098. Chapter III (Revelation 16)
CHAPTER III The exposition of the 16th chapter.—A division of the vials.—The two last briefly touched. The execution of these two last vials doth follow the five first, from Revelation 16:1 to Revelation 16:12; and they are vials upon the beast, the Pope, and his adherents; God by degrees plaguing them as he did the Egyptians, until the fifth falling eminently upon the seat of the beast, Rome itself, his kingdom be so darkened and despoiled of its glory and power, that although the beast may remain, for Jesus Christ himself, at his coming under the seventh vial, to have the last blow at him, and the full glory of the conquest, yet so weakened and darkened as that I believe the period of his power to do (as the word is in the original, Revelation 13:5) for forty-two months, or 1260 years, is there set, and the date of his lease expired.
Now for the sixth and seventh vials: because they are further off to come, and that the seventh vial, and the preparation unto it, from Revelation 16:13, belongs to the kingdom of Christ, as being the immediate making way thereunto, therefore I will but briefly touch upon these, and despatch them first. The five first, especially the fourth and fifth, being those that concern these times, and which chiefly serve for the opening the 11th chapter, I shall treat more largely upon.
Now the sixth vial is upon the great river Euphrates; that is, the Turk, whom the sixth trumpet left standing in the east. And he is compared to the great river, (which is the epithet given to the river Euphrates in the Old Testament,) as the Assyrian monarch and his army are called in Isaiah 8:7; and to the river Euphrates, for his first seat was, as you heard out of Revelation 9:14, upon that river. Now this river is to be dried up for the kings of the east, the Jews, to possess their own land, according to that prophecy of their last conversion, Isaiah 11:13-14, compared with the 15th and 16th verses of the same chapter. The seventh vial is general, upon the air, the whole power of Satan all the world over. The relics both of Turk and Pope, and of all the church’s enemies throughout the world, as Revelation 16:14, mustering up all their forces against the Christians in the west, and the Jews in the east, are to be overthrown by Jesus Christ himself and his armies; as you may read more at large in the 19th chapter, from the 11th verse to the end, that being an explication of this vial, the last upon the world, as the 18th chapter is of the fifth vial, the most eminent upon the beast.
Section I Seven things premised for the understanding the five first vials, which are upon the beast and his company.
Now for these five first vials upon the beast, Antichrist, and his adherents; I shall premise these things for the true understanding of them:—
First, That for the times of them, they, as was said, began with the times of the first separation from Rome, recorded Revelation 14:6, and so do indeed contain all those steps and degrees of ruining Antichrist, first and last, from the first time of the church’s attempting to come forth out, and separating from this Egypt. And therefore the three first vials are an allusion, as you shall see in the next premise, unto those plagues which Moses and Aaron, in bringing Israel out of Egypt, executed upon the Egyptians; and so do refer to the times of the church’s separation and first reformation. It appears also from the thing itself; for how can we think that all those discoveries of the whore’s nakedness, and the falling off of these kingdoms from her—although they for a time should begin to court her again—should not be reckoned among the vials, they having been well-nigh as great plagues as are like yet to befall her, except that her last ruin? And it appears likewise from this, that in the vintage of the 14th chapter, we find, as was observed, mention made of the angel of the fourth vial. Therefore the times afore that vintage must belong unto those three vials which preceded this fourth. And for the time of the beginning of them, whether at the harvest, or the voices of those angels that made the separation, the Holy Ghost hath not left us without some character whereby we may discern it, in the story of that 15th chapter, where the song which the church sings, when the vials do begin, is, as you may see it there, ‘Who shall not fear thee, O Lord, and glorify thy name? for all nations shall come and worship before thee; for thy judgments are made manifest,’ &c. Of which this is one meaning,—though there is another,—that the plagues of these vials now beginning, the judgments of God are made manifest. Now see what the voice of the first angel is, he who began the first separation from Antichrist, and first preached the gospel to every nation, Revelation 14:6-7. His message unto all nations is, ‘Fear God, and give glory to him; for the hour of his judgments is come: and worship him who hath made heaven and earth.’ That angel did but begin to give warning to Antichrist and his company of the vials that approached. But then observe the voice of the second angel, and you will find that the first vial did begin as the effect of these two angels’ preaching. For this second not only calls Rome Babylon, and discovers the Pope to be Antichrist, but says, ‘Babylon is fallen, is fallen;’ that is, the foundation of her ruin is laid. Now here began the first vial, even in this discovery of him to be Antichrist, whom before that the superstitious world did never so much as suspect. And whereas it is said, ‘Babylon is fallen,’ the Scripture speaks of a thing as done when the foundation of it is laid. So the western empire is reckoned as taken away then when the wars of the Goths began, and when the first of the ten kingdoms was broken off from the empire, anno 410; as was before said in the exposition of the 13th chapter. And the Pope is from that time reckoned to rise with his ten horns, though it was forty years after ere all the ten kingdoms were fully erected; yea, and seventy years after ere the power of the western empire was wholly extinct. Thus in the like manner, Isaiah 21, the prophet says of old Babylon, ‘She is fallen,’ he prophesying at the very time when the Medes first revolted from that monarchy, and began to set up a kingdom of their own, which afterward was to destroy Babylon, being also enabled thereto by that revolt. Now so is it here: when the first open and professed revolt from Rome, as from a second Babylon, was made by our predecessors, then was the foundation of her fall laid; then, says the angel, ‘Babylon is fallen;’ and so there begins the first vial, for the vials are the means of ruining of it. A second thing to be premised is, That these vials are expressed in an allusion unto the plagues executed in Egypt by Moses and Aaron; of which the first were not so great, but they ended in the drowning of those Egyptians in the Red Sea, even as these do in the utter ruining of the seat of Antichrist. The first is upon the earth, and the effect of it a noisome and grievous sore on the men who have the mark of the beast; in allusion to that plague of throwing dust in the air by Moses, which caused a botch on man and beast then in Egypt. The second on the sea, and the waters thereof. The third on the rivers and fountains, turning all their waters into blood. All this is a manifest allusion unto that turning the Egyptian rivers, &c., into blood by Moses. The fourth is upon the sun, and tormenteth men with fire. Which may be an allusion to the punishment of Sodom. For so in the 11th chapter, where these four first vials are enumerated, Revelation 11:5-6, the antichristian state is called Egypt or Sodom. Or rather it alludes to Moses’s consuming by fire that company that offered up strange fire in the wilderness, when they were come out of Egypt. A third thing to be premised is, That as in the trumpets the Holy Ghost compared the empire to a world, so here in the vials he useth the same comparison, comparing the kingdom of the beast, and the several parts of it to be plagued, unto several parts of the world. And as the four first trumpets were so many degrees of ruining the western empire, so are these vials of ruining the beast’s world or empire. The first trumpet was on the earth, the second on the sea, the third on the rivers, and the fourth on the sun. And whereas it was there shewed, that in Scripture any kingdom or body is usually compared to a world, which hath an earth and heavens, &c., wherein what is lowest is the earth, and what is highest is the heavens, the sun and stars, &c.; so in that empire then, and now in this antichristian kingdom here, the parts of it are compared to an earth, sun, sea, rivers, &c.
Fourth premise. And as I observed in the 13th chapter, that the Pope and his company were resembled by a double beast, one representing the political state of these ten kingdoms, which made up one body under him as a head; and the other the spiritual state of his church and clergy, as they call it, which make up a distinct body under him as their high priest and spiritual head: so, answerably, this his earth, and rivers, and sun, which are the parts of these his kingdoms, may, according to the analogy of this representation, be interpreted in a double sense; either his spiritual earth, sea, &c., or his political earth, sea, &c.
Fifth premise. Seeing that in the 11th chapter, Revelation 11:8, his kingdom is called spiritual Egypt and Sodom, and this in relation to these very plagues of the vials, which are enumerated there, Revelation 11:5-6 : ‘The city,’ says he, ‘which is spiritually called Egypt and Sodom;’ and that is more than merely or allegorically such, it importing that this his kingdom is a spiritual Egypt and a spiritual Sodom;—and it is a state, we know, that claimeth spiritual jurisdiction in spiritual things, and over the souls of men, as Revelation 18:13 hath it, and not only or principally in things outward and political, but in ordine ad spiritualia, in order to things spiritual: now therefore the plagues (and so these vials, they being the plagues upon this Egypt and Sodom) upon this city, must needs be understood of spiritual plagues, upon the souls and spirits of Antichrist’s adherents, as well as outward. For they must be answerable to the Egypt upon which they are plagues; yea, and seeing that it is both a spiritual state, and yet withal a temporal kingdom also for outward power and pomp, having an earth, sea, &c., as other worldly kingdoms have; therefore they shall have double plagues, spiritual and outward also, on their spirits and also on their outward worldly kingdom. Even thus it became the righteous God, as in relation to these plagues he is called, Revelation 16:5, to proportion their plagues to their sins, and so to ‘double unto her double according to her works,’ as the phrase is, Revelation 18:6. For him to ruin this beast and his adherents but outwardly only, as he hath done other monarchies, was not enough; for he sinned, not only in assuming outward power, pomp, and glory, and a kingdom like to other monarchies, under the name and pretence of having Christ’s power, but a spiritual kingdom also. The merchandise of this city was not only gold and precious stones, &c., Revelation 18:12, but likewise the souls of men too, as it is there. She traded in spirituals as well as temporals; and therefore the highest spiritual judgments, as well as temporal, shall befall that state, and the abettors of it. And as the plagues of Pharaoh and his Egyptians were spiritual, in the hardening of their hearts, as well as temporal; so such a spiritual hardness and impenitency is made mention of in some of these vials, as well as outward plagues. And therefore they are also said, Revelation 15:7, to be ‘the wrath of God that liveth for ever,’ an eternal wrath seizing upon the souls of them on whom they are poured. And such are these four first vials, and so to be understood both of spiritual and temporal plagues.
I mention the four first especially, because there where this city is called spiritually Egypt, these four are enumerated; namely, Revelation 11:5-6. And as it is evident that these vials are in that 11th chapter to be understood spiritually, so it is as evident that the same vials, as here in Revelation 16 they are made mention of, are to be understood of outward plagues, and so meant of both.
Sixthly, For the right understanding these vials, I premise, That though there be a first, second, and third vial in order succeeding each other, and which in a successive order begin after each other, and have some special precise time for their eminent pouring out and execution; yet so as some sprinklings of the first may continue still under the second, third, and fourth, and some relies of the second under the third, fourth, &c., and so of the rest. And this seems evident to me, in that their sores begun under the first vial are made mention of under the fifth vial, Revelation 16:11 of that chapter. And so in like manner the same effect, namely, blaspheming, which is a part of the fourth vial, and an effect of it, is also continued in a further height under the fifth. And so again, on the contrary, it may fall out that some droppings of a succeeding vial may begin in the times of the vial foregoing it, and go before, as the droppings of storms do, before their strength and fulness comes; and so may those, before the extremity of pouring forth the vial itself. As for example, during the times of the fourth vial some droppings of the fifth may begin, and some preparations to it, though still the fulness of that and every other vial hath a special time in its due order succeeding. The seventh and last thing to be premised is, That all the plagues on the Popish party, first and last, are reducible to one of these vials. For, Revelation 15:1, they are said to be ‘the last plagues, in which the wrath of God is fulfilled’ upon that party; and so every drop and sprinkling of wrath and vexation poured out goes to fill up some vial or other, as a part of it.
Section II A particular and more large explication of the five first vials on the beast and his company.
Now for a more particular explication of them:— The first vial is principally upon the beast’s earth, the lowest part of his kingdom; and this, according to that rule given, both spiritual and political. Now this vial was the effect of those first and second angels, preachings, Revelation 14, especially of that second angel there. For the preaching of the gospel, and the discovery of the Pope to be that Antichrist, did draw away many of his inferior subjects, and of the common people in all kingdoms, namely, the ten European kingdoms, which are his earth political. And so his authority and interest in the hearts of the people all Europe through was weakened, and the number of the worshippers of the beast lessened. So as all the world did not now, without contradiction, go after him as they had wont. And there was an effect of this vial also upon his spiritual earth; which his clergy were. For the Waldenses and their followers, by their preaching in those ages, discovering the uncleanness, idleness, and hypocrisy of the priests, monks, and nuns, who were the beast’s enchanters, they did, as it were, cast up dust in their faces, as Moses did; and so they brake out in botches, and became odious to all the people. So speaks the vial, Revelation 16:2, ‘There fell a noisome and grievous sore upon the men that had the mark or the beast.’ Now they are properly his clergy, who, being exempted from the civil power, are more peculiarly his subjects and sworn vassals; and, indeed, by ordination do receive from him a character indelible—(for this, see the exposition upon Revelation 13)—who are also called the worshippers of his image, they being the upholders of his idolatrous doctrine. And, accordingly, we find in story that all those first gospellers before Luther made it the chiefest subject and end of their writings and disputes, to render odious and vile the pharisaical Popish clergy, as in the Book of Martyrs abundantly appears.
Neither was this judgment merely outward, as only bringing shame through such an outward discovery of their hateful and abominable iniquities, which was also the beginning of their ruin, for it made way for it in all men’s hearts; but further, it is most certain, that the effect of the light of the gospel, which in their preaching was discovered, proved really a curse unto this Popish clergy, in order to this their breaking forth in filthiness and botches: in that for this their not embracing it, but shutting their eyes against it, God gave them up, by way of a curse, unto all manner of gross sins, of uncleanness, sodomy, &c., so as after this to commit them with more greediness than before this preaching of the gospel; even as he did the Gentiles, Romans 1 : because ‘they withheld the truth in unrighteousness, therefore he gave them up the more unto vile affections.’ So these, after the first light of the gospel began to dawn, they daily brake out into botches and boils more than ever they did before. And thus this vial was a spiritual judgment upon them, as well as an outward, in discovering their sores unto their shame. And this is the first degree of their spiritual judgment under the first vial. The second vial is upon the sea. And this is the fruit and effect of the third angel’s preaching, namely, Luther and his followers; who as in their doctrine they were raised up to a greater light, comparatively to the former, so the fruit of their doctrine was a further plague, both upon the political and spiritual sea of the beast. The sea, in a kingdom or body politic, is put for jurisdiction over many people, as was shewed in the second trumpet, Revelation 8; and so here the sea of the beast are those many kingdoms, and peoples, and nations, and tongues, which she sits upon, as you may see it expounded, Revelation 17:15. Now after Luther’s preaching, and his followers’, not only particular persons, as before, were divided from the Pope, but whole nations were rent from him, as England, Germany, Sweden, Scotland, &c., and his sea lessened by a third part and more; and some of the ten horns of the beast wrung off, so becoming like as members when divided from the body, and, as the similitude is, Revelation 16:3, to express that division, as ‘the blood of a dead man.’ And every living thing died in those seas divided from him; in that now those of the Popish faction could not, through the alteration of religion by law, live in their idolatrous worship, so quietly, safely, and peaceably as before. There was no free living or breathing for them in these separated kingdoms. And in like manner his spiritual sea also had a vial poured upon it, even his abominable doctrine and worship; as the doctrine of purgatory, indulgences, merit, &c., in which, as in the sea, his merchants—namely, his priests—had brought in gain, both to themselves and to the Pope’s custom-house, as the expression is, Revelation 18:17. This sea of the beast’s doctrine is turned into blood, and does, like the blood of a dead man, begin to putrefy and stink; yea, and, which is a further plague, to be damnable. Insomuch that those who, after so clear a light of the gospel now discovered, will still continue in that doctrine, die and perish eternally. And so in that sense also it is true which is said, Revelation 16:3, that ‘every living thing died in the sea.’ And see how this agrees with the preaching of the third angel, Revelation 14:9-10; he preaching, that not only that Rome was Babylon, as the former was, but that ‘if any one did worship the beast or his image, the same should drink of the wine of God’s wrath.’ And by that wrath is meant hell: for it follows, ‘the smoke of their torments ascends up for ever and ever;’ that is, now they shall be sure to be all damned who know the truth but embrace it not. And this was a further spiritual punishment upon them, above what their doctrine was unto them in former times, wherein through ignorance men remaining, many more of them were saved than now there are. The third vial is upon the rivers and fountains; that is, those who serve to enlarge or any way recover that his sea again, or to sweeten it. They are therefore called rivers, because as rivers run from the sea into the sea again, so do these.
I shall now explicate both the rivers and fountains severally.
First, For his fountains, they are the lesser springs; and those—
1. The spiritual ones. When the Egyptian waters were turned into blood, we read that they digged fountains and wells; and that they also were turned into blood by Moses. So here, they, when their sea is become bloody, dig fountains to live in. Which fountains are their writings and writers since the Reformation, that with learning and eloquence would labour to sweeten and make good some of their sea-waters again; but in vain, our writers again confuting them, and turning all into blood, as it was before. So as still those among them that shall read the one and the other, cannot but so be convinced, that if they persist still in their doctrine they will be damned, as the curse is, 2 Thessalonians 2:11-12.
2. Their fountains temporal and political also. Such we may account those politic agents, the Jesuits, and others that have, in all these separated kingdoms, attempted to restore this his lost power and jurisdiction. And the lesser springs, namely, particular persons, have many of them been turned to blood, whilst laws enacted against them (in England, 1581; in Holland, 1586; in France, 1584; and again in England 1605) cut off many of them, and gave them blood to drink, many of them being martyred; insomuch that they have a martyrology, or book of martyrs, even as we have. Thus they have had a just reward, as the angel from the altar cries, Revelation 16:7; that is, true worshippers in churches, who through their prayers had procured these edicts, and therefore do now return the praise unto God’s justice, in retaliating to them and upon them. That phrase, ‘from the altar,’ notes not out martyrdom, as some think, neither here nor Revelation 14:18,—but this phrase, ‘the souls under the altar,’ is that which importeth martyrdom, as Revelation 6—but altar is here put to signify worship; and so, the angel out from the altar, or place of worship, is put to signify those public worshippers and priests of God that stand at the altar, or in public assemblies, and give thanks for these judgments upon all occasions. Their acclamation is, that as they had dealt by us, so now themselves were dealt with; and, indeed, just in the same manner: for they had singled out particular persons, and put them to death by bloody laws established; and these kingdoms, being fallen off, have enacted the like, and put them to death in the like public manner.[11]
[11] It can scarcely be necessary to point out that the author’s manifest approbation of persecution and persecuting ordinances, is a blot that, originally derived from Rome, long attached to the Reformed churches.—Ed. In the second place, this third vial is upon his rivers also, and greater streams, namely, those armadoes and navies from out the sea of those kingdoms that continue still to uphold the beast, and endeavour to lay all kingdoms into this one sea again. As the Spaniards, both against England in’ 88, and against Holland often since, sent out to regain Rome’s jurisdiction; who yet have still been defeated. And unto this head may be reduced the defeatment of that late navy, 1639, sent forth to the same end, as a sprinkling of this vial—though now be the times of the fourth vial—still going on, according to the rule given in the sixth premise. The fourth vial is upon the sun; and to the angel that is executor of it, there is ‘power given to scorch men with fire.’ The effect whereof is their blasphemy. This vial scemeth to me to have two distinct parts:—1. The effusion of this vial upon the sun. 2. The scorching with fire those that adhere to the beast. And according to my former general rules, I do interpret it both of outward and of spiritual plagues, and both of them falling on the Popish party; and so the former part of the vial to import an outward plague, and the latter a spiritual punishment. Now—
1. For the vial upon the sun. The sun here, according to the third premise or rule given, may be put for the more illustrious light or prince adhering to the Popish party, and shining in his political heaven, whereof he is the great god or Jupiter. And this must be either the emperor, or the king of Spain, or, as it may be, both; they both being of the same family of Austria. The issue of these German wars, when the Popish party shall once have had blood enough given them to drink, shall be either the ruin of the one or the other, or both; and if not of them both, then of the Austrian family in Germany, as Mr. Mede first well conjectured; though it may be the hint of his conjecture might have been taken from what was Mr. Parker’s opinion of this vial long before; who interpreted this sun to be some Protestant prince in Germany, who should first have a part of this vial poured upon him by the Popish party; but being thereby provoked, and afterwards raised again, should, like the sun, scorch them with his heat, and so only the latter part of this vial should fall on them. Thus Mr. Parker, anno 1616, did first interpret this vial, long before these German wars. But I do much rather incline to Mr. Mede’s opinion, because these vials are wholly peculiar to the beast and his company, and to those professed enemies of the church who adhere unto him. And so this first part of the vial upon the sun cannot be understood of any Protestant, but of those that do adhere to the beast, even as well as the latter part of it, ‘scorching them with fire.’
Now if this sun be one of these two, either the king of Spain or the emperor, I rather take the latter: for the king of Spain, though now the greater light in the present horoscope, and so would, rather of the two, seem to be this sun; yet considering those more elderly and former times, the empire of Germany hath, for this 800 years, been the eminentest principality in Europe, and hath upheld the Pope the most, and in those times done more that way than any other king, though indeed some of the emperors opposed the Pope. Now God, in bringing punishments on kings and kingdoms, reckoneth with them for what their predecessors in state have done, and respecteth former times as much if not more than present. And besides, this German empire was peculiarly of the Pope’s creation, being by him set up in the first foundation of it in Charlemain; even as God is said to set up ‘the sun in his firmament, the work of his hands,’ Psalms 19. So the Pope may be said to have set up this sun in his. And so the ruin of the emperor is more peculiarly a punishment, respecting the papal seat and authority, than the ruin of any other prince, he having so peculiar an interest in him, as in his eldest son and chief begotten. This vial Mr. Mede thought to have been in execution in that great prevailing of the king of Sweden against the emperor, whose death diverted many men’s thoughts from that interpretation. But surely, though he proceeded not to throw down that sun from his heaven, yet those glorious victories of his, and quelling of the Popish party, may well be accounted in itself a vial, although it should proceed no further, and such a darkening of this sun as he will never more recover his ancient glory and splendour. And that king did lay such a foundation of weakening his power as may end in the utter ruin of that family in the issue of these wars. Others have interpreted this vial to be upon the Pope’s own temporal and spiritual authority, which is his sun or chief glory; for so sun in the Old Testament, and the darkening of it, is put for glory, and the obscuring of it; as Isaiah 60:20, Jeremiah 15:9. And so that power and authority which the Pope once had in temporals is here to be understood; he so eminently and conspicuously shining over princes in their temporal power, that, as their own decretals speak, they used to call the Pope and the emperor the two great luminaries in heaven, the sun and the moon, entitling the Pope the sun and the emperor the moon. But how hath this his glory, in the consciences of his own vassals, and in the eyes of those princes who sometimes were subject to him, waned more and more; which now at last may haply grow yet more dim? The whole kingdom of France ever denied him that absolute temporal power he once challenged. And in these latter times, how is the king of Spain rather become the sun, and the Pope the moon, who is glad to beg light from him, and to flatter other princes, to be by them upheld, who once flattered him, and whom he excommunicated at his pleasure? So that the Pope indeed is but the chaplain to the king of Spain, whom he makes use of for the acquiring of a universal monarchy. But which of these, or whether both of these, are here meant, the event must judge. And thus much for the first part of this vial. Now—
2. For that other part which follows, ‘and power was given him to scorch men with fire.’ This hath been much mistaken; as if because the sun useth to scorch with heat, therefore that power were here given to this sun to scorch with fire, and so it should refer to the sun’s heat. Whereas, I take it, it is mentioned as a distinct power given to this fourth angel; that as he hath power to pour out a vial on the Pope’s sun, be it taken as political or otherwise, so also that he hath a further power given him to scorch all those with fire that shall continue to advance the Pope in these his declining times. Which, as I take it, doth, according to the rule given, properly refer to a further and greater height of spiritual punishments—and so this latter part makes up the spiritual plague, as the former did the political and outward plague—inflicted upon the upholders of the beast in the times of this vial; even upon the learned among them, especially those who now take pains to write for him, or to bring in his authority into these European kingdoms again, where the light of the gospel shines so clearly and perspicuously as they cannot but long since have been convinced of it; their sea being turned into blood, and discovered to be corrupt, and their writings (their springs) so clearly refuted and turned to blood also, that those that live in those kingdoms, and still labour to bring in Popery again, cannot but manifestly go against their own light and knowledge.
Now, to punish this so presumptuous and high rebellion against so much light still shining, and age after age increasing, the angel (or the executioners of this vial) hath power to ‘scorch them with fire.’ And this is manifestly interpreted, Revelation 11, where the Holy Ghost, speaking of this vial, says, Revelation 11:5, ‘I will give power to my two witnesses,’—who are all one with these angels,—‘and if any man will hurt them, fire shall proceed out of their mouths, and devour their enemies; and if any will hurt them, he must in this manner be killed.’ The punishment there recited is spiritual, as all the rest there mentioned are; for they do execute it as witnesses by prophesying, and therefore this fire is said to come out of their mouths. And those other plagues, (as their stopping the rain, &c., Revelation 11:6,) must needs be so understood, namely, in a spiritual allusion. And so this of devouring with fire notes out the highest kind of punishment that men are capable of, as being killed with a witness; ‘in this manner must they be killed.’ And it is also there made the punishment of a wilful sinning of men, even of those that set their wills against God, and these his witnesses. For so the emphasis is put, ‘if any man will hurt them;’ and it is twice said, as making them go wholly and fully against knowledge, and so to sin wilfully.
Now both this here and that in Revelation 11 do seem to be an allusion either to the fire of Sodom, the city being called spiritually Sodom, which, Jude 1:7, is called ‘the vengeance of the eternal fire,’ because that fire that came down from heaven upon the Sodomites was but a beginning of hell unto them, and a type of it unto us; or else, to which I rather incline, it is an allusion unto that fire that came out of Moses’s mouth, namely, at his prayer, unto Nadab and Abihu, for offering strange fire unto God, Leviticus 10:1-2, and upon Korah’s company, Numbers 16, when they said, ‘All the people are holy.’ Which, Hebrews 10:27-28, is brought in as the type to express their punishment who sin wilfully after the knowledge of the truth, and so sin against the Holy Ghost: Hebrews 10:26, ‘If we sin wilfully, after we have received the knowledge of the truth, there remaineth no more sacrifice for sins, but a certain fearful looking for of judgment,’ (
But, above all, how those that apostatise and become of the Popish party, having lived and been brought up in ‘a land of uprightness,’ as it is Isaiah 26, and yet ‘will not behold the majesty of the Lord’ shining round about them, but relinquish the truth they are educated in, and would bring in the worship and doctrine of the beast and whore, after so clear a light and powerful preaching so long enjoyed,—towards the latter end of the harvest, and summer growing more bright than ever,—who yet in hypocrisy deny this to be their aim, and yet their deeds do so manifest it that all the world accounts them Popish, and to be of his faction, and so they merit the title of the number of his name, being spirits such as Rome hath not worse in malice and enmity against God’s witnesses: how a man’s thoughts, I say, should excuse many of these as innocent, from presumptuous sins at least, yea, and this great transgression also, is as hard not to think it as the thing itself is hard to be thought of them. For their venom, rage, subtlety, hypocrisy, and underhand opposing the saints is such as the godly do almost generally suspect them for this sin. And, indeed, what other principle could act men so cannot well be imagined. Their case being in this worse than that of the Pharisees, in that they had been brought up in darkness and ignorance of the righteousness of God and of the Messiah, when the ministry of John and of Christ came upon them, calling on them to acknowledge and embrace Christ as the Messiah, whom, being but a carpenter’s son, they never acknowledged. And yet they sinned that sin, through their smothering that new light, because their owning him would have put themselves out of credit, and have set up Christ. But these men in this our age have been brought up in the contrary truth and light, and have both professed it, subscribed to it, and preached it; and yet they love this darkness of Popery, and embrace this carted[12] whore, and, courting her, would bring her into their tents in the face of Moses and of the whole congregation; and they loathe the truth of the gospel and of the faith they once received, and this in the face of the clearest sunshine and light that ever shone round about them. One would think God should destroy them visibly; but they must do one exploit for him first. Their destiny further is, that they should kill the witnesses for this their scorching them through the powerful testimony of their lives and prophecy, and so be even with them, and overcome them yet before the fifth vial comes. And though, as yet, they have not got a full victory, yet they are now a-making war, and shall prevail, and banish and disperse them among tongues and nations throughout Europe. But by that time the fifth vial comes, these witnesses in the end shall again have overcome them, who are indeed that ‘number of the beast’s name,’ the last of all his company to be overcome, as Revelation 15:2, they being the last sort of his champions, even these ‘names of men,’
[12] Probably referring to an old mode of punishing disreputable persons, who were dragged through the streets in a cart, with the executioner by their side. The guilt of these abettors of Popery was all the greater, because the abominations of Popery had been already detected and exposed.—Ed. The fifth vial is upon the throne, or seat of the beast; which is plainly Rome itself, which was the old seat of the dragon, the heathenish empire, which Satan did, as it were, openly govern that empire under heathenish idolatry. But after that, this seat was resigned by the dragon unto the Pope, at his first rising, Revelation 13:2; which city the Sibyls long since prophesied of should again become a sheep-cot; and the Holy Ghost, in Revelation 18, that it should be ‘thrown down as a millstone, and be no more found at all,’ but should become ‘the habitation of devils only, and the dwelling of every foul spirit’ for ever. Of this vial we may say, as the disciples said to Christ, ‘Now he speaketh plainly, and not in parables,’ as before; only, as the other vials are to be taken in the largest sense, so I think this is, though not in a spiritual sense, for he speaks plainly, and not in figures. And therefore, as was said, Revelation 13, in the explaining of that second beast, that not alone the Pope is that beast, but concrete, and together with him, his clergy, who make up one body with him as their head. And so it may be, that by the seat of the beast here is not only and simply meant Rome, the sea and seat of that chief bishop the Pope, but it may be extended to other seas and seats that fall together with it—namely, of such of the clergy, whether in Italy or elsewhere, as cleave unto the beast, and profess themselves of his number and company, who now, under this fifth vial, are tumbled down from their usurped seats, thrones, and dignities, together with this their head, whose whole kingdom is now become full of darkness and obscurity. Yet so as eminently Rome, the proper seat of the beast, is here intended, and in the letter of this vial held forth as the subject of it upon which it falls; and with the fall of Rome the number and time of the beast’s reign and kingdom is reckoned as fulfilled—namely, his twelve hundred and sixty years allotted him ‘to do’ in, which years have now their period. And although the popedom remains to be destroyed by the seventh vial, yet his glory is here reckoned as gone and taken from him, and he is now reserved alive only for a further and more glorious execution. Therefore it is said, ‘his kingdom is darkened,’ for now he is put by his seven hills, his seat; his seven-headed kingdom is no longer reckoned of, as Mr. Mede reasons. But that which hath chiefly confirmed me in the opinion that the period of the beast’s kingdom is by the Holy Ghost reckoned to end with this fall of the city of Rome is, that I observe the 17th and 18th chapters are principally and on purpose added, first, to present this city of Rome in all her bravery Before her ruin, as Revelation 17, and then to sing a solemn, stately, and triumphant song for her ruin and destruction, as Revelation 18 throughout. Now that the Holy Ghost should make this ruin of the city that hath so long reigned, as Revelation 17:18, over the kings of the earth, so great a matter of triumph, and so eminent above all things else in this book, imports that the last and fatal period of that fourth Roman monarchy, of which that city was to be the seat, and the beast the last head, is here to be accounted as come, and the number of its years expired, the beast’s kingdom being now as good as at an end. He may indeed raise some trouble, and again make some resistance, after the sixth vial, but reign any more he shall not; for, otherwise, this had been pæana triumphalem ante victoriam canere, to triumph before an assured victory, which the Holy Ghost would not have done upon this occasion, but reserved it till after the seventh vial. But then was to come another manner of triumph, more high and glorious, for the marriage of the Lamb, when Rome’s ruin and the beast’s kingdom will be forgotten. And, therefore, God ordained it to be performed at the funeral of this great whore, the city of Rome. And it is much that two whole chapters should be spent on purpose to set forth the pageants of the church’s triumph over her. Surely here this great kingdom ends, and therefore, after that, the church prepares for the Lamb’s marriage, Revelation 19.
Now that that whore presented in those two chapters, the 17th and 18th, is this city of Rome, is evident by the last words of the 17th chapter,—the whore is that ‘great city that reigns over the kings of the earth,’—and so those two chapters are but a fuller setting forth and enlargement of this same fifth vial, as being the most eminent and the most fatal of the vials upon the beast. Which chapters therefore I shall not need to spend time in explicating of, but do now hasten to the exposition of the 11th chapter, which was by me mainly intended, because that contains the state of the church, and the condition of it in these times, and those that are next a-coming upon us. And I join that next unto the vials, because these vials serve directly to expound it; and it mentioning the four first vials, goes on then to shew what shall befall the churches of the Reformation under the fourth vial, and before the fifth: with which fifth vial those twelve hundred and sixty years, or forty-two months of the Pope’s kingdom, there in that chapter computed, are to end and expire, according to the notion even now given. And as the 14th chapter shewed us the condition of the church within itself to the times of the fourth vial, as was proved; so this 11th chapter begins where the 14th chapter ends. And from thence the supplement of the story of the church’s various condition is to be fetched, as will appear in the opening of it.