Book XIII

THE DOCTRINE CONCERNING ANTICHRIST, AND VARTA- TIONS ON THIS SUBJECT FROM LUTHER'S TIME DOWN TO THIS.

A brief Summary. — Variations of the Protestants in regard to Antichrist. — Luther's own predictions. — Calvin's evasion. — What Luther lays down, as to this Doctrine, is contradicted by Melancthon. — A new article of Faith added to the Confession in the Synod of Gap. — The foundation of this decree manifestly false. — This Doctrine despicable in the Reformation.— The absurdities, contrarieties, and impieties of the new interpretation of prophecies proposed by Joseph Mede, and maintained by the minister Jurieu. — The most holy Doctors of the Church enrolled amongst Blasphemers and Idolaters.

1. — Article added to the Confession of Faith on purpose to declare the Pope Antichrist.

The disputes of Arminius raised great combustions in the United Provinces, and it were now time to treat of them: but as the questions and decisions resulting from them are of a more particular discussion, before I engage therein, a famous decree should be mentioned of the Synod of Gap, the account of which was deferred, not to interrupt the aJBfair of Piscator.

It was therefore in this SynG<l and in 1603, that a new decree was made to declare the Po{)e Antichrist. This decree was counted of so great importance that it passed into a new article of faith, the thirty-first in order, and took place after the thirtieth, it being there said that all true pastors are equal; so that what gives the Pope the character of Antichrist, is his styling himself superior to other bishops. If it be so, it is a great while since Antichrist has reigned ; nor do I conceive why the Reformation has so long deferred enrolling in the

THE HISTORY OF [bOOK catalogue of this great number of Antichrists she has introduced, St. Innocent, St. Leo, St. Gregory, and the rest of the Popes whose epistles shew us the exercise of this superiority in every page.

2. — Luther's empty prophecies, and CahirCs as empty shift.

Now when Luther so greatly exaggerated this new doctrine of the Antichristian papacy, he did it with that prophetic air above remarked in him *. We have seen in what a strain he foretold the downfal of the Paj)al power ; and how his preaching was that breath of Jesus Christ which was to overthrow the man of sin ; without arms, without violence, by himself alone, without any intervening power : so dazzled, so intoxicated was he with the unexpected effect of his eloquence! The whole Reformation was in expectation of the speedy accomplishment of this new prophecy. But when they saw the Pope still keep his ground (for many more than Luther will split against this rock), and that the Pontifical power, so far from tumbling at the blast of this false prophet, maintained itself against the conspiracy of so many revolted powers, insomuch that the attachment of God's people to this sacred authority, which makes the band of their unity, redoubled rather than was weakened by so numerous a defection, they laughed at the illusion of Luther's prophecies, and at their weak credulity who took them for celestial oracles. Yet Calvin had his evasion ready when he said to one that ridiculed them f , that " though the body of the Papacy subsisted still, the spirit and life had forsaken it so as to leave nothing but a dead carcass." Thus men will run the hazard of a prophecy, and if the event does not answer, a flash of wit brings them off.

3. — Daniel and St. Paul brought in to no purpose.

But they tell us with a serious air it is a prophecy, not of Luther's, but of the Scripture, and evidently to be seen (so it should since it is an article of faiths in St. Paul, and in Daniel. As for the Revelations, Luther did not think fit to employ this book, nor receive it into his canon. But for St. Paul '_, what could be more evident, seeing that the Pope sitteth in the temple of God? In the Church, says Luther §, that is questionless in the true Church, the true temple of God ; it being unexampled in Scripture, that a temple of idols was

X 2 Thess. ii. 4. § Sup. 1. iii. u.50.

Xirr.] THE VARIATIONS, ETC. 193 ever called by this name : so ^hat the first step tliey must make towards a right understanding how the Pope is Antichrist, is to acknowledge that Church, wherein he presides, for the true Church. What follows is not less manifest. Who does not see how " the Pope sheweth himself that he is God, exalting himself above all that is worshipped ?" Chiefly in that sacrifice so much condemned by our Reformers, in which, for proof that he is God, the Pope confesses his sins with all the people ; raises himself above every thing by entreating all the saints and all his brethren to beg forgiveness for him ; also by declaring afterwards, and in the most holy part of this sacrifice, thathe hopes this forgiveness, " not through his own merits, but through the bounty and grace, and in the name of Jesus Christ our Lord ?" A new kind of Antichrist, that obliges all his adherents to place their hope in Jesus Christ, and for always having been the most firm assertor of his divinity, is placed by the Socinians at the head of all Antichrists, as the chief of them all, and as the most incompatible with their doctrine.

4. — Protestants discredit themselves by this Doctrine.

But again, if such a dream can deserve our serious attention, which of all these Popes is "that man of sin and the son of perdition specified by St. Paul ?¹" We never met in Scripture with the like expressions, unless to characterize some particular person. No matter for that : all the Popes since St. Gregory, as they said heretofore, and as they say at present, all the Popes since St. Leo, are "this man of sin, this son of perdition, and this Antichrist,'"" though they converted to Christianity England, Germany, Sweden, Denmark, and Holland ; so that all these countries, by embracing the Reformation, did publicly acknowledge that they had received Christianity from Antichrist himself.

5. — Illusions with recjard to the Revelations.

Who can relate here the mysteries our Reformed have found in the Revelations, and the deceitful prodigies of the beast, which are the miracles Rome attributes to saints and their relics ; to the end that St. Austin, and St, Chrysostom, and St. Ambrose, and the rest of the Fathers, who, they allow, published the like miracles with unanimous consent, may be the precursors of Antichrist? AVhat shall I say of the character which the beast stamps on the forehead, which in their language means the sign even of the Cross of Jesus Christ, and the holy chrism VOL. ir. o which is employed to imprint it : to the end that St. Cyprian, and all the other bishops before and after, who most undoubtedly, as is confessed, did apply this character, may be Antichrists ; and the faithful, who bore it ever since the origin of Christianity, be stigmatized with the badge of the beast ; and the sign of the Son of Man, become the seal of his adversary. It is irksome to relate all their impieties, and for my part, I am verily persuaded, it was these impertinencies and profanations of the holy book of the Revelations, which were seen increasing without end in the new Reformation, that brought the ministers themselves, weary of hearing them, to a resolution in the national synod of Saumur², "that no pastor should undertake the exposition of the Revelations, without the advice of a provincial synod."

6. — This Doctrine concerning Antichrist was not till then in any one act of the Reformation : Luther places it among the Smalcaldic articles, but Melancthon opposes it.

Now although the ministers had never ceased to animate the people by these odious notions of Antichristianism, they had never ventured hitherto to let them appear in the confessions of faith, though never so outrageous against the pope. Luther alone had placed, among the articles of Smalcald, a long article concerning the papacy, more resembling a satirical declamation than a dogmatic article, and in it inserted this doctrine f ; but this example was followed by none else. More than this, when Luther proposed the article, Melancthon refused to subscribe it, and we have heard him say, with the general consent of the whole party, that the Pope's superiority was of so great benefit to the church, that were it not established, it ought to be so J ; nevertheless, it was precisely in this superiority that our Reformed acknowledged the character of Antichrist at the synod of Gap in 1603.

7. — Decision of the Synod of Gap. — Its false Foundation,

There they said, " that the Bishop of Rome pretended a dominion over all the churches and pastors, and styled himself God." In what place ? in what council ? in what profession of faith ? it is what they should have specified, this being the foundation of the decree. But they durst not do it, for then it would have appeared they had nothing to produce but the

XIIT.] THE VARIATIONS, ETC. 195 words of some impertinent interpreter, viz., that in a certain manner, and in the sense God speaks to Judges, *' Ye are gods," the Pope might be called God. Grotius laughed at this objection of his party, asking them since what time the hyperboles of some flatterer were taken for received dogmata ? Nor, indeed, we may safely say it, has this reproach of the Pope's naming himself God, any other foundation than this. On this foundation they decide that " he is properly the Antichrist, and the son of perdition pointed at in the word of God, and the beast clothed with scarlet whom the Lord will discomfit, as he promised, and as he has already begun to do :" and this is what was to constitute the thirty-first article of faith for our pretended Reformed of France, accord mg to the decree of Gap, chapter concerning the Confession of Faith. This new article had for title, " Article omitted." The Synod of Rochelle gave orders, in 1607, that this article of Gap, " as most true and conformable to what was foretold in Scripture, and which we see in our days manifestly fulfilled, should be inserted in the copies of the Confession of Faith which were to be printed anew." But it was judged of dangerous consequence to suffer a religion, tolerated under certain conditions, and under a determinate confession of faith, to multiply its articles as its ministers should think fit, and a stop was put to the effect of the synod's decree.

8. — Occasion of this Decree.

It may be asked, perhaps, what spirit moved them to this novelty. The secret is discovered by the synod itself. We there read these words in the chapter concerning Discipline : " Forasmuch as many are uneasy for having the Pope called Antichrist, the company protests this is the common belief and confession of us all, by ill luck omitted, nevertheless in all precedent editions, and the foundation of our separating from the Church of Rome, a foundation drawn from the Scripture, and sealed with the blood of so many martyrs." Wretched martyrs, who spill their blood for a tenet absolutely forgotten in all the Confessions of Faith ! But it is true that of late it is become the most important of all, and the most essential subject of the breach.

9. — This Doctrine relating to Antichrist, how despised in the Reformation.

Let us now hearken to an author, who alone makes more noise in his whole party than all the rest, and whom they seem o2 to have intrusted with the whole defence of the cause, none but he any longer entering the lists. Here is what he says in that famous book entitled, " The Accomplishment of the Prophecies *." He complains, preferably to everything else, '^ that this controversy concerning Antichrist had languished a whole century, and was abandoned through policy, and in obedience to popish princes. Had this great and important truth, that popery is Antichristianism, been placed before the eyes of the Reformed, they would not have fallen into that remissness we see them in at this day. But it was so long ago since they had heard the thing mentioned, that they had quite forgotten it." Here, then, is one of the fundamentals of the Reformation ; "and nevertheless," continues this author '[-, "it so happened, through a manifest blindness, that we were solely bent on controversies which were but accessories, and neglected this, that popery is the Antichristian empire." The more he enters- into the subject, the warmer his imagination grows. '' In my judgment," proceeds he J, " this is so capital a truth, that, without it, we cannot be true Christians." And in another place : "Verily," says he, " I so greatly account this an article of a true Christian's faith, that 1 cannot hold those for good Christians Avho deny this truth, after that the event and labours of so many great men have set it in so evident a light." Here is a new fundamental article which they had not as yet thought on, nay, on the contrary, which the Reformation had unfortunately abandoned : " for," adds he §, " this controversy was so thoroughly extinguished, that our adversaries believed it dead, and imagined we had renounced this pretension, and this foundation of our whole reform.³"

10. — Confuted by the most learned Protestants, Grotius, Hammond, Jurieu himself

For my own part thus much is true, that I never in my life have met with any man of good sense among our Protestants, that laid stress on this article: in sincerity, they were ashamed of so great an excess, and more in pain how to excuse the transports of their own people that introduced this prodigy into the world, than w'e were to impugn it. Their ablest men freed us from this labour. It is well known what the learned Grotius wrote on this subject, and how clearly he has demonstrated that the Pope should not be Antichrist [|. If the autho-

• Ibid. Ace. des Proph. pan i. ch. xvi. p. 292. § Avis. t. i. p. 49, 50.

II Avis. p. 4. ace, part i, ch. xvi, p. 291.

XIII.] THK VARIATIONS, ETC. 197 rity of Grotius seem not weighty enough to our Reformed, because truly this learned man, by studying carefully the Scriptures, and reading the ancient ecclesiastical authors, disabused himself by little and little of the errors he was born in, Doctor Hammond, that learned Englishman, was not suspected in the part. Nevertheless, he took no less pains than Grotius to destroy the frenzies of Protestants touching the Antichristianism charged on the Pope.

These authors, with some others, whom our minister is pleased to call " the shame and reproach, not only of the Reformation, but also of the Christian name⁴," were in every body's hands, and received the praises not only of the Catholics, but likewise of all the able and moderate men amongst Protestants. Mr. Jurieu himself is moved with their authority. For which reason, in his book of " Lawful Prepossessions j," he delivers all he says of Antichrist as a thing not unanimously received, as a thing undecided, as a picture " whose lineaments are applicable to different subjects, some whereof have already happened, and others perchance are to come." Accordingly, the use he makes of it is as of a prepossession against popery, not as a demonstration. But now the case is quite altered; what was undecided before, is now become the groundwork of the whole Reformation ; " for certainly," says our author |, " I do not believe this Reformation otherwise well grounded than for this reason, that the church we have abandoned is true Antichristianism." Let them no longer perplex themselves as hitherto, in search of their fundamental articles: here is the foundation of foundations, without which the Reformation would have been unjustifiable. What will then become of it if this doctrine, " popery is true Antichristianism," falls of itself, merely by exposing it .' This will be perceived clearly by ever so little attention to what follows.

IL — Exposition of the Minifiter Jurieu' s Doctrine.

There needs only to consider that the whole mystery consists in clearly shewing Avhat it is that constitutes this pretended Antichristianism. The next point to be determined, is the ])eginningof it, its duration and its period, the most speedy that it is possible, in uider to comfort those who are wearied with so tedious an expectation. He thinks he has found, in the Revelations, an infallible light for the unfolding of this secret, and sup[)Oses, by taking the days for years, that the twelve hundred and sixty days assigned in the Revelations * for Antichrist's persecution, make twelve hundred and sixty years : let us take all this for truth, for our business here is not to dispute, but relate historically the doctrine given us for the ground-work of the Reformation.

12. — Mr. Jurieu labours hard to abridge the time of his pretended prophecies.

At first, he is very much puzzled about these twelve hundred and sixty years of persecution. Persecution is very wearisome, and gladly would he find a speedy end put to it : it is what our author openly manifests ; for since what happened last in France, " my soul being cast," says he-, " into the deepest abyss of grief that I ever felt in my life, I was willing for my comfort to find grounds to hope a speedy deliverance for the church." Bent on this design, he goes to search "even in the fountain head of the Sacred Oracles, to see," says he J, *^ whether the Holy Ghost would not teach me, in regard to the approaching doivnfcd of the Antichristian empire, something more sure and more precise than what other interpreters had discovered in them."

13. — This Author owns his prevention.

Men generally find, right or wrong, whatever they have a mind in prophecies, that is, in obscure places and enigmatic sayings, when violent prejudices accompany them. This author acknowledges his own : " I will own it," says he §, "with sincerity, that I approached these divine oracles full of my prejudices, and entirely disposed to believe that we were near to the end of the reign and empire of Antichrist." As he confesses himself prepossessed, he desires also to be read with favourable preventions [| : if so, he is persuaded you cannot but enter into his notions j all will go on smoothly with this allowance.

14. — He forsakes his guides, and why.

Here is he then well convicted, by his own confession, that he commenced reading the word of God, not with a mind disengaged from his prejudices, and thereby in a fit temper to receive the impressions of divine light ; but, on the contrary, with a mind " full of its prejudices," disheartened with perse-

XIII.] THE VARIATIONS, ETC. 199 cutions, absolutely determined to find the end of them, and the approaching overthrow of this so irksome an empire. He finds all the interpreters put it off to a distant date. Joseph Mede, whom he had chosen for his guide, and who had indeed set out so much to his liking, lost his way at last ; for whereas he hoped, by the means of so good a guide, " to see the persecution ended in five and twenty or thirty years' time," to accomplish what Mede proposes, he must stay many ages^ *' Tims are we," says he *, " very much retarded, and greatly remote from our reckoning : we must still wait these many ages." This was too much for a man in such haste to see an end, and to publish better tidings to his brethren.

15. — T/ie imjJossihiUty of settling the beginniiKj of these twelve hundred and sixty years which the Reformation allows to the persecution of Antichrist.

But after all, do what he will, he is obliged to find full twelve hundred and sixty years of persecution. To give a speedy end to them, it is necessary to date the beginning early. The greatest number of the Calvinists had begun this reckoning from the time we began, as they pretended, to say mass, and to adore the Eucharist; for that was the god Mauzzim, whom Antichrist was to Avorship, according to Daniel -|-. Among other fine allegories, there was somewhat of a resemblance in sound betwixt Mauzzim and the mass. Crespin makes a mighty stir with this in his " History of the jMartyrs ;];,"" and the whole party is ravished with the invention. But how ! place the adoration of the Eucharist in the first ages ? it is too soon: in the tenth or eleventh, in Berengarius's time ? that may be done ; those are ages the Reformation is little concerned about : but after all, supposing these twelve hundred and sixty whole years to commence in the tenth or eleventh century, there would remain still six hundred and sixty years of troublesome times to rub through. Our author is disheartened at this, and his ingenuity would be of little service, could it not furnish him with some more favourable expedient.

16. — New date given to the blrfJi of Antichrist by this Minister in his jyreposscssions.

Until now the party had shewn a regard for St. Gregory. It is true, masses were discovered in him abundantly, even for the⁵⁶⁷⁸ dead, invocations of saints in plenty, a number of relics ; and ^vhat is very disagreeable to the Reformation, a strong persuasion of the authority of his see. Yet, for all this, his holy doctrine and holy life made him be revered. Luther and Calvin had called him the last bishop of Rome ; his successors were nothing but Popes and Antichrists ; but as for him, it was not feasible to make him of that number. Our author was bolder, and in his '' Lawful Prepossessions" (for he began there to be inspired to interpret the Revelations) after frequently deciding with all his interpreters, that Antichrist must begin with the ruin of the Roman empire, he declared *, " This empire ceased when Rome ceased to be the capital city of the provinces, when this empire was dismembered into ten parts, which happened at the end of the fifth century, and at the beginning of the sixth." This he repeats four or five times, that you may not doubt of it, and at last concludes thus f : " It is, then, certain, that at the beginning of the sixth age, the corruptions of the church were great enough, and the pride of the bishop of Rome already risen high enough, to make us determine on this era for the first birth of the Antichristian empire." And again | : " One may well reckon for the birth of the Antichristian empire a time, wherein Avere already seen all the sprouts of future corruption and tyranny." And, finally, " this dismembering of the Roman empire into ten pieces, happened about the year 500, a little before the end of the fifth century, and at the beginning of the sixth." It is, then, manifest we must begin from thence to count the twelve hundred and sixty years assigned for the duration of the Popish empire.

17. — The times do not tally right with it, by reason of the sanctity of the then Popes.

Unfortunately, the Church of Rome is not found sufficiently corrupted in those days to make an Antichristian church of her, for the Popes of those times were the most zealous defenders of the mysteries of the incarnation and redemption of mankind, and withal as illustrious for sanctity as ever the church had. We need but hear the encomium which Dionysius Parvus §, so learned and pious a man, gives St. Gelasius the Pope, who was seated in St. Peter's chair from the year 492 to the year 496. We shall there see, that the whole life of this holy Pope was either reading or prayer : his fasting, his

S^ Pref. Coll. decret. cod. Hist. t. i. p. 183.

XIII.] THE VARIATIONS, ETC. 201 poverty, and, in the poverty of his life, his immense charity to the poor, his doctrine, in short, and his so f^reat watchfulness, that made him account the least remissness in a pastor of dangerous consequence to souls, formed in him such a bishop as St. Paul describes. This is the Pope whom this learned man beheld in the chair of St. Peter towards the end of the fifth century, when, it seems, Antichrist was born. Even a hundred years after him, St. Gregory the Great was seated in this chair, and the whole church, in the East no less than in the West, was replenished with the odour of his virtues, amongst ■which his humility and zeal shone conspicuous. Nevertheless, he was seated in the chair, which " began to be the seat of pride, and that of the beast⁹." These are fine beginnings for Antichrist. Had these Popes been pleased to be something more wicked, and defended with less zeal the mystery of Jesus Christ and the cause of piety, the system would fit better ; but every thing is settled : Antichrist, then, was only in his minority f, and in this nonage nothing hindered his being a Saint, and a most zealous defender of Jesus Christ and his kinodom. These were our author's discoveries at the bejrinningofthe year 1685, and when he composed his " Lawful Prepossessions."

18. — 21ic Author changes his mind, and is for advancing the overthrow of Antichrist.

But upon his observing, towards the end of the same year, the revocation of the Edict of Nantes, with all the consequences of it, this great event made him change his proj)hecies, and advance the time of the downfal of Antichrist's kingdom. The author would have it in his power to say, he hoped to live to bean eye-witness of it. In IGSG, he published his great work of the " Accomplishment of tiie Prophecies ;j;," wherein he determines the period of the Antichristian persecution at the year 1710, or at least in 1714 or 1715. But he informs his reader that, after all, he thinks it a difficult matter to mark precisely the year. " God," says he, " in his j)rophccies, looks not into matters so minutelij." Stupendous maxim ! Nevertheless, " one may say," j)roceeds he, " this must happen between the year 1710 and the year 1715." This we may depend n])on, and what he calls j)ersecution will be at an end for -certain, at the beginning of the eighteenth century; so we draw near the point : scarce fivc-and-twenty years remain. Which¹⁰ of the zealous Calvinists would not have patience, and wait so short a term ?

19. — He is ohlUjed to make him be born in the person of St. Leo the Great.

The truth is, there is some difficulty in the thing ; for the more he advances the end of the twelve hundred and sixty years, the higher must he carry the beginning of them, and settle this epoch of the Antichristian empire in still purer times. Thus to finish in i7Uf, or thereabouts, he must have begun the Antichristian persecution in the year 450 or 454, under the Pontificate of St. Leo; and accordingly it is what the author chooses after Joseph Mede, who, in our days, has made himself famous in England by his learned extravagancies on the Revelations, and the other prophecies employed against us,

20. — Absurdity of this System.

It seems as if God had a design to confound these impostors by filling the chair of St. Peter with the greatest men and greatest Saints it ever had, at the time which was selected to make it the seat of Antichrist, Can one but consider the letters and sermons wherein St. Leo inspires, even at this day, so forcibly into his readers the faith of Jesus Christ, and believe that an Antichrist was the author of them ? But what other Pope has impugned more vigorously the enemies of Jesus Christ, has maintained with more zeal both Christian grace and ecclesiastical discipline, and, in fine, given to the world a more holy doctrine, with more holy examples ? He, whose sanctity made him be revered by the barbarous Attila, and saved Rome from massacre, is the first Antichrist, and father of all the rest. It was Antichrist that held the Fourth General Council, so respected by all good Christians ; it was Antichrist that dictated the divine letter to Flavian, which was the admiration of the Avhole church, wherein the mystery of Jesus Christ is so sublimely and so distinctly explained, that the Fatliers of this great Council cried out at each word, " Peter has spoken by the mouth of Leo ;" whereas they should have said, by his mouth Antichrist has spoken, or rather, Peter and Jesus Christ himself have spoken by the mouth of Antichrist. Must not a man have drank deep, even to the dregs of that infatuating cup, the potion of the lying prophets of old, and turned his head quite giddy with its fumes, to vent to the world such delirious exorbitancies ?

XIII.] THE VARIATIONS, ETC. 203:

21. — Idle shift of the Minister,

At this part ofthe prophecy, the new prophet foresaw the indignation of mankind, and that of Protestants no less than Catholics ; for he is forced to own that, from Leo the First to Gregory the Great, inclusively, Rome had a great many good bishops *, of whom he must make as many Antichrists, and hopes to satisfy the world by saying they were '^Antichrists commenced." But after all, if the twelve hundred and sixty years of Antichristian persecution begin then, he must either abandon the sense he gives to the prophecy, or saj% that then " the holy city was trod under foot by the Gentiles f; the two witnesses," namely, " the small number of the faithful," were put to death, " the Avoman with child," to-wit, the church, " was driven into the wilderness," and deprived at least of the public exercise of religion ; that from that time, in short, began the execrable *' blasphemies of the beast against the name of God, and against all those that dwell in heaven, and the war, she waged against the Saints|." For it is set down expressly in St. John, that all this was to continue a thousand two hundred and threescore days, which he will have to be years. To make these blasphemies, this war, this Antichristian persecution, and this triumph of error, to begin in the Church of Rome, even from the time of St. Leo, St. Gelasius, and St. Gregory, and make it hold on for the space of all these ages, when unquestionably that church was the model of all other churches, not in faith alone, but also in piety and discipline, is the height of all extravagancy.

22. — Two bad characters imputed to St. Leo.

But again, what has St. Leo done to deserve to be the first Antichrist ? He could not be Antichrist for nothing. Here are the three characters he gives to Antichristianism, which must be made to agree with the time of St. Leo, andAvithhim in person ; '¹¹ Idolatry, tyranny, and corruption of manners §." How deplorable, to be reduced to defend St. Leo against Christians, from all these reproaches ! but charity constrains us to it. Let us begin by the corruption of manners. But tJicn nothing is objected against him on this head : nothing can be found in the life of this great Pope but examples of sanctity. In his time ecclesiastical discipline was still in its full vigour, and St.¹²

Leo was the support of it. Thus you see how manners were corrupted. Let us run over the other characters, that of tyranny next, in as few Avords. Ever since the time of St. Leo, objects our author¹³, '' Avho was sitting in the year 450, to that of St. Gregory the Great, the Bishops of Rome have laboured to arrogate to themselves a superiority over the universal church :" but was it St. Leo that began ? He dares not say it ; all he says is, " he laboured at it," for he knows full well that St. Celestin his predecessor, and St. Boniface, and St. Zozimus, and St. Linocent, to go no further back at present, acted no otherwise than St. Leo ; nor wei'e they less zealous in maintaining the authority of St. Peter's chair. Why should they not, then, be of the number, at least, of these " Antichrists commenced."" Tlie reason is, because, had he began from their time, the twelve hundred and threescore years would have elapsed already, and the event would have belied the sense he is resolved to give the Revelations. Thus do men impose on the world, and turn the divine oracles to their own fancy.

23. — St. Leo's idolatry , — The Mauz~ims of Daniel applied to the Saints.

But it is time we should come to the third character of the beast, which our adversaries are determined to find in St. Leo, and in the whole church of his time. There is a new Paganism, an idolatry worse than that of the Gentiles, in the honour paid to saints and their relics. It is on this third character the chief stress is laid : Joseph Mede | lias the honour of this invention, who interpreting these words of Daniel, ^' he shall honour the God Mauzzim," to wit, as he 'translates it, "the God of forces:" and again, *' he shall do it to fence Mauzzim with a strange God ;" understands this of Antichrist, who shall call the saints his fortresses.

24. — St. Basil and the rest of the Saints of those times accused of the same Idolatry.

But how can he find that Antichrist will give the saints this name ? " Li this," says he, " that St. Basil has preached to all his people, or rather to the whole universe, who have read and approved his divine sermons, that the forty martyrs, whose lelics they possessed, ' were towers whereby the city was de-

•}• Expos, of Dan, ch. xi. n. 30', &c. Book iii. cli. xvi. xvii. p. G66, et seq.

Dan. xi. 38, 39.

Xin.3 '^^^^ VARIATIONSj ETC. 205 fended *.' " St. Chrysostomf has also said, " that the relics of St. Peter and Paul \Yere more secure towers for Rome than ten thousand ramparts." " Is not this," concludes Mede, " raising up the gods JNIauzzims ?"" St. Basil and St. Chrysostom are the Antichrists who erect these fortresses against the true God.

25. — Other Saints Ukeivise Idolaters.

Yet not they alone : the poet Fortunatus hath sung after St. Chrysostom, '^that Rome had two ramparts and two towers in St. Peter and St. Paul." St. Gregory has said as much of them. St. Chrysostom, " that the holy martyrs of Egypt protect us like impregnable ramparts, like unshaken rocks, against our invisible enemies." And Mede still replies, "are not these Mauzzims ?" he adds, " that St. Hilary discovers likewise our bulwarks in the angels J." He cites St. Gregory, of Nyssa, brother to St. Basil, Gennadius, St. Eucherius, Theodoret, and the prayers of the Greeks, in proof of the same. He does not forget that the Cross is called our defence, and that our common expression is, " we fortify ourselves with the sign of the Cross ;" Munire se sujno Crucis § ; the Cross comes in amongst the rest, and this sacred symbol of our salvation must also be ranked amongst the Mauzzims of Antichrist. ^

26. — St. Ambrose added to the rest by Mr. Jurieu,

Mr. Jurieu sets off all these fine passages of Joseph Mede to the best advantage || ; and not to be a mere transcriber, adds to them St. Ambrose, who says, '' the saints Gervase and Protase were the tutelary angels of the city of Milan." He might also have named St. Gregory Nazianzen, St. Austin, and, in short, all the Fathers who abound in as strong expressions. All this is making as many gods of the saints, because it is making of them ramparts and rocks where is found a secure sanctuary, names which the Scripture appropriates to God.

27. — Tlic Ministers cannot believe what they say themselves.

These men know well, in their own consciences, that the Fathers, whom they quote, never understood it so : but meant f Chrvs. Honi. 32 ad Rom.

• lb. p. (;73. Horn. 70. ad Pop.' Ant. Orat. in 40. Mart. § Ibid. p. (■,^(i.

II Acc. des Proph. part i. ch. xiv. pp. 24«, 249, et seij. lb. p. 235, Mede ubi sub. ch, xvi.¹⁴

only to say, that God gives us in the saints, as heretofore he did in Moses, in David, and in Jeremiah, invincible protectors, whose acceptable prayers are a more secure defence to us than a thousand ramparts : for he is able to make of his saints, when he pleases, and in the manner that he pleases, " impregnable fortresses, iron pillars, and brazen walls *." Our doctors, I say again, are convinced in their hearts that is the sense of St. Chrysostom and St. Basil, when they call the saints towers and fortresses. From these examples they ought to learn, not to take in a criminal sense other as strong expressions, and withal as innocent as these ; at least not to carry impiety so far as to make these holy doctors the founders of Antichristian idolatry, this being a charge equally atrocious on the whole church of their times, whose doctrine and worship they did but propound. Nor, indeed, ought we to imagine our ministers believed seriously what they said, and judged so many saints no better than blasphemers and idolators. All that we can conclude from thence is, that they suffer themselves to be transported beyond all bounds, and without enlightening the understanding, seek only to kindle hatred in the heart.

28. — JVhy they do not mahe St. Basil the beginning of AntU christlanism as ivell as St. Leo.

But after all, if we must hold for Antichrists all these pretended worshippers of Mauzzims, why do they defer to St. Leo's time the beginning of the Antichristian empire j? Let them shew me that in this Pope's days more was done for the saints than acknowledging them for towers and impregnable fortresses ? Let them shew me that more trust was put in their prayers, more honour paid to their relics ? You say that in 360, and 390, the worship of creatures, that is, in your notion, that of the saints, was not as yet established in the public service : shew me that it was more or less so in St. Leo's time ? You say, in the same year of 360, and 390, great precautions were taken not to confound the service of God with the service of creatures then commencing : shew me that less was taken afterwards, and especially in St. Leo's Pontificate ? But who ever could have confounded things so well distinguished ? We demand things of God ; we demand prayers of the saints : Yvhoever dreamt of asking either prayers of God, or the things themselves of the saints as of those that gave them ? Shew,

XIII.] THE VARIATIONS, ETC. 207 then, that in St. Leo's time these so distinct characters were confounded, the service of God, with the honour given to his servants for love of him ? you never will undertake it. ^Vhy, therefore, stop in so fair a way ? dare to utter what you think. Begin by St. Basil, and St. Gregory of Nazianzen, in the reign of Antichristian idolatry, and the blasphemies of the beast against the Eternal, and against all that dwells in heaven : turn into blasphemies against God and against the saints, what has been said ever since that time of the glory God imparted to his servants in the church : St. Basil is no better than St. Leo; nor the church more privileged at the end of the fourth age, than fifty years after the middle of the fifth. But I see the answer you make me in your heart, viz., that should you begin by St. Basil, all would have been completed long ago ; and thus belied by the event, you could no longer amuse the people with vain hopes.

29, — Ridiculous Calculations.

Accordingly, our author owns * you might begin his whole calculation from four different epochs: viz., 360, 393,430, and in fine, 450, or 455, which is the calculation he himself follows. All these four accounts, according to him, agree admirably with the system of the new idolatry f : but unluckily in the two first reckonings, where all things else, as he pretends, agree so well, the chief point is wanting ; to wit, that according to these computations the Popish empire should have fallen in 1620, or in 1653. Now it still exists and enjoys a small respite. As to the third calculation, it terminates in 1690, four or five years hence, says our author : it would be too much exposing himself to take so short a term. Yet every concurrence tallied with it to admiration. See what these concurrences are which they build so much on, mere dreams, visions, manifest illusions, proved notoriously such by the event.

30. — JVIiy St. Basil's Idolatry and that of the other Fathers is not accounted ylntichristian.

" But," says our author, " the chief reason why God will not compute the birth of Antichristianism from these years, 360, 393, and 430, notwithstanding that the new idolatry," which he will have to be the character of Antichristianism, " was then established, is, that there was a fourth characteristic of the¹⁵¹⁶ birth of this Antichristian empire which had not as yet appeared ; namely, that the Roman empire was to be destroyed ; that there were to be seven Kings, to wit, according to all the Protestants, seven forms of government in the city on seven mountains, meaning Rome *." The Papal empire was to make the seventh government, and it was requisite the six others should be destroyed to make room for the seventh, which was that of the Pope and Antichrist. When Rome ceased to be mistress, and the Antichristian empire was to commence, it was necessary there should be ten kings, which were to receive the sovereign power at the same time with the beast j ; and ten kingdoms, " into which the Roman empire was to be subdivided," according to the oracle of the Revelations. All this was fulfilled in the nick of time under St. Leo : this, therefore, is the precise time of the birth of Antichrist, and there is no resisting the concurrence of such circumstances.

31. — Infinite absurdity.

Admirable doctrine ! neither these ten Kings, nor the dismemberincr of the empire, entered into the constitution of Antichrist, nor at farthest could this be any thing else than an exterior token of his birth ; what truly constitutes him, is the corruption of manners, is the pretension to superiority, is principally the new idolatry. All this is no more to be found under St. Leo, than fourscore or a hundred years before ; but God would not, as yet, impute it for Antichristianism, nor did it please him that the new idolatry, though already entirely formed, should be Antichristian. It is impossible, in fine, that such extravagancies, where impiety and absurdity strive together which shall exceed, should not open the eyes of our brethren, and, at length, put them out of conceit with those who delude them with such dreams.

32. — The system of the Ministers concerning the seven Kings of the Revelations evidently confounded by the very ivords of this prophecy .

But let us enter into the particulars of these fine concurrences so dazzling to our Reformed, and begin with the seven Kings, who, according to St. John, are the seven heads of the beast, and with these ten horns, which, according to the same St. John, are ten other kings. The sense, say they, is manifest. " The seven heads," says St. John, " are the seven mountains

Xni.] THE VARIATIONS, ETC. 209 on which the woman sitteth, and these are seven kings : five are fallen ; one and the other is not yet come; and when he Cometh he must continue a short space; and the beast that was and is not, even he is the eighth king, and one of the seven, and goeth into destruction * ." The seven kings are, says our author f, the seven forms of government Rome had been subject to ; the kings, the consuls, the dictators, the decemvirs, the military tribunes who had consular power, the emperors, and finally the Pope. Five are fallen, says St. John: five of these governments had expired when he wrote his [)rophecy : one is stdl ; the empire of the Caesars under which he wrote : and the other must come soon ; who does not espy the Papal empire ? It is one of the se\ea kings: one of the seven forms of government, and it is also the eighth king, namely, the eighth form of government: the seventh, because the Pope much resembles emperors by the dominion which he exercises ; and the eighth, because he has somewhat peculiar, his spiritual empire, his dominion over consciences ; all mighty just, but for one little word that mars the whole. In the first place, I would fain ask, why the seven kings are seven forms of government, and not seven real kings. Let them shew me in Scripture, that the forms of government are named kings ; on the contrary, three verses after, I see that the ten kings are ten real kings, and not ten sorts of goxernment. Why should these seven kings of verse the ninth, be so different from the ten kings of verse the twelfth ? Does he pretetid to make us believe that the consuls, annual mac^istrates, are kings? that the entire extirpation of the regal power of Rome is one of the seven kings of Rome ? that ten men, the decemviri, are one king; and the whole seiies of four or six military tribunes, more or less, another kingp But in good truth, is that another form of government? who is ignorant that the military tribunes differed not from consuls, except in the number ? for which reason they were called Tribuni millfum Consulari jyotesfafe ; and if St. John had a mind to denote all the names of the supreme power among the Romans, why did he forget the Triumviri ? had they not, at least, as much power as the Decemviri ? And should it be said, it was too short to deserve notice, why shouUI that of the Decemviri, which held but two years, deserve it more ? This is true, they may reply: let us put them in lieu of the Dictators, for there is little likelihood the Diclator>hip could ever be called a form of govenmient under which Rome continued for a certain time.

VOL. II. P¹⁷¹⁸

It was an extraordinary magistracy, set up according to the exigency of present circumstances in all times of the republic, not a particular form of government. Let us remove them then, and put the Triumviri in their stead. I consent to it, and even willingly give to the inter[)retation of Protestants the best ap[)earance it is ca{)able of : for when all is said, there is nothing in it but illusion ; one little word, as I said, will subvert the whole fabric ; for in short, we read of the seventh king (who shall be, since they will have it, the seventh government), that, " when he cometh, he must continue a short space¹⁹." St. John has but just shewn him ; and immediately, says he, " he goeth into destruction." If this be the Papal empire, it must needs be short. Now it is pretended from St. John, that it must continue at least one thousand two hundred and threescore years, as long a time, as is owned by our new interpreter, " as all the other governments togetherf." Wherefore it is impossible the Papal empire should be meant by this prophecy.

33. — Trifling reply.

But replies our author, " one day," as says St. Peter |, " is with the Lord as a thousand years." A fine discovery! all equally is short to the eyes of God, and not only the reign of the seventh king, but also the reign of all the rest. Now St. John would distinguish this seventh king by comparing him with the other kings, and his reign was to be remarkable by the shortness of its continuance. To shew this characteristic in the Papal government, who does not see that its being short in the sight of God, with whom nothing is durable, is -not sufficient? It ought to be short in comparison with the other governments ; more short by consequence than that of the military Tribunes, which scarce subsisted thirty or forty years ; more short than that of the Decemviri, which continued but two ; more short at least than that of the kings, or consuls, or emperors, who filled up the greatest space of time in duration. But on the contrary, that which St. John has distinguished by the brevity of its duration, does not only hold out longer than any of the rest, but also longer than all the rest together: what more manifest absurdity! and is it not an attempt to make the prophecies ridiculous, thus to interpret them ?

Xrir.J THE VARIATIONS, ETC. 211

34. — The Ten Kings of the Revelations manifestly as ill interpreted.

But let us say one word of the ten kings whom our interpreter, after Joseph Mede, beheves he triumi)hs in. Tliere it is he ranges before us²⁰ — first, the Britons; second, the Saxons j third, the French; fourth, the Burgundians; fifth, the Visigoths; sixth, the Suevi and Alani; seventh, the Vandals; eighth, the Germans ; ninth, the Ostrogoths in Italy, where the Lombards succeed tiiem ; tenth, the Grecians. Here are fully ten kingdoms which the Roman empire was divided into at its fall. Without disputing on the qualities, without disputing on the number, without dis[)uting on the dates, this at least is very certain— viz. that as soon as ever these ten kings appear, 8t. John makes them " give their power and strength unto the Beast f." We own as much, say our interpreters |; ; and it is likewise the very thing that gains our cause ; for these are " the ten vassal and subject kings which the Antichristian empire, namely, the Pontifical, hath always had in subjection to worship it, and maintain its power." Here is a wonderful tallying of incidents : but what, I [)ray, have the Arian kings contributed to the establishment of the Papal empire, such as the Visigoths and the Ostrogoths, the Burgundians and the Vandals ; or the Heathen kings, such as at that time were the French and Saxons ? Are these the ten vassal kings of the Papacy, who had nothing else to do but worship it? But when was it that these Vandals and Ostrogoths worshipped the Popes ? Was it under Theodoric and his successors, when the Popes groaned under their tyranny ? or under Genseric, when, with the Vandals, he pillaged Rome and carried the spoils of it into Africa ? And since even the Lombards are introduced, were they also of the number that aggrandized the Church of Rome, they that did all in their power to oppress her as long as ever they subsisted, namely, for two hundred years ? For what else were, during tiiis whole space of time, the Alboini, the Astol})hi, and the Didiers, but enemies to Rome, and tlie Church of Rome ? And the Emperors of the East, who were in reality the Emperors of Rome, though ranged here the last under the name of Greeks, must they also be reckoned amongst the vassals and subjects of the Pope, they whom St. Leo and his successors, down to the time of Charlemagne, acknowledged for their sovereigns ? But, you will say, these Heathen and heretical kings embraced r2 the true faith. Right ; they embraced it a long uhile after this division into ten kingdoms. The French had four Heathen kings: the Saxons were not converted till the time of St. Gregory, a hundred and fifty years after this division: the Goths, who reigned in Spain, were converted from Arianism at the same time. What has this to do with these kings, who, according to the pretension of our interpreters, were to begin to reign at the same time with the Beast, and give up their power to him ? Besides, can no other era be found for the entrance of these kings into the Antichristian empire, but that of their turning Christians, or Catholics? AVhat a happy destiny for this pretended Antichristian empire, to be compounded of people converted to Jesus Christ ! But what is it, after all, that these kings, so happily converted, have contributed to the establishment of the Pope's authority ? Jf, at their admittance into the Church they acknowledged the First See, which was that of Rome, neither did they give him that supremacy which he had undoubtedly before their conversion, nor did they acknowledge, in the Pope, any thing more than Christians had acknowledged in him before them, to wit, the successor of St. Peter. Nor did the Popes, on their side, exercise their authority over these people otherwise than by teaching them the true faith, and upholding regularity and discipline among them : nor can any man show, during this time, or four hundred years after, that they concerned themselves with any thing else, or enterprised any thing on temporals. Thus you see what were these ten kings, with whom the Papal empire was to commence.

3b.— Vain reply.

But then, we are told²¹, came other ten in their place, and these are they with their kingdoms : first, Germany ; second, Hungary ; third, Poland ; fourth, Sweden ; fifth, France ; sixth, England ; seventh, Spain ; eighth, Portugal ; ninth, Italy ; tenth, Scotland. Expound who can why Scotland stands here rather than Bohemia ; why Sweden rather than Denmark or Norway ; >vhy, in fine, Portugal, as separated from Spain, rather than Castile, Arragon, Leon, Navarre, and the other kingdoms ? But why do we lose our time in examining these fancies ? Let them resolve me at least this question, whether or no these were the ten kingdoms that were to be formed out of the remnants of the Roman empire at the same time that Antichrist was to appear, and which were to resign their au-

XIII.J THE VARIATIONS, ETC.

tliority and power to him ? What has Poland to do here, and the other kingdoms of the North, which Rome was not acquainted with, and which, beyond question, were not formed of her ruins when the Antichrist, St. Leo, came into the world ? Is it in banter that men write, with so serious an air, such ridiculous conceits ? In good truth, it ill becomes those who have nothing in their mouths but the pure word of God, thus rashly to sport with its oracles ; and if they have nothing more pertinent whereby to explain the prophecies, it were much better to adore their sacred obscurity, and respect the future, which God has reserved in his own hands.

36. — Contrarieties of the new Interpreters.

We must not wonder to see these daring interpreters at variance among themselves, and destroying one another. Josej)h Mede, on that verse of St. John, importing that in a great earthquake " the tenth part of the city fell²²," thought he had hit exactly, when he interpreted this tenth part with respect to the new Antichristian Rome, which is ten times less than ancient Rome. To come at the proof of his interpretation, he seriously compares the area of old Rome with that of the new, and with a fine figure demonstrates that the first is ten tirr.ea greater than the last: but his disciple, Mr. .Turieu, deprives hu^i of so mathematical an interpretation. '' He is mistaken with all the rest," cries out haughtily the new prophetf, "when by the city St. John speaks of, he understands only the city of Rome." " We ought to hold for certain," proceeds he in a masterly strain, " that the great city is Rome with its empire |." And the tenth part of the city, what shall it be ? He has found it out: " France," says he, " is the tenth part§." But how ? shall France fall ? and does this prophet forebode so ill of his own country ? No, no, she may be reduced indeed to a tottering condition; let her look to it, the prophet threatens her: yet shall not ])erish. What the Holy Ghost here means by saying she shall fall, is " that she shall fall with respect to Poperyjl ;"" but then she shall rise more illustrious than ever, because she shall embrace the Reformation, and that speedily ; and our kings (a thing I am loth to repeat) are on the point of being Calvinistically reformed, ^Vhat patience is able to support these inler[)retations ? But after all, he is more in the right than he imagined, by calling this a " fall:" dreadful in- deed would be the '^ fall" into a " reformation," wherein the spirit of illusion so forcibly predominates.

37. — The EncjUshman finrh England, and the Frenchman France, in the Revelations.

If the French interpreter finds France in the Revelations, the Englishman finds England in them : the phial poured out upon the rivers and fountains of waters, " are the Pope's emissaries, and the Spaniards vanquished in Queen Elizabeth's reign of glorious memory." But good Mr. Mede²³, it seems, was in a gross mistake : his more enlightened disciple assures usf, the second and third phial " were the crusades, when God returned upon Catholics blood for the blood of the Vaudois and Albigenses spilt by them." These Vaudois and Albigenses, John WickhfFand John Huss, with all ihe rest of that gang, even to the bloody Taborites, appear throughout these new interpretations as faithful witnesses of the truth persecuted by the Beast; but they are now well known, and even this were enough to prove the falsity of these pretended prophecies.

38.— The King of Sweden foretold, and the prediction falsified immediately after.

Joseph Mede had outdone himself in his exposition of the fourth phial. He saw it " poured out upon the sun, upon the chief part of the heaven possessed by the Beast|," — namely, the Papal empire : the meaning whereof was, that the Pope was going to lose the empire of Germany, which is his sun : nothmg more clear. Whilst Mede, if you will believe him, was printing these things, " which he had meditated on long before §," he heard of the wonderful achievements " of that pious, happy, and victorious king, whom God had sent from the North to defend his cause :" in a word, it was the great Gustavus. Mede can no longer doubt but his conjecture was an inspiration ; and applies to this great king the same canticle that David applied to the Messiah : " Gird thy sword upon thy thigh, O most mighty King ! combat for the truth, and for justice, proceed prosperously and reign||." But the event belied the prediction ; so Mede published at once his prophecy and shame.

XIII.] THE VARIATIONS, ETC. 215

39. — Ridiculous conceit about the Turks.

No less remarkable is that fine passage, where, whilst Mede is contemplating ihe overthrow of the Turkish empire, his disciple, on the contrary, spies in it the victories gained by that empire. The Euphrates in the Revelations²⁴, is to Medef the empire of the Turks; and the waters of the Euphrates dried up at the etfusion of the sixth phial, is the Turkish empire destroyed. He is quite in the dark : Mr. Jurieu| demonstrates to us that the Euphrates is the Archipelago and the Bosphorus, which the Turks passed in 1390, in order to possess themselves of Greece and Constantinople. More than this²⁵ : " there is great likelihood that the conquests of the Turks are carried on thus far in order to give them the means of contributing, together with Protestants, to the great work of God, — namely, to the destruction of the Papal empire: for though the Turks have never been so low as at present" (this is the very thing that makes our author believe they will soon rise again,) '' 1 look upon, (says he,) this year 1685, as critical in this affair. God hath humbled the Reformed and the Turks at the same time, to raise them up again at the same time, and in order to make them the instruments of his revenge against the Popish empire." Who would not admire this sympathy of Turkism with the Reformation, and this common destiny of them both ? Should the Turks prove successful, then will the Reformed (whilst the rest of Christians grieve at their victories) raise up their heads, and believe th;<t the time of their deliverance is at hand. We were strangers as yet to this new excellency of the Reformation— of its l)eing to increase and decrease as it were by sympathy with the Turks. Our author himself was puzzled at this place when he composed his allowable " Prepossessions," and knew nothing of the plagues of the two last phials wherein this mystery was locked up : but at last, " after knocking two, four, five," and " six times, with a religious attention, the door flew open||," and he beheld this mighty secret.

40. — JVhy these absurdities are tolerated in the party.

Men of sense, you will tell me, among the Protestants, laugh at these fooleries as well as we. Yet they let them take their run, knowing them necessary to amuse the credulous multitude. It was principally by these visions that hatred was excited

• Rev. xvi. 12. i Jos. Blede, ad Ph. vi, j). 529. t ^'^'^'^- V^^ "• c^- ^Ji' P- 99. § Ibid. p. 101. ll.lbid.p.D-l.

216 THE HISTOllY OF [bOOK against the church of Kome, and hopes fomented of her speedy overthrow. The same artifice is employed again for the same purpose, and the people, a hundred times deceived, give ear to them, as the Jews, abandoned to the spirit of error, did heretofore to false prophets. Examples are quite useless to disabuse a people possessed with prejudice. They believed they saw, in the prophecies of Luther, the expiration of the Papacy so near at hand, that there was not a Protestant who did not hope to be present at its funeral. It was necessary, indeed, to prolong the time, but the same spirit was kept up still, and the Reformation never ceased to be the bubble of these lying prophets, who prophesy the delusions of their frantic brain.

41. — The parti/ s Prophets are imposlors. — Confession of the Minister Jurieu.

God forbid I should lose my time in speaking here of a Cotterus, a Drabicius, a Christiana, a Comenius, and all those other visionaries, of whose predictions our minister boasts, and whose errors he acknowledges. None of them, as he pretends, no not even the learned Usher, but must turn prophet. But the same minister frankly owns he was no less mistaken than the rest. Experience proved them all deluded, " and we discover in them," says the minister*, " so many things in which they blundered, that there is no relying on them." Yet he nevertheless accounts them prophets, and great pro{)hets, Ezekiels and Jeremiahs. He finds " in their visions such majesty and loftiness, that those of the ancient prophets have not more, and a train of m.iracles as great as e\ er happened since the apostles f." Thus does the chief of our Protestants suffer himself to be imposed on by these false prophets, even after that the event had confounded them : so prevalent is the spirit of illusion in the party ; but the true prophets of the Lord deliver themselves in another strain against such impostors as abuse the name of God : " Hear thou, O Hananiah," saith Jereraiali|, '^ this word that I speak in thine ears, and in the ears of all the people. The prophets that have been before me, and before thee of old, and have prophesied good or evil to nations and to kingdoms; when their words came to pass, it was known that they were pro})hets whom the Lord had truly sent: and the word of the Lord came unto Jeremiah, saying. Go and tell Hananiah, saying, thus saith the Lord ; thou hast

XIII.] THE VARIATIONS, ETC. 217 broken llie yokes of wood,"" — in token of the people's future deliverance, — " and thou sluilt make for them yokes of iron : I \vill aggravate the yoke of those nations" to whom thou denounccst peace. '' Then said the prophet Jeremiah unto Hananiah the prophet, Hear now, Hananiah, the Lord hath not sent thee, bat thoii makest this people to trust in a lie; therefore, thus saith the Lord, Behold, 1 will cast thee from off the face of the earth : this year thou shalt die, because thou hast spoken against the Lord ; and Hananiah the prophet died the same year, in the seventh month." Thus did he deserve to be confounded who deceived the people in the Lord's name, and the people needed but to open their eyes and take warning.

42. — Their Interpreters no better.

Our Reformed interpreters are not worth more than our Reformed prophets. The Revelations and the rest of the Prophecies have ever been the subject which the wits of the Reformation have thought themselves at liberty to s{)ort with. Each one has discovered in them his concurrences, whereby the credulous Protestants were always caught. Mr. Jurieu reproves often, as we have seen, Joseph Mede, whom he had chosen for his guide *, Nay, he has pointed out the errors of Du Moulin, his grandfather f, whose interpretations on the prophecies were admired by the whole Relbrmation ; and has even shewed " that the foundation he built upon Avas destitute of iidelity.' Nevertheless, there was abundance of wit, and a very extensive erudition in these visions of Du Moulin ; but so it is, the more wit a man has, the more he deceives himself on these occasions ; because, the more wit he has, the more he in\ents, and ventures the more. Du Moulin's fine wit, which must needs exercise itself on futurity, set him on a task for which he was laughed at, even in liis own family; and ]\lr. Jurieu, his grandson, who, perhaps, shews more wit than the rest on this subject, Avill be but the more certainly the laughter of mankind.

43. — IVIiat the Ministers have discovered in the Revelations touching their Reformers.

I am ashamed of dwelling so long on visions more chimerical than sick men's dreams. But 1 ought not to forget what is of greatest im[)ortance in this vain mystery of the Protestants. According to the idea they give of the Revelations, nothing should be more distinctly marked in them than the Reformation itself, with its authors, who came to destroy the empire of the Beast; and especially it ought to be marked in the effusion of the " seven phials," in which are foretold, as they pretend, the seven plagues of their Antichristian empire. But what our interpreters descry here, is so ill contrived, that one destroys what the other builds. Joseph Mede²⁶ thinks he has found both Luther and Calvin when the phial is poured on the sea, that is on the Antichristian world, and when immediately this sea ''is changed into blood like to that of a dead man f." " Here," says he, " is the Reformation ; it is a poison that kills every thing: for then every living soul died in the sea." Mede takes care to explain this blood hke to that of a carcass, and says, it is as the blood of a member lopped off, on account " of the provinces and kingdoms which were then rent from the body of the papacy J." This is an ill-boding spectacle for Protestants, to see the reformed nations exhibited to them in no other view than that of " lopped members," which have lost, according to Mede, " all connexion with the fountain of life, all vital spirit, and all warmth," without telling us any more of the matter.

44. — The idea of the Minister Jiirieu.

This is Mede's idea of the Reformation. But if he sees it in the effusion of the second phial, the other interpreter sees it only in the effusion of the seventh, " When there came," says St. John §5 " a great voice out of the temple of heaven, from the throne, saying, it is done. And there were voices, and thunders, and lightnings ; and there was a great earthquake, such as was not since men were upon the earth ;" there, says he, is the Reformation ||.

This great commotion, I must own, suits well enough with the disturbances it raised over the whole universe, such as never had been seen before on the score of religion. But here it is he shines most : " the great city was divided into three parts ^, namely," says our author, " into the Church of Rome, the Lutheran, and the Calvinian; these are the three parties that divide the * great city,' to wit, the Western Church." 1 accept the omen ; the Reformation breaks unity: in breaking it, she divides herself into two, and leaves unity to the Church of Rome in St. Peter's chair, which is the centre of it. But St. John should not have forgotten that one of the

XIII,] THE VARIATIONS_, ETC. J2l9 divided parties, the Calvinian, broke again into two pieces, since England, reckoned to appertain to it by our minister, yet makes, in the main, a sect apart. Nor must he say, this division is but light, for, by his own confession, they mutually treat each other as '^ excommunicated persons²⁷." Accordingly, the Church of England reckons the Calvinists, or Puritans, in the number of Nonconformists ; that is, in the number of those whose service she does not allow, nor receives their ministers but by ordaining them anew as pastors, destitute of sanction or character. 1 might also speak of the other sects which divided the Christian world at the same time with Luther and Calvin, and which, taken together or separately, make a party sufficiently great not to have been omitted in this passage of St. John. And all considered, these men should have given their reformation a more specious character than that of overthrowing every thing, and a more creditable mark than that of pulling to pieces the Western Church, the most flourishing of the whole universe ; which has been the greatest of all plagues.²⁸

Footnotes

1. Sup. 1. i. n. 31. f Gratul, ad Ven. Presbyt. opusc, p. 331. ↩

2. Syn. of Saumur. 159G. t S. 1. iv. n. 38. + S. 1, iii. n, 39. L. r. n. 24. 1603. ↩

3. Avis. t. i. p. 48. f Ibid. p. 49. ↩

4. Avis. p. 4. t Prej. leg. part i. cb. iv. pp. 72, 73. J lb. p. GO, ↩

5. Rev. xi. xii. xiii. f Avis. p. 4. I Ibid. pp. 7, 8, ↩

6. Ibid. p. 8. II Ibid. p. 63. ↩

7. Accomp. part ii. ch. iv. p. CO. f Daii. xi. 38. ↩

8. Hist, des Mart, by Cresp. 1. i. ↩

9. Prej. leg. part i. p. 82. f Ibid. pp. 83, 85. J lb, p. 128. ↩

10. Trej. leg. part i. p. 147. j Ibid. 128. I Ace. part ii, cli. ii. pp. 18, 28 . ↩

11. Ace. part ii. ch. ii. pp. 39, 40, 41 . i Rev. xi. 2. ↩

12. Acc. part ii. ch. x. p. 159. Rev. xii, G, 14. xiii. 5, C. § Ibid. cb. ii. pp. 18, 28. ↩

13. Ace. ties Proph. part ii. ch. ii. p. 41. ↩

14. Expos, of Dan. cli. xvli. p. C73. Bas. Orat. in 40. Mart. Id. in Ulaur. Mart. ↩

15. Jer. i. 18. + Ace. part ii. p. 23. ↩

16. Aoc. part ii. p, 20, &c, i Ibid. p. 22, ↩

17. Ace. part ii. p. 23. Rev. xvii.O.j f Rev. xvii. 12. ↩

18. Rev. xvii. 3, 9, 12. lb. 9, 10, 11, f ''^«' part i- 1'- H. ↩

19. Rev. xvii. 10. f Ace, part i. p. 11. | 2 Pet. iii, 8. ↩

20. Prej. legit, part i. ch. vii. p. 12G. Ace. des. Piopli. part ii. j)p. 27, 28, f Rev. xvii, 13. J Ace. part i. ch. xv. p. 2(iC. ↩

21. Prej. part i. ch. vi, p. 105, ! ↩

22. llev. xi. 13. Meil. comm. in apoc. part ii. p. 48D. t Ace. \ ii. ch. xi. p. 191. + Ibid. pp. 200, 203. ^ lb. 201. II IbiJ. ↩

23. Med. comm. Apo. p. 528. ad Phial. Ap. iii. p. 16. f Ace. des Proph. part ii. ch. iv. p. 72. Prej. legit, part i. ch. v. pp. 98, 99«. $ Com. Ap. p. 528. Rev. xvi. 8. § Com. Ap. p. 529. || Psalm xliv. ↩

24. Avis a tous les ch., at the begimiiiig, pp. 5, 67- lb. f Acc. des Proph. part ii. p. 174. Ibid. J Jer. xxviii, 7- et seq. ↩

25. Jur. Ace des. Tropli. part i, p. 71. f Part ii. }>. 183. ↩

26. Jos. Mede, ad Ph. ii. Apo. xvi. 3. f Rev. Ibid. + Med. Ibid. ↩

27. Rev. xvi. 17. II Ace. part ii. ch. viii. p. ]22. •[[ Rev. Ibid. ↩

28. S. 1. xii. n. 44. ↩