the Christian faith in Rome, is that it was everywhere spoken against, as blasphemy literally implies. The edicts of the emperors designate it in the most opprobrious terms. Even the refined and elegant Tacitus describes it as a pernicious or pestilent (exitiabilis)* superstition-applying to it the same term in which he otherwise describes a pestilent disease; and he ranks the Christian faith among the atrocious and shameful things (atrocia aut pudenda) which flowed from every quarter into Rome. The humane Pliny, as compared with other Roman governors he may be called, terms Christianity a wicked and extravagant superstition (pravam et immodicam superstitionem); he too, as well as more modern inquisitors, could interrogate by torture, though he could discover nothing but a piety, a purity, an innocence, brotherly kindness, and charity, that mocked all the pomp of paganism, and might well have put the best of heathens to the deepest blush. And to prove the difference of their faith, as well as of their virtue, he brought forth before Christians the image of the emperor, and the images of the gods; and those who would not worship them, and offer oblations of frankincense and wine, and blaspheme Christ, (maledicerent Christo) were punished for their inflexible obstinacy. As the governor of Bithynia, he expressed, in an epistle to the emperor Trajan, his doubts whether in punishing Christians, no distinction should be made between the old and the young, the feeble or the strong, the penitent or the impenitent, or whether the name alone was worthy of punishment. But he cherished not a thought of religious toleration in the truest sense, nor a doubt of his duty as a Roman governor of punishing all who would not bow down and offer oblations before the image of a mortal, and Tacit. Ann. lib. xv. 44. + Pliny, lib. x. Ep. 97. worship those that are not Gods. The lenity of the emperor reached not farther than to pardon those who abjured their faith. Idolatry was the very test. Those only could escape who supplicated the gods and worshipped an idol. Such was the answer of Trajan ; such the boasted toleration of paganism; such the union between idolatry and persecution, between the worship of the dragon and war with the saints ; and such the mildest specimen of Roman and imperial legislation against the church of Christ. The blood of many martyrs, many imperial and bloody edicts, and ten successive persecutions, are a portion of the reckoning on behalf of the church, against the ancient empire of Rome. There was given unto the beast a mouth speaking great things, and blasphemies. And it was given unto him to make war with the saints, and to overcome them. And all that dwell upon the earth shall worship him, whose names are not written in the book of life. They, whose names were written there, would not worship him. And power was given unto him, to continue forty and two months. The presumed coincidence of this period with the twelve hundred and sixty years, or the time, times, and a half, has induced protestant commentators in general, to identify the beast having seven heads and ten horns, &c. with papal Rome. Yet the analogy is not only wanting in other respects, (except in their joint power, and persecution of the saints), but it is also obvious, that a different mode of computation, or measure of time, is here adopted, and that a different period may therefore be designated. One kingdom might even possibly have subsisted 1260 years as well as another; and different empires, or forms of government, might have been marked, though the same space had been specified as their duration, and though it had been defined even in the same manner. But both, there is reason to presume, are here different-the period itself, as well as the form of defining it. The Jewish month bore no fixed, uniform, or positive relation to a year, which sometimes consisted of twelve, and sometimes of thirteen months. Previous to the giving of the law, the month consisted solely of thirty days, five months being equivalent to 150 days, Gen. vii. 11; viii. 4. But, after the institution of their ritual observances, their months consisted alternately of thirty and twenty-nine days. To appeal to the familiar authority of Cruden, " that which had thirty days was called a full or complete month; and that which had but twenty-nine days was called incomplete or deficient." A single full and complete month, or the period that was marked by the name of one month, consisted of thirty days. Every third year contained an additional month, or thirty days;* and when, instead of a single month, several were included, some of them were necessarily incomplete or deficient." Forty-two months (including twenty-two full and twenty incomplete months) thus amounted to 1240 days, prophetically years. " Rome, according to Varro, was founded in the year before Christ 753. But Fabius Pictor dates its foundation five years later, or in the year before Christ 748. The power of the Roman emperor continued in Rome till the 493d year of the Christian era. After the dethronement of Augustulus, Zeno reigned as sole emperor, and consuls and senate exercised their wonted authority, under the Roman emperor in Constantinople, according to their repeated practice from the days of Constantine. Odoacer, though the conqueror of Rome, abstained from the * Brewster's Encyclop vo. vi. p. 403. Art. Chronology Table. use of the purple and diadem, and, claiming only the title of patrician, scrupulously transmitted to the emperor all the insignia of royalty.* The purple, the ensign of Roman authority, was for the first time assumed by Theodoric, the king of the Ostrogoths, in the year 493. His "royalty was proclaimed by the Goths, with the tardy, reluctant, ambiguous consent of the emperor of the east.-From the Alps to the extremity of Calabria, Theodoric reigned by the right of conquest."+ Foundation of Rome, B. C. It continued either 753 or 748 493 493 1246 or 1241 years. For so long a period the Roman authority was recognised and obeyed in Rome, and the successor of Romulus was its master. By the latter computation, the forty-two prophetic months, or 1240 years, had then exactly expired, and the utmost variation by the former period, as denoting the continuance from the foundation of the city, amounts only to the sixth part of a prophetic month, and could, therefore, as measured by months, denote no other number than that which is stated in the prophecy. Power was given him to continue forty and two months. Another month would have exceeded the period of the continuance of his power, either twenty-three or twenty-eight years. The twelve hundred and forty-first year behoved to be entered on, before the twelve hundred and forty years were completed. And I beheld ANOTHER beast coming up out of the EARTH; and he had two horns like a lamb, and spake as a dragon. The first beast, like the successive Gibbon's Hist. vol. vi. pp. 226, 228. +Ibid. vol. vii. pp. 15, 16. temporal kingdoms described by Daniel, arose out of the sea, from the midst of commotions and revolutions; but the second beast rose out of the earth, as the Roman empire itself is repeatedly denominated in the previous visions. It sprung not up by war, but in another form, within the territories of the Roman empire. The second beast manifestly succeeds to the first beast before him. And the prophecies of Daniel and Paul may help to expound the vision. Having described the Roman empire, or the fourth beast, (corresponding in every particular, as well as in the manner of its origin, with the first beast in the present vision), he adds, "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, by interpretation, "the ten horns out of this kingdom are ten kings (or kingdoms) that shall arise, and another shall rise after them, and he shall be diverse from the first, and he shall subdue three kings. And he shall speak great words against the Most High," &c. "Now ye know what withholdeth," saith the apostle," that he might be revealed in his time. For the mystery of iniquity doth already work only he that now letteth (hindereth) will let, until he be taken out of the way: and THEN shall that wicked one be revealed," &c. 2 Thess. ii. 6-8. Another beast, or kingdom, was to arise after the first; and to be revealed when the first was taken out of the way. The second beast was to arise also after the first beast before him, and may therefore be presumed to come up in his place, when he should be taken out of the way. That event happened towards the close of the fifth century; and early in the sixth, in the year 508, the first religious war began. |