undeniable Principles of common Sense and Reason and of all the Arts and Sciences God has illuminated the Mind of man withall Consider the twelfth Conclusion of the above-named Treatise together with the other ten before cited Wherefore any one that is not a mere Bigott may be as assured that Transubstantiation is a mere Figment or enormous Falsehood as of any thing else in the whole world 8. From whence it will unavoidably follow and themselves cannot deny it that they are most grosse and palpable Idolaters and consequently most barbarous Murtherers in killing the innocent Servants of God for not submitting to the same Idolatries with themselves Costerus the Jesuite speaks expresly to this Point and consonantly I think to the Suppositions of the Council viz. That if their Church be mistaken in the Doctrine of Transubstantiation they ipso facto stand guilty of such a piece of Idolatry as never was before seen or known of in the world For the errours of those saith he were more tolerable who worship some golden or silver Statue or some Image of any other Materials for their God as the Heathen worshipped their Gods or a red Cloth hung upon the top of a Spear as is reported of the Laplanders or some live Animal as of old the AEgyptians did then of these that worship a bit of Bread as hitherto the Christians have done all over the world for so many hundred years if the Doctrine of Transubstantiation be not true What can be a more full and expresse acknowledgement of the gross Idolatry of the Church of Rome then this if Transubstantiation prove an Errour Then which notwithstanding there is nothing in the world more certain to all the Faculties of a man as is manifest out of what has been here said And therefore the Romanists must be grosse Idolaters from the second third fourth seventh and ninth Conclusions of the first Chapter and from the fourth fifth eighth ninth twenty-first twenty-second and twenty-fifth of the second Chapter All these Conclusions will give evidence against them that they are very notorious Idolaters 9. And therefore this being so high and so palpable a strain of Idolatry in them touching the Eucharist or the eating the Body and drinking the Bloud of Christ wherein Christ is offered by the Priest as an Oblation and the People feed upon him as in a Feast upon a Sacrifice which is not done without Divine Adoration done to the Host according to the precept of their Church This does hugely confirm our sense of the eating of things offered unto Idols in the Epistles to the Churches in Pergamus and in Thyatira this worshipping of the Host being so expresly acknowledged by the Pope and his Clergy and in that high sense of Cultus Latriae which is due to God alone And therefore it is very choicely and judiciously perstringed by the Spirit of Prophecy above any other Modes of their Idolatry it being such a grosse and confessed Specimen thereof and such as there is no Evasion for or Excuse Hoc teneas vultus mutantem Protea â—odo CHAP. IV. The grosse Idolatry of the Romanists in the Invocation of the Saints even according to the allowance of the Council of Trent and the authorized practice of that Church 1. BUT we will fall also upon those Modes of Idolatry wherein the Church of Rome may seem less bold though indeed this one that is so grosse is so often and so universally repeated every-where in the Roman Church that by this alone though we should take notice of nothing farther Idolatry may seem quite to have overspred her like a noisome Leprosy But how-ever we shall proceed and first to their Invocation of Saints Touching which the Council of Trent declares this Doctrine expresly Sanctos utique unà cum Christo regnantes Orationes suas pro hominibus offerre bonúmque atque utile esse suppliciter eos invocare ob beneficia impetranda à Deo per Filium ejus Jesum Christum ad eorum orationes operam auxiliúmque confugere Where Invocation of Saints is plainly allow'd and recommended and besides their praying for us or offering up our Prayers to God it is plainly imply'd that there are other Aids and Succours they can afford if they be supplicated that is invoked with most humble and prostrate Devotion And the pretending that this is all but the way of procuring those good things we want from God the first Fountain and that through his Son Christ that makes the Saints the more exactly like the Pagans Dii medioxumi and the Daemons that negotiated the affairs of men with the highest Deity 2. I say then that though they went no farther then thus even this is down-right Idolatry which the Council of Trent thus openly owns and consequently the whole Church of Rome as appears from the third fourth fifth sixth and eighth Conclusions of the first Chapter as also by the fifth seventh eighth tenth eleventh twelfth thirteenth fourteenth fifteenth and twenty-fourth of the second But if we examine those Prayers that are put up to the Saints their Invocation is still the more unexcusable 3. Wherefore looking to the publick Practice of the Church of Rome authorized by the Popes themselves the Invocation of a Saint does not consist in a mere Ora pro nobis as people are too forward to phansy that the state of the Question though the mere invoking of them to pray for us would be Idolatry as is already proved but which is insinuated in the Council it self there are other more particular Aids and Succours that they implore of them and some such as it is proper for none but God or Christ to give Such as Protection from the Devil Divine Graces and the Joys of Paradise But as the things they ask of the Saints are too big for them to be the Disposers of so the Compellations of the Virgin Mary especially are above the nature of any Creature Whence this Invocation of Saints will appear a most grosse and palpable Mode of Idolatry in that Church As I shall make manifest out of the following Examples taken out of such pieces of Devotion as are not mutter'd in the corners of their Closets but are publickly read or sung with Stentorian Voices in their very Churches I will onely give the Reader a tast of this kinde of their Idolatry for it were infinite to produce all we might 4. And first to begin with the smaller Saints as indeed they are all to be reckoned in comparison of the blessed Virgin to whom therefore they give that Worship which they call Hyperdulia as they give Dulia to the rest of the Saints and Latria to God alone and to Christ as being God That Prayer to S. Cosmas and S. Damian is plainly a Petition to them to keep us from all Diseases as well of Soul as of Body that we may attain to the life of the Spirit and live in Grace here and be made partakers of Heaven hereafter O Medici
Nineteenthly The Curious may be prone to enquire why the Church of Laodicea in those times should account her self so hugely and extraordinarily rich increased in goods and to have no want of any thing And truly why this should be her estate rather then any of the Churches specify'd from the Literal ground we can fetch no reason But admitting the Propheticall sense and that this is the last Intervall of the Church of Christ it will naturally so come to passe For this Laodicea will be left Heir to all the Riches of her Sister Philadelphia to Peace Prosperity Purity in Worship abundance of natural Knowledge universal skill in the Interpretations of the Prophecies and what-ever good thing there is belonging to the Church saving the Life and Spirit which Philadelphia carried along with her into the other world How easily then and naturally or rather necessarily does this Description of the Church of Laodicea fall upon the last Intervall And lastly It is a Question extremely obvious to demand Why that phrase He that hath an ear to hear let him hear which our Saviour so often is found to adde at the end of his Parables to the people should be used here so repeatedly in every Epistle they being no Parables but Epistles sent to each of those Seven Churches in Asia respectively And then why this Epiphonema is sometimes the last close of the Epistle sometimes not To which Probleme there is no tolerable Solution in the Literal sense of these Epistles But supposing a Mysticall or Propheticall sense there was a necessity of affixing this Epiphonema to shew there was a farther sense intended then that of the Letter and also that sometimes this Epiphonema should come last of all as in the four last Epistles that the Promise to the Conquerour to him that overcomes might be more certainly understood to be of a proper Propheticall or Politicall sense not merely Theologicall Moral or Spiritual as has been abundantly declared in the Exposition 9. We might have drawn many more Questions and Solutions from the consideration of the Letter and of this Hypothesis we go upon to shew its solidity and fitnesse but that we hold it needlesse having produced so many already which jointly considered with the perpetuall easinesse and naturalnesse of the whole Exposition of all the Epistles and the exact Correspondency of the Names of the Churches to the Events of the successive Intervalls of the true Catholick Church which they represent one would think they should not fail fully to satisfie any unprejudiced Peruser of our Exposition of these Epistles touching the truth thereof But I am abundantly taught by Experience that both the finding out and receiving of Divine Truths found out by others is a special gift of God And therefore to him alone be the Glory for ever and ever Amen THE END AN ANTIDOTE AGAINST IDOLATRY OR A brief Discourse containing sundry Considerations or Conclusions tending to the Discovery of what is or ought to be held to be IDOLATRY amongst Christians With Application to the Doctrine of the Council of TRENT and for the putting a stop to the Romish Infection MATTH 4. 10. Thou shalt worship the Lord thy God and him onely shalt thou serve To the Reader Reader 1. I Suppose thou wilt expect something should be said of this ensuing Discourse also though it needs not be much The occasion of writing it and the fitnesse of joyning it to the foregoing Exposition of the Seven Churches will discover themselves to thee in the perusing of the Treatise it self I must confess I have treated of this Argument elsewhere namely in my Mysterie of Iniquity But it is a Subject of that great Importance that it deserves an entire Treatise apart by it self and that girt up in the most close and convictive method that may be that those that are sanable or preservable from this dreadfull sin of Idolatry may finde the efficacy of our Antidote and those whose minds it cannot alter may however be found without excuse And there is this considerable here above what I have done already on this Subject that here is such an expresse Application made of the Theorie to the grosse Errours in this point and foul Mispractices of the Church of Rome 2. Those of ours that speak the most favourably of that Church cannot but declare them guilty of Material Idolatry as they call it And questionlesse there must be something among them very like that great Sin if there be any truth or sense in the Visions of that Divine Volume of the Apocalypse For the order of things and demonstration of the Synchronisms do necessarily cast those Visions that represent the concerned as Idolatrous Chap. 13. and 17. upon the Church of Rome as also Ch. 2. v. 14 20 and they can belong to none else in the Propheticall scope of the Visions Time and Place and the Order of things having so unavoidably fixed them upon her Wherefore even according to Divine suffrage they are guilty of Idolatry in one sense or other or come so nigh it that the Spirit of God in a jealousie to exaggerate their Wantonness speaks to them as such to deterre them from those suspected ways and dangerous approches to so horrible a Crime And grant it were but thus yet both in the Vision of the Seven Churches and in that of the Whore of Babylon the people of God are expresly called unto and encouraged and commissioned to forsake the Church of Rome's Communion So that the Protestants have not the least guilt of Schism upon them for leaving her no not upon this more favourable Supposition 3. But alas alas this smooth Hypothesis is but a pleasing Dream arising from the softnesse and sleepinesse of the carnal minde and the love of those things that must passe away as a Dream or Phantasm of the night Let God be true and every man a liar as the Apostle speaks And truly the Spirit of God would scarce speak true if what is spoken of Idolatry so broadly and so expresly in those Visions insomuch that they have been understood of the Heathen Idolatry even for this very reason by learned and able Interpreters should now we are necessitated to understand them of Rome Christian in her apostatized condition not amount to the Charge of any proper and formal Idolatry at all 4. But the desperatenesse of their case is that if they were not represented by these Visions as Idolatrous that is to say if these Visions had never been writ or now they are writ though they were to be understood of some others and not of the Church of Rome yet appealing to the nature of the thing to the true Notion of Idolatry properly and formally so called and to the acknowledged Doctrine of their Church expressed in the Council of Trent and their universal Practices abetted by publick Authority this alone is sufficient to demonstrate them to be Idolaters properly so called Which is the scope of this present
Imprimatur Sam. Parker ERRATA In the Pref. to the Exposit. pag. 4. l. 2. Interims read in terms In the Exposit. p. 11. l. 1. r. the Church in Thyatira p. 53. l. 21. r. in Thyatira p. 107. l. 26. r. event In the Antidote p. 11. l. ult for at r. all p. 27. l. 17. r. impossible or p. 91. l. 24. r. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 AN EXPOSITION OF THE SEVEN EPISTLES TO THE SEVEN CHURCHES Together with A Brief Discourse of IDOLATRY with Application to the Church of ROME By HENRY MORE D. D. PROV 12. 19. The lying tongue is but for a moment but the lip of Truth shall be established for ever London Printed by James Flesher 1669. To the Right Honourable John Lord Robarts Baron of Truro Lord Privy Seal Lord Lieutenant of Ireland and one of his Majestie 's most Honourable Privy COUNCIL My Lord WHat things single are usually thought sufficient to determine ones choice of a Patron to any publick Writing whether it be private Obligation from particular Favours or the Desire of leaving to Posterity a just and honourable Testimony to the Parts and Vertues of some excellent Person or the design of obtaining the Patronage and countenance of such a Person to what we adventure to make publick as is able by his Learning Judgement and publick Repute to protect it from Injury all these do so happily conspire in your Lordship that I should have thought it an Omission unpardonable if I had not taken this opportunity of paying your Lordship this due respect and of doing that right to the Truth I here professe as to put it under the wings of so fit and able a Patron Which still ought to be done with the greater alacrity there being that Providentiall Coincidence of things that I should have a Book ready in the Presse at that very time that our Gracious Sovereign did think good to conferre upon your Lordship that great Honour and Trust of being Lord Lieutenant of Ireland Which conjuncture of Circumstances could not but excite me with greater readinesse to make your Lordship this congratulatory Present upon your new Honour Which all good Christians that know the inflexible uprightnesse of your spirit and cordiall adherence to the Apostolick Faith and just Interest of Reformed Christendome cannot but congratulate For this it is indeed My Lord that has begot in me a more special esteem of your Lordship that in this instable and uncertain Age you have with that steadinesse of minde and clearnesse of Judgement stuck to the Truth and Purity of the Protestant Religion as discerning the vast difference betwixt it and Popery which yet too many now-adays either because they are removed too great a distance from all Religion or else because their sight is extremely dim in matters of this nature can not or will not discern But this is spoke with a more particular regard to the second part of this small Volume I present your Lordship withall But the first also has its speciall sutablenesse to the Circumstances your Lordship is placed in For by how much more power any one is intrusted with by any Protestant Prince by so much the more he is concerned to understand how sacred a Province he undertakes and how expresly that Religion and Profession is owned in the Holy Prophecies Christ has delivered to his Church above and against the barbarous and idolatrous Tyrannie of the Church of Rome Which things are set out with that plainnesse evidence and easiness in this Exposition of the Epistles to the Seven Churches that I hope no impartial Reader can fail of being made exceeding sensible of the Sacrednesse of the Protestant Religion and Interest by the perusall thereof Besides that there are some notable Hints in these Oracles for the more happy and secure management of the Affairs of Reformed Christendome I shall onely name that passage to the Sardian Church Remember how thou hast received and heard and hold fast c. The Verse runs out into a dreadfull Commination of heavy Judgements to the Angel of the Church of Sardis for his loosenesse and slipperinesse in those points of Apostolick Doctrine which the Reformers had recovered into the knowledge of so great a part of the world And amongst the things that they had heard that voice of the Angel Apoc. 18. Come out of her my people that ye be not partakers of her sins c. was not the least articulate Whereby the Church of Rome was openly declared to be that Babylong the Great the Mother of Fornications and the Abominations of the Earth as also the Pope with his Clergie to be that notorious Antichrist This the Sardian Church had received from their Evangelicall Predecessours And it had been their everlasting establishment never to have for got it never to have let it die or smothered it But what mischief the halting betwixt two Opinions is apt to doe and the not taking notice how sacred a thing the Protestant Religion is in the sight of God and how rejectaneous that of the Church of Rome I believe neither your Lordship nor any one else that has his eyes opened either into History or the Affairs of the world can be ignorant of or if he be a good Christian make the observation without regrett and sorrow But the Prospect of what is to come is more pleasing and comfortable which is the state of the Church of Philadelphia into which the Sardian Church that is to say Reformed Christendome or the Protestant Churches are to passe as being the next successive Intervall Which therefore cannot but be a Note of main importance for all Reformed States and Kingdomes to stear their Affairs by namely to bend their course thitherward whither they are pointed to by the Finger of God himself in his Holy Oracles For they sail as it were with winde and tide whose carriage of Affairs approaches the nearest to the purpose of Divine Fate Which is lively pourtray'd all along in this stupendious Book of Prophecies written by S. John The most pleasing and enravishing part whereof is that which is typify'd or prefigured by the Church of Philadelphia the Church of Brotherly love Which is the next Scene Divine Providence has designed to introduce And which all those do most grosly oppose who for difference in matters not revealed in holy Scripture nor necessary to Salvation think they have pretense enough with all unchristian keennesse and bitternesse of spirit to reproach and inveigh one against another to nourish the highest Animosities and to watch all opportunities of persecuting ruining and trampling one another into the Dirt. As this is extremely unchristian in it self so is it also diametrically opposite to that Dispensation that God intends to introduce into his Church as the chiefest Blessing he has in store for her and is as it were knocking at the door to enter if the lovd noise of hot and quarrelsome Brawls about matters of smaller moment as indeed all things are exceeding small
Magistrate by how much more kinde and loving to one another and by how much more seriously affected for the advancing the publick good and the endeavouring the common welfare of all mankind which will introduce the Philadelphian Intervall by so much more near they may reckon the approach of the downfall of Antichrist and the glorious Reign of Christ in his Saints at the happy Millennium But what other Indications there be besides these in the Visions of the Prophets whereby we may compute the nearnesse of those Times I must ingenuously confesse I know not But this was a sudden Excursion We will return again into the way 14. But thirdly In that it is said Notwithstanding I have a few things against thee because thou sufferest that Woman Jezebel which calleth her self a Prophetesse to teach and seduce my servants to commit Fornication and to eat things sacrificed unto Idols c. this is a perfect clearing of the Protestant Reformers from that hainous Crime of Schism that the Church of Rome so magisterially lays to their charge it plainly implying that their Separation from the Church of Rome was not onely no Fault but a Vertue and an indispensable point of Obedience to the command of Christ and that it had been Disobedience and Rebellion against Christ not to have separated and therefore was impossible to be any Schism Which is a thing worthy of our notice and consideration As is also this contrary to the opinion of some otherwise learned That to depart from the Church of Rome upon the very account of Idolatry is not Schism before God but onely in the sight of men and those it is to be feared of none of the purest minds but rather such as have a greater sense of the carnal Interest of the Church then of the Glory of God and the purity of his Worship For Christ who is God blessed for ever does here blame the Church in Thyatira that she suffers the Woman Jezebel any longer and does not cast her off as the Eunuchs cast her out of the window in the Type and that for this very cause because she is a Teacher of Idolatry and an Abettour and Countenancer of spiritual Fornication as is manifest in the Text. So that before God or in the sight of God both the Church of Rome stands guilty of Idolatry and also the Protestants leaving her Communion upon that account are acquitted from any the least taint or suspicion of Schism And that the Spirit of God does but witnesse with our spirits in the truth of this matter if thou hast not lost the free use of thy Reason that brief Treatise of Idolatry added to this present Exposition will I hope abundantly satisfie thee which therefore I have adjoined as a sutable Appendage thereunto 15. Fourthly In that Reformed Christendom especially after their Remissnesse in Life and Manners and Contentionsnesse about Trifles is represented under the Type of the Church in Sardis to be in such an imperfect Condition though emerged out of the grossnesse of the Popish Idolatry for there is no farther complaint of either the Doctrine of Balaam or of Jezebel here this should teach us to be humble and not over-fierce and confident in our Opinions and Doctrines but meekly to bear one with another and be ready to be instructed by one another for the clearing up the Truth But in the mean time things being no better then they are sith they are no worse then they were predicted we are hence to learn that it is our Duty never to suffer our mindes to relapse towards the Flesh-pots of AEgypt or think we had as good goe back again to Rome as to be no better then we are For this Sardian state is like the wandring in the Wildernesse betwixt AEgypt and the promised Land which is the Philadelphian state into which there is no entrance till after the seven Vials that is till the last of them be poured out or at least a-pouring As it is said in the fifteenth of the Apocalypse And the Temple was filled with smoak from the glory of God and from his power and no man was able to enter into the Temple till the seven plagues of the seven Angels were fulfilled Where no man according to the Apocalyptick style signifies that that company of men that were to enter into and make up that state of the Church which is here styled 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the living Temple of God would not appear in that eminent condition till after the Vials the last either current or complete Which agrees admirably with that passage in the Epistle to Philadelphia Him that overcometh will I make a Pillar in the Temple of my God So that these Philadelphians shall not onely enter into the Temple after the smoak of the Vials but never goe out of it again according to the sense we have explained it in Wherefore because we are in a kinde of Wildernesse-condition we ought with Faith and Meeknesse and Patience to abide till God shall bring us into that good Land and not to murmur against him and reproach his Providence who hath thought fit to carry on things with such leisurely steps nor peevishly and falsly to say that we had as good return to Rome again and that it is a question whether the Reformation has done more good or hurt For such thoughts or speeches are false injudicious and ingratefull Reproaches against the sacred Providence of God whose ways these bitter shallow and unsanctify'd spirits understand not because the spirit of the world has blinded their eyes And forasmuch as there is no complaint of Idolatry in the Epistle to this Sardian Church nor the least hint to make any Separation as before all the Churches of Reformed Christendom and all the particular Sects and Members thereof ought to have a tender regard how they divide from one another or break Communion for difference of Ceremony or Opinion but holding all the indispensable Foundation and bearing joint Testimony against the grosse Idolatries and wilde Enormities of the Church of Rome to study Peace and mutuall Compliance that the Body of Reformed Christendome may be more strong and compact to stand against the common Enemie But above all we are with might and main to endeavour to perfect Holinesse in the fear of God and to purge our selves from all pollution of flesh and spirit that we may prevent the extremity of that Judgement which is threatned as suddenly and unexpectedly to come upon the Church of Sardis And these I think are main Usefulnesses discoverable in the Interpretation of the Epistle to the Sardian Church 16. And fifthly As for the Exposition of the Church of Philadelphia it is of main Importance for the making of the world good For it is the ordinary excuse for the reigning of Impiety and Immorality in the world that men will be men as long as the world lasts and that things are more likely ever to grow worse and worse then
Churches as well as the Vision of the Seven Seals and of the opened Book reaches from the beginning of the Church to the end of all things Which consideration is so repeated to us that certainly it must not stand for nought but is to give infallible aim at a higher meaning of the Seven Churches then we are at first aware of For the summary of the Vision before he descends to the particular Churches begins and ends with this v. 11. and 18. I am the First and the Last and have the keyes of Hell and of Death Which undoubtedly respects the execution of the final Sentence under the seventh Thunder 5. But there is first this not able to be observed in the Tenth verse I was in the Spirit on the Lord's day and heard behind me a great voice as of a Trumpet This pompous entrance with the sound of the Trumpet into this Vision of the Seven Churches and the glorious appearance of the Son of man walking in the midst of the seven golden Candlesticks with seven Stars in his right hand comes up so near to that splendid Preamble to the Vision of the Seven Seals that any sagacious man cannot but suspect that both the Visions be of like extent and importance and not of such private concern as merely to respect those Seven Churches in Asia For at the beginning of both these Visions there is the glorious appearance of Christ in the midst of the Church in the first standing or walking in the midst of the seven golden Candlesticks in the latter sitting in the midst of the four Beasts and four and twenty Elders and both these Preambles to the future Visions ushered in with the sound of the Trumpet Wherefore the Pomp being equal the concern of each Vision in all likelihood is equal Nor can it be pretended that the Pomp before the Vision of the seven Churches was designed as a fair Frontispice to the whole Book of Prophecies because at least as splendid a Frontispice is again erected before the Vision of the Seven Seals Wherefore that former was entirely intended for the Visions of the Seven Churches and therefore portends some mighty concerning Mysterie therein and such as the present Affairs of those seven particular Churches in Asia could not reach nor exhaust But we proceed 6. Saying I am Alpha and Omega the first and the last and what thou seest write in a book and send it unto the seven Churches which be in Asia Here again immediately before his sending to the seven Churches of Asia he displays those Titles of himself that least of all suit with the small continuance of those particular Churches But the holy Catholick Church endures from the beginning to the end of all Upon which therefore I cannot doubt but the Spirit of Prophecy had his eye at this time and in the Mystery understood by the seven Churches in Asia the holy Catholick Church divided into seven successive Intervalls according to the opinion of Petrus Galatinus For indeed in all reason if there was not some grand Mysterie underneath why should onely seven Churches in Asia be writ to when there were others many others either there or at least in other parts of the Empire in all likelihood as notorious for either the Faults the Vertues or the Sufferings that are noted in these 7. You 'll say haply that Asia minor was the special Diocese as it were of S. John But they that answer thus forget that John was merely passive in these Visions and wrote no otherwise then he was moved by the Holy Ghost which is no respecter of persons Besides that there were certainly other Churches in Asia besides these seven Why therefore just Seven and why these But that seven signifies Universality is obvious in the Prophetick style Therefore to the seven Churches in Asia is as much as to all the Churches in Asia But it 's much that all the Churches in Asia minor should be thus carefully saluted by the Holy Ghost and the rest of the Churches in the Christian world be taken no notice of As if it were according to the Proverb that kissing goes by favour whenas yet it is expresly said in the Scripture that God is no respecter of persons as I intimated before 8. But you will farther urge that we cannot possibly make it any more then all the Churches in Asia unlesse Asia were turned into an Appellative Which consideration will put a bar to all attempts for any Mysticall Interpretation so that we must necessarily rest in the Literal But Hugo Grotius who interpreteth all the Churches also Mystically from the reason of their Names yet takes no notice of any Allusive signification in the word Asia So that in this learned man's judgement that sequel is not so firm But besides though I do not love to play with words more then needs must I think it not hard to finde out an Allusive signification apposite enough in the name of Asia to the Mysticall sense intended For both 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the former signifying Fundamentum the latter Actio or Effectio as to their paronomasticall sound are as near Asia as the nicest criticall ear can require in these cases And for the sense of them both it is extremely accommodate to the present purpose For then will this Superscription To the Seven Churches in Asia either signifie To all the Churches in the foundation that is that keep to the Apostolick Foundation in matter of Doctrine and Profession or else To all the Churches in Action that is to say these Epistles are writ to them with an intended censure of their Actions And it is said expresly by the Logician touching the Topick of Effects and Actions Hujus loci sunt Laudes Vituperationes upon which all these Epistles altogether run And I know thy works begins every Epistle Besides that they are directed to none but such as profess the Fundamentals of the Christian Faith and nothing repugnant thereunto as will appear in our Interpretation of them Nor is it strange that S. John though writing in Greek should himself being a Jew make an Allusion to Hebrew words nor is it without example For the Son of Sirach does plainly in that passage in the Greek Text 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 allude to the Hebrew word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to hide as if 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 were as much as 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 9. These verbal Allusions are so frequent in the Prophetick Style that there is no need farther to take notice thereof nor any doubt I think but the Spirit of God would not in this Book of Prophecies where all things are so comprehensive and majestick salute onely seven particular Churches of all the Churches of the World and that with such pompous Circumstances nor when he had begun so magnificently a Book of Prophecies and so expresly intitled it so that he would immediately afterwards as if he
in those days that my faithfull Martyr Antipas that is those plain-hearted and openly-professed enemies of the Pope and his adulterate and idolatrous Religion the Waldenses and Albigenses were so cruelly persecuted and murthered who were slain among you who stood out and yet escaped though in the very Synagogue of Satan that is to say in that Church which is a treacherous Adversary to all my true Members and a very bitter Censurer and Accuser of them for their not complying with the Laws of Wickednesse which she hath established and a worse Adversary then the Pagan Dragon before whom therefore my Church overcame in a few Ages This Satan I say is a more mischievous Enemy then that red Dragon by reason of his Cunning and Hypocrisie and his pretenses that he is for me when indeed he is against me and by reason of the abuse of my Authority in pretense against the Members of my true Church Wherefore I cannot but take notice where thou dwellest and how in that regard thou art in a worse condition then the Smyrnian Church her self who were onely to grapple with a professed Enemy but thou with both a malicious Enemy and a false and hypocritical Friend It is therefore well done of thee that thou holdest out in such hard and difficult Circumstances 6. This for the sense of that Verse in general But now particularly why the Waldenses and Albigenses that were persecuted in this Intervall of the Church should be called Antipas why Martyr why faithfull and why slain rather then burnt we shall briefly give this account And that a Company or successive Body of men is represented in the Prophetick style under one single person is so trivial that I need not note it Alcazar makes Jezebel mentioned in the next Epistle to be the Church of the Jewes Aretas the Sect of the Nicolaitans Dr. Hammond the Gnosticks But now that this one person should be called Antipas there is nothing more congruous to the Doctrine of the Waldenses and Albigenses who boldly preached that the Pope was Antichrist the Mass an Abomination the Host an Idol and Purgatory a Fable And Waldo the chief beginner of this Sect was of the same mind denying the Pope to be the Head of the Church or that he had any Authority over the Kings and Princes of the earth who depend immediately upon God alone Was not this an Antipas indeed then and exactly opposing the sovereign Paternity of his Holiness of Rome But they were faithfull because they did so plainly declare to the World such concerning Truths and Martyrs because they suffered death for so doing it being for the Cause of God and for the Interest of the Kingdome of Christ. And they are said to be slain suppose with the Sword or any weapon of War not burnt because Burning was more rare within this Intervall of the Church but they were slain in the field many hundred thousands of them A great number of the Waldenses that took Arms in Germany were cut in pieces in the year 1220 as Matthew Paris writes they being in such a disadvantageous place betwixt marish ground and the Sea that they could make no escape And Mr. Mede out of Petrus Perionius in his book of this Albigensian War intimates that near ten hundred thousand of them were slain in battel at times and that in France alone Wherefore slaying with the Sword is very Characteristically spoken here in this Epistle of the faithfull Martyr Antipas Burning as yet being in it self not so frequent and bearing no proportion at all to this vast number slain in the Field Whence this is a considerable note of distinction betwixt this present Intervall of the Church in Pergamus from that of her abode in Thyatira as we shall see in its due place 7. But I have a few things against thee because thou hast there them that hold the Doctrine of Balaam who taught Balac to cast a stumbling-block before the children of Israel to eat things sacrificed unto Idols and to commit Fornication This is spoken to the whole Body of those that in their judgements did condemn both the Doctrine and Practices of the Church of Rome But these may be cast into three sorts such as notwithstanding this Judgement still held Communion with her and pretended they did well in so doing those that separated from her Communion and those that not onely separated but suffered death for so doing These last were the Martyr Antipas above named the first the Balaamites here reproved that were of a more Gnostick-like temper too much leaning towards the Flesh thinking themselves wiser then the other in not exposing themselves for their judgement in Religion Ye do well indeed saith he in declaring against the Enormities of the Papal Church and in condemning them in your own thoughts and Consciences but this I take ill of you that ye permit some of you the Doctrine of Balaam to take effect that is by communicating with this Church of Rome in her idolatrous Eucharist and by eating her Deus Panaceus ye commit spiritual Fornication and become guilty of Idolatry To eat things sacrificed to Idols is one mode of Idolatry but by a Propheticall Diorism it signifies Idolatry in general That ye indulge this liberty to your selves or others is to cast a Stumbling-block before the Children of Israel and to occasion and encourage many to adhere to the Roman Communion when they ought to separate from her that there be no prejudice done to my true Church nor Dis-interest to my Kingdome 8. So hast thou also them that hold the doctrine of the Nicolaitans which thing I hate That also is a fault amongst some of you that you do not possesse your Vessels in that holinesse and sanctity ye ought to doe and though you can discover the spiritual Fornications of Pergamus and their Luciferian Pride yet ye are not so pure and clean as ye ought to be and free from the Lusts of the flesh which Vice is here noted by Nicolaitism dioristically as Idolatry in general before by eating things sacrificed to Idols Flesh and bloud is over-prone to think little ill of such things because they are so natural and pleasing but I declare a pertly unto you that it is a thing that I hate Be ye holy even as I am holy Repent or else I will come unto thee quickly and will fight against them with the Sword of my mouth Amend these faults left I come to you suddenly in Judgement Haply by the more sedulous activity of the Lords of the Inquisition whose reign was most chiefly in the following Intervall as also of other Judicatures the Pragmaticalnesse of whose Agents will be more then ordinarily ready to discover every one that dissembles his Religion and the frequent terrour of being burnt alive at the Stake will more effectually suppresse the flames of all Wantonnesse and Lust. And as I will come to you thus in Judgement unlesse ye repent so I am
trade of whoring still Behold I will cast her into a bed and them that commit adultery with her into great tribulation except they repent of their deeds Unlesse she repent I will certainly cast her into a bed of sicknesse and languishment for that bed of Adultery wherein she has entertained the Kings of the earth Her strength and glory shall be much diminished and her Paramours shall bewail the Calamity I shall bring upon her For there shall be of the Kings that shall hate the Whore shall make her desolate in their dominions and naked and shall eat her flesh and burn her with fire As it fell out in the late defection of whole Nations from her And I will kill her children with death That is either slay them with the sword of the Spirit and so make them dead as to her by their conversion to the truth or else kill them with a natural death such I mean as come against my true Church whether whole Armies or seditious Emissaries as has often happened since the Reformation And all the Churches shall know that I am he that searches the reins and hearts and will give unto every one of you according to his works That is it will be notoriously taken notice of in all Christendome how just my judgements are and that I deal not with Jezebel according to her fair pretenses and Titles who calls her self Holy Church and pretends all her cruelties and imposturous and Idolatrous Trumperies to be for my glory whenas they have run into all this degeneracy for their worldly Interest But mine eyes which are a flaming fire searching into the hearts and reins clearly see their abominable Hypocrisie and my feet like fine brasse that never goe out of the way of purity and justice will be sure to overtake them and doe due vengeance upon them I will reward every one according to his works 18. But unto you I say and unto the rest in Thyatira as many as have not this doctrine To you Pastours of my true Church in Thyatira and the rest which are your charge that hold not the Idolatrous doctrine or faith of the Thyatirian that is of the Roman Church And which have not known the depths of Satan as they speak that is which have not approved the deep mysteries as they speak of reason of State or of the Roman Religion such as murdering innocent men for the Interest of Holy Church Infallibility Transubstantiation and the like but I who search the heart and reins do apertly declare to be the depths of Satan they tending to nothing but to Luciferian Pride barbarous Persecutions and Murders and grosse imposture and Idolatry I will put upon you no other burden but that which ye have already hold fast untill I come I have already shew'd you my approbation of your wayes ver 19. and in that ye do not communicate with the Idolatrous Jezebel keep to where you are and stand out to the last let no Persecutions dismay you till I come in judgement against this Jezebel the same with the little Horn in Daniel which in the expiring of the time and times and half a time will certainly be judged 19. And he that overcometh and keepeth my works unto the end to him will I give power over the Nations That company of men those people that keep my works to the end to the last semi-time of the Seven they shall have power over the Pagan Christians they shall get them under and be no more domineered over by them And he shall rule them with a rod of Iron that is with sufficient power and strictnesse to keep them in subjection As the vessels of a Potter shall they be broken to shivers The stone shall smite the Image on the feet and break them to pieces That shall be at the long-run Even as I received of my father I in you and you in me you in me by vertue of the Power of my Spirit shall thus reign and I in you according as it is written I shall give thee the Heathen for thine inheritance the uttermost parts of the earth for thy possession Thou shalt break them with a rod of iron thou shalt dash them in pieces as a Potters vessel But this is something further off 20. And I will give him the morning star In the mean time and which is next to succeed I will give them the morning star that is a considerable dawning towards that greater Day of the illustrious reign of Christ upon earth in his Saints by his Spirit The Phosphorus to the glorious Sun-rise of the happy Millennium properly so called This intervall will be the same with that of the Vials which are accompanied with such a smoake As here the Promise which is to be performed in the next Succession of the Church and there continued is not expressed with that vigour as elsewhere where Christ in reference to his Kingdome is said to be the bright morning star here onely the morning star without the ornament of that Epithet The Kingdome of Christ therefore under the first Thunder may be said to be the morning star but under the second the bright morning star And it is observable that whereas in that other place he is called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in this he is called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which may also have the signification of more early then was expected which exquisitely answers to the evert it falling out toward the fore-part of the last semi-time But these things are onely by the by He that hath an ear to hear let him hear what the Spirit saith unto the Churches There is nothing new remarkable in this Epiphonema but the placing of it here after the whole Epistle which is a sign that all the Epistle is a Parable and is not onely meant of the Church in Thyatira in the Literal sense but that the condition and affairs of some other Church the truely Catholick and Apostolick Church in the Intervall defined are here prefigured and described Prophetically And that therefore the Promises are to be performed on this stage of the Earth as of their own nature they appear to be such that have a Political sense Which therefore therewithall assures us that such a tenour of Interpretation belongs to the three following Epistles because the Epiphonema is the close of every one of them And therefore we shall steer the course of our Interpretation accordingly CHAP. VII The Interpretation of the Epistle to the Church in Sardis 1. AND unto the Angel in the Church of Sardis write That Sardis was a City in Asia is manifest Ch. 1. And considered no otherwise then so does not at all illustrate the condition of this fifth Succession of the state of the Church But acknowledging here again a Paronomastical Allusion to Sarda the precious Stone as Grotius does or taking notice with Pliny that that Stone is so called for its first being found about
Sardis it may prove very significative of the condition of Reformed Christendome within that Intervall beginning from the rising of the Witnesses and ending in the last Viall in part of it I mean After which the Intervall of Phyladelphia comes in and takes up also the second and third Thunder Some special qualities therefore of the Church of Sardis are to be read in this Stone Sarda and some to her praise others to her diminution The virtue of this Stone is that carried about one it makes a man chearfull and couragious and drives away Witchcraft and Enchantment and expells poison rightly administred which adumbrate some peculiar Privileges in this Sardian Church Their chearfull security in justification by faith in Christ's bloud and their being rid of the poisonous idolatrous doctrines and bewitching Enchantments of the Cup of the Whore Here 's nothing of Jezebel in this Church nor any mention of the eating of things offered to Idols nor in the two following Epistles which is no small ratification of the truth of these Successions Both they and she are well and sound touching these points 2. But this Stone Sarda which is also called Carnalina and in the Hebrew 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Odem as representing humane flesh and bloud so lively seems also to insinuate something to the Derogation of the Sardian Church as if they were flesh and not spirit which is the special Dispensation of the Church of Philadelphia And whereas Christ's Conquest over Edom is by letting out or squeezing out the corrupt bloud of old Adam this Odem or Carnalina is said to be of that virtue as to stanch bloud and stop it from running out and therefore seems to be significative of whatever Doctrines in the Sardian Church that hinder the due and requisite Mortification of the old man as loth to weaken him too much and let too much of his bloud and life run out 3. The meaning therefore is that though the Sardian Church be well rid of the foul Idolatries and grosse Trumperies of the Papal Church yet her state as yet is but carnal most-what It is not the Dispensation of the spirit of life but the main stir is about external Opinion Ceremony they seem to know Christ onely according to the flesh not according to the power of his Spirit whereby he is able to subdue all things under him Whereas Christ after he had said that his flesh was meat indeed and his bloud was drink indeed clearly explains himself in declaring expresly that the flesh profiteth nothing the words that I speak unto you they are spirit and they are life yet a great part of this Sardian Church I mean the Lutherans rack their own Wits and disturb the rest of Reformed Christendome to maintain that odd Paradox of Consubstantiation that so men may eat and drink that grosse Flesh and Bloud of Christ that was crucify'd upon the Crosse in the Celebration of their Eucharists What can be more Carnaline-like then this Besides that there are over-many that do as grosly and carnally erre touching the nature of the Resurrection-Body they phansying it as terrestrially modify'd though it be called a celestial or spiritual Body in the Scriptures as that Body is that we put into the Grave or is capable of the imbraces of the Nuptial Bed To say nothing of other such like grosse carnal Conceits that this Sardian Church has not yet expunged out of her mind But as mischievous a mark as any of her Carnality is her Dissension and Schismaticalnesse even to mutuall Persecution as also the unnatural and unchristian Wars of one part of Reformed Christendome against the other These things rankly savour of the Flesh and are infinitely contrary to the due Dispensation of the Spirit which when it shall appear will bring in the Church of Philadelphia the Church of unfeigned Love and Charity wherein according to the prediction of the Prophets there shall not be the noise of this unchristian War any more These Touches may suffice to shew why the Spirit of God has denoted this Succession of his Church by the Title of the Church in Sardis 4. These things saith he that hath the seven Spirits of God The number Seven signifies Universality sometimes whence the Pythagoreans call it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The sense therefore is that hath in readinesse to bestow all the spiritual or Divine Graces to make the man of God perfect to every good word and work And the seven Stars That is to say that holds the seven Stars in his right hand so it is in the Description before his speech to the Ephesine Church which is repeated here for encouragement Christ hereby declaring his Power and promising his Assistence to the renewing of Christendome through the Reformation as well as he did to the forming of it at first and rooting out Paganism in the first beginning of the Church which is the Ephesine Intervall I know thy works that thou hast a name that thou livest and art dead I discern plainly thy state and condition Thou hast indeed a semblance of life because thou hast a great deal of Heat and Zeal and dost with an externall fervour doe many performances that may raise a fame of thee of being more then ordinarily religious And many hot disputes there may be for this or that Ceremony for this or that Opinion and against them much and very vehement discourse about Faith and Justification and the like Which Heat and activity bears a semblance of Life in thee But assure thy self unlesse thou hast that Faith that worketh by Love all this stir is but the noise of tinkling Brasse or of sounding Cymbals And being thus alive thou art notwithstanding in my sight little better then dead And although thou dost thus imitate warm flesh and bloud yet thou art but a cold Sardius Stone to my touch and discernment As she that liveth wantonly is dead while she liveth though she thinks she is then most of all alive so it is with him that devoid of Christian Love and Charity is enlivened with an hot bitter ignorant and preposterous Zeal This is not the life of God but of mere Nature and Carnality 5. Be watchfull and strengthen the things that remain that are ready to die Take heed that want of Love and Life hazard not Faith too and Remissnesse in Manners bring not in Atheism and Infidelity over all For I have not found thy works perfect before me Those things that have Life in them goe on to Perfection Wherefore if they stop before and make no progresse it is a sign there is some deadly distemper at the very heart or root and such a Plant must wither and die Thy Works are neither perfect nor dost thou easily admit of such Doctrines as lead most effectually to Perfection Remember therefore how thou hast received and heard and hold fast and repent That is to say You that are my true Apostolick Church remember what ye have
small reason for it that name being so particularly and pompously set out for a special name of his And though he has ever had a right unto it yet because the getting into possession of this right will be new and fresh in this Philadelphian Intervall after the battel of the Heros on the white Horse it is rightly termed a new Name and very fittingly writ upon these Philadelphians because they are so instrumental in his Atchievements These are the Boanergesses thundering over the great City divided into three parts and also those Horsemen on white Horses as I intimated before Christ therefore through these becomes King of Kings and Lord of Lords or rather he has made them the greatest Kingdome upon earth The mountain of the Lord's house is exalted upon the top of the mountains and all Nations flow unto it as it is to come to passe under the third Thunder Through which third and second Thunder and seventh Vial is drawn the Intervall of the Succession of the Church of Philadelphia as I have hinted above He that hath an ear to hear let him hear c. We need not here urge the intimation of this Political sense of things from the putting of the Epiphonema last the very nature of the expressions calling for it though we had no such guide But we may rather argue that the things themselves being of so manifest Political sense not moral or spiritual that it confirms our Rule touching the position of this Epiphonema But this by the bye We proceed to the Church of Laodicea CHAP. IX The Interpretation of the Epistle to the Church of Laodicea 1. AND to the Angel of the Church of the Laodiceans write The Intervall of the Succession of the Church of Laodicea is the fourth and fifth Thunders that is from the loosing of Satan to the appearing of Christ coming to Judgement under the sixth Thunder In this Intervall the Scene of Philadelphia is past and Laodicea takes place which is acknowledged a true Church as to Worship and Doctrine but is represented as a lazy lethargical Church in which that former Philadelphian zeal is extinguished as to the generality of the Church though it 's likely this degeneracy comes on by degrees in this Intervall 2. Thus therefore it is foreseen in the series of Divine Providence that after that glorious estate of the Church which is synchronal to the second and third Thunder during which space and a little before the Scene of Philadelphia adorned the Stage had well purged the Christian World from all foolish opinions and superstitions and of that accursed custome of persecuting one another for them and that the truth of the Gospel had clearly shined in the simplicity thereof and so convictively against all the follies and impostures of the former Ages that the Church had no great hazard of being again cheated with them and that they had seen all Prophecies in a manner fulfilled before their eyes so that there could be no doubt to them but that the Philadelphian Church was the true Church nor be in any capacity of any change in faith or worship after this I say as all things are in some sort or other variable under the Sun so it seems this Philadelphian Church was at last to degenerate into this Laodicean state and that which was before the Reign of the Spirit and the living Righteousnesse of God would now become the Church of Laodicea which signifies a more popular or external Politicall righteousnesse or the righteousness of the people An external profession and performance of that Mode that was used by the Philadelphians in a living way and with the power of the Spirit the same will this Church of Laodicea hold on spiritlesly and lazily with little life or zeal and yet applaud themselves by reason of the abundance of knowledge she has because of the completion of the Prophecies and by reason of the purity of the external Worship she still retains as if all was still well with her and as if she wanted nothing 3. This in brief is the condition of this Church as it is significantly intimated in the very name For 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 signifies as much as the righteousnesse of the people And the people are any multitude of mankind gathered into a body politick as is manifest in that notation of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as if it were from 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and then again in Homer 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And therefore the people being a body politick are ruled by such and such laws which if they observe it is not regarded quo animo or out of what Principle they observe them The new nature Regeneration and the Spirit are quite out of this rode And a National or Oecumenical Religion Doctrine or Worship as they are ab extrà are but as a political law and the Righteousnesse therein but a Laodicean Righteousnesse as has been abundantly inculcated already But besides this meaning of the name Laodicea which I doubt not but is particularly intended there may according to the multifarious Allusivenesse of the Propheticall style another notable meaning be also intimated and that very appropriate to this Church For the ratio nominis in Laodicea may be likewise 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 because in the Intervall of this Church God will in that most notorious and terrible manner come to judge the people Because the Closure of this Church brings in the last Judgement properly so called therefore this last Intervall of the Church is called Laodicea The judging of the people all the Nations of the world at the last Day And there is nothing more frequent in the Scripture then the giving of names from some notable externall Accident that respects the thing or person so named 4. These things saith the Amen the faithfull and true witnesse Paul in his second Epistle to the Corinthians says That all the promises of God in Christ are Yea and Amen that is to say they are so sure and certain that no man need doubt but they will be performed Wherefore this Attribute of Christ is seasonably brought in as respecting both the completion of the Promises already performed in bringing his Church to that admirable glorious condition in the Succession of Philadelphia as also the performance of that material Promise at the end of this Epistle touching eternal Life or a blessed Immortality in Christ's Heavenly Kingdome which these Laodiceans or degenerated Philadelphians like our modern Familists that pretend to the Philadelphian Dispensation may some of them it 's likely be prone to distrust But Christ is here also called the faithfull and true witnesse because he does so impartially witnesse concerning the truth of the condition of the Laodiceans and so faithfully discover to them the danger thereof And the declaration seeming so paradoxicall to them it was the more requisite to inculcate into them his own truth and faithfulnesse that he might gain
belief of them against their own false sense and opinion of themselves The beginning of the Creation of God This hath a more high meaning like that in the beginning of S. John's Gospel and respects the Divinity of Christ by whom all things were made and in whom all things are But I believe also that is more particularly insinuated here which is expresly declared of him according to the Seventy by the Prophet Esay 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The beginner of that world or Age under the Messias wherein he having as I intimated before carried on all things so completely according to promise and prediction this seems an advantageous repetition of what was intimated before in that Attribute of Amen As if he should say I was the beginner of this marvellous Scene of things from the time of my living on this Earth in the flesh to this very day and you see how steddily all things have been carried on according to Predictions and Prophecies wherefore believe me in the rest whether Comminations or Promises which I shall now declare unto you This seems to be the genuine sense of this Preface to the Epistle 5. I know thy works that thou art neither cold nor hot I see thee to be in a tepid formal remisse Dispensation Thou holdest still the outside of the Philadelphian Church for Doctrine and Worship But thou art destitute of that Spirit of life in the new Birth which was the proper Character of thy deceased Sister of Philadelphia I would thou wert cold or hot Though it be not better in it self yet it were better for thee thou wert not so externally good as thou art that thou mightest the sooner be convinced of thine own wants and get into the state of Repentance of Mortification and finally of Regeneration that so thou mightest partake of my Spirit But now thou art but an externall Image of warm flesh out of which life and soul did lately depart even then when thy Sister Philadelphia departed out of this world Thou art the external frame of that Philadelphia but the spirit has left thee 6. So then because thou art luke-warm and neither cold nor hot I will spew thee out of my mouth That is I will declare in a torrent of words against thee how nauseous and distastfull thou art to me and how my stomack rises against thee Which is done in the following verse where he pours out those just Reproaches against her that she is wretched and miserable and poor and blind and naked Or it may be there may be a more profound and yet not less solid meaning in this Commination and that it may be predictive of her utter Extermination that the continuance of the Church of Christ upon Earth shall cease in her For the immenseness of Christ's Divinity incompassing all things that are he can vomit nothing out from him but it must therewith be cast into Non-entity And the Laodicean Church is the last Scene of Providence and this Church and indeed the whole Scene of affairs on this Earth for her sake is shortly to have an end For in the next Thunder to this Laodicean Intervall Christ comes to Judgement and presently after is the Conflagration And Satan is to be let loose but a little time so that the time of the Laodicean Church cannot be long Wherefore the Commination I will spew thee out of my mouth may well be a prediction of the utter Extermination of the Church out of being that is as to the state of a Church upon Earth For as before the coming of the Floud God is said to repent him that he had made man upon the earth and that it grieved him at his heart so Christ here expresseth how nauseous and stomack-sick he is against his Church under this Intervall and Title of Laodicea how his choler and indignation rises against her Luke-warmnesse and that therefore he will vomit her out in a floud of Fire and overwhelm her in a deluge of hot scalding sulphureous flames which will come to passe at the Conflagration The state of the Church now in its old age naturally growing worse Christ will think fit to put an end to the Scene of things and carry his to his Celestial Kingdome 7. Because thou sayest I am rich and increased with goods and have need of nothing And this is one reason of the Spiritlesnesse and Inactivity of the Laodicean Church that she thinks she has all things desirable already Peace Plenty Power and Dominion Security from enemies Profession of the Truth Purity in externall Worship rid of Superstition and Idolatry abundance of Knowledge as well Natural as Theological the understanding of all Prophecies by reason of their clear Completion and the faithfull and judicious Interpretations of her Predecessours no Oppression no Persecution for Conscience sake every man lives at quiet and injoys himself under his own Vine under his own Fig-tree What want we therefore are we not still the true Philadelphian Church and the new Jerusalem descended from Heaven in all the riches and glories thereof One would think so indeed according to the judgement of any carnal eye But let us hear what the Amen says the true and faithfull Witnesse And knowest not that thou art wretched and miserable and poor and blind and naked Christ saith to the Church in Smyrna I know thy works and tribulation and poverty but thou art rich The Primitive Church while the Spirit of life was in them though in the midst of the want of all externall Comforts and under most dreadfull Persecutions in the judgement of Christ are accounted rich but the Laodiceans in the affluence of all external Blessings because they want that Spirit of life are deemed poor and miserable and naked as if they had not a rag to hang on their backs nay blind also for all their abundance of Knowledge because they are devoid of the knowledge and experience of the Mysteries of the Spirit of life in the new Birth and the Renovation of the Soul into inward living Righteousnesse but take up with the externall Laodicean state or condition 8. I counsel thee to buy of me gold tried in the fire that thou may est be rich I advise thee sincerely to endeavour for that is the price thou must pay for this Gold after the Recovery of thy self into the state of the new Jerusalem descended from Heaven which City was of pure Gold so purify'd in the fire that it was as clear as transparent Glasse This is the new Creature in thee the Transformation of thy nature into the Image of the Heavenly Adam This is solid and durable Riches indeed and such as will go along with thee into the highest Heavens when this Earth and the metalls therein shall melt with fire Labour therefore after such a solid Treasure as will abide those fatal flames and will not perish with thee in the general Conflagration And the Symbol of this Treasure is this
Treatise 5. Which therefore doth confirm and corroborate and place beyond all exception the Orthodox Protestant Interpretations of those Visions that concern the Church of Rome which in this last Age have been made so clear and every way so natural and congruous that this one thing granted of their Idolatry there cannot be the least scruple of the truth and congruity of the rest of the Applications 6. And I cannot but adore the faithfulnesse of Divine Providence that has furnished his Church with these Oracles to be the Guide of the Faithfull in these latter Ages which are as it were the dregs of those times which the Spirit of Prophecy has set no good character upon wherein there is such an Inundation of Wickednesse and Prophanenesse that there is scarce any Faith to be found upon earth But that Church which has deluded the world with so many Fictions could never forge those Prophecies that are so punctually true and so cuttingly set out all her grosse Miscarriages and as expresly foretell her Ruine unlesse she will humble her self and pluck in her horns lay aside her bold boasts of Infallibility and be content to be taught to cast away her Idols and be cured of her Dropsie and unnatural thirst after the bloud of the Saints and the bloud of the Martyrs of Jesus 7. Nor can I on the other side sufficiently admire the stupidity of some of our own and their grosse ingratitude to Divine Providence that have so slight a regard to a Book of that mighty weight and moment as the Apocalypse is and think it such a subject as that any good Wit must needs mis-place his time if he meddle with it which is more then a Pagan irreverence to so holy and so important Oracles The Romans of old had another esteem for the Verses of the Sibylls Nihil enim ità custodiebant neque sanctum neque sacrum quemadmodum Sibyllina Oracula as Dionysius Halicarnasseus testifies And it was an high honour to be the Keepers much more the right Expounders of them But that which God of his mercy offers to all such is either the idlenesse frivolousness or profaneness of the spirits of men that it is scarce accepted of any 8. The truth is most men are loath to be 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to be messengers of ill news to the greatest that is to say to the corruptest part of Christendome but rather affect the glory and security of being accounted of so humane of so sweet and ingratiating a temper as that they can surmize well of all mens Religions and so think to conciliate to themselves the fame of either civil and good Natures or of highly-raised and released Wits though it be indeed but a spice of the old abhorred Gnosticism that can comply with any Religion and make a fair tolerable sense of all 9. But these are such high strains of pretense to Wit or Knowledge and Gentility as I must confess I could never yet arrive to nor I hope ever shall though I am not in the mean time so stupid in my way as to think I can write thus freely without offence And yet on the contrary I can deem my self no more uncivil then I do him that wrings his friend by the nose to fetch him out of a Swound 10. I am not insensible how harsh this charge of Idolatry against the Church of Rome will sound in some ears especially it being seconded with that other of Murther and that the most cruel and barbarous imaginable and finally so severely rewarded with an impossibility of Salvation to any now so long as they continue in Communion with that Church But I believed therefore I spake and have no reason to recall my words or to have concealed the truth that their fishing may become lesse successfull in these parts and that it may be with my Countrey-men according to that in Salomon Surely in vain the net is spred in the sight of any bird And therefore this is to open their eyes that they may see what snares of destruction are laid for them and how those that promise others liberty are themselves the servants of corruption and how they that take upon them to be the onely Absolvers from sin are themselves held fast in the snares of eternall death and do as necessarily illaqueate all others therein whom they proselyte to their Religion so far are they from giving them any effectual Absolution 11. I doubt not but many will be prone to cry out This is a very rude piece of Uncharitablenesse to all Romanists But I say it were a most perfidious kinde of Civility even to them themselves to say nothing of the Injury to our Church and Countrey to declare otherwise But if this be the main Odium that sticks upon so true and usefull a Conclusion that it is so far estranged from the spirit of Charity hear but this brief Parable Reader and then I will leave it to thy self to judge and conclude There was a certain Knight bravely mounted as it might seem and in goodly equippage in bright armour a rich scarf about his shoulders and a large plume of feathers in his Helmet who was bound for the Castle of Health seated on an high Hill not unlike to the Domicilium Salutis in Cebes his Table which therefore he easily kept in his eye But the way he was in being something stony and rough and leading not so directly as he thought to the desired Castle he diverted out of the way and descended into a green Plain but not knowing whether it was all passable to the Castle called to some Loyterers there in the field to enquire of them who came right willingly to the Knight scraping many legs to him and desiring him to tell his demands 12. There was an old Shepherd likewise not far off who by that time this idle people had got to the Knight had come down to him also Friends said he to those men he called Is the way passable and safe through this green Plain to yonder Castle pointing to the Castle of Health with his Warder Very safe may it please your Worship said they and shrugging their shoulders and scraping many legs asked a Largesse of the Knight pretending they had been at common work not far off Whereupon the Knight put his hand into his pocket and gave them liberally But are there no Bogs said he nor Lakes betwixt this and the Castle Some small inconsiderable Sloughs it may be said they but you will meet with the Holy Society of the Wipers every-where who will be ready to wipe you as clean as a Clock before you come at the Castle And being so excellently well mounted as we see you are namely upon that famous Steed renowned over all the world the infallible-footed Aplanedo so good an Horse as that he never stumbles your Worship need fear no disaster at all Besides the Beast God blesse him has a Nose like any Hound and by a
will not stick to kill his dearest Friend And finally This Idolatry is the more discernible and aggravable in the Invocation of Saints or Angels their Omnipercipiency being so extremely incredible if not impossible or ridiculous upon any ground as appears by the foregoing Conclusion 8. The sixteenth That the erecting of a symbolicall Presence with Incurvations thitherward the consecrating of Temples and Altars the making of Oblations the burning of Incense and the like were declared by the supreme God the God of Israel the manner of Worship due to him and therefore without his Concession this Mode of Worship is not to be given to any else as appears by Conclusion the ninth The seventeenth That the Pagans worshipping their Daemons though not as the supreme God by symbolicall Presences Temples Altars Sacrifices and the like become ipso facto Idolaters This is manifest from the ninth the fifteenth and the foregoing Conclusion The eighteenth Though it were admitted that there is communicated to Saints and Angels at least a terrestriall Omnipercipiency and that we had the knowledge of this Communication and so might speak to them in a civil way though unseen yet to invoke them in such Circumstances as at an Altar and in a Temple dedicated to them or at their symbolicall presence this were palpable Idolatry The truth is manifest agian from the ninth and sixteenth Conclusions 9. The nineteenth Incurvation in way of Religion towards any open or bare symbolicall Presence be it what-ever Figure or Image as to an Object is flat Idolatry in the Worship of Saints Angels and Daemons double Idolatry in the Worship of the true God single The reason hereof is resolved partly into the ninth and sixteenth Conclusions and partly into the nature of Application of Worship For externall Worship is not any otherwise to be conceived to be apply'd to a symbolicall Presence but by being directed towards it as towards an Object Wherefore if religious Incurvation be directed towards any Figure or Image as to an Object this Figure or Image necessarily receives this religious Incurvation and partakes with God if the Image be to him in it which is manifest Idolatry For the direction of our Intention here is but a Jesuiticall Juggle And therefore I will set down for Conclusion The twentieth That religious Incurvation toward a bare symbolicall Presence wittingly and conscienciously directed thither though with a mental reserve that they intend to use it merely as a Circumstance of Worship is notwithstanding real Idolatry The Reason is because an externall Action toward such a thing as is look'd upon as receptive of such an Action and has frequently received it if it be thus or thus directed will naturally conciliate the notions or respects of Action and Object betwixt these two whether we intend it or no. And it is as ridiculous to pretend that their motions or actions toward or about such a symbolicall Presence are not directed to it or conversant about it as an Object as it were for an Archer to contend that the Butt he shoots at is not the Scope or Object but a Circumstance of his Shooting and he that embraces his Friend that his Friend is not an Object but a Circumstance of his Embracing Which are Conceits quite out of the rode of all Logick See the last Conclusion of the foregoing Chapter 10. The twenty-first That the Adoration of any Object which we out of mistake conceive to be the true God made visible by hypostatical union therewith is manifest Idolatry The Reason is because Mistake does not excuse from Idolatry by Conclusion the fourth and the fifth And in this Supposition we misse of one part of the Object and the onely part that single is capable of Divine Honour For God to be disunited from this adored Object is in this case all one as to be absent For God is not considered nor intended in this act of Adoration but as united with this visible Object Which respect of Union if it fail that consideration or Intention also fails and the Worship falls upon a mere Creature In brief If out of mistake I salute some lively Statue or dead body for such or such a living man though this Man or his Soul were present and saw and heard the Salutation yet I play the fool and make my self ridiculous and am conceived not to have saluted him I would So if I doe Adoration to any Object suppose the Sun or some Magicall Statue for the true Deity visible whenas neither of them are so I play the Idolater and make my self impious and have missed of the due Object of my Adoration 11. The twenty-second That the Adoration of the Host upon the presumption that it is transubstantiated into the living Body of Christ is rank Idolatry This appears from the precedent Conclusion To which you may adde that the Romanists making Transubstantiation the true ground of their Adoration of the Host do themselves imply that without it were so their Adoration thereof would be Idolatry But that it is not so and that their Ground is false any body may be as well assured of as he can of any thing in the world and no lesse assured that they are Idolaters according to their own Supposition and Implication as Costerus indeed does most emphatically and expresly acknowledge it if they be mistaken in their Doctrine of Transubstantiation as we shall hear anon The twenty-third Conclusion That Adoration given to the Host by Protestants or any else that hold not Transubstantiation is manifest Idolatry The Reason is to be fetch'd from the nineteenth and twentieth Conclusions For it is religious Veneration towards a bare corporeall Symbol of the Divine Presence and to make the Action more aggravable towards a Symbol that has Imagery upon it and that of the person that is pretended to be worshipped thereby What can be Idolatry if this be not The twenty-fourth That the Invocation of Saints and Angels though attended with these considerations that both that Excellency we suppose in them and which makes them capable of that Honour is deemed finite and also be it as great as it will wholly derived to them from God yet it cannot for all this be excused from grosse Idolatry This is clear from the seventh eighth tenth and so on till the sixteenth Conclusion For though this Excellency be supposed finite yet if it be so great as that it is no-where to be found but in God it is his Right onely to have such Honours as suppose it And though it be deemed or conceived to be derived from God yet if it be not we give an uncommunicate Excellency to the Creature and rob God of his Right and Honour And lastly though this Excellency were communicated but yet the Communication of it unreveal'd to us it were a treasonable Presumption against the Majesty of God thus of our own head to divulge such things as may violate the peculiar Rights of his Godhead and for ought we know fill the
world with infinite bold examples of the grossest Idolatry and therefore all our practices upon this Principle must be Idolatrous and Treasonable against the Divine Majesty Consider well the fifteenth Conclusion 12. The last Conclusion That this pretended Consideration that where Christ is corporeally present Divine Worship is not done to his Humanity but to his Divinity and that therefore though the Bread should not prove transubstantiated the Divine Worship will still be done to the same Object as before viz. to the Divinity which is every-where and therefore in the Bread this will not excuse the Adoration of the Host from palpable Idolatry For first That part of the Pretense that supposes Divine Worship in no sense due or to be done to Christ's Humanity is false For it is no greater presumption to say that in some sense Divine Worship is communicable to the Humanity of Christ then that the Divinity is communicated thereto In such sense then as the Divinity is communicated to the Humanity which are one by hypostaticall Union may Divine Worship also be communicated to it namely as an acknowledgement that the Divinity with all its adorable Attributes is hypostatically vitally and transplendently residing in this Humanity of Christ. Which is a kinde of Divine Worship of Christ's Humanity and peculiar to him alone and due to him I mean to his Humanity though it be not God essentially but onely hypostatically united with him that is and does as naturally partake of Religious or Divine Worship in our Addresses to the Divinity as the body of an eminently-vertuous holy and wise man does of that great Reverence and civil Honour done to him for those Excellencies that are more immediately lodged in his Soul Which Honour indistinctly passes upon the whole man And as the very bodily Presence of this vertuous person receives the civil Honour so in an easie Analogy doth the Humanity of Christ receive the Divine but both as partial Objects of what they do receive and with signification of the state of the whole case viz. that they are united the one with the Divinity the other with so vertuous a Soul Hence they both become due Objects of that entire externall Worship done towards them to the one civil to the other Divine And therefore in the second place it is plain that there is not one and the same due Object capable of Religious Worship in either Supposition as well in that which supposes the Bread transubstantiated as in that which supposes it not transubstantiated For in the former it is the true and living corporeall Presence of Christ whose whole Suppositum is as has been declared capable of Divine Honour but in the latter there is onely at the most but his symbolicall Presence whose Adoration is Idolatry by the nineteenth twentieth and twenty-first Conclusions And lastly The pretending that though the Bread be not transubstantiated yet the Divinity of Christ is there and so we do not misse of the due Object of our Worship this is so laxe an Excuse that it will plead for the warrantableness of the Laplanders worshipping their Red cloth or the Americans the Devil let them but pretend they worship God in them For God is also in that Red cloth and in the Devil in that Notion that he is said to be every-where Nay there is not any Object in which the ancient Pagans were mistaken in taking the Divine Attributes to be lodged there whether Sun Heaven or any other Creature but by this Sophistry the worshipping thereof may be excused from Idolatry For the Divine Attributes as God himself are every-where To direct our Adoration toward a supernatural and unimitable Transplendency of the Divine Presence or to any visible corporeall nature that is hypostatically united with the Divinity most assuredly is not that sunk and sottish that dull and dotardly sin of Idolatry For as touching this latter to what-ever the Divinity is hypostatically united or to avoid all cavill about terms so specially and mysteriously communicated as it is to Christ the Right of Divine Worship is proportionably communicated therewith as I have already intimated And as for the former That through which the Divine Transplendency appears is no more the Object of our Adoration then the diaphanous Air is through which the visible Humanity of Christ appears when he is worshipped But the Eucharistick Bread being neither hypostatically united with the Divinity nor being the Medium through which any such supernatural Transplendency of the Divine Presence appears to us Adoration directed toward it cannot fail of being palpable Idolatry For the Eucharistick Bread will receive this Adoration as the Object thereof by Conclusion the nineteenth and twentieth But the Adoration or any Divine Worship of an Object in which the Divine Attributes do not personally reside in such a sense as is intimated in those words of S. John And the Word was made flesh but onely locally as I may so speak this according to sound reason and the sense of the Christian Church must be downright Idolatry CHAP. III. That the Romanists worship the Host with the highest kinde of Worship even that of Latria according to the Injunction of the Council of Trent and that it is most grosse Idolatry so to doe 1. AND having thus clearly and distinctly evinced and declared what is or ought to be held Idolatry amongst Christians let us at length take more full notice of some Particulars wherein according to these Determinations the Church of Rome will be manifestly found guilty of Idolatry and that according to the very Definitions of their own Council of Trent As first in the Point of the Adoration of the Host touching which the very words of the Council are Latriae cultum qui vero Deo debetur huic sanctissimo Sacramento in veneratione esse adhibendum and again Siquis dixerit in sancto Eucharistiae Sacramento Christum non esse cultu Latriae etiam externo adorandum soleâ—â—iter circumgestandum populâ—que proponendum publicè ut adoretur Anathema sit 2. This confident Injunction of grosse Idolatry as it is certainly such is built upon their confidence of the truth of their Doctrine of Transubstantiation For the Chapter of the Adoration of the Host succeeds that of Transubstantiation as a natural or rather necessary Inference therefrom Nullus itaque dubitandi locus relinquitur c. That is to say The Doctrine of Transubstantiation being established there is no Scruple left touching the Adoration of the Host or giving Divine Worship to the Sacrament or Christ as it is there called when it is carried about and exposed publickly in Prócessions to the view of the people But the Doctrine of Transubstantiation being false it must needs follow that the giving of Divine Worship to the Host is as grosse a piece of Idolatry as ever was committed by any of the Heathens For then their Divine Worship even their Cultus Latriae which is onely due to the onely-true God is exhibited to
a mere Creature and that a very sorry one too and therefore must be gross Idolatry by the twenty-first and twenty-second Conclusions of the second Chapter 3. But now that their Doctrine of Transubstantiation is false after we have proposed it in the very words of the Council we shall evince by undeniable Demonstration Per consecrationem Panis Vini conversionem fieri totius substantiae Panis in substantiam Corporis Christi totius substantiae Vini in substantiam Sanguinis ejus quae conversio convenienter propriè à Sancta Catholica Ecclesia Transubstantiatio est appellata And a little before cap. 3. Si quis negaverit in venerabili Sacramento Eucharistiae sub unaquaque specie sub singulis cujusque speciei partibus separatione factâ totum Christum contineri Anathema sit In which passages it is plainly affirmed that not onely the Bread is turned into the whole Body of Christ and the Wine into his Bloud but that each of them are turned into the whole Body of Christ and every part of each as often as division or separation is made is also turned into his whole Body Which is such a contradictious Figment that there is nothing so repugnant to the Faculties of the humane Soul 4. For thus the Body of Christ will be in God knows how many thousand places at once and how many thousand miles distant one from another Whenas Amphitruo rightly expostulates with his Servant Sosia and rates him for a Mad-man or Impostour that he would go about to make him believe that he was at home though but a little way off while yet he was with him at that distance from home Quo id malúm pacto potest fieri nunc utî tu hîc sis domi And a little before in the same Colloquie with his Servant Nemo unquam homo vidit saith he nec potest fieri tempore uno homo idem duobus locis ut simul sit Wherein Amphitruo speaks but according to the common sense and apprehension of all men even of the meanest Idiots 5. But now let us examine it according to the Principles of the learned and of all their Arts and Sciences Physicks Metaphysicks Mathematicks and Logick It is a Principle in Physicks That that internall space that a Body occupies at one time is equal to the Body that occupies it Now let us suppose one and the same body occupy two such internall places or spaces at once This Body is therefore equal to those two spaces which are double to one single space wherefore the body is double to that body in one single space and therefore one and the same body double to it self Which is an enormous Contradiction Again in Metaphysicks The Body of Christ is acknowledged one and that as much as any one body else in the world Now the Metaphysicall Notion of one is to be indivisum à se both quo ad partes and quo ad totum as well as divisum à quolibet alio But the Body of Christ being both in Heaven and without any continuance of that body here upon Earth also the whole body is divided from the whole body and therefore is entirely both unum and multa which is a perfect Contradiction 6. Thirdly in Mathematicks The Council saying that in the separation of the parts of the Species that which bears the outward show of Bread or Wine that from this Division there is a parting of the whole divided into so many entire Bodies of Christ the Body of Christ being always at the same time equal to it self it follows that a part of the Division is equal to the whole against that common Notion in Euclide That the Whole is bigger then the Part. And lastly in Logick it is a Maxime That the Parts agree indeed with the Whole but disagree one with another But in the abovesaid Division of the Host or Sacrament the Parts do so well agree that they are entirely the very same individuall thing And whereas any Division whether Logicall or Physicall is the Division of some one into many this is but the Division of one into one and itself like him that for brevity sake divided his Text into one Part. To all which you may adde that unlesse we will admit of two Sosia's and two Amphitruo's in that sense that the mirth is made with it in Plautus his Comedy neither the Bread nor the Wine can be transubstantiated into the intire Body of Christ. For this implies that the same thing is and is not at the same time For that individual thing that can be and is to be made of any thing is not Now the individual Body of Christ is to be made of the Wafer consecrated for it is turned into his individual Body But his individual Body was before this Consecration Wherefore it was and it was not at the same time Which is against that fundamental Principle in Logick and Metaphysicks That both parts of a Contradiction cannot be true or That the same thing cannot both be and not be at once Thus fully and intirely contradictious and repugnant to all Sense and Reason to all indubitable Principles of all Art and Science is this Figment of Transubstantiation and therefore most certainly false Reade the ten first Conclusions of the brief Discourse of the true Grounds of Faith added to the Divine Dialogues 7. And from Scripture it has not the least support All is Hoc est corpus meum when Christ held the Bread in his hand and after put part into his own mouth as well as distributed it to his Disciples in doing whereof he swallow'd his whole Body down his throat at once according to the Doctrine of this Council or at least might have done so if he would And so all the Body of Christ Flesh Bones Mouth Teeth Hair Head Heels Thighs Arms Shoulders Belly Back and all went through his Mouth into his Stomach and thus all were in his Stomach though all his Body intirely his Stomach excepted was still without it Which let any one judge whether it be more likely then that this saying of Christ This is my Body is to be understood figuratively the using the Verb substantive in this sense being not unusual in Scripture as in I am the Vine The seven lean Kine are the seven years of Famine and the like and more particularly since our Saviour speaking elsewhere of eating his flesh and drinking his bloud says plainly that the words he spake they were spirit and they were truth that is to say a spiritual or aenigmaticall truth not carnally and literally to be understood And for the trusting of the judgement of the Roman Church herein that makes it self so sacrosanct infallible the Pride Worldliness Policy multifarious Impostures of that Church so often and so shamelesly repeated and practised must needs make their Authority seem nothing in a Point that is so much for their own Interest especially set against the
excuse and therefore become obnoxious to God's eternall wrath and Damnation if they relinquish not that false Prophetesse Jezebel as she is called in the Epistle to the Church in Thyatira who by her corrupt Doctrines deceives the people and inveigles them into gross Idolatrous Practices 9. Thus little is conceded by those of our Reformed Churches that speak most favourably of those in the Church of Rome And yet this little must be retracted unless we can make it out that any of that Church are capable of sincere and unfeigned Repentance while they are of it For to repent as a Thief because he is afraid to be hanged is not that saving Repentance But to repent as a true Christian none can doe unlesse he has the Spirit of God and be in the state of Regeneration For true Repentance arises out of the detestation of the uglinesse of Sin it self and out of the love to the pulchritude and amiablenesse of the Divine Life and of true Vertue which none can be touched with but those that are Regenerate or born of God Now those holy and Divine Sentiments of the new Birth are so contrary to the Frauds and Impostures to the grosse Idolatries and bloudy Murthers of the Church of Rome which they from time to time have perpetrated upon the dear Servants of Christ that it is impossible for any one that has this holy sense but that he should incontinently fly from that Church with as much horrour and affrightment as any Countrey-man would from some evil Spectre or at the approach of the Devil 10. He that is born of God sinneth not saith S. John How then can they be so born whose very Religion is a Trade of sin and that of the highest nature they ever and anon exercising grosse acts of Idolatry besides that they are consenting by giving up their belief and suffrage to the murtherous Conclusions of that Church to all the barbarous and bloudy Persecutions of the Saints that either have happened or may happen in their own times or ever shall happen by that Church they become I say guilty thereof by adjoyning themselves to this bloud-thirsty Body of men with whom the Murther of those that will not commit Idolatry with them and so rebell against God is become an holy Papal Law and Statute And therefore I say how can any man conceive that those men are born of God who are thus deeply defiled with Murtherous and Idolatrous Impurities but rather that they are in a mere blinde carnal condition and uncapable while they are thus of any true and sincere Repentance and consequently of repenting of their daily Idolatries which they commit and ordinarily to make all sure in ipso articulo mortis and therefore are out of all capacity of Salvation while they are members of that Church As plainly appears both by this present Reason fetch'd from the nature of Regeneration as also from the judgement of the Romanists themselves touching the state of Idolaters after this life and chiefly from the expresse sentence of the Spirit of God in Scripture as I intimated before 11. And therefore in the fifth and last place it is exceeding manifest how stupid and regardless those Souls are of their own Salvation that continue in the Communion of the Church of Rome and how desperately wilde and extravagant they are who never having been of it but having had the advantage of better Principles yet can finde in their hearts to be reconciled to it This must be a sign of some great defect in Judgement or else in their Sincerity that they ever can be allured to a Religion that is so far removed from God and Heaven 12. But this Church as the woman in the Proverbs is I must confess both very fair of speech and subtil of heart and knows how to tamper with the simple ones right skilfully She knows how to overcome all their carnal senses by her luxurious Enticements She has deck'd her bed with coverings of Tapestry with carved works with fine linens of AEgypt She has perfumed her bed with Myrrh Aloes and Cinnamon She entertains her Paramours with the most delicious strains of Musick and chants out the most sweet and pleasing Rhymes to lull them secure in her lap Such as those Idolatrous forms of the Invocation of the Virgin Marie and of other Saints which I have produced of which she has a numerous store Unto which I conceive the Prophet Isay to allude in that passage touching the City of Tyre representing there mystically the relapsing Church of Rome Take an harp goe about the City thou harlot that hast been forgotten make sweet Melody sing many Songs that thou mayst be remembred See Synopsis Prophetica Book 2. ch 16. 13. She gilds her self over also with the goodly and specious Titles of Unity Antiquity Universality the power of working Miracles of Sanctity likewise and of Infallibility and boasts highly of her self that she has the power of the Keys and can give safe conduct to Heaven by Sacerdotal Absolution and if need be out of the Treasury of the Merits of Holy men of their Church which she has the keeping and disposing of can adde Oyl to the Lamps of the unprovided Virgins and so piece out their Deficiency in the works of Righteousnesse Such fair speeches and fine glozing words she has to befool the judgements of the simple 14. But as to the first it is plain that that Unity that is by Force is no fruit of the Spirit and therefore no Sign of the true Church nor that which is from free Agreement if it be not to good Ends. For Salomon describes an Agreement of Thieves or Robbers heartening one another to spoil and bloudshed and to enter so strict a society as to have but one purse And therefore for a company of men under the pretense of Spirituality to agree in the inventing or upholding such Doctrines or Fictions as are most serviceable for a worldly design and for the more easily riding and abusing the credulous and carnal-minded thereby to be masters of their Persons and Wealth this is no holy Unity but an horrid and unrighteous Conspiracy against the deluded sons of Adam 15. And for Antiquity and Universality they are both plainly on the Protestants side who make no Fundamentals of Faith but such as are manifestly contained in the Scripture which is much more ancient and more universally received then any of those things upon whose account we separate from the Church of Rome which are but the fruits of that Apostasie which after four Hundred years or thereabout the Church was to fall into according to Divine Prediction So that we are as ancient and universal as the Apostolick Church it self nor do we desire to appear to be the members of any Church that is not Apostolicall And for their boast of Miracles which are produced to ratifie their crafty Figments they are but Fictions themselves framed by their Priests or Delusions of
the Devil according as is foretold concerning the coming of Antichrist that Man of Sin which the Pope and his Clergy most assuredly is namely that his coming is after the working of Satan with all power and signs and lying wonders So that they glory in their own shame and boast themselves in the known Character of Antichrist and would prove themselves to be Holy Church by pretending to the Privileges of that Man of Sin and by appealing to the palpable signs of the Assistence of the Devil For from thence are all Miracles that are produced in favour of Practices that are plainly repugnant to the Doctrines of the Holy Scriptures 16. But now as for their Sanctity what an holy Church they are any one may judge upon the reading of the Lives of their Popes and History of their Cardinals and other Religious Orders of that Church of Rome how rankly all things smell of Fraud and Imposture of Pride and Covetousnesse of Ostentation and Hypocrisy what monstrous examples of Sensuality their Holinesses themselves have ordinarily been of Fornication and Adultery of Incest and Sodomie to say nothing of Simonie and that infernall sin of Necromancy But for Murther and Idolatry those horrid Crimes are not onely made familiar to them but have passed into a Law with them and are interwoven into the very Essence of their Religion Judge then how holy that Church must be whose Religion is the establishment of Idolatry and Murther Of the latter of which Crimes the holy Inquisition is an Instance with a witness And yet that Den of Murtherers whose Office it is to kill men for not committing Idolatry with the Church of Rome must needs bear the title of Holy 17. And for their pretense of Infallibility it is expresly predicted in the Apocalypse of S. John as well as their laying claim to Miracles For as the two-horned Beast is said to doe great Wonders and to bring fire from Heaven which two-horned Beast is the Pope and his Clergy so Jezebel which is the same Hierarchy is called the Woman that gives to her self the title of a Prophetesse whose Oracles you know must be infallible For she does not mean that she is a false Prophetesse though indeed and in truth she is so And the Pope with his Clergy is judged to be so by the Spirit of God in that he is called the false Prophet as well as the two-horned Beast in those Visions of S. John And while he pretends himself to be a Prophet even without Divine Revelation one may plainly demonstrate that he is a false one from this one notorious Instance of Transubstantiation which is a Doctrine repugnant to common Sense and Reason and all the Faculties of the Mind of man and bears a contradiction to the most plain and indubitable Principles of all Arts and Sciences as I have proved above So that we may be more sure that this is false then that we feel our own bodies or can tell our toes and fingers on our hands and feet Judge then therefore whether is more likely that the Church of Rome should be infallible or Transubstantiation a mere Figment especially it being so serviceable for their worldly Advantages and they being taken tardy in so many Impostures and Deceits So that Infallibility is a mere Boast 18. And now for their Sacerdotal Absolution that they can so safely dismisse men to Heaven or secure them from Hell thereby this power of their Priest is such another vain Boast as that of Transubstantiation Except a man be born again he cannot enter into the kingdome of God And the form of words upon one's Death-bed can no more regenerate any one then their Quinqueverbiall Charm can transubstantiate the Bread and Wine into the Body and Bloud of Christ. Where the form of Absolution has any effect it must be on such persons as are already really regenerate and unfeignedly and sincerely penitent which I have shewn to be incompetible to any one so long and so far forth as he adheres to the Roman Church So that in this case one AEthiopian does but wash another which is labour spent in vain There must be a change of Nature or no externall Ceremonie nor words can doe any thing For the form of Absolution is not a Charm as I said to change the nature of things but onely a Ticket to passe Guards and Scouts and to procure safe Conduct to the Heavenly Regions But if by Regeneration and due Repentance one has not contracted an alliance and affinity with the Saints and Angels but is really still involved in the impure and Hellish nature the grim Officers of that dark Kingdome will most certainly challenge their own and they will be sure to carry that Soul captive into a sutable place let the flattering Priest have dismissed her hence with the fairest and most hopefull circumstances he could This is the most hideous the most dangerous and the most perfidious Cheat of that Church of Rome that ever she could light on for the damning of poor credulous Souls that thus superstitiously depend on the vain breath of their Priest for the security of their Salvation 19. And yet they are not content with this Device alone to lull men secure in wickednesse but besides their pretense of singing them out of Purgatory by mercenary Masses and pecuniarie Redemptions by Pardons and Indulgences and I know not what Trumperies they allure men to come into their Church as having that great Store and Treasury of the Merits of Holy men and women their works of Supererogation which they pretend to have the keeping and disposing of So that a poor Soul that is bankrupt of her self and has no stock of Good works of her own may sufficiently be furnished for love or money by the Merchants of this Store-house Which besides that it is a blasphemous Derogation to the Merits of Christ is the grossest Falshood that ever was uttered For these Holy men as they are called and Virgins were God wot themselves most miserable Sinners and died in most horrid Idolatries as dying in the Practices of that Church and he that comes to that Church does necessarily become a grosse Idolater himself besides that he sets to his seal and makes himself accessory to all that innocent bloud the bloud of those many hundred thousands of Martyrs for the Protestant Truth which that Woman of bloud that sits on the Seven Hills has with the most execrable Circumstances imaginable so frequently murthered So that a Soul otherwise passable of her self would be necessarily drown'd in this one foul Deluge of Guilt so far is she from having any relief or advantage by reconciling her self to the Church of Rome 20. Wherefore who-ever thou art that hast any sense or solicitude for thy future state and Salvation believe not this Woman of subtil lips and a deceitfull heart and give no credit to her Fictions and high Pretensions but the more she goes about to magnifie her self