The United States in Prophecy

THE manner in which the two-horned beast was seen coming up shows, equally with its location and its chronology, that it is a symbol of these United States. John says he saw the beast coming up "out of the earth." And this expression must have been designedly used to point out the contrast between the rise of this beast, and that of other national prophetic symbols. The four beasts of Daniel 7 and the leopard beast of Rev. 13 all arose out of the sea. Says Daniel, The four winds of heaven strove upon the great sea, and four beasts came up from the sea. The sea denotes peoples, nations, and tongues, Rev. 17:15; and the winds denote political strife and commotion. Jer. 25:32, 33. There was, then, in this scene, the dire commotion of nature's mightiest elements, the wind above, the waters beneath, the fury of the gale, the roaring and dashing of the waves, and the tumult of the raging storm; and in the midst of this war of elements, as if aroused from the depths of the sea by the fearful commotion, these beasts one after another appeared. In other words, the governments of which these beasts were symbols owed their origin to movements among the people which would be well represented by the sea lashed into foam by the sweeping gale; they arose by the upheavals of revolutions, and through the strife of war.

But when the prophet beholds the rising of the two-horned beast, how different the scene! No political tempest sweeps the horizon, no armies clash together like the waves of the sea. He does not behold the troubled and restless surface of the waters, but a calm and immovable expanse of earth. And out of this earth, like a plant growing up in a quiet and sheltered spot, he sees this beast, bearing on his head the horns of a lamb, those eloquent symbols of youth and innocence, daily augmenting in bodily proportions, and daily increasing in physical strength.

Some may here point to the war of the Revolution as an event which destroys the force of this application; but this furnishes no objection; for, 1. That war was at least fifteen years in the past when the two-horned beast was introduced into the field of this vision; and, 2. The war of the Revolution was not a war of conquest. It was not waged to overthrow any other kingdom; and build this government on its ruins, but only to defend the just rights of the American people. An act of resistance against continual attempts of injustice and tyranny cannot certainly be placed in the same catalogue with wars of aggression and conquest. The same may be said of the war of 1812. Hence, these conflicts do not even partake of the nature of objections to the application here set forth.

The word which John uses to describe the manner in which this beast comes up is very expressive. It is anabainon, one of the prominent definitions of which is, "to grow or spring up as a plant." And it is a remarkable fact that this very figure has been chosen by political writers as the one which best illustrates the rise of our government. Mr. G. A. Townsend, in his work entitled, "The New World Compared with the Old," p.462, says:—

"Since America was discovered, she has been a subject of revolutionary thought in Europe. The mystery of her coming forth, from vacancy, the marvel of her wealth in gold and silver, the spectacle of her captives led through European capitals, filled the minds of men with unrest; and unrest is the first stage of revolution."

On p. 633, he further says:—

"In this web of islands, the West Indies, began the life of both [North and South] Americas. There Columbus saw land, there Spain began her baneful and brilliant Western Empire; thence Cortez departed for Mexico, De Soto for the Mississippi, Balboa for the Pacific, and Pizarro for Peru. The history of the United States was separated by a beneficent Providence far from this wild and cruel history of the rest of the continent, and like a silent seed we grew into empire; while empire itself, beginning in the South, was swept by so interminable a hurricane that what of its history we can ascertain is read by the very lightnings that devastated it. The growth of English America may be likened to a series of lyrics sang by separate singers, which, coalescing, at last make a vigorous chorus, and this, attracting many from afar, swells and is prolonged, until presently it assumes the dignity and proportions of epic song."

A writer in the Dublin Nation, about the year 1850; spoke of the United States as a wonderful empire which was "emerging," and amid the silence of the earth daily adding to its power and pride."

In Martyn's "History of the Great Reformation," vol. iv. p. 238, is an extract from an oration delivered by Edward Everett, on the English exiles who founded this government, in which he says:—

"Did they look for a retired spot, inoffensive from its obscurity, safe in its remoteness from the haunts of despots, where the little church of Leyden might enjoy freedom of conscience? Behold the mighty regions over which in peaceful conquest—victoria sine clade—they have borne the banners of the cross."

We now ask the reader to look at these expressions side by side: "Coming up out of the earth," "coming forth from vacancy," "emerging amid the silence of the earth," "like a silent seed we grew into empire," "mighty regions" secured by "peaceful conquest." The first is from the prophet, stating what would be when the two horned beast should arise; the others are from political writers, telling what has been in the history of our own government. Can any one fail to see that the last four are exactly synonymous with the first, and that they record a complete accomplishment of the prediction? And what is not a little remarkable, those who have thus recorded the fulfillment have, without any reference to prophecy, used the very figure which the prophet employed. These men, therefore, being judges—men of large and cultivated minds, and whose powers of discernment all will acknowledge to be sufficiently clear—it is certain that the particular manner in which the United States have arisen answers most strikingly to the development of the symbol under consideration.

We now extend the inquiry a step further: Have the United States "come up" in a manner to fulfill the prophecy in respect to the achievements they have accomplished? Has their progress been sufficiently great and sufficiently rapid to correspond to that visible and perceptible growth which John saw in the two-horned beast?

Every person whose reading is ordinarily extensive has something of an idea of what the United states are to-day; he likewise has an idea, so far as words can convey it to his mind, of what they were at the commencement of their history. The only object, then, in presenting statistics and testimony on this point, is to show that our rapid growth has struck mankind with the wonder of a constant miracle.

Said Emile de Girardin, in La Liberte (1868):—

"The population of America, not thinned by any conscription, multiplies with predigious rapidity, and the day may before [long be] seen, when they will number sixty or eighty millions of souls. This parveni [one recently risen to notice] is aware of his importance and destiny. Hear him proudly exclaim. 'America for Americans!' See him promising his alliance to Russia; and we see that power, which well knows what force is, grasp the hand of this giant of yesterday.

"In view of his unparalleled progress and combination, what are the little toys with which we vex ourselves in Europe? What is this needle gun we are anxious to get from Prussia, that we may beat her next year with it? Had we not better take from America the principle of liberty she embodies, out of which have come her citizen pride, her gigantic industry, and her formidable loyalty to the destinies of her republican land?"

The Dublin (Ireland) Nation, already quoted, says:—

"In the East, there is arising a colossal centaur called the Russian Empire. With a civilized head and front, it has the sinews of a huge barbaric body. There one man's brain moves 70,000,000. There all the traditions of the people are of aggression and conquest in the West. There but two ranks are distinguishable serfs and soldiers. There the map of the future includes Constantinople and Vienna as outposts of St. Petersburg.

"In the West, an opposing and still more wonderful American empire is emerging. We islanders have no conception of the extraordinary events which amid the silence of the earth are daily adding to the power and pride of this gigantic nation. Within three years, territories more extensive than these three kingdoms [Great Britain, Ireland, and Scotland] France and Italy put together, have been quietly, and in almost 'matter of course' fashion, annexed so the Union.

"Within seventy years, seventeen new sovereignties, the smallest of them larger than Great Britain, have peaceably united themselves to the Federation. No standing army was raised no national debt sunk, no great exertion was made, but there they are. And the last mail brings news of three more great States about to be joined to the thirty: Minnesota in the north-west, Deseret in the south-west, and California on the shores of the Pacific. These three States will cover an area equal to one-half the European continent."

Mitchel, in his School Geography (4th revised edition), p. 101, speaking of the United States says:—

"When it is considered that one hundred years ago the inhabitants numbered but 1,000,000, it presents the most striking instance of national growth to be found in the history of mankind."

Let us reduce these general statements to the more tangible form of facts and figures. A short time before the great Reformation in the days of Martin Luther, not four hundred years ago, this Western Continent war discovered. The Reformation brought out a large class of persons who were determined to worship God according to the dictates of their own consciences. Being fettered and oppressed by the religious intolerance of the Old World, they sought, in the wilds of America, that measure of civil and religious freedom which they so much desired. A little more than two hundred years ago, Dec. 22, 1620, the May-flower landed one hundred of these voluntary exiles on the coast of New England. Here, says Martyn, "New England was born," and this was "its first baby cry, a prayer and a thanksgiving to the Lord."