While Sapor was engaged in the siege of Nisibis, a formidable invasion of the Massagetæ compelled him to raise it, and "march with rapid diligence from the banks of the Tigris to those of the Oxus." "The dangers and difficulties of the Scythian war engaged him soon afterward to conclude, or at least to observe, a truce with the Roman emperor, which was equally grateful to both princes; as Constantius himself, after the death of his two brothers, was involved by the revolutions of the west in a civil contest, which required, and seemed to exceed, the most vigorous exertion of his individual strength."

This was the civil war with Magnentius, who assumed the purple in the year 350. Magnentius was defeated A. D. 351, in the battle of Mursa, when fifty-four thousand of the troops of the empire perished. "The distractions of civil war, and the irreparable loss which the Roman legions sustained in the battle of Mursa, exposed these (the Illyrian) countries to the light cavalry of the barbarians."

"Before the wounds of the civil discord could be healed, the provinces of Gaul were overwhelmed by a deluge of barbarians. The Sarmatians no longer respected the barrier of the Danube. The impunity of rapine had increased the boldness and numbers of the wild Isaurians to ravage the adjacent country. Above all, the Persian monarch, elated by victory, again threatened the peace of the empire, and the presence of the emperor was indispensable both in the west and in the east."2

In 355, Constantius made Julian, his cousin, Cæsar, and sent him to the Rhine to defend the provinces against the incursions of the Alemanni and other German tribes.

Julian succeeded Constantius, who died in November, 361. The war with Sapor still continuing, the emperor invaded the Persian territories in April, 363; he was compelled to retreat on the 16th of June, and, on the 26th of the same month, was mortally wounded.

But these invasions of the Persians, the Sarmatians, Germans, Goths, and other barbarians, were but as the gathering clouds, and distant moanings of the approaching storm; nor were the

winds fully let loose, lashing the sea into foam and driving it in impetuous billows on the land till the blast of the first trumpet; when the whole barbaric world appeared in violent commotion, and the savage nations of Germany and Scythia issuing from the remote north and the far east, having burst the barriers of the Roman empire, continued, during many centuries, to pass and repass her territories in ceaseless ebb and flow, sweeping away, in their destructive course, the produce of her fertile provinces, her inhabitants, her cities, and the most precious monuments of art, of learning, and of genius.

CHAPTER XIV.

THE SEVEN ANGELS WITH THE SEVEN TRUMPETS PREPARING

THEMSELVES TO SOUND.-Revelation, viii.

"AND when he had opened the seventh seal, there was silence in heaven about the space of half an hour. And I saw the seven angels which stood before God; and to them were given seven trumpets. And the seven angels which had the seven

trumpets prepared themselves to sound."

1

In the seventh chapter, 12,000 out of every tribe of Israel is sealed, indicating, as in Ezekiel's vision, the preservation of some and the ruin of the many; and it has been shown that at the time of this vision, Christianity was being exceedingly corrupted, and religion made every where the pretext for rapine, violence, and murder. In the eighth chapter, the pouring out of Divine vengeance on an idolatrous and depraved people, is symbolically represented by the angel filling the censer with fire from the altar and casting it on the earth; as the destruction of Jerusalem is symbolically represented by the man, clothed2 with linen, taking coals of fire in his hand and scattering them over the city. Moreover, it has been seen that the Lord is waging a war of vengeance against the kings of the earth, and against the beast whose seat is that great city on the seven hills, that reigneth over the kings of the earth. This war which had been long and fearfully carried on, but which seems to have relaxed for a moment, begins to rage with irresistible fury on the sounding of the first trumpet, and continues to the close of the seventh, through the long remaining period of the "day of vengeance."

3 The sounding of the seven trumpets seems to allude to the blowing of the horns before Jericho, and its fall to be a type of the events represented by the Apostle. For, as on the blowing of the horns on the seventh day, the city falls and the enemies of the Lord are slain; so, when the seventh trumpet is sounded, the mystery of God is finished; that great city, Babylon, is thrown down with violence; the destroyers of the earth are destroyed, and the kingdoms of this world become the kingdoms of our Lord and of His Christ.-Rev. x., 7; xviii., 21; xi., 15, 18. See Vitringa on this vision.

The First Angel sounds-the Storm of Hail and Fire mingled with Blood-the Third of the Earth burnt-the Third of the Trees-and all the Green Grass.

"THE first angel sounded, and there followed hail and fire mingled with blood, and they were cast on the earth; and the third part of the earth was burnt up, and the third part of the trees, and all the green grass was burnt up."

The third part of the earth or of the Roman empire, which is devastated by the storm, is either her territories in Europe, Asia, or Africa: as, according to Josephus and others, her dominions any of these quarters of the world, were called a third of the earth or the world.1

in

Storms and winds, as has been seen, represent invasions. It is therefore to be shown from history, that the whole of the provinces of one of the three great divisions of the empire in Europe, Asia, or Africa, were overrun by barbarians at the Apocalyptic period, indicated by the sounding of the first trumpet; and that the symbolical grass (the inferior people) suffered far more severely than the symbolical trees (the wealthy or the nobles).

It does not appear from the prophecy on what part of the empire the storm bursts, but as hail comes from the north, it is most likely to be Europe: and this is confirmed by the event.

THE HISTORICAL ILLUSTRATION.

"In the disastrous period of the fall of the Roman empire, which," says. Gibbon, "may be justly dated from the reign of Valens, the happi

2

1 "As for the third part of the habitable earth, (Africa) whose nations are so many," &c.-Wars, b. ii., xvi.

"Aut Libyæ, aut Asiæ latus, aut pars tertia rerum."-Sil. Ital. cited in Ainsworth's Latin Dictionary.

9 Decline and Fall, xxvi.

ness and the security of each individual were personally attacked; and the arts and labours of ages were rudely defaced by the barbarians of Scythia and Germany. The invasion of the Huns precipitated on the provinces of the west the Gothic nation, who advanced in less than forty years from the Danube to the Atlantic, and opened a way by the success of their arms to the inroads of so many hostile tribes more savage than themselves."

The original principle of motion was concealed in the remote countries of the north.

"The ancient, perhaps original, seat of the Huns, who, under the reign2 of Valens, threatened the empire of Rome, was an extensive, though dry and barren, tract of country, immediately on the north side of the great wall (of China). Their place is at present occupied by the forty-nine hordes or banners of the Mongous, a pastoral nation, which consists of about two hundred thousand families."

The dominion of the Huns extended far towards the west, and was bounded on the east by the ocean, and on the north by the north sea.

Their vast empire having been destroyed by the Sienpi, the great body of the nation submitted to the conquerors; but a horde of 250,000, preferring flight to submission, passed the Imaus, and then separated; a part settled in Sogdiana, east of the Caspian sea; the second division continued their march westward. The Alans, who "pitched their tents" between the Volga and the Don, opposed the Huns on the banks of the latter river, and were defeated in a fierce and bloody battle. The greater part of the vanquished people joined the conquerors, who gladly received and adopted so warlike a nation. A colony, however, retreated into Mount Caucasus, where they still preserve their name and independence; and another,

1 Decline and Fall, vol. iii. c. xxvi.

2 "The region which the Scythians occupied, extended about 5,000 miles from the mouths of the Danube to the Sea of Japan. Its latitude from the wall of China to the very cold regions of the north, was, perhaps, a thousand miles."-Decline and Fall, c. xxvi., p. 334, &c.