Daniel 8:23
And in the latter time of their kingdom, when the transgressors are come to the full, a king of fierce countenance, and understanding dark sentences, shall stand up. And in the latter time of their kingdom, when the transgressors are come to the full, a king of fierce countenance, and understanding dark sentences, shall stand up.
The latter time of the divided Grecian dominion fixes the emergence of the little horn to the latter part of the four kingdoms that succeeded Alexander's empire. The symbols and specifications of that horn belong to Rome, not to Antiochus Epiphanes. That identification is confirmed by Rome's historical course, for it rose from a small beginning, grew toward the east and toward the south, persecuted God's people, and exalted itself against Christ. The prophecy stands within the prophetic periods of Daniel 8 and 9, whose historical and chronological reckoning is anchored to 457 B.C. as the starting date.
Its final breaking without human hand ties its overthrow to the stone that smites and destroys the image in Daniel 2. It belongs to Daniel's prophecies concerning the mysteries of future ages, which even Daniel did not fully understand and whose meaning was sealed until the time of the end, the closing period of this world's history. It belongs to a vision whose events are in process of fulfillment in the last days and will soon come to pass.