decree concerning the order of transactions For that day shall not come except there come a falling away first and that man of sin be revealed the Son of perdition The text branches it self thus 1. The delay of Christs last coming that day shall not come 2. A preceding general defection from the faith Except there come a falling away first 3. The unmasking the detection of the great Antichrist or ringleader of that Apostacy The man of sin revealed 4. His doom The Son of Perdition For that day shall not come except c. My purpose is not to speak any things concerning Christs putting off his last coming to judgement nor yet to give you the Common-place of Apostacy but that which I aim at is to discover Antichrist to you in his own colours for all writers both Popish and Protestant say that by Man of sin here is meant the great Antichrist by Son of Perdition his most remarkabe destruction Well then without any more ado the point I hold forth and undertake by Gods assistance to make good to you is this The Popes of Rome are the revealed man of sin the now well known Antichrist of Whom Daniel Paul and the Apostle John have spoken such vile and fearfull things I say in all they have said of the great Antichrist they have pointed the singer at the Popes of Rome To make this good first thus Daniel in Chap. 7. ver 2. saw the four windes of heaven strive upon the great Sea i. e. great commotions in the States of the World out of which there came four great beasts the first like a Lion shadowing forth the Babylonish Monarchy with its Pride and Violence the second like a Bear of a churlish and ravenous disposition such a one was the Persian Monarchy the third like a Leopard having upon his back four wings very subtle and very swift upon the prey such was the Grecian Monarchy set up by Alexander the great but he saw a fourth exceeding terrible and dreadful having Iron teeth and it devoured and brake in pieces and stamped the residue with his feet and 't was diverse from all the rest and had ten hons upon his head Who these beasts were you have the Angels interpretation Dan. 7 17. These great beasts Which are four are four Kings Which shall arise out of the Earth but so monstrous was the fourth that Daniel would needs know the truth of him the Angel speaks to that ver 22. and 24. The fourth beast shall be a fourth Kingdom upon Earth which shall be diverse from all Kingdoms and shall devour the whole Earth and shall tread it down and break it in peices and the ten horns out of this Kingdom are ten Kings that shall arise and another shall arise c. 'T is well known that the Roman Monarchy hath been the fourth great Kingdom of the World then in its greatness and glory of domination when Saint John writ his Revelation who will tell you yet more of this beast and business Rev. 17.3 I saw a woman sit upon a scarlet-coloured beast having seven heads and ten horns ver 9 the seven heads are seven Mountains the Palatine Capitoline Aventine Esquiline Quirinal Viminal and Janicular Mountains upon which Rome in its greatness stood And the seven heads are expounded also to be seven Kings ver 10. There are seven Kings five are fallen and one is and the other is not yet come and when he cometh he must continue a short space Seven Kings i. e. seven Supream Kings or forms of governments in Rome which made good the saying of Daniel that the last beast was diverse from all the rest Now saies St. John five are already fallen Kings Consuls Tribunes Decemvirs Dictators these five were all fallen and gone in Saint Johns dayes one is viz government by Emperors which made up the sixt head of the beast The other is not yet come he doth not say the seventh but the other as one hath very well observed pointing doubtless at the Christian Emperors who did not differ from the Heathen Emperors as a distinct form of Government but onely in the quality of their persons the one persecuting destroying Christianity the other protecting advancing Christianity and when he comes he must continue a short space for the Christian Emperors did not reign in their full strength and greatness above seventy or eighty years as Historians make it evident It follows ver 11. And the beast that was and is not even he is the eighth and is of the seven The beast that was The Papacy was in respect of the body of the Empire but is not in respect of any present being for it was not in Saint Johns time Even he is the eighth if you reckon the Christian Emperors for one but in that you ought not so to reckon He is indeed of the seven or one of the seven for there have not been eight but seven forms of Governmnt at Rome the last whereof is called the beast by way of eminency the great whore the false Prophet Antichrist himself So then find out the last head to the Roman Empire and you may say of him this is the man of sin the great Antichrist Now who is he why le ts reckon again the Kings had their time of Governing that 's one the Consulls theirs that 's two Tribunes theirs that 's three Decemvirs theirs that 's four Dictators theirs that 's five Emperors theirs that 's six All these are fallen and gone and if I should put the question in this Congregation who is the seventh head of that beast or who since Emperors have Governed Rome I am perswaded the most ignorant man or woman could tell me they are Popes therefore ye Popes of Rome are the man of sin and the great Antichrist And with this agrees that of the Apostle Paul a little after my text 2 Thes 2.6.7.8 Ye know what withholdeth that he might be revealed in his time For the mystery of iniquity doth already work only he who now letteth will let till he be taken out of the way And then shall that wicked be revealed That the Papacy was working in St. Johns time is evident if you search Scriptures what errors were then taught and what Doctrines the Church of Rome doth now teach Antichrists Limbs and Joynts were then a framing a knitting the Pope was then a young Embrio and was still growing in the womb but could not break forth till the Emperors had made way for him by removing from Rome and seating themselves at Bizantium or Constantinople Tertullian Hierom Chrysostom and the more judicious of the ancient Fathers have still thus expounded this place When Constantine had endowed Churchmen with indeed too much temporal greatness especially the Bishops of Rome they then began every day to look more and more like Popes i. e. like the great Antichrist and play Rex which you know they could not do while the Emperors seat was at Rome the Imperial presence
that But further Suppose we grant a necessity of a Successour in that Dignity and Office did it not of right fall to S. John who was an Apostle and lived many years after S. Peters death The Apostle whom Jesus so loved Certainly if any one could have been found fit and worthy to have been left Vniversal head of the Church 't was he but Peter did not at his death confer it upon him willing the Church of Rome to signifie so mcuh to him and bring him to that See for surely Peter was acquinted with no such office much less necessity of such a Succession Whereunto add but this one word They themselves confess an Apostle to have been above any Bishop t is a truth more clear then could ever yet be denyed now how could Linus if he succeeded Peter in the place of universal Supremacyship but be above the Apostle Iohn and yet with the same breath they say an Apostle is above a Bishop But you know it is a Mystery of Lying Iniquity abovo admalum from the root to the very fag end of it But well In the last place the Pope will needs be Successor to an Apostle I confess I think he is but 't is to Iudas and my reasons are these following 1. The Pope continued a great while in the Church undiscerned a close Hypocrite but a real hater of that he did professe to love as Iudas did 2. He 's a Theif as Iudas was and bears the bag too I told you how he first came to possess himself of Rome and all Italy and presently after of all Ravenna just as a thief gets a purse on the high way Do I need to tell you what vast Treasures of wealth their Sorceries and Legerdemain of Pardons Indulgencies Purgatory Canonization and the like have brought them in yearly they make Merchandize of mens souls Vendit Alexander claves Altaria Christum and what is this but mear cheating and thievery Iudas you know was such a thief and lover of the bag that he grudged his Master the Oyntment the good woman poured on him the Pope t is the grief and vexation of his heart that a drop of mercy or comfort falls upon Christ in any of his Members 3. He is as perfect at Hail Master and kissing Christ and then betraying him in his Truths Worship Saints Discipline Kingdom to be spit on reviled crucified as ever Iudas was 4. Our Saviour calls Iudas the son of perdition Joh. 17.12 which very expression the Holy Ghost here takes up and calls him also the Son of perdition It is said Iudas went to his own place Act. 1. The same is said of the Pope Rev. 17.11 He goeth into perdition And Rev. 19.20 The false Prophet was taken and cast alive into the Lake The Pope in the pride and baseness of his heart makes himself S. Peters Successor but God in Wisedome an Justice declares him to be Iudas Successor and this indeed is the true foundation upon which the present Rome or stately Babel of Papacie is built Ve I shall now make some improvement of the point by Application and first be informed That as the Iews have framed a Messias to themselves so the Popish Clergy have framed an Anti-Christ that God never made mention of for the Descriptions they give of him when applyed to the True One are all of them most false and frivilous 1. One of them is this That the Great Antichrist must be a single individual person as the Article o e denotes therefore the Pope cannot be he for there have been many Popes Reader it thou thinkest there is any thing in this be pleased to take better information The Article o e doth not enforce any such thing Mark 2.27 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and not Man for the Sabbath Luke 4.4 It is written 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that Man doth not live by bread alone 2 Tim. 3.17 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that the Man of God may be perfect Will any one who is Master of Common Reason say that the Aricle o e in these places denotes an individual single Person Therefore the prefixed Article cannot enforce it upon us that Antichrist is one single man 2. All the Rulers of the four great Monarchies are set out by Daniel as if every Kingdom had had but one Dan 7.17 These great beasts which are four are four Kings whereas we know there were more in every one of them The last Beast or Kingdom had seven heads or Rulers seven Kings make up the first and they are all called one head and so one The Emperours S. Iohn moulds them all into one Five are fallen and One is speaking of government by Emperours The seventh head of this fourth Beast is the Great Antichrist and why should he be thought a single person rather then any of the other six As each of the former must be taken Collectively so doubtless must this be unless better reasons be given against it then Bellarmine or any other of his way have yet held forth 3. Jesuits themselves call the whole bulk and succession of Popes One visible head of Christs Church therefore give us leave to learn of them and call the whole bulk and succession of them that one Antichrist or one head of the Antichristian Church which was arising in S. Paul and S. Iohns time and is not yet fallen and tell me what single person can be head of a body of such continuance The second thing they fancy of Anti-Christ is That his Seat must be at Ierusalem T is needless to speak much to this can any man read the 17. chap. of Rev. where the Angel tells Iohn That his Seat is the City built upon seven Mountains and that hath seven distinct forms of Government and the great City which in S. Iohns time Ruled over the Kings of the earth Of courtesie tell me can any man understand this of Ierusalem was Ierusalem built upon seven Mountains had ever Ierusalem seven heads or distinct forms of Government did Ierusalem in S. Iohns time raign over the Kings of the earth or was it not rather it self in Vassalage 2. Whereas it is said 'T is the City where our Lord was crucified Revel 11. this will not carry it in their sense For first Let them reconcile this to the former description which I am confident they can never do 2. Antichrists seat is called Ierusalem Spiritually or Mystically as 't is also called Sodom and Egypt Erroneous Prophane Murtherous Ierusalem take it in that state or posture and Ierusalem was a Type or Shadow of Rome Antichristian Antichrists seat is at Ierusalem not Literally but Mystically 3. When Christ was crucified Ierusalem was one of the streets of Rome for there you should hear the fear of Caesar swaying all If you let this man go you are not Caesars friend You should see a Roman Judge Roman Souldiers a Roman Death and all Canaan within Romes boundary and so upon the matter Christ was Crucified at
as to the end of the World an eternal excellency i. e. an excellency while the World stands according to Dans. 2.44 In the dayes of these Kings shall the God of heaven set up a kingdom which shall never be destroyed and the kingdom shall not be left to other people but shall stand for ever Dan 7.14 His dominion is an everlasting dominion which shall not pass away and his kingdom that which shall not be destroyed But you le say how can this be reconciled with that Rev. 20.7 8 9. When the thousand shall be expired Satan shall be loosed out of prison and shall go out to deceive the nations which are in the four quarters of the earth Gog and Magog to gather them together to battell the number of whom is as the sand of the Sea And they went up on the breadth of the earth and compassed the camp of the Saints about and the beloved City hoping to make an end of them at once that the world might be troubled with them no more Where is the glorious Kingdom of Christ at this time shall it not be even broken and lost I answer 1. 'T is nowhere said Christs Reign in the height of its excellencie and utmost amplitude or extent of it should be everlasting we do not anywhere read that 2. A people Christ will have all the Saints will be his and be they never so few he may truly be said to rule in and over the kingdome of the Saints Earthly and worldly kingdoms may but none of the Spiritual kingdome made up of Saints ever was or ever will be taken from him 3. Thought the Devil turned loose deceive the nations in the four quarters of the earth yet I do believe Christ will hold his own in the nation of the Jewes Isa 60.20 21 Thy sun shall no more go down neither shall thy moon withdraw herself for the Lord shall be thine everlasting light and the dayes of thy mourning shall be ended Thy people shall be all righteous generally righteous they shall inherit the land for ever Isa 59.20 21. The Redeemer shall come to Sion and unto them that turn from transgression in Jacob saith the Lord as for me this is my covenant with them my Spirit that is upon thee and my words which I have put in thy mouth shall not depart out of thy mouth nor out of the mouth of thy seed nor out of them mouth of thy seeds seed saith the Lord from henceforth even for ever To convince you that this place is properly alleaged for this purpose see Rom. 11. where all confesse the Apostle purposely sets himselfe to treat concerning the calling of the Jews v. 25. sayes he Blindnesse in part is happened to Israel untill the fulnesse of the Gentiles be come in and so all Israel shall be saved as it is written Isa 59.20 There shall come out of Sion the Diliverer and shall turn away ungodlinesse from Jacob. And sayes God when I shall make this good unto them I will bind my self to them by covenant that my Spirit which I shall put upon them my word which I shall put into their hearts and mouth shall not depart from them nor from their seed nor from their seeds seed while the world stands I say surely the people of the Jewes when once they are brought in to Christ again they 'l not forsake him any more for ever which will be enough to make Christ a visible kingdome upon earth And when all the powers and policies of the world are united in this designed of compassing and so destroying the holy City Christ will not suffer his Scepter to be wrested out of his hand nor the visibility of his kingdome and dominion to faile and therefore fire comes down from God out of heaven and destroys them Rev. 20.9 whereupon the glory of this Church and Kingdome will revive and flourish again and thus his dominion is an everlasting dominion which shall not passe away and his Kingdome that which shall not be destroyed When we speak of the great and glorious Rule and Kingdome of Christ over the generality of nations peoples and languages as here we do of this we say only it shall last a long time it shall continue a thousand years it shall be the joy of many generations You see the Point I doubt not to say it is a sure and impregnable truth viz. Vpon the breaking to peeces of the Church to Rome the Lord Christ will reign and King it so so gloriously as he never did in the world before Vse 1. For application thus But little cause have all Gods people to let their hearts be sadded when they see the famous Governments and Grandeour of this World broken to peeces and laid in the dust Did they rightly understand their true interest it would no more trouble them then the pulling down of an old rotten smoaky cottage doth any man that a strong stately house may be set up for him in its room It God throw down the powers the greatnesse of the kingdoms of men it is that he may bring in the place thereof the power and greatnesse of the kingdom of his Son T is storied when the War began in Germany ann 1619. that a great Brasse-image of S. Peter that had Tu es Petrus super te adificabo ecclesiam meam engraven upon it standing in S. Peters Church at Rome a great and massie sone fell down upon it and so shattered it to peeces that not any word or syllable of that sentences was legible but only these Aedificabo Ecclesiam meam I will build may Church Certainly out of these Wars that are now on foot as I touched in the close of the last point out of the ruines and ashes that shall be made he will bring forth the most glorious Kingdom and frame of Government that ever the World saw Carnal Reason may say 't is pitty that such persons such families such constitutions should be shaken to pieces but I speak to those who profess to live by a principle above Carnal Reason above flesh and blood to you that profess your selves born of God Members of Christ Subjects of his Kingdom that profess 't is your everlasting joy to see the Crown set upon the head of Jesus Christ T is a hard Riddle to me that it should at all go to your hearts to see great but barren Mountains cast into the Sea that so the way may be made plain for our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ and for his Kingdom Vse 2. The second thus It were to be wished that every one would set themselves upon the stretch to hasten to bring on this Kingdom Set up that Kingdom in thy self which comes not with observation as our Saviour speaks that Kingdom which consists in righteousness peace and joy in the Holy Ghost Rom. 14.17 Let Christ his Truth and Worship rule in thee and over thee Lay down thy self thy name thy estate thy All at the
so strongly support him The Second Viall Rev. 16.3 is poured out upon the Antichristian Sea In this God came nearer to him then in the former for the sea is above the land as t is the proper place of the fire to be above the air the place of the air to be above the water so t is proper to the water to be above the earth t is kept from overflowing all by the power of that word hitherto shall thy proud waves goe and no further Upon the pouring out of the first viall finding themselves in a decaying state they lay their heads together how to plaister their soars and heal themselves of the noysom botches and boyls that had lately broken out upon them and were so visible in every ones eye for which end the Councel of Trent was calld where all the streams of Popish doctrine Popish worship and discpiline were brought together the confluence whereof the Holy Ghost there calls Sea Upon this there did appear in the Reformed Churches men of most eminent Godliness and Learning who did abundantly discover this Sea of theirs both by writing and preaching to be a sea of blood the blood of a dead man and no better In the true Gospel Ordinances there is to be had the living purging saving blood of Jesus Christ but Popish Trental Ordinances were not such blood they were a sea of blood of a dead man clotted congealed blood polluting choaking killing blood this is the Best word God affords them and no marvell when the death of souls was all their operation and effect Every living soul dyed in the sea All those who contented themselves to abide and swim in that Popish Sea that had no other life but what was begot and nourished in the Romish religion dyed and perishd eternally This Vial turned their religion inside out and showed it to all the World in its native colours and baseness till this time Every one took it that it was the bad Lives of the Common sort of people and worse Lives of the Parish-Priests that were in all the fault their Religion in itself good enough but now t is made apparent to all that will nor shurt their eyes that even the Religion itself is naught and base and Antichristian all over And this was yet a hotter Vial of wrath and torment upon them The Third Angel Rev. 16.4 5 6 7. pourd his Viall upon the rivers and fountains of waters that is upon Seminary Priests and Jesuites who compass the earth to and fro conveying the salt of Popish Trental doctrines and worship to people nations and languages and they became blood the meaning is they had blood given them to drink Now to give a man blood to drink is to kill him They were executed by vertue of Queen Elizabeths Law enacted with consent of Parliament in the year 1581. as Traitors hangd drawn and quartered A Book entituled Justitia Britanniae was publised in several Languages to clear the Christian equity and justice that was in such her proceedings with them The United Provinces of the Low Countries come from under the Altar of Persecution for Christ and Truth 1. being freed from the fearfull Tyrannies of Pope and Spaniard took at her in the year 1586. and made a Law to the same effect against them That if any Priest or Iesuite whether Forreigner or Home-born should come into any of the Provinces it should be death to them being apprehended and so they said Amen to the Law and Justice of Queen Elizabeth Let it be even so Lord God true and righteous are thy judgements For the Pope to have capital punishment executed upon his Emissaries the supporters and advancers of his Kingdom and Glory could not but be a tormenting vial of wrath upon him as clearly speaking what measure he himself might look for if he should fall into their hands even he that had drunk the blood of others so freely to have his own heart-blood given him to drink with a Satia te sanguine take your fill of blood and murther The fourth Vial is poured out upon the Sun Rev. 16.8 9. Papacy is resembled by an Antichristian world where there is earth sea rivers fountains and a Sun shining gloriously If we take this Mystical and most Illustrious light according to their conceits and fancie then t is the Popes Supremacie in Temporals Papists will tell you The Pope is as far above the greatest Monarch in this world as the Sun is above the Moon and the several glories of the Kings of the earth are but lights derived from him Temporal glory being in the Pope as light is in the Sun But how is the glory of the Popes Supremacy in Temporals everywhere darkened and in many Kingdomes quite put out You do not not now hear in any of the Popish Nations of his Excommunicating Kings Deposing Kings and giving away their Kingdoms since Henry the 8. God hath exceedingly darkened almost quite destroyed that Sun of the Popes Supreme power in Temporals which hath been a scorching Vial of wrath to him and his Clergy and drawn from them sufficient blasphemies But if you understand the Holy Ghost speaking of things as indeed they be then doubtless t is the house of Austria or the German Emperour It is well known that the Emperours before the Pope set up his Kingdom of Temporal greatness were the Sun and glory of the Political world they being the sixt head of the fourth or Roman Beast were wounded deadly by the incursions of Goths and Vandals Rev. 13.3 But the Pope growing up to his height vouchsafed to be their Surgeon his skill failed him not for he quickly healed that deadly wound by setting up an Emperor in France and after that translating the Empire into Germany Taking things as they really are of a certainty this is the earthly Sun that shines most illustriously in the Popes Antichristian world It matters not whether the Pope will own the Emperour as above himself or no we know he set him up instead of the old Emperours or sixt head who were by all mens confession the Sun of the Political world and the Bishops of Rome but Stars Revel 9. God and Scripture have still made the supreme Magistrate in Temporals the greatest lustre and splendor of any State and therefore with very good reason may the Emperour be here pitched upon who hath been the greatest Light and Glory of the Popish world for hundreds of years The King of Sweden was the Angel out of the Temple who poured this Vial upon the Popish Imperial State as if scorching flames of fire had light upon them And here give me leave to insert a discourse concerning Kings I am not ignorant that he who follows truth too near the heels may chance to have his brains dashd out at least may derive a great deal of spight and odium upon himself which a politick wise man would not do but that of Solomon prevails with me The uprightness of the upright
shall deliver him I find upon search That when Christ is going in good earnest to set up his Kingdom in the name and glory of it there is a great hazard I may say downfall of Kings I shall make this good to you from four scriptures The first of them is Psal 2. ver 2. The Kings of the Earth set themselves and the Rulers take councel together against the Lord and against his Christ This Peter saith was fulfilled at Christs apprehension tryal and death Act. 4.25 26 27. Herod Pontius Pilate the Chief Priests and others consulted and set themselves against him when he had but given out some hints of his Kingship This was that which stirred them up so against him Tell us art thou the King of the Iews And when Pilate was minded to let him go they cryed out He that makes himself a King speaks against Caesar whereupon Pilate went and passed Sentence upon him When there was but some talk that Christ would set up a Kingdom they presently band themselves against him and he dyes for 't and so they think they have broke the Cordes of his Government asunder as t is vers 3. In the 4. verse God laughs at them being wroth verse 5. Speaks that which vexes them Yet or notwithstanding all their combined powers and policies against him have I set him up King of Sion verse 6. And says God I will declare the decree thou art my son this day have I begotten thee verse 7. This was fulfil'd in his raising him up from death to life Act. 13.33 God hath passed an Eternal Decree concerning his Son That when they should kill and bury him he would the third day bring him forth out of the womb of the grave and own him for his Son and set him at his own right hand there to intercede and his intercession should not be in vain Ask of me says the Father to him and I will give the Heathen for thine inheritance and the uttermost parts of the earth for thy possession ver 8. As if he had said I will set thee in possession of thy inheritance which shall have the uttermost parts of the earth for its boundary according to that Psal 72.8 He shall have dominion from sea to sea and from the river to the ends of the earth For God to declare the Decree is to act it for Dei discere est facere When the time is at hand he must be thus set in actual possession of all the Dominion and Greatness and Glory that God hath promised him if the Kings of the earth did set themselves and the Rulers took councel together against him when he did but speak somewhat of his Kingly Office how much more will they do it then when they see his throne a building and his Kingdom a going up to the no small prejudice of their Interest Revel 11.15 17 18. When he begins to put forth and act his Great Power and do something towards taking the Kingdoms of this world into his own hands and reign then the Nations are angry at him that is they act against him in their anger wherein Kings are chief as you may see Rev. 16.14 16. But do they carry it no and thy wrath is come Rev. 11.18 Christ in his wrath fights the battel with them in Armageddon that is where he gives them a most remarkable overthrow and destruction which this 2. Psal expresses plainly Thou shalt break them with a rod of Iron and dash them in pieces like a Potters vessel v. 9. Be wise now therefore O ye Kings be instructed ye Judges of the earth v. 10. as if he said look You well to your selves be his servants without Complement and rejoyce with trembling when he comes about this work v. II. Kiss the Son with kisses of Reverence kisses of Obedience lest he be angry and then a little thing will provoke him and so ye perish in the mid-way in the mid-way of your plots enmities oppositions of him for if his wrath be kindled but a little blessed are all those those Kings and Rulers especially that have Wisdom and Faith to get interest in him and be of his side those that have not the fire of his wrath will certainly consume them ver 12. The second Scripture is Isaiah 24. ver 18.19 20. Marlorat who professes to have taken the marrow and substance of his Comment out of Vatablus Luther Musculus Calvin Oecolampadius Pagnin c. hath these very words upon the latter end of the eighteenth ver pertinet autem proprie hic contextus ad Papistus nostros Christ in this Prophesie says he chiefly intends the Popish State Upon a following verse he hath these words ' hoc vaticinium proprie ad Christi regnum pertinet this other part of the Prophesie doth chiefly respect the kingdom of Christ he means his glorious kingdom expressed in the last words of the Chapter The Popish and Gospel-opposing World is here set out by the Earth as it is also in diverse places of the Revelations Rev. 14.19 Chap. 16.1 Here is mention of heavy transgression according to Rev. 18.5 Her sins are reach'd up to heaven The transgression is sayd to be so heavy upon it that the foundations of the Earth shake reel to and fro yea are utterly broken down fall and rise no more the same you may read Rev. 16 18 19. and Rev. 18.21 And it shall come to pass in that day that is in the day of the Earthquake that the Lord shall punish the Host of the high ones that are on high Who are they I take the next words to be Exegetical why the Kings of the Earth upon the Earth ver 21. The most of the Kings and high Ones of the Earth will be Engaged aganst him enough to make an Host whom Christ will fall upon and punish upon the Earth with temporal judgement according as you have heard when he is abought to Raign before his Ancients gloriously as 't is ver 23. If this Prophesie have been at all fulfilled it will doubtless be much more fulfilled in that day for Prophesies many times have a gradual fulfilling The third Scripture is Psalm 110. Sit on my right hand till I make thy Enemies thy footstool ver 1. Concerning those Enemies you may get some light out of Luke 19. ver 14. the Citizens hated him and sent this message after him We will not have this man to Raign over us and ver 27. Those mine Enemies which would not that I should Reign over them c. The Father speaks of those who were Enemies to Christ as a King Enemies to his Raigning When Christ had cast down heathenish Idols and Government Rev. 12. in all reason he might have expected in Constantine and following Emperors and ages to have set up his Kingdom but then upstarts the Pope that Beast with his ten horns or Kings who by their smiting and pushing keep Christ out of all Whereat to speak after the manner of men Christ
he fallen down dead or the ground had opened and swallowed him up alive or had Moses called down fire from heaven and consumed him or the like then indeed it had been an extraordinary case an act above nature yea an act above the power of ordinary grace but t was neither so nor so therefore certainly the case was but ordinary and was recorded and transmitted to after-times for instruction Will you please to consider the case of Phineas He finds Zimri and Cozbi committing uncleanness and with a javeling kills them both at once Now what could as to men and Law be said for this mans act surely nothing that I can bethink my self of but much against him He was Phineas the Son of Eleazer the Priest what had he to do with the civil sword of Justice but suppose he had was he to do Justice in a private way when Justice might have been obtained easily in a publike way Had it not been Charity to have caused them to have been apprehended their sin laid home to their consciences peradventure they might have repented though their bodies had fallen yet their souls might have been saved Had it not been both wisdom and Piety to have brought them to publike Triall and publique condemnation and thereupon all the People to have stoned them that so others might have seen and feared and done no more so wickedly But Phineas steps out of his place makes himself Judge Jury Witness Executioner all in a heat stabs them both through the guts to Hell How the Law and men of those times looked upon him in this act I know not but this I know he had a Commission for what he did that no man in the World knew of or could read beside himself Numb 25.10 And the Lord sayd unto Moses for doutless Moses was at a stand and knew not what to think or judge of this Act of his thus Circumstanced but God instructed him concerning it that Phineas in the sparklings of his zeal had done well and excellently well and he would reward him and his for it as you may see ver 11.12 13. Behold I give unto him my Convenant of peace He shall have it and his seed after him even the Covenant of an everlasting priest-hood because he was zealous for his God If you shall say this was extraordinary I deny it what extraordinariness can there be for one man with a Javelin to kill two that lye along before him Whether God gave these men that are now in place and power with us this kinde of Commission for that eminent and exemplary peice of justice as I will not affirm it so I will not deny it but this is granted of all they were the Instruments in the hand of Divine providence whose dispensations are alwayes just and righteous But what might be the reason that Christ hath such an eminent and incensed quarrel at Kings a Viall of wrath is reserved peculiarly for them My answer in general is that which a wise man of this Land once sayd Kings of all men have been most beholding to God and God hath been of all men least beholding to Kings Why do you think did God call the four great Kingdoms of the World Dan. 7. four great beasts but because the Kings and Rulers of each of them were as so many wild raging untamed beasts preying upon the poor Peoples estates and persons at their pleasure setting up their own wills for a Law and none of them so cruel this way as the Roman Monarchy Dan. 7.7 Behold the fourth Beast was dreadfull and terrible and strong exceedingly and it had great iron teeth and it devoured and brake in peices and stamped the residue with its feet and it was diverse from all the beasts that were before it and it had ten horns These ten horns are ten Europaean Kings and who ever reckons them up I finde brings in the Kings of Brittain for one of the horns of this terrible and fearfull Monster See yet more of these Europaean Kings Rev. 17.12 13 14. The ten horns which thou sawest are ten Kings These have one mind and shall give their power and strength to the Beast These shall make War with the Lamb and the Lamb shall over-come them for he is Lord of Lords and King of Kings To have gone on in wayes of violence oppression towards any sort of people had been enough to have set Christ against them but when these ten Kings of Europe successively have one minde for the Beast give their power and strength to the Beast to make war with the Saints and with the Lamb do you marvel at that which follows the Lamb falls particularly and after a special manner upon them i. e. upon the European Kings as being resolved to have this known in the World that he is King of Kings and Lord of Lords History tells us that in the years four and five hundred after Christ the Barbarous Nations of Goths and Vandals broke the western Empire all to peices at which time the Saxons were setled in England Franches in Gall the west Goths in Spain the East Goths and Longobards in Italy the Almains in Germany these growing into civil States together with their manners change their religion close with the Pope settle their Governments so as was most sutable yea serviceable to his Interest And the Pope got in upon their Consciences and brought them into Oaths and Obligations to defend the Rights and Priviledges of holy Church that is indeed of Rome Antichristian against the Kingdom of Jesus Christ And now when the time of Christs taking the Kingdoms of this World into his own hands draws dear the most of these European Kings are yet professedly for the Pope in opposition to Jesus Christ to keep him out Do you all know this and do you ask a reason why Christ pours out wrath upon the Political fun of every Nation of Europe why he makes the thrones of Kings to totter Bvt you 'l say the Kings of England cast off the Pope long since I answer Henry the eight it cannot be denyed did cast off his Supremacy but Jehu like as Calvin hath observed of him so far as served his own turn in Temporals only but was still zealous upon the six Articles of the Church of Rome that whoever denyed any of those Articles of Popery they were burnt for it Then came that blessed child and doubtless now glorified Saint of God Edward the sixt into the Throne who repealed the six Articles threw Images out of Churches and furnished the Land with an English Service-boook or Liturgie He had Wars with Scotland Insurrections at home a plain War in Norfolk his time very short his age very green We cannot blame him for reforming no more but must wonder at him and bless God for his reforming so much Queen Mary you know brought us again full sail into the Popes arms or bosom but let her Reign pass in a red Parenthesis Next came Queen
and creeks of it The like you shall see in the sequels of this business they are four all set down ver 13. The first of them this The same hour the witnesses rose there was a great earthquake A violent shaking of Church and State even of the whole Kingdom in the breaking out of these late Wars between King and Parliament there have been such Commotions amongst us as may well be called a great earthquake and it began presently upon the quickening or return of these men The second this The tenth part of the city fell Conceive as I touched before the great Mystical City made up of the ten Kingdoms that gave their power to the Beast and when one of these Kingdoms fell off utterly and irrecoverably from Rome by means of the earthquake then the tenth part of the city fell If you would know which peradventure the Greek may give some hint of it the Holy Ghost seems to lay a great Emphasis upon the Article 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that tenth part where the last of the Witnesses were killed in so different and signal a way that tenth part that is so easily discernable from all the rest Et penitùs toto divisi ab orbe Britanni in plain terms England You 'le say was England but shaken off from Rome by this late Earthquake I answer it was in part but not wholly in Doctrine but not in Worship and Discipline for as I told you Rome and we were fast tyed together by the tails of Episcopacy Ceremonies and Formes of Worship though their bodies were loose and heads looked several ways Yet truly let me tell you this that in our times the heads were turning and looking one upon another with marvellous benigne aspects and were working their bodies together again as fast as such great and unweldy bodies could be moved There were such Popish Doctrines Popish Practises and Popish ordering of Church-affairs to say nothing of the State in most points and places that the Pope had good cause to assure himself of Englands return into the Bosom of the Romane Church But when the Parliament arose for Parliaments themselves rose from the dead you know how long we had been kept without them and at last a Proclamation set forth that men should not think of a Parliament and quickened the dead Witnesses Voted down Episcopal Government with all the Appurtenances of it and being forced to 't took up Arms resolving to live and die in the defence of those Votes then and not till then I dare boldly say it did England a tenth part of those Kingdoms that had given their power to the Beast utterly totally fall off from Rome that in reason they can have no hope of ever fetching it back again to serve the Popish Interest The third is this In the earthquake were slain of men 7000. This being a round and perfect number you need not understand it of just so many and no more for indeed 7000. is not a proportionable number for such an earthquake but it may be a certain number for an uncertain and in the earthquake were slain 7000. i. e. thousands upon thousands But searching the Original I finde That runs thus In the earthquake were slain 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 names of men that is men of name men of renown the like Hebraisme you have Gen. 6.4 So in this Fall of the tenth part of the City were slain men of name note quality besides the common sort of People 7000. meaning of the Witnesses enemies some lost their blood and lives others their places powers livings livelyhoods and thus there were slain of noted Statesmen and noted Churchmen 7000. which in reason may be conceived a competent number in this late earthquake The fourth sequel is this And the remnant were affrighted and gave glory to the God of Heaven Observe 't is not said the remnant repented but were terrified and indeed nothing is more evident then that an awe and terrour is fallen upon the spirits of those that remain and as Joshua exhorted Achan to confess and give glory to God so they are constrained it bursts out of their mouths fore against their wills that since the restoring of those men every Providence of God hath fought against them And though they speak evil of dignities and instruments as Jannes and Jambres did against Moses yet they will confess that this is digitus Dei the just handy-work of God upon them they have nothing to accuse God of for such his Dispensations to them Whatever they think or say concerning men and present Powers yet being terrified they confess and give glory to the God of Heaven Tell me now in the singleness of your Spirits have not Providences suted marvellous patly to the Text Hath not something fallen out in our days that may with more perspicuity of Reason be called the signal killing of the Witnesses then hath in any Kingdom you can name all Circumstances complying fully with the standard of the Word Confident I am that since the quickening and Resurrection of these men there can no Kingdom in the World be named where the Beast hath prevailed against the Zealous Protestant party so as it may be said he is yet killing Witnesses he hath enough to do to hold his own and in many places is apparently on the loosing sinking hand Wherefore if I may draw the conclusion it shall be this That which we all so much fear is past and let Antichrist and those of his Faction take what follows I remember what our Saviour said to his Disciples Mat. 24.32 33. When the Fig-tree putteth forth her leaves you uknow that Summer is nigh Likewise ye when ye shall see all these things know that it is near even at the door So say I to you When something hath passed before our eyes which we cannot in reason but call the killing of the witnesses and resurrection of the witnesses from that time from that sign know that Antichrists utter ruin is near even at the dore Vse The first use shall inform you of the ground and cause of God's thus severe proceeding with them A Vial of wrath is poured upon every thing that belongs to Antichrist and the latter still more hot and scalding then the former till he 's utterly burnt up and ruind by them Why it lies in this The justice of God God hath a nature that constrains him to give to every one according to their works but such have been Antichrists works and carriage that it is the equallest thing in the world that God should execute and pour out upon him all those fearfull things which Daniel Paul and the Apostle Iohn have foretold and threatned him withal He who hath made himself the Man of Sin God can do no less then make him The Son of Perdition as t is in the Text Rev. 18.2 An Angel cryed with a strong voyce saying Babylon the great is fallen is fallen the reason is laid down in the 5. ver Her
sinns have reached unto heaven We commonly call it the See but it may well be called the Sea of Rome for the streams of all the wickedness of all the world have run thither and have there been swallowed up 1. The Apostle says of the Cretians They are all-wayes lyars Tit. 1. but of these he saith They speak lyes in Hypocrisie 1. Tim. 4.2 The very first rise of Popery was from a lye Hypocritically and against their Conscience they challenged Appeals in difficult matters to themselves and forged a Canon of the Councel of Nice for it which the sixt Councel of Carthage did with much diligence search out and found to be a very forgery a very lye but for all that they had the face to go on adding one lye to another till they had made up their Religion which indeed is nothing else but a great knot and bundle of lyes Their Doctrine of Merits their Doctrines of Purgatory Transubsantiation very lyes as our Reformed Divines have made appear sufficiently show me one point that is truly and peculiarly theirs and I will pawn my life upon 't I demonstrate it to be a lye a taste whereof you had in the first Sermon showing you his contradictions of Christ 2. There is the greatest pride found in them that ever was found in men Suppose thou hadst been at Rome this year being the year of Iubile but you must know that he is not such a proud and pamperd Beast now adays as he was in formen ages hadst thou been at Rome this year of Iubile but especially any of those Iubiles that were some hundreds of years before Luther and there seen the Pope arrayed as the Holy Ghost describes him Rev. 17.4 In purple and scarlet colour decked with gold precious stones and pearls with a Triple Crown upon his head set in a golden chair carried on mens shoulders his Princely Cardinals about him his Breaden God Crucifixes Reliques carried before him opening the gates of Paradise as they call them with the touch of his golden hammer great Ambassadors sometimes Kings themselves bowing before him and worshiping of him the common people begging pardon of sin and eternal life of him scarce suffered to kiss his feet I say hadst thou been at Rome and seen all this couldst thou have thought or said less of him then hic est ipse primogenitus diaboli this is doubtless the first born Son of Lucifer the eldest Son of the devil Pope Innocent the 4. Ann. 1253. in the 37. year of Henry the 3. of England being set in his Conclave in the midst of his Cardinals after much advisement upon a small occasion brake out into this language Annon Rex Anglorum noster est vassallus ut plus dicam mancipium qui possumus eum nutu nostro incarcerare ignominiae mancipare Is not the King of England our Vassal nay to say more our slave whom we can imprison at pleasure and condemn to everlasting ignominy Pope Alexander the 3. set this foot upon the Neck of the Emperor Frederick the first blasphemously using those words of the Psalmist Super Aspidem Basiliscum Vpon the Adder and the Basilisk shalt thou tread The Pope hath made Kings to wait at his Gate and hold him his stirrop I could have furnished you with many stories of like nature speaking aloud the pride of their Spirits says Basil long since Odi fastum istius Ecclesiae I hate the pride of that Church of Rome And lest you should think we speak out of Spleen and Envy against him hear what the Holy Ghost saith 2 Thes 2.4 Who opposeth and exalteth himself above all that is called God or that is worshiped for that he as God sitteth in the Temple of God shewing himself that he is God 3. The greatest truely and blood guiltiness lies upon them that ever was upon any T is impossible for me to convince you of the ten thousand part of their murthers Historians do generally with one mouth tell us in that one Kingdom of France 400. years ago they slaughtered ten hundred thousand of those godly Waldenses and Albigenses The Duke D'Alva boasted He had destroyed above 18000. Hereticks in the Netherlands in the space of six years In the first 30 years after the Order of Jesuites was set up t is found that above fourscore thousand were slain The Spanish Inquisition in the space of 30 years made away no less then one hundred and fifty thousand In the year 1572. was the Massacre at Paris in a few days space there were above 30000. treacherously and basely murtherd In our Queen Marys days in less then 4 years were consumed with fire and faggot 277 persons every one whereof it might be strongly presumed were true Members of Jesus Christ his Saints indeed In the late rebellion in Ireland to speak with the least one hundred thousand were murthred before we could get so much as one Breast-work against them And now by these hints I have given you can you make any guess at the number of those that have been slain in all those ten Kingdoms who submitted to him throughout the space of above 1000 years Certainly they do exceed all humane Arithmatick Rev. 17.12 13 14. The ten horns which thou sawest are ten Kings these shall give their power and strength to the Beast these shall make war with the Lamb. The ten Kings of Europe with all their power and strengths were nothing but the Popes instruments of blood and cruely I may be bold to say it the Popes little finger hath been heavier upon the people of God then were the Loyns of the ten Heathenish Persecutions To shed the innocent blood of any man is a sin that cryes to God and will certainly prevail with him for vengeance how much more then to shed the blood of an Innocent Saint I am confident if one had shed the blood of a hundred thousand men that were indeed Reprobates and the blood of but one true Saint of God he should find a harder task and pull of it to come off with Divine Justice for the blood of that one Saint then for all the other hundred thousand there 's reason enough for it they being but Chaff Bryars and Thorns Dung Scorpions and worse then naught but t is said the death of a Saint is precious with God A Saint is a Member of Christ helps to make up that body which is the fulness of him that fills all in all is the pupilla oculi the very apple of Gods eye yea so dear to God that the very hairs of his head are numbred and therefore no marvel if he have a harder pull of it But the Popes of Rome have shed the blood of more then one Saint indeed no other blood rellishes with them Rev. 18. and last verse In her was found the blood of Prophets and of Saints and of all that were slain upon the earth A vein of cruelty bloodshed went down from Cains days even to the
the seed of Gods people they have lain a great while under the clods as if they had been lost or quite dead but God hath a day wherein his seed shall spring up into a harvest of joy and all that see them shall acknowledge they are the seed which the Lord hath blessed as it is Isa 61.9 Thirdly after these the residue of the Nations shall be the Lords Zach. 8.22 23. Many and strong Nations shall come to seek the Lord of Hoasts in Jerusalem and to pray before the Lord. And in those dayes it shall come to pass that ten men shall take hold out of all languages of the Nations even shall take hold of the skirt of him that is a Jew saying we will go with you for we have heard that God is with you That which was done Act. 2. will not agree to this Text for we do not read of many and strong Nations coming in then You will say how can many and strong Nations come in to Jerusalem at any time Doubtless it will be by Agents or Messengers according to Zach. 7.2 3. when the Jews shall send forth their Emissaries into all Lands to Preach Christ to them there shall go a great blessing a mighty power of the Spirit along that the hearts of the Nations generally shall be mightily taken with them and there shall be certain men out of every Nation and Language authorized to take hold of the skirt of him that is a Jew and say we will go up to Jerusalem with you for God and Christ are with you to have the most exact and perfect Directory that we and our whole Nation may worship God aright Once Christ in his Rule and Government was kept within the narrow bounds of Jury then he stretched forth the arms of his power over the Gentiles first the Eastern then the Western Churches but the day is coming wherein he will lift up a Scepter over all the Nations of the world Dan. 7.14 There was given him Dominion Glory and a Kingdom that all People Nations and Languages should serve him He reigns a glorious King indeed that is King of all Kings of all Kingdoms Nations in the Earth Sixthly Christ will then given his People more purity and power of Ordinances then ever the Churches did enjoy Take me I pray you in my own sense Ordinances as they came from the Apostles themselves were pure perfect because they were the immediate inspirations or breathings of the Holy Ghost but consider them in the hands of divers others and in the hands of succeeding Officers and Churches and what Errors yea damnable Doctrines were there presently found amongst them Which increased daily grew worse and worse till at last there came out of the womb of them the great Antichrist But when Christ shall set up this Kingdom whereof we speak there shall be no danger by any gross Errors or seduction by false Teachers Isa 30.25 26. There shall be upon every high mountain and upon every high hill rivers and streams of waters in the day of the great slaughter when the Towers fall Moreover the light of the Moon shall be as the light of the Sun and the light of the Sun shall be sevenfold as the light of seven dayes in the day that the Lord bindeth up the breach of his People and healeth the stroke of their wound These rivers and streams of Ordinances shall break forth in all the Churches in the day of the great slaughter and when the Towers fall i. e. when the Pope and towring Kings shall be brought down Rev. 19 17. to 21. There shall be this wonderfull increase of Gospel-light when God shall heal that spiritual wound the poor Jew lies so sick of to this day when he shall bind up the breach that is between the ten and the two Tribes making them one in faith and love Rev. 22.1 He shewed a pure river of water of life clear as Chrystal proceeding out of the Throne of God and of the Lamb. Romish Ordinances were the blood of a dead man but the Ordinances of Christs Kingdom shall be a river of life most clear and pure ver 2. In the midst of the street of it and of either side the River was there the tree of life which bare twelve manner of fruits and yielded her fruit every moneth and the leaves of the tree were for the healing of the Nations Christ in his Ordinances will be a wonderfull tree of life bearing both all plenty and all variety of fruits free and open for every one to pluck and feed upon a healing vertue there is in the very leaves thereof the most outward parts of Ordinances will have saving efficacie upon mens hearts God will then send forth men of eminent parts and graces Obad. ver 22. Saviours shall come up on Mount Sion to judge the Mount of Esau and the Kingdom shall be the Lords In the day when the Lord shall take the Kingdom to himself there shall be Saviours raised up upon Mount Sion in the Margent of your Bibles you have a parallel place put 1 Tim. 4.16 Save the self and those that hear thee q.d. be a Saviour to thy self others Obadiah cals the then-Ministers of the Gospel Saviours because their Gospel-dispensations shall be in the holiness power of the great Saviour of men the Lord Jesus Christ And there will be the most zealous and impartial exercise of Church-discipline that ever was to keep out to purge out both the prophane and the erroneous for which take two or three Scriptures Rev. 21.27 There shall in no wise enter into it i. e. into the holy City which comes down from God out of Heaven any thing that desileth neither whatsoever worketh abomination or maketh a lye but they which are written in the Lambs book of life Not but that doubtless there will be hypocrites in the Church but they shall be so close they shall so artificially paint and varnish themselves over with seeming holiness that they may very well be taken in the judgement of charity for such whose names are written in the Lambs book of life but if once they appear to be defilers of themselves or others any kinde of way nay if they be but catched in lying if such offer themselves they shall not enter shall not be received if they be got in they shall quickly be sent packing again Zach. 13 1. In that day when there shall be a great mourning in Jerusalem because of him whom they had pierced Chap. 12.10 11. There shall be a fountain opened for sin and for uncleanness i. e. abundant streams not only of Doctrine and Worship but also of Discipline for it follows That Idols and false Prophets shall be cut off ver 2. And if any one continue to Prophesie or Preach lyes even his Father and Mother that begat him shall cause him to be thrust thorow with the sword of the Spirit or Church-censure such zeal and impartiality will there be
of Popish wordly powers they vanished and new ones came up in their place According to this Text must divers others be understood Isa 66. from the 18. verse to the end of the Chapter the Prophet Treats wholly of this Kingdom In the last verse he bids you look on the carcases of the men that had transgressed against Christ how remarkably and everlastingly they are destroyed In the 18 19 20. verses you have the Calling of the Jews and Nations of the Gentiles In the 21. and 23. verses you have the Ministers and Ordinances of the Gospel set forth and verse 22. all this called new heavens and new earth In the Margent of this Scipture there are divers quotations I would commend two of them to your notice One is Isa 65.17 For behold I create new heavens and new earth and the former shall not be remembred nor come into my minde That which God will do is so strange so mighty a Work that in comparison of Gods former Works of Providence t is called a Creation of new Heavens and new Earth which cannot be understood concerning the material Heavens and Earth for 't is a Prophesie of something to come that then was not but there was as much yea the very same Heavens and Earth properly taken then as there is now or ever will be there will be no change in the now Visible or Material Heavens Earth but the same Earth Sea Sun Moon Stars to Christs last coming Therefore the Prophet means and calls them new in respect of former ones as t is in the Text the former shall not be remembred Honoris gratiâ The Political Heavens and Earth as I said before of the Pope and Popish worldly Kingdoms these shall pass away and Christ shall set up new Heavens viz. a Heavenly King and Government over all the World Heavenly Officers to rule under him Thy exactors shall be righteousness heavenly Ordinances heavenly gifts and graces shall shine forth heavenly Pastors and Discipline and a new earth of external peace and external plenty the following verses of that 65. of Isaiah will force your thus to understand it The other Scripture the Margent quotes is 2 Pet. 3.12 13. Looking for and hastening to the coming of the day of God c. Nevertheless we according to promise look for new heavens and a new earth wherein dwelleth righteousness q.d. though I bid you look for and hasten to the great day of God wherein all shall be set on fire yet nevertheless take special notice how that word nevertheless v. 13. comes in do not fear that you shall lose that glorious Kingdom upon earth that your hearts are generally so much set upon Act. 1.6 7. Lord wilt thous now restore the kingdom to Israel That the Messias would do it 't was commonly known and believed of all the Jews and by these taken for granted our Saviour denyes not the matter of their Quaere suffering them to go on in their Faith of the thing it self only gives check to their curiosity It is not for you to know the times and seasons the Father hath put in his own hands Fear not say Peter before the great and last burning we groundedly from a promise expect that God will make and give us in our Posterity new heavens and new earth in which shall dwell none of that base ungodliness the present heavens and earth of the Kingdoms of this World are full of but in which shall dwell Righteousness as t is Rev 9 8. He names the chief thing in Christs Kingdom which will bring with it all the rest I have spoken of to you If we that live now who have taken notice of the present state of things might be raised out of our graves and have a full view of the Kingdom Christ will set up everywhere certainly there would be no more spirit in us we should cry out here is noting of that World that was when we were upon earth we see none of the old Kings and Queens old Rulers old Governments old Sins and Sinners old wayes that formerly were all the old things are gone and behold all is become new Here 's a new King and new Officers new kinde of Preachers new Ordinances new Discipline new Saints new Church new State all 's become new Why this is not the World that was when we were alive behold here 's a new World that the Lord Christ Omnipotent hath Created Lastly This Kingdom shall be of no small continuance Surely Christ will not be at all this care cost pain to pull down to set up to make a new World of it and all this but for a day or a year Antichrist had a thousand two hundred and threescore years to play Rex in now indeed 't is pitty Christ should not have as long a Reign in the World at least It is not for us to know the times and seasons the Father hath reserved in his own hands But I le tell you what Scripturer saith to it Isa 65.17 he had promised as I told you to create new Heavens and new Earth and lest you should mis-understand this new Heavens and new Earth what they are he tels you ver 18. I create Jerusalem a rejoycing and her people a joy that I mean but when shall this be Why ver 19. When the voice of weeping and crying shall be no more heard in her which must needs point at a time after the destruction of the Temple for then there was weeping and crying enough amongst them viz. upon the now so much expected Calling of the Jews and setling of them again in their own Land at which time ver 22. They shall not build and another inhabit as it had been often formerly with them they shall not plant and another eat but they shall dwell in their own houses and eat their own labours But for what space shall this joy and settlement of theirs be It follows Mine elects shall long enjoy the work of their hands they shall enjoy their new heavens and new earth a long time Rev. 20 2 3 4. The angel laid hold on Satan and bound him at thousand years and the Saints lived and reigned with Christ successively generation after generation a thousand years T is very likely this is a certain number for an uncertain but whether it be more or it be less questionless this expression of a thousand years assures us of a very long time Isa 60.15 I will make thee the joy of many generations not a few but many generations I leave it to your judgement what number of years in this case are to be accounted many the Saints shall enjoy this blessed this glorious reign of Christ for many generations But that which goes immediatly before is this I will make thee an eternal excellency speaking of the Church The word eternal here being to be understood comparatively to other great Kingdoms that have been set up and in time fallen must import a duration as great
and greatness withheld them but when the hand of Providence took them out of the way then they became Popes and manifested themselves to be the seventh distinct Roman Government the last head of that beast Thus you see how both Saint John and Saint Paul were guided by one Spirit when they describe Antichrist to point the finger at the Popes of Rome Take it thus He that succeeds the Emperors in the Government of the Roman State or he that is seventh head of Daniels fourth beast he is the great Antichrist but the Popes of Rome succeed the Emperors in the Government of the Roman state or they are the seventh head of the fourth great beast therefore the Popes of Rome are the great Antichrist Secondly Antichrist is the man that sets himself above all Rule and all authority 2. Thes 2.8 then shall the wicked be revealed that 's our translation but the Greek is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the lawless man v. 4. Who opposeth and exalteth himself above all that is called God or that is worshipped so that he as God sitteth in the Temple of God shewing himself that he is God How must men forfeit their Intellectuals to fasten all this anywhere but upon the popes For first they are Church-men their seat is in the Temple or reputed Church of God The great Turk let his pride and domination be what it will yet he sits not in the Temple he 's no Church-man but the Pope is Secondly he is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Lawless man PopeGratian in his decrees reckons up several Laws publike private Laws the Laws of Nature and Nations written and unwritten Laws civil and canonical the Laws both of God and man but the conclusion of all he makes is this that they are all subject to the Popes interpretation and dispensation and that he is the spiritual man who judgeth all things and himself is judged of none He allows such marriages as God hath forbidden You all know he allowed Henry the eighth of England to have his brother Arthurs wife which God expresly forbids Levit. 18.16 Thou shalt not uncover the nakedness of thy brothers wife And when the sinfullness of it was discovered he would not untye the knot or allow a divorce though it got him nothing and so justified the sin of uncleanness and the trangression of Gods Law He absolves people from the Laws of obedience to the Powers that God hath set over them contrary to that Let every soul be subject to the High powers so the Greeks or the Powers that are set up on high Rom. 13 To kill a Protestant is no murther to blow up a Parliament is meritorious nay though he carry plures animarum currus ad tartara none may say unto him cur ita facis Thus he puts all Rule and Law under his feet Thirdly He apposeth and exalteth himself above all that is called God or is Worshipped meaning all civil Powers and Rulers of this World the beast hath lift up his paw at them all yea and fetched them under too Rev. 17.12.13 The ten horns are ten Kings those have one mind and give their power and strength to the beast i. e. he had conquered them and they yeilded themselves his slaves their power their strength their all should be at his service vigorously to promote his designs Bellarm in his fifth Book de Rom. Pontif. hath these words Omnes Imperatores Pontifici Romano debent suum imperium all Kings and Emperors owe their Crowns and Scepters to the Bishop of Rome And hereupon the Pope stiles himself Rex Regum Dominus Dominantium King of Kings Lord of Lords and 't is not bare words but he acts accordingly in deposing Kings and giving away their Kingdoms Pope Innocent the third deposed King John of England and gave this Land to Philip Augustus King of France but at last he absolved him upon condition he would hold his Kingdom in Fee of the Church of Rome and that he should pay yearly a thousand Marks of silver in token of his subjection Pope Alexander the sixth gave the West Indies to the Spaniard the East Indies to the Portugal and set them their Limits Pope Pius the fifth pronounced the sentence of degradation and deposition against Queen Elizabeth The Monks whipt Henry the second of England upon the death of Becket and when he spoke some angry words to them Domine say they noli mirarii nos enim nullas minas timemus qui de tali curia sumus quae consuevit imperare Regibus Imperatoribus never threaten us we fear no threats we are of such a Court as ruleth our kings and Emperors I think I could have furnished you with a hundred stories of like nature Fourthly he sits in the Temple of God shewing himself that he is God Non ait dicens sed ostendens says one hoc est operibus signis miraculis nitens ostendere quod sit Deus He doth not say it in words at length that he 's God but his carriage and the prerogatives Royal he claims are such as if he were God himself This they stick not to speak out idem est dominium Dei Papae the Rule of God and the Pope are the same Jus ecclesiasticum est jus divinum their ecclesiastical Law is Divine and must bind the conscience as well as any Laws of God Hereupon one expounds it meethinks very well in templo conscientiarum he sits in the Temple of mens consciences He forgives sin as God doth he makes Articles of faith as God doth he takes to himself the Names and Titles that God doth the Councel of Lateran stiles him tu es alter Deus in terris another God upon Earth Dominus Deus noster para our Lord God the Pope he takes Divine worship to himself as God doth they bow before him and kiss his feet which an Angel of heaven would not receive of John Rev. 22. see you do it not Worship God Nay he takes upon him to do that which God will not do to dispense with Laws moral and natural as I said before to give Indulgences to sin for time to come there have been Leases granted for years Schoolemen affirm Deum non magis homini indulgere posse ut 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 sese gerat quam justitiae suae ordinem overtere seipsum negare God can as soon destroy his order and course of Justice yea deny himself as give men Indulgences to transgress his Laws to walk disorderly but the Pope hath not so bound his own hands he can be Dominus Deus and yet upon good consideration and advantages indulge men to violate any or all the laws of God and Nature He takes upon him to deliver souls out of Purgatory to Canonize Saints at his pleasure so that what is said of God is said of the Pope and more also Take the summ of all thus He who is the great Churchman above all Law and above all Earthly
found to pretend to be wholy for Christ and yet in every thing he crosseth and opposeth Christ therefore the Pope is the man of sin the true and great Antichrist Fourthly Saint John Rev. 13. having described the Roman State under six of its heads or Governments ver 11. he brings forth the last head viz. Antichrist that beast by himself of him he saith He had two horns like a Lamb spake like a Dragon and exercised the power of the first beafi that was before him How this Description agrees to the Pope you shall see 1. He hath two horns like a Lamb two horns in his Miter two Keys in his hand a twofold Power Sacred and Secular Spiritual and Temporal as being both King and Priest of the Church Boniface the eighth in the year one thousand three hundred who instituted the first Iubile came out one day in his Pontifical habit the next day in his Robes imperial having two swords carried before him he caused the Herald to cry Ecce duo glady behold two Swords he might as well have caused him to have cried Ecce duo cornua Antichristi behold the two horns of Antichrist Secondly as like a Lamb as he looks yet he hath the Dragons tongue in his mouth he speaks like a Dragon i. e. like a raging Devil swelling words of great terror Rev. 13.5 There was given unto him a mouth speaking great things and blasphemies He. speaks on this wise whosoever will not worship the beast and his Image and receive his mark in their hand or forehead they shall not buy nor sell they shall be killed he will shut heaven against them and pass sentence of Damnation upon them they shall go to Hell That furious Dragon the Devil speaks nothing but terror to Saints hath the Pope a good word for any that do truly fear God He calls them Heretiques he thunders out his Bulls and Excommunications against them he speaks nothing but Inquisitions Blood Death Hell unto them Truly the Pope speaks as like the Dragon as if he had been spate out of his mouth John 12. ult Our Saviour saith of himself Whatsoever I speak even as the Father said unto me so I speak the Pope may take up the words thus Whatsoever I speak even as the Dragon sayd unto me so I speak Thirdly He exerciseth all the Power of the first beast that was before him Look what Power was in the hands of any or all the Roman Governors Kings Consuls Tribunes Decemvirs Dictators Emperours the Pope hath got it all to himself and hereupon is called the Image of the first Beast He hath brought Kingdoms and People under him as the former did Rules over them with as much Pride and Tyranny as the former did hath suppressed the preaching of the Gospel as much as ever they did is as great a hater persecutor shedder of the blood of Saints as ever any or all of them were Lives in as great sensuality pompous glory as any did that were before him So then He who hath two horns like a Lamb speaks like the Dragon and exerciseth the Power of the first beast he is the great Antichrist but the Pope hath two horns like a Lamb speaks like the Dragon and exerciseth the Power of the first beast therefore the Pope is the great Antichrist Fifthly Antichrist shall comfirm his Doctrine Laws Kingdom by Miracles Rev. 13.13 14. He doth great Wonders so that he maketh fire come down from heaven on the Earth in the sight of men And deceiveth all them that dwell upon the earth by means of the Miracles which he had power to do in the sight of the beast c. This none in the World attempts to do beside the Pope Heb. 2.3 4. Christ did sufficiently confirm that Doctrine Gospel Kingdom he set up by Signs Wonders and divers Miracles so that Austin long since said If any man looked for Miracles he himself was a Miracle And therefore t is evident the Pope hath another Doctrine Gospel Kingdom to establish and advance in the World that to perswade men to receive and submit to he must be put to the working of new Miracles Miracles are so in esteem with them that they are made a mark of the true Church and ours is a false Church because we can work no Miracles whereas indeed our Saviour makes them a note of false Christs and false Prophets Mark 13.22 False Christs and false Prophets shall rise and shew signs and wonders to seduce if it were possible even the Elect The Pope hath come as near seducing the Elect as any man did that ever lived And Saint John here makes them a mark of Antichrist and his Church so also doth Paul 2 Thes 2.8 9. Then shall that wicked be revealed even he whose coming is after the working of Satan with all Power and signs and lying wonders In Gregory the great his time when Antichrist was near to be revealed Miracles of all sorts began to be multiplied there were apparitions for confirmation of purgatory praying to Saints praying for the dead I have read many stories of their Miracles which here I will not trouble you with they 'l serve well for winter-tales Onely this one word t is sayed of Pope Hildebrand called Gregory the seventh that he would as oft as he pleased shake fire out of his Gown sleevs to the great terror and astonishment of the People Their own Historians tell us that above twenty of their Popes have been abominable Nigromancers who by their sorceries and divelish wonders have deceived the World so gaining credit to their way But it may be some will ask me what shall we think of the many and great Miracles that are amongst them I 'le tell you Those Miracles Papists say they now do are done with the Antipodes in the furthest parts of the world for my part I am resolved I will not go to disprove them I believe the most of them are meer fained lyes or else they are but mira not miracula as applying activa passivis may produce very wonderful effects sometimes the senses of men are bemisted add deceived as Pharoahs Magicians did their Spectators Many times the fancy is deluded they perswade some People they are possessed and then perswade them they are dispossessed but they do it by Holy-water Crosses Exorcisme not by the Power of the word as Christ did and Christ did cast out divels by day-light before many witnesses yea his very Enemies but Priests cast them out closely in their chambers in the night and will have no spectators but such as are their sworn friends Our Saviour did other Miracles He gave legs to the lame eyes to the blind he raised the dead to life but these can do nothing but only this about devils therefore I am assured there is some gross delusion or other in it But well gloria Miraculorum is their badge and t is most evident if Saint John may be believed t is a mark of Antichrist and
his Church Take it thus He that since the Apostles and first primitive-Christian times will confirm his Doctrine and set up his Kingdom by Miracles is the great Antichrist But the Pope and none in the World else since those times confirms his Doctrines and sets up his Kingdom by Miracles therefore the Pope is the great Antichrist Sitxhly Antichrist shall challenge to himself a Power over all Nations and Churches upon the face of the Earth in reference to Christ as being his Vicegerent Rev. 13.7 Power was given him over all Kinreds Tongues and Nations ver 16.17 He causeth all both great and small rich and poor bond and free to receive his mark and that no man might buy or sell save he that had the mark c. This Power the Pope assumes to himself and hath had it for no man in the World layes claim to it but he though the great Turk lays claim to all yet not in reference to Christ as his Deputy but the Pope doth It is Antichristian to challenge Power over the faith and conscience of one man or Church t is more Antichristian to challenge Power over many Churches as Bishops do t is a further degree of Antichristianism to claim a Power over whole Provinces as Arch-Bishops do t is yet more to Lord it over the faith of many Provinces and Kingdoms as Patriarks do but to challenge such Soveraignty over all the Churches in the world as the Pope doth thats the great Antichrist of Antichristianism And as one wittily saith lest he should wrong himself by too modest a claim for you must know he 's a modest soul he doth not onely challenge a Power over all this world but in Heaven Hell also where ever Christ hath power yea and even in Purgatory too where Christ hath no Power Mr. Fox in his book of Martyrs records Pope Leo the tenth his Bull against Luther where he charges all Patriarks Metropolitans Primates Arch-Bishops Bishops and all other Ecclesiastical Orders downwards even to the begging Friers and then all Kings Electors of the Empire Princes Dukes and so on and at last all men throughout the universal World upon pain of the great excommunication that they do not embrace Luthers Doctrine adhere to or favor his person Judge you now if this Language be not the very same with that of the great Antichrist Rev. 13. And let me tell you the Popes of Rome have exercised this supremacie for many hundred years Before I close this in hand let me in a word answer a quaere or two the Church of Rome are still putting to us Where was your Doctrine and where was your Church before Luther Why as for our Doctrine my Answer 's thus It was where their 's never was in the Scriptures And as for our Church where that was my Answer runs thus I. Our Protestant-Divines have abundantly cleared it to them that in all Ages there were some they have named the men and the junctures of time in which they lived that opposed Pope and Popery Secondly if we had none before Luther how came they to have so much work for their Inquisitions before Luther for their Armies against the Albigenses and Waldenses five hundred years ago and how came Thomas Arundel Arch Bishop of Canterbury and his fellow Bishops in the reign of Henry the fourth and Henry the fifth of England to condemn and execute so many of the followers of Wickliff and amongst the rest that gallant and famous Saint Sir Iohn Old-Castle 'T is strange there were none of our Church before Luther when there were its well enough known so many in every Kingdom apprehended and executed for opposing the Pope for denying and rejecting popish Doctrine and worship Surely all they may very well be reckoned of our Religion for they would die before-they would be of theirs Thirdly If by this they mean where was your Church visible t is a Nonsence quaere for Rev. 11.2 the holy City meaning the visible Church of Christ shall they tread under foot forty two Moneths i. e. all the time of Antichrist and Rev. 13. He had Power given him over all People Nations and Languages and all the World wondred after the beast T was an impossibility and inconsistent with Gods eternal counsel and decree that we should have a visible Church during the height of Antichrists reign It is enough for us that there have been two witnesses in every age Prophesying in sackloth against him some few haters opposers of him very closely and secretly you might hear of two or three Heretiques in a Kingdom or in a County but perhaps you should not know many times where to find one of them the Beast had so got all the World under his paws Take it in this Syllogisme He that usurps Authority over the faith and conscience of all the Kingdoms and Churches in the World he is the great Antichrist but this the Pope hath done and doth do at this day at least presumptively and intentionally he 'l tell you 't is his right therefore the Pope is the great Antichrist Seventhly The Holy Ghost hath upon the matter named him to us Rev. 13. and last verse Here is wisdom let him that hath understanding count the number of the beast for it is the number of a man and his number is six hundred threescore and six As if the spirit of God had sayd 't is not over difficult to find out his name seing t is the number of a man a number that a man may find out or reckon Then he commends the finding of it out for a special piece of wisdom and understanding that so every one might be encouraged to set himself to work it being natural unto men to desire to be accounted wise In the Hebrew 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Romagnosh Romanus a Roman the numeral letters make up six hundred sixty six In the Greek 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the man that useth the Latine tongue so much the numeral letters make up six hundred sixty six You know no expression pleaseth but this ecclesia catholica Romana and the Latine Tongue Latine Bible Latine Service all must be in Latine out of this number says Saint John in effect find out his name that is so much for the Latine In the Latine tongue this Generalis dei Vicarus in terris makes up six hundred sixty six And to give him not onely the name he desires but the name he deserves In our English The Pope by superioritie is the divels Leiftenant the numeral letters hereof make up six hundred sixty six This number may be found in such names and terms as do rightly set him out in diverse Langaages But the Jesuites object that this number may be found in many other names We shall easily grant it may without weakning what hath been delivered for they can bring no other name to whom all the other properties of Antichrist do agree The Holy Ghost doth not send us here barely to
Rome therefore Anti-christs Seat must be also at Rome The Third thing they weakly or rather wilfully say of him is this That his whole raign is but for three of our years and a half 1. But doubtless this must be understood of Angels years according as Daniels seventy weeks and threescore and two weeks are meant of weeks of years this is spiritual counting by Gods own direction Numb 14.34 Ezek. 4.6 I have appointed thee each day for a year 2. Is there any likelihood in reason that in the space of three of our years and a half he should compass all that the Scripture speaks of him First he must seduce from Christ by corrupting their judgements all the world except two witnesses a small number of the Elect and what time must this take up set the shortest for it in reason that you can Secondly He must teach them his own Doctrine and Worship and make them all drunk with the wine of his abominable fornications Thirdly he must build a great and stately Temple to sit in and there be worshipped as God say they but suppose all the materials at hand it would spend most if not all that time before it could be finished and his sitting times surely will be but short considering what his work must be if his whole should be but three years and a half Fourthly He must wage war and fight great battels bring down mighty Kings and Kingdoms and make himselfe drunk with the blood of all the Saints Fifthly He must have a flourishing reign without any visible or considerable opposition Rev. 11.2 The Court which is without the Temple measure it not for it is given to the Gentiles and the Holy City shall they tread under foot forty two months Rev. 13.7 Power was given him over all Kindreds Tongues and Nations ver 3. All the World wondred after the Beast and ver 4. Who is like unto the Beast Who is able to make war with the Beast Tell me now that likelyhood in reason is there that all this should be effected in three years and a half Thus you see they who willfully left God have left yea lost both Religion and common reason in that which most nearly concernd them to be quick-sighted in But I wonder not if they that are dead drunk ravingly talk their own irrational Fancies Other fond and groundless descriptions they give of that Antichrist they have framed to themselves but these three being fallen the rest cannot stand 'T is not worth while to trouble you or my self any further with them as those who will search after them cannot but confess and I judge it better to say enough then all Vse 2. Is the Pope Antichrist You see then First what a sad case they are in who of Protestants turn to be Papists they submit themselves to the Beast and stand engaged to fight against Christ his Kingdom and their own Salvation and what the issue of that will be you shall hear upon the next Subject and they shall feel hereafter Secondly You may hence gather what it is to be an able a learned Papist this a grown strong man armed a Goliah defieing God the Israel of God and the Gospel of God with all its grace and hopes We use to say of Jesuites quo meliores eò deteriores the better they are the worse they are it holds true of all Papists whatsoever Thirdly the Pope being Antichrist you may easily know what all Popish Ordinances are their Doctrines Auricular confessions Pennances Holy water Crucifixes Beads Extream Unctions Altars Bloodless Sacrifices Merits Satisfactions Images the Worship of Saints and Angels with Invocation of them Indulgences Pilgrimages Burying in a Franciscans-hood Purgatory Canonization all this will all other appurtenances of their Religion are all Antichristianism the Holy-Ghosts expression of them is They are the blood of a dead man Rev. 16.3 No bettter then the polluting Choaking Killing blood of a dead man therefore take heed and beware of their Religion hate it with a right perfect hatred even all those forms of worship Formalities Ceremonies any thing every thing that is a kinn to it as you would hate when you are athirst drinking blood Fourthly You may hence also learn what healing balm for a wounded Conscience what true comfort for him that is weary and burdened heavily with his sin the Church of Rome and their Religion can afford Alas what balm what heart-consolations can Antichrist Antichristianism hold forth They themselves are so far convinced of this that they have made it a Doctrine and point of Faith that to talk of assurance of Salvation is presumption onely Apostles and extraordinary Christians have attained to assurance but t is presumption and boldness for the People to think of it to believe as the Church believes is enough Cold comfort this the Lord knows for an enlightned and wounded Conscience at the hour of Death to have nothing to take off the guilt of sin to break the power of lust to appease an angry God and deliver the poor soul out of the jaws of Death and Hell but a few Beads and Crucifixes and Reliques and the menstruous raggs of creature-righteousness and performances a few empty wishes and hopes and believing as the Church believes how may all such cry out as one of them did O animule quo vadis Poor despicable miserable Soul whither goest thou Cornel. E. Lapid in his Comment on the eleventh of Numbers tells this story of Pius Quintus who Excommunicated Queen Elizabeth Cuus essem religiosus sperabam bene de salute animae meae Cardinalis factus extimui Pontifex creatus penè despero When I was in Religious Orders I hoped well of the Salvation of my soul being made a Cardinal I was sore afraid of it but since I was created Pope I een despair Rev. 9.5 And to the Locusts was given that they should not kill men but that they should torment them five months and their torment was as the torment of a Scorpion when it strikes a man Natural Locusts come in April and continue till September five months whereto the Spirit of God here alludes and says those mystical Locusts that came out of the smoak the bottomless pit should torment men five months that is throughout their whole duration and their torment is as the torment of a Scorpion when he striketh a man Now the sting of a Scorpoin is not at first perceived but when it is it works after such a lingering manner that it affords some hopes of life yet doth certainly bring death in the end When the poor soul is enlightned and conscience stird with appredension of Divine displeasure Popish Ordinances and Administrations prove no better then the stings of Scorpions to them afflicted and vexed they are with them yet some faint hopes they have from them but at last finding themselves deluded they vainly wish Death it self as if that would help them ver 6. They shall desire to die and Death shall flie
from them leaving them still to the mercy of Popish racks and torments Know assuredly that Pope and Jesuites by any thing that is in their Religion are not nor can they be but skinners over at the best slight healers of the wounds of Conscience miserable Comforters Physitians of no value the Lord in mercy keep all his own out of their hands Vse 3. The next Use is exhortatory that every one of us would admire and bless the Lord and his goodness that he hath brought us forth in such a juncture of time and cast our lot in such a place that we are not constrained to receive the mark of the Beast in our hands or in our foreheads I desire to bless God every day that God did not bring me forth in Spain or Italy but that I am born an English man and at such a time when Popery is not the Religion of the Nation but the light of the Glorious Gospel of Jesus Christ shines amongst us and into us Troubles I confess we have seen and felt but put them all together with their utmost aggravations so far as concerns the outward man and they are not worthy to be compared with the exceeding great happiness we enjoy in our deliverances from the Egyptian darkness and bondage of popery especially if you take in the light and comforts of Christs blood and Gospel-truths we walk in What would have become of thee poor soul hadst thou lived in times wherein the Sea of Ordinances were no better then the blood of a dead man The Lord grant every one of us to know our Gospel-happiness and priviledges to rejoyce in the light and work the works of him that sent us while we have the light even comfort and Salvation to our selves glory to Christ advancement to his Kingdom and all this by receiving the truth in the love of it and holding forth the word of life Vse 4. Is the Pope Antichrist and Popery Antichristianism Why then let it not trouble you when ever or where ever you see Christ and his Armies in the greatness of their strength and fury marching out against them The Pope hath long time been Apollyon a destroyer of others even of the Church and People of God but he himself shall be destroyed Filius perditionis the Son of perdition 2 Thes 2.3 That day shall not come except there come a falling away first and that man of sin be revealed the Son of Perdition IN the former Treatise I held forth the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 also both the Rise and full Growth of Antichrist It remains that I now shew you his 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Ebbing or declination of that proud Tide the many several paces and degrees whereof from first to last do make up his total ruine and give him his name Filius Perditionis the Son of Perdition Taking him in his largest capacity the Point will be this The Pope and his Kingdom are appointed of God to most remarkable destruction First God hath foretold and threatned it Rev. 13.9.10 If any man have an ear let him hear He that leadeth into captivity shall go into captivity He that killeth with the sword must be killed with the sword Here is the Patience and Faith of the Saints God hath proclaimed it to all who have spiritual ears to hear that he hath captivity and a killing sword in store for those who have been such cruel enemies to his People And he would have all his Saints act their faith in believing this threat and their patience in waiting the full Execution of it Secondly Christ into whose hands all power in heaven and Earth is committed hath sworn it I say God hath not onely threatned it but Christ hath sworn it Rev. 10.5 6. The Angel which I saw stand upon the Sea and upon the Earth lifted up his hand to Heaven And sware hy him that liveth for ever who created Heaven the Earth and Sea with all things that are therein that there should be time no longer The Angel of the Covenant set one foot upon the Sea the other upon the Land Sea and Land you know make up the terrestial Globe whereby is prefigured his throwing Antichrist out of all and taking possession of all the World himself He lifts up his hand the ancient ceremony of an Oath The thing he swears is this That there should be time no more not simply but for the Man of sin to reign havocking and destroying his Church Look upon the structure of the Church of Rome the power and policy of its constitution and Government and who could in reason conceive that Babylon should ever be destroyed Says Christ you have my word for it you have my Oath for it it shall shortly come to pass that the time of their domination shall be no more I will certainly ease you of her God willing more abundantly as the Apostle speaks Heb. 6. to shew unto the Heirs of promise the immutability of his Counsel confirmed it by an Oath that by two immutable things his Word and Oath in which it was impossible for God to lye we might have strong consolation in the assurance of Romes headlong downfall Thirdly The Holy-Ghost brings it in as fully performed as either sayd or sworn in the Gross or Lump and also in the Particulars of it First in the Gross and Lump Dan. 12.1 At that time shall Michael stand up the great Prince which standeth for the children of thy People and there shall be a time of trouble such as never was since there was a Nation even to that same time and at that time thy People shall be delivered You have a Parallel to this Rev. 16.17.18.19 The seventh Angel poured out his vial into the air and there came a great voice out of the Temple of Heaven from the Throne saying 't is done And there were Voyces and Thunders and Lightnings and there was a great Earthquake such as was not since men were upon the Earth so mighty an Earthquake and so great And the great City was divided into three parts and the Cities of the Nations fell and great Babylon came into remembrance before God to give unto her the cup of the wine of the feirceness of his wrath Such an Earthquake will God raise under them such showers and storms shall God send down upon them as t is in the last verse of that Chapter There fell upon men a great hail out of Heaven every stone about the weight of a Talent that made them curse and blaspheme for the plague thereof was exceeding great I say such terrible Earthquakes and plaguing Storms of troubles will befall them as never any Kingdom in the World felt or heard of Rev. 14 19 20. And the Angel thrust in his sickle into the Earth and gathered the Vine of the Earth the Church of Christ is a Vine of Heaven its root is in Heaven all its fruitfulness is from Heaven and for Heaven
Vial into their hands and poured it out upon Episcopacy to some purpose Then came the Parliament of England and rooted up Episcocal Government by the very roots and in both Nations it was done with a great deal of Judgement Wisdom Courage Piety And his Kingdom was full of darkness So our translation but the Greek imports but this his kingdom was darkned what Scotland had done in a judicial way and the Parliament of England had done in a judicial way I say when the news thereof came to the Popes ears to the ears his Cardinals Jesuites and all his religious orders and Churches in Europe can you imagine less but it was black and sad news to them and news of a dangerous consequence and a shrewd persage to all the lovers and upholders of that Government what a deal of Popish lustre and glory was there in the three Nations by reason of Episcopacy East Host Altar Tapers Copes Surplesses dressing up of Chappels with the Pictures of Christ Virgin Mary Apostles Adorning Church-Widdows with the stories of the Bible in time to have become Laymens books Altar-adoration Sacrament-adoration Organs Singing of service that travellors from beyond Seas when they saw the posture of things would say one to another we are at home were but the service in Latine as t is in English And what great hopes had the Pope of the reconciliation of these Kingdoms to himself again and all by means of that height of Episcopacy amongst us But when a Vial full of wrath was poured out upon it according as you have heard how was the popish lustre and glory in England Scotland and Ireland quite put out and a very considerable degree of loss sorrow and darkness brought in upon the Popes whole dominions so as made them generally bite their tongues for madness and blaspheme The sixth Vial is poured out upon the great river Euphrates Euphrates must be here taken mystically for that which is the maintenance and defence of Rome Antichristian as that river was anciently of old Babylon There are five streams of baseness that run into one and so make up this great Euphrates Saint John mentions them Rev. 9.20 21. Images Murthers Sorceries Fornications Thefts by these Rome hath encreased her wealth and by these Rome hath been upheld and secured Now when the ten Christian Kings or Supream Powers shall be so far converted to God and have the eyes of their understanding so far enlightned as to see all this their perverting of Religion and these gross abuses out the Christian world their hearts will then rise against her so as to dry up and withdraw these streams of base revenues by which they have been so enriched and defended They 'l pull down Images whereby the simple people have been deluded severely punish their Sorceries whereby they have so awed and terrified the World their fornications and whorish stews whereby so many have been daily drowned in sensuality and undone eternally they 'l put an end to their Inquisitions whereby so many precious Servants of God have been cruelly murther'd an end also to their spiritual Thefts and Robberies when they perceive the merits of the Alsufficient sacrifice of Jesus Christ is held forth to them freely for the remission of sins according to that Isaiah 55.1.2 They 'l refuse to trade with them any more for their rotten creature-righteousness their Pardons and Indulgences shall bring in no more treasures into the Popes Coffers they 'l part with no more monies to have the souls of their departed friends prayed and sung out of Purgatory and will cast all their Trumperies out of their dominions And thus shall the great river Euphrates be dryed up That be way may be prepared for the Kings of the East that is that the ten Kings or Supream powers now finding in the eye of reasons the ruine of Rome feasable may encourage one another to the work and dispatch it they are called Kings of the East in allusion to Cyrus who came East from Babylon and took it Or thus that way may be made for the Kings of the East i. e. for the briging home the People of the Jews who are here called Kings You may see another notable interpretation of this Vial in Mr. Reynolds Sermon preaced before the House Aug. 28. 1644. page 41. The seventh and last Vial is poured out into the Air. The Air in which the Antichristian world lives is the smoak of the bottomless Pit Rev. 9. or the darkness of Ignorance for out of this came their Locusts all their hellish Doctrines and Worship Upon the pouring out of this Vial the Glory of the Son of Righteousness and of Gospel Ordinances doth so break forth as quite prevails against that Infernal Darkness and Spiritual Ignorance which bred Papacy and in which Papacy had so long breathed and lived and so the Antichristian Air being destroyed they fall a gasping and the pangs of Death come upon them for immediately there comes a voyce from Heaven saying T is done there 's an end of the Pope and his Kingdom and all the Mystery of iniquity Let me speak a little to the following verses Verse 18. There were voyces and thunderings and lightnings and as it were the sound of Trumpets upon mens Spirits that make their hearts quake and tremble within them and also a great earth-quake such a one as was not since men wer upon the earth so mighty and so great These will be sad days with the Antichristian party such thunderings voyces lightnings from above such an earth-quake from beneath them the face of things threatning as if Heaven and Earth would come together Do you marvel if at their Worlds end they be at their Wits end The effects of these lightnings thunders earthquake follow verse 19. First The great City was divided into three parts But by this Great City I understand Rome it self which was shaken into three factions and so became weak that it could not defend it self against the Besiegers There have been three factions amongst us I call them Factions onely because each have so esteemed of other peradventure it will run upon a threefold Party of Faction to the end of the War Then the Citits of the Nations fell i. e. fell off from her and left her dosolate of all former help and comfort and so Babylon the great came into remembrance before God to give unto her the cup of the wine of the feirceness of his wrath See how this is expressed Rev. 18.8 Her plagues come in one day Death and Mourning and Famine and she shall be utterly burnt with fire The latter end of that nineteenth verse doubtless looks as far as the great battel of God Almighty the issue whereof is set down Rev. 19 20. the Beast was taken and with him the false prophet and were both cast alive into the Lake of fire burning with brimstone Yet all this contents not Christ he still goes on to pursue his Victory Rev. 16.20 Every
Island fled away and the mountains were not found Nothing so remote as the Islands nothing so strong as the Mountains but the Antichristian Islands fled and perished before the stroak of Christ the Mountains were beaten to dust Christ will not leave Papacy so much as a Mountain to flie to or an Island to hide itself in he 'l leave no peice of the frame of Antichristianisme standing in any part of the World And yet still he goes on ver 21. There fell upon men a great hail out of heaven every stone about the weight of a Talent and men blasphemed God because of the plague of the hail for the plague thereof was exceeding great Here is an Allusion to Ezek. 13.11 to 16. I conceive the genuine sense of the verse to be this Those ten Kings or Supream powers who follow Jesus Christ in this Expedition have Commissions or Commands from the God of Heaven though Rome be burnt yea and the great battell of God Almighty fought and finished to go on with their braining destroying judgements upon all those everywhere wo are found to have had any interest in the Popes cause or Kingdom in worshipping the Beast or any way been engaged for his preservation and defence They shall be pursued and destroyed with such plagues and judgements as that it shall be evident they are from God and that heaven it self fights against them to root out that accursed race to the last man from off the Earth I suppose by this time you are all willing and ready to set your seals to this truth that The Pope who is the great Antichrist and his Kingdom shall be destroyed with most remarkable destruction But now I know the first Quaere you l make within your selves upon what hath been delivered and desire some satisfaction in wil be that of the Disciples Mat. 24.3 tell us when shall these things be and what shall be the sign of their comming I confess these are marvellous hard Questions but I shall freely tell you my thoughts upon them I find the time of Antichrists reign set down Rev. 11.2 The Holy city shall he tread under foot forty two months also Rev. 13.5 and it was given him to continue forty and two moneths by the way let me tell you his reign is reckoned by the moon which rules the night to hint thus much to us that Antichrists works are night works his whole reign is a reign of darkness but to the thing itself Forty and two months allowing thirty dayes to a moneth for they are Lunar moneths I told you make up a thousand two hundred and thereescore days the just time of the witnesses prophesying in sackcloth Rev. 11. or three years and a half First I understand these numbers of a certain and determinate time because every one of them is a broken number round numbers as we call them ten a hundred a thousand are put most times indeterminately a certain for an uncertain number but this is not a round but a broken number 2. These 42. months or three years and a half cannot be taken strictly for 42. of our months or three of our years and a half because as I shewed you before t is an utter impossibility that the Rise and Growth the Glory and all the business of his Kingdome should be compassed in so short a time Therefore Thirdly they must be taken according to that Ezek. 4.6 I have appointed thee each day for a year Every day in these 42 months being put for a year the whole amounts to 1260 years the just raign of Antichrist But when the time of his raign did begin confident I am there is no man alive without extraordinary Revelation can speak certainly and to a day and hereupon it is that all divines are at a loss as to a punctual certainty for his fall and ruin Concerning the time of the seetting forth of this Giant to run his course there are two or three opinions and I shall quickly tell them unto you 1. Some begin it as high as Constantine when he left Rome about the 19. year of his raign and seated in the East 2. Others place it as low as about the year 455. when Gensericus the Vandal took and burnt Rome at which time the Empire was broken all to pieces and utterly extinct There are a third sort who pitch it about the year 410. or 412. when Alaricus the Goth came and conquered and ransacked Rome Now they who say his 1260 years began when Constantine left Rome pitch his fall about Luthers time something above 100 years ago They who say it began at 455. make his fall and ruin 65. years yet to come They who affirm it began 410. or 412. lay him on his Death bed about twenty years hence It may be you will ask me my opinion amongst these Truly in a business of this abstruseness t would be wisedom to put you off with other mens judgements and conceal my own but I still finde that the sigleness of my spirit gets the predominancy of my Politicks 1. I like their opinion well who reckoning from Constantine pitch his fall in Luthers time for indeed Luther laid the foundation of his manifest ruin It is not unusual with Scripture to say a work is done if it be of God when t is but begun Revel 16.17 for it shall be as certainly done as if it were done already God calls things that are not as if they were 2. I think their Conclusion may be right who counting from 455. spin out his life to threescore years hence and upward but sure t is to be understood of that great battel of God Almighty mentioned Rev. 19.19 20. I verily perswade my self they who live threescore and ten or fourscore years hence shall neither see Pope nor form of Popery established by a law defended by a power in any Kingdome in the world 3. They most take with me who counting from 410. pitch his fall 20. years hence for about the year 410. or 412. the ten Horns or Kingdoms as Historians generally tell us were fairly appearing and surely the sixt head was going off at least if not quite off when some of the horns that grew on the seventh head were so visible The Pope must of necessity be before them for he is the seventh head upon which those horns grew it is said Rev. 17.12 They receive power one hour or as the Original might be better rendred the first hour with the beast But some read it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and not 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 not with but somewhat after the beast And indeed about this time the Popes shewed themselves openly to all the world and spake out what they wounld have that the censures of Bishops and all other causes of moment ought to be reserved to the Audience of the Bishop of Rome calling themselves the Father of Fathers and Firmament of Bishops When the Councel of Carthage in the year 413. sent and acquainted
perfect Victory is got Now let me shew you but very briefly how the Circumstances of that Providence stand in joynt with the Text both the thing itself and the sequeles of it For the thing itself First The Beast set upon them when they had finished their testimonie ver 7. The strictest sense may not be put upon this for when they have quite finished their testimony the beast will be absolutely ruined he and they being contemporaries Rev. 11.2.3 they both begin and end together else Christ should have none to be for him during some part of Antichrists raign therefore it must be understood when they were about to finish their testimony had brought it almost to a period because the Beasts raign and Kingdom was come almost to a period This war is to be when Antichrist is near upon his fall may it not then be looked for in our time when he is grown so old and gray-headed of his 1260. years having run up a 1240. or little less Seeing that from Daniel Paul and the Apostle Iohn we understand the ruine of the man of sin to fall into the lap of the Century wherin we live the more safely may any man conclude that what hath fallen out in our times may be the killing of the witnesses and signal token of his ruine It consists well enough with the Text for the time wherein the Witnesses are to be killed Secondly The text well looked into and considered doth clearly give it to be not a bloody but mystical or civil slaughter ver 7. compared with verse 11. their resurrection is not a proper but a civil or Mystical resurrection as shall anon be made good therefore it must needs follow to those who love not to be contentious that such also must be their death there being still the same reason of Opposites turned out of their places silenced disabled from speaking moving or acting in a publike way but thus we know the men spoken of were killed and lay dead Thirdly They thus lay dead the text saith In the street of the great City which is spiritually called Sodom Egypt where also our Lord was crucified ver 8. Rome is elegantly here described to be Sodom for uncleanness Egypt for idolatry Jerusalem for murther Oh Ierusalem thou that killest the Prophets c. It is called the great City as being made up of its ten Kingdoms and in the street t is not streets but in the street or in that Kingdom where they shall be killed there they shall lie that whole Kingdom or dominion being a street of the great City so made up whereto agrees the slaughter of these men being killed in one place which then was within Romes boundary and that in divers respects Fourthly In the street they lay unburied they were not suffered to be put in graves ver 9. this also must be expounded mystically those that are put in graves are out of every ones eye these dead men their friends were not suffered to afford them graves that is to allow them any harbour or hiding place all must shut them out of doores but they lay there where their Enemies might feed and glut their eye upon their miseries Fifthly They were in this condition for the space of three dayes and a half ver 9. Which being a broken number do certainly point out a determinate time neither can they be taken strictly for three natural days and a half for in that time the news of their killing could not be sent throughout the Antichristian World and what space were that to congratulate and solace themselves and one another in the slaughter of them and besides how litle is half a day perceived in such feasting and jocand solemnity and therefore they must be understood prophetically three days and a half for three years and a half and t is well known that these men were under the bands of Confinement or power of their civil death just so long neither more nor less three years and a half a die ad diem Sixthly It is sayd They that dwell upon the Earth shall rejoyce over them make merry and send gifts one to another because these two Prophets tormented them that dwelt upon the Earth ver 10. All the witnesses did torment them but these last especially whom having conquered and killed the Popish Prelatical party please and content themselves in this Conquest exceedingly as those of old upon their Pompous Solemnities and Feasting dayes did use to do they made merry and sent gifts to which the Holy-Ghost here alludes and says they rejoyced over them observe rejoyced over them for they had these men still in their clutches Seventhly At the end of the forementioned time the Spirit of life from God entered into them and they stagger up again ver 11. God by unexpected means did loose the bands of their death they are suspended no longer silenced no longer kept in Antichristian clutches no longer and after three years and an half through a principle of life from God bestowed upon them they get upon their feet again even those same men that were killed had the space of their lying dead been an Age or 2. or 3. Ages I should have sought this Resurrection in their Successors or men of such like Spirits risen up after them but it being but three years and a half I can easily believe that those same numerical men that were silenced suspended and so killed might have their suspensions taken off their mouths opened and they set upon their feet to Prophesie again and so 't was a Mystical or Civil Resurrection Eightly They heard a voice from heaven saying come up hither The Decree or Vote of Parliament calling them out of their low and dead condition into Liberty Freedom to a competent Maintenance and comfortable Estate wherein they also protected them in the sight and spight of Antichrist and all their enemies so that they were as secure from those that had lately killed them as if they had been taken up into heaven it self Ninthly They ascended up to heaven in a cloud Heb. 12.1 There a multitude of Believers are called a cloud of witnesses When these men returned from their imprisonment 't was wonderfull to see what a cloud of witnesses they were accompanied withall rejoycing greatly at this their unexpected and happy Freedom every one helping and lifting them up into their Heaven what they could Tenthly Their enemies beheld all this but could not hinder it and great fear fell upon them As easily apprehending that being tormented with them before they should be now much more plagued by them for the late injury done them to say nothing of old quarrels and besides a fresh and more full supply of the Spirit of God was come upon them and now are days fear swallows up and devours their whole three years joy and more so that there is no sign left of it amongst them You perceive how this piece of Providence agrees with the Text in all the joynts
certainly dye Now when God shall empty his last and hottest Vials of wrath upon her and all her plagues come in one day Rev. 18. Death Mourning Famine and she 's set all on a flaming fire not to be quenched for t is sayd her smoak goeth up for ever and ever those who shall then wonder why God deals so hardly and severely with her God may answer them are not my wayes equal have I done unto her without cause all that I have done unto her have not her sinnes reached up to Heaven Do not you know that I am a just God and reward every one according to their works judge I pray you between me and my enemies if I have not done the thing that 's right Vse 2 The Second use shall instruct us in a point of wisdom this to hear and obey that voyce Rev. 18.4 Come out of her my people that ye be not partakers of her sins and that ye receive not of her plagues This is the voyce of God in all the streets of the great City that is in all the ten Kingdoms especially that either now do or formerly have submitted themselves to the Beast Come out from amongst them my People Oh we are no Papists I but art thou none of the Popish Faction is not thy heart with those that have joyned hands with Papists in one common cause if so in Gods interpretation thou art a Papist and if thou dost not come out from amongst them expect a share in their plagues And as for thy not going to Mass t is true I think thou dost not love a Latine Mass but peradventure thou lovest an English Mass but peradventure thou lovest and English Mass with all thy heart How welcom would the old Common prayer Mumpsimus be to thousands and Millions in this Nation before any minister of Christs-praying or worshipping in the Holy Ghost as Saint Jude expresses it And dost not thou love and allow thy self in some sins lying is a Popish sin Swearing Blaspheming are popish sins Apostacy from Christ and the faith to follow our own Fancies and Delusions a Popish sin Pride and self-conceitedness a Popish sin hating and fighting against God and his Saints a Popish sin sleighting the power and purity of Ordinances and profaning the Lords day theft or any known dishonest gain the sin of Uncleanness Adultery Fornication and Impenitency all these yea many more that might be named are Popish sins The Israelites though they went out of Egypt yeat took too much of Egypt along with them their sins in the Wilderness were indeed Egyptian sinnes We of the reformed Churches though we left Rome behind us yet we brought too much of Rome along with us most or all those vile sins that are practised amongst us our Ancestors found and learned them in the bosom of the Romish Church and though they did let go their Doctrines and forms of worship in a great measure yet they held fast very much corruption of manners which we have inherited and improved I fear to a greater pitch and stock of Impiety by far then when t was left us the Eternal God be mercifull to us I say if these or any other Popish sins be found amongst us God will put little difference between us and Papists these Popish sins if they be not put away from amongst us will surely bring Popish plagues on us sooner or later In this late Earthquake amongst us many because they were of the Popish Eaction and Popish sins were found in them were shaken all to peices and as much of the Vial fell upon them as did upon Papists themselves But perhaps thou'lt tell me thou hast escaped as many others also have I advise thee then sin no more lest a worse thing come unto thee repent or else believe it that wrath which is due to a Papist will one day find thee out Therefore friends let all of us have our ears and hearts open to this voyce from heaven and come out from amongst them those sinnes any Papist lives in do not thou live in especially the wayes a Papist walks in let not us walk in that party or design a Papist ever did or will own let us hate and disclaim as we love our selves and so we shall not onely escape their Plagues but share in the Peace of God and blessings of his own People Vse 3. The third Use take thus I remember what comendations the Holy-Ghost gives the men of Issachar 1 Chron. 12.32 That they were men who had understanding of the times to know what Israel ought to do O that this could be truly affirmed of us that we did but know the times and what we have to do that we could come once to understand our true Interest and prosecute it vigorously all of us according to our places and power The grand Interest of all the People of God this day in Christendom is the ruine of Pope and Popery till that be done I dare deliver it Firm and Blessed Peace and Happiness in any Church or State there will be none 1. In this great quarrell of the times between the Zealous Protestant and Popish Faction hate that wise indifferency and neutrality of some men Judg. 8. ver 4 5 6 7. And Gideon came to Jordan and passed over he and the three hundred men that were with him faint yet pursuing them And he said unto the men of Succoth Give I pray you loaves of bread unto the people that follow me for they be faint and I am pursuing after Zeba and Zalmunna kings of Midian And the Princes of Succoth said are the hands of Zeba and Zalmunna now in thy hands that we should give bread unto thy Army And Gideon said therefore when the Lord hath delivered them into my hands then I will tear your flesh with the thornes of the â—ilderness and with briers You may read ver 12. He took the two Kings discomfited the whole Hoast and by a guide he lite on came to Succoth learned out the Princes and ver 16. It s said He took the elders of the city and thornes of the wilderness and briers and with them he taught the men of Succoth He taught them how to stand Neuters when the Cause was a disputing between the People of God and the Common Enemy Judg. 5.23 Curse ye Meroz said the Angel of the Lord curse ye bitterly the inhabitants thereof because they came not to the help of the Lord to the help of the Lord against the mighty Meroz did not help the mighty against the Lord nor yet help the Lord against the mighty but would be wise and save their own stake what way soever the game went But the Angel of the Lord the Lord Christ did curse and curse and curse them bitterly effectually and gave all his People a charge that they should pray down curses upon them because of their Neutrality Let me tell you this quarrell that now Christ is engaged in t is of the nearest
and carriage and see what we contribute to this great design Christ is gone forth upon Do ye so dispence Justice and Judgement so administer Gospel-Ordinances Word and Sacraments so act your Faith so Pray so Fight as may help to shake out the remaining Vials of wrath faster and faster upon them There is never a man or woman in this Congregation but may carry the matter so as when Christ hath got the day and conquest may without lying or vanity of spirit say Through the goodness of God upon me I was a weapon a poor instrument in the hand of Jesus Chirst for the effecting of it when Rome is all on a flaming fire may say I was one that helped to set it on fire when Babylon is fallen I was one that helped to pull it down which if thou hast done not Jehu-like out of pride and for thy own ends but as service due to Jesus Christ and for the bringing in of his Kingdom doubtless thy seed shall be blessed upon Earth and great shall be thy reward in Heaven Vse 4. The last Use is to you who in reason may live to this great day of Romes ruin when you shal see the great Earthquake shaking their Politicall Heavens and Earth all to pieces and the greatest temporall glories now in Christendom brought down laid low and trodden under foot let it not trouble you at all for let me tell you those in Rev. 18. That shall tament her burning are none of Christ friends but carnal wretches and indeed his enemies Your duty upon it is of a clean contrary nature Rev. 18. you read of Babylon fallen as when a milstone is cast into the bottom of the Sea of the smoak of her burning and that in one hour she is made desolate saith the Holy Ghost Rejoyce over her thou Heaven and ye holy Apostles and Prophets for God hath avenged you on her Rev. 19.1 After these things that is after Rome burnt and laid in ashes I heard a great voyce of much People in Heaven in the true Church of Christ saying Allelujah salvation and honour and glory and power unto the Lord our God ver 2. For true and righteous are thy Judgements for he hath judged the great whore which did corrupt the Earth with her Fornication and hath avenged the blood of his servants at her hand ver 3. And again they said Allelujah and her smoak rose up for ever and ever ver 5. A voyce came out of the Throne saying praise our God all ye his servants ye that fear him both small and great It was one of S. Austins three wishes that he could have rejoyced greatly in to have seen Rome in her glory though but heathenish but I am confident were he upon earth now one of his greatest wishes wherein he would most please and solace himself would be to see Rome all on a flaming fire and burnt to ashes O quam pulchrum spectaculum And truly there is cause why you should rejoyce in it with exceeding great joy 1. When the Witnesses were dead in the streets you know what was their carriage Rev. 11. They rejoyced over them made merry sent gifts and God will have you to tread forth the law of retaliation as they rejoyced over your misery so Gods tels you t is an equal thing and he requires it as a duty of you to rejoyce greatly over their miseries 2. You know what postures they stand in in reference to Christ and his Church they provoke God daily with the highest hand that ever any did as I have shewed you they wrong Christ strangely keeping him out of his just rights they are the proudest enemy the cruellest enemy and enemy of the longest continuance the most hopeless of ever being brought in by repentance that ever the Church had any and therefore if ever the people of God might rejoyce in the downfall of an enemy you may certainly in this 3. Consider the sequel of their ruin which will be this A Kingdom that cannot be shaken as the Apostle speaks Heb. 12.27 28. and if the Text be rightly understood it speaks to this very time and business Out of the ruins and ashes these wars shall make Christ will bring the most glorious frame of Government that ever the world saw and let men and States do what they can it will not be brought forth till then but then it shall and can any Saint but rejoyce in that which ushers in those good and blessed times Scripture is so abundant in promising which shall be the subject of the ensuing discourse THE REIGN OF CHRIST By Ed. Hawghton LONDON Printed for Francis Tyton 1652. TO THE READER I Would not have any one think that I am able no nor any man now alive to set forth the so-much-expected Kingdome of CHRIST in the true worth and glories of it let it suffice if I give you some rude draughts of it The Prophets of old did speak very clear and excellent things concerning the Messiah his Birth Life Miracles Doctrine Death Resurrection and what was to follow thereupon insomuch that Isaias is usually called by Divines the Evangelical Prophet But when John was come our Saviour saith of him Mat. 11. He was the greatest of those that had been born of women meaning in respect of his knowledge of the Messias nay that he was was more then a Prophet i. e. he had more abilities to speak of Christs nature offices and excellencies of his kingdome then any or all the Prophets that had been before him But yet sayes he The least in the kingome of God is greater then John the Baptist After the ascension of Christ and descension of the Holy Ghost the meanest Minister of the Gospel was able to hold him forth in all points more excellently then John the Baptist was To bring this home to the present businesse We that now speak concerning this great this blessed Kingdome of Jesus Christ onely as Prophets yet not by any private spirit but groundedly from the Word may speak very clear undoubted and in their eares especially to whom this subject is somwhat strange and new very wonderful things almost incredible but when Rome shall come to be buried in its own ashes and after that the great Battel of God Almighty fought and finished and Christ hath his Kingdome actually upon the Anvil hammering and working it out those whose lot it shall be to stand forth Ministers of the Gospel then and be eye witnesses of Christ so at work of them it may be said They are the greatest of those that have been born of women in respect of their distinct knowledge of the Kingdome of our Lord nay more then Prophets men far more accomplish'd to speak of the parts government glory of his Kingdome then any or all the most holy learned men that have been before them who saw it only at a distance through the Prospective of the more dark and general Promises and spake of it by way of
Prophesie But they who shall be so far honoured and blessed of God to be called to the marriage-supper of the Lamb as the expression is Rev. 19. to see this Kingdome drawn forth in all the just parts and lineaments of it set up to the height of its greatnesse and glory I say the least of them will be greater then John the Baptist my meaning is will be far more able to preach forth the excellencies of that Kingdome in all the dimensions of it then were those who were spectators of Jesus Christ when he was but at work upon it Therefore Reader I say again since you ought in reason let it answer your expectation if I set before you only some unpolisht draughts of it The Church of God will have more knowledge of this businesse ere it be long Dan. 12.4 Shut up the words and seal the book even to the time of the end many shall run to and fro and knowledge shall be increased The context rightly under stood clearly gives it thus That when the time of Antichrists reign and the Jews captivity shall draw towards an end men and matters will be hurried to and fro there will be great stirs in the world but then the sealed Book will be opened the knowledge of the Popes ruine calling of the Jewes the starry lustre of Christs kingdome will break forth increase and shine more and more unto the perfect day Which is the daily and fervent prayer of Your true Friend and Servant in the Lord E. H. The Reign of CHRIST Rev. 19.6 The Lord God Omnipotent raigneth THe four and twenty Elders we read of ver 4. are the Representative of the Church of Iews and Gentiles arising out of twelve Patriarks and twelve Apostles The four Beasts there also mentioned are the Ministerial Embleme who are elswhere said to have the face of a Lion of an Oxe of a Man and of an Eagle that by their special courage laboriousnesse wisdome speed the work of Jesus Christ in its time might be effectually carried on in the four parts of the world These four Beasts and four and twenty Elders something they do and something they say that which they did was this they fell down and worshipped him which sate upon the throne that which they said was Amen Allelujah be it even so as God hath done and praise and honour and glory be given to God Two grounds they lay down for this their posture and carriage the first this that he had judged the great Whore which did corrupt the earth he had pull'd down Babylon the second this he had set up himself as 't is in the text The Lord God omnipotent reigneth There needs but little explanation of the words The Lord God that is the Lord Christ for Christ is truly God 1 Joh. 5.20 This is the true God as might abundantly out of other Scriptures be proved yea the next word makes it good an incommunicable Attribute is given to him Omnipotent the Lord God omnipotent he is elsewhere called the mighty God Isa 9.6 which is of no lesse import then Almighty or Omnipotent Reigneth i. he is King Why was he not King before yes but not so as he is now now he reigns to some purpose The words thus opened and relatively taken afford us this point Vpon the breaking to peeces of the Church of Rome the Lord Christ will reigne and King it so as he never did in the world before Christ hath reigned from everlasting by Gods decree he hath reigned actually since mans fall he hath reigned eminently since his ascension and mission of the Holy Ghost but he will reigne gloriously upon the expiration of the reign of Antichrist The wonderfulnesse of this Kingdome we speak of appears to us many wayes First from those Scripture-epithites and adjuncts of him and his then-government In the very text the Lord God omnipotent reigns Omnipotent such a rule and government shall be set up that all shall be convinced and say Nothing under nothing lesse then the Omnipotencie of the Lord Christ could set it up Rev. 11.17 Thou hast taken to thee thy great power and hast reigned then Christs great power will be seen in his reigning Isa 24.23 Then the moon shall be confounded and the sun ashamed when the Lord of Hosts shall reign in mount Sion and in Ierusalem and before his Ancients gloriously You remember what I have spoken to the immediately preceding verses there is the great Earthquake v. 18 19 20. see Rev. 16 18. the ruine of the Kings of the earth and of the whole world v. 21. see Rev 16 14.16 the visiting and calling forth of the imprisoned Jews v. 22. the reigne of the kingdome of Jesus Christ v. 23. Take Sun and Moon how you will Politically for the supreme powers of the Nations or literally for the great lights of heaven the Sun and Moon will be ashamed of themselves and confounded as not being the greatest glories and admirations of the world When his Ancients the Jewes shall be fully brought in Christ will reign so gloriously as shall cast shame and darknes into the face of Sun and Moon If you say this Scripture hath been at any time fulfilled I will not deny it but affirm this that a prophesie may have a gradual fulfilling Jer. 31.15 A voice of an old Grandmother raised out of her grave was heard in Ramah lamentation and bitter weeping Rachel weeping for her children refused to be comforted because they were not This was fulfilled when Israel went captives into Babylon which will be undeniably clear if you read on to the 22 verse and yet when Herod kill'd the children upon his search after him that was born King of the Jewes Mat. 2.17 18. then was fulfilled that which was spoken by Jeremy the Prophet saying In Ramah was a voice heard lamentation c. If Isaias prophesie of Christs reigning before his Ancients hath been at any time fulfilled much more will it be fulfilled in the day may Text points at then it will be fulfilled to the uttermost fulfilled gloriously you see 't is epithited A glorious reign Secondly Christ his then-mannagement of affairs the Holy Ghost sets it forth in such high language to answer the reality of the Kingdom as hath deceived many thousands as if it should be a glorious personal raign 2 Thes 2.8 Then shall the wicked be revealed whom the Lord shall consume with the spirit of his mouth and shall destroy with the brightness of his coming The Lord hath two wayes to bring down Antichrist First He consumes him by the spirit of his mouth i. e. by the ministry of the Word ever since Luther the Pope hath been in a Consumption you might see it in his face The second is by his own coming the brightness of his coming some take it for a personal appearance to give him his deaths wound Rev. 1.7 Behold he cometh with clouds and every eye shall see him and they also which peirced him and all
Kinreds of the Earth shall wail because of him even so Amen That this cannot be meant of the day of Judgement is evident because the mourning here spoken of is a penitential mourning and is taken out of Zach. 12.10 at the last day all the Saints shall rejoyce with joy unspeakable and full of glory all the wicked shall be hardned in impenitency and though they may howl over their own misery yet not mourn after Christ there will be no penitential mourning in that day and therefore Christ will appear in the clouds before that day and every eye shall see him especially the people of the Jews I could give you other Scriptures that speak to the same effect But yet these as express as they are with the rest which look that way are not fully convicing as I conceive for 1. I find often in Scripture what 's carried on by Instruments ascribed to God as if the had done it personally without the use of any such Instruments Rev. 16.456 The third Angle poured out his Vial upon the Rivers and Fountains of Waters and they became blood and they say unto God Thou art righteous O Lord who hast judged thus and thou hast given them blood to drink All grant that this Vial was poured out as were also all the rest by men holy and spiritual men yet they speak to God and say thou hast judged thus thou hast given them blood to drink 1 Chron 16.13 Let the heavens be glad and let the Earth rejoyce and let men say among the Nations the Lord reigneth ver 33. The Trees of the Wood shall sing out at the presence of the Lord because he cometh to judge the Earth Ps 22.28 The Kingdom is the Lords and he is governour among the Nations Isai 33.22 The Lord is our judge the Lord in our Law-giver the Lord is our King but none of all this immediately by himself or personally but in the use of Instruments So that thought it be sayd he shall destroy Antichrist with the brightness of his coming at which time also he 'l set up his Kingdom and raign yet may it well enough be understood of a coming in those ten Kings or Supreme powers that Scripture saith shall hate the whore and burn her flesh with fire and he may as well set up his kingdome and reign also in and by them and such like 2. How can a circumscribed body as Christ hath be personally visibly in all and every of his kingdoms at once When he shall reign visibly personally on mount Sion or at Jerusalem he cannot at the same time reign personally and visibly here in this Nation but must rule it and all others by his Deputies therefore t is safer to let him keep his place at Gods right hand in heaven then bring him down to sway an earthly scepter seeing he may do it in his Spirit by some special Instruments and comparatively in respect of those he hath formerly ruled in it may be said that Christ himself reigns not personally upon earth but after so eminent and wonderfull a manner in certain select servants as he never reigned in the world before 3. Christ will usher in his kingdome with the most glorious conquests over earthly powers that ever were known I have spoken much to this already it was the subject of the last point yet for method sake give me leave to speak a word to it here Rev. 6.12 to the end I beheld when he opened the sixth seale and lo there was a great earthquake and the sun became black as sackcloth of haire and the moon became as blood and the stars of heaven fell unto the earth even as figtree casteth her untimely figs when she is shaken of a mighty wind And the heaven departed as a scroll when t is rolled together and every mountain and Island were moved out of their places And the Kings of the earth and the great men and rich men and the chief Captains and the mighty men and every bondman and every freeman hid themselvs in the dens and in the rocks of the mountains and said to the mountains and rocks fall on us and hide us from the face of him that sits upon the throne and from the wrath of the Lamb for the great day of his wrath is come and who shall be able to stand The most and best reformed Expositors do with one mouth tell us that upon the opening of the sixth Seale Christ in Constantine did pull down Heathenisme set up Christianisme and the victories were so great so terrible that by their description you would think them to be the end of the world The terrors of Jesus Christ were so upon the spirits of Kings Captains mighty men as that had the earth shaken under them the mountains and Islands moved out of their places had the sun turned to darknesse the moon to blood stars fallen from heaven had heaven and earth come together and the world been at an end there could not have been greater feares greater outcries to the rocks and mountains to be hid from the wrath of the Lamb some poysoning some hanging some drowning themselves some flying and fell by the sword all at their wits end Thus Christ set up Christianity by Constantine But as I shewed you at large it soon degenerated into Antichristianism or Papacie the most Politique and strongest consitution against Christ that ever any was the very foundation-stones whereof the must and will pluck up that so he may build up himself a sure throne and kingdome But you will say 'T is impossible Christ should bring in his worship and kingdome with greater and more terrible conquests over the Kings of the earth then those he got over the Heathenish powers Let me tell you Nothing is impossible to the Lord God omnipotent He tels us he 'll bring in his Reign with far greater Rev. 16 17.18 When the seventh Angel poured out his Vial into the aire there were voices and thunderings and lightenings and there was a great earthquake such as was not since men were upon earth so mighty an earthquake and so great To the same purpose understand that of Dan 12.1 At that time shall Michael stand up the great Prince which standeth for the children of thy people and there shall be a time of trouble such as never was since there was a Nation even to that same time and at that time thy people shall be delivered These matchlesse troubles should be at that time when Daniels people the Jewes all the twelve Tribes that are now lost in the dust should be sound out and delivered which Scripture tels us in places enough shall be upon the breaking of Antichrist Dan. 2.44 And in the dayes of these Kings shall the God of heaven set up a kingdome which shall break in peeces all these kingdomes i. e. all these kingdoms of the world putting all rule and authority that is carnal and stands in opposition to this designes under his
the corrupt lives of Christians into the great Apostacy or Antichristianism Then the Dragon gave the Pope his Seat his Keys his Power and great Authority and the Text says the bottomless pit was opened yea kept open for the smoak of that hellish furnace ascended daily and darkned the sun and aire and so continued to do above a thousand years T is strange to me that the Devil should be shut up and Hell open Therefore I am satisfied this Prophesie of binding Satan will be fulfilled after the great Battel of God almighty and not till then Christ hath shortened his Chain given him many a curb and check within this hundred years and will so yet more and more but bound shut up sealed up he will not be till after the Beast and false Prophet are taken and destroyed but then he will and shall deceive the Nations no more till the thousand years are past In your Iron Mills a fire there might be but were the bellows taken away certainly not so great so violent a burning by an hundred fold The Devils that continually day and night haunt wait upon us are the great bellows of mens lusts whereby such a world of flaming iniquity is amongst us but when Christ shall come and take away these bellows and lock them up the fire of mens corruptions must needs be exceedingly abated not only of men regenerate but also of men unregenerate I dare say were it not for the devil and his Angels we should not run into so many sins and exorbitancies in a year as now we do in a moneth Upon the destroying of Heathenism Satan was cast down to the Earth Rev. 12. but upon the pulling down of Pope and Popery he with all his Regiments shall be cast into hell a trap door let fall upon him sealed up and so shall not come forth to provoke men to impieties against God for a long time 2. The second cause of the exceeding great excellencie that shall be in the Subjects of this Kingdome is the abundance of Grace that will come down from heaven upon them The 72 Psalm is chiefly if not wholly spent upon this Kingdome of Christ v. 6. Ye read thus He shall come down like rain upon the mowen grasse as showers that water the earth Zach. 12.10 I have before sufficiently cleared it this and the following Chapter speak directly to the time and businesse I am upon I will poure upon the house of David and upon the inhabitants of Jerusalem the spirit of grace and supplication the grace of Faith they shall look upon me whom they have pierced the grace of Repentance they shall mourn for him as one mourneth for his onely son and shall be in bitternesse for him Observe the expression 't is not I will sprinkle grace upon them but I will poure grace upon them the grace of faith the grace of repentance in which are comprehended all other graces God will then poure out his Spirit upon them abundantly Chap. 13.1 In that day there shall be a fountain opened to the house of David viz the two Tribes and to the inhabitants of Ierusalem viz. the ten Tribes for sinne and for uncleannesse We have but small Rivulets they 'll have the Fountain of the blood of Christ opened flowing full stream upon them As I have said before if these two Prophesies were fulfilled in the dayes of primitive Christians much more will they be fulfilled in the great and glorious day of Christs kingdom Take one Text more Rev. 21 10 11. He shewed me that great City the holy Ierusalem descending out of heaven from God having the glory of God and her light was like unto a stone most precious even like a Iasper-stone cleare as Chrystal Which expressions resolved into their true and native sense must needs be this The abundance of precious and glorious graces God will will then send down out of heaven upon his people 3. The third and last cause may be made up thus The pains and vigilancy of Pastors over their Flocks which will be very great the Ordinances falling more immediatly then ever in the Power Majesty Authority of God upon their hearts the quick and smart acting of Discipline which then will be and that spirit of watchfulness that every man will have over himself and his neighbour also every Saint in that day will be not only his own but his brothers keeper and stirrer up to the thing that 's good Jer. 50.4 5. In those dayes and in that time saith the Lord the children of Israel shall come they and the children of Judah together going and weeping they shall go and seek the Lord their God saying Come let us joyn our selves to the Lord in a perpetual Covenant that shall not be forgotten But the least part of this Prophesie was fulfilled upon their return out of Babylon it chiefly points at a time when Israel and Iudah all the twelve Tribes shall come together to seek the Lord and when they shall joyn themselves to God in a perpetual Covenant that shall not be forgotten they renewed their Covenant upon their return out of Babylon but that hath been long since forgotten but when they shall be called again then their Covenant with God will be perpetual indeed from generation to generation and never be forgotten more but that which I aym at in this Scripture lies in these words Come let us their zeal will mightily provoke one another you have yet a more pregnant place for it Zich 8.20 21. Thus saith the Lord of Hosts it shall come to pass that there shall come people and the inhabitants of many Cities and the inhabitants of one City shall go to another saying let us go speedily to pray before the Lord and to seek the Lord of Hosts I will go also That it speaks how the pulse of Saints will beat one towards another upon the calling of the Jews the two last verses sufficiently clear it to any indifferent and intelligent Reader So then to give you briefly the summe of what I have said upon this branch of the Kingdom Satan the bellows that blew mens lusts into such flames shall be taken from amongst them whereby their natural corruptions shall lie very still in them Next God will send down Grace abundantly into their hearts and nature which will search out and exceedingly prevail against the lusts that are in men though they lie hid never so close Heb. 4.12 13. And lastly there will be Pastors Ordinances Discipline and keeping Centinel one over another by all which means their Gifts their Graces and goodness will be raised to a more abundant height then otherwise they would or could have been I tell you there will be gallant times for grace and holiness such as the world was never acquainted with before Eigthly his reign will be wonderful for the peace that shall accompany it when once the great Battle of God Almighty is fought and past Christ will then appear to the
world to be the true Melchisedech not only King of Righteousness as I but now shewed you but also King of Salem i e. King of peace ruling all the Kingdoms of the world for the generality of them will be his in external peace Isa 9.6 7. To us a Child is born to us a Son is given he shall be called the Prince of Peace of the increase of his government and peace i. e. his government of peace or peace of his government there shall be no end and that this be not limited to internal peace it follows upon the Throne of David to order and establish it but Davids Throne and government of peace was external therefore so also shall Christs be Isa 2.2 It shall come to pass in the last dayes that the Mountain of the Lords house shall be established upon the top of the Mountains and all Nations shall flow unto it ver 4. He shall judge among the Nations and rebuke many People and they shall beat their Swords into Plough-shares and their Spears into pruning hooks and National shall not lift up sword against Nation neither shall they learn war any more Isa 11.6 7 8 9. The Woolf shall dwel with the Lamb the Leopard shall lie down with the Kid the Calf the young Lion and the fatling together and a little Child shall lead them The Cow and Bear shall feed their young ones shall lie down together and the Lion shall eat straw like the Oxe The sucking Child shall play on the hole of the Asp and the weaned Child shall put his hand on the Cockatrice den They shall not hurt nor destroy in all my holy Mountain for the Earth shall be full of the knowledge of the Lord as the waters cover the Sea The Prophet goes on in the 10 11 12. verses concerning this Kingdom and sayes he ver 13. The envy also of Ephraim shall depart the adversaries of Judah shall be cut off Ephraim shall not envy Iudah Iudah shall not vex Ephraim Isa 60.18 Violence shall be no more heard in thy Land wasting nor destruction within by borders and therefore is it ver 11. Thy gates shall be open continually they shall not be shut day nor night And sure such a City who never shut their gates take themselves out of all possibility of danger This 11. ver S. Iohn quotes Rev. 21.25 The gates of it shall not be shut at all by day for there shall be no night there i. e. no night of darkness caused by enemies wars sorrows oppressions for saith Christ I will make all thine Officers peace Isa 60.17 There were no end of giving you Scriptures that must of necessity be understood of the peace of this Kingdom Rev. 21.2 3 4. Ezek. 34.24 25. My servant David meaning Christ shall be a Prince amongst them And I will make with them a Covenant of Peace and will cause the evil beasts to cease out of the Land and they shall dwel safely in the wilderness and sleep in the wood i. e. without fear or danger which is unusual and unknown Ver. 28. They shall no more be a prey to the Heathen neither shall the beasts of the Land devour them but they shall dwel safely and none shall make them afraid He gives you light ver 29. when this shall be And I will raise up for them a plant of Renown and they shall be no more consume with hunger in the Land neither bear the shame of the heathen any more This place cannot be fulfilled yet since Ezekiel spake it for they have been a prey to the heathen beasts have devoured them they all bear the shame of the Heathen at this day But when the time comes that this promise shal be fully made good to them these things shall never befall them more but there shall be peace to him that comes in and to him that goes out they shall have peace extended to them like a River as the expression is Isa 66.12 He speaks to our present purpose as the context there clearly gives it Ninthly His Reign will bring wonderful plenty and outward prosperity to his Subjects Isa 30.23 Then shall he give the rain of thy seed that thou shalt sow the ground withall and bread of the increase of the earth and it shall be fat and plenteous in that day shall thy cattell feed in large pastures ver 24. The oxen likewise and young asses that ear the ground shall eat clean provender which hath been winnowed with the shovel and with the fan There being such plenty they will not grudge it them they may well afford them clean provender The two following verses I quoted under the sixt Head they speak of the abundance and increase of Blessings Spiritual all which says the Prophet shall be in the day of the great slaughter Rev. 19.20 And when God shall binde up the breach between the two Tribes and the ten then there will be plenty of all things not only for the soul but also for the body Isa 60.16 Thou shalt suck the milk of the Gentiles and shalt suck the brests of Kings you must take special notice of this all along that the great and glorious Promises of this Kingdom are made primarily and chiefly to the Nation of the Jews the Nations of the Gentiles not excluded they also shall share in them according as they shall come in to Christ ver 17. For brass I 'le bring gold for iron silver for wood brass and for stones iron I will also make thy officers peace and thy exactors righteousness They shall not bee impoverished by those that bear rule amongst them Ezek 34.26 I will make them and the places round about my hill a blessing and I will cause the showre to come down in his season and there shall be showers of blessings ver 27. And the tree of the field shall yield her fruit and the earth shall yield her increase Rev. 21.24 The Kings of the earth shall bring their glory and honour into it ver 26. And they shall bring the glory and honour of the Nations into it Time was and in part yet is that the Kings and Kingdoms of the world brought the glory of their power and wealth and laid it all down at Antichrists feet to enrich him to make him a pompous pamper'd Beast but the days are certainly comming wherein they shall make as much haste to lay down all the feet of Jesus Christ and his People according to that Dan. 7.27 the kingdom and dominion and greatness of the kingdom under the whole heaven shall be given to the People of the Saints of the most High and all dominions shall serve and obey him Tenthly The setting up of this Throne of his will make such a change from bad to good in all points that in Scripture t is called a new world Rev. 21.1 And I saw a new heaven and a new earth for the first heaven and the first earth were past away viz. The Political Heavens and Earth
feet of his Will Set up as much of Christ and his Kingdom in thy Family as thou canst suppress sin in it as far as thy power will go set up Duties of Religion in it bring all under the power thereof Oh that Magistrates would not stand consulting chiefly what sutes best to the Interest of the State but what sutes best to the Interest of Jesus Christ and will most help on his Kingdom Certainly setting up standing by and countenancing in Spiritual Powerful Ministery not suffering Sabbaths and Ordinances to be prophaned and affronted good Learning and Holiness maintained in the Universities and other inferiour Schools Judgement and Justice executed without respect of persons I say doubtless these things would contribute much towards the enthroning of the great King of kings Oh but some man will say I am a poor wretch I can do noting towards the hastening this Kingdom you speak of That 's strange Canst not thou go into thy chamber or Closet and there lament the Antichristianism that is in the present Governments of the World tell God that he 's Omnipotent and so is able to remove whatsoever stands opposition to the Kingdom of his Son minde him of his many promises that he will do it Ask him if he should fail what would become of his Faithfulness of his great name Jehovah and then cry Lord let thy Kingdom come Lord how long yet Lord when shall it once be Be assured of it God may be stirred up much by fervent praying to hasten his Work You have a very notable place for this Psal 102. ver 13. to ver 19. Thou shalt arise and have mercy upon Zion for the time to favour her yea the set time is come Thy servants take pleasure in her stones and favour the dust thereof So the Heathen shall fear the name of the Lord and all the Kings of the earth thy glory He will regard the prayer of the destitute and not despise their prayer This shall be written for the generation to come and the people which shall be created shall praise the Lord. What shall be written for the generations to come what shall the People which shall be hereafter created praise the Lord for Why this that when the Lord shall build up Zion and so appear in the glory of his power and grace as to make the heathen and all the kings of the earth to fear his name he will therein have regard to the prayer of the destitute The word that is here translated destitute signifies arbusculum nascentem in deserto a poor shrub in the wilderness which every beast is ready to bruise or tread upon a poor shrub that is low and mean and despicable When the Lord shall appear in his Glory and build up Zion in its Glory he will do it in reference to the prayers and sighs and wrestlings of such poor shrubs as the weakest and meanest of you are and therefore says the Prophet Ye that make mention of the Lord keep not silence give him no rest till be establish till he make Jerusalem a praise in the earth Isa 62.6 7. q.d. You that are Saints indeed and make mention of the name of God in prayer follow him hang about him let him not have a quiet day when argument fails yet importunity may do much till he have broken Antichrist and all the powers of this World that stand in the way of the Gospel till he have set up the Kingdom of his Son made his name great and glorious in all the earth You poor of the flock may do more toward this work then you are aware of Wherefore I beseech you stand fast in the faith pray without ceasing quite your selves like men Oh! but I shall not live to see it nor share in the joy of Gods People and glory of this Kingdom My Answer to thee is thus 1. If God take thee to Heaven before thou canst be no great looser by that thou shalt drink there at the Fountain-head of glory when those thou hast left behinde must drink but of the streams of Grace at a far greater distance 2. The News of this Kingdom set up will be quickly brought to heaven and spred all up and down there thou mayest as well enjoy the comforts of it there keep a day of thanksgiving there and sing thy Hallelujahs with the spirits of just men made perfect to Him that sits upon the throne 3. Get upon mount Nebo however and thence look into the Canaan that flowes with milk and hony setting an eye of faith upon the Prospective of Promises thou mayest bring it very near to thee and have a very clear view of it Heb. 11.1 Faith is the substance of things hoped for the evidence of things not seen v. 13. These all dyed in the faith not having received the promises i. the matter of them but having seen them afar off were perswaded of them and imbraced them Though the great things promised were far off from them yet by saith and strong perswasions of the truth of them they brought them very near so that they took them in their arms and saluted them as the word in the original imports Abraham though he lived many hundred years before Christ yet he rejoyced to see his day He saw it and was glad Joh. 8.56 he could improve faith and promises to as much comfort and joy of heart as old Simeon did the very taking him up in his arms it applies it self I remember what Jacob when he lay upon his death-bed said to his son Joseph Gen. 48.21 Behold I dye but God shall be with you and bring you to the land of your fathers Thus when thou liest upon thy last bed thy children and friends coming with blubber'd cheeks and heavy hearts to take their leaves of thee thou mayest tell them Behold I dye but this is the support and comfort of my heart God shall be with you God will let you see the good dayes he hath spoken of in his word even from generation to generation I dye and must never see the glory of Jesus Christ in his Churches upon earth yet Posterity shall see it the Saints of God in after-ages shall enjoy the comforts the blessednesse of it and that 's life to me in the midst of death I rejoyce in that and glory in that with joy unspeakable FINIS Reader I Would have thee rest thy heart assured of this That the 21 22 Chapters of the Revelations are a Description of a State of a Church here below yet in allusion to Heaven Amongst many reasons which might be given for it take these three 1. It is called the New Ierusalem coming down from God out of Heaven And behold the Tabernacle of God is with men and he will dwell with them chap. 21.2 3. The Church triumphant is taken up from the earth into heaven and the spirits of just men made perfect may more properly be said to dwell with God then God with them 1 Thess 4. Then shall we for ever be with the Lord. 2. It 's said the Kings of the earth do bring their glory and honour into it v. 24. Into the Church of Christ on earth for the further completing of the Churches happinesse We all know the glory and honour of earthly Kings is of no esteem in heaven can adde nothing there 3. It is said The leaves of the Tree Rev. 22.2 are for the healing of the Nations meaning the Spiritual sores and wounds of hte Nations But surely there are in Heaven it self neither whole Nations nor persons that stand in need of any healing whatsoever VVherefore it may safely be concluded the 21. and part of the 22 Chap. of that Book are a Description in high expressions and metaphors of the State of a Church here upon Earth E. H. * Thursday Lectures at Horsham in the county of Sussex * Ann. Christi 66. Ann. Neronis 11. In this as also in many other Prophesies Evangelical matters are clad with legal and old terms * Though under Legall terms * Some judgment or destruction that all must acknowledge to be from God
feet Many and mighty victories you know make a Kings reign glorious why Christ himselfe never got such victories over men in this world as then he 'll doe Fourthly Scripture sets it forth as the day of his marriage solemnity The Lord God omnipotent reigneth so my Text the next verse expresseth it thus The marriage of the Lamb is come and v 9. They who are called to have a share in this kingdome are blest of God being called to the marriage supper of the Lamb to a continual and the most sumptuous Feast that ever was You may be sure that Christ on that day will appeare in no mean royalty and glories which may be gathered from the description of the Bride for 't is said v. 7. She hath made her self ready araied finely v. 8. In Solomons time she was brought in raiment of needle-work nay her cloathing of wrought gold so the King did greatly desire and delight in her beauty Ps 45. But the Bride is described upon the fall of Antichrist at a higher rate Rev. 21.2 I saw the holy city New-Ierusalem coming down from God out of heaven prepared as a Bride adorned for her husband Not dressed with needle-work or cloth of gold things here below of the earth earthly but she 's prepared and dressed as if she had dropt out of heaven cloathed with the glories of heaven and this onely to fit her in some measure for the Bridegroom If the Church shall be so glorious in that day shal not the King upon the throne in the height of his state and government be more exceeding glorious in all eyes Fifthly His reign will be wonderfull and unparallel'd in respect of the extent of his domination Rev. 10.1 2. And I saw a mighty Angel come down from heaven and he set his right foot upon the sea and his left foot upon the earth Earth and Sea make up the whole Globe thereby signifying that he would when time served take possession of all the world the power and majesty of his throne and scepter should be extended over sea and land Psal 2.8 Ask of me and I will give thee the Heathen for thine inheritance and the uttermost parts of the earth for thy possession Psal 72.8 He shall have dominion from sea to sea and from the river unto the ends of the earth Rev. 15.3 4. Thou King of Saints who shall not feare thee All nations shall come and worship before thee for thy judgments are made manifest viz. upon the Pope and his kingdome Isa 2.2 And it shall come to passe in the last dayes that the mountain of the Lords house shall be established in the top of the mountains and shall be exalted above the hils aod all nations shall flow unto it The generality of the Nations shall come flocking in as Doves to the windows First those Ten Kingdoms that had given their power to the Beast all ties all bands of peace and amity between them shall be strangely broken and dissolved nay such a spirit shall come upon them that they shall hate the whore and even burn her flesh with fire Rev. 17. This you must confess is a great eminent coming in and giving up themselves to and for Jesus Christ Secondly He will find out and bring home to himself his old dear people Rom. 11.25 26 I would not brethren that you should be ignorant of this mysterie that blindnesse in part is happened to Israel untill the fulnesse of the Gentiles be come in and so all Israel shall be saved as it is written There shall come out of Sion the Deliverer and shall turn away ungodlinesse from Iacob I like their interpretation best who by fulnesse of the Gentiles coming in understand the fulnesse or most part of those Nations that had given themselves to Popery when then eyes shall be opened to see what they have done and then giving themselves to Christ in an holy indignation shall set Rome on fire yea quite destroy Pope and Popery this will mightily work upon the hearts of the two Tribes in time on the ten Tribes The fulnesse of the Gentiles being thus come in then all Israel shall come in and be saved as 't is written There shall come out of Sion the Deliverer and shall turn away ungodlinesse from Jacob Now Iacob you know comprehends all the twelve Tribes for the twelve Patriarks from whom all the twelve Tribes descended came out of Iacob's loines Isa 11 11 12. And it shall come to passe in that day that the Lord shall set his hand again the second time to recover the remnant of his people which shall be left from Assyria and from Egypt and from Pathros and from Cush and from Elam and from Shinar and from Hamath and from the Islands of the sea He shall gather together the dispersed of Iudah and assemble the outcasts of Israel from the four corners of the earth God had gathered them from all the nations from all the places whither he had caused them to be carried away captive once before as you may see Ier. 29.14 He had fetch'd them out of Babylon and out of all the Provinces round but this is a second time and he 'll gather together the outcasts of Israel and the dispersed to Iudah which since their great division 2 Chron. 10. he never yet did and make them one as you have it Ezek. 37.19.21 22. Thus saith the Lord behold I will take the stick of Ioseph which is in the hand of Ephraim and the Tribes of Israel his fellowes and will put them with him even with the stick of Iudah and make them one stick and they shall be one in my hand And thus saith the Lord behold I will take the children of Israel from among the Heathen whither they be gone and will gather them on every side and bring them into their own land And I will make them one nation and one King viz. Christ shall be King to them all and they shall be no more two nations neither shall they be divided into two kingdoms any more at all This hath not been yet fulfilled but will be in the day of Christs kingdome Take one place more Hos 1.10 11. And it shall come to passe that in the place where it was said unto them Ye are not my people as at this day we know it is there it shall be said unto them Ye are the sons of the living God Then shall the children of Iudah and the children of Israel be gathered together and appoint themselves one head and they shall come up out of the land i. e. out of every land where they haven been lost for great shall be the day of Iezerel Iezerel signifies both scattered and the seed of God Great shall be the day of Iezerel i. e. great shall be the day of bringing in the scattered the scattered people Or thus Great shal be the day of Iezerel i. e. great shall be the day of the seed of God of springing up of