A37035:733
A commentary upon the book of the Revelation Wherein the text is explained, the…A commentarie upon the book of the Revelation Wherein the text is explained, the…
A commentary upon the book of the Revelation Wherein the text is explained, the series of the several prophecies contained in that book, deduced according to their order and dependence on each other; the periods and succession of times, at, or about which, these prophecies, that are already fulfilled, began to be, and were more fully accomplished, fixed and applied according to history; and those that are yet to be fulfilled, modestly, and so far as is warrantable, enquired into. Together with some practical observations, and several digressions, necessary for vindicating, clearing, and confirming many weighty and important truths. Delivered in several lectures, by that learned, laborious, and faithful servant of Jesus Christ, James Durham, late Minister of the Gospel in Glasgow. To which is affixed a brief summary of the whole book, with a twofold index, one of the several digressions, another of the chief and principal purposes and words contained in this treatise.A commentarie upon the book of the Revelation Wherein the text is explained, the series of the several prophecies contained in that book, deduced according to their order and dependance on each other; the periods and succession of times, at, or about which, these prophecies, that are already fulfilled, began to be, and were more fully accomplished, fixed and applied according to history; and those that are yet to be fulfilled, modestly, and so far as is warrantable, enquired into. Together with some practical observations, and several digressions, necessary for vindicating, clearing, and confirming many weighty and important truths. Delivered in several lectures, by that learned, laborious, and faithfull servant of Jesus Christ, James Durham, late Minister of the Gospel in Glasgow. To which is affixed a brief summary of the whole book, with a twofold index, one of the several digressions, another of the chief and principall purposes and words contained in this treatise.
Edinburgh: printed by Christopher Higgins, 1658
Modern spelling is a reading aid: the words are the author’s, only the spelling is modernized. Original shows the page as printed, with the transcription marks.
To the first, we answer, Although Church-censures have no civil compulsion with them or bodily violence or strength to restrain any from corrupt teaching; yet they have a threefold weight, when rightly gone about: they have an authority and weight as to the conscience of the gain-sayer: because censures, being the Ordinance of Jesus Christ, and, as it were, a seal put by His Authority to a conditional threatening, they have a stamp of His Majesty upon them: and so they serve to humble men, or to revenge their disobedience: and therefore these who seemingly profess to despise sentences, want not an inward apprehension of the terror of Excommunication, and would gladly not have that sentence past upon them. 2. If men obstinately suppress the weight of the censure upon the conscience, as well as of the Word; yet, being a mean appointed of God for the restraining of such evils, it's oftentimes countenanced by Him, if not to the humbling, yet to the blasting of such persons in their designs: whereby in His secret Providence and Justice it often cometh to pass that sentences against such persons, are eminently owned and countenanced by Him, with some concurring dispensation, evidencing His ratifying of the same, as sometimes, such, are in Justice given up to more vile delusions, sometimes to gross out-breakings in practice, sometimes their very natural judgement and senses are blasted, their credit and reputation evanisheth, and, it may be, some way He doth signally follow them with His own immediate Hand by some stroke upon their Estates, Persons, or Families, even when they seem to be countenanced by civil Power, as it is written in Church story He did to Simon Magus, & Arrius after he was Excommunicated, by taking him away in the very height of his insolency, who having again recovered Court and being in a solemn manner with many attendants coming to appear for his pretended vindication, was smitten as he thought with a desire to ease himself, and for that end withdrawing to a retiring place ⟨p. 164⟩in one of the streets of Constantinople, he did instantly expire, and having been waited-for long by his attendants, was at last found dead in the seat, his intestines being dissolved and voided. That little Book (formerly cited) of the Rise, and Reign of the Familists, &c. hath some dreadful instances of this.
To the first, we answer, Although Church-censures have no civil compulsion with them or bodily violence or strength to restrain any from corrupt teaching; yet they have a threefold weight, when rightly gone about: they have an authority and weight as to the conscience of the gain-sayer: because censures, being the Ordinance of Jesus Christ, and, as it were, a seal put by His Authority to a conditionall threatning, they have a stamp of His Majesty upon them: and so they serve to humble men, or to revenge their disobedience: and therefore these who seemingly professe to despise sentences, want not an inward apprehension of the terrour of Excommunication, and would gladly not have that sentence past upon them. 2. If men obstinately suppresse the weight of the censure upon the conscience, as well as of the Word; yet, being a mean appointed of God for the restraining of such evils, it's oftentimes countenanced by Him, if not to the humbling, yet to the blasting of such persons in their designes: whereby in His secret Providence and Justice it often cometh to passe that sentences against such persons, are eminently owned and countenanced by Him, with some concurring dispensation, evidencing His ratifying of the same, as sometimes, such, are in Justice given up to more vile delusions, sometimes to grosse out-breakings in practice, sometimes their very natural judgement and senses are blasted, their credit and reputation evanisheth, and, it may be, some way He doth signally follow them with His own immediate Hand by some stroak upon their Estates, Persons, or Families, even when they seem to be countenanced by civil Power, as it is written in Churchstory He did to Simon Magus, & Arrius after he was Excommunicated, by taking him away in the very height of his insolency, who having again recovered Court and being in a solemn manner with many attendants coming to appear for his pretended vindication, was smitten as he thought with a desire to ease himself, and for that end withdrawing to a retiring place