inauspiciously to make cunning Traficking properly Whoredom Let him produce any Lexicographer that will tell us that Traficking signifies Whoring in any approved Authour sacred or profane and a farther answer shall be framed In the mean time to one that will say any thing it is fit to answer nothing Cunning Traficking may be akin to thieving but how it is to simple Whoring I see not Secondly The seventy years Tyre is forgotten and lyes in Ruines cannot be understood of the seventy years of the Babylonish Kingdom For then Tyre should be taken in the beginning of Nebuchadnezzar's reign whenas it was not taken by him till the 4136 year of the Iulian Period which is about 30 years from the beginning of the Babylonian Kingdom as you may see in Petavius his De Doctrina Temporum Thirdly What a vain conceit it is to make the Christian Caesars part of the sixth Head of the Beast I have shewn upon his foregoing Remarks To make them part of the sixth Head is to make them Idolatrous which is a perfect contradiction to the Vision which makes eight Kings but onely seven Heads of the Beast and all of them Idolatrous Wherefore one of these eight Kings must not be Idolatrous which were the Primitive Christian Caesars who were the seventh King of the eight Fourthly Rome was Idolatrous before it was Christian and turned Idolatrous again when it became Paganochristian and Whoredom is the true Symbol of Idolatry known to all wherefore the Harlot though she was silent awhile in the time of the pure Christian Caesars which were the seventh King yet when that time expired she might sing again like a Harlot Nor does this at all hinder but that this Vision is Typical of Rome-Antichristian this stroke setting out more exquisitely the Paganochristianism of their Idolatry that they Paganize again and again play the Harlot by a new Mode of Idolatry which yet is the lively Image of the Idolatry of old Paganism Fifthly As for Pharaoh his being threatened with the death of the uncircumcised we being taught out of the Apocalypse that by Aegypt is understood the Pontifician Hierarchy he must be of a slow sense that does not discern that Prophecy of Ezekiel chap. 32. v. 19. to concern the Papal Hierarchy which pretending to be Holy Church in a special manner and that this Papal Polity is that Kingdom of Christ that shall abide for ever which is the privilege onely of the Millennial Empire of Christ the Prophet upbraids that confidence to this Roman Pharaoh as if he were more holy and pure than other worldly Potentates and therefore says expresly Whom dost thou pass in Beauty Go down and be thou laid with the uncircumcised Thou shalt perish as well as other Heathen or Pagan Polities If there were not some such weighty sense as this under it it is incredible that Pharaoh's lying down in Death with the uncircumcised should be so often repeated in this Prophecy He is reckoned amongst that long list of uncircumcised Potentates whose Empires failed and so must his though he thinks himself in such a special manner a circumcised one and to be that Christian Kingdom which shall never fail Sixthly That the Prince of Tyre is described as adorned with the High Priest's Vestments is evident from hence in that of all the nine pretious stones which are named there is not one of them but what is in the High Priest's Breast-plate but to have named all twelve had been too bare for the nature of a Prophecy of this kind and too sorry a conceit it would be to fansie the Breast-plate without the other cloathing And his naming a little after the anointed Cherub shews that the Prophet's fancy was carried into the Temple into the Sanctum Sanctorum and to the High Priest who alone had power to enter thereinto Seventhly And as to his being said to be in Eden the Garden of God that ill sutes with the City of Tyre built on a hard steril Rock whenas Italy the seat of the Sacerdotal Prince chiefly aimed at is by Geographers and Historians acknowledged to be the very Paradise of Europe Nor does the Remarker mend himself by making the Prince of Tyre the tallest Cedar in the garden of God by referring to Ezek. 31. For that example of the King of Assyria is brought in onely to set out the high Sovereignty and Magnificency of Pharaoh who is a Type of Antichrist that exalteth himself above all that is called God or is worshipped It is a Parable taken up against him And therefore v. 18. it is said Thou shalt lye in the midst of the uncircumcised for all thy pretended Holiness with them that be slain with the sword This is Pharaoh and all his multitude saith the Lord God The whole Parable of the King of Assyria is understood of Pharaoh and consequently of the Papal Hierarchy and it does lively set out the business but it would take up too much room to give an account of it here Eighthly There must be a strange thick callosity on the perceptive faculty of that man that can discern no more by those expressions The anointed Cherub The Holy Mountain of God The walking up and down in the midst of the stones of fire viz. cloathed with the Vestments of Aaron as was above noted than the signification of forsooth an Angelical state as if the Angels in Heaven were anointed Cherubs whenas it plainly refers to the Cherubim in the Sanctum Sanctorum which were anointed and consecrated of an high and mighty Merchant with a company of his cunning Traders and Trafickers if not blew-apron men grown rich and wealthy by their worldly craft and subtilty nothing less than the most holy things in the Temple of God must set out the greasie glory of these fat Burgomasters and their worldly splendour and prosperity arising from their over-reaching arts in Trafick and the thence issuing sordid gain What a homely course conceit is this Ninthly As for the name Sanctuary being applied to Moab the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which is in both places is of a general signification and signifies any consecrated place whether it be to the God of Israel the true God or otherwise But that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 here respects the true God and alludes to the Sanctuary of the God of Israel and therefore denotes some high and mighty Priest principally not a worldly though princely Merchant the anointed Cherub the holy Mountain of God and the Vestments of Aaron a little before mentioned do naturally indicate and that the fancy of the Prophet had not withdrawn it self from the Temple at Ierusalem The allusion to whose most holy things to conceive to be merely to set out the worldly prosperity of a City of subtile cheating Merchants as also to conceive that the comparing of the Wisedom of the Prince of Tyre with that of Daniel and making the Tyrian Prince prefer his own before it doth denote onely his cunning in Trading and not some
this must needs beget a many frigid and dilute notions and interpretations Such as these are that follow The measuring of the Inner Court signifies its preserving from the toils the Outer is oppressed with which he offers as an argument that they synchronize But the natural and obvious sense and onely sense of measuring a thing is to try if it have its just dimensions discoverable by the measure Thou son of man shew the house to the house of Israel that they may be ashamed of their Iniquities and let them measure the pattern And suppose measuring signified preserving yet it follows not that they of the Inner Court and they of the Outer synchronize but that such an Interval of the Church which answers to the Inner Court shall be preserved from such Apostasies as that succession of the Church which answers to the Outer Court shall fall into And a like groundless conceit it is that the Worshippers in the Temple and in the Thysiasterion should be the two Witnesses as if the two Witnesses were not sufficiently described under that very Title in the Residue of the Vision and moreover by an allusion to Zorobabel and Ieshuah but must be typified also the secular Magistratical Witness by those in the Temple the Sacerdotal by those in the Thysiasterion Which is the most evanid and uncouth conceit that any man of wit and parts could pitch upon But the former must signifie so because there was the Law in the Ark on which the Divine Presence was seated in the Mercy-seat as on a Throne of Judgment to be consulted with But I answer therefore the Worshippers there were in the quality of Subjects rather than Magistrates Besides he that sits here in the Throne sits there not to judge Causes but to utter Oracles which is the office rather of a Priest or Prophet than of a Judge as Aaron's Breast-plate was called the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And this Sanctum Sanctorum where the Divine Presence is seated in Hebrew is called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which the Seventy usually render 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 but Aquila and Symmachus 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as Buxtorf also Oraculum What 's this to civil Magistracy And though the Law was in the Ark yet this Law concerns Sacerdotal matters as much if not more than Civil and Aaron's Rod that budded was there also To all which you may add that the Temple altogether relates to Sacerdotal matters and Religion To the high Priest alone it was permitted to go into the Sanctum Sanctorum In the Sanctum was the Incense-Altar which was once a year sprinkled with the bloud of the Sacrifice by the high Priest And the golden Candlesticks were also there which denote the light of the World as the Altar of Incense the requisiteness of Prayers which two duties of Preaching and Praying the Priest's lips shall preserve knowledge are the notorious duties of the Priesthood Thus it was with the Temple but for the Thysiasterion not the Priests alone were there but upon the occasion of offering their oblations and sacrifices which the sons of Aaron assisted in the people had frequent recourse thither Let us consider what Oecumenius and Elias Cretensis tells us in Cornelius à lapide upon Exod. 27.21 There were three Tabernacles say they the first the outmost closed on the sides with Curtains and open above which they call 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Sanctum seculare or Mundanum because it was common to all In this stood the brazen Altar for Holocausts sub dio This therefore is the Thysiasterion The second Tabernacle was the Sanctum quod erat quasi Templum Sacerdotum hoc undique clausum erat nexum Sancto Sanctorum In hoc erat Candelabrum c. And the last Tabernacle was the Sanctum Sanctorum soli Pontifici patens c. Add unto these the Autority of S. Chrysostome and Theophylact to which also Erasmus subscribes Out of this I think it is abundantly manifest what a groundless conceit this is to make those in the Temple the Secular and Magistratical witness and those in the Thysiasterion the Sacerdotal when both the Temple and Thysiasterion belong to the Priests though the people had also access to the Thysiasterion but are unfit to represent those that are in the ruling or judicial office And therefore it is plain that those in the Temple and Thysiasterion signifie but one sort of men or one succession of the Church that are symmetral indeed as answering to the measure they were measured with but one part less holy than another as the Holiness of the Sanctum Sanctorum Sanctum and Thysiasterion differs in degrees For the Church in her Holiness lessened by degrees till at last she fell into her gross Apostasie Vers. 2. The Court without the Temple being left out and not measured is explained by the Holy City being troden under foot c. Which shews that the coming down of the New Ierusalem from Heaven is the Restauration of the outward Court that God may be worshipped there as in the inward Court which during the time of the other being left out continued in such a state as to need no restauration and consequently they synchronize Ans. That City viz. the Church which was holy before the Apostasie and therefore compared to the Inner Court being troden down by the Gentiles after the Apostasie came in is compared to the Outer But the Outer Court is here explained by the Holy City because in Moses's time there was no other Outer Court than the Camp of Israel or the holy people of the Iews who were gathered in the Outer Court when the Temple was built to serve God as Mr. Mede has rightly noted And therefore the coming down of the New Ierusalem from Heaven is the Restauration of the Outer Court that is of the Apostated Church to the Primitive Purity of the Inner before the Apostasie But what argument of the state of the Inner and Outer Court sychronizing can there be gathered from hence Vers. 7. The ordinary Translation viz. And when the Witnesses shall have finished their Testimony is true And the Beast overcoming them is not onely Politically meant in keeping them out of power but also in silencing them from Prophesying And for this it is that the dwellers on Earth do so rejoice over them because the Witnesses had tormented them viz. by their prophesying Now they prophesied 1260 days so that the victory over them for which there 's such joy being after their prophesying viz. for their being silenced it must be after the 1260 days Nor can they be supposed to prophesie the three days and an half they are said to lye dead though they may when they are onely Politically slain viz. kept out of power Ans. The ordinary Translation is true so far as it respects the sense of the Letter or Cortex But when they shall be a finishing their testimony is also a true and natural sense
there had wanted an Animal to typifie Reason unless you made Man the Type of both and put the Eagle quite out of office Thus crude and broken is the Remarker's conceit in this matter Again There are good Scriptural-phrases produced about the two flying wings of the Seraphins which he will have the same with the third pair of wings of the Beasts but the Application is methinks much of the Hooks For the two flying wings of the Seraphins Esay 6. signifie the readiness and expediteness of their Ministry enjoyn'd by God to the service of his Church whenas he referrs it to the exalting of ones self from a Worldly and Earthly to a Heavenly state Thirdly That seems a precarious groundless conceit or rather false That the Tree of Life was not set in Paradise for Adam to eat of but to play at Chop-cherry with him and to mock him whenas the Text says The Lord commanded the Man saying Of every tree of the Garden thou shalt eat and I hope the Tree of life was one of them The Original is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 thou hast plenary commission if not command to eat of all saving the Tree of Knowledge of good and evil Which had been a mere mocking of Adam if he had no power of eating of the Tree of Life And now fourthly this being a fundamental mistake of the Remarker in the case of Adam the like discovers it self in his conceit touching the Iews and the two Visions of Ezekiel that of the four living Creatures and that other of the Temple God gave no impossible Commands to the Iews But those exquisite descriptions of things touching the Temple by a long and operose Hylasmus and Israelismus set not out what the Iews should have been if they had kept these Ordinances exquisitely but what the Church of Christ would be of which the Iews were a Type in process of time That this is the sense of that Vision the Apocalypse that borrows so many things from it and uses such frequent Allusions to the Temple does sufficiently indicate Nor is there any other sense of the Vision of the four living Creatures as touching the Iews who were not upon condition of legal performances to arrive to that Angelical State that the Christian Church with them will arrive to at last But the Divino-political sense of that Vision which yet is most properly applied to it as repeated in the Apocalypse which relates to the Camp of the Iews a figure of the State of the Christian Church to come is that the Church of God at last will answer the Pattern of the Angelical Kingdom and God's Will will be done on Earth as it is in Heaven Fifthly The Name of the City The Lord is there is the very Indication of the state of the New Ierusalem which is a demonstration it was never intended for the Iews under their Legal Dispensation upon any terms Sixthly Ezekiel is not here sent to Prophesie the Ruine of the City and Temple they both having been destroyed fourteen years before But they being destroyed he in this Hylastick and Israelistick way prophesies of the state of the New Ierusalem which the Apocalypse also describes Seventhly therefore The Iews their making a golden Calf and craving a King whatever other inconveniences it may cause to them it could not make them forfeit that which was never intended them in that state Eighthly If the Beasts be the Governed and the four and twenty Elders the Governours how come the Beasts to be upon the Throne and the twenty four Elders onely about it Ninthly The Wheels and living Creatures being not moved but as acted by the spirit does not signifie an Earthly state in them but the most Divine and Heavenly viz. an Vnselfwilledness in them That they have no Self excursions of mind or will but that the Spirit of life from the eternal mind is the perpetual principle of their motion and rest Tenthly That the four Beasts are not upon the Throne I have shew'd upon that place of the Apocalypse and that he contradicts himself in saying so I observed even now in the eighth Note Eleventhly The burning Coals which are Prunae do not signifie the Spirit of Elias in Men but the Seraphick Spirit in Angels as Seraphin from 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 has its denomination viz. from burning And the Seraphin are counted of the higher sort of Angels And as for Lamps they are in the description of the scene of the New Ierusalem Apoc. 4. Now for the Temple I say Twelfthly That the whole Vision of the Temple concerns the Christian Church and therefore that command to the Prophet chap. 43.10 11. respects especially the Thyatirian and Sardian Interval thereof that they may repent of all their sins and corruptions and so make what haste they can toward that excellent State of the Church which is prefigured by the Vision of the Temple Thirteenthly As for the Numbers 25000 5000 and 500 Ezek. chap. 45. and 666 in the Apocalypse nothing more can be signified by the former viz. those in Ezekiel than that the New Ierusalem will gratifie even the external man also and his outward senses which the Quinary number does denote namely that even the outward State of the Church then will be rich and glorious according to what is likewise prophesied of in the Apocalypse that the Kings of the Earth shall bring their honour and glory into it And it is the encouraging Prediction of Christ himself Seek the Kingdom of God and his righteousness and all worldly good things shall be added thereto Which will most amply be fulfilled in the Millennial Empire of Christ which is that eminent Kingdom of God upon Earth And for that other Number 666 it is not set down to signifie the most complete carnal politick State but to be a certain character of the Pontifician Hierarchy the two-horned Beast who are discovered to have affected the number 25 which is the root of 666. That is the main drift of that Number though deluding their followers with pleasing Objects of sense may haply be aimed at thereby also Fourteenthly The 18000 measures which is the compass of Ezekiel's City agreeing with the Perimeter of the New Ierusalem whose Solid or Cubick measure is 12000 furlongs in the Apocalypse the true and usefull meaning of that is to assure us that Ezekiel's Vision of the Temple is a Prophecy of the State of the Church which is set out by S. Iohn in his description of the New Ierusalem that men may make no vagaries into any other fancies as the Remarker has done here And the Wisedom and Providence of God is admirable herein Besides if that Externality or Superficiality were aimed at which the Remarker would have signified the measure of the Superficies of the Cube not the Perimeter would have been set down and made use of Fifteenthly The difference of the Mosaical Laws and those of Ezekiel's Temple the greater exactness of these above the other is
such as are pure Saints and have the truth of life dwelling in them And however that be men will not then be born Saints but emerge into true Saintship by degrees and therefore will need an external direction But the Remarker seems to imagine they will be grown men as soon as they drop out of the womb and will want no Childrens Catechisms to instruct them Vers. 6. I will give to him that is a-thirst of the fountain of the water of life freely does primarily respect the Millennial State which is the present subject and so likewise do the words in the next verse viz. Shall inherit all things yet eternal Rewards may be included in those promises Ans. I say these places here mentioned do plainly point at the Heavenly Reward as the Expositor has explained them when Christ saves us to the utmost His saying he is Omega as well as Alpha intimates as much For the last letter in the Alphabet of salvation is our enjoyment of the Heavenly Inheritance in which we inherit all things that heart can wish And v. 7. as if he alluded to the conclusion of his Epistle to the Church of Laodicea which farther confirms the Expositor's sense of that Epistle he useth the phrase He that overcometh He shall inherit all things and I will be his God he speaks there in reference to his Divinity and he shall be my Son and consequently an heir of the celestial Inheritance with Christ enjoying such happiness as his glorified Humanity does there in the Kingdom of his Father Vers. 13. The Inscription of the Names of the twelve Tribes on the Gates is but a continuance of that Israelism which runs through the whole Prophecy But if the imagined sense here were true that there is no entrance into the dispensation of the spirit without endeavours to live up to the external rules of the Word as well as one can how come Publicans and Sinners to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven before the legal Scribes and Pharisees Ans. To make the distinct parts of the continued Israelism in this description of the New Ierusalem to signifie nothing is to make the Spirit of Prophecy to trifle in the description thereof Nor does this usefull and edifying sense the Expositor has given at all clash with that saying of our Saviour That Publicans and Sinners enter into the Kingdom of Heaven before the Scribes and Pharisees For they did not live up to the external Law of God as near as they could for then they had been sincere But our Saviour Christ expresly calls them Hypocrites Wo unto you Scribes and Pharisees Hypocrites ye tithe mint and cumin but omit the weightier matters of the law judgment mercy and faith So that there was more sincerity in the Publicans and Sinners our Saviour pleads for than in them Vers. 15. The golden Reed here is to answer to all the rest of the splendid Description of the New Ierusalem but neither it nor the Angel measuring with it signifies the Ierusalem state to surpass those measured ch 11. For it being as is shewed there the restauration of the outward Court to the inward is not a superiour state to that of the Worshippers in the inward Court But the measuring there by a man is by Iohn himself to signifie his being to Prophesie of them and what he does Prophesie of them respects chiefly their preservation from being troden down and the duties they should perform So that a golden Reed were not agreeable for that occasion Ans. This shuffling off this solid interpretation of the Angel's measuring the City with a golden Reed depends upon the Remarker's making the Witnesses and the Worshippers in the Temple and Thysiasterion ch 11. to be the same and the Inner and Outer Court to synchronize But the vanity of this Imagination I have sufficiently confuted on that Chapter And therefore measuring the Inner Court signifying the symmetricalness of the Church visible for about 400 years after Christ as not yet degenerated into that gross Apostasie and there being different degrees of Holiness in the Sanctum Sanctorum Sanctum and Thysiasterion which also insinuates that that Interval of the Church did lessen in its Holiness by degrees till at last it degenerated into that state of the Apostasie and according to History those times having several things in them of a superfluous and combustible nature that will not abide the fire as Gold will and lose nothing of its weight it is apparent that that state of the Church was inferiour to this of the Millennium and that being measured by an ordinary combustible Reed and but by a man for Iohn was such this by an Angel and with a golden Reed it does not onely admit but enforce upon the intelligent such an Interpretation as the Expositor has given which is an edifying instructive Interpretation when that account the Remarker gives signifies nothing viz. onely That the golden Reed here is to answer to the described splendour of the New Ierusalem I demand then What does that ordinary Reed answer to Certainly to a more combustible and inferiour condition of the Inner Court or the Worshippers therein viz. the Church for about 400 years after Christ. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as Aristotle somewhere tells us The City therefore being measured by a golden Reed and by an Angel is not said so for pomp sake or merely to follow suit as at a game at Cards but by an antistoechal Reflexion on the Reed and the man measuring the Inner Court ch 11. to denote the excellent State of the Millennial Church above that of the Church till about 400 years after Christ though that was an excellent state of the Church too in comparison of the times of Apostasie This is more than enough on this Remark that which I have wrote on ch 11. does alone abundantly demonstrate the weakness thereof Vers. 18. The City being of pure gold does signifie the sound judgment and righteousness that will dwell therein by the Throne of God and the Lamb being in it Which to be sure will not be without charity but the description does respect a spiritual state of Government Ans. Sound judgment and righteousness necessarily arise from the Spirit of Divine love or charity Vnself-interessed Love must needs clear the sight in judgment But the Remarker is shy of admitting Charity primarily to be understood because it sutes so well with making the Millennium the same with the Philadelphian Interval after the settlement of things which he has taken a toy against though it be most certainly true Vers. 19 20. The twelve stones which are the foundation of the Wall need not each of them a particular signification here but as all pretious stones are chiefly valued according to their degrees of splendour and solidity so these two qualities seem mainly here to be aimed at to signifie the soundness and beautifulness of that Apostolical Righteousness whereon the safety and defence of the New Ierusalem shall be
Civis so such an unregenerate man would be a good Christian Monarch not at all Antichristian A man would think that the Remarker were a Republican or Antimonarchical man by such wild passages as these But what follows may clear him from that suspicion For he likens the Autority that those Spiritual Kings and Priests will have in the Millennial State over those they govern to that Rule and sway which the Nobility Gentry and Clergy have over the Commonalty c. Which if it relates to the English Constitution he must needs understand of the Time out of Parliament because Convocations Councils and Parliaments are of a Political nature which he will not allow of in the Millennium From whence it is manifest that the Rule of those Spiritual Kings and Priests in the Millennium over them they govern is merely precarious and they may chuse whether they will obey them or no. And so this deep mystery of the Remarker touching the Millennial State is resolved at last into mere Anarchy Though I will be so charitable as to hope he will allow Monarchy to be the best Government till that time which is far enough off that the Millennial Anarchy comes in This is an extravagant dream arising out of a dry and over-thoughtfull Melancholy thus to fansie the Millennial State here on Earth to be Aziluthical or like Ovid's golden Age when there was neither Law nor Magistrate whenas I have above noted that even the unfallen Angels and that before the lapse of any were in a state Briathical or Political in the Heavenly Regions And lastly as for the Joy and Doxology he concludes with no intelligent good man but would be more thankfull to Divine Providence for such a tight and well-knit Polity in the Millennial Kingdom of Christ as I have described than such a lax and lazy Anarchy as is described by the Remarker Vers. 24. The Kings of the Earth bringing their glory to it does not signifie their becoming Converts but their doing honour to it by Acts of bounty c. as foreign Princes did sometimes honour to the Temple of Ierusalem by Sacrifices and Presents though they became not Converts Ans. That the Kings of the Earth bringing their glory to it does signifie their becoming Converts plainly appears from the precedent part of the verse for there is but the repeating according to an usual scheme in Scripture the same thing again in different words the Conversion of Nations implying the Conversion of their Kings and the Conversion of Kings the Conversion of the Nations they rule over And the Nations of them that are saved shall walk in the light of it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which answers exquisitely to that passage Act. 2.47 The Lord added every day to the Church 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 new Converts such as should be saved And Esay also to which this place of the Apocalypse alludes chap. 60.2 plainly confirms this sense 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The Nations shall come to thy light and Kings to the brightness of thy Rising Lift up thine eyes round about and see all they gather themselves together they come to thee thy sons shall come from far and thy daughters shall be nursed at thy side Then thou shalt see and flow together and thy heart shall fear and be enlarged because the abundance of the Sea shall be converted unto thee the forces of the Nations shall come unto thee What can signifie the Conversion of Kings and Nations more fully than this Chap. 22. Vers. 1. THis pure River of Water of life is the waters of life which every one that is a-thirst is called to drink of freely and its issuing out of the Throne does signifie that the executing of righteousness by the Throne of God dwelling among them is accompanied with the full communion of his Spirit So that the Throne of God is not here to be applied to those that are in Autority more than the whole City in which the Throne of God is and that communion with him by his Spirit is a blessing attending the Throne of God being therein viz. It 's that River the streams whereof make glad the City of God Psal. 46. Ans. The Expositor has given so easie apposite and natural a sense of this and the following verse that were it not for the pertinacious continuance of the Remarker in his Aziluthick dream he would never go about to substitute any other in lieu of it and say The Throne of God is not here to be applied to those that are in Autority more than the whole City As if the Throne of God which doubtless signifies the Sovereign Throne as Apoc. 12.5 were equally erected in every private Citizen What can be more gross than this This is like that arrogance in Core Dathan and Abiram Numb 16. who said to Moses and Aaron Ye take too much upon you seeing all the Congregation are holy every one of them and the Lord is among them As the Remarker says The Throne of God is in the whole City If every Citizen then be a Sovereign Magistrate where are the People to obey Wherefore it is a mere Aziluthick dream and a substituting Anarchy for an holy and righteous Polity and perfectly repugnant to the very Text. And therefore that v. 17. of him that is athirst his drinking the waters of life freely is rather to be interpreted Politically by this River issuing from the Throne of God that they that sincerely desire it may admit themselves into a Church and Polity where pure Doctrine and impartial Iustice is to be had and where there are none that do 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 nor sell Justice for money and bribes Which yet does not exclude that more general sense of the communion of God's Spirit in all the Citizens of the new Ierusalem Vers. 2. Tree of life may be another Symbol to signifie the same thing with the Waters of life And thus did the Tree of life signifie in Paradise viz. That Dispensation of life to be revealed by the Prince of life who brought life and immortality to light And therefore Adam was not disposed to eat of the Tree of life being not forbidden though he was so forward to eat of the Tree that was forbid which after he had done he was expelled Paradise lest he should then take of the Tree of life whereby is signified that enterance into life is not to be gained by following our own inventions in searching after the knowledge of good and evil But if this Tree of life be taken as it is here to signifie Men it must not be to signifie Grandees onely but all Citizens viz. all Plants of Righteousness nourished by the Waters of life The leaves healing the Nations does not mean those that were become Subjects to Christ's Kingdom and Discipline but neighbouring Nations whose Kings brought their honour and glory to the new Ierusalem And that light of Instruction they borrowed from the glorious lustre of it in the light
the Lion denoted the same The swiftness of whose expeditions viz. of the King of Babylon Ieremy compares to the slight of Eagles chap. 4. and chap. 40. Wherefore these four wings of this Leopard answer exquisitely to the description of the He-Goat in the next Chapter which is the same Empire viz. the Greek Behold an He-Goat came from the West on the face of the whole Earth and touched not the ground What did he then but in a manner fly And what can better set out such a flying than wings So fitly do these two Visions explain one another as to this passage But in the mean time the Remarker professeth himself of a wonderfull indistinct conception that cannot distinguish the nature of the four wings in general from the Number of them wherein yet he contradicts himself For he will not say that the four wings as four signifie haughty aspiring but as wings Wherefore as he from the general nature of them would have signified ambitious aspiring which if they did both here and in the Lion it clashes not with the Expositor's Interpretation one Symbol being capable of several senses by an Henopoeia of the second kind so the Expositor from the said general nature of them will have them signifie swiftness which is at least the more principal sense as has been proved and will reach also the swift division of the Greek Empire into four parts Alexander living so little a while after his Conquest Vers. 9. Though it be difficult to give an account of Ezekiels Vision chap. 1. yet I think it may be safely concluded that the living Creatures and Wheels are not Angelical as is here supposed For those four living Creatures agreeing in number and name with the four Beasts Revel 4. for they are both called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and the four faces of each of these living Creatures being the faces of the four Beasts it shews that as the last signifies a successive body or society of men so the other must have the like signification Which is farther confirmed by their all four having the likeness of a man and a man's hand under every wing and their having Calves feet signifying the labour and travel which is given to men under the Sun and also by the spirit that is said to be in them and in the wheels Whereas Angels are called Spirits and not described by any Spirit abiding in them 1. The four faces and the four wings of the living Creatures I take to signifie the same thing viz. The complication in humane nature of the nature of those four Animals signified by the faces that is of Reason Religion Courage and Industry Of these four does humane nature consist and subsist by them they being the life and support of humane affairs The four wings may signifie the several spirits from which these operations are produced and the man's hand under each wing the management of all these operations by reason and prudence The four Beasts all of them representing the same body or society of Christians have the same signification with the four faces and wings of each living Creature but it would not have agreed with them that each of them should have had four faces as it doth with the erect stature of the living Creatures and also it would have been needless being the same thing is signified by the four several Beasts Besides those Beasts having six wings there would have been faces wanting to two of them 2. Which two wings added to the other four I take to be the same with the two wings with which the Seraphims fly Esay 6. these six-winged Beasts being the same with those Seraphims and to signifie that grace and truth which came by Jesus Christ or that Life and Truth which he says he is and thereby the way to the Father And we being by this grace or life and truth quickened and raised unto newness of life in Christ Jesus whereby we cease to be of the World and are delivered from the power of darkness and translated into the Kingdom of our Lord and so raised up and made to sit together in heavenly places in Christ Jesus Ephes. 2.6 they thereby become truly wings to us in exalting us from a worldly or earthly unto such an heavenly state Ezekiel's Vision therefore of the living Creatures and Wheels I take to be a Representation of the ruling of the God of Israel over his people in a natural state under a Legal or Iudaical Dispensation as the twenty four Elders and the four Beasts represent the same rule in a Christian state under the Dispensation of the Divine life The latter of which is to be fulfilled in the Millennium but the former was never fulfilled completely because the Iews failed of living up to the height of that Dispensation 3. But this Vision of Ezekiel and his other also of the Temple seem to be designed for the like purpose as the Tree of life was planted in Paradise viz. to signifie that Dispensation of life which men in due time were to be admitted unto but not then the natural earthly state of man not admitting thereof 4. So likewise the two mentioned Visions the first of them seems to signifie the Spiritual power wherewith God would have ruled over his people and the last the Spiritual communion he would have had with them with the blessing attending the same if they had walked perfectly with him according to all his righteous judgments in that legal dispensation 5. Hence the close of the Vision of the Temple is The name of the City from that day shall be The Lord is there that is from the time they shall keep and observe all the Laws and Ordinances then delivered 6. And hence the God of Israel on sending Ezekiel to prophesie the ruine of the City and Temple and Captivity of the people does to render their iniquity more heinous shew himself to the Prophet in the glory of that government which their transgressions made them fail of or fall from to be cast off 7. Two instances of their falling from that Government are First their making the Calf whereon God who Exod. 29.45 46. had promised to dwell among them does chap. 33.2 3. say he will send his Angel before them but refuseth to go up in the midst of them lest he destroy them Secondly their desiring a King which is said to be not the rejecting of Samuel but of God to rule over them 8. The Wheels I take to be the same to the four living Creatures as the four Beasts are to the twenty four Elders viz. as the Governed to the Governours 9. And both the Wheels and living Creatures being under the Throne and not rising but as lifted up nor moving but as acted by the spirit which was in both seems to signifie the natural earthly state of those they represent whereby they were as mere passive Subjects to the actings of the Spirit of God upon them like as the Prophets were to
peace which are to flourish in his Kingdom yet this King so acknowledging him and honouring him with splendid superstitious devotions shall notwithstanding continue the same iron Kingdom as formerly though mixt with Clay in the sense mentioned Vis. 1. viz. the same Kingdom of violence and war Ans. Nothing was ever writ with more judgment elegancy and solidity in Explication of Prophecies than what that excellent Interpreter Mr. Mede has writ on this and the foregoing verse Which yet this conceited Remarker very superciliously calls a conceit and says is very remote from the intended sense of the Text when nothing is more congenerous thereto the Prophecy intending to describe the State of the Church as to Religion and Divine Worship in that space of the Time and Times and half a Time when the little Horn which is this King of Pride should rule the rost And therefore we may be sure it will not omit to perstringe the Idolatry then sprung up I mean the Pagano-christian Idolatry or an Idolatry of a new Mode For it is said of this King of Pride v. 37. That he shall not regard the God of his Fathers i. e. either none of the Pagan Gods he shall regard none of them or if you will more particularly he shall not regard that proper God of his Fathers viz. Mars whom Grotius would have understood by the red Dragon Of which Mars Romulus and Remus were born and he is the special Presidentiary God of the Roman City and Empire as Grotius himself also will have it This God of his Ancestors this King of Pride does not regard but is one who with his Hierarchy professes Celibate forbidding to marry a single life for him and his Adherents being most sutable and for their ambitious designs and preferring his own Politick ends before any God or Religion it follows v. 38. according to a true skilfull and faithfull account of the sense out of the Hebrew Together with God he will in his place or Temple where he is worshipped honour the Mahuzzim not Mars the proper God of his Ancestors but these new 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as Mahuzzim may signifie from the Seventy's Translation Psal. 31.3 these new Numina defensoria of his Empire even with a God his fathers knew not which is Christ shall he honour them with gold and silver and pretious stones c. This is the onely easie and genuine sense that can be made of the 38 th verse And it being thus plain to any unprejudiced eye that these Mahuzzim are the Daemons that S. Paul speaks of 1 Tim. 4. where he tells us that the Spirit has foretold 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 expresly that those that forbid to marry c. will bring in the worship of Daemons which express Prediction is no-where but here and the degenerating Church looking upon the Relicks of Saints and their consecrated Images whose form of consecration does sometimes specifie their intended virtue against the Invasion of Enemies to be the Defence of the City where they are and the Saints themselves to be their Mahuzzim their 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Martial and Warlike Defenders of the City where Temples or other places are consecrated to them What a groundless Cavil is this of the Remarker to except against Mr. Mede's rendring the sense of this present verse thus which is exquisitely according to the Hebrew viz. And he shall make the Holds of the Mahuzzim jointly to the foreign God understanding it of Churches and Monasteries For the Mahuzzim being once such Warlike Defenders expressed so under that Notion and their help being supposed to come from the places consecrated to them what an easie and obvious Analogy is it to call those consecrated places strong Holds or Forts a And the Prediction is not of what they would be in Reality but what they would be thought and reputed Which therefore is a foretelling of those delusions in the Church under the reign of the King of Pride That the people should put their trust and confidence in such vanities b What the Remarker would substitute in lieu of this excellent account of Mr. Mede is very frigid and jejune it giving notice of nothing but that the King of Pride will be for war as well as other Potentates and so making him to honour the God of forces he makes him still a worshipper of Mars the God of his Ancestours contrary to the Text. Besides there is this other Incongruity in this conceit in that this Prince of Pride is not a Sword-man but Rex sacrorum and his power lyes merely in a manner not in Martial forces and feats of Arms but rather in Magical Incantations and lying Miracles and prestigious charming of people into such superstitions as make most for his own advantage and such whereby he has an hank upon the Empire and deludes them with all deceiveableness of unrighteousness c And as for the Antithesis in professing Christ who is the Prince of Peace and yet to be given to War Is not the Antithesis at least as full when Christ came to introduce a pure divine Worship to Worship the Father in spirit and in truth that this King of Pride has filled all with superstitious Rites and Idolatries towards the Mahuzzim the Daemons or deceased Saints And lastly there is another a more near proper and immediate Antistoechy or Opposition betwixt the Genius of this King of Pride and his Ancestours in Mr. Mede's way they worshipping the God Mars in a gross Pagan secular sense he the Mahuzzim which are as it were so many 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Paganochristian Mavortes in a sense more Spiritual and Ecclesiastical To all which you may add That Grammar and Criticism will not so easily comply with the Remarker's way But I have been too long on this Remark already Vers. 44. Thy tydings out of the North is surely more likely to be meant of the Germans Poles Muscovites c. than of the Tartars both because they are directly North of the Turks whenas the Tartars are as much East as North of them and also because the End here foretold against the Turks is more likely to be executed by the Christians than by those of the same Religion with the Turks especially whenas it is sent upon them in reference to the advancement of Christianity which is the occasion of its here being foretold Ans. That the tydings out of the North is surely more likely to be meant of the Germans Poles Muscovites c. than of the Tartars is spoke with more confidence than sound assurance of Reason For the Tartars being North-East of the Turks but much more properly North than the Persians it is easie and natural to conceive that the tydings out of the East being out of Persia that the News of the Stirs in Tartary would be called the Tydings out of the North the Tartars being a people so hugely more North than the Persians Any one that but casts his eye on a Map