from the seventh chapter.

2. “And I saw another angel ascending from the east, having the seal of the living God.”] He speaks of Elias the prophet, who is the precursor of the times of Antichrist, for the restoration and establishment of the churches from the great and intolerable persecution. We read that these things are predicted in the opening of the Old and New Testament; for He says by Malachi: “Lo, I will send to you Elias the Tishbite, to turn the hearts of the fathers to the children, according to the time of calling, to recall the Jews to the faith of the people that succeed them.”38    Mal. iv. 5, 6   And to that end He shows, as we have said, that the number of those that shall believe, of the Jews and of the nations, is a great multitude which no man was able to number. Moreover, we read in the Gospel that the prayers of the Church are sent from heaven by an angel, and that they are received against wrath, and that the kingdom of Antichrist is cast out and extinguished by holy angels; for He says: “Pray that ye enter not into temptation: for there shall be a great affliction, such as has not been from the beginning of the world; and except the Lord had shortened those days, no flesh should be saved.”39    Mark xiii. 18–20.   Therefore He shall send these seven great archangels to smite the kingdom of Antichrist; for He Himself also thus said: “Then the Son of man shall send His messengers; and they shall gather together His elect from the four corners of the wind, from the one end of heaven even to the other end thereof.”40    Mark xiii. 27.   For, moreover, He previously says by the prophet: “Then shall there be peace for our land, when there shall arise in it seven shepherds and eight attacks of men; and they shall encircle Assur,” that is, Antichrist, “in the trench of Nimrod,”41    Mic. v. 5, 6.   that is, in the nation of the devil, by the spirit of the Church. Similarly when the keepers of the house shall be moved. Moreover, the Lord Himself, in the parable to the apostles, when the labourers had come to Him and said, “Lord, did not we sow good seed in Thy field? whence, then, hath it tares? answered them, An enemy hath done this. And they said to Him, Lord, wilt Thou, then, that we go and root them up? And He said, Nay, but let both grow together until the harvest; and in the time of the harvest I will say to the reapers, that they gather the tares and make bundles of them, and burn them with fire everlasting, but that they gather the wheat into my barns.”42    Matt. xiii. 27-30.   The Apocalypse here shows, therefore, that these reapers, and shepherds, and labourers, are the angels. And the trumpet is the word of power. And although the same thing recurs in the phials, still it is not said as if it occurred twice, but because what is decreed by the Lord to happen shall be once for all; for this cause it is said twice. What, therefore, He said too little in the trumpets, is here found in the phials. We must not regard the order of what is said, because frequently the Holy Spirit, when He has traversed even to the end of the last times, returns again to the same times, and fills up what He had before failed to say.43    [The rule of Mede’s “Synchronisms.”]   Nor must we look for order in the Apocalypse; but we must follow the meaning of those things which are prophesied. Therefore in the trumpets and phials is signified either the desolation of the plagues that are sent upon the earth, or the madness of Antichrist himself, or the cutting off of the peoples, or the diversity of the plagues, or the hope in the kingdom of the saints, or the ruin of states, or the great overthrow of Babylon, that is, the Roman state.  

9. “After this I beheld, and, lo, a great multitude, which no man was able to number, of every nation, tribe, and people, and tongue, clothed with white robes.”] What the great multitude out of every tribe implies, is to show the number of the elect out of all believers, who, being cleansed by baptism in the blood of the Lamb, have made their robes white, keeping the grace which they have received.  

EX CAPITE VII.

2. Et vidi alterum angelum ascendentem a solis ortu habentem signaculum Dei vivi. Heliam prophetam dicit, qui Anticipaturus est tempora Antichristi ad restituendas Ecclesias et stabiliendas a magna et intolerabili persecutione. Haec in apertione libri Veteris Testamenti et Novi praedicata legimus, ait enim per Malachiam: Ecce ego mittam vobis Heliam Thesbiten, convertere corda patrum ad filios (Malach., IV, 5, 6), secundum tempus vocationis Judaeos ad sequentis populi fidem revocare. Et ideo ostendit, ut diximus, numerum ex Judaeis crediturorum, et ex gentibus magnam multitudinem, quam nemo poterat dinumerare. 0330D Mitti etiam de coelo orationes Ecclesiae ab angelo, et suscipi illos contra iram, effundi et aestimari regnum antichristi per angelos sanctos, in Evangelio legimus; ait enim: Orate, ne intretis in 0331A tentationem, erit enim angustia magna, qualis non fuit ab origine mundi: et nisi abbreviasset Dominus dies illos, non esset salva omnis caro (Marc., XIII, 18-20). Hos ergo archangelos magnos septem ad percutiendum regnum antichristi mittet; nam et ipse ita dixit: Tunc mittet Filius hominis nuntios suos , et colligent electos ejus de quatuor angulis venti a finibus coeli usque ad fines ejus (Marc., XIII, 27). Nam et ante ait per Prophetam: Tunc erit pax terrae nostrae, cum surrexerint in ea septem pastores, et octo morsus hominum, et indagabunt Assur, id est antichristum, in fossa Nembroth (Mich., V, 5, 6), id est in natione diaboli, Ecclesiae spiritu. Similiter cum moti fuerint custodes domus. Ipse autem Dominus in parabola ad apostolos, cum venissen tad eum operarii, et dixissent: Domine, 0331Bnonne bonum semen seminasti in agro tuo, unde ergo ibi lolium? respondit eis: Inimicus homo hoc fecit: cui dixerunt, Vis ibimuset eradicabimus illud? qui ait, Non, sed sinite utraque crescere usque ad messem, et in tempore messis dicam messoribus, colligere lolium, et facere manipulos (Matth., XIII, 27-30), et cremare igni aeterno, triticum autem colligere in horrea mea. Hos igitur messores et pastores et operarios heic Apocalypsis ostendit esse angelos. Tuba autem verbum est potestatis. Et licet repetat per phialas, non tamen quasi bis factum dicitur: sed quoniam semel futurum est, quod est a Domino decretum ut fiat, ideo bis dicitur. Quod ergo in tubis minus dixit, heic in phialis est. Non aspiciendus est ordo dictorum, quoniam saepe Spiritus sanctus, ubi ad novissimi temporis finem 0331C percurrerit, rursus ad eadem tempora redit, et supplet ea quae minus dixit: nec requirendus est ordo in Apocalypsi, sed intellectus sequendus est eorum quae prophetata sunt. Sunt igitur significata in tubis et phialis aut plagarum orbi missarum clades, aut ipsius antichristi insania, aut populorum detractio, aut plagarum differentia, aut spes in regno sanctorum, aut ruina civitatum, aut ruina magna Babylonis, id est, civitatis romanae.

9. Post haec vidi, Et ecce turba multa quam dinumerare nemo poterat ex omni gente, tribu, et populis et linguis, amicti stolis albis. Quod dicit turba multa ex omni tribu, ex omnibus credentibus electorum numerum ostendit, qui in sanguine Agni per baptismum purgati suas stolas fecerunt candidas, servantes gratiam 0331D quam acceperunt.