Selected quad for the lemma: book_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
book_n	church_n	scripture_n	sense_n	2,756	5	6.8104	4	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A82555	The Quakers confuted, being an answer unto nineteen queries; propounded by them, and sent to the elders of the church of Duckenfield in Cheshire; wherein is held forth much of the doctrine and practise concerning revelations, and immediate voices, and against the holy Scriptures, Christs ministry, churches and ordinances &c. Together with an answer to a letter which was written and sent by one of them to a family of note and quality in the said county, which pleaded for perfection in this life, and for quaking. By Samuel Eaton, teacher of the Church of Christ heretofore meeting at Duckenfield, now in Stockport in Cheshire.	Eaton, Samuel, 1596?-1665.; Waller, Richard, d. 1657.	1654 (1654)	Wing E125; Thomason E719_8; ESTC R9865	69,620	98

Davids Psalms be sung Many strick at that who will assent unto the singing of other Psalms which are compiled by a special gift Answ There are reasons which are weighty which do carry thereunto 1. Psalms which were immediately inspired by the Spirit of God are most Divine and Heavenly and do contain the most admirable Doctrine 2. The Scripture is given for every use to be read sung pre●ched out of confened of medicated on and to be the matter of our prayers also And those parts of it which we finde to be Psalms we ought to make use of as Psalms and sing them And though we have liberty to sing other spiritual Songs of our own or others making after we have wel digested them as well as to read other godly Books besides the Scriptures yet as our reading of other Books will not excuse our omission of reading the Scripture so our singing of other spiritual Songs will not excuse our omission of singing Scriptures Psalms 3. Davids Psalms were brought into the Church of God in Hezekiahs time and an express command given to the Levites to sing praise to the Lord with the words of David and of Asaph the Seer which is a president and a pattern for Saints to follow 4. There are Commands laid upon the Churches of Christ and upon particular Christians to sing Psalms Hymns and spiritual Songs unto the Lord and nothing suggested unto them concerning the matter of them And doth Christ put a service upon use people and nor afford them any straw or matter to perform the same with There was no need else Christ would not have been wanting There were Psalms Hymns and spiritual Songs complied by David to their hands for such Titles we shall meet with in the Book of the Psalms A Psalm of David familiarly a Song often in Hymn sometimes as in the Title of 145 Psalm 5. The Ex 〈…〉 of the Apostle to the Church at Coloss is to let the word of Christ dwell in them 〈◊〉 in all wisedom teaching and admonishing them selves in psalms c. what is this but a clear suggestion that the word of Christ which is some part of Scripture should be famliar unto them and become the matter of their Psalms for their instruction For is there not first an injunction Let the word of Christ dwell in your And is there not after wards a direction how to perfom it and one way is by teaching and admonishing themselves in Psalms 6. It is less warrantable because there is no president for it and more dangerous because of some evil consequences that may attend it to bring in other Psalms of mens compiling and not Scriptural into the Church of God and to impose them upon the people For the people that must act in singing must first know them to be consonant to the Scripture and must have a right understanding of them that they may sing to their edification and them there must either be a book of such Psalms so brought in and imposed which every Saint must have or else the whole Church must be gathered together every time there is singing to peruse such Psalms which must be allowed to be sung amongst them but Scripture is silent concerning such wayes and seemes to give other direction And though he that had a gift brought his Psalm into the Church 1 Cor. 14. 26. yet for ought appears he sung it alone and then the rest might judge and say Amen or not say Amen as they approved or disapproved of it And it was not imposed upon the Church to be sung But the Apostle Paul layes singing of Pslams Hymns and spiritual songs upon the whole Chruch and there are no orders of Musitians now or office of singing Choriston as in the Old Testment but all the people are the Choristers in the dayes of the New Testament to sing Psalms and Songs c. And the Apostle James layes at injunction upon every particular Saint if he be merry to sing Psalmi Jam. 5. 13. But hath every particular Saint a gift to compile a Psalm If not what must such a Saint do Therefore there must of necessity be use made of Scripture-Psalms And as for singing them in Meeter the Hebrews had their Poetrie according to which they both compiled and sung their Psalms And it is but sutable that every Nation should have the liberty of their own proper and peculiar Poetrie among themselves to praise God by and meeter is that which is congruons to our English Poetry Concerning putting on of Hats in reading Psalms and putting them off in singing them I shall not much contest But this I say that reverence is that which is sutable to all Gods Ordinances and because the putting off the Hat doth shew reverence it would be very comely when Scripture is read but if it be otherwise I judge it not to be want of reverence in such a person because reverence may be shewed and not tied to one posture therefore I leave persons to their liberty Yet there is a difference in Ordinances in some we have an immediate address to God and in such we use more reverence as when we pray or give thanks we do not send one to God with our requests but we go our selves to him immediately but in preaching and reading it is otherwise we have not immediate communion with God but God sends by whom he will send his Message to us and speaketh not immediately but by another and so there is no irreverence though the like degree of reverence be not given And hence it comes that we may use a different posture and gesture though the same words be spoken if they be spoken in an Ordinance of a divers nature As if words of prayer he read as a part of Scripture then they are Gods speaking to us by another but if we our selves make use of such words and put them into our own prayers then they become our speaking to God in our immediate addresses unto him and so the Hat may be put on in the former and yet ought to be put off in the latter the like may be said of singing and reading Davids Psalms They are different Ordinances and may require different postures There is also difference betwixt speaking and hearing he that is the speaker though it be but in a civil Assembly shews more reverence speaking to many then they that hear him do to him and is usually uncovered when they that are spoken to are covered and in Religious Assemblies it is so also he that speaketh though it be in the name of God is uncovered when yet the people that are spoken to are usually covered But in singing of Psalms they are all Speakers and have to do with God shewing their holy joy in him and in his word and therefore are all uncovered But the custome of the Churches of God in these things if there be not palpable superstition in them is much to be respected and not rashly departed from

Dear friend Christian I have sent you a little book read it without partiality and you may see deceit discovered My wife desires you to present her service to her Master and Mistress and all the children and her love unto you and all the servants We are both well and our child grows fast As for me as I begun with my dear love unto you all so I end For I dare not complement because it is a Custom of the World Farewell A Copy of an answer to the forementioned Letter written in the name of the Church of Duckenfield now meeting in Stopport and sent unto the wife of Richard Waller for the setling and establishing of her in the faith of Christ being a member of the forementioned Church wherein all such Scriptures which were brought to prove an absolute Perfection and Quaking are Interpreted and the true sense given to them and freed from such corrupt fense for which they are alledged Sister Waller YOu are very precious to us though your miscarriage against God and us hath been very great We are apt to hope that the Lord either hath or will convince you of the sin you committed in your unadvised Marriage Which you so selfwilledly carried on against us And when your heart is kindly humbled we know you will give praise to God and justifie us And then we shall conceive as much can see of joy from your repentance as we have done grief from your sin We cannot yet think otherwise but that you do belong to the Lord And if so he will not suffer you to have rest in any evil way you have gone in till he have made you truly sensible and sorrowfull after a Godly manner which if ever you once manifest to us we shall with as much tenderness own you as in any time heretofore For you are very dear to us and our bowels do very much yearn after you Especially since we heard of a Letter which your husband wrote to Duckenfield which some of us have seen by which we discern what deadly poyson he hath sucked in to the undoing of his poor Soul if God be not very mercifull to him and bring him to Repentance And you also through your nearness of Relation to him are exposed to multiplicity of Temptations to forsake the faith of our Lord Jesus and to turn aside to such Satanical delusions which he is carried away with We do conceive hope that as yet the Lord hath kept you by observing one passage of his Letter which holds out your desire that your service may be presented to your Master and Mistress therein owning the relation they stood in to you and you to them which he declares against making it the worlds way and not Gods Our desire and prayer to God for you shall be that he will yet keep you even to the end And who can tell but that the Lord may bring out a great deal of good to your soul by this evil of your Husbands fearfull apostacy which his Letter holds out God may open your eyes thereby to see your sinfull haste which you made in that Marriage He may humble you for rushing upon it against Counsel he may make you to know that he was angry against you by leaving him to such fearful error of way He hath laid a sore affliction upon you by giving up one so near and dear to you to such fearfull Temptations You have offended God through him and now you must be chastned in him Be awakned be awakned and consider the Lords righteous hand in this matter The person whom you have chosen God seems to have forsaken at least for a time he is become the Devils Captive O fear you and repent you least he also forsake you But we hope better of you and our prayer is that you may be setled and established in the truth We foresee that you will be strongly sollicited He that thought himself bound to tempt persons by his Letters at so great a distance what alluring ways will not he take to cause you to forsake your integrity and to turn aside to such fleshly deceits of Satan take heed you be not bewitched with pretences and quotations of Scripture presented in the Letter there lyes the greatest danger The Devil tempted Christ by telling him that it was written and his Instruments will use the same fleights They will put false Glosses upon Scripture while they deny all senses to be put upon Scripture to deceive themselves and others thereby The Apostle Peter saith 2 Pet. 3. 16. that some that are unlearned and unstable do wrest Scripture to their own destruction and he doth warn them lest they being led away by the error of the wicked do fall from their own stedfastness by such means And we also do beseech you to beware of this Snare viz of Scripture abused by misconstructions It is a misconstruction when the construction is made to follow the sound of the words though it be never so much repugnant to other Scripture You know that all Scripture is given by Inspiration of God 2 Tim 3 16. And that holy men spake as they were Inspired by the Holy Ghost 2 Pet. 1. 21. Now God is a God of Truth and the Spirit is a Spirit of Truth and cannot speak contrary things nor contradict himself therefore if there be any seeming contradiction in Scripture taken in the Letter of it we must seek after a right sense by which the seeming contradiction may be removed Your husband produceth many Scriptures to prove an absolute perfection without sin And the first Scripture he mentions is Phil. 3. 15. Let us saith Paul speaking of himself and the Philippians as many as be perfect be thus minded He Collects from hence that the Saints here have such a perfection that excludes all sin Alas poor Creature We thought he had been better acquainted with his own heart But he might have looked a little higher in the Chapter upon ver 12. and have discerned that Paul expresly denies Perfection in reference to himself Not as though I were already perfect saith he Was Paul perfect and yet was he not perfect In the Letter there is a contradiction But Paul speaking by the Spirit of God cannot contradict himself therefore we must look after the sense of the word Perfect It is many time taken for sincere 2 Kings 15. 14. Asa took not away the high places that was his failing Yet his heart was perfect In what sense perfect Was it perfect without sin Not so For it was his sin that the high places were not taken away But perfect that is Upright He did not serve God in pretence but in truth They say we must not give the sense of Scripture but must take it in the Letter but that is contrary to the examples of Scripture Those in Nehemiah 8. 8. read in the Book of the Law and gave the sense and it is necessary sometimes to avoid contradiction which is in the Letter to