are led by the eighth head of the beast, which is also of the seven. "The high ones of stature," may be the kings which march under his banner: for the principal oppressor of God's people hath always been a "kings of kings," and the last ten kings of the Antichristian confederacy give their power to the beast. "The haughty" may be his commanders, whom he maketh "to be altogether as kings," and who upbraid Hezekiah with words like these (Isai.xxxvi. 9): " How then wilt thou turn away the face of one captain of the least of my master's servants?" And "the thickets of the forest" may be his valiant and numerous and well-disciplined armies, who seem impervious to all attack, like the thickest parts of the forest. Whether there be any intention of such an enumeration of particulars, or whether it be the rich variety and strong reiteration of prophetic style, I take not upon me to say. But, however it is, it doth express a most entire destruction of the haughty and uplifted potentates of the earth; the removal of the whole fabric and institution of power which till that time shall have existed; its total supplantation, its complete subversion; to make room for another form and fashion of it, which is set forth in the next chapter. This greatest revolution upon the face of the earth is expressed in an infinite variety of ways. In the cxth Psalm it is, "wounding the heads over many lands, and filling the places with the dead bodies:" in the iid Psalm, it is "God's Anointed King over Zion breaking them with a rod of iron and dashing them in pieces like a potter's vessel: " in the lxxxii d Psalm, "Ye are gods, and every one of you are children of the Most High; but ye shall die like men, and fall like one of the princes" in the lxxvth it is, "All the horns of the wicked will I cut off." In the Apocalypse it is expressed by a diversity of symbols: vi. 13, "The heavens departed like a scroll, and every island and every mountain were removed out of their places." This is rather the preparation for the event than the event itself: the former we have seen during the years of the French Revolution and the changes which followed upon it; the latter we wait for, in the effects of that earthquake which is at hand, thus described, Rev. xvi. 20,-" And every island fled away, and the mountains were not found;" and, in plainer language, Rev. xix. 20,-" And the beast was taken, and with him the false prophet that wrought miracles before him, with which he deceived them that had received the mark of the beast, and them that worshipped his image: these both were cast alive into a lake of fire burning with brimstone: and the remnant were slain with the sword of him that sat upon the horse." But perhaps the most grand and sublime of all the descriptions which are given of this event is in the second chapter of our Prophet, from which we take the following passage:

"Enter into the rock, and hide thee in the dust, for fear of the Lord, and for the glory of his majesty. The lofty looks of man shall be humbled, and the haughtiness of men shall be bowed down; and the Lord alone shall be exalted in that day. For the day of the Lord of hosts shall be upon every one that is proud and lofty, and upon every one that is lifted up, and he shall be brought low; and upon all the cedars of Lebanon, that are high and lifted up, and upon all the oaks of Bashan, and upon all the high mountains, and upon all the hills that are lifted up, and upon every high tower, and upon every fenced wall, and upon all the ships of Tarshish, and upon all pleasant pictures. And the loftiness of man shall be bowed down, and the haughtiness of men shall be made low; and the Lord alone shall be exalted in that day. And the idols he shall utterly abolish. And they shall go into the holes of the rocks, and into the caves of the earth, for fear of the Lord, and for the glory of his majesty, when he ariseth to shake terribly the earth" (Isai. ii. 10-19). How few of the kings and the statesmen and the captains of the earth believe in any such subversion of their estate, because of the wickedness and pride and independency of God which are found in those that fill the thrones and occupy the dominions of the earth! They debate their questions, whether the power should be lodged in this or in that hand; they cry out for reform, and they are in fear of revolution; but no one hath an eye upon the rights of God's King, of God's Anointed King. To put in a claim for Him, were to obtain for yourself the appellation of madman, or fool, or knave. Yet such a claim, at such a risk, I do now put in. His are the thrones, His are the kingdoms. They belong neither to king nor to people, but to the Lord Jesus Christ. And the time is at hand for him to come and claim his own; to come and reckon with you, his stewards, O ye kings and judges of the earth! Therefore, be wise, be instructed; worship the Son; do homage and fealty to him; lest ye perish from the way, when once his wrath begins to burn.

Furthermore it is declared that this grand subversion of the firmament of power not only is to take place by violence, such as that by which a forest falls, but also that it is to be effected by the hand of a Mighty One: "Lebanon shall fall by the hand of a Mighty One." In like manner is it written of the fall of the Assyrian, in two places of our Prophet; which, for the clearer understanding of that now before us, it may be well for us to consult. The first is in the xxx th chapter, where, in the midst of the most sublime imagery announcing the terrible coming and presence of the Lord, very similar to that contained in the xviiith Psalm, the Assyrian's fall is thus described: (ver. 31)" For through the voice of the Lord shall the Assyrian be beaten down, which smote with a rod. (ver. 32) And in every place where the grounded staff

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shall pass, which the Lord shall lay upon him, it shall be with tabrets and harps and in battles of shaking will he fight with it. (ver. 33) For Tophet is ordained of old; yea, for the king it is prepared he hath made it deep and large; the pile thereof is fire and much wood the breath of the Lord, like a stream of brimstone, doth kindle it." The first of these verses declares that he shall endure until that voice of the Lord be uttered, which is thus described in the preceding verse; "And the Lord shall cause his glorious voice to be heard, and shall shew the lighting down of his arm, with the indignation of his anger, and with the flame of a devouring fire, with scattering, and tempest, and hailstones." This is, no doubt, identical with that "sword which proceedeth out of his mouth," and by which the slaughter of that fearful day is wrought (Rev. xix. 21). And if the Assyrian is to endure till then, it confirmeth one of the great conclusions running through this interpretation,-that under the name of the Assyrian is the great oppressing power of God's church, both Jewish and Christian, until the coming of Christ, prophesied of. The second of these verses connects his downfal with the downfal of all oppression: for as he falls, joy is to arise; as he is rooted out of his place with battles of shaking, the sound of the tabret and harp shall be heard. It shall not be any more to fall out of the hands of one oppressor into the hands of another; but out of the darkness of all oppression to emerge into the light and blessedness of everlasting joy and triumph. And this is true, whether by the words translated "grounded staff" we understand the staff with which the Great Builder lays the foundation of his everlasting structure; or whether we render them" the rod of correction," and understand by it the chastisements with which in the day of the Lord he shall be visited. And the last verse distinctly points out to us the very same event and act of God's wrath which in Rev. xix. 20 is expressed by the beast and the false prophet being cast into a lake of fire burning with brimstone; determining that the mystery of the Assyrian is coextensive with the mystery of the beast with seven heads; and that the "eighth head which is also of the seven"-that is, the infidel head of Rome yet to arise, and bring the false prophet to be at his steps-is the person properly meant by "the Assyrian" in Isaiah. For surely it was not for Sennacherib that the fire of Tophet is ordained, nor for any man who hath yet appeared upon the earth. The man still hath to appear who is not to die by natural death, but to be cast alive quick into the lake of Tophet. The other passage in which the downfal of the Assyrian is described is in the xxxist chapter of Isaiah, where, at verse 8, it is thus written of a time when " every man shall cast away his idols of silver and his idols of gold: "Then shall the Assyrian fall with the sword, not of a mighty man ; and the sword, not of

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a mean man, shall devour him: but he shall flee from the sword, and his young men shall be discomfited. (verse 9.) And he shall pass over to his strong hold for fear, and his princes shall be afraid of the ensign, saith the Lord, whose fire is in Zion, and his furnace in Jerusalem." There is an enigma in the description here given of the person by whose sword he falls, who is at once represented as "not a mighty man," and "not a mean man." Now, in our text he is described as a mighty man. Is there a contradiction in this? Not a contradiction, but an enigma. For in our text, after he has been denominated a mighty man, he is immediately described as growing like a despised branch, a root out of a dry ground, without form or coneliness: so that he is at once" not mighty, and not mean:" having the identity of Jesus of Nazareth, he is the despised branch," not mighty;" having the identity of Adon-Jehovah, he is" not mean." With respect to the event which is contained in the 9th verse, I know not well to what it refers. It may perhaps be a glance at the historical fact of the first Assyrian, who, after his troops were destroyed by the breath of the Lord, fled to Nineveh, his strong hold, and there ended his days; as we are informed, Isa. xxxvii. 36-38: "Then the angel of the Lord went forth, and smote in the camp of the Assyrians an hundred and fourscore and five thousand: and when they arose early in the morning, behold, they were all dead corpses. So Sennacherib king of Assyria departed, and went and returned, and dwelt at Nineveh. And it came to pass, as he was worshipping in the house of Nisroch his god, that Adrammelech and Sharezer his sons smote him with the sword; and they escaped into the land of Armenia and Esar-haddon his son reigned in his stead." Or it may refer to some event connected with the last Assyrian, which is not elsewhere, that we can see, spoken of. Inasmuch as it points out a different end to him from those who are joined with him, it is indeed particularly referred to in Rev. xix. 20: inasmuch as it points out a different locality, we have not been able to find any note of it elsewhere. Let these illustrations from other parts of Scripture explain to us what is meant by the Assyrian's falling by the hand of a Mighty One. That Mighty One is doubtless Adon-Jehovah-Sabaoth, who does the action of lopping the bow with terror: the Mighty One who has been already described as the El-gibbor, the God-hero; "the mighty God;" the mighty One whose anointing of the Holy Ghost in his generation of the virgin doth destroy the yoke. He is the person celebrated in this Divine song of his conception, name, and action; and therefore every great event introduced is declared to come to pass by His might and power: under whatever figure it is set forth, the glory of the exploit is his. The whole prophecy is the testimony of him. It is Immanuel's great and wonderful birth, and name, and work which the

prophet is given to set forth, as the assurance to the faint heart of Ahaz and the sign to his wavering faith that the line and the throne and the exploits of David's house should never have an end.

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The Assyrian, and with him all the oppressors of Israel, being thus brought to an end, that aspect of the subject is concluded; the aspect which concerns Israel's transgressions, Israel's punishment, and the punishment of all her oppressors together. And straightway the spirit of inspiration changes, and another form of the One Person is introduced to us; which might be entitled, The view of him as the Regenerator of the world, and its Redeemer from all the woes and miseries, the warfare and confusion, with which it hath been so long deluged. The prophetic harp ever closes with a strain of hope and blessedness; because all the severe inflictions of God are only to the end of destroying the enemies of peace. He maketh war, only to scatter them which delight in war, and to make wars to cease unto the ends of the earth his desolations are only to cast out the desolator: he roots up the forest, and reverses the surface of the ground, only that he may turn it into the smiling garden and the fruitful field as it is written in the xlvith Psalm, "Come, behold the works of the Lord, what desolations he hath made in the earth. He maketh wars to cease unto the end of the earth; he breaketh the bow, and cutteth the spear in sunder; he burneth the chariot in the fire. Be still, and know that I am God: I will be exalted among the heathen, I will be exalted in the earth. The Lord of hosts is with us; the God of Jacob is our refuge." That stillness, that peace, that exaltation and blessedness of the world under Immanuel, the strain doth now proceed to describe. "And there shall come forth a rod out of the stem of Jesse, and a branch shall grow out of his roots. In order to describe the fulness of creation, as well as of Godhead, which is contained in the man Christ Jesus, it is the method of the Holy Spirit to take similitudes from every department of nature and of art, and by the perfection thereof to represent his all-inclusive perfection. Amongst reasonable men, he is Lord: amongst the captives, he is Redeemer: amongst the militant members of the church, he is the Captain of their salvation: amongst the beasts of the field, he is the Lion of the tribe of Judah: amongst the trees of the wood, he is the cherishing Vine, which supporteth as its branches all the fruitful creation; or the goodly Cedar planted upon the height of Zion, in the shadow of whose branches all fowl of every wing do dwell: of the great fabric of redeemed things, the great temple of the Holy Ghost, he is the Foundation-stone with its seven eyes, and the Chief Stone of the corner, which is to be brought out with shoutings, saying, Grace, grace, unto it: he is the Sun in the firmament of heaven, he is the Light of the circumambient air, he is the Resurrection from