1260 days were drawing near to their close. Hence it is manifest, that we are to expect the appearance of this king in the last times; in the times of the scoffers; in the very times in which we are now living.

every

It is to be observed nevertheless, that the scoffers and the king are not in all respects absolutely and completely the same. The scoffers and false teachers, predicted by the apostolical prophets, are plainly individuals, springing up and disseminating their baneful principles in various parts of the world: whereas both the appellation of a king, which in the prophetic language signifies a state or kingdom, and the definite political actions, ascribed to that king, shew plainly, that he was to be no individual, but a power or nation composed of individuals, who should profess and act up to the impious principles of the atheistical scoffers. The people therefore of the kingdom, alluded to by Daniel, were to do according to their will; were to exalt themselves; were to magnify themselves above every god; were to speak marvellous things against the God of gods; were alike to disregard the God of their fathers, the desire of women, and other god; because they were to magnify themselves above all. They were moreover to be traitors, heady, high-minded; to deny the existence both of the Father, and of the Son; and to be blasphemers of the name of God. They were likewise to be presumptuous, self-willed; to be despisers of government; to be not afraid to speak evil of dignities; and to promise the universal diffusion of liberty, while they themselves were the miserable slaves of vice and corruption. In fine they were to be a pandemonium of licentious anarchists and determined atheists; a wonderful phenomenon both in religion and politics which should first be developed after the era of the Reformation: a phenomenon, such as had never before, in any age whatsoever, made its appearance in the world: insomuch that they might safely be pronounced, whensoever they should start up, to be the long-expected and laterevealed Antichrist.

And shall we, while recent events are yet fresh in our memory, find any difficulty in pointing out the nation prefigured by the infidel king? Have we not all beheld

....

a mighty people, after the period of the reformation, and during the last days of open blasphemy and profaneness, rising up as one man, and throwing off every restraint both civil and religious; disregarding at once the dignity of their sovereign, and the high majesty of heaven; trampling upon the rights both of individuals and of nations with liberty, humanity, and philanthropy, ever in their mouths; and professedly rending asunder all the endearments of social life, as if human nature could only be perfected by being previously brutalized? When we consider both the character of the infidel king, and the period at which Daniel predicted his manifestation, we can scarcely hesitate to pronounce him to be revolutionary France.*

Let us proceed however to a more minute examination of his character, in order that this opinion may be satisfactorily established.

As the king then was to rise up after the second persecution of the men of understanding, or, in other words, after the Reformation: so has the power of infidel France commenced at this very period. As the king was to magnify himself above every god, whether true or false: so has the atheistical republic, soaring with a bold flight of impiety above her heathen and papal precursors, openly maintained and supported the most astonishing lie, that was ever embraced by infatuated mortals, an avowed denial of the very existence of the Deity.†

*It is almost superfluous to observe, that the circumstance of this power being styled a king is no impediment to the application of the prophecy to revolutionary France. "The Hebrews," as Mr. Mede justly remarks, "use king for kingdom, and kingdom for any government, state, or polity, in the world." Apost. of the latter times, p. i. c. 16.) Upon this principle, I conceive the infidel king to be France, from the epoch of the revolution to the end of the 1260 days, under whatever form of government, whether republican or imperial, it may exist during that period.

†The reader will find ample proofs, if any proofs be wanted, of French Atheism in Hist. the Interp. of prophecy, Vol. ii. particularly at pp. 223, 238, 241, 250.

I love the truth wherever it can be found, whether in the writings of a Papist or of a Protestant. While I think the jesuit Cornelius à Lapide quite mistaken in referring the character of the king primarily to Antiochus Epiphanes, I believe him to be very right in referring it ultimately and properly to the great Antichrist. It is a curious circumstance, that long before the French Revolution took place (for his Commentary was printed in the year 1634) he pronounced, merely from a view of the prophetic character of the wilful king, that, whenever he should be revealed, he would be an athiest, and would abolish, not only the worship of Christ and the superstitious idolatry of paganism, but even the very name and adoration of the truc God. "Ex hoc ergo ver. et ex ver. præcedente (ver. 37, 38.) colligitur, An

Yet, in the midst of undisguised atheism, contradictory as it might appear before this prophecy had received its accomplishment, the king was not to be without a god of his own. He was to worship, as soon as he was firmly established, a certain god at the head of a host of Mahuzzim or tutelary gods; a god, whom Daniel styles a strange or foreign god: a god, whom his fathers, superstitious as they had been, never knew. Hence it appears, that the adoration of this deity and his kindred Mahuzzim was not to be an invention of the king himself, but that it should be borrowed by him from the theological code of some other country. The god was to be a foreign god, whom his immediate predecessors of the Apostacy, notwithstanding their idolatrous veneration of saints and angels, had never worshipped.*

The Romans were, I believe, the only nation that ever expressly deified Liberty, till the worship of it was borrowed from them by the atheists of France.† A spurious Freedom, utterly incompatible either with genuine religion or with the real rights of man, was the very soul of the revolution which has since shaken Europe to its centre. Liberty and Equality were the watchwords of the infidel conspirators and their boast was, that slavery and superstition should soon be made

tichristum fore atheum, eumque, cum pleno potietur imperio, non tantum Christum et idola, sed et Dei veri nomen et cultum ablaturum." (Comment. in loc.)

Such was the language of anticipatory exposition previous to the French Revolution : let us now attend to the remarkably similar language of applicatory exposition after the commencement of that awful politico-theological convulsion. “I fear, I too clearly see the rise, instead of the fall, of the Antichrist of the West,-who shall be neither a Protestant nor a Papist; neither Christian, Jew, nor Heathen who shall worship neither God, angel, nor saint-who will neither supplicate the invisible majesty of heaven, nor fall down before an idol" Bp. Horsley's Letter on Isaiah xviii. p. 105, 106.

It is not unworthy of notice, that "the Fathers constantly thought, that under these Mabuzzim was some idol meant which Antichrist should worship." (Apost. of the latter times, Part i. C. 16.) The event has shewn, that they were right in their judgment. Jerome observes, that the Jews likewise conceived the character of this king to relate to Antichrist. Bp. Newton's Dissert. XVII.

The Greeks had a festival in honour of Jupiter Eleutherius, but I am not aware that they ever deified Liberty itself. If I am mistaken however in this point, it will not in the slightest degree affect the circumstance of Liberty being a foreign god considered in relation to France. The boasted Liberty of the Romans was not unlike that of their modern apes: as far as I am able to comprehend its nature, it was a liberty to quarrel with each other, and to tyrannize over their weaker neighbours.

to vanish from off the face of the earth. Liberty in short, according to their definition of the word, that is to say, a freedom from all restraint both civil and religious, formed undoubtedly the most prominent feature in all their harangues, and in all their projects. Not satisfied however with merely applauding and imitating the prin ciples and practice of the ancient Roman republicans, they determined likewise to adopt the literal worship of Liberty. Accordingly, after abjuring the religion of Christ, and declaring him to be an impostor, the Convention, with tumultuous applause, decreed the adoration of Liberty and Equality; and, in express imitation of the idolatrous Romans, appointed festivals exactly similar to those of paganism, in honour of Reason, the Country, the Constitution, the Virtues, and various other allegorical deities.* Liberty then I conceive to be the foreign god so peculiarly venerated by the infidel king, and which he placed with such distinguished honour at the head of his inferior Mahuzzim. Nor were these allegorical deities his only Mahuzzim. One of the tenets of modern philosophy is, "that tutelary gods, even dead men, may be canonized, consecrated, and worshipped." In perfect harmony with this doctrine, the anti-social republic formally enrolled in the list of its Mahuzzim Voltaire, Rousseau, Mirabeau, Marat, and even the vile assassin Ankerstrom. The church of St. Genevieve "was changed by the national assembly into a repository for the remains of their great men, or rather into a pagan temple; and, as such, was aptly distinguished by the name of the Pantheon, with the inscription, Aux grands hommes la Patrie reconnoissante, on the front." To this Pantheon, this avowed copy of the ancient Roman Pantheon, this polluted den of foreign idolatry, the remains of Voltaire and Rousseau were conveyed in a magnificent procession and, as if to insult the Almighty to his face, the bones of Voltaire were placed upon the high altar, and incense was offered to them, the infatuated

The late venerable Mr. Jones remarked some years ago the gradual approximation of the present age to paganism. He afterwards lived to see the worship of strange gods openly established in France. See his Reflections on the growth of Heathenism among modern Christians: Works, Vol. iii. p. 423.

multitude meanwhile bowing down in silent adoration before the relics of this arch enemy of Christ.* Such have been the tutelary gods of the infidel king. Disregarding the god of his fathers and the Desire women, he has revived the adoration of the Mahuzzim of Paganism; and, although a professed atheist, has prostrated himself before a foregin god whom his fathers never knew.†

It is now therefore that we behold the rise of Antichrist for in no particular does the Papacy answer to his character, as drawn by the inspired pen of St. John. Plunged as are the adherents of the Roman see in the grossest superstitions, they have never denied either the Father or the Son and consequently we are not warranted in stigmatizing their Church, however corrupt and apostatical it may be, with the appellation of Antichrist. The pretended universal Bishop, that man of sin who sits in the temple of God shewing himself that he is God, has indeed been the precursor of Antichrist, as Gregory justly remarked; but he is not Antichrist himself.

To complete the character of the infidel king. Daniel adds three other particulars, all of which correspond with the conduct of atheistical France, no less than the bolder outlines of his picture.

1. The king was to cause the upholders or champions of his tutelary deities, together with the strange god whom he acknowledged, to rule over many-Since the

It was in this same Pantheon that a prostitute personated Human Reason, and in that capacity received the worship both of the Convention and of the people. (See Hist. the Interp. Vol. ii. p. 233.) It is not unworthy of notice, that the adoration of Ceres has been revived even by name; a statue having been erected to her, and a festival appointed in honour of her. Ibid. p. 242.

+ It has often been observed, that prophecy is designedly obscure till it receives its accomplishment. This is remarkably the case with the present prediction. It appears perfectly contradictory, that a power, which magnified itself above every god, true as well as false, should nevertheless venerate a strange god and tutelary deities: yet such has been precisely the conduct of France. Had the people of that nation adored their foreign gods, really believing them to be gods, they would not have fulfilled the prophecy; because it declares, that the king should not regard any god: yet, if they had not honoured foreign gods in some manner, they would equally have failed in accomplishing the prophecy, because it declares that they should honour them. What then has been the conduct of France? With professions of atheism in her mouth, she has adored certain deities, whom she nevertheless disbelieves, to be deities; and has thus worshipped foreign gods without regarding any god.