is determined: Of which more shall be spoken afterward; for the
path-way that he goeth, is as the shining light, which shines
more and more unto noon. True, the fogs of Antichrist, and the
smoke that came with him out of the bottomless-pit, has darkened
and eclipsed the glorious light of the gospel: But you know, in
eclipses, when they are on the recovering hand, all the creatures
upon the face of the earth cannot put a stop to that course, until
the sun or the moon have recovered their glory. And thus it shall
be now, the Lord is returned to visit the earth, and his people
with his primitive lustre; he will not go back, nor slack his hand,
until he has recovered what Antichrist has darkened of his. 'The
anger of the Lord shall not return, until he have executed, and
till he have performed the thoughts of his heart: in the latter days
ye shall consider it perfectly' (Jer 23:20). Therefore he saith
again, 'The light of the moon shall be as the light of the sun [was
in her eclipse;] and the light of the sun shall be sevenfold, as
the light of seven days, in the day that the Lord bindeth up the
breach of his people, and healeth the stroke of their wound,' &c.
as the verse before has it: 'In the day when the towers fall.' For
(as was said before) as to the recovery of the light of the gospel
from under antichristian mists, and fogs of darkness; Christ will
do that, not by might nor power, but by the spirit of his mouth,
and the brightness of his coming: Wherefore the soul of Antichrist,
or that spirit of wickedness by which this gospel-light hath been
diminished, must be consumed and destroyed by that spirit also. Nor
can any other way of conquest over that be thorough, and lasting;
because that spirit can by no other means be slain. The body
of Antichrist may be destroyed by other instruments, but spirits
cannot be killed but by spirits. The temporal sword then may kill
the body, but after that it hath no more that it can do, wherefore,