Selected quad for the lemma: book_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
book_n	according_a	life_n	write_v	4,079	5	5.6476	4	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A90293	Theomachia autexousiastikē: or, A display of Arminianisme. Being a discovery of the old Pelagian idol free-will, with the new goddesse contingency, advancing themselves, into the throne of the God of heaven to the prejudice of his grace, providence, and supreme dominion over the children of men. Wherein the maine errors of the Arminians are laid open, by which they are fallen off from the received doctrine of all the reformed churches, with their opposition in divers particulars to the doctrine established in the Church of England. Discovered out of their owne writings and confessions, and confuted by the Word of God. / By Iohn Owen, Master of Arts of Queens Colledge in Oxon.	Owen, John, 1616-1683.	1643 (1643)	Wing O811; Thomason E97_14; ESTC R21402	143,909	187

no distinction of men halfe and wholly elected where it is affirmed that it is impossible the elect should be seduced Matth. 24. 24. that none shall snatch Christs sheep out of his fathers hand Ioh. 11. 28 29. what would they have more Gods purpose of election is sealed up 2 Tim. 2. 19. and therefore cannot be revoked it must stand firme Rom. 9. 11. in spight of all opposition neither will reason allow us to thinke any immanent act of God to be incomplete or revocable because of the neere alliance it hath with his very nature but reason Scripture God himselfe all must give place to any absurdities if they stand in the Arminian way bringing in their Idoll with shouts and preparing his throne by claiming the cause of their predestination to be in themselves Thirdly the Article is cleere that the object of this predestion is some particular men chosen out of mankinde that is it is such an act of God as concerneth some men in particular taking them as it were aside from the middest of their brethren and designing them for some speciall end and purpose the Scripture also aboundeth in asserting this veritie calling them that are so chosen a few Mat. 20. 16. which must needs denote some certaine persons and the residue according to election Rom. 11. 5. those whom God knows to be his 2 Tim. 2. 19. Men ordained to eternall life Acts 13. 48. us Rom. 8. 39. those that are written in the Lambes booke of life Revel 21. 27. all which and divers others clearely prove that the number of the elect is certaine not only materially as they say that there are so many but formally also that these particular persons and no other are they which cannot be altered nay the very nature of the thing it selfe doth so demonstratively evince it that I wonder it can possibly be conceived under any other notion to apprehend an election of men not circumscribed with the circumstance of particular persons is such a conceited Platonicall abstraction as it seemes strange that any one dares professe to understand that there should be a predestination and none predestinated an election and none elected a choise amongst many yet none left or taken a decree to save men and yet thereby salvation destinated to no one man either re aut spe indeed or in expectation in a word that there should be a purpose of God to bring men unto glory standing inviolable though never any one attained the proposed end is such a riddle as no Oedipus can unfold now such an election such a predestination have the Arminians substituted in the place of Gods everlasting decree we deny say they that Gods election extendeth it selfe to any singular persons as singular persons that is that any particular persons as Peter Paul Iohn are by it elected no how then Why God hath appointed without difference to dispense the means of faith and as he seeth these persons to beleeve or not to beleeve by the use of those means so at length he determineth of them as saith Corvinus well then God chooseth no particular man to salvation but whom he seeth beleeving by his own power with the helpe only of such means as are affoorded unto others who never beleeve and as he maketh himselfe thus differ from them by a good use of his own abilities so also he may be reduced againe into the same predicament and then his election which respecteth not him in his person but only his qualification quite vanisheth but is this Gods decree of election yes say they and make a dolefull complaint that any other doctrine should be taught in the Church it is obtruded say the true born sons of Arminius on the Church as a most holy doctrine that God by an absolute immutable decree from all eternitie out of his own good pleasure hath chosen certaine persons and those but a few in comparison without any respect had to their faith and obedience and predestinated them to everlasting life but what so great exception is this doctrine lyable unto what wickednesse doth it include that it should not be accounted most holy nay is not only the matter but the very tearmes of it contained in the Scripture doth not it say the elect are few and they chosen before the foundation of the world without any respect to their obedience or any thing that they had done out of Gods meere gracious good pleasure that his free purpose according to election might stand even because so it pleased him and this that they might be holy beleeve and be sanctified that they might come unto Christ and by him be preserved into everlasting life yea this is that which gals them no such will can be ascribed unto God whereby he so willeth any one to be saved as that thence their salvation should be sure and infallible saith the father of those children Well then let St. Austine his definition be quite rejected that predestination is a preparation of such benefits whereby some are most certainly freed and delivered from sinne and brought to glory and that also of Saint Paul that by reason of this nothing can separate us from the love of God that is in Christ what is this election in your judgement Nothing but a decree whereby God hath appointed to save them that beleeve in Christ saith Corvinus be they who they will or a generall purpose of God whereby he hath ordained faith in Christ to be the means of salvation yea but this belongs to Iudas as well as to Peter this decree carrieth an equall aspect to those that are damned as to those that are saved salvation under the condition of faith in Christ was also proposed to them but was Iudas and all his company elected how came they then to be seduced and perish that any of Gods elect goe to hell is as yet a strange assertion in Christianity notwithstanding this decree none may beleeve or all that doe may fall away and so none at all be saved which is a strange kinde of predestination or all may beleeve continue in faith and be saved which were a more strange kinde of election We poore souls thought hitherto that we might have beleeved according unto Scripture that some by this purpose were in a peculiar manner made the Fathers thine they were and by him given unto Christ that he might bring them unto glory and that these men were so certaine and unchangeable a number that not only God knoweth them as being his but also that Christ calleth them all by name Ioh. 10. 3. and looketh that none taketh them out of his hand we never imagined before that Christ hath been the Mediatour of an uncertaine Covenant because there are no certaine persons covenanted withall but such as may or may not fulfill the condition we alway thought that some had been separated before by Gods purpose from the rest of the perishing world that Christ might lay down