his own decrees and decretals, speak it, and set it down. "To believe that our Lord God the Pope might not decree, as he decreed, it were a matter of heresy;" it is so written there, he hath heard it, he hath seen it, he knoweth it is so, yet he suffereth it to go abroad, and thereby suffereth himself to be called God. He hath burnt many saints of God and holy men, for no other cause, but for the profession of the Gospel. He hath in many places burnt the holy Bible, and such books as teach nothing but godliness. Where did he ever burn? What speak I of burning? where may it appear that ever he controlled any for so writing, or called in such speeches?

One of them seemeth to take shame of this shameless and blasphemous style or title. He seeketh friendly to teinper, and qualify, and take up the matter: "Thou art neither God nor man; in a manner thou art neither of both; but rather a mean between both;" that is, thou art not so high as God, nor yet so base as man. Whom then shall we imagine him to be? is he an archangel, or angel, or a spirit of the air?

God give him grace to see his own vanity, that he may know he is but a miserable and mortal man; that he may know that a time shall come when his hypocrisy and dissimulation shall be disclosed. God give him grace to become godly, as becometh the man of God; that he may indeed be the minister of Christ, and a disposer of the secrets of God; that he may serve God in truth, in holiness and righteousness all the days of his life.

But you say, the Pope at this day is not called God; he rather abaseth himself, and writeth himself by a title of humility, and is called so," The servant of servants." Be it so, that he is so called, and so written. Yet he is King of kings, and Lord of lords. This servant saith, I do make holy the unholy; I do

justify the wicked; I do forgive sins; I open, and no man shutteth. This servant can say, Whosoever obeyeth not me, he shall be rooted out.-This servant may dispense for any commandment of the Old and New Testament.

"This servant hath Christ's lieutenantship, not only over things in heaven, over things in earth, and over things in hell, but also over the angels, both good and bad." No man may judge this servant; for they say, "The Pope is exempted from all law of man.' And again: "Neither all the clergy, nor all the whole world, may either judge or depose the Pope." Such a power this servant of servants claimeth to himself. What greater power may be given to God? what angel, what archangel, ever had the like power?

And this power even at this day Pope Pius challengeth as proper to his seat; that he hath the authority which is due to Christ over his church; that no man may judge him, nor say he doth err, nor ask why he doth sa. He is invested in the privilege of his church, and loseth no one jot of his dignity, It is yet good at this day, which hath been set down, "It is sin, as great as sacrilege or church-robbing, to reason of any the Pope's doings." These be their qwn words, God knoweth before whom we stand this day, they be their own words, and not mine. Thus doth he sit in the temple of God, shewing himself that he is God.

And therefore may we say, as sometimes said Eusebius, "This is an evident token, that they hate God, because they will have themselves called by the name of God:" or as Gregory, who speaking of antichrist, said, "Whereas he is a cursed man, and not a spirit; he feigneth himself by lying to be a God."

Ver. 5. Remember ye not, that when I was yet with you, I told you these things?

Before I departed from you to go farther to plant the Gospel in other churches, I told you that antichrist should come, and that he should oppress and confound the church of Christ.-Paul was chosen to be an Apostle. The office of an Apostle was not to rest in any one certain place, but to pass from country to country, from land to land, and to fill all the world with knowledge of the Gospel; and therein appeareth the difference between an apostle and a bishop: a bishop had the charge of one certain church, an apostle had the charge over all the churches.

But Paul was not tied to any one city, or island, or country. He had authority to preach to all cities and countries, to all lands and islands from the east to the west. So did Christ appoint his Apostles (Mark, xvi.), "Go ye into all the world, and preach the Gospel unto every creature." They were not sent to Jerusalem, nor to Samaria, nor to Ephesus, nor to Rome only, but into all the world. The whole world was their diocese, and their province.

So speaketh the Prophet David of them (Psalm xix.) Their sound is gone forth through the earth, and their words unto the ends of the world." This was the commission which our Saviour gave unto John, and to James, to Paul, and to Peter, and to the rest of the Apostles, that they should go into all the world; therefore if any of the Apostles should have staid in one only place, and have gone no further, he had offended, and done otherwise than Christ commanded.

Here we see how foully they are deceived, which say, Peter was bishop of Rome, and did sit there five-and-twenty years. They that say so, know not what they say. It is an error: Christ made Peter an

Apostle, and not to sit as a bishop at Rome. He said unto Peter, "Go into all the world;" thou shalt be a witness unto me, unto the utmost coasts of the earth. I send thee unto all the churches, and not to one alone. The like charge received Paul; he travelled from Damascus to Arabia; from Arabia to Jerusalem; from Jerusalem to Illyricum; from Illyricum to Rome, and so from country to country, and from coast to coast, to make a pleasant perfume of the Gospel of God in all the world, that it might be unto them a savour of life unto life.

you,

Therefore saith he to the Thessalonians, Ye remember, that, when I was with you, I told you these things. The Spirit of God warned me to go further. Other churches required my presence. I was debtor unto them as unto you; yet before I left I told you what dangers should ensue. It was mine office, I was bound so to do, lest you might be deceived; I told you antichrist should come, even that man of sin, the son of perdition, which should destroy himself and others also. I told you he should be an adversary of the Gospel of Christ; that he should advance himself over all the kings and powers of the world; that he should sit as God in the holy place; that the people should give him place to sit in their hearts and in their consciences.

This warning the Apostle gave to the Thessalonians. The like warning he gave to other churches where he taught the Gospel; and the same is also spoken unto us. They knew by his teaching that antichrist should come. We know by the marks which he hath given to know antichrist, that he is already come; and that the very same is come, which the Apostle describeth; that he is grown unto his fulness, and hath stalled himself in the place of God.

Ver. 6. And now ye know what withholdeth, that he might be revealed in his time.

Paul seemeth not in these words to say, what letteth the coming of antichrist; but what shall stay the coming of Christ, for so he maketh entry into this matter. I beseech you by the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, that ye be not troubled, as though the day of Christ were at hand. Let no man deceive you by any means; for the day of Christ shall not come, except there come a departing first, and that antichrist be disclosed. Even so here he saith, Ye know what withholdeth Christ, and why he cometh not. Even this, that antichrist might first be revealed in his time. His time is appointed; the spring cometh not, until the winter have gone before; the night goeth before, and then the day cometh. And so shall not the glorious majesty of Christ's coming appear, before the dreadful and dangerous days of antichrist shall come. There shall be no delivery, unless bondage go before.

Antichrist shall bring the world into bondage; he shall do violence to the saints of God; he shall be as a continual storm and darkness in the church. The godly shall look up to heaven, and call for aid; they shall cry unto the Lord, and he will hear them; they shall say, "Oh! come, Lord Jesus, thy kingdom come, confound thine enemies." Then will he not stay; he will appear, and shew himself in glory. In the mean while this is the cause of his stay; this letteth his coming; antichrist must first come. This I take to be the Apostle's meaning; it agreeth with the beginning; it is simple, clear, and plain, and without danger of error.

Antichrist shall appear, not when he will, but he shall be revealed in his time. His time is the time of darkness, when shepherds and the guides of the people shall be careless; when the word shall be