change in these two respects to satisfy the prophecy; that; if the coming were to be to-morrow, there is enough to convince the most hardened infidel, that Daniel’s words have received a literal, complete, and most remarkable, fulfilment. In this respect, therefore, the world is ready for the advent. * * * * * IV. There is reason to believe from the prophetic Scriptures that _the nations of Europe will __be the first nations of the world at the time of our Lord’s return_. It is curious to observe in history the rise and fall of the various nations which have successively occupied the foremost position in society. Like the gleam of sunshine on the landscape, civilization and power have beamed for a while upon successive kingdoms, and then left them to be obscured and darkened by the cloud. Thus Babylon, Medo-Persia, Greece, and Rome, have successively swayed the sceptre of the world. This sceptre is now held by the European nations generally. The power is perhaps greater than in any former age; but there is this great difference, that now it is possessed by no nation singly, but divided amongst several. In former days, the Roman republic was itself sovereign and supreme; there was no other which could pretend to rivalry. It is not so now; there may be proud pretensions to national superiority; but all have the advantage of unquestionable superiority over the uncivilized nations of Africa and the East. Such changes are inexplicable on merely worldly principles: there is nothing in nature to explain this rise and fall of moral light. The student of history may endeavour to trace the causes of a nation’s gradual decline; but, why those causes themselves appeared is a question which no natural intellect can solve. The student of prophecy, however, is not left in darkness. He knows not why it is that an all-wise God has so ordered it, but he sees in all these changes the exact completion of God’s prophetic Scriptures, and at once solves the mystery by referring the whole to the revealed purpose of an all-wise and all-controlling God. In two separate visions these changes were all foretold by Daniel. As history says there have been, so prophecy foretold there should be, four ruling kingdoms in the world. We are taught this by the vision of the image and its explanation in Daniel, ii. 31–45; and by the vision of the four beasts, in Dan. vii. {17} From both we gather the same leading facts. (1.) That Medo-Persia, Greece, and Rome should, in turn, succeed to the supremacy of empires held by Babylon at the time of the Prophet. (2.) That the fourth, or Roman empire, should appear under a two-fold aspect, at first being united like the foot, but afterwards divided like the toes. (3.) That this fourth empire should be the last; that there should be no fifth arising to supersede it; for that in the time of the ten kings, its second or divided period, should arise the kingdom of the Son of man. Dan. ii.