Grammatical Criticisme or the Rules of Rhetorick and observable Genius of the very stile of this Book of the Apocalypse it self if such an Exposition for so far as the time of Prophecies is already past be not true what Exposition of any Prophecy or of any thing else can be thought to be true And the things that are to come as the Calling of the Jews and the utter breaking in pieces of the Roman Idolatrous Hierarchy sore against their will considering the sweet relish of domineering and imposing upon the world and their obdurate pretence of Infallibility it were a Miracle indeed to think they will ever confesse themselves convinced of those enormous Errours and Crimes that are so justly laid to their charge And being they would fall of themselves did not some Secular Power support them it therefore is rational to conceive that some Remnant of the Roman Empire may stick to them to the last Vial So solid is our Exposition in that part also And concerning the Calling of the Jews I have noted already how generally the Opinion is allowed of and how often intimated in the Scriptures To which I may add that it does not seem probable that they are preserved a distinct People from the rest of the world all this time for nought And then for the flourishing of Peace and Truth and Righteousness in the times of the New Jerusalem so universally over the face of the Earth It is a thing that has been so little done already and so fully and repeatedly inculcated by the ancient Prophets as well as set down so exactly in the Apocalypse that unless a man will question the Truth of Scripture he cannot but admit it to be true From which considerations I hope it will appear that our Exposition of the Apocalypse is throughout true and that I have not rashly called it Apocalypsis Apocalypseos it being a plain and true unveiling of the Apocalypse or stripping it of all those coverings and disguisings contained in the Prophetick stile and whatever other Artifices of Concealment and laying the sense bare and open to the eyes of all that will not wilfully wink that they may not see the Truth And that there may be no distrust of the assuredness of our Interpretation by pretending that others have interpreted the Apocalypse another way I shall give notice here by the bye that I have with all care and diligence perused other Interpreters and the very best of them Grotius and Ribera for as for some Modern Buffoones rather and abusers of the Apocalypse than serious Interpreters of it no sober man will think-himself obliged to take notice of them and in those two chefest Chapters as to the Controversie betwixt the Church of Rome and us whether they are not to be proved from thence Idolaters I mean the thirteenth and seventeenth Chapters of which I have made a Joynt-Exposition in my Synopsis Prophetica I have shewed how absurd and impossible both Ribera's and Grotius his Interpretations of those Chapters are And in Grotius his Exposition of them who yet is now accounted the Chiefest Interpreter and most accommodate to baffle the true and genuine meaning of those Prophecies I have noted near fourscore such flawes as I should be loth any one should be able to find one in my whole Exposition of the Apocalypse besides his absurd mis-timing of the Visions which would show though otherwise his Expositions were more tolerable that they were nothing to the purpose And that they are mis-timed I have abundantly demonstrated in my Synopsis Prophetica Book II. Chap. 2. So that there is the greatest assurance imaginable of my Exposition of the thirteenth and seventeeth Chapters of the Apocalypse as you may be fully satisfied by the reading of my Joynt-Exposition of them Synops. Prophet Book I. Chap. 12 13 14 15. And if this Bulwark of my Joynt-Exposition stand impregnable as most certainly it will none that perceives the force thereof but will easily admit of the rest of our Interpretations as solid and true And thus much briefly of the Truth of our Exposition of the Apocalypse Now the usefulness thereof which I proposed in the third and last place it is exceeding considerable First against Atheists and those that believe neither Angel nor Spirit for there being a deduction of things foretold from the beginning of the Church to the end of all so natural so solid and so true and every way unexceptionable to any Rational Man this is the greatest Evidence desirable to evince a Divine Providence over the Church and the Affairs of Mankind and consequently the existence of a God as also of Angels the Ministers of his Providence which is all along inculcated in this Book of the Apocalypse And particularly it is asserted in the beginning of the Book that this Revelation was made to S t John by the Ministry of an Angel And that this can be no imagination of S t John 's as the prophane Hobbians and Spinozians would be ready to suggest out of the Principles of their stupid and incredulous minds but a real thing the Book it self is an ample Testimony and plain demonstration it being out of the reach of any man by his own natural wit or fore-sight to write a Book of such comprehensive Prophecies and so continuedly true to say nothing of the manner of writing it the very Wit and Artifice thereof which seems to imply 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Stile and Wit is not the Stile and Wit of a Man but certainly of an Angel Nor does the Apocalypse only support the truth of Natural Religion which is the belief of the Existence of a God and of Spirits or Angels good and bad and of a Blessed Immortality after this life but it is a most special and extraordinary confirmation of the truth of the Revealed Religion of Christianity and the most assured Argument and most lasting and satisfactory of the Apotheosis of Christ that the Wit of Man can excogitate or his heart desire For reading this Book and comparing it with the History of the Affairs of the Church and of the Nations so far forth as they have had any thing to do with the Church or the Church with them he may as it were see with his own eyes and feel with his hands the Truth of our Religion in the veracity of our Great Prophet and Saviour and in the exact completion of the Predictions he has communicated to his Church as hitherto Which standing Miracle is of as much weight with the Intelligent for the confirmation of their Faith in Christ if not more than if they lived in our Saviours time to see his Miracles or conferr with the eye-witnesses of them And it is an extraordinary glorious priviledge of the Christian Church to have such a Book of Prophecies as these and peculiar to her above all Religions else in the world that ever was and so easie and naturally applicable to the events predicted And therefore they deserve very ill of the Christian Church who
either rashly or out of design instead of the true and genuine meaning of the Visions of the Apocalypse give unnatural forced senses of them disterting them from their intended scope applying mean sapless insignificant useless and inept meanings to them instead of those that are proper and adequate Which not to dissemble the Truth Grotius though otherwise a Learned Writer has most wretchedly done For this makes the very pretense of understanding Prophecies ridiculous and deprives Christ of his Glory and of one of the most Illustrious Fruits of the Passion and Apotheosis and the Church of her so Eminent Priviledge above all other Religions For such meager dry distorted and contradictions Expositions as Grotius has given of the Apocalypse if there were no other to be had than those would never argue it a Book Divinely Inspired but to be rather a confused heaping up of vagrant thoughts and fortuitous imaginations And yet these fond conceits of Grotius forsooth must stifle the genuine meaning and due efficacy of the Apocalypse that is We must rob Christ of his Glory and the Christian Church of her high peculiar Priviledge above any other Churches or Religions nay take take away that extraordinary support which not only Christianity but even Natural Religion it self has from this Book of the Apocalypse in a meer Complement to the Church of Rome that she may not seem as well by Divine Testimony as by Humane Reason guilty of Idolatry See my Synopsis Prophetica Book II. Chap. 2 3 4. and my Mystery of Godliness Book V. Chap. 16. Which Chapters if you attentively read though with the Favourers of Rome and Grotius you may think me not over-civil yet you will certainly conclude me very true and just in this my censure This I thought fit though it is against my Genius to lessen any ones performances plainly to declare that no man may be fobbed off from embracing the Truth by the specious name of Hugo Grotius prefixed to such weak and imperfect Essayes upon the Book of the Apocalypse where amongst other things it is to be noted that the six first Seals and the six first Trumpets which are indeed all the Visions of the Sealed Book he interprets of things which were transacted before the Prophecy was writ than which nothing can be more wild and preposterous A third considerable Usefulness of our Exposition is that it is a plain justification of all Reformed Churches Prince and People for their having left the Communion of the Church of Rome and a discharging of them of that perverse and unjust imputation of Schism which the Church of Rome would fain cast upon them For though they do loudly miscall them by the name of Hereticks yet they have nothing to lay to their charge but the disowning those things which it were Heresie for them to embrace and are nothing but unsound Doctrines and foul Trumperies and Principles of Idolatry which pretended Holy Church holds up for her unholy and secular ends or worldly interest For the main Body of Protestants hold all that were accounted Articles of Faith in the first Ages of the Church about the first four hundred years while the Church was deemed Symmetral as is intimated in the Apocalypse Chap. 11. whence it is impossible they should be Hereticks And that neither Prince nor People in the Reformed Churches are guilty of Schism besides the nature of the thing it self that no man is bound to disobey God under pretence of obeying a Church that is Idolatrous there is not only a Commission but a Command to all to leave her Communion Apoc. Chap. 2. ver 20. and Chap. 18. vers 4. And I heard a voice from Heaven saying Come out of her my people c. So that both Prince and People every where have a Commission from Heaven to leave her Communion so far are they from being Schismaticks for leaving it A fourth Usefulness may be and that again to the Reformed Churches which are the Church in Sardis who are reprehended by Christ in his Epistle to that Church for having a name of living as having a zeal one against another about things of smaller consequence and from thence making Schisms and Dissentions in the Reformed Churches but being even dead otherwise to that which is the onely Life of a True Christian which is Charity or Love the character of the Philadelphian Church Which the Sardian Church is heartily to breath after that all their breaches may be healed and defects made up and that Peace and Truth and Righteousness may flourish amongst them But as yet it is too true that her works are not found perfect before God as Christ complains of her in his Epistle Which Epistle of Christ to the Church in Sardis I wish all the Reformed Churches would seriously peruse and take notice of the heavy Commination against them If they do not watch and stand upon their guard and endeavour to strengthen the things that are ready to dye namely true Faith in God and in Jesus Christ and the promised asssistances of his Holy Spirit to subdue our Corruptions to the Scepter of his Kingdom and a sincere Zeal against all scandal and debauchery of Life and gross Superstition and Idolatry and against hankering after the Flesh-pots of Aegypt as thé Israelites did when God had brought them out of the House of Bondage into the Wilderness Which state is something analogous to the Sardian Interval in respect of the Philadelphian which is as it were the taking possesssion of the Holy Land and more analogous than we could wish in murmuring against their Governours and that Government which obtained in the Church even in those times which by the Spirit of God were accounted Symmetral Apoc. cap. 11.1 If they do not remember how they have received and heard and hold fast and repent namely how they have received from the Apostles themselves by their Writings and from Apostolick men raised up in the late Reformation who generally declared against the Idolatries of the Church of Rome and declared the Pope with his Hierarchy to be that Man of Sin the Antichrist even those that professed themselves not to know what to make of the Book of the Apocalypse as Luther and Calvin whom Cornelius à Lapide affirms to have cast it out of the Canon which is a sign that the Idolatry and Antichristianisme of the Roman Church was to their judgements so gross that they wanted no such helps to assure them thereof How they have received from S t Paul Children obey your Parents in the Lord as well as Fathers provoke not your Children to wrath Ephes. 6.4 And that Love is the fulfilling of the Law Galat. 5.14 For all the Law is fullfilled in one word even in this Thou shalt love thy Neighbour as thy self but if ye bite and devour one another take heed that ye be not consumed one of another These and the like sins is
is plain that the measuring belongs to the men not to the place This space therefore of ground answers to that space of time which is comprehended in the Ephesine and Smyrnean succession of the Church And the correspondence is admirable betwixt the Smyrnean succession and the Thysiasterion when so many Martyrs as so many Holocausts were sacrificed in testimony of the Truth of the Christian Religion the space where the Altar of Holocausts stands falling in with the space of Time of the Smyrnean persecutions 2. But the Court which is without the Temple leave out and measure it not For it is not commensurable to the Rule of Gods Word and the Apostolick Faith and Practice but contrary or repugnant namely that time of the Church which is comprised in far the greatest part of the Pergamenian succession and all the Thyatirian in which they are said to offer things sacrificed to Idols and were in some kind or other become Idolatrous never go about therefore to measure them for they are incommensurate to the Rule and point-blank contrary thereto such is the outward Court. For it is given unto the Gentiles and the holy City shall they tread under foot forty and two months that is a kind of Paganochristianity instead of pure Christianity shall visibly domineer for forty and two months of years that is 1260 years which is the same proportion of Time to the commensurate Time of the Church under the Ephesine and Smyrnean succession and a little further that the proportion of the outward Court has to the inward Court which proportion is as 1260 to 360 that is the outward Court contained the inward three times and an half in quantity 3. And I will give power unto my two Witnesses and they shall prophecy a thousand two hundred and threescore dayes cloathed in sackcloth The works of darkness were numbred by months the Moon being Ruler of the night but the works of Righteousness by dayes of which the Sun is moderator But by dayes are understood Prophetick dayes here that is years a thing known and usual in Prophecies By these Two Witnesses are understood all that bore witness against the Idolatries and disorders of this time of Apostasie and they are said to be cloathed in sackcloth to denote both the sadness of heart they are in to see such times and also to signifie the low and mean condition of such Holy and Apostolick men in this wicked time of Apostasie But all these mournful Witnesses are said to be two though never so many partly by reason of the Types in the Old Testament to which they allude Moses and Aaron Elias and Elisha Zorobabel and Ieshuah who show'd their Zeal for the purity of Gods Worship against the Idolatry in the Wilderness in the Baalitish Idolatry and in the Captivity of Babylon There may be also an allusion to things in this Division into two viz. to Magistracy and Ministry to the Old Testament and the New or else to the People of the Iews such as are kept out from our Religion by the gross Adulterations of it and to the Virgin Company of Christians 4. Those are the two Olive Trées and the two Candlesticks standing before the God of the Earth A description of the two Witnesses in the sense above declared with a particular allusion to that in Zachary chap. 4.11 where by the two Olive Trees upon the right side of the Candlestick and the left is understood Zorobabel and Ieshuah those faithful Servants in the Babylonish Captivity and the time of the mournfull Witnesses is the very time of the Whore of Babylon 5. And if any man will hurt them fire proceedeth out of their mouth and devoureth their Enemies The allusion is to Moses and Elias who did really bring down fire upon their Enemies but here it is to be understood Mystically of the fire of the Spirit Not by might nor by power but by my Spirit saith the Lord of Hosts It was the Word of the Lord to Zorobabel who was a Type of these Witnesses and an helper of Gods People in the Babylonish Captivity And it is said of the Man in Esdras coming out of the Sea And he shall destroy them without labour by the Law which is like unto fire In which sense I would understand that which followes And if any man will hurt them he must in this manner be killed by the power of the Spirit in conviction and prayer these are the weapons of their warfare 6. These have power to shut heaven that it rain not in the dayes of their Prophecies namely in the dayes of their mournful Prophecy their prophecying in sackcloth This is figuratively spoken by a Prophetical Metalepsis or Zoopoeia of the second kind attributing that to their activity or it may be oral denunciation which is only a consequence of their condition they being put out of power and place in Church and State The allusion is to Elias his hindering it from raining three years and six months in Ahab's time which time exactly answers to 1260 dayes the time of these mournfull Witnesses But the rain that is here hindred is the sound Apostolick Doctrine and Heavenly influence thereof which hinderance is a consequence of these mournfull Witnesses being put out of power and place And have power over waters to turn them to blood because their Apostolick preaching of the Gospel of meekness and peace does not take place And to smite the earth with all plagues as often as they will that is as often as occasions offer themselves * For particular occasions answer in analogie to particular acts of will in this Prophetick Zoopoeia and indeed all the ten plagues of Aegypt came upon the Roman Empire because these Witnesses to the Apostolick Truth are not heard it having become a Land of Aegypt to the true Israelites the pure and Apostolick Christians How the plague of Frogs of Lice of swarms of Gnats and Flyes murrain of Beasts Boyles and Ulcers Hail and Locusts in a mystical sense interpreted fell upon this mystical Aegypt as it is called in this Book of Prophecies as a necessary consequence of these Witnesses disgrace affliction and deprivation of power and office were easie here to show if it were not too long for this short Explication we are upon 7. And when they shall be * a finishing their Testimony that is performing their witnessing to the Truth against all the Impostures and Idolatries of this Spiritual Aegypt The Beast that ascendeth out of the bottomless pit that is either out of a pit of the Earth or the abysse of the Sea and so it will signifie either the two-horned or the ten-horned Beast shall make war against them and shall overcome them and kill them shall oppose them and overcome as to the power of this world and kill them so that they shall be politically dead all of them and some as it happened to the Waldenses and Albigenses and others be slain in a natural sense
you would be done to Quod tibi fieri non vis alteri ne feceris which he caused to be set up in his Palace and other publick places They are both taken notice of for their care and provision in Bread-corn and other necessaries of life 7. And when he had opened the fourth Seal I heard the fourth Beast that was like a flying Eagle and was placed on the North say Come and sée 8. And I looked and behold a pale Horse which colour of the Horse is very sutable to the Name of the Rider For it follows And his name that sate on him was Death And Hell followed him that is the Grave which is made a person here as Death is and as it were his Lackey to follow him And Power was given unto them over the fourth part of the Earth that is over almost all the Roman Empire which upon due compute was then a third part of the Earth as if this Power reached three fourths of the Empire To kill with the Sword and with Hunger and with Death that is with Famine and Pestilence and with the Beasts of the Earth Which ordinarily invade the Land in those Eastern and Southern parts in extream Famines and Pestilences to increase the mortality The beginning of this Seal is from Maximinus the Thracian and consequently an Emperour from the North as the place of the flying Eagle denotes that notable bird of prey and feeder on dead carcasses and therefore significant of the condition of this Seal under which concur so various modes of vast Mortality the Sword Famine Pestilence and wild Beasts Which Pestilence raging and over-running in a manner the whole Empire for the space of fifteen years and ending Anno CCLXIII from Maximinus to this year is the extent of this Seal And now for the Sword in the Interval of this Seal besides that in the Reign of Gallus and Volusianus Emperours the whole Empire in a manner was exhausted with rapine and slaughters by the Barbarians and consequently Tillage did fail and Famine ensue there were not two more bloody Beasts in the world than Maximinus and Gallienus the former for his cruelty being called Cyclops Busiris Phalaris and what not who without accusers or defence caused to be killed and spoiled of their goods no less than four thousand men and the latter his cruelty was such that he killed all the Male Sex of whole Cities and made nothing of slaying three or four thousand of his Soldiers in a day And there are many more examples of horrid cruelty by the Sword under this Seal according to the prediction thereof So admirably fully was accomplished what was predicted by these four Seals of which it is to be noted that not only parts of the Introductory Vision are made use of namely the four Beasts which usher in each Seal I mean the Visions thereof as parts of the description of him that appeared in the midst of the seven golden Candlesticks in the salutation of each Epistle are again made use of but as those parts of his description were sutable to the things signified concerning the Church the Epistle was wrote to so each Beast is sutable to the things predicted in each Seal in these four first Seals which strengthens the certainty of the Epistles being a Prophecy reaching from the beginning of the Church to the end of the World as well as this of the Sealed Book 9. And when he had opened the fifth Seal I saw under the Altar the souls of them that were slain for the Word of God and for the Testimony which they held that is he saw them lye at the foot of the Altar as Sacrifices that are slain use to do slaughtered or martyred for their couragiously professing Christianity For by Faith and an invincible Firmness of mind and unspeakable Patience they had made themselves an Oblation or Sacrifice for the carrying on the Affairs of the Kingdom of Christ. Here is predicted the bloody ten years persecution begun by Dioclesian and continued by his successor which was the most terrible that befell the Church of God This is the dregs of bitterness in the Smyrnean succession of the Church where by the ten days of Tribulation this persecution may be more particularly glanced at as well as all the Ten Persecutions usually so called 10. And they cryed with a loud voice saying How long O Lord holy and true dost thou not judge and avenge our blood on them that dwell on the Earth that is the Persecution of the Church under this Seal was so exceeding grievous that they called aloud for Divine Vengeance on this persecuting Empire 11. And white Robes were given to every one of them and they were adopted into the Society of the Blessed which white Robes allude to the custome under the Jewish Temple Where after a due search into their Pedigree and the unblemishedness of their body by giving them or putting on them a white Vesture they were admitted into the Court of Priests as these to serve God in Heaven And it was said unto them that they should rest yet for a little season untill their fellow-servants also and their brethren that should be killed as they were should be fulfilled that is till their fellow-Christians under Licinius Iulian and under the Arians should be slain after which due vengeance should be taken of the bloody Empire under the time of the Trumpets 12. And I beheld when he had opened the sixth Seal and lo there was a great Earthquake The Greek word is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and may have a more general signification and denote a concussion shaking and commotion of the frame of things which things are here the constitution of the Pagan Hierarchy as I may so call it or Gentilism the Religion of the Roman Empire as Pagan And the Sun became black as sack-cloath of hair and the Moon became as blood that is they were both eclipsed both the Dragon himself the Sun as Head of that Religion and the Office of their Pontifex Maximus which is next to the Draconick Majesty and there intimated by the Moon These plainly suffered an Eclipse when the Roman Emperours by professing Christianity renounced Satan with all the wicked crew of evil Spirits under him and would serve him no more nor exercise the Office of his Pontifex Maximus as is recorded of Constantine Constantius Valentinianus and Valens and Gratian would not so much as retain the name of Pontifex Maximus 13. And the stars of Heaven fell unto the Earth even as a Fig-trée casteth her untimely figs when she is shaken with a mighty wind that is all the false gods of this Diabolical Polity the frame of the Pagan Religion they fell from that Religious Honour and Worship which was given them and were trampled under-foot by the prevailing Christians as also their Priests that served them 14. And the Heaven departed as a scrowl when it is rolled together that is this Pagan Hierarchy shrivelled
the torment of a Scorpion when he striketh a man viz. lesser at first but increasing upon him and the stroke being by the Serpentine taile of the Locusts it shows the poison and sting to be Diabolical and to cause such vexations of mind as that poison is apt to breed And as the torment of a Scorpion when he strikes a man is from a white poison transfused in the stroke as Apollodorus relates in Pliny lib. 11. So it is that perversly pretended Monotheisme of these Saracens that looks so fairly and innocently on it with which they might perplex and torment the minds of the unsealed and sorely disquiet their consciences besides the general fear of their lives in them that would not turn Mahometans the Saracens Wars being carried on upon a Religious account as is to be noted in their Alchoran and Zuna and they great Zelots and diligent promoters of their Religion as being the most Early Professors of it and as it is signified by their Type these Scorpion Locusts it being * the nature of the Scorpion perpetually to attempt to sting and transfuse her poison as of these Saracens to proselyte the world to their Religion 6. Wherefore the fear of death and horrour of conscience did so vex men and fill them with anxiety that it was worse than death it self to be in such perpetual danger and unsettledness of things worse than the Christians are now in under the Turks which were a desirable condition to them rather than these perpetual renewed vexations of the Saracens but this did not fall to their lot in the Saracens dayes though it were the more desirable condition of the two which may be glanced at in these words And in those dayes shall men seek death and shall not find it and shall desire to dye and death shall flée from them That is those parts of the Empire shall not be setled in the Saracens hands where they Invaded as afterwards it came to pass in the Turks Invasion who seized on the Eastern part of the Empire and setled there so that the Empire there was not only vexed but killed extinguished or put an end to and the minds of the conquered at quiet 7. And the shapes of the Locusts were like unto Horses prepared to battel That is ready harnessed as it is said afterwards that they have Breast-plates of Iron which shows the courage of these Saracens and their well-appointedness for War and their success was accordingly as is expressed by what follows And on their heads were as it were crowns of Gold Which shows their victory over so many Nations and Kingdoms For in the space of eight years or a little more they acquired to that Satanical Kingdom of Mahomet Palestine Syria both the Armenia's all Asia minor in a manner Persia India Aegypt Numidia all Barbarie to the River Niger Lusitania and Hispania nor were they stinted here but won also a great part of Italy even to the Gates of Rome To which you may add Sicily Candia Cyprus and the rest of the Mediterranean Islands Wherefore there is great reason that they should be represented with golden Crowns on their heads they having acquired so many Rich Kingdoms by War And their faces were as the faces of men The better to assure the Reader that Men indeed are meant and not Infects or mere Locusts 8. And they had hair as the hair of women to show what Countrey-men they were not for any effeminacy or cowardize in them namely that they are derived from the Arabians whose custom it was to wear long hair on their head unshorn and an head-tire like women This therefore shows they are Saracens from Arabia and in that it is said And their téeth were as the téeth of Lions that shows that they were very dispatchfull of their prey who could devour so many Kingdoms in so little time as was above noted 9. And they had breast-plates as it were breast-plates of Iron That is they were well armed to fight and had an Iron courage And the sound of their wings was as the sound of Chariots of many horses running to battel Here is mention of wings in allusion to the figure of Locusts who also make a noise with their wings when they fly but the sound of Chariots of many horses running to battel emplyes that they are indeed Men and great Warriours that with great swiftness noise and terrour run down all before them witness the above-mentioned conquests which were so large and so many 10. And they had tails like unto Scorpions and there were stings in their tails That is they are of the Serpentine kind of the Ancient Serpent that was alwayes an Enemy to the Son of God and his Kingdom and it denotes that with their conquests they would bring in a Religion contrary to that of Christ and destroy the worship of the Son of God under an ignorant pretense of Monotheisme as if the Christian Religion were inconsistent with the worship of one God whereas the more distinct knowledge of that one God does not make us less Monotheists than they This is the up-shot of their victories and the very sting and poison their atchievements end in And their power was to hurt men five months That is to hurt and vex the Empire particularly but not quite to destroy it as the Turks did afterwards Nor is it said here to hurt the third part of Men as in the former Trumpets because their Invasions were not restrained to the Empire but ran over other vast Tracts of the habitable world also But they are said to hurt men five months in allusion to the life of Locusts as I noted above And if mention be made of five months twice to remind us to double the number that is another character whereby we may discern that the Saracens are here meant by these Locusts twice five months of years viz. three hundred years saving that there is the difference of five single years which is nothing in the numbering by months of years being that most notable Interval in the Saracenical Kingdom namely from the beginning of the Caliphate of the Abasidae who first made Bagdad their Imperial seat to the taking of the said Bagdad by Togrulbec King of the Turks that is from the year of Christ 750 to the year 1055. But otherwise I conceive that five months do not signifie Arithmetically but Symbolically with an allusion to the time of the Locusts and only stand for the time that the Saracens had to hurt men not defining how long it was to be 11. And they had a King over them which is the Angel of the bottomless Pit The same that the fallen Star to whom was given the Key of the bottomless pit it being an Ensign of his Power in the Kingdom of darkness as I noted above This was the Supreme Captain of these Troops of Locusts that is Saracens and his name denotes his nature as follows Whose name in the Hebrew tongue is Abaddon but
they who are only led by his Word and Spirit not by a blind and implicite Faith in a Church not only fallible but fallacious or deceitful most of their corruptions both in Doctrine and Worship being upheld for their own worldly interest These were redeemed from among men were rescued from being carried away with the stream of the rest of the Superstitious and Idolatrous Rabble hood-winked and captivated by the false showes and subtil enticements of the most cunning Polity in the world Being the first-fruits unto God and to the Lamb namely the first pure Apostolick Christians after the Apostasie and but an handful in comparison of those multitudes that will appear after the dissolution of the Papal Tyranny 5. And in their mouth was found no guile that is there was no hypocrisie nor dissembling in them but they professed the Truth from their hearts and concealed it not For they are without fault before the Throne of God that is in the judgment of God they are holy and upright men though at the Tribunal of Antichrist they are condemned for Hereticks and deemed men not worthy to live or dye an ordinary death Nay besides what they call Heresie in them though according to that they do worship in purity the God of their Fathers as S t Paul speaks even the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ they add a multitude of abominable lies to make them odious to the people but the God of Heaven knows they are guiltless whence it is said They are without fault before the Throne of God 6. And I saw another Angel distinct from that Quire of Angels taken notice of before fly in the midst of Heaven that he may be seen and heard over all the Christian world as well the Western as Eastern Empire as is intimated in what follows Having the everlasting Gospel to preach unto them that dwell on the Earth and to every Nation and Kindred and Tongue and People that is to preach the Everlasting Righteousness Law or Religion that Christ according to Daniel was to bring in Which is the pure and Apostolick Doctrine unsophisticated with the Superstitions and Idolatries of either Greek or Roman Church which hay and stubble is to be burnt up but that Apostolick Gospel to be Eternal never to fail and to spread over all 7. Saying with a loud voice Fear God and give Glory to him for the hour of his judgment is come And worship him that made Heaven and Earth and the Sea and the fountains of waters And therefore none but God the Father and the Son with the Spirit who Created all things is to be worshipped The Gods that have not made the Heavens and the Earth they shall perish from the Earth and from under the Heavens as the Prophet Ieremiah foretells This is a plain declaration against giving any Religious Worship to any but God alone And therefore a commination against all Saint-worshippers and Image-worshippers or whatever other Idolatry in the Greek or Roman Church That this voice of the Angel respects the Edicts and Degrees of those Greek Emperours that protested so zealously against Saint-worship and Image-worship namely the Decrees of Leo Isaurus Constantinus Iconomaches Leo Armenius Michael Balbus and Theophilus I do not deny but this Angelical Monition was the most loudly and earnestly urged upon the Christian World at the dreadfull siege and storming of Constantinople and the subduing the whole Eastern Church and Empire to the Turk This was a plain manifestation that the hour of his judgement was come against such gross Idolaters And yet though his judgements flew so high and sounded so loud as to give notice to all Christendome yet the Western Church would take no notice thereof as it is predicted Chap. 9. vers 20. And the rest of the men which were not killed by these plagues from the Euphratean Horsemen which are the Turks yet repented not of the works of their hands that they should not worship Demons and Idols of Gold and Silver c. And therefore if we hear news of the hand of God upon the Western Church also I mean upon the Idolatrous Hierarchy thereof which is more particularly stiled Babylon we need not be much surprized And thus we read in the next verse 8. And there followed another Angel saying Babylon is fallen is fallen that great City or Polity bicause she made all Nations the Eastern as well as the Western Church as may be observed in the Popes activity at the second Nicene Council and in excommunicating the Iconoclast Emperours drink of the wine of the wrath of her fornication of the Philter she had mingled for them the Love-poison or Love-potion of her fornication by which is plainly understood Idolatry To the voice of this Angel belongs the Reformation when so many Provinces and Principalities fell off from the Church of Rome and was a pledge of her further ruine Here therefore ends the Thyatirian Interval and that of Sardis begins in which is contained the effusion of the Vials all but the last 9. And the third Angel followed them saying with a loud voice If any man worship the Beast and his Image that is give obedience to the Secular and Spiritual Power in such things as are Idolatrous and are the very strokes and lineament of the Image of the Beast and receive his the Beasts mark in his forehead or in his hand that is make profession of or promote and countenance the Romish Idolatrous Religion 10. The same shall drink of the wine of the wrath of God which is poured out without mixture into the cup of his indignation He shall drink of the cup of bitterness and malediction from the Lord. And he shall be tormented with fire and brimstone in the presence of the holy Angels and in the presence of the Lamb. 11. And the smoke of their torment ascendeth up for ever and ever that is all they shall be condemned to those infernal and eternal flames who under the voice of this third Angel shall persist in the gross Idolatries and other foul corruptions of the Church of Rome For under the voice of this Angel the abominations of that Church will be so fully discovered and convincingly that the adherers thereto will be generally deemed uncapable of salvation with any that have any remainders of judgment and conscience in them And they have no rest day nor night who worship the Beast and his Image and whosoever receiveth the mark of his Name Truth against the Church of Rome will be then so dear that no man that has any Conscience can be of that Religion and Profession but it will lye exceeding unevenly in his mind it will put him in restless and unsatisfied condition it appearing so manifestly against all sense all reason all honesty and loyalty and against all those sound and sacred Principles that God hath implanted in the nature of man Wherefore in those dayes no honest-hearted man can endure to submit to the Church
Condemnation of the Antichristian and Idolatrous Hierarchy for so whoredom signifies in the Prophetick stile That sitteth upon many waters who is seated amongst many People and whose Jurisdiction spreads far and wide and who pretends to be the Church Universal 2. With whom the Kings of the Earth the ten Kings suppose vers 12. have committed Fornication have joyned with in Idolatrous worship And the Inhabiters of the Earth have been made drunk with the wine of her Fornication so inflamed so intoxicated and dementated with the unwholesome heat of Idolatrous zeal that it has made them very boisterously quarrelsome against all opposers or despisers of their fair Diana and so sottish secure and heedless that they have lien exposed to all the deceits and injuries that this cunning Circe could put upon them 3. So he carried me away in the Spirit into the Wilderness and I saw a Woman sit upon a scarlet-coloured Beast whose colour denotes Tyrannical Cruelty as well as Imperial Majesty By this is understood the Roman Empire Full of names of blasphemy that is full of titles or kinds of Idolatry full of gods so Grotius interprets it understanding it of the Pagan Empire And we may safely render it full of Daemons in M r Medes sense that is full of superstitious and idolatrous worship of the souls of the Saints departed besides other Idolatries in the manner of worshipping the due object of our Religion God and Christ since the Empire has become Paganochristian Having seven heads and ten horns which the Angel interprets vers 9.12 4. And the woman was arayed in purple and scarlet colour and decked with gold and precious stone and pearls that is to say this Idolatrous Hierarchy the Patriarchs or Popes especially and Cardinals c. have this Imperial colour and richness very gorgeously apparelled upon occasions in their rich Copes and costly Miters to say nothing of the furniture of their Altars Having a golden cup in her hand full of abominations and filthiness of her fornication An enchanted Cup or Philter an intoxicating Love-potion to inflame the Empire again with a whorish desire after Idols And it is further observable that the very metal of the Cup has a natural Magick with it to draw and allure men to her and at a distance to intoxicate the brains of their Clergy with the fumes of ambition and covetousness who are not enriched with the golden gifts of their Church but upon the condition of assisting and abetting the Idolatry thereof 5. And upon her forehead was a name written By way of allusion to some impudent Harlots who had their names written upon their foreheads Mystery Babylon the great the Mother of Harlots and abominations of the Earth The first word is a Key to the rest and is to be understood in such a sense as that Chap. 11. vers 8. The great City which is spiritually called Sodom and Aegypt For in neither place is it a mere ordinary Synecdoche putting one Heathenish City for another For what Mysteriousness or Spiritualness could there be in that But it is a Christian Polity or Hierarchy so degenerated into unchristian Tyranny and Idolatry that it is mystically or spiritually set out by the name Aegypt in that Chapter and here by the name of Babylon the great Babylon as holding the Children of God in such an hard Captivity and also propagating as they the worship of Baalim of Daemons or false gods so this Hierarchy of Saints and Angels and Images and other Idolatries Great as pretending to be the Church Catholick or Universal and having indeed a large extent of Jurisdiction in the Christian world Mother of Harlots by way of reproach to her affectation of being accounted and called Holy Mother the Church when she is yet so unholy as to be the Author of the Abominations of the Earth that is of Idols or Image worship For so 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is translated by the seventy Interpreters But to understand here by Babylon Rome Heathen one Pagan City for another certainly would be but a dry Synecdoche no mystery at all This Whore of Babylon therefore is the same with the two-horned Beast that had the horns of a Lamb that is pretended to be a Christian Hierarchy but spake as a Dragon that is Decreed gross Idolatries and cruel persecutions As here one part of the Charge laid against this Whore of Babylon is Idolatry and the other part follows in the next Verse Her bloody persecutions 6. And I saw the woman drunk with the blood of the Saints and with the blood of the Martyrs of Iesus To be drunk with the blood of the Saints shows her excessive and unsatiable cruelty in persecuting them not only burning them with fire and fagot but destroying them with repeated massacres insomuch that those that have made a careful compute of their murders and cruelties have found them to exceed the bloodiness and cruelty of the Pagans against the Primitive Christians under the Red Dragon And when I saw her I wondered with great admiration To see a Woman so nobly and splendidly attired drunken and defiling her garments with blood and that God should permit so great impiety and wickedness and so great prosperity to consort together But that Iohn might the better understand the comprehension of Gods wayes and Providence touching his Church the Angel unfolds the riddle to him 7. And the Angel said unto me Wherefore didst thou marvel I will tell thee the mystery of the Woman and of the Beast that carrieth her which hath the seven heads and ten horns namely on his seventh head that thou mayest be satisfied touching the wayes of the Providence of God 8. The Beast which thou sawest * his name is and the occasion of it taken from the intercessation of Paganism when the Empire becomes Christian which to your comfort will come to pass his name is was and is not and shall ascend out of the bottomless pit and go into perdition that is to say the Roman Empire which is understood by the Beast with seven heads and ten horns is represented here under such a state or condition that at some time it might be said truly of it in its prefiguration that it is the Beast that was and is not which was only true in the time of pure Christianity obtaining in the Empire that is from Constantines time suppose to the Apostasie of the Church into Antichristianism or Idolatry For the Beast is the Empire Idolatrizing which Idolatrizing Empire ceased to be in the reign of the pure Christian Caesars but being there would be an Apostasie again into a kind of Paganochristian Idolatry in the Empire and so the Empire become a Beast again it is therefore called the Beast that was namely under the Paganical Idolatry but is not namely in that time that pure Christianity is the Religion of the Empire but should be afterwards which is expressed by And shall ascend out of the bottomless pit The word in the
who is the Authour of the Prophecy and revealed it to John would reveal the Truth to him as if the Reader was to find it in this his new and rare Litteral way But to examine now as briefly as we may the three grand causes or grounds of his betaking himself to this new Invention never yet met with in any other Writer whatsoever as he but truly and justly boasts of himself in the beginning of his Preface Concerning the first therefore I answer That I commend Civility and fair Language so far as is consistent with Truth But if by the Interpretation of the Angel the Whore of Babylon that rides the Beast Chap. 17. is necessarily and inevitably the Roman Hierarchy debauching the Empire with Idolatry I will ask R. H. whether he takes himself to be a more wise and just Nomenclator than the Holy Ghost speaking by the voice of an Angel and whether we have not sufficient warrant to call Rome or the Roman Hierarchy the Whore of Babylon we having the Example of such an infallible 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or imposer of names and whether he himself is not to take the less offence at it he expresly declaring at the end of his Book that God may permit the Turk for the punishment of Idolatry to take the City of Rome and possess himself of it To the second I answer That I dearly embrace that Christian good Nature in him and great abhorrence from War and Blood-shed especially upon account of Religion but withall I affirm that with this Christian temper my Exposition of the Apocalypse though I follow M r Medes Synchronisms for the main and interpret it Mystically better agrees than R. H. his Litteral Interpretation which seems framed in a tenderness to the worldly peace of the Church of Rome only but mine tends to a peace and cessation of Wars and Persecution in all Christendom Let R. H. read my Preface Sect. 12. and then tell me whether his Litteral sense or my Mystical sense is more abhorrent from persecution war and bloodshed and better consists with Christian peace and charity But he while he seems so solicitous for the Church of Rome in his Litteral Interpretation of the Apocalypse cares not to disarm all the Reformed Churches of that just defence which apparently they have out of the Apocalypse rightly understood for their separation from Rome whereby they can demonstrate themselves neither Schismaticks nor Hereticks nor ought to have been massacred and burnt for such to the exhausting of the lives of several hundred thousand innocent Souls that could not stoop to their Idolatries What a preposterous piece of Charity therefore is it in R. H. that in a tenderness to the peace of the Church of Rome he will despoil his own Church and all the Reformed Churches of their just and most effectual defence against that blood-thirsty Hierarchy who have drunk the blood of so many hundred thousands of innocent dissenters and if their Interest require it and opportunity give leave are it is to be feared ready to drink as much more But for my own part I am against all War upon account of Religion and all bloody Persecutions of one Party or other nor doth my Interpretation of the Apocalypse require any such thing But that they that are unjustly assaulted may defend themselves R. H. himself allows against the Papists in the Conclusion of his Book in these express words And so stands the Case betwixt Vs and Rome if they assault us we may assault them if they begin with us we may defend our selves and offend our foes until they be minded to be quiet and agree on peace upon safe terms and firm foundation And the Mystical Interpretation of the Apocalypse implyes no more against the persons of the Romanists than thus But that their Policy quatenus Idolatrous and persecutive will be confounded methinks R. H. should conceive there is no inconvenience in that unless he were a lover of Idolatry and Persecution more than of the purity of Gods Worship Goodness Equity and Truth Therefore the second cause of his adhering to a Litteral Exposition of the Apocalypse is thus quite blown away And for his third and last though the Church of England cannot but take in good part his kindness and well-meaning in her behalf against such phancy-full Sectaries as would prove her Antichristian out of the Mystical Interpretation of the Apocalypse yet the most Orthodox the most Pious and the most Learned Clergy-men of the Church of England to whom he dedicates his meaning of the Revelation will easily understand that he does our Church a great disservice by exploding all Mystical Interpretations of the Apocalypse the true Mystical Explication thereof such as I have pitched upon and such as I challenge R. H. or any man else living to show any flaw of moment therein excusing our English Church from all suspicion of that Antichristianism which is deciphered in the Apocalypse as doth appear by the second Consectary of my Ioynt-Exposition Synops. Prophet Book 2. Chap. 5. Besides what occurrs in my Preface to my Synopsis Sect. 17. of a peculiar Attestation to the Church of England from the completion of the Prophecy of the rising of the Witnesses Not to omit also that according to our mystical Interpretation Episcopacy was in the Church in the Symmetral times thereof And that there is no warrant for separation from the Church of England it being so considerable a part of the Reformed Church or the Church of Sardis So plain is it that R. H. doth disservice to our Church by decrying all Mystical Interpretations of the Apocalypse In the mean time I have abundantly shown how altogether groundless as well as how extravagant R. H. his Hypothesis is who would have the Apocalypse expounded in a litteral sense and supposeth the visions must be fulfilled in the same order they occurr in the Text And how weak his objections have proved against M r Mede's Synchronisms But as weak as they are they were the best his cause could afford him and his way more laudable thus to combate with his adversary in the open field to try if he could vanquish him than to use those small arts and petty tricks that is usual with a party of men that think any thing just that is for their Interest and stick not to report of men when they are dead that they had changed their opinions whom they being fixed upon firm grounds they could never move when they were alive And thus as I have heard has M r Mede been served His singular Learning and Piety being a great countenance to what tenents he held and therefore the most plausible as well as the most compendious confutation being his own disapproving of them upon better thoughts there has been a report raised that himself before he died was out of conceit with his own Synchronisms Which that it is a meer figment any unprejudiced man may be satisfied from these brief
and prophane in these words vers 2. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 But the Outer Court of the Temple leave out and measure it not as being to be trodden down by the Gentiles and to be defiled by a new kind of Gentilism and Idolatry contrary to the Word of God which is the true measure of all Christian Rites and Usages with which these times not squaring they are called Incommensurate or Asymmetral So fitly do these two Courts denote these two different States of the Church But they signifie not only the order of Dignity or Worth of one before the other but of Time also for the Inner was before the Outer And moreover there is the same proportion betwixt the Inner and the Outer Court which is as two to seven according to Villalpandus his compute that there is betwixt the Symmetral times of the Church and the Asymmetral Thus have I crowded in more than could be well contained within the ordinary compass of an Epilogue but it was out of an extreme solicitude that nothing might be wanting to the clear understanding and certain assuring of the truth of this our Exposition of the Apocalypse it being of so mighty concernment for the Christian World that this Book be rightly understood that men may know what Religion they ought to adhere unto and what to forsake and that the great Potentates and Prelates of Christendom seeing the State of the Church thus lively and truly represented in this Looking-glass of Divine Providence may conscientiously guide their Affairs accordingly with judgment and prudence removing what is an offence in the eyes of God and like Fathers of their People and true Sons of the most High after so long a Tyrannical Reign of Antichrist bethink themselves of the further introducing and enlarging the Righteous and Comfortable Kingdom of Christ which according to the Romish Expositors themselves is thus described Isai. Chap. 32. Behold a King shall reign in Righteousness and Princes shall rule in judgment And a man shall be that is men shall be and especially they in power an hiding place from the wind and a covert from the tempest as rivers of waters in a dry place as the shadow of a great rock in a weary Land Such nursing Fathers and nursing Mothers will the Higher powers be in the Reign of Christ to all his True and Living Members whenas in the Reign of Antichrist or the Roman Hierarchy they are the only men that are exposed to danger and have been slaughtered and massacred and burnt with fire and faggot some hundred thousands of them for keeping Faith and a good Conscience towards God upon pretence of their being Hereticks Whenas there can be no Heresie but it must be the profession of something contrary to the truly Catholick and Apostolick Faith whereas the Reformed Churches generally hold all those points of Faith that were professed in the Symmetral Times of the Church about four hundred years after Christ before the Apostasie came in And certainly the Christian Faith was abundantly complete in those Primitive Ages and wanted nothing But the Dissenters from the Church of Rome are held Hereticks by them for not embracing such Articles and Rites and Usages as are maintained by them for mere worldly Interest for encreasing the Power and Revenue of Holy Church as they call it though in what it differs from the Reformed Churches suppose this of England for Example Holy Church or the Roman Hierarchy are nothing else but a Body Politick of Men that drive on a Secular Design under a Religious pretense and so may be looked upon rather as a Secular Polity than Spiritual but Christian no further than as to the profession of that Christianity we both agree in a subserviency to their worldly designs For if they did in good earnest believe and love the Ancient Apostolick Christianity which obtained in the Symmetral Ages of the Church which was then consummate and abundantly sufficient to Salvation they could not murder those that do heartily profess it the rest being no part of that consummate Christianity but at best mere moss and filth added to it From whence it follows that no one that suffers in the cause of the Roman Hierarchy or Church of Rome as opposite to the Reformed Churches suffers as a Martyr for Christianity but as a Souldier of fortune that espouses the cause of a worldly Polity that guilds it self over with a specious Title of holy Church And truly it were very well if they quitted their lives thus as mere Souldiers of a secular Power But they giving testimony to all the Abominations of the Roman Religion by their thus suffering for they suffer not for the primitive Apostolick Faith wherein we are all agreed they giving testimony I say to all their Idolatries gross superstitions wicked and Tyrannical Laws against the true Members of Christ whom they nickname Hereticks which things make the Roman Hierarchy the real Antichrist they are not only not the Martyrs of Christ but the real Martyrs of Antichrist they suffering for such Doctrines and Practices as are against the law of Christ and are the very support constitution and peculiar interest of Antichrist But as many as suffer by this Roman Hierarchy as the faithful servants of Christ in Obedience to his Laws that are contrary to the Institutes Doctrines and Practices of Antichrist they die as the real Martyrs of Christ and faithful witnesses against Antichrist their witnessing serving no Secular design but the keeping faith and a good Conscience and the approving themselves the sincere servants of Christ. The main thing therefore that I aim at is this That they that suffer by the Roman Hierarchy instigating the Princes of Christendom to persecute the conscientious being the real Martyrs of Christ and their persecution only for such things as are both against the Laws of Christ and only for the Interest of the Antichristian Hierarchy nothing for the secular Powers themselves such as are the Invocation of Saints the Worshipping of Images the Adoration of the Host the Doctrine of Transubstantiation than which nothing can be imagined more reproachful and blasphemous against the person of Christ it exposing him to be swallowed down into that bag of filth the bodies of men or to be imprisoned in a Pyxis to be gnawn with rats and mice or if fallen to the ground and he cannot stay himself I mean this Deus Panaceus this Breaden-God of the Pontificians to be licked up by every obscene dog And yet as glibly as he goes down he is a whole man with head arms and legs with flesh and bones and thus all swallowed down at once without gnawing or chawing nay and that which is still more prodigious it is a whole living man in health and vigour with arms and legs able to run away from either mouse rat or dog or chase them away from himself and yet he suffers himself to be gnawn and eaten up by these vermin I say these