Coming Up Out of the Earth.
THE last symbol of Rev. 13, the beast with two horns like a lamb, was described, as he came forth and took his place among the symbols of earthly governments, as “coming up out of the earth.” This expression is most clearly designed to point us to the contrast between the manner of its rise, and that of the other symbols introduced in the prophecy. They rose out of the sea. Daniel’s four beasts came up as the four winds of heaven strove upon the great sea. The first beast of Rev. 13, the one preceding the symbol under notice, and embodying all the characteristics of Daniel’s four, also came up out of the sea. There was all the fury of the gale, the roaring and dashing of the waves, the noise and tumult of the raging storm; and in the midst of this confusion, as if stirred up by the fearful commotion, these four beasts reared their heads. In other words, the empires of which they were the symbols, arose by the upheavals of revolution, and through the strife of war. The two-horned beast comes up out of the earth. No tempest of political excitement is raised, no armies clash together like the waves of the sea. John beholds only the unbroken surface of the immovable earth, and coming up calmly and peaceably, bearing on his head the symbols of gentleness and innocence—the horns of a lamb—this beast arises. In the rise of our own government, this very feature, the peacefulness of its rise and progress, is one of the prominent things that arrest the attention of the beholder. Political writers mention it; and the more remarkable part of it is, that, without dreaming that prophecy had pointed all this out eighteen hundred years ago, they use terms to describe it, almost identical with those used by the prophet; at least, those which are exactly parallel in meaning; showing that the same channel in which the mind of the inspired writer was led when making the prediction, is followed by the political historian in recording its fulfillment. This is shown in the following extracts which I give from a work entitled, “The New World Compared with the Old,” by George Alfred Townsend. The first extract is from pages 462, 463. Two sentences I italicize to more particularly arrest the attention of the reader:— Our attention is turned from Europe to the near Orient, whence are to come the problems of multitude and mode which will speedily overflow the Rocky Mountains, and meet Europe half way on the plains of Missouri. Destinies of colossal magnitude tower in that Asiatic mist, and with youth, but confidence, we accept them. This hemisphere was laid away for no one race; the pilgrims, and they of the caravans of the earth, have seen our star, and at last the English Magi also. And ours is the government of which Emile de Girardin in “La Liberte” says (1868): “The population of America, not thinned by any conscription, multiplies with prodigious rapidity, and the day may before long be seen, when they will number sixty or eighty millions of souls. This parvenue is aware of his importance and destiny. Hear him proudly exclaim, “America for Americans!” See him promising his alliance to Russia; and we see that power which well knows what force is, grasp the hand of this giant of yesterday. In view of his unparalleled progress and combination, what are the little toys with which we vex ourselves in Europe? What is this needle gun, we are anxious to get from Prussia, that we may beat her next year with it? Had we not better take from America the principle of liberty she embodies, out of which have come her citizen pride, her gigantic industry, and her formidable loyalty to the destinies of her Republican land? Since America was discovered, she has been a subject of revolutionary thought in Europe. The mystery of her coming forth from vacancy, the marvel of her wealth in gold and silver, the spectacle of her captives led through European capitals, filled the minds of men with unrest; and unrest is the first stage of revolution. Out of her discovery grew the European reformation in religion; out of our Revolutionary War grew the revolutionary period of Europe. And out of our rapid development among great States and happy peoples, has come an immigration more wonderful than that which invaded Europe from Asia in the latter centuries of the Roman Empire. When we raised our flag on the Atlantic, Europe sent her contributions; it appeared on the Pacific, and all orientalism felt the signal. They are coming in two endless fleets, eastward and westward, and the highway is swung between the oceans for them to tread upon. We have lightened Ireland of half her weight, and Germany is coming by the village load every day. England, herself, is sending the best of her working men now (1869), and in such numbers as to dismay her Jack Bunsbys. What is to be the limit of this mighty immigration? On page 635, the same writer, speaking of the difference between the English and Spanish settlements on the American continent, says:— In this web of islands, the West Indies, began the life of both [North and South] Americas. There Columbus saw land, there Spain began her baneful and brilliant Western Empire; thence Cortez departed for Mexico, De Soto for the Mississippi, Balboa for the Pacific, and Pizarro for Peru. The history of the United States was separated by a beneficent Providence far from this wild and cruel history of the rest of the continent, and, like a silent weed, we grew into empire, while empire itself, beginning in the South, was swept by so interminable a hurricane that what of its history we can ascertain is read by the very lightnings that devastated it. The growth of English America may be likened to a series of lyrics sung by separate singers, which coalescing, at last make a vigorous chorus, and this, attracting many from afar, swells and is prolonged, until presently it assumes the density and proportions of epic song. Can any one doubt that a nation of such progress, capacity, prowess, and influence, as is so vividly set forth above, would fail to find its place and receive its mention, among the prophetic delineations of the governments of earth? Place these expressions side by side: “Coming forth from vacancy,” “like a silent weed, we grow into empire,” “coming up out of the earth.” The first and second are from a political writer describing what has been; the third is from the apostle John, describing what would be. Can any one fail to see the parallel between them? And can any one fail to see how accurately our own government, in this respect, answers to the requirements of the prophecy?