on this paffage in particular, is the worldly and anti⚫ christian part of it.'

The anonymous author, who about the middle of the prefent century wrote a Differtation to prove France to be the Tenth Part of the fymbolic city, after obferving, that there will be effects big with deftruction to every Secular Power, that attempts the extirpation of the witneffes;' fays, there is extraordinary power affigned the witnesses in the eleventh chapter; nothing of which has yet been obferved to turn up in their hiftory, that I know of; and therefore is moft probably referved for the times of this GRAND REVOLUTION".' And he appeals, in proof of this, to thofe two very remarkable verfes, of which an illuftration has just been attempted.

Should it be conceded, that the French as a nation are in an eminent degree criminal, which I certainly am not difpofed to grant, ftill it will not therefore follow, that their efforts may not, for a very confiderable period of time, be attended with fignal fuccefs. That the wicked are always punished for their crimes in this world, is a doctrine contradicted by revelation, and the testimony of all ages. Providence is always equitable and just, 'but our views of it are too limited and partial, to ⚫ enable us to reafon juftly concerning the methods of its procedure. Sacred and profane hiftory afford many 'inftances of rude and barbarous nations, being raised

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up by the Almighty, to serve as a scourge in his hand 'for chastizing others, who, having been favoured with the knowledge of the true God and the advantages of ' revealed religion, had abused these privileges by vicious and immoral practices. The Ifraelites were often sub'dued, and their kingdom at last brought to ruin, by their idolatrous neighbours. And when the Chriftian

69 P. 26.

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church was mostly confined within the bounds of the Roman empire, that large and mighty body, which 'for ages had been strong as iron, was at laft over'whelmed and broken in pieces, by a people nurfed in ⚫ favage manners and brutal ignorance".'

The contents of this and the two preceding chapters being too bulky for recapitulation, I shall conclude the fubject, by recalling the reader to a very few points upon which the whole matter turns. Since we have not only feen, that the witnelles are those who bear teftimony to the truth against errors and corruptions; but have moreover collected from thofe whofe authority stands highest upon the fubje&t, that the death (v. 7) and the resurrection (v. 11) of the witnesses, that their hearing of a great voice from heaven (y. 12), that their afcent to heaven (v. 12), and that the great earthquake which was to take place in the Tenth Part of the city (v. 13), are all decidedly political symbols; it appears abfolutely neceffary to interpret the prophecy as applying to fome political event. Not to mention that the time, when the French Revolution happened, perfectly agrees with all the intimations, which St. John has afforded us relative to the period of its fulfilment; not to mention that France was the country which arofe out of the ruins of the Roman Western empire the Tenth in order; not to mention that it has a well-founded claim to diftinction, from its extent, importance, and the greatness of the sufferings both of a religious and a political nature which its inhabitants have endured; it may fafely be asked, if the prophecy must be politically interpreted, where is the country in Europe, excepting France, to which we can turn our eye, in order to discover the occurrences which correspond to it; and particularly the abolition of titles

60 Mil's Difc. ut fupra, p. 24.

Le

which

which is predicted, the overthrow of ecclefiaftical usurpation which is plainly included, and the invitation which it is foretold should be given to men to affume a share in the government ?

I shall only add, that those persons, who shall still conceive, notwithstanding all which has been advanced, that the prophetic narrative of the witneffes is incapable of being applied at all to those, who have recently stood forward against civil and against spiritual defpotifm in France, are not obliged on that account to conclude, that the prediction of the fymbolic earthquake in the 13th 61 which follows the account of the witneffes, received not its fulfilment in the events of the French Revolution. For it may be plaufibly argued, as Vitringa and other commentators have fhewn, that the latter moft ftriking verfe was not to be accomplished at the fame time with moft of the former verfes, but by different perfons and at a different period.

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Probably fome of my readers may expect, that, before I terminate this chapter, I should notice the exact correfpondency of 666, the number of one of the Beafts defcribed in ch. xiii. to LUDOVICUS, the ordinary name of the French Kings. Now those who admit the num.

ber

6 To illuftrate this and the two verfes moft closely connected with it (v. 11, 12), has been my principal care: whilft it has been deemed fuffi cient incidentally to remark on the eight antecedent verfes.

O and S are not-numeral letters, and therefore of course not taken into

the

ber 666 to denote the name of Ludovicus, must, I conceive, of course apply it to the Secular Beast, who is first mentioned in that chapter, and, of the two, sustains the most important character. That masterly expofitor, Daubuz, does indeed lay it down as a remark of general application, that when the Holy Ghoft mentions the Beaft by itself, it is to be understood of that great Beaft 'with seven heads and ten horns, that is, the Secular • Powers within the precincts of the corrupted church; not the lefs beaft with two horns, which is described ⚫ and faid to be the False Prophet 3.?

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The words of St. John, which I am now to cite, conftitute the conclufion of the xiiith chapter, a chapter appropriated to the delineation of these two symbolic Beafts. Here is Wifdom. Let him that hath underftanding count the number of the Beast: for it is the number of a man; and his number is fix hundred threeScore and fix. It is not,' fays bp. Newton, a vain and ' ridiculous attempt, to search into this mystery, but on 'the contrary is recommended to us upon the authority of an apostle. It was a method practised among the ancients to denote names by numbers;' and it hath 'been the ufual method in all God's difpenfations for the holy Spirit to accommodate his expreffions to the 'customs, fashions, and manners of the feveral ages","

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the account.

It may be asked,' fays Mr. Bicheno, why is the Latin language referred to rather than either the Hebrew, the Greek, or French? For these reasons. At the time this prediction was given, 'the Latin was the most general language in the Roman empire; and after the empire was divided, it became the universal language in the Western 'part, where the scene of John's vifion chiefly lay. It is alfo the language used in all the services of that church which is Beast was to sup'port; and thus the names of the French kings have been written in their ¿ communications with the pope, in public infcriptions, and on coins.” Signs of the Times, 2d ed. p. 31.

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*It has been obferved,' fays Dr. Gill in his Expofition, "that the numeral letters in Ludovicus or Lewis, which ' is a common name of the French king, and is the name of the present French king, make up this fame number; and may denote the destruction of Antichrist, 'which will quickly follow THE DOWNFAL OF THE KINGDOM OF FRANCE under a king of this name; ' and the rather fince this was the last of the Ten King'doms that was fet up, and in which the primitive Beaft 'fubfifts, and the only one that has not yet been con'quered, or in which A REVOLUTION has not been made; and fince this is the Tenth Part of the city, which fhall fall a little before the third woe comes on 65 The earliest commentator, whom I have myself confulted, who notices the agreement of Ludovicus with 666, is Vitringa, the fecond edition of whofe Commentary on the Apocalypfe was printed in 1719. For the grounds of this application of the prophecy he refers the reader to the elaborate performance of an anonymous writer, whom he ftyles most learned. This mode of calculating the number of the Beast occurs also in Wolfius, in his Cura Philologica et Critica, printed in 1741; and in the Gnomon Novi Teftamenti of Bengelius, which was published in the fucceeding year. On this point Wolfius refers the reader to Klefchius, who has probably treated fully upon it, and whose sentiments I apprehend to have been published in 1705. Klefchius, in corroboration of what he advanced, had also pointed out another striking coincidence. Three Lilies are the established fymbol of the French monarchy; and pwwww, which in Hebrew

65 Vol. V. p. 584, 4to. That a Revolution in France was foretold in the xith ch, the doctor, in a former part of his Expo (p. 553), more dis refly ftates.

fignifies