There are two other remarkable places of Scripture concerning the Devils power in working signs and wonders, the first of which is this: _For there shall arise false Christs and false Prophets, and shall shew great signs and wonders, insomuch that (if it were possible) they shall deceive the very elect_. The other is this: _Even him whose coming is after the working of Satan, with all power, and signs, and lying wonders: And with all deceiveableness of unrighteousness, in them that perish; because they received not the love of the truth, that they might be saved. And for this cause God shall send them strong delusion, that they should believe a lie. That they all might be damned, who believed not the truth, but had pleasure in unrighteousness._ From whence we may take these remarkable observations. [Sidenote: _Observ. 1._] 1. Though there arise false Christs, and false Prophets, and even the Antichrist himself, working after the power of Satan, with signs and lying wonders; yet though Satan be the organ and instrument in performing these lying wonders, God is the Author and efficient cause that doth inflict them, because they are _mala pœnæ_, and come not by a bare permissive power, but are inflicted by him as punishments upon the wicked, even those that received not the love of the truth, and therefore these lying wonders cannot possibly deceive the elect, but prove all deceiveableness of unrighteousness in them that perish; and the reason why they are thus punished with the deceits and delusions of Satan, is because they received not the love of the truth, and therefore God doth send such strong delusion, that they might believe a lie, and this he doth rightly and justly, that as _Beza_ notes, _Ita tamen ut soli increduli sint illius fraude perituri_. Upon which place learned _Rollock_ tells us this: “We are (he saith) to observe that Antichrist is nothing else, but Gods Executioner by whom he punisheth those, by his just judgment, who have not received the love of the truth, but have contemned the Gospel: which is so far forth true, that if there had not been, and now were a contempt of the truth, then altogether Antichrist had not been, that is, the Executioner had not been, whom God sendeth to execute his just judgment upon those that despise the truth of his Gospel. So that it is manifest that God doth make a just, and good use of the very malice, and lying nature of Devils, in punishing those that did not receive the love of the truth, but deceiving them by strong delusions that they might believe a lie; and this he doth as sent and commanded of God, and so cannot go one jot further than his Commission, or as far as he is limited by God.” [Sidenote: _Observ. 2._]