CHAPTER VI. THE FOURTH TRUMPET

THE events of the First, Second, and Third Trumpets had brought the Western Empire to the brink of annihilation; and the Fourth Trumpet accomplishes its utter extinction.GNT 47.1

“And the fourth angel sounded, and the third part of the sun was smitten, and the third part of the moon, and the third part of the stars; so as the third part of them was darkened, and day shone not for a third part of it, and the night likewise.” Verse 12.GNT 47.2

This trumpet illustrates the blotting out of the Roman government. Sun, moon, and stars are evidently symbols that denote the ruling powers in the government—its emperors, consuls, and senators.GNT 47.3

The last paragraph (nineteen) of the chapter of the “Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire,” that gives the history of Attila’s invasions, and thus of the Third Trumpet, is entitled, “Symptoms of Decay and Ruin” of the Western Empire; and of the history of Genseric, “the Monarch of the Sea,” the history of the great burning mountain cast into the sea, which continued longer than did the falling star burning as a lamp,—of this history the very last words are that Genseric “beheld the final extinction of the Empire of the West.”GNT 47.4

Thus by the very words of the standard history itself. we are introduced to the great thought of the Fourth Trumpet; and by this to that other name—Odoacer—which in the destruction of the Roman Empire must forever stand conspicuous with those of Alaric, Genseric, and Attila.GNT 47.5

“In the space of twenty years since the death of Valentinian [March 16, A. D. 455], ‘nine emperors had successively disappeared; and the son of Orestes [Odoacer], 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.”GNT 48.1

“The sun was smitten.” “Extinction of the Western Empire A. D. 476 or 479,” is the title of paragraph thirty-one of Chap. XXXVI, of the “Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire.” And the record is: “Royalty was familiar to the barbarians, and the submissive people of Italy were prepared to obey without a murmur the authority which he [Odoacer] should condescend to exercise as the vicegerent of the emperor of the West. But Odoacer resolved to abolish that useless and expensive office; and such is the weight of antique prejudice that it required some boldness and penetration to discover the extreme facility of the enterprise. The unfortunate Augustulus was made the instrument of his own disgrace; and he signified his resignation to the senate; and that assembly, in their last act of obedience to a Roman prince, still affected the spirit of freedom and the forms of the constitution.GNT 48.2

“An epistle was addressed, by their unanimous decree, to the Emperor Zeno, the son-in-law and successor of Leo, who had lately been restored, after a short rebellion, to the Byzantine throne. They solemnly disclaim the necessity or even the wish of continuing any longer the imperial succession in Italy; since in their opinion the majesty of a sole monarch is sufficient to pervade and to protect, at the same time, both the East and the West. In their own name, and in the name of the people, they consent that the seat of universal empire shall be transferred from Rome to Constantinople; and they basely renounce the right of choosing their master, the only vestige that yet remained of the authority which had given laws to the world....”GNT 49.1

Zeno’s “vanity was gratified by the title of sole Emperor, and by the statues erected to his honor in the several quarters of Rome; he entertained a friendly, though ambiguous, correspondence with the patrician Odoacer; and he gratefully accepted the Imperial ensigns, the sacred ornaments of the throne and palace, which the barbarian was not unwilling to remove from the sight of the people.”GNT 49.2

“The power and the glory of Rome, as bearing rule over any nation, became extinct. The name alone remained to the queen of nations. Every token of royalty disappeared from the imperial city. She who had ruled over the nations sat in the dust, like a second Babylon, and there was no throne where the Caesars had reigned. The last act of obedience to a Roman prince which that once august assembly performed, was the acceptance of the resignation of the last emperor of the West, and the abolition of the imperial succession in Italy. The sun of Rome was smitten.GNT 49.3

“Long had that name been a terror to the nations, and identified with supreme authority in the world. Long had the emperor of Rome shone and ruled in the earth, like the sun in the firmament. His was a kingdom and dominion, great and terrible, and strong exceedingly, to which all others were subjected or subordinate. His supreme or imperial authority, had, in the decline of the empire, been greatly obscured, but till then it had never been extinguished. It had been darkened and disfigured by a great storm; eclipsed, as it were, by a mountain that burned with fire; and outshone, as it were, by a falling star, like a fiery meteor. It had survived the assaults of Goths and Vandals and Huns. Though clouded and obscured, it had never been smitten; and though its light reached but a little way, where previously it had shone over all, it had never been extinguished.GNT 50.1

“Neither, at last, was the whole sun smitten, but ‘the third part.’ The throne of the Caesars had for ages been the sun of the world, while other kings were designated as stars. But the imperial power had first been transferred to Constantinople by Constantine; and it was afterward divided between the East and the West. And the Eastern Empire was not yet doomed to destruction. Even the Western Empire was afterward revived; and a more modern dynasty arose to claim and maintain the title of emperor of the Romans. But, for the first time, after sudden, and violent, and distinctly marked and connected convulsions, the imperial power IN ROME, where for so long a period it had reigned triumphant, was cut off forever; and the third part of the sun was smitten.GNT 50.2

“But though Rome itself, as an imperial city, ceased to exercise a sovereignty over any nation, yet the imperial ensigns, with the sacred ornaments of the throne and palace, were transferred to Constantinople, where Zeno reigned under the title of sole emperor. The military acclamations of the confederates of Italy saluted Odoacer with the title of king.GNT 51.1

“A new conqueror of Italy, Theodoric, the Ostrogoth, speedily arose, who assumed the purple, and reigned by the right of conquest. ‘The royalty of Theodoric was proclaimed by the Goths (March 5, A. D. 493), with the tardy, reluctant, ambiguous consent of the emperor of the East.’ The imperial Roman power, of which either Rome or Constantinople had been jointly or singly the seat, whether in the West or the East, was no longer recognized in Italy, and the third part of the sun was smitten, till it emitted no longer the faintest rays. The power of the Caesars was unknown in Italy, and a Gothic king reigned over Rome.GNT 51.2

“But though the third part of the sun was smitten, and the Roman imperial power was at an end in the city of the Caesars, yet the moon and the stars still shone, or glimmered, for a little longer in the western hemisphere, even in the midst of Gothic darkness. The consulship and the senate [‘the moon and the stars’] were not abolished by Theodoric. ‘A Gothic historian applauds the consulship of Theodoric as the height of all temporal power and greatness:’—as the moon reigns by night, after the setting of the sun. And, instead of abolishing that office, Theodoric himself ‘congratulates those annual favorites of fortune, who, without the cares, enjoyed the splendor of the throne.’GNT 52.1

“But in their prophetic order, the consulship and the senate of Rome met their fate, though they fell not by the hands of Vandals or of Goths. The next revolution in Italy was its subjection to Belisarius, the general of Justinian, emperor of the East. He did not spare what barbarians had hallowed. ‘The Roman Consulship Extinguished by Justinian, A. D. 541,’ is the title of the last paragraph of the fortieth chapter of Gibbon’s History of the Decline and Fall of Rome. ‘The succession of consuls finally ceased in the thirteenth year of Justinian, whose despotic temper might be gratified by the silent extinction of a title which admonished the Romans of their ancient freedom.”GNT 52.2

“The sun was smitten.” Odoacer caused the title of emperor to cease. But one-third part only is affected—the jurisdiction of Rome then extended over only the middle division of the empire, as ceded by Constantine to his three sons. One-third part of the moon was smitten; the effect of this political calamity had the same extent as the former. When the consulship was taken away, Rome had ceded all her territory beyond the Alps.GNT 53.1

“The third part of the sun was smitten, and the third part of the moon, and the third part of the stars. In the political firmament of the ancient world, while under the reign of imperial Rome, the emperorship, the consulate, and the senate, shone like the sun, the moon, and the stars. The history of their decline and fall is brought down till the two former were ‘extinguished,’ in reference to Rome and Italy, which so long had ranked as the first of cities and of countries; and finally, as the Fourth Trumpet closes, we see the ‘extinction of that illustrious assembly,’ the Roman senate. The city that had ruled the world, as if in mockery of human greatness, was conquered by the eunuch Narses, the successor of Belisarius. He defeated the Goths (A. D. 552), achieved the ‘conquest of Rome,’ and the fate of the senate was sealed.GNT 53.2

“The calamities of imperial Rome, in its downfall, were told to the very last of them, till Rome was without an emperor, a consul, or a senate. ‘Under the Exarchs of Ravenna, Rome was degraded to the second rank.’ The third part of the sun was smitten, and the third part of the moon, and the third part of the stars. The race of the Caesars was not extinct with the emperors of the West. Rome, before its fall, possessed but a portion of the imperial power. Constantinople divided with it the empire of the world. And neither Goths nor Vandals lorded over that still imperial city, the emperor of which, after the first transference of the seat of empire by Constantine, often held the emperor of Rome as his nominee and vicegerent. And the fate of Constantinople was reserved till other ages, and was announced by other trumpets. Of the sun, the moon, and the stars, as yet but the third part was smitten.GNT 53.3

“The concluding words of the Fourth Trumpet imply the future restoration of the Western Empire: ‘The day shone not for the third part of it, and the night likewise.’ In respect to civil authority, Rome became subject to Ravenna, and Italy was a conquered province of the Eastern Empire. But, as more appropriately pertaining to other prophecies, the defense of the worship of images first brought the spiritual and temporal powers of the pope and of the emperor into violent collision; and, by conferring on the pope all authority over the churches, Justinian laid his helping hand to the promotion of the papal supremacy, which afterward assumed the power of creating monarchs. In the year of our Lord 800, the pope conferred on Charlemagne the title of Emperor of the Romans.”—Keith. That title was again transferred from the king of France to the king of Germany. And by the Emperor Francis the Second even this fiction was finally and forever renounced, Aug. 6, 1806.GNT 54.1