12.  But this aforesaid Antichrist is to come when the times of the Roman empire shall have been fulfilled, and the end of the world is now drawing near The fourth kingdom in the prophecy of Daniel (vii. 7, 23) was generally understood by early Christian writers to be the Roman Empire; and its dissolution was to be speedily followed by the end of the world.  See § 13 below; Irenæus, V. 26; and Hippolytus, ubi supra, §§ 19, 28..  There shall rise up together ten kings of the Romans, reigning in different parts perhaps, but all about the same time; and after these an eleventh, the Antichrist, who by his magical craft shall seize upon the Roman power; and of the kings who reigned before him, three he shall humble Dan. vii. 24:  and he shall put down three kings (R.V.)., and the remaining seven he shall keep in subjection to himself.  At first indeed he will put on a show of mildness (as though he were a learned and discreet person), and of soberness and benevolence The Jerusalem Editor quotes as from Hippolytus a similar description of Antichrist (§ 23):  ”In his first steps he will be gentle, loveable, quiet, pious, pacific, hating injustice, detesting gifts, not allowing idolatry, &c.”  But the treatise is a forgery of unknown date, apparently much later than Cyril.:  and by the lying signs and wonders of his magical deceit Iren. V. 28, § 2:  “Since the demons and apostate spirits are at his service, he through their means performs wonders, by which he leads the inhabitants of the earth astray.” having beguiled the Jews, as though he were the expected Christ, he shall afterwards be characterized by all kinds of crimes of inhumanity and lawlessness, so as to outdo all unrighteous and ungodly men who have gone before him; displaying against all men, but especially against us Christians, a spirit murderous and most cruel, merciless and crafty Iren. V. 25, § 4:  “He shall remove his kingdom into that city (Jerusalem), and shall sit in the Temple of God, leading astray those who worship him as if he were Christ.” According to the genuine treatise of Hippolytus Antichrist was to restore the kingdom of the Jews (De Antichristo, § 25), to collect the Jews out of every country of the Dispersion, making them his own, as though they were his own children, and promising to restore their country, and establish again their kingdom and nation, in order that he may be worshipped by them as God (§ 54), and he will lead them on to persecute the saints, i.e. the Christians (§ 56).  Compare the elaborate description of Antichrist and his cruelty in Lactantius, Div. Inst. vii. 17; Epit. § 71..  And after perpetrating such things for three years and six months only, he shall be destroyed by the glorious second advent from heaven of the only-begotten Son of God, our Lord and Saviour Jesus, the true Christ, who shall slay Antichrist with the breath of His mouth 2 Thess ii. 8.  Cf. Iren. V. 25, § 3:  Hippol. § 64., and shall deliver him over to the fire of hell.