is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness. That the man of God may be perfect, thoroughly furnished unto all good works." (67)

SECTION XLIV.

The Roman empire most conspicuous in both profane and sacred history.-The present state of it, a remarkable verification of prophecy.--A new idea of the prophetical period 1260 suggested.The wisdom of the Creator infinite equally in bis visible and invisible works.-His preseience and government of the intellectual world.-Absurd consequences of presumption in the exposition of prophecy. Prophecies connected with time, are delivered under a seal,—and dealt out in suitable portions at seasonable times.-A certain degree of obscurity necessary to prophecy, and will accompany it to the end.

THE empire of the Romans makes a more conspicuous figure in history than any of the three great monarchies which attained to universal dominion before it, for its great anti

quity, and the long duration of its power, the splendour of its achievements in arms, and its celebrity in arts, of which some astonishing monuments remain to the present time. Neither were the terror which the Roman name bore along with it, and the consequent vast extent of her conquests, which in the flattering language of her historians and poets, were represented as being bounded only by the limits of the world itself, (68) less instrumental

(68) This hyperbolical representation of the empire of the Romans, though not literally true, yet being the common mode of speaking, is adopted in the scripture, Luke ii. 2. And the whole world or the earth is the common emblem in prophecy for the Roman empire, Rev. xiii. 3, 7, 8. Thus Psalm, x. 18.-The man of the earth is equivalent to St. Paul's man of sin, 2 Thess. ii. and to Isaiah xi. 4;-xiv. 6;-xxvi. 21. &c. This adoption of the Roman phraseology is one proof amongst many, that several things in scripture objected to by freethinkers as errors, are only in condescension to the ideas and philosophy of the age, or the country where the sacred author wrote. Such is Joshua's address to the sun, (see vol, ii, p. 32.) and Micaiah's court of heaven, where, as in the courts on earth, evil ministers are sometimes employed for their talents peculiarly fitted for the work they are sent to execute. 1 Kings xxii. 20:-Job i, 8. Multa in -scripturis sanctis dicuntur juxta opinionem illius temporis, et non juxta quod rei veritas continebat. HIERONOM. in Jer. xxviii,

to the consolidating of the fame of ancient Rome.

But it is not on any of these accounts, that the fourth universal monarchy occupies also a much larger share of the attention of the prophetic writers, than any of those which preceded it; but because the valuable information which it pleased God to vouchsafe to his church and faithful witnesses, for their com fort, and to be a light unto their paths, under the augmented darkness of times of persecution, was necessarily interwoven with the destinies of the Roman empire. Rome became a prominent figure upon the prophetic canvass, on account of the great length of time that her connection with the church was to endure, the very remarkable alterations her government was to undergo in that time, and the changing phases under which this fictitious moon was to shed her baleful light upon the earth. At certain times she would appear so unlike her former self, that not only a particular enumeration of her ancient characteristic marks was to be made, but the additional ones which she would also assume, would need to

be given; and still the "lady of kingdoms (69) and mistress of witchcrafts" would demand a long and laboured description, and require to be shewn in different attitudes, and under a variety of emblems, in order to render the numerous and important singularities of her character fully comprehensible.

For these reasons, and because it afforded a proper vehicle for the prophetic history of the sufferings, the admirable patience and final triumph of the faithful witnesses of Jesus, the Roman empire is an object of great consequence in the prophecies; and is, therefore, in its different stages of existence, carried down to a very late period of time. Sullenly she gave a place of nativity, a poor one indeed, (70) to the christian religion; and herself unwittingly afforded an occasion of signalizing it, and placing the evidences of its birth amongst the public records of the empire. But she watched its growth in infancy with the keen jealousy of a stepmother's eye

(69) Nahum iii. 4.-Isaiah xlvii. 5, 7.

(70) Luke ii. 9.