After this I saw in the night visions, and behold a
fourth
beast
Not in another night, as Jarchi; but in the same night, and in
the same visions of it; only after he had seen the other three
successively, then last of all he saw this fourth beast; and more
being said of this than of the rest, shows that this was the
principal thing in the vision to be observed, as being to endure
until, and having a close connection with, the kingdom of the
Messiah; which, arising, shall destroy it, and take place of it:
this is not the Turkish empire, as Aben Ezra, and others: nor the
kingdom of the Seleucidae, as Grotius, and others; to which
neither the characters, nor the duration of it, agree; but the
Roman empire, which succeeded the Grecian, so Gorionides
F7: dreadful and terrible, and
strong exceedingly;
exceeding powerful, as the Roman empire was, and terrible to all
the kingdoms of the earth; its armies, wherever they came, struck
terror among the nations, and threw them into a panic, killing,
wasting, robbing all they met with F8; and especially it was
terrible to Christians, by their persecutions of them, as both
Rome Pagan and Rome Papal have been. Rome has its name from
strength with the Greeks, and from height with the Hebrews, as
Jerom F9 observes: it had great iron
teeth;
which may design its generals and emperors, such as Scipio,
Pompey, Julius Caesar, and others; which crushed and devoured all
that came in their way: this monarchy answers to the legs and
feet of iron in Nebuchadnezzar's dream: it devoured and
brake in pieces, and stamped the residue with the
feet
of it;
it devoured nations, broke kingdoms in pieces, and brought them
in subjection to them; reducing them to the greatest servitude,
and obliging them to pay heavy taxes and tribute: it was
diverse from all the beasts that were before it:
in its original, language, laws, customs, and forms of
government; it was such a monster, that no name could be given
it; there was no one beast in nature to which it could be
compared; it had all the ill properties of the other beasts, for
craft, cruelty oppression, and tyranny; and therefore John
describes this same beast as being like a leopard, having the
feet of a bear and the mouth of a lion. ( Revelation
13:2 ) : and it had ten horns;
which are explained of ten kings or kingdoms, ( Daniel 7:24 ) , the
same with the ten toes in Nebuchadnezzar's dream and with the ten
kings that received power as kings with the beast or ten
kingdoms, into which the Roman empire was divided about the time
of the rise of antichrist,(See Gill on
Revelation 17:12).