14. What did the angel Gabriel say about the activities of the symbolic small horn, and what would happen to that horn?

¹⁴ Before we can understand the meaning of the words just quoted, we must pay attention to God’s angel. After pointing to the coming to power of the four kingdoms from Alexander’s empire, the angel Gabriel says: “In the final part of their kingdom, as the transgressors act to a completion, there will stand up a king fierce in countenance and understanding ambiguous sayings. And his power must become mighty, but not by his own power. And in a wonderful way he will cause ruin, and he will certainly prove successful and do effectively. And he will actually bring mighty ones to ruin, also the people made up of the holy ones. And according to his insight he will also certainly cause deception to succeed in his hand. And in his heart he will put on great airs, and during a freedom from care he will bring many to ruin. And against the Prince of princes he will stand up, but it will be without hand that he will be broken.”—Daniel 8:23-25.

17. (a) What relationship did Britain have with the Roman Empire? (b) How is the British Empire related to the Hellenistic kingdom of Macedonia and Greece?

¹⁷ What, then, does history identify as that aggressive “king fierce in countenance”? Britain actually was a northwestern offshoot of the Roman Empire. Down till the early part of the fifth century C.E., there were Roman provinces in what is now Britain. In the course of time, the Roman Empire declined, but the influence of the Greco-Roman civilization continued in Britain and in other parts of Europe that had been under Roman dominion. “At the fall of the Roman Empire,” wrote Nobel Prize winning Mexican poet and author Octavio Paz, “the Church took its place.” He added: “The Church fathers, as well as the later scholars, grafted Greek philosophy onto Christian doctrine.” And the 20th-century philosopher and mathematician Bertrand Russell observed: “The civilization of the West, which has sprung from Greek sources, is based on a philosophic and scientific tradition that began in Miletus [a Greek city in Asia Minor] two and a half thousand years ago.” Thus, it could be said that the British Empire had its cultural roots in the Hellenistic kingdom of Macedonia and Greece.

18. What is the small horn that became “a king fierce in countenance” in the “time of the end”? Explain.

¹⁸ By 1763 the British Empire had defeated her powerful rivals, Spain and France. From then on she demonstrated herself to be the mistress of the seas and the seventh world power of Bible prophecy. Even after the 13 American colonies broke away from Britain in 1776 to establish the United States of America, the British Empire grew to embrace a quarter of the earth’s surface and a quarter of its population. The seventh world power gained still greater strength when the United States of America collaborated with Britain to form the Anglo-American dual world power. Economically and militarily, this power had indeed become “a king fierce in countenance.” The small horn that became a fierce political power in the “time of the end,” then, is the Anglo-American World Power.