symbolic language. "We must note," "We must note," says Daubuz, "that the governing part of the political world appears under symbols of different species; and that it is variously represented according to the various kinds of allegories. If the allegory be derived from the sensible world, then the luminaries denote the governing part; if from an animal, the head or horns; if from the earth, a mountain or fortress; and in this case the capital city, or residence of the governor, is taken for the supreme; by which it happens that these mutually illustrate each other. So a capital city is the head of the political body; the head of the animal is the fortress of the animal; mountains are the natural fortresses of the earth; and therefore a fortress or capital city, though set in a plain level ground, may be called a mountain. And this by the rule of analogical metaphors, the terms of which mutually illustrate each other. Thus head, mountain, hill, city, horn, and king are in a manner synonymous terms to signify a kingdom, monarchy, or republic united under one government; only with this difference, that it is to be understood in different respects: for the head represents it in respect of the capital city; mountain or hill, in respect of the strength of the metropolis, which gives law, or is above the adjacent territories; and the like. Thus in Is. 2. 2. And it shall come to pass in the last days that the mountain of the Lord's house shall be established in the tops of the mountains,· and shall be exalted above the hills; and all nations shall flow unto it.' This needs not to be proved to signify the kingdom of the Messias. So a capital city is a head, and taken for the whole territory thereof, as in

6

Is. 7. 8, 9. For the head of Syria is Damascus, and the head of Damascus is Rezin; and the head of Ephraim is Samaria, and the head of Samaria is Remaliah's son.' Is. 11. 9. They shall not hurt or destroy in all my holy mountain,' that is, in all the kingdom of the Messias, which shall then reach all over the world, for it follows; The earth shall be full of the knowledge of the Lord.' Mic. 6. 7, 8. Contend thou before the mountains, and let the hills hear thy voice: hear, ye mountains, the Lord's controversy.' The commentators here say: Montes hic vocat principes et proceres'he here calls princes and potentates mountains, citing for it Ps. 72. 3. Is. 2. 14. Habak. 3. 6. So the whole Assyrian monarchy is called a mountain in Zech. 4. 7. Who art thou, O great mountain? before Zerubbabel thou shalt become a plain;' and in Jerem. 51. 25, α destroying mountain.' Thus also in Dan. 2. 35. 'The stone that smote the image became a great mountain, and filled the whole earth; that is, the kingdom of the Messias having destroyed the four monarchies became an universal monarchy, as it is plainly made out in v. 44, 45. Again, Is. 41. 15. Thou shalt thresh the mountains, and shalt make the hills as chaff." Targ. 'Occides populos, et consumes regna, quasi stipulam pones eos'-thou shalt slay the people, and shalt consume the kingdoms; thou shalt make them as stubble.”* Heads and mountains therefore being synonymous symbols, the seven heads of the Dragon are seven monarchies. This is strikingly confirmed by a reference to

* Perpet. Comment. p. 50%.

Rev. 17. 9, 10, where the prophet gives a description of the Beast which succeeded the Dragon, and whose power territorially considered was commensurate with that of the Dragon, so that the heads in each are a symbol perfectly equivalent, and which is thus explained by the interpreting angel: "Here is the mind which hath wisdom. The seven heads are seven mountains, on which the woman sitteth. And there are seven kings." The translation here is unhappy.* By the sentence being closed at the word 'sitteth,' and the next made to begin thus; And there are seven kings,' the 'seven kings' are separated from their antecedents, and the verb 'are' from its nominative, and the reader is led to suppose that the words 'there are seven kings' have no particular connexion with the seven heads in the preceding verse. Whereas it is clear from the original, that the seven heads are the antecedent both to the seven mountains and to the seven kings, and the nominative to both the verbs which precede the words 'mountains' and kings.' A literal translation would render the passage thus :-The seven heads are seven mountains where the woman sitteth upon them, and they are seven kings;' i. e. kingdoms, the uniform sense of the term kings' in the style of the prophets. The drift of the hierophantic angel is to inform the wondering seer, that heads' and mountains' were equivalent symbols, both denoting kingdoms.' By the woman's sitting on seven mountains, therefore, we are to understand that the Roman Empire, in its ecclesiastical form, embraced within

* Αί επτα κεφαλαι ορη εστιν επτα, όπου η γυνη καθηζαι 'επ' αυτων, και βασιλεις επτα εισιν.

premacy.

its limits all those ancient sovereignties which had constituted the heads of the Dragon in former ages, and which had successively yielded to the Roman arms, and been merged into constituent parts of its imperial integrity. As, however, the city of Rome itself was seated upon seven hills, there is in the image a simultaneous secondary allusion to that far-famed centre of suAt the same time we do not hesitate to affirm, that the plenitude of the symbol is far from being exhausted by its application to the Capitoline, Viminal, Quirinal, and other hills, which constituted the site of the eternal city.' "We must not here forget," says the writer above cited," as a secondary event or coincidence of this prophecy, that the capital city of the Dragon's dominions was placed upon seven heads or hills. The Roman authors are full of that notion; and as if that circumstance were fatal, not only Rome was so built, but also Constantinople or the New Rome, sister to the former, was built on seven hills. This, I confess, is a kind of fatal coincidence; but yet the first intention of the Holy Ghost was not to express that, but that the empire of the Dragon should, in its whole extent and duration, as also the Beast his successor, consist of seven capital cities or monarchies; which is the true meaning of the seven heads, mountains, or kings. We may not imagine that the Holy Ghost would dwell upon so narrow a conceit as that circumstance of the building of the city, and neglect that remarkable one of the extent of the dominions; besides, that the exposi tion of seven kingdoms destroys so trifling a notion of the seven mountains. There goes about another account

of these seven heads, said to be found out by King James the First :-that the seven heads were the seven kinds of government which have been in Rome from its foundation under the kings to the emperors and popes. This is mightily applauded by Du Moulin, followed by Mede, Jurieu, and who not. But we cannot acquiesce therein, both upon the account of the true signification of head or mountain, as we have explained and fully proved it; and more especially for the following reason:

-That the Holy Ghost doth not use to call any government by any other name but that of kingdom, and so takes no notice of what changes might be made in the lodging of the supreme power in different hands, provided it remains in the hands of the same nation. It is still the same head though it should run through many more sorts of government. A king signifies the possessor of the supreme power, let it be lodged in one person, two, ten, or more; and a head or capital city is still the same head, though its power be executed by a king, consuls, decemvirs, or senate. For we must argue about the political body as about the animal. changes that happen in the animal through the various nourishment it takes, or the different ages it goes through, are not wont to make us describe him with different bodies, heads, or faces, (merely) because the appearance of these hath sometimes changed; so it is in the political body. Many revolutions may happen therein from within itself, but as long as the same polity is preserved in the same city, people, and laws, without making any thorough or partial change of nation, occasioned by the force of foreign armies, it is the same political body, and

The