He emerges out of the sea, that is, "the mingled people"* of "nations, and peoples, and kindreds, and tongues," of which the prodigious extent of the roman empire was made up.† And his seven heads and ten horns, &c. shew that the body of this beast is-essentially the very same as that of the pagan dragon, though somewhat changed in his exterior, and become divers from his predecessors by this disguise. But he is so well in the interests of the subtil dragon which anciently. presided there, that he yields up to him "his power, and his seat, and great authority. The pope was seated on the throne of the roman emperors, and exercised a universal authority over the same countries, in spirituals pretendedly, but it is well known that the papal influence and power, at which the emperors themselves trembled, and "which shook

* Jer. xxv. 20; 1. 37; Ezek, xxx. 5.

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† Rev. xiii. 7, "and power was given him over all kindreds, and tongues, and nations." Rev. xvii. 15, "The waters where the whore sitteth, are peoples, and multitudes, and nations, and tongues,"

Dan. vii. 23, 24.

"The

kingdoms," would brook no controul. crowns formerly on the seven heads of pagan Rome, (chap. xii. 3,) and which then signified the seven different forms of government that had subsisted there, are now removed, and placed upon the ten horns, or ten kingdoms lately raised under the ecclesiastical empire of the pope ;* but the spiritual authority (or names of blasphemy, as it soon proved in his wonderful exercise of it,) remained to himself, and issue still from the conclave and seven hills of papal Rome.

The manner in which this great change came about is next related. One of the original heads (the sixth or the imperial government) receives a mortal wound, yet death does not ensue; for, contrary to all expectation, the wound is healed, and the beast lives, and is idolized more than ever before. This alludes to the total ceasing of the imperial name and

* Rev. xvii. 12, "The ten horns are ten kings (or kingdoms) which have received no power as yet.” "" Dan, vii. 7. "And it was vers from all the beasts that were before it, and it had

te born-See Bishop Newton in loc

power at Rome, in the person of AUGUSTULUS, and the revival of it afterwards in CHARLEMAGNE, through the intrigues of the POPE, who is again in turn supported in his usurpations by the emperors. This is the FIRST BEAST, or the body of the original pagan dragon or imperial authority, in a changed form. The SECOND BEAST is the papacy and hierarchy of the church of Rome, or the strange and incoherent mixture of temporal power with spiritual authority, and an universal influence and catholic supremacy over all nations." And they worshipped the DRAGON which gave power unto the BEAST, and they worshipped the BEAST, saying, who is like unto the BEAST? who is able to make war with him?"

The testimonies I have before produced shew that they actually do worship the POPE, and set his power and authority and that of the church of Rome higher than that of kings, or councils, or Holy Scriptures; and, in short, upon an equality with that of God himself! Who then is able to contend with the beast

which all the world worships? His " opens ing his mouth in blasphemy," and his “ power to continue forty and two months," the same term assigned to the woman (or true church) in the wilderness, and the two witnesses prophesying in sackcloth, are circumstances already explained.*

The SECOND BEAST rises up out of the earth, or peculium of the church itself, as the first had, on the contrary, arisen out of the sea, or "peoples, and kindreds, and nations of the whole empire." "It had two borns like a lamb, but spake like a dragon."-The resemblance to the lamb was fictitious, but the affinity to the dragon was real: the same language, the

* See Sect. ix. p. 250.. His war against the saints is the per secution of all that opposed his idolatry and corrupt doctrines; and his overcoming them is the long superiority of the romish superstition, and the martyrdom of its enemies, the servants of the Lamb. These things have all been made very plain by obvious and strong facts. The warning given is for that reason the more awful :-" If any man have an ear, let him hear." For the fatal delusion shall be very genéral, and almost universal ; and dreadful will be the consequence of yielding to it. (Rev. xiv. 9)

same imperious tone, and persecuting spirit, and extent of authority. The two horns are the two swords of the civil and spiritual authority, which the pope pretends to wield in imitation of Christ.* And the image, (ver. 14) or mimic representative of the original beast, which comprises in itself, as it were in epitome, all the powers of the beast, seems to be the pope, or representative of the holy roman church and empire in general. He sets him

* Our Blessed Lord, when he was going to submit his sacred person to the outrage of his enemies, signified this in his usual figurative manner, by reminding his apostles that when he sent them out to preach the gospel of the kingdom, it was without purse, or scrip, or sword. Yet they had not wanted either food or protection: but that now the time was at hand when their Master himself would want protection, and they themselves every thing. (Luke xxii. 36.) Misapprehending him as usual, they answered him" Lord, here are Two SWORDS."

Of this the pope has made a MYSTERY, signifying the temporal and spiritual power of the VICAR OF CHRIST! Pope Boniface the eighth, when he instituted the jubilee, in the year 1300, on the first solemn day shewed himself to all the people IN PONTIFICALIBUS, in his ecclesiastical vestments, as a bishop giving them his apostolical benediction. But the next day he presented himself to public view in an imperial habit, with a rich diadem on his head, and a naked sword borne before him; and