The last pages of these Observations having been differently drawn up by the Author in another copy of his Work; they are here inserted as they follow in that copy, after the 22d line of the 261st page foregoing.

And none was found worthy to open the book till the Lamb of God appeared; the great High-Priest represented by a lamb slain at the foot of the Altar in the morning-sacrifice. And he came, and took the book out of the hand of him that sat upon the throne. For the High-Priest, in the feast of the seventh month, went into the most holy place, and took the book of the law out of the right side of the Ark, to read it to the people: and in order to read it well, he studied it seven days, that is, upon the fourth, fifth, sixth, seventh, eighth, ninth and tenth days, being attended by some of the priests to hear him perform. These seven days are alluded to, by the Lamb's opening the seven seals successively.

Upon the tenth day of the month, a young bullock was offered for a sin-offering for the High-Priest, and a goat for a sin-offering for the people: and lots were cast upon two goats to determine which of them should be God's lot for the sin-offering; and the other goat was called Azazel, the scape-goat. The High-Priest in his linen garments, took a censer full of burning coals of fire from the Altar, his hand being full of sweet incense beaten small; and went into the most holy place within the veil, and put the incense upon the fire, and sprinkled the blood of the bullock with his finger upon the mercy-seat and before the mercy-seat seven times: and then he killed the goat which fell to God's lot, for a sin-offering for the people, and brought his blood within the veil, and sprinkled it also seven times upon the mercy-seat and before the mercy-seat. Then he went out to the Altar, and sprinkled it also seven times with the blood of the bullock, and as often with the blood of the goat. After this he laid both his hands upon the head of the live goat; and confessed over him all the iniquities of the children of Israel, and all their transgressions in all their sins, putting them upon the head of the goat; and sent him away into the wilderness by the hands of a fit man: and the goat bore upon him all their iniquities into a land not inhabited, Levit. chap. iv. & chap. xvi. While the High-Priest was doing these things in the most holy place and at the Altar, the people continued at their devotion quietly and in silence. Then the High-Priest went into the holy place, put off his linen garments, and put on other garments; then came out, and sent the bullock and the goat of the sin-offering to be burnt without the camp, with fire taken in a censer from the Altar: and as the people returned home from the Temple, they said to one another, God seal you to a good new year.

In allusion to all this, when he had opened the seventh seal, there was silence in heaven about the space of half an hour. And an Angel stood at the Altar having a golden Censer, and there was given unto him much incense, that he should offer it with the prayers of all Saints, upon the golden Altar which was before the throne. And the smoke of the incense with the prayers of the Saints ascended up before God out of the Angel's hand. And the Angel took the Censer, and filled it with fire of the Altar, and cast it to the earth, suppose without the camp, for sacrificing the goat which fell to God's lot. For the High-Priest being Christ himself, the bullock is omitted. At this sacrifice there were voices and thundrings, of the musick of the Temple, and lightnings of the sacred fire, and an earthquake: and synchronal to these things was the sealing of the 144000 out of all the twelve tribes of the children of Israel with the seal of God in their foreheads, while the rest of the twelve tribes received the mark of the Beast, and the Woman fled from the Temple into the wilderness to her place upon this Beast. For this sealing and marking was represented by casting lots upon the two goats, sacrificing God's lot on mount Sion, and sending the scape-goat into the wilderness loaden with the sins of the people.

Upon the fifteenth day of the month, and the six following days, there were very great sacrifices. And in allusion to the sounding of trumpets, and singing with thundring voices, and pouring out drink-offerings at those sacrifices, seven trumpets are sounded, and seven thunders utter their voices, and seven vials of wrath are poured out. Wherefore the sounding of the seven trumpets, the voices of the seven thunders, and the pouring out of the seven vials of wrath, are synchronal, and relate to one and the same division of the time of the seventh seal following the silence, into seven successive parts. The seven days of this feast were called the feast of Tabernacles; and during these seven days the children of Israel dwelt in booths, and rejoiced with palm-branches in their hands. To this alludes the multitude with palms in their hands, which appeared after the sealing of the 144000, and came out of the great tribulation with triumph at the battle of the great day, to which the seventh trumpet sounds. The visions therefore of the 144000, and of the palm-bearing multitude, extend to the sounding of the seventh trumpet, and therefore are synchronal to the times of the seventh seal.

When the 144000 are sealed out of all the twelve tribes of Israel, and the rest receive the mark of the Beast, and thereby the first temple is destroyed; John is bidden to measure the temple and altar, that is, their courts, and them that worship therein, that is, the 144000 standing on mount Sion and on the sea of glass: but the court that is without the temple, that is, the peoples court, to leave out and measure it not, because it is given to the Gentiles, those who receive the mark of the Beast; and the holy city they shall tread under foot forty and two months, that is, all the time that the Beast acts under the woman Babylon: and the two witnesses prophesy 1260 days, that is, all the same time, clothed in sackcloth. These have power, like Elijah, to shut heaven that it rain not, at the sounding of the first trumpet; and, like Moses, to turn the waters into blood at the sounding of the second; and to smite the earth with all plagues, those of the trumpets, as often as they will. These prophesy at the building of the second temple, like Haggai and Zechary. These are the two Olive-trees, or Churches, which supplied the lamps with oil, Zech. iv. These are the two candlesticks, or Churches, standing before the God of the earth. Five of the seven Churches of Asia, those in prosperity, are found fault with, and exhorted to repent, and threatned to be removed out of their places, or spewed out of Christ's mouth, or punished with the sword of Christ's mouth, except they repent: the other two, the Churches of Smyrna and Philadelphia, which were under persecution, remain in a state of persecution, to illuminate the second temple. When the primitive Church catholick, represented by the woman in heaven, apostatized, and became divided into two corrupt Churches, represented by the whore of Babylon and the two-horned Beast, the 144000 who were sealed out of all the twelve tribes, became the two Witnesses, in opposition to those two false Churches: and the name of two Witnesses once imposed, remains to the true Church of God in all times and places to the end of the Prophecy.

In the interpretation of this Prophecy, the woman in heaven clothed with the sun, before she flies into the wilderness, represents the primitive Church catholick, illuminated with the seven lamps in the seven golden candlesticks, which are the seven Churches of Asia. The Dragon signifies the same Empire with Daniel's He-goat in the reign of his last horn, that is, the whole Roman Empire, until it became divided into the Greek and Latin Empires; and all the time of that division it signifies the Greek Empire alone: and the Beast is Daniel's fourth Beast, that is, the Empire of the Latins. Before the division of the Roman Empire into the Greek and Latin Empires, the Beast is included in the body of the Dragon; and from the time of that division, the Beast is the Latin Empire only. Hence the Dragon and Beast have the same heads and horns; but the heads are crowned upon the Dragon, and the horns upon the Beast. The horns are ten kingdoms, into which the Beast becomes divided presently after his separation from the Dragon, as hath been described above. The heads are seven successive dynasties, or parts, into which the Roman Empire becomes divided by the opening of the seven seals. Before the woman fled into the wilderness, she being with child of a Christian Empire, cried travelling, viz. in the ten years persecution of Dioclesian, and pained to be delivered: and the Dragon, the heathen Roman Empire, stood before her, to devour her child as soon as it was born. And she brought forth a man child, who at length was to rule all nations with a rod of iron. And her child was caught up unto God, and to his throne in the Temple, by the victory of Constantine the great over Maxentius: and the woman fled from the Temple into the wilderness of Arabia to Babylon, where she hath a place of riches and honour and dominion, upon the back of the Beast, prepared of God, that they should feed her there 1260 days. And there was war in heaven, between the heathens under Maximinus and the new Christian Empire; and the great Dragon was cast out, that old serpent, which deceiveth the whole world, the spirit of heathen idolatry; he was cast out of the throne into the earth. And they overcame him by the blood of the Lamb, and by the word of their testimony; and they loved not their lives unto the death.

And when the Dragon saw that he was cast unto the earth, he persecuted the woman which brought forth the man child, stirring up a new persecution against her in the reign of Licinius. And to the woman, by the building of Constantinople and equalling it to Rome, were given two wings of a great eagle, that she might flee into the wilderness into her place upon the back of her Beast, where she is nourished for a time, and times, and half a time, from the face of the serpent. And the serpent, upon the death of Constantine the great, cast out of his mouth water as a flood, viz. the Western Empire under Constantine junior and Constans, after the woman: that he might cause her to be carried away of the flood. And the earth, the nations of Asia now under Constantinople, helped the woman; and by conquering the Western Empire, now under Magnentius, swallowed up the flood which the Dragon cast out of his mouth. And the Dragon was wroth with the woman, and went to make war with the remnant of her seed, which keep the commandments of God, and have the testimony of Jesus Christ, which in that war were sealed out of all the twelve tribes of Israel, and remained upon mount Sion with the Lamb, being in number 144000, and having their father's name written in their foreheads.

When the earth had swallowed up the flood, and the Dragon was gone to make war with the remnant of the woman's seed, John stood upon the sand of the sea, and saw a Beast rise out of the sea, having seven heads and ten horns. And the Beast was like unto a Leopard, and his feet were as the feet of a Bear, and his mouth as the mouth of a Lion. John here names Daniel's four Beasts in order, putting his Beast in the room of Daniel's fourth Beast, to shew that they are the same. And the Dragon gave this Beast his power and his seat and great authority, by relinquishing the Western Empire to him. And one of his heads, the sixth, was as it were wounded to death, viz. by the sword of the earth, which swallowed up the waters cast out of the mouth of the Dragon; and his deadly wound was healed, by a new division of the Empire between Valentinian and Valens, An. 364. John saw the Beast rise out of the sea, at the division thereof between Gratian and Theodosius, An. 379. The Dragon gave the Beast his power, and his seat and great authority, at the death of Theodosius, when Theodosius gave the Western Empire to his son Honorius. After which the two Empires were no more united: but the Western Empire became presently divided into ten kingdoms, as above; and these kingdoms at length united in religion under the woman, and reign with her forty and two months.