THE second section of the revelator's discourse, which commences at the thirty-sixth verse and ends at the thirty-ninth inclusive, is a more amplified description of the Little Horn power than that previously given in the eighth chapter. The following is a corrected translation of the testimony:
"And out of one of them (one of the horns) came forth a Little Horn, which waxed exceeding great against the south, and against the east, and against the glory (of the land). And it waxed great above the host of the heavens; and of the host and the stars it cast down to the ground, and stamped upon them. And against the Commander of the host it magnified, and by it the evening-morning sacrifice was taken away, and the foundation of its holy place scattered. And a host was given against the daily sacrifice because of transgression, and it cast down the truth to the ground; and it wrought and prospered" (Dan. 8:9-12).
"And in the latter time of their kingdom (the dominion of the four horns), so as to cause the transgressors to fill up their measure, there shall stand up a king of fierce countenance, and understanding an intricate language. And his power shall be mighty, but not in his own virility; and he shall destroy wonderfully, and shall prosper and work; and shall destroy multitudes, and the people of the holy ones. And through his policy, also, he shall cause falsehood to prosper by his power; and because of his heart he shall do proudly, and in prosperity he shall destroy many; he shall also stand up against the Commander of chieftains; but he shall be broken without help" (Dan. 8:23-25).
"And the king shall work according to his pleasure, and he shall exalt himself and magnify himself against every mighty one, and he shall utter marvellous things concerning the Mightiest of the mighty, and he shall cause to prosper till the indignation be accomplished; for that that is determined shall be done. But to the gods of his predecessors he shall' give no heed, nor to the delight of women, nor to any god shall he attend; for he shall become great above all."
"But he shall do honour to a god of guardians in his realm; even to a god whom his predecessors knew not, shall he do honour with gold and silver, and with costly gems and precious things. Thus shall he do to the Bazaars of the Guardians pertaining to a strange god, whom he shall acknowledge (and) exalt (with) riches; and shall cause them to rule over many; and he shall divide the land for a price" (Dan. 11:36-39).
Here is a power which is to "prosper till the indignation" against Judah "be accomplished". The present condition of the Jews makes it evident to all that divine indignation against them still exists: hence the conclusion is necessary, that the Little Horn power is one of the powers that be.
The prophecy concerning "the King" in the eighth chapter is evidently descriptive of the Latino-Greek power in its pagan constitution, known in history as the destroyer of Jerusalem, and Judah "the people of the holy ones"; but with a hint also of its future ecclesiastical peculiarity, as appears from the testimony that "through his policy he shall 'cause falsehood to prosper by his power". These few words are descriptive of the character or nature of the power since Constantine the Great set up its throne in Constantinople to the present hour; and will be sopre-eminently, when its administration shall pass from the Sultan to the Autocrat of all the Russias. As the head of a confederacy of the adherents of the Greek and Latin churches, it will be his policy to cause their priesthoods to be respected as useful co-operators in the subjection of Europe to his will.
This ecclesiastical policy of the Constantinopolitan Autocracy is enlarged upon in the description of it set forth in the eleventh chapter, where it is more particularly regarded in its catholic constitution without taking into the account the division of the Babylonian superstition into Greek and Latin catholic churches. Whatever may be the individual prejudices existing between individuals of the two schisms matters not; their ecclesiastics, whose spiritual authority is death-stricken by infidelity, on the principle of self-preservation will have to place themselves under the shadow of the Autocrat, as Greeks and Latins have already done in the present dominions of the Czar.
studying the nature of the Little Horn power it must not be regarded as a purely civil and military, or as an ecclesiastical power per se. It is both; but in describing it two classes of administrators are personified, the one as "the king", and the other, as "a god of guardians, whom his (pagan) predecessors knew not", and therefore "a strange god". The power is said to give "no heed to the delight of women". But under its pagan constitution, the emperors who were Pontifices Maximi, or High Priests, as well as the civil and military chiefs of the state, and their subordinates in the priesthood, did give heed to the delight of women; that is, it was their pleasure to marry: but when this pagan constitution of the power was superseded by the Catholics as the consequence of the Constantinian revolution of the fourth century, the High Priesthood disappeared until its revival in the Bishop of Rome; so that he in Rome, and the Emperor in Constantinople, became the representative incarnations of the civil and spiritual elements of the Latino-Greek Babylonian power. The imperial head still gave heed to "the delight of women", or, as some render it, "the desire of wives"; while the sacerdotal constituent of the power "forbids to marry, and commands to abstain from meats" (1 Tim. 4:3).
Till the foundation of "the Holy Roman" dominion by Charlemagne and Leo, the bishop of Rome's imperial associate was the emperor at Constantinople; but when he could no longer afford him protection against the Longbeards he formed an alliance with the French emperor A.D. 800, which has politically obtained in the imperial line to this day. He is, however, at present in a peculiar and exceptional situation, which cannot become permanent. A pope and two emperors of the west is representative of two antagonist policies acting upon the same ecclesiastical centre which must result in collision,(1) and terminate in the suppression of one of the emperors, that the normal constitution of things may be restored.
But the time is not far off, when the Latin Bishop may have to seek again to the Constantinopolitan Imperial Autocracy for protection. Daniel's prophecy of "the king" required this; for he is to "cause to prosper till the indignation be accomplished". The pope and one of the emperors sustained "by the power of the king" will place the Latino-Greek king "above all" the mighty who shall be his contemporaries in "the time of the end".
But, for this manifestation to appear, the Ottoman dynasty must of course be driven out of Europe. The occupation of the Dragon's throne by a non-catholic royalty is clearly exceptional. The Ottoman has never, as a matter of fact, "magnified himself above all"; nor has he honoured the Latin Bishop as a god in his dominion, or shown himself at all a gracious patron of his saints and their temples. The power causing falsehood, or False-Prophetisrn, to prosper, must hold Jerusalem at the crisis of the accomiplishment of the indignation. By False-Prophetism, I mean, papalism. Hence, the Sultan must be ejected, that a dynasty patronizing a High Priest who forbids to marry, may come in. When, therefore, the Czar gets possession of Constantinople(2) he will not be hostile to the pope. On the contrary, he will honour and acknowledge him, and be the enemy of the Holy Land.
(1) The collision occurred in 1859 in the Franco-Italian conflict with Austria; while the war of 1866 has given the ascendancy in papal affairs to the emperor of the French, for a time at least. The expulsion of Austria from Italy and the abolition of the Concordat, abandons the Pope to the caprice of Napoleon III. The fall of Napoleon would change the situation greatly.
(2) It is questionable whether Gog obtains possession of Constantinople before the advent, or after it. He may get the city, but still lack dominion over Asiatic Turkey. His contest for this brings him against Egypt and the mountains of Israel.
As to the Ottoman, his existence in Constantinople is exceptional. His mission was to punish the Greek catholics, and the Latins also to some extent, for their excessive superstition and idolatry, with the loss of their sovereignty over "a third part" of the Latino-Greek Babylonian empire; and not to extinguish temporarily or finally the Little Horn Power. As far as the Greeks were concerned, their sovereignty was abolished A.D. 1453. The Greek dynasty of the power gave place to the Turkish, while the horn itself remained. The destruction of the horn is reserved for Michael the great Commander of Judah, after it shall have come under the sovereignty of the king of the north. This existence of the Ottoman regime in the Kingdom of Babylon, may be regarded by way of illustration, as a splint upon a broken leg. It remains therefore the support of the limb until the fractured ends shall be reunited by callus, after which it is removed as useless. The brass and iron eastern limb of Nebuchadnezzar's Image received a fracture at the juncture of the two metals. The sovereignty of the kingdom of Babylon was no longer Greek and Latin; but, as at the present time, Latin and Ottoman. In "the time of the end", however, when the Image stands complete upon its Feet of Iron and Clay, sound constitutional limbs are indispensable. The time is now about come, when the Ottoman splint may be removed, and the Latino-Greek Leg of the Image repaired by Russian callus be permitted to stand under a regime more in consonance with the catholic constitution of the kingdom of Babylon. The unbinding of the splint is the current mission of "the Powers". It is obvious to all that the Turk is a useless excrescence upon society, occupying a position in the .heaven of Churchdom for which he is not at all qualified by faith, civilization, or sympathy with contemporary despotisms. The Babylonians are all willing that he should be deposed from his sovereignty over the catholic populations; but they are not willing that the Byzantine empire should be revived under the Autocrat of All the Russias. Their antagonisms, however, for the prevention of this may be the providential means to bring it about. Every step they take in the Eastern Question only makes this result more probable. The end, untoward enough for them, is decreed; and the Deity has blinded them, confusing all their counsel, that it may come to pass.
The Little Horn of the Goat is brother to the Little Horn of eke fourth beast with its Eyes and Mouth. Their fraternity is consequent upon the Latin element entering into the constitution of them both. Old Rome is the throne of the Little Horn with Eyes and Mouth; while New Rome, or Constantinople, is the throne of the Little Horn of the Goat. The former power is the New Roman Empire of the West rounded by Charlemagne, which has never been as yet united to the Greek element of the kingdom of Babylon. It is styled "the Holy Roman" dominion, because their Holinesses the Popes are its High Priests. Hence, it is the Latin kingdom of heaven, beyond the pale of which, they say, there is no salvation ! The Little Horn of the Goat represents the undivided power of the Kingdom of Babylon from the annexation of the northern kingdom to Rome, B.C. 65, to the loss of Italy, and the West; and of the same power minus Italy and the West from the eighth century to the present time. But when the Autocrat gains Constantinople, and Russianizes Italy and the West; and having superseded the Ottoman regime in Asia, comes as Gog to invade the Holy Land and to besiege Jerusalem, the Little Horn of the Goat will again represent the power of the whole dominion briefly united under one chief, and he the proudest that ever exalted and magnified himself above all the rulers upon earth. In that near future the Little Horn of the Goat will be "exceeding great", overshadowing all the sovereignties represented by the Two-Horned, and Ten-Horned, Beasts, and the Pseudoprophet of the Beast. But when it is "broken in pieces without help" it appears no more as a symbol upon the prophetic page. Its mission in the Holy Land and against Judah ends with its own Pharaoh-like destruction; and the East delivered, future events re-open in the West, where only a Beast, the False Prophet, and the Ten Horns, their Russian Constantinopolitan confederacy being dissolved, remain to be ground to powder, and destroyed by fire and sword.
The "policy" of the Little Horn king in his Constantinian successorship to A.D. 1453 was, and will hereafter be, characterized by zeal for the baptized paganism known in history as the catholic religion. Justinian of all its crowned heads affords the most striking illustration of Daniel's description of it. His policy was truly ecclesiastical. "Never prince", says Dupin, "did meddle so much with what concerns the affairs of the Church, nor make so many constitutions and laws upon this subject. He was persuaded that it was the duty of an emperor, and for the good of the state, to have a particular care of the Church, to defend its faith, to regulate external discipline, and to employ the civil laws and the temporal power to preserve it in order and peace".
Justinian, says Gibbon, "sympathized with his subjects m their superstitious reverence for living and departed saints; his Code, more especially his Novels, confirm and enlarge the privileges of the clergy; and in every dispute between the monk and the layman, the partial judge was inclined to pronounce that truth, and innocence were always on the side of the Church. In his public and private devotions, the Emperor was assiduous and exemplary; his prayers, vigils, and fasts, displayed the austere penance of a monk; his fancy was amused by the hope, or belief, of personal inspiration; he had secured the patronage of the Virgin, and St. Michael the archangel; and his recovery from a dangerous disease was ascribed to the miraculous succour of the holy martyrs, Cosmas and Damian... Among the titles of imperial greatness, the name of Pious was the most pleasing to his ear; to promote the temporal and spiritual interest of the Church was the serious business of his life; and the duty of father of his country was often sacrificed to that of defender of the faith... While the barbarians invaded the provinces, while the victorious legions marshalled under the banners of Belisarius and Narses, the successor of Trajan, unknown to the camp, was content to vanquish at the head of a synod".
Enmity to Judah and the disciples of Christ, whom it designates as heretics and schismatics, has been characteristic of the kingdom of Babylon under all its administrations. This feature of it is indicated in the saying, that "In prosperity he shall destroy many". The Constantinopolitan Little Horn as well as its imperial brother of the West, has abundantly vindicated its claim to this destructiveness. Justinian was no individual exception to this general character of the power. His reign, says Gibbon, "was an uniform, yet various scene of persecution; and he appears to have surpassed his indolent predecessors both in the contrivance of his laws and rigour of their execution. The insufficient term of three months was assigned for the conversion or exile of all heretics; and if he still connived at the precarious stay, they were deprived, under his iron yoke, not only of the benefits of society, but of the common birthright of men and Christians".
The high exaltation of the Constantinopolitan Autocracy in "the time of the end", previously to its standing up to "be broken without help" by Judah's Commander in Chief, is predicted in the words, "He shall become great above all". Impious and cruel as Antiochus Epiphanes, and superstitious and fanatical as Justinian, with the arrogance, ambition, and profanity of the Latin Prophet in his palmiest days, this Sin-power administered by a Russian regime, will be wanting in none of the arrogance that has been predicated of Paul's "MAN OF SIN and Son of Perdition", whose spiritual element opposeth and exalteth himself above every one called a god, or an object of regard; so that in the temple of the god he sits as a god exhibiting himself because he is a god. The apostle then informs us of his destruction by Michael the great commander, saying, "That Lawless One shall the Lord consume with the Spirit of his mouth (represented in the Apocalypse by a sword going out of his mouth) and bring to an end with the manifestation of his presence: the coming of whom is according to. the working of the adversary in all power, and signs, and lying wonders, and with all deceivableness of unrighteousness in them that perish" (2 Thess. 2: 3, 4, 8, 9). This is not exclusively applicable to the Latin False Prophet; but to the power comprehensive of the civil, military, and spiritual elements as described by Daniel, and designated by Isaiah as "The King for whom Tophet is ordained of old" (Isa. 30:27-33; 31: 8, 9). When the sceptre falls from the feeble hands of the Sultan, the world will behold in his Muscovite successor a potentate not surpassed in presumption and impiety by any of his predecessors, not excepting Pharaoh of the olden time.
