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ruind and deftroy'd, by Fire, Sword, Earthquakes, Inundations, Famines, and Peftilences. The Air fhall be corrupted and peftilential; fometimes there hall be fcorching Heats, then pinching Cold, C. fo that the Earth fhall not bring forth Fruit; the Corn fhall be blighted; the Trees and Vines fhall fail. The Springs and Rivers shall be dried up; so that the Beafts fhall die upon the Earth, 'the Fowls in the Air, and the Fishes in the Sea. A little after he speaks of the Falfe Prophet; how that he shall Seal those that obey him; fhall burn the Holy Scriprures, and make the World defolate for Forty Two Months, &c. St. Cyril of Ferufam, Cat. 15. after he had spoken largely of Antichrift, adds, This is the cruel Beaft, the great Dragon, fighting against Mankind, being ready to devour them; therefore the Lord knowing the Power of the Adverfary, commanded the Chriitians that should live in thofe Days, to tice to the Mountains, Matth. 24. 16. But if any one knoweth that he hath Strength enough to refift the Devil, let him ftay; for I do not despair of the Strength of the Church: But let the fearful take heed to themfelves, for then shall be Tribulation, fuch as never was fince the Beginning of the Creation to this prefent Time, nor never fhall be. My dear Brethren, (fays Ephrem Syrus, Serm. de Antichrifto, p. 222.) then fhall there be a great Trial upon all Men, but especially

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the Faithful and the Saints, and great Tribulation fhall there be in thofe Days, when great Signs and Wonders fhall be wrought by the Power of that Hellish Beaft, Antichrift. (A little after) Who, my Brethren, amongst you all, fhall be found at that Day fo compleatly armed with the Shield of Faith, as to be fully perfuaded in his Mind, that the Coming of the Son of God is nigh, when he fhall fee this inexpreffible Tribulation upon every Soul of Man, without any Allay of Reft or Comfort; when thou shalt fee the whole World in Confufion (for every one shall flee to the Mountains for fhelter;) when thou fhalt fee fome perifhing for Hunger, others languishing with intolerable Thirft, and none to pity them? (A little after) There fhall be at that time no Reft upon the Earth, but great Tribulation, Trouble and ConfuC fion, Famine and Death, in all the CorC ners of the Earth. Then fhall the Saints fhed Rivers of Tears, and flee to the Deferts. They fhall hide themfelves in the Mountains, and in the Valleys, covering their Heads with Duft and Afhes, C praying to be delivered from the Beast. S1 The Mountains, the Hills and Trees of the World fhall mourn. The Lights of Heaven fhall mourn, because Men have forfaken their God, and believed the Deceiver, &c. And in many other Inftances does likewife this Holy Father elegantly bewail the Miseries of that Time: As

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does alfo St. Augustin, Lib. 20. Cap. 8. St. J rom in the 11th and 12th Chapters of Dan St. Cyril, Lib. 11. in Gen. St. Gregory, Lib.1 Moral. and Lib. 32. Cap. 12.

21. UPON the aforegoing Quotation fervations I cannot but obferve, I. That Hippolytu afferts, that the Means whereby the Churc preceding Quotati (or Chriftans of that time, which are n ons, and counted worthy to efcape) fhall be dec concerning ved by Antichrift, will be by his offeri them Food in that great Famine. Whic fame thing is attefted by Anaftafius Sin (Contempl. in Hexaemer. Tom. I. Bib. Pa P. 327.) in thefe Words: God faid to the Serpent, He fhall bruife thy Head, and the fhalt bruife his Heel; i. e. The extreme Parts of the Body of Chrift, which is his Church; fo that the Heel fhall be the Prefence of Antichrift in the laft Times and the evil Serpent waits for that Tim when he may again fupplant the Church by offering them Food,t when there fal be a great Famine. So that they who have not Faith to believe that Man do

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not live by Bread alone, but by every Word the
proceedeth out of the Mouth of God, fhall no
have Patience to expect God's Accom
plishment of his Promifes, that God will
at laft be Jealous for his Land, and pity his
People, and fend them Corn, and Wine,
and Oil, to fatisfie them therewith,
2. 18, 19. They, I fay, that will not for
this wait upon God, fhall trangrefs the
Law of their God, and pollute the Holy
One, for handfuls of Barley and pieces of

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Bread, Ezek. 13, 19. II. That those who thus Apoftatize and go over to the Enemy, fhall be fealed with the Mark of the Beaft; concerning which the Holy Scriptures and Fathers fpeak exprefly, only with this difference, that as the Scripture attributes this Sealing to the Eastern Beaft, or Falfe Prophet, Rev. 13. 16. The Fathers attribute it to Antichrift himfelf; underftanding, I fuppofe, the Falfe Prophet, as being in the Spirit of Antichrift, to be as the Inftrument by which he Seals them (even as we are fealed by the Spirit of God to the Day of Redemption, Eph. 4. 30.) That the Impreffion of this Seal, and the Number of the Beaft, are both one, is generally fuppofed by Ancient Writers (as may be feen at large) who therefore use them promifcuoufly. But what that Seal, Mark, or Number is, or wherein it confifts, is hard to determine. Most of the Ancients fuppofed that it was to be a Name compofed of the Numeral Letters which compofe 666. Of which fort many are reckoned up by Hippolytus, Irenaeus and others, to the Number of Sixteen or Seventeen, many of which are moft violently drawn in; and there is indeed fo great a Latitude in that way of Interpretation, that fome of the later Writers of the Church of Rome have made Luther and Calvin bear the Name of the Beaft: And when Monfieur Jurieu, Minifter of the French Church at Rotterdam, upon the Authority of Irenæus, had afferted that Al was it, his Adverfaries

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verfaries found that Rotterdam was comprized in the fame Number, and afferted that to be the Name of the Beaft. fhort, by this way we may make any thing out of any thing; for which very Reason Hippolytus, p. 39. owns he does not underftand it. A very probable Hypothefis was that of the Learned Dr. Potter, who afferted that the counting of it confifts in extracting the Root of it, which is 25, that being the only Number, which by being multiplied into it felf, makes the Square Number 666, when the Fraction (which is 41 in this Operation) is added to it, which is what is meant by the Square Root of a Number. And this, as for many other Reafons reckoned up by that excellent Writer, fo efpecially for this, that the Number 25 has always been efteemed by Sacred and Prophane Writers, who had never thought of Antichrift or his Kingdom, to be myfteriously Evil; and to be an Hieroglyphical Character of fome unhappy, defperate, deplorable, and apoftate State of the Church, because it is an oddly uneven Number, which is unevenly measured by an odd Number, fo uneven indeed, that no fquare perfect Number can arife out of it, but what is made up of fractional Additions. Whereas, on the contrary, the Number 12, the Root of the Pure Church, is an even Number making 144000, it's Square perfectly and entirely, to fhew the Perfection, Entireness, and Agreeableness

of

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