Though there were some ruffinly Captains that would have had him cut off Ambroses head no saith he let him alone he does it out of love to God and my soul Therefore with many teares and much dejection of soul he sanctifiâ—d God in his heart and was afterwards received againe into the Church not onely to the great comfort of the Church where he lived but of all others that were under his Government and he never lost the honour of his Government No man ever lost by submitting to the Authority of Christ we may trust the Lord for that Authority is more worth then our haires and yet he numbers our haires and all the comforts of the world are not answerable to it trust him with it as he that is faithfull and he will certainly provide that nothing shall be lost commit your souls to him as to a faithful Creator and the Lord finding his name sanctified in it before the people he will certainly sanctifie us and our names before them as we sanctifie his Let us yeild up our selves to the service of his Kingdome when men have been contrary minded the Lord hath pursued them with fearful judgements You know the case of Nadab and Abihu Lev. 10. 1. They came before God with strange fire and the Lord makes a strange worke and consumes them with fire Annanias and Saphira that dealt deceitfully with the Church some part they delivered but kept back part of their substance what followed upon that The Lord struck them dead you will say those were in those dayes in which God was neere to his Church Beleive it the Lord is as neere to his Church now though not in miracles as then there needs not miracles now The Lord will confirme his Truth Rev. 2. 23. All the Churches shall know that I am he which searcheth the reignes and hearts and I will give to every one of you according to your workes As men deal subtilly he will deal subtilly with the faithful with plain hearted with conscionable men he will deal faithfully and all the Churches shall know it the Lord will not have his judicature in his Church bafled down with partiall and Annanias his confession The Lord will set his face against those men and cut them off from the land of the living that shall dis-regard his throne and Crown And therefore it behooves all men whom it may at any time concern to sanctifie his name My sonne give glory to God and tell me what thou hast done Josh 7. 19. And he ingenously tells him from first to last which no body ever could tell but saith hee I saw among the spoiles a goodly Babilonish Garment and two hundred sheckels of Silver and a wedge of Gold of fifty sheckels weight then I coveted them and took them well saith he thou hast troubled Israel and the Lord shall trouble thee but yet this acknowledgement was the valley of Achor for a door of hope Hos 2. 15. for their prosperity and victory over all their enemies So that if all Nations and Languages be thus ready to submit to the inventions of men how justly doth the Lord challenge due subjection to his will to sanctifie him in our hearts to throw down our Crowns if we have them at his feet and glad we may do so It is evident Rev. 4. 10. that all the Church the four Officers and 24. Elders they all cast their Crowns down before him Though they all did weare Crowns all had Authority yet they cast them all down at his feet when they came before him that sate upon the throne and before the Lambe There they stooped In the presence of Christ they threw down their Soveraignty and let the name of Christ be magnified and his Ordinances have free passage but for them let their honour fall down Lastly let it learn us thus much to take to heart in these dayes the estate of our Ancestors and Fathers of old in those dayes For if every Kindred have worshipped the Beast then thy Kindred have done it or Ancestors We speak not in dederision of them but they have all done it the body of them though here and there some may be left out and all their power they have given to the Beast to rule Families Churches and Common-wealths and all our Kindred and especially our Tongues have done it not onely those that speak Dutch and Spanish but we have been more devoted then any Christian Nations in giving such vast revenues and Monasteries and so large devotion to the man of sinne none have been so devout as English It is incredible to tell the great payments they made to the Pope it is not to be numbred And if all Tongues have submitted to the Beast then they that speak English as well as those that speak Scottish or Welsh or Brittish the body of all Kindreds if not to this day It must therefore humble us in regard of this their sinne which will be set upon our score unlesse the Lord humble us for it the contagion of their sinn reaches to us and his jealousie will cut off root branch Gods jealousie is kindled by Images and superstitions I will visit the iniquities of their Fathers upon their children men may suffer much for their Ancestors and for their Kindred Tongues and Nation And therefore it behoovs us all to be humbled for the sinne of our Ancestors and they hoped to be saved by the intercession of Saints c. This provokes the jealousie of God Therefore if we would not have our teeth set an edge by these sour Grapes it behooves us to be humbled that the intaile of Gods curse may be cut off from us though it lay heavy upon them that went before us Rev. 13. 8. And all that dwell on earth shall worship him whose names are not written in the booke of life of the Lamb c. YOu have heard that upon the recovery and healing of the wounded head of the Catholick Church sundry effects followed the Dragon gave unto the Beast a four fold power Power to speak great things power to continue and to be active 42. moneths power to make warre with the Saints and to overcome them Power of soveraignty and Authority over all Kindreds Tongues and Nations and that even to worship that all that dwell on the Earth shall worship him believing as the Church believes and neither more nor lesse submitting themselves in conscience to all their decrees and expecting their salvation in the fellowship of that Church which is divine worship peculiar onely to the Lord Jesus In the words now read you have these that worship the Beast that is that give this divine honour to the Catholick Church to believe as they believe to submit their consciences to the power of this Beast taking up all their observations for worship for Government from them not from God and looking for their salvation in reconcilement with this Church I say these men that doe thus worship
is the note The Bishop of Rome exerciseth all the Authority of the first Beast that is of the Roman visible Catholick Church he causeth all that dwell on the Earth to worship that Church he doth worke wonders even to the fetching of fire from Heaven and by his wonders procures all christian States to make an Image to the first Beast and gives such life and power to the Image of the Beast that it is able to speak and it shall cause such as do not worship it to be put to death and finally he leaves an impression or imprints a character upon all sorts of christians and will suffer none to enjoy spirituall or civill communion with them unlesse such as will receive either his marke or his name or the number of his name I put them into a doctrinall frame because they are the sum of the words of the Text. Let me breifly open them all First He doth exercise all the Authority of the first Beast Let all that are acquainted either with the writings of the Romanists or of our Divines that bear witnesse against Rome be testimonies in this case what is there that the Catholick Church claimes but the Pope can do it all There are six or seven trascendant â—cts of power which that Church claymes and the Pope familiarly exerciseth them all 1. The Pope hath power to convent generall Councels or if the Emperours will call a general Councel it shall not stand in â—oâ—ce unlesse the Catholick Church and the Bishops meet in a representative Synod it concludes with their determination this he pleads for to this day it belongs not to the Emperors nor to Christian Princes but to the Bishop of Rome It is one of Bellarmines affirmations that one Church shall have power to call all Churches be it to Florence or Basseil thether they must go whether he will 2. As the Catholick Roman Church did usurpe power to make Laws and Canons to binde all Churches So the Pope doth challenge the same power to make Laws to binde all Churches he pleads for it and will not be content without it 3. Look as the Catholick visible Roman Church doth claime Authority of ratifying Scriptures if they put in the Apocrypha it shall be good Scripture and if the Church do not approve the Gospel of Matthew in Greek but in Hebrew it shall be that or if they refuse both them and take the vulgar Latine that shall stand This power the Catholick Church challengeth power to do and the same doth the Pope 4. If the Roman Catholick visible Church challenge a power of interpreting Scripture and judging of controversies with infalibility of judgement The Pope challengeth that to himselfe when he interprets Scripture or decides controversies about Religion he cannot erre and so they make account he is a fit Judge therein 5. Look as you see the Roman Catholick visible Church had power of binding and loosing challengeth all applealâ— and great things they will do by that priveledge excommunicate some of many Churches that are absent some they excommunicate for seven years some to their death that the shall not be reconciled All this the Pope challengeth in a larger measure then the old Roman visible Church did challenge This the Roman Bishop challengeth to binde conscience to loose oathes and covenants between Prince and people between man and wife to loose vows and oaths and natural relations between parents and children if they will shrowd themselves in a Monastery and will dispence against the Apostle Paul in case of incest this is such a power to loose the bonds of Gods commandments and Gods oaths and relations to God and his servants it is such Transcendant power the Roman visible Catholick Church never challenged greater 6. The Roman visible Catholick Church never challenged so great power till it was animated and acknowledged by the Pope to take upon them to set up one King and to take down another King John in England Frederick the first and Frederick the second Henery the fourth and Henery the fifth he crowns and discrowns whom he will and this out of the plentitude of his power And lastly he doth challenge this beyond the Church it selfe Immunity and Impunity from all Civill and Ecclesiastical power and judicature The Church is above all jâ—dicial power and the Pope the head of it is above it and therefore may not be brought into order by any censure of any Church nor by the civil sword And therefore he 〈◊〉 well called one that exerciseth all the power of the first Beast and rather puts more power to it whatever the Catholick Church may do that he can do where they can dispence and make Laws where they can bind or loose c. So farre as they may go he can go and he doth all in the name and sight of the Church And he causeth all that dwell on the Earth That is carnal christians whose conversation is not in Heaven To worship the first Beast How to worship He speaks of divine worship not civil adoration This is an aberation from a Church but a beastly Church it is a monster The Church of the first institution was of one particular congregation and for all the Churches of the world to be subject to one Cathedral it is far beyond all comprehension of rule Now he causeth all that dwell on the Earth to worship that Beast Wherein are they to worship him 1. It is made a matter of necessity to salvation to be reconciled to that Church and more care is had of being reconciled to that Church then of being reconciled to God in Christ All pleas of being reconciled to Christ will not stand in their judgment unlesse you be reconciled to them 2. Except you be bound in conscience to that state he will allow you no communion he will have all the decrees of the Church as binding the conscience 3. This is divine worship you shall take no doctrine but that is of his stamp nor worship nor Government but of his acknowledgment nor no dispensation of them but according to his Canons And all that dwell on the Earth must worship him all run upon the Beast the Pope doth not so much challenge it to himselfe as to the Church and that which is given to the Church he takes to himselfe Thirdly He doth great wonders so that he makes fire come from Heaven on the Earth in the sight of men And it is said Antichrist shall come in all power of signes and lying wonders 2 Thes 2. 8 9. Their Legions are full of these wonders And in particular for this point of causing fire to come down from Heaven It is an allusion sure to the fire that the old Prophet fetched from Heaven As Eliah fetched fire from Heaven to consume the sacrifice 1 Kings 18. 38 39. And that was a fire that expressed Gods gracious acceptance that made all the people cry the Lord he is God But this the Pope did not fetch
1639. and the first and second of the yeare 1640. upon his weekly Lecture at Boston in New-England where he went over the other Chapters of the Revelation as he did this thirteenth Chapter and indeed they that were acquainted with his Preaching may easily discern his very spirit in them all along Now that the holy spirit of the Lord may breath in these holy Labours of his precious Servant so as the Reader may experience the truth of that divine sentence mentioned in the beginning The tongue of the righteous is as choise silver is the unfeigned desire of The servant for Jesus sake Thomas Allen. Norwich the 1. day of the 1. month 1654-55 AN EXPOSITION Upon the thirteenth Chapter of the REVELATION Revel 13. 1 2. And I stood upon the sand of the Sea and saw a Beast rise up out of the Sea having seven heads and tenne horns and upon his horns ten Crowns and upon his heads the name of blasphemy And the Beast which I saw was like unto a Leopard and his feete were as the feete of a Beare and his mouth as the mouth of a Lyon and the Dragon gave him his power and his seate and great authority YOU have heard from the last Chapter that when the Dragon that is the Devill as he ruled the Roman Pagan Empire was cast downe out of Heaven that is dethroned from his heavenly and Divine worship he endeavoured by all meanes to oppresse the Church that is the woman that brought forth a Christian Emperour her and her seed 1. By persecution 2. By an inundation of damnable Heresies and barbarous Nations 3. By open War which open war is exprest in the last verse of the former Chapter and here more fully described in this Chapter a whereof hath been now read The warre which is made against the Church is here described to be managed by two beasts which the Devill raised up One he calls a Beast rising up out of the Sea described from the first verse to the end of the tenth Another Beast hee beheld coming up out of the Earth from the 11 th verse to the end of the Chapter Now the former of these Beasts is described by three arguments 1. By his Originall or Fountain from whence he springs he riseth up out of the Sea which is amplified by the place of Johns beholding him I stood upon the sand of the Sea 2. He is described by his shape here is his figure and resemblance For his head he had seven heads and they amplified by honourable Ornaments or rather dishonourable indeed but honourable in the beasts view namely upon his heads the name of blasphemy 2. For his horns he had ten horns and they are set forth by their Crowns which he had on his horns He had so many horns so many Crowns upon his ten horns ten Crowns And as his shape is set forth by his head and horns so also by his resemblance or likenesse the whole shape or bulk of the Beast is like a Leopard The Leopard is of the femenine gender and signifies the female of the Panthers the she Panther spotted and ravenous famous for her speedy race and yet of a good smell by which she allures other beasts to her and as she hath occasion doth devoure them And as his resemblance for his whole shape is like a Leopard so for his feet he is like a Bear And for his mouth he hath the mouth of a Lyon This is the second argument by which he is described 3. The third argument whereby he is described is his state and that amplified by three arguments 1. By the efficient cause 2. By the variable change of it And 3ly by a wise conclusion and observation For the efficient cause of it it is said to be the Dragon he gave him his power and authority For the variable change of it it was 1. Great for it is here called Power and Seate and great Authority 2. One of his heads was wounded I saw one of his heads as it were wounded to death And thirdly this wound was healed this is the variable change of it 1. Great authority honourable seate 2. Wounded to death And thirdly healed of that deadly wound And this healing is amplified by five Effects or Consequents The first was the worlds wondering All the world wondered after the Beast The admiration was aâ— this great change so happily atchieved as they thought that he should recover that desperate danger The second effect it wrought was worship both towards himselfe And secondly to the Dragon that gave him power The third effect of this healing was liberty to blaspheme There was a mouth given him to speake great things blasphemies A fourth effâ—ct was Authority and Power to do what First To continue forty two moneths vers 5. Secondly Power to make warre with the Saints and to overcome them that was the fourth effect that followed his healing The fifth effect was amplitude or largenesse of his Dominion Power was given him over all Kindreds Tongues and Nations vers 7. And all that dwell upon the earth shall worship him vers 8. Which worshippers are described by their estrangement from the number of Gods elect whose names are not written in the book of the life of the Lamb and the Lamb set forth by the eternall efficacy of his death Slaine from the foundation of the world This is the second part of the description of the Beast The third part is a conclusion which contains a word of Caution and Consolation or a word of Attention and Consolation in the ninth and tenth verses If any man have eares to heare let him heare as if it were a matter worthy of observation and diligent attention and of exact understanding and of consolation in the tenth vers He that leadeth into captivity shall goe into captivity he that killeth with the sword must he killed with the sword c. This is the former Beast and his description The latter Beast is in the eleventh verse to the end I beheld another Beast coming up out of the earth c. He is described by his variety from the former beast For his Original he comes not as the other Beast out of the Sea but from the Earth And for his resemblance he hath two horns like a Lamb and he spake lik a Dragon 2. He is described by his power as in the twelfth verse but I will not now speak further of him Now for the meaning of the words It is that which the holy Ghost calls us diligently to attend unto He that hath cares to heare let him heare If any man have an eare to understand any apprehension of spirituall mysteries any capacity of matters of Religion let him heare what manner of beast the Devill stirred up and set against the Church to make war against the Saintâ— as if it were a matter that few would understand but such as were of spirituall understanding and who will listen duly to a diligent observation
of this description the matter whereof is weighty and challengeth all our intentions and the more because it is very rare to meet with that which will satisfie a diligent Reader in the Exposition hereof But yet so much light God casts almost into the head of every man that takes this Book in hand especially in his name and feare according to his promise Cap. 1. vers 3 that he adds some light more than hath been before brought to his hand Here you see are two Beasts what is the former Many take it to be the Roman Empire some take it to be the Roman Pagan some the Roman Christian Empire but I feare neither of them are right It is not the Roman Papan Empire that is take the Empire as it was before the conversion of Rome from Pagan to Christian in the dayes of Tyberius and other persecuting Emperours till Constantine This Beast was not the Roman Pagan Empire I will give you a double reason from the Text the first is this 1. The Pagan Empire was described as this Beast is in Rev. 12. 3. Behold a great red Dragon having seven heads aud tenn horns but with this difference The seven heads had seven Crowns upon their heads Now this Beast hath also seven heads which make it like the other but these Crowns are not upon the heads but upon the horns which maketh a great difference an evident signe it is not the Roman Pagan Empire 2. Againe it is said of this Beast that he continues 42. moneths and that is as long as the Church was in the wildernesse for the Church continues in the wildernesse as in chap. 12. 6. a thousand two hundred and three-score dayes which is just 42. moneths And so Chap. 11. 2. It is said The holy City they shall tread under foot forty two moneths all the time that the two witnesses prophecyed in sackcloath which was a thousand two hundred and threescore dayes Now it is certain the Roman Pagan Empire did not continue as long as the Church was in the wildernesse for the Church went not into the wilderness till the Pagan Empire ceased to be Pagan and was translated to Christian Now the Roman Pagan Empire was removed as by a great Earth-quake in Constantines time and changed from Pagan to Christian it cannot therefore be the Roman Pagan Empire though many judicious Divines have gone that way What then may it be the Christian Empire Many have run that way but neither is it so 1. For it is said this Dragon gave to him his power his seate and great authority now the seat of the Roman pagan Empire indeed was Rome but the Dragon did not give the Christian Emperors Rome for their Seat they would never sit there but theâ—e sate at Constantinople and prepared it to sit there and for that end Constantine named it after himselfe Constantinople and if they had occasion to come into the Western parts of Italy they would sit at Ravenna but at Rome they would not come unlesse it were Guest-wise 2. Though it be true as they say the Roman Christian Emperour had a deadly wound given him by barbarous Nations yet when it was healed the whole world did not admire him When Charles the great did heale the wound yet all the world did not wonder after him It is true France and Germany and Italy did admire him but all the Eastern parts did not submit to him no nor England nor Scotland nor Sweden nor many other parts they did not acknowledg the Western Emperour gave him neither civill nor religious worship 3. Neither doth this suffer it to be the Roman Christian Empire that it should be a note of perdition and reprobation to honour the Roman Christian Emperours for they that have lived under the Roman Christian Emperour have not hazarded their salvation by that subjection but here it is said in the eighth verse that they that honour this beast are such whose names are not written in the booke of the life of the Lambe So that for these reasons I dare not so conceive this Beast to he either Roman Pagan or Roman Christian Empire What then is it Antichrist The third sort of Interpreters run that way and I would not exclude that wholly but yet neither dare I consent to rest in it for when we open the Oracles of God we must not alwayes give the Comments and Judgments of men for Scripture truths though the men be highly to be reverenced But in this place their Interpretation doth not satisfie me I will give my reason Antichrist doth evidently appeare to be the other Beast that comes out of the Earth which is sayd to have two hornes like a Lamb c. You may say but Antichrist may be more wayes considered then one as he is invested with temporall soveraâ—gnty and dominion and so he may be the former beast and as he is invested with spiritual supremacy and so he may be the latter Beast and indeed so many Interpreters take it but consider these descriptions 1. They differ in number John saith I saw a beast rise out of the Sea and then it is said in vers 11. I beheld another beast it is not therefore the same 2. They differ as in number so in their originall the first rose out of the sea the second out of the earth 3. They differ in their shape The first beast had ten horns the second had but two horns like a Lamb. 4. They differ and are apparantly distinguished in the exercise of their power for he exerciseth all the power of the first Beast in his presence And it is said also in the 12th vers He causeth the earth and them that dwell therein to worship the first beast and he causeth them to make an image of the first beast and he had power to gve life to the image of the beast c. So that the description seems to be different The second beast gives all his power to the first and yet honours himselfe too But that which most of all prevailes with me and which wholly captivates my Judgment to leane another way is this That whereas they say the first beast was the Pope as Dominus in Temporalibus as Lord in Temporalls and the second beast is the Pope as he is Dominus in Spiritualibus It is evident that the Pope did not invest himselfe with temporall authority at the first But at first claimed spirituall and universall Episcopacy over-sight over all the Churches he was first supream head of the Church in his spirituall Jurisdiction and did not claime dominion in Temporalls till after his wound was healed and then he took power to depose the Emperour of the East and translated his Empire from Greece to France this was his Dominion in earthly Monarchies which he took in the latter place And therefore I would rather say that the second beast is the Pope in both respects as Lord and Soveraign high Priest in Spiritualls and the high
Priest also over the Kings of the world in Temporalls Hee had two hornes like a Lamb as the successor of Peter and as if he had nothing but from Christ but he spake like a Dragon When he had once power by his Lamb-like horns he then spake like a Dragon Therefore to speak that which I conceive to be the truth I do look at this first beast as indeed of like condition with the Pope and very nearly joyned to him The Pope is one of the heads and rulers of this Beast but yet distinguished from the beast it selfe and is not the same with the beast This therefore all things weighed according to the Text I conceive to be the first beast the Roman Catholick visible Church The seven heads and ten horns are a clear description of the Roman State Now this State here is neither the Pagan Roman Empire nor the Christian Roman Empire as hath been shewed And therefore it must needs be a third Roman State distinct from the former and succeeding in their place and what is that but the Roman Catholicke visible Church Of this Church the Pope is the head both as universall Bishop over all Churches and chiefly Lord in Temporalls that had both Swords and obtained both Authorities to be highest supream head in Spirituals as also supream head in Temporalls he was Soveraign Governour in all And the Roman-catholick visible Church it comes just in the room of the Roman Empire how was it described The beast that had seven heads and ten horns this comes in his room the one governs all the world in his way and the other all the Churches another way This is the Beast that the Dragon stirs up to make War with the Saints Now to appply this description to this Church for the better understanding of the Text. Qâ— I saw a beast rise out of the Sea You may aske what is the Sea from whence this beast ariseth Answ The Sea is the collection of many waters The gathering together of the waters called the Seas Gen. 1. 9 10. And what are the waters The waters which thou sawâ—st are People and Nations and Languages and Tongues Rev. 17. 15. So then what is the beast here that ariseth out of the Sea It is some soveraign State that ariseth out of the connexion of many Nations into one body as you know the Roman Catholick Church is not confined within the lifts of the City of Rome though there the head is seated but the whole Roman Sea it is well called a Sea in that respect it is that which comprehends all Nations whether subject to the Eastern or Western Emperour yea and other Nations that did not submit themselves to the one or other as if they did recollect themselves as into one Sea all banks are broken down in the Sea yet there is no distinction but all is one Sea one vast body And such is the Roman Catholick visible Church all partitions are here broken downe all Churches make but one visible Catholick Church And again it is well said to arise out of the Sea according to the like description which Daniel makes of the foure Monarchs in Dan. 7. Hee saw the foure windes of heaven strive upon the great Sea and foure Beasts came up from the sea divers one from another From the multiplyed agitations of the Sea it came to passe four great Monarchs did arise Just thus from the tumult of particular Churches did this Beast arise for when they could not agree in the Churches but some were of one minde some of another it was the wisdom as they thought of Christian Princes and Bishops but it was but humane wisdome and was indeed from the Dragon and not from Christ they thought it would be best to have but one church and the Bishop of Rome to be the head though at first they divided them to four but in the end they would have the Bishop of Rome over all that so they might have unity for they say unity springs from one head and unlesse you have one head you cannot have unity Therefore from the particular Church of a Congregation they came to Diocesan from Diocesan to Metropolitan from Metropolitan to Patriarchal from Patriarchal to Cecumenical And so it comes to pass all Churches must be gathered into one Sea that is one Catholick Church For look what reason they had to set Bishops over particular Churches So having many Bishops by the same reason they must have some Metropolitan and of many Metrapolitans foure or five Patriarchs and of them one Chief that is the Pope the Father of Fathers he must be the grand Governour of all Therefore doth he rise out of the Sea out of the Sea of Tumult and Sea of Contention And if you take Sea for corruption in Doctrine and worship and Government as some good Interpreters do it was from thence also that this beast did arise This beast did arise out of them all for had either pure Doctrine or worship or Discipline been well looked unto it had not been possible that such a beast as the Catholick visible Roman Church should have bin raised up It is further described to have seven heads and ten horns The holy Ghost describes them so fully that we need no further interpretation of them He tells us in the 17. Chapter of this book the ninth and tenth verses The seven heads are seven Mountaines on which the Woman sitteth which are the mountaines of the City of Rome it is built upon seven hills and the seven heads are also seven Kings that is seven Kingly governments soveraign governments The first were Kings then Consuls then Decemvins then Dictators then Tribunes and then the Caesars Five were fallen that is were past in John's time the sixth were then extant and they were the Caesars the Pope he makes the seventh Now the Pope then is the seventh of these Heads but the seventh head and the beast are two distinct things though he be one that rules the beast and hath a great influence in the guiding of it Hee was to receive a deadly wound and after became an eighth head whereas he was but one of the seven So that he is one of the Heads but there is difference between the head and the beast and the beast it selfe And it is said He exerciseth all the power of the first Beast that in conclusion what the Pope decrees that stands So that it is not a generall Councell that determines any thing authentically without him but he doth all that the first beast doth Hee would have the Catholick Church honoured but it is that himselfe may be honoured as the Lord of the Church So therefore for the heads these are the seven Heads And for the Hornes he tells you they are so many Kings which were not then risen to Soveraigne Power but John saw it in a Mystery afore hand But when this Beast ariseth this Pontifex maximus then they receive a Kingdome at the same
time Chap. 17. 12. And the severall Kingdomes that then were broken off from the Roman Empire whereof England was one they were so many severall Kings that all gave their dominion to the Beast with one consent and so were his protectors ver 17. They were his Beauty and his Strength as the Hornes are to the Beast So it is true here is a great Beast indeed of a vast comprehension here is an universall visible Church and he hath seven Heads that is Seven Hilles there he sits and seven Governments There are seven Heads both of the one and other both Hills and Governments whereof five were fallen and the sixth was when John wrote The seventh was to rise in their roomes and that is He that hath two Hornes like a Lambe and spake like a Dragon and doth exercise all the Power of the first Beast what power is in the Church the Pope hath the ordering thereof And it is said here that these Hornes had ten Crowns but so had not the Hornes of Pagan Rome The heads of Pagan Rome had soveraign Authority and lived like Princes but so had not the Pope they did not wear the Crowns though they affect temporall dominion but leave the Crowns to the hornes leave them to Crowned Kings that give their power to him Now upon these Heads are names of Blasphemy The old High-Priest of the Jewish Synagogue he had a plate of pure Gold and there was graven upon it holiness to the Lord Exod. 28. 36 37. This Beast hath not holinesse to the Lord but names of Blasphemy the Pontifex maximus His head is full of names of Blasphemy But the Pope exceeds all in this case for who ever took upon him as he to pardon Sinne A name of Blasphemy To be Judge of Scriptures a name of blasphemy Hee hath many other names of Blasphemy he will dispence with Oaths of allegeance and all civil subjection he will dispence with marriages most incestuous and doth exalt himself above all that is called God especially the Gods of the Earth His heads are full of names of Blasphemy as we shall come to speak God willing in the 5 and 6 verses Now it is said of this Beast he is like a shee Leopard It is in the 17 Chap. compared to a woman to shew that the Roman catholick visible Church is as fitly resembled by a woman as a she Panther such is this Beast Can a Leopard change his spots Jer. 13. 23. Is it not a State full of spots and the spots are not the spots of Gods people but spots of herisie and spots of Idolatry spots of Tyranny and great variety of all spots of Blasphemy To tell the spots of that Sea were ineeed to enter into a Sea of wickednesse which that Church abounds withall Can a Leopard change his spots This church they make account cannot erre so how should they change for they that cannot erre to what purpose should they change yet of a very sweet fragrant smel as they they perfume their Temples with incense and love to please ambitious minds and to fill covetous hearts they are sweet also and faire to voluptous spirits with their Brothel houses c. But for the Leopard Bear and Lyon I suppose there is speciall reference to them all In Dan. 7. 4 5 6. where he resembles the Monarch of Babell to a Lyon and the Monarch of Persia to a Bear and the Monarch of Greece to a Leopard There the Leopard is the last of the three here it is the first to shew a direct contrary course that this Beast takes in his rise to the old Monarchies Of the great Monarchies the first was a Lyon full of magnanimity the next was a Beare full of cruelty a Bear that devoures mucb flesh and the Leopard the spotted Beast comes after cruell as the former Now here the Leopard is first the whole shape is sweet and savoury other beasts would follow him by the smell and so this church seemes in the wole bulk sweet and savory to inveagle all unstable Soules But where he gets hold he layes his paw like a Beare presseth hard and holds fast and will not let goe Just like the Persian State they hold fast Never did any of the States last so long as the Papall State The Assyrian lasted long but yet did not continue above a thousand years but this is to continue 1260. dayes that is so many yeares in a great deal of Power and Authority And therefore as by subtilty he drawes others to him so them hee holds fast that it is marvellous hard to root out where he hath got hold you may cut off his head as it is in England but it is a wonder to see what paines there is to have the Government of Christ brought in and of the Beast cast out they will make so many Statutes in Parliament that you can have no wills confirmed nor Marriages made but by them nor no Parliments Acts passe but through their hands you have so many matters in the State depending on them that one would think it impossible ever to root them out you may take off the Beast his head you may thrust the Leopard out at windows but he will take hold with his feet that you shall have much ado to root him out The great profits and great preferments they sink deep in the hearts of carnall men And he hath a mouth like a Lyon How did the Lyon of Babell speak presumptuously what God is able to deliver you out of the firey furnace c. and he commands all that will not worship his Image should be cast into the fyery furnace Just such is the mouth of this Beast who so will not worship the Image of this Beast shall be killed in the 15 v. of this chapter So you see this is the Roman Catholick visible church And the Dragon gave this church power All that the Roman Emperor could doe before that doth the Catholick church that w ch the old Roman Emperor did by force of arms that doth the Roman Church by the power of Religion and conscience The Dragon gave him his power and Seat and great Authority And Satan will worke by the power of conscience making them believe that all must be subject to them He gave them his Seat what was the Seat of the old Roman Emperor It was Rome Satan gave that to the Beast There is his Seat and great Authority insomuch that all the world were deeply taken with the reverence they owe as to the Imperial mother City So to this soveraign mother Church their holy Father the Pope that was the head of that Church This is the plain description of this first Beast I canot proceed now to open the wounding of one of the heads of this Beast nor of the healing of that wound nor of his warre against the Saints I am the longer in this because the more clearly these things are opened the more fully will
the counsell of the holy Ghost appear in the sequell If any man have eares to heare let him heare doe not think that these things concern Students onely and Scollars But what is this to common christians He that hath an eare let him heare what the holy Ghost saith It is the same charge which he gave concerning the Epistles which were common to all churches If any man have an eare let him hear what the Spirit saith unto the Churches Those generall doctrines necessary for all Christians to understand the same charge is laid upon all to heare what is spoken concerning this beast If thou understandest Religion if thou wouldst be or art a member of a Church of Christ know this point If any man have an ear let him hear this But you will say to me shall we make it an Article of our Creed to believe the Catholick Church and shall we now make it an Article of Faith to beleive it to be a Monster I believe the holy Catholick Church and shall we make it a Beast To this I answer The holy Catholick Church we make it an Article of our Creed that is a company of the Godly called out of the world we look at them all as those for whom Christ shed his bloud But we must not look at this as a visible Catholick Church much lesse the Roman Church as the Catholick Church we believe the Catholick Church is invisible we believe no visible Church but Congregations and therefore if you come to heare of a Roman Catholick visible Church whereof the Pope is the head and who takes upon him all this Soveraignty and power here described we look at such a body as a great Bâ—ast Communion of Saints wee acknowledge and that all the Churches of Christ have one and the same power amongst them The Church of this Congregation hath power within it selfe equall to what others have and none have power one over another None of us are like Leopards to other beasts perfumed to draw other beasts after us and then like Beares to clasp them in to be subject to this Church then speak like Lyons that all shall be subject to our commands This is a Beast and this is no Catholick Church This is a Catholick Church of the Devill but not of Christ Thus have you the two first verses opened unto you Come we now to gather one briefe note from the words The visible Catholicke Roman Church is in the esteem of the holy Ghost a monstrous Beast that is the note That it is the beast here described you have heard it opened Some Roman State it must be and you have heard it can neither be Rome-Pagan nor Rome-Christian It must therefore be the Roman Church for it is described by seven heads and ten horns which are the Arms of Rome as they are described in the Revelations That it is in the eyes of the holy Ghost a monstrous beast is here evident for imagine a beast set before you with seven heads and ten horns would it not seem a monster and unnaturall that it should look like a Leopard all sported and feete like a Beare and look at his mouth and that 's like a Lyon is not this a monster to say nothing of his blasphemies which makes him a wicked beast but look at his visage which is here resembled and what is here deciphered but a monster It holds forth his description in other places in Chap. 16. 13. There came forth three unclean spirits out of the mouth of the Dragon that is the Devill and out of the mouth of the Beast out of the mouth of the false Prophet And you shall also read that the beast was taken and with him the false Prophet these were two still they could not be made one Rev. 19. 20. And they were both cast alive into a lake of fire burning with brimstone both the the first beast and the latter beast the beast and the false Prophet He like a Lamb comes in sheeps cloathing but inwardly is a ravening wolfe Now why is it such a monstrous beast If God had made such a kinde of creature a Leopard is no monster nor a Beare nor a Lyon But if you make a Beast of all these that will be a monster that is contrary to the course of nature cleare besides the ordinary course of naturall generation that makes a thing monstrous this then is the reason of the point A beast ingendred against the course of nature that is a monster especially if there be so many uncouth shapes of which it is composed And it is not so with this universall Catholick visible Church Doe but consider what kinde of Church the Lord instituted the Church of a particular congregation If thy brother trespasse against thee goe and tell him his fault between thee and him c. If he will not hear thee take with thee one or two more c. If he shall neglect to heare them tell it to the Church Mat. 18. 15 16 17 18. What the Catholick visible Church when will that meet think you And is it ever to be expected that when they do meet that every brother of this countrey and other countreys must go to Rome and tell the Trespasses of his brother against him and send for those that have offended him and thus and thus plead with them And when do you think that a Catholick Church will heale all offences between brethren Will not this be a monstrous beast when the Catholick Church must heare and remove offences That Church which Christ hath ordained will heare the offences of brethren and a brother hath liberty to tell his offence to the Church and at length the matter will be brought to an issue when they they have two witnesses then the Church sees what is to be done Now to have a Catholick visible Church what a monstrous disturbance will that be to the free dispensation of the government of Christ and yet the rulers thereof will be the only visible Church-governnours of the world Again you read in 1 Cor. 14. 23. When the whole Church saith the Apostle shall come together into one place c. The Church therefore which the Apostles instituted may be gathered into one place that all may heare and all may be edefied Why is it possible that all Churches should be gathered into one place or should all heare if they were gathered or will they be ever so gathered what a wondrous beast will this be Againe whereas Christ hath said his Kingdome is not of this world and hath appointed to his Disciples that they should not be Lords over Gods heritage 1 Pet. 5. 3. and in Mat. 20. from 23. to 29. It shall not be so among you But whosoever will be great among you let him be your Minister and let every soule be subject to the authority of the higher powers Well now if there must be a Catholick Church and an Officer that shall rule all
Nations and that in so many Nations with Spirituall and Temporall Dominion carry all before him will it not be a Monster What a disproportion is this to the Churches of Christ and to the Officers thereof Not to speak of their other monstrous usurpations of the head of this Church but take the body as it is how they speak like a Lyon and hold fast when they get like a Beare and are spotted like a Leopard that they are nothing but hotch-potch and mingle-mangle If any man have understanding let him understand what kind of Church this is that is thus deciphered and described this visible Catholick Church For the Use It may first teach us the great and just reason which all Protestant Churches have to with-draw themselves from the fellowship of the Church of Rome from the Catholick visible Roman Church though they look at those that submit not to them as Schismaticks and Hereticks I pray you consider would they have us submit to this great beast would they have the Lambs of Christ for such are the Churches of Christ to submit to a Lyon Beare or Leopard Hath any Lamb in the world much lesse a Lamb of Christ so many Heads and Horns and such spots and such feeâ— and such a mouth Therefore I pray you consider it is not time for the Lambs of Christ and for all the Churches of Christ to flye off from this Monster and to abandon them utterly as having no part nor portion with such a beast as this Secondly let this be another Use it may teach us how Christian Protestant Churches wrong themselves that leave any footsteps of this government in their Churches For that is part of the image of the beast for the second beast when he was advanced he would have an image of the first beast they must have Provinciall and Diocesan Churches and National Churches and carry I know not how many hundred congregations into one Nationall Church and there must be some Diocesan and Metrapolitan church and the rest must be inferiour to that Though this be not so great a monster as the great Beast yet it is an image of this beast can any brother tell his offence to such a church And will you have him stay till the whole National church meets Or will you have him stay till the Diocesan church meets and carry his offences to the Visitation Do you think they will right his cause then Are a few such kind of men the Chancellor and Register and Surrogate and Apparitor do you think the church that our Saviour bids us tell Are these they that are gathered together that all may heare and all may be edefied Do these serve the Lord Jesus and not their owne bellies I say therefore you may see what great reason men have to with-draw from subjection in spirituall matters to the Image of this great beast that in some measure represent the same state as they Thirdly let it be a seasonable advertisement to all if I were to speak to Princes to all Princes but however to all Magistrates how to make use of their Authority to be as Protectors of the Church in respect of their spirituall estate as children of the church but not to give the horns to the church though horns be for beauty and strength you see it makes the Church a monster and it is to make a beast of the Church And so if you should make Church-Officers Justices of Peace or Councellors or prostitute your own Government to them that if the Church condemn any then you must do so too as heretofore if a man were condemned by the Church and by them delivered to the secular power then burn him presently this puts your Horns upon the Churches head unto monstrous deformity And therefore it is necessary for Magistrates to keep their power in their owne hands and not to take things Ipso facto from the Church but to consider what is done and then they are to confirm what the Church doth according to God Here are ten horns and these are tenne Kings by the holy Ghosts interpretation and they adde to the monstrousnesse of this Beast by giving their power thereto Why doth this mishape a Christian Church for Magistrates to submit their crownes to the Church No God forbid it is an honour and happinesse to them when Kings are nursing Fathers to the church and bow down their faces to the earth Isa 49. 23. But why then doth he put it as a part of the mishapen state of the Church that it had tenne hornes to wit because these Kings did give their strength and power to the Beast that the Beast did act these Horns acording to the power of his lust as Chap. 17. v. 17. as it was truly accomplished in all the Kings of Europe that did submit all their Scepters and Thrones and Crowns and Dignities to the Bishop of Rome That if hee command this or that there must be room for him what ever becomes of Princes Laws and Endeavours and all acts and enterprises of War or Peace He had their horns on his head he might push with them as he would This made the Church a monster when soveraign power was obnoxious to the Bishop of Rome when without Excomunication whether a cause were of God or no Magistrates proceeded if the Church had censured As a Beast that hath horns on his head as hee turns so must the power of his horns be set and put forth If therefore the Catholick Church or any Officer of it shall condemn a man as an Heretick and then deliver him to the secular power they never dispute the cause but take it for granted If their holy mother Church condemn him the Secular Power must push and crush him to the very Earth and trample him under foot and rend his bowels from his body if he once be delivered to them Now this makes the Church a beast that hath this power over the Princes of the Earth that look what is their lust or their ignorance or their errour and the contrary adjudged by them to be Heresie that the Secular power must mayntain the one and condemn the other It is a comfortable thing for Churches to be strengthned and protected by civill Magistrates But if they captivate their power to the Church that what Church Rulers call for not according to the Word but their Lusts that the civill Magistrate must confirm that makes the Church a Beast And therefore be wise now O ye Kings be instructed O ye Judges of the earth serve the Lord with feare and rejoyce with trembling c. Psal 2. 11 12. Kisse the Lord Jesus submit to him and in him to the church Lick the dust off the feet of the church dispensing his counsell and will But when by implicite obedience the Common-wealth must he prostitute to the Beast it makes the Beast more monstrous then it is The authority of Princes in that kind makes such churches to be
may be the more able to finde the free passage of joy and the power of godlinesse in all your private or publique conversation Revel 13. the latter part of the 2 d. verse And the Dragon gave him his power and his seate and great authority THe next note is this That the Dragon that is Satan as he had the government of the Pagan Roman Empire so being cast out of it he gave or procured and obtained to the Roman Catholicke visible Church his power and seate or Throne and great authority For so it is plainly here said That the Dragon gave to the Beast his power and his seate and great authority The Dragon who is that You heard the Dragon is the old Serpent called the Devill and Satan but the Dragon considered as he sometimes swayed the Roman Pagan Empire as in Rev. 12. 3. There appeared a wonder in heaven a great red Dragon having seven heads and ten horns they are interpreted by the Angell Rev. 17. 3 4. 9 10. 12. 18. The seven heads to be the seven hills of Rome and the ten horns so many Kings that arose with the last head of the Beast Therefore he means the Dragon as he sometimes swayed the City of Rome and so the Seate and State of the Pagan Roman Empire And being now cast out and seeing he cannot maintaine his State and divine honour as before to whom doth he give his honour what to the Roman Christian Empire No his rage is against them and the Church amongst them Neither did he give them his Seate they sate not at Rome but at Constantinople Neither can he easily fasten upon the civill State such delusions as to cause the Christian Emperours to take to themselves divine honour though the Pagan Roman Emperours had so done But now hee doth choose to fasten them upon the Ecclesiasticall State and thinks he shall more prevaile with Church-men as I may speak to drinke in an inundation of Heresies in Doctrine and Tyranny in Government and Superstition in Worship he thinks he shall sooner prevaile with the Ecclesiasticall State then with the Civill Therefore upon this Beast which can neither be Roman Heathen nor Christian Empire but the Roman Church doth he fasten his power and seate and great authority His power A three-fold power did the Devill fasten upon the Roman Catholick visible Church 1. The power of signes and lying wonders Hee gave him great power to worke great wonders 2 Thes 2. 9. Of which there is more spoken in the sequell of the Chapter where some of his miracles are mentioned 2. He gave him the power of effectuall Sophistry or as the Scripture calls it 2 Thes 2 9 10. of deceit of unrighteousnesse partly in the Schoolmen and partly in their Votaries or Cloyster-men and partly in their Canonists By the efficacy of Sophistry in School-men he corrupted all Doctrine By the deceit of the Cloyster-men the Monkes he corrupted all their devotion and worship And by the policy of their Canonists he corrupted all Church-government and this was carryed with such efficacy of deceit that those School-Divines were accounted the most profound and the Monks most devout and the Canonists most judicious and exquisite Polititians Now these three did mightily deceive the Christian world by their power and all this power Satan gave to this Beast 3. He gave him the power also of making war for in vers 7. It was given him to make warre with the Saints and to overcome them putting into the hearts of christian Kings to give their power to the Beast and to wage all their Battels at their own charges whiles he sate still this was the power which was given him by the Dragon And for his seate what was it It was the City of Rome which ruled over the Kings of the earth Rev. 17. 18. And for that end he would not suffer Constantine nor other Emperors to dwell at Rome If they were in Italy they should dwell at Ravenna So that the Dragon granted his owne Seate or Throne not to the Emperors for they never cared for it but he reserved it for this Beast to be the center and chief Seate of the Roman Catholick Church And he gave him also great authority transcendently great indeed Great Authority 1. Over the Scriptures 2. Over the consciences of men 3. Over the treasury of the church Over Church-Rulers and Churches over the merits of Christ over Kingdoms and Common-wealths over Purgatory and for mitigating the paines of Hell All this he gave to the Roman Catholick visible Church 1. He gave him power over the Scriptures 1. As Judg of them The Church is the Judg of controversies and the head of that Church is the Judg of all places of Scripture by his authority it is authenticall This the Catholick Church doth challenge 2. He doth prefer the vulgar Latine before the Originall Scripture a transcendant power 3. It is in his power to make Apocrypha Scripture to be of like power with the canonicall Scripture 4. It is his power and authority that gives unwritten Traditions like power with the canonicall Scripture 5. He takes upon him to be the infallible Interpreter and Judge of the meaning of Scripture and that is Blasphemy 6. He takes upon him power to dispence with Scripture Hee hath power to dispence with the morall Law of God in point of Marriages even in incestuous Marriages this is a power beyond Scripture 2. He hath great authority over the consciences of men making Laws and Canons to bind the conscience and releasing and loosing them from the power of Gods Lawes either in point of Marriage or in point of Oaths and Covenants or in point of naturall relation He can dispence with children in respect of duty to Parents if they come into Monasteries and with duty which Subjects owe to Magistrates 3. They have power over the Church Treasury by which they meane the supererogation of the merits of Christ and of the Saints They say Christ merited for a thousand worlds and because he saved but a few it is free for the Pope to take the surplussage of merit He can take them and apply them by Indulgences for the pardoning of them that pay well for them And thus they who despise Gods imputation of the righteousnesse of Christ for justification they take upon them to impute it to themselves and to this and that notorious wicked man 4. They have power over Kingdomes and Common-wealths to depose Kings and to dispose of their Kingdoms as they please and to absolve Subjects from all Allegiance to civill power and for that end to nullifie their Oath for that end you know what the Pope sent to Henry the fourth Christ say they gave this power to Peter and Peter to the Pope and to that end abuse Jer. 1. 10. See I have this day set thee over the Nations to root cut and pull downe and to destroy and to throw downe to build and to plant 5. They
have power over the estate of the life to come 1. Over Heaven Hee claimes transcendent power in that and doth abuse that place in Mat. 16. 19. To thee will I give the keyes of the Kingdome of heaven that whatsoever thou shalt bind on earth shall be bound in heaven whatsoever thou shalt loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven Therefore he can open the gates of Heaven to them that are dead 2. They have power over Purgatory Upon so much done and given they can help them out of Purgatory They make account the torments of Purgatory are equall to the paines of Hell but that Hell is for ever and Purgatory but till the last Judgment 3. They have power over Hell they have not absolute power to deliver out of Hell only Gregory is said to have delivered Trajans soul out of Hell but though they cannot deliver out of Hell yet they can ease the torment The witnesses of this will hardly owne it but it is the judgment of the most devout to that Sea So that he gave to the Catholick church his power of signs and lying wonders of all kinds of efficacy of delusions and power of making Warre and he gave him great authority over the Scriptures over mens Consciences over the treasures of the Church over Kingdomes and Princes and Powers of the world to come and over Purgatory and Hell And therefore consider if this be not a vast power which is here given and acknowledged to be given by himselfe to the Catholick visible Roman Church You must not wonder that the Catholick Church did not claim all this at first but came to this by degrees and more faster grew to this especially at that time when this second Beast that received in spiritualls his power speaking like a Dragon had got all this transcendant power In the mean time from the very first you shal find this power in the representative Catholick Church They quartered them into severall Jurisdictions into Bishopricks and when they had done that they rested not till they had set one over the rest and that was this of Rome And besides this was devillish Authority to make Laws to bind all Christian Congregations to take their Government from them 3ly In every Councell they devised some new Doctrine and some new form of worship and Government which was the seed out of which this transcendant power was hatched For the reason of the point you may aske how hee should give all this power which he never had himself how he should give that which never was his to a Beast so as to carry all things with that transcendant power for divine power he had not himself he was cast out from it how then could hee give this to any State in the world First from Gods divine Justice and heavy Judgment upon the unthankfull world That look as God in former times did give up the Roman Pagan world to be ruled by Satan as the god of it and therefore he is called in 2 Cor. 4. 4. the God of the world So now God gave up the Roman Christian world as he did the Pagan world before the Scripture tells us so 2 Thes 2. 8 9 10 11 12. Because they received not the love of the truth that they might be saved he gave them up to efficacy of delusions to believe lies That they all might be damned who believe not the truth but had pleasure in unrighteousnesse They loved not the simplicity of the Apostles Institutions concerning Churches and Laws and Doctrine and Apostolick government but did affect high preferments and setled endowments and carnall excellency Now the Lord therefore gives Satan wonderfull power that as of old he was once the God of Pagan Rome so now in the Church he gives them Church-power that what he could not retaine in his owne hands that he substitutes and gives to the Roman Catholick Church to carry it along with great successe and that 's the first Reason the judgment of God upon the unthankfull world A second Reason is taken from the effectuall means which Satan used to advance the Roman Church by to exalt his Church above all others what were the means The means were these First Ignorance raising a smoak out of the bottomlesse Pit darkning all the light of the Church Rev. 9. 2. The Sun and the Aire were darkned by reason of it There was a mighty dark mist as it were They regarded not the love of the truth they studyed it not and so the Lord left them to palpable grosse ignorance in so much that at that time when the second beast arose had we seene any that lived in the former time of Religion and that lived now we would not have thought they had been the same men such palpable darkness were they left unto of ignorance Now palpable ignorance is the mother of all Superstition and Idolatry and the misguidance of all things in the Church A second means which he used was terror of Conscience which he set on effectually by the Locusts Rev. 9. 3 5. There came out of the smoak Locusts and unto them was given power as the scorpions of the Earth have power They had such a notable power to sting the Consciences of men that men would seek for death and could not finde it and take desperate courses drowning or hanging or any thing rather then to live in that terrour They that shall read Parsons Resolutions Granatensis shall find what terrible threats there are applyed to terrifie but never shewed them the way to come to Christ to binde up such broken souls Now the Conscience broken and not healed is fit to sow any superstition in A third means was the superstition and hypocrisie of the votaries and of all afflicted but unsetled consciences Terror of conscience makes them greatly devout They tell them of a state of perfection and that they shall shrowd themselves in such a Monastery and there they should live devoutly and be kept from the pollutions of the world Many Princes have been thus taken and have given large endowments to pray for their souls their consciences being wounded A fourth meanes was the subtilty and sophistry of the School-men suppressing the reading of the Scriptures and mixing Philosophy with Divinity that they might as well have studied a point of Aristotle as their divinity and make as good use of the one as of the other They left studying of Scriptures and read Peter Lombard which was mentioned in Latine and this was a notable meanes A fifth meanes was the policy of the Canonists who had gathered together all those Canons that tended to Christs powerfull Government and fastned them upon the Catholick Church and the Bishop of Rome being head he had it all committed to him a notable means to bring in Tyranny Last of all lying miracles 2 Thes 2. 9. Whose coming is after the working of Satan with all power and signes lying wonders Thus you see the means how the
Dragon gave him his power and Authority and such Authority that he exalts himself above all that is called God The use is thus much First it serves to shew the vanity of all that admiration of the Roman Catholick visible Church and devotion to that Church which hath so long for many Ages deluded the world and with which Jesuites and Seminaries doe to this day delude devout but carnall souls Here is great power given to them and great authority but whence hath the Church all this They pretend they have it all from Christ but they have it from the Dragon of the bottomlesse pit He gave him his power and seat and great authority It never came from Christ he never gave this power to any Church nor State in the world it is from the Dragon And whereas they plead it is the keys of the kingdome of Heaven Mat. 16. 19. It is verely as the Text calls it Rev. 9. 1. The key of the Bottomlesse pit There fell a star from Heaven to the Earth and to him was given the key of the Bottomlesse pit It is he that hath power to let out smoak out of the bottomlesse pit Not to let out men from thence as some have pretended or from Limbus which is the suburbs of Hell But to let out smoak damnable doctrine and false Government He hath power to open it but no power to shut it power to sting mens consciences but no power to heal them And therefore when Bellarmine makes the Roman Catholick visible Church to be the true Church he makes this the first note of a true Catholick Church whereas our Divines make Preaching of the word and administration of the Sacraments and holy Diâ—cipline he refutes them and sets down three other universall Catholick visible Church to be the true Church And the truth is it is the very Beast to which the Devill gave this great Authority and power Wherefore let not men be bewitched with them but let us know they are all but efficacies of delusions what ever have been in this kinde spoken If any man say shall we disclaim an Article of our Creed to despise the holy Catholick Church God forbid we doe believe the holy Catholick Church spread over all Nations But a Church Catholick that shall have one visible head and be the Mother Church verily we look at it as the greatest and ugliest beast that ever was raised in the world Take all other Monarchies that the Scripture describes the Leopard of Greece the Lyon of Babell and the Bear of Persiae and they are either of them but a beastly state but here all these Beasts are mingled and confounded in one And besides It hath seven heads and ten horns A Leopard a Lyon and a Beare they are orderly creatures according to some Institution But here is a Beast that runs besides all institution and description of Scripture and societies of men that ever was raised The Catholick visible Roman Church is the most monster God forbid we should blaspheme any Church but I do but speak Scripture Let the world be judg if the Scripture can be accommodated to any but to this Roman-Catholick mother Church It is evident in Scripture these seven heads and ten horns must be some Roman State the Roman Pagan State it cannot be nor yet the Roman Christian State and a Roman State it is but there hath been no other Roman State but the Roman-Catholick visible Church and that hath claimed such great power and authority which is doubtlesse as incompatible to Scripture as may be which by the wit of man hath not been invented but by the Dragon and yet so goodly in the eyes of the world which great Princes are deluded and besotted withall and happy they that can be reconciled to that State Secondly Learn we to magnifie the free rich grace of God that hath delivered us from this great Beast and the worship of it and hath restored us in a great measure to the government of primative simplicity that now we may meet every Lords day that all may heare and all may be edefied where every one may brign his offence if hee cannot be satisfied in private and may be heard and the case in due time searched into and healed according to God This is Primative simplicity and this is direct proceeding without Lordly Prelacy which overwhelms all the world like a great Sea And it i well called a Sea for it swallows up all like a vast Ocean And the more thankfull ought we to be that he hath delivered us from the Image of the Beast as well as from the beast it selfe A Catholick Church that beareth sway over so many hundred Churches and overwhelms them all Such Lawes they shall make as shall binde all Nations and whether they give consent or no they must subscribe to them in point of government Were we sensible how odious this Beast were in the sight of the holy Ghost and of the Apostle John it would affect us with strong thankfulnesse and hearty enlargednesse to God that hath delivered us from so great a beast and from any image and picture of it unto which all the world is subject unlesse in some few places Thirdly It may teach all Church Officers not to affect any Lordly pomp and state For Officers of a Church to take upon them any great State or to see a Church composed in any such form you see in the eyes of the holy Ghost it is a Beast There is nothing more disproportionable to us then for us to affect Supremacy for us to weare the hornes that might push Kings to throw downe any or to desire Magistrates to execute what we shall think fit verily it is not compatible to the simplicity of the Church of Christ Neither may they give their power to us nor may we take it from them That when an Excommunication passe in the Church then to leave it to the Magistrate that so a man being excommunicated is left Ipso facto to civill censure upon the Churches censure this will cause the Magistrates to submit their power to the Church unavoidably that if a Church censure the Magistrates must proceed against them Now it is good to have these two States so joyned together that the simplicity of the church may be maintained and upheld and strengthened by the civill State according to God but not by any simplicity further then according to the word Beware of all secular power and Lordly power of such vast inspection of one church over another Take heed of any such usurpation it will amount to some monstrous Beast Leave every church Independant not Independant from brotherly counsell God forbid that we should refuse that but when it comes to power that one Church shall have power over the rest then look for a Beast which the Lord would have all his people to abhor Fourthly let it be in the feare of God an use to beware how we take Satans offers This
slay him and crush his spirituall arrogancy that under pretence of Vicarship to Christ will yet be the Lord of the Church The Reason of the point is From the dishonour put upon Christ to take the headship from him to whom it belongeth This honour to be the head of the Church is the proper right of the Lord Jesus It is his First by guiâ—t from the Father Ephes 1. 22. To be head ever all things to the Church and Col. 1. â—8 He is the head of the body the Church Secondly it is his by Purchase He gave himselfe to death even the death of the Crosse and God hath highly exalted him and given him a name which is above every name Phil. 2. 8 9. He dyed and rose again that he might be Lord both of the dead and living Rom. 14. 9. So that now when the Lord hath this headship of the Church granted him and also hath purchased it by his own death now for another to claym headship it must needs imply either that the head is a non-resident or else thrust out of his headship he doth administer And though the Lord be not present in body yet in his spirituall presence he is as truely present and more effectually then any that can be devised And therefore in regard of injury done to Christ which the Lord will not bear he will therefore crush and wound such heads 2dly From the sacrilegious injury put upon the Church It is an usurpation of all power from the Church that if a Catholick Church be met they will give power and Lawes to other Churches and look what the second Beast doth he administers all the power of the first Beast Look what power is given to the Catholick Church that doth the Bishop of Rome incorporate to himself and he causeth an Image of that Church to be made in Provinciall Nations which when they have taken hold like a Bears claws they will not easily be rooted out Now this is such injurous usurpation that from that day to this they have never been free That where the Pope hath had to doe the Churches are spoiled of the authority that is given to them by Christ And therefore you must not wonder if the Lord wound the head of such as goe on in their wickednesse Psal 68. 20 21. The jealousie of the Lord riseth against such usurpations For a visible Catholick Church to be set over the world who may make Lawes to rule conscience and make Officers for the ordering of all Churches It is such a Monster and the Government of it is so odious in the sight of God that he wounds it to death For the use of the point It may serve to provoke us all to pray heartily and faithfully for the repressing of all such heads as either the Bishop of Rome is or any Images of him whatsoever they be You read of a little horn in Daniel whose root was stubbed up wherever you read of any horns that will usurpe power over the Church look at it as it is abominable to Christ it provokes the spirit of Christ Soveraign Authority is his If the Lord be set upon the hill of Sion he will wound the Bishop of Rome or any that shall take his Image He will give them a deadly blow especially when they are more arrogant then his Indignation ariseth against them to execute judgement on such The headship of the Church is a singular priviledge to the Lord Jesus and incompitable to any They must either take Christs office out of his hands or think him negligent or non-resident and that he doth not sufficiently discharge his headship and therefore they will usurpe an office in his name but that is abominable to Christ Obj. But you will say So wee shall pluck the Crowne off from the heads of Christian Princes for they challenge that stile to be head of the Church Answ I doe not know any Christian Prince that chalengeth that stile That which was sometimes given to Saul may be given to Princes 1 Sam. 15. 17. When thou wast little in thine eyes wast thou not made the head of the Tribes of Israel That is true and so the King is head of all the Peeres and head of all the Shires and the Churches are in some or other of them that is 1. They have power over the Church in all civill matters 2. And I will say thus much that they have power to redresse and reforme inordinate abuses in the Church provoking Church officers to doe it If they doe not other Churches are to treat with them and if their corruptions be prejudicial either to the doctrine of the Gospell or if they degenerate to any Tyranny they are to look to redresse such things but this gives them not headship over the Church over their persons it doth but not over the Church that is 1. They have no power either to call Church-officers or to depose them 2. They have no power to dispence Church-censures 3. They have no power to suspend Church liberties 4. They have no power to appoint Church-ordinances nor power to administer any matter further then any other member of the Church and this did the Church of England acknowledge and no more then this was due Therefore we allow some power and authority to Princes and Magistrates in the sence spoken of If they claime any further it will so kindle the jealousie of the Lord that the Lord wil certainly wound it to the cracking of the Crowns of all that take it upon them which may be a notable warning to all Church-men I mean Church officers to beware of cleeking into their hands the power which God hath not given them the Lord will wound their heads he will not endure it 't is a priviledge that he hath purchased with his owne bloud I think there is no need here to presse it but this let me say it is a just motive to pray the more ardently and faithfully for the crushing of such heads wherever the Lord findes any arrogant head that any Church-officer will undertake to give Lawes to the Churches in their diocesse that they will put Officers upon them that they will suspend them at their pleasure and put in and put out whether the Church will or no This kinde of insolency in such a state let it look for a wound for a wound it shall have And therefore we are the more encouraged to pray for and to look for deliverance from these Heads for John tells us 1 John 5. 14. that if we aske any thing according to his will he heareth us And this is according to the will of God that all ambitious heads be wounded What he hath done he will doe There is no new thing under the Sun he spares and changes and wounds in every change Persons are changed but Gods administrations are one and the same If Gods indignation have been ardently kindled against the Bishop of Rome he will certainly visite such powers
that might be felt From the ninth Centuary to the tenth both Protestant and Popish Divines complaine that had not some lived in the 800. year and in the thousand yeare after Christ they should not have known what had beene done in the nine hundred a whole hundred years together Men were so full of darknesse and ignorance that scarce any set pen to paper to tell us what was done in those dark times that men did not know what were principles of Christianity much lesse were able to discern of Cases of Church-government or the misterie of godlinesse which requires more diligent attendance And thence it was that they were so taken with the pretended claymes of the Catholick visible Church that it would not erre because it was built upon a Rock and had the keys of Peter and he had the keys of heaven What he bound on earth was bound in heaven and what he loosed on earth was loosed in heaven that had there not been palpable grosse ignorance it had not been possible such grosse things should have been suffered to come in And a second thing that moved them was the strange successe of the Beast in recovering of his wounded head for that made them wonder after the Beast when they saw such a mortall wound so throughly healed They thought had it not been above the power of mortall men it had not been possible it should have been healed but certainly there was a power above mortall men in it and that is the reason in the Text to give him a mouth to speak great things to speak what hee would And a third reason why Princes gave this power was their devout superstition many were convinced by Matchivilian policy of their great sins and they had in those dayes a notable dexterity to apply the Law of God and to sting mens consciences like a Cockatrice Rev. 9. 5. and then they would do any thing for ease out of the bondage they lay under and this was a great meanes Then they directed them to give so much to such a Monastery or to goe a Pilgrimage or fast such a time and such devotion which a mans own unsanctified heart could reach That when this Beast speaks great things that he can pardon sinne and his Shavelings will take a course for redeeming souls and preserving them out of hel this was such satisfaction to them that you need not wonder if all Princes gave their Kingdomes to the Beast And so having advanced him as supream over them all he hath a mouth he may speak what he will Princes may make Laws on this hand or on that but if they do not suite with him they are disannulled And they must be reconciled to the mother Church and so this Harlot gives them all to her and hath a mouth speaking great things and therewithall great blasphemieâ— Thus have you the point and the reasons of it For the use of it I might from hence first speak to this point that it were therefore a necessary counsell to all Roman Catholicks to consider diligently the grounds of the great priviledges of the visible Catholick Church they stretch their authority beyond all degrees of Churches beyond all Temporall States or particular Churches Now necessary it were for them to reverse all the great things which are delivered and which the Pope hath set open his mouth to speak though they be delivered with never such fulnesse and boldnesse and plentitude of power It behoves men to consider whether all these great words be not the words of a Beast and blasphemies which the head of the Beast had taken upon him to utter for it is not enough that they are spoken boldly and confidently and with good advisement and grave Counsell Provinciall Decretals and Decrees for they are distinct things It behoves Catholicks not to be gulled with Titles and great things for it is not alwayes that power which God in mercy gives to men when they dare speak great things they think the Pope is not Antichrist but when Antichrist comes will he do greater things then these as they sayd of Christ when Christ comes will he doe greater workes then these And so when Antichrist comes can he speak grater things then these And if I were to speak to Lay-men as they say in their Religion I might advise them to take heed they be not taken with the confidence of their Priests that speak with good advisement even to impudency and with such resolute courage that many thousands are carryed away with it and say certainly men would never be so bold if they were not possessed with the goodnesse of their cause Let them not be deluded the Beast hath power to speak great things and he opens his mouth with all courage and confidence and whispers it not but speaks with impudency and abundance of resolution Secondly This may serve to teach us the danger of allowing to any mortall man an inordinate measure of power to speak great things to allow to any man uncontrollâ—bleness of speech you see the desperate â—â—â—ger of it Let all the world learn to give mortall men no greater power then they are content they shall use for use is they will and unlesse they be better taught of God they will use it ever and anon it may be make it the passage of their proceeding to speake what they will And they that have liberty to speak great things you will finde it to be true they will speak great blasphemies No man would think what desperate deceit and wickednesse there is in the hearts of men And that was the reason why the Beast did speak such great things hee might speak and no body might controll him What saith the Lord in Jer. 3. 5. Thou hast spoken and done evill things as thou couldst If a Church or head of a Church could have done worse he would have done it This is one of the straines of nature it affects boundlesse liberty and to runne to the utmost extent What ever power he hath received he hath a corrupt nature that will improve it in one thing or other if he have liberty he will think why may he not use it Set up the Pope as Lord Paramount over Kings and Princes and they shall know that he hath power over them he will take liberty to depose one and set up another Give him power to make Laws and he will approve and disprove as he list what he approves is Canonicall what hee disproves is rejected Give him that power and he will so order it at length he will make such a State of Religion that he that so lives and dyes shall never be saved and all this springs from the vast power that is given to him and from the deep depravation of nature Hee will open his mouth His tongue is his owne who is Lord over him Psal 12. 3 4. It is therefore most wholsome for Magistrates and Officers in Church and Common-wealth never to affect
God for all Blasphemy against the name of God or hâ—s Tabernacle or those that dwell in heaven it is blasphemy against God It is said here there was power given to the Beast to speak great things and blasphemyes wherein did that lye against Gods name and against his Tabernacle and those that dwell in Heaven So that blaspheme any of these and you blaspheme God blaspheme the name of God the Tabernacle of God and those that dwell in Heaven whether Saints above or Saints on Earth and you blaspheme God himself And therefore it should be farre from us to abuse any ordinance or providence of God for it is blasphemie against God himselfe they are the name of God Gods name is called on his providences If we speak evill of Gods ordinances or providences as for a man to say would to God I had never known such a woman it is blasphemy Gods wisedome and righteousnesse hath ordayned it If we be in distresse or in any sicknesse and we snarle against God and mutter at our poverty and sickness it is to blaspheme the name of God all these are providences of God To speak evill of Churches as if they were Congregations of Heriticks or Schismiticks or Congregations of Rebels or Libertines and Brownists and such like it is blasphemy against the God of Heaven Besides it is blasphemy against the Body of Christ in the Sacrament to think every Baker can make it that is Popish blasphemy To speak evill of the Saints of God on earth to thinke to take liberty because they are absent Our tongues are our owne who is Lord over us Little do we know how tender God is of his people we cannot speak evill of any in the Church but we blaspheme God And so if we speak evill of his providences it is as much as if we speak evill of God himself And therefore how precious ought the name of God to be to us to whom our names are pretious It is but a scandall to a christian brother but it is blasphemy to God and therefore speak not evill as thinking it shall never come to his eare If we speak evill of Authority of Churches of Saints or evill of them that doe evill unlesse you may take order to represse it the Lord himself looks at it as blasphemy and therefore we must not look at it as a light matter our tongues are our own and we may have liberty to speak I you have liberty but not to speak blasphemies either small or great There is not the least blasphemy but it is a great Sinne and therefore greatly to be avoyded Rev. 13. latter part of the 5. vers And power was given him to continue forty and two moneths THis is the continuance of the description of the former Beast which the Apostle John saw rising out of the Sea to be the instrument of the Dragons power that is Satans rage against the Woman and her feed Among other parts of the description which have been opened this Beast is described by the change that befell him in his head wounded and healed the effect whereof was 1. The admiration of the world 2. The worship of the Beast and of the Dragon The third effect or event was the authority or power that the Beast did receive and did exercise and that power was 1. To speake great things and blasphemies which accordingly he did exercise in blaspheming the name of God and his Tabernacle and the Saints 2. There was a power of continuance as it is here translated forty and two moneths 3. There was given to him power to make warre with the Saints and to overcome them Of the first part to speak blasphemy we have already spoken Now come we unto the second part of the power given him which is his continuance There was power given him to continue forty and two moneths The note from thence is shortly this That power and authority was given to this Beast that is to the Roman Catholicke Church to continue that is to be active and doing to be busie fortie and two moneths This expresseth the sum and sence of the words they are obscure as any place in the word and therefore need your more diligent attention and the power of the Lord Jesus to clear his counsel and will in this point who alone openeth the Seales and none can shut them To open the words Power was given to him The word in the Originall is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which properly signifies the power of Authority or Jurisdiction a soveraign kind of power as it is here described in the seventh verse over all Kindreds and Tongues and Nations Such power that all the world wondered at it and adored especially that which they call the Christian world did exceedingly magnifie the power and authority of this Beast and he speakes here principally of Spirituall Authority though it grew to Temporall Power in making Warr in the 7. vers for he riseth by degrees to further power but authority was given him Given him by whom 1. By God that put it into the heart of the tenne Horns that is the tenne Kâ—â—gs to give their Kingdoms with one consent to the Beast Rev 17. 17. So God by his wise and just providence gave him authority such as God hath ordained in his word but he put it in their hearts by his wise and just providence 2. This authority was given by Satan who assisted Antichrist in the mystery of Iniquity in working signs and lying wonders with all deceivablenesse of unrighteousnesse till hee lift up himselfe above all that is called God 2 Thes 2. 9 10. And indeed Satan wrought mightily what by the sophistry of the School-men and by the policy of the Canonists and what by the devotion of Cloyster-men and Fryers it was a wonder to see how he gained a mighty power against Churches all the world over 3. This power was given him by those States the ten Horns which gave their Crowns with one accord to the Beast that he should rule in their Dominions The chiefe Kingdoms in Europe are in these ten our Native Countrey for one France and Spaine and Navarre Sweden Denmarke and the rest they did with one accord give their Kingdomes to the Beast that in point of Religion they should establish all Ordinances according to the wisdome of his soveraign power And in Temporall matters they gave him greater power to depose and dispose of their Kings then the Roman Emperour had in sundry respects for his was limâ—ed by Laws but this was without Laws 2 Thes 2. 4. He opposeth and exalteth himselfe above all that is called God That without all power of Laws he did out-rage out of measure Given it was by their Devotion and Superstition God piercing their hearts much in those times by the Ministery of their Fryars that did wound their consciences with the sense of their murthers and lusts that they were willing to do any thing for the peace of their
Consciences and therefore willingly gave up all their power and Kingdomes into his hands so it was given him Again further he is said to continue Some Translations doe read it to make Warre but War is not in the best corrected Copies but making Warre is spoken to in the seventh ver But making War is not spoken to expresly in this fifth verse but power was given him to be doing and as we call it in a generall phrase to be a Factotum the onely doer of the world forty two moneths That what he did was done and what he did not authorize and allow it was not done If the Princes chose an Emperour if he accepted him he stood if he did not accept of him he was not received If any decrees be made if the Bishop of Rome establish them which is the seventh head then they are authenticall If he do not then they are Apocrypha So it is with Scripture though it be such as God never ratified as the Apocrypha but what sense he gives it is Authenticall He hath power to be active and doing This word then 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which is here translated to continue doth indeed so signifie usually when it is joyned with words of time you have many examples of it in Scripture as in Acts 15. 33. it is said After they had tarried there a space the word is the same as here continue So in Acts 18. 23. it is said After they had tarried some time about three moneths So in Acts 20. 3. you have there continuance or tarrying expressed by the same word And Paul saith Night and day I was in the deep 2 Cor. 11. 25. the same word he had his businesse there there he was duely he continued so long But sometimes the word ever used with this word of time signifies to be active and busie So in James 4. 13. You say you will goe into such a Citie continue there a yeare and buy and sell and get gaine the same word here and there you will be busie and gaining c. This same power therefore to continue and be doing argues that this authority of power absolute Soveraign power over Kindreds Nations and Tongues this is here said to continue a matter of 42. moneths Now for these 42. moneths I would not busie my selfe in needlesse speculations but I finde not any word of God a neednesse speculation for the Church to search into and understand We have had this number three or foure times before For it is the same number of which it is said The Gentiles shall tread under foot the holy City forty two moneths Rev. 11. 2. And 42. moneths if they be dissolved into dayes make up just the sum of a thousand two hundred and threescore days allowing thirty dayes to a moneth as the old account was wont to do which is the same time of the two Witnesses prophecying cloathed in sack-cloath Rev. 11. 3. And the same time of a thousand two hundred and threescore dayes or forty two moneths is just the computation of three years and an halfe that is a time and times and halfe a time which time it is said the woman fled into the wildernesse and was nourished there Rev. 12. 6. So that all these are manifest to be contemporary as they call it to begin together in the same period of time and to end together The Beasts rising and continuing in power 42. moneths The Gentiles which is the Roman Catholick Church treading down the true Church of God forty two moneths And the two Witnesses prophecying in sack-cloath 1260. dayes And the womans flight into the wildernesse and her continuance and abode there 1260. dayes where she was nourished by the prophecying of those two Witnesses So that expound aright one of these and you cleare the right Interpretation of all Three questions therefore may be enquired into to open the durance or continuance of the authority of this Beast 1. Whether this be a definitive or indefinitive time 2. Why it is sometimes reckoned by moneths and sometimes by dayes And 3. When doth this time take his beginning and where doth it expire and take his ending These things spoken to will reach as farre as God hath revealed to me For the first of these Questions 1. There be that think this time is not a definite or determinate time but indefinite forty two moneths shewes a good space of time known and determined by God but uncertaine to the Church Now I must confesse that meaning doth not well sink into my heart to receive it with any faith in Gods word for if God would have put a definite time for an indefinite a certain time for an uncertaine I thinke he would rather have chosen as he is wont to do some such phrase as is wont to expresse illimited time if it had been seven moneths or ten moneths Thou hast changed my wages tenne times saith Jacob to Laban that is many times How often shall I forgive my brother till seven times I till seventy times seven times He doth not meanee to limit us but as oft as he doth offend forgive if he repent or if he professe such repentance as you have no just exception against forgive him But when he saith 42. moneths why not 600. moneths for that is a definite time for an indefinite why should hee say 1260. dayes it is not a speech used in Greek and Latine to express an indefinite number no more is the time and times and halfe a time usuall in Daniel Therefore I cannot rest in that Interpretation though sundry have gone that way 2. There be that take it indeed for a definite time but they would confine it to three years and an halfe for forty two moneths or 1260. dayes is just three yeares and an halfe and that is true But I cannot accept that Interpretation and though it be common yet our Divines do with one accord reject it For this Antichrist which they say is their Beast in which they say true that he should come out of Hierusalem three years and an halfe before the great Judgment day and prevaile against Rome But that it cannot be taken for three years and an halfe may appeare from the great authority he shall gaine in this time and the power that he shall exercise over all Kindreds and Tongues and Nations now for any one in three yeares and an halfe to overcome all Nations and to rule them by an Ecclesiasticall and Civill power it is incredible The Leopard of Greece which was a swift Beast and had wings yet he did not conquer the world but in twelve yeares and it was a great matter to overcome it then But this Beast is described to be a Leopard but not with wings now that he should do as much in three yeares and an halfe without wings as Alexander did in twelve years with wings is not credible 3. There is a third Interpretation that make indeed the dayes and time and
moneths definite that is determined and â—et and do limit them according to the account of the Prophets that take a day for a yeare A like proportion of 42. moneths of a time times and halfe a time and of 1260. dayes taking a day for a yeare they will all come to the same period to the same computation of 1260. yeares Now that the Prophets do sometimes so reckon them appears from Ezek. 4. 5 6. where the Lord did direct the Prophet to lye upon his side 390 dayes according to the defection of Israel from the house of David in all which time the Prophet did beare the burden of the defection of the People and to represent that Son of man saith he I have given thee to lye so long I have appointed each day for a yeare thou shalt lye so many dayes as their apostacy hath continued in yeares For from the defection of Jeroboam to the captivity of the Land they continued 390. years And after that saith he thou shalt turne thee and lye upon thy other side forty dayes and that was the time of the renewing of the Covenant by Josiah in which the Lord was reconciled with his people but the people falling into apostacy againe it proved forty dayes more And so when the twelve Spyes had gone forty dayes and searched out the Land the Lord saith They shall beare the provocation of their Fathers forty yeares after the number of the dayes in which yee searched the Land even forty dayes each day for a yeare c. Numb 14. 34. So that this is a Propheticall phrase in mysticall Scriptures when Ezekiel is to set out a vision for God to expresse his Justice he sets it down dayes for years Then it is not uncouth but very agreeable to Scripture to say 1260. dayes is so many yeares and forty two moneths being so many dayes is all one and those dayes being three yeares and an halfe if you reckon every day for a yeare they will be just 1260. yeares that therefore I take to be most agreeable to Scripture phrase and the sense of the words But then here grows a second Question Why doth he reckon some of these times by dayes and some by moneths There may be a double reason of that 1. When he describes what the Children of God doe he sums up their actions by dayes Children of light it is meet that their actions should be measured out by the period of dayes The Witnesses prophecying and the womans flight into the wildernesse is said to be 1260. dayes But as God gave the Sunne to rule the day so the Moon to rule the night Psal 136. 8 9. Now therefore when you are to speak of superstitious devotions they are works indeed of darknesse and therefore are best reckoned by moneths by that Creature in Heaven which measures out Night the Moon And therefore it may be and so the holy Ghost useth it if he speak of the Gentiles treading under foot the holy City though it be by day-light yet it is a work of darkness They tread under foot the holy City forty two moneths Rev. 11. 2. And if Antichrist be to continue long all his continuance is but a work of darknesse and therefore he is said to continue 42. moneths But what the Church do and what the Witnesses do is reckoned by dayes but it is the same time the one makes day-work of it and the other night-work There may be also this Reason That the Apostle in these Prophecyes in the New Testament might allude to the like in the old Testament as to Antiochus whose dispensation was only a time and times and halfe a time Now for the third Quest when this may be said to begin and when it may be said to end There I confesse lyes the greatest difficulty 1. Some of our best interpreters pitch the beginning from the beginning of the Reign of Constantine when the Man-child was brought forth that is advanced to Imperiall dignity which some make in the yeare 304 after Christ though it be true of later times they will by no meanes grant his Reigne began then but two or three years after and an easie mistake grows there for when they come to measure out a Princes Reign they begin in such a time and a whole yeare is allowed to it and it may be the next begins in that year and so they bring a variation in Chronologies but you may not wonder in such mistakes if there be foure or five years variation that makes no great difference God knows certainly but through reckoning the last yeare of one and the first of another applying the same to both may sometimes make a yeares difference But holy Brightman makes the beginning of that time to be in Constantines coming to the Crown and thence expires the authority of this Beast in the yeare 1546. Now though his paines have been most serviceable to the Church of all that have written of this Book and God is to be exceedingly magnified for him and his Learning esteemed that having such a Prophetical spirit he spake so homely and plainly that without pregnant reason I would not pervericate his judgment Yet as it falls out ordinarily there is something amisse in the best humane Writers that ever wrote Therefore let me tell you what doth not satisfie me The first is this that neither in the beginning nor end doth it punctually jump and suite with all events described First for the beginning it is sayd the woman fled into the wildernesse and continued a time and times and halfe a time after the Dragon was cast out of heaven and there was place found for him in heaven And it is true Constantine made warre against the Dragon but I cannot say there was no place for him in heaven for this was the failing of the good Emperor that he still allowed the Heathens Idols Temples to continue though he shut the doors and his Successor Julian the Apostate opened them againe and restored the Dragon to spiritual authority stated him in heaven as before with a great part of the Empire And besides this certaine it is till Gracians time they all kept the title of Pontifex maximus which was an honour belonging to the great Priest of Jupiter or to the Devill Onely Gracian and Theodosius after him being tender in conscience refused it then the Senate of Rome sayd if he will not be Pontifex maximus yet they will have him to Rome and call him to Rome and had it not been by a marvelous providence they had wonderfully prevailed for at the same time they did restore all the Temples as Julian had done and established all the Revenues belonging to them restored them all to the Priests and the Devill had the place of worship as before but the Lord putting them down by a mighty providence of his through the prosperity of Theadosius he utterly overthrew that title and through the zeal of his spirit cast
more and more after that time Rev. 13. 7. And it was given unto him to make warre with the Saints and to overcome them and power was given him over all Kindreds and Tongues and Nations WHen the Devill that is to say the Dragon could not find any longer resting place in heaven that is to say he could no longer enjoy Soveraign and divine worship as the great God Constantine and his Successors having brought in Christ and his worship alone instead of all the gods of the Gentiles He therefore to revenge himselfe makes warre against the Church that were the rooters out of Pagan Idolatry This warre because he could not manage by himselfe it being very strong he therefore raiseth two Beasts out of his power the first and second Beasts in this Chapter the first from vers 1. to the 10. The second from vers 10. to the end of the Chapter It was a third Roman State not Rome-Pagan nor Rome-Christian but Rome-antichristian that is to say the Roman visible Catholick Church This is described many wayes by a wound given him upon one of his heads for a season that when Rome was sacked he was almost in a forlorn estate and despairing of recovery but being healed the effects were 1. The worlds admiration after the Beast 2. Their worship both of the Beast and of the Dragon which is Satan himselfe The third event is Power or as the word signifies Authority ver 5 6 7. And this Power and Authority did stretch forth it selfe to three employments First He had power given him to speake great things and blasphemies He might speak blasphemy by authority The second power that was given him was to continue or to be doing to be acting and working all in all for the number of 42. moneths which in the former Chapter is described by dayes and the dayes meant years 1260. yeares which have been at large spoken to The third power and authority given him was To make warre with the Saints and that not a vain and loose war but an effectuall prevailing war a victorious war It was given him to make warre with the Saints and to overcome them There was also a fourth power given him and that was dominion over all the Kindreds Tongues and Nations All Christian Kingdomes they did all of them submit their Crowns and Scepters to this Beast the Roman Catholick visible Church whereof the Pope is the seventh head for he had seven heads and ten horns Five of them were fallen the sixth then which was the Caesars and the Pope he was the seventh Two of these Powers have been opened Power to blaspheme and Power to continue and be doing I come now to the third Power or Authority given to this Beast and that is to make war with the Saints and to overcome them The note then is shortly this The Roman visible Catholicke Church had power to make warre against the Saints yea and to overcome them They are in a manner the words of the Text explained in their true meaning The warre that he speaks of as I conceive in this place is not a spirituall warre though that also this beast did make for he caused all that dwelt upon the Earth to admire and adore him and that was spirituall war But he speaks of such a warre here the effect whereof is killing with the Sword Hee that killeth with the sword must be killed with the sword vers 10. As if God would reward him in his owne kind He that slayes many thousands of Christians with the sword that is by the power of warre he himselfe shall at length be destroyed by warre also So that he speaks of a war fought by Arms by slaughter and blood-shed by open expedition of Military persons fighting in the quarrell of this beast against the Saints of God There is another warre mentioned in the 17. Chap. of this book where it is said this Beast and the ten Horns that is the Christian Kings that shall give their power and authority to this Beast shall make warre with the Lamb and they which are of the Lambs side are called and chosen and faithfull and here they are called Saints But there you shall see it is not the same kinde of warre but differing there from what is here for there it is sayd They shall make warre with the Lamb and the Lamb shall overcome them but here it is said He shall make warre with the Saints and overcome the Saints So that one of these warres he speaks of when he that hath smitten others he shall be smitten himselfe that is towards the end of his Authority then the Lamb shall make warre and overcome him but in the meane time he hath power to make warre and overcome them it is therefore a bloody warre And it is not said that he began this war as soon as he began to do for here are sundry acts and passages of Authority before he comes to this transcendant power to violent warre Hee was admired and adored in the consciences of all Roman Catholicks Hee had done many things spake great blasphemies many a day and yeare together And in the end he receives also this power to make warre with the Saints that he was able to muster up such an Army of his owne or his Horns that is those Princes that were obedient to him as he was able to make warr Now this Scripture I conceive was accomplished in his wars against the Waldenses and Albingenses in the 12. Century after Christ they held all things conformable to the Scriptures and the Fathers as they called them and every way Orthodoxall only they blasphemed the Church of Rome this Beast could not tell what he had against them otherwise but otherwise he commended them for their honesty piety and good dealing and there was nothing culpable in their doing but that they spake against the Church of Rome now against them did the Pope and the Catholick Church procure many expeditions of sore warre for many yeares together and in conclusion rooted them out of the Countrey and scattered them up and downe some to some part of France some to Bohemia some to Germany some to England and some to one place and some to another though the Papists did confesse that the people were not rooted out but scattered and where-ever they came they propagated their Religion that it was more and more spread where they came but they overcame them for they slew as stands upon Record about ten hundred thousands of them and did burn up their Cities and Cattell fel'd their wood that there might be no more Hereticks nestled in that wildernesse and they did take a course that Midwives and Mothers and Infants in the womb all should be slaughtered by fire and sword that there might be no more continuance of that Generation So that in this War the Pope did mightily prevaile and prospered so farre that he spread all Christendom and in one battle did overcome a great many
sword into the head of their Guides Leaders where they lived and though they were by former Lawes engaged by way of Homage yet now they may take up the sword of their own defence and maintenance in witnesse bearing to the Truth to the last bloud In such cases the case is much altered for their Princes and supream Governours they are all subject to the Laws and Oath of the Kingdome and they have no power but according to the Lawes which are made If therefore they take up a power against Law and contest with the people of God then this power which these holy men did exercise to maintain their peace against all opposition to be raised against them is lawfull For a fourth use it may teach all the people of God not to measure a cause by the event nor persons by accidents that do befall them lest they should condemn the generation of the Just It was a grievous temptation Asaph lay under to see the ungodly prosper and have what their hearts could desire and himselfe plagued all the day long and chastned every morning Psal 73. 3. to 13. and by this meanes he condemned the generation of Gods children But no matter though the Beast prosper and the Saints are overcome yet the Beast is a Beast when he prospers and the Saints are Saints though they be overcome therefore let us not judge of things according to their appearance Fifthly It may teach all the Saints in this Countrey or where-ever not to trust the pretences of deceitfull men especially such as are not sound in Religion and take heed also how you trust upon your own strength let me put them both together for brevity sake We know not how soon any of us may be tempted in this kind what warres may be raised against this Countrey though wee have none for the present nor feare none yet in time we know not what may come what are we better then our Fathers The Beast of Rome still lives his 42. moneths is not yet out though his power he much weakned but his Agents still live He is able to blow a coale to those that look for salvation from him to do this great and glorious service to the Catholick Church and cause And if it please the Catholick Church then it grows a great businesse to root out Hereticks to blast them by censures of Excommunication and Civill State if it were so we stand upon our own defence you see It behooves you therefore as you desire to be faithfull to God to Religion to your Churches and Common-wealths to your Wives Children Estates as you desire to be faithfull to his Ordinances to the Kingly Priestly and Propheticall Office of Christ to attend to that which these Saints neglected that is to say to attend to the word of Faith and to the wisdome of God Trust not upon the experience of your Captaines or Souldiers to fight by Land or Sea Trust not upon your Castles or Vessels by Sea any thing you have or may have Trust not upon the pieces of Ordnance they are all vaine things to save if you stand in need and yet of use Be prepared in this kind that you may be instrumentall to Gods providence but trust not in them they are but the Arm of flesh And if Wars come against New-England it will be from Principalities and Powers and flesh and blood will not be able to with-stand them They will be Principalities from Hell or the great Beast the Catholick Church or from the Image of this Beast otherwise there is no feare of any War but if any War do come trust not in those means you have nor though all the Natives in the Countrey were on your side and if any great Protestant States should offer you help use them but do not trust in them It was the way of overcoming the Saints of God they trusted on the arm of Flesh and that was their great folly and that brought the hand of God against them therefore see your Faith be sincere and upright to him Secondly Leane not to the wisdome of carnall reason nor trust not to faire pretences you shall have your liberties longer established only something or other you must give way to and some principall ones must be singled out to treat of peace but it was the ruine of this State It behoves the Saints to sanctifie God in their hearts to trust upon his grace to cleave to the word of God trust what the Lord saith and not what deceitful men say It was a grave saying of an ancient Prince in England Obey according to the Law and you obey the King but if you obey what comes suddenly out of his mouth or against Law you obey not me as King And that is it which Christian Religion teacheth no Religion teaches a man more to obey Kings in wholsome Laws to obey them it to obey God in them for Princes are subordinate to God himselfe The people do concur in making some Laws in every Common-wealth and Princes have transcendant power over the People and God forbid any should spring out of this Countrey to plead against their Governours and weaken their forces but keep their Scepters fresh from one Generation to another yet this is the best service done to Kings service according to God If Laws be made let a man yield active obedience to them if they be good and passive if they be evill but against Law contrary to the stream of Law to make a man think himselfe bound in such a case it is to flatter Princes and Powers and not to yeeld professed subjection to them Therefore it behoves the people of God to know upon what terms they stand that wee may carry our selves like loyall Subjects and Christians that the name of God may not be dishonoured by any weaknesse of ours and starting aside on any hand or other Rev. 13. latter part of the 7. vers And power was given him over all Kindreds and Tongues and Nations WEe come now to the fourth thing which these words hold forth and that is the power or as the Greek word hath it the authority which is here sayd to be given to the Roman Catholick Church and that is over all Kindreds and Tongues and Nations The note is this To the Roman Catholicke visible Church was given very ample jurisdiction and authority over all the Christian world if we may so speake or as in the Text over all Kindreds Tongues and Nations And he meanes Kindreds Tongues and Nations of such Countreys which were wont to be subject to the Empire of Rome which were then counted all the Civill Nations of the world To open it briefly It was given him over all kindreds tongues and nations Here are three words and one include another Nation is the largest for in a Nation there may be many Tongues and in one Tongue there may be many Kindreds He had dominion and soveraignty over all Nations or over the
a kinde of sacred Authority in the consciences of men because he had this absolute power in Churches a great power for 1260. years together whether you reckon from Constantines time or Theodosius his time he had a marvellous power in Kingdomes Nations and Common-wealths But notwithstanding he had this power in those times yet Christ kept the interest in his own chosen as in Rev. 14. 1. where he had 144000. that were spotlesse virgins Answ â— The Lord Jesus will at length challenge all his own purchase them into his own hand when at the calling of the Jews all the Kingdomes of the world shall be given to the Saints of the most high Dan. 7. 26 27. The Lord will take them all into his own hand and power and jurisdiction but he must first throw down this enemy that hath usurped over his purchased possession But in the mean time this Beast swallows up all for so many Ages together For the use of the point First it may be to refute the Papists that give this as a true note of the Church namely amplitude of dominion as the Catholick Church had They give this for an infallible note of the Church now that note you see is here evidently ascribed to the people that worship the great Beast of whom the Lord saith here ver 8. their names are not written in the booke of the Lamb. So that this is a note not of an Apostolicall Church but it may be a note of an Apostaticall Church that is fallen away from the Apostles Doctrine It is a true description of that State of the Church You see here Power was given over to the Beast over all Kindreds Tongues and Nations And therefore amplitude of dominion is not an inseperable character of the Spouse of Christ for it may be given to those that are not the Church of Christ even to those that are but a Beast in the sight of God not his Spouse I may rather say the contrary that amplitude of Dominion was never a note of a Church of Christ since the world began For in the old Testament the State of the Church was Nationall and they had power over one Nation and sometimes conquered others as in David and Solomons time they conquered the Philistims Ammonites and Moabites and Edomites but it was never over all the whole world and that dominion which they had they did not challenge it by Church power but left them still to their own Religion for the Common-wealth propagated their power by arms having first occasion of warre given them by their arrogance to them In the dayes of the new Testament the Church that Christ instituted reacheth no further then to their own members and their own members reach no further then to one Congregation that all might hear and all might be edefied 1 Cor. 14. 23. So that if Church power extends no further then the bounds of one Congregation then that Church that swelleth and strecheth forth her power all the world over Kindreds and Tongues and Nations what an out-ragious swelling Beast is that that reacheth such vast dominion beyond the proportion that the Lord gave to his Church If you should see a body swell to such a vast bignesse that his armes shall reach from one end of the world to another would it not be counted a monster So in this case the Lord hath limited the power of the Church within it selfe it is a great power that they have but not so great as to binde conscience unless it be Ministerially and so they have power to binde Kings in chains and Nobles in lincks of Iron but to have power judiciary power over the Scriptures and over the conscience over and above the application of the word it is such as the Lord never gave to any Church but it is arrogated and usurped by the man of Sinne. Secondly it may serve to teach you the prouenesse of your natures to that which is evill above that which is savingly and spiritually good This power over all Kindreds and Tongues and Nations the Lord hath purchased by his death Rev. â— 9. He dyed and rose againe that he might be Lord both of quick and dead Rom. 14. 9. And upon his resurrection all power was given him in Heaven and Earth Mat. 28. 18. He prayed for this power and the Lord promised to give him it Psal â— 8. Aske of me and I will give thee the Heathen for thine Inheritance and the uttermost parts of the Earth for thy Possession This hath the Lord bought with his pretious bloud and paid for by the power of his eternall Spirit and yet never did the Lord Jesus enjoy this power to this day which the man of Sinne hath enjoyed for so many years together He will enjoy it at lenght when he shall call in the Jews and with them the fulnesse of the Gentiles and reigne in Soveraigne Authority both in Church and Common-wealth according to all the Councell of his word and will But yet it was never known to this day that so many Nations did submit their thrones to the Dominion and Government of Christ and to the Truth of Christ and to worship him with the servants of God notwithstanding the purchase which Christ hath made of this Soveraignty and notwithstanding the efficacy of his prayer for obtaining this power that hee might have dominion over all As soon as Constantine brought the world to become Christian the woman she fled into the Wildernesse The true worshippers of Christ were soon troden under the hatches a mountaine of corruption in Church Government overwhelmed them amain that you cannot set the time when so many Nations served him and were as ready to take up arms in his quarrell as they have done for the man of Sinne. You will say did they not for the recovery of the holy Land many Churches conspire and lay their heads together and engaged themselves for this Warre why when they they undertook that Warre was it Christ that commanded any such thing that Churches should engage themselves and their Estates and Lives and Souls and all for the recovery very of the holy City was it not meerly undertaken by the Bishop of Rome and by the motion of the Catholick Church in a Generall Councell The Roman Catholick Church met in a Generall Councell and they agreed to set about this expedition They promised pardon of Sinne to the people and in hope of that and such like things they went about it It was service to the Beast not to Christ God never acknowledgeth it as any service to Christs Kingdome It was for the advancement of the head of the catholick Church but as any grew more wise they grew more afraid of them So that it is a wonder to see never did the the Christian world give that Authority to Christ as they have done unto the Pope and his Institutions which are not Ordinances of Christ Yea let me say another word which is above
sure he never fetched any acceptance from Heaven But you read of another fire fetched from Heaven by Eliah and that was to destroy those that mocked him 2 Kings 1. 10. 12. Which practise when James and John would have followed in Luke 9. 54 55 56. You shall read that they being offended with the Samaritans because they would not receive them Master say they shall we call for fire from Heaven to consume them as Eliah did Our Saviour utterly rejects that You know not saith he of what spirit ye are Now minde you that fetching fire from Heaven which is to destroy mens lives and not save them that James and John are taught to refusâ— as being incompatible to the Gospel But that which they refuse the Successour of Peter as they call him takes up if any Scribe or Pharisee or Samaritan refuse him then fire comes down from Heaven consuming fire and vengance and wrath and blood-shed and extreamity of outraged evils he causeth to come down upon them and in pretence from Heaven to destroy the Church and people of God that I take to be the cheif parâ— of the meaning of that But if any man will urge the letters of the Text which you need not in mystical Scriptures yet it is not without truth therein Gregory the seventh he declares this that he had strange power when he had much people about him he would have shaked the sleeve of his gound and caused fire to come down Now it is evident it might be for he was a Conjurer and 22. Popes together as their own storyes do record they were wiâ—ches and gave their soules to the Devil that they might obtaine the Popedome but they were but lying wonders for miracles require divine power but the Devil cannot go beyond the power of nature so that you may take it in the proper meaning their own men do much magnifie it and make it one of the markes of their Churche whereas Protestants that want miracles are not Churches So that those censures by which they thundred against christian Emperors they did follow with such success that they made all wonder that none could stand against them not Henery the fourth nor Henery the fifth not Leo the Emperour nor the King of Fraunce none of them all were able to take up armes against him they did all admire him Who is able to stand against him end to make Warre with him And that gave such free passage to his Laws that all christian States presently took up what injunctions he put upon them Fourthly by these miracles and the mighty successe of them he had power to cause them that dwell on the earth to make an Image to the Beast that had the deadly wound and was healed that is the Roman Catholick visible Church What is this Image of the Beast he causeth all the earth that is all earthly States to receive it he will suffer none to be without it what is this Image an Image not of their own making they must make an Image by his appointment It is an Image of the first beast not of the second directly and consequently the officers of that Beast must represent this second Beast but be an Image of the first if the first Beast was the Roman Catholick visible Church then if he causeth all the Earth to make an Image to that Beast then he causeth all Churches and Common-wealths to frame their State and platforme according to the Image of the Roman Catholick visible Church and therefore he causeth all Christian Princes to erect all their Churches in a Roman Catholick way what is that Metropolitan National Provnciall Diocesan Cathedral and Provincial Churches These are all lively characters of the Roman Catholick Church reserving stil pre-emenency to their mother Catholick Church of Rome but otherwise they are the lively Image of such a Church even as daughters are of their mothers and being overcome with the power of his miracles and deceits and delusions as you heard by the Policy of Canonists by carnall Policy and by their Votaries and by working miracles signes and lying wonders it is a wonder to see what power he had that all the power of the Popedome and of the Catholick Church was in a model and representation drawn in all Churches in Christendome during the time of 42. moneths which is 1260. years and then a great part of his Image was marred in a great part of Christendome but yet he still continues so then there is a lively Image of the Roman Catholick Church though it may be some are drawn from subjection thereunto and yet though they be drawn off from subjection to it yet still the Image and representation is written in the very foreheads of such Churches that is a fourth thing Fiftly He had power to give life to the Image of the Beast what life that it should both speak and cause That as many as would not worship the Image of the Beast should be killed How doth he put this life into the Image of this Beast to speak It is to speak with authorty as in verse 5. A mouth speaking great things He would speak and speak with authority that now these Diocesan Metropolitan and Provinciall Churches they can speak with authority as the Roman Catholick Church doth and their words must take place and he puts that life into it by his own canons and laws which they take up the canons and laws made by the Church of Rome do so animate Provincial and Diocesan Churches that they speak the same language not altogether so corrupt but with like authority and require like subjection of all persons and by your leave they grow to it for very conscience sake that those things which were indifferent before yet being laws of the Church now they must binde conscience this is to speak great things Now they have power likewise to cause as many as will not worship the Image of the Beast they shall be killed a signe none of them took that power like the beast but yet though they have not power to kill them yet to deliver them to the Secular power and they must kill them â— whatever the Diocesan Church doth agree on against her Hereticks that will not obey the Government or doctrine of the Church what then The deliver him to the Secular power then they cause him to be put to death and they deliver him to fire and faggot so you see the mighty power of this Beast There is one thing remaining of his power and that is the sixth and last effect He causeth all both small and great rich and poor free and bond to receive a mark in their right hand or in their foreheads Kings and Princes Ministers and Clergy men as they call them high and low whatever they be he causeth them all to receive a character or marke either in their right hand or in their foreheads A marke in the hand that character themselves call an indelible character and
they receive that who receive any orders from the Pope and are reconciled to the Roman Catholick visible Church This Beast causeth all to receive a marke that is they shall sweare fidelity and loyalty to the Roman Catholick visible Church this they make indelible wherever they come they are Priests for ever after the order of Melchesidech Or on their foreheads they have a marke answerable to their name their name what is that but Roman Catholicks or else there is no fellowship with them and all must at length have that name and go under the number of that name Roman Catholicks there is the number of that name but I leave that to the next time as being too large to enter into at present In the mean time you see these things thus opened touching the nature and character of this second Beast Now to make some use of all First it may be an evident conviction and demonstration and designation of this Beast who it is Is hath been much disputed but all the parts of this description doth directly fall upon the Bishop of Rome that if John had lived in these dayes he would have seene all this with his eyes which he saw in a vision No man can tell where to bestow all this description for 1260. years but upon the Bishop of Rome that is of such a wilde nature that no Church no law of God no society of men no Kings nor Princes can rule and all the world that knows this Beast knows this to be true of the Pope whose Original all Christians know springs from the Earth to keep men in unity and to preserve the Empire from inundations of Barbarians to keep Christian Princes closer together and in better order all carnall policy out of which he springs yet incensibly and slowly that he is not discerned for many years together And he hath horns like a Lamb that he pretends nothing but Saint Peter as they call it the Keys of the kingdom of Heaven But he speaks like a Dragon as if he had the Keys of the bottomlesse pit he thunders such sentences gives dispensations both against the lawes of Paul and Moses to dissolve oaths and covenants and relations they shall marry whom they will their own sisters he will venom with such noysome doctrine as the breath of them will stinke he will speak so terrible that time was when Princes were to tremble he hath spoken as a Dragon The Devil himselfe as he ruled the Roman Pagan Empire hath not spoken greater words then he Those that spake Whoever will not worship an Image set up shall be cast in a fiery furnace it is not a greater word then he speaks Secondly this doth justly reprove all the Popish admiring and adoring of the man of Sinne They look at him as their holy Father and Bishop of Christ and Vicar of God as one that hath an infallible judgment that cannot erre that he is above all power of censure If he should draw missions of soules to hell no man must say Sir why do you so they have this opinion of him No matter what they conceive he must be judged by the King of Kings and by the God of Gods and by the Saints of that God that judgeth according to the word and they look at this Father as a Monster as a wilde beast whom no Scripture no Church can keepe in awe but he is Lord paramount above them all they look at him as the Dragon of the bottomlesse pit as he that destroys the Christian world and however he may pretend as if he had nothing but Lamb-like power yet hee speakes like a Dragon thus John saw him Thirdly Observe from hence a reason of a note that troubles many Interpreters That if this beast have such power why doth he not cause the earth to worship himself why doth he not provide for his own honour but for the first beast The reason is plain the first Beast being the Roman Catholick Church and the head of that Beast all the honour that redounds to the beast falls upon the head of the beast and it is upon himselfe He exerciseth all that power that the first beast hath and therefore no marvell if he labour to draw all men what he can to worship not himselfe but the Roman Catholick Church to be reconciled to it and receive decrees from it and submit in conscience thereunto and receive no worship nor doctrine but from them nor government but established by them no Lawes to be enjoyned and transacted but by them for he knows that this honour will redound to him He knows all this power doth rest in his own breast and it is he that acts the Roman Catholick Church and he can do with a Councell and without a Councell what the Church can do and he failes not to do it from time to time Wonder not therefore that he puts off the honour to the first beast the old Roman Church there he layes all his devotion but in conclusion it is all for himselfe Fourthly you may see the corrupt Originall and dangerous State of corrupt religion and of such kind of Churches as are drawn out by the modell of the Roman Catholick visible Church any image of that beast I do not trouble you with what others think to be the image of the Beast I should but weary my selfe in so doing but if the first beast be the Roman Catholick Church as it must needs be then the image must be according to it though not of equall authority yet of the like frame whereas the Lord hath instituted no other but particular Congregations to bring in a whole Nation that may containe a thousand Congregations into one Church what an image is this of the Roman visible Catholick Church It is not Catholick indeed it is short of that but so large as it carries a Nation it exceeds Diocesan and Diocesan exceeds particular Congregations Now see the danger of this you see the first rise was from the power of this beast He causeth all the earth to make an Image of this Beast He did not bring them to make one in number but one in England and one in Scotland and one in France and one in Germany and in every Countrey according to their divisions and Princely Potentates that all that dwell in the limits of that Jurisdiction they have one Cathedral Church to which all other Parochiall Churches do belong this hee causeth them to do and when he hath done it giveth it the very like breath of the Roman Order though not in so vast a measure yet in a faire modell that they are like the image of this holy Father and so by this meanes it comes to passe by his Laws and Canons which he perswades all to receive and which is a wonder since they have cut him off from being head of the Church yet still they reteyn the life of Papacy in the State of such Chancellors and Parators and such
kind of Civill and Ecclesiasticall power mingled together that a Cathedrall Church forty or fifty miles off shall send terrible censures to cut off the poor Saints of God and they must obey it and if they stand in an Hereticall course as they call it there is no living for them they will kill their Propheticall life as they did the two Witnesses or if they do in any effectuall manner work they will not stick to call them to account and cast them out and deliver them to the Secular power and they shall deliver them to fire and sword So then see the danger of such Constitutions it was wrought by the Bishop of Rome and lives by life from him the life of the Law of God breaths not in the pulses of it any that know them know how far they be from the pattern of the Scripture how ridiculous they be to such as discern the state of them You see also what mighty power they have that all civill States have been contented to deliver such to fire and sword whom they have delivered up as Hereticks They soon loose the protection of the Civill State if they loose the favour of imaginary Churches well doth he call them images they are images of the Pope and images which God forbids and the inventions of the sonnes of men Thou shalt not make to thy selfe any graven Image in the second Commandement You shall make no Images of Officers nor Government nor worship but that which Christ himselfe hath set up Fifthly it lets us see how dangerous it is to annex civill penalties ipso facto upon such as are cast out of the Church an usuall thing in Popish Churches or in the Images of such First they suspend them from the Sacrament but then it comes with an Excommunication no man must buy nor sell he hath refused to honour the image of the Beast It is dangerous to bring in civill Authority immediately upon Church-censure A warning to us here that if men be excommunicated not to deny them civill Commerce or to say such as stand out excommunicated so long shall no longer enjoy the priviledges of the State The Church may cut them off from fellowship with it selfe there may be just reason so to do they may discover such hypocrifie as may make them unfit for the Church but yet they may not altogether be unfit for the Common-wealth Sixthly It may serve to humble us so farr as in times past we had any thing to do with this Beast eyther in the loynes of our Fathers with this first Beast the Roman Catholick visible Church or as in our own time we have had any communion I meane Ecclesiasticall communion with the image of this first Beast that is with Provinciall Diocesan Cathedrall National Churches You know it is not my manner to fall into speeches of Christs in other parts it is best for us to look to our owne but when the Text is just so fit now to be silent were to deny the children of God the bread of their portion If it be such a Church as is of the Popes devising as hath provoked the jealousie of God and hath not been derived from the primitive institution that Christ hath established then so far as we have had to deale with them either in office or out of office receiving their Sacraments and their Censures or have published their Censures though God it may be mercifully kept us from publishing such as we did conceive unjust yet forasmuch as there hath been any submittance in this kind any Church-communion whereby we have been admitted into Church-office by the Image of this beast or installed by the ordination of the first beast or so far as wee have submitted to the first or second Beast so far as we have partaked in the holy things of God which flow from Church-communion as Sacraments and Censures do verily so farre we have cause to be humbled though the Lord kept any of us from thinking it any necessity to be reconciled to the Church of Rome or kept us from sundry things in our practice which the Image of the Beast required and though he kept us also from receiving all their Dictates without controll yet for our practice in entring into our calling and our dispensations which have been but images of the first beast and so far as our fellowship in Ordinances with them have cleaved to that Church verily the guilt of that will lye upon such soules as have not unfeignedly bewailed it before the Lord. What think you might be the cause that Christians do complayn of so much deadnesse under such plenty and as some say power of Ordinances I might as justly blame the world for as great part that men think they are forced to lanch out in building and planting an evill haunt and custome hath been rivetred into mens spirits that they have much ado to be content any where but this is not all Nor can I lay it wholly upon over-much confidence in Ordinances we have heretofore thought men happy that had liberty of Ordinances though out in a duty of humiliation God will let you see the emptinesse of all Ordinances that there is no life in them further then he puts in them but I will not put in neither of both these though both these may challenge a part of the deadnesse of the Countrrey and may because of humiliation But giue me leave to say I feare this chiefly that men thought it enough that they were got out of the reach of Summoners and Pariters and such like whose offices have been by the power of the beast the remnants whereof hang in those places where they should not stand I feare men have rested in turning their backs upon such troubles as they were put unto when they have not been serious in judging themselves for these Images of jealousie when they are so loft to be rent from them I feare the Lord hath not humbled them for their old contagion and therefore they are not so dead for what is an Image but deadnesse truly because we are rather in bodily presence then in heart departed from them therefore there is such deadnesse what 's the reason that upon the least motion men are ready to remove to a new Plantation as if they removed from old England to New in a pang If men had a calling upon just grounds to come hither then when we come where the Ordinances of God are we should sit down under the Ordinances under the shadow of the Almighty and never look for more But when that doth not satisfie that we enjoy Ordinances all that liberty we did desire we do enjoy and yet it doth not satisfie certainly there is some sinne lyes in the breast still for which the Lord pursues men with a restlesse frame they are not yet purged from the image of Romish pollution and therefore the Lord sees it not meet to give us rest no not in Sion because in
what I said It hath been a very rare and singular case when any man would acknowledge a particular visible Church depending on no power but Independant within it selfe It is such a rarity that a man may here and there indeed finde it in times of persecution in 3000. years But after the Church come to peace it is very rare to heare such a matter till you come down to the Waldences and Albedences and those poor Churches that were scattered in the Wildernesse It is very hard to finde the Church of Christs Institution to remain in the world whereas this Roman Catholick Church reigns in the world This is a great power and yet this power the Church of Rome had The Harlot reigns over Kindreds Tongues and Nations whereas the true Spouse of Christ hath scarce a subsistance in the world So that consider if it did not smite with our hearts to close with the Inventions of men with satanicall power rather then with Christ it were not possible there should be such aberations from the Institutions of Christ were it not for the impetuous licentiousnesse of the hearts of the Sonnes of men And therefore when there is such a vast swelling that many Congregations shall be but one Church how shall we go home edefied by such discourse This belonges to all the Churches to take the opportunities that we have that we may not runne headlong upon the devices of men or our owne wits to that which is suitable to sence and naturall reason and walking according to the light of naturall conscience Conscience was never so corrupt as in corrupt nature it is and reason never so blinde as in corrupt nature it is and sence never so luxurious A man is ready to please sence his pallat his nostrils his eye and hand and touch and naturall reason and conscience a manis marvellous free that way so free that the lesse a man discerne it the more he is captivated to it And therefore let every man know that we carry about with us a principle of subjection of our selves to the Ordinances of men rather then to Christ If it be to speak to our owne honour and applause we have words at will and hearts that runne full stream that way If it were to set out our selves or our friends we are open hearted and open mouthed that way but if it shall be to give glory to God in the presence of a particular visible Church of Christs Institution there we are marvellous unwilling to submit to edifie our brethren and glorifie God If it were to an Ordinance of man it is a wonder to see how men will runne and ride to give satisfaction to this and that Episcopal Court higher and lower and clear all scores there that we may not be debarred of Christian buriall or Church Communion though it may be we cannot have it with mixture of corruption and can scarse close with it especially those that are enlightned But when we come to sanctifie God his praise and holding forth our own shame there is an inward principle in us to consider whether it stands with our honour and credit with our peace and safety a world of carnall reason and conscience will worke together in this case and inwardly so reply and muzzle the hearts and consciences of men that it is a wonder to see what shifting and daubing there is which they willingly give up themselves to when they are called about the inventions of the Sons of men Thirdly it may teach us if the whole world have runthus mad and wild to give their Crowns and Scepters Churches Common-wealths and consciences to have power put upon all these of their own choise by the man of Sinne every Kindred Tongue and Nation what a shame will it be if we be not as truely devout in our Religion as it is said of Cornelius Acts 10. 1. He was a devout man a Godly man given up to God So should we give up our selves to the Lord and sacrifice our credit and profit and whatever wee have to the Lord. There have been men that have been content to forfit all their Kingdomes to the man of Sin The Emperours in Germany have given their Crowns The Kings of England King John in his time did as much to the Popes Legat And it hath been frequent with him to set the Crowns upon their heads and dash them down with his feet These 42. moneths it hath been frequent with them to give up their Crowns to him but much adoe to runne any hazard for Christ though a petty jurisdiction And yet none did ever truely runne hazard for the Lord but the Lord took up their Crowns and maintayned their cause and honour and recoverd what honour they lost David by making known his Adultery and by his repentance for it did recover what Power and Authority he might seem to loose in the hearts of his subjects It is true he had lost his Kingdome but was it for his Repentance No but for his natural affection to his rebellious Sonne Absolom and his incestuous Sonne Amnon that should have been cut off He lost his Crown not for his Repentance but for want of executing the Law of God upon his own children as upon others there was his Sinne otherwise had he executed judgement upon his rebellious Sonne Absolom as the Lord required thou shalt pluck him from mine Altar that Rebell he had not lost his Kingdome But if so be his naturall affection over-rule him that he doe not execute judgement then no marvaile though they cast him out of his Kingdome and cut his throat at length if God doe not come between as he did to David But belive it no man did ever loose by sanctifying God in his heart by giving honour to him and taking shame to himselfe The Lord hath maintained peace in the conscience hath given it when it hath bin wanting and the Lord hath been pleased to sanctifie their names as they have sanctified his before men whoever shall be ashamed of me and of my words in this adulterous and sinfull Generation of him also shall the Sonne of man be ashamed when he cometh in the Glory of his Father with the holy Angels Mark 8. 38. And it will shortly be the ruine of those things they would preserve the ruine of a mans name and state the ruine of his body and soul together if a man shall dare in the presence of God to give the Glory doe to his Name to a Beast The Lord will be a swift witnesse against all the workers of iniquity Trust God with your honour and estate did he ever â—aile any man to this day Theodosius did submit himselfe and gave glory to God and acknowledged his offence to Ambrose the Pastor of his Church and to the people of God because he had sinned against the Lord to the offence of the Church of God did it weaken his esteem did not all the Churches hear of his repentance