demonstrated in my Synopsis Prophetica Nor can any man wonder that the Apocalypse affects such high figures as these are if he consider that this is one part of the artifice of Concealment which is so studiously intended in it But if we understand this power given to these Witnesses of the oral denunciation of these Aegyptian plagues that also is very plausible from Jer. 1.10 where God speaks thus to Jeremiah See I have this day set thee over the Nations and over the Kingdoms to root out and to pull down and to destroy and to throw down and to build and to plant Which is not to do these things but to denounce them CHAPTER XII 1. ANd there appeared a great wonder in Heaven a Woman cloathed with the Sun and the Moon under her féet and upon her head a Crown of twelve Stars This is the primitive Apostolick Church before the Apostasie Where being clothed with the Sun signifies her being environed with the pure Light of the Gospel or the Sun of Righteousness communicated to her And her being crowned with twelve Stars denotes that it was her Glory and her Crown that she was not yet degenerated from the True Apostolick Faith and practice nor did as yet either Iudaize or Paganize but trod under-foot both the Carnality of the Judaical Rites whose Feasts and Legal Observances were appointed according to the course of the Moon and also the gross Superstitions and Idolatries of the Pagans which are rightly deemed the works of darkness or of the night of which the Moon is Governess 2. And she being with Child cryed travailing in birth and pained to be delivered These sharp throes signifie the cruel cutting persecutions the Primitive Church was under and the many martyrdoms they did suffer before that promise of Christ was made good to them Fear not little stock for it is my Fathers good pleasure to give you the Kingdom This state therefore of the Church is contemporary with that of the earnest Ephesine and bitter Smyrnean succession and with the inward Court where also stood the Altar of Holocausts betokening the Primitive Christians frequent sacrificing their lives in Testimony to the Truth 3. And there appeared another wonder in Heaven namely while this Woman was thus in travail And behold a great red Dragon that is bloody and cruel having seven Heads and ten Horns on his seventh head suppose but without Crowns to intimate they are not yet in being though the heads be said to be crowned as well the five past and that one to come as the present sixth head the better to understand thereby that they are Men or Magistrates not Hills that are intimated in this place that is the reason it is said And seven Crowns upon his heads 4. And his tail drew the third part of the stars of Heaven and did cast them to the Earth that is his Military Train or Armies had subdued in S t Iohn's time the third part of the Kingdoms and Principalities of the then known world And the Dragon stood before the Woman which was ready to be delivered to devour the Child as soon as it was born The Dragon that is the Roman Empire Pagan known by its seven Heads which allude also to the seven Hills Chap. 17. as well as to the sevenfold succession of Government in it but Pagan in that it is in the shape of a Dragon as being under the Dominion not of Christ but Satan and also because seven Heads are only named and the Horns of the seventh Head yet uncrowned Wherefore this Vision belongs to the Empire while it was yet purely Pagan and the sense of that last clause is briefly this That the Roman Pagan Emperours and their Ministers the Devil assisting watched as close as they could that the Church of Christ never should come to such Power as to have an Emperour of their own Religion and so the Roman Empire come into their hands but so soon as any such thing appeared they endeavoured to quash it and defeat it 5. And she brought forth a Man-child who was to rule all Nations with a rod of Iron But notwithstanding all their envious and malicious watchfulness the Woman brought forth a Man-child a Mystical Christ or Christian People that at last would make themselves Masters of the Empire and Rule the wicked persecutive Pagans with such severity as they deserved which is intimated by what follows And her Child was caught up unto God and to his Throne He was advanced to the Imperial Dignity which is called here the Throne of God in such a sense as Supreme Magistrates are called Elohim Gods in the Hebrew Idiom because they are Gods Vicegerents and Representatives here on Earth whence their Majesty is also called Sacred And this was plainly fulfilled when Constantine turned Christian. The watchfulness therefore of this 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 this quick-sighted vigilant Dragon seems to be contemporary with the Travail of the Woman till she had brought forth a Man-child that might rule all Nations with a Rod of Iron 6. And the Woman fled into the Wilderness But a little after this external prosperity of the Church and deliverance from the present Pagan persecution she was yet fain to take shelter in the wilderness the outward Catholick Church becoming little better in a short time For which reason she is said to fly into the Wilderness being more safe in this Christiano-gentilism than in that open furious oppression of the Pagan red Dragon thought in propriety of speech the desart or Christiano-paganism came swiftly upon her rather than she by any will of her own fled into it but it is a Prophetical Hypallage Where she hath a place prepared of God that they should feed her there The Apostolick Church should be preserved by Gods Providence all the time of this her abode in the Wilderness or Christiano-gentilism namely about the time of a thousand two hundred and threescore dayes Prophetical that is years Or the time and times and half a time as they are afterward called and sometimes resolved into Dayes sometimes into Months for * particular symbolical meanings and for the embellishing of the Cortex of the Apocalypse but to be understood alwayes seven Semitimes in whatever other disguise expressed whether of Dayes or Months These 1260 dayes therefore is the same time with forty two months of the treading down the outward Court by the Gentiles 7. And there was war in Heaven which betokens the like affair to come upon Earth Michael and his Angels fought against the Dragon and the Dragon fought and his Angels which implies the invisible assistances and oppositions of Angels good and bad the one on the Primitive Christians side the other on the Pagan Empires side during that strong conflict betwixt the Church and the Pagans their persecutors in the Ephesine and Smyrnean succession with which the pangs of the Woman in travail also is contemporary 8. And the Dragon and his Angels prevailed not that
For that this belongs to Rome the wonted character Third plainly shews Therefore under this Trumpet there is no longer at last any King of Rome denoted by the Sun nor Consular Power nor Senatorian nor the Power of other known Ancient Magistrates of Rome denoted by the Moon and Stars but the City at last namely after that from the year 542 in the Ostrogothick War by Belisarius and Narsus Iustinian's Generals it was deprived of the Consular Power and after taken twice by Totilas and burnt and retaken by Narses and a little after struck to the ground by thunder and lightning and tempest being despoiled of all Ancient Ranks of Roman Magistracy sunk to that ignoble and obscure Title of the Dutchy of Rome and after was forced to pay Tribute to Ravenna under the Exarchate a City that before had been subject to her In which inglorious state she continued till the year 750 Which year is the Epocha of that notable Interval of the Kingdom of the Saracens from the beginning of the Caliphate of the Abasidae who first made Bagdad their Imperial Seat to the taking of the said Bagdad by Togrulbeck King of the Turks which was in the year 1055. And this is the easie and natural sense of the fourth Trumpet and perfectly fills up the scope thereof 13. And I beheld and heard an Angel flying through the midst of Heaven saying with a loud voice Wo wo wo to the Inhabiters of the Earth by reason of the other voices of the Trumpet of the three Angels which are yet to sound These Woes are denounced against the Roman Empire who by this time besides the guilt of the blood of the Primitive Martyrs had in a gross manner lapsed into a kind of Paganochristian Idolatry which they would be found in under these following Trumpets and in cruel persecutions of the Apostolick Members of the Church that would not submit to their Idolatrous Paganochristianisme Wherefore vengeance proportionable to their redoubled wickedness shall be poured down upon them under the voices of the Trumpet of the three Angels that are to come NOTES CHAPTER VIII Vers. 7. As a character of the Roman Empire c. That the third part or subtriple proportion is a character of the Roman Empire will appear from Chap. 12. vers 4. where the Dragon with seven Heads and ten Horns which is undoubtedly the Roman Empire Pagan is said with his taile to have drawn the third part of the Stars of Heaven and cast them to the Earth Which in the Prophetick stile is as much as to say that he had brought down a third part of the Princes or Rulers of the known world in that time and subjected them to himself that is that the Roman Power had subdued a third part of the Powers and Principalities of the World to her self For Heaven and Earth are the parts of a Political World as well as of a Natural And the Stars of the Political World are the several Princes or Rulers thereof But when they are subjected to some other great Potentate then they cease to be fixed Stars but fall to the Earth that is to the low estate of subjection or are utterly extinct And in that they are said to be cast down by the taile of the Dragon by his taile is understood his Retinue his Train Military especially his Armies and Forces whether by Land or by Sea This is a most assured sense of the Prophetick stile and that therefore the amplitude of the Roman Dominion is hinted by the third part of Stars cast down to the Earth by the Dragons Taile as if it were about the third part of the known world in S t John 's time And that consequently this subtriple proportion is an intended character of the Roman Empire whereby we may know that such or such a Vision belongs to it And thus to give characters from Numbers and Proportions is according to the Cabbalistical mode and the very Genius of this Book which is Cabbalistical And it is absurd to think there should be so repeated a mention of a third part so perpetually of things as if Divine Providence had a peculiar pique against the third part of things or persons more than any other part as it may seem in at beast a dozen places in the Apocalypse were it not there were this mystery under it CHAPTER IX 1. ANd the filth Angel sounded and I saw a Star * fallen from Heaven to Earth that is a lapsed Spirit or Angel a Devil if you will For as a Star signifies an Angel so a fallen Star a lapsed Angel And to him was given the Key of the bottomless pit That is he had great Power in the Kingdom of darkness of which a Key is a Symbol 2. And he opened the bottomless Pit and there rose a smoke out of the Pit as the smoke of a great furnace That is there arose a hot and hellish zeal conjoyned with dark Ignorance for the Imposturous Religion of Mahomet And the Sun and the Air were darkened by reason of the smoke of the Pit That is the Gospel of the Sun of Righteousness was endeavoured to be clouded and eclipsed by the over-running force and false pretenses of Monotheisme and of a more pure worship in Mahometisme 2. And there came out of the smoke Locusts upon the Earth That is under this dark ignorant and false pretense the Saracens professors of the Mahometan Religion spread themselves over the Earth And unto them was given power as the scorpions of the Earth have power to have their sting and poison in their taile which deadly sting and poison in the Saracens was the falseness of their Religion which they transfused at the end of their conquests That was the poisonous sting to all conscientious Christians and to others it was at least poison if not a sting 4. And it was commanded them that they should not hurt the grass of the Earth neither any green thing neither any tree Which here in Analogie stand for several orders of Men as the Locusts for the Saracens But only those men that have not the seal of God in their foreheads which intimates that notwithstanding the grassations of these Impostors the truly Apostolick Church would be kept safe And there is mention made of Men to insinuate that these Locusts were also men not mere insects For Locusts do not fall upon Men but upon Grass and Trees 5. And to them it was given that they should not kill them That is that these Saracens should indeed infest the Roman Empire sore but not destroy it quite as after happened by the Euphratean Horsemen But that they should be tormented five months that is during their time of lying upon it called here five months in allusion to the time of Locusts who live about that space of time as Naturalists relate But their continuance in vexing Italy was not much above five months of years if that may be particularly glanced at And their torment was as
to the Opinion even of the Ancient Fathers As the Empire was healing into the Image of old Paganism again and became a Beast it grew actually divided into several Kingdoms which therefore is as much if not more express than the Crowns upon the ten horns of the healed Beast Chap. 13. vers 1. And therefore the more needless to mention the Crowns here 13. These have one mind and shall give their power and strength unto the Beast that is shall be of one Paganochristian Religion whereby the Empire had again become a Beast and shall give their power and strength unto the Beast being ready by force of Arms if need be or by what other Power or Authority they have to maintain this Beast in its beastly that is in its Idolatrous condition and Pagan-like Superstitions 14. These shall make war with the Lamb and the Lamb shall overcome them namely at the last by that patience and truth that is found in his followers For he is Lord of Lords and King of Kings So already by right and his Father has decreed that at last he shall have full and quiet possession that all the Kingdoms of the Earth shall become the Kingdoms of the Lord and of his Christ. And they that are with him are called and chosen and faithful The great stress lies upon chosen and faithful For many are called but few are chosen But those choice ones that are said to be with him are stout Soldiers that will follow the Lamb whithersoever he goes never leave him for any persecution whatsoever but be firm and faithful unto him be their patience never so much exercised by sufferings 15. And he saith unto me The Waters which thou sawest where the Whore sitteth are Peoples and Multitudes and Nations and Tongues Even all the Nations and People in the Roman Empire 16. And the ten Horns which thou sawest upon the Beast viz. under the seventh head that is the Paganochristian head be it Pope or Emperour for the Supreme Power Paganochristian be it lodged where it will is the head of the healed Beast or of the Beast that was and is not and yet is These some of them at least shall hate the Whore that is the Idolatrous Hierarchy and Church of Rome particularly And shall make her desolate and naked and shall eat her flesh and burn her with fire The making of her desolate and naked is the stripping her of her wealth and revenues and bestowing of them upon better uses And the eating of her flesh may partly have the same signification Flesh signifying wealth with the Onirocritical Interpreters But it may also signifie carnal Ordinances and Institutes Superstitious and Idolatrous which are the fulsome flesh of this Whore And the eating this flesh of hers and burning her with fire is the abolishing of these grosly Superstitious and Idolatrous Rites through the spirit of Truth and Zeal which is likened to fire This has been done in its measure in the Reformation when so many Kingdoms and Principalities forsook the Church of Rome but may be further that is more extendedly fulfilled under the fourth and fifth Vials Politically understood 17. For God hath put in their hearts to fullfil his will It is easie enough to conceive that by Gods connivence at these times of ignorance as the Apostle speaks of the Gentiles it might be permitted to the Pseudoprophetick Beast through the officious assistance of the Powers of darkness to do such Miracles and use such wayes of imposing upon the ten Kings as would certainly enough determine them to the Idolatrous Religion of the Empire But that they were thus certain to be deceived is the fault of their own lapse and of the after-consequences of it not any injustice in God who no otherwise here is said to put in their hearts to fullfill his will c. than in Exod. he is said to harden Pharaoh's heart from letting the people of Israel go And to agree and give their Kingdom to the Beast the same that was hinted vers 13. and so to be understood Until the words of God shall be fulfilled For Dan. chap. 7. it is plainly said of the little Horn which there takes upon him to change Times and Laws that they shall be given into his hands for a Time and Times and half a Time which therefore is a Time determinate by God But then it presently follows But the judgement shall sit and they shall take away his Dominion to consume and destroy it to the end And that little Horn is the Whore of Babylon as I have proved Synops. Prophet lib. 2. cap. 14. sect 12. 18. And the Woman which thou sawest is that great City which reigneth over the Kings of the Earth that is which reigned in S t Iohn's time over the Kings of the Earth whereby it is manifest that Old Rome is understood not New Rome or Constantinople For no Polity seated upon seven Hills but what was there reigned over the Kings of the Earth in S t Iohn's time The sense therefore of the Verse may be clearly delivered in this short Paraphrase The Woman which thou sawest riding on the Beast whose name is Was is not and yet is is that great City that now ruleth over the Kings of the Earth namely Rome whose Inhabitants though flowing successively are accounted one and the same City because included within the same reputed walls and buildings as that is accounted one and the same River that flowes betwixt the same banks though the same water does not continue for a day together Therefore the Ruling Power Ecclesiastick or Hierarchy of seven-hilled Rome in Italy as the two-horned Beasts name is Latinus in the other Vision chap. 13. is this Woman that rides the Beast that was and is not and yet is and most principally concerned in this Vision which contains as it were the Arraignment of her person described from her Quality or Dignity being Queen or Empress as it were of the whole Empire signified by the Beast she rides on and from her Gorgeous Apparel and from her Palace or Chief Place of her Residence seven-hilled Rome But the Crime or Charge against her is the corrupting of the whole Empire with Idolatry and Cruelty murdering the Saints of God and Martyrs of Iesus Her doom or condemnation is very copiously and pompously set out in the Chapter following And this I think is a very easie natural and coherent Exposition of this Seventeenth Chapter of the Apocalypse and such as cannot but abundantly satisfie any unprejudiced Reader But whoever will take the pains carefully to peruse and throughly to understand the eight last Chapters of the first Book of my Synopsis Prophetica amongst which is my Ioynt-Exposition of this Seventeenth and Thirteenth Chapters of this Book of the Apocalypse I hope be he never so much prejudiced if he will speak his own conscience he will confess that I have made out with evidence even mathematical and undeniable demonstration that the sense
the face of the Earth Grace he unto you and peace all favour happiness and prosperity From him which is and which was and which is to come from the Eternal Jehovah who graspeth all past present and to come in the eternity of his Wisdom and Power And from the seven spirits which are before his throne And from all his holy Angels that are assisting at his Throne and in a readiness to be sent upon messages and to minister for the good of his people 5. And from Iesus Christ who is the faithful Witness and the first-begotten of the dead and the Prince of the Kings of the Earth From Jesus Christ that faithful Witness of the Will of his Father when he was upon Earth and the first-begotten of the dead the first-fruits of them that slept to whom is given the right of all the Kingdoms of the Earth to be Prince over them all and to rule them in Righteousness and Peace To him that loved us and washed us from our sins in his own blood That so loved us that he laid down his life for us for a propitiation for our sins and to wash us from all the silth thereof through sincere repentance and mortification of our lusts out of a due and gratefull return of love to him that died for us 6. And hath made us Kings and Priests unto God and his Father namely by this victory over our corruptions through faith in him to offer spiritual sacrifices of Prayers and Thanksgiving with an utter resignation of our selves to the will of God the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. To him be glory and Dominion for ever and for ever Amen 7. Behold he cometh in the clouds so vast a prospect have the prophecies of this Book and will judge the whole world at the last day And every eye shall see him and they also that pierced him either in his own person or wounded him and killed him in the persecution and murdering of his living members And all kindreds of the earth shall wail because of him namely all those that have thus outragiously sinned against him Even so Amen This is a certain truth let scoffers and unbelievers say and imagine what they please 8. And that this may not seem strange that his Providence and Power reaches so far as to the very last there is presently added I am Alpha and Omega the Beginning and the Ending saith the Lord which is and which was and which is to come the Almighty whose administration therefore of Affairs and the presence of his Power is palpably to be felt and plainly to be discerned from the beginning of the Church to the end of the world He is the Almighty grasping all things in the hand of his All-comprehending Providence 9. I Iohn who also am your brother and companion in tribulation and in the kingdom and patience of Iesus Christ both which he hath bequeathed to his faithfull followers Was in the Isle that is called Patmos one of the Cyclades so called in the Aegean Sea for the word of God and for the testimony of Iesus Christ thither banished for the preaching the Word of God and bearing witness to the Truths of the Gospel of our Lord Jesus 10. And it came to pass in this Island that I was in the spirit on the Lords day actuated and impressed upon in my inward man my mind being vacant from this earthly body and external senses and wholly seised by this Divine and Angelical Power which caused in it the following Visions and Prophetical Impressions but as lively and clear as any objects to the outward or corporeal senses And when I was thus in the Spirit and had as it were left the body in this ecstasie I heard behind me a great voice as of a Trumpet 11. Saying I am Alpha and Omega the first and the last and shall declare unto thee such things as concern the Church continuedly from the first beginning thereof to the end of the world And what therefore thou seest write in a Book and send it unto the Seven Churches which are in Asia unto Ephesus and unto Smyrna and unto Pergamus and unto Thyatira and unto Sardis and Philadelphia and unto Laodicea that is to say send it to the truly Catholick and Apostolick Church dispread upon the face of the Earth and divided into seven successions unto the Ephesine succession and unto the Smyrnean succession and unto the Pergamenian succession and unto the Thyatirian succession and unto the Sardian succession and unto the Philadelphian succession and unto the Laodicean succession Which seven successions one after another fill up the whole time of the Church Universal from the beginning thereof to the end of the world 12. And I turned to see the voice that spake with me to see who it was that spake thus to me And being turned I saw seven golden Candle-sticks 13. And in the midst of the seven golden Candlesticks one like unto the Son of Man the Representation namely of Christ as he is also one with his Church For we are Members of his Body of his Flesh and of his Bones They two shall be one flesh This is a great Mystery saith the Apostle but I speak of Christ and his Church Cloathed with a garment down to the foot and girt about the pops with a golden girdle in token that he is our High Priest this habit alluding to the High Priests Vestments 14. His head and his hairs were white like wool as white as snow for the greater venerableness of this High Priests person and in token he is that Christ that the Prophet calls Councellour the Mighty God the Everlasting Father For these are the symbols of his Wisdom and Paternal Authority And his eyes were as a flame of fire to signifie the penetrancy of his Providence and spirit of discerning both in himself and in his Church 15. And his feet like unto fine brass as if they burned in a furnace which shews the stability and purity of his wayes in himself and the constancy of his Church in the furnace of affliction and fiery tryals And his voice as the sound of many waters Which plainly discovers that Christ is here represented in union with his Church Waters signifying a Multitude in the prophetick stile as most certainly they do 16. And he had in his right hand seven stars The seven stars according to his own Interpretation are the seven Angels of the seven successions of the Church whom he bears up sustains and strengthens throughout all Ages And out of his mouth went a hard two-edged sword a Symbol of Christ as he is the Living Word of God quick and powerfull and sharper than any two-edged sword And denotes also the powerfull Word of the Gospel preached by the Living Members of his Church And his countenance was as the Sun that shineth in his strength This is spoke in reference to him as he is called the Sun of Righteousness or in reference to
condemned for an Heretick by this lofty Roman or Pergamenian Church where Satan the Accuser dwells yet I will give him a white Stone and absolve him in Foro Divino Or I will give him the white Stone in which a New Name is written that is to say I will confirm and establish him in the new Birth and give to him that pure and permanent inestimable Pearl of the Divine Nature which none knows but he that has it And thus he shall be abundantly compensated for all the evil or loss he may seem to sustain by his quitting the Communion of this Idolatrous Church of Pergamus or Rome For the * signification of their names do very nearly agree 18. And unto the Angel of the Church of Thyatira write To the Bishops and Pastors c. of the Thyatirian succession of the Church which begins at the ending of the former succession and reacheth till the time that whole Nations forsook the Communion of the Church of Rome * and whose condition is represented in the signification of its name write thus These things saith the Son of God who hath his eyes like unto a flame of fire and his feet like fine brass These things saith the Son of God to a people that live amongst those that make the Virgin Mary in as high a way or higher as to worship the Daughter of God But his eyes like a flame of fire denote the penetrancy of his Providence as also the kindling of his just anger against the fiery persecutions of his servants by Thyatira the Roman Church again in this Interval And that his feet are said to be like to fine brass if we refer it to him as he is in union with his Church that supplement is to be remembred As if they burned in a furnace which is an intimation of the frequent burnings of the Servants of Christ at the stake in this Interval 19. I know thy works and charity and service and faith and thy patience and thy works and the last to be more than the first that towards the latter end of this Thyatirian succession they were more and greater than before Which is a noble testimony to the zeal and sincerity of those that began the Reformation 20. Notwithstanding I have a few things against thee because thou sufferest that woman Iezebel the Roman Hierarchy or Priesthood when now in this Interval things are come to that maturity that thou mayest cast her off and free thy self from this unjust and Idolatrous Yoke This is spoke to the Powers and Principalities held under by her Which calleth her self a Prophetess but is indeed a Pseudoprophetess a false teacher and seducer of my Servants the same with the false Prophet elsewhere mentioned in the Apocalypse To teach and seduce my servants to commit fornication and to eat things sacrificed unto Idols That thou sufferest her to bring them to the Communion of the Mass which she has made so Idolatrous that my Supper being a Feast upon a Sacrifice she makes it look altogether like the eating of things sacrificed unto Idols and so seduces to spiritual fornication which is Idolatry Wherefore let Iezebel * according to the omen and fate in her name be cast out and reputed as the dung of the earth 21. And I gave her space to repent of her fornication and she repented not Since my monition to her by the Waldenses and Albigenses but she remains still obdurate and impenitent 22. Behold I will cast her into a bed of languishment instead of that large bed of wantonness in which the Kings of the Earth have so universally committed fornication with her And them that commit adultery with her into great tribulation except they repent of their déeds unless they desist from their usual gross Idolatries so scandalous in the eyes of all sober Christians 23. And I will kill her Children with death that is either by the sword that cometh out of my mouth I shall make them dead to her by their conversion to the truth they being mortified and made dead to all the vain trumperies of that false deceitfull idolatrous Church or I will kill them by a natural death namely their Emissaries and Armies that may be sent against my True Church And all the Churches shall know that I am be which searcheth the reins and hearts And I will give unto every one of you according to his works So that all the Christian World shall ring of the Righteousness of my Judgments who have mine eyes like a bright flame of fire piercing into the reins and hearts of men to discover what they are that I may give to every one according to his demerits 24. But unto you I say and unto the rest in Thyatica as many as have not this doctrine nor comply with the Idolatrous Form of the Roman Religion And which have not known the depths of Satan as they speak Those deep reasons of State as they phrase it that frame Religion so as if there were no God really nor Christ that superintends his Church but that Religion were only to be a trick of State to Rule or Fool the people with Unto you I say that are better minded I will put upon you no other burthen I will give you no further trouble 25. But that which you have already hold fast till I come Persist only in the good way you are in and hold fast to the Truth till I come and take the Papal Yoke from off your neck 26. And he that overcometh and kéepeth my words unto the end to him will I give power over the nations that is they that with invincible patience and courage stand out to the last and keep my works unto the end remembring to do what I command that keep faith and good conscience in despite of all the Thyatirian persecutions These People with their Princes and Governours shall at the end namely in the last Semi-time of the Seven get the Nations under them that is the Paganochristians nor shall be any longer subject to their Dominion who had become in a manner Heathens by their Idolatrous practices and barbarous Cruelties 27. And he shall rule them with a rod of iron as the vessels of a potter shall they be broken to shivers that is they shall rigidly enough and severely rule them so that they shall not be able to whinch but at their own peril and all their strength shall be broken to fitters as a potters vessel even as I have received of my Father that is so far as I shall have received of my Father as to the propagating of my Kingdom at this time so will I give to them 28. And I will give him the morning star Not the Bright Morning Star which state belongs rather to the seventh Vial the commencement of the Philadelphian Interval or to the Millennial Empire of Christ but the Morning Star which shall appear though not so bright yet very early or unexpectedly but a little beyond the middle of
up with all the false Deities and Priests therein as a scrowl of parchment that hides the letters therein contained as it is rolled up And every Mountain and Island were removed out of their places that is their high places where they sacrificed and their Temples divided from other houses for their supposed sacredness were demolished at last by Theodosius 15. And the Kings of the earth and the great men and the rich men and the chief captains and the mighty men and every bondman and every fréeman hid themselves in the dens and in the rocks of the mountains that is all sorts of men from the highest to the lowest were sorely affrighted and dismayed at this terrible storm that came upon the Pagan Hierarchy nor were able to resist the force thereof not Maximianus Galerius not Maxentius not Maximinus with Martinianus Caesar not Licinius nor Iulian the Apostate who all felt the irresistible Power and Wrath of the Lamb and some of them viz. Galerius Maximinus and Licinius their miserable conditions even whether they would or no forced them by open confession to give Glory to God 16. And said to the mountains and rocks Fall on us and hide us from the face of him that sitteth on the Throne and from the wrath of the Lamb like that of Esay 2.20 And they shall go into the holes of the rocks and into the caves of the earth for the fear of the Lord and for the Glory of his Majesty when he ariseth to shake terribly the Earth as he did in this shaking of the Pagan Religion of the Empire and abolishing their Idols 17. For the great day of his wrath is come and who shall be able to stand Not Galerius not Maxentius not Licinius nor Iulian nor the Tyrants Eugenius and Argobastus with all the Power the Pagan party were able to make could stand against this storm of the wrath of the Lamb. So that the Church upon the Conversion of Constantine to the Faith entred into the state of the Pergamenian succession being exalted out of the dust And O that she had not been thereupon exalted so much in her own mind and become the Pergamenian succession in the worst sense that is proud and cruel as well as exalted in Power CHAPTER VII HItherto the first six Seals which are contemporary with the Ephesine and Smyrnean succession and with the forepart of the Pergamenian while the Church was only exalted out of her Smyrnean affliction in which she had been so trod to the ground not yet grown haughty and Antichristian and persecutive of the true members of Christ nor apostatized into gross Superstition and Idolatry as she was after in the far greatest part of the Pergamenian Interval and in all the Thyatirian in both which the eating things offered unto Idols is mentioned which tract of time is equal to the first six Trumpets which together with the seven Thunders fill up the whole space of the seventh Seal Which seven Thunders are put in the place of the seventh Trumpet on purpose that the six first Trumpets may be noted as a more peculiar space of time wherein as vengeance was taken on the Roman Empire by the Incursion of the Barbarous Nations for the persecution of the Primitive Christians so in the mean time a kind of Paganochristianism and Antichristian Power sprung up in the Church and grew to the height I say this being the condition of things under the first six Trumpets the artifice of the following transition from the first six Seals to them is admirable and of grand consideration The hundred forty four thousand sealed and so taken special notice of by Divine Providence intimating that the true Apostolick Church should be still preserved all this time notwithstanding all the incursions and devastations of the Barbarians and all the gross Apostasie Idolatry and Antichristian cruelty from a wickedly degenerated Church against Christs true members that held to the pure Apostolick faith and practice 1. And after these things viz. after the opening the six Seals I saw four Angels standing on the four corners of the Earth holding the four winds of the Earth that is He saw the Ministers of Gods Power in making War and Peace and blusters in the world and that at that time they held all in peace as for any Incursions of the Barbarians into the Empire That the wind should not blow on the Earth nor on the Sea nor on any Tree should not blow down buildings nor cause shipwracks on the sea nor break off branches of trees or tear them up by the root Houses Ships and Trees in analogie signifying Political Fabricks and Constitutions And the Babylonian Kingdom in Daniel is expresly represented by a Tree 2. And I saw another Angel ascending from the East that is from Christ * one of whose Titles is the East having the Seal of the Living God having a Commission from Christ to protect such certain men from the imminent destruction now coming upon the Empire And he therefore cryed with a loud voice to the four Angels to whom it was given to hurt the Earth and the Sea that is to raise tempests of War and Invasion on the Empire 3. Saying Hurt not the earth neither the sea nor the trees that is forbear to bring in those tempests of the Barbarians upon the Empire Till we have sealed the servants of our God in their foreheads That is marked them out for deliverance and protection Which insinuates the assured Providence of Christ over his True Church and living Members of his Body in all that confusion and corruption that would be under the first six Trumpets 4. And I heard the number of them that were sealed which is not numerally to be understood but symbolically noting the condition of the sealed And there were sealed an hundred forty four thousand Which Chiliads or Thousands are Cubical numbers and signifie therefore Stability or Constancy But it is said there were an hundred forty four thousands it being the square number of these Chiliads or Companies of which the Root is Twelve which is the Apostolical number Of all the Tribes of the children of Israel namely the twelve Patriarchs typically or figuratively being put for the twelve Apostles and the children of Israel for the Church of Christ of which the Israelites are here a Type as they are in the Epistle to the Church in Pergamus in which Pergamenian Interval this sealing begins Wherefore briefly by the hundred forty four thousands are meant the faithful constant Apostolick Christians that submitted not to the Tyranny and Idolatry of the Apostatized Church but were preserved pure and safe by Divine Providence during the sounding of the first six Trumpets under which notwithstanding the Empire was broken in pieces and the Tyranny and Idolatry of Antichrist rising and increasing and growing to the height So great was the Providence of God in his preservation and protection of his truly Apostolick Church for all this 5. Of the Tribe of
the torment of a Scorpion when he striketh a man viz. lesser at first but increasing upon him and the stroke being by the Serpentine taile of the Locusts it shows the poison and sting to be Diabolical and to cause such vexations of mind as that poison is apt to breed And as the torment of a Scorpion when he strikes a man is from a white poison transfused in the stroke as Apollodorus relates in Pliny lib. 11. So it is that perversly pretended Monotheisme of these Saracens that looks so fairly and innocently on it with which they might perplex and torment the minds of the unsealed and sorely disquiet their consciences besides the general fear of their lives in them that would not turn Mahometans the Saracens Wars being carried on upon a Religious account as is to be noted in their Alchoran and Zuna and they great Zelots and diligent promoters of their Religion as being the most Early Professors of it and as it is signified by their Type these Scorpion Locusts it being * the nature of the Scorpion perpetually to attempt to sting and transfuse her poison as of these Saracens to proselyte the world to their Religion 6. Wherefore the fear of death and horrour of conscience did so vex men and fill them with anxiety that it was worse than death it self to be in such perpetual danger and unsettledness of things worse than the Christians are now in under the Turks which were a desirable condition to them rather than these perpetual renewed vexations of the Saracens but this did not fall to their lot in the Saracens dayes though it were the more desirable condition of the two which may be glanced at in these words And in those dayes shall men seek death and shall not find it and shall desire to dye and death shall flée from them That is those parts of the Empire shall not be setled in the Saracens hands where they Invaded as afterwards it came to pass in the Turks Invasion who seized on the Eastern part of the Empire and setled there so that the Empire there was not only vexed but killed extinguished or put an end to and the minds of the conquered at quiet 7. And the shapes of the Locusts were like unto Horses prepared to battel That is ready harnessed as it is said afterwards that they have Breast-plates of Iron which shows the courage of these Saracens and their well-appointedness for War and their success was accordingly as is expressed by what follows And on their heads were as it were crowns of Gold Which shows their victory over so many Nations and Kingdoms For in the space of eight years or a little more they acquired to that Satanical Kingdom of Mahomet Palestine Syria both the Armenia's all Asia minor in a manner Persia India Aegypt Numidia all Barbarie to the River Niger Lusitania and Hispania nor were they stinted here but won also a great part of Italy even to the Gates of Rome To which you may add Sicily Candia Cyprus and the rest of the Mediterranean Islands Wherefore there is great reason that they should be represented with golden Crowns on their heads they having acquired so many Rich Kingdoms by War And their faces were as the faces of men The better to assure the Reader that Men indeed are meant and not Infects or mere Locusts 8. And they had hair as the hair of women to show what Countrey-men they were not for any effeminacy or cowardize in them namely that they are derived from the Arabians whose custom it was to wear long hair on their head unshorn and an head-tire like women This therefore shows they are Saracens from Arabia and in that it is said And their téeth were as the téeth of Lions that shows that they were very dispatchfull of their prey who could devour so many Kingdoms in so little time as was above noted 9. And they had breast-plates as it were breast-plates of Iron That is they were well armed to fight and had an Iron courage And the sound of their wings was as the sound of Chariots of many horses running to battel Here is mention of wings in allusion to the figure of Locusts who also make a noise with their wings when they fly but the sound of Chariots of many horses running to battel emplyes that they are indeed Men and great Warriours that with great swiftness noise and terrour run down all before them witness the above-mentioned conquests which were so large and so many 10. And they had tails like unto Scorpions and there were stings in their tails That is they are of the Serpentine kind of the Ancient Serpent that was alwayes an Enemy to the Son of God and his Kingdom and it denotes that with their conquests they would bring in a Religion contrary to that of Christ and destroy the worship of the Son of God under an ignorant pretense of Monotheisme as if the Christian Religion were inconsistent with the worship of one God whereas the more distinct knowledge of that one God does not make us less Monotheists than they This is the up-shot of their victories and the very sting and poison their atchievements end in And their power was to hurt men five months That is to hurt and vex the Empire particularly but not quite to destroy it as the Turks did afterwards Nor is it said here to hurt the third part of Men as in the former Trumpets because their Invasions were not restrained to the Empire but ran over other vast Tracts of the habitable world also But they are said to hurt men five months in allusion to the life of Locusts as I noted above And if mention be made of five months twice to remind us to double the number that is another character whereby we may discern that the Saracens are here meant by these Locusts twice five months of years viz. three hundred years saving that there is the difference of five single years which is nothing in the numbering by months of years being that most notable Interval in the Saracenical Kingdom namely from the beginning of the Caliphate of the Abasidae who first made Bagdad their Imperial seat to the taking of the said Bagdad by Togrulbec King of the Turks that is from the year of Christ 750 to the year 1055. But otherwise I conceive that five months do not signifie Arithmetically but Symbolically with an allusion to the time of the Locusts and only stand for the time that the Saracens had to hurt men not defining how long it was to be 11. And they had a King over them which is the Angel of the bottomless Pit The same that the fallen Star to whom was given the Key of the bottomless pit it being an Ensign of his Power in the Kingdom of darkness as I noted above This was the Supreme Captain of these Troops of Locusts that is Saracens and his name denotes his nature as follows Whose name in the Hebrew tongue is Abaddon but
works of the Devil gross Superstition Imposture Idolatry Cuelty lying Impossibilities instead of true Miracles or Mysteries and what other Inventions of the Old Serpent that seduceth the whole world Against such Witnesses therefore you may be sure this Dragon will make war who in this Chapter is described under one single Figure of a Red Dragon the Roman Pagan Emperours being Pontifices Maximi as well as Caesars In the following Chapter this Draconical power is divided into two there being now such a state in the Roman Empire as that there may be said to be Imperium in Imperio the Papal or Sacerdotal Hierarchy distinct from the Caesarean Majesty and Power NOTES CHAPTER XII Vers. 6. For particular symbolical meanings and for the embelishing of the Cortex of the Apocalypse c. This symbolical meaning as I remember M r Mede takes notice of That the Time and Times and half a Time is expressed by one thousand two hundred and sixty days when the time or continuance of the Children of Light or of the Day is notified but by forty two months when the Children of Darkness or of the Night their continuance is signified Thus the continuance of the Ten-horned Beast Chap. 13. is numbred by months as also the treading down the Outward Court by the Gentiles Chap. 11. But the Womans stay in the Wilderness is expressed by Dayes as also the time of the two Witnesses prophecying in sackcloth And it is manifest that the outward letter or cortex of the Apocalypse is better adorned this way than if where ever we find forty two months or one thousand two hundred and sixty dayes a Time and Times and half a Time had been repeated But these reasons of varying the phrase thus being so apparent to say nothing of the use of turning Daniel's Time and Times and half a Time into forty two months or one thousand two hundred and sixty dayes for the more certainly understanding that three Prophetick years and an half is meant thereby we may be the better assured that no greater accurateness of Time is intended by them than if the phrase of a Time and Times and half a Time had been alwayes used The not understanding of which has made sundry in vain attempt to predict events foretold in the Apocalypse to the accurateness of a Prophetical Day whenas indeed there is no use of either Prophetical Day or Month unless in saying such a thing was to fall out or did fall out in such a Day or such a Month or such a day of such a Month of suppose the seventh or last Semitime or Prophetical half year which consists of one hundred and eighty dayes or six months And the nature of the things foretold are such that they are not to terminate on a year but rather require that grosser numbring by Semitimes But the several particulars of the completion of a Prophecy suppose of the rising of the Witnesses might be more distinctly declared by saying this part was suppose in such a month of the last semitime and such in such in the fourth month suppose of the seventh or last semitime or Prophetical half year and such a day of that month c. CHAPTER XIII 1. ANd I stood upon the sand of the Sea that is me thought I stood by the Sea side or rather as the vulgar Latine reads it which not only M r Mede but Cornelius à Lapide and Alcazar and as they say the generality of Interpreters follow And he stood upon the sand of the Sea that is The Dragon stood c. And I saw a Beast rise up out of the Sea having seven heads and ten Horns which betoken the Roman Empire and upon his Horns ten Crowns In the former Vision there were no Crowns upon his Horns but here there are to denote that this is the Roman Empire divided into many Kingdoms viz. that the Vision reaches unto these times or belongs to the times of this state of the Empire which Division of the Empire happened betwixt four and five hundred years after Christ. And upon his heads the name of Blasphemy that is of Idolatry which signifies to us that this Figure represents the Empire only under that succession of Time that it was more or less Idolatrous 2. And the Beast which I saw was like unto a Leopard that is it was like a Kingdom divided into many parts as the Greek Kingdom was And his feet that is his forepart which are as the Arms and Hands of the Bear which are his strength and instrument of action to raven and prey with these were as the feet of a Bear Which denotes the likeness of it with the Persian Kingdom who as they were governed by their Magi in their affairs so these by the Papal Hierarchy by the Power and Counsel of the Pope and his Clergy And his mouth as the mouth of a Lion that is It is like the Babylonish Kingdom in its cruel Decrees against such as will not obey their Idolatrous Edicts nor worship the Golden Image that Nebuchadnezzar had set up Their stubbornness must be punished by an hot fiery furnace Fire and Fagot must be prepared for them that will not submit to this New Roman Idolatry And the Dragon gave him his Power his Seat and great Authority His power here according to the Original should be his Forces or Armies And what are the Forces and Armies of the Dragon but his Evil Angels or wicked Spirits and their Weapons and Artillery the external pomp of Images or Idols and such gross furniture of their worship whereby they overcome and captivate the feeble phancies of the people But his Seat and great Authority is the Imperial Crown and Authority Which showes that this Imperial Power as Idolatrous is the genuine successour to the Pagan Imperial Power 3. And I saw one of his heads as it were wounded to death namely in the fight of the Dragon with Michael and the Holy Martyrs who were conquerours at last and converted the Roman Pagan Empire to Christianity And his deadly wound was healed that is the Roman Empire for that succession of Time it was represented to me under was recovered unto its former Pagan-like and Idolatrous plight and condition This Panther-like Beast who by reason of the beauty of his skin and sweetness of his scent allures other Beasts to him and whom the Dragon is said most chiefly to fly from under this fair show and yet with the assistances of the Dragon was easily reduced to the former Pagan-like state under pretense of Christianity they imposing the old Paganick Idolatries upon the People And all the world wondred after the Beast that is they were all mightily taken with the Beast he both gratifying them with his outward specious show of Christianity that seemed so contrary to the Dragon and from which he so much abhorrs and also having the assistance of the Dragon viz. the Dragon-like Idolatries and carnal sense-striking Rites of worship and the tricks
of Rome From whence it follows 12. Here is the patience of the Saints This is the time wherein the patience of the Saints will be tryed the external carnal power of the enemy endeavouring to force them against so great Light to submit to their Idolatrous and Antichristian usages by cruel and barbarous persecutions Wherefore this answers to that passage in the Epistle to the Church of Sardis which contains a commination for their more general deadness and degeneracy whereby the better sort amongst them are brought to this jeopardy and distress Here are they that keep the Commandments of God and the faith of Iesus that is Here are they that will say unto their persecutors Whether it be right in the sight of God to hearken unto you more than unto God judge you Here are they that keep to the pure Faith and Doctrine of Christ and his Apostles and will not submit to any new-coined forms invented for worldly Interest and contrary to the Faith and Doctrine of Christ and his Apostles And surely God will give at last to the sufferings of such holy and sincere souls sutable victory and success as is intimated in the following Verse 13. And I heard a voice from Heaven saying unto me Write Blessed are the dead that dye in the Lord That dye as Martyrs in witness to his Truth against the abominable corruptions of that Idolatrous Church From henceforth are they blessed that is from this time of the Sardian Interval that here is intimated a time when the Scales begin to turn and nearer approach is made to the Philadelphian State which commenceth with the Reign of the Spirit as the Cabbalists call it and therefore it follows Yea saith the Spirit The Spirit that is to bring on these days sets his Seal thereto That they may rest from their labours For their martyrdom puts an end to their pains and toyles in this world And their works do follow them that is the effect and success of their works and labour here which are the hoped consequences thereof Which expected effect and success is the restoring of the Kingdom of Christ upon the overthrow of the salvage and barbarous tyranny of a bloody Idolatrous Church which murders and massacres men and does all imaginable despight to them because they will not sin against the manifest Laws of Christ to serve the lewd worldly ends and interest of Antichrist 14. And I looked and behold a white cloud and upon the cloud one sat like unto the Son of Man having on his head a golden Crown This is Christ that Son of Man in Daniel who is said to come with the Clouds of Heaven as if they were his Chariot and Dominion and Glory and a Kingdome as here a Crown is said to be given unto him And in his hand a sharp sickle That Christ himself here appears with his sickle in his hand ready to reap is very agreeable to what was intimated before of the Reign of the Spirit and the approaching thereof For what he is said to do by himself is by the Ministry of his Spirit in counterdistinction to humane and carnal means This is about the time of the sixth Vial. 15. And another Angel came out of the Temple representing the holy Church and her earnest and sincere Devotions for the enlargement of the Kingdom of Christ And therefore it is added Crying with a loud voice to him that sate on the Cloud Thrust in thy sickle and reap for the time is come for thee to reap for the harvest of the Earth is ripe Like that of our blessed Saviour himself Lift up your eyes and look on the fields for they are white already to harvest 16. And he that sate on the cloud thrust in his sickle on the Earth and the Earth was reaped namely that crop that belonged to that season which as I said is about the sixth Vial which contemporizeth with the Vision of the Lambs Bride And therefore by this Harvest happily may be prefigured the gathering of the Jews to the Faith of Christ which will prove a further enlargement of his Kingdom But the most universal conquest of all follows in the next Vision which contemporizeth with the seventh or last Vial. 17. And another Angel came out of the Temple which is in Heaven which is in Heaven is omitted vers 15. as needless because the Reaper there is Christ himself which implies his immediate assistance in that work But this Angel being himself to be Vintager there is mention made of Heaven to intimate his heavenly mission that he is sent from God and immediately assisted by his Spirit The appearance of which Reign of the Spirit will be eminent under this seventh Vial which contemporizeth with the Vision of the Rider of the White Horse with a sharp two-edged sword coming out of his mouth this Angel also having a sharp sickle which fitly answers to the sharp two-edged sword coming out of the mouth of the Rider of the white Horse Both of them signifie the cutting convictiveness of the Word and Spirit in the powerful Ministers of Christ in those days 18. And another Angel came out from the Altar which had power over fire The Altar as elsewhere in the Apocalypse is a symbol of the sacrifice of Martyrdom And here is mention of Fire because that kind of Martyrdom was so frequently inflicted by that Murderous and Idolatrous Church of Rome upon the Faithful Witnesses of Christ who bore Testimony against the abominations of that bloody Synagogue And cryed with a loud cry to him that had the sharp sickle namely for vengeance against this den of cruel Murderers and Idolaters saying Thrust in thy sharp sickle and gather the clusters of the Uine of the Earth for the Grapes are fully ripe that is some are in full ripeness and readiness for Conversion and for others their sins are fully ripe for utter destruction and confusion But I conceive this Vision respects more especially the former which yet involves the destruction and confusion of the latter 19. And the Angel thrust in his sickle into the Earth and gathered the Uine of the Earth and cast it into the great Wine-press of the wrath of God that is men were pressed in conscience upon the sharp convictions of the powerful Ministers of Christ with sorrow for their sins and the wrath of God against themselves was kindled in them As the Apostle writes to the Corinthians concerning the like conviction What carefulness it wrought in you what indignation what vehement desire what revenge Here Christ who is said to tread the wine-press of Gods wrath alone treads and squeezeth out the corrupt blood of Edom. And in the Vision which is parallel to this Chap. 19. his Vesture is said to be dipt in blood and that he treadeth the wine-press of the fierceness of the wrath of Almighty God which plainly shows that these two Visions tend to one and the same thing 20. And the Wine-press
was trodden without the City that is this powerful conviction neither began in nor reached to the City of Babylon the Roman Hierarchy or Polity for wood and stone is not here meant but a Polity or Society of men as is observable in the seventh Vial that though the Cities of the Nations fell by those powerful Boanerges's yet this Babylon the great though hail-stones of a Talent weight fell upon them were not converted or convinced in their consciences but blasphemed God because of the plague of the hail it was so exceeding great And in the Vision of the Rider of the White Horse the false Prophet and his adherents were taken and their power abolished as to that Tyranny and Idolatry they exercised before but it was the rest only that were slain with the Sword that proceeded out of the mouth of him that sate on the white Horse it was they only that were converted and convinced by the powerful preaching of the Everlasting Gospel the pure Gospel of Christ cleansed from all the filth and trumperies all the Idolatries and Superstitions of Antichrist And they are the same that are pressed here by Christs Vintagers or Grape-pressers but the City of Babylon proves obdurate and uncapable of any such pressure of conscience or true contrition for her Abominations so strongly is she hardened in her pretense of Infallibility And blood came out of the Wine-press even to the Horses bridles This again shows plainly that the Vision of the Rider of the white Horse and his Company and this of the Wine-press is all one But this signifies a full conviction in the convicted and a perfect victory over the contumacious which is further illustrated by what follows By the space of a thousand and six hundred furlongs which signifies the exceeding largeness and universality as it were of the victory if we read as we may sixteen Hecatontads or Centuries of furlongs And then as in the number 666 and as in the 144 Chiliads by extracting the square root we find the symbolical meaning of them so by the extracting the square root of sixteen which is four we find the symbolical meaning of this * For four is the symbol of Vniversality with the Pythagoreans and Cabbalists Which construction sutes wonderfully well with the Visions this is a parallel to namely that of the seventh Vial and the Battel of the Rider of the White Horse Which is the Battel of that Great Day of God Almighty to which the Kings of the Earth and of the whole world are gathered together and the defeat is proportionable For upon this defeat all the Kingdoms of the World will become the Kingdoms of God and of his Christ. NOTES CHAPTER XIV Vers. 20. For four is the symbol of Universality with the Pythagoreans and Cabbalists c. That the Ancient true Cabbalists held the number Four to be a symbol of Universality is plain from the fourth dayes Creation Which is indeed the Creation of the whole world in general according to the Philosophick Cabbala And as for the Pythagoreans it is frequent with them to call their Tetractys that is the number four 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 All Number as Photius observes because all number is made up in Ten and the putting together of every number in Four viz. 1 2 3 4. makes up Ten 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 saith he 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 For this reason the Pythagoreans called the number four All number or the whole number And Suidas reports the same almost in the very same words concerning the Pythagoreans For the abovesaid reason saith he 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 they called the number Four All number as universally comprehending all Number in it And Philo Judaeus 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The number Four is called All number or the whole Number because it comprehends what reaches to Ten and the Number Ten it self Which again he asserts but with that distinction that Ten is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 All number or the whole entire Number 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 actually but Four 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 potentially which Hierocles expresseth thus 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Whereby he would insinuate that before we make up explicitly Ten by the Numbers contained in Four viz. 1 2 3 4. there is notwithstanding an implicite or complicate entireness of Ten in the Number Four Which is sufficient to make it a symbol of Universality See Meursius his Denarius Pythagoricus This therefore being the symbolical significancy of Four the root of Sixteen I do not doubt but that I have hit upon the genuine sense of the sixteen hundred furlongs But before I was aware of this Mystery I was fain to take up with M r Mede 's conceit that they relate to Stato della Chiesa and to the Holy Land but so as I understood it mystically For the literal sense of sixteen hundred furlongs overflown with blood so that it reached to the horse-bridles never seemed to me either credible or tolerable CHAPTER XV. IN two several setts of Visions the one contained in the eleventh Chapter the other in the twelfth thirteenth and fourteenth Chapters and each of them beginning from the first Epocha of the Christian Church and ending with the last Vial or first thunder have the Prophecies of the Opened Book hitherto been contained as being most general and comprehensive taking in all the five intervals of the Ephesine Smyrnean Pergamenian Thyatirian and Sardian Churches together with the beginning of the Philadelphian Now according to right method some particulars are more copiously or clearly explained As for example the transition out of the Thyatirian condition into the Sardian the Joy and Triumph thereof is competently set out Chap. 11. vers 15 16 17. and more sparingly Chap. 14. vers 8. but most clearly and illustriously in this 15 th Chapter vers 2 3 4. Which plainly demonstrates that before the effusion of the Vials there is a considerable victory over the Beast For that Doxologie Chap. 11. is after the rising of the Witnesses And that triumphant acclamation Chap. 14. vers 8. not before the fall of Babylon And here most expresly of all in this Chapter there is thanks for a notable lately gotten victory over the Beast and over his Image c. before we come to the effusion of the Vials so that these things notably confirm one another To say nothing how the very name Sardis signifies Canticum laetitiae a Song of Ioy. 1. And I saw another sign in Heaven great and marvellous seven Angels having the seven last plagues for in them is filled up the wrath of God Namely against the Beast or Roman Hierarchy that was punished considerably by the Reformation but before there Vials be over In the cup that she has filled it will be filled to her double The seven last plagues which therefore in all reason are to be in the last Wo-trumpet and the second Wo-trumpet was past at the rising of the Witnesses And therefore the effusion of
Greek is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which may signifie both the bottomless pit and the sea the latter denoting multitudes of people of which this Beast would consist the other the original of this horrid Apostasie into Idolatry again as coming from the pit of hell it self and the deceits of the Devil But to mitigate S t Iohn's wonderment there is at last added And go into perdition This Apostasie shall not continue alwayes but the Empire as to its Idolatry shall perish quite and so cease to be any longer a Beast the Idolatry and Tyranny therein against the Saints of God being utterly abolished Whence it is plain that not the Pagan Empire but the Empire Paganochristian is here to be understood by the Beast and that the Times of the Apostasie of the Church are here prefigured And they that dwell on the Earth shall wonder As Chap. 13. vers 3. And all the world wondered after the Beast which is the same Beast with this in this Chapter that is were so wonderfully taken with the Beast that they were in love with him and enslaved to him and to the Paganochristian Idolatry which he countenanced whose names were not written in the Book of Life from the foundation of the world that is all are seduced unless the elect of God such as are afterwards termed the called chosen and faithful When they behold the Beast that was and is not and yet is Which is the very same Beast that is called the Image of the Beast Chap. 13. vers 14. For the Empire becoming Paganochristian and exercising their Idolatry upon other objects than the old Pagans did could not be properly said to be the same Pagan Empire revived again but rather the Image thereof that is an Idolatrous Empire bearing an analogie or similitude to the old Pagan Idolatrous Empire in a manner in all their strokes of Idolatry From whence it is rightly termed that was as being Idolatrous as the Pagan Empire was and is not that is to say is not that very Pagan Empire their Idolatry now having new objects and yet is viz. because the Idolatry is the same though disguised under new titles and objects This is the easie and natural sense of this description of the Beast and which necessarily imports that the Roman Empire is here understood in that succession of Time wherein it had apostatized from the pure Christian worship into Idolatry And that therefore the Woman that rides this Beast can be no Pagan Polity but the Paganochristian Hierarchy 9. And here is the mind which hath wisdom that is here lies a meaning of a great Arcanum or secret For so the Greek word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 seems to insinuate For wisdom is according to her name and is not manifest to the vulgar Ecclesiastic 6.22 The seven Heads are the seven Mountains on which the Woman sitteth Which haply has a glance at Constantinople as well as Rome both these Cities having seven Mountains and the Greek Clergy having defiled the Eastern Church with Idolatry as well as the Latine Church the Western And the horns of the two-horned Beast we did above interpret of these two Patriarchates Rome and Constantinople 10. And there are seven Kings viz. seven forms of Soveraignty or Supreme Magistracy in the Roman Common-wealth or Empire the division of the succession of which is naturally made thus The Soveraignty is either in many or in one in many as Consuls Tribuni militum Triumviri in one as Kings Dictators and Emperours Which Emperours may be again divided into Pagan Christian Paganochristian So that according to this distribution the Beast will have just seven Heads of Blasphemy as he is described Chap. 13. vers 1. Kings Consuls Tribunes Decemviri Dictators Pagan Caesars or Emperours and Emperours Paganochristian Five are fallen viz. Kings Consuls Tribunes Decemviri Dictators these Sovereign Magistrates had past away in S t Iohn's time And one is viz. the Pagan Caesars or Emperours these were in being in his time And the other is not yet come viz. the other King for the enumeration now is of Kings in the largest sense Therefore this other King is the Christian Caesar or Emperour who had not appeared upon the stage yet And when he cometh he must continue a short space The succession of the pure Christian Emperours will last but a while the Apostasie not long after being to come in 11. And the Beast that was and is not which above was called the Beast that was and is not and yet is the Head suppose of this Beast he is the eighth King or Soveraign which are the Paganochristian Caesars at least till the Pope make himself Caesar or Supreme Paganochristian for Paganochristian Supremacy constitutes the eighth King or seventh Head of Blasphemy As it follows And is of the seven that is and is of the seven Kings that are the seven Heads of the Beast and consequently Idolatrous For though there be eight Kings yet there are but seven Heads of the Beast the Beast ceasing to be under the Christian Caesars who therefore could be no head of the Beast as being not Idolatrous themselves and the Idolatrous Empire then ceasing And goeth into perdition The Beast that was and is not and yet is or the Image of the Beast though it reign to the last Semitime of the forty two months yet his Jurisdiction about that time was to be cut shorter which happened in the Reformation when so many Provinces Principalities and Kingdoms fell off from him and at last his Idolatrous Power and Tyranny shall be quite abolished As is supposed in several passages in the lamentation over Babylon in the following Chapter 12. And the ten Horns which thou sawest are ten Kings which have received no Kingdom as yet namely in S t Iohn's time who lived in the reign of the sixth Head under which the Beast fought and was slain by Michael In which battel he is also represented with seven Heads and ten Horns but no Crowns upon the Horns their actual Coronation being not till the seventh Head But Chap. 13. vers 1. there are Crowns on his Horns because the Beast there in that Vision is the healed or revived Beast the same that the Beast that was is not and yet is And yet no mention of any Crowns in this Chapter because it had been a repugnancy to this passage which have received no Kingdom as yet and there are other infallible arguments of this Beast being the Beast under the seventh Head without that so that that indication was needless though fit and requisite in the Vision of this Beast in the thirteenth Chapter But here that which follows supplies the omission of the Crowns on the Horns But receive power as Kings one hour with the Beast that is about the same time that the Church degenerates into paganish superstitions and Idolatries will the Empire be divided into many Kingdoms the entireness of the Empire being a lett to the appearing of Antichrist according
things of the greatest importance makes men careless and remiss and destroyes all order and discipline weakens the health of the body and makes the soul incapable of the holy influences of the Spirit of God So necessary a stone therefore for the safety of the City is this Amethyst to be placed in the wall thereof 21. And the twelve Gates were twelve pearls every several Gate was of one pearl which shows plainly the thing cannot be literally understood unless there were Oisters or other Conchae bigger than one of these Gates or Porches But in that the Gates viz. Inletts into the City are said to be Pearles that Gemm sets out the condition of them that are fitted to enter into the City For the colour of the Pearle shows the mild innocent child-like meekness of them that are fit to enter as our Saviour has declared Vnless you be converted and become as one of these Children you cannot enter into the Kingdom of God The Notation of the word also intimates what is requisite to Baptism viz. Repentance For 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Vnio from whence 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is derived alludes to 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the mixture of bitterness which denotes the wholesome cup of Repentance But the whiteness of the Pearles may insinuate also the washing away of the guilt and stain of Sin in the Sacrament of Baptism which Interpreters make these Gates to be a symbol of And the street of the City was pure gold as it were transparent glass The street that is Forum Vrbis as Grotius notes the publick place where they meet and transact businesses It is said to be pure gold like to transparent glass because they converse one with another bonâ fide in pure love and sincerity as if they were transparent to one another and could see one anothers hearts and thoughts 22. And I saw no Temple there No such Temple as was amongst the Jews which together with the Divine Residence supposed in it as being deemed the house of God is properly called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Such a Temple as this there was none in the New Ierusalem For the Lord God Almighty and the Lamb are the Temple of it The eternal Deity is the object of their worship and the Lamb the body of Christ the Holy Catholick Church is the house wherein he resides the same with the City it self which from his presence there is called Iehovah Shammah Ezech. 48.35 God therefore immediately residing by his Spirit in the hearts of his people the Citizens of this New Ierusalem this is instead of the Temple of the Ancient Jews And according to the Prophetick stile Lamb will more naturally though it does not so usually signifie the body of Christ his Church than Christ himself 23. And the City had no need of the Sun neither of the Moon to shine in it This may allude to Isai. 60.19 The Sun shall be no more thy light by day c. But the more peculiar sense of the place I conceive according to the Prophetick stile which makes the Sun the highest Power in any Polity and the Moon next to it as an Emperour and an Emperess in an Empire or an Vniversal Patriarch and Emperour as the Popish Interpreters expound the two great Lights the Sun and the Moon the one of the Pope the other of the Emperour the Ecclesiastick Power being the Sun the Secular the Moon the sense I say is this That no man imagine any necessity in those dayes when the Kingdoms of the World shall become the Kingdoms of the Lord and of his Christ that there should be any such Oecumenical Patriarch Pope or Bishop over the Church of Christ or any Vniversal Monarch or Emperour over his whole Empire it is expresly said that the City had no need of the Sun neither of the Moon to shine in it no need of any one Vniversal Prelate and Vniversal Monarch as some would fancy the Pope and the Emperour to have been For the Glory of God did lighten it that is the Spirit of God which is compared to the Iasper-stone vers 11. which is said to be the Luminary thereof this is the Sun or Supreme Power thereof which is to hold all together And the Lamb is the light thereof namely by shedding the promised efficacy of his Spirit into it The Kings therefore of those many Kingdoms that in those dayes become the Kingdom of Christ shall have no other Supreme Head over them but Christ himself but be as the four and twenty Crowned Elders before the Throne of the Lamb and have no other Superiour neither Patriarch nor Monarch but he Of those times is said that of Isai. chap. 24.23 Then the Moon shall be confounded and the Sun ashamed all that have born themselves as Universal Monarchs in Church or State hitherto when the Lord of Hosts shall reign in Mount Sion and Ierusalem namely in this New Ierusalem and before his Ancients gloriously those Ancients described Chap. 4. as cloathed with white rayment and sitting upon Thrones with golden Crowns on their Heads which signifie the Kings of those Times when Jew and Gentile shall make one Fold and the Church be reduced to her Apostolick purity in the blessed Millennium over whom there will be no Head but God and Christ nor will they have need to be held together in one Universal Kingdom of Christ by any other Tye than his Laws and the Union of his Holy Spirit which will be so abundantly shed forth in their hearts in those days namely in the Philadelphian Succession 24. And the Nations of them that are saved shall walk in the light of it Extra Ecclesiam nulla est salus is a maxime amongst the Pontificians confining Salvation to a blind implicit Faith in the Infallibility of their Pope and Church But the Iasper-stone the influence of the Holy Spirit which is the Light of this City is that by whose guidance the Nations now walk in the wayes of Salvation And the Kings of the Earth do bring their Glory and Honour into it that is turn Converts to this dispensation of the Spirit where the Word and the Spirit is the Rule not the blind Decrees of both a fallacious and fallible Polity of men that adulterate Doctrine for their worldly interest 25. And the Gates of it shall not be shut at all by day Their prosperity and great knowledge and illumination will not make them proud disdainful or careless of others happiness and salvation but they will be ever ready to embrace and admit by Baptisme all Converts from all quarters of the World upon their sincere Repentance and Conversion For there shall be no night there no Adversity nor Ignorance in this Philadelphian Interval while the Eternal Spirit of Love shines upon them And therefore they will be alwayes ready at every one of their twelve Gates standing open to all the four quarters of the world to admit all single-hearted and sincere Proselytes 26. And they shall
Horns of the Lamb falsly pretending to be his Vicar but spoke like the Dragon decreeing Idolatries and barbarous persecutions And his servants shall serve him they shall serve him with a willing and prompt mind in this day of his power 4. And they shall see his face They will enjoy the full light of the Glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ. His Life and his Spirit will be most palpably and sensibly revealed in them And his name shall be in their foreheads It shall also be plain to all from their outward Conversation whose they are and to whom they belong viz. That they are the faithful Servants of Jesus 5. And there shall be no night there No ignorance nor any persecution for not being ignorant and for not admitting of things blasphemous and impossible That ignorance is the Mother of Devotion will be out of date in those days which Principle sate like the darkness of midnight on the Church during the time of the Idolatrous Hierarchy And they need no candle no factitious lights or false Instructions of carnal men Nor the light of the Sun no pretended Infallibility of the Pope whom his flatterers make the Universal Sun of the Christian World and put the Emperour like the Moon under his feet For the Lord God giveth them light namely by his Word and by his Spirit and they shall be no longer slaves to the cunningly contrived Opinions of men And in this freedom of the Light of the Word and Spirit they shall reign for ever and ever that is this Kingdom of Christ shall never be subjected again to the power of the wicked Nor shall that numerous rabble of Gog and Magog be able to take this City but it shall continue to the visible Coming of Christ to judgement and his sentencing all the Ungodly to the Lake burning with fire and brimstone which is the second Death 6. And he said unto me These things are faithfull and true namely these predictions of the Excellent state of the Church in the Philadelphian Interval described or set out by the New Ierusalem and as stupendious as it may seem to flesh and blood yet is a most certain truth And the Lord God of the holy Prophets sent his Angel to shew unto his Servants both this great Mystery of the New Ierusalem and other things the things which must shortly be done namely under the first six Seals 7. Behold I come quickly to support my Church in her Smyrnean condition under the second third fourth and fifth Seals and to deliver her from her Persecutions under the sixth Blessed is he that keepeth the sayings of the Prophecy of this Book that is That observeth what is writ therein for his own Direction and Comfort 8. And I Iohn saw these things and heard them and when I had heard and seen I fell down to worship before the feet of the Angel which shewed me these things and amongst other things the great Glory of the Catholick or Universal Church set out by the description of the New Ierusalem Which did so overcome him with joy as that assurance of the Conversion of his own Countrey-men the Jews that again he was carryed away into the greatest Affection and Veneration for the Messenger of such enravishing news 9. Then saith he unto me See thou do it not For I am thy fellow-servant and the fellow-servant of they Brethren the Prophets viz. of those that truly believe in and bear witness of Jesus Christ by the inspiration of the Holy Ghost And of them which keep the sayings of this Book That observe them understand them and believe them and have faith and courage to act accordingly which no man can do but by the power of the Spirit of God Worship God Accordingly as our Saviour has prescribed Thou shalt worship the Lord thy God and him onely shalt thou serve 10. And he saith unto me Seal not the sayings of the Prophecy of this Book as if it concerned onely Times afar off or many ages to come For the time is at hand that is The time of exercising the Faith of the true Followers of Christ in the Smyrnean Interval of the Church and of discovering the barbarous and brutish cruelty of Paganism against them Which Tragedy will be acted over again in the Pergamenian and Thyatirian Intervals of the Church by a Pagano-christian Synagogue whereby the Faith of the True Church will be exercised and more illustriously appear and the wickedness of a false hypocritical Hierarchy more notoriously manifested to the World Divine Providence administring occasion for the discovering both in their colours not forcing the Wills of either by his Absolute Omnipotency Whence it follows in the next Verse 11. He that is unjust let him be unjust still and he that is filthy let him be filthy still Let their unjust cruelty and barbarous persecution and foulness of Life and filthiness of Idolatry go on in the Pagan and afterwards in the Pagano-christian Polity till they are ripe for Judgment I will not stop them And he that is righteous let him be righteous still and he that is holy let him be holy still that is increase more and more in honesty of Conversation unblameableness of Life and purity in Religion and in Zeal against all Idolatry not refusing the assistances of my Spirit and Grace 12. And behold I come quickly and my reward is with me to give every man according as his work shall be I will demolish or abolish the Pagan Religion and set up the Christian under the sixth Seal in the Reign of Constantine and judge the Whore the Idolatrous Hierarchy under the sixth Trumpet and utterly destroy her under the seventh Vial and he that is righteous growing still more righteous and he that is holy still more holy introduce the glorious State of the New Ierusalem under the second Thunder These things are within the compass of my Providence and Power and therefore will certainly come to pass For 13. I am Alpha and Omega the Beginning and the End the First and the Last My Kingdom shall out-last all Kingdoms neither shall any Power upon Earth survive my Reign in the Holy City Ierusalem Whence follow the words of Saint Iohn as relating to those Times 14. Blessed are they that do his Commandments that walk uprightly according to the external Word or Law That they may have right to the Tree of Life that is be baptized at last into the dispensation of the Spirit of Life in the New Birth And may enter through the Gates into the City that is be baptized and admitted Citizens in order to the aforesaid attainment to be true Members of this Living Church of Christ the New Ierusalem and enjoy all the holy and healing priviledges thereof which have been above described 15. For without are Dogs and Sorcerers and Whoremongers and Murderers and Idolaters and whosoever loveth and maketh a lye that is brutish obscene and Atheistical men and jugling pretenders to
Miracles and Kainish Persecutors had they but Power and in the mean time gross Idolaters and either lovers of lying Legends or Inventours of them These unclean Birds are kept out of the New Ierusalem but have their dismal haunts in the rubbish and ruines of the demolished Babylon as has been observed above 16. I Iesus have sent my Angel to testifie unto you these things in the Churches alluding to the Churches in Asia which signifie the whole succession of the truly Catholick and Apostolick Church to the end of the world The Churches therefore for whose use this Book was written are the Churches in Smyrna Pergamus Thyatira Sardis Philadelphia and Laodicea The whole Book of the Apocalypse is as it were an Epistle to them all as they are concerned in their several Successions Which passage is a farther confirmation of the Prophetical sense of the Epistles to the seven Churches in Asia I am the Root and the Off-spring of David * Which may denote his Divinity and Humanity as also his being the Off-spring or Son of David the true Messias his Right to the Kingdoms of the Earth as it is foretold in the second Psalm Ask of me and I will give thee the Nations for thine Inheritance and the utmost parts of the Earth for thy possession And therefore because of the greatness and glory of his Kingdom it follows And the bright Morning-Star In the Sardian Interval he was onely the Morning-Star here the bright Morning-Star which is a sign this saying glances at the Philadelphian Interval in the commencement thereof under the last Vial which sutes with the saying of S t Iohn in the next Verse 17. And the Spirit and the Bride say Come The Spirit because this is the commencement of those Times that are properly called the Reign of the Spirit by the Cabbalists And the voice of the Bride is added as a Testimony of the Churches desire of the settlement of things into the Glorious Condition of the New Ierusalem upon the destruction of the blood-drunken Idolatrous Babylon And let him that heareth say Come that is Let him pray for the acceleration of so glorious a settlement of things And then our Saviour speaks for this latter part of the Chapter from vers 10. to the end is a kind of Dialogue as both Peganius and Grotius have observed And let him that is athirst come that is He that sincerely hungers and thirsts after Righteousness And whosoever will that is whosoever has a Will and Desire let him take the waters of Life freely Let him enjoy the happy priviledge of this Living City of God and so grow up in all true Holiness and Godliness in Communion of the Spirit This priviledge shall he enjoy 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 gratis or freely without money as the Prophet speaks 18. For I testifie unto every man that heareth the words of the Prophecy of this Book If any one shall add unto these things Interpreters and not without reason take this to be a commination to terrifie men from being so negligent as to let any Errata slip into the Copies of this Book of Prophecies where every word was so curiously weighed by the Pen-man thereof or from being so bold as on purpose to alter any thing therein by adding or taking away * But I conceive also there is besides this a 〈◊〉 sense and that it is a prohibition from bringing in their carnal Inventions to add inconsistently with the pure Apostolick Doctrines and Institutes of this City Whosoever would do any such thing God shall add unto him the plagues that are written in this Book whether they concern this Life or that which is to come the sulphurous lake of fire which is the second Death 19. And if any man will take from the words of the Book of this Prophecy and be faint-hearted or of little or no Faith and contend there never will be such an Excellent State of the Church upon Earth God shall take away his part out of the Book of Life and out of the Holy City and from the things that are written in this Book He shall never be able to enter into the blessed New Ierusalem state by reason of his unbelief 20. He that testifieth these things saith Surely I come quickly that is for the fulfilling of the Visions of the first six Seals and what contemporizeth with them to assist his Church and support them in their Smyrnean Affliction and to defeat the Enemy under the sixth Seal To which Saint Iohn answers Amen Even so Come Lord Iesus This was seasonable for Saint Iohn to say in his time in reference to Christs Coming to subvert the Power of the old Dragon and abolish Paganical Idolatry and Tyranny As it was also in the Pergamenian and Thyatirian Intervals for the oppressed and afflicted Church to say in respect of his coming to judge the Great Whore the Pagano-christian Hierarchy who had been drunk with the blood of the Saints and with the blood of the Martyrs of Jesus And in the Sardian that he would consummate the Judgement begun to be executed on the false Prophet who is perfectly to be consumed under the seventh Vial. And lastly in the Laodicean Interval it will be again very seasonable by reason of the inclining of things again to worse to pray Come Lord Iesus come quickly to that general judgement when Death shall be swallowed up into Victory and all the Saints shall be translated into the incorruptible state of heavenly Bliss and Glory And this whole Book of Prophecies being as it were one entire Epistle Monitory to the Church of God throughout all Ages of the world as there is mention Vers. 16. of witnessing these things to the Churches in Asia no doubt that is over the face of the whole Earth and successively through all Ages or Intervals from Saint Iohn's time to the end of the world Smyrnean Pergamenian Thyatirian Sardian Philadelphian and Laodicean This whole Book I say being such a general Monitory Epistle it is but sutable that he conclude with that usual form of valediction in the Epistles of the Apostles 21. The Grace of our Lord Iesus Christ be with you all Amen NOTES CHAPTER XXII Vers. 16. Which may denote his Divinity and Humanity c. This any one that firmly believes the Divinity of Christ and that he is the Eternal Logos united with the Humane Nature will easily admit to be suggested here though Grotius is content to understand no more by Radix Davidis than Surculus Davidis and I must confess that according to the use of the Hebrew word Radix is sometimes the same with Surculus But being that Root ordinarily signifies that from which another grows not that which grows from another and that this sense here is both true and more ample and sublime and therefore more sutable to the Genius of the Apocalypse I thought it was more probable to be meant here as also in the fifth Chapter And generally the Ancients go
Apocalypse are so absurd that as he boasts himself the sole Inventor of them so he is like to prove the sole Assertor to them yet that he has said something material against M r Mede's Synchronisms which how little it is we shall now see but with all possible briefness alledging only the main stress of M r Medes Arguments and taking notice only of the main stress of R. H. his Answers unto them THE FIRST PART Synchronism I. The Woman remaining in the Wilderness The seven-headed Beast restored The outward Court troden underfoot by the Gentiles The two Witnesses in the mean time Prophesying in Sackcloth THat the two latter of these do Contemporize or Synchronize he grants but denyes that the two first begin at the same time the Woman in the Wilderness and the seven-headed Beast restored For he saith 1. The Woman got into the Wilderness before the Dragon cast the flood of water after her to drive her out from thence Chap. 12. vers 14 15. And then 2. That the Earth opens her mouth and swallows up the flood of water Vers. 16. And 3. That the Dragon seeing that leaves the Woman in the Wilderness and goes and makes war with the remnant of her Seed which were not fled into the Wilderness Vers. 17. This he thinks is so true a sense and order of the Prophecy that he wonders that any man should set his wit against it And I wonder on the contrary that any man should have so little wit or so little to do as to bring such weak stuff to obscure the clear reasoning of M r Mede in this Synchronism For if what is alledged have any strength it is this That the Dragon and his activity against the Church in his own person was so long after the time of the Womans getting into the Wilderness that the time of the restored Beast and the Womans entring into the Wilderness cannot commence together But the premises are said only not proved at all Nay the Scriptures alledged for his conceit are plainly against him For Vers. 14. the sense of that verse plainly is That two wings of an Eagle were given unto her to fly into the Wilderness that she might there be nourished for a time and times and half a time c. And the Copy that Grotius follows has it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that she may be nourished there And though we retain the ordinary reading 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 yet the sense of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 it being a Prophecy will be future For it is nonsense to say Wings were given her to fly into a place into which she had gotten already And therefore Vers. 15. the Serpent casts out the flood of waters whilst she was in her flight that she might be drowned before she got into the Wilderness where she was to be entertained and nourished And Vers. 16. the Earth opened her mouth and drunk up the flood that she might pass safe into the Wilderness and consequently all this is before she gets into the Wilderness and this casting out the flood by the Serpent is his personal persecution of her mentioned Vers. 13. But that the Dragon Vers. 17. went to wage War with a party of the Womans Seed that had not gone into the Wilderness is a meer figment of R. H. There is no such thing in the Text and it is contrary to the plain sense thereof For no man can doubt but that Woman is the whole Catholick Church whom to phansie not to have fled whole into the Wilderness is as absurd as to phansie a Woman to fly into the Wilderness but to leave some limbs of her behind her and the Seed of the Woman is part of the Woman her self The Woman is Ecclesia tota semen ejus singuli qui ad ecclesiam pertinent as Grotius notes upon the place And therefore if the Woman be in the Wilderness her Seed must be in the Wilderness and this Seed distinguished from her Seed before she came into the Wilderness Whence the sense is clear That as the Dragon persecuted the Womans Seed before she got into the Wilderness so being he could not hinder her going into the Wilderness by his spuing out of that flood he maliciously meditated some mischief and hostility against her seed in the Wilderness which he presently did by raising the Healed Beast against them in the Chapter immediately following Thus solidly has M r Mede evinced that the time of the healed Beast and of the Womans remaining in the Wilderness do commence together and it plainly appears that it is even nothing that R. H. has alledged against it M r Mede's other proof of this Synchronism namely from the ending of the times of the Beast with the sixth Trumpet Revel 11.14 15 17. to this R. H. speaks more materially than to the former But for brevity sake I will only note this That there is nothing of moment alledged that reaches any further than to prove that the Reign of the Beast does not end with the sixth Trumpet Which is a thing I do easily grant but yet in the mean time I contend that the fulfilling of his fourty two months is at the exitus of the sixth Trumpet which respects the duration of his Kingdom in the Entireness thereof Which Entireness was broken at the Rising of the Witnesses and therefore the Entireness of his Kingdom is Synchronal to the two Witnesses Prophesying in Sackcloth they being both Isochronal or of equal time as all those four Synchronals are expressly noted to be in the very Text And hence by these two Arguments of M r Mede's demonstrated to be Synchronal namely the Womans abode in the Wilderness and the restored Beasts Reign for forty two months beginning together and being Isochronal are Synchronal And the restored Beasts Reign for forty two months ending with the Witnesses Prophesying in Sackcloth and being Isochronal are also Synchronal Therefore the Womans being in the Wilderness and the Prophesying of the Witnesses in Sackcloth are Synchronal And R. H. himself cannot deny but the treading under foot the outward Court and the Witnesses prophesying in sackcloth are Synchronal whence it is manifest that they all four Synchronize one with another His evasion by asserting the Beast Chap. 11. vers 7. and the Beast Chap. 13. vers 1. not to be the same is very sleight For 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is as much as 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and if the Translators had been pleased to translate it accordingly rising out of the Sea there had been no doubt of his sameness there being nothing repugnant in him to the description of the other and it is the genius of the Apocalypse to give an obscurer hint at first of what it speaks more fully and clearly afterwards Synchronism II. The two-horned Beast or false Prophet The ten-horned healed Beast or image of the Beast Here R. H. acknowledges that the healed Beast Synchronizes with the two-horned Beast from the time of his healing
God simply whenas it is understood of them quatenus sealed The eighth and last That the companies are sealed not to call them out against the Beast but to preserve them from the storms of the ensuing Trumpets which plainly implies by the by that their continuance is all along the Trumpets till they get a new denomination But I say they are sealed in both regards both to secure them from the ensuing storms and to confirm them in a constant courage against the debauching decrees of the Beast And their being twelve Regiments and the order of the Tribes put according to the merits of their zeal against Idolatry plainly implies as much This little is more than enough to his pretended Arguments against the first part of M r Mede's demonstration What he says against the second part is more pertinent and express to the purpose And I must confess he does prove That the latter end of the Beasts Reign does not Synchronize with the exit of the sixth Trumpet but it is sufficient for my design that the end of his Reign as to the Entireness of his Kingdom does Synchronize with it and that M r Mede has very firmly demonstrated Lastly two of those four things which he says M r Mede supposes he does not merely suppose but prove by vertue of his Synchronisms viz. That the sealed Virgins and the two Witnesses be all one Company and That the 1260 days of the Witnesses be the same with the fourty two months of the Beast But I confess one of the other two viz. That the whole reign of the Beast is contained within forty two months is false but the other that the Beast Chap. 11. is the same with the Beast Chap. 13. if he supposes it it is an easy and modest supposition For the Beast Chap. 11. being the beast rising out of the Sea as I noted above as well as the Beast Chap. 13. and the times of them both being not only equal but Synchronal and they both persecuting the witnesses for Chap. 12. vers 17. those there whom the Beast is raised to persecute and who are said to have the testimony or witness of Iesus Christ what can they be but the witnesses Chap. 11 To all which you may add that even without the use of these Synchronisms Interpreters generally as you may see in à Lapide and Ribera understood the same thing by these two Beasts namely Antichrist which is a sign they took the two Beasts to be one and the same Beast so easy and modest a supposition is this or rather more than a supposition a truth demonstrable from his Synchronisms and other observations from the Texts of Scripture And R. H. himself making this Beast Chap. 11. the same with the Scarlet Beast Chap. 17. this last Beast being the same with the ten-horned Beast Chap. 13. as I have demonstrated in my Ioynt exposition the ten-horned Beast Chap. 13. must be the same with the Beast Chap. 11. Synchronism II. The Inner Court The fight of the Dragon and Michael about the Womans childbirth The six first Seals That the last Synchronizes with the two former M r Mede proves briefly and solidly thus Because all three are the immediate Antecedents to Synchronizing subsequent Visions The six first Seals to the seventh The Inner Court and the fight of Michael with the Dragon to the Beast and to the 144000 of the sealed companies of the Lamb. And that the seventh Seal or six first Trumpets the sealed Companies and the Beast do Synchronize is proved Synch 1. Part 2. To which R. H. says but does not so much as offer to prove 1. That the Inner Court and the fight of Michael with the Dragon do not Synchronize 2. Nor that the Inner Court and fight of Michael with the Dragon are immediate Antecedents of the Beast and sealed Virgins 3. Nor the first six Trumpets the sealed Virgins and Beast Synchronize one with another Which since he says only and proves nothing and I have proved upon the foregoing Synchronisms against him that it is quite otherwise I need add nothing further on this Synchronism Synchronism III. Of the Vials with the sixth Trumpet This expressed in the general Synch 7. Part 1. he swallowed down glib But being here so particularly explained he rejects Where some of his arguments against it are passable but others at random But because here I utterly dissent from M r Mede and place all the Vials in my Table under the seventh Trumpet within the first Thunder I hold it needless to say any thing more on this Synchronism Synchronism IV. The thousand years of the Dragon or Satans being bound The seventh Trumpet or space from the destruction of the Beast This Synchronism in a more large and improper sense may be more passable But the binding of Satan properly so called together with his imprisonment commences not till the second and third Thunder before which is the effusion of the seven Vials and therefore this binding and imprisoning of Satan cannot Synchronize totally with the seventh Trumpet To say nothing of his being let loose in the Laodicean Interval which M r Mede not taking notice of makes me conceive that though he still calls them Synchronisms he did intend no more by the Postmedial Synchronisms with the seventh Trumpet than that those things which he would prove to Synchronize with it were to be placed in the seventh Trumpet and not before it R. H. here says true that the binding and imprisoning of Satan is shorter than the seventh Trumpet both à parte ante and à parte post though all his arguments for it are not sound But it is not worth the while to canvase them we being both already agreed in the conclusion Synchronism V. The thousand years of the Reign of Christ. The seventh Trumpet or space from the destruction of the Beast The same is to be said of this as of the former Synchronism If you understand it of his partial or inchoative Reign when some of the Kingdoms fall off from Antichrist it may begin with the seventh Trumpet but the millennial Reign properly so called begins not till the third Thunder as you may see in my Table R. H. his answer to this Synchronism is That the seventh Trumpet and the space of time that succeeds the destruction of the Beast are not all one Which is true but the argument he brings for it precarious which to confute is nothing to my scope and therefore I let it alone Synchronism VI. The New Jerusalem or the Lambs Bride The seventh Trumpet or the space from the destruction of the Beast The New Ierusalem descends from heaven immediately upon the utter destruction of the Beast by the seventh Vial. But that all the Vials are within the seventh Trumpet I have already noted and that therefore the New Ierusalem cannot totally Synchronize with the seventh Trumpet but with part only of it But that which R. H. here answers is this in general That the
shall come to pass in order as they are revealed and such are the Prophecies of the Revelation says he no instance can be given of any Prophecy that comes to pass before or after the order of its Revelation And therefore they shall come to pass Prophecy after Prophecy as they were revealed and presented unto Iohn in Vision 1. But to the first I answer The argument will not hold good there if at all where there are special Notes given of a new beginning of prophesying For that is as much if not more than if the Visions had been exhibited to Iohn at several distant times or days And that there are such Notes it is plain namely of a new beginning of prophesying For as the Prophecy of the Seven Churches was ushered in with a sound of a Trumpet so is the Prophecy of the Sealed Book betwixt which two Prophecies there was an intermission of Iohn's Ecstasy as you may see Chap. 4. vers 2. And then before the Prophecy of the Opened Book besides other certain indications of the beginning of a new Prophecy as I have above shewed there is again that voice like a Trumpet that talked with him at the beginning of the Sealed Book-Prophecy which is a greater assurance that there are three distinct Prophecies than if they had been revealed to him at three distinct times or days 2. To the second I answer That there is no harshness at all to conceive two Prophecies beginning at the same Epocha to be writ in the same Book one after another it being impossible according to the usual writing of Books that they should be written together no more harshness I say than to conceive that an Historian in one Volume may write the lives of all the Secular Governours and Bishops of a City from the first times thereof to his own times Is it any thing harsh or rather not necessary when he has gone through all the times of the Governours that he begin at the first Epocha to write the lives of the Bishops of the said City 3. To the third I answer That the argument proves only that the Seals and Trumpets are to be fulfilled in that order they are mentioned and the Trumpets after the six first Seals they being the parts of the seventh Seal But this does not at all hinder but that the Seven Churches in that order they are set may commence with the Seven Seals as also the measuring the Inner Court and the fight of Michael and the Dragon as is plain to any one that attends to what is said 4. And lastly to the fourth and last I answer That it is demonstrable by vertue of M r Mede's Synchronisms that there are many instances of things coming to pass not in the order they are revealed but before and after This is most evidently true if M r Mede's Synchronisms be true as most certainly they are and I have mentioned them to be so against all the pretended cavils of R. H. IV. As for his last Position all the proof it has is from the arguments of the three former which being so false and weak and this last Paradox but a Consectary of them it is manifest it falls to the ground with them if they be sufficiently confuted as they will all without question be deemed to be after I have perfected my answer to the first argument for the second paradox and shown what is the Clavis to the Apocalyptical Steganography which is such a mystical or occult way of Revelation I briefly therefore here answer Those two places R. H. himself notes viz. Rev. 1. vers 20. and Rev. 17. vers 8 9 c. are the two keys the one of the Prophecy of the Seven Churches the other of the Prophecies of the Sealed Book and Opened Book in vertue whereof we may come to a clear and certain knowledge of this Steganographical Revelation called the Apocalypse For as for the first that is the Interpretation of the Mystery of the Seven Stars and of the seven Golden Candlesticks it is a plain intimation to any one that is not stupid that there is something more meant by these Seven Churches in Asia than seven particular Churches in Asia minor at that time and that indeed the Vision of the Seven Churches represented by the seven Golden Candlesticks is a Prophecy concerning the whole Succession of the Church to the end of the world divided into seven Intervals For if it were not so what needed all the pomp of this Vision and the explication of it if concerning the seven particular Churches in Asia whenas Chap. 1. vers 4. there was mention of the seven Churches in Asia and after seven Epistles writ to them by name Wherefore he must be exceeding stupid and slow-witted or of a course perverse Spirit that cannot at least being advertised of it discern the scope of the Spirit in this Vision of the Seven Stars and Seven Golden Candlesticks and the Interpretation thereof that it is a Prophecy in so large a sense as I have shown in my Exposition and proved that it is such a Prophecy by twenty solid Arguments in the tenth Chapter thereof Such intimations suffice to the pious free and sagacious Reader But for profane Drolls carnal Politicians or prejudiced Superstitionists if seeing they see not and hearing they understand not the fault lies at their own doors Now for the Key of the other two Prophecies of the Sealed Book and of the Opened Book let us briefly observe the use thereof and how effectual it is for the purpose intended and what the clear result thereof will be Revel Chap. 17. vers 8. there begins the Interpretation of the Vision of the Whore of Babylon and the Beast with seven Heads and ten Horns ridden by her The Beast that thou sawest saith the Angel was and is not and shall ascend out of the bottomless pit and go into perdition And here it is remarkable how the Angel does not go about to explain what a Beast is it being so well known that according to the Prophetick stile it is a Kingdom State or Empire Cruel and Idolatrous such as they were that are described in Daniel and called there by the Septuagint 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 not 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as this Beast is called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which is as much as to say a Cruel wild Beast Wherefore the Angels Interpretation plainly imports thus much That the Beast which Iohn saw denotes a Kingdom State or Empire Cruel and Idolatrous and withall whose condition is such that at some time it might be said of it truly that it was a Cruel Idolatrous Kingdom State or Empire but is not but will be again a Cruel Idolatrous Kingdom State or Empire and then afterwards quite perish at least as to its Cruelty and Idolatry that is the Bestiality of it shall perish This is the name or nature of this Beast in general And though it may already very well be
understood of that time of the succession of this Beast which followed after it had ceased to be yet for sureness that you may not mistake the Angel calls him at the latter end of this Verse The Beast that was and is not and yet is Which therefore is necessarily understood of the latter part of his time after he once ceased to be 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a Beast that is after this Empire had ceased to be a Cruel Idolatrous Empire but had become a Cruel Idolatrous Empire again though not perfectly the same Idolatrous Empire it was before which is the natural and necessary meaning of is not and yet is But yet we are never the wiser what Empire certainly to pitch upon if the Angel stick here and therefore he holds on vers 9. The seven Heads are seven Mountains on which the Woman sitteth who is also said to sit upon the Beast Now he comes up closer to the business which plainly showes this Empire to be the Roman Empire whether you understand the seven Hills of Rome or Constantinople or both they both belonging to the Roman Empire Wherefore it is manifest the Roman Empire is here meant in that succession of Time after it had ceased to be an Idolatrous Empire which it did for a Time while pure Christianity prevailed and till the Apostasie came in After which it became the Beast that was and is not and yet is It was of old the Pagan Idolatrous Empire but is not so now and yet it is in a very considerable sense it being a Pagan-like or a Paganochristian Idolatrous Empire and cruelly persecutive of the pure Christians And that you may still be the better assured that this latter part of the succession of the Empire namely after it had become Christian and Apostatized again into Idolatry was aimed at the Angel holds on vers 10. And there are seven Kings namely which are the heads of the Beast and must take up the entire Times of the being of the Beast both the former and latter part thereof unless we will admit of a living Beast without an head Five are fallen and one is Now let any man living show five Heads that is five Supreme Governours to be fallen or past in S t Iohn's time unless they be those five sorts of Governours of the Roman State or Empire Kings Consuls Decemviri Consular Tribunes and Dictators No five single Emperours can fill up that space of time and therefore it must be understood of sorts of Governours whereof five had ceased in S t Iohn's time and one is that is was in his time viz. the Pagan Caesars or Emperours What can be more plain and assured But the other is not yet come namely the Christian Caesars or Emperours For the Emperours were Pagans in S t Iohn's time And when he cometh he must continue a short space that is the pure Christian Caesars Reign would be short the Apostasie into an Idolatrous Paganochristianism being so quickly to prevail in the Empire And the Beast that was and is not that is to say the Paganochristian Head be they Paganochristian Emperours or Popes that get the Soveraignty it is all one they make still or continue the Paganochristian Head of that Beast For that Beast is the Empire not the Head of the Empire 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 He is both the eighth and one of the seven that is he is both the eighth King and seventh head of the Beast For the Beast is the Empire quatenus Idolatrous and so has but seven heads though there be eight Kings the seventh of them being King over the Empire while it ceased to be a Beast or Idolatrous or while the publick Religion of the Empire was purely Christian. And the ten horns which thou sawest namely on the seventh head are ten Kings which have received no Kingdom as yet viz. in S t Iohn's time but receive Power as Kings one hour with the Beast This also plainly denotes the time of the Beast commencing with the discerption of the Roman Empire into many Kingdoms which happened not while the Religion of the Empire was purely Pagan but when it was Apostatizing again into a kind of Paganochristian and Idolatrous condition The Empire therefore debauched again with Superstition and Pagan-like Idolatry and Cruelty after the expiration of the pure Christian Caesars or seventh King who was to continue but a short space is the Beast upon which the Woman rides And who this Woman is is plainly indigitated again and more precisely than in the ninth Verse viz. vers 18. And the Woman which thou sawest is that great City which reigneth over the Kings of the Earth In the ninth Verse the seat of the Woman are Seven Hills and here in this Verse She is that great City that in Saint Iohn's time is said to reign over the Kings of the Earth which no City on seven Hills then did besides Rome But the Walls and Houses of Rome did not then Reign over the Kings of the Earth but the Roman Polity here signified by 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a City did then Rule over the Kings of the Earth And therefore the Roman Polity it must be that rides the Beast that was is not and yet is but not the Roman Polity Pagan For that Beast which is here ridden is after the expiration of Paganism properly so called and therefore it must be the Roman Polity Paganochristian that is the Roman Hierarchy which rides this Beast Which Roman Hierarchy the Spirit of God here calls the Whore of Babylon Quod oportebat demonstrare And what more assured demonstration of any thing can R. H. or any man living else desire than of this so concerning a truth And what a notable Key this is to unlock the sense of the Prophecies of the Sealed Book and Opened Book I will briefly show after I have smoothed the flawes and wiped off the rust that R. H. seems to fancy to stick on it I will produce his most material Cavils that by them you may judge of the rest 1. The first is touching the Hills of Rome which though at first they were seven three were after added while Rome was Pagan and that Papal Rome stands but upon two and no more 2. That Kings Dictators and Emperours being but one kind of Governours we shall fall short in our account of making up seven Heads of the Beast 3. That when it is said Five are fallen the meaning is not that Five are fallen in S t Iohn's time but that Five are fallen that is shall fall before the seventh Vial. Forasmuch as the Apostle writes a Prophecy not an History And therefore it must be understood of things to come 4. And the like he objecteth concerning the 18 th Verse That it does not speak of a City which raigned over the Kings of the Earth in Iohn's time but which is to raign in the time of the seventh Vial because the Apostle writes not an History but
a Prophecy 5. And lastly that this Babylon cannot be the City of Rome he proves by an heap of Arguments 1. That Babylon till the seventh Vial is not to taste of the Cup of Gods wrath but Rome hath tasted of that Cup many a time but especially in the time of the Gothes and Vandals by whom it was taken four times and made so desolate that not a Man Woman nor Child could be seen therein for forty dayes together 2. Babylon is one of the greatest Cities in the world but Rome at this day but a little City but the tenth part of what it was before 3. Babylon one of the strongest Cities in the world Revel Chap. 18. vers 8. but Rome but a weak City in comparison of other Cities and which was seldom besieged but taken 4. Babylon one of the most prosperous Cities in the world Revel Chap. 18. vers 7. but Rome a doleful City many a time 5. Babylon the last City to be taken insomuch that she thinks it will never be but Rome taken many a time by the Gothes and Vandals and She cannot think but that she may be taken again 6. And lastly Babylon is a City with which the Merchants of the Earth have great Trade and Traffick by Sea but Rome not so nor can she be so for since she became Pontifician the mouth of the River Tiber hath been stopped up for fear of Invasion so that no Ships of any great magnitude can pass thither These are the chief of his Arguments to which I shall answer briefly and in order 1. To the first I answer That those three Hills of less Note added to the first seven never were so considerable as in History or Poetry to alter that Title of Rome Roma septicollis or 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Seven-hilled Rome And it is the most clear and exquisite way to speak in the language of Historians when we would certainly define or describe things Again as for Rome Pontifician standing upon two Hills and no more which yet is not absolutely true it standing upon two Hills more besides as I am informed from a good hand skilfull and curious in these things the Text of the Prophecy does not require that exactness that Rome Pontifician should stand upon all the Seven Hills For the words run thus The seven Heads are seven Mountains 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which only denotes the place of her abode or where she is seated And the Woman which is not the Houses and Walls of the City but the Polity residing there is possessed of the whole space of ground environed with a Wall that takes in all the seven Hills so that all the seven Hill may be said to be the place of her abode And if the being environed with a Wall be essential to a City I do not see but that the name of the City is to be conceived to reach so far and the Wall with all the space of ground contained in it all of it to be called Rome To all which you may add that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 may be taken partitivè as when it is said of Iephtah Iud. 12. Chap. 7. that he was buried in the Cities of Gilead and of Iosiah that he was buried in the Sepulchers of his Fathers 2 Chron. 35. vers 24. that is in some one of the Cities and some one of the Sepulchres So 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 may signify upon some of the Hills as well as upon them all And the character is as certain whether Rome now stand but on four hills or two that Rome is meant as if it stood still on all As suppose 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Seven-mouthed Nilus his stream so lessen that it did nothing near fill the Chanel so much as of old and that thence five of his Mouths being shallower than the rest should grow dry no man notwithstanding will deny that it is Nilus still and so this Rome is Rome still though contracted suppose to two hills and her walls stand at a great distance from the City as the banks of Nilus from his now more narrow and shallow stream So sure a character notwithstanding R.H. his exceptions are the seven hills that Rome is here glanced at 2. To the second I answer briefly as to the former If Prophecy describe things as they are described in History it self the description is more certain and exact and Historians generally make Dictators Kings and Emperours three several sorts of Government Which answer being abundantly full and sufficient for brevity sake I omit to prove they are three several sorts of Government as well as so called 3. To the third That this is a distorted unnatural exposition in this place to understand a preterperfect Tense in a sense future all Commentators that I have met with will testify Who however otherwise they vary in their Interpretations yet take it for granted that Five are fallen signifies had ceased to be in S. Iohn's time Which the varying of the Tense immediately in And one is would force any one that is not obstinately humorsome and perverse to acknowledge to be true as that also which follows must needs still put it further out of doubt And another is not yet come It is a mere madness to imagine in these circumstances Five are faln not to signify time past because forsooth the preterperfect Tense sometimes is used of a thing future in Prophecy as Rev. 14. vers 8. where there are no such circumstances But I add further that it is impossible but it should be so understood the Roman State or Kingdom as Idolatrous having but seven heads in all and the Pagan Ceasars or Emperours in S. Iohn's time being the present head Therefore of necessity those other heads must be past unsess you will have the Roman State or Kingdom till the Caesars time to have been an headless Animal which would be a very witless supposition And lastly his grand argument is a gross mistake For this interpretation of the Angel is not properly a Prophecy but the interpretation of a Prophecy which naturally requires plainness and propriety of speech and therefore not to understand by Five are faln Five shall fall but requires us to understand it of the time past according to the vulgar Grammatical sense thereof 4. To the fourth I answer as to this last That the Objector forgets that this eighteenth verse is part of the interpretation of a Prophecy not the Prophecy it self and therefore is to be taken in the plain Grammatical sense if there be no indication to the contrary as there is touching that saying vers 17. For God hath put in their hearts Where the preterperfect Tense is used for the future but safely and elegantly safely because the foregoing verse doth plainly determine the sense to a futurity and elegantly that which it expresseth being a cause antecedent to what is said before and therefore rightly intimated to have been first And where the verb substantive is or
are occurr we are carefully to distinguish when they signify the nature of a thing and when existence As when it is said And there are Seven Kings it does not signify the present existence of them for it were a contradiction to what follows but that there are seven several kinds of Governours that appertain to the Roman State or Empire whereby its nature or condition is illustrated as to this point but nothing yet is defined touching their present Existence or Non-existence But when it follows Five are faln and one is is here plainly signifies existence and because it is in the present Tense present existence namely at the time he was to whom it was spoken And so it is vers 18. And the Woman which thou sawest 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is that great City which raigneth There 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 put together signify present existence in this Interpretation of the Angel there being no indication to the contrary but rather a forcible urging thereunto by that repeated demonstrative Article 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of which the full sense in English cannot be otherwise rendred than thus that great City that City that raigneth c. Which plainly denotes a known City then existent and pointed to But I cannot insist on these things I hasten to the last objection 5. To which I briefly answer That the more true those particulars are the more they confirm my Mystical Interpretation of the Whore of Babylon which Chap. 18. I interpret not of Rome against which Interpretation all these Particulars run but of the Roman Hierarchie Whom I understand also by Babylon Chap. 17. So that all this hailshot flyes quite over my head and touches not an hair thereof We having thus brightened this Key and smoothed it as it were and freed it from all those flaws and rust that R. H. phansied to stick to it we shall now show what an excellent Key it is for the unlocking the meaning of the Sealed and Opened Book-Prophecies For as that Key of the Prophecy of the Seven Churches by taking notice only of the obvious order of the Churches as they are set down and of the meaning of the Paronomastical allusions of the names of them and of the persons concerned in them and applying them to History gives the assured sense of that Prophecy So by this present Key of the Prophecies of the Opened and Sealed Book taking notice of the order into which the Visions of these Prophecies are cast by vertue of the Synchronisms which I have maintained to be true we are enabled to apply every Vision to its proper time in History as there by Paronomastical allusions so here by the knowledge of the Prophetical Iconismes And so with judgment to discern what events answer such and such Visions And now more fully and orderly to illustrate the admirable use of this Key that is of the Interpretation of the Angel Chap. 17. vers 8. First we may observe how it assuring us that the Beast that was and is not and yet is is the Roman Empire divided into many Kingdoms and tainted again with new Paganlike Superstitions and Idolatries which his very description also makes good And that the Paganochristian head of this Empire should shortly succeed the Seventh King the purely Christian Caesars how it is manifest I say from hence that this Beast with the Whore riding him began many hundred years ago even as soon as the Empire was dividing into many Kingdoms and apostatizing into a Paganochristian kind of Idolatry which was about four hundred and odd years after Christ. Now let us see what further comes of this Secondly By carefully comparing the ten-horned Beast Chap. 13. with the ten-horned Beast Chap. 17. and the two-horned Beast with the Whore in this Chapter we shall find that the two Beasts be one and the same Beast and that the two-horned Beast and the Whore denote the same thing This I have demonstrated in my Synopsis Prophetica Book 1. Chap. 10. by no less than eighteen agreements betwixt the two ten-horned Beasts and by nine agreements betwixt the two-horned Beast and the Whore So that no man that is in his wits can be so sceptical as not to be convinced of it But Thirdly Of the ten-horned Beast Chap. 13. it is said vers 5. That power was given unto him to continue forty two months I demand here of R. H. has the Roman Empire since the time of its being divided into many Kingdoms continued but forty two months or three years and an half Is this a likely measure of time for the continuance of an Empire Nay is it not plain that this divided Roman Empire thus apostatizing and apostatized more and more into a Paganlike Idolatry had continued so near forty two Prophetical Months that is months of years viz. 1260. years till in the last Semitime of these 1260. years the Reformation broke out which was the expiration of the Entireness of the raign of the Beast But in the mean time by vertue of this Key of the Angel it is exceeding evident that the forty two months are not to be understood litterally but of Prophetical Months forty two whereof make 1260. years And consequently that all the Visions that Synchronize with this ten-horned Beast have the same extent of duration As the Two-horned Beast The Whore The Woman in the wilderness The Sealed company of Virgins The Outer Court troden down by the Gentiles The two Witnesses mourning in Sackcloath and The dead bodies of the witnesses lying three days and an half in the street of the great City For I conceive that as the Womans abode in the wilderness is first denoted by 1260. days and after in the same Chapter by a Time and Times and half a Time so the continuance of the sad condition of the Witnesses is first set down by 1260. days but after by three days and an half to answer to a Time and Times and half a Time which is three Times and an half And that three Times and an half are signified by three days and an half on purpose to teach us to reckon the duration of all these Synchronals not by the curiosity of a Prophetical month much less of a Prophetical day but as it is originally in Daniel by semidays or half-days after the beginning of the expiration of the seventh of which Half-days the Witnesses were to rise as they did But this by the bye but very worthy the noting All these Synchronals I say of the Prophecy of the Opened Book are necessarily to be measured by Prophetical Semitimes that is the duration of every one of them is to be about seven Semitimes a Semitime consisting of one hundred and eighty years And so must also those two Synchronals of the Sealed Book-Prophecy The six first Trumpets and the one hundred forty four thousand sealed Servants of God they being synchronal to these Fourthly from whence it will further follow that
neither the one hundred forty four thousand sealed Ones are the same individual persons continuing all the space of time near one thousand two hundred and sixty years nor the Two-horned Beast some one particular Witch or Magician nor the Two Witnesses two particular persons as R. H. with his litteral sense would have all these expounded but all of them successions of such and such Bodies or Companies of Men for such a space of time together And before we go any further let us observe of those Synchronals we have noted hitherto what either correspondent opposition or else close cognation or identity they have one with another which is a further marvellous confirmation of their Synchronizing That the Two-horned Beast and the Whore signifie one and the same thing and that the Ten-horned Beast Chap. 13. and the Ten-horned Beast Chap. 17. are one and the same Beast I have noted already and the cognation of the one two with the other two is apparent the former being the Ecclesiastical part of the Roman Empire and more particularly the Roman Hierarchy as appears by the Name and Number of the Two-horned Beast and the Seven Hills the seat of the Whore for which Rome is most remarkable as also that it is the City that ruled over the Kings of the Earth in S t Iohn's time according to the Interpretation of the Angel and the latter the Secular part of the Roman Empire debauched chiefly by the Roman Hierarchy with gross Pagan-like Superstition and Idolatry And the Secular and Ecclesiastick part together thus Paganizing in a new Mode are the Gentiles that tread under foot the Holy City or Outer Court of the Temple till the seventh Semitime of the forty two Prophetical months that is till the Rising of the Witnesses And these are the Synchronals of the debauched part of the Roman Empire for this time But the Apostolick Church never failed notwithstanding in this Apostasie This sincere part therefore that run in correspondent opposition to the former are set out by The Woman viz. crowned with twelve Stars to denote her Apostolicalness though now in the Wilderness The two Witnesses prophesying in Sackcloth The Servants of God sealed in their foreheads The bodies of the Witnesses lying dead three dayes and an half and unburied which showes that the Apostolick Christians though in being could not be a Living Body Politick that is invested with Open Power and Rule during the seven half-dayes or semitimes of the Beast till they were in the seventh Semitime expiring As the two mournful Witnesses could only protest and witness against the cruel Idolatrous proceedings of the Beast and denounce the judgements of God against them but proceed no further For that the three dayes and an half of their bodies lying unburied is the same with the one thousand two hundred and sixty dayes of their mournful Prophecy is plain from hence that else no war was made against them nor they either Politically or Naturally slain till the last three years and an half of their prophesying whenas they were Politically slain all the while and some hundred thousands of them in a Natural sense slain at times some by the sword others by fire and faggot c. Which is a demonstration that the three dayes and an half must be understood in the same sense that three times and an half or one thousand two hundred and sixty dayes The Virgin Company also by their avowed and resolved Virginity was a perpetual reproach to the Whore of Babylon and the one hundred forty four thousand marked with the Lambs Name and the name of his Father in their forehead are in an apparent opposition to the marked slaves of the two-horned Beast And this being the state of the Roman Empire for about something more than four hundred years after Christ till the seventh Semitime was expiring it is no wonder that the Judgements of God thundered upon them under the sounding of the six first Trumpets and that at the beginning of their sounding one hundred forty four thousand Servants of God are marked to save them both from these Judgements and also from the debauchings of the Two-horned Beast or Whore of Babylon which signifies that God would preserve to himself a pure Apostolick Church notwithstanding all the Calamities Persecutions and gross Superstitions and Idolatries raging in the Empire And conformable to the account of this period of time are the Pergamenian and Thyatirian Intervals For during eight parts of nine of the Pergamenian Interval and all the Thyatirian was this Pagan-like Superstitious and Idolatrous State of the Church and there is express mention of the Idolothyta in both those Intervals but in none else and the persecuting the Pure Christians by the sword in one and by fire and faggot in the other is plainly made out in our Exposition So admirably do the Visions correspond belonging to this Time and State of the Roman Empire which the Angels Interpretation hath pitched upon So that there is all the assuredness of the truth of the thing hitherto that Humane Reason can desire and that the middle Synchronals are to be expounded in such a sense as I have expounded them in my Exposition of the Apocalypse But let us now proceed and see how the Antemedial Synchronals will sute with the Times which they necessarily run into for that they all precede these middle Synchronals and so Synchronize one with another has been plainly proved in my Defence of M r Mede which Antemedial Synchronals are The six first Seals immediately preceding the six first Trumpets The Inner Court which is the Court of the Temple and the Altar symmetral or commensurate The Woman clothed with the Sun and crowned with twelve Stars not yet gone into the Wilderness and The fight of Michael with the Dragon while this Woman is in travail These are the Antemedial Synchronals and therefore all of them necessarily run into the Primitive Times of the Church before its Apostasie and reach up to its very first beginning as soon as the Church assisted by the promised aids of Christ after his ascending to his Father began to propagate his Kingdom There was the beginning of the parturient state of the Woman whose throes were great and sharp till Constantines Time and the Dragon spued out a flood after her while she was making into the Wilderness that flood of Contention about the Arrian Points Here I will appeal to R. H. or any man else living what a fit resemblance the sharp throes of the Woman is of those fierce resistances and cruel persecutions the Church of Christ found in preaching his Gospel and in their endeavouring to enlarge his Kingdom And how naturally the conflict betwixt Christianity and the Old Roman Paganism is expressed by the Fight of Michael with the Seven-headed Dragon And how significative the Inner-Court that is said to be measured and allowed but the Outer rejected as incommensurable is of the first Ages of the Church not
yet lapsed into those gross Superstitions and Pagan-like Idolatries And lastly for the first six Seals though the Sealed Book-Prophecy respects the Fate and Affairs of the Empire rather than of the Church yet the first Vision viz. of the first Seal namely the Heros on the White Horse I doubt not but it is Christ more particularly guiding and assisting the Apostles and other Agents for the enlarging of his Kingdom in those Times by sending of the Holy Ghost and enabling them to do True Miracles one of the greatest whereof is this Apocalypse written by S t Iohn and the mention of a Bow and a Crown of which the Right was given him denotes him aiming at the possession of the Imperial Crown the making the whole Roman Empire his Church or Kingdom which causing such great mutations in the Empire the fate of the Empire may very well be conceived to be concerned therein The three next Seals how exquisitely they fit with those Times of the Riders of the Red Black and Pale Horses the Exposition makes good and they are in a manner merely touching the Affairs of the Empire though useful also to the Church to know where or in what Times they were and what to expect next But the fifth Seal exhibiting the Souls of the slain under the Altar martyred or sacrificed for their bearing Witness to the Christian Truth is hugely congenerous with the sharp throes of the Womans Child-bearing and the Affairs of the Empire are here also concerned great Calamities being to come upon it for the effusion of this Innocent Blood And lastly that great Earthquake under the sixth Seal which brought the confusion and subversion of the Old Pagan Religion as the Fate of the Empire could not but be concerned therein so also it doth fitly fall in with the Victory of Michael over the Dragon and his casting him down unto the Earth So agreeable are the Primitive Times of the Church to all these Antemedial Synchronals And what is still more admirable we may further observe how exactly the Ephesine and Smyrnean Interval of the Church agree with those Times and with the said Antemedial Synchronals of the Sealed and Opened Book For as in the first Seal the Heros on the White Horse is brought in earnestly aiming with his Bow and Arrow at a Crown the Right of which is given to him so the first Interval of the Church viz. the Ephesine has its name from a Paronomastical Allusion to 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that signifies an earnest desire after a thing and in the Smyrnean Interval which with the Ephesine equalizes the Time of the Fight of Michael with the Dragon till his Victory over him under the sixth Seal and is the Interval of the Ten noted Persecutions of the Church it is said to the Church in that Interval Be thou faithful unto death and I will give thee the Crown of Life that is the Imperial Crown Constantine turning Christian under the sixth Seal at the expiration of the Smyrnean Interval so called from the bitterness of Persecution in that succession of the Church But the great Encomiums of the Church in those two Intervalls answer handsomly to the Inner Court of the Temple and Altar which is said to be symmetral and allowed and the Altar there to the many Martyrdoms of the Primitive Christians sacrificed for the profession of the Christian Faith in the Smyrnean Interval of the Church So wonderful an harmony is there of these Antemedial Synchronals of all sorts with the History of those Primitive Times and with one another So that it must be mere stupidity or obstinate perverness that hinders any one from assenting to the Truth in this point We have seen what a fit and effectual Key the Interpretation of the Angel has been for the opening the true meaning of all the Antemedial and Medial Visions of the Apocalypse Which since they concern things past the sense of the Visions is the more assured and certain to us But the Postmedial Visions being all of them in a manner to come the sense cannot be so precise fixt and certain But thus much is manifest out of the Interpretation of the Angel that they are to succeed the Rising of the Witnesses or the expiring of the seventh Semitime of the forty two Prophetical months of the Beast which seventh Semi-time or seventh Semiday or Half-day by the Interpretation of the Angel reaching to our Times or the Times of the Reformation it is evident that the Reformation is the Rising of the Witnesses After which immediately succeeds the seventh Trumpet within which in gross or at large are contained The Millennial Reign of Christ The Ligation and Incarceration of Satan The Palm-bearing Company The time of the New Ierusalem or of the Lambs Wife And this is so firmly proved by M r Mede's Synchronisms that there can be no doubt but that those glorious and happy times of the Church upon Earth are yet to come which is the main scope of the Postmedial Visions But in our Table of Synchronisms things are delineated more distinctly and particularly and it mainly differs from that part of M r Mede's Table in that I have divided the Seventh Trumpet into Seven Thunders and placed the Seven Vials under the First Thunder For in that they are the Seven last Plagues that they should belong to the last Wo-Trumpet there is all the reason in the world And that the Vials must of necessity follow the Rising of the Witnesses I have elsewhere sufficiently demonstrated It remains only that we briefly note the Reasonableness of the order of the Postmedial Visions in my Table and the Congruity of those that are set down as Synchronizing one with another all which I have referred to the order of the Seven Thunders And that we also observe how the expiration of the time of the Beast and his destruction and so likewise of the Whore at the Rising of the Witnesses is to be understood only of the Entireness of their Kingdom or Rule And that according to that analogy all the rest of the Synchronals are to be understood namely as there is but a partial destruction of the Kingdom of the Beast and the Whore so there is but a partial and imperfect advance toward the Millennial Reign of Christ and the New Ierusalem c. This being premised we will take notice of the order of the Seven Thunders and what Visions Synchronize with them As with the first Thunder Synchronizeth the effusion of the Seven Vials as the Seven Thunders with the Seventh Trumpet and the Seven Trumpets with the Seventh Seal With the Sixth Vial synchronizeth the Harvest and also the Preparedness of the Spouse of the Lamb. Whereby the conversion of the Iews is intimated to be under the Sixth Vial as also in part at least by the Sixth Vial it self And if this be not the time of their conversion there appears none in the Apocalypse for them And R. H. himself is very