Bellua marina, or, The monstrous beast which arose out of the sea being a historical description of the papal empire as it is originally copied out of the prophecies of Holy Writ : together with an epitome of the lives of all the popes who have reigned in the church empire for these last 900 years, from the time this beast began to put forth his ten horns at Roma / by J.B.

§. 2.

When the first, & capital enemy of the Church, the Dragon was cast out of place: there was a woe pronounced, on the Inhabiters of the Earth first, & then of the Sea. Intimating that the next seat of the Dragon should be on the Earth, and after that He would gaine power in a place called the Sea. Now these three places called Hea∣ven, and Earth, & the Sea, must needs be diverse one from other, as are the places properly so called. As for the first place cal- called Heaven, it is very plaine that it was not meant of any place properly so called, but of that place where the Dragon had once power to persecute the holy woman, and from whence He was cast out. And this was in the Empyre of Roma, under the power of

Pagan Emperours; from the suffering of the ever blessed our Lord Christ, unto the reigne of Constantinus Magnus, who by putting downe that Pagan Power, is said to have cast out the Dragon, and was therefore cal∣led the Manchild borne of the Woman, & advanced into the Throne of God. And af∣ter this also, was there a time, while the Church did sing [Now is Salvation Come &c.] And this also was the time of the Church called Heaven, & reached unto the end of the four first general Councils. For so long & so farre, it is mostly agreed of all Christians, that the Church continued Holy & Pure, & very little defiled, and there∣fore is called Heaven, or the true Heavenly Church. True it is, that in these times were great interruptions unto the Churche's peace, by meanes of Emperours, Patriarchs, & Bishops falling away from the pure & true faith; but there was no general de∣fection: there were diseases in the Church: some times one member was sicke or lame, and somtimes another; somtimes the sto∣mach was disordered, and other while an arme was lame, and somtimes the Head was in an high feavourish distemper; but yet the whole Body together was not amiss. Altho here & there somtimes an Arrian Emperour threatened, banished or put to death; and other where, troublesome Pa∣triarchs & Bishops broached strange doc∣trines, & qua••reled, excommunicated, & greatly disturbed: yet at all those times was there a Body of holy Magistrates and Church

men, who kept up the life of Holy Church, and the Doctrine & Discipline thereof in that purity, as They received it from Christ & His Apostles; (the common failings of the Church militant only excepted.) And so far lasted the true Heavenly Church. But about the year of Christ 400, the Gothlanders, & great swarmes of Other Pagan people out of the North, in vaded Christendome, and comming in with men, women, & Chil∣deren, did overrun, conquer, & misera∣bly wast, the Christian countreyes of Ita∣lia, Gallia, Hispania, Germania, Hun∣garia, Dacia, and Illyricum. And these being properly called the floud out of the Ser∣pents mouth, which droue the Church into the wilderness: They dispossesst the Christian natives of their Cityes, & Countreys, and drove Them from place to place, & mixt among Them, and in great abundance were They massacred & destroyed, in all the Countreys aforenamed by These. And these Pagan Powers were Men of the Earth, Or Men that were of no Kinne to God or Christ, or Heaven: And all Christians dwelling under the danger, & power of these Invaders, were those Inhabiters who dwelt under the domi∣nion of the Men of the Earth. And Their condition was very woful. But these Mise∣ries, were after the storme over, in diffe∣rently well healed, partly by the Power of Holy Church standing firme in the Easterne parts, and rescuing the brethren of the west, out of Their dangers: and partly by meanes of privat quarrels among the several Tribes

of those Northerne Men, devouring one another: Where by the Earth is faid to drinke up the floud, that came upon the Church out of the Serpents mouth: and espe∣cially for that these flouds of Barbarous peo∣ple, being first broken; and then mixing among the natives, were won by the conver∣sation of Their neighbours, to become Chri∣stians, as They were. And tho They were at first, but Arrian Christians, yet became they sociable thereby, and by degrees men peace∣able, and such, as the Church of God found roome, to enjoy life & breath among Them. But about the year of Christ 600, or a smal while after, the old enemies of the Church, the Persian Pagans brake into the pale of Holy Church, and made great slaughters; and ca••∣ryed away many captives of holy people, & subjected much of the Holy land, and these also were More Men of the Earth that brought in Woe upon the Church. But then lastly came up the Angel of the Bottomless pit, the Impostor Mahomet, & his Sarrazenes, & ruined, & laid desolate, a third part of the Church, & that irrecoverably, as has been said before: and this was the fift Trumpetter the Angel of the Earth. And un∣der these the distressed Christians Inhabiters with in Their dominion, were miserable, and in woful State, even worse then under the pangs of death, when men long for death, & cannot have it. And this was especially called the Angel of the Earth, because after His Trumpet sounded, there followed a great Conquest against the Church, and a 3^d. part

thereof was wasted & lost, by it; and a new Religion was brought up, by this Angel, that being of no Kinne to Heaven, and ha∣ving no dependency, or clayme from Christ, was said therefore to spring from the Earth; or out of, the bottomless pit, or, an endless depth of an Hole in the Earth, where the Ser∣pent hath His abode. And because one Ser∣gius a Monke, who had been in Holy orders, had helped this Angel of the Earth in the composing of His Religion, He is said to fall downe from Heaven, or from that Church, which was called, heavenly, wherein He had been a Priest or Teacher, and therefore is cal∣led a Starre of Heaven, or a light of the Church; and is said to fall unto the Earth, meaning unto the Mahometan Religion. And hence therefore under the Kings of this Religion who held Their chiefe seat at Bagdat in Me∣sopotamia, the distressed Christians are cal∣led Inhabiters of the Earth, living in woful miseryes; because of the old Serpent som∣times called the Dragon, having set up a new Kingdome there.

Notes

• Rev. 12.12. The History of the Church under the Hea∣venly state, both in persecu∣tion, & in power, & under the Earthly State, of Goths Persians & Sar∣razenes reigning over Her.
• See the Hist. Eccles: of So∣crat. & Evagri.
• See the Hists as before, & the An∣nals of Baron: & Iournan∣des de rebus Gothor.
• Reu 12:12, 13, 14, 15, 16
• See the Annals of Baron: & Hift. of the world by peta∣vius. Rev. 9:11.
• ver. 1, 2, &c,
• ver. 6.
• ver. 11.
• ver. 1.
• Ch. 1:20.