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
that Wicked one be revealed whom the Lord shall consume with the Spirit of his mouth and destroy with the brightness of bis coming That Wicked one 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that Lawless one who exalts himself above the Laws of God and Christ and can dispense with them as he pleases whose destruction is by the preaching of the Gospel and by the victorious evidence of Truth by clear and convictive Reason divulged to the world by such as speak by the Spirit of God and by a Principle of Life within them For their mouth is the mouth of God and their breath as a flaming Torrent to consume the ungodly Deceiver The remainder of this Prophecy we have expounded already and therefore need not renew our Exposition in this place No Prophecy can be more expresly applicable to any Event then this is to the Papal Power and Imposture The Effect therefore being already in the world who can doubt but that this is the Prediction of it especially we having the common suffrage of Antiquity that it is to be understood of one that is to appear after the breaking of the Roman Empire into pieces If any one ask Tertullian who this 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 he that hindered the revealing of Antichrist is he shall have this round answer from him Quis nisi Romanus Status cujus in decem reges abscessio dispersa Antichristum superinducet tune revelabitur Iniquus Accordingly as the faithful Servants of Christ have found to their great sorrow and affliction 2. This Man of Sin therefore is that little Horn with the eyes of a man in it both expressions intimating the humane Policy of the Papal Power that King diverse from the ten as being an Ecclesiastick Prince and rising up behinde them to over-grow them and over-top them by his policy Whom S. Paul calls 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Lawless man as Daniel makes him a changer of Times and Laws as not being content to be kept in and bounded by those that were already though they were the Sanctions of God and of his Christ. In that Horn also is a mouth speaking great things and that against the most High that is treasonable words against the Sovereignty of God and Christ as this Man of Sin does this Papal Body exalting their Head the Pope above every thing that is called God or is worshipped And lastly as the little Horn in Daniel is to be burnt by the fiery stream issuing from before that dreadful Judge so is this Man of Sin to be consumed by the Spirit of the mouth of the Lord and by the fiery brightness of his coming Which considerations may assure us that one and the same Person is aimed at in the little Horn in the seventh of Daniel and that prosperous King in the eleventh that exalts and magnifies himself above every God they both agreeing in this present Prophecy of the Man of Sin and Son of Perdition So plain is it that this Prophecy is not to be understood of either Cains or Simon Magus as Grotius groundlesly conceits whose Opinion I will now examine because the name of that Authour bears so much sway with some men otherwise it were scarce worth the pains of perusing CHAP. XIX 1. A summary Proposal of Grotius his Exposition of the foregoing Prophecy 2. That the coming of Christ in this Prophecy cannot be understood of the Destruction of Jerusalem 3. Nor Apostasy attributed to Caius nor he said to sit in the Temple of God nor 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to fit so well with Vitellius 4. That Caius his purpose of placing his Scatâ—…e in the Temple was no Mystery of Iniquity but gâ—…oss Prophaneness 5. Grotius his ridiculous luxation of the sense of the Prophecy in making Caius the Man of Sin and Son of Perdition concealed by Vitellius his standing in the way and yet upon Vitellius his removal not Caius but Simon Magus to be the man revealed and destroyed 6. That in all likelihood the Story of Simon Magus is a Fiction and from what Occasion 7. That if it were true it is not so applicable this wicked man Simon being not consumed by the Spirit of Christis mouth but onely his Coach and Horses 8. That Grotius makes Paul prophesy of things past his Epistle being written ten years after Caius his death with a fâ—…ll Answer to Grotius his first Argument to the contrary 9. An Answer to the second 10. A Demonstration out of Scripture and Grotius his own Concessions that this Second Epistle was wrote ten years after Caius his death as also that the fall of Simon Magus from his fiery Chariot was eight years before this Prophecy 1. THE summe of Grotius his Exposition of this Second Chapter of the Second Epistle to the Thessalonians is this First He interprets the coming of Christ of the destruction of Jerusalem Secondly The Apostasy or Falling away and the Revealing of the Man of Sin he understands of Caius Caligula who indeed was a very impious Emperour and would have had his own Statue set in the Temple of Jerusalem Thirdly The 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 he will have to be Lucius Vitellius President of Syria and consequently of Judaea who was a friend to the Jews and therefore in his time not so seasonable for Caius to make the motion of setting his own Statue in the holy Temple Fourthly By the working of the Mystery of Iniquity he understands the persuasions of Helicon and other Aegyptian Impostors who were great with Caius and were preparing the way to this grand piece of Impiety Fifthly But when he that letteth is taken out of the way that is Lucius Vitellius who as yet hindered Caius from this impious purpose of placing his Statue in the Temple at Jerusalem then shall that Wicked one be revealed who has dealt under-board hitherto with his Conspirators Helicon and the rest Caius certainly you will say no Simon Magus saith Grotius Was there ever such a ridiculous 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in any serious interpretation of Authors much less of Holy Scripture Sixthly and lastly But this is because the rest of the Prophecy seems to speak of a Conjurer or Magician such as Simon Magus was famed to be whom at Rome riding in the air with his fiery Chariot and Horses Peter by his prayers to Christ made fall to the ground And thus was Simon consumed by the Spirit of the Lord's mouth and by the brightness of his coming as Grotius would have it 2. This is a brief account of his Exposition in which there is scarce one sound Joynt For as for the first which understands the coming of Christ of the destruction of Jerusalem Whosoever considers that this Epistle is really the Second Epistle to the Thessalonians as I shall hereafter prove and that in the * Ch. 4. v. 15 16 17. foregoing Epistle he speaks of the final coming of Christ which is joyn'd with the Resurrection of the dead and
for us That he might purchase to himself a glorious Church not having Ephes. 5. 27. spot or wrinkle or any such thing but that it should be holy and without â—…mish Which being the very End of Christ's coming into the world of the suffering all those hardships during his pilgrimage here on Earth and of submitting himself to the shamefull and unexpressibly-painfull Death of the Cross for any to oppose supplant or any ways to defeat this so serious and earnest design of his by any countenanced method or constitution of things would certainly be Antichristian in the highest measure Let us now therefore consider distinctly and articulately the most material ways of opposing or supplanting this design laying before us in view such depraved Laws Constitutions or Practices in a Church as tend to the extinguishing the Divine Life in general or are more particularly directed against the Root or Branches thereof namely either against Faith that is to say the belief of the Summe of Christianity or else against those inestimable Graces of Humility Purity and Charity 2. For the depainting of this Opposition against the Divine Life in general I need not put my pencil into any new colours Those multifarious ways of Idolatry and Superstition which I have noted in the first Book I. ch 12 17 18 c. and second Limb of Antichristianism and which carrie mens minds out to external exercises that profit nothing but elude the right intention of Zeal and Devotion which should better our spirits and make us more inwardly and vitally holy and righteous these do certainly of their own accord lay asleep or suffocate the Life of God in the Soul and like false food either poison or starve it Those Oppositions also that were against the Offices of Christ the vilifying his Law the removing it from the eyes of the people or the reading of it and their publick Service in an unknown Tongue the interpreting his serious Commands for slight Advices left to our pleasure to follow or forbear false Glosses put upon the Oracles of God by pretended infallible Interpreters the defeating that mighty Engine of Obedience to Christ which is the affectionate Meditation upon his Death and Passion his direfull Sufferings for us by diverting of our Thoughts and distracting them by several insignificant Objects pety Advocates and Patrons that run away with our Devotions and rob Christ of his honour and our Souls of the chief means of their Sanctification and Salvation These with several other particulars I might instance in are plain Antichristian Assaults and Oppugnations of the Divine Life in general and tend to the sweeping of all away before them 3. To which you may adde those ungodly surmises That it is sufficient to number over our Devotions without defixing our Mind upon what we say and that a more hovering and general attention will serve the turn our particular Thoughts wandring to what else we please That the Sacraments confer Grace ex opere operato it being the very difference betwixt the Sacraments of the old Covenant and the new that the former confer Grace ratione operis operantis the latter ratione operis operati and That any inward good Motion is not requisite in him that receives the Sacraments What can more relaxate those earnest breathings and hearty aspirings of our Souls towards a real renovation of our natures into true holiness and righteousness then such corrupt conceits as these 4. The feeding also the people with dumb shows instead of searching their Consciences and exciting their zeal by intelligible Exhortations or Forms of Devotion that will re-minde them of their duty and imprint upon them the sense of such holy things as they stand in want of and inflame their desire after them this also would be a defrauding of the Divine Life of that food which it should be increased and nourished by As also would be that conceit generally of all Acts of Religion that the duty of the Act is done if the Act be but externally done be the Principle what it will though it neither proceed from nor reach to that fountain of life which ought to be ebullient in every Regenerate Christian and without which no man can reasonably esteem himself regenerate Certainly such Opinions Customes and Usages as these must needs wear out true and living Holiness out of the World 5. And yet we may conceive a further Antichristian poison that will wonderfully damp and benumme men in all their endeavours after true Sanctity and that is easy Absolution and slight Penance after formal Confession For Confession which is so rigorously extorted by this Antichristian Church I am now describing being accompanied with a conceit that upon their Absolution and performance of imposed Penances they are then right and straight and in as secure a condition as if they had never sinned the just chastisements of their offended Consciences being slaked by the soft and false interposal of the Priest's pretended Authority to absolve where God has bound as certainly every one is bound over to that eternal doom at the last day let the Priest pretend the power of loosing him here as much as he will and he shall answer for what he has done in the flesh which no Absolution nor Penance can clear him from unless he really forsake his wicked ways and become a sincere Convert to God I say from this constitution of things touching Absolution and Penance it must needs follow that the raines will be let loose on the necks of all men they being given to understand what a slight thing it is to sin against God when they can have their reconcilement upon such easy terms Whenas it would be a greater awe upon mens spirits to let them be condemned or acquitted by their own Consciences being so well assisted by the Word of God and the Light of Reason and Nature to lay the Law against them and never to leave urging them till they have emerged into a competent sincerity of heart Which when they have arrived to Christ within them and his Word without them will absolve them and give them peace of mind and if need be they may also receive Absolution from some sober and faithfull Priest whose honesty and exemplarity of life has fitted him for so serious a function as I have intimated above where I had slipt aforehand into this Argument 6. But the most outrageous Antichristian effort against the Divine Life would be the persuasion that upon the paying of certain tolerable summes of mony and doing some slight superstitious performances or other they shall obtain by virtue of the supreme Ecclesiastick Authority plenary Indulgences and Pardons for vast numbers of years and the certainty of freeing of themselves or their friends from Purgatory As for example suppose that some Churches or if you will many may have purchased from the Ecclesiastick Sovereignty a perpetuity of plenary Indulgence so that he that prays before such an Altar in this Church
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
A MODEST ENQUIRY INTO THE Mystery of Iniquity THE FIRST PART CONTAINING A Careful and Impartial Delineation of the True IDEA of ANTICHRISTIANISM IN THE Real and Genuine Members thereof such as are indeed opposite to the indispensable Purposes of the Gospel of Christ and to the Interest of his Kingdome By H. MORE D. D. Sext. Empiric 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 LONDON Printed by J. Flesher for W. Morden Book-seller in Cambridge M DC LXIV To the READER READER 1. HAD it been but onely to apologize for breaking His necessity of Prefacing before this present Treatise that silence which I might seem to have imposed upon my self by publickly intimating the probability of it it had upon that account been requisite to Preface something to excuse the unexpected publishing of this new Treatise But I have fallen upon such a Subject as whose very Title sounds so harshly and disharmoniously to some ears that this alone were of sufficient force to extort from me the trouble of a Prefatory Apology The Idea of Antichristianism Both those words are so heavy laden with preconceived offence and prejudice that the Book may also be prejudged and precondemned before perused for the very Title 's sake unless I prepare the way by due and timely information for better acceptance 2. Know then Reader that this Idea which I present thee with This Idea of Antichristiinism what the nature thereof is and how unliable to any uncivil construction is not a vain Airy Platonical or Chimerical Figment as some phansy every Idea to be nor my treating of Antichristianism a Rude uncivil uncharitable phraseological Form of railing against such Things or Persons as are not onely Innocent but Sacred But contrariwise the nature of Antichristianism is so justly circumscribed by this Idea and so fitly limited thereby that it is in truth a bridle to the tongues and lips of such as not knowing what is truly Antichristian and what not in every pettish mood call any thing so in Religion that does not suit with their own humour and phancy Besides this Treatise being written in the way of an Idea that is to say being an Abstract Description or Delineation of the nature of Antichristianism without any application thereof to any person or persons whatsoever what Rudeness Incivility or Uncharitableness can this design carry along with it unless it can be thought rude or uncivil to define Vices in abstracto and describe them in their Parts and Objects and in what-ever Circumstances make to the clear and perfect knowledge of them provided it be done faithfully and skilfully And truly that I have not falsified anything in this my Description of Antichristianism I dare with confidence appeal to the judgment of any able and unprejudiced peruser thereof But what I have set down for Antichristian is such of its own nature whether it be called so or no. Which accuracy if all would imitate nothing would tend more to the peace of Christendom and the steddy and firm promotion of Protestantism in every Nation 3. Well be it so will some reply that there is nothing falsly nor unfaithfully managed in this Province you have undertook yet is That the abuse of the terme does not take away the right use of it not the undertaking it self though just and usefull yet something ignoble inglorious and ungentile thus to tincture your style and soil your pen with the names of Antichrist and Antichristianism of which the breath of the rude and ignorant vulgar usually smells as strong as of Onions and Garlick and have so fouled these words by their unmannerly mouthing them without all aime that they have made them now unfit to pass the lips of any civil person In answer to which I must ingenuously confess that the Title of my Discourse for this very reason may justly seem less plausible But it is the true and proper Name of the matter which I handle to which onely if these ruder people had been taught to appropriate the Term it could never have contracted any such nauseous prejudice as it seems to have done And I hope I am at least excusable if not thank-worthy in that I have taken pains to teach them the due and proper use thereof 4. But if there be any farther meaning in the Objection as That the opposing of Antichristianism in our sense is not at all ungentile but rather Heroical if it were ignoble or ungentile and below a man of a generous spirit to concern himself in the detecting or opposing Antichristianism it self I must take leave to profess that I think the Objectour understands not what Antichristianism is or at least not what I understand by it or have described it by in this Idea For that Antichristianism which I oppose and expose here to the view of the world is nothing else but real Impiety gross Fraud and Couzenage and most barbarous and unparallel'd Cruelty against the harmless Members of Christ and all this which infinitely aggravates the crimes under the show and pretence of Piety and Religion nay of the most Sacred of all Religions Christianity it self If these things therefore be not onely uncivil and ungentile but ferine brutish or rather Diabolical can it be ungentile or uncivil heartily and professedly to oppose them 5. Or to plead more distinctly and more particularly to two capacities Made evident to the judgments not onely of Believers of men to them first that have a conscience and belief of Christian Religion as it is delivered in the holy Scripture I demand of them how ignoble or inglorious a thing they deem it to oppose that which is plainly and palpably opposite to the Word of God and to the Commandments of Christ Jesus to endeavour to demolish that which does supplant and frustrate the very End of the Gospel of Christ and is so diametrically repugnant to the Interest of his Kingdom Certainly whosoever can judge such a Design as this dishonourable must be of the spirit of that company whom our Saviour of old most righteously reproved in these words How can ye John 5. 44. believe that receive honour one of another and seek not that honour that cometh of God onely As it is said also in another place For they loved the praise of men more then John 12. 43. the praise of God 6. And now for them that think it so noble and glorious a thing But even of Infidels or Atheists themselves to be indifferent to all Religions or indeed to believe none who are not so much as touched with the sense of the common Christianity such as all who call themselves Christians agree in yet if they have not put off the sentiments of common Humanity then which nothing can be more barbarous and ungentile I demand of them what offence can it be against the Laws of the highest Generosity to profess a mans disgust and enmity against such a constitution of things as runs point-blank not onely against the
Libamen Suffitus which he calls Venerationis Signa quae consensus Gentium Divini cultûs esse propria voluit and so has not only afforded us Examples but a Rule how to find out proper Signes of Divine worship namely that at least those are such that consent of Nations has made so And I think it seasonable here because some do so rashly appropriate Sacrifice to that which they call Latria as if this signe of Religious worship were adequately proper to God others communicable to other Objects to take notice that if they mean by Sacrifice the Mactation of living Creatures that manner of worship not being in use amongst Christians it must needs enhance the nature of other Signes of Religious worship and make them the more apparently incommunicable to any created Object which yet were really so though this case were not But this only by the bye 2. Vows also and Oaths Grotius acknowledges to be part of this kind of Worship as also The praying for the Holy Spirit for Remission of sins and for Eternal life These then according to him are not to be asked of an Angel though he were visibly present To which I will make bold to adde the Religious invocation of any Angel or Spirit absent or invisible For as because God is the only giver of Eternal life of Remission of sins and of the Holy Spirit he that asks so high things of any Creature acknowledges the incommunicable Excellencies of God in that Creature so also he that invokes any invisible Angel Saint or Spirit does in like manner acknowledge an Omnisciency and Omnipresency in this Saint or Angel which are the incommunicable Excellencies of God 3. Nay I adde further That the asking of such things as are in the power of a creature to give as suppose a fit medicine for such or such a malady or assistance in danger upon the way in a journey if the one be asked suppose of Aesculapius in a Temple and at an Altar consecrated to his Ghost and the other of Hercules at one dedicated to his these petitions of such feasible good offices yea and if you will begged of these Ghosts or Daemons present there and visible and there is the same reason in Saints and Angels would not fail notwithstanding to be Idolatry the Consent of Nations having made the erecting and dedicating Temples and Altars for Prayers Vows and Sacrifices a Sign of Divine worship and it was you know the formal worship of the most High God the God of Israel while the Temple stood whose residence was conceived more peculiarly upon the Cherubims which were concealed from the eye of the People that they might not commit Idolatry with them 4. But the Gentiles very depravedly used this circumstance of Religious worship and made their addresses towards the open Images or Statues of Divine residence consecrated to that purpose where the God was to receive their Offerings and Prayers So that though all Nations at all times did not use this representation of the Divine residence by Images yet where it was in use which was exceeding general it is manifest that it was part of the Divinest worship and such as they used towards the Highest Numen And seeing that this manner of Divine presence or visible Residence by Images was not only used in the worship of the inferiour Daemons but of such as were styled Dii coelestes whom assuredly they could not think exiled from Heaven to assist at these earthly Statues it is a sign that the Image it self was reckoned for the visible presence of the Deity they did adore and consequently that this representation of the presence of the Deity whether the Deity be personally there present or no is that which by Consent of Nations has passed into an ordinary mode of Divine worship Nor can the erection of Temples Altars or other Symbols of Religious worship to them that are not Gods make these cease to be such Signes or Symbols For then since they all have been after that manner abused there would be no signes of Divine worship left at all But rather on the contrary we are to conclude that whatever things were consecrated to the worship or honour of the God of Israel that to consecrate the like to that which is not God is an invading his right and a manifest act of Idolatry 5. Hymns also and Incurvations as they may be framed will be unavoidably Signes of Divine worship as namely if this Incurvation be made to any particular invisible power while he is invisible for it is an acknowledgement of one of the incommunicable Excellencies of God viz. his Ubiquity For we may bow any where to the invisible God because he is every where but to bow to any particular Angel or Spirit while he is invisible is incongruous because he is not every where Therefore he that does this worship to him as congruous does therewith interpretative acknowledge by that act an Ubiquity in him and thereby becomes an Idolater Incurvation also towards an Image erected to any Creature especially in a Temple or on an Altar yea though removed from both were a sign of Religious worship or service by infallible definition Thou shalt not bow down to them nor serve them that is to say Thou shalt not doe the service of Incurvation nor any other Religious service to them For 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Service is Cultus religiosus of which Incurvation in such circumstances is assuredly one kind I mean exhibited either to an invisible power or to its visible representation in an Image Concerning the latter whereof Consent of Nations has also made it an appropriate Sign of Religious worship especially in a Temple as I noted before And now for Hymns I say the framing of a Song to the praise of any created Being suppose Sun Moon or Daemon if there be such Epithets therein as signifie the incommunicable Excellencies of God as if one should begin O Sol Omnipotens or O Luna Omniscia this would certainly not fail to be the giving of Divine worship to the Sun and Moon upon which account Martial seems to me not a flatterer only of Domitian but an Idolater in that Hendecasyllabon Edictum Domini Deique nostri Wherein he writes after Domitian's own copy who taught his Ministers of State this Epistolar form Deus Dominus noster sic fieri jubet Which if it might be more tolerable in Pagan Kingdoms where Dii usually amounted to no more then Angeli amongst us yet in Christian Nations where God is an incommunicable name as the Author of the Book of Wisdom intimates the calling of any man God cannot but be Idolatry or Blasphemy 6. But not the less Idolatry for being Blasphemy sith every Idolatry is so For Idolatry by giving the appropriate Signes of the acknowledgement of the Divine Excellency to a vile Creature and every Creature is so in respect of God does equalize that Creature unto God and consequently makes God as vile as that
Creature Which is a manifest reviling and Blaspheming of him worse then the calling of a Prince by the name of the basest vermin I say therefore in such Countries as the name of God usually signifies the true God and not Angels to apply that appellation to any man is both Idolatry and Blasphemy as it would be to use any Gesture to him that were appropriate to Divine adoration which made the Greeks that they would not doe reverence to the King of Persia in the Persian mode because that was the very posture which in Greece they used in worshipping their Gods 7. These are the chief if not all the Signes of Divine worship that easily occur to my mind And if I have let any escape my recital in particular they will easily be recalled if not kept safe in the general Notion I have given of the Appropriate Signes of Religious worship namely That all they are such that either Consent of Nations or the Use of particular Countries or the natural Signification of the thing it self or else Divine definition has made so Of the first sort of which are Meat-offerings Drink-offerings Burning of Incense Erecting Altars Dedicating Images and the like Of the second sort is such or such a posture of Religious veneration proper to such a Country as in that example of the Greeks which was obligatory to them of that Country And of the third The praying for the Holy Spirit for Remission of Sins Eternal life or for what else is out of the power of the Creature to give also The making of Vows and Oaths they implying an absolute 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in them in whose name they are made and not only a knowledge of the fact but a power of punishing out of the road of Humane laws of which power and knowledge we have no assurance in any particular Spirit but in God only To which you may adde The invoking of any particular invisible powers while they are invisible though in such things as they are naturally able to help us in Hymns also or any Compellations whatsoever made to a Creature if the words signifie the incommunicable Excellencies of God All these of their own nature and whatsoever are like these are the Appropriate Signes of Religious worship though the Consent of Nations did not give their suffrage and are not due to any thing nor lawfull to be given to any thing but to the true God Whence the misapplication of them to any other Object will certainly be the sin of Idolatry Lastly an example of the last sort is Bowing to Images it being declared in the Decalogue a kind of service of them according as I noted before 8. And now that no man may phansy to have found any creep-hole to evade the power and plainness of our Reason by pretending that Religious worship is of a larger extent then what I have defined I shall here timely advertise him not only that I matter not what careless abuses there may be put upon a word or what forced pullings and drawings to make proper terms to stretch for the covering and palliating unproper actions or unsound opinions but also and of which I would have him take special notice that the strength of our Demonstrations will not depend upon the singleness of the signification of Religious worship which yet I have sufficiently proved to be but One but upon the truth of that Definition we have given thereof in that sense that is there professedly intended For no man can deny but the Religious worship due to God alone though he were so extravagant as to conceit some kind of Religious worship due to some Creatures is truly and exactly defined in the above-said Definition And I promise here aforehand that my convictions of Idolatry shall be fetched not from the supposition that Religious worship may have no other sense then according to which I have defined it in this Definition but only from the truth of the Definition of that Religious worship which is due to God alone to the end that there may not be the least room left for any imaginable cavil or evasion or for any shadow or dream thereof CHAP. XII 1. A brief enumeration of the parts of that full instruction we have to discern what is Idolatry 2. That the Adoration of the Cross is Idolatry 3. As also the Worshipping any Person of the holy Trinity by an Image or Picture 4. That Religious worship given to Saints or Angels though without the use of any Image or Picture is Idolatry 5. That the mere Invocation of any particular invisible power is also Idolatrous 6. Certain Evasions touching the praying to Saints answered 7. Another subterfuge answered 8. Worshipping Saints by Images a double Idolatry 9. That it is Idolatry to worship an Image taking it for the Saint himself 10. As also the Adoration of any man alive upon Earth 11. That the worshipping of the Eucharistick Bread taken for the real Body of Christ is Idolatry 12. That all the above said acts are Idolatrous let men pretend what they will to cover the guilt 13. And that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in S. Peter does not imply a lawfulness in any kind of Idolatry 1. WE are now I think sufficiently instructed partly by the acknowledged examples of Idolatry committed by Heathens or Jews and partly by the knowledge of the adequate Object of Idolatry as also of the right Definition of Religious worship and of the appropriate Signes thereof and of the formal or essential application of those Signes to discern and define infallibly what would be Idolatry where-ever it was practised amongst Christians themselves and what not 2. As for example To adore the Cross or to give any Religious worship thereto though there were no Image upon it would be Idolatry according to the First Instance thereof and of such as are referrable thereto which shew that Idolatry may be committed without an Image And that it is here committed is plain in that we suppose the appropriate Signes of Divine worship used in the adoration thereof Which done to any creature is ipso facto Idolatry 3. Secondly To doe Religious worship to the Picture or Image of any Person of the holy Trinity or of all three or particularly to the Image of Christ though this Religious worship is intended to pass through the representation to God himself Father Son or Holy Ghost is notwithstanding Idolatry according to the second Instance where worshipping the true God by an Image is proved to be such 4. Thirdly The worshipping Angels or Saints yea the blessed Virgin herself with Religious worship though without an Image is Idolatry And such may be a Religious Invocation of them the asking of them such things as are proper only for God to give as Remission of sins Assistance of grace and Eternal life or using any Epithets in Hymns or Songs to them that signifie the incommunicable Excellencies of God or lastly making Vows and Swearing in their names
the Sheep 9. But there is yet an harder burthen that Superstition may invent and be either added to some of the Monastick Orders or imposed as Penance or voluntarily inflicted on a mans self out of a blind intoxicating zeal the practice being applauded by this not Mother but Stepdame Church and it is in a word Flagellation or Whipping a mans self cruelly and bloudily for a Religious satisfaction or else for Merits A custom so harsh and salvage that it is more befitting the Altar of Diana Taurica then the Temple of Christ and has no precedent unless in those Religions which were of the Devil 's own setting up whose sport was his Tyrannizing over poor despised Mankind Such a Pastour as this is not onely a clipper but a flayer of his Sheep and exquisitely opposite to his Spirit who promised his followers that his yoke should be easie and his burthen light 10. But such hardships as these as they make a shew in the flesh so they tend nothing to the right chastising and subduing of the corruptions of the spirit and are but like the whipping the Cart and letting the Horses go free That chastisement that reaches to amendment of life and the bringing the Inward man under the obedience of Christ is a resolute denial of acting any of the suggestions of the flesh This will wound the sinning principle more home and will really heal the Soul in the conclusion But the other cannot well be countenanced but upon an Hypocritical affectation of a pompous kind of Severity wherein this false Church may ostentate her own power over the minds and bodies of men and take a secret joy in the relish of this wonderful Empire she has got over the World even to a vile kind of bondage and vassalage But in the mean time such American cruelties as these may well hazzard the life or health of the abused Penitents and will not fail to bring a very loathsom reproach upon the School of Christ making it look like salvage Paganism and the Synagogue of the Devil 11. That also were a kind of Paganical injury put upon deceived Souls and a great wearisomness and drudgery to the Body to be ingaged in long Pilgrimages to salute this or that Saint's Image for better reconciliation But the Offerings tend to the enriching of that Church and the Resort of Pilgrims to the enriching of the Town and thereby to the conciliating of the affections of the Towns-men to so gainful a Religion But in the mean time the Pilgrims affairs at home are left at sixes and sevens his Children to the sole government of his Wife and his Wife to the oversight of the Ghostly Father and what other humane Visitants shall put in for her comfort in her Husband's absence To Pilgrimages might be added Jubilees at the great Metropolis of this Apostatized Church which though not so frequent yet at their celebration would be frequented from the remotest parts of Christendom with multitudes of devout Strangers upon belief of pardon of their sins for so holy a voiage But the end and inconveniences of this Solemnity would be much the same with those of Pilgrimages saving that this is more peculiarly designed for the replenishing of the High-priest's coffers 12. It were an endless business to reckon up all the manners of Superstitious molestations which might be invented for the bodies of deceived and inslaved Christians under the pretence of fulfilling the Laws of Christianity and of the Church Such as Going a considerable way bare-footed and bare-headed The putting themselves into cold congeling Springs the water gushing upon their bare breasts The rolling themselves in beds of Ice and Snow The creeping upon their bare knees on flinty Causeys to the cutting of their skin and flesh and making all run with bloud The wearing of hair-cloth next their skin and a girdle of nails and needles with many such like tragical extravagancies concerning which I have nothing new to take notice of but that they are quite contrary to the ingenuous Spirit that breaths in true Christianity and as I said before do too much assimilate the Religion of Christians to the bloudy Superstitions of barbarous Pagans CHAP. XX. 1. The Burthen of afflictive Opinions 2. The distracting puzzles of a Soul intangled with multifarious Superstitions and Conceits 3. The illaqueations of Religious Vows 4. Intanglements arising from a Superstitious trust in certain surmised virtues in the Mass. 5. Vexatious Scrupulosities concerning the Intention of the Priest in administring the Sacraments 1. BUT to let pass these incommodations of the Body Christianity may be made very uneasie and uncomfortable by several rackings and distractings of the Mind by unnecessary Obligations of the Conscience by entangling Conceits and Opinions which also being innumerable it were to no purpose to go about to reckon up all But some few obvious ones I shall venture to name such as The supposed duty of worshipping the Cross the Images or Reliques of Saints The conceit of communion of Merits The intanglement of Vows A superstitious trust in the Eucharist and in the power of the Priest's Intention in that and other Sacraments The belief of the necessity of Auricular Confession and of the Assent to every of the smallest points of Doctrine held by the Church though there be no footsteps thereof in the Scripture nor any ground in Reason The excruciating fear of a worse then Pagan Purgatory and finally the necessity of Penal Satisfaction and Merit A man may pronounce these words without blistering his tongue but if he once imbibe them as Principles obliging the Conscience and be superstitiously intangled in them he will sleep as uneasily by reason of the unsettledness of his Mind as if his bed were strowed with chopped hairs or pulverized glass There is no redemption of the quiet of his Spirit but by taking of a lusty draught of that Soporiferous potion that will make him repose himself wholly on the faith of his Priest to say and to doe just as he will have him without any disquisition or reasoning and so to metamorphose himself from a rational cautious Man into a mere passive Ass for the false Prophet to ride upon 2. But if he were seriously set to promote his own happiness upon the account of his own judgment and diligence how would he be distracted in the multiplicity of the Objects of his Devotion For if it be so meritorious to visit the Shrine of one Saint it will be the neglect of his own Salvation to omit another And if the Saints be so ambitious as to be pleased by our Religious Invocation of them the invoking one may it not bring upon us the displeasure of the rest who are pretermitted And if I make one of them my Patron why may I not suspect that I have thereby made the rest mine Enemies by slighting them were they thus desirous of Divine Honours as we conceit them And as concerning their holy Reliques that are offered to be kissed by
some part That it is not an Absolute Inconditionate Promise to the Whole is plain in that the parties of Christendom differ so much in matters of Belief as they do But if it be to some part where is the nomination of that part in these Promises whereby their Right of Interpreting may appear to the world There is no Particular Church specified there neither Greek nor Roman neither Muscovian nor Armenian nor that of Prester John nor any other Church else Whence it is plain that no Particular Church can have any claim or right to any such privilege 6. Again suppose some Particular Church had a Promise how does it appear that the Promise is Inconditionate to this Particular Church and that it is not upon supposal that they will seriously and sincerely apply their mind to find out the Truth and purifie their Souls from all those worldly and sensual impediments thereto For this spirit of Infallibility cannot lodge in a body that is subject unto sin For Purity of heart and life is the very Light and Crystalline Organ the very Eye of the Soul and to think of a privilege of Infallibility without Holiness is like the imagining of a promise to see without Light or Eyes Wherefore it is such an Hypocritical conceit that a man cannot well tell whether it be more to be lamented or laughed at for a Church to pretend that God has an irresistible design of making them Infallible to every Punctilio of Controversie and yet not of making them Holy and Good But it is a sign they contemn or abhor Goodness as being contrary to their corrupt natures but desire the privilege of Infallibility as being agreeable to their natural pride and the boast thereof an instrument to bring about all their deceitful devices And therefore we might adde to this That it is questionable whether the Promise be to any Church visible but to such as the Apostles were chosen sanctified and faithful Regenerate men for none but these are truly the Church of Christ and if he make his Promise good onely to such as are his true Church it is sufficient 7. Moreover be this Promise Conditionate or Inconditionate we cannot but be sure that this Infallibility is not Universal as to all Objects whatsoever And therefore to meddle with such things as are not necessary to Salvation nor really edifying were to go beyond their Warrant or Commission and thereby to forfeit or at least to have no benefit of the promised Assistence 8. But let us particularly examine the Texts of Scripture themselves The first whereof infers no more then this That the Church of Christ shall never cease to be that Death shall never be able to prevail against her neither to extirpate her in this world or hinder her of a glorious Immortality in the world to come For 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 signifies no more then 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Death or Abolition or The state of the dead But this may be true of the Church though it were not Infallible So weak is this first Allegation 9. As for the second it were well for the Alledgers if it were onely weak for it is strong against themselves and makes much for our Hypothesis who conceive this Infallibility to be Conditional For reade the whole Context entire and it runs thus If ye love me keep my Commandments and I will ask the Father c. which implies there is a Condition That they must love Christ and keep his Commandments if they expect that Spirit which will abide with them for ever that is as long as they lived for so the word ordinarily signifies in Scripture And it is further added that it is such a Spirit as the World cannot receive Which therefore does strongly imply that it resides not in those who are worldly and carnally-minded Which Conditionality of the Promise is also infinuated in the third place alledged When the Spirit of Truth is come he will Lead you or guide you into all Truth that is he will lead you as a Man not hale you or drag you as a Stone or a brute Beast which is not a free Agent So that we see plainly that this Infallibility is Conditional where-ever it is And though I doubt not but the Condition being performed the Promise will be made good to all men as far as it is necessary to their Salvation yet these places are not the best that may be produced to that purpose the Promise being not General here but directed to certain particular men in such circumstances as it is evident that it is meant to them in particular and does not infer any succession For the men that he speaks to there he decyphers to be such as he was present with and should be put in mind by the Paraclet what he had said to them when present such Joh. 14. 16 17. as were sorrowful upon the occasion of his departure with other like circumscribing circumstances that cannot belong to any succession of men but were proper to the Apostles to whom he then spake 10. As indeed Infallibility it self seems a Promise most proper to them they being to lay the Foundations of the Church and to build the House of God which they having done in terms plain enough as to all things necessary to Salvation the Promise of Infallibility needs reach no further the Church for ever hereafter being safe provided she keep but close to what is plainly delivered by the first Founders of her nothing else need be obtruded upon Believers by way of Infallible imposition 11. And as for that fourth citation where the Church seems to be called The Pillar and Ground of Truth If we admit of Cameron and Capellus 1 Tim. 3. 15. their ingenious conjecture upon the place viz. That The Pillar and Ground of Truth is to be disjoyned from the precedent words by a Colon at least and understand also what follows without controversie great is the mystery of Godliness to be onely a Parenthetical Elogium of the Mystery of the Gospel into which the Apostle was transported upon consideration of those weighty Points thereof which he was a-delivering God manifest in the Flesh c. so that The Pillar and Ground of Truth may be 1 Tim. 3. 16. the Preface to the grand Points of the Christian Truth which that Parenthesis being seposed do immediately follow according as it was usual with the Jews to prefix before such Fundamentalls of knowledge the Title of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Fundamentum Columna Sapientia this passage will be wholly disâ—…bled from making any shew of proof for what it was alledged 12. But if you will adjoyn this Title to the Church it was the Ephesian Church where Timothy resided which has vanished long agoe And what other Church then unless every Particular Church can urge this place for Infallibility which experience of contradicting one another does openly confute Besides that the style it self of Ground and Pillar may not
them from any material blemishes as being so exceeding necessary for the continuance of those Truths that were published by such men as accordingly as I have already intimated were Divinely and Infallibly inspired And that there were such Writings sufficient for the conveyance of the knowledge of Christ written by them that were infallible Witnesses of the Truth and that we may be assured that those which commonly bear the Title of them are they I have without any recourse to the Infallibility of the Church so plainly demonstrated in my Explanation of the Book 7. chap. 10 11. Mystery of Godliness that I think it needless to say any thing further of it in this place 2. In the second place they will pretend That the Church must be Infallible or else there will want an Infallible Judge of Controversies nay there will not be so much as any Authority in the Church to order the affairs thereof But the Answer is easie and brief That there is no want of any such Infallible Judge and therefore not of the Churche's Infallibility for the Scripture is a Sufficient Rule of Faith to all that have understanding whether Learned or unlearned in things necessary to Salvation and That the belief and practice of these will carry a man to Heaven The Spirit of God therefore is the onely Infallible Judge here and has declared as plainly as any successive Judges can in those things that are necessary to Life and Salvation what is to be believed and to be done Which if we believe and practise in particular and do also in general and implicitly believe and stand in a readiness to obey the rest of the Scripture when the sense thereof appears to us we are in a safe condition and need not doubt but it will go well with us in the other State For it is manifest that what is necessary is plain in the Word of God to all men otherwise Salvation were not sufficiently revealed to the world and what we above recited out of St. Paul were not true nor the Providence of God sufficiently watchful in the laying the first Foundations of his Church 3. For if the Scripture were not a Sufficient Infallible evidence of all necessary Truths God would have afterwards raised other persons of Apostolical purity in conversation and with the like power of working Miracles to have made a Supplement to the former which yet was never done or else those other necessary Truths taught indeed by the first Apostles but not written by them had been committed to Tradition which had been a very lubricous and perillous way and unlikely to be taken by Divine Providence But if any such way had been taken certainly the Scripture it self in which all men are agreed would have pointed it out to us as also if there had been any Interpreter instituted that there might be infallibly communicated to us what remains necessary to our eternal safety But the Scripture being silent herein it openly declares it self to be Sufficient to all such as with sincerity and care apply themselves to the understanding of it as certainly every man considering that his eternal Salvation lies upon it will be enforced to doe in his own behalf whenas if others interpret for him they may doe it more remissly or more fraudulently 4. Besides that it is a very unskilfull and inept desire that there should be any such Infallible Judge that has concluded all Controversies to our hands already For that would prevent or forestall that privacy and peculiarity of converse which God has with those Souls that are more dear to him who does in a special manner assure them of such Conclusions as are not to be reached at by every hand But when the Infallible Determination of the Church has passed all mens assurances will be alike and God will have as it were given the staff out of his own hands Wherefore there being no external Infallible Judge for the Interpreting obscure places in Scripture God's right of his dispensing his special favours is preserved and men of a more devout and Intellectual spirit are divinely employed and earnestly engaged to extraordinary piety and holiness that they may win the favour of that inward Infallible Interpreter even of that Holy Spirit which the World cannot receive and by the light of his assistence be inabled to reach the true sense of those Writings which himself dictated to the Apostles and other Holy men of God 5. And lastly That the want of Infallibility will take away the Authority of the Church is a very weak Inference For her Authority is entire in the urging those Truths and Duties in Scripture that are plain to all men even to such as do not in the least dream that they are Infallible And those that are thus plain are such as are the most useful for our safe conduct to Heaven And for those Doctrines that be more obscure if they be withall useful and edifying as also Rites and Ceremonies the Church has Authority though she be not Infallible to declare them and appoint them Let all things be done decently and in order But how she is to behave her self to Dissenters having spoke of that more copiously elsewhere 2 Cor. 14. 40. I shall not here so much as touch upon it I will onely adde That in things that are really disputable I conceive it is the duty of every one whatever his private judgment and inclinations otherwise would be to compromise with the Authority of the Church and for Peace and Order sake to be concluded by their Determinations 6. Now what has been already suggested will serve to null or enervate a third Sophism For it seems a plausible Objection against the Scripture alone being sufficient to guide us and rule us without a publick Infallible Interpreter That this were as if one should contend that the Law alone in Civil matters were sufficient without a publick Judge For besides what we above insinuated That a plain Law and such we averre the Scripture to be in matters necessary to Salvation may want no Judge where the Conscience finds it self upon pain of Damnation obliged to understand it aright we further suggest That the urging or pressing of the Law of Christ by a publick Minister Interpreter or Declarer of the sentence of his Law so far as it is plainly his to all unprejudiced Understandings as well unlearned as learned is not denied by those that contend that the Scripture is the sole Rule of Faith And for my own part as I said before in places that are not thus plain if such Interpretations be made as are not repugnant to other plain Texts of Scripture but tend to the promotion of the Ends of the Gospel which I have elsewhere specified I hope no man shall offend God but doe his dutie to the Church in compromising with them in their sentiments of things in such circumstances as these For they are supposed conscienciously and in the Fear of
shadows of the Truth if they be that Such a constitution of things as this does plainly discover it self to be Antichristian and to oppose that Title of Christ which styles him The Truth Without are Rev. 22 15. Murtherers and Sorcerers and every one that loveth and maketh a Lie That is not so remarkably spoken in the Apocalyps for nothing And it is worth the noting also in * Chap. 8. Daniel that Antiochus who is generally look'd upon as a Type of Antichrist is said to cast down the Truth to the ground 3. The next Title is The Light which is a figurative Title and signifies Wisedom and Knowledge and indeed upon the matter is but a symbolical expression of the former For Truth and true Wisedom are one and the same thing but in that it irradiates and informs the minds of others it is more especially called Light And Christ is so called both in that he enlightens every man that comes into the world according to his Divine nature and in that he was the Light of the Gentiles and the Glory of his people Israel in his exteriour Personal manifestation to the world Wherefore to endeavour to keep the people in a worse then Aegyptian darkness under pretence of raising their devotion to God when the plot is to have them wholy at their own devotion and to abuse them and mislead them as they please it were plainly to Antichristianize against this Second Title of Christ The Light and to defeat the End of his coming into the World which was to be a Light to lighten the Gentiles and to Isa. 42. 6. bring them that sit in darkness out of the Prison-house And Christ has entailed this Title also upon his true followers and Successours Ye are Matt. 5. 14. the Light of the World What then are they that are not onely not shining Lights themselves but industrious abettors and promoters of darkness and ignorance and diligent hinderers of any true light that may be let into the Church from others 4. The Third Title of Christ is The Life as it is written in S. John's Gospel In him was the life and the life was the light of men Which life I conceive S. Paul describes very savourly when he saith That the Kingdom of Heaven is not meat nor drink but righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Ghost Christianity therefore is a dispensation of inward life flowing out into all laudable and usefull actions not a Babel of confused and intangling Opinions and unprofitable Observances a heap of Ceremonies and Conceits but a steddy abode in God who is Love and will teach us and inable us from an inward sense of Life to love him with all our hearts and all our souls and our Neighbour as our selves which is the most eminent fulfilling of the whole Law Wherefore instead of this holy dispensation of the Spirit and Life if there were introduced a rigid adherence to empty Opinions and unedifying Observations of multifarious Ceremonies this would be an Antichristian Trespass against this Third Title of Christ while we thus substitute insipid Theories and dead Formalities in the place of the Power and Life of Godliness 5. The Fourth Title is The mighty God and the Divinity of Christ is an acknowledged Article of our Faith and so choice a Prerogative of his Person that whatsoever does derogate from this infringe or weaken it cannot but be deemed considerably Antichristian Such therefore must be the building of Temples and Altars the burning of Incense and religious Invocations and Prayers to Saints or Angels Nay though there were no Prayers put up to them the solemnly reposing the Reliques of Saints in any Church or Chappel and making them therewith the Patrons or Tutelar Genii as it were of such a City or Province were no less then Idolatry and a Superstition much like that of the ancient Pagans in their Telesms and Palladiums and their Dii Tutelares whose presence they conceited to be detained by these superstitious Ceremonies and so made them Patrons and Protectours of their Cities and Countries Wherefore if the Christians by religiously reposing the Reliques of this or that Saint in this or that City should be so superstitiously conceited as to repose a Trust in the Aide of these Saints from Pestilence from War from Thunder from Earthquakes or the like believing them powerfull and benigne Protectours of the Place this undoubtedly were a kind of Religious worship done to them and could not be less then the sin of Idolatry For all such Faith and Repose upon any particular invisible Power is Idolatrous as well as Invocation because it as well supposes in that particular invisible Power what is onely proper to God For there is no certainty of the Presence and consequently of the Assistence of an invisible Power in any one place unless the nature of that Power be to be in all places at once And therefore he that puts his Trust for Aid and Assistence in such a sort as I have described in a particular invisible Power makes that invisible Power Omnipresent or Omniscient which are the incommunicable Attributes of God and thereby commits Idolatry as I have above more fully argued in the like case 6. The mere trusting therefore in Saints as Patrons and Protectours of such and such Places as well as the building of Altars burning of Incense to them or invoking them derogates from the onely-assured Patronage and powerfull Divinity of our Blessed Saviour For by these Divine honours we equallizing such Patrons or Mediatours as these to the onely-begotten Son of God make him less then he is and but like them that is to say make him unlike himself obscure the peculiarity of his Divinity and disclaim his Godhead 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as the * Coloss. 2. Apostle speaks letting go our true Head and putting our selves under another Chieftain For there is onely one that is capable of this Divine honour which therefore if we give to any other we act the part of that Antichrist who is defined by the denying the Father and the Son 1 John 2 22. For the Father and the Son are one Such an arguing as this God seems to implie in his expostulation with the Israelites in the wilderness O ye house of Israel have ye offered to me Victimes and Sacrifices by the space of forty years in the Wilderness Yea ye Acts 7. took up the Tabernacle of Moloch and the star of your God Remphan c. The sense of which assuredly is this That though the Israelites did sacrifice as they thought or did pretend their usual sacrifices to God according to the Law of Moses during their abode in the wilderness yet because they served and acknowledged other Gods besides him he infers and that truly and justly even according to the humane Faculties that they really did not serve him at all that is did not acknowledge him to be what he was the onely true God And
therefore they erring in the apprehension of the Excellency of that Object to which Divine worship is due as if it were so mean that there could be many such did not direct their worship to him but to a phancy or Idol of their own making to which they profanely attributed the name of Jehovah For the true Jehovah was not so vile a Being as there could be any partakers of Divine honour with himself And so it is with Christ who is the same true God blessed for ever He that gives Divine honour which is due to him alone unto Saints or Angels disclaims his Divinity and makes him but as one of them This would be one Antichristian way of undermining his Godhead by equallizing mere Creatures unto him 7. But there is another way or rather the same way but in an higher degree and consequently more Antichristian and that is the preferring that which is but a mere Creature though a blessed and glorious one before him or above him As for example if either Fraud or blind Devotion should exalt the ever-blessed Virgin not onely to that Divine honour of having Temples and Altars erected to her with Prayers and Invocations of her as in the worship of the rest of the Saints and Angels but that these Honours should be done much more frequently and more magnificently to the Virgin Mary then to Christ himself that is to say that there should be more Temples and Altars and more sumptuous erected to her then to Christ Jesus more Devotions Prayers and Offerings made to her then to him a greater acknowledgement of mercy and goodness from her then from him who poured out his Life in the bitter Agonies of his bloudy Passion for the Salvation of the World and lastly be ascribed unto her a Superiority and Authority over Christ to command him to doe this or that by virtue of that duty he owes unto her Certainly if this be not against the Divinity of Christ nothing can be thus to make him inferiour to a deceased woman even him that is perfect God as well as perfect Man For it is plainly to un-deify him if I may so speak and to declare him to be no God at all Which is as Antichristian an outrage against the Divinity of Christ as can be imagined For who is Antichrist if he be not that denies the Father and the Son 1 John 2. 22. who is one and equal with the Father And who denies the Godhead of both Father and Son but he that pronounces the Mother of Christ according to the flesh to be greater then them both as certainly she is if she be greater then either 8. The Fifth Title is The Everlasting Father The Seventy translate it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 meaning I suppose the world under the Messias The efficacy of which Title I conceive the Mystery of Regeneration to reflect upon Christ regenerating us into his own Image by the inward working of his Eternal Spirit All things that the Father hath John 16 15. are mine and it is no wonder he being one with the Father therefore said I that he the Spirit shall take of mine and shew it unto you Wherefore Christ regenerating the World which was to come by the operation of his Eternal Spirit he was rightly and fitly styled 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The Father of the World to come or if you will The everlasting Father as being so in his own Essence and begetting Children to endless Eternities Of this Mysterie he treated in his converse upon Earth with his secret disciple Nicodemus Unless a man be born from above he cannot enter into John 3. 5 7. the Kingdom of God Marvel not that I said unto thee that we must be born from above The wind bloweth where it listeth and thou hearest the sound thereof but thou knowest not from whence it comes nor whether it goes so is every one that is born of the Spirit No unregenerate man is acquainted with the sense of the first rise and motion of the Spirit nor understands whither those actions and speeches tend that proceed therefrom But it is so with these as is said in the Apocalyps of the hundred forty four thousands who by virtue of their new birth sung a new Song which none could learn but the hundred forty four thousands Chap. 14. which were redeemed from the Earth by being born from above as our Saviour spake to Nicodemus These are the true Israelites in whose mouth is found no guile and who by the guidance of that Spirit by which they are regenerate follow the Lamb wheresoever he goes 9. Wherefore Christ being to his true Church so real a Father by a true and living Regeneration and Renovation of their Minds by his Spirit into such holy sentiments as appertain to all those that are indeed the Sons of God to treat them so as if they were mere Images made of wood or stone or rather dead matter to be carved upon and have the inscription of any thing that a pretended Infallible Power shall be pleased to engrave upon them this is an high Antichristian affront against the Paternity of Christ as if he did not beget living Children who have as certainly the sense of discernment in Spiritual things as any Animal birth has in Natural but that the number of his Elect were but a certain Tale of billets brick or stone to be hewen or carved or any way ordered according to the petulancy and imperiousness of a self-willed Power who under a pretence of an infallible and unfailing succession that must be in the Church has stept into the place of Christ. Maxima debetur puero reverentia is most true concerning every child of God For there is that Divine sense in them against which whatsoever is unholy and unsavoury will grate very hard and unpleasantly and what is false will be found by them very disharmonious both to those immutable Principles of Truth in their unprejudiced minds and also to the written Oracles of God which were penned down by the same Spirit by which this genuine off-spring of Christians are regenerated Wherefore as I said to use these as if there were no life no spirit no sense or discernment in them but that they must as passively without any Conviction or Appeal to any thing in themselves bear the Dictates of this usurping Power we describe as a Table-book or Paper-book which is irresistibly writ upon by that hand that pleases is an enormous Injury against Christ as he is the Everlasting Father and holy Regeneratour of his true Church into his own life and likeness But to murther and massacre these Children of his because they do so stoutly and exactly Patrissare so conscienciously and carefully tread in their Father's steps and witness his Truth to the world I leave to any man to judge if there can be imagined any thing more hellishly Antichristian against the Paternity of Christ then that For what can be more hostile and
should have free remission of all his sins past and security from punishment But this is a small matter Suppose that such a piece of Devotion at some other Altars and in some other Churches would procure the pardon of sin and punishment for twenty thirty fifty or an hundred thousand years and that the saying of such and such Prayers at such an Altar would deliver a Soul out of Purgatory that the bowing at the Name of Jesus may procure toties quoties twenty years pardon that the mere stooping to kiss a Cross on the pavement of a Church an Indulgence or Pardon for all a mans sins that the pattering over so many Prayers especially if there be the weight of some consecrated Medal as an Agnus Dei or the like annexed to them will save a Soul out of Purgatory that one Salutation of the Blessed Virgin shall gain eighty years pardon that the saying a certain short Prayer devoutly looking on the Picture of Christ shall obtain ten thousand days of Pardon and the saying of others no less then ten hundred thousand years and for but the looking on a certain Crucifix six thousand years of Pardon These intimations would be infinite I have produced so much already as implies such a Constitution in a Church as nothing can be more opposite to or destructive of that Life and Holiness Christ came to plant in the World and therefore cannot but be judged very soully Antichristian 7. The Falseness and unjustifiableness of these proceedings I need not goe about to evince they being so damnable at first sight nor point at the Fraud it being so conspicuous which is as I have above intimated in like cases the emunging of the people of their mony And the Mischief is here the Opposition or Extinction of the Divine Life as it will be likewise in the Root and Branches So that we need hereafter note no other Mischiefs then will be comprized in the Subject we shall be upon the Mischiefs being expressed in the very Titles of the Argument Which I thought fit here to note once for all and would proceed to the delineating of the next Limb of Antichristianism did there not one consideration more offer it self to my mind that would help to make the state of the Church very Stepdame-like to any offers toward growth and increase in life and Godliness Which supposition is this 8. Let us imagine that either a mighty party of the Ecclesiasticks had plotted it so or the Ambition of one Bishop with some few adherents being back'd with opportunities and wanting no wit policy nor industry had brought it about to be so that he and his Successours should be declared and by a very considerable part accepted for the Universal Bishop of the World should be esteemed of an Authority more sacred high and glorious then of any Emperour or Potentate upon earth that there should be substituted under him several Orders some of very high degree which should be as it were so many Ecclesiastick Princes equal in a manner for Pomp and Splendour to the Kings of the Earth besides Patriarchs Metropolitans and many other very rich and illustrious Ranks of the Priesthood the Church in the interim abounding with sundry sorts of very creditable and profitable Preferments to bear out all Why thus far you will say is very good news and it were desirable it were so indeed That Religion being the most Sacred and precious thing in the world those that are in a more special manner the Supporters and Pillars thereof should be the most richly splendid and adorned 9. I do confess so a man would think at first sight For it seems but a respect to God whose Servants they are by a more peculiar dedication But by the same reason our Churches should be as well the most splendid as the most ample Buildings especially there being no danger of infecting these walls of stone with either the sense of Pride or any other uncomely Passion But suppose that these pretended living Stones of the Temple of God were as unexcitable to Pride or Lust as the dead Stones of the walls of a Church though this extreme glory and pomp and excessfull affluency of the World might doe them no hurt as to their Manners yet I believe they would profess they found little good in it unless it were in being Treasurers for the Poor which would be something a Secular employment or in giving testimony to the World that Christian Happiness consists not in these things which yet the World would not think them serious in unless they did actually quit them And for the external pomp and splendidness of their own Persons it is credible they would declare that if the Houses of God I mean the external Churches were at least decently if not in some case gloriously adorned their eyes could better view that and with more pleasure then any Imperial Ornaments on their own head and back which they could not well see without the help of Looking-glasses This would be a greater pleasure to them as also to see no poor but such as were wholesomely and handsomely apparrell'd not so squalidly and forlornly that they appear as ungratefull Eye-sores in Providence But to make rich Miters and costly Habiliments for a S. Peter or S. Paul were not indeed to make a Coat for the Moon but which is as ridiculous to make a golden Cope for the Sun as if his native splendour did not out-shine all such artificial Ornaments The gorgeousness of Apparrel may make the person that wears it to be gazed or stared upon but unspotted Holiness and Vertue will make the possessour thereof truely reverenced and adored 10. This excessive Grandeur therefore in the Governours of the Church though they were as holy as the Apostles themselves would not seem necessary nor requisite nor it may be at all desirable But as for those that are not of such an Apostolical Spirit as the generality of the world are not or rather very few are that of S. John having continued true in all ages in a manner 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The whole world lies soaked in wickedness in these this glorious setting out 1 John 5. 19. this fair and glittering Morning will assuredly very suddenly prove a foul Day There being therefore such Temporal prizes to be aimed at such several sorts and degrees of Dignities to the very top of the highest Sovereignry over the world all mens spirits will be inflamed with the desire and pursuit of what lies so temptingly in their view and that hellish fire of Ambition will be the very life and soul of the Church all her activity and motion deriving it self from that hatefull Principle Whence it will follow that nothing but the name of Spirituality will be left the minds of the Clergie being totally drawn off from meditating what is true holy and edifying and quite drown'd and immerst in the affairs of the world For such are also Ecclesiastick Preferments when they are sought
after to satisfie the lust of the eyes the lust of the flesh and the pride of life 11. Nor will this mischief stop here I mean in the neglect of Holy and Divine Meditation and of either usefull or generous Enquiries after Truth but every one being exalted in the conceit and apprehension of his own place and dignity especially he whose Superiority is so vast as to pretend to be the Universal Bishop of Christendom and higher then all the Kings of the Earth they will be driven on so far with that furious spirit of Ambition that they will not onely neglect but oppose every thing that is sacred and holy if it stand in competition with any devised method of getting in Riches to the Church that they may Lord it and carry it out bravely every man in his respective Office and Dignity Wherefore the genuine Simplicity of Christian Religion shall be corrupted and adulterated and Laws and Articles devised by this Infallible Priesthood that are point-blank against the Laws of Christ and the immutable Rules of sound Reason The ears of all men will be filled with deceitfull Figments and gainfull Lies such as we have already produced many Instances of the Merits of Christ's Passion vilified and maimed Truth and Justice banished persecuted and oppressed the Old and New Testament made but a dumb and dead letter that has no sense nor information in it but all Dictates must be immediate from the Church that is resolved to dictate nothing that is against her worldly advantage that is to say The two Witnesses must be slain and their carcasses lie breathless in the streets otherwise those that dwell on the Earth not those that Apoc. 〈◊〉 are redeemed from the Earth and have their conversation in Heaven will not be able to rejoyce in such a measure and to send gifts to one another that is mutually support and promote one anothers Interest and merrily share the World amongst themselves 12. It is plain therefore that such a Luciferian Polity as this would of its own nature clash with the Kingdom of Christ and totally defeat that Grand design of the Gospel which is the Renewing of the World in true Righteousness and Holiness For thus even those which should be the Salt of the Earth will of all men become the most unsavoury every mans judgment being bribed by either the present possession or earnest expectation of such vast and extravagant Preferments of which there being so many degrees the minds of the ambitious will find no rest till they come to the highest that is possible and therefore will be necessarily entangled and taken up with worldly projects even as long as they live and that with great vehemence and sollicitude the Objects seeming so great and making so glaring a show in their phancies And Ambition and Pomp in all ranks rendring them indigent of Money no inferiour Candidate can attempt the corrupting of the Superiour Authority without success and every one betime will get as much of Church-preferment as he can to be able to buy more Wherefore by Law or Dispensation men shall be inabled to hold not onely many Benefices but Bishopricks besides other Dignities in the Church by which means no Shepherd will be able to attend his own flock but instead of feeding them with wholesome Doctrine will help the Devil to infuse the worst poison that can be conveyed into mens minds namely That the whole business of Religion is but a device to enrich the Priest Thus necessarily and unavoidably by their absence and silence will they preach and inculcate Atheism and Infidelity into their scandalized Clergie For if the Salt it self become thus unsavoury what better can become of that which it is to season Will not Leudness and Irreligion overflow all 13. To be short All mens minds upon the reckoning being inflamed with Pride and Ambition and no mans Ambition being to be served without mony the Temple of God will as in times past be filled with buyers and sellers and the Church become a very Mart or Fair the Ecclesiastick Polity a City of Merchan dises and every particular Church a Merchant's Ship or Vessel of Traffick amidst the populosity of the World which the Prophetick style resembles to many waters But I will harp no longer on this string I have already made a Description full enough of such a Constitution or Frame of the Church as would in an universal manner oppose or disappoint the planting or growth of the Divine Life whereby it does sufficiently shew it self to be extremely Antichristian CHAP. VIII 1. That such a Frame of things as naturally tends to the extinguishing of Faith is highly Antichristian 2. That A trade of Worldliness in the Spiritual Guides is one part of this Frame 3. And a Self-ended policy in all the Doctrines and Practices of this Church another 4. Thirdly The profession of uncertainty and obscurity in the Christian Faith 5. Fourthly The necessity of being in a Church where there is no Interruption by misordination 6. Fifthly The bearing men down that Dissent in any thing takes away certainty in all things 7 12. Sixthly Lying Miracles 13 16. Seventhly A rabble of incredible Reliques 17. Eighthly Transsubstantiation 18. How naturally it super-induces Atheism 19. What a bundle of Impossibilities it is 20. That the pretended Infallibility of the Church is infinitely too light to weigh against it 21. Nor can it be made credible by the countenance of feigned Miracles 22. Several Characters of them that are excluded the Holy City comprized in this present Limb of Antichristianism 1. WE will now proceed to those main parts of the Divine Life the Root and the Branches Where it is obvious to take notice that what deads the Root whereby the whole Tree must necessarily wither cannot but be Antichristian to the highest pitch Wherefore if I describe such a management of Affairs in the Church as naturally tends to the extinguishing of Faith which is the necessary Root of the other Divine Graces no man will doubt but that I have delineated a very considerable Limb of Antichristianism 2. Of which the first point is what we last of all touched upon Such a Frame of Government and such sublimities of Dignities as would lapse the Church and immerse it into the World and thereby make them that should be the Salt of the Earth an unsavoury masse and of a secular dead insipid spirit relishing nothing of the Kingdom of God but wholy taken up with the Profits and Promotions of this present life For they would thereby look so like Unbelievers themselves that they would stagger the faith of all those under them and make them think that there was nothing to be expected after this life because their Leaders and Guides lived so exactly according to that Principle That there is nothing to be expected hereafter 3. Secondly The Exquisiteness of their Order and Policy in managing the affairs of their Ecclesiastick Empire if it did surpass all
for the more undeniably convincing the guilty and for the clearing the innocent from all such unjust Aspersions The End of the First Part. SYNOPSIS PROPHETICA OR THE SECOND PART OF THE ENQUIRY INTO The Mystery of Iniquity CONTAINING A Compendious Prospect into those PROPHECIES of the Holy Scripture wherein The Reign of Antichrist or The notorious Lapse or Degeneracy of the Church in all those Points comprised in The Idea of Antichristianism is prefigured or foretold Theognis 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 DANIEL 4. This matter is by the decree of the Watchers and the demand by the word of the Holy ones LONDON Printed by James Flesher for William Morden Book-seller in Cambridge M DC LXIV The PREFACE to the Reader READER I Am not ignorant under what manifold Prejudice The main Prejudices against this present Discourse this Performance I present thee with may lie it being a Treatise wholy spent upon the Interpretation of Prophecies and chiefly of Daniel and the Apocalyps For it is over-true that some men look upon such Attempts as very vain and frivolous having concluded with themselves aforehand that all Prophecies are inextricable Aenigms and Riddles utterly uncapable of any certain Solution Others whose Exception were more material if it were true have a conceit that the searching into Prophecies especially those of the Apocalyps and of Daniel tends to nothing else but Faction and Confusion to the trouble and dissettlement of the affairs of Christendome and to the hazard of the subversion of States and Kingdoms and the ruine and destruction of the Church of Christ. And haply there may be others who though they neither deem the obscurity of these Prophecies invincible nor the search into them dangerous nay rather of good use and great consequence yet are so well satisfied already concerning these things by those worthily-magnified Elucubrations of Mr Joseph Mede that they may in all likelihood judge any new Essays herein needless and superfluous With these three grand Prejudices I phansy my self incumbred in regard of the Nature of the Subject I write of besides what particular Exceptions men may be prone to make against any parts of the Performance it self But I do not despair of more then fully quitting my self of them all 2. For as touching the first I think there is no man that has the That the Divine Prophecies are not invincibly obscure and that it smells of Blasphemie and Prophaneness to pronounce them so fear of God before his eyes but he would be ashamed to stand to any such Assertion it verging so near upon Prophaneness and Impiety nay upon open Blasphemie against the Spirit of God as if he dictated such things to the holy Prophets as are not sense nor ever to be understood by any reader of them Can there be any thing more Scoptical against Divine Inspiration then this or more undermining the very foundations of Christian Religion But we need not labour very solicitously in confuting an Errour so universally condemned by all parties that are any thing serious in their Religion For the obscurest Books of Prophecy I mean those of the Apocalyps and Daniel are commented upon by Papists Protestants and Neuters whereby they have all set to their hands that the Visions are intelligible But whatsoever Obscurity there may be in them I think my present pains ought to be the more acceptable in that I have contributed so much to a clear and certain way of interpreting them laying down such assured Grounds and Rudiments as if a man carefully observe and find History applicable within the compass of these Laws he can no more fail of the right meaning of a Prophecy then he will of the rendring the true sense of a Latine or Greek Author keeping to the Rules of Grammar and the known Interpretations of Dictionaries Which Laws I having kept to my self so strictly and carefully I dare appeal to all the world if I have not demonstratively made out the sense of such Visions as I have undertaken to expound And for my own part I must freely profess that I found it no such hard thing to understand those Prophecies I have interpreted and am certainly persuaded that neither any such greatness of Parts nor Exuberancy of Learning as Integrity of heart and Unprejudicedness of mind is requisite to the understanding of these things For if that Spirit of life be once revived in a man he will by virtue of his Regeneration or new Birth not onely see with his eyes but feel with his hands the truth of these Mysteries None of the wicked shall understand but the wise Dan. 12. 10. shall understand namely as many as apply themselves to the search of such things who will also in the mean time be so prudent as not to prejudge what they never had yet opportunity carefully to examine 3. Now touching the second Surmise That the search into That the greater danger there is from false unskilful Interpretations of them the greater value there ought to be upon their labour that search out such as are exact and true these Prophecies of Daniel and the Apocalyps tends to nothing but tumult and sedition in Christendom it is very rashly and unskilfully spoken I do not deny but that as it is said of Philosophy that a more superficial smattering therein may hazard a mans plunge into Atheism before he be aware so a slighter inspection into these Prophecies may incline some to a Fanatical unsettledness and a dream of a Fifth Monarchy sutable to the carnal Conceitedness of their own temerarious phancy But as a more full draught of Philosophical knowledge will again wash away that Atheistical foulness out of the Soul so I doubt not but a more through search into the meaning of these Divine Predictions will make a man of a more sober mind and root out of his spirit all those vain pretences to Innovation and Schism And therefore the pains that I have spent in a more full and through scrutiny into the meaning of these Prophetick Visions may I hope at least deserve mens Pardon if not challenge their Approbation as their due Reward sith what tends so much to peace and soberness can not unrightfully seem to challenge the reward of a due Approbation from men I say then if by a more careless search there has been framed such meanings of those Prophecies as bear any danger or inconvenience with them there was the greater necessity that some or other upon a more diligent perusal should dive into the true and genuine sense of them that that Divine truth which was revealed for the good of the Church might not by any mistake tend to her detriment and ruine As certainly such a conceit of the manner of introducing a Fifth Monarchy as some have imagined and entertain'd might cause much trouble and mischief in the affairs of Christendome The Foundation of which Errour with the evil Sequels thereof the Seventh Consectary of my Joint-Exposition does
5. c. 17. Molinaeus all these were imitations of the Imperial Power and Dignity So exactly may he be said to exercise all the power of the first Beast before him And is yet still more palpably true in that he takes away all power in Ecclesiastick affairs from the Emperour and will exercise it solely himself not to adde that by virtue of this entire Ecclesiastick Power he has wrested even the Civil Power of the Empire out of the Emperour's hands in a very great measure so awful a thing has been the Pope's thunder of Excommunication And this is sufficient to make good the third Agreement of my first Parallelism 3. Having a golden Cup in her hand full of abominations and filthiness of her fornications Where Grotius upon the word Abominations 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 saith he In Viso quidem intelligendo humor foetens in re verò Dii falsi quos Graeci vocant 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and the Hebrews 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And therefore the filthiness of her Fornications is the same with the former they all signifying the Idolatry of the Roman Hierarchy And as we have already demonstrated in the foregoing Chapter that this Whore is not understood of Rome Pagan so this Circumstance amongst others agrees very naturally thereto For this Woman with her Cup in her hand implies she is the beginner not of an health but of this damnable Pollution of Idolatry and that whereas the Empire had grown chast and cold to this folly and madness through the power of the pure Gospel of Christ this Woman by this Incentive this Virus amatorium would inflame their spirits again with new lustful motions after Idols and make them goe a-whoring from their God 4. But there is something further observable in this golden Cup wherein the force of its bewitchery may consist For that it is an enchanted Cup or a Philtrum I have abundantly made good under that Title in my Prophetick Alphabet and not onely Mr. Mede but Cornelius à Lapide and Cha. 8. Sect. 2. Alcazar interpret it to that sense The latter of whom besides the filthiness of the Composition as the ashes of Toads and of mens brains hanged at the Gallows addes also Cantiones execranda verba Charms and direful words which must needs therefore be conceived to be Magical and of a miraculous power Analogical to which is that Chap. 13. concerning V. 13. 14. the Two-horned Beast that he doth great wonders even so much that he maketh fire to come down from Heaven and so deceiveth them Par. 1. Agr. 4. that dwell on the Earth by those miracles that he had power to doe in the sight of the Beast that is to say in the sight of the Empire which he seduced into Idolatry by these Miracles and so re-introduced the Image of the slain Beast by this seduction Whence it is plain That the Magick and the Miracles of the Whore and of the Two-horned Beast tended to one end the reviving of Idolatry again in the Empire according to the fourth Agreement of our first Parallelism 5. But one chief Charm that was used over this Magical Cup undoubtedly are those powerful and affrightful words of Excommunication that Menace of committing men to Hell-fire if they did not submit to these Idolatrous Institutes of the Church This Thunder from that Roman Vejovis did not sowre but sweeten this Cup and make it goe off with a great deal of pleasure it looking so like the Cup of salvation to those that drank it when it was so authoritatively and terribly declared that those that refused it should undoubtedly perish This is that main Spell that did invigorate the virtue of this Potion and made the Whore's Paramours lie more close in her bosom when they were terrified with such ineffable danger and misery that should befall them out of it Which pretended power being neither lawful nor natural but above the limits of Nature what can it be justly deemed but Magical or Diabolical And this is that very same power which is plainly and apertly figured out in those words of the 13 Chapter where the Two-horned Beast is said to make fire come down from Heaven which I have already in my Prophetick Alphabet plainly Chap. 6. Sect. 14. proved to be a very significant Iconism of Excommunication 6. And there is nothing more frequent in the mouths of all men then the Pope's Thunderbolt of which they have conceived so miraculous an effect that the people at Paris were made generally to believe that it had so blasted the Hereticks that their very faces were grown black and ugly as Devils their eyes and looks ghastly their breaths noisom and pestilent as Sir Edwin Sandys has recorded in his Europae Speculum Erasmus also runs much upon this Metaphor in his Colloquies and the Popes themselves glory in it And as if the people were not quick enough to understand the similitude without some visible Ceremonie the Pope casts down burning Fire-brands from aloft at a certain solemn Excommunication And lastly Nauclerus uses this phrase of being thus Thunder-struck three or four times within the compass of a page or two And the Popes themselves look upon them whom they have Excommunicated tanquam fulmine afflatos and so speak of them as Paraeus has also observed upon the place So that there is not room left for the least Hesitation whether Excommunication be not alluded to in that miraculous bringing down fire from Heaven 7. But whereas it is said That he deceiveth them that dwell on the Earth by reason of those Miracles which he had power to doe I must confess I think other Miracles may also be glanced at of which there is abundance boasted of by the Roman Church themselves by which they would confirm several sorts of Idolatries practised amongst them Which may be attributed as many of them as are true to the great activity and desire of their Priests to promote Idolatry who thereby invite the Devil to play such pranks at their Images or Altars or in their Coemeteries But to return to the Magick-Cup 8. We have considered the contents of it and that supernatural Magick infused into the Liquor thereof But the very Metall of the Cup which is Gold has also its significancy and bears with it a meaning of a more natural Magick that attracts all Quid non mortalia pector a cogis Auri sacra fames Wherefore that great Affluency of Riches Honours and Preferments that are to be had in the Roman Church is no small part of this intoxicating Potion 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 nay indeed has made the Inhabitants of the Earth drunk the fumes of Ambition and Covetousness possessing their Brains especially theirs of the Roman Clergie who are not enriched with these Golden gifts of the Church but upon the condition of assisting and abetting the Idolatry thereof This Cup therefore I conceive may also be an Emblem of
a Decreer of Idolatrous practices and a publisher of Doctrines of Adulterate Worship Whence the fifth Agreement of our first Parallelism is manifest both the Whore and the Two-horned Beast being found Introducers of Idolatry under pretence of promoting Christianity 6. That was the meaning of the Lamb-like Horns and Dragon's speech of the Two-horned Beast But concerning his rising up out of the Earth which is peculiar to him other Beasts being described both in Daniel and the Apocalyps to rise out of the Sea the Winds also bustling against one another on the surface thereof in those four Beasts in Daniel this discovereth this Beast to be quite of another kind getting up not by War nor by power of the Sword as the Potentates of the world doe but in a more still and concealed way and from a meaner condition Cui origo privata Apoc. 13. 11. non publica saith Grotius and he addes further Mos est Hebraeorum vocare 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 populum terrae And Molinaeus also upon the Text Sic Latini homines novos ex sordibus provectos ad nobilitatem opes vocant Terrae filios ipsáque Scriptura dicit Deum attollere humilem expulvere Which how true it is of the Whore and the Two-horned Beast every one knows CHAP. XIII Vâ—…r VI. What is meant by the Martyrs of Jesus 2. The sixth Agreement of the first Parallelism Ver. VII That the Woman is not Rome Heathen demonstrable from the Beast that carries her 2. That she rides the whole Empire 3. That the Two Horns of the Beast are the Two Imperial Patriarchates but by an Henopoeia may glance also at the Power of Binding and Loosing and at the Horns of the Episcopal Mitre 4. The seventh Agreement of the first Parallelism 5. The first Agreement of the second Ver. VIII What is meant by 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 2. That the end of the Vision of the Beast in this Chapter is to represent the Empire in that Succession wherein it is Pagano-Christian 3. That the 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 is 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 Ver. VI. ANd I saw the Woman drunk with the bloud of the Saints and with the bloud of the Martyrs of Jesus that is to say with the bloud of the Saints which were the Martyrs of Jesus Which were not Martyrs for the Doctrine of this or that seducing Spirit or false Teacher who might besot them with a foolish confidence and hardy resolution of laying down their life to witness to a Lie cunningly contriv'd for the Interest Advantage of the Inventours of it No these were the close followers of the Lamb Jesus Christ and trode in his footsteps onely and in the footsteps of them that faithfully followed him I mean the Apostles according to their own direction Be ye followers of me as I am of Christ. And him they did follow through prosperity and adversity through good report and 1 Cor. 11. 1. evil report through life and death it self 2. Whose Death is imputed here to the Whore because she by her counsel and animation stirs up the Seven-headed Beast to this Murther and Bloud-shed Accordingly as it is said of the Two-horned Beast that he gave life and animation to this revived Beast and made this breathing Image speak and cause as many as would not worship that is obey and submit to the commands of the Image of the Beast even in those things wherein it was the slain Beast's Image viz. in Idolatry that they should be killed Which is plainly the sixth Agreement of our first Parallelism Ver. VII I will tell thee the mystery of the Woman and of the Beast that carrieth her Which Mystery of the Woman he unlocks by unfolding first the order and succession of the Beast that carrieth her for that is a demonstration that it is not meant of Rome Pagan as I have clearly proved in the eleventh Chapter of this Book and consequently that the meaning of this Mystery of the Whore's Title which displays her nature is such as I have declared upon the Fifth verse in the fore-going Chapter 2. Here we shall onely note that her riding of the Beast implies her to be such a Polity as had the Governance of the whole Empire was not confined to one part thereof As he that rides an Horse is not conceived to ride one part of him and leave the other unridden but to ride the whole So the Whore rides the whole Beast that is the whole Empire as well Oriental as Occidental Which agrees with the description of the Two-horned Beast whom I conceive to be so depainted in the Vision because of the two Imperial Patriarchates the one at Rome the other at
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
〈◊〉 〈◊〉 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