Selected quad for the lemma: book_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
book_n	old_a	prophet_n	testament_n	5,085	5	8.1969	4	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A61521	An answer to Mr. Cressy's Epistle apologetical to a person of honour touching his vindication of Dr. Stillingfleet / by Edw. Stillingfleet.	Stillingfleet, Edward, 1635-1699.; Clarendon, Edward Hyde, Earl of, 1609-1674.	1675 (1675)	Wing S5556; ESTC R12159	241,640	564

the ecstatical Visions and Raptures and Revelations which Montanus and his followers pretended to Baronius proves from the testimonies of Philastrius Epiphanius Theodoret and others that Montanus and his companions were good Catholicks and great practisers of fasting and mortifications and were in great esteem in the Church for a more than ordinary degree of sanctity when they wee in this reputation they pretended to have extraordinary Visions and Ecstasies wherein they suffered such violences as Mother Teresa describes and were under such a force upon their minds as they thought divine which deprived them of the present use of ratiocination in which state they said they had many Revelations from God Now here we have the very case of Mystical Unions and we all know that this Spirit of Montanus was rejected in the Christian Church as a Fanatick Enthusiastical Spirit but it will be worth our while to shew that it was upon this very ground because the Montanists pretended to such Ecstasies and Revelations from God which deprived men of the use of their Reason Claudius Apollinaris Bishop of Hierapolis apprehending the dangerous consequences of these Enthusiastical pretences to Ecstasies and Revelations goes to Ancyra in Galatia to give himself full satisfaction as to the nature of them and being returned he writes this account to his friend Marcellus that Montanus was wont to fall into sudden transports and ecstasies in which he became Enthusiastical and uttered strange things and prophesie which saith he is a thing contrary to the constant tradition and practice of the Christian Church the same he saith of the two female Enthusiasts Prisca and Maximilla and all the account he gives of their separation from the communion of the Church was because the Christian Church all over the world refused to give any entertainment to their Enthusiastical Spirit and that the Churches of Asia having met together and examined this Spirit they condemned it as impious whereupon they were cast out of the Church upon which Maximilla cryed out I am driven away as a Wolf from the Sheep but I am no Wolf but the Word and the Spirit and the Power Miltiades as appears by Eusebius writ a Book against the Montanists on this subject that God did not communicate Revelations in Ecstasies wherein he shewed that Montanus was wont to fall into his Ecstasies which ended in an involuntary Madness and then proves that none of the Prophets either of the Old or New Testament ever prophesied in Ecstasies or when they had no use of their Reason But no one speaks more punctually to this business than Epiphanius who layes down this as a general Rule that whatever Prophets spake they delivered with the clear use of their Reason and Understanding and afterwards saith that the Montanists were very much deceived in pretending to such Visions and Revelations because God had sealed up his Church and put an end to those extraordinary Gifts While there was any need of Prophets holy men of God were sent by him with a true Spirit 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 with great steadiness of mind and a clear understanding and afterwards makes this the characteristical difference of a true and false Prophet that a true Prophet speaks 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 with a great consistency of ratiocination and consequence Thus Moses thus Isaiah saith he thus all the Prophets Do not you see saith he that these are the words of men that understood themselves and not of men that were ecstatical but these pretenders to Visions and Revelations speak dark and perplexed and obscure things viz. much like to Mystical Divinity which neither they understood themselves nor those that hear them As any one may see in him by the fragments he hath preserved both of Montanus and Maximilla But they pleaded Scripture too for their Ecstasies and Raptures viz. Gen● 2. 21. Gods sending upon Adam a deep sleep which was rendered 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to which Epiphanius answers that that was only a binding of his senses by natural rest and not any force upon the mind but they had another place too as impertinent as this but as impertinent as it is it is the very same phrase that my Adversaries produce Ego dixi in ●xcessu meo which Epiphanius proves cannot be understood of any such Ecstasie as the Montanists pleaded for and in Truth he needed not take much pains to do it But they could not follow the Montanists exactly unless they abused Scripture too to justifie their Visions and Ecstasies So one Ferdinandus de Diano a Venetian Divine writing a Book purposely in Vindication of these things on the occasion of the Ecstasies and Visions of a Certain Nun which were sent to Paul the fifth and which were taken by her Confessor for fourteen years together makes use of the very same phrases of Scripture as the Montanists did but exceeds them in impertinency for to prove Raptures he produces all the places where the word raptus is used raptus est nè malitia mutaret intellectum ejus Sap. 4. Mens illius ad diversa rapitur Job 26. rapiemur cum illis in nubibus 1 Thess. 4. but above all commend me to Holofernes his Rapture to prove the Raptures of the Popish Saints Holophernis oculi à sandalibus Iudith rapti sunt ejus cor sensus cum illis rapta sunt Jud. 16. Can any man be so hard hearted to withstand such manifest proofs as these are But to return to Epiphanius we are not to understand saith he any Rapture or Ecstasie of the Prophets so as to suppose them to be deprived of the use of their reason and them So he shews that S. Peter in his Ecstasie had still the free exercise of his Reason which he absolutely affirms of every Prophet both of the Old and New Testament What would Epiphanius have thought then of the glorious frenzies and heavenly follies of M. Teresa in which she spake she knew not what What of the Mystical Unions wherein the operations of the understanding are suspended What of all the holy Violences she underwent wherein both understanding and memory were distracted No doubt he would have declared them all to be downright Montanism and condemned by the whole Christian Church Neither were these the only Persons who delivered the sense of the Church in this matter but S. Hierom saith the same thing The Prophet saith he speaks not in an Ecstasie as Montanus and Prisca and Maximilla fondly imagine but what he prophesies is the Book of the Vision of one who understands all he sayes So of the Prophet Habakkuk he understands what he sees contrary to the perverse doctrine of Montanus and speaks not as a fool nor gives as distracted women do a sound without any signification Whence it comes that the Apostle commands that if any thing be revealed to another that sitteth by the first should hold his peace for saith he presently after