Works, Treatise · Chapter 9
CHAP. IX.
Two Exceptions against the foregoing Assertion. Except. I. That Idolatry should rather be laid upon the Pagans. This answered, and proved That Pagan Idolatry is not here meant, nor can the Saracen or Turk be the Antichrist meant in Scripture. Except. II. That Antichristianism cannot be charged upon those that acknowledge the true God and Christ. The Answer to this, wherein is interwoven the Author's serious and pathetical Expostulation with the Church of Rome. That Antichrist is a Counter-Christ, and his Coming a Counter-resemblance of the Coming of Christ; shew'd in several particulars.
BUT you will say, if Idolatry and Spiritual fornication be the matter, why should not this rather be laid upon Paynims and Turks and Saracens, who acknowledge not Christ, rather than upon Christians who do?
I answer, S. Paul and S. Iohn prophesied of a thing to come, not of that which was in being when they prophesied. But Ethnical and Paynim Idolatry at that time overwhelmed the whole earth, yea and persecuted and made war with the Saints, and no time hath yet been when this Idolatry was not to be found. It must needs be then some other Whoredom (for Whoredom it was to be) which was prophesied of to come.
Again, neither Sara…en nor Turk (the greatest unchristian States since Christ) neither of these,In Saracen. Frid. Sylburgii (citanta Martinio p. 1903. Lex.) foreign. I say, can be the Antichrist we speak of; nor their Blasphemy that Mystery of iniquity foretold by the Apostles and Prophets.
For there are two unquestionable Characters of that Mystery, which will neither of them, without doubt not both of them, agree to Turk or Saracen; namely, First, That it should sit in the Great City, which in S. Iohn's time reigned over the nations of the earth: Secondly, That it should be an Apostasie from the Christian faith once embraced. But the Turk, whatsoever he be, is no Apostate, being of a Nation which never was Christian: Nor was the seat of the Saracen Empire, whilest it stood, either in the Old or New Rome, or near unto either: For I would seem to yield for this time, that New Rome or Constantinople would serve the turn; though I am far enough from believing it. Nor will I allege, that Mahumet Mahomet in Alcorano indu… Deum ad se ità lequentem: Pauper fuist… & ditavi…e; Idolis servisti, & vocavi te, Hent…n. in Praefa…. ad Ar…tham in Apocal.himself and his Nation were both Paynims when they began their blasphemie; for you would tell me that Sergius the Monk taught him to make the Alcoran. Nor will I question now whether the Christian or the Mahumetan Mahomet w… a Paynim, … ther … …das the … Arabians were, n…t baptized till he begun his false Prophecy; when Abdalia the I…w did th… one unto him, and Sergi…s the Monk conferred the other.be the greater Idolater; though the doubt might soon be resolved, seeing it is well known that the Mahumetans worship no Images. But I have alleged nothing but what is without exception, That both these Characters I speak of cannot be applied either to Turk or Saracen, though I believe that neither can be. When I spake of Paynims and Mahumetans, I would have you remember that there were some blasphemous Sects in the first Ages of the Church, which are no more to be accounted of as Christians than Mahumetans and Paynims are; nay Mahumetanism is nearer Christianity than many of them were: For amongst whom the Christians Deity is not received and worshipped, those, though they spring up in imitation of Christianity, I account but new Paynim-blasphemies, and not Christian Heresies. Such were the*Tertul. in his De Resurrectione Carnis calls these Hereticks, Alterius divinitatis Haretici. Cerinthians, Marcionites, Saturnians, Valentinians, and Manichees, &c. Which neither professed the same Deity, nor acknowledged that Divine Word which we Christians do: whereas yet the Mahumetans worship the same God with Iews and Christians, God the Creator of Heaven and Earth, the God of Abraham, Isaac and Iacob; howsoever they conceive otherwise of his Nature and Properties than Christians do. But this by the way, lest it might put a rub in our discourse of Spiritual fornication.
But you will still allege for her behalf who seems all this while to be charged, That Antichrist and the Man of sin is set forth in Scripture as the most hateful and execrable thing that can be in the eyes of God Almighty: But how can such a thing be said, and comparatively to be, where the true God, with Christ his Son, God and man are in any sort acknowledged and worshipped?
Lord! that the whole strain of Scripture, in the Prophets especially, and the example of the Church of Israel, should not cure this web, and take this filme from the eyes of men! Doth not the Lord say of Israel, that he had chosen them to be a special people to himself, above all people that are upon the face of the earth? Deut. 7. 6. You only have I known (saith he) of all the families of the earth, Amos 3. 2. And is not Christ the Lord of Christians? and is not the Church his Spouse? foreign, saith S. Paul, Ephes. 5. 32. This is a great Mystery. No marvel then where this Mystery is not considered, if the Mystery of iniquity be not understood.
Alas poor Church of Israel! thy case it seems should have been a very hard one; For, what Nation in the world ever suffered so much rebuke, so many plagues, so much wrath, as thou hast done? Yet couldst thou say for thy self, thou never forsookest the true God altogether, but wast still called by his Name; only thou wouldst fain worship him in Calves and Images, as other Nations, thy neighbours, did their Gods; thou wouldst needs follow the fashion, and this was thine errour. Thou never meantest to cast off thy Iehovah altogether, but still wouldst have him to be thy God, and thy self to be his people; yet thou tookest this liberty, to have other Gods besides the Lord thy God, viz. thy Baalims and Daemon-Gods of other Nations about thee; and yet hopedst that Iehovah the God of heaven, thy only Sovereign God, would not be offended thereat, since thou retainedst him still in chief place and honour with thee.
Why was thy God then so unkind and cruel unto thee, to call thee Whore, and Prostitute Whore, so often? all his Prophets continually baiting thee with that so foul and odious a name of abominable Harlot? Why did he scatter thee, and even cart thee naked among the Nations, afore his jealousie would be satisfied? For it seems he is far more indulgent to his Second wife, the Church of the Gentiles: For she worships her God in Images and Crucifixes, yea calls a piece of Bread her Lord and her God; and yet saith, he is no whit jealous of her, but well pleased. She, though espoused to Christ Iesus, the Son of the living God, as her sole Mediator and Intercessor in the presence of God his Father, yet thinks she may fall down to Saints and Angels, yea to as many Images of them as ever the Iews had of their Baalims, or the Gentiles of their Daemons. And yet, forsooth, because she makes her Lord the chiefest still in the honour of her affection, and uses the rest of her Lovers no farther than she may still yield the first and chief place to him, she verily supposes he is no whit offended wite her: whereas Israel should have been called a Whore a thousand times over for as little as this; yea and like enough to have been carted too, and her nose slit (Ezek. 23. 25.) long before this time.
Nay, but she wipes her mouth, and asks why her Lord should be angry; for she calls him still her Lord, and acknowledges and professeth him still to be her Husband. If he hath a mind to be angry with any, let him go to the Turks, Tartars and other Mahumetans, or to the Paynims, who will not acknowledge him at all to be their Lord, though he hath offered himself, and perhaps wooed some of them; but they would none of him, but have married themselves to other husbands: here, if he will be jealous, is matter for his jealousie.
But thou Christ-apostatical Strumpet, knowest thou not the first Commandment of thy Christian Decalogue to be,Hieron. in cap. 43. Ezek. …go hoc arbitror, quòd non polluat nomen Demini, nisi ille qui visusest nomini ejus creder…: Et qoumodo tollit membra Christi, & facit membra meretricis, qui pri…s Christo credid…; sic ille pollicit nomen D… mini, qui pri… nominis ejus fidem susceperit. Thou shalt have no other Christs but me? What doest thou then with so many Christ-lings? Knowest thou not that an Husband is more grieved and dishonoured by his Wife's adultery, than if any other women whatsoever, yea suppose his kinswomen and daughters, should play the harlots?
What are Turks, Tartars, or any other unbelieving Nation under Heaven, unto thy Lord and Saviour? are they not all as Strangers to him, and he to them? But as for thee, he had chosen thee out of many Nations to espouse thee to himself; so that thou mayest say with Israel, Isa. 63. 19. We are thine; but as for them, thou never barest rule over them, they were not called by thy Name. But to thee (to use the words of Ezechiel, ch. 16. v. 8. &c.) He sware an o…th, and entered into a covenant with thee, and thou becamest his, and wert called, and wilt still be called by his name. Thee he washed with water, yea, throughly washed thee from the pollution of thy birth, and anointed thee with oyl. Thou wast decked with gold and silver, and thy raiment was of fine linnen, and silk, and broidered work; thou didst eat fine flour, and honey, and oyl, and wast exceeding beautiful, and didst prosper into a Kingdom. And thy renown went forth among the Heathen for thy beauty; for it was perfect through the comeliness which the Lord thy God had put upon thee. But thou didst trust in thine own beauty, and playedst the Harlot because of thy renown, and pouredst out thy fornications upon every one that passed by. And of thy garments thou didst take, and deckest thy high places with divers colours, and playedst the Harlot thereupon. Thou hast also taken thy fair jewels of thy Lord's gold, and of thy Lord's silver, which he had given thee, and madest to thy self Images of men, and didst commit whoredom with them; And tookest thy broidered garments, and coveredst them: and thou hast set the Lord's oyl and his incense before them, &c.
Iudge now between the Lord and his people, ye that have Wives, give sentence ye Husbands, whether of the two in question hath most dishonoured our Lord and Saviour; which of the two is most like to fret him, and kindle the coals of fury and jealousie: Those who never were in covenant with him, nor yet are called by his name; or whether his Spouse, his darling and beloved one, to whom he was betrothed and married. Iudge according to the manner of Wedlock, and the notorious precedent of Israel. He that is a Father (we say) is best able to understand the love of a Father, and therefore God's love to his children: For the like reason, he that is an Husband is sensible of the jealousie of an Husband, and so of the case of Christ with his unfaithful and treacherous Spouse the Christian Iezabel.
The decision and sum of all is this, That the Whoredom of the Church of God is a Spiritual Adultery; and therefore between the Idolatry of Christians and that of Infidels and Paynims is as much difference, in God's esteem, as is between Adultery and simple Fornication. The one, as equal to Murther, was in the Law punished with death; the other with a much lighter punishment. Whence in Ezechiel (in those words I have been so long) Chapter 16. verse 38. God saith to Ierusalem for their Idolatry, that he would judge her as women that break wedlock and shed bloud are judged: he would give her bloud in fury and jealousie. And this was the resolution of God himself against Israel, Amos 3. 1, 2. Hear this word that the LORD hath spoken against you, O children of Israel, saying, You only have I known of all the families of the earth; therefore will I punish you for all your iniquities. And the same will be the judgment of the Christian Iezabel (howsoever Paynims and Infidels speed) when Great Babylon shall come in remembrance before God, to give unto her the cup of the wine of the fierceness …f his wrath.
This I would have well considered and weighed by those whom the Mahumetan blasphemy hath dazeled, that they can hardly believe that so hated and execrable a name as that of Babylon should belong unto any other, unless there be yet to come some otherlike barbarous Tyrant and seducer after them.Rev. 16. 19. The cause of which errour is, That men have fancied another manner of Antichrist than the Holy Ghost meant of, and placed their eyes far wide of the ground of God's hatred, and of the nature of that Mystery of Abomination. But Israel's Apostasie, God's jealousie, and their unparallel'd Punishment therefore, such as no Nation in the World, how Idolatrous soever, endured besides themselves, are in this case the only Pole-star to direct us.
But even this mistake, which is and hath been of the Mystery of iniquity, is it self a kind of Mystery, or not without one: For Antichrist is a Counter-Christ, and therefore his Coming to be a Counter-resemblance of the Coming of Christ.
Christ was both to come, and accordingly looked for in the Last times, that is, in the time of the Fourth Kingdom of Daniel: So Antichrist and his Mystery of impiety was to be foreign, in the latter times of those Last times, that is (as I shall better shew hereafter) in the Last times or Last Scene (as I may so speak) of the Fourth Kingdom of Daniel.
When Christ came, the Sceptre was to depart from Iudah, and that Common-wealth to be dissolved: So when Antichrist was to come, the Roman Empire was to fall, and He that hindered was to be taken out of the way, 2. Thess. 2. 7.
The Iews expected Christ to come when he did come, and yet knew him not when he was come; because they had fancied the manner and quality of his coming like some temporal Monarch, with armed power, to subdue the earth before him: So the Christians, God's second Israel, looked the coming of Antichrist should be at that time when he came indeed, and yet they knew him not when he was come; because they had fancied his coming as of some barbarous Tyrant, who should with armed power not only persecute and destroy the Church of Christ, but almost the World; that is, they looked for such an Antichrist as the Iews looked for a Christ.Io. 1. 11.
Wherefore as Christ came unto his own, and his own received him not; so Antichrist came upon those who were not his own, and yet they eschewed him not: But yet as some Iews (though few) knew Christ when he came, and received him; so did some Christians (though but few) keep themselves from the pollution of Antichrist.
Lastly, as the Iews ere long shall acknowledge and run unto him, whom they pierced as not knowing him: So hath the Christian Church, for a great part, discovered that Son of perdition, whom a long time they had ignorantly worshipped, because they knew him not. O the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of GOD! how unsearchable are his judgment, and his ways past finding out!
But for our part, seeing our case is so like unto that of the Iews, let their lamentable and woful error, in mistaking their Messiah by wrongly fancying him, be a warning and caveat unto us, that we likewise upon like conceits and prejudice mistake and misdeem not the Man of sin.
TINE' foreign, SOME.