become the last or Carlovingian bead of the Roman beast. For, since the Roman beast under his Carlovingian bead is represented by St. John as the chief of the confederacy which is gathered to Armageddon at the close of the 1260 years, and since the wilful king is described by Daniel as the chief of an expedition against the same country and at the same period; it seemed necessarily to follow, that the Roman beast under bis Carlovingian bead should at that era be identified with the wilful king. That such was my opinion, I more than once, though cautiously and obliquely, intimated in my Dissertation*: and the event has, with much greater rapidity than I once expected, unhappily shewn by practical demonstration, that it was but too well founded. That Buonapartè has revived the Carlovingian empire, and consequently has become the representative of the last or Carlovingian bead of the beast, can now scarcely be doubted. As yet indeed he has not assumed the title of Emperor of the Romans, nor compelled the chief of the house of Austria to resign it, but he appears to be upon the eve of assuming it: and, when he has assumed it, I know not what it can add to his present power and influence. Who will deny, that, like Charlemagne to whom his flatterers delight to compare him, he is the uncontrouled continental Emperor of the western Roman world? Such were the grounds, on which I maintained that the context required us to apply a clause, ambiguous so far as mere grammar is concerned, to *See Dissert. Vol. II. p. 194, 336, 337, 360, 361, 362, 363, 364. the the wilful king, and not to the king of the North: and because I was persuaded the context required us to do so, I therefore translated the connecting Vau by but instead of by and, both as expressing my own ideas of the proper application of the clause, and as desiring to produce a version free from the unavoidable ambiguity of the original. Let us now see Mr. Whitaker's representation, or rather misrepresentation, of the matter. "What Mr. Faber "has ventured to say, that the context sufficiently. "shews that it is not the king of the North who is to "invade the glorious land, is founded on the liberty " he himself has taken to translate the Hebrew particle Vau but instead of and". With what possible degree of attention can Mr. Whitaker have read my work to hazard so strange a criticism upon it? He exhibits me as translating Vau by but, instead of by and, in order to make a context, upon which I may build my conclusion that the disputed clause ought to be referred to the wilful king: whereas what I did was precisely the reverse. I did not draw my conclusion relative to the disputed clause, because I had translated Vau by but: but I translated Vau by but, because I had previously drawn my conclusion relative to the disputed clause from that general view of the context which I have just exhibited to the reader. In short, what Mr. Whitaker makes my foundation, namely my rendering Vau by but, I had considered as a mere incidental part of my superstructure: and, as I have already observed, I adopted that translation, not as authorizing me to refer the disputed clause to the infidel king, but simply as exhibiting my own opinion how it ought to be referred agreeably to a previous Q 2 view view of the context-But he is very indignant at my translating the Vau by but, and not by and; which, he says is not only in contradiction to our own version, but likewise to the LXX. This is the first time that I ever heard a person censured in the abstract for departing from those two translations. However I can assure Mr. Whitaker, that, if he like to retain the and, it is a matter of profound indifference to me: my explanation, not being founded upon the version of the Vau, as be would persuade me, will remain precisely the same whether the Vau be rendered and or but. "And at the "time of the end a king of the south shall butt at " him; and a king of the north shall come against " him like a whirlwind, with chariots, and with "horses, and with many ships. And (notwith"standing this two-fold attack) he shall enter into "the countries." Does the reader perceive any difference in the superstructure, since, what Mr. Whitaker represents as my foundation, the allimportant but has been taken away?-Before the matter be quite dropped, I have a little circumstance to notice in Mr. Whitaker's criticism, of which I would fain hear some account. He says, I have made an unwarrantable, nay a most unwarrantable, alteration in the text by translating the Vau by but; and he brings against me, in formidable array, both our English version and that of the LXX. I wish to have the cogency of all this explained to me. Does Mr. Whitaker mean to say, that my alteration is "most unwarrantable", because Vau never signifies but; or because, by so translating a particle which may signify but, I contradict the English version and the LXX? If the former; I must take take the liberty of telling him, that he is quite mistaken: if the latter; then he maintains, that every person, who differs from the English version and the LXX, makes "a most unwarrantable altera "tion in the text". I freely give him his choice of the dilemma*. Mr. Whitaker closes his final objection with an observation of his own, which he evidently considers as of no small importance. The king of the South is said to butt; and Mohammed, he says, is described under the figure of a little born: this latent hint therefore is to be esteemed an argument tending to prove, that the king of the South denotes the successors of Mohammed in the Saracenic empire; and, because my hypothesis quite destroys it, such destruction is no great recommendation of my hypothesist I had myself observed, as Mr. Whitaker rightly states, that the king of the south is said to butt: but, to be sure, I never thought of thereby proving him to be Mohammed and bis successors; and, as for "the latent hint" of which he speaks, it was so latent that it quite escaped my notice. The Persian ram butts: so does the Mace donian be-goat: so does the papal little born: so do all the other borns. Among so many competi tors I should not have known where to fix: but in truth the idea never occurred to me. After all, neither Mohammed nor his Saracenic successors are * Mr. Whitaker does not seem to have observed, that even in the short space of the prophecy, relative to the wars at the time of the end, our translators themselves have rendered the Vau by but no less than three times, and once by yet. See ver. 41, 43, 44, 45. + Letter, p. 50. typified typified by the little born of the be-goat, but the Mohammedan religion, which is common alike both to the Saracens and the Turks. How then can even a shadow of argument be brought to prove, that the butting king of the south is the Saracenic empire, because, not the Saracenic empire, but the Mobammedan religion is typified by a little born? And here I cannot refrain from observing, what seems not only to have escaped Mr. Whitaker's notice, but even that of our venerable predecessors Mede and Newton, that, if the king of the South be the Saracenic empire (which I maintain to be impossible, because he is first introduced at the time of the end), it is very singular that so little should be said about him, and so much about the king of the North whom they suppose to denote the Turkish empire. The exploits of the Saracens were at least as wonderful as those of the Turks: and, in addition to their other amazingly extensive conquests, they likewise, no less than the Turks, made themselves masters of the glorious holy land. If then the kings of the South and the North denote the Saracenic and Turkish empires, is it not somewhat singular that so much should be said about the latter, and so very little about the former? According to the scheme, which I bave ventured and do venture to oppose, although sanctioned by the eminent names of Mede and Newton, all that is said of the Saracens is, "The king of the south "shall butt at him": while six long verses, with the exception of these few words (in the original only four words), are exclusively devoted to the Turks. When this argument, however inconclusive in an insulated |