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Now if any will require a proofe on Christs part, that he hath also publick∣ly giuen the Church of Rome a bill of diuorce; let him but search in Gods records: Doth not Christ Reuel. 17. openly declare the Church of Rome to be the Whore of Babylon? and is there not a plaine bill of Diuorce, Reuel. 18?
and that by a voice from heauen, say∣ing, Come out of her my people, &c? doth not Christ here separate his owne people, his owne spouse out of Babylon? And this diuorce on Christs part, came to bee of force vpon the Councell of Trent; when the Church of Romes se∣cond mariage was solemnly concluded, and Christ excluded: what need be said more; to proue this Diuorce, and that on both sides?
What need bee said more? (quoth you?) marry much more then either you haue said yet, or euer will bee able to say, I trow: what is it (I pray) you haue said now, that you need to say no more? Is it this? That Rome, and the Romane Church is the whore of Ba∣bylon? Wee allow it: Or that Christ would haue his people to separate from her? we grant it: But that the Church of Rome was maried to a second hus∣band in the Councel of Trent, & Christ excluded; or that those words, Come out of her my people, are a bill of diuorce; or that Christ by them separateth his
Spouse from her, we vtterly deny. To the first enough hath beene said in the last answer. To the second wee say, first that (if Brightman your best master say true,) this place must not be vnder∣stood spiritually, but literally, of the lo∣call departure of Gods people out of Rome, and Gods calling them thereto at the last ouerthrow and destruction thereof, as he called Lot out of Sodom, and the Iewes out of the Easterne Ba∣bylon in the same words, & the Church out of Ierusalem when it was to be vt∣terly destroyed; so that as Mice (I vse his owne similitude) perceiuing the house will fall, doe leaue it, and runne away; so the people of God warned by the Angell will leaue Rome, and shift for themselues: which being so, this Prophesie is not yet fulfilled. Secondly, if it be taken spiritually, it is so far from prouing a diuorce, that it proueth the quite contrary: for first, so long as Ba∣bylon hath a being, this euocation will bee of vse and force, because so long God shall haue a people in Babylon; and so long there can bee no diuorce,
because God begets not children of any, but of his Spouse the Church: Secondly, these words declare not what Christ himselfe either doth or will doe, but what hee would haue his people to doe: Now a Diuorce is not a separation of the Familie from the Mother, or Mistris, but of the hus∣band from the wife; Ergo, here is no Diuorce intended. To the third, we say, that seeing the wife is the whore, and the whore is Babylon; Christ in∣tendeth not here to separate his Wife or Spouse from Babylon; because in so doing he should separate his wife from his wife, and Babylon from Babylon, which implies a contradiction.
As it is a visible Church we haue not detracted to hold communion with it; as Babylon, we can haue nothing to doe with it.