to prove how willingly he would annihilate the God..... Whatever has been invented by the guilty spirit of unbelief from the beginning of time-whatever of subtle objection, of sceptical doubt, of gross or refined atheism, is here concentrated-and as the uninitiated, ingenuous reader proceeds with this "mystery of iniquity," his mind is bewildered, his heart is appalled; he feels like an individual hurried from the light of day, and the sweet converse of human society, into those dim regions which poets dream of, where dæmons mock, and unearthly forms of horror amaze and distract the sight; nor does the illusion cease till he shuts the volume, and feels himself in the living world of humanity, with the bright heavens above him, and nature smiling in her loveliness around him." P. 17.

The fourth charge is that in which the poet is exhibited as "the direct assailant of virtue; the deliberate corrupter of morals; the profligate and undisguised advocate of vice." Concerning the poem which is adduced to support this awful charge, we have only room for a few lines, in which its character is, we believe, correctly enough delineated.

"It is at once the glory and disgrace of our literature; and will remain to all ages a perpetual monument of the exalted intellect and depraved heart of the writer. It is devoted to the worst of purposes and passions, and flows on in one continued, unvarying stream of pollution....If for a moment the author appears to forget himself, and to suffer his muse to breathe of purity and tenderness, if a touch of hu... manity, a faint gleam of goodness awaken our sympathy, he turns upon us with a sneer of contempt; or laughs our sensibility to scorn.... In every page the poet is a libertine;' and the most unexceptionable passages are mildewed with impurity.' The cloven foot of the libidinous satyr is monstrously associated with the angel-wing of genius." P. 22.

Dr. Styles's observations on the influence of "the character of women," upon the well-being of a nation, are just and sensible; but far too vehement and glowing to suit our taste. We have now only one word to say, ere we dismiss the subject, with regard to the extraordinary individual who has succeeded in obtaining for himself so unenviable a notoriety, but who has failed, we may, without uncharitableness, profess to hope, in securing that permanent renown which seemed to be the darling object of his life. Lord Byron's bane, was rather pride than infidelity. The distinction may be thought a nice one; but yet there is a distinction, and he is entitled to the benefit of it. Had he let his passions loose upon mankind because he believed there was no God above who would punish him for doing so, his fault would have been not pride but infidelity; but as it was

in the wanton exercise of a fancied superiority over the rest of the world, that he threw their religion in their teeth, that he affected to despise what they love, and to spurn what they adore; his fault was not infidelity but pride. Condemned by all pious and virtuous minds, in either case he still must remain: but we do not like to see an irregularity in the process by which so fearful a condemnation is passed even on the worst of

criminals.

A Sermon on the Death of Lord Byron. By a LAYMAN. 8vo. 32pp. 1s. 6d. Knight and Lacey. 1824.

2 SAM. iii. 38.-" Know ye not that there is a prince and a great man fallen this day?"

This discourse opens with some very abrupt and somewhat turgid sentences upon the sudden fall of that undisputed genius, Lord Byron. The author then takes into consideration at some length,

I. The certainty of death.

II. The unwillingness generally prevalent among men to make the event of death a subject of serious concernment.

III. The reflections suggested by the fall of Lord Byron.. IV. The duties and responsibilities of individuals occupying elevated stations in society.

The third of these heads is the only one in which the subject of the sermon is really touched upon; and under this head are noticed, the general sensation caused by the death of Lord Byron; the peculiarities of his genius; the misapplication of his talents; and the glory of his attempts to aid the cause of Greece. But here, as in the rest of the discourse, correctness and usefulness are so entirely sacrificed to pomp and shew of words, that we fear the remarks will be read with very little either of profit or satisfaction. It is mere romancing to say, that when Lord Byron's death was first announced "a rigid anxiety was marked in every countenance which manifested the intensity of interest felt by all ranks in this extraordinary person." P. 22. No one, perhaps, who was acquainted even by report, with the manner of this nobleman's life, could hear unmoved that all opportunity of reformation was suddenly cut off: but this is not the kind of interest which contracts the muscles or racks the brain: Lord Byron had long proscribed himself from the social circles of his country, and had latterly

obtained for his works a share in the same sentence of banishment: the interest we feel for him is therefore, the interest of fellow Christians, not that of companions, or of admirers. But it is worse than romancing to speak of the "patent of his honours as being registered in Heaven," for this, if it mean any thing, means that he is of Heaven's true nobility; or that he has been gifted with one of those crowns of glory which are laid up as the reward of perseverance in faith, meekness, purity, charity, and in every other thing which is lovely and of good report.

RETROSPECTIVE REVIEW.

Apocalyptical Key. An extraordinary Discourse on the Rise and Fall of Papacy, or the pouring out of the Vials, in the Revelation of St. John, ch. 16. By Robert Fleming, V.D.M. 1701.

THIS very rare and curious old book is admitted to a share of our notice, because it really is, what it professes to be, an extraordinary discourse; and excites interest by the manner in which its author hazarded conjectures respecting the revolution of France, the fate of its monarch, and the depression and elevation of the Papal power, nearly a hundred years before the accomplishment of these events.

Generally speaking, we are inclined to follow the opinion of Sir Isaac Newton, and to censure the presumption of those interpreters, who affect to be able to foretell times and things by the prophecies of the Apocalypse, as if God designed to make them prophets. The design of God, says he, when he gave them this and the prophecies of the Old Testament, was not to gratify men's curiosity by enabling them to foreknow things, but to the end that, after they were fulfilled, they might be interpreted by the event, and his own Providence be manifested to the world.

Mr. Fleming, who was a very modest and learned dissenting divine, deprecated, as sincerely as Sir Isaac Newton did, the practice, so prevalent in those times, of building wild theories upon the predictions of the Book of Revelations; but having studied history attentively, and made his observations upon what he read, he was struck with the frequent coincidence of similar events taking place at nearly equal distances of time. observation he applied more particularly to such events predicted in the

This

Apocalypse, as had already occurred, or were likely to happen at no very remote period, and comparing the future with the past, he suggested the probability of homogeneous revolutions taking place at the end of corresponding intervals.

The reason why Mr. Fleming conjectured that the prophecy of the 8th verse of the 16th chapter," And the fourth Angel poured out his vial upon the sun," would apply to the kingdom of France, and that the prediction would be fully accomplished about the year 1794 is thus ingeniously, and, some will think, satisfactorily explained.

"The sun and other luminaries are the emblems of Princes and kingdoms. As to the remaining part of the vial I do humbly suppose that it will come to its highest pitch, about the year 1717, and that it will run out about 1794. The reasons for this conjecture are two. The first is, because I find that the Papal kingdom got a considerable accession to its power, upon the Roman western empires being destroyed A.D. 475. Now if from this remarkable year we begin the calculation of 1260 years, they lead us down to 1735, which in prophetical* account is this very year 1717. The second is, because this year leads us down to a new centenary revolution, for is it not observable that John Huss, and Jerome of Prague, (to run this up no further,) were burnt A.D. 1417. After which the true religion in Bohemia, and in other places, was more and more obscured and suppressed until that famous year 1517, when Luther arose and gave the reformation a new resurrection, according to that remarkable prediction of Jerome of Prague, Centum annis revolutis, Deo respondebitis et mihi, which the Bohemians afterwards stamped upon their coin as their motto. From which year the reformed interest did still increase till the year 1617, about which time the German and Bohemian wars began to break out. And it is but too obvious what an ebb hath followed since that time to this, so that there is ground to hope that about the beginning of another such century, things may alter again for the better, for I cannot but hope, that some new mortification of the chief supporters of Antichrist will then happen; and perhaps the French monarchy may begin to be considerably humbled about that time; that whereas the present French King (Louis XIV. in 1701) takes for his emblem the sun, and this for his motto, "Nec pluribus impar," he may at length, or rather his successors, and the monarchy itself, at least before the year 1795, be found to acknowledge in respect to neighbouring potentates, he is even, singulis impar." But as to the expiration of this vial, I do fear that it will not be until the year 1794. The reason of which conjecture is this, that I find the Pope got a new foundation of exaltation, when Justinian, upon his conquest of Italy, left it in a great measure to the Pope's management, being willing to eclipse his own authority, to advance that of this haughty prelate. Now this being in the year 552, by the addition of 1260 years, reaches down to the year 1811, which according

66

In the prophetical year, thirty days make a month, and twelve months make a year. Thus the 1260 days mentioned in the Revelation, being reduced to years, are eighteen years short of Julian years.

to the prophetical account in the year 1794, and then I do suppose that the fourth vial will end, and the fifth commence by a new mortification of the Papacy." p. 52.

The decapitation of Louis XVI. the temporary overthrow of the throne of the Bourbons, the suppression for a time of the Roman Catholic, or established religion in France, the invasion of the states of the church by the French armies, and the suspension of the Pope's temporal authority, are singular accomplishments of the two predictions, agreeing both in time and fact with Mr. Fleming's conjecture.

In another passage the author excites our surprize, by the extraordinary felicity with which he has thrown out surmises, that relate to the restoration of the throne of the Bourbons, and to that of the triple crown, after their humiliation at the end of the last century. “Be pleased to call to mind what I premised to the consideration of the seven vials, viz. that seeing the vials do all of them suppose a struggle, or war between the popish, and reformed parties, every vial is to be looked upon as the event and conclusion of some new periodical attack of that first party upon this other, the issue of which proves favourable at length to the latter against the former. For if this be duly considered it will let us see that great declining of the protestant interest, for some time, and great and formidable advances, and new degrees of increase in the Romish party, are very consistent with the state of both these opposite interests under the vials. And therefore we are not to entertain such chimerical notions of the fall of the Papacy, as if it were to be accomplished speedily and miraculously." p. 54.

Again, "whatsoever is denoted by the sun here, and power was given unto him to scorch men by fire, ch. 16, v. 8. as I suppose the House of Bourbon principally is, is made use of both to torment others, and to be tormented himself in so doing. And if the King of France therefore be denoted by this principally, I fear he is yet (that is after his temporary downfall) to be made use of in the hand of God, as Nebuchadnezzar was of old, against the Jews, as a further severe scourge to the Protestant churches every where." p. 56.

The following application of the 9th verse is more remarkable still. "And besides this characteristical mark, which seems to forebode his further exaltation, and our humiliation, there is yet a third thing, which I cannot but hint upon with dread and trembling of heart, viz. That it is further said, that while this Sun of the Popish world is running his fatal and dreadful career, and scorching men with fire, they are so far from being bettered by these judgements, that they go on more and more to blaspheme the name of God, who hath power over these plagues. And while this continues to be the state of the Protestant world, while Atheism, Deism, Socinianism, profaneness, irreligion, scepticism, formality, hatred of Godliness, and a bitter persecuting spirit, continue and increase among us, what can we expect but new and desolating judg→ ments." p. 56.

It was in this manner, that our author, in his quaint style, not only applied the words of the prophet to a series of events, which have