returned into Power again Proposit 5. Every one of the Eight Kings Rev. 17. 10 11. is represented by one of the Seven Heads of the Beast Coroll 1. The Eighth King is one of the seven Heads that had ruled before and was revived again Coroll 2. The Eighth King called the Beast v. 11. is the Beast with that Head only which is last in Rule Proposit 6. The Beast all over the 17th Chapter is the Beast in the time of its last Ruling Head Coroll 1. The Beast in the 17th Chapter continues no longer than his last Ruling Head Against Grotius's Notion of the Beast after all his Heads Coroll 2 The Ten Horns belong to the Beast no longer than the time of his Last Head Against the same Proposit 7. The Beast all over the 17th Chapter of the Revelations is a particular Sovereign of Rome in the time of its Idolatrous Rule Proposit 8. The Term of The Beast all over the 13th Chapter does signify the First Beast shown v. 1. Corollar 1. By the Image Mark Name and number of the Name of the Beast chap. 13. is to be understood the Image c. of the First Beast Corollar 2. By the Beast with the False Prophet and with the Image Mark c. in all the other Chapters of the Revelations is to be understood the First Beast with all the same Attendants in Chap. 13. Proposit 9. The Beast in the 13th Chapter is a particular state of the Beast under one of its either Ruling Heads or Horns for all the time of the continuance of the Head or Horn. Corollar 1. The False Prophet or Second Beast Image Mark Name c. do in all the mentions of them in the 13th Chapter belong to that particular state of the Beast under either of one of its Heads or Horns Corollar 2. The Beast with the False Prophet Image Mark c. in all other Chapters signifies the same particular state of the Beast that it is signified to be in the 13th Chapter with the like Adjuncts Proposit 10. The Seven Heads and the Ten Horns in the 13th and 17th Chapters are the same things Corollar 1. The Beasts in the 13th and 17th Chapters are one and the same particular Beast in every successive state of the same Heads or Horns Corollar 2. The Beast in the 13th Chapter is the same particular state of the Beast with that in the 17th Chapter for the whole time of its continuance Corollar 3. The wounded and healed Head of the Beast Chap. 13. is the same Last Ruling Head of the Beast with that in the 17th Chapter Proposit 11. The Judgment of the Dead Rev. 11. 18. is the General Judgment at Christ's Second Coming Corollary The Reign of Christ over the Kingdoms of the World Rev. 11. 15. is Christ's Second Coming in glory Proposit 12. The Beast that killed the Witnesses Rev. 11. 7. is the same particular time of Roman Rule with the Beast in the other Chapters Corollar 1. The Beast in the Revelations is to continue till some Vniversal Reign of Christ over the Kingdoms of this World Corollar 2. The Beast and the Two Witnesses Chap. 11. are Contemporaries for the whole time of the continuance of them both BOOK II. PROPOSITIONS Prop. 13. THE Kingdom of the Son of Man Daniel 7. 13 14. is some Kingdom of Christ Jesus Prop. 14. The Kingdom of the Son of Man Dan. 7. is the Second Coming of Christ in glory Corollary The Kingdom of the Son of Man is Christ's Second Coming to Judgment Prop. 15. The Fourth Kingdom in the 7th Chapter of Daniel is the same thing with the Beast in the Revelations Coroll 1. The Last Ruling Head of the Beast in the Revelations is the same thing with the Little Horn of the Fourth Beast Dan. 7. Coroll 2. The Beast in the Revelations signifies the same particular time of Reign with the Fourth Beast in the time of the Little Horn Dan. 7. Coroll 3. The time of the Beast in the Revelations did not begin till after the division of the Roman Empire into Ten Kingdoms Coroll 4. The time of the Beast in the Revelations is not yet past Prop. 16. All over the Prophecy of Daniel By a Beast as the common Subject of its Heads and Horns is meant a Ruling Nation or People Part. 1. Part. 2. By the Heads and Horns of that Beast the several kinds of Supream Government in that Nation Part. 3. And if they be said to come after one another they denote so many Successive Governments in the same place Part. 4. But if they are described as ruling all at the same time then they signify so many divided Sovereignties in that one Ruling People or Nation Part. 5. And in both the kinds of them each particular Head or Horn does signify the whole time of all the several single Governours that reign either in the same form of Government when they signify successive Forms of Government or in the same particular division when they signify divided Kingdoms Observ 1. Every whole Figure signifying Dominion does all over Daniel signify a Ruling People or Nation Observ 2. The parts of whole Figures signifying Dominion do all over Daniel follow the Rule of the Heads and Horns of the Beast Observ 3. An Head and an Horn are indifferently used to signify the same Ruling Power of a Nation Observ 4. The distinguishing Character of a new Succession of an Head or Horn or of a new Succession of a different Government in the same place is a new name of the Sovereign Power publickly established Observ 5. All parts of Figures signifying Dominion do all over Daniel denote the whole successive Line of all the single Persons that reign either in the same form of Government or in the same part of a divided Nation or People BOOK III. PROPOSITIONS Prop. 17. THE Beast in the Revelations when taken for the common Subject of its Heads or Horns does signify the Rule of the Romans in general The Seven Heads of it the Successive Changes of the Government of that Nation The Ten Horns the division of that Empire into so many several Sovereignties Prop. 18. The Three last Kings of the Eight Rev. 17. 10 11. are three Changes of Roman Government coming after one another in an immediate order Prop. 19. The Sixth King Revelat. 17. 10. was the Imperial Government of Rome in the time of St. John Prop. 20. The Beast was that Supream Government of Rome which came next but one after the Imperial Government in St. John's time Prop. 21. An Head of the Beast is that setled Sovereign Power of the Romans whose Authority is owned for Supream by the City of Rome Coroll 1. Every Head of the Beast is at an end when the City of Rome does own another setled Power for Supream in the room of it Coroll 2. The Sixth Head was at an end when the City of Rome owned another setled Authority in the room of the Imperial Government that had continued
immediatly succeed one another then it is certain that The Eighth King is one of the first Six returned into Rule again Corollary For the Eighth King is one of the Seven that were past before returned into Rule again Coroll Prop. 4. And it cannot be the Seventh because the three last Kings and therefore the Seventh and Eighth do immediatly succeed one another Prop. 18. so that if the Eighth were the Seventh and with the Seventh King it would be but the Seventh continued in being and therefore not an Eighth The Eighth King must therefore be one of the Six that were past before it It cannot therefore now be doubted but that The Sixth King of the Eight in the 17th Chapter of the Revelations Proposit 19. was the Imperial Government of Rome at the time of the Vision For the Sixth King is the Sixth Head of the Beast Prop. 5. And an Head or Horn of a Beast does in Prophecy signify a form of Supream Power in a Nation And the continuance of that Form under all the single Persons that reign in it till it be changed by another Prop. 16. Now there was no other Government over Rome when the Sixth King is said to be in Rule there but only that of the Roman Emperours The Sixth King then must be the Government of the Roman Emperours till that was cut off by a Form of Government of another name Observ 4. Prop. 16. If it should be objected That by the Sixth Head or King may be meant but one part of the Imperial Government or those only that were of the same Line or Family or of the same Countrey or of the same Religion or the like It may be replied that there is no warrant for any other signification of a new Successive Head or Horn in the same Jurisdiction than that of a new name of the Governing Power There were many other differences in the Successions of the several Kings of the Persian and Graecian Monarchies viz. several Lines and Families several different Countries but yet they were all comprehended under one and the same Horn. The only plain Example that we have of the change of a single Horn in the same Beast which is the same with the change of an Head Observ 3. Prop. 16. is that of the Two Horns of the Ram Dan. 8. where all the difference betwixt the latter Horn and the first is that the Last was known by the name of the King of Persia whereas the other was called the King of Media in the same one Kingdom of the Medes and Persians There is therefore no warrant for making the Sixth King any thing else but the whole time of the Imperial Government till it was changed for a Roman Government of another name There is no kind of scruple to be made against this upon the account of the name of King which is common to all the Eight Kings For that is known to be very dubiously used in Scripture but especially in Prophecy to signify either a Kingdom or a Government in a Nation of another kind than the Kingly Government The most certain Example of it is this present use of the word King where it must at least signify an Emperour which is a Government of another denomination and so different from that of Kings that the Romans which permitted the one are said to have †Hieron Balbus de Coronatione c. 13. Julius Caesar c. Julius Caesar who when he had engrossed the Dictatorian and Regal Power to himself because he knew that the name of King was hated by the Romans and even execrable to them to decline the envy of it instead of King chose rather to be called Emperour When Mark Anthony the Consul offered him the Diadem he cried out aloud that he was Caesar and not a King and threw away the Diadem an hatred for the other Grotius's Answer to this is That an Emperour had really the same power that a King had But if that be sufficient to qualify a Supream Power for the Name or Title of King Then all the several different Rulers of the Roman State might as well have See References that name and so be comprehended under the Five first Kings here mentioned For the Consuls are said to have succeeded into all the Power and the Authority of the Kings that were before them And all the other kinds of Government had the same Authority And though there should be some small difference in the degree of their Authority yet that is no more than is to be found betwixt c Ribera in cap. 17. Apoc. v. 10. numer 15. But if any one should think it hard and forced that many Kings should be signified by the name of one King and should think that these seven are but seven single Kings let him know in the first place that all Expositors have understood that in every one of these seven are comprehended a great many and that never did any take them to be seven single persons only but Victorinus whose Opinion all do deservedly cry out against And then next let him understand that it is not unusual in Scripture by one King to signify many of the like sort and as it were of one and the same Body which is especially to be observed So in Daniel 8. The Ram with the two Horns does signify all the Kings of Persia succeeding one another in order and making as it were but one body who are therefore accounted but as one King So that in Jeremiah chap. 25. And they shall serve the King of Babylon 70 years which it is impossible to understand of one single King different sorts of Kings As for the Plea that the Name of a King denotes a single Person almost d Ribera in cap. 1. Apocal. v. 3. numer 5. citat We may say that which is begun is now done or doing Wherefore since those things were shortly to begin he might well say the things which shall shortly be done although they were not shortly to be ended This is the common use of speech and the use of Scripture all the Examples in Daniel of that name do show See References that it does signify a Succession of many single Persons in a Kingdom Prop. 16. Part the Last This Grotius takes no notice of but thinks it argument sufficient against it to call it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and quis unquam ita loquitur To which Ribera does best answer on cap. 17. Apoc. pag. 528. That all Expositors have said so and never any but Victorinus said otherwise But in the 7th of Daniel it is evident That by the Four Beasts called Four Kings is meant four Kingdoms and by the Fourth of these Kings the Roman Commonwealth For it is described in that state in which it conquered the Graecian Monarchy which was in the state of its Commonwealth And Deut. 33. 5. and Judges 9. 16 18. chap. 17. 6. ch 18. 1. ch 19. 1. ch 21. 25. the
at Rome For besides that it has been demonstrated that the essential Character of an Head of the Beast is the Government owned at Rome by Prop. 21. It appears also by almost all the known examples besides of the changes of Government in a Monarchy either in Daniel or the Revelations That the continuance of the former Government together with a new face of the Soveraign Power is made to be a New Succession of the Sovereign Power of that Nation The most plain instance of it is in the Figure of the Graecian Monarchy in the 8th Chapter of Daniel where after the end of the first form of Government under the first King there succeeds a fourfold Kingdom notwithstanding that the Macedonian Sovereignty which was the first King continued still in being for it was one of those four Kingdoms So also in the figure of the Persian Monarchy just before it the successive changes of the Sovereignty are represented by the Two Horns coming after one another thô the first of them That is The King of Media was still in being when the latter was in Rule because the King of Persia was also King of Media and his Realm at that time called the Kingdom of the Medes and Persians This also is confirmed from the Succession of this very same Imperial Head which was a new head notwithstanding that the x Onuphr Panuvinus lib. Fastor p. 61. But the Consulary Dignity continued at Rome to the time of Justinian Joh. Fersius Silesius protonotarius de p. Praet Justinian Novell 105. calls the Consulship a Dignity that goes alway with the Imperial Power so that the Consulary Power seems to be so interwoven with the Sovereignty that it follows it of its own accord and is tacitly included in it as soon as the Scepter of the Empire is taken L. 6. Cod. Theodos The Emperors Decree That all other Dignities shall give place to that of Consul Prattica dell Medagglie de Carlo Pattin Pag. 67. The greatest part of the Money which the Emperors Julius Caesar and Augustus caused to be stamped was called Consular Money for the respect that they bore to that Supream Dignity Consulary Government continued with it thô in subordination to the Imperial much more must this Government be a new Head when that which was only Imperial is turned into a Regal form at Rome There is therefore no longer any question to be made whether the Imperial Government which was the Sixth Head at the time of the Vision be yet at an end CHAP. V. Rev. XVII The 23 d Proposition The Beast some Present Sovereign of Rome The 24th The 42 Months of the Beast at least 1260 years The 1260 Days of the Witnesses the same particular time The Two Witnesses the Representatives of the whole Church enslav'd by the Beast SInce it has been made unquestionable from the preceding Proposition That the Sixth King or Head has been past for some hundreds of years From thence it may as assuredly be concluded That The Beast called the Eighth King is a Sovereign Roman Proposit 23. Power that is owned for Supream by the Authority of the City of Rome at this present For the Sixth King in being at the time of the Vision was certainly at an end after the ruine of the Western Empire by the Heruli and Goths Prop. 22. And the Seventh King does immediately succeed the Sixth by Prop. the 18th And the Seventh King was to continue but a short space chap. 17. 10. Whereas the number of years from the Ruine of the Western Empire to this present is three times longer than the whole time of the sixth Head from the date of the Vision and as long as the whole time of the other six Heads before Wherefore the Seventh King must needs have been long since past and the Eighth King called the Beast have entred upon his Reign For the Eighth King did immediately succeed the Seventh by Prop. 18. And the Eighth King or the Beast is to continue till the Second coming of Christ by Corollar 1. Prop. 12. And therefore must the time of the Beast be both begun already and not yet past that is must be at present in being Upon the same grounds it appears That The forty two Months of the Reign of the Beast Revel 13. 5. are at least 1260 Years Prop. 24. For the Beast is in being at this present by Prop. 23. And he began his Reign soon after the fall of the sixth Head because the Seventh King was to continue but a short space Rev. 17. 10. And the sixth Head was at latest ended at the fall of the Western Empire in Augustulus by Prop. 22. which was above 1200 Years since It is therefore impossible that the forty two Months of the Reign of the Beast should have a literal signification in this place They must then of necessity be understood in a Mystical Signification by Rule 2. and in such a Mystical Signification also as must make them contain in them above 1200 Years Now there is no Example in Prophecy of any such Mystical Signification of Time as will make these forty two Months reach to 1200 Years and make them less exceed that number of Years than the Mystical use of Weeks and Days in some of the Prophecies Weeks are by almost the Vnanimous Consent of all Interpreters taken for so many Years as they have days in them in that famous Prophecy about the first coming of the Messias into the World in the 9th Chapter of Daniel v. 24. under the name of the seventy Weeks This is an unexceptionable Instance of the mystical use of days for years So also is the Year of Jubilee after 49 years called the end of seven Sabbaths or weeks of years Levit. 25. 8. Days also are made use of to signify Years in Ezekiel twice in one Chapter Ezek. 4. 4 6. and in the same manner in the Book of Numbers 14. 34. Against these two last Examples it is pretended That Days do not absolutely signify Years but are only made the Types of Years But this is no material Objection against this usage of Days For though in those two places they be used but as Types yet it is easie to observe that Types of things are ordinarily used in the New Testament for the things themselves after the Type is fulfilled in them and in that use of them they signify the things absolutely and not Typically for a typical signification of any thing is the signification of it before it is come to pass which cannot be when the Type is used for the real thing it self then in being And therefore in such a use of the typical word it must signify the thing absolutely only Thus do we find the names of Temple Altar the Holiest of Holies the Vail the Passeover-Lamb used to signify the Christian Church the Communion Heaven this Earthly state Christ Jesus after these Types were accomplished and so after their typical time was past
by Pope Leo. as Kings and Emperors of the Romans and they are owned for such by all Christian Princes in their Treaties with them The Pope also who confers this Right and Title of Roman Emperour is by Custom and Prescription the g Clementin de sententia re judicata That Law was made by Pope Clement V. against Henry VII That in the time of the Interregnum or Vacancy after every Emperour's death the Pope should have all the Power over the Imperial Countreys and Towns The Administrator of the Empire in time of a Vacancy and is the Representative of the Senate and People of Rome in whom the power of chusing or approving the Head of the Roman Empire did always reside how various soever the way of chusing him was as Grotius informs us in his Notes upon the 9th Chapter of his 2d Book de jure Belli Pacis Bellarm. de Translat Imp. Rom. Note 1 2. on Chap. 3. These Rights of the present Roman Emperor are also confirmed by that Civil Law which was always in former times the General Law of all Nations and is so now for the greatest part of it and his Title has been acknowledged by the Constantinopolitan Emperors themselves His Power in disposing of the Fees of the Roman Empire in h Blondus Trithemius Sabellicus Cuspinian c. and almost all Historians do blame the Emperour Rodolph of Hasburg for selling the Fees of the Imperial Towns and Principalities in Italy But the Popes were well pleased with it because it kept the Emperours at greater distance from them Italy he is continually in the exercise of and has publick homage done him for the Dutchies of Milan Mantua Modena Montferret c and for other Rights in these Parts i Grot. Respons de Antichristo in Not. 6. of this Chapter His being of the German Nation signifies no more against him than it did against others that they were of Thrace or Dalmatia or Hungary Besides there is a plain distinction in his Titles betwixt that of Caesar or the Emperor of the Romans and his being King of Germany Hungary Bohemia It can be no objection against this That the Imperial Power has no exercise of Authority over the City of Rome or over all the Jurisdiction of the Roman Empire For 1. His Absence from Rome and from the particular Government See References of it is no greater Argument against his being the Head of that City as it is a part of the Empire than it was against those Roman Emperors who first left the City of Rome to its own disposal and seated themselves at Ravenna And tho the Authority of the present Emperor be now less at Rome than it was in the days of those Emperors yet as long as he is still owned there as Lord paramount of the whole Empire of that City a particular privilege of exemption from the execution of his Orders among the inhabitants of Rome is no more than the asserting it to be a privileged place within the extent of his Jurisdiction Besides that it is by k The Popes themselves pretend no other Right to the City of Rome than the Donations of their Emperours and these were upon occasion recalled The most famous instance of which was no later than the year 963. when Pope Leo VIII made a most solemn Renunciation of all the Imperial Donations that had been given to his Predecessors and this for Himself and his Successors to the Emperour Otho I. and his Successors and to this subscribed the Archbishops Cardinals and all the Clergy there and the Consuls Senators c. and all the Civil Governours of the City of Rome and the Papacy as is recorded by Theodoric à Nyem There was indeed continual Differences betwixt the Popes and Emperours about these Donations and the Popes were not wholly in the free possession of the Government of it till it was given away by the Emperour Charles IV. who in lieu of it had the Golden Bull to chuse the Emperour of the Romans in Germany Blondus in his 2d Decad. lib. 10. gives that account of Pope Innocent VI. That he would not give him the Imperial Crown but upon this Condition That he should not keep his publick Meetings there nor make any Order about the Romans without the advice of the Pope and that he should not keep any constant Court at Rome or in Italy Thus was the Emperour Sigismund brought afterwards to do much the same thing by Pope Eugenius about the time of the Council of Constance and that under the name of Confirming the Donations of Constantine and of the other Princes the consent of the Emperors themselves that they exercise no temporal Superiority there And that Power which they have lost there is only upon the account of their power there exercised before them by a Church-Head according to the Letter of the Prophecy Rev. 13. 12. 2. As for the inconsiderableness of his Power or Authority over the Jurisdiction of the Roman Empire it is no more than what is foretold of him in the Figure of the Beast For it is expresly signified in the Figure that he should be but the Head Rev. 13. 1 chap. 17. 12. of the Roman Empire when it was divided into l Aventinus in Annal. Boior lib. 7. Eberhard Archbishop of Saltzbourg about the year 1240. describes the Usurpations of the Papal Authority over the Imperial with application to the Beast in the Apocalypse The Emperour says he is now no more than a Name the Ten Kings who have parted the World amongst them do Destroy it rather than Govern it Under them is grown up that little Horn which has Eyes and a Mouth speaking proud things What can be clearer than this Prophecy Turn over the Annals all the strange things which our Master forewarn'd us of are already come to pass Ludovic à Bebenburg de Jurib Reg. Imp. Rom. cap. 9 shews That the Imperial Authority stands upon the same Title that Charlemagne left to his Sons by Inheritance the way by Election succeeded into the same Right and so the Imperial Power has still the same Title over the Lands and Kingdoms that were subject to the Roman Empire tho he is not in the actual possession of them Eleven distinct Sovereignties represented by the Ten Horns with Crowns upon them and the last Ruling Head amongst them And therefore must the Head be really but a titular Head of that whole Empire and not in the actual possession of all the Jurisdiction of it And since the Beast is a Roman Secular Power in being at this present by Coroll preced And there is no other Secular Power of the Empire who is acknowledged to be superiour to all the rest by the Authority of the City of Rome but he alone The smalness of his Dominions cannot hinder him from being a Secular Head of Rome Besides He is in the actual possession and exercise of many priviledges
the time of the continuance and the last period of so formidable a power as that of the Beast and the False Prophet is described to be I will now proceed to propound my apprehensions about those particular circumstances which is so much the more necessary because almost all the applications of the many Characters and Properties of the Beast do seem to depend upon such a particular determination And because I know it will be difficult to prevail with any who have framed to themselves an Hypothesis of their own about these things to see any convincing proof for the way that I make choice of To be civil to the Understandings and Assurances of others I will now propound my own particular Application under the name of Queries instead of Propositions thô to my self they may appear to be of much the same strength I would therefore first have it considered Whether at the time of Justinian 's Conquest of the Italian Query 1 Goths there had not been at least Two such Changes of the Secular Soveraign Power of Rome since the time of the Visions about the Beast as might be called Two different Heads of the Beast For the Secular Soveraign Power of Rome at the time of the Vision was the Imperial Government and Sixth Head by Prop. 19. and 5. And the Imperial Government as the Sixth Head was changed at latest upon the ruin of the Western Empire by the Heruli and Goths by Prop. the 22. There remains then nothing more to be done for the determining of this question than to show That the Succession of the Heruli and Goths to the Government of Rome and Italy did make a new Head of the Beast For then it will not be questioned but that the Conquest of the Goths by Justinian did also make the other Head that was to be revived That the Succession of those Barbarous Kings at Rome did make a new Head of the Beast appears from the definition of an Head of the Beast Prop. the 21st For upon the ruin of the Western Empire by these Kings and their Reign over Rome and Italy The Supream Secular Power of Rome was changed and another owned there in the place of it Thô the one part of the Imperial Head remained still sound at Constantinople yet by the change of the other part of it which did more immediately preside over the City of Rome the Soveraign power of the Romans came to be divided betwixt a King and an Emperor And so that which was a form of Government purely Imperial before came to be a mixture of Kingly and Imperial Government For that the new Kings of Italy and the Eastern Emperours made still but one Supream form of Roman Government thô divided in the Seats of their Empire appears from the state of the Imperial Government before the ruin of the Western Empire by these Barbarous Kings The Eastern and Western Emperor were then but one and the same Imperial Head Thô they had Two different Kingdoms they had both of them their Authority Chap. xvii pag. 157 158. from the a SEe Note the second on Chap. 3. Grotius de Jure Bell. Pac. lib. 2. c. 9. Art 11. and in the Annotat. Onuphrius Panvinius lib. Fastor does frequently make mention of the Constantinopolitan and Roman Consuls and shews them to have been indifferently chosen from either of those Cities See Pancirollus in Note 2. Chap. 4. same people and Senate of Rome and therefore were there half the Senate and one of the Consuls ordinarily residing at Constantinople The Laws also of the Empire were joyntly subscribed by both and do now in the Code bear the names of both the Emperors and it is the Subject of a great part of Pancirollus's Explication of the Notitia Imperii to show that the Military Ensigns and the Arms of the chief Dignities of the Empire were almost every one of them Figures on purpose contrived by the Emperors and given by their Authority to represent the Vnity of the Roman Empire all over the World under the divided shares of the Two Imperial Heads of it as has Ch. 17. been before observed page 148. And thus were the Two Empires but like the Two Provinces of the Two Consuls of Rome which nevertheless were but one Vnited Supream Government of the Romans Now all the change of this Imperial Partnership in the Government by the change of the Western Empire was the introducing the Kingly power into that share of the Empire For in every thing else The new Kings observed b Sigonius de Occident Imper. lib. 15. Odoacer did humble the Authority of the Senate and Consuls but in every thing else he retained the Old Constitutions of the Commonwealth and the Rights and Names of the Magistrates gave the Bishops and Churches their due respect And speaking of Theodorick after him lib. 16. He retained the Roman Magistrates and because he reigned by the Emperour's Favour and the Consent of the Senate he laid aside his own Country Habit and wore the Purple and the Royal Robes He set up a Kingdom every way like the ancient Western Empire Joan. Fersius Silesius de Praefectura Praetor Theodoric retained still the Roman Laws and Customs and the very same Magistrates so that the Citizens of Rome were ashamed to create them themselves Cassiodor lib. 3. Variar Ep. 43. Theodoric says We delight in governing according to the Laws of the Romans whom we desire to maintain by our Arms. And all over that Book nothing is more frequent than the mention of the Roman Commonwealth for the Kingdom of the Goths in Italy And the whole business of it is The Kings or Governours Letters for the administration of the Civil Government after the same manner and by the same kinds of Magistrates that the Western Empire had been govern'd by before Hieron Rubeus Histor Ravennat pag. 867. speaking of the Gothish Government in Italy But altho they changed not any Roman Constitutions as the Senate the Praefects the Comites the Curators and the like yet they did ordinarily model them after their own fashion but yet all in imitation of the Roman Laws and Dignities And pag. 128. Then began Italy to breathe and flourish again and Theodoric when he saw the Romans whom he had an affection for very much bent upon their ancient Liberties he commanded all things should be administred by Roman Magistrates He committed the whole Government of the City to the Senate and People of Rome but so as that he himself chose the Praefect of the City the old form See References of Government which they found in use at their coming to the Crown as appears from all the History of their Government They changed no Roman Custom says Rubeus And it may H. Rubeus Histor Raven p. 128 167. more particularly be seen in Cassiodorus's Variarum That they retained all the same Magistrates by which the Government of the Western Empire was administred Besides the fall of
of Competitors to the Kingdom and besides not owned as heads of Rome that there is no reason to account it any setled change of the Imperial Head Prop. 21. part 1. Hugo of Arles had indeed the Principality of Rome with Marozia but he was presently cast out of it again Besides that r Ibid. cap. 14. The German Writers account Conrad and Henry Auceps Emperors in succession to Ludovicus the immediate Emperor before them and then there will not be above 8 years of vacancy others reject these two because they were not anointed and crowned by the Pope But the Germans do much dispute the necessity of that the Kings of Germany with whom the Imperial Title of Rome had continued by right of Succession from Charlemaigne till that time did still retain the same right in appearance because they were neither formally disowned by the City of Rome nor had any other set up there in their place For the Kingdom of Italy was then accounted a particular Jurisdiction by it self distinct from the City of Rome And the Pope was by that time almost absolute in that City So that all that could be inferred from hence would be that the False Prophet acted for a little time without the Beast 9. And this last Observation may occasion a Scruple How the Emperors can be said to be an Head of the City of Rome when some hundreds of years they have had no more than the bare Title of it The easie Answer to this is That all that is required to make an Head of the Beast is to be Å¿ See Note the 6th on the 6th Chapter a setled Secular Authority owned for Supream at Rome And 't is no wonder that he should be called an Head of it and have so little power or influence over it For all his power was to be exercised before him by another Church-Head distinct from him It cannot be thought necessary Rev. 13. 12. for the Emperor to be particularly resident at Rome to be the Head of Rome For then the Roman Emperors ever after the making Ravenna the Imperial Seat by Honorius must have ceased to have been the Heads of Rome 10. It may then be replied That the Constantinopolitan Emperors in the time of the Gothish Kings of Italy had the Title of the Imperial Head of Rome and upon that account should seem not to have been changed from the time of the Vision But it must be remembred That it is not sufficient to have a Title only but that Title must be owned by the chief Authority of the City of Rome for the sole Secular Sovereign Power of it Whereas it has been made to appear that in the Reign of the Gothish Kings of Italy the Constantinopolitan Emperors were far from being owned for the only Sovereigns of Rome For they were no further owned to have any thing to do there than what the t All Historians give an account of the Imprisonment of Pope John the First for crowning the Emperor Justin in the East and of the absolute Sovereignty of the Gothish Kings over the City of Rome See Notes on the 4th Chapter Lib. 3. Kings of the Goths who were then in the real and actual possession of Rome did allow them as Partners with them in the Honour of the Title of that City 11. It may also be objected That the Emperors have been very often in Wars with the Popes which is contrary to the strict Confederacy that is every-where expressed to be betwixt the Beast and the False Prophet But since they have been notwithstanding at a constant agreement in the great design of their Confederacy which is persecution for false Worship their occasional differences about other things is not to be regarded at most not more than the Differences betwixt the Popes and the Ten Kings who yet give their Kingdom to the Beast 12. How also can the Ten Kings be said to have given their power to the Beast about the time of Justinian when they were many of them Arrians at the greatest distance from the Religion of Rome The Answer to this is That they were soon brought under the Authority and See of Rome France Spain and all Justinian's Conquests changed about the end of that Age. 13. If it be said That when the Roman Empire was divided into Ten Kingdoms distinct from one another there could be no one Secular Head that could deserve to be called the Beast It may be answered That the Beast is but such an Head of the Roman Empire as has a superior Right to the Authority of the chief City of the Empire while the whole body of it is divided Prop. 21. into ten Sovereignties and by that Right has a claim to a Jurisdiction paramount to them all And such is the claim of the present Emperors to u See Notes m and n on the 6th Chapter reserved Rights over all the divided Kingdoms of the Roman Empire And there is at present so great and publick an acknowledgment of the German Emperor's Superiority over over other Kings only as he is Roman Emperor That as has been observed he is suffered to have the precedence of Kings who have both a much larger Dominion than he and a much ancienter Title and who take place of him before he has the Imperial Title when he has nothing but his Hereditary Countries But that which is chiefly to be regarded for the qualifying him for this character of an Head amongst the Ten Horns is That he is properly said to be the Roman Civil Head of those Ten Kings in one common Design that they are all engaged in because he is so acknowledged to be by the False Prophet who manages them all for that end and gives Him the Title of their Head in it 14. It may be further enquired How it can be said That the Imperial Power has subdued three Kings as it is said of the Little Horn in the 7th of Daniel It is answered That whatsoever is said there of the Little Horn is to be understood of the Beast in the Revelations in his joint confederacy with the False Prophet as one Thing engaged in one Design And then whatsoever is done by the False Prophet in that Design will be said to be done by the Beast so that the subduing of the three Kings may thus be either x Hierom. Rubeus Histor Ravennat pag. 145. says That Justinian built that Magnificent Temple of Sancta Sophia in memory of his Persian Vandalic and Gothick Victories Cuspinian de Casaribus pag. 139. gives an account of Belisarius's Expedition against the Persians and that he entred in a Triumph into Constantinople for that Conquest And pag. 140. says That he had a most Pompous Triumph from the Spoils of the Vandals being then Consul in ordinary And pag. 141. says That when Justinian had recovered Italy and subdued Africa and Persia he put the Glory of his Victories into his Titles Justinian's Conquests or y
10. Restauration of the Imperial Rule after the Reign of the Goths in Italy For their whole time was not above seventy years which Isa 23. 15. is but the Age of one Man and is by the Prophet Isaiah called the days of one King and is a very short space of time in comparison with those Kings betwixt whom it stands and to whose time of Reign the reference is made For those seventy years were as nothing in comparison of either the Imperial Rule before it which had continued for above five hundred years or of that after it which has already continued above a thousand years And besides it is a shorter space of time than is attributed to the Seventh King by almost all others who do not make him to be a single Emperor The changing of Times and Laws attributed to the Little Horn in Daniel may signify no more than appearing like a new Lawgiver in the Church But if it be desired to see this more particularly verified of the Reign of Justinian Is it not sufficient for that purpose that His Code was then made the standing Law of the Roman Empire and has ever since continued to be so And that the Epocha that Dionysius Exiguus did then bring in of the Year of our Lord against the old Epocha ab urbe conditâ has ever since been observed But I rather stick to his Settlement of the Laws of the Roman Church There is no manner of difficulty about the Ten Kings which Rev. 17. 12. are said to Reign with the Beast either one hour or at the same time For the number Ten is usually taken in Scripture for an uncertain multitude of those things of which it is said to be the number and in such a long succession and change of Kingdoms as it is here joined with and where there is no other circumstance to shew it to be a definite number it ought in all reason to be taken in that sense that is for an uncertain multitude of Kingdoms that were to be set up with the Beast in the bounds of the Roman Empire according as they are represented by Horns of that Beast which is agreed to be the particular Roman Monarchy Prop. 16. For it is unimaginable That ever that definite number of Ten Kingdoms should be found to have been constant under all those Changes of Masters that the Divisions of the Roman Empire have have been successively ruled by I am sure in the time of the Saxon Heptarchy in England it could not be so And many other Instances of the like nature might be produced against it But however it is not questioned by those who maintain the definite number but that these Ten Kings were up in Rule at the same time with Justinian That they should have their first Rise with him at one and the same time is not at all necessary from the Text though the signification of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 should be granted to be at the same time See pag. 216. But indeed the common and unforced signification of that Expression is one hour that is a small time as has been observed And then all that could be made of it would be That those Ten Kings which are said to have received no Kingdom in St. John's time yet should receive power as Kings or as free Independent Sovereigns for a small time with the Beast and that only till as it is said they should give their power and strength and Kingdoms to the Beast that is Till they should submit themselves and their Kingdoms to that Roman Usurpation which the Imperial Authority should set up and be the Secular Head of which will be better understood when it is explained what the worship of the Beast and of his Image is For that end it will be now requisite to enquire what the Image of the Beast can be determined to be It seems at first to Chap. 13 14. be a figurative Expression and so capable of variety of Interpretations but there will be peculiar marks enough found of it in the Text to determine it to one certain thing But before we enter upon that it is to be premised That the mention of the Beast and his Image is a very manifest allusion to the b Panciroll de Notitia Imp. Orient pag. 46. gives the examples of raising the Emperour's Image and carrying it about to denote his Exaltation to the Empire And pag. 47. gives the examples of breaking the Emperour's Images or the throwing them down to signifie the end of his Reign or his being Deposed common custome of the Romans at that time to raise the Emperors Image in all publick places at his election to that Dignity and to continue the adoration of it during the time of his Reign and to pull down and break those Images at the end of every respective Reign The Emperor's Image and the worship given to it was the publick signification of his being in power And that they might have the fairer Title to Adoration c Panciroll pag. 47. Notit Imp. Orient shews the way of consecrating the Images of the Emperours and the unlawfulness of selling them after it no less than Crimen laesae Majestatis or High-Treason they were consecrated with a form of words as the Idols that were dedicated to the honour of the Gods And so sacred were they after that accounted to be that it was High-treason for any to sell them after Consecration The Beast then and his Image are here joined together with a reference to the worship of the Emperors and their Images The False Prophet who is the contriver of this Image has been already found to be a Church-Head with Supream Authority over the Roman Empire and that he is really distinguished from the Beast who is the Secular Head of it Prop. 24. And this False Prophet is determined to be in particular the Papal Authority Coroll 3. Prop. 25. The Characters of this Image in the Text are to be next considered It is said to be the Image of the first Beast which had the deadly Chap. 13. wound and was healed again It was then the Image of the Imperial Roman Rule restored again by Justinian Coroll 1. Prop. 5. Query 2. Now an Image of any thing is something made after the likeness of the thing of which it is the Image And particularly in this Case it must have as great a likeness to its Original as the Images of the Emperors used to have to the Emperors themselves But then this Image is different from all Carved Images of the Emperors For it is said to have life put into it and therefore must it be a living likeness to its Original That which it represents is the Imperial Roman State which is said to have power over all Kindreds and Tongues and Nations This Image then must also be a living Supream Power over all tbe same Jurisdiction for otherwise it cannot be a living likeness of the
former A Carved Image is indeed but the dead likeness of some single Person But an Image of a Publick State that is alive as this is must be some Ruling Power in the same State that has a very lively resemblance to it for it is in being at the same time with it the Beast and his Image are ordinarily described to be together And the Image is made in honour of the Beast and so must like the Images of the Emperors be within the bounds of the Authority of the Beast And besides is made by a False Prophet in the exercise of the Power of the Beast This living Image then must necessarily be an Universal Rule of the World like to that of the Imperial Roman State And accordingly we find it speaking and commanding all the World to worship it chap. 13. 15. forcing all men to receive the mark of it and to take the name of it v. 16. which shows the extent of its Power to be as large as that of the Imperial Power its Original It had also power of life and death in it v. 15. which is the peculiar Prerogative of Supream Power Now this was all for nothing else but the enforcing of False Worship which it was inspired with life by a false Prophet to effect And one of the Punishments was Excommunication v. 14. v. 17. That men might not buy or sell which was an usual punishment d Selden de Synod l. 1. cap. 7. De effectibus Excommunicationis He that was excommunicated with either greater or lesser Excommunication was said to be 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And the effects of them were Separation from Converse from the Synagogue from the publick Assemblies from all the People and Commonwealth of the Jews And he that was accursed with Cherem was not to have any Commerce with any but just so much as to get Victuals of the Elders of the Synagogues amongst the Jews All which denotes it to be an Ecclesiastical Power equal to the Secular Power for the universality of its Jurisdiction Indeed what kind of Power within the same Bounds and Territories can it possibly be but Ecclesiastical that can be a living Image of the Secular Exercising Supream Authority at the same time with it and in the same places as this is described This Image therefore must be a Church-Rule equal to that of the State And since the Jurisdiction of it is Universal or Catholick and also Roman can it be any thing else but the Roman-Catholick-Church And since all the life that it has is inspired into it by the False Prophet who is already known to be the Papal Power Corol. 3. Prop. 25. what plainer description could we have had of the Roman-Catholick-Church under the Pope Or what can there be that is a e Leo Sermo 1. de Natali Apos Rome has a larger Jurisdiction in its Spiritual Reign than it had formerly in its Worldly Empire Bellarm. l. 5. de Pontif. c. 6. From whence it appears That the Pope is greater than the Emperour c. Stenelius Eugubinus lib. 1. de Donat. Constant By the Exaltation of the Papacy Rome has recovered a Greatness very little different from that of the Ancient Empires since all Nations from the East to the West reverence the Pope of Rome in the same manner as they formerly did the Emperours See the expressions of Pope Gregory VII of his own Authority Greg. 7. Epist 37. The Roman Ceremonial l. 1. c. 2. shews this to be the manner of investing the Pope with his Authority I invest Thee with the Authority of Pope that Thou maist Rule over the City and the World Urbi Orbi more exact living Image of the Roman State under the Imperial Power For the Head of it has a Jurisdiction equal to the Head of the State Both Pope and Emperor have long since had the Title of The Lords of the World They have both a Triple Crown tho for different Jurisdictions They are both called King of Kings The body of the Image is just the same with that of the Beast The Ecclesiastical Jurisdictions are parted out exactly according to the divisions of the Civil Government of the Empire The Patriarchs Archbishops and Bishops had their Ranks and Places every-where according to the Divisions of the Provinces of the State and the name of the Ecclesiastical Diocesses did arise from the distinction of the several Civil Diocesses of the Empire by Constantine And it is established by the Canons of f Concil 6º in Trullo Can. 37. The Canon which was made by the Fathers we do also observe which says thus If any City be or shall be new raised by the Royal Power the Ecclesiastical Dignity shall follow the Publick and Civil state of it two Synods That if any City were newly raised by the Emperor the Ecclesiastical Dignities there should be conformed to it So that the Church and State did run parallel to one another through the whole Body of the Roman Empire just like the Arteries and Veins in the Body of Man and observed the same proportion every-where to one another a MAlvenda de Antichristo pag. 234. de 10 Cornibus The number Ten is very often in Scripture used indefinitely for a great many CHAP. III. Rev. XIII Wherein the Worship of the Beast and of his Image doth consist BY the process of the former Chapter we have all the Confederates in the design of the Beast discovered to us There is the Imperial Roman State for the Beast with his last Head The Image and false Prophet for the Roman Catholick Church and the Pope The ten Kings giving their Kingdoms to the Beast for those Roman Catholick Kings who force their Subjects to submit to the Roman Religion enjoyned by the Papal Power or Imperial Authority And now it is to be examined what is meant by Worshiping the Beast and his Image It is certain in the first place That the words here used to express the Worship of the Beast and his Image are the same with those which were in use at the time of the Vision to signifie the Adoration given to the Emperors and their Images publickly set up 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and adorare were the terms in common use amongst the Greeks and Latines of those times to express that profound Reverence which was paid to the Emperor and his Image And then there seems to be nothing more required to make Application of this Phrase but only to show what obedience was given to the Secular and Ecclesiastical Authority of Rome by all the World from the time of Justinian But because we find that the a GRotius in Decal Nor did the first Christians think it contrary to their Religion to fall down before the Emperours Images But when they afterwards joined the Images of false Gods with their own they chose to endure any thing rather than to worship them first Christians did pay that Reverence before-mentioned to the
Diaconus de Gest Longobard c. 37. who was near those times Phocas says he at the request of Pope Boniface did Decree That the See of the Church of Rome should be the Head of all Churches because that the Church of Constantinople did write it self the first of all Churches See Note g on this Chapter Our Lords the Emperors Our Most Gracious and Pious Lords and subscribed themselves Their meanest Servants And that which is the chief flower of their Authority their Universal Headship or Supremacy over the Catholick Church was begged m Boniface the 3 d did so far acknowledg this Title of Universal Head to be the Emperour's favour That he has the Emperour's grant for it proclaimed at Rome in a Council of 62 Bishops Platina in Boniface 3. Sigonius says That Boniface sent an Embassy to Phocas to desire it by which means he obtained that Decree of the Emperor Phocas by Boniface and could not be obtained but by the drudgery of an approbation of Murder and Assassination and then also not without n The Contest about the Universal Headship appears plainly to have continued from the Order of the Council of Chalcedon for the place of the Patriarch of Constantinople The Law of the Emperors Leo and Anthemius l. 16. c. in fin de Sacros Eccles for the superiority of the See of Constantinople was soon after that Council Pelagius the 2 d. condemns John Patriarch of Constantinople for that claim and so does Gregory the 1st after him See Note g on this Chapter Platina says in Boniface 3. Though his pretentions were not always obeyed yet there has ever since that time been a Schism betwixt the Greek and the Latin Church Bellarmin in Praefat. in lib. de Pontifice The Greeks opposed the Popes Supremacy in the year 451. in the Council of Chalcedon and in the year 600. declare the Bp. of Constantinople Universal Bishop great contests against it as an usurpation upon the Rights and Liberties of other Churches to mind him by whose favour only he came to possess it For the Emperor o Cuspinian de Caesaribus p. 140. Mauritius wrote to Pope Gregory To obey John Patriarch of Constantinople as if Head Patriarch of all others Mauritius just before had commanded Pope Gregory to acknowledg John Patriarch of Constantinople for the Universal Head There is great reason then to account the Honour shown to the Papal Authority and his Clergy which are the Life and Soul of the Roman Church to be an honour done to the Power that raised him and supported him 4. The Worship that is given to the Roman Religion may well be called the Worship of the Imperial Authority because it is the Secular Arm that makes the Church-Laws to be obeyed and thereby it does appear That it is the owning of these Laws by the Secular Power for its own will and command that gives all the life and force to them and that therefore they are obeyed as the Laws and Will of that Power only The Church might make what Laws it pleased to the Consciences of men Their Anathema's would not have been much regarded by those who knew them to be unwarrantable But that which sets the edge upon them is the Secular Arm of the Civil Power 'T is then the Secular Arm that is in reality the chief thing that is worshipped or whose will is complied with as the Will of God and as the Law of his Religion It is therefore very properly the Worship of the Beast both before the division of the Empire when all the Secular Authority was only Imperial and also after the appearance of the p Canon 3. Concil Lateranens 1. The Secular Powers are enjoyned to take an Oath to prosecute Hereticks to the Rooting them out of their Territories And those Princes that neglect to do thus are to be Excommunicated and their Subjects Absolved of their Oath of Allegiance to them and their Lands to be exposed to the Seizure of Catholicks See Note c and f on Chapter 4. The Council of Milan and Arles send to their Emperours to make their Decrees effectual Aeneas Sylvius afterward Pope Pius 2d Epist l. 53. We are all of the same Faith with our Princes If they were Idolaters we should be so too and should deny not only the Pope but Christ himself also if the Secular Power did but press us to it Otho Frisius in prol l. 4. Chronic. There are two persons set up in the Church The Sacerdotal and the Regal the one to execute the Ecclesiastical Censures by the Spiritual Sword the other carries the Material Sword to execute the Secular Sentences And as Spiritual possessions are under the jurisdiction of the Spiritual Sword so are the Dignities of this World as Dutchies Counties c. under the jurisdiction of the Material Sword Ten Kings in it because N. B. they are found to give their Kingdoms to the Beast or to that Religion which the Imperial Authority does set up For this end alone is it that the Imperial Authority has its confirmation at present from q Goldast Polit. in Imperial H. 1. pag. 72. Speaking of the Installation of the Roman Kings or Emperours They do then require an Oath from the Supream Monarch of the whole World To defend the Roman Church to exterminate Hereticks and to secure the Dignity of the Pope by all manner of ways Glabar l. 1. Histor in fine Benedict the 9th made this Decree That none should be called or taken for Emperour but He whom the Pope for his good behaviour shall make choice for a fit person for the Common-weal and upon whom he shall set that Imperial Crown which is a Golden Apple set with Jewels and a Cross in the middle of it viz. To denote the end of his power to be to defend the Church And such is every Imperial Crown of every particular Prince Clementina unica de jure jurando Gives the Oath that the Emperour takes to defend the Rights of the Church the Head of the Church that it may enforce the Spiritual Power of the Church and by this means do both the Civil and Ecclesiastical Power come to be Worshipped in one and the same Act of obedience From hence it is now easie to apprehend how the false Prophet does exercise all the power of the first Beast before him For Rev. 13. 12. since the first Beast is found to be the Imperial power the exercise of all his power must be an Universal Supremacy over the Roman Catholick Church and this does very well answer the Popes exercise of the power of both the Roman Swords And it is said to be done before the first Beast as that signifies in Honour of him or in Honour of the chief seat of the Empire The first great effect of this power is to cause all the world to Ibid. worship the first Beast And that is when the Papal Authority does either make the World receive the Imperial
Laws and their Sanctions of Councils as the Will of God about the way to Salvation or make them receive the Roman Religion it self as the Gospel of Christ only upon the account of its being the Doctrine of the Roman Church which has all the Authority that it lays claim to from the will of the Emperors only in veneration to the Majesty of that Empire and the Supream Ruler of it or when the Pope does make the Emperors to be owned for the r Gregor 7. Ep. poll 18. l. 6. Richard Prince of Capua takes this as part of his Oath to the Pope I will acknowledg the Emperour Henry for every thing else and will Swear fealty to him when I shall be exhorted to it by thee or thy Successours always with the exception of the Holy Church c. And it is the general practice of that Church in case of the Emperor's failure of this Defence of the Church or in case of Heresie contrary to it He is to be deposed defenders of the Faith of that Church by a Divine Commission to them from his hands at their confirmation in the Imperial Dignity and thus recommends them under that Sacred Character as the immediate and special Ordinance of God in the Roman Church whose will must be submitted to in their commands for the owning of the Infallibility of the Roman Church or the Divine inspiration of it in all things The next exercise of the False Prophets power is by all the deceitful Arts of persuasion to get the World to make an Image to Rev. 13 14. the Beast which does set out the great industry of the Papal Power upon its exaltation to the Supremacy over the Church to make the Church of Rome to be as Universal an Empire over the World as the Civil state of it was and so to be the Image of the Roman Empire When this was obtained it is said That he had power also to V. 15. give life to this Image and questionless all will own the Church of Rome to have almost all its life from s This appears from the Oath that all the dignified Clergy of the Church of Rome take at their Creation the form of which is thus set down Lib. 2. Decret Tit. 24. I N. N. by the Grace of God and of the Apostolick See Bishop of c. will assist for the retaining of the Roman Pacy and the Regalia of St. Peter and to the maintaining them against every Man I will take care to preserve encrease defend and further the Rights Honours Priviledges and Authority of the Roman Church of our Lord the Pope and his Successors I will prosecute and suppress to my power all Hereticks Schismaticks and Rebels against our Lord the Pope Add to this the Oath that the Emperour and Kings take at their Coronation to defend the Rights of the Apostolick See and then the Papal Authority seems to be the sole Head of the Image and the inspirer of it the Papal Authority in it Of which there could be no more lively a proof than to Ibid. make the Image speak and cause all to be killed that would not worship it And does not this very exactly agree with the Decrees and Canons of that Church put in execution by its own Courts of Judicature and by the concurrence of the Secular Arm which it makes its Officers and Executioners It is known That any dissent from the Faith of that Church is judged by them to be Herefie and that the punishment of Heresie is death And since all the Government of the Church is made a Papal Monarchy and the Pope the Supream Head of it it is very properly said that he does cause the Church to do all these things The last mentioned exercise of the False-Prophet's power is to make all men receive a mark in their hand or forehead or to Rev. 13 16 17. have the name of the Beast or the number of his name This seems to be very mystical at the first sight of it But the custom of all the Eastern parts to give their Soldiers and Slaves a mark to know them for their own does make it plain that it is to be understood of some t Malvenda de Antichristo Pag. 434. Let it therefore be taken for clear and undoubted which all the Fathers did unquestionably teach That this number of the name of the Beast 666 does not relate to either the birth or death of Christ or to any kind of duration or space of time but that it is to be the real name of Antichrist And he there mentions Romanists and Latines Alcasar in c. 13. Apoc. de Charactere Bestiae The Mark says he is not here any thing distinct from the number and the name 1. because it is said the Mark or the Name or the Number of the Name which does not intimate three distinct things but only three distinct Names of the same things 2. Because Chap. 20. Apoc. it is said That all that had not received the Mark of the Beast did Reign with Christ where the Mark includes in it the Name and Number 3. Because Chap. 14. 9. It is said also of the punishment of the followers of the Beast That it was to those who should receive the Mark where all that had the name and the number are also comprehended He there also adds That it was the Custom for Soldiers to receive the name of their Prince in their Skin So Vegelius l. 1. c. 8. and l. 2. c. 5. Soldiers are Listed by being pricked in the Skin with the name of the Prince or General So Lipsius l. 1. c. 9. Quotes Justinian's Code for it St. Augustine Chrysostom and Prudentius The Society of Bacchus were thus marked with an Ivy-leaf peculiar mark and name which does distinguish those of the Roman Church from all other Christians But that which does the best open the mystery of these expressions is that observation of Grotius upon this place That it was a common fashion in St. John 's time for every Heathen God to have a particular Society or Fraternity belonging to him and the way of admitting any into these fraternities was 1. By giving them some Hieroglyphick mark in their Hands or Forehead which was accounted Sacred to that particular God as that of an Ivy-leaf to own themselves of the fraternity of Bacchus 2. By Sealing them with the Letters of the name of that God And 3. with that number which the Greek Letters of their name did make up for the Numeral Cyphers of the Greeks were the Letters of the Alphabet Thus the Greek Letters of the Name of the Sun did in all make up 608. And therefore his fraternity were marked with XH A very great confirmation of this way of interpreting the Name and Number of the Name is Irenaeus's Testimony from Irenaeus l. 5. c. 24. the mouth of those who had received it from St. John That the Number of the Name of
would be but the taking of the word Latinos after the Ancient way of the Latins The False Prophet's punishment of those who had not the mark or name of the Beast is just the same with z The effect of the Papal Excommunications for this purpose does appear from the Bull of Pope Martin the 5th in confirmation of the Council of Constance and to be found at the end of it Which commands all Emperours Princes Lords and all Civil Magistrates as well as Ecclesiastical to expell all Hereticks out of their Territories not to suffer them to make Contracts or to exercise any kind of Merchandize amongst them the Papal-Excommunications For the hindering them from the Market or from buying and selling was one of the effects of the Excommunications of the Jews CHAP. VI. Rev. XIII Vnder the name of the Beast is comprehended all his under-Agents in the same design How the ten Kings give their Kingdoms to the Beast How the Character of speaking like the Dragon can agree with a Christian Bishop It cannot be any thing else THE particular instances explained in the former Chapter do clearly show that the exercise of the Power of the false Prophet does in all the parts of it regard the Beast as the principal concern of his design The Worship that he promotes is the Worship of the Beast The Image that he causes to be made is an Image made in honour of the Beast it self And the Worship that is given to it is because of its being the Image of that Beast that was deadly wounded and was healed again And the mark name and number of the name is the name of the Beast by which all Men were to own themselves the peculiar slaves of the Beast And this is no more than what the Character of that Power which the false Prophet did exercise in all these ways does plainly intimate to us for it is said to be the Power of the Beast it self exercised hefore him And therefore must the exercise of it be only upon his account and those that were employed in it were therefore but his Ministers and Instruments in it All which does signifie to us That the Supremacy of the Pope the Infallibility of the Church of Rome the blind Submission and Veneration that is paid to it the taking the name of a Roman Catholick the confining of all the publick Offices of Religion and Devotion to God and of the lively Oracles of God to the old Roman Language That all these things are done in honour of the Universal Imperial Power of the Romans or of the Empire of the City of Rome and that in the time of the Imperial Authority over Rome restored by Justinian And therefore are all these things signified to be the Worship of the Beast under the last Ruling Head because it is not a Civil honour that is given to this Empire and the Head of it But the giving them the Prerogative of Almighty God the Power of setting up a Spiritual Authority which shall give Law to the Consciences of Men according to their own will and pleasure and shall have the Spirit of God confined to their Arbitrary proceedings and the Curses of God to dispose of at their will against all that dissent from them The Beast therefore is the final Object of all the Worship N. B. and Honour that is given and therefore does generally comprehend in it all the under-Actors and Instruments in this Design where he is mentioned alone Thus ln the 17th Chapter of the Revelations there is no mention of the false Prophet or of the Image but only of the Beast and of the magnificent appearance of his Empire under the name of Babylon And therefore by the Beast must there be understood all his Ministers and Instruments joyned with him according to the nature of the several Characters that he is joyned with As in the time of the Mayres of the Palace in France by the name of the King must many times be understood the will of those Mayres to the prejudice of the Royal Authority because it was the King's Power that was exercised by them And all the Honour and Obedience that they had was upon the account of their being authorized by him So also do the Actions and Honour of the false Prophet and the Image go under the name of the Beast in that Chapter tho in reality they have been much to the diminution of the Imperial Authority It is enough to qualifie them to be comprehended under the name of the Beast that they concur with the Beast in his great design of making all the World to submit to an Ecclesiastical Authority of his own Creating as the acknowledgment of the Honour of his Empire For all the Worship that is hereby promoted is The Honour shown to the Imperial Power of the Romans which is submitted to as the only ground for any hopes of Salvation And that not upon the account of its being the Catholick Church of Christ but for that which is at present a contradiction to it viz. for being the Roman-Catholick Church Wherefore when the ten Kings are said to give their Power Rev. 17. 13. and Strength and Kingdoms to the Beast it is to be understood of their concurrence to advance the Roman Religion as the Imperial Religion of the Romans which was first set up and promoted by the Imperial Authority and so still continues to be defended and protected by it and therein does the Worship of the Beast more eminently appear because of the submission of crowned Heads to it who have no Superior upon Earth but God alone For it is very difficult to understand how ten Kings can be supposed to be of one mind and to agree to give their Kingdoms to the Worship of any Power upon Earth but only in this way of an Uniformity in a common Religion which is set up by the Will and to the Honour of another And here it is to be observed how exactly the Prophecy and the Event do agree with one another in respect of the Order which is observed in the Text. The Beast is described as beginning the Scene first and setting the design on foot And the false prophet and the Image come in afterwards to perfect and accomplish it which was very punctually verified by the beginning of the Universal Monarchy of the Church of Rome under the Imperial Authority and the advancement of it into a perfect Tyranny by the Roman Hierarchy So that after a while the False-prophet seems to take the power of the Beast out of his hands and to exercise it before his face and then the Beast had little to do himself in the management of it and seemed only to give Authority to what was done by others which is also now manifest from the common course of the Roman Church in their proceedings against Hereticks They judge condemn and pronounce sentence against them and then deliver them over to the Secular
in any thing here by the Authority of his Judgment only And the most a Cornel. Ã Lapide in cap. 17. Apocalyps v. 2. Ex dictis patet non esse probabile c. From what has been said it appears That it is not probable what a Learned Man has imagined viz. That those things which we meet with in this and the following Chapter may be understood of the Sacking of Rome by Alaricus Gensericus Odoacer and Totila for those Exploits were not done by Ten Kings as it is in the Text but by single Kings Nor were they so considerable as that shall be which is described in the following Chapter that is the last and never-before-parallell'd Ruine of Rome So also Malvenda pag. 186. in cap. 19. v. 9. Apocalyp It is manifest That this denotes the burning of Babylon that is of Rome in the end of the World Idem pag. 187. Equidem si cuncta c. For if what the H. Evangelist has delivered from the 11th verse Chap. 18. Apocal. be observed one may see very plainly from thence That John did undoubtedly prophesie of that state in which Rome should be about the end of the World Bellarmin lib. 4. de Pontif. cap. 4. Nor is it any Objection against this That Rome is to be laid waste and burnt according to Rev. 17. 16. For this will not be till about the end of the World Ribera in cap. 18. Apoc. v. 21. But the Greatness of the Stone signifies something more viz. That Babylon is to be utterly destroyed so that there shall be no footsteps of it to be seen And v. 22. After this manner do the Prophets usually speak of Cities that are ruined Jerem. 25. Malvenda de Antichristo pag. 185. The first Opinion viz. That Rome will be an Idolatrous Harlot in the time of Antichrist is probable because Rome which is to be destroy'd about the end of the World must be destroy'd for some Crime against the Church of Christ Ribera pag. 455. in cap. 14. Apoc. num 44. For that Rome shall be utterly burnt not only for its former sins but also for those which it shall commit in the last times is so manifestly to be known from these words of the Apocalypse that the silliest man in the world cannot deny it Eminent of the Roman Interpreters do also agree in this Opinion and shew it to be the mind of the b Alcasar Notat 13. Prooemial The Ancient Fathers did agree That the Roman Empire shall continue till the City of Rome shall be burnt with corporeal Fire and that also by Ten Kings Ancient Fathers It is a great confirmation of the evidence of these inconveniences against the making Babylon Rome-Heathen That they have forc'd the most judicious and ingenuous of the Roman Interpreters rather to venture upon applying all to the City of Rome in an Apostacy from the Roman Church about the end of the World for three years and an half acording to the time of forty two months or twelve hundred and sixty days assigned for the Reign of the Beast tho' they have thereby manifestly endangered the Two Chief Notes of their Church that is Vniversality and Infallibility For Babylon must then seduce All Nations and All the Kings of the Earth which must at least signifie all the Nations within the bounds of the Roman Empire which must be vastly greater than the rest of the Roman Church and then it would have the Authority of Rome it self at that time and of all its Empire to make it a fallible and deluding Roman Church greater than any remaining part of that Church But the certain Obstacles against this are first That Rome must thus be supposed to get the Conquest of all Nations Rev. 17. 18. and of all the Kings of the Earth within three years time for that is made to be the time of her Reign and not only to get such a miraculous Conquest in that time but also to make all Nations own her Idolatry in that space of time which must be a far greater Miracle than ever God Rev. 17. 2. yet suffered the Devil to work in the World and that also against all the Light and Resolution of mens Consciences to the contrary which is a more difficult matter to bend against the Natural Course of it than the subject-matter of any other Miracle Rome must also by this be supposed to advance all Merchants to an incredible Stock of Wealth and Riches within Rev. 18. 15. the space of three years and an half by Foreign Traffique with her For these Merchants are to be all that trade by Sea and the Great Men or Princes of the Earth And how monstrous a thing is this to think of Foreign Merchants v. 17. within so short a time when the business of but one ordinary Voyage does take up the best part of one of those years This the chief Author of this Opinion Ribera does ingenuously confess to be a very hard thing to imagine the manner of and that He himself does account it a wonderful and miraculous thing and thereby does seem to allow us the liberty of taking it for a kind of incredible thing as Miracles before they are done are generally accounted to be And then this makes it at least very highly probable That the time of forty two months or of one thousand two hundred and sixty days of the Reign of Babylon with the Beast who carries her and to whose Seven Heads she is always fixed must be understood in such a mystical sense as will give time enough for the things that are described to be done in that Reign and according to the use of such parts of time in a mystical sense amongst the Prophets by Rule 3. which will make the time of Babylon to begin many Ages before the end of the World From hence then it appears That we have this encouragement already for our hopes of a clear Determination of the Application of this Prophecy viz. That there are but three ways yet pitched upon for the Application of it that is to Rome-Pagan to Rome-Christian and to Rome about the end of the World The first of which has been found to be very Absurd and the last Incredible And this is an inviting fore-tast of the satisfaction that may be expected from the more orderly and cautious Examination of the Grounds of all clear Determinations concerning these Visions CHAP. IV. Rev. XVII Inferences drawn from the former Chapter to discover the Nature of the Three last Heads of the Beast and the time of the Reign of the last called The Beast An Account of the Author's Method THE determination of the Reign of Babylon to the times after the end of Rome-Pagan which seems now to be unquestionable does offer a very fair light for some general discoveries about the Mystery of the Beast and his Heads which seem by the order of them to be designed to be the Clue to direct us in
Beast and of the parts of it signifying Dominion from the frequent use of those Schemes in Daniel The business of the Third Book is to apply these general Notions to The Beast in the Revelations and to the parts of it And from the known signification of that Head of The Beast which in the Prophecy is said to reign at the time of the Vision and from the immediate Succession of the other two Reigns after it to determine the time of that particular state of The Beast which is by way of eminency called The Beast alone by it self and the Eighth King and which is the Great Subject of these Visions And then the Explication of all the Uncouth Characters of The Beast is the last Finishing-work of this Design in the Fourth Book And this may give the Reader a distinct and comprehensive view of my whole Design at once and of the Order of my Method towards it CHAP. V. Rev. XVII The distinct Notion of The Beast enquired into The Fourth Proposition Every one of the Eight Kings is one of those called the Seven in general Rev. 17. 10 11. The Eighth King one of Seven that were past revived The Fifth Proposition Every one of the Eight Kings is one of the Seven Heads The Beast is The Beast under the Last Head The Sixth Proposition with its Corollaries The Seventh Proposition The Beast is a Sovereign Power of Rome in its Idolatrous Antichristian State THE foundation of all satisfaction about the certain time of that Idolatrous Reign of Rome that is signified by Babylon does seem to depend wholly upon the means that are offered from the Angel's Explication to determine the time of the Reign of The Beast which appears all over the Prophecy with that City as its inseparable Companion There seems to be no other means left to fix that particular time but the Succession of the Heads of The Beast the three last Reigns of which seem to be on purpose singled out from the general sum of the other five and to be distinctly mentioned one after another for no other end but to direct us from the knowledge of the first of the three said then to be in Rule when these words were spoken and so might easily be known to determine the particular time of The Beast who is made to be the next Reign but one after that Ruling-Power which was then in present possession But before any thing can be well setled upon this bottom the use of the Term of The Beast must be first sufficiently cleared For it seems to have an ambiguous Signification in it which may defeat all our hopes of fixing it to any determinate meaning Sometimes it seems to signify a thing common to all the Seven Heads when it is represented as the common Subject of them all in their several successive Reigns and sometimes it seems to signify nothing but one of its Heads in distinction to all the rest Wherefore it seems to be the first thing that is to be enquired after Whether there can be any determinate and fixed signification setled upon the use of this Expression And the fear of mistaking in so fundamental a Point made me think it necessary to be very cautious of every step I made in it and to have a distinct comprehension of it before I setled my self upon it For this purpose I found it requisite to begin with this Proposition as the ground of all that was to follow Every one of the Eight Kings reckon'd up in order Rev. 17. Proposit 4. 10 11. is one of those called the Seven Kings in general v. 10. Nothing can well be more plainly signified than this in the Text after this manner They are Seven Kings Five are fallen one Rev. 17. 10 11. is and the other is not yet come and when he cometh must continue a short space and the Eighth is of the Seven What can more plainly signify the parting the whole sum of the Seven Kings mentioned just before into five and one and the other and an Eighth which is one of those Seven For who would ever understand those words otherwise than in this plain sense They are Seven Kings Five of which Seven are fallen One of them is the other of the Seven is not yet come c. And there is an Eighth who yet is one of those Seven before mentioned So that every one of the Eight is one of the Seven and therefore can there be but Seven Kings in all This indeed seems to be so very plain and necessary that it may be wondered why it should not be rather suppos'd than endeavoured to be proved since there seems to be no manner of ground for a doubt about it but only upon the account of the Eighth King who yet to make all clear is said expresly to be an Eighth which was one of the Seven and is so granted to be without dispute But yet it was thought needful to secure this by these Reflexions upon it because there is a considerable Authority against it in defence of a particular Hypothesis That which is alledged from the Text to make it capable of another sense is * Dr. More Vol. 1. p. 647. Brightman in V. 10. c. 17. Apoc. That the 7th King in the Order is called the other and not the 7th and that therefore he may be a King of a different nature from those Seven Kings which are said to be the Seven Heads because 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the Greek signifies sometimes a thing of another nature And that to make up the number of those Seven Kings that are the Seven Heads the 8th is said to be one of those Seven But it is plain enough that the other in that place denotes no new quality in the 7th King but only refers to the signification of the number of the King just before him who is called one And that King is called one by a very proper and familiar way of Speech without any ground for the least mystery in it such as this following would now be accounted The Seven Heads are Seven Kings five are past one is at this present after which would very naturally follow and the other is not yet come That is the other of the seven which is an usual and ordinary way of speaking if not more proper than to say five are past the sixth is at present and the seventh is not yet come And certainly the 7th would in the latter Example appear to be nothing but one of the seven Kings who had at first been called the seven Heads When with this we consider there is mention here made of an 8th Can any thing be more manifest than that the other just before it is as certainly the 7th as if it had been expresly so called and that the one before that is the same with the 6th And then of what can they possibly be the Sixth or the Seventh but of those Seven Kings which were just
to avoid all disturbance in the City and prejudice to the Church none should be chosen without his knowledg See also Petavius Rationar Temp. part 1. lib. 7. cap. 3. The doubled strength of the Two Consuls The Coyns also of the Empire in the time of this division had both the Emperors Heads with this Inscription The mutual love of the two Augusti And whatever was there more like to the Consuls of Rome which are said to be one of the five Heads that were past at the date of the Prophecy than these two Emperors After this came the Western Empire to be cut off by the Barbarous Nations Odoacer who cut off the last Emperor Augustulus Reigned with his Heruli Sixteen years in his stead and how much he deserved to be accounted a new Head of Rome may appear by the power he had there to have a Law made f Petavius Rationar Temp. l. 7. c. 3. To prevent which that is the Commotions in the City about the Election of Laurentius and Symmachus upon the death of Pope Anastasius the whole Controversy was remitted to the determination of King Theodoric according to the Law made in that Case by Odoacer And he pronounced Symmachus Pope And many Synods were about that Affair in the year 501 and some years after That no Election of the Bishop of Rome should be valid except it were confirmed by the King And also That in a Controversial Choice The King should determine which of the Elected should stand This Law continued also under g Hieron Rubens Histor Raven p. 131 132. The year after was there another Council called by the Command of King Theodorick from Ravenna The French Bishops mention their being called to Rome by his Command And Pope Symmachus gives the King thanks that he called the Council to meet at Rome See Tom. 2. Concil de Synodis Romae sub Symmacho Theodoric does there shew the Letters of Symmachus himself to request him to call the Fourth Synod Theodorick who succeeded Odoacer together with his Goths and Theodorick was in the exercise of it till the year 502. h Pompon Laetus of Odoacer The Romans at his first entrance into the City salute him King of Rome and Italy and lead him to the Capitol with all the highest Honours To the same purpose Blondus Decad. l. 3. pag. 31. In decretal distinct 69. Odoacer is called by Pope Symmachus the Most Excellent King of the Romans And by his Authority were there frequent Synods of the Orthodox called at Rome till some years after the year 501 thô he himself was an Arrian which shows how absolute he was amongst them And of the i De Translat Romani Imper. in Germanos Tit. Quâ ratione facta est Imperii translatio The Roman Power was transferred upon Odoacer first by the Army or by the submission of the Roman Legions to him 2. By the Nobility and Senate of Rome 3. By the Right of Conquest 4. By the Renunciation of Augustulus 5. By the Consent of all Rome and Italy declared in the Capitol as they used to acknowledg their Lawful Emperours Blondus Decad. l. 3. p. 37. He there shews How Theodoric was received at Rome by the agreeing Consent and Applauses and Acclamations of the Pope the Senate and People of Rome And that he left Rome to its own Government by the Senate but yet so as that his Praefect did preside over them Bellarm. l. 1. de Translat Imper. Rom. in Germanos cap 9. says that Theodoric enjoyed the Empire of all Italy The style of Theodoric's Letters-Pattents represent him every-where as the Absolute Sovereign of the Romans as much as ever the Emperours had been before him In his Letter to the Senate of Rome upon his Coronation Oath Lib 10. Variar Cassiodori Our Goodness must be a very commanding thing when we are overcome by our own Will who are not bound to answer to any one else because we owe thâ—se things to God only and not to Man Epistola 17. So also in the next Letter to the People of Rome consider How much kindness is intended you when he swears to you who cannot be compelled And speaking of the Office of Praefect of the City of Rome Epist 4. lib. 6. says of himself in comparison with those Praefects Hâc sold ratione c. In this only are we different from them that we cannot be subject to any one else who have none to judge us or to call us to account Sigonias says of him lib. 16. de Occident Imper. That Theodoric set up a Kingdom in the West every way most like the old Empire there splendid receptions of both Odoacer and Theodorick at Rome by the Pope the Senate and the People of Rome and of the applauses and submissions that were shown them in acknowledgment of their Sovereignty There are sufficiene Testimonies from the best approved Historians of those times And the time of the Reign of these Barbarous Kings over Rome was near 70 years The Lieutenants of Justinian Bellisarius and Nurses subdued those Kings of Italy And thereby Justinian who was but the Emperour of Constantinople and which had been divided from the Authority of Rome for so many years comes to be restored to the Royal Seat of the Empire at Rome which was another Change of the chief Government of that place And thus it continued under the Command of the Exarchs of the Greek Emperors for near Two hundred years The Lombards and the Franks and the Pope together seem to make another Change of the Sovereign Power of Rome by the ruine of the Greek Emperors interests in Italy But thô the Lombards seemed to be the next Masters of that Jurisdiction yet they never could succeed in their attempts to make themselves Masters of Rome For they were checked in it by the Power of the Franks under Pepin and Charlemain But then upon a Confederacy betwixt the Pope and those Kings of the Franks Rome was left wholly free to it self and Charlemaine was made Emperor of the Romans and from him the Title continued to this day in the French and German Line with some small intervals of vacancies Who would make any question whether here be not variety of Changes enough to make one conclude That the Imperial Government which was the Ruling Head in St. John's time must have been long since at an end One would indeed be more apt to judge from hence That there hath been not only a Change of the Sixth Head since that time but also four or five Heads besides in succession to one another But since we are already assured That the next Change but one to the Imperial Sixth Head was to be the Beast Prop. 20. And that the Beast was to continue from his first rise under that Head to the last coming of Christ in Glory by Prop. 6. and Corol. 1. Prop. 12. It is manifest that there can be but Two of these several Changes of Government that can
be Heads of the Beast the latter of which must continue to the second coming of Christ Wherefore to be able to know from the account of these Changes of the Roman Government whether we are now in the times of the Beast which is our chief concern It is now to be enquired Whether it can be assured from thence that the Sixth Imperial Head has been at an end since the time of the Vision Now leaving all the rest of the Changes to the particular defenders of them one may upon most undoubted grounds for it resolve himself That At the ruine of the Western Empire by Odoacer and the Gothish Proposit 22. Kings of Italy The Sixth Head was at latest at an End For the Sixth Head was to be at an end when another setled Government should be owned at Rome instead of the Imperial Government by Coroll 2. Prop. 22. And at the ruine of the Western Empire by those Kings their Authority was k Cassiodor Variar Lib. 5. Epist 3. de Praefecturâ Praetorianâ No Dignity is equal in power to it And although other Dignities have their set bounds yet under that jurisdiction does almost every thing come that is done in our whole Empire And in the Comment there by Brossius Ammianus Marcellimus lib. 21. affirms That the Praefectura Praetoriana is much above all other Dignities as Valentinian Valens and Gratian have decreed l. 1. c. de Officio Vicarii And that with good reason For the Praetorian Praefecture was a kind of Sovereignty of Command but without the Purple and that was the distinction betwixt the Sovereign and the Praefectus Praetorio that he had not the sacred Purple nor the Imperial Badge of Authority owned for supream at Rome as has been already made appear from the publick reception of those Conquerors at Rome by the whole Authority of that City the Pope the Senate and People of Rome and their acclamations to them under the name of the King of Rome And what other Authority does Bellarmin himself make necessary for such an end Bellarm. de Translat Imp. Occid but that of the Pope And the Exercise of this Power is manifest from the whole Book of Cassiodorus Variarum who was the Chancellor and chief Minister of State to two or three of the Gothish Kings For that whole Book is nothing but the several forms of the Letters Patents as one may say of the Gothish Kings for all the great Offices of the Roman Government such as those of Consul Praefectus Praetorio c. Prefect of the City c. And the Office of the l Cassiodor Variar l. 1. Epist 4. l. 11. Ep. 1. 8 10. l. 12. Ep. 3. 56. Praefectus praetorio was immediately depending upon the supream Imperial Power and Commanding all under him with an Imperial Authority But the most assured evidence of it is the Commands that we find from the Gothish Kings to the Senate by the same name m Cuspinian in Sextum Rufum p. 8. De Imperatoribus Appian writes in the Proem of his History That Emperor was the name of the Generals of Armies of old From whence he that Governed the Commonwealth at his own pleasure like a King was called an Emperor And they took that name upon them because the name of Emperor was more acceptable at Rome than any other Title which had a show of Absolute Government And Julius Caesar as Dion says did take the name of Emperor upon him as omnium Rerum Dominus from whom the Emperors after him took the name Thus were the Gothish Kings really Emperors of Rome under the name of Kings They had the same Power and differed only in Name of Rerum Dominus n Cassiodor Variar Lib. 1. Epist 29 31 32 33 44. Lib. 4. Ep. 45 c. that the Emperors had in distinction from all other Sovereigns and in such terms as these By these o Cassiodor Variar Lib. 8. Ep. 2 3 4. Lib. 10. Ep. 18. Lib. 11. Ep. 1. pag. 658. Cassiodor Lib. 8. Epist 24. Clero Ecclesiae Romanae Athalaricus Rex We decree by our Authority at this present That if any one has an Action against any belonging to the Roman Clergy That he Cite him to the Court of the Most Blessed Pope And if the Plaintiff has not right done him there then he may go to the Secular Courts presents we do ordain By our Proclamation we do enjoyn And know ye lest any one incur the severity of our displeasure Give ye your Suffrages according to our Command And know ye that we have given our special Order But Especially n when we see them minding the Senate and People of Rome that not only by the general consent of all Goths and Romans THEY were chosen their Kings and Governors but that also they had taken an Oath of Allegiance to them And if there should be any scruple of a Superiour Authority in the Pope at that time We find an Ordinance of the Kings That o Clergy-men should indeed go first to the Bishops-Court But if they apprehended themselves not righted there they should from thence appeal to the Civil Courts of Judicature which shows which of the Courts was then accounted the Superiour Jurisdiction even amongst the Clergy themselves And this will not be much wondred at as any strange thing when it appeaas That those Kings made Edicts to Regulate the Ordinations p Cassiodor Variar Lib 8. Epist 15. King Athalaricus to the Senate of Rome concerning their Agreement in the choice of that Pope which his Father had named to them after the Imprisonment of Pope John by him He calls it their Obeying his Command in it Idem Lib. 9. Epist 15. To Pope John of the Popes themselves and directed them to the Popes in such terms as these to publish May your Holiness know that we have at present decreed which we will have to extend to all Patriarchs and Metropolitans And in the substance of the Edict We allow no voice to any Clergy-man that shall be found to have been bribed for it And then commands that a former decree of the Senate about it be observed And with the desire of the Bishops Prayers bids him take care to observe his Edicts and commands him to intimate this to the Senate and People by the Praefect of the City and to make it known himself to all the Bishops under him And to intimate a thing was the Law-term to signify the making a publick Act of it Panciroll notit Imp. Orient p. 33. q Anastasius Bibliothecarius records this of Pope John the first in the time of Theordoric and of Pope Agapetus in the time of Theodahat It was also an ordinary thing for the Gothish Kings to send the Popes in Ambassy to the Greek Emperors If now it be replied That the Imperial Government was still in being in the Constantinopolitan Emperor because he had a part of the Senate of Rome and one of the Consuls with
him which was the Supream Authority of that City The utmost that can be pretended from that is That that Greek Emperor had as much Roman Authority on his side after the fall of the Western Empire as he had before it but that being only one share of the Authority of Rome It is plain That those Kings who had the real Sovereignty of the City of Rome must at least be the other part of the supream Government of it And of the two they must unquestionably be the most r Bellarmin in his 9th Chapter De Translatione Imp. Rom. Lib. 1. does show that Odoacer was King of Rome and Italy against the Emperors will and so had no dependance upon him and that Theodoric after him was made King of Rome and Italy by the consent of Zeno as one Emperor did usually create another so that these Kings must unquestionably be qualified to be the Sovereigns of Rome both for their independance on any other and their possession of it by the same way that the Western Emperors used to have it properly the Sovereign Authority of Rome which is the qualification of an Head of the Beast Prop 21. This made Theodorick deal so harshly with Pope John for Crowning the Emperor Justin Roman Emperor at Constantinople Petav. l. 7. c. 3. Part 1. For that did show that it was then generally thought that the conferring that Honour by the chief Minister of Rome was the giving him a Title to the Command of the Authority of Rome In short one need but consider who was the Head of the Roman Empire before the fall of the Western Empire to determine whether that Head were changed or no by that fall It is certain that if it were but one of the Imperial Thrones that was then the Head of it it must be the Western who had the chief Imperial Seat in his power and then the Kings that succeeded him must be a new Head but if they were both together the Roman Head as is most likely then at the fall of the Western Power and the succession of a new Regal Government in the stead of it the whole Government of the State must be acknowledged to have been changed and a new Head set up in the room of it Wherefore instead of the whole Imperial Government in the Eastern and Western parts of the Empire by this new conquest of Rome There is a Succession of Kingly Government in the Western part to share with the Imperial in the East And of the Two the Authority of the Kings must be acknowledged to be the most considerable part of the Head of Rome But that the Imperial Government of Rome was then changed into another Form than what appeared before that conquest is no ways to be questioned There must therefore necessarily be thereupon the appearance of a New Head But whether it were the mixed form of Imperial and Kingly Government together that made that Head or the Kingly Government alone need not yet be determined It cannot be here Objected That the Gothish Kings could not be any part of a Roman Head upon the account of their being quite another Nation distinct from the Romans and therefore not possible to be any part of the same Beast by which the Roman Empire is represented and that there was then no other Head of the Romans at their Conquest but the Imperial Head at Constantinople which continued the same for all the time of the Reign of those Barbarous Kings of Italy and so was never put an end to by them For it is well known That those Barbarous Nations were taken into s Grot. in cap. 17. Apoc. v. 12. The Goths were the first that were made the Confederates of the Roman Empire as Procopius shows Gothic l. 4. And that before the time of Maximinus as we learn out of Jornandes To the same purpose Onuphrius Panuvinus Lib. Fastor pag. 307. The Romans a little before that is before the time of Augustulus had taken the Scythians Alans and Gothish people into Society with them The Dignity of the Roman Princes was so diminished about that time That they were even forced by these Strangers against their will under the decent Name of Associates and Confederates to let them share all the Italick parts of the Empire with them Grot. de jure Belli pacis Lib. 2. c. 9. Art 11. By the Decree of Antoninus All within the bounds of the Roman Empire were made Citizens N. B. of Rome Petavius shows out of Idatus That in the year 38. The whole Nation of the Goths were taken into Society with the Romans and had Lands assigned them Petav. Rationar Temp. Lib. 6. c. 8. the Society of the Romans and had Kingdoms and Territories assigned them within the bounds of the Empire long before this last Conquest of Italy at the subversion of the Western Empire By the Decree of Antoninus all that were within the bounds of the Roman Empire were made Citizens of Rome as Grotius observes c. 9. l. 2. de jure B. P. And all over Cassiodorus Variar t So also all over Cassiodorus's Variar The Gothish Kings stile themselves Roman Princes Cassiodor Variar Lib. 3. Ep. 16. 18. Lib. 11. Ep. 1 2. pag. 658 659 669. the Gothish Kings stile themselves Roman Princes and their Kingdoms Roman Empires And Theodoric who was the first of them had this Commission from the Roman Emperor Zeno and the Senate as may be seen in pag. 284 285. Jornandes affirms that the alliance betwixt the Romans and Petavius in Theodor. Goths began in the time of Maximinus but it is certain that in the time of Theodosius there was a very formal agreement betwixt them The whole Nation of the Goths delivered themselves up into the hands of the Romans and they had Lands of the Empire assigned them for their habitation and so were Members of the Roman State And such real Members were they of it in the time of Theodorick that he was u Jornandes de Reb. Geticis Sect. 86. Zeno Adopts Theodorit for his Son And he was made one of the Yearly Consuls which is the highest Office and the greatest Honour in the World Cassiodori Chronicon p. ult D. N. Eutharicus Cillica Justinus Aug. Caes made Consul of the Empire by Zeno and Eutharicus his Son in Law after him But that which gives the best satisfaction in this case is that the Goths of Italy must be either an Head or an Horn of the Roman Beast according to the interpretation of all Protestants who make the Ten Horns to be the division of the Roman Empire amongst the Barbarous Nations and then since the Kingdom of the Goths in Italy had the City of Rome for its share it was much better qualified to be an Head than an Horn by Propos 21. The continuance of the Imperial Roman Government at Constantinople could not hinder the change of that Head when there was a new face of Government
the Western Empire was in the time of Zeno Emperor of the East and Zeno could not be less a part of the Supream Government of Rome after the fall of the Western Empire than he was before the fall of it because he had his part of the Senate of Rome and the choice of one of the Consuls still continued to him all the the time of Odoacer the Conqueror's Reign and c Jornandes who was the Gothish Bishop of Ravenna in the time of the Reign of the Goths in Italy gives this account of King Theodoric in his Book De Rebus Geticis sect 86. Zeno upon the report that he heard of Theodoric then chosen King of the Goths invites him into the City and receiving him with Honour placed him amongst the Nobles of his Palace And after that to shew him greater Honour he adopts him his Son for the Wars and gave a Triumph in the City at his own Costs then made him Consul in Ordinary which is the highest Honour in the Empire But Theodoric weary of living idle begs of Zeno that he would give him leave to try his Fortunes for the recovery of Italy which had been a part of the Roman Empire and contained in it that City which was Head and Lady of the World For it is better says he that I who am your Son should possess that Kingdom by your Gift than one that tyrannizes over your Senate and Commonwealth for if I be Conquerour I shall hold it as your Gift and Favour Which Zeno hearing did yield to his desire and sent him away with Honour recommending the Senate and People of Rome to his Care Blondus Decad. l. 3. pag. 32. speaking of Theodoric 's Petition to Zeno When Zeno had reported this to the Senate they voted That it was not only very reasonable but that it ought freely to be offered him of their own motion wherefore Zeno when he had honoured Theodoric with a consecrated Veil which was then the surest Confirmation of the Emperour's Grant for any thing sent him away with a recommendation of Italy and the Senate and People of Rome to his Care Carolus Sigonius de Occid Imp. lib. 15. concerning this Grant to Theodoric Zeno thereupon gives him a Grant of Italy by a publick Instrument per Pragmaticum putting a consecrated Veil upon his Head De Translat Imp. Rom. in German Amongst the rest of the proofs that he gives of the Translation of the Western Empire upon Odoacer and the Goths brings this for one That Theodorick had the Grant of it by the Consent of the whole Imperial Senate for which he quotes Sigebert Abbas Urspergensis c. And that he was the Emperour's adopted Son and made Consul which was next in Dignity to the Emperour and had a consecrated Veil from him which he says was the Imperial Purple And that Pope Symmachus was subject to him and that he governed all the Bishops of Italy Ibid. As for the Name of King he proves from Baldus Examp. Col. fin de probat in lib. penultim C. de donat inter Vir. Uxor That a King in his Kingdom is the same with an Emperour the Emperours ordinarily called themselves Kings as well as Caesars Augusti Emperours by his own Authority did Zeno first make Theodorick who Conquered Odoacer one of the Roman Consuls Adopted him for his Son like a new Caesar then gave him a formal Commission for the Government of Rome and Italy as the Emperor used to See References create another Emperor to share with him in the Government and from that time was there much the same Union in the Publick Acts of the Government betwixt the Gothish Kings and the Eastern Emperors that there had been before betwixt the Eastern and Western Emperors Accordingly do we find the dates of the Decretals of the Popes of those days to have the mention of the years of the Gothish Kings as well as those of the Eastern Emperors As for their occasional differences That was no more than what used to be sometimes betwixt the two Emperors and must necessarily be sometimes betwixt the most united Soveraigns as it is expresly intimated by Sigonius as the Case between Zeno and Odoacer Lib. 15. de Imperio Occid Zeno says he took Odoacer's Invasion of Italy so ill that he would have no Society of the Empire with him which shows by the way That the Agreement of the Emperors with the following Kings of Italy was the same kind of sociable Government of the Roman Empire that had been before used amongst the Eastern and Western Emperors Thus was Theodorick d See Not. praeced And Sigonius de Occid Imp. l. 16. says of Theodoric That he conformed himself to the Purple of the Roman Princes and laid away the Habit of his own Country because he was made King of Italy by the Roman Emperour and Senate And Blondus says pag. 37. Decad. l. 3. That Theodoric was received at Rome with the applause of the Senate and all the people Hieron Rubeus Histor Ravennat pag. 122. says That Zeno and the Senate conducted Theodoric out of the City in his Robes of State chosen King of Italy and of Rome by Zeno and the whole Senate and with pomp accompanied by them out of the City in his Robes of State He is received at Rome for their King with the Applauses and Acclamations of the People and the Honours of the Senate After a small difference with Anastasius the next Emperor in e Cassiodor Variar l. 1. Ep. 1. Theodoric to Anastasius wherein those mentioned expressions are found and amongst them an Acknowledgment of frequent Messages from Anastasius To love the Senate To observe the Roman Laws To take care of all the Members of Italy which shews how much the Western Empire was still accounted by the Eastern Emperours to be a part of the Roman State as it had been before in Union with the Eastern the beginning of his Reign Theodoric begs Peace of him with an acknowledgment of his Superiority over all the World and moves him to it by this consideration That these two Common-wealths of the East and West were always one body under the former Princes And there ought to be but one Will and one Judgment in the Kingdom of the Romans And Onuphrius Pauvinius observes Fastor pag. 308. That Theodoric enjoyed the Government of Italy by the consent of Anastasius and the very difference betwixt them at the beginning of Anastasius his Reign does show what opinion Theodoric had of his being the Emperor's partner in the Government of the West For upon Anastasius's conferring the honour of Consul and Augustus upon Chlodoreus King of the Franks Theodoric is Pomponius Laetus said to have declared War against him for the Provinces of the Western Empire A manifest instance does he give of his owning the same conjunction with the Eastern Empire that the Western Emperors before him did testify by their joynt Suffrages in chusing of each
of their Consuls He sends to that Emperor to joyn his Suffrage with his own in f Cassiodor Variar lib. 2. Ep. 1. Theodoric does first acquaint the Emperour Anastasius That he himself has chosen Felix for Consul and then recommends him to him to join his Suffrage with him according to the old Custom of the joint Consent of both the Eastern and Western Princes in that Choice Onuphr Panvinius Fastor p. 61. p. 290. shews how the Consuls were chosen at Rome and Constantinople in the time of the Gothish Kings and gives a particular Account of all the Consuls of the West and East the choice of Felix for that years Consul that he might show his care of both the Common-wealths And g See Onuph Panvinius Fastor p. 308. Anno 507. Cum Anastasio Augusto Consul Venantius Theodoric Comes domesticorum Verientius Theodoric's Comes domesticorum was chosen Consul with the Emperor Anastasius And the joynt consent of the two Emperors in the choice of their Consuls was one of the most remarkable testimonies of their perfect concord in the same common Government of the Roman Empire For the h See in Note 25. chap. 4. Justinian Novell 105. 6. Cod. Theodos Tit. 6 7. Consulary dignity was always accounted the next in Degree and Honour to that of Emperor In the time of the Gothish Kings we do also find the ancient Ensign of Honour continued to be carried before those of the Consulary Dignity which had been i See chap. 17. Pancirollus about the Ensigns of Authority carried before all the great Magistrates in the time of the division of the Empire used ever since the division of the Empire to signify the Vnity of the two Emperors in the Roman Government And which Pancirollus says p. 46. Notit Orient That it was the chiefest of all the Ensigns of Publick Authority And that was to have the Heads of both the Princes of the East and West carried before them upon a Mace As may be seen in the Forms of the Gothish Kings Letters to the new Elected Consulary Magistrate Cassiod Var. Lib. 6. Epist 20. Vultus quinetiam Regnantûm c. The Faces of the Princes are carried before thee in Pomp That thou mayst be Reverenced for the Authority of the Governors And again The name of Consul bespeaks thee to be Merciful And the Images of the Princes declare that thou oughtest to be feared And there were Two and Twenty of these Consulary Magistrates in the Western Division which appear to N. B. have continued to the time of Justinian Pancirol Notit Imp. Orient p. 249. The same Figure had the chief Military General engraven upon the backside of a Book Id. pag. 56. Athalaricus k Cassiodor Variar l. 8. Ep. 1. Vos avum nostrum in vestrâ civitate celsis curulibus extulistis Vos genitorem meum in Italiâ palmatae claritate decorâstis Cassiodor Variar l. 11. Ep. 1. It appears by the Letter of Cassiodorus to the Senate That Justinian had taken advantage of the Death of Theodoric to invade the Gothish Territories in Illyricum while things were unsetled under the young Prince Athalaricus and his Mother but that he was well repulsed in the Attempt and that the Goths had gained upon the Eastern Empire in these parts In the very beginning of her Reign says hc of Amalasuntha and Athalaricus when Attempts are usually made by reason of the unsetledness of new Changes the Army made the Danube part of the Roman Empire in spight of the Prince of the East It is well enough known what the Invaders met with which I purposely omit lest the Genius of a Social Prince that is then in a League of Peace should put on the blush of a Traytor after Theodoric Sollicites the favour of Justinian that they might continue in Peace and Vnion as his Father had done and commemorates the former Emperors kindnesses in making his Grandfather Consul at Constantinople and his Father Consul in Italy For his Father Eutharicus was l Cassiodor Chronicon pag. 702. D. N. Eutharicus Cillica Justinus Aug. Cos And there does Cassiodorus describe the Pomp in which Eutharicus appeared at Rome in the time of his Consulship after which he returned to his Father Theodoric to Ravenna Consul with the Emperor Justin and his Father's Consulship in Italy is an evident sign of the joynt suffrages of both the Princes for the Consul of Rome especially when it appears that m Onuph Panvin Fastor p. 308. Anno 510. Eutharicus Consul Orientalis cum Boethio Occidentali Lutharicus was once the Consul of the East viz. when he was Collegue with Roatheus the Western Consul Onuph Panci Fastor Anno 510. He professes the strength of his Kingdom to lye in his good correspondence with the Emperors and mentions n Cassiod Variar l. 8. Ep. 10. He was also made your Son for the Wars in order to a closer Union This Name you will more fitly bestow upon so young a Man as I am since you have given it to those that were much older his Father's being his adopted Son like those who were made Augusti or Partners of the Empire by others and desires the same for himself Amalasuntha and Theodohadus after the death of Athalaricus send the same professions of Amity and desire an Vnion betwixt the Two Kingdoms as that which was then confirmed by long o Cassiod Var. l. 10. Ep. 1 2. Custom and become like a Law betwixt them And they both send to the Emperour for leave to transport p Cassiod Var. l. 10. Ep. 8. Justiniano Aug. Amalasuntha Regina For it is fit that the Roman World should be embellished by your assistance which the love of your Serenity does illustrate And Theod. Ep. 9. It is but fitting that you should willingly grant us those things which if we were negligent of we ought to be stirred up by your Clemency to set about for without question all must be very pleasing to you whatsoever shall be done by us for the Ornament of Italy because it is to your Honour whensoever the Glory of our Common-wealth is advanced Marble for the Ornament of that Roman World and Commonwealth which they express his glory to be concerned in and Theodohadus in particular sends his recommendation of a Petitioner to him about the Affairs of the Church at Ravenna notwithstanding that Ravenna was Theodahadus his Royal Seat But the Goths being Arrians they committed the chief care of the Orthodox to the Emperour Vitiges pleads with the r Idem l. 10. Ep. 32. Vitiges R. Justiniano Aug. That you may do after your usual manner that both the Commonwealths may continue in Concord and that according to the manner of the Princes that have gone before c. Emperour Justinian for Peace in the same stile shows him how much Rome the Head of the world had suffered by the War moves him to Peace by the consideration of the advantage of
both parts of the Roman Commonwealth by it and the Examples of all former Princes and sollicites the s Idem l. 10. Ep. 33. Magistro officior Vitiges R. For tho I may be thought to have deserved less of you yet have some regard to the Roman Liberties which by the Tumults of War are every-where violated concurrence of the great Men of that Court with him in that motion upon the account of the common Liberty of the Roman Nation The Senate also of Rome it self uses the same motive to Justinian for Peace t Cassiod Var. l. 11. Ep. 13. Justiniano Aug. Senatus Urbis Romanae It is a very just and necessary thing to petition for the security of the Roman Commonwealth of one that is a pious Prince of it because it is reasonable for you to desire all that may contribute to our Advantage or Liberty c. because Rome ought to be his care and therefore not to be suffered to be ruined upon his account And that it was his Agreement only with the Goths that made that City find favour with them because of his concern in the common Interest of the Romans And well worth the perusing for this purpose is u Ibidem Be not thou the cause of my Ruine who hast always contributed to the Joy of my Life Do not ruine by Discord whom thou oughtest to defend by War Joyn Councels with the King and unite your Forces that whatsoever may be to my Advantage may redound to your Glory That Prosopopaeia which the Senate represents to Justinian in the name of the City of Rome as his peculiar City that ought to be his care and concern and that he ought to maintain Peace and Unity with the Goths for her sake It is also a remarkable observation of Joh. Fersius Silesius to this purpose in his Book de Praefect Praetor That Justinian demanded of the Gothish King as the condition of the Peace That he should never set up his Statue without Justinian's in an higher eminency than his own and at the Right hand as the more Honourable place which confirms the former Custom of setting up both the Princes Statues to signify one Empire in common to them both thô the Emperour would have the precedence Again both the Eastern Emperours and Gothish Kings had the name of Rerum Domini or Lords of the World from the same City of Rome which was then called The Head of all things Of the Emperours it is unquestionable and x Idem l. 11. Ep. 1 8 10. l. 12. Ep. 3 5 6 11 18. of the Gothish Kings it is no less certain from Lib. 11. and 12. Cassiod Variarum in above Twenty several instances of that Title And both Emperour and King were represented together in Italy at least as the one conjoyned Soveraign Authority of the Roman Empire as appears from the before cited form of the Kings Letters to Pag. 186. the new elected Consulary Magistrate where the Heads of both the Princes are said to be carried before them And accordingly we find the Dates of the Pontificates in those times to have the King of the Goths as well as the Eastern Emperour signified in whose time the Popes lived The Wars betwixt the Goths and Justinian are no greater objection against their being One Head of the Romans than the Civil Wars betwixt the Two Consuls Sulla and Cinna c. Or the Wars betwixt the Two Emperours of the East and West who yet for a while at least are acknowledged by the chief Adversaries of my opinion to have been one of the Heads of the Beast From hence then it may be certainly concluded That so considerable a change of the Form of the Sovereign power of Rome is sufficient to give it the name of one of those two last Kings of the Eight Rev. 17. 10 11. which should come immediately after that Imperial Sixth Head which Ruled at the time of the Vision for it has all the qualifications of one of those Kings That is it is a change of the Supreme Government of Rome And to know what kind of change of that Government is sufficient for the Title of one of these Kings one must consult the Examples of those which were past before it It is certain That the five first changes called the five Kings past and one in being could be nothing but the change of the name of the Civil Sovereign power let them be what they will in particular For there was one and the same Religion in them all There are then five plain instances in the same Figure to justify the making of this change of the name of the Civil Roman Government at the ruin of the Western Empire to be one of those Two Kings of the Eight which were to come after the Imperial Sixth Head that was the King at the time of the Vision Besides There is also the example of the Ten Horns or Ten Kings represented by them to show the difference betwixt the Supreme powers which they signified to be nothing but outward civil differences For those Ten Kings are said to be of one and the same Religion to be of one mind and to agree together in false Worship Rev. 17. 13 17. Here are then Sixteen instances in the same Figure to show that the change of the Civil Form of Roman Government by the Gothish Kings was sufficient to make them to be accounted one of those Two Kings that were to come after the Sixth King that Ruled in St. John's time If further we consult the usages of the Figures in Daniel that signify Kings we shall find there that the only note of distinction to know different Kings by is some outward civil difference either upon the account of a different Dominion or for being another name of the Civil Government in the same Dominion and the number of the instances of that kind in that Prophecy are about Thirty So that there seems to be no manner of reason why this change of the name of the Sovereign Power of Rome by the Goths succeeding the Imperial should not be one of those Two Kings that were to come after the Imperial since All the Eight Kings are agreed to be so many changes of the Roman Government And thô it should be said That the change of the Religion of the Empire by Constantine was one of those Kings yet since the different kind of the Civil Government under the same Religion have been found to be the difference betwixt all the Kings besides that are figuratively mentioned in Daniel or the Revelations This constant usage of Prophetical expressions in above Sixty Instances is surely warrant enough to make that remarkable change of the Civil Form of the Sovereign Power at the fall of the Western Empire to be another King thô the Religion might continue the same Now if this change of the name of the Civil Government by the Goths were either the Seventh or Eighth King after the Imperial
about the year 1820 for their Last End But by the same reason that they are made to be but 1260 years or 17 years short of the full account of the three Times and an half N. B. every of those 1260 years as has been observed may be judged to want five days in them and then they would reach but to just the year 1800. And this I account to be the true way of determining the number of the years in both the halves of the Week of Times here referred to For the industrious care that the Prophecy seems to take in three Chapters of the Revelations to limit the number of years contained in the latter half of that great week is sufficient ground to conclude that the former half of it before the Times of the Beast which has no such limitation in it is to be accounted according to the received Custom of the Babylonian Nation for their number of days in a year to which all this peculiar calculation of the Times does refer For the Exception expresly put in to the one half is a confirmation of the common way of account in the other half where there is none Thus may we observe That this great Tribulation of the domination of the Beast does in that resemble the time of the greatest Tribulation that ever befel the Jews as it is characterized by our Saviour The days that this should have in it in proportion to the other half of the seven before it are shortned for the Elects sake And all the grounds that there are for the shortning of the length of 1260 years by the Chaldaick and Greek Account without the additional five days expresly referred to in the Prophecy do also prove that the Rise of the Beast whose time is measured out by these years could not be about the Year 450. for then his time would now have been almost just run out For 1260 Chaldaick years would be but 1242 which added to 450 would make but 1692 for the end of the Beast And yet that is the time to which the first Rise of the Beast is fixed by the most Judicious of the Protestants that take other ways for the succession of the Eighth King called The Beast But in the shortest account of these years they appear however to be so prodigious a length of time for the Reign of One Tyrannical Kingdom over the Church of God in comparison with any other of the Four Monarchies by which the whole N. B. time of the Captivity of the Church of God is measured out in the 7th of Daniel That that is a very sufficient Reason for the particular mention of them as the half of some week of years For by that this Antichristian Tyranny is set out by that which is the most remarkable Circumstance in it viz. The continuance of it in the last Monarchy of the Four as long as all the rest of the time of the slavery of the Church under all the other Three Monarchies and that also in but the one part of the Fourth Monarchy CHAP. II. Rev. XIII The Character of an Eighth which was one of the Seven explained of was and is not yet is Of coming after a Seventh which should continue but a short space Of the changing of Times and Laws Of the Ten Kings reigning one hour with the Beast Of the Image of the Beast TO go on with the rest of the Characters of the Beast in the Revelations The Imperial Head cut off by the Goths and restored by Justinian does very naturally agree with the Character of its being an Eighth King which was one of the Seven Because Rev. 17. 11. it was the Sixth of those Seven Kings at the time of the Prophecy and an Eighth in the time of its Restauration by Justinian And it is a strange thing to see how others are forced to make either their Eighth King to be the same with their Seventh or their Seventh King to be none of the seven Heads to uphold their Interpretation And that also shows How the Imperial Head restored by Justinian was the Head wounded to death and healed again ch 13. 3. And the Beast that was and is not and yet is ch 17. 8. which do but signify the same thing with its being the Eighth which was one of the Seven that had been once past before For all those Expressions signify no more than that the Imperial Head was before it was deadly wounded by the Goths then ceased to be while the Gothish Kings were the Kings of Rome and Italy and afterwards was healed again by the return of the Imperial Rule over Rome in Justinian Where by the way may be observed how justly the continuance of the Roman Imperial Power in the East after the ruine of the Western Empire does answer the Character of and yet is at the time when it had but a small share in the Authority of the City of Rome together with the Gothish Kings See the Account of their Note 20 21. on Chap. 18. Union in the choice of their Consuls c. But whereas the first of these Expressions seems to belong only to an Head of the Beast and the other is said of the Beast indefinitely It is to be considered that the notion of the Beast is the Beast in the particular state of its last Head Prop. 6. which is the healed Head Coroll 3. Prop. 10. As for the Riddle of was and is not and yet is The Learned Vol. 1. p. 642. Dr. More has shown that that is to be understood of the Beast as it was subject to those several changes of one and the same state of it and not to be tied to any one set particular time when those inconsistent Characters were really verified of it altogether as several compounded Names of things are found to be in the Old Testament For to understand it literally of the substance of the Beast is an open contradiction or to understand those Characters about the same qualification of it in the same respect at the same time And yet it cannot but be seen that in the time of the Gothish Kings it was very near being verified to the greatest nicety about the Imperial Government It was Supream at Rome before them it was not so in their time and yet it was owned for its share with them in the Authority of it But to make out this difficulty by applying these Expressions only to a quality of the Beast that was and was not and yet was as Dr. More does to the Idolatry of the Romans is contrary to that which has been proved to be the constant acceptation of the Beast Prop. 6 that is The particular state of it under the Eighth King which therefore must be the thing of which was is not and yet is must be verified The Character of his being an Eighth after a Seventh King which should continue but a short space agrees very well with the Ch. 17.
give Him according to the Canons of the Holy Fathers Authority and the first Seat there Baronius calls it usurping upon the Rights of the Pope The Fourth General Council at Chalcedon is said in the Acts of the Council to be called by the Decree of the most Pious Emperors Valentinian and Marcian The Emperor Marcian bespeaks them as the chief amongst them prescribes them their bounds in their Disputes not to say any thing contrary to the Council of Nice The Judges of the Assembly were appointed by the Emperor and the Senate sat there with Him as the Presidents and Moderators of the Assembly who correct the Pope's Legats in their Demands c. And Eusebius Bishop of Doryletum appeals to them and conjures them by the safety of the Emperors next to the Holy Trinity which was a plain evidence who were then accounted the Highest Authority amongst them under God And in the conclusion of that Action all give thanks to the Emperors the Judges and the Senate Actione prima Concil Chalced. Pope Leo in his Epistle to the Emperor Marcian tells him That he had thought his Clemency would have granted him his desire to have the Synod at a more convenient Season But since his love for the Catholick Faith would have the Assembly to be at that time that he had sent his Legat to it to supply his place In the fifth Action of the Synod at Chalcedon it is ordered that a Definition of Faith be brought in by some Bishops appointed for that purpose And in the sixth it is said that after the Emperor Marcian's Speech the Emperor's Definition of Faith was read which had been mentioned in the fifth Action The Emperor in the same Action confirms the Acts of the Council and threatens the Contemners of it with condign punishment the same does he mention in his Letter to Palladius But nothing does more shew the Custom of calling Synods to be by the Supream Civil Power than the exercise of this Right in the Roman Church by the Arrian Kings of Italy after the fall of the Western Empire Several Synods were called at Rome by those Kings to appease the Divisions of that Church and Clergy Tom. 2. Concil In Synodis Tempore Symmachi By the command of the most Religious King says the Fourth Synod and that the King had signified that the Pope himself had desired him by his Letters to appoint the Synod and that the Synod presumed not to declare any thing in that Affair without the knowledge of the King and that Pope Symmachus was commanded by the King to engage with his Adversaries there And that according to the command of the Prince they had power allowed them But that they did restore him all the Ecclesiastical Right both within and without the City The Fifth General Council was summoned by Justinian and the Pope Vigilius banished by the Emperor for not obeying the Summons The Sixth General Council is said to have been summoned by the Decree of the Emperor Constantine at Constantinople The Emperor there seated in the Highest Place with the Consuls and Judges on his side And the Emperor first gave order for the Dispute and after it by the Emperor's command the first Action was concluded Actio prima Concil 6. In the second Action the Emperor presides again Praesidente Imper. Piissimo In the third Action the Emperor again presides The Emperor and the Judges do there consult together about a Passage in the Fifth Synod And the Judges determine with the Synod In the fourth Action the same Emperor presides Pope Agatho in the second Action tells the Emperor If he offers himself to render ready Obedience to the things that had been commanded him by the sacred Patent of his most Clement Fortitude and says to fulfil the obedience of my Service according to the most pious Command of your Clemency for the Obedience which we owe. In the fifth Action the Emperor presides orders Macarius to bring forth his Testimonies And by the Emperor's Command the Action was finished In the sixth the Emperor presides is applied to by the Pope's Legats to desire that he would command the true Copies of the Book cited by Macarius to be sent for and the Emperor did accordingly order it to be done the next Session In the ninth the Emperor presides and orders those of the Synod of one Party to declare themselves The Emperor presides also in the 10th and 11th Actions and then orders his Deputies two Patricians and two Exconsuls to preside in his room for the future because he had heard the Principal things himself They continued till the 18th Action And in the 18th Action the Emperor presides and the Council first subscribe to the Acts and then the Emperor Thereupon does the Emperor issue out his Edicts to the People of the West to confirm all that had been decreed The Seventh General Council is said to be called by the Emperor Constantine and Irene his Mother in their Letters Patents and that at the Request of Tharasius Patriarch of Constantinople and the Council it self says it was by that pious Decree Action 7. The Council of Frankford celebrated soon after in the West is by Charlemaigne in his Letters to Elipard Archbishop of Toledo said to have been summoned by his Command He presided there and the Circular Letter of the Synod is dispatched in his Name So are the Councils of Arles Aix Tours Chalons Mentz about the same time said to be summoned by the Command of the Emperor Charles There was also a Synod at Rome said to be summoned by Charles in the time of Pope Adrian as Gratian affirms D. 6. C. Adrianus 22. And in the Council of Francford does Charlemaigne give a very remarkable proof of the Imperial Authority For by his countenancing it it condemned the famous Second Council at Nice and with it the Four Councils that were held at Rome before it about the same business in the years 713. 716. 742. 768. And even after the depriving of the Eastern Emperor of his Right in Italy yet do the Popes then date their Councils according to the year of the Reign of those Emperors as it always before had been the Custome as that of Pope Zachary at Rome against Godescalcus In the Reign of our most pious Lord the Emperor Constantine Augustus the six and twentieth year of his Reign All the several Kings in the West had also the same Authority for the summoning of Provincial Councils as may be every-where observed in the Tomes of the Councils The Eighth General Council is said by the Bishops of it Action 6. That it was summoned by the Emperor Basilius crowned of God And in the 7th Action That the Emperor had used all diligence to get the Legats of other Patriarchs as well as those of Rome and had thereby assembled an Universal Council But Pope Stephens's Letter to Basilius is the best Testimony of it What evil has the Roman Church done Has it not according to
the custom of the former Synods at Constantinople sent its Legats at thy Command And the Emperor himself says in the Preface to this Council That the Divine Benignity having committed the Helm of the Vniversal Ship to his care he had taken care before all things to appease the Ecclesiastical Storms The Popes Legats did indeed preside in this Council But it is the first where-ever they can be found to have done so Radevicus says of the Council of Pavie that was called to judge of the Schism betwixt Alexander the Second and Victor the Second in the Year 1160. That the Emperor Frederick did declare that he summoned it by his Authority according to the custom of the Ancient Emperors And in his Decree for it to the Bishops expresses the same thing Radevic c. 51. deinceps And all their meeting in Council asserts his Authority from the Examples of Constantine Theodosius Justinian Charles and Otho Aeneas Sylvius Ep. 34. says of the Council of Basil That it was called by the King of the Romans with the permission of the King of France the Emperor See References at the end of the Fourth Chapter that summoned the General Councils at his pleasure He often presided himself in them and managed the Disputes there and appointed others to preside in his absence All Applications were made to him as the Supream Authority amongst them when he was present And those that were the Judges of the Assembly in his absence were delegated from him His will was consulted upon all occasions The definition of Faith that the Council subscribed to was many times proposed by him and it was called the Emperor's definition of Faith and after the Bishops the Emperor subscribed to the Acts of the Councils in the last place and as the last confirmation of it and then was the Councils said to be c Concil Arelatense sub Carolo M. Ann. 823. cap. 26. These things we have decreed should be sent to our Lord the Emperor beseeching his Clemency that if there be any thing here omitted it may be supplied by his prudence If any thing unreasonable that it may be corrected by his judgment If any thing be well determined that it may have its effect by His Assistance the Divine Aid concurring with it Eutychius in Origen says That the Bishops of the Council of Nice upon Constantine's resigning up himself and his whole Empire to them by the laying down of his Sword before them did begirt him with his Sword again for the defence of the Faith Euseb de vitâ Constantin l. 4. c. 35. Constantine tells the Bishops there That they are Bishops for the things within the Church and he appointed by the Grace of God to be Bishop over the things without the Church And l. 1. c. 37. ibid. that he called a Synod as if God had appointed him to be the Universal Bishop Concil Milevitan under the Emperors Arcadius and Honorius cap. 11. It was also decreed that Legats should be sent from this Honourable Council to obtain from the most Glorious Emperors whatsoever they shall judge useful against Hereticks Pagans or their Superstitions Novell 42. Cod. Justinian Justinian gives this account of the Deposition of the Patriarch Mennas by him after he was condemned by the Council We according to the Usage of the Imperial Power have our selves also resolved upon this Law For whenever the Assembly of Bishops have ejected any out of the Priestly Thrones as Nestorius Eutyches Arius Macedonius Eunomius and others The Imperial Power did agree to it confirmed or made valid and not before For the Emperor had a negative Voice in all they did as well as the chief power in the doing it whenever he pleased to concern himself in it After the conclusions of these Assemblies that which made their Definitions and Decrees to be universally received and obeyed was d Concil Arelatense sub Carolo M. Ann. 823. cap. 26. These things we have decreed should be sent to our Lord the Emperor beseeching his Clemency that if there be any thing here omitted it may be supplied by his prudence If any thing unreasonable that it may be corrected by his judgment If any thing be well determined that it may have its effect by His Assistance the Divine Aid concurring with it Eutychius in Origen says That the Bishops of the Council of Nice upon Constantine's resigning up himself and his whole Empire to them by the laying down of his Sword before them did begirt him with his Sword again for the defence of the Faith Euseb de vitâ Constantin l. 4. c. 35. Constantine tells the Bishops there That they are Bishops for the things within the Church and he appointed by the Grace of God to be Bishop over the things without the Church And l. 1. c. 37. ibid. that he called a Synod as if God had appointed him to be the Universal Bishop Concil Milevitan under the Emperors Arcadius and Honorius cap. 11. It was also decreed that Legats should be sent from this Honourable Council to obtain from the most Glorious Emperors whatsoever they shall judge useful against Hereticks Pagans or their Superstitions Novell 42. Cod. Justinian Justinian gives this account of the Deposition of the Patriarch Mennas by him after he was condemned by the Council We according to the Usage of the Imperial Power have our selves also resolved upon this Law For whenever the Assembly of Bishops have ejected any out of the Priestly Thrones as Nestorius Eutyches Arius Macedonius Eunomius and others The Imperial Power did agree to it the Emperor's Edicts for that purpose which were published with the Threats of Anathema's as well as Civil Punishments e See Cod. Theodos Tit. de Haereticis Item Cod Justiniani Tit. de Episcopis Clericis Item de Apostatis So also was it in the times of the Gothish Kings of Italy after the ruine of the Western Empire Cassiodor Variar l. 9. Ep. 15. King Athalaricus to Pope John concerning the Conditions of the Elections of Bishops Novell 434. Justiniani Orders that no Bishops be sued without an Imperial Command for it And Pope Pelagius the First upon the choice of Paulinus Bishop of Aquileia in his Letters to Narses desires him to send the principal of the Faction to Justinian and gives this reason for it that Totila himself would not suffer the Bishop of Milan who consecrated Paulinus to be created without his leave first had in writing for it Cod. Theodos Novel Valentin l. 2. Tit. 12. The Emperor Valentinian forbids the Bishops to be Judges of the persons of Bishops and that in any Civil or Criminal Causes but that they should come before the Secular Judges unless they go by consent to the Bishops Courts Liberatus in Breviario c. 22. gives an account of Belizarius's setting up and deposing one Pope after another And that Anthimus being deposed by Justinian gave up his Pallium or Episcopal Robe to the Emperor Gregory the Great in the Case of
necessary to the Emperors for upholding their Power in the midst of the Invasions of the Barbarous Nations the Emperors were willing to enlarge their Authority to make use of it for the management of their own Affairs And after that the Divisions of the Roman Empire were setled in so many Sovereign Princes that Church-Authority which they themselves had now lost in those several Kingdoms they were not unwilling to bestow upon the Chief Bishop of their City and so by small advances he came at last to get the Title of Occumenical Bishop and Vniversal Head of the Church of Christ upon Earth But yet still did the Emperors retain their Power of the setting up of every new Bishop of Rome The Emperors m This is thus well expressed by John Wex de Antichristo p. 119. And so the Ten Kings delivered to the Beast their Kingdoms which they had got at the dissolution of the Western Empire according to Apoc. 17. 12. For after that the Western Empire was broken in pieces all the Kingdoms of the West did join again together in one body that by the bonds and tye of the Babylonish Superstition of the Bishop of Rome they might fight against the Lamb. Consent was still held necessary for the confirmation of the Election as the Chief Power upon Earth that gave him his Authority And upon this account he was set up as the Emperor's Deputy and Creature to be the Universal Head of the Roman Church in all the divided Kingdoms of the Roman Empire which now would own no other Secular Head of the Churches in them but those Sovereigns which ruled them And thus came the divided Roman Empire to be n one entire thing again and the several Kings in it to own one Roman Head again set up by the Imperial Authority Things continued not long in this mere spiritual and Ecclesiastical State The new Ecclesiastical Head used all ways to make himself universally acknowledged for such And to that end as Head of the Church he assumes a power of executing the Canons of Councils upon Sovereign Princes to the depriving them of their Kingdoms if they refused to execute the Orders of the Church upon all those that were disobedient to it and that even to the punishment of death From hence then we have a perfect Idea of the worship of the Beast and of his Image from the first Rise of the last Ruling Head or of the Imperial Power restored by Justinian The Imperial Authority was at first the sole Head of the Roman Catholick Church Afterwards the Submission of the divided States of the Empire to one Ecclesiastical Sovereign who was set up by the Emperor made this new Empire the exact Image of the first in respect of the Church-Government of it And the Manager and Contriver of this new Model is in History the Bishop of Rome and is in the Prophecy called the False Prophet CHAP. V. Rev. XIII Four Grounds for the applying of the Worship of the Beast to the Imperial Power How the False Prophet does Exercise all the Power of the First Beast causes all the World to Worship him makes them make an Image to him Gives Life to that Image and makes All receive its Mark c. BY the Observations in the preceding Discourse it is easie to see How justly the Worship of the Beast may be applied to the Imperial Authority after the degeneracy of the Christian Religion 1. For the Imperial Authority as has been observed p. 221. was 〈…〉 a long while the only commanding Head of the Roman Religion and the a SOcrates Proam in l. 5. We have therefore in the whole course of out History given an account of the Emperor's interest in it because that since they began to embrace the Christian Religion Ecclesiastical Affairs did seem very much to depend upon them so that the most eminent Councils were in times past and are at this day summoned by their consent and procurement See Notes on the third Chapter b c d e f g i k The Emperours had always the Right of Investing Church-Governours in their several jurisdictions till the Council of Worms in the year 1122. And then the Emperour Henry the 3d. wearied with the vexations occasioned him by the Popes gave up his Right of the Staff and the Ring the Ceremonies of the investiture to Pope Calixtus the 2d Aventin Histor Boior l. 6. The Abbot of Ursperg in his Chronicle gives the form of this Concordat betwixt the Emperour and the Pope And the Pope in return agrees for the future That the Elections of the Bishops and Abbots c. should be performed in his presence c. And that He that was Elected should receive the Regalia of the Emperour by the Scepter And this was called the Uniting of the Royal Power with the Priesthood and long endeavoured after under that Name Cardinal Cusan Concordia Catholic c. 6 7 8 9. Affirms That every Emperour and Prince in their several Jurisdictions are of God alone and that it belongs to the Emperours to summon General Councils and to regulate the Procedures in them and to every Prince to do the same in his respective Territory for National and Provincial Councils And that if the Pope be negligent in these things the Emperour ought to make use of his Authority in all such Cases That the Emperour always presided in the Councils assisted with fifteen or twenty of the Nobles of his Court whom he made to take place before all And He and his Legats propounded the matters that were to be considered Pererius in Apoc. Disp 5. de Constantino Then came the Imperial Majesty first into the Church which was then Armed with both the Swords c. For though from the first The Church had that Sword viz. the Secular Sword yet then first began the facility and conveniency of exercising it against whomsoever it pleased only Soveraign Authority upon Earth that was acknowledged in all Ecclesiastical Affairs so that all obedience given to the erroneous Acts of those Councels was really an obedience to the Emperors will only For those things had no obliging power in them to overrule the Conscience upon the account of the Councels Authority And therefore since it had been long before that time received as a maxime by those who owned that Councel That all was there done by the b Socrates l. 1. c. 6. Ep. 4. Constantine unto the Churches He there tells them That whatsoever is decreed in the Holy Councils of Bishops is to be attributed to the Will of God And of the Sentence of the Council of Nice in particular Ibid. Ep. 2. to the Church of Alexandria For that which has been agreed upon by the 300 Bishops is to be taken for nothing but the determination of God himself The Holy Ghost residing in the minds of such worthy persons and inspiring them with the Divine Will of God himself Concil Constantinop Universal 6. Action 17. sub finem The
for the precedence of the Cities to which they did belong And Baronius himself does openly acknowledg this An. 39. 10. The Ancients says he observed no other Rule in instituting the Ecclesiastical Sees than the division of Provinces And the Prerogatives before established by the Romans But the Authority of the Councel of Chalcedon in the particular Case of the Bishop of Rome is an unanswerable evidence for it was the biggest of all the first four famous General Councels which Pope Gregory did reverence as the four Gospels And this was there carried f See the contest betwixt the Pope's Legats and the Councel about this Affair Concil Chalcedon Action 16. where it was in fine determined against the Legats by the Judges and Council Bellarmin acknowledges this in his Preface to his Book de Pontifice The Greeks says he opposed this That is the Universal Supremacy of the Pope in the Council of Chalcedon in the year 451. against the will of the Bishop of Rome thô then at the greatest height that he ever had been which does manifest the sense of the Councel to be contrary to the tenure that the Pope claimed to hold by And further That this was the true aim of the Councel does appear not only from Pope Leo's Exception against this Decree but also by the opposition that there was ever after betwixt the Patriarch of Constantinople and the Bishop of Rome about the precedence till the time of Boniface who got the Title of Universal Bishop but yet not without much opposition from the Greeks upon the account of the change of the Seat of the Empire to Constantinople By this then it appears that the Imperial Power was the principal object of the Worship that was given to the Roman Church because it was given to that Church only in veneration of that Power For that for whose sake a thing is honoured is the principal object of that honour And g Platina in Bonifacio tertio He obtained of the Emperor Phocas That the Seat of St. Peter should be called and esteemed to be the Head of all Churches but yet not without great contention about it many affirming that there ought to be the nrst and chief See of the Church where the Head of the Empire was Anastasius Bibliothecarius in Bonifacio 3. He obtained of Phocas That the Apostolick See of St. Peter should be the Head of all Churches whereas the Church of Constantinople did write it self the chief of all Churches Caranza Concil Summa p. 369. Bonefacius 3. He obtained c. That the See of St. Peter should be accounted the Head of all Churches which Title the Church of Constantinople did challenge to it self evil Princes favouring it and affirming that the chief See of the Church ought to be there where the Head of the Empire was that is at Constantinople Gregor M. just before Boniface is full of the mention of the Patriarch of Constantinople's claim to the Title of Universal Bishop in his 4th 6th and 7th Book of his Epistles Boniface the Third notwithstanding all his good services to Phocas could not get the Title of Universal Bishop without much opposition from the Greeks upon the account of the change of the Seat of the Empire to Constantinople 3. The chief Head and Life of the Roman Church is the Papal Authority 'T is that which is the contriver of that Image and is also the evil spirit of it that instigates it to all the mischief that it does Now the Popes of Rome were nothing but h Edictum sive Decretal Pap. Hilarii Ep. 11. About the Year 476. when the Western Empire fell into the hands of the Barbarians and so the Pope seemed to be the sole Head of the Church of Rome It has also been decreed by the Laws of Christian Princes That whatsoever the Bishop of the Apostolick See should upon examination pronounce concerning Churches and their Governours should with reverence be received and strictly observed Dr. Barrow 's Pope's Supremacy p. 244. speaking of the Episcopal Sees before the time of Constantine so stood the Order of Church-Dignities till it was confirmed by the Council of Nice backed with Imperial Authority What before was but custom by so August a Sanction became Universal Law and with such veneration as by some was accounted immutably and everlastingly obligatory as appears in Pope Leo's Maxims This does best appear from the ground of the Supremacy of the Pope which was because they were the Bishops of the Emperor 's chief Seat And also from the Authority by which they came by it which was by the Imperial Laws by whom their Primacy was established See Not. preced And they were set up and deposed by the Emperors at pleasure and were created by them the Emperours Creatures No Election of the Bishop of Rome was valid till after the i Caranza Concil summa in Severino Ann. Dom. 634. Severinus was set up in the room of Pope Honorius by Isaacius the Emperor's Exarch or Deputy in Italy For in those days the Election of the Clergy and People was not accounted valid unless the Emperors or their Exarchs did confirm it After he had before observed in Pelagius the Second Ann. Dom. 580. That Pelagius was created Pope without the Roman Prince's Authority against the usual custom For in those days nothing was done by the Clergy in the Election of the Pope without the Emperor's Approbation But there was no conveniency at that time of sending to the Emperor at Constantinople because Rome was then besieged by the Lombards But he afterwards begged pardon for it by his Legat Gregory But in Adrian the Third he does thus more remarkably confirm this Custom This Pope Ann. Dom. 888. was so stout as in the beginning of his Pontificate to bring in this Law to the Senate and People That the Authority of the Emperor should not be waited for before the Creation of the Pope This was so commonly acknowledged that it appears that the Popes used to pay a sum of money to the Emperors for their Confirmation Canon Agath 21. Can. distinct 63. See Note 1 on Chapter the Fourth Onuphrius Panvinius gives an account of the first Rise of this Custom at Justinian's Conquest of Italy In Pelag. 2. The Goths says he being beaten out of Italy by Narses and Italy together with the City of Rome being made a part of the Eastern Empire under Justinian the Emperor by the Authority of Pope Vigilius there was a New Custom brought up in the Assemblies for the Elections of the Popes which was that upon the death of the Pope there should forthwith be an Election made by the Clergy the Senate and the People after the manner of the Right of Majors But the new elected Pope could not be consecrated or ordained before his Election was confirmed by the Emperor at Constantinople nor before he had the Emperor's Letters-Patents for his Consecration in order to enter upon the Papal Jurisdiction For
Eighth substituted in his place by the Emperor's Approbation And the Old Law that there should be no consecration of the Pope without the Emperor's Order was renewed by the Authority of the Pope and another Council and Anathema and Banishment was the punishment of the Disobedient D. 63. C. In Synodo 23. See Note l on the Thirteenth Chapter Theodor. Ã Niem says He saw the Patent from whence this was drawn preserved at Florence in testimony of the Imperial Dignity and he lived under John the XXIIId The Emperor Henry the Second upon complaint of great Disorders of the Roman Church goes in the year 1046. to Rome there deposes Gregory the Sixth and fets up Clement the Second and the Romans swear to him that they would never chuse them any Pope without his Consent And upon the meeting of a great Council there it is ordained that the New-elected Pope shall not be so accounted till the Authority of the Emperor should confirm it and that the Pope ought not to be created without his Authority Petr. Damian in lib. Gratis Platina Onuphr in Clement 2. The Council of Lateran Ann. 1055. order the Election of the Pope to be begun by the Cardinals and the rest of the Clergy and People to consent to it and adds seeing nevertheless the Honour due to our dear Son Henry who is at present held for King and to be Emperor afterwards as we have granted to him and his Successors who shall obtain this right in person of the Apostolick See In the Synod at Rome in the Year 1106. is that dreadful Charge drawn up against Gregory the Seventh or Hildebrand for aspiring to the Papacy without either the Consent of the Emperor of the Romans or the Senate or People In the Year 1107. the Emperor Henry the Third sets forth a Remonstrance against Pope Paschal the Second and concludes That although by Right and force of Arms he could retain the Ancient Custom observed of so long time by so many Holy Fathers touching the Election of the Popes and the Right of Investitures yet he should not much trouble himself about it if they would return him the Estates and Chattels which they retained by the Gifts of the Laity and would content themselves with the Title Aventin Histor Boior L. 6. And upon taking Pope Paschal Prisoner by Henry it was sworn to by the Pope That the Right of confirming or investing the new chosen Bishop should be always in the Emperor and none should dare to own them before they were invested by the Emperor's Command Sigebert says thus concerning this Affair Chron. Ann. 1111. The King or Emperor would use the Authority which the Emperors had used since the time of Charlemaigne for 300 years and more under 63 Popes 1118. Gelasius the Second succeeded Paschal the Second and was created without the knowledge of the Emperor Henry who thereupon returns from Padua to Rome and consecrates Gregory the Eighth in his place 1165. Paschal the Third was confirmed Pope by the Council of Wurtzbourg where this Remarkable Decree was made That for the future no Pope should be created but after the Ancient Fashion by the Consent of the Emperor Aventin Hist Boior L. 6. And afterwards That the Pope should be called only Nuntius Christi and not to be the Rival of the Imperial Power And an oath was thereupon taken by all there present The Universities of Oxford and Paris agree about the Year 1404. that the Emperor has right of Patronage to the Pope and to the Roman Church That the Election of the Pope does not appertain of divine Right to the Cardinals but to the People and the Confirmation of him to the Emperor Epist Universit Paris Editae A. Hutten Ann. 1520. Emperor's confirmation of him and was the Imperial Authority that did many times call them k Nothing is more common in the History of the Church than the summonings and depositions of Popes by the Emperors to an account for their irregular actions and depose them The usual Titles that the Bishops of Rome gave their Emperors were l Guicciard Histor L. 4. In this time of the Exarchat that is after Justinian's recovery of Italy the Bishops of Rome had no Civil Power passing their lives under the subjection of the Emperors without the Authority of whom or of their Exarchs they durst not receive or exercise the Pontifical And therefore their Addresses to the Emperors must be proportionably submissive as follows 601. Gregory the Great who by the Romanists is made the Example of a Good Pope in his Second Book Ep. 62. 65. to the Emperor Mauritius hath these Expressions He is guilty before the Almighty who in all that he says or does is not clear towards His Most Serene Lords and I the Unworthy Servant of Your Piety If c. And I when I speak thus to My Lords what am I but dust and a Worm of the Earth c. Power is given My Lords from Heaven over all men I have committed will Christ say my Priests or Bishops into thy hands And l. 2. Ep. 64. my tongue cannot express the favour that I have received of the Almighty and of the most Serene Emperor My Lord. And Ep. 52. I have sent him to the Feet of My Lords And yet Gregory speaks boldly enough to him when he reproves him as his Confessor L. 2. Ep. 64. And L. 6. Ep. 11. to Anastasius Bishop of Antioch All that are advanced into Holy Orders ought always to give thanks for it to Almighty God and always pray to God for the Life of our most Pious and most Christian Lord the Emperor Pope Agatho Concil 6. Act. 2. and 4. tells the Emperor That he gave ready obedience to the things that were commanded him by the Sacred Letters Patents of his most Clement Fortitude And that again To do his due obedience to the Emperor in making the Bishops of those parts Address themselves to the Most Pious Feet of his Goodness calls Rome the Servant City of his most Serene Empire often uses according to your most Pious Command And we beseech you upon the bended knees of our Soul 800. Ado Viennensis in Chronic. An. 798. Aimoin l. 4. c. 90. Refute the Coronation of Charlemaigne by Pope Leo. And that after the Acclamations of the People He was adored by the Pope after the manner of the former Emperors And Salvian in Epistolam ad Parentes Explains what is meant by the manner of the Ancient Emperors He says That As Servants they kissed the feet of their Masters An. 854. Pope Leo the 4th writes to the Emperour Lotharius That he observed His and his Predecessors Commands and should always observe them Dis 10. c. 9. An. 1158. Pope Adrian the 4th Together with all the Cardinals and Clergy send to the Emperour Frcderick and acknowledg him Lord and Emperour of the City and of the World Urbis Orbis Raderius de Gestis Frederici l. 1. c. 22. Paulus
Ordain That all usurped jurisdiction of any Bishops over another's Province shall be ipso facto void And that lest the fear of any Mans power should creep in under a shew of an Holy Function and so we should lose that Liberty insensibly and unawares which our Lord Jesus Christ did purchase with his own Blood the Ephesine Council not long after the time of Theodosius had made an excellent provision against any incroachment of any one part of the Christian Church over the rest so that though there might be some irregular exercise of the Imperial Authority yet whenever any considerable Diocese should have stood up for their Liberty though against the Roman Church they had a right to plead for it from that Council In this estate did things continue till the fall of the Western Empire and then the Arrian Goths being the Masters of Rome and the West there was a composition betwixt them and the Eastern Emperors for a f It appears from Cassiodor Variar L. 10. Ep. 26. That the Gothish Kings did not press any in Italy to their way Theodate to Justinian says there Since the Deity suffers many Religions to be we dare not enjoyn one alone to be followed For we remember it is said That Men must sacrifice willingly to the Lord not at the command of any one to force them to it With good reason therefore does your Piety invite us to that which the Commands of God do require And in the time of Justin before Thedoric forced him to leave off persecuting the Arrians in the East And Zeno and Anastasius before Justin are represented as Lovers of Peace and Union rather than a strict Conformity of which Zeno's Henoticon is an example Petavius says of the Emperour Anastasius That he gave every Man liberty to profess what Sect he pleased Rationar Temp. Part 1. l 7. c. 3. Theodoric to all the Jews lib. 2. ep 27. Gassiodor Variar We cannot says Command Religion because none is to be compelled to believe against his Will mutual Tolleration of Orthodoxy and Arrianism in their respective Jurisdictions And before that had the Emperors Zeno and Anastasius contrived a form of Faith for a Comprehension and Union and did connive at a general Liberty of Conscience But the Emperor Justin after them begins the Project of an Vniversal Conformity to the Roman Religion At the sollicitations of Pope Hormisda he makes g See Petav. Rationar Temp. Part. 1. l. 7. c. 3. Item Anastasius Bibliothecar in Hormisdâ an Union betwixt the Greek and the Latin Church which had been in a Schism against one another near forty years After that in Pope John's time sets out several Edicts against h Petav. ibidem Item Blondus de Inclinat Rom. Imp. in Occidente Pag. 37. Pope John in whose time the Emperour Justin being wholly set upon rooting out all the Heresies throughout the Eastern parts deprived all the Bishops of that Sect of their Places and put their Ministers out of their Churches And a little after not only the Eutichyan Heresy but all kind of different Parties were suppressed throughout all the East Anastasius Bibliothecar to the same purpose in Joanne 1. the Hereticks and heavily persecutes them so as even to suppress all kind of Heresie throughout the Eastern Empire But he was forced by i Anastasius Bibliothec. in Joanne 1. gives an account of Theodoric's sending Pope John in an Embassy to Justin to acquaint him That he would ruine all the Catholicks in Italy if he did not restore the Arrians in the East to their Dignities and Churches And that Justin did thereupon comply with him Theodorick king of Italy to desist and so his Design came to nothing But however there was so good a Correspondence by this means setled betwixt the Emperor and the Bishop of Rome for that common Interest that the Emperor submits to be crowned by the Pope which was the k Petav. Rationa Temp. Part 1. l. 7. c. 3. The Emperour received the Pope with all honour and was the first that received the Imperial Crown at the Popes Hands Anastas Bibliothec. in Joanne 1. first Example of that kind and got the name of Justin l Hieron Rubeus Histor Ravennat pag. 141. Item Anastas Bibliothec. in Joanne 1. the Orthodox for his Piety to the Church This good Correspondence betwixt the Secular and Ecclesiastical Power of Rome was the only means to carry on an Vniversal Vniformity in the Roman Religion For the Imperial Authority was now confined to a very small Jurisdiction and the rest of the Empire was divided into several Kingdoms which had no other Secular Sovereign to command them but their own particular Kings There was therefore no other way of reducing them all to one Religion but by the advancement of a Spiritual Roman Authority to be the principle of Vnity amongst them whose business it should be to overawe the Conscience with the Curses of the Church for the enforcing the execution of the Imperial Penalties For as the Imperial Laws were for every thing else the standing Laws of these divided Kingdoms so the only way to make their Edicts and Sanctions of Councils about Church-matters to take place amongst them was to have them confirmed and enforced by the Authority of an Universal Head of the Church And though the Church Head seems by this to be the principal in all this Affair yet the Temporal Penalties of the Laws being the only certain means to effect an Universal Conformity and this Sovereign Head of the Church himself being also a Creature of the Imperial Power to carry on his design of Uniformity in the Roman Religion as has been observed all the Obedience that Chap. 22. is given by other Princes and their Subjects is really nothing but the Worship of the Beast or of the Imperial Religion and they give their Kingdoms to the Beast when they force their Subjects to submit to that Religion There was nothing that could make it look more like the worshipping of that Roman Authority than this Submission of the Ten Kings who were absolute in their Kingdoms and had as much right to appoint the Laws of Religion to their Subjects as the Roman Emperor had in his own Territories But by this conformity to the Romans they did seem to lay down their N. B. Crowns at the feet of that Nation and to adore them as the great Dictators and Oracles of the Will of God There is indeed not the least appearance of so general an Uniformity at the end of the Reign of the Emperor Justin who as has been observed was not able so much as to bring it about within the bounds of his own Territories But Justinian immediately after him appears in this Design like a new Blazing-star in the East whom all the World began to be afraid of One would indeed from a cursory view of his History be apt to entertain no other Idea of him than as a very eminent Conqueror
by the dissention of two Popes we ought to summon the one and the other and to determine the difference by the Advice of the Orthodox at the day of meeting declares that the right of assembling them did belong unto him For so says he did Constantine Theodosius Justinian Charlemaigne Radevicus l. 2. Ã cap. 52. ad c. 65. Grotius Respons de Antichristo Gregory the Great acknowledges the Emperor to be His Lord and obeys his Edicts And the Imperial Power was very magnificently exercised upon the Popes themselves by the Otho's And Rome had its Magistrates set over it that were sworn to the Emperor Onuph Panvin l. de Fastis pag. 61. From the time of Justinian the Power of the Consuls ceased at Rome And it was governed by the Emperor's Exarchs and by a particular Duke over the City of Rome Hieron Rubeus Histo Ravennat Anno 590. Alberic de Rofat a Famous Lawyer shows in verbo Roma that Rome was under the Emperor's disposal to the time of Innocent the Second and that the Popes acknowledged the Emperors their Lords by the Bishops of Rome Their ordinary Style was Our Lords the Emperors and themselves their meanest Servants They got indeed not long after the Title of Vniversal Bishop over all the whole Church but it was then known to be got hh See Note m on Chap. 4. and the Note g ibidem Ludovic Bebenburg de jurib Reg. Imp. Rom. Edit Heidelbergi pag. 46. The Greeks a long while before the Translation of the Empire to Charlemaigne were departed from the obedience of the Roman Church setting up the Church of Constantinople for their Head And because that Church did write it self the first of all Churches Phocas the Emperor at the request of Boniface the Third decreed that the Church of Rome should be the Head of all Churches by the Emperor's Allowance and Protection in it And the very opening the Pantheon for the worship of the Saints was wholly ii Anastas Bibliothec. in Bonifacio Quarto At the same time he begg'd of the Emperor Phocas the Temple called Pantheon which he made the Church of the Blessed Virgin and all the Martyrs by the Emperor's Grant and Favour But notwithstanding this Grant we see kk See Note b c e x on this Chapter the Imperial Jurisdiction over the Councils still continuing ll See the Sixth General Council in Note b on this Chapter The Sixth General Synod is acknowledged in the Acts of it to be called by the Emperor Constantine to be wholly managed either by himself or such as he deputed in his absence to be confirmed by him and to be made an Imperial Law by his Edict for the observance of it Concil Univers 6. Action 18. Therein also do we find Pope Honorius anathematized for an Heretick But Justinian's Fifth Council with all the Extravagancies of it though called managed and enforced by the Emperor 's sole Power against the will of Pope Vigilius is there made a perpetual Concil 6. in Trullo Action 18. Edit Constantin Rule for the Church and of equal Authority with the first four famous Councils which Gregory the Great did reverence like the four Gospels and Justinian's Faith there celebrated by Pope Agatho as a great Pattern Thus did things continue till that famous Breach betwixt the East and the West about the Point of Image-worship and yet at that time did Gregory the Second who rebelled against the Emperor Leo Isaurus call him the King and Head of the Christians And long after that did the mm See Notes i l xx on this Chapter Platina in Pelag. 2. Pelagius having been elected by the Clergy and People without staying for the Emperor's leave because the Lombards did then besiege the City sent Gregory his Deacon to excuse it to the Emperor at Constantinople Because says Platina the Election of the Clergy signified nothing in those days without the approbation of the Emperor Blondus Decad. 1. l. 9. de Severino 1. Honorio Then was that Custom observed that he that was chosen Bishop of Rome was not crowned till the Exarch came from Ravenna to confirm him D. 63. c. Hadrianus 22. Sigonius de Reg. Ital. l. 4. By the Consent of all the Great Men of Rome there assembled it was agreed that Charlemaigne should have the power of electing the Pope and of ordering the Roman Church D. 63. c. in Synodo 23. Pope Leo the Eighth Anno 963. in a Synod at Rome consents to that Canon That none shall be elected Pope but by the Emperor's leave The Title of the Canon in Gratian is The Election of the Bishop of Rome belongs of right to the Emperor And also two years before at his reception at Rome Ann. 961. the Romans swear Fealty to him and that they would never elect a Pope without his leave nor ordain him without the Consent and Election of the Emperor Otho and the King his Son Luitprand l. 6. c. 6. Aventin l. 5. Annal. Boiar Till his time Gregory the 7th the Popes used to be chosen by the Clergy Nobility People and Senate and above all came in the Emperor's Authority to confirm it The Council of Worms says the same of Gregory Sigonius de Reg. Ital. lib. 9. The Diet of Ratisbonne 1322. published a long Decree against Pope John XXII and amongst other things declare against the Pope's Election without the Emperor Aventin l. 7. Popes not only continue to be confirmed by the Emperors but also to be chosen by them But since it was necessary for this universal conformity to the Roman Worship to be managed by a Church-Head after the division of the Empire into so many absolute Civil Sovereigns there can be no dispute in this case about the Imperial share in the worship of the Beast though the Papal Power should afterwards appear to be the almost only active thing in this Affair For it must necessarily be so to fulfil that which is said of the False-prophet that he did exercise all the power of the first Beast and caused the World to worship that Beast and made men make an Image to it which they must worship under pain of death For the power of the Roman Church under the Pope does exactly answer these things and this being all done in honour of the Imperial Command of the City of Rome makes it still the worship of the Imperial Power CHAP. VIII Rev. XIII The first date of the Idolatry of the Roman Church very early The worshipping of Images or Saints in honour of the True God Idolatry shown from Hosea 4. 15. and chap. 8. 13. compar'd with chap. 13. 2. So also chap. 8. 5. Idolatry begun in Justinian 's days proved from the Second Council of Nice The 82 d Canon of the Synod in Trullo From the Zeal of Serenus From the 26. c. Episc Clero Saint-worship in use before St. Augustin 's days and unquestionably in his time shown from the Accusation of