THE church of Christ will ultimately come off victorious. She will have passed the prophetic landmarks which have been to her as light shining in a dark place until the day dawn, and the day star (Christ) arises in the hearts of his people. These prophetic waymarks are to be studied to ascertain where the people of God are, until they have passed the last sign, and the last battle has been fought. It is then that the “woman clothed with the sun, and the moon under her feet, and upon her head a crown of twelve stars,” will stand forth in all her beauty and glory. It is then that all will “see what is the fellowship of the mystery, which from the beginning of the world hath been hid in God, who created all things by Jesus Christ: to the intent that now unto the principalities and powers in heavenly places might be known by the church the manifold wisdom of God.” Eph. 3 : 9, 10. But the most perfect illustration, or object-lesson, of this period in the past, was when Christ left the church clothed with the light that he had brought to this earth. She had passed the types and shadows represented by the moon under her feet; and upon her head was a crown of twelve stars (or twelve apostles). It was at this time that Herod, the Roman king, sought to destroy Christ as a rival king when he was born. The Roman province of Judea was at this time governed by the king, Sanhedrin, and the priests. God had said, through Jacob, fifteen hundred years before: “The scepter shall not depart from Judah, nor a lawgiver from between his feet, until Shiloh come; and unto him shall the gathering of the people be.” Gen. 49 : 10. The prophet Isaiah had said, “Before the child shall know to refuse the evil, and choose the good, the land that thou abhorrest shall be forsaken of both her kings.” Isa. 7 : 16. If Jesus was the virgin’s son, before he should have knowledge to choose between good and evil, the land of Israel would be without a king. When Christ was born, an Edomite, a proselyte, Herod the Great, reigned in Judea. He died soon after the birth of Christ. He appointed Antipas his successor in his first will; in his last, Archelaus. The people would not receive Archelaus, but revolted, and Antipas went to Rome to present his claim to Caesar for a decision. Caesar confirmed neither, but sent Archelaus back to Judea with the title of ethnarch, with the promise of the crown if he deserved it; but he never obtained it. Thus it was that the land was forsaken of both her kings after the death of Herod. The taking away of the kingly power (one of the three forms of the government of Judea) by pagan Rome, was a fulfillment of the prophecy that a third part of the stars of heaven would be cast down at the first advent of Christ. This was also an object-lesson of the casting out of Satan from the heavenly courts at the beginning, taking with him a third part of the angels of God. The child which the church (the woman) brought forth, who was to rule all nations with a rod of iron, was caught up to God and to his throne. Through humanity, Christ vanquished Satan and bore the palm of victory back to glory’s heights. Rome, in its pagan and papal forms, became the most perfect object-lesson of the character and working of the devil, of any government that ever existed upon the face of the earth; and it is this beast, with the false prophet, that leads the world; and these two are mentioned as going together into the lake of fire. Rev. 19 : 20. Pagan Rome had seven heads and ten horns, or kings. The first time that it is said the devil deceived the whole world, is in the ninth verse of chapter 12, and refers directly to him personally who was cast out of heaven into the earth. To those who worship the beast, it is said: “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.” Rev. 13 : 8. It is also said that “all the world wondered after the beast. And they worshiped the dragon which gave power unto the beast; and they worshiped the beast, saying, Who is like unto the764beast? who is able to make war with him?” Rev. 13 : 3, 4. The dragon worship was continued in the worship of the beast. The devil ruled the beast, and made all the world worship the beast. Of the two-horned beast we read that he “causeth the earth and them which dwell therein to worship the first beast, whose deadly wound was healed (Rev. 13 : 12); and, further, that this two-horned beast “had two horns like a lamb, and he spake as a dragon” (verse 11); and again, he “deceiveth them that dwell on the earth by the means of those miracles which he had power to do in the sight of the beast; saying . . . that they should make an image to the beast, which had the wound by a sword, and did live.” Verse 14. The dragon power was merged into the ten-horned beast. The dragon spirit was conveyed to the two-horned beast (Rev. 13 : 11), who made the world worship the beast (ten-horned beast). The beast, in turn, made the world worship the dragon. The dragon is merged into the beast, and in worshiping the beast, the people worship the dragon. The two-horned beast, in making an image to the beast, shows the same dragon element that existed in the beast. Sun worship, or sun’s day worship, originated with paganism. It passed down through the papacy, and is finally enforced by Protestantism. But who is it that makes the world worship?—It is the devil, through the governments of earth, and he, unmasked and free from all symbols, is brought to view in the ninth verse of the twelfth chapter. The dragon, or pagan Rome, is used as a symbol of his power; and when Satan failed to accomplish his purpose in the dragon, he used the papal power, which is recognized as the ten-horned beast; and when Satan fails to accomplish his purpose through the papal power, another power comes upon the stage of action, called the two-horned beast (the United States of America), or Protestantism, through which he works for the accomplishment of his own purpose. S. N. H.