in its style, but speaks in the wretched and feeble jargon of Robert Owen, and the orators of the socialist school. And in Britain, at least, its prospects of a speedy return to respect and popularity are, we trust and believe, far from cheering.

But leaving our British home, we advert to some materials of contrast which lie in the wider field of Europe and the world.

Fifty years ago, the only throne in Europe which could be called limited and constitutional was that of Britain; now the only thoroughly despotic sceptre in Europe-the one throne which laughs at popular control, and scowls defiance at senates and parliaments-is that which stands guarded, but yet not secure, by the icy plains and eternal snows' of Russia. A representative system, more or less efficient, curbs and overawes all the ancient despotisms of the Continent. Austria, Prussia, France, Spain, and, with scarcely an exception, all the lesser States,-the Roman alone excepted, (there, even the shadow of freedom is found incompatible with priestly dominion).

Fifty years ago, or somewhat less, the star of France was far in the ascendant. The thrones of continental Europe lay all prostrate at her feet. Her vast resources were wielded with unrivalled energy and skill, by a leader who united in himself the genius of Alexander, Hannibal, and Cæsar. The more than Nebuchadnezzar of his day-Napoleon Bonaparte set his throne at the gates of almost every walled city and every splendid capital, and 'found as a nest the riches of the nations.' The colossal strength of Russia, and the leonine power of Britain, quailed or retired before him. The former was glad to number herself among his allies-the latter was compelled to withdraw her armies, defeated or disgraced, from every spot on the contiguous continent. The world had hitherto seen no greatness like this. It was a dominion, not over savages brave but unskilful, nor over the effeminate millions of Asia, but over nations and empires in the full maturity of their strength, defended by armies as numerous, as brave, and as disciplined as his own. Yet it was but a magnificent dream, and like a dream it vanished. Did France and her champion pass before the prophetic eye of the king of Israel when he said, 'I have seen the wicked in great power, and spreading himself like a green bay tree, yet he passed away, and, lo! he was not; I sought him, but he could not be found?' The description suits with a graphic accuracy. France has fallen, and is falling-her emperor and her empire have departed -and her uneasy, excited, and staggering gait, gives manifold proof that the retribution which overtakes guilty nations is now descending on her head. Corresponding to the depth of her rival's fall is the height to which Britain has been allowed to ascend. But it is better not to dwell on this-it better becomes Britain to lift up her eyes and say, I am not worthy of the least of all the mercy and the truth which have been made to pass before me.'

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In the first or second page we relinquished in behalf of the era in which we live any claim to be a creative age—that is, creative in the sense in which those periods were in which new and extensive revelations were given to men, or in which long-lost truths were recovered-but, in some respects, this has been one of the most creative of all ages. It has not, indeed, given birth to any great ruling principle-nor has any moral or religious truth of transcendent importance been evolved or recovered in the course of it-but it has given new and memorable illustration to some truths of no mean importance-and it is distinguished, above all the ages which have gone before it, for the birth and growth of great institutions-and it is not less distinguished for a boundless luxuriance of invention and discovery,-inventions which have given to man a supremacy over material nature which no former age had reached. It is sufficient only to mention the Bible, Missionary, and Tract societies, as instances of great institutions. These are peculiar to this age, and nothing in the past can venture to claim kindred with thern. The manifold application of the powers of steam is also the product of this age.

Fifty years ago, steam-ships, railways, and more than half the innumerable applications of the same agent to impel or abridge the processes of human labour, were unknown and unthought of. By the aid of this marvellous agent, Europe and America have been rendered but ten or more days apart-and the two capital cities of Britain less than twelve hours asunder.

Of these contrasts which the first half century present, some are permanent, others may present a reversed contrast as deep, before the century shall have closed. It is not probable that the slave trade or slavery will ever be revived or carried on by the countries which have abolished it, nor is it likely that the nations of Europe will again submit their necks to the political servitude of past centuries, nor that the discoveries of this age will be forgotten. But all the spiritual triumphs which have signalised the opening half of this century-all the national and commercial greatness which we are apt to dwell on with a misplaced and dangerous vanity, may be followed by a decline and fall, which may leave us among the churches the most cold and corrupt-among the nations the most degraded and fallen. It ought never to be forgotten, that the zeal, and energy, and success of the early church, outshone all that has been exhibited or accomplished by the boasted institutions of our day; yet all the power and glory of that early church withered before the pestilential breath of error. A revived christianity, and a prosperous and powerful empire, are the work of God, and being his, unless employed to accomplish his designs, they will be transferred to other hands. The agents which he may employ to accomplish the transference are obvious enough. Infidelity is not dead, but sleepeth, and unless kept at bay by a living gospel, it may regain that influence over the minds of men which, for some time past, in this kingdom, it has been constrained to resign. Rome has not exhausted her wiles, nor has the day of her dissolution yet arrived. Fifty years ago, the adherents of that system in Britain formed an all but invisible and diminishing sect-her priesthood and her congregations now count about or above 700. Again, fifty years ago, both doctrine and practice were in a much healthier and more vigorous state in the old dissenting and seceding churches of Britain than they are now. Among an excited and half-informed populace, the shallow but plausible propositions of an Arminian theology again find favour and acceptance. Those very doctrines which Archbishop Laud and King Charles, with the aid of the Star Chamber, found it impossible to force on the sturdy christian intelligence of England and Scotland, are now adopted with voluntary avidity. Every disciple added to this school loosens a stone in the fabric of the church's prosperity, and imparts insecurity to the pillars which support the national greatness.

In a former age, the Sabbath was assailed by a royal book of sports, and the abettors of superstition would then persuade the people to trample out the life of religion in their Sabbath dances-now the sacred day is assailed by the remorseless spirit of Mammon-that same covetous and cruel deity who, less than fifty years ago, sold, and bought, and branded slaves-and quoted then, as now, the words of God to justify their deeds. Success in Sabbath desecration would be in effect the attainment of their whole design. It would be equivalent to the extraction of the key-stone from the arch. This is now eminently the present truth. And it would be no small triumph if, in regard to the Sabbath, Britain could be brought back to the position which Scotland occupied fifty years ago.

THE TRIUNE ANTICHRIST.

REV. CHAP. XIII.

PART I.-THE BEAST OF THE SEA.

The navigator who now sails around the globe must acknowledge himself highly indebted to those who preceded him, and especially to him who first accomplished the hazardous circuit. Each succeeding

voyager may, however, attain some useful object as the fruit of his research, since, in the world of waters there is room enough for all that choose to visit and explore foreign shores. He may, perhaps, succeed in discovering some new island which escaped the observation of former adventurers, or, at least, in fixing more precisely the geographical boundaries of regions which are seldom approached, and are but little known, and in bringing home much valuable information to the aid of science, commerce, and agriculture, and to the furtherance of the gospel and kingdom of Christ.

Many expositors have, with great ability, penetration, and laborious and prayerful investigation, been the instruments of unfolding and elucidating some of the darkest passages of inspiration so successfully, as to encourage and embolden others to follow them, after they have rested from their labours. It becomes the writer of this largely to acknowledge his obligation to them. At the same time, he begs leave to state, that he has been constrained to take, in some respects, a different view from that entertained by the venerable guides who have led the way to all right interpretations of prophecy.

We select, as the subject of the present series of papers, the character of Popery, both because of its intimate connection with the events which pertain to the seventh vial, and also because of the great revival which Popery has lately had in protestant countries, and the unexpected manner in which it is introducing itself under a new garb, and under the name of Puseyism, in our own nation. Its progress at the present day, after the experience which the world has had for ages of its demoralizing and ruinous tendency, and amid the boasted enlightenment of the nineteenth century, is an evidence of its bewitching influence, and cannot fail to fill those with alarm who regard it as the mystery of iniquity,' and 'the abomination which maketh desolate.' There is not in scripture a more full description of the whole 'mystery of iniquity,' than that which is contained in the thirteenth chapter of the book of Revelation. We shall accordingly endeavour to show here that the antichristian empire, associated in support of Popery, is represented by the emblem of a beast arising out of the sea; the antichristian priesthood, or the Pope and the Roman clergy, by the emblem of a beast coming out of the earth; and the antichristian or Popish church, by the emblem of an image which the second beast caused to be made to the first.

The first beast, which John saw in vision, arose out of the sea. He had seven heads, and ten horns, and upon his horns ten crowns, and upon his heads the name of blasphemy.' The original word signifies 'a beast of prey,' and, in the language of prophecy, denotes an empire. Thus, the four great monarchies which arose successively-the Assyrian, the Persian, the Grecian, and the Roman, were represented to Daniel under the likeness of four wild beasts. John saw this beast arise out of the sea,' which is in prophecy the emblem of a troubled and unsettled state of civil society. The Psalmist compares the tumults of the people to the raging of the sea, when he says that God sitteth King upon the floods, and stilleth the noise of the seass-the noise of their waves, and the tumults of the people.' What empire is signified by this beast,' and what particular state of society by the sea,' will appear from these characteristics of him: His having seven heads

and ten horns, and upon his horns ten crowns.' An inspired interpretation of these heads and horns is given in the 17th chapter of the Revelations. There it is said, that the seven heads are seven mountains, on which the woman sitteth; and the woman is that great city which reigneth over the kings of the earth.' The seven heads are also represented as 'seven kings or forms of government,' which arise suceessively; and the ten horns as 'ten kings,' or kingdoms, which exist simultaneously. This description accords with no other city or empire in the world than that of Rome, which is celebrated by its own poets and historians, as the City of the Seven Hills, and was as well known by that designation, as by its own proper name. Lest any should object that there may be other cities in the world which are built upon seven hills, such as Constantinople-the seat of the Turkish and Mahomedan empire-the seven forms of government also signified by the seven heads, and the ten kingdoms represented by the ten horns, fix the interpretation of these emblems exclusively to Rome. Like the heads of the beast which John saw in vision, which were not arranged side by side, but were placed one above another, there have existed in the Roman empire, from its commencement till the present day, precisely seven successive forms of government, which are-the kingly, the consular, the dictatorial, the decemviral, that of military tribunes, the imperial, and, last of all, the papal. And, like the ten horns of the beast, which were not distributed amongst the heads, but were all upon the seventh head, the ancient Roman empire, after being overthrown by the barbarous nations of the north that invaded it, was finally divided into ten kingdoms, about the year 480. Society remained in a very disturbed and lawless condition, resembling the agitated state of the sea after a storm, till these ten kingdoms were all united to one head, under the Pope, who was declared universal Bishop, in 606, and whose power from that time began gradually to be acknowledged by them. Thus was formed the Papal or AntiChristian empire, headed by the man of sin, and signified by the Beast of the Sea.

But let us proceed with the allegorical description which John gives of this monster of the deep. Upon his heads was the name of blasphemy,' or a name which belongs exclusively to God, and which it is daring impiety for any creature to assume. The blasphemous name arrogated by the Pope, and conceded to him by the antichristian empire, is His Holiness,' which is a designation applicable only to the Holy One of Israel-the high and lofty One who inhabiteth eternity -whose name is Holy; and doubly blasphemous when born by the man of sin.

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Again, the beast was like unto a leopard, and his feet were as the feet of a bear, and his mouth was as the mouth of a lion.' In Daniel's vision of the four beasts, the first was like a lion, the second like a bear, the third like a leopard, and the fourth possessed the mischievous propensities and properties of all these, with power peculiar to itself. 'It was dreadful, and terrible, and strong exceedingly, and had great iron teeth, and stamped the residue with its feet, and was diverse from all the beasts, and had ten horns.' This fourth beast of Daniel, therefore, corresponds with 'the beast of the sea,' which, in its general appearance, is like to a leopard, for craft, activity, and cruelty-like a

bear, for savage ferocity-and like a lion, for strength, and terribleness of aspect, and voice. Every part of the history of the papal empire illustrates the propriety of these figures or comparisons: The dragon gave the beast his power, his seat, and great authority.' The beast of the sea is therefore the true successor of the dragon, which is the emblem of the ancient Roman empire, actuated by the devil. After this empire was overthrown in its original form, it was succeeded by the papal, which received the united strength of the ten kingdoms into which the former was divided-obtained the same extent of territory and dominion as that which preceded it-occupied the same seat of government in Rome, the city of the seven hills and exercised 'its great authority' over all the subjects of the ten kingdoms, and over the consciences, as well as the bodies and lives of men-so that the laws and edicts of the papal empire were far more dreaded than were those of ancient Rome.

When the beast arose from the sea, John saw' one of his heads as it were wounded to death, and his deadly wound was healed, and all the world wondered after the beast.' These words still more clearly identify the papal with the Roman empire. The heads of the beast signify, as we have seen, seven forms of government. We are informed, in chapter xvii. of the Revelations, that, at the time of John's vision, five of them had passed away-that the sixth, or imperial heal, existed in the apostle's own day-and that the seventh, or papal, was not yet come. The head which was wounded and afterwards healed must therefore have been either the sixth or seventh. We do not see how this can be, with any propriety, affirmed of the last, or papal head of government. It has indeed the sentence of death pronounced on it, and recorded against it, in the word of God; and by the Reformation it may be said to have received a mortal wound; but this is a wound which shall never be healed, for the Lord will consume the man of sin,' etc. And it cannot be satisfactorily shown, that the papal head of the antichristian empire ever received a deadly wound which was healed since the time that the beast arose. It is therefore the sixth, or imperial head, which was 'wounded to death,' and whose 'deadly wound was healed.' The wounding of this head happened when Odoacer, king of the Goths, in 476, deposed Augustulus, the last of the Roman emperors, abolished the imperial title, and transferred the seat of government from Rome to Ravenna. So deadly was this wound, that the proud city became a small dukedom, under the erastrate of Ravenna; and no person could have supposed that Rome should ever again govern the world. But contrary to all expectation and probability, this mortal wound was healed, when the Bishop of Rome was acknowledged as their head, by the ten kingdoms into which the Roman empire was divided; and Rome again became the seat of a revived imperial government in the person of the Pope. Hence it is called, that great city which reigneth over the kings of the earth.' Not less striking is the fulfilment of the prediction contained in the following words, and the whole world wondered after the beast.' All, with the exception of the people of God, within the territories of the ancient Roman empire, which formerly reigned over the whole of the known world, were amazed beyond measure to find that something like a miracle had been performed by the resuscitation

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