Popery condemned by scripture and the fathers - End Time Deception

130 POPERY CONDEMNLD BY
phecy. 13. Confession of adversaries. 3 4. The
unhappy end of the enemies of the Church.
15, Temporal felicity *.
According to Bellannine, wherever these notes
exist, there is the true Church, or, to express
his meaning more ^perspicuously, there is the
Church of Rome, which, he and the R. very
naturally suppose, possesses the only claim to
truth, A short review of these notes would e-
vince the contrary. At present, the reader may
be'* satisfied w-ith comparing the 15th, temporal
felicity, with the doctrine of Christ. That is essentially
necessary to the existence of the church,
because the Saviour has said, " In the world ye
" shall have tribulations f." On the contrary,
persons, who are persecuted, " afflicted and tor-
*'
ment-fd," for conscience sake, smell rankly of
heresy ; for it is said of those who are before the
throne and before the Lamb, " These are they
" who came out of great tribulation |."
His illustration of the notes of the true Church,
the R. has prefaced with the following observations.
" He does not enquire whether the
" Church of Christ be the Roman Church, or
" the English Church, or a Church of any other
" denomination : such an enquiry is useless : for
" if it be incontrovertibly true that the Church
" of Christ is and was perpetually visible, since
" the publication of the new law on the day of
*'
Pentecost,
* De Not. Eccles. f John, xvi. ^^, X
l^^v. vii. 14.