period will end. Of all transactions recorded in history, however, that
between Phocas and Boniface appears most like "giving the saints into
the hand of the little horn." At this juncture in particular, church and
state conspire, as never before, to resist the authority of Jesus Christ
the Mediator. Paul's "man of sin" has been "revealed in his time." (2
Thess. ii. 6.) Paganism has been abolished by formal edict throughout
the Roman empire, and Christianity established as the recognised
religion of the commonwealth. That which "letted,"--hindered, that is,
the pagan idolatry of the civil state, is "taken out of the way;" and
nominal Christianity takes its place. This combination or alliance
between church and state will be more clearly made known in the
succeeding chapters of this book. Mean while it is the immediate design
of the "little open book," to give an epitome or outline of this unholy
confederacy in the first thirteen verses of this chapter. The treading
under foot of the holy city by the "Gentiles," furnishes occasion for
the witnesses to appear publicly against them. These pretended
Christians, but real hypocrites, as will appear with increasing evidence
as we proceed, have usurped the rights of Messiah's crown, and
grievously oppressed his real disciples. Against these outrages on the
prerogatives of Christ and the rights of man, these witnesses lift their
solemn protest. Their distinctive name, "witnesses," is familiar to
every one who searches the Scriptures. (Isa. xliii. 10; Acts i. 8.) But
witnesses who love not their lives unto the death are distinguished by
the name of _martyrs_. (Rev. ii. 13; Acts xxii. 20.)

God has had his witnesses in all ages since the fall of Adam, in defence
of truth and holiness against error and ungodliness; but the specific
work _these_ witnesses is to oppose the corruption of his two ordinances
of church and state during the specified period of 1260 years. The
existence of this complex system of civil and ecclesiastical tyranny and