The Persecuting Work to Develop in This Nation—It Will Also Spring Up Under the Papacy in the Old World
This is the sixth of several articles by Elder Wilcox on the prophecy that deals with the United States government. Last week and this, he studies the “dragon voice” that is yet to be heard in persecutions. This may seem strange to many of our readers; but please study the subject closely, and mark the evidence which shows the tendency in that direction. This strong trend toward teachings and practices which must result in religious tyranny and persecution will be more apparent in succeeding numbers. Editor.
OUR last study presented some of the influences operating to make this erstwhile “land of the free and home of the brave” a persecuting nation. Read the prophecy:
“And I saw another beast coming up out of the earth; and he had two horns like unto a lamb, and he spake as a dragon. And he exerciseth all the authority of the first beast in his sight. And he maketh the earth and them that dwell therein to worship the first beast, whose death stroke was healed. And he doeth great signs, that he should even make fire to come down out of heaven upon the earth in the sight of men. And he deceiveth them that dwell on the earth by reason of the signs which it was given him to do in the sight of the beast; saying to them that dwell on the earth, that they should make an image to the beast who hath the stroke of the sword and lived. And it was given unto him to give breath to it, even to the image of the beast, that the image of the beast should both speak, and cause that as many as should not worship the image of the beast should be killed. And he causeth all, the small and the great, and the rich and the poor, and the free and the bond, that there be given them a mark on their right hand, or upon their forehead; and that no man should be able to buy or to sell, save he that hath the mark, even the name of the beast or the number of his name.” Rev. 13: 11-17, A. R. V.
In the development of its dragon phase, the prophecy sets before us these particulars:
1. It exercises the authority of the first beast in the presence of that beast. Verse 12.
2. It causes the earth and those who dwell therein to worship the first beast, whose deadly wound was healed.
3. It deceives the earth dwellers by its wonder-working power, even to bringing fire from heaven in the sight of men. Verses 13, 14.
4. It demands from the people that they should make an image to the restored first beast. Verse 14.
5. It has power to give life to the image of the beast, and cause the image to speak and demand worship under death penalties.
6. It enforces the mark of the beast.
Let us develop these particulars.
1. The two-horned beast we have demonstrated to be the United States of America. It may come to include, through federation, all the republics in the western hemisphere. In such a federation, this nation would without question be the dominating influence, hence the power of the prophecy.
The word rendered “power” in our Common Version is not dunamis, meaning strength, energy; but the original is exousia, authority. A government exercises its authority within its territory. Its jurisdiction is geographically limited by its political boundary lines. The two-horned beast exercises its authority in its own territory, before, or in the sight of, in the presence of, the first beast, after the healing of the death stroke of that beast. In other words, the first beast is exercising its own authority in its own territory, under the healed head, when the two-horned13beast does its persecuting work, and exercises its authority before the beast.
THE POWERS THAT PERSECUTE
The first beast power, as we have learned, represents a union of church and state. A church, an ecclesiastical power, cannot of itself legally persecute, however much it may desire. It has not the authority. A civil power not legally connected with religion or the church, will not persecute. It has no desire or incentive so to do. Adherents of all religions are equal before its bar. A wild beast in prophecy represents a union of these two elements, proper and efficient when separate, but pregnant with evil when united. Under seven distinct forms, or dynasties, this beast power, used by Satan, has antagonized the work and people of God, from Babylon to the last and crowning apostasy under the head wounded and healed. The first of these beast forms was Babylon; then Medo-Persia; then Grecia; then Rome pagan; then Rome papal; then apostate church-and-state Protestantism and orthodoxy of the Old World, following the overthrow of the papal supremacy in 1798. The healing of the deadly wound, which lies a little before us, constitutes the seventh.
This restoration of the papal phase is revealed in Revelation 17. After disclosing to the prophet the beast and the apostasy of the forty and two months (Rev. 13: 5) of prophetic time—
This destruction was wrought by bombs dropped from a Zeppelin airship in its raid on England. The terror produced in a locality subject to such raids might possibly be imagined, but could not be described. Can there be any doubt that the prophet Jeremiah was viewing in vision just such conditions as these when he exclaimed, “My anguish, my anguish! I am pained at my very heart; my heart is disquieted in me; I cannot hold my peace; because thou hast heard, O my soul, the sound of the trumpet, the alarm of war”? Jer. 4: 19.
1,260 years, ending in 1798—one of the angels of the last plagues says for the people of God of this generation: “The beast that thou sawest” (Rev. 13:5-8; 17:3, 4), during the Dark Ages period, “was, and is not [as a persecuting power; that head is lying prone under its death stroke]; and is about to come up out of the abyss, and to go into perdition [the last phase of persecuting government]. And they that dwell on the earth shall wonder, they whose name hath not been written in the book of life from the foundation of the world, when they behold the beast, how that he was, and is not, and shall come.” Rev. 17:8.
THE PAPACY REINSTATED IN THE OLD WORLD
That development and reinstatement of the papacy lies just before us. There is a strong probability that it may develop out of the present European struggle. Out of the ruined or well-nigh ruined states of Europe there will come a patched-up peace with the papacy at the head more fully than the Middle Ages ever saw it. The papacy is working for it. Men are looking to her to do it. Logic, based on her belief and claims, demands that she should. She believes it will mean peace and prosperity for the world, and she will make the war-wrecked nations believe it and yield to her plans and policies. A confederation to be found in that territory will be of “one mind” to “give their power and authority unto the beast.” Rev. 17:13, 17.
It is after the restoration of the papal phase of the beast power that the two-horned beast exercises the same authority in his own territory that the restored beast does in Europe; for the two-horned beast acts in the presence of the beast that had a wound by the sword and lived. It is the papacy supported by apostate Protestant governments in the Old World; it is apostate Protestant governments supported by the papacy in the New.
WILL HELP THE RESTORED PAPACY
2. The power of the two-horned beast will be used in his own territory for the exaltation of the restored papal beast. He will use his power and influence, not for a phase of the beast that is supposed to have died forever in 1798, but for the phase manifest in the last days, after the healing of the death stroke. In that restoration, the fashion may be different, more modern than that of the Middle Ages, but it will in principle be the same; for it is in the same territory, among the same peoples, controlled by the same ambitious religious power that sought to rule the world, and did, to a great extent, during the Middle Ages.
When the beast is once more constituted under that phase by a united Europe, it will be the embodiment of the same evil principles, at the head of which will be the Vatican. All the world will wonder after and worship the abnormal creature. Rev. 13:3, 8. The two-horned beast will stand with all the others. Turning from the principles of the Lamb, it will swing to the principles of the dragon. Instead of being ruled by the truly Christian principles of the equality of man and freedom of choice in matters religious, it will turn to the principles of the devil, of the exaltation and inequality of man and the coercion of conscience. It will show the highest homage and admiration a government can possibly manifest; it will demand that the people shall make an image to the beast that had the death stroke by the sword and lived.
How it will do this, by what influences such mighty change shall be wrought in this erstwhile land of the free, will be studied in our next.
