Chapter XII

5. The Wreath of Twelve Stars

In this “great sign” is seen upon the head of the Sun-Invested Woman “a wreath of twelve stars.” Thus I have rendered in my translation the words στεφανος αστερων δωδεκα. The twelve stars were set in a stephanos, not in a diadema. If there had been seen upon her head a diadem of twelve stars, it would have indicated that she was an integral part of the diademed sixth head of the dreadful and terrible dragon, all of whose heads are diademed. But no; the “crown” of the C. V., was a stephanos, and not a diadem.

Now, the reader of the former volumes of this exposition is aware of the important apocalyptic difference there is between a stephan and a diadem. The former was given to a combatant when victorious in his conflicts; the latter is the symbol of regal and imperial, or elective sovereignty of an established order. The Antipagan Woman was a combatant community, to whom dominion and power over the nations were promised, as a prize to be contended for, and bestowed upon the victor—ch. ii. 26, 27. This prize was signified by a stephanos. If she were victorious, her success would be indicated by a stephan upon her head, as in the “great sign.”

It may be remarked here, that the Antipagan Woman and the arrowless Archer of the first seal are representative of the same community in its warfare “against the principalities, powers, world-rulers p. 26 of the darkness, and the spirituals of the wickedness in the heavenlies of the Roman Orb—Eph. vi. 12. The Antipagan Archer went forth to conquer the Græco-Latin Dragon. He had first to overcome and dethrone Jupiter and the gods, “by the blood of the Lamb, and the word of his testimony;” and afterwards to take possession of the diadems enthroned under the whole heaven, and to rule their nations for a thousand years. Significative of this it is written in ch. vi. 2, εδοθη αυτω στεφανος, there was given to him a stephan, or wreath. John saw that the archery of this communion, to which he himself belonged, was prevailing “against. the darkness of the course of things”—του αιωνος τουτου—which obtained while he was in Patmos. He saw it, therefore, going forth “conquering, even that it might conquer.” Its career of conquest, though harassed by the enemy, was not to be stopped. The stephan was to be placed upon the woman’s head by the highest authority in the state, as the result of “a great earthquake,” or revolution, which should place her son upon the throne. When John in vision saw the archer ride forth upon the white horse he had not then won the stephan. He had a combat for the faith of over two centuries before him; at the end of which the fraternity he represented was seen in the heaven invested with the sun, the moon in subjection, and the stephan of victory emblazoning her head with its stars. Thus far the triumph was complete; nevertheless, the earnest or type only of a greater yet to come.

But, the placing of a simple stephan upon the Woman’s head would have merely signified that she was a victor. But what was the prize of victory? What had she gained by her victory over the Dragon persecutor, which accused her people incessantly before the Deity? This question is apocalyptically solved by the TWELVE STARS inserted in the wreath. These were the twelve most conspicuous stars of the Roman Firmament. They were stars of the first magnitude which excelled all the other stars in the glory of their position. There were none brighter in the political astronomy of the state. They were the stars of that imperial dragon-headship of which it was remarked to John in chapter xvii. 10, saying “ONE IS.” These stars of this Sixth Head at the time of the apocalyptic going forth of the archer of the first seal were exactly twelve, and may be enumerated chronologically thus—

1. AUGUSTUS, founder of the Sixth Headship of the Roman Dragon. This Star reigned 44 years from the battle of Actium, which was fought B. C. 30. He died A. D. 14, in his 76th year. He made Tiberius his colleague in the empire three years before his death A. U. C. 764, equal to . . . . A. D. 11

2. The SECOND STAR was Tiberius Cæsar, successor to Augustus. p. 27 In the 15th year after being made the colleague of Augustus, “the word of God came to John the son of Zachariah in the wilderness;” and he began to preach. This was 483 years from the 20th of Artaxerxes, the beginning of Daniel’s seventy weeks. John was aged 27; Jesus 26 years and six months. A. D. 26

At the end of three years and a half, Jesus having been immersed, and John cast into prison, Jesus began to preach the gospel of the kingdom. This began the second half of Daniel’s seventieth week. . . . . A. D. 30

At the end of Daniel’s Seventieth Week, or 490 years from the 20th of Artaxerxes, which was the 22d of Tiberius Cæsar, sin was condemned in our common nature by the crucifixion of Jesus Christ. . . . . A. D. 33

3. Tiberius dies in the 23d year of his reign, and is succeeded by the THIRD STAR, named Caius Cæsar Caligula. . . . . A. D. 33

Of this human monster Tiberius said, that he had brought up a serpent for the Roman people; concerning whom he expressed the wish that they had but one neck, that he might cut it off at one stroke. He died . . . . A. D. 37

4. The FOURTH STAR was Claudius Cæsar. The famine mentioned in Acts xi. 28, pervaded the whole Roman Habitable under this star. He reigned not quite fourteen years, and died aged 63. . . . . A. D. 51

5. The FIFTH STAR was his successor Tiberius Claudius Nero. This Cæsar for the first five years reigned with applause, being provoked to good conduct by the perpetual admonitions of the renowned Seneca. But changing his manners, he sunk to the lowest depths of degradation. He reduced the greater part of Rome to ashes, and charged it upon the christians, upon whom he inflicted the most exquisite torture. He died by his own hand in the fourteenth year of his reign, aged 32. A. D. 64

6. The SIXTH STAR was Galba, who reigned 8 months.

7. The SEVENTH STAR was Otho, remarkable for his wickedness, and the shortness of his reign, which scarcely exceeded three months. He died by his own hand, and was succeeded by a man of incontinent gluttony.

8. Vitellius was the EIGHTH STAR, whose reign of seven months was signalized by the expenditure of thirty millions of dollars in feasting and riot. In the 57th of his age, he was dragged half-naked by a Roman mob into the forum, and with exquisite tortures torn to pieces, and thrown into the Tiber.

p. 28 9. The NINTH STAR was Vespasian. He emulated the excellences of Augustus, and grieved to inflict punishment when justice demanded it. He was, however, extremely avaricious. He reigned ten years, and died aged 69. . . . A. D. 75

10. The renowned Titus was the TENTH STAR. On account of his singular humanity, he was called “the delight of mankind.” In the life-time of his father Vespasian he destroyed Jerusalem. He reigned rather more than two years, and died aged 41. He is supposed to have been poisoned by his brother who succeeded him. . . . . A. D. 77

11. Domitian was the ELEVENTH STAR of the Imperial Stephan. He persecuted the christians with the greatest rigour. He was a second Nero. John, the Apostle, was banished by his decree to the isle of Patmos, where the Apocalypse was revealed to him for the benefit of all true Christadelphians, or Brethren of Christ. After a reign of fifteen years, being detested on account of his cruelty, he was put to death by his own guards, aged 55 . . . . A. D. 92

12. The TWELFTH STAR of this “dreadful and terrible” succession Cocceius Nerva, a man of prudence and moderation, who acquired the dominion late in life. During his brief reign of one year and four months, John was restored to the society of his brethren and companions in tribulation. He died, aged 66, and was succeeded by Trajan. . . . A. D. 94

In the foregoing chronological table the dates are given according to the true time, which is four years earlier than the regular era.

Such was the WREATH OF TWELVE STARS extended by the Deity as a prize to be gained by the conquest of the Dragon. All the twelve were imperial supreme pontiffs. For the archer-and-woman fraternity to carry off the prize, was for it to be wreathed with the imperial stephan of the Cæsars; and to subdue their pontificate under their feet. This it did most effectually; and, as a sign prophetic of this great victory over the principalities, authorities, world-rulers, and spirituals of the Roman Heaven; and for the encouragement of all engaged in the good fight of faith against the gods, who had eyes to discern the import of the vision, the woman was photographed in the firmament of the Roman Orb, wreathed with the supreme pontifical authority of the twelve.

For two centuries after the reign of the twelve stars, the soldiers of the faith, when they perused the verbal description of the “great sign in the heaven,” would understand what was the stephan to be conferred; and would be filled with a full assurance of hope, that they would go on conquering until they obtained it. It was under this p. 29 conviction, that on the opening of the Fifth Seal, they are represented as crying with a loud voice from underneath the altar, “How long?” How long till their brotherhood should wear the dodecal Cæsarian starry stephan? They knew that this wreath of victory was Cæsarian. A believer living in the beginning when the apocalypse commenced to be fulfilled; that is, at the accession of Trajan; knew that twelve Cæsars had occupied the draco-Roman pontifical throne. From Augustus to Constantine there were about fifty-four emperors. Why, then, were there not as many stars upon the imperial stephan, seeing that it was gained when so many had sat upon the Italian throne? Because, I conceive, the number of the stars was given to indicate, that the opening of the apocalyptic seals was to begin when the twelfth imperial star had set; that is, with the reign of Trajan, who was a thirteenth, or number one of a new series. Trajan and his pagan successors may be said to have worn the crown of the Twelve Cæsars.^a But they could not retain it. It was wrested from them by the Woman, whose Jezebel-son claiming to be her Head—the Supreme Pontiff of the Catholic Church—wreathed himself therewith; and then caused her to become a fugitive in the wilderness of the Great Eagle.

Ignorance and superstition have sadly misinterpreted the signification of this “great sign in the heaven.” An engraving published with the sanction of the authorities of the Mary-worshipping synagogue of New York City, as a frontispiece to a book entitled “The Glories of Mary,” interprets the sign as a signification of the “Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary.” In the centre of the picture is a woman standing upon a cloud. She stands, as it were, in the sun, with beams of light issuing from the palms of her hands downwards towards the earth, as if they were rays of grace being shed upon her worshippers. Around her head is a halo, in which is a circlet of twelve stars; and over these a diadem supported by winged angels resting upon the upper margin of the cloud on each side of the woman. Under her feet is the moon, and beneath this, the ocean and rocks of earth. Thus is represented the ghost of a dead woman having been taken up into heaven and being on exhibition there as queen; for the legend of the picture is “salve regina,” Health to thee, p. 30 O Queen! Assuredly, nothing can be more remote than this from the true import of this “great sign.” The reader, unless he be a Mariolator or a Puseyite, need scarcely be told, that the sign is wholly irrelevant to the mother of Jesus; and but for the adoption of the heathen dogma of the immortality of the soul by the Laodicean Apostasy, such a signification could never have been invented. There is no such woman in being, whether in heaven above or in the earth beneath, as the Virgin Mary, body or ghost. The dust of what was once Mary is in “the pit of corruption,” or Sheol, and will there remain until “the time of the dead,” when she will stand again upon her feet the “blessed among women,” and “thenceforth all generations will call her blessed.” In all “the times of the gentiles,” however, she is non-existent. This is well known to all who are not drunk—drunk with the wine of the abominations and filthiness of Jezebel’s fornication—Apoc. xvii. 4; xviii. 3. Hence the object of the adoration of Romanists is the merest fiction that can be conceived. They have deified nonentity, and fall down and worship the conceit as the goddess-queen of heaven. This is not only folly, but the idiotcy of pietism notably characteristic of the ecclesiasticism of our day.

But not only have Romanists missed the truth of this great sign, but their Protestant brethren likewise. Dr. Newton, a former Bishop of Bristol, in his work on the prophecies, page 600, in commenting most meagrely upon this sign, says, “St. John resumes his subject from the beginning, and in ch. xii. 1, 2, represents the church as a woman, and a mother bearing children to Christ. She is ‘clothed with the sun,’ invested with the rays of Jesus Christ, the sun of righteousness; having ‘the moon,’ the Jewish new moons and festivals, as well as all sublunary things, ‘under her feet, and upon her head a crown of twelve stars,’ an emblem of her being under the light and guidance of the twelve apostles.” This is all he can see signified by this great sign! The bishop of Jezebel’s English daughter has certainly made a nearer approach to the import of the sign than Jezebel herself. He does perceive that the woman represents church of some kind—that she is a sign-ecclesiastical woman, and not the emblem of a phantasma yclept the Queen of Heaven. But more than this he sees nothing signified.

The Rev. E. B. Elliott, however, does not agree with the interpretations of his ecclesiastical superior. He admits with him that church in some sense is meant by the woman in the sign; but this is all. On page 8, vol. 1, he says, speaking of the sign, “But what the things prefigured hereby? This is the question. And first there can scarce be meant by the solar emblem, I think, what so many commentators p. 31 have suggested in explanation—the church’s investiture with Christ, as the sun of righteousness. The sun is no where in the Apocalyptic imagery made the representative of Christ. His countenance with its own intrinsic light is described as like the sun, not as borrowing the sun to enlighten it: and, when fully revealed in the heavenly city, as altogether superseding it to the favored inhabitants. Nor, again, by her having the moon subjacent can there be meant a trampling upon things sublunary. Can the moon signify things under the moon? Consistency requires that we explain these greater luminaries to signify the chief rulers of the state, according to the general prophetic use of the symbols; and in the same way the stars, also seen in symbol, to signify lesser rulers in it. As to the precisely defined number of twelve stars—considering that the professing church on the Apocalyptic scene, including the true, was in an earlier vision (though one depicting somewhat later and worser times) numerically symbolized as the twelve tribes of Israel, we cannot well err, I think, in explaining them to signify the heads, or ecclesiastical rulers, of those twelve tribes. The rather so, since this interpretation agrees with that which is given by inspiration itself of almost precisely the same symbol in the earliest of all emblematic visions, the dream of Jacob’s son Joseph: and indeed with that explanatory note given at the very commencement of the Apocalyptic visions by the revealing angel himself; ‘the seven stars are the angels (or chief and presiding ministers) of the seven churches.’

“And thus we are led to see that the figuration here given of Christ’s faithful church was not one universally or generally true; but designative of it at some remarkable and particular time and conjuncture, viz: when the ruling powers in the Apostolic world would be associated with it, as its decoration and support; and its ecclesiastical rulers, or bishops, would be recognized as dignified authorities before the world. And indeed much the same thing is indicated by the very representation of the woman as in heaven. For the heaven meant is evidently that of political elevation; just as in the vision, a little while since discussed by us, of the ascent of the witnesses; it being one in which the dragon might occupy a place as well as the woman; and one, the position in which is contrasted with dejection to the earth, as of a change from political power to political degradation.”

Thus far Mr. Elliott, in whom there is certainly more light than in bishop Newton. Still Elliott’s light is but darkness after all. The woman-church being crowned by the heads, or ecclesiastical rulers, of the twelve tribes of the apostolic Israel, is a very far-fetched conceit. He admits, that the sun and moon of the sign belong to the p. 32 heaven common to the woman and the dragon; what consistency then is there in not recognizing the twelve stars as belonging to that heaven also! Why interpret the sun and moon of the Roman Heaven, and twelve stars of the woman’s own polity in apostasy? The stars are Roman as well as the sun and moon; and stripped of these in flight, the twelve stars remain with the sun and moon in the same heaven from, or out of, which she flies; otherwise, we ought to behold her a fugitive with a wreath of beauteous stars upon her head in the wilderness; a symbolization which would be incompatible with her trampled condition there.

6. The Woman Pregnant

“And being pregnant she cries being in pangs and straining to bring forth.”—Ver 2.

Εν γαστρι εχουσα, literally, having in belly. She contained something within the pale of her communion afterwards to be manifested, or brought forth. She contained it, according to the fitness or decorum of the symbol, previous to her cries in parturition. She did not cry being in pangs and straining to bring forth after her investiture with the solar mantle of imperialism. Her being invested with the sun was consequent upon her giving birth to what was contained within her, and its being placed upon the Italian throne. Had her child not been born, the “great sign in the heaven” would not have there appeared. The Italian throne in Rome had first to be vacated by its pagan occupant, before anything produced from the Laodiceanized Christian Body, pre-figured by this woman, could be ἡρπασθη, carried up from its birth-place in the Roman heaven to godship and its throne—προς τον Θεον, και τον θρονον αυτου. Hence the “great sign” described in the first verse, was representative of the consummation of certain antecedents; and though first stated, was the last thing in the situation developed before the world.

The woman’s pregnancy, then, preceded her cries. With what was she pregnant? This is now the question to be solved.

Zion and Jerusalem not only signify the geographical and topographical things so called, but all those, whether Jews or Gentiles, who have acquired citizenship in the Commonwealth of Israel by adoption through Jesus Christ. These all constitute a community, which in Isaiah lxvi. 7, and Jer. vi. 2, is likened to “a comely and delicate woman.” In the former text the Spirit saith of her, “before she travailed, she brought forth; before her pain came, she was delivered of a man child.” It was the same comely and delicate woman the exile in Patmos saw in the heaven invested with the sun. Isaiah’s woman and John’s woman are both represented as pregnant, p. 33 and bringing forth, or giving birth to, a man child. But the difference existing is this, that John’s woman brought forth under the Sixth Seal, A. D. 312-’13; while Isaiah’s woman brings forth under the Sixth Vial at “the time of the dead.” There is difference also in the things brought forth. Isaiah’s woman brings forth a multitudinous man child; that is, a nation, the “holy nation” (1 Pet. iii. 9) consisting of the children of Zion, whom the earth is made to bring forth in one day. This nation is “born at once” before the travailing of Zion in the bringing forth her children after the flesh. As the saints are still mostly in the grave, and Israel and Judah in captivity among the nations—entombed in national graves—Zion is now a pregnant woman waiting until her time come to be delivered.

But we have to do with the comely and delicate Zion-woman as pregnant neither with Israel and Judah, nor the Saints, but with some other thing. What was that thing?

In writing to the Corinthian section of the Zion-community, Paul says, “I have espoused you to one husband, that I may present a chaste virgin to Christ”—2 Cor. xi. 2. By this we are taught, that the “One Body,” likened to a woman, is to be considered in the absence of Christ, not as a married, but as an espoused woman—a bride elect. Paul desired that she might be presented in all the purity of her original espousals, when she was “sanctified and cleansed in the laver of the water with doctrine”—Eph. v. 26. But, though this was his desire, penetrating the darkness of the future by the light of the Spirit, he could not forbear the expression of his fears lest the fate of Eve, the espoused of the first Adam, who was corrupted from the simplicity of the truth, should become the unhappy condition of the betrothed of the second Adam. “I fear,” says he, “lest by any means, as the Serpent beguiled Eve through his subtilty, so your minds should be corrupted from the simplicity that is in Christ.”

What Paul feared, and to prevent which he was “jealous over all with a godly jealousy,” was even then secretly at work, impregnating the Christian Eve with principles which in fruition caused her to give birth to a Cain, who has been murdering his brother Abel for fifteen hundred years. It was even then at work. He styles it “the Mystery of the Iniquity”—the secret principles of that lawlessness which would develop itself into the Lawless One, or Man of the Sin—ὁ ανθρωπος της ἁμαρτιας—THE MAN OF THE APOSTASY. The seed-germ of this man was already in the womb of the espoused. “The mystery of the iniquity is already effectually working,” says the apostle in 2 Thess. ii. 7. Yes, it was this working, which, in verse 9, he styles “the inworking of the Satan,” gave him so much trouble, and caused him such great anxiety, as evinced in his epistles. The principles of p. 34 the apostasy were being inwrought, as he informs us, “with all power, and signs, and miracles of falsehood, and with all deceivableness of unrighteousness in them that perish.” So effectual and specious was this inworking that, as Jesus predicted, even the elect would be endangered—Matt. xxiv. 24. How could it be otherwise when, as Paul said to the Star-Angel of the Ephesian section of the betrothed woman, “Of your own selves shall men arise, speaking perverse things, to draw away disciples after them”—Acts xx. 30. These Star-Angel men had been made overseers of the ecclesia of the Deity by the Holy Spirit. They were the apostles, prophets, evangelists, pastors and teachers, who had been supernaturally qualified by spiritual gifts “for the work of the ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ”—Eph. iv. 12. With all the sanction of these gifts from the ascended Lord himself, they had been recognized by the flock they episcopized as the ministers of Christ. How unlikely, therefore, that they would speak perverse things, and, becoming deceivers, rend the flock as grievous wolves, instead of feeding it, as they were exhorted to do by Paul. But, unlikely as it might seem, such was the fact. It is true that the Lord had bestowed upon them spiritual gifts; but these gifts did not act compulsorily upon those who had them. They did not compel them to speak only the truth, and to use them aright; they only qualified them so to do if they were disposed; but if, under the temptation of the flesh, they were indisposed, they could falsely teach, and speak perverse things, and misapply the signs and miracles they were able to work, to confirm what they said; for Paul says plainly that “the spirits (or spiritual gifts) of the prophets are subject to the prophets”—1 Cor. xiv. 32: the prophets were, therefore, responsible for the right use of them. They could abuse them, and many of them did, to the overthrow of the faith of those who heeded them.

It was by the inworking of these unfaithful teachers constituting “the Satan,” “the Serpent,” that the Christian Eve was “corrupted from the simplicity which is in Christ.” The depths of the Satan as they taught (Apoc. ii. 24) impregnated her with the mystery of iniquity. They formed within her the embryo of the Man of Sin. They preached a Jesus which was not according to the Jesus Paul preached; they taught another gospel than that proclaimed by him; and denied a future resurrection of the dead; or, which was equivalent thereto, said that it was already past. The inworking of this mystery, or perverse teaching, showed itself very early in the history of the Christian Eve. The first intimation on record of this subverting of souls is found in Acts xv. 1-5. In this place we are told that certain who believed were not satisfied with the sufficiency of the simplicity which p. 35 is in Christ for salvation. The belief of “the things concerning the kingdom of the Deity and of the Name of Jesus Christ;” and the immersion of such a believer for salvation from the sins of the past did not satisfy them. They required that Moses should be obeyed as well as Jesus; and that no gospel short of this would save any one: “Except ye be circumcised after the manner of Moses, and keep his law, ye cannot be saved.” This was their perversion of the gospel, which Paul terms “another gospel,” the preachers of which, though of celestial angelic origin, he pronounced “accursed.”

But these accursed preachers did not regard the anathema of Paul. They did not desist from the sowing of tares; but continued to heap tradition upon tradition until the distinctiveness of the truth was lost in “the commandments and doctrines of men”—Col. ii. 22; and the way of truth came to be evil spoken of. Many followed their pernicious ways. Nor were the apostles able to extinguish their evil influence. Their reasonings and denunciations and threatenings, although sanctioned by the Spirit, failed to check or restrain the rapidly developing apostasy. Whole houses were subverted from the faith by these mercenary, unruly and vain talkers and deceivers—Tit. i. 11: and as error always progresses more rapidly than truth, the apostles found their influence waning, and the faithful falling into a minority; which steadily increased until there remained but few names who had not defiled their garments; and only a little strength to maintain the truth before the world—Apoc. iii. 4, 8.

From these premises then, we perceive, that the Zion-woman community was no longer, as a whole, “a chaste virgin.” She had been corrupted and defiled by the subtilty, or “slight of men and cunning craftiness, whereby they laid in wait to deceive,” after the example of the beguilement of Eve. Hence, the woman-community, originally a chaste virgin, and all her constituents virgins undefiled, came to be pregnant with a multitude of “children tossed to-and-fro, and carried about with every wind of doctrine.” These were tares, or “children of the wicked one, and sown of the enemy, the devil”—Matt. xiii. 38, 39. In the seven Apocalyptic Epistles, the constituents of this embryo apostasy are termed “liars,” “Nikolaitanes,” blasphemers, spurious Jews, “the synagogue of the Satan,” “Balaam,” “that woman Jezebel,” “her children,” “the Satan,” “the dead,” “the wretched and miserable, and poor, and blind, and naked.” In the pentecostal beginning, these constituents were not found in the Christian Eve. Then “the multitude of them that believed were of one heart, and of one soul”—Acts iv. 32. They had not yet been distracted and thrown into confusion by “grievous wolves,” and “men speaking perverse things to draw away disciples after them,” for their own p. 36 glory and advantage, reckless of the truth. But, in the course of three hundred years, all this was changed. The multitude of them who styled themselves Christians, were destitute of all unity of heart and soul; and had degenerated into a “wretched, and miserable, and poor, and blind, and naked” set of catholic politicians. These gave character to the woman-community in the beginning of the fourth century. The Christadelphians or Brethren of Christ, at that crisis, were the “few names left, who had not defiled their garments.” These alone were the pillar and support of the truth;” and but for them, it would have died out from among men; and there would have been no woman to fly into the wilderness, and to be sustained there 1,260 years. But the Deity had reserved to himself a remnant, styled “the remnants of her seed, who keep the commandments of the Deity, and have the testimony of Jesus Christ”—ch. xii. 17.

Thus the woman, who had become excessively attenuated, as it were skin and bone, a living skeleton, in all the period of her pregnancy, was grieved with a multitude of nominal professors ready for any enterprise by which they might acquire power and office in the state. This was the party with which she was pregnant. It styled itself “the HOLY APOSTOLIC CATHOLIC CHURCH;” and only waited for a catholic man of power to lead them in their attack upon the pagan Roman government. This was “THE COMING MAN” of the fourth century—a leading politician, a Man of Power, who should be able to make the party to which he should belong the ruling power of the state. With this party, waiting for the manifestation of its chief, the woman was pregnant before “she cried being in pangs and strained to bring forth.”

7. The Period of Pregnancy

The decorum of the symbol requires that the period of the woman’s pregnancy be analogous to the time during which in nature a woman compasses a child before she gives it birth. Now it is well known, that the time of gestation from conception to birth, is a period of forty weeks or 280 days. This being the “set time”—the time appointed by Deity for the development of children from the womb of humanity—it became a law of nature. If, therefore, one of “the deep things of Deity” in a revelation has to be symbolized by the natural result of a woman’s pregnancy, which is the birth of a child, it is necessary that the law of nature in the case become the measure of the duration of the symbolic pregnancy before the symbolic child is manifested in the world. This is styled “the decorum of the symbol,” and must be regarded in the interpretation of all symbols. To neglect p. 37 it would produce sad confusion in an exposition. We must therefore find the woman in espousable existence 280 years before the manifestation of any MAN OF POWER, who in any sense could be decorously styled “her child.”

The espousal of the “one body,” symbolized in this prophecy by a woman, occurred on the day of that Pentecost, which first followed the crucifixion of the anointed Jesus. The apostles were instrumental in this betrothal, and promising the virgin bride of believers marriage to the Lamb when He should return to celebrate his nuptials with all who should be found faithful to the end. “I have espoused you,” says Paul, “to one husband, that I may present you as a chaste virgin to Christ.” He had begotten them to this honorable and glorious destiny by the truth he had taught them, and which they had received in its simplicity; therefore he says in another place, “to Christ Jesus I have begotten you through the gospel”—1 Cor. iv. 15.

But the Christadelphian Eve had not been espoused twelve months before it became manifest that iniquity was working within her. The case of Ananias and Sapphira was illustrative of this. The evil manifested through them was the evil principle which generated that “Mystery of Iniquity” which at length developed the Lawless One or Man of Sin. It was the spirit of falsehood, which Paul styles “the deceivableness of unrighteousness in them that perish”—2 Thess. ii. 10.

This case of Ananias and Sapphira marks the commencement of the woman’s symbolic pregnancy. It occurred A.D. 33. This was the epoch of her impregnation. From this year of apostolic espousal to what Mr. Whiston styles “the famous proclamation and edict for the universal liberty and advancement of christianity (more correctly, “the Apostasy”) by Constantine and Licinius, A.D. 313, which put an end to the pangs of birth in the heaviest persecution that ever was then known, was exactly 280 years.” A pregnancy of forty weeks of years, at the end of which there was manifest a Man of Power, who professed the faith of the majority of the woman’s community; delivered her from the sanguinary oppression of the pagan “Devil and Satan,” whom he cast out of the heaven into the earth together with the stars of his tail; and who set himself up as the Bishop, or Overseer, επισκοπος (the Eyes and Mouth) of all the bishops of the Roman world.

8. The Woman cries being in pangs

The woman was pregnant, and therefore, if she lived through the p. 38 period of her painful gestation, her time would certainly come to bring forth. It is therefore written of her, “she cries being in pangs and straining to bring forth.”

The period during which she was tormented with the pangs of parturition were the “ten days,” or years, preceding the proclamation and edict of Constantine and Licinius, which were issued, as I have said, A.D. 313. This parturient crisis in the woman’s history is foretold in the letter to the ecclesia at Smyrna in these words—“the Devil shall cast some of you into prison, that ye may be tried; and ye shall have tribulation ten days”—Apoc. ii. 10. This ten days’ parturient tribulation came upon her with the opening of the fifth seal, A.D. 303. This is known in history as the great Diocletian Persecution, the severest ever inflicted by the great red pagan “Devil and Satan” upon professors of christianity. In this fifth seal period her “cries” were uttered “with a loud voice, saying, Until when, O Despot, holy and true, dost thou not judge and avenge our blood on the dwellers upon the earth?” Her pangs produced these outcries, which need not to be expounded here in detail, seeing that they have been sufficiently treated of in the second volume at p. 252. After the death of the augustan emperor Galerius, in A.D. 311, her straining efforts began. Her pains now became forcing. She felt that she must die, if she did not give birth to a deliverer. The time of judgment and vengeance was to come at the end of “a little while,” χρονον μικρον; and of that little while about two years only remained for the manifestation of her son upon the throne of the Roman Orb. The straining efforts of the woman were synchronous with the opening of the sixth seal, by which was initiated that “war in heaven” which resulted in casting the pagan Dragon out, and her own investment with the sun; in allusion to which, Eusebius, in his Life of Constantine, says, “In short, as the sun, when he rises upon the earth, liberally imparts his rays of light to all, so did Constantine, proceeding at early dawn from the imperial palace, and rising as it were with the heavenly luminary, impart the rays of his own beneficence to all who approached his person”—lib. 1. chap. xliii. The totality upon which these rays of the imperial beneficence fell, was all of the woman’s adherents previously to his drawing the line between those who recognized his EPISCOPAL SUPREMACY and those who rejected it as the usurpation of the ANTICHRIST. After this line was drawn, the rays of his beneficence were reserved exclusively for what he styled “THE HOLY CATHOLIC CHURCH,” of which he was the acknowledged episcopal head. All others were regarded as perverse and wicked.

p. 399. “Another Sign in the Heaven”

“And there appeared another sign in the heaven, and behold a great fiery red dragon, having seven heads and ten horns, and upon his heads seven diadems. And his tail draws the third of the stars of the heaven, and he cast them into the earth”—Verses 3, 4.

John saw “another sign in the heaven.” The first sign which he terms “a great sign,” was the woman invested with the sun. The same heaven was the scene in which the two signs were exhibited to all who observed them. It was the heaven of the Roman Orb in which shone all the luminaries of the Græco-Latin body politic. The Dragon had long occupied the heaven of Italy; but it was not until the judicial crisis of the sixth seal that he was exhibited as “a sign.” He was significative of a power occupying a position of hostility to the Christian Eve, and to all who favored her. This third verse is the first place in the Apocalypse where this hostile power is mentioned by the name of Dragon, though it is not the first where the power itself is indicated. The power is referred to in ch. ii. 10, where it is styled “the Devil.” Here the Smyrnæan section of the woman is exhorted to “fear none of those things which thou shalt suffer: behold, the Devil shall cast some of you into prison that ye may be tried.” The Devil was the power which owned and controlled the prisons into which then, as now, he casts all whom his prosecuting attorneys convict of violating his laws. All the sufferings of the woman in her gestation of 280 years were inflicted upon her by “the Devil and his Angels,” who reigned in the heaven of the Roman Orb. These were her opponents who sought her destruction. The Devil was her adversary, who, “as a roaring lion, walketh about, seeking whom he may devour;” but she resisted him being steadfast in the faith; nevertheless, though cast down by the afflictions he heaped upon her, she was not destroyed—1 Pet. v. 8; but overcame him in the epoch of this other sign in the heaven—Apoc. xii. 11.

10. The Great Fiery Red Dragon

A dragon is a kind of beast, and therefore partakes in the characteristics of beasts. These in prophetic writing are the well-known symbols of destroying monarchies or powers; and, where the people of the Deity are found sojourning under their authority, the persecutors of the saints. But, though the dragon is a beast, he is apocalyptically distinguished from the beast of the earth, and the beast of the sea; nevertheless, he possesses certain characteristics in common p. 40 with them both: for they are all found upon the same arena, though not contemporary in all their history.

The four beasts in Dan. vii. 3, the winged lion, the bear, the winged leopard, and the anonymous fourth beast, are explained in verse 17, as representative of four kings or powers, styled kingdoms in verse 23. The nameless fourth beast, that is, not named by Daniel, is styled by John diversely a dragon and a beast, according to the subject he may be treating of.

The Hebrew תנין tannin, and the Greek δρακων, drakōn, rendered in our English version dragon, it is evident from Ezek. xxix. 3, signifies a crocodile; the great scaly serpent-fish of the Nile, the symbol of the Egyptian power, styled “Pharaoh king of Egypt, the great dragon that lieth in the midst of his rivers.”

The dragon, then, whose force is in his tail, symbolized the power of the old Egyptian Polity. This, in the days of Moses, was the great enemy of Israel after both flesh and spirit. It embodied in its institutions all the filthiness, and superstition, and tyranny of human nature; and stood before the world as the great SIN-POWER of antiquity—“the Old Serpent, the Devil and the Satan.”

But the empire of the Dragonic-Sin-power was westward. It did not remain enthroned in Egypt. Yahweh’s servant Nebuchadnezzar transferred it to Babylon; whence in due time it migrated, and was at length found in the city of the Seven Hills. The power there, in the epoch of the sign, was the old Egyptian Dragon incorporate in the Græco-Latin polity, which possessed Egypt, Syria, and the East. Hence, the territory of the Dragonic fourth beast of Daniel is apocalyptically and “spiritually called Sodom and Egypt, where our Lord was crucified”—ch. xi. 8; “the great city Babylon.”

“The Dragon,” says Daubuz, “is a crocodile, a creature which is ranked among the serpents by Horus Apollo; and is called by the Arabians Pharaoh, and which was held by the Egyptians as the symbol of all mischief. And therefore Typho being, in their belief, the author of all evil, was supposed to have transformed himself into a crocodile, or dragon. So that the principle of all evil, or Typho, was in the symbolical character represented by a crocodile or dragon; and under this symbol was the said principle worshiped. Agreeably whereunto in the Chaldean theology the principle of evil was called Arimanius; that is, the crafty serpent, from ערום crafty, and נחש serpent.”

Amongst profane writers may be mentioned Horace, who compares the Roman people, not only to a beast because of its ferocity, but to a many-headed beast—lib. i. Ep. i. ver. 76. The apocalypse denominates that Egypto-Roman monster a great seven-headed dragon.

p. 41 The dragon was one of the military ensigns of imperial Rome. Ammianus Marcellinus, as quoted by Elliott, thus describes it: “The dragon was covered with purple cloth, and fastened to the end of a pike gilt and adorned with precious stones: its wide throat being opened, so that the wind blew through it; and it hissed, as if in a rage, with its tail floating in various folds to the breeze.” He elsewhere often gives it the epithet of purpureus, purple-red: “purpureum signum draconis.” In another note Mr. Elliott remarks that “in Trajan’s time the dragon was a Dacian ensign, not a Roman; as appears from the bas-reliefs on Trajan’s arch. A century afterwards it was, as a Roman ensign, sculptured on Severus’ arch of triumph. Later in the third century it had become almost as notorious among Roman ensigns as the Eagle itself: and is in the fourth century noted by several authors. Among these John, surnamed Chrysostom, who flourished then, says that “the emperors wore among other things to distinguish them, silken robes embroidered with gold, in which Dragons were represented.” Speaking of the procession of Constantine from Milan to Rome, Gibbon says, “he was encompassed by the glittering arms of the numerous squadrons of his guards and cuirassiers. Their streaming banners of silk, embroidered with gold, and shaped in the form of Dragons, waved round the person of the emperor.”

Daniel’s nameless “dreadful and terrible” fourth beast is a contraction, or condensation, of John’s great fiery-red dragon, ten-horned beast of the sea, two-horned beast of the earth, image of the beast, and scarlet beast and drunken woman. These apocalyptic symbols are illustrative amplifications of the head, ten horns, eleventh horn, and eyes and mouth, of Daniel’s “dreadful and terrible” beast, in its relations with the saints in all the 1260 years of their subjection, or down-treading by the Gentiles. In Daniel’s description of it no mention is made of more heads than one. “The ten horns that were on his head.” This is all recorded of its head. Daniel says nothing about “seven heads” on any beast shown to him. He only saw one; but behind this one were concealed seven others, of which we should have no more knowledge than he, had not the apocalypse brought them into view. In this, the seven heads are brought out conspicuously. They are seen upon the Dragon, the Beast of the Sea, and the Scarlet-coloured Beast of the Wilderness. Though seen on different symbolic beasts, they are not different sets of seven; that is, one set of seven heads for the dragon; and a set of different seven heads for the Marine Beast; and yet a different seven from either, for the Scarlet Beast of the Wilderness. They are one and the same seven heads upon all three beasts; so that the signification of them p. 42 in connexion with the scarlet beast, is their signification as the heads of the dragon and the beast of the sea.

11. The Seven Heads of the Dragon

I have said that behind the head seen by Daniel there were seven other heads which he did not perceive. This is equivalent to saying, that the head seen by him was an EIGHTH HEAD. This is the truth. The beast he saw was headed with this eighth head contemporary with its destruction by the saints. The seven heads, except the sixth, which precede this have now no other political existence than what may be found on the page of history. They are things of the past, save only so far as the eighth is a partaker of the political character of the seven. The eighth head, in Apoc. xvii. 11, is styled a beast; as, “the beast that was, and is not, even he is the eighth, and is of the seven, and goeth into perdition.” The eighth head is styled the beast, because a headless beast is a mere carcase, and incapable of action. All the seven heads, topographically viewed, being politically defunct ages before the judgment sits for the slaying of the beast, it became necessary to give it an eighth that it might live on to the time when judgment should be given to the saints. The Eighth Beast is therefore the “dreadful and terrible fourth” in eighth head manifestation. Its history begins after the fall of the seventh head, and winds up in its perdition after the advent of the Ancient of Days.

But the seven heads have not only a political, or ecclesiastical and secular, signification; they have also a topographical one. By this, I mean, they represent the particular place, or city, where the seven heads, in their political manifestation, were to be enthroned. The heads were politically anchored to the capital of the body politic. They must be sought for there, and only there; for the legislative head of a dominion is constitutionally located at the seat of government.

Now “here is the mind which hath wisdom”—here is the sense or meaning which is true. “The seven heads are seven mountains, where the woman is sitting upon them.” This is a Hebraism; an idiom, in which “are” is used for represent. It is a form of speech often used in scripture; as, of the rock smitten by Moses, it saith, “that rock was Christ”—1 Cor. x. 4; it represented Christ: “this bread is my body;” it represents my body: “the seven lightstands are the seven ecclesias;” they represent them: and in many other places too numerous for reference. The seven heads have a two-fold signification, the first whereof is given in Apoc. xvii. 9. They represent p. 43 seven mountains. But, if nothing more had been said, we should have been at a loss with regard to the particular seven represented. It was therefore added, “where the woman is sitting upon them.” But what does “the woman” represent? There can be no doubt about the signification of this symbol; for John was informed that the woman represented “a Great City”—an Imperial City; even “that great city, which,” while he was in Patmos, is “having dominion over the kings of the earth”—ver. 18. From the description, it was impossible that John could mistake as to the signification of this imperial woman. He knew, as we may know, that no other city could be meant than “the Seven Hilled City”—ROME. This is the only city situate upon seven mountains, in John’s day or since, that can be said to have dominion over the rulers of the earth. Her topography is seven heads, or elevations, of the land drained by the Tiber; and are thus named:

1. Mount Cœlius;

2. Mount Viminal;

3. Mount Aventine;

4. Mount Esquiline;

5. Mount Quirinal;

6. Mount Capitoline;

7. Mount Palatine.

Upon these seven mounts Rome, styled by its historians, “the Eternal City,” is sitting; and, when the Apocalypse was revealed to John, contained a population of millions. She was founded by Romulus 753 years before the birth of Jesus Christ; so that in A. D. 1868 she is 2621 years old. Her limits are now greatly reduced. About thirty years before Christ, and in the days of Augustus Cæsar, ROME contained two millions of inhabitants; and was fifty miles in circumference; but in 1847, she contained only 175,883 inhabitants, exclusive of Jews, whose number was computed at 8000. As long as she continues above ground she will be an interesting city. She contains 354 edifices, termed by Dan. מבצרי מעזים mivtzerai māuzzim, BAZAARS OF GUARDIANS; but, by “the dæmons, foul spirits, and unclean and hateful birds” of “Christendom” so-called, “churches;” which, in their ignorance and folly, they have dedicated to ghosts or phantoms, which they have decreed to be immortal, and protecting guardians to all who worship them therein. Among these bazaars of Romish saints, St. Peter’s, the temple of the Roman God, holds the first rank, being the largest temple in the world. It is 666 feet long, 284 wide, and its magnificent cupola rises to the height of 408 feet. It was 200 years in building. It is the temple of “the god of the earth,” before whom, in belligerent antagonism, the saints and p. 44 witnesses of Jesus stood; prophesying in sackcloths 1260 years—Dan. xi. 39; Apoc. xviii. 2; xi. 3. It is the temple in which is worshipped “the Man of Sin and Son of Perdition,” styled also “the Lawless One;” “who opposeth and exalteth himself above all that is called a god or is reverenced: so that, as a god, he sits in the temple of the god, publicly exhibiting himself that he is a god”—2 Thess. ii. 4. Such are the capital and chief temple of the apocalyptic Sodom and Egypt; the Queen City of the Gentiles, and most holy sanctuary of Satan.

The second signification of the seven heads is expressed in Apoc. xvii. 10; as, “And they are seven kings;” the “and” connecting them with the seven mountains—“the seven heads are seven mountains, and they are seven kings,” or governing bodies, as βασιλεις also signifies. These seven forms of government belong to the seven hills; and are therefore Roman and Italian. John was informed, that at the time of the revelation of the mystery being made, five of the heads had fallen; and that the one in existence, consequently, was the sixth head; and that the other, or seventh head, had not yet appeared; but that when it came up, it would continue only a short time: “they are seven kings; the five have fallen, and the one is, the other not yet come; and when he may come, it behooves that he continue a short time.” The two greatest historians, Livy and Tacitus, have enumerated the five from the building of the city, as,

1. The Regal Head, which continued 240 years;

2. The Consular Head, which continued 11 years;

3. The Dictatorial Head, which continued 5 years;

4. The Decemviral Head; and,

5. The Tribunitial Head with consular authority, which continued till it was superseded by

6. The Imperial Head, B. C. 31. John the apostle and Tacitus the historian, lived under this head, which continued in Rome 507 years. It was then wounded as it were to death by the

7. Or Gothic Head, A. D. 476. But, as this was only to continue “a short time” compared with the sixth, it was slain after reigning 60 years, in A. D. 554.

There was this peculiarity about the sixth head, namely, that, about A. D. 330, Constantine, the first catholic emperor, dedicated a new city, which, after his own name, he called CONSTANTINOPLE. This new Rome was also built upon seven hills; nevertheless, it is impossible to mistake it for “the woman,” or “great city,” of Apoc. xvii, inasmuch as it has never been the capital of οἱ ἑπτα βασιλεις, the seven governing bodies enumerated by the historians of the Italian Rome. On the dedication of Constantinople, the imperial residence and court p. 45 were established there; while the ancient Senate of the empire continued its sittings and the exercise of its functions in Rome, until it became contemporarily extinct with the seventh head A. D. 554, after a continuance of 1307 years from its institution by Romulus, the founder of the Roman State. Thus, from the dedication of the City of Constantine to the establishment of the Seventh Head upon the seven mountains, the Sixth Head of the Dragon had two capitals and two thrones to which the governing orders of the state were related. This was an arrangement peculiar to the sixth head, and doubtless providentially ordered with reference to future predetermined constitutional developments, to be manifested after the fall of the Seventh Head. The sixth head continues enthroned in Constantinople, though not in Rome, to this day. Rome has witnessed eight heads upon her seven mountains; but Constantinople only one. The government in Constantinople has always been imperial, whether administered by a Roman or Ottoman dynasty. The imperiality of the Ottoman capital has descended, through Constantine, from Augustus Cæsar, the founder of the sixth head of the dragon. The loss of old Rome by the sixth head did not deprive the governing power in Constantinople of its sixth headship. The sixth head there still rules over the eastern section of the territory of the Dragon; and perpetuates the Dragon-Power for the developments of which it is to be the subject in “the time of the end.” Hence, the Constantinopolitan power, without regard to the particular race administering it, be it Italian, Greek, Turkish, or Russian, is the Dragon, as opposed to the Beast of the Sea, and the Beast of the Earth, of Apoc. xiii. The Constantinopolitan power, as we have seen, originally owned both Rome and Constantinople; but in after times “yielded to the Lion Mouth of the Beast of the Sea his power, and his throne, and great authority;” reserving to itself what it was able to keep: so that the Roman Orb came to be divided between the Eastern Dragon and the Western Beast; and the populations of the two sections “worshiped” each respectively, as it is written, “they worshiped the Dragon which yielded power to the Beast: and they worshiped the Beast—”Apoc. xiii. 4.

Further details concerning the Imperial Sixth Head will be exhibited when I come to treat of the Beast of the Sea. I would, however, call the attention of the reader to the remarkable feature in the symbolism of the Dragon in contrast with that of the Beast, namely, that upon the seven heads are “seven diadems,” while upon the seven heads of the Beast there are none. Now, a diadem is a symbol of sovereignty. Upon the ten horns of the Dragon are no diadems, but only upon its seven heads. Had there been seven diadems p. 46 upon the heads, and ten diadems upon the horns, seventeen in all, there would have been no Beast of the Sea and Image of the Beast, to have divided with it the political “worship in all the earth.” The heads of the Dragon being only diademed indicates that its heads are sovereign; and that the dragon symbol during the continuance of the Beast has specially to do with apocalyptic developments connected with the heads, Therefore it is we find the dragon in existence after the destruction of the Beast and his Image in “the Lake of fire burning with brimstone”—ch. xix. 20. These are entirely destroyed when “judgment is given to the saints;” but the Dragon is not. This power is bound in the abyss for 1000 years; but at the end thereof, he lifts up his diademed sixth head, of which is the eighth, and by which the nations are again beguiled into the old delusion of the sovereignty of the people, and independence of all power but that which is inherent in themselves—Apoc. xx. 7, 5. But this is the last effort of flesh and blood to rule itself imperially upon the earth. The power that binds the dragon, and destroys the beast and his image, premillennially, will at the end of the thousand years crush the Dragon’s Sixto-Octavian Head, and so rid the earth forever of man’s accursed nature, which is the Devil and Satan, in apocalyptic eight-headed and ten-horned manifestation—ver. 9, 10.

12. The Ten Horns of the Dragon

The difference between the ten horns of the Dragon and the ten horns of the Beast of the Sea, consists in the ten upon the beast being diademed, while the ten upon the dragon are not. This indicates that the beast symbol represents things concurrent with the Horns in their exercise of sovereignty; while the Dragon, as far as old Rome is concerned, had to do with the sovereignty of the heads before the horns had received their kingdoms.

John in the wilderness saw the horns in what may be termed their Dragon-state, and writes of them thus, “the ten horns which thou sawest,” said the angel to him, “are,” or represent, “ten kings,” or sovereignties, “which have received no kingdom as yet”—Apoc. xvii. 12. This was their apocalyptic status until the Sixth Head of the Dragon had been wounded. After this had been slain almost to death, then we may look for the ascending of the beast out of the abyss, in the dragon-horns receiving their kingdoms at the cost of the dragon power—Apoc. xi. 7; xiii. 1.

We have seen that the heads were interpreted to John by the revealing angel, topographically and politically; thus conferring upon them a two-fold signification. So it is with the Horns: they are to p. 47 be interpreted chorographically and politically. Until they had received their kingdom, they were mostly chorographic appendages of the dragon-empire; that is, they existed as provinces, territorial regions, of the dominion, upon which ten kingdoms were afterwards established by the barbarians, who founded the seventh head upon the seven mountains; wounded the Dragon’s Sixth Head, which was afterwards “healed;” and subverted the Dragon’s jurisdiction over extensive regions.

Those regions were styled, by anticipation, horns—undiademed horns. In the time of John, they might be enumerated as, Greece, Mœsia, Illyricum, Pannonia, Noricum, Rhœtia, Italy, Gaul, Spain, and Africa. The Dragon had then, and afterwards, other provinces in the east; but those only are to be reckoned as horn-provinces upon which kingdoms “receiving power as kings one hour with the beast’s” eighth head, horns sustaining the Papacy, were established. The political organization of peoples that was developed upon these Dragon-horn provinces, became the apocalyptic Beast of the Sea; while Macedonia, Thrace, Asia Minor, Syria, and Egypt, remained to the Dragon, as at this day.

13. The Tail of the Dragon

“And his Tail draws the third of the stars of the heaven.”

The tail of the old Roman Dragon swayed by this power must have partaken of the character of that power, as the tail of a beast partakes of the peculiar vitality of the beast. The dragon in the heaven, heads, horns, body and tail, as a sign there, is to be viewed chronologically, in his tail-conflict with “Michael and his angels.” This tail-conflict was the last conflict of the Pagan Roman Serpent-power, or dragon, with the partisans of the Christian Eve. The ancient and the honorable he is the head, and the prophet that teaches lies he is the tail”—Isai. ix. 15. All the pagan priests and philosophers were the teachers of lies in this, the crisis of the sixth seal. They would therefore constitute a very important element of the dragon’s tail. Added to these would also be all “the rulers of the earth, and the great men, and the rich men, and the chief captains (or chiliarchs, commanders of a thousand men), mighty men, and every slave, and every freeman”—(Apoc. vi. 15) who adhered to the pagan prophets. Of these were “the Stars of the heaven” in which the dragon was a sign. Entering into the composition of his tail, his tail is said to “draw” them. The tail of a power in motion, represents the fierce anger of that power against its enemies, as manifested p. 48 in its movements of an army to destroy them. This appears from Isai. vii. 4, where the armies of Syria and Israel, in march against Jerusalem, are styled the two tails of as many smoking firebrands, or their fierce anger. The tail of the dragon is represented as in motion; for it is written, “his tail draws the third of the stars of the heaven, and did cast them to the earth.” The power of the Dragon, or crocodile, is in its tail. It sways it violently in its anger; but if the power of its tail is overcome, all composing the tail, or attaching themselves to the party of the tail, will be laid prostrate under the feet of the victor; or, in the words of the prophecy, be “cast to the earth.” The conflict was between Michael and the Tail of the Dragon, both being in the heaven. A third of the stars of this heaven sided with the Dragon’s Tail; while the two thirds ranged themselves under the Standard of “the Cross,” by which sign “Michael” proposed to conquer. At that time, the Dragon dominion was divided into three parts—the Eastern, the Western, and the Illyrian, præfectures. On the defeat of Maxentius, Constantine ruled the Western, Licinius the Illyrian, and Maximin the Eastern, Third. Maximin was the champion of Jupiter and the gods. This third was chorographically the Dragon’s Tail, his Head being in Rome. Maximin dying in great torments, was succeeded in the Eastern Third by Licinius; who, apostatizing from the Catholic profession, solemnly professed himself at an idolatrous altar the champion of the gods. He was now the Pontifex Maximus of Paganism, or Chief Prophet of the Tail of the Dragon. He was the centre of attraction to the stars of the Eastern Third of the Heaven; and therefore to a “third of the stars of the heaven.” He drew them after him to a final struggle against the Archer of the First Seal. But he was defeated and dethroned, and ignominiously ejected from his high position in the state; and, in his fall from the heaven, drew with him to the earth, all the men of power, philosophers, and priests of paganism, the stars of the dragon’s tail, who had staked their all upon his success.