Sidor som bilder
PDF
ePub

Cyrus, the inftruments which he uses may not know him, nor mear to fulfill his will, yet they may be the rod of his anger to accomplish his councils.

Let us now revert to the queftion, What are to be the confequences of the refurrection of the witneffes? Soon after it, the feventh trumpet is to found, which is the fignal for the feven angels to pour out their vials of God's wrath upon the antichriftian kingdom.-Has this feventh trumpet been blown ? Is it founding? Or is it about to found for the angels to prepare to execute the vengeance of God, on the mother of harlots and all abominations? My heart trembles at the idea of those calamities which are to fweep the earth, and of thofe convulfions which shall shake kingdoms and nations! "Who would not fear thee, O King of nations? for to thee doth it appertain! At thy wrath the earth fhall tremble, and the nations shall not be able to abide thine indignation!"

As to the gathering of the harvest and vintage in the fourteenth chapter, the time feems not yet come for their elucidation. I am inclined to think that they properly fall under one or more of the vials. The latter, as Dr. Goodwin has explained it, feems to be a vifion of the vengeance which is to be executed upon the Proteftant party; for the wine press is said to be trodden without the city, i. e. without the jurifdiction or reach of the city of Rome; and is reprefented in a feparate vision, on purpose to fhew that vengeance will fall even upon fuch kingdoms and nations as had caft off the Pope's fupremacy. Dr. Gill and others have fuppofed, that the Proteftant nations will again return to Popery, and perfecute with great violence. But Dr. Goodwin's idea is more probable. He fays, in his Expofition, part II. chap. I. "Whether the wine prefs will be brought into this country, he only knows who is the Lord both of the harvest and the vintage ;" (reader, mark well what follows,) "only this may be more confidently affirmed, that thofe carnal Proteftants in England and other places, who like the outward court have been joined to the people of God, fhall yet, before the expiration of the beaft's kingdom and number, be more or lefs

+ Ifa. x. 5-?.

+ Ifa. xiv. 4.

§ Jer. x. 1-10.

given

The number of the beaft, as we have endeavoured to prove above, is the tyranny of the Lewises; and as to have the mark of the beaft is to pay homage to the first beast; the ufurped power of the Pope and his clergy; fo to have this number "is to be devoted to the fupport of the tyranny of the fecond healt.

given up to the Papifts, and be made to vail to them, if not all of them, by bloody wars, and con quests, yet by fome base and unworthy yielding to them, as a just punishment of their carnal profeffion of the gospel."And the wine prefs was trodden without the city, and the blood came out of the wine prefs, even unto the horfes bridles, by the Space of a thousand and fix hundred furlongs. The Lord avert from this country fuch a judgment !

How incompetent is man to judge of the ways of God !—While the trumpet is blowing, and the angels are preparing to pour the divine vengeance on the heads of tyrants and their fupporters, and to spread defolation and woe for the fins of men, the great army of faints and martyrs in heaven fing, Great and marvellous are thy works, Lord God Almighty; juft and true are thy ways, thou King of faints All nations fhall come and worship before thee, for thy judg ments are made manifeft!+

- Rev. xvi. 1. And I heard a great voice out of the temple, faying to the feven angels, Go your ways and pour out the vials of the wrath of God upon the earth. It appears to me, that although we must fuppose a conformity to the order of the vision, in inflicting the plagues of these seven vials, yet, perhaps, it will not be fuch a formal one, -as to exclude all mixture. It ftrikes me, that although the vial which is to be poured out upon the earth, will commence firft, and that on the fea follow, yet their falling ftreams will mingle; and although the full torrent of the latter vials may not commence, yet fome small portion of them may be dashed upon the rivers, the fun, or the throne of the beast, while the first are pouring out; and although the plagues of the latter vials will commence last, as in the vision, yet the streams of the former may still be running. The angels faying of this woe, that it cometh quickly, and the circumstance of the feven angels with their vials all appearing, and being fent out at the fame time, fuppofes that they will all be employed together, to execute their miffions on the feveral objects of the divine difplcafure. And we may hope that thefe judgments will foon be

over.

Were I to detail half the opinions of authors on the following objects of the Divine vengeance, adding to them my own conjectures, this pamphlet would fwell into a folio; but as I apprehend, that the events which are here reprefented have not yet taken

[blocks in formation]

place, or at most, are but now commencing, my reflections fhall be fhort.

Ver. 2. And the first went and poured out his vial upon the earth, and there fell a noifome and grievous fore upon the men which had the mark of the beaft, and upon them which worshipped his image. The pouring out of this vial upon the earth may poffibly refer to fome particular country on the main, where the judgments of God arc to commence; or, perhaps, we may be taught by this emblem, that the downfal of the antichriftian kingdom fhall begin with terrible wars on land, in which God's wrath fhall be manifefted against thofe armies of land forces which have for fo many ages been the bafis of tyrannic power, and who, at the nod of defpots, have flaughtered their fellow-creatures, without either thinking or caring about the juftice or injuftice of the caufe; who have been the bafe inftruments, without a motive, of defolating nations, and of carrying unnumbered woes from one end of the earth to the other. But the time of judging the cause of the dead is come, and both they who have the mark of the beast, i. e. who are the subjects and flaves of the papacy, and they who worship, or only serve and endeavour to fupport the image of the beaft, (which, according to what appears from chap. xiii. is the tyranny of the antichriftian party in France, all fuch as ferve this image of the beast, though not papifts and flaves to Rome) fhall experience such chaf'tisements and disappointments in their attempts to support what God has determined to overthrow, and fuch violent and successful attacks on their power, that they fhall be deeply wounded, and grievously vexed; or, a noisome disease fhall get into their camp, and cover the earth with their dead; that thus men may fee the hand which fimites them, and give glory to God. + Ye can difcern the face of the fky, but can ye not difcern the figns of the times? Who drove back, and cut off, by a noifome and grievous difeafe, the invading army of Brunswick? He, who turneth the way of the wicked upfide down.

Ver. 3. And the fecond angel poured out his vial upon the fea, and it became as the blood of a dead man, and every living foul died in the fea. As in Ifa. lx. 5. "The abundance of the fea fhall be converted unto thee," means the inhabitants of iflands, or of lands come at by fea, and as by the fea, chap. viii. 8. was intended the maritime

↑ Matth. xvi. 3.

coun

countries of Europe, and as "woe to the inhabitants of the earth and of the fea," chap. xii. 12. means woe to the inhabitants of continents and of islands, all mankind, so the pouring out of this fecond vial on the fea may indicate thofe calamities which God will bring upon his enemies, the fupporters of papal tyrannies, in such fituations; or, if the meaning of the pouring out of this fecond vial of wrath is not to be restricted to this sense, it may probably refer also to the deftruction of naval armaments, whether in battle, or by God's more immediate judgments. And fo great will the deftruction be, that the fea will not only be stained with blood, but become as the blood of a dead man.

Ver. 4. And the third angel poured out his vial upon the rivers and fountains of water, and they became blood, &c. This may be a reprefentation of those judgments which are to fall on the inhabitants of inland countries, and where rivers abound, and have their fources; or, as it has been generally explained, of that juft vennce which is to be inflicted upon thofe orders of men, who, by of power, both civil and ecclefiaftical, have been the fources of human misery, and the great feeders of the sea of oppreffion. The calamities which are to attend this vial, are to ́ be peculiarly grievous. This may be concluded from the following circumftance: heard the angel of the waters fay, Thou art righteous, O Lord!-Thou haft given them blood to drink, for they are worthy. The former judgments pafs in filent folemnity, as though the objects of them were lefs.confpicuous in guilt, but no fooner is this vial poured out than it excites acclamations of praise. If this refer to the inland countries of Europe, more especially where the people are held in vaffalage, and where both the priests and nobles, above most others, rule the people with a rod of iron, there appears a peculiar fitnefs in these acclamations. The blazing ftar, or comet, which fell upon the third part of the rivers and fountains of water, chap. viii. 10. appears to have had its fulfilment in the wars which laid waste the countries bordering on the Danube, the Rhine, and the Po, and efpecially the two latter, when Attila, with his Huns, made his terrible irruption about the year 452: it will therefore be worth our while to obferve the progrefs of things in these countries.

[ocr errors]
[ocr errors]

Ver. 8. And the fourth angel poured out his vial upon the fun. This appears to be either a reprefentation of God's awful vengeance in vifiting the nations with unfriendly feafons, that thus they may

[blocks in formation]

at once be humbled under his mighty hand, and be more difpofed to forward his designs in the overthrow of antichriftian systems of error and oppreffion, or it is a prediction of the display of God's wrath against thofe fyftems of pride and defpotifm, which by their fplendor have been dazzling, and by their violence confuming mankind. Mr. Mede fuppofes this fun to be fome fplendid potentate of Europe, as the emperor or the king of Spain. But if it be not the emblem of unfriendly feafons, I fhould rather fuppofe it to represent the extinction of defpotifm in general, than of an individual monarch or monarchy.+

Ver. 10. And the fifth angel poured out his vial upon the feat of the beast. This must be confidered as referring to thofe calamities which God intends to bring more immediately upon the Pope, and upon that city and country where the throne of the beaft ftands. And we may expect foon to fee heavy judgments fall upon the Roman Pontificate; and that city to be facked and burnt which has been the fource of fo many corruptions, and which has tyrannized, for fo many ages, with spiritual defpotifm, over those kingdoms that have given their power to the beast,

Ver. 12. And the fixth angel poured out his vial upon the great ri ver Euphrates, and the water thereof was dried up, that the way of the kings of the caft might be prepared. The Turkish empire also fhall experience the wrath of God for their abominable oppreffions, and not only tidings from the north (Ruffia) but from the caft (Perfia and Arabia) fhall trouble him, as predicted Dan. xi. 44, and thus a way be prepared for the return of the Jews to their own land, previous to their conversion to Christianity. But the beaft does not yet expire.

Ver.

+ A friend has favored me with an extract from the works of Mr. R. Fleming, who, in a fermon, printed 1701, applies it to the French monarchy, and fays, Whereas Lewis XIV. took the fun for his emblem, and for his motto Nec pluribus impar, he may at length, or rather his fucceffor, and the monarchy itfelf, before the year 1794, be forced to acknowledge, that in respect to neighbouring potentates he is fingulis impar, but as to the expiration of this vial, fear it will not be before the end of the year 1794." What a fingular agreement between prefent circumstances and this good man's calculation!

گرد

I

If by this vial's being poured out on the fun we are to understand a drought, then aura may refer to the fun, but if it be an emblem of much rain, or of the wrath which is to be poured out on defpotifm, then I think, with Dr. Goodwin, that it refers to the angel, who, by the pouring out of this vial, is to afflict tyrants and their fupporters with fcorching calamities.

« FöregåendeFortsätt »