Note (return) — Chapter XIV

A careful study of these three messages will show that they are inseparably connected. The second cry was against Babylon, that she had fallen. Rev. 18:1, 2 proves this fall of Babylon to be a moral one—a giving away to ungodliness, iniquity and all manner of deception. According to chapter 16:19 the great city of Babylon is composed of three parts, being a confederation of the dragon10 (heathenism), the beast (Catholicism), and the false prophet (Protestantism). Chap. 16:13, 14. It is evidently to this latter division of Babylon that this second message applies; for Paganism was always a false religion, and Catholicism was always a corrupt one, during whose reign the church of God, as already shown, was separate. Protestantism, then, was the only part of the great city that could fall morally or spiritually. During the space of three hundred and fifty years, from the formation of the first Protestant creed, she held reign and authority over the people of God, who were scattered among her hundreds of opposing sects.