Selected quad for the lemma: head_n

Word A Word B Word C Word D Occurrence Frequency Band MI MI Band Prominent
head_n beast_n dragon_n horn_n 3,264 5 10.5839 5 false
View all documents for the selected quad

Text snippets containing the quad

ID Title Author Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication) STC Words Pages
A65195 Two treatises ... both written by Sir Henry Vane, Knight in the time of his imprisonment. Vane, Henry, Sir, 1612?-1662.; Vane, Henry, Sir, 1612?-1662. Epistle general, to the mystical body of Christ on earth.; Vane, Henry, Sir, 1612?-1662. Face of the times. 1662 (1662) Wing V80_PARTIAL; Wing V67_PARTIAL; ESTC R7026 96,369 132

There are 4 snippets containing the selected quad. | View lemmatised text

or Priests with Christ or both that is joynt or co-heirs with Christ in the dignity and perfection of his Manhead in one or both of these Considerations of it This is intimated Isa 43. 10. Ye are my Witnesses saith the Lord and my Servant Christ whom I have chosen that ye may know and believe me or be one in Judgment and Will with me and understand that I am he Before me there was no God formed nor shall be after me And they are called Witnesses not only because they know and believe him and are one in Spirit with him as he is a glorified earthly man and a man also that is Michael God's fellow but as they Prophesie in Sack-cloth or in a suffering state not loving their lives unto the death rather then cease to be Witnesses and to bear their testimony to the Truth when called thereunto under the greatest contradiction of sinners 9. By the Woman chap. 12. clothed with the Sun c. who being with Child cried travelling in birth with a Man-child and pained to be delivered is meant the true Sarah or spiritual Womb of Christ's dead body Rom. 7. 4. which lawfully discharges us from the Covenant of the Law or obligation to act singly by the activity it gives that we should be married to another even to him who is raised from the dead that we may bring forth fruit unto God as quicken'd into a life and activity much more excellent There is therefore set before the eyes of our Faith the Law of the Spirit of Life that is in-Christ Jesus risen from the dead for us hence-forward to be conformed and live unto as that birth of manly perfection which shines forth in him who was crucified indeed in weakness but was raised in power or a man of Power in whose hands all Power in Heaven and Earth is intrusted And those who become one in conjunction of Spirit with him by the new and everlasting Covenant are with him caught up to the Throne of God in the one or other capacity before intimated of the two sorts of Citizens that by the new birth are members of the Heavenly Jerusalem and of the remnant of the Womans Seed that keep the Commandments of God and have the Testimony of Jesus The great Contest and Battel which happened between the Witnesses on the one part comprehended under the name of Michael and his Angels and the Serpent and his brood on the other was as the one were Friends and the other Enemies to the Cross and Death of Christ and as the Judgment Opinions and Practises of the one or other made void or else established and advanced the Mystery and Efficacy of the Cross and the Law of it which those that observe and follow peace will be upon them as on all the Israel of God In this Quarrel the Witnesses do fight under the protection and blessing of Michael their Head as the other do under the support and encouragement of the Old Dragon their Head 10. By the Old Dragon we are to understand the Spirit that rules in the Children of disobedience who is for the present Head and chief Ruler over the World as managing the universal Scepter thereof by Christ's permission The Ensigns and Characters of this Empire according to Scripture phrase is seven heads and ten horns intimating the nature as well as perfection and universality of that worldly Power which is exercised by the Old Dragon in waging war against the Woman and her Seed This War he is capable to manage either as an Angel of Light and a false Prophet in the Church or as an universal Monarch and Governor in the World In the first Capacity as this Dragon transforms himself into an Angel of Light and Minister of Righteousness he works with all Power Signs and lying Wonders As Jannes and Jambres withstood Moses and Aaron in their Commission so do the Serpent's Seed in Sheep's clothing and Christ's own likeness resist the Witnesses in their Testimony and oppose the Inhabitants of the Heavenly Jerusalem by pretending a greater Friendship to Christ and conformity to his written Law in all their words and actions than the true Seed of the Woman having indeed the form of Godliness but denying the Power and Spirit thereof After this manner did the Dragon and his Angels in the Primitive Church fight with Michael and his Angels to prevent the birth of the Man-child and to keep up the Credit and Authority of the Law and their following after Righteousness in the Principles and upon the terms of the first Covenant in opposition to the Ministry of the Spirit according to the Promise and Tenor of the new and everlasting Covenant This battel continued in the Primitive Church about four hundred years and came at last to this issue Satan was cast down out of Heaven upon an evident discovery of his deceitful workings and lying wonders in the Teachings and Inspirations which came out of his mouth as a false Spirit and Prophet so that he was not able singly this way to bear up any longer against the Power and Demonstration of the Spirit of Truth in the mouth of the Saints but found himself necessitated to resort to his earthly and worldly Weapons the Power of the Civil Sword that so joyning both his Interests together that of the Magistrate and false Prophet he might grow up into such a formidible posture as is mentioned Chap. 13. 4. where it is said Who is like unto the BEAST or able to make War with him This posture the Apostle John beheld the Dragon putting himself into when the seven-headed and ten-horned Beast arose out of the Sea and the two-horned Beast out of the Earth Both of these together do become the Seat or Throne to which the Dragon gave up his Power and Authority The first of these two Beasts receives him as the old unclean prophane heathenish Spirit they that are meant by that Beast are still the same in Principles as before only outwardly baptized into the name of the Christian Profession or Religion when Christian Religion became the Religion of the Roman Empire Thus was that Beast healed of its former Wound when Paganism was destroyed and pull'd down And because the bare name of Christian Religion or out-side Profession thereof without something of real Reformation and Power of inward Principles was not of credit or authority enough to advance Antichrist's Kingdom therefore the Ministry of the Law or first Covenant even the knowledge of Christ according to the flesh as it is capable to serve the Serpents Seed for a cover and vail of their enmity against the Cross of Christ and Power of his Resurrection doth spring up over the head as it were of the first Beast This second Beast or branch of Antichrist's Subjects and Kingdom with two horns like the Lamb but speaking as the Dragon chuses rather to joyn Interest with the first Beast than to suffer the Citizens of the heavenly Jerusalem to come out
continuance is measured out by the time of the six Trumpets that is to say in the exercise of these three distinct Powers under the Name Christian the one Imperial and Magistratical the other Spiritual and Ecclesiastical in the two Horns and branches of it pretended unto of Divine Right and Institution or whether it be more diffusive in a Collective Body of Church-Rulers and as more particularly it is expressed to last twelve hundred and sixty Prophetical dayes that is to say years in the 11 12 and 13 Chap. of the Revelations and by comparing what is spoken and described in the foresaid Chapters with Chapter 17 concerning this Constitution and Face of the Christian Church and State that was fore-seen to rise up out of the dissolution of the Heathenish Roman Empire and the driving into the Wilderness the Spiritual part of the Church made up of those who are said for the heavenliness of their Principles and Converse to be those that dwell in Heaven chap. 12. vers 12. and chap. 13. 6. It seems very plain that upon the Disputes that was likely to arise in the Christian Ecclesiastical State and Government upon the bottom of the Papacy and Rule in the Church by one universal visible Head under Christ here upon Earth as one of the Horns belonging to the second Beast by Daniel called the Little Horn mentioned single because he was most Potent and for a long time was able to uphold his Authority without any considerable cruelty and division that was visible But in process of time the separation and division happened as John in mentioning of the two-horned Beast did fore-tell there would alwayes be within the bowels of the visible Church of the outward Court-worshippers a more and a less corrupted and backsliden part the one of which compared with the other would or might be likened to the earthly Jerusalem in the temper it was in when Christ was upon Earth for persecuting the Prophets and killing the Heir himself when he came amongst them As the other might be to Samaria and the worshippers of Jeroboams Calves after that he had headed the ten Tribes in their defection not only in the Civil State but from the Purity of God's visible Worship kept up according to God's Ordinances This latter being the lively resemblance of the Papacy and all that acknowledge the Papal Authority as the chief Ruler and Head of the visible Church throughout the several States and Dominions of the Christian Empire the other figuring out the Jerusalem that now is and is in bondage with her Children distinguishing her self from Popery on the one hand and from them that dwell in Heaven as the true Citizens of the Jerusalem that is above the Mother of all those that are Heirs according to the Promise on the other hand accounting the one Babylonish Antichristian and Heretical and the other Schismatical and Erroneous Fanatical and Blasphemous And because the Woman as the Apostle calls the earthly Jerusalem which was amongst the Galatians in his dayes as being in bondage with her Children to the Law and worldly Rudiments that perish in the using Touch not taste not handle not as Objects of Divine Worship which feed most the outward senses doth make a very fair shew in the flesh having the Form of Godliness but denying the Power of it and withdrawing from and disowning the Children of the Promise that are of a more heavenly birth and of the free Woman Therefore we shall find this sort of Professors described by John in his 1 Epist 2. 19. They went out from us but they were not of us for if they had been of us they would no doubt have continued with us and not have made a manifest distinction of themselves from us that is to say from being followers 1 Thess 2. 14 15. of the Churches of God which in Judea are in Christ Jesus that are the Circumcision in Spirit and have no confidence in the flesh For which cause sake the Thessalonians in adhering to the primitive pattern which shewed it self in those Churches did suffer the like things from their own Country-men the Jews among whom they lived as those Churches of God in Judea did from the Jews there who both killed the Lord Jesus and their own Prophets and chased out the chiefest of the Apostles from amongst them and they pleased not God and are contrary to all men forbidding under pretence of too much familiarity with the Heathen and prophane World that the Gospel should be preached unto the Gentiles whereby they might be saved every way filling up their sins and bringing wrath upon themselves to the uttermost This is the Woman which John saw in Rev. 1. that was drunk with the blood of the Saints ver 6. and with the blood of the choicest Martyrs of Jesus at which he wondred with great admiration as little expecting to find what he saw or to reade that name written upon her forehead which he did of Mystery Babylon the great the mother of Fornications and Abominations of the Earth with whom the Kings and Inhabitants of the Earth commit Fornication and have been made drunk with it For at last her false unchaste whorish spirit to her Lord and Husband is discovered and made manifest by the open rejection of him in his Members and by the Combination and Conjunction which she is found in with the seven-headed and ten-horned Beast and his Adherents under the Papacy thereby to make War with his Witnesses and slay them and expose their dead bodies to shame and reproach in the streets of this earthly Jerusalem who for her exceeding Apostacy and fierce Enmity against the true Temple-worshippers is spiritually called Sodom and Egypt where also our Lord was crucified and though she have strengthened her self as one that sits upon many Waters and who is the City that reigns over the Kings or chief eminent Persons men of Name of the Earth which the Children of the earthly Jerusalem are yet sayes he God determines to bring her to Judgment and in order thereunto the Instruments he will employ therein are the several Potentates and Kingdoms that have given their Power to the Papacy who at the time appointed shall find it their Interest to agree and become of one mind in hatred of this Whore or unchaste Spouse of Christ that sitteth upon Peoples and Multitudes and Nations and Tongues and shall therefore combine together to make her desolate and naked and shall eat her flesh and burn her with fire For God hath put it into their hearts to fulfil his Will in this Judgment which they are to execute as Nebuchadnezzar formerly did upon the earthly material Jerusalem in his days until which be fulfilled they shall agree and hold together giving joyntly their Counsel Authority and Strength in support and maintenance of the Beast that is the first and chief Horn of the two-horned Beast which is the Papacy And how to give a right interpretation of the things in
and way answer but to the outward Court thereof and the Worship appertaining thereunto The former have the true inward Circumcision of the heart in the spirit whose praise is not of men but of God The latter are those who at best have but the Circumcision of the heart in the letter which labours to shew it self in such outward Circumcision of language and practice as may serve to keep up a shew or form of Godliness in the sight and to the well-pleasing of man whilst they are at an utter distance even in their hearts from the very life and power of Godliness that springs up from the new nature that is found in the true Circumcision which worship God in the spirit and answer to the inward Court Paul takes notice of this in his time Gal. 4. where he distinguishes between an earthly Jerusalem that is in bondage with her Children under the Covenant of Works or Dominion of the Law and a Jerusalem above which is free and is the Mother of all that Seed of Abraham who are Heirs according to the Promise These are described Rev. 12. by the Woman clothed with the Sun that hath the Moon under her feet and upon her Head a Crown of twelve Stars This figurative description shewes the Glory of the City Jerusalem as it is above inward and in spirit who with her Children is in freedom under the Covenant and Dominion of Grace The same is also signified by the inward Court appointed to be measured by the Reed of God in distinction from the outward Court which is not measured but abandoned and given up as it were to the power of the Gentiles to be by them troden under foot and defiled 2. In this same space of time falls out the impregnating of the Woman or her growing Great ready to be delivered of a Man-child The principal care of the Apostles and other Teachers who succeeded in their Spirit in the Primitive Church described under the representation of the seven Churches of Asia and the Angels or Officers appertaining to them was to be doing what had the most conducible tendency to the hastening and forwarding this birth of the Man-child which the Dragon opposed diligently watch'd to hinder resist and if possible to devour as soon as born 3. The seven-headed Dragon's lying in wait and managing the battel against Michael and his Angels about the aforesaid birth must needs contemporize with the two fore-mentioned Particulars All the three do therefore fill up the first space of time or age succeeding the Apostles measured out by what is contained in the six first Seals and was fore told to John as that which should happen both to the Church and World until the Womans flight from the Dragon after this great battel in Heaven and retiring into the Wilderness there to be nourished of God her appointed time These three are the immediate Antecedents of those things which have been shewed to contemporize under the seventh Seal and six Trumpets that is to say the distinguishing between the inward and outward Court with the Worship and Service appertaining unto each Secondly The impregnating of the Woman And then Thirdly The battel hereupon arising in Heaven or within the Primitive Church and continuing a long time till at length the Man-child comes to be born Then the Dragon loses his credit and authority in the Church His subtilty in accusing and laying false imputation on the Brethren the truly pure and spiritual part of the Church is detected Hereupon he is cast out into the Earth confined as it were to the outward Court and the Worshippers and Service belonging to it as the only matter for him to work upon for the increase of his Kingdom by the number of Hypocrites and Apostates drawn by him out of the true Church They were in truth never of it though for a while they were in it At length they find it their interest to make a Separation from it being sensual and not having the Spirit they can no longer endure those that have it and that shine forth daily more and more in the Life and Testimony thereof The old Dragon became hereby necessitated to manage and prosecute the War with the earthly Weapons only of worldly Power and Government in a way of outward force and compulsion exercised by the power of humane Laws and of the civil Sword This Power and Sword the corrupt sensual and malignant Church founded and consisting in the worshippers and service of the outward Court getting into their hands or engaging it on their side by mingling Interest with worldly Governours committed Whoredom like Tyre with all the Kingdoms of the VVorld upon the face of the Earth Isa 23. 17. Yea this Beast with two horns so influenced encouraged and back'd the ten horn'd Beast that he became thereby fixed and engaged in his Mind as well as Power to continue and carry on the War forty and two months longer against the Woman and her Seed and to blaspheme God his Name his Tabernacle and them that dwell in Heaven Thus in brief Heads have we seen how the two first great Sections or Divisions of time in the third Age are filled up to wit the space from John's receiving the Prophecy of them in the Isle of Patmos to the end of the first battel or war made in Heaven and as the issue of that the catching up of the Man-child unto God and to his Throne and the Womans actual flight into the VVilderness and from thence to the rising of the VVitnesses which puts a period to the suffering season alloted to their Prophesying in Sack-cloth And as to the third and last Section of time it is that which is measured out by the sounding of the seventh Trumpet and the pouring out of the seven Vials which begins with the beginning of that Trumpet and continues till the Whore be judged Babylon sunk and the whole Kingdom of the Beast for ever ruined and destroyed This makes way for the marriage of the Lamb to be celebrated here on Earth and so for the coming on of the Kingdom of Christ into the actual exercise of a visible ruling Power and universal Empire over the whole VVorld for a thousand years Having thus had a view of the distinct periods of time together with the matter of the Prophesies which were to be fulfilled in and under each of these distinct Revolutions it will yet much prepare and help our understandings rightly to discern and look into the Mysteries of this most excellent Book if once we can but arrive at a satisfactory opening and interpreting at least in some chief particulars the things which are signified under many of the Figures and Allegorical Expressions made use of throughout the whole Prophecy For Example Let us consider these The seven Churches and the Angels of them The Throne in Heaven The sealed Book The Woman The Dragon and his Angels Michael and his Angels The Man-child The throne and seat of the Dragon's
of their Wilderness-condition Yet this earth or miry clay cannot when all 's done cleave heartily and thorowly to the heathenish prophane Spirit of the first Beast but at last is preyed upon by it This Earthly Jerusalem is unexpectedly surprized and overflowed as with a flood by that prophane Interest it ventured to call to its assistance against the true Seed of the Woman in which respect it is said that the Earth helps the Woman the wrath of the prophane party of Antichrist's Kingdom or of the ten-horned Beast being chiefly spent and poured out upon that Professing Party that make up the second or two-horned Beast 11. By the Inhabitants of the Heavens of the Earth and of the Sea chap. 12. 12. are meant First The Citizens of the heavenly Jerusalem who are under Grace Secondly The Citizens of the earthly Jerusalem who are under the dominion and curse of the Law And Thirdly The prophane Party who live under sin moving therein as in their Element past feeling by reason of the blindness and hardness of their hearts This state of Sin is nevertheless not unchangeable nor those that are Captives under it in a condition irrecoverable for Christ died to redeem men out of it 12. By the seven-headed and ten-horned Beast arising out of the Sea is to be understood the Empire or Governing Power of the World in whose hands soever it be found as it is made the Seat and Throne of Satan and promotes the Interest of the Devils Kingdom in corruption of manners and prophaness even by the countenance of humane Laws or at least in the execution of them 13. By the two-horned Beast arising out of the Earth we are to understand the Usurpation of the Prophetical Office of Christ by a false Spirit or the said Office as deceitfully executed in a private Spirit of self-byassed Reason in disjunction from the Spirit of the true Head undertaking to counsel and lead men in the interpretation of the written Word or other evident signification of God's Will This once joyned with worldly Government and Power made its vassal and ridden by it is that Spirit and Principle for promoting of worldly Religion which is founded in and supported by humane Laws under the Name and Form of Christianity The two-horned Beast and the false Prophet are therefore the same as by comparing chap. 13. vers 14. with vers 20. of chap. 19. is most clear And the ten-horned Beast is wont also to be called the Image of the Beast where ever therefore the Beast and the false Prophet are mentioned together as they are three times there by the name of the Beast is meant no other but the ten-horned Beast as by the false Prophet the two-horn'd Contrarily where with the Beast we find coupled the Image of the Beast as chap. 14. vers 9 11. chap. 15. vers 2. chap. 16. vers 2. chap. 19. vers 20. chap. 20. vers 4. there by Beast is to be understood the false Prophet and by his Image the seven-headed and ten-horn'd Beast as restored For this Beast seeing he acknowledgeth the false Prophet as his Restorer and suffereth himself to be guided by him as his supream Lord chap. 13. vers 12 14 15. he is not without cause called his Image not as representing or bearing the similitude of the two-horn'd Beast but he is the Image which the two-horn'd Beast speaking like the Dragon did restore and which he challengeth for his own To justifie this that very Image of the Beast which the false Prophet did give life unto did cause that whosoever would not worship the Image of the Beast should be slain To conclude of the self-same is the Image of the Beast and the Name or Number said to be chap. 15. 2. The Name and Number seem not to be called the Name and Number of any other Beast than of the two-horn'd as of the principal Founder and Lord. 14. The Number of the Name of the Beast being said to be the Number of a man signifies that it is the sensual part of man's Wisdom or Reason become devilish by joyning in combination with Satan in his revolt from his true Head and in exercising enmity against all Righteousness upon one account or other This sensual part of man's Wisdom savours and minds Earthly or seen things and delights in corporeal fleshly objects whether actually corrupt or only corruptible This is the Wisdom that is prevalent with the generality of men in the World according to the Principles of which the Empire and Government of the World is managed and the judgment and interpretation of the very Law and Word of God is made for the Rule in matters of Faith and Worship This Wisdom is in its best estate unstable and unfixed so as from the top and height of its honour there is suddenly a being made like the Beast that perishes and so a falling short of the true Rest This was the case of the first Adam who was created on the sixt day and whose unstable perfection is therefore numbered by six thrice repeated This sensual part of man's Wisdom is the executing or performing Power of the Soul in reference to the dictates and enlightnings that declare themselves in the intellectual and angelical part of the mind which many times serves and approves the Law of God whilst the sensual part serves and obeyes sin and as with a Law of common consent from the Members opposes and resists the good and right Rule which shines forth in man's intellect and which we call sound or right Reason But as this sensual part in its movings and actings holds agreement and is in conjunction with the intellectual part as its Ruler and Guide following the dictates thereof so far the actings thereof are sound and right holding conformity to the Law of God Thus even the sensual part as subject to the right dictates of the intellectual is it self a Rule unto humane action and is the principle and foundation of righteous Magistratical Government amongst men Now when this Principle in Magistrates ceases to be any longer found in a state of down-right Paganism and comes to be healed and restored out of darkness and prophaness by receiving of the Scriptures or written Word of God opened and interpreted by such as pretend to be commissioned and gifted for that purpose unto which it owes its healing and restoration it doth by way of acknowledgement receive and set up that prophetical Office in an administration countenanced by humane Laws and the Magistrates Power Where-ever this kind of Magistracy is in both the branches of it both Civil and Ecclesiastical setting up for themselves and their own Interests in their own wills in disjunction from Christ and his Spirit the true Head and in opposition to the Remnant of the Womans Seed and their testimony in word and action there is the Kingdom and Seat of the Beast and Antichrist leading the People over whom it is exercised into servitude both of Soul