The great attendance of the Divine Spirit is to the Line of Time which it joyns to the Jewish Lines that went before and particularly to Ezekiels 430 Days or Years which just comprehended and ended with the Babylonish Monarchy which Monarchy in a real Calendar I have before more than once said began the Gentiles Times during which Jerusalem lay and was to lye under Foot but just here the Babylonish Monarchy is no farther given in Type although it remains in the former Types to the last but the Future Line of Time is given in 2300 Evenings Mornings from the Persian Monarchy beginning And this latter could not have been given with Prophetick Secrecy and yet also without Confusion if the former had not been omitted whose Time given before could not enter into this but it must confound Time every way But thus this principal Line reaches from Literal Babylon fallen to mystical Babylon fallen from Literal Jerusalem near to be rebuilt with its Temple to the New Jerusalem which much adorns this Line of Time and sets these two just even from Point to Point It is true The Four as Vniversal Monarchies are together the great Canale of Time till the glorious Kingdom of Christ whatever great States or Kingdoms were coexistent with them or any of them at any Time or have arisen since do not mingle with this Stream which runs strait on to this end nor are any of themselves adopted into it sooner than the just Time of their Succession into Vniversal Monarchy nor do they abide any longer in it as a Calendar of Time after once they are fallen from that Vniversal Monarchy each successive Monarchy subduing the precedent takes it up and in the Roman Monarchy the Dragon resigns his Seat and Power to the Beast the Imperial to the Antichristian without any Conquest to whom as the seventh Roman Head and Vniversal King the ten Kings giving their Power the fourth Beast still survives differently from all the rest of the Successions for each Succession was by Force besides this so in This the whole Line is continued to the Kingdom of Christ But if any of these Kingdoms falls in its order of Succession and becomes great afterwards on another Bottom as the Persian subdued by the Grecian the Grecian by the Roman the one afterwards rising in its own Name the other in Mahomet's yet they disturb not this order nor so much as enter a-new into this Calendar of Time And because of this real substantial Calendar of Time in these Monarchies the first Act of Christ's Kingdom is recorded by the Apostle Paul to be the putting down all Rule Authority 1 Cor. 15. â—6 and Power referring especially to these four Monarchies the great Emblem of such Rule and Power viz. when the Kingdoms of this World become the Kingdoms of the Lord and of his Christ Rev. 11. 15. Then all this Calendar of Rule and Power is at an end That therefore which is most considerable in the Explanation of this Course of Time farther to us is That whereas the Gentiles Times viz. this substantial Calendar of the four Monarchies began in the Babylonian so long as that Calendar is in presenting the Babylonian is never omitted but is the Capital in it but when it comes to this Numeral Line or the 2300 Ev. Mor. it is then omitted because the Numeral Line runs not upon any Revolutions of these Monarchies but upon some eminent Providence of God towards his Church either of Mercy towards it or its suffering under the Tyranny of some of these Monarchies especially the Bestian as will be seen all along which is a very clear Reason why the Babylonian is first so chief in the Calendar of the Monarchies for that being one and the first it must be so in the Real But when it comes to the Numeral it is of no use because it had been given in the last numeral Line as then existing it is not given in the following Numeral because it was then past and would disorder the Account The real Calendar is taken from each Vniversal Monarchy that had the Jews particularly the Tribe of Judah in Subjection and so oppress'd Christ's Kingdom here the Babylonian was the first the Persian the second the Grecian the third the fourth the Roman under which as Imperial first the Jews were desolated The manly Birth or Christ as King was watch'd as by a Dragon Christians lay as martyr'd under the Altar and then under it as Antichristian lies subdued the spiritual Israel till both That and the Twelve Tribes are restor'd by Christ's Kingdom So these are the Times of the Gentiles before which neither the twelve Tribes nor the Apostolical Church are fully restor'd or can be From all which it is most evident that though the Vision is not dated from the Persian Monarchy as if it was given for the Persian Monarchy's sake yet the 2300 Ev. Morn begin just when that begins and very fitly because the Persian Cyrus found the Temple fallen and the daily Service of the Jews taken away and proclaims the Restoration which makes the Date as we shall see And this is the first thing that was to be prov'd The second Proposition follows viz. That the twenty Propos 2. three hundred days of this Vision as also the Things contained in it run down and reach to the end of All or to the Glorious Kingdom of Christ. Of this we have many Arguments in the Vision it self which having briefly directed first unto I will endeavour by farther strong Proof from the whole course of Prophecy to establish it Every Vision of Daniel's except the following Vision of the Argu. 1 seventy Weeks which hath the high and noble Subject of the Death and Resurrection of our Lord Jesus Christ making an end of Sin and bringing in everlasting Righteousness but else every Vision runs expresly to the last End and Kingdom of Christ. And whether even that does not after the Desolation of Judaism give a Prospect of their Restoration also signified by 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or until the Consummation until which their Desolations are to last and no longer I leave to the Learned however It certainly bears its part in carrying on Time to that end But the very Shape and Design of all the other Visions is most apparently That End and therefore I conclude of This also The often mention of the End Three Times the Vision and Argu. 2 the End are conjoyn'd At the time of the End the Vision shall Dan. 8. be and the Exposition of the Vision is to make Daniel know what shall be in the last end of the Indignation and at the Time appointed the End shall be Now what End can be so absolute as to be understood by its naming only except that End of Christ's Kingdom so well known by the former Visions and by the following Vision chap. 11. v. 27. When because of this End to which every thing has led and made no
Voices had now prepar'd for the Vials and the Thunders then were unseal'd for the Vials pouring out Rev. 22. 10. And this agrees with the sealing Vision and Prophecy at the very cutting off of Messiah altho there was a Time of farther Tryal of the Jews the last Half-week yet it was then indeed seal'd the Jews having rejected and crucified their King who yet even by Pilate's Inscription in Hebrew Greek and Latin This is the King of the Jews by his Resurrection Ascension and sending down the Spirit was Anointed But till the End of the Indignation The Prophecy of his Kingdom was seal'd from its Glorious Appearance altho this Sealing had several new Sealings after some partial and momentary Discoveries of the Kingdom which are most necessary to be here understood and carried all along It is most evident It was here seal'd and answerably in the Revelation c. 5. It was a Book seal'd with seven Seals when Christ took it at his very Resurrection and though the opening the first Seal was a Publication of his Kingdom to the Jews and Gentiles and he went out conquering and to conquer c 6. 1 2. after the opening the first Seal yet it could not then appear for there were six Seals still upon it Now these Seals carry most evidently as we shall see a Course of 400 years from the last half week when the sealing was complete in the final rejection of the Jews For the first Seal opened and the Gospel not received by the Jews the rest had greater Force of Sealing which Sealing yet was determinately made at the very Death of Christ and the Indignation upon that Parricide And though these Seals carry a Course of Time yet condecent to the Type of the great secrecy of the seven Seals There is no express Line of Time drawn till the Kingdom of Our God is celebrated as come after the sixth of the Seals opened and the Rev. 12. 10. compar'd with c. 6. 12. c. 8. 3. 4. seventh also opened as compleating that whole Vision of the manly Birth Caught up to the Throne and the Dragon cast down Revel 12. in Theodosius the Great 's last Victory over Heathenism as we shall see in those Visions But then immediately at the sixth Seal as it were by way of prevention of the Kingdom of Christ breaking out at the seventh The 144000 were first sealed and this was such an c. 7. obscuring Christs Kingdom under the Apostasie That the Lines of Time were according to the Decency of the Type concealed till the Thunders uttering their Voices and the Book opened Apoc. c. 10. c. 11. without which Apocalyptick Lines these Numbers of Daniel could not be understood So till the End viz. the seventh Trumpet finishing all and the Kingdom of Christ proclaim'd there is a continuance of this sealing in some Degrees even till the Thunders unseal'd Chap. 14. But yet there are convenient Notations of Time along the Seals For every Event upon their opening leads us demonstratively enough from Time to Time and that general Character of this First space of Time of the Seals after Christs Resurrection is most significantly imprinted by that Motto Many shall run to and fro and Knowledge shall be increased Dan. 12. 4. which was so notably fulfill'd in the Apocalyptical Ministry it self and after that especially during the Three following Seals in those Gospel Voices of a yet continuing Apostolical Ministry though inferior to the Apostles and daily growing flatter but still saying Come and see All labouring to have then proclaim'd Christs Kingdom For so Come and see imports all along c. 6. till the Fifth Seal Christ having now commanded the sealing of the Book with that Latitude not to the End but to the Time or whole Current of Time to the End The Two Angels on either Bank attending Christ the Man in Linnen upon the Waters of the great River Hiddekel as in the Preface c. 10. v. 4. These two by divine Ordination from that very word The End start this Question Vnto how long the End of these Wonders viz. That End until the Time of which Christ had just now signifyed The Book was seal'd To this Christ is pleas'd intending to reveal this Course of Time to his Church by Daniel to return an answer in the very sight of Daniel by lifting up both his Hands to Heaven and swearing by the Eternal Being living for ever to whom all Time is but as the Drop of the Bucket That there should be Time Times half a Time for the scattering of the holy People or the Revel 12. Womans being in the Wilderness which is the Apocalyptick Comment on it and when that was accomplished According to the Correspondent Oath in the Revel c. 10. All these things should be finished in the Days of the seventh Trumpet Now it is most observable Christ gives an answer by this Oath not of the Time from the End of the Weeks or at his Resurrection but from the Time of the Seals opened confirming that sealing the Book to make a Line of Time in its unsealing For who can think Time Times c. were together with the Seals seeing those three Times and Half are so plainly given after the Seals But because the Divine Spirit knew that neither could the Cypher of Time Times half a Time be truly discypher'd but by it self and that the Half Time would open in some appearance of the Kingdom and that this very Oath that now Lett out this Time would be revers'd upon it at that very prophetical Juncture Daniel is mov'd by the same Spirit as not enough intelligenc'd by this Oracle to desire a further Divine Responsal I heard saith he but I understood not and therefore I said Lord what the End of these things Upon which Christ declares first a second sealing and discharges Daniel from farther Attendance in this matter after this last Oracle given him v. 9. which is again repeated v. 13. Go thy way Daniel saith Christ that is the way of all Flesh or Dye at thy Time till Thou stand in thy Lot at the end of the Days Not the Book now but the Words referring to the Thunders Vtterances and the Words within the open Book are seal'd or stay'd from an immediate coming to pass till the very Time of the End much farther promoted viz. to the Vials And then Christ is pleas'd to give first this Emblem of the Time of the Vnsealing in these Words Many shall be purified and made white and tryed or refin'd viz. by the Voices and by the Efficacy of Divine Truth then breaking out but as is discover'd in the Vials The wicked will do wickedly and will not understand by so great a Thunder of Truth and therefore it is so eminently noted of them in the Vials They Repented not but blasphem'd and in proper Application to the same Time it is said He that is Vnrighteous and Vnjust let him be so still and He that is Righteous let
final Judgment over the Book is quite unseal'd in Death the last Enemy overcome and then the Book the Symbol of the Kingdom is resign'd with the Kingdom it self into the Hand of the Father 9. Hereupon the State of the Christian Church in its Apostolical Purity with the Order of the Living Creatures first and then drawing that of the Elders along with it in a Song of Redemption in Praise of the Lamb with a Prophecy of his Kingdom in which his Servants and Saints shall reign above the Earth or over it as 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 signifies in several Places of the New Testament joyn'd with a Genitive Case particularly Matt. 25. 21. 23. I will make thee Ruler over many things 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 10. To sum up all The State of the Church in the thousand Years Kingdom of Christ is given in a second Song of Praise wherein all things bow in the Name of Christ as Lord and that not ceremonially but in real Subjection Phil. 2. 10. Things in Heaven and in Earth and under the Earth and that to the Glory of the Father For the four Living Creatures having said Amen to this high Celebration of Christ the four and twenty Elders as having by the Apostolical Church receiv'd an explicate Knowledge of Christ to shew The New Testament did not at all derogate from the Old The four and twenty Elders after they had fallen down with the four Living Creatures and joyn'd in a Song of Praise to the Lamb now as making up the Concent worship him that liveth for ever and ever and conclude that which the four Living Creatures or the Apostolical Ministry began and herein shew the Resignation of the Kingdom of God at last that he may be All in All Rev. 4. 10. compar'd with Rev. 5. 8. 14. For as all began in God that made all things so here it ends in him The sealed Book being now in the Hands of Christ and all due Acknowledgments made to him that sits on the Throne and to the Lamb immediately follows the opening of the Seals and therein the Course of Time flows out and so flows on of which we are now to take a particular and strict Account only I would desire every Person that sets his Mind and Thoughts to view this so august Inthronization of God and of the Lamb That he would ponder within himself Whether the desolating either the Jews or the Heathen Empire can be Events great enough for so stupendious a Pre-Representation or any thing less than the Glorious Kingdom of our Lord Jesus Christ could answer to it And now that we may establish the Line of Time according to these Seals and the Time of their opening there are three Things to be consider'd 1. What it is that is the principal Jewel and Treasure that lies under these Seals and so to be set free by the unloosing them 2. What is the principal and supream Visum or Thing to be seen in every Seal and the opening of it and how it serves the disclosing that Jewel 3. What is the true method of fixing the certain Time that the whole Course of the Seals took up and how it is to be measur'd and fix'd If we can now determine and settle aright upon the Resolution of each of these Particulars we shall be able to understand this first Sett of Apocalyptical Visions and to have ample satisfaction concerning them and have great Light into the following Visions also 1. As to the First then That great Treasure and Jewel of Truth that is inclos'd within these Seals and so also as we shall see that the Trumpets ultimately sounded unto is the Glorious Kingdom of our Lord Jesus Christ Every Event and the Stage of Time it was to pass over is as a Seal or Stop upon this Kingdom till it opens into Glory and the opening of every Seal was an Advance towards it and although when the seven Seals were open'd there appeared a greater and more prodigious Cause of Delay viz. the Antichristian Kingdom yet every Trumpet was as an Alarm of War to the subduing that Mock-Kingdom that rose in Despight and Opposition to the Kingdom of Christ And because all things were so set and placed in their Season and Order that no one thing could come to pass before that which was set before it had had its free Egress and Event therefore every of these Events and the opening of the Seals to let them out though they did not in the Issue open to the true Appearance of that Kingdom yet because they did as it were what they could and there was a Remove of so many Prohibents or Obstacles to that Kingdom and Time so advanc'd from Point to Point that by the opening every Seal the Kingdom of Christ might be nearer to its Appearance therefore they are justly understood and expounded to be Seals unloos'd and opening to the Kingdom of Christ Now besides those 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or IT IS DONE IT IS DONE at the End of the Apocalyptical Time and all its Events whither they one and all run together besides this there is this absolute Assurance That the Kingdom of Christ was under the Seals The Kingdom made so magnificent a show of it self at the sixth Seal that had not the Servants of God been seal'd in their Fore-heads that they should not then appear with him in Glory the Kingdom had even then appear'd for in Constantine's Christian Empire to the End of the Reign or at the Victory of Theodosius the Great over Heathenism of which he endeavour'd the utter Extirpation that Kingdom so far came out of its Retirement that there was a solemn and loud Doxology in Heaven that the Kingdom of God and the Power of Christ were come and yet at the very same time the Woman is recorded as fled into the Wilderness Rev. 12. 10. 2. The first Particular then being resolved with so much Evidence and Assurance we may with the greatest Clearness resolve concerning the second or the principal Visum of every Seal open'd for it must be some State of the Kingdom of Christ defin'd by the joyning together the Voices that summoned to the Sight and Observation so far as these Voices continued and then when they ceased the State of the Kingdom of Christ must be considered by the Visa themselves as under the Cessation of those Voices and by any sort of Voices we can find equivalent to them And in this Method and no other that I can understand we may justly and truly comprehend the Intention and Signification of the Seals For if all the Seals carry on the Kingdom of Christ by so many Degrees and Steps of Advance as I have in some measure I hope made evident they do By undeniable Proof then it must needs be That every Seal hath some State of that Kingdom protuberant or swelling out in its Appearance upon that opening and that the Voice that says Come and see calls to observe it and
as to the State of the Church all along these Seals past There was a plain Appearance of it in the Apostolick Voices till just the Entrance of the fourth Seal From that Time these Voices ceas'd which had so far as supported by the Characters of Imperial History declar'd to us the Times and States of the Church as before drawn out in the Labour and Patience and Sufferings of the Ephesine Church while those Apostolical Voices lasted although there was such a Leaven of the Apostacy hid in it that it was charg'd to have left its first Love one great Instance of which was in Victor's Excommunication of the Asian Churches upon the score of the unwritten Ceremony of keeping Easter at all much more unwritten as to Criticism of Time which made that so great Fewd The Fifth Seal so plainly opens in the Sufferings of the Seal 5 Christian Martyrs as to assure us This Prophecy as also other Scripture-prophecies and Notes of Time are for the sake of the Church and not of Heathen Empires and States yet by the Course of the Seals we may easily know at what hour of the Empire it was as by referring to the peculiar foregoing Church-prophecy we know under what Symbol of the Church it lies and from both That it was the last and cruel ten Years Persecution or ten Days Tribulation begun by Dioclesian while the Christian Church was under that peculiar Symbol of the Church of Smyrna That it was about the Time of Dioclesian the Current of the former Seals and the immediately following Desolation of Heathenism under Constantine assure us That it was under the Symbol of the Church of Smyrna its peculiar Character of Sufferings and ten Days Tribulation make out as also in that there was no longer any Apostolical Voice but the Voice of Souls that were gone out of martyr'd Bodies it signifies the Synagogue of Sathan near an height and from that very occasion of the Tombs Relicks Memories and Veneration of Martyrs and Trust in their Negotiation out of the Body for those they left behind in it growing much higher However God graciously accepts this Suffering Church and lays no Imputation upon it but only on the Sathanick Synagogue He seems to have more respect to the Souls Complaint than to the Survivers of that Church He appoints them white Robes but as unconcern'd in Mediations for any in this World they are commanded to rest and there is on their Instance a Signification of a new Roll of Martyrs under Antichrist when the whole Number of those of the first Resurrection should be compleat over whom the second Death should have no Power This Seal then is the very Joynt betwixt the Kingdom of Paganism falling but not yet fallen and that short Appearance of Christ's Kingdom in the Christian Empire till Theodosius the Great The Army of Martyrs had not yet overcome by the Word of the Testimony which they held The Kingdom of Christ was not yet celebrated with that Doxology chap. 12. But there was nothing came between this Cry of the Souls and that Kingdom although speedily surpris'd by Antichristianism into which Pagan Demonolatry was first transplanted on this very occasion of Martyrs Sufferings compleated within this Seal especially And thus we have the State of the Kingdom of Christ in the Church within this Seal assur'd by one of the most famous Monuments of Ecclesiastick History The sixth Seal is that great Seal opened by which the Heathen Seal 6 State of the Roman Empire was demolish'd and which carries most abundant Instruction of this whole Time of the Seals and also of the Kingdom of Christ in his Church during that Time 1. That Heathen Idolatry that had seated it self as in the Heavens and from thence reach'd down it self into the Earth and in the Deep is as by an Earthquake remov'd from below and as by a Tempest above is dismounted and deposed from thence so that here Sathan as the Dragon was cast down from Heaven as by Lightning according to the Vision chap. 12. 2. The Emperours or Kings of the Earth and all its great Men lay'd aside their Greatness even to their Imperial Purple and Diadems as particularly Dioclesian the Arch-Persecutor and Maximian with him mov'd not so much by any thing as by a divine Terror by the Fear of him that sate on the Throne and of the Lamb. And this is given as a lively Type of Christ's glorious Appearance in the Destruction of his Enemies Who will be able to stand in that Day of his Wrath What Mountains Dens or Caves will then open to receive affrighted men 3. From hence it plainly appears What was to be open'd by Christ's opening of these Seals even no other than the glorious visible Kingdom of Christ and not his spiritual Kingdom only As an eminent Assurance of which He declar'd himself in the preaching of the Gospel and a Crown was given to him as an Acknowledgment of his Right though to obtain it he was to go out conquering and to conquer Here then in this Christian Empire beginning at the sixth Seal and so going on in the seventh Seal to Theodostus's Victory over all the Remains of Heathenism after Julian in the Senate Magistracy and People of Rome gather'd to a Head in Eugenius and Argobastes This Kingdom appear'd as in an Emblem and earnest of it self and so it is celebrated chap. 12. with Praise and Triumph as in Heaven though even there surpris'd 4. Here the State of Christ's Kingdom in the Church is solemnly declar'd and also as in the Christian Empire In the Church to shew the high towring Synagogue of Sathan There is no Voice of the Church but of an Angel crying to the four Angels not to hurt c. a certain Indication of bad Symptoms appearing at this in it self happy Change 2. There was a pure Church and Kingdom of Christ yet publick and visible but upon the Retreat for it was just now retiring and about to be seal'd that is under that over-growing Synagogue 3. This Kingdom of Christ in his Church was to have abating the general Unhappiness of fallen sinful Man a more quiet and illustrious State than heretofore viz. in a Christian Empire for till the whole Time of sealing the Servants of God was past the four Angels that had the four first Trumpets were commanded to hold the Wind that no such Hurt could be done upon the Empire as was after to be done when they sounded This was Smyrna's Crown So that tho' God had determin'd the Period of the Blood-guilty Roman Western Empire as Imperial yet it was kept off till it became Pagan-Antichristian a new Paganism Then God gave it in Wrath after a Time an Antichristian King its former Imperial King being taken away in Wrath first 5. The precise Time of Sealing that is of covering all the True visible Glory of Christianity in the Christian Empire is hereby set viz. until the First Trumpet For till all was sealed no
his mighty ones according to Rev. 19. comes down and the whole Air is full of Divine Judgments so that this Battel just before the Kingdom v. 17. of Christ is with Burning and Fewel of Fire and not Garments roll'd in Blood of which all the immediate Judgments from Heaven as on Midian as on the Assyrians Esa 9. 5. are Types which last is joyn'd to a clear Prophecy of this Glorious Kingdom of Christ. I can give no fitter Remark upon so unfathomable a course Remark of Judgments than the recording that Song of Moses the Servant of God at the final Overthrow of the Egpptians in the Red Sea and of the Lamb c. 15. 9. Great and marvellous are thy Works Lord God Almighty just and true are thy ways oh King of Saints Who shall not fear thee Oh Lord and glorifie thy Name for thou only art Holy and all Nations shall come and worship before thee for thy Judgments are made manifest And this course of Judgments comprehends all the Dead both small and great to that very 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 IT IS DONE and at last to these Dead at the seventh Vial are gathered All whose Names are not found written in the Book of Life and are cast with Death it self into the Lake of Fire and Brimstone which is the second Death SECT XVI Wherein is given in a most brief Account the state of the thousand Years both as to Time and Excellency On c. 20. THE Time of the Duration of the Kingdom which is the Sabbath of Time when all Anti-sabbatical Time shall be at an end and NO MORE is a thousand Years Now it may be a great doubt How this Time is to be understood whether literally or mystically if literally How then will it agree with the whole Frame of the Prophecy which hath very little that is not mystical and of a typical Signification and most particularly all the Lines of Time But if the thousand Years be mystical either they shall express no definite Time or they shall if mystically multiplied set the State of Eternity at incomputable Distances yet from the last Time and Ends of the World we are now subsisting upon contrary to all the Reason and Faith of Christians and the whole Analogy of the Scriptures Now that which I would reconcile the Thoughts of all the serious Considerers of Prophecy in this matter by is That here The literal and the mystical Sense conspire and closely embrace one another The literal 1000 Years comprises highest Mystery in it for besides that in round Number as we compute Time it comes in as the sabbatical thousand for which I perceive there is a general Favour of all Christians if not Jews that have any Estimation of mystick Types of Prophecy Besides this and that the millenary Number hath great Reputation in Pythagorick mystick Numbers as a cubical Number rising from 10 and filling up the Perfection of Number even as the millenary State is the perfectest State of Conformity to the Law of Creation given by God in the 10 Words we call the Decalogue in which Sabbatism hath so great Place and Reason It is also the Time wherein Sathan is bound chain'd and seal'd up the Sanctuary is cleans'd in the other 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or IT IS DONE in the New Jerusalem Besides all this It is the great Emblem God hath chosen to represent his own and his Servants blessed Eternity in This thousand Years is as one day to him to represent his and his SECT VIII Wherein the 42 Months are measur'd by the exactest Rule of Prophecy and found to begin at the Cessation of the Christian Western Empire and to end whenever the 1260 Days end the Date of the Kingdom of Christ immediately ensuing and by compare with the 1260 Days at 1697. Page 90. SECT IX In which the Time from the 42 Months beginning is set out till 622 or the Mahometan Hegira by Rome's dark State in the fourth Trumpet by the Angels proclaiming the three Woe Trumpets by the Beast becoming a fallen Star at 606 and the Key of the Abyss given him viz. in the universal Pastorship by Phocas and the Ministry of the other Beast to him herein and the State of the Witnesses are also declar'd Revel c. 8. v. 12. c. c. 9. v. 1. c. Page 114. SECT X. Wherein is undertaken to be proved That the Mahometan Saracens are the Locusts design'd in the fifth Apocalyptical Trumpet and that the 25 Months given to them comprehend 435 Years from the Mahometan Hegire at 622 and so reach â—o 1057. Vpon Rev. c. 9. v. 1. c. Page 124. SECT XI Of the Number 666 shewing the Certainty it gives to the whole Line of Time both as to the Nature and Time of the Beast upon a true and right Explanation of it Rev. 13. v. 15 16 17 18. Page 132. SECT XII In which is given an Explication of the Woe of the sixth Trumpet especially to the taking of Constantinople and by proportion to the Reformation and to the End of that Woe and an Adjustment of the Hour Day Month and Year to the whole Time Vpon Revel 9. 12 13 14 c. Page 149. SECT XIII This Section enters into the Half-time of the Reformation and by the Agreement of Prophecy with the Event demonstrates the Beginning and End of that Time On Rev. c. 10. Page 155. SECT XIV Wherein is contained a brief Disquisition upon the seven Voices as they run along Apoc. c. 14. Page 177. SECT XV. VVherein is given a very brief Display on the Vials Page 185. SECT XVI VVherein is given in most brief Account the Time of the 1000 Years both as to Time and Excellency Page 189. FINIS
The Contents of this Treatise are given in Tables annexed to each Part. 1 Part Before the Apostacy in 10 Sections 2 Part During the Apostacy to the last End in 16 Sections A CALENDER OF THE Whole Time contained in Scripture ennobled with the Events of each Part of Time distinguish'd by the true Year of the World according to Scripture the Years before Christ till the Incarnation then the Year of Christ and of the Resurrection to all which is applied the Julian Period  Year of the World Year before Christ Year of the Resur Julian Period TO the perfect Creation and first Sabbatism 1 3987  764 765 To the Flood containing the History of Abel and the Patriarks of the first Roll of the Gyants the Translation of Enoch the seventh from Adam The Ark prepar'd by Noah an Eighth and the Destruction of the old World 1656 2331  2420 To Terah's Death containing the History of Shem or Melchisedeck as he is after known to be with the Patriarks of the 2 d. Roll Of Babel the space of 427 Years 2083 1904  2847 To the going out of Egypt containing the History of the sojourning of Abraham and his Seed of the Promises of Sodom and the â—gyptian Bondage and Deliverance the space of 430 Years 2513 1474  3277 To the building of the Temple begun containing the setting up of the Tabernacle of Testimony the Conquest of Canaan the Time of the Judges of David the space of 480 Years 2993 994  3757 To Solomon's Death containing the Building of the Temple and his illustrious Reign his Fall and Repentance 36 Years 3029 958  3793 To Ezekiel's Vision of the New Jerusalem containing the History of the Kings of Judah the History of the Defection of the ten Tribes and their Kings of the two great Witnesses Elijah and Elisha the Destruction of Jerusalem and the Temple the Captivity by Nebuchadnezzar the space of 390 Years 3419 568  4183 To the End of the Captivity containing the Continuance of the Captivity Nebuchadnezzar's Victory over Egypt Ezek. 29. 17. and Babylon's Fall the space of 40 Years 3459 528  4223 From Cyrus to the Sanctuary cleans'd and to the King of fierce Countenance and understanding dark Sentences broken without hand a Line of 2300 Evenings and Mornings or 2300 Years with its collateral Lines which now follow being also inclusive of the Daily Sacrifice taken away     From the Words first going forth by Cyrus to its compleat being gone forth by Darius Hystaspis and ultimately at Artaxerxes Longimanus's seventh year the space of 75 Years 3534 453  4298 From thence to the Incarnation containing Antiochus's Tyranny and other Troubles the space of 453 Years 3987 1 Yea. of Christ  4751 To the Resurrection containing the Birth private Life publick Ministry and Death of our Lord Jesus Christ to his Resurrection 33 Years 4020 33 1 4784 To Alexander Severus's Death the ballance of Time between the Resurrection and the Apostacy containing the History of the Universal Preaching of the Gospel the space of 202 Years 4222 235 202 4986 To the Apostacy or the beginning of the 1260 Days * Or Time Times Half TIme containing a Vindication of the Gospel by the most rational Apologies constant Sufferings of Christians till the Christian Empire and then the Christian Empire till the taking away the Daily or pure publick Worship the space of 202 Years 4424 437 404 5108 To the End of the first time and Beginning of the second or first of the two Times during the Fall of the Western Empire containing the rising of the Beast at 475 his Fall as a Star from Heaven at 606 his manly Age at 666 from his Conception Anno Domini 59 to that manly Age 725 of the space of 360 Years 4784 797 764 5468 To the End of the second Time or first of the two Times and the Beginning of the third Time containing the Range of the Mahometan Locusts or Saraoens and the Beasts Promotion to a settled Age or of Consistency the space of 360 Years more 5144 1157 1124 5828 To the End of the third or second of the two Times to the Half-time containing the Cavalcade of the Turkish Horse-men and the Beasts declining Age the space of 360 Years more 5504 1517 1484 6188 To the End of the Half-time or to the seventh Trumpet containing the State of the Reformation and since to the Expectation of the Witnesses Rising about 1697 ten Years hence the space of 180 Years 5684 1697 1664 6368 To the End of the last Seventy Five Years of the seventh Trumpet containing the seven Voices and the seven Vials and ending in It is done It is done at 1772. 5759 1772 1739 6443 After this follows new Time or the SABBATISM of the Creation viz. The cubical thousand Years of the glorious Kingdom of Christ     AN EXPLICATION OF Daniel's Grand Line of Time or of his 2300 Evenings and Mornings as given in his four last Chapters In these following Sections SECT I. Of the Vision of the Daily taken away and therein of the 2300 Ev. Morn or the Vision call'd the Vision of the Ev. Morn in general On Dan. chap. 8. THE Vision of the 2300 Evenings and Mornings dates most exactly and precisely the Time from the very Beginning of the Persian Monarchy or the First of Cyrus to the cleansing of the Sanctuary at the new Jerusalem and the breaking of Antichrist without hand or by the stone cut out of the Mountains without hand at the Kingdom of Christ Dan. 8. 14. 25. The order of the former Visions duely consider'd gives great light to this For first there is in the course of Ezekiels Visions a long allotment of Time till the New Jerusalem and a peculiar Sanction of the prophetical Cypher of Time or of a Day for a Year Ezek. 4. 6. That gives full scope aed room to those Monarchies to run their Time as in the Image and the four Beasts in Daniel's two precedent Visions 〈◊〉 2. c. 7. The former of those two or the Vision of the Image gives only a general Appearance of so many Monarchies or Kingdoms or rather of a Monarchy universal shifting from one People and their Kingdom to another and all adverse to the Kingdom of Christ for that could not appear while they were in Play From hence arises such a Line of Time as necessarily is requir'd for four Monarchies to display themselves but because they may be shorter or longer in their duration they give no certain measures only as that there is no History of Action elder than Moses's of the Creation appearing in the World it is an Argument of weight against the World's Eternity so on the other side the daily matter of History arising from many other Kings and Kingdoms and particularly of the Romans assure us the Kingdom of Christ is not yet come because while that lasts the grand foretold Kingdom of Christ cannot
come But now the next Vision of the Four Beasts gives us in Prophetick Cypher the very measure of the Beast's Duration as that Beast is symboll'd by the little Horn viz. Time Times and half a Time But because this does not assure us when those Days begin nor consequently where they end the Vision we are now entring upon will teach us that And it hath a threefold Aspect upon Time to this end 1. It continues the principal Line of Time from Creation which because there will not be Scripture History to maintain it and also because and especially because the Times of the Gentiles in whose History Scripture little concerns it self are drawn by it without lesser Periods but as the Accounts of the Churches Case in relation to them after requires it they are given in one entire Line or Sum 2300 Days beginning contiguously from Ezekiel's 430 Days and continuously also to so many Days for Years uniting with the former parcel-lines and with the 430 as the last given Line and so one whole Line from the Creation is constituted by uniting these several Parcels by a divine Certainty 2. It determines the particular Time from the beginning of the Persian Monarchy at literal Babylon fallen to mystical Babylon falling as also at literal Jerusalem restor'd to new Jerusalem appearing for Antichrist broken intends the former and the Sanctuary cleans'd the latter 3. It is a measure of the length of particular Lines given after this from Time to Time as they are given in Scripture that as it self is distinguish'd into several Periods by them so it is a Boundary to them when to begin and end that together they may be symmetral to this whole Line neither longer nor shorter and therein be justly proportion'd to one another even till this Line call'd most emphatically by our Lord the Times of the Gentiles Luc. 21. 24. be fulfill'd That the Vision then and the Line of Time it carries away be rightly understood these things are necessary to be premised 1. That the principal thing in these Visions of Daniel except that single Vision next in order to that we are upon that centers in Messiah's Coming and Death is the glorious Kingdom of Christ and of his Saints having the Dominion throughout the Earth and the Destruction of that peculiar Enemy of his Kingdom who is justly call'd Antichrist immediately preceeding his Kingdom and before which it could not appear Upon the Account of this Kingdom of Christ having its way made by the Destruction of Antichrist there are so many Representations of the other Monarchies of which else we may conceive the Holy Spirit had no more touch'd their Prophecy than it does their History which it never does but in relation to the Church or to set out God's Government Universal over the World and his Judgment on sinful Nations We find therefore in these Visions of the Monarchies Antichrist next to the Kingdom of Christ is the greatest Subject and more Words laid out upon him than upon all the rest so it is in Nebuchadnezzar's Dream The Feet and Toes Dan. 2. v. 34. 41. c. take up a greater Proportion of the Dream and Exposition than all the rest and then the Kingdom of Christ flows out upon the Image broken in the Feet So in the Vision of the four Beasts the fourth Beast and in that the little Horn imploys the greatest part of the whole Vision in its Description and Judgment and the Kingdom of Christ then breaks out upon it so proportionably in this Vision He then that would understand it must be arm'd with this Rule as preparatory 2. It must be worthy our Advertency that the Antichristian State in these Prophecies and in the Revelation is rank'd with Heathenism and Gentilism and treated with much less regard than even Idolatrous Israel or Judah God not taking any notice of them as his People but as mere Gentiles so that I do not remember any Parallelism of them with the People of Israel even in their Apostacy but altogether with those that were Aliens as Balaam Jezebel the Daughter of Elth Baal King of the Sydonians with Sodom Egypt and most notoriously Babylon and so is represented by the Gentiles treading the outward Court And thus the Corruptions of Divine Worship among the Jews were express'd by entertaining the manners of the Gentiles defiling themselves with them falling in love with them bringing them into the Sanctuary The Beast united with the heathen idolatrous Monarchy coming into the Seat of the Dragon is the grand Apocalyptick Figure for Antichrist and nothing of Christ allow'd him except to the other Beast having borns as a Lamb while he spake as a Dragon nor of the Jews to the Antichristian Rev. 13. 11. Gentiles but that in the Beginning of the Apostacy within the prophetical Church of Smyrna Rev. 2. 9. They said They were Jews but were not but lyed and were the Synagogue of Sathan nor any thing of Jerusalem to the Seat of Antichrist except one only allusion to the City where Our Lord was crucified where a Heathen Power presided in Revel 11. 8. his Condemnation and that a Roman too to signifie its extream Hate to the True Christ It s deep dye in Blood and its irrecoverable Destruction for which Jerusalem was so infamous and for which the Roman Church like the Jewish Church was broken off from the true Olive and all consider'd as a Church in Conjunction with it as the Apostle had foretold Rom. 11. 6. make the Allusion On the other side The True Christianity and Worship of it are symboliz'd by the pure Jewish Worship The Temple its Measures Ordinances as they stood in Israels best Estate are the Ichnography of the Perfect Pure Christian Church But the drawing men from True Christianity to Antichristianism the Persecution of Men for it the last Deliverance from Anti-Christianism and its Persecutions are continually given out in Parallellismes betwixt the same Things heretofore between the Jews and the Gentiles and unite with the Jews great Deliverance and the New Jerusalem at last These two things are most necessary to be premonish'd for the true Interpretation of this Vision and other Visions also as we shall see as we pass along to preserve all clear and free from Confusion And upon this Premonition I say this Vision beginning with the Persian Reign goes on through the Grecian and so passes through the whole Roman Monarchy first and last and describes a Line running parallel with the whole Times of the Gentiles after the Babylonish Empire at the end of which Ezekiels 430 Days ended as hath been made to appear And they being the last Joynt of the Line from Creation this Line of 230 Days joyns with it and continues the whole Acts. 3. 21. Line from Creation to the Restitution of all Things Upon this Premonition I say further That Antiochus as the most Infamous Heathen Prince for treading down the holy and pure Jewish Worship from
him be farther justified that is clear'd from the Imputations laid upon him by the Apostacy and let him farther also vindicate and justifie himself from it by a Ministration of the Vials on the Beast and doubling to the infamous Woman the Cup she had given and thereby making Preparation to the Kingdom of Christ Thus is that great Time in its curious Emblematism in Prophecy c. 22. 11. compar'd with Rev. c. 15. c. 18. v. 6. And because all this should by the Will of Christ be yet drawn out more definitively He is pleas'd to add From the Time of the Daily or Continual in the very same only word Tammith no where applied alone to Sacrifice from that taken away by the Apostacy I say are given exactly till the seven Thunders unseal'd thirty additional Days to the 1260 Days viz. 1290 Days and to that very End so often mention'd of the Lots of Blessedness by the Addition of 45 more are given 1335 and all cast into Indictions or eighty nine Fifteens a way of accounting Time so notoriously known to have come into use after Constantine as elsewhere shall be farther urg'd and most evidently characterizing this Time And it is much to be observ'd This so clear Line is given here as in the Revelat. after a Supposition of the Book open'd at the Half-time and not before except in this Cypher of Daniel's Time Times Half-Time not to be understood but by the 1260 Days and other Apocalyptical Lines Now from all this may be collected by compare with the Apocalyptick Prophecy a Line of Time as exact as from the very Ages of the Patriarks allowing the Hebrew Copies there and the prophetical Days for Years here For first the 2300 Ev. Mor. are so exact undoubted an entire Number as to leave no Dispute if granted to be a Line of Time The Weeks ending at the Resurrection is so very full and compleat a Vision before this Vision not only in the Order of Prophecy but of the express Dates of Darius's First and Cyrus's Third The sealing of Prophecy in that Vision just at the End of that Vision of the Weeks and the Book shut and seal'd in this Vision joyn those two Visions close together The sealed Time and of the Book shut by the Apocalyptick Prophecy in so orderly a Progress as by compare with History it is found cannot but be acknowledg'd to be 400 Years from the last half-week ending Then the 1335 are so close joyn'd that they cannot be forc'd asunder and so riveted into the End both by being a farther Resolution to Daniel in his Complaint of not understanding for his Knowledge of the End of Wonders as also by the Blessedness and Daniel's standing in his Lot Besides the Evidence from the Indictions so open and industrious is not small But what could Daniel's Lot in the End of the Days be of or in but of and in the New Jerusalem and its holy Priesthood It is impossible then the days should fly back from the End these therefore being the whole of the 2300 except 75 the 75 must be plac'd in the Forefront of all the Number as we have seen what Reason from the Vision of the Words going forth hath been found so to place just so many And if we allow that Number to be 75 there is as great a certainty the sealed Time must be just four hundred for one adjusts the other necessarily if 75 before the Weeks there must be 400 between the Weeks or 490 Years and the 1335 if 400 there then 75 here for so the 2300 require Now how each of these Spaces of Time the 400 of the Seals the Time Times Half-time or twelve hundred sixty days of the Trumpets the Thirty of the Voices the forty five of the Vials how these I say are all replenish'd with their proper Furniture we must be instructed by the Prophecy of the Revelation What great Reason have we now to adore the Spirit of Remark Jesus Christ in this Prophecy of Daniel and to search what or what manner of Time it signifies in this sure Word of Prophecy giving in prophetick Schemes the very same Thing that the Transfiguration in so glorious a majestick Appearance represented viz. Christ the Sun of Righteousness with his Stars of the first Magnitude Prophets and Apostles those wise turning many to Righteousness and then the lesser ministerial Stars and the sporadick Fellowship of Saints included appear therein as those who are so turn'd to Righteousness And this Prophecy having been so long in the World and traversing such spaces of Time like a vast Tract of Earth with Charts Maps and Sculptures fitted to them and that came with such Certainty and Assurance into every hand is inlighten'd and enlivened with new and fresh Delineatories of the New Testament Prophecy or the Revelation Certainly had not God in Justice upon the Apostacy diverted the Thoughts and Labours of his Servants from the Illustration and Demonstration of them so that they have not travell'd herein as in other parts of Christian Verity nor by such a Concert of Minds and Judgments herein the Evidences both against Atheism and the Apostacy had much exceeded what they arise to now No Miracles except in constant and present Motion before our Eyes nor hardly then being so intellectually sensible Arguments of the Divine Being of Christianity and against Antichristianism as these Prophecies from Time to Time fulfill'd And this very Prophecy of Daniel is a most certain Ground to expect such a Prophecy as that of the Revelation for one cannot be understood without the other and how admirably do they conspire For just at that sealing at the end of the last half Week begins the unsealing also or the Events coming to pass in their just order and the Apostolical Ministry running to and fro to increase Knowledge and just Scals 400. Rev. c. 6. then 1260 in the six first Trumpets c. 8. c. 9 Then 30 45 in the Voices c. 14. and Vials of the 7th Trumpet c. 15. c. 16. as they have hitherto proceeded exactly according to their Time and Place so far as within ten years end of the sixth Trumpet so shall they proceed in the seventh Trumpet in the Voices and the Vials till the last end of Wonders be produced and perfected Blessed therefore is He that waiteth and cometh thereunto he shall tho out of this Body certainly then stand in his Lot of that New Jerusalem State and Priesthood in a Body of the First Resurrection SECT VIII Wherein is given a Prefatory Survey of the whole Apocalyptical Prophecy I Am now brought down by the course of prophetick Time to that very Point of Time where the Series of Apocalyptical Visions begins so that although the Line of Time was by Daniel stretch'd over whole Apocalyptick Time in the Number given to him and in a general way some Umbrages of those Visions had been presented by Ezekiel and even by all the Prophets since the World began
that so in the Mouth of not only two or three but many Witnesses every word might be establish'd yet it appertains to the Glory of the New Testament the Gospel and Kingdom of the Mediator there should be so great and stupendious a Prophecy peculiar to it as that of the Revelation wherein God and Jesus Christ are for ever to be ador'd and had in reverence of all that approach the Profession of Christianity I say It must be of necessity agreeable to the Excellency of the New Testament there should be besides many Incidental Prophecies so divinely majestick a Prophecy as this of the Apocalyps such a Temple of Prophecies whose Symbols should be so high and lofty its Light more clear and full its Lines of Time in what it pleas'd to give more evident and certain the Doctrines intermingled more spiritual the Promises more heavenly and explain'd the Threats more dreadful and more open that in every thing there may be a Becomingness of All to the Old Testament unveil'd fulfill'd and excell'd in the New And accordingly we shall find all these to the very height taken care of and adjusted we shall see this all along the Iconisms and Figures of Things in the Churches in the several Visions in the Doctrines in the solemn mentions of the Lamb of his Blood so often memorializ'd as an Antidote against the Poison of Antichrist as also the Ministeries of Angels and their most peremptory Abhorrence of all Worship offer'd to them It s only numbred Line of Time till the 1000 Years is so often repeated and ascertain'd that it does in all things illustriously shew it self to be that grand Revelation of Jesus Christ which God gave him to shew to his Servants to the transcendent Honour of the Son by whom he thus spake last of all Who is the Heir of all things especially of the World to Heb. 1. 1. come of which this Prophecy speaks So that to ravish this from the Search and Enquiry of his Church or by Imputations of immodest Presumption to bar from it the utmost Endeavours of his Servants to compare so great a Prophecy and its Events is to take from them one of the principal Props of Christian Faith and Obedience and to devest the New Testament of so high a Glory as this sure Word of Prophecy to which we ought to take heed as to a Light that shineth in the obscure and even squalid Ayr of the Apostasie till the Bright Morning-Star appear and therefore notwithstanding all Prejudices the Apostacy hath rais'd against Researches into it Blessed is he that Readeth and they who hear the Words of this Prophecy That which this Prophecy reveals is the glorious Restitution of all things in the Kingdom of Christ and his Reign with his Saints the Destruction and Consumption of all the wicked so as to be no more as they have been in God's Creation and Earth Psal 104. 35. The Sense in which it reveals is not only Prophetical Doctrinal and Verbal but Real and Eventual and that immediately from the very Beginning of it All the Visions in their own Order each in their Season come quickly or shortly to pass that is begin to come to pass and so go on to their End according to the Types wherein they are imprinted This Revelation begins justly at the Resurrection of Christ conjoyn'd as in one entire Act and Time with his Ascension when all power in Heaven and Earth was given to him at the Lord's Day dedicated by himself to the Glory of his Rising and the Publication of his Anointing by the coming down of Act. 1. c. 2. the Holy Spirit Then could he say Behold I was dead am alive and live for evermore Then he was brought near to the Ancient of Days and receiv'd the Assurance of his Kingdom Then had he Right to be the Prince of the Kings of the Earth though he was pleas'd to stay and to joyn Patience to and with his Kingdom And this was as in the middle Rev. 1. 9. of the Five hundred sixty second Ev. Mor. from Cyrus and in the middle of the last of the seventieth of the seventy Weeks and at the Time the Roman Empire was come to Maturity in the AUTONOMY of Augustus and Tiberius in the Time of which the first Right of his Kingdom began and e're that Empire in its last State ends it shall be set up in Glory For though the Apocalytical Prophecy was not actually given to the Apostle John till some years after yet as Prophecy calls the future so that which is past to the present Time and represents in an entire Frame both together a Priviledge as to that which is past necessarily allowed to History and to a prophetick Frame much more when it hath occasion for it The Period of the Revelation till the thousand years is most evidently those two Apocalyptical Pillars bearing the two answering Inscriptions IT IS DONE IT IS DONE Apoc. 16. 17. c. 22. 6. from whence the Kingdom begins So that this Book of the Revelation is justly to be styl'd the Book of the Kingdom of Christ in its several Offers of Appearance and rending the very Clouds to shew it self in the Acts 1. 7. Dan. 12. 7. Justice of its Claim and yet retiring it self till the very moments appointed by the Father and sworn by himself In which Regards this Prophecy is call'd A Book both in Daniel and here in the Apocalyps on all occasions So that the thousand Years are properly within this Book as the Book of the Kingdom There is also beyond the thousand Years a 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a little Space as it were the Revel 20. Hour of the thousand-years-day of the Lord or of the Son of Man in which the natural Apostacy of Humane Nature shews it self in the lukewarm Laodicean Church and in Gog and Magog as at a blush but the whole of any State either 1 Cor. 15. of Church or Nation below immediately is swallow'd up in Flames and Death and Hell with their whole Propriety shut up within themselves and the Kingdom resign'd to God ALL in ALL. The Passage or Conveyance of this Apocalyptical Time is through the seven Churches comprehending the whole Time within themselves as also Symbols proper to the Prophecy as peculiar to the Christian Church and then the whole Time begins again and runs in seven Seals seven Trumpets seven Voices as unseal'd Thunders seven Vials as so many Conduits Tubes or Pipes of the whole Prophecy under the Conduct and Government of the Lamb with seven eyes and the guiding Operations of the seven Lamps the seven Spirits of God that is of the Divine Spirit in its sevenfold Operations And in all I understand the sabbatical Number deriv'd from the first Sabbath and terminating in the last great Sabbatism of Christ's Kingdom continued with the Sabbatism of Eternity Thus the Prophecy is divided into two Systemes or Complexes of Visions The Systeme of the
Wind could stir when therefore the first blasting Trumpet sounded all true Christian Glory was cover'd shut and seal'd and Apostate Christianity alone in any splendid publick Appearance could be hurt 6. At this very joynt of Time upon the Christian Empire is grafted a Pre-Appearance of the Glory of the New Jerusalem in the innumerable Palm-bearing Company 7. That Glorious Kingdom is notwithstanding the sixth Seal open'd apparently stay'd and estopped in sealing the 144000 of Gods Servants that the Glory of Christ in them could not appear For the Glory of a King is in the Multitude of his People the sealing therefore this square Israelitish Apostolical Number is the sealing and estoppage of the Kingdom it self The seventh Seal is the last Portion of this sealed Time and it keeps its hold on all future Time till the Book and Kingdom are resign'd In which the Visum or Thing seen was the seven Angels that stood before God to whom were given seven Trumpets and these Angels preparing themselves to sound till they just began to sound make up the Representation of this Seal The State of Christs Kingdom is to be understood 1. By the Silence as Characteristick a Note as any of the former Voices For in the structure of this Divine Prophecy the symbols are not only drawn and taken from the Events but He that both manages the Events by his supream Power and erects the Schemes upon them hath design'd provided and contriv'd so much of Event and Symbol one for another that it is a great Symbol that there is no more of such or such Event That while it looks as if it were a Reason why the Symbol goes no further because the Event goes no further It is even yet a Symbol through the admirableness of this Mystick Prophecy that just then and there where the Event ceases the Cessation of the Event comes in the place where that Cessation may create a Symbol And this could be no way thus modelled but by so supream an Authour who is not only the Artificer of the Symbols but the Opifex the absolute Operator of the Events themselves The Reason why the living Creatures spoke no more after the Fourth Seal was not only because there were but Four living Creatures but also because the Pure Apostolical Ministry there ceas'd The Reason why the Souls cryed under the Altar was not only because the Martyrdomes under the Pagan Empire were then compleated That all of that Roll might joyn in that appeal to God but because that was the most Pure and Excellent Voice the Church had then left to speak to God in the Voice of Martyrs Blood that when they were dead yet spoke for after this the Church spoke no more so as to be heard till after the Apostacy nor did the four living Creatures or twenty four Elders appear any more after this Seal till then c. 11. 20. And this Cry was tim'd just before that amazing change in the World that Constantines Conversion produc'd The Reason why an Angels Voice remarqu'd the sixth Seal except only as that so wonderful Event of the Desolation of Heathenism spoke it self was because the Kingdom of Christ was greater in the sealing of so many of his Servants to be hidden under the Antichristian Kingdom then that very Conversion of Constantine which as it let out the Kingdom of Christ so far as in an Emblem let out the Apostacy and Antichristian Kingdom also by accident that just then the 144000 were seal'd and the Woman took her Flight into the Wilderness Lastly the Reason why Silence and Prayers without any audible Voice solemnize this Seal is because the pure Service was reducing to the silent private Prayers of the measured Temple Altar and its Worshipers and the publick Tammith Daily or continual Pure Worship was about to be taken away by the Gentiles Intrusion into the outward Court Chap. 11. 1. Compar'd with Chap. 8. 1. Yet at this Time the Worship was both publick and pure in Gods Account and the Prayers of all Saints came up as Incense before him and the Prosecution the Kingdom opened in all the Seals had made against Heathenism was completed in Theodosius's Famous Victory against it imported in the scatter'd Altar-Incens'd Fire of his and all Christians memorializ'd Prayer in the midst of the Battel with Eugenius upon which followed Voices Thunderings Lightnings and an Earthquake the usual Symbols in this Prophecy of all the Acquists and Prevalencies of Christs Kingdom So the State of the Empire was during this Time a State of Respite Quiet Peace or Victoriousness and Greatness under the Favour of the Precept given to the four Angels that held the four Winds which Precept was yet in full Force and Vertue But all this was but for an Half-hour an imperfect decurtated Time seiz'd and surpriz'd from its Perfection as the Beast's Times have been and much more shall be yet within the Half time The Purity of Worship was surpris'd by the Apostacy the Kingdom of Christ by the Antichristian Kingdom being immediately in Preparation The Glory and Peace of the Empire no sooner vindicated from Paganism but merg'd in Antichristianism and so pursued by Vengeance that punish'd the former in the latter and so also made way by a high mysterious Counsel of Justice for the Antichristian King while it destroy'd the Antichristianiz'd Empire Now the just Time of the whole Course of the Seals opened from the last half Week I estimate at 400 Years For the Decency of the Type of sealed Time it is indeed given in no numeral Account Even as the seven Thunders seal'd are ever after conceal'd and under the Name and explicite Series of seven Thunders never open'd and yet as we shall see produc'd in the seven Voices So this sealed Time and of this seventh Seal ending may be understood 1. By comparing that great opening of the Kingdom of Christ at the first Seal in the Apostolical Preaching and the magnificent Appearance of it in the sixth Seal in Constantine's Conversion and except that short Nubecle that little Cloud of Julian's Apostasie all along the Christian Empire to Theodosius's Death Parallels to each of which nothing appears throughout the Time either in Common or Ecclesiastick History wherein the Christian Church is concerned as shewing Christ's Kingdom 2. By comparing all along the 2300 Ev. and Mor. the 75 of the Word going forth the 490 of the Weeks the 1260 of the Witnesses and its concurrent Numbers and the 75 of the Voices and Vials we have and shall farther find the sealed Time determin'd to 400 Years and ending at 437 when the Trumpets began to sound which ought to be shewn 3. By the Signature of the half Time of the Churches Purity and of the Western Roman Empires Duration before the Vacancy at which Vacancy it enter'd in the New and last In Augustulus form viz. the Bestian we may compute the Sealed Time This I account given by the Voice in the midst of the
still preserv'd on the other side that the Imperial Torch however Flaming yet falling into the Water would be soon quenched while a burning Mountain resisted the contrary Element so Rome liv'd but the Emperour dy'd Rome Burns as a Mountain in the Sea and though it turn'd the Waters into Blood yet it surviv'd to ride aloft upon a new Universality The Flaming Taper did hurt while it flam'd but falling into Water must needs be short-liv'd And it was to dye that another sort of Principality might succeed it upon which Romes Grandeur a City Reigning over the Kings of the Earth might have the Guaranty of Prophecy even as of Providence to secure it for a longer time than by all Computation it had made the Epoch of Vrbs Condita or it had been Built I am yet to state justly and more at large what the Dragon Enquiry 5 means and how his Persecution of the Woman can agree with the Explanation of the Trumpets seeing both must be at the beginning of the Line because then was the Woman's first flight into the Wilderness when the Dragon persecuted her from whence arise these two Doubts How can these Trumpets that are the Alarms of Divine Doubt 1 Judgment and Displeasure upon the Antichristianiz'd Empire as was before declared be the Dragons Persecution of the Woman When the Beast or his Gentiles have the whole Time Doubt 2 Times Half Time and so the 1260 of the Womans Wilderness-state under their Domination and Tyranny does not the Dragons Persecution of the Woman and then of the Seed contradict the Assertion of this Time to the Beast That these two Doubts may be substantially resolved and so as to clear the whole progress of this Time with Relation to the Beast we must understand aright concerning the Dragon for a mistake in that confounds the whole order of the Prophecy The Dragon then as it is presented Revel 12. 3. with Seven Heads and Ten Horns hath a double meaning One proper to it as the sixth or Imperial Head of the Roman Empire which headship is always accounted to the whole Roman Beast in this Prophecy But when the Christian Emperour arose That Head became wounded and by degrees the Power and Conduct of it Transmigrated from the sixth to the seventh Head and Eighth King as is to be shewn upon the Symbols of the Beast But in all this it is of great Influence to the right understanding of this Prophecy to be known there is a more abstract signification of Draconism or of the Dragon viz. the Old Serpent deceiving the Nations into the Worship of himself under the disguise of those many Idol Gods and Demons they sacrificed and did service to when therefore this Idolatry and Demonolatry was demolished by Constantine and the Christian Emperours and the only True God in Jesus Christ and his Kingdom acknowledg'd at the Head of the Roman Empire Satan that Old Serpent was cast down from Heaven and Christ the manly Birth caught up thither Satan therefore as an Intelligence within at the Head and Spring of all is to be understood in this Dragon Revel 12. 7. The Roman Cesars as having the Imperial Monarchick Government of so great a part of the World at the Birth of Christ so along in the first Times of Christianity lay indeed in the midst of Nations and People and watched all the effects of the Kingdom of Christ and were ready to devour the manly Birth that was to rule the Nations with a rod of Iron and who had right to do so at his Resurrection and all along since But at the Time this Cesarian Dragon was acted by that Satan that invisible Spiritual Dragon and his Angels who made War against Christ who carried the Cesarian Dragon in a perpetual Hostility to the Kingdom of Christ and also most devoted to Idolatry While therefore Devils were worshipped under those several Names of Jupiter Mars c. and an Idolatrous Power was at the Head of the Roman Power Satan is accounted in Heaven and the rather so because the Title of Satan is not reckon'd purely of Fraud and Usurpation but By Permission and not only so but even in regard of Justice and divine displeasure against the Apostacy of humane Nature as it were of Commission so that he was overcome and cast down by the Blood of the Lamb as the true meritorious Cause appeasing that Wrath satisfying that Justice expiating the World by the Word of his Testimony as the Grand instrumental Cause and by the Martyrdom of Christians who loved not their Lives unto Death as a subordinate dispose of God in honour to his Justice against the horrible degeneracy of Mankind From hence whatever Power acted by Sathan to an aspiring to a supreme Residency in the Fourth or Roman Monarchy in the days of which Christ's Kingdom was foretold to be set up and of all Right ought to have been so speaking as to the Duty and Obligation of all Mankind because of his Sovereign Resurrection after his Death and Sacrifice of himself for the Life of the World and that then the Roman Monarchy was the Monarchy of the Oecumene or habitable Earth in Symbol of Prophecy whatever Power therefore did not then acknowledge that Kingdom nor that Truth of Christianity any way either seated in or attempting that Monarchy is under a Character of Draconick the Notion of which came into especial date since that Resurrection of Christ and his Right thereby to an universal Monarchy at which Time the Roman Cesareate arisen to that universal Monarchy from the Time of the more publick Notices of the Right of Christ inspir'd by Sathan with a Draconick Subtilty and watchfulness waited to devour that princely Birth of which Pharaoh's Cruelty to Gods typical first-born lying as a Dragon in the Egyptian Nile was a Type and was therefore by the most notable signancy of the Symbol invested with the Draconick Title But when the Acknowledgment of Jesus as Christ and Lord was made by the Christian Roman Emperour Constantine and his Successors Christ was then in eminent Type caught up to the Throne of God never to be dethron'd as we see he is not to this day notwithstanding the Combat of the Dragon and his Angels by Julian Argobastes the Roman Senate and others with Michael and his Angels But for all this the Woman the Church was persecuted by the rolling of the barbarous Nations upon that Empire who were Enemies to the Profession of Christianity at the first and so to the Kingdom of Christ and their Invasion upon the Rights of the Empire as Christs and on the Roman Church as eminent in the Profession of Christianity and having produc'd the Christian Emperour was both as design'd by Satan and reputed by God a Draconick Persecution of the Woman even as after the Mahometan Flood which came out of the Dragon's mouth to have swallowed up Christianity and that Empire together as it were wherever it could be found was on the very
be no Vacuity Rex nunquam moritur where God holds the Succession and its Law firm and so it is to the very Kingdom of Christ Just then when the Christian Emperour deceas'd tht Bestian Emperour succeeded and that was indisputably at 475 and then his forty two Months of Duration succeeded and it was a large Time as Prophecy draws them out and they are still current they must have been yet a long time ago begun for there was the sixth King in Being when the Apostle wrote signifying his Time then in spending The seventh had no long time That end of things the Apostle declares Ch. 18. c. 19. c. 20. c. 21. is beyond all Controversie upon due yea but small Consideration not yet come Therefore this eighth King must have been long upon the Throne and now near the end of his forty two months For he came at the very first of them He came then though as an Infant Prince a Prince as in the Cradle yet then he came Humane History is not more competent to declare the Time when Antichrist was born than the Jews could pronounce aright when the Christ was born yet some chosen Observers there were of the one and of the other some or alarming Indications The Father Jerom sounded it aloud or rather by Inspiration before hand proclaim'd it but God hath judg'd it he hath declar'd it and there can be no incertainty in it When the short-liv'd Christian Emperours and their Empire dyed in the West then it was The true Seat of the Roman Empire being at seven headed seven hill'd Rome was by a wonderful Operation of Providence quitted by the Dragon to be the Seat of the Beast the Christian Emperours resided elsewhere most for still that was the Metropolis of the Bestian Empire Constantinople did but borrow the Name by a secret of Providence of Nova Roma as useful for some Types of Prophecy when the Christian Western Empire was cessated then the Eighth King succeeded his Fourty two Months then began I come now to the second Head of this Discourse The Head 2 Kingdom of Christ must come immediately after the Beasts Fourty two months ended The Law of the Succession requires it it must be then immediately proclaim'd It does not appear all at once no Kingdom does so But its Preparations are seventy five Years So great so glorious an Empire so just so even and cubical in its Thousand Years must have an honourable Preparation And it is but short in comparison During this time all sorts of warnings are given by the seven Thunders unseal'd Revel 14. all kind of Justice done upon Offenders by the Vials c. 16. The Beast hath a kind of dying Life as an outdated Usurper not yet executed but that hath lost his usurped Empire and then Lak'd for Ever This Succession of the Kingdom of Christ is dated by Prophecy to the end of the 1260 Days For then the Witnesses rise go out of their Sackcloth are array'd in a white Cloud Ascend to Heaven they cannot Ascend in Sackcloth but for 1260 Days Sackcloth was their Shrowd it is then certain the 1260 Days End It is certain also the Kingdom of Christ is then proclaim'd for when the second woe past away the third comes quickly No delay and the third woe Trumpet brought it and the first Sound or Report is The Kingdoms of this World are become the Kingdoms of the Lord and of his Christ therefore lastly the forty two months must end with the 1260 days for Christ abated nothing of them by his Kingdom overhastily as is to be shewn and the Beast was to have so many for his Reign The 1260 days and the forty two months ending together Head 3 and the forty two Months beginning at 475 they must be adjusted one to the other as one being Time of the Sun the other as Time of the Moon For as in all Languages and parts of the World Days must and do signifie most properly the Time measured by the Sun so in the eastern and most especially the Jewish and Scripture Language Months signifie only and solely the Time as measured by the Moon and are call'd Novitates Newnesses or Times measured by each new Congress of the Moon with the Sun or new Moons so that however another way of speaking hath prevailed with us a Month of the Sun is as improper as a day of the night or a day measured by the Moon so that if words can signifie as they are always in Scripture us'd to signifie Months must signifie Time according to the motion of the Moon And further as hath been already shewn the Symbol is of the peculiar use in this Prophecy to semble Time of the Night of the Moon that the True Church hath under its Feet and as shall be more seen in a great Remarque upon the Mahometan Moon Because therefore days months years as they are within this Line of Time must all lye within Time Times half Time and equal 1260 days or years There are twice Forty two Months that knitting one within another will supply the shortness to 1260 Days or Years of the Forty two Months either of the Gentiles ending thirty eight years sooner or those of the Beast beginning thirty eight years later than those 1260 Days And as the Moon could be no Moon if there were no Sun to lend it Light so the Sun on a body prepared and moving to it as the Moon casts a Light like that of the Moon certainly and without fail In the same manner there could be no Antichristian months or Church if there were not a true Church and its Seed the Witnesses cloth'd with the Sun of Righteousness all those 1260 Years which cast those Months And if there be such a body as the Antichristian Church moving to the Christian Church as that does it must needs derive Months from its Days equal one to the other And it is most apparent that waving Scriptures round Number Unto the exactness of considerably less than a Years difference the Time of Forty two prophetical months adjusted by the strictest Accountant to the time of 1260 prophetical Days measured by the Moon 's motion from one new Conjunction with the Sun to another will be as 1222 Years to 1260 Years so that if the forty two months of the Beast begin at 475 the 1260 days beginning at 437 they will both end necessarily at 1697 which is the thing that ought to be shewn so great an Exactness so surely arguing the true Calculalation of this Line I hope all will agree cannot be bychance I request then I say a strictness of Account which to avoid both longsomness and perplexity in this Discourse I do not give but by so strict Account two mistakes will be escaped which may arise from a general apprehension of this Matter For it will then be found the Calculation is not to be made by accounting the Time of a Synodical Month to twenty nine days so many hours c.
to shew himself a Beast whereas yet he could not appear so but must remain in his State Is not till this fall and after it too even till he came to his number that Prophecy might be fulfilled when he ascends out of this Abyss And though his fall was but to the Earth yet because instead of the Keys of the Kingdom of Heaven he pretended to he had only the Key of the bottomless Pit he is justly said to rise out of it for that he ascended what was it as the Apostle argues in a much better Case but that he descended first Ephes 4. 9. for seeing he rises to his Power by the Efficacy of his deceivableness of unrighteousness in them that perish by his sathanick Signs and Wonders by his excommunicational Thunders from beneath by which he affrights men downwards and that much of his Potentacy lies in the management of a false Hell of his own founding It is very proper to him to ascend out of the bottomless Pit and the Power of the Keys he assumes is very ominous to him for what he calls Keys is this one Key of the bottomless Pit and so in just derision of him he carries this device in Prophecy The Key of the bottomless Pit was given him I confess The Patriark of Constantinople was the First in this Assumption the Emulation of which mov'd Gregory it is to be fear'd as a lower cause to so high an Exclamation but though he was First yet he was not to have the Key of the Abyss in Supremacy for Prophecy sees not as Man sees by degrees and as in parcels but at once it therefore calls him that fallen Star alone who was to have this Key although the other was a falling Star also and spake as a Dragon He is then and he alone He that hath under Sathan the Key of the bottomless Pit and though an Angel is call'd afterwards the Angel of the bottomless Pit whom we shall find in its due place very diverse from this Star who may seem to have a better right to this Key we shall yet find he was only a Warlike King of the Locusts under the Title of a Prophet the false Prophet Mahomet but was not could not be this Star whose fall must be from Heaven perpetual even as his aspiring Pretensions to Heaven are so continual as shall be further declared as one who once had a fixation in Heaven which Mahomet never had He that ascends out of the bottomless Pit is he that open'd it and let out the Smoke he opens it he lets out the Smoke out of which the Locusts came but against his own Intention he intended himself to ride in this Cloud as in an infernal Chariot alone but with the Smoke Sathan also ascended and became an Angel of the bottomless Pit in the King of the Locusts who were the Flood out of his Mouth propagating his Kingdom by both the Star and by the King of the Locusts The latter of which was principally a great Judgment of God on the Antichristian Star as shall be shewn at large In the mean Time we find the other Beast ministring to this delivery of the Key of the bottomless Pit under the decree and judicial Ordination of God For they made Trial for him of the Efficacy of the Lamb-like Horns joyn'd with the draconick Idolatry and Persecution and so exercis'd the Power of the first Beast before him while he as one and the chief Revel 13. among them look'd on They essayed the calling fire from Heaven and working lying Miracles in his sight to establish the Grandeur of false Prophecy they stirred up all to worship the first Beast viz. The Roman idolatrous Supremacy and to make an Image of Vniversality to it in such a Roman Catholick Supremacy as of the Vicar of Christ on Earth And even the Eastern Horn that aspired for it self above this Beast yet by approving the Idea by making the Experiment by assuming the Title provok'd and inkindled the Ambition of him who by the divine Decree had the Permission got the Possession and hath for many Ages wedg'd himself fast into it and left the other Horn leisure only to be angry at his defeat while his vain claim justifies the thing as lawful and desirable and therefore gave the occasion to the High sounding Voice of Gregory the Great And it is very observable on this very account the Divine Justice fell all along severely upon the Eastern Empire and Patriarchate by the two first woe-Trumpets especially at the taking of Constantinople and to this day lies heavy upon them so that as the Grecian Emperours gave first to the Constantinopolitan Patriarch and then to the Bishop of Rome this Antichristian Vniversality so most distinctly the Wrath of God was very dreadful upon both the Empire and the whole Hierarchy as so antichristianizing and so it continues and will so far conjoyn them in the Punishment of the Beast and false Prophet as they shall not divorce themselves from them by Repentance For this Prophecy looks upon both the Eastern and Western Hierarchy as one and the same Beast with two Horns under the same grand Beast and their People as one Body of Men Gentiles Inhabitants of the Antichristian Earth and Sea and as two Wings of the same Eagle And they all along are both punish'd in and with one another 'T is not the lesser Controversies among themselves concerning Primacy or some other matters that can dissolve the Antichristian Vnion wherein this Prophecy leaves them it must be sincere Repentance turning from Idolatry Superstition Enmity to the pure Religion and from Pride and Tyranny enjoyed only by one one of the Horns indeed for many years as most nearly allied to the Grand Beast but affected by both that must make that Wall of Partition that hath not yet been made between the Eastern and Western Antichristians or between any parts of each and their Antichristianism In the Interim from this very Time we are upon the Beast falling as a Star to the Antichristian Earth receives as Latin that is strictly Roman the Universality of both East and West as was always design'd by God to be so given or permitted and so by degrees enlightens Rome when all the Rulers of the Day and even of the Night were smitten gone down and set and now he begins to carry the Woman on high even at his first ascending and so gradually as he ascends to his Number And hereby the fallen Star appears to be the same Beast that rises out of the bottomless Pit to war with the Witnesses and therefore must be the same that wars with the Saints who are the Witnesses and who is led captive or taken by the Lamb and his Army of the faithful and true and goes into Perdition that is is cast into the Lake and so the same throughout And when he is so cast into the Lake an Angel of another Character does not fall but descends from Heaven
to 1697. We have found the order in which it hath come on very clear brought down by Prophecy in Symbols so justly proportionate to matters of Fact and Events all along History first to the Apostacy and from thence by as unquestionable a Chain of Events during that Apostacy as hath been before describ'd till the Reformation and now we shall find the Reformation as admirably set out and no other things in the whole course of Time answering to each Representation as those Cardinal Points of History do What greater Demonstration then can we have that we are upon the right sense and scope of Prophecy Since such admirable Correspondencies as if we our selves by our own Judgments had been to contrive the one for the other we could not under Veils have desired so much and therefore they can no more be suspected of chance then that the Letters Sillables and Words of the Apocaliptick Prophecy should come out by chance into that exact System wherein we now find them I pray therefore which of these grand Events can by History be contested or what fitter prophetical Symbols could be found out for them or in such a Succession And so we shall find in this particular of the Reformation so recent and fresh in History and all most in Memory at this day and at this day running on so that the Instances of it are most notorious confess'd and even to be admired in the Wonders of Providence that brought it to pass and yet sustain it When therefore the Bestian or Antichristian Kingdom was coming so near its number as that the Image of Supremacy had been made to the Beast at the 606 confirmed to it and Life given to it to speak and to cause c. by the Lateran Councel at 649. come to its very number at 725. The War was between the Beast and the Witnesses represented by the Jeconoclastick Emperours and their Constantinopolitan Councel damning Image Worship 754 but then the Witnesses were overcome by the Cessation of those Emperours and by that Councel of Nice 787 and so they lying dead till their first motion to a rising 1517. While all these things were the Judgment of God in just Degrees and Measures pursued with Vengeance this Antichristian Kindom First by Mahomets setting up his false Prophetism as near the Supremacy given by Phocas as 622 to 606 by the Locusts or Mahometan Saracens ready to enter their first five Months and to strike as a Serpion about the Time of the War with the Witnesses especially at their Death 787 And together with the Apostacy strengthning it self they advanc'd into their second five Months of hurting with the stings of their Tails and when a winterly torpidness seiz'd them then by the Turks as a far greater and more severe as also more continuing Scourge God Executed his Judgments on this Antichristian Empire But the Impenitency still continuing Christ Appears as it were from Heaven in the Reformation and how evident is it that the Reformation followed on such a state of the Latine or strictly Roman World for can any pretend there was after the taking of Constantinople any shew of Repentance Repentance of their worshiping Demons departed Spirits or Images and Pictures of Gold or Silver Wood or Stone which neither hear see or walk nor did they repent of their Murthers those cruel Butcheries of the Saints and Servants of God nor of their Sorceries those bewitchings of Men with a false sensual Religion their lying or magical and Necromantick Miracles ascrib'd to Relicks Images and the Idolized Host nor of their Fornications allowed Concubinacies and Stews nor of their Thefts their pious Frauds and wiping men of their Goods and Estates by Cheats and to false and impious Ends and that this high and avowed impenitency was not only then but hath continued ever since appears too much by the Councel of Trent and the whole Tract of time after the Reformation 1. Let us then consider the Appearance as it were of Christ from Heaven against this Impenitency He the mighty supream Angel of the divine Presence comes down from Heaven though sitting in Heaven in his mighty Administrations 2. He is cloathed with a Cloud his Face as the Sun breaking out of the Cloud and creating a Bow as in the day of Rain These Appearances are as after a Flood not yet removed the Clouds were yet hovering and flying the Rain not yet gon the Brightness watery and yet with significations of Mercy and the Grace of the Covenant That the Flood should be drawn off and return no more to cover the Earth 3. His Feet as Pillars of Fire signifying both the refining and purification of his Servants as also their Vivi Comburin their Death in the midst of Flames as we know how frequent they were at that Time 4. He had in his Hand an open Book the Book of his Kingdom as if he were now ready to publish the Decree of his universal Psal 2. 7. Reign which had been so often stay'd by sealing and now after the Seals opened and the six Trumpets sounding ready to reveal it self 5. As a signal of his unbounded Dominion He sets his Dan. 12. 6. right Foot on the Sea and his left Foot on the Earth as from the Sea to the end of the Earth 6. He cried with a Loud Voice as when a Lion roars when he received the Book He is call'd the Lion of the Tribe of Judah Then he prevail'd to open the seven Seals now as the same Revel 5. 5. Lyon he holds the Book open shewing his just right to the Throne of David the Throne and Empire of the new Jerusalem and roars from his Holy Habitation 7. When he had thus roared seven thunders utter their Voices as in an Eccho or resound of Heaven above to his just 2 Sam. 2. 10. claim and as Hannah prophecyed of old The Lord shall thunder from Heaven on his Adversaries so he on the Adversaries of his Kingdom when he comes to judge the end of the Earth when God gives strength to this his King and exalts the Horn of his Anointed Now all these things were that powerful sound of the Gospel and divine Truth by Luther and the first Reformers like the Angels coming down from Heaven and rouling away the Stone in Preparation of the Lords Resurrection This arous'd Matt. 28. 1. and amaz'd the World then even as the Keepers of the Grave were as dead Men when Christ arose and this was more a dreadful stroke upon the Bestian Kingdom then Mahometanism it self For this was an Arrow levell'd at the Heart of his Kingdom and declared it to be Antichristian an Usurpation upon the Glory of Christ This was a dawn of the most terrifying Appearance of Christ and shaked the very Foundations of his State This accompanied with the Separation of so many Princes and States from that Antichristian Empire was more formidable then all the Assaults of a false and barbarous Religion however
Wilderness coequally in both Whenever the 1260 Days end the Witnesses Apoc. 12. 6. v. 14. Apoc. 11. 14. ascend then the sixth Trumpet and its Woe passes away Then the seventh Trumpet sounds Let us lay all this to the Oath of Christ Dan. 12. 7. There shall be Time Times half a Time and all these things shall be finish'd and to the Oath Revel 10. 6. Time shall be no more but till the seventh Trumpet then the Mystery of Christ's Kingdom succeeding shall be finish'd These two Oaths so solemn as to have no parallels so equal and even in all their aweful Rites except we observe a difference in the mention of only Hand in the Apocal and the Right and Left in Dan. as if signifying in the Apocal The half-time was yet remaining These two so solemn Oaths can by no means contradict but must confirm one another one looks forward on Time to come and assures there shall be Time Times half a Time and all things shall be finish'd the second looks back on all but the half-time already past and assures there shall be no more whole Time but at the seventh Trumpet to which there remain'd only half time All should be finish'd So the Half-time is secur'd to the Beast in a party-Party-Kingdom 1. By sealing the Thunders for while they were seal'd the Kingdom of Christ could not perfectly appear seeing their sealing continues that Delay of it all along signified by sealing 2. By the express Allowance of time at large till the seventh Trumpet For when it is said Time shall be no more But in the days of the seventh Trumpet All shall be finished It is a certain Implication Till then there shall be some Allowance of Time although not a whole Time nor so much as a whole Half time nor any Time at all of the Elevation Intimate Time was of or of a Kingdom so entire to the Beast Whoever then knows these two Oaths will compare them whoever compares them will conclude There must have been before the last Oath Time Times and some part of Half-time that the first Oath may be true he will also conclude There can be no more than Half-time and not that whole for there can be only an imperfect Remnant of time after this last Oath else How can this last Oath be true And yet it is impossible any part of the 1260 Days or three times and a half equal to them should run beyond the end of the sixth or the very entrance of the seventh Trumpet for it is expresly said when the Witnesses ascended which they could not do till the end of the 1260 Days Prophecy in Sackcloth the seventh Trumpet immediately sounded Thus these 1260 Days are every way bounded by the seventh Trumpet they cannot end sooner for then there would be Time after the Oath more than the Half-time and the seventh Trumpet not sound which must not be And they cannot run beyond the first of the seventh Trumpet because they must needs end when the VVitnesses so perfectly rise as to ascend as before said which is before the seventh Trumpet or 1697. Whither then must these 1260 days reflow from the seventh trumpet beginning to sound Into the spaces of what trumpet or trumpets as into their proper Channel Into the sixth trumpet they certainly do but that cannot receive them all for allowing after the taking of Constantinople sixty four Years for the making the Experiment of the Impenitency of the rest of Men the half-day immediately appear'd joyning then the half-time or day of 180 Years to 64 that Space receives only 244 by vertue of the Mahometan Hour or a defined Space allowed them beyond their Day Month and Year To which day month year being 395 add the 244 and they are 639 which is the whole and that a very long space of the sixth trumpet delaying the seventh also that comes and quickly dispatches to hereafter But seeing this trumpet holds but 639 somewhat above half of the 1260 Days they must be thrown back into the fifth trumpet which having room but for 435 as we have before found from the Hegira 622 the remaining 186 must regurgitate into the four first trumpets where they find just entertainment to 437 even as all these accounting forward determine from space to space at the same 1697. Turning things thus every way then we may find how the order of this Apocalyptical Prophecy lies upon this Line of Time and how and with what secret Invitations the Characters or Dates of Time are call'd after the Voice of the Lyon and the Thunders-Voices at the Reformation to every prophetical Symbol either of the Sufferings of the Servants of God or of the Apostacy and Tyranny of the Bestian Kingdom engraven with them and first why although the Characters of Time began at the Beginning of the trumpets they are not given till after the Vision of the Reformation Chapt. 10. 1. First then till after the opening of the Kingdom of Christ at the Reformation it was neither Condecent to the prophetical types of either the dark obscure and conceal'd state of the Servants of God nor the entireness of the Beast's Kingdom that either the Servants of God should be rescued from their Death and Condemnation nor the Beast discover'd to be the Beast as he was at the Reformation for how then should his Kingdom stand or the VVitnesses lye dead each their Time Prophecy therefore observes the order of the Events themselves foreseen and foretold even as the Beast was believ'd to be no Beast but the Vicar of Christ all the Time of his Kingdom entire and the VVitnesses Hereticks and no VVitnesses so in the Prophecy till the Book of the Kingdom open'd by the Claim of Christ we neither read of the Beast nor of the VVitnesses nor of the Gentiles nor of the Woman in the Wilderness but by some very silent Intimations This Order became the Prophecy and its Emblems 2. The History of the trumpets taking in in the sixth trumpet the entire History of the 1260 Days goes on to the end of the sixth trumpet in particular and of all the trumpets in general even to the end of the seventh and that grand Scope or Aim in its Eye the history of the Witnesses comes hereby to be deliver'd whole and entire also as also of the Bestian Kingdom in one summary Platform very agreeable to the Composure of the best histories that delay any principal Subject its Treaty till the due season whereas the end of the 1260 Days of the VVitnesses and of the Bestian Fall could not have been given as the end of the 1260 Days if the whole had not been taken and comprehended together seeing till the end of that sixth trumpet that end proper to each did not appear and yet something like it did appear before at the Reformation 3. The end of the sixth trumpets Woe as it joyns the end of the witnesses Sackcloth the Fall of the great City and makes one the
although they are as overflowings of the Prophecy beyond its Conduct of things within the Trumpets yet it is most demonstrable They must all return within the Trumpets and Time at large begin with the Trumpets and intimate Time be guided by the Pillar of Time erected within the fifth Trumpet For seeing the Woman and the Witnesses 1260 days must needs be equal in their Beginning and Ending and the Beasts Intimate Time must be plac'd where the Witnesses Vanquishment and Death are and that these must be within the Trumpets nay in that all Time must be before the seventh Trumpet and end at it All Time therefore from thence in account recoyls backward so as to find room for it self even to the first of the 1260 Days within the first Trumpet which beginning at 437 ends with 42 the Concent of all Periods at 1697. All which ought to be evinc'd all along and I do more then hope hath been so evinc'd I have already prevented my self in the Remarques of this whole Line by placing them early in the first Views of it and therefore now make only these short ones as a Conclusion We may be heal'd of any dangerous Wonder that an Remark 1 Apostacy from Christian Religion so foul and thick as to need no Confutation of its Figments and Fables the very Title his Holiness Vicar of Christ do so loudly proclaim Antichrist That such a one hath endur'd so long a Time hath captivated the Wise the Learned the Politick the Noble the Royal the Imperial we see in this Prophecy It was to do so and by this Oath of Christ it was and is to last Time Times half Time even till the end of it It is to do so e're its Decem Principality It s ten horn'd Kingdom Fall And although it began by degrees yet it hath two most sudden Downfalls one at the Reformation as but in preparation and beginning the other at the end of that Half time then begun viz. at 1697 when His Fall shall be exceeding great Seeing it is most impossible Intimate time should return Remark 2 whatever Sufferings there may be of the Church of Thyatyra how great how dismal soever yet there cannot be a slaying of the Witnesses any more for Christ hath sworn with the Rainbow cap. 10. 1. on his Head It shall be as the Waters of Noah to him Isa 54. 9. There shall be no such Return for ever nor can I apprehend the Church of Sardis can in any parts of the Reform'd Nations Rev. 3. 3. v. 9. lose its State by a Return of that Apostacy its only danger is its shame that without Repentance will befall it at the more glorious Appearance of Christ's Kingdom and especially those Parts of it that have relapsed to a Synagogue of Sathan shall with double shame be forc'd to come and worship at Philadelphia's Feet and to know Christ hath lov'd it who endeavour'd to shut its Door Seeing we are compassed about with so great a Cloud of Witnesses Remark 3 let us with great Confidence wait hope expect pray for the great Glory that is to be brought unto us at that great Appearance that will be made of the Kingdom of Jesus Christ at the end of the half time or half day or at the last of the last 180 of 1260 Days viz. at 1697 so often memorializ'd although but in preparation to that Kingdom it self 75 Years after And if we shall not live to it in this World yet we shall lose nothing by it for in Heaven and with the Lamb on Mount Zion we shall with the other Witnesses rejoyce in Rev. 14. 1. so happy a Change as will even then be made and so rejoyce for ever each in our Lot of the Land of Promise or the New Jerusalem The end of the second Point of this Line of Time or its Period SECT XIV Wherein is contained a brief Disquisition upon the seven Voices as they run along Apoc. ch 14. THE last Line of Time upon the grand Line of Daniel's 2300 Ev. Mor. stretches out it self beyond the so often repeated Prophetical Line we have been upon and yet it is most justly and according to the Reason of the Line to be joyned with it because the holy Spirit hath in Daniel so joyned to 1260 30 more making 1290 and then 45 making 1335 as hath been so often observ'd so that from hence however joyn'd rises a distinct Line of 75 Years consisting of its lesser Distinctions 30 and 45. And with great Wisdom and Design they are undoubtedly thus joyn'd and yet distinguish'd for hereby is shewn 1. That it is the same principal Line of 2300 Ev. Mor. thus protended 2. That the managements of Divine Power as to the Divine Kingdom are of a distinct nature from what they were any part even the last and best part that is the half-Half-time of the 1260 Days or since the Reformation and yet that there is an Agreement too so that the Kingdom is distinctly advanc'd in the first 30 above the State of it along the half-Half-time and still farther and higher advanc'd in the last Distinction or the forty five and yet that the Kingdom does not appear in Glory until the End of the 1335 all which appears very plainly both in Daniel and this Apocalyptick Prophecy where seeing the Voices and the Vials come after the 1260 Days we may conclude by the Union and by the Distinction together That the latter end of the sixth Trumpet adheres close to the seventh and then by the Voices first and the Vials after them both of the seventh Trumpet following so close one upon another and by the Blessed State coming upon all we may be most assur'd the Voices and the Vials answer to the Thirty and the Forty five Years of Surplusage to the 1260 Days so distinguish'd and so conjoyn'd Now that these Voices and Vials of the seventh Trumpet are yet to come and to come in the Order laid down and within the Time laid down these six Things may indubitably convince us 1. We may be fully assur'd nothing so great as the seven Thunders could be heard before the Reformation so high so loud for the Kingdom of Christ so they must be with the Reformation beginning 2. There is most apparently a space allowed for the Thunders remaining seal'd after their Voices uttered which space hath so great reason as hath been given to be rated at a half-Half-time or 180 Years and so cannot be run out yet since the Reformation 3. Nothing so eminent since the Reformation as the Fall of the Tenth of the Great City or the Turkish Woe ceasing whatever hopes now appear nor of the seventh Trumpet so closely lynck'd with both hath yet been seen 4. The Oath of Christ that Time should be no more cannot possibly allow such a space of Time or Delay as the Half-time after Time Times Half-Time within the seventh Trumpet or indeed any Time at all wherein every thing should not be in
A Scripture-Line OF TIME Drawn in Brief From the Lapsed Creation to the Restitutution of all Things Discours'd at large upon the 2300 Ev. Morn Dan. 8. 14. And their Collateral Lines From CYRVS to the Kingdom of CHRIST in the New Jerusalem By T Beverley Blessed is he that waiteth and cometh to the 1335 Dayes viz. the Last of the 2300. Dan. 12. 12. We are not of the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Apostasie to Perdition but of the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Apostolick Faith to the saving of the Soul Heb. 10. 39. Printed according to a Calendar 1684. ERRATA THE Errors in this Impression are either small by change of a Letter mispointings sometimes want of Points or of a Parenthesis which it is hop'd the considering Reader will easily over-rule by the sence The more notorious are thus to be corrected before the reading the Book p. 5. l. 6. before the end for 230 r. 2300. l. 4. before the end for as r. was p. 12. l. 23. for shape r. scope p. 20. l. 17. for Revelational r. Revelation p. 36. l. 13. before the end for 2302. r. 2300. p. 63. l. 23. for Kingdoms r. Kingdom p. 66. 16. blot of p. 82. l. 28. blot was Second Part. At p. 66. of the second part some more noted Errata's are mark'd which the Reader is desir'd to mend before Reading IN the Title for XXII r. XVI Sections p. 39. l. 11. before the end for 626. r. 622. p. 46. l. 11. after hundred blot the Comma p. 47. l. 25. for sufferings r. sufferers p. 58. l. 1. blot all of them p. 103. l. 12. after Tribunes blot of the People p. 110. l. 6. after Head blot Com. p. 11. l. 16. after by blot him p. 127. at l. 13. Marg. Argument 2. p. 128 at l. 7. Margent Argument 3. p. 135. l. 16. r. Surd p. 146. l. 23. r. Tempt one p. 151. l. 3. r. Grandiloquence p. 163. l. 11. remove the Colon after Smyrna to after camein p. 175. l. 20. blot the Figures after with In the Preface p. 4. l. 10. after Discourses r. without p. 4. l. 11. after compar'd r. with THE PREFACE TO Those who desire to Hear and Vnderstand the Words of Scripture Prophecy My very Honoured Friends THE Scripture Line of Time which I affirm is that which rises from the excellent State of All Things at Creation when followed an immediate Deordination flowing from the Apostasie and Fall of Man through the Serpents Temptation But by the interposal of the Promised Seed of the Woman That State was borne up from utter Ruine and sinking and a Prospect given of a Restitution of all Things by a new Creation when the Serpents Head should be bruis'd Now of this Restitution all the holy Prophets have been speaking since the Worlds Beginning and they have led along the Course of things to it in the Exaltation of Him whose Name is the Word of God the Alpha and Omega of the written Word till He appears encircled with many Crowns Revel 19. At which That old Serpent the Devil and Sathan is laid hold upon chain'd and seal'd up within his proper Abyss or Bottomless Pit and the New Creation is establish'd in the Kingdom of this Many-Crown'd King Which Kingdom can never be broken nor leaves a possibility of any Succession to it self But it is deliver'd up into the Hand of the Father from which it is receiv'd before which Delivery or Resignation shall be the perfect and final Contusion of the Serpents Head Himself and all his Off-spring not written in the Book of Life being cast with Death and Hell into the Lake of Fire which is the second Death Rev. 20. This blessed State therefore is not a single Sabbath but a Sabbatism of a thousand years that remains to the People of God conjoyn'd inseparably with the Sabbatism of Eternity even as the seventh day Sabbath of the Creation was connected with united in and immediately succeeded by the Christian first day Sabbath or Our Lords Day at his Resurrection This Line of Time I then avow is drawn from that former Sabbath of the First Creation to the Sabbatism of the New Creation as from Point to Point without Ostentation or formal Profession of such a Line yet so that it is all along and especially the Commissures and Joynts of the parcel and particular Lines are ennobled with some illustrious Symbols of the down fall of Sathans Kingdom and of the Glory of the Kingdom of the Seed or of the Teknogony of the Woman as may be abundantly made good in all Instances At what I have aim'd and for what end in the calculation of this Line I have prepared a full Discourse may be seen by the Calendar annexed to this Preface what I have perform'd may be seen hereafter if God permit the Publication of that Preparation upon the whole Line At this Time I have only presented my Endeavours upon that grand Prophetick Line of Daniels 2300 Evenings Mornings which is by the admirable contrivance of the Divine Wisdom given first entire and so preserv'd as not to be under any such Prejudice from the formidable variation of Copies as the Ages of the Patriarks are and then the parcel or collateral Lines either in number'd Numbers or as I hope will appear on very good Proof rise exactly adequate to the 2300 so that the whole and the Parts demonstrate and assure one another besides I vouch those undoubted and indisputable Lines delineated in the Calendar as far as to Cyrus indisputable I do not mean so much when they began or how much Time they comprehend For so I know there are many Doubts through Difference of Copies or otherwise but in this indisputable that Holy Writ hath taken care there should be an Account of Time so far And this I vouch as an Argument That he who begun a Line from the Creation continued it to Cyrus and defin'd by seventy weeks the space from the word going forth to the Messiah hath every where fill'd it up and continued it to the Kingdom of Jesus Christ seeing he as easily commands Time future by Prophecy as Time past by History and I do find both are certain and definite to that preciseness as to be twice once in History once in Prophecy said to be the self same day viz. the coming out of Egypt Exod. 12. 40. and the Vision of the New Jerusalem Ezek. 40. 1. And that very Charactarism of Ezekiels 390 and 40 days lying on his two sides I look upon as an especial contrivance of the Holy Spirit to mediate between the Historical and Prophetick Pares of Time that being part Historick viz. to the Time of the Siege especially and more or less so to that Vision of the New Jerusalem and of very great Symbolical Importance also concerning the state of the Twelve Tribes till the Times of the Gentiles that entred in Nebuchadnezzars Universal Monarchy were fulfill'd of all which with the answer of all Doubts
upon that and other the Visions of Ezekiel relating to Time I have at large treated in that afore promis'd Discourse only I cannot omit the Prophetical Cypher of Time translated from the 40 Days for forty years in the Wilderness is here solemnly given with its Key as of perpetual Scripture use from thence I can with great Truth and Sincerity make Protestation It was no part of my Design to enter a Dispute with any Perswasion of Christians but only to pursue the Line of Time as it reaches that illustrious Sabbatism for which I find Eminent Persons of all Perswasions have very great Favour But doing this I could not avoid but that the Antichristian Apostacy as seated in the City that in the Time of the Revelation given and its Prince are so fathally enwrap'd in all parts of Prophecy that they must be every where attack'd yet I have taken care to do it only in the Terms and Phrases of Prophecy and as the necessary Explication of it and its Times enforc'd Notwithstanding I had no such Intention I find no Discourses upon or against that Apostasie in any degree comparable either in clearness or assurance if disjoyn'd from Prophecy as when conjoyn'd with it either for determination of Theological Doctrinal Controversies or Differences in History or Chronology as when such corrupt Doctrines superstitious Innovations in Christian Worship Usages and Usurpations in Christian Discipline entred the World and at what rate of Detestation they ought to be Had All these are more certainly and more briefly resolv'd when Prophecy hath the umpirage for little Intimations either deriv'd from Grounds of Scripture or Reason or from History and General Opinion when Prophecy inclines with them or supposes things agreeably with them will weigh against vast Volumes on the other side with which Prophecy propends not Thus I am much more assur'd by observing what is after fully discours'd from Prophecy concerning Image-worship however palliated that it is that so much detested Idolatry forbidden in the second Commandment then from all Rational Discourses with Prophecy however grounded on Scripture but not compar'd without Prophecy for a fuller Interpretation of it I am much more assur'd in what Class of Religions and Churches that Religion and Church is to be repos'd that on such Terms calls it self Catholick by laying them into the Prophetical Scales then by the most considerable Moments of Discourse without Prophecy I know better when a Church-Supremacy entred by the Prophetical Era joyn'd with that however it may be by any controverted Agreement of History that Phocas gave it Anno 606 then I can know by some very learned Tracts concerning it I better understand of what small avail that Distinction betwixt the Court and the Church of c. in Vogue with some great Names can be by offering it to the Prophetical Test then by any other way of Exploration although I look upon the Distinction as a Confession extorted by Divine Judgment upon both from Prophets of their own that that Court is the Court of the Beast and that he ought to have such a Court that the Prophecy might be fulfill'd And what a Church it is I learn from the Prophetical System of the Churches of which I have given a brief survey though it does not so expresly concern Time yet as most admirably illustrating as well as concurring with other Prophetical Iconisms and Characters of Time And to every part I have added Brief Remarques directing to that Faith and Patience of the Saints to that keeping the Commands of God and the Testimony of Jesus which are the use of all the Discourse that at that Glorious Resurrection It may be said of us Here are they that have so done Revel 14. 12. Thus I have given Account of what is now drawn in full and whole and what only in little in short Calendary Proportions which I intend if God please to give in more proper Dimensions as also to make compleat concerning the Churches concerning the Voices and Vials concerning the thousand years what is rather in Perspective then in just Figures of Discourse I have only to add that notwithstanding speaking or writing the Word of God I must obey the heavenly Visions throughout yet as that teaches me I yield all the Regards Deferences of Honour and esteem due to the Character Learning Vertue general Profession of Christianity that I can render to every Person and much more to Princes and all in Authority however of a Communion I could for this Prophesies sake most earnestly pray and even offer my Life in the Service they might not be of But nothing can be more effectual against Rebellion Sedition or any Irregularity towards Government and supream Power then the Right Vnderstanding of this Prophecy For while Holy Prophecy styles them Kings who yet give their Kingdoms to the Beast the plain Doctrinal and Preceptive part of Scripture obliges as to fear God so to Honour those whom It so styles Kings and then Prayers Supplications Intercessions giving of Thanks should be made for them and for all in Authority Nor is it possible any Pretence of setting up or advancing Christs Kingdom can justifie any Rebellions mutinous or seditious Commotions seeing hitherto It is most evident they have proceeded upon mistakes of Time And when ever that Kingdom shall Appear The manner of Appearance is mistaken also for it is not as from Earth but as from Heaven Heavenly Spiritual Pure Peaceable yet Efficacious and Almighty Regular Orderly conducted by lawful Sovereigns even those who till the Words of God are fulfill'd have so given their Power so that as well may the Doctrine of the Day of Judgment which no created Power can produce or oppose be made a pretence for Rebellion as the Doctrine and Prophecy of Christs Kingdom or be complain'd as dangerous to Government or destructive to Humane Society That therefore we may be Aright guided by this sure Word of Prophecy that shines as a Light in a dark place is my Grand Design in this publication even till it be wholly Unriddled and Unveil'd as it shall be when it Turns to the Lord just then Appearing however it be now Veil'd when it looks from Him as at a distance 2 Cor. 4. 3. v. 13. 16. from that Appearance and towards us for our Instruction and as inviting our Diligent search first and then our Expectation Prayer and earnest Desire for the Quick Coming of our Lord Jesus Christ especially now his Appearance grows so near And that we may be thus guided is also the most Humble and Incessant Prayer of My very Honoured Your most Faithful Servant in this Work Beverley If any Person either Friendly and from desire of further satisfaction in this Point or Unfriendly and from Prejudgment please to make any notice of it to me I doubt not by the Evidence of this Prophecy and the Gracious Assistance of the Spirit of it to satisfie their Doubts and remove their Prejudice upon fair Allowances
the Days of Cyrus while that Worship remain'd to be Gods Worship from which impure Pessundation that Holy Worship was most wonderfully vindicated and the Time of his Tyranny being in the most intimate part of it in literal or natural Account near the Time of Antichrists 1260. Days at a day for a year and near the whole 2300 in the whole of it and being broken by an immediate Hand from Heaven without an earthly Hand as Antichrist shall be He is made a most notable and eminent Type of Antichrist and so with Relation to Him and his Time a Line is drawn from Cyrus to the cleansing of the Sanstuary polluted by Antichristian Gentiles and to the breaking of Antichrist without Hand Antiochus standing all this while in open view as a Type and his Time as a Typical Line of Time And yet while his Time will serve a Typical End It is not exact enough to either main Intention to be the principal Thing to be measured by that Line of Time And for the making good these Assertions I shall now apply my self to the solemn Proof of these two Propositions 1. That the 2300 Days are a definitive Line of Time from the beginning of the Persian Monarchy to the very End of the Monarchies and till the Supream Monarchy of Christ and so are to be joyn'd to the end of the last Line and thereby to the several Lines from the Creation that altogether may reach that End 2. That the Vision principally intends Antichrist in every Part wherein Antiochus stands as a Type For the Proof of the first Assertion I use this first Argument Argu. 1 There is a plain Concatenation or Connexion of this Vision with the former as following orderly upon or after it For that purpose and to make it known it is so Daniel tells us This Vision appear'd unto him after that which appear'd c. 8. v. 1. unto him at the first Now that this was not intended as any Date of the Vision is very plain in that It is more particularly dated by assigning it to the third Year of Belshazzar whereas the first was assign'd to the first year of the same Belshazzar and so must needs be after the first Vision even as Belshazzars Third Year must be after his First These words therefore cannot but be of further Importance and signifie to us This Vision comes after the Former in a just Order and promotes the scope of it and adds further Light to it Now it is most evident the four Beasts intending four Kingdoms and Antichrist the little Horn with his Time Times and half a Time and then his being destroy'd and the Kingdom of Christ succeeding are the Principal Objects of that Vision and therefore they must be so of This. And in some notable Instance thereof It must exceed the Notices of the former and what can that be but in the Notices of Time Wherein it is so particular as to 2300 Evenings Mornings for to shew it one Line of Time It is in the Hebrew 2300 Evening Morning not 2300 Evenings Mornings although for Arguments sake with Ordinary Language and in Agreement with the sence we may express them in the plural Number and it is also call'd the Vision of the Evening Morning as so many Evenings and Mornings combin'd into one from the Monarchy of Cyrus the Persian to the Monarchy of Christs Vniversal Kingdom The Vision begins at the Persian Monarchy goes on General Argu. 2. through the Grecian Monarchy and so to the End and the Line of Time runs parallel with the Vision therefore the Line of 2300 Evenings Mornings must reach from the Beginning of the Persian Monarchy to the Monarchy of Christ which is the known and most undoubted End of the Four Monarchies and of all Monarchy but under him This Argument consists of these three main Propositions 1. That the Vision begins at the Persian Monarchy 2. That it runs on through the Grecian Monarchy to the End 3. That the Line of Time runs Parallel with the Vision SECT II. That this Vision begins at the Persian Monarchy and the Proof of it THat the Vision begins at the Persian Monarchy I give these undoubted Reasons It is most apparent in the very Portal of the Vision it was Reason 1 given at Shushan the Pallace by the River Vlai a River of Persia whither the Prophet was visionally convey'd out of Babylon to shew the Translation of the Monarchy from the Babylonian to the Persian Prince The Babylonian Monarchy was yet standing the Prophet a Subject of it in principal Place for he continued in his Preferment in Babylon till Cyrus the Persian He must therefore Dan. 1. 21. be resident at the time of the Vision in Babylon and not a Runnagate from it and his Loyalty but was prophetically and visionally set down at the Pallace of Persia to shew where the Visions Date was to commence viz. from the Persian Monarchy If this were not enough the Exposition of the Vision begins Reason 2 with the King of Persia and where the Exposition begins the Vision begins neither of these can be contested The Vision crops off the Babylonian Monarchy The Head Reason 3 of Gold and the first Beast like a Lyon does not under any Symbol or Representation appear in it The Monarchy was now indeed just expiring in Belshazzar's Third which Scripture counts upon as his last Year and whereas the former Visions were deliver'd to us in the Language of that Empire that thereby All People Tongues and Languages which take care by one means or other to have knowledge of the Imperial Language might have notice of them The Holy Spirit returns in this Vision to the Hebrew Tongue peculiar to the Church of God in the Old Testament But the Monarchy was not yet fully expir'd nor was the Image in all succeeding Ages to be bereft of its Head while therefore the Image and the Iconism of the four Beasts compleating the Image stood in the Eye of Prophecy Nebuchadnezzer is the principal in the first Monarchy with the Heart of a Man after his Eagles Wings were pluck'd importing his sober Acknowledgments of God upon the Humiliation into which his Frenzy dejected him even into a state among the Beasts but he seems to have risen out of Bestianism it self by abasing himself before God Dan. 4. ult The Beast in the Revelation To shew the Monarchick Power of the Image translated into that of the Beasts Kingdom survived whole and entire in him is resembled with every one of the Beasts himself being the fourth and to assure us he is the very fourth he hath neither in Daniel nor the Apocalips any shape peculiar to him but what in the Apocalips is compounded of the Three as it were to say All the Three existed in him as in one Image Revel 13. 2. The principal Reason therefore of omitting the Babylonian Monarchy is because The Prophetical Type of the four Monarchies being fully satisfied and replenished
Story betwixt these Visions and the Messiah But the so strange the so unaccountable foul longsome Apostacy of Antichrist lying so long on the so excellent Religion of the Gospel ecclipsing the Kingdom of Christ Full of all the most pernicious Effects is deservedly Astonishing to Angels and Men and captivating the Many the Wise and the Great against all Scripture Reason and even common Sense and were it not for that Captivation as unworthy Confutation as the Alchoran The very History of Antiochus as it were proper to Antichrist is only to be found in the Antichristian Canon of Scripture and only Typically given in Daniels Prophecy shewing it of no great Account with God The Time The understanding dark Sentences the growing great not by his own Power are no way applicable to any historical Memoirs of Antiochus A Prince furious active enterprising at the Head of his warlike Affairs Lastly the very Ev. Mor. of this Line a manner of Speech not used in Scripture from the very first of Genesis till now lead us to the new Creation to the Restitution of all things to the bright Mornings Stars display of his Beams and in the mean time even as Days compounded of Ev. and Mor. so these Ev. Mor. with equal Fitness and Naturalness sustain the prophetical Type of Time Days for Years Of all which let this be the applicatory Remark to lead Remark us with Confidence Assurance due Preparation Faith Prayer and earnest Desire to him who saith Behold I make all things new and immediately after as it were in remembrance Dan. 8. 26. compar'd with Rev. 21. 5. of his Declarative Amen upon the Vision of the Ev. and Mor. It is true imposes his perfectory Finitive Amen When he says no longer Seal but write in Capital Letters These Sayings are faithful and true Whoso then by following the Lamb whithersoever he goes overcomes shall inherit all Things Christ will be his Father He shall be the Son of God and of Christ. But the Fearful who are frighted into Antichristian Cympliances the Abominable c. sunk down into the Defilements of all sorts proper to the foul State Falshood and the great Lye of the Apostacy shall have their part in the Lake that burns with Fire and Brimstone where the Beast and the False Prophet are Let us then live by Faith and not draw back for He that shall come will come and will not tarry Even so Come Lord Jesus Come quickly Amen SECT III. In which a Line of Seventy Five Years precedent to the seventy Weeks is asserted and endeavour'd to be prov'd Dan. 9. HAving in the precedent Sections establish'd the Grand Line of 2300 Ev. Mor. and their Determination to the Kingdom of Christ I now proceed to the Distribution of this Line and first to the Line that must however subordinate and collateral yet set out at the very same instant with the 2300 Ev. Mor. and that is of the Word going forth Now of this It is most evident by Scripture that it must begin at the Persian Monarchy or the Monarchy of Cyrus for at Darius the Mede to whom Scripture allows only one Dan. 9. Year it did not begin for in that Year Daniel prayed and had this Vision in Return of Prayer as appears enough throughout this Chap. At Cyrus's first year it did begin for so Ezra assures us chap. 1. For must not that most necessarily be the going forth of the Word when Cyrus sent forth his Proclamation and put it in Writing v. 1 2. c But although the Word began here to go forth yet it is most manifest It did not here attain its effect for then would it not have rested and ceased to go forth any farther But we find it stop'd after the Altar set up and the Foundations laid all the Reign of Ahasuerus and in the Days of Artaxerxes which two as we shall after reason must be Cambyses Ezra c. 4. 24. the Son of Cyrus and the Counterfeit Smerdis so that it as plainly went forth again in the Reign of Darius known in common History by the Name of Darius Hystaspis After that although it came much nearer its Perfection yet it was contradicted in the Days of Xerxes Ahasuerus by so severe a Decree for the Destruction of the Jews throughout all the Provinces so that Artaxerxes call'd by Historians Longimanus Esth 3. 8. illustrated his seventh Year with the Word compleatly going forth The Eccho of which for the building of the Wall was in his twentieth and in his thirty second the Quavers of that same Word in leave to Nehemiah to restore Jerusalem into its perfect Order and Polity which plainly argue the Word gone forth in his seventh Year Now although the great Perplexities of the Persian Chronology are no way to my main Intention to be concern'd in yet the making it Evident that the Going forth of the Word must take up such a Time as 75 Years is of very deep behoof in that Intention both as it gives great Assurance to the former principal Line of 2300 Years shewing how seventy five of them were spent and also as it will inlighten some Concernments of the Kingdom of Christ to which all Accounts of Time tend Upon this whole Consideration I shall endeavour the proof of such a space implied in the word going forth And first I shall observe that which I do not look upon so considerable as to call it an Argument The very Phrase of going forth implies some protracted and prolonged going Mich. 5 2. forth by the Word The same Word is us'd of him whose goings forth are from everlasting But more enforcingly to press this I thus argue It is impossible to spare any of those great Decrees we have Argu. 1 so specially recorded Ezra 1. c. 1. c. 6. c. 7. from the words going forth Not the first because it was the first so much foretold of formerly by the Prophet Esay of so famous Memory and that first broke the Bonds of the Jewish Captivity Who can with possible Reason suppose That had no Interest in the words going forth in which Prophecy gloried so long before-hand that was even pointed upon by Gabriel and from which the other Decrees were deriv'd as is expresly mention'd in Darius's Decree Ezra c. 6. compar'd with Dan. 9. 21 Nor can the second Decree of Darius be denied a place in it which so united it self with Cyrus's Decree that if either was the word going forth both must be so for tho they were distant in Time they were one in Substance and by it the Temple was built And least of all can the Decree of Artaxerxes in his seventh Ezra 7. year be impeached as to this Right for it was the perfective Decree so liberal and ample with such Peculiarities in it all along that there is not a word in the whole but yields an Argument It excells all that went before and leaves no Room for any to come after It
Peculiarity of Expression The Lamb slain from the Foundation of the World Rev. 13. 8. and the corrupting and annulling that Supreme Point of Christian Religion and the Service founded on it and regulated by it according to its own Purity Simplicity and Transcendency free from idolatrous Defilements is a Cardinal Point of Antichristianism and a most proper Sense of taking away the daily Sacrifice of which I am often to make mention and desire that from hence it may be carried all along with the Notion of the daily Sacrifice though mentioned but this once even this Sacrifice of Daily or Eternal Vertue The sealing Prophecy and Vision is not only the Ratification and confirming all Prophecy by finishing of it as Christ Joh. 19. 30. declar'd It is finish'd so far as was requisite to that coming of Christ into his Mediatory and Redemptory Kingdom but signifies also the sealing of Prophecy at that present Time so as thta the second Coming of Christ into his glorious Kingdom Rev. 6. 1. c. Rev. 7. 1. c. Rev. 10. 4. c. should not at that Time be but run through that course of sealing first during the Time of the seven Seals then during the Time of 144000 sealed then during the seven Thunders sealed under which Sealing we yet must remain these next following Ten Years Then all Things shall be finish'd spoken of in that yet sealed Prophecy for the Glorious Kingdom of Rev. 16. 17. ch 21. 6. Christ till those two words of Finiture are pronounced It is done It is done Yet notwithstanding This The most Holy is Anointed in his Resurrection made Lord and Christ the true Messiah Acts 2. 36. Act. 13. 3â— even by Him who said Thou art my Son this day have I begotten thee The Covenant of Grace in his Blood and the Sacrifice of himself He Confirms for one Week viz. the First half week by himself For so it begun to be spoken by the Lord and then it was confirmed by them that heard him Heb. 2. 1. c. To which the Body of the Jewish Nation being so heinously Enemies first in cutting off Messiah then in resisting all the Ministry of his Apostles and persecuting them to the Death The Flood of Desolations returned upon them by that very Roman Power People and Wing of Idolatrous Abomination and Desolation that they invocated for the Death of Messiah and so they remain and shall remain desolated till the End of that Indignation during the Times of the Gentiles till that City spiritual Sodom and Egypt in which our Lord was Crucified shall be burnt with Everlasting Burnings and the Captivity never be returned till the Captivity of the Old Jerusalem the bloody and filthy City be returned which shall never be for the New Jerusalem shall come down from Heaven and constitute a Holy City below Ezek. 16. 54. This Richest Line of Time laden with the Redemption of Remark our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ invites us to it self with admiring and adoring Thoughts and commands the World to Kiss the Son with a Kiss of Homage and Obedience Great Occasions derive agreeable Names Daniel is therefore suitable to the Vision call'd a Man of desires or belov'd expressing the infinite Love from which Redemption flows and which it begets in us back to God and Christ with vehement Passions of Desire And he is not only call'd so in this Vision but ever after it to shew the Honour put upon him by it Dan. 10. 11. 19. And as this Vision stands in this Prophetick Line of Time it ensures it to us For as at the fulness of Time treasur'd up in it Christ came against all contrary Appearances against all the Indisposition of the World to receive him and the Indesert of so Divine a Condescention He came according to the sure word of this Prophecy Determining him as to the very self same day in comparison of which the Transfiguration before the Apostles as Eye-witnesses was less sure according to this he came and did not tarry and though his Transfiguration remonstrated his Right yet it was in private His Decease as a Cloud receiv'd it and though vindicated by his Resurrection yet the sitting down on the Right Hand of the Majesty on High was on the Throne of his Father He shall sit on his own Throne The Father will shew him whom the Heavens yet contain and Hide the Transfiguration was an earnest of it and does assure it yet we have a more sure Word of Prophecy unto which if we take heed and pursue its Conduct as a Light in the dark and obscure the fuliginous and dusky State of the Apostacy it will bring us to that bright Morning Star as the Wise Men were by a lesser Star led to this Morning Star even to him who Matt. 2. as the King of his whole Church is to be acknowledged with those Presents of Gold Myrrh and Frankincense Whatever most speaks Royalty Dignity on his part Love and Obedience on ours and he will return it a Thousand Fold by shewing himself and exalting us to the Mountain of Spices Cantic 8. ult SECT VI. Brief Remarques on Daniels last and largest Vision are made from part to part c. 10. c. 11. c. 12. THis last and longest of Daniels Visions I shall most briefly pass over Because the chief Things in it that concern the Kingdom of Christ have either been already given and are here recollected with some Explanations or the Line of Time to Christ is just Travers'd especially to introduce the End or else when it comes beyond the Weeks the Death and Resurrection of Christ Things are gone over again in the Evidence and clearness of a New Testament Prophecy yet sundry things of greatest Use and Remarque to the fuller understanding of what went before and is to follow will arise to us This last and longest Vision measures more particularly and distinctly the whole space of the 2300 days abating the two or three first years of Cyrus and so brings down Time to the End so as that from the sealing of Prophecy at the End of the first half and the last of the seventy Weeks Lines of Time are given the First implicitely along the Time of the sealed Book to be open'd in its seven Seals in the Apocalyps Or in express Numbers viz. the 1335 which just at the end of the seventh Seal begin in the Trumpets and continue until all Finished or IT IS DONE IT IS DONE and so arise to One thousand three hundred thirty five years This Vision according to the Pleasure of the infinitely wise Spirit of Prophecy varies from the precedent in this That it is rather Enigmatical in vail'd and covert Expressions then Iconical or by way of Imagery The first Vision was perfectly Dan. 2. an Image whose Anatomical Distributions by the Head the Arms and Breast the Belly and Thighs the Legs Feet and Toes distributed Time The second Iconiz'd by four Beasts had
a Line of Time in the Cypher of Time Times half a c. 7. Time applyed to a little Horn of the fourth Beast The third pourtrays Three Beasts and makes a little Horn of the Third of them a Type to the little Horn of the fourth Beast of the c. 8. former Vision and the Veil of a Type being thrown over There is a Line of 2302 Days drawn out by the Action of the Type * Antiochus Epiphanes bearing some Resemblance both in Action and Duration of Time naturally and not prophetically understood to that Anti typical little Horn It is drawn I say to the Kingdom of Christ rising on that little Horns Ruine at the End of the 2300 Ev. Mor. The State of the four Monarchies in the fourth of which the Kingdom of Christ breaks the whole Image is much the same in the main in this Vision as in the former The Antichristian King is guilty of the same Blasphemy against the God of Gods or the Lord of Lords and King of Kings as in the former Visions against the Prince of Princes and the most high and lastly the same Date of Time Times half a Time is applied to him yet notwithstanding there are some peculiar Things which this Vision carries all along upon the whole Line of the 2300 Ev. Morn by way of farther Explication as also of the excellent Vision of the seventy weeks and of the Word going forth before it which Vision of the seventy weeks most resembles this Vision in this that it is rather a prophetical History than Imagery The prefatory Description of Christ hath several Magnificencies of Presence like those Revel 1. and also Dan. 7. wherein the Divine Nature of Christ appears in his Mediatorship But in this they differ from the Majesty of Christ as on his Throne wherein Ezekiel's Visions exceed and for the sake of which He is so often honour'd with the Title Son of Man so peculiar to Christ's Kingdom and wherein Daniel came nearest in the Vision of the Sanctuary cleans'd and the Corrival to Christ's Princedome broken without hand at the end of the 2300 Ev Morn All which shall be then fulfill'd in the State of the Jews restor'd of the New Jerusalem and the Kingdom of Christ Rev. 20. 4. and therefore there he is peculiarly call'd Son of Man as before noted To shew it measures the same Time as that of the Ev. Mor. Daniel is much in the same manner affected It begins in its very Date near the Beginning of the Persian Monarchy it runs most evidently to the same End And having now made these general Remarks upon it I come to observe what is most particular in it in the way of a short Elenchus or Table of it 1. It is peculiar to this Vision that tho Christ calls to mind in it His supreme Assistance to His at the first Year of Darius who to distinguish him is call'd Darius the Mede and of the Seed of the Medes at the very Entrance of Cyrus's Persian Monarchy yet his third Year is the critical and precise Date of it for then that wonderful and unexpected stop upon so Royal a Decree by the divine Permission was made Ezr. c. 3. compar'd with c. 4. shewing the leisurely Progresses of the divine Kingdom and as is most probably conceiv'd Cyrus in his third Year making foreign Expeditions Cambyses or Artaxerxes his Son was left Viceroy upon whom the Enemies of the Jews gain'd so far that though they could not plainly command a Cessation yet by Sleights and Artifices They eluded the Decree and frustrated the Work all the days of Cyrus But Cyrus being dead in the days of the proper Reign of Artaxerxes or Cambyses the Son of Cyrus the Adversaries of the Jews writ to him and obtain'd his Edict against the Progress of the Building And in the Reign of Ahasuerus in the beginning of his Reign wrote they also an Accusation and still prevail'd Now by Ahasuerus I understand the Counterfeit Smerdis Ezr. 4. v. 5 6 7. whose Reign being very short it is said In the beginning of his Reign And by Artaxerxes I understand Cambyses who reign'd indeed before Ahasuerus yet the Sacred History intending a fuller Account of the whole matter gives first the general Account that all the days of Cyrus the Work was frustrated then takes in Ahasuerus first because his Reign was short and then gives the true Series of Things in Artaxerxes who was first in the days of Cyrus possess'd against the Jews and suffer'd an artificial Impedition of them When he came to Reign he laid a Prohibition on their Building When Ahasuerus began to Reign after the Death of Artaxerxes the Jews upon that change attempted to revive their Work but on Letters to Ahasuerus by their Enemies were still prohibited At the Reign of Darius being twice discouraged they lay still till arous'd by Haggai and Zechariah the Prophets and confirm'd by Darius in a new Enterprise they begin the Work again That which justifies this as the True Order is That the History expresly tells us upon the Letter to Artaxerxes The work ceas'd and that it ceas'd till the second Year of Darius the Persian all the Days of Artaxerxes Cambyses all the short Reign of Ahasuerus or the Counterfeit Smerdis Under Artaxerxes then it began to cease and till then the Cessation continued And thus often Sacred Story postpones that on which it intends to place the full and largest Accounts and therein directs the true Order yet As here Artaxerxes is postpond to Ahasuerus although before him And of this Delay of the Building the Space otherwise unknown is made known in this Vision by the one and twenty days Resistance Christ found from the Angel-Prince of Persia against whom Michael the Angel-Prince of the Jews stood with Christ Now these twenty one days viz. days for years for what could twenty one days Resistance signifie to such a stop of the Building if naturally taken Daniel observ'd a symbolical Fast three weeks of days a day for a year as Ezekiel observ'd on each side so that it is true The weeks of days do distinguish those weeks of days from the seventy weeks of years and yet they are a Type of twenty one days for years also so that here we have an Explanation of so much Time as the stop of the Building amounted to as so many years of the Persian Time as was before explain'd of the Word going forth and it justifies that Account so far towards 75 where it is possibly most needed 2. Here we have also the Intimation of the whole History of Esther as pertaining to the Decree of the Jews Destruction and Deliverance compris'd in the short Note of Christ's speedy dispatch of this Vision to Daniel and returning to sight for the Jews with the same Angel prince of Persia who Zec. 3. 1. as Sathan stood at their right-hand to resist them and this Reason to believe That Ahasuerus was Xerxes
sort of Idolatrous Worship of Christ ecclips'd and drowned And all this was fulfill'd especially from that War concerning the Worship of Saints and Images 725 or 26 at the famous 666 as is after to be shewn Now the Pourtray of these Things is admirable in this prophetical Table and the Travers from the God who is superiour that is Christ to the whole Gentry of Saints in such a confused manner as the Text gives it The Maozzim and the strange God whom he shall acknowledge and encrease with Glory and shall cause them to rule over many so passing out of one into another that the very Frame of the Context does above all Expression by the Elegancy of the Scheme exquisitely present it and it hath been with wonderful Fidelity expounded by that ever to be acknowledg'd Duumvirate of Prophetical Interpreters Dr. More and Mr. Mede 5. It is very extraordinary in this Prophecy that upon this very Idolatry and at the very Time when it was contested by the Iconoclastick Emperours so profess'd Enemies to Images and Worship of Saints and yet sanction'd by the second Council of Nice however palliated by that of Frankford Cabbasut Notitia Eccles p. 314. which Palliation is yet abhorr'd and the Truth of the History of that Council decried at this Day At that very Time the Mahometan King of the South by the Saracens or Locusts and after the King of the North the Turkish Horsemen according to the Military Language of Daniel's Time with his Chariots and Horsemen like a Whirlwind and with his Gallies or Ships pass'd and overflow'd And this in the same order the Apocalyps after describes and at the same Degrees of Elevation The King of the South first does but push he torments and hurts but does not kill or swallow up in Conquest The King of the North comes after and does overflow and pass over and inherit a great part of the Antichristian Territory as the Beast would have it that is the Grecian Empire and yet leaves to the Beast his proper Bestian Demesne still for the sake of which Mahometan Kings of the South and the North as well as to draw a Line of prophetick History upon the sixty two Weeks from the Wall built to Messiah There is so much said of the King of the North and the South the Seleucidean and Lagidean Potentacies in the Prophecy 6. It is very observable after a Description of the very great Conquests and vast Tracts of the Turkish Empire v. 42. c. given His End is foretold upon the Mountains of Tzebi or the pleasant Holy Land and from thence the last end of Things and the glorious state of the Kingdom of Christ in the Lustre of his Saints and the Shame and Contempt of his Enemies seems to be given and not from the breaking the Image in the Bestian State of it which both here and in the Revelation is the most definite Thing that can be that the End should be so plac'd on the Beast These two Considerations yet will make a perfect Reconciliation of that Objection 1. That indeed The End of Things is not given from the Turkish End but from the Day of great Trouble such as never Dan. 12. 1. was since there was a Nation Now that Day of Trouble is the same with the Battel of Armageddon under the seventh Rev. 16. 16. c. v. 12. Vial. The Turkish Power therefore coming to its End and none helping it is under the sixth Vial poured out upon the River Euphrates that the way of the Kings of the East the Jews upon the Mountains of Tzebi might be prepar'd where the Turk receives his final Overthrow except the last Remainders of him rallied from this Fatal Blow on the Mountains of Tzebi may be congregated by the Spirit like a Frog that shall immediately after it go out of the mouth of the Dragon to the Battel of Armageddon upon which immediately follows that Resurrection describ'd in the Glory of the Saints the Ministers of Divine Truth who have turn'd many to Righteousness in an Excellency and the Enemies of Christ rising to everlasting Shame and Contempt according to Dan. 12. 1 2. c. and Revel 20. 4. c. to v. 7. Where we may observe the use of the Word Many to shew there is another Determination of the Future State of Mankind at the end of the 1000 Years both of them written in the Book and whose Names are not found in the Book of Life compare this with Apoc. 20. 15. From hence therefore compar'd with the Turkish Woe going off at the end of the sixth Trumpet Rev. 11. 14. It seems most probable but I dare not in Particulars be too definitive There is a reducing of the Turkish Power at that Trumpets end sending it to Euphrates from whence it came at the Beginning of it and a DE-PORTING it from Constantinople At the sixth Vial there is a drying it up in his proper Euphrates in some Encounter on the Mountains of Tzebi or Judea and what Mahometan Tail may remain shall be wholly cut off at Armageddon when neither Head nor Tail Tyranny nor False Prophetism to hurt with shall be left in the World 2. After the End had been thus given leading from the sixth Vial to the seventh Then the true orderly native course of that End is drawn within its proper Channels and Successions of Prophetick Time as is now in the next place to be demonstrated upon this Danielian Prophecy SECT VII Of the whole Line of Time from the Resurrection of Messiah unto the Time of Blessedness in the Lotts of the New Jerusalem and its Royal Priesthood On Dan. 12. v. 4. c. to the End AFter the full and ample Discovery according to the Allowance of Prophecy of the State of the Honourable Resurrection of the Servants of Christ and the despicable Resuscitation of the Wicked inclusive of all Misery follows the Delineation of Time Immediately upon this Declaration of this Resurrection Christ commands Daniel to shut the Book and seal it to the time of the End which End must be that End When many of them that sleep shall so awake But in regard of the Laxitude of the Expression The Time of the End we must understand The whole Time from Christ's Resurrection to this Resurrection is call'd The last Time The End The End of the World The last Days frequently in Scripture All Progresses in which Time are still yet nearer the End and so more the Time of the End and the last Days than the former Parts are This then being first conceiv'd Under some sealing more or less The Book must continue till Christ says Seal not the Sayings of this Book for the Time is at hand relating just to the Time of the Vials when the Kingdom of Christ was not only entred and proclaim'd and all Things were in finishing in the seventh Trumpet but the Time of the Dead that they should be judged was nigh when the
seven Churches that is proper and particular to the Church wherein the Churches as Symbols sustain the whole Prophecy which is worthy the Spirituality and Clearness of a New Testament Prophecy so to Order and of great Grace Elegancy and Condecency to God's great Regard to his Church The Second is that which embraces the whole State of the Church but propp'd and supported with such Imperial Events as most nearly related to the Church adorn'd with such Symbols such Notes of Time such Events as agree to those Times whereby History both Common and Ecclesiastick may be adjusted to and concerted with both and the Truth of the Prophecy and its true Interpretation justisted before and by all the World And this is that Systeme or Complex of Prophecies that first by the Seals runs through the Roman Empire till the sixth Seal Pagan and Christian in the sixth and seventh Seals in those things wherein the Kingdom and Church of Christ are most interessed until the Empire was blasted in the first Trumpet and true publick Worship also by the 1260 Days of the Daily taken away entring The Imperial City was thrown like a Mountain into the Sea in the second and in the third Trumpet when the Roman Empire expiring in the West was surrogated or new founded in the Beast succeeding in his forty two Months and so the Prophecy goes on in the other Trumpets till it comes to the Kingdom of Christ in the seventh Trumpet in its just Succession to the last State of the Roman fourth Monarchy according to all Prophecy And this till the thousand Years runs through the Voices of Preparation into the Vials and the Vials prepare to the thousand Years glorious Reign of our Lord Jesus Christ. So then this is the only true proper Division of this Prophecy into its two Systemes of the Churches and then rise the Seals Trumpets Voices Vials in another Systeme supporting all things relating to the Church by Imperial Motions Mutations and Times And in the latter Systeme all these Tubes of Time are each Sett of them and each of each Sett so united one to another that they can neither be disjoyn'd from their immediate sequence one upon another nor mov'd out of their order so that the Trumpets follow the Seals the Voices the Trumpets the Vials the Voices and each Seal Trumpet Voice and Vial follows immediately upon its foregoing Seal Trumpet Voice and Vial and every seventh comprehends the following Sevens the seventh Seal the seven Trumpets the seventh Trumpet the seven Voices the seventh Voice the seven Vials and each precedent Seventh hath some grasp on all the following Sevens So the seventh Seal comprehends the Trumpets the Voices the Vials the seventh Trumpet the Voices and Vials the seventh Voice the seven Vials so admirably is this Prophecy united and interwoven And to other Division than this of the second Systeme of Prophecies I can by no means subscribe as of the Prophecy divided into the sealed and open Book-prophecy or the Prophecy of the Empire first and then of the Church For that remarkable part of the sealed Book-prophecy viz. the palm-bearing Company by peculiar Right pertains to the open Book or that must be so if there were such an open Book-prophecy and much of the open Book-prophecy allowing such a one must needs pertain to the sealed but indeed there is no such Thing as an open Book-prophecy in that place where it is said to be open'd for the Book was no sooner open'd but it was eaten and so absconded assoon as open'd till open'd by the Voices c. 14. as shall be farther clear'd nor is there any Prophecy of the second Systeme but pertains properly to the Church as within first the Pagan then the Christian then the Bestian State of the one Roman Empire and lastly of the Vniversal Empire and Kingdom of Christ. Now in this Order apocalyptical Both Visions and Times in the first Systeme run through the six Churches In the second through those four Sets of prophetical Tubes Seals c. 6. c. 7. c. 8. to v. of Trumpets c. 8. v. 8. to the end of c. 11. of Voices c. 14. of the Vials c. 15. c. 16. and so laying these Chapters together the order is most exact except that in c. 7. There is an Anticipation of the Triumph of the New Jerusalem from v. 9. to the end In c. 11. there is a Collection of the whole State of the Apostasie during the six Trumpets into one Body together as it consists of the Sufferings of the Witnesses and the Tyranny of the Bestian Apostasie excepting some close Intimations in the very Composure of the Symbolisms of those Trumpets for the great Reasons hereafter to be given that refer to the same Apostacy and begin at the first Trumpet And then in the twelfth and thirteenth Chapters the extravasated Account of the Dragon watching the Woman and her manly Birth the Dragon cast down and the manly Birth caught up is to be reduc'd within its most proper Channel viz. the fifth and sixth Seals And this prepares for the right understanding of the Beast mention'd ch 11. as deriv'd from the Dragon c. 13. arriving his Number 666 which belongs to the six first Trumpets and it is there fitly set to prepare for the Vision of the Lambs Number c. 14. And as to the Chapters 17. 18. and 19. they are most evidently the Progress of the History of the seventh Vial and the full Relation of its Effects To prepare for which an extraordinary Description of the Woman or Great City reigning over the Kings of the Earth opposite to the Woman in the Wilderness is prefix'd and on her occasion a more perfect Portraicture of the Beast and of his ten Horns or Kings is given in preparation to the Judgment executed on all c. 19. And then the Milennial State being drawn up c. 20. it is carried on to the end of Apocalyptical Time as it reaches into the complemental State of Eternity which the Prophecy briefly absolves and then returns upon its more proper Subject or the 1000 Years of the New Jerusalem c. 21. c. 22. Now this Order began with the Preface to the Churches Vision of the first Systeme c. 1. and then the Preface of the second Systeme and lastly a Postscript returning especially c. 4. c. 5. c. 22. 16. to the Vials as given by the first Angel of the Vials This Order is I say the whole entire natural Order of this Apocalyptical Prophecy which is contriv'd indeed suitable to the Secrecy and Mysticness of the Prophecy so as often symbolically to declare when these Prophecies would have the clearest and most efficacious Discoveries in the Church viz. after the Half Time when the Thunders had utter'd their Voices and the Book open was shewn in the hand of Christ. That was the just Season for the Discovery of the Apostacy in the suffering of the Witnesses and the Tenthly Fall of the City and then after the seventh Trumpet
we would understand them of natural Angels as few or none do But the meaning is The seven Churches contain a very great Mystery throughout the Vision of the Churches Even as upon the forehead of the Woman Rev. 17. 5. was a Title written Mystery Babylon the Great c. that is Understand that whole Inscription in a mystical Sense or to carry the Mystery of the Apostate Church in all Successions so Understand the seven Churches carrying the Mystery of the Christian Church throughout And it is observable the word Mystery is expresly applyed to the True and False Church As it is said here The Mystery of the seven Churches and their Stars or Angels So there I will tell thee the Mystery of the Woman and of the Beast the Fallen Star with the Key of the bottomless Pit that carries her And proportionably this whole Prophecy of the Kingdom draws down into it self the Great Mystery of that Kingdom spoken of by all the Prophets since the World began viz. THE TRUE CHURCH IN GLORY The particularizing upon the Churches the so Apocalyptick Argu. 2 number Seven assures us It will bear its proportion to all the other Sevens And seeing there are no sevens to introduce them nor to receive them and carry them on They must themselves by their own Time Sevens and Symbols embrace the whole Apocalyptical Time and its Sevens For the Book of it is the Book of the Kingdom the Kingdom is the Mystery of God The Churches are the true Kingdoms when they come to their Glory and so a Mystery The Apostate Church is a Mock Kingdom the Kingdom of Antichrist foisted into the place of Christs Kingdom and so a Mystery but a Mystery of Iniquity The Kingdom of Christ and his universal Monarchy is an Empire in a Church of which He is the Head The last State of the Roman Monarchy is an Imperialism by vertue of an Ecclesiastical Image made to it which is a false Christship that is an Empire in an Apostate Church of which Antichrist is the Head How fitly therefore are these Things displayed in the Symbolisms of Churches It is certain There hath been a Christian Church in all Argu. 3 Ages from the Resurrection of Christ to this Day and shall be to the New Jerusalem and to the End of the World This is grounded upon those two Places Matt. 16. 18. Vpon this Rock will I build my Church and the Gates of Hell either of Hell as it signifies the Grave Mortality and Death or the Powers of Darkness shall not prevail against it and Matt. 28. ult Lo I am with you always unto the end of the World Nor is this controverted among any Christians From hence it follows we cannot be Time-bound or straitned in space of Time to place these Successions in For there must necessarily be a Succession of this Christian Church in several Ages and States and so must continue till the End which must as necessarily run a long Apocalyptical Time and so give a bottom to found such Symbols upon if it pleas'd as we suppose it did the Prophetick Spirit to give them As there must necessarily have been a Variety of States of Arg. 4 this one Church so the first of them must needs have been settled and founded in Doctrine Worship Rules of Life Order and Discipline by immediate Inspiration divine Authority and Institution through the Ministry of the Apostles This is most evident from that Book of Scripture written to that purpose The Acts of the Apostles as also from all the Apostolical Epistles From hence it follows the Apostolical Church in its Apostolical State was first in order whether therefore we will allow it to be symbollically represented or not in that first Church of Ephesus it is certain that Labour and Patience twice repeated that trying them which said they were Apostles and were not and finding them Lyars importing the exact consigning all Apostolical Truths and Rules into an authentick Canon of Scripture does most admirably represent that truly Primitive Apostolical State Besides the daily or every days Miscarriages from this excellent Arg. 5 State by Heresies Errors and bad Practises to which degenerate and deeply corrupted Humane Nature is so subject and of which Apostolical Writings take so continual notice there was foretold an eminent visible and notorious Apostacy fix'd and settled upon its own Base out of which Antichrist was to come and so very fit to be taken notice of in this Book of the Kingdom Now this Apostacy was declar'd expresly by the Apostle Paul to be at work in a mystery of Iniquity and the Spirit saith expresly that in the latter Times which latter Times as we have before affirm'd were then begun though every day more and more latter Some that is not a few but a certain sort of men that should make a Body or Species of Men should depart from the Faith If then it had begun so 1 Tim. 4. 1. Written to Timothy as then at Ephesus early in some Lineaments of it although not in that of Nicolaitanism and that it daily proceeded and grew much higher after the Apostles Departure or Death ravening Wolves and Men teaching perverse things arising from Christians themselves Act. 20. 28. c. remonstrated also to this very Church of Ephesus Their leaving their first Love the removing this Candlestick out of the Superiority and Excellency of Primo-geniture and conferring it on Smyrna in the Crown of Life and Philadelphia in the Scepter of the New Jerusalem are most lively Symbols to such a purpose though yet the Overcomers of this protoplast Church are assur'd to eat of the Tree of Life in the midst of the Paradise of God This Apostacy being to become so grand an Apostacy it Arg. 6 must needs proceed and work on by degrees so as that some Church and its Bishop deriving it self from the Apostles should very elderly vere towards a Synagogue of Satan and there should be such an Assumption by it and Deference of Advantages to it by many in the whole Christian Church tending towards and preparing for such an Apostacy that it gain'd Pretensions undesign'd yet to it particularly to intitle it self to such a blooming Antichristian Power as was foretold to come out of the Apostacy for if it could not derive high from Antiquity it could not rise to that Grandeur of Apostacy under the Profession of Christianity And yet in the mean time the Vniversal publick Christian Church may not only remain pure but be first in deep Sufferings for Christ and so fill up the Number of Martyrs dying under the Pagan Draconick Empire but also receive the Crown of Life and of the Glory of the New Jerusalem in a Figure by the Empire becoming Christian as it did in Constantine Now what Type of such a State of the Church could be more express in all this than the Church of Smyrna For whether it was so design'd by the Spirit or not it is certain in
Reason such an Apostasie Apostate Church and falling Star must have a Foundation in Antiquity even while the Church was pure and in Sufferings and that very Church and its Bishop bore a part in it and yet was every day more and more under the Aspect of that Caution given to it Rom. 11. 17 18 c. and cspecially when it was crown'd in Constantine The Apostasie must come to be such a high enthron'd Apostacy Arg. 7 and so obscuring over-shadowing covering the true Church under its self that the very Apostatiz'd Synagogue usurp'd the Title of the true Church and yet because God owns the true Church only he speaks only to that as having under it in his Account the false Church and as bearing in the Type of the false Church polluted with Idolatry spiritual Fornication horrible Corruption of Manners while indeed the true Church is oppress'd and its Members martyred and slain as Antipapal Witnesses by the false Church and the Antipas true Church carries the Name of the enthron'd false Church the high and lofty Pergamus and therefore the Things that would be great if the Church were directly guilty of them are call'd small things and the threatning diverts from that true Church and falls on the false Church only I will come to thee and slay THEM with the Sword of my Mouth and as a Church partly abhorring the Pollutions of the false Church partly excommunicated and anathematiz'd hath the Promise of hidden Manna in the former case and of the white Stone of Absolution as to the latter Now I appeal to all Protestants Whether this was not truly the State of Things in the depth of the Apostasie And I appeal to all judicious Considerers of the Epistle to the Church of Pergamus Whether such a State could be given in more expressive and significant Shades It is then most evident There must be a Time wherein the Mystery of Iniquity began to work seeing it did begin gradually and that Beginning must be within the Apostolical Times for the Apostle declares it so to begin besides from this Neighbourhood it derives a Pretence of Authority tho' indeed there can be from thence no Authority gain'd to Antichristianism seeing the Scripture and not Neighbourhood to the Apostles Time is our Rule and seeing any Authority no higher deriv'd is stain'd and blemish'd by that Apostolical Declaration yet a Face a Countenance of Authority will be thence deriv'd to deceive and delude with It is also most evident The Progress of it must afterwards grow so high to be a Synagogue of Sathan and after to be a Throne of Sathan so that from hence may arise the Symbols of Ephesus Smyrna Pergamus After the Time that Antichristianism did thus prevail seeing Argu. 8 it was not to be perpetual and everlasting however long and that the Ruine of it is first to be gradual and then at last sudden there must be some preparatory Wrestles and Struggles for the Eluctation and Recovery of the true Church after this Oppression and being muffled up under the Name of a false Church call'd Catholick and Vniversal and HOLY MOTHER CHURCH at the same Time yet in regard of the remaining Power of Antichristianism united with the Powers of the Kings of the Earth the state of the true Church must needs be still cover'd under the Appearance of such a false Vniversal Church over and above it and so must in that regard bear in Type the Name of that apostate Daughter Thyatyra while in the mean time its Charity Jezebel Daughter of Ethbaal c. Faith Patience Service Works against that false Church grow continually greater and greater to the very last and its disownings of the Depths of Sathan and not accepting them for Deeps of Religion are very evident and eminent to its Praise The suffering Jezebel therefore or the false Church regnant over it because it cannot help it are small things against it because but Types for yet it is accounted so perfect as to be commanded only to hold its own and no other Burden of Command impos'd on it but to hold fast what it had already whereas to suffer Jezebel had it not been over-power'd had been a very heinous thing Now so much therefore of this True Church as did so eluctate and force its way out of the False was while it was forcing its way under one Notion or Denomination and when it had forc'd its way under another and while it in any parts and portions of it continues in the midst and within the Bowels of Kingdoms and States still keeping up and submitting themselves to the Power of Antichrist It may still retain its name Thyatyra and although the Time or interval it properly measures when the whole True Church was compris'd in it may be past yet it may continue in Being in no higher State then of Thyatyra till the appearance of the Morning Star and the fall of the Tenth of the Great City Now it is most evident there have been such earnest Motions of the True Church from under the Tyranny of Antichristianism There still continue such in Antichristian States and Kingdoms according to their Power I demand therefore what more agreeable and expressive Lineaments hereof could be given then in the Church of Thyatyra first espying and as under Affliction looking for the first dawns of Light and after advanc'd to Rule the Nations c. in the New Jerusalem After the Emersion and actual manumission of several parts of the True Church from Antichristianism and a settlement Argu. 9 in Recess and Separation from it some Churches through the Favour of Princes States and their Laws entred into a Condition of outward Splendor and Glory Riches Power and Authority of which the Sardius Stone may be a fit emblem But this outward Elevation not so becoming nor agreeable to the Patience of Christs Kingdom such a Church may be too much taken up about Rites and Jurisdictions and such extern Decencies and not press forward upon Things that remain in an order and sequence to the Kingdom of Christ and so fall under severe Censures This Church represents Churches which are yet accepted by Christ as True Churches they have on their own proper Title Names though but few that have not defiled their Garments And these few though best are not yet made the Church but the whole though in a sleepy and defiled State are the Church that has the few Names that had not defiled their Garments contrariwise in Pergamus and Thyatyra the false Church that calls it self the universal is not the Church but the Few suppress'd overcome Witnesses are yet the two Candlesticks standing before the God of the whole Earth which is a most remarkable Difference shewing Sardis a True Church Now since the Reformation it is known by general Observation There are such Churches that are in a State and Splendor Sardian but let the Application of the Characters remain till he comes that says He will Come
at an Hour this Splendid secure Symbolical Church thinks not of except the few undefiled Names and they of it that overcome who have Promises of greater Glory with Christ then this outward but this Church in its own Name hath the Honour to make a Line of Time from the Reformation to this Day and shall till that sudden coming of Christ upon it when such a State will be at an End There have been Societies of Christians that since the Reformation Arg. 10 have subsisted only upon the Principles of brotherly Love whose Door hath been attempted to be shut upon them as not allowed Churches of Christ or not in such a way of Worship who have had little outward strength who have yet kept the word of Christ and not denyed his Name in a strict adherence to his word only who have Enemies even of the Reformed who are relaps'd down to the same Pitch the Apostacy was at when styl'd the Synagogue of Sathan in the Church of Smyrna not receiving indeed the Beasts Number of 666. but too far link'd with the Corruptions of Antiquity after the Empire becoming Christian soon Antichristianis'd who though for the present at least seem irreconcileable with the Apostacy advanc'd to its Number yet have great Indignation against Philadelphia and its Members These shall at the Kingdom of Christ appearing come and worship at this Churches Feet and be forc'd to acknowledge Christ lov'd it whose Crown of Honour it is that it hath kept the Word of Christ's patience embrac'd the Purity of Christianity in a low and mean State and therefore the Glory the Kingdom the New Jerusalem shall crown it when the Hour of Temptation comes upon all the rest of the Earth and detects the Vanity of their Religion even of their false or defiled Christianity and the Church-state of those who have not overcome the Impurities of them who call'd themselves Churches Christians Reform'd and were not so but did lye This Church is not yet come to its proper space upon the Line of Time nor can do till the Witnesses rise out of their Sackcloth and the Kingdom of Christ be proclaim'd at the seventh Trumpet And how excellent a Type of all this is the Church Philadelphia There shall be a most perfect happy and glorious State Arg. 11 of the Church before the Resignation of the Kingdom to God and the Father during the thousand years the very first Recidivations from which shall be spew'd out of Christ's Mouth and the whole of Church-States drawn up into Eternity of which Loadicea is a clear Emblem viz. of the Recidivation and spewing out in that last State Now from All this it is most evident The Church of Ephesus may have place from the first preaching the Gospel till the cruel Persecution of Dioclesian into which last and most cruel One All the Christian Blood shed from the Resurrection sunk down as the Blood from Abel to Zacharias upon the Generation of the Jews in the Time of our Saviour and was requir'd of it therefore here Smyrna began to compleat the Churches Sufferings in being faithful unto Death and receiv'd the Crown of Life in the Symbol of Constantine's Christian Empire and so down to Theodosius the Great all which Time the Church continued pure although it began to be check'd by a Synagogue of Sathan Thus these two Churches contemporiz'd with the Seals Pergamus and Thyatyra ran along with the six first Trumpets under the Apostasie and Bestian Tyranny till in the latter part of the sixth Trumpet Thyatyra eluctated into the Reformation then several of the reform'd Churches settled into the Sardian state and draw the Line of Time with the last 180 of the 1260 Years in Conjunction with Thyatyra still existent tho' not intitled any longer to bear this Line and with Philadelphia not yet come to bear the Line of Time which last shall bear the last 75 Years from the Witnesses Rising and the Kingdom of Christ proclaim'd till the New Jerusalem and its thousand Years settle upon it and that new Cube of Time begin at the End of which the Laodicean Church no sooner begins but ends and an Amen is set to all Time by Eternity receiving it All which makes apparent There is no Inconsistency but a high Condecency in these seven representative Churches bearing a Line of Time contemporary with all Apocalyptical Time which ought to be shewn Hereby we see The Excellency of the Christian Church Remark and of our Union with it and Freedom from Schism depends not upon the Greatness the Antiquity the Primitiveness of Churches but upon the Divine Apostolickness of the Doctrine Worship Rules of Holy Life truly Christian Discipline wherein we unite with them The overcoming that evil of leaving the first Love that Christ had against the very first Church of Ephesus not made diminutive as in Pergamus and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 small or few things Thyatyra was more as to the Excellency of true Christianity than being of that Church The not mingling with the Synagogue of Sathan in the Church of Smyrna gave the Inculpableness and Honour to it and its Members The not being of the Apostate Church when it call'd its self Catholick in Pergamus and Thyatyra but keeping to the Truth of the Gospel constituted the true Church when the Proselites and Disciples of that Apostacy were the Proselites and Disciples of Balaam and the Children of Jezebel The few undefiled Names and Overcomers in Sardis tho' a Reform'd Church were of greater Estimation with Christ than the whole Church besides some of whose rigid Zealots of its Splendour and Power Uniformity of Rites it is to be fear'd made the Synagogue of Sathan and Philadelphia tho' of little outward Power or Splendour yet holding fast the Word of Christ and not denying his Name and keeping the Word of Christ's Patience is preferr'd much before it and honour'd with the New Jerusalem from which Blessed State Laodicea abating and growing cool All Church-states in this World are so distasted by Christ that He spews them out of his Mouth and receives only the Overcomers to his Throne and his whole Church into Eternity SECT X. Of the Third Line of Time in the Grand Line of 2300 Even Morn or of the Seven Seals from the Resurrection shewing it extends to a space of 400 Years Apoc. Cap. 4. cap. 5. cap. 6. cap. 7. cap. 8. I Have now finish'd the first Real and General Line of Time that runs from Stem to Stern from the Beginning to the End of Apocalyptical Time I come now to the second giving of the same Lines which is not uniform and entire as the former of the Churches but made up not only of various Parts as that was of seven Churches but of various Representations of each part as Seals Trumpets Voices and Vials and each of these comprehends its following Order viz. the Seals the Trumpets the Voices the Vials under the Seventh of each former as hath been already clear'd
by which they are all kept in a close successional Connexion one with another and the seventh Seal hath its Hold upon the whole even to the last Day of Judgment when the whole Book of the Kingdom is resign'd back into the Hand of God out of whose Hand it was received by Christ seal'd 1 Cor. 15. 24. c. I am therefore now and in the first place to speak of the first part of this second giving of the Line of Time and that as in the Seals before it came to the Trumpets 1. And because there is one general Preface to this whole Repetition of the Line of Time I shall first consider how adequate it is to the whole Line and to the great Administrations of it in a brief or summary Survey of it For to assure us The Preface was to the whole Apocalyptical Book or Time adorn'd with new Figures and Sculptures John heard the first Voice that spake to him and it was as it were of a Trumpet saying to him I will shew thee Things that must be hereafter Rev. 4. v. 1 2. and immediately he was the second time in the Spirit where the Distinction of things hereafter from the things that are as Rev. 1. 19. was made only as the Types of the Churches had a real Existence at that Time as Types in the then begun Christian Church but the following were deriv'd from things to come And after this there was no more any such Voice of a Trumpet speaking to John no more being in the Spirit except a being carried in the Spirit into the Wilderness to see the Apostate Church and then to a Mountain to behold the Holy City The Voice speaking again c. 10. v. 8. evidently relates to the first Voice in that chap. saying seal and write not v. 4. and then take the Book and eat c. and c. 1. 10. c. 4. 1 2. not to these Trumpet-Voices 2. At this second Apocalyptical Volume we have the great Theatre of the Throne and the whole Grandeur of it and adorn'd every way suitable to the Doctrine of the Gospel and as it were in the first Apostolical Church settled first in God as the Doctrine of the One God made known in the Father the Son and the Spirit is the Foundation of Christianity For the Father the Word and the Spirit bear Record of it in Heaven and these three are one in that Record as they are in themselves ONE 3. About this Throne at each Angle or at each of the four Points of it are four Living Creatures so I choose to translate 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 not Beasts properly and distinguishingly in this Prophecy call'd 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and these four Living Creatures represent the Apostolical Church of the New Testament as in four Ternaries or Threes of the twelve Apostles in perpetual Action and therein as it were encircling the twenty four Elders of the pure Israelitish Church The Elders are upon Seats round about the Throne and with Crowns on their Heads as being of old a Kingdom of Priests and they are in this Prophecy introduc'd in Service to the Kingdom of Christ that shall be at the New Jerusalem together with and as by the Apostolick Church who shall be Kings and Priests together with them represented by these four and twenty Elders Heads of the priestly Courses who are first plac'd as leading the Gospel of Jesus Christ and his Kingdom by Prophecy but yet in the very first Action the Order is revers'd and the living Creatures are first in giving Glory First there is the particular Song to the Divine Nature on the Throne as the absolute Creator and Lord of all ending in this For thy Pleasure all things are and were created and so are absolutely under his Dominion and Dispose before whom they cast their Crowns 4. The grand Symbol of the whole Apocalyptical Time and its Events and of the supreme Conduct and Government till they issue into the Kingdom of Christ is the seal'd Book in the Hand of Him that sat on the Throne seal d with the seven Seals which Seals have under them the whole Course of preparatory Events to this Kingdom and the Kingdom it self till it be resign'd back to God Thus Daniel saw Prophecy and Vision seal'd up Dan. 9. and the Book seal'd Chap. 12. 5. There is Proclamation made by the loud Voice of a strong Angel for the finding out a worthy Person to open the Book and loose its Seals And none in Heaven or Earth was found worthy to open the Seals or so much as look thereon All which is certainly as Divine a Symbol to set out the supream and sole Excellency of the Lord Jesus Christ as far above all Principalities and Powers and every Name in Heaven or Earth as could be found out and surpassing all Understanding or Invention finite and is in surprize of any Admissions of Angels or Saints into any parts of his Mediatory Office the very least so much as an Ability to look thereon as also to foreclose that grand Antichristian Assumption of the man of Sin for his very Supremacy is hereby plainly declar'd to be Antichristianism who undertakes not only to look upon this Book but to open the Seals and herein he shews himself in the Temple of God as God 6. The much weeping of John that none was found worthy to open the Book does most exactly and critically point to the time of the Death of Christ or his lying in the Grave when there seem'd a Despair upon all the Creation in that dark Interval and a suspension of the Consolation of Israel and when all the Apostles had given up as it were the hopes of it of which the Apostle John was here a Symbol and represented all the Apostles 7. The same Article of Time is farther assur'd and confirm'd by the one of the Elders as a Representative of the whole Israelitish Church who lead to Christ Thus Christ open'd the Scriptures of the Old Testament especially of Daniel That Christ was thus to suffer and to enter into his Glory viz. of sitting first at the Right-hand of God till his Foes should be made his Footstool He sate down on his Fathers Throne in his Father's Kingdom He shall have a Throne and Kingdom properly his own 8. Christ hereupon exactly as in the Time according to the History of the Gospel appears as on the sudden and unexpectedly in the midst of the Throne of the Elders and the living Creatures a Lamb as it had been newly slain and now risen and ascended and so the Epoch of the Apocalyptical Time is most strictly defin'd and fully assur'd And at this Point of Time he receives the Book which is the very same with sitting on God's Right-hand till his Foes shall be made his Footstool for when the Book is unseal'd and the thousand Years begin Then there is a putting down all Rule and Authority At the End of the thousand Year and the Day of
the silence of any such Voice moves Enquiry Why there is no such Voice and every Visum or Thing to be seen in both sorts of Seals the Voic'd or the seemingly silent Seals are to be judg'd of as they have Relation to the Kingdom of Christ especially because we shall find the three last Seals without Voices have something to supply the want of the Voices of those four Living Creatures 3. As to the Time and its Space that is measur'd out by these Seals seeing no Line of Time is expresly given with them it is impossible to be found out but either first by some of the Visa or things seen at the opening of these Seals that are so certain as to be necessarily agreed in and thereby measuring from them on each side of them to take the whole Course or secondly by the having good Assurance what are the Visa of the first and last of these Seals that thereby we may know when they begin and when they end by the most undoubted Accounts of History or thirdly by observing if there be any Light concerning the just middle Point of their Time or lastly by some other Line of Time that may how much larger soever so as to comprehend it yet set Limits to it in its Beginning Middle and End by some certain Line of Time that must end just before it and some other Line of Time that must follow it and that all taken together can answer that whole Line And all these ways I shall use to come to the exact Measure of the Space of the seven Seals and what Measures of Time are and ought to be allow'd to them Let us then examine the Importance of every Seal first by what it discovers of the Kingdom of Christ upon the joyning of the Visum or thing to be seen and the Voice together or remarking upon the No Voice and the equivalent Supply with the Visum or thing to be seen and then collect the Time of these seven Seals The Visum or thing to be seen of the first Seal is as is Seal 1 hardly controverted by any The riding out of Christ on his white Horse with his Bow and the Right of a Crown conquering and to conquer This then was the Aim of Christ to obtain his Crown in the first place by the pure and holy Arms and Power of his Gospel in the Vniversal Perfect Ministry of the Apostles and till the Effect of that was tryed he makes shew of no other whatever farther Aim Christ might have if his Gospel was not submitted to Thus is Christ riding out prophesied of of Old Ride prosperously because of Truth Meekness and Righteousness Ps 45. 3. And upon this Horse he rides out with final Victory Rev. 19. whose Name is the Word of God This then was then the State of Christ's Kingdom the making an Universal Offer of it self to Jews and Gentiles by that high Ministry of Persons immediately guided and infallibly inspir'd and accomplish'd with the Gift of Tongues and Power of Miracles to make the Publication of that Decree Thou art my Son This Day have I begotten thee Ask of me and as I have set Thee upon my Holy Hill of Zion by thy Resurrection so I will give Thee the Heathen for thy Inheritance and the uttermost Ends of the Earth for thy Possession And if they will not submit Thou shalt break them with a Rod of Iron and dash them in pieces like a Potters Vessel Psal 2. 6. The Apostolical Voice deep and loud as Thunder royal as of a Lyon the first Living Creature Come and see is a farther Assurance That this was then the State of Christ's Kingdom in this free and universal Offer of it self It bespoke the World therefore in the Language of the rest of that Psalm Be Wise now O ye Kings Be Instructed ye Judges of the Earth Serve the Lord with Fear Rejoyce with Trembling Kiss the Son lest He be angry and for breaking his Bands and casting his Cords from you He break you at last as a Potters Vessel with a Rod of Iron or as the Stone cut out of the Mountain without Hands shivers the Image of which the next Seal gives a Type Now this Appearance of Christs Kingdom and the most Holy declar'd Annointed in it was absolutely necessary to make known the thing seal'd and to be unseal'd and that the End might be known by the Beginning and the whole Compass of the Time of the Seals by Both. For nothing could make all these more known nor the stay the sealing had on this Kingdom from appearing more manifest than this its offer to appear at the end of the last half week in the Apostolical Preaching and yet Prophecy and Vision concerning it seal'd up so that it could not bring forth this Kingdom till its just Time constituted by the Father and the Oath of Christ himself and that in regard of the Obstinacy of the Body of the Jewish Nation and of the World of the Gentiles Immediately upon the refusal of this King upon the Holy Seal 2 Hill of Zion He began to use his Rod of Iron and sent out the Red Horse of War the Visum or Thing to be seen under the second Seal joyned with the Voice of the Gospel Come and See but abated and weakened not a Voice of Thunder Whereas had the Kingdom been accepted the Thunder should not only have continued but multiplyed into Thunders and Voices and grown lowder and lowder to introduce the Kingdom But the Antichristian Kingdom upon the True Kingdom rejected work'd on and enervated the Voice though it was still Apostolical Come and See As the Voice of an Ox as if it self were Falling a Sacrifice at the Altar deploring the slaughter then coming upon the World So this second living Creature The State of the Kingdom therefore was as retreated in the Gracious and Merciful Offer The Voice was not so Grand and Sounding but instead of it He that sat on the Red Horse of War had a Great Sword given him and It was Given to Him that He should take Peace from the Earth and that Men should kill one another This certainly was especially verified in those Desolations of the Jews under Vespasian and Titus and those succeeding War-like Emperours Trajan and Hadrian under the first of which the Destruction of Jerusalem was so dreadful and bloody till the last ruines by Hadrian That no Time nor History was ever deeper dyed in Blood nor could this be without dismal Recoyls of the Great Sword upon the Empire it self within the Bowels of which it was continually sheath'd insomuch that Hadrian in his account of the final Wars with the Jews omitted the usual Preface in his Letters to the Senate Ego quidem exercitus valemus We and our Army are well This he suppressed as not agreeing to that Season of so great loss of Blood to the Romans This was a very affrightful appearance of this Kingdom and of great Evidence
of its Greatness and Power of Revenges especially upon the Jews those Murtherers and Enemies that would not have Christ reign over them and it returned back upon the Gentiles also and the Roman Empire guilty of the same Opposition to the Kingdom of Christ though not against the same Light nor with the same unnaturalness for as to them He came more particularly to his own and his own receiv'd him not and therefore having after the crucifying of him rejected his Dominion the People of that Prince Vespasian Came and destroyed the City and the Sanctuary as with a Flood and Torrent of Vengeance and now unto the End of the War Desolations upon the Jews were determin'd and by the overspread of the abominable Armies was pour'd upon the Desolate by Hadrian after the Desolation of Titus Daniel 9. ult Now this great Judgment and Desolation as a grand Argument of the Truth of Christianity in Revenge of which this Desolation came upon the Jews and the Reverberations or Repercussions and Returnings of it upon the Heathen Empire and their Persecutions of Christians was a great Subject for the Apostolical Voice to enlarge it self upon and to perswade Men to pay Homage to the King of Kings who could thus avenge himself and so of great Use was that Sound of the Voice Come and See that beholding the Desolations that were made by Christ in the Earth they might be still and know that He was God and exalt him in the very Heathen Earth After this severe Vengeance of Christ by the Rider of the Seal 3 Red Horse there ensues the opening of the third Seal and the Thing to be seen under it was a Black Horse and He that sat upon it had a pair of Ballances in his Hand and the Apostolical Voice continuing as under the last former Seals Come and See and it was the Voice of the third living Creature the Voice as of a Man Now that we may judge of the State of the Kingdom under this Seal it is to be closely examined what this Visum or Thing to be seen imports even the Black Horse and the Rider with a Pair of Ballances in his Hand and then the distinct Voice in the midst of the Living Creatures It hath been generally interpreted all to Famine as if the Seals were a Course of Judgments but besides that neither the First nor the Fifth Seals carry any Signification of Judgment by a more sagacious Inspection into the spectacle of this Seal after that forenam'd excellent Duumvirate of Apocalyptical Interpreters Mr. Mede and Dr. More and compare of it with the Voice of the third living Creature as of a Man I am abundantly satisfied the Black Horse and the Ballances in the Hand of the Rider are an Emblem of that solemn Imperatorial Justice of the Emperours of this Third Seal the Antonines especially that great Mirror of Justice to Magistrates Alexander Severus in whom I account the interval of this Seal to End who bore in his Hand continually in all Administrations that great Ballance of the World that Ballance of commutative Justice given by our Saviour Do as you would have done to you and no otherwise and this as so remarkable in it self and of a higher Prophetical Vse as we shall Discourse when we come to the Time affix'd to these Seals and particularly to this A Voice in the midst of the living Creatures calls to the more solemn Observation of a Measure of Wheat for a Penny Three Measures of Barley for a Penny and see that thou hurt not the Oyl and the Wine And now the State of the Kingdom in Relation to this Visum I estimate by those highly Rational and Apocalyptick Discourses for Christianity by Justin Martyr Athenagoras Apollonius in his publick Account of Christianity to the Roman Senate Clemens Alexandrius Tertullian Origen Minutius Felix who all appeal'd to these Just and Manly Emperors and offer'd to lay Christianity before them as Equal Judges and that would but shew themselves Men. And Alexander Son of Mammaea a Christian Lady Severus was so far prevail'd upon by those weighty Reasons that History hath reported him to have decided for Christianity and as he shewed a constant Reverence to that great Apothegme of the Saviour of the World so to have built a Temple in Honour to him upon which very last particular yet I lay no weight as being too doubtful But the other Parts of the State of this Kingdom of Christ born up by the manliest Efforts of Reason manag'd by those Apostolick Persons before nam'd before those forenam'd Emperours and Alexander particularly are so beyond all Historical Dispute as to sway me much more than those inquisitive searches for some Dearth or Famine that might be adjusted to the Time of this Seal For I account it a Rule in this and all other parts of this Prophecy That the Interpretation depend not upon dark and obscure Parts of History but upon the most Conspicuous Open and Clear and that are most known and notorious in it And it is to me a just Suspition upon any Interpretation that is otherwise grounded After this gracious Tryal and Essay upon the Heathen Empire Seal 4 to draw it by the Cords of a Man and by the Bands of Reason immediately follows the Fourth Seal In which open'd the Visum or Thing to be seen is the Pale Horse and in the Place of any Imperial Rider sits Death and Hades the Grave or Hell followes it as its attendant Emblem and the Voice of the Fourth living Creature as an Eagle drawn by the Carcase says Come and see This imports that Complication of Evils and Judgments The Sword the Famine the Pestilence and the Beasts of the Earth and Power was given to Death over a fourth part of the Earth or every fourth of it that is upon all Quarters of it Under this Seal then in the Time of those many cruel and short liv'd Emperours between Alexander Severus and Dioclesian which were as Beasts of the Earth for savageness and so are a most famous Historical Commentary upon this Seal is shewen the mighty Vengeance and Wrath of God upon an impenitent and imperswasible Empire and this by that Apostolical Voice to Come and See or to consider it the State of the Kingdom vindicating it self is so far declar'd that it was even ready to break in with Fury upon the Heathen World and that Patience so much injur'd and abus'd was now about to flame out in utmost Wrath so far therefore the Kingdom of Christ was advanc'd as to have made its last Tryal of Grace upon Pagan Rome and upon this undoubtedly the Apostolical Ministry insisted in its Come and See as Ezekiel Ezek. 14. from 12 to 22. of old as God saith there When I bring my four great Judgments The Sword Pestilence Famine and the Beasts of the Earth though Noah Job and Daniel stood before me to turn away my Wrath They should deliver only their own Souls And now
four Beasts in the third Seal in the very Reign of that Mirror of Magistratical Justice Alexander Severus presented with the Ballances in his Hand weighing out this Time just at the half Time or 202 years from the Resurrection or 237 of Vulgar Account from the Incarnation to which 202 Years added as the other half Time the Apostacy enter'd at 437 and then the Trumpets sounded to the Empires Ruine And how fitly is the daily Service at its just and even Ballance symbol'd by the exact care of just Weight and Measure according to the Charge on the Prince in the Prophet Ezek. without any Injury to the Wheat Barley Oyl and by Concomitancy no daily Oblation being without it Wine and as it were on purpose to shew us it was not the Levitical but according to the Unceremonial Simplicity of Gospel Worship the spiritual Sacrifice that is intended Barley is added which had no Place in the daily Levitical Oblation Now to explain this Symbol I desire a diligent Compare of Rev. 6. 6. Exod. 29. 40. Numb 28. 7. Ezek. 45. 9 10. c. Oh infinite and supream Dispose that changes Times and Remark Seasons as it pleases having first drawn them in an entire Table lying always before it where every Thing is beautiful in its own season and so every thing shall at last appear before Holy Angels and Saints and even extort the Confessions of Angry and Male-content Spirits How admirably hath it seal'd and open'd in this course of Seals and for his own Glory suffer'd a new sealing by surprise upon his Kingdom when that first sealing was taken off that he might bring Good out of Evil Light out of so long obscurity of the Apostacy that even then when the Empire or Vniversal Monarchy of the World was risen out of Heathenism into the Acknowledgment of the only true God and the one Mediator Jesus Christ suffered it to relapse into the new Heathenism of Antichristianism Even so Father who hast hid these things from the wise and prudent and revealed them to Babes it seemed good in thy sight For thou hast what Time thou pleasest to whom a Day and a thousand Years are equal to display thy Kingdom in within the most perfect Measure of Time viz. a cubical thousand Years and then in a boundless Eternity To him then who sits on the Throne and to the Lamb who hath the sealed Book yet in his Hand and is even ready to unseal it into his Kingdom within Ten Years to be proclaim'd be Glory Blessing Salvation Dominion Obedience for ever and ever Amen An Explication of Daniel 's Grand Line of Time as given in his four last Chapters SECT I. OF the Vision of the Daily taken away and therein of the 2300 Ev. Morn or the Vision call'd the Vision of the Ev. Morn in general on Dan. chap. 8. Page 1. SECT II. That this Vision begins at the Persian Monarchy and the Proof of it Page 8. SECT III. In which a Line of 75 Years precedent to the 70 Weeks is asserted and endeavour'd to be proved Dan. 9. Page 24. SECT IV. Gives the Proof that the Time of the Words going forth was the first 75 Years of the 2300 Ev. Mor. Page 28. SECT V. Of the 70 Weeks themselves in brief the second Line of the 2300 Even Morn Page 32. SECT VI. Brief Remarks on Daniel's last and longest Vision are made from Part to Part. Page 35. SECT VII Of the whole Line of Time from the Resurrection of Messiah unto the Time of Blessedness in the Lotts of the New Jerusalem and its Royal Priesthood on Dan. 12. v. 4. c. to the end Page 45. SECT VIII Wherein is given a Prefatory Survey of the whole Apocalyptical Prophecy Page 52. SECT IX Wherein a Proof is given The seven Churches carry with them a Line of Time contemporizing with the whole Apocalyptick Time Page 62. SECT X. Of the third Line of Time in the Grand Line of 2300 Even Morn or of the seven Seals from the Resurrection shewing it extends to a space of 400 Years Apoc. c. 4 c. 5. c. 6. c. 7. c. 8. Page 72. Of the Great LINE OF Prophetical Time In XXII Sections viz. The 1260 Days of the Witnesses and the Woman in the Wilderness Apoc. c. 11. 3. 12. 6. SECT I. Of the Ninefold Repetition of this Line and its several Characters shewing 1. That Time Times Half a Time must each signifie first Years then Years of Years 2. That Days must signifie either first Days of Years in the 1260 Days and then each of the three Days a Year of Years and proportionably in the Half Time and Half Day 3. The Months can be no other than Lunar Months and so must signifie such Months of Lunar Years as are proportion'd to the 1260 Days as Lunar Time is to Solar THE Great Line of Time in the Eye of Prophecy Position and upon which it is most intent as drawn for the latter Times and approaching so near the final Accomplishment of all Prophecy at this very Time is the Time Times and Half Time call'd also Three Days and a half Twelve hundred Sixty Days and Forty two Months All of which even as each of them concurr though in different manner as shall be seen into One Line of Twelve Hundred and sixty Years and are coeval to the space of the six first Apocalyptical Trumpets That this Line may be better understood and Apprehended It is first to be well observ'd in these following Grand Heads or Generals of Discourse This Line of Time is nine times to be found in Sacred First General Prophecy Twice in Daniel it is called Time Times Half a Time once 1260 Days though concealed somewhat by Dan. 7. 25. and Dan. 12. 7. Dan. 12. 11. joyning it with Thirty more for twelve hundred and sixty are made to lye in the complex of Twelve hundred ninety Dayes In the Apocalyptick Prophecy it is first made known by Forty two Months* then by Twelve hundred sixty Days* Apoc. 11. 2. Apoc. 11. 3. Apoc. 11. 9. Apoc. 12. 6. Apo. 12. 14. Apoc. 13. 5. then by Three dayes and a half* then again by Twelve hundred sixty Dayes* then is again reassum'd the Time Times Half a Time* and lastly the Forty two Months are the second time assign'd the observation of which Repetition and Variation and Order of both in giving this space of Time is of great Instruction as we shall see in its proper place for the understanding Prophecy That then which I shall first address our Thoughts unto shall be to consider every Character of Time given us in Prophecy by its self with its Signification and Extent and the Assurances it is of such signification and Extent then the Balances of the Characters one with another and lastly their several Epochs and Periods The first Character of Prophetick Time is Time Times Half a Time or if translated exactly either according to the Character first
be deriv'd into it and so make the much greater River and having made their way as so united some Leagues the Old River its Name and Memory are swallow'd up in the New so are the Gentiles forty two months merg'd in the Forty two months of the Beast and both coextend the Twelve hundred sixty days and no more SECT II. Of the two Communities and their two-fold state described within this Line of Time viz. The Church of Christ and its Sufferings the Kingdom of the Beast and its Tyranny shewing also there must be Season or intimate Time within Time at large I Have thus far settled the General Sciagraphy or Land-Scaph of this Prophetical Line of Time and shall now endeavour to make a farther penetration into the understanding of it and its several Characters by enquiry into its signification its extent in every one of these Characters and the Balance of every one of them each with the other and that not by an over-critical restraint of the following Disscourse to every Head but in such a communication of the Extent the balance of the Characters one with another that the most perfect knowledge of the whole may arise from them together as they most naturally fall one into the other It is then to be known in the Second General There are two states of Things and two kinds of Personages Second General and in successive Communities and Incorporations each of them are to be found both which appertain to this Line of Time and the Characters of Time are distinctly suited to each viz. to the tyranny of that King the Scripture-Prophecy calls the Beast and his Gentiles and to the Sufferings of the true Church and Servants of God under that Tyranny The whole mass of Time is therefore divided into the Time of the Night under the Conduct of the Moon the Governess as hath been said of the Night and into the Time of the Day and the Light under the Government of the Sun the Prince of the Day And this is agreeable to that long Line of Time Dan. 8. 14. viz. The twenty three hundred Evening-Morning for so they are expressed in the Hebrew that while the twenty three hundred notes by such a number the length of the space the Evening-Morning is all but one Evening and one Morning and so it is call'd The Vision of the Evening and of the Morning verse 26. As then it is called the Vision of the Evening and the Morning so the Evening is but One and the Morning but One. As they are 2300 Evening-Morning ver 14. it is signified the lesser portions of Time are taken out of that great Number Again As they are One Evening and One Morning it speaks the Time One continued Evening with a bright Morning at the end of it As they are twenty three hundred Evening-Morning it signifies so many Nights and Days or natural Nycthemers or prophetical Years in which the Children of darkness take the Evenings or Night under the Moon and the Children of Light have the Mornings or Dayes for their portion under the Sun of Righteousness with which the Church is cloath'd and hath the Moon even when it seems most to have the Ascendent under its Feet but their Morning or Day does not appear in its Brightness till All night's past and the bright Morning-Star shall appear The whole Mass of Time I say then or the Time Times Half Time is distributed into twelve hundred sixty dayes twice nam'd but can be but one and the same Twelve hundred and sixty and twice forty two months which taken as Lunar Time and single cannot be equal to Twelve hundred sixty dayes or so much Solar Time and taken double exceeds it and therefore must as hath been said and shall be prov'd coalesce and knit one into another as a due Point and so may be Two forty two Months and this as proper to the Children of the Night must be peculiar to the Beasts Tyranny and the Days distinct to the Children of Light and their Holy Martyry or Testimony though under Sufferings and Death it self The first of these or the Tyranny of the Beast is expressed by changing Laws and Times and wearing out the Saints of the most High by accomplishing to scatter the power of the Holy People by the Gentiles treading the Court and the Holy City under foot whereby the Tammith viz. the daily or continual Publick Service of God is taken away by making War with the Witnesses and Saints the Womans Seed and overcoming and killing them as may be seen by a compare of Dan. c. 7. c. 8. c. 11. c. 12. and Apocal. c. 11. c. 12. c. 13. The second State of Things or the Sufferings of the Church and Servants of God is expressed by the Witnesses and Servants of God worn out given into the Hand of the little Horn or Beast for he is call'd both Dan. 7. v. 8. 12. 25. compar'd lying dead cast down stamped upon scattered the Witnesses in Sackcloth and the Woman in the Wilderness so as to be hid from the Face of the Serpent All which appears in the places fore-cited Now that we may see how these States and so the Characters of Time are Implex'd and Enfolded one within the other First the Time Times Half Time are the common Womb and Continent of the whole Time And this Character is therefore given first Dan. 7. 25. And that it might be the more observable it is given again the second time Dan. 12. 7. And then to give a farther notice to it it is given a third time in the Revelation Apoc. 12. 14. But because the just space and duration of time times semi time cannot be concluded certainly by themselves they are slid into twelve hundred sixty dayes lying as I have said in the Bosome of twelve hundred ninety dayes as the just size and exact standard of the whole Time so that in its utmost Extent It and all its Characters must be equal and they can neither exceed nor fall short of Twelve hundred sixty Prophetical Days or Years that is neither the Time Times Semi or Half Time nor the three Dayes and a half which are but other words as we shall see for the Three Times and a Half Nor the twice Forty two Months can be either longer or shorter than the Twelve hundred sixty Years because therefore Fourty two Months of Lunar Time as they ought to be interpreted as hath been shewn are not equal to twelve hundred sixty Days or Years and that twice Forty two Months will much more exceed therefore the Forty two Months twice given must be two Forty two Months which by the Characters we shall be guided to we shall find at an exact Point coalescing or uniting into One as hath been already said And because Time Times Semi Time are both as long and as broad as the twelve hundred and sixty dayes and yet have a more pregnant Intimate part viz. the Season within the Time in
Conversions to Christianity though so great as to be a very strong Argument of its Truth were small in comparison of what this shall be for the Mistery of Iniquity began early to work Ephesus the Type of the Apostolical Church left its first love as soon as the Apostles went off the World and notwithstanding all the sufferings of the Primitive Christians under the Type of Smyrna yet a Synagogue of Satan an authoritative Ecclesiastick Apostasie then overshaded it till in the times figur'd by Pergamus all was cover'd with the Throne of Sathan a Supremacy of Apostacy and so things went on and they are not yet recover'd in the Best Christian Churches but they shall be after the space of ten prophetical Days that is years to that degree that the Kingdoms of this World shall be proclaim'd to be the Kingdoms of the Lord and of his Christ and so things shall go on amain to the Restitution of all things as God hath spoken by his Prophets since the World began the Lord will hasten all this in his own time and if it be wonderful in our Eyes should it be therefore wonderful in Gods The Witnesses shall then put off their Sack-cloth the everlasting Gospel shall be preached to every People and Language the Monarchy of Christ Jesus shall be an Vniversal Monarchy and the Tenfold Principality the ten Kings shall fall perfectly off from the Beast and the City that is born up on high by it that hath so long reign'd over the Nations and Kings of the Earth shall fall Stay then you Atheists and Despisers of all Religion and asswage the high Atheistical Humour see whether God hath not call'd the end and declar'd it from the beginning and declar'd all along the great things to come that you and all may know that he is God have so much Patience as to see what these ten years will produce at their end but if you will not be perswaded take your fill of Atheism and your farewel also for the very Air you breath in will be too bright and hot for Atheism to live any longer in Let us considering at what Door this fatal Apostasie Remark 2 enter'd even at a departure from the Apostolical twelve and so grew up to its number 666 let us I say fear the least remove in Doctrine Worship and Practice from the foundation of the Prophets and Apostles or from Christ the chief corner stone We need not so much mind combating Parties in Religion by names hateful or reproachful to them much less those little snatches at them by trifling Reflections upon them let us center our selves upon Truth it self in the word of God and grow in Grace and in the Knowledge of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ and that will secure us from this Error of the Wicked and from falling from our own stedfastness this will cut off Offence from all but those who are resolved to take Offence this will preserve us in due regard to Authority if we dissent from it in matters of Religion and yet we shall preserve our Religion while we keep close to those Images of things Scripture hath given us and observe those notes of Time it hath fitted to them and suffer History which is every mans Priviledge to read to hear or to know even by the Law of Nature to declare what fell out and this we cannot be deny'd since God hath furnished us in all things and commands us to search his word and to hear and read the Words of his Prophesie and count the numbers he hath given with Wisdom and Vnderstanding and his Ministers are to expound to us and then we are to search and try whether those things are so or not and in all things receiv'd from the word of God we know and all know it is more reasonable to obey God than Men. These are two things in which the Happiness and Welfare of Man consists for this World and for that to come both which he hath made as certain and evident to us as the Light One and the First and Principal is true Religion fix'd in his Word with the present Consent of Natural Conscience and the Awes of that even whether we will or no. If we would but rest in the clear plain and undoubted Truths of it and not be hasty of removing from them till we have full Evidence from them to conduct us farther into Divine Knowledge without suffering our own Fancy to mislead us or our Credulity and sudden Belief of others to hurry us according to their Impositions The Second is Loyalty or Subjection to the Sovereign Power set over us by God and what that is we may easily know For the Sword of Justice is Supremely in the Hands of it and the Government of that World in which we live that the Disorders of Mankind may not swallow up it self depends upon it It carries before it a Terrour to evil works and a praise to them that do well Upon which account we must be subject not only for wrath but for Conscience sake And when this is in the Hand of a Prince whose Ancestors have been Princes throughout many Ages when the Succession is Clear and Lineal we can have no greater Assurance The Power that is is ordain'd of God And such blessed be God is the Case of our Nation that we can have no possible Scruple Now our Subjection is clear what it ought to be even in all things but our Religion whether Reveal'd or Natural for that is Gods and to be rendered to him onely All things else are Caesar's A Christian as a Christian can have no Scruple or Doubt in any thing else whatever it be This he can by no means submit It is to impeach Sovereignty in its highest Orb even as it is to obey a Subordinate Magistrate sent by the King against the King and his Supremacy But in all things else he needs as a Christian ask no Question for Conscience sake What men may as men as the Subjects of such Laws such Establishments as every Nation hath peculiar to it self insist upon I leave to those Laws I know as Christians the rendering our Lives our Estates if call'd for by God and the Edicts of Princes cannot hurt our Consciences but rendering our Religion to any but God and his Word will So these two things Religion and Loyalty can never clash can never interfere for to deny the surrender of our Religion can never hurt our Loyalty for to be Religious according to the Word of God onely and Natural Conscience guided by that is the highest Loyalty This is all the Loyalty Man can require to render All things else without Resistance and to Love Honour Pray for the Prince that requires all our Loss God will recompence in the Resurrection of the Just So a Christian hath no need to be Disloyal if he understand his Religion aright It is not our Loyalty to our Prince to be of our Prince's Religion though it be right
it is our Loyalty to God in the first place so it is not Disloyalty not to be of the Princes Religion if it be not according to the Word of God when we render All but our Religion He can require And this we need not fear to do because we cannot lose by it our Reward will be great from our Father who is in Heaven and as Christians we should be asham'd to deny it but in Religion even to the least Ceremony of it except determined by natural decency or order we have but one Father and Master God and Christ and here he hath neither Vicar nor Vice-gerent but his Spirit in his Word We should be content in this time of the Apostasie with a Remark 3 mean Condition upon the account of Religion not to seek Grandeur and Honour upon that Title If God casts it on us we should improve it to his Glory and the support of the Service and Servants of Christ it is the Beast and his Adherents that carry the Pomp and Greatness of this World in a Religious Equipage it is even a suspition upon what is high and stately and in Opulency by Christianity for Christs Witnesses are in Sack-cloch it is the Time of the Delay of his Kingdom and all his Servants are with him in the Patience of it they ought not to ravish Glory and surprise Dignity before the time but to stay for it till the appearance of Jesus Christ the 1260 Days of Mourning and of the Church in the Wilderness are not yet run out the Beast is yet in Power the Tenthliness of the City is not yet fallen the Kingdom of Christ is not yet proclaimed It is no wonder there is yet so great a Rent and Division Remark 4 in Christian Religion that any thing unreasonable or a frame of things most contrary to it bears up against all the urgencies of Scripture and Reason and will not be bafled nor ashamed but vouches high and pretends aloft so it should be that Prophesie may be fulfilled The Beast and his Adherents are obstinate to the last even when the Elevation of things against them shall be much higher then now when Evidences from Heaven shall be much more sensible they blaspheme and repent not Christianity from so long an Antiquity and the profession of it shields and defends their Pretensions and carries a shade over them even wherein they depart from it and most Apostatize this keeps up the Controversie and perpetuates the Dispute But within a Time a short Time it will be decided it will come to that publick Declaration of the Witnesses Ascention of their Song before the Throne the positive Denunciation If any man worship the Beast and his Image He shall drink of the wrath of God and c will put an end to all Dispute Revel 14. 9. In the mean time let not any pretence stagger us The man of sin ought to sit in the Temple of God his seat then must be founded in a profession of the true Religion his Antiquity signifies nothing for he ought to be a Beast of forty two months of years or above twelve hundred years standing His Pretences from any thing said or done before that 1260 how early soever if it be not found evident in Scripture is of no avail for the Mystery of Iniquity the Womb out of which He came was at work and in a Mystery so secret so cunning as not to be discern'd by many good men and all to bring him to what he was and is the Spirit of Antichrist was then in the World It is no wonder Princes continue so devoted to him and his City he calls a Church the words of God are not yet fulfilled concerning him but they shall consider and change their Minds when God puts it into their Hearts and therefore we ought earnestly to pray for them whatever their Perswasions are now that God would continue their Lives for they shall then be Instruments in his hand that change so near approaching shall be most orderly most regularly by Princes themselves induced by Evidences from Heaven of an extraordinary nature God will not be help'd herein but by his own Vicegerents whom he hath appointed whom he hath ordain'd no Sedition Rebellion may grow from hence It is to be quieted appeas'd and even rooted up by this Doctrine even as it is utterly condem'd by it for God will appear and Princes with him But yet on this nor on any other Account can there be a Reconciliation a Composition with this false state of Christianity there may be such Attempts for there will be a Synagogue of Satan rising a-new at the very approach of Christ's Kingdom before the end yet of the 1260 Days It appears as if there would be so for Philadelphia the best State of the Christian Church before the New Jerusalem and with which it united shall receive Acknowledgment from such a Synagogue that Christ hath lov'd it Revel 3. 9. But this Representation of Bestianism obstinate impenitent to the Last in the Body of it as it is the decisive Argument and beyond all Volumes of Dispute because it is divine perpendicular down-right swift and sudden in its Determination so it shews the impossibility of meeting half-way accepting Terms to any good Effect We know not what may be between this present Time though but a Remnant and the end of the 1260 Days There may be an Eye of the Witnesses kill'd and lying dead three days and a half a return of former Darkness in some parts at least I apprehend it not in this Nation yet God only knoweth it is not so far reveal'd so far as I have found but I hope not There may be a Synagogue of Satan a Project of Compounding this I more fear but let us obtain and maintain a full Victory over the Image the Mark the Name and the Number of the Name But it is certain it is but ten prophetical Days and the Witnesses shall not only every where rise but every where come out of their Sackcloath out of which the true Witnesses of God are no where yet come Then they shall for the mouth of the Lord hath spoken it So many certain Notes Characters and Boundaries of Time as I have drawn together in the compute of this Line of Time with it self and that are given as Assistants to it though not immediately of the Essence and Body of it can be no more by chance than many Pictures exactly resembling several Persons pertaining to a Family and found in the Mansion of such a Family and at such Times when such Persons were known to be so appertaining to it can be by chance Forc'd they are not for things themselves conspire Fancyful and Arbitrary they are not for they cannot be chang'd or remov'd at Pleasure nor any like them made If then they are truly Scriptural and Divine How certainly shall they be fulfilled in their Season All counter-Appearances can signifie no more than the Israelites severer
Usage by Pharaoh argued against their Deliverance by Moses All the Disaffection in the Age to Interpretation of Prophecies or its insensibleness of them can no more disprove them than Christ's coming as a Thief upon Sardis at an Hour it knew not shall be disprov'd by the Sleepiness and Unwatchfulness of that Church Let us then with Resolution Constancy of Obedience Strength of Faith Labour of Love Patience of Hope wait for and come to the end of these ten days and from them to the 1335 Days where Blessedness shall certainly be But if we should say We may dye before those Ten Years are come to their Period and there is no Probability or Possibility we should live to the seventy five beyond or the 1335 of Blessedness I answer The Saints of God living on Earth shall receive their share in all the Glories of his Kingdom and the several degrees of it and they that dye hoping waiting desiring praying shall be rais'd in the very same posture of Soul wherein they died so that they who by a general Faith and Obedience waited and came in Daniel's Time and ever since viz. by earnest Prayers Come Lord Jesus Come quickly shall be blessed even as they who by particular Faith and Obedience wait and come at the Time it self And in the mean time the Souls of Saints above the Spirits of just men who shall be perfected at that time celebrate in Heaven all the Advances of Christ's Kingdom even as they pray for it as the Souls under the Altar cry How long Lord c. so they rejoyce at every Rising of Christ's Kingdom so do the same Souls Rev. 12. 10. So Rev. 14. 3. They that sing that new song harping with their Harps So They Rev. 15. 3. So they Rev. 19 c. Such is the universal Song of Triumph of the Palm-bearing company Revel 7. 10. Let us not therefore despond but be abundant in the work of the Lord knowing our labour shall not be in vain in the Lord. Why should it be thought an incredible thing that God Remark 6 should draw in his Word the Plot of Future Time to so great a Period as the Kingdom of Christ That all Futurity is within the Grasp of Infinite Omniscience cannot be doubted Known to God are all his Works from the beginning to the end The Scheme of all that hath been before it was or that shall be is always with Him as if it just now was in all the circumstances and Life of a present Appearance in whose Eternity All present past to come are all one The whole Table of Time is always before Him Does it then pertain to the Prerogative of Omniscience that Future Things should be known only to himself It does so indeed any further than he is pleas'd to reveal them But He that challenges the false Divinities of the Heathen that they could not declare things to come hath certainly given Isa 42. 23. Instances of his own Prescience and Demonstrations of it to his People Hath he not done so in all Ages by his Servants the Prophets Is he not as Liberal to the Ages of Christianity to the state of things under the Gospel of his Son whom he hath constituted Heir of all things and put in subjection to him the World to come of which we speak Or is the Glory of Divine Truth so great that even as immediate Appearances the Power of Miracles and extraordinary Revelations have ceas'd since the full Settlement and Sealing the Volume of Truth in the Gospel so Prophecy needs not now This indeed hath much of Reason yet even as all Truth is compriz'd in that Volume so are the Grand Revolutions pertaining to the Christian Church in the same Volume and therefore whatever God hath done for the former World the very same hath he summ'd up in the New Testament When therefore we have besides the Interspersion of Prophecy in several places of it a Book wholly Dedicated to Prophecy Blessed is he that heareth and readeth the words of this Prophecy Have we not reason then to expect the course of things to the very end in it But does not the Prophecy it self say The Things were shortly to come to pass So that what is to be found in it pertain'd to the primitive Age the Destruction of Jerusalem to the Time when Christianity was well settled and till Pagan Rome became Christian It is true indeed The Divine Revelator Jesus Christ our Lord does say the things were shortly to come to pass that is to begin to come to pass They were then upon motion but as a great Army is said to come immediately when the Avant-Corriers are coming or come although the whole Body and Rear may be considerable distances off so this whole Series and Chain of Events in the Revelation come quickly although the first and the last part differ so many Ages Is it not clear and visible that there is the Beginning of Things and the End of Things in every mans Apprehension plain and evident that is from the Resurrection and to the Day of Judgment and why then should we not believe there is the Middle of Things also Why should we imagine Prophecy hath made such a Leap over the Between Lying Times seeing they were very great Did it not behove his Church and Servants to know of so great and wide spreading an Imposture as Mahometanisme Was it nothing to it Christianity should be in so low and dark a state as it was from the lowest Fall of the Western Empire to the Ruine of the Eastern Empire in both which the principal Residences of it were and so long space as from 666 to 1453. But still it may be said If such a Prophecy be it does not become us to pry into it it is the Ark of secret things that do not belong to us Why then does Christ say Blessed is he that heareth the words of this Prophecy Why doth he command him that hath Wisdom and Vnderstanding to count the Number of the Beast Why doth He in explication of the Seven Heads say Here is the Mind that hath Wisdom Why had Christ the Revelation to shew to his Servants But was it not all one as if they had not been reveal'd since the Revelation was not pretended to be understood in former Times I answer we do not know what was understood the Apostacy so cover'd and muffled all Things and does yet so darken them The universal prejudice against the Explanation of this Prophecy is I doubt not the effects of this Apostasie But that there hath gone a stream of Light from hence to the Servants of Christ by the Witnesses in every Age is to me out of all question and that it hath discover'd the Things most necessary to that Age although the Light hath been not only clearer but the knowledge that such a Light hath been more certain to us since the last Age and Half and shall be every day clearer and clearer When
did not appear to be hurt during the time times half a time according to the Oath of Christ immediately therefore in pursuance of the former Symbol the Servants of God are seal'd the Worshippers worship not in an open but reserv'd Temple the Witnesses do not enjoy but prophecy and that in Sackcloth the Woman flies to her close Receptacle in the Wilderness and even in pursuance of this same Symbol the seven thunders are seal'd as we shall see Cap. 10. And all this to that very purpose that the Beast may have his time times till the Morning of the half-time when in Declaration of the Right of Christ even then to take the Kingdom because the half-half-time was entred as the third Day was in the Morning of Christ's Resurrection the Thunders began But that the Beast might have his whole half-time also the Thunders were again seal'd down For were not the Kingdom of Christ thus under Seal its Brightness would immediately consume the man of Sin and his Bestian Kingdom as will be seen at the end of the 1260 Days viz. Ann. 1697 in the first appearance of Christ's Kingdom and more fully at the Appearance it self 75 Years after Let us now inquire when this sealing had its Efficacy and we shall find it hath its Efficacy distinguishingly as to the fixing its Epoch or Beginning at the first of the first Trumpet and so on during the whole Time of the first and second Trumpets until the falling of the Star in the third Trumpet So that the Trumpets and the sealing necessarily begin together as they ought For we find it is thus expresly determin'd to the first of the first two Trumpets for nothing that was hurt in those two first Trumpets viz. the Earth nor the Sea nor any Tree was to be hurt till the sealing past And why was it so but that the Seal might have its defensive Vertue on the sealed which Defence was certainly as early as the hurt else it could not defend It is expresly continu'd all the first and second Trumpet by naming the Earth Sea and Trees for all these were hurt in the two first Trumpets But the Fountains are not nam'd nor the Sun c. not because the sealing did not continue for we find the express mention of it rising within the Time of the first woe Trumpet Revel 9. 4. as of a thing suppos'd to have continued all along But because the Spirit of God would lead us to the new date of Time viz. the Beasts forty two Months negotiated by the event of the third Trumpet or the Imperial Star falling which Star as all History knows fell at 475 immediately on which the Beast in prophetical Account succeeded as the eighth King So that then in the very space of the third Trumpet those Months began and the fourth Trumpet ran upon that new Line of the forty two Months concurrent with the 1260 Days and so forward till Both end at 1697 the one as Time of the Moon or Months the other as Time of the Sun or Days by which we know also when the 1260 days began viz. by computing and adjusting the Lunar Time of forty two months to the Solar Time 1260 days If the months began so famously at 475 The days that both may end together within time times half a time must begin thirty eight Years before or at 437 as hath been before intimated so as to be plainly understood but shall be fully proved Now because of all this the Spirit of God comprehends only what pertain'd to the first two Trumpets within the express security of not being hurt viz. the Earth and Trees of the first Trumpet and the Sea of the second Trumpet till the Servants of God were seal'd Revel 7. 2 3. shewing plainly that then the Efficacy of the sealing began where first the Earth and all green things were hurt in the first and the Sea in the second Trumpet and as it were to hint the Beasts forty two months falling within the third Trumpet and so going on in the fourth There is no mention of the securing the Fountains nor the Lights of Heaven until the Servants of God were seal'd which the Beast could not yet surrogate for being in his Infancy till a Star fell to the Earth Revel 9. 1. which by all Count was at the Time Phocas gave Universality to the Bishop of Rome Then Rome seems to be again enlightned not long before the Mahometan Hegire when the Locusts came forth and therefore then Divine Judgment pursues by three woe Trumpets because then the surprise of the Kingdom of Christ by the cheat of Antichrist reigning more appear'd But after another concurrent date of Time viz. the Five and five Months of the Locusts Revel 9. 15. 10. given new in the fifth Trumpet the sealing is there mention'd again and in the sixth Trumpet where the Hour Day Month and Year of the Horsemen began there is a parallel Symbol of Secresie and Security with the sealing viz. the true Worshippers crying out from the Altar of Incense where they were hid Revel 9. 13. within the first of which viz. of the Locusts fell in the Beasts intimate Time or Season with his Number 666 as shall be shewn Revel 13. ult Now by all these the Spirit of God does interpoint and distinguish the beginning of the Lines of several Times that fall in with the great entire Line of the 1260 Days and notes when they began which new Lines do some way or other note when that great Line began and when it shall end viz. by the Proportion those other Lines however beginning after hold to it all joyning with it when they are once begun and by that Proportion The Beginning must be 437 and the end of it 1697 as shall be shewn upon all of them Wherein also the Time remark'd with the Voices of the seven Thunders seal'd will admirably shew it self at 1517 when the last 180 Years or Half-time began at which Time the Division of so many States from Rome first appear'd also And the End of all at 1697 will declare it self So strongly although requiring strict Attention and Observation hath God secur'd the fixing of this Line both in its Beginning and End as shall be all along by Gods gracious permission to proceed made evident I shall but just salute the Third Enquiry and finish the first Point discours'd viz. its Beginning And because it joyns in assuring this Beginning I must as I say salute it And this Third Enquiry is to Research what is the meaning Enquiry 3 of this Grand Apocalyptical Symbol the Trumpets Now from the general Use and universal Signification of a Trumpet as an Alarm to War and the dismal consequences of it these Trumpets certainly signifie the same as appears by the course of the Trumpets for every Trumpet calls to some War and the seventh to the Battel of Armageddon They are therefore so many loud Sounds of the Indignation of God upon those
against whom the Sounds are Directed These two first Trumpets then as beginning at 437 summon the Barbarian Nations to fall on on all parts of the Empire as they had began to do by the vertue of the Angels preparing themselves to sound About this time Gensericus the Vandal-King took Carthage the Hunns over-ran the upper and lower Pannonia now called Hungary Thrace and Illyricum the Brittish Provinces soon after fell into the Hands of Strangers and Barbarians Thus the Glory and Greenness the Flourish and Verdure of the Roman Empire was universally blasted by the Hail and Fire mingled with Blood of the first Trumpet running every way At the same time no Green of true Christianity was unblasted by the Apostacy and Rome it self as a great Mountain burning with Fire was thrown into the Sea that is it had been indeed taken under Honorius in the preparation to Sound and immediately recover'd But now at the Second Trumpet it was made the Ball of War in a continual Taking and Retaking for many years after so that the Flames of War from several Parts of the World and the People of it compar'd to a Sea congregated about it and in the midst of the fearful Broil the Imperial Starr Augustulus the last Emperour fell From hence therefore we obtain the clear Agreement of Time with the Symbol of the First three Trumpets as their Blast fell upon the third part of men the Figure of the Roman Empire in Agreement with the Dragon or Roman Emperours drawing down the third part of the Starrs with his Tayl. Revel 12. 14. Where all Interpreters understand that Imperial Power Now at the very time of the Barbarous Nations coming like the Gentiles into the chief Residences of the Christian Religion is the Symbol of the Apostacy of the Gentiles treading the Holy City and Court and the Dragon Rev. 11. 2. c. 12. 13. 14. persecuting the Woman just now taking her flight into the Wilderness fairly made out both as to Similitude and Time But that the Ministration of the Trumpets may answer the Ministration by the Servants of God in his Church at the Seals opened besides this Semblance of the Trumpets with War Holy Writing leads us to another viz. the Sacred use of Trumpets in the giving of the Law Exod. 19. And they were instituted by God to call the Congregation of the Servants of God together which was now not into Publick but in Private at the Altar of Incense There was also the Feast of Trumpets on the First Day of the Seventh Month joyn'd with the Reading of that Law upon which follow'd the Solemn Fast on the Tenth Day Levit. 23. 23 c. and Numb 29. 2. Thus by these Trumpets the Witnesses began their Prophecy and Testimony for the Commandments of God and Doctrine of Jesus and in Sackcloth and Fasting These Prophets and Watchmen blew the Trumpet according to the charge laid upon them Ezek. 32. v. 1 c. And according to this Blowing the trumpets the Camp the Congregation the Woman the Church made its motions in the Wilderness according to Numb 10. v. 1 c. So admirably does this Symbol agree with the Gentiles forty two Months of treading the Holy Court with the Worshippers at the Altar of Incense with the Witnesses Prophecy in Sackcloth and the Womans Flight into the Wilderness as on Eagles wings in regard of Divine Providence as well as of the Roman Eastern and Western Empire Apostatizing And how fitly does the whole Apocalyptical Time answer the Jews Feast of the Passover at the Resurrection of Christ united with the Feast of Weeks at the giving of the Spirit and John's being in the Spirit when he receiv'd the Revelation and then follows the Interval of the Seals opened like that Interval of Feasts till the day of blowing the Trumpets and the Fast or Sackcloth after which follows the Triumphant Feast of Tabernacles so celebrated Numb 29. by the Ennumeration of every Day 's Services like the cleansing of the Sanctuary by the solemn Observation of it at the restoring Jerusalem Ezra 3. 4. in Image of the New Jerusalem and Nehemiah 8. after the Feast of Trumpets with Olive-branches Pine Myrrh Palm-branches ver 15. like dwelling in a Garden of Eden and in Resemblance of the Palms Revel 7. 9. and as a prophetical Emblem of the Paradise of God Revel 2. 7. c. 22. 2. compar'd according to all which the Prophet Zechar. so distinguishly proclaims in that wonderful Prophecy of the Glory of Christ's Kingdom Zech. 14. this Feast of Tabernacles v. 16. and as if it were the entring a Caution against understanding that as the True Feast of Tabernacles Nehem. 8. 4. A solemn Fast follows as it were irregularly upon it Nehem. 9. to shew the True Feast of Tabernacles was not yet come but a long Mourning to intervene And how excellently do the seven Thunders uttering their Voices agree with the Trumpets sounding so long For towards the latter Time of the sixth Trumpet and at the last 180 Days beginning the Gospel Law was given in these Thunders like those of the Law Exodus 20. v. 28. Thus all things concurring even to Miracle or a Demonstration of the Almighty Wisdom and Power of God I cannot doubt I have fix'd upon the true Epoch or Beginning of the Line of 1260 days at 437 and so upon the end of it at 1697. Let it then be certainly apprehended by all that love Christs Remark on the whole Kingdom what God hath so determin'd shall come to pass and that He the Lord will hasten it in its own Time He will work and none shall let it The Israelites went out of Egypt to a Day at the 430 years end of their sojourning and no sinful Exod. 12. 41. unsensibleness that God would deliver them by Moses or their other sins could interpose Christ wrought Redemption at the very night of the Fulness of Time viz. at the middle of the last half Week and no unworthiness of the Age could Dan. 9. 27. hinder it though never so great so nothing shall hinder the Rising of the Witnesses and their Ascension at the 1260 days Revel 11. 9. Ten years hence no though there should be Three dayes and a half not only signifying the intimate Time as hath been declared but a Blush a Recollection a drawing the whole Time past again in little at the end For no Appearances how great soever shall surprise the Divine Decrees upon Time Nullum tempus occurrit Regi There may be a deep Reshrouding Christianity at least in some Parts The Israelites slavery sate closest upon them when their Redemption was so nigh We see what a change was begun 1517 by those seven Thunders when all was one Night piece and the Voice so little from Man and wholly from Heaven much more at 1697. We see how at this day the Turkish Power that hath been so long the Terrour Scourge and Woe of the World call'd Christian Falls when
God pleases their strong Holds are like the first ripe Figs that fall into the Mouth of the Eater Their Nahum 3. 12. Warlike People are as Women This is a visible Pledge God will be ready with all things else the Tenth of the great City falling and that Turkish woe passing away when his Witnesses shall rise Revel .. 13. 11. Our Duty is to stand still to be in our Station of Subjection to the Powers that are over us and to see the Salvation of God and He that put it into the Hearts of Princes to agree and give their Power to the Beast untill His words shall be fulfill'd will also put it into their Heart to agree to do what shall then be to be done by his Appointment Our right sense of which and suitable Obedience to our Prince will be an Honour to Christianity to our Hearing and Reading this Prophecy and a Safety to our Souls if it should not be as it is most likely to be and we have the Royal Promise it shall be and I much hope it in these Nations even according to this Prophecy to our Concernments in this World And thus I have brought to a Point the Beginning of this Line at 437 which is the Foundation of all and accordingly we shall find the whole going on to 1697. The End of this first Point settling the Epoch or Beginning of this Line of 1260 Dayes ERRATA PAge 20. Line 3. for sixth read seventh p. 23. 6th line before the last for Witnesses read Woman p. 24. l. 15. As every Leap-Year we double February 24 to equal the Suns Year to our Account p. 58. l. 1. blot all of p. 64. l. 14. read Myrtle SECT VI. Wherein The Third Part of Men upon which the Trumpets have their Effects is more fully made clear to be the Roman Imperialness and that the Symbols of the Three first Trumpets do most plainly agree with the History in full Answer to the second and third Enquiry HAving given a general Account of the things nam'd in the Contents so far as is necessary to settle the Beginning of that Line upon the beginning of which we have been so intent it is now necessary to give a more ample Satisfaction concerning the Third part of men both that It means the Roman Imperial Power as also why the Empire being Christian there was such an Effusion or Wrath upon it that so the whole Line may be thereby ascertain'd The first Time then in true order of nature in this Prophecy though not in Place or in the Contexture of it this Third Part is found and made use of is in that Vision of the Dragon Revel 12. 3. Where I think hardly any Interpreter does not think there is a Representation of the Roman Pagan Empire in one Line or other of that Table And indeed when we consider the Prophecy hath the Roman Empire for its great Subject seeing in the Days of that and at the end of that Christ's glorious Kingdom is to be establish'd it is every where where it can be to be suppos'd and seeing here All things agree to it and that the Careir of Time was guided directly to it in the parallel Vision to this viz. of the fifth and sixth Seals upon the Dragon watching to destroy the Prince the Christian Church was to bring forth and to devour it in which Cause so many Souls lay under the Altar and yet that the Lamb was on the Throne from all this we cannot but suppose the Roman Pagan Empire intended The third part then of the Stars brush'd down as it were with the Tail of the Dragon whatever spiritual Signification it hath of the Sathanick Power does also suppose those Supreme Princes and States that the Roman Imperialism dismounted and made tributary stamping upon them with its Legs of Iron according to Daniel The Emblem is lively Dan. 7. 7. and elegant to present their Dominions converted into Provinces subjected to the Roman Dominion So that from hence That Empire Thirding the East and West of the Sovereignties of the habitable known World in the divine Judgment of it is symbol'd by a third part of Nature it self viz. Earth Trees Sea Fountains Sun c. for of the third part of the Stars brought under its universal Monarchy it was constituted And in this very Vision where the Holy Spirit who fore-knew and fore-saw what Interpretations would be made of what he writ and what Interpretations he would have to be made and in what Time and to what degrees of Certainty and Assurance these Interpretations should rise and so from thence what was fit to be laid in the Foundations and what to be superstracted The Holy Spirit that knew all this knew that in the Vision of the Dragon there would be found the Roman Monarchy agreedly so that there would be a fair Conduct to its third part in Dominion and wherever that Imperialness resided whether in the East or the West it was mounted upon the Ruine or Subjection of the third part of the Stars and so the third part became the Figure of the Roman Imperialness not of the whole Territory of the Empire but of the Imperialism or Grandeur of Supremacy And what was most immediately and properly to touch that is according to the most solemn Symbolicks of this Prophecy said to touch and impeach that third part For otherwise the whole Empire is call'd in the Evang. Luke the whole Habitable World and in the course of the Luke 2. 1. four Judgments of the fourth Seal which rang'd equally as it were over the whole Territory and Dominion of the Empire Death is said to have Power given it over four parts of men or over every fourth part with each Judgment signifying the free Expatiation of those Judgments upon the whole Latitude of the Empire and as it were quartering it with a judiciary staff But here the Territory of the Empire with its far and wide Dominion over the Earth was under the Ravage of Death without any touch upon the Imperialisme it self although so many Emperours fell under it and so there is no mention of the third part Revel 6. 8. So in the change of the Empire from Heathenism to Christianity there was no Change upon the Imperiality which continued as high still in the Christian Emperours from Constantine to the Death of the Great Theodosius as it was before the Description therefore is as if Heaven and Earth were concern'd in the Mutation but there is no mention of a third Revel 6. ult The opening of the bottomless Pit darkned the Sun and the Air with the Smoak out of which the Locusts came upon the Earth and they had Power to hurt men universally but Revel 9. 6. because the Imperial Sovereignty was not to be hurt in the very Imperiality there is no mention of the third part but when the Turkish Number was to seise upon the Eastern Throne that had its first Establishment upon the
third part of the Stars in the East and West the third part of men are said to be kill'd and thus the third part was under the force Rev. 9. 18. of every one of the first four Trumpets because every Trumpet was in an order or series to the destruction of the Western Empire in the three first of them and upon the Remains of Senatorian and Consular Power in the last of them All which I look upon as a fair Resolution of that part of this Enquiry As to what remains why so severe a Procedure upon a Christian Empire If it had been the Pagan Empire that had been under this Pursuit it had not been strange but it looks so unreasonable upon a Christian Empire as to call in question the whole frame of the Exposition Hereunto I therefore offer these two Solutions It having been decreed long ago by the determinate Counsel Solut. 1 of God and sworn by Christ himself that the Accomplishment of the Wonders of his Kingdom should be delay'd after the Seals of the Book open'd for the Time Times and half Time of the Beast or Antichrist the Roman Empire did no otherwise pass into Christian but that it Antichristianiz'd at the same time gradually and insensibly covered the former Paganism with the disguise of Antichristianism worshipping Maozzim and a God their Fathers had not known but Idolatrously and so on the other side it degenerated true Dan. 11. 38. Christianity into a kind of Paganism whereby they intitled themselves to the Blood Paganism had shed even as the Jews by the Murther of Christ did to all the Blood shed from Righteous Abel c. This went forward even from Constantine by silent and deaf steps but by the year 437 when the Trumpets first sounded the Measure was fill'd up and the Talent down weight and then the Imposture of suppositing the Kingdom of Antichrist for the true Kingdom of Christ was compleat so that the Vengeance of God arose and chased down that Empire that was call'd Christian but was now indeed become Antichristian God that changes Times and Seasons and the States of Solut. 2 Kingdoms giving them as he pleases had destin'd to the Beast the Seat and Power of the Western Empire and the Eastern as a kind of tributary Commendam for forty two Months does by these Judgments void the Room for him by taking away the Western Imperialism first in its seventh King that he the Beast might succeed into his forty two Months Then taking away all Consular and Senaterian Power so that it shined not the third part of the day nor of the night that he as the falling Star might inlighten Revel 9. 1. it and grow up to his Regnancy or Number 666. Upon both these Accounts therefore the Eastern Empire was so much longer spar'd first That it was not to be so deep in the Guilt of Antichristianism and Supplantation of the Kingdom of Christ and as it were for his Servant Constantine's sake and then the Room of it was not necessary for the receiving a Successor till the Mahometan Emperour a thousand Years after although it was many Times under dreadful Rebukes of Divine Judgment as also under the Claims and endeavour'd Usurpations of the Antichristian King Having thus far endeavour'd to satisfie the third Enquiry Enquiry 4 there will be the less necessary to add to the Resolution of the fourth for the course of Events is in History most notorious The Event of the first Trumpet was the Irruptions of the Barbarians on the whole Latitude of the Western Empire which thereby was as much blasted as the Glory of Summer is by a Storm of Hail and Lightning mix'd with Fire The Event of the second Trumpet connected with the first was That that great Mountain Rome the City upon seven Hills that had been under so many Emperours Pagan and Christian the Mistress of the Nations that had been under the Pagan Emperours Pagan Mystical Babylon and was now becoming Antichristian Mystical Babylon this Babylon was in the very Beginning of the Apostacy arrested by Divine Judgment for that City which had been so lately purg'd from Heathen Idolatry and was to be the Antichristian City for so long a Time after God erects the Pillar of his Judgment early upon it so that he cast it into the Sea as a flaming Mountain not as Babylon of old burnt but a burning Mountain into the Sea of continual Turmoil and Estuation so that in regard of the Warriors of that Time in their dreadful Disputes concerning it All Waters were turn'd into Blood And yet because it was to be born aloft upon the Beast of ten Horns that it might not be consum'd it burns as in a Sea wherein it was preserv'd though burning often it was taken and sack'd and made in the very literal sense a burning Mountain but it was rescu'd and surviv'd for so it was decreed till its final Desolation and Burning Rev. 18. At the Voice of the third Trumpet the very Heavens of the Western Government were so shaken that the great Star of Imperialism fell like Wormwood into the Rivers and made them so bitter that many died of that Imbitterment of the Waters that became even Wormwood it self Whilst Rome as a burning Mountain in the midst of the Sea made it to boyl even into Blood with a prodigious noise through the Nations and made that Tumult and Commotion in the midst of People a burning Mountain like Etna or Vesuvius may be suppos'd to do the Star falling imbitter'd so deadlily the Inland private State of the Empire that although it was quickly quench'd it self when it fell yet in the Time it was burning as a Lamp which was some time before its Fall into the Water and when it fell it was like a Lamp burning in Water every moment ready to dye and yet not presently extinct that it so consum'd the sweeter Juyces and benign Spirits of Government and Commerce that many Men died that is innumerable Families and Persons were ruin'd and utterly impoverish'd within the Empire both by the loss of the Aspect and influence of such a Star as also by the Confusion its Fall made and the Struggles it had with Death in its Fall and in the Water all which made the malign Effects much greater while the Fire and Water were in contest Now all these Symbols are so very evident in History that there needs no more than the very Appeal to it concerning them and so wonderfully accomplish'd in their Gravity Significancy and Sprightliness as to speak Divine Inspiration What History of that Time knows not These things were so That first all the Glory and Honour of the Empires Grandeur was struck all over as it were at once as with Fire and Hail from Heaven every day bringing the News of Invasions and Revolts every where That Rome was in the Flames and in a Sea and yet by contrary Agencies of the several Interests of Princes like Fire and Water
same Account a Persecution of the Dragon for the Mahometans were from their very original Adversaries to this Sovereignty of the Lord 's Anointed substituting an Imposture of Sovereignty and Prophetism in the place of it and all this within the universal Roman Monarchy the Propriety of Christ Their Deluge of Power and People impetuously overflowing with a false Religion is then most justly call'd a Flood out of Sathan's mouth acting as a Dragon according to the Notion of abstract Draconism and so raging and foaming with hostile Opposition to the Kingdom of Christ notwithstanding some seeming Acknowledgment of him in Mahometanism as a Prophet but truckling under that infamous false Prophet This then being the first Account of Draconism it is very easie to give Satisfaction to the first Doubt for the same things that are remonstrated as the Judgments of God as permitted and order'd by him in his holy Government of the World and Execution of Justice and Judgment upon Offenders are also most maliciously and hellishly negotiated by Satan as is most evident in the History of David's numbring the People that same misdoing of David is attributed to the displeasure of God and to Sathan as may be seen by comparing 2 Sam. 24. 1. and 1 Chron. 21. 1. yea in that different Case viz. the Transaction of our Lord's Sufferings Satan enter'd into Judas to embolden him to do what supreme Wisdom and Goodness had contriv'd to redeem lost Man It is therefore nothing strange the Holy Angels and Sathan met in these Trumpets each in their Place and Orb that while the Holy Angels sounded an Alarm to the Instruments of the divine Vengeance Sathan had his Contrivance to persecute the Woman both by the Barbarians and Mahometans But besides this Draconism of profess'd Enemies to Christianity there is the Draconism of the Beast or the Dragon living and being worshipped in the Beast or Antichristianism beginning by the other Beast who is afterwards call'd the false Prophet speaking as a Dragon which was the Synagogue of Sathan in the first growth and his Throne in the farther Growth when the Beast came to his Image and Number and the depths of Sathan or his Government in his ripest Age and thus the Dragon gave his Seat or Throne and great Authority to the Beast that is Sathan the Supreme Dragon in the idolatrous and bloody Cesareate now became Residentiary in the Beast and conveyed both the Hostility to the Kingdom of Christ the Idolatry and the Bloodiness into the Beast and by his Negotiation under divine Permission order'd the very Seat and Power of the Imperial Cesareate to the Beast as the Heir both of his Idolatry Enmity to Christ's Kingdom and persecutory Tyranny and for the sake of all these in all Revel 16. 13. which Regards it may well be esteem'd Draconism to the last And God in just Indignation brings upon this Serpentinism of this Beast a Counter-Serpentinism of Infidelism a Counter Draconism for serpens serpentem devorans fit Draco as before explain'd But yet the Draconism of the Beast is a diverse Draconism its Hostility to the Kingdom of Christ is not by down-right Force and Resistance of open War to the Name of Christianity but by way of Surprise out of his Hand and held as in his Right and to his Glory and yet in such real Opposition to him that he hath sworn His Kingdom shall not come till that be at the full end of Time Times and half Time Its Idolatry is an Idolatry as it were consecrating it self to the Honour of Christ and is therefore as in it self so in the prophetical Symbol full in all its heads of the Names of Blasphemy under this Head all the former Heads are flower'd and as it were powder'd with the Names of Blasphemy all former gross Idolatries and Demonolatries are dissembled under True Religion and Heathenism under Christianity or more truly True Religion and Christianity are Travestied and Burlesqu'd into Heathenism and Paganism and therefore it is not Simple-Idolatry but Blasphemy as we shall see But yet notwithstanding all this Sathan is but on Earth for the Beast holding the Kingdom as in the Right of Christ Christ thereby is still acknowledg'd to be on the Throne and in that the true God Holy Angels and Saints are thus blasphem'd by Antichristian Idolatries and that Sathan and wicked Spirits are abandon'd and detested in Profession generally though his Kingdom hath sometimes portentously broken out in Acknowledgments as it were to the Devil himself by some of the Antichristian Cheifs His Seat is not then as before as in a Heaven he therefore in a Rage dashes one part of his Kingdom against another the Barbarian against the Antichristian the Mahometan against the Bestian because he as a subtil Computator of his own Time knows It can be but short compar'd with above four thousand Years Reign before and that as in Heaven too in the Idolatry perform'd to Devils viz. Fallen Angels or Damned Souls And for so great a Pledge of the future Fall of Sathan is that Doxology and Song of Praise concerted in Heaven Rev. 12. 10. as also in Prevision of the full Glory of Christ's Kingdom decreed to him by God from the infinite value of his own Blood and as a Retribution for the Sufferings of his Servants maugre all Sathan's Accusations in which the Accuser himself was condemn'd and cast out and notwithstanding the succeeding Antichristianism And from all this arises a full Solution to the second Doubt and not only a Solution but an admirable Harmony and Consent of the whole Prophetical Symbolism For when Satan fell from Heaven in that desolation of Heathenism not only by the Christian Empire of Constantine but the perfect Victory over it by Theodosius When the Devil and his Angels after the War in Heaven were finally cast down A Victory obtained by the Incense offered with the Revel 8. 3. Prayers of all Saints as a Signal of the Church yet continuing pure in the publick Worship and that then was so great Expectation of the Glory of Christs Kingdom as that Doxology exprsses now mention'd Now is the Kingdom of our Rev. 12. 10. God come At this very Moment to shew that though God was pleas'd to account the Church pure to the very moment it could in his Righteous Judgment be so accounted yet I say to shew its Purity was at a very low Ebb and that it had long wan'd as also to shew that God had design'd to permit a very different state of Things to the Kingdom of Christ the very next news of the Church is that the two wings Western Eastern of the Great Roman Eagle had convey'd the Church the True Church into the wilderness that Rev. 12. 14. it could not be found This had been mention'd before assoon as ever the manly v. 6. Birth was caught up to the Throne of God but that was only in preparation and to match with the other Symbols But
remove any seeming Objection arising from the sudden change from such a Glory into the Apostacy so soon after entring and the Witnesses going into Sackcloth and the Woman into the Wilderness SECT VII In which is given the description of the other Beast and his first Administration of the Witnesses and their first manner of Testimony both before the Beast's forty two Months with the Answer of an Objection and Reflections upon this Interval IN these Enquiries I have now explain'd whatever I can conceive needful from the Beginning of the Trumpets to the forty two Months of the Beast except the Delineation of that which the Prophecy calls the other Beast under whose Conduct the Gentiles were brought into the outer Court and Holy City so far as the Action of that other Beast led to the grand Apocalyptick Beast And to inlighten this Interval of Time the more viz. from the Apostasie beginning in the 1260 Days at 437 unto the Beasts 42 Months 475 I find it most convenient to consider most accurately the State of the Witnesses as Prophecy hath given any Light to the pointing of the Time of their whole Testimony and distinguishing the various States of it which Method I will endeavour to follow through this whole Line of Time viz. to observe the Advances and Declinations of the Bestian Kingdom and to adjust thereunto the Declinations and Descents of the Witnesses into the deepest of their obscure State and their Re-advances till their Resurrection and Ascension for the one and the other States rise and fall alternately whose motion herein the Woman the Church was exactly conform'd to being indeed the very same one with another except the Notion of Single and Collected Single in the Witnesses Collected in the Church as before said But because the Action especially was sustain'd by the Seed or the Witnesses the Line of that Action is most particularly drawn over them the Witnesses I begin then with the other Beast but I will adventure to lay no stress upon the Word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Another as if it did necessarily imply Another Order or a various Sub-specification of these two Beasts because I find this Word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 may be according to this Prophecy significant of no more than a numerical individuating Difference But yet that these two are so different so solemn and great so momentously different Iconisms as are given of each of them and their Action by the holy Spirit sufficiently argue That we may then have the perfect Pourtracture of this other Beast who manag'd all things from the Beginning of the Apostacy during the wounded State of the Grand Beast in one viz. the sixth of its Heads call'd the Dragon and the Infancy of the Grand Beast viz. as united to its seventh Head call'd in this Prophecy most often The Beast We may thus behold Him the other Beast so far as his Description reaches while the Grand Beast lay wounded which was till the forty two Months began by which great Preparation will be made to understand that Grand Beast 1. This other Beast must as Beast does every where in Prophecy import a Body of Men under some Superiority of Power I must here remember again to except to the Translation of the Four not 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 salvage Beasts but 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 gentle Animals or living Creatures Revel 4. and elsewhere least it should cause any mistake but else both in Daniel and the Apocal. Beast does imply a People under united to some Principality above and because here the Principality was in a Peerage or Aristocracy it resides in the two Horns 2. Because it is a Beast of Continuance as plainly appears by its Action from the very Apostasie to the Number of the Beast viz. from 437 to 725 and after that to the very Destruction of the Beast and false Prophet it must be a fluid successive Body as other Prophetical Beasts are 3. The inward sense of it must be a Body of False Prophets under Chiefs mitred Prophets for all the marks of false Prophetism are upon them this Beast therefore rises low mean feeble stilly out of the Earth without warlike force or noise it works Miracles pretends to call for Fire from Heaven like Elias that is it threatens Men with the Wrath and Judgments of God it deceives it caused men to do by saying or teaching After its Administration as a Beast is past because swallowed up in the Grand Bestianism it is several Times call'd the False Prophet as being expressive of its very Essence and wherein it is most nearly united to the Beast Revel c. 16. 13. c. 19 20. c. 20. 10. 4. It must be Antichristian and seeing Antichristianism is a false mock abused Christianity it must have of Christian also in it else it could not be Antichristian it hath therefore the Resemblance of a Lamb in its two Horns but it is Antichristian specifickly working by Fraud to surprise the Kingdom of Christ ambitious haughty idolatrous persecutory cruel thirsting after blood for it spake as a Dragon altho therefore it hath two Horns like a Lamb yet not the Lamb Christ Jesus for he hath seven Horns Revel 5. 6. agreeable to all the Apocalyptical Sevens except the Dragon 's and the Beast's seven Heads Seven not because They were symbolically but literally seven Successions of Government as the Rev. 17. Womans seven Mountains 5. Seeing the great Subject of the Apocalype is the Roman Empire in its last State when the Kingdom of Christ was begun in the Gospel and to appear in Glory after that last State of the Roman Empire the last of those four Imperial Canales of Time it must therefore be that this pseudo prophetical Beast under its two Horns is compounded of the upper and under the dignified and inferiour False Prophets of the Eastern and Western Empire And seeing we shall find that the Grand Beast is Roman it will thence appear This Beast must be so seeing its whole Ministry is about that Grand Beast which is Roman 6. It must be after the Grand Beast in some prophetical Respect or Notion of that Grand Beast for it is call'd the first Beast in compare with this other Beast yet this other Beast must be before it in regard of Action for it does all for it viz. It is after it as the Grand Beast is one from its very Beginning or Foundation of the Roman Empire under its seven Heads successively it is after it in regard of Procuration of the Cure of its Wound of the Exercise of its Power while it lay wounded all which speak it in being before this other Beast But it is before this very grand Beast as under its seventh Head for it erects it into its Headship by speaking as a Dragon by keeping alive the Bestian Power and in exercise while the sixth Head lay wounded till the VVound was heal'd by the seventh Head succeeding and then
it protected the Infancy or low beginning of that seventh Head as will be seen under the beginning of the forty two Months to which it hath led us From the whole then these two Things arise to our main Purpose 1. That this other Beast must be the whole prophetick Office of the VVestern and Eastern Roman Empire under its Superiors or Hierarchy so far as it was grown Apostatical Antichristian and Pseudo prophetick or into false Prophecy from the very beginning of the Apostacy at 437 to the end of it at 1697 and beyond that in what State soever it shall be till it is cast into the Lake with the Beast With this Exception before the Beasts coming to the Image and Number of it self this Beast hath the Regency and so the Type of a Beast after that it subsides into bare false Prophetism but such as is inseparable from the Beast and the Beast from it so that they rule together but the Supremacy is in the Beast and they fall and are cast into the Lake together 2. The Action of this other Beast till the forty two months is its shaping its own Bestianism both into the Body under it and its Superiority over its own Body It s speaking as a Dragon and governing the Gentiles who are call'd the Earth and them that dwell therein herein exercising the Power of the wounded Beast before him viz. the former Paganish Beast that with all its Heads and Populacy according to the prophetical Emblem liv'd in a wounded State for want of a Bestian Head or Prince from the Empire becoming Christian till the Antichristian King became its Head at the beginning of the forty two Months And this other Beast guided them rul'd and conducted them as paganishly affected to a new Antichristian Paganism in preparation for the seventh Head without whose Succession the Grand Beast had been extinct In all which by Head is meant Head in Power It may be objected against this whole State of Things Object That here is no view of that Arrian Heresie and Persecution which could not be untaken in the Notices of this Prophecy This Prophecy is not to be suppos'd to take notice of All Answer the disorders in the Profession of Christianity any more than of all the Governments or Changes of Government in the World It minds its own Pursuit runs in its own Channel which was the fourth Monarchy and in that the Antichristian Surprisal of the Kingdom of Christ after the Destruction of pure Paganism so that Paganism first under the Pagan Empire Antichristian Paganism punish'd with the Barbarian and Mahometan Inundations from which the True Church was hidden and its Seed persecuted under the Bestian Kingdom is the only Symmetral Even Proportionate Course of this Prophecy till the end of the 1260 Days I come now to the last Thing necessary before the Entry into the Beasts forty two Months that is to settle the State of the Witnesses as in its general view under the whole 1260 Days and more particularly in this Interval from the Apostacy beginning unto the Beasts forty two Months The Witnesses as hath been already declar'd are the Seed of the VVoman the True Church who keep the Commandments of God and hold the Testimony the VVitness the Martyry of Jesus These are in Sackcloth as the best of their State the whole 1260 Days but their Time is distinguish'd by three great Pairs of VVitnesses in the Old Testament whose History explains the varying Types of their Condition Joshua and Zerubbabel Elijah and Elisha Moses and Aaron The first is of Joshua and Zerubbabel who though in mournful Garments as Joshua and in union with him Zerubbabel is represented Zech. 3. 1. c. yet They were as two Olive Branches to the Church of the Jews which was at that Time the Candlestick standing before the God of the whole Earth And this is the first Representation of the VVitnesses for they are also the two Olive Trees and the two Candlesticks standing before the God of the Earth Revel 11. 6. compar'd with Zech. c. 4. And it comprises the certain Assurance and Expectation of the New Jerusalem and its glorious Sanctuary even as the typical Temple and its Jerusalem were so far settled by those two great personages But beyond that They had the Promises of the New Jerusalem State peculiarly made to them to Joshua Zech. 3. 7. places among the Angels standing by in that Vision as Attendants on Christ to Zerubbabel Haggai 2. 21. c. When that Overthrow of Kingdoms should be which could be no other than that at the seventh Vial. Zerubbabel shall be a Signet and to all God's People throughout the Prophecy of Zechar. the same Promises are confirmed and so to these two Witnesses The VVitnesses then at this Time by holy Doctrine pure VVorship unspotted Sanctity begin their Testimony and are truly Christian Prophets or Persons of a magistratical Character and Eminency or truly fit for such a Dignity and as the Sons of Oyl or anointed ones Zech. 4. ult They empty the golden Oyl into the two golden Candlesticks into the Souls of the Servants and People of God the Seed of the VVoman who from the beginning of the Apostacy to the end of it are Members and make up those two Churches Pergamus and Thyatyra which as I have shewn in its Place run parallel in Pergamus at the beginning and Thyatyra in the latter part with the whole Apostacy although the Church of Sardis first and Philadelphia at last do indeed undertake the Line drawn by the Churches through the whole Apocalypse before the Church of Thyatyra in its real Subsistence shall cease to bear that Type of the Christian Church it is appointed to sustain Now how admirably does this agree with the state of the true Christian Witnesses for some considerable space after the Apostacy beginning They did indeed put on Sackcloth in God's Account assoon as the Gentiles came into the holy ground with their unhallowed feet shod with Paganish Superstition But They at first and for some space of time rather emptied the golden Oyl out of themselves than were under Persecution and Sufferings They sent out the Holy Doctrine and chrystal Stream of Evangelical Truth The Worship of God they directed was transparent clear and pure without Paganish Mixtures and Ceremonies and the Conversation they preach'd and gave Example of was not foul ranck fetid but holy gracious pellucid of an excellent Odour and Fragrancy And although History is not just and sincere enough to give account hereof passing through the Feculencies of the beginning Apostacy and suffering under all its particular Injuries more than those of Time and obscur'd as under that cover'd State in which the Church now was yet we are not under a total want of such Monuments of the Witnesses Testimony But for the Corruptions they were to testifie against they are too notorious to be denied as such Beginnings of the Apostacy even at this very joynt of
Time and therefore by the constant care of God in preserving a Seed that is accovnted to the Lord for a Generation and particularly by the Types of this Prophecy we are most assured there must be such Witnesses and such must be their Testimony SECT VIII Wherein The Forty Two Months are measur'd by the exactest Rules of Prophecy and found by express Concurrencies of those Prophecies to begin at the Cessation of the Christian Western Empire and to end whenever the 1260 Days end the Date of the Kingdom of Christ immediately ensuing and therefore to begin at 475 and by compare with the 1260 Days to end at 1697. According to which the State of the Empire of the Administration of the First Beast and of the Witnesses during the Fourth Trumpet viz. from 475 to 606 is represented THE Point of Time I am now entring upon hath had a just Approach made to it according to its Importance which is very great I shall now through the Assistance of the Divine Spirit duely consider the most weighty sense of it self there being no Line of Time whose Bounds are so definitive the Beginning so uncontestably evident in History the End so illustrious as this must be to sense it self in the very nature of the thing That I may therefore discourse hereof most regularly I propose these four Heads to fix the Intendment upon 1. To shew That the Apostle Paul hath affirm'd the coming of the Man of Sin or Beast whose End is according to all Prophecies concerning him Destruction by the immediate Appearance of Christ's Kingdom at that his end hath an unmoveable Bar to his Manifestation till his own Time and that the Apostle John declares that Bar to be an indefeisable Succession of a seventh King not come in his Time to a sixth King then in Being in his Time and that seventh King to endure a short time and that then the Beast the eighth King should succeed and that he could succeed neither sooner nor later When therefore it will appear that such a seventh King did succeed the sixth and that that seventh did decease at 475 if it shall also appear as it will that this is the very same Beast to whom forty two months are determin'd it will then be most evident his forty two months must begin at 475. 2. To shew That the Kingdom of the Beast must last till the Kingdom of Christ according to the same Laws of Succession can succeed and it can last no longer as also that the Kingdom of Christ must succeed when that Kingdom ends and it can succeed no sooner if then it is expresly said the Kingdom of Christ shall immediately succeed the 1260 Days and that according to this Law of Succession and the course of all Prophecy it must also succeed the forty two months it then will plainly follow the 42 Months and the 1260 Days end together 3. To shew That the 1260 Days must be Time of the Sun and the forty two months must be Time of the Moon and seeing they must be adjusted to one another as ending together and lying both within one common Womb of Time Times Half Time The forty two months by the most exact compare of Lunar and Solar Time can be but 1222 Years and therefore besides all Advantages of Scripture-use of round Number beginning at 475 they most exactly and most necessarily must end at 1697. 4. To shew That the Beast indeed must have every way the Seminal fundamental Nature of such a Beast as he is describ'd to be at the very beginning of his forty two Months as the Infant hath of a Man but need not nor cannot be suppos'd to attain full prophetical Proportions till long after which Time Prophecy hath also dated to him by his Number 666. So that the description of the Empire according to the Fourth Trumpet the Administration of the other Beast and the State of the Witnesses may continue many Years after as they stood at the forty two Months entring and so Prophecy determines of them To begin then with the first of these I find this Order and Head 1 Concert of the Parts of it will be most convictive and demonstrative 1. That Daniel the Apostle Paul and the Apostle John speak all of one and the same Beast 2. That this one and the same Beast hath forty two months determin'd upon him as the just State of his Duration 3. That the Apostle John hath declared that peremptory positive Law of Succession that was the Let of the coming of the Beast into his forty two months For the first Although a multitude of Proofs from the Concert of all Prophecy which either have been or will be farther taken notice of may be given yet That which I will rest upon alone at this time shall be that most convictive one That his End is Destruction by the glorious Appearance of the Kingdom of Christ so that his eminent Character is Son of Perdition in Conformity to that Apostate Apostle Judas so near the Glory of Christ's Resurrection so the Apostle John twice describes him by his going into Perdition Apoc. 17. v. 8. v. 11. and his Destruction is solemnly declared c. 19. and then the Kingdom of Christ succeeds c. 20. c. 21. Thus Daniel in every Vision The great Image was smitten by the Stone cut out of the Mountains without hands growing to a great Mountain filling the Earth by a Kingdom never ending in its ten-toed feet part of Iron and part of Clay so exactly compounded of the Beast out of the Sea with his ten crowned Horns inseparably united with his false Prophetism a Beast out of the Earth Revel 13. The little Horn is a Beast deliver'd to the Flames and the Kingdom under the whole Heaven given to the Saints The King standing up against the Prince of Princes shall be broken without hand At the Accomplishing to scatter the Holy People viz. by this Beast as hath been made to appear All the Wonders of Christ's Kingdom shall be finished Dan. c. 2. v. 24. c. compar'd with Dan. c. 7. 11. c. c. 8. 24 25. c. 12. 7. The Apostle Paul 2 Thess 2 3. c. stiles him the Son of Perdition and foretels his being consumed with the Brightness of the Lords viz. Christ's coming and the Glory of his Appearance Whoever then considers the most notable and notorious Destruction always affix'd to one and the same kind of Power so even in all its manners of Description and such a kind of Destruction as is always declar'd to issue and flow out from the Glory of Christ at his coming to his Kingdom will find It must be one and the same Beast since Christ hath but one such Coming and one such Kingdom as these are describ'd to be nor indeed is there any more than one such Beast so scituated in Time Place and Succession as this will appear to be It is in the second place to be made out that this is the same
Beast that hath Fourty two Months determin'd to Him and though there needs nothing to make that good but to take the two Chaps c. 13. and c. 17. of the Apocal. and to write down all the particulars of agreement between those two Beasts and it will be impossible for so much as the thinking Mind to doubt of their being one and the same But I will only insist upon the former Argument in this matter that Beast that is so destroyed as the Beast in the c. 17. is to be destroyed must needs according to the former Argument be the same Beast But the Beast that hath Fourty two Months determin'd to his Continuunce c. 13. v. 5. hath such a Destruction affix'd to him as the Beast c. 17. hath For who can assume the Effrontery or Boldness to deny that the Beast c. 19. who is taken and cast into the Lake v. 20. is the same with the Beast c. 17. And the Beast c. 13. hath this very same Destruction foretold to him For he is to be Taken and to go into that Eternal Captivity of the Lake with his False Prophet inseparable from him according to v. 10. and his Ten Crowned Horns or whole Circle of Kings are to be killed with the Sword of Christ's Mouth c. 19. v. 21. compar'd with ch 13. v. 10. he that leadeth into Captivity shall go c. and he that kills with the Sword c. now Christ's Captivation and Killing are such as argues Divine Justice and Power and such is that declar'd c. 19 20. The Apostle John hath declar'd that so obstinate unyielding Bar to the Man of Sin being reveal'd still in his Time as the Apostle Paul most emphatically speaks signifying the impossibility of his Coming till that his own proper Time Now the occasion of that great Apostolical Paragraph was an Expectation of a sudden Appearance of the 2 Thess 2. Glory of Christ's Kingdom this very Kingdom of which we are now speaking which was the great Expectation of the Apostles till they were better Instructed and of other Christians after them upon a general but not particular Apprehension of Scripture Prophecy For that this Day was the day of Judgment there is no Sense for in those lightsome Days before the Apostacy seeing all the Prophecies are big with a Glorious state of Christianity in this World To this the Apost for their Information and of after Ages much more speaks punctually That it could not be expected so soon and does most vehemently obtestate by the very coming of Christ and our gathering unto him against the Expectation for saith he There must be an Apostacy first and the Man of Sin must be reveal'd but that must be in his own proper Time and not before for there is a 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a Person witholding and a 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 an effectual Thing witholding or each of these taking such Fast Hold of their proper Space and Time that the Bestian Prince cannot come forward till they by going off let go their Hold and then shall be reveal'd that lawless one that Man of Sin which is an Exposition of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 when it is to be understood of a Body of Successors So this is the Apostle's Sense The day of Christ viz. of his Glory and Kingdom cannot come till the Man of Sin come The Man of Sin comes indeed out of the Apostacy as out of a Womb but as no Birth can so he cannot come till his own Time Sathan is eager enough every thing works to it as fast as it can the Mystery of Iniquity is now already at this very moment at work But every Thing that God hath ordain'd will hold its own it s own Time it s own Place and such a Holding Thing there is and such a Holding Person there is that possesses and fills that Time and Place Thus far the Apostle Paul goes in his Epistle so far he was order'd by the Holy Spirit to go and no farther the rest he refers to former Personal Discourse Now whatever prudential reason there might be of saying no more The great Reason was the Holy dictating Spirit order'd no more but that all Scripture might be search'd and compar'd Holy Writers say so much in one place so much in another so much one Holy Writer says so much more is said by another by every ones part the Harmony is made up The Apostle John therefore speaking as I have prov'd of the same great Matter and aiming at the Glorious Kingdom of Christ the grand scope of all Prophecy declares the Reason why the Kingdom of Christ could not Come because there was an unalterable Succession determin'd by God before that Kingdom There were seven Kings five of them he gives in the Lump because Prophecy was not concern'd in them or in the manner or order of their Succession they are only a Character of the Monarchy a distinctive of the Fourth Beast by its seven Heads or Forms of Government in a Succession as Kings signifie Dan. 7. But in three of them the Prophecy then in motion by the Apostle John was highly interested The first was then and it was in its course according to five of the seven Seals The seventh King was not yet Come it was not very far off comparatively but it was not as yet Come it was to come in the sixth Seal and when it came there was a necessity upon him he must continue by the same Comparativeness but a short space viz. during only the time of the sixth and seventh Seals Now this seventh the Spirit is industrious to assure us He was the Christian Emperour though he was a King of that great City and Empire yet he pertain'd not to the Beast indeed there was a Declination to the Apostacy in his time but the Church was yet pure all those Seals as appears by them it appears too it was declining the Apostacy drew near a declining from one Degree to another there had been from the first Operation of the Mystery of Iniquity forming the Antichristian Prince no with great Curiosity in the lowest parts of the Earth where no Eye saw the way of the Sathanick Spirit but he before whom Hell and Destruction have no Covering However this Christian Emperour was none of the Heads but wounded the Pagan sixth Draconick Head The Beast he is the eighth and is of the seven Seven what but Heads Clearly joyning this Vision with the seven Heads of Chap. 13. He that as the Son of Perdition goes into Perdition I say again Goeth into Perdition that Perdition just before the Kingdom of Christ and so hath no Successor but Christ consuming him Now this Succession stands firm God himself had fix'd it As then no Prince can succeed till the former is avaunted in so exact a Succession one cannot crowd out another no more than one Month or a Day following can crowd out the precedent but when any goes off the next succeeds immediately there can
with the false Prophet and cast into the Lake with him He is consumed with the Spirit of Christs Mouth and disappears vanishes as a counterfeit at the sight of the true Christ himself being a false Christ an Antichrist comprehending and embracing false Prophetism within his Tyranny of changing Laws and Times and doing after his own Will Now whether such a Tyranny in the Image of Pseudo Prophetism hath been in the World gradually rising according to Prophecy since the decease of the Christian Emperour and supporting the forty two months for above these last twelve hundred years and especially from 606 and 725 that hath been no Fantom Ghost or Mormo but Flesh and Bones hard substantial Tyranny Let all the Christian World judge And thus I have settled every way the forty two months as Bestianism lyes under them without any new Distinction of Time under which nothing so remarkably transcendent to the former account of the other Beast and the Witnesses appears as will come into consideration in the Progress of things to which therefore I adjoyn the farther Treaty of them and close this part of Discourse with these few short Remarks Let the Prophetick Symbols be laid either to Ecclesiastick or Remark 1 General History and we shall find History hath nothing relating to things Prophecy hath been suppos'd to have design'd its Symbols to and for but that both in the Frame and Structure of the whole Prophecy in its Series and Notes of Time there is a most exact and wonderful Co-ordination of one to and with the other I mean in Cardinal Points To ascribe them then to Chance or Fancy what does it speak but an Obstinacy semblable to that of the Atheist against all proof of a Divine Being or to the Pharisaick Despightful accounting to the Prince of Devils what was too evident to be denied and too great to be devolv'd upon natural Causes If the Mystery of Iniquity began in the very Time of the Remark 2 Apostles if the Apostacy began at 437 and that then the Gentiles had invaded the outward Court of the Christian Profession as within their forty two months so to do if the Beast was at 475 in his forty two months under the Guardianship of the other Beast with the two Horns of East and West however pretending to the Lamb What Dependance can there be upon Antiquity not supported by Divine Authority of Scripture or firm solid Reason How much better are close Researches into this Divine Prophecy to determine those Controversies than Search into Antiquity only As certainly as the Gentiles Power of entring the Holy Remark 3 Ground and treading it down with unhallowed Feet as certainly as the Beast came into his forty two Months at the due time so certainly shall the Kingdom of the Lord and of his Christ succeed at the end of these forty two Months for it is not only so according to the Word of the Watchers and Demand of the Holy ones but according to the solemn Oath of Christ with hands lifted up to Heaven That after Time Times Half a Time Time shall be no more but of the seventh Trumpet finishing All and the Beast going into Perdition There is no Injury done to Persons of Royal Dignity or Remark 4 of any other Character of Dominion by deriving upon them what Divine Prophecy hath affix'd to them their Persons their Places may receive all due Honour and Christian Subjection notwithstanding Prayers may be made for them as any way deputed by God their personal Vertues and worthy Actions may be had in due esteem even as the Princes of the Heathen by Daniel Ezra Nehemiah or of the Caesars by the Apostles SECT IX In which the Time from the Forty two Months beginning is set out till 622 or the Mahometan Hegira by Rome 's dark State in the Fourth Trumpet by the Angel proclaiming the three Woe Trumpets by the Beast becoming a fallen Star at 606 and the Key of the Abyss given him viz. in the Universal Pastorship by Phocas and the Ministry of the other Beast to him herein and the state of the Witnesses are also declar'd Revel c. 8. v. 12. c. c. 9. v. 1. c. I Have in the former Section settled that so considerable Period of the Beast's Forty two Months and settled them upon their own Base the Beast in his most essential and fundamental Delineation but this Part rested upon the Point of Time that was even with his Succession His Rising out of the Sea that Sea into which Rome was thrown into which those Fountains ran where into the Imperial Star Wormwood fell and imbitter'd them This gave opportunity to the Beasts Succession to his rising out of that very Sea as hath been argued for when Augustulus thus fell the Name and Head into which the Beast succeeded was in the midst of the Tumults of the Winds striving upon the Great Sea the Winds rais'd by the three first Trumpets left supreme so He succeeded The Judgment of God upon the apostatiz'd Christian Empire made way for him to rise to a supreme Apostate God took away that apostatiz'd indeed Imperial King but no Head and gave the Apostacy a proper both Head and King in his Wrath. But he was at this time and long after a Beast that Was and yet Is not There being therefore no other Name of Potency and Augustness Rome the Absolute Rome for Constantinople was but a mutuatitious Rome it borrowed in Emulation the Name Rome only because I say there was no other Name but that of the Bestian Succession in the time when he was under the Inscription Is not Rome was very dark All other Names not only of Supremacy but even of Subordinacy by degrees were ecclips'd yea the Ecclipse was total ' ere the Light returned no Emperour no Senate no Kings under the Denomination of Rome no Consuls And Rome it self became a Provincial City under the Exarchat of Ravenna as low a State as the Mistress of the World could be depress'd into more inglorious than an utter Extinction Thus it was from 475 beginning to about 550 under Justinian the Emperour Herein all History is at Peace at one with it self and so things continued some time And how elegantly does Prophecy represent this under the symbolical Account of the fourth Trumpet The fourth Angel sounded and the third part of the Sun of the Moon and of the Stars were smitten and the Day shined not for a third part thereof and the Night likewise The Bestian Name being as yet in a Peerage and out of that very Peerage to come in an Image into its lustre and the Image not yet made could not inlighten this great Orb for its Name however the only Name of Supremacy was not yet known in its Bestian Supremacy but was yet as of another Order and Claim But now at the end of the fourth and in the beginning of the fifth Trumpet it began to dawn and so Prophecy will by its Dawn
convey us upon this Line this wonderful Line we have discoursed so long upon the Line of the 1260 Days with which the forty two Months of the Beast are now combin'd Prophecy will I say very speedily in the fifth Trumpet convey and set us upon a new Line of the Mahometan Hegira or Computation of Time so that we shall run upon it for the space of eight hundred and thirty Years together with the 1260 Days and with the Bestian Line comprehending in short the most Oecumenical and illustrious Points of History at that Time in the Universe viz. of the Bestian and the Mahometan Grassation or Invasion into the same kind of Universal Power and both upon the Account of Pseudo-Prophetism the due Observation of which will persuade us of the Divineness of this Prophecy and that we are upon the true Explication of it As it were then between the ending of the Time of the fourth and the beginning of the Time of the fifth Trumpet there was a loud Voice as of an Angels flying through the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that upper Region like the Voice of Thunder reaching down to the Earth and saying Woe Woe Woe to the Inhabiters of the Earth because of the Voices of the Angels that are yet to sound Now it were wonderful if merely by the chance of Imagination running such a Path so great and remarkable Configurations both of Prophecy and History should meet it so often just where it would choose and desire to be so met For at this very Time Gregory call'd the Great Bishop of Rome a Personage of so great Eminence for Vertue Learning and Eloquence declar'd aloud in his Epistles to the Emperour Mauricius and to John the Bishop of Constantinople So also to the Bishops of Alexand. and Antioch That Antichrist was near That the Title of Vniversal Bishop was a certain Indication of him That it was Pride to assume such a Title It was like Lucifer Son of the Morning ascending the heights of the Stars setting his Throne above the other Angels above the other Stars affecting to be like the Most High Now seeing no such could be fix'd in the Firmament or Heaven of the Gospel he must needs Fall How close then is this to the prophetick Language I saw a Star fall from Heaven or as Christ in a like case speaks I saw Satan fall as Lightning from Heaven as the Dragon fell but found in the Beast a Kingdom on Earth as before said Just as when Satan fell from Heaven he had a Kingdom assign'd him by the Divine Permission and Decree viz. God of this World Ruler of the Darkness of this World This Star who is the Son of Perdition whose coming is after the manner of Satan had the same in Proportion the Key of the bottomless pit is given to him that is permitted to him given judiciarily into his hand by God's wise and holy sufferance and over-rule of all things to his Glory This Fall then of this Star is like the Angels leaving their own Habitation their first Estate or true original Principality Jude v. 6. a Fall not like that of the Stars the Dragon swept down with his Tail or of the Star Wormwood an involuntary Fall a Fall from the Heaven of a political Order and Supremacy to a low State without Power but a Fall of Apostacy from his due Station a planetary Defection from his own Orb v. 16. into a Kingdom of the bottomless Pit to which Darkness is reserv'd for ever And whenever the Antichrist came the Beast rose out of the bottomless pit or which is the same this Star had fallen there must be then Woe Woe Woe for the Vengeance of God at the same time made him way and pursued him every Trumpet sounded against him The first was to hurt only the Revel 9. 4. Men that were not seal'd of which he was the Prince the second was upon those who were guilty of Murthers Sorceries v. 20. Thefts Idolatries The Woman whom the Beast carried was guilty of all these was impenitent in them although c. 11. v. 15. compar'd with c. 14. c. 15. c. 16. God gave her space to repent The Third Woe-Trumpet brought with it the Kingdom of Christ and the Destruction of Antichrist or the Bestian Kingdom so there was Woe Woe Woe on the Bestian Earth whenever Antichrist came Immediately after this Remonstrance of the Bishop Gregory the Bishop Boniface accepts from the parricidick Emperour Phocas this Vniversality so that in his sense Antichrist then came and the first Woe-Trumpet according to Prophecy is dated from his Fall What can be more wonderful as Gregory was at all a good Man his Prediction must be own'd to a better Spirit and to the Knowledge Divine Prophecy gave him and to the Impression it had made upon him As he was himself part of that Body upon which his own Prediction ran it was like Nebuchadnezzar's prophetick Dream of Dan. 2. the Ruine of that Image by the Stone of which he was the head of Gold or like the Prophecy of Caiaphas a very bad Joh. 11. 51. part of which himself was concern'd in however his eminent Station gave the Rebound of his Prediction as through the World And the time of Rome lying so low is noted most emphatically by Prophecy viz. Rome without any eminent Light of Government and then follows such an immediate Appearance of Antichrist according to the Signal given of him by that Bishop of Rome and according to Prophecy the Star Fell. This is in some sense I may say but too remarkable in so plainly declaring who is Antichrist and that his Kingdom holds by the Key of the bottomless Pit It is true the Beast had been in his forty two months above a hundred Years yet as a Tyrant prophetically declar'd to be a Tyrant is not yet so in his Infancy or Under-state no more than Hazael was a Tyrant when Elisha told him what 1 Kin. 8. 11. he as such a Tyrant should do no more was the Beast such a Beast while he was under the Inscription Is not So that though he was a Beast by way of Succession and some presagious Actions He might yet not be a falling Star till he now fell and receiv'd this Key for the whole Bestian Body or Succession is consider'd in the whole Beast not in its several Ages nor in the single Persons making it some better some worse all that enter its Composition are consider'd as one Beast in the prophetick Scheme in any Age in any Bestian Qualities more or less yea though so moderate as that they should only bear up the Title and maintain the Succession And this removes all possible Objection as thus Was he that had been a Beast so long a Star yet to Fall You see he might be so while he was the Beast Is not and yet not a falling Star for this fall prepar'd his rising out of the bottomless Pit and so
having the Key of the bottomless Pit not judicially given but committed to him not to open the bottomless Pit and let out the Smoak not to loose nor draw out at greater liberty and by provoking God to give the Malice of Devils greater scope by the Angel of that Pit raging like a roaring Lyon in a hellish Mahometanism but to lay hold on him to bind him to cast him into the bottomless Pit to shut him up and to set a Seal upon him that he may deceive the Nations no more for the 1000 Years which very Consideration of that so opposite Vision does much inlighten this of the fifth Trumpet we are now upon It remains that we consider now what the Service of the two Witnesses might at this time most agreeably with Prophecy be and as so considering it I look upon this joynt of Time this Proclamation of the three woe Trumpets to be the very entrance of the Witnesses in the second Type of that eminent Binary or Pair of Witnesses and Prophets Elijah and Elisha The Witnesses had now a long time as the Sons of Oyl emptied their golden Oyl by way of preparatory Furniture of those two golden Candlesticks the true Churches of Pergamus and Thyatyra that stood this whole Line of Time before the God of the whole Earth and though we have not the clear and unmixed Records of any such Testimony for that were to lessen the Prophecy besides that the Indignation of the Apostate Church must needs have suppress'd them they must needs have suffer'd more so than under the Injuries of Time but I say it were to lessen Prophecy which says They were cover'd with Sackcloth they were seal'd they were retir'd within the Temple the Church was in the Wilderness through the scattering of its Seed It is not then possible according to the Prophecy there should be pure liquid Remains of their Testimony But now the Antichristians like Sanballat and Tobiah and other the Enemies of the Jews disturb'd their Service and in building with them hinder'd the Operation and infus'd their Venome in some part into the Writings and Discourses of Persons of a much more excellent temper in the main Now the Witnesses therefore as we may in part see by Gregory praised before passed into the Spirit and Power of Elijah and Elisha they began now to have fire proceed out of their Mouths to devour their Adversaries They began to declare the Wrath of God against Idolatry and Antichristian Pride and Blasphemy And this entred as Fire into the Consciences of their Enemies that in this manner they were kill'd as it were by the Sword of Christ's Mouth which he threatens to the Balamites in the Church of Pergamus and herein they imitated the Zeal of Moses and Phincas against the spiritual Fornication and Nicolaitanism of that time and also prepar'd the Servants of God in Thyatyra with a holy Zeal against the Jezebelism and Idolatry and Fornication of that Time also when the Apostacy was increas'd But how can we hope for much of Monument hereof The Prophecy of Gregory is more than we could expect and were it not that he serv'd the Apostacy to many other great purposes we had not had so much of him but God over-rul'd so far Now the Witnesses were coming into the closest time of being seal'd and therefore we have the mention of it reviv'd within the fifth Trumpet They were sed with hidden Manna They were hardly known one to another at the very Time Elijah knew not of the seven thousand Knees that had not bowed to Baal nor their Mouths kiss'd him but thought himself alone How much less then can we now know them And which is very characteristical of this Period of the Witnesses Prophecy and Testimony They have Power to shut Heaven that it rain not in the Days of their Prophecy so that there arises a Famine not of Bread but of hearing the Word of the Lord and this endured for the intimate Time of which we are to speak in the next Period of the Witnesses and the Remark of shutting Heaven for three Years and six Months will be of great Conduct to us SECT X. Wherein is undertaken to be prov'd That the Mahometan Sarazens are the Locusts design'd in the fifth Apocalyptick Trumpet and that the five Months given to them comprehend Four hundred-thirty five Years from the Mahometan Hegira at 622 and so reach to 1057. upon Rev. c. 9. v. 1. c. I Pass on from this joynt of Time engraven with the real and substantial Characters of the Angel proclaiming the three Woes the Star falling the Key of the bottomless Pit given to him All which I have explain'd I come now to speak of the Descent of this Star to the opening the bottomless Pit and of that Smoak that issued out upon it and the unexpected Events of Locusts coming out of the Smoak which produce a new Line of Time beginning at 622 and not ending till 1453 but divided by Prophecy into two parts the five Months and five Months of the Locusts and the Hour Day Month and Year of the Army of Horsemen between which will come in the Account of intimate Time and so we will discourse each in their order Antichrist then appearing in the Star fallen to the Earth to shine there as an universal Pastor of which sort the Firmament of Heaven knows none nor can bear any such so he must needs fall to the Earth and the Beast here transmigrated into by the Dragon and beginning to exalt the Woman by carrying his Vniversality in an Image inscrib'd with the Name of the Woman and having receiv'd the Key of the bottomless Pit in place of the Keys of the Kingdom of Heaven he immediately proceeds to open it and le ts out Error Falsehood Blasphemy the Doctrine of Balam Nicolaitanism Antichristianism spiritual Pride and Tyranny like the Smoke or perpetual Vapour of the Abyss and its open Mouth that darkned the whole Air of the Christian Doctrine and Profession and in this by degrees he ascends higher and higher till he comes to his number 666. But Sathan above him in this bottomless Pit turning every way and moving more ways than one to advance his Kingdom especially over-rul'd and govern'd by God in fulfilling the course of his Judgment so impregnates this Smoke in that time of spiritual drought and of the Heaven shut as Brass and the Earth as Iron a Time specifick for these Locusts as drought is for the natural ones that unawares to this fallen Star there comes a swarm of Locusts out of the Smoke and they prove armed crowned Locusts dreadfully annoying and Tormenting the Antichristian World viz. by the Mahometan Saracens Having thus far then prepar'd to it I come to the main position of this Section the proof of which I am to undertake that these Locusts are the Mahometan Saracens whose five and five Months measure from 622 to 1057 The first Argument I derive from the Style in which
Wither of all the Greenness of Religion For so Scripture Prophecy both designs before-hand for and after derives from it self The Distribution of their dreadful Effects to a five months of Torment upon men like the stroke of a Scorpion while it was a vexation to understand the Report we suppose according to History was their first invading the World in general and hovering over the Apostate Kingdom The swiftness of their Success was so prodigious that it could not but be thought that the Lord uttered his Voice before his Army and that as his Camp was very great so he was strong that executed his Word that the Day of the Lord was very terrible and none could abide it before their Face all People were much pained and all Faces gather'd Blackness The continual Tidings of their Victories and Successes was to be continually tormented as with Job's Messengers or with the stroak of a Scorpion a not being kill'd but a living in pain But when this Army drew nearer into Italy and even to Rome it self in the second five Months when it enter'd the very Gates of that great City they ran up the Walls and enter'd in at the Windows to pillage and plunder and were also perpetually striking with the Tails of not only their false Religion but in Contempt and Scorn of the Antichristian Idolatry and Image-worship it was worse than a speedy Death or a total Conquest the prophetical Death here intended especially when it came to cruel Slavery It was no wonder then men sought for Death that is a quiet State although of being conquered and in Subjection and could not find it it fled from them for God had determin'd them this lingring Torment and not a speedy Death or Conquest over them and even these Locusts could do no more than what was commanded them and given to them Now their Power the five second Months was more than the first it was not only to torment with their terrour and report but to hurt with a real Presence but it was only to hurt and not to kill as the Turkish Cavalry was to do at Constantinople so they could do no more than hurt they could not kill the Bestian Rome and Empire were to survive them Thus they had five Months and five Months of Action eminent grand Action but seeing they had the space of five Months more in their Fourhundred and thirty years they must be suppos'd to come out of a first Formation and rude Preparations or to be at a distance from the effects of Torment and Hurt upon the unsealed Anticbristian especially Western State And at their latter end of Power a winterly Torpor and Deadness seis'd them and the Turkish Power drove them into a desolate Land and their stink as of an Army of dead Serpents came up that yet in their Time had done great things and so is their Memory at this day And thus History and Prophecy will agree in the account of their Time at least in relation to the Bestian Kingdom besides supposable Interspersions or Truces of their Impressions upon the Earth of the fallen Star or Antichrist The just and natural ensuing Woe upon this first as close Arg. 4 as the two Bestian Times one to another and yet distinguish'd too under the very same Mahometan King or Angel of the bottomless Pit and in the Entail of the same serpentine Religion is a very persuasive Argument of the due Explication of these things in Prophecy whose Situation Connexion and Sequence one upon another even as the Hour Day Month and Year upon their Five Months Five Months and their Vacation or Non-Term of Action is close and inseparable but this will rise into a farther Observation upon that part of the Line in the mean time as a strong support it helps to sustain the Point we are upon The very great fitness of these Locusts under their King Mahomet is every way most admirable to be a Scourge and Arg. 5 Woe upon the Antichristian Empire and their Months or Half-Moon to be a portentous Paraselene or another Moon upon them They are a mock-state every way to them by the severe Vengeance of God an Antichrist to Antichrist coming by Sergius the Monk out of their very Smoak let out by the Key-bearing fallen Star Their King an Angel of the bottomless Pit rivals the Star of the bottomless Pit the Monarchy of the Beast and his ten Horns is mated by the Monarchy of this King and one Vniversality by the other the pseudo or false Prophetism of the one by that of the other the Miracles of the one by those of the other the Superstition of the one and the Cruelty and Bloodiness of the one by those of the other both are sharers in the Roman Empire each hath his Rome one old Rome the other new Rome each of which Imperial Cities are in this prophetick Emblem Thirds of Men. Both aspire to the Possession of Jerusalem as having the promise of Universal Monarchy and Dominion but both mistake the Jerusalem in Bondage for that which comes down from above at which both will be vanish'd Both are Draconick and oppose and stave off the true Kingdom of Christ both oppress the Witnesses and Servants of God but the Beast by single War with them the King of the Locusts in the general and mistaking the false Church for the true and its earthly Glory for the Glory of Christ and so cannot hurt the true Glory both last the one as a Bestian Kingdom the other as a Woe till the end of the 1260 Days Both are to be utterly destroy'd before the Glorious Kingdom of Christ But the latter is a Judgment and a Woe-Trumpet on the former both as it is Christian in Pretence and Profession to which Mahomet is a profess'd Foe and as it is Antichristian Idolatrous and Superstitious for so it is scorned and abused and derided as well as persecuted by Mahometanism Now to ballance these two Antichristianisms one with another and the Interest of Satan in them it is thus to be settled in one Satan is as an Angel of Light falling from Heaven and making use of the Key of the bottomless Pit as if it were the Key of the Kingdom of Heaven in the other he is plainly the Angel of the bottomless Pit and acts as the Destroyâ—r Now the first must be necessarily the most hateful to God because it is the greatest Blasphemy its Moon eclipses the Kingdom of Christ most directly and as it were in the Draconick Nodi surpris'd it when it was to appear at the casting down Satan from Heaven and the manly Birth caught up to the Throne of God upon which Antichristianism as the Finess of Sathanism Mahometanism was provided as a Scourge and Woe of the coursest and thickest of the bottomless Pit and the blackest Appearance of the Angel of it and therefore though Mahometanism shall be finally destroyed and sent back to the bottomless Pit yet Antichristianism shall receive greater
as we shall see presently Now that it so began at Twenty five or six we have a threefold Testimony Of the Apostle Paul that the Mystery of Iniquity viz. the Apostacy as a Womb in which the Man of Sin was curiously form'd as in the lower parts of 2 Thess 2. 7. 1 John 4. 3. Revel 2. 4. the Earth was then at work that it might bring forth the Man at his full growth at 666. The Apostle John assures us Antichrist was then in the World and the supreme Apocalyptes Christ tells us Ephesus the Image of the Apostolical Church had even in the Apostles Times left its first Love when therefore Apostolical Time had doubled it self from Twelve to Twenty Four and was moving onward as at a precise Time from Conception the Mystery of Iniquity began to work at 25 or 26. And it is no wonder the Man of Sin beheld by the Apostle in Spirit when no Eye saw him in this his Embrional Condition in his first Principles was thus remark'd by him For then every thing receives its nature Even as Jacob in the Womb as John the Baptist as our Lord in his Conception is celebrated so this Man of Sin is dated from the conceiving of Sin as well as from the manly State from the Conception as well as from the grown Man till then Iniquity fully accomplishing its Time brings forth Death This Psendo Abrahamite this spiritual Edom and Esau struggled as another Nation in the Womb of the Apostacy while the pure Israelitism without guile lay in the Womb of true Christianity to both which the outward Profession was a common Womb. This prophane Esau is he that sold the Birth-right of the Gospel for a Mess os Pottage and the Heavenly Kingdom for an Earthly Dukedom and wherein he got the start Thus the Number of the Name of the Beast and the number of the Beast or the time of his adult and man-like Bestianism so closely related so closely joyn'd as not possible they should lead two several ways both being the Time of worshipping the Image receiving the Mark the Name and the Number of the Name assure beyond all doubt that they are both one Nature appearing manifestly at one and the same Time and by both mathematical and prophetical Certainty if the Top of the Number be 666 Twenty five must be the Root and Bottom and if the Root be Twenty five from the Resurrection the top must be 666 from that twenty five viz. 725 or 726 and so both from the nature counter-Apostolical under the pretence of Apostolical as also the Root and the top of Time being compar'd It can neither be Mahometan not so early up as twenty five nor Pagan that did not live so long as 725 but must be Antichristian or the Beast And by this wonderful Hieroglyphick of Number God hath surpris'd all defence from Antiquity out of the hand of Antichrist that is not built upon his Word Truth and solid Reason for seeing the Mystery of Iniquity wrought so soon as 25 from the Resurrection all Proof from Antiquity only is but proof for Antichrist taken from the Mystery of Iniquity beginning to work and so not to be for that cause allowed I come therefore now to the second point viz. To see Head 2 where this Pillar of intimate Time this six hundred sixty six can be only duely and proportionably plac'd And we shall find evidently where it is thus to be plac'd That we may then understand this we must consider that there is in Time Times Half Time an intimate Time or Season signified to us 3 ways 1. By the force of the Words us'd in the Chalde in the Dan. 7. 25. Dan. 12. 7. Rev. 12. 14. Hebrew and in the Greek Originals to express this Line It is indicted appointed Time or Season Seasons half Season Now Season is the most virtual lively point of Time for though all Season must have Time to support it yet Time is only Season to those things whereunto it is especially appointed and gives advantage the very words therefore import Season within Time and thus the Apostle says The Man of Sin is reveal'd 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as it were in the same Words with that of the three Seasons and half in his own Season 2. The intending and elevation of the Events speak the same for as much as Prophecying in Sackcloth is transcended by lying dead as much as being in the Wilderness so as to be hid from the face of the Serpent exceeds being in the Wilderness only in general as much as changing Times and Laws and wearing out the Saints and scattering the holy People by the Antichristian Prince himself exceed the rude Gentiles trampling the holy Court or the Beasts mere Power of Continuance so does the intimate Time or season of seasons seasons half season transcend the Time at large and in general and therefore all these Notes of Time are first given and then Inward time with this Exaltation of the Effects 3. The Three times and a half pointing and propending towards though not rigidly denoting three years and a half even as twelve hundred sixty days do and as forty two months of Lunar years do they have two great Paralels one of Years the other of Days and both fitted to the very 1260 days of the Witnesses The first of years is that of Elijah declaring that there 1 Kings 17. 1. should not be these years Rain nor Dew but according to his Word Now the Time of this Drought is most expresly affirmed twice that we might take the more notice of it to be three years and six months once by Christ himself a second Luc. 4. 25. Jam. 5. 17. Time by the Apostle James And yet by the History we cannot find that the Drought was any longer than a part of the three years and a part of 1 King 18. 1. the six months for it is said in the third year Elijah appeared to Ahab and Rain ensued accounting then from the latter end of the first year to the beginning of the six months after two years there might be no Rain a part of the first year the whole of the two years nor till the six months began and yet it might be in the third year according to precise account of years as may be easily understood For there may be three full years within a part of the first of the three years and of the six months viz. the latter part of the first year and the beginning of the last six Months comprehending two whole years in the middle That of Days is the instance of our Lords three days in the heart of the Earth which by the full evidence of the Evangelists we know was but a part of the first day the whole of the second and a part or the first part only of the third Now these three days both lay as an intimate part of Time within the three full years and half of our
accompanied with the Mahometan Force and yet even that remains a scourge upon it since the Reformation until now and cannot cease to be so while Antichristianism it self shall survive But if things had thus gone on The Kingdom of Christ had long ' ere now appear'd Let us then consider the Agreement of the Symbols of Prophecy with the stay of this Glory of Christ that it did not proceed to the utmost in the Ruine of Antichrist and the Revelation of his supream Dominion The first Estopple on the Kingdom of Christ is the sealing of the Thunders the constant Symbol of some breaking out of Christ's Kingdom for they were such powerful Voices of Highest and most Excellent Truth that if they had been written as John in Zeal to the Glory of Christ was about speedily to write them and not seal'd They had rent the Heavens and the Kingdom of Christ had been proclaim'd as by the Voices of the seventh Trumpet The clear shrill and exalted Voice of Divine Truth is Luc. 17. 24. as the Lightning that with the Thunder shineth from one end of the Heaven and that shineth to the other end of Heaven and brings forth the Day of the Son of Man which the Antichristian Kingdom trembles at and is shiver'd by as by the stroke of Thunder But written and seal'd are oppos'd in this Prophecy as immediate coming to pass and reserv'd to come to pass hereafter are oppos'd one to the other There is a Recognition and Renewal of the Oath of Christ concerning Time Times Half-Time Dan. 12. 9. Indeed the Front and Aspect of the Oath there is turn'd another way for then it was directed upon these Times as to come and the Oath is They shall be here it points upon them as past and Christ swears Time shall be no more but till the seventh Trumpet and then all should be finish'd spoken by the Prophets of his Kingdom which is such a Mystery the World will not believe however told them They are angry whenever Christ takes his Power to him and reigns and much more angry at Rev. 11. 18. any mention of it before hand at any unlocking or reading viz. interpreting Prophecy concerning it But Christ swears There shall be no more Time Or no Kalendar of any Kingdom but his own at the seventh Trumpet it shall then immediately succeed and be proclaim'd Till then Time is allowed for the thunders to remain seal'd Then they shall be opened And if the Thunders had not been sealed before the Oath the Oath had cut off that Time also but because the half Time cannot be less then it self The Thunders remain seal'd neither more nor less than the half Time So it is not 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a Time but only a half Time and a whole Time could be no more 4. The eating the Book It s being sweet in the Mouth and bitter in the Belly and prophecying again signifie altogether the retirement of Christs Kingdom anew into Prophecy in place of present Accomplishment and of that Kingdom then appearing For therefore was Its sweet in the Mouth because the Discourse of that Kingdom as in the Voice of Thunder was exceeding sweet as importing its present Appearance But the Discourse of it as matter of Prophecy and the Re-absconding it to that purpose into the Belly was exceeding bitter as signifying its Delay and Secrecy for longer time yet as Belly imports secretly Whereas therefore the Book in regard of the half-season ended was opened as if then to be accomplish'd and the things written in it to be finished It s remanding into the Belly of the Prophet concludes its delay and this was bitter The Book therefore was sweet in any presence bitter in any Delays of the Kingdom The Kingdom is not to be yet while the half day lasts It must be when that ends in the seventh Trumpet therefore it remains in Prophecy And of the Servants of God continuing to Prophecy in Sack cloth because of the delay of Christs Kingdom and to prophecy again before many Peoples and Nations and Tongues and Kings whom this Kingdom concerns John is here the Representative the prophetical Scheme or Symbol For this Prophecy is unto and so before many who will not vouchsafe to hearken or attend to it yet it is unto them before them and will take hold of them But while the Book is in Prophecy in the Belly It is Bitter and the Witnesses prophecy in Sackcloth So John Personates or Proxies for them The sealing then of the Thunders as also the Voice of the Roar of the Lion by implication retiring the Eating of the open Book or returning it into Prophecy Argue It must remain in Prophecy as it had done the whole Time of the Trumpets after the Seals opened because of the 144000 seal'd and that the Kingdom did not appear when it had in the Christian Emperours made so loud a claim And now by the Thunders utterances a so publick challenge of its Right yet it must return again into Prophecy and be Bitter in the Belly All these are the clear and evident Importance of these Symbols in a due compare of the Parts of this Prophecy between themselves And if we look not only into History but Knowledge it cannot be denyed but that the Kingdom of Christ hath not yet appear'd in Glory The blessed Effects of Christian Religion The great Prophecies concerning those Effects that even swell the Womb of Prophecy have not yet been brought forth The Antichristianism the Bestianism the Apostle Paul the Apostle Pet. Epist 2. c. 2. c. 3. Peter the Apostle John especially in his Apocal. describes hath yet a too sad Interest in the Christian World Mahometanism covers a great part of the habitable Earth and till very lately as in signification of the Time of Christ's Kingdom to be proclaim'd near at hand hath been the Scourge and Terror of Christianity but more particularly as according to this Prophecy of the Antichristianity of East and West and holds a very considerable part of the Profession of it under Slavery Pagaism we know possesses except obstinately blind interspers'd Judanism the rest of the World All which must remove at Christ's Kingdom And if we consider the State of Christianity more Reformed to it self to speak in the Language and Symbols of this Prophecy There are very great Parts of the Reformation that are within the Bowels of the yet Antichristian Princes and so within the Dition and Kingdom of the Beast when ever it pleases God to give scope to that Power They are all manner of ways persecuted and harrass'd even as the Succession or 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of the Church of Thyatyra were to be and their last Works and Sufferings thereby became more than their First Rev. 2. 19. c. and are so far from being perfectly risen and out of Sack-cloth that they make an appearance of the Witnesses again Hungary France slain as in Neighbour Countries of
their Corrupt Antichristian state and utterly abolished and an Apocalyptical Evangelical seven shall take their Room so that the Successours in their Places shall have such a Sense of this Great Judgment on them as to Give Glory to God For that at this Time the whole Antichristian State was converted and repented I cannot understand because of the after course of this Prophecy But a great alteraiion in the Posture of the Christian World will then be made It will be of another Model as great a change as seven thousand Orders of Men falling under the sense and influence of this Apocalyptical Prophecy and modelled according to that can make shall then be so that in the whole Succession to the Kingdom of Christ signified by the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 They shall give Glory to God the God of Heaven in place of the Man of Sin who sat in the Temple of God shewing himself that He is God and in place of Idols of Gold and Silver Then the second Woe shall pass away Mahometanism whatever Existence it may have in the World shall no longer remain the Woe of the Christian World because when Antichristianity the Provocation of so great a Judgment is fallen the Judgment it self shall also remove although Euphrates may yet continue a River till at the sixth Vial it is dried up yet it shall not so overflow as hitherto it hath done And this Woe is always to be esteem'd the Boundary of the 1260 Days for their ending for till that Woe is past they cannot end for till then the Witnesses do not rise perfectly nor come out of Sackcloth till then the Beasts forty two Months of being a Bestian Power do not end nor the 1260 of the Woman in the Wilderness but then they shall all end together Therefore the Crashings and Smoaking of the Mahometan Mountain at this Time gives an alarm to the Expectation of these things and however the Antichristian Power by its Contributions concurr with the Ten Kings to the passing away of that Woe yet let it certainly know that at that very same time and by those very Ten Kings falling off from it it s own Decarchy or Ten-horn'd Supremacy shall fall into the Dust also For as we may be assured The Reformation the rising of the Witnesses are not yet at their top because that Woe is not yet pass'd so we may be assur'd All the Symbols and Emblems of the Antichristian City and Prince as roll'd down from their height and of the Kingdom of Christ rising although being future we cannot so certainly expound them yet they shall in their significancy be fulfill'd and made good to the utmost as those have been before them which we more fully comprehend by History And that all must be fulfill'd within the 180 Years from 1517 or from the Reformation begun then which must be by 1697. For that so the mouth of the Lord hath spoken by this Prophecy I now proceed to argue I must rely upon the proof I have already offer'd along this Line That I have made true motions and progresses upon it in Events of so great Concernment and universal Notoriety to the Christian World as to be most worthy to be the Discoveries of so Sovereign and Imperial a Prophecy given by the Prince of the Kings of the Earth receiv'd from his Father to shew to his Servants digested into a methâ—â—â— and Series of Time most exact and contriv'd into such â—onderful and self-demonstrating Symbols as that they may be found out by them that are stirr'd up by God to Read and so propos'd to those whom God enclines to Hear that Both may come to the Blessedness promis'd by understanding them aright Rev. 1. 3. In comparison of which Events and their order and series as I have presented them the little and close the private and particular points of Story without an equal and just Admensuration to Apocalyptical Time upon which some Names so great that for Reverence I dare not Name have fallen are but as Relations fit for private Discourse and unfit for a grave History or like the Description of small Rivers Hills or Vills unworthy the Title of a Geography and yet such a Prophecy so much below its own Majesty do such Interpretations make it Now according to this so illustrious so orderly Series of Events it will easily appear by Reflection on what is written The Reformation must necessarily be determin'd to the last 180 of the 1260 Years so as to determine at 1697. But I shall yet offer these two particular Arguments The very Time of the Pillar of the Beasts Number erected Argu. 1 I date to 725 or 26 as the solemn Representation of it by the beginning of the Iconoclastick War and so of the Beasts War with the Witnesses The very Time of the Death of the Witnesses I date to 787 represented by the second Council of Nice damning all that refus'd to worship Images the one 72 Years before the two Times of 360 Years a-piece the other only ten Years before Let us now by proportion of the three Years and a half of Elijah's Drought and the three days of our Lord's Death adjust the Expiration of the Intimate Time Times half a Time and as near Ten years after the two whole Times of intimate Time expir'd at 1517 we find the Witnesses standing on their Feet so eminently as that they began to esteem the Thunderbolts of Antichristian Excommunication brutish and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in a solemn and Oracular manner as from this very Prophecy to be called Protestants Which Appellation however it began on particular occasion and as only in a providential Representation to agree History with Prophecy as I all along observe yet it hath been espous'd by the whole Reformation and it is by secret instinct derived probably beyond their Intention from these two Apocalyptical Witnesses For what is Protestation or Protestancy but a publick avowed Witness against the Tyranny of the Beast And that so solemn a Denomination is of no small Account appears by that so great Memorial of the Disciples being call'd Christians Acts 11. 26. And as the Pillar of Intimate Time was erected at 725 or 26 71 or 72 Years before the two whole Times so seventy one or seventy two Years after the two whole Times at 1517 lead us to the famous 1588 from which Time the most Catholick Kingdoms so call'd decay'd in Pomp and Reputation not to say the whole Austrian Family And had not the Thunders been seal'd and the Book retired into Prophecy the Parallels had been more illustrious but Sixteen hundred ninety seven shall I am fully assur'd answer for all The Disposal of this Time of the Reformation as it hath Argu. 2 been given is so demonstrative as not to be avoided for the Witnesses Prophecy in Sackcloth 1260 days Twelve hundred sixty days we are assur'd are three times and a half at their full extent for so long the Woman is in the
bound to the other had not been set with so great advantage so interlocking part of the 1260 with the sixth trumpet and especially the Reformation singled out as so distinct a Time from both the time and times or the 1080 of the 1260 Days and so made a half-time or 180 to it self glorious in the Beginning seal'd in the Middle and glorious again in the End if it had not been thus before the whole 1260 Days given together For either there must have been more open and declar'd Distributions of the time by it self of the two times by themselves of the half-time by it self than agrees with the admirable Contrivance and Mysticness of this Prophecy or else the distinction could not have been understood nor made out as now it may But the Appearance of Christ the Lyon roaring the Thunders proclaiming What but Christ's Kingdom The Book open'd and above all the Oath time should be no more could no way comport with the former Oath till the half-time dawning The Beast's Kingdom could bear no such shock sooner for how should he then have had time times half-time viz. a part of the first and last and the whole of the middle in entire Regnancy So that Reading afterwards of 1260 Days call'd also three days and a half so significantly to this purpose and three times and a half we know assuredly what Time of the Day it must be when such a roaring of the Lyon was and of the Thunders and such an Oath that Time should be no more and so much of the Beast's Kingdom torn from him as a Pledge and Earnest of the whole to be so rent from him It must be at the half-Half-time And had there not been a sealing of the Thunders and an enclosing the Book in the Prophet's Belly we might have suppos'd Then had been the end of those Days and the Reformation to have been all that was to be expected of Christ's Kingdom till Eternity But by both these determin'd before the 1260 Days or other Characters of Time given we have a most certain Gauge of the half-time of the Reformation and of the end of that ten-folded Kingdom of the Turkish Woe of the Witnesses Sackcloth together so that if the Beginning was at 1517 The end must be at 1697 which is the Thing undertaken to be shown To shew now in the second Place how in the just order of the Prophecy each Character or Date of Time may be assign'd to each State of the Servants of God in their Sufferings under the Bestian Kingdom It may thus be made not only plain and intelligible but admirably harmonious and the interweaving of the Prophecy with it self and with the Prophecy of Daniel be clearly understood After Christ's Claim of his Kingdom at the Reformation as describ'd Chap. 10. The Vision of the Temple measured and Chap. 11. of the Witnesses in Sack-cloth and dying under the victorious Beast and so rising is given entire in signification that the Beasts Kingdom could not be disturb'd nor his Time and two Times interrupted with any part of such a Vision till the half Time appearing when that and the Vision of that had been given and the first Glory of it seal'd Then things were ripe for this after Vision for any part of which they were before unripe unripe as to the Condemnation of the Beast and the Vindication of the Witnesses before the half Time Unripe as to the rising of the Witnesses till the seal'd Thunders had Post-pond that rising And so the Angel that had bidden John Eate the Book Ordered him a Reed bids him arise and measure the Temple of God c. For the outward Court and City the Gentiles should tread under foot forty two Months and then saith the Lord I will give Power to my two Witnesses and they shall Prophecy 1260 days c. Thus the Altar of Incense necessarily here intended being the only Altar in the Temple leads us back to the Altar of Incense just before the Trumpets where the Prayers of All Saints were sent up and where attending without in the publick Worship yet pure They were commanded into the Temple shut up at the First Trumpet as from that Time the 1260 Rev. 8. 4. days Hereupon the Daily Service was Taken away at the very 1260 Beginning joyn'd with the 30 more in the 1290 and so the 42 Months and 1260 Days are related to so many Evenings and Mornings of the 2300 Evenings Mornings Dan. 12. 11. Dan. 8. 13 14. of the Vision of the daily taken away and the entring in of the Gentiles first by Constantines Conversion then by Theodosius's Victory over them forcing them into the Profession of Christianity and completed by the Barbarians inrode into the Empire at the first Trumpet semblanc'd gentiliz'd Christianity At the same Time and for the same Time of 1260 days the Woman the Church after the deliverance from the Pharaoh-like Dragon goes into the Wilderness Her Seed the 144000 of the twelve Tribes and Apostolical Church being Revel 7. seal'd under the Witnesses herein like Moses and Aaron also But That Prophetick History being before this systeme of the Trumpets is deriv'd higher from the Dragon as necessary to Revel 12. introduce and to derive down the History of the Beast that follows Chap. 13. And having shewed both by the early sealing As deriv'd from the Dragon and the sudden Account of the Woman flying into the Wilderness the violent Inclination of things to the Apostacy after the Gentiles coming into the Profession of Christianity with their Emperour The very entrance into the Wilderness is just at the first Trumpet where another sort of Gentiles were crowding also as well upon the Empire as the Church For then as hath been made out the sealing first obtain'd its Effect although declar'd before At the Third Trumpets Complement of Effect the Imperial Power ceasing The Beast enters his Existence and hath his forty two Months assign'd for that Existence from first to Rev. 8. 10. with chap. 13 5. last which forty two Months uniting with those of the Gentiles run parallel with the 1260 days All which hath been fully Argued At the Beasts Number 666. Intimate Time enters and conjoyns it self with the Witnesses three days and a Half with Revel 11. 9. c. 12. 14. c. 7. 25. Dan. c. 12. 7. the Womans Time Times and half Time with Daniels Time Times half Time of wearing out the Saints of the most high and scattering the Power of the holy People At this Intimate Time or Hour as it is also call'd Emphatickly The Ten Kings as his Horns receive Power with him Rev. 17. 2. He fulfils all Types of himself both in Dan. and the Revelation Arm'd with their Power He commands Himself and his Revel 13. Image to be worshiped by an Idolatry or Image Worship so blasphemous to God and his Saints makes War with the Saints and kills them Now in each of these Particulars
motion and zealous of finishing the Mystery of God and that within so short a Time as 75 Years so that as the Voices and Vials cannot have yet been since the Reformation so they cannot take up above 75 Years after it For to shew them quick they are styl'd Voices soon given and Vials suddenly pour'd out and what is quicker than the Voice of God's Thunder than the Spouts and Cataracts of Heaven 5. If there be seven Voices or Thunders they must needs unite with the seventh Trumpet and the seven Vials must issue from the seventh Voice or else the admirable Contexture of this Prophecy its Symmetry and Harmony must needs be lost as therefore the seventh Seal comprehends the seven Trumpets during which the Kingdom remains seal'd even so must the seventh Trumpet the Voices and to shew the Voices are seven Voices the seven Vials are fill'd from the Blood of the Wine-press of the seventh Voice 6. It is most impossible the Bestian or Antichristian Power should be in such a State as at this day it is If the seventh Trumpet with its Voices and Vials had made their Impressions on it it must needs have been torn and rent in pieces thereby But because that so illustrious End of the sixth Trumpet and the seventh Trumpet are to come and that the seventh Trumpet is so expresly styl'd Mystery I shall with all Humility Modesty and Brevity undertake not any thing in their Explication as to the very manner or precise sense of Particulars but only in the general demonstrate their Order and Sequence and observe their necessary main Importance but whether even that Fall of the Tenth of the City and the concomitant mighty Works do not with a great notice of themselves only given at the end of the sixth issue into the seventh Trumpet and so are gradually fulfill'd in the Voices and the Vials and how the Bestian Power or the spiritual Pharaoh and his Egypt is so much as kept in a State of Being or Existence at all and survives as Pharaoh and Egypt of old under such Voices and Vials to the last or as the City where our Lord was crucified did under such a Ministry and a course of Miracles and Prophecies fulfilling upon it till destroy'd by Titus I confess my self unable to account but must leave it to that Time it self that will be so full of Light to explain it But that the Prophecy gives us an orderly course of seven Voices although in reverence as it were of the Prophecy it self to its own Type of the Thunders once seal'd they and their Order is so much cover'd I shall thus argue There are in this Apocal. Prophecy ch 14. seven distinct Issues Arg. 1 or Emanations following in a Connexion and yet to v. 1. v. 13. v. 6. v. 14 15. each is annex'd its signal Note of Distinction so that while they are in a Connexion they are also under a Distinction v. 8. v. 18. v. 9. and they are just seven and most undeniably so From hence it appears they concert with all the Apocalyptick Sevens in which Number the whole Prophecy is all along conveyed To each of these there is applied either a Voice from Heaven Arg. 2 a loud Voice or a loud Cry according to the Note of the seventh Trumpet There were great Voices in Heaven Every one of these Sevens hath therefore this Note except the Third concerning the Fall of Babylon omitted then as it were on purpose to distinguish it and that it might not be mistaken for the Execution of this Voice by the seventh Vial c. 18. else it cannot but be thought That Angel discharg'd his Office and Trust with the same Zeal the other Angels did and that a Point of so great Concernment to the Kingdom of Christ as Babylon's Fall was neither whisper'd in a low Accent nor coolley or so much as calmly pronounced To shew there is a Connexion of the Seven when there had been no mention of any Angel in the first Voice yet it is Arg. 3 said in the second Voice Another Angel Now seeing he cannot be call'd Another with respect to any precedent Angel it must undoubtedly be with Relation to the first Voice and thus as there is a Connexion so there is an Order in the fourth Voice therefore the Angel is call'd the third Angel to shew there is a design'd Order And as to shew the same Order also the first Angel was called not the first but another and if Another there must be a former another can't be without a first other for Another is a second other So it appears again there is an order of Voices signified in this third Angel but fourth Voice for the Order is again express'd by Third a most express Note of Order The very Importance of each Voice carries a Succession to Arg. 4 the Kingdom of Christ which that we may better understand we must consider Voice and Voices and Thunder in their general Notation in Scripture signifie Doctrine and an Emanation of Doctrine so John Baptist is called a Voice and those two Apostles Boanerges or Sons of Thunder and especially in this Prophecy Thunders and Voices are always big with some Appearance of Christ's Kingdom This course of Voices must therefore be a course of Doctrines very productive of Christ's Kingdom and in the two last of earnest Prayers for it that were returned to as Christ's Prayer Glorifie Joh. 12. 28. thy Name by a Voice of Thunder I have both glorified it and will glorifie it again and as the Place where the Apostles prayed was shaken so these Petitions will be to the Acts 4. 31. World as a Thunder and Earthquake and yet the Kingdom it self after these Preparations is in a still Voice of Grace and Peace We must then enquire from whence these Voices rise and spring and we may find three Origins of them 1. They rise from the Church of Philadelphia whose proper Interval or Support of the Line of Time is at the seventh Trumpet as hath been affirmed And it is said Christ set it an open door viz. of divine Doctrine reaching to Christ's Kingdom So the Apostle calls the Propagation of the Gospel 1 Cor. 16. 9. Col. 4. 3. by his Ministry the opening to him a door wide and effectual and the very Publication it self a door of Vtterance 2. They spring from the seven Thunders that uttered their Voices but as not in due time to proceed nor in the order of the Apocal. Sevens were then sealed but are now written The first Voice therefore as the Voice of Thunder allies the whole Course of them to the Thunders and the Persons from whom the Voice of the first Thunder proceeds had the Name of the Lambs Father Written which Number was first under Seal at the Apostacy beginning then they shewed themselves at the Thunders but immediately were seal'd again and now unseal'd and written at the Thunders unseal'd and written in these Voices So in
delay beyond its Time therefore all Designs of the two Kings designing a longer Monarchy and to that end speaking Lyes at one Table could not prosper for the End appointed did not allow it to either of them the universal Empire of the Romans spoken of in the Ships of Chittim coming on And what last end of the Indignation can be meant but that of the Desolation determin'd on the Jews in the very next Vision that explains it together with Ezekiel's bearing their Iniquity till the New Jerusalem So the Vision being for many days its being commanded Dan. 8. v. 26 27. 28. to be shut up the asserting it to be true as John Apoc. 21. 5. These Sayings are true Daniel's deep Sleep Sickness Fainting being astonish'd for days answerable to the Visions being for Days viz. many Days argues to how great a Period the Vision tends and what a fatal course of things it was to run And to conclude this Reason That very Title of the Vision of the Evening and Morning or of 2300 Ev. Morn collected all into one shew the long Night of three Idolatrous Monarchies and longest in the Roman Antichristian and the glorious Morning of Christ's Kingdom There cannot be two Expressions of the noted End of Argu. 3 Daniel's Visions more full and adequate than those two however brief The Sanctuary shall be cleans'd in correspondence with Ezekiel's Vision of the New Jerusalem and its Sanctuary and of the Saints taking the Kingdom And the insolent King shall be broken without hand even the Prince of fierce Countenance Dan. 8. 23. compar'd with c. 7. v. 8. c. 2. 33 34. whose Look was more stout than his Fellows who had the Eyes of a man to understand dark Sentences growing great but not by his own power but as the Toes of Clay and Iron broken without hand or by the Stone cut out of the Mountain without hand Nor can any thing be more agreeable to the two Inscriptions on the End in the Apocalyptical Prophecy It is done Revel c. 16 17. c. 21. 6. It is done one the End of the Beast's Kingdom the other on the Kingdom of Christ or the New Jerusalem Now from all this of the Vision beginning with its 2300 Propos 3. Ev. Mor. at the first of the Persian Monarchy and so running to the end it plainly follows Those 2300 are not the Gauge of the daily Sacrifice taken away but of the whole Vision from the Persian through the Grecian to the end of the Roman Antichristian Monarchy and the Kingdom of Christ and so the Vision and the 2300 Ev. Mor. are equal So that the most literal sense of those Words Vnto how long or unto when the Vision of the Daily and of the Transgression of Desolation to give both the Sanctuary and the Host to be trodden under foot And he said unto me unto 2300 Ev. Morn Then shall the Sanctuary be cleans'd The literal sense of the Question I say cannot be Unto how long does the Taking away c. endure For so are not the Words But Unto how long that whole Vision whose principal Visum or Thing seen is the taking away c. amidst many other Visa in the whole Frame as the Tares was of that excellent Parable Matt. 13. 36. that had several other Materials to compose it and yet is call'd the Parable of the Tares and is indeed of the very same Import with this Antichristianism and Prophecy of it Now when such a Question is ask'd and the Answer is given to so long the most natural sense is When no Time is fix'd for the Beginning that the present Time should be understood to be it and when it is added And then shall the Sanctuary be cleans'd it is plain a cleansing of the Sanctuary proportionable to the treading it under foot must be understood to be the end of the Vision and of its 2300 Days From all which it is evident The 2300 begin and end with the Vision And it will be farther evident upon these following Reasons The Vision is one entire Vision though it consists of several Reason 1 Members and however They may be distinguish'd in the Vision and be divided in the Events what Date of Time is given with the Vision as this one Vision agrees to the whole Vision and not to any single part but as so united with the whole however therefore the Vision may be denominated from any single part as principally to be remark'd as the Vision of the Daily c. The Vision of the Ev. Mor. yet in any thing relating to the Vision as the Vision it self the whole must be intended and not that part The several parts of the Vision have indeed several spaces of Time cut out of the whole space proper to themselves But as the Vision is one entire Vision so the Date is one entire Date and can be no other to agree with the whole Vision The Vision is call'd ten times The Vision to shew it is all one and the same Vision and the several parts of it are but as the parts of one and the same Body Lines of the same Image The Exposition of the Vision answers part for part to the Vision it self first given saving that in the Vision Antiochus the Type appears uppermost but in the Exposition the Anti-type appears uppermost and as in Reason it should be is most apparent and the whole Vision being expounded is call'd The Vision of the Even and Morn all the 2300 being united into one as it were to unite the whole Vision and the whole Line of Time as close and entire as possibly may be And which is most remarkable Before the Exposition of the Vision the space of Time allowed to the whole Vision of which the Taking away c. was the chief as in the Anti-type however couched under the Type is given before the Exposition or just between the Vision and the Exposition that it might distribute it self to the whole of both and in the Exposition it is therefore so summ'd up that it cannot be divided but must remain entire to the whole for it is as was said but one Ev. and one Mor. applied to all the Vision and afterward we shall find the Dividend or Allotment to each part and most particularly to the Daily taken away to each I say their part of the 2300 Ev. Mor. And lest any one should insist too hard on the Daily understanding it of the Jewish daily Sacrifice besides that any Word importing Sacrifice is prescinded and only Tammith or the Continual applicable either to Sacrifice or Service and Worship in general used it is also to be observ'd in the Exposition in the place of many Words concerning the daily taken away we have the whole Action in Expressions most proper to the Bestian Prince according to all Prophecy of the Old and New Testament and not at all proper to Antiochus and nothing said of the daily at all but the entire Vision