2. The names or titles given to him ; they are two : — (1.) ' The man of sin,' wherein he is compared and likened to Antiochus ; (2.) ' The son of perdition,' wherein he is compared and likened to Judas.
[1.] For the first, the Jews called Antiochus 'theman of sin:' 1 Macch. ii. 48, * They gave not the power to the sinner ; ' in the Greek, ro Kepa<i dfjLapTcoXa, ' They gave not the horn to the sinner.' The Syriac ver- sion hath it, ' They suffered not the horn of the sinner to be lifted up ; ' and ver. 62, ' Fear not the words of the man of sin,' — aTro \6ycov av8p6<; a/j.apT(o\ov /xrj ^o^rjOrjTe, ' From the words of the man the sin- ner be not afraid ' Now why did they call Antiochus the man of sin ? Because he sought to alter the religion of the people, and by cruelty to introduce a change of worship and idolatry, and such laws as he would set up. Now, according to this pattern. Antichrist is a man of sin ; that is, either a man given up to all sin eminently, a sinner addicted unto sin, and a ringleader of others unto sin, either by fraud and violence ; or as he giveth encouragements and encitements to sin ; or as a special kind of sinner, a usurper and invader of the empire of the Son of God. So was Antiochus. So was Antichrist. Now, how much open sin is practised, allowed, and maintained in the Papacy, I list not now to rake into ; their own stories speak enough ; — the sodomy, blasphemy, incest, adulteries, sorceries, murders, treasons, parricides, which they have authorised and countenanced. Histories witness that hardly hath the world yielded a more abominable sort of men, than
32 THE THIRD SERMON. [2 TlIES. II. 3.
have sat in that chair of pestilence. This I am sure of, that a man can sin nowhere at so clieap a rate as in Popery, where, what by dividing their sins into mortal and venial, and these expiated by a little penance, accompanied with a single attrition, and bare grief and tronble, because of the punishment ; what by faculties, pardons, licenses, dispensations, indulgences, sin is distinguished out of the conscience.
But because he is called the man of sin, here it cometh fitly to bo inquired whether Antichrist be an individual person ? for ' that man of sin ' would seem to be some single person. No ; he is put for a society and succession of men, that make up the head of the apostate state. As one lion figured the whole kingdom of the Babylonians, and one bear the kingdom of the Medes and Persians, and one leopard the kingdom of the Grecians, Dan. vii., — and there the fourth beast is the fourth kingdom, — so one person that succession of men that head the revolters from Christ. So Dan. viii., a goat figured a succes- sion of kings ; so the Assyrian, Isa. x. 5, several kings in that empire ; so Isa. xiv. 9, the king of Babylon, meaning not one but many. So this man of sin doth not note a single man, but a succes- sion of men, a body politic or corporate, under one opposite head to the kingdom of Christ : so the ' man of God ' is put for all faithful ministers, 2 Tim. iii. 17 ; so 'honour the king,' 1 Peter ii. 17, series regum. So 6 apxtepev^;, Heb. ix. 25, ' The high priest every year entereth into the holy place ; ' meaning not one, but the succession of the order ; and in reason it must needs be so here. Because Anti- christ, from his beginning to his end, from his rise and revelation, till his ruin and destruction, will take up such a long track of time, as cannot fall within the age of any one man, even from the time of the apostles till the end of the world. Antichrist is the head of the apo.stasy ; for here the apostasy and the revelation of the man of sin are conjunct ; now the mysterious apostasy could not be perfected in a short time.
[2.] The son o/2:>erdiiion, wherein he is likened to Judas : John xvii. 12, * None of them is lost but the son of perdition.' Him he re- sembleth in covetousness, treachery, and final destruction. The term may be explained either passively, or actively : — (1.) Passively, as one condemned to everlasting destruction ; as the * son of death,' is one condemned to die: 2 Sam. xii. 5, 'He shall be a son of death;' we translate it, ' He shall surely die.' So * children of wrath,' Eph. ii. 3 ; so here, ' son of perdition.' (2.) Actively, bringing destruction upon himself and others ; one that shall destroy others, and so he is called 'Abaddon,' and ' Apollyon,' Rev. ix. 11, and is opposite to Christ, who is ' the author of salvation,' Heb. v. 9, but Antichrist of destruction. And let us see the parallel between him and Judas ; for the person is a" type, as well as the name hath a significancy. Antichrist then is like Judas — in profession, a disci|)le of Christ ; in office, a governor of the church ; but in practice, a traitor. As they said of the blind man, John ix. 9, ' Some said. This is he ; others, He is very like him.' The Pope boasteth that his seat is apostolical, liis chair is Peter's chair, and that he is the successor of the apostle. Grailt it, but there is an error of the person — not of Peter, but of Juda.s. Let us see the parallel : — "