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34 U T H E
P O L IT I C A L D E S T IN Y
OF THE
E A R T H ,
AS REVEALED IN THE BIBLE.
“I saw in the night visions, and behold one like the Son of Man came with the clouds
of Heaven, and came to the Ancient of Days, and they brought him near before him.
And there was given him dominion and glory, and a kingdom that all peoples, nations,
and languages, should serve him; his dominion is an everlasting dominion, which
shall not pass away, and his kingdom that which shall not be destroyed.
“But the saints of the Most High shall take the Kingdom, and possess the Kingdom
for ever, even for ever and ever.”—Dam. vii. 13, 14, 18.
By WILLIAM CUNINGHAME, Esquire,
Of Lainshaw in the county of Ayr.
PHILADELPHIA,
ORRIN ROGERS, 67 SOUTH SECOND STREET.
E. G. Dorsey, Printer.
1840.
PR EFACE.
THE object of the present Tract is to furnish to plain readers,
who have not the means of consulting many books, a short
view of the purposes of God towards the World, as they were
revealed to Daniel about 2,400 years ago—to give an outline
of their accomplishment hitherto, and to show, from the events
of our own times, that the day is not remote when the kingdoms
of this world shall be broken to shivers, and that glorious
kingdom shall be set up by God himself, which shall fill the
whole earth, and shall stand for ever.”
Some persons may probably be offended at the title of the
Tract; for an idea has widely gone forth, in the present day,
that Religion has nothing to do with Politics. In a limited
and qualified sense, this may be at once admitted. It certainly
becomes not the Ministers of Christ, or even private Chris-
tians, to busy themselves with the heats, and animosities, and
contests of party; and when they permit themselves to be en-
tangled therein, they are as the salt which hath lost its savour.
But as the disciples of Christ are now members of the king-
doms of this world, they have political rights to exercise, and
obligations to perform; even as being fellow-citizens with the
Saints, they have exalted spiritual privileges to improve, and
duties towards God to fulfil. And our Lord himself, in his
memorable words “Render unto Caesar the things that are
Caesar's, and to God the things that are God’s,” has taught us,
that neither class of duties is to be neglected. It would be an
easy matter to enlarge these remarks, by applying the principle
included in our Lord’s words, to many of the circumstances of
* Dan. ii. 44.
iv PREFACE.
the present day. But this would be foreign from our present
purpose, which is simply to vindicate the Title of this Tract
from the objection above noticed. In justification of it, let it
be further observed, that the writings of the Prophets are full
of Politics. All the kingdoms of the earth are brought into
notice by them. Their principles of administration, their sins,
and their destinies, fill the sacred pages; and it is plain, from
our Lord’s prophetic discourse on the destruction of the Temple
(Matth. xxiv. and Luke xxi.), which reaches down to his
Second Advent in glory, that he expects and commands his
disciples to be diligent observers of the political events of their
own times, since it is from these events that he draws the de-
scription of the signs of his approaching advent, to which they
are required to give the most earnest heed, in order that that
day may not come upon them unawares. *
It may not also be without use to the English Reader, to in-
form him that our words, Politics and Political, are derived from
Greek words, used in the New Testament, to express the City
and Church of God. The Greek Polis, “a City,” is that which is
found in the phrase, “the City of the heavenly Jerusalem;” and
another word, Politeia, is used in Ephes. ii. 12, for “the Com-
monwealth of Israel.” To speak, then, of the Political Destiny of
the Earth as being revealed in the Bible, is to use words fully
warranted by the phraseology of the New Testament. Fur-
thermore, when the Saints in heaven, in their song of praise to
the Lamb, employ the words, “Thou hast made us unto, our
God kings and priests, and we shall reign (that is, exercise
kingly power) upon earth;”f and when at the sounding of the
Seventh Trumpet, “great voices are heard in heaven saying,
the kingdoms of this world are become the kingdoms of our
Lord and his Christ, and he shall reign for ever and ever:”f
and lastly, when Christ himself is revealed, having on his head
MANY DIADEMs, and a name written, KING OF KINGs, AND
LoRD OF LORDs,' the language in all these passages certainly has
reference to Political Power on this Earth, and the Political Des-
tiny of the Earth.
*
* Luke xxi. 24–36. t Rev. v. 10. # Rev. xi. 15, § Rev. xix. 11–16.
PREFACE. V
As it is not our desire to give a long Preface, we shall con-
clude with two or three brief remarks. Sould any of the dif-
ferent classes of persons, to whom are addressed the practical
observations contained in this Tract, feel offended at the
freedom of our language, we shall request them to recollect,
that none gave so much offence to the generations in which
they lived, as the Prophets of God; because none told them
such deeply mortifying, and, at the same time, salutary truths.
Now, the true interpreter of Prophecy must, in a measure, im-
bibe the spirit of the Prophets. He must not seek popularity,
by concealing or diluting the truth. Hence it seems quite
unavoidable, that he should give offence to his own generation,
in interpreting those predictions, which relate to the times in
which he may happen to live.
Lastly. Our object in bringing before this generation the
Political Destiny of the Earth, is not to fill the minds of men
with the worldly Politics of this age, but to improve, if possible,
the Political excitement with which the minds of men are uni-
versally filled, for the purpose of directing them to the hea-
venly Politics of that kingdom, which is about to be revealed,
the sceptre of which is a sceptre of righteousness.” We aiſºnot
at converting men to Toryism, or Whiggism, or Radicalism;but
to show them that all these things are shortly to perish, and to
persuade them to flee from the wrath to come, and by repen-
tance towards God, and faith in the Lord Jesus Christ, and
working righteousness, to prepare for his glorious coming, to
judge the quick and the dead.
Let it be observed, in conclusion, that every reader who
would desire to understand the contents of this Tract, ought to
make himself thoroughly acquainted with the Second and Seventh
chapters of the Book of Daniel.
* Heb. i. 8.
P. R. E. F. A C E
TO THE
SEC O N D E D IT I O N.
THose persons who are acquainted with the present state of
Prophetic discussion in this country, must be aware that cer-
tain writers have recently called in question, and are now en-
deavouring to overthrow the whole principles of the Protestant
interpretations of Daniel and the Apocalypse. As the prin-
ciples thus denied are the foundation of a great part of what
is offered in the following pages, it appears to me that although
the limits of this Tract forbid my entering largely into this
controversy, yet a few remarks upon the reasoning of these
opponents are called for, and may be acceptable to the intelli-
gent reader. And let me observe, as an introduction to what
will follow, that we have no reason to be surprised, that such a
trial should come upon us, who adhere to the principles of in-
terpretation, which, since the age of the Reformation, have been
held almost unanimously, and with the most confident assu-
rance, by the Protestant Divines of greatest reputation, and
soundest learning and judgment. The truth of Christianity
itself is denied by the infidel, and the most important, yea, the
fundamental doctrines of the Gospel, namely, our Lord’s
deity, and incarnation, and atoning sacrifice, are rejected and
opposed by men who call themselves Christians and Protes-
tants. What marvel then if prophetic truth is made to undergo
the same ordeal?
Were we asked how we arrive at a clear and immoveable
conviction that the 53d chapter of Isaiah describes the suffer-
ings and death of our Lord, we might perhaps reply, Why ask
such a question? It is just as if we were desired to explain
how we know that the picture of a friend, which is generally
acknowledged, and is by ourselves felt to be a most exact
likeness, is his picture.—And were men as honest in seeking
moral and spiritual truth, as they generally are in following
and receiving truth in things natural and worldly, there is no
doubt that the same reasons which convince us that the 53d of
viii PREFACE.
Isaiah relates to Jesus of Nazareth, would convince all. But
experience teaches us that it is far otherwise. Neither the
infidel nor the unbelieving Jew can or will see the above re-
lation, and they both reject the Lord of glory. Hence we
learn that there exists in the heart of man a power of resist-
ing moral and spiritual truth, which no evidence can overcome.
It is the perverted will which is the seat of this power, and
the will when estranged from the love of the truth, blinds the
understanding, and holds it in absolute bondage.
The evidence by which we are assured that the Little
Horn of Daniel’s fourth beast, and the Man of Sin of St.
Paul, and the Lamb-like Beast of St. John, all describe the
Papal power, is precisely similar to that by which we know
that Isaiah liii. relates to our Lord. The resemblance be-
tween the prophetical descriptions and the living character,
is in the one case, quite as exact as in the other; and it has
been acknowledged by the nearly unanimous voice of the Pro-
testant Churches.—Among the witnesses for so applying these
Prophecies, we enumerate Luther, Calvin, Cranmer, Ridley,
Hooper, Jewel, Knox, Usher, and nearly the whole body of
the Protestant writers of these kingdoms, since the era of the
Reformation, with many illustrious foreign Divines, including
the names of Mede, Brightman, Cressener, Whiston, Sir
Isaac Newton, Archbishop Usher, Bishops Chandler, Lloyd,
Newton, and Hurd, W. Lowth, Dr. H. More, Daubuz,
Jurieu, Vitringa, Pyle, Dr. S. Clarke, Fleming,” &c. &c.
What, then, it may be said, is the line of argument adopted
by the persons who rashly oppose and vainly think to over-
throw this body of testimony?—It will be seen by a reference
to their writings, that they generally approach the whole
subject, not by a careful consideration of the historical evi-
dence of the perfect identity of character between the Little
Horn and the Papacy, but they endeavour to attack the
Protestant interpretation indirectly, through the medium of
the Prophetic Chronology. Rejecting the mystical interpre-
tation of the THREE TIMES AND A HALF, or 1260 days of Daniel
vii. 25, and xii. 7, as being destitute of evidence, they first
assume that they are a period of 1260 literal days, and thence
they proceed to argue that the Little Horn cannot be a symbol
of the Papacy, since this power has already endured more than
* The Author of this Tract has sometimes been charged with paying too
great a deference to great mames.—Now I suspect that all men feel the weight
of names, and that they who pay mo deference to great names are themselves
led by the authority of the little names that happen to attract them into their
wake. Originality is a rare gift, especially in this age. I believe also that
they who are most original will always be found to pay the greatest deference
to the authority of the wise men who have preceded them.
PREFACE. * ix
even the supposed period of 1260 years.-I shall here observe,
that even on their own principles these persons reason most
inconclusively; for if it be, as it assuredly is, proved by the
testimony of all History, that the Little Horn is the Pope, then
all that would legitimately follow from the conclusion that
the 1260 days are literal, is, that the Pope shall yet receive
power greater than he has had in any past age, for the short
period of 1260 days.
Let me, however, next say, that the true mode of arriving
at the solution of the question of Chronology, is to follow in
our inquiries the same order in which the Spirit of God has
revealed these mysteries. And since the Spirit does first in
the Prophecy of Daniel vii. 8–25 describe the political and
spiritual character of the Little Horn, and does afterwards in
the last clause of verse 25, discover to us the duration of its
power as being three times and a half: Therefore, these writers,
in making the inquiry, as to who and what this power is, last
in order, and in seeking first a solution of the question as to
its chronology, and from the supposed discovery of this, reason-
ing back again to show that it cannot be the Papacy, do ob-
viously contradict, and invert, and nullify the legitimate order
of investigation which is prescribed to us by the Supreme
authority of the Spirit of God.
We, on the other hand, carefully and reverently following
this order, are first assured by the infallible voice of History,
that the Little Horn is a symbol representing the Pope of
Rome, as truly as the most exact picture does him from whom
it is painted. Next, seeing that History also testifies, that
the Pope has continued to lord it over the visible Church of
Christ, for more than twelve centuries, from the decree of Jus-
tinian, we as certainly conclude that the three times and a
half, or 1260 days, are mystical, and not literal time, and that
each day is to be taken for a year. In the next place, we in-
fer from the events that have taken place in the body of the
fourth Kingdom, since the fall of the French Monarchy in
1792, that the Judgment of the Ancient of Days, which we
learn from Dan. vii. 21, 22, is the limit of the reigning power
of the Horn, began to sit at that time, and is still sitting. Lastly,
computing from March 533, the date of the Decree of Justi-
nian, to August 1792, when the Judgment began to sit, we
find a period of 1259 complete years and 5 months, or that the
sitting of the Judgment began precisely in the 1260th year
from the delivery of the church into the hand of the Little
Horn by the Decree of Justinian. Thus, it appears, that the
seal of demonstration is set to the accuracy of all our previous
59
X PREFACE.
reasoning, by the exact accordance of the chronology of the
Papacy, with our other conclusions.
It is also most remarkable, that though scarcely a year and a
half have passed since the former Edition of this Tract went
forth, yet, in this short interval, new and unexpected evi-
dence in support of the foregoing Chronological conclusions,
has poured in upon us from various quarters.
I shall mention, first in order, that only a few months
since, I learned from Dr. Allix’s Work, De Duplici Messiae
Adventu, a fact of which I was before ignorant, viz. that the
most celebrated Jewish Doctors concur with us in understand-
ing the Prophetic numbers of Daniel as being mystical and not
literal, a day for a year.—This was soon afterwards confirmed
to me by the kindness of a converted Israelite in London,
through whom and a Christian Lady I was furnished with
translations of certain passages of Rabbi Isaac Abarbanel’s
Commentary on Daniel.-About the same time I got possession
of a small Hebrew work (which will be mentioned below)
wherein there is an account of the interpretations of the num-
bers of Daniel by all the most learned Doctors of the Syna-
gogue. It appears, that Eben Ezra is the only one of them
who computes THE THREE TIMES AND A HALF literally, as being
THREE YEARS AND A HALF of solar time. But he is strongly
opposed by the other Doctors. Abarbanel asks him how he
will on this principle explain the season and the time during
which the lives of the three former beasts are prolonged, and
whether he will make it only one year?”—Rabbi Saadias Gaon
and Solomon Jarchi explain the 1335 days at the conclusion
of the Book of Daniel to be years, and with respect to the TIME,
TIMEs AND DIVIDING OF TIME, they say, “This Scripture de-
scends into the Abyss by reason of the difficulty and profundity of
its interpretation.”—They explain it in the way that the Jewish
(Cabbalistical) Doctors call one tº General and Particular.—
The one time they make to be the 480 years from the Exodus
to the foundation of the Temple. The times they make the
period of the standing of the first Temple or 410 years. These
numbers are together 890 years; and the dividing of time
they make the half of the sum, or 445 years. The sum total
is thus 1335 years, which they computed from the destruction
of the second Temple, and therefore they expected their re-
demption at the beginning of the fifteenth century.—Most of
* We might almost imagine that Abarbanel was arguing against the persons
whose views I am now combating. Abarbanel asks, “If it be “according to
his (Eben Ezra's) view, what secret was there in this number, that the Angel
should see it fit to conceal it?” These writers are, forsooth, wiser than Daniel
himself. They tell us, in contradiction to the express words of the Angel, xii.
9. that there is no mystery at all, and that the number is just three years and a
half. If so, why did Daniel say I heard, but understood not?
PREFACE. xi
the Rabbis of the middle ages, Hannaneel, Bechay, Laban,
Moses Ben Nachman, concurred in interpretations equally
fanciful with the above, but all resting on the true principle of
the period being mystical, and where days are mentioned, their
being used for years. Rabbi Abarbanel makes the one time to
be the period of the standing of the first Temple or 410
years. The two times 820 years, and the half time 205 years,
which, being added, are altogether 1435 years.--This period
he expected to elapse in the Jewish year 5263, answering to
the year of our Lord 1503. He lived to see his calculation
fail. -
The author of the small Hebrew work already mentioned,”
which is now open before me, seeing that all former computa-
tions had failed, interprets one time to be the length of the 490
years revealed in Dan. ix. 24. Three times are, therefore, 1470
years, and half a time, 245 years, which being added, make
1715 years. Computing this period from the Jewish year
3828, which is their date of the destruction of Jerusalem, he
brings the three times and a half out in their year 5543, answer-
ing to the year of Christ 1783, that is within nine years of the
true end of the three times, and a half or 1260 years.
Next as to the period of 2300 evenings and mornings, re-
vealed in Dan. viii. 14, the Hebrew work from which I have
obtained the whole of this information, of which the title is,
The Eaplanation of the Times,t tells us, that Eben Ezra, and also
the Christian Doctors, explain the days according to the letter,
making them a period of six years and three months, being the
duration of the distress of Israel during the days of Antiochus
(Epiphanes) the wicked. “But Rabbi Isaac Abarbanel knocks
them down (Hebrew b-pºp by Hºn Smites them on the head,) and says,
that this is a fiction of their imagination, and that it is not
found in the book; and he proves, that the days are to be inter-
preted as years, when shall be the days of our redemption, and
so have explained them all our other interpreters. Rabbi
Saadias Gaon, and Rashi, have interpreted the words EVENING,
MoRNING, ºps any by arithmetic to be 574,i and added this num-
* His name is Eliakim Ben Abraham. -
i This work I obtained when lately in London at a Jewish bookseller's, who
gave it the just character of being very curious. It was printed in London in
the Hebrew year 5554, or A. C. 1794.
# This is as follows:—
70
200
2
2
100
200
574
:
º
xii PREFACE.
ber to the 2300, and they amount to 2874; and they say, that
their beginning is at the captivity in Egypt, and according to
their belief, the end of them will be 1290 years after the de-
struction of the second Temple. The great Rabbi Abraham
Ben Chaja makes their beginning to be at the foundation of the
first Temple.” The author afterwards tells us the opinions of
the other Rabbis, which it is not necessary to state, only that
they all adopt the same principle of days for years. I shall just
mention that of R. Bechay, to prove how invariably they adopt
this system of the year day. R. Bechay supposes the words
Even ING AND MORNING to be the two parts of a day, and thus
makes the 2300 to be 1150 days, “which are years, and then shall
be the beginning of redemption according to his view, and the
end of it will be 1335 years after the desolation of Jerusalem.”
It were too much to expect, that the Jewish Doctors, upon
whose hearts, because of their rejection of the Lord Jesus, the
vail still was, should apply the true principle of interpretation
of a day for a year in a correct manner, so as to have arrived at
the solution of the mysterious chronology. This knowledge
was not to be given even to the Church of Christ till the end.
Dan. xii. 9. But from what has been now laid before the
reader, it is manifest that the Jewish Rabbis entirely accord
with the body of the Protestant Churches as to the principles
of interpretation, and in negativing the puerilities of those modern
writers, with whom we have now to contend. -
The principle that the 1260 days, and also the 2300 are years,
and also the fact that both periods terminate at the same time,
and consequently are identical during the whole of the 1260
years, have in the next place received the strongest confirma-
tion since the former edition of this tract was published from
the principles of Astronomical science. It was known to me so
far back as the year 1811, and was communicated to the Chris-
tian Observer,” that Mons. de Cheseaux, a Swiss Astronomer,
had about the middle of last Century submitted to certain lead-
ing members of the Royal Academy at Paris, some Astrono-
mical remarks on the book of Daniel, wherein he showed that
the periods of 2300 and 1260 years, and also their difference
1040 years are all Astronomical cycles, at the end of which,
the sun and moon return to nearly the same positions in the
heavens, as they set out from. All my endeavours to find the
work of Mons. de Cheseaux were, however, ineffectual, till last
year, when I procured a M.S. copy of his observations on
Daniel from the Library of the University of Lausanne. I
have since then, in a work published early in the present year,t
* See the Vol. for that year, p. 404, 5.
f “On the Jubilean Chronology of the Seventh Trumpet, with a brief ac-
PREFACE. xiii
proved the accuracy of the conclusions of Mons. de Cheseaux,
and that at the end of 2300 years the Sun and Moon return to
within 26 or 27 minutes of a Degree of the Ecliptic, or 10 hours,
44 minutes, 57 seconds, 49 thirds of Solar time to each other,
from the point where they set out at the commencement of that
period. At the end of 1260 years they return to about 30
minutes of a Degree of the Ecliptic, or 12 Hours, 3 Minutes, 6
Seconds, and 8 Thirds of time to each other. And at the end of
1040 years, they return to less than 24 Minutes of a Degree, and
to 1 Hour, 18 Minutes, S Seconds, and 19 Thirds of Solar Time,
and as these two periods are the only round numbers which
are Cyclical,” it follows that the mysterious numbers 2300 and
1260 days, are not only revealed as years, in the Book of Daniel,
(according to the principle of years for days,) which is sanc-
tioned by the authority of nearly all the most eminent Jewish
and Christian interpreters, (though rejected by certain pro-
phetic writers of the present day,) but that these periods of
years, and their difference 1040 years, are also written in the
Heavens as great Astronomical periods.
The last, and perhaps the most remarkable confirmation which
the Prophetic Chronology adopted in this Tract, and in the
other works of the author, has received, is from the circum-
stance, that in the year 1817, in a Paper in the Jewish Expo-
sitor, he advanced a conjecture, that the number of 70 years
mentioned by the Angel in the Vision in Zechariah, ch. i. 12,
besides its literal meaning has also a mystical signification, and
probably represents the whole period of the captivities and dispersions
of Judah tuntil the final redemption of the nation.
Till within the last four years, I had no definite idea of the
length of the mystical period therein signified. In the year
1830, I first arrived at a conviction that it is a period of 70
Jubilees, or 49 x 70 = 3430 years. But though I then and in
the following year attempted to calculate that period, I could
only arrive at approximations to it, which my own mind did
not rest upon as the exact truth. In the Tract last mentioned,
given to the public in the present year,t I have at length made
it evident on the basis of the true Chronology of the Books of
Judges and Kings, that supposing the Jubilee Trumpet to have
sounded at the Exodus in the month Nisan of the year B. C.
count of the Discoveries of M. de Cheseaux, as to the great Astronomical
Cycles of 2300 and 1260 years, and their difference 1040 years.
* I mention this on the authority of Mons. de Cheseaux, and also of another
Scientific friend, who has favoured me with some remarks confirmatory of
the accuracy of these conclusions.
t On the Jubilean Chronology of the Seventh Trumpet of the Apocalypse.
See Note, p. xiv.
60
xiv. PREFACE.
1638, which is the true date of that event, the period of 70
Jubilees, or 3430 years actually elapsed in the year of Christ
1791, reckoning the years from Nisan, or the Vernal Equinox.
The end of the year 1791, Hebrew style, is thus made to fall
out in March, 1792, according to our style; and it, therefore,
follows, that August, 1792, when I place the end of the 1260
years and the beginning of the Judgment of the Ancient of
Days, and the Sounding of the 7th Apocalyptic Trumpet was the
71st Jubilee year from the Exodus. -
Thus does the whole mass of evidence which has been pro-
duced from Christian and Jewish writers, and from the great
Astronomical Cycles, and from the Jubilean Chronology,
concur in establishing beyond the possibility of question by
those who will yield to evidence, that the 2300 and 1260 days
of Daniel are years, and that they ended in the year 1792, and
consequently that we are now far advanced in the Judgment of
the Ancient of Days, and near to the coming of the Son of
Man with Clouds. .
August 19, 1834.
INTRODUCTORY REMARKS.
It was a dark and gloomy night in the history of the An-
cient Church, when more than a century after the kingdom of
Israel had been finally subverted, and the Ten Tribes carried
captive by the Assyrian, Judah also at length sunk under the
power of Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon, and some of the
princes of the Royal Family of David were made eunuchs in
the palace of the Babylonian monarch.* The Prophetic bless-
ing of Isaac to his son Jacob, “Let peoples serve thee, and
nations bow down to thee, be lord over thy brethren,”t was
believed by the Church of Israel to include in it the grant of
the dominion of the whole earth to be accomplished in the ful-
ness of time through the Lord Messiah. But this expectation
seemed now to be utterly falsified by the cutting off both of
Judah and Israel, and their subjection to the Gentiles, and the
magnificent promise of God to Abraham, “thy seed shall pos-
sess the gate of his enemies,”f appeared to be clean gone for
€Ver’.
This was the hour of sorrow and despondency, in which
Jeremiah poured forth the strains of mourning, which are to be
found in his Lamentations. This, therefore, was the very sea-
son of extremity, when it pleased the God of mercy, who
cannot forsake his Saints, to open to the beloved Daniel the
first of those prophetic visions, which rekindled the rays of
light before the eyes of the servants of God, being given as a
lamp to his Church, during the long ages of darkness, which
were to intervene between the first captivity of Judah, and the
triumphant establishment of Messiah’s kingdom, to which the
Saints of God, are even now looking forward, with outstretched
necks.
º now referred to, is the dream of Nebuchadnezzar,
recorded in the second chapter of Daniel’s Prophecies. In a
* See Is. Xxxix. 7. The kingdom of Israel was subverted by Shalmanasar,
king of Assyria, in the year before Christ 719. Jehoiakim, king of Judah,
was carried to Babylon by king Nebuchadnezzar, in the year B. C. 605. And
Jerusalem was destroyed, and the Temple burned, in the year B. C. 586.
f Gen. xxvii. 29. f Ibid. xxii. 17. Ś Luke xxi. 28. Rom. viii. 19.
16 INTRODUCTORY REMARKS.
second vision communicated to Daniel himself, at a later period,
and recorded in his seventh chapter, he received a confirmation
of the former prophecy, with certain further particulars.
The connexion between these visions, and the whole Pro-
phetic times of the Scriptures, is set forth by the illustrious
Joseph Mede, in the following most important passage of his
Apostasy of the Latter Times, which deserves to be written in
letters of gold.
“For the true account of TIMEs in Scripture, we must have
recourse to that SACRED KALENDAR and GREAT ALMANACK
of PROPHEcy, the four kingdoms of Daniel, which are a Pro-
phetical Chronology of times measured by the succession of
four principal kingdoms, from the beginning of the captivity
of Israel, until the mystery of God should be finished, a course
of time, during which the church and nation of the Jews, to-
gether with those whom, by reason of their unbelief in Christ,
God should surrogate in their room, was to remain under
bondage of the Gentiles, and oppression of Gentilism; but
these times once finished, all the kingdoms of this world should
become the kingdoms of our Lord and his Christ; and to this
great Kalendar of Times, together with that other but lesser
Kalendar of Seventy Weeks, all mention of TIMEs in the Scrip-
ture seems to have reference.”*
Mede also quotes the following passages from the Commen-
tary on Daniel of Rabbi Saadias Gaon, an eminent Jewish Ex-
positor, who lived in the tenth century. On Dan. vii. 18, he
thus writes, “Because Israel have rebelled against the Lord,
their kingdom shall be taken from them, and shall be given to
these four Monarchies, which shall possess the Kingdom in
this age, and shall lead captive and subdue Israel to themselves
in this age until the age to come, until Messiah shall reign.”f
THE FOUR KINGI)OMS OF DANIEL.
According to the unanimous testimony of the Jewish and
Christian Churches, the Four Kingdoms which are described
in the foregoing visions are,
I. That of BABYLoN, signified by the head of the Image of
fine gold, Dan. ii. 32, and by the first Beast, like a lion, with
eagle’s wings. † w
Daniel, in expounding the dream of king Nebuchadnezzar,
says to him, “Thou art this head of gold.”S In other words,
he being its sovereign, with unlimited autocratical power, is
* Mede's Apostasy of the Latter Times, Ch. xii.
# Mede's Works, Book III, PLACITA DoctoruM HEBREORUM, &c.
# Dan. vii. 4. § Dan. ii. 38.
INTRODUCTORY REMARKS. I7
considered as representing in his own person the kingdom.
This part of the interpretation, therefore, rests on the authority
of the Holy Ghost. -
The plucking of the wings of the lion, and its being made
to stand on its feet as a man, point out the remarkable circum-
stances in the life of Nebuchadnezzar, which are recorded in
the 4th chapter of Daniel. The plucking of the eagle wings,
indicates the humiliation of his pride, when walking in the
palace he said, “Is not this great Babylon that I have built
for the house of the kingdom, by the might of my power, and
for the honour of my Majesty?—While the word was in the
king’s mouth, there fell a voice from heaven—O King Nebu-
chadnezzar, to thee it is spoken—the kingdom is departed from
thee.”* - - .
The liſting up of the lion, and causing it to stand erect as a
man, and a man’s heart being given to it, signify the great
change in the heart of the king, when his reason returned to
him, and he “blessed the Most High, and praised and honour-
ed Him that liveth for ever.”f Being thus restored to reason
and converted to the worship of the true God, a man’s heart is
given, namely, a rational heart to the wild beast, or lion, even
as in ch. iv. 16, his madness was signified by a beast's heart
being given to him. -
II. In expounding the vision of the Image to Nebuchadnez-
zar, Daniel says, ii. 39, “and after thee shall arise another king-
dom, inferior to thee.” This answers to the silver breast and
arms of the image,i and it signifies the kingdom of the MEDEs
and PERSIANs, which continued from the year before Christ
538, to 331, a period of 207 years. This interpretation, like
that already given of the first kingdom, rests also not only on
the testimony of all profane history, but on the authority of
the Holy GHost; for Daniel, in interpreting to Belshazzar, the
hand writing on the wall, announces to him, “God hath num-
bered thy kingdom, and finished it,”||—and “thy kingdom is
divided, and given to the Medes and Persians.”S
The second kingdom which is thus determined to be that of
* Dan. iv. 30, 31.-Most interpreters explain the plucking of the eagle's
wings as signifying the cessation of the conquests of the Babylonian monarchy,
which appears to have taken place before the insanity of Nebuchadnezzar.
The connexion between the plucking of the wings, and the giving a man’s
heart to the lion, appears to me, however, to show, that the interpretation
which is offered in this tract, is the true one, and since the former edition was
published, I have discovered, that Hippolytus, who suffered Martyrdom in the
reign of Severus, does in his Commentary on Daniel, adopt the same view
with myself. His words are—Evra phaly ºatian ºra ºr rigz avºrnº, ört kaśngón avºrou
# Joža £ºtaxºn yag & the 3xataaixº avºrov. “Then he said, his wings were plucked
because his glory was taken away, he was driven from his kingdom.” --
+ Dam. iv. 34. # Ib. ii. 32. | Ib, V. 26. § Ib. W. 28.
60%
18 INTRODUCTORY REMARKS.
the Medes and Persians, is likewise signified by the second beast
like a bear.” “This Beast raised itself up on one side, the Per-
sians being under the Medes at the fall of Babylon, but after-
wards rising up above them. And it had three ribs in the
mouth of it, between the teeth of it, to signify the kingdoms
of Sardes, Babylon, and Egypt, which were conquered by it,
but did not properly belong to it.”t
III. The third kingdom, answering to the belly and thighs of
brass of the image,i and to the third beast like a leopard,S is that
of the MACEDoNIANs or GREEKs, under ALEXANDER, and his
Successors. This is also confirmed by the authority of the
Holy Ghost, as well as the voice of history, seeing that it is
declared in Daniel’s vision of the Ram and He-Goat, that the
Ram signifies the kings; namely, the kingdoms of JMedia and
Persia,] and the He-Goat, which cast the Ram to the ground
and stamped upon him, is said by the interpreting angel to be
the king, that is, the kingdom of Grecia." The four wings of
the leopard denote the astonishing rapidity of the conquests of
Alexander the Great, and the four heads signify the four king-
doms which were formed out of his dominions after his death.
“Cassander reigned over Macedon, Greece, and Epyrus, Lysi-
machus over Thrace and Bythinia, Ptolemy over Egypt,
Lybia, Arabia, Coelo Syria and Palestine, and Seleucus over
Syria.”*
The third beast continued to reign from the year before
Christ 331, to 168, a period of 163 years.
Thus far we have expounded the visions of the four king-
doms, upon the authority of the Written Word, given by inspi-
ration of the Holy Ghost.
IV. We shall next place the interpretation of that part of
the prophetic visions which relates to the fourth Kingdom, on
the same immoveable foundation, so far at least as it respects
the identification of that kingdom. In the dream of Nebu-
chadnezzar, it was signified by the legs of iron, and feet part of
iron, and part of clayff of the image, and in the vision of Daniel
it is described as, “a fourth Beast, dreadful and terrible, and
strong exceedingly, and it had great iron teeth, it devoured
and brake in pieces, and stamped the residue with the feet of
it—and it was diverse from all the beasts that were before it,
and it had ten horns.”ff
It is manifest, both from the vision of the Image and that of
i. Pºi. 5. # Sir Isaac Newton on Daniel, p. 29. # Dan. ii. 32.
§ Ib. vii. 6. -
| See Dan. viii. 20. That the words king and kingdom are used synony-
mously, will appear by comparing Dan. vii. 17 with the 23d verse. g
º * 21. ** Sir Isaac Newton on Daniel, p. 30, it Dan. ii. 33.
# Ib. vii. 7. -
INTRODUCTORY REMARKS. I9
the four Beasts, that the fourth Kingdom was immediately to
succeed the third, without the rise of any intermediate power,
and also that it continues till the establishment of the Kingdom
of God, which, in the vision of the Image, is signified by the
stone cut out of the mountain without hands, that smote the image
on the feet, and became a great mountain, and filled the whole
earth. In Dan. vii. the same stupendous event is denoted by
the judgment of the Ancient of Days, wherein the fourth Beast is
slain, and his body destroyed by fire; and by the coming of the
Son of man, with the clouds of Heaven, and the giving of the
Kingdom and dominion under the whole heaven to the people of the
saints of the Most High.* -
Now it is undeniable, that when our Lord appeared upon
earth, the third Kingdom had already passed away, for history
testifies that Egypt, the last of the four Divisions of the Empire
of Alexander, was subverted by the Romans, in the year before
Christ, 30. Therefore, the fourth Kingdom, which, as we have
seen, immediately succeeds the third, and continues till the es-
tablishment of the Kingdom of God, must have been in exist-
ence when our Lord was upon earth. We have only then, to
ascertain from the New Testament, what power at that time
had dominion, and we, at once, establish the identity of that
power with the fourth JMonarchy of Daniel’s visions. But, we
learn from the testimony of St. Luke, chap. ii. 1, of our Lord
himself, Matth. xxii. 21, “Render unto Caesar the things that
are Caesar's,” and of the chief Priests, John xix. 15, “We
have no king but Caesar”—that the Roman power was that
which then ruled: and it may not be superfluous here to state,
for the information of plain readers, that both Caesar and Agustus
were titles of the Roman Emperors. Moreover, we have the
words of the chief Priests, in John xi. 48, “If we let him thus
alone, all men will believe on him, and the Rom ANs shall come
and take away both our place and nation.” The Roman power
is therefore certainly the fourth kingdom of Daniel. Accord-
ingly, it is observed by Bishop Chandler in his Defence of
Christianity from the Prophecies of the Old Testament, that
“no sooner was the Kingdom of the Seleucides,” (the third of
those formed from the Empire of Alexander, which fell before
the Roman power) “extinguished by Pompey in the person of
Antiochus Asiaticus, in the year B. C. 65; but the Jews every-
where lifted up their heads as if they saw the sign of their re-
demption in the dawning of the fourth Monarchy. Then rumours
went about” (nobody knew how, though originally from the
Jews) “that nature was in pangs to bring forth a king for the
* Dan. vii. 13, 14, 27.
20 INTRODUCTORY REMARKS.
Roman people, at which the frightened Senate decreed the
strangling of every child that should be born within that year;
but their vain hopes of having that kingdom in their own family,
spoiled the execution of the decree, and so Augustus was suf-
fered" to live.” When Egypt about the year B. C. 30 was
reduced into a Roman province, whereby the Empire of Alex-
ander was wholly subverted, “It was again” (says Bishop Chan-
dler) “revived, that it would turn to the great evil of the Com-
monwealth of the Romans if they entered Egypt with an army,
because, as Cicero explained it, a great king will then prove
that great evil. No such predictions were heard of in the
Gentile world, before the Jews perceived that the Roman would
prove the fourth Monarchy in Daniel. And upon that view,
they published every where their expectations of the kingdom
of Heaven, that was to follow the rise of the fourth Monarchy”
&c.—And, it may be asked, were not those expectations re-
alized? Did not John the Baptist, and Christ himself, preach
the kingdom of God within a century of that time? The Jews
were then quite accurate as to the period of Messiah’s personal
Advent, though wrong as to its circumstances.
It has thus been proved that without going out of his Bible, the
plain reader has complete assurance from its unerring testi-
mony, showing, what are the four kingdoms, which were suc-
cessively to bear rule on the earth, from the days of Daniel, till
the establishment of the Kingdom of God.
Since also it has been shown, that the Roman Empire is the
fourth kingdom, which continues in existence, till the Ancient of
Days sits in judgment for its destruction, to prepare the way
for the establishment of the Kingdom of God, and the coming
of the Son of Man with the clouds of heaven; it becomes ne-
cessary in the next place, to trace the accomplishment of the
Prophetic description of this empire, in its past history and
actual condition, in order that it may be made manifest, that
we are at the present moment near its end, and that the coming
of the Son of Man, is forth with to be looked for.
Now, that the Ancient Roman empire is fitly represented by
the Iron legs of the Image, and by the fourth Beast dreadful and
terrible and strong exceedingly, is evident from its whole history.
Sir Isaac Newton observes, “And such was the Roman empire.
It was larger, stronger, more formidable and lasting than any
of the former. It conquered the kingdom of Macedon, with
Illyricum and Epirus, in the eighth year of Antiochus Epi-
phanes, Anno Nabonass. 580t—and inherited that of Pergamos,
* Bishop Chandler's Defence of Christianity from the Prophecies, Vol. i.
ch. 2, pp. 124, 5.
+ Answering to the year before Christ, 168.
INTRODUCTORY REMARKS. 21
A. Nabonass. 616; and conquered that of Syria, A. Nabonass.
679,t and that of Egypt, A. Nabonass. 718.j And by these
and other conquests, it became greater and more terrible than
any of the three former beasts.”S Bishop Newton quotes the
following passage from Dionysius of Halicarnassus, a Greek his-
torian of high reputation in the age of Augustus Caesar. “The
Macedonian empire having overturned the strength of the
Persians, in greatness indeed of dominion, exceeded all the
kingdoms which were before it; but yet it did not flourish a
long time, but after the death of Alexander, it began to get
worse and worse. For being immediately distracted into
several principalities by his successors, and after them, having
strength to go on to the second or third generation, it was
weakened by itself, and at last was destroyed by the Romans.
And yet it did not reduce all the earth and sea to its obedience.
For neither did it possess Africa, except that part adjoining to
Egypt; neither did it subdue all Europe, but only northward,
it proceeded as far as Thrace, and westwards it descended to the
Adriatic sea. But the city of Rome ruleth over all the earth, as far
as it is inhabited, and commands all the sea, not only that within the
pillars of Hercules, but also the ocean as far as it is navigable,
having first and alone of all the most celebrated kingdoms, made the
east and west the bounds of its empire; and its dominion hath con-
tinued not a short time, but longer than that of any other city or
kingdom.”"
That Empire subsisted also with undiminished extent, during
more than three centuries after Dionysius flourished. For it is
only from the reign of Valens, who was defeated and slain by
the Goths, in the year of Christ, 376, that Gibbon dates the fall
of the Empire. Sir Isaac Newton, as we shall see, places the
period of its fall, somewhat later, viz: at the death of Theodo-
sius the Great, in 395.
THE DIVISIONS OF THE Romſ AN EMPIRE INTo TEN KINGDOMS,
OR THE RISE OF THE TEN HORNS OF THE FOURTH BEAST.
“This Empire,” says Sir Isaac Newton,” “continued in its
greatness till the reign of Theodosius the Great; and then brake
into ten kingdoms, represented by the ten horns of this Beast;
and continued in a broken form till the Ancient of Days sat in a
throne like fiery flame, and the judgment was set, and the books
were opened, and the Beast was slain, and his body destroyed, and
* Year B. C. 132: + B. C. 70. it B. C. 30.
Ś Observations on Daniel, p. 30. || The Strait of Gibraltar.
T See Dissert. on the Prophecies, Dissert. xiv.
** Observations on Daniel, p. 30.
22 INTRODUCTORY REMARKS:
given to the burning flames; and one like the Son of Man came with
the clouds of Heaven, and came to the Ancient of Days, and re-
ceived dominion over all nations, and judgment was given to the
Saints of the Most High, and the time came that they possessed the
Kingdom.” . - - .
The division of the Empire was effected by the invasion of
the Goths and Vandals, in the fourth and fifth centuries. All
history testifies, that in the period which intervened between
the defeat and death of the Emperor Valens, in the year 376,
and the year 476, the northern nations, called Goths and Van-
dals, broke in upon the territories of Rome, divided the pro-
vinces of the Western Empire among themselves, and in the
year last mentioned, finally subverted that Empire, Augustulus,
the last of the Emperors, having been deposed and banished
from Rome, by Odoacer the General of the Heruli, who was
elected and reigned the first Gothic King of Italy. At this
time, or shortly afterwards, the following Gothic Tribes had
planted themselves in the provinces of the Western Empire,
and they answer to the ten primary horns of the Beast. 1.
The Visigoths in Gaul and Spain. 2. The Suevi in Spain. 3.
The Heruli in Italy. 4. The Franks in Belgium. 5. The
Burgundians in Burgundy. 6. The Savons in Britain. 7. The
Alans in Gaul and Spain. 8. The Ostrogoths in Pannonia. 9.
The Lombards in Pannonia. 10. The Vandals in Africa.
The number of kingdoms has varied from age to age, and
also their geographical positions and boundaries; and it has
been observed, that the number ten, frequently in the Scrip-
tures, denotes a considerable, but indefinite number. * At pre-
sent the number of the kingdoms is more than ten.f
It only remains to say, that the ten Toes of the Image, part of
* See Gen. xxxi. 41. Zech. viii. 23. Amos vi. 9. 1 Sam. i. 8: Dr. Cres-
Sener in his Demonstration of Protestant Principles of Apocalyptic Interpre-
tation, p. 247, quotes the following words from the Malvenda De Antichristop.
234, De 10 Cornibus. “The number TEN is very often in Scripture used inde.
finitely for a great multitude.” Malvenda was a Spanish Dominican, and
therefore of the Romish Church. He died in 1628.
f Machiavel, himself a member of the Church of Rome, in his History of
Florence, Book I., gives a list of the Gothic Tribes which overthrew the West-
ern Empire, and makes them just TEN in number. It is, with one exception,
the same as the list here given. He omits the Suevi in Spain, and inserts the
Huns in Pannonia. As the Huns do not appear to have possessed Pannonia at
the period of the dissolution of the Western Empire, I have not included them
in the list of the original Gothic kingdoms.--When, however, the Ostrogoths
left Pannonia and marched into Italy in the year 489, Sir Isaac Newton tells
us (see his Observations upon Daniel, p. 68, 9.) that they left their seats in
Pannonia to the Avares, a tribe of the Huns, and that from that time “the Huns
grew again very powerful,” and that hence the present kingdom of Hungary
took the name of Hun-avaria, and by contraction Hungary.—Koch in his Ta-
bleau des Revolutions de l’Europe, Carte No. II. Tom. III. enumerates ELEVEN
Kingdoms in the Western Empire near the close of the Fifth Century.
INTRODUCTORY REMARKS. 23
iron, and part of clay–Dan. ii. 42—answer to the ten Horns of
the fourth Beast, ch. vii. 7. And if we look abroad into the
present kingdoms of Europe, we shall see that some of them, as,
for example, Austria and France, partake of the strength of the
iron. England also did possess this character; but the elements
of national dissolution are working in her body politic with too
much energy to permit us to reckon her now among the Iron
Kingdoms. Other kingdoms, as Spain, Sardinia, Naples, are
evidently, from their internal weakness, to be likened to the
clay.
THE LITTLE HORN OF THE FOURTH BEAST.
Dan. vii. 8.-“I considered the horns, and behold there
came up among them another Little Horn, before whom there
were three of the first horns plucked up by the roots, and be-
hold in this horn were eyes like the eyes of a man, and a mouth
speaking great things.” -
This horn, by the unanimous testimony of the Protestant
Churches, is the Pope or Bishop of Rome, and it exactly answers
to the character of that ecclesiastical power. The Pope rose
gradually into the maturity of his power, in the midst of the
secular kingdoms of the Roman Empire. Three of the first
horns were eradicated before him; and history testifies that the
three Gothic Kingdoms of the Heruli, the Ostrogoths, and the
Lombards in Rome and Italy, were successively rooted out pre-
paratory to the full developement of the Papal power. In the
above interpretation, the Protestant Churches do not stand
alone. The learned Abarbanel, one of the most eminent Jew-
ish Doctors of the middle ages, affirms in his Commentary on
Daniel, published before the Reformation, as he died in 1508,
that the Little Horn is the Pope.
Daniel is told by the Angel, v.24, that the Little Horn shall
be diverse from the other horns. All these horns were secular
kingdoms; but the Papal power being a spiritual or ecclesiastical
kingdom, is essentially different from the rest. The eyes of the
Little Horn denote the cunning and policy for which the Papacy
has always been peculiarly distinguished; but they also point
out the character of the horn as a Bishop or Overseer of the Church
of Christ—the Greek word Episcopos for a Bishop, signifying
literally an Overseer or Overlooker. The Little Horn had a mouth
speaking great things. This was fulfilled by the Popes, both
in things secular and in the Church. In the proud insolence
of their power, they claimed dominion over all earthly kings,
and authority to dethrone them at their own pleasure. In
the Church also they usurped the authority and titles of the
24 INTRODUCTORY REMARKS:
Lord himself. I shall give some examples of these things from
History.
In the year 1076, Henry IV., Emperor of Germany, was
excommunicated by Pope Gregory VII. with a sentence of
deposition from the kingdom. In order to propitiate the Pope,
Henry passed the Alps, amidst the rigour of a severe winter,
and arrived in February, 1077, at the fortress of Canusium,
where Gregory then was with Mathilda, Countess of Tuscany.
Here the suppliant emperor stood for three days in the open air, at
the entrance of the fortress, with his feet bare, his head uncovered,
and no other raiment but a wretched covering of woollen cloth. On
the fourth day, he was admitted into the presence of the Pope,
who, on certain conditions, agreed to absolve him. One of
these was, that he should always, if he were maintained in his
kingdom, be obedient to the Holy See.*
Henry afterwards threw off for a time the yoke thus imposed
upon him, but at length fell a victim to the rancorous hatred of
the Little Horn. Pascal II., a subsequent Pope, instigated
Henry, son of the Emperor, to rebel against his father; and this
unfortunate Prince having, by the vilest deceit, been entrapped
by his son, was first imprisoned by him, and then divested of
the imperial dignity, by a decree of the Diet;f and having been
ignominiously stripped of his royal robes by the hands of the
Archbishops of Mentz and Cologne, he afterwards died at
Liege.f -
In the year 1155, Frederic Barbarossa, Emperor of Germany,
was obliged by Pope Adrian IV. to hold his stirrup, while he
dismounted from his horse.
In the year 1212, Pope Innocent III. passed a sentence of
dethronement against John, King of England, and granted the
kingdom to Philip, King of France. Alarmed at the danger
which threatened him, John agreed to hold his kingdom as a
feudatory of the Church of Rome. He came disarmed into the
presence of the Pope's Legate," who was seated on a throne, flung
himself on his knees before him, and laid the crown of England at
his feet, swore fealty to the Pope, and paid part of the tribute for his
Kingdom as the patrimony of Peter.|| Elated beyond measure at
this triumph of the Papal power, the Legate immediately
trampled upon the money, which was laid at his feet, as the earnest
* That is the Pope.
t The Diet was the Legislative Assembly of the German Empire.
# See Condillac Cours d’Etude pour l’Instruction du Prince de Parme,
Tome 8me, pp. 346—348. Condillac was a Member of the Church of Rome.
See also Mosheim, Cent. xii. Part 2d, and Modern Universal History, vol.
xxix. pp. 92–94.
§ That is Deputy.
l! The Popes pretend to be the successors of St. Peter,
INTRODUCTORY REMARKs. 25
of the subjection of the kingdoms of England and Ireland, and took
away the crown, which he kept five days, and then returned it
to John as a favour from the Pope.*
At the fifth General Lateran Council held in the year 1512,
the Archbishop of Spalatensis opens his oration to Pope Julius
II. in the following words:—“I who am about to speak in pre-
sence of thee, the Prince of the whole world, and the true Vicar
of Christ placed in the highest eminence of the human race.”f
In the fourth Session of the Council, Christopher Marcellus,
in presence of the same Pope, calls him the Bridegroom, (spon-
sum) and says, “Take care, I say, most blessed Father, that
beauty and grace and comeliness are restored to thy Bride.”
Afterwards we find these words—“Thou then art the shepherd,
thou the physician, thou the guide, thou the husbandman, in fine,
THou ART ANoTHER GoD Upon EARTH.”f
In the Seventh Session Beltassar del Ryo, Protonotary of the
Apostolic See, in presence of Pope Leo X., spoke the following
words of blasphemy. After relating the victory of Sigismund
of Poland over the Turks, he says, “And 0 if it had been so
that the only hand of so many princess had been turned against
the true enemies, I should indeed have believed concerning
thee, O most mighty Leo, at the expense of the same kings,
that word of the Prophetical Psalm: ‘He shall have dominion
from sea to sea, and from the river to the ends of the earth.
The Ethiopians shall fall down before him, and his enemies
shall lick the dust. All kings shall adore him, and all nations
shall serve him.” Thou truly who art VICEGERENT of the Most
HIGH GoD Upon EARTH, and who hast preserved without seam,
the coat of Christ which was ready to be rent, and as formerly
the hand of the Lord held up the prince of the Apostles lest he
should sink, so hast thou held up and called the poles and prin-
ces of the Church Universal in this valley of tears, lest they
should be overwhelmed in the whirlpool of dissension; and
thou following the footsteps and words of the good Shepherd
hast to thee drawn these thy sheep hearing thy voice, foras-
much as thou didst lately proclaim going before the sheep, “I,
when I shall be liſted up, will draw all things unto me.’ſ Thou
lord, I say, hast drawn all things unto thee, since being made
* Hume's England, ch. xi. Condillac Cours d’Etude, Tome 8me. p. 414.
Russell's Modern Europe, vol. i. p. 322. - • * * - - -
+ “Ego vero quicoram te, hoc est coram totius orbis principe et vero Christi
Vicario in exceſcissimo humani generis fastigio posito,”—“sum verba fatu-
rus.”—Acta Concil. Tom. ix. Col. 1602. Paris, 1714.
f “Cura inquam Pater beatissime ut sponsae tuæ forma, decorque redeat et
pulcritudo.”—“Tu enim pastor tu medicus tu gubernator tu cultor, tu denique
ALTER DEUs IN TERRA.”—Ibid. Tom. ix. Col. 1651.
§ Meaning, I presume, the hand or authority of Leo himself.
ll John Xii.
61
26 POLITICAL DESTINY
the Shepherd, thou drawest, nourishest, and embracest the sheep
which were absent from the fold; that when thou shalt give an
account of thy stewardship thou mayest speak the words of God
to God. ‘Of those that thou gavest me I have not lost any
one.” ” .
He afterwards says, “and like as the lion (leo) is the king of
beasts do thou another Lion (Leo) of men, and not another
king only, but KING OF KINGs, and made THE SUPREME RULER
of THE whole world bring back, allure and recall to thy fold
the other sheep which thou hast which are not of this fold.
Gird then thy sword upon thy thigh, O thou most mighty, for thou
hast two swords, the spiritual namely and the temporal. Having,
therefore, drawn forth the one, and placed the other in its scab-
bard, rush headlong against thine enemies, for nothing shall be
impossible to thee.”*—Acta Concil. Tom. ix. Col. 1704, 5.
These horrible blasphemies were uttered in the Council in
the very presence of Leo himself, (“our said most holy Lord
the Pope being present and presiding,”t) and they are found in
* I shall here place the original Latin of these passages. “Etsi O utinam
jam datum esset solam tantorum principum manum in veros hostes converti
potuisse, credidissem profecto dete Leo maxime, eorumdem regum impensa
illud Prophetici Psalmi dictum: Dominobitur a mari usque ad mare, et a flumine
18que ad terminos orbis terrarum. Coram illo procident AEthiopes, et inimici
غls terram lingent. Et adorabunt euan omnes reges, et omnes gentes servient ei.
TU VERo QUI stiNTMI DEI GERIs vices in terris quique Christi tunicam scissurae
Jam proximam inconsutilem, uterat, praeservasti, universalisque ecclesiae car-
dines et principes, ut olim manus Domini Apostólorum principem a fluctibus,
me mergeretur erexit, tu quoque in hac lacrymarum fluctuoso valle, ne dissen-
sionis turbine obruerentur, erexisti, evocasti; ovesque ipsas tuas, vocem tuam
audientes, pastoris boni fastigia et verba secutus, ad te fraxisti: quandoquidem
dudum ante oves existens praedicebas: Cum evaltatus fuero, omnia iraham
mecum, (John Xà) Traxisti inquam domine, omnia ad te, quando quae aberant
ab Ovili oves, jam pastor effectus attrahis, foves, amplexaris, ut willicationis
tugs rationem reddiurus, Dei verba dicas Deo: Quos mihi dedisti non perdidi
ea, eis quemguam.”
“Acceu leo rex quadrupedum, tu alter Leo, hominum non alter rex tantum,
red regum rex, et orbis terraruia monarchaeffectus, alias oves quashabes, quae
mon sunt de hoc oviliad tuun ovile reduceres, alliceres, revocates. Accingere
ergo gladio tuo super femur tuum potentissime: namet tu duos gladios habes, Spi-
ritualem Scilicet et temporalem. Altero igitur evaginato, altero in vaginam re-
posito in hostes irrue quia nihil impossibile erit tibi.” •º
f Latin “Praesente et praesidente praefato sanctissimo domino nostro Papa.”
One of those writers of the present day, who reject the whole Prophetic testi-
mony of the Protestant Churches against Papal Rome, and of the oly Ghost
himself, by denying that the Pope is the Man of Sin &f 3d. Thess, ii., and the
Little Horn of Dan. vii., wishes to clear the Pope of the guilt of these or simi-
lar blasphemies, by supposing them to have been uttered by persons whom he
never saw or heard of, or to use a legal phrase, this writer wants to prove, or to
suppose, an alibi in favour of his Holiness. The attempt to screen him in this
way, however, utterly fails. The two Popes, Julius II. and Leo X, were both
present in the Council, and heard the blasphémies addressed to them, and the
Church of Rome has sent them forth to the world in the proceedings of the
†: Council, becoming thus responsible for the whole guilt of these blas-
pnemies,
OF THE EARTH. . 27
the authentic Acts of that Council, published under the autho-
rity of the Romish Church. It is, therefore, undeniable, that
the whole guilt of them rests on the Papal Power, and they
fulfil to the very letter the words of the prophet, that the Little
Horn had a mouth speaking great things; for be it observed, the
person who utters them is the Protonotary of the Papal See,
and it is as it were the Pope speaking in the person of this officer
to himself the Pope, and assuming the character and attributes of
the Lord Jesus Christ. -
It is said of the Little Horn, that it “made war with the Saints
of the Most High, and prevailed against them until the Ancient
of Days came, and judgment was given to the Saints of the Most
High, and the time came that the Saints possessed the king-
dom.”* All history witnesses to the fulfilment of these words.
In the year 1208, a crusadet was proclaimed in the name of
Pope Innocent III., against the Waldenses and Albigensest in
the south of France, in which a million of men perished. From
the beginning of the order of the Jesuits, in the year 1540 to
1580, nine hundred thousand were destroyed. One hundred and
fifty thousand perished by the Inquisition in thirty years. In
* Dan. vii. 21, 22. t A religious war.
# They were the Protestants of that day.
[The former part of this Note, importing that the Albigenses and Walden-
ses were the Protestants of that day, belongs to the first Edition of this Tract.
Before permitting it to remain, I have thought it incumbent upon me carefully
to examine the ponderous Octavo of the Rev. S. R. Maitland, wherein he la-
bours hard to show, that the Albigenses were either hypocritical impostors or
misguided fanatics; (P. 443) and he especially grounds this conclusion (P. 451)
upon the testimonies extracted from the Book of Sentences of the Inquisition,
that is upon testimony just as credible, as that of Satan and his Angels, and not
one whit more. But I deny, that even the Sentences of the Inquisition pro-
duced by Mr. Maitland and the other testimonies, do when weighed impar-
tially, and compared with one another, warrant the conclusions he draws from
them, and I fearlessly maintain, that these calumniated and persecuted men
were the Saints of God, and that no evidence worthy of credit is produced to
prove the charge of false doctrine against them. This is not the place to meet
the arguments of Mr. Maitland or to offer any observations on his facetiousness
(P. 280) at the expense of one of the victims of the Inquisition, whom I verily
believe to have been a saint of God, or his commendation of the wisdom of the
Inquisitors (P. 277) in sentencing another to perpetual imprisonment against
whom no crime is proved, or to animadvert upon the deference he shows to
the authorities of the Romish Church, and his blindness to their numberless
contradictions, or upon the spirit which he manifests towards Protestant wri-
ters. Lest, however, I should be suspected of having written this Note with-
out due consideration, I shall inform the reader, that it is the result of more
than a week's laborious examination of Mr. Maitland's work, and some of the
original Acts of Council, referred to by him. I have also consulted Dr. Allix's
Remarks upon the Ecclesiastical History of the Ancient Churches of the Al-
bigenses, and of Piedmont, and Milner. These remarks are, therefore, the re-
sult of severe and laborious application of mind to the points at issue between
the Protestant Churches and º: Maitland, who in this matter by giving credit
to the false testimonies of Rome against the Saints, whom she cruelly murder-
ed, does plainly appear in the light of her Advocate.]
28 POLITICAL DESTINY
the low countries, fifty thousand persons were hanged, beheaded,
burned, and buried alive, for the crime of heresy,” within the
space of thirty-eight years, from the first Edict of Charles V.,
against the Protestants, to the peace of Chateau Cambresis, in
1559. t Eighteen thousand suffered by the hand of the execu-
tioner, in the space of five years and a half, during the admi-
nistration of the ferocious Duke of Alva. I
Such were some of the deeds of blood, whereby the Little
Horn made war with the Saints of the Most High. Volumes
have been filled with the narratives of its atrocities; but in a
Tract like this, only a few hints of them can be given.
In explaining these deeds of the horn, the interpreting angel
farther says, that “he shall wear out the saints of the Most
High, and think to change times and laws, and they shall be
given into his hand, until a time, and times, and the divi-
ding of time. But the judgment shall sit, and they shall take
away his dominion, to consume and destroy it unto the end.”S
His changing times and laws was accomplished by his assum-
ing the Divine Prerogatives of deposing and setting up kings,
the reigns of kings being one of the usual measures of time, and
by his claiming paramount authority over the highest princes of
the earth, with a power to absolve their subjects from their
oaths of allegiance. But, without doubt, the times and laws of
the Church are principally designed, and over these he claimed,
and exercised, supreme authority. -
The saints, with the times and laws, were given into his hand,
until a time, times (that is, two times) and a half, or for a period
of three prophetic years and a half—and by comparing Rev. xii.
6, with v. 14, we learn, that the period here revealed is as
follows:—
1 Time, º º o 360 days.
2 Times, o e e 720 days.
Half a Time, . o tº 180 days.
1260 days.
By the general consent of Protestant commentators, these
days are mystical, signifying so many years, or a period of 1260
years. This period began in the month of March, 533, when
the Roman Emperor Justinian, in an epistle to the Pope, which
was afterwards inserted in the laws of the Empire, gave to him
the title of Head of all the holy Churches, and thus subjected to
* That is opposing the Romish Church.
t This fact rests on the authority of a Roman Catholic Historian. Fra Paolo
Sarpi Histoire du Concile de Trente, Tom. ii. p. 52.
t Watson's Reign of Philip II. vol. i. p. 392. Ś Dan. vii. 25, 26.
OF THE EARTH. 29
his authority all the saints of God throughout the Empire.
The 1260 years being computed from the year 533, by current
time, which is the universal mode of reckoning in the Scriptures,
and even to the present day in Eastern countries, we are brought
down to the year 1792, as the end of the great prophetic period,
and the beginning of the judgment which follows.
Accordingly, at the fall of the French monarchy, on the 10th
August, 1792, a series of the most stupendous events began
their awful course, which so exactly correspond in character
with the results to be expected from the Judgment of the An-
cient of Days, that we are led, reasoning from these events, to
fix that year as the era of the commencement of the Judgment;
and thus the former conclusion, founded on the calculation of
the years, receives new strength by a consideration of the his-
tory of our own times. It is proper to add, that most of the
writers on prophecy of the present day concur with us in these
two conclusions. 1st. That the 1260 years ended in the year
1792; 2dly, That the judgment of the Ancient of Days then
began.* -
THE JUDGMENT OF THE ANCIENT OF DAYS, AND THE COMING OF
THE SON OF MAN WITH THE CLOUIDS OF HEAVEN.
“I beheld till the thrones were cast down (or set), and the
Ancient of Days did sit. A fiery stream came forth from be-
fore him, thousand thousands ministered unto him—and ten
thousand times ten thousand stood before him—the judgment
was set, and the books were opened. I beheld then, because
of the voice of the great words which the horn spake, I beheld
even till the beast was slain, and his body destroyed, and given
to the burning flame.” Dan. vii. 9–11.
Before considering the import of these words, let it be ob-
served, that the verse which follows, namely, the 12th, is a
parenthesis, and simply informs us, that when the three former
Peasts were deprived of their dominion, it was not effected by
a destruction similar to that of the fourth Beast, but their lives
(that is, the political existence of the nations of which they con-
sisted) were prolonged for a season. As to the fulfilment of
this, history testifies to it. Indeed, the nations inhabiting the
territories of the former three Beasts, continue in existence even
to the present day, although, in a feeble state, and now fast
wasting away.
* Mr. Faber dissents from the first of these conclusions, but places the com-
mencement of the Judgment even at an earlier period, viz., at the beginning of
the French Revolution in 1789, and, therefore, accords with us, that it is now
sitting.—Sacred Cal. of Prophecy, Vol. i. p. 234. -
61%
30 POLITICAL DESTINY
The Judgment of the ANCIENT of DAys is an emblematical
representation of that special act of the FATHER, which is sig-
nified in the words of the 110th Psalm: Sit thou at my right
hand until I MAKE THY FoEs THY Footstool. It is manifest
from the last clause that there is to be an acting or putting
forth of the power of the ALMIGHTY FATHER in making the
enemies of Christ his footstool. The ANCIENT of DAys, or
the ETERNAL FATHER, is here represented, therefore, as comf-
ING, (for the Horn prevailed against the saints until the An-
cient of Days cAME,%) and sitting down with his joint asses-
sors (the imagery being taken, as Mede observes, from the
session of the Jewish Sanhedrim) on the throne of Judgment.
The fourth Beast, and his lawless Horn, are summoned to the
bar and condemned, and the execution of the judgment is begun.
Now, seeing that the ETERNAL FATHER, is essentially invi-
sible to mortal eyes, and no man hath seen Him, or can see
Him;f it is necessarily implied in the foregoing description of
the Judgment of the Ancient of Days, that it is conducted by
an agency which is altogether invisible and can be discerned
only by the eye of Faith.
Its effects, however, must be awful and universal as it respects
the territories of the fourth Beast of Daniel, and must bring in
a train of calamities of the most fearful and unequalled extent.
Turning now to the history of Europe for the last forty-one
years, we find, that during that period, every European king-
dom has been shaken to its foundations. The throne of France,
its central kingdom, has been overthrown five times, besides
numerous minor changes. The thrones of the greater part of
the other European Kingdoms have been twice subverted. §
Every part of Continental Europe has been drenched with
blood in a series of wars, wherein millions of the human race
have fallen by the sword and disease.
Every Capital of the European Kingdoms of the Continent,
from Moscow to Lisbon, has, in the same period, been occu-
pied by foreign armies.
In the greater part of Europe, the property of the Church of
Rome has been seized for secular purposes. The Papal domin-
ion has also been shaken to its foundations, and its power to
persecute the Saints taken away. It is true, that it is now using
every effort to obtain proselytes, and with such success as justly
to alarm the true disciples of the Lord—but it is obliged to trust
* Dan. vii. 22. + 1 Tim. vi. 16.
# Ist. QVerthrow, that of Louis XVI. in 1792. 2d. Bonaparte in 1814, 3d.
Louis XVIII, in 1815. 4th. Bonaparte in 1815. 5th. Charles X. in 1830.
§ 1st. At the overthrow of the ancient Dynasties; and 2dly. When the vas-
sal Kings of Bonaparte shared the same fate, -
OF THE EARTH. 31
to the power of persuasion only, and is deprived throughout
Europe of the power of the temporal sword, which was formerly
wielded in its behalf. The destruction of the Papal Power is
proceeding even in the States of America, which profess the
Romish faith. In the year 1825, an important State Paper was
issued by the Congress of Mexico, renouncing the authority of
Rome to interfere in secular and political affairs; and in the
Republic of Colombia the public exercise of the Protestant
worship has within the last two years been permitted. It was
before prohibited.
During the whole of the above period of forty-one years,
Europe has been in a continued state of revolutionary excite-
ment, nor has it enjoyed, even within the last seventeen years
of peace, so much as one year of solid tranquillity, free from
the alarms of the political volcano which has ever and anon
been manifesting the signs of new eruptions.
In the British kingdoms, by the passing of the Catholie
Emancipation Bill, in the year 1829, and the Reform Bill in
1832, there was effected within the short space of little more
than three years, an entire revolution, whereby its Political
and Ecclesiastical Constitution has been changed, its House of
Peers degraded as an independent branch of the Legislature, its
Aristocracy deprived of its power, which has been transferred
to the people, and its monarchy left as a naked column with-
out support.* This country, though exempted from the mise-
ries of foreign invasion, has been most severely visited by
commercial, and manufacturing, and agricultural distress, at
different intervals, which have reduced the poorer classes from
comparative eomfort to misery.
It may be added, that all Europe is now trembling and heav-
ing with the expectation of some mighty crisis, so that no words
can fitly express its present condition; but those of our Lord
himself, who thus describes the same series of events, which
have been detailed in the preceding pages, as the results of the
sitting of the Judgment of the Ancient of Days.
“And there shall be signs in the Sun, and in the moon, and
in the stars; and upon earth, distress of nations with perplexity;
the sea and the waves roaring. Men’s hearts failing them for
fear, and for looking after those things which are coming on
the earth, for the powers of the heavens shall be shaken.”f
Writers on prophecy are generally agreed, that by the Sun,
* It will be understood, that this is merely a narrative of the late changes,
without any opinion, whether they are for better or worse. That their effects,
as here stated, are not magnified, might easily be shown, were there space for
it.
f Luke xxi. 25, 26. See also Matth. xxiv. 29.
32 POLITICAL DESTINY
in the language of symbols, is to be understood the Imperial or
Royal power of the State, and by the Moon and Stars, the
Nobles and Princes, who are under the king in authority; and,
if the reader refer to Jacob’s interpretation of Joseph’s Dream,
Gen. xxxvii. 10, “Shall I and thy mother, and thy brethren,
indeed come to bow down ourselves to thee on the earth?” he
will find that the principles of this interpretation, are as old as
the age of Jacob. They have, indeed, their foundation in na-
ture itself; for since the natural universe is used in symbols,
to express the moral and political universe, therefore the
heavens and celestial luminaries, must represent the reigning
and ruling powers, and subordinate dignities of the political
heavens. By the same beautiful analogy, the roaring of the
sea and the waves, denotes the populace, rising up in tumult
and insurrection against the higher powers of the State.
The words of our Lord’s prophecy, above cited, being com-
pared with the context, do therefore manifestly indicate, that at
the close of the Times of the Gentiles, namely, the times of the
dominion of the four Gentile Kingdoms, and when the redemp-
tion of Israel is about to take place, the states which are con-
nected with the visible church within the limits of the fourth
Empire of Daniel, which is the principal theatre of the New
Testament prophecies, shall undergo a concussion so violent, as
to shake the thrones of all the reigning sovereignties, and fill
their territories with distress and perplexity; the populace rising
up in tumultuous movements, threatening the very existence of
civil society, so as to fill the hearts of men with fear and dread
of the things which are coming on the earth. -
That this prophecy of our Lord describes the same events as
are signified by the coming of the Ancient of Days, in Daniel,
and his sitting in Judgment, is now acknowledged by all the
leading writers on Prophecy, and is made quite manifest from
the circumstance which follows next in order—both in Daniel
and St. Luke.
That circumstance is the coming of the Son of Man with the
clouds of heaven.
“I saw (says Daniel, vii. 13) in the night visions, and behold
one like the Son of Man came with the clouds of heaven; and
came to the Ancient of Days, and they brought him near before
him, and there was given him dominion, and glory, and a king-
dom, that all people, nations, and languages, should serve him;
his dominion is an everlasting dominion, which shall not pass
away, and his kingdom that which shall not be destroyed.”
The following remarks as to the order of these events,
viz., the Judgment of the Ancient of Days and the Advent,
OF THE EARTH. 33
which are made by Mr. Faber,” seem to me to be perfectly
correct. *
“The Judgment of the Roman beast commences with the
Session of the Ancient of Days; after that judgment has con-
tinued for some undefined space, the Son of Man makes his
appearance in the clouds of heaven, and is brought near to the
already seated Ancient of Days, to whom he becomes a judi-
cial assessor; and then at length through the special agency of
the Son of Man (as we are assured by St. John, Rev. xix.
11—21), the Roman Beast and his little Apostate horn are de-
stroyed.”
Turning back now to the text of St. Luke, we find that our
Lord, immediately after the clause which has been already
quoted, ending with the annunciation of the shaking of the
powers of the heavens, thus continues his prophetic discourse.
“And then shall they see the Son of Man coming in a cloud
with power and great glory. And when these things begin to
come to pass, then look up, and lift up your heads, for your
redemption draweth nigh.”f
It is plain therefore, that Christ places his coming with
clouds in the midst of that final shaking of the nations, which
is to precede the redemption of the Church, and the establish-
ment of the kingdom of God. In like manner Daniel sees one
like the SoN of MAN coming with the clouds, during the judg-
ment of the ANCIENT of DAys, and just before the establish-
ment of the Kingdom of God.
That the coming of the SoN of MAN, which is predicted in
both these passages, is one and the same, is still denied by
some of our Religious Reviewers and theological writers, who
are about as wise in these matters as the Babylonian king was,
as to the signification of the MENE TEKEL UPHARSIN, before
it was interpreted by Daniel; but it is not now disputed by any
one who has a competent knowledge of the Prophetic Scrip-
tures, or by any of the later writers on Prophecy. On this
point it may be enough to say, that even Mr. Faber, though
he contends that the coming with clouds is not personal and real,
but figurative, yet does he most strenuously uphold the same-
ness of the Advent in both passages.—“The coming of the
Son of Man in the clouds with power and great glory, here
foretold, is the same as the coming of one like the Son of Man
in the clouds of heaven, to receive dominion, glory, and
royalty, foretold by Daniel in his vision of the four great
Beasts.”S -
We proceed next to show that the coming of our Lord
* Sacred Calender of Prophecy, Vol. i. p. 231. t Luke xxi. 27, 28.
# Dan. v. 25. - § Faber's Sacr. Cal. Vol. i. p. 218. -
34 POLITICAL DESTINY i
which is predicted in both passages, is his proper personal
.Advent to judge the quick and the dead—and that it is now
near at hand. -
Let it be observed, in the first place, that the modern fancy
of a figurative coming of the Son of Man with the clouds of
heaven, was altogether unknown to the Church of God in the
Apostolic and following ages, and would, doubtless, had it been
then propounded, have been rejected, as a pernicious heresy.
Yet by the great body of the doctors and evangelical preachers
of the present day, it is held to be the orthodox explanation
of the passages which have been quoted from Daniel and St.
Luke, and as such is preached to the people; while they who
hold the ancient doctrine are branded as heretics. In proof of
what has been asserted, with regard to the sentiments of the
primitive Church, we shall quote from several of the earlier
writers. Justin Martyr, an illustrious Father who suffered
death for the cause of Christ, in the year 163, in his Dialogue
with Trypho the Jew, having asserted that Devils were through
the name of Jesus Christ, obedient to the Christians, thus con-
tinues his argument. “If such power is demonstrated to have
followed, and still to follow the dispensation of his passion (or
death), how great shall it be at his coming in glory—for he
shall come as the Son of Man, on the clouds, even as Daniel
hath showed, the angels also accompanying him.” Justin
then cites the whole passage, Dan. vii. 9—28.*
Tertullian, in his 3d Book against Marcion, Ch. vii., applies
the same words of Daniel, to the second personal coming of
Christ.
“De quo secundo adventu, “Concerning which second
idem Prophetes. Et ecce cum coming, the same prophet
nubibus coeli tanquam filius (writes). And behold one
hominis veniens venit usque like the Son of Man came
ad Veterem Dierum,” &c. with the clouds of heaven to
the Ancient of Days.”
The same Father, in the 22nd Chapter of his Book on the
Resurrection of the Flesh, expounds also the words of St.
Luke, which I have cited, viz: “the powers of the heavens
shall be shaken, and they shall see the Son of Man coming
with clouds;” as referring to the same great event, namely,
the second personal coming of Christ to judge the World. The
passage is, however, too long to be inserted in this Tract.t
* Dialog. cum Tryph. p. 186. Edit. Thril.
f I shall introduce a few words from it in this Note. “Quum enim et tem-
pora totius spei fixa sint sacrosancto stylo, nec liceat eam ante constitui, quam
in adventum (opinor) Christi, vota nostra suspirant in seculi hujus occasum,
in transitum mundi quoque ad diem Domini magnum, diem ira et retribu-
tionis, diem ultimum et occultum, nec ulli praeterquam Patri notum.” “For
OF THE EARTH. 35
Chrysostom, another of the Fathers, who was Patriarch of
Constantinople at the end of the fourth Century, in his Homi-
lies on the Gospel of St. Matthew,” applies the words in Matth.
xxiv. 30, “Then shall appear the sign of the Son of Man in
Heaven—and they shall see the Son of Man coming in the
clouds of Heaven, with power and great glory,” to our Lord’s
personal advent in judgment. .-
Cyril, Archbishop of Jerusalem, in the same century, in the
15th of his Catechetical Discourses, being on that article of the
Nicene Creed, “He shall come again to judge both the quick
and dead; whose Kingdom shall have no end,” cites Dan. vii.
9, “I saw until the thrones were set, and the Ancient of Days
did sit,” also the 13th verse, “I saw in the night visions, and
behold, one like the Son of Man came with the clouds of
Heaven,” &c., as appertaining to the day of Judgment. He
also classes the following texts, namely, 1 Thess. iv. 16, “The
Lord himself shall descend from Heaven, with the voice of the
Archangel:” Matth. xxiv. 30, “Then shall they see the Son
of Man coming in the clouds of Heaven, with power and great
glory:” and Ps. l. 3, “Our God shall come, and shall not keep
silence: a fire shall devour before Him, and it shall be very
tempestuous round about him,” as equally applicable to the
second personal coming of our Lord to Judgment.
It would not be difficult to enlarge these testimonies from
the ancient writers, but let it suffice to say, that we challenge
the opponents of these views to produce a single passage from
any writer of authority in the three or four first centuries in
favour of the modern figurative interpretation of the words of
H)an. vii. 13, and of our Lord in Matth. xxiv. 30, and Luke
xxi. 27.
We shall, in the next place, bring forward some testimonies
from modern writers of the highest reputation.
The learned Mr. Lowth, in his Commentary on Daniel vii.
9, says, “The fourth monarchy being to continue till the con-
summation of all things, the general Judgment is described
in this and the following verses, wherein sentence was to pass
upon the Fourth Beast, and an end put to its dominion.”—
Again, on verse 26, he says, “This being the last of the four
earthly Kingdoms or Monarchies, when that is destroyed, there
since the times of our whole hope are fixed in the sacred writings, and (I sup-
pose), it cannot be placed before the coming of Christ, our desires pant after
the end of this age, the passing away of the world at the GREAT DAY of GoD,
the day of wrath and retribution, the last and hidden day, unknown to all but
the Father,” &c. He afterwards quotes our Lord's words already given, as
having reference to that day; but there is not a syllable said by him of the
latter day of glory before the coming of the Lord.
* See his Works Benedict, Edit. Vol. vii. p. 736.
36 POLITICAL DESTINY
will be an end to the present state of things, when all human
power, rule, and authority, shall cease, and the kingdoms of
this world shall become the kingdoms of our Lord and of his
Christ.” And on verse 27, “The greatness of the Kingdom
under the whole Heaven shall be given to the people of the
saints of the Most High:” “This denotes the reign of Christ
on earth, where his saints are described as reigning with him.”
, Dr. Cressener, a learned divine of the seventeenth century,
who dedicated his Work on the Protestant Applications of the
Apocalypse to Queen Mary, Consort of William III., thus
writes:— $. -
“The Kingdom of the Son of Man in the 7th of Daniel, is
the second coming of Christ in glory.”
“One would easily be persuaded of this at the first sight of
the glorious properties of it, and especially upon the account
of its universal command, and the eternal duration of it. For
what else is his coming in glory for, but to take possession of
the whole world, and to reign with the Father and his saints
to all eternity, and though he delivers up his kingdom to his
Father at the last end, yet he has so much share in it, as to
have it here called his Everlasting Kingdom.”—“But it may
be said this was verified of Christ at his first coming: for at
his ascension into heaven he is said to have all power given
wnto him both in heaven and earth. It must, therefore, be
shown that, by the characters of the Kingdom of the Son of
Man in this place, it cannot be that universal power which
was given to Christ at his ascension into heaven, and his sitting
at the right hand of power.
“For this purpose, it is to be considered that the Kingdom
of the Son of Man, and that of the Saints in the 7th chapter
of Daniel, is the same Kingdom, for they both are described
as beginning at the same time, at the destruction of the Little
Horn, and have the same characters of an universal and eter-
nal dominion, which it is impossible for two different kingdoms
to have at the same time.
“And the Kingdom of the Saints hath these properties in
it: “1. To begin at the destruction of a kingdom that did
devour the whole earth, and of a great tyrannizing power in
it, who did wear out the Saints of the Most High.”—“2ndly,
To be in the actual possession of the obedience of all people,
nations, and languages, and all dominions under heaven.”—r
“3dly, To be Eternal from that first beginning of such an uni-
versal dominion.”—And this can be nothing but Christ’s second
coming in glory: for though all power, both in heaven and
earth, was given to him at his ascension into heaven, yet St.
OF THE EARTH. 37
Paul tells us,” That all things then were not put under him,
and that he had not put down all authority and rule, and
power,” &c.f - -
The same learned writer afterwards shows, that the coming
of the Son of Man also in Matth. xxiv. 30, is his coming in
glory to judge the world. His argumentis, however, too long
to be quoted in this Tract. We shall give the following short
passages from it:— 4
“The description of his coming in the clouds of heaven, was
the chief thing that made Grotius himself acknowledge that
this f must be meant of our Saviour’s last coming, because it
was so promised, Acts i. 11, that he should come from heaven
upon a cloud, just as they saw him going into heaven, and this
is confirmed by 1 Thess. iv. 17, which is acknowledged to
signify the last coming of Christ.
“To this may be added the consideration of the concurrence
of most of these same peculiar circumstances in places which
do unquestionably signify the last coming of Christ. As in
the 31st and 32d verses of the 25th chapter, where we have
just the same crowd of particular expressions and descriptions
with those in the 30th and 31st verses of the 24th chapter.
. There is mention of his coming in glory and with angels, and
to gather the Elect from the rest, out of all nations. So, again,
in the 4th chapter of 1 Thess. 16, 17, there are the circum-
stances of the triumph, of the clouds, and the angels employed
in it, as here; and in the 27th verse of Matth. xvi. we have the
coming in glory, and the Angels, and the last reward.
“Who can desire a more convincing proof of the same signi-
fication of words in several places, than to see them thus joined
with the same very many peculiar circumstances and expres-
sions in all those places? and, therefore, do we find an almost
unanimous consent among all sorts of interpreters, that this
coming of the Son of Man, Matth. xxiv. 30, must be his second
coming in glory. Grotius himself, in this, is forced to be of
the same mind as the rest.”S
It is true, as already noticed, that since Dr. Cressener’s Work
appeared, which was in the year 1690, many commentators have
taken another view of the words of our Lord in Matth. xxiv.
30, and have applied them in a figurative sense to the destruc-
tion of Jerusalem by the Romans;| and they endeavour to sup-
port this perversion of the text, by the words of Christ in verse
34, Verily, I say unto you, this generation shall not pass till all these
* Heb. ii. 8.
+ Demonstration of Protestant Application of the Apocalypse, pp. 75, 76.
it Viz. Matth. xxiv. 30. § Demonst. of Apocal. p. 81.
# See Whitby, Doddridge, Gill, &c.
62 -
38 POLITICAL DESTINY
things are fulfilled, and hence they reason that every part of
what our Lord here predicts must have been accomplished in
that very generation. -
Without dwelling upon the circumstance already mentioned,
that this view is now universally exploded by the students of
Prophecy, I proceed to examine it on its own merits.
, If, then, it were as these writers suppose, how is it that our
Lord afterwards says, in the 36th verse, “But of that day and
hour knoweth no man, no not the angels of Heaven, but my
Father only?” Is it not plain that in these words, compared
with the former, he means to make a distinction between cer-
tain events which were to take place in that generation and ano-
ther event, being that which he had before announced, viz: his
advent with the clouds of heaven, the time of which was un-
known even to the angels of Heaven—and to all but the Father?
There is also a general agreement, that the destruction of the
Jewish State, is used in this whole prophetic discourse, as a type
of the destruction of the ungodly world at the second appearance
of our Lord;—and the former event took place in that very
generation, about 37 years after our Lord uttered his discourse.
Now, as the birth of Isaac, from the body, dead as it were of
Abraham, and the dead womb of Sarah,” was a type and a cer-
tain pledge to the Church of the birth of Christ, in the fulness
of time, from the womb of one who had not known man, which
was therefore, excepting by the mighty power of God, dead as
to childbearing; so the fulfilment in the eye of that very gene-
ration of the former part of our Lord’s prophecy, concerning
the destruction of Jerusalem, was a certain pledge of the accom-
plishment of the latter part of it by his second Advent with the
clouds of heaven, in the day appointed by the Eternal Father.
In this manner, then, were all the things foretold by our Lord,
fulfilled before that generation passed away. There was an
actual execution of the judgment against the Jewish people,
which was itself a type of his second advent in glory.
It is further to be observed, that the Greek verb, which is
rendered “fulfilled,” in Matth. xxiv. 34, and Luke xxi. 32, is
often used to signify not the completion, but the beginning, of
that to which it refers. It is so understood by our most eminent
interpreters, in Rev. i. 1, where it is rendered “which must
shortly come To PAss.” It occurs in Matth. viii. 24, and is
translated there ARoSE a great tempest in the sea—which does
not signify that the storm was over, but was begun. In the 16th
verse of the same chapter, we have the words, evening being
comE, where the same word occurs. Other examples might be
* Rom. iv. 19.
OF THE EARTH. > 39
produced, of the same signification of the word, and, therefore,
in our Lord’s Discourse, it may be understood to signify—this
generation shall not pass away till all these things shall have
begun to take place.* In confirmation of this let it be observed,
that it is quite evident, from Luke xxi. 24, 25, that the Signs
in the Sun, &c., which are to precede the Advent, do not begin till
the Times of the Gentiles (namely, the times of the four Gentile
Kingdoms) are fulfilled. -
Furthermore to make the words, they shall see the Son of Man
coming with the clouds of heaven, to signify simply the destruc-
tion of Jerusalem by the Romans, as our modern Theologians
do, is a wresting of the Scriptures not exceeded in magnitude
by any of the glosses of the Scribes and Pharisees of old, or
even by the Popish doctrine of Transubstantiation. The Pa-
pists tell us, that when the Priest has pronounced the words of
consecration, that which appears to our outward eyes to be a
wafer, is no longer a wafer, but is that very flesh of Christ,
which was nailed to the Cross, and afterwards laid in the tomb
of Joseph. Our modern Doctors, and Evangelical preachers,
tell us, that when Christ says then shall they see the Son of
Man coming with the clouds, it signifies that they shall not
see him coming with clouds, but that they shall behold Titus
the Roman General, and his army besieging Jerusalem.
Mr. Faber, a celebrated interpreter of the present day, does,
indeed, very decidedly reject this interpretation as a vulgar
error, and most justly reasons from Luke xxi. 28, which is
parallel with Matth. xxiv. 30, that the Advent, described in
both texts, “occurs, as St. Luke has recorded the prophecy, at
the close of the times of the Gentiles, and at the end of the
long dispersion of Judah among all nations,”f and therefore
after the expiration of the 1260 years.
The learned author himself, however, offers an explanation of
the words quite as false as the one which he thus demolishes.
He tells us, like the authors already referred to, that when
Christ says, “then shall they see the Son of Man coming with
the clouds of heaven, with power and great glory, it signifies
no such thing; but that in the overthrow of the Antichristian
confederacy (the Beast and False Prophet, Rev. xix. 19), “the
Lord will interpose, not by any literal manifestation of him-
self, but by the secondary agency of those whom he will em-
* Dr. Cressener offers a similar interpretation of this clause.—He thinks the
meaning of the phrase to be the same “with that which the Jesuit Ribera, and
most others do determine the same of a like expression, at the beginning and
at the end of the Apocalypse to be, in both which places, it is said, of all the
things in that Book, that they were things that must shortly be done—that is,
says Ribera of those words, things that must shortly BEGIN to be done.”—See
Dr. Cressener's Demonstrations, &c. P. 82. t Sacr. Cal. vol. i. p. 217.
40 POLITICAL DESTINY
ploy as his servants;” that is, as the learned author had before
said, “certain warlike states and kingdoms.” -
To reason with persons who thus pervert the testimony of
the Written Word, seems to be a vain attempt, for it is certain,
that no testimony of the Scriptures can convince, when it is set
aside by interpretations directly contrary to the signification of
the words. Indeed, it is just by a similar process, that the
Romish Church justifies the worship of Saints and their Images,
in defiance of the words of the first and second Command-
ments.
If, then, as we certainly conclude, the Advent in Dan. vii. 13,
and Matth. xxiv. 30, and Luke xxi. 27, be our Lord’s personal
Coming to judge the quick and the dead, since it has been seen
that the 1260 years ended in the year 1792, and the Judgment
of the ANCIENT of DAys then began to sit, and the Signs in the
Sun, Moon, and Stars, and distress of nations, and roaring of
the Sea and waves, or popular commotions, and the failing of
men’s hearts for fear, and the shaking of the powers of the Po-
litical heavens or Governments, are even now accomplishing
before the eyes of every one who hath eyes to see, then it does
most indubitably and incontrovertibly follow, that our Lord’s
Coming with clouds, is even at the doors;t and as that very
generation, to whom our Lord addressed his Prophetic dis-
course, did witness its inchoate fulfilment, in the awful destruc-
tion of Jerusalem, with circumstances of unparalleled wrath and
misery on that people; so it is not impossible or incredible that
this very generation, before whose eyes the Lord is now
spreading the multiplying signs of his approach, may see his
Coming in his own glory, and the glory of the Father, and in
vain call on the hills and the mountains to fall on them, and
hide them from the wrath of the Lamb.
* Ibid. vol. iii. p. 462, compared with i. p. 219. I marvel that this learned
writer, and the learned authors above alluded to, when they tell us to swallow
such absurdities, do not look a little into the meaning of words. The Greek
word for they shall see, both in Matthew and Luke, is oxycytau. Now Schleusner,
on the verb Orrogau, tells us, that “de visione oculari usurpatur, ita tamen ut
fere adjuncta sit admirationis et obstupefactionis non solum sed etiam splendo-
*is, majestatis et praºstantia, notio.” “It is used to express ocular vision; yet so
that there usually accompanies it, not only the idea of wonder and astonishment,
but also of Splendour, majesty, and transcendant excellency.” He then eites, as
an example of this meaning, the very text under discussion, Matth. xxiv. 30,
which he thus renders, “admirabundi et obstupefacti videbunt filium hominis
in nubibus adventantem.” “Wondering and astonished, they shall behold the
Son of Man coming with clouds.” No, say these learned authors, “wondering
and astonished, they shall see Titus and the Roman army;” or, Mr. Faber,
ºring and astonished, they shall see certain military states and king-
OIIlS.
t When ye shall see all these things, know that it (or he) is near, even at the
doors.-Matth. xxiv. 33.
OF THE EARTH. 41
Let us now therefore go on to consider how the subject ad-
dresses itself to various classes of persons.
1st. To THE MINISTERs of CHRIST. You, Brethren, are the
Watchmen appointed to sound the alarm in Zion. Now, the
very first qualification of a Watchman, is to know the hour of .
the night. “Watchman, what of the night? Watchman, what
of the night? The watchman said, the morning cometh and
also the night.”* The morning of the resurrection cometh to
the just—also the night of judgment to the wicked. But how
is this to be known, but by giving heed to that sure word of
Prophecy, “which as a lamp shineth in a dark place, till the
day dawn, and the day star arise in our hearts?f It was by not
giving heed to the prophetic word, that the Pharisees brought
upon themselves the sharp rebuke, “O ye hypocrites, ye can
discern the face of the sky; but can ye not discern the signs of
the times.f And if they who now have the high office of
opening to their brethren the mysteries of the kingdom, desire
to emerge from the condition of spiritual infancy, in which so
many still remain, we tell them that they cannot advance a
step beyond the first elements of the doctrine of Christ, with-
out the study of the Prophetic word. It is not, indeed, to be
denied, that this study is attended with difficulty. The diffi-
culty is however greatly magnified, by those who desire to find
excuses for their sloth, or their secret aversion to the subject.
Moreover, the knowledge of the very first principles of Pro-
phetic truth, is sufficient to convince every candid and inquir-
ing mind, which is willing to discern the signs of these times,
that the awful crisis is now at hand, when “the stone cut out of
the mountain, shall smite the Image upon its feet, and when
the gold and silver, and the brass, and the iron, and clay, shall
become like the chaff of the summer thrashing-floors, and the
wind shall carry them away, and the stone shall become a great
mountain, and fill the whole earth.” In other words, the time
is at hand, when the Son of Man, with his Saints, shall be re-
vealed in flaming fire, and shall abolish all earthly rule and
authority, and establish his everlasting kingdom of peace and
righteousness. Now, as the Watchman placed on the walls of
Zion of old, was found faithful in announcing the approach of
the chariot of asses, and the chariot of camels,S which were
the symbols of the armies of the Medes and Persians, coming
to destroy Babylon, so will the Lord require it at the hands of
the Shepherds and Watchmen of our Israel, when He is speak-
# Is. xxi. 11. f 2 Pet. i. 19. f Matth. xvi. 3.
s Is. xxi. 7. The first clause of the 8th verse, is in our version unintelligible.
The marginal sense of our larger Bibles, “he cried As a lion,” says Mr. Lowth,
is better; “the Particle as being frequently understood.”
62%
42 POLITICAL DESTINY
ing by signs and wonders in the Political heavens, and the
casting down of the thrones of the Kings of the earth, and by
Pestilence, and by the roaring of the sea, and waves, and by
distress of nations, and by men’s hearts failing them for fear,
for looking after the things which are coming on the earth,
that they be found faithful in announcing the approach of the
Great Day of the Lord.
2nd. To the PRoPEssoRs of RELIGION. Brethren, we re-
mind you, that the parable of the ten Virgins, is a representa-
tion of the state of the professing Church, when the BRIDE-
GRoom shall come. It is evident, that the foolish Virgins who
took their lamps, but took no oil in their vessels, are professors
of religion, for the character does not at all suit the ungodly
and profane. They take no lamps—they do not even pretend
to wait for the Bridegroom. But it is otherwise with the pro-
fessors of Religion. Their very profession includes in it a pro-
fessed going forth to meet the Bridegroom. From the above
Parable, we therefore learn this most alarming fact, that of the
most devout part of the Churches of Christ, when he cometh,
only one-half shall be found ready. The other half shall be
cast into outer darkness, where there is weeping and wailing,
and gnashing of teeth. Let then every professor of Religion,
who may cast his eye on these pages, retire in secret, and com-
mune with his own heart before God, crying to him for the
earnest of the Spirit in his heart.” Let every religious pro-
fessor remember, that it is to them only that love the appear-
Żng of the Lord Jesus, that is promised the crown of righte-
ousness.t And certainly this character does not belong to
those, whether Ministers or Professors of Religion, who treat
with levity, or with scorn, the annunciation of the speedy ſld-
vent and glorious reign of the Lord Jesus Christ and all his
Saints, who shall judge the quick and the dead, at his appear-
ing and his reign;f or even to those who will not listen to the
Scriptural evidence of these truths.
3d. To the CARELEss and UNGoDLY and the worldLY-
MINDED. To you, fellow-men! the report of the coming of
the Lord with the clouds of heaven addresses itself with the
voice of terror. It is only by the entire disbelief of it that
you can have a moment’s quiet. But even when you try to
disbelieve it, suspicions will force themselves into your minds,
that there must be something in this doctrine. It is, indeed,
true, that few of the ministers of Christ give heed to it; but
* 2 Cor. i. 22. + 2 Tim. iv, 8.
+ 2 Tim. iv. 1, the Greek word &auxela, means the same as our word reign,
regnum, regia, potestas, Scapula. If it be asked, where his reign shall be!
Daniel answers it, vii. 13, 27. It is under the whole heaven, that is, on earth,
OF THE EARTH. 43
on the other hand, you cannot but feel, that we, who hold it,
do so with the Bible in our hands, and that we challenge our
opponents to meet our arguments from the Word of God. But
this challenge is offered in vain. Our adversaries are reduced
to silence. Let every one, then, who has been leading a care-
less and ungodly life, into whose hands this Tract may fall, be
persuaded not to neglect or despise the warning here given of
the approach of the Son of Man with clouds, but let him in-
stantly repent, and turn to God, and believe in the Lord Jesus
Christ, and he shall not only be saved from the wrath to come,
but shall receive that spiritual illumination which will enable
him to discern, whether this doctrine of the speedy advent of
the Lord, with all his Saints, be the truth of God, or a fiction
of our imagination. But on entering on the examination of it,
let him beware of saying, as some did of old, Have any of the
7°ulers or the Pharisees believed it?”
4th. To WoRLDLY Politici ANs. We include in this class,
men of every party, who are giving their minds and supreme
affections to the Political affairs of this World, whether they
be Tories, or Whigs, or Radicals. Let them be all warned,
that their schemes will end in utter and equal disappointment.
The Tories who desired to resist all change, and to keep every
thing as it was, are already laid in the dust. The Whigs have
placed their confidence in the Reform Bill, as that which was
to cure all the maladies of the State; and the People have
worshipped it, almost as the Ephesians did their great goddess
Diana, and the Image that fell down from Jupiter. They,
however, who brought forward this measure, expecting it to
settle every thing, will speedily be, if indeed, they are not
already undeceived. It will settle nothing. Turning now to
the Radicals, their great doctrine is that of the Sovereignty
of the People, and if we are to believe the present leaders of
the populace, the Sun has never shone on a generation so wise
and so virtuous as they are, and therefore so fit for the exercise
of absolute sovereignty. They publicly proclaim to the world,
“the ignorance and barbarity of our ancestors,” as one of the
main sources of the evils of the body politic. When He who
sitteth in the heavens stretches out his hand “to punish the in-
habitants of the earth for their iniquity,”f they refuse to see
it; for “God is not in all their thoughts.”f They all but pro-
claim it as the fool did of old, that “there is no God.”
We are told by the wise man, “that there is no new thing
under the sun. Is there any thing whereof it may be said,
See this is new? It hath already been of old time which was
+ John vii. 48. t Is. xxvi. 21. f Ps. x. 4. § Ib. xiv. 1.
44 POLITICAL DESTINY
before us.” The doctrine of the Sovereignty of the People,
which is the boast of the present generation, and for which it
gives credit to its own wisdom, is very ancient. It was first
broached in the following memorable words:—“Yea hath God
said, ye shall not eat of every tree of the garden? Ye shall
not surely die. For God doth know that in the day ye eat
thereof, your eyes shall be opened, and ye shall be as gods,
knowing good and evil.”f The same doctrine was in most
vigorous operation among the children of Israel in the wilder-
ness. We learn in Numb. xiv. 2, that “all the congregation
of the children of Israel murmured against Moses and against
Aaron; and they said one to another, Let us make us a Cap-
tain, and let us return to Egypt.” And when Joshua and
Caleb remonstrated with them for their rebellious conduct, it
is recorded, that “all the Congregation bade, stone them with
stones.” Had not the Lord immediately interposed, there is
no reason to doubt that these eminent persons would have been
immediately killed by the people, and it would be easy to pro-
duce many other examples of the working of the same princi-
ple in that people. But to be brief, I shall only add, that the
very last act of rebellion which is predicted in the Scriptures,
being that of Gog and Magog, at the close of the Millenniumi
will also be the final act of the people.
The Scriptures assure us that sovereignty and power belong
to GoD only, § and that “the Most HIGH ruleth in the king-
dom of men, and giveth it to whomsoever he will.”|| All
power is delegated by the ETERNAL FATHER to his ONLY
BEGoTTEN Son JESUS CHRIST, who is the PRINCE of THE
KINGs of THE Earth." Whether, therefore, they be kings or
people, who attribute to themselves inherent sovereignty or
autocratical power, it is BLASPHEMY against GoD AND His
CHRIST.” Accordingly, we learn that one of the first acts of
Christ when he cometh again, will be to rule the nations with
a rod of iron, and to break in pieces as a potter’s vessel,tf
those who thus usurp his sovereignty. “Associate yourselves,
O ye peoples, and ye shall be broken in pieces, and give ear
all ye of far countries; gird yourselves and ye shall be broken
in pieces.”ff The Sovereignty of the people will then be laid
in the dust, no less than the former power of the Tories already
is, and that of the Whigs shortly will be. In that awful day,
* Eccles. i. 9, 10. f Genes. iii. 1, 4, 5. it Rev. xx. 8. § Ps. lxii. 11.
il Dan. iv. 32. Iſ Rev. i. 5.
** Every piece of the Coin of this Realm, and the whole Ceremonial of the
Coronation, abnegate any pretension to autocratical Sovereignty (Dei gratiá
zew) in the King of Great Britain. He is therefore emphatically our lawful
Sovereign, to whom all allegiance is due. ,
+f Ps. ii. 9. Rev. ii. 26, 27. xix. 15. ft Is. viii. 9,
OF THE EARTH. 45
“by fire and by his sword, will the Lord contend with all
flesh, and the slain of the Lord shall be many.”—“Come near,
ye nations, and hearken, and hear ye peoples, let the earth
hear, and all that is therein, the world, and all things that come
forth of it, for the indignation of the Lord is upon all nations,
and his fury upon all their armies, he hath utterly destroyed
them, he hath delivered them to the slaughter. Their slain
also shall be cast out, and their stink shall come out of their
carcasses, and the mountains shall be melted with their blood.”t
The last clause signifies the dissolution of Kingdoms in the
blood of their people.
Such is the end prepared for the Sovereignty of the people;
and, in the day when Christ shall effect this awful work, he
himself shall be revealed with his new name of KING of KING's
AND LoRD of LoRDs,i and all nations shall and must obey
him, or perish.
He is now giving a short space to men of all political parties,
to repent and bow the knee to him, and cry for mercy; but
the time is at hand, when, if they listen not to this call, they
must be broken in pieces with his iron rod.
5th. To INFIDELs. Their guilt is of a very aggravated
nature. Though surrounded with the light of Revelation, they
wilfully and perversely refuse to see that light, and they treat
the LoBI of LIFE AND of GLoRY as an Impostor, and the
Scriptures of truth as a lie. Should any of these unhappy
persons cast their eyes on this Tract, we entreat them to con-
sider seriously what has been laid before them. The pro-
phecies of Daniel, which we have briefly reviewed, contain an
accurate and comprehensive outline of the Political history of
the leading Kingdoms of this Earth, with whose fortunes have
been linked the interests of religion and civilization, and as it
were the moral destinies of the human race for the last 2400
years. The kingdoms of Babylon, of Persia, of Greece, and
of Rome, pass successively before the eyes of the prophet.
He then sees the rise of the Gothic Kingdoms, which were
erected on the platform of the Western Empire, and of that
anomalous ecclesiastical power exercised by the Pope, which,
during a period of 1260 years, dated from the Decree of
Justinian, in A. D. 533, and ending at the fall of the French
Monarchy, in 1792, was to wear out the Saints of the Most
High. Lastly, he beholds the events which we of this gene-
ration are actually witnessing, and of which we are not simply
spectators, but are suffering their awful effects. These events
are the Coming of the Ancient of Days, invisible to mortal
eyes, and the Judgment that follows, and is now going on, the
purpose of which is to prepare the way for the revelation of
* Ib. lxvi. 16. f Is. Xxxiv. 1–3. # Rev. xix. 16.
46. POLITICAL DESTINY
the Son of Man, with his holy angels, to break in pieces all
power, all authority, all dominion, and all nations; and having
cast every wicked person into the furnace of fire, to subject to
himself and his Saints the whole world in that irresistible and
Despotic sovereignty, which shall fill the earth with judgment,
and justice, and peace, and righteousness, and love.
Let the Infidel then see and acknowledge, that He who
enabled Daniel thus to delineate the history of the most distant
ages, must be that God to whom past, present, and future, are
equally present, and let him confess the sin of his infidelity,
and seek the forgiveness of it through that blood which was
shed for the salvation of a lost world. Let him be assured,
that if he follow this friendly counsel, he shall receive mercy;
but if he despise it, then the great truths set before him in this
Tract, shall certainly aggravate his condemnation.
CON CLUSION.
That the present moral and political condition of the world
is altogether without parallel in the past history of mankind,
will be denied by no accurate observer. This is, indeed, uni-
versally acknowledged by thinking men, as well as by our
leading political Journals. And if any further evidence of it
were wanting, it is to be found in that indescribable sensation
of fear and expectation, which every were fills the minds of
men of some mighty event, they know not what, which is
coming. -
The Political Destinies of this Earth, as summed up in Dan.
ii. 34, 35, and 44, 45, also Ch. vii. 9–14, and 26, 27, may be
briefly imbodied in the two following propositions:—
I. “Jill human Rule, Authority, and Power,” which
72070 eacist, “shall cease,”* and be abolished.
II. The Son of God is about to appear with his Saints,
and into their hands all Rule, all Authority, and all Power,
are to be transferred. !,
The awful Political Phenomena which now arrest the atten-
tion of men are a part of the process of judgment, preparatory
to the demolition of all human rule, authority, and power.
Hence it is that the stamp of fatuity, and disappointment, is,
in the present day, so evidently put upon every scheme of
every worldly Politician. There are two reasons for this.
First. Our Politicians of every party refuse to humble them-
selves before God, and ask wisdom from Him; therefore are
they given up to their own vain imaginations. Secondly. Their
schemes are all for the purpose of upholding, or mending, or
reforming, that which now exists, but is destined to perish,
* The words marked with inverted commas, are those of the learned Mr.
W. Lowth, whose Commentary on Daniel was published in the year 1726.
OF THE EARTH. 47
and is already under the process of judgment—while that which
is hereafter to exist by the power of the Son of God, is yet
hidden from our eyes.
The Stone, which is to smite the IMAGE on its feet, is not
yet seen. It is when the Lord Messiah shall come with clouds,
and when that despised people, the Jews, shall again arise into
political existence, and stand on their feet in a national form,
that the Ston E will appear. The MoUNTAIN out of which the
STONE is cut, appears to be a symbol of the kingdoms of this
world and especially the Roman empire. The cutting of the
STONE out of the mountain without hands signifies the gather-
ing of the Jews out of these kingdoms by the mighty power
of God, Ezek. xx. 33–35, and their being again formed into
a nation. Then shall be fulfilled the promises to Israel:—
“Behold” (said Balaam in mystic song) “the people shall rise
up as a great lion, and lift up himself as a young lion; he shall
not lie down until he eat of the prey, and drink of the blood
of the slain.” “Fear not, thou worm Jacob, and ye men of
Israel; I will help thee, saith the Lord, and thy Redeemer,
the Holy one of Israel. Behold I will make thee a new sharp
thrashing instrument having teeth: thou shalt thrash the moun-
tains, and beat them small, and shalt make the hills as chaff.
Thou shalt fan them, and the wind shall carry them away, and
the whirlwind shall scatter them.”f
Let the reader advert to the circumstance that, in the symbo-
lical style, mountains denote kingdoms, and he will at once see
that this prophetic annunciation in Isaiah, is exactly parallel to
the one in Daniel ii. 34, 35, respecting the stone falling on the
feet of the image. It were easy to multiply such quotations,
but the limits of this Tract will not admit of it. Let one or
two more suffice.
“And the remnant of Jacob shall be among the nations
(Gentiles,) in the midst of many peoples, as a lion among the
beasts of the forest, as a young lion among the flocks of sheep,
who if he go through, both treadeth down, and teareth in
pieces, and none can deliver.”f
This passage is plainly parallel to the words of Baalam,
already cited, and as Micah lived at the period of the captivity
of the Ten Tribes, and of the rapid decline of the kingdom of
Judah, the prophecy has evidently never yet been fulfilled.
Lastly, I quote the following:—“Behold I will make Jeru-
salem a cup of trembling unto all the peoples' round about,
when they shall be in the siege both against Judah and Jeru-
salem. And in that day will I make Jerusalem a burdensome
stone for all the peoples; all that burden themselves with it,
* Numb. xxiii. 24. t Is. xli. 14–16. # Micah v. 8.
Ś The English version by perpetually rendering the Hebrew Plural in the
Singular Number, greatly obscures the sense of such passages,
48 POLITICAL DESTINY OF THE EARTH,
shall be cut in pieces, though all the nations of the earth be
gathered together against it.”
It is after the execution of these awful judgments on the
nations, that the Lord will establish his kingdom of peace
throughout the whole earth.
In that dispensation, “the kingdom, and dominion, and
greatness of the kingdom under the whole heaven, shall be
given to the people of the Saints of the Most High.”f Israel
will also become the Metropolitan nation of the earth. “At
that time they shall call Jerusalem the throne of the Lord, and
all nations shall be gathered to it, to the name of the Lord to
Jerusalem;”f and through this highly-favoured people, will
the blessings of the rule of Christ and his Saints be dispensed
to the whole world. Speaking to Jerusalem, the Lord says,
“The nation and the kingdom that will not serve thee, shall
perish; yea, those nations shall be utterly wasted.”S To serve,
and not to exercise sovereignty, is that to which the Lord, there-
fore, calls the nations in that glorious age; and for this they
are required now to prepare themselves, by the outstretched
arm and the judgments of the Almighty, warning them to con-
fess their sins, to repent and turn to God.
We exhort, therefore, and in much love we beseech, every
reader of this Tract, to prepare for the Coming of the Son of
God, with all his Saints, to judge the world in righteousness;
for that day “shall come as a snare on all them that dwell upon
the face of the whole earth,”| and all the signs of its approach,
spoken of by our Lord, have passed before the eyes of this
generation.
TO THE SAINTS OF GOD.
To you, brethren, who with loins girded, and lamps burn-
ing, and vessels filled with oil, are waiting for his coming, it
will be a blessed day, when the Son of God shall descend
“with the voice of the Archangel and the Trump of God,”’ſ
for “in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye ye shall be
changed,”* and together with the raised saints “shall be caught
up to meet Him in the air.”ff Ye shall be with Him when
he breaks in pieces the nations. “He that overcometh and
keepeth my works unto the end, to him will I give power over
the nations, and he shall rule them with a rod of iron; as the
vessels of a potter shall they be broken to shivers.ff This
honour have all his saints.”SS
REPENT, O SINNER! AND PREPARE To MEET THY GoD !
* Zech. xii. 3.
t Dan, vii. 27. The Saints who thus possess the Kingdom, are the raised
and changed Saints in their glorious and immortal bodies.
# Jerem. iii. 17. § Is. lx. 12. | Luke xxi. 35. ºf 1 Thess. iv. 16.
** 1 Cor, xv. 51. ft 1 Thess, iv. 17, # Rev. ii. 26, 27. §§ Ps. cxlix. 9,
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