Whence we may justly conclude,

Therefore this doctrine or opinion, that makes the whole community or body of the church to be the first subject and immediate receptacle of the keys, is an unsound and unwarrantable opinion.

The middle-way men, (that profess to go between the authoritative presbyterial, and the rigid Brownistical way,) seeing these and such like absurdities, upon which the Brownists inevitably dash themselves, think to salve all by their new-coined distinction of the keys; viz. 1.  There is a key of faith or knowledge, Luke xi. 52.  The first subject of this key is every believer, whether joined to any particular church or not. 2.  There is a key of order, Col. ii. 5, which is either, 1.  A key of interest, power, or liberty, Gal. v. 13, which key is of a more large nature; 2.  A key of rule and authority, which is of more strict nature, Matt. xvi. 19, John xx. 23.  Hence, upon this distinction premised, they thus infer, 1.  A particular congregation of saints is the first subject of all the church offices with all their spiritual gifts and power, 1 Cor. iii. 22. 2.  The apostles of Christ were the first subject of apostolical power. 3.  The brethren of a particular congregation are the first subjects of church liberty. 4.  The elders of a particular church are the first subjects of church authority. 5.  Both the elders and brethren, walking and joining together in truth and peace, are the first subjects of all church power needful to be exercised in their own body.

Answer.  A rotten foundation, and a tottering superstruction, which tumbles down upon the builders’ own heads:  for,

1.  This distribution of the keys is infirm in divers respects:  e.g. 1.  In that the key of knowledge (as it stands here distinguished from the key of order, comprehending the key of power and authority) is left utterly devoid of all power.  Now no key of the kingdom of heaven is to be left without all power, Independents themselves being judges. 2.  In that the key of power is left as utterly void of all authority, (being contradistinguished from the key of authority,) as the key of knowledge is left void of power.  Now, power and authority, in matters of government, seem to be both one; and the word in the original signifies the one as well as the other. 3.  The key of liberty or interest is a new key, lately forged by some new locksmiths in Separation-shop, to be a pick-lock of the power of church officers, and to open the door for popular government; no ordinance of Christ, but a mere human invention, (as will after appear upon examination of that scripture upon which it is grounded,) and therefore this limb of the distribution is redundant, a superfluous excrescence. 4.  The texts of Scripture upon which this distribution of the keys is grounded, are divers of them abused, or at least grossly mistaken; for, Luke xi. 52, key of knowledge is interpreted only the key of saving faith.  But knowledge, in