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THE POLITICAL USE OF THE BIBLE IN EARLY MODERN BRITAIN:
biblical with Britain’s political events and civil
institutions. Of especial importance is the interpretive
junction between Charles I and that boastful little horn.
I Therefore, that there is such a thing as a fifth
Monarchy to be expected in the world, is
evident from Daniels vision, Dan 7. where he
saw four Beasts, interpreted to be four Kings
or Kingdomes, v. 17.23. or four sorts of
Monarchy, and all of them arising out of the
earth, or modelled & moulded by humane
prudence. The last of which Beasts or
Monarchies, is differenced from the other
three former Monarchies, by the extent of it,
and by a distribution of the ten hornes, or
Kings that shall arise out of this Monarchy, v.
23, 24. And the last of those horns or Kings, is
differenced from the rest of the horns, by the
extent of his soveraignty over 3 Kingdoms, v.
8. 24. and by his fierce and arrogant
persecution of the Saints, v. 25. and by a
determinate extirpation of his Kingdom and
Soveraignty, and the reason thereof, v. 9, 10,
11, 26. All of which was fulfilled in Charls, late
King, or absolute soveraign of 3 kingdoms, a
fierce & arrogant Tyrant & persecuter of the
Saints, . . . 214
Aspinwall continues, claiming that the late king’s
“dominion continued till the judgement was set,” as
“Parliament, and High Court of Justice, . . . slew the
Beast, and utterly overthrew his dominion,” doing so by
an “Act made against Kingly power.” “The Beast or
chief Soveraign, was slain or beheaded,” which included
“the doom of the little horn, or sovereign of 3
Kingdoms.” The late Charles I, King of three
kingdoms, was the prophesied destined-to-destruction
boastful, arrogant King. 215 Aspinwall expounds on each
of the verses in Daniel 7 in An explication and application
of the seventh chapter of Daniel . . . wherein is briefly shewed
the state and downfall of the four monarchies (1653), and
extracts sixteen characteristics of this little horn which
correspond to the rule and therefore tyranny of
Charles I. 216
John Canne offered a very detailed analysis of each of
these horns in A voice from the temple to the higher powers
(1653). “These ten horns,” he claimed, were the “Romane
Empire, dissolved into ten parts or Kingdoms,” and
coordinated his findings with Revelation 17. The
fourth kingdom was now in the process of being
destroyed along with “the little horn, that is, the
Antichristian State, and Kingdom likewise.” Canne
considered England to have been “the first of the ten
horns,” and where judgment began with “The High Court
of Justice . . . in the Year 1648,” the “throne of God” which
tried Charles I. Other nations represented the various
“horns” Daniel described who would, like Britain, erect
similar tribunals of judgment upon their monarchs. As
for the “little horn,” Canne identified it as “the
Antichristian State,” or kingdom, which he calculated
would end in the year 1660. 217
Fifth Monarchists tended to understand the first three
kingdoms to represent Babylon, Medo-Persia, and
Greece respectively, while the fourth symbolised Rome,
the last to be overthrown, and synonymous with the
Roman Catholic empire which the Stuart Monarchy
served. The trial and beheading of the ‘tyrant’ Charles I,
the boastful horn to some, who trampled the saints, was
in the service of this last beast, and therefore, in the
army of Antichrist, but now stripped of dominion;
judgment began with the house of Britain and was
expected to progress across the European continent.
The Fifth Monarchy, with the millennial rule of Christ
and His saints was now imminent. Unless the Rump
Parliament was actively promoting and expediting
Christ’s millennial reign, by default, it too was serving
the beast of the Fourth Monarchy, and must also be
subdued. Fifth Monarchists do though diverge as to the
identity of that last horn, and at times, in light of
political events. John Tillinghast attempted to prove in
Knowledge of the time, or the resolution of the question, how
long it shall be unto the end of wonders (London, 1654),
that it was not Charles I but the “Romish Antichrist.” 218
Some considered it to be the Roman Papacy, while
others focused upon William the Conqueror, and still
others, equated it with Cromwell as Lord Protector!
214
William Aspinwall, A brief description of the fifth monarchy, or
kingdome that shortly is to come into the world (London, 1653), A2.
215
Ibid.
216
William Aspinwall, An explication and application of the seventh
chapter of Daniel . . . wherein is briefly shewed the state and downfall of
the four Monarchies (London, March 20, 1653), 26-28.
217
John Canne, A voice from the temple to the higher powers
(London, June 13, 1653), 12, 14, 20. Not all agreed of course on
the identity of this ‘little horn.”
218
John Tillinghast, Knowledge of the time, or the resolution of the
question, how long it shall be unto the end of wonders (London, 1654).
See 77-84.
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