verfal fway have been pursued, I must refer the reader to Mofhein in his reports of the conduct of the inquifition; and as to thofe inflictions more efpecially anfwering to the penalties mentioned by the Evangelift, he will receive most fatisfactory information from Bp. Newton on the place: in whofe work he may likewife find the best fupported interpretation of the number of the name of the beaft.

Yet I cannot proceed to ftate the remaining prophecies of the revelation which have already been accomplished, until I have requested the reader to pause awile on the remarkable portion of it, we have laft inveftigated, and afk himself, whether it be not, more than utterly improbable, even morally impoffible, that any man fhould without fupernatural affiftance have accurately described feveral centuries before its rise,

the

the nature, origin, establishment, inftruments, and fuccefs of a power fo extraordinary as that of the Popes. Since the writer of this book lived in the earlieft age of Chriftianity, unless he really received it, as he afferts, by revelation, how was it poffible that he should know what would thus come to pass ? or not knowing it, how is it probable that he could have gueffed it fo accurately? It is undeniably true, that there had been no inftance in the world of any power like that which he defcribes. Whence then could he have drawn the idea? The Papal Empire is fomething, fui Generis, viewed altogether it is fomething of a peculiar kind, without precedent and without fimilitude, the means too of its fuccefs have been as fingular as the fuccefs itself. At the time this authour wrote, Rome kept her fubjects in awe by the fword, and extended her dominions by her armies. What ground. X 3.

then

then had he to imagine, that he should reach the truth by foretelling, that her Empire would-be renewed by miracles and figns; and her future sway extended by the influence of a falfe prophet? what ground for prefuming he could be right in ftating, that a power fo raised could be long fupported by, the fame inftruments: or that the abuse of its authority would not for many ages be fully punished by Heaven, nor effectually refifted by men? I am perfuaded that any reader of honeft heart, who fincerely attending to the facts of the existence of these predictions, and of that of the historical teftimony of their completion, fairly weighs these questions, will think it utterly incredible, that any one should by force of conjecture write a page of prophetick history perfect as this. And if this be far from credible, how much farther is it from being fo, that he should by chance fix upon images that might

be

be easily and correctly applied to a long chain of distant facts? yet fuch images, the reader has feen, have hitherto been employed in this prophecy; and he will now fee, that they continue to be fo.

The Evangelift after his delineation of the triumph of the beast proceeds, " and I looked, and lo, a Lamb stood

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on the mount Sion, and with him an hundred, forty and four thousand, having his father's name written in "their foreheads, And I heard a voice "from heaven, as the voice of many "waters, and as the noife of a great "thunder: and I heard a voice of

harpers, harping with their harps : "and they fung as it were a new fong "before the throne and before the four "beafts, and the elders: and no man

could learn that fong, but the hundred "and forty and four thoufand, which "were redeemed from the earth,

These

"are they which are not defiled with

women; for they are virgins. Thefe "are they which follow the Lamb "whither foever he goeth. These were

redeemed from among men, being "the first fruits unto God, and to the "Lamb; and in their month was found

no guile, for they are without fanlt "before the throne of God." As the reprefentation of a former feafon of trouble to the true fervants of God and Christ was fucceeded by an account of praise offered before the throne by the redeemed; fo here the emblematick hiftory of the oppreffive reign of the beast is followed by an hymn fung by those who have escaped the corruptions of the world, and having by following the captain of their falvation wherever he went, been made perfect through fuf. ferings, are able to exprefs a measure of joy, which no others can either feel or

utter..