me as saying); this I never asserted, nor ever thought of asserting. Indeed if I had, I should most palpably have contradicted myself. Yet on this gross misrepresentation does Mr. Whitaker build one of his arguments against my scheme, and tell me that "the Carlovingian empire ought, to support my hypothesis, to have begun sooner "than it did, even in the year 606, that is before "Charlemagne was born"*. My opponent can surely never have read with any common degree of attention the section wherein I discuss the character of the ten-borned beast: to that section in general, for I scarcely know how to give him a particular reference, I beg to refer the reader. Let me be right or wrong in my opinion, he will at least see what I really do say, unsophisticated by the gloss of Mr. Whitaker. But Mr. Whitaker undertakes to demonstrate that the ten-horned beast of the Apocalypse is the same as the little born mentioned in the seventh chapter of Daniel. And this he does in the follow ing manner. The same duration, or (as he might more accurately have expressed himself) the same term of prosperous duration, is assigned both to the apocalyptic beast and to the little born; namely three times and a half, or 1260 days: and, during this term, he says, the saints are alike to be given into the hand of the beast and the born: but they cannot be given, during the same term, into the hand of two different powers: therefore the beast and the born must be the same power. But the born I myself allow to be the Papacy: therefore the Letter, p. 55. beast beast must be the Papacy. He concludes this supposed irrefragable argument, after the manner of Euclid, with an emphatic Q. E. D. Here again he compels me to suspect, that he never can have read the section of my Work, wherein I treat of the apocalyptic ten-borned beast, with even a moderate degree of attention. I there fully state the reason, why the ten-borned Roman beast in his revived state must necessarily continue to practise prosperously during the very same term that the saints were given into the hand of his little born: namely, because he revived from his deadly wound, or in other words relapsed into his ancient open support of persecuting idolatry, by the very act of giving the saints into the hand of his little born; which he did, when under his imperial head in the year 606 he declared the Pope to be sole universal bishop. Hence the prosperous duration of the revived beast and his little born cannot but be contemporary from beginning to end. But, how contemporaneous existence proves identity, I have yet to learn. Mr. Whitaker might just as well argue, that, because the same term of 1260 years from beginning to ending is assigned both to Popery properly so called and Mohammedism, Popery must be the same as Mohammedism. But, says Mr. Whitaker, the saints are given during the same period into the hand both of the beast and the horn: but they cannot be given into the hand of two contemporary powers at once: therefore the beast must be the born. I cannot quite see the conclusiveness of this syllogism, even if Mr. Whitaker had stated his premises accurately; because I find not the least difficulty in conceiving, that the saints might at once be given into the hand both of a persecuting ecclesiastical power, and of its ally and supporter a persecuting secular power ready to execute all its projects of tyrannical cruelty. But Mr. Whitaker has not stated his premises accurately. He will no where find it said, that the saints were given into the hand of the beast. It is said indeed, that power was given unto him, namely by permission from above, to make war with the saints, and to overcome them: but, as for the giving of the saints into the bands of the little born, which implies I think necessarily some specific act of investiture, it was he himself that gave the saints into the hand of the born, so far from receiving them from some other power. The beast and his little born co-exist: the beast gives the saints into the hand of his little born: and then, by the all-wise though inscrutable permission of providence, lends himself, as even Bp. Newton acknowledges with what consistency I stop not now to inquire*, to execute with unrelenting barbarity the sanguinary wishes of his ecclesiastical colleague. Having thus, he conceives, fairly overturned three of the points on which this new hypothesis rests, Mr. Whitaker should now go on to the next: but so imposing is the manner in which his doughty antagonist asserts that he has proved what he has *❝Sanders himself confesses, that an innumerable multitude "of Lollards and Sacramentarians were burnt throughout all "Europe, who yet he says were not put to death by the Pope and "Bishops, but by the civil magistrates; which perfectly agrees "with this prophecy, for it is said of the secular beast, that he "should make war with the saints, and overcome them". Dissert, in loc. only only assumed, that, to prevent readers not accustomed to investigate the arguments presented to them from being misled, he kindly thinks it right to point out some of the particulars produced under this head, which are untenable*—He begins with complaining heavily of my mode of reasoning, which is this: having either proved, or believing that I have proved, any given position, I argue from it as solid ground to the next position, and so onwards. Of this reasoning he gives sundry specimens; but, before I proceed to examine them, it may not be amiss to inquire whether Mr. Whitaker does not use the self-same mode himself, although he affects to consider it as peculiarly a contrivance of my ownt. He takes it for granted then, and tells us that he has actually demonstrated it, that the little Roman born is the same as the ten-borned apocalyptic beast, and that they both alike symbolize the Papacy. Upon this position every thing that is said in his Commentary from p. 205 to p. 423, and in his General and connected view from p. 194 to p. 247, is more or less founded: yet would a Papist deny, that either the born or the beast is the Papacy; and I, who am a hardened and inveterate" Protestant, deny that the beast is. Mr. Whitaker's writings abound with similar instances just as much as mine do: nor do I at all blame him for it, because in truth I cannot see how an argument can be carried on in any other way: I only think it a little 1 *Letter, p. 53. + The judicious reader will not charge me with being guilty of any originality in using this mode of reasoning. hard, hard, that he should object to my reasoning from one position which I consider as proved to another which I wish to prove, when he does the very same himself; and, not only he, but Mede and Newton likewise. The first specimen of my assumptions is this*; that I take it for granted that the appearance of the wilful king (who, Mr. Whitaker says he has demonstrated, can only be the Roman power) must be after the Reformation, and that the time of the end must be when the 1260 years expire: from these two assumptions come no small part of the deductions necessary to my system-If it be an assumption * Mr. Whitaker, in his letter, p. 53, has given various references to different assumptions as he calls them throughout my work. That all these are ill-founded, the reader is to take Mr. Whitaker's ipse dixit: for he offers not a shadow of argument against them, but simply denies them. I was at first puzzled how to deal with such an antagonist, but after mature deliberation I thought the best method was the retort courteous. Accept then, friendly reader, my positive denial of the following assumptions of Mr. Whitaker. Commentary on the Revelation. Preface, last page, last line.-P. 42. 1. 7, 8.9-P. 81. the 5 last lines P. 83. the whole of note on ver. 7 with the rxception of the last three lines-P. 98. the four last lines with all that is subsequently said relative to Attila being the Mountain-P. 105. last line and P. 106. first line et infra-P. 111. 1. 8, 9—P. 176. 1. 13, 14, 15-P.1.79. 1. 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11-P. 187. all that is said relative to the holy city being the literal Jerusalem-P.191. 1. 5, 6-P. 198 et infra, all that is said relative to the man-child being Constantine -P. 205. All that is said relative to the beast being the Papacy -P. 207. three last lines to the end of the sentence-P.209. 1. 16--20-P. 205, 210. His idea that the rising of the two beasts from the sea and the earth denote their rising in the west and the east. I have now got half way through the book, and am weary of making any more such memorandums. that |