the 1000 years are finish'd and those 1000 years begin not till Christs coming and his destroying the man of sin but how that will be proved that after Christ is revealed from heaven and the new Jerusalem planted in the earth such an enemy shall arise I cannot see for besides the improbability it is flat contrary to the text which saith the first heaven and earth were put away before the descending of the Jerusalem and Gog and Magog are destroyed by fire from heaven before the old heaven and earth pass away Rev. 20.10 11. therefore Gog and Magog are not in being after the new Jerusalem this is my 1st ground Obj. But it is said that the beast and the false prophet were cast into the lake before Gog and Magog come up upon the stage therefore Gog and Magog cannot be the same enemy with the beast and false prophet Ans They are not formally the same but materially they are as the old and new commandment are the same materially though they differ fromally or as the Dragon Rev. 12.3 and the beast Rev. 3.2 to whom the Dragon gave up were materially the same for the Dragon was a Roman and so was the beast therefore it was but the shifting of a form in like manner inter preters hold the first and the 2d beast to be the same materially only formally distinguishing this therefore I take to be the resolution of this doubt that during the 42 months all things are managed in the name of the beast though as I have hinted from the year 1300. the devil was loosed in him and acted as a Dragon but he puts not on the name of Gog and Magog till those 42 mouths are expired which was in and about the year 1650. and from thence begins Daniels last 45 years which are the times of Gog and Magog properly which Gog and Magog are the remnant of the same Roman Antichrist that was before but acting now in another rage and spirit and in the very name of the Dragon And to confirm this let it be considered that the casting of the beast and the false prophet into the lake was rather a damming of their places their politique and publick capacity and interest then a destroying of their persons and power physical or a judging of them under that form of Antichristian abomination leaving them enemies still in being as men that which makes for this is that they are said to be cast alive into the lake and the remnant of their party to be slain not with the material sword but with the sword of him that fate on the white horse which sword proceedeth out of his mouth to be short then the heathen Dragon the Antichristian beast and false prophet and the devil loosed with his Gog and Magog are the same 4th beast described by Daniel the same Roman Monarchy putting on several forms for several scenes works to be done by them for the tryall of the Saints and though the glory of the Roman Antichrist be ecclipsed and his name not used in this last scene of Gog and Magog which makes him fry in the lake as in his own grease for this shameful foil yet he shall be alive till Christ's coming from heaven who will then make void his place litterally as it was spiritually by the light of truth and conviction in the hearts of men made void before during which interim from his dejection into this lake of vexation and disappointment untill Christs glorious appearing the Dragon who joyned forces with him against him that sate on the white horse before his fatal discomfiture shall take up the bucklers and by himself manage the warr against Christ till he descends from heaven with his mighty Angels in flaming fire and consumes him and his forces disables him as he did the beast before him and cast him even the Dragon also into the same lake of torment wrath vexation enmity and disappointment of these notions I say as of the former Hypothesis if they can be made good they will do the businesse My second ground is this Antichrist the beast the man of sin the false Church the whore of Babylon receive only a mistical judgment and destruction before Christs appearing from heaven then and not till then will be the manifest abolition and destruction of these enemies they will live and breathe though under judgment till that moment that Christ may have the glory of destorying them and that they may fell the terror of his hand in their destruction else what means that of the Apostle that Christ shall destroy the man of sin with the brightness of his coming therefore 't is that at the last Vyal of all we reade of great Babilons coming up in remembrance before God which shews that whatever interpreters invent of another Babilon at Constantinople to salve it the 5th Vyal poured on the throne of the beast did not dispatch Babilon and that the 18th chap. of the Rev. hath only a mistical fulfilling till Christ comes from heaven It will be objected that the papacy must be destroyed before the Jews be converted their Idolatries being a great let to the Jews receiving the Gospel I answer that this is a conjecture no where that I know determined in Scripture I grant that the Idolatries of Rome and the superstitions of those that come too near the Papists may well be look't upon as a great hinderance to the Jews embracing the Gospel but that God cannot carry them over this block I fear to affirm Nay 2ly I do expect the Jews return into their own land before they embrace the Christian faith and that their first stirring and restoring will be as truly while they are in their blood as their first planting was but after that when they are setled the Lord promises to pour clean water upon them and for ought appears to me God may make use of the Eastern Gog and Magog whom he will bring against them for an awakning of them to himself and will be sanctifyed in their eyes by his appearing for them against that enemy which deliverance he will likewise sanctify unto them for the turning their hearts back again unto him and the receiving of him whom he sent unto their fathers and now sends again to be their deliverers from this last enemy My third ground is the Analogy between the course of the ancient Church and people of God the Jews and us gentiles for they are our types as the Apostle saith 1 Cor. 10. Now there is not the least colour or footsteep for the expectation of any the least disturbance of the new Jerusalem state by Gog or Magog or any other enemy yet Ezekiel and other of the prophets prophecy of this new Ierusalem and this is a certain truth that the whole System and body of prophecy was made up in the times of the old testament and therefore it is said the prophets prophecyed until Iohn the new Testament being called the fulness of times for this cause because it is the time not of giving forth new prophecies but of fulfilling the old And therefore the book of
themselves of the great works of God to come have constantly led them out of the way so that they have not known those works when they have been before them mistaking both the Quid and the Quando both what and when they were which were the 2 grand enquiries of the prophets as might be instanced in all the great works of God recorded in Scripture would Israel in Egypt else have been so deaf to Moses message when he came to deliver them would the Jews have been so surprised with their return out of Babylon that they were like them that dreamed would they also have overlook't the coming of Elias and Christ himself had not their minds been prepossest with other figures and representations of these things like as Naaman the Sirian that thought the prophet would have come forth unto him and have stroaked the Leper and have called upon his God when his way was none of all these The misteries of Christs kingdome are spirituall things and must be compared with spiritual the testimony of Jesus is the spirit of prophecy the way of God towards particular believers is a little but true model and abstract of those greater ways of his providence and administration towards the Church for they are both cast into the same mould Taking my measure hence from the spiritual analogy I define and determine the general nature and import of this last enemy Gog and Magog that as the new birth of a soul is not without it's pangs and dangers his course and progress through a wilderness of temptations his issue and conquest ordinarily with a sharp conflict either at or before death so the Church in like manner at her first coming forth is watch't by the dragon exercised all along in the wildernesse by the beast and false prophet and at last when none of these wiles can prevail but that she gets ground every day and is ready to be crown'd with an absolute victory and rest then the devil being loosed rages and foams as he did in the Gospel when Christ came to eject him out of his long usurped possession To discourse these things at large is what I have neither time nor patience now to do only as to the last 2 or 3 brief hints in evidence that such a dispensation is common and we are taught to expect it 1st From the great law and pattern our Lord Jesus Christ who as he was sought to be destroyed as soon as born and was all his life time a man of sorrows and temptations so last of all had the sharpest tryal by an hour and power of darkness and the Apostle acquaints us that whomsoever God foreknew be predestinated to be conformed to the image of his son and therefore 2ly The Authour to the Hebrews in strengthning believers to sufferings tells them ye have not yet resisted unto blood as much as to say they must look for that first or last a fiery tryal as Peter calls it conform and agreeable whereunto In the 3d place hath been the experience of the Saints all along as if they were all ask't one by one ho they get to heaven or to assurance in this life they would all tell you with one mouth that besides their ordinary and familiar exercises with which they lived and were brought up they had at last the greatest shock and most signal tryal which was as the parting blow And as Gog and Magog are the last so that they are no new or strange enemy but an old enemy known to the Church too well we have the Lord himself asserting Ezek 38.17 Thus saith the Lord thou art he of whom I have spoken in old time by my servants the prophets of Israel this is plain also in the book of the Revelations the devil that was loosed is the same that was bound viz. the Dragon with 7 heads and ten horns he changed his form and carryed on his design by other methods during his bynding but the same enemy all along and when at last he resumes his 1st shape of a dragon he carries on his work by the same hands of the beasts worshipers all that are lest him for the beast and his worshipers were these he entred into at his bynding these he is in a confederacy with from his loosing as we have exprest at the 6th Vyal by attending this character we shall finde it is the Roman Antichrist from first to last for as the beast that makes warr upon the witnesses is said to ascend out of the bottemlesse pit Rev. 11. so also the Dragon after the thousand years of his consynement is said to ascend upon the surface or bredth of the earth Rev. 20.9 For so the word translated they went up is in the greek they ascended correspondent whereunto is their judgment fire descended from God and fell on them so that by this character the beast that slays the witnesses and the Devil loosed are the same enemy though this of Gog and Magog be not the same action for this is after the slaying of the witnesses Also by this character the loosing of Satan should bear date from the 5th trumpet the first of the wo trumpets during the first 4 trumpets there was no such wo pronounced the Church had her thousand years of a mistical reign but under the 5th trumpet we first read of the bottomles pit opened and although this be by inter preters applyed to the issuing forth of the Saracens about the year of Christ 600 yet I conceive it will be found otherwise and that this opening of the bottomlesse pit was not till about the year 1300 when the devil was let loose after the 1000 years from Constantine of his binding of which more hereafter if this hypothesis can be made out as I trust it shall it will dissolve many knots in the Revelations In order whereunto I premise and lay as a fonndation that the man of sin is the last enemy the Church is to be exercised with until Christs coming and that is clearly intimated by the Apostles 2 Thes. 2. where speaking to this argument the times of the day of Christ he shews it is not to be till Antichrist hath run his course That may be you will say yet it follows not but another enemy may succeed but the Apostle cuts off all pretence to that by saying that this man of sin is to be destroyed by the brighnesse of Christs coming as much as to say he is to last unto Christs coming though he will be much wasted before by the spirit of Christs mouth in the ministry of his servants and witnesses yet so much of him will remain as to give Christ the oppurtunity of the last and dispatching blow at him whence I conclude either this man of sin takes in Gog and Magog or else Christ should concern himself with a lesser enemy and leave the greater untoucht which were not for his honour I know what will be said that Gog and Magog come not up till after
Revelations is but a collection of the old prophecies as to the subject matter thereof but which was that which none of the prophets could do there is made an orderly digestion distribution and applycation of them in the order of times to be fulfilled and all the scenes that concern us Gentiles are with allusion to the like that have been or are to be fulfilled among the Jews and are delivered to us in the language of those types as might be instanced throughout the whole book of the Revela from one to the other now we finde in the prophets no Gog and Magog prophecyed of to infest the new Jerusalem but before it commences we have a prophecy thereof at large by Ezekiel which is an argument I know not how any can get over therefore either the new Jerusalem is not the same state which the 1000 years or Gog and Magog must precede the 1000. years raign which is contrary to the text or else the Gentiles new Jerusalem state must be cast in another mould quite then the Jews is I say one of these 3 must follow if we have a Gog and Magog to disturb us after it when the Jews shall have none but only before theirs and so God must vary his rule and way and his oeconomy and dispensation to one part of his own family must be on this wise and to another on that wise in this particular which is alike in all others which without better grounds to suppose it I cannot admit My 4th ground is that by this Hypothesis there is a fairer account given of the 2 beasts Rev. 13. and of their distinction then the ordinary exposition doth afford if we take the time of the 2d beast for the times of Satan loosed when the beast that was so plausible and taking before changes his shape form and puts on a dragon-like rage and cruelty I know this will seem very absurd to suggest because of the hornes of the lamb that are seen on this 2d beast what more unlike a dragon then a lamb but let it be considered withall that this 2d beast spake like a Dragon so that there is something of a Dragon and a great matter too the mouth of the Dragon is as bad a part as any for with that he sâ—…s fire as we commonly say and poisons with his breath But 2ly Let us consider this 2d beast is not only 2d in way of numeration but in the order of his rising springing up after the other which though not so plainly exprest by John in the Revel but only couch't in those general intimations of the other beast and the first beast before him yet is expresly noted by Daniel Dan. 7.24 Another shall rise after them i.e. after the 10. horns and he shall be divers from the first and he shall subdue 3 kings and into the hands of this horn it is that times and laws shall be given untill a time and times and the dividing of time which time times and dividing of time cannot be the whole 42 months of the beast or the 1260. days of the witnesses fackcloth-prophecy as they are commonly expounded for that this beast rises after the 10 horns not with them nor presently after them it is to be supposed for that would be as good as with them but many hundreds of years after them and let it be observed that this phrase and reckoning is but once mentioned in the Revelation and that is chap. 12. and then 't is applyed not to the beast but to the serpent or dragon which is all one and that not to his times before his casting down out of heaven nor to his times while he was shut up in the pit but as I suppose to his last times of loosing again Rev. 12.14 for I take this 12th chap. for a compendium or abstract of the Dragons story from his dethroning by Constantine to his last treading of Gog and Magog where we finde a 2 fold fight of the woman The first v. 6. making an opportunity for Antichrists rasing or rather giving way to him at his coming forth The second v. 14. Upon the devils loosing for this double slight is paralel'd and answer'd with a double scene of trouble from the Dragon the one presently upon the birth of the manchild who had got into the throne in heaven being caught up thither the Dragon and his Angels sought to have destroyed this interest but prevailed not The 2d is after a 1000 years when this manchild had so long carried heaven away from the Dragon and that the beast and his followers to whom the Dragon resigned were discovered now by the dawning of reformation which then began about the year 1300 to be but an earthly crew the Dragon bethinks himself what use to employ them to and finds they were apt and sit to make instruments of outward trouble and persecution against the heavenly ones and so he employs them that way for the first warr was in heaven but this latter on the earth the first warr was managed by the Dragon and his Angels learned men and religious men for it is said that the Dragons tail drew the 3d part of the starts from heaven and did cast them to the earth i.e. he made them of his party for an earthly interest which yet they coloured with the name of heaven and with pretended miracles and jugling tricks sought to cozen the world and to put the cheat of a false and adulterated Christianity upon them wherein he prevailed upon the inhabitants of the earth all whose names were not written in the lambs book of life but the woman and her heavenly off-spring hold out against the Dragon Michael and his Angels got the day and the Dragons place was fonud no more in heaven then comes on the 2d war after the 1000 years wherein the dragon betakes himself to outward force then the woman flees the 2d time into the wilderness from this 2d state of the beast and his warr and under this assault she is helped by the earth which availed nothing to her help in the former warr but here the earth opened her mouth and swallowed up the flood as we shall shew hereafter how kingdoms engaged and stood up for the witnesses bearing off much of the shock of warr and persecution from them untill at last the Dragon siugles out the remnant of the womans seed and goes forth with great rage to make warr with them and to swallow them up v. last of the 12th which I take to be his last attempt and properly to referr to Gog and Magog wherein as in all his former he shall fail and shall make least of all of it as shall be shewed in it's place This is my Scheme of this chapter and to confirm this observe that in this last warr to give light to us that