unwarranted assumption: one, which Holy Scripture does not support-one, with which the course of past events has not agreed, and cannot be made to agree. To force it to do so, the strangest liberties have been taken with the language of the Apocalypse; but in vain. The Church of God remains unsatisfied; andtill looking elsewhere than to Rome for the "great City" of John's visions-will continue to be so. Rome cannot be the Babylon of the Apocalypse. For we cannot make Rome a maritime City, nor an Oriental City nor can we place her in the region out of which Inspired Prophecy foretells that Antichrist shall arise--the northern quarter of the kingdom of Alexander the Great: nor show her to be a city, whose location it was so difficult to discover at. the time when the angel spake to John, that he who should then make the discovery, would be the declared possessor of "the mind which hath wisdom.” Constantinople has, however, all these Scripturally delineated features of the destined Metropolis of the Antichristian Empire, and is, besides, as strictly as Rome is, a city seated on seven mountains."

Here, then, we commence our contemplationswith the rise of the Antichristian Empire, having Constantinople as its metropolis: the time, as yet future and unknown. It is to have its first development under seven kings, of whom one will be Antichrist. The first five kings are represented as "fallen." (Section iv.) The chronology of this Book with the sixth King-the "one" that "is." We

opens

are to suppose ourselves brought to that period in future time.

Then

Section V. The scene of action changes-from earth to heaven; where we behold preparation made for the Judgment on Antichrist. A second and third line of prophecy (Lines i. iv.) open upon us. (See Sections v. vi.) "The Judgment is set" on the Beast, "and the Books opened -as it had been foreshown, ages before, to the Prophet Daniel, that they would be. Dan. vii, 9, 10. Then-Judgment is executed-first, on Satan, as the representative of the Beast, then on the Beast himself.

With the casting down of Satan and his angels to the earth, the Calendar of Prophecy begins to assume a definite character. We are brought to the day 2400 before our Lord's next Advent.

Section XVII. We return to the Line of Prophecy from which, at Sect. v., we diverged-and witness the execution of Judgment on the Beast. Then we contemplate his foretold re-appearance, and the contemporaneous accession to power of the Ten Kings, who, with him, are to compose the Antichristian Confederation. (For the time of these events, see the Analysis.)

Section XX. We enter on a fourth Line (Line v.) of Prophecy, which presents to our view Antichrist restored. The seven kings are gone. We no longer see crowns on the seven heads of the Beast. The Ten Horns now have crowns upon them. The rise of the Beast is reverted to. His identity with the Fourth Beast of Daniel's vision (vii, 7) is shown. His death

is narrated-then his re-appearance in life, and accession to universal dominion. As effects of this, we have Jerusalem trodden down by the Gentiles, and the flight of the Hebrew Church into the wilderness. (Sections xxi, xxii.) At Section xxi. we enter on another Line of Prophecy. (Line iii.) At Section xxii. we return to the one we diverged from at Sect. xvii. And at Section xxiii. we are again on Line v. The reason of these transitions is obvious. The time discoursed of in Sections xxi, xxii, xxiii. is one and the same. We have arrived at the beginning of the 1260 days, which, with an added three days and a half, are immediately to precede our Lord's next Advent.

Section XXIV. conducts us back to Line 1, where we behold Antichrist on the Red Horse, and (in Section xxvi.) the False Prophet on the Black Horse: a reversion to Line v. in Section xxv. preparing the way for the latter spectacle, by the introduction on the scene of this impious coadjutor of the Man of Sin.

And now that Satan's two witnesses, Antichrist and his Minister, are before the world, we have, on reverting to Line iii, Messiah's two witnesses most appropriately introduced. It will be perceived that the time here is the same to which preceding contemplations have conducted us.

Then we have (Sections xxviii-xxxvii,) the antagonistic action of Messianic and Antichristian power: in the impressed Seal of God, and mark of the beast— in the "Îying wonders" of the False Prophet, and

Angelic warnings, to counteract these-in the "strong delusion" and " falling away " of the world, and the persecution of the Church-in the foreshown extent, and character of that persecution, and the Spirit's requiem on the Martyrs-the revelation of their souls in heaven, and of-first, their prayers there, before God's altar, and then their triumphant praise to Him. We have diverged from one Line of Prophecy to another, as the progressing action required us to do.

Thus far we have had to contemplate the Rise and Progress of the Antichristian Empire. Now we shall be made spectators of its Decline and Fall.

Section XXXVIII. introduces Messiah invoking Divine Judgments on the Antichristian World. We enter here, and in Section xxxix, on the last two Lines of Prophecy (Lines ii. vi.), into which the revelations made to John are distributed. We note (Sections xli-xliii.) the contemporaneous sounding of the trumpets, and pouring out of the vials; indicated by the corresponding scenes of action under each trumpet, and each vial. The antagonism of Antichristian and Messianic power then becomes apparent, in progressing action on either side, as set forth in Line after Line of Prophecy--" here a little, and there a little." See Sections xliv-lvi. And now the 1260 days have passed, and the succeeding three days and a half of Antichristian rejoicing over the Dead Witnesses. At Section lvii. we find ourselves brought to the Great Day of Wrath in which the Lines of Prophecy will be perceived to have a common termination, with

the exception of Line iv, which ended with the expiration of the 1260 days-in other words, three days. and a half earlier than do the other six lines. Judgment is executed on the Dragon and the Beast, on Great Babylon, and the Antichristian Confederation : and the Millennial Reign of Christ and His Saints commences. Soon after the expiration of the 1000 years we have Satan's Final Struggle. Then the last Judgment-introductory to the new Heaven and Earth, and the new Jerusalem; and the final states of the righteous and the wicked. No portion of the Book from chap. iv. to chap. xx. has been omitted in the Arrangement. And I think it will be evident now, to the reader, that each event has had its proper place in the chain of action assigned to it; and that, as announced in the Introduction, "it is a Drama of stupendous interest and unrivalled magnificence, whose successive scenes here rise in long array before the mental vision: consistent in its various parts, and presenting to view an unbroken chain of action, wonderful, and oftentimes awful to contemplate; but, in its final issues, worthy of God, and most beneficial to the universe. A regular uninterrupted progress of events towards a designed end may be plainly discerned; proving this Book to contain, not a series of unconnected revelations, but a wise, well arranged, and perfect plan of Divine operation of which, the several parts only require to be suitably combined in order to the development of a wonderful, beautiful, and harmonious whole.