Page:Mahometanism in its relation to prophecy - or, an inquiry into the prophecies concerning antichrist, with some reference to their bearing on the events of the present day (IA mahometanisminit00philrich).pdf/85

 long period after the saint had uttered these remarkable words: but about all this we shall have to say more by and by. We might add other citations from the holy fathers to the same purpose, but we have already given enough; we will therefore conclude this part of our subject with the following remarkable passage from St. Jerome (Hieron, in Daniel, cap. vii.): "Ergò dicamus, quod omnes Scriptores Ecclesiastici tradiderunt: in consummatione mundi, quando regnum destruendum est Romanorum, decem futuros Reges, qui orbem Romanum inter se dividant; et undecimum surrecturum esse Regem Parvulum, qui tres Reges de decem Regibus superaturus sit: id est, Ægyptiorum Regem, et Africæ, et Æthiopiæ: sicut in consequentibus manifestitùs dicemus." From this passage of the great St. Jerome, we learn that the tradition was universal in the Church of his day, that immediately after the breaking up of the Roman empire it would be parcelled out into ten kingdoms, by which number might be intended either the literal number into which the Roman territory would be subdivided, or as other fathers often explain the Scripture numerals, it might mean simply to express the whole number of states into which the possessions of the old Roman empire would be