of the ten horns was an extraordinary exercise of authority on the part of the ecclesiastical beast! From the time of Numa to that of Augustus, the spiritual office of Pontifex Maximus had always been filled by one of the most eminent senators: and, when the first head awoke from its long slumber, that office was united to the Imperial Dignity. But, upon the conversion of the Empire to Christianity, the distinction of the spiritual and temporal powers was first introduced'. When the Christian Emperors renounced the title of Pontifex Maximus, it was assumed by the Bishop of Rome: and thus, henceforth, the second beast, having acquired the ancient supremacy of the first beast in spiritual matters, and having fully engaged the se cular authorities within his own allotted peculium of the West to carry all his commands into execution, exercised, in the immediate presence of his secular colleague, all the power which that colleague possessed.

(5.) The second beast causes the earth and all that dwell therein to worship the first beast whose deadly wound was healed.

As the blasphemy of the beast denotes his apostasy from the exclusive worship of the one true God to the predicted joint worship of demons or canonised mortals: so the worship, paid to the dragon and to the beast, will antithetically denote an apostatic devotion to the corrupt theological system

'Hist. of Decline, vol. iii. p. 280-284.

adopted by the beast and secretly excogitated by the dragon.

In promoting such apostatic worship, the eccle siastical beast is most accurately described by the prophet as being the main agent: and his success is so great, that the earth and all that dwell therein, or the Roman Empire and all its political members, are induced to adopt and to love it.

(6.) The second beast performs great wonders, in order that he may make fire come down from heaven upon earth in the sight of men.

Heaven is a symbol of the Church under its spiritual governors: the earth, throughout the Apos calypse, typifies the territorial platform of the Roman Empire: and fire or lightning represents penal wrath.

The present clause, therefore, of the prophecy declares, that, through the aid of specious miracles, the Ecclesiastical Empire, symbolised by the second beast, should establish an universally acknowledged right of hurling the excommunicative thunderbolts of the Church against any such kingdoms or princes of the Secular Empire as should prove disobedient and refractory.

It is superfluous to point out the exact completion of this oracle in the claims and practices of the Roman Church. I need only to remark, that the avowed basis, upon which those claims and practices repose, is that alleged possession of miraculous powers, which, according to Bellarmine and other doctors of the same school, is one of the most certain marks of the true Church of Christ.

(7.) The second beast deceives them that dwell on the earth, by means of those pretended miracles which he had power to do in the sight of the first beast: for, by the authority of those pretended miracles, he induces them to make an image for the beast, which had the wound by a sword and yet was resuscitated.

Before the prophetic import of this clause can be determined, its verbal meaning must obviously be ascertained: for, otherwise, an exposition may be framed, specious indeed in its appearance, but yet altogether foreign from the true sense of the oracle itself.

The expression the image of the beast, and the expression the beast and his image which elsewhere occurs, are both abstractedly ambiguous because, so far as the word image is concerned, they may signify, either the effigies of the beast, or the idol which belongs to the beast. Thus the image of Cesar, when the Roman coin is spoken of, means no doubt the effigies of Cesar1: but the image of Micah, when the whole context of that individual's history is considered, certainly means the image which belonged to Micah or the idol which he had made for the purpose of some superstitious veneration".

Had, then, no other expressions occurred in the Apocalypse, except the image of the beast and

the beast and his image, we should have been unable positively to determine what precise idea we ought to annex to this image: but all ambiguity seems to be removed by the manner, in which the Apostle introduces his account of it. It is said, that the second beast so deceived the inhabitants of the earth by his false miracles, that he induced them to make an image to or for the first beast.

Now it is surely putting a very great force upon language to suppose, that the making an image For the first beast can signify the making a representation of him. When we read in the decalogue, Thou shalt not make UNTO thee any graven image; we are at no loss to understand the import of the prohibition. It is manifest, that, in this passage, the making an image to a person's self denotes the making an image for his own use and worship. Hence it is well nigh imperative upon us to conclude, that, in an exactly parallel passage, the making of an image To the beast signifies the making of an image for the use and worship of the beast'. From such a conclusion, therefore, it results, that the image of the beast imports, not the effigies of the beast, but the image which the beast adored2:

'That the parallelism of the passages may the more distinctly appear, I cite them both, in the Greek of the Seventy, and in the Greek of St. John. The Seventy write: Οὐ ποιήσεις ΣΕΑΥΤΩ, εἴδωλον. St. John writes: Ποιῆσαι εἰκόνα ΤΩΙ ΘΗΡΊΩ. In each passage, the grammatical construction is precisely the same. * To avoid all ambiguity, and to give what I believe to be the

This being the case, the import of the clause will be, that the ecclesiastical beast, acquiring a strange influence over the abused inhabitants of the Roman world, should, by the instrumentality of pretended miracles, though in plain opposition to the express word of God, introduce image-worship throughout the dominions of the secular beast.

As was the prediction, so has been the event. In the course of the eighth century, the Emperor Leo Isauricus had suppressed image-worship at Constantinople and in the East: and he attempted to do the same in his provincial Italian dominions. Upon this he was informed by Pope Gregory the second, that he exceeded his proper commission by interfering in spiritual matters: and he was taught, that, although the sword of justice is in the hands of the magistrate, the more formidable weapon of excommunication is entrusted to the clergy, who will not spare a heretic even though he be seated upon a throne: You accuse the Catholics of idolatry, said the Pontiff in one of his epistles to Leo: and, by the accusation, you betray your own impiety and ignorance. He then proceeds to point out to the undiscerning Emperor the distinction between pagan idols and Christian images. The former were the fanciful representations of phantoms or demons, at a time when the true God had not manifested his person in any visible likeness:

true sense of the original, I have translated ɛikov Tov Onpiov, the beast's image, rather than the image of the beast.