quiring universal submission to him, as Head of the Church, and accepting the sanction of his authority, in that character, to the imperial edicts, it may be justly considered that the Saints were virtually delivered into the hand of the little horn. A more distinct, overt, and formal mode of performing such an act, cannot well be devised; nor one which seems more clearly to meet the sense of the inspired writer : and when it is compared with the extraordinary event, which 1260 years after so signally marked the termination of this remarkable period, it may surely be admitted, as a satisfactory point from which the commencement of the period may be dated.

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Much, indeed, has been said against the mode of computation here adopted; which consists in reckoning a part or portion of some given time, of a day, for instance, or of a year as if it were the whole of that period. But it is a mode so commonly in use among mankind, and so frequently occurring in Scripture, of which the statement given of our Lord's Resurrection from the dead, is an obvious and familiar example; that the writer does not deem it necessary to add any thing further in explanation or defence of it. According to this mode of computation, the year 533, A. D., in which Justinian's ediet, dated on the ides of March, was issued, will constitute the first year of the period of " a time,

times, and the dividing of time;" while the addition of 1259 years will terminate in the year 1792; in the course of which, the seventh trumpet, ushering in the French Revolution, sounded; and of which, the portion that elapsed previously to this event, was the twelve hundred and sixtieth, or the last year of that great prophetic period.

There are, however, two other objections, occasionally urged against the use that has thus been made of Justinian's edict, to which it may be expedient briefly to advert.

It is said, that there were two edicts of Roman Emperors prior to that of Justinian, granting supremacy to the Roman Pontiffs; namely, that of Gratian and Valentinian in 375 or 376, A. D.; and that of Theodosius and Valentinian in 445, A. D. On what satisfactory ground, then, it is asked, is the liberty to be claimed, of selecting at pleasure the edict of Justinian, while the two more ancient grants of his predecessors are passed over? To this objection it may be replied,

First, The event has shown, that neither of the two earlier edicts are to be the dates for the commencement of the 1260 years; since nothing occurred in the years 1637, A. D., or 1704, A. D., which could mark the termination of this memorable period.

Secondly, There appears to have been a very essential difference between the edict of Justinian and the grants of his predecessors. The latter, it is true, and especially that of 445, A. D., admit, in the most extravagant terms, the power claimed by the Pope, but ascribes it merely to the grants of preceding Emperors: while the former recognising the same pretensions in as ample a manner, uses language which admits them as a divine right, and on the very grounds on which the Pontiff himself rests them, namely, as being successor to the inheritance and sovereignty of St. Peter. This important circumstance, even if nothing more could be said in support of Justinian's edict, would decide the question in its favour. But,

Thirdly, It must be remembered, that this act was to deliver the Saints into the hand of the little horn. But the little horn was not itself to arise, till the destruction of the Western Roman Empire had opened a way for the rise of the ten horns; among which, and after some of them at least, this was to make its appearance, As that event, then, did not take place till the year 476, A. D.; it was not possible that either of the two earlier edicts, the last of which was issued 30 years before, could be that, by which the surrender in question could be effected. It is not, therefore, from choice, but from necessity,

that the two more ancient edicts are rejected, and the preference given to Justinian's: while, so far as the argument founded on priority avails, this latter clearly supersedes the grant of Phocas, which being issued more than 70 years after, merely confirmed the identical title previously granted to the Roman Pontiff.

The other objection to be noticed is the following. Justinian, it is averred, could have no power to deliver the Saints in the Western Empire into the hand of the little horn; for he himself possessed no authority there. But even admitting this to be in a great degree the fact, his edict still appears to have been fully competent for the purpose for which it is adduced. Though it be true, that at the time of its promulgation, he had but little actual power and possession in the peculium of the Western Empire; yet, as the successor and representative of the Cesars, he considered himself as entitled to the sovereignty of it, and laid claim to the whole, though, at the time, it was over-run by hordes of foreign invaders. And this claim was so far admitted, that the successor of Clovis was glad to obtain from Justinian 536, A. D.; only three years after the date of the edict in question a formal acknowledgment of the independence of France, and a regular transfer of the allegiance

of the provinces of that kingdom. * Let it also be recollected, that Justinian was at that time prophetically the Head of the Beast, and substantially the supreme secular Head of the Christian church and from what other power than this could the Little Horn, which was now beginning to sprout after some, and generally among the rest of its fellows, more properly derive the grant of that supremacy; which, though small in its commencement, gradually extended its spiritual dominion; and to which at length all the kingdoms of the Beast, as they successively embraced Christianity, and adopted the Justinian code as the law of their respective governments, and consequently this Edict with the rest, subsequently submitted.

Such are the grounds on which the writer meets these objections: and having thus met them, he presumes, that as far as a satisfactory exposition of the commencement and termination of the 1260 years are necessary for his present argument; so far the proposition, which he is endeavouring to establish is confirmed.

* Gibbon, vol. v. p. 329.

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