"AGAINST this infinite fiat that the earth should be divided into a number of kingdoms, which should never be united, have been hurled, each in its time, with titanic force and herculean effort, the clans of Clovis, the legions of Charlemagne, the flower of knighthood under Charles V, the dragoons of Louis XIV, and the battalions of Napoleon. The world reeled under the fierce charges of these world-empire-grasping warriors; but the word of the Lord stood fast, and Europe has remained divided."
Defying the Fiat of Heaven
By Percy T. Magan
THE iron monarchy of Rome was the last of the so-called universal empires. Of the four — Babylon, Medo-Persia, Greece, and Rome — she, the last, was by far the greatest. Every acre of Rome's vast territory had been bought with blood. The brutal cut and thrust of conquest hewed its way through everything, from peaceful Carthage to sunny Gaul, in whose behalf the brave Vercingetorix made his mighty fight. The battle of Actium, B. C. 31, was followed by the last conquest of Egypt. And says the eloquent De Quincey:
"That conquest rounded and integrated the glorious empire. It was now circular as a shield — orbicular as the disk of a planet. The great Julian arch was now locked into the cohesion of granite by its last keystone. From that day forward, for three hundred years, there was silence in the world. No muttering was heard. No eye winked beneath the wing. Winds of hostility might still rave at intervals: but it was on the outside of the mighty empire; it was at a dream-like distance; and like the storm that beat against some monumental castle, and at the doors and windows seemed to call, they rather irritated and vivified the sense of security than at all disturbed its luxurious lull. She could suffer only by the wrath of Providence; and so long as she continued to be Rome, for many a generation, she only of all the monarchies has feared no mortal hand."
The world monarchy of Rome was anything but a merciful government. The world at large suffered much under the gross misrule of the Roman Senate. And when at last the foreign wars of Rome were ended, then Roman unsheathed sword against Roman, and the men and women of the unhappy empire learned anguish still keener during the three civil wars of the great Julius against Pompey, and the authors of the Triumvirate against Brutus and Cassius, and of Octavius against Mark Antony. Truly was the little finger of Rome thicker than the loins of the three universal kingdoms in whose wake she followed.
Governed by Brute Strength
SUCH were the workings of the "iron rule" of Rome. The "Eternal City," risen from a bog once situate between the Tiber and the Anio, had become the metropolis of the earth, and that band of robbers whose keep had been the Mons Palatinus had become le vainqueur des vainqueurs de la terre.
There is a deeply significant thought in the very idea of an "eternal city" and empire. Curious it is that the early memorials of Rome appear to be Greek in their origin. That name, "Rome," was Grecian in its genesis, and literally interpreted, means "Brute Strength." And "Brute Strength" correctly describes the foundation upon which the entire edifice was reared. Brute strength was what their woof and warp was woven from. And brute force is the intrinsic, the ultimate thought which is and ever has been mantled beneath that word "Rome," from the founding of the Urbs Aeterna in the misty gray days of the dawn of history, down to these, its twilight hours. In Rome, both pagan and papal, brute force has ever been the great, the last resort. By this one weapon did that genuinely heathen nation seek to bring the world beneath her yoke, and by that same sword has the great pseudo Christian church sought to enforce her sway.
CAESAR CROSSING THE RUBICON
It was brute force that gave to Rome her territory. That vast and fruitful domain brought forth her riches, riches bred luxury, and luxury gave birth to those most wretched of all twin sisters — corruption and vice.
Now the rule and ruin of Rome was foretold in the sacred Scriptures. Daniel the prophet, himself a statesman of renown, speaks of "the fourth kingdom," which "shall be strong as iron: forasmuch as iron breaketh in pieces and subdueth all things: and as iron that breaketh all these, shall it break in pieces and bruise. And whereas thou sawest the feet and toes, part of potters' clay, and part of iron, the kingdom shall be divided; but there shall be in it of the strength of the iron, forasmuch as thou sawest the iron mixed with miry clay. And as the toes of the feet were part of iron, and part of clay, so the kingdom shall be partly strong, and partly broken. And whereas thou sawest iron mixed with miry clay, they shall mingle themselves with the seed of men: but they shall not cleave one to another, even as
iron is not mixed with clay. And in the days of these kings shall the God of heaven set up a kingdom, which shall never be destroyed: and the kingdom shall not be left to other people, but it shall break in pieces and consume all these kingdoms, and it shall stand forever. Forasmuch as thou sawest that the stone was cut out of the mountain without hands, and that it brake in pieces the iron, the brass, the clay, the silver, and the gold; the great God hath made known to the king what shall come to pass hereafter: and the dream is certain, and the interpretation thereof sure." Dan. 2: 40-45.
The Dragon's Supreme Effort
THE twelfth chapter of the book of Revelation opens with a view of a woman clothed with the sun, and the moon under her feet, and on her head a crown of twelve stars. Of her it is written that she brought forth a man child who was to rule all nations with a rod of iron; and her child was caught up to God on the throne. Without question, the man child was Christ, and the woman can be nothing else than a symbol of the Christian church. Luke 24: 51; Mark 16: 9; Rev. 12: 3-5.
And there stood before the woman a great red dragon, "to devour her child as soon as it was born." And now the question arises: What instrumentality, what power, did Satan — the original "dragon" of the Bible — use in his attempt to devour the Child Christ Jesus as soon as He was born?
Ah, he had a world power, strong as iron, all ready for his undying purpose of annihilating the truth of God in the earth. That world empire, which for this very purpose he had planned at Babel, which he had accomplished in part in Babylon — "the hammer of the whole earth" — which he had tried again in Medo-Persia and Greece, he had accomplished as near to the full as the confusion of tongues would permit in the giant Roman Empire.
There can be no question but that Satan had indeed timed nicely that such an empire, with such an emperor over it, ruled the earth when the Son of God was born in Bethlehem. For truly when the Son of God was on earth was the all-crucial day in the history of redemption. If Satan could destroy the power of Christ, or annihilate Him, he knew that his hellish principles would triumph. And so it was that he marshaled a world empire, under the master hand of the imperial Cæsars, absolutely controlling all things religious as well as all things civil. Never in the history of the world before that time were his forces better prepared for the battle.
Slain by Roman Authority
ROME, the world empire of the dragon, lost no time in her endeavor to put to death Christ, the Man Child born of the woman. First came the decree of Herod that every male child should be put to death. Herod was king of Judea, king by decree of the Roman6Senate. Satan had sought the life of Christ when he inspired the decree that all the male children of the Jews were to be killed. Christ had escaped him, but he was not to be halted by this. He never rested until Pilate, a Roman governor, sentenced Christ to death; till Roman soldiers nailed Him to a cross; and till a Roman seal sealed Him in a tomb, over which a detachment of Roman soldiers mounted guard.
And then, as if the whole gigantic scheme which Satan had with such master cunning perfected were as a mere nothing for God to deal with, He sent one angel from heaven — the stone was rolled away, the guard of Roman soldiers became as dead men, and Christ arose to life.
In all this, God had met Satan, as it were, at his own time and under his own circumstances, and triumphed over him then and there; for the "man child" "was caught up unto God, and to His throne."
The Mirror of Satan's Mind
AND to the last day that the Roman Empire remained, she remained as Satan's instrumentality; and he used her to persecute the church, until the measure of the great empire's iniquity was filled, and the decree went forth, as against "the hammer of the whole earth" before her, "It is time to thresh her." Then that dragon empire, the mirror of Satan's mind in civil and religious government, was crushed to pulp and ground to powder beneath the heel of the barbaric tribes of ancient Germania.
The prophet Daniel had stated of this kingdom that it should be divided into ten parts. Seven of these, according to the Scripture, were to remain until the end of time, when the God of heaven is to set up a kingdom that shall never be destroyed. Therefore any attempt on the part of any of the great powers at the present time to set up a world monarchy is bound to be in vain, for the division of the earth into a number of kingdoms is to stand until Christ shall come and set up the everlasting kingdom of God. Out of the present war there will never — there never can — come one overshadowing world power.
But against this infinite fiat that the earth should be divided into a number of kingdoms, which should never be united, have been hurled, each in its time, with titanic force and herculean effort, the clans of Clovis, the legions of Charlemagne, the flower of knighthood under Charles V, the dragoons of Louis XIV, and the battalions of Napoleon. The world reeled under the fierce charges of these world-empire-grasping warriors; but the word of the Lord stood fast, and Europe has remained divided.
