states; which was before the year 1786. It was not formed for inactivity or amusement in Europe, nor is it so in America. In Europe their real designs were perfectly curtained from their candidates in the lower degrees of masonry. While they were amused with various things; they were as ignorant of the real designs of their higher orders, as a child unborn. And when the designs of their leaders burst out in bloody operations; honest members of the lower degrees fled. One of them, in an address to his masonic brethren, said, "Brethren and companions, give free vent to your sorrow. The days of innocent equality are gone by. However holy our mysteries may have been; the lodges are now profaned. Let your tears flow. Attired in your mourning robes, attend; and let us seal up the gates of our temples; for the profane have found means to penetrate into them. They have converted them into retreats for their impiety; and into dens of conspirators. Within the sacred walls, they have planned their horrid deeds, and the ruin of nations. Let us weep over their legions, whom they have seduced. Lodges that may serve as hiding-places for conspirators, must for ever remain shut to us, and to every good citizen. The celebrated Professor Robison of Edinburgh, who had been a first-rate mason, sounded the same alarm. He renounced the order, and advised all his brethren in the masonic world to do the same.

We have here one deep source of the danger attending the seed of the woman, in these states. May the Christians of our land awake to their dangers, and their duties. May the warning voice of Heaven arrest their hearts; such as the following-"Be sober, be vigilant, because your adversary, the devil, as a roaring lion, goeth about, seeking whom he may devour." "The devil is come unto you, having great wrath, because he knoweth he hath but a short time." "Whom resist steadfastly in the faith." "Resist the devil, and he shall flee from you." Christ says, of these very days, "Watch!"—" Watch ye and pray always; that ye may be accounted worthy to escape those things which shall come to pass, and to stand before the Son of man." "Come, my people, enter into thy chambers." "Seek the Lord, all ye meek of

* Barruel's Memoirs.

the earth. Seek righteousness; seek meekness; it may be ye may be hid in the day of the Lord's anger." "Come out of her, my people, that ye be not partakers of her sins, and that ye receive not of her plagues."

LECTURE XVII.

REVELATION XIII.

Ver. 1. And I stood upon the sand of the sea, and saw a beast rise up out of the sea, having seven heads and ten horns, and upon his horns ten crowns, and upon his heads the name of blasphemy.

2. And the beast which I saw was like unto a leopard, and his feet were as the feet of a bear, and his mouth as the mouth of a lion: and the dragon gave him his power, and his seat, and great authority.

3. And I saw one of his heads as it were wounded to death; and his deadly wound was healed: and all the world wondered after the beast.

4. And they worshipped the dragon which gave power unto the beast: and they worshipped the beast, saying, Who is like unto the beast? who is able to make war with him?

5. And there was given unto him a mouth speaking great things and blasphemies; and power was given unto him to continue forty and two months.

6. And he opened his mouth in blasphemy against God, to blaspheme his name, and his tabernacle, and them that dwell in heaven.

7. And it was given unto him to make war with the saints, and to overcome them: and power was given him over all kindreds, and tongues, and nations.

8. And all that dwell upon the earth shall worship

him, whose names are not written in the book of life of the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world.

9. If any man have an ear, let him hear.

10. He that leadeth into captivity shall go into captivity: he that killeth with the sword must be killed with the sword. Here is the patience and the faith of the saints.

Having attended, in several preceding lectures, to a description of the church, and of her grand adversary, the devil, and to some outlines of events between them, for about two thousand years; we now come, in this thirteenth chapter, to contemplate more particularly two great instruments of her annoyance, under the figure of two beasts-the secular Roman beast, and the papal beast.

The events of this chapter are synchronical with those of the chapter preceding, and comprise the period from the commencement of the Christian era, to near the Millennium. We have here first the secular Roman beast, which Daniel beheld rising out of the sea; and which is never to be confounded with the papal beast, which is in this chapter distinctly given.

In the language of prophecy, a notable power hostile to the church is represented by some great ferocious beast. And the properties of that power are described by properties of that beast, natural or ideal. In Dan. vii. we have a number of such beasts. The Babylonish empire is denoted by a lion with eagle's wings; the Persian empire, by a bear with a piece of his prey in his mouth; the Greeian empire, by a leopard with four heads and four wings; and the Roman empire, by a nondescript fourth beast, dreadful and terrible, with great iron teeth. The first part of this thirteenth chapter gives a further description of this fourth beast, denoting the secular Roman empire.

The beast in our text is the same with that given in Dan. vii. 7. In three different passages of Scripture, we find this secular Roman beast: in Dan. vii. 7, to end; in our text; and in Rev. xvii. In some other texts allusion is made to this beast. In each of these three principal passages, the secular beast is kept distinct from the papal power, which is likewise given: and we are never to blend them. The consideration of this will be im

portant to a right understanding of these powers,-the secular, and the papal.

A beast is a ruling power, and not a subordinate one. There can be but one such ruling power on the same ground, at the same time; and hence we can have but one beast on the same ground at the same time. Subordinate powers are but horns of the beast of that region. The secular power on the ground of the Roman earth, from the time of the subversion of the power of Greece, before the Christian era, till the battle of the great day, is given under the figure of a great and terrible beast, rising from the sea; meaning the contending state of the nations at the time of its rise; as in the text, and in Dan. vii. Though his rise had long been past when our text was written; and though the main object of the writer was to foretel events then future; yet as those future events of this beast, or things to take place towards the close of his existence, must be known as the deeds of the Roman beast;-so the account must revert to the origin of this beast to show that he is (first and last) the same. This is a liberty repeatedly taken in prophecy, as has been shown. When that part of a series of things which is future, is to be predicted; the prediction also takes into view the origin of that series, to identify the future with it. So in Rev. xvii., describing the last head of this beast, as a new beast from the bottomless pit; in order to show that this is the old Roman beast, his seven heads are given, though five of them were then past, when John had his vision. In our text additional appendages are given. Both in the text, and in Daniel, he has ten horns. Here he has also seven heads, to denote seven hills, on which Rome was built; and also seven forms of government, from the origin to the end of that power; viz. kings, consuls, dictators, decemvirs, military tribunes, emperors, and an atheistical republic. The sixth, the imperial, was in existence when John had his vision. This imperial form was to exist twice, and at two distinct and distant periods, as will be shown on Rev. xvii. The first reign of the imperial head was in existence when the Revelation was given. It was under this, that the Christian era commenced, that Christ was crucified, and that the ten pagan persecutions of the Christians took place. It was this imperial head that then received a wound, under Constantine, and died as a pagan

beast, by the empire's becoming Christian; as is noted under the sixth seal, Rev. vi. 12 to end. This beast lay dead, in symbolic language, from that time for many centuries, and had only a mystical existence; "that was, and is not, and yet is," because he would rise again in the last days in his own hostile nature. The literal facts were, that paganism was overturned by Constantine in the fourth century; and Christianity was established in its place. But, at a period far future of that revolution, and before the battle of the great day of God, a terrible power should rise on the Roman earth, similar to the ancient pagan beast. And, in the language of prophecy, this should be noted as the old pagan beast recovered to life; or his head (anciently put to death by the sword) having its deadly wound healed, and living again, with the Roman world wandering after him. This healing was to be fulfilled by a mighty power rising on the Roman earth, in the last days, of utter and avowed hostility to the cause of Christ. This took place in the breaking out of illuminism under the cover of masonry in France, in 1789, and an antichristian power was there established. This will be more clearly shown in lecturing on Rev. xvii.-the beast from the bottomless pit, which is but the healed head in our text, symbolized by a new beast from the world of darkness.

It seems, from the various descriptions of that beast, or power, that something like that ancient wounding, and modern healing of that head of the beast, may be more than once verified; that it is a characteristic of this power which may be verified in different instances. This power, being part of iron, and part of clay, as in the feet and toes of Daniel's image, seems designed to convey the same idea. This beast may repeatedly appear partly strong and partly broken, before its final crushing under the wrath of Christ. Its being the beast that was, and is not, and yet is, indicates the same thing. It seems sometimes out of existence, and sometimes in existence. A prime leader of the order said, Let the whole system go to wreck and ruin; I will engage to restore it in a short time, and that to a more perfect state than before! One thing of this beast is certain; he is spoken of as having an existence, either visible or invisible, till he goes into perdition, in the battle of that great day of God, the last vial;—at which time