No. 12.
MY DEAR CHILDREN, ―I have not said a word to you as yet about Rome, the capital of the fourth monarchy, to which in the course of history we are now coming. Remember that Alexander the Great died in the year 323 B.C., and that Rome was founded B.C. 753, so that she had been in existence more than 400 years, and, I may say, had become great, and yet had she never been interfered with by Alexander. It is said that once he had remonstrated with her by an embassy, concerning the piracies allowed upon her coasts, by which Greek commerce was molested, and there are some grounds for believing that, on the occasion of his last visit to Babylon, when he was waited upon by ambassadors from all the known potentates of the globe, those from Rome appeared amongst them; but nothing is known for certain. She had been engaged in making room for herself on the Italian peninsula, and Alexander had been ten years in the East, far away from the stage of European politics; and as to that Greece which he had quitted, only intent upon preserving his interests there. Rome had not yet come into contact with Greece, nor had she engaged in any strife outside of her own peninsula. Carthage, as a great maritime power, had been more the object of dislike to Alexander; but the, originally a colony from Tyre, had drawn off from any attempt to assist the mother city when attacked by him.
Rome had just finally conquered Latium, in her internal wars, when Alexander began his first military enterprises against the Illyrians, and his conquest of Thebes. She had as yet to conquer the Samnites, and a few nations which were still maintaining their independence in the Roman peninsula, before she acquired the sovereignty of all Italy. She had been for some time governed by magistrates, called consuls, and her internal organization was already complete, so far as that the functions and rights of each component in the state were defined; whilst the usual jealousy between these parties, as is common in civilized nations, had already been the occasion of proving what superior minds she had given birth to. Rome, therefore, was growing great, and was becoming ambitious, although the marvelous career of Alexander in the East, according to the purpose of God, drew all eyes to him. Thus in implicitly believing all that the Scripture has said about the universality of the existing monarchy, facts would be against us if we supposed that there was no other authority in existence. As the kingdom of Lydia apparently kept its independence in the time of Nebuchadnezzar so Rome was free and enlightened during the sway of Alexander. If the monarch of Lydia had confronted Nebuchadnezzar, or the legions of Rome had battled with Alexander, there can be no doubt that they must have succumbed Alexander’s empire, some years after his death was divided into four― “the beast had also foul heads.” (Daniel 7:6, 8:8.) The events connected with these four heads form some of flu most perplexing and entangled parts of our history. Before Rome had absorbed these four kingdoms into herself, a period had elapsed from firs to last of nearly 250 years. Now Daniel 2 and 7 make the fourth empire directly to succeed the third, without noticing the career of the four heads into which the third resolved itself, while Daniel 8 deals with these four (at all event, two of them), in order, no doubt, to show the connection which the Jews did and will yet have with two of the four kingdoms which arose on of Alexander’s empire. I must, therefore, touch upon what happened with these four divisions of Alexander’s vast empire after his decease, and show you how Rome absorbed them. Immediately after his death, division was made of thy empire among a great number of his generals; but only as viceroys to his half-brother Aridoeus, a person of weak intellect, on whom the crows devolved, with reserve to a son of Alexander’s expected to be born. But these ambitious men soon quarreled among themselves, and there was to master-mind nor central authority to control them. Fourteen years after Alexander’s death the last of his children was murdered, and then, when obedience was no longer claimed, even nominally, to the blood of the conqueror, they began each to assume the diadem for himself.
After a battle at Ipsus, in Phrygia (301 B.C.) between Antigonus, who wanted to assume universal authority, on the one hand, and Seleucus, Ptolemy, Cassander, and Lysimachus, four of Alexander’s great generals, on the other, the empire was divided among these four, and thus Daniel 11:4 came true― “His kingdom shall be broken, and shall be divided toward the four winds of heaven, and not to his posterity, nor according to the dominion which he ruled; for its kingdom shall be plucked up, even for others resides those.” Two of these kingdoms, that of the north, Syria (the Seleucidæ), so called because it lay north of Judæa, and of the south, Egypt (the Ptolemies), because it lay south of it, occupy a prominent place in Daniel 11, as connected politically and geographically with the Jewish people (whom those kings alternately possessed and persecuted), and with a willful king (Daniel 11:36), who is to rise up in days not yet come to pass, and through his attack on them bring the judgment of God upon himself. The other two were Macedon, on the west, and Thrace and part of Asia Minor on the east. From Daniel 7:6 we find the third beast had four beads; we are not, therefore, permitted to begin the fourth or Roman empire till these heads are absorbed into it. As to Macedon, beginning with Cassander, the new kingdom existed about one hundred and thirty years, at which time the last king, having entered into a struggle with the Romans, graced a Roman triumph, and Macedon became a Roman province. The kingdom of Thrace, in the east, was eventually, with a capital at Pergamos (where afterward was one of the Apocalyptic churches), bequeathed by the last king to the Romans, and a praetor had his seat there.
With Egypt and Syria the case was different. Their history, until they fell into the hands of the Romans, is a more prolonged one, and interwoven on both sides with Jewish affairs, as I have already told you.
In Daniel 11, it would appear that, down to verse 20, we have the account of the wars between the Ptolemies and the Seleucidæ. At verse 21, Antiochus Epiphanes appears as king of the north. He is execrated in history as a tyrant and persecutor, especially of the Jews. His career is, perhaps, pursued to the last verse of the chapter, when he comes to his end. But inasmuch as in verse 31 a time of trouble is depicted in connection with “the abomination that maketh desolate,” which “abomination of desolation” is spoken of by the Lord (Matthew 24:15) long after the death of Antiochus, as a marked epoch of the latter days, it is impossible to doubt that this persecutor was only a type of someone else, and that the history rather dwells on that king of the north who is to arise in the latter days, during the time of “Jacob’s trouble.” (Jeremiah 30:7.) Hence we see why the kingdoms of the north and south are introduced as parts of the Grecian monarchy, because out of one of them―that is apparently, out of that part ruled over by the Seleucidæ―a mighty persecutor of the Jews is to arise. These kingdoms must, therefore, yet have a future existence, when it is a question of the Jews in the latter day. As to their past history or the time when they were absorbed into the Roman power, the following is a short account of Syria and Egypt. Syria flourished under the Seleucidæ, especially under Seleucus, the first king, who had a long reign, and built many cities. His successors carried on continual war: with the Ptolemies, to whom, in the partition of the empire, Palestine had been allotted, but which Seleucus had invaded and taken. Thu: it was a kind of battle-field for the contending parties, and it has been supposed that Dan. 11:1-21 relates the history of these wars until the time of Antiochus Epiphanes, whose history it taken up, but, as I said before, principally as a type of the destroyer of the last days. The ships of Chittim (verse 30) is the interference of a power from the west, that is Rome, in one of his attempts upon Egypt. It is an historical fact, and interesting as being the first account we have of the power of a people in the west of Europe, who were afterward to subjugate the world. Meanwhile the Jews, under the princes of the Maccabean family, asserted their independence against the tyranny of Antiochus Epiphanes, and maintained it for above 100 years, when they fell under the power of Pompey, the Roman general, who took Jerusalem B.C. 63, and ever afterward these kings received their investiture from the Romans. A year or two before this event, the Romans, under the same general, had conquered Syria. Three of the four kingdoms into which Alexander’s empire broke up have now been disposed of. The fourth―Egypt―during its existence, was better ruled, for the most part, than Syria. Its politics were interwoven with those of Syria, and the poor Jews suffered from both. The Ptolemies encouraged learning, and accumulated at Alexandria the largest library in the world, amounting, as some say, to 700,000 volumes―in manuscript, of course, as printing was not known; but the copying of manuscripts was then as regularly followed as an art, and for a livelihood, as printing is now. This library existed in great part until the time of the Mahometans, when one of their caliphs (A.D. 640) destroyed it, saying that, having the Koran―Mahomet’s religious book―every other learning was useless. The last kings of the Ptolemies degenerated. Civil dissension entered the palace. They became at first protected by the Romans; but on the death of the last queen (Cleopatra, B.C. 30, and 294 years after the decease of Alexander), Egypt was converted into a Roman province.
We have now arrived at the last, or Roman empire, ―the fourth beast of Daniel―the iron rule―a part of which we English people constitute, ―to which we belong. I will say a few words about the character of that people, which, during the time it preserved its original elements, stamped its impress on the world as it was conquering it. Its rise was from small beginnings. Their poets and romancers loved to trace their origin to Æneas, as he fled from Troy. In the very first germ of their history, we find a strong national or popular element, such as we never hear of in Babylon or Persia, if it ever existed in Greece; for in this country individuals might rise and become prominent in the state by an intellectual superiority, and thus introduce new forms of government or new eras of thought; but there never was in Greece that strong national or iron will, which, whilst in its native strength, before it became debased or mixed with clay, gave laws to the world. During the twelve years that Alexander had been attracting the eyes of the world to Asia, the Romans had been elbowing a place for themselves in the Italian peninsula. Although their city had been founded as early as 753 B.C., that is 150 years before Nebuchadnezzar, yet so small was its importance, that it made no figure in the world till after the death of Alexander. After a struggle of nearly five centuries, she became (about 266 B.C.) master of the whole of Italy. Then her foreign wars began. Sicily was first wrenched from the Carthaginians. This latter was the great maritime power of the day. Originally a colony from Tyre, settled on the north coast of Africa, near the present Tunis, she became gradually possessed of Sicily, Sardinia, and Spain, and had emporiums of trade all over the known world. Her internal policy was in contrast with that of the Romans. She did not give the right of citizenship to the inhabitants where she settled, nor identify them with her interests. As with the English in India, her armies were commanded and officered by Carthaginians, but it is doubtful whether they served in the ranks. A struggle had long been foreseen between the two powers, which came off in what have been termed the first, second, and third Punic wars. These wars lasted from B.C. 264 to B.C. 146. The second was carried on under the direction of Hannibal, one of the greatest generals which this world ever produced; but his single abilities were unable to cope with an united power like the Roman. May we remember our object whilst we read of the rise and fall of these empires, viz.; that history with God is only noticed where it connects with His Christ, and so with His earthly family the Jews.
Your affectionate Father,―.