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CHAPTER V.

RESPECTING THE CHARACTER AND MANIFESTATION OF

THE ANTICHRIST.

ST. JOHN, in his Epistles, more than once announces the manifestation of some remarkable enemy to the faith, whom he denominates THE ANTICHRIST : and, at the same time, he speaks of what he calls THE SPIRIT OF THE ANTICHRIST1.

From this variety of expression we may collect plainly enough, that THE ANTICHRIST is some palpable and embodied person or community, and that THE SPIRIT OF THE ANTICHRIST denotes the principles by which that person or community would be animated.

Hence it is evident, that the spirit of the Antichrist may extend very far beyond the person or community emphatically denominated the Antichrist: for all, who embrace or advocate the principles of the Antichrist, are animated by his spirit; though, if the Antichrist be a community, it does not follow that they are all members of that community. Such being the case, while some person or community of preeminent wickedness is specially styled THE ANTICHRIST; every one, who is animated

1 1 John ii. 22, 23. iv. 2, 3. 2 John 7.

by his spirit or infected by his principles, whether it be to a greater or to a less extent, may properly be called an antichrist. If, then, we speak of individuals, there are many antichrists; because many are described, as being animated by the spirit of the Antichrist: but, if we emphatically speak of THE ANTICHRIST, some preeminent person or community must be intended; because St. John mentions only one such preeminent person or community, and the Church has never understood him to mention more than one.

Agreeably to this obvious distinction, he tells us, that THE SPIRIT OF THE ANTICHRIST was already in the world at the very time when he was writing; and, consequently, that there were even then many deceivers, each of whom was an individual antichrist but he gives us no intimation, that THE ANTICHRIST was then revealed; nor did the primitive Church ever understand him to say so. On the contrary, the early Christians, from the language employed by St. John (who is the only inspired writer that uses the term), always expected, that THE ANTICHRIST was some violent and avowed opponent of the Messiah, who was about to be manifested in the last age of the world and therefore long after the period in which the Apostle flourished.

I. It is not to be dissembled, that both the early Fathers and the Romanists and the Protestants

11 John iv. 3. 2 John 7.

have almost universally agreed to identify THE ANTICHRIST with the man of sin and the little horn of Daniel's fourth beast and the second beast or false prophet of the Apocalypse: the consequence of which has been, that, since protestant expositors with scarcely a single exception of any note have very reasonably pronounced the man of sin and the little horn and the false prophet to be the Papacy, they have thence been led also to brand the Roman Bishop with the odious title of the Antichrist.

1. No doubt, this will follow, as a thing of course, if we identify THE ANTICHRIST with the man of sin and the little horn and the false prophet: but, since the joint character of the three last does not more perfectly agree with the character of the Papacy, than the character of the first entirely and palpably disagrees with it, we may well be allowed to doubt, whether the man of sin and the little horn and the false prophet, identical as they plainly and confessedly are with each other, are also identical with THE ANTICHRIST. St. John gives us a very unambiguous character of the Antichrist: the simple question, therefore, is; Whether the character of the Antichrist, as thus delineated by the Apostle, does, or does not, agree with the character of the Pope.

What, then, is the character of the Antichrist, as delineated by the pencil of St. John? It is given in the following passage.

Who is the liar, except he that denieth that Jesus is the Christ? He who denieth the Fa

ther and the Son, this is THE ANTICHRIST. Every one who denieth the Son, neither hath he the Father1

It is not easy to find language more definite and explicit than this. We are expressly told, that THE ANTICHRIST is some person or community, that should deny the Father and the Son: whence it will clearly follow, that THE SPIRIT OF THE ANTICHRIST is that speculative principle, by which the Father and the Son are denied. Can the most lynx-eyed antipapist here discover the portrait of the Roman Pontiff? That the great Patriarch of the West is prophetically delineated in the allied characters of the man of sin and the little Roman horn and the false prophet, admits, I think, of small reasonable doubt: but, how he can likewise be THE ANTICHRIST described and foretold by St. John, certainly exceeds my limited powers of comprehension. It is true, that, in a loose and vague sense, we may call any foe to sound Christianity an antichrist: but this is not the mode, in which the title of THE ANTICHRIST has been applied to the Pope by a whole host of protestant expositors. They have contended, that the Pope is emphatically THE ANTICHRIST described and foretold by St. John they have allowed, that there may be many individual and inferior antichrists; but they have strenuously maintained, that the Pope, that is to say the line of the Roman Bishops, is preeminently and

1 1 John ii, 22, 23:

exclusively THE ANTICHRIST.

Now this position,

however ancient or however commonly received among Protestants, I hesitate not to controvert. My argument I shall throw into the form of a syllogism and, if any person be able to confute me, I shall be very ready to own myself mistaken.

According to St. John, he who denieth the Father and the Son, this is THE ANTICHRIST. The line of the Roman Pontiffs did not deny either the Father or the Son. Therefore the line of the Roman Pontiffs is not THE ANTICHRIST.

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Extraordinary as it may appear, scarcely any protestant expositor, who asserts the Pope to be the Antichrist, has paid the least attention to the character of the Antichrist as unreservedly and distinctly delineated by St. John. The name of the Antichrist is liberally bestowed upon the Roman Pontiff but not the smallest anxiety is shewn to identify the character of the one with the character of the other. Dr. Doddridge has, indeed, attempted something in this way: but his total failure of success serves only to shew, that he is laboriously bolstering up an opinion which can never be satisfactorily maintained. He tells us, that Popery is an usurpation entirely inconsistent with a due homage to Christ: THEREFORE, as he rapidly advances to his conclusion, the Papacy is the Antichrist. But what has all this to do with an express denial of the Father and the Son? The gloss of Dr. Doddridge (and I see not what more can be said in favour of the common protestant notion) is

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