Selected quad for the lemma: heaven_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
heaven_n	great_a	see_v	son_n	5,173	5	5.0248	4	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A60972	Davvnings of light wherein the true interest of reformation is opened in generall, and in particular, in this kingdome for the establishment of weaker judgements, and many other things impartially hinted, to a further discovery of truth and light in many of our present controversies : with some maximes of reformation / by John Saltmarsh ...	Saltmarsh, John, d. 1647.	1646 (1646)	Wing S477; ESTC R40634	39,746	130

well studied might be exalted into a transcendent science and it is pitty that now when severall Ages of Reformation draws on few or none that I know elder or more modern that have much enquired into the mystery sublimity whereas every variety here below is drawn up into systemes and aphorismes only this wanders incompleatly under the shadow of the science Theologie which is so universall that there is not that perfection attained in it as there might be if like other Sciences it were taken in or inclosed and so studied for then some whose spirituall ingeny might be of a complexion fitter for such or such a part in Divinity would apply thither when as now they wander up and down in the unbounded wastes of Theologie and like the Philosopher who laying himself out to nature at large sits down with a narrow satisfaction whereas the ●stronomer or any other single scienced person knows every star and circle and variation and hath a more exact and particular knowledge then such an universall contemplation can give him The increated Interest FIrst then for the Interest of Reformation as it relates to God I mean the supernaturall interest or the increated interest and we must know it lies radically in the counsels of God and subsists in his power and infinity and takes not degrees and improvements here below as other interests naturall and politicall do and therefore it is that the Interest of Reformation rayes out in some ages gloriously at its very first rise then when it seems to have the least ingagement or complication below but seemes rather to flow from new created springs and originals so as that scripture holds forth Things which are seen are not made of things which do appeare and though sometimes other contraries may seem to have anticipated all the interest and taken up the advantages beforehand yet on a sudden God lets out an effusion of light and spirit and in a moment disinteresses and dispossesses all the former and this appeares in that when the people which sate in darknesse saw great light and to them which sate in the region and shadow of darknesse light is sprung up for as the appearance of Christ to judgement is implied to be momentary As the lightning that lightneth out of the one part of heaven shineth unto the other part so shall also the Son of man be in his day now the Son of man is thus in his day of Reformation as well as Condemnation and as in light there is not that graduall alteration and propagation and working for interest in the aire but a transfusion and illumination in such an interminate subject or body because there is not in it any quality contrary or obstructive that can put any impediment to so immateriall a thing as light So it is in the spirituall transfusions of grace and reformation when the power and will of God carries it and applies it irresistibly efficaciously to such and such a season or State or people for God being as it were more immediate and indistant and intrinsecal in this work he will not sometimes admit of any such grosse or inferiour artifice and preparings and consociations which argues an impotencie in the agent and work but as he is infinite and the Creator so he commands the creature to make room and the creature in an obedientiall and passive capacity opens and entertains his dispensations this is then when he would make bare as it were his glory and shew himself to his people and put off the creature and as it were devest himself of his interests here below act more immediately upon the world and then his light and dispensation is carried on without reluctancy or disputings in the creature there is a melting at his presence this divine work is sweetly insinuated in that Scripture his lightnings enlightned the world the earth saw and trembled the hills melted like waxe at the presence of the Lord the earth trembles the earth or the most grosse and opace impediment● the hils or high obstructions flow down and are powred out when God powres out himselfe in any strong activity upon them The work of Reformation being of this nature in part and such an immediate efflux of God in Christ we should rise into higher conceptions and contemplations concerning it and find out the interest on which it turns in the most spirituall motions and beginnings The more spirituall effluxes of the Interest with a Caution ANd these are the very same which God brought his Dispensations into the world by at first and carried on his truths on a naked power witnesse all his miraculous actings for his Law and Church then under Moses Joshua God carrying them on by a mighty hand and after under several Judges by such sudden lightnings of mercy when all their own interest was lost overflowed by the enemies as the Scriptures intimate Then the Lord raised them up a Deliverer The sudden restoring of the worship under Asa Jehoshaphat Hezekiah Josiah And so the raising of the Temple under Cyrus and Darius the expressions all hold out the most high and divine risings and actings as those concerning Cyrus The Lord stirred up the spirit of Cyrus and then rose up the fathers of Benjamin and Judah with all them whose spirit God had raised to go up and as these concerning Artaxerxes And the King granted me sayes Nehemiah according to the good hand of God upon me and then I told them of the hand of my God which was good upon me And in the time of Mordecai And in that very day that the e●●mies of the Jews hoped to have rule over them it was turned to the contrary and the Jews had rule over them And thus the Reformation under the Gospel was carried on by a pure heavenly work and immediate concurrence The Lord saith the Scripture working with them and confirming the Word With signes following and many of them which heard the Word beleeven and the number of the men was about five thousand all on sudden Thus the Interest of Reformation or the Gospel lay then most in the naked and immediate power of God subsisting in his very omnipotencie and so in divers ages to this though in a particular account from Ecclesiasticall Story we may soon be led into some false experiments of this interest for it was a luxuriancie in some of them to put down some miraculous passages or stories which indeed are very questionable for the mysterie of iniquity working higher every age then other the learning of after times partly in an easie and corrupt piety and partly in a policie to preserve the reputation of so divine an interest kept up many Legends to this day But for later Centuries in France and Gormanie Scotland and our own kingdom God hath brought in himself according to the former Scriptures with an high hand with signes and wonders with raising

experience in our own and others reformations yet here we must enquire too whether Kingdomes ought to ●it so loose in their decrees and whether the conscience of Nations or Parliaments are to remain still in such a constant potentiality to new degrees and whether such a way would not keep a Kingdome alwayes tottering and uncertain Yet further whether the potentiality of acquiring new degrees of this nature would not bring such an alteration as were rather perfective then corruptive or destructive and if so whether these jealousies may not be saved we see that in the bodies naturall and spirituall there is a potentiality to any perfective alteration as in the aire to light and in the soul to degrees of illumination till they come to the statu●e of the fulnesse of Christ The advancers out of Babylon IN our commings out of Babylon we have many fellow travellers that pretend as well to leave her behinde as we and these are called Hereticks Schismaticks Anabaptists Separatists Now before wee be too far engaged in this being they are such as pretend to come from the same point of advancement or setting forth it would be well enquired how Popery and Prelacy come to oppose them so directly and their interests to be so inconsistent if they be all enemies to the truth I finde Christs maxime tend to another sense How can Sathan cast out Sathan yet here again I finde that Sathan may appear as well an Angel of Light as Darknesse and Heresies may walk abroad as well in white as in black and that some vices are as inconsistent and destructive to one another as vices and vertues However they pretend with us to come out of Babylon so it is possible they may only mistake their way in their going out yet we must ask further in such cases where popery Prelacy agree with us thus in unotertio as appears in this one experiment of calling the others Hereticks and Schismaticks whether a godly jealousie may not do well for it is possible to cast out the courser part of popery and Prelacy and yet hold it by a finer thred as it hath been to this age in our partial Reformations when at first popery was cast out only by the head and so gradually still holding it by some parts for it is harder casting out a mysterie then every one conjectures at the first sight for popery being a mysterie in the Spirits sense hath something more then a visible traine of Hierarchy courts and ceremonies there is something more spiritual in it their mixed unity their tyrannie their magistrality their universality their implicite obedience with others c. Now it would be enquired what interest or remainder these may have left behinde for it is possible for poperie to leave such roots and stumps in the ground where it hath planted so deeply to work again upon these hidden and occult dispositions for the Man of sin rose by such interests at first and this the holy Spirit had observed betimes saying the mysterie of iniquity doth already work defections compliancies and ap●stasies as we have seen are easily obtained when the man of sin hath such invisible interests and agents layed in to work by nor ●as the grosser or more visible ag●●ts the only meanes to actuate this Kingdom back againe towards Rome so often as we experience but these more secret and mercuriall engines which I have named First for their unity it hath such cold principles as freeze and congeale multitudes heterogenially together in the worship of God and then puts the name of Schisme upon all the Reformed Churches that will not come into the dark with them where all colours are like Their tyrannie reaches to the most spiritual cruelty That of compelling soules under the penaltie of martyrdome Their magistrality in obtruding the decrees of their counsels their infallibility with Anathema's their Lording it over the heritage Their universality in holding out their religion for Catholick because the ten horns have given their Kingdom to the Beast though no longer then untill the words of God shall be fu●fi●●d Their implicite obedience wherein all light and liberty is denied to the people but such as streams through their ministery dispensations which must needs be of their own colour and will never be purer comming so Now these and such like would be enquired into further and our ministery may do well a little more then they do to set upon this part of discovery of the interests of popery and prelacie in their magistrality unitie and implicitie obedience as their Covenant oblieges them for this I take to be the more spirituall part of it and little studied and thus they shall be more faithfull to their Covenant which ingages them to a universall extirpation and now that we are upon reforming or refining the extractions must not be only of the grosser the government superstition ceremonies but of the more essential and formal and vertual parts of prelacie and popery in the things I named only we must take heed that in such extractions the purer spirits doe not exhale with the other and therefore in such spirituall experiments the furnace must be chimically heated for it is possible that Gods unity order and subordination may go out with the other if the extractions be more violent then the word of God and Apostolical practices will endure The severall Interests of REFORMATION in this Kingdome I. The Supernaturall Interest THe supernaturall interest appears in those many great and eminent mercies since the first opening of Heaven upon this Nation I reckon now from our own late epoche of Reformation And first in that designe of calling a Parliament and engaging them against the Kingdome of Scotland and so to have turned back the Reformation in its first advancing a designe not unlike that of Herods of killing Christ in the cradle and here God let in some glimpses and cast in some jealousies into that great Counsel which rescued it from such an ingagement and for all the State Artifice of Court Declarations and pretences suspitions sprang up in the hearts of people and though armies are levied by prerogative and carried down yet God takes off their spirits and successe both in their advancings and skirmishings with Scotland and this is made by Providence a necessity of calling a Parliament again so as this inter designe of the enemies served onely to land us upon clearer discoveries This Parliament is summoned and excellent Members elected by a corrupt commonalty So as the voice of the Lord is upon the Waters And now all things worke and turn upon heavenly engines and the long design of keeping of Parliaments is turned into a necessity of a Trien●●all one and further to that of an everlasting one by an act of continuation and God hath fastened it as a raile in a sur● place and now Reformation moves some degrees on Votes and suffrages begin to vvi Properie and