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lived seventh head should not simply fall by any domestic revolution or political arrangement, but that it should be mortally wounded by the sword of foreign war: the Francic Emperorship fell not by internal revolution, but, on the ever memorable 18th day of June in the year 1815, it was mortally wounded by the sword of external violence in the destined field of Waterloo.

4. From what has now been said it appears, that all the seven heads of the Roman beast are at present defunct: six of them having fallen by domestic revolution or political arrangement; and the seventh, agreeably to the prophecy, having been slain by the sword of foreign violence. But the beast is represented, as having no more than seven heads. Whence, upon the slaughter of his seventh and last head, since all his heads are now defunct, zoological decorum requires, that he himself should be exhibited as sinking into a state of death.

Accordingly, in the hieroglyphic, the beast dies, when his last surviving head is slain by the sword: and, in the verbal interpretation, he is said to sink into a state of political non-existence as an Empire, when, after continuing only a short space, his last head perishes. The beast was, or existed in actual vitality as an Empire, from the rise of his first head with Romulus down to the sword-inflicted slaughter of his seventh head under Napoleon Buonaparte the beast is not, or ceases to exist as a living Empire, when, at length, through internal

revolution or external violence, all his heads successively become defunct.

Such is the tenor of the prophecy, as set forth, partly in the pictured hieroglyphic, partly in the verbal interpretation afforded by the angel. Let us now mark its completion, as we may behold it with our own eyes.

From Romulus down even to beyond the year 1806 when the Roman Kingship or Emperorship was finally extinguished, the hieroglyphical wildbeast had never been without a living head: and, consequently, under one head or another, he himself had never ceased to live.

But a very different scene presented itself, when, in the year 1815, the hostile sword of England, wielded by the great captain of the age, inflicted a mortal wound upon the short-lived seventh head. For the first time, during the lapse of more than twenty five centuries, all the heads of the wildbeast now lay dead together: and, when the seventh head was slain by the sword, no new head sprang up in its room. The place of the Francic Emperorship remained unoccupied. Neither in virtue of a recognised official appellation of supremacy',

'As in the case of the Roman Emperors since the time of Charlemagne. Hence Mr. Gibbon remarks, that the supremacy of the Emperor was not confined to Germany alone, but that in rank and dignity he was acknowledged to be THE TEMPORAL HEAD of the great Republic of the West. See Hist. of Decline, vol. ix. p. 216. See also Mackenzie's Observ. on Preceden. chap. i. p. 1.

nor through a predominance of solid power extending over the whole Empire', can it be said, that, since the violent death of the seventh and last head in the year 1815, any single State within the limits of the Roman world has exercised the function of a head. On the contrary, during the present period of the wild-beast's allegorical death or political nonexistence, the great European Commonwealth is, even avowedly, moderated and governed by a sort of high police formed out of a college or corporation of the stronger monarchies: which, claiming to regulate the conduct of the weaker sovereignties, professes to watch over the interests and to preserve the peace of the Roman Ecumenè *.

Thus it appears, if there be any justice in the preceding conclusions, that, in the year 1815 when the Francic Emperorship was mortally wounded by the sword, we entered upon the second grand chro+ nological period, which the apocalyptic prophet describes hieroglyphically as the period during which the wild-beast should lie dead in consequence of the then defunct condition of all his seven heads, and which the interpreting angel sets forth verbally as the period during which the Empire of the seven-hilled city should be in a state of non-existence

1

As in the successive cases of Charlemagne and Napoleon: the one, as King or Emperor of the Romans, the representative of the first head; the other, as Emperor of the French and King of Italy, the representative of the seventh head.

* See the declaration, with which the Congress closed its session at Aix-la-Chapelle on Nov. 15, 1818.

through the sudden and violent downfall of the short-lived seventh king or seventh political form of Roman government. On the principles here laid down, the first period of the beast's life or the first period of the Empire's political existence, namely the period from the rise of the first head under Romulus to the slaughter of the seventh head under Napoleon, is PAST: or, in the language of the angelic hierophant, the wild beast was. Hence, in regular descent through the great prophetic calendar as successively expounded and verified by faithful history, we must now, unless my principles be altogether erroneous, have entered upon the second period of the beast's death or the Empire's political non-existence: that is to say, in the language of the same angelic hierophant, we must have entered upon the period during which the wild-beast IS NOT.

5. But the interpreting angel mentions yet a third period, connected with the strangely varied fortunes of the Roman Empire.

The beast was, and IS NOT, and yet is or (as some copies read) yet SHALL BE.

He was, as we have just seen; during his term of original existence, from the first foundation of Rome down to the year 1815 when his seventh and last surviving head was slain by the sword: he is NOT; during the term of his allegorical death or political non-existence as an Empire, which term of political non-entity commenced in the year 1815, when, through the mortal wound inflicted upon his

last head, all his seven heads for the first time in the course of five and twenty centuries lay dead together he is or SHALL BE; at some yet future period, during the term of his reexistence, when, restored to the functions of imperial sovereignty, he shall again stand forth as formidable as ever.

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As the interpreting angel thus divides the entire duration of the wild-beast's Empire into three successive periods; that of his original existence, that of his non-existence, and that of his reëxist ence; or that during which the beast was, that during which the beast is NOT, and that during which the beast SHALL BE: So, both the fashion of the hieroglyphic itself, and the corresponding verbal exposition, unite to point out the mode, in which the defunct beast should rise from the dead or should start into political reëxistence.

(1.) With respect to the fashion of the hieroglyphic itself, the prophet describes it very minutely and particularly.

1

I saw, says he, one of the heads of the beast as it were wounded to death; and HIS DEADLY WOUND was HEALED: for the beast had a wound, even A DEADLY WOUND or A WOUND OF HIS DEATH ', by a sword; and yet DID LIVE.

Hence it appears, that the slain wild-beast will be restored to life, by the healing of the mortal wound which he had received from the sword, and which had caused his political death. But his

1 Gr. ἡ πληγὴ τοῦ θανάτου αὐτοῦ.

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