still preserv'd on the other side that the Imperial Torch however Flaming yet falling into the Water would be soon quenched while a burning Mountain resisted the contrary Element so Rome liv'd but the Emperour dy'd Rome Burns as a Mountain in the Sea and though it turn'd the Waters into Blood yet it surviv'd to ride aloft upon a new Universality The Flaming Taper did hurt while it flam'd but falling into Water must needs be short-liv'd And it was to dye that another sort of Principality might succeed it upon which Romes Grandeur a City Reigning over the Kings of the Earth might have the Guaranty of Prophecy even as of Providence to secure it for a longer time than by all Computation it had made the Epoch of Vrbs Condita or it had been Built I am yet to state justly and more at large what the Dragon Enquiry 5 means and how his Persecution of the Woman can agree with the Explanation of the Trumpets seeing both must be at the beginning of the Line because then was the Woman's first flight into the Wilderness when the Dragon persecuted her from whence arise these two Doubts How can these Trumpets that are the Alarms of Divine Doubt 1 Judgment and Displeasure upon the Antichristianiz'd Empire as was before declared be the Dragons Persecution of the Woman When the Beast or his Gentiles have the whole Time Doubt 2 Times Half Time and so the 1260 of the Womans Wilderness-state under their Domination and Tyranny does not the Dragons Persecution of the Woman and then of the Seed contradict the Assertion of this Time to the Beast That these two Doubts may be substantially resolved and so as to clear the whole progress of this Time with Relation to the Beast we must understand aright concerning the Dragon for a mistake in that confounds the whole order of the Prophecy The Dragon then as it is presented Revel 12. 3. with Seven Heads and Ten Horns hath a double meaning One proper to it as the sixth or Imperial Head of the Roman Empire which headship is always accounted to the whole Roman Beast in this Prophecy But when the Christian Emperour arose That Head became wounded and by degrees the Power and Conduct of it Transmigrated from the sixth to the seventh Head and Eighth King as is to be shewn upon the Symbols of the Beast But in all this it is of great Influence to the right understanding of this Prophecy to be known there is a more abstract signification of Draconism or of the Dragon viz. the Old Serpent deceiving the Nations into the Worship of himself under the disguise of those many Idol Gods and Demons they sacrificed and did service to when therefore this Idolatry and Demonolatry was demolished by Constantine and the Christian Emperours and the only True God in Jesus Christ and his Kingdom acknowledg'd at the Head of the Roman Empire Satan that Old Serpent was cast down from Heaven and Christ the manly Birth caught up thither Satan therefore as an Intelligence within at the Head and Spring of all is to be understood in this Dragon Revel 12. 7. The Roman Cesars as having the Imperial Monarchick Government of so great a part of the World at the Birth of Christ so along in the first Times of Christianity lay indeed in the midst of Nations and People and watched all the effects of the Kingdom of Christ and were ready to devour the manly Birth that was to rule the Nations with a rod of Iron and who had right to do so at his Resurrection and all along since But at the Time this Cesarian Dragon was acted by that Satan that invisible Spiritual Dragon and his Angels who made War against Christ who carried the Cesarian Dragon in a perpetual Hostility to the Kingdom of Christ and also most devoted to Idolatry While therefore Devils were worshipped under those several Names of Jupiter Mars c. and an Idolatrous Power was at the Head of the Roman Power Satan is accounted in Heaven and the rather so because the Title of Satan is not reckon'd purely of Fraud and Usurpation but By Permission and not only so but even in regard of Justice and divine displeasure against the Apostacy of humane Nature as it were of Commission so that he was overcome and cast down by the Blood of the Lamb as the true meritorious Cause appeasing that Wrath satisfying that Justice expiating the World by the Word of his Testimony as the Grand instrumental Cause and by the Martyrdom of Christians who loved not their Lives unto Death as a subordinate dispose of God in honour to his Justice against the horrible degeneracy of Mankind From hence whatever Power acted by Sathan to an aspiring to a supreme Residency in the Fourth or Roman Monarchy in the days of which Christ's Kingdom was foretold to be set up and of all Right ought to have been so speaking as to the Duty and Obligation of all Mankind because of his Sovereign Resurrection after his Death and Sacrifice of himself for the Life of the World and that then the Roman Monarchy was the Monarchy of the Oecumene or habitable Earth in Symbol of Prophecy whatever Power therefore did not then acknowledge that Kingdom nor that Truth of Christianity any way either seated in or attempting that Monarchy is under a Character of Draconick the Notion of which came into especial date since that Resurrection of Christ and his Right thereby to an universal Monarchy at which Time the Roman Cesareate arisen to that universal Monarchy from the Time of the more publick Notices of the Right of Christ inspir'd by Sathan with a Draconick Subtilty and watchfulness waited to devour that princely Birth of which Pharaoh's Cruelty to Gods typical first-born lying as a Dragon in the Egyptian Nile was a Type and was therefore by the most notable signancy of the Symbol invested with the Draconick Title But when the Acknowledgment of Jesus as Christ and Lord was made by the Christian Roman Emperour Constantine and his Successors Christ was then in eminent Type caught up to the Throne of God never to be dethron'd as we see he is not to this day notwithstanding the Combat of the Dragon and his Angels by Julian Argobastes the Roman Senate and others with Michael and his Angels But for all this the Woman the Church was persecuted by the rolling of the barbarous Nations upon that Empire who were Enemies to the Profession of Christianity at the first and so to the Kingdom of Christ and their Invasion upon the Rights of the Empire as Christs and on the Roman Church as eminent in the Profession of Christianity and having produc'd the Christian Emperour was both as design'd by Satan and reputed by God a Draconick Persecution of the Woman even as after the Mahometan Flood which came out of the Dragon's mouth to have swallowed up Christianity and that Empire together as it were wherever it could be found was on the very
be a Prince without a People so that though the Gentiles forty two months are necessary before the Beasts forty two months yet they are not necessary to be a distinct time after for the Beasts Power necessarily supposes them they serve therefore not only the Grace of the Type as was said but the Secresie of the Prophesie both which require these numbers should be given entire and parallel even as Adams years of Life ran along to his Death with the common Line of Time to the Flood though it was necessary only until the Time of his Begetting and after that the Line was set upon a succeeding Patriarke and so in the whole Roll every ones Life though it did not support the Line yet corroborated it after the Paidogony or Begetting and so concurred with it to the last even thus the Gentiles Fourty two months support the Bestial Line till the Beasts rising and concurr in it with the Beast while they last and when they are ended there is no alteration because the Bestian Times include to the very last of them the gross Gentilisme of them that dwell on the Earth and the false Prophetisme into which the other Beast sunk down as into a proper Character after the Beasts 666 as Apoc. 19. v. 20. He is called and c. 20. v. 10. But further than this the Beasts forty two months have a certain Epoch viz. at the Year of our Lord 475 in the cessation of the Christian Empire in Augustulus Compare 2 Thess 2. with Revel 17. 10 11. For the Christian Emperours being the sixth King but none of the seven Heads was the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or he that letted or with-held as the Empire was the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or the thing that letted or with-held that the eighth King that was yet of the seven Heads could not succeed for an after King cannot succeed till the former is gone off the Stage especially where God holds the Line of Succession firm so that by adjusting the forty two Months of the Beast as lunar Time to the 1260 Days of solar Time we find thirty eight Years difference and seeing All the whole Line must end with the 1260 the Time of the Beasts forty two Months beginning exactly agrees with 475 thirty eight Years after the 1260 Years of the Witnesses Sackcloath at 437 and All end at 1697. And because we have spoke much of the Intimate Time of the Beast or of his Season Seasons Half-season within time times half a time we have the Pillar of that Time erected Revel 13. 17 18. when his first Season was well or about eighteen Years enter'd viz. at 666 when his Name or Nature was come to his Number and when he was come to his Age of 666 from his Conception which by searching the Root and as the Vnderstanding and Reason of a Man searches Number we find to be Twenty Five by the consent of all Arithmetick as the Time of his Conception when the Mystery of Iniquity like a Womb was at work for him who as a man of those Characters 2 Thess 2. was indeed 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or a Beast and from Twenty Five after the Resurrection or Apocalyptical Epoch the first visible Variation from the Apostolical Twelve both in Time and Nature when it became the Base of another Doctrine Kingdom the Root of another Name the Apostacy conceiv'd and wrought within the Mystery of Iniquity not openly but secretly and as in the lower parts of the Abyss out of which the Beast comes as a Womb at 725 when the War concerning Images began and continued till all that refus'd that Worship were anathematiz'd by the second Council of Nice I say to that 725 when Leo Conon the Grecian Emperour was struck by the Thunderbolt of Excommunication interceeded just 666 Years from twenty five Years after the Resurrection and if by the three days and a half by themselves as also by many other Circumstances leading us to the three days of our Lord's Death we ballance Time we shall find the Proportions for as Christ died in the last fourth part of the first day and rose in the first fourth of the third day so was the Condition of the Witnesses Begin their 1260 days at 437 and at 707 began the last fourth part of the first Day or Time viz. the last 90 of the first 360 as Christ's Death began at the sixth Hour or at twelve the last fourth part of the Nycthemer and was perfected by the end of it to his Burial so the Witnesses from 707 to 797 the end of the first day lay dead in the Street of the great City But it did not become the Type they should be buried and so to 1517 then their first motion to a Resurrection began and their compleat Resurrection at 1697 even to admiration answering the last half day And lastly because Imperial Revolutions as being under the eye of all History most livelily represented by their Emblems and fixed upon their just Rests of Time must needs strengthen Prophecy concerning the Church of God when one joyn Hand in Hand with the other there is therefore the Fall of the Western Empire given by the Divine Apocalyptical Prophecy to the Fall of the Eastern Empire or the taking of Constantinople by such wonderful Types and Figures of the gradual Impressions on the Western Empire Apoc. 8. v. 7. to the end by such Images of the Mahometan Saracens as Locusts c. 9. to v. 13. and of the Turkish Horsemen to the end of the Chap. and with such a Relation to the Antichristian Idolatries and their Impenitency therein adorn'd with such Notes of Time as the five months and five months to the Locusts and the hour the day the month and the year to the Horse-men call'd for by the Voice from the Golden Altar of Incense within the measur'd Temple when the Daily of publick Worship was taken away as makes the Line out of measure excellent and adorable as given by the Holy Spirit to the killing the third part of men or taking Constantinople 1453. Behold then as at a Review the admirable Structure of it and the great Instructions arising from its order of Repetitions upon these short Particulars 1. The intimate Time of this Line is especially most solemnly appointed and design'd and the whole as united with it for it is made and constituted not without an Oath Dan. 12. 7. to be Time Times half a Time and therein Season Seasons half a Season and it is cut off not without an Oath at the end of intimate Time though the whole of the Time Times half time be first supposed to run out at large and the whole both of Time at large and intimate Time also cut off for ever at that end Apoc. 10. 6. 2. The whole of this Line and of the last seventy five Years is measured by even Indictions or Fifteens of Years the use of which Rising in the Reign of Constantine became well known by
a Line of Time in the Cypher of Time Times half a c. 7. Time applyed to a little Horn of the fourth Beast The third pourtrays Three Beasts and makes a little Horn of the Third of them a Type to the little Horn of the fourth Beast of the c. 8. former Vision and the Veil of a Type being thrown over There is a Line of 2302 Days drawn out by the Action of the Type * Antiochus Epiphanes bearing some Resemblance both in Action and Duration of Time naturally and not prophetically understood to that Anti typical little Horn It is drawn I say to the Kingdom of Christ rising on that little Horns Ruine at the End of the 2300 Ev. Mor. The State of the four Monarchies in the fourth of which the Kingdom of Christ breaks the whole Image is much the same in the main in this Vision as in the former The Antichristian King is guilty of the same Blasphemy against the God of Gods or the Lord of Lords and King of Kings as in the former Visions against the Prince of Princes and the most high and lastly the same Date of Time Times half a Time is applied to him yet notwithstanding there are some peculiar Things which this Vision carries all along upon the whole Line of the 2300 Ev. Morn by way of farther Explication as also of the excellent Vision of the seventy weeks and of the Word going forth before it which Vision of the seventy weeks most resembles this Vision in this that it is rather a prophetical History than Imagery The prefatory Description of Christ hath several Magnificencies of Presence like those Revel 1. and also Dan. 7. wherein the Divine Nature of Christ appears in his Mediatorship But in this they differ from the Majesty of Christ as on his Throne wherein Ezekiel's Visions exceed and for the sake of which He is so often honour'd with the Title Son of Man so peculiar to Christ's Kingdom and wherein Daniel came nearest in the Vision of the Sanctuary cleans'd and the Corrival to Christ's Princedome broken without hand at the end of the 2300 Ev Morn All which shall be then fulfill'd in the State of the Jews restor'd of the New Jerusalem and the Kingdom of Christ Rev. 20. 4. and therefore there he is peculiarly call'd Son of Man as before noted To shew it measures the same Time as that of the Ev. Mor. Daniel is much in the same manner affected It begins in its very Date near the Beginning of the Persian Monarchy it runs most evidently to the same End And having now made these general Remarks upon it I come to observe what is most particular in it in the way of a short Elenchus or Table of it 1. It is peculiar to this Vision that tho Christ calls to mind in it His supreme Assistance to His at the first Year of Darius who to distinguish him is call'd Darius the Mede and of the Seed of the Medes at the very Entrance of Cyrus's Persian Monarchy yet his third Year is the critical and precise Date of it for then that wonderful and unexpected stop upon so Royal a Decree by the divine Permission was made Ezr. c. 3. compar'd with c. 4. shewing the leisurely Progresses of the divine Kingdom and as is most probably conceiv'd Cyrus in his third Year making foreign Expeditions Cambyses or Artaxerxes his Son was left Viceroy upon whom the Enemies of the Jews gain'd so far that though they could not plainly command a Cessation yet by Sleights and Artifices They eluded the Decree and frustrated the Work all the days of Cyrus But Cyrus being dead in the days of the proper Reign of Artaxerxes or Cambyses the Son of Cyrus the Adversaries of the Jews writ to him and obtain'd his Edict against the Progress of the Building And in the Reign of Ahasuerus in the beginning of his Reign wrote they also an Accusation and still prevail'd Now by Ahasuerus I understand the Counterfeit Smerdis Ezr. 4. v. 5 6 7. whose Reign being very short it is said In the beginning of his Reign And by Artaxerxes I understand Cambyses who reign'd indeed before Ahasuerus yet the Sacred History intending a fuller Account of the whole matter gives first the general Account that all the days of Cyrus the Work was frustrated then takes in Ahasuerus first because his Reign was short and then gives the true Series of Things in Artaxerxes who was first in the days of Cyrus possess'd against the Jews and suffer'd an artificial Impedition of them When he came to Reign he laid a Prohibition on their Building When Ahasuerus began to Reign after the Death of Artaxerxes the Jews upon that change attempted to revive their Work but on Letters to Ahasuerus by their Enemies were still prohibited At the Reign of Darius being twice discouraged they lay still till arous'd by Haggai and Zechariah the Prophets and confirm'd by Darius in a new Enterprise they begin the Work again That which justifies this as the True Order is That the History expresly tells us upon the Letter to Artaxerxes The work ceas'd and that it ceas'd till the second Year of Darius the Persian all the Days of Artaxerxes Cambyses all the short Reign of Ahasuerus or the Counterfeit Smerdis Under Artaxerxes then it began to cease and till then the Cessation continued And thus often Sacred Story postpones that on which it intends to place the full and largest Accounts and therein directs the true Order yet As here Artaxerxes is postpond to Ahasuerus although before him And of this Delay of the Building the Space otherwise unknown is made known in this Vision by the one and twenty days Resistance Christ found from the Angel-Prince of Persia against whom Michael the Angel-Prince of the Jews stood with Christ Now these twenty one days viz. days for years for what could twenty one days Resistance signifie to such a stop of the Building if naturally taken Daniel observ'd a symbolical Fast three weeks of days a day for a year as Ezekiel observ'd on each side so that it is true The weeks of days do distinguish those weeks of days from the seventy weeks of years and yet they are a Type of twenty one days for years also so that here we have an Explanation of so much Time as the stop of the Building amounted to as so many years of the Persian Time as was before explain'd of the Word going forth and it justifies that Account so far towards 75 where it is possibly most needed 2. Here we have also the Intimation of the whole History of Esther as pertaining to the Decree of the Jews Destruction and Deliverance compris'd in the short Note of Christ's speedy dispatch of this Vision to Daniel and returning to sight for the Jews with the same Angel prince of Persia who Zec. 3. 1. as Sathan stood at their right-hand to resist them and this Reason to believe That Ahasuerus was Xerxes
we would understand them of natural Angels as few or none do But the meaning is The seven Churches contain a very great Mystery throughout the Vision of the Churches Even as upon the forehead of the Woman Rev. 17. 5. was a Title written Mystery Babylon the Great c. that is Understand that whole Inscription in a mystical Sense or to carry the Mystery of the Apostate Church in all Successions so Understand the seven Churches carrying the Mystery of the Christian Church throughout And it is observable the word Mystery is expresly applyed to the True and False Church As it is said here The Mystery of the seven Churches and their Stars or Angels So there I will tell thee the Mystery of the Woman and of the Beast the Fallen Star with the Key of the bottomless Pit that carries her And proportionably this whole Prophecy of the Kingdom draws down into it self the Great Mystery of that Kingdom spoken of by all the Prophets since the World began viz. THE TRUE CHURCH IN GLORY The particularizing upon the Churches the so Apocalyptick Argu. 2 number Seven assures us It will bear its proportion to all the other Sevens And seeing there are no sevens to introduce them nor to receive them and carry them on They must themselves by their own Time Sevens and Symbols embrace the whole Apocalyptical Time and its Sevens For the Book of it is the Book of the Kingdom the Kingdom is the Mystery of God The Churches are the true Kingdoms when they come to their Glory and so a Mystery The Apostate Church is a Mock Kingdom the Kingdom of Antichrist foisted into the place of Christs Kingdom and so a Mystery but a Mystery of Iniquity The Kingdom of Christ and his universal Monarchy is an Empire in a Church of which He is the Head The last State of the Roman Monarchy is an Imperialism by vertue of an Ecclesiastical Image made to it which is a false Christship that is an Empire in an Apostate Church of which Antichrist is the Head How fitly therefore are these Things displayed in the Symbolisms of Churches It is certain There hath been a Christian Church in all Argu. 3 Ages from the Resurrection of Christ to this Day and shall be to the New Jerusalem and to the End of the World This is grounded upon those two Places Matt. 16. 18. Vpon this Rock will I build my Church and the Gates of Hell either of Hell as it signifies the Grave Mortality and Death or the Powers of Darkness shall not prevail against it and Matt. 28. ult Lo I am with you always unto the end of the World Nor is this controverted among any Christians From hence it follows we cannot be Time-bound or straitned in space of Time to place these Successions in For there must necessarily be a Succession of this Christian Church in several Ages and States and so must continue till the End which must as necessarily run a long Apocalyptical Time and so give a bottom to found such Symbols upon if it pleas'd as we suppose it did the Prophetick Spirit to give them As there must necessarily have been a Variety of States of Arg. 4 this one Church so the first of them must needs have been settled and founded in Doctrine Worship Rules of Life Order and Discipline by immediate Inspiration divine Authority and Institution through the Ministry of the Apostles This is most evident from that Book of Scripture written to that purpose The Acts of the Apostles as also from all the Apostolical Epistles From hence it follows the Apostolical Church in its Apostolical State was first in order whether therefore we will allow it to be symbollically represented or not in that first Church of Ephesus it is certain that Labour and Patience twice repeated that trying them which said they were Apostles and were not and finding them Lyars importing the exact consigning all Apostolical Truths and Rules into an authentick Canon of Scripture does most admirably represent that truly Primitive Apostolical State Besides the daily or every days Miscarriages from this excellent Arg. 5 State by Heresies Errors and bad Practises to which degenerate and deeply corrupted Humane Nature is so subject and of which Apostolical Writings take so continual notice there was foretold an eminent visible and notorious Apostacy fix'd and settled upon its own Base out of which Antichrist was to come and so very fit to be taken notice of in this Book of the Kingdom Now this Apostacy was declar'd expresly by the Apostle Paul to be at work in a mystery of Iniquity and the Spirit saith expresly that in the latter Times which latter Times as we have before affirm'd were then begun though every day more and more latter Some that is not a few but a certain sort of men that should make a Body or Species of Men should depart from the Faith If then it had begun so 1 Tim. 4. 1. Written to Timothy as then at Ephesus early in some Lineaments of it although not in that of Nicolaitanism and that it daily proceeded and grew much higher after the Apostles Departure or Death ravening Wolves and Men teaching perverse things arising from Christians themselves Act. 20. 28. c. remonstrated also to this very Church of Ephesus Their leaving their first Love the removing this Candlestick out of the Superiority and Excellency of Primo-geniture and conferring it on Smyrna in the Crown of Life and Philadelphia in the Scepter of the New Jerusalem are most lively Symbols to such a purpose though yet the Overcomers of this protoplast Church are assur'd to eat of the Tree of Life in the midst of the Paradise of God This Apostacy being to become so grand an Apostacy it Arg. 6 must needs proceed and work on by degrees so as that some Church and its Bishop deriving it self from the Apostles should very elderly vere towards a Synagogue of Satan and there should be such an Assumption by it and Deference of Advantages to it by many in the whole Christian Church tending towards and preparing for such an Apostacy that it gain'd Pretensions undesign'd yet to it particularly to intitle it self to such a blooming Antichristian Power as was foretold to come out of the Apostacy for if it could not derive high from Antiquity it could not rise to that Grandeur of Apostacy under the Profession of Christianity And yet in the mean time the Vniversal publick Christian Church may not only remain pure but be first in deep Sufferings for Christ and so fill up the Number of Martyrs dying under the Pagan Draconick Empire but also receive the Crown of Life and of the Glory of the New Jerusalem in a Figure by the Empire becoming Christian as it did in Constantine Now what Type of such a State of the Church could be more express in all this than the Church of Smyrna For whether it was so design'd by the Spirit or not it is certain in
at an Hour this Splendid secure Symbolical Church thinks not of except the few undefiled Names and they of it that overcome who have Promises of greater Glory with Christ then this outward but this Church in its own Name hath the Honour to make a Line of Time from the Reformation to this Day and shall till that sudden coming of Christ upon it when such a State will be at an End There have been Societies of Christians that since the Reformation Arg. 10 have subsisted only upon the Principles of brotherly Love whose Door hath been attempted to be shut upon them as not allowed Churches of Christ or not in such a way of Worship who have had little outward strength who have yet kept the word of Christ and not denyed his Name in a strict adherence to his word only who have Enemies even of the Reformed who are relaps'd down to the same Pitch the Apostacy was at when styl'd the Synagogue of Sathan in the Church of Smyrna not receiving indeed the Beasts Number of 666. but too far link'd with the Corruptions of Antiquity after the Empire becoming Christian soon Antichristianis'd who though for the present at least seem irreconcileable with the Apostacy advanc'd to its Number yet have great Indignation against Philadelphia and its Members These shall at the Kingdom of Christ appearing come and worship at this Churches Feet and be forc'd to acknowledge Christ lov'd it whose Crown of Honour it is that it hath kept the Word of Christ's patience embrac'd the Purity of Christianity in a low and mean State and therefore the Glory the Kingdom the New Jerusalem shall crown it when the Hour of Temptation comes upon all the rest of the Earth and detects the Vanity of their Religion even of their false or defiled Christianity and the Church-state of those who have not overcome the Impurities of them who call'd themselves Churches Christians Reform'd and were not so but did lye This Church is not yet come to its proper space upon the Line of Time nor can do till the Witnesses rise out of their Sackcloth and the Kingdom of Christ be proclaim'd at the seventh Trumpet And how excellent a Type of all this is the Church Philadelphia There shall be a most perfect happy and glorious State Arg. 11 of the Church before the Resignation of the Kingdom to God and the Father during the thousand years the very first Recidivations from which shall be spew'd out of Christ's Mouth and the whole of Church-States drawn up into Eternity of which Loadicea is a clear Emblem viz. of the Recidivation and spewing out in that last State Now from All this it is most evident The Church of Ephesus may have place from the first preaching the Gospel till the cruel Persecution of Dioclesian into which last and most cruel One All the Christian Blood shed from the Resurrection sunk down as the Blood from Abel to Zacharias upon the Generation of the Jews in the Time of our Saviour and was requir'd of it therefore here Smyrna began to compleat the Churches Sufferings in being faithful unto Death and receiv'd the Crown of Life in the Symbol of Constantine's Christian Empire and so down to Theodosius the Great all which Time the Church continued pure although it began to be check'd by a Synagogue of Sathan Thus these two Churches contemporiz'd with the Seals Pergamus and Thyatyra ran along with the six first Trumpets under the Apostasie and Bestian Tyranny till in the latter part of the sixth Trumpet Thyatyra eluctated into the Reformation then several of the reform'd Churches settled into the Sardian state and draw the Line of Time with the last 180 of the 1260 Years in Conjunction with Thyatyra still existent tho' not intitled any longer to bear this Line and with Philadelphia not yet come to bear the Line of Time which last shall bear the last 75 Years from the Witnesses Rising and the Kingdom of Christ proclaim'd till the New Jerusalem and its thousand Years settle upon it and that new Cube of Time begin at the End of which the Laodicean Church no sooner begins but ends and an Amen is set to all Time by Eternity receiving it All which makes apparent There is no Inconsistency but a high Condecency in these seven representative Churches bearing a Line of Time contemporary with all Apocalyptical Time which ought to be shewn Hereby we see The Excellency of the Christian Church Remark and of our Union with it and Freedom from Schism depends not upon the Greatness the Antiquity the Primitiveness of Churches but upon the Divine Apostolickness of the Doctrine Worship Rules of Holy Life truly Christian Discipline wherein we unite with them The overcoming that evil of leaving the first Love that Christ had against the very first Church of Ephesus not made diminutive as in Pergamus and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 small or few things Thyatyra was more as to the Excellency of true Christianity than being of that Church The not mingling with the Synagogue of Sathan in the Church of Smyrna gave the Inculpableness and Honour to it and its Members The not being of the Apostate Church when it call'd its self Catholick in Pergamus and Thyatyra but keeping to the Truth of the Gospel constituted the true Church when the Proselites and Disciples of that Apostacy were the Proselites and Disciples of Balaam and the Children of Jezebel The few undefiled Names and Overcomers in Sardis tho' a Reform'd Church were of greater Estimation with Christ than the whole Church besides some of whose rigid Zealots of its Splendour and Power Uniformity of Rites it is to be fear'd made the Synagogue of Sathan and Philadelphia tho' of little outward Power or Splendour yet holding fast the Word of Christ and not denying his Name and keeping the Word of Christ's Patience is preferr'd much before it and honour'd with the New Jerusalem from which Blessed State Laodicea abating and growing cool All Church-states in this World are so distasted by Christ that He spews them out of his Mouth and receives only the Overcomers to his Throne and his whole Church into Eternity SECT X. Of the Third Line of Time in the Grand Line of 2300 Even Morn or of the Seven Seals from the Resurrection shewing it extends to a space of 400 Years Apoc. Cap. 4. cap. 5. cap. 6. cap. 7. cap. 8. I Have now finish'd the first Real and General Line of Time that runs from Stem to Stern from the Beginning to the End of Apocalyptical Time I come now to the second giving of the same Lines which is not uniform and entire as the former of the Churches but made up not only of various Parts as that was of seven Churches but of various Representations of each part as Seals Trumpets Voices and Vials and each of these comprehends its following Order viz. the Seals the Trumpets the Voices the Vials under the Seventh of each former as hath been already clear'd
be deriv'd into it and so make the much greater River and having made their way as so united some Leagues the Old River its Name and Memory are swallow'd up in the New so are the Gentiles forty two months merg'd in the Forty two months of the Beast and both coextend the Twelve hundred sixty days and no more SECT II. Of the two Communities and their two-fold state described within this Line of Time viz. The Church of Christ and its Sufferings the Kingdom of the Beast and its Tyranny shewing also there must be Season or intimate Time within Time at large I Have thus far settled the General Sciagraphy or Land-Scaph of this Prophetical Line of Time and shall now endeavour to make a farther penetration into the understanding of it and its several Characters by enquiry into its signification its extent in every one of these Characters and the Balance of every one of them each with the other and that not by an over-critical restraint of the following Disscourse to every Head but in such a communication of the Extent the balance of the Characters one with another that the most perfect knowledge of the whole may arise from them together as they most naturally fall one into the other It is then to be known in the Second General There are two states of Things and two kinds of Personages Second General and in successive Communities and Incorporations each of them are to be found both which appertain to this Line of Time and the Characters of Time are distinctly suited to each viz. to the tyranny of that King the Scripture-Prophecy calls the Beast and his Gentiles and to the Sufferings of the true Church and Servants of God under that Tyranny The whole mass of Time is therefore divided into the Time of the Night under the Conduct of the Moon the Governess as hath been said of the Night and into the Time of the Day and the Light under the Government of the Sun the Prince of the Day And this is agreeable to that long Line of Time Dan. 8. 14. viz. The twenty three hundred Evening-Morning for so they are expressed in the Hebrew that while the twenty three hundred notes by such a number the length of the space the Evening-Morning is all but one Evening and one Morning and so it is call'd The Vision of the Evening and of the Morning verse 26. As then it is called the Vision of the Evening and the Morning so the Evening is but One and the Morning but One. As they are 2300 Evening-Morning ver 14. it is signified the lesser portions of Time are taken out of that great Number Again As they are One Evening and One Morning it speaks the Time One continued Evening with a bright Morning at the end of it As they are twenty three hundred Evening-Morning it signifies so many Nights and Days or natural Nycthemers or prophetical Years in which the Children of darkness take the Evenings or Night under the Moon and the Children of Light have the Mornings or Dayes for their portion under the Sun of Righteousness with which the Church is cloath'd and hath the Moon even when it seems most to have the Ascendent under its Feet but their Morning or Day does not appear in its Brightness till All night's past and the bright Morning-Star shall appear The whole Mass of Time I say then or the Time Times Half Time is distributed into twelve hundred sixty dayes twice nam'd but can be but one and the same Twelve hundred and sixty and twice forty two months which taken as Lunar Time and single cannot be equal to Twelve hundred sixty dayes or so much Solar Time and taken double exceeds it and therefore must as hath been said and shall be prov'd coalesce and knit one into another as a due Point and so may be Two forty two Months and this as proper to the Children of the Night must be peculiar to the Beasts Tyranny and the Days distinct to the Children of Light and their Holy Martyry or Testimony though under Sufferings and Death it self The first of these or the Tyranny of the Beast is expressed by changing Laws and Times and wearing out the Saints of the most High by accomplishing to scatter the power of the Holy People by the Gentiles treading the Court and the Holy City under foot whereby the Tammith viz. the daily or continual Publick Service of God is taken away by making War with the Witnesses and Saints the Womans Seed and overcoming and killing them as may be seen by a compare of Dan. c. 7. c. 8. c. 11. c. 12. and Apocal. c. 11. c. 12. c. 13. The second State of Things or the Sufferings of the Church and Servants of God is expressed by the Witnesses and Servants of God worn out given into the Hand of the little Horn or Beast for he is call'd both Dan. 7. v. 8. 12. 25. compar'd lying dead cast down stamped upon scattered the Witnesses in Sackcloth and the Woman in the Wilderness so as to be hid from the Face of the Serpent All which appears in the places fore-cited Now that we may see how these States and so the Characters of Time are Implex'd and Enfolded one within the other First the Time Times Half Time are the common Womb and Continent of the whole Time And this Character is therefore given first Dan. 7. 25. And that it might be the more observable it is given again the second time Dan. 12. 7. And then to give a farther notice to it it is given a third time in the Revelation Apoc. 12. 14. But because the just space and duration of time times semi time cannot be concluded certainly by themselves they are slid into twelve hundred sixty dayes lying as I have said in the Bosome of twelve hundred ninety dayes as the just size and exact standard of the whole Time so that in its utmost Extent It and all its Characters must be equal and they can neither exceed nor fall short of Twelve hundred sixty Prophetical Days or Years that is neither the Time Times Semi or Half Time nor the three Dayes and a half which are but other words as we shall see for the Three Times and a Half Nor the twice Forty two Months can be either longer or shorter than the Twelve hundred sixty Years because therefore Fourty two Months of Lunar Time as they ought to be interpreted as hath been shewn are not equal to twelve hundred sixty Days or Years and that twice Forty two Months will much more exceed therefore the Forty two Months twice given must be two Forty two Months which by the Characters we shall be guided to we shall find at an exact Point coalescing or uniting into One as hath been already said And because Time Times Semi Time are both as long and as broad as the twelve hundred and sixty dayes and yet have a more pregnant Intimate part viz. the Season within the Time in
Lords Ministry and also a part of the three days of his Death was an intimate Time within the three days at large of his state of Death or dying According then to these paralels but especially that of our Lords three days of Death to which the Death of the Witnesses is more eminently paralel'd we may find the intimate part of Time Times half a Time we are upon Observing then our Lords three days we find the half Matt. 28. 1. Marc. 15. 1. Luc. 22. 66. day of the first of the three began early in the Morning with Proceedings against him which were as Legal Judiciary Proceedings by the Priests and Elders in Council they had by a private way examined him in the Night in the Morning as soon as it way Day they held the Council Ecclesiastick and proper to themselves and condemned him as guilty of Death About the third Hour they led him to Pilate that he might be legally and juridically condemned by him as the Roman Governour like delivering over to the secular Power At the sixth hour they began the actual Crucifixion viz. about twelve but after the ninth hour that is our three in Matt. 27. 46. Marc. 19. 34. the Afternoon our Lord died as a Sacrifice between the two Evenings and before that day ended which was the first of the three he was laid in the Earth and there he continued the whole second Night and the Day following which was the Jewish Sabbath and till within the Night of the third Day Matt. 28. 1. Mar. 16. 2. Luc. 24. 1. which was the first part of it and was our Christian Sabbath or Lords day and the first of the Week This is now the Scripture-sense of the three Days of our Matt. 12. 40. Lords being in the Grave or Heart of the Earth and so by Proportion we are taught to understand the three days and half of the Witnesses lying dead viz. a part of each first and last and the whole of the middle The very precise Time of the Night at which Christ arose is not indeed revealed but it was a part of the Third Day ' ere he rose For it is well known the Night going before and the Day or Light coming after according to the order of Creation made the Jewish day although therefore we know not the very Moment yet it is most agreeable to believe In the very first part of the Night as soon as Christ had lain long enough to fulfill the Prediction He arose for early in the Morning while it was yet dark the Women coming John 20. 1. to embalm him found him risen It is very plain then the intimate time of the dying sufferings of our Lord Jesus Christ entred at the second half or the Morning of the first of the three days and grew more intimate and was more fill'd with that transaction by the second fourth part of that half for the Evangelist Mark says it was Marc. 15. v. 25. the third hour viz. our nine of the Clock and the Jews crucified him intending the whole proceeding before Pilate to his Crucifixion at the third fourth part or the sixth hour which is our Noon after some short debate with Pilate They led him away bearing the Cross to Golgotha and then he was lift John 19. 49. Matt. 27. 45. v. 46. Marc. 13. 34. up to the Cross and the Heavens were cover'd with blacks as at his Crucifixion soon after the last fourth part or the ninth hour which is our three of the Clock He gave up his Spirit and was speedily after entombed I do not intend to pursue this Paralel too close or too minutely nor to rely too hard on History to give the motions of time exactly enough but I rest securely on Prophecy that there was a sufficient agreement between that and the Event at every just Time The Idolatry and Tyranny or Usurpation of the Beast was risen by the Morning of the second 180 of the first 360 about 617 eleven years after the Vniversality given by Phocas when the Star fell and received the Key of the bottomless Pit It was further advanc'd and strengthned by the first Council of Lateran 649 against the second fourth of this 180 years viz. 659 To answer the third fourth viz. 717 it was promoted so much further that God who justly weighs all such Motions sets up 18 years after viz. at 725 or 726 the Pillar of intimate Time 666. Between the two Evenings or within the last fourth part viz. 787 at the second Councel of Nice the Beast overcame the Witnesses were slain and so they lay dead for two whole Days or twice 360 years till 1517 when after the half day begun The first motion to a Resurrection manifested it self which could not be till they had continued dead such a part of this last half day as suffic'd to fulfill the Prophecy that says their dead Bodies should lye three days and a half in the street of the great City And without laying too much weight upon Particles of Time it is out of measure certain the Power of the Beast the Idolatry and Tyranny of the Man of Sin within due distance of the time signified by this Prophecy and of which History near enough to Time gives some very remarkable watch-word or rather loud Voice were at an elevation every way adequate to the suffering dying state of the Witnesses according to the Predictions that went before concerning both in this Symbol or Exemplar of that great Proto-Martyr the chief and supream Witness the faithful Martyr Jesus Christ and those Gradations or Steps of his dying and rising again so exactly measured out in time within his three days and their three days and a half abating only for the difference of the Paralels our Lord was buried they were not to be so as we shall presently observe Now for the further proving these things I thus Argue Whenever the Beasts Name and the number of his Name began Arg. 1 the Receiving the Name and the number of the Name began also For these are so essentially joyned together as not to be divided and indeed the Name and the Number do not come into Record but for the receivings sake of them and then the Worship of the Image the receiving a Mark in the Forehead or the right Hand began also For all these are here of equivalent Satisfaction to the Beast and they are all along through the after Prophecy joyn'd as of equal Guilt Sin and Danger however then they may denote several Posts and Stations in the service of the Beast as it is indeed a great and wonderful Court and hath a most stupendious diversity of Offices Ministrations Subordinations and Dependencies and as vast a Populace yet all these speak the same Devotion Subjection Vassalage to the Beast in one kind or other and therefore the Priviledge of those who abjure any of these as therein abjuring all is allowed equal by Christ so that
their Corrupt Antichristian state and utterly abolished and an Apocalyptical Evangelical seven shall take their Room so that the Successours in their Places shall have such a Sense of this Great Judgment on them as to Give Glory to God For that at this Time the whole Antichristian State was converted and repented I cannot understand because of the after course of this Prophecy But a great alteraiion in the Posture of the Christian World will then be made It will be of another Model as great a change as seven thousand Orders of Men falling under the sense and influence of this Apocalyptical Prophecy and modelled according to that can make shall then be so that in the whole Succession to the Kingdom of Christ signified by the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 They shall give Glory to God the God of Heaven in place of the Man of Sin who sat in the Temple of God shewing himself that He is God and in place of Idols of Gold and Silver Then the second Woe shall pass away Mahometanism whatever Existence it may have in the World shall no longer remain the Woe of the Christian World because when Antichristianity the Provocation of so great a Judgment is fallen the Judgment it self shall also remove although Euphrates may yet continue a River till at the sixth Vial it is dried up yet it shall not so overflow as hitherto it hath done And this Woe is always to be esteem'd the Boundary of the 1260 Days for their ending for till that Woe is past they cannot end for till then the Witnesses do not rise perfectly nor come out of Sackcloth till then the Beasts forty two Months of being a Bestian Power do not end nor the 1260 of the Woman in the Wilderness but then they shall all end together Therefore the Crashings and Smoaking of the Mahometan Mountain at this Time gives an alarm to the Expectation of these things and however the Antichristian Power by its Contributions concurr with the Ten Kings to the passing away of that Woe yet let it certainly know that at that very same time and by those very Ten Kings falling off from it it s own Decarchy or Ten-horn'd Supremacy shall fall into the Dust also For as we may be assured The Reformation the rising of the Witnesses are not yet at their top because that Woe is not yet pass'd so we may be assur'd All the Symbols and Emblems of the Antichristian City and Prince as roll'd down from their height and of the Kingdom of Christ rising although being future we cannot so certainly expound them yet they shall in their significancy be fulfill'd and made good to the utmost as those have been before them which we more fully comprehend by History And that all must be fulfill'd within the 180 Years from 1517 or from the Reformation begun then which must be by 1697. For that so the mouth of the Lord hath spoken by this Prophecy I now proceed to argue I must rely upon the proof I have already offer'd along this Line That I have made true motions and progresses upon it in Events of so great Concernment and universal Notoriety to the Christian World as to be most worthy to be the Discoveries of so Sovereign and Imperial a Prophecy given by the Prince of the Kings of the Earth receiv'd from his Father to shew to his Servants digested into a methâ—â—â— and Series of Time most exact and contriv'd into such â—onderful and self-demonstrating Symbols as that they may be found out by them that are stirr'd up by God to Read and so propos'd to those whom God enclines to Hear that Both may come to the Blessedness promis'd by understanding them aright Rev. 1. 3. In comparison of which Events and their order and series as I have presented them the little and close the private and particular points of Story without an equal and just Admensuration to Apocalyptical Time upon which some Names so great that for Reverence I dare not Name have fallen are but as Relations fit for private Discourse and unfit for a grave History or like the Description of small Rivers Hills or Vills unworthy the Title of a Geography and yet such a Prophecy so much below its own Majesty do such Interpretations make it Now according to this so illustrious so orderly Series of Events it will easily appear by Reflection on what is written The Reformation must necessarily be determin'd to the last 180 of the 1260 Years so as to determine at 1697. But I shall yet offer these two particular Arguments The very Time of the Pillar of the Beasts Number erected Argu. 1 I date to 725 or 26 as the solemn Representation of it by the beginning of the Iconoclastick War and so of the Beasts War with the Witnesses The very Time of the Death of the Witnesses I date to 787 represented by the second Council of Nice damning all that refus'd to worship Images the one 72 Years before the two Times of 360 Years a-piece the other only ten Years before Let us now by proportion of the three Years and a half of Elijah's Drought and the three days of our Lord's Death adjust the Expiration of the Intimate Time Times half a Time and as near Ten years after the two whole Times of intimate Time expir'd at 1517 we find the Witnesses standing on their Feet so eminently as that they began to esteem the Thunderbolts of Antichristian Excommunication brutish and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in a solemn and Oracular manner as from this very Prophecy to be called Protestants Which Appellation however it began on particular occasion and as only in a providential Representation to agree History with Prophecy as I all along observe yet it hath been espous'd by the whole Reformation and it is by secret instinct derived probably beyond their Intention from these two Apocalyptical Witnesses For what is Protestation or Protestancy but a publick avowed Witness against the Tyranny of the Beast And that so solemn a Denomination is of no small Account appears by that so great Memorial of the Disciples being call'd Christians Acts 11. 26. And as the Pillar of Intimate Time was erected at 725 or 26 71 or 72 Years before the two whole Times so seventy one or seventy two Years after the two whole Times at 1517 lead us to the famous 1588 from which Time the most Catholick Kingdoms so call'd decay'd in Pomp and Reputation not to say the whole Austrian Family And had not the Thunders been seal'd and the Book retired into Prophecy the Parallels had been more illustrious but Sixteen hundred ninety seven shall I am fully assur'd answer for all The Disposal of this Time of the Reformation as it hath Argu. 2 been given is so demonstrative as not to be avoided for the Witnesses Prophecy in Sackcloth 1260 days Twelve hundred sixty days we are assur'd are three times and a half at their full extent for so long the Woman is in the
although they are as overflowings of the Prophecy beyond its Conduct of things within the Trumpets yet it is most demonstrable They must all return within the Trumpets and Time at large begin with the Trumpets and intimate Time be guided by the Pillar of Time erected within the fifth Trumpet For seeing the Woman and the Witnesses 1260 days must needs be equal in their Beginning and Ending and the Beasts Intimate Time must be plac'd where the Witnesses Vanquishment and Death are and that these must be within the Trumpets nay in that all Time must be before the seventh Trumpet and end at it All Time therefore from thence in account recoyls backward so as to find room for it self even to the first of the 1260 Days within the first Trumpet which beginning at 437 ends with 42 the Concent of all Periods at 1697. All which ought to be evinc'd all along and I do more then hope hath been so evinc'd I have already prevented my self in the Remarques of this whole Line by placing them early in the first Views of it and therefore now make only these short ones as a Conclusion We may be heal'd of any dangerous Wonder that an Remark 1 Apostacy from Christian Religion so foul and thick as to need no Confutation of its Figments and Fables the very Title his Holiness Vicar of Christ do so loudly proclaim Antichrist That such a one hath endur'd so long a Time hath captivated the Wise the Learned the Politick the Noble the Royal the Imperial we see in this Prophecy It was to do so and by this Oath of Christ it was and is to last Time Times half Time even till the end of it It is to do so e're its Decem Principality It s ten horn'd Kingdom Fall And although it began by degrees yet it hath two most sudden Downfalls one at the Reformation as but in preparation and beginning the other at the end of that Half time then begun viz. at 1697 when His Fall shall be exceeding great Seeing it is most impossible Intimate time should return Remark 2 whatever Sufferings there may be of the Church of Thyatyra how great how dismal soever yet there cannot be a slaying of the Witnesses any more for Christ hath sworn with the Rainbow cap. 10. 1. on his Head It shall be as the Waters of Noah to him Isa 54. 9. There shall be no such Return for ever nor can I apprehend the Church of Sardis can in any parts of the Reform'd Nations Rev. 3. 3. v. 9. lose its State by a Return of that Apostacy its only danger is its shame that without Repentance will befall it at the more glorious Appearance of Christ's Kingdom and especially those Parts of it that have relapsed to a Synagogue of Sathan shall with double shame be forc'd to come and worship at Philadelphia's Feet and to know Christ hath lov'd it who endeavour'd to shut its Door Seeing we are compassed about with so great a Cloud of Witnesses Remark 3 let us with great Confidence wait hope expect pray for the great Glory that is to be brought unto us at that great Appearance that will be made of the Kingdom of Jesus Christ at the end of the half time or half day or at the last of the last 180 of 1260 Days viz. at 1697 so often memorializ'd although but in preparation to that Kingdom it self 75 Years after And if we shall not live to it in this World yet we shall lose nothing by it for in Heaven and with the Lamb on Mount Zion we shall with the other Witnesses rejoyce in Rev. 14. 1. so happy a Change as will even then be made and so rejoyce for ever each in our Lot of the Land of Promise or the New Jerusalem The end of the second Point of this Line of Time or its Period SECT XIV Wherein is contained a brief Disquisition upon the seven Voices as they run along Apoc. ch 14. THE last Line of Time upon the grand Line of Daniel's 2300 Ev. Mor. stretches out it self beyond the so often repeated Prophetical Line we have been upon and yet it is most justly and according to the Reason of the Line to be joyned with it because the holy Spirit hath in Daniel so joyned to 1260 30 more making 1290 and then 45 making 1335 as hath been so often observ'd so that from hence however joyn'd rises a distinct Line of 75 Years consisting of its lesser Distinctions 30 and 45. And with great Wisdom and Design they are undoubtedly thus joyn'd and yet distinguish'd for hereby is shewn 1. That it is the same principal Line of 2300 Ev. Mor. thus protended 2. That the managements of Divine Power as to the Divine Kingdom are of a distinct nature from what they were any part even the last and best part that is the Half-time of the 1260 Days or since the Reformation and yet that there is an Agreement too so that the Kingdom is distinctly advanc'd in the first 30 above the State of it along the Half-time and still farther and higher advanc'd in the last Distinction or the forty five and yet that the Kingdom does not appear in Glory until the End of the 1335 all which appears very plainly both in Daniel and this Apocalyptick Prophecy where seeing the Voices and the Vials come after the 1260 Days we may conclude by the Union and by the Distinction together That the latter end of the sixth Trumpet adheres close to the seventh and then by the Voices first and the Vials after them both of the seventh Trumpet following so close one upon another and by the Blessed State coming upon all we may be most assur'd the Voices and the Vials answer to the Thirty and the Forty five Years of Surplusage to the 1260 Days so distinguish'd and so conjoyn'd Now that these Voices and Vials of the seventh Trumpet are yet to come and to come in the Order laid down and within the Time laid down these six Things may indubitably convince us 1. We may be fully assur'd nothing so great as the seven Thunders could be heard before the Reformation so high so loud for the Kingdom of Christ so they must be with the Reformation beginning 2. There is most apparently a space allowed for the Thunders remaining seal'd after their Voices uttered which space hath so great reason as hath been given to be rated at a Half-time or 180 Years and so cannot be run out yet since the Reformation 3. Nothing so eminent since the Reformation as the Fall of the Tenth of the Great City or the Turkish Woe ceasing whatever hopes now appear nor of the seventh Trumpet so closely lynck'd with both hath yet been seen 4. The Oath of Christ that Time should be no more cannot possibly allow such a space of Time or Delay as the Half-time after Time Times Half-Time within the seventh Trumpet or indeed any Time at all wherein every thing should not be in
by which they are all kept in a close successional Connexion one with another and the seventh Seal hath its Hold upon the whole even to the last Day of Judgment when the whole Book of the Kingdom is resign'd back into the Hand of God out of whose Hand it was received by Christ seal'd 1 Cor. 15. 24. c. I am therefore now and in the first place to speak of the first part of this second giving of the Line of Time and that as in the Seals before it came to the Trumpets 1. And because there is one general Preface to this whole Repetition of the Line of Time I shall first consider how adequate it is to the whole Line and to the great Administrations of it in a brief or summary Survey of it For to assure us The Preface was to the whole Apocalyptical Book or Time adorn'd with new Figures and Sculptures John heard the first Voice that spake to him and it was as it were of a Trumpet saying to him I will shew thee Things that must be hereafter Rev. 4. v. 1 2. and immediately he was the second time in the Spirit where the Distinction of things hereafter from the things that are as Rev. 1. 19. was made only as the Types of the Churches had a real Existence at that Time as Types in the then begun Christian Church but the following were deriv'd from things to come And after this there was no more any such Voice of a Trumpet speaking to John no more being in the Spirit except a being carried in the Spirit into the Wilderness to see the Apostate Church and then to a Mountain to behold the Holy City The Voice speaking again c. 10. v. 8. evidently relates to the first Voice in that chap. saying seal and write not v. 4. and then take the Book and eat c. and c. 1. 10. c. 4. 1 2. not to these Trumpet-Voices 2. At this second Apocalyptical Volume we have the great Theatre of the Throne and the whole Grandeur of it and adorn'd every way suitable to the Doctrine of the Gospel and as it were in the first Apostolical Church settled first in God as the Doctrine of the One God made known in the Father the Son and the Spirit is the Foundation of Christianity For the Father the Word and the Spirit bear Record of it in Heaven and these three are one in that Record as they are in themselves ONE 3. About this Throne at each Angle or at each of the four Points of it are four Living Creatures so I choose to translate 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 not Beasts properly and distinguishingly in this Prophecy call'd 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and these four Living Creatures represent the Apostolical Church of the New Testament as in four Ternaries or Threes of the twelve Apostles in perpetual Action and therein as it were encircling the twenty four Elders of the pure Israelitish Church The Elders are upon Seats round about the Throne and with Crowns on their Heads as being of old a Kingdom of Priests and they are in this Prophecy introduc'd in Service to the Kingdom of Christ that shall be at the New Jerusalem together with and as by the Apostolick Church who shall be Kings and Priests together with them represented by these four and twenty Elders Heads of the priestly Courses who are first plac'd as leading the Gospel of Jesus Christ and his Kingdom by Prophecy but yet in the very first Action the Order is revers'd and the living Creatures are first in giving Glory First there is the particular Song to the Divine Nature on the Throne as the absolute Creator and Lord of all ending in this For thy Pleasure all things are and were created and so are absolutely under his Dominion and Dispose before whom they cast their Crowns 4. The grand Symbol of the whole Apocalyptical Time and its Events and of the supreme Conduct and Government till they issue into the Kingdom of Christ is the seal'd Book in the Hand of Him that sat on the Throne seal d with the seven Seals which Seals have under them the whole Course of preparatory Events to this Kingdom and the Kingdom it self till it be resign'd back to God Thus Daniel saw Prophecy and Vision seal'd up Dan. 9. and the Book seal'd Chap. 12. 5. There is Proclamation made by the loud Voice of a strong Angel for the finding out a worthy Person to open the Book and loose its Seals And none in Heaven or Earth was found worthy to open the Seals or so much as look thereon All which is certainly as Divine a Symbol to set out the supream and sole Excellency of the Lord Jesus Christ as far above all Principalities and Powers and every Name in Heaven or Earth as could be found out and surpassing all Understanding or Invention finite and is in surprize of any Admissions of Angels or Saints into any parts of his Mediatory Office the very least so much as an Ability to look thereon as also to foreclose that grand Antichristian Assumption of the man of Sin for his very Supremacy is hereby plainly declar'd to be Antichristianism who undertakes not only to look upon this Book but to open the Seals and herein he shews himself in the Temple of God as God 6. The much weeping of John that none was found worthy to open the Book does most exactly and critically point to the time of the Death of Christ or his lying in the Grave when there seem'd a Despair upon all the Creation in that dark Interval and a suspension of the Consolation of Israel and when all the Apostles had given up as it were the hopes of it of which the Apostle John was here a Symbol and represented all the Apostles 7. The same Article of Time is farther assur'd and confirm'd by the one of the Elders as a Representative of the whole Israelitish Church who lead to Christ Thus Christ open'd the Scriptures of the Old Testament especially of Daniel That Christ was thus to suffer and to enter into his Glory viz. of sitting first at the Right-hand of God till his Foes should be made his Footstool He sate down on his Fathers Throne in his Father's Kingdom He shall have a Throne and Kingdom properly his own 8. Christ hereupon exactly as in the Time according to the History of the Gospel appears as on the sudden and unexpectedly in the midst of the Throne of the Elders and the living Creatures a Lamb as it had been newly slain and now risen and ascended and so the Epoch of the Apocalyptical Time is most strictly defin'd and fully assur'd And at this Point of Time he receives the Book which is the very same with sitting on God's Right-hand till his Foes shall be made his Footstool for when the Book is unseal'd and the thousand Years begin Then there is a putting down all Rule and Authority At the End of the thousand Year and the Day of
final Judgment over the Book is quite unseal'd in Death the last Enemy overcome and then the Book the Symbol of the Kingdom is resign'd with the Kingdom it self into the Hand of the Father 9. Hereupon the State of the Christian Church in its Apostolical Purity with the Order of the Living Creatures first and then drawing that of the Elders along with it in a Song of Redemption in Praise of the Lamb with a Prophecy of his Kingdom in which his Servants and Saints shall reign above the Earth or over it as 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 signifies in several Places of the New Testament joyn'd with a Genitive Case particularly Matt. 25. 21. 23. I will make thee Ruler over many things 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 10. To sum up all The State of the Church in the thousand Years Kingdom of Christ is given in a second Song of Praise wherein all things bow in the Name of Christ as Lord and that not ceremonially but in real Subjection Phil. 2. 10. Things in Heaven and in Earth and under the Earth and that to the Glory of the Father For the four Living Creatures having said Amen to this high Celebration of Christ the four and twenty Elders as having by the Apostolical Church receiv'd an explicate Knowledge of Christ to shew The New Testament did not at all derogate from the Old The four and twenty Elders after they had fallen down with the four Living Creatures and joyn'd in a Song of Praise to the Lamb now as making up the Concent worship him that liveth for ever and ever and conclude that which the four Living Creatures or the Apostolical Ministry began and herein shew the Resignation of the Kingdom of God at last that he may be All in All Rev. 4. 10. compar'd with Rev. 5. 8. 14. For as all began in God that made all things so here it ends in him The sealed Book being now in the Hands of Christ and all due Acknowledgments made to him that sits on the Throne and to the Lamb immediately follows the opening of the Seals and therein the Course of Time flows out and so flows on of which we are now to take a particular and strict Account only I would desire every Person that sets his Mind and Thoughts to view this so august Inthronization of God and of the Lamb That he would ponder within himself Whether the desolating either the Jews or the Heathen Empire can be Events great enough for so stupendious a Pre-Representation or any thing less than the Glorious Kingdom of our Lord Jesus Christ could answer to it And now that we may establish the Line of Time according to these Seals and the Time of their opening there are three Things to be consider'd 1. What it is that is the principal Jewel and Treasure that lies under these Seals and so to be set free by the unloosing them 2. What is the principal and supream Visum or Thing to be seen in every Seal and the opening of it and how it serves the disclosing that Jewel 3. What is the true method of fixing the certain Time that the whole Course of the Seals took up and how it is to be measur'd and fix'd If we can now determine and settle aright upon the Resolution of each of these Particulars we shall be able to understand this first Sett of Apocalyptical Visions and to have ample satisfaction concerning them and have great Light into the following Visions also 1. As to the First then That great Treasure and Jewel of Truth that is inclos'd within these Seals and so also as we shall see that the Trumpets ultimately sounded unto is the Glorious Kingdom of our Lord Jesus Christ Every Event and the Stage of Time it was to pass over is as a Seal or Stop upon this Kingdom till it opens into Glory and the opening of every Seal was an Advance towards it and although when the seven Seals were open'd there appeared a greater and more prodigious Cause of Delay viz. the Antichristian Kingdom yet every Trumpet was as an Alarm of War to the subduing that Mock-Kingdom that rose in Despight and Opposition to the Kingdom of Christ And because all things were so set and placed in their Season and Order that no one thing could come to pass before that which was set before it had had its free Egress and Event therefore every of these Events and the opening of the Seals to let them out though they did not in the Issue open to the true Appearance of that Kingdom yet because they did as it were what they could and there was a Remove of so many Prohibents or Obstacles to that Kingdom and Time so advanc'd from Point to Point that by the opening every Seal the Kingdom of Christ might be nearer to its Appearance therefore they are justly understood and expounded to be Seals unloos'd and opening to the Kingdom of Christ Now besides those 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or IT IS DONE IT IS DONE at the End of the Apocalyptical Time and all its Events whither they one and all run together besides this there is this absolute Assurance That the Kingdom of Christ was under the Seals The Kingdom made so magnificent a show of it self at the sixth Seal that had not the Servants of God been seal'd in their Fore-heads that they should not then appear with him in Glory the Kingdom had even then appear'd for in Constantine's Christian Empire to the End of the Reign or at the Victory of Theodosius the Great over Heathenism of which he endeavour'd the utter Extirpation that Kingdom so far came out of its Retirement that there was a solemn and loud Doxology in Heaven that the Kingdom of God and the Power of Christ were come and yet at the very same time the Woman is recorded as fled into the Wilderness Rev. 12. 10. 2. The first Particular then being resolved with so much Evidence and Assurance we may with the greatest Clearness resolve concerning the second or the principal Visum of every Seal open'd for it must be some State of the Kingdom of Christ defin'd by the joyning together the Voices that summoned to the Sight and Observation so far as these Voices continued and then when they ceased the State of the Kingdom of Christ must be considered by the Visa themselves as under the Cessation of those Voices and by any sort of Voices we can find equivalent to them And in this Method and no other that I can understand we may justly and truly comprehend the Intention and Signification of the Seals For if all the Seals carry on the Kingdom of Christ by so many Degrees and Steps of Advance as I have in some measure I hope made evident they do By undeniable Proof then it must needs be That every Seal hath some State of that Kingdom protuberant or swelling out in its Appearance upon that opening and that the Voice that says Come and see calls to observe it and
as we shall see presently Now that it so began at Twenty five or six we have a threefold Testimony Of the Apostle Paul that the Mystery of Iniquity viz. the Apostacy as a Womb in which the Man of Sin was curiously form'd as in the lower parts of 2 Thess 2. 7. 1 John 4. 3. Revel 2. 4. the Earth was then at work that it might bring forth the Man at his full growth at 666. The Apostle John assures us Antichrist was then in the World and the supreme Apocalyptes Christ tells us Ephesus the Image of the Apostolical Church had even in the Apostles Times left its first Love when therefore Apostolical Time had doubled it self from Twelve to Twenty Four and was moving onward as at a precise Time from Conception the Mystery of Iniquity began to work at 25 or 26. And it is no wonder the Man of Sin beheld by the Apostle in Spirit when no Eye saw him in this his Embrional Condition in his first Principles was thus remark'd by him For then every thing receives its nature Even as Jacob in the Womb as John the Baptist as our Lord in his Conception is celebrated so this Man of Sin is dated from the conceiving of Sin as well as from the manly State from the Conception as well as from the grown Man till then Iniquity fully accomplishing its Time brings forth Death This Psendo Abrahamite this spiritual Edom and Esau struggled as another Nation in the Womb of the Apostacy while the pure Israelitism without guile lay in the Womb of true Christianity to both which the outward Profession was a common Womb. This prophane Esau is he that sold the Birth-right of the Gospel for a Mess os Pottage and the Heavenly Kingdom for an Earthly Dukedom and wherein he got the start Thus the Number of the Name of the Beast and the number of the Beast or the time of his adult and man-like Bestianism so closely related so closely joyn'd as not possible they should lead two several ways both being the Time of worshipping the Image receiving the Mark the Name and the Number of the Name assure beyond all doubt that they are both one Nature appearing manifestly at one and the same Time and by both mathematical and prophetical Certainty if the Top of the Number be 666 Twenty five must be the Root and Bottom and if the Root be Twenty five from the Resurrection the top must be 666 from that twenty five viz. 725 or 726 and so both from the nature counter-Apostolical under the pretence of Apostolical as also the Root and the top of Time being compar'd It can neither be Mahometan not so early up as twenty five nor Pagan that did not live so long as 725 but must be Antichristian or the Beast And by this wonderful Hieroglyphick of Number God hath surpris'd all defence from Antiquity out of the hand of Antichrist that is not built upon his Word Truth and solid Reason for seeing the Mystery of Iniquity wrought so soon as 25 from the Resurrection all Proof from Antiquity only is but proof for Antichrist taken from the Mystery of Iniquity beginning to work and so not to be for that cause allowed I come therefore now to the second point viz. To see Head 2 where this Pillar of intimate Time this six hundred sixty six can be only duely and proportionably plac'd And we shall find evidently where it is thus to be plac'd That we may then understand this we must consider that there is in Time Times Half Time an intimate Time or Season signified to us 3 ways 1. By the force of the Words us'd in the Chalde in the Dan. 7. 25. Dan. 12. 7. Rev. 12. 14. Hebrew and in the Greek Originals to express this Line It is indicted appointed Time or Season Seasons half Season Now Season is the most virtual lively point of Time for though all Season must have Time to support it yet Time is only Season to those things whereunto it is especially appointed and gives advantage the very words therefore import Season within Time and thus the Apostle says The Man of Sin is reveal'd 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as it were in the same Words with that of the three Seasons and half in his own Season 2. The intending and elevation of the Events speak the same for as much as Prophecying in Sackcloth is transcended by lying dead as much as being in the Wilderness so as to be hid from the face of the Serpent exceeds being in the Wilderness only in general as much as changing Times and Laws and wearing out the Saints and scattering the holy People by the Antichristian Prince himself exceed the rude Gentiles trampling the holy Court or the Beasts mere Power of Continuance so does the intimate Time or season of seasons seasons half season transcend the Time at large and in general and therefore all these Notes of Time are first given and then Inward time with this Exaltation of the Effects 3. The Three times and a half pointing and propending towards though not rigidly denoting three years and a half even as twelve hundred sixty days do and as forty two months of Lunar years do they have two great Paralels one of Years the other of Days and both fitted to the very 1260 days of the Witnesses The first of years is that of Elijah declaring that there 1 Kings 17. 1. should not be these years Rain nor Dew but according to his Word Now the Time of this Drought is most expresly affirmed twice that we might take the more notice of it to be three years and six months once by Christ himself a second Luc. 4. 25. Jam. 5. 17. Time by the Apostle James And yet by the History we cannot find that the Drought was any longer than a part of the three years and a part of 1 King 18. 1. the six months for it is said in the third year Elijah appeared to Ahab and Rain ensued accounting then from the latter end of the first year to the beginning of the six months after two years there might be no Rain a part of the first year the whole of the two years nor till the six months began and yet it might be in the third year according to precise account of years as may be easily understood For there may be three full years within a part of the first of the three years and of the six months viz. the latter part of the first year and the beginning of the last six Months comprehending two whole years in the middle That of Days is the instance of our Lords three days in the heart of the Earth which by the full evidence of the Evangelists we know was but a part of the first day the whole of the second and a part or the first part only of the third Now these three days both lay as an intimate part of Time within the three full years and half of our