inauspiciously to make cunning Traficking properly Whoredom Let him produce any Lexicographer that will tell us that Traficking signifies Whoring in any approved Authour sacred or profane and a farther answer shall be framed In the mean time to one that will say any thing it is fit to answer nothing Cunning Traficking may be akin to thieving but how it is to simple Whoring I see not Secondly The seventy years Tyre is forgotten and lyes in Ruines cannot be understood of the seventy years of the Babylonish Kingdom For then Tyre should be taken in the beginning of Nebuchadnezzar's reign whenas it was not taken by him till the 4136 year of the Iulian Period which is about 30 years from the beginning of the Babylonian Kingdom as you may see in Petavius his De Doctrina Temporum Thirdly What a vain conceit it is to make the Christian Caesars part of the sixth Head of the Beast I have shewn upon his foregoing Remarks To make them part of the sixth Head is to make them Idolatrous which is a perfect contradiction to the Vision which makes eight Kings but onely seven Heads of the Beast and all of them Idolatrous Wherefore one of these eight Kings must not be Idolatrous which were the Primitive Christian Caesars who were the seventh King of the eight Fourthly Rome was Idolatrous before it was Christian and turned Idolatrous again when it became Paganochristian and Whoredom is the true Symbol of Idolatry known to all wherefore the Harlot though she was silent awhile in the time of the pure Christian Caesars which were the seventh King yet when that time expired she might sing again like a Harlot Nor does this at all hinder but that this Vision is Typical of Rome-Antichristian this stroke setting out more exquisitely the Paganochristianism of their Idolatry that they Paganize again and again play the Harlot by a new Mode of Idolatry which yet is the lively Image of the Idolatry of old Paganism Fifthly As for Pharaoh his being threatened with the death of the uncircumcised we being taught out of the Apocalypse that by Aegypt is understood the Pontifician Hierarchy he must be of a slow sense that does not discern that Prophecy of Ezekiel chap. 32. v. 19. to concern the Papal Hierarchy which pretending to be Holy Church in a special manner and that this Papal Polity is that Kingdom of Christ that shall abide for ever which is the privilege onely of the Millennial Empire of Christ the Prophet upbraids that confidence to this Roman Pharaoh as if he were more holy and pure than other worldly Potentates and therefore says expresly Whom dost thou pass in Beauty Go down and be thou laid with the uncircumcised Thou shalt perish as well as other Heathen or Pagan Polities If there were not some such weighty sense as this under it it is incredible that Pharaoh's lying down in Death with the uncircumcised should be so often repeated in this Prophecy He is reckoned amongst that long list of uncircumcised Potentates whose Empires failed and so must his though he thinks himself in such a special manner a circumcised one and to be that Christian Kingdom which shall never fail Sixthly That the Prince of Tyre is described as adorned with the High Priest's Vestments is evident from hence in that of all the nine pretious stones which are named there is not one of them but what is in the High Priest's Breast-plate but to have named all twelve had been too bare for the nature of a Prophecy of this kind and too sorry a conceit it would be to fansie the Breast-plate without the other cloathing And his naming a little after the anointed Cherub shews that the Prophet's fancy was carried into the Temple into the Sanctum Sanctorum and to the High Priest who alone had power to enter thereinto Seventhly And as to his being said to be in Eden the Garden of God that ill sutes with the City of Tyre built on a hard steril Rock whenas Italy the seat of the Sacerdotal Prince chiefly aimed at is by Geographers and Historians acknowledged to be the very Paradise of Europe Nor does the Remarker mend himself by making the Prince of Tyre the tallest Cedar in the garden of God by referring to Ezek. 31. For that example of the King of Assyria is brought in onely to set out the high Sovereignty and Magnificency of Pharaoh who is a Type of Antichrist that exalteth himself above all that is called God or is worshipped It is a Parable taken up against him And therefore v. 18. it is said Thou shalt lye in the midst of the uncircumcised for all thy pretended Holiness with them that be slain with the sword This is Pharaoh and all his multitude saith the Lord God The whole Parable of the King of Assyria is understood of Pharaoh and consequently of the Papal Hierarchy and it does lively set out the business but it would take up too much room to give an account of it here Eighthly There must be a strange thick callosity on the perceptive faculty of that man that can discern no more by those expressions The anointed Cherub The Holy Mountain of God The walking up and down in the midst of the stones of fire viz. cloathed with the Vestments of Aaron as was above noted than the signification of forsooth an Angelical state as if the Angels in Heaven were anointed Cherubs whenas it plainly refers to the Cherubim in the Sanctum Sanctorum which were anointed and consecrated of an high and mighty Merchant with a company of his cunning Traders and Trafickers if not blew-apron men grown rich and wealthy by their worldly craft and subtilty nothing less than the most holy things in the Temple of God must set out the greasie glory of these fat Burgomasters and their worldly splendour and prosperity arising from their over-reaching arts in Trafick and the thence issuing sordid gain What a homely course conceit is this Ninthly As for the name Sanctuary being applied to Moab the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which is in both places is of a general signification and signifies any consecrated place whether it be to the God of Israel the true God or otherwise But that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 here respects the true God and alludes to the Sanctuary of the God of Israel and therefore denotes some high and mighty Priest principally not a worldly though princely Merchant the anointed Cherub the holy Mountain of God and the Vestments of Aaron a little before mentioned do naturally indicate and that the fancy of the Prophet had not withdrawn it self from the Temple at Ierusalem The allusion to whose most holy things to conceive to be merely to set out the worldly prosperity of a City of subtile cheating Merchants as also to conceive that the comparing of the Wisedom of the Prince of Tyre with that of Daniel and making the Tyrian Prince prefer his own before it doth denote onely his cunning in Trading and not some
ruling them by the Divine Influence of his Spirit whereby he has the perfect and absolute command over them This Symbolical Idea of the glory of the God of Israel Moses saw in the Mount and ordered things according to this pattern in the Mount as he was directed of which the Cherubims on the Ark of the Covenant is part as also the pitching of the Tents of the Israelites about the Tabernacle in four parts with the Standards bearing the names of these four living Creatures in their Camp These were an external Imitation of the Symbolical Idea of the Angelical Kingdom of the God of Israel but their Dispensation reached not to the Life and Reality thereof but they bore it onely in the outward Image But this standing Symbolical Idea is that Seal which the Divine Providence intends so thoroughly to impress on his Church at last in way of Life and Perfection that the God of Israel by the Influence of his Spirit will so actuate his Church that his Will will be done on Earth as it is in Heaven or in the Angelical World by his holy Angels To which purpose this Vision is again exhibited to Iohn in the Apocalypse as a Representation of the blessed state of the Millennium when the State of the Church will answer this Symbolical Idea in the truth of Life or plenteous Dispensation of the Spirit Here therefore is the Remarker's mistake that he fansies that the standing Symbolical Idea of the Angelical World where there is no Death nor Succession cannot set out the State of the Church on Earth where there is Death and Succession Which methinks is as awkardly argued as if one should imagine that St. Michael the Archangel being the Seal of some Corporation and intended for the signing of successive Leases of that Corporation the Seal should be argued successive and not to be the same standing Individual Seal because the Wax and Leases it seals are not so and consequently that the Seal cannot be the Image of St. Michael the Archangel because he is one standing Person and not in Succession Wherefore it is plain that the standing Symbolical Idea of the Angelical Kingdom which is unsuccessive may notifie the Millennial Kingdom of Christ on Earth which is successive and the said Kingdom be examined by it how near it is to the Pattern as the Seals of Leases how near they are to the standing Original Seal of the abovesaid Corporation To the second I say Those four living Creatures having the likeness of a man and the hand of a man under each wing does not prove these Angels to be men but rather proves that the Remarker is mistaken in the nature of Angels as if they had either no form which is impossible they being finite Creatures or a round form as if they were so many Aereal or Aethereal Foot-balls or contracted Hedg-hogs But if they have distinct Animal Forms what can it be but humane all conceived imperfections being removed therefrom and nothing taken in but what will well consist with Heavenly Beauty and Glory Wherefore let their Figure for the main be humane and other variations in them onely Symbolical Appendages it does not follow from thence that they are not the standing Symbolical Idea of the Angelical Kingdom but rather that the Angels are naturally in humane shape For that this Vision signifies Angels is plain in that they are called Cherubims But if one will be here resty and perverse there will be no room left for any Cavils if we answer that the faces of a man and the hands of a man signifie no otherwise than the faces of a Lion Oxe and Eagle or the feet of a Calf they all signifying onely symbolically Which Answer will weaken also the third Reason For the feet of a Calf need signifie nothing but what is competible to the Angelical nature as the face of an Oxe or Calf does no other it may signifie robustious indefatigable strength And 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which signifies God or an Angel has its Notation from strength and is ordinarily translated 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by the Seventy And to give a reason why all the four Beasts have Calves feet is obvious enough because that which supports ought to be strong But there are farther Cabbalistical Mysteries touching that point which is needless here to enter upon It is sufficient that we have hitherto proved that the three first Reasons have no force to evince that these living Creatures and Wheels are not Angelical And for the last Reason it is the slightest of all as if Angels which are Spirits were not to be actuated by the Spirit of God as well as the Souls of men are Whenas by virtue of the Divine Spirit they escape the being turned into Devils And indeed the many Reins whereby the God of Israel rules and governs the four Provinces of his Angelical Kingdom is the Influence of his Divine Spirit which unites with their spirits and they with it whereby he drives them whither he pleases For his Spirit is as sure to be effectually in their pure Essence as the Rays of the Sun in the clear Air. Wherefore there being such solid proofs that the living Creatures in Ezekiel's Vision are Angelical and none but invalid Arguments against it it is an argument that the Remarker has much mistaken himself in thinking it was so safe to conclude the contrary The rest of the Remark is a Digression into an Ethical or Ethico-political explication of the Vision of Ezekiel which though it were true and unexceptionable the Expositor is not concerned to meddle with as not at all enervating the Philosophical account of that Vision he admitting both a Philosophical and Moral Cabbala touching both the Bereshith and Mercavah too But that the Remarker's pains may not seem to be over much slighted I will consider some passages in it First then He makes the four faces the four wings and the four Beasts to signifie but one and the same thing which is a marvellous slubbering and hudling things together which surely have more distinct meanings Certainly it must be some great and abstruse Mystery that is thus repeatedly both by the Faces Wings and whole bodies of the four Beasts and living Creatures and thus pompously set out And yet it is onely this That there are these four Properties in Humane Nature Reason Religion Courage and Industry Which lying so bare and obvious to every understanding what is this but the making the Spirit of Prophecy to trifle in setting out so pompously such a trivial Theory that no man is ignorant of nay I may say and that so maimedly and unfitly For the Elephant certainly had been a more fit Animal to represent Religion than the Eagle so that there is a fitting Animal wanting to denote the property of Religion in Humane nature And for as much as Brutes have Reason and Man alone properly Religion Man had been a better Symbol of Religion than an Eagle But then
and so thoroughly enlightening them with the Judgments of his Truth that they shall not need the light of the Sun or Moon viz. of those humane Laws and Policies c. So that Time shall be no more and the Mystery of God shall be finished does here answer to that great voice from the Throne at the pouring forth of the seventh Vial viz. It is done And to the same voice from him that sate on the Throne ch 21. who also there says Behold I make all things new viz. The Mystery of God being finished by the former things passing away a new state of things is to be introduced as is there after described Ans. At the expiration of the sixth Trumpet it is not improper to give notice that there will be no more time than what is contained in the seventh because the seventh is both contiguous to the sixth and reacheth to the end of the world as was noted above But that Time signifies Political Order and Government is a private precarious Notion of the Remarker without any ground or example in Scripture or the Onirocriticks And for his reason for which he imagines it signifies so it is over-lax Time indeed is divisible into Ages Ages into Years Years into Months Months into Days c. But what greater matter of order in this than in the dividing and subdividing of any other quantity Or if there be how does this Typifie Political Orders and Laws more than in Husbandry Mechanicks c. So that it signifying all things under the Sun done in any order or method as well as Political Laws and Government when this Time here spoken of shall be no more we may all put up our Pipes Tradesmen Husbandmen Students in whatever Arts and Faculties and fall asleep with our fingers in our mouths unless a spirit waken us that will drive us to act without order or government which yet can be no Apostolick Spirit because the Apostle's Precept is 1 Cor. 14.40 Let all things be done decently and in order How much better were it Sapere ad sobrietatem than to entertain such high-slown conceits as these In these best times undoubtedly there will be humane Laws and Polities that is Laws and Polities constituted by men but perfectly conformable and complyable with the Laws of God and dictates of his Holy Spirit and his guidance will assist in making them To fansie an Aziluthick State on Earth whenas a Briathick Constitution is consistent with the State of Heaven is a too too extravagant surmise As for It is done and All things are made New Here would be rather undoing than doing and nothing would be made new No new Heaven nor new Earth which certainly has a Political sense if there were no Polity in this renewed state And the Polity will be constituted by men though by the guidance of the Holy Spirit which will invigorate also both Governours and People to support the said Laws and to live according thereunto Vers. 7. The saving here is a great straining of the Text to uphold a crazy Notion For whereas it is said in the Notes on the Verse That the sense is exceeding imperfect unless 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 be put for 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 saving or except the common sense given of it is very clear and this new imposed sense so exceeding imperfect as to be really false And the several places cited to prove that it may be taken in this sense is no proof that it is taken so here Nor do those Citations prove that it is so taken in them For the Particle 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or But will signifie the same with saving or except c. Ans. The Remarker here is very Magisterial and somewhat Scoptical But the Expositor is crazy neither in his notion nor the proof of it For no man that understands Greek but must acknowledge that our English Translation is out in rendring those words 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 thus When he shall begin to sound the Mystery of God should be finished For it leaves out the Particle 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and yet makes but imperfect sense rendring 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 should be finished whenas to make the sense perfect it should be rendred shall be finished but that would ill agree with 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 But in the days of the voice of the seventh Angel when he shall begin to sound the Mystery of God shall be finished That is the sense our English Translation aims at but then it should not be 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as it is but 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And yet so 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 being left out which yet is intollerable 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 will be rendred unsutably to the words following 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 ut Evangelizavit as he told the joyfull news to his servants the Prophets Wherefore this Mystery of God containing that joyfull news it is very hard to conceive it not to contain the new Ierusalem and the Millennial reign of Christ. Which Mystery is not finished at the beginning of the sounding of the seventh Trumpet but rather at the end thereof But now render but 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 saving as it certainly does signifie sometimes and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 shall sound as it naturally signifies and all will run as glib as can be according to the most approved copies of the New Testament set out by Isaac Casaubon and Dr. Winterton which is the Cambridge Greek New Testament thus That there shall be time no more saving in the days of the voice of the seventh Angel when he shall sound and the Mystery of God be finished Which shews that the sounding of the seventh Trumpet will reach to the end of the World But now according to these Authentick Greek Copies if you render 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 But not Saving or Except The sentence will not be sense thus That there shall be time no more But in the days of the seventh Angel when he shall sound or begin to sound and the Mystery of God be perfected What then what of all that one may well say This plainly is not perfect sense to any one that understands sense unless you take away the Colon and take but in the same sense that except has which is all that I contend for Wherefore it being so plain that the sentence is imperfect sense unless you understand 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and But to signifie the same that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and Except if 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 does sometimes signifie so it plainly follows it signifies so here This is more than enough to this Remark I will onely here note which I intimated above on v. 3. That this Oath of the mighty Angel That there shall be time no more saving in the days of the voice of the seventh Angel plainly imports that the sounding of the seventh Trumpet reaches to the end of the World or of the Scene
before the Vials has a very fit and fresh Object the fall of Babylon and the Rising of the Witnesses and worth the praising and glorifying God for his Judgments therein and it is said in the Song All Nations shall come and worship before thee for thy judgments are made manifest Again The fall of Babylon and the Rising of the Witnesses cannot but imply a victory over the Beast and there is in this Song mention of those that had got the victory over the Beast and over his Image c. Thirdly The fall of Babylon is really the fall of Aegypt the Pontifician Power being denoted by both and therefore the Rising of the Witnesses implies a deliverance from the yoke and bondage of that Aegyptian Pharaoh and his overthrow in the Red Sea And those that sing this Song are said to stand 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that is on the shoar of that Sea that was converted into Glass or Ice Exod. 15.8 while the Israelites passed over and to sing the Song of Moses the servant of God c. Fourthly and lastly the Song is exquisitely framed to signifie a Thanksgiving for a victory and deliverance actually obtained and therefore if we cannot be certain that it is for such an actual deliverance and victory we can be certain of the sense of nothing This I hope is invincible evidence nor can any thing be more demonstrable and may deserve better language than what the rude Remarker gives viz. That nothing is here demonstrated but onely how the weakness of arguments is supplied with strength of confidence and imagination b And now for the fall of Babylon synchronizing with the Rising of the Witnesses there wants no new proof thereof here What has been said already on this Remark proves it over and over again And if any one will consult my Answer on S. E. his Remarks upon chap. 11. and chap. 14. it will be evident unto him that what he says there signifies nothing to the invalidating this present Position So that it is a groundless boast of S. E. to make any such Reference c And for the next clause of this Remark I say the Expositor does not make chap. 14.8 to signifie the same with chap. 11.13 For this latter contains onely the fall of the great City but the former the bringing the joyfull News of the fall of the great City or of Babylon which joyfull Annunciation supposes what happens chap. 11.13 and the Annunciation of it it self follows in order of time after that Accident as well as the Acclamations in Heaven or Doxology of the Elders d And now lastly for that boyish Clause of S. E. so grave a Divine as he may seem to be from his skill in the holy tongue whereby he is able to note that Sar in Sardis may as well signifie a Remnant as a Song though it be but a childish chiming piece of wit of his thus to allude to that old Proverb As the fool thinketh so the bell clinketh yet to give him his due he shews himself a man of no small judgment in the manner of his Application he omitting the mention of Fool and so closely reserving that Title to himself In which that he has done himself all imaginable Right I shall prove in that he has so fondly substituted 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which signifies Reliquiae for 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which signifies Canticum in the Aetymological account of the word Sardis For his reasoning here is wonderfull weak and sorry For First Though Sar in Sardis signifies as well a Remnant as a Song yet it signifying both and the latter sense complying so well with the joyfull Annunciation of the Angel with the Acclamations in Heaven and Doxology of the Elders and with the Song of Moses the servant of God and of the Lamb which all respect the commencement of the Sardian Church the Expositor had most solid and unexceptionable reason to make choice of that sense of Sar in Sardis that comported so manifestly with the Song of Moses and those other significations of Ioy upon the fall of Babylon and Rising of the Witnesses and the commencing of the Sardian Interval of the Church the late happy Reformation so many strings drawing and tyeing us to that determinate sense rather than any other Secondly Suppose Sar to signifie Remnant how will he rid himself of the latter part of the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Dis which signifies Ioy. So that this Remnant will be a Remnant of Ioy however or a joyfull Remnant Who therefore cannot but break forth into Doxologies Praises and Thanksgivings for so great a deliverance It would be a very sensless and mute Remnant if it were not so But being so there is a real agreement and harmony betwixt even this Etymon of Sardis and those Songs and Doxologies above mentioned But thirdly and lastly To make Sar in Sardis to signifie Reliquiae or a Remnant in reference to the emerging of the Sardian Church upon the Rising of the Witnesses and the fall of Babylon is an apert Repugnancy or gross Nonsense those Kingdoms and Principalities then gained by Christ out of the hands of Antichrist being the Primitiae of his Acquists by his Wars and Victories not the Reliquiae and a Pledge of greater Accessions to his Dominion to be made hereafter So that this sense of Sar which S. E. would have is utterly unapplicable to the Church of Sardis And therefore must as the Expositor would have it signifie Canticum not Reliquiae and Sardis 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a Song of Ioy or Ioy breaking out into Singing So that this Exception of S. E. is so very slight and sorry that the grave Divine seems to have been in some more freakish fit allured thereto merely that he might vent his boyish wit of thinking and clinking with which he seems as much tickled as a Squirrel with the Musick she makes in her Wire-Cage with Bells hanging over it Pag. 283. a Whereas it 's said here that as Mr. Mede has placed the Vials onely the seventh followeth the sixth Trumpet he hath placed all of them within the sixth Trumpet b For the Bohemian War on the suffering of Iohn Huss was many years after the taking of Constantinople by the Turks at which the sixth Trumpet must commence if not sooner c So that though onely the seventh Vial follows the expiring of the sixth Trumpet yet all of them follow the commencement of it d And whereas it s argued that all the seven Vials must be after the seventh Trumpet because they are called the seven last plagues e it 's a strange crippling the sense of the words to make them serve the end designed But as it 's said in Remarks they are most properly called the last plagues in respect of the precedent plagues of the Opened book viz. those signified by the Monitions of the two precedent Angels chap. 14. and the plagues the Witnesses smote the Earth with chap. 11. yet also with
predict the entire Event of the Medial-Visions to the accuracy of one Prophetick day nor yet month yet the Spirit of Prophecy has not herein trifled at all but that there are several considerable uses of this variation that no man for the want thereof may obstinately pretend that the other must needs be the use thereof whenas yet there is no necessity at all of that viz. that the 42 months or 1260 days should signifie the full extent of that time whenas that full sense is so easily abatable by a Prophetick Synecdoche or Numeral Diorism there being given also intimations thereto Having thus therefore dispatched the two first Queries we proceed to the third and last the Solution of which I shall transcribe out of the abovesaid Letter to a friend Which Solution is as follows First having fixt the Epocha of the beginning of the Church which I conceive is to be reckoned from the year in which our Saviour suffered ascended into Heaven and sent down the Holy Ghost to assist his Apostles which is the most indubitable and unexceptionable Epocha that can be pitched upon and must needs seem the least strained to serve any design in the next place we are to consider whether the Epocha of the threefold Prophecy of the Apocalypse that is to say The Prophecy of the seven Churches the Prophecy of the Sealed book and the Prophecy of the Opened book is not to be fixt in the self same year that the beginning of the Church is And that it is so to be fixt these few Reasons seem to infer First They are Prophecies all three of them of a large universal extent reaching from the time at least of their reception which was but a few years after the beginning of the Church especially in comparison of the time succeeding even till the day of Doom Wherefore in all likelihood they are a Transcript of the Divine Decree or Provision of the State of the Church such as God foresaw it would be in its general successions from the very beginning thereof to the end of the World that so the three Prophecies or Visionary Representations of the State of the Church may be complete and unmaimed Secondly It is acknowledged by such Interpreters that otherwise dissent from us that the Prophecy of the seven Churches begins from the very beginning of the Church why should not then the other two Prophecies do so too Thirdly The beginning of the Visions of the Sealed-book-prophecy and the Opened-book-prophecy are naturally applicable to that Epocha of the Church we have pitched upon viz. the year when our Saviour suffered ascended and sent down the Holy Ghost to assist his Apostles For what more natural and fit application can there be of the Rider of the white Horse with a Bow in his hand to whom a Crown is given than to Christ ascended and sending down the Holy Ghost to assist his followers to conquer the Roman Empire and subject it to the Sceptre of the Son of God that that might be fulfilled which was predicted by our Saviour Fear not little flock for it is your father's good pleasure to give you the Kingdom And this Rider came from the East Oriens nomen ejus See the Interpretation of the first Seal in the Exposition of the Apocalypse Wherefore this Vision does that right to our Saviour as to represent his glorious and miraculous assistence at the very beginning of his Church in the beginning of the Prophecy of the Sealed book Now for the two Initial Visions of the Opened book that comprized in the eleventh Chapter which begins with the measuring of the Inner Court it is manifest at the first sight how applicable that is to the Church from the year that Christ suffered till the Apostasie came in and the more Primitive the more applicable and therefore here is but justice done to that part of the succession of the Church which reaches from the first year of the Church of Christ to the Reception of these Visions that it be as well as the rest of the time before the Apostasie noted as Symmetral in this Visionary Representation And now for the Initial Vision comprized in the twelfth thirteenth and fourteenth Chapters the Throes of the Church begun in the Head thereof Christ on the Cross of whom it is truly said There was never sorrow like his sorrow These were the pangs so early begun for the bringing forth in his Church a man-child that should wear the Imperial Crown at last the Emperours becoming Christian. And so the fight of Michael with the red Dragon the Paganick Roman Power the battel was begun in Christ on the Cross crucified under the Roman Power by Pilate their Governour But this strategem of the Captain of our Salvation in suffering thus himself to be crucified was the spring and source of all his Conquests and Victories afterwards as is obvious to observe and therefore it were very unfit and unjust to have this left out of the Visionary Representation which yet it would be did not the Prophecy of the Opened book reach to the very first beginning of the Church and take in the year of Christ's Crucifixion And fourthly and lastly Whenas it is observable in Daniel chap. 7. in that Set of Visions that represents the four Monarchies by four Beasts viz. the Babylonian Persian Greek and Roman that notwithstanding those Visions are received in the first year of Belshazzar which is according to Thomas Lydiat about 50 years from the beginning of the Babylonian Monarchy yet merely that the Set of Visions might be complete the Babylonian Monarchy is represented from its very first Rise and Original though above two thirds of its duration was then past when Daniel received those Visions Wherefore the Spirit of Prophecy affecting as I may so speak this completeness in Sets of Visions though the Representation be of profane Kingdoms and we finding no cause of the Vision reaching into some part of time before its reception saving that Intent that the Visionary Representation of such Periods of time should be complete we may hence much more be assured that these Sets of Visions are so they so much concerning his Church and for whose completeness there were such weighty reasons as were even now alledged namely why they should reach into the very first year of the Church when Christ suffered ascended into Heaven and sent down the Holy Ghost and being the space of that time to the Reception of the Visions though they were received under Domitian bears nothing that proportion to the space of the Antemedial Visions or of the first six Seals that 50 years bear to 70 which is above the proportion of two to three but of the other the proportion is less than of one to six I say he must be a Sceptick even to stupidity that is not hence convinced that all these three Prophecies I have spoken of the Prophecy of the seven Churches the Sealed-book-prophecy and the Opened-book-prophecy