d the beast slain, the throne of
Constantinople continued to be occupied by the representative of the
empire. In the popular apprehension the imperial head of the beast
seemed to be utterly cut off by the sword of Odoacer,--"wounded by a
sword:" but the several kingdoms into which the empire was divided, in
process of time became united in the bonds of an apostate faith. The
imperial name and dignity were revived in the person of the emperor of
Germany, Charlemagne, in 800; and by the wars among the horns of the
beast, the title of emperor has been claimed alternately by Germany,
Austria and France, down to our own time. These dissensions and
rivalries among the sovereigns of Europe,--the mystic horns of the
beast, were foreshadowed in the Babylonish monarch's dream:--"the
kingdom shall be partly strong and partly broken,--they shall not cleave
one to another, even as iron is not mixed with clay," (Dan. ii. 42, 43.)
And doubtless these internal commotions among the common enemies of the
saints of God, have tended, in divine mercy, to divert their attention
occasionally from the witnesses. While they have been made the
instruments of mutual punishment, the Lord's people have been "hid in
the day of his fierce anger." (Zeph. ii. 3.)

At what time the sixth head of the beast disappeared and the seventh
became developed, is not clearly marked in the Apocalypse, and it is of
comparatively little importance, since the latter is to "continue a
short space" (ch. xvii. 10.) The _central fact_ is the continuance of
the beast a definite time under _all the heads_,--1260 years. Under all
the forms of government through which the empire passed, it continued
bestial and was the object of popular admiration. "All the world
wondered after the beast." The populace made court to, fawned upon,
followed in the train, or formed the retinue of the beast. We are to
limit the phrase,--"all the world," for not all the inhabitants are to
be understood, but such only as professed allegiance to the existing
imperial dominion; and among those within the beast's territorial
jurisdiction, the witnesses still stood to their protest against his
impious claims.--But from admiration and loyalty, the servile multitude
break forth into adoration, addressing the dragon and the beast in such
language as is proper to God only. (Ps. lxxxix. 6.) The shouts of the
rabble on Herod's birth-day may illustrate the conduct of these votaries
of the beast and dragon. (