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tress and alarm than history can furnish any account of-if the feries of Prophecies and their correfponding events that are past and generally acknowledged to be understood, is brought down near enough to our own times to mark whereabouts we are in the series of trumpets and vials-it will be furely difficult to deny that "the Antichrift is come,” and that the judgments of God are" now "abroad in the earth," though the appropriation of the title of Antichrift to any particular power, or united powers, be left undecided. "If indeed it be true, as the Romanifts pretend, that this part of the Prophecy is not yet fulfilled, and that Antichrift will come only for a little time, before the general judgment, it would be in vain to enquire who, or what he is; we should split upon the fame rock as the Fathers have done; it would better become us to fay with Calmet, that, the reign of Antichrift is ftill remote, we cannot fhew the accomplishment of the Prophecies with regard to him:" but if the system which I prefume to offer concerning the power of Antichrift be right, it will appear that these different opinions of the

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Newton, vol. i. p. 476.

Proteftants

Proteftants and Papifts, derived from partial views of the fubject, are not wholly incom patible with each other.

The PAPAL POWER one Branch or Form of Antichrift.

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With refpect to the commonly received opinion, that the Church of Rome is Antichrist, the Divines of the Church of England, as well as moft of the Divines of the Protestant churches abroad, who have written upon the subject, concur in maintaining, that certain of these Prophecies of Daniel, of St. Paul, and St. John, that have been quoted, point directly to the Church of Rome. And the members of that Church cannot complain, that the application of thefe Prophecies has been made by men incompetent to the discus fion of fuch a fubject; for perhaps, in the whole compafs of the learned world, it would be difficult to find thofe who poffeffed more candour, learning, diligence, acuteness, or

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zeal for the discovery of truth, than the writers who have turned their attention this way.

The fubject has been examined and illuftrated, and this important point has been determined by Mede and Newton, Warburton, Daubuz and Clarke, Lowman and Hurd, Jurieu, Vitringa, and many other illustrious members of the Proteftant Churches.

The first Reformers likewife, in the most ftrong and explicit terms, charged the See of Rome with her Antichriftian fpirit, and urged, in their own defence and vindication, the authority of thofe Prophetical warnings that encouraged all true Chriftians "to depart out of her communion, that they might not be partakers of her plagues." This was the conftant exhortation of Wickliff, of Luther, and of Jewell; and fuch was the language of their followers. They were fenfible of the value of the arguments drawn from thefe Prophecies in favour of their feceffion and feparation from a corrupted and erroneous Church, and they failed not to oppose them to their adversaries with the greatest zeal and energy.

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That their conduct was highly juftifiable is clear from what we may collect from the most authentic records of Ecclefiaftical History; because we find that the very fame interpretation was given to thefe predictions, not only long before any controverfy was moved between the Papifts and the Proteftants, but be fore any fuch diftinctions of Chriftians were known to the world.

It was the reigning opinion of the Chriftians of the earliest times, that Antichrift would appear foon after the fall of the Roman Empire. They looked forward to this event as fo replete with alarm and danger to the church, that it was a custom to introduce par ticular prayers in their liturgy for the continuance of the Empire of Pagan Rome, that the coming of Antichrist might be delayed. St. Jerom, who flourished in the fourth century, in his commentary upon the Prophecies of Daniel, delivers the general opinion of his age in these remarkable words; "Let us affert, in conformity with the sentiments of all the Ecclefiaftical writers, that towards the end of the world, when the Roman Empire shall be destroyed, ten kings fhall come, and divide the Empire, and an eleventh king shall arife,

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arife, in whom Satan fhall dwell corporeally, who fhall fubdue three of thefe ten kings."

St. Cyril, who likewife flourished in the fourth century, afferted exprefsly, "that the eleventh king mentioned by Daniel, is Antichrift, who fhall violently feize, by magical and wicked contrivance, the Roman power."

In the fixth century, Gregory the Great, in the most plain and direct manner, in his addreffes to the most eminent perfons of his own time, fcrupled not to apply the Prophecies concerning the beaft in the Revelations, the man of fin, and the apoftafy from the faith, mentioned by St. Paul, to him who fhould prefume to claim the title of Universal Priest, or Univerfal Bifhop, in the Chriftian Church. "I affirm confidently," said he, "that whoever calls himself univerfal Bishop, or is defirous to be fo called, fhows himself, by this pride and clation of heart, to be the forerunner of Antichrift." Such was his language, intended to convey a fevere cenfure upon the Patriarch of Conftantinople. Yet this zealous Bishop of Rome was blind to his own fituation; for no one before his time had ever carried the claims and the arrogance of Papal fupremacy

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