A Brief Exposition of the Prophecy of Daniel

21. The Holy Roman Dominion, or Little Horn of the West

We have seen how the Constantinopolitan Little Horn Power acknowledged the god of guardians, who was unknown to his predecessors under the pagan constitution of the empire. From about A. D. 395 to the recovery and settlement of Italy, A. D. 554, after a war of twenty years, the Roman god flourished in tumultuous times. With the exception of sixty years, the period of the reign of the Gothic kings in Rome, whence they were expelled by the generals of Justinian, his godship was the cherished ally of the Byzantine emperor. During the turbulent period indicated, the Constantinopolitan dominion had receded from Gaul and Spain before the new kingdoms of the West; while the Universal Bishop had been recognized by the barbarian lords of Europe as a god upon earth. This recognition filled him with stoutness towards the emperor, which he would not have ventured to manifest if he had not been energized by their countenance. From A. D. 554 to A. D. 799, Rome had lost her pre-eminence, having been reduced to the rank of the second city of the Byzantine or Constantinopolitan empire; and Italy to the condition of a province of it. During this period a violent quarrel broke out between the Roman god and the imperial majesty. The subject of it was the adoration of images. The use and even worship of saint-idols was firmly established before the end of the sixth century. In the beginning of the eighth century, however, in the full magnitude of the idolatry, the people of the East were awakened to an apprehension, that under the mask of Christianity they had restored the paganism of their fathers. The Mohammedans, who reigned in Damascus and threatened Constantinople, denounced them as idolaters, whose punishment it was the divine commission of the followers of the Arabian prophet to execute.

It was the invasion of their empire by these avengers of the divine law against images, and the bowing down to them, that stirred up the Orientals to the consideration of the subject, and at length to p. Dan. 73 their opposition to the practice. The monks zealously defended the images, which were also fondly cherished by the clergy and people of Constantinople; while the rude and remote districts of Asia were strangers to the innovation.

In 726, the controversy issued in a revolution. An adventurer named Conora appeared from the mountains of Isauria, filled with zeal and indignation against the Images. He was raised to the throne of Constantinople by the Anatolian legions which he commanded, and being installed reigned as the founder of a new dynasty under the imperial name of Leo III., or the Isaurian.

During the first ten years of his reign his policy was moderate and cautious; too much so, indeed, to satisfy the views of the reformers who had effected his elevation. During that period of toil and danger he bowed before the idols he despised, and satisfied the Roman god with the annual profession of his orthodoxy and zeal. But at length their impatience caused him to be more decided. He proscribed the existence as well as the use of religious pictures; the churches of Constantinople and the provinces were cleansed from idolatry; and the images of Christ, the Virgin and the saints, were demolished, or a smooth surface of plaster was spread over the walls of the edifice. The zeal of his party, styled the Iconoclasts, or Image-Breakers, was rendered effective by the cordial coöperation of his five successors, and the East and West were involved in a stormy conflict of one hundred and twenty years. The Iconoclasts, however, were at last suppressed by the Idolaters, who in the reign of the empress Theodora, A. D. 842, finally succeeded in reëstablishing the adoration of the idols of the demonials whom they delighted to honor. This system of idolatry continued upwards of six hundred years after, the government and people being sunk in the grossest superstition. “They repented not of the works of their hands.” The Deity, therefore, sent against them the Four Euphratean Angels, who at length extinguished their dominion by the capture of Constantinople, A. D. 1453.

While the patient East under the Iconoclast emperors abjured with reluctance her idols, they were fondly cherished and vigorously defended by the independent zeal of the Italians, A distant and dangerous station amidst the barbarians of the West, excited the spirit and freedom of the Bishops of Rome. Their popular election endeared them to the Romans; the public and private indigence was relieved by their ample revenue; and the weakness or neglect of the emperors of Constantinople compelled them to consult, both in peace and war, the temporal safety of the city. In the school of adversity the Roman god insensibly imbibed the qualities and ambition of a prince; so that after the loss of her legions and provinces, the genius and fortune of the popes again restored the supremacy of Rome. “It is agreed,” says Gibbon, “that in the eighth century, their dominion was founded on rebellion, and that the rebellion was produced and justified by the heresy of the Iconoclasts:” in other words, that the temporal power of the popes is based upon a determined p. Dan. 74 adhesion to the worship of demonials and of their idols of gold and silver, wood and stone.

Pope Gregory II., the founder of the papal monarchy, commenced the controversy with Leo the Isaurian, who avowed his intention of breaking the Images in Rome; and of transporting the pope in chains an exile to Constantinople if he did not submit to the imperial edict, which abolished the images of Christ, and the Virgin, and of the angels, martyrs, and saints, in all the churches of Italy. The Italians swore to live and die in the defence of the pope, and of the images of his guardian saints. Leo despatched an army into Italy to establish his decree, but being defeated by the idolaters with great slaughter, the edict could not be enforced. This was a great triumph for the Roman god. He convened a synod of anti-Iconoclastic bishops, with whose consent he pronounced a general excommunication against all who should by word or deed attack the tradition of the fathers and the images of the saints. The emperor, of course, was tacitly involved in the sentence, though the god of Roman thunder did not make a personal application of it to Leo. His moderation delayed and prevented the election of a new emperor for Italy and the West; and the Italians were exhorted not to separate from the body of the Roman monarchy; so that till the imperial coronation of Charlemagne, the government of Rome and Italy was exercised in the name of the successors of Constantine.

Rome was now free from the foreign yoke of emperor or king; but reduced to her ancient territory from Viterbo to Terracina, and from Narni to the mouth of the Tiber. Her ruins presented the sad image of depopulation and decay: her previous slavery was a habit, her liberty an accident; the effect of superstition, and the object of her own amazement and terror. By the necessity of their situation, her inhabitants were cast into the rough model of a republican government. The style of “the Roman Senate and People” was revived, but the spirit was fled; and their new independence was disgraced by the tumultuous conflict of licentiousness and oppression. The want of laws was supplied by their religion, and their foreign and domestic counsels were moderated by the authority of the Bishop, whom they became accustomed to consider as the first magistrate or prince of the city.

Here then was formed the nucleus of a new power, consisting of a god upon earth, and a scanty remnant, the offspring of slaves and strangers, inhabitants of Rome and its territory; feeble, unwarlike, and despicable in the eyes of the victorious barbarians. As often as the Franks or Lombards expressed their most bitter contempt of a foe, they called him a Roman; “and in this name,” says the bishop Luitprand, “we include whatever is base, whatever is cowardly, whatever is perfidious, the extremes of avarice and luxury, and every vice that can prostitute the dignity of human nature.” Such were the pope’s children at the origin of his principality, a fitting progeny for such a sire. The Lombards were his immediate neighbors, and under their king Astolphus, the equal enemy of the pope and emperor. p. Dan. 75 The love of arms and rapine were congenial to them; and both the prince and people were irresistibly tempted by the disorders of Italy, the nakedness of Rome, and the unwarlike profession of her new chief. They summoned the city to acknowledge the victorious Lombard as her lawful sovereign; and to pay an annual tribute of a piece of gold as the ransom of each citizen, and the sword of destruction was unsheathed to exact the penalty of her disobedience.

Had the pope and his Romans been left to their own resources in this extremity, the world might never have witnessed among the ten barbaric kingdoms of Europe, a power answering to the “Little Horn with EYES like the eyes of a man, and a MOUTH speaking great things,” as seen by Daniel on the head of the Fourth Beast. The little popedom was too feeble to defend itself against its rapacious neighbors; so that if succor could not have been procured from a stronger power, it must have perished in the alpha of its existence. In this event, it would be impossible to say what would have been the constitution of Europe for a thousand years past. This, however, may be considered as certain, “the Holy Roman Empire” would never have existed; and “the Saints” would have escaped that long and terrible war by which they have been prevailed against in all the countries of its dominion. But “the powers that be are ordained of God,” with reference to an end appointed. He scourges the wicked with the evil works of their own hands. They founded the papacy, which has whipped them who with it warred against the saints with scorpions; while he has overruled its policy to the formation of a situation which will favor the manifestation of his rightousness and power.

In their distress the “strange god” and his feeble folk sought the protection of the king of the French. The ambassadors of Pepin and of the Greek emperor accompanied the pope to the court of Astolphus, king of the Lombards, to persuade him to peace and amity with the papists. But he would listen to nothing short of absolute submission to his sceptre, which would have been fatal to the ambition of the popes. Finding nothing could be done, Stephen III. hastened to Pepin to excite his pity for St. Peter’s patrimony, and his indignation against Astolphus who was ready to devour it. Prompted by the love of glory and superstition, Pepin yielded to the solicitation of the Roman Bishop, and proclaimed himself the champion of the papal church. Being the first of the Barbarian Kings who stood up in defence of the “Holy See,” the king of France came to be honored by the popes with the title of “Eldest Son of the Church.” An alliance was formed between France and the Little Papacy; which in forty-six years from Stephen’s visit to Pepin expanded into the Roman Empire of the West, called “the Holy Roman Empire,” and represented by the Little Horn of Daniel’s Fourth Beast.

From A. D. 754 to A. D. 799 at Christmas, was the period occupied in the establishment of the Little Horn power; which, like the Little Horn of the Goat, budded forth upon the territory of the p. Dan. 76 Kingdom of Babylon, but confined to its western division. The first event in the formation of the Little Horn of the West was the overthrow of Leo the Isaurian’s army against the saint-idols of Rome and Italy; the next was the recognition of Charles Martel and his heirs as Patricians of Rome; the assumption of the championship of the papal church by Pepin; his coronation by the pope; and his compulsion of Astolphus to restore its possessions, and to respect its sanctity: the third series of events was the plucking up by the roots of the Lombard kingdom by Charlemagne, the son of Pepin, A. D. 774; his investment with the honors of Patrician, being presented with the keys of the shrine of St. Peter as a pledge and symbol of sovereignty; and with a holy banner which it was their right and duty to unfurl in defence of the church and city: and his coronation by the pope, the people shouting, “Long life and victory to Charles, the most pious Augustus, crowned by God the great and pacific emperor of the Romans!” The patrimony of St. Peter was enlarged through the liberality of Pepin and Charlemagne, by the spoliation of the Lombards and the emperor of Constantinople, to the dimensions of an earthly kingdom of respectable limits, constituting the Eye and Mouthship proper of the Roman god. The gift of this enlarged estate did not, however, alienate it from the empire of Charlemagne; for in his life and at his death, Ravenna and Rome were numbered in the list of his metropolitan cities.

At this crisis of affairs, there existed on the territory of the Kingdom of Babylon Two Little Horn Powers, THE STRANGE GOD, and the Ten Horn or Toe Kingdoms. I would remark here in passing that it has hitherto been found impossible to define these kingdoms according to the number given. Several tens have been guessed at, but the lists bear inaccuracy on the face of them. The kingdoms are represented by ten horns, and ten toes, because there would be that number appear on the territory of the Roman Beast between A. D. 476 and A. D. 799, the interval between the fall and restoration of the Western Roman Empire. In part however of this period only seven independent monarchies can be found, three of the original ten being “plucked up by the roots.” At the time of the revelation of Jesus Christ and the Saints, there will also be ten kingdoms whose territories will embrace those of the original Gothic Ten. In past centuries their number has varied. The ten kingdoms contemporary with the smiting of the Image by the Stone-power, or with the slaying and burning of the Fourth Beast by the Saints, in relation to the old Gothic kingdoms, are as so many trees to their original sapling-roots. The Gothic kingdoms of the period indicated were the roots of the present kingdoms, which are designated in prophecy by the number of Romano-Gothic kingdoms extant at the beginning and when the end comes. There will then be ten; therefore, without regard to their numerical variation, in previous ages, they are styled the ten kingdoms of the Beast.

p. Dan. 7722. The “Time of the End”

The revelator having pointed out to Daniel the characteristic marks, by which the Little-Horn-of-the-Goat-Power might be known, directs his attention to what should happen to it “at the time of the end,” which is the “time appointed” for the denouement or issue to which the whole prophecy of Daniel points. Habakkuk had a vision of the catastrophe; and in noting it down said, “at the end it shall speak, and not lie:” and because the truth of the matter would not be discovered till then, Daniel was told to “Shut up the words and seal the book to the time of the end, . . . for the words are closed up and sealed till the time of the end.”

The time of the end, then, is the period of the opening and unsealing of the words of the book; so that it may speak intelligibly to “the wise.” The opening and unsealing is effected by the events of the time, being an unmistakable fulfillment of what is written: so that every one of “the wise” cannot fail to understand.

The time of the end has its beginning, and ending; and period intermediate between the beginning and the ending. Its approach is marked by an event connected with Egypt; and its ending by a consummation connected with Israel. The fortieth verse of the eleventh chapter announces its beginning by informing the reader that “at,” or near, “the time of the end shall the King of the South push at him.” For the southern horn of the Goat to push at him is for the Egyptian Power to attack the Little Horn Power; for “the king” or Little Horn of the Goat is the power last discoursed of in the preceding context. This attack, then, upon the Ottoman régime of the kingdom of Babylon, by the Ruler of Egypt, including Arabia, etc., indicates the approach of the Time of the End. The conclusion of it is marked by the event predicted in the seventh verse of the last chapter, which is to be completed at the end of “a time, times, and an half,” and noted in the words, “When he shall have accomplished to scatter the power of the holy people, all these things shall be finished.” Between these two orders of events, the attack of Egypt on the Porte, and the reconcentration of the power of the Twelve Tribes, the vision speaks, and no more of the book of Daniel remains to be fulfilled—the Time of the End will have passed away, in other words; with the establishment of the Kingdom of God.

The reader, on turning to the eleventh chapter, will notice that no more is said about the King of the South, or of Egypt, after the the ships of Chittim interfered in his behalf against Antiochus, the King of the North, until the fortieth verse. Between the first event of this verse, then, and that of the thirtieth is an interval of about 2000 years. During this long time no note is made of Egypt in the prophecy, nor of the King of the North from the time of the Maccabees, through whom Judah was “holpen with a little help”—verse 34. The connecting link in the prophetic chain between B. C. 160 and A. D. 1838 is the Little Horn of the Goat which incorporated p. Dan. 78 the Assyrian kingdom of the north, and the kingdom of the south into its own dominion. But in the year 1829, Egypt, which had been so long in vassalage to the Little Horn, or Constantinopolitan power, revolted; and reappeared on the map of the Babylonian world as a kingly power. Mehemet Ali then established himself as king of the south. He attacked and conquered Syria, and for a time was lord ascendant of the east. This exaltation opened new prospects to Mehemet, and he aspired to the throne of the Sultan. The time of the end was approaching, there being only twenty-two years of the evening-morning of 2400 years to expire. In 1838 he “pushed at” the Sultan. Hitherto he had confined his operations to Egypt, Arabia, and Syria, but now at the closing of the war he pushed for Constantinople, and advanced as far as Smyrna; and but for the interference of Russia, Austria, Prussia, and England, unconsciously “to establish the vision,” he would doubtless have dethroned him. Wearied of this state of affairs, these powers undertook to establish peace, and to place things on a permanent footing. They ordered the king of the south to surrender Syria including Palestine to the sovereignty of the Little Horn, and to restore its fleet which had revolted from the Sultan during the war. Mehemet refused to do either, contending that Syria was his as a part of his kingdom by right of conquest forever, and the fleet as the spoils of war. These four powers, however, were not to be trifled with. They were willing that the throne of Egypt should be hereditary in his family; but resolved that he should only be Pacha of Syria for life. But the king of the south would not yield, and the result was that the allied fleet under Sir Charles Napier bombarded the cities of the Syrian sea-board, and took possession of St. Jean d’Acre. They again offered him “all that part of Syria, extending from the Gulf of Suez to the Lake of Tiberias, together with the province of Acre for life,” if he would restore the Little Horn’s fleet. But he still refused, and in the autumn of 1840, they compelled the Egyptians to evacuate the country, and determined he should not have it at all; and threatened that if he did not restore the fleet in ten days, they would make Alexandria too hot to hold him. Prudence, said to be the better part of valor, at length overcame the obstinacy of the king of the south; he therefore yielded, and surrendered the ships within the time. Thus, the Holy Land was wrested from the Ruler of Egypt and restored to the sovereignty of the Constantinopolitan Little Horn, which still continues to possess the country.

Such was the important series of events which marked the approaching termination of the 2,400 years, and the commencing of the Time of the End. The king of the south’s pushing at “the king” terminating in the disposal of the Holy Land is evidential of the time approaching to which Yahweh refers in Lev. xxvi. 42, saying, “I will remember my Covenant with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, and I will remember the land.” The king of the south claimed the land as his for ever; but Yahweh hath said, “The land shall not be sold for ever; for the land is mine.” If then the God of Israel would not p. Dan. 79 permit the people of his own nation to alienate it from one to another for ever, he would be far from permitting a Gentile power to possess it, or the Allies to grant it him, for ever. The hand of Yahweh may be clearly discerned in the events of this epoch. He hardened the Ruler of Egypt’s heart not to accept the land on any other terms than his own, which were certain not to be granted. If they had yielded to his demand, the present “eastern question,” involving the overthrow of the Ottoman dynasty of the Little Horn, could not have been created. If the Allies had allowed the king of the south to retain possession of the Holy Land, the Frog-Power could have made no demands on the Sultan for the protectorate of the Holy Places. The application must have been made at Alexandria instead of Constantinople, which would have deprived Russia of the power of interference, having no access to Egypt by land, and her fleets being shut up in the Baltic and Black Sea. But in 1840 the time had nearly come to put things in train for “avenging the holy,” which had been so long trodden under foot of the worst of the Gentiles. It was necessary, therefore, to place the land under the sovereignty of the Porte, so that when the question of the Holy Places should be mooted by the Frog-Power, it might stir up the King of the North to jealousy, and bring him into collision with the Little Horn. The transfer, then, of the land from Egypt to the Porte prepared the way for the demands of the Frog-Power on the Sultan; the granting of these stirred up the King of the North to send Menschikoff to pick a quarrel with the Sultan, who having rejected his demands found it necessary to prepare for the worst. Meantime the king of the north crossed the Pruth, and took up his position in the Moldo-Wallachian principalities of the Little Horn. It is clear, then, that as far as statesmanship is concerned, the attack of the Allied Powers on Egypt in 1840, and their restitution of the Holy Land to the Porte, was a great political blunder. They should have left it in the possession of the King of the South, or have given it to the Jews under their joint protectorate, and the Crimean phase of the Eastern Question, with all its terrible accompaniments, would never have occurred. But their counsel was turned into foolishness by Yahweh, whose purposes are diametrically opposed to theirs. Their purpose is to establish Gentile sovereignty over the East for ever: while, on the contrary, His avowed intention is to restore the kingdom to Israel with dominion over the world. These projects are as opposite as the poles, and each project has its policy. The European Powers unsheathed the sword, that the purpose of the strongest might be established. The West was sanguine of speedy and entire success. The boastings of England and France were premature. When they don their armor Powers no more than men should boast; it is time enough for that when they come to put it off. Woefully will these western powers be deceived in the result of the coming struggle. The Ottoman empire will be dried up, and “the sick man” must die in spite of all their efforts to save him. The sure word of prophecy is against them, and shines upon their patient’s doom as near, sudden, and complete. He is already in articulo p. Dan. 80 mortis, and his efforts but the convulsive energies of an expiring man.

The rest of the events predicted from the fortieth verse of this chapter to the second verse of chapter twelve all belong to the time of the end, and are yet future. The king of the north is to come against the Little Horn king, and to sweep away the reigning dynasty; many countries are to be overthrown; the land of Egypt will be taken from its Mohammedan rulers; the Holy Land will be invaded by the northern king; his power will be broken there; the nations will be in such trouble as they were never in before; the Lord Jesus Christ will appear on the arena of conflict; the dead will be raised, and the righteous glorified; and the Kingdom of God established on the ruin of the Kingdom of Men. These are speaking events, trumpet-tongued proclaiming the purpose of Yahweh in all his doings among the children of men.

23. The King of the North

The eighth, ninth, and eleventh chapters of Daniel are principally a symbolical and descriptive prophecy concerning three of the five horns of the Grecian Goat in their relation to one another so far as their acts and policy affect the fortunes of Judah and the Holy Land. These three horns are the southern or Egyptian Horn, the northern or GRECO-ASSYRIAN HORN, and its conjunct, the Little Horn, which arose out of it, and will ere long subside into it, the power it represents being absorbed into it by forcible incorporation.

The Greco-Assyrian Horn Power, as we have already seen, was in its origin the Kingdom of Babylon incorporated with the Alexandrian Empire, afterwards acquired by the Seleucidæ, and by this dynasty surrendered to the Romans about sixty-five years before Christ. Till A. D. 324, ROME was exclusively the throne of the Greco-Assyrian Kingdom of Babylon; but from that date until the fall of the Western Empire about A. D. 476, the Power was enthroned in Rome and Constantinople, the former city being the place of the Senate and of the junior emperor, while the latter was the palatial residence of the chief. On the re-conquest of Italy from the Goths in the reign of Justinian, Rome was reduced to the rank of the second city of the Greco-Assyrian, or Constantinopolitan, dominion; but still retained her ecclesiastical preëminence, being the throne of the Chief Pontiff of the Kingdom of Babylon.

On the revival of the Latin empire of the west under Charlemagne, the separation between the East and West became complete. The Constantinopolitan continued the Greco-Assyrian Dragon-power, but deprived of its jurisdiction and authority over the West. This surrender of dominion to the New Confederacy of the West is apocalyptically represented in the saying, “And the Dragon gave him his power, and his throne, and great authority;”^a but what he retained was Greek and Assyrian.

p. Dan. 81 This blending of the Romano-Greek power with the Assyrian is the reason why the Little Horn of the Goat is represented as coming out of one of its four horns. They occupy one and the same territory; that is, where the Seleucidian dynasty once ruled, the Little Horn’s dynasties afterwards ruled; and where the Little Horn’s present dynasty now rules, a Russian dynasty from the north will probably be enthroned; so that when this form of things obtains, the northern horn and the Little Horn will be blended into one power, still Constantinopolitan, but with a Russian instead of an Ottoman for its chief.

But before this can be accomplished these words to Daniel must be fulfilled: “And the King of the North shall rush on like a tempest against him with chariots and horsemen, and with many ships; and he shall enter into countries and overwhelm and pass over.” This plainly intimates war between the two horns in the time of the end; and such a war too that will sweep all before the King of the North. He will rush on against him both by land and sea, his forces being distinguished by their numerical strength in “chariots,” or artillery, cavalry, and ships. The result of this tornado will be a successful one, for he will “overwhelm and pass over.”

The attack, answering to the words of the prophecy, has not yet commenced. All the western European world prophesies the impossibility of the King of the North doing anything with his ships against the combined fleets of the Little Horn’s allies! But to “overwhelm and pass over” is to prevail. He has only to bide his time, and to look out for eventualities. The elements have interposed for Russia in great extremity; and we know it is written, “Thou breakest the ships of Tarshish with an east wind.”^a In the absence of this, however, complications will doubtless arise in the West, which may divert the attention of the Ottoman’s allies from the Euxine. This diversion will be Russia’s opportunity; and when seized, the movement of the King of the North will answer to the full force of the prophetic word.

The tempest, then, is gathering. The King of the North is preparing his hosts, and fortifying with all the forces that iron can afford him, against the “drying up” Euphratean power and its infatuated protectors, until the time arrives to use them with effect. The Turks are alive to the danger they are in, and the French and English have proclaimed the integrity and independence of the Ottoman empire. But things are not yet quite ripe. The position of Prussia, Austria, and Germany yet delays the rushing forth of the storm in all its violence. Something must arise to cause these powers to declare themselves on one side or the other. Prussia and Austria have not declared their policy on the Eastern Question: they also fear the volcanic elements of their own dominions, and the ambitious projects of the ruler of the French. Maritime disasters, revolutionary outbreaks, or Russian appeals to their dynastic interests and fears, may necessitate their abandonment of neutrality and the declaration p. Dan. 82 of a policy by one or both of them in favor of the king of the north. The division of the Kingdom of Babylon into two belligerent sections will then be complete, and Russia will be overwhelming. The rush of nations then ensuing will be terrific, and is well described by the prophet—who says, “Hark! a multitude of many peoples making an uproar as the noise of seas. Hark! a tumult among peoples, warring as a tumult of mighty waters; they rage against peoples like a roar of many waters.”^a This is Isaiah’s description of things “when the nations are angry,”^b and the king of the north rushes on like a tempest against the Little Horn. At present it is only the gathering of the storm, but when begun, who can say with effect, “Peace, be still?”

The king of the north’s career for a time will be most successful. Some of the countries he is to enter into and overwhelm are Egypt and the Goodly Land. “He shall send forth his hand upon countries: and the land of Egypt shall not escape. But he shall have power over the treasures of gold and of silver, and over all the precious things of Egypt: and the Libyans and Ethiopians shall be at his steps.” These are the forty-second and forty-third verses, and explain somewhat the passage in the fortieth, that “He shall enter into the countries, and shall overwhelm and pass over.” Then follows the saying in the forty-first verse, “He shall enter also into the goodly land.” To do what is foretold of him in regard to Egypt implies the conquest of Turkey; because not being a maritime power he cannot get at Egypt and Palestine (unless in alliance with a naval power) until he first overwhelm the Ottoman.

The last country he will invade will be the Holy Land; whose covenanted limits are from “the entering into Hamath” to the Nile, for its western frontier; and from thence by the Red Sea to the Persian Gulf for its south line; and from the Gulf along the Euphrates to the mountains of Amanus for its eastern side. He will not be able to occupy the whole country, the south and south-east of it being held by his antagonists; for it is written in the prophecy, “But these shall escape out of his hand, Edom, and Moab, and the chief of the children of Ammon;” the reason of their escape being because they will then be in the hands of a powerful antagonist.

24. Proof of the Russian Power being the King of the North

The proof lies in the obvious identity that exists between Daniel’s “king of the north” of the time of the end, and Ezekiel’s “Gog” of the latter days. By comparing what is said about each of these in the two prophets, it will be manifest that they can only be different titles for the same power. The following particulars may be cited in proof:

1. Their geographical position is the same. Gog’s country is the p. Dan. 83 north parts in relation to the Holy Land; as it is written, “Thou shalt come from thy place out of the north parts.” Gog is therefore king of the north, his place or country being there.

2. They are both the adversaries of Israel, and the invaders of their country. The eleventh chapter of Daniel abundantly proves this in relation to the king of the north; and of Gog, Yahweh saith, “Thou shalt come up against my people Israel, as a cloud to cover the land.”

3. The time they invade the land is the same. The king of the north invades it in the time of the end; and of Gog it is said, “It shall be in the latter days, and I will bring thee against my land.”

4. The same peoples are named as components of their armies. The Libyans and Ethiopians are at the steps of the king of the north; and in the enumeration of Gog’s forces, it says, “Persia, Ethiopia, and Libya with them.”

5. Hostile tidings come from the east and north which excite the king of the north to fury; while tidings also come to Gog from the same quarter to deter him from invading the Holy Land.

6. The king of the north encounters the Little Horn; and Gog is antagonized by “Sheba and Dedan, and the merchants of Tarshish and the young lions thereof”—the Anglo-Indian power—“the ancient ally” of the Little Horn.

7. They both meet with the same fate, at the same time, in the same place, and by the same power. The “king of fierce countenance” stands up against the Prince of princes; the king of the north encounters Michael the Great Prince; and Gog is smitten by Adonai Yahweh. They all three come to their end with none to help them; they all fall upon the mountains of Israel, and consequent upon their overthrow Israel is delivered.

These seven particulars prove that Gog and the king of the north are but different titles for the same power; and the title given to Gog in the thirty-eighth and thirty-ninth chapters of Ezekiel proves that this northern power is no other than the Russian. In these places the prophet is addressed by Yahweh as the representative of Him who is to vanquish Gog and to deliver Israel. Hence, he says to him, “Son of Man, set thy face against Gog, the land of Magog, prince of Rosh, Meshekh, and Thuval, and prophesy against him.” In this title to the prophecy the antagonists are indicated, namely, the Son of Man, (ben-adam) or seed of the Woman, on the one side; and the Prince of Rosh, the Head of the Serpent Confederacy, on the other. Hence, by understanding Gog’s title, the reader may know which of “the powers that be” is chosen of God to personate the Serpent’s Head when it is bruised by the Woman’s Seed.

The question as to what nations are signified by Rosh, Meshekh, and Thuval, has been long since determined by the learned. The celebrated Bochart about the year 1640, observed, in his elaborate researches into Sacred Geography, that ΡΩΣ Rōs, or ראשׁ Rōsh, is the most ancient form under which history makes mention of the name of RUSSIA; and he contended that Rosh and משׁךְ Mĕshekh, properly denote the nations of Moscovy and Russia. “It is credible,” p. Dan. 84 says he, “that from Rosh and Meshekh (that is, the Rhossi and Moschi) of whom Ezekiel speaks, descended the Russians and Muscovites, nations of the greatest celebrity in European Scythia.” We have indeed ample and positive testimony, that the Russian nation was called ΡΩΣ, Rōs, by the Greeks in the earliest period in which we find it mentioned, as, Εθνος δε ὁι Ρως Σκυθικον περι τον αρχτωον Ταυρον; that is, “the Rosh are a Scythian nation bordering on the northern Taurus.” And their own historian says, “It is related that the Russians (whom the Greeks called Ρως, and sometimes Ρωσος, Rūsos) derived their name from Ros, a valiant man, who delivered his nation from the yoke of its tyrants.”

Thus then we discern the modern names of Russia and Moscow in the Bible names adduced by Ezekiel. It is not difficult also to recognize in תוֹבל, Thuvahl, or Tubl, or as the Greeks wrote it Θοβελ Thobel, a name which naturally connects itself with them; and which in conjunction with them tends in a very remarkable manner to determine and fix the proper object of the prediction. The river Tobol gives name to the city of Tobolium, or Tobolski, the metropolis of the extensive region of Siberia, lying immediately eastward of the territories of Muscovy. Thobol and M’sh’kh, are mentioned together by Ezekiel, who characterizes them as nations trading in copper;^a a metal which, it is notorious, abounds in the soil of Siberia; a region which included all the northern part of Asia, which borders on Russia to the west, on the Ice-sea to the north, on the Eastern Ocean to the east, and on Great Tartary to the south. And thus the three denominations Rosh, Meshekh, and Thuval, united in the prophecy, point out, with equal capacity and conciseness, those widely extended regions which at the present day, we denominate collectively THE RUSSIAN EMPIRE.

Gog is styled the “Prince of Rosh, Meshekh, and Thuval,” that is, Autocrat of the Russians, Muscovites, and Siberians, or of “All the Russias.” But he is also styled “Gog of the land of Magog” as well. There must be something significant in this. It affirms that he is sovereign of Magog as well as prince of all the Russias; for there in the latter days is his proper dominion. “Whoever reads Ezekiel,” says Michaelis, “can hardly entertain a doubt that Gog is the name of a sovereign, and Magog that of his people; the prophet speaks of the former, not as a people, but as an Emperor.” Let us then now inquire where is the region styled Magog; that we may be able to ascertain of what people besides the Russians, Gog will be the imperial mishmar or sentinel. And as Gomer is represented by Ezekiel as a constituent of his confederacy, we will also endeavor to establish what people among the moderns will answer to the name.

From the Hebrew Scriptures we learn that Magog and Gomer were the names of two of the sons of Japheth; and it is to ancient Hebrew authority alone that we can resort to ascertain where, according to the common repute of the Israelites, the nations which p. Dan. 85 descended from these two heads of families, and which long retained the proper names of those heads, were spread and established. Josephus says, “that Japheth, the son of Noah, had seven sons; who proceeding from their primitive seats in the mountains of Taurus and Amanus, ascended Asia to the river Tanais (or Don); and then entering Europe penetrated as far westward as the Straits of Gibraltar, occupying the lands which they successively met with in their progress; all of which were uninhabited; and bequeathed their names to their different families or nations. That Gomer founded the Gomari, whom the Greeks at that time called Galatæ—τους νυν ὑφ Ἑλληνων Γαλλατας καλουμενους;—and that Magog founded the Magogæ, whom the Greeks then called Scythæ—σκυθαι.” It only therefore remains for us to ascertain, which were the nations that the Greeks in the time of Josephus called Scythæ, and which they then styled Galatæ; and to observe whether the geographical affinities of these nations are such as answer to those which are plainly required by the prophecy for Magog and Gomer.

Herodotus, the most ancient Greek writer accessible, acquaints us “that the name Scythæ was a name given by the Greeks to an ancient and widely-extended people of Europe, who had spread themselves from the river Tanais, or Don, westward along the banks of the Ister or Danube.” “The Greeks,” observes Major Rennel, “appear to have first used the term Scythia in its application to their neighbors the Scythians of the Euxine, who were also called Getæ, or Gothi; and were those who afterward subdued the Roman empire: and from which original stock the present race of people in Europe seem to be descended.” And again: “The Scythians of Herodotus appear to have extended themselves in length from Hungary, Transylvania, and Wallachia, on the westward, to the river Don on the eastward.” Thus the testimony of Herodotus and Josephus is in perfect agreement concerning the progress of Magog and Gomer. In these same regions the Scythæ continued many ages after Herodotus, and even long after the time of Josephus; for Dio Cassius, who lived 150 years after Josephus, and about 200 after Christ, relates that Pompey in his return into Europe from Asia, “determined to pass to the Ister, or Danube, through the Scythæ, and so to enter Italy.” These were the original Scythæ. But Herodotus states further, that a portion of the same people in an after age, turned back upon the European seats of their fathers, and established themselves in Asia; and from these sprung the Asiatic Scythæ, who in process of time almost engrossed the name to themselves.

Since the name of Scythæ, or Magog, is to be considered not by itself, but in geographical connection with Galatæ, or Gomer, we have only to inquire, whether any geographical affinity is really ascribed by the Greeks to the Scythæ and Galatæ? and to ascertain to what regions of the earth those names so associated were applied. If we can discover these two points, we ought thereby to have discovered specifically the Magog of the prophecy, which is to be associated with the region, or people of Gomer.

p. Dan. 86 Diodorus Siculus, who lived about a century before Josephus, traces them much further into Europe than the Danube; even to the shores of the Baltic, and to the very confines of the Galatæ of the Greeks. In speaking of the amber found upon the shores of that sea, he there places the region expressly denominated, “Scythia above or north of Galatia.” In which description we at length find the Scythæ, or Magogæ, in the immediate neighborhood of the Galatæ of the Greeks, or Gomer.

GALATIA—Γαλατια—is the common and familiar name used by all the earlier Greek historians for Gaul, the Gallia of the Latins; and Galatæ—Γαλαται—is the common Greek name for Gauls, or the Galli of the Latins. Thus Strabo says, “all the Galatæ were called Celtæ by the Greeks;” and it is equally true that “the Celtæ were called Galatæ by the Greeks, and Galli by the Latins.” To inquire, who were “the Galatæ of the Greeks?” is therefore the same as to inquire who were the Galli of the Romans? A colony of these Galatæ or Galli in the third century before Christ, emigrated from Gaul and established themselves in Asia Minor; where they were ever after called by their Greek name, Galatians. Diodorus’ “Scythia above Gaul extending towards the Baltic,” accurately describes that large tract of Europe above the Rhine, or northern boundary of Gaul, through which flow the rivers Elbe, Ems, and Weser. Here, and in the countries immediately adjoining, were the SCYTHÆ bordering upon the GALATÆ on the north; that is to say, a considerable part of MAGOG geographically associated with Gomer.^a Diodorus elsewhere describes the northern part of Galatia, or Gaul, as confining upon Scythia. “The Greeks,” says he, “call those who inhabit Marseilles and the inland territory, and all those who dwelt towards the Alps and Pyrenean mountains, by the name of Celts; but those who occupy the country lying to the northward, between the Ocean and the Hyrcynian mountain, and all others as far as Scythia, they denominate Galatæ; but the Romans call all those nations by one collective appellation, Galatæ, that is, Galli.” These geographical affinities unite in the name of Celto-Scythæ, mentioned by Strabo. “The ancient Greeks,” says he, “at first called the northern nations by the general name cf Scythians; but when they became acquainted with the nations in the west, they began to call them by the different names of Celts, and Celto-Scythæ;” and again, “the ancient Greek historians called the northern nations collectively Scythians and Celto-Scythæ;” which latter name plainly denoted the most western portion of the Scythæ, adjoining Gaul; of the number of whom were the Scythæ on the north of the Galatæ, or the Σκυθαι ὑπερ Γαλατιαν.

In this general description may be easily discerned that extended portion of the West of Europe, comprehending ancient Gaul, Belgium, p. Dan. 87 and the countries bordering upon them, which constituted in our day the Napoleon empire. Gomer, then, points immediately to France. “Scythia above Gaul,” or Magog above Gomer, that is, to the north of it, through which flows the Ems, Elbe, and Weser, is the country from which proceeded principally that renowned people who in the early ages of Romanism formed an extensive confederacy with their kindred nations upon the Rhine, which had migrated successively thither from the regions of the Danube; and who under the common denomination of FRANKS overran Gaul, and subdued it; and finally establishing their power and population in the conquered country, permanently superseded the name of Gaul by that of FRANCE. “As for the seats of the Franks,” says the Universal History, “it appears from their constant incursions into Gaul, that they dwelt on the banks of the Rhine in the neighborhood of Mentz.” All historians speak of them as placed there till their settling in Gaul. Their country, according to the best modern geographers and historians, was bounded on the north by the Ocean and the Rhine; on the south by the Maine; and on the east by the Weser.

These were therefore the Celto-Scythians, or Scythians on the northern confine of Gaul; that is, Magog in contiguity with Gomer. The Chaldean interpreter applies the name of Magog to the Germans; in short, all the ancients looked for the Magog of scripture in the West. The Scythæ of Asia, who as we have seen were only a partial emigration, or reflux, from their ancient stock in Europe, cannot, with any soundness of criticism, be taken account of in this argument.

From the evidence, then, now before the reader,^a the proposition may be considered as fairly proved, that Daniel’s “king of the north” is the same power as Ezekiel’s “Gog;” and that Gog being the Russian Power in full manifestation, the king of the north and the Russian Power are identical. This position being established, we can now look around us, and far before us into the future, and be p. Dan. 88 prepared to point out assuredly what will be the general progress and issue of the present EASTERN QUESTION.

25. Future Magnitude of Gog’s Dominion

Daniel does not particularize the extent of the dominion of the King of the North in the eleventh chapter; though indeed he symbolizes it in his second. But what he has omitted in the eleventh, Ezekiel has sufficiently supplied in his prophecy of Gog. By the names of the peoples he mentions in Gog’s title, and the description of his army, the reader may learn what nations this Autocrat gathereth and heapeth to himself as thick clay in the day of his high exaltation.^a

Daniel says of him in general terms, “He shall enter into the countries, and shall overwhelm and pass over”—and “many (רבּוֹת ravboth, referring to ארצוֹת erĕtzoth, countries, understood) shall fall;” that is, from weakness, as the word implies—the worn-out condition of the powers facilitating his progress. Ezekiel tells us that these countries are those of Magog, Gomer, Persia, Ethiopia, Libya, and Togarmah, with their hosts; in addition to Rosh, Meshekh, and Thuval. He says that the King of the North, or Gog, is to be for משׁמר mishmar, a guard, sentinel, shepherd, or supervisor, over all these.^b It is not to be supposed that he will be the sole emperor, or crowned head. The position marked out for him is that of a King of kings, and a Lord of lords, as was his predecessor, Nebuchadnezzar, the post-Nimroudian founder of the Kingdom of Babylon. It is probable that the House of Hapsburg will continue imperial; nay, I would say more than probable. The Autocrat’s supervisorship of the Kingdom of Babylon is not at all incompatible with the Western Imperiality of Austria. Alexander in Constantinople, and Francis Joseph in Vienna, with the priority assigned to the former, would only be a resuscitation of an old form of the catholic Kingdom of the Fourth Beast, as when Arcadius and Honorius amicably divided, or rather agreed to sustain, the Majesty of the Two-Legged Iron and Brass dominion upon their united shoulders. According to this arrangement there will then exist a Dragon, a Beast with Two Horns like the horns of a Lamb, and the Ten Horns, exercising all the power now exercised by the thrones, principalities, and powers, in the countries named by Ezekiel, and represented by the Diademed Ten-Horned symbol.

The Autocrat, then, as chief emperor, will become in the progress of events “Lord of the Ascendant,” even the Agag^c of the East and p. Dan. 89 West; shining forth from his lofty throne as Lucifer, son of the morning, over the nations weakened by the gratification of his insatiable ambition. If he have not yet said it, the time is coming when he will “think an evil thought,”^a and say in his heart, as it is revealed of him, “I will ascend into heaven, I will exalt my throne above the stars of God: I will sit also upon the Mount of the Congregation (Zion) in the sides of the north: I will ascend above the heights of the clouds; I will be like the Most High!”^b He who made man, and knows thoroughly the vanity and presumption of the human heart, has spoken thus of Belshatzar the type of the last occupant of the throne of the Kingdom of Babylon. A man of such a soul as this is not upright, and therefore unfit to rule the world for God; for “He that ruleth over men must be just, ruling in the fear of Yahweh.”^c His dominion’s duration must therefore of necessity be brief. But while it lasts, he will prove himself to be “a proud man, who enlargeth his desire as the grave, and as death, and cannot be satisfied, but gathereth unto himself all nations, and heapeth unto him all peoples, .... lading himself with thick clay.”^d

By turning to a map of Europe and Asia, the reader may trace out the territory of the Kingdom of Babylon as it is destined to exist in its last form under the King of the North in his Gogian manifestation. The names of countries furnished by Ezekiel will lead him to a just conception of its general extent. Besides “All the Russias,” it will take in Norway, Sweden, Denmark, Holland, Belgium, France, Spain, Portugal, Italy, Switzerland, Germany, Prussia, Austria, Turkey, Persia, Tartary, Greece, the Roman Africa, and Egypt. This will be a dominion of great magnitude, extending from the North Sea to the Wall of China and Affghanistan, and from the Ice-Sea to the Deserts of Africa and Arabia.

26. Nebuchadnezzar’s Image the Symbol of the Gogian Autocrat’s Dominion

The organization which this vast empire will assume, when fully developed, is represented in the second chapter of Daniel by a Colossus in human form, which as an apparition flitted before the mind of Nebuchadnezzar in a dream. Daniel says that the scene of which it was the subject, was representative of what should be “in the Latter Days.” This being admitted, it follows that what is recorded in that chapter is yet in the future. The scene exhibits a Colossus standing on its feet in unrivalled brightness of glory, and terrible to behold. Standing thus for a time not indicated, another object appears, even A STONE representative of a Power not in mortal hands. This Stone-Power smites the Colossus on the Feet, and it falls; after which the Stone proceeds to reduce the broken fragments to dust which by the violence of the process is carried away so completely that not a vestige of the Colossus remains; and the place left void by p. Dan. 90 the disappearance of the statue becomes the territory of the Stone-power, which by the operation becomes a Mountain-dominion, and fills the whole Image-earth.

This scene has never been exhibited before the eyes of the world, because the constituents of the Colossus have never yet been put together so as to form the Image of the scene. These constituents are represented by the different metallic parts, as the Chaldæo-Assyrian golden head; the Medo-Persic Assyrian silver arms and breast; the Macedo-Assyrian belly of brass; the Greco-Assyrian, and Greco-Egyptian, northern and southern thighs of brass; the Latino-Assyrian and the Greco-Assyrian eastern and western iron legs; and the Russo-Greek Assyrian and Latino-Assyrian iron and clay feet and toes. Now, while the head, breast and arms, belly, thighs, legs and toes, have all existed, the Feet have not yet been formed; so that it has been hitherto impossible for the Colossal Image to stand erect, as Nebuchadnezzar saw it in his dream. It is, therefore, the mission of the Autocrat to form the feet and set up the image before the world in all its excellent brightness, and terribleness of form; that all men subject to the Kingdom of Babylon may worship the work of its creator’s power.

When it stands upon the Plain of Dura the imperial fabric will rest upon the Russo-Greek and Latin Feet and Toes—two emperors and ten kings on the Roman earth, whatever may be beyond. The form of the Image necessitates the reduction of the present number of European emperors from four to two.^a There are but two Legs, therefore there can be only two imperial divisions of the dominion in its latter-day, or time-of-the-end manifestation. From mature consideration I am satisfied that Austria and Russia will be the imperial supporters of the united majesty of the Image; for there must be Ten Kingdoms, and if Austria were suppressed, and France remain imperial, the tenth kingdom would be wanting; besides that prophecy has already designated France as a Gomerian constituent of the Image, and as “a tenth of the city” or State of Babylon.^b From these premises my inference is, that the present Napoleon-empire is simply meteoric. Providence has raised it up as the Frog-Power dominion^c to work out by its policy an antagonist Russo-Austrian policy leading to the manifestation of the Image, preparatory to the overthrow of the Kingdom of Babylon by the Stone-Power, or kingdom of God. Had the French empire not been resuscitated, events would have flowed in a different channel, and the gathering of the nations to the Armageddon-conflict, humanly speaking, evaded. State documents prove that the policy of Louis Napoleon has been the exciting cause of the Eastern Question; and it will be the cause of still further complications. But beyond a certain limit he cannot go. He has a mission to perform, and when it is accomplished his work is done. He will not be allowed to settle himself in the throne of a French empire.

p. Dan. 91 The age of conquest, he says, is gone, never more to return; and this was most complacently reëchoed by the admirers of Louis Napoleon in England. But, how little do the puppets, through whom Providence works out his purposes, understand the times and tendencies to which they belong! They propose, but the disposition of all things is of God. There is to be no more fighting for conquest or aggrandizement, or selfish advantage between France and England, says Lord Palmerston; but for the liberties of oppressed nations, and to establish the freedom and independence of Europe: and, continues he, “I am confident it will be crowned with success.” There may, indeed, be no more fighting between France and England, as belligerent principals: but their leaders are all wrong in supposing that “the age of conquest is past for ever,” and that they will succeed in establishing the freedom and independence of Europe. There never has been such an age of conquest as that which will soon open upon the world; and as to the establishment of European freedom and independence, the war to be initiated is the setting in of an overwhelming inundation that will submerge them under one of the most terrible and scorching despotisms that ever wrung the heart of nations. England’s ally, in whom she now glories, and by whose aid she proposes to do such great things for Europe, will eventually prove but a broken reed. The French empire must fall, and Napoleon perhaps give place to a nominee of his “good friend” the Autocrat; for before the end comes the French Monarchy may be expected to reappear, and then, unless Britain can form some alliance beyond the limits of the Kingdom of Babylon, she will have to fight the battle of freedom and independence alone, and at the price of her own existence if she fail. France, as I have said, is Gomerian; and as such must come into confederacy with the great Cossack Ruler of the Gogian Image; and then, though not as a principal, she will send her conquered and crest-fallen hosts to do battle for the Autocrat against Britain on the mountains of Israel’s land.

It is impossible that Nebuchadnezzar’s image can represent any other imperial confederacy of nations than that under the King of the North in the time of the end. The names given in Ezekiel’s list of Gog’s army, are representative of the countries known to have existed under the dynastic rule of the gold, the silver, the brass and the iron. Part of Assyria proper already belongs to the King of the North, and pertains to the gold; Persia is to be with him as the silver element; his Grecism is typified by the brass; and his Gomerians by the iron; while his Magogians, Roshi, Muscovites, and Siberians, with the central Asiatic Tartars of Togarmah’s house, are the clay, which he commingles with the iron to form the Feet as the connecting medium between the Legs and Toes. Besides, no two such empires as that of the Image and the Northern Gog could coexist in the latter days; there would be, neither population nor space for them in the Kingdom of Babylon. As then the time and place of their existence are the same, they must, therefore, be one and the same confederate power, the image being symbolical or representative p. Dan. 92 of the Gogian dominion of the King of the North, or Autocrat of Russia.

27. Edom, Moab, and Ammon Divided Off from Turkey for a Price

“But these shall escape out of his hand, Edom and Moab, and the chief territory of the sons of Ammon.”

These territories are not included in the Gogian empire. They are situated in the south and south-east of the Holy Land, and will fall under the dominion of another power, hostile to the King of the North. It is probable that the power holding these countries will for a time possess Egypt, but in the course of the war lose it; for “the land of Egypt shall not escape” the King of the North, which implies its independence of him to a certain time.

In the thirty-ninth verse of the eleventh chapter of Daniel, the phrase אדמה יחלק במחיר adahmah yechallek bimchir, is rendered by Moses Stuart, “land will he distribute as a reward,” and affirms it of Antiochus. But a general distribution of land to favorites is no special characteristic, but common to all powers. It is evidently some particular land or country the Little Horn is to treat as expressed by the words. The land is without doubt that which was to be trodden under foot by the Little Horn of the Goat abomination until the end—the Holy Land.

Now, though the words are susceptible of the rendering he has given, the testimonies of other prophets satisfy me that it is not the proper rendering in this place. I rather incline to the words, “he shall divide the country for a price,” as foretelling a bargain and sale between the Little Horn and another power of a portion of the territory now in its possession. Yahweh addressing Israel upon the subject of their restoration, says by Isaiah, “I gave Egypt for thy ransom.”^a Egypt acknowledges the suzerainty of the Porte, and is so situated that a tract including Edom, Moab, and the chief of the territory of the sons of Ammon could be easily commanded from thence by a naval power; so that while the King of the North is making great progress elsewhere, an adversary is securing a maritime section of Ottomania for itself.

Besides the passage in Isaiah, there is a testimony strikingly to the point in Joel.^b Speaking of the time when Yahweh will gather the armies of all nations into the valley of Jehoshaphat, on the east of the Holy City; which encampment there is the same as the King of the North’s, “between the seas to the mountain, the glory of the holy;” the prophet says, that they will be gathered there for a great overthrow because they have scattered Israel, and divided Yahweh’s land. The words are in the English version, “parted my land;” “parted” being the same word in the Hebrew as “divide” in Dan. xi. 39. In p. Dan. 93 Joel the word for “land” is ארץ ĕrĕtz, but in Daniel אדמה ădāmāh. Now, though both words are applied to the Holy Land and other countries, I take it that ădāmāh in relation to the Little Horn of the Goat, has reference to more country than that of the Holy; while ĕrĕtz in Joel refers exclusively to Yahweh’s land, which will suffer division or partition as a part of the adāmāh or country bargained for between the Constantinopolitan and his wealthy customer. The partition of countries in general by “the powers that be,” is no offence against the Deity, because, although the earth is his and the fulness thereof, yet he does not lay claim to them in that special sense in which he does to Palestine. He has published to the world, “the Land is mine, and shall not be alienated;”^a and because it is his, and all pertaining to it, therefore it is all holy—the land, the cities, the metropolis, and the nation. In relation to the Gentiles, they are under an interdict. They are forbidden to appropriate them, or to oppress and spoil them, under penalty of Yahweh’s wrath and terrible indignation. Poland may be divided, and Lombardy and Hungary “plucked up by the roots” with impunity, because they are the lands of Israel’s enemies, the worshippers of the Beast that has made war upon the Saints and overcome them; but, woe be to the peoples that divide the Holy, and burden themselves with Jerusalem, “the glory of the Holy.” Hear what Yahweh proclaims in regard to this subject: “Behold, I will make Jerusalem a cup of trembling unto all the people round about when they shall be in the siege both against Judah and Jerusalem. And in that day will I make Jerusalem a burdensome stone for all people; all that burden themselves with it shall be cut in pieces, though all the people of the earth be gathered together against it.”^b

The country then divided off by the Constantinopolitan will include the south and south-east of the Holy land, comprehending Edom, Moab, and the principal part of Ammon. I do not say that this will be all that will be purchased of the Constantinopolitan. I rather expect that all Palestine (which, however, does not comprehend in the modern use of that name all the Holy Land) may be included in the purchase; but what I mean is, that when the seat of war is transferred to the Holy Land, that portion of the purchase anciently styled Edom, Moab, and Ammon, in major part, will be exempted from the fate of Egypt; and therefore form an asylum for refugees from the northern parts of the country. It will be the section preserved from conquest by the power of the purchaser at the time of the King of the North’s overthrow by Michael, the great Prince Royal of Israel.

The power that comes into possession of “Tyre and Sidon, and all the coasts of Palestine,”^c with Edom, Moab, Ammon, Egypt, Ethiopia, and Seba, is the great Latter-Day antagonist of Gog, whose dominion attains to the full after the rushing forth of the King of the North like a tempest against the Ottoman element of the Little p. Dan. 94 Horn of the Goat; and because it possesses these countries in “the time of the end,” it is the Tyre, or Daughter of Tyre, the Edom, the Moab, and so forth, of the latter days; so that the prophecies treating of those lands at the time, are really delivered concerning that power; for the prophets speak not so much of races and individual potentates, as of powers on the territories named from the ancient founders of states upon them.

Let us take Moab as an illustration. Moab has evidently a latter-day history, from the notice taken of her in Daniel; and from the saying, “I will ‘bring again the captivity of Moab in the latter days, saith Yahweh.”^a We are not, however, to expect that the real descendants of Lot will return there; for their race is melted down and lost among the nations; but that the country called Moab, now a desolate portion of the Constantinopolitan, or Dragon empire, will be occupied by a power that shall restore prosperity to the country previous to its coming into the possession of the occupant of David’s throne, who will make her the wash-bowl^b of his kingdom.

When the northern Gog invades the Holy Land and advances against Jerusalem, there will of course be great alarm among the Jewish inhabitants of the country whose especial enemy he is. As the power that overshadows them with its protection is compelled to fall back on Edom, Moab, and Ammon, where it will maintain its position, they will retire with it as “outcasts” from its northern section, which will then be in the hand of Gog the “spoiler,” the “extortioner,” and the “oppressor” of Judah. Now in view of this situation of affairs, the Spirit of God has oracularized the following address to this Moabitish power, saying, “Take counsel, execute judgment; make thy shadow as the night in the midst of the noonday; hide the outcasts, bewray not him that wandereth. Let mine outcasts dwell with thee, Moab; be thou a covert to them from the face of the spoiler.” From this it is evident that in the time of the end the power occupying Moab is antagonist to the spoiler, and the protector of Yahweh’s outcasts; which a Moabitish power has never been before. The protection will certainly be accorded until the Deliverer come to Zion. If the power understood the oracle, its energy of resistance would be increased by it; because the exhortation to become the protector of the Jewish outcasts is immediately followed by the announcement, that “the extortioner is at an end, the spoiler ceaseth, and the oppressors are consumed out of the land;” as the result, doubtless, of the king of the north “coming to his end with none to help him.” The power occupying Moab, then, would not be disposed to enter into terms with Gog and to deliver up the refugees; but would be stirred up to make greater efforts in hope of more prosperous campaigns than heretofore; assuredly gathering that the overthrow of the enemy was not remote.

The consumption of the oppressors out of the Holy Land can only be coetaneous with the fall of Gog upon the mountains of Israel by p. Dan. 95 the fury of Adonai Yahweh;^a the overthrow of the king of the north by Michael;^b the smiting of the image on the feet by the stone; the consumption of Paul’s Man of Sin; and the beating down of the Assyrian by the voice of Yahweh.^c They are all one and the same event happening to the same power—the treading of the winepress in the day of vengeance, when the hero of Bozrah tramples the people in his anger, and makes them drunk in his fury, and brings down their strength to the earth.^d

But when it shall be said, the treaders down are consumed out of the Holy Land, what order of things will obtain there from that time forward? Will the Moabitish protector of Judah advance his forces and reoccupy the scene of Gog’s disaster; or what other alternative will remain? The answer is, by no means! The oracle of the Deity declares, in this same prophecy concerning Moab, that when the oppressors are consumed out of the land, “The throne shall be established in mercy; and He (whose right it is) shall sit upon it in truth in the tabernacle of David, judging and seeking judgment, and hasting righteousness.”^e When this establishment of the kingdom of David is perfected, Yahweh will have accomplished to scatter the power of the Holy People; an event which marks the terminus of the “time, times, and a half,” and finishes the things revealed in Daniel’s book.