the great river Euphrates, and into the air. Now, as there appears a sevenfold distinction in these calamities, and that they do not all commence together, but are successive (though I suppose they all mingle their streams and run on together, till the last, before they produce all their awful effects); and seeing that we suppose even the sixth angel to have already begun to pour out his vial, what proof is there that the pouring out of these judgments is commenced, and how far are we able to trace the several distinctions?

As to the fifth and sixth vials, (all other circumstances agreeing) these are marked by events sufficiently strong; nor is there much difficulty in ascertaining the objects on which they are poured. It will, I think, be allowed by every one, who has attended at all to these subjects, that without either offering violence to the symbols, or calling in the aid of fancy, we may understand by the seat of the beast, Rome, or the Roman government, the throne of the papal monster, as distinguished from his kingdom which extends over the whole mystical Babylonish empire. And seeing that smiting, or drying up the rivers of a country, kingdom, or empire, does often, in the style of the prophets, signify the conquest and ruin of those countries, kingdoms, and empires, which they water, enrich, and defend; there can be but little doubt, but that by the river Euphrates is signified the empire of the Turks; their empire having had its beginning in that quarter, and that river being its principal defence on the eastern side. For as in Isa. xi. 15. the Lord's destroying the tongue of the Egyptian sea, and shaking his hand over the river, and smitting it in its seven streams, that men may go over dry shod; and as in Ezek. xxx. 12. his making the rivers dry, signify the conquest of Egypt; and as in Isa. xliv. 27. when the prophet is fortelling the conquests of Cyrus, and the destruction of the Babylonish monarchy, he has these words, That saith to the deep be dry, and I will dry up thy rivers; so the pouring this libation bowl, of the wrath of God, on the river Euphrates, may mean the conquest and ruin of the Ottoman empire. For seeing that this river is west of Persia, we cannot suppose that empire to be intended, because this judgment is to make way for the kings of the cast, (whoever may be intended by these) when, if it here signified the conquest of Persia, it should rather have been, to make way for the kings of the west.

The objects, then, of the fifth and sixth vials, may be as

certained with tolerable certainty, and the commencement of the calamities signified, supposing all other circumstances to agree, may be distinguished with sufficient precision. But to ascertain and trace the first four vials, viz. those on the earth, the sea, the rivers and the sun, is not so easy; and yet by a close attention, and a tolerable acquaintance with the meaning of the symbols used, and with the events signified by the first four trumpets, in chap. viii. I think it far from impossible. I must here refer the reader to what has been advanced in the Third Part; where I have treated of the Probable Progress and issue of the commotions of Europe.

I shall only observe here, that I apprehend the seventh angel sounded his trumpet, to bring the third woe, about autumn 1792, immediately after the fall of the French monarchy; that now 'the first vial commenced its current of calamities, when not only anarchy raged through all France, but the nations were angry (Rev. xi. 18.) and those military destructions began which have produced such awful effects on the Continent. By the vial on the sea, I suppose are signified the judgments which were to afflict maritime countries and bring naval destructions, and which might begin in ninety-three. By the vial on the rivers and fountains of waters, I conclude some district in the territory of the beast is intended, distinguished by the greatness and multitude of its rivers, and sources of rivers. This vial I suppose may be dated from ninetyfour when the French broke into the north of Italy, and began to conquer and revolutionize the countries watered by the Po, and the other numerous rivers in that quarter.

The sun, we have seen, is the sovereign power exercised in that region where the scene of a vision, or prophecy, is laid, whether exercised by one or many; for but one sun can be admitted in one scene, the decorum of the symbol requiring this. The fourth vial, then, is poured on the despotism of the beast's kingdom. Our business is to look for some remarkable stroke on the power, pride and insolence of the monarchs of Europe, subsequent to the conquests in the country of the rivers and fountains of water, and previous to the fall of the papal government. And this I think is easily to be distinguished. Behold, since the peace of Campo Formio, not a petty Prince, or single Monarch, prostrate at the foot of Republican France, but, the most august, puissant, and invincible Emperor of the Romans, king of Hungary, and Bohemia, with all the sove

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reigns of Germany and Italy. It is certain that the civil power of the beast's kingdom never experienced so great, and so general, a humiliation before.

But, consider attentively the circumstances attending this vial. And the fourth angel poured his vial on the sun -And what followed and power was given unto him to scorch men with great heat-fire, scorching and heat, when put with such adjuncts as betoken destruction, are the symbols of calamities, such as war, &c. Isa. xlii. 25. xlvi. 15, 16. Matth. xiii. 6. 1 Pet. iv. 12. To whom, or what, was this scorching power given? To the angel, as Dr. Goodwin supposes, or to the sun, as others We must never forget, in explaining these vials, that, as Mr. Mede observes in his Key, p. 113. "Whatever it is on which "a vial is poured out, that suffereth damage and loss "from the vial, since the effusion of the vials, is the effu❝sion of the wrath of God, therefore no interpretation "can stand here, whereby the effusion of a vial falleth out "to the benefit of that upon which it is poured out" It was this consideration, perhaps, which led Dr. Goodwin to his conclusion; but may we not suppose ultimate damage, and even utter extinction, to this sun, to be compatible with a temporary rage, that shall bring great calamities on men? Suppose from the mortifications which the power and pride of despotism suffer, the humbled papal tyrants should be enraged with new fury, and again unite to wage a more furious and cruel war than ever; but that, in spite of all their exertions, they should fail, and that their extraordinary rage and efforts should but hasten their ruin; would not this be an exact, and evident, illustration of the prophecy? It certainly would.*

*It is nine years since the above was written, and every year and every month has produced new and awful events, to confirm the conclusion then drawn from a comparison of passing occurrences with the prophecies. The sun of Europe has indeed raged with destructive heat; but whilst it has scorched men with the fire of war, it has been to its own wasting, almost to annihilation. Without noticing the every-day sanguinary conflicts of kings and their armies, we have only to recollect the battles of Marengo, Austerlitz, Jena, and Friedland, and their tremendous consequences; and we may easily perceive the striking accomplishment of what this scenic prophecy taught us to expect. How many monarchs have been hurled from their thrones, or been reduced to retain them on terms the most humiliating! The glory of the most ancient and splendid houses in Europe has been extinguished. Almost every state and kingdom has been broken, and cut, and pared, at the will of a man of yesterday; and new sovereigns created, and new kingdoms and governments erected and modelled at his pleasure. How blind must

I am thoroughly aware that when the mind has been long and deeply engaged in the contemplation of subjects like these, it is in great danger from the illusions of fancy; and is apt to imagine evident correspondencies between prophecies and events, which no one else can discover, and which, in truth, have no existence, and I would therefore form my sentiments, on such subjects, with caution, and utter them with diffidence. But I appeal to every one conversant in the style of the prophetic writings, and who has taken the pains to compare events with what is contained in them, (and such only are qualified to judge) whether there is not a very singular and striking agreement between the prophecies we have been reviewing, and recent events; such an agreement as is not to be discovered between these prophecies and any former events; and, consequently, whether there is not great ground for apprehending that we are fast approaching some awful crisis? For, if there be any scriptural and rational grounds for concluding it highly probable that the third woe commenced about the time we have supposed; and if there have been circumstances, since, which may, even with a tolerable degree of plausibility, be considered as agreeing with the figurative and mystical signification of the first four vials, (for Providence doubtless intended they should be obscure, that they might not, by their perspicuity, operate against their own accomplishment) then, I think, the circumstance of the present movement in the east; the attack on the Ottoman empire, as immediately following the fall of the papal government, being the exact order marked out in the prophecy, puts it, almost, beyond a doubt, that the sixth angel has begun to pour out his vial of the wrath of God, and that we are fast approaching to an awful crisis. How near we are to the great crash it is impossible to say. For though, from prophecies found in Dan. viii. 14. and xii. 11. we have ventured to conjecture, that thirty years, from the beginning of these convulsions, were to be reckoned for the cleansing of the polluted sanctuary, yet it is but an hypothesis; and should we on the whole be right, yet perhaps, the nineteen years of reformation, contended for, in

they he who see not the finger of God in all these changes, but still say, Where is the promise of his coming? Where is the fulfilment of the prophecies? O fools, and slow of heart to believe what the prophets have spoken! 2d Edit.

the long note at the end of the second Inquiry, in the First Part, may, if the idea prove just, be reckoned as part of this thirty years. This would bring the great sweep near indeed. Nor do I think it at all improbable, from the aspect of things, and the bearing of the prophecies, that what is called the battle of Armageddon will be brought to an issue between the years 1800 and 1803 inclusive. But let us not be presumptuous. I should not

I had not long written the above before I perceived that I should rather have said, It is not improbable from the aspect of things, but that either what is called the battle of Armageddon will be brought to an issue; or, at least, that the imperial dragon will be bound, between the years 1800 and 1803 inclusive: for it does not follow that this battle, or war, must be brought to a termination, as I have here supposed, before the binding of the dragon (Rev. xx.); and the commencement of 1000 mystical years of his confinement-which I suppose to be hebdomadal years, or nineteen years and a quarter-especially if we consider these nineteen years as a part of the thirty which Daniel allots for cleansing of the sanctuary: whether they close with these thirty years, or run into the next period.

In my Destiny of the German Empire, in which I have attempted to ascertain the apocalyptic dragon, and to shew that the binding of the dragon, that old serpent, called the Devil and Satan; and the Millenary state are likely to be altogether different from what christian writers have taught us to expect, and which I first published in 1800, I corrected this inaccuracy; and now, after so many years observation of what has been passing on the theatre of Europe, I still think much as I did. It becomes me to judge with modesty respecting opinions in which I stand alone; but if I am right as to the main question about the dragon, whether he be the devil literally, or, with his agnomens, a symbol of the romano-germanic empire, as I firmly believe to be the case, then it is certainly deserving of consideration, whether he was not bound and shut up in the bottomless pit about the time I supposed he would; and whether or not-strånge as the notion may appear to the old millenists-we may not have entered upon the mystical 1000 years, during which the revived witnesses are to TRIUMPH WITH CHRIST, in his victories over the enemies of his church: for of this nature, I believe, is the reigning with Christ in Rev. xx. 4.-That glorious state of things on earth, which this reigning hath been mistaken for, being not to take place till the new Jerusalem come down from God out of heaven, as described in the following chapters that being the reality; this only symbolical; as I have endeavoured to shew, more at large, in the Destiny of the German Empire.

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The Holy Roman Empire, as it has been profanely called, is, at this present moment, bound and shut up as in the regions of the dead, and the old persecuting governments are falling, one after another, as fast as they can fall.—The fault of most believers in prophecy is, that they look for too much; not sufficiently considering that the natural (not to say the common) occurrences of Providence, assume in the prophecies, from the pomp of the symbols employed, and the high colouring of the prophetic style, a sort of supernatural appearance. I say nothing positively on this subject, but I acknowledge that I have some expectation that