that his coming was near when they heard of wars and rumours of wars; for nation rising against nation, and kingdom against kingdom, and famines, and pestilences, and earthquakes in divers places, were but the beginning of sorrows, but that the end should not be till the gospel of the kingdom should be preached in all the world for a witness unto all nations. And he then adds two events, by which we are led to understand the end that is alluded to, viz. the time of "great tribulation, such as was not since the beginning of the world to this time, no, nor ever shall be;" and the standing of the abomination of desolation, spoken of by Daniel, in the holy place. Let us see, now, if we can find any other events in prophetical narrative with which these two are synchronous. In Dan. xii. 1, we are told, “At that time [viz. at the time of the end-temps marque,' 'sub tempus constitutum,' v. 40] shall Michael stand up, the great prince which standeth for the children of thy people; and there shall be a time of trouble, such as never was since there was a nation even to that same time: and at that time thy people shall be delivered, every one that shall be found written in the book :" and also in the last verse of Dan. xi. we are informed that the wilful king "shall plant the tabernacles of his palaces between the (Mediterranean and Dead?) seas in the glorious holy mountain ;" and this a little posterior, in the order of his prophetical narrative, to the date of the events of v. 40 of Dan. xi., when the Jews are, Dan. xii. 1, to be delivered. Now, we would take occasion to observe here, that if this time of tribulation, at which the Jews are to be delivered from their captivity among the nations, and to be raised, some of them, from the dead, be such as never was since there was a nation, even to that same time, it must needs be a time of greater tribulation than that at the sack of the temple and city of Jerusalem by the Roman arms under Titus; and therefore not this latter, but the former, must our Saviour mean when he says, " For there shall be great tribulation, such as was not since the beginning of the world to this time, no, nor ever shall be:" which our Saviour could not have said with truth, and, therefore, would never have said at all, if this time of trouble he here alludes to had been that at and subsequent to the destruction of Jerusalem. Read here Ezekiel, xxxvii. and xxxviii., and also Rev. xix. and xx. We would also take occasion farther to notice, that from what our Saviour says in this chapter, our position of the wilful king being the same Antichristian power as the abomination that maketh desolate is greatly strengthened; for in chap. xi. of Daniel, after v. 35, no other power than the wilful king of v. 36 of that chapter is mentioned, and he it is who plants the tabernacles of his palaces between the seas in the glorious holy mountain, about that time of great trouble when the delivery of the Jews is to be accomplished, and the first resurrection of the dead is to take place.

In v. 23, 24, and 25, our Saviour cautions the future disciples of the Christian faith from believing in impostors false prophets and false Christs, that "shall shew great signs and wonders, insomuch that, if it were possible, they shall deceive the very elect;" for that his real appearance should be of so grand and splendid a character, that they

could not possibly be mistaken,-"For as the lightning cometh out of the east, and shineth even unto the west; so shall also the coming of the Son of man be." In coincidence with what our Saviour says here regarding the great signs and wonders wrought by the false prophets that should appear in the world immediately previous to his next advent to the earth, we may notice what St Paul says of his man of sin, "whose coming is after the working of Satan with all power, and signs, and lying wonders," who is, doubtless, the very same power as the beast coming up out of the earth in Rev. xiii. 11, who "deceiveth them that dwell on the earth by the means of those miracles which he had power to do in the sight of the" papal beast of Rev. xiii. 1, 2, which had the wound by a sword and did live, whose imperial head was healed, and of whose image the beast of Rev. xiii. 11, enforces the worship.

Verse 28-" For wheresoever the carcase is, [at the supper of the great God, Rev. xix. 17, to which "the fowls that fly in the midst of heaven" are to be invited,] there will the eagles be gathered together."

"And I will smite thy bow [Gog] out of thy left hand, and I will cause thine arrows to fall out of thy right hand. Thou shalt fall upon the mountains of Israel, thou and all thy bands, and the people that is with thee: I will give thee unto the ravenous birds of every sort; and to the beasts of the field to be devoured. Thou shalt fall upon the open field; for I have spoken it, saith the Lord God.”—Ezekiel, xxxix. 3—5.

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2 THESSALONIANS, CHAP. II., 1—9.

Verses 1-3-"Now we beseech you, brethren, by the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, and by our gathering together unto him, that ye be not soon shaken in mind, or be troubled, neither by spirit, nor by word, nor by letter as from us, as that the day of Christ is at hand. Let no man deceive you by any means: for that day shall not come, except there come a falling away first, and that man of sin be revealed, the son of perdition." The purpose of St Paul here is evidently to undeceive his fellow-Christians regarding some opinions they had been led to entertain concerning the speedy re-advent of our Saviour to this earth, which event, he assures them in v. 3, shall not take place except there come a falling away first, and that man of sin be revealed, the son of perdition." This passage, from its wording, would seem to admit of a double meaning. Is it meant that our Saviour shall not come, except there come a falling away in the first place, and after that again the man of sin be revealed? or is it meant that our Saviour shall not come before there be a falling away only by the revelation of the man of sin? If the former of these meanings be the correct one; and if the man of sin, as we have shewn cause for believing, be the only Antichristian power besides the papal, then the falling away first must be the papal apostacy. Some will have this man of sin to have been the succession of popes at Rome. But when, in the name of common sense, did the pope exalt himself, as we said before, above all that is called God, or that is worshipped? and when did any pope

sit in the temple of God ?. a Roman Catholic church could never receive from the Apostle Paul any such designation. Let us search the Scriptures, reader; they are much the best interpreters of themselves. The expression," man of sin," however, we can find in no other passage of the Bible. But this power is also here called "the son of perdition," which word " perdition" we find applied twice to the scarlet-coloured beast full of names of blasphemy, in Rev. xvii. 8, 11, by the interpreting angel: "The beast that thou sawest was, and is not; and shall ascend out of the bottomless pit, and go into perdition." "And the beast that was, and is not, even he is the eighth, and is of the seven, and goeth into perdition." And although we do not meet with the word "perdition" applied to the little horn in chaps. viii, and xi. of Daniel, yet we have it said there, that the king of fierce countenance "shall be broken without hand,"- - that is, in a supernatural manner; and that the wilful king "shall come to his end, and none shall help him :" all agreeing with the fate of the beast and of the false prophet, as unfolded to us in Rev. xix. 20.

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Verse 4 "Who opposeth and exalteth himself above all that is called God, or that is worshipped; so that he as God sitteth in the temple of God, shewing himself that he is God." Here we have said of the man of sin by St Paul, nearly what was revealed to Daniel of the wilful king of chap. xi. 36, of which power it is there said, that "he shall exalt himself, and magnify himself above every god," "neither shall he regard the God of his fathers," "nor regard any god." What the temple of God here means it is not easy to tell. Whether the British nation, the sanctuary, the domicile of the true mode of Christian worship, or the "jugis cultus," can be entitled to such a name, seeing that " temple of God" in Rev. xi. 1, is represented as being the consecrated abode of the consecrated worshippers of the true Christian faith during the " forty and two months" of the papal supremacy; or whether it be the temple at Jerusalem built by the Jews after their return to the Holy Land, we cannot positively say. We must also consider, that the human body is called by St Paul the temple of God. Certainly the temple of the Jews, after their return to the Holy Land, is to be built before the advent of our Saviour, at which the Antichristian powers are to be destroyed; and certain it is, that after their resurrection and return to Judea, they shall be a holy nation, as we learn from Ezekiel, xxxvii., and shall transgress no more; so that the temple they may then build may be called the temple of God; and also, if we consider the man of sin to be the same power as the wilful king of Daniel, xi. 36, certain it is, that this latter establishes his palaces between the seas in the glorious holy mountain about the time of great trouble at which the Jews, Dan. xii. 1, are to be delivered from their captivity among the nations.

Verses 5-7 Remember ye not, that, when I was yet with you, I told you these things? And now ye know what withholdeth that he might be revealed in his time. For the mystery of iniquity doth already work only he who now letteth will let, until he be taken out of the way." St Paul here adverts to some personal conversation he

had held with the Thessalonians, and reminds them of his having be føre told them what withholdeth that this man of sin, of which he has been speaking, should be revealed in his time, and then hints darkly about a power, which he designates in no other way than by the simple pronoun "he," preventing the appearance of this man of sin at that time in the world. What this power may be which St Paul expresses by the word "he" we cannot fathom, unless it be the title of the Emperor of Rome, or prototype of the sixth head, as we have seen of the beasts which are typical, at different periods, of the Roman commonwealth, viz. the dragon of Rev. xii., the papal beast of Rev. xiii. 1, 2, and the scarlet-coloured beast of Rev. xvii. Certainly, in the time of St Paul, the Roman Emperor was the ruling power upon earth; and that it was the title of the first magistrate of Rome which prevented the man of sin from appearing, and not the Roman power in general, without reference to the title of its head executor, we may be confirmed in the opinion of, from the man of sin appearing in the world as an Antichristian power necessarily before the destruction of the Roman power: for, in Dan. vii. 11, we are told that Daniel beheld till the fourth beast, which is typical of the Roman power, 66 was slain, and his body destroyed, and given to the burning flame," which took place when the beast and the false prophet were congregated with the kings of the earth and the armies "to make war upon him [our Saviour] that sat on the horse," and when "the beast was taken, and with him the false prophet that wrought miracles before him," and "both were cast alive into a lake of fire burning with brimstone:" so that it could not be by the taking away of the Roman power in general that this man of sin was allowed to be revealed to the world, seeing that, at the very time this power is to be destroyed, the man of sin is to be destroyed also. "There was some obstacle," says Bishop Newton, "that hindered his [the man of sin's] appearance, the apostle speaketh doubtfully whether thing or person; and this obstacle would continue to hinder till it was taken out of the way. What this was we cannot determine with absolute certainty at so great a distance of time; but if we may rely upon the concurrent testimonies of the fathers, it was the Roman empire. Most probably it was somewhat relating to the higher powers, because the apostle observes such caution. He mentioned it in discourse, but would not commit it to writing. He afterwards exhorts the Thessalonians, v. 15, Brethren, stand fast, and hold the traditions which ye have been taught, whether by word, or our epistle.' This was one of the traditions which he thought more proper to teach by word than by epistle."

If the "he" which prevented the appearance of St Paul's man of sin in the world, then, be the prototype of the sixth or imperial head of the several beasts representing the Roman power in the Revelations, or the title of Emperor of the Roman Empire; then we have seen that that title was taken away by the abolition of the empire of Germany, or Holy Roman Empire as it was impiously called, by Bonaparte in the year 1806; so that, in this case, there can be no obstacle now to the appearance of this man of sin of St Paul's in the world,

who, by the power of working lying wonders, attributed to him by the apostle in v. 9, is, perhaps, none other than the beast like a lamb with two horns that cometh up out of the earth in Rev. xiii. 11, who "deceiveth them that dwell on the earth by the means of those miracles which he had power to do in the sight of the" papal beast, "saying to them that dwell on the earth, that they should make an image to the beast which had the wound by a sword and did live," and who "had power to give life unto the image of the beast, that the image of the beast should both speak, and cause that as many as would not worship the image of the beast should be killed." This power of working miracles, which the man of sin possesses, St Paul intimates "is after the working of Satan ;" and who can doubt that this evil spirit, by his superior intelligence of the laws which regulate the action of the subtile agents from which the phenomena of the material world arise, may control some of these agents in such a manner as to prevent the ordinary phenomena to which the operations of others of them give rise; just as man, by directing the magnetic power, controls that of gravity? The knowledge of evil spirits concerning the laws of heat, light, electricity, magnetism, animal and vegetable life, and mechanical and chemical attraction, to which we refer all the phenomena upon our earth, may be much greater than that of man. St Paul tells us that

"God shall send them strong delusion that they should believe a lie; that they all might be damned who believed not the truth, but had pleasure in unrighteousness:" that is, that unfaithful Christians may believe the miracles which this man of sin is permitted, by the power and knowledge of Satan, to perform, to be the work of God for the furtherance of some good end, and so believing a lie, worship the image which this Antichristian power has set up.

PART III.

Commentaries on those Passages of the Revelations which relate to future Antichristian Powers.

CHAPTER XI.

Verses 3-8-" And I will give power unto my two witnesses, and they shall prophesy a thousand two hundred and threescore days, clothed in sackcloth. These are the two olive trees, and the two candlesticks standing before the God of the earth. And if any man will hurt them, fire proceedeth out of their mouth, and devoureth their enemies and if any man will hurt them, he must in this manner be killed. These have power to shut heaven, that it rain not in the days of their prophecy and have power over waters to turn them to blood, and to smite the earth with all plagues, as often as they will. And when they shall have finished their testimony, the beast that ascendeth out of the bottomless pit shall make war against them, and shall over