ing up from one (the western, or Macedonian) of the four heads (or kingdoms) into which the empire of Alexander had been divided. The progress of the Roman power is here geographically described also; for this little horn "waxed exceeding great towards the south, (Sicily and Africa,) and towards the east, (Macedon, Greece, and Syria,) and towards the pleasant land, (Judea.)

20. Thus, as marked out by prophecy, four times have the nations of the earth gathered themselves into mighty aggregates of power, denoted Universal Empires or Monarchies: none like went before, and none like have come after them; and it is upon the warrant of nega tive scripture testimony that men believe no other temporal universal empire possible. But, still, the dream of Nebuchadnezzar, and the interpretation of the prophet, point to a fifth monarchy greater than all the others, that shall arise when Christianity shall have swallowed up all other forms of religion, and the nations of the earth shall be gathered into one fold, under one all-conquering Shepherd-the Prince of Peace.a For Nebuchadnezzar saw a "stone cut out without hands, which smote the image and became a great mountain, and filled the whole earth," (Dan. ii. 34–5,) and this the prophet himself declares to be "the kingdom which the God of Heaven should set up, and which shall never be destroyed." The first and the fourth vision of Daniel contain farther prophecies relating to this kingdom.

21. While Daniel, in the first vision, was considering the ten horns (or kingdoms),b a little horn, believed by Protestant writers to denote Papal Rome, came up among them, and before it were three of the first horns plucked up by the roots;-the kingdom of the Heruli in the year 488-of the Ostrogoths in 553-and of the Lombards in 756. The seventh chapter of Daniel also gives an interpretation of the vision, and says of this little horn or kingdom that it "shall speak great words against the Most High, and shall wear out the saints of the Most High, and think to change times and laws; and they (the saints) shall be given into his hand until a time, and times, and the dividing (or half) of time." The period here denoted, in which the supposed Papal power was to prevail, is found to be twelve hundred and sixty years, allowing a day for a year, as explained in the Apocalypse. (Rev. xi. 3-xii. 6, 14.) Dr. Hales, a

a. Hence the fanatics of 1650, who looked for the immediate advent of the Saviour to rule over the whole earth as a temporal prince, were usually called Fifth Monarchists.

b. The ten kingdoms into which that of Rome was broken, or divided, are generally believed to have been the following, with their dates. Huns, (A. D. 356)-Ostrogoths, (377)—Visigoths, (378)-Franks, (407)—Vandals, (407)—Suevi, (407)—Burgundians, (407)—Heruli, (476) -Saxons, (476)—and Lombards, (483—526.)

celebrated English divine and chronologist, computes the commencement of the period at A. D. 620, and the end of it at A. D. 1880. We have not room to follow out here the reasoning on which the chronology is based.

22. The fulfilment of the prophecies relating to the taking away of the daily sacrifice of the Jews, and the destruction of the city and sanctuary of Jerusalem by the Romans, is so clear in relation to the times mentioned as to satisfy the most arrant scepticism. The period of the two thousand three hundred days (years, Dan. viii. 14) at the expiration of which the "transgression of desolation" should cease, and the "sanctuary be cleansed," is computed by Dr. Hales to have commenced B. C. 420, and the expiration of this period is also placed in the year of our Lord 1880. Most Protestant theological writers suppose that the three great angels described in the Apocalypse (Rev. xiv. 6-12) were the three great heralds of the REFORMATION, Wickliffe, Huss, and Luther.

23. The eleventh chapter of Daniel contains a remarkable series of prophetic declarations, foretelling the sufferings and persecutions of the Jews, from Alexander's successors in Syria and Egypt, till the end of the reign of Antiochus Epiph' anes, a period of one humdred and sixty years. Bishop Newton, who has given a copious illustration of the historical facts which verify the whole of this prophecy, remarks that "there is not in profane history so complete and regular a series of Egyptian and Syrian kings, and so concise and comprehensive an account of their affairs, as is found in this chapter of the prophet Daniel," and that "the prophecy is really more perfect than any one history." Dr. Hales says that "these prophecies of Daniel are, if possible, more surprising and astonishing than even his grand prophetic period of two thousand three hundred years, and the sev eral successions of empire that were to precede the spiritual kingdom of God upon the earth." With reference to the exact fulfilment of these prophecies he remarks: "Even the infidel Porphyry, who had access to several sources of information now lost, was so confounded by this exactness that he was driven to deny the authenticity of the prophecy relating to the Jews, declaring that it could not have been written before, but must have been compiled after, the reign of Antíochus Epiph' anes. But the prophecy is so intimately connected with the preceding and following parts of the vision, which relate to the Macedonians and Romans, that it must have been written by the same hand, and therefore be esteemed equally genuine with the

whole book of Daniel. The astonishing exactness, indeed, with which this minute prophetic detail has been fulfilled, furnishes the strongest pledge, from analogy, that the remaining prophecies were, and will be, as exactly fulfilled, each in its proper season.

24. The Old Testament abounds in prophecies which foretell the time and the circumstances of the coming of Christ the Messiah. That event was to happen before the sceptre should depart from Judah, and while a prince, of Jewish descent reigned over the Jews in their own land: the Messiah was to come while the second temple was standing,b and a messenger was to appear before him, the voice of one crying in the wilderness to prepare his way.c In the prophecies of Daniel the same event is foretold, (Dan. ix. 24-27,) and specified periods (marked according to similar computations in the Jewish scriptures, by weeks of years, each day for a year) are designated for the birth of the Messiah, his death, the duration of the Jewish war, and the destruction of Jerusalem. This illustrious prophecy Sir Isaac Newton declares to be "the foundation of the Christian religion."

25. The subject of the prophecies embraced in the Old Testament is one of so vast magnitude, that a brief sketch of only a few pages devoted to it must be imperfect in the extreme; but our object will have been accomplished if the little that we have said shall induce the reader to examine farther the historical evidences which the prophecies furnish in favor of the Christian religion, and which may be found in full detail in the works of Newton and Hales,d and an excellent compend of which is contained in the valuable work of Keith. The disciples of the Christian religion believe that its doctrines rest on a basis firm as immutable truth; and among the evidences of the reasonableness of their faith they point with confi dence to the prophecies which set forth the circumstances attendant upon the introduction, progress, and final triumph, of that religion; which contain historical proofs the most conclusive, and furnish the Christian with arguments which the cavillings of infidelity have never been able to invalidate. Whoever expresses an infidel doubt against the Christian religion, before he has fully examined the evidences which prophecy and history combined furnish in its favor, shows not only an unwarranted prejudice against the truth, but the most culpable ignorance and presumption also.

a. Gen. xlix. 10.

b. Hag. ii. 7, 9. Mal. iii. 1.

d. Thomas Newton on the Prophecies, 2 vols. 12mo, 1793. and Geography, History and Prophecy, 4 vols. 8vo, 1830.

c. Isa. xl. 3. Mal. iii. 1-iv. 5. Hales' Analysis of Chronology

CHAPTER VIII.

THE ROMAN EMPIRE.

ANALYSIS. 1. Rome at the commencement of the Christian era. The Roman empire.-2 Beginning of the history of Imperial Rome. Roman greatness not destroyed by Cæsar.-3. POWER AND MAJESTY OF ROME AND HER CESARS.-4. Sacred character of the emperorattached to the office rather than the man.-5. Atrocities of the early Cæsars. Character of Caligula.-6. Story of Caligula and the two consuls: of Caligula and his wife Cæsonia. Clandius and Nero. How their crimes were viewed by the people.-7. Virtues of the people of Republican Rome. Causes of the rapid declension from virtue--revolutionary wars-changes in the character of the population, &c.

8. Conquests of Republican Rome. Peaceful FOREIGN POLICY of Augustus and his successors.-9. Departures from this policy.-10. Policy of Adrian and the Antonines.-11. Decline of the empire under succeeding rulers. Causes and consequences of this decline-an interesting subject of philosophical research. Proposed view of the subject.

12. INTERNAL CONDITION OF THE ROMAN WORLD IN THE AGE OF THE ANTONINES. Repub lican simplicity of the early emperors.-13. The republican forms retained by Augustus and succeeding rulers. The numerous offices concentrated in the person of the emperor. Extent of the royal prerogatives. The illusion cherished by the people.-14. Increase of prosperity and population after Claudius. Italy and Greece compared. Amount of population in the empire.-15. THE SLAVES OF THE ROMANS. Derivation of the term slave.-16. Sanguinary character of the wars of the ancients. Treatment of slaves. Their value. Manumission of slaves.-17. ROMAN CITIZENS. Extension of the rights of citizenship.-18. TAXATION, under Augustus, Caracalla, Alexander Sevérus, &c.-19. Depopulation of the provincial districts. Foreign luxuries.-20. General poverty of the people. The amount of taxation.-21. Fixedness of the amount on each municipality. Causes of the impoverishment of the provinces.—2. THE ROMAN ARMY;-recruited in early times from the citizens only-in later times from the barbarians. Examples,-in the times of Marius and Cæsar;-at a later period.-23. Decline of public virtue in the army-how the emperors attempted to supply the defect. The pay of soldiers.-24. Military strength of the empire. Divisions of the legions. Their principal stations. "City Cohorts" and "Prætorian Guards."--25. Military tactics, armor, and discipline. -26. The cavalry. A Roman camp. The Roman navy.-27. The RELIGION OF THE ROMANS DURING THE EMPIRE.-28. Intolerance towards the Christians. Rise, progress, and influence, of Christianity.-29. The pagan religions-how viewed by the philosophers. The advantages of some religion admitted by all. General infidelity on the subject of religion.-30. The educated pagans. Superstitions of the common people.-31. SOCIAL MORALITY OF THE ROMANS. —32. Demoralizing effects of domestic slavery.-33. Of the favorite amusements of the Romansmock sea-fights, and the combats of the gladiators. Tragedy, in its gross reality. Influence of Christianity.

34. OUTWARD APPEARANCES OF GENERAL PROSPERITY IN THE AGE OF THE ANTONINES.— 35. Populousness of Italy, Gaul, and Britain. Carthage and the Eastern provinces.-36. The public highways. Construction of the Appian Way,-37. Aqueducts leading into the capital. Buildings of the Imperial age.-38. Roman architecture.-39. Sculpture and painting. The Laocoon and the Apollo Belvidere.-40. Education of the common people. Branches taught in the public schools. Additional instruction of the higher classes.-41. Support of the schools. Encouragement given to education by Vespasian, Adrian, and Antoninus Pius. Mathematics and the Natural Sciences. Bookshops. Libraries.

42. THE SILVER AGE OF ROMAN LITERATURE. Niebuhr's view of it. Gibbon's view. Servile imitation of the Greek writers.---43. The most distinguished Roman writers in this period of decline.-44. Opposing opinions entertained of Lucan. Lucan's Pharsalia.-45, Writings and character of Seneca. Juvenal.-46. Pliny the Elder.-47. Quinctilian the rhetorician.-4. Tacitus the historian.

49. GREEK LITERATURE DURING THE SILVER AGE. geographer.-50. Plutarch, Lucien, Galen, Pausanias, &c.

Dionysius the critic. Strabo the

51. ROMAN HISTORY AFTER THE TIME OF THE ANTONINES. Science of jurisprudence. Philosophical school of the Eclectics. Their system and its results.-52. Revival of Grecian literature. Longinus, Arrian, Diogenes Laertius, Herodian, and Dio Cassius.

53. INCREASING CAUSES OF DECLINE. Education for the many neglected. Public morals depraved. Diverse interests, &c., in the widely-distant provinces. Division of the empire. The citizens confounded with the provincials. Mercenary legions. Election of emperor. The old attachments to Rome broken. The destruction completed by the barbarians.-54. Gloomy forebodings. Examples from the opposite extremes of the pagan and the Christian world. Byron.

I.

1. At the commencement of the Christian era, the little settlement of mud-walled cottages which Romulus and his robber band had formed on the Palatine Hill, had grown into a mighty city-a nation in itself the emporium of commerce and the arts, and the Mistress of the civilized world. The laws and institutions of Augustus, and the gradual assimilation of manners, cemented the union of the provinces; and had public and private virtue remained, and wise legislation continued to uphold the fabric, the history of the "Decline and Fall" of the Roman empire-the last of the great monarchies of Prophecy-might not yet have been written.

2. With the overthrow of the republican constitution by Julius Cæsar, the history of Imperial Rome commences :-the struggles that followed the death of the usurper are only an interlude between the first and the second acts of the drama. But the destruction of Roman greatness was not an act of Cæsar: Rome, already given up to anarchy and civil war, and fast falling a prey to its own passions, was saved from dissolution by an act of daring usurpation; and it was through the twelve Caesars, of whom Julius was the first, that she attained the summit of her power, and fulfilled her destiny.

3. If Imperial Rome-embracing within herself and her mighty suburbs not less than three millions of inhabitants-was the "Mistress of Nations," the "Mother of Empires," in comparison with whom other cities were but villages; the Roman Cæsars were monarchs, in comparison with whom all modern kings or emperors are mere phantoms of royalty. In the times of the Cæsars there were no other kings that de

POWER AND

MAJESTY OF
ROME AND

HER CESARS.

a. Including the numerous contiguous villages immediately dependent upon the capital for support. Much has been written on this subject. Vossius, Lipsius, Chateaubriand, and others, assign to imperial Rome fourteen, seven, five, and three millions of inhabitants: Hume, seven hundred thousand to eight hundred thousand; and Gibbon one million two hundred thousand. De Quincey ("The Cæsars,” p. 5) "resolutely maintains" that her population was "not less than four millions."