insulated state, is added to my other arguments, it will, I think, carry some weight*.

To

* That I may not interrupt the regularity of my argument, I shall throw into a note my answer to the charge which Mr. Whitaker has brought against me relative to the man of sin. I had asserted, that there was no sort of resemblance either chronological or circumstantial between the wilful king and the man of sin except in the single circumstance of their both exalting themselves above all that is called God or worshipped: and, what I meant by the former of these (for it is to this only that Mr. Whitaker objects) I afterwards very fully stated to be, that the man of sin was to be revealed shortly after the downfall of the western empire, whereas the wilful king was not to make his appearance till after the Reformation. (Dissert. Vol. I. p. 310, 313.) But, says Mr. Whitaker, there is a chronological resemblance between them, because they are both to come to their end at the same time. This was an objection which I certainly did not expect, after expressing myself, as I had thought, so clearly on the point. Mr. Whitaker however has urged it, and with a considerable degree of parade. He has my free leave to make the most of it. If he can prove the identity of two powers by their chronological contermination, while they rise up at two entirely different periods, he will certainly perform wonders. In the mean time, I will direct him to a passage in my Work, wherein this very contermination, which he supposes I had overlooked, is expressly insisted upon. (See Dissert. Vol. I. p. 212.) As for his saying, that the primacy seems to be ascribed both to the wilful king and the man of sin, and that two cannot have it at once, I have carefully read over the descriptions of both, and cannot find the least hint about the primacy in either. I had observed indeed, that Mr. Whitaker says, prudently enough, seems to be ascribed". With regard to the partial co-existence of two such powers, the possibility of which he doubts, I beg only to refer him to the co-existence of infidel France and the Papacy. In all the arguments which he has brought against me, I cannot find that, so far as mere circumstances' of character go, he ever attempts to deny, that the character of the wilful king, contained in Dan, xi. 36-39, answers very

exactly

To all that I have said relative to the great confusion which is necessarily occasioned by our supposing the wilful king to be a sort of compound of Pagan Emperors, Christian Emperors, Western

exactly to the character of the infidel republic: and of course he will not deny, that the character of the man of sin exactly answers to the character of the Papacy. Here then, by the tacit acknowledgment of Mr. Whitaker himself, we have a demonstrative proof of the possibility of the co-existence of two such powers: for, if he could have found any flaw in my application of the character (I speak now only of the character) of the wilful king to infidel France, I have no reason to suppose that he would not have immediately pointed it out with high satisfaction. (Letter, p. 47.)

And now truth compels me to acknowledge, that I have not stated the case of the wilful king and the man of sin so accurately as I might have done. I ought to have said, that there was no sort of resemblance between them either chronological or circumstantial; whereas I erroneously made the exception of their both exalting themselves above all that is called god or worshipped. The king is said to magnify himself above all gods, true as well as false: but the man of sin is only said to oppose and exalt himself above all that is called god or august. At the time when I wrote what I did, I had not very recently read Bp. Newton's Dissertation on the man of sin; and his interpretation of that particular part of the prophecy had escaped my memory. I certainly thought, that the man of sin's exalting bimself above all that is called god or is worshipped related to his exalting himself above God and his Christ: and I have to thank Mr. Whitaker for having so led me to reconsider the subject, as clearly to perceive that I was mistaken. He builds an argument, as we have seen, on the use of the word anticimenus to prove that the Pope is antichristus: whereas the word proves no such thing; for what the man of sin opposed, as Bp. Newton rightly observes, was not God, but all that is called god or august, in other words, kings and emperors. It is obvious, that my correction of this error considerably strengthens my argument; and proves yet more decidedly, that the wilful king cannot be the same as the man of sin.

Emperors,

Emperors, Eastern Emperors, and Popes, Mr. Whitaker gives only the following answer.

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"To

any thing objected to a supposed want of unity and simplicity occasioned by this application, I think it a sufficient answer, "that a description of the character of the "governing powers of the Roman empire, must, "to suit it, vary as they did't. This very answer, such as it is, was furnished by myself, and rejected as quite unsatisfactory: for I was aware that it was the only answer that could be given, and therefore I was determined to anticipate it. If Mr. Whitaker think it sufficient, I can only say that be is much sooner satisfied than myself. Let the reader however compare together my objection, and the supposed sufficient answer to it; and then determine for himself. I ask no more: the cause is laid before him.

Mr. Whitaker winds up his arguments, by which he had hoped to destroy my second point, as follows. Speaking of my disregarding the connection between the butting king of the South and the Mohammedan little born, so clearly established by "the latent hint", which I have already discussed, he observes: "Now this connection is by Mr. Faber's hypothesis entirely broken, which is certainly no great recommendation of the latter, yet a "little blot in comparison with the others I "have noticed, and which as they really militate "both against the topography and chronology of "the prophecy, though the author professes to

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+

* See my Dissert. Vol. I. p. 289–292. Letter, p. 44.

Dissert. Vol. I. p. 291, 292.

" contend earnestly for both, seem to me completely "to destroy the second point on which his system "rests-the late appearance of the king, who does "according to his own will, in revolutionary "France". Let the careful reader peruse with his utmost caution all that I have just written on this second point, and see whether he can discover in it any thing that militates against the chronology of the prophecy. Against its topography indeed, according to Mr. Whitaker's idea of that topography, I confess that my scheme greatly militates: but against its real topography I flatly deny that it militates. This sweeping objection is plainly founded upon what I have already sufficiently noticed, Mr. Whitaker's erroneous idea that the prophecy is local, and that the scene of it must be confined to the land of Judea.

"

3. "The next point", says Mr. Whitaker, necessary to the support of the new system of interpretation published in the Dissertation on "the Prophecies, is the assumption, that the Carlovingian empire is the ten-horned beast in the Apocalypse"--I might, were I so disposed, quarrel with Mr. Whitaker's second introduction of the word assumption, as if I assumed every thing, and did not even so much as attempt to prove any thing: but let that pass. I ask Mr. Whitaker then, in the face of the public, where he finds that I ever asserted the ten-borned apocalyptic beast to be the Carlovingian empire? What I said was this: that the Roman empire under every one of its seven forms of government was symbolized by this beast; that

* Letter, p. 51.

St. John

St. John beheld the rise of this beast, which in strict. ness of speech had been in existence long before he was born, because considered in its bestial capacity the Roman empire had ceased to be from the age of Constantine to the year 606; that the beast revived under his sixth or wounded bead, which considered as a bestial bead was healed by his relapsing into his former bestial state of idolatry and persecution; that, when the beast thus revived, his last or double or Carlovingian head was not, chronologically speaking, in existence, though he appeared with all his seven beads and ten borns complete, because the Roman empire considered as a whole could not otherwise be symbolically represented; and that, when that last bead at length arose, it was in extent of dominion, agreeably to the apostolic prediction, the whole beast. In this sense it was, that studiously adapting my expression to the language of St. John, and imitating the example of my illustrious predecessor Mr. Mede, I indifferently styled the Carlovingian monarchy the Roman beast under his last head or the last head of the Roman beast, considering the terms as convertible, because the prophet had told me that the eighth king or head should be the beast himself*. But, that the ten-borned beast was so exclusively the Carlovingian empire, either from his original birth under Latinus or Romulus or from his revival under Phocas, that he was absolutely nothing else (for so, if I mistake not, Mr. Whitaker represents

* "Bestia Romana capitis novissimi", says Mr. Mede. We differ indeed essentially in our ideas respecting what power is meant by that last head, but our phraseology in speaking of the beast and his last head is the same.

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