wealth honour and sensual pleasures 9. This is a competent Draught of the second Limb of Antichristianism which consists In the heaping together a number of trouble some and unwarrantable Superstitious conceits and observances whereby the yoke of Christ would be made far more grievous then the dispensation of Moses yea whereby the Servitude of Christians would be little inferiour if not greater then the slavery of the Israelites in the Land of Aegypt and in that house of bondage as it is styled peculiarly in the Scripture And therefore I think this particular constitution of things which I have described may very well goe for a confiderable Member of Antichristianism BOOK II. CHAP. I. 1. The Positive Ends of the Gospel which the rest of the Limbs of Antichristianism do oppose 2. That to lay claim to a Right of Infallible Interpretation of the Laws of Christ is a supplanting of his Kingly Office 3. An instance of that danger in the Glosses of the Pharisees 4. Several places of Scripture alledged to prove the Church Infallible 5. The first general Answer to these Allegations by demanding whether the Promise of Infallibility be to the Whole Church or to Part. 6. The second by demanding whether the Promise be Absolute or Conditional 7. A third That the Promise cannot be Universal touching all Objects that may be considered 8. A particular Answer to the first place of Scripture 9. An Answer to the second and third 10. Infallibility a Promise onely to the first Founders of the Christian Church 11. What the meaning of The pillar and ground of truth 12. A further exposition of that passage of Paul to Timothy 13. That if understood of the Universal Church it may be meant onely of it in the Apostles times 14. And that the like may be said of the last allegation 1. WE have now done with those Members of Antichristianism that oppose the Privative Ends of the Gospel of Christ which were The removing of Idolatry and the Burthen of Superstition out of the world we come now to the Positive End thereof which in general is The Advancement of the Divine Life and this either Personally in Christ or by way of propagation in his Members the Church Those Divine Honours and Offices the Person of Christ is advanced to and are most obvious to take notice of are those of King Priest and Prophet the opposing or supplanting of which cannot but be so many abhorred parts of this wicked Antichristianism whose Image we are now setting out in its genuine colours 2. As concerning the first therefore of these Suppose any man or company of men under pretence of being the true Visible Church successively descending from Christ and his Apostles should take upon them to be the Infallible Interpreters of the Law of Christ and teach that all men were to embrace and to submit to their Glosses seem they never so harsh never so improbable nay if you will never so impossible and declare it a mortal sin for any to doubt of their determinations in this kind This surely were a plain opposing or utter supplanting of the Kingly Office of Christ and the quite taking away His exercise of Sovereignty which cannot otherwise be exercised then by Commands and Decrees which when a King has published if another have power to interpret them any way as he pleases the Kingly power will really be in the Interpreter and not in the King I say this pretended right and power of Infallibly interpreting does in very truth make the Interpreter King and the King a Shadow or Cypher Assuredly no Earthly Prince would think himself truly Sovereign over his people if all the Injunctions and Edicts he made were not to bear the easie natural sense which he intends them in but to be drawn to some other meaning by any exception or evasion or any forcible interpretation that some forein Potentate should put upon them Wherefore whosoever pretends a Right and Infallibility in the interpreting the Law of Christ does in effect make Christ no Law-giver and consequently no King nor Governour in his Church then which what can be more grossly Antichristian 3. Cui jus est interpretandi hujus Sententia pondus habet legis Divinae is a saying which although * In his 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Erasmus has put into the mouth of a mean person yet is a great Truth And our Saviour knew and has noted the mischievous abuse of this presumption so plainly in that instance of the Pharisees who could interpret away the force of that Command Honour thy Father and thy Mother by saying it was Corban that it is impossible he should allow of any visible Interpreter with such an unlimited Right as some contend for to the abuse of his Church and the taking his Kingly Office out of his own hands For he has there observed That the Matth. 15. 6. Pharisees had made the word of God of none effect through their Traditions that is to say through their Exceptions Qualifications and Interpretations of it 4. I but they will pretend that Christ will make his Church Infallible and if they be so he himself will really reign in them they interpreting alway according to his mind And that he has made his Church Infallible they will pretend to appear plainly out of such places of Scripture as these * Matth. 16. That the gates of Hell shall not prevail against her and again * Joh. 14. I will ask the Father and he will give you another Comforter that he may abide with you for ever even the Spirit of truth which the World cannot receive c. again * Joh. 16. When he the Spirit of truth is come he will guide you into all truth To which adde that of S. Paul to * 1 Tim. 3. 15. Timothy where he seems to call the Church the Pillar and Ground of Truth And lastly that to the * chap. 4. Ephesians where Christ is said to have given some Apostles and some Prophets and other some Evangelists and other some Pastors and Teachers for the perfecting of the Saints for the work of the Ministery for the edifying of the body of Christ till all come in the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God unto a perfect man unto the measure of the stature of the fulness of Christ That we henceforth be no more children tossed to and fro and carried about with every wind of Doctrine by the sleight of men and cunning craftiness whereby they lie in wait to deceive But speaking the truth in love may grow up into him in all things which is the Head even Christ. Let these passages then be their Letters patent their grand pretended Commission of Infallibly interpreting and never erring in any Determinations or Conclusions and we shall easily discover that it is a mere pretence 5. For I demand whether this Promise of Infallibility be to the Whole visible Church in succession or
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
Various ways of the improving this gainful persuasion 6. The unspeakable honour that seems to accrue to the Priest from this stupendious miracle 7. That it seems to give him a just claim to exemption from Civil jurisdiction and saves him the labour of endeavouring after Truth and Sanctity 8. That their Pretences for Idolatry though they be weak yet their Self-ends therein are palpable 51 CHAP. XVI 1. That Idolatry is the highest and most peculiar injury that can be committed against God 2. That giving Religious honour to Saints or Angels is really a reproaching them and blaspheming them 3. The exceeding great Mischief done to the Soul of man by Idolatry 4. That Idolatry turns men into bloudy Wolves and Bears 5. And is the Mother and Nurse of the foulest impurities 6. That it is the source of all manner of wickedness and eternal death to the Idolater 7. The great Mischiefs it doth to the Church of Christ. 8. How the Church is lessened by Idolatry at home 9. And the spreading thereof hindred abroad 10. And consequently the whole World injured thereby 55 CHAP. XVII 1. That a multitude of slight Observances may amount to an intolerable burthen 2. That no Religious observance can be slight while it has an obligation upon the Conscience 3. Though this general estimate of the burthen of Superstition from obligation of Conscience and multitude of Observances might suffice yet he will adde a more particular Draught of this Limme of Antichristianism 4. Of Anointings and of the Multiplicity of Sacerdotal Ornaments 5. The pretence and Self-endedness in these Ornaments and Anointings 6. The Mischief arising from these kind of Ceremonies to Priest and People 7. A more full description of their publick Service 8. That respect to the Priest is better sought and more certainly found in the Power of Life and Doctrine then in any Histrionical Pomp 9. Which is so unsatisfactory to the serious that it may hazard their departure 10. The Opinion of a miraculous power in Religious Vestments 11. The Falseness and Fraud of this Opinion 12. The ill consequence thereof 59 CHAP. XVIII 1. Of the Enchanting or Exorcizing of Water Oil Salt Wax-candles c. with a general intimation of the Mischief thereof 2. Of the Exorcizing of a Golden Rose and Lamb of Wax 3. That the using of the Name of the true God in these Exorcisms does not hinder but that they may be properly termed Enchantments 4. Other Instances of their being Charmers and Magicians With an Anticipation of an Objection 5. The Falshood Fraud and Mischief of these Exorcisms 6. The derivation or distribution of these Exorcized Elements into several Superstitious uses 7. Of the supposal of the Infant 's being possess'd and of Baptismal Spittle 8. Of Extreme Unction and other Superstitious practices upon the dying man 9. As also upon his Corps laid out 10. The Fraud and Mischief of these practices .. 65 CHAP. XIX 1. The burthen of Spiritual Cognation and excessive Numerosity of Holy-days 2. Perpetual abstinence from Flesh in some Religious Orders The Fraud and Mischief thereof 3. The burthen of vowed Coelibate 4. The more dangerous purposes thereof 5. The ordinary services done by the Monasticks to this Antichristian power we describe 6. That its establishment is much corroborated by the Interest of Monasteries 7. And enriched by being Heir to all professours of Coelibate 8. The great Mischiefs of Coelibate 9. Of Flagellation 10. The ineffectualness thereof Hypocrisie of the Penitent salvage Pride of his Church and the Mischiefs resulting therefrom 11. Of Pilgrimages and Jubilees 12. An enumeration of several other Antichristian Austerities 70 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 75 CHAP. XXI 1. Of the necessity of Anniversary Confession 2. Of Sacerdotal Absolution 3. What is meant by Binding and Loosing and to what manner of persons Remission of sins is committed 4. Erasmus his gloss upon that Text of S. John 5. As also Hugo Grotius his whence Auricular Confession and Absolution prove groundless 6. A voluntary Confession and in general useful in the Church in some circumstances and in order to particular Absolution from the Priest 7. As also a more particular Confession if voluntary 8. The Self-ends of this Church in exacting so punctual a Confession from men 9 10. The slavery and Mischief of such kind of Confessions 11. The infinite vexation to the consciencious and ingenuous from the obtruding upon them incredible and impossible Opinions 78 CHAP. XXII 1. The dreadful Figment of Purgatory 2. That by this affrightful Fable the whole Moles of Superstition hitherto described is made infinitely more weighty and burthensome 3. The Antichristian Doctrine of Christ his Satisfaction reaching onely to the freeing us from the Guilt of sin not the Punishment 4. The multifarious drudgery and slavery this Doctrine and that Figment of Purgatory casts men into 5. A confutation of the said Doctrine and Figment 6. That it is impossible that the sincerely-minded in this life should find either Hell or Purgatory in the other 7. That there is no ground for this Antichristian Purgatory in either Scripture or Fathers 8 The gross Fraud and grand Mischief of this Fiction 9. The conclusion of the description of this second Limme of Antichristianism 82 BOOK II. CHAP. I. 1. The Positive Ends of the Gospel which the rest of the Limms of Antichristianism do oppose 2. That to lay claim to a Right of Infallible Interpretation of the Laws of Christ is a supplanting of his Kingly Office 3. An instance of that danger in the Glosses of the Pharisees 4. Several places of Scripture alledged to prove the Church Infallible 5. The first general Answer to these Allegations by demanding whether the Promise of Infallibility be to the Whole Church or to Part. 6. The second by demanding whether the Promise be Absolute or Conditional 7. A third That the Promise cannot be Universal touching all Objects that may be considered 8. A particular Answer to the first place of Scripture 9. An Answer to the second and third 10. Infallibility a Promise onely to the first Founders of the Christian Church 11. What the meaning of The pillar and ground of truth 12. A farther exposition of that passage of Paul to Timothy 13. That if understood of the Universal Church it may be meant onely of it in the Apostles times 14. And that the like may be said of the last Allegation 87 CHAP. II. 1. That the safe conveyance of the Apostolick Writings down to us by the Church does not infer her Infallibility 2. That the Plainness of Scripture in points necessary to Salvation takes away the want of an Infallible Judge 3. That the Scripture not pointing to
signifie certain performance but the duty what they ought to perform As when the Apostles are called the Light of the world and the Matth. 5. 13 14. Salt of the earth which onely signifies what they ought to be not what they were necessitated to be For those that ought to be thus may notwithstanding hide their Talent or grow unsavoury through their own fault as it fared in Judas and in all his succession of false Apostles which call themselves the Servants but are the betrayers of the Lord Jesus 13. But lastly Suppose that the Church then in general were here understood it does not follow That because that Primaeval and Apostolical Church should by a peremptory design of Providence have engraven upon it or exhibit to the world as Articles of belief nothing but what was true that the Church in succession should always doe the like For there was a prime care taken that the first establishment of the Church should be in truth and solidity but that being done which was sufficient for the after-carrying on the affairs of the Church in a right way by free Agents the success should afterwards lie upon their industry and fidelity at least so far as that by no miraculous and supernatural force they should be assisted or driven on to keep things pure and intemerate And that was sufficient for the Church I think which is thought sufficient for every particular man namely That the Christian Doctrines and Precepts being faithfully laid down in the Evangelists and other Writings of the Apostles they might that usual Grace of God which is not irresistible assisting them frame their lives and beliefs accordingly in those things that are plain And all are so that are necessary to Salvation Which Rule if it had been kept to no Error had crept into the Church to this very day 14. Which last Answer will contribute something towards an Answer to the last place alledged for it seems onely to contain a description of a special provision of God for the rightly settling his Truth in the first Ages of the Church To which purpose he appointed not onely Pastours and Teachers which Functions continue still but Apostles having a particular mission from Christ himself who breathed into them the Spirit of Truth as also Prophets and Evangelists men in a special manner inspired and assisted to erect the Fabrick of the Church according to the will and purpose of Christ who then in an extraordinary manner did supervise all by a miraculous assistence of his Spirit And therefore what-ever was wrote for the publick use of the Church while any of those unto whom our Saviour Christ said that the Spirit should abide with them for ever which should lead them into all Truth were alive or was approved by them is really of certain and infallible authority but what-ever after-Inventions or Super-additions there were in the Church they are to be measured by this unerring Rule These unerring Pastors therefore and Teachers Apostles Prophets Evangelists were not a promise to all Successions but an extraordinary gift as the Text it self imports which Christ at that time namely at his solemn Coronation or Triumph ascending above all Heavens that he Eph. 4. 10. might fill all things cast down as a Royal Largess upon his Church for the speedy completement of her for her growing up into the unity of the Faith and Knowledge of Christ and that she might not be carried about with every wind of Doctrine but adhere to that onely that was delivered by those Heavenly-inspired and miraculously-assisted Ministers of the Gospel The acknowledgement whereof I conceive had been the onely sure means to keep the Church in Unity for ever whenas the pretending to an Infallibility in the succeeding Church where indeed it was not and the taking upon them thereupon to impose things with equal authority to the Apostles themselves would naturally prove the fountain of all Error Schism and Confusion CHAP. II. 1. That the safe conveyance of the Apostolick Writings down to us by the Church does not infer her Infallibility 2. That the Plainness of Scripture in points necessary to Salvation takes away the want of an Infallible Judge 3. That the Scripture not pointing to any Infallible Judge nor any faithful Keeper of Traditions does ipso facto declare her self the onely sufficient Guide 4. That there is not onely no want of an Infallible Judge but better there should be none 5. That the want of Infallibility does not take away the Authority of the Church it being the duty of every person in things really disputable to compromise with her 6. That though a Visible Judge be necessary in Civil causes yet it is nothing so in Points of Religion 7. That every private man has not onely a liberty but a command to judge for himself in matters of Faith 8. The said Right or Privilege demonstrated also by Reason 9. That the Reason or Judgment of every private man is not a private Spirit in that reproachful sense that some speak it 10. That the claim to a right of judging for ones self in points of Faith does not make a man superiour to his Church 11. Nor yet equal 12. Nor implies that he thinks himself wiser then his Church but rather more careful of his own eternal Concerns 13. That it is not his private Wisdom he sticks to but the Wisdom of God known to all that are not wilfully blind 14. That the Church is not Infallible proved from the Example of the Jewish Church 15. That there is the same reason of the Christian. 16. That the want of an Infallible Interpreter is no such loss to the common people 17. That their assurance of the truth of the Scriptures by the Spirit is a Tenet not so superciliously to be exploded as some make shew of 18. That this Spirit is properly the Spirit of Faith distinguishable from that of Knowledge and Wisdom 19. The notorious Fraud and excessive Mischief of this pretence of Infallibility 1. BUT being worsted thus in Scripture they will pretend Demonstrations in Reason upon the presumption they are the true visible Church successively descended from Christ and his Apostles that Infallibility is for ever intailed upon them As first That unless the Church were successively Infallible we could have no certain and Infallible belief of the Holy Scriptures which are avouched to be such by the Church But I briefly answer That supposing this successive Church were a trusty undoubted Conveyer of the Copies of the Holy Scriptures uncorrupted yet it doth not follow that they must be Infallible Interpreters of these Scriptures no more then the faithful conveyance of Plato's and Aristotle's Writings to all posterity implies that the Conveyers thereof are Infallible Interpreters of them For they might preserve the Writings of either by a diligent comparing of Copies upon every transcription besides that there might be a special watchfulness of Providence over these Holy Writings for the conservation of
Christ is the rescinding so many Souls from the body of the Church as are persuaded to entertain it Whence it is manifest that Idolatry is as it were a Gangrene in the body of Christ and eats so much away from it as it seizes upon 9. But this is not the sole Mischief of this kind done to the Church by Idolatry viz. The streightning the extent thereof by the divulsion of those that were her true members but as considerable as this is The prevention or hinderance from making them members that otherwise might be persuaded thereto For it is very visible that letting in of Idolatry into the Church of Christ will for ever while it there continues exclude both Jew and Turk out of it who are deservedly so great abhorrers of Idolatry To say nothing of the Idolatrous Heathens themselves to whom it would be ridiculous to preach as the Apostles did to turn from dumb Idols to serve the living God whenas they might easily see aforehand that it would be but the turning from their wonted Idols to the serving of new ones It is a fearfull thing therefore to profess the Church Catholick and yet by introduction of Idolatry to streighten it at home and hinder the propagation of it abroad by such horrible Scandals 10. Which is not only a Mischief to the Church herself in curbing her growth and eclipsing her glory but a sad disaster to the whole World which is the the last evil issuing therefrom it being to them the most certain pledge of everlasting happiness to become members of the Catholick Church of Christ of which there is little hope in either Jew Turk or Heathen that are consciencious while this stumbling-block is in their way and that they cannot profess Christianity without the allowance and practice of Idolatry Which in my apprehension ought to be reputed a very sad calamity upon Earth Thus we have seen a competent Description of the First main Limb of Antichristianism namely Idolatry brought into the Church of Christ under pretence of honour to him and the Saints with a discovery of the Falseness and Unwarrantableness of that Doctrine and Practice and the gross Fraud and grand Mischiefs that accompany it CHAP. XVII 1. That a multitude of slight Observances may amount to an intolerable burthen 2. That no Religious observance can be slight while it has an obligation upon the Conscience 3. Though this general estimate of the burthen of Superstition from obligation of Conscience and multitude of Observances might suffice yet he will adde a more particular Draught of this Limb of Antichristianism 4. Of Anointings and of the Multiplicity of Sacerdotal Ornaments 5. The pretence and Self-endedness in these Ornaments and Anointings 6. The Mischief arising from these kind of Ceremonies to Priest and People 7. A more full description of their Publick Service 8. That respect to the Priest is better sought and more certainly found in the Power of Life and Doctrine then in any Histrionical Pomp 9. Which is so unsatisfactory to the serious that it may hazzard their departure 10. The Opinion of a miraculous power in religious Vestments 11. The Falseness and Fraud of this Opinion 12. The ill consequence thereof 1. THE next Limb of Antichristianism is The burthening and entangling mens minds with Scrupulosities in either unnecessary or hurtfull Observances and Opinions laying an equal or greater yoke on Believers by reason of the Multitude of these Rites and Superstitious conceits then Judaism it self did upon the people of the Jews and thereby frustrating that End of Christ's coming which was To put a period to such burthen some and unprofitable Ordinances and to conciliate to himself a Church that should worship the Father in Spirit and in Truth Which Burthensomness as I have already intimated may arise merely from the multitude of these Ceremonies though the things may seem slight considered singly and in themselves as Feathers that are singly light may by their number grow heavier then a masse of Lead And what a man may sometime doe out of Idleness or wantonness to wit stoop to take up a straw or to divide clay or dirt into Squares or Oblongs yet to be kept close to this task how little different is it from that vile Aegyptian bondage of being condemned to the perpetual making of bricks or gathering of stubble 2. Besides that every toy to which there is once a Religious obligation girds hard with those that are serious and consciencious And such followers Christ expects and therefore neither he nor his Apostles would burthen them with any thing but what was necessary But we are exhorted rather to stand fast in that liberty wherewith Christ has Gal. 5. 1. made us free and not to suffer our selves to be brought under the bondage of any servile and unprofitable burthens of Superstition And our Saviour Christ rebuking the Pharisees tells them plainly that they worshipped God in vain while they taught for Doctrines the commandments Mark 7. of men Forasmuch as laying aside the Commandments of God they held the Traditions of men as the washing of pots and cups and brazen vessels and the like Wherefore if our Saviour Christ was so tender in the behalf of his Disciples that he would not have them superstitiously ensnared no not in so commendable and easy an observance as the washing of the hands ever before they did eat certainly it is utterly against his mind to have his followers intangled and enthralled in an innumerable multitude of less usefull Ceremonies Which be their natures what they will yet if by their numerosity they equallize the burthen of the Judaical Rites this general estimate is sufficient to discover it to be no inconsiderable Limb of Antichristianism in what Church soever such an enormity shall appear 3. Which I speak not as if I found it beyond my skill to pourtray this Limb of Antichristianism more articulately with stronger sinews and more full and solid muscles Such a draught therefore of Ritual Ordinances and Dogmatical Observances I will now draw as I dare appeal to any indifferent judge whether it will not prove an eminent part of that Mystery that opposes and defeats the purposed Ends of the coming of Christ into the world which assuredly were to free his followers from Sin and Superstitious slavery 4. And truly observing how tender and carefull our Saviour is in keeping off the least taint of Superstition from his Disciples about washings and eatings of meat and how expresly he affirms to them in that excellent parable That nothing that enters into a man defiles the man it will be Mark 7. easy thence to infer that much less any thing that hangs upon him or is about him can Sanctifie or make him holy Whence in the first place though I do not lay the greatest stress on it If we should suppose the Christian Priests to heap to themselves several sorts of Consecrated Garments for greater Ornament and Sanctimonie insomuch that every Priest's
is not for the Remission of Punishment but of Guilt and that he that would goe to Heaven must travel thither upon his own proper cost and charges must satisfie in his own person for his faults and corruptions in such ways as this adulterous Church has prescribed Which is no method of freeing Souls from the pains of Purgatory but of the inslaving them as I have said to a worse then Aegyptian bondage and condemning them to gather stubble and make bricks to work and drudge to hold up the wealth and magnificency of this imperious Pharaoh and his cruell Task-masters Which is a Servitude as abominable and Antichristian as can be invented or imagined For it does absolutely change the condition and nature of Christian Religion then which there is nothing more free and ingenuous and more professedly opposed to the yoke of the Mosaical Law into a poor pitifull ignorant and servile Pedagogie and makes it not only exceed the burthen of Moses but which I cannot too often inculcate the very bondage of Aegypt it self 5. But though this Figment of Purgatory would be a very profitable invention for the increasing of the wealth and power of this Pseudo-Clergie and bring vast revenues to their Church there being a like fear of it and desire to be rid of it in Princes and Peasants in Gentle and simple yet it cannot be denied by any but such as are past shame but that it is a mere Figment and has no grounds of truth at all in it nay is contrary to what is most certainly true For it is assuredly true and any good Christian may feel it to be so that Christ has satisfied as well in respect of Punishment as Guilt and it is perfect Non-sense that the sincerely-minded should be justified by the merits of Christ's Passion and the excellencie of his Person he being that innocent Lamb of God that takes away the sins of the world that is to say in a Forensal sense be esteemed as Just and yet be handled or treated as Sinners For it is as if a man should be acquitted and yet punished for the same crime at the same Court then which nothing is more foolish or incongruous Wherefore it is manifest that there can no external punishment abide the Sincere soul after this life for I cannot pronounce any thing in the behalf of the unsincere but that Hell it self is their portion no fire no whips of Furies or Devils to afflict them no infernal Bailifs or horrid Pursivants of Purgatory to arrest them but they may pass free through all guards and scouts of the invisible Regions and not one dare to offer to molest them 6. And that he that was sincere-hearted in this life and did not onely believe in Christ but to the best of his power and skill followed his Precepts and had a real enmity against all the appearances of sin whensoever they assaulted him nor could be overtaken or overcome by the importunity of his Body without sorrow regret or indignation that this man should carry in himself any tormenting Hell or Purgatory in his freedom from the body is a thing impossible and unconceivable For he being freed from that with which he was so often forced to tugg and in the midst of his greatest conflicts his life being comfortable to him through the sense of his own sincerity and through the assurance of the Love of God in Christ Jesus what can Death be to such a man but Life from the dead He that in patience can possess his soul in a prison cannot fail to enjoy himself in the fresh aire and he that can walk upright in fetters may easily if he will dance for joy when he is out of them So little fear is there of any such Mormo's or Bug-bears to the sincere Christian when he has passed out of this mortal life 7. Some pretence indeed they may have for Purgatory from that passage in S. Paul If any mans work be burnt he shall suffer loss but himself 1 Cor. 3. 1â—… shall be saved but yet so as by fire which is the only place in Scripture which makes any show for them But yet if it were meant of a Purgatory-fire after this life it will not at all serve their purpose as neither those several passages of the Fathers do which seem to make this way which would be too prolix a business to enter into But the interpretation which Scaliger and Hugo Grotius give of the place is so genuine and natural and so little inferring any such Purgatory-fire that this ground will prove very lubricous to the builders upon it For 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Scaliger and Grotius expound thus That he shall escape but so as out of the hot fire it being nothing but a proverbial expression signifying the great danger he will be in 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 est preverbiale ad significationem summi periculi So that the sense is nothing but this He will hardly escape the dreadfull judgment of God As for Origen's 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and the like expressions of the Fathers they will never establish such a Purgatory as these Masters of mischief would erect in the Universe who make sure that no man may doe any thing meritorious in this condition nor make any progress in grace and holiness for all the very Fire is called Purgative For this would beat down the price of Pardons and Indulgences make men careless of hiring Masses for the dead and take away all that costly sollicitude from friends for their deceased kindred if they were conceived to be in a capacity by their own demeanour and carefull management of their affairs in the other world to wind themselves out of trouble 8. But how weak soever their Proofs were for Purgatory their Motives thereto would be very strong this Figment making all the rest of their Frauds take more certain effect with men they being hereby affrighted into a facil and foolish good humour of parting with any thing even to the impoverishing of themselves and their posterity so that those may be satisfied who pretend they have the Keys of this prison of Purgatory and may be persuaded either to excuse them from ever entering into it or if they must enter into it to deliver them out of it as timely and speedily as may be But the grand Mischief of this cheating Invention is a blasphemous affront to the Merits and Satisfaction of our dear Saviour and a Tyrannicall oppression of the consciences of the simple but so great a scandal to the more nasute that it were a strong temptation to them to misbelieve the whole summe of Religion or any state at all of the Soul after death but that she is mortal and perishes these false Apostles having abused the belief of the Doctrine of her survival after the death of the Body so grossely and rancidly merely to the advancing their own estates in this life and to the wallowing in
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
God to have interpreted the Scripture and not for their own ends or carnal satisfaction in any thing And questionless in this case they can shew their Commission and that they act by Authority Let all things be done to edification 1 Cor. 14. 26. But that because every Civil controversy must be determined by a Judge therefore there must be an Infallible determinative Judge of all the nice and unprofitable controversies that emerge amongst Christians about Scripture and Religion is but a weak and lame Illation For Civil controversies cannot be undecided without injury to some party but no man is injured by not having those unprofitable at least unnecessary questions determined for they may hold their several opinions without wronging one another if they will but keep to that known Law of Christ that Royal Law of Charity Nay the deciding such controversies by a pretended Infallible Judge were a vast wrong to one party it galling their consciences and streightning their liberty and making the way to Heaven narrower then Christ has made it For so does this Infallible Judge that imposes his Determinations on men upon pain of eternal Damnation But God of his infinite wisedom and mercy has not given the least Intimation for any such Usurpation And therefore this Infallible Judge being not appointed by God and being unappointable by man the Scripture alone and not these pretended Infallible decisions must be the Rule of our belief 7. The fourth and last pretence is That unless the Sense of Scripture be determined by the Infallibility of the Church every private Spirit must be Judge of the meaning thereof nay and which is worse be Judge of the Church and thereby superiour to the Church then which nothing can be more wild and extravagant This seems a big difficulty at first But I answer That every particular man should judge for himself he has a Commission from the very Word of God nay I may say a Command As where he is bid to try 1 Thess. 5. 21. all things and to hold that which is good as also not to believe every 1 John 〈◊〉 spirit but to trie the spirits whether they be of God and in another place to be ready to give a reason of his Faith The Beroeans also are commended 1 Pet. 3. Acts 17. for searching the Scripture and trying whether the things that Paul even an inspired and chosen vessel of God had taught them were true or no. But for any one man or any company of men to be appointed by God Authoritatively and absolutely to be Judges for others in matters of Faith and Religion we do not find any where in Scripture or in Reason any such Commission given unto them but we are rather admonished to take heed how we be led hoodwinkt by any lest the blind Matt. 15. 14. leading the blind both fall into the ditch 8. But not Scripture onely but Reason it self does plainly commissionate private Spirits as they call them to judge for themselves For these pretenders to Infallibility doe it onely upon the boast that they are the true successive Church from the Apostles But unless they will be above all measure ridiculous they must convince the Reason of him whom they would make a Proselyte to their Church that their Church is that true and Apostolical one For to say so without proof is a madness to be hooted at by all men But to goe about to prove it is to appeal to the private Reason of him they would convince And if he be a Christian already though not of their Church the common acknowledged Principles are the Holy Scriptures in arguing from which the Disputant appeals to him he would bring over if his Interpretation or Allegation of them be not true But if he be an Infidel or Pagan he is to use Reasons to prove the Truth and Authority of the Scriptures themselves Which is still an appeal to the conscience of him that is to be gained to the Church whether what is offered to him be true or false And that which is offered to him being the whole Christian Faith for that is it which makes a true Church it is plain that his Reason and Conscience is appealed unto whether the whole Summe of the Credenda in Christianity is not true That is to say Though the Church and he that argues in the behalf of the Church have already judged and firmly concluded that the Christian Faith is a true Faith in the whole and in every part and make no appeal from their own judgment in reference to themselves yet in reference to the party they would convince they appeal to him if the grounds of their Belief be not solid and so imply and acknowledge that he is Judge for himself in these affairs call that in him a private spirit or what you please 9. But I do not know but it may be too reproachfully called a private spirit at least in the sincere and simple-hearted who have no private designs but to know the Will of God and to doe it and it is the Will of God all men should doe so and the spirit of man * Prov. 20. is said to be the Lamp of the Lord and that which judges according to the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the common notions of Reason in all men and has not lost the * Psell. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 those common characters and ingenuous sentiments of Indispensable Truth and Morality which the Father of lights has of old sealed upon the Soul and which are hardly obliterated quite in any and are necessarily continued and that vigourously in the sincere I say such a Life or Spirit as this judging in a man is very hardly to be called a private spirit it judging according to the Universal sense of humane Nature and so as every one judges when he is unbiassed Nay if this will not serve I say that the Judgement which is thus made is the Judgement of that Universal King and Law-giver the Eternal Son of God it is his sentence in these cases but writ in the tables of our hearts and pronounced by our mouths as by the Praeco of a Court. So far is it from being the Judgement of a mere private spirit But that rather is the Judgement of a private spirit though it should bear the Title of an Infallible Church which is decreed not according to the plain Texts of Scripture so as all unprejudiced men would certainly understand them nor according to those indeleble Characters of Truth which Christ the Eternal Logos has writ in the Rational Souls of all mankind but according to partial Interest and depraved desires The sentence of Thousands nay of Millions of such Judges is more the verdict of a private spirit then the Judgement of the meanest private man that pronounces from such Principles as I have declared 10. Now for that odious imputation of making a mans self Superiour to the
Church by laying claim to a Judgement of discretion I say he lays claim to no more then is of necessity given him as I have already demonstrated For if there be an appeal to the Reason and Conscience of a private man in the endeavouring to convince him he is ipso facto made Judge and if to be Judge in this sense is to be Superiour he is necessarily Superiour But I see no necessity that his being Judge thus for himself makes him Superiour to his Church Indeed if he judged for his Church he were thereby their Superiour but judging for himself onely he usurps no Superiority over the Church but onely is obedient to him that is Superiour to both that is to Jesus Christ following his plain Injunctions and Precepts whether written in the outward Word or legibly engraven upon the Table of his Heart To follow therefore the plain and inevitable dictates of his own Conscience which as the Tribunal of God is not to exalt a mans self above the Church but to submit a mans self to God and exalt him above all 11. Nor does a man herein equallize himself to his Church in that he does not define for others but for himself and professes himself in the mean time ready to obey the visible Church in such things as are not repugnant to the express Precepts of God and Christ and to those immutable Characters of Truth which he has imprinted upon the Souls of all men and which are there to be found unless gross violence and Interest has obscured or obliterated them 12. Nor in the last place does he make himself wiser then his Church which were also an odious imputation But without immodesty it may be thought that a private man may be more sollicitous of his own important Concerns and more faithfull to his own Eternal Interest then many thousand men put together and that therefore though he may not have so much wit and learning as these yet he may conduct his own affairs more safely then if they were put into their hands especially they that pretend to be guides to Heaven for others seeming to be wholy taken up with the things of this World as if they had forgot their intended journey It is not therefore a boast of Wisedom above the Church but a carefull sollicitude touching such things as the wise men of the World do not usually trouble themselves much about that may embolden some private sincere-hearted Christian to dissent from some Dictates of the Church professing himself in other things as weak and childish as they please remembring that Doxologie of our Blessed Saviour I thank thee O Father Matt. 11. Lord of Heaven and Earth because thou hast hid these things from the wise and prudent and hast revealed them unto babes Even so Father for so it seemed good in thy sight 13. Finally This Wisedom which they adhere to is plainly and evidently not the Dictate of their own private spirit which to oppose to the Church were indeed to make a mans self wiser then the Church but the plain and perspicuous Testimonies of the Word of God and the common and indubitable Notions of universal humane Nature writ by the Finger of that Eternal Wisedom which created all things on the spirits of all men that be in their wits and therefore is a plain and legible Copy of that Wisedom So that he that adheres thereto does not prefer his own Wisedom before the Wisedom of the Church but submits himself faithfully to the Wisedom of God to which the Church also ought to submit and not to efface as much as in them lies those imprinted Characters of Truth out of the Souls of men thereby to enslave them to themselves and to the corrupt Interest of their Kingdom of darkness and gross Imposture 14. But I have been more copious then was needfull or intended in confuting this dream of Infallibility We might have made shorter work of it and suddenly evinced the folly of that pretence by actual Errours that have been in the Church of God As surely the Church of the Jews was as really the Church of God as the visible Christian Church and has as magnificent promises as it in Isaiah For what is spoke Chap. 54. rebounds upon the Church of the Jews first as Grotius has observed and there it is said That they shall all be taught of God and that with everlasting kindness God will have mercy upon them And yet this Church was in so gross a mistake that the Governours and Grandees thereof knew not their Messiah when he was come into the world but put him to a most shamefull death But even in those times when there was a more palpable Residence of God's miraculous power with them they erred very hainously as in the worshipping the Golden Calf in the wilderness as also in the ten Tribes worshipping those in Bethel nay apostatizing all to the worshipping of Baalim saving seven Thousand which were so few in respect of the rest that Elijah took himself to be left alone And Ahab consulting the Prophets found by wofull experience that four hundred of them prophesied false and onely Micaiah true And * Ch. 5. 30 31. Jeremie complains of his times A wonderfull and horrible thing saith he is committed in the Land The Prophets prophesy falsely and the Priests bear rule by their means and my people love to have it so and what will you doe in the end thereof That is also a smart monition of his * Ch. 7. 4. Trust you not in lying words saying The Temple of the Lord The Temple of the Lord c. For all which they doe that call themselves The Temple of the Lord is not right as appears in the same Chapter where they are accused of committing Idolatry openly in the Cities of Judah and in the streets of Jerusalem which could not be had they not fallen into the hands of blind and erroneous Guides which might cause them to stumble in their ways from the ancient paths and yet in the mean time take up that presumptuous boast That the Law shall not perish from the Priest nor the Counsel from the Wise nor the Word from the Prophet no not then when they were imagining mischief against the true Prophets of the Lord as you may see Jeremie 18. But * Ch. 3. 6. Micaiah says plainly That the Prophets that are onely for easie times and for good chear Night shall be upon them and they shall have no vision and it shall be dark unto them that they cannot divine That such Seers shall be ashamed and Diviners confounded as having no answer from God And * Ch. 56 10 11. Esay complains that the watch-men of the City are blind that they are ignorant shepherds that cannot understand they all look to their own way every one for jollity or gain Thus clear is it that the Church of the Jews though it was in such a special manner espoused to God was
to Paul from Heaven and so appointing him to be an Apostle did proclaim to all the World that he would Infallibly assist him and that therefore what was imparted to the World by him should be a Law irreversible to Christendom Whence the nulling of the Authority of S. Paul's writings were the abrogating of the very Law of Christ which were a most rebellious and blasphemous Enterprise against the Sovereignty of Christ himself 4. But there is also another way of undermining or subverting the Rule and Sovereignty of the Son of God and that is An undervaluing his Laws in proportion of Penalties laid upon the transgression of them and of some slighter humane Ecclesiastick Institutes As surely these would be very Antichristian Instances of this kind namely If Absolution for him that kills his Father or lies with his Mother should be five or six times Cheaper then of him that takes two Orders in one day or is Ordained without Letters dismissory or that to be Ordained out of the set times of the year should have a penalty ten times greater then Lying with a mans own Mother or if you will but equal to the deflouring of a Virgin the lying with a mans own Sister Murther Perjury Sacrilege Simonie revealing Confession keeping a Concubine lying with a woman in the Church but equal I say to all these nine put together What could vilifie the indispensable Law of God and Christ more then to make so many transgressions and so hainous less then that trifle of humane Tradition To Ordain onely at such times of the year 5. Again That were likewise a very conspicuous vilification of the Word of God if instead thereof there were read in the Churches finelydevised Fables to entertain the People withall As if they were wiser then the Wisdom of God himself and could entertain the people more edifyingly with incredible and ridiculous stories then with the Discourses of Christ Jesus and sober and easily-intelligible histories of truth that Divine Providence has recorded for the instruction of his Church 6. Dispensations also against the Law of Christ whether written in the Word of God or comprised in the sacred Law of Nature which is but the Transcript of that Law in the Eternal Logos Christ according to his Divinity were also an Antichristian defeating of Christ's Rule and Sovereignty as also would be the Interpretation of the serious Injunctions of Christ as if they were not Praecepta but Consilia not Commands but Advice left to us to follow if we would or to let alone if we pleased whenas Christ plainly declares that he that breaks the least of these Matt. 5. Commandments and teaches men so to doe shall be called the least in the Kingdom of Heaven What then would it be to dispense with Perjury Treason Murther Incest Adultery Sodomie and other such hainous crimes What were it but the utter taking away the Law of Christ and destroying his Kingdom upon Earth The Fraud and Self-endedness of which easy Anarchy is onely to fill the net full though it be of rotten sticks and durt so long as out of this durt they can extract Silver But the Mischief is that the Riches of this false Church would flow and rise with the height of the Abominations and Transgressions of rich sinners till a deluge of wrath wash away this deluge of sin But those in the interim that are so foolish to believe these Dispensations and think they are come into a fair liberty of spirit having found so facil ghostly Fathers will thereby most certainly become the Bond-slaves of sin which in the conclusion will as certainly deliver them up to Eternal Death 7. But what plea or pretence will you say may there be made of acting Religiously while they act thus enormously in letting the raines loose to all manner of wickedness to them that will goe to the price thereof Why yes This Antichristian Power might pretend that all that Power which is in Christ though it be plainly a casting Christ out of his Royall Throne is derived upon him or them as his Successours But Christ being the absolutely-Supreme Power may doe as he will dispense with his own Laws as he pleases Wherefore this Antichristian power pretending to be or have the very same power may dispense with the Laws of Christ as it pleases especially for the enriching the Church for all such Interest is pious Which yet is such an Imagination that nothing can be more Treasonable against the Regal Office of Christ nor more destructive of his Kingdom 8. The effect of which villanous Principle would also certainly appear in this Synagogue of Satan or Antichrist and we should find Laws and Institutes quite contrary to the Laws and Decrees of the Son of God As certainly such as these would be namely Sundry sorts of Idolatry such as I have instanced in already and need not repeat and have noted the Frauds Book I. ch 12. and fetches in the practice of them The teaching for Doctrines the commandments of men which is expresly against our Saviour's own command and of which I have given sundry examples in my * Book I. ch 17 18 19 20 21 22. second branch of Antichristianism The with-holding the Cup from the Laiety notwithstanding the Institution of the Lord's Supper by Christ himself does so plainly injoyn the communicating both of Bread and Wine Drink you all of this and S. Paul again following the Example of Christ Let a man examine himself Matt. 26. 27. and so eat of this bread and drink of this cup which indefinite command 1 Cor. 11. 28. surely includes all But the drinking of the Cup being made the Privilege of the Priest it magnifies his condition hugely and makes the poor Laiety feel and acknowledge their distance how unholy and how removed from God they are in comparison of the Priesthood This would be the true Reason though they might pretend for I think they have nothing better to pretend the length of the Lay-mens beards which I suppose they would rather cut off then be cut short in their share of so holy a Sacrament Again The serving of God in the Church in an unknown Language praying to him and praising him and reading the Scripture in a Tongue the people understand not is evidently against the directions of S. Paul 1 Cor. 14. in this particular and against that more universal and indispensable Law Let all things be done to edifying As also the worshipping of Angels 1 Cor. 14. 26. Coloss. 2. 18. which the same Apostle does expressely speak against and likewise the forbidding to marry and the abstaining from meats upon a Religious 1 Tim. 4 3. account with several other such All which being expressely against the Commands or Laws of Christ it were a most reproachfull and Traitorous affront to him the true Head of the Church and a plain declaring against the Right of his Sovereignty thus to make any Laws or Institutes so
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
the Cunning and Industry of Secular Princes and if all those Doctrines and Duties which were most urged and most frequently came into practice were of such a nature as did plainly tend to the either Honour Power or Profit of the Priesthood This I say would strike very far towards the making the World Infidels or believers of nothing but this That the Summe of our Religion is but a witty Invention of so many fictitious Stories Doctrines Precepts and Ceremonies which would serve to hamper the Consciences of men and make the World more Governable but so shaped out by the Priests as made most for their worldly advantage And such we have already described the Tenents and Doctrines of this Church to be continuedly displaying the Frauds and Self-endedness of all their Errours and Mispractices and need not here again repeat them 4. Thirdly This also would oppose the Christian Faith To make the nature of it such that it must be always doubtfull Of which I must confess I know not what may be the fetch unless it be to keep mens Minds as some deceitfull Physicians and Surgeons do their Bodies in such an unsound and valetudinarious condition that they may have the more frequent recourse to them and depend the more upon them or because they mixe some things in Religion necessarily to be believed which it is impossible they should be firmly believed by any but fools And thus the true and solid points of Christianity such as have sufficient evidence to convince any maâ—… of Reason must be reputed obscure and uncertain for being found in the company of such gross Falsities or Uncertainties which yet pretend to an equal right of entire reception with the clearest Truths And further It is no wonder that such a Church as places whatever certainty there is of Faith upon her own Infallibility as if that were the ground of it should derive both an opinion and profession of the Uncertainty of Belief upon her Nurselings they having no better ground then what we have so plainly demonstrated already to be hollow and ruinous But it is their onely Shift and Refuge to make their Infallibility the ground of Belief the matters they propose to be believed having no recommendation either from Scripture or their own nature to be embraced And therefore things being thus uncertain at the bottom upon their Principles they must instead of a firm and solid Faith be content with an obscure and uncertain one Which is indeed the destroying of Christian Faith and the substituting of a more vertiginous fluctuation of mind in lieu thereof 5. Fourthly That Principle also tends to the ruining of Faith which supposes That without right Succession of Bishops and Priests there is no true Church and therefore no true Faith and that this Succession may be interrupted by the misordination or misconsecration of a Priest or Bishop the persons thus ordained or consecrated being Atheists or Jews or ordained by them that are so or do out of malice not intend what they ought in the Sacrament of Orders as some call it Which were a conceit able to turn all men Scepticks concerning their state in Religion but is a Position absolutely against inward sense and Reason As if a man could not feel in his own conscience whether he believed or not the Truths of Holy Scripture without he were first assured that he was a member of that Church that had an uninterrupted lawfull Succession of the Priesthood from the Apostles times till his own Whenas there is nothing more immediate to a man then inward sense which it is not in the power of any Sophistry ever to confute 6. Wherefore though this Position may be spightfully levelled against the Certainty of Faith yet the execution it can doe upon the considerate is very inconsiderable and small much like that peevish Supposition of the necessity of Unity of Opinion as if those Churches that did differ in any thing had the certainty of nothing An excellent Hypothesis indeed were it but true and such as would effectually recommend the usefulness of an Infallible Judge of Controversies if he could be had for love or mony by whom they might closely compact the parts of the Church Catholick together as with cramps of Iron But there is no such force in the Theorem which will of it self fall asunder into dust if we consider it can stand upon no other terms then what will supplant the truth of all Reason and Religion in the world the whole world being divided in their judgments and conclusions concerning both Whence it is plain that the Attempt though weak tends to the bringing in universal Scepticism in all things In which deluge the Christian Faith would be also drowned and perish with all other Truths there being no Ark left to take Sanctuary in and to be safe from the working and absorptive waves of this reciprocating Euripus 7. But sixthly and I shall now instance in what is not onely ill-meant but must needs have a successfull efficacy for making the World Atheists or Infidels and that is The glutting of them with lying Miracles and gulling of them with delusions and cousening devices call them pious Frauds or by what other fine names you please For the Falsehood being once discovered in such a Church as requires to be believed more upon their own Authority and Infallibility then upon the credibility of the matters which they propound I say if they once be taken tardy in Forgeries and guilefull Fictions in any points especially such as tend to their own profit how can this fail of shaking or rather ruining the whole Frame of belief to the very Foundations How ruinous then must the Christian Faith be where such Lies and Figments are frequent and almost as frequently discovered by those that are more nasute Certainly Atheism and Infidelity must break in upon such a Church as the Sea upon the cutting of the Banks 8. That I may the better be understood I will give you some brief Instances of these impudent Figments As for example If they should have the face to tell the people that such a Saint when his Head was struck off walked four or five mile with it in his hand onely resting himself every mile's end to take breath at his open weasen-pipe That another Saint being hospitably entertained at the expence of the lives of a Cow and a Calf restored them again to life and that they were both of them found the next day in their Master's Meadows That by another Saint the Devil was seen behind the Altar busily writing down mens sins in a parchment which being something too scant he stretched with his teeth and his hold slipping knocked his head against the wall That a certain She-Saint being swallowed by a Dragon she making a Crosse in the Dragon's belly burst him in pieces and so was delivered That a Bishop having cut off his own hand upon its being polluted by the kiss of some over-affectionate female it
himself may at the same time move and rest lie along and walk be many miles absent from his friend and present with him at once may be now in Heaven and then in a moment on the Earth without passing any of the Regions betwixt with many such like Incongruities which we having above noted it is needless any longer here to insist upon 20. It is already plain enough that Transsubstantiation or the turning of the Bread into the very Body of Christ is encumbred with so many and so manifestly gross Impossibilities and easily deprehensible that the Impossibility of the Churche's either ignorantly erring or voluntarily imposing uponmen for her own gain can bear no weight at all to turn the scales in her behalf but there will be such an irresistible moment of these apparent and plain Contradictions of this so boldly obtruded Article of the Church I mean this of Transsubstantiation that the weight thereof will naturally sink all her sons that but a little consider of it if nothing better then their Church help them and buoy them up into the abhorred pit of Infidelity first and then of Hell 21. For there is no plastering over such Impossibilities which are deprehended to be such according to the Universal and Immutable Laws of Reason by feigned Miracles to give countenance thereto As if they should make such Stories as these That the Sacrament being struck with a dagger did bleed That when the Bread as was thought was taken out of the mouth of the Communicant it proved Flesh in the fingers of the Priest That the Host has dropt many drops of bloud upon the Corporall as it has been taken into the Priest's hands That it has flown out of his hands round about the Church dropping drops of bloud on the Marble pavement all the time of its flight That a lovely fair Child has been seen sometimes to appear out of the consecrated Bread and the like For these Stories could not evince the truth of that which is impossible to be true but would argue their own falseness by the end of their producement For commonly liers back lies with lies 22. And now I think I have described so plentifully and punctually this particular Limb of Antichristianism which is opposite to the Root of the Divine Life Faith that nothing can be conceived wanting to the perfection of such a Contrariety nor any man doubt but that Church which is thus described is really one and the same with that which is excluded out of the New Jerusalem as being opposite to her inhabitants For from such a Constitution of things as I have here in this member of Antichristianism set forth it will plainly follow that the professed sons of this false Church as those in the * Chap. 21. Chap. 22. Apocalyps must be 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that is to say They must either be men whose spirits are intimidated with superstirious Fables which are the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the fearfull and the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 such as love to hear lies and believe vain things out of a sottishness and imbecillity of mind and brutish simplicity or else they must be 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Unbelievers and Atheists though they externally for their own peace sake submit to the Orders of their Church or lastly they must be the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 such as forge lies and help to deceive the people with multifarious Falsehoods and Impostures Which being the Characters of that Church which is opposite to the Holy City it is a farther Indication that in the putting together these things that do so diametrically oppose or undermine the Christian Faith we have truly described a notorious Limb of Antichristianism CHAP. IX 1. Humility the proper Characteristick of the Person and Spirit of Christ. 2. The Affectation of an Ecclesiastick Sovereignty contrary to this Divine Grace 3. The pretence for this Ambition That the visible Church being One requires one visible Head with the Answer thereto 4. Further Reasons to prove the Church wants no visible Head besides Christ. 5. That this one Head Christ Jesus and one Apostolick Law does make the Church sufficiently One 6. That there is no just pretence for any such claim of being this Universal Head in any Bishop 7. But that Ambition may purchase such a Title by wicked practices 8. The method of this Universal Bishop's enslaving the Clergie to himself and undermining the Secular Powers 9. His Frauds against the Emperour and other Princes 10. A further description of the Frauds Rapine and Pride of this Universal Pastour and of his Usurpation in a manner of the whole Power of the Empire 1. WE proceed now to the Description of as lively Opposition as we can to the First Branch of the Divine Life namely Humility which being so special a Characteristick of the nature and Genius of Christ's own Spirit and so pronounced by himself in his own person when he was upon Earth Learn of me for I am humble and meek Matt. 11. 29. that which is perfectly opposite to this must needs be exquisitely Antichristian in all manner of people but especially in those that do in a more peculiar way presume themselves to be Successours of Christ and his Apostles whom he of old premonished of Pride and Lordliness and affectation of Superiority saying The Kings of the Gentiles exercise Lordship over them and they that are great exercise authority upon them But Luke 22. Mark 10. it shall not be so among you c. Which lesson Peter remembred and endeavoured to transmit it to others where he advises the Pastours to feed their flocks not for filthy 1 Pet. 5. 2 3. Lucre but of a ready mind neither as being Lords over God's Heritage but being ensamples to the flock How contrary therefore to this would it be if some pretended Supreme Pastour whom others in their severall subordinate capacities would in proportion naturally imitate should not onely Lord it over his flock but tyrannize over Kings and Emperours and Lucifer-like place himself in the same Throne with God and Christ or rather displace them and domineer absolutely according to his own will treading under foot the plainly-promulgated Laws of God 2. Let us therefore dip our pencil a little deeper in some of those colours which we made use of in the Description of that member of Antichristianism which was opposite to the Divine Life in general and pourtray out more fully such an Ecclesiastick Polity as will appear most oriently Luciferian and Antichristian and most diametrically opposite to that holy Humility that was recommended by Christ to his Successours We will therefore suppose as before some one Prelate that has got the start of the rest to put in for the Title and Authority of Universal Bishop which whosoever does was declared by Gregory the Great the Fore-runner of Antichrist the Fore-runner of that Rex Superbiae cui
so long as the Moon endureth And a little after in the same Psalm He shall spare the poor and needy and shall save the souls of the needy He shall redeem their souls from deceit and violence and precious shall their bloud be in his sight And in * Chap. 4â—… Esay it is said of him A bruised reed shall he not break and smoaking flax shall he not quench till he hath brought judgment into victory And again in the * Psal. 45. Psalms In thy majesty ride on prosperously because of truth meekness and righteousness and thy right hand shall teach thee terrible things namely to break in pieces the Oppressour and to put the Fraudulent to open shame Also in * Chap. 9. Zacharie Rejoice greatly O daughter of Sion shout O daughter of Jerusalem Behold thy King cometh unto thee â—…e is just and having salvation lowly and riding upon an Ass and upon a Colt the foal of an Ass. And again in * Chap. 40. Esay He shall feed his Flock like a Shepherd he shall gather the Lambs with his arm and carry them in his bosom and shall gently lead those that are with young And in another place more copiously describing the Kingdom of Christ * Chap. 11. With righteousness saith he shall he judge the poor and reprove with equity for the meek of the earth and he shall smite the earth with the rod of his mouth and with the breath of his lips shall he slay the wicked And righteousness shall be the girdle of his loins and faithfulness the girdle of his reins The Wolf also shall dwell with the Lamb and the Leopard shall lie down with the Kid and the Calf and the young Lion and the Fatling together and a little Child shall lead them and the Cow and the Bear shall feed their young ones shall lie down together and the Lion shall eat straw like an Ox. And a sucking Child shall play on the hole of the Asp and the weaned Child shall put his hand on the Cockatrice den They shall not hurt nor destroy in all my holy mountain For the earth shall be full of the knowledge of the Lord as the waters cover the sea To all which you may adde That Christ with his Church in the Revelation is all along represented under the Hieroglyphick of a Lamb that harmless and peaceable creature and in Daniel under the Type of a Man whenas the rest of the Kingdoms are typifi'd by wild Beasts Which intimates that the Kingdom of Christ is not a Kingdom of Belluine Ferocity but of Reason Humanity and tender Loving-kindness 3. According therefore to this Description of the Kingdom of Christ it is plainly a Kingdom of Peace and Love the Empire of that Divine vertue of Charity and discovers it self in the defending righting and easing of the poor in the lowliness and meekness of the Governours and in the truth and faithfulness of them in managing their affairs without any guile or deceit in the unity and friendly conversableness of people in the cessation of war and hostility and in the protection of the â—…aints of God from persecution and slaughter All these Happinesses are included in the Reign of Christ according to the above-cited predictions and are all of them the Effects of Charity as S. Paul has described that Grace from the excellent fruits thereof For Charity is kind full of acts of Humanity seeketh not her own much less what belongs to others either out of envy or covetousness 1 Cor. 13. Charity is not puffed up with pride and high-mindedness has no pleasure in unrighteousness or deceitfulness but rejoyceth in truth and faithfulness Charity does not easily think evil of men or unseemly behave her self out of the bad opinion she conceives of them in matters of Morality or Religion Charity is so far from exciting others to war that she is hardly provoked to anger but is patient and long-suffering so far from persecuting and murthering the good that she will not be over-severe to those that are no better then they should be For Charity beareth all things believeth all things hopeth all things endureth all things so far is she from persecuting imprisoning from racking and killing of innocent and good men that are endued with the true fear of God upon worldly Jealousies and Suspicions that is to say for fear the spreading of the Truth of the Gospel should bear down their usurped Empire of Idolatrous Tyranny and Superstition 4. Having therefore so clear a view of the nature and properties of Charity and of the condition of the Reign of Christ in his Church whose Dominion is founded in the Law of Love it will not be hard to draw the picture of an Antichristian Polity so far forth as it is opposite to this last Branch of the Divine Life which is that transcendent Grace of Charity Let us suppose therefore a company of men that pretend to succeed Christ and his Apostles who if they be his legitimate Successours they should succeed him also in the Graces of his Spirit to be quite contrary in the administration of the affairs of the Church to that Description of the Kingdom of Christ out of the Prophets and Psalms would not this of a truth prove a most palpable and remarkable Limb of Antichristianism 5. As suppose first for example Whereas our Saviour Christ is described as one that does redeem the souls of the poor and needy from oppression and wrong if the Frame of this Polity that his pretended Successours set up in the World were a yoke upon the most simple-meaning people greater then that of Judaism and a servitude and bondage more intolerable then that of Aegypt as I have above described it as both burthening and afflicting their Consciences and also wearying their Bodies and Book I. ch 19 20 21 22. emptying their Purses by mulcts for such offences as are neither against the Law of God nor any duty we any way owe to our Neighbour but onely against such Superstitious Institutes as were made by the Ignorance of some and the cunning Craft of others who multiply unnecessary Laws that they may enjoy the sweet of the Penalties and suck away the bloud and sustenance of the poor labouring-man as often as they catch him in these nets were not this point-blank contrary to that part of the Description of Christ's Kingdom that consists in the protecting and easing of the poor and oppressed 6. It were a very unchristian thing and a shreud sign that those were not the true and genuine Successours of Christ that did not prevail so much upon the Civil Government that vassalage and slavery and squallid and deplorable poverty should be chased away for the glory of the Gospel and the honour of the Kingdom of Christ which is supposed to be where-ever the Gospel is received But for these pretended hypocritical Successors to be Instruments and Assistants to the enslaving of the World for the partaking
of the spoil or rather to erect a Spiritual Polity to enslave all and bring the most insupportable Servitude of Body Soul and Estate such as Paganism could scarce ever shew the like certainly this must be very highly Antichristian For indeed what can be more salvagely oppressive in reference to the very Estates of men then to frame such a Religion upon the pretence of their Infallibility as is perfectly repugnant to the plain Word of God and immutable Rules of Reason depraving of things so for their own worldly advantage as I have already abundantly set out to bring in a more ample Revenue to feed the Pride and Luxury of this false Church And then when they have thus grossly perverted the Truth of God to declare that they who will not say Amen to their lies and forgeries have no more right to their own Estates then a Thief or Robber to what he has got by unlawful spoil and therefore accordingly not onely to hinder them from any employments of either profit or credit but disable them from making of Wills and their Heirs from inheriting their Estates and awing them from laying claim to their Patrimonies lest their Father's Heresie be intailed upon them whether they will or no. 7. To which Antichristian Barbarities you may adde also the scornful and cruel Penances they put upon them that do submit themselves to their Church making them go in procession in contemptible disguises or else enjoyning them to march in their shirts bare foot and bare leg and to whip their own bodies in the sight of the people as they go along How unlike nay how utterly contrary is this to that Meekness and Sweetness that is described in the Discipline and Government of the Kingdom of Christ But we need not insist upon these things we having treated sufficiently of them already 8. Now upon the second particular viz. that Humility and Lowliness which is also one fruit of Charity and by which the Person and Rule of our Saviour is described in the ancient Prophecies We have shewn the Antichristian Detestableness of the opposite to this Vertue already in the first Branch of the Divine Life and need adde nothing more thereto 9. The third character of Charity is her delighting in true and faithful dealing amongst men The opposites to which are easily discoverable To say nothing therefore of the manifold Frauds which we have already taken notice of all along in this our Description of Antichristianism this certainly must be very Antichristian and uncharitable namely To misrepresent mens Actions and Opinions in publick Speeches or Writings nay to invent notorious lies and fictions to the disparagement of mens Persons and Doctrines and suborn men to write them and divulge them to the world for truths Which is to doe so as was the custom of those who were under the Dragon that old Serpent and false accuser of the ancient primitive Christians whom they aspersed and calumniated as worshippers of the Sun because they put up their prayers with their faces towards the East as Man-sacrificers and as Eaters and Drinkers of humane flesh and bloud because of their calling the Eucharistick Bread and Wine the Body and Bloud of Christ they understanding it onely in a mystical or symbolical sense For professing with S. Paul There is neither Male nor Female in Christ but that both have equal admission into his eternal Kingdom That they had no regard of Sexes but were vile Sodomites and abusers of themselves with Mankind For meeting together to serve God in private in Grotts and Caves of the Earth for fear of persecution That they were Conspirators against the Roman State and Empire And lastly for their reverently receiving the Elements of Bread and Wine at their holy Communions That they were Worshippers of Ceres and Bacchus 10. In like manner we may imagine that this Pseudo-christian Church may raise such perverse Calumnies against the true members of Christ as namely traducing them for Atheists or at least Arrians because they will not acknowledge the Divinity of a consecrated piece of Bread reporting them as Manichees because they do not hold the power of the Church to be superiour to that of Emperours and Kings to make thereby but one Sovereignty in the Church but affirm the Secular Power independent thereon as if the holding these two distinct Powers were forsooth the holding the two Principles of the Manichees defaming them for Beesoneriders or Witches because they have by reason of hard persecution been driven to inhabit desert and mountainous places or upon their meeting more privately in houses by night to impute to them some such horrid and villainous practices as were reported of the primitive Christians that the Candle being put out they committed Incest and all manner of Uncleanness in the dark nay that they killed their own children in these concealed Assemblies of theirs To accuse them of reviling the Saints merely upon their professing it unlawful to invoke them or of blaspheming the Blessed Virgin because they hold it unfit to worship her To tax them of disobedience to the Magistrate onely because of their persisting in the sincere profession of that Faith that is consonant to the Doctrine of Christ and his Apostles And lastly to father upon them what abominable actions they please and speaking without a Metaphor to gag the mouths of the thus accused and slandered that they may not answer for themselves to clear themselves in the audience of the people Nay to rack men till their very bowels break out of their belly to force them to acknowledge themselves or their party guilty of such villainous crimes as it is incredible their very persecutors should in good earnest suspect them of merely to get a pretence from such an extorted Confession to verifie their wicked Slanders to the world and to make the harmless and innocent professors of the Truth of the Gospel to be odious and hateful in the eyes of all men Certainly if this be not diametrically opposite to that part of Charity that discovers it self in true and faithful dealing nothing can be excogitated that is so CHAP. XIV 1. The nick-naming of the true Christians by the odious Title of Hereticks with their barbarous injuries thereupon 2. That Heresie and Schism are sins against the truly-Catholick and Apostolick Church 3. What is meant by One Catholick and Apostolick Church 4. What is that hainous sin of Heresie 5. What Schism 6. That while men are sincere members of the Apostolick Body they can be neither Hereticks nor Schismaticks 7. The Hypocritical and Schismatical Niceness of this Antichristian Church in forbearing to joyn in any Religious Duty with any member of the truly-Apostolick Body 8. Their fraudulent purpose in fostering this Schismatical Niceness and Unsociableness 1. BUt we will also take notice of that which will be so usually cast upon the Dissenters from this false Church that it will be scarce accounted any reproach done to them but rather civility
or justice and that is the so freely nick-naming them by the style of Hereticks and Schismaticks Which yet in their own judgment I suppose not to bear so little weight with it whenas their real estimate is discoverable by their proceedings they deeming an Heretick so odious or contemptible that he is not worthy of the common privileges of mankind and of that protection that the Laws of humane Society do afford men that he shall not have the security of a Promise though confirmed by Oath Faith not being to be kept with Hereticks Not to mention here that they have made the penalties of Heresie capital Which how justly though a man were an Heretick in the matters of Belief provided it were not out of Pride and conceitedness but out of invincible Ignorance I will not here discuss 2. It will be of greater use to consider what is real Heresie or Schism that the sincere and knowing Christian may not be reproached nor the less skilful affrighted with these Bug-bears Those that make so great a cry against the hainousness of these sins their Zeal and Rhetorick would be more usefully placed if they would be so faithful as to give us a right Notion of them otherwise while they pretend to be so industriously desirous of Peace and Unity in the Church they may but give greater occasion of Dissensions and Animosities For to make more things Heresies and Schisms then are is to create more quarrels then there need be I will acknowledge as soon as any that Heresie and Schism are very grievous crimes even of the deepest dye but then it must be truly Heresie or Schism not what-ever the peevishness or interest or prejudice of a domineering party will be pleased to call so under the pretence that they are that One Catholick Church from whose Doctrine be it never so false or corrupt for one to dissent must be Heresie and to separate from their communion be their practices never so Idolatrous Schism No certainly those high sins of Heresie and Schism are not against this or that particular Synagogue be they never so numerous but against that ancient and truly Catholick and Apostolick Church and he that sins against her Unity sins against his Creed which has taught us to say I believe one Catholick and Apostolick Church Which words because they may be abused to the making of the Church look less Catholick and One then it is I shall offer an easie resolution of the sense of them 3. I conceive therefore that the Object of our Belief in this Clause of the Creed are these three Propositions First That the Church of God wherein eternal Salvation is to be had is but One that is to say That a man cannot be saved in any Religion as some wantonly conceit but that there is one onely way of Salvation which is revealed to God's true Church under which all must come before they can be saved Secondly That this Church of God is now a Catholick Church not Topical or National as in the Commonwealth of the Jews but a Church that is by right to spread over the face of the whole Earth and is designed so to doe by Providence as is expressed in several passages of the Prophets From the rising of the Sun to the going down of the same my name shall be great amongst the Gentiles c. as * Chap. 1. Malachie has fore-told And David in the second Psalm Ask of me and I will give thee the Heathen for thine inheritance and the uttermost parts of the earth for thy possession Thirdly and lastly That this One Catholick Church is neither to be stretched so wide as to be acknowledged there where the Apostolical Doctrine the Faith and Practice delivered and commanded by Christ or his Apostles is oppugned and contradicted and quite contrary Doctrines and Practices brought in nor to be made so narrow as that such companies of men should not be allowed to be part of this Catholick Church amongst whom notwithstanding the Apostolical Doctrines do obtain and Primitive Practices of the Church set on foot by the Apostles or Christ himself are in use That is to say The adequate Character of this One Catholick Church is that it rejects nothing of the Apostolical Doctrines and imitable Usages which were commanded by Christ or by his Apostles to the Church nor teaches or institutes any thing that is point-blank opposite thereto or to the Word of God to which Christ and his Apostles give testimony That therefore is the true Catholick Church in the whole and in every particular company of it which has for its visible Laws and Usages whereby it self becomes also visible the Laws and Usages of Christ and his Apostles and nothing contradictorious thereunto This I hope will be acknowledged by all men the most easie and genuine sense of this Article of the Christian Creed that the words are capable of 4. And hence I think a man may easily discover what that Heresie is that is justly to be deemed so hainous a sin namely That it is A Dissent from the Catholick Church even in those things that are in it Apostolical For by them alone they being entire and uncontradicted in her does she discover her self to be that One and onely Catholick Church of Christ. And this would be an hainous sin indeed against that Authority she has to instruct and imbue the world with this saving truth I say to dissent from any part of this Apostolick Doctrine out of a spirit of contradiction and self-conceitedness would be Heresie in the most loathsom circumstances that can be imagined And the next degree to this would be the dissenting from the Catholick Church in such things as they generally agree in though they be not expressly any part of the Apostolick Doctrine but in the mean time not plainly dissonant to the Word of God nor to the immutable Notions of humane Understanding And the third and last degree is to dissent from the determinations of a mans own particular National Church in the like circumstances with the former These seem to have something an over-near affinity with what we have defined most properly primarily to be Heresie But considering that even Oecumenical Councils themselves may erre and that Scripture in things necessary to Salvation is sufficiently plain and the Affairs and the Genius of particular Nations exceeding different and changeable and General Councils very hardly and slowly to be congregated I must not be over-hasty to call a Dissent here no not from an Oecumenical Doctrine or Usage by so harsh a denomination as Heretical there being no entrenchment made thereby upon the Apostolical Laws and Doctrines But to dissent from or not to subscribe to the determinations of what Church soever that are plainly repugnant to the Doctrines Apostolical were not onely not Heretical but Heroical especially if the Dissent is likely to beattended with any personal inconveniences to the Dissenter 5. And now for Schism there is much-what
the same judgment to be made hereon For it is plain that Schism truly so called is A Separation from the Catholick Church or from any National Church which is part thereof even then when she approves her self to be Catholick that is to say even then when she is Apostolick or though she be Apostolick and offer no Opinions and Usages but such as are conformable to the Usages and Doctrines of Christ and his Apostles To separate from the Church in such circumstances as these I confess were a great and damnable sin But for one to separate from the Church in other things upon an invincible suspicion that the consenting to or doing this or that were sinful and displeasing to God though those Opinions might be true and Practices harmless in themselves this I conceive though it make a man materially a Schismatick yet he is not formally so and he is rather to be pitied then reproached But if he separate from that part of the Church if it can be still a part of the Church that does so which imposes Opinions and Practices plainly repugnant to the Precepts of Christ and his Apostles Separation in this case need not be pitied nor ought to be reproached but highly commended and applauded And that voice will warrant them that calls for such sober Separatists Come out of her my people lest you partake of her Rev. 18. sins and of her plagues For the coming out here would be really the going in to the true Church and the standing still the abiding disjoyn'd therefrom as one speaks very smartly and truly Is Ecclesiae non jungitur qui ab Evangelio separatur 6. Wherefore from this true and determinate apprehension of things it is manifest how outrageously and Antichristianly uncharitable this false Church would be against the true Members of Christ in calling them Hereticks and Schismaticks and Renders and Tearers in pieces of the Unity of the Church whenas in truth they are so far from being Hereticks that they are the faithful Witnesses of Jesus and the onely sincere Members of the Apostolick Body and keep to that one foundation of which Christ is the chief corner-stone and are so far from being Schismaticks in their separation from such a Church as I have described where gross Idolatry and Superstition has overflown all that by separating they have redeemed themselves out of this Babylonish or Aegyptian Captivity and returned to that City that is at unity or one with it self and must never vary I mean that one and onely true Catholick Church as being truly Apostolick For if it be true That he is not joyned to the Church that is separate from the Gospel I think it will be true also that he that is sincerely joyned to the Gospel cannot be separate from the Church And therefore this noise of tearing and rending the Church is but a clamorous Accusation of men that feel their own usurped Power and Interest to shake as if it would break in sunder at this resurrection of the true Apostolick Church and Christ's recovering the Power into his own hands for the raising that promised and long-expected Kingdom of Righteousness upon Earth 7. And yet in the fourth place though this false Church be thus perfectly Antichristian as I have described grossely Idolatrous and wretchedly Superstitious and thus shrilly clamorous and querimonious against the rending of the Unity of the Catholick Church as she will phrase it notwithstanding all this we will suppose her so Hypocritically nice and scrupulous that she will not contaminate herself with joyning in Divine Service with those of the true and Apostolick Church though there be nothing in their Service but what is Apostolical no not so much as joyn in the Lord's Prayer or giving of thanks at meat nor say Amen to the shortest Ejaculation or Doxologie that occasion should put into the mouth of those that appertain to the Apostolick Body nor say Grace themselves for fear these Apostolicks should joyn with them or adde their Amen And yet forsooth this Synagogue of Deceivers is so zealous and industrious for the keeping up of the Unity of the Catholick Church as passes when in the mean time they are so full of rancour and railing against these Hereticks as they call them that they will style them and indeed any Church besides their own the Church of the Devil and pronounce that God is not God if he do not damn them and will forbid their Nurselings to so much as wish a Requiem for their Souls when they are departed this life 8. But this is but an Histrionical swaggering in comparison Their Devillish Fraud in the pursuance of this Unsociableness in any Divine duty betwixt them whom they please to term Hereticks and those of their own Church is conspicuous viz. for fear commerce in religious matters should give them the knowledge of the Truth who are held to this false Church by nothing but by believing of Lies I mean not onely such as were long agoe framed for the advantage of their Church but such misinterpretations and falsehoods as they possess their Nurselings with against those whom they call Hereticks whose Doctrines they falsify and traduce their carriage as they please and by this interdicting converse with them keep them in that vile opinion of them which they have infused by their base Calumnies Besides that by this scrupulosity in communicating with them in any Religious duty they ostentate the great Sanctity of their own Pharisaical Church as I intimated before and ingender an hatred and detestation of all that are opposite which plots and practices in those who talk so much for Peace and Unity in the Church is a double iniquity and the highest breach of Charity that comes not yet to blows But she was certainly the Whore that called so remorslesly for the dividing of the Child not the genuine Mother And that must be an Adulterate Church most assuredly that would have Christians differ wherein they profess themselves all agreed and clove in sunder wherein they would naturally joyn together and that is in the Apostolical Doctrines and Practices CHAP. XV. 1. What Incendiaries to War and Plotters of abhorred Murthers these falsely-pretended Successours of Christ are 2. Their Butcherly Cruelty to the Sheep of Christ's Fold 3. Instances of prodigious Barbarities upon them for their very faithfulness to their Saviour and Redeemer 4. The numerousness of them that thus suffer with some particular kinds of Cruelty 5. More Instances of this Diabolical Barbarity 6. All the Elements made Instruments of the wrath and fury of this Antichristian Power 7. Most beastly and unnatural Examples of this Antichristian Salvageness 1. BUT there are yet behind more palpable discoveries of this Antichristian contrariety to that Divine Vertue of Charity the Royal Law as I have already said of the Kingdom of Christ which is described from the Peace and Security of them that live under it That there shall none destroy in God's holy Mountain In
Truth of the Gospel for then their Power and Credit would fail in the world But it were the Interest of the Church of God they did so and therefore they are the worst enemies that can be doing more mischief under the colour of friendship then any declared enemy can Besides that there are pregnant proofs in the Scripture that Antichrist is to be a Christian in external Profession not a Pagan or any other Alien from the Church To the second That their not killing all that are called Christians shews that their Malice and Cruelty is more exquisitely opposed and directed against Christ in that their spight is onely against his true and sincere Members For those that are spared are not truly Christ's Servants but this High-priest's vassals or at least are taken to be so by him else they could not escape his sury so that his opposition to Christ is onely more judicious and adequate not less fierce nor malicious And to the last that they worship the Images or Persons not of Venus or Neptune or Mars but of the Blessed Virgin S. Peter S. Paul c. Suppose a mighty Potentate and as vertuous as mighty should put out severe Edicts against Adultery and carnal Fornication and that some guilty of the fact should apologize for themselves to their Prince on this wise It is true indeed Great Sir that we have committed Fornication but beseech you to take notice of the excusableness or justifiableness of the circumstances For we are not such gross and course-grain'd Fornicators as defile themselves with any Flesh but onely such as we have and that upon high desert a very great respect for and entire love to and that the rather for their near Relation to your Highness namely your Daughters Sisters and Neeces and others that are more near then ordinary Would not such an Apologie as this enrage the Prince with the greater wrath against their wicked Leudness How odious then and ridiculous would such a Plea be touching this Spiritual Fornication with the nearest Relations and Friends of our Blessed Saviour Can Spiritual Adultery which is Idolatry committed upon the Blessed Virgin upon S. John and others be more tolerable then upon Diana Apollo and other Mortals canonized by the Heathen Nay indeed would not this latter be but onely simple Fornication or Adultery there being no aversation in such unsanctified persons from the receiving of Divine honours but the former an execrable Rape they committing Idolatry or Spiritual Fornication against the wills of these Holy Saints they thus blaspheme and abuse So that I see not the least reason left to doubt but that I have decyphered the Idea of the most perfect and most detestable Antichristianism that can be 10. And thus having fully perfected the Draught of the Idea of Antichristianism I might according to the method I intimated make Application thereof to the state of the Church apostatized thereinto But because some men are so very hardly brought off to believe that any degeneracy of the Christian Church so long as they do still formally profess Jesus to be the Christ can amount to the production of that famous and signal Antichrist the Prophecies seem to point at whom they with all peremptoriness contend to be an open Denier of Jesus and as express an Assertor of himself to be the expected Messias no pretended Successor nor Disciple of the true Christ I think it very convenient before I proceed to the Application of my Idea of Antichristianism to make a more exquisite search into the Prophecies and thence to demonstrate as I hope with unexceptionable evidence That such an Antichrist for the main as is represented in that Idea is also prefigured or fore-told by the Holy Prophets that is to say such an one as doing such abominable villainies as I have instanced in yet professes himself to be Part nay Chief of the Body of Christ which is his Church For unless I doe this I know that such is the shuffling disposition of Ignorance and Falshood that they will think they can evade all by saying That I have indeed made an operose Description of A true Idea but not of The true Idea of Antichristianism such as my Title pretends to that is to say That the Church does indeed very naughtily and in some sense Antichristianly in these miscarriages but it will not amount to the making up the Antichrist properly and signally so called and pointed unto by the Predictions of the Prophets Which therefore we are necessitated to search into before we goe any further and are the more easily induced so to doe the Method being indifferently natural either way For the first intended Method was After this Description of the Idea of Antichristianism to make punctual Application thereof to the Apostatized condition of the Church to discover who is de facto that grand Antichrist and then to apply the Prophecies to the Events to shew that they also do indigitate the same that my Idea does discover My present purposed Method is After this Description of the Idea of Antichristianism to make search into the Prophecies to find out that their prefigurations of Antichrist are in the main strokes for neither are the Prophecies concerning Christ predictions of all his particular actions most manifestly answerable to the Idea we have given and that the Antichristianism which they foretell of is a Degeneracy or Apostasy of the Church still formally professing Christianity accordingly as we have described things in our Idea and then in the last place to make a more punctual Application of our Idea of Antichristianism thus justified by the agreeableness it hath with the Prophetick Predictions unto the Apostatized state of the Church for so many Ages to our own times Which will be a more plenarie eviction of the stupendious veracity of the Prophecies And it is as good and natural a method to prove the Truth of the Prophecies by the Fulness of the Events as to illustrate the Nature of the Events by the Application of the Prophecies But in the mean time there will be a necessity in this present search to have recourse unto Events in some sort or other for who can explain a Prophecie without any recourse to Events But all the History we need to have recourse to being either such as is distinct from any part of this Idea we have delineated and therefore to be brought into view in the interpreting of such passages as require it or else being but a general knowledge of those Limbs of Antichristianism I have described of which scarce any are ignorant or unpersuaded of for the main we may without the least confusion or obscurity partly by referring to this Idea in things that want no proof and partly by producing History where occasion requires apply our selves to our intended search into the Prophecies for a more full demonstration of the truth of our Idea of Antichristianism Which having finished we shall make a more punctual Application thereof
quite take away to say nothing of other Passages We know likewise Book 2. Ch. 5. Sect. 5. by wofull experience what wild Applications Enthusiasts make of the Ten-horned Beast and the Whore of Babylon phansying in their mad mistaken zeal every legitimate Magistrate that Beast and every well-ordered Church that Whore as that famous Romantick Knight in his inflamed courage and distempered phancy encountred the next Wind-mill he met for a Giant and innocent Flocks of sheep for so many Armies of men 4. But he that will but take notice of what I have so plainly proved An Instance of such an Interpretation in the Vision of the Resurrection of the two Witnesses with the use thereof against the Quakers Familists That the middle Synchronalls must needs cease together as also that our Reformation in England was an eminent Speciminal Completion of the Resurrection of the Witnesses he cannot fail of being rid of this phrensy for ever and of finding himself sufficiently fortified against all those extravagant Sects that bear themselves so stiff in these times and more particularly against the high-flown conceitedness of Quakers and Familists who can so easily part with all our Religion that referres to the Personal Offices of Christ under the pretence of knowing no man after the Flesh. For if the Protestant Reformation as in other parts so here in England especially be the Resurrection of the Witnesses as most certainly it is it is as certain and assured that Familism and Quakerism are mere Enthusiastick Freaks in that they reject or despise all those things that are so fully declaredly and universally attested by this cloud of Witnesses or rather by these Witnesses ascending up into Heaven in a cloud The Completion of which Prophecy I conceive fell out most fully and orderly in our English Reformation where the Ecclesiastick Witness mounted the highest among the Reformed Churches into this Prophetick Heaven Which may serve for a just Reproof also to those of the Presbyterian Party that either have or do envy him that Residence And again for the Quakers and Familists that are such Gigantick self-sufficient Religionists and scorn and contemn that part of the Testimony of these Witnesses which is Remission of sins in the Bloud of Christ and the being justified and acquitted by the merits of his Passion how silly and ignorantly proud they are in this point appears in that the Witnesses deliverance from the bondage of that Roman Pharaoh is plainly attributed to their passage through this Red Sea And we know that the first Protestant Reformers began with the point of Justification in this very sense wherein the Mystical Aegyptians were overthrown horse and man Which I doubt not but that Epinikion Revel 15. alludes to as * See Book 1. Ch. 4. Sect. 5. Book 2. Ch. 11. Sect. 2. I have proved more particularly in its proper place 5. Wherefore it is apparent of what great force this ought to be And for the settling this Church and Nation in peace as also for the establishment of other Protestant States and Kingdoms to reconcile the minds of all the Sectaries to the Church the Confession of her Faith as also her Institutes being the same with those of these Witnesses who were by special Providence called up to Heaven and by the fulfilling of that Divine Prediction approved for the Witnesses of God and of the Truth And likewise of what great usefulness it is for the peace and settlement of all Protestant States and Kingdoms they being so well assured from hence that it were to strive against the stream nay to fight against God and the determinations of Providence to superinduce upon a People such Antichristian Opinions or Practices as have been witnessed against by these approved Witnesses of God For there is neither wisedom nor understanding Pro. 21. 30. nor counsel against the Lord. For in such cases as this God who can seize the hearts of men at his own pleasure and illuminate their eyes may so enlighten the people as to make them see more then their professed Prophets whose sight may be blinded because the reward of unrighteousness is found in their hand that is to say because carnal Interest has laid wast their judgment For then the case would be much like that of Balaam 's riding the Asse whom he cudgels on this side and on that side to keep him in the path that leads most directly to his own self-ended design But the Beast being more affraid of the drawn sword of the Angel then of the furious blows of the Prophet runs him out of the way and crushes his leg against the wall For no humane force can drive any mortal Creature against the power and terrour of God Wherefore it is of great consequence for them in Authority not to be ignorant of the meaning of Prophecies that they may be sure not to fall into this 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 nor to stear their Affairs against the Current of Divine Providence Which Ignorance our Saviour seems to exprobrate to the Jews Ye Hypocrites ye can discern Luke 12. the face of the Sky and of the Earth but how is it that ye do not discern this time So far is the finding of the true sense of the Prophecies from causing tumults and disquietnesses in States or Kingdoms whenas on the contrary the right understanding of them tends so much every way to their firm settlement and peace 6. And now touching the third Allegation wherein I find little That the laudableness of Mr. Mede's performance in interpreting Prophecies is no bar to the usefulness of this present Treatise propension in my self to be over-loquacious yet I shall not altogether neglect it but briefly answer First That if I had only made a Collection of the most sound and unexceptionable Interpretations of such Prophecies as concerned my Idea of Antichristianism this had been no impertinent performance but necessary for the proving what I had avowed namely That my Idea was a Description of such an Antichristianism or Antichrist as is prefigured or foretold in the Holy Scriptures Which bare Collection of Interpretations would notwithstanding have had their peculiar usefulness distinct from that of Mr. Mede whose enterprise was to interpret the whole Apocalyps in order But in this Collection the Reader would be put to the trouble of perusing only such Prophecies as are for the making good the present point we are upon and which is of so vast concernment Which usefull Compendiousness is a thing very considerable with those that abound not with over-much leisure and yet would gladly be satisfied in so weighty a Controversy Again I have produced and explain'd several Prophecies that Mr. Mede never meddled with Besides that I have made use of none of his Expositions which I have not either rectified or corroborated or some way or other improved as he has done with very good success in several Interpretations of others To say nothing of our full and
as they maintain with truth as the Papists are of their own party even in their obtruded Falsities and Deceits It may therefore more rightfully be imputed to my fidelity to the true Church of Christ then Uncharitableness to the Church of Rome that I again bring into play with all due advantages this common Assertion of the Protestants touching the Great Antichrist Which appearing to me so solid and unexceptionable a truth I should be conscious to my self of the highest degree of Uncharitableness to the precious memory of the first Reformers those Witnesses whom Divine Providence so miraculously raised from the dead if I did not what in me lies for the maintaining their Credit in so grand a Point wherein they cannot seem to fail but with infinite dishonour to themselves and an irreparable prejudice to the Protestant Cause For as there is no Doctrine wherein the Romanists and we differ more true so there is none any thing near so potent for the bearing off all their assaults against us as this of their Church being that City of Babylon which the People of God are expressly commanded to come out of lest they partake of her sins and of her plagues Which that Apoc. 18. 4. wise Prince King James of ever-glorious memory knew full well and accordingly kept entire those Primitive Sentiments of the Protestant Reformation or rather adorned them and improved them by his Royal Pen as also did those singularly Devout and Learned Prelates Bishop Andrews and Bishop Jewell and several other Pious and Learned Bishops of our Church Nor will I omit how explicit our Church herself is touching this point in her Homily of the Peril of Idolatry as also in that against Rebellion Which illustrious witnesses to so concerning a Truth it were both uncivil and unjust to either suspect or accuse of Uncharitableness And for my own part I cannot but farther adde having such an apprehension of things as I have and so great encouragement from those Heroical Examples in whose footsteps I insist for the main in my Prophetick Interpretations that I should think my self not onely Unfaithfull to the true Church of Christ and to the Interest of his Kingdom which Charity will never betray but Uncharitable also even to the Church of Rome herself if I should not use this liberty of prophesying against her which I have or rather of interpreting Prophecies for her just Reproof and Amendment Stultorum incurata pudor malus ulcera celat That saying is true as well of him that conceals the sore of his friend when the disclosing thereof tends to the healing of it as of him that conceals his own sore And her own professed Nurslings either cannot or dare not use these Scripture Reproofs to her they being either blinded with her Lustre or terrifi'd by her Cruelty Whence it must be some good Samaritan Stranger that must work her cure But if it be Uncharitableness to speak some few hard words against her though never so true what Barbarity would it be to expose her to the greatest hardships of Fortune that humane Affairs are obnoxious to as suppose to betray her to the successfull Rage and Ravin of the overflowing Turk would that be such a piece of indearing Kindness and Charity And yet surely those doe so to her that sow pillows under her Elbow that sooth her up and call her my Sister and my Mother and say there are no considerable miscarriages in her whenas she stands guilty of all those sins that are reckoned up Revel 9. 20 21. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 multifarious Idolatries bloudy Persecutions Conjuring or Enchanting defiled Coelibate and pious Frauds or wicked Policies with Impenitency added to them all For these sins have the Locusts and Euphratean Horsemen the Turks and Saracens laid wast the Eastern Church and yet it is Uncharitable to admonish the Latine Church thereof which is much more guilty of these high miscarriages yea and that in such a time as the Mahometan Forces have fallen so grievously upon the disspirited Empire and have made all fly before them To give a stop to whose fury for the future I am confident nothing can be more effectual then the Reformation of the Roman Church according to the Word of God and the first Primitive Ages or to speak more compendiously according to the platform of our excellent English Reformers For this would put a new life and spirit into Christendom and make her grow young and strong again and able to repulse the Turkish forces for ever with Victory And truely the whole summe of what may seem either so affrightfull or distastfull in my old Orthodox Protestant way of interpreting the ensuing Prophecies to either the Church of Rome her self or any of her hidden friends or well-willers is but to reduce the whole Western Church to that unexceptionable Purity and Beauty that our Royal and Reverend Reformers through the special assistence of God did reduce this of ours But if this be of such excellent purpose must it not be to very great purpose to make the Church of Rome sensible that she wants this Reformation And is there any thing that can convince her more of that want then that her enormous miscarriages are so plainly depainted as most certainly they are in those Visions we have explained in this Treatise nay are very stingingly and satyrically set out by the Spirit of God on purpose to awake the Christian World out of this deep Sopour or Lethargie For it must be some such rousing Rebuke that can wean or reclaim that Church from so inveterate errours rooted in Custom and founded in a sweet bewitching Interest not to be parted withall upon any easy terms Which power of the Light of the true meaning of these Prophecies that obnoxious Church does plainly acknowledge herself sensible of in her hiding herself as well as she can from the convictive perstringency of them and in getting men to palliate her deformities with all possible art and to shelter off the searching gleams and piercing Lustre of these veracious Visions by their false and adulterate Glosses Which is the greatest Uncharitableness and Disser vice that can possibly be done unto her thus to lull her asleep to be surprised by the irresistible wrath of God and to expose her to the fury of his Jealousy Wherefore had she not better cease to take Sanctuary in such forced and incredible misinterpretations of Scripture and letting go those false shifts reform herself according to that Platform which has so manifest approbation from the Divine Oracles in a sense not onely credible but true 16. For it is demonstratively true by the second Consectary of my Joint-Exposition That the Church was not grown Antichristian till How well the Protestant Reformation is attested to out of the Apocalyps especially that of our English Church And what were the main hinderances to the Authour from the applying so illustrious an Event to the Prediction about 400 years after Christ As also
paternal chastisements to have restored in such a point of time as may for ever re-mind them of the end of their restitution namely That they may never fail with all faithfulness and diligence to witness to the Truth and to support propagate and emprove that saving Light of the Gospel which was * Namely since Popery first let into this Island by their Pious and Reverend Predecessors the first renowned Authors of so blessed a Reformation and keep it intemerate and incorrupt from all Papal impurities and adorn it with all sanctity of life and sobriety of conversation 18. Wherefore there is no reason at all for any Protestant Party to look That the Reformed part of Christendom is the real Fifth Monarchy and how perillous a Project that of Grotius is to reconcile the Protestant Churches to the Church of Rome before she be reconciled to the ancient Apostolick Church of the Primitive Ages upon the Apocalyps if rightly understood as such an affrightfull Mormo or Megaera and less for the English Church then any there being such illustrious Testimonies therein of her peculiar worth and precellency And as for the Roman Church herself though she be I must confess most sharply and satyrically reproved in some Visions there Ch. 17 18. and seems most dreadfully to be menaced yet I am well assured that none of those Comminations are meant in the harshest sense unless she will by her own obstinacy make them so but onely of a destruction of what is evil in her and of the Reformation of her from what is really and properly Antichristian But she is indeed there charged most plainly and apertly in the judgment of any one that is not wilfully blind with the highest Instances of Antichristianism to the end that she might Reform and repent and undergo no Destruction but what is her real Perfection As certainly it would be to be reduced to the Purity of the Primitive times or to take a Pattern from our Church which is already so conformable thereto Which free Advertisement to this so deeply apostatized Church of Rome I think is the greatest act of Charity that any member of Christ can doe for her But for us Protestants to reconcile to her before she be reconciled to the Primitive Church in those Symmetrall Ages thereof would be to rend our selves from Christ and his Church or at least to daub with untempered morter Associate your selves Oye people and ye shall Esay 8. 9. be broken in pieces gird your selves and ye shall be broken in pieces gird your selves and ye shall be broken in pieces So little good can there come of that Union that is founded in that which is so evil For to make the Church of Christ seem all of one piece by the Protestants conforming to the Church of Rome were indeed to make all Christendom one entire Field of Aegyptian Reeds for the fire of God's Jealousy to consume Such Counsells I say were not onely unskilfull and perillous but downright Treachery and Treason against the Empire of Christ and against the Princes of the Provinces thereof For it were the betraying of any Protestant Prince to the displeasure of God and wrath of the Lamb to persuade him to come again under the Laws and Religion of that Man of Sin and so to betray that trust Christ has committed to him by thus perfidiously surrendring part of his regained Empire into the hands of his declared enemie For I say the Reformed parts of Christendom are the Empire of Christ and the real Fifth Monarchy to the shame and reproach of those blind Enthusiasts that would tumultuously and rebelliously erect it where it already is not to be empaired by Revolts to Antichrist but to be propagated improved and enlarged by the ruine and destruction of his Kingdom Accordingly as Daniel has foretold touching the little Horn with the eyes of a man and a Dan. 7. 8. mouth speaking great things which I have demonstrated against Grotius to be meant of the Papacy That this Judgment shall sit and they shall take away his dominion to consume Dan. 7. 26. and destroy it unto the end So that according to the design of God the Papacy is to decay and consume after the rising of the Witnesses and that the Seventh Trumpet has once begun to sound For in it the Mystery of God is to be finished and the Seven Apoc. 10. 7. Vials to be poured on the Two-horned Beast or the False-Prophet Which Seventh Trumpet has begun to sound already and we are under the first Thunder thereof comprising the Seven Vials which are the Seven last Plagues and we are under the effusion of the Third of them And therefore to sound a retreat to Rome under the Conduct of Grotius or of any one else were to bid battel against Heaven and to harden our faces against the dreadfull Flashes and direfull Thunder-claps of the Almighty against whom there is neither Force nor Counsel neither can any man disannull his Judgment For who has Job 40. 9. an arm like God or who can thunder with a voice like him There are many devices in a mans heart nevertheless the Pro. 19. 21. Counsel of the Lord that shall stand SYNOPSIS PROPHETICA OR A compendious Prospect into the Prophecies in the Holy Scriptures touching the ANTICHRIST to come BOOK I. CHAP. I. 1. That the Antichristianism we have so punctually described in our Idea and is for the general so notoriously known to have over-run the Church is in truth a kind of Pagano-Christianism 2. That it is incredible that there should be no Divine Predictions of so considerable a Change 3. The ill-spent pains of those Interpreters who endeavour to obscure such Predictions by distorting them to other useless meanings 4. Whether this Great Antichrist be prophesied of in the Epistle of S. John under that very Name 5. That Barchocab if applicable at all to the Text may be a Type of this famous Antichrist 6. That the mention of those many Antichrists in S. John was occasioned from the fame of that Great Antichrist predicted in Daniel 7. That there is much-what the same reason of the slowness of Christians in discovering the true Antichrist as of the Jews in discovering the true Christ. 8. That a fraudulent and Hypocritical Opposer of Christ may be as real and considerable an Antichrist as an open Enemie as also S. John's description as easily applicable to him 9. The inept Niceness of declining the Name of Antichrist and that the Title was put upon this great Enemy of the Church by the ancient Fathers occasionally from this Epistle of S. John 10. Certain Considerations proposed touching the Obscurity of the Prophetick style 1. WE have sufficiently discovered to what a great measure the Church of Christ may degenerate or rather apostatize from the Purity of the Gospel into that abhorred condition of Antichristianism and yet retain the external Profession of Christianity using indeed the Name and
History of Christ and his Apostles but introducing thereupon such a face of Idolatry and Heathenish Superstition and barbarous Cruelty against the true Servants of Christ that by those whose judgments are more free and piercing such a state of the Church cannot but be deemed rather a Revival of Paganism then an uninterrupted Succession of true Christianity in the world or to use the softest language that the truth of the thing will admit of it cannot be judged pure and unadulterate Christianity but a kind of Pagano-Christianism the Pagan Rites Idolatries and Superstitions being practised upon Christian Objects and this Paganism in this pretended Christianity being maintained with as ferine cruelty as Paganism it self was in the time of the Heathen Emperours It remains now according to our proposed Method to search into the holy Oracles to find out Whether such a kind of Antichristianism as I have described be not prefigured therein and Whether so horrible a Mutation in the Church of Christ which for the general it is apparent even in the judgements of all that are not wilfully blind has for these many Ages seized upon the Church was not predicted of old by the Prophets or Apostles or by both 2. For it seems to me a wonderfull thing and incredible That God who was so carefull and watchfull over the Church of the Jews foretelling their Captivities and Returns out of Captivity and fore-advertising them in a manner of all their affairs of Importance by the mouths of his Prophets sometimes many hundred years before should leave the Church of Christ for so great a number of Ages without Ephod and without Teraphim without Prophets or timely Predictions what things would betide her in the decursion of so long a space as twelve or thirteen hundred years together to let her be bewildred thus in so endless a Night and leave her floating upon the waves without any Cynosura to stear by Wherefore I do not doubt but Christ has been so faithfull to his Spouse that he has left some Oracular Records wherein a man may reade if he come with unprejudiced eyes in a very legible Character the state and condition of the Church and this grand Apostasy of it with the most notorious circumstances thereunto appertaining that is to say He shall find in a manner all those Heads of Antichristianism which I have insisted upon intimated some way or other and charged upon that Church especially which History has found so guilty thereof 3. Which thing I being so fully persuaded of in my own judgement cannot without a great measure of grief or indignation reflect upon the misspent pains of some learned Pens who have endeavoured to pervert all those illustrious Prophecies whether in Daniel the Apocalyps or other places that do forewarn the people of God of this grand Degeneracy of the Church unto some other sense and meaning though never so forced and frivolous though never so strained and inconsiderable thereby obscuring both the glorious Providence of God of whose watchfulness over his Church the true and easy sense of these Prophecies is a most ample witness as also hindering that benefit which was to accrue to us by the right understanding of these holy Prefigurations and Predictions which if rightly interpreted would be of wonderfull great virtue for the reclaiming of the world and converting of Christendom to that ancient and Apostolick purity as well in Practice as Doctrines from which they have so long time swerved Wherefore out of a due sense of the Honour of God and the Interest of the Kingdom of the Lord Jesus I hold it fit to bring into view all those Prophecies as well of the Old as New Testament that have been by the Ancients understood of this Antichristian Apostasy and with an unprejudiced freedom and impartiality to unfold the meaning of them Which I hope I shall doe with that plainness and simplicity of evidence offering so unforced so easy and so natural a sense of things and so coherent with undubitable Principles that there is no man that is not grosly prejudiced but will receive full satisfaction concerning the true meaning of these Divine Oracles 4. I must confess that it is hard to produce any Text of Scripture wherein this Apostatized state of the Church is undoubtedly foretold under the very Name of Antichrist though that Name be found more then once in the Epistles of S. John But though some do yet I dare not contend that this Antichrist or Antichristianism which I have hitherto described is so clearly pointed at in every one of those places Not onely Grotius but Mr. Mede himself understands those Antichrists of the Pseudo-christs that our Saviour foretells of in Matthew which should start up before and after the destruction of Jerusalem which was the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the last hour of the Jewish Commonwealth But 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 signifying no more then 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is indifferently rendred 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and the Fourth Kingdom in Daniel being the last the time of that Kingdom may be also intimated by 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Whence that in S. John * 1 Ep. 2. 18. My little children it is the last hour and as you heard 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that that famous Antichrist will come even now there are many Antichrists whereby we know it is the last hour may bear this sense upon supposition the Prediction is somewhat Elliptically set down That the last time in Daniel's Kalendar of his Four Kingdoms that is to say the last Kingdom was then a running on which is the Roman during which Kingdom the Little horn which here is called Antichrist shall come upon the stage This is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 saith he that famous Antichrist whom you may have heard of out of Daniel but this is a greater distance off Wherefore to speak what more pressly concerns you Even now there are many Antichrists which not Daniel but our Saviour foretold of whereby again we know it is the last hour but I mean not of the Four Kingdoms of Daniel but of the Jewish Commonwealth according as our Lord has predicted Or more briefly thus My little children it is the last hour that is to say the last Kingdom of the Four namely the Roman and as you have heard that that famous Antichrist will then come viz. in that last hour so also now in the last hour of the Jewish Polity there are many Antichrists whence we may gather it is the last hour thereof these many Antichrists according to prediction attending this last hour as that one famous Antichrist that In some such sense as this I do confess that that Antichrist or Antichristianism which I have hitherto treated of may be by very Name intimated in this Text of Scripture though I shall quarrel with no man that would interpret it otherwise Grotius expounds this famous Antichrist of whom they
no reference to the usefulness of the Church The truth of this Rule appears not onely from the perpetual Examples of Prophecy where it is rare to find any that do not respect the Church of God some way or other in a special manner for even the * Rev. 6. Riders of the red black and pale Horses were as it were so many Scouts to inform the Church of the succeeding Periods of her affairs but also from the reason of the thing it self For if the number of Prophecies be not limited by this measure what must be the bounds of them And if there be any beyond this why are there not Prophecies of all Nations and of their affairs without any reference to the Church The last Rule Those Interpretations are more likely to be true that are suggested to a Minde unprejudiced and unbiassed by any outward respects then those that are made by such as the sense of Interest worldly hopes or fears or any feud or disgust may put a false biass upon and make the judgement partial The truth of this Rule is plain at first sight but I must confess the usefulness is more maimed and uncertain For though it may be apparent enough in many cases that an Interpreter is prejudiced by some of those waies I have intimated yet because it is very hard to be assured of any mans being entirely free from prejudice the application of the Rule will be found the more difficult But where certain Demonstration will not reach wary Conjecture may claim a right of succeeding in its place Nor need we be over-solicitous concerning the force or use of this last Rule it respecting the Interpreter more then the Interpretation and arguing rather from the quality of the person then the solidity of the performance which is better examined by the three foregoing Rules and other firm Principles of Reason and Knowledge CHAP. X. 1. The order and entrance of his Search into the Prophecies beginning at the Seventeenth Chapter of the Apocalyps 2. That the Seventeenth Chapter and the Thirteenth treat adequately of the same Subject proved by Two Parallelisms of Agreements 3. The Parallelism of Agreements betwixt the Two-horned Beast and the Whore of Babylon 4. The Parallelism of Agreements betwixt the Seven-headed Beast with ten Horns in the thirteenth Chapter and the Seven-headed Beast with ten Horns in the seventeenth 5. That the Parallelism of the Seven-headed Beasts in those Chapters is perfectly adequate and exact And also of the Two-horned Beast and the Whore saving that her Original is omitted and her Destruction mentioned in the Seventeenth Chapter of both which a sufficient account is rendred 6. The Adequateness of these Parallelisms demonstrated by comparing the Seventeenth and Thirteenth Chapters so as it may appear that the one does wholly imbibe the other saving in what is above excepted 7. That the naturalness and unforcedness of this Imbibition shall be made good by a joint-Exposition of the two Chapters 1. WE are now I hope competenty well appointed to pursue our main Design which is To trace â—…t in Prophecies of Scripture the Predictions and Prefigurations of this sad Apostatized state of Christendome into that Antichristian condition which it is notoriously known to have degenerated into Which we shall doe in the same order which we have observed in our Idea of Antichristianism beginning first with that first and most eminent member of Antichristianism Idolatry which we shall note through all those Prophecies which we conceive to have pointed thereat whether in the Old or New Testament beginning at the Seventeenth Chapter of the Apocalyps which is the Royal Gate which will let us in to view with the greatest certainty and assurance desirable all those Scenes of future things which are exhibited either by S. John himself by S. Paul or Daniel touching the Church of Christ in that State we have described Wherefore it being of so great importance to be well ascertain'd of the true meaning of the Vision of that Chapter I have thought fit with more then ordinary diligence and I hope with proportionable success to search into the genuine sense thereof and have I think by carefully comparing of it with the Vision of the Thirteenth Chapter thereby demonstrating that both Chapters do adequately treat of the self-same things as also by strictly keeping my self to the known Analogy of Prophetick Schemes wrought out such an undeniable clearness of the meaning of both those Visions that no man that is not wilfully blinde can fail of discerning the truth thereof 2. That both these Chapters have the very self-same Subject and more particularly that the Two-horned Beast is the same with the Whore of Babylon and the Seven-headed Beast with ten Horns in the Thirteenth Chapter the same in all respects with the Seven-headed Beast with ten Horns in the Seventeenth Chapter the manifold Agreements betwixt the first two and second two in these two following Parallelisms will abundantly make good 3. The Parallelism of Agreements betwixt the Two-horned Beast and the Whore of Babylon Agreement I. The Two-horned Beast and the Whore of Babylon are both the Restorers and Promoters of Idolatry in the Empire Agreement II. They both had the Rule and government over the Seven-headed Beast with ten Horns Agreement III. They both aspired to a Majesty and Power plainly Imperial Agreement IV. They both were workers of Miracles or a kinde of Magicians or Sorcerers and that in reference to the restoring of Idolatry Agreement V. They are both Pretenders to Sanctity and make a show of acting in the behalf of Christ when indeed they are Introducers of Idolatry and Antichristianism Agreement VI. They are both cruel and bloudy Persecutors of the Saints and of the Witnesses of Jesus Agreement VII They are both so described as to have a Jurisdiction over the whole Empire as well Oriental as Occidental Agreement VIII The Seat of them both is so indigitated at first as that it may be understood to be as well at New Rome or Constantinople as at Old Rome Agreement IX Both their Seats are afterwards expresly determined to Old Rome 4. The Parallelism of Agreements betwixt the Seven-headed Beast with ten Horns in the Thirteenth Chapter and the Seven-headed Beast with ten Horns in the Seventeenth Agreement I. They both have seven Heads and ten Horns Agreement II. The bodies of them both are set out by the Symbols of Cruelty and Idolatry Agreement III. In both Visions this Seven-headed Beast is a Beast that had in some sort ceased to be and was restored and healed and revived again Agreement IV. The time of the Death or of the Non-existence of either was not long Agreement V. In neither Vision this Beast is so perfectly restored as to be utterly the same again but rather the Image of the former or is so the former in one sense that it is not in another Whence it is called The Beast that is not and yet is or Was and is not and
so prosperously hitherto with an Admonition thereupon 4. The meaning of Until the words of God be fulfilled with a further Admonition to the Apostatized Church 5. The eviction of the truth of the seventeenth Agreement of the second Parallelism Ver. XVIII Why the Seat of the Whore is so determinately affixed at last to Old Rome in this Prophecie 2 3. A clear and confessed evidence that Old Rome is here pointed at as the Seat of the Whore with a short Paraphrase upon the sense of the Verse 4. That the Seat of the Two-horned Beast is also fixed to Old Rome and of the Cabbalisticalness of the Apocalyps 5. That the Numeral Name of the Beast is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and that it is so to be written and not 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 proved from the ancient Orthography of both the Greek and Latin Tongue 6. That the ancient Latines who usually sounded long i as a Diphthong pronounced their Vowels nearest to the Greeks 7. How exquisitely this name 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 answers to Events 8. That the finding the number 666 in other names does not at all weaken the determinate applicability of this 9. In what sense 666 is called the number of the Beast 10. The application of the Root thereof illustrated from the Cabbalistical application of the Root of the Tetractys 11. The last Agreement of the first Parallelism 12. The last Agreement of the second 13. That the Vision of the Whore is more appropriate and peculiar to the Church of Rome 14. Of the Inscription Mysterium on the Pope's Crown and of a Woman-Pope Ver. XV. THe Waters which thou sawest where the Whore sitteth are peoples and multitudes and nations and tongues This Interpretation of Waters in reference to the describing of the Extent of the Whore's Jurisdiction does imply that it was very large and if we compare it with what is in the Thirteenth Chapter v. 7. it seems to indicate no less compass then that of the whole Empire For the Beast there is certainly the whole Empire and it is but said of him 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Here is not indeed in this present verse 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. for the Angel here delivers a precept of the Art of interpreting of Prophecies and therefore could not so well say that Waters signifie All peoples and multitudes but his heaping up so many words more then in the fore-cited Verse of the other Chapter and that in the plural number seems to drive at as large extent as the other Which the consideration of his calling these Peoples and Multitudes and Nations and Tongues 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the beginning of this Prophecie which seems to point at the whole Empire as I have intimated above does farther ratifie To which you may adde that both Grotius and Alcazar understand the meaning of the place of the universal extent of the Roman Empire And à Lapide also who glosses upon the Text Aquae quas vidisti saith he significant omnes gentes populos quibus Roma imperabit But that the Two Horns of the Second Beast import the same thing Par. 1. Agr. 7. I have already named and whether this exercising all the power of the first Beast before him may not as well respect extent of place as the kinds of power I leave to further disquisition Enough already has been produced for the making good of the seventh Agreement of our first Parallelism Ver. XVI And the Ten Horns which thou sawest upon the Beast these shall hate the Whore and shall make her desolate and naked and shall eat her flesh and burn her with fire To burn with fire is a Diorismus and signifies onely to consume and destroy and to make to cease to be what it was What execution also the making of her desolate and naked and eating of her flesh does imply I shall defer to declare till the last part of our Discourse In the mean time having so plainly discovered that this Whore is not a City built with Wood and Stone but an Hierarchical Polity degenerated into a kind of Idolatrous Paganism the very same with the Two-horned Beast or Pseudo-prophetick Body I must confess I see no necessity of any such War as should aim at the burning of the ancient City of Rome but that this Prophecy may be fulfilled without any such martial noise or ruines or garments rowled in bloud Which is a thing seriously to be considered for the peace and welfare of Christendom For the hatred of these Ten Horns against the Whore and their persecution of her implies no such raising of Forces or marching in Battalia against Bulwarks and Walls and Houses and taking so long an Expedition as to Rome For this City is larger then to be comprised within the whole confines of Italy For it is a Pseudo-prophetick Polity that has spred through the whole Territories of the Empire a Water-Nymph whose skirts are so large that she has sat floting upon the whole Imperial Ocean for these many Ages and therefore is such as neither the Punishment of burning nor drowning is competible to in that crass and literal sense as vulgarly is understood But of these things in their more proper place Ver. XVII For God hath put in their hearts to fulfill his will and to agree and give their Kingdom unto the Beast This seems to be but the very same with the thirteenth verse These have one mind 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which answers to 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 here and shall give their power and strength to the Beast But that which is the most stupendious Arcanum and not to be thought upon but with the greatest humility and veneration is That God is here entitled to this counsel and joint-purpose of these Kings he is said to put this in their hearts and it is called the fulfilling of his purpose or counsel 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to give their Kingdom to the Beast Of which the easie sense is to contribute their Kingdoms to make up this Ten-horned Beast as the children of Israel might be said to contribute to the golden Calf 2. This seems a wonderful passage of Providence which that of S. Paul Act. 17. will hardly come up to where speaking of the gross Idolatries of the Pagans which reigned in the world so many Ages And the times saith he of this ignorance God winked at but now commandeth all men every Vers. 30. where to repent But God is said here not to wink at the thing but to put it into the hearts of these Kings c. Wherefore it seems most like to that of hardening Pharaoh's heart that he might not let Israel go or of the Jews crucifying our Saviour Christ whom Peter saith they took and by wicked hands crucifi'd and slew him 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 being exposed Act. 2. 23. and given up to them as it were by the determinate counsel and foreknowledge of God Wherefore it should seem that such
next to these a company of Dancers youthfully clothed in white Apparrel bright and shining like snow There were also Heralds who by Proclamation spoke to the people to give way that the Pomp might not be impeded by any rudeness or crowding nor any look down out of their windows upon them Such were the Religious Pomps and Processions of the ancient Pagans 19. Let us now transcribe the manner of certain Processions or Supplications of the Church of Rome out of the same Polydore who could not be ignorant of those Rites In the Pomp saith he of our Supplications or Processions there uses some ludicrous show to precede as Ranks of Souldiers Horse and Foot or some snapping and chattering Image ridiculous and loquacious or else gaping with wide chaps and making a gnashing noise with its teeth very formidable to behold with other sportful sights amongst which the ancient Prophets are personated and Boies with wings goe singing as if they were of the Heavenly Quire of Angels whom immediately follows a company of men and women dancing after their Musick Here one acts David there another Solomon Some play the parts of Queens and Princesses others of Huntsmen Beasts also are brought into the Pomp and there an Ape or Monkey with a Munmouth Cap button'd up on one side bestrides some big Mastiff or bedwarsed Nag There are also men carrying Torches in their hands and Boies and Girls are forbid to look out of the Windows Besides the Priests or some others sustain the persons or act the parts of this or that Saint they carrying also their Images or Reliques along with them in the Procession The air also is filled with odours as they goe and the ground they pass over strew'd with flowers And lastly to some is appointed the office of speaking to the people to give way that the Pomp may march on without any impediment Can there be one Egge more like to another then this Romish Procession is to the ancient superstitious Pomp of the Pagans Wherefore Polydore's inference is very solid and unexceptionable Ità Romani factitabant aliae pleraeque gentes à quibus ad nos ritus ejusmodi dubio procul manavit 20. Thus fully has this ancient Pagan Empire the slain Beast recovered into life again and so completely is his Image made up by the counsel and direction of the Two-horned Beast or the False Prophet Nor can I while I consider it but with bended knee adore that Divine Providence that watches so punctually over humane Affairs and with all possible thanks and humility acknowledge the tender care and faithfulness of the Lord Jesus Christ our great Pastor that has so exquisitely prefigured the state of the Church and told us afore-hand how things would be with her for a time that the truth of these Events may give us a more sure pledge of the certainty of her Restauration to her pristine Apostolical Purity according as he has predicted in the same Prophetick Visions 21. Truly this exact Symbolizing of the Roman Church in Idolatry and Superstition with the Pagan Empire jointly considered with the abominable Cruelty against the true Members of Christ practised by them both their Interdiction of all civil Commerce and the necessary supplies of life without joyning with them in Idolatrous Profession and Practice Non illis emendi quicquam Aut vendendi copia Nec ipsam haurire aquam Dabatur licentia Antequam thurificarent Detestandis Idolis which as Bede complains was the condition of the Primitive Christians that would not submit to the Idolatries of Paganism and which is the real fate of them under the Church of Rome that declare against their Pagano-Christianism nay they make Inquisition to take away the lives of poor harmless men and hunt after the bloud of the innocent and torture rack and burn with fire and fagot those that refuse to commit Idolatry with them I say the likeness and similitude that the state of the Roman Church bears to ancient Paganism in Idolatry Superstition and Cruelty to say nothing of their lying Miracles and Impostures is so complete and the Pagano-Christian Empire so lively an Image every way of that which was once purely Pagan that I cannot but devoutly admire the exact veracity of these Divine Visions in so material a Prediction but withall wonder excessively and am even amazed at Grotius when the event of things is so full and adequate so fit and exquisitely accommodate to this Interpretation of the Image of the Beast that a man of his Wit and Learning should content himself with one so petty so forced so impossible so unprofitable as that which he has made choice of and which I will now more fully confute after I have shew'd the weakness of Ribera's Interpretation BOOK II. CHAP. I. 1. The great Usefulness of shewing the folly of Ribera's and Grotius his Expositions of these two Chapters of the Apocalyps 2. That according to Ribera the Beast is the Devil 3. The seven Kings the wicked Kings of the seven Ages of the world 4. That five of these Ages were gone over in S. John's time and that the Reign of Antichrist is the seventh and Rome Heathen the Whore 5. The general Usefulness of our Joint-Exposition 6. That the Beast is not the Devil proved there-from by several circumstances Nor the seven Heads seven such Ages by the deadly wound in the sixth Head 7. Nor the Whore Rome Heathen more then the Two-horned Beast 8. That the Devil cannot be the Beast that was and is not c. proved by arguments not leaning on our Joint-Exposition 9. Farther proof from that part of his Name and yet is with a Vindication of that reading 10. A confutation of Ribera's Exposition of the seven Heads from the groundlesness and exceptionableness of his division of the duration of the world into seven Ages 11. From the Ununitableness of the Kings of the Age into one Head 12. From the Devil's eminency and superiority over these Heads 13. From the leaving neither room nor time for an eighth King 14. From the disproportionableness of the seventh Age of the world to the rest and especially to the strange Feats they say Antichrist is then to atchieve 15. And lastly from the seven Hills necessarily appropriating those seven Heads to the Roman Empire 16. That these Expositions of Ribera as also of the rest of the Roman Interpreters were very weak even in Grotius his own judgment which set him upon minting new ones 1. HItherto we have laid out our pains in the fully demonstrating what is the true and genuine sense of these two chief Chapters of the Apocalyps But because the Hypocrisy and Unwillingness of those whose Interest biasses them another way will be ready to shuffle off the weight and evidence of so plain a Demonstration in pretending that Learned men have given quite different Expositions of these Prophecies and that therefore it is uncertain what they signify I will bring in the two chiefest Expositours
And lastly if 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 did contain in it just 666 as it does most certainly 860 it would follow indeed that this would be no lett but that Trajan might be that former Beast in the Vision according to Grotius his Exposition But we are withall to remember that he had before made Domitian to be that Beast and Claudius so that a Triumvirate of Beasts is but One Beast And not onely these three Varieties but it must be Idolatry in the Abstract besides which is grosly against our second Rule of rightly interpreting of Prophecies Thus infinitely forced and distorted nay groundless contradictious and inconsistent is Grotius his Exposition of these two Chapters of the Apocalyps all along 15. The consideration whereof has even cast me into an astonishment that a Person of those admirable Parts and Learning and as I have been always prone to think of great ingenuity should ever please himself in any such performance as this and I am more puzzled to find out the cause of this strange Misadventure ofhis then of any Phaenomenon of nature that ever sollicited my thoughts For to think he was in good earnest in this Exposition and sincerely delivered his judgment his known skill and sharpness of sight in other things will not permit Nor will that Ingenuity and Integrity I presumed always to be in him suffer me to suspect he would willingly and wittingly in favour of a party forge false glosses and adulterate the true meaning of the Oracles of God there being in my apprehension nothing more abominable then for a man whom God has blest with Parts and Learning and an honest Reputation amongst men to make use of all these against him that gave them and for the serving of an Interest to doe so great a disservice to the Kingdom of Christ as to hide the most concerning Truths thereof by blinding the eyes of men by the interposing of the Idolized lustre of his own Name betwixt those Truths and them 16. But I will not be too inquisitive into what I cannot fathom That which is more useful for us to consider is this That Grotius a man of those excellent Parts and Learning and so throughly read in History and having also so great a zeal and resolution to make good sense of these Visions in the behalf of the Church of Rome and for that end taken to himself the liberty even against the whole stream of Antiquity to chop into such Times as he thought made most for his turn yet for all this having made so pitiful and impossible a piece of work of it though certainly in his own judgment considerably better then any thing the Church of Rome had invented for her self before it is plain partly from hence I mean from Grotius his own judgment who has by this new Invention antiquated and condemned all their precedent Expositions and partly from our observation of the multifarious Incongruities and Impossibilities of his that there is no Interpretation extant against the main sense of the Protestants that is not superlatively weak and frivolous nay incredible and impossible CHAP. V. 1. The first Consectary from our Joint-Exposition with a Demonstration of the truth thereof 2. The great Usefulness of the second Consectary for the peace and security of the Church 3. The settled Notion of Long and Short 4. A Demonstration of the truth of this Consectary 5. The third fourth fifth and sixth Consectaries together with their Proofs 6. The Demonstration of the seventh Consectary with an intimation of the special usefulness thereof for the Peace of Christendom 7. The eighth Consectary with the Proof thereof 8. The ninth Consectary with a copious Demonstration of the truth thereof 9. The truth of the tenth Consectary clearing the Protestants from Schism plainly demonstrated 10. The eleventh Consectary with its Proof 11. The Proof and notable Usefulness of the twelfth Consectary 12. Hoâ—… clearly and plainly that part of Antichristianism which consists in Idolatry is prefigured and foretold in these Visions we have explained in our Joint-Exposition 1. WHerefore having cleared the coast of all Opposers and made sure of the right sense of these two Chapters of the Revelation there being nothing strained nor forced in our Exposition of them but all according to the acknowledged Laws of Prophetick Interpretation in those four Rules I have laid down and the usuall meaning of the Symbols noted in my Prophetick Alphabet let us now take notice of some few but weighty Consectaries partly contained in but necessarily flowing from the continued and perpetual Firmness of our Joint-Exposition of the said Chapters As first Consect I. That the Fourty two months by which the Continuance of the Seven-headed Beast with ten Horns after the healing of his wounded Head is prefigured are not months of Days but 1260 Years This does necessarily follow from our Joint-Exposition wherein we have clearly demonstrated That the Beast whose deadly wound was healed and the Beast that was and is not and yet is are one and the same Beast absolutely and adequately and therefore must of necessity have one and the same duration But the Duration of the Beast that was and is not and yet is cannot be 42 months literally understood wherefore they must signify Symbolically and be interpreted of months of years as there are weeks of years in Daniel Now that the duration of 42 months cannot be literally understood of the Beast that was and is not and yet is is plain from hence in that it is said of the Seventh King that he should * Apocal. 17. 10. stay but a short space Which must be a peculiar Property of him and distinct both from the immediately preceding and immediately succeeding King Which implies that both they should stay longer then he And yet that short-lived King did continue about an hundred years at least as may appear by History and will be farther demonstrated in the following Consectary Whence the Beast that was and is not must needs continue above three years and an See Mystery of Godliness Book 5. Ch. 15. Sect. 2. half nay above an hundred years Which fourty two months having no fitness to typify it is manifest that by these months are meant 1260 years Which was the thing to be demonstrated Consect II. That the Church was free from Idolatry and Antichristianism till about four hundred years after Christ. 2. This is a main Truth and a mighty Bulwark against the rampant fury of many Fanatical Sects that would reform even to utter Confusion Deformity and Destruction under pretence of calling any thing Idolatrous and Antichristian that does not stand with their own phancy But this Consectary is a Protection to the greatest and most considerable Truths of Christianity there being a Subscription as it were by the Finger of God to the general sense of the Church concerning such things as were then universally held or concluded in Councils that they were neither Idolatrous nor Antichristian 3. Now the
are said to ascend up to Heaven in a cloud it seems an Allusion to Christ's Ascension after his Crucifixion which is also alluded to here in the eighth verse And the time of Christ's mournfull Prophecy before his Resurrection was about Three years and an half if we may believe Chronologers to make the Allusion still more perfect Ver. XIII And the same time there was a great Earth-quake and the tenth part of the City fell and in the Earth-quake were slain seven thousand Names of men and the Remnant were affrighted and gave glory to the God of Heaven That an Earth-quake signifies Political Commotions and change of affairs is obvious to any one to note But that the City here mentioned should be understood not of a City of brick or stone but a Polity has not been so easy for every one to hit on But I conceive it is plain enough that this City is the very City mentioned in the eighth verse which is called the great City and this great City is the Whore of Babylon and the Whore of Babylon is nothing but the body of the Idolatrous Clergy in the Empire who appertain to the seventh or last Head of the Beast which is an Head of Blasphemie as well as the six first that is to say an Idolatrous Head Whence we may understand what is meant by these Seven thousand Names of men For neither seven nor thousand signify any determinate number though by a pleasant Diorismus they seem to doe so but onely the nature or property of those Names of men that are said to be slain namely That they are Titles Dignities Offices or Orders of men belonging to the State of Christendom as under the Seventh Head that is become Idolatrous and Antichristian And in that this Number Seven is multiplied into a Thousand it signifies a perfect and durable nulling all such Offices and Orders of men Which if Mr. Mede had taken notice of it would have saved him the labour of making out the sense of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and also the solicitude touching the proportionableness of the Number of the slain For no men at all here are necessarily implied to be slain but onely all Antichristian Offices and Fraternities to be dissolved and abrogated and things to be reduced to the purity of the first four hundred years For to slay by a Diorismus signifies nothing else but a causing a thing to cease to be This I little question but is the true meaning of this place And 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 will have a sense marvellous coincident therewith But that there is any design upon the brick and stone the walls and buildings of Rome either in this present Vision or any other in the Apocalyps I do profess my self for the present so dim-sighted as not to discover the Papal Polity by an Hylasmus not the material City being understood in all the denunciations against her so far as I see yet So that if she be to be burnt or sack'd or sunk by Earth-quakes it may be but a By-Accident and not directly pointed at nor prefigured in the Apocalyptick Visions But if such a thing should happen in such circumstances as should in a special and peculiar way fit with some of these Prophecies it will be therein comprised by an Henopoeia of the second sort as I have intimated in my Prophetick Schemes But be this how it will I make no question but this thirteenth verse of the Chapter we are upon concerns mainly if not onely the Idolatrous Clergy it self But it is said of the rest 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 not the remnant that they were indeed affrighted and amazed but gave glory to the God of Heaven as being just in his judgments 2. Out of what I have written here and in my Mystery of Godliness I think it is evident enough that that Antichristian Opposition that is made Book 5. Ch. 17. Sect. 8. against the Prophetick and Regal Office of Christ is clearly prefigured in this Vision of the Two Witnesses who are said to lie slain in the street of the great City during the Conculcation of the Outward Court of the Temple by the Gentiles And truly though some please themselves in conceiting this Vision such an invincible puzzle I cannot but prosess that the fense thereof seems to me as clear as the Meridian Sun And for that special Knot therein imagined to lie in the eighth verse how these Witnesses can be understood of Christendom their bodies being said to lie dead in the City where our Lord was crucified which must be Jerusalem I have already intimated that this City is called the old Jerusalem spiritually or mystically as well as Sodom and Aegypt And if any one have an heart to hear for it requires no great labour of the head to understand it the brief and plain sense of this verse is this That these Two Witnesses shall lie despoiled of all Respect and Power in the Precincts of the Jurisdiction of that Church which hitherto has always been the greatest and is now very large indeed consisting of mere formal carnal and Hypocritical Professours of the worship of the true God in which Church our Lord also was crucified What can be more easy and plain then this For it onely supposes that this carnal Hypocritical Witness-slaying Church of the Christians is one succeeding City Synagogue or false Church with the formal Hypocritical Prophet-murthering Church of the Jews Which is a plain truth whether this Prophecy suppose it or no. But we proceed CHAP. XIII 1. That the little Horn in Daniel is a Type of that Power which should oppose the Regal Office of Christ. 2. That the Fourth Kingdom in Daniel is not that of the Lagidae and Seleucidae but the Roman proved from the universal Consent of Ecclesiastick Writers 3. From the eminency and greatness of the Fourth Kingdom 4. From the distance of time betwixt the Kingdom of the Lagidae and Seleucidae and the Kingdom of the Stone cut out without hands or the Kingdom of the Son of man which is also the Kingdom of Heaven or of God 5. Grotius his fond and profane Interpretation of the Son of man as if thereby were meant the People of Rome 6. The like extravagancy in his interpreting the Stone cut out without hands of the same People 7. The unsoundness of that conceit more particularly discovered 8. The Kingdom of the Lagidae and Seleucidae farther proved not to be the Fourth Kingdom from the Coexistence of the Ten Kings according to Type 9. From their vastly-differing Periods the one ending according to Daniel presently after Antiochus the other not before the Day of Judgment 10. From Daniel's making the great Horn the first King in the Third Kingdom and four lesser to grow up after him on the same Goat's Head 11. From the four Heads of the Leopard which are the four Successours of Alexander in this Third Beast or Kingdom and from Daniel's reckoning Antiochus in the latter end of
Images kneel before them hold up their hands before them set up Candles burn Incense before them offer up gold and silver unto them hang up ships crutches chains men and women of wax before them attributing health and safeguard the gifts of God to them or the Saints whom they represent as they rather would have it who I say can doubt but that our Image-maintainers agreeing in all Idolatrous Opinions outward Rites and Ceremonies with the Gentile Idolaters agree also with them in committing most abominable Idolatry Truly for my part I must confess I do not at all doubt of it and therefore from such passages as these and several other of the like nature scattered up and down in this excellent Homily of our Church concerning Idolatry and Images do think it an easie Task to prove such a state of the Church as is here described to be the very Image of the Beast foretold in Apoc. 13. 14. the Apocalyps as any man may discern out of my foregoing Discourse But I will give my self the trouble of transcribing one or two more passages as that upon that famous Act of the good King Hezekias in breaking a-pieces the Brazen Serpent when once abused to Idolatry though set up by the special commandment of God and so mysterious a Figure of our Saviour himself How think you saith she would that godly Prince if he were now living handle our Idols set up against God's commandment directly and being Figures of nothing but folly and for Fools to gaze on till they become as wise as the blocks themselves they stare on and so fall down like dared Larks in that gaze and being themselves alive worship a dead stock and stone gold or silver and so become Idolaters abominable and cursed before the living God 6. And again Now concerning excessive decking of Images and Idols with painting gilding adorning with precious vestures pearl and stone what is it else but for the farther provocation and enticement to spiritual Fornication to deck spiritual Harlots most costly and wantonly Which the Idolatrous Church understands well enough For she being indeed not onely an Harlot as the Scripture calleth her but also a foul filthy and withered Harlot for she is indeed of ancient years and understanding her lack of nature and true beauty and great loathsomness which of her self she hath doth after the custome of such Harlots paint herself and deck and tire herself with gold pearl stone and all kinde of precious Jewels that she shining with the outward beauty and glory of them may please the foolish phantasy of fond Lovers and so entice them to spiritual Fornication with her Where it is most manifest that the Church of England doth and that with truth and judgement intimate that that apostatized Church of Rome is prefigured in the Type of the Whore of Babylon accordingly as I have above demonstrated in this present Treatise And answerable to this just Censure is that which we may reade in the following Page Surely the Prophet Daniel in the eleventh Chapter declareth such sumptuous decking of Images with gold silver and precious stones to be a token of Antichrist's Kingdome Wherein undoubtedly allusion is made to those words of the Prophet And a God whom his Fathers knew not shall he Dan. 11. 3â—… honour with gold and silver and with precious stones and pleasant things which is consonant to that sense we have * Ch. 10. above delivered of that Prophecy And as touching that ordinary pretence for Images that they are the Lay-mens Books she doth roundly rebuke the Sophistry of so fond a Plea But away for shame with those coloured Cloaks of Idolatry of the Books and Scriptures of Images and Pictures to teach Idiots nay to make Idiots and stark Fools and Beasts of Christians Do men I pray you when they have the same Books at home with them run on Pilgrimage to seek like Books at Rome Compostella or Jerusalem to be taught by them Do men light Candles at Noon-day to their Books Do they burn incense offer up gold and silver and other gifts to them And a little after Wherefore call them what they list it is most evident by their deeds that they make of them no other Books nor Scriptures then such as teach most filthy and horrible Idolatry as the Users of such Books daily prove by continually practising the same O Books and Scriptures in the which the devillish School-master Satan hath penned the leud Lessons of wicked Idolatry for his dastardly Disciples the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the Apocalyps and Scholars to behold reade and learn to God's most high dishonour and their most horrible damnation And at last she winding up towards a Conclusion determines thus True Religion then and pleasing to God standeth not in making setting up painting gilding clothing and decking of dumb and dead Images which be but great Puppets and Babies for old fools in dotage and wicked Idolatry to dally and play with nor in kissing of them capping kneeling offering to them incensing of them setting up candles hanging up legs arms or whole bodies of wax before them or praying and asking of them or the Saints things belonging onely to God to give But all these things be vain and abominable and most damnable before God all such not onely bestowing their money and labour in vain but with their pains and cost purchasing to themselves God's wrath and utter indignation and everlasting damnation both of body and Soul And a little after Wherefore God's horrible wrath and our most dreadful danger cannot be avoided without the destruction and utter abolishing of Images and Idols out of the Church and Temple of God Which to accomplish God put in the minds of all Christian Princes Amen Thus freely zealously and judiciously does our Church of England condemn the Roman Religion of gross Idolatry in all those Points which I have nominated in my Idea nor has she left or appointed any Usage or Ceremony that bears any similitude or has any affinity with that hainous Crime So clear is she from this First part of Antichristianism which is the polluting of the Church of Christ with a Pagan-like Idolatry 7. And now concerning that Second part of Antichristianism opposite to the Second Privative end of the Gospel which was the Removal of that Yoke of Judaical Institutes and Ceremonies in lieu whereof Antichrist brings in an heap and lurry of Superstitious Opinions Rites and Ordinances which prove a load more intolerable not onely then the Law of Moses but the Tyranny of Aegypt itself I demand has not the Church of England by the appointment of the Royall Power of the Nation freed us from this miserable bondage Whose patience is now set on the Tenter-hooks by attending of dumb shows or â—…ish Masses as they are rightly called in our Book of Homilies wherein the Unintelligibleness of the Tongue administers no life nor devotion to the hearer Whose limbs are now tired out with
dispatch with like brevity as in these former CHAP. XXII 1. The diametrical Opposition of our Church to that part of Antichristianism which would subvert the Regal and Prophetick Offices of Christ. 2. As also to that which strikes at his Sacerdotal Office 3. That she holds nothing against those other sacred Titles of Christ the Truth Life Light c. 4. A demonstrative Vindication of Episcopacy from the Imputation of Antichristianism out of the Apocalyps 5. What an Establishment that Book is if rightly understood to the Crown and Church of England 6. That no Papal nor Presbyterian Power is of right above the King no not in causes Ecclesiastical 7. The judgement of our Church thereupon 8. The peculiar glory of our Church that she is so perfectly free from all Frauds and Impostures 9. Her freeness from Pride 10. From Antichristian Impurity 11. And from Cruelty 12. Her Reformation an eminent Speciminal Completion of the Prophecy of the Resurrection of the Two Witnesses 13. The usefulness of this Vindication of her for the suppressing of Popery and Schism 1. I Demand therefore concerning those three known Offices of Christ Regal Sacerdotal and Prophetical is not our Church very faithful and sincere in this point and not at all guilty of such opposings and underminings of them as I have specified in my Idea of Antichristianism Does our Church pretend to be Infallible her self or so much as connive or consent to the pretended Infallibility of others Nay has she not plainly declared That general Councils for asmuch as they be an Assembly Article 2â—… of men whereof all be not governed with the Spirit and Word of God may erre and sometimes have erred even in things pertaining to God and that therefore things ordained by them as necessary to Salvation have neither strength nor authority unless it may be declared that they be taken out of the Holy Scripture And in the fore-going Article she does affirm That it is not lawful for the Church to ordain any thing that is contrary Article 20. to God's Word written and that she may not so expound one place of Scripture that it be repugnant to another and finally concludes That although the Church be a Witness and a Keeper of Holy Writ yet as she ought not to decree any thing against the same so besides the same ought she not to enforce any thing to be believed for necessity of Salvation To which effect she also speaks in another Article touching the Sufficiency of Article 6. Holy Scriptures Holy Scripture saith she containeth all things necessary to Salvation so that whatsoever is not read therein nor may be proved thereby is not to be required of any man that it should be believed as an Article of Faith or be thought requisite or necessary to Salvation And again to the same purpose doth she speak in that excellent Exhortation to the reading and knowledge of Holy Scripture where with all earnestness she invites every one to the diligent perusing thereof declaring That in Holy Scripture is fully contained what we ought to doe and what to eschew what to believe and what to love and what to look for at God's hands at the length and tells us the best way for understanding of them in a Paragraph worthy to be written in letters of Gold toward the end of the first part of the Homily And in reading of God's Word saith she he profiteth not most always that is most ready in turning of the Book or in saying of it without-book but he that is most turned into it that is most inspired with the Holy Ghost most in his heart and life altered and changed into that thing which he readeth he that is daily less and less proud less wrathful less covetous and less desirous of worldly and vain pleasures he that daily forsaking his old vicious life increaseth in Vertue more and more And in the second part of the said Homily she heartens her Sons against those discouragements and stumbling-blocks which that false and treacherous Church casts in their way of pretended difficulty and obscurity exhorting them to pray to God for Assistence in reading the Scriptures assuring them that if they be sedulous and serious what they are at a loss in God will either send some pious and knowing person as he did Philip to the Eunuch reading the Prophets to instruct them or that Himself from above will give light into our minds and teach us those things that be necessary for us and wherein we be ignorant farther adding out of S. Chrysostom That humane and worldly wisdom or science is not so needful for the understanding of Scripture but the revelation of the Holy Ghost who inspireth the true meaning into them who with humility and diligence do search therefore And lastly she concludes That none be enemies to the reading of God's Word but such as either be so ignorant that they know not how wholsome a thing it is or else be so sick that they hate the most comfortable medicine that should heal them or so ungodly that they would wish the people still to continue in blindness and ignorance of God How diametrically opposite this Genius of our Church is to that Antichristian Spirit I have described in his opposings and underminings of the Regal and Prophetical Offices of Christ is obvious for any man to discern who listeth but to compare them 2. And now for his Sacerdotal Office which is injured and affronted in multiplying Mediatours in pretending to offer up the very Body of Christ in the Mass and in derogating from the virtue of that Sacrifice himself made for the sins of the world as if it reached not to the Punishment but to the Guilt onely and that every man must satisfie for himself in imposed mulcts and penances either here or in Purgatory As for the first we have already proved it to be contrary to the Doctrine of our Church And that one Article part whereof I have cited already against Transsubstantiation will assure us of her rejection of the two latter The offering of Christ once made saith she is that perfect Redemption Propitiation and Satisfaction for all the sins of the whole world both original Article 31. and actual and there is no other Satisfaction for sin but that alone And then it follows Wherefore the Sacrifices of Masses in the which it was commonly said that the Priest did offer up Christ for the quick and the dead to have remission of pain or guilt were blasphemous fables and dangerous deceits See also the Article of the Justification of Man and the Homily of Salvation and Good Works But this is so notorious a Doctrine in our Church that I need not insist any further upon the proof of her avowing of it 3. As for the Oppositions against the other Titles of Christ specified in the sixth Chapter of the second Book of my Idea of Antichristianism it is manifest that our Church is not concerned
ancient as Christianity it self and runs through not onely part but all those Symmetral Ages of the Church So manifest is it that there is not left in the frame of our English Church any thing of its own nature Antichristianly opposing that Heavenly and Christian Grace of Humility But if we come to take view of Persons who can help it but that a Lay-man may be proud as well as a Clergy-man and a Presbyter as soon as a Bishop So that all would be Antichristian upon this score 10. And it is as evident that there are none of those Oppositions against that celestiall Grace of Purity noted in the twelfth Chapter to be found in our Church And not so onely but I think we may without vanity provided it be done with humble thankfulness to Almighty God who inspired our Heroical Reformers with such exquisite prudence and judgment glory in that excellent and fit constitution of things in our Universities Where none are tied up to the Vows of Coelibate nor confined to separate and solitary cells to be shewn disguised in some uncouth habit with circumcised crowns and moaped or bloated looks as they are wont to shew strange Animals through their several grates at the Tower but live under more free and manly Laws and ingenuous Exercises without either the lash or hypocrisy of Superstition and are appointed to spend their time in such things as may adorn their Souls with real Knowledge and Vertue where also there is an honest and frugal Provision made for them that list to lay their Bodies as well as bury their Minds in the dust of an Academie Which if either Nature or some Diviner power has fitted them for it they may doe with honour and if they be weary of a single life they may leave the University when they will without the least reproach Which ingenuous and Christian freedom in my judgment is infinitely to be preferred before the Superstitious Slavery and Hypocrisy of the Roman Monasteries where people are caged up and imprisoned like so many Captives of the King of Babylon or so many Bond-men or Bond-women of that Mystical Pharaoh to work out imaginary stuff to fill the Churche's Treasury of Merits which are vended for ready money to encrease the Revenue and to support the Pomp of this magnificent Tyrant of Aegypt 11. Lastly Concerning those most Antichristian Oppositions against that transcendent Grace of Charity Our English Church is so far from opposing it that she is exemplary in it condemning the Doctrines and Practices of that worst of Churches no more then needs must and courting the adverse party to her Communion by all lawfull accommodations and compliances in her publick Service if by any means she may gain some of them over to the Truth Whereas on the other side that imperious Woman on the Seven Hills sits like a Queen to whom every one must bow but she neither bend nor condescend to any thing but stands as stiff as a Marpesian Rock for the maintaining her own Humour and Interest though never so point-blank against the Eternal Laws of God and Right Reason Then for that bloudy and butcherly Decree of killing of Hereticks namely such as hold against the Tenents of that Church though those Tenents of this Church be plainly repugnant to express Scripture How contrary to this Antichristian and Diabolical Spirit is the Doctrine of our Church of England who as I have above noted has declared That no Article 20. Church has authority to decree any thing against Holy Writ nor to enforce any thing to be believed for necessity of Salvation besides it as you may see in the Book of Articles Nor can they justly frame any excuse for their abominable Cruelty from the Sanguinary Laws of this Realm against Priests and Jesuites For what a vast difference is there when the one suffer as Traitors to their Liege Sovereign the other because they will not be Traitors and Rebels to God and the Lord Jesus Christ for every Idolater is so And no man can submit to the Church of Rome but he must ipso facto submit to Idolatry 12. Verily while I consider what an honest and faithfull Spirit breaths in the Book of Homilies and other Writings of our Church and how exquisitely and perfectly we are set free from all that Imposture and Wickedness that can properly be styled Antichristian by the wise management and solid and sound judgment of our renowned Reformers and how that men of this Integrity of mind and soundness in the Faith were then advanced into Power in Church and State by the Sovereign Authority I cannot withhold from declaring that I do not at all doubt but that the Reformation of our English Church into such a condition as I have briefly represented was one eminent Speciminall Completion of the Prophecy of the rising of the Two Witnesses and of that Voice from Heaven that is to say of the Sovereign Power saying unto them Come up hither For every tittle of the Prophecy is exactly applicable to the Event as any one may find that will try Besides that so notable a providence as the Protestant Reformation is no-where prophesied of if not in that Vision For the Vials are none of them within the Sixth Trumpet as the Vision of the Witnesses is but all within the Seventh as I have above plainly enough proved nor they expressive of the first Reformation in the chief Circumstances thereof nor any Vision else save this of the Resurrection of the Witnesses Nor know I any thing that should make a man hesitate unless it be that the Witnesses are said to be raised up after three Days and an half that is to say three Times and an half whenas our Reformation fell within these Times namely in the last Half of a Time But no Observation can be more trivial then this That the designation of Time divided into parts unless some intimation determinate it to one sense may signify either such a space of time fully finished or else expiring in the last division thereof As if one should say Post triduum mortis resurrexit Christus no man can understand that of Christ's being dead three entire days And so Aliquot post menses may as well be rendred Within some months after as After some months And the Seventy do expresly translate that in Genesis 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Ch. 38. 24. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 whenas the genuine sense is within three months cùm tertius mensis ageretur as the Marginal Exposition has it in Vatablus Whence it is evident that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 does not imply the time fully run out but that the last part thereof must then be current And so it is in this Prophecy our Reformation happening in the last Half-Time or Half-Day So easily is this Scruple removed And therefore the Application so fit to the Event that I doubt not but this Vision was a Prediction of it Which therefore should make our Reformation
any Infallible Judge nor any faithful Keeper of Traditions does ipso facto declare her self the onely sufficient Guide 4. That there is not onely no want of an Infallible Judge but better there should be none 5. That the want of Infallibility does not take away the Authority of the Church it being the duty of every person in things really disputable to compromize with her 6. That though a Visible Judge be necessary in Civil causes yet it is nothing so in Points of Religion 7. That every private man has not onely a liberty but a command to judge for himself in matters of Faith 8. The said Right or Priviledge demonstrated also by Reason 9 That the Reason or Judgment of every private man is not a private Spirit in that reproachful sense that some speak it 10. That the claim to a right of judging for ones self in points of Faith does not make a man superiour to his Church 11. Nor yet equal 12. Nor implies that he thinks himself wiser then his Church but rather more careful of his own eternal Concerns 13. That it is not his private Wisedom he sticks to but the Wisedom of God known to all that are not wilfully blind 14. That the Church is not Infallible proved from the Example of the Jewish Church 15. That there is the same reason of the Christian. 16. That the want of an Infallible Interpreter is no such loss to the common people 17. That their assurance of the truth of the Scriptures by the Spirit is a Tenet not so superciliously to be exploded as some make shew of 18. That this Spirit is properly the Spirit of Faith distinguishable from that of Knowledge and Wisedom 19. The notorious Fraud and excessive Mischief of this pretence of Infallibility 92 CHAP. III. 1. That the keeping the Law of Christ in an unknown Tongue is an undermining or opposing of his Sovereignty 2. As also the reproching and vilifying his Law 3. Their fraudulent pretence of hiding the Scriptures with a vindication of their Usefulness and Excellency 4. The vilifying of the Laws of Christ by setting far less penalties upon the transgression of them then of the inconsiderable Institutes of the Church 5. That their rigid Impositions are against the Kingdom of Christ as also the reading of Legends instead of his Law in Churches 6. The dispensing also with the Divine Laws The Fraud and Mischief thereof 7. The treasonable pretence of this Power 's being absolute by right of succession in Christ's seat 8. The evil effect of this pretence discoverable in several Institutes contrary to the written Laws of Christ 9. As also in nulling those Laws he has given as he is the Eternal Word 10. The bloudy opposing the Sovereignty and Kingdom of Christ in murthering his faithful Subjects 102 CHAP. IV. 1. Sundry particular Oppositions against the Prophetick Office of Christ which may be the Characters of that grand Pseudo-prophet that was to come into the world 2. That the Spirit of Prophecy is not to be monopolized by any one person but is free 3. An Excerpt out of Caelius Secundus Curio to that purpose 4. The silencing the Dictates of those common Notions implanted in humane Souls the highest affront to the Prophetick Office of Christ that can be 5. Several Absurdities propounded as Instances of that Tyranny over the immutable Principles of humane Understanding with the detection of that eminent False-prophet thereby 6. That it is infinitely more likely that this pretended Prophet should be fallible then the foregoing Absurdities true 7. That the slaying of the Prophets 8. Together with the above-mentioned Oppositions against the Prophetical Office of Christ make up a conspicuous Limme of Antichristianism 106 CHAP. V. 1. That the pretence of repeating the Oblation of the real Body of Christ is a derogation to the Excellency of Christ's Priesthood 2. Fuller Aggravations of this wicked affront 3. A prevention of a subterfuge 4. Another more dangerous assault against the Priesthood of Christ and the main end of his Suffering 5 6. The making the Bloud of Christ available to take away the Guilt of sin onely and not the Punishment how salvagely Antichristian 7. Farther Aggravations of this despightful piece of Antichristianism 8. That there can be nothing more fundamentally Antichristian then it 9. That the crime considering the circumstances seems worse then that of Judas with the Fraud of this wickedness 10. As also the great Mischief thereof 11. Injuries against the Mediatourship of Christ. 12. An Answer to some slight pretences 13. A farther confutation of such Antichristian errors and mispractices 14. The Fraud and Mischief of multiplying Mediators 15. A special Mischief done thereby to our growth in grace and holiness 110 CHAP. VI. 1. The opposing of Christ in his three noted Offices how hainously Antichristian 2. An enumeration of other Titles of Christ. Opposition against him as he is the Truth 3. As he is the Light 4. As he is the Life 5 6. Opposition to his Divinity by equallizing Saints and Angels to him 7. Yea by preferring what is but a Creature before him 8 9 10. Opposition against his Paternal Title by injuries and cruelties to his children 11. Opposition to him as he is Prince of Peace 12. By needless Definitions in points of Opinion 13. By taking away the obligation of Oaths 14. By making war with the Saints 118 CHAP. VII 1. That any Constitution of things that naturally opposes and suppresses the Divine Life is Antichristian in the highest measure 2. Such as Idolatry Superstition and all the above-mentioned Oppositions to Christ's Offices and Titles 3. The opinion of a virtue in the Sacraments ex opere operato and of the needlessness of our attention to our Devotions 4. Dumb shows and the resting in the mere doing of a Religious duty be it from what principle it will 5. Easie Absolution and slight Penances 6. Plenary Indulgences purchased by money from Ecclesiastick Authority 7. A general note prefixed touching the Mischiefs of the several Oppositions against the Divine Life 8. The plausibility of the Supposition of an Ecclesiastick Power and Pomp more then Imperial 9. The weakness of the grounds for the said Supposition 10. The consequential Mischief thereof in driving the minds of Church-men from the study of Truth and Holiness 11. Yea in making them oppose every thing that is true and holy if it oppose their designs of Ambition and Avarice 12. That such a Luciferian Power as this were the very ruine of the Kingdom of Christ upon Earth 13. And the turning of his Church into a mere Mart or Fair. 124 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.
confirmation of the truth of our Idea of Antichristianism therefrom 4. A summary Representation of this Idea in the Oppositions and Defeatments of the Privative Ends of the Gospel as also of those noted Offices of Christ. 5. Of his Divinity and other holy Titles 6. Of the Divine Life in Root and Branches 7. A Parable to set out the salvage Injustice and Cruelty of this Antichristian Synagogue 8. The Apodosis of the Parable 9. That we have set out the Idea of the most real and essential Antichristianism that can be with an Answer to what may be objected to the contrary 10. That it is that very Antichristianism that is foretold in the Prophets the clearing whereof necessitates us to an inspection into them before we make any punctual Application of our Idea to the Apostasy of the Church 173 The CONTENTS of the Second Part OR SYNOPSIS PROPHETICA BOOK I. CHAP. I. 1. THat the Antichristianism we have so punctually described in our Idea and is for the general so notoriously known to have everrun the Church is in truth a kind of Pagano-Christianism 2. That it is incredible that there should be no Divine Predictions of so considerable a Change 3. The ill-spent pains of those Interpreters who endeavour to obscure such Predictions by distorting them to other useless meanings 4. Whether this Great Antichrist be prophesied of in the Epistle of S. John under that very Name 5. That Barchocab if applicable at all to the Text may be a Type of this famous Antichrist 6. That the mention of those many Antichrists in S. John was occasioned from the fame of that Great Antichrist predicted in Daniel 7. That there is much-what the same reason of the slowness of Christians in discovering the true Antichrist as of the Jews in discovering the true Christ. 8. That a fraudulent and Hypocritical Opposer of Christ may be as real and considerable an Antichrist as an open Enemie as also S. John's description as easily applicable to him 9. The inept Niceness of declining the Name of Antichrist and that the Title was put upon this great Enemy of the Church by the ancient Fathers occasionally from this Epistle of S. John 10. Certain Considerations proposed touching the Obscurity of the Prophetick style 205 CHAP. II. 1. Why Prophecies are wrapt up in some considerable Obscurity 2. An indispensable necessity of these kinds of involutions in regard of mans Free will 3. As also in regard of the Enemies of the Church both Men and Devils 4. A recital of such Schemes and Figures wherein this Obscurity does most-what consist 5. What Diorismus is with several examples of Numeral Diorisms 6. That it seems most safe to expound the Rev. 9. 5 10. five months of the Locusts according to this Figure 7. The reason of the use of Numeral Diorisms 8. From whence also some light is offered toward the understanding the reason of the uncertain designation of Vers. 15. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 9. Examples of Proportional Diorisms 10. As also of Specifical 211 CHAP. III. 1. Hylasmus what it is with the kinds thereof 2. Eximious Examples of each kind 3. What the first and chiefest kind of Henopoeia 4. That one single Beast signifies a Body Politick demonstrated out of Daniel 5. That a Succession of Individuals is represented by one Individual 6. That one individual Beast represents a Kingdom or Body Politick from its rise to its fall 7. That one single Man or Woman does also represent a Body Politick in the Prophetick style 8. The second kind of Henopoeia what it is 9. What Zoopoeia with Examples thereof 10. A second kind of Zoopoeia proved and illustrated from Examples 217 CHAP. IV. 1. Israelismus what it is 2. That the reason of the frequent use thereof is the Sacramentalness of the Jewish Church in reference to the Christian as appears in their Tabernacle and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 3. In the brasen Serpent Manna strucken Rock and fiery Law 4. In the High-priest's Robes in his entring alone once a year into the most Holy and in the Jews worshipping towards the Mercy-seat 5. In their bondage in Aegypt and in their escape through the Red Sea 6. What is properly a Prophetick Ellipsis 7. What the meaning of the Apocalyptick Book being written within and without 8. The difference of a Prophetick Ellipsis illustrated by example 9. Homonymia what it is and in what it differs from an Henopoeia of the second kind 10. What Metalepsis with the proof and examples thereof 11. Antichronismus what it is together with the rise thereof 12. That the three days and an half of the unburied Witnesses put for three times and an half is apparently resolvible into this Figure 13. What Icasmus is and that the frequency of the Figure does not so obscure Prophecies but that they are as intelligible as ordinary Heraldry 221 CHAP. V. 1. The great Usefulness of an Alphabet of Prophetick Iconisms 2. What the best way of attaining to the right sense of them 3. What weight the Onirocriticks of the Ancients may cast in toward the determining their meaning 4. That there is the same reason of the Signification and Interpretation of Dreams as there is of Visions provided they be merely Typical and not Complexional 5. Angels Their Ministery in all affairs of Providence a noted Supposition in the ancient Cabbala and in the Apocalyps 6. Ascension into Heaven 7. Air the special Region of Devils 8. Balances 9. Beast 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Idolatrous Kingdoms 10. The reason of the Lamb 's signifying one single Person and of wild Beasts noting Idolatry as well as Cruelty 11. Blasphemy That it signifies Idolatry made out both upon the account of Reason use of Scripture and Authority of Interpreters 12. Bloud 13. Bow and Arrows Buildings Burial 226 CHAP. VI. 1. Candle 2. Character 3. Clouds of Heaven 4. Crown of precious Stones 5. Darkness Day Death 6. Desart 7. Dragon a figure of the Devil according to the ancient Cabbala and then of the chief Polities that oppose the Church 8. Drunkenness 9. Eagle Earth-quake 10. Eclipses 11. Eye an Hieroglyphick of Counsel and Prudence 12. Fishing Fish dead in the Sea 13. Fire the different significations thereof 14. Fire from Heaven its exact significancy of Excommunication 15 16. Flesh two notable significations thereof 17. Floud Fornication Frogs 18. Gemms and precious Stones God 232 CHAP. VII 1. Hail the signification thereof according to Scripture 2. And the ancient Onirocriticks 3. Harvest the evil and auspicious sense thereof 4. Head how clearly significative of Sovereign Power whether in Many or One. 5. Heaven and Earth 6. Horn. 7. Horse Islands 8. King and Kingdom 9. That Kinds or Sorts of things are sometimes expressed as if Individualls of the same Kind 10. Leopard Locusts 11. Male-childe Mark Measure Mill Month Moon 12. Mountain the several significations thereof 240 CHAP. VIII 1. Nakedness Paradise 2. Philtre That 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is Virus amatorium 3.
prolixity of the Title hinders not but that it may be called the Name of the Beast 4. The meaning of the Name 5. That the Angel having considered the whole Successions of the Roman Kingdom or Empire fixed his mind on that time the Empire was purely Christian and why And that it thence appears what succession of the Beast's time is understood 6. As likewise from his name a little varied into Was is not and yet is Whence the fifth Agreement of the second Parallelism is also evinced 7 8. How the Angel came to give the Beast these Names And that there is an Ellipsis in the Angel's saying The Beast which thou sawest was and is not c. 9. That the Name Was and is not and shall ascend c. signifies the successive Order in being not the actual being or not being of the Beast with a confirmation thereof out of Alcazar 10. A plain Eviction from the Name Was is not and yet is that Was and is and is not do not signifie actual Existence or Non-existence but order of Existence and Similitude 11. That Is not and yet is would neither be good sense nor any elegancy unless the Laws of a right Contradiction were closely touched on in this mysterious Assertion 12. And yet that an absolute Sameness in either Essence or Qualification could not be under this affirmation and negation without falsity Whence Similitude is necessarily intimated thereby 13. That the certainty of the meaning of this Title Was is not and yet is confirms the sense of the former and demonstrates a latitant Ellipsis in the Application of these Names of the Beast which is farther argued from other considerations 14. Why he interprets the Re-existence or Image of the Beast of the Empire 's becoming Idolatrous again rather then of the Revival of its ancient Polity in the Pontifical Power 15. The third Agreement of the second Parallelism 16. The sixth Agreement 17. The seventh 18. The eighth Agreement 19. The third Agreement again noted with a Confirmation therefrom of the above-mentioned Ellipsis 20. That near Resemblance stands for Identity in common elegancy of speech Whence The Beast that was is not and yet is and the Image of the Beast is again evinced to be all one and the fifth Agreement of our second Parallelism thereby farther confirmed 286 CHAP. XIV Ver. IX What is the meaning of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and that Siracides seems to allude to the Hebrew 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in his description thereof 2. That Constantinople is also allowed to have Seven Hills and that it makes for the proof of the eighth Agreement of the first Parallelism Ver. X. That the making the seven Heads seven sorts of Governours is no 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 but a natural and necessary truth 2. How naturally the different successions of the Supreme Powers of the Roman Empire fall into eight parts 3. The onely true reason why there are numbred Eight Kings though but Seven Heads of the Beast 4. That the dividing of the Emperours into Pagan Christian and Pagano-Christian is aimed at or supposed in the enumeration of the Eight Kings is an unexceptionable Truth 5. That it is most credible that after the Sixth King no other account of distinction of the Supreme Power of the Empire was look'd upon by the Angel but what respected Religion 6. A demonstrative Inference from One is that there is an Ellipsis in The Beast that thou sawest was and is not c. 7. Why Apocal. 17. 10. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 rather then 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Whence the last subdivision is confirmed and the tenth Agreement of the second Parallelism made good 8. The fourth Agreement of the second Parallelism Ver. XI That the description of the Beast is his Name and part thereof used for the whole as in the Name of God which farther confirms the above-mentioned Ellipsis 2. The easie and genuine meaning of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 3. That the meaning of Verse 11. The Beast that was and is not he is the eighth is that his Head is the eighth 4. That the Eighth King by an Henopoeia may admit of more Caesars then one reigning at a time and why 5. The ninth Agreement of the second Parallelism 6. The seventh Agreement Ver. XII The eleventh Agreement of the second Parallelism 2. The twelfth Agreement 3. The meaning of Verse 12. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Ver. XIII The thirteenth Agreement together with the meaning of Verse 13. being of one minde and of giving their strength and power to the Beast 2. That the Pope once emerged above the Emperour even in Secular Power may continue the succession of the seventh Head there being nothing else intended thereby but the secular Pagano-christian Sovereignty of the Empire Ver. XIV The fourteenth Agreement of the second Parallelism 2. The fifteenth Agreement 3. The sixteenth Agreement of the second Parallelism 296 CHAP. XV. Ver. XV. The seventh Agreement of the first Parallelism Ver. XVI The folly of those Interpreters that understand the Burning of the Whore of the burning of the Houses of Rome by fire Ver. XVII The Ten Kings giving their Power and Kingdom to the Beast according to the will and purpose of God how stupendious an Arcanum 2. In what sense God may be said to put it into their hearts 3. That it is rather Fate then Policy that has carried on the affairs of the Whore so prosperously hitherto with an Admonition thereupon 4. The meaning of Until the words of God be fulfilled with a farther Admonition to the Apostatized Church 5. The eviction of the truth of the seventeenth Agreement of the second Parallelism Ver. XVIII Why the Seat of the Whore is so determinately affixed at last to Old Rome in this Prophecie 2 3. A clear and confessed evidence that Old Rome is here pointed at as the Seat of the Whore with a short Paraphrase upon the sense of the Verse 4. That the Seat of the Two-horned Beast is also fixed to Old Rome and of the Cabbalisticalness of the Apocalyps 5. That the Numeral Name of the Beast is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and that it is so to be written and not 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 proved from the ancient Orthography of both the Greek and Latin Tongue 6. That the ancient Latines who usually sounded long i as a Diphthong pronounced their Vowels nearest to the Greeks 7. How exquisitely this name 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 answers to Events 8. That the finding the number 666 in other names does not at all weaken the determinate applicability of this 9. In what sense 666 is called the number of the Beast 10. The application of the Root thereof illustrated from the Cabbalistical application of the Root of the Tetractys 11. The last Agreement of the first Parallelism 12. The last Agreement of the second 13. That the Vision of the Whore is more appropriate and peculiar to the Church of Rome 14. Of the Inscription Mysterium on
same purpose 9. That Epiphanius his Testimony makes against Grotius his main Project 10. That Epiphanius is but one single Father against the rest and that the Testimony of Irenaeus alone is far to be preferred before his 11. An unexceptionable clearing of the sense of Irenaeus his Testimony and that the very detorsion of it will not serve Grotius his turn 12. That there is not the least shadow of Probability that the Apocalyps was wrote before toward the end of Domitian's reign 13. Proofs out of the Apocalyps it self that it was not wrote before the Persecution under Domitian 14. The great consequence of the clearing this Truth it wholly subverting all Grotius his Interpretations of the Seals and Trumpets and all their Synchronals 342 CHAP. III. 1. That as Grotius has mis-timed these Visions so his Interpretations are accordingly absurd and incongruous 2. The groundlesness of his beginning the Compute of the Seven Heads at Claudius and ending it in Domitian 3. The dim-sightedness of the ancient Fathers that could not discern Domitian to be the Beast that was and is not though they stood so exceeding much nearer him then Grotius 4. The trivialness and falsity of this Conceit of his 5. The second third and fourth Absurdities of Grotius his Exposition of this Seventeenth Chapter 6. The fifth sixth seventh and eighth Absurdities 7. The ninth tenth eleventh and twelfth 8. The thirteenth fourteenth fifteenth and sixteenth Absurdities of his Exposition 350 CHAP. IV. 1. That this Mis-timing of Visions must needs cast Grotius into the like Absurdities in interpreting the Thirteenth Chapter and that his Exposition of the first verse thereof is guilty of at least nine or ten 2. Four gross Contradictions in the second 3. As many Incongruities or Weaknesses in the third 4. As also in the fourth and fifth 5. Two Absurdities in the sixth and seventh 6. As many in the eighth 7. Three Difficulties in the exposition of the tenth verse 8. Five Incongruities in the eleventh 9. His gross Interpretation of the twelfth verse 10. Four Absurdities in the thirteenth 11. Eight Incongruities or Weaknesses in his expositions on the fourteenth verse 12. Three in the fifteenth 13. Three or four more in the sixteenth and seventeenth 14. And nine more in the eighteenth verse 15. The astonishing consideration of the Absurdness of Grotius his Expositions compared with his Parts and Learning 16. An useful Illation from this weak performance of his That all the Expositions of the Romanists upon these two Chapters are superlatively frivolous and incredible 355 CHAP. V. 1. The first Consectary from our Joint-Exposition with a Demonstration of the truth thereof 2. The great usefulness of the second Consectary for the peace and security of the Church 3. The setled Notion of Long and Short 4. A Demonstration of the truth of this Consectary 5. The third fourth fifth and sixth Consectaries together with their Proofs 6. The Demonstration of the seventh Consectary with an intimation of the special usefulness thereof for the Peace of Christendom 7. The eighth Consectary with the Proof thereof 8. The ninth Consectary with a copious Demonstration of the truth thereof 9. The truth of the tenth Consectary clearing the Protestants from Schism plainly demonstrated 10. The eleventh Consectary with its Proof 11. The Proof and notable Usefulness of the twelfth Consectary 12. How clearly and plainly that part of Antichristianism which consists in Idolatry is prefigured and foretold in these Visions we have explained in our Joint-Exposition 363 CHAP. VI. 1. The Synchronism of the Whore the Two-horned Beast the restored Beast or the Beast that was and is not and yet is demonstrated out of our Joint-Exposition 2. To which the False-Prophet is also proved Synchronal the Virgin-Company the Two Witnesses the Woman in the Wilderness and the Outward Court as being either the same Antistoechal or necessarily connected all along with them 3. Again in a more abstract way That the restored Beast the Woman in the Wilderness the Outward Court the Two Witnesses are of equal time 4. That the Woman in the Wilderness and the restored Beast begin together and therefore are Synchronal 5. That the restored Beast and Two Witnesses are Synchronal as ending together 6. That the Two Witnesses and Outward Court are Synchronal as both beginning and ending together And all these four Synchronal to the Whore and Two-horned Beast because the Two-horned Beast and the Whore are Synchronal to the restored Beast to which the other three are Synchronal 7. That the Virgin-Company and the Sealed out of the twelve Tribes are all one Company and therefore both Synchronal to the Whore by an 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and consequently with the rest of the six with whom She is Synchronal 8. That the said Sealed Virgin-Company is Synchronal to the Series of the first six Trumpets as being sealed immediately before the blast of the first Trumpet and as being Synchronal to the Mourning of the Witnesses which ceases at the end of the sixth Trumpet 9. The six first Seals the Fight of Michael and the Dragon and the Inward Court proved Synchronal 10. That the Vision of Apoc. 11. measuring the Temple begins from the first Epocha indicated from the quality of the Person that holds in his hand the opened Book 11. From his supplying the place of the seventh Angel and the space of the seventh Trumpet with seven Thunders 12. From the suspending of the sound of the seventh Trumpet to make a Regression 13. From the newness or new condition of the Book in the Angel's hand 14. From the voice communing or talking with John from Heaven as in the beginning of the Prophecies of the Seals 15. From the bitterness of the Book in his belly From his being bid again to prophesie and that before many Kings and Peoples and Nations 16. From the Epocha of the Vision of the Apoc. 12. ensuing Chapter 17. The Synchronism of the first six Seals with the Inward Court of weighty concernment 18. The Millennial Empire of Christ the Palm-bearing Company the New Jerusalem and the Ligation of Satan that they are all in some sense Synchronal to the Seventh Trumpet 370 CHAP. VII 1. Mr. Mede's Account of placing the first six Vials within the sixth Trumpet 2. That the truth of this Account depends upon an unlikely sense of the Expiration of the Reign of the Beast as if immediately after 42 months it should entirely and universally expire 3. A caution touching the Interpreting of the Prophetick style 4. That the Expiration of the Reign of the Beast upon the Exit of the sixth Trumpet is but partial or speciminal argued from the seventh Trumpet 's being also called a Woe-Trumpet 5. As likewise from the seven Thunders 6. Two more Arguments to the same purpose 7. Lastly from the fixed Epocha's of the Middle Synchronals compared with the affairs of Europe 8. That it follows hence that all the seven Vials are naturally to take their places in the seventh Trumpet
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 445 CHAP. XX. 1. The Preeminence of this latter Interpretation above that of Grotius 2. A summary Proposal of the same 3. The first part of this Exposition the same with Grotius his and therefore confuted already The second enervated 4. The third confuted from a farther discovery of the improbability of Simon Magus his Story from his being sufficiently revealed before and from his not being found to sit in any Temple to receive Divine honours 5. That 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is not so good Syntax in the present case nor the wickedness of the Gnosticks a Mystery but open Impiety and Hostility against the Church 6. The harshness of interpreting whom in whom the Lord shall consume c. of two several Subjects the one to be destroyed by the breath of Christ's mouth the other by the brightness of his coming and that in distinct places and times 7. That if the History of Simon Magus had been true and the Application fit to this Prophecy the most ancient Fathers would not have failed to have hit upon it And that it might then have been a preludious Type to the great Antichrist to come 8. Brief Prophetick Strictures touching Antichristian Impurity 9. The Antichristian Cruelty predicted in the Vision of the King of Babyion and of the little Horn. 10. Also in the slain Witnesses and in the Two-horned Beast's causing the Ten-horned to kill as many as would not worship the Image of the Beast nor receive his Mark 11. In the Vision of the Angel with the third Vial and in the Declaration of the cause of the Whore's Ruine 12. And lastly in the Description of the Whore as drunk with the bloud of the Saints 13. That all the Members of Antichristianism in our Idea are prefigured in the Prophecies of the Holy Writ so expressly that so clear an evidence cannot be withstood for ever 14. That that ample Testimony of the Apocalyps cannot be evaded by the novel Exposition of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 450 CHAP. XXI 1. The marvellous Completeness of the Reformation of the Church of England in her Doctrines and Institutes 2. That she plainly condemns the Invocation of Saints for Idolatry 3. As also the Adoration of the Host where our Kneeling at the Communion is vindicated 4. Her condemning the Worshipping of Images 5. Her concluding the manner of the Papists worshipping Saints and Images to be plainly the same with that of Pagans 6. Her free and just censure touching the decking of their Images and making them Lay-mens Books 7. How perfectly she has freed us from that Aegyptian yoke we lay under in the time of Popery 8. The Celebration of Holy-days the keeping of Lent and the use of the Surplice in the sense of the Church of England fully vindicated from all imputation of Superstition or Antichristianism 9. That the use of the Surplice is not from any grounds at all of Policy in the Church but pure Charity with a vindication of the use of the Cross in Baptism 459 CHAP. XXII 1. The diametrical Opposition of our Church to that part of Antichristianism which would subvert the Regal and Prophetick Offices of Christ. 2. As also to that which strikes at his Sacerdotal Office 3. That she holds nothing against those other sacred Titles of Christ the Truth Life Light c. 4. A demonstrative Vindication of Episcopacy from the Imputation of Antichristianism out of the Apocalyps 5. What an Establishment that Book is if rightly understood to the Crown and Church of England 6. That no Papal nor Presbyterian Power is of right above the King no not in Causes Ecclesiastical 7. The judgement of our Church thereupon 8. The peculiar glory of our Church that she is so perfectly free from all Frauds and Impostures 9. Her freeness from Pride 10. From Antichristian Impurity 11. And from Cruelty 12. Her Reformation an eminent Speciminal Completion of the Prophecy of the Resurrection of the Two Witnesses 13. The usefulness of this Vindication of her for the suppressing of Popery and Schism 469 FINIS Errata PAG. 27. l. 45. for Contradiction r. Counterdistinction P. 130. l. 12. for Clergie r. Charge P. 132. l. 12. for more r. mere P. 141. l. 21. for 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 r. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 P. 204. l. 11. for this judgement r. the judgement P. 207. l. 21. for 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 r. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 P. 227. l. 33. for the presidency r. their presidency P. 241. l. 33. for Supreme be r. Supreme power be P. 246. l. 45. for vivet r. vivat P. 254. l. 28. for naturally by r. naturally by and for Israelism it r. Israelism it P. 284. l. 23. for Beast r. Boast P. 306. l. 19. for named r. noted P. 399. l. 37. for sight r. light P. 422. l. 34. for right use r. right use P. 429. l. 3. for Prophet-murthering Fornication r. Prophet-murthering Fornication P. 434. l. 8. for faign change r. faign to change
the right Spirit or Dispensation of Elias for the better discovering all false Pretenders thereto Apoc. 10. 3. and yet know neither his Spirit nor their own nor what times they are in nor doe that office which is proper for Elias to doe which is to testify that the Lord is come and as the holy Baptist pointed at Christ at his First coming and said Behold the Lamb of God so to indigitate his Second coming saying Behold the Lion of the Tribe of Juda even that mighty Angel whose face is as the Sun with a Rainbow over his head crying with a loud voice as when a Lion roareth and discharging his seven thunders upon the Earth The Series of which undoubtedly commenced upon the Protestant Reformation For then began the Judgment to sit and the dominion of the Dan. 7. 26. little Horn to be taken away to consume and to destroy it to the end What Monsters of Enthusiasts therefore are they that kick against the sentence and authority of those holy Benchers or Heavenly Witnesses of God whom he raised up to judge the Deceiver and to settle Truth upon Earth dividing themselves from that Church that is the real and genuine Spouse of Christ so approved by these very Witnesses which God raised from the dead What a goodly Specimen do those high-flown Boasters give of their Elias like Spirit who though they imitate something of the Wind Earthquake and Fire that appeared before that great Prophet yet are utterly unacquainted with that still and small voice in which alone the Lord was heard to speak This Rending and Tearing this Faction and Siding is the fruit of the Flesh and not of the Spirit Nor was Elias zealous about any thing but the indispensable Laws of God Nor is his office to divide but to cement and make up the Breaches of the Church of Christ to reconcile the People to their Governours and their Governours to the People according as it is written * Behold I will send you Elijah the Mal. 4. 5. Prophet and he shall turn the heart of the Fathers to the children and the heart of the children to their Fathers lest I come and smite the Earth with a curse Wherefore whatsoever Dispensation drives not on an healing and uniting design in the true Church of Christ is not the Spirit of that expected Elias which some dream of but a second game of Antichrist contrived abetted and promoted by his cunning Incendiaries upon whom that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 dothâ—…stick and will be raging at least till the Fifth Vial. But this is more then I meant to speak in this place 14. Now concerning Grotius and my confuting him onely and sometimes something smartly As for the former it is not wholy true for That he has not confuted Grotius onely in this Treatise with an Apologie for doing of it sometimes something sharply I have also confuted Ribera the best of the Roman Expositours upon the Seventeenth of the Revelation nor have I declined any Interpreter that I could find to speak any thing considerable which is not already confuted in my confutation of these And for my Smartness against Grotius I believe I shall appear so to none but such as make an Idol of him which they will doe most that least understand or have read least of his Expositions of Daniel and the Apocalyps touching the Controversy in hand For I dare pronounce to all the World that there was never any thing more weak and groundless as I have made it abundantly clear in the ensuing Discourse And I think it is not at all unseemly to resist him with some kind of Zeal who had grown up to that boldness in his contrived Interpretations as to trample under feet the Sacred Titles of Christ under which he is peculiarly prophesied of in the Divine Oracles and that in those very Prophecies themselves See Grotius his Annot. in Dan. 2. 34 45. and chap. 7. 13. and to cast them as unholy to a Pagan Nation the People of Rome merely to cover the shame of that Body of men who are so hideously lapsed and apostatized from the Truth and being fast to one party and loose to another to drive the sincere Protestant into a net under a colourable show of Reconciliation and to expose again the innocent Lambs of Christ's flock to the merciless teeth of that devouring Wolf of Rome And yet as smartly as I have dealt with him I have onely expressed my admiration that a Person otherwise so Learned should fall into such unparallel'd Weaknesses and Extravagancies in interpreting these Prophecies of Scripture nor have given the least intimation that gifts had blinded the eyes of the wise or that he had followed the way of Balaam the son of Bosor who loved the wages of unrighteousness but that he had been tempted in that way and how far he accepts the condition one may in some sort observe in the Epistle of Du-vair to him and his answer thereunto and what other transactions there might be God and his own Conscience best know But in the interim it cannot be unknown to any that will search into the truth but that some very great Biass must have been clapp'd upon so good a Judgment as Grotius his to make him capable of running so extremely much out of the way 15. I have elsewhere imputed it to the excess of Candour and Humanity The vindication of himself from the imputation of Uncharitableness for applying certain Visions usually understood of Antichrist to the Church of Rome in him and the love of Peace and Unity and I spoke as I thought and am loath to unthink it again and may sooner tire my self and my Reader then satisfy either by searching into the hidden principles of another mans actions and therefore I shall dismiss that for ever It will be more to the purpose to vindicate my self from the imputation of the want of Charity then to accuse him of the excess thereof or of any other Passion For it is alledged in the last place that I have taken to my self a very uncharitable kind of liberty to apply those Prophecies to so great a share of Christendom as the Roman Church that have been by ancient Interpreters and are by the Romanists themselves understood of Antichrist To which I freely and ingenuously answer and as in the presence of him before whom all mens hearts lie open that I take no more pleasure in the finding of those Antichristian Tokens upon the Church of Rome then I should in discovering so many Plague-spots upon my dearest Friends or Relations so that I am not conscious to my self of the least touch of Uncharitableness in this matter But if the Laws of Charity be so strictly to be observed as certainly they are let us take that method which is approved by the voice of all men and has passed into a Proverb of Charitie 's beginning at home and be as tender of the Protestant Churches in such things
as it will defile them who joyn with them in publick worship But there is yet another sense of Woman not Political but more Physical and Cabbalistical and that is The life sense and relish of this Body This is a Woman that we must have a special care of being polluted by through over-passionately closing with any of her suggestions or over-deeply sympathizing with or resenting of those pleasures she would allure us by and so desix our desire upon her For not Idolatry onely but all other Enormities arise in us from the listening to the false counsel of this domestick Eve 14. Worship That Worship or Adoration may be an Iconism of Subjection is plain from the nature of the Ceremonie it self the bowing of the Body being a fit Symbol of submitting the Mind and Will to his power to whom we doe this homage And that it does signifie thus in the Hebrew Idiom is manifest from several Instances But the very Symbol it self is explained Gen. 37. where the Sheafs of Joseph's brethren are said to make obeisance to Joseph's Sheaf that is to worship Joseph's Sheaf 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Your Sheafs worshipped my Sheaf Whereupon his Brethren presently interpreting the Dream say unto him Shalt thou indeed reign over us or Shalt thou indeed have dominion over us that is to say Shall we be your Subjects or fall under your Dominion So Esa. 45. 14. speaking of the subjection of the Aethiopians and Sabeans to King Cyrus They shall come after thee saith he in chains they shall come over and they shall fall down unto thee The Greek has it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 They shall worship thee All which signifie submission and subjection to his Sovereignty I will onely adde one place more Gen. 27. the blessing of Isaac upon Jacob Let people serve thee and Nations bow down to thee be lord over thy brethren let thy mother's sons bow down to thee The word is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in both places and signifies obedience or subjection at large as is manifest But suppose it had not that general signification of it self but only denoted that part of the duty of subjection which is Worship or Incurvation it might notwithstanding signifie thus largely Stylo Prophetico by a Diorismus World See Heaven and Earth 15. These be the chief Icastick terms that occur in the Prophetick style which if they haply prove more in number then we shall have use for in this Discourse yet I account my pains not improper in reference to what I have had occasion to treat of in my Mystery of Godliness besides their desireable usefulness at large for understanding the chief Visions and Prophecies in Scripture And I hope I have made it appear partly by this Alphabet of Iconisms and partly by my Explication of those preceding Prophetick Schemes That it is as easie a thing to render a Prophecy or Vision out of this Prophetick style into ordinary language as it is to interpret one language by another and That the difficulty of understanding Prophecies is in a manner no greater when once a man has taken notice of the settled meaning of the peculiar Icasâ—…s therein then if they had been penn'd down in the vulgar speech in which there are as frequent Homonymies of words as here there are of Iconisms and That therefore it need be no reproach to any one that he endeavours to understand the Prophecies of Scripture more then the Histories thereof Prophecy being nothing else but an Anticipatory History and when once fulfilled as plain an History as that which was never prophesied of 16. We will onely annex a few Rules concerning the Preference of one Interpretation of Prophecy before another and then conclude The first Rule That Interpretation that keeps close to the approved Examples and Analogie of the Prophetick style is to be preferred before such as are framed at pleasure according to the private phancy of the Interpreter The ground of this Rule is this That besides that it is safer to follow an approved Example then to be destitute thereof and wholly lean upon a mans private sense the very style of the Prophets being as it were a peculiar language or dialect there is a necessity of understanding things according to the meaning of their dialect or language and not according to what it would sound in our own Which is as fond and ridiculous as if an English-man in hearing of Latin spoken where the word Fur is occasionally brought in should think the Furre of an Alderman's Gown were meant or at the sounding of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in Greek should let his fancy presently fall into the dripping-pan And yet as absonous and incongruous is it to interpret the Iconisms of the Prophets according to what conceits are either vulgar or peculiar to our selves As if because Vices and Vertues are painted out in the figure of Women or Beasts we should therefore apply that meaning to the Prophetick style whenas they always signifie a Body Politick even in that very Scheme where abstract Inscriptions are upon them as Zech. 5. 7. where the Woman in the Epha is said to be Wickedness By which Woman notwithstanding Vatablus understands the Ten Tribes revolted to Idolatry and other Interpreters expound it to the same purpose And so to interpret Hail of hardness of heart is like the interpreting of Latin or Greek by what they sound nearest in English This is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as Aristotle speaks and quite to forget where we are or what we are about The second Rule That Interpretation that keeps one tenour of sense of the same words in one and the same Vision especially is to be preferred before that which varies backward and forward and takes the same word in as many different senses as it occurs in different places of the Vision To be in many tales is accounted an infallible sign of a false story and to vary the Interpretation of the same word in one and the same Vision without any account or reason is as great a demonstration of fraud and forcedness in the Interpretation and that the Interpreter was biassed by some design or interest and that he has done violence to the Text for his own advantage As for example If one should interpret that Iconism of a Beast one while to signifie a Kingdom or Empire another while some single Person of that Empire and then again some grand Vice thereof were not this a mere botch in comparison of interpreting this Beast of such a Kingdom or Body Politick in every place of the Vision I might instance in other such like shufflings but this one intimation shall suffice The third Rule That Interpretation that does concern the affairs of Religion and the Church of God and is of the greatest use and serviceableness to us is a more likely Interpretation and to be preferred before that which less respects us but seems to make the Spirit of God to have predicted things with little or
truth of the Consectary appears thus The Seventh King which is called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and which I have proved to be the Emperours purely Christian it is said of him that he must * Apoc. 17. 10. continue a short space which unless the Prophecy speaks altogether undeterminately and defines nothing thereby must in reason be thought to be about a third part of that space which this Expression intimates to be long For Short and Long are not absolute terms but relative or comparative and are two Extremes which imply a Middle Wherefore we cannot better settle the determinate Idea of them then by supposing a Line divided into three equal parts and to look upon the whole Line as the Subject of Longness two thirds of the Line as the Subject of Mediocrity and one third of Shortness From whence we may gather universally what proportion to speak accurately and Mathematically Short and Long must bear the one to the other That in strictness of Notion that which is just the third part of the other is short in comparison of it but in common use of speech though it be something more or less it will break no squares There must either be some such way as this to settle this Notion or else Short and Long will signify nothing but be words spoke at random unless it be in such cases as there is a known measure of Mediocrity as when we say a tall man or a low man where it is taken for granted that a middle stature is so many foot and no more Having seriously considered the necessity of some determinate Notion of these two terms and how naturally they fall into this proportion I could not but consent to so plain a Conviction though I might justly seem prejudiced against it by what I have wrote elsewhere concerning 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 but I had not then so accurately Mystery of Godliness Book 5. Ch. 16. Sect. 9. weighed the matter 4. Admitting therefore that to be the genuine sense of these terms of Short and Long which I have propounded and comparing the continuance of the Seventh King with the continuance of the Sixth that is to say of the Pagan Caesars which from Julius to Constantine is about 360 years it is plain that the continuance of the Seventh King that is of the Christian Caesars must be 120 years or thereabout which added to Ann. Christi 312 when Constantine was converted to Christianity make 432 years Which I would not pronounce to be so defined as to understand a Mathematical accuracy in the proportion of Short and Long but with some latitude such as befits the use of common speech in such Expressions though it be necessary to have recourse to this Mathematical Idea that we may judge whether the use of these terms be tolerable or extravagant But what I leave more laxe here will be more particularly bounded in the Proportion of the Inward and Outward Court of the Temple which will gird in this time a little within 400 years but so as this present way of Compute will be very flexible and obedient to it For supposing the Short term viz. 120 subdivided into three degrees or parts any thing above two thirds thereof may rationally be deemed Short in the first degree of Comparison And we are to remember that the Duration of the Beast restored is computed by Months of years which as I have above noted intimates a latitude no less then any thing within thirty in the computation of these Epocha's the pinching of things to a year's coincidence being of no usefulness in these long Periods nor in the nature of the things that are predicted and therefore not affected nor intended by that Spirit that dictated these Prophecies Which I doubt not but is a very solid and true Observation Wherefore it is plain enough that the Churche's lapse into Antichristianism was not till about four hundred years after Christ the reign of the Seventh King not expiring till then Consect III. That the Reign of Antichrist is comprised within the compass of 1260 years or thereabout 5. For thus long is the Empire to continue Idolatrous as is evident out of our Joint-Exposition and the first Consectary thereof But it is in a manner impossible for the Empire to continue Idolatrous any longer then the Idolatrous Clergy thereof rides it and guides it which is the Whore or the Two-horned Beast and these Types the Types or Symbols of Antichrist Which we shall farther prove to synchronize with the Ten-horned Beast that is with the Pagano-Christian Empire in the following Chapter Consect IV. That Antichrist is long since entred into the World and has reigned about twelve hundred years already The truth of this Consectary is evident from the second wherein is shewn that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or the succession of the purely Christian Caesars was not above 120 years or thereabout Which added to the year of Constantine's Conversion 312 make up 432. From about that time Antichrist began his reign and therefore has reigned at least twelve hundred years already Consect V. That according to Prophetical Compute the Ruine of Antichrist is near and that nothing can retard it but the Sinfulness Hypocrisy and Factiousness of the Reformed Churches and that therefore that voice of Him that cried in the Wilderness Repent for the Kingdom of God is at hand is again very seasonable in this our Age. This Consectary is exceeding plain from the three Consectaries immediately going before nor is it needfull to adde any thing to the farther clearing it Onely see if you will my Mystery of Godliness Book 5. Chap. 17. Sect. 10. Consect VI. That the Roman Empire divided into Ten Kingdoms is the Seat of Antichrist This is directly contained in our Joint-Exposition the Beast with ten Horns being there proved to be the Roman Empire thus divided And the Whore which is Antichrist is said to sit upon this Beast and the Two-horned Beast to be the Idolatrizing Clergy of the Empire under those two Imperial Patriarchates of Rome and Constantinople as also the Whore and the Two-horned Beast are proved to be all one Which fully make good this sixth Consectary Consect VII That the Ruine of the Fourth Monarchy and the Introducing of the Fifth which is the Kingdome of the Saints of the most High as Daniel calls it does not imply warrs and spoil and the invading of the rights of any Prince or People according to the tenour of the Prophetick style but merely the renewing of the Empire into an Evangelical Purity in Doctrine and Worship and in Christian Life 6. This plainly appears out of our Joint-Exposition where it is manifest that the Beast which is the Roman Monarchy is said to be slain and not to be in rerum natura merely because the Pagan Idolatry was expelled out of it or ceased to be the Religion of the Empire and that the Beast was revived from the dead and brought into Being again merely
therein For we traffick not in Legendary Lies and false Miracles against the Sacred Title of Truth nor desire to keep the people ignorant of the Scriptures and to hold them in darkness against the Sacred Title of Light nor trespass against the Sacred Title of Life by making our Religion consist of dumb shows and heaps of dead Rites and Ceremonies nor derogate from the Divinity of Christ by giving Religious worship to Saints and Angels nor offend against his Paternity by making his Children a company of stocks and stones and by taking away the judgement of discretion from them and forcing them to believe as the Church believes right or wrong with Scripture or against it and are so farre from injuring the life of any Child of God by any captious and wicked Sanction that we profess nothing requisite to Salvation but what is plain in Scripture as appears from what has been already produced out of the Articles of the Church Which alone will also vindicate her from any imputation of the following points of Antichristianism against the Peace of Christ's Kingdome And for absolving Princes from their Oaths what Church unless that of Rome ever pretended to so blasphemous a Power 4. The next Antichristian Opposition and which occurrs in the next Chapter is that against the Divine Life in general Such as Idolatry and all manner of Superstition dumb Shows speaking in an unknown Tongue substituting silly Penances instead of real Repentance and Amendment of life all which our Church is so plainly and professedly against in her Articles and Homilies every-where and so acknowledgedly that I will not give my self the trouble of Citation Some not so well minded may peradventure be over-inclinable to imagine the Episcopal Office and Revenues to have a greater propinquity with that Hypothesis at the end of this Chapter then any indifferent man can possibly judge For he must be very ignorant of the Constitution of Christendome that does not plainly discern that in that Hypothesis it is the Papal Hierarchy that is perstringed and adumbrated which is done again more fully and particularly in the ninth and tenth Chapters For for my own part though I do not know the accurate values of the several Bishopricks of this Nation yet considering the largeness of their Dioceses and the great burthen as well of care as expensiveness in conscientiously executing the Function truly I cannot imagine them so great but that the weight of the Office will weigh down every-where the value of the Revenue and we reade in the Gospel that * Luk. 10. 7. the work-man is worthy of his hire And concerning the Office and Dignity itself it cannot sink into my minde that that Order of the Church which was instituted and in practice in those Ages thereof which were Symmetral can with any face or conscience be judged Antichristian And that the Church was Symmetral for about four hundred years after Christ is a demonstrable Consectary from my Joint-Exposition and that Joint-Exposition so convincingly evident that no Interpretation of any Scripture can be more 5. Whence I cannot but wonder that any true Son of the Church of England should be so shie of the Apocalyps or so fearful of it that they durst not touch it without a pair of Mittens of Grotius his making for fear it should bite them that is to say unless it be unfolded or rather folded up in Grotius his fond and groundless Explications For there is not any Book in the World that makes more for the establishment of the Crown and Church of England then this Holy Book of the Apocalyps if rightly and solidly understood A thing which that wise and sagacious Prince King James of blessed memory had discovered betimes and accordingly made use of it against the Usurpations of the Church of Rome And truly I finde nothing in the Apocalyps though the style seems Mysterious and Aenigmatical but what is very rational and look upon it as the most faithful and Philosophical writing that ever was penned A tast whereof we have in that Catalogue of the evil characters of them that are excluded the Holy City wherein bloudy and inhumane Zeal as also vain and imposturous Superstition is so plainly perstringed The former in 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Murtherers the latter in 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in Sorcerers Exorcists or Enchanters and lying Legendists and in fearful intimidated spirits that are superstitiously inclined to submit to the delusions and lies of such shameless Deceivers These doth our faithful Redeemer of Souls who deals bonâ fide with Man-kinde to rescue their abused minds from the Tyranny and burthen of Superstition note with a mark of Infamy and Condemnation So fast a friend is the Lord Jesus to Humanity to Equity to Truth and Reason 6. And not to insist upon those passages of the Apocalyptick Visions that imply it which are more then one or two either there is the greatest Equity and Reason in the world that every Christian Prince should next under Christ be Supreme Head over all that part of his Church over which he is King or Sovereign over Clergy as well as Laiety in Causes Ecclesiastical as well as Civil and that not any Papal or Presbyterian Power should be above him as our English Episcopacy does most justly and professedly submit unto him For why should any Clergy-men expect of a Prince who has received like precious Faith with themselves to fall in his Power by becoming a Christian Which is as unjust as it were ridiculous to phansy that every proper man should be bound to remit so much of his natural stature as would make him goe lower then the Priest that baptized him For Christianity does not take away Nature nor Power but rightly employs it Could any of the Pagan Emperours think you have been brought over to the Christian Faith if the Bishop of Rome would have laid claim to the Headship of the Empire so farre as it became the Church of Christ or would they not have suspected the preaching the Kingdome of Heaven a trick of the Priests to make themselves Lords of the Earth No certainly a Prince once become Christian that is a Believer and Professour of the Apostolick Faith comprised in the Word of God in those plain and generally-confessed Points of our Religion is a Person so Sacred that nothing can mount above him for Headship in his own Dominions For the anointing of the Spirit whereby we believe to Salvation is infinitely more holy then any external Sacerdotal oil whatsoever Why may not then so sacred a Fountain be the Head and Influencer of the whole Church Or whether is Christ greater as he is Priest or King of Saints Or who had the preeminence in the Polity of the Jews the Kings or High-Priests of Israel And was not that Polity a Type or Figure of the Church of Christ The plain Law of Christ is indeed immutable and it ought to be so no
the Pope's Crown and of a Woman-Pope 305 CHAP. XVI 1. What remains for the making up the fullest assurance that can be desired of the truth of our Joint-Exposition 2. That the Roman State from the beginning to the end is to be look'd upon as One Kingdom or Empire appears out of Florus 3. That there had been Five sorts of Supreme Magistrates in S. John's time in the Roman State Reges Consules Tribuni Consulares Decemviri Dictatores and that the Tribuni Plebis were no Supreme Power 4. Nor the Tribuni Militum simply so styled 5. But that the Decemviri and Tribuni Consulares were 6. As also the Dictators 7. That there had been no more then Five sorts of Supreme Governours in S. John's time and that the Interreges were not nor were at all reckoned by Historians a Supreme Government distinct from that of Kings 8. That the Triumviri Reipublicae constituendae was either a Scuffle and Confusion in the Roman State 9. Or else a formal Caesareate exercised by Augustus Lepidus and Antonius 10. That there is full and sufficient ground from Reason and History not to reckon the Triumvirate of constituting the Commonwealth a Sixth Form of Government distinct from Emperours and the Five fore-going Forms 11. That though there had been some other Forms truly distinct but yet of a near affinity with some of the other it had not been so harsh to have accounted them one with those they had that nearness with 12. But that there is a greater Exactness then this in the Application of this Vision and such as Scepticism it self can hardly doubt of 13. The Conclusion of the whole drift of the Chapter with a fuller enforcement of the truth thereof 317 CHAP. XVII 1. That a Relapse of the Empire into Idolatry in general were sufficient to make it the Image of the old Pagan Empire and yet that the Resemblance is more exquisite and particular 2. That there was an intended imitation of the Pagan Rites in the Church degenerating 3. The Pope compared with the Pagan Caesars and his Cardinals with the Roman Senate 4. The Tutelar Saints compared with their Tutelar Deities as also of adoring of what they eat 5. The minute multiplication of the Pagan Deities compared with and found to be out-gone by this Pagano-Christian Church in the Presidents of Physick and Rural Affairs 6. As also in the Presidents of Trades or Courses of Living 7. The Saints and Heathen Deities compared in their Offices and how punctually they have surrogated the Blessed Virgin into the place of Venus and the Moon 8. Most lively Lineaments of Restored Paganism in dedicating the Pantheon to the Virgin and all the Saints as also the Seven Hills to seven several Saints in erecting Altars and Images thereon in adorning these Images in appointing Festivals in Adoration and Prayers in Oblations of Wax-candles and Incense in carrying their Images in Procession and hiding them in Lent 9. In Vows Oathes Deifying dead men Pilgrimages Miraculous Cures with the Monuments of them hung up in the Temples 10. In Aspersions and Purifications by Holy Water 11. In the driving away the Devil by the jangling of baptized Bells 12. In their Jubilees general manner of celebrating their Festivals 13. In fetching in May in running about the fields with light Torches in their hands in sprinkling their Beasts with Holy Water by the Friars of S. Antony in leaping over S. John's Fires in Baptismal Spittle in their Master of Misrule at Christmas in their Carnavals and other Festivals 14. That the Image of the Beast is also in some sort revived in their Funerals 15. But more considerably in their Religious Fraternities under this or that Saint 16. As also in their shorn Crowns in their Vows of Virginity and in their Ninevites or Flagellants 17. In their pretence of bringing down Christ bodily and personally at the Mass 18 19. As also in their more pompous Processions 20. The great Usefulness of the Observation of the punctual correspondency of the Events hitherto to the Predictions touching the state of the Church 21. His amazement and astonishment at Grotius that he should decline so clear and easie a meaning of the Image of the Beast and take up with one so impossible and so unprofitable 323 BOOK II. CHAP. I. 1. The great Usefulness of shewing the folly of Ribera's and Grotius his Expositions of these two Chapters of the Apocalyps 2. That according to Ribera the Beast is the Devil 3. The seven Kings the wicked Kings of the seven Ages of the world 4. That five of these Ages were gone over in S. John's time and that the Reign of Antichrist is the seventh and Rome Heathen the Whore 5. The general Usefulness of our Joint-Exposition 6. That the Beast is not the Devil proved there-from by several circumstances Nor the seven Heads seven such Ages by the deadly wound in the sixth Head 7. Nor the Whore Rome Heathen more then the Two-horned Beast 8. That the Devil cannot be the Beast that was and is not c. proved by arguments not leaning on our Joint Exposition 9. Farther proof from that part of his Name and yet is with a Vindication of that reading 10. A confutation of Ribera's Exposition of the seven Heads from the groundlesness and exceptionableness of his division of the duration of the world into seven Ages 11. From the Ununitableness of the Kings of the Age into one Head 12. From the Devil's eminency and superiority over these Heads 13. From the leaving neither room nor time for an eighth King 14. From the disproportionableness of the seventh Age of the world to the rest and especially to the strange Feats they say Antichrist is then to atchieve 15. And lastly from the seven Hills necessarily appropriating those seven Heads to the Roman Empire 16. That these Expositions of Ribera as also of the rest of the Roman Interpreters were very weak even in Grotius his own judgment which set him upon minting new ones 336 CHAP. II. 1. What the meaning of the Scarlet Beast with seven Heads and ten Horns and of the Woman riding him is according to Grotius 2. A Confutation of Grotius his Interpretation out of our Joint-Exposition 3. Two main Grounds or necessary Supporters of Grotius his Interpretation The one That S. John reckons the Seven Heads beginning at Claudius with the Confutation thereof 4. The other That this Vision was wrote in Vespasian's time with a Discovery of the weakness and falseness of that Opinion 5. That Claudius his banishing the Jews from Rome falls many degrees short of a proof that John was then exiled into Patmos And that Impulsore Christo in Suetonius does not so much as evince that any Christians were then expelled the City 6. And if the Decree reached Christians it does not strait follow that S. John was concerned therein 7. An Answer to a Passage in Epiphanius alledged for S. John's Exile then 8. An Answer to another alledged to the