rm _Antichrist_, that it means, the
_Papacy_, or, the _Church of Rome_. Thus he reasons:--"He is Antichrist
that denieth the Father and the Son: but _the Church of Rome_ never
denied either the Father or the Son: therefore _the church of Rome_
cannot be the _Antichrist_ intended by St. John." Now, in this argument,
which seems to be so clear and conclusive, there is a latent sophism, an
assumption contrary to the Scriptures. The false assumption is, that the
word _denieth is univocal_; that is, that it has in the Bible, and on
this doctrinal point in particular, only _one sense_; whereas this is
not the case. The Church of Rome does indeed "profess to know" the
Father and the Son, but "in works denies" both, (1 Tim. v. 8; Tit. i.
16.) Therefore Mr. Faber's conclusion is not sustained by his premises,
and the Church of Rome might be the Antichrist for any thing that his
syllogism says to the contrary.

Mr. Faber imagined that "Republican France,--infidel and atheistical
France,"--was the Antichrist; and he labored with much ingenuity to
sustain his position by applying to revolutionary France the latter part
of the eleventh chapter of Daniel, together with the prophecies of Paul,
Peter and Jude. I presume that most divines and intelligent Christians
are long since convinced, by the developments of Providence, that he was
mistaken. The commotions of the French Revolution and the military
achievements of the first Napoleon, however important to peninsular
Europe, were on much too limited a scale to correspond with the
magnitude and duration of the great Antichrist's achievements. They
were, however, owing to their proximity to Britain and their threatening
aspect, of sufficient importance to excite the alarm and rouse the
political antipathies of the Vicar of Stockton upon Tees! Mr. Faber's
Antichrist is an "infidel king, wilful king, an atheistical king, a
professed atheist," of short duration, and his influence of limited
geographical extent. He is not in most of these features the Antichrist
of prophecy, whose baleful influence is co-extensive with Christendom,
and whose duration is to be 1260 years. Mr. Faber's erudition is to be
respected, his imagination admired, but his political feelings to be
lamented. Indeed, his very ecclesiastical title of office,--"Vicar," is
itself partly indicative and symbolical of the prophetic Antichrist.

I do not believe that infidel France, whether republican or monarchical,
nor the P