to which John was introduced was,
therefore, the period of the fourth
world power of Rome, which had ab-
sorbed into its gigantic empire the
carlier kingdoms of Babylon, Medo-
Persia and Greece.
The Identity of the Heads
Because the whole series of world
pOWErs is now comprehended in one
composite beast, the successive ruling
powers have to he distinguished by
multiplying the heads ol the beast.
There are seven of these, and Bale
vion, Medo- Persia, Grecia and ame
perial Rome were obviousiv the fast
[our.
The ten horns correspond with the
ten horns of the lourth heast of
Daniel seven and represent the ten
kingdoms into which Western Rome
was divided by the barbarian in
vasions olf the fourth and hlth cen-
turies. It is ta he noticed, however,
that whereas in the twelith chaper ol
the Revelation these horns wie un-
crowned, by reason of the fact tha
the kingdoms they represent had not
vet come to existence, in the thir
teenth chapter they cach have crowns,
So the specific point of time in the
story of the beast upon which our
attention is here focused may he even
more dehnitely pinpointed as the
davs when the harms had just heen
crowned, when the dracon of ime
perial Rome had vacated its seat in
favour ol its successor, and when the
fourth head of the beast had civen
place to the filth. All of which came
to pass mm the latter part of the ith
century ol our era.
Our mterest now centres upon the
fifth, sixth and seventh phases ot the
“beast,” which cover its history from
the breakup ol the Roman Fmpire
to the end of time, for one ol them
1s the “beast” of our dav which we
are particularly anxious to dently,
The Fifth or Papal Head
The fifth head of the beast which
dominated Furope after the fragmen-
tation of the cmipire into its ten sep-
arate parts 1s pictured in the seventh
chapter of Daniel as “another little
horn.” Verse 8, It is further described
as rising among the other horns, hat
“diverse” in nature from them (Verse
24), having “eves hike the eves of
man” (Verse 8), a mouth speaking
“great words against the Most Tigh”
and 1t is stated that it would “think
to change times and laws,” and would
“wear out the saints of the Most
High.” Verse 25.
In Revelation seventeen. where
the beast appears again to John in
vision, this same dominating power is
represented as a harlot woman seated
FEBRUARY, [950
upon the beast. bearing upon her
body the name of blasphemy (Rev-
elation 17:3), and “drunken with the
blood of the sainrs.” Verse i.
The exanunation of all these sep-
arate specilications is not here nec
essary. Qur readers do not need to he
told that they all point without any
shiclow of doubt te the apostate ec
clesiastical power of Rome. Jt arose
at the very centre ol the empire, taking
its seat on the throne ol the Caesars in
the ancient capital, from whenee for
more than a millennium it held the
nations of the West ms thrall.
Sa the hodv of the beast mots hith
period comprised the ten kingdoms
of Western Furope, and the Gfth
head was the mediaeval Papacy,
The Wonnding of the Papal Head
In the third verse of the thirteenth
chapter of the Revelation we are car-
vical on to the end of the long period
ob papal domination by the striking
statement of the revelator, “1 saw one
ol his heads [the fifth] as at were
wounded to death.”
Did such a catastrophe befall the
papal head, and if so. when?
The answer to the first question
is that this predicted catastrophe did
overtake the Papacy: and the answer
tor the second is that the blow etl in
1795, when General Berthicer with a
Luge French army invaded Tealv, oc
cupicd Rome, took the pope prisoner,
and dissolved the Papacy!
Commenting on this catastrophe.
Dir. Adam Clarke, in his Cormnendary
on Danitel 7:25, writes:
“In 179% the French republican
army under General Berthier rook
possession of the city of Rome. and
entirely superseded the whole papal
power. Phis was a deadly wound.”
With this conclusion the historians
of the period concur,
By
W. L. Emmerson
The Reverend George revor, Can:
on of York, in Rome and Its Papal
Rulers writes: “The Papacy was ex-
tinct; nat a vestige of its existence
remained; and wong all the Roman
Catholic powers not a Inger was
stirred in ats defence.” — Pase HO,
Joseph Bernhart, himself a Cath-
olic, savs of the death of the captive
pope in 1799: “Funeral orations were
held not merely tor the pope, but for
the Papacy. The goddess of freedom
was already erected on San Angelico
and her foot was on the tiara.” — The
atican av oo World Power, p- 324.
T. HH. Gill. another Catholic his
torian, in The Papal Dima. savs:
“Multitudes imagined that the Pua
pacy was at the pomt of death
asked, Would Pius VI be the
pontlf, and if the close of the cighi-
centh century would he sionalized by
the Tall of the papal dynasty,” -—
Jook 1
Ascent From the Abyss
That this was not to he the ond of
the Papacy, however, was made ciear
to the revelator, Tor he was told: “ITis
deadly wound was healed: and all
the world wondered alter the beast”
Revelation 15:3, Last part.
A Tuller account of the recnery of
the papal beast from its deadly
wound, which brinues the story down
to our own time, is found in the
seventeenth chapter of the Revela-
tion, where we may take 1t up in the
cichth verse:
“T'he beast that thou sawest was,
and 1s not: and shall ascend out of
the bottomless pit.” "The papal beast
“was” an all its glory and power right
on throuch the Middle Nees. Tt “was
not” when the mortal blow fell at the
end of the eighteenth century. There:
after 1 was to “ascend out of the hot-
tonnless pit” by reason of the healing
of its deadly wound, and the world
would wonder at its miraculous re-
COVery.
That the Papacy alter its humilia-
tion did ascend out of the abyss is
evident enough from a glance at is
history during the nineteenth and
twentieth centuries. Tis re-emergence
actually began mm Napoleonic dvs
when the emperor, having cast the
church aside as something for which
he had no use, was soon wanting if
hack again as a moral ally for the fur
therance of hs designs.
For many vears its revival was slow
hy reason of the growing spirit of
liberal nationalism nn Europe, but
with the accession of Lea NTI in 1870
it began to move forward by leaps and
bounds.
The first world war cave a further
mpetus to its re-establishment as one
ol the vreatest forces im made
Europe, and on February 11, 1929,
the signing of the Lateran Treaty
with Italy restored the long-lost rem:
poral power to the popes.
During the interwar years the Pa
pacy still further strenzthened dts me
fluence among the nations: and when
Pope Pius NTT was crowned in March,
1939, no fewer than fitty states were
represented. The “deadly vound™ was
certainly “healed.” "The beast that had
almost ceased to be was ascending
with great vigour from the abyss, Al-
ready the world was wondering after
the beast.
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