L1, 7. may refer to her false doctrines, idolatrous worship, pious frauds, titles of honour, temporal advantages, and superstitious adoration of the venerabile, or consecreted host.

And upon her forehead was a name written. This superscription indicates the real charcter of the whore, as publicly expressed in her days, by the true Church of Christ, or the followers of Jesus. It is not her choice, and much against her will, to wear this sign of shame; but she has obtained this badge of reproach, by her corruptions of Christianity. We need not have recourse to the inscription on the forehead of the high-priest, or to the custom of ancient harlots, who had their names written over their doors, or on their foreheads; as it is very improbable, that she would thus proclaim the loss of all her reputation as a Christian Church, and glory in her own ignominy. It is proverbial among all nations and it is true that the countenance of a wicked person is an index of his passions and crimes; and thus in a spiritual sense, the great harlot exhibits her character in large and legible letters, on her brazen front.

Mystery Babylon the great, the mother of harlots and abomination of the earth. We are informed by the word mystery in front of this inscription, that the following title of the great whore is not to be taken in a litteral, but in a mystic sense, as the angel himself explains in verse 7. Rome is termed the Babylon of the New Testament, in three points of view. Because, like that ancient city in Asia, it has been the residence of a court exercising a universal power in Christendom, as the monarchs of Babylon did over the Old Testament church. Secondly, because Rome in connexion with the Romish church, persecuted the true Church of Christ by fire and sword, and led the followers of Jesus into spiritual captivity, as did Babylon of Old. And thirdly, because it introduced a strange mixture of Paganism, Judaism and Christianity, both in point of

doctrine and worship; as the languages of Babylon were confused, whence the word Babylon signifies confusion. The resemblance between Rome and Babylon is so strikingly evident, that even the most able Romish expositors have felt themselves compelled to acknowledge the appel lation, and only endeavour to parry the stroke from the head of the Pope, by referring it to Pagan Rome, or to Rome in the days of Antichrist. But the prophecy here most certainly designs Rome Papal. She is called the mother of harlots or of all the false churches in Christendom; because she has not learned her spiritual fornication from others, but is herself the first source and fountain head of all false worship. That ancient city has prided herself for ages in the title: Rome the great, the mother of churches, and of the only saving faith. In this spirit of selfaggrandizement, the principal Church at Rome has been adorned by the following inscription: Sacrosancta Lateranensis ecclesia, omnium orbis & urbis ecclesiarum mater & Caput.* But the spirit of prophecy has invariably borne a contrary testimony.

I saw the woman drunken with the blood, &c. Our heart recoils at the sight of a woman, destitute of those tender feelings which adorn the female sex ; but when she is represented as having abandoned all character, and being drunken with human blood, she exhibits an extraordinary scene of moral depravity, and is depicted as a monster of wickedness. This figure of being drunk with blood, is probably an allusion to Jer. XLVI, 10. and indicates dreadful persecution and horrible slaughter. The Romish church began to drink the blood of the saints and martyrs of Jesus, ever since she was termed Jezebel. For the truth of this terrible accusation, I would refer the reader to the butcheries of the Vallenses and Albigenses,

* Literally : The holy Lateran church, the mother and head of the churches of every city, and of the whole world.

the slaughter of the Waldenses, the massacres in France, the burning of the martyrs in England, the Netherlands and Bohemia, the furious persecutions of the Protestants all over Europe, and the secret and inhuman tortures of the inquisition. She has drank more blood than even Pagan Rome. How great must be her inebriation, after being gorged with so much blood! She has drank little during the last century, and yet, St. John beheld her in a state of intoxication when riding upon the beast. But the effects of blood-drunkenness are great, and of long continuance. Those persons, whose blood she has thus shed, are called saints and parvpes, witnesses. Saints are those, who are washed by the blood of reconciliation, and live holy lives; witnesses are those, who remain firm in the confession of Christ and the truth of his doctrine at all hazard. The first word may indicate private Christians, and the second public teachers of the Gospel.

I wondered with great admiration. The original implies an exceeding great admiration. St. John was shocked and amazed at this vision of the woman; for he fully understood that this hieroglyphic signified a Christian Church in a state of deplorable degeneracy and corruption. It was matter of astonishment to him, how a church of the meek and lowly Jesus, could fall so deep, as to be drunken with blood, totally disfigured, and ride upon such a beast. He anticipated from this vision, that the followers of Christ would yet have to undergo tremendous trials, before this prophecy could be accomplished.

Verse 7. And the angel said unto me wherefore didst thou marvel? I will tell thee the mystery of the woman, and of the beast that carrieth her, which hath the seven heads and ten horns. 8. The beast that thou sawest was, and is not; and shall as cend out of the bottomless pit, and go into perdition and they that dwell on the earth shall wonder, (whose names were not written in the book of life from the foundation

of the world,) when they behold the beast that was, and is not, and yet is.

The angel seems to disapprove of the apostle's amazement at the sight of the beast and its rider, and takes this opportunity to relieve his mind, by a satisfactory explanation of the different parts of this compound hieroglyphic. It would however be contrary to the nature of prophecy to expect a full interpretation of this mystery from the lips of the angel; as all predictions must be veiled in obscurity, till their time of completion. But this is not cause of despair. He has partially elevated the vail and we have already progressed so far in its accomplishment, that by a close attention to the angels interpretation, we may nevertheless be able to satisfy our wishfull hearts with tolerable certainty.

The angel begins his elucidation by informing St. John, that Providence had so ordered the course of events in regard to this beast, that its history in detail, would naturally divide itself into three parts, and these three parts would comprise its whole duration. This division appears important to the right understanding of the beast, as the angel in order to fix the apostle's attention upon it, repeated it four different times in verses 8. 10. 11. I will arrange his words under the following numbers, to make them more perspicuous for the contemplation of the reader.

1. The beast Was and Is not and shall Ascend out of the bottomless pit, and go into perdition.

2. It Was, and Is not, and yet Is.

3. Five are fallen, and One Is, and the Other is not yet come; and when he cometh, he must continue a short space.

4. The beast that Was, and is Not, even he Is the eighth, and is of the seven, and goeth into perdition.

This division of the angel's is again one of those critical tests of discrimination, where all true and erroneous expositors of the beast from the sea may be easily appre

ciated by discerning readers. Bossuet, the eloquent champion of Popery, in his controversy with the ingenious Jurieu, in which he esteems the Roman emperor Maximin and his colleagues, to be the ten-horned beast, is here in a sad dilemma, with all his rhetoric and eloquence. And Faber, though a careful and strong reasoner on many points, yet having once set out on an erroneous path, and unwilling to abandon his otherwise plausible system, takes refuge in a singularly fanciful opinion ; that the beast, i. e. according to him, the Roman empire ceased in its power and authority, and entered a state of Non-existence upon the conversion of Constantine, when Pagan idolatry was abolished; and that it again ascended from the bottomless pit, when image-worship was established in the West of Europe. These learned authors were very able to weigh all the different degrees of probability, and symbolical propriety of an opinion; but prejudice, and love of system compelled them to adopt these unsatisfactory ideas, or offer no opinion at all upon this subject.

In illustrating the different states of the beast, I would have the reader to pay a particular regard to these words of the angel, was, is not, and shall ascend out of the bottomless pit, which can have no reference whatever to the time of St. John, or the year in which he has writtten. The present time in this prophecy, is always the then present point of completion, to which the prophet has arrived in his prophetic narrative; and thus he describes that which is already accomplished in the preterite or past, what is then receiving its completion, in the present, and what is yet to follow in the future tense. See chap. IX, 12. chap. XI, 14, chap. xx, 6. and compare John XXI, 18. Ezek. XXXVIII, 17. Thus St. John's prospect of the beast and its rider here, is precisely that of our own time. For the beast is just at this present period in his state of Non-existence, as described by the angel.