appears a married wife and Christ to her an husband in the open face of his glorious administration and withal in this consideration there be times of minority widowhood forsaking as through the antichristian age when the beloved in this second sense had withdrawn himself and was gone Cant. 5.6 the Church of the elect then in some respect in the state of widowhood Luk. 18.4 7. and one forsaken Isa 62.4 the being no more forsaken intimates a forsaking before the marriage then coming infers a non-marriage the season preceding If it be demanded how the marriage can be said to return when the covenant successively remained We answer that the bare Gospel-covenant when not stated in the free and full glory of Evangelical regiment especially when the visible order is another doth not in Scripture-language bear the dignity of a visible Gospel-marriage For the same covenant of grace runs tacitely along through the Jewish legal stand and had a secret saving influence on the godly yet is not stiled a Gospel-marriage till set in the majesty of a Gospel-order and then the nuptials were solemnized Mat. 22. So in the antichristian defection the said Covenant had some close hidden being and breathing on the sealed number yet being deprived of the outward court of its regiment and the Church-constitution becoming a stranger it could not carry the prerogative of a true single genuine visible Gospel-marriage till re-estated from Heaven in the power and beauty of its first dominion and when this returns the marriage of the Lamb is again said to come and not till then Rev. 19. Object 4. It may as well be said that there is no visible marriage between Christ and particular Christians before that time as that there is none between Churches and Christ. Answ As the marriage betwixt Christ and the Church was in this season onely more mystical and hidden so is it betwixt Christ and particular Christians Object You go on and assert That no particular Christian can be a meet bride for Christ who is not clothed with the pure fine and shining linen viz. The righteousness of the Saints Answ We assent that without the righteousness of Christ applyed by faith to the heart there can be no union or marriage to Christ and so no salvation But this more internal work when the outward stand is not answerable is not anywhere in type figured out by the metaphor of garments because they being an outward covering do usually signifie the visible station and walk of the Saints Hereupon this visible station of the godly since the Apostacie is in the Revelation allegorically set forth by a threefold clothing parallel to a treble condition 1. That of the witnesses and Elect while abiding in spiritual Babylon Rev. 11.3 who though they had the inward grace yet being externally in false Churches are emblem'd in the habit of black and filthy sackcloth their clothing being agreeable to their outward stand Rev. 11.3 2. The raiment of the Virgins or separated Saints in the season of separation Chap. 14.4 which for that they are off from the beast and defiled women Chap. 9.7 and in a more approved way then before together with joy and triumph Chap. 15.6 is pictured in the forme of pure white linen and this is the first to whom the type of white garments is attributed since the great defection 3. The wedding garments given as a new grant by the pouring out of the Spirit Chap. 19.7 9. after the period of the former which for their high pure and emphaticall excellency of walk are stiled the righteousness of the Saints Without this latter robe neither many Saints in general nor any one in particular can be a meet bride for a visible marriage with Christ none can give it till they first receive it Object But you appropriate this marriage chap. 19. to the Jewes and those wholy without Answ That this belongs to all as well to Gentile Christians as to the Jewes and Pagans we render these reasons 1. The reigne of God is general the marriage generall the Spouse married the whole Bride the Lambs wife the call is universall they which must comeprehend all the Saints If the Christian Gentiles be not concluded in this marriage then are they no part of the bride nor have any share in the reigne marriage or the blessing thereof View the text well and your sense cannot avoid this absurdity 2. The people injoying and rejoycing in all this royall magnificence are the singers for the utter destruction of Babylon And not onely the Jewes but the Gentiles also who were the chiefe actors in her ruine must questionless rejoyce in her downfall Besides this book was sent to the Christian Gentiles as principally pertaining unto them 3. The externality of Church-government amongst the Gentile Israelites which carries the name and dignity of a Gospel visible marriage as is shewed before was cast out when given to the Nations chap. 11.2 and since that exclusion we find no return grant and call for the restauration thereof if not here in this book no nor yet in any other Prophecie till this time and at this very point of time the whole current of Scripture foretels the same work to revert Now it is extream follie to think that this Revelation should not inform us when the glory of outward order and rule should be restored as well as it teacheth us when it was ruined and rejected or that all the prophecies besides should pass it over in deep silence We rather believe it then again to come when the Spirit fore-declares it to be and not before 4. Our Saviour in Matth. 24.23 24 25 26 27. and Luk. 17.21 22 23 24. acquaints us that since the time of that great falling away till the day of his bright appearance all the visible Lo's or models of Churches being grounded on mens observations are false delusive and that in this his day his shining dispensation shall flash from east tow est like lightning and not be tied up to one or a few Nations Againe the open pouring of the Spirit the begetting cause of a Gospel-marriage doth not returne in its open blast till this season and the effect cannot be existing before its cause neither can any without that manifest administration build up true spiritual Churches Object You insinuate that Isa 62.5 partains to Sion and its restauration which must be the Jewish Nation Answ If it belong to Sion then must it be common to all believers as well Gentiles as Jewes which you have proved from Heb. 12.22 and Revel 14.1 And though you build so much upon other interpreters and therein seem not to be an hairs breadth from him whom you cite to have said Malo cum Platone errare quam cum aliis vera sentire I had rather err with eminent Ploâ—o then to think the truth with others yet we shall rather prize the truth before any humane authority and think it far safer
consideration I gathered what the meaning and mystery of this last marriage is by the stating of old Israel at mount Sinai Gal. 4. and by that of the Christians in the primitive Matth. 22. and found the same in the visibility to belong to external Church-constitution and disciplinal Order It is be demanded whether the Elect were before during the apostacie in the estate of widowhood and non-marriage I answer They are not simply but respectively in regard of visibility as compared with the primitive marriage For in this season Christ was as one gone and long absent and these elect ones were in their outward stand strangers in a strange country even in spiritual Babylon and there were under the rule of other lords and therefore the Scripture seems to figure them out in the condition of a forsaken widow Luk. 18.3 Isa 54.4 Also we are to minde that the same thing is set forth in various Types and Metaphors as it hath a bent to divers respects so the kingdome of heaven in the rule of grace is expressed by many parables Matth. 13. that thereby God may shew himself compleat in his word and what is wanting in the one is supplied in the other and so by this means there may be a fulness of Ministery knowledge and practice Hereupon the godly in another regard in the time of tribulation when they were but few little small and weak are denoted in another type and Metaphor to wit in the form minority and youthhood Isa 54.4 in the period of separation they proceeding to a higher growth and stature are deciphered in the conditions of virgins Matth. 25.7 Revel 14.4 and in the season of the wedding-day when they are come to more maturity and ready are represented in the state of a married wife Matth. 25.10 Rev. 19.8.9 Finally I took a survey of other interpreters on the Apocalypse and saw by many reasons that they very were defective and much mistaken in their senses of the later Prophecies speaking of our times and that ensuing and that the later part of the said Book when the little book is opened Chap. 10. must have a new interpretation both for time and matter of which you may observe something in the after-work and concerning which I may meet with occasion to treat more amply in our next reply if the Lord so dispose it But that I dwell not too long upon the Epistle I shall onely speak a few words of the following Book and so conclude I confess the stile is plaine and something rude plainness I endeavoured that it might be sutable to the meanest capacity the more unpolished it is because the most are my first and sudden conceptions For constant exercise in spiritual imployments and multitude of necessary worldly incumbrances would not permit me times of absolute repast and solitude to recollect and reduce my thoughts into an exquisite composure Also some Scriptures are often repeated occasioned partly by necessity it being but one case in the root in prosecution whereof I endeavoured to use the clearest and most pertinent texts partly by reason of Master Elmestones multiplicity of Arguments meeting in the same base together with some repetitions of his in a manner the same in sundry places of his book and for the better resolving such knots where I met with them I made use of those Scriptures which were elsewhere proved more at large that the weak might be thereby the better satisfied in particulars Such who are more intelligent may dispense with what may be for the benefit of lower apprehensions And I doubt not but they that are spiritually prudent will prize the naked and solid Truths of God delivered in the plain language of the Word before the adulterate shadows of carnal Reason though glittering in the specious habit of humane Eloquence Christian and sincerely pious Reader though this subject may seem new and strange and the Scriptures dark and doubtful at a sudden glance yet he that will bring to pass his act even his strange act hath promised to make dark things lightsome and crooked things strait and upon a serious reflection you may finde the accomplishment of the same promise blessing your endeavours and removing the veil to shew you the inward beauty of those Prophecies aspecting your own generation which will direct you to imbrace and walk in the right path cast up by the Spirit and to avoid those accursed things that will bring a general deluge upon the secure world that while darkness covers the earth and gross darkness the people his light may arise upon you till at last his glory be seen upon you Now that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ and Father of glory may give unto you the Spirit of wisdome and revelation in the knowledge of himself is the desire and uncessant prayer of him who is Your cordial friend and Brother in the Lord Simon Henden Certain ANIMADVERSIONS upon Master Elmestone's Epistle to the Reader YOur Epistle comes galloping in upon the wooden story of the Trojan-horse built by the counsel of Pallas and by subtile Sinons perswasion received into Troy to the ruine of that ancient and famous City For from thence issued out a warlike Troop of most valiant Greek Captaines who laid that City wast with fire and sword To this horse you compare the liberty granted for tender consciences in Religion procured say you by Satans craft and the insinuation of some cunning Sinons and may redcund to the great prejudice if not the ruine of your Troy your Church and Gospel For out of it have come forth c. Answ The native language of Canaan is more sutable to the majesty of Divinity then the fabulous fictions of heathen Poets and did you conceive your Church to be genuine of a Celestial birth you might be better advised then to Christian it by the name of an outcast stranger Indeed to follow you in your own similitude Rome being built partly by some roving Trojans was called a second Troy rising out of the ruines of the former and what should move you to stile your Hierarchical Church a third we cannot guess unless because you are an off-spring arising from her ashes in England However you may be pleased to consider that the maine cause bringing desolation to the first was not the Trojan-horse but the wilful retaining of Helena a defiled whorish woman amongst them and if there be the like accursed thing with you it is that will procure your great prejudice if not your ruine We use the more boldness that these your works may burn and your persons be saved in the day of the Lord. Notwithstanding that liberty which you most unfitly yoke with the said woodden horse is a precious jewel bought by the invaluable ransome of Jesus Christ who by the price of his dearest blood did at first redeem his Saints from vain traditions and humane thraldoms to be a free willing people to him their sole Soveraign in Religion but in the
are in and caused by our new-built models are too well known in England and how they ground upon an humane bottom is to be seen in the second Querie of the Cessation Object Against this you quaerie What means then hath been left for which the Lord would make due provision for his people from whence then came the conversion of the one hundred and fourty four thousand living under the Apostaciâ— and of multitudes in these later times were they aborigines a people springing out of the earth or let down from heaven Answ 1. You cannot I hope think that the conversion or edification of any soul under the Romish defection came from the Ordination Confirmation Admission Absolution c. of the Pope or any of his Hierarchy nor hath the least good but rather hurt come from these as exercised by the Bishops or you for they have been utterly empty of any true spiritual breathings as before is cleared 2. Gods ways of conversion are various his Spirit worketh when where and how it pleaseth sometimes he calleth from the womb Isai 49.1 Jer. 1.5 Luke 1.15 Rom. 9.11 sometimes by the godly conversation of the Saints by their holy walk and seasonable admonition Josh 2.1 Ruth 1.16 17. and 1 Pet. 3.1 Thus godly men in our times going into places where the Ministery hath been blinde and formal were instruments to work on and enlighten others and by this means many have been spiritualized in the Antichristian times Sometimes the Lord may sanctifie great outward afflictions and the sence of hainous sins as he did to Manasseh 2 Chron. 33.12 13. Sometimes by the sight of a strange and fearful accident striking a terror on the man as Waldus the first founder of the Waldenses was by seeing a man fall down dead before him also a kinsman of mine was first wrought upon by seeing a Fire-drake fall down beside him Sometimes by a divine light or vision as Paul Act. 9.3 also another precious Saint in our age by his own acknowledgement to me and others Sometimes by reading of the Scriptures 2 Tim. 3.15 which many very godly men in our days have affirmed to be the means God hath used to turn them to himself Sometimes by a powerful officiated Ministery as in the Primitive times Sometimes by a gifted Ministery as shall be in the next place manifested and this gifted Ministery together with the rest of the first sort of Ordinances as Prayer c. were the ordinary means to feed the woman in the wilderness The variety of Gods ways in this noble work of Conversion is beyond the apprehension of any creature and you much forget your self in tying it up onely to an Antichristian Office By what means the one hundred and fourty four thousand and the standers at the glassie sea were spiritually begotten and brought forth we leave it to the Lord sure we are they were not oborigines their birth came not from the earth nor from the earthly key of your Officials but from a grace descending from heaven Object 1. Against thâ—s gifted Ministery is affirmed That it is onely said not proved and may be as castly denied as affirmed Answ There was such a Ministery in the Primitive times as is evident Act. 8.4 Chap. 11.19 20.1 Cor. 14.31 and 1 Pet. 4.10 11 though then the chiefest glory thereof was administred by way of Office but in the Antichristian season the true Ministery was managed by a gift subordinate to and beneath that of a true Office for 1. There was no Office in all the West but what was Romish for many hundred yeers after the first fall and that it is there false and Antichristian shall be declared in the next Section 2. When all Office came from Antichrist and his false key then Christ himself to provide food for his Elect gave power to his two Witnesses not from the hand of a Popish Ordination but from his own immediate gift Rev. 11.3 I will give to my two Witnesses and they shall prophesie their prophecie came from the immediate gift of Christ This gift beginning at that time when the four open windes were held from their blast and the false key was given must be a gift inferiour to the former Office and come not from any mediate power on earth but simply from heaven 3. Experience hath taught us in our generation that there is not the least degree of vertue in Ordination that addes one scruple to the gift of the Ministery or tends to the furtherance of salvation but rather that the Spirit hath breathed forth with with greatest efficacie in such men who either had no Office at all witness Dudly Venner of Cranebrook M. George Frogmorton when he preached at Bennâ—nden with multitudes now in England the truth of whose Ministery is sealed by the conversion of thousands or else by such Non-conformists Ministers who in the closets of their brest renounced or at least disliked their Office and subscription and by these last when Office in your sence was not refined you may ghess how it was when more corrupt Object 2. They always acted as Officers and were so acknowledged Answ This is not true many neither were nor acted as Officers many disliked their Office some renounced it as is before declared and if any did so act and were acknowledged it was the blindness of the times so to account which the Lord in times of ignorance might connive at Certain we are that no good came from their Office that being false but onely from their gifts and the blessings thereof were weak and lowe in comparison of what they were in the primitive times they being darkned and bemudded by their Office And this is so far from being ungrateful as that it is agreeable to the prophecies and the event Object 3. Paul produceth the conversion of the Corinthians not so much to prove his gifts as for a seal of his Apostleship Answ We will first declare the occasion of this argument of Paul and then return to yours The occasion was this There were certain false Apostles who subtilly perswaded the Churches not that he was no Officer but that he was onely an ordinary Minister or one at least inferiour to an Apostle and so not to be looked on as infallible In consutation of whom Paul proves himself to be an Apostle in the strictest sense as is clear by this text compared with Chap. 10.16 Chap. 12.12 Gal. 1.1 17 18 19. Chap. 2.7 8.9 This premised we shall now reply to your chiefest Helena 1. When Office was true it had not onely an ordinary grace common with private Christians but also an addition of a grace and life proper to the Office Thus Apostles Prophets Evangelists Pastors and Teachers having several degrees of order were endowed with a propriety of gift peculiar to each degree and the success was answerable in the heaters Thus Paul being a true Apostle shewed forth all the signes thereof with Apostolical power and authority and the same proper
tread the holy City the sealed number under foot are tyrannical and bestial But such National Churches do so tread as is further asserted And the holy city shall they tread under foot The truth of this hath shewed it self not onely in the cruelty of Rome but also by the like tyranny of the Bishops in England and the rigour of the Presbytery in Scotland and that the same aspiring spirit is in many amongst you if the sword of the Magistrate would second and impower you the declarations of some both in their writings and in their open Pulpits which men look upon as the oracles of Truth have sufficiently manifested to the world we hope they will be more wise and tender of the consciences of others for the future These National Churches considered in one universal body are the great city Babylon Chap. 17.15 18. Chap. 11.8 9 10. Now if the visibility of Church-constitution was onely National for many generations as is cleared by all the evidences of former times and these National Churches Babylonish then must there be a fail and cessation of the truth of the same visibility Compare this Scripture with the event and you may finde that as here the whole outward court was given to the Nations and then cast out by the Spirit so the event is parallel to the prophecie which tells us that the total Order of Ecclesiastical regiment became National and was for many hundred yeers Romish in the full possession of the Pope where by the common grant of all Protestants it is held to be Babylon and when the visible Church became a stranger and bottomless the key of outward Government in Confirmation Ordination Excommunication c. must be of the same nature with the Church as is declared in the former Paragraph The truth of this is likewise confirmed by the state of the true Church in the times of this apostacie who was onely a sealed elect number which by an invisible union made up a mystical temple a Sion a women c. whose visible abode was in the wilderness of Babylon as you may read in the Cessation I shall here demonstrate it by another Scripture which was there omitted The text is Micah 4.10 where the prophet speaking of the daughter of Sion saith that she shall go forth out of the city her genuine and celestial Order and shall dwell in the field answerable to the wilderness into which the woman fled Rev. 12.6 and shall go even to Babylon to such a field where is meer confusion from whence the Lord will at last deliver her by separation and redeem her from the hands of her enemies And that this alludes to the condition of the Gospel-Church in spiritual Babylon is evinced by the gathering of the nations against her vers 11 which agrees whith these last combinations against the Saints Zeph. 3.8 Isai 54.15 Revel 16.14 16. by her horns of iron and hoofs of brass to thresh and beat in pieces many people also after her complete victory by her consecrating their gain to the Lord which never was fulfilled in the majesty here delivered but must be proper to the time of the vials wherein the people coming out of Babylon reward her and her assistants with the like degree of punishment Rev. 18.6 Dan. 7.22 The event doth likewise comply with this Scripture as face answers to face in a glass For the primitive Church who was glorious in her visible constitution setled and beautified with Apostolical power did after decline from thence into the vast barren field of the Babylonish nations where she was scattered here and there a godly person outwardly mixed with the rude multitude from whom she was not distinguished either in Membership or Office and where she was held in chains of thraldom by Popes Bishops and the like beastly Hierarchies who in this strange country monopolized the key of Government into their sole tuition and in this desolate estate she must needs be an exile in a forraign land From this bondage also the Lord begins at last to call her out and deliver her from her enemies From hence we may necessarily conclude that if this external station wherein the daughter of Sion visiby stood was a field a wilderness a Babylon or forraign country of strange confusion then must all the beauty of her former outward Order be dissolved and turned into a rude Chaos that if her key of visible Rule was taken solely into the usurpation of Antichrist the Beast those alien lords Then must the Ordinances thereof lie void as did the Temple-vessels in the house of Nebuchadnezzar's idol-gods We will now with God's assistance proceed to answer your Objections made against this Object You alleadge that to say the visible Church did fail is as much as to affirm that the pillars of the earth were broken down the Church standing as firm by Gods ordinance power and faithfulness Answ It is true that the pillars of the earth are born up by the Word of God albeit the earthly governments thereof have the times of their shake and dissolution Psal 75.3 Isai 2.19 21. Hag. 2.21 And withal it is as true that the Church in the being of election inward grace outward profession and the more intrinsecal rule of grace is a kingdom that cannot be shaken Heb. 12.28 it being promised to be perpetual Matth. 16.18 But the visibility of Church-government was not so pillared in the Word for its successive abiding this is rather fore-prophesied that it should be corrupted by Antichrist and become Babylon To lay the ground-work of your after-discourse you here distinguish a visible Church M. Elmest First say you by a visible Church may be meant a company of Christians joyned together in one place set in true order of Worship and exercise of all Gods Ordinances that such a Church hath been in any one place or many successively you think cannot castly be proved Answ By such a Church if we understand you aright you mean a Church set in a right order of Discipline and furnished with true Officers And if such a Church cannot be proved to have been successively through the apostacie then must you yeeld that the primitive chain of Order was broken and so justifie its cessation for such an one it is that you have maintained to abide and we have proved to discontinue This grant of yours duely pondered doth at one breath unmount the whole fabrick of this your Babel and might soon put a period to the major part of this Controversie M. Elmest Secondly by a visible Church may be meant a company of persons professing true religion abstaining from all false worship and worshipping God in a pure way though for the most part in sundry places and meeting in small companies such a Church hath been perpetual Answ 1. Such companies may thus assemble for Ministery Prayer as did the one hundred twenty before they received powerfrom on high and we do now and yet not be a visible Church
as here they are in Babylon then such who have only an outward station must be wholly shut out they standing solely in the outward court of false constitutions And therefore here all the world of Israelites worshiped the beast except those whose names were written in the book of life of the Lamb slaine from the foundation of the world Chap. 13.8 and Chap. 17.8 none are excepted but those who were written in this book from the foundation of the world So that here all save the elect are excluded and that for one thousand two hundred and sixty yeers Chap. 14.1 which razeth your next argument from its sandy foundation Their sealing notes their confirmation of the truth of grace and that being in their foreheads argues some measure of visible profession We shall in the last place deliver Master Elmestons assertion touching the outward court which he affirmed in a verbal dispute which was after this manner That it typed out the state of a false Church and that it never had any measurement at all To which was then answered That it did prefigure the outward order or visibility of Church-constitution and three reasons were produced to prove it drawn from the text which you may finde written in the Cessation also that this was true till here rejected by the Lord Jesus and could not denote that which never had any approved measurement as was then likewise cleared by these following arguments 1. By way of allusion to the temple of old That as there was not only a Temple within whereinto the Priests and none but they might enter but also a Court without erected by Divine institution and sanctified by the Spirit into which the Priests and people had access in common both which made a full and compleat temple so in the primitive times there was the internality of true grace wherein properly the elect who only were a royal Priest-hood had interest and likewise an outward order built up and breathed into by divine inspiration into which Christians visibly professing some true and some seeming came and both these together concurred to make a full visible Church 2. From the words of the text the court without cast out which the original phrase 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 signifies Nothing in propriety of speech can be said to be cast out that was not before within Ishmael was a member in the family of Abraham before he was excluded none can be excommunicated unless he be first a brother so this being now cast out argues it to be till then approved 3. From the reason rendered by the Spirit why it was excluded for it is given to the nations which implies that it had measurement till it was thus given and corrupted by Antichrist Some trifling objections were made by Master Elmestone against these which partly for brevity sake partly because I conceive them not to be materiall I shall now omit If he think them to be otherwise and be pleased to publish them I shall be ready with Gods assistance to give a reply Thus much of the fourth Section we shall now pass on to the fifth Section 5. The fifth and last Section is taken from Mat. 24. where the visible models Loe here and Loe there or as Luke hath it Chap. 17.23 See here or see there being thus rejected by Christ are false and deceivable the powers that bear and teach them up are false Christs or Antichrists and false Prophets the spheres wherein they rule are the wilderness and secret Chambers For the clearer apprehending of this Scripture it may be requisite first to explaine something on the Chapter and after to declare your mistakes thereon To begin with the unfolding of the Chapter we are to consider there were three questions demanded by Christs Disciples vers 3. The first When these things shall be to wit the destruction of Jerusalem and dissolution of the temple spoken of in vers 2. The second What shall be the signes of his coming that is of his bright ministerial coming and dispensing his spirit-like lightning The third The signes of the end of the world to wit of the great and last day of judgement and the general resurrection To which the Lord methodically and in order one after another answereth with the signes thereof from vers the 15. to vers the 32. To the first from vers 15. to vers 23. To the second from vers 23. to vers 30. To the third vers 30 31. To omit the first as that impertinent to this subject we shall begin with the second of his coming like lightning The signes of the second are double 1. The long foregoing delusion of Antichristianisme abiding till his bright coming from vers 23 to vers 27. 2. The short noted immediate signals as the darkning of the Sun Moon and Stars and the shaking of the powers of heaven vers 29. If you desire to understand what these figurative speeches mean you may know by these places Isa 34.4 Joel 3.15 Hag. 2.21 22. and by the subversion of outward Babylon set forth by the like metaphors Isa 13. 10. Also by the overthrow of the Jewish Church Joel 2.30 31. And that of the Roman Heathen Emperors Rev. 6.12 13 14. The signes preceding the third to wit the end of the world are also twofold 1. The appearing of the Son of man in heaven that is his bright coming like lightning 2. The mourning of all the tribes of the earth upon the sight of the same glorious dispensation Psal 97.4 Zech. 12.10 11 12 13 14. of the Jews for their long blindness in Judaisme of the false stated Churches amongst Christians for their defilements in Antichristiansme of Turks and Heathens for their Mahometisme and gross Idolatry Againe we are to mind that the long Babylonish delusion of the signe of the second contains two distinct seasons 1 The time of the tribulation of the godly by the overswaying power of the false Antichristian Churches which by comparing this with the Revelations continued 1260 years chap. 11.2 3. chap. 12.6 14. chap. 13.5 a remarkable time it being ingraven in five places of that prophecie for our more espiciall remembrance 2 The time of the Sun and Moons darkning the Stars falling c. to wit the season of the vials wrath wherein the Saints are passing from their former bondage and retaliate the reward upon their Enemies vers 29 where it is said Immediately after the tribulation to wit that wrought by the Beasts prevailing for 1260 years the word after notes our another distinct time of the Sun and Moons darkning c. and the Saints lifting up their heads who at this time are said to come out of great tribulation Rev. 7.14 and to get victorie over the Beast cha 15.2 and that this delusion continues the same season also is clear from Mark 13.24 where it is said In those daies to wit of the Antichristian deceit after the tribulation This orderly method of the text concurring with the Disciples three questions