Thus, in a.d. 533 came the notable decree of the Papacy's powerful supporter, recognizing its supremacy; and then the decisive stroke by the sword at Rome in a.d. 538, cleaving the way for the new order of popes—the rulers of state.
Exactly 1260 years later, in 1793, came the notable decree of the Papacy's once powerful supporter, France,—"the eldest son of the church,"—aiming to abolish church and religion, followed by a decisive stroke with the sword at Rome against the Papacy, in 1798.
Significant Events of the French Revolution
Of the decree of 1793, W.H. Hutton says:—
"On Nov. 26, 1793, the Convention, of which seventeen bishops and some clergy were members, decreed the abolition of all religion."—"Age of Revolution," p. 156.
The frenzy of the days of the Terror presented the spectacle of outraged humanity, goaded to desperation by centuries of oppression in the name of religion and divine right, rising up and madly breaking every restraint. Because in the minds of the people the Papacy stood for religion, they blindly struck at religion itself, and at God, in whose name the papal church had done its cruel work through the centuries.
In the prophecy of Rev. 11:3-13 these events of the wild days of the French Revolution are specifically referred to as coming at the close of the prophetic period of the 1260 years. The prophetic picture was so clear that over a hundred years before the time, Jurieu, an eminent French student of prophecy, wrote that he could "not doubt that 'tis France," the chief supporter of the Papacy, that would give the shock as of an earthquake to the great spiritual Babylonian city. He wrote of France, one of the ten parts of divided Rome:
"This tenth part of the city shall fall, with respect to the Papacy; it shall break with Rome, and the Roman religion."—"The Accomplishment of the Prophecies" (London, 1687), part 2, p. 265.
And so it came to pass. Far beyond France the movement reached. Canon Trevor says of the wave of revolt against absolutism that passed over Europe:
"It is worthy of observation that only those nations which eschewed popery were able to resist the tide. Every throne and every church, without exception, that owned the supremacy of Rome, was prostrated in the dust."—"Rome and Its Papal Rulers," p. 436.