphatically styled by the revealing angel that King, (for such is the import of the original Hebrew) must be viewed as the Roman Empire chronologically existing, from the year 1697, when the second woe terminated, down to the year 1864, when the time of the end commences. For the character