true that "holy men of old spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost."

But the very repetition of this passage shows that there must be importance in it. Surely God does not reiterate trifles. I ask you, Do those men treat the Scripture with that reverence which is its due, or God with truly responsive gratitude, who tell us that we ought to pass over such passages as these, as if our duty were not to pray, and labour to be able to explain, and, if possible, to understand whatever God has written for our learning? And yet I have heard ministers of the gospel speak as if it were to their credit, that they were so dazzled by the glories of Palestine, that they could not spare one glance at what they think the humbler and the misty beauties of Patmos. It does seem to me that "all Scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for correction, and for instruction in righteousness" and if God saw it to be for his glory to write it, surely the least response that we can give is, to make it our study to understand it. Of course it becomes us never so to dwell upon one part as to give a disproportionate attention to the rest. These historic and prophetic pictures are the few and the far between; and we are only to discourse upon them on Sabbaths that are few and far between. The great, saving, vital truths of the gospel are to be the woof and the warp of every sermon; the sum, the substance, the core, the life, of every appeal. But when such passages as these-historical, it is true; prophetic, it is also true -come before us, in the ordinary course of our ordinary reading, it becomes us to look at them, and pray for light to understand them, and to gather from the tree that God has planted leaves that shall be for healing, and fruit that shall be for food to the people.

These four kingdoms, then, are now depicted under a new symbol. The first symbol was the image composed of different metals; the second class of symbols are four wild beasts; the first, a lion with wings; a hieroglyph in one respect: because this composite animal alone could express what was the mind of God, and denote the strength and courage that combined with them the speed and progress of the Babylonian empire. The second symbol, or type, was the bear-the symbol of Persia, and expressive

of its cruel and savage nature. The third was the leopard,-the Macedonian leopard, with four wings, to give a greater idea of the rapidity of its conquests; and with four heads, into which the empire of Alexander was divided after his death, and the dominion that was given to them. And then the last, an animal, not named, but described,-" dreadful and terrible, and strong exceedingly, stamping the residue with the feet of it, and diverse from all the other beasts,"-plainly the Roman empire, represented by the iron feet and toes of the great image. It had also ten horns. The horn is always used in Scripture to represent power it denotes, in prophetic language, a dynasty, a political empire. This last wild beast, of terrific power and strength, and irresistible victories, was to have upon his head, as the hieroglyph expresses it, "ten horns." These were the ten kingdoms, symbolized in the former image by the ten toes, into which the Roman empire was to be divided; these ten kingdoms I have enumerated in their order, in the course of my remarks upon the great image; and I therefore forbear to repeat them now. These ten horns, or kingdoms, have existed in every age since the empire came into being, and are in existence at the present moment.

Then there was to spring up in the midst of the ten horns, a "little horn," politically and physically small, but from its pretensions and its assumptions, terrible and influential. This little horn was to pull down three of the ten horns. Now, is there any one fact in history by which this is borne out, and which shows how truly this prediction has been fulfilled? This I will look at by-and-by; but, in the mean time, let me call upon you to notice that these four wild beasts arose from the ocean, or the great sea, convulsed and agitated by the four winds that swept it; teaching us that these governments were to arise from social chaos, or, if I may so express myself, that society, torn and convulsed to its centre by the antagonistic passions of those that compose it, should be driven to have recourse to rule, government, and authority, in order to preserve it from utter extinction; to consolidate its powers, and maintain harmony within; to defend itself from the aggressions of enemies without. But these governments that were to arise are here called "wild beasts;" denoting what, after all, has been the character of those great empires, and of every

empire that has not the gospel of peace to perfect, to sanctify, and to cement it. What has been the history of nations in the past? they have raised themselves to ascendency by force or by fraud; and they have maintained that ascendency generally by force or by fraud also. War has been the pride and the glory of nations in the past. Coercion has been the language of the most illustrious emperors; and the sword cast into the scale, as in the case of Camillus of old, has been the justice which nations have meted out, and kings and great kingdoms have called in. A wild beast is the true symbol of a nation, a dynasty, or a kingdom that knows not, and coheres not by, the cementing influence of the gospel of Jesus. And when we know that this is the character of nations, how fervently should we pray for the advent of that blessed period, when the spear shall be turned into the pruning-hook, and the sword shall be beaten into the ploughshare; when the kingdoms of this world shall become the kingdoms of our God and of his Christ, and the only sceptre that shall sway the nations from sea to sea, shall be the sceptre of the Prince of peace, the righteousness, the love, the mercy, of the Son of God.

I have noticed that this last wild beast, the fiercest, or the most powerful of all, had ten horns; or, as I explained to you, was divided into ten separate and independent dynasties. Of these I have already given you a list, as they exist at the present moment, with the slightest shade of differences, in the modern European nations. In the midst of all these, there was to arise a little horn; plainly a political dynasty, like the rest, but with very great moral, personal, and distinctive peculiarities. This little horn was not Mohammed, or Bramah, or Confucius, because it was to appear in the midst of the other ten horns. It spread from the head of the wild beast, amid the ten horns, or kingdoms, which first arose; and it was, like the other horns, a political dynasty; but it differed from the rest in this respect, that it had eyes seeing, and a mouth for speaking. We are, therefore, taught that this power should be a combination of the power of the seer and the speaker, the лioxоños, and the priest, and the political speaker. It should be "a horn," having political power; but should have eyes; the origin of the Greek word èñíøzoños,

for

from which is derived the English word episcopacy, signifying 66 one that oversees ;" one that sees and looks over other persons;" and the name given to the prophets of old is "a seer;" 66 one that sees." The ecclesiastical character of this little horn is, therefore, plainly indicated by the peculiar feature that it was to have eyes for seeing, or superintending those that were beneath it. And not only was it to have eyes, but it was also to have a mouth, speaking great things; a preacher of proud pretensions, or a doctor of despotic laws; an enacter of canons, or rules for government and for regulation.

Then you will notice another feature in it, that it was to uproot three out of the ten kingdoms. Now if I apply this little horn where I think it is indisputably applicable, to the Papal power that now reigns at Rome, I think you will find every feature of the prophecy met and embodied in the history of that power. The three kingdoms that were rooted up by this little horn were the three kingdoms of the Vandals, Ostrogoths, and the Lombards, who were, after a succession of troubles, rooted up by the Papacy and constituted into the States of the Church. Now here is a very remarkable coincidence. Can this accident, that there is here a description of a little horn, an ecclesiastico-political power, which was to root out three horns or kingdoms that preceded it? And you find in the history of Europe, that the Papacy has destroyed, partly by force and partly by fraud, long ago, three of the estates of the ten into which Europe was divided; and the pope wears upon his head at this very moment, the tiara or three-crowned cap, to denote the three kingdoms or horns which he rooted up, and over which he now reigns.

Then you will notice that this power was to have a mouth speaking great things—a mouth by which it claims to be the vicar of God, and to have the keys of heaven and hell. It assumes the language, and arrogates to itself the attributes of deity. A mouth which assumes what bishop never assumed before, and claims an intimacy with the world of spirits such as God never vouchsafed to any creature upon earth. The pope professes to see into the realms of spirits; to read and to make known God's hidden, unsearchable, and inscrutable record; and pronounces, by declaring that he sees, what is the doom of the

lost that are in wo, and the destiny of the saved that are in glory; and can, for payment, facilitate the escape of the sufferers in purgatory, and can canonize and constitute into saints, to be worshipped, those who are the inmates of the latter.

But the better way to show how this prophecy is fulfilled, is to refer to some of the great things that this horn speaks. Do not say that it is of no importance to explain this. Whatever God has written, it is the duty of the minister to endeavour to expound. Here is a prophecy that this episcopal ecclesiasticopolitical power was to have, in the first place, a mouth that should speak great things. Let me read to you very briefly what I myself have collected, at considerable labour and pains, from among the "great things" which this mouth speaks. I might give you, not my description of the things, but the very things themselves, as I have taken them from the writings in which they are contained. The bull of Pope Sextus V. against the two sons of wrath, as he calls them, Henry of Navarre and the Prince de Condé, is one specimen amid many of the pretensions put forth by the Papal power. You say, perhaps, "these are obsolete."

What was infallibly right in the sixteenth century, cannot be wrong in the nineteenth. These pretensions never have been diluted, still less repudiated. The pope claims jurisdiction over all the kings and governments of the earth; though, thanks be to God, I think his political sovereignty is gone substantially, never to be wielded again with any thing like success over the nations of the earth; though his spiritual power, in our own land especially, seems to be making progress to a degree unprecedented since the Reformation.

In making these arrogant assumptions, "the mouth," as it is here called, proceeds upon the assumption that Peter was the chief of the apostles, and that the popes of Rome are the successors of Peter. There is not the least evidence in the Bible or in history that such was the case. In the first place, when the apostles contended which should be the greatest in the kingdom of heaven, our Lord, instead of setting Peter before them and saying, "Here is your superior," took a little child, and set him in the midst of them, and said, "He that is greatest of all shall be servant of all." Was Peter constituted an ambassador? So