of the foregoing day: so Christ's kingdom shall begin with the withdrawing of peace and comfort, and in following darkness; in that great trouble shall begin to arise upon those, who shall be the subjects of Christ's monarchy, both believing Gentiles and Jews, with Israelites or the Ten Tribes, who shall be all converted, and greatly troubled. But, when that trouble is at the height, then comes the beginning of Christ's kingdom.

At the first setting up then of this kingdom, Christ shall come from heaven visibly, even as he went thither which yet is not his last coming to the Last Judgment, but a middle coming betwixt the two other.

For Christ, he saith, hath three comings: the first, when he came to take our nature; the second, when he comes to receive his kingdom, for the receiving of which he went to heaven; the third, when he comes to judge all and end the world.

This second coming of Christ shall be long before his coming to the Last Judgment.

In which second coming, Christ will do these three things: First, he will raise up the Saints, which are dead before this his coming not only such as have been martyred, as some think: but all saints, who have died in the faith: for which cause he is said to come with all his Saints; Zech. xiv. 5. But all the dead, which are not Saints, shall lie still in the dust, till the Last and General Judgment, for the Second Death. The Saints which thus are raised in the First Resurrection, shall not return to a mortal state of body again, nor yet be so perfectly glorified as they shall be afterwards; for then the people on earth could not bear their presence, for they shall shine as the sun: but they shall be in a middle state, betwixt glory and mortality; as Christ was after his Resurrection, before his Ascension.

Secondly, he will destroy the wicked people on earth: for they, about the time of his coming, shall combine against the Saints; and then will Christ suddenly surprise them to their ruin. Now this ruin of the wicked shall not be as yet universal to every one; only now he will ruin the armies of them: and so he will break the head and the arm of them, as it was with the Egyptians at the Red Sea; and the rest he will make slaves to the Churches. And, it seems that some wicked shall be left for a seed to these nations; because, by the end of Christ's kingdom, Gog and Magog shall rise against the Saints: which cannot arise out of such as prove hypocrites or excommunicated; for there shall be none such there: but these wicked ones left, shall be the nations ruled with iron; Rev. ii. 26, 27.

Thirdly, he shall examine, blame, and shame the Saints, who are alive at his coming, if they be found to have walked loosely. He will not kill them, nor change them in a moment; but

shame them therefore, Peter exhorts to be holy, that we be not blamed at his coming; 2 Pet. iii. 11-14.

Now when Christ hath thus done, and put his kingdom into form, he will withdraw to heaven again, and leave the government to the dead Saints raised up; among whom, the Apostles shall be chief: and they shall have the government of those Saints, which are found alive: that is, they and all believers shall rule the world, in which the Twelve Tribes shall be chief: and they shall not only rule as kings, but as priests; that is, discipline their souls, as well as their bodies.

Now, for that it might seem to be no small damage for the souls of Saints dead to be fetched from heaven to live again upon earth, with men, in their bodies; he tells us, that it is likely the souls of the departed Saints are not in the highest heaven, but in a middle place better than this world, but inferior to the highest heaven; which place is meant by Paradise in the New Testament: which Paradise, he conceives, to be below the third heaven; and therefore, surely, to be in the region or element of fire, where the sun and stars are; or in the highest region of air, which is called heaven in Scripture.

These Saints' souls, fetched from this paradise, and joined with their bodies raised from the dead (which is the First Resurrection) they rule Christ's kingdom, even all of them; though some of them in more eminent place than others.

The Persons that shall be governed, or the Subjects of this kingdom, shall be all that live upon earth; and the place they shall govern shall be the whole world. The Saints shall be ruled like the Israelites under Solomon; the wicked, as slaves. Those Ten of the Twelve Tribes, that are lost, shall be found out and made subjects of this kingdom. The cities of the Tribes shall be built again, especially Jerusalem; which shall be the most eminent city then in the world. The Israelites shall be first raised to this glory; and, at Jerusalem, will Christ begin to shew himself: and, from the Israelites, shall glory descend to the Gentiles.

The Privileges of this kingdom shall be wonderful. First, all the subjects of it, that are freemen, shall be holy; and not seemingly Saints, but true Saints: not any sinners. Nothing, that defileth, shall be there; no hypocrite; no person excommunicated, as proving bad; nor any of the children of these Saints shall prove naught, but all shall be elect, and prove Saints, and the seed of the blessed: for if any of their issue should prove hypocrites or wicked persons, it would so affect them, that they should not have everlasting joy; neither could sorrow nor sighing fly away. Now, in these times, there shall be no sorrow nor weeping. They shall be edified immediately from God in Christ. The Sacrament is but to last till the next coming of Christ, to set up his kingdom. Christ will hold them

up in fulness of grace; though not in full perfection of grace, till the last General Judgment, or their translation to heaven. There shall be a full and present answer to all their prayers; there being no sin, to keep good things from them. There shall be a fulness of all temporal blessings; as peace, safety, riches, health, long life, or whatsoever can be had in this world. They shall have exemption from all bodily troubles. Every one shall live a hundred years: no infant, nor any other shall die sooner. There shall be no sickness or grief, to consume the strength. Although a natural death shall be, yet there shall be no violent or untimely death, by any grief, sickness, or trouble. Satan shall be wholly restrained from tempting them to sin, or others to trouble them. Original corruption shall be kept in, not to break forth into any gross way. To which he adds, they shall not be infected with Popery.

This for the Evening or first part of Christ's kingdom.

Now when this kingdom of Christ hath lasted to many generations, the slaves and tributaries will be grown to multitudes. These, under the name of Gog and Magog, upon whom the Devil shall be let loose, shall be drawn by Satan to assault the Saints which trouble shall not be long: it shall be sudden and violent, but short. For Christ shall suddenly come from heaven; and, with fire, kill all the wicked ones, not leaving one of them alive upon earth.

:

This assault of the wicked will Christ take for the occasion of his coming to the Last and General Judgment: before which he shall, in a moment, change the bodies of all his Saints that are not dead, but alive at his coming; and raise up the dead bodies of the Saints, who lived and died during this kingdom of Christ; and they, together with the changed Saints, shall meet the Lord Jesus in the air, coming again from heaven, never more to be parted.

Then shall all the wicked be raised up, from Cain to the last wicked man that is found on the earth: and now shall be the Judgment, which we call the Day of Judgment; which being finished, the Saints shall be carried with Christ for ever into heaven, and the wicked sent with the Devil into hell: which hell shall not be the same, which is now so called; but another this being now but as a prison; that, the place of execution and torment; the hell, that now is, serving only to reserve condemned spirits, which have no bodies, till the execution at the Last Day: at which time, this hell shall cease and be swallowed up. The hell, that shall be for torment, shall be all this lower and visible world of earth, waters, and the lower heavens, reduced by God then to their first chaos of confusion.

Now this kingdom of Christ, though for the evening or the first part of it, it is expressly determined to last a thousand

VOL. VIII.

M m

years, or ten generations: yet the Dawning or latter part of it is not expressed in Scripture, how long it shall endure; but, doubtless, will last a long time: and though called but a Day of Judgment, yet it may last a thousand years, as the other is to do; because this is the time, in which God's mercy, justice, truth, power is to be gloriously revealed before all men and devils; so as every sinner is to be silenced in his reasonings, or convinced; which must require much time. Secondly, this is the time, in which Jesus Christ is to triumph and lord it over all reasonable creatures; to be worshipped and acknowledged, by every one in heaven, earth, and under the earth. Thirdly, the solemnity of it were to little purpose, if it were not to last long as we deride great preparations and pomp for a short show. Lastly, every act of reasonable creatures being immortal, shall not only abide for ever in heaven or hell, but be revived and brought forth in that day before all the world; and all these acts, from Adam to the last of mankind, shall be orderly and clearly proceeded in by books as in a Court of Justice.

When all this is done, and the final sentence pronounced upon all creatures, both blessed and cursed, then will Christ resign his kingdom to the Father; and this world, together with his kingdom, shall end.

For the beginning of this monarchy of Christ, it must be set up, saith he, the last in the world, after the other four are passed; whereof the Roman is the last that being divided into the Eastern and Western Monarchy; and, out of the Western, Ten Horns or kingdoms arising; and, among them, another Little Horn most blasphemous, which is the Papacy. When these Ten Kingdoms and the Papacy shall be put to an end, then is the beginning of this Kingdom of Christ; which, saith he, by comparing of Daniel with the Revelation, shall be Anno 1666; the Number of the Beast, only the thousand, because it comes seldom, left out. Three years and a half before this 1666, the papal power shall have support in Europe: all the Ten Kingdoms apostatizing to Popery; and yet one of them shall return to the truth. In the years of Christ 1650, or 1656, the Israelites are to be delivered, by being called to Christianity; both Jews which were Two Tribes, and the Ten Tribes of Israel: both which shall, after their conversion for forty-five years after, suffer great trouble from Mahometans, Heathens, Papists. Upon all which computations, it is likely, saith he, that Christ's coming from heaven, and the raising the dead, and beginning his kingdom, and the Thousand Years, will be about the year of our Lord 1700: for it is to be about forty-five years after 1650, or 1656.

Now it being found out when Christ's kingdom, or the Thousand Years, shall begin, it is easy, he saith, to guess when the

time of the last General Judgment and the world's end shall be which neither angel, nor Christ himself as man, did, in those days, when the Disciples asked the question, know; for it was locked up in the Father's secrets. But, after Christ's sufferings and ascension, all the Father's secrets were revealed to him for he was worthy; and he reveals them to the Churches by John: opening the meaning of Daniel's time, ·times, and half a time, which no creature could expound, to be forty-two months, or one thousand two hundred and sixty days. He tells us expressly, that his kingdom should last, after it was fully settled, a thousand years; and then should be a little disturbance: so as we have some comfort, that there is hope the troubles of us Gentile-Christians shall cease about 1666: but, till those days, we are like to see sad times; for it is to be feared that Popery shall again overrun Europe, and bring back under papal power every king in Europe, and suppress all their opposers in every kingdom. By this revolting of the kingdoms to Popery, it comes that the Witnesses are slain, and lie dead in the streets. But ere Antichrist can have time to triumph four years, the Witnesses shall be raised up, and one of the Ten Kingdoms fall off from him, and ruin the city of Rome. But, yet, the Papacy shall breathe; and, by degrees, get head, and join with Turk, Tartar, and the Christians in Europe: but, from this danger, will Christ save all Christians, by his coming, and setting up of his kingdom.

SECT. 6.

THUS have I faithfully related the opinion, and summarily contracted the larger discourse, of Mr. Archer: who, upon the grounds of Alstedius and Mede, runs his own descant plausibly enough; for every clause of his Tractate, calling up the testimonies of the Sacred Scripture.

The several allegations whereof, upon every passage, I could be most willing thoroughly to SCAN, if I had less care to spare myself, than the reader.

For whose satisfaction, that I may be neither unpardonably tedious, nor in any sort deficient, in the managing of this subject, I shall, first, shew that UNIVERSAL STRAIN AND GROUND OF ERROR, which runs through the whole writing of this author: then, I shall note some of the chief of those BOLD PARADOXAL AND UNWARRANTABLE ASSERTIONS, which I meet with in this opinion and discourse: in the third place, I shall lay forth those STRANGELY IMPROBABLE CONSEQUENTS which will inevitably follow upon both: and, lastly, I shall subjoin such FAIR, SAFE, AND ORTHODOX CONSTRUCTIONS, as may be warrantably admitted of that dark passage of Scripture, the misprision whereof is guilty of this controversy.