throw power into the hands of the Romish pontiffs; first, the factious citizens of Rome often found it convenient, in their contentions, to apply to the ambitious bishop of that city, to decide their disputes; which thing the aspiring pontiffs did not fail of improving to their own aggrandizement: secondly, the idea had been conceived, and after long struggles confirmed, that the commission of Christ, given to his gospel ministers, had instituted different grades of men in this office; or had given the official right to some to rule; while the same commission gave to others to be ruled. Long had the faithful witnesses of Christ piously struggled against this innovating corruption. Jerome and many others contended for the well-known fact, that those who had come to be called bishops, were never in early times viewed to be of an officially superior order, but only as first among equals in office, and received all their supremacy only from the customs of the day: and not from any superior commission from Christ. We find in authentic church history, that the early bishops had no superior power allowed in the church to enact any thing but in union with both the common pastors, and the brethren of the churches. But the long pontifical exertions to be received as being of an order officially superior, prevailed; and they assumed a power to act independently of the common pastors and brethren. And these lordly pontiffs soon came to exercise influence in proportion to the city in which they dwelt! The bishop of Rome, hence, soon found himself able to rise from one degree of ambitious power to another, till the emperor Phocas declared bishop Boniface III. to be universal bishop of the Christian church; and himself to be judged by no man. And the pretensions and influence of this bishop rose still higher and higher, till the full-grown man of sin became manifest; and the saints were given into his hands for 1260 years. The long wilderness state of the true church under the blasphemous papal horn here commenced, Dan. vii. 8, 11; also the papal harlot, Rev. xvii. 1-5. And here, at a period which will receive further attention, arose the second beast in our text. This spiritual beast was to reign over the kings of the earth (chap. xvii. 18); while the secular Roman beast lay dead. Prophetic imagery cannot admit of but one beast on the same ground at the same time. A beast is the great ruling empire; and two such powers cannot at the same time exist.

This papal beast was

"diverse" from all other powers,

Dan. vii. 24; or, he was ecclesiastical. The secular Roman beast was said to be "diverse" from other beasts that had gone before, verse 7. But the papal beast was still "diverse" from this, as professing to be a spiritual power. For many centuries this papal beast did govern with a mighty sway, and reigned indeed over the kings of the papal earth. These kings formed one of his horns; and his armies of priests the other. The pope assumed power to crown kings, and to strike off their crowns at his pleasure, as is well known in history. Says bishop Newton, "The pope was the head of the state, as well as of the church." A bishop, of the council of Lateran, styled the pope "the prince of the world." A Catholic orator called him “king of kings, and monarch of the world." A prelate said of him that "he had all power, above all power, both of heaven and earth." Pope Innocent boasted that the church was his spouse who brought him her dowry of absolute power, in temporals and in spirituals:-that she brought him his mitre as priest, and his crown as king; and she constituted him vicar to him who is King of kings, and Lord of lords! This was the papal power, which was claimed and acknowledged for many centuries. It was then the highest power on earth for the time; and was a beast indeed. 'Mystery, Babylon the Great!" The views given of popery, in the collateral passages, militate nothing against this. It was a horn of the secular beast, in Dan. vii., as it rose on the same ground with the secular beast, and remains in existence after the secular beast recovers his life. But this does not hint that it was not itself a beast, part of the time, on the same ground, while the secular beast lay dead. And in our text and context, we find it did thus become a beast; and facts from history testify the same. The view given of the papal harlot, in Rev. xvii., as borne on the back of the secular beast, does not interfere with our view given. For this her position on his back is after he recovers his life in the last days, or ascends from the bottomless pit,-takes the ground as a reigning power; and popery becomes a merely subordinate being,-a false prophet,—a harlot on the way to execution.

This second (the papal) beast is said to exercise all the power of the first beast, or of pagan Rome; meaning before the revolution from paganism. This implies what has been stated, that the pagan beast had for the time ceased to exist. "The first beast before him," says the text. The pagan beast was before him; but was not now in real.

existence. The papal beast exercised all the power of the first, by occasioning as much annoyance to the true people of God as did the pagan beast. He caused the people of the papal earth to worship the pagan beast, by making them submit to a system of false religion of his own invention, no better than the religion of the antecedent pagan empire noted by the beast in the first part of this chapter. And the papal power thus makes an image to the pagan beast, and enforces the worship of it upon all men upon pain of death. This explains his causing all men to worship the beast. They do it by worshipping his image in the hands of popery. This image of old paganism must mean that in popery which resembles paganism. But this is the body of the papal religion; that mummery of delusion, which is nothing better than paganism under the Christian name. It is striking, indeed, that this should be called an image to the first beast. Ordinances of religion of human invention are nothing but an image of pagan mythology. If it nearly resembles the Christian religion, it is so much the worse, as being more dangerous. Counterfeits well executed are counterfeits still, and are more dangerous than those badly executed. The whole mass of popery is but an image of paganism, as our text and the whole genius of the Bible decide. One essential feature of old Roman paganism was, paying adoration to great characters who are dead, and applying to them as demigods, or mediators between them and their highest god; and venerating them in images. And a complete image of this idolatry was established in popery. Deceased saints were there constituted their intercessors with God. And worship directed by the fancied mediation of such saints, was there "established by law." (Scott.) And "the worship of images was there established by the second council of Nice." (Faber.) In pagan Rome the names of these demigods were selected from great civil or military characters. In papal Rome, they were selected from the apostles, or eminent Christians. The virgin Mary is with them a most worshipful demigod. Her image with that of Christ and favorite saints, must be before them for remembrance and veneration. These, and a hurdle of rites of human invention, constitute the false religion of popery,-the papal image. made to the pagan beast. To accommodate which, and to sanction the blasphemous supremacy of the pope, the Bible itself is by them altered and made to read according to their impious and abominable system. Giving life to this

This

image, making it to speak, and to cause that all who would not worship it should be put to death,—is a striking representation of the real management of popery. was aided by false miracles, dogmas, and gross impositions. By a bloody usurpation, and abuse of power, all who could not submit to this impious mummery of papal religion, should be excommuicated and delivered over to the civil sword. The popes managed the civil powers, and especially the German empire (which was designed for this very purpose), as a mere puppet in their own hands, to enforce their laws, and to execute their bloody bulls and thunderbolts. This beast is noted in the text as making fire to come down from heaven in the sight of men, and deceiving them that dwell on the earth. This alludes to the papal system of false miracles. Let one instance of these serve to illustrate this portion of our text;—an instance given from good authority. A Catholic priest had found on a tree the nest of a very loquacious bird. He now formed a design to work a papal miracle, to strengthen their system. He placed under this nest a bomb of powder, with a trail; which he induced some arch accomplice to manage. He then notified a religious meeting to be holden in the shade of that tree. In the midst of their religious exercises the bird being disturbed became clamorous, as he well knew would be the case. After bearing with her noise for a time, he affected to be out of patience, that she should thus disturb their devotions; and he prayed that the fire of heaven might destroy her. His accomplice now slily fired the trail of powder, which caused the bomb under the nest to explode. And here was a notable miracle to vindicate the papal religion. And multitudes of miracles equally divine confirmed their deluded millions in papal superstition. The papal beast called to his aid also the fire of persecution, to afflict the true witnesses of Christ. And thousands almost beyond number, he caused to seal their testimony with their blood.

In verses 12, 14, it is said of the secular beast (to which the papal beast made an image) "whose deadly wound was healed;" "which had the wound by the sword, and did live;" which passages have led some incautiously to imagine that the secular beast alluded to is here represented as actually alive, in the time of the papal beast; and that hence the papal power must be himself this beast raised to life. But the text says no such thing. And the figure in the text can admit of no such thing, as has been

shown. Two beasts cannot exist at the same time in the same place. The text no more says the secular beast was already alive from this deadly wound in his head, while the papal beast lived, than it says he was thus alive while John was writing the passages. The two passages

are simple references to the figure of the first beast presented to the eye of John. In this, it is found that the secular beast, at some time between his rise and his final ruin, dies by a wound in the head, and yet afterward lives again; this deadly wound being healed. And now, in describing this beast, as distinct from the papal beast and all others, this part of the description is taken, as being singularly prominent among his features; but not to decide any thing as to the time, when the healing of his head takes place; whether in the days of papal predominance; or in the revolution in France, in 1789. It could not take place in the former, and yet popery be a beast. But it could in the latter, and thus destroy the papal beast, and take his place as a supreme power; as was the fact. The making of an image by the papal beast to the first,-the pagan,-implies that the pagan beast was not himself on the ground, but lay dead. In verse 14, the papal miracles are said to take place, "in sight of the beast," probably meaning the pagan beast. This also at first view seems to indicate that the pagan beast was then alive. But for the reasons which have been stated, this cannot have been the fact. John beheld in vision the two beasts standing in his view together. Of course what was done by the papal, was done (as it might seem to him) in sight of the pagan. But this was not designed to teach that the two beasts were actually to exist on earth at the same time. It has been shown that such could not have been the case. The miracles being "in sight of the beast, means also that when this image was made, the old pagan beast was in clear historic sight, and therefore the papal beast must make an image to it; as it follows the words, "saying to them that dwell on the earth that they should make an image to the beast," the pagan beast. This is given as explanatory of his working miracles in the sight of the beast: hence says Pool, "in sight of the beast, i. e., to his honor and to gain him reputation." If this were not the real design in the mind of the pope, but to gain his own reputation; yet it operated as a gaining of reputation to paganism, as it is itself no better than paganism. The fact was, paganism in the revolution under Constantine died.