ROME AND THE COMING KINGDOM.
THAT the Roman power will continue till the coming of the Lord is plainly shown by the prophecy of Daniel. That it is the “little horn” of chapter eight is made clear by the statement that, “through his policy also he shall cause craft to prosper in his hand; and he shall magnify himself in his heart, and by peace [margin, “prosperity”] shall destroy many; he shall also stand up against the Prince of princes; but he shall be broken without hand.” Verse 25. This “little horn” stands for Rome in its entirety, both under its Pagan and Papal phases. It was by the Roman authority and Roman soldiers that Christ was put to death. But Rome, under the Papacy, has more especially “magnified” itself than it did under pagan rule. That power is represented in Revelation 13 as having received a “deadly wound;” but the prophecy adds that “the deadly wound was healed,” and the healing process has been in progress for many years, and is now progressing faster than ever. Rome is fast gaining a more extensive political influence in the world without direct temporal sovereignty than she had as an imperial government. But the “little horn” power is to be “broken without hand.” Neither the fall of the empire, nor the exile of the pope by France in 1798, nor the loss of temporal power in 1870, can fulfil this prophecy; for those reverses were accomplished by human hands, by military power. Then when can it be accomplished? We may learn this from the prophecy of Daniel 2, in the explanation of the great image which Nebuchadnezzar saw in his dream. There the fourth universal kingdom, represented by the legs of iron, and feet of iron and clay, occupies the same historical setting as the “little horn” of the eighth chapter; it represents the same identical power. Now of that fourth kingdom of iron, and of iron and clay the prophet said to the king, “Thou sawest till that a stone was cut out without hands, which smote the image upon his feet that were of iron and clay, and brake them in pieces.” Verse 34. The explanation of this is in verses 40-45, where it is shown that the “stone” which finally destroys this power is the kingdom of God, which will be set up at the second advent of Christ, and under His personal reign will fill the whole earth. Then this Roman power, this “man of sin” (2 Thess. 2:3-12), this spiritual Babylon that is now operating to make all the nations “drunk” with the “wine” of her Church-and-State “fornication” (Rev. 18:1-6), will continue till broken in pieces by the “Stone cut out without hands.” So shall it be consumed and destroyed unto the end. Dan. 7:26.