modern times but in all these events there are no sufficient marks of discrimination; they are spoken of in the general under the phrase of the witnesses prophesying in sackcloth. On the contrary, in the Smalcaldic league, we behold a regular association of lawful sovereigns to maintain the religion of themselves and their subjects against foreign oppression we behold a complete religious war between independent princes: we behold a religious war attended with every one of the predicted circumstances. The 30 years war, and the actions of Gustavus of Sweden, may indeed be considered as a sort of religious war between protestants and papists; but it possesses none of the determinate features of the Smalcaldic league, nor does it answer in any circumstantial points to the prediction. Hence I assert, that the Smalcaldic league was worthy of a place in prophecy, because it is a perfect unique in the history of the 1260 years : and I moreover assert, that no other persecutions were of a sufficiently definite nature to be otherwise described, than under the general phrase of the witnesses prophesying in sackcloth.

2. The second objection is, that the war of the beast against the witnesses was to take place when they were drawing near to the end of their testimony; whereas the protestants were defeated in Germany in the year 1547, which is already near three centuries ago. This objection however will not appear of any great weight, when the whole duration of the Apostacy is considered; for three centuries are either a long or a short period according to the number with which they are compared. Apostacy of 1260 years most probably commenced, as we have seen, in 606: consequently, in the year 1547, the witnesses had prophesied upwards of nine centuries, or very near three quarters of their whole testimony. The remaining period therefore was short in comparison with that which preceded it.*

The

* It may also be added, that, since the firm establishment of the Reformation, the sufferings of the witnesses have been very greatly mitigated; insomuch that what they have endured during the last quarter of the period of their prophesying in sackcloth is not to be compared with their troubles during the three first quarters of it. Would that we were more sensible of the great mercy of God in being allowed

It is a trite observation, that one error generally prepares the way for another. This is the case with Mr. Galloway's interpretation of the prophecy respecting the two witnesses. He assumes as proved, that the two witnesses are the two Testaments; and that their enemy, the beast of the bottomless pit, is the same as the second apocalyptic beast, or the beast of the earth, which he conceives to be " the powers of atheism established by revolutionary France." From these premises he concludes, that the three days and a half, during which the witnesses were to lie dead, are the same as the time and times and dividing of time, during which the saints were to be worn out by the little horn of the fourth beast and consequently, since the little horn, as well as the beast of the earth, is, upon his hypothesis, revolutionary France, that Daniel and St. John allude to one and the same event; namely, the suppression of Christianity in France, during the space of three years and a half. I have already shewn the erroneousness of this conjecture, so far as the little horn is concerned; I shall now point out, that it is equally erroneous in the case of the present prophecy.

Mr. Galloway supposes, that the two witnesses are the two Testaments. We have seen, on the contrary, that they are not the two Testaments, but the protestant confessors, the spiritual children of the two-fold church of Christ. Now the revolutionary fanaticism of France was not directed against the protestants exclusively, but against all who professed the Christian religion: the supposed completion therefore does not accord with the prophecy in this particular.

Mr. Galloway further supposes, that the beast of the bottomless pit, who slew the witnesses, is the same as the second apocalyptic beast, or the two-horned beast of the earth; and that this two-horned beast of the earth is revolutionary France. Waving at present the discussion of the last of these points, I shall only now observe, that the beast of the bottomless pit, who slew the witnesses, is certainly not the two-horned beast of the earth, but the

to enjoy the undisturbed exercise of our religion; for what are we better than our fathers, that the Almighty should shew himself thus gracious to us?

ten-horned beast of the sea:* consequently Mr. Galloway's interpretation will not hold good even upon his own hypothesis. He has largely endeavoured to prove, that the ten-horned beast is the Papacy,† and that the two-horned beast is revolutionary France: but, whatever power the ten-horned beast may be, he is evidently the same as the beast of the bottomless pit: whence it would follow, even according to Mr. Galloway's own plan, that the two witnesses were slain by the papul beast not by the atheistical one: therefore his exposition of the whole prophecy must be radically faulty. This will yet further appear, when I have proved, as I trust I shall be able to prove, that neither the one, nor the other, of the two apoc alyptic beasts, is revolutionary France.

And in that hour there was a great earthquake, and a tenth part of the city fell, and in the earthquake were slain seven thousand names of men: and the remnant were affrighted, and gave glory to the God of heaven. The second woe is past; and, behold, the third woe cometh quickly."

Before any satisfactory interpretation can be given of this passage, it will be necessary to ascertain the meaning of the word hour which occurs in it: for, upon that, and upon the circumstance of the earthquake being the last event of note under the second woe-trumpet, the hinge of the whole exposition turns.

A year, a month, and a day, are all definite terms, conveying only one single idea: but an hour is not so;

Let the reader only compare together the following texts, and he will be suf ficiently convinced of the truth of: my assertion.

"The beast, that ascendeth out of the bottomless pit, shall make war against them.”

Rev. xi. 7.

"And I stood upon the sand of the sea, and saw a beast rise up out of the ing seven beads and ten borns." Rev. xiii. 1.

"I will tell thee the mystery of the woman, and of the beast that carrieth her, which hath the seven beads and ten borns. The beast, that thou sarvest, was, and is not, and shall ascend out of the bottomless pit." Rev. xvii. 7, 8.

It appears then, that, in one text, the seven-headed and ten-horned beast is said to arise out of the sea; and, in another text, to ascend out of the bottomless pit: whence it is a palpable truth, that the beast of the sea, and the beast of the bottomless pit, are the self-same ten-borned and seven-beaded beast. Not that I conceive the sea and the bottomless pit to mean precisely the same thing; the history of the rise of the Saracenic Locusts sufficiently confutes such an opinion: but I apprehend, that the sea typifies the natural origin of the beast; and the bottomless pit, his spiritual origin.

+ Comment. p. 159-Proph. History of the Church of Rome, passim.

for it either signifies the twenty fourth-part of a day, or a season of indeterminate length.* It occurs in both these senses in the Apocalypse, as its several contexts abundantly shew. Thus, when we read of the Euphratè in horsemen being prepared for an hour, and a day, and a month, and a year, we cannot entertain any reasonable doubt of the word hour signifying in this instance the twenty-fourth part of a day and since, the day here mentioned is a prophetic day or a natural year, its corresponding hour will be the twenty-fourth part of a year, or fifteen natural days. But, when we read of there being silence in heaven about the space of half an hour, between the opening of the seventh seal and the sounding of the first trumpet, a mode of expression used to denote the state of mute expectation in which the Church anticipated, as it were, from various less important invasions, the grand irruption of the Goths under Alaric: it is evident, that what is there translated half an hour ought rather to be rendered half a season; both because the meaning of the word is not limited by being connected with the definite terms a day, a month, or a year; and because common sense itself shews, that that half hour of silent and anxious suspense must not be confined to merely seven natural days and a half, the length of a determinate prophetic half hour. In reality, this half hour, or rather half season, extends from about the year 321 or 323, when the happy tranquillity of the Constantinian age began to be disturbed by the incursions of those Goths who finally subverted the Western empire, to the year 395, when, the half season of restraint having elapsed, they burst with irresistible violence the barriers which the great Theodosius had opposed to them, and poured like an overwhelming torrent into the empire.

When the word hour then occurs in an insulated form, unconnected with the specific terms a day, a month, or a year, it certainly means, not the twenty-fourth part of

Thus pn expin, the vernal bour, means the whole season of spring; the length of the pm, or season, being in this particular instance determined by the annexed adjective expin. El pov is a phrase of a similar nature, though not precisely of the same construction. The two expressions occur in Homer and Theocritus.

a day, but a season of indeterminate length and, when it is thus used in the Apocalypse, I know not what season it can reasonably be supposed to mean, except it be some one of the great Apocalyptic periods; namely one of the seven seals, one of the seven trumpets, or one of the seven vials. Thus the hour or season of God's judgment upon Babylont is manifestly the one particular period under which the pupal Apostacy is to be abolished; a period, comprehended within the limits of the last vial : and thus the one hour or season, in which the ten horns were to receive power as kings along with the beast, means the period of the first woe-trumpet; at the beginning of which the ancient Roman idolatrous beast revived, by his lapsing, under his ten horns, into the demonolatry of Popery. The ten kings indeed had received power previous to this time; but they had not till then received power along with the beast: for the era of their first rise was between the downfall of paganism and the commencement of Popery; that is, during the short space of time that the Roman beast had put off his bestial nature, or, in the language of the prophet, while he was not. But, if they rose while the beast was not, though they were horns or kingdoms of the Roman empire, they could not in strictness of speech be styled horns of the beast, till the empire once more became a beast. And this event did not take place till the year 606, when the first woe-trumpet began to sound, and when the beast ascended out of the bottomless pit, and resumed his old posture of determined hostility to the Church of Christ.§

It is almost superfluous to observe, that I except such passages as Rev. iii. 3, and iii. 10, from relating to any of the apocalyptic periods; but I am not aware of a third exception in the whole book of the Revelation, unless the half bour of the seventh seal be a sort of one.

+ Rev. xvii. 12.

† Rev. xiv. 7. xviii. 10, 17, 19. "Kingdoms they might be before, but they were not before kingdoms or borns of the beast till they embraced his religion." (Bp. Newton's Dissert. on Rev. xvii.) Though I cannot agree with Bp. Newton, that the first beast means the Papacy, the propriety of this remark will be unaffected, whether his scheme or mine be adopted. Daniel, not noticing the three-fold state of the beast as St. John does, simply describes the first rise of the ten borns and of the eleventh little born which sprung up among them. This division of the empire however took place during the intermediate state of the beast: hence St. John does not consider the ten kingdoms as borns of the beast, till the Roman empire reassumed its ancient bestial nature; and hence Daniel carefully dis