God as corporal food enableth the body for the continuance of corporal actions and works And such as this had been the Devil's fare had he not fallen from his first estate by sin whereas now in stead of that Manna he is fain with the Serpent to feed on a food as course and as base as the dust of the earth For as of a glorious Angel he is fallen to be a damned Spirit so is his diet answerable to continue him in that damnable estate namely a food clean contrary to that of the blessed Angels and a very earth to their heaven a most execrable joy and a malicious delight in whatsoever is opposite to the Power the Wisdom the Goodness the Glory of God his Creator this is that he hungreth and hunteth after and nothing but this If there were no sin no confusion no misery of creatures in the world the Devil would be soo◠starved for this is that he preys after this is that carrion he seeks for when he goeth about as S. Peter saith like a roaring Lion seeking whom he may devour I have read of a people of America that will eat no flesh before it be stinking rotten and then it seems to them most tender and delicate These are of a diet like unto the Devil for nothing but garbage and carrion are his dainties the more rotten with sin the more pleasing to his palate that which stinks most in God's nostrils that smells the sweetest in his Thus much of the second part of this Curse The last part remains I will put enmity between thee and the woman and between thy seed c. In which we will first consider The parties who are to be at this deadly seud Secondly The event and success they have one against the other For the first The parties are on one side said to be the Serpent and his seed on the other side The woman and her seed By the Serpent we are to understand Satan the Prince of darkness and Father of Devils The Serpent's seed in the first place are the whole crue of Devils and damned spirits who are fallen from their first estate and condition These are the Serpent's first-born begotten by him not by corporal generation nor as they are Spirits but by spiritual deformation as they are Devils For it is the opinion of Divines That Satan fell first himself and afterward propagated his Apostasie by drawing others after him over whom therefore he worthily deserveth to have the principality and chiefdom in which respect also were there no other yet he might be called their Father and they his sons or seed as we know the use of the Scripture is to call Princes Fathers and Subjects Sons The latter off-spring of the Devil being a second brood are the whole company of wicked and reprobate worldlings for that such as these are the spawn of that foul Fiend it appears clearly by the words of our Saviour to the Pharisees Ioh. 8. 44. Ye are of your Father the Devil and the lusts of your Father ye will do And again 1 Iohn 3. 10. The children of God are opposed to the children of the Devil Therefore Christ calls Iudas a Devil Iohn 6. 70. And Paul Acts 13. 10. calls Elymas the Sorcerer a child of the Devil The case is plain And as the Vanguard consisted of the first crue so these latter are the Rere of Satan's Army Now on the other side against this Army of Hell-hounds stand The Woman and the Woman's seed The Woman though only named excludes not the Man who was to be at enmity with the Devil as well as the Woman But the reason of this unusual Trope which call◠the Kind by the name of the weaker and inferior Sex is because o◠the words following of the seed wherein is contained the great Mystery of Christ's Incarnation under whose colours and in whose power alone this Army is both to march and overcome For this great Captain was to be as you know the seed of the Woman only and not of the Man A Virgin should conceive a Son whose name is called Emmanuel Whence it comes to pass that some by seed will have no other seed to be understood but the person of Christ only both because he is alone that seed of the woman which is not the seed of man and because S. Paul Gal. 3. 16. on those words v. 8. In thy seed shall all the Nations of the earth be blessed expoundeth seed singularly and individually of Christ himself alone But if it be well observed the case here is not the like for the seed of the Woman is opposed to the seed of the Serpent which seed cannot chuse but be taken collectively for Satan and all his regiments of Devils and Hell-hounds And why should not also the seed of the Woman be understood of Christ mystical that is of Christ the Head with all his members who are incorporate into him by Faith into one mystical body For although they are naturally the seed of Man as well as of the Woman yet spiritually by this incorporation they are the seed of the Woman only as is their Head with whom they are one And this it is which makes them of the party against the Serpent for till they once became the seed of the woman only there was no enmity betwixt them The seed therefore of the Woman I expound to be Christ and his Members He 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the seed of the woman by nature they 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by their spiritual engrafment into him Hence appears the difference of these two Armies First In Satan's Army all march under their Father who begot them but Christ's Army sighteth under the Colours of their elder brother the first-begotten seed of the woman Secondly In their ranging Christ and his Army are as one body informed by one Spirit the Devil 's is far more disunited Thirdly In their fighting for in Satan's Army every Souldier useth his own strength and fights with his own weapons but in Christ's Army the whole strength lies in Christ their General all our armour is on his back and our weapons guided by the power of his hand So we may learn out of S. Paul Ephes. 6. 11 12. Put on saith he the whole armour of God that ye may be able to stand against the wiles of the Devil For we wrastle not against flesh and bloud but against principalities against powers against the rulers of the darkness of this world against spiritual wickedness in high places Thus then having seen the marshalling of these two Armies which are at so deadly an enmity let us at last see The success of their skirmishes and of the stratagems which they practise one against the other These are described on the Devil's part very terrible that his head should be mauled but on Christ's side the loss should be very small the Devil prevailing but to the wounding or bruising of his heel But what is this Head of
redeemed us from our Spiritual thraldom by raising Iesus Christ our Lord from the dead begetting us in stead of an earthly Canaan to an inheritance incorruptible in the Heavens In a word the Christian by the day he hallows professes himself a Christian that is as S. Paul speaks To believe on him that raised up Iesus from the dead So that the Iew and Christian both though they fall not upon the same day yet make their designation of their day upon the like ground the Iews the memorial-day of their deliverance from the temporal Egypt and temporal Pharaoh the Christians the memorial-day of their deliverance from the spiritual Egypt and spiritual Pharaoh But might not will you say the Christian as well have observed the Iewish for his seventh day as the day he doth I answer No he might not For in so doing he should seem not to acknowledge his Redemption to be already performed but still expected For the deliverance of Israel out of Egypt by the Ministery of Moses was intended for a Type and pledge of the Spiritual deliverance which was to come by Christ their Canaan also to which they marched being a Type of that Heavenly inheritance which the redeemed by Christ do look for Since therefore the Shadow is now made void by the coming of the Substance the Relation is changed and God is no longer to be worshipped and believed in as a God fore-shewing and assuring by Types but as a God who hath performed the Substance of what he promised And this is that which S. Paul means Colossians 2. 16 17. when he saith Let no man judge you henceforth in respect of a Feast-day New-moon or Sabbath-dayes Which were a shadow of things to come but the body is of Christ. DISCOURSE XVI 1 COR. 11. 5. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Every woman praying or prophesying with her head uncovered dishonoureth her head I HAVE chosen this of the woman rather than that of the man going before it for the Theme of my Discourse First Because I conceive the Fault at the reformation whereof the Apostle here aimeth in the Church of Corinth was the womens only not the mens That which the Apostle speaks of a man praying or prophesying being by way of supposition and for illustration of the unseemliness of that guise which the women used Secondly Because the condition of the Sex in the words read makes something for the better understanding of that which is spoken of both as we shall see presently The Discourse I intend to make upon the Text shall consist of these two parts First of an Enquiry What is here meant by Prophesying a thing attributed to women and therefore undoubtedly some such thing as they were capable of Secondly What was this Fault for matter and manner of the women of the Church of Corinth which the Apostle here reproveth To begin with the First and which I am like to dwell longest upon Some take Prophesying here in the stricter sense to be foretelling of things to come as that which in those Primitive times both men and women did by the pouring out of the Holy Ghost upon them according to that of the Prophet Ioel applied by S. Peter to the sending of the Holy Ghost at the first promulgation of the Gospel I will pour out my Spirit upon all flesh and your sons and daughters shall prophesie and your young men shall see visions And that such Prophetesses as these were those four Daughters of Philip the Evangelist whereof we read Acts 21. 9. Others take Prophesying here in a more large notion namely for the gift of interpreting and opening Divine mysteries contained in Holy Scripture for the instruction and edification of the Hearers especially as it was then inspired and suggested in extraordinary manner by the Holy Spirit as Prophecy was given of old according to that of S. Peter Prophecy came not in old time by the will of man but holy men of God spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost So because many in the beginning of the Gospel were guided by a like instinct in the interpretation and application of Scripture they were said to Prophesie Thus the Apostle useth it in the fourteenth Chapter of this Epistle where he discourses of spiritual Gifts and before all prefers that of Prophecy because he that Prophesieth saith he speaketh unto men to edification and exhortation and comfort But neither of these kinds of Prophecy sutes with the person in my Text which is a woman For it is certain the Apostle speaks here of Prophesying in the Church or Congregation but in the Church a woman might not speak no not so much as ask a question for her better instruction much less teach and instruct others and those men This the Apostle teacheth us in this very Epistle Chapter the fourteenth even there where he discourseth so largely of those kinds of Prophecy Let your women saith he keep silence in the Churches For it is not permitted unto them to speak 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 but to be subject And if they will learn let them ask their husbands at home Again in 1 Tim. 2. 11 12. Let the woman learn in silence with all subjection But I suffer not a woman to teach nor to usurp authority over the man but to be in silence Note here that to speak in a Church-Assembly by way of teaching or instructing others is an act of superiority which therefore a woman might not do because her sex was to be in subjection and so to appear before God in garb and posture which consisted therewith that is she might not speak to instruct men in the Church but to God she might To avoid this difficulty some would have the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in my Text to be taken passively namely for to hear or be present at Prophecy which is an acception without example either in Scripture or any where else It is true the Congregation is said to pray when the Priest only speaks but that they should be said to preach who are present only at the hearing of a Sermon is a Trope without example For the reason is not alike In prayer the Priest is the mouth of the Congregation and does what he does in their names and they assent to it by saying Amen But he that preaches or prophesies is not the mouth of the Church to speak ought in their names that so they might be said to speak too but he is the mouth of God speaking to them It is not likely therefore that those who only hear another speaking or prophesying to them should be said 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to prophesy no more as I said than that all they should be said to preach who were at the hearing of a Sermon What shall we do then Is there any other acception of the word Prophesying left us which may sit our turn Yes there is a Fourth acception which if it can be made good will
Hail thou highly favoured the Lord is with thee blessed art thou amongst Women where God chuses the womb of Mary wherein to erect that pure Altar and Temple whereof the Legal were but shadows Thus these two circumstances seem no ways to bind us But the first That there should be select places for holy Assemblies and the publick worship of God this is that which was before the Law was given and yet remains in force now the Law is ended As long as it is required of the Church to appear before the Lord in publick Assemblies so long is it also required to have chosen and select places for that purpose Adam and his Sons had places whither to bring their Sacrifices the Patriarchs used Altars Mountains and Groves to the self-same purpose from the very beginning of Christianity Christians have had their select Oratories 1 Cor. 11. 22. S. Paul speaking of the Assemblies of the Church and some abuses therein as eating and drinking Have ye not saith he Houses to eat and drink in or despise ye the Church of God Here it appears that the place of holy Assemblies was not an ordinary place where men eat and drink but a place select and set apart for holier purposes which he yet more confirms when he addeth v. 34. If any man hunger let him eat at home It follows hence That the place of Holy Assemblies was no man's home but a place hallowed unto God for the common use of the Church howsoever these in the times of persecution so secret as not to be discovered by the Gentiles What hath been the practice since in all Ages he hath no eyes that sees not and if there be any who cannot behold them without a desire to have them levelled it were better their eyes were plucked out than so many monuments of our Forefathers piety should be thrown down and ruined and God so unseemly and disorderly served as he should be if as Beggers do for lodging so his Assemblies were every week or month to seek a place of entertainment We are therefore as well as the Israelites to appear before the Lord in a chosen place But here is the difference that they were to have but one we have liberty to have many there God chose a place for himself but we in the Gospel have liberty to chuse a place for God where we will Nevertheless it is to be observed that the Leaders of the Primitive Church howsoever they acknowledged this liberty yet they used to select for their Assemblies such Places as God had any way dignified or honoured either by some work of mercy or the glorious sufferings of his Martyrs whereupon the most ancient Monuments of the Christian Churches do mention the Assemblies of Christians In Coemeteriis Martyrum at the Coemeteries and Monuments of their Martyrs For howsoever God did not immediately select the place of his worship then as he did in the time of the Law yet they thought he had made these places of a choicer fitness than other though none of necessary obligation which I for my part would be loth to condemn as an error seeing to follow the order of the Church of Israel byâ— way of direction and not obligation is no abridgment to Christian liberty so it be only so far and in those things only whereof Christianity is capable as I think this we speak of was though I know it was afterward an occasion of damnable Idolatry use of erecting Temples unto Saints and Angels But what is there which the corrupt nature of man will not make an occasion of sin Even as an unclean body of the best nourishment will breed evil humors So out of the most wholsome ordinances our wicked hearts will contrive superstition DISCOURSE XLVIII DEUTERONOMY 16. 16 17. In the Feast of Vnleavened bread and in the Feast of Weeks and in the Feast of Tabernacles and they shall not appear before the Lord empty Every man shall give as he is able according to the blessing of the Lord thy God which he hath given thee IN these words being a commandment for the observation of the three solemn and principal Feasts of the Law were Four things considerable 1. The Work or action To appear before the Lord 2. The Persons who All Males 3. The Place where In the place the Lord shall chuse 4. The Time when Thrice in the Year In the Feast of unleavened bread In the Feast of Weeks and in the Feast of Tabernacles Of the three first the Action the Persons and Place I have spoken Now therefore I come to speak of the Time The Feast of unleavened bread c. The Feast of unleavened Bread is that which is otherwise called The Feast of the Passeover consisting of seven days from the fifteenth of March until the twenty first On the Even before this solemn Feast the fourteenth day of the first month was killed and eaten the Paschal Lamb on the seven days following were offered the Paschal Sacrifices and no other Bread but unleavened eaten the first and last days being days of holy Assemblies or Convocations The Feast of Weeks was a Feast kept at the end of seven Weeks or a Week of Weeks after the second day of the Passeover or fifty days after the first day of the Feast of unleavened bread and therefore called The Feast of Weeks that is a Feast to be kept a Week of Weeks after the Passeover and Pentecost because the first day thereof was the fiftieth day after the first of the Passeover as now our Whitsunâ—ide is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the fiftieth day after Easter This Feast was likewise of seven days continuance all spent in multitude of Sacrifices but the first and last specially in keeping of holy Assemblies The Feast of Tabernacles 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 was a Feast of eight days continuance in the seventh month or September from the fifteenth day thereof to the two and twentieth all whereof had their proper Sacrifices and the first seven days they dwelt in Booths or Tabernacles made of Willow Palm Myrtle and Citron boughs whence it hath the name of the Feast of Tabernacles The first and the last or eighth day were here also days of an holy Convocation wherein no servile work might be done Thus having in brief described the Time Continuance and Service of these Three solemn Feasts now let us also see what was the End of their institution The End of these Feasts was partly for Remembrance of things past and partly for Types and Figures of things to come which I will shew in them severally The Feast of the Passeover was for a thankful Remembrance of their great deliverance out of Egypt when for hast they were forced to carry their dough unleavened upon their shoulders and the evening before the Lord having slain all the first-born of Egypt yet passed by them because of the bloud of the Paschal Lamb which he saw upon the door-posts of their houses For this
in the day-time for three weeks together or some such like sense Gen. 29. 27. The Week which Laban would have Iacob fulfil before he gave him Rachel was not the Seven years service but the Seven daies of Leah's wedding-feast as the Targum translates and the Vulgar Imple hebdomadam dierum hujus copulae nor can it be otherwise by the age of Rachel's children Secondly Let it be shewn in all the Prophecy of Daniel or for ought I know in any other of the Prophets where times of things prophesied expressed by daies are not to be understood of years For when the Angel means daies in Daniel he expresseth it therefore not by daies for so it were doubtful but by evenings and mornings chap. 8. 14. where he speaks of the time of the persecution of Antiochus A brief Demonstration and as I conceive unanswerable of the Contemporation of the four Timed Prophecies in the Apocalypse viz. Of the Gentiles treading down the Court and Holy City 42 months Of the Witnesses preaching in Sackcloth 1260 daies Of the Beast's power of doing 42 months Of the Apostolical Woman's continuance in the Wilderness a Time Times and half a Time expressed also by 1260 daies 1. The Times of the Beast and of the Witnesses come out together viz. at the end of the Sixth Trumpet Chap. 11. Ergò being equal times they must needs begin together and so contemporate throughout 2. The Times of the Beast and of the Woman's being in the Wilderness have the same Epocha and beginning namely the dethroning and vanquishing of the Red Dragon Ch. 12. Ergò being equal times they must also have the same ending 3. The Times of the treading down the Court and Holy City by the Gentiles and of the Sackcloth-prophecy of the Witnesses are concurrent by the plain construction of the Text which gives them to prophesy all that heavy time Besides when the Witnesses have finished we find the Gentiles angry as being driven from their possession in the Temple Ch. 11. vers 18. I. M. CHAP. X. A Discourse of the Beginning and Ending of the 42 moneths or 1260 daies Rev. 11. 2 3. wherein Alstedius his Four Epocha's are examined SIR I Waved not the Question of the Ending of the XLII months more than that of their Beginning for as I designed their Beginning in a latitude so by consequent I do their Ending If they begin between the years 365 and 455 they must end between the years 1625 and 1715. Only I refused precisely to determine the year of their ending which for some reasons I supposed should not certainly be known till the Event should make it manifest according as was not the precise Beginning of the LXX years of the Babylonish captivity till the Event discovered it by their Ending For when the articuli are more than one to begin at who can determine at which God will reckon the beginning and consequently at what precise year shall be the ending Yet as God accompted the LXX years of the Babylonish captivity from a remarkable moment of that latitude of time the Iews were entring into so I believe the same All-wise God will do the period of the XLII months from some remarkable moment in the latitude of their beginning Howsoever because such remarkable moments or terms are more than one all that we can say is That it shall be from some one of them and it may be from some one we observe not God in his wisdom till he sees fit veiling it from our eyes For Alstedius I will ingenuously confess I had never observed those passages of his Chronology you acquaint me with as having never been nor yet am owner of that Book though I think I want few of his other Writings in which I have met with many passages tending to the same purpose with these of his Chronology here and there scattered but no where so fully and ex proposito I sought up and down for the Book and some two days since I got a sight of it so long as to read the pages you quote and no longer yet because you desire my judgment of the Years he setteth down I will answer something for your satisfaction and first lay the ground to examine them by viz. The Holy Ghost reckoneth the Epocha or Beginning of Antichrist and his Apostatical times from the taking of that which hindred out of the way that is the then-reigning Imperial Sovereignty of Rome 2 Thess. 2. 6 7 8. or as S. Iohn expresseth it from the deadly wounding of the Head or Sovereignty of the Roman Beast which in his time ruled or the shivering of the Empire into a plurality of Kingdoms upon that deadly wounding Apoc. 13. 3. with chap. 17. 12. When that great City should cease to be the lap of that Sovereignty which the Caesars once held over the Nations and many new upstart Kings should appear in the place and territory of that once One Empire then should the Times of Apostasy with that wicked One make their entrance Therefore as the Epocha or beginning of the Apostatical times in a latitude is to be fetched from that deadly blow or downfal of the Caesarean head in a latitude so he that would conjecturally point out any precise year where to begin those times must do it from some remarkable step or degree of the Caesarean blow or downfal in the same latitude Where note further that the Caesarean blow or downfal may be accompted double First Religious and Sacred as he was Draconicola by a dismounting and dethroning of the Dragon which actuated and enlived him Secondly Political by the ruin of his State and Majesty Some of the places I now quoted may seem more to respect the one some more the other Antichrist we see hath cured them both the First by a new Idolatry the Second by his usurped Tyranny Let us examine Alstedius his Four Epocha's according to this ground The first is Anno Christi 362. which was ill pitched it being the very time of the Dragon's recovery of the Imperial Throne under Iulian not any moment or step of his dismounting and the Empire flourishing under one Monarch not falling or disshivering Nor is his Reason good Because then began the persecution of Iulian for that argues that the Dragon was not yet down Nor the other Because of the Schismatical contention of the Roman Popes for what reason can there be why the Schism of the Popes should be the Epocha of their dominion and of the times of Apostasy under them Besides the Event shews this was no Epocha of the 42 months for then the expiration of them should have appeared anno 1622. by some mortal blow to the Antichristian state but it proved contrary Alstedius addeth the three years and an half of the Slaughter of the Witnesses to the end thereof hoping they should have revived Anno 1625. but alas they did not He that would chuse an Epocha about Iulian's time might with much more probability