and just ready to sail, he suddenly fell upon, and sinking a great many, and disabling others, he returned with some in triumph to Africa. Leo, the Byzantine emperor, to revenge the ravages of Genseric's fleets, on the coasts of the Peloponnesus, and the Greek islands, made (A. D. 468) great naval preparations to attack him. The emperor at Rome sent very considerable supplies of both men and ships. "The fame of these preparations (says Constan"tine Manasses) struck the world with terror and anaze"ment, and nothing seemed capable of resisting so nu"6 merous an army, and so powerful a fleet, except gold: "but as the time appointed by Providence, for punishing "the Vandals, was not yet arrived, heaven suffered Leo "to commit the whole management of this war to Basilis66 cus, brother to his wife Verina;" a man who was actuated by the two dangerous passions of ambition and avarice.--Ah! Leo has not been the only prince, who has been left, for the scourge of a nation, to commit the management of public affairs to men of Basiliscus's character. -This fleet of Leo's met with the most calamitous defeat. And Genseric, improving the opportunity, first recovered Sardinia, which he had lately lost, and then sailed for Sicily, which he reduced; as he did, the three following years, all the islands between Italy and Africa; the Romans being in no condition to restrain his conquests, and trembling at the very name of Genseric. From these islands he yearly sent fleets, to ravage the coasts of Italy, of Peloponnesus, and the Greek islands. Genseric, though far advanced in age, still commanded in person the most important expeditions. "His designs were concealed "with impenetrable secrecy, till the moment he hoisted "sail. When be was asked by his pilot, what course he "should steer? Leave the determination to the winds, "(replied the Barbarian, with pious arrogance), they will "transport us to the guilty coast, whose inhabitauts have "provoked the justice of God." -Spain, Liguria, Tuscany, Campania, Lucania, Bruttium, Apulia, Calabria, Venetia, Dalmatia, Epirus, Greece, and Sicily, repeatedly experienced his avarice and cruelty. "And as the Bar"barians always embarked a sufficient number of horses, "they had no sooner landed than they swept the dis"mayed country with a body of light cavalry." It may truly be said, without hyperbole, that the inha- bitants of maritime countries had never suffered such continued and aggravated calamities, since men had associated for the purpose of legal murder, or had learned to brave the dangers of the deep. Genseric died in 470, but not before he had seen the overthrow of the Western empire, and the dominion of the Barbarians erected on its ruins: in effecting which important event he had acted so conspicuous a part. Odoaser, with his revoiting Barbarians, had, this very year, overturned the throne of the Roman Cæsars, and assumed the title of king of Italy. Britain had long since been abandoned by the Romans, and was now over-run by the Saxons; Spain was possessed by the Visigoths and Suevians; Africa by the Vandals; the Burgundians, Visigoths, Franks, and Alans, had erected several kingdoms, or tetrarchies, in Gaul; and, at length, Italy itself, "with its proud metropolis, which, for so many ages, had given laws to the rest of the world, was enslaved by a 66 contemptible barbarian, whose family, country, and na"❝tion, are not known to this day."* Before his death, Genseric had made peace with the emperors, Orestes and Zeno; a peace which was strictly observed till the reign of Justinian, who drove the Vandals out of Africa, and united its provinces with the Eastern empire. Thus we have seen the awful effects of this symbolic burning mountain, cast into the sea; and must have observed that, as the Goths were not the only enemy employed for the destruction of the trees and grass, in the inland parts; so, though the Vandalic hordes were the most conspicuous agents in inflicting those judgments we have been just reviewing, yet they were not the only enemies of the Roman empire whose operations, against insular and maritime countries, were directed by the second trumpet; for, from the year 407 may be dated the most violent and successful attacks of the Franks, Scots and Picts, and Saxons, and other Northern nations, upon the countries so situated. And, if we look back, and review the ground we have traversed, and notice, with attention, the progress and destructions of the judgments of the first and second trumpets, we shall see, that, though the hail and fire cast on the earth, and the burning mountain cast into the sea, *Univer. Anc. Hist. Vol. XIV. p. 436-438. occasioned very extensive calamities, and contributed much to the general ruin of the Roman empire, Eastern and Western, especially of the latter; yet they were the more immediate cause of the loss, to Rome, of the countries situate on this side the Alps; the Gauls, Spain, and Britain; for as the political death of the Eastern part (chap. ix. 15.) was not effected now, but reserved for the judgments of the sixth trumpet; so the ruin of the Italian part was more immediately effected by the judgments of the third and fourth trumpets, as we shall hereafter see. The judgments, both of the first trumpet and of the second, appear to have been directed more immediately against one and the same third part of the Roman em pire; those of the first, as has been observed, against the continental and inland parts; and those of the second against insular and maritime countries. But, having advanced thus far, it is necessary to inquire, more particularly, what is signified by the third parts, which are spoken of as being more immediately affected by five of these trumpets? It is generally agreed that most of the trumpets do principally regard Europe; the scene of the tyrannies of the fourth beast of Daniel. It is of consequence to ascertain to what parts of Europe these several third parts are to be referred; for if we can determine this, we shall do much towards the better understanding the vials, or the seven last plagues, which we suppose to be now pouring out. Various have been the conjectures of commentators respecting the To Tpírov, or third part, so often mentioned. Some have supposed it to have an indefinite signification; -others, that the whole Roman empire is intended, as being about the third part of the world; and a third class of interpreters have concluded that it refers to the ancient division of the world into three parts, Asia, Africa, and Europe; but, after an attentive consideration of the subject, I think, with Dr. Cressener, that neither of these conjectures are maintainable. The very face of the prophecy bespeaks something definite; and we find little dif ficulty in determining it to be so under the sixth trumpet, the judgments of which slew the third part of men, or subverted the whole Eastern empire: first, that part of it situate in Asia, and afterwards the European part, now called Turkey in Europe. Nor can the third part signify the whole Roman empire, as Daubuz explains it; "for "in the sixth trumpet there is a plain distinction between "the third part that was slain (as Dr. Cressener has observed,) and the rest who were not killed, but did not "repent; and yet all the judgments of the trumpets, " doubtless, have the subjects of the Roman empire for "their object."* Nor can the division of the world into three parts, Europe, Asia, and Africa, be alluded to, for then the Saracens, under the fifth trumpet, must have been said to kill the third part of men; for they seized all the Roman territory in Africa; but they are said only to tor'ment, not to kill. In the symbolic, or prophetic sense, they did kill the African part of the Roman empire; and yet not what is understood by the third part, because it was not the whole third part of any one of its divisions.We have already observed, that, according to the symbolic style, to kill a people, as a body politic, is to destroy their government, or to take from them their civil and religious rights, or to reduce them under the power of a foreign nation. † On the most mature consideration, I am induced to conclude, that wherever a third part is mentioned, in this' Book, there is an allusion to a threefold division of the Roman empire. This division we will endeavour to trace. Originally there were two præfecti pretorio, "but Con"stantine, jealous of their too great power, lessened it by creating two more, and allotting to each of them a cer"tain number of provinces; by this institution the whole "empire was divided into four parts, which were the "Orient, Illyricum, Italy, and Gaul.-The præfects were "the first officers of the empire, and generally looked upon as emperors of an inferior rank." After the death of Constantine (the period of these trumpets) they appear to have been reduced to three. "At the death The Judgments of God on the Rom. Cath. Ch. printed, A.D. 1689, 4:0 p. 36-39. + Grotius de Jure, B. & P. Lib. II. c. 9. Art. 3, 4, 5, 6. "Where he shews, that as a people continue one and the same living body, as long as they continue in an united society: so may they be said also to die, when their government, and society, is taken from them; as when a people are reduced under the power of another nation." Dr. Cressener's Judgin. of G. Ref. a. p. 44. Univer. Anc. Hist. Vol. XIV. page 122. See also Gibbon, Vol. III. page 42. of Constantine the Great, the empire was shared among his three sons. Constantine the eldest had all the wes"tern part of it beyond the Alps, Britain, the Gauls, and Spain. Constance, the youngest, had all the rest of "Europe, with almost all Africa, and the isles between "them. And Constantius, all the Asiatic part of it, with "the kingdom of Egypt."* And on the murder of his brothers, he became possessed of the whole empire. The præfectures continued, indeed, still distinct, but "it is well known, that those of Illyricum and Italy were "but the two parts of one imperial share, and were some"times confounded together, when the whole empire was "united under one Emperor., This appears from Amia"nus Marcellinus, to have been done in the days of Julian "the Apostate, in whose time Mamertinus was the præ"fect of Italy, Africa, and Illyricum, which shews, that "till after the time of Julian the Apostate, at least, the "only constant division of the empire among these præ"fects, was that of the three divisions of the empire, by "Constantine, among his sons at his death-and after the division of the empire (into eastern and western), the "Italian præfect had all the western share of Illyricum.”† Thus did the vast Roman empire consist of three parts, as distinct from each other as any three great kingdoms, subject to one sovereign. "The præfect of the east (says Gibbon) stretched his "ample jurisdiction into three parts of the globe, which "were subject to the Romans, from the cataracts of the "Nile, to the banks of the Phasis, and from the moun"tains of Thrace to the frontiers of Persia." This was the original extent of the eastern præfecture, but after the division of the empire, it embraced also the eastern provinces of Illyricum. "The præfect of the Gauls com"prehended, under that plural denomination, the kindred "provinces of Britain and Spain, and his authority was "obeyed from the wall of Antoninus to the fort of mount "Atlas. The power of the præfect of Italy was not con"fined to the country from whence he derived his title; "it extended over the additional territory of Rætia, as "far as the banks of the Danube, over the dependent * Dr. Cressener's Judgment, page 36. page 118. Gibbon, Vol. III. page 131. + Dr. Cressener, page 37, Univer. Anc. Hist. Vol. XIV. 38. ↑ Gibbon, vol. iii. p. 43. Q |