xvii OBSERVATIONS ON THE CHART. THE Writer wishes to repeat the remark, that in preparing the annexed Chart, he has adopted that arrangement and exposition of the prophecies, which have appeared to him, after such consideration as he has been enabled to bestow on the subject, to be supported by the strongest probabilities, and exposed to the fewest objections. It does not fall within his purpose, for the reason before assigned, neither, indeed, would it be practicable, without entering into a very long and minute discussion, to state the various arguments, which in every case have induced him to prefer the interpretation here proposed. At the same time, there are three or four points on which he is desirous of offering some few observations. First. While he agrees in opinion with those commentators, who consider the little Macedonian Horn, in the vision of the ram and of the he-goat, (Dan. ch. viii.) as designed to prefigure the Mahometan power; because this application of the prophecy, though not unattended with difficulty, is on the whole the most satis-' factory and conclusive of any which has been suggested; yet he does not assent to the interpretation, which connects this vision immediately with the period of 1260 years. According to his judgment that period, wherever it is mentioned in the prophetical writings, exclusively refers to the domination of the Papal power in the Roman or Western empire, and has no specified relation to the corruptions or desolations of the Greek or Eastern church. It is during the 1260 years, that, according to Daniel, the saints were to be given into the hands of the little (Papal) Horn; and that, according to St. John, the Holy City was to be trodden down under foot of the Gentiles, and the two witnesses were to prophecy in sackcloth, and the woman was to be nourished in the wilderness, and the ten-horned beast was to continue and make war: all symbols of the depression of the true Church, and of the tyrannical power exercised over it in the Western empire. Whereas the prediction of the Mahometan power is distinguished by its own appropriate dates. Daniel was told by the Angel that the * That the Writer does not consider Dan. xii. 7. as any exception to the truth of this remark, will be seen in the progress of the following essay. |