lous, for one who knew not that he wrote concerning one who was raised up of God. "And as in this particular (his code of laws) he has deserved well of posterity, so did he deserve no less from that state he governed, and the age in which he lived, for his wisdom and success, by which he recovered, to the empire, Africk from the Vandals, and Italy from the Goths. In a word, he may be said to have been the last prince who shone with the genuine lustre of the ancient Roman majesty, which revived awhile in him, and flourished in the variety of affairs, relating both to war and peace, conducting great armies, designing mighty performances, and conversant in variety of accidents. But as if it had been raised by some chance, which forced it to act for some time contrary to the law of nature, it disappeared again on a sudden, and vanished into nothing for we are now upon a mighty precipice, to be hurried down from thence into low, obscure, and narrow tracts, and the farther we pass, we shall meet with little of action, and less of performance; so that the substance of the remaining part of this history will be a subject for our contemplation rather than curiosity."

III. We have already had two forms of the serpent's rage against the seed of the woman, given in the Apocalypse. First, that of the dragon with seven crowned heads and ten horns, whose persecutions drove the woman to her hiding-place of faith. Secondly, that of the serpent pouring out of his mouth a flood of heretical nations, to carry her from that only refuge which was left to her; and, by the last words of the latter emblem, expectation is led forward to a third form about to arise; "the dragon was wroth with the woman, and went to make war with the remnant of her seed, which keep the commandments of God, and have the testimony of Jesus Christ." And, immediately, in the vision of the seer, there ariseth out of the sea, that is, out of the troubled state of the nations, a beast with seven heads and ten horns, to which the dragon gives his seat, and his power, and great authority; but the crowns are placed upon the horns; and on the heads, instead of th royal diadem, is written the name of Blasphemy. And his evil office and permitted function is the same with Daniel's little horn, "having given to him a mouth speaking great

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things, and blasphemies, which he opened in blasphemy against God, to blaspheme his name, and his tabernacle, and them that dwelt in heaven; and it was given him to make war with the saints, and to overcome them." Moreover, his appointed time is the same with that of the little horn, and with that of the woman's nourishment in the wilderness, from the face of the serpent, "power was given unto him to continue forty and two months." This beast is helped to his power over all kindreds, and tongues, and nations, by another beast which came out of the earth with horns like a lamb, but speaking with a dragon's mouth, who exerciseth all the power of the other beast in his presence, and causeth the earth and them that dwell thereon to worship the first beast, whose deadly wound was healed. This latter beast, by miracles, deceiveth the earth, so that they should make an image to the beast, to which he had power to give life, and to cause the people to worship it. And he caused all, both small and great, rich and poor, and free and bond, to receive a mark in their right hand, or in their forehead and that no man might buy or sell, save he that had this mark, or the name of the beast, or the number of his name.

The particular feature by which the former of these two conjunct beasts is twice characterized, as wounded in one of his heads and healed, gives us great insight into his identity for, as we shall see in the sequel of this discourse, his seven heads, besides denoting seven hills, denote also seven kings, or forms of government, that ruled over him in succession, whereof that to which John's attention is turned, and by which he characterizes him, was well nigh wounded to death. Five of these headships, we are told afterward, were past, (Rev xvii.) the sixth was holding its sovereignty, in the time of John, and the seventh was not then come. This sixth, which, therefore, is the headship of emperors, is wounded to death, but cured, and, in its healed state, acts the things contained in the emblem. Accordingly, the imperial head was wounded in Augustulus, and for three centuries seemed dead, but revived in Charlemagne ; wfrom whom it continued, in the emperors of Germany, till it was abolished in these latter days. But the crowns were all the while upon the ten horns; that is, there were separate sovereignties in the ten kingdoms into which the

empire fell asunder. And upon the heads where crowns had heretofore been, blasphemy was written; that is, Rome, from being the seat of empire, became the seat of blasphemy during this period. Now as the little horn was that which overruled the ten horns, and inspired the actions of the beast in Daniel, so here have we another power conjoined, with the imperial power of wounded head, and the kingly power of the ten horns, an imperium in imperio, which cometh out of the earth, that is, out of the empire settled again, and recovered of its wound. This creature, by its lamb-like or Christ-like aspect, and its various deceptions, insinuates the other into power over the earth. Whose form of power it gradually imageth in itself, and though it have none of the substance, doth so wonderfully win upon the deluded eyes of men, as to make them fall down to the image, and worship it; and if they will not, hath power to excommunicate them from all fellowship of human life. Which emblem, if we had time to open it in detail, doth convey the aptest and completest picture of the state of power, and spirit of government in the territory of the western empire, during the forty and two months of the church's captivity.

But our object is not to decipher the emblem, or remark its points of application, which hath been ably done by many hands, but to derive from it new evidence of the beginning of those forty two months, during which it was appointed to reign. And the first thing, as usual, is to ascertain that particular, among the many, from which the period is to be dated. It cannot be dated from the crowning of the horns, which was not at one, but at several times; for not till after the rising and falling of many petty sovereignties, did those ten kingdoms settle themselves, which have continued even till now, with the exception of those three which fell before the little horn. It cannot be dated from the recovery of the wounded head, for before that time, all the ten horns had been crowned, and the beast had been working most effectually in its wicked vocation. a complex emblem like this, which hath to image forth the characteristics of the power, through all its changes and revolutions, the wisdom lies in finding from which of the characteristics the date is to be reckoned. And here, as in the two former cases, the true guide is an exact faith in the

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record itself, to which applying we find his investiture in power, and his time of exercising it against the saints, to be wholly separated from the description of his power, and the fruit of his actings. First, there is the description of his power and origin, then his investiture in power, then his deeds. His investiture in power and time is in these words: "There was given unto him a mouth, speaking great things and blasphemies; and power was given unto him to continue forty and two months, and he opened his mouth in blasphemies against God, to blaspheme his name, and his tabernacle, and them that dwell in heaven. And it was given unto him to make war with the saints, and to overcome them; and power was given unto him over all kindreds, and nations, and tongues." Now, this is what we have to consider, in order to ascertain the beginning of his time, the rest being to ascertain his identity. When was the mouth given to this complicated power to speak great things and blasphemies? When was power given him to make war with the saints, and to overcome them? When was power given him over all kindred, and nations, and tongues, to make them bow down and worship him? These questions have been fully answered in the first particular of this head of discourse; where was shown the series of enactments whereby ecclesiastical power over the faith of the west, and against the saints who dwell there, was given to the bishop of Rome; which imperial edicts, being seconded by the imperial arms, as was shown in the second particular, brought to nothing the heretical powers who might have opposed his entering into possession. Whereupon, he travelled onward in his deceptions, mounting more and more highly towards the throne of heaven, and increasing his blasphemies as he arose. In twenty years from that date, he ordered heretics to be burned by the temporal powers-the first indication of that mixture and combination of powers, civil and ecclesiastical, which is the proper characteristic of the whole period. Then also mass was introduced. In sixty years, he had made such great strides towards absolute supremacy, that in the reign of Gregory the Great, who resisted the bishop of Constantinople's supremacy, were introduced purgatory, invocation of saints, expiations by masses, lustrations of the blessed virgin; and the celibacy of the clergy was

attempted. In seventy years, he obtained from the emperor the sole title of Universal. In little more than a century, the service was performed in Latin, and the ignorance of the people sealed. In two centuries, the pope had obtained the pride and power to oppose and excommunicate the emperor of the east, for prohibiting image-worship, and began to pay his court to the rising star of France; by the grand mayor of which kingdom, Charles Martel, he was delivered out of the hands of the Lombards; and therefore encouraged the Franks to place his son Pepin upon the throne, by whom he was again sustained against the Lombards, and endowed with temporal possessions; of which he would have been soon stripped by his stout enemies the Lombards, had not Charlemagne, the son of Pepin, interposed, and crushed them. In return for which, and other services, the pope did solemnly crown him emperor of the west, and acknowledged him his sovereign, when the people shouted, "To Charles Augustus, crowned of God, the most mighty and most pious emperor of the Romans, long life and perpetual victory!" In which act, the wounded head was cured; and the lamb-like creature caused the earth, and them that dwell thereon, to worship the beast whose deadly wound was healed. But thereafter, the lamb-like creature, having fulfilled his office of reconstituting the imperial headship of the west, continuing to run his course, did address himself to his second appointed work, of making to himself an image of that same imperial power: whereby he was brought into jealousy and strife with his former copartner of power; until, in three centuries, he carried it against Frederick Barbarossa, than whom no greater emperor had arisen since the days of Charlemagne, with such ignominy and contempt, as well proved that the image of the beast had now won the superiority over the substance and reality of the beast, and could cause that as many as did not worship it, even the emperors themselves, should be excommunicated from the fellowship of men.

Thus, from the era of 533, when power was given to the beast, or if not to the beast in complete organization, to the embryo of the beast, the spirit which organized and en forced it, to blaspheme God, to overcome the earth and persecute the saints, he went on fulfilling his period, in the exact letter of this vision; first making good his own supre