Thus the Beast, after he was wounded to death with a sword and revived, was deified, as the heathens used to deify their Kings after death, and had an Image erected to him; and his worshipers were initiated in this new religion, by receiving the mark or name of this new God, or the number of his name. By killing all that will not worship him and his Image, the first Temple, illuminated by the lamps of the seven Churches, is demolished, and a new Temple built for them who will not worship him; and the outward court of this new Temple, or outward form of a Church, is given to the _Gentiles_, who worship the Beast and his Image: while they who will not worship him, are sealed with the name of God in their foreheads, and retire into the inward court of this new Temple. These are the 144000 sealed out of all the twelve tribes of _Israel_, and called the _two Witnesses_, as being derived from the two wings of the woman while she was flying into the wilderness, and represented by two of the seven candlesticks. These appear to _John_ in the inward court of the second Temple, standing on mount _Sion_ with the Lamb, and as it were on the sea of glass. These are _the Saints of the most High_, and _the host of heaven_, and _the holy people_ spoken of by _Daniel_, as worn out and trampled under foot, and destroyed in the latter times by the little horns of his fourth Beast and He-Goat. While the _Gentiles_ tread the holy city under foot, God _gives power to his two Witnesses, and they prophesy a thousand two hundred and threescore days clothed in sackcloth_. They are called _the two Olive-trees_, with relation to the two Olive-trees, which in _Zechary_'s vision, chap. iv. stand on either side of the golden candlestick to supply the lamps with oil: and Olive-trees, according to the Apostle _Paul_, represent Churches, _Rom._ xi. They supply the lamps with oil, by maintaining teachers. They are also called _the two candlesticks_; which in this Prophecy signify Churches, the seven Churches of _Asia_ being represented by seven candlesticks. Five of these Churches were found faulty, and threatned if they did not repent; the other two were without fault, and so their candlesticks were fit to be placed in the second Temple. These were the Churches in _Smyrna_ and _Philadelphia_. They were in a state of tribulation and persecution, and the only two of the seven in such a state: and so their candlesticks were fit to represent the Churches in affliction in the times of the second Temple, and the only two of the seven that were fit. The _two Witnesses_ are not new Churches: they are the posterity of the primitive Church, the posterity of the two wings of the woman, and so are fitly represented by two of the primitive candlesticks. We may conceive therefore, that when the first Temple was destroyed, and a new one built for them who worship in the inward court, two of the seven candlesticks were placed in this new Temple.