In the interpretation of the symbol of the two horns, or rather of one of them, I have ventured to differ very materially from the opinions commonly received; and I do so on the following grounds.

A horn in Scripture, even in plain diction, signifies strength or power, (see notes, ch. v. 6; and xvii. 12;) and in its prophetical language, supreme or kingly power, (ch. vii. 28, and ch. viii. throughout.) And as the two horns of the ram, in the prophecy of Daniel (ch. viii. 20,) are divinely expounded to prefigure two kings, wielding the power of two nations, in an union springing from the same causes, and directed to the same object, so the two horns of the lamb-like beast will probably be found to be two powers, derived from the same origin, resembling each other in character, and directing their efforts in persecuting the saints, and attempting to eradicate the pure religion of Christ.

The Protestant commentators are generally agreed in supposing, that the prophetical description of the second wild beast is to be seen clearly, and exclusively, in the Roman hierarchy. But to complete this exposition, it has become necessary for them to show, that the two distinct horns of supreme power are perfectly fulfilled in the papal domination, and thus to satisfy the prophecy so decidedly, as to render further inquiry and illustration unnecessary. In attempting this, their ablest interpreters have been greatly divided, and have thus shown the difficulty of accomplishing their common object. Mede supposes the two horns to be exemplified in the power of binding and loosing, so extravagantly and unscripturally assumed by the Pope and his clergy. Vitringa prefers the power given to the two orders of Franciscans and Dominicans in the appointment of the Inquisition. Bishop Newton and others think it more apparently verified in the two bodies of the

Romish clergy, the regular and the secular. But these, and such like exhibitions of divided power in the Roman Catholic Church, are only of a minor character, official or ministerial, and completely subservient to the supreme Head, whose unity, indivisibility, and infallibility, are the boasted pre-eminence of their religion.

To those who form their map of the Christian world by the light of history, at the time when the bishops of Rome had made some advance towards the antichristian character, as exemplified in the false prophet, a more extended scene will open itself; and the result may be, that while we acknowledge that the abuse of the papal power amply verifies one horn of the second and ecclesiastical beast, we may find the other as aptly exemplified in a separate apostasy, similar and coeval.

The Christian world, like the political, was early divided into two great portions, the eastern and the western. Of these, the eastern division was originally the most important, and continued so for some centuries. It was superior to the other in dignity, being the primeval seat of the sacred religion; preeminent also in extent of country and of Christian population. Over this district the Roman pontiff had no jurisdiction or influence, except the little he may at some seasons have acquired by arrogance or art. But do we not acknowledge, does not history relate, the growth of an antichristian corruption in this eastern division of Christendom, gradually opening the way for that tyrannical, persecuting domination, which is the peculiar mark and character of the

1 The superiority of the eastern division was experienced by the western, when the learned Greeks, escaping from their Mahometan conquerors, brought with them their valuable language and books, and opened new and most important sources of knowledge to the inhabitants of Europe.

two-horned beast? In the patriarchs of Constantinople, during the fourth, fifth, and sixth centuries, we see the same worldly ambition, the same ardent endeavours, to extend their hierarchal power, as is exemplified in the bishops of Rome. These two hierarchs having, each in his own district subdued the minor prelates, they at length encountered one another on the confines of their dominions, each prepared to stop the progress and encroachment of the other. Here then began their contest for universal jurisdiction, and the submission of all rival claims; each in his turn possessed, for a time at least, the name of it-the name of oecumenical or universal bishop.'

This contest, so notorious in history, induced some of the early commentators to discover, as they imagined, the fulfilment of the two horns in these two equally corrupt, ambitious, ecclesiastical powers, whose unchristian contentions produced at length the entire separation of the two great Christian Churches, the Greek and the Latin. The same exposition is adopted by Daubuz, who, in his commentary on the Apocalypse, has described and shown by historical testimony, the ferocity and antichristian spirit with which this unbecoming warfare was

1 This ambitious contention had its rise from the times of the emperor Constantine the Great, who added the bishop of his new metropolis to the prelates or patriarchs of Rome, Alexandria, and Antioch. The two last, not being invested with metropolitan dignity, were obliged to take a lower degree, and to leave the field of contest to their presumptuous brethren. About the year 588, John, patriarch of Constantinople, assumed the envied title. In this he was most furiously opposed by Pope Gregory the Great, who proceeded against him so far as to declare," that whosoever calleth himself universal bishop, or desireth to be so called, in the pride of his heart, doth forerun Antichrist." (See Bishop Newton and his authorities in his learned statement of the ancient opinion concerning Antichrist. Dissertation xxii. on the Man of Sin.)

carried on. But yet this fulfilment of the prophcey has not been allowed by more considerate inquiries. The parallel of the two horns, thus explained, runs with fair exactitude for some centuries, but ceases at the time when the patriarch of Constantinople, by the loss of power and population, had no longer the means of opposing his more successful rival, who seems to have entered alone upon the prophetic period of 1260 years assigned for the continued domination of the beasts.

The contest began in the fourth century, and terminated in the seventh, when the Roman pontiff beheld his rival sinking under the extraordinary circumstances of the times, and himself enabled to pursue the objects of his ambition with unwonted success. For observe this extraordinary coincidence just at the time when this apparent horn in the eastern division of Christianity began to fail, and no longer to fulfil the prophecy, another was seen to spring up suddenly in the same quarter, and completely to occupy the vacant place. The religion of Mahomet, founding its pretensions on the Old and New Testaments, armed with ecclesiastical and secular power, began to apostatise and subdue the This seems to be the true eastern horn, for it is probable that we are to date the rise of this, and likewise the western or papal horn, from the same era; because neither of the rival prelates had before this time arrived at that height of successful ambition which is displayed by the symbols of the beasts in the 13th chapter of the Apocalypse. But both of them had well earned the name and title which they had enviously attributed to each other, "a precursor of antichrist;" and this mutual charge by the two great rulers of the Christian Church, seems to amount nearly to a confession, or, at least, an authorized declaration, that antichrist was to be ex

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pected, where history has since placed him, in the apostate Christian Church.'

1 In my former work, upon the authority of archbishop Usher and Dean Prideaux, I ventured to date the rise of the two horns in the year 606, when the impostor Mahomet retired to his cave to broach his superstition in the east, and in the west Pope Boniface the Third received the title of universal bishop from the hands of the tyrant Phocas. Upon further examination, it has appeared to me, that this concession to the Papal see does not stand upon undoubted evidence of history. I willingly recede from it, being decidedly of opinion that no event of a doubtful or inefficient character can be admitted to prove the very important fact of a clear commencement of the 1260 years. The progress of the papal power was slow, steady, and gradual for many centuries, without exhibiting any well-authenticated particular event, promotive of it in such a degree as to establish it as the era from which this prophetical period had its beginning.

Mr. Hallam, in his view of the state of Europe during the middle ages, has presented an able and learned draft of the progress of the Roman ecclesiastical power in those times. After tracing it through many stages, he observes, that "the papal authority had made no decisive progress in France, or perhaps any where, beyond Italy, till the pontificate of Gregory the First;" (the years 590 to 604; vol. ii. p. 299.) and he adds, that "for nearly one hundred and fifty years afterwards, it might even appear that the papal influence was retrograde." It does not seem to be intended by Divine Providence that we should at present possess the means of determining the commencement of this important period, which may not be disclosed till it approaches nearer to its end.

Some respectable writers have endeavoured to fix upon an early period of its commencement, in the year 533; when an epistle from the emperor Justinian to Pope John the First is appealed to, together with an edict of the same character, to prove, that the emperor did then concede the supreme ecclesiastical dignity to the papal see. And this event is considered as the beginning of the period of years. Mr. Hallam has not noticed this event, which he could not with any propriety have passed over, if he had considered it as promotive, in any great degree, of the papal pre-eminence and power. But it is of much more importance that Gregory the Great, in his contest with his rival in the eastern Church, seems to have been unconscious that he had so powerful an argument in his favour; otherwise he would have told him, "the object you ambitiously pursue cannot be yours; it is already mine, by a grant from your own emperor;" instead of saying what he did say that "whoso

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