Appendix II, Note D: The Ten Kingdoms
‘“‘ PROPHECY is not given to enable us to prophesy,” and no one who has worthily pursued the study will fail to feel misgivings at venturing out upon the tempting field of forecasting “things to come.” By patient contemplation we may clearly discern the main outlines of the landscape of the future; but “until the day dawn,” our apprehension of distances and details must be inadequate, if not wholly false. The great facts of the future, so plainly revealed in Scripture, have been touched on in preceding pages. For what follows here no deference is claimed save what may be accorded to a “pious opinion” based on earnest and careful inquiry.
Next to the restoration of the Jews, the most prominent political feature of the future, according to Scripture, is the tenfold partition of the Roman earth. The emphasis and definiteness with which fez kingdoms are specified, not only in Daniel, but in the Revelation, forbid our interpreting the words as describing merely a division of power such as has existed ever since the disruption of the Roman Empire, though this is undoubtedly a feature of the prophecy. Babylon, Persia, Greece, and Rome in turn sought to grasp universal dominion. That there should be a commonwealth of nations living side by side at peace, was a conception that nothing in the history of the world could have ‘suggested.
The. principal clew which Scripture affords upon the subject is the connection between these kingdoms and the
Roman Empire.* But some latitude must probably be allowed as to boundaries, otherwise we should have to choose between two equally improbable alternatives, namely, either that our own nation shall have sunk to the position of a province, not even Ireland remaining under her sway,T or else that the England which is to be numbered among the ten kingdoms will include the vast empire of which this island is the heart and centre. May we not indulge the hope that however far our nation may lapse in evil days to come from the high placé which, with all her faults, she has held as the champion of freedom and of truth, she will be saved from the degradation of participating in the vile confederacy of the latter days?
These considerations as to boundaries apply also to Germany, though in a lower degree; and Russia is clearly out of the reckoning altogether. The special interest and importance of these conclusions depend upon the fact that the -
antichrist is to be at first a patron and supporter of the religious apostasy of Christendom (see p. 201, anfe), and that England, Germany, and Russia are precisely the three first-rate Powers who are outside the pale of Rome.
But there is no doubt that Egypt, Turkey, and Greece will be numbered among the ten kingdoms; and is it not improbable in the extreme that these nations will ever accept the leadership of a man who is to appear as the champion and patron of the Latin Church? A striking solution of
* “The ten horns out of this kingdom” (Dan. vii. 24).
y Ireland was entirely, and Scotland was in part, outside the territorial limits of the Roman Empire.
+ In Dan. xi. 40, Egypt and Turkey (or the Power which shall then possess Asia Minor) are expressly mentioned by their prophetic titles as separate kingdoms at this very time.
“a GF a edt i this difficulty will probably be found in the definite prediction, that while the ten kingdoms will ultimately own his suzerainty, ¢iree of the ten will be brought into subjection by force of arms (Dan. vii. 24. See p. 214, ante).
Turning again to the West, the names of France, Austria, Italy, and Spain present themselves; and seven of the kingdoms are thus accounted for. Can the list be completed? Belgium, Switzerland, and Portugal remain, and these too would claim a place were we dealing with the Europe of to-day; but as it is the future we are treating of, any attempt to press the matter further seems futile. It has been confidently urged by some that as the ten kingdoms were symbolised by the ten toes of Nebuchadnezzar’s image, — five on either foot, — five of these kingdoms must be developed in the East, and five in the West. The argument is plausible, and possibly just; but its chief force depends upon forgetting that in the prophet’s view the Levant and not the Adriatic, Jerusalem and not Rome, is the centre of the world. -
To the scheme here indicated the objection may naturally be raised: Is it possible that the most powerful nations of the world, England, Germany, and Russia, are to have no part in the great drama of the last days? But it must be remembered, first, that the relative importance of the great Powers may be different at the time when these events shall be fulfilled, and secondly, that difficulties of this kind may depend entirely on the sz/ence of Scripture, or, in other words, on our own ignorance. I feel bound to notice, however, that doubts which have been raised in my mind regarding the soundness of the received interpretation of the seventh chapter of Daniel point to a more satisfactory
answer to the difficulties in question.
As the vision of the second chapter specifies the four empires which were successively to rule the world, and as the seventh chapter also enumerates four “kingdoms,” and expressly identifies the fourth of these with the fourth kingdom of the earlier vision, the inference appears legitimate that the scope of both visions is the same throughout. And this conclusion is apparently confirmed by some of the details afforded of the kingdoms typified by the lion, the bear, and the leopard. So strong indeed is the prima facie case in support of this view, that I have not felt at liberty to depart from it in the foregoing pages. At the same time I am constrained to own that this case is less complete than it appears —
to be, and that grave difficulties arise in connection with it; and the following observations are put forward tentatively to promote inquiry in the matter : —
1st. Daniel ii. and vii. are both in the Chal dee portion of the Book, and are therefore bracketed together, and separated from what follows. This strengthens the presumption, therefore, which would obtain in any case, that the later vision is not a repetition of the earlier one. Repetition is very rare in Scripture.
and. The date of the vision of the seventh chapter was the first year of .Belshazzar, and therefore only some two or three years before the fall of the Babylonian empire.* How then could the ise of that empire be the subject of the prophecy? Verse 17 appears definite that the rise of all these kingdoms was future.
3rd. In the history of Babylonia there is nothing to correspond with the predicted course of the first Beast, for it is scarcely legitimate to suppose that the vision was a pro
* See Chron. Table, App. I., ante,
e phecy of the career of Nebuchadnezzar, whose death had taken place upwards of twenty years before the vision was given. Moreover, the transition from the lion with eagle’s wings to the human condition, though it may betoken decline in power, plainly typifies a signal rise rei i and intellectually.
4th. Neither is there in the history of Persia anything
answering to the bear-like beast with that precision and - fulness which prophecy demands. The language of the English version suggests a reference to Persia and Media; but the true rendering appears to be: “It made for itself one dominion,”* instead of “It raised up itself on one side.”
5th. While the symbolism of the sixth verse seems at first sight to point definitely to the Grecian Empire, it will appear upon a closer examination that af tts advent the leopard had four wings and four heads. This was its primary and normal condition, and it was in this condition that ‘« dominion was given to it.” This surely is very different from what Dan. viii. 8 describes, and what the history of Alexander’s Empire realised, viz., the rise of a single power, which in its decadence continued to exist in a divided state.
6th. Each of the three first empires of the second chapter (Babylon, Persia, and Greece) was in turn destroyed and engulphed by its successor; but the kingdoms of the seventh chapter all continued together upon the scene, though “the dominion,” was with the fourth (Dan. vii. 12). Verse 3 seems to imply that the four beasts came up together, and at all events there is nothing to suggest a series of empires, each destroying its predecessor, though the symbolism of
—=
* Tregelles, Daniel, p. 34.
the vision was (in contrast with that of chap. ii.) admirably adapted to represent this. Compare the language of the next vision (Dan. viii. 3-6).! 7th. While the fourth beast is unquestionably Rome, the language of the seventh and twenty-third verses leaves no doubt that it is the Roman Empire in its revived and future phase. Without endorsing the views of Maitland, Browne, — etc.,* it must be owned that there was nothing in the history of ancient Rome to correspond with the main characteristic of this beast unless the symbolism used is to be very loosely interpreted. To “devour the earth,” “tread it down and break it in pieces,” is fairly descriptive of other empires, but Ancient Rome was precisely the one power which added government to conquest, and instead of treading down and breaking in pieces the nations it subdued, sought rather to mould them to its own civilization and polity.
All this — and more might be added + — suggests that the entire vision of the seventh chapter may have a future reference. We have already seen that sovereign power is to be with a confederacy of ten nations ultimately heading up in one great Kaiser, and that several of what are now the first-rate Powers are to be outside that confederacy: it is in the last degree improbable, therefore, that such a supremacy will be attained save after a tremendous struggle. At this moment the international politics of the old world centre in the Eastern Question, which is after all merely a
+..
+ ae ye ae a ae
a, ew Sa) SD
. * Seep. 38, ance.
+ The beasts of Dan. vii. are those named in Rey. xiii. 2, to represent the Antichrist, Though this admits of the explanation given at P. 202, ante, it may also be used as a strong argument in favour of the view above set forth,
POE net eee ae question of the balance of power in the Mediterranean. Now Dan. vii. 2 expressly names the Mediterranean (“the Great Sea”) as the scene of the conflict between the four beasts. May not the opening portion of the vision then refer to the gigantic struggle which must come some day for supremacy in the Mediterranean, which will doubtless carry with it the sovereignty of the world? The lion may possibly typify England, whose vast naval power may be symbolized by the eagle’s wings. The plucking of the wings may represent the loss of her position as mistress of the seas. And if such should be the result of the impending struggle, we would be eager to believe that her after course shall be characterized by moral and, mental pre-eminence: the beast, we read, was “made to stand upon the feet as a man, anda man’s heart was given to it.”
If the British lion have a place in the vision, the Muscovite bear can scarcely be omitted; and it may confidently be averred that the bear of the prophecy may represent the Russia of to-day fully as well as the Persia of Cyrus and Darius, The definiteness of the symbolism used in respect of the leopard (or panther) of the vision makes it more difficult to refer this portion of the prophecy to Germany or any other nation in particular. It would be easy to make out an ad captandum case in support of such a view, but it may suffice to remark that if the prophecy be still unfulfilled, its meaning will be incontestable when the time artives,
: APPENDIX TL
A RETROSPECT AND A REPLY.
(ADDITIONAL CHAPTER FOR THE FOURTH EDITION.)
y te 2 See