“And the same hour there was a great earthquake” (ch. 11:13). This “same hour” is characterized as that in which the Two Tormenting Prophets, having risen from three lunar days and a half of years of political death, ascended to the possession of terrific power in the government, or heaven, in the sight of their enemies. The three days and a half, and the 1260 days of their sackcloth prophesying, styled in ch. 11:6, hen hemerais auton tes propheteias in their days of the prophecy, both ended together. The common terminus of these two periods was A.D. 1789’90; and signalized the commencement of the “same hour,” or twelfth part of “a time,” equal to thirty years. These ended with the beginning of the outpouring of the sixth vial, and the death of the “Man of Destiny,” who had figured so gigantically in the ministration of the wrath of the third, fourth and fifth vials. As the Hour began with the ending of one prophetic period, so it ended with the termination of another—the 1290 days of Dan. 12:11. It was an hour of judgment upon the Beast, to “slay it, and to give its body” politic to “the burning flame;” but not the hour. Between “a” or “an, ” and “the”, there is all the difference existing between type and antitype, shadow and substance. Napoleon, “the most gigantic being of modern times,” was a man of destiny, but not the Man of Destiny; who is indeed yet to appear, and before whose almigh- tiness the gigantic proportions of Napoleon’s glory and renown will shrink into the dwarfish insignificance of a babe. Still, as compared with other mortals, “this extraordinary man, whose name for twice seven years had filled the world with wonder and amazement,” was a giant of immense proportions, contending for universal monarchy, which, for a moment, in the Beast’s territory, he may be said to have realized. He was the man ofthefiour, whose tormenting pains and ulcers caused their victims to “gnaw their tongues,” as the earnest, or instalment, of that more terrible torment-that awaits them in “the Hour of Judgment,” in the presence of the Lamb (ch. 14:10,11).
The Hour of Judgment, in which “the Man of War” celebrated by Moses in his song, develops himself as the Man of Destiny, is characterized in its incipiency, by the preparation of a people to whom judgment may be given. This preparation, which is antitypical of that in 1789-’90, and at the termination also of a symbolic period of 1260 days, consists in a resurrection and ascension process. This resurrection and ascension are greater than the resurrection and ascension of the two tormenting prophets; for the antitype and substance are always grander and more intrinsically important than type and shadow. The earth is to be made to cast out, or bring forth, literally, the feeble; but poetically, the dead—aretz rephaim tapil (Isa. 26:19). These feeble ones all appear before the bema, or tribunal of justice; not before the thronos, throne or seat of dominion: and there, having been previously made capable of so doing, by the impressment of their identity, they every one give account of themselves to Christ, “the Judge of the living and dead”. The approved among them being accepted as “holy, and unblameable and unreprovable in his sight,” are arrayed in the symbolical “fine linen pure and bright” — that is, what Paul terms in Rom. 8:11; 1 Cor. 15:54 and 2 Cor. 5:4, to thneton, “the mortal” is quickened in the twinkling of an eye; and in this momentary operation, raised from corruption to incorruption; from dishonor to glory; from weakness or feebleness to power; from earthiness to spirituality: so that, being clothed upon with the house from heaven, “the mortal” is “swallowed up of the life” — hina katapothe to thneton hupo tes zoes. The life-power which descends upon
it, permeates it in all its substance; so that “the corruptible” becomes incorruptible, and “the mortal” becomes immortal; and the raising of the “building from the Deity, the house not made with hands,” is complete.
The people thus prepared, the Firstfruits redeemed from among men for the Deity and the Lamb, in whose mouth was found no guile, stand faultless before the throne of dominion, and become sharers in it. They ascend to power, and in the prophetic vision are seen standing upon Mount Zion with the Father’s Name impressed upon their foreheads (ch. 14:1-5). As for the rest of the feeble earthborns, they are deemed unworthy to be raised to “glory, honor, incorruptibility, and life”. Their record is unclean. They are convicted liars, hypocrites, deceivers, and seducers, who have “held the truth in unrighteousness;” and walked faithlessly in the prejudices and conceits of their corrupt nature. Having thus, and in many other ways, proved themselves enemies of the cross of Christ, and sowers to their flesh, they are sentenced to reap according to their sowing. They are repudiated by the Man of Destiny, who indignantly expels them from his presence as unworthy to share with him in the throne of his glory.
Having thus separated the wheat from the chaff, and gathered the former into his bam, he confers upon his accepted brethren the honor of co-operating with him in the execution of “the judgment written;” and of accompanying him whithersoever he goes in the work, not merely of casting a dark shadow over the kingdom and throne of the Beast, as under the fifth vial; but of effectually and finally slaying the Beast, and destroying his body, and giving it to the burning flame (Dan. 7:11). Napoleon’s work in his hour, assisted by his talented generals, was the type, or shadow cast before, of the work yet to be performed by Christ, the Man of War, and his brethren in arms, upon the same Beast, under the Seventh Vial, and in the terrible hour of his judgments. Napoleon and his marshals at the head of the French, was the shadowy representation in real life of the scene exhibited in ch. 19 of this prophecy, where Christ, the Faithful and True Warrior, is seen with his Brethren at the head of the Jewish white horse (Zech. 10:3), making righteous judicial war upon the same enemies, the worshippers of the Beast and his Image, that Napoleon scorched so effectively. And further, when his work was consummated, where among the Powers was the Papacy? It was nowhere. For about six years, the Papacy had no place in the Napoleonic Empire; neither in the antitypical dominion of Jesus and his Brethren will such a curse and blasphemy be tolerated. Napoleon effected a temporary abolition of it, and deprived Rome of its sovereignty for a while; but Christ Jesus, the king-breaker and king-maker of the future judicial hour, will abolish it forever, and sink Rome in the un-
fathomable abyss of fire, to be “found no more at all”.
Seven thunders, styled “Coalitions,” were organized against the French by the Powers of the world. These, however, were not the Seven Thunders whose utterances John was commanded not to write. The former were only the shadows of the future coalitions that will be formed against the King of the Jews, for the like purpose for which they were formed against the Emperor of the French, as being “the enemy and disturber of the tranquillity of the world, and hostile to its civil and social relations”. Napoleon and Jesus Christ are both chargeable with this hostility. The tranquillity of the Beast and his Image, and the perpetuity of their dynastic, civil, and social, institutions and relations, are doubtless highly desirable to all who profit by them. But, it is contrary to the Divine purpose that the wicked be at peace. The Deity hath decreed that there is no peace for them. It is only to the righteous that abundance of peace is promised. He therefore raised up Napoleon, and strengthened him by His power; and hath raised and exalted Jesus, and made him strong; and will send him again into the world under the sixth vial, to take peace far away from the worshippers of the Beast’s Image; and to destroy them and their institutions, by “the energy whereby he is able to subdue all things to himself’. Coalition after coalition will, doubtless, be formed against him; but, they will only serve, as under the third, fourth and fifth, vials, to bring their hosts up to the field of slaughter; that they may be “tormented with fire and brimstone in the presence of the holy angels, and in the presence of the Lamb”.
I cannot suppose, that these resemblances between Napoleon’s Hour, and Christ’s Hour, of judgment, can be accidental. I am persuaded rather, that they are designed, and that the one series is prefigurative of the other. Cyrus, in his conquest of Babylon, restoration of Judah, and laying the foundation of the temple, was a type of Christ in future and similar undertakings: Constantine “the Great” in the conquest of the “great red dragon,” whom he ejected from the heaven; and in his deliverance of the church from his sanguinary power, was also a type of Christ in his yet future work of slaying the Scarlet-colored Bbeast, delivering his downtrodden people, binding the Dragon, and shutting him in the abyss: and I am satisfied, that Napoleon “the Great” should be associated with them in their typical relation to him. The parallel between Napoleon and Christ is still further remarkable in this, that they both were plebeian and poor in their beginning; and commanded by their wonderful works the attention and admiration of mankind. They were both friends of Israel, and enemies of their oppressors; Christ was born to be a king, and therefore a military commander, which Napoleon became by extraordinary ability and success. They both entered upon their career in youth, to the confusion of the wise and prudent. Christ is the Mediator of the Commonwealth of Israel; Napoleon was the legally constituted Mediator of the Helvetic Commonwealth. Napoleon was king of Italy, emperor of Europe, and “Protector of the Church;” Christ is King of Israel, the destined Emperor of the world, and Protector of the Faithful in all future time. Napoleon abolished the ancient dynasties, gave their thrones to his brothers and relations, and darkened the kingdom and throne of the Beast; Christ will abolish all dynasties, will give their thrones to his Brethren, and destroy finally the same kingdom and throne: Napoleon suppressed the Papacy; Christ will destroy it, and leave not a wreck behind. In fine, I know not how the reader may view these things, but for myself, I see in the transformation of Europe under the first, third, fourth, and fifth vials; and in the military development, constitution, and triumph of the Napoleonic empire, a shadowy representation in real life of the approaching transformation of the world; and of the military development, dynastic constitution, and victorious establishment of the kingdom and empire of Christ and his Brethren, by the concluding judgments of the sixth, and all the plagues of the seventh, vials. There is an universal monarchy in these vials, whose judgments are not only destructive, but formative; and whose sovereignty will command and compel the obedience of all peoples, nations, languages, and rulers, to earth’s utmost bounds (Dan. 7:14,27; Psa. 2:8,9). “Hitherto is the end of the matter:” and a glorious consummation it will be.