BABYLON IS NOT THE WHOLE WICKED WORLD

Revelation 17 represents Babylon by the symbol of a woman seated on a scarlet-colored beast. If, therefore, the woman Babylon represents the whole of this fallen world, the entire empire of the Devil, what does the beast represent upon which the woman is seated? Is it not a fact that the beast represents the fourth empire of our earth in its papal form? And that being the case, is it not a certainty that Babylon does not include the whole wicked world? That the beast and the woman are two distinct symbols, is evident from verse 7.TMR 37.3

The same chapter represents the unlawful connection of Babylon with the kings of the earth, and that she has made the inhabitants of the earth drunken. She is also represented as that great city that reigneth over the kings of the earth. Babylon is therefore distinct from the kings of the earth, and does not include all the wicked of the earth.TMR 38.1

It is also stated that this great harlot sat upon many waters. In the explanation it is stated that these waters are peoples, and multitudes, and nations, and tongues., Revelation 17:1, 15. Certainly we should not confound the harlot with the waters or nations upon which she is said to sit. When Babylon is destroyed, being thrown down as a millstone is cast into the mighty deep, and utterly burned with fire, the kings of the earth, the merchants, the sailors, etc., are still spared, and mourn, and lament over her. It is plain, therefore, that the utter destruction of Babylon is not the destruction of those wicked men who lived in iniquity with her. Hence it follows that Babylon does not comprise the whole wicked world.TMR 38.2