Abstract
[1] And after that saw I four angels [2] stand on the four corners of the earth, [3] holding the four winds of the earth [4] that the winds should not blow on the earth, [5] neither on the sea, [6] neither on any tree. [7] And I saw another angel [8] ascend from the rising of the sun [9] which had the seal of the living God. [10] And he cried with a loud voice [11] to the four angels (to whom power was given to hurt the earth and the sea) [12] saying: ‘Hurt not the earth, neither the sea, neither the trees, [13] till we have sealed the servants of our God in their foreheads’.
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Notes
- 1.
described] 1545; describeth 1548.
- 2.
suffered…of God = i.e., God allowed the angels to come, but he did not send them himself.
- 3.
Bale acknowledges the common argument about the key role of the printing press in spreading the Reformed doctrine.
- 4.
their, their = his people’s, the wrathful angels’.
- 5.
let] 1545, 1570, Christmas; lette not 1548; let not 1550.
- 6.
The marginal note points to Ezek 9, in which a mark is given to the righteous so that they will be saved (parallel to this situation in Rev 7). Bale calls for a similar lamentation: ‘put a mark on the foreheads of those who sigh and groan over all the abominations’ (Ezek 9.4).
- 7.
Bale is using the scriptural passage about sealing multiple servants to support the exegesis that the angel does not correspond to one particular preacher, but instead to many.
- 8.
wax] 1545 & 1548 (wexe); were Christmas. ‘Wexe’ is an alternate spelling of ‘wax’ (OED) and more fitting than Christmas’ emendation.
- 9.
parage = lineage, descent.
- 10.
success = succession, as of heirs (OED, citing 1587 as the first usage).
- 11.
See 1 Kings 19.18.
- 12.
This could refer to Mordecai from the book of Esther, or else to Mardocheus, a Jewish leader who accompanied Zerubbabel from Babylon to Judah (1 Esd 5.8).
- 13.
In the apocryphal book of Tobit, the titular character has a son named Tobias (though the book itself was once referred to as Tobias, as Bale does in the margin here, so he may be referring to the father and not the son).
- 14.
The 1545 text places the woodcut here.
- 15.
had] 1550, 1570; hand 1545, 1548, 1570.
- 16.
lost] 1545; least 1548.
- 17.
wot = know.
- 18.
unto them] 1548; un-them 1545.
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Minton, G.E. (2013). The Seventh Chapter. In: Minton, G. (eds) John Bale’s 'The Image of Both Churches'. Studies in Early Modern Religious Tradition, Culture and Society, vol 6. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-007-7296-0_9
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