“At the voice of the first angel, and the blast of his trumpet, the whole Roman world was in agitation, and ‘the storms of war’ passed over it all. ‘The union of the empire was dissolved;’ a third part of it fell; and the ‘transalpine provinces were separated from the empire.’ Under the second trumpet, the provinces of Africa, another, or the maritime, part, was in like manner reft from Rome, and the Roman ships were destroyed in the sea, and even in their harbors. The empire of Rome, hemmed in on every side, was then limited to the kingdom of Italy. Within its bounds, and along the fountains and rivers of waters, the third trumpet reëchoed from the Alps to the Apennines. The last barrier of the empire of Rome was broken. The plains of Lombardy were ravaged by a foreign foe: and from thence new enemies arose to bring to an end the strife of the world with the imperial city. “ ‘In the space of twenty years since the death of Valentinian’ (two years subsequent to the death of Attila), ‘nine emperors had successively disappeared; and the son of Orestes, a youth recommended only by his beauty, would be the least entitled to the notice of posterity, if his reign, which was marked by the extinction of the Roman empire in the west, did not leave a memorable era in the history of mankind.’ ” The throne of the Cæsars had been for ages the sun of the world; while other kings were designated as stars. The imperial power had first been transferred to Constantinople by Constantine; and it was afterwards divided between the east and the west; but the eastern empire was not yet doomed to destruction. The precise year in which the western empire was extinguished, is not positively ascertained, but it is usually assigned to A. D. 476. Some place it in 479. The imperial Roman power, of which either Rome or Constantinople had been jointly or singly the seat, whether in the West or the East, ceased to be recognized in Italy; and the third part of the sun was smitten, till it emitted no longer the faintest rays. The power of the Cæsars became unknown in Italy; and a Gothic king reigned over Rome.