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ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A66360	Ho Antichristos the great antichrist revealed, before this time never discovered, and proved to be neither pope, nor Turk, nor any single person, nor the succession of any one monarch or tyrant in any policies, but a collected pack, or multitude of hypocritical, heretical, blasphemous, and most scandalous wicked men that have fulfilled all the prophesies of the Scriptures ... and especially have united ... together by a solemn league and covenant to slay the two witnesses of God, Moses and Aaron ... that is, the supreme magistrate of the Commonwealth, and the chief pastors and governours of the Church of Christ, and the Christian world is requested to judge whether the Assembly of Presbyterians consulting at Westminster, together with the independents, Anabaptists, and lay-preachers be not the false prophet ... and whether the prevalent faction of the long Parliament ... that killed the two witnesses of Jesus Christ, 1. Charles the First ... 2. William Laud ... be not the grosse and visible body of the same antichrist / by Gr. Williams.	Williams, Gryffith, 1589?-1672.	1660 (1660)	Wing W2662; ESTC R25201	504,825	313

a forcible compulsion but a continual perswasion and an undeniable intreaty and importunity until our request be granted for so the two Disciples going to Emmans Luke 24.29 are said to have compelled or constrained Jesus to stay with them that is by their importunity and not by any forcible way And so we are to compel all men by entreating them with continual importunity to believe in Christ and by him to be reconciled unto God and by captivating their understanding to the obedience of Christ which is the best compulsion in the world 2. I say that we are in some sense to compel them that is quoad media to the nieanes of Faith though not to the Faith it self to come into the House but not to eat to come into the Church but not to believe because this men may do but the other God alone must do And therefore we say with S. Aug. against the Donatists that in this sence Kings within their Kingdoms and every man within his House is to compel and to cause his Children and Servants and all that are under his Jurisdiction to come into the Church to hear the Word of God and to make every one to perform the outward service of God at least in shew so far as man can judge for so the Commandment is that thou shalt keep holy the Sabbath Day and shalt do no manner of work thou and thy Son and thy Daughter thy Man-servant and thy Maid-servant Exod 20. and the Stranger that is within thy Gate But the Church of Rome would compel us to believe what they believe and to profess that we believe whatsoever their Church professeth and this their compulsion is with no light hand as appeareth by their Inquisition and the French Massacre And yet they will answer that they compel no man to believe but only punish those that do erre and revolt from their Belief I confess that some of the Learned do affirm haereses spirituali gladio jugulatas esse that Heresies and apostasies are to be punished only with the spiritual sword and not with the temporal sword of the Civil Magistrate because our Saviour said unto his Disciples John 6.66 67. after he saw many departing from him nunquid vos vultis abire and will you go away likewise As if he said I hold you not use your own judgment and he that will depart let him depart he may go for me And therefore St. Paul doth but excommunicate and deliver such men unto Satan 1 Cor. 5.3 5. that they might learn not to blaspheme to shew unto us that there should be no bloodshed nor temporal punishment for the Faith in the Church of Christ But for the better clearing of this point A twosold consideration to be had about the suppression and punishing of Schismaticks Hereticks and Apostata's 1. Of the time 1. When the Members and true Professors are but few Mat. 13.30 of compelling men to Christianity and to believe I say that great wisdom and discretion is to be adhibited in this case of mens consciences and that a double consideration is to be had herein 1. Of the Time when these Offenders do appear in the Church 2. Of the Persons who they be that do thus offend For 1. There is a time when such Offenders Hereticks or Apostata's should be spared and there is a time when they should be punished and not spared For 1. In the Infancy of the Church that is of any Church when the true orthodox Christians are but few and it may be fewer than the Herericks and Apostata's it is not the safest way to be too severe and rigid against these men but in a Christian policy rather to give some scope to these mens Consciences and so to suffer the Tares to grow with the wheat as our Saviour speaketh 1. Because they are not able being few or fewer to struggle against many And I know no reason why the Roman Catholicks should not be tolerated as well and assoon as Anabaptists and other worser Schismaticks That these times do require some toleration of Religion 2. When the true Professors are many 2. Because their unseasonable severity and rigidness towards these Offenders might be a meanes to raise other enemies against them whereby more wheat should perish than Tares should be destroyed and perhaps hinder those that are in aequilibrio and as yet unsetled to embrace the Truth and that Profession wherein they see so little mediocrity and so much severity used And truly in these very times wherein the true Professors are so few and the Sectaries so many I suppose this gentleness moderation and some scope of Christian Liberty ought to be given until by the goodness of God and a painful preaching of the truth we shall reduce them to the full and perfect imbracing thereof But 2. When any Church is established the Magistrates setled and the true Professors many and plentiful then all such offenders are to be corrected and not permitted to corrupt others and to seduce the weaker sort of the true Professors or otherwise the Christian and civil Magistrate cannot be free from sin if he suffer such offenders to go free from punishment for if he punish Theevery and spare Idolatry the Rebels and Runagadoes from him and not the Revolters from Christ how shall he answer this to God And therefore King Asa gathered both Judah and Benjamin and all the strangers from Ephraim 2 Chron. 15.8 13. Manasses and Symeon and did enact with them that whosoever would not turn from his Idols and his Idolatrous waies to seek the Lord God should be slain Exod. 32. ●7 And Moses caused them to be put unto the sword that had worshipped the Golden Calf And Jehu did put all those Priests unto the sword that had forsaken the Lord to worship Baal 2 Reg. 10.25 And so should every Christian Magistrate do the like when he seeth the time serveth that he may and can do it For immedicabile vulnus Ense recidendum ne pars syncer a trahatur The Rule of nature tells us that the scab'd sheep must be separated from the Flock lest she infect the sound ones and so must Hereticks and Schismaticks from the flock of Christ but a little leaven leaveneth the whole lump and one lewd fellow may spoil many and one subtle Heretick or Schismatick may seduce many of the simple people and therefore I would they were cut off from you that trouble you saith the Apostle II. As a wise consideration must be had of the time when and how this rooting out of the weeds may be done 2. Of the persons so the like consideration must be had of the Persons that do offend and are themselves led out of the way For 1. Some are private 1. Tacit Offenders quiet and peaceable men that tacitly keep their errors and misbeliefs unto themselves and so do no great hurt but only unto themselves And 2. Some are more

and to punish those that would observe them as the adherents of that Parliament did if I knew him I should verily believe him to be the great Antichrist But as the Prophet David complaineth of the Jews that they kept not the Covenant of God and would not walk in his law but soon forgate what he had done and the wonderfull works that he had shewed for them Psal 78.12 so we may justly complain of all those the spawn and offspring of the Presbyterian assembly and adherents of that long Parliament that not only forget the due observation of these holy times but also forbid and inhibit and in many places reprove correct and punish their Christian brethren for their religious observation of these good dayes and the performance of these holy duties which they owe to God for his great blessings Yet I hope that with all their subtlety and authority that vote them down they shall never be able to suppress them no more than Antiochus was to abolish the Jewish feasts because the holy Ghost saith the little horn that was the type of the Antichrist when he came to be great Daniel 7.25 and to the height of his power did but think to change the times and was not able to change them because the godly Jews observed all their festival times and holy dayes notwithstanding all the inhibition of Antiochus to the contrary and all the tortures that they endured for observing them So I hope all good Christians and true Saints will observe these their feasts and holy dayes and upon no termes either of fear flattery or gain omit on these times to do their service and holy duties unto God nor shew themselves less thankfull to God for the true substance than the Jews were for the types and shadowes of that substance But I remember Sanders Sanders in demonst Ansel in Apoc. c. 7. ex Irenaeo l. 5. Hypolit in orat de fine seculi Gen. 49.17 Jerem. 8.16 Bellar. de Rom. Pontif. l. 3. c. 12. Anselmus and some others out of Irenaeus and Hippolitus do think that the Antichrist shall be a Jew of the Tribe of Dan because old Jacob saith Dan shall be a serpent by the way an adder in the path that biteth the horse heels so that his rider shall fall backward and the Prophet Jeremy saith the snorting of his horses was heard from Dan and especially because that the Angel in the Revelat. c. 7. where 12 thousand are sealed out of every Tribe of Jacob leaves out the Tribe of Dan for that the Antichrist as these men suppose should arise from that Tribe and Bellarmine saith it is very probable the Antichrist shall be a Jew And whether these men that refuse and forbid the observance of the festival times and dayes of Christ be Danites or no I cannot tell but I am sure they are like Jewes not only in the Jewish precise and ceremonious observation of the Sabbath that was to be sanctified for the remembrance of our creation and the prophanation of these holy Christian feasts that we keep for the remembrance of our redemption but also in many other things that do obliterate and blot out the memorial of the greatest benefits that Christ hath done for us and the chiefest points of our Christian Religion Therefore if the promoting of Judaism the suppressing of the adiutaments and helps to understand and to preserve the main heads of Christianity be a note and property of the Antichrist let our Assembly of Presbyterians and the members of that long Parliament with their adherents that think to change these times take heed they be not found to be the Antich Object But these men will object against the observation of these Feasts and especially of Christmas that they know not on what day of the month he was born and therefore why should they observe the 25th day of December for the day of his Nativity Or if it be true that he was born on that day yet they have no Precept in all the Scripture that they should cease from their vocation and keep that for an holy day Respons To the first part of this Objection I shall but briefly answer by demanding of thee To the first part of the Objection Why dost thou with all other Churches in Christendom observe the year of our Lords Incarnation when the Angel saluted Mary and the Word beg●n his Incarnation in the womb of the blessed Virgin to begin on the 25th day of March if thou doubtest that he was not born on the 25th of December Dost thou think she went either more or less time with her Child than the usual and natural time of other women And therefore if thou wilt change the day of his birth change the day of his Incarnation in the wombe of his mother and let the year of our Lord in all our deeds and writings be altered and begin on another day which thou knowest to be a surer time of his Incarnation than the 25th day of March for why should all our evidences be false and erronious Or if thou my good Presbyterian dost not think the 25th of December to be the day of his Nativity why dost thou not inform us for certain on what day of the month he was born that we may not neglect the duty because we are not sure of the day But you think it a sufficient excuse wholly to neglect the duty because you doubt of the day And yet it might be a sufficient reason to satisfie any reasonable man besides that John Baptist who was born on the 24th of June that then was the longest day in the year and just six months before the birth of Christ as the Angel informed Mary tells us plainly that according to the daies of their birth Christ must encrease and he must decrease that the whole Church of God have unanimously observed this day constantly for the day of Christ his birth and why shouldst thou think that Christ would all this while suffer his Church to be deceived herein or that thou shouldst be wiser than the whole Church hath been for so many Ages together Solut. To the second part of the Objection To the second part of thine Objection that thou hast no Precept in Scripture to observe this day I confess it and how many things dost thou not only in natural businesse and ordinary affairs but also in and about the Service of God that thou hast no Precept for them in all the Scriptures For where hast thou any Precept to keep the first day of the week for the Sabbath To receive the Sacrament of the Lords Supper once every month To preach twice every Lords day To build a Church in such and such a place To make the Sermon so long as thou dost The People to meet in Church twice a day and no more And the Service to be on such hours and no other And the like For though God accepteth of no 〈◊〉 〈◊〉

of 1200 and 60 dayes that make three years and a half just so long as Christ Preached after he was Baptized among the Jewes and at the end of those 1200 and 60 dayes they should be slaine by the Antichrist about one moneth before the Antichrist should be destroyed and it is a wonderfull thing to consider how many Papists are led away with the belief of these fictions of which I will not stand to confute and to shew their Vanity for that Bibliander and Chytraeus have sufficiently answered to these places Chytraeus in c. 11. Apoc. Math. 11.14 and have fully shewed howthese were the mistakes of those Fathers and but meere fancies of the Papists when our Saviour tels us plainly that Iohn Baptist was the Elias which was for to come and which the Jewes dreamed as the Papists do should be Elias the Tisbite that was taken up to Heaven in a Fiery Charet Exposition 2 Dr. Hammond in Apoc c. 11. Eusebius l. 4. c. 6. Others by these two Witnesses do understand two Bishops of Hierusalem wherof the one was Bishop over the Converted Jewes and the other of the Gentile Christians and these Berchochabas a Seditious and Rebellious Jew whereof Eusebius writeth did kill in the civil dissention of the Jewes as some Authors testifie but as unlikely as the former fiction of the Papists Reason 1 And the acts of the Apostles seem not to intimate any such thing but rather the clean contrary 1. Because we cannot yield that there were two Bishops of Hierusalem one of the Converted Jewes and another of the Gentile Christians as if they meant to make two distinct and severall Churches which might produce a great division and bring many Inconveniences betwixt the Jewish Christians and the Gentiles whereas now the partition Wall betwixt Jews and Gentiles was broken down and as both people were to have but one chief Shepheard that is Jesus Christ so they were to have but one fold and one Deputy Shepheard that is one Bishop under Christ in one City though I deny not but there might be subordinate Presbyters and Deacons under that Bishop to assist him to instruct the people and to Govern the Church Reason 2 2. Because the Revelation is not of known things that were already past for that is not properly a Revelation but a Narration of things especially things publickly done and not concealed but it is of things that were to come to pass and though Berchochabas was supprest by Rufus in the time of the Emperor Adrian about the 130 year of Christ yet it is thought that these men which are supposed to be two Bishops were slain long before this Revelation was shewed unto St. Iohn and not unlikely because Eusebius nameth 15 Bishops of Hierusalem that succeeded one another before Xistus that was but the sixth Bishop of Rome after the Apostles and lived about the beginning of Adrians time Reason 3 3. Because it is manifest that Berchochabas cannot be understood by the Beast that ascendeth out of the bottomless pit and the great Antichrist which is here said to kill the two witnesses because none of the notes and marks of that Beast under which notes the antichrist is described in the Scriptures do any wayes agree with Berchochabas for he never apostatized and fell away from Christ whom he never professed neither did he ever sit in the Temple of God as God nor wrought any signes or wonders nor went about his work slily mysteriously as the Antichrist doth but he went about his design openly and plainly aperto marte with armed Troops and therefore he cannot be understood to be the killer of these two witnesses nor these witnesses to be those two supposed Bishops of Hierusalem Exposition 3 Francisc Junius in loc Others by these two witnesses do understand it generally of the Ministers and Preachers of Gods word that are expressed by the number of two because of their weakness contemptibleness and fewness according to our Saviours words The harvest indeed is great but the labourers are few and yet they are two that they might the better assist one another and especially Deut. 19.13 2 Cor. 13.1 Mat. 18. v. 16. to confirm the Testimony of one another unto all other men according as the Law requireth that by the mouth of two or three Witnesses every word might be made good unto men as the Apostle sheweth But I can see no reason that all the Ministers and Preachers of Gods word should be expressed by the number of two when as though in the beginning when Christ spake it the number of the Apostles and Disciples were but very few yet the Psalmist prophesying of the succeeding time of the Gospel after the day of Pentecost saith that God gave the word and great was the Company of the Preachers and they could not be weak and contemptible during the time of their prophesying and before the coming of the Antichrist because they were the two Olive Trees and the two Candlesticks that stand before the God of the Earth and if any man hurt them that is during the time of their Prophesie Apoc. c. 11.4.5 fire proceedeth out of their mouth and devoureth their enemies and therefore our last translation addeth for the explanation of the point the word power unto the Text saying and I will give power unto my two witnesses and they shall prophesie that is Apoc. c. 11.3 during the time alotted them 1200 and 60 dayes so that none shall be able to hinder them Exposition 4 Others do conceive that by these two witnesses we may better understand the two Testaments that is the holy Scriptures of the old and new Testament whereof our Saviour saith Search the Scriptures for they testifie of me John 5.39 and thus do they expound them that make the Pope to be the Antichrist because he hath supprest the Scriptures both of the old and new Testament and hath offered violence and so killed the true sence and meaning of these two Testaments For the violence that the Pope and his Cardinalls and the whole Church of Rome have offered unto the holy Scriptures I cannot and I will not go about to excuse them neither do I think that they can excuse themselves but though the two Testaments are witnesses of Christ and do bear witness of him yet because they are but a dead letter and so dead witnesses as are the Heavens and all the works of God the witnesses of God though the Scriptures truly expounded are by far the clearer and the surer witnesses of him but being turned like a nose of wax by the Hereticks as they are very often I assure my self they are not here meant by these witnesses because they cannot properly nor indeed any wayes be said to be killed when the truth may onely be wounded and for a time suppressed but never killed and quite extinguished quia magna veritas prevalet as Zorchabel proveth and it is but an idle shift

evade and wash away these Characters of Sodom and Egypt and Hierusalem I will not accuse her let her excuse her self if she can howsoever when the slaughtered witnesses are cast forth into the streets of the great City they of the people and kindreds and tongues and Nations shall see their dead bodies three dayes and a half and shall not suffer their bodies to be put in graves Upon which words Junius in his notes annexed to Beza's Translation that understands this beast that slew the witnesses Ju●ius in annot annex Bezae translat in apoc c. 11. Quia tres annos cum dimidio Juper vixit bon facius Jubilaeo suo ut ait Bergomensis that is the Protestant Preachers of his time to be Boniface the 8. who killed neither King nor Bishop and I am confident never did so much mischief to the Waldenses and fratricelli that were condemned for hair brain'd Hereticks as the long Parliament did to the Orthodox Bishops saith that these three dayes and a half do signifie those three years and a half that the said Boniface lived after his Jubilee as Bergomensis recordeth But I conceive rather that these three dayes and a half are not simply and properly to be taken strictly for the set and determinate time of 3 years and a half but for some certain short space or time thereabouts that for some reasons I shall shew hereafter the spirit of God is pleased to express by these three dayes and a half during all which time thus expressed the dead witnesses that are in some part actually killed and in the rest spiritually and civilly slain by the beast shall after the beast hath triumphed over them remain in the sight of the World in the streets that is in the common Roads and open places of every Town City and Village rejected despised and scorned for so 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the street of the great City signifieth as Mr. Mede proveth at large And being thus despised and scorned in every place the wicked limbs of the beast and the adherents to the Antichrist shall not suffer their carkasses to be put in graves that is they will strip them of all honour they will deprive them of all their just Titles and they will denie them all civill respects and esteem them no better then as the Apostle saith 1 Cor. 4.17 Vergilius Aeneidos lib. 6. Plutarchus in vita Nic●ae p. 544. Quintus Curtius l. 5. the very filth and off-scouring of the Earth for this is the meaning and to be understood by the laying of them in their graves which the very Heathens reckon'd the last and not the least honour and respect that we owe and should shew unto our worthy friends and deceased Heroes as Virgil sheweth by the interring of Palinurus to whom he saith Et statuent tumulum tumulo solennia mittent And Plutarch sheweth that the same due respect ought to be observed as an honour that we owe unto all our worthy Heroes friends and benefactors And so Quintus Curtius saith that when Alexander lost so many men in the straights of Pila-Susida he would not depart thence and leave his slain Souldiers unburied Vide Tobit 1.17 18 19. and c. 2. 4. 7. untill they were interred because saith Curtius among all other Ceremonies observed in the Discipline of their Warres there was none more religiously kept then the burying of their dead and you may remember what great account Tobit made of this honour that is due unto the dead bodies of men and therefore especially of worthy men such as these witnesses of Christ were And whether the godly and Christian King the defender of the true Christian faith while he lived was according to the letter of the Text suffered to be put in his grave after the Christian form prescribed by the Church of Ingland or rather thrown like into a pit Mr Fuller in the Hist of the Church of the buriall of King Charles without the due honour that we owed him let the worthy Authour of the History of the Church of Ingland be consulted with I am sure the goodness vertue and piety of this gracious King and glorious Martyr deserved at the hands of his friends and subjects a far more glorious Tombe honour and solemnities of buriall then what Artemisia did for Mausolus or what was done for Alexander or any other Emperour or King whatsoever I will not except Constantine nor Theodosius who though they were most pious men yet did they not sacrifice their lives and suffer all their blood to be spilt rather then they would suffer Gods service to be any wayes defiled or his Servants to be destroyed as this glorious Martyr did therefore I wish he should And whether the Reverend Bishops the worthy Deanes the learned Doctors and abundance more of the faithfull witnesses of Jesus Christ do not thus lie neglected without honour without respect nay despised and scorned without meanes and without maintenance in the great Cities and in the little Villages Towns and Countrey throughout all Ingland Scotland and Ireland let those that see them be the Judges And let my Reader consider I beseech him if that learned and pious man Mr. Mede seemeth not to intimate that these two Witnesses of Christ shall be killed and rise againe in the reformed Churches for he saith who knoweth not Mr. Mede pag. 22. whether or no the reformed Churches shall not be deservedly punished for the reproach offered to Christ in this behalf by taking away the Witnesses for a time because they reverenced them not according to the dignity of their Embassage while they injoyed them for it is too well known A true conselsion of Mr. Mede what offence the reformed Churches have committed in this behalf that while the Prophets of Christ mightily bestirred themselves in reforming the Temple of God others in the meane while disgracing that most sacred work and especially the Workmen by pillaging the I reasure and interverting the oblations thereof not leaving in some places so much as foode to the great disgrace of the true Religion whereby the Ministers thereof That the Antichrist shall arise in the reformed Church and why might be ho nestly according to the dignity of their Calling sustained much less that any thing should abound which they might set aside for the enlarging of the Reformation the necessity of the Holy War the relief of the Afflicted Brethren and other pious uses and was not the prevarication of this kind for which the Jewish Temple that was the Type of the true Christian Church was given to Antiochus Epiphanes that was the Type of the great Antichrist to be prophaned and the true Religion of the true God to be troden down for the space of three years and a half for an Army saith Daniel shall be given to him against the daily Sacrifice Dan. 8.12 by reason of transgression and it shall cast down the truth to the ground and it shall do

far greater then the troubles of many of them that were within the Walls of Hierusalem And therefore their being in Pella could not fignifie the earths opening of her mouth to swallow up the flood of their afflictions which no doubt but they endured in full measure Reason 4 4. In that Pella being but a little Village it is not likely that it could containe so many of the Jews or that so many should go out of Hierusalem unto it as should move the Holy Ghost to express them here under the notion of this Woman that was persecuted by the Dragon when as these were not the men against whom Titus waged his War being so few and so contemptible and no wayes opposing him Reason 5 5. In that this persecution of the Woman and her flight into the Wilderness is after the Warre in Heaven and after the Dragon was throwen into the earth as the Text makes it plain v. 13. 14. but these Jewes being in Pella was long before this warre and therefore they cannot be meant by this woman Reason 6 6. In that according to the old rule non est distinguendum ubi non distinguit lex we may not chop and change times places and persons where Scriptures change them not to fit our own purposes and to make good our own best liked Interpretations which is but as the Poet saith to stagger Nunc huc nunc illuc exemplo nubis aquosae Much like a waterish Cloud which sometimes hither is driven with the wind How men should fairly proceed in their interpretations without wresting of any Text. and sometimes thither or as another saith Praxitiles like to make beguiled mindes to bow down to the painted strumpet either of these high conceits of the great Scholars or of the brain-sick fancies of the weaker wits but we ought fairly to proceed according to the most genuine sence of the place that we enterpret and such as crosseth no other truth nor carrieth any absurdity or impossibility with it And who seeth not prima facie at the first sight and reading of this 12th Chapter how the Holy Ghost proceedeth therein to set forth the dangers troubles and persecutions of this woman that signifieth the Christian Church from the time that she became cloathed with the Sun and the beginning of her pain in travell unto the end of her persecutions as how she should flie into the Wilderness how long she should be nourished and fed in that place what Warres she should undergo in that time and after the ending of that Warre and the stepping out of her place how she should be therefore punished and persecuted and for what time she should be distressed in that persecution and how she should be helped and relieved out of the hands and power of her enemies which are all successively in a continued Series and a just order set down by the spirit of God of the same woman that was the Christian Church in this 12th Chapter of the Revelation And as not all this by Junius his concession so indeed not any part of this can be referred to the believing Jewes in Pella as understood by this woman v. 14. but to the Christian Church converted and collected both out of the Jewes and Gentiles especially considered after the time of Theodosins as I have shewed to you before And this last persecution of this woman can be no otherwise understood Why this last persecution of the woman is to be referred to these our times as I conceive then of the sufferings of the reformed Protestant Churches and servants of Christ in these our times wherein we live because they fall out just at the end of 1200 and 60 years wherein the two witnesses after that the woman was cloathed with the Sun should prophesie and the woman should be fed by the witnesses before they should be slain and before the beginning of this her great persecution and flood of all miseries that the Dragon by the service of the Antichrist should raise against her and throw after her And I say that although Arethas Rupertus and Barradius do with Junius understand this woman to signifie the Jewish Synagogue and Alcazar takes it for the primitive Church of the Christians to whom I do assent she may be taken for that Church at that time when the Dragon began to watch her that he might devoure her Child yet St. Ambrose Ticonius and Primasius do with me understand this woman here flying to avoid the Dragons flood to signifie the true Christian Church in her last persecution sub finem mundi a little before the end of the world when Satan should be let loose after his 1000 years imprisonment and should then powre forth a flood and deluge of all crosses troubles and miseries upon the true Church and the faithfull servants of Jesus Christ the which I think he hath now within these late years done to the uttermost Reason 7 7. And lastly in that these times of the womans being fed and nourished in the Wilderness for 1200 and 60 years wherein the Hereticall war betwixt the Angels of Michael and the Angels of the Dragon was made and was not ended here in our Church until King Charles his dayes in whose time both the Brownists and Puritans were suppressed and the Jesuite Fisher the great Golias of the Papists That the times here spoken of cannot cohere with the Jewes in Pella in these parts was quite vanquished and confuted by Bishop Laud and these times that are here expressed by time times and half a time which are the time of the Churches persecution after the 1200 and 60 years and the end of the hereticall warre cannot be referred to the believing Jewes in Pella but rather for the persecution of our Protestant Churches and the preservation of them from being ruined by the earths opening of her mouth to swallow up the flood of afflictions that the Dragon casteth after them because the Holy Ghost saith that after three dayes and a half which is the very same time though expressed in other termes with time times and half a time the spirit of life from God shall enter into the witnesses that is ministris verbi as Junius confesseth the Bishops and Preachers of Gods word or as E. H. more rightly thinketh the Magistrates and Ministers which formerly had been slain and they shall stand again upon their feet that is in their successors by a Monarchicall and Episcopall Government to shew that God will not suffer his Church and Servants to be alwayes nor long trodden underfoot and to want her lawfull Pastors and Governours but should have the witnesses of Christ within a short space restored unto her And we are confident that such a thing as this never happened to the believing Jewes in Pella nor to any other believing Church in the World that we know of that both the witnesses of God That we cannot remember where it happened that the chief Magi. strate and the

by opportunity of leisure and he that giveth his mind to the Law of the most high is occupied in the meditation thereof and will seek out the wisdom of all the ancient and be occupied in prophesies he will keep the sayings of the renowned men and where subtle parables are he will be there also he will seek out the secrets of grave sentences and be conversant in dark parables But how can he get wisdom that holdeth the plow and that glorieth in the goad that driveth oxen and is occupied in their labours and whose talk is of bullocks for he giveth his minde to make furrowes and is diligent to give the kine fodder so every carpenter and workmaster that laboureth night and day and they that cut and grave seales and are diligent to make great variety the smith also sitting by the anvill and confidering the iron work setteth his mind to finish it and watcheth to polish it perfectly and so the potter sitting at his work turneth the wheele about with his feete and fashioneth the clay with his arme and is diligent to make clean the furnace And all these and all others the like Tradsemen that trust to their hands shall not be sought for in Publick Counsell nor sit on the Judges Seat Ecclesiast 38. and 24. Vsque ad 34. fin cap. for they cannot understand the Sentence of judgement nor declare what is justice and therefore they shall not be found where parables are spoken saith the wise son of Syrach And if such lay men and tradesmen cannot understand justice and judgement in Civill matters nor find out the sayings aphorismes and parables of men how shall they be able to search out the deep things of God and to understand the Mysteries of the Holy Scriptures for 2. It is not an easie matter and of small labour and without learning 2. Because the Scaipture is full of obscurity and very hard to be understood to explaine the Scriptures to reconcile different Texts and seeming contradictions and to unfold the sence and mysticall meaning of the Holy Ghost as you may find by what the Apostles say in 1 Tim. 3.16 Heb. 5.11 and 2 Pet. 3.16 how difficult and hard a matter it is to expound the Great Mysteries of Godliness and how by reason of that difficulty the unlearned and unstable do wrest them to their own destruction for you may observe that although Christ taught the people in the plain yet he taught his Disciples in the Mount Luke 6.17 Matth. 5.1 Luke 5.3 4. and while the people stood on the shore he bids his Apostles to launch forth into the deepe to shew unto us that as Origen saith the Scripture consisteth of an outward barke which is soft and tender and may easily be plained and of an inward substance which is hard and tough and cannot so easily be squared or as S. Gregory saith that the Doctrine of Christ and the Mysteries of the Holy Scriptures are like the Ocean sea where a lamb may wade by the shore where the people stood and the Elephant may swimm in the deep where the Apostles launched forth to Teach us this Truth Many things in Scripture easie to be understood as the heads 1. To be done 2. To be believed that the meanest capacity the vulgar and lay people may understand out of the Scriptures what they should do as to fear God to Honour their Parents to obey the Magistrates not to kill not to commit adultery not to steal and the like and the chiefe necessary Heads of their Christian Faith as to believe in Jesus Christ that thorough him they shall have remission of their sins and Eternall life and that this truth is Sealed unto them by the blessed Sacraments of Baptisme and the Lords Supper and yet the strongest Head the greatest Wit and most exquisite Schollers may find there such depth as cannot easily be dived into but will soon swallow them up and like the Sun in his full strength dazle and confound their fight The reasons of the difficulty to explain and to understand the Scriptures 1. The diversity of Languages if they be not very carefull to go the right way and take great paines and earnestly pray to God for his helpe to understand the same And the reason of this difficulty to explain and to unfold the Scripture is manifold as 1. The diversity of Languages wherein the same was written and the great affinity of the Hebrew with the Syriac and the Chaldick tongue with the very many equivocall words of the Hebrew Language which made the Jewes themselves many times to mistake the meaning thereof as 1. When Christ said destroy this Temple John 2.19 Marck 14.58 and in three dayes I will raise it up they thought he spake it of the materiall Temple when he meant the Temple of his body and the same word signified both the one and the other 2. When he told his Disciples Matth. 19.24 Luke 19.25 it was easier for a Cammell to go thorough the eye of a needle then for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven and this was a proverbiall speech among the Jewes when they spoke of any hard and unlikely thing to be done it was easier for a Cammell to go thorough the eye of a needle as Caninius observeth out of their Talmud and yet most men and many good interpreters and of no small learning have understood the word of that great and large fiz'd foure-footed beast called a Cammell whereas the word indeed quo hic utitur paraphrastes funem anchoratum significat which the Paraphrast saith our Saviour used signifieth a Cable rope which being untwifted may easily pass thorough an needles eye and so may the rich man enter into the Kingdom of Heaven if he disperseth his wealth and give them to the poore though as our Saviour saith it is easier for us to untwist the Cable rope then to perswade the rich men to part with their goods and give them to the poore or to any pious uses 3. When he cried out Math. 27.46 Eloe Eloe Lamasabacthany the Jewes said he calleth for Elias when as the words fignified My God My God why hast thou forsaken me 4. When John 20.16 after the resurrection of Christ Mary turned her selfe towards him and said Rabboli which is Master Tremelius saith that in this word either the letter Lamed is put for Nun and so Rabboli for Rabboni or else it is a composition of the Noune with the Pronoune and Rabboli is put for rabbonli and it is not properly any Hebrew word but a Chaldaic and Syriac and it is said to be an Hebrew word quia tunc temporis Syriaca lingua hebraeis esset vulgaris because that the Syriac Tongue was then common amongst the Jewes when they had lost the use of their own Tongue in their Captivity and had learned in that space of seventy yeares the Idiomes and the phrases of the Conquerors and the

Downam and many others that follow them doe imagine because not any one of all the Popes can be justly proved to be the Antichrist but many arguments may be produced which I have touched in this treatise to prove that neither of these can be this beast here spoken of and much less can I assent to the fancies of these men that dream of the reduction of the long lost tribes to their ancient possessions and least of all of the opinion of Mr. Mede and some others far less learned and indeed far absurder then he that speake of a 1000 years reigning of the Saints with Christ here in an earthly Paradise after the destruction of the Antichrist and the conversion of the Jews which unprobable paradoxes are most gravely and truely demonstrated so to be by the reverend Author of the Revelation unrevealed but I say as I shewed to you before that this beast the Antichrist must be taken for a collected multitude and an ungodly pack or knot of the worst and most wicked men that cold live which doe covenant and unite themselves like the Jewish Sanhedrim to slay the two witnesses of Iesus Christ and so to accomplish and to fulfill all the rest of the predictions that are set down in Scriptures concerning the Antichrist And for the continuance of that unchristians Antichristian companie I conceive it must be considered in a two fold notion 1. Of their prevalencie and domineering successful time The continuance of the beast to be considered 2 speciall wayes 1. The prevalent time of the beast 2. Of their industry and endeavours stil to rule and domineer 1. For the prevalent time of the beast I am cleer of the Papists and Fathers mind that say the Antichrist shall domineer in his full strength and power to the terror of the true saints but three years and a halfe or some short space expressed by that time of three years and a halfe or three years and halfe three years that make four years and a halfe or much about that length of time though not precisely such a time to a day for as when the scripture saith that Adam when he was an hundred and thirty years old Gen. 53. 5. Casman Cos●●piae cap. 5. pag. 269. begat Seth and died when he was nine hundred and thirtie year old shall we think it necessary to beleeve that he begat Seth on that verie day wherein he did precisely fulfill the hundred and thirtie years or that he died on the last day of the nine hundred and thirtie years complete So it is not requisite that by these three years and a halfe we should understand that exact quantity of time without more or less but a short space much about those years and no such length of time as Balaeus Brightman Downam The prevalent time of the beast much about three years and a halfe and the rest of their followers doe attribute unto the Antichrist because the holy Ghost saith the ten hornes of the beast that is his chief generals and captaines shall receive power with the beast 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 one bour c. 17.12 that is as the same spirit expoundeth it of the predecessor of this beast in the same 17. c. v. 10. a short space saying that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 he must continue a short space and that space of the beast his continuance is more cleerly and precisely explained c. 13.5 to be 42 months which must be taken as Bellarmine and the Fathers before him tooke them for three years and a halfe and as many other Protestant writers doe now gramatically expound them for that time or some small quantity of time much about that space more or less as I said before for otherwise if you take everie day of thee 42 months for a year to make them to synchronize with the 1200 and 60 dayes that the witnesses should prophesie in sack cloth as Mr. Mede doth and as Iunius doth and before them the Magdeburgenses did and as the scriptures doe set a day for a year in many places as in the words of Ezechiel I have set thee a day for a year and the words of Christ Mr. Mede in Clavi apoc Jun. in loc Magdcbur cent 1. l. 2 c. 4. Ezech. 14. Luke 13.33 I must walk to day and to morrow and the day following that is three yeers as it is generally expounded by most interpreters and the 40 dayes wherein the explorators and searchers of the Land of Canaan were searching the same signified that for their false report they should bear their punishment 40 years and Ionas his 40 dayes respite for Ninive before it should be destroied was extended as the Lord meant thereby to 40 years and the 70 weeks of Da●●el are by all interpreters taken for so many years as there be dayes in those weeks if I say you take it so here then these 42 months cannot agree with one hour nor with a short space wherein this beasi and his hornes shall prevail when as thus taking a day for a year the 42 months doe amount to 1260. years which is no short space nor can any wayes signifie 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 one hour which is the time of the beast Neither can I altogether assent to Bullinger and Chytrans that say Bulling and Chytrans in a poc c. 13. this certain number of months is absolutely put for an uncertain time though we find a certain number often time put down for an uncertain number yet this is never used as Divines observe but when some full and perfect number is put down as 10 100 1000 and the like as where Iacob said unto Laban thou hast changed my wages ten times that is severall times Genes 37.7 Eccles 6.3 Dan. 5.1 and when Solomon saith if a man beget a bundred children that is verie many children and where Daniel saith Belshazzar made a feast to a thousand of his Lords that is a great many Lords and so many Interpreters do take the binding of Satan for a 1000 years to signifie a long time euen from the determination and ending of the ten primitive persecutions to the comming of this beast or as some thinke from Christ his time to the time of the Antichrist and so they take the 1000 years raigning of the Saints with Christ to signifie all that indefinite time of Satans binding and so likewise our Saviour saying to St. Peter that he must forgive his brother not till seven times Math. 18.22 but seventy times seven times signifieth that he must forgive him as often as he doth offend him but though Aug. de civitate Dei l. 20. in these and the like places a certain number is put for an uncertain Yet is it never so used and taken where several numbers of few and many are assigned and coupled together as time times and halfe a time and here 42 months and three dayes and a halfe as both Bellar. and St. Angust doe observe

which was thought so invincible that no humane power could dissolve them yet as you have seen the breath of their own generall without one blow given without one drop of blood spilt did blow away that indissoluble conceived Parliament whose members now are metamorphosed from cruell Tygers to most timorous Hares that flye away from the noyse of the hunters And thus as the Psalmist saith like as the smoak perisheth so did the Lord drive away that cruell companie and herein the Lord our God did a work to his poor servants worthy of everlasting thanks and praise for remembring us when we were in troubles delivering us out of our distresses and therefore I may well say with the Psalmist O that men would therefore praise the Lord for his goodness shew the wonders that he doth for the children of men specially for this favour to dissipate scatter so many hundred tyrants that would have intailed the masterie both of Church kingdoms upon them selves and their successors for ever to perpetuate the slaverie of these nations far worse then the Athenians under the thirtie tyrants Justin l. 5. versus finem 2. The final and totall destruction of the Antichrist when to be 2. Though we acknowledge a three-fold advent or coming of Christ The 1. In humilitie when the word was made flesh The 2. In power when by his Spirit he doth powerfully regenerate his elect and protecteth them from all their enemies and destroyeth their ungodly adversaries and his despisers at his pleasure And The 3. In glorie and Majestie when he commeth to judge both the quick and the dead But for The 4. Comming that the Chiliasts or Millenaries dream of to overthrow the Antichrist in his owne person and after that to convert the Jews and then to reign a 1000 years with his Saints here on earth it is such a fiction as is not worthie to be thought on and brings so many erronious consequents with it as are not fit to be imbraced by any Christian and though some learned Divines do hold and understand the destruction of the Antichrist to be by the second comming of Christ that is his powerful comming by his spirit which shall utterly destroy this beast and leave not one Limb of him to remain and that not by the faithfull preaching of the Gospel which the Antichrist shall put down and instead thereof raise flattering and false Prophets and Parasites to countenance him in his impieties but by some powerfull strength that Christ by his Spirit shal work in the hearts of his servants beyond our capacities to conceive how as Moses saith One man should chase a thousand and two put ten thousand to flight that shall rise against the Antichrist to overthrow him yet wee finde two words in this expression of the Apostle which assure me that his utter destruction cannot be referred to any other coming of Christ That the utter ruine and totall destruction of the beast is not to be till the day of the last judgment then to his third and glorious comming to the last judgement For 1. The Apostle saith 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 whom the Lord will destroy and the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 signifieth to abolish to make to cease to be and inanem reddere and to render him void the word being compounded of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 ocior to be at rest and is a word seldome found in classick Authors Two words proving the same but often in the writings of S. Paul as Rom. 7.6 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 but now soluti sumus we are loosened or as the Syriac hath it aboliti sumus wee are abolished from the law and in Gal. 5.4 he saith 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 exclusi estis separati à Christo you are made void and separate from Christ whosoever are justified by the law saith Beza and in 1. Cor. 15.26 he saith 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the last enemie qui abolebitur saith Tremellius or qui aboletur saith Beza which shall be abolished and quite taken away that it be no more is death so here the Apostle by this word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 meaneth that the Lord at his appearance wil exclude separate abolish and quite take from himselfe and from his chosen saints and servants this wicked Antichrist and all his ungodly adherents that they be no more And this seperation of the goats from the sheep and of the tares and darnel from the Wheat is not made untill Christ shall set the Goats on his left hand and shall say unto them Depart from me ye cursed into everlasting fire because the tares shall not be weeded and rooted up nor the wicked be made to cease to be but shall remain as the Canaanites among the Israelites and as the hereticks Why the limbs of Antichrist shall be still suffered to remain among the faithful that being once sprung were never quite rooted out of the Church but their proselytes remained more or less in one place or other continually to be as thorns in the sides of Gods children to exercise their patience and to make them more watchfull over themselves and their own wayes while they walk and wander among such briars so shall the members of the Antichrist remaine amongst us and the final and total destruction and abolition of the beast and the quite taking away of all his Limbs head and feet root and branch that is the utter ruine of the Antichrist and all his followers and adherents cannot be understood to come to passe untill Christ shall come at the last day to make an end of them and to evacuate and bring to nothing both them and their devices plots and successes and to render vengeance unto them according to their just deferts 2. The other words that shew the Antichrist shall not be quite abolished 2. The other word is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and destroyed till the coming of Christ to judgement are that the Lord shall destroy him that is quite take him away 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 with the brightness of his coming saith our translation revelatione adventus sui by the revelation of his Coming saith Tremellius or illustri adventu suo saith Beza by his illustrious or glorious coming and this coming of Christ thus exprest can be no otherwise understood than of the last coming to judgement for though each and every of the three comings of Christ be illustrious and glorious in some respects yet the proper titles and the usuall Epithets of each coming are that his first coming The coming of Christ to judgment is properly called his glorious coming Math. 16. is called his humble coming or his coming in humilitie his second coming is stiled his gracious coming or his coming by his spirit to offer his grace unto us all and his third comming is termed his glorious coming when he cometh in the glorie of