"See the Day Approaching."

As I told you last month the four beasts of Daniel 7. represent the four Gentile monarchies of “the times of the Gentiles,” viz., the Assyrio-Babylonian (vs. 4), the Medo-Persian (vs. 5 and 8:20), the Alexandrian (vs. 6 and 8:21), and then, lastly, the Roman empire (vs. 7). With the first three we need not now concern ourselves, as they have passed away; but the fourth, or Roman monarchy, has a separate place given to it from the way in which it is introduced by the words, “I saw in the night visions, and behold.” Hence it is marked out as more important than the others, as it surely is. It was under its rule that man’s iniquity, both in Jew and Gentile, reached a climax, and “the judgment of this world” was declared in the crucifixion of our blessed Lord; it was mainly within its limits that the Gospel was preached, and Christendom with all its responsibilities was established, and where also it still exists (although terribly corrupted), and it is, as you see from verses 11, 25, 26, directly owing to its blasphemous wickedness and assumption that judgment at last comes upon it. This is important, as it quite upsets the notion so commonly entertained that the Gospel is to convert the world, for on the contrary, the world in this its last form becomes so bad as to call down judgment on itself as in the days of Noah (Luke 17:26-3026And as it was in the days of Noe, so shall it be also in the days of the Son of man. 27They did eat, they drank, they married wives, they were given in marriage, until the day that Noe entered into the ark, and the flood came, and destroyed them all. 28Likewise also as it was in the days of Lot; they did eat, they drank, they bought, they sold, they planted, they builded; 29But the same day that Lot went out of Sodom it rained fire and brimstone from heaven, and destroyed them all. 30Even thus shall it be in the day when the Son of man is revealed. (Luke 17:26‑30)). This will appear more fully as we go on. I would first try to make plain to you what is meant by the fourth beast, or Roman empire. In doing so we shall have to enter into some historical and geographical details which, though of no direct spiritual importance, are necessary to an understanding of the prophecy. Those of my readers who are already acquainted with these things must bear with this for the sake of those who are not.
About 750 B.C. a city was built on the banks of the Tiber, in Italy, called ROME after Romulus its founder. Its inhabitants (at first no better than a band of robbers) gradually extended their sway from Italy to other countries, so that at last when our blessed Lord was on earth, “the kingdoms of the world” (Luke 2:1; 4:51And it came to pass in those days, that there went out a decree from Caesar Augustus, that all the world should be taxed. (Luke 2:1)
5And the devil, taking him up into an high mountain, showed unto him all the kingdoms of the world in a moment of time. (Luke 4:5)) under the Roman dominion included all the countries from the Euphrates along both sides of the Mediterranean Sea, as far west as the south coast of Britain. It was not, however, until the second century that England was finally conquered, when the boundaries of the Roman empire were as follow: ― On the north, the Wall of Antoninus Pius (a little way beyond the modern cities of Glasgow and Edinburgh); the rivers Rhine and Danube, and the Black Sea. On the south, the coast of Africa, from Mequinez, in Morocco, as far as, and including Egypt. On the east, the rivers Tigris and Euphrates; and on the west, St. George’s Channel and the Irish Sea. There was one province beyond the Danube called Dacia, stretching along the west coast of the Black Sea, which also belonged to the empire. Its boundaries were, the Dniester and the Theiss, so that it comprised the countries now called Roumania, Tenneswar, and Transylvania. Altogether the empire extended in length some 3,000 miles from west to east, and about 2,000 in breadth from north to south, and comprised countries with the names of which I have no doubt many young readers of GOOD NEWS are already familiar, as England, Spain (including Portugal), and France, anciently called Gaul, and extending from the Pyrenees to the mouths of the Rhine, and from the Alps to the ocean, so as to include not only modern France, but also Switzerland, Alsace, Lorraine, and part of Holland, as far as Leyden. Then there was Italy, the seat of the Roman capital and power—Bavaria, as far north as Ratisbon, on the Danube; Austria (excepting Bohemia, Moravia, and its northern skirts), ancient Dada, already mentioned, Greece, and the whole of Turkey in Europe and Asia, as far east as the Euphrates and Tigris, and including God’s favored land, Palestine; and on the African continent, Egypt, Tripoli, Tunis, Algeria, Fez, and part of Morocco, as far as Mequinez, already mentioned. Of course the islands of the Mediterranean were under the same dominion, while the nations bordering on the empire were kept down by its military power according to the latter part of verse 7, where you read that it “stamped the residue with the feet of it.” Now, it is not my intention to enter into all the details of this chapter, but only to direct your attention to three points. First, that this fourth beast is not, as some think, an ecclesiastical or church power; but a civil power, or kingdom (vs. 23), whose military strength is greater and more destructive than that of any of the other three (vs. 19). Secondly, that it is characterized by blasphemy (vs. 25); and thirdly, that it is found hi existence when God is again about to set up His throne in this earth (vs. 9).
And now, perhaps, you will say, “If this great empire was in existence when Christ first came, and is found existing When He comes again, how is it that we do not see it at the present moment? for evidently the countries which once owned its sway are no longer under one Government, but subdivided into many kingdoms, having no common center as formerly, but each possessing its own capital, Government, and laws without any necessary connection with each other, much less with Rome, except as a bishopric, whose ecclesiastical domination has been so remarkably overturned of late years, even by the most Romish of the nations.” Well, to answer this question, we must now turn to Revelation 13, where, at verse 1, you read “And I stood upon the sand of the sea and saw a beast rising up out of the sea having seven heads and ten horns, and upon his horns ten crowns, and upon his heads the names of blasphemy.” Here you have clearly the ten-horned beast of Daniel bearing the same blasphemous character, and differing mainly in this, that you see seven heads instead of one, because Daniel gives only the broad out lines of the empire, being chiefly occupied with that which specially concerns Israel, namely, the “little horn” which rises after the other ten (Dan. 7:88I considered the horns, and, behold, there came up among them another little horn, before whom there were three of the first horns plucked up by the roots: and, behold, in this horn were eyes like the eyes of man, and a mouth speaking great things. (Daniel 7:8)). As to these seven heads you read in Revelation 17:9,9And here is the mind which hath wisdom. The seven heads are seven mountains, on which the woman sitteth. (Revelation 17:9) “The seven heads are seven mountains on which the woman (vs. 18) sitteth.” Rome was built on seven hills, and is always called in history “The Seven-hilled City,” and thus the seven mountains fix the locality and name of the imperial city; “the seven heads are seven mountains.” Then we read, “and there (or they) are seven kings,” that is, the seven heads represent seven different ruling powers governing the empire.1 Of these it is said “five are fallen,” so then when John saw the vision (A.D. 96), one of these governmental heads had already ceased to exist. These are stated by Tacitus, a Roman historian, who lived and wrote in the same century, to have been kings, consuls, dictators, decemvirs, and military tribunes. These having passed away, we read “one is,” that is to say, the sixth head was ruling when John wrote this book, and on turning to Luke 2:11And it came to pass in those days, that there went out a decree from Caesar Augustus, that all the world should be taxed. (Luke 2:1); Acts 25:1111For if I be an offender, or have committed any thing worthy of death, I refuse not to die: but if there be none of these things whereof these accuse me, no man may deliver me unto them. I appeal unto Caesar. (Acts 25:11); Philippians 4:22,22All the saints salute you, chiefly they that are of Caesar's household. (Philippians 4:22) we learn that the ruling authority of the empire, from the birth of Christ and onward throughout the Apostles’ days, was the Cæsar or Kaiser. This was the sixth head. This imperial form of government began in Augustus (Octavius), who was the first of the Caesars, and it is worthy of notice that just when He came into the world, who was “born King of the Jews,” and not only of the Jews, but who was rightful heir to the throne of the whole earth, the sixth head should have sprung into existence, claiming universal dominion, so that he could command “that all the world should be enrolled” as his subjects, not even excepting “the King of kings and Lord of lords.” This one verse in Luke 2 Contains, as it were in embryo, the character and ways of both Imperial and Papal Rome, from its beginning to its awful end; ignoring His presence, whether personally in the world, or by His Spirit in the Church; utterly denying His claims, and not only so, but usurping them to itself, with a blasphemous audacity carried at last even to an open-eyed lawless defiance of His authority and power as “God over all, blessed forever,” so that finally, blinded by its own arrogance and monstrous assumption, the wild beast dashes himself madly upon the Rock of Ages and is ground to powder—but only to occupy the lake of fire forever with the living dead who owned him here, “and denied the only Lord God and our Lord Jesus Christ”!
(To be continued.)
 
1. These seven heads may also shadow forth the seven leading oppressors of Israel during the whole period of “the times of the Gentiles,” from Nebuchadnezzar to “the Beast” inclusively.