beast which supports Babylon may signify the power of the DEVIL.'

Now here we have the Papists authoritatively admitting that Rome is the city here described, nor can we give them much credit for candour in the admission, for never was deserter described in terms more explicit than is the scarlet Whore in the 16th verse of this chapter,-And the woman which thou sawest is that great city, which reigneth over the kings of the earth. How then do they evade this application? By confining the prophecy to Pagan Rome. Most suicidal evasion, for we read that when the said Babylon is fallen, she becomes the habitation of devils, and the hold of every unclean and hateful bird. (xviii. 2.) Now if according to their interpretation, Pagan Rome be the Rome figured under the name of Babylon, then a child may draw the unavoidable inference, that Papal Rome is at this moment the habitation of devils, and his holiness the pope, and their eminences the cardinals are all unclean and hateful birds.

*

No, it is Papal Rome, and at a moment when Papal Rome is drunk with the blood of the saintswhile the kings of the earth are living deliciously with her; after the tides of the mystic Euphrates have ebbed their last; after the battle of Armageddon has been fought; after the seventh angel has poured out his vial, and after the great voice hath come out of the temple of heaven, from the throne, saying, IT IS DONE! (xvi. 17.) then comes the earthquake such as hath not been seen so mighty and so greatthen come the voices, the thunders and the lightnings

It is also true that at some period the ten kings are to hate the whore and make her desolate, and devour her flesh (xvii. 6.); but this seems to be a part of her final judgement.

-and THEN great Babylon comes in remembrance before God, to give unto her the cup of the wine of the fierceness of his wrath.

The date of Babylon's fall relative to other prophetic events is important, for we thereby gather that she wastes not away by slow stages; she does not sink in effete decrepitude, but exists revelling in her infamy during all the events which are now coming upon the earth. She was sitting as a queen and no widow, and never thinking of seeing sorrow; (xviii. 7.) she was clothed in her fine linen, and purple, and scarlet, and decked with gold, and precious stones, and pearls-when in one hour so great riches come to nought; (xviii. 17.) in one day her plagues come, death and mourning and famine; and she shall be utterly burned with fire, for strong is the Lord God who judgeth her. (xviii. 8.)

And a mighty angel took up a stone like a great millstone, and cast it into the sea, saying, Thus with violence shall that great city Babylon be thrown down, and shall be FOUND NO MORE AT ALL.* And after this I heard a great voice of much people in heaven, saying, Alleluia; salvation, and glory, and honour, and power, unto the Lord our God: for true and righteous are his judgements; for he hath judged the great whore, which did corrupt the earth with her fornication, and hath avenged the blood of his servants at her hand. And again they said, Alleluia; and her smoke rose up for ever and ever. (xix. 1-3.)

But whenever we read of this awful downfall, and I believe that it will be as visible an outpouring of God's wrath as befel Sodom and Gomorrah (Jer. 1.

This verse must have escaped the Rhemish annotators, or they never would have admitted that Rome in any form was intended.

40.), there is a previous encouragement given to us to work while it is yet day. Before the awful downfall of Rome, listen to the voice which John heard from heaven-Come out of her, MY PEOPLE, that ye be not partakers of her sins, and that ye receive not of her plagues (xviii. 4.).

And so in the 16th chapter, which commences with a description of the LAMB standing on Mount Sion, and with Him those which were redeemed from the earth; and in verse 6th, an angel flies in the midst of heaven, having the everlasting gospel to preach unto them that dwell on the earth, and to every nation, and kindred, and tongue, and people, saying with a loud voice, Fear God, and give glory to him, (and not to saints and angels) for the hour of his judgement is come, and worship (pоokuvηoare proskunēsatè-bend yourselves towards) him that made heaven and earth, and the sea, and the fountains of waters. The angel in fact repeats that second command, and that especial clause in it (bow down and worship) which Rome with audacious hand has dared to obliterate from the decalogue, and then after this proclamation there followed another angel, saying, Babylon is fallen, is fallen.

Let us now turn to that prophecy of Jeremiah which was so literally, so circumstantially fulfilled when Babylon fell before Cyrus. The very stratagem by which the city was taken; the turning aside of the river Euphrates (Jer. 1. 38; li. 36.); the state of the city at the time of its fall; its princes drunk and revelling (li. 39, 57.), and yet in this prophecy, which from its striking and minute fulfilment may be adduced with so much efficacy against cavillers, and so confidently appealed to, we might without any subsequent revelation have discerned the germs

of another and a greater fulfilment. This inference might be drawn from the warnings and encouragements addressed to the Jews, which ever and anon interrupt the thread of the prophetic discourse. Thus in chapter 1. from verse 4 to verse 8, is a parenthetic address to Israel; so are verses 38 and 39, and chapter li. 5, 6; but most remarkable is the address in chapter li. 20,-THOU art my battle ax and weapon of war: for WITH THEE will I break in pieces the nations, and WITH THEE will I destroy kingdoms; and WITH THEE will I break in pieces the horse and his rider; and WITH THEE will I break in pieces the chariot and his rider; WITH THEE will I break, &c. &c.

Many commentators suppose that the Jews are here addressed, and that they are to be the instruments of God's vengeance, but after carefully examining the context and comparing it with other passages, I am inclined to think that the Lord Jesus in his office of kingly avenger is here addressed. We read in the preceding verse 19, The PORTION of Jacob is not like them; for HE is the former of all things, and Israel is the rod of HIS inheritance; the Lord of Hosts is his name.*

We have only to compare this with the 2nd Psalm,

* This verse occurs literatim in the 10th chapter of this book; and although Babylon is not named, yet Babylon, the great mystical Babylon, is most circumstantially described. "The customs of the people are vain, for one cutteth a tree out of the forest, the work of the hands of the workman with the axe. They deck it with silver and with gold; they fasten it with nails and with hammers, that it move not. They are upright as the palm tree, but speak not, they must needs be borne, because they cannot go (2—5). Who would not fear thee, O King of nations! There is none like unto thee, but they are altogether brutish and foolish, the stock is a doctrine of vanities (7). Every man is brutish in his knowledge, every founder is confounded by the graven image; for his molten image is falsehood, and there is no breath in them. They are vanity, and the work of errors, in the time.of their visitation they shall perish. THE PORTION OF JACOB IS NOT LIKE THEM," &c.

when God the Father addresses God the Son,-Thou shalt break them with a rod of iron. So in Isaiah xi. the same Lord, the rod out of the stem of Jesse (1.), shall smite the earth with the rod of his mouth and with the breath of his lips shall he slay the wicked (4.). So the stone cut out without hands smites the image upon his feet, the ten nations which constitute the present Babylonish empire, and breaks them to pieces. (Dan. ii. 34, 44.) So the glorious Rider of the white horse, the FAITHFUL AND TRUE ONE, smites the nations and rules them with a rod of iron.

Whether, therefore, this passage refers directly to the King of the Jews, the Lord of glory—or to the Jews viewed as his rod: or whether it will be fulfilled by the Lord at the head of the Jewish nation as their king, whatever interpretation may seem to us most in accordance with the revealed purposes of Godyet this prediction was not fulfilled at the taking of Babylon by Cyrus.

I thank God that the downfal of the hated dealer in the souls of men is so plainly and so unequivocally noted in the inspired volume among the erchomena or coming things, that every true millenarian must be of necessity a good Protestant.

The prophecies of the Lord's second coming to be glorified in his saints nerved the early martyrs under Pagan Rome to face the lion in the thronged arena; and the prophecies of the anti-Christian Man of Sin strengthened our own phalanx of noble martyrs to court the faggot and the stake in Smithfield; and times may be nigh at hand when we shall need all these prophecies to strengthen us against still more fearful persecutions-the tribulation, the great one (Rev. vi. 14)—that season when our Lord says, there