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Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
city_n	bishop_n	church_n	rome_n	9,289	5	7.3911	4	false

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ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A86191	The key of Scripture-prophecies: or, A glass of some new discoveries. Being an answer to a book published by Mr John Elmestone. Wherein is resolved, 1. Whether a true constituted church, with true office and visible membership, together with the ordinances proper to such a Gospel-stating, continued true by a line of succession from the primitive time downward to our times: or whether it were not interrupted by the apostacie. 2. If they did there intermit, when they return again to their first glory, whether now, or hereafter; and what is the dispensation now approved by the Spirit. / By Simon Henden.	Henden, Simon.	1652 (1652)	Wing H1430; Thomason E668_11; ESTC R202520	120,810	124

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

6.4 9. compared with John 12.40 Acts 2.2 by which the visible keys of Church-power were given and sanctified but after when the Angel fell Rev. 9.1 2 3. another earthen hellish key with other smoke arising from the pit darkning and banishing the lightsome glory of the former as above and at last a new smoaking of the Temple from Gods glory Rev. 15.8 a new opening and entering implying key and doors all shewing that there was no opening nor entering but a cessation and shutting of the true visible betwixt these two days Besides there is a new open breathing of the four windes of the Spirit Ezek. 37.9 after the long restraint of the primitive blast Rev. 7.1 Act. 2.2 Ezek. 1.4 a new pouring of his Spirit Isai 32.15 after the former hiding of his power a new Marriage and Marriage-call Rev. 19.7 9. besides the Marriage at the first Matth. 22. a new lightning Matth. 24.27 besides the lightning at the primitive Ezck. 1.4 13 14. all teaching a non-continuance of this glory Again there was an invisible day between the bright shining day at the first Luk. 17.22 and the like glorious day again at the last vers 24. an invisible kingdom as that within vers 21. passing between the open kingdom of the primitive and the manifest kingdom of God at the last Chap. 21.31 Rev. 19.6 Chap. 11.17 all clearing up this cessation The visibilities Lo here and there were false and delusive The event hath made all this as perspicuous as the sun shines in the open firmament to those who will not obstinately and of set purpose shut their eyes against it to wit That there was an apparent and general Apostacie darkning and swallowing up all the bright Order of the primitive For that Church after Constantine had sully subdued the heathen Emperors and setled all in outward tranquillity about the yeer of our Lord 327 as the margin on Socrates hath it lib. 1. cap. 3. beginning to conform to and mix her self with National and worldly things degenerated and daily declined by the four first trumpets Rev. 8. till at last by the fifth the star totally apostated from heaven to earth about 390 and then the key of external Rule became purely National and was onely in the jurisdiction of Popes Patriarchs Bishops and earthly Hierarchies who alone usurped all Church-power into their hands In all our Western Globe there was no Church-Government visible but what was Romish for many ages and our Antagonist M. Elmestone confesseth that their Office of the Ministery the principal pillar of the Church came directly from Rome no longer ago then Luther's time Hereupon that of Protestantism is not termed a Separation but a Reformation their Office and Membership coming radically from the Romish Synagogue which seems to be hinted by the Prophet Jeremiah Chap. 51.9 We would have healed Babylon and she was not healed Object It hath been objected by others What shall we think of the Greek Church who never had to do with Rome nor owned her power Answ To whom we reply 1. That the Church of Grecia may be no plea to such who live in the Levant under the Turk but concerns not in the least our Protestant Churches who derived not their power from the Greek but from the Romish Pontificality 2. It is not true that the Greek Church never had to do with Rome For about the yeer 390 after Christ all the Eastern Bishops yeelded the Primacie of seat the proper place of Christ to the Romane Pope And afterward if the Bishop of Rome obtained by Phocas the Emperour the title of Vniversal then assuredly the Bishop and Patriarch of Grecia must be subject unto him and together with the Church be within the limits of his territories Again the Greek Empire was possessed by the Latines for sixty yeers together even from the yeer 1200 to the yeer 1260 and then Michael Paleologus recovered their Empire who about the yeer 1273 agreed with Pope Gregory the tenth at Iyons in France and promised that both himself and all his people hereafter should yeeld all Sovereignty to the Latine Pope and Church 3. The Greek Church was as well National and had a terrene Hierarchy even the very same with Rome and is so apostated that she denies the holy Ghost to proceed from the Father and the Son prays for the dead believes that the Saints departed enjoy not the presence of God till the Resurrection admits children of seven yeers old to the Sacrament because then as they conceit they begin to sin receives none into Orders but such as are married and forbids marriage to those who are actually in Orders rejects carved Images but admits the painted with many the like Fopperies and in many fandamentals is as gross or grosser then Rome To conclude Chap. 7 all the four windes of all quarters were restrained Chap. 11.2 the whole outward court of Discipline as well East as West was cast out as above and the great City Babylon was not onely at Rome but at Judea where our Lord was slain Chap. 11.8 and then certainly Grecia lying in the midst between must needs be comprehended within the circumference thereof It hath by some as the Dippers been questioned whether these National Churches be within the Covenant To whom I answer that though in their Church-order they were Babylon or confusion yet are they not wholly excluded from the Covenant as Heathens but are termed by the Spirit Israelites who had a sealed number amongst their tribes Rev. 7. Here we may see how though the place or hand failed the name was everlasting And it is not safe to detract from the words of this Prophecie especially seeing the sequele hath cleared that there was some profession of Christianity and a godly people amongst them through every age of this hiding of Gods power You may find this further cleared in the following Paragraph The next thing considerable under this first Querie is touching the true Church in this confusion 1. What she was 2. What was her condition 3. How she was fed 4. The just time of this her captivity 1. What she was In Chap. 7 I finde that there were one hundred and fourty four thousand sealed ones preserved secured and provided for In Chap. 9 that this number onely was undestroyed by the Locusts In Chap. 11 that the Temple measured must be this sealed company built up a spiritual house by the mystical bond of the Spirit it having no dimensions specified and all the externality being excluded as shall be proved in Paragraph 1. Sect. 4. In Chap. 14.1 that the mount Sion there expressed must be onely the mount of true grace footed on the counsel of God which is called a sure and sealed foundation 2 Tim. 2.19 For 1. All the sealed elect people even the whole one hundred and fourty four thousand stand on this mountain and that through all the apostated season which they did not do in any true visible being mixed amongst the Nations

the word of God we are assured is an unerring rule by which we shall endeavour to steer our course and not by the wandering notion of learned men Our recourse is onely to the Law and Testimony for proof whether you they or we be rightest In the interim we condemn not the grace of Christ where-ever we finde it nor the generation of the righteous as righteous Yet if their outward way be condemnable by the word of God we conceive it true humility and piety to judge accordingly and charity to acquaint them therewith Thus we shall end with your general exceptions against the whole and shall in the next place proceed to the more particular framed against some particular reasons before nominated which we will divide into several Sections Your fourth Objection is opposite to our first Reason deduced from Rev. 18.4 9. and runs as followeth Object 4. All Circumstances considered the time of this separating and rewarding is not untill God shall put it into the hearts of Kings to joyne together to destroy Rome it self and is surely about the pouring out of the last or some of the last vials And then being ready to give the onset on Rome by this voice they are called to plague her throughly At which time this call is directed to such of Gods people who are hidden in the Idolairous City and the adjacent territories to flee from her by a personal flight And how long it will be ere this be effected the Lord knowes Answ This your assertion consisteth of many fallacies which must be drawn out in their parts to clear up the truth 1. As that Babylon is not onely Rome with her adjacent territories but the great City chap. 17.18 reaching where out Lord was slaine chap. 11.8 above two thousand miles distant from Rome and duely pondered must be as large as the whole Roman Christian Empire and so compriseth England Scotland France or what place soever hath a false Church or beastly power to bear it up 2 These last plagues of God are not onely against Rome but every land where Babylonish Churches are residing even all Christian Nations The same whirlwind in these latter daies is said to begin at the ends of the earth and to go from Nation to Nation Jer. 25.31 32 33. chap. 23.19 20. chap. 30.23 24. Psal 110.5 6. and to be universall Isa 24. chap. 34. Luk. 21.35 Mat. 24.37 c. We have seen the beginnings of it in our Dominion the effects whereof were lately like to fall on some men of note in England Caetera taceo 3. This call of separation is not simply from Rome as an outward place but from all Antichristian stands whether Romish Episcopal Presbyterial c. the call is generall and the surest remedy to escape the general judgement 4. The pouring these plagues is not all at once by the last or some of the last vials it is gradual by every vial degree after degree For all the Angels pour out in their order upon the Earth Sea Rivers and fountains Sun and Throne of the beast upon the great river Euphrates and the aire chap. 16. 5. Not the Kings of the earth but the separated people are the principal instruments in rewarding for the text bids first Come out of her my people then reward States that come off may be assistants Object But this was done by the ten hornes ten Kings chap. 17.16 12. Answ The reading of the text must be warily observed for the better understanding thereof The most and authentick Greek copies have it The ten horns and the beast shall hate the Whore but Aretas whom the vulgar Latine followes renders it The ten horns on or upon the beast shall hate both senses are true and in both the hornes and the beast are coupled together the hornes and the beast hate also the horns hating are fastened on the beast And as the horns are these ten for nature Christians not for number for they did not all ten but some of them detest this Whore to the same Christian beast that abhors must be taken by the like Synecdoche the whole for the part to wit the Episcopal and Presbyterial beast shall hate not the Papal and the Whore defied must must be the great Whore or grandmother Rome who in her whordoms was grown over-foul They detested not the lesser and more specious daughters of whom themselves were a part nor yet the the woman Babylon in her extent for they most sadly mourned for her downfall their riches and delicacies being taken away with her chap. 18.9 10. Neither did they abominate the beast but beeing fastned on him did assist him with their Armies against the sitter on the white horse and his Armies and both hornes and beast fell together ch 19.11 to the end The abovesaid hating appeares to us to allude to the Protestant Princes who together with their beast the ecclesiastical hierariches either Episcopall or Presbyteriall did hate make desolate and naked consume and burn up the whore of Rome as having nothing to do with her in their dominions Now the rewarders before specified were not horns on the beast being severed from the very number of his name and being on Christs side follow him upon white horses to subdue the beast and horns together For the time of the call of separation I shal speak in the next place Object You go on and say that the spiritual separation made by Protestant Princes and Churches from Rome in doctrine and worship as they had a warrant from this call the reason whereof belonging to all times and persons not to partake in Romes sins do sufficiently inforce it so had they pregnant grounds from other Scriptures and commands Answ Here are many insinuations also couched up in this sentence which must be examined in their parts As 1. What you here intend by your spiritual separation 2. How you can justifie a spiritual separation to be made by Princes you mean I suppose by their laws If it be spiritual it must be caused by the free motion of the Spirit constraining a people by the linkes of love and not inforced by the cumpulsive lawes of men 3. You affirme your separation to be in doctrine and worship it seemes you are ashamed to say in discipline as being convinced in your conscience that yours is the same radically with Rome If your Church be grounded upon a Baylonish discipline it cannot be a visible Sion Jer. 51.26 4. You tell us they had a warrant for it from this call by which at at one breath you blow downe all you built before Marte cadunt subiti per mutua vulnera fratres For if this call be not untill Kings join together to destroy Rome it self about the last or some of the last vials and that then it is directed to such onely who are hid in that City with the adjacent territories how can these be applyed to Protestant Princes and Churches They renounced Rome long before they were

tribulation out of which the godly at last do come nor doth the figure of the wilderness and secret Chambers fitly allude to those who took on them to be Christ in Person but all these properties with the rest above specified most exactly concur with the great Antichrist whether Romish Episcopal or elsewhere and none but in him As for Bencocab he was a Jew and seduced none but Mosaical Jews who soon found him as you confess to be an impostor and therefore called him Bencosban the son of a lye his deceit was to the Jews only of short continuance and did not at all indanger Christians much less the elect amongst them As for Hacket he was an obscure man and did not involve England much less the Christian world in his private error which was not known of most or if it had was too too gross to delude so universally The special warning of Christ to beware infers a greater and more mystical subtilty then were Bencocabs or Hackets Object But say you this false one in the wilderness cannot be applyed much less appropriated to the Roman Antichrist who hath not acted his part in a desart but hath set as God in the Temple of God 2 Thess 2.4 and ruled with pompe over nations Answ 1. We did not appropriate him to the Pope but granted the Bishops and national Presbyters also to have an interest in him who mingled all together compleat this false Christ in the wilderness 2. This wilderness is not a proper as you carnally apprehend but metaphorical speech and alludes to such a way as resembles a desart which is cleared above Now though such worldly pompe may appear very majestical to flesh and blood yet in the Spirits judgement and in a mystical sence it is a desolation being barren and voide of spiritual fruitfulness Thus outward Babylon was the glory of kingdoms the golden city anc very magnificent in the eyes of natural reason yet together with her nations is called a wilderness as before So Rome the head and mother of this mystical Babel is as you assert to a carnal judgement a great and stately City and ruled over multitudes of people yet together with her nations compared with the primitive heavenly glory of Christianity is a meer desart as saith the Prophet Isa 65.10 Sion is become a wilderness That Church which in the first Gospel-day was Sion in the beauty of apostolical order afterwards having such a desolation and confusion of her first Gospel-order so great a famine of the word of God so many thornes and briars in her and usurping a terrene national hierarchy with multitude of ravenous devouring beasts together with a pompous shew of humane Ceremonies Canons c. might most fitly be stiled an earthly wilderness she being worldly in her foundation and whole artifice The place in 2 Thes 2.4 in which Antichrist sits is called the temple by a Synecdoche the whole for the part to wit for the outward Court for no more was given to the Nations over whom he rules as God then the outward Court Rev. 11.2 but the temple vers 1. within to wit the inward roomes of the hidden man that beast never reigned over it being sustained by Christ and this you must assent to unless you make Rome to be a true Church and to have true measurement this text of the Apocalypse interprets that of Paul and the same outward Court was by the Antichristian impietie made a wilderness You grant That the Brownist Dippers c. invite into secret chambers Answ If so then surely it is very improbable that Christ should pass over in utter silence the great beast of Rome the head of all the rest which for many ages did so universally deceive the world and hint only upon the last and least It is not safe to tax Wisdome it self with such an oversight not to close up your eyes against the light of so clear a prophesie You further inquire Whether the calling of men into houses parlors and Chambers do not reflect c. Answ These Chambers are not proper but figurative Chambers as before is shewed and preaching and praying in houses are not as barely considered these false narrow roomes for the Apostles went about from house to house and Christ hath promised his Spirit to those who truly worship him in any place whatsoever You tell me That mutato nomine de me fabula narratur the fable may be told of me Answ If any can tax me with false doctrine or touch us in out call for or walke in separation let him come forth we do not bring Christ to any particular stating so to say Lo nor bottom our union on a narrow corporation but separating from all these restraints we bear up our spiritual relation with all the godly wherever scattered and indeavour to bring them off from these bestial formalities which bondage the Saints and divide Christ to Lo here Lo there that renouncing these they may joyn together with one consent in the way of separation wherein Christ is gone forth that so they may get full victory over the beast and this is not to bring into but pull men off from their inthralings either in the wilderness or secret Chambers I will not say Fabula de te narratur as making the oracle of Truth to be an old wives fable which your inversion against me is but whether for you to take up a new power to state Churches and to make members and officers upon your own call name time spiriting and to shew such signes and wonders in inspiring you stative Ordinances some whereof are meer inventions for you I say to begin such a narrow limited obscure and unwarrantable work upon your own observation as a false Christ and teach it up as a false prophet be not numbered amongst these secret Chambers we leave it for wise and impartial men to determine You indeed plead for national Churches and are officiated from their hierarchies being in your confession in the wilderness but in your walk as those in the narrow roomes Conclusion For conclusion and close of this subject we acquainted you that these latter Ordinances of Ordination Confirmation c. have a being in the Scriptures and the mind and desires of the faithful and that we carry them along with us in our journey of separation as the Israelites of old did the vessels of the temple out of outward Chaldea but dare not officiate in them within the territories of Babylon in which we are till we have passed by the sixth vail over the river Euphrates Object If they have a being in the Scriptures then are they the institution of Christ and ought alwayes to be taken up in practice proved from Mat. 28.20 Answ Those Ordinances which have their constant existence perpetuated in the word by institution and promise are ever accompanied by the same Word and the Spirit thereof for their continued use in all convenient times and places as you affirme