of the Chaldee Paraphrast super munitionem quae habitat pacificé The vulgar Latin has it super montem caliginosum Upon which Grotius Id ideo quia vetus Babylon in palustribus locis sita erat unde ascendens vapor urbem obscurabat Jer. 51. 25. Behold I am against thee O destroying mountain I will stretch out my hand upon thee and roll thee down from the rocks Upon which Munster Vocat Babylonem montem ob aedificiorum molem cùm urbs ipsa in planitie fuerit sita and analogically he interprets the Rocks de praesidiis turrium eminentium To which Vatablus and Clarius agree expresly But all interpret this Mountain of the City Babylon And Zach. 4. 7. Who art thou O great Mountain before Zerubbabel thou shalt become a plain Grotius interprets it of Babylon cast down by Cyrus Thirdly Achmetes according to the sense of the Persians Indians and Aegyptians interprets Mountains of great and wealthy men cap. 144. where speaking of Earthquakes and the things that are overturned by them 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 saith he 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And lastly it seems to be spoke of a whole Kingdom that is grown great as Dan. 2. where the Stone cut out without hands becomes a Mountain and fills the whole Earth CHAP. VIII 1. Nakedness Paradise 2. Philtre That 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is Virus amatorium 3. That Magical words were used in the mixing of Philtres 4. Pillars Rain Red. The seventh Head of the red Dragon what it intimates 5. Resurrection That to be cut off and slain signifies also Politically 6. Rivers what they signifie in reference to the Sea 7. What in respect of their limpidity and irrigation 8. Saints Scorpion Scorched by the Sun 9. Sea Serpent Slain Slaughter 10. Sun Moon and Stars The spiritual signification of Sun and Moon 11. A secular signification of them in general 12. A more particular signification of them in that sense 13. In what sense the King of Babylon is called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Lucifer and the Western Caesar a Star in the Apocalyps 14. A more mystical signification of Stars and what 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 signifies 1. NAkedness It is either understood spiritually as Apocal. 3. 18. for being destitute of Divine Graces or else in a more vulgar meaning for Distress Poverty and Disgrace Achmetes 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 See also ch 117. to the same purpose Paradise Achmetes cap. 8. according to the sense of the Indian Interpreters If a man dream he enters Paradise it fore-signifies salvation to him 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 But it signifies also riches and worldly prosperity And presently after concerning the fruits of Paradise 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Because the fruits of Paradise are Divine and useful Notions 2. Philtre Philtrum is a Love-potion Virus amatorium a Composition that is to extort love from the party that drinks it Mr. Mede makes that Apocal. 14. 8. of the wine of the wrath of her Fornication which in the Greek is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to be a Periphrasis of a Philtre which therefore he renders thus ex vino veneficii scortationis suae For as the Hebrew word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 signifies both wrath and poison so the Greek word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 signifies the like as is plain out of that one place Deuteron 32. 33. Their wine is the poison of Dragons and the cruel venome of Asps which the Seventy render 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 There are also several other places of Scripture to the same purpose See Grotius on the Text. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 therefore is as much as Vinum venenatum in such a sense as it may be Virus amatorium For what other kinde of Potion should be in the hand of a Whore especially such an one who is said 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by her sorcery and enchantment to have deceived the nations of the earth that is to say by her enchanted cup 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 For 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 signifies venenum as well as 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 3. But that Magical Rites and Charms were used in the mingling these Love-potions is up and down famed in the writings of the Poets As in Juvenal Satyr 6. Hippomanes carménque loquar coctúmque venenum And towards the end of that Satyre Hic magicos affert cantus hic Thessala vendit Philtra Which plainly implies that Philtres are made by Witchcraft And Virgil concerning the superstitious gathering of Hippomanes potent as it was believed for this purpose Georgic 3. intimates the like Hippomanes quod saepe malae legere Novercae Miscuerúntque herbas non innoxia verba And lastly Ovid in his De Arte amandi lib. 2. Non facient â—…t vivet amor Medeïdes herbae Mistáque cum magicis Marsa venena sonis All which places with several others do sufficiently inform us of the nature of a Philtre That it is a Magical potion and superstitiously mingled according to certain Rites and Laws of Sorcery or Witchcraft whatever the Ingredients be And that therefore 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 rendred Vinum Veneficii or Philtrum which is Virus amatorium agrees very well with 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 with the Sorcery of the Whore mentioned Apocal. 18. 23. which she being accused of and no other signs appearing upon her of that wickedness but this Cup in her hand it is in all likelihood to be found there 4. Pillar Pillars signifie Princes or Nobles in a Kingdome 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as you may see in Achmetes c. 148. 160. Rain Rain may signifie the refreshment of pure and heavenly Doctrine As in Deuteronom ch 32. 2. My doctrine shall drop as the Rain my speech shall distill as the dew as the small rain upon the tender herb and as the showers upon the grass Also Peace and Righteousness through the goodness of the sovereign power Psal. 72. 6. the Kingdome of Christ is so described He shall come down like the rain upon the mowen grass as showers water the earth In his daies shall the righteous flourish and abundance of peace so long as the Moon endureth So likewise Hosea 10. 12. there is mention of the Lord 's coming and raining down righteousness upon them Achmetes out of the Indian Solutions c. 171. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Rain is an emblem of mercy from God in answering our Prayers And therefore he saith If any one dream that his field is rained upon 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 he shall find riches and joy and mercy from God And a little after he interprets 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to be 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 According to which is that of the Psalmist Thou O God sentest a gracious rain on thine inheritance and refreshedst it when it was dry Red. That Red does emblematize bloudy Cruelty and barbarous Persecution is so obvious to conceive that it seems needless to have noted it Every one acknowledges that that 〈◊〉
mans innocency and integrity Astrampsychus 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Nicephorus 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Achmetes according to the sense of the Indians c. 157. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And again cap. 232. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 according to the sense of the Aegyptians and Persians I need not adde what is said in the Apocalyps That the White raiment is the Righteousness of the Saints 9. Whore and Whoredom That by Whoredom is signifi'd Idolatry there are infinite Instances in the Old Testament Exod. 34. 15. Lest thou make a Covenant with the inhabitants of the Land and they goe a-whoring after their Gods c. Deut. 31. 16. This people will rise up and go a-whoring after the Gods of the strangers of the Land c. And Ezek. 6. 9. I am broken with their whorish heart which hath departed from me and with their eyes that go a-whoring after their Idols That Idolatry therefore is compared to Whoredom is a plain case And truly the reason of this Icasmus is not obscure since the people of God are his Spouse and God calls himself their Husband By which Figure is meant that the highest Joy of the Soul of man is by keeping her self in strict union with her God and by being sincere in his Covenant as also that it is his duty to be so and that that high act of Religion and devotional Love which is due to him should not in any measure be diverted upon another but that the eye of our Mind should be wholly fixed upon him This is the duty of every Rational Soul whether she be in exterior Covenant with God or no. And therefore the very Idolatry of the Heathen in this regard is rightly called Whoredom as it is in that first place of Exodus which I cited But when she is in external Covenant with God and God becomes her Husband both jure and de facto the Whoredom is double 10. We see therefore the Analogie betwixt Whoredom and Idolatry For as in Whoredom that special kind of passion and the proper effects thereof which are due onely to a Legitimate Husband are derived upon some other person so in Idolatry that summity and flower of our Divinest affection which is Religious Devotion and Adoration with the outward signs thereof due to God alone are discharged and exercised upon some Creature whether Idols of wood and stone or any other things which are not God This is a fundamental reason of this frequent Iconism in Scripture To which you may adde some other few Resemblances As the Provocation of God's jealousie against them especially that be in an exteriour Covenant with him The ornamental Pompousness in Idolatry answering to the garishness of Whores and the pranking up themselves to allure their Paramours The Pronity also and Propenseness to fall into this sin it being even as natural to this corrupt condition of the Soul to dote on a visible Object of Worship as for the Body to incline to the reaping of those joys it presages upon every inticing Object did not an higher Law forbid it in both cases To which you may further adde the Remorselesness of Conscience which men easily fall into in both sins they rowing down so easily with the stream and their Animal nature being so much gratifi'd by them Such is the way of the adulterous woman in both senses She cateth and wipeth her mouth and saith I have done no wickedness Prov. 30. â—…0 And lastly as the being engaged in whorish practices extinguishes that love and respect that is due to a Husband so the being inveigled in Idolatrous worship does quite suffocate and dead that Divine sense whereby we enjoy God indeed and know our true duty to him and relish those indispensable points of Obedience wherein we are really to honour him So deep and weighty a sense is there concealed under this one Prophetick Iconism Fornication or Whoredom Which therefore seems to be so particularly affected in the Apocalyps not onely by way of just reproach to the sin but for the exquisiteness of signification it so fully and so truly emblematizing the nature of Idolatry Wilderness See Desart Winds See Sea 11. Wine-press That a Wine-press is an Hieroglyphick of great pressure and Affliction yea of effusion of bloud and great slaughter the nature of the thing it self does witness I mean the pressing of the grapes till their bloud comes out as it is called Deut. 32. 14. And accordingly Scripture has made use of this Emblem Lam. 1. 15. The Lord hath troden under foot all my mighty men in the midst of me he hath called an assembly against me to crush my young men The Lord hath troden the Virgin the daughter of Judah as in a Wine-press And Joel 3. 12. Let the Heathen he awakened and come up to the Valley of Jehosaphat for there will I sit to judge all the Heathen round about Put ye in the sickle for the Harvest is ripe come get ye down for the press is full the fats over-flow for their wickedness is great This is understood of the great slaughter of the enemies of the Jews in the valley of Jehosaphat 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as the Seventy render it 12. But though this Iconism of the Wine-press signifie slaughter or an abundant effusion of bloud yet we are to remember that death and slaughter it self does not always signifie Physically but sometimes Morally And for my part I do not question but that of Esay 63. Who is this that cometh from Edom with his died garments from Bosra c and again I have troden the Wine-press alone and their bloud shall be sprinkled upon my garments what ever other sense there is thereof has some such Allegorical meaning as the Fathers have put upon it concerning Christ his spiritual Victories as I shall have occasion to insist more largely upon in its due place 13. Woman and Women That Woman by a Prophetick Scheme signifies not one single Woman but a Body Politick I have already taken notice For I have heard a voice as of a Woman in travel the voice of the Daughter of Sion Jer. 4. 31. But this Scheme is so usual that it is needless to insist upon Instances Here Sion that is the Inhabitants of her is called both Woman and Daughter The second in a sense of delicacy and nobility as if we should say in English The Damosel Sion But there is another sense of Daughter which is conspicuous Ezek. 16. where he calls Jerusalem Harlot v. 35. Wherefore O Harlot hear the word of the Lord c. And does in the process of the charge or complaint declare how Jerusalem with her Daughters was worse then her two Sisters Sodom and Samaria with their Daughters who yet notwithstanding v. 45. are said to have loatbed their Husbands that is to say to have been Whores and to have committed Idolatry A Metropolis therefore with the lesser Towns are Mother and Daughters and consequently all Women but if Idolatrous such Women
this Succession 12. That the little Horn does of necessity appertain to the Roman Kingdom become Ten-horned and Pagane-Christian at once 13. That it is of equal duration with the Whore and Two-horned Beast and at least coincident in time with them and the Beast restored 14. From which Equality and Coincidence he is discovered to be the Whore or Two-horned Beast 15. That the Patriarch of Rome is more especially concerned in this Type 16. The exquisite Applicability of the Characters of this Horn to the said Patriarch 17. The Application of those Characters that more particularly concern his opposing the Regal Office of Christ. 1. THat Prophecy also in Daniel of the little Horn that is said to change times and laws is an express Prediction of that Antichristian Opposition which is against the Regal Office of Christ. For that this little Horn is the same with the Two-horned Beast or the Whore in the Apocalyps I think no man will scruple that considers that this Horn is part of the Roman Kingdom which is decyphered by Ten Horns and that it belongs to that time when the Kingdom is actually Ten-horned which is not in succession but together as the Ten toes of the Statue which answer to these Ten horns do not signify the succession of Ten Kings but Ten Kings ranked in the same time as the Toes of the feet of the Image which have not properly a precedency but rather a co-ordination in Site 2. Now that the Fourth Kingdom which is prefigured by the iron leggs feet and ten toes of the Image and by the Beast with Iron teeth and ten Dan. 2. Horns is not that of the Lagidae and Seleucidae as Grotius would have it but the Kingdom of the Romans there are these weighty Reasons to convince us First It is the universal sense of all Ecclesiastick Writers That the Fourth Beast is the Roman Empire as both Cornelius à Lapide and Caspar Sanctius both of them Jesuites yet do roundly assort The words of the latter are these Est ergò omnium sententiâ innominata has atque â—…rribilis bellu a Romanum Imperium neque necesse est quonquam nominare cùm nemo non dicat 3. Secondly That it cannot be the Kingdom of the Lagidae and Seleucidae as Grotius would bear us in hand in which odd conceit of his he forsakes the judgment of the whole Church of Christ to follow Porphyrius his who was a sworn Enemie to the Christian Religion appears from what is said Daniel 7. 23. The Fourth Beast shall be the Fourth Kingdom upon Earth 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Quod majus erit omnibus regnis Which shall be greater then all Kingdoms so the vulgar Latine and Vatablus The Seventy also render it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And it agrees best with what follows and shall devour the whole Earth which must be understood in such a sense as Earth was before and shall tread it down and break it in pieces Which it could not be said to doe unless it were so great a Kingdom as is here intimated Now it is manifest that the Kingdom of the Seleucidae and Lagidae was neither greater more excellent nor a more victorious Kingdom then any of the three preceding namely the Babylonian Persian and that of Alexander the Great from whose Kingdom they would make this of the Seleucidae and Lagidae distinct Wherefore their Kingdom cannot be this Fourth This Inference is so plain to Gaspar Sanctius that he does though but justly yet very severely chastise Porphyrius for this errour which Grotius has so unluckily taken up For he breaks out into these words upon this Text Vide Porphyrii stuporem oscitantiam in cujus mentem venire potuit ut existimaverit regnum eorum qui Alexandro successere omnium esse maximum quódque omnem terram sibi subjecerit conculcaveritque cùm reliquis regnis longè fuerit infirmius ab omnibus concisum aut malè vexatum Nay the very Prophecy it self makes the Kingdom of the Successours of Alexander less then his in power and greatness Dan. 8. 22. where it is said that four Kingdoms shall stand up but not in the power of Alexander Which is they shall be inferiour to him Which questionless is meant of them joyntly it being a needless intimation of them single 4. Thirdly The Kingdom of the Iron leggs and toes and of the Ten-horned Beast with iron teeth are one and the same Kingdom according to Grotius his own acknowledgment which he makes that of the Seleucidae and Lagidae Now it is said that a Stone cut out of a Mountain without hands should break in pieces these leggs and toes Dan. 2. nay the whole Image of iron brass silver and gold and so succeed this Kingdom of the Seleucidae according to his sense of the Vision And Chap. 7. One like the Son of man in the clouds of Heaven comes to receive a Kingdom namely upon the destruction of Antiochus Epiphanes that little Horn amongst the ten in this fourth Kingdom of Grotius his framing of whom it is said at the 21. verse I beheld and the same Horn made warre with the Saints and prevailed against them untill the Ancient of days came and judgment was given to the Saints of the most High Which is the same with the Son of man his coming in the clouds of Heaven to receive the Kingdom of the Ancient of days ver 13. And both agree with the Stone cut out without hands to shew it is not the work of man but of the Ancient of days God himself and that this is indeed the very Kingdom of Christ as Interpreters ever have expounded it Which is a perfect contradiction to Grotius his dream That the Fourth Beast with iron teeth and the iron leggs of the Image denote the Kingdom of the Lagidae and Seleucidae and that Antiochus is this little Horn. For Antiochus Epiphanes was dead almost two hundred years before Christ so much as preached the Doctrine of the Kingdom or had any Disciples to follow him and yet it is said Dan. 2. 44. And in the days of these Kingdoms shall the God of Heaven set up a Kingdom which shall never be destroyed From which passage I doubt not but that phrase The Kingdom of God as also from that above The Kingdom of Heaven does so often occurre in the Gospel as also that Title which Christ so often gives himself of the Son of man And Grotius himself upon Matthew Ch. 8. 20. acknowledgeth that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Son of man mentioned Dan. 7. 13. is to be understood of the Messias Wherefore it is impossible that the Kingdom of the Lagidae and Seleucidae should be the Fourth Kingdom 5. But here Grotius contrary to his judgment when he wrote upon Matthew has found a device which is scarce to be uttered without horrour and astonishment So that I am infinitely amazed that a man otherwise so learned and laudable as he speaks of Porphyrius should be
miss-led into so bad an adventure The Son of man coming in the clouds of Heaven according to him is Populus Romanus nullum intra se habens regem When our Saviour Christ intimated to the high Priest that he was that Son of man that should come in the clouds of Heaven it seem'd so high an Arrogation that he rent his clothes and said he had spoken blasphemie And truly I think that neither Jew nor Christian can well acquit Grotius of that crime who attributes that which is the peculiar character of the Messias to a Prophane and Pagan people and that forsooth because they had no King as if they were ever the better for that But they had Kings at first and both in the Infancy of their Empire and afterwards they had a Supreme Power so great and imperial as may excuse them from the least shew of Contempt They had always over them a Sovereignty so that they could not be deemed the Son of man for any such private condition For the Summa Potestas is the Summa Potestas under what name or form soever and of the same real grandeur Besides that they were a most glorious and victorious people before Antiochus his time So that it is a very dilute and sapless conceit of Grotius to apply the phrase of the Son of man to them for any inconsiderableness in them or obscurity For they were not so in the times of Antiochus 6. Again the Kingdom of the Son of man and the Stone cut out without hands are all one both in truth and according to Grotius his own Concession But this Stone is Christ and his Kingdom as being Heavenly 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a thing erected not by humane power but by the power and Spirit of God That this is the meaning of without hands is the general vote of Interpreters S. Jerom Irenaus Justin Epiphanius S. Augustin Theodoret and several others Where think you does Grotius take shelter now Why This Figure which is so appropriate to Christ and mentioned of him so often in the New Testament This Stone must be cast away as if it were neither precious nor a Corner-stone and be bestowed again on a Pagan people the Romans For so Grotius does not stick to profess Idem Lapis Filius hominis and he made the Son of man before the people of Rome But can a man believe that the Original or Success of that people was 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a thing brought to pass by the special power and Spirit of God and not more humano according to the usual course of the World and that not of the best kind their beginnings being helped on by a rabble of Ruffians and Robbers 7. No but that is not Grotius his gloss you will say Let us therefore hear what it is Lapis abscissus de monte sine manibus according to him is Exercitus populi qui suae esset spontis nullique regi pareret cujus populi origo à monte nempe Palatino In which there is nothing sound nor solid For was this Roman Army any thing more suae spontis in that they had not a Kingly Government at Rome That Supreme Power of Consuls and Senatours was as directive and coactive as if it had been Regal So that the motion of this Army was never the more spontaneous for this Again The Stone cut from the mountain without hands implies that it was then spontaneously divided from the Mountain when it is said to be cut thence But when the Romans first issued from mount Palatine yea so soon as they were populus Romanus Regal Government was amongst them it being the first Government of this People and therefore they were not then Populus suae spontis according to Grotius his Conceit so that he cannot bring both ends together And lastly To interpret Mountain here in a literal sense is unskilfully done and not according to the analogy of the Prophetick style nor the very intimation of the present Text which says the Little stone became a great Mountain itself and filled the whole Earth Wherefore this Mountain signifying not literally but politically there is no question but the other does so too and that the Stone is in some sense homogeneall to this rocky Mountain Whence the sense is plainly this That out of the great Mountain that is the Roman Empire there should be a People raised not by humane power or policy but by the Spirit of God and the preaching of the Gospel by Jesus Christ and his Apostles which should be a peculiar people to him and become the Subjects of his Kingdom that is to say That the Church of Christ should be cut out of the Roman Empire without humane help This is a most easy and undistorted sense and against which there cannot be made the least Exception 8. Fourthly which I have already intimated above The Ten Horns of the Fourth Beast with iron teeth and the Ten toes of the iron leggs of the Statue signify the same thing Wherefore it is plain sith the Ten toes imply a Coexistence of the Ten Horns by reason of the coordination of their Site that there must be Ten Kings together in the Fourth Kingdom But in the Kingdom of the Seleucidae and Lagidae there were not Ten Kings together all at once Therefore that Kingdom is not the Fourth 9. Fifthly Antiochus Epiphanes part of this Kingdom of the Lagidae and Seleucidae is said to rise up in the latter time of the Kingdom of the Successours of Alexander Dan. 8. 22 23. Wherefore this Kingdom of the Lagidae and Seleucidae has expired near two thousand years ago But the Kingdom of the Fourth Beast reaches even to the Day of Judgment Dan. 7. 9 10. And I beheld till the thrones were cast down and the ancient of days did sit His throne was like the fiery flame and his wheels as burning fire A fiery stream issued and came forth from before him thousand thousands ministred unto him and ten thousand times ten thousand stood before him the Judgment was set and the Books were opened c. That this is the Description of the Day of Judgment is the general Opinion of both Christians and Jews and answers exactly to the Lake of fire and the opening of the Books Apocal. 20. which Grotius himself does interpret of the Last Day Whence we may safely conclude that the Kingdom of the Lagidae and Seleucidae is not the Fourth Kingdom as having ceased so long before that time though we understood the Day of Judgment in the sense of the Rabbins 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 According to which the meaning of I beheld till the thrones were set and the Books were opened is this That the Prophet Daniel had a prospect even to the utmost end of that great Day But he begins more particularly at the beginning of that Day in the eleventh verse But this I have onely noted by the bye 10. Sixthly and lastly Alexander's Kingdom and that of his Successours
any but that which is truly the Deity as I have noted in its due place 4. As for the places in the New Testament they are more copious and not less express The first is that in the Acts where when the Chap. 14. v. 14 15. Priest of Jupiter would have sacrificed to Paul and Barnabas at Lystra by reason of the great miracles he saw done they rent their cloaths and ran in amongst the people crying out and saying Sirs why do you these things We also are men of like passions with you and preach unto you that ye should turn from these vanities unto the living God which made Heaven and Earth and the Sea and all things that are therein And what vanities are those from which they must turn but from the giving Acts 17. 29 30. of Divine honour to mere Creatures The same Apostle also at Athens in his Speech he made to them on Mars-hill reads them a very round lesson against Idolatry Forasmuch then as we are the off-spring of God we ought not to think that the Godhead is like unto Gold or Silver or Stone graven by art and mans device And the times of this ignorance God winked at but now commandeth all men every where to repent Which exhortation certainly Paul made with the greatest earnestness that could be it being said verse the 16. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that his spirit was in a very sharp fit in a paroxysm of zeal when he saw the City of Athens so given to Idolatry Again in his first Epistle to the Corinthians he makes Idolatry the very Chap. 12. v. 2. Character of Gentilisme which Christ came to reclaim the world from Ye know that ye were Gentiles carried away to dumb Idols even as ye were led And elsewhere in the same Epistle he exhorts them more copiously and Chap. 10. v. 14 20 c. vehemently Wherefore my dearly-beloved flee from Idolatry The things which the Gentiles sacrifice they sacrifice to the Daemonia and not to God Ye cannot be partakers of the Lord's table and of the table of the Daemonia Do we provoke the Lord to jealousy are we stronger then he And this was only about the meat sacrificed to these Daemons what had it then been to bow to their Idols He speaks also very smartly on this subject in his second Epistle to these Corinthians What fellowship hath righteousness Ch. 6. v. 14 16. with unrighteousness what communion hath light with darkness and what agreement hath the Temple of God with Idols And in his Epistle to the Galatians he plainly reckons up Idolatry amongst the grossest works of the flesh Murther Sorcery and Adultery And therefore accordingly Chap. 5. v. 20. in the Apocalyps Idolaters together with Murtherers and Sorcerers Chap. 21. v. 8. are threatned with the lake that burns with fire and brimstone and are shut with obscene Dogs out of the holy City And therefore assuredly Chap. 22. v. 15. S. John is in very good earnest in his dehortation from Idolatry in the 1 John 5. 20. close of his general Epistle And we know that the Son of God is come and has given us an understanding that we may know him that is true and we are in him that is true through his Son Jesus Christ This is the true God and eternal life Little children keep your selves from Idols Amen From these places I think it is abundantly manifest That the divulging of the Gospel aimed at the taking away of Idolatry that sottish depravation of Religion out of the World 5. And we may be still the more assured of it by those words from our Saviour's own mouth The hour cometh and now is when the true worshippers shall worship the Father in spirit and in truth for the Father John 4. v. 23 24. seeketh such to worship him God is a Spirit and they that worship him must worship him in spirit and in truth Where Grotius and I think very truly interprets 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 sublatis ut ritibus ita locorum discrimine And surely the Christian worship being so pure as to abhor from the voluminousness of Judaizing ceremonies and the affixing of the residence of God to a consecrated place as in the Temple of the Jews Imagery and Idolatry must be abhorred infinitely more as infinitely more inconsistent therewith And if God may not be worshipped with an Image much less any thing that is not God either with an Image or without it CHAP. III. 1. What is meant by Grace and Truth coming by Christ. 2. Further Testimonies of Scripture to evince that Christ came to ease men of the Judaical burthen of Ceremonies The meaning of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 3. That the Death of Christ upon the Cross was the solution of the Ceremonial Law of Moses 4. Further proofs to the same purpose 1. BUT now That the grossness and carnality of the Judaical Ceremonies and the unprofitable burthen of them was to be done away by the coming of Christ which is the other point to be proved is very apparent out of several places of Scripture For the Law was given by Moses but Grace and Truth came by Jesus Christ that is to say The John 1 17. Law both Moral and Ceremonial was given by Moses but even that Moral Law was but such an one as could not give life as the Apostle Gal. 3. 21. speaks but the gracious assistance of the Spirit of God promised in the Gospel that does give life and strength to walk according to the will of God And then for the Ceremonial Law both it and indeed all things else happening to the Jews were but Types and Shadows but in Christ is the Truth They were not what they made a show to be and therefore in that sense may be said to be false so as he that says that the Image or Picture of a Man or Horse is a Man or Horse indeed pronounces false And therefore our Saviour speaks true when he saith Moses gave you not that bread from Heaven but my Father giveth you that true bread John 6. 31. from Heaven Whenas yet it is said of the Manna Psalm 78. He gave them bread from Heaven to eat But it being but a shadow of the true Vers. 25. bread from Heaven which is Christ it is said not to be the bread from Heaven As in the Epistle to the Hebrews the Law is said to have a Heb. 10. 1. shadow of good things to come and Paul to the Colossians Let no man judge you in meat or in drink or in respect of an holy-day or of the Coloss. 2. 16 17. new Moon or of the Sabbath which are a shadow of things to come but the body is Christ's So plain is it what is meant by Grace and Truth coming by Jesus Christ. For he is that Truth which was signified by the shadows of the Law and by him is
esse si quis tres Deos credit See Dr. Rainolds De Romanae Ecclesiae Idololatria So plain is it that Idolatry is not confined to the worshipping of an Image Lib. 2. cap. 9. but to the admitting of more Objects of Divine worship then that one true God For the worshipping any more is that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as the Jews call it and is most frequently and most significantly termed in Scripture Fornication which looks more at the Plurality of the Objects of worship then the Kinds of them For this Spiritual Fornication is committed where we worship any thing besides him that is the Creatour and Conserver of all things CHAP. IX 1. The necessity of knowing what Religious worship is for the discovering of Idolatry 2. The faultiness of the distribution of Worship into Latria Dulia and Cultus civilis 3. That Christ only who is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 has such a middle Excellency as may admit Religious worship 4. That the excess of Excellency in God above that in Saints and Angels is so infinitely more then the excess of excellency in Saints and Angels above that in Men that it is extremely forced and irrational to allot worship of one denomination to the first and second and not rather to the second and last which they being fellow-citizens might rightly be called Civil 5. That no kind of Religious worship is due to Saints and Angels proved by the Angel's refusing to be worshipped by S. John 6. And also from the near affinity of our natures with theirs 7. To whom Origen pronounces Good men equal nor allows the glorious Stars though they were intellectual to be worshipped 8. That the Religious worship of Saints and Angels is no duty of ours as being reducible to the Precepts of neither Table 9. That Religious worship is but One and due to God only proved from our Saviour's answer to the Devil 10. As also from the Authour to the Hebrews arguing the Divinity of Christ from Religious worship due to him with several other testimonies 11. An Answer to an Objection 1. THus we have found out the adequate latitude of the Object of Idolatry that it is whatsoever is not truely God 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as the Apostle speaks to the Galatians But unless we have also the Knowledge Chap. 4 v. 8. of what is Religious or Divine worship and when or by what we give this worship to that which is not truely God we shall be still at a loss how to discern when our selves or any one else commits Idolatry and when not 2. There are some who for the better palliating their unjustifiable practices have framed a smooth story namely That there are as many kinds of Honour or Worship as there are of Excellency and that therefore there being three kinds of Excellency Divine Humane and a middle betwixt Humane and Divine as that Supernatural grace and glory of the Saints and Angels there are also three kinds of Worship Latria Dulia and Cultus civilis But the distribution had had less fraud and better Logick in it if it had been bipartite for then would have appeared more plainly what kind of Worship they mean by Dulia For they will not have it Civil worship in that it is a distinct member therefrom It remains therefore that it must be Religious worship though they were afraid to speak out what they harbour in their breast For indeed Religion which in its prime and proper sense is nothing else but Cultus Numinis belongs de jure only to the true God and if it be transferred to any thing else it is Idolatry or Superstition But if they would have dealt above-board and like honest men and exact Logicians they should have distributed Honour or Worship first into Religious and Civil and then according to the sense that they intended subdivided Religious worship into Latria and Dulia But this being craftily aimed at and supposed though not so plainly expressed and indeed being the chief thing intended That Religious worship is due to Saints and Angels as well as to God himself I shall direct my answer only against this mistake 3. First therefore I say That that ground of allotting Religious worship to Saints and Angels is very weak namely because they have a middle excellency betwixt God and man For it is plain they have not in a due and strict sense that being a Privilege belonging to Christ alone who is the acknowledged 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 God-man and therefore may justly be worshipped with Religious worship Wherefore there being nothing that has truly a middle excellency betwixt God and Man as a Zoophyton may be rightly said to have a middle excellency betwixt an Animal and a Plant saving the Man Christ Jesus there is no Creature capable of Religious worship besides him nor is he indeed capable thereof but in virtue of that Mysterious union with the true Godhead and thereby becoming as well God as Man 4. And then again there is another fraud and indeed the more principal and original one in the distribution of these Excellencies immediately into three whenas it had been more faithfully and Logically done to have distributed Excellency first into Created and Increated and then Created Excellency into that of Saints and Angels and that of Men. But hereby the boldness and grossness of their assigning Religious worship to that which is but a Creature would have appeared at first sight the Creatour standing in contradiction to it who is infinitely more Excellent then any glorified creature whatsoever or rather whose degree of Excellency above the most glorious Creature that is is infinitely greater then the degree of Excellency of Saints and Angels above Men. Whence appears what a rash and forced thing it is to hold together two Excellencies betwixt which there is that infinite distance in one common capacity of receiving Religious worship I mean the Divine Excellency and that of Angels and Saints whenas the Humane Excellency and that of Saints and Angels are infinitely nearer one another and therefore infinitely more fit to receive worship of one common denomination to both Which may very well be termed Civil the glorified Saints and Angels and Good men being but fellow-servants and fellow-citizens of that new Jerusalem which reaches from Heaven to Earth according as it is written But you are come to the Mount Sion and to the City of the Heb. 12. living God the Heavenly Jerusalem and to an innumerable company of Angels and the Spirits of just men made perfect Which shews plainly that Saints and Angels and Good men upon Earth are all of one communialty Citizens of the same City the new Jerusalem and fellow-citizens you know do not give Religious worship one to another but only Civil 5. Nor yet fellow-servants as the Angel argues to John in the Apocalyps And I fell at his feet to worship him And he said unto me Chap. 19. See thou doe it not I am thy fellow-servant and
an appropriate Sign of the incommunicable Excellencies of God is also Idolatry and is to be referred to the first Instance 11. Seventhly and lastly To worship the Consecrated Bread in the Eucharist though upon full persuasion that it is transsubstantiated into the Body of Christ and so Hypostatically united with the Divinity is notwithstanding this opinion conceited of it a real act of Idolatry and is evidently referrable to the last Instance 12. All these acts or what other soever of the same nature that can be found though amongst Christians and upon the pretence of worshipping God and Christ are assuredly acts of Idolatry according to the undeniable Notion and Definition thereof which is The worshipping that which is not God by the appropriate Signes of Religious worship such as either use or the nature of the thing it self has made the proper Modes of our acknowledgement of the Divine Excellencies 13. And now that I have proved such acts as these Idolatrous I need not bestow any new pains to prove them unlawfull because all Idolatry is so according to the vote and sense of Scripture and of all men For to goe about to infer that some kind of Idolatry is lawfull because * 1 Ep. 4. 3. Peter mentions 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is as weak and foolish as if from the mentioning of Impious blasphemies against God one should infer that the party that spake so supposed that some blasphemies against God were not Impious Wherefore it is plain that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is added not by way of distinction but of aggravation or description as when we say Alba nix or Corvus niger which are not intended in common speech as notes of distinction of Crows or of the Snow into white and black but as Epithets denoting their nature The practice therefore of such actions as we have enumerated if they be introduced into the Christian Church will prove one Branch of Antichristianism and a chief one too and their doctrines that averre the warrantableness of them must be false and irrational CHAP. XIII 1. That the professing one only true God does not necessarily quit a People from the guilt or capacity of being Idolaters 2. That to exhibit such Modes of worship as are proper to the true God to a Creature though we take it for a Creature is Idolatry 3. That the Jews were Idolaters though they professed the only true God 4. That the belief of the Eucharistick Bread being the real Body of Christ does not excuse the adorer thereof from Idolatry 5. The case of the Heathen that worshipped the Sun and this of the Bread-worshippers compared 6. A solution of a Sophism the Authour once put upon himself in excuse of this Bread-worship 7. That their not thinking the Bread to be in the Eucharist does not excuse the worshippers of the Host from Idolatry 1. HAving thus evidenced the Falseness of the Mystery of Iniquity in this first point according to my professed method I shall proceed to the Fraud which as I have already intimated includes the fallacious pretences and excuses together with the Self-endedness of the drivers on of this impious Mystery And truly the pretences and shelters under which they would shroud themselves are very slender and scant but their Self-ends may be gross and palpable As methinks that would be a very poor plea for the Christians namely that they forsooth cannot possibly be Idolaters because they apertly and declaredly profess that there is only one true God of a nature infinitely excellent above any Creature and that therefore if they were Idolaters they should contradict themselves Wherefore no professours of Christianity though they did Religious worship to Saints to Angels to Images to Crosses to a piece of consecrated Bread could be Idolaters especially if they shamelesly stand out with it and out-face the world they are not so But the insufficiency of this excuse is too-too apparent if we consider how easy and ordinary a thing it is for men to contradict the profession of their own faith For how many are there even of those that do truly believe there is a life to come that do not live as if there were any such thing and so contradict their belief by their actions How many are there that professing a particular Providence of God and faith therein yet in time of streights do not depend thereon but divert to some unlawfull practice or doe some wicked action to relieve themselves in distress or secure themselves from danger How many that will zealously declaim against Cruelty and Injustice as things abhorted of God and man and yet are themselves notoriously Unjust and Cruel in the judgement of all the disinteressed though they themselves will make a more favourable construction of their own actions and will stand it out as stoutly for their justification as these professors of Christianity that they are no Idolaters It may so fare therefore that as the Apostle speaks to Titus men Tit. 1. 16. may profess to know God but in their works deny him They may say there is one only true God yet doe that Homage which is due to him alone unto this or that Creature without saying or intending that this Creature should be taken for the true God or that they doe that Religious worship to it as to the true God Which is such a piece of Idolatry as never was amongst the Heathens themselves nor can explicitely fall into the mind of a man no more then to believe contradictions while he thinks them so or conscienciously to goe against the dictates of his own conscience while he thinks those dictates to be true So plain is it that no people can conscienciously and devotionally give that worship which they think due to God alone unto that which they think is not the true God 2. But out of inadvertency ill education or accustomary Superstition it is not impossible but that not knowing or not taking notice that such or such Ceremonies or Modes of worship are properly due to the only true God they may use them in honour to that which is but a Creature or the Image of a Creature be it Saint or Angel nor can the remembring they are God's Creatures in this case secure a man from Idolatry For the mistake in the nature of the worship they perform to them does lapse them into Idolatry notwithstanding they conceive of the Object as of a Creature And Ignorance can be no excuse where there is opportunity of being better informed Nay Incest and Adultery must be accounted and called by us Adultery and Incest though practised in such countries as allow thereof and we must say they are a more unclean people then our selves 3. To which you may adde That the Church of the Jews were sometimes Idolaters and so declared by the Prophets of God though they had not cast away the knowledge nor acknowledgment of their Jehovah the only true God Why may not therefore Christians be Idolaters
and that even then when he does not cease to be and which is another great miracle without making the Bread seem to any of our Senses any thing altered from what it was before What honour or privilege may not they claim to themselves that assure the people that they are the ordinary workers of so stupendious so incomprehensible and so impossible a Prodigie 7. Verily they that have derived upon them so boundless and miraculous a power which exceeds nay is repugnant and contrary to the strongest Laws of Physicks Logick and Metaphysicks can it seem any more then a modest claim in them to challenge an exemption from all Politick Laws also unless of their own making For how holy how sacred a person must he seem to the world who so easily and so frequently can work so astonishing a miracle And therefore how uncomely a thing would it be that the Secular powers should pretend any Dominion over one that is endued with so divine a power 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 For it is as if they would take upon them to give laws to God himself as Aristotle speaks of his Polit. lib 3. Heroically vertuous 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 For it is fit that such an one should be as a God amongst men that is to say such an one that is so eminently and superlatively vertuous as he there describes What then must he be accounted that is thought to have a power which is a more sensible Object of the peoples admiration either equal or superiour to God himself who as ordinarily wise men conclude cannot doe any thing that implies a contradiction to be done Wherefore if the degenerated Christian Priesthood could persuade the people that they had the power of doing so huge and incomprehensible a miracle that tends so infinitely to the advancement of their esteem it could be no wonder that they were zealous maintainers of the Imposture it conciliating to them with such as believe it so mighty credit and respect and saving them the labour of that harder way of winning it to wit by unblemished Sanctity and Exemplarity of life and by a true and sound knowledge in the Mysteries of the Religion they profess 8. Wherefore though the Pretences and Excuses for the Invocation of Saints the worshipping of Images and the adoring of the Host be slight and triviall yet we see the Self-ends of these Idolatrous practices may be very substantial and palpable but both put together make up that Antichristian Fraud and assuredly it is an eminent one that is discoverable in this first and chief Limb of Antichristianism which is the Introduction of Idolatry into the Church of Christ. CHAP. XVI 1. That Idolatry is the highest and most peculiar injury that can be committed against God 2. That giving Religious honour to Saints or Angels is really a reproaching them and blaspheming them 3. The exceeding great Mischief done to the Soul of man by Idolatry 4. That Idolatry turns men into bloudy Wolves and Bears 5. And is the Mother and Nurse of the foulest impurities 6. That it is the source of all manner of wickedness and eternal death to the Idolater 7. The great Mischiefs it doth to the Church of Christ. 8. How the Church is lessened by Idolatry at home 9. And the spreading thereof hindred abroad 10. And consequently the whole World injured thereby 1. WE will now briefly consider the Mischief of this horrid enormity which reaches either to God as much as any mischief can reach him to the Saints to the Idolaters themselves to the Church or to the rest of the World The sin of Idolatry is the most properly injurious to God of any sin it so peculiarly touching the right of his Honour or Worship which Honour he will not give to any other nor suffer to be taken from him And indeed it is highly reasonable it should be reserved entire to himself no other Tribute being competible to him but this For God who is that Infinite Fulness of Perfection can want nothing but we having all received of his fulness and possessing nothing but therefrom it is according to the sense of that Eternal Law of Reason and ingenuous Gratitude as well as according to the express injunction of the sacred precepts of Scripture that there should be proper Homages of Divine honour peculiarly due to so Infinite a Benefactour which to alienate or prophane by applying to any creature ought to be reputed the most accursed and execrable Sacrilege that can be committed This robbing therefore of God of his honour of which he every where professes himself so jealous and so wrathfull a revenger is the highest affront or injury that can be committed against that glorious Majesty of Heaven Which point is so confessedly true that it is needless any further to pursue it 2. The next seems more Paradoxical That by the excess of honouring and worshipping of the Saints we should injure them and abuse them or by giving them over-much respect become guilty of disrespecting them And yet it is in very truth so if examined to the bottom For the zealous and carefull yielding of that honour which is done to them implies our belief or opinion of their acceptance but for them to accept of that honour or worship that is due to God as all Religious and Divine worship is is to be Rebells and Traitours to the Divine Majesty usurping or at least accepting of his Rights and Prerogatives and in stead of being Saints and faithfull Subjects of Christ and his Heavenly Kingdom to be transformed into Titans and Giants or Children of Lucifer that would ascend the throne of God and divide his Empire amongst themselves Wherefore whosoever pretend that the Saints accept of such Homages or services to them do in effect proclaim to all the world that they are proud and vain-glorious nay that they are Traitours and Rebells against God and thus instead of honouring them do really injure them reproach them and blaspheme them 3. The Mischief that is done to the Idolaters themselves is very great and obvious to observe Image-worship and Saint-worship debasing the Mind and making it superstitious and pusillanimous begetting in it a crass or gross conceit of things making the spirits course and carnal and leaning towards Corporeal matters so that the exteriority and palpability of the exercise of their affections in this sort toward Divine things inclines them with a greater proneness and readiness to be transposed upon other visible objects and to fall quickly from caressing and embracing cold Statues and Images and such like sensible and palpable entertainments of their Devotions to the courting of warm flesh and to the polluting themselves with such sins of uncleanness as the ancient Pagan Idolaters were signally guilty of For indeed all such Ludicrous and Superficial Religion must needs leave the body of sin entire and untouched and the inward Mind dead and starved so that the full raines will be given to every impetuosity of the Flesh
Vestments would vie in number with the Vestments of Aaron the High-priest and imitate also his in Analogie his Breast-plate his Ephod his Robe his broidered Coat his Mitre and Girdle and the Bishops not content with these should adde for the further adorning themselves as if they had a mind to out-doe the Ceremonial Habiliments of Aaron himself six more holy Ornaments nay I will suppose nine more besides the consecrating of these Priests with holy oyl on their shaven Crowns and in their hands which become thereby so sanctified that the more devout would eagerly and zealously kiss the hand of the Priest strait after his Ordination hoping thereby to partake more fully of his devotedness and sanctity What were this I say but to Judaize under Christianity and to illaqueate the minds of men with such Superstitions as our Saviour Christ came to set them free from Which intimation is sufficient to shew the Falsness and groundlesness of such an Oeconomy in the Church 5. But as for the pretence for such kind of Aaronical Ornaments I can imagine none unless it be the imitation of the Levitical Laws which is a very bad one those Laws being to be abolished by Christ. Besides that the Robes of Aaron were of a more * Appendix to the Defence of the Philosophick Cabbala Ch. 5. Sect. 2 3 4. profound and important signification then to be imitated upon any slight or superficial design as well they as other Mosaical figures being prescribed according to a certain Pattern exhibited by God in the Mount which being the shadows of things to come do naturally vanish in this Meridian and Vertical Sun-shine of the Gospel And therefore to bring in so many New shadows is to reenvelop the Church with darkness and divert us from the rightly understanding of the meaning of the Old which assuredly were all Types of that more full knowledge of Jesus Christ and of that inward and Spirituall Sanctity we have in him But that advantage which this erroneous Priesthood might seek to it self herein is this That by these Histrionical disguises and peculiar adornings they may become more honourable in the eyes of the People who are much struck with outward shews I mean the simpler sort of them and that their Persons may be accounted very holy whose Ordination is with such pompous Ceremonie and whose sacred Unction makes it in some sort to vie with the Coronation of Princes Could they be more through-paced in the imitation of that great high-Priest of the Jews and adorn themselves with what in analogie should answer to his * See the Preface General to the Collection of my Philosophicall Writings Sect. 3. Urim and Thummim that is Illumination of mind and Sincerity of heart that indeed would be an happy emulation and would absolve them from an over-rigorous pursuance of the rest 6. But so it is according to our Hypothesis that instead of so great a good there follow these Inconveniences That this Sacerdotal Pomp and Gayness to those Priests that understand the nature of Christianity is both a Scandal and a Burthen to those that do not rellish Christianity in the right sense of it it is to them an occasion of insufferable pride and conceitedness and of great security and neglect of those true and indispensable endowments of the Christian Priesthood of that Anointing 1 John 2. 27 which will teach them all things even that of the Holy Spirit of God which is not lodged in consecrated Garments but in those purer habits of the Mind in the Inward man wholy and throughly dedicated to God by perfect and real abrenunciation of himself and of the flesh the world and the Devil by entirely giving up ones self to the sincere Love of God and of his Neighbour to Purity and Sobriety of life and to unfeigned Humility and Self-denial Which real Accomplishments should be the Foundation of respect to the Christian Priesthood not those exteriour Ornaments that may be the covers of a Beast or Devil And lastly for the People themselves As some are liable to be miserably deceived by those external Pomps so others to be much offended I mean those who are more seriously set upon the real duties of Christianity and find their wholesome appetite mock'd not fed with those outward shews in the publick Service of God 7. Which we shall better understand if we make a more plenary representation of their Publick worship and adde to the Consecrated Garments of the Priest the dedicating of an unknown Tongue to their Publick Prayers and Offices to the great disedification of the People What spectacle could one behold more Antichristian To see a man in those Sacerdotal disguises all of them consecrated and dedicated to the purpose himself having had both Head and Hands anointed with holy oyl standing in an anointed Church and at anointed Altar with his anointed Chalice and other anointed Utensils whose Church-yard is holy by the consecration and benediction of sprinkled Holy-water for the frighting the Devils from hanting that consecrate ground and molesting the sleep of the bodies of the Dead nay whose very Bells of his Steeple are Christned and Chrismatized for the chasing away the foul fiends out of the Aire at the departure of a Soul by their tolling or ringing To see him in his holy postures now at the one end of the Altar now at another now turning his face toward the people now his back-side one while holding up his hands another while holding them down another while a-cross at his breast now making with his hand a single Cross now two or three Crosses together now sitting then standing and another while stooping and kissing the holy Altar now speaking aloud then muttering to himself in a lower tone but always in a tongue that is not at all understood by the People To see I say such a Sight as this and to compare it with that of our Saviour The hour cometh when the true worshippers John 4. shall worship the Father in Spirit and in truth for the Father seeketh such to worship him It would necessarily extort from the Spectatour this just Censure That these are either false-worshippers or our Saviour's prediction not true or else the completion thereof past in the simplicity of the Primitive times or rather that if he would find these true Christian worshippers he must seek them somewhere else for here is neither Spirit nor Truth nor intelligible language but all more dark and blind and dumb then in the very Midnight-shadows of the Mosaical Dispensation 8. And therefore as I was a-going to conclude as the more sottish people will be liable to be even brutishly amazed and amused by this unintelligible and unedifying pomp and spectacle and be made the more obnoxious to all the Frauds and Tyrannies of this Unchristian though over-much Anointed Priesthood so the more nasute will be tempted to look upon it but as a kind of circumforaneous Masking or Mumming nor easily be persuaded that
the number and circumstances of his sins So little pretence can there be from hence of this Injunction But if he profess his sorrow and resolution of amendment and by reason of some weakness or melancholy cannot lay such fast hold upon the Promise of remission upon unfeigned Repentance without this visible and palpable seal set thereto of Sacerdotal Absolution I do not see but a Priest anointed with the Spirit of Christ and full of holy compassion to a penitent member of his Church may rightfully and profitably by that Authority which was derived upon the Apostles and their Successours and by that divine power that assists the sincere exercise of his Ministery seal to him the Remission of his sins by pronouncing his Absolution and so restore to peace his disquieted Mind his sins being as certainly pardoned as if Christ himself in person had absolved him he in such a case as this assuredly ratifying in Heaven whatever is here transacted upon Earth Which I suppose Grotius himself will not deny nor conceive at all clashing with his interpretation of S. John he not pretending those he mentions the only occasions of remitting or retaining of sins but the most notable 7. And as this Voluntary Confession in general to the Priest in order to the Penitent's Absolution is usefull and commendable so likewise a Voluntary unbosoming a mans self in a more particular way to such an one as he could trust and can presume fit and able for his office to the end that he may have a more perfect understanding of the state of his Soul and thereby administer more sutable and effectual counsel is a thing questionless of very good consequence 8. But to extort from every Believer every year or oftener a punctuall enumeration of all his transgressions in thought word and deed with all their circumstances were but a vile and disingenuous pretence of insinuating into all mens bosoms for the getting out their secrets of which the Priest may make his private advantage or communicate to the Churchpoliticians such matters as will tend to the strengthening of their distinct Interest which is The conserving or promoting that Honour Wealth and Power which they affect in the World And truely by this means the secrets not of this man or that woman but of whole Families and Cities nay of whole Provinces and Kingdoms and of all Christendom may flow together into that common Cistern or if you will Sea of Ecclesiastick Intelligence which is the very Eye of Action and the Soul of Conduct in all affairs 9. But though this would be a sweet morsel to this Pseudo-Clergy we are now describing it would be sour sauce to the Laiety not only in that it is a foul badge of an inevitable bondage upon them to be constrained upon pain of Damnation at least once by the year to cast themselves down upon the ground before them that are so many fathom sunk into the Earth themselves and to reproach themselves by ripping up their own faults accurately and punctually before such as they have no assurance of either their Candour Judgment or Friendship and for a man to balk his own Priest in this case would be to brand him and so make one of his chiefest neighbours his greatest enemy I say besides the external slavery of the business and the doing of a Ceremonie which may goe so much against the hair even with good and ingenuous spirits a man may be obnoxious to very great dangers and mischiefs For he that has the office of hearing men thus accurately and necessarily accusing themselves once a year at least has a greater opportunity of injustly defaming them by some tacit insinuations or somewhat expresser notices then is fit to be put into the hand of any man that is not a Saint upon Earth of which sort we suppose in this Polity we speak of extremely few 10. Interrogatories also from such Confessours may in greatest likelihood prove to young men and women Lessons of sin and lust and the knowing of the secrets of Families the seeds of infinite contentions betwixt Neighbours and also betwixt those of the same Families For it will be a hard thing for those that by this Shriving of persons know much of their Interest or disinterest to hold their itching fingers from acting or intermedling in their affairs or their other prurient parts from the soliciting the Chastity of such parties as they find hopefull and coming or not to be officious Intelligencers or Game-finders for such as pursue the pleasures of Venus Besides that the vainness of their Penances which yet must needs look like the right value of the Sin may harden men into a conceit that there is no great hurt in sinning and teach them to esteem the transgressing of the Law of God as a thing slight cheap and trivial Whereas if the only Penance of sin were the pain of forsaking it urged upon them from the certain expectation of that most direfull Judgment to come though no other condition but that were annexed to Absolution it would make men more sensibly feel the weight of sin and make them make the greater speed to get from under the burthen of it But to draw to an end 11. That also will pinch very hard especially upon the more Intellectual or Rational complexions namely To be bound in their Conscience upon pain of Damnation to hold whatsoever the Church professes to be true while she in the mean time obtrudes such things upon mens belief as have no ground neither in Reason nor Scripture For even in things that are disputable either way it is the fate of some men notwithstanding to be in a manner invincibly inclined to conceive this part to be true rather then the other What struggling and conflicting therefore must he undergoe to hold to the Authority of the Church against such strong and fatal sentiments of his own Mind But if the Church should be thus Dogmatical not only in things that may according to the sense of the generality of men be either way but conclude and require the belief of such things as are point-blank against either Scripture or Reason and are impossible according to the Faculties of all men who are unprejudiced to be true as That one and the same Body may be wholy and entirely in a thousand places at once and at a thousand miles distance betwixt all those places That we may worship a graven Image and the like how unevenly must these conditions of Salvation sit upon the spirit of him that is not a mere sot What reciprocations of belief and misbelief of hope and despair of Salvation must such an one be tortured with that holds that his share in eternall bliss depends upon the hearty belief of the truth of the Church in all things when what she propounds according to all his Faculties is not only unlikely but impossible to be true CHAP. XXII 1. The dreadfull Figment of Purgatory 2. That by this affrightfull Fable
God to have interpreted the Scripture and not for their own ends or carnal satisfaction in any thing And questionless in this case they can shew their Commission and that they act by Authority Let all things be done to edification 1 Cor. 14. 26. But that because every Civil controversy must be determined by a Judge therefore there must be an Infallible determinative Judge of all the nice and unprofitable controversies that emerge amongst Christians about Scripture and Religion is but a weak and lame Illation For Civil controversies cannot be undecided without injury to some party but no man is injured by not having those unprofitable at least unnecessary questions determined for they may hold their several opinions without wronging one another if they will but keep to that known Law of Christ that Royal Law of Charity Nay the deciding such controversies by a pretended Infallible Judge were a vast wrong to one party it galling their consciences and streightning their liberty and making the way to Heaven narrower then Christ has made it For so does this Infallible Judge that imposes his Determinations on men upon pain of eternal Damnation But God of his infinite wisedom and mercy has not given the least Intimation for any such Usurpation And therefore this Infallible Judge being not appointed by God and being unappointable by man the Scripture alone and not these pretended Infallible decisions must be the Rule of our belief 7. The fourth and last pretence is That unless the Sense of Scripture be determined by the Infallibility of the Church every private Spirit must be Judge of the meaning thereof nay and which is worse be Judge of the Church and thereby superiour to the Church then which nothing can be more wild and extravagant This seems a big difficulty at first But I answer That every particular man should judge for himself he has a Commission from the very Word of God nay I may say a Command As where he is bid to try 1 Thess. 5. 21. all things and to hold that which is good as also not to believe every 1 John 〈◊〉 spirit but to trie the spirits whether they be of God and in another place to be ready to give a reason of his Faith The Beroeans also are commended 1 Pet. 3. Acts 17. for searching the Scripture and trying whether the things that Paul even an inspired and chosen vessel of God had taught them were true or no. But for any one man or any company of men to be appointed by God Authoritatively and absolutely to be Judges for others in matters of Faith and Religion we do not find any where in Scripture or in Reason any such Commission given unto them but we are rather admonished to take heed how we be led hoodwinkt by any lest the blind Matt. 15. 14. leading the blind both fall into the ditch 8. But not Scripture onely but Reason it self does plainly commissionate private Spirits as they call them to judge for themselves For these pretenders to Infallibility doe it onely upon the boast that they are the true successive Church from the Apostles But unless they will be above all measure ridiculous they must convince the Reason of him whom they would make a Proselyte to their Church that their Church is that true and Apostolical one For to say so without proof is a madness to be hooted at by all men But to goe about to prove it is to appeal to the private Reason of him they would convince And if he be a Christian already though not of their Church the common acknowledged Principles are the Holy Scriptures in arguing from which the Disputant appeals to him he would bring over if his Interpretation or Allegation of them be not true But if he be an Infidel or Pagan he is to use Reasons to prove the Truth and Authority of the Scriptures themselves Which is still an appeal to the conscience of him that is to be gained to the Church whether what is offered to him be true or false And that which is offered to him being the whole Christian Faith for that is it which makes a true Church it is plain that his Reason and Conscience is appealed unto whether the whole Summe of the Credenda in Christianity is not true That is to say Though the Church and he that argues in the behalf of the Church have already judged and firmly concluded that the Christian Faith is a true Faith in the whole and in every part and make no appeal from their own judgment in reference to themselves yet in reference to the party they would convince they appeal to him if the grounds of their Belief be not solid and so imply and acknowledge that he is Judge for himself in these affairs call that in him a private spirit or what you please 9. But I do not know but it may be too reproachfully called a private spirit at least in the sincere and simple-hearted who have no private designs but to know the Will of God and to doe it and it is the Will of God all men should doe so and the spirit of man * Prov. 20. is said to be the Lamp of the Lord and that which judges according to the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the common notions of Reason in all men and has not lost the * Psell. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 those common characters and ingenuous sentiments of Indispensable Truth and Morality which the Father of lights has of old sealed upon the Soul and which are hardly obliterated quite in any and are necessarily continued and that vigourously in the sincere I say such a Life or Spirit as this judging in a man is very hardly to be called a private spirit it judging according to the Universal sense of humane Nature and so as every one judges when he is unbiassed Nay if this will not serve I say that the Judgement which is thus made is the Judgement of that Universal King and Law-giver the Eternal Son of God it is his sentence in these cases but writ in the tables of our hearts and pronounced by our mouths as by the Praeco of a Court. So far is it from being the Judgement of a mere private spirit But that rather is the Judgement of a private spirit though it should bear the Title of an Infallible Church which is decreed not according to the plain Texts of Scripture so as all unprejudiced men would certainly understand them nor according to those indeleble Characters of Truth which Christ the Eternal Logos has writ in the Rational Souls of all mankind but according to partial Interest and depraved desires The sentence of Thousands nay of Millions of such Judges is more the verdict of a private spirit then the Judgement of the meanest private man that pronounces from such Principles as I have declared 10. Now for that odious imputation of making a mans self Superiour to the
Also Christ's Handkerchief and the Shirt which the blessed Virgin made for him as likewise the Cradle in which he was rocked 15. Furthermore the Virgin Mary's Veil with which she used to cover her head her Comb her Hair her Girdle her Needles sowing-Thread and Work-basket nay the very House in which she dwelt and wrought transported as I said before out of Palestine into Italy by the hands of Angels The Reed with which they smote Jesus the Rope with which they haled him to execution the very Sponge also with which the Jews gave him vinegar mingled with gall to drink and some of the Coin for which Judas betrayed him nay the very Lantern he used in that work of darkness and the Dice wherewith the Souldiers play'd for Christ's seamless Coat Moreover the pure Bloud of Christ and the Milk of Mary his Mother kept in glasses The Pillar also at which Christ was whipped and the Stairs or Steps on which he went up into the Judgment-Hall and some of the Thorns wherewith he was crowned An Image of the Virgin Mary made by S. Luke to which an Angelical Statue of Marble was seen often to bow The paring of the nails of a living dead Crucifix and the lively Picture of Christ made by himself by the pressing onely of a Napkin to his face when he sweat 16. What would the world say to the credibility of three Tuns of Teeth from the Jaws of one Saint to the producing of the very Dagger and Shield with which S. Michael fought with the Devil and a Feather that might then haply fall out of one of the Angel's Wings What to the shewing of the Skull of a Saint's head at one place his Hair in another his Jaw-bone in another his Forehead in a fourth and yet his whole Head in a fifth What to the Fore-skin of Christ shewn also in five several places at once What to some dozens of Nails wherewith Christ was nailed to the Cross and as many pieces of the Cross as would load a Cart to carry them and as many glasses of the Virgin 's Milk as would fill all the vessels in a countrey-dairy How can such gross Impostures as these but wipe the Priests lips clean of all credit and belief and cast the world into desperate Atheism and Infidelity 17. But eighthly and lastly The Incredible of all Incredibles and the greatest Impossibility of all Impossibilities were that pretended Mystery of Transsubstantiation which being urged with the like necessity and assurance of Truth that any thing is urged by this Antichristian Church whose Picture I am a-drawing will doe the most fatal execution upon the Christian Faith that any thing imaginable can doe For supposing this the most Fundamental Article of their Creed or if you will the most precious and the most seriously-urged Fundamental of them all and the very hindge of almost all their publick Devotion and God-service if this break all must fall to the ground For if the Church be found shamelesly false in so important a Point as this it does immediately follow that she will be believed in nothing Wherefore they whose belief was either wholly or mainly supported by the seeming greatness of her Authority this failing by the easy discovery of so gross a Falsehood and yet by her most earnestly and most seriously avowed for Truth the Faith of every such man must also necessarily fail unless by some special grace of God assisting his conference with the persons or writings of some better-instructed Christians which he may haply meet with in this vast Wilderness he wanders in he be stopt from splitting himself a-pieces from this dangerous precipice he stands on and from the plunging himself into the mire of Atheism and Unbelief 18. For undoubtedly if he have no other help but this Pseudo-christian Synagogue though he may be awed by their external lash from professing his Infidelity yet it will be impossible for him to hinder the tacit growth of it in his own Soul but he will naturally disgust and disclaim all hearty commerce with Religion and even loath it as a pack of lies Wherefore it is impossible but this congregation of Impostours and Deceivers which I am setting forth in the truest colours I can should swarm with multitudes of grown and obdurate Atheists For the Imposture we speak of now being so signal and the discovery so easy and obvious how can it chuse but be discovered even by multitudes of people For the account comes onely to this Whether it be more likely that the Church for her own advantage which I perceive she does every-where eagerly and stiffly pursue may knowingly and wittingly impose upon me or at least mistake in her own judgment of the Infallibility whereof I have no proof but her own boast when it is in the mean time her Interest to boast so I say the account comes onely to this Whether it be more likely that she may practise fraud or fall into a mistake out of some blind Superstition or that by the uttering of Five words a Priest should have such a power as to turn a piece of Bread into a Man the Bread according to all my Senses being as much Bread as it was before Which is a double Miracle and greater then ever was yet done in the world considered but thus far and almost as great a Miracle that any one should believe it 19. But there are still greater I cannot say Miracles but downright Impossibilities As first That this Bread is not turned into a Man that was to be but that was already in being Which is the hardest Non-sense that can be offered to the mind of man to think upon And yet in the second place the Bread is so turned into a Man that is to say into the Man Christ that he is entirely in every place where this consecrated Bread seems to be that is in thousands of places at once at very large distances Which is as perfect a Contradiction as any can be proposed That one and the same Body should be entirely distant from it self For how can it be One being thus divided from it self since Unity consists in Indivision and Self-Unity certainly is Self-Indivision Wherefore if there be one Self at Oxford suppose and another at Cambridge at the same time it is impossible it should be one and the same Person their distance or division demonstrating them two distinct ones And thirdly and lastly From this false supposition That one and the same Body may be at the same time in several places it will also follow That one and the same Person or Body may be at the same time wholly within it self and wholly without it self wholly above it self and wholly beneath it self on the right hand of it self and on the left hand of it self That it may be One Body and yet many Bodies at once or rather no Body but a Spirit or to speak more truly Nothing That one and the same Person may meet himself and complement
Monitor ad Caesar. c. King James of ever-blessed memory has smartly and justly taxed them sub larvata simulatione curae spiritualis animarum regna exhaurit orbémque Christianum caede sanguine miscet to this Power I must confess the Visions of the Apocalyps are somewhat more severe as it is most fit they should be For this Power except so much therein as agrees with the Primitive Ages of the Church comprising in it nothing but a masse of Frauds and Impostures of Superstitions and Idolatries and bloudy and Antichristian Cruelties the Visions of the Apocalyps were not the Visions of God if they predicted not ill to so ungodly and Diabolical a Polity And yet if I might profess freely my opinion were but that heap of wicked stuff cast out and abolished and all her false Merchandizes every-where interdicted as they are here in England such a purification as this would undoubtedly fulfill the prediction of the burning of the Whore of Babylon with fire according to the primary sense or scope of these Visions and the Church and whatsoever is comely and usefull be saved from any farther or severer Castigations provided they did not Antichristianize in what is left and place all their Religion merely in an outward though unexceptionable Form neglecting the indispensable Laws of the Life of God and of honest and laudable Morality So little reason have any to be affraid of the right sense of the Apocalyps in those Visions unless they have a favour for the Kingdom of sin and dominion of the Devil in the World 11. Again I must confess also that I cannot but dissent from Mr. His difference from Mr. Mede's way in expounding the three days and an half of the death of the Witnesses and in the placing of the Vials c. Mede in his expounding the three days and an half wherein the Witnesses lay slain three years and an half and not three times and an half which is a mistake of no small consequence As also in his placing of six of the Vials within the sixth Trumpet whenas I have shewn reason I think sufficient why they should be all ranged within the seventh Upon which supposition the pouring out of the first will follow the ascension of the Witnesses into Heaven in a cloud with a very close and natural coherence and such as is intimated in the very Text. For it is said that they ascended up into Heaven in a cloud and their Enemies beheld them and you may be sure Apoc. 11. 12. with a very envious eye and with much wrath and bitter exulceration of spirit accordingly as it is said Ver. 18. And the Nations were angry This is presently upon the blast of the seventh Trumpet And the first Vial answerably thereto is said to be 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Apoc. 16. 2. an evil and wicked Ulcer or Sore Which does very significantly indigitate that rancour and exulceration of spirit that fell on them that had the Mark of the Beast upon their seeing the exaltation of the Witnesses and hearing the Triumphal Song of those mystical Israelites that had escaped the Tyranny of the Roman Pharaoh by betaking themselves to the safeguard of the Red Sea in such a sense as I have above intimated These are considerable Examples of differences betwixt Mr. Mede 's Interpretations and mine From which several others must necessarily flow as depending thereon beside others that depend not on these which were to little purpose to note particularly But they all put together will not amount to any such summe as will at all impair that rich stock of honour and esteem which will be for ever due to so excellent a Writer whose Modesty Judgment and usefull Industry will I doubt not be admired and applauded to all posteritis For there is no reason at all that those 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which I mention here should derogate any thing from either that singular ability Mr. Mede had of interpreting Prophecies or from the credit of other performances of his in this kind where he had more maturely considered things and therefore according to the accuracy of his Judgment had perfected his Interpretations beyond all just exception But these that I differ from him in he does ingenuously confess to be but certain Specimina which he had communicated to his private friends nor did look upon them himself as throughly concocted and completed 12. These are the main prejudices that seemed to encumber our Design The reason of the Prolixness of his Alphabet of Prophetick Iconisms which I think I have clearly removed As for particular Exceptions they are of less moment such as might be made against the Prolixity and Inadequateness of my Alphabet of Iconisms my Confutation of Grotius onely and that with some sharpness in some places and lastly my uncharitable Liberty in applying those Prophecies of the Apocalyps and other Scriptures which by the ancient Fathers and more modern Writers even of the Romanists themselves are understood of the famous Antichrist unto the Papacy and Church of Rome To which I shall briefly answer and in order To the first That that Alphabet of Prophetick Iconisms is neither prolix nor inadequate to the whole design I had in mine eye when I compiled it though it be much too long for the use of the present Treatise But we are to remember that I had occasion to write of other Visions in my Mystery of Godliness which are pretermitted here as not appertaining to our present Scope But the use of this Alphabet is extendible also to that former Writing as likewise to a future design in my last part of the Mystery of Iniquity where I shall have occasion to range very far into the Prophecies of the Apocalyps besides other Divine Predictions even upon this very account more fully and accurately to examine whether those Comminations that threaten destruction to the Fourth Beast and the Whore or by whatsoever other Figures those Powers are indigitated do primarily signify any bloudy or boisterous destruction such as the keen Fifth-Monarchy-men or any other Enthusiasts are over-forward to imagine or whether the Mystery of God may not rather be accomplished in such an orderly Reformation as was made by the Sovereign Power of England in King Edward and Queen Elizabeth 's time Which can be no affrightfull news to any that have any Knowledge of God or Love of the Truth For assuredly that was an eminent Example of Christ's Re-visiting the World in the behalf of the faithfull and of his coming again to Judgement in thus judging the Whore and rescuing this part of his Kingdom here in this Island out of the hands of that Man of Sin though few have taken due notice hereof or had a right notion of this so marvellous Event 13. And therefore it is a wonder to me that there are so many that talk so loud of the Spirit of Elias and pretend to be in that Dispensation A Description of
as they maintain with truth as the Papists are of their own party even in their obtruded Falsities and Deceits It may therefore more rightfully be imputed to my fidelity to the true Church of Christ then Uncharitableness to the Church of Rome that I again bring into play with all due advantages this common Assertion of the Protestants touching the Great Antichrist Which appearing to me so solid and unexceptionable a truth I should be conscious to my self of the highest degree of Uncharitableness to the precious memory of the first Reformers those Witnesses whom Divine Providence so miraculously raised from the dead if I did not what in me lies for the maintaining their Credit in so grand a Point wherein they cannot seem to fail but with infinite dishonour to themselves and an irreparable prejudice to the Protestant Cause For as there is no Doctrine wherein the Romanists and we differ more true so there is none any thing near so potent for the bearing off all their assaults against us as this of their Church being that City of Babylon which the People of God are expressly commanded to come out of lest they partake of her sins and of her plagues Which that Apoc. 18. 4. wise Prince King James of ever-glorious memory knew full well and accordingly kept entire those Primitive Sentiments of the Protestant Reformation or rather adorned them and improved them by his Royal Pen as also did those singularly Devout and Learned Prelates Bishop Andrews and Bishop Jewell and several other Pious and Learned Bishops of our Church Nor will I omit how explicit our Church herself is touching this point in her Homily of the Peril of Idolatry as also in that against Rebellion Which illustrious witnesses to so concerning a Truth it were both uncivil and unjust to either suspect or accuse of Uncharitableness And for my own part I cannot but farther adde having such an apprehension of things as I have and so great encouragement from those Heroical Examples in whose footsteps I insist for the main in my Prophetick Interpretations that I should think my self not onely Unfaithfull to the true Church of Christ and to the Interest of his Kingdom which Charity will never betray but Uncharitable also even to the Church of Rome herself if I should not use this liberty of prophesying against her which I have or rather of interpreting Prophecies for her just Reproof and Amendment Stultorum incurata pudor malus ulcera celat That saying is true as well of him that conceals the sore of his friend when the disclosing thereof tends to the healing of it as of him that conceals his own sore And her own professed Nurslings either cannot or dare not use these Scripture Reproofs to her they being either blinded with her Lustre or terrifi'd by her Cruelty Whence it must be some good Samaritan Stranger that must work her cure But if it be Uncharitableness to speak some few hard words against her though never so true what Barbarity would it be to expose her to the greatest hardships of Fortune that humane Affairs are obnoxious to as suppose to betray her to the successfull Rage and Ravin of the overflowing Turk would that be such a piece of indearing Kindness and Charity And yet surely those doe so to her that sow pillows under her Elbow that sooth her up and call her my Sister and my Mother and say there are no considerable miscarriages in her whenas she stands guilty of all those sins that are reckoned up Revel 9. 20 21. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 multifarious Idolatries bloudy Persecutions Conjuring or Enchanting defiled Coelibate and pious Frauds or wicked Policies with Impenitency added to them all For these sins have the Locusts and Euphratean Horsemen the Turks and Saracens laid wast the Eastern Church and yet it is Uncharitable to admonish the Latine Church thereof which is much more guilty of these high miscarriages yea and that in such a time as the Mahometan Forces have fallen so grievously upon the disspirited Empire and have made all fly before them To give a stop to whose fury for the future I am confident nothing can be more effectual then the Reformation of the Roman Church according to the Word of God and the first Primitive Ages or to speak more compendiously according to the platform of our excellent English Reformers For this would put a new life and spirit into Christendom and make her grow young and strong again and able to repulse the Turkish forces for ever with Victory And truely the whole summe of what may seem either so affrightfull or distastfull in my old Orthodox Protestant way of interpreting the ensuing Prophecies to either the Church of Rome her self or any of her hidden friends or well-willers is but to reduce the whole Western Church to that unexceptionable Purity and Beauty that our Royal and Reverend Reformers through the special assistence of God did reduce this of ours But if this be of such excellent purpose must it not be to very great purpose to make the Church of Rome sensible that she wants this Reformation And is there any thing that can convince her more of that want then that her enormous miscarriages are so plainly depainted as most certainly they are in those Visions we have explained in this Treatise nay are very stingingly and satyrically set out by the Spirit of God on purpose to awake the Christian World out of this deep Sopour or Lethargie For it must be some such rousing Rebuke that can wean or reclaim that Church from so inveterate errours rooted in Custom and founded in a sweet bewitching Interest not to be parted withall upon any easy terms Which power of the Light of the true meaning of these Prophecies that obnoxious Church does plainly acknowledge herself sensible of in her hiding herself as well as she can from the convictive perstringency of them and in getting men to palliate her deformities with all possible art and to shelter off the searching gleams and piercing Lustre of these veracious Visions by their false and adulterate Glosses Which is the greatest Uncharitableness and Disser vice that can possibly be done unto her thus to lull her asleep to be surprised by the irresistible wrath of God and to expose her to the fury of his Jealousy Wherefore had she not better cease to take Sanctuary in such forced and incredible misinterpretations of Scripture and letting go those false shifts reform herself according to that Platform which has so manifest approbation from the Divine Oracles in a sense not onely credible but true 16. For it is demonstratively true by the second Consectary of my Joint-Exposition That the Church was not grown Antichristian till How well the Protestant Reformation is attested to out of the Apocalyps especially that of our English Church And what were the main hinderances to the Authour from the applying so illustrious an Event to the Prediction about 400 years after Christ As also
History of Christ and his Apostles but introducing thereupon such a face of Idolatry and Heathenish Superstition and barbarous Cruelty against the true Servants of Christ that by those whose judgments are more free and piercing such a state of the Church cannot but be deemed rather a Revival of Paganism then an uninterrupted Succession of true Christianity in the world or to use the softest language that the truth of the thing will admit of it cannot be judged pure and unadulterate Christianity but a kind of Pagano-Christianism the Pagan Rites Idolatries and Superstitions being practised upon Christian Objects and this Paganism in this pretended Christianity being maintained with as ferine cruelty as Paganism it self was in the time of the Heathen Emperours It remains now according to our proposed Method to search into the holy Oracles to find out Whether such a kind of Antichristianism as I have described be not prefigured therein and Whether so horrible a Mutation in the Church of Christ which for the general it is apparent even in the judgements of all that are not wilfully blind has for these many Ages seized upon the Church was not predicted of old by the Prophets or Apostles or by both 2. For it seems to me a wonderfull thing and incredible That God who was so carefull and watchfull over the Church of the Jews foretelling their Captivities and Returns out of Captivity and fore-advertising them in a manner of all their affairs of Importance by the mouths of his Prophets sometimes many hundred years before should leave the Church of Christ for so great a number of Ages without Ephod and without Teraphim without Prophets or timely Predictions what things would betide her in the decursion of so long a space as twelve or thirteen hundred years together to let her be bewildred thus in so endless a Night and leave her floating upon the waves without any Cynosura to stear by Wherefore I do not doubt but Christ has been so faithfull to his Spouse that he has left some Oracular Records wherein a man may reade if he come with unprejudiced eyes in a very legible Character the state and condition of the Church and this grand Apostasy of it with the most notorious circumstances thereunto appertaining that is to say He shall find in a manner all those Heads of Antichristianism which I have insisted upon intimated some way or other and charged upon that Church especially which History has found so guilty thereof 3. Which thing I being so fully persuaded of in my own judgement cannot without a great measure of grief or indignation reflect upon the misspent pains of some learned Pens who have endeavoured to pervert all those illustrious Prophecies whether in Daniel the Apocalyps or other places that do forewarn the people of God of this grand Degeneracy of the Church unto some other sense and meaning though never so forced and frivolous though never so strained and inconsiderable thereby obscuring both the glorious Providence of God of whose watchfulness over his Church the true and easy sense of these Prophecies is a most ample witness as also hindering that benefit which was to accrue to us by the right understanding of these holy Prefigurations and Predictions which if rightly interpreted would be of wonderfull great virtue for the reclaiming of the world and converting of Christendom to that ancient and Apostolick purity as well in Practice as Doctrines from which they have so long time swerved Wherefore out of a due sense of the Honour of God and the Interest of the Kingdom of the Lord Jesus I hold it fit to bring into view all those Prophecies as well of the Old as New Testament that have been by the Ancients understood of this Antichristian Apostasy and with an unprejudiced freedom and impartiality to unfold the meaning of them Which I hope I shall doe with that plainness and simplicity of evidence offering so unforced so easy and so natural a sense of things and so coherent with undubitable Principles that there is no man that is not grosly prejudiced but will receive full satisfaction concerning the true meaning of these Divine Oracles 4. I must confess that it is hard to produce any Text of Scripture wherein this Apostatized state of the Church is undoubtedly foretold under the very Name of Antichrist though that Name be found more then once in the Epistles of S. John But though some do yet I dare not contend that this Antichrist or Antichristianism which I have hitherto described is so clearly pointed at in every one of those places Not onely Grotius but Mr. Mede himself understands those Antichrists of the Pseudo-christs that our Saviour foretells of in Matthew which should start up before and after the destruction of Jerusalem which was the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the last hour of the Jewish Commonwealth But 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 signifying no more then 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is indifferently rendred 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and the Fourth Kingdom in Daniel being the last the time of that Kingdom may be also intimated by 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Whence that in S. John * 1 Ep. 2. 18. My little children it is the last hour and as you heard 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that that famous Antichrist will come even now there are many Antichrists whereby we know it is the last hour may bear this sense upon supposition the Prediction is somewhat Elliptically set down That the last time in Daniel's Kalendar of his Four Kingdoms that is to say the last Kingdom was then a running on which is the Roman during which Kingdom the Little horn which here is called Antichrist shall come upon the stage This is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 saith he that famous Antichrist whom you may have heard of out of Daniel but this is a greater distance off Wherefore to speak what more pressly concerns you Even now there are many Antichrists which not Daniel but our Saviour foretold of whereby again we know it is the last hour but I mean not of the Four Kingdoms of Daniel but of the Jewish Commonwealth according as our Lord has predicted Or more briefly thus My little children it is the last hour that is to say the last Kingdom of the Four namely the Roman and as you have heard that that famous Antichrist will then come viz. in that last hour so also now in the last hour of the Jewish Polity there are many Antichrists whence we may gather it is the last hour thereof these many Antichrists according to prediction attending this last hour as that one famous Antichrist that In some such sense as this I do confess that that Antichrist or Antichristianism which I have hitherto treated of may be by very Name intimated in this Text of Scripture though I shall quarrel with no man that would interpret it otherwise Grotius expounds this famous Antichrist of whom they
are such as these Apoc. 8. The third part of the Trees was burnt up The third part of the Ships was destroyed The third part of the Sea became bloud and ch 12. The third part of the Sun was smitten and the third part of the Moon c. where Third does not signify the proportion of that which was smitten to that which did escape but the Empire at large which was smitten is indigitated by this Number Which has a smack of the Cabbalistick Genius who use Numbers for the Symbols of things as I have already noted So the Tenth part of the City is not the Tenth of the City that then was but of a City whose extent bore but the proportion of a Tenth part to what it had been as Mr. Mede has carefully computed To this head you may also refer that Apoc. 18. Double unto her double according to her works and Fill unto her double Which is so definitively spoken as if she should be repay'd with as much more as she had injured others but the sense is onely that she should be pay'd home for all her injurious dealings 10. Examples of Specifical Diorisms are such as usual Synecdoches are that put the Species for the Genus which being a more determinate Object strikes the Phancy stronglier and with fuller gratification Thus is the Imagination more loudly alarm'd by being informed that such a Thing or Person shall be burnt or consumed with fire then if it were only said they should perish or be consumed and not specify the manner So to make warre is more determinate and specifick then to oppose and to be beheaded then simply to die or be killed and to be slain more specifick then to be destroyed and lastly King is a more specifick term and more fully strikes upon the phancy then Supreme Magistrate or whatever other appellation that is more general and consequently more dilute Which Examples of this third kind of Diorismus occurre up and down in the Apocalyps and indeed every where in the Prophets CHAP. III. 1. Hylasmus what it is with the kinds thereof 2. Eximious Examples of each kind 3. What the first and chiefest kind of Henopoeia 4. That one single Beast signifies a Body Politick demonstrated out of Daniel 5. That a Succession of Individuals is represented by one Individual 6. That one individual Beast represents a Kingdom or Body Politick from its rise to its fall 7. That one single Man or Woman does also represent a Body Politick in the Prophetick style 8. The second kind of Henopoeia what it is 9. What Zoopoeia with examples thereof 10. A second kind of Zoopoeia proved and illustrated from Examples 1. HYlasmus is a Prophetick Scheme bearing strongly upon the Phancy by exhibiting crass and palpable Objects such as in Logick would bear the Notion of Subject or Matter The first kind is coincident with Metonymia Subjecti as when a City is put for the Inhabitants or a Temple for them that worship therein Examples of this kind are frequent every where To the second kind I would refer such Representations as are from Buildings Pavements and the like which are compact of crass and palpable Materials but are Mystical or Spiritual Symbols of quite another thing Examples of this kind are the Inward and Outward Court of the Temple the one Symmetral the other Asymmetral which signifies the Christian Church one while in her Purity another while in her Apostasie to Idols So the Holy City troden down by the Gentiles signifies the Christian Church over-run with Gentilism So that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in this case is an Emblem of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or a Body Politick as Temple may be of the living Church of Christ. 2. An eximious Example of this kind of Hylasmus is the Description of Jerusalem Apoc. 21. with its high wall and twelve gates and by a Prophetick Diorism the measure of the City is concluded twelve thousand furlongs and the wall an hundred fourty four cubits and the Materials are Gold and Pearls and precious Stone And yet this City so Hylastically set out has a most Spiritual meaning and signifies nothing else but the Church of Christ reduced again to Apostolical Purity But the most notable Instance of a Prophetick Hylasmus is the Description of the Temple by Ezekiel to which I cannot say but this of S. John alludes in several passages And that it is an Hylasmus and not a literal Description I think any one will easily grant that does but peruse the 47 Chapter Lastly The destruction of the City Babylon in the Apocalyps is also a remarkable Example of this Scheme but though in the general it appertain to this second kind of Hylasmus yet things are there set out very much by the former kind which is a Metonymia Subjecti not continentis as before but occupantis the Objects of their Spiritual Negotiations being so crassly discovered and described 3. The next Prophetick Scheme is Henopoeia and the most graceful but withall as much obscuring as any And the first and chiefest kind thereof is this The collection of a multitude of Individuals into the show of one Individual as also of a Succession of Individuals or Multitudes into the show of one standing Individual This is an ancient method of delivering Mysteries as any one will discern if he throughly perpend the nature and truth of the ancient Cabbala Which that both Daniel and S. John I may adde S. Paul too have imitated in their Prophecies I think is easily to be evinced 4. Touching the collection of a Multitude into the show or representation of one Individual it is plain in Daniel for one individual Lion there denotes the whole Kingdom of the Babylonians one Bear the Kingdom Dan. 7. of the Medo-Persians one Leopard the Kingdom of the Greeks and the fourth Beast the Roman Kingdom It is true it is said The four Beasts are four Kings but the vulgar Latin has it four Kingdoms as also Theodotion and the Text says expresly that the fourth Beast is the fourth Kingdom upon earth So the Ram and the Goat in the eighth Chapter according to Grotius his own Interpretation out of the Hebrew Idiom though they be said to be Kings are Kingdoms And whereas it is written And the rough Goat is the King of Graecia and the great Horn that is betwixt his eyes is the first King unless this Goat either signifie a Succession of Kings or a Kingdom it is not sense yea though Succession yet it will be very harsh sense to make the great Horn the first King and the Body the rest Wherefore unless we would distort things beyond all measure the Body of the Goat must signifie the Kingdom of Graecia as the Horns the Supreme Power consonantly to what Grotius has written and I doubt not but his Interpretation is true And I think that scarce any one can be so weak but upon the reading of Daniel he will be assured that in Prophetick
consopite in both whence these 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 are called also 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in Achmetes the question is not concerning the Principle from whence or the manner how these divinatory Impresses come but what they represent or signifie which if it be granted that they prefigure rightly and unforcedly such or such things in Dreams it is manifest that they will doe the same in Visions For I speak of such Impresses as have not the nature of the Effects of Complexion or of any other natural Cause but of a mere Type or Prefiguration Wherefore it will not be impertinent to adjoyn sometimes the suffrage of these Onirocritical Writers to what weight we produce out of Scripture and from Reason for the interpreting of such Symbols or Iconisms as we shall comprise in our Prophetick Alphabet which I shall now exhibit to view 5. Angels There is such frequent mention of the Ministery of Angels in the Apocalyps and the Presidency there so prefixed to every thing that I cannot omit to take notice of this Scheme amongst the rest though peradventure it does not fall so right under the notion of an Icasmus they being rather the Instruments of Divine Providence then the Emblem of it But if we reflect upon their vulgar representation which doubtless took its ground from the Mosaick Cherubims how well they are appointed with wings for the quicker dispatch of those services that are expected of them they are not unsignificative of that Wisdom that is * Wisd. 8. said to be more quick and moving then any motion and to reach from one end to another mightily and sweetly to order all things But that Angels are in these Apocalyptick Visions so constantly and particularly set over every negotiation of Divine Providence is exceeding consonant to the sense of Daniel as in that great change of Nebuchadnezzar's condition which is said to come to pass by the decree of the Watchers 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Greeks would say 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Excubitores or Vigiles by which are understood Angels and also to the sense of the ancient Cabbala that makes the number Seven a Symbol of the Sabbatism of God wherein he rests from his works and calls that number 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in relation to this employment of these Excubitores or Vigiles these holy Angels whom God imploys in the administration of his Providence 6. Ascension into Heaven A Kingdom or Polity being so expresly resembled to the World or Universe as we shall see under that Title it is an easie Analogie to parallel the Heavens to the high Places and Dignities of it According to this sense is that of * Chap. 14. 12. Esay How art thou fallen from Heaven O Lucifer son of the morning For thou hast said in thy heart I will ascend into Heaven c. Aspiraveras ad summam dignitatem so Vatablus And Achmetes 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Onirocrit c. 161. And in the following Chapter 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And a little after 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Thus Achmetes out of the writings of the Indians Persians and Aegyptians All which does expressly declare that Ascending into Heaven signifies the acquisition or increase of Political Dignities and Honours 7. Air. That the Air is taken for the place of the Empire of the Devil appears from Ephes. 2. And you who were dead in trespasses and sins wherein in times past you walked according to the course of this world according to the Prince of the power of the Air the spirit that now worketh in the children of Unbelief that is to say in Infidels such as have not submitted themselves to the Kingdom of God but serve Idols and walk after the lusts of their own mind Upon which place Drusius out of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Sciendum à terra usque ad Expansum omnia plena esse turmis ac praefectis According to which opinion of the Hebrew Rabbins the Apostle again speaks Chap. 6. For we wrastle not against flesh and bloud but against Principalities against the Rulers of the darkness of this world 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 against those that hold fast the Rule of this lower world this dark caliginous Air 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 against wicked Spirits or Devils in these Aereal places For 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 here is but to the same sense that Expansum is in 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the space from the clouds downward as it is limited Gen. 1. Else how could these wicked Spirits be said 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as both Peter and Jude declare of them But enough of this and the rather because where Air occurs in the Prophetick Visions in this sense we have spoke of it is rather an ordinary Metonymie then an Icasmus 8. Balance That a Balance should signifie Justice is obvious to any one to conceive it being a main Instrument of commutative Justice and a fit Emblem of exactly weighing out and sharing all things or rather dispensing all things accurately Achmetes out of the Indian Onirocriticks chap. 15. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 I omit to transcribe how he refers the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Scales to the Ears of the Judge and the Weights in these Scales to the matter pleaded on both sides for him to ponder with an indifferent hearing And again in the same Chapter 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and more particularly he descants upon the condition of the Scales and Beam but here is enough already to shew how confessed an Emblem a Balance is of Justice And he insinuates the same of the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of Measures 9. Beast What a plain resemblance there is betwixt a Body Politick and a living Creature S. Paul copiously declares 1 Cor. 12. And it is a thing easie to conceive that as in a Creature that has life there are distinctly-framed parts so ordered one in reference to another that they are all to be moved for the good of the whole by that power that resides in the Brain in virtue of the spirits pervading throughout so in a Polity that there are several Orders and Ranks of men held together by one common Law which is as the life and spirit of the Body Politick and to be moved and directed for the common good by the command and appointment of the Sovereign Power which is the Head of this Kingdom or Polity Wherefore it is no wonder that Men or Nations thus framed into a Body Politick which is called a Kingdom be represented in Daniel under the resemblance of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 living Creatures but such as are rightly translated by the Septuagint 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Ferae wild Beasts they being such that appear in those Visions Of which Grotius upon Dan. 7. where there is mention of the four great Beasts ascending out of the Sea Ideo Bestiae saith he quia Idololatrica erant Imperia ut notat hîc Jacchiades
omission of this warning it is said that his Bloud shall be upon the Prophet And chap. 14. 19. even natural death where there is no effusion of bloud is so expressed Or if I send pestilence into the land and pour out my fury upon it in bloud to cut off from it man and beast Upon which Grotius rightly out of the Chaldee Paraphrast Omne mortis immaturae genus Sanguis Hebraeis Bloud therefore signifies Death and bloudy dead because as it is written In the bloud thereof is the life thereof And answerably to this * Onirocrit c. 103. Achmetes according to the sense of the Aegyptians and Persians 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 where the letting out his bloud must be his death and in Analogie the destroying the strength of any thing or that power or virtue whereby it is what it is is the death of that thing not considering whether it be animate or inimate 13. Bow and Arrows They naturally signifie the aiming at some thing and the hitting the mark the enjoying the scope of our enterprises But it may more peculiarly refer to Victory in war and the rather because they are warlike weapons Achmetes out of the Onirocriticks of the Aegyptians and Persians 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Onirocrit 249. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 If a man dream he holds in his hand Bow and Arrows he shall victoriously insult over his enemies Buildings Achmetes according to the sense of the Indian Interpreter 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 If one dream he is in an house of Marble or Stone it imports long life and riches where thieves cannot break through nor steal Burial For a dead body to be unburied it may have a two-fold signification either of a more infamous death or of hope of recovering into life According to the first is that of Ecclesiasâ—…es If a man beget an hundred Chap. 6. 3. children and live many years and his soul be not filled with good and also that he have no burial I say that an untimely birth is better then he Otherwise not to be buried may signifie onely that what the Vision portends will not be quite finished Burial being the consummation of all even of Death it self Whence Leonas Syrus dreaming that he was dead but not buried Artemidorus interprets it of that Event viz. that he was Artemidor lib. 4 c. 84. victorious but not crown'd But Menander of Smyrna dreaming also that he was buried was also crowned Victor at the Olympick Games Wherefore not to be buried in Visions that portend good is bad in those that portend bad is good And Achmetes expresly according to the sense of the Indian Interpreters 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 If there be any thing wanting whereby the Interrement is hindered it signifies hope of recovery to life CHAP. VI. 1. Candle 2. Character 3. Clouds of Heaven 4. Crown of precious Stones 5. Darkness Day Death 6. Desart 7. Dragon a figure of the Devil according to the ancient Cabbala and then of the chief Polities that oppose the Church 8. Drunkenness 9. Eagle Earth-quake 10. Eclipses 11. Eye an Hieroglyphick of Counsel and Prudence 12. Fishing Fish dead in the Sea 13. Fire the different significations thereof 14. Fire from Heaven its exact significancy of Excommunication 15 16. Flesh two notable significations thereof 17. Floud Fornication Frogs 18. Gemms and precious Stones God 1. CAndle Candle seems to signifie the prosperous state of things in this world Job 18. Yea the light of the wicked shall be put out and the spark of his fire shall not shine The light shall be dark in his Tabernacle and his candle shall be put out And chap. 29. O that I were as in months past as in the days when God preserved me when his candle shined upon my head and by his light I walked through darkness The like prosperous success the Psalmist also denotes by the same figure Psal. 18. For thou wilt light my candle the Lord my God will make my darkness to be light in his Song of thanksgiving for his deliverance out of the hand of Saul Astrampsychus and Nicephorus 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And Artemidorus lib. 2. c. 9. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 A Candle seen burning bright in the house portends good the increase of riches and plenty Lastly Achmetes according to the meaning of the Aegyptians and Persians 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And in the same Chapter again he saith That the lighting up of Lights signifies joy and chearfulness 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 but the extinction of them against a mans will 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 affliction and distress from a mans enemies proportionable to the darkness 2. Character That Servants and Souldiers received Marks upon their foreheads and hands whereby it might be known to whom they did belong is a piece of indisputable Antiquity there being sufficient testimony thereof in Authours See what is congested in Mr. Mede and Grotius upon Apocal. 13. But in the Prophetick style it does not imply that there is any visible mark in the hand or on the head of those that are said to be marked but onely that there is an open profession of belonging to them whose mark they are said to receive For they are onely Types of Propriety and are no more to be conceived to be really impressed upon them that are said to bear them then those whole Kingdoms of men that are called Beasts in the Prophetick style are to be imagined to be metamorphozed into Bears or Leopards For all these are Typical Attributes not Real 3. Clouds of Heaven In the Scripture-phrase they seem to signify Power and great Glory Achmetes Chap. 194. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 according to the mind of the Persians and Aegyptians And Chap. 162. according to the Aegyptians Persians and Indians 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And again in the same Chapter 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The sense of all which is this That the riding upon the Clouds and ascending into Heaven signifies honourable prosperity and success against our enemies and enlargement of power and dignity 4. Crown of Gemms and precious Stones Achmetes out of the Onirocriticks of the Indians Chap. 247. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Where the force of the Interpretation bears most upon the Gemms or precious Stones they being the Emblems of Riches Height and Honour They have also a more Mystical meaning in this very Chapter and signify 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the brightness of Divine doctrine or Truth But Chap. 248. they are onely interpreted of worldly things according to the mind of the Aegyptians and Persians 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 viz. Pearls and precious Stones 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that he has got abundance of them 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 he shall find proportionable riches and honour 5. Darkness See Candle and Eye Day See Time Death Death is a dissolution of Body and Soul and therefore properly belongs onely to a natural Animal but by Analogie may be transferred to all Bodies Politick which the Prophetick
style represents under the figure of Animals or single Persons whether by the simple Appellation of Man or Woman or else such Conditions of man or woman as Whore Wife Witness or the like Now what Life and Spirit is to a natural Animal that is Rule and Power to figurative Persons or Animals in the Prophetick sense which are Bodies Politick And therefore as the loss of the one is the death of the one so the loss of the other is the death of the other And because there is a Spirit in all things even in those things that are inanimate the fading or vanishing of that spirit may be said analogically to be the Death of those things Instances are innumerable I will onely adde that as in the Hebrew Idiom not to be is to be dead so in analogie any thing that is not what it was namely any thing that is changed from its former condition this change thereof may goe for a kind of Death as Death is ordinarily said to be a Change 6. Desart That by Desart is meant Paganism Alcazar pronounces with great confidence speaking of the Woman in the wilderness In qua locutione notandum est per Desertum proculdubio figurari Gentilitatem For which opinion he produces a cloud of witnesses Clemens Alexandrinus Origen Ambrosius Basilius Hieronymus Gregorius Hilarius Hesychius c. The reason of which Hieroglyphick I conceive is this The Idolatry of the Pagans was much in Woods and Groves and on the tops of Mountains and wast places and the names of their Daemons 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 have reference to the fields and desarts Besides that Idolaters do not emerge above the pitch of the mere Animal life and their worship and devotion is little higher then that of the Elephant or Cercopithecus The Rapacity also and bloudy Cruelty of the Pagan Kingdoms farther fill out the congruity of the Type And consequently where such a condition of things is as this does typify that is to say whatever Kingdoms or Empires do paganize they do ipso facto become a Wilderness or Desart 7. Dragon The Hebrew word is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and signifies Draco or Serpens and also Cetus as being the great Serpent or Dragon of the Sea And accordingly the Seventy render 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Gen. 1. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 That it is a Figure of the Devil the ancient Cabbala of Moses may assure us and it may be though one be noted chiefly yet the Serpent there may have a Prophetick Henopoeia in it and signify the whole Principality of Satan that Kingdom of Darkness which has been ever in opposition against the Kingdom of God and therefore it is no wonder that those Kingdoms that have in such a special manner afflicted the Church have been represented under this Figure as Aegypt and the Roman Empire Awake awake put on strength O arme of the Lord awake as in the Esay 51. ancient days in the generations of old Art noâ—… thou he that hath cut Rahab that is Aegypt see Forerius and wounded the Dragon which is Pharaoh as Ezekiel plainly speaks out I am against thee Pharaoh King of Aegypt the great Dragon that lieth in the midst of the Chap. 29. Rivers And for that he lies thus in the Rivers he is called Leviathan as if he were a Water-serpent or a Whale Psalm 74. Thou brakest the heads of Leviathan in pieces and gavest him to be meat to thy people in the Wilderness 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Heads of the Leviathan as if this Leviathan as the Dragon in the Apocalyps had more Heads then one These considerations plainly intimate to us That the Seven-headed Serpent in the Apocalyps which is the Roman State or Kingdom is so represented not onely in regard of that old Serpentine form that tempted our first Parents but has a reflexion also upon that Tyrannical Kingdom of Aegypt which is typified under the image of a Dragon and Leviathan and that not only Rome Pagan has a share in this Type but Rome Pagano-Christian For all the Seven Heads are from the Body of the Dragon and the Beast that was and is not and yet is is as well the Dragon as not the Dragon and therefore is as well Aegypt and I wish I could not say more as the Church of God or the Kingdom of his Son Jesus 8. Drunkenness It is taken sometimes for the being so filled and intoxicated with the pleasures and affluences of this world as to be regardless and senseless of the things of God Esay 29. Stay your selves and wonder cry ye out and cry They are drunken but not with wine they stagger but not with strong drink For the Lord has poured upon you the spirit of deep sleep and hath closed your eyes the prophets and the rulers the seers hath he covered Such a remiss Stupor and Drunkenness does the prosperity of this world often cast men into Achmetes from the Indian Interpretations cap. 111. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 If any one dream he is drunk with wine riches and power will flow in to him proportionably to his dunkenness And he affirms the like in the following Chapter according to the sense of the Aegyptians and Persians There is also a Drunkenness from the Cup of Affliction which is often intimated in the Scriptures 9. Eagle Esay 40. 31. But they that wait upon the Lord shall renew their strength they shall mount up with wings as Eagles they shall run and not be weary they shall walk and not be faint And Exod. 19. 4. Ye had seen what I did to the Aegyptians and how I bare you on Eagles wings and brought you unto my self Artemidor lib. 2. c. 20. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 For poor men to dream they ride upon an Eagle it is good for it signifies they will be supported and well relieved by the rich Earth-quake So we usually turn the Greek word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 but it signifies also more generally any shaking or concussion as Heb. 12. 26. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 where the Author says this 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 signifies the removing of those things that are shaken Hagg. 2. 21. Speak to Zerubbabel Governour of Judah saying I will shake the Heavens and the Earth and I will overthrow the Thrones of Kingdoms and I will destroy the strength of the Kingdoms of the Heathen This is a plain 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The like ruine and overturning of things is set out but by what is the effect of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 an Earth-quake properly so called Jer. 4. 24. I beheld the Mountains and lo they trembled and all the Hills moved lightly Which verse 26 he interprets as Haggai before I beheld and lo the fruitful place was a Wilderness and all the Cities thereof were broken down c. Achmetes out of the Indian Persian and Aegyptian Onirocriticks 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Artemidor lib. 2. c. 46. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉
But this is so easy an Iconism that it was needless to produce so many testimonies 10. Eclipses The Eclipses of the Luminaries what they mean will easily be understood if we consider what the Sun and Moon are in the Political Universe For certainly they are the highest Dignities in that Heaven Of which more under their proper Titles In the mean time it shall suffice briefly to note out of Achmetes that according to the Indian Persian and Aegyptian Onirocriticks If the Sun be 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 without brightness in such an hue I suppose as Virgil describes Cùm caput obscurâ nitidum ferrugine tinxit and without rays 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that inglorious obscurity and duskishness is referred to the person of the King and implies an imminution of his glory 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 But if the Sun be eclipsed he will be afflicted and oppressed by war The same judgment they give of the Moon and of the Stars if they be 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 See cap. 167 168. These things are too easie to insist upon and will be necessarily acknowledged it being once granted That the Universe is a Prophetick Emblem of a Kingdom or Polity as we shall clearly shew in its due place 11. Eye The light of the body saith our Saviour is the Eye And * Topic. l. 1. c. 14. Aristotle 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 That the Eye of the Soul is the Understanding or Intellect So that it is plain that the Eye is an Iconism of Knowledge as Darkness and Blindness is of Ignorance an expression frequent in the Scripture But there is also a peculiar fitness of significancy of humane Policy and Prospection in the Eye that Organ of the Body being not onely in the Head but the chief guide of it and the whole Body as being able to reach further by far and to act more quick then any other Sense whatsoever Wherefore Prospicere in longitudinem that is to say wisely to consult afore-hand for the rightly managing affairs and to contrive Counsels so as makes most for the future safety of things and for the advancement of the Interest of a State the Eye is a fit Emblem of this skill Which the Aegyptians seem to have intimated in that known Hieroglyphick of theirs A Scepter with an Eye on the top of it where it is plain that the Eye signified that Political skill prospection and counsel which is necessary in managing and ordering affairs of State for the greatest security and promotion of them And that Eyes signifie the administration of Divine Providence also seems to be intimated Zach. 4. 10. on which we have not here time to insist 12. Fishing Artemidor lib. 2. c. 14. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 To dream of catching fishes many and great is good and portends profit to all that dream so Achmetes c. 178. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. If any one dream that he catches fishes by angling in the Sea he shall find riches c. Fish dead in the Sea Artemidor lib. 2. c. 18. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 To seem to see Fishes dead in the Sea is not good for it signifies disappointment of our hope and that what we expect will not come to pass 13. Fire Fire is a various Symbol and signifies as well good as ill but always in a way of Consumption or Destructiveness but when it destroys that which is bad it is good The Holy Ghost it self is assimilated to Fire as the Baptist witnesses of Christ He shall baptize you with the Holy Ghost and with fire such a Fire as is to burn up the chaff but save the wheat as is intimated Matth. 3. 11. in the place So Malac. 3. Who shall abide the day of his coming For he is like a refiner's fire and like fuller's sope And he shall sit as a refiner and purifier of silver and he shall purifie the sons of Levi and purge them as gold and silver that is consume away their dross Manifold instances there are of this sense of Fire but it is needless to produce them But for Fire in the other destructive sense it is still more obvious I shall name one place for many Esa. 66. 15. For behold the Lord will come with fire and with his chariots like a whirl-wind to render his anger with fury and his rebukes with flames of fire For by fire and by sword will the Lord plead with all flesh and the slain of the Lord shall be many The fitness of the Fire 's signifying Consumption or Destruction Artemidorus has taken notice of lib. 2. c. 8. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And in the same Chapter he says it signifies if there be a considerable quantity of it in the Heavens 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the incursion of Enemies and their coming from that part in what quarter of the Heaven it is seen And answerably to this Achmetes according to the sense of the Indians c. 159. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And of the Persians and Aegyptians c. 160. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And again 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And lastly he saith that if his Chariot appear to be set on fire 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 So destructive is the Symbol of Fire every-where and particularly denotes a destruction by war and hostility as is observable out of these citations 14. Fire from Heaven Fire from Heaven and Thunder may very well be the same 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as Artemidorus speaks lib. 2. c. 8. But in allusion to Elias his bringing down fire from Heaven upon those Fifties that were sent to him from Ahaziah to apprehend him the fame of that eminent Miracle may make the bringing down Fire from Heaven pass into a Proverbial phrase for the doing exceeding great Miracles This may be good sense but we seek for an Icasmus Fire from Heaven therefore according to Artemidorus may signifie 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the commination of those that are in Authority and that very fitly Heaven being the place of Dignity in the Political Universe But nothing so minacious as that Fire or Lightning that goes before Thunder What therefore can be more significative of Excommunication then this especially if conceived to be vibrated from no inferiour Officer but from an Oecumenical Bishop the Head of the Church Catholick who is placed in the higher Regions of the Political Heaven Which Analogie will be still more exact if we consider what Artemidorus observes of Thunder 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 For Thunder and Lightning does not unite but disjoyns things that are united So does Excommunication that rives off a Member from the Church And there is still a further congruity that Excommunication should be called Thunder and Lightning or Fire from Heaven in that it is the commination of Hell-fire of which the destruction of Sodom was a Type which was burnt by fire from Heaven as Mr. Mede has judiciously observed And what is the last 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉
but Fire from Heaven To which destruction whoever do take upon them to adjudge men may very well be said to bring down fire from Heaven upon them which that Thunder-bolt of Excommunication does threaten 15. Flesh. By Flesh is understood in Scripture whatsoever is opposite to the Spirit and I mean in a Moral or Mystical way and that is all to be consumed by the Spirit and by Fire But more particularly Flesh signifies sometimes that which they vulgarly call Carnal Ordinances in some such sense as that is meant by S. Paul Are ye so foolish having begun in the Gal. 3. 3. spirit are ye now made perfect by the flesh Where he speaks of the Law of Moses And the Author to the Hebrews more expresly who speaking Chap. 7. v. 16. of Christ and comparing of him with the Mosaick Aaron Who is made saith he not after the Law of a carnal commandment but after the power of an endless life And still nearer to our purpose chap. 9. ver 10. where he speaks of a service which stood onely in meats and drinks and divers washings and carnal Ordinances imposed on them untill the time of Reformation By Flesh therefore may be understood all the external Ordinances and Institutes that men have rashly heaped upon Christianity whether merely useless or else Superstitious and Idolatrous for these are to the spirit of Christianity as the over-load of a fulsome and over-grown and unwholesome Flesh to the spirit of man 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 16. But there is another sense of Flesh taken much notice of in the Onirocriticks Artemidor lib. 3. c. 23. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 It is not good for a rich man to dream he eats his own flesh for it signifies the utter wasting of his riches or substance Achmetes c. 283. according to the Indian Persian and Aegyptian Interpreters 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Like that of the Israelites eating the flesh or the Leviathan in the Wilderness for the Leviathan or Dragon is the King of Aegypt And again c. 285. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And lastly according to the Indians c. 87. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And compendiously and at once 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Flesh is universally referred to gold and riches in the interpretation of Visions or Dreams 17. Floud See Water Fornication See Whoredom Frogs A Frog is an Hieroglyphick of Imperfection saies * Hieroglyph lib. 29. Pierius according to the sense of the Aegyptian Priests and he makes as if the occasion thereof was the observation of the half-finished generation of this Animal out of the slime of Nilus which he casts up in his overflowing after which this Creature is seen half-formed part Frog part Mud as * Lib. 1. Hieroglyph 25. Horus Apollo also expresly affirms 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 But in that it is thus gendred of filth and mire I should look upon it as a fit Emblem of that Wisedom which is not from above but is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Earthly Animal or Sensual and Devillish and is accompanied with bitter zeal and strife in the heart as the Apostle intimates just before and contrary to that Wisedom which is from above which is first pure not bemired with worldly lusts then peaceable not breeding contention nor full of words and brawlings like the importunate narsh and disharmonious Coaxations of Frogs so called in the Greek from that very ungratefull noise as if 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 were as much as 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 from the shrilness and asperity of the noise they make much less forward to war and bloudshed or to the instigating of Princes and men in Power thereunto which the hoarse and harsh Coaxation of these Creatures may be a fit Symbol of and the rather if these Trumpeters to war be conceived to be such men as are as soft and unwarlike as these naked and slimy Animals no more fit to fight then they but be onely Trumpeters to war and confusion and that for their own Interest the zealous declamations and vociferations they make being in behalf of themselves as all the noise the Frog makes is with its tongue turned inwards towards its one gullet Whence that Creature seems a very lively Emblem of such Wretches as these Artemidor lib. 2. c. 15. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Ranae homines impostores scurras significant which has no small affinity with our larger description of them 18. Gemms and precious Stones See Crown God In the Hebrew 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 signifies Magistrates as well as God as appears from several places of Scripture And Artemidorus has taken notice of the Analogie even from the highest Antiquity lib. 2. c. 37. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Quicquid dominatur vim habet Dei And again lib. 3. c. 13. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 If any rich man dream he is made a God it prognosticates a very great Principality For Princes are in a power of doing good and hurt in a manner equal to the very Gods CHAP. VII 1. Hail the signification thereof according to Scripture 2. And the ancient Onirocriticks 3. Harvest the evil and auspicious sense thereof 4. Head how clearly significative of Sovereign Power whether in Many or One. 5. Heaven and Earth 6. Horn. 7. Horse Islands 8. King and Kingdom 9. That Kinds or Sorts of things are sometimes expressed as if Individualls of the same Kind 10. Leopard Locusts 11. Male-childe Mark Measure Mill Month Moon 12. Mountain the several significations thereof 1. HAil Whenas Winds and Storms signify Political Commotions and Warres as is acknowledged by Grotius and all other Interpreters that they doe as in Daniel 7. 2. where the Four winds of Heaven are said to strive upon the great Sea well may a storm of Hail signify War and Incursion of the enemie and especially if they come from the North the congeledness of this Meteor bearing upon it the character of that Quarter Two eminent Examples of this Prophetick Figure we have in Esay The first Ch. 28. Behold the Lord hath a mighty and strong One which as a Tempest of Hail and destroying storm as a floud of mighty waters overflowing shall cast down to the Earth violently The crown of Pride the Drunkards of Ephraim shall be troden under feet Haec significant saith Forerius hostium adventum qui universum regnum Israel devastaturi erant But it is so plain it wanted no interpretation The other example is Esay ch 30. And the Lord shall cause his glorious voice to be heard and shall shew the lighting down of his arme with the indignation of his anger and with a flame of devouring fire with scattering and tempests and hail-stones For with the voice of the Lord shall the Assyrian be beaten down c. that is to say The forces of the Lord will come against Assur like Thunder and Lightening and Hail So plain is it that an Hail-storm is significative of the incursion and assault of an enemie according to the style of Scripture 2.
The like significancy is also acknowledged in the Onirocriticks Artemidor lib. 2. c. 8. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The like he saith also c. 41. which have some similitude with that in Daniel But to come nearer to the point concerning Hail Achmetes out of the Indian Persian and Aegyptian Onirocritical Solutions c. 191. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 But yet more particularly of Hail and more to our present purpose 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 If one dream that Hail falls on a place he may expect a through and sudden incursion of the enemie And further 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 But if he dream that the Hail hurt the stemms or stalks of the Corn accordingly as they are broken in the same proportion will the slaughter of men be upon the place 3. Harvest That cutting down Corn is significative of the death of men appears by that Apparition of twelve men seeming to mow the Corn-fields with sithes in Merchia upon which a pestilence followed But that mortality that is by war is still more fitly expressed thereby Achmetes out of the Indian Onirocriticks 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 If a King dream he sees harvest reaped in his own Countrey he will suddenly hear of the slaughter of his people This similitude is also used in Scripture Jer. 15. 33. The daughter of Babylon is like a thrashing-floor it is time to thrash her yet a little while and the time of her Harvest shall come But Harvest sometimes has a more auspicious sense as in that of our Saviour John 4. 35. Behold I say unto you Lift up your eyes and look on the fields for they are white already to Harvest And he that reapeth receiveth wages and gathereth fruit to life eternal that both he that soweth and he that reapeth may rejoice together 4. Head That the Head of a Beast in these Prophetick Figures signifies that Person or those Persons in whom the Supreme Power resides is as infallibly to be concluded as the fourth Proportional in Arithmetick three Numbers being given For we have three terms of the Analogie here also viz. a Kingdom and the Sovereignty thereof and a Beast which is the Prophetick figure of a Kingdom Wherefore we cannot miss to say As a Kingdom is to the Sovereign Power thereof so is this Prophetick or figurative Beast to the Head thereof and alternately As the Kingdom to the Beast so the Sovereign Power of the Kingdom to the Head of the Beast Whence we see plainly that the Head of a Beast answers to the Supreme Power and that whether the Supreme Power be in one single Person or in many For as the Power abstractedly is not considered so neither the Persons abstracted from their Power but both in concreto make up this Head Politick And therefore if the Supreme be not but in many those many are the Head and not the less one Head for consisting of many persons no more then the Body is less one Body for consisting of many persons Nay if a man should follow the Symmetry of his Phancy rather then his Reason a Head of many persons to a Body of a vast multitude of persons would look more elegantly and proportionably then one single person As if a Beast were made of little wax bullets sticking together a head of one bullet put to it would not look so conformably as an head of many bullets such as the whole body consisted of 5. Heaven and Earth By Heaven and Earth is understood the Universe as Grotius has rightly noted upon Genesis and abundantly proved upon 2 Pet. 3. 13. But that by Heaven and Earth the Prophets sometime understand a Political Universe that is a Kingdom or Polity there needs no further proof thereof then what is found in Esay ch 51. 15. I am the Lord thy God that divided the Sea whose waves roared the Lord of Hoasts is my Name And I have put my words in thy mouth and have covered thee in the shadow of my hand that I might plant the Heavens and lay the foundations of the Earth and say unto Sion Thou art my people that is to say to make them that were but scattered persons and slaves in Aegypt before a Kingdom or Polity to be governed by their own Laws and Magistrates Again chap. 65. 17. For behold I create new Heavens and a new Earth and the former shall not be remembred nor come into minde But be ye glad and rejoice for ever in that I create for behold I create Jerusalem a rejoicing and her people a joy Upon which Text Forerius Decrevi enim novum Orbem condere by which he means the Kingdom of Christ upon Earth that is his Church According to which sense also he interprets For as the new Heavens and the new Earth which I shall make shall remain before me so shall your Esay 66. 22. seed and your name remain Quam diu duraret novus Orbis i. e. Regnum Dei Ecclesiae c. And Grotius also though he look a-scue and is very shie himself best knows the reason at these places that have been mentioned yet he cannot abstain from interpreting the new Heaven and the new Earth Apocal. 21. of the state of the Church upon Earth And Dr. Hammond upon 2 Pet. 3. doth expresly acknowledge the new Heaven and the new Earth there mentioned to have a Political sense Which notion was worth the clearing because this general Analogie will make us the better understand what the parts of the Universe figuratively signify as to be called up into Heaven or cast down to the Earth and the like 6. Horn. Horn also signifies the Supreme Power of a Body Politick which is resembled to a Beast it being the highest part of the Beast and the Defender of his body It is the interpretation of the Angel in Daniel The great Horn is the first King And the ten Horns are interpreted ten Kings by the Angel in the Apocalyps For they were the height and summity of their respective Kingdoms though in some sort subordinate to the seventh Head of the Beast 7. Horse There is no express interpretation of that Animal in Scripture But a generous Horse with his Rider does naturally emblematize Rule and Command Which may seem also hinted to us from that of Psalm 45. 4. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which is Prosper and ride which the Seventy turn 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Prosper and reign But an Horse signifies also any success or fortune of him that rides on him So Achmetes out of the Indian Interpretations 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. If one dreams that he rides on Pharas which is a generous Steed which goes orderly and obediently he shall obtain 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 honour and renown proportionable to the Beast he rides on And so after he descants on the largeness thickness and length of the tail declaring that his power and train shall be answerable but if bob-tailed or thin of hair it signifies defect of power The halting of
〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Apocal. 12. that great red Dragon with seven Heads is so called from his Sanguinolency But that his Seventh head 's growing out of this red body signifies that this Beast will be cruel also under the Seventh Head and that this Cruelty it self is part of the Image of the Beast this every one has not noted 5. Resurrection That the Resurrection of the dead has a Political sense as well as a Theological or Physical may appear plainly from Ezekiel 37. 9. Then said he unto me Prophesy unto the wind prophesy son of man and say to the wind Thus saith the Lord God Come from the four winds O breath and breathe upon these slain that they may live So I prophesied as he commanded me and the breath came into them and they lived and stood upon their feet an exceeding great army That this is to be understood in a Political sense concerning the restoring of the people of Israel to their own Land out of thraldome and captivity is plain from the very mouth of God himself in the following verses Then he said unto me Son of man these bones are the whole house of Israel Behold they say Our bones are dried and our hope is lost we are cut off for our parts Therefore prophesy and say unto them Thus saith the Lord God Behold O my people I will open your graves and cause you to come out of your graves and bring you into the land of Israel Whence it is plain that to be cut off to be slain and to rise from the dead has as I said a Political sense as well as a Natural or Theological and that Resurrection is a Recuperation of such rights and liberties as have been taken away and a deliverance from persecution affliction and bondage Achmetes cap. 5. according to the Indian doctrine 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And cap. 6. according to the doctrine of the Persian Onirocriticks 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And lastly according to the Aegyptians c. 7. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The sense of all which put together is That the dreaming of men rising from the dead signifies the execution of Justice and deliverance from war bondage and affliction 6. Rivers A River has a double consideration The first in respect of its Original and its recourse thither which is hinted Ecclesiast 1. 7. All the Rivers run into the Sea yet the Sea is not full unto the place from whence the Rivers come thither they return again According to which consideration supposing the Sea a Type of the Extent of the Jurisdiction or Empire of any Potentate as it indeed is Rivers will signifie any Emissary Powers from thence whether Armies or Provincial Magistrates or what Agents abroad soever that are under this chief Power and so act in reference to it These may according to exact Analogie be called Rivers because both themselves and their affairs have recourse to the main Sea the amplitude of that Jurisdiction to which they belong Achmetes c. 178. according to the mind of the Indians Persians and Aegyptians 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The sense of which is That any great King is resembled by the Sea I suppose he means his Kingdom and as all Rivers run into the Sea so the wealth of the world to him And again to the same purpose 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 That new Rivers running into the Sea signify new Revenues accruing to the King or Kingdom from people afar off suppose made Provinces by his power 7. The other consideration of Rivers is their limpidness and irrigation but in this respect they have either a Spiritual sense or more Mundane The former appears from what our Saviour hath said John 7. 38. He that believes in me out of his belly shall flow Rivers of water This he spake of the Spirit which they that believed in him should receive The fruit of which Spirit as it is communicable to the generality of the Church is Righteousness Peace and Joy according to that Onirocritical solution of Astrampsychus 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Of this Water our Saviour Christ John 4. Whosoever drinketh of the water that I shall give him shall never thirst but the water that I shall give him shall be in him a well of water springing up into everlasting life Like that in Esay 58. And thou shalt be like a watered garden and like a spring of water whose waters fail not But Waters are also meant of worldly affluency Jerem. 31. 12. Therefore they shall come and sing in the height of Sion and shall flow together for the goodness of the Lord for wheat and for wine and for oil and for the young of the flock and of the herd and their soul shall be as a watered garden and they shall not sorrow any more at all Achmetes c. 176. according to the Aegyptian Solutions 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Rivers that water the soil are interpreted of mans livelihood 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 If one sees a River that uses to water the country dried up it portends death sorrow and affliction 8. Saints The first style of Saintship belongs to the Israelites who were a separate people set apart from other Nations and made holy to the Lord by adhering to that Law he gave them not contaminating themselves with the Idolatrous Institutes of the Gentiles Deuteron 33. 2. The Lord came from Sinai and rose from Seir unto them he shined from mount Paran and he came with ten thousands of Saints that is to say saith Vatablus cum populo Israel quorum fuerunt quidem multa millia licèt nâ—…n singuli Sancti tamen sancta fuerunt millia quòd Deus illos sanctificâsset in populum suum illos sibi segregâsset And further in the following verse Yea he loved the people all his Saints are in thy hand Which is plainly spoke of the Israelites according to that sense in Exodus ch 19. v. 5 6. where they are called a peculiar treasure above all people and also a Kingdom of Priests and an holy Nation And this they are said to be if they obey his voice and keep his Covenant Whence it is easy to conceive that those Christians succeed into this Title that are purely Evangelical and do not contaminate themselves by any Idolatrous Practices against the Command and Covenant of God they are Saints in this peculiar and separate sense in that they do not mingle with the Rites of the Gentiles but keep themselves to the Commands of that one Master Christ. If they doe this sincerely and constantly and truly there is little doubt of their sincerity that did not stick to lay down their lives for the truth though they be not so wise and plausible according to the mode of the world nor devoid of all blemishes of humane infirmity yet undoubtedly they are those Saints of which there is so frequent mention in the Apocalyps and are the true Israel of God under whatsoever hardship or low condition of fortune they
〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The sense of all which is in brief that in the interpretation of Visions or Dreams the Sun immutably represents the King the Moon the next in power to him the Planet Venus the Queen and the rest of the bigger Stars the Princes or Nobles of the Kingdom 13. Which is not so superstitiously to be understood but that if there were no Queen any third in dignity might be represented thereby For this Venus is also Lucifer which the Hebrews call 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 under which the mighty King of Babylon is represented Esay 14. 12. How art thou fallen from Heaven O Lucifer son of the Morning how art thou cut down to the ground that didst weaken the Nations Which seems to be against the analogie of the Onirocriticks which say the Sun signifies the King 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 But they do not say a Star may not signifie him especially when he is not compared with his own Nobles and Princes but with other Kings For a plurality of Suns is unnatural Wherefore in that case the Parable is to be made from the Stars onely and the chiefest King is the greatest and most glorious Star Whence when the Roman Empire had two Caesars unsubordinate to one another they could not well be called Suns but Stars though glorious ones Which agrees well with Mr. Mede's interpreting of that great Star that fell at the sound of the third Trumpet of the expiring of the Western Caesareate 14. But that there is a more Mystical sense of Stars also may appear in that Promise of Christ * Revel 2. 28. I will give him the Morning-star But where Christ saith * Chap. 22. 16. I am the root of David and the bright Morning-star I know not but that may be understood in a Political sense for all Kingdoms had not then nor have yet submitted unto him But where Stars signifie Angels that is more Cabbalistical Apocal. 1. 20. The seven Stars are the seven Angels of the seven Churches According as they signifie also in Job 38. 7. When the Morning Stars sang together and all the Sons of God shouted for joy As many of which as kept not their station but fell into this terrestrial pollution may well be called Fallen Stars 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Stars fallen from Heaven to the Earth According to which that Apocal. 9. 1. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is nothing but a Periphrasis of some one fallen Angel or Devil who afterwards is called the Angel of the Abyss a great Officer in the Kingdom of darkness That this is the sense is plain in that it is said not 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 but 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the preterperfect Tense It may not be impertinent also to adde what * Lib. 2. Hieroglyph 1. Horus Apollo says of this Hieroglyphick 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 CHAP. IX 1. Tail Temple 2. Throes Throne of God 3. Thunder an Iconism of Divine assistence for the discomfiting of the Enemies 4. Other more mystical meanings thereof 5. Time Hours Days That Day signifying a Year is an Icasmus 6. The appropriation of Months and Days to the story of the Wicked and Righteous with an inference from the latter of a latitude of compute in the 1260 days in the Apocalyps 7. Trees Vintage Water 8. White-clothing Wilderness Winds 9. Whore and Whoredom 10. The exquisite Analogie Idolatry bears thereunto 11. Wine-press 12. That it signifies also spiritual Destruction and slaughter 13. Woman and Women 14. Worship World 15. That the Prophetick style is so determinately intelligible that the endeavour of understanding Prophecies is most unjustly reproached for any insuperable difficulties therein 16. Certain Rules to try Interpretations of Prophecies by which are more warrantable and genuine which less 1. TAil The Tail of a Beast is that part that follows or comes behind to which therefore the Train of a great Prince or Potentate will correspond in Analogie But me-thinks the Analogie is most exact in Serpents of a great length who therefore have a long train following them But it is significant enough in other Animals also as the Onirocriticks have taken notice Achmet c. 152. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 he means 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 If any one dream he rides on a generous Steed such as the Persians called Pharas having a large Tail thick of hair and long he shall have a Retinue or Train of Men or Officers answerable to the fulness and length of the Tail This Analogie will hold good from Nobles to Princes and Emperours or any Sovereign Power over a State or Kingdom In which case their Forces and People are their Train or Tail Temple To omit those more Mystical or Moral meanings of Temple it signifies sometimes in the Prophetick style a People consecrated to God by an outward profession of him and so set apart from other Nations as consecrated Places are from other buildings or plats of ground 1 Tim. 3. 15. That thou maiest know how to behave thy self in the House of God which is the Church And Rev. 3. 12. Him that overcometh will I make a Pillar in the Temple of my God which both Grotius and Dr. Hammond interpret of the Church Visible Grotius of the Sardian Dr. Hammond of the Church Catholick 2. Throes of Child-birth The Throes of Child-birth are a Figure or Image of great endeavours to bring something to pass not without much difficulty pain and danger And the compassing their end is a delivery of what they were big with and a deliverance from the pain and danger they laboured under There are several examples of this Iconism in the Prophets Jer. 30. 6 7. Wherefore do I see every man with his hands on his loins as a woman in travail and all faces are turned into paleness Alas for that day is great so that none is like it it is even the day of Jacob's trouble but he shall be saved out of it Also Esa. 66. 7. Before she travailed she brought forth before her pain came she was delivered of a man-child which Interpreters usually understand of the sudden Birth of the Church I mean of the sudden Conversion of the Gentiles to it Grotius of the deliverance of Judaea by Maccabaeus Throne of God The Throne of God signifies a great Throne a magnificent Throne according to that usual Hebraism where Nouns joyned with 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 acquire a sense of excellency vehemency or greatness So the Trees of God the Cedars of God the Mountains of God are great and high Trees Cedars and Mountains the Fire of God a vehement Fire and the like According to which the Throne of God is an high and exalted Throne a Royal or Imperial Seat from whence the Political World is ruled as God from Heaven rules the whole Universe 3. Thunder Thunder and Lightning signifies the disjection and dissipation of the forces of War Esa. 29. 6. Thou shalt be visited of
as it will defile them who joyn with them in publick worship But there is yet another sense of Woman not Political but more Physical and Cabbalistical and that is The life sense and relish of this Body This is a Woman that we must have a special care of being polluted by through over-passionately closing with any of her suggestions or over-deeply sympathizing with or resenting of those pleasures she would allure us by and so desix our desire upon her For not Idolatry onely but all other Enormities arise in us from the listening to the false counsel of this domestick Eve 14. Worship That Worship or Adoration may be an Iconism of Subjection is plain from the nature of the Ceremonie it self the bowing of the Body being a fit Symbol of submitting the Mind and Will to his power to whom we doe this homage And that it does signifie thus in the Hebrew Idiom is manifest from several Instances But the very Symbol it self is explained Gen. 37. where the Sheafs of Joseph's brethren are said to make obeisance to Joseph's Sheaf that is to worship Joseph's Sheaf 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Your Sheafs worshipped my Sheaf Whereupon his Brethren presently interpreting the Dream say unto him Shalt thou indeed reign over us or Shalt thou indeed have dominion over us that is to say Shall we be your Subjects or fall under your Dominion So Esa. 45. 14. speaking of the subjection of the Aethiopians and Sabeans to King Cyrus They shall come after thee saith he in chains they shall come over and they shall fall down unto thee The Greek has it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 They shall worship thee All which signifie submission and subjection to his Sovereignty I will onely adde one place more Gen. 27. the blessing of Isaac upon Jacob Let people serve thee and Nations bow down to thee be lord over thy brethren let thy mother's sons bow down to thee The word is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in both places and signifies obedience or subjection at large as is manifest But suppose it had not that general signification of it self but only denoted that part of the duty of subjection which is Worship or Incurvation it might notwithstanding signifie thus largely Stylo Prophetico by a Diorismus World See Heaven and Earth 15. These be the chief Icastick terms that occur in the Prophetick style which if they haply prove more in number then we shall have use for in this Discourse yet I account my pains not improper in reference to what I have had occasion to treat of in my Mystery of Godliness besides their desireable usefulness at large for understanding the chief Visions and Prophecies in Scripture And I hope I have made it appear partly by this Alphabet of Iconisms and partly by my Explication of those preceding Prophetick Schemes That it is as easie a thing to render a Prophecy or Vision out of this Prophetick style into ordinary language as it is to interpret one language by another and That the difficulty of understanding Prophecies is in a manner no greater when once a man has taken notice of the settled meaning of the peculiar Icasâ—…s therein then if they had been penn'd down in the vulgar speech in which there are as frequent Homonymies of words as here there are of Iconisms and That therefore it need be no reproach to any one that he endeavours to understand the Prophecies of Scripture more then the Histories thereof Prophecy being nothing else but an Anticipatory History and when once fulfilled as plain an History as that which was never prophesied of 16. We will onely annex a few Rules concerning the Preference of one Interpretation of Prophecy before another and then conclude The first Rule That Interpretation that keeps close to the approved Examples and Analogie of the Prophetick style is to be preferred before such as are framed at pleasure according to the private phancy of the Interpreter The ground of this Rule is this That besides that it is safer to follow an approved Example then to be destitute thereof and wholly lean upon a mans private sense the very style of the Prophets being as it were a peculiar language or dialect there is a necessity of understanding things according to the meaning of their dialect or language and not according to what it would sound in our own Which is as fond and ridiculous as if an English-man in hearing of Latin spoken where the word Fur is occasionally brought in should think the Furre of an Alderman's Gown were meant or at the sounding of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in Greek should let his fancy presently fall into the dripping-pan And yet as absonous and incongruous is it to interpret the Iconisms of the Prophets according to what conceits are either vulgar or peculiar to our selves As if because Vices and Vertues are painted out in the figure of Women or Beasts we should therefore apply that meaning to the Prophetick style whenas they always signifie a Body Politick even in that very Scheme where abstract Inscriptions are upon them as Zech. 5. 7. where the Woman in the Epha is said to be Wickedness By which Woman notwithstanding Vatablus understands the Ten Tribes revolted to Idolatry and other Interpreters expound it to the same purpose And so to interpret Hail of hardness of heart is like the interpreting of Latin or Greek by what they sound nearest in English This is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as Aristotle speaks and quite to forget where we are or what we are about The second Rule That Interpretation that keeps one tenour of sense of the same words in one and the same Vision especially is to be preferred before that which varies backward and forward and takes the same word in as many different senses as it occurs in different places of the Vision To be in many tales is accounted an infallible sign of a false story and to vary the Interpretation of the same word in one and the same Vision without any account or reason is as great a demonstration of fraud and forcedness in the Interpretation and that the Interpreter was biassed by some design or interest and that he has done violence to the Text for his own advantage As for example If one should interpret that Iconism of a Beast one while to signifie a Kingdom or Empire another while some single Person of that Empire and then again some grand Vice thereof were not this a mere botch in comparison of interpreting this Beast of such a Kingdom or Body Politick in every place of the Vision I might instance in other such like shufflings but this one intimation shall suffice The third Rule That Interpretation that does concern the affairs of Religion and the Church of God and is of the greatest use and serviceableness to us is a more likely Interpretation and to be preferred before that which less respects us but seems to make the Spirit of God to have predicted things with little or
Bishop he in a more peculiar manner entitling himself thereby to all the foul miscarriages of the Catholick Church 3. And that the Vision of the Two-horned Beast does also imply such an universal Idolatrous Corruption in the Clergie as well in the Oriental as Par. 1. Agr. 7. in the Occidental parts of the Empire is intimated in the Two horns of that Beast as also in exercising all the power of the former Beast in his sight which I will defer to speak of till we come to the 15 th verse of this present Chapter I shall onely take notice before I pass any farther that I have in the foregoing Chapter proved by a method plainly Demonstrative That this Great Whore is not to be understood of any Body Politick that promoted Idolatry while the Empire was Pagan but after it became and continued Christian though contaminated with a Pagan-like Idolatry of a new Fashion which I have proved to have been many Ages already in being according to the evident sense of this Prophecy So that there can be no rub nor scruple as concerning this Ver. II. With whom the Kings of the Earth have committed Fornication That is to say By whose allurements and perswasions the Kings of the Roman Empire which is called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the inhabited Earth Luke 2. have admitted and embraced Idolatrous doctrines and practices which is Spiritual Whoredome Haply the Ten Kings may be alluded to which are mentioned v. 13. and are said to have one minde and to give their power and strength to the Beast which the Whore rides And the Inhabitants of the Earth have been made drunk with the wine of her fornication that is to say The people of the Empire were so inflamed intoxicated and dementated with the unwholsom heat of Idolatrous zeal that it made them very tragically quarrelsom against all Opposers or Despisers of their fair Diana and made them so sottish secure and heedless that they were exposed to all the deceits and injuries this intoxicating Circe could put upon them 2. Now as this Great Whore is said to be such a Promoter or Restorer of Idolatry so likewise is the Two-horned Beast which though he have two horns like a Lamb yet is said to speak like a Dragon that is to publish Paral. 1. Agr. 1. Idolatrous Edicts or Doctrines And again v. 12. he is said to cause the Earth and them that dwell therein that is the Empire as I said before to worship the first Beast whose deadly wound was healed And v. 14. to command them that dwell on the Earth that they should make an Image to the Beast who had the wound by the sword and did live The sense of the latter of which citations is this That the Two-horned Beast by his authority and power of speech perswaded them of the Empire which was now purely Christian and was therefore the death of the Beast as I have demonstrated in the fore-going Chapter to introduce such a face of Idolatry again though upon pretence of the better adorning and promoting Christianity that the slain Beast might justly seem to revive again in this Image that is to say that the Empire might be said to become a Beast again by becoming Idolatrous as the death of the Beast was the Empire's ceasing from Idolatry And therefore to make an Image to the Beast that was slain is as much as to make an Image in the behalf of the Beast that was slain that he might at least live again in this Image And it is said in the very Text 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 revixit so Vatablus and Grotius that is upon the making this Image the slain Beast revived again and lived in this Image Wherefore it is no wonder that this Two-horned Beast is said to make them that dwell on the Earth to worship the first Beast whose deadly wound was healed when he was the Healer and Reviver of him and put him in a capacity of being worshipped that is obeyed as I have noted in my Alphabet and that in such Injunctions as were Impious and Idolatrous For this Pagano-Christianism becoming the Religion of the Empire it was made thereby the Law and Commandment of the Empire so that the healed Beast may be rightly said to be obeyed in the submission thereto Out of all which does plainly appear That the Two-horned Beast as well as the Whore of Babylon was a Restorer and Promoter of Idolatry in the Empire Ver. III. So he carried me away in the Spirit into the wilderness This is no part of the Vision unless we make Wilderness Hieroglyphical And indeed Alcazar from the authority of many of the Fathers makes it a Symbole of Gentilism But whether you consider the Type or no this Two-horned 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or wild beast will naturally be conceived to be in the wilderness as well as the Whore is declared to be so and this Pagano-Christianism of which they are both the Authors what is it but a kinde of Gentilism So that it had not been inept to have made this one Agreement in our first Parallelism 2. And I saw a Woman sit upon a scarlet-coloured Beast The sitting upon a Beast implies the riding and guiding of him the exciting and quickning of him to this or that course as the Rider pleases And the Two-horned Beast is said likewise to animate the Seven-headed Beast and to prick Paral. 1. Agr. 2. him up to those bloudy Edicts that seem to be alluded to Chap. 13. v. 15. That the revived Beast should speak and cause as many as will not submit to him as Beast that is to say as Idolatrous to be slain And this may suffice for an intimation of the truth of the second Agreement of the first Parallelism That as well the Whore as the Two-horned Beast has the governance and rule over the Beast with seven Heads 3. Now for the scarlet colour of the Beast it has a double indication the one of Tyrannical Cruelty the other of Imperial Majesty In the former Paral. 2. Agr. 2. sense Victorinus Aretas Zegerus Viegas Alcazar and others interpret it In the latter Cornelius à Lapide Paraeus Ribera and Grotius Fera coccinea saith he nimirum quia eo colore tingi solebant Imperatorum Romanorum Paludamenta But where both senses are so fit they are both to be understood by an Henopoeia which reduces many Objects prefigured under one Type But for the present I shall onely take notice of the Cruelty of the Beast set out by this bloudy colour And the like is also figured in the shape of the Seven-headed Beast in the Thirteenth Chapter His body there being like that of a Leopard his feet like a Bear 's and his mouth like a Lion's All which are Beasts of great Rapine and Cruelty 4. Full of names of Blasphemy that is Full of Titles or Kinds of Idolatry Plenam Diis so Grotius understanding it of the Pagan Empire and we may
Caesarem where he saith this City is called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by Nicetas Urbs Septicollis by Paulus Diaconus and that it is so acknowledged by Janus Dousa and by Mr. Richard Knolls in his Turkish History To which I will adde what I finde in Theatrum Urbium That Scholarius Patriarch of Constantinople in his Enarratio Vaticinii de Turcici Reg ni interitu styles the City 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Dilichius also in his description of the City not onely mentions the seven Hills but tells also what magnificent structures stand upon them And lastly Ludovicus Gotofredus Muri ejus saith he speaking of this City sunt incredibilis altitudinis complectentes ambitu suo septem Colles So that though there be not so ancient and early mention of the Seven Hills of Byzantium or Constantinople as of those of Rome and that it may be probably conceived that upon the Emperour's pleasure of having the City called New Rome they would also finde seven Hills in it in emulation of the old Imperial City whether there were just Seven or no I mean though there might be more then seven or if fewer take occasion to phansy one and the same Hill for some little unevennesses in it to be more then one yet I cannot well distrust but that there is a tolerable ground for this Title and being that it has obtained in the Writers of her History I will not gainsay but that she may also goe for Urbs Septicollis Which will be no inconvenience to our Interpretation but a further confirmation of our Exposition of the Two Horns of the Beast which I conceive to be the two Imperial Patriarchates the Roman and Constantinopolitan which shews the extent of that Pseudo-prophetick Beast that it reached over the whole Empire as well Oriental as Occidental And here we finde the Seat of the Whore as broad these Seven Hills not confining her as is usually conceived to Old Rome but permitting her to reside also at New Rome or Constantinople there being Seven Hills Paral. 1. Agr. 〈◊〉 there as well as at the other Seat but not so famous as those other as the fame of her whoredomes is not so great from the one as from the other According to which sense 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 would be rendred Septem capita septeni sunt montes The seven Heads signifie the two Septenaries of Mountains the one at Rome the other at Constantinople From whence the eighth Agreement of our first Parallelism is cleared Ver. X. And they are seven Kings that is They signifie seven sorts of Supreme Governours which are called Kings here by a Diorismus or an Hebraism who understand by King and Kingdom any Body Politick with the supreme Power thereof be it in one or in many And these Seven Sorts are not seven Individuals of different sorts but the whole Succession of each sort by an usual Henopoeia And that seven different Sorts of Governours may be called Seven Heads as well as seven Individual Persons I think is demonstrable by Reason because there is a greater difference betwixt Kind and kind then betwixt Individuals of the same kind Whence I wonder that Grotius should call seven forms of Government taken concretely as every one does take them 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Whenas if there be such a sevenfold difference in the supreme Powers in the succession of an Empire the Empire once considered as a Beast it will be ipso facto Seven-headed whether we will or no. So farre is it from being a 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that it is a natural and inevitable truth 2. Now the Division of the succession of the Supreme Powers of the Empire is made naturally thus This Power was either in many or in one In many as in the Consuls the Tribuni Militum the Decemviri In one as in the Kings Dictatours and Emperours Which Emperours I will again divide into Pagan Christian and Pagano-Christian So that the whole line of succession of these Supreme Powers is divided first into two equal parts and then each of those two subdivided into three and then one part of the second subdivision into three again So that the whole line does naturally fall into eight parts agreeably to the History of things and declaration of the Prophecy For there are plainly numbered Eight Kings though but Seven Heads of the Beast For under the Christian Emperours the Empire was no Beast and therefore there could be no Head thereof 3. Nor know I any tolerable solution of this Riddle of Eight Kings and yet but Seven Heads but this For the shortness of the stay of the Christian Succession cannot put them out of the number of the Heads since the stay of the Decemviri was above fourty times shorter Wherefore it is not this but because the Empire during their succession was not a Beast nor they either fit or actual Heads of one but were onely Heads or Kings of the undegenerated and not-yet-again-Paganizing Empire Which therefore was the time of the Death of the Beast when he was not and therefore was to have no Head nor could have any 4. Nor is there the least ground of any Cavil against our last Subdivision which is of Emperours into Pagan purely Christian and Pagano-Christian as if there were not a cause fundamental enough of this last Distribution Whenas on the contrary there is such a strong Opposition betwixt the two first members thereof that one outs the other the seventh King being the wounder and killer of the sixth Head And forasmuch as when a Religion is made the Religion of a Kingdom or Empire it is in a sort the Law of that Empire it may be rationally conceived that there is even a Political difference betwixt a Christian and a Pagan Emperour And lastly be that how it will it is plain to all men that there is a very eminent and notorious difference betwixt a Christian and a Pagan Emperour and of more concernment to the Church of God then any Political Distinction of Government And that which most concerns his Church we may be assured God takes most notice of and therefore would be as likely to distinguish the succession of Supreme Governours by this difference as by any 5. Nay I think I may safely adde that it is likely that when once the Angel had come to the division of the Heads or rather Kings into Christian and Pagano-Christian he did wholly neglect the confideration of the Political differences of forms of Government in the Empire that notion being now impertinent to his design and contented himself with the distinction of them from the account of Religion onely But till this he numbered according to the distinction of Political form they all of them till now agreeing in pure Paganism So that the sense of The Beast that was and is not his Head is the eighth King seems to be this That supreme Power be the Political frame or Title of it what it will which is
fifty years See Mr. Mede's Diagram of the ten Kings Ver. XIII These have one mind and shall give their strength and power Par. 2. Agr. 13. to the Beast And therefore in the Thirteenth Chapter he is also adorned with this gift where he is described The Beast with seven Heads and ten Horns and upon his Horns ten Crowns which shews that even when they were actually Kings they were voluntarily the strength of this Beast For what strength in the Empire could have constrained them they being the very strength thereof Whence appears the thirteenth Agreement of our second Parallelism But the sense of this verse is briefly this These ten Kings shall be of one mind that is of one mind in matters of Religion shall be of the Religion of the Empire that is to say of the Pagano-Christian Religion whereby the Empire had again become a Beast and shall give their power and strength unto this Beast that is to say shall be ready even by force of Arms if need be or by what other power or authority they have to maintain this Beast in its beastly that is in its Idolatrous condition and Pagan-like Superstitions or else understanding all along a Synecdoche shall give the Pagano-Christian Emperour which is the Head of this Beast the aid or afford him the assistence of their Armies or forces if need should so require against all Opposers of this Pagano-christianism For the Emperour is look'd upon as the chief Champion and Generalissimo of all the Pagano-Christian Forces And though those Kings be distinct and absolute in their own Dominions yet looking upon them as held together in one upon the account of the Religion of the Empire of which the Emperour is by place the chief Champion these ten Kings may be considered as coming into a kind of subordination unto him and be conceived to be the Horns of this Head I mean of this Generalissimo or Emperour of that Army which makes War with the Lamb. But that Power which influences all is the Whore that rides the Beast 2. And truly when the Head of this Whore is once found to be so big as to out-top the Secular Head of the Empire the Emperours themselves and both pretends to and makes use of that boasted Jus utriusque gladii that is to say So soon as the Pope is found to act the Caesar as well as the Universal Patriarch there is no incongruity to allow him represented in two places as well as he sustains two parts and conceive him to be typifi'd as well in the last Head of the Beast as in the costly adorned Head of the Whore But my way is more distinct and more compliable with Grotius his opinion who stands so stoutly for the permanency of the Imperial Majesty to this day And it seems also reasonable to me to interpret Prophecie according to the sense and phrase of History Prophecie being nothing else but an Anticipative History And therefore the Series of Roman Emperours and Title of the Empire and the Body of the Empire continuing still though much contracted and being so look'd upon in History I should think it is the most natural way to interpret according to the common acknowledged phrase and sense of Historians But as I said if the Pope be conceived to supply the room of the Emperours as soon or as oft as he appears to out-top them even in Secular power and to prove the real Head of the Empire acting the Caesar as well as the Patriarch that Interpretation also is very approvable and unexceptionable For the Supreme Power of the Beast that was and is not is by the Angel look'd upon as one and the same Head provided it be but all along the Head of that Beast that is Pagano-Christian For the spirit of Prophecie takes no notice of any useless distinctions and discriminations Wherefore that Supreme Power that shall be found Pagano-Christian is still one Head in the style of this Prophecie as I have above noted And that which is under it though it were invested with the Title of Emperour will fall under the number of the Ten Horns after the division of the Empire into many Kingdoms Ten suppose at least or thereabout For I look upon the number to signifie Symbolically rather then purely Arithmetically Ver. XIV These shall make war with the Lamb. What is said of these Par. 2. Agr. 14. Ten Kings is said of the Beast in the Thirteenth Chapter That he should make war with the Saints which is the same as to war with the Lamb. Saul Saul why persecutest thou me And these Ten Kings being the Horns of the Beast what is done by them is done by the Beast So that the Beasts in both Chapters make war with the Saints according to the fourteenth Agreement of our second Parallelism As for the 16 and 17 verses of the Thirteenth Chapter the sense of them is this That no man of what degree soever that was not of the Pagano-Christian Profession for that is meant by receiving a mark in the hand or in the fore-head should have any traffick or commerce in the Empire or Territories of any of these Ten Kings which is a kind of besieging them with famine and therefore not unfitly reckoned under the Hostilities of War Which interdiction of all commerce and traffick is an effect of Excommunication by the Two-horned Beast Examples of which Warfare are obvious every-where in History Concerning the Name of the Beast and the Number of his name mentioned in those 16 and 17 verses I shall speak upon the last verse of this present Chapter 2. And the Lamb shall overcome them According to that in the Thirteenth Par. 2. Agr. 15. Chapter v. 10. He that leadeth into captivity shall go into captivity This fifteenth Agreement of our second Parallelism is very manifest 3. And they that are with him are Called and Chosen and Faithful Par. 2. Agr. 16. Sutably to that in the Thirteenth Chapter v. 10. Here is the Patience and Faith of the Saints The great stress lies upon Chosen and Faithful Patience and Faith For many are called but few are chosen But those choice ones that are said to be with him are stout Souldiers that will follow the Lamb wheresoever he goes never leave him for any persecution whatsoever but be Firm and Faithful unto him be their Patience never so much exercised by sufferings In which is comprised the sixteenth Agreement of our second Parallelism CHAP. XV. Ver. XV. The seventh Agreement of the first Parallelism Ver. XVI The folly of those Interpreters that understand the Burning of the Whore of the burning of the Houses of Rome by fire Ver. XVII The Ten Kings giving their Power and Kingdom to the Beast according to the will and purpose of God how stupendious an Arcanum 2. In what sense God may be said to put it into their hearts 3. That it is rather Fate then Policy that has carried on the affairs of the Whore
a more lively Image of ancient Paganism then this And yet this does the Church of Rome doe to their Saints and their Images and more then this for the reviving of the Image of the Beast and for the fulfilling of the Prophecie For as the Heathens brought Oblations to their Idols and Gods so do these to the Images of their Saints as is notoriously known As the Heathens set up lights before their Images as for example before the Altars of Saturn upon a more humane Exposition made by Hercules of that Oracle 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and placed a great deal of Religion in the Vestal Fire Apud nos itidem saith Polydore nullo magis honore quà m cereis candelis decorantur extrinsecùs Coelicolae The ancient Heathen burnt incense to their Gods ubi Templum illi centúmque Sabaeo Aeneid lib. 〈◊〉 Thure calent arae which is a consumptive Sacrifice and the very notation of Thus is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 à sacrificando so does the Church of Rome burn Incense before the Images of her Saints and make this kind of Sacrifice to them The Pagans sometimes carried their Idols in Procession so does the Church of Rome as namely the Images of S. Roche that Apollo Apotropaeus and S. Genevefve that Jupiter pluvius or rather Juno pluvia if you will The Roman Church hide their Images in Lent by drawing a veil before them How little does this fall short of the Pagans concealing for a time their Idols by shutting them up from the sight of the people to make them more eager of them afterwards Dii quoque Templorum foribus celentur opertis Ovid. Fast. lib. 2. Thure vacent arae sténtque sine igne foci 9. The mouths of the Pagans were filled with diversity of Oaths by the names of their Gods so are the mouths of the Pagano-Christians by the names of their Saints and their making of Vows is alike in them both The Fathers of the Primitive times reproched the Heathen for their giving Divine Honour to mere men whose dead Bodies or Reliques were in their very Temples and does not the Church of Rome doe this Honour to their Saints and profess their Reliques to be in their Churches The ancient Heathen made toilsome journeys suppose to the Oracles of Delphos or Jupiter Hammon to the Temple of Aesculapius or other such like places for Instruction or Help and do not the Romanists make as tedious Pilgrimages to the Shrines of their Saints Whether by the juggle of their Priests or the assistence of some officious Daemons there were several Miracles and strange Cures conceived to be done in the Temples and at the Images of the Pagan Gods and certain Monuments thereof hung up for the honour of their Deities and the profit of the Priests to increase Offerings Polydore out of Strabo Mos fuit in Templo ejus Dei qui auxiliatus esset praesertim Aesculapii quod Epidauri insigne erat tabellas appendere in quibus morbi sanati erant inscripti According to the sense of which custom is that Distich of Tibullus Nunc Dea nunc succurre mihi nam posse mederi Picta docet templis multa tabella tuis Eleg. lib. 1. 3. The same thing Polydore acknowledges to be done in the Church of De Invent. rerum lib. 5. c. 1. Rome and for a memorial of having their leg their arm their ear their pap or any other part cured by this or that Saint they hang the effigies of these parts openly near the Shrines or at least in their Chappels or Temples 10. Their Superstition in Holy-Water is also not unworthy our noting This Aqua lustralis was usual amongst the Ancients Spargit aquâ captos lustrali Graia Sacerdos but the virtue thereof is most justly and judiciously derided by Ovid. Ah nimiùm faciles qui tristia crimina caedis Fastor lib. 2. Flumineâ tolli posse putatis aquâ But Aeneas was not of that mind in Virgil who speaking to his Father Anchises when he was about to offer Sacrifice argues thus Tu genitor cape sacra manu patriósque Penates Me bello à tanto digressum caede recenti Aeneid lib. 2. Attrectare nefas donec me flumine vivo Abluero And again in another place Occupat Aeneas aditum corpúsque recenti Spargit aquâ And at the burial of Misenus Idem ter socios purâ circumtulit undâ Aeneid 6. Spargens rore levi ramo felicis olivae Lustravitque viros Tibullus also in his second Book of Elegies Cast a placent Superis pura cum veste venite Et manibus puram sumite fontis aquam There was a Water near Porta Capena holy to Mercury wherewith the ancient Romans used with a Laurel-bough to besprinkle themselves the Merchants especially for the purifying them from their sins especially that of couzenage and lying Ovid has described the Ceremony so lively and pleasantly and with so judicious a note of the ill effect of such pretended Purifications for the corrupting mens manners that I cannot abstain from the transcribing the narration though it be something long Est aqua Mercurii portae vicina Capenae Fastor lib. 5. Si juvat expertis credere Numen habet Huc venit incinctus tunicâ Mercator urnâ Purus suffusâ quam ferat haurit aquam Uda fit hinc Laurus Lauro sparguntur ab uda Omnia quae dominos sunt habitura novos Spargit ipse suos laurororante capillos Et peragit solitâ fallere voce preces Ablue praeteriti perjuria temporis inquit Ablue praeteritâ perfida verba fide Sive ego te feci testem falsòve citavi Non audituri numina vana Jovis Sive Deum prudens alium Divámve fefelli Abstulerint celeres improba verba Noti Da modò lucra mihi da facto gaudia lucro Et face ut emptori verba dedisse juvet That is he desires of Mercury that in virtue of this superstitious Devotion and of besprinkling himself with water sacred to his Deity he may cheat and grow rich with a chearful conscience and without the fear of the displeasure of the Gods The examples of Lustral Water are infinite as also the imitation of this Superstition exceeding frequent in the Church of Rome in their washings and aspersions with Holy-Water and it is to be feared with as much Hypocrisie and secure trading in sin upon a vain presumption of the virtue of such Superstitious and imaginary Purifications as the Poet has here described 11. The Tubilustria or Hallowing of Trumpets has some considerable affinity with the Popish Christening of Bells But this Agreement would be still more exact if as these consecrated Bells are conceived to have a power to drive away evil Spirits by their ringing so those Trumpets to chace away Ghosts and Spectres by being sounded But whether these Trumpets be understood or no to have such a special virtue the ringing of brass Instruments with the assistence of Holy-Water is
he has yet at any time ceased to be a regnant Beast For till Christ came he reigned over all the World excepting the Jews After Christ came he tyrannized over the Christians for about three hundred years And after the Empire in a manner wholly turned Christian yet the Kingdom of the Devil was no less then all the Habitable world besides in comparison whereof the other is but a small spot of ground and yet what great slices have been pared off therefrom Besides his Rule in Christendom it self by superinducing so universal a spirit of Antichristianism into it consisting of gross Idolatries and bloudy Persecutions of the dear Servants of God Now let any one consider and say whether the Devil be Bestia non regnans or regnans in the world from Christ's time to this day and how groundless an Interpretation this of Ribera's is that understands the Beast that was and is not of the Devil at large and not of the Roman Empire in such a sense as we have expounded it For that it is the Fourth Empire which is the Roman the ten Horns do plainly indicate which are the Ensigns of the Fourth Beast in Daniel which I think no man has been yet so grosly extravagant as to interpret of the Devil 9. Besides this Beast is not onely styled The Beast that was and is not but there is also added to his Title and yet is Which whole Title cannot be true of the Devil regnant in Antichrist's time according to Ribera's sense For he being then regnant he is the very same Devil in every respect and a man cannot say he is not regnant though it be then true that he is So that part of the Title onely will agree to him namely that he was and is Which is another plain detection of the falsness of Ribera's Exposition Nor is there any Evasion in the various readings For Copies generally have it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Which seems such a contradiction that it has made some leave out 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and others turn it into 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 neither reaching the meaning of the Apostle But seeing this reading we follow so generally obtains notwithstanding its seeming harshness and contradictiousness it is an unexceptionable argument that it is the true and genuine reading indeed and that merely the undubitable authentickness of Copies has made it bear down the other two readings which the over-much boldness and unskilfulness of some had ventured to cast into the place of the true one 10. Again concerning his Exposition of the Seven Heads many things are to be objected As first That his dividing the whole duration of the World into Seven Ages is a thing groundless and merely arbitrarious there being nothing either in Tradition or Scripture to countenance it There is indeed an ancient Tradition of Elias that divides the duration of the World into four parts Two thousand years Vacuity Two thousand the Law and Two thousand the Messias and then the great Sabbatism But of such a division as Ribera has made here there is no News nor Example in Antiquity And in the steps he takes he has very unmannerly troden over the head of Moses as if he was not a man great enough to be taken notice of amongst the Joints of this Division whenas certainly he is one of the most eminent Epocha's of time as appears by that Tradition of Elias and therefore ought to have been mentioned before he came to David As also Enoch so famous for his Assumption into Heaven his Birth ought to have been noted before he came to Noe. Besides other as justifiable Divisions which were easy to observe But these short intimations may suffice to shew how lubricous and fictitious a Comment Ribera's Exposition is in this regard 11. But secondly How can the Kings in each one of these Ages having no subordination to one another but being absolute and absolutely disjoin'd in their respective Kingdoms or rather having no political Co-ordination or Correspondence as Heads of one Body Politick how can they make up but one Head for an Age There is no warrant nor example of any such thing in the Prophetick style But if you will say they are one Head because they belong to one Body the Devil all the whole Succession of wicked and persecutive Kings throughout all these Ages will be but one Head upon this account and so the Beast will have but One Head not Seven For distance of time and Succession makes no difference of Heads nor Beasts in the Prophetick style but some distinction of nature in them 12. Thirdly It is very harsh and incongruous to make these wicked Kings the Heads of the Devil whenas the Devil is their Prince and Head he being above them both in his preeminency of Nature as being an Angel though but a wicked one and they but wicked Men as also by right of Jurisdiction all those that are Rebells to the Kingdom of God making an Accession to the Kingdom of the Devil So that the Exposition in this respect is as harsh and preposterous as the painting of an Horse with his Head on his Coccyx and his Tail hanging down before his Breast Spectatum admissi risum teneatis amici 13. Fourthly If the Seven Kings be the wicked Kings of the Seven Ages of the world even to the very day of Judgment what is that Eighth King and what Age of the world will he be in For there seems neither room nor time left for him Why truly Ribera has pitched upon a very subtil Merchant who will insinuate into all times and places if it be possible for his own advantage This Eighth King saith he is the Devil But the Devil say I is the Beast according to his own Hypothesis and this Eighth is said to be one of the Seven Heads But how can one and the same be both the whole Beast and yet but one of the Heads thereof Wherefore it is plain that his Exposition in this regard is against common sense and the very first Notions of humane Understanding 14. Fifthly The Seventh Age of the world which is the measure of the Reign of Antichrist is most ridiculously disproportioned to the rest it being but three years and an half as Ribera has computed it Which yet were more tolerable if it were well proportionated to those great Exploits that Antichrist is to doe in that short space For he is to subdue all the World or if you will the Ten Kings which they feign will be the Rulers over the whole World when Antichrist begins to lay about him For having first made an Expedition against Three Kings namely the King of Aegypt the King of Libya and the King of Aethiopia overcome them and slain them the other Seven shall submit to him and become the Seven Heads of Antichrist the first of which being mortally wounded in his service he shall miraculously raise him from the dead Thus by a wonderfull Metamorphosis have
they changed the Ten Horns into Seven Heads and made the Horns of Antichrist to grow before the Heads So pitifully are they put to it in their prevaricatory Expositions of the Oracles of God And not content to adorn this great Potentate with that one single Miracle of raising the slain from the dead they also allow him a power of literally bringing down fire from Heaven and of making his own Statue to speak His Royal Palace they place in Judaea and derive his Pedigree from the Tribe of Dan and make his Throne the very Temple of God at Jerusalem and proclaim him the expected Messias of the Jews to whom they are all to gather themselves He must besiege Rome and burn it and call to himself the Nations from all the Quarters of the Earth to conspire the utter Extirpation of the Christian Name from under the Cope of Heaven and as it seems notwithstanding all the vigilancy of the Pope and his whole Conclave of Cardinals and their active Emissaries and all the Forces of Christendom will in a manner wholly effect it and all this which is the Miracle of Miracles within the space of three years and an half Nay which is still more miraculous This quadrimular Antichrist shall not onely over-run Christendom but subdue the Grand Signior over-run the Persian make the Tartarian Cham submit to him in the North and extort Homage from the remotest Kingdoms of Africa Which is such a piece of Prophetick Fabulosity as no man would ever vent in the most Romantick History So incredible therefore is this Exposition of Ribera in this regard also concerning the Seven Heads of the Beast 15. Sixthly and lastly To that Beast onely to whom the Seven Hills belong some way or other can the Seven Kings appertain for both are said to be signifi'd by the Seven Heads of the Beast and therefore both have a proper and peculiar reference to him for they being his Typical Heads to him must needs appertain what they are said to typifie But it is plain that the Seven Hills appertain to the Roman Beast that is to the Roman Empire Therefore it is necessary that the Seven Kings likewise appertain thereunto From whence it will follow that these Kings cannot be the Kings of the Seven Ages of the world For Rome was not built till about Anno Mundi 3200 when even the Fourth Age of the World according to Ribera's own reckoning was almost expired So impossible every way is this Exposition of his and against all sense and reason And yet it is the very best the Romanists have and in which they think they have the safest shelter as appears in Cornelius à Lapide and Lessius his adhering thereto rather then any other they have hitherto lighted upon 16. The weakness of all which Expositions Grotius as it seems friendly commiserating has minted one of a-new at his own Forge which though we have else-where in some sort examined already and found light and adulterate yet it being a matter of so great moment we will give it a second Trial wherein if it be again found manifestly salse and more fully detected to abound with gross Incongruities and Impossibilities I cannot imagine any thing omitted for the giving us the greatest assurance that any one can desire of the truth of that Exposition we have made of these Seventeenth and Thirteenth Chapters of the Apocalyps CHAP. II. 1. What the meaning of the Scarlet Beast with seven Heads and ten Horns and of the Woman riding him is according to Grotius 2. A Confutation of Grotius his Interpretation out of our Joint-Exposition 3. Two main Grounds or necessary Supporters of Grotius his Interpretation The one That S. John reckons the Seven Heads beginning at Claudius with the Confutation thereof 4. The other That this Vision was wrote in Vespasian's time with a Discovery of the weakness and falseness of that Opinion 5. That Claudius his banishing the Jews from Rome falls many degrees short of a proof that John was then exiled into Patmos And that Impulsore Christo in Suetonius does not so much as evince that any Christians were then expelled the City 6. And if the Decree reached Christians it does not strait follow that S. John was concerned therein 7. An Answer to a Passage in Epiphanius alledged for S. John's Exile then 8. An Answer to another alledged to the same purpose 9. That Epiphanius his Testimony makes against Grotius his main Project 10. That Epiphanius is but one single Father against the rest and that the Testimony of Irenaeus alone is far to be preferred before his 11. An unexceptionable clearing of the sense of Irenaeus his Testimony and that the very detorsion of it will not serve Grotius his turn 12. That there is not the least shadow of Probability that the Apocalyps was wrote before toward the end of Domitian's reign 13. Proofs out of the Apocalyps it self that it was not wrote before the Persecution under Domitian 14. The great consequence of the clearing this Truth it wholly subverting all Grotius his Interpretations of the Seals and Trumpets and all their Synchronals 1. LEt us therefore more accurately examine Grotius his Interpretation the summe whereof is this The Scarlet Beast ridden by the Whore of Babylon is the old Roman Idolatry guided and dispensed by the ancient Ethnick Roman State or Domination as he calls it The Seven Heads of the Beast are seven Roman Emperours Claudius Nero Galba Otho Vitellius which five were fallen when S. John had this Vision or at the least wrote it as Grotius supposes But Vespasian was then reigning Titus the seventh was not yet come and when he was come he was to continue but a while But the Beast that was and is not and is the Eighth King and consequently an Eighth Head that 's Domitian who as Grotius pretends reigned first in his Father Vespasian's absence but receding from the government of the Empire at Vespasian's return was then the Beast that was but is not but was after to emerge and resume the Empire again after Vespasian and Titus his reign and to die a violent death The Ten Horns he saith are Ten Kings which were not as yet that is in S. John's time in side reverentia Imperii Romani but should be for a time And those saith he were the Ostrogotthi Wisigotthi Vandali Gepidae Longobardi Heruli Burgundiones Hunni Franci Angli sive Saxones 2. These are the main strokes of Grotius his Interpretation of the Seventeenth Chapter of the Apocalyps the general lineaments of which not answering to those of the Thirteenth may make it upon that very account suspicable to those that duly consider what great presumption there is or rather demonstration that these two Chapters handle the very self-same things but are so contrived that the one may give light to the other Wherefore the Dragon in the Twelfth Chapter with seven Heads bearing seven Crowns which plainly shew that the signification of Kings not Hills is
there to be understood being wounded to death in one of his Heads in that fight and healed so that all wondred after him I would demand of Grotius which of these Emperours was wounded to death in a fight with Michael and was then revived again to the wonder of the world Again there are but seven Kings in the Thirteenth Chapter how come there to be eight in the Seventeenth Thirdly The eight Kings in the Seventeenth Chapter are all Idolatrous according to him but the Inscription of Idolatry is onely upon seven Heads in the Thirteenth which implies the Beast had no more then so Of which things there can be no sense unless according to such an Explication as I have already exhibited Furthermore If the Beast in the Seventeenth Chapter be the Roman Pagan Idolatry how comes it to continue but fourty two months in Grotius his sense for that is the continuance of the Seven-headed Beast in the Thirteenth Himself also acknowledges the Ten Horns of one Beast not to be the same with the Ten Horns of the other I omit to note that Dominatio Romana which he says is the Babylonish Whore in the Seventeenth Chapter is not the same with Magia in the other Chapter whenas notwithstanding I think it clear enough that the Whore of Babylon and the Two-horned Beast are the Types of one and the same thing But this I confess may well seem too Magisterial to make my own Exposition though never so true a Rule for others Wherefore I shall wholly release Grotius from any such unequal terms and examine his Interpretations of these two Chapters of the Apocalyps upon free and common Principles such as all men do appeal to 3. And that first in a more general way searching into the solidity of two main Grounds which he supposes The one That S. John begins the reckoning of the seven Heads of the Beast from Claudius the other That this Vision of the Whore of Babylon and the Beast that was and is not was wrote by S. John in Vespasian 's time Which Grounds are so necessary for his Interpretation that without them it is not onely incongruous but impossible forasmuch as Five are said to be fallen and one to be c. which therefore this Interpretation necessarily requires and implies to be Vespasian and that he then was when this Vision was either seen or wrote Wherefore his Reasons for these Grounds deserve a more diligent Examination For the first of which he alledges these two First That Claudius was the first persecuting Emperour I mean that persecuted the Christians Which yet is contrary to the whole stream of Antiquity who fix the first Persecution upon Nero omitting that expulsion of the Jews from Rome as a thing either inconsiderable or as not properly appertaining to the Christians as such but as they were Jews But so far as I see Caius the Predecessor of Claudius afflicted both Jew and Christian more by his enormous Extravagancies then ever Claudius did concerning which Grotius himself has wrote in his Notes upon 2 Thess. 2. Moeror metúsque maximus Judaeorum Christianorum plenum habuit effectum So that the Epoche might have begun at Caligula as well as Claudius according to this rate which shews the Exposition to be but arbitrarious Besides if the Epoche begin at Claudius because a Persecutor why did not the account break off where Persecution ceased For Galba Otho Vitellius Titus and Vespasian are none of them infamous for any persecution The other reason why this Epoche is fix'd on Claudius is because S. John himself was banished into Patmos in Claudius his time and therefore S. John accounts from the time of his Banishment as Ezekiel from the Epoche of his Captivity But this is a very weak Allegation For Ezekiel did not compute the time from his particular Captivity but from the Captivity of Jeconiah as you may see again and again in Gaspar Sanctius upon Ezekiel Besides that it is one thing for a man to compute what happened to himself as Ezekiel did from the time of his private Captivity and another to reckon the succession of Kings or Emperours from so private an Epoche And then which is still worse it is not at all probable that S. John was banished into Patmos in the reign of Claudius not onely because he suffered not as a Jew but as he was a witness of Jesus but also because he has not set down that Epoche which had been very necessary and but ill omitted if there were any such great stress lay upon it as to assure us of the truth of the main Visions of the Apocalyps Adde to this that S. John was not at Rome and therefore unconcerned in this Edict of Claudius and if he had been there or where-ever else he was there is no mention made of any confinement to places in these Expulsions And we see that Act. 18. Aquila and Priscilla that were expelled from Rome abode securely enough in Corinth to whom S. Paul joyned himself and wrought on his Trade with them And lastly it is against the whole current of Antiquity Irenaeus Origen Tertullian Eusebius Hieronymus Nicephorus Victorinus Primasius Andreas and Aretas and against the universal suffrage of both Papists and Protestants who with one voice declare that S. John's Exile into Patmos was under Domitian But I need not insist on these things so much for the present sith the confutation of his second Ground will make this vanish also 4. Which second Ground is That the Vision of the Whore and the Beast was wrote by S. John in Vespasian 's time But unless it was seen then it will not serve the turn forasmuch as it is not the voice of S. John but of the Angel that says Five are fallen and one is and therefore the Vision as well as the writing thereof must be in Vespasian's time And also in the Island Patmos because once and for all at the beginning of this Book of Visions he saith they happened to him in the Isle of Patmos and never gives any other intimation throughout the whole Book whence it is incredible but that they all befell him in that Retirement Which things I note to meet with Grotius his supposition in his De Antichristo That though S. John was banished into Patmos under Claudius yet he was out of the Island in Vespasian's time From whence I would infer that the Vision of the Whore and the Beast was not seen by John in Vespasian's time Which is the utter destruction of Grotius his Exposition as I noted before 5. And this alone of his own concession were enough to put an end to this Debate but it being a matter of such great consequence I shall insist a little larger upon it and no less then demonstrate the utter insufficiency and weakness of this Ground of Grotius Wherefore sticking close to the Catholick suffrage of Antiquity and of all Writers as well Protestants as Papists let us again consider what
〈◊〉 〈◊〉 For if they say there was not a Church at Thyatira in being at that instant when S. John wrote they plainly declare that S. John did prophesie and intimated afore-hand that there would be one Wherefore Epiphanius found little reason why he should from the state of the present Controversie chuse the ordinary opinion rather then that which is accounted his own 8. The other place of Epiphanius is Haeres 51. Sect. 12. where he tells us how S. John was impelled and constrained to write the Gospel by the instigation of the Holy Ghost though he very much declined it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 yet he was forced by that impulse and that in his old age 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 when he was more then ninety years old after his return out of Patmos which happened in Claudius his time Where there is this adjection of the mention of his return from Patmos as a confirmation of the grandevity of the Apostle at that time Now let us see what service this Magnus testis Historiarum diligentissimus Inquisitor as Grotius calls him as well as he does Petavius who so plainly contradicts him in this very point can doe this learned Interpreter in the present case For this passage if there had been any force in the former does quite obtund it it shewing Epiphanius not at all diligent in Chronologie as Alcazar has also well observed in making S. John above ninety years old in Claudius his time whenas the common Tradition of the Church is that he was very young when he entred upon his Apostleship S. Jerom saith that Christ chose him when he was but a youth or child Baronius makes him just twenty five years old at the Passion of our Saviour The Scripture it self implies also that he was but young in that Christ says to his Mother concerning John Woman behold thy son which should imply that he was at least as young as our Saviour Christ he being himself born of the Virgin when she was but of the age of fifteen as Nicephorus relates out of an Epistle of Euodius Bishop of Antioch But by Epiphanius his Chronologie S. John would be at least twenty years older then the Blessed Virgin concerning whom notwithstanding Christ says to John Behold thy Mother And which is still worse if S. John was ninety years old when he came out of Patmos under the reign of Claudius it will run the Nativity of Christ near fourty years back and place it long before Cyrenius was Governour of Syria forasmuch as all men conceive S. John to be at least as young as our Saviour if not much younger Which Absurdities detect Epiphanius not to be so great and unexceptionable a Witness in History as Grotius would make him And therefore Petavius again peremptorily sets down in the Margin over against Epiphanius his 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Sub Cocceio Nerva Joannes revocatur ab exilio Which certainly is the truth and agrees with that time of S. John's age which Epiphanius allots to him when he wrote the Gospel For supposing him to be born about the same time our Saviour was or a little later this writing of the Gospel will fall into the years of Nerva or at least some few years after Domitian according as you shall finde it set down in Chronologies 9. But supposing Epiphanius his Testimony of value in this case the same Epiphanius that witnesses John in Patmos under the reign of Claudius witnesses him out again in the same reign which as I have * Sect. 4. already noted spoils Grotius his Project who would have S. John prophesy in Vespasian's time else all the fat is in the fire as touching the Interpretation of the Seventeenth Chapter of the Apocalyps But I think I have plainly proved that there can be nothing gained out of Epiphanius for establishing Grotius his conceit these Passages of the Father being either but Conjectures or Inadvertencies or else some lapses of the Scribe who wrote it seems more glibly the name of Claudius then of the other two Emperours as it might appear in that second Citation S. John being indeed about that age when he came out of Patmos in Cocceius Nerva his time but not in Claudius's 10. So that Grotius has not so much as one Witness to countenance his new Invention and if he had had this one what is one to the whole stream of Antiquity and of the Churches Nay what is Epiphanius his Testimony compared with the Testimony of that one single Father Irenaeus he living two hundred years nearer S. John's time then Epiphanius and who expresly asserts in Eusebius that the Apocalyps was imparted to S. John at the end of Domitian's reign For speaking of the Name of the Beast he writes thus 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 If the name of the Beast had been openly to be divulged at this time it would have been told by him that saw those Visions which under one collective Title are called The Apocalyps For they were seen not long since at the end of Domitian 's reign 11. This I doubt not but is the genuine sense of these words and that he speaks not of the Vision of the Beast alone under that name of the Apocalyps but of the whole body of Visions so called Otherwise for distinctness sake he would have said not 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 but 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 especially considering Apocalypsis had then passed into a known Title of this volume of Visions Besides that the Name of the Beast was not seen by S. John but the Number of his Name And therefore whereas the Latine has it Antichristi nomen per ipsum utique editum fuisset qui Apocalypsin videret neque enim ante multum temporis visum est I should easily believe that visum got in for visa by the oscitancy of the Scribe For unless the Interpreter of Irenaeus had understood qui Apocalypsin videret of the whole Collection of Visions and not of the Beast onely and his Name he would have rather said Revelationem and for sureness have added ejus to make the sense more distinct and determinate qui Revelationem ejus videret And lastly suppose this Testimony proved onely that the Vision of the Thirteenth Chapter of the Revelation was seen at the end of Domitian's reign which I have not the least conceit of it will not serve Grotius his turn since this of the Seventeenth Chapter is later both by order of situation in the Apocalyps and also by nature For it being the plainest Vision concerning the Beast with seven Heads and ten Horns that was exhibited to S. John and containing in it a Key for the right understanding the other it ought to come last the Comment being naturally later then the Text according to common sense and reason 12. Wherefore seeing there is no proof at all that Claudius persecuted the Christians much less that he exiled John into Patmos but that Domitian was a notorious Persecuter and
Concretes in the same kind but a handsom Repository for different matters signifiable by one Type as is easie to be understood from what is declared concerning that Scheme Eighthly If Domitian be the Beast and the Whore the Roman Power then the Roman Power rides on Domitian's back as if Domitian were not the Head but the Body of the Empire or if you will metamorphoz'd by this marvellous Interpretation into Apuleius his Ass for the Roman Power to ride on But then again Domitian being chief of the Roman Power himself he must by this account ride also upon himself and make a wonderful Centaure such as the deepest-witted Poets never so much as dream'd of 7. Ninthly If the Whore be the Roman Pagan Power how can she be said to be the Mother of Fornications and out of her Cup to intoxicate the Kings of the Earth with that kind of wickedness whenas all the Earth before the Empire was Christian were Idolaters of themselves and stored Rome her self with multifarious kinds of Idolatry Which Objection neither Grotius nor any one else with all the fetches they have will be ever able to assoil Tenthly This Inscription on the Whore of Babylon Babylon the Great Apoc. 17. 〈◊〉 the Mother of Fornications cannot be understood of Rome Heathen as Grotius would have it because there is prefixed Mystery before it which would be a sorry Mystery indeed if it were onely a bare Synecdoche and should intimate no more then that Rome Pagan was another Babylon that is to say an Idolatrous City O the depth of the Mystery In the eleventh place Those ten Kingdomes which Grotius would insinuate to be the ten Horns were not Kingdoms intra fines Imperii Romani as he speaks before the Conversion of the Empire to Christianity nay indeed before the subversion of it or discerption into many Kingdoms how then could these Kings give their Power to the Beast I mean not Apocal. 17. 13. onely to Domitian who is farther removed from them but to the Roman Pagan Idolatry which by this time of Discerption had ceased to be the Religion of the Empire Or how can they be said to eat the flesh of the Whore and burn her with fire whenas the City of Rome had ceased to be Vers. 16. the Pagan Whore before these Kings were in being much more before she was assaulted and sacked by Totilas which was Anno 547. whenas Gentilism was cast out and the Temples of their Idols demolished all over the Empire about the year 399. the very next to that wherein according to the Devil's mistake upon his survey of the proportion betwixt the Inward and Outward Court of the Temple Christianity was expected by the Heathens to expire And again in the twelfth place How can those Ten Kings which Grotius assigns be said to fight against the Lamb in his sense that is against Christianity Apoc. 17. 14. in the behalf of the Roman Pagan Idolatry whenas the Empire had then become Christian and was not that Pagan Beast to whom they should lend their aid and power against the preaching of the Gospel Was it a likely thing that such ten Kings that were foes to Christianity should as Grotius speaks intra fines Imperii Romani Romanis ipsis concedentibus regnare So impossible is Grotius his Interpretation concerning the ten Horns every way 8. In the thirteenth place This destruction of Babylon is a perfect 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a full and final destruction set out by the casting a Milstone into the midst of the Sea But none of Grotius his Ten Kings ever destroyed Rome in such a manner In the fourteenth That exhortation to the People of God to goe out of Apoc. 18. 4. Babylon lest they partake of her sins can make no good sense in Totilas his time For would the Angel have all the Christians leave the City of Rome in the year 546. and for several years upwards toward Constantine's time because there might be some Pagan Idolaters still amongst them and not rather keep the City for the better suppressing Idolatry and quite extinguishing it and not let it spread more by the receding of the hearty Christians out of it Truly this gloss of Grotius is very ridiculous and incredible that makes the Angel utter such an irrational Exhortation Fifteenthly If Come out of her my people lest ye partake of her sins be as Grotius interprets Tu popule mi ubi apparuerit Totilae exercitus exite ad Basilicas Apostolorum extra Urbem it will follow that to have returned again into the City after Totilas was gone had been to return into Babylon and partake of her sins again Which is a very vain and fond conceit 9. Lastly His interpreting that Instigation Reward her as she has rewarded you to be made to Totilas and the Goths is harsh and groundless For what injury had Rome done to the Goths but rather the Empire was injured by them And therefore Grotius is sensible of the ill service that Pronoun 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 does his Interpretation and upon that account applauds a certain Manuscript that has left it out but not very loudly it being so generally contradicted by other Copies Sed 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 abest in MS. non malé CHAP. IV. 1. That this Mis-timing of Visions must needs cast Grotius into the like Absurdities in interpreting the Thirteenth Chapter and that his Exposition of the first verse thereof is guilty of at least nine or ten 2. Four gross Contradictions in the second 3. As many Incongruities or Weaknesses in the third 4. As also in the fourth and fifth 5. Two Absurdities in the sixth and seventh 6. As many in the eighth 7. Three Difficulties in the exposition of the tenth verse 8. Five Incongruities in the eleventh 9. His gross Interpretation of the twelfth verse 10. Four Absurdities in the thirteenth 11. Eight Incongruities or Weaknesses in his expositions on the fourteenth verse 12. Three in the fifteenth 13. Three or four more in the sixteenth and seventeenth 14. And nine more in the eighteenth verse 15. The astonishing consideration of the Absurdness of Grotius his Expositions compared with his Parts and Learning 16. An useful Illation from this weak performance of his That all the Expositions of the Romanists upon these two Chapters are superlatively frivolous and incredible 1. THus many Incongruities and Inconsistencies that I may not say Impossibilities and Contradictions are there in 〈◊〉 Exposition of this Seventeenth Chapter Let us now see how successful he is in the Thirteenth where he taking the same liberty of applying the Prophecy to times it was never meant of it will be a wonder if we finde not the Interpretation alike harsh and incongruous Let us pass therefore through the whole Chapter from verse to verse Where In the first he makes the Beast with seven Heads and ten Horns to be the Roman Idolatry whose Heads are seven Hills and whose Horns are ten Kings namely
have been said also to continue the sense in the following verse 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as any one will acknowledge that does but observe the contexture of the whole sentence Lastly whereas this conjuring up the Ghost of Achilles was to revive the Beast who had the deadly wound as Grotius intimates this clashes with what was acknowledged before that this wound was healed in reedifying the Capitol Nor can this healing be naturally understood of any more then the first-mentioned wound which the Beast received in the Battel with Michael But Grotius distrusting the fitness of this Exposition upon second thoughts forges another to adde to it namely That the Disciples of Apollonius caused a Statue to be erected to him But if this be 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Apollonius will prove the Seven-headed Beast because the Image is erected to him 2. Grotius produces no History that attests that certain Magicians Disciples of Apollonius gave any such order 3. That expression Saying to them that dwell upon Earth is too big for the private Instructions of any Disciples of Apollonius to one single Town or some few persons therein Lastly it is but a lank business to take notice of one single Statue for Idolatry when there were already innumerable numbers of them in the Empire 12. In the fifteenth he interprets the Two-horned Beast's giving life or breath to the Image so that it would speak of Apollonius his Confabulation with Achilles Ghost or of his Statue's speaking But suppose his Statue did speak which yet Philostratus who made it his business by travel and enquiry to know where Apollonius was buried does not mention it is not presently to be imputed to Magick since that Idol-garrulity is often noted in History without any such reflexion 2. That Image that is here said to speak is said to give in charge that they that would not worship the Image of the Beast should be killed but there is no record of any such Edict from either the Ghost of Achilles or the Statue of Apollonius that they that would not worship their Images should be killed 3. But if the worshipping of the Image of the Beast be understood of the Universality of Images or Idols besides that it is exceeding hard and extravagant to change that settled sense of this word in which it had been used thrice before that also will want proof that either the Statue of Apollonius or Spectre of Achilles ever gave any command that they that would not worship Images should be killed 13. In the sixteenth and seventeenth 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 seems most naturally to be spoken of the Image of the Beast in the fore-going verse of whom it was said 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which was either the Ghost of Achilles or the Statue of Apollonius here of a sudden Magia is understood which is but an harsh shift But this Magia it is that makes all ranks of men to enter into some Religious Society or other and in token thereof to receive either the mark of this or that God as of a Thunder-bolt for Jupiter an Ivy-leaf for Bacchus an Helmet for Mars a Trident for Neptune or the Names of such Gods or the Number comprised in their names or else not to be permitted to buy or sell. But against this I urge That the Mark of the Sealed is not a visible puncture or stigmatism and therefore it 's likely that in a Book so Symbolical as the Apocalyps is the Mark of the Beast does not signifie so grossly and literally 2. These Fraternities or Societies were not the procurement of Apollonius his Magick in Trajan's time they being in use long before Lastly it is not credible nor is there any History to make it good that no Pagan could buy nor sell unless he had some such sacred Stigmatism upon his body So inadequate and groundless is this part of Grotius his Interpretation 14. In the eighteenth he makes Ulpius Trajanus to be him to whom the Number 666 belongs but very groundlessly nay against all reason For it is a mere mistake in him to think that the Number is understood of the number of any mans name whatsoever because it is expresly said that it is the Name of the Beast And Ribera takes away all occasion of any such errour interpreting For it is the Number of a man according to the mind of Aretas or at least according to what he thought should have been his mind as well as his own in quite another sense Numerus enim proprius hominis est intellectum habentis ac ratiocinantis est numerare 2. If it were the Number of a man it being intended for the note of one most signally wicked and mischievous to the Church why must it fall to Trajan's share when there were Emperours far worse then he or rather when he was so very good an Emperour and not so cruel a Persecutor of the Christians as several others were but one that easily desisted being once rightly informed of things who gained so much on the Christians themselves that they thought he got to Heaven and amongst the Heathens made up part of that auspicious Acclamation of the Senate to their Caesars Felicior Augusto Melior Trajano 3. What a leap is this to leave all the Seven Heads of the Beast and pitch upon one that has not been in play all this while 4. That also is very weak and suspicable to find this number in his Praenomen or Fore-name and not in his Name 5. But far worse to fall short or rather to misreckon in the account for assuredly in 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 write the final Sigma as you will it being still a Sigma it will have no other valor then 200 whence the whole summe of the Name will not be 666 but 860 as any one may see that will reckon For that Sigma even in the end signifies 200 is plain in 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and several other examples This is most certainly true and there is no subterfuge at all to avoid it as Maresius Grotius his Antagonist has fully made good against him as he has indeed every where in a manner worsted him though Grotius so unseemly contemns him trampling him down into the durt under that uncivil Nick-name of Borborita 6. The Mark the Name and the Number belong all to one wherefore if the Number be Trajan's the Mark must be his also But might no body buy nor sell who had not his mark on their hand or fore-head 7. Here is wisedom let him that has understanding count the Number of the Beast is such a Preface as implies another sort of numbering then the mere summing up the Numeral Letters of a Name into one summe 8. To what purpose was this setting down the number 666 for the denoting of the Emperour Ulpius Trajanus it never entring into any ones head that this number reflected upon him till Grotius hit upon it and mist it both at once 9.
followers For it is too dilute and frigid a Gloss to make no more of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 then to turn it off with a Posthac or Hereafter as if the term of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 had not passed into a phrase of Art already and had not been defined long since by the Angel in Daniel or at least was not a necessary Consectary from Chap. 12. his Definition who being asked how long to the end of these wonders he held up his right hand and his left hand unto Heaven and sware by him that liveth for ever that it shall be for a time and times and half a time And being again asked by Daniel to declare more plainly when the end of those things should be he gives this Answer That the words are sealed till the time of the End which is so called as being that notable section of time that lies next to the end of the Fourth or Last Monarchy but presently after addes this hint to point him to this time of the End That from the time that the daily Sacrifice should be taken away and the Abomination that makes desolate set up should be 1290 days but that blessed he should be that came to the 1335 days 9. Now the end of those things Daniel enquired after reached as appears from the Text and general consent of Expositors even to the Day of Judgment however that phrase is to be understood Whence it is rational to conceive that Daniel's Prophecies reach through those four famous Monarchies or Kingdoms the Babylonian Persian Greek and Roman and that the Roman Kingdom conterminates or synchronizes with the fulness of time or the end of Times and Ages and being the Fourth and last division of this Sacred Kalendar of Prophecies as Mr. Mede calls it may rightly be termed the last times or last days in which the Messias was expected and came But after Christ's coming seeing there would be a very marvellous and notorious reign of Antichrist during this Fourth Monarchy or last time who is figured out in the Two-horned Beast and the Whore of Babylon which are of the Middle Synchronals of the Book-prophecie and which I have already demonstrated to begin about 400 years after Christ and that the time of their continuance is the same with a Time and Times and half a Time and that this is 1260 years it is evident that this share of time is the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the latter times of these last or the time of the End as lying next thereto and the very times the Angel speaks of in this Chapter where he asserts with an Oath that those Wonders that is that prodigious Reign of Antichrist should continue for a time and times and half a time but that when he shall have accomplished to scatter Dan. 12. 7. the power of the holy people namely the Jews then all things spoken of shall be finished Which is the very same with that in the Apocalyps where the Angel swears by him that lives for ever that there should be no more time saving in the days of the voice of the seventh Angel Apoc. 10. 7. when he shall sound and the Mystery of God be finished as he has declared to his servants the Prophets alluding particularly to this of Daniel This is the right meaning of this passage of the Revelation according to common sense and Grammatical construction Which plainly shews that the Time and Times and half a Time end with the sixth Trumpet From which considerations it is evident to any one that is unprejudiced that this term of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is a term of the Prophetick style the same with the Time of the End with an allusion to that Sacred Kalendar of Daniel consisting of the four Monarchies as being the latter section of the continuance of the last running on along with the Reign of Antichrist For so does the Church generally interpret that Time and Times and half a Time in Daniel 10. And that they do belong to the Reign of Antichrist even in our sense Mr. Mede has in my judgment most convincingly made good even from those numbers of 1290 days and 1335 days in his little Treatise of those Numbers which he calls Revelatio Antichristi Which were certainly given as a Key to open the truth of Daniel's Prophecies concerning the reign of that Man of sin and the time of his Discovery The words Dan. 12. 9. are closed up and sealed till the time of the End that is till these latter times but the wicked shall not then understand them but the wise shall and may be assured of them by this Key of Numbers of years from the Epocha of Antiochus his prophaning the Temple compared with the Event the first notable Instances of Revealing of this Man of sin The first of these Numbers from that Epocha ends in the year of our Lord 1120 the latter in the year 1165. For I have already so undeniably demonstrated that Days stylo Prophetico do signifie Years both in this Treatise and in my * Book 5. Ch. 15. Sect. 2. Mystery of Godliness that I think no man will doubt of it and that they cannot signifie Days here Mr. Mede has with no less evidence evinced Now the Event is exact to Admiration For in the year 1120 a true and perfect detection or description of Antichrist came forth and not till then as you may see by that compendious account which Mr. Mede has given thereof The ending of the other Period is also notable for the Waldenses and Albigenses in whose times the Mystery of Iniquity was more fully detected and by more numerous Companies protested against Whence they are said to be blessed that reach to those times by reason of the great clearness of the Light of the Gospel that shined forth nor less happy they that then also suffered for witnessing to it but certainly much more blessed by reason that their Reward should be greater and more singular For the Prophecie declares how things are in truth and reality and not according to the judgment or sentiments of the soft and false carnal mind See that judicious Author Mr. Mede for I cannot dwell upon these things I will onely adde for a farther assurance of Mr. Mede's Exposition that no other will hold water For it is not likely that these Numbers of Days should be any Interpretation of the Extent of the above-mentioned Time and Times and half a Time they both of them varying from the just measure of that Period and the sense also of that Aenigmatical expression being not so hard but that all hit on it and agree in it To which you may adde that the Epocha from Antiochus will not comply with this design and it is hard to make that Epocha signifie otherwise then literally with any credibility of meaning As also that this way the main difficulty about which Daniel was so solicitous will not be satisfi'd which was When this
time of the End would be not of what extent it was Unto the course of which I mean of these 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or the time of the End which is that Time and Times and half a Time these Numbers of 1290 and 1335 do in a special manner direct from the above-said Epocha as you may see at large if you consult that excellent Interpreter I referred to before The Angel tells Daniel The words shall be sealed till the time of the End and Mr. Mede shews plainly how the matter is revealed in this time of the End and even in those very points of this Time which these Numbers direct to which is worth our consideration and admiration CHAP. X. 1. Epiphanius his Exposition of the Prophecie of Paul to Timothy confirmed from the reference it has to that in Daniel 2. Grotius his miss-timing this Prophecie of Daniel and applying it to Antiochus how rash and groundless 3. A Confutation of his Application 4. The right timing this Prophecie by Calvin and Mr. Mede who both interpret it of the Roman State and Empire 5. A more particular account of the two first verses of the Prophecie Mr. Mede's way 6. As also of the third 7. And fourth 8. That the sense of this Prophecie so clearly accordâ—… with that of S. Paul that it is manifest he refers to it in 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 9. That though this Interpretation of Mr. Mede be unexceptionable throughout yet the two first verses of the Prophecie may be otherwise expounded and more suitably to S. Paul's Prophecie in his Epistle to the Thessalonians 1. WE see therefore what small reason Grotius has to turn off these 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 with a frigid and undeterminate Posthac when they signifie in this place at least so punctually and determinately Which is yet impli'd still more plainly in that the Apostle says that the Spirit speaks 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which intimates some Record where this Prophecie is written in a manner totidem verbis For if there be any force in reasoning from words and phrases 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 must signifie some such thing not simply Inspiration but verbal description of what is inspired Which advantage neither Grotius nor any one else I think can alledge for their Interpretation if it agree not with this which Epiphanius first so happily lighted upon and Mr. Mede has so marvellously well improved and is found most exactly to agree with that Prophecie of Daniel which shall be the last Prediction of the Churche's lapsing into Idolatry which I intend to produce The words are these Then shall a King doe according to his will and he shall exalt himself Dan. ch 11. v. 36 37 38 39. and magnifie himself above every God and shall speak marvellous things against the God of Gods and shall prosper till the Indignation be accomplished for that that is determined shall be done Then he shall not regard the God of his fathers nor the desire of women nor regard any God for he shall magnifie himself above all For together with God in his seat he shall honour Mahuzzim yea together with a God his Ancestors knew not shall he honour them with gold and silver and with precious stones and pleasant things And he shall make the Holds of the Mahuzzim jointly to the forein God whom acknowledging he shall increase with honour and shall cause them to rule over many and shall distribute the Earth for a reward 2. This is Mr. Mede's Translation of the Text which is very easie and natural as to rules of Grammar and Criticism as I shall take notice afterwards In the mean time I cannot but observe how groundless and irrational Grotius his Interpretation is who expounds all this of Antiochus both against the stream of Antiquity who always suspected Antichrist to be here prefigured and against all probability of things For to pass by the direction of those Numbers above mentioned that fall into that Time and Times and half a Time that comprise the continuance of the Wonders Daniel enquires after which Wonders are intimated in this present Prophecie as well as in that of the little Horn as also the necessary determination of this Time and Times and half a Time by the Middle Synchronals of the Apocalyps who can imagine that the Series of Daniel's Visions Chap. 11 and 12. that reach to the day of Judgment as certainly they do should admit of so vast an Hiatus or gap as from the Gests of Antiochus to the end of all things neglecting that long tract of time betwixt in which the Church is so much concerned Wherefore Calvin has judiciously adventured to interpret these verses of the Roman Empire which immediately succeeded the Greek in the last times whereof Antiochus is said to reign according to the Prophecie of Daniel though he has over-rashly on the other side rejected the opinion of the Ancients who suspected Antichrist concerned in these verses Mr. Mede therefore has most happily joyned them both together as we shall see anon 3. Now accordingly as Grotius has miss-timed the Prophecie so his Applications are alike cold and incongruous For he cannot make good that Antiochus was a Rejecter of the Gods of his Fathers nor of the love of Women against which the Roman Writers themselves expressly witness For à Lapide upon the place affirms that he both worshipped the Gods of his Fathers and made the Jews doe so too and both Gâ—…sper Sanctius and he tax Antiochus for his Mulierosity and excess in Luxury And as touching Mauzzim besides that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the plural number is not so likely to be the proper Name of any one God he does not make it out by any History that Antiochus was such a zealous worshipper of this Modin as he would have him called or that he had a Temple built to him in Modin which is a City in Judea cut out in a Rock and in all likelihood was a strong Hold and therefore was called Modin but without any reference to this imaginary Modin of Grotius the strange God of whom Antiochus should be so zealous a worshipper For which conceit he brings no proof but 1 Mac. 2. 15. where the Officers of Antiochus are said to make the Jews to sacrifice in Modin but not to the God Modin So that Grotius his whole Interpretation is but a mere precarious phancy Let us now cast our eyes upon Mr. Mede's 4. Mr. Mede therefore accordingly as Calvin before him supposes that at the thirty sixth verse of this eleventh Chapter the Prophecie of Antiochus breaks off and that the Roman Kingdom comes into consideration Which is not doubtful and conjectural but necessary from the reasons already intimated Wherefore 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is rightly rendred Then shall a King doe according to his will For that particle 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is of such a lax sense that there is no injury done in putting upon it this determinate meaning
Accordingly as Pareus renders 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Tum flebunt Apoc. 18. 9. And by King is here meant as else-where in Daniel a State or Kingdom And that the Roman is here meant the order of Succession implies it following the Greek according to all Chronologie and according to the sense of Historians is conceived to succeed the Greek upon the Romans Conquest of Macedonia which was in the latter times of Antiochus So fitly do things fall in for matter of time in our Hypothesis which does promise an easie flowing of the sense all along which is this 5. In the first of these verses That the Roman State or Kingdom towards the end of Antiochus his reign shall carry all before them and domineer as they list they shall exalt themselves and make themselves greater then any Kingdom For to conquer a Nation is to conquer their Gods whom the Romans vocally called out of those Cities they took by a certain Charm I spoke of above and so led away the Gods of the Nations as it were captive as well as the people Nay the Officers of this State spoke marvellous things and blasphemous against the God of Gods that is against Christ Jesus himself when he was so mocked and despightfully used by his Persecutors and Crucifiers and yet they prospered and were successful in the Empire notwithstanding all this their villainy towards Christ and bloudy persecution of his Members wherein he was again reproched and blasphemed till the determinate time of this Rage ran out and that the Empire became Christian. For as it follows in the next verse the time was next to succeed wherein the Roman Empire should contemn neglect and cast off the Gods of their Ancestors that is the Pagan Gods and turn Christians but that withall Marriage which was in so high esteem with the Romans before as it appears by those Laws which were called Julia and Papia which Constantine abrogated should be much slighted at first but in process of time be superstitiously forbidden as well to Priests as Monks that Man of sin then getting the rains of the Empire into his hands who respected not any God but for his nulling the Laws of Christ and trampling on the necks of Princes is justly said to magnifie himself above all according as it is written of him in the Epistle to the Thessalonians 6. And sutably to this lawlesness and contempt of God it follows in the next Verse 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that is to say For together with or besides for 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 will signifie so God will he honour Mauzzim 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in sua ditione Grotius renders it referring it to Antiochus The Latine reads in loco suo referring it to the Idol Mr. Mede in his Seat referring it to Christ the true God There may be also another sense of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 viz. super basin ejus as if that honour done to the Mauzzim was grounded in the honour intended therein to Christ which is the plea of the Pontificians The sense therefore briefly is this That it is plain that this Roman Power as was said in the foregoing verse has cast away the true fear of God from them and exalt themselves above every thing that is called God even Christ himself in that against the express Law of God they doe Divine honour to the Mauzzim though in pretence of worshipping thereby the true God with gold and silver and wooden Statues and with whatsoever is costly and precious as it immediately follows 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that is to say Even together with a God whom their fathers knew not that is Christ who was truly 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a very stranger amongst the Roman Deities and such as the ancient Romans never sacrificed to will he worship them viz. the Mauzzim with gold c. Whence it is plain that the Daemons spoke of by S. Paul are here prophesied of For these Mauzzim are they namely the Saints by this Idolatrizing Empire turned into Daemons which are here called Mauzzim by a wonderful strange prevision of God this Hebrew word being for sense the very language of those that by too superstitious a zeal and affection towards the Saints brought in this Daemon-worship placing a more sensible trust and repose in their Reliques and Protection then in the Omnipresent God himself These therefore they called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Towers Fortresses Walls Bulwarks Guards Protectors and what not All which Mauzzim does naturally and properly signifie as you may see more at large in Mr. Mede So easily does the sense flow concerning the abuse of Saint-worship who though Christ be pretended in all that Divine honour done to them yet it is plain they go partners with him in the Dedication of Temples and other Religious worship 7. Which this last verse seems to aim at also in those words so artificially couched 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The holds of the Mauzzim with the strange God as if they were Joint-Tenants which Holds are the Holy Houses Churches Chappels Monasteries dedicated to the honour of Christ and the Saints For these Holy Places are called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Strong Holds in allusion to Mauzzim which has a warlike sense in it and signifies military Protectours and Champions whose Houses therefore may well be called Strong Holds The sense of the whole verse is this And this Roman Power shall erect Temples and other Religious Houses to Christ and the Saints where Christ is indigitated by 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a strange God he being both according to his Humanity born of a stock distinct from all the Heathen Nations so that he is more strange then any other could be in that respect and also being perfect God and perfect Man which is such a Deity as never the Nations had any thought of before so singularly significant is this Description of Christ in this Prophecy by this name of a strange God But that he being once known to them they should give him condign honour saving that they should share part thereof amongst the Mauzzim and make them also Rulers over the Empire dividing the world amongst them as a Reward of their Sufferings as is pretended one Saint being constituted Patron or Protector of one City or Countrey another of another accordingly as I have above more fully Book 1. Ch. 17. Sect. 4. declared 8. This is so clear and easie a sense thâ—… it is no wonder that S. Paul saies that the Spirit speaks 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 expresly that in the latter times that is to say in Daniel's Time and Times and half a Time which is the latter part of the continuance of the Roman Empire men should Apostatize from the Faith and embrace the Doctrine of Daemon-worship or the worship of the Mauzzim To which Prophecy the Event is so exactly answerable that a man must be strangely blinded with prejudice that cannot see it as also a
the South as a numerous army of Locusts or that palpable Darkness in Divine matters seize the minds of men or that the First-born in every Family be found dead that is saith Alcazar the Soul of every man obnoxious to eternal Death as if he would not have the Soul 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 born later then the Body but to be the first born in man or rather because she has the right of Primogeniture the right of Ruling over the Body That all these Plagues of the Mystical Aegypt what-ever they be as certainly they cannot signify well are attributed to the two mournfull Witnesses by a Zoopoeia they being the necessary Consequence of the Witnesses Disgrace Affliction and Deprivation of Power and Office as Darkness Thefts Murthers and Adulteries are of the Absence of the Sun Ver. VII And when they shall have finished their Testimony the Beast that ascendeth out of the bottomless pit shall make war against them and shall overcome them and kill them The Greek has it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which signifies no more then when they shall perform their Witnessings And out of the bottomless pit is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which is either Out of a deep pit in the Earth or Out of the Sea and so may intimate either the Two-horned Beast or the Ten-horned The making war against them by a Diorismus signifies any manner of opposing them and endeavour to suppress them not excluding war and bloud-shed as it happens to them toward the latter end of their Prophecy among the Waldenses and Albigenses and others And as War signifies any Opposition so Death or Killing any changing their condition into worse so that they cease to be what they were before And that this is a Political Death or putting out of Power is plain in that their Resurrection is such See Death and Resurrection in my Prophetick Alphabet So that the sense is this That no sooner shall they begin to perform their office of witnessing to the Truth but they shall be assaulted suppressed and politically killed that is kept out of power Ver. VIII And their dead bodies shall lie in the street of the great City that Spiritually is called Sodom and Aegypt where also our Lord was crucified This verse I have expounded already onely you may here take notice how well this Appellation of Aegypt agrees with the mention of the Aegyptian Plagues before alluded to which abode upon the Land because they still kept the People of God in bondage and would not suffer them to serve God according to his own will and precept Ver. IX And they of the People and Kindreds and Tongues and Nations shall see their dead bodies three days and an half and shall not suffer their dead bodies to be put in the grave This not being buried has a double sense as you may see in the Prophetick Alphabet But I must confess I take the more favourable to be the truer and that their not being buried is a pledge of their Resurrection at last that is after three days and an half which I have in my Mystery of Book 5. Ch. 15. Sect. 4. Godliness shewn to be Three Times and an half or 1260 years the very same with the time of their mournfull Prophecy For they being onely Politically dead it is not at all inconsistent in the verity of the thing signified that they should prophesy in a mournfull condition nay indeed it is necessary to be so And the Spirit of God designing the setting out these two parts of their condition namely their Prophetical Witnessings and their Devestment of all Political Power which the Scripture calls the Death of a people and their Recovery again into a Polity their Resurrection he has partly because it were very incongruous to make them prophesy while they were dead and partly because so long a time as their Prophecy is said to last viz. 1260 years was not so sutable for a dead body to lie unburied in the streets and then to revive so contrived the Cortex of this Vision with such admirable artifice as that these harshnesses are avoided in that Homonymia of Three days and an half and all the parts of the Prophetick Figurations made to keep due proportion and symmetry as well as the inward signification of the things meant and yet without any prejudice to the finding out of the true meaning to him that is sagacious the Three days and an half so easily casting him upon Three times and an half which is the very same time with 1260 days But whether in a secondary Intention these Three days and an half may have some such meaning as Mr. Mede has given them Event will best define For my own part I see very little or no ground in the Text for any such meaning See my Mystery of Godliness and what I have above intimated in this Treatise Ver. X. And they that dwell upon the Earth shall rejoyce over them and make merry and shall send gifts one to another because these two Prophets tormented them that dwell on the Earth The dwellers upon Earth Ribera in another place out of Andreas interprets Habentes in terra perpetuam cordis habitationem whose minds dwel upon worldly things These must needs rejoyce when the Two Witnesses are slain their free Rebukes out of the Oracles of God being very disquieting and tormenting to these worldly and carnally-minded men See my Mystery of Godliness Book 5. Ch. 17. Sect. 8. Ver. XI And after three days and an half the Spirit of life from God entred into them and they stood upon their feet and great fear fell upon them that saw them That the Spirit of life from God enâ—…red into them is correspondent to what we have already cited out of Zacharie Not by might nor by power but by my Spirit saith the Lord of Hosts That this Resurrection of them has a Political meaning you may be farther satisfied in my Prophetick Alphabet from what I have there said upon that Term. Ver. 12. And they heard a voice from Heaven saying unto them Come up hither And they ascended up to Heaven in a cloud and their enemies beheld them I had rather render 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 For they heard c. this voice from Heaven raising them from the dead as the voice of Christ did Lazarus By which Heaven is here understood the higher places in the Political Universe unto which the slain Witnesses are called by a voice from thence saying Come up hither Whence it will not be unseasonable to note That those that are the true Witnesses will not come before they be called nor like the ancient Giants invade this Heaven against their wills that reside there but stay till they have a lawfull call to Political Offices and Dignities For it is not true of this Political Heaven but of the Spiritual The Kingdom of Heaven suffers violence and the violent take it Matt. 11. 12. by force And that these Witnesses
either of these latter and the first and the second are joyn'd together in the Vision of the Outward Court and the Two Witnesses Wherefore 42 months and a Time and Times and half a Time being the same with 1260 daies they are the same one with another But this little Horn in Daniel we speak of his reign is also set out by a Time and Times and half a Time Therefore it is of the same duration with the Whore or Two-horned Beast which is Synchronal to the Beast restored whose continuance is 42 months Wherefore it is a strong suspicion that there is a Coincidence at least of time if not of affairs or complication of natures if not Identity of some betwixt this little Horn in Daniel and those three Synchronals the restored Beast the Whore and the Two-horned Beast For that expression Dan. 7. 24. And another shall rise after them does not at all hinder since the Seventy translate 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 behind them it signifying order of situation as well as of time And this being placed behind is the most convenient posture for such an exploit as is attributed to this Horn which is said to throw down or humble three Kings which is more by treachery and craft then open force 14. Now from this equality of time it will also follow that the duration of this little Horn is 1260 years by the last Consectary of our Joint-Exposition Which again shews how impossible it is this Horn should be Antiochus Epiphanes To which you may adde that it is said to be different from the rest of the Horns in the explication of them * Dan. 7. 24. And the ten Horns out of this Kingdome that is the Roman Kingdome as has been demonstrated are ten Kings that shall arise and another shall rise 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 behind them and he shall be diverse from the rest and he shall subdue three Kings Now I demand what one of the ten Kings or Kingdomes is so different from all the rest unless it be an Ecclesiastical Kingdome Wherefore the Coincidence of time with the Pagano-Christian Empire and the long continuance as also the difference of this Kingdome from the other ten is more then a strong suspicion that it is part of the succession of a Kingdome Ecclesiastick which is necessarily to run along with the Empire professing Christianity But if the question be whether this part of this Ecclesiastick Kingdome be the uncorrupted Kingdome of Christ or the Reign of Antichrist the solution is not difficult For that it is not the Kingdome of Christ is plain in that Christ is said to come to burn and consume it Whence it is manifest that the Church has not been out in their Conjecture in deeming this little Horn to be Antichrist and therefore say I the same with the Two-horned Beast and the Whore who is plainly Isochronal and I doubt not but Synchronal to this little Horn and is adjudged to be burnt in the Apocalyps as this little Horn is here in Daniel 15. To speak briefly therefore This little Horn is the Idolatrizing Clergy of the Empire but more chiefly and particularly that great and notorious part thereof under the Bishop of Rome who has been a more then ordinary stickler for both the obtaining this degenerate Ecclesiastick Empire in the Roman Empire and in lapsing and keeping down the Empire in Superstition and Idolatry and therefore is rightly said to be an Horn growing out of this Beast the Symbol Beast itself according to Grotius his own Confession intimating Idolatry 16. And if exquisite fitness of Application will assure us of the right sense of a Prophecy we cannot fail in this examining every character of this little Horn. For as it is little so is the Original of the Popes mean and obscure and their Secular Principality small in comparison of those Princes they have contested with Again As this Horn had the Eyes of a man so it is well known that for politick quick-sightedness there has not been any Body of men comparable to the Roman Hierarchy insomuch that it is Proverbial to say That the Roman Religion is nothing else but a mere trick of Policy to encrease and keep up the honour power and wealth of the Pope and his Clergy See Sir Edwyn Sandys his Speculum Europae and you shall finde this part of the Prophecy fulfilled to admiration and that it is not for nothing that this little Horn is said to have the Eyes of a man in it which is said of no Horn in all the Prophecies besides this Thirdly As this Horn is said to have a mouth speaking great things whether you mean thereby boasting of its own Sovereignty or Blaspheming it is well known that from this Horn are uttered such words as imply the Pope greater then all Princes and Emperours nay that he is not onely said to be Infallible but styled God and declared worthy of divine worship Fourthly For the humbling and subduing three Kings which this Horn is foretold to doe is it not long since performed by the Pope of Rome in his usage of Leo Isaurus in ruining the Kingdome of the Lombards to get to himself the Exarchate of Ravenna and in tormenting and disquieting Henry the Fourth and his Successours with his Thunder-claps and mischievous Political Plots till he wrested from them all their Right and Jurisdiction in Italy 17. Fifthly and to come nearer to our purpose in hand Whereas it is said that he shall speak great words against the most High and shall wear out the Saints of the most High and think to change Times and Laws and they shall be given into his hand for a time and times and half a time I say this Idolatrous Clergy has bid fair toward the fulfilling this Period of times already the Degeneracy of the Church beginning about four hundred years after Christ and which is more considerable they having received so notorious a Check in the Decursion of this Half-Time which is elsewhere called a Half-Day in which his swaggering is pretty well diminished and chastised Sixthly And for his wearing out and consuming the Saints of the most High he has done it even more bloudily and cruelly then the very Pagans on the Primitive Christians which is the most furious Opposition against the Regality of Christ that can be imagined thus to wast and destroy his true Subjects Seventhly And for his speaking great words against the most High that is against the Divine Sovereignty is it not plainly done in the Pope's pretences of having power to dispense with or lay aside the Laws and Injunctions of Christ of which we have given several Instances in our Idea of Antichristianism and such as are notoriously well known to appertain to that Church Besides that he is Reus laesae Majestatis Divinae in appointing Religious worship to his canonized Saints which is an Honour due to God alone Lastly In that he is said to change Times and Laws what
speak against these ungodly tradings and hast slain the Witnesses of the Truth Wherefore thou shalt sit no longer on Seven-hilled Rome which is holy for the profession of the name of my Son Christ but I will bring thee down who pretendest to be universal Oracle and High Priest over Christendom and strip thee out of thy Sacerdotal Raiments that glister with precious Stones like Fire and thus I will destroy thee 17. Thy heart was lifted up because of thy beauty thou hast corrupted thy wisedom by reason of thy brightness I will cast thee to the ground I will lay thee before Kings that they may behold thee 18. Thou hast defiled thy Sanctuaries by the multitude of thine iniquities by the iniquity of thy traffick therefore will I bring forth a fire from the midst of thee it shall devour thee and I will bring thee to ashes upon the Earth in the sight of all them that beheld thee The summe hereof is this The greatness and splendour of the See of Rome the pursuit and affectation thereof in her and proportionally in the rest of the Grandees of that Clergy made them corrupt their Policy with wicked Principles so that they defiled their Sanctuaries that is to say the Christian Churches with such Idolatrous and Superstitious worship as made most for their own gain I mean with such like iniquity of their traffick as I have already intimated in the Vision of Babylon Mass-money Oblations to Saints and their Images and the like Wherefore this King of Tyre is as the Whore of Babylon which is a Type of the same thing condemned to be burnt to ashes by a fire which shall break forth from the midst of him as it is said of the Whore that the ten Horns which were Principalities of her own Jurisdiction should hate her and eat her flesh and burn her with fire 4. The Vision is so naturally applicable to the same that the Whore of Babylon is and so hardly applicable in some passages to the King of Tyre that it is no small assurance but that the chief Scope of the Prophecy respects rather the Bishop of Rome then the Tyrian Prince Of which we may be farther assured by that other Prophecy to the same sense in * Esay 23. Esay where Forerius conceives not onely Rome Pagan to be spoken of as Alcazar but says expresly that John seems to understand Civitatem Antichristianorum by this City of Tyre in Apocal. 18. though he names not the City ver 19. Alas alas that great City wherein were made rich all that had ships in the Sea And with Forerius and Alcazar joyn'd together I conceive by Tyre to be understood Rome become Antichristian the Antichristian Hierarchy thereof being pointed at as it is in Babylon For S. John as I have above intimated has plainly directed us to this sense by transplanting the very self-same phrases into the Vision of Babylon As appears besides what we have already noted from the eighth verse of this Chapter Who hath taken this counsel against Tyre the Crowning City whose Merchants are Princes whose Traffickers are the Honourable of the Earth I omit to take notice how patly the Crowning City fits that Polity that in ordine ad spiritualia pretends to a right of taking off and putting on the Crowns of Kings and Emperours and have done it with the greatest insultation imaginable I onely note that the rest answers exactly to Apocal. 18. 23. Thy Merchants are the great men of the Earth as here Princes and the Honourable of the Earth How well these terms agree to the grandeur of the Pope and Cardinals and such great persons of that Church is obvious to every one to conceive But there is something more pleasant that follows and of a good Omen Verse 15. And it shall come to pass in that day that Tyre shall be forgotten seventy years according to the days of one King after the end of seventy years shall Tyre sing as an Harlot Here is both good news and bad news in this verse For by Tyre is here meant as has been already suggested Idolatrous Rome who must be forgotten seventy years according to the days of One King which say I is one of the eight Kings in the Apocalyps Chap. 17. And by the Cabbalistical sense of the number 70 it is easily discovered who he is namely the Seventh King which is the Succession of the Christian Caesars as I have there noted the space of whose reign is not here intimated but their property by multiplying 10 into 7. Of which the Cabbalistical meaning is That during the whole reign of those Caesars for Ten is a Symbol of Totality Tyre should be forgotten that is the Polity of Rome should not be professedly Idolatrous but after this term then Tyre shall again sing as an Harlot as it follows Verse 16. Take an harp goe about the City thou Harlot that hast been forgotten make sweet melody sing many songs that thou mayest be remembred That is to say That the Roman Hierarchy after that time of the abrogation of Idolatry expired by fair pretences and bewitching speeches accommodating their harangues and exhortations with much harmony and agreeableness to the corrupt inclinations of the people shall by these plausible persuasions and other meretricious Ceremonies and sense-striking Invitations bring Idolatrous worship again into the Empire the will of God so far as I see being that it should be so as it follows Verse 17. And it shall come to pass after the end of seventy years that the Lord will visit Tyre and she shall turn to her hire and shall commit fornication with all the Kings of the Earth And it shall come to pass The more determinate sense is For it shall come to pass otherwise it looks like a Tautologie Her Apostasy into Idolatry is here described like that of the Whore of Babylon with whom the Kings of the Earth are said to commit Fornication And whereas it is said For the Lord will visit Tyre that is answerable to that Apocal. 17. 17. For God has put in their hearts to fulfill his will Which Apostasy also begins as here after seventy years so there in the Apocalyps after the Seventh King But that which follows is most welcome Ver. 18. And her Merchandise and her hire shall be Holiness to the Lord it shall not be treasured nor laid up for her Merchandise shall be for them that dwell before the Lord to eat sufficiently and for durable clothing Here the Scene of things is again changed and that for the best For Interpreters generally agree that here is a Conversion to Christ. But S. Jerom and some of the Hebrew Writers understand it of the Conversion of the City Tyrus herself Alcazar of Rome Pagan But I conceive this Conversion to be of Rome Pagano-Christian to the ancient pure and Apostolick Christianity which the fitness of things as well in this Vision of Esay as those of Ezekiel seems sufficiently to assure us of
Nor can it well but be expected when it is so evident that the People of the Jews was one great Sacrament or Type of the Church of Christ to come as is inculcated over and over again in the Apocalyps abounding so every-where with that Figure we have ventured to term Israelismus I say it cannot but be expected that those Nations that were Enemies to the Jews should also bear the Type of such as should be found the Enemies of the true Church of Christ and that the Prophets predicting things of them in reference to the first Completion which is Literal should in the exaltedness of their spirit be raised into such expressions as were more sutable to those whose Types they were then to them themselves in such sort as several Prophecies concerning Christ are framed and noted accordingly by Interpreters which are either purely Allegorical or Mixt of which I Book 7. Ch. 7. Sect. 2 3 4. have spoken in my Mystery of Godliness 6. And truly I think these two Visions of Tyre so perfect Predictions of Antichrist and his Fall that they deserve to be received into the number of the second kind there being that in them which will not sute with the first Completion of them Amongst which is Tyre's being called Whore and her being said to commit fornication with all the Kings of the Earth Which is no tolerable sense understood literally of Tyrus but easily and naturally understood of Rome Antichristian What à Lapide saies of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that it signifies Caupona as well as Meretrix is but a poor subterfuge as if the Prophet for a verbal Jest's sake would reproach a City so highly for usefull trades and negotiations Besides though 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 signify as well Caupona as Meretrix yet 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 signifies onely scortari And therefore 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 must determine the sense of the other Esay 23. 17. Also the seventy years silence and ollivion is so unapplicable to Tyre literally as that Grotius though I cannot approve of his boldness is fain change the seventy years into seven as if the Text were corrupt which is an odd way of interpreting Scripture something like the cure of the Head-ach by decollation And when he has reduced these years to seven neither the life nor the reign of Salmanassar was seven years nor he King of that City Which yet according to common sense seems necessary to be understood Again The Prince of Tyre being threatened with the death of the Uncircumcised implies him a pretended member of the Church of God and more especially his being called the anointed Cherub and set out by the adornings of the High Priest and menaced to be cast out of the Mountain of God as profane and lastly reproved for defiling the Sanctuaries All these are more then Intimations that the King of Tyre is a Type of some great person who is Priest in the Church of God to whom this Vision chiefly does belong and will hardly be sense in some things if not understood of him 7. But I will not dwell any longer on this subject Let me onely give a brief Account of the sense of this last verse And her Merchandise that is to say Then or After this her Merchandise for of so lax a sense isâ—… as we noted upon Dan. 11. 36. her Merchandise and Hire shall be Holiness to the Lord. The meaning is Those Revenues and Preferments which Simony and other oblique and unjust administration of the affairs of the Church had made mere Merchandise as also that which had been the Hire of an Whore that is to say that had accrued to the Church of Rome by her Idolatrous and Meretricious Artifices shall be taken and made good use of laid out in the true and substantial service of God and be dedicated to him that is be appropriated to his real service It shall not be treasured nor laid up that is It shall not be raked together into a few mens hands to make them and their Families a Fortune they shall not seize upon it and possess it as their own for so 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 may seem to intimate to satisfy their own either Luxury or Covetousness For her Merchandise shall be for them that dwell before the Lord that is They shall be for the Houshold of Faith such as walk as ever being in the sight and eye of God and have a reverential sense of his presence in all their Conversation for such as be of the Christian Faith not of the Antichristian Faction be they Laiety or Clergy To eat sufficiently That men may have sufficient sustenance that good Hospitality may be kept and that the poor and hungry may be satisfied 8. And for durable clothing 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 It may signify either durable clothing or comely grave clothing such as becomes aged men Ut vestiantur veste honestâ decorâ qualis decet senes Presbyteros It is à Lapide's own gloss upon Vatablus his Interpretation Ad Operimentum senum By which I conceive this Prophecy perstringes the Luciferian Pride and splendid Pomp of the Pope and Cardinals and other Grandees of that Church predicting that that Revenue which is mis-spent upon this Antichristian vanity the times will come when it shall be better bestowed in Christian Hospitality and a common care of the whole Body of Christ that no man want due Food and honest Raiment neither Clergy nor Laiety But these are Excursions farther then I intended In the mean time I think I have made it exceeding plain as well out of the Apocalyps as out of these Visions of Ezekiel and Esay that that leud Trafficking and Merchandising in the Church of Rome as if she were a mere City of Trade is very lively and graphically prefigured in Tyre and Babylon CHAP. XVII 1. Their lying Legends perstringed in S. Paul's Prophecy of the Latter Times 2. A more full Prefiguration of that Antichristian Opposition that is against Faith in part of his Prophecy of the Man of Sin 3. A clear Exposition of that part of the Prophecy 4. Strictures in the Apocalyptick Visions to the same purpose 5. The Pride of the Bishop of Rome prefigured in the King of Tyre as also his Downfall and how 6. His gorgeous splendour set out both in the King of Tyre and in the Whore of Babylon 7. The Pride and Downfall of this Patriarch typified in the King of Babylon The meaning of the twelfth and thirteenth verses Ver. 14. The meaning of the Prophecy from the fourteenth to the nineteenth verse Ver. 20. An Explication of the twentieth verse 10. Farther Prefigurations of the Papal Pride in the Whore and the little Horn. 11. An easy and genuine Exposition or Paraphrase of the thirty sixth and the thirty seventh verses of the eleventh Chapter of Daniel wherein the Impious Self-elation of the Bishop of Rome is clearly foretold 12. That the sense of the two following verses of
〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in this place that Lapse into Idolatrous worship which is Rebellion against God and Christ and that Man of Sin be revealed the Son of Perdition That this is to be understood of that signal Antichrist is the current Opinion of Antiquity yea of Alcazar Ribera and Bellarmine himself But we say that this Antichrist will prove the Pope with his Clergy For it is a ridiculous Defence to excuse it by saying that the Man of Sin must imply one single person whenas a Man as well as a Woman in the Prophetick style does easily signify not onely a Succession of single men but of a Body Politick by an Henopoeia and so does here the succession of lapsed Popes with their Clergy who are called the Son of Perdition because they are to be destroyed by the brightness of the coming of Christ and the power and Light of the Gospel Not by worldly power nor by might but by my Spirit saith the Lord of Hosts Ver. 4. Who opposeth and exalteth himself above all that is called God or what is worshipped so that he as God sitteth in the Temple of God shewing himself that he is God That the Bishop of Rome fulfilleth every tittle of this Prediction any one will see that does but cast back his eyes upon what we have wrote in our Idea of Antichristianism and what is generally known to all that have sipped but never so little of the History of the affairs of Christendom For it is plain from thence that he opposeth and exalteth himself above all that is called God in some eminent way or other For he opposeth and exalteth himself above Christ who is very God in all his Offices Regal Sacerdotal and Prophetical as I have abundantly shewn and therefore consequently above all the Saints Nay particularly he is set above the Saints and Angels as Bishop Dounham proves at large in his Treatise De Antichristo lib. 4. c. 4. And as for the Emperours he treads on their very necks and makes them his vassals kicks off their Crowns with his feet and with his feet sets them on again So plain is it that this Prince of the Crowning City does exalt himself 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that is to say above all Powers whatsoever whether celestial or terrestrial amongst the latter of which are the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Augusti the Roman Emperours An Hint is sufficient a more full Amplification of his enormous Pride is set down in the above-named Idea which yet is no more then what is obvious Idea of Antichristianism Book 2. Ch. 11. and notorious as well in common Fame as in History This passage in this verse does so expresly answer to that in Daniel ch 11. 36. He shall exalt himself and magnifie himself above every God that I doubt not but that the Apostle had a respect to that King of Pride there described and means here the same thing by the Man of Sin So that he as God sitteth in the Temple of God shewing himself that he is God 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that is to say Doing and accepting such things as if they did rightly belong to him would demonstrate that he were God but by so doing he does ostentare se Deum esse makes a shew as if he were God The Temple of God is here either materially to be understood and then it is plain how well it fits with the Pope's receiving honour sitting on the high Altar in S. Peter's Church at Rome after his Election and his being there adored or if it be understood Figuratively for the People that bear the Name of Christ and are dedicated to him here he sits too and rules as God infallibly uncontrollably antiquating or dispensing even with the Laws of God himself Ver. 5. Remember ye not that when I was with you I told you these things 6. And now you know what withholdeth that he might be revealed in his time That is to say what hindereth his revealing and shewing of himself to be in the world For all things are in the confused Potentiality of the Universe but hid as a Rose in winter but appear 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in their season But that which hindered this appearing of Antichrist was according to the general opinion of Antiquity the Entireness of the Roman Empire Till the breaking of the Empire into ten Kingdomes Antichrist was not to be and it may be not to appear in another sense till afterwards That this 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is the Roman Empire Alcazar brings in plenty of witnesses out of Malvenda Tertullian Chrysostome Ambrose Jerâ—…e Austin Theophylact Oecumenius To which he addes Anselmus Hayâ—… Strabus Thomas Lyranus Cajetan Bellarmine Suarez and Pamelius Ver. 7. For the Mystery of Iniquity does already work onely he that now letteth will lett until he be taken away Tertullian and Chrysostome and most of the Expofitors as Alcazar does avouch understand this working of Iniquity in the Apostles time to be onely as a Type and Figure of that which should be under Antichrist That there was then something either actually in being or a-brewing that was a previous Representation of the state of the Church under Antichrist Alcazar would have it the Roman Paganism or worship of Idols But that was no Mystery of Iniquity But it may be he will say it may be a Type of that which when it came would be a Mystery and that a wonderful one that is the living Image of Paganism revived in Christianity and that therefore the future Mystery did work in its Type as well as was in its Type For the Empire revived into Idolatry is called the Beast that was and is not and yet is The conceit is not altogether extravagant But I am more inclinable to think that the Apostle might speak of something in Christianity already I mean in the Professours of it that bore some similitude with that of the great Antichrist that was to appear in his season that he might intend by this present working of the Mystery of Iniquity some miscarriage in some of the Christians or some propensions thereto in them as having got a great smack of the Antichristian Spirit and particularly of the spirit of contention for Rule and Priority Whether Simon Magus may not be here hinted at I shall consider in its due place But this Antichristian heat of Ambition must play at lesser games till the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 till the Roman Emperour most properly so called namely he that has his Imperial Seat at Rome be removed or destroyed which Series of Casars ended in Augustulus After which the Pope plai'd his pranks in these Western parts of the Empire and gleaned much wealth and power to himself in the ruines thereof and at last grew visibly to the full pitch and stature of this Man of Sin or Antichrist Then he was big enough to be seen by them that were not blinde as it follows in the next verse Ver. 8. And then shall
confirmation of the truth of our Idea of Antichristianism therefrom 4. A summary Representation of this Idea in the Oppositions and Defeatments of the Privative Ends of the Gospel as also of those noted Offices of Christ. 5. Of his Divinity and other holy Titles 6. Of the Divine Life in Root and Branches 7. A Parable to set out the salvage Injustice and Cruelty of this Antichristian Synagogue 8. The Apodosis of the Parable 9. That we have set out the Idea of the most real and essential Antichristianism that can be with an Answer to what may be objected to the contrary 10. That it is that very Antichristianism that is foretold in the Prophets the clearing whereof necessitates us to an inspection into them before we make any punctual Application of our Idea to the Apostasy of the Church 173 The CONTENTS of the Second Part OR SYNOPSIS PROPHETICA BOOK I. CHAP. I. 1. THat the Antichristianism we have so punctually described in our Idea and is for the general so notoriously known to have everrun the Church is in truth a kind of Pagano-Christianism 2. That it is incredible that there should be no Divine Predictions of so considerable a Change 3. The ill-spent pains of those Interpreters who endeavour to obscure such Predictions by distorting them to other useless meanings 4. Whether this Great Antichrist be prophesied of in the Epistle of S. John under that very Name 5. That Barchocab if applicable at all to the Text may be a Type of this famous Antichrist 6. That the mention of those many Antichrists in S. John was occasioned from the fame of that Great Antichrist predicted in Daniel 7. That there is much-what the same reason of the slowness of Christians in discovering the true Antichrist as of the Jews in discovering the true Christ. 8. That a fraudulent and Hypocritical Opposer of Christ may be as real and considerable an Antichrist as an open Enemie as also S. John's description as easily applicable to him 9. The inept Niceness of declining the Name of Antichrist and that the Title was put upon this great Enemy of the Church by the ancient Fathers occasionally from this Epistle of S. John 10. Certain Considerations proposed touching the Obscurity of the Prophetick style 205 CHAP. II. 1. Why Prophecies are wrapt up in some considerable Obscurity 2. An indispensable necessity of these kinds of involutions in regard of mans Free will 3. As also in regard of the Enemies of the Church both Men and Devils 4. A recital of such Schemes and Figures wherein this Obscurity does most-what consist 5. What Diorismus is with several examples of Numeral Diorisms 6. That it seems most safe to expound the Rev. 9. 5 10. five months of the Locusts according to this Figure 7. The reason of the use of Numeral Diorisms 8. From whence also some light is offered toward the understanding the reason of the uncertain designation of Vers. 15. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 9. Examples of Proportional Diorisms 10. As also of Specifical 211 CHAP. III. 1. Hylasmus what it is with the kinds thereof 2. Eximious Examples of each kind 3. What the first and chiefest kind of Henopoeia 4. That one single Beast signifies a Body Politick demonstrated out of Daniel 5. That a Succession of Individuals is represented by one Individual 6. That one individual Beast represents a Kingdom or Body Politick from its rise to its fall 7. That one single Man or Woman does also represent a Body Politick in the Prophetick style 8. The second kind of Henopoeia what it is 9. What Zoopoeia with Examples thereof 10. A second kind of Zoopoeia proved and illustrated from Examples 217 CHAP. IV. 1. Israelismus what it is 2. That the reason of the frequent use thereof is the Sacramentalness of the Jewish Church in reference to the Christian as appears in their Tabernacle and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 3. In the brasen Serpent Manna strucken Rock and fiery Law 4. In the High-priest's Robes in his entring alone once a year into the most Holy and in the Jews worshipping towards the Mercy-seat 5. In their bondage in Aegypt and in their escape through the Red Sea 6. What is properly a Prophetick Ellipsis 7. What the meaning of the Apocalyptick Book being written within and without 8. The difference of a Prophetick Ellipsis illustrated by example 9. Homonymia what it is and in what it differs from an Henopoeia of the second kind 10. What Metalepsis with the proof and examples thereof 11. Antichronismus what it is together with the rise thereof 12. That the three days and an half of the unburied Witnesses put for three times and an half is apparently resolvible into this Figure 13. What Icasmus is and that the frequency of the Figure does not so obscure Prophecies but that they are as intelligible as ordinary Heraldry 221 CHAP. V. 1. The great Usefulness of an Alphabet of Prophetick Iconisms 2. What the best way of attaining to the right sense of them 3. What weight the Onirocriticks of the Ancients may cast in toward the determining their meaning 4. That there is the same reason of the Signification and Interpretation of Dreams as there is of Visions provided they be merely Typical and not Complexional 5. Angels Their Ministery in all affairs of Providence a noted Supposition in the ancient Cabbala and in the Apocalyps 6. Ascension into Heaven 7. Air the special Region of Devils 8. Balances 9. Beast 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Idolatrous Kingdoms 10. The reason of the Lamb 's signifying one single Person and of wild Beasts noting Idolatry as well as Cruelty 11. Blasphemy That it signifies Idolatry made out both upon the account of Reason use of Scripture and Authority of Interpreters 12. Bloud 13. Bow and Arrows Buildings Burial 226 CHAP. VI. 1. Candle 2. Character 3. Clouds of Heaven 4. Crown of precious Stones 5. Darkness Day Death 6. Desart 7. Dragon a figure of the Devil according to the ancient Cabbala and then of the chief Polities that oppose the Church 8. Drunkenness 9. Eagle Earth-quake 10. Eclipses 11. Eye an Hieroglyphick of Counsel and Prudence 12. Fishing Fish dead in the Sea 13. Fire the different significations thereof 14. Fire from Heaven its exact significancy of Excommunication 15 16. Flesh two notable significations thereof 17. Floud Fornication Frogs 18. Gemms and precious Stones God 232 CHAP. VII 1. Hail the signification thereof according to Scripture 2. And the ancient Onirocriticks 3. Harvest the evil and auspicious sense thereof 4. Head how clearly significative of Sovereign Power whether in Many or One. 5. Heaven and Earth 6. Horn. 7. Horse Islands 8. King and Kingdom 9. That Kinds or Sorts of things are sometimes expressed as if Individualls of the same Kind 10. Leopard Locusts 11. Male-childe Mark Measure Mill Month Moon 12. Mountain the several significations thereof 240 CHAP. VIII 1. Nakedness Paradise 2. Philtre That 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is Virus amatorium 3.
prolixity of the Title hinders not but that it may be called the Name of the Beast 4. The meaning of the Name 5. That the Angel having considered the whole Successions of the Roman Kingdom or Empire fixed his mind on that time the Empire was purely Christian and why And that it thence appears what succession of the Beast's time is understood 6. As likewise from his name a little varied into Was is not and yet is Whence the fifth Agreement of the second Parallelism is also evinced 7 8. How the Angel came to give the Beast these Names And that there is an Ellipsis in the Angel's saying The Beast which thou sawest was and is not c. 9. That the Name Was and is not and shall ascend c. signifies the successive Order in being not the actual being or not being of the Beast with a confirmation thereof out of Alcazar 10. A plain Eviction from the Name Was is not and yet is that Was and is and is not do not signifie actual Existence or Non-existence but order of Existence and Similitude 11. That Is not and yet is would neither be good sense nor any elegancy unless the Laws of a right Contradiction were closely touched on in this mysterious Assertion 12. And yet that an absolute Sameness in either Essence or Qualification could not be under this affirmation and negation without falsity Whence Similitude is necessarily intimated thereby 13. That the certainty of the meaning of this Title Was is not and yet is confirms the sense of the former and demonstrates a latitant Ellipsis in the Application of these Names of the Beast which is farther argued from other considerations 14. Why he interprets the Re-existence or Image of the Beast of the Empire 's becoming Idolatrous again rather then of the Revival of its ancient Polity in the Pontifical Power 15. The third Agreement of the second Parallelism 16. The sixth Agreement 17. The seventh 18. The eighth Agreement 19. The third Agreement again noted with a Confirmation therefrom of the above-mentioned Ellipsis 20. That near Resemblance stands for Identity in common elegancy of speech Whence The Beast that was is not and yet is and the Image of the Beast is again evinced to be all one and the fifth Agreement of our second Parallelism thereby farther confirmed 286 CHAP. XIV Ver. IX What is the meaning of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and that Siracides seems to allude to the Hebrew 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in his description thereof 2. That Constantinople is also allowed to have Seven Hills and that it makes for the proof of the eighth Agreement of the first Parallelism Ver. X. That the making the seven Heads seven sorts of Governours is no 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 but a natural and necessary truth 2. How naturally the different successions of the Supreme Powers of the Roman Empire fall into eight parts 3. The onely true reason why there are numbred Eight Kings though but Seven Heads of the Beast 4. That the dividing of the Emperours into Pagan Christian and Pagano-Christian is aimed at or supposed in the enumeration of the Eight Kings is an unexceptionable Truth 5. That it is most credible that after the Sixth King no other account of distinction of the Supreme Power of the Empire was look'd upon by the Angel but what respected Religion 6. A demonstrative Inference from One is that there is an Ellipsis in The Beast that thou sawest was and is not c. 7. Why Apocal. 17. 10. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 rather then 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Whence the last subdivision is confirmed and the tenth Agreement of the second Parallelism made good 8. The fourth Agreement of the second Parallelism Ver. XI That the description of the Beast is his Name and part thereof used for the whole as in the Name of God which farther confirms the above-mentioned Ellipsis 2. The easie and genuine meaning of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 3. That the meaning of Verse 11. The Beast that was and is not he is the eighth is that his Head is the eighth 4. That the Eighth King by an Henopoeia may admit of more Caesars then one reigning at a time and why 5. The ninth Agreement of the second Parallelism 6. The seventh Agreement Ver. XII The eleventh Agreement of the second Parallelism 2. The twelfth Agreement 3. The meaning of Verse 12. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Ver. XIII The thirteenth Agreement together with the meaning of Verse 13. being of one minde and of giving their strength and power to the Beast 2. That the Pope once emerged above the Emperour even in Secular Power may continue the succession of the seventh Head there being nothing else intended thereby but the secular Pagano-christian Sovereignty of the Empire Ver. XIV The fourteenth Agreement of the second Parallelism 2. The fifteenth Agreement 3. The sixteenth Agreement of the second Parallelism 296 CHAP. XV. Ver. XV. The seventh Agreement of the first Parallelism Ver. XVI The folly of those Interpreters that understand the Burning of the Whore of the burning of the Houses of Rome by fire Ver. XVII The Ten Kings giving their Power and Kingdom to the Beast according to the will and purpose of God how stupendious an Arcanum 2. In what sense God may be said to put it into their hearts 3. That it is rather Fate then Policy that has carried on the affairs of the Whore so prosperously hitherto with an Admonition thereupon 4. The meaning of Until the words of God be fulfilled with a farther Admonition to the Apostatized Church 5. The eviction of the truth of the seventeenth Agreement of the second Parallelism Ver. XVIII Why the Seat of the Whore is so determinately affixed at last to Old Rome in this Prophecie 2 3. A clear and confessed evidence that Old Rome is here pointed at as the Seat of the Whore with a short Paraphrase upon the sense of the Verse 4. That the Seat of the Two-horned Beast is also fixed to Old Rome and of the Cabbalisticalness of the Apocalyps 5. That the Numeral Name of the Beast is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and that it is so to be written and not 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 proved from the ancient Orthography of both the Greek and Latin Tongue 6. That the ancient Latines who usually sounded long i as a Diphthong pronounced their Vowels nearest to the Greeks 7. How exquisitely this name 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 answers to Events 8. That the finding the number 666 in other names does not at all weaken the determinate applicability of this 9. In what sense 666 is called the number of the Beast 10. The application of the Root thereof illustrated from the Cabbalistical application of the Root of the Tetractys 11. The last Agreement of the first Parallelism 12. The last Agreement of the second 13. That the Vision of the Whore is more appropriate and peculiar to the Church of Rome 14. Of the Inscription Mysterium on