12.  And the sixth angel poured out his vial upon the great river Euphrates; and the water thereof was dried up, that the way of the kings of the east might be prepared.

13.  And I saw three unclean spirits like frogs come out of the mouth of the dragon, and out of the mouth of the beast, and out of the mouth of the false prophet.

14.  For they are the spirits of devils, working miracles, which go forth unto the kings of the earth and of the whole world, to gather them to the battle of that great day of God Almighty.

15.  Behold, I come as a thief.  Blessed is he that watcheth and keepeth his garments, lest he walk naked, and they see his shame.

16.  And he gathered them together into a place called in the Hebrew tongue Armageddon.

Vs. 12-16.—­“The great river Euphrates” is the object of the sixth vial.  By the very general consent of expositors the Turkish empire is intended by this symbol; and they seem to be equally agreed that the sixth vial in now in process of pouring out.  The object of the sixth trumpet is the same, (ch. ix. 14.) There is, besides, an obvious allusion to the ancient literal Babylon; and to the manner of its overthrow by Cyrus the king of Persia. (Jer. l. 38; li. 36; Dan. v. 26-28; Is. xliv. 27, 28.)—­This monarch, as historians relate, changed the current of the Euphrates, and by this means took possession of the city, while Belshazzar and his nobles were engaged in a drunken festival. (Dan. v. 1-30.)—­The waters of this river are to be taken as representing the population of the Ottoman empire, (ch. xvii. 15.) By the “kings of the east” may be understood the Jews, agreeably to the symbolical nature of this book; (Is. xli. 2, 3;) yet as the Turkish empire and Mahometan imposture constitute barriers to the extension of Christ’s kingdom among the populous nations of the east, as Popish despotism and idolatry, obstruct the gospel in the west, we may give this symbol of the “kings of the east” a more extensive interpretation.  Probably a larger proportion of the natural seed of Abraham are to be found on the west than even on the east of the Turkish empire.  The dynasty of the Turk is in process of visible exhaustion, and nothing but what is termed among antichristian nations “the balance of power,” prolongs its existence or hinders its extinction.  “Drying up,” evaporation, is a gradual process, and with singular precision describes the waning light of the once proud Crescent,—­the expiring breath of what has been termed by a bold figure, “the sick man."[13]—­Under this vial, however, and likewise as the termination of the second woe, a general, final and desperate alliance is to be found to resist the aggressive forces of the “Lord of Hosts.”—­This confederacy is headed by the dragon, and is identical with the war, (ch. xii. 17,) against the “remnant of the woman’s seed.”—­These “unclean spirits like frogs” are called “spirits of devils.”  They “come out of the mouth” of all the