healing of that deadly wound which had been inflicted upon it by the sword: it is manifest, that we are once more brought to the same arrangement of all the latter part of the Apocalypse, as that which I have heretofore adopted. For, having concluded rightly though through a different and erroneous train of reasoning that the Francic Emperorship would prove to be the last form of Roman government, I of course ascribed to it, as I still do, all those yet future exploits, which are attributed to the wild beast subsequent to the effusion of the fifth vial upon his throne.

Hence, on the ground that the Francic Emperorship must be identified with the eighth Roman form (which form however I now believe to be altogether future), I suppose that it will organize that mighty confederacy of vassal Latin kings, the formation of which is placed, together with the subversion of the Ottoman Empire, under the sixth vial; and that it will perish at their head under the seventh vial (agreeably to the angel's declaration that it goeth into perdition) in that awful encounter with the Word of God, which is described so energetically by the inspired apostle *.

Hence, also I suppose, that, by some or other politico-ecclesiastical concordat, the revived Francic Emperorship will be in close alliance with the Romish false prophet: for the three frogs, whatever they may mean, come forth from the mouths of the dragon

* Rev. xvi.. 12-16. xix. 11–21.

and

and the beast and the false prophet; and the same pretended universal seer is destroyed with his secular colleague the wild beast in the same great fight of Armageddon *.

Hence likewise I suppose, just as I formerly supposed, that the same Francic Emperorship, identified no less with Daniel's Infidel King than with the eighth political form of the Roman wild beast, will perform all those actions which the Infidel King is said to perform at the time of the end or (as I understand the phrase to mean) at the close of the 1260 prophetic days. He will fight with the vainlyopposing kings of the South and the North: he will enter into the countries, and overflow, and pass over; he will enter also into the glorious land; and many countries shall be overthrown: he will stretch forth his hand also upon the countries; and the land of Egypt shall not escape. But tidings out of the east and out of the north will trouble him: therefore will he go forth with great fury to destroy and religiously to exterminate many. And he will plant the tabernacles of his pavilions between the seas in the glorious holy mountain: yet, in the fatal day of Armageddon, he shall come to his end, and none shall help him. At that same time will Michael stand up, the great prince who standeth up for the now scattered children of Daniel's people: and there will be a time of trouble, such as never was since there was a nation even to that same time. And, at that time, shall Daniel's people be delivered; also

* Rev. xvi. 13, xix. 20.

EVERY

EVERY ONE THAT SHALL BE FOUND WRITTEN IN THE BOOK *.

May the name of the great protestant and maritime nation of Britain, now engaged in assiduously sending bibles and missionaries to every quarter of the globe, be found written in that same mystic volume of God †!

*Dan. xi. 40-45. xii. 1.

Mr. Cuninghame, in the first edition of his Dissertation on the Apocalypse, threw out the following brief conjecture respecting the seventh and eighth forms of Roman government.

"The sixth head continued till the subversion of the German "Empire and the extinction of all the imperial titles of Rome, "in the year 1806. Since that period, Napoleon Buonaparte, "Emperor of the French, King of Italy, and Protector of the "Confederation of the Rhine, has been the acknowledged head "of the beast; and, if I mistake not, this is the seventh king or form of government, which was not come when the apostle " saw the beast with the harlot seated on his back. This is a new form of government, quite distinct from the sixth head, " inasmuch as at the present time the imperial titles of Rome

are not in existence; they are extinct. The eighth king, or "form of government, is, I apprehend, still future. Things "seem to be preparing for this last form of the Roman Empire.

The present head of the beast evidently aims at the re-estab"lishment of the Roman Empire in all its pristine vigour and "splendour; and perhaps may assume, at no distant period, "the now extinct title and pretensions of Cesar Augustus "emperor of the Romans, and thus unequivocally identify him"self with the Roman Empire. This seems the most probable "explanation of the expression, the beast, that was and is not, ઃઃ even he is the eighth, and is of the seven. He is not really a "new form of the beast, but one of the preceding seven re "vived; namely, the sixth." Dissert. on the Apoc. p. 356

Respecting

Respecting the characteristic marks of the seventh head, Mr. Cuninghame is wholly silent; nor does he enter into the subject beyond the limits of the preceding quotation. I likewise conceive him to be mistaken in his supposition, that the head slain by the sword was the sixth head; for it was most assuredly the seventh and, on this principle, I of course deem him to be also mistaken in his conjecture, that the eighth form will be a revival of the sixth. The conjecture no doubt follows from his view of the matter; because, assuredly, the same head, that was slain by the sword, must likewise revive: but, if the slain head be the seventh and not the sixth; then the deadly wound must be healed by the revival, not of the sixth, but of the seventh.

Happy however in the main, as was the brief hint thrown out by Mr. Cuninghame in his first edition; instead of correcting the errors with which it stands associated, and instead of prosecuting it as it ought to have been prosecuted, he rejects, in his second edition, the whole idea as decidedly and intrinsically erroneous: that is to say, he discards a peculiarly felicitous conjecture at the very time when events have demonstrated it to be true, so far at least as its grand outlines are concerned. The consequence is, that this ingenious and able expositor now sets forth, as his voτspaι Oportides, a tissue of contradictions so glaring, that I can only wonder how his general acuteness could have suffered them to pass from him without dissatisfaction His present theory is as follows.

The sixth head is the Pagan Roman Emperorship from Augustus to Constantine: the short-lived seventh head is the Christian Roman Emperorship from Constantine to Augustulus, the last of the western Cesars. This seventh head was slain by the sword, when the imperial dignity in the West was extinguished by the Heruli and Turingi: and it was healed by the restoration of the Western Empire in the person of Charlemagne. But this revived seventh head ceased to exist; when, in the year 1806, the Christian Roman Emperorship of Charlemagne was abolished. What then is that eighth form of government, which is to follow the seventh, and which is to identify

itself

itself with some one of the preceding seven, heads? It is, if we may credit Mr. Cuninghame, "a sort of complex sovereignty, "consisting, not of the ten regal horns alone, nor of the em. perors alone; but of the two taken together, forming one "federal system, and united by a community of religion and "civil polity." The existence of this eighth form we have witnessed, ever since the fall of the revived seventh head in the year 1806. When, in that year, the sovereign of Austria was compelled" formally to resign the imperial titles of Rome; "then, for the first time since its origin in the person of "Augustus, the title of Emperor of the Romans became "totally extinct. From that date till the abdication of Napo"leon Buonapartè in the year 1814, the imperial power of the "West, though without its titles, appears substantially to have "rested in his person. Since his fall to the present moment, "the ten regal horns have reigned WITHOUT ANY SUPERIOR "CO-EXISTING POWER WHICH CAN BE VIEWED AS REPRESENTING THE IMPERIAL DIGNITY." Dissert. p. 163–171, 2d Edit.

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I would particularly direct the attention to the winding up of this theory. Mr. Cuninghame clearly perceives, as every man must perceive, that the Roman Empire now exists WITHOUT any superior dominant government, which may fitly be deemed its HEAD; in other words, it is now, for the first time, since the days of Romulus, in a HEADLESS condition. Yet does the learned expositor pitch upon this identical period of HEADLESSNESS, as the period appropriated for the eighth form of Roman government under which it is to go into perdition. I readily allow, that this headless state of the Empire might have been meant by the Spirit of prophecy as the eighth form of Roman government, if that Spirit had declared that it should be PALPABLY DIFFERENT from all the preceding seven forms but the accurate language of the apostle pronounces, that the very reverse should be the case. When the eighth form comes, it is not to be DIFFERENT AND DISTINCT from its seven predecessors; but it is to be THE SAME as some one of them.

The eighth," says the interpreting angel, "is or the seven:"