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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
A80008	The hinge of faith and religion or, a proof of the deity against atheists and profane persons, by reason, and the testimony of Holy Scripture: the divinity of which is demonstrated, / by L. Cappel, Doctour and Professour in Divinity ; translated out of French by Philip Marinel, M.A. and fellow of Pembroke-College in Oxford.; Piuot de la foy et religion. English	Cappel, Louis, 1585-1658.; Marinel, Philip.	1660 (1660)	Wing C482; Thomason E1845_2; Thomason E2265_1; ESTC R209659	84,739	200

most noted Heathen Philosophers comes nothing near that sinful and corrupted man as he is naturally inclined to evil could not have invented so perfect a Rule to live by as that which is shewed unto us there Much less is the Devil Authour of chese things who is so great an enemy to all Virtue and Holiness that he would not have recommended or taught it unto men Besides if Damons are granted to be it must be consequently acknowledged That there is a God as hath been shewed before Whence it appears that these things proceed necessarily from Divine Revelation As to the Narrations and Histories they are so tyed and connexed unto the Doctrines that they cannot be separated one from another So that if the Histories are true and no forged things the Doctrines which are annexed to them must needs also be true For in every part of them you have a God Creatour and Governour of Heaven and Earth represented to you who doth see conduct and order all things a Judge of men who punisheth and chastiseth the one and doth reward and recompense the others who worketh wonders above and beyond all Natures Power who stiles and in effect shews himself to be such as he is there described viz. Eternal Infinite Immortal Invisible Incomprehensible Almighty VVise Good Just and Mercifull c. VVe see in the New Testament a man Jesus Christ our Lord stiling himself The Son of God and The Saviour of the World shewing and evidencing by his Miracles that he was indeed such a one dying for mens salvation arising again ascending into Heaven and there sitting at the right hand of God his Father and sending from thence the Holy Spirit upon his Apostles There he is seen ministred to by Angels preached to the Gentiles believed in the World and by the strength of his Spirit bearing down all Heathenish Idolatry and Superstition demolishing the empire of the Devil and triumphing gloriously over Sathan and over all his Power These Narrations are not Fables artificially invented as those of Homer and those of the Old and New Romancès of all sorts but are true Histories and genuine Relations of things which have really and certainly came to pass so as they are there related to us Which appears First by the Connexion and admirable contexture of these Relations which do strengthen follow and maintain one another with so exact and just an agreement that there is nothing there unjoynted or that doth bely any other matter therein contained Which in so great a multitude and variety of Narrations so well continued with all their Circumstances of Times Places and Persons and of which we do see many Traces and Footsteps in the most authentical and certain Monuments of Antiquity and so well continued by so many Ages from the Beginning of the World to our Lord Jesus for the space of four thousand years add to this the connexion and coherence there is between the Relations and Doctrines of the New Testament with those of the Old cannot have been compiled nor so admirably invented by any humane Industry though such a Writer had been as subtile and ingenious as it may be although one man alone which is not true had undertaken to write and continue such a design which he had before invented out of his own brain Much less could it be that so many and so different Writers as to Time and Place some in the Desart others in Judea others in Babylon others in Samaria two Kingdomes so contrary and Enemies one to the other some Jews other Christians two people so different in such a wonderfull variety of matters and so differing arguments of their Writings as are Histories Laws Political and Ecclesiastical Ordinances Moral Precepts Prophesies of many kinds Epistles Discourses Disputes of so differing stiles the one low genuine and popular the other figurate and sublime to which all humane Eloquence cannot attain the one terse and polished the other harsh and unpleasing it is I say impossible that so many and so different heads which have neither seen known nor combined together should have so well agreed in all points to divulge and put forth and give credit to a Fable so well continued and to suit so wonderfully all the Narrations Doctrines and Precepts which they lay there before us Secondly it appears That these are not sabulous Narrations and Tales made to deceive the VVorld because the Nation of the Jews the Origin and History of which is held forth to us in the Old Testament and is continued for the space of two thousand years and which is almost all the subject matter of all the Books of the Old Testament and makes a good part of the Books of the New Testament is and doth subsist yet at this day scattered upon the face of the Earth even so as their own Prophets had fore-told them Their Sanctions Customes Ceremonies and Religion the very same as was prescribed to them by their Law-giver Moses and by the Prophets It cannot be denied that Jesus Christ and his Apostles have been and have Preached in the World since that their Doctrine and their Writings are received and held by so many millions of Christians which have been for these 1600. years upon the Earth known and noted among men But it may be it wil be objected that the ground and basis of these Histories is true and hath some reality in it that there have been a Moses Joshua Judges and Kings of Israel a David a Solomon c. but that these Histories have been sluffed and garnished with Fictitious Tales as Homer's Iliad and Odyssea the Foundation of which is Historical since that once Troy Priam Hector Achilles had a real being but they have not done all that Homer tells and writes of them and as the Romances of Roland and Regnault who once were but never did that which the Romances written of them tell us So the Miracles and Wonders of Egypt of the Desart of Joshua of the Judges of the Kings of Jesus Christ and his Apostles are Ornaments invented by these Writers to set an higher value on what they present there to us Let us see whether there is any ground of Reason in this First Moses writes himself his own History and that of the people of the Jews which he had drawn from Egypt and led through the Desart for the space of fourty years with so incomparable an ingenuity and so far from suspicion of fraud or deceit that he notes there his own defects and faults and doth not bestow the most Honourable charges of this People the Priesthood or Royalty upon any of his Posterity And a little before his death he makes a long Sermon to them which is all the Book of Deuteronomy where he represents to them all things that had befallen them in the Desart and a little before their going out of Egypt just in the same manner as he relates it in the Books of Exodus Leviticus and Numbers Was it then any

separated and alienated through his Injustice Pollution and Perverseness which doth incline him to deny this Providence which he feareth as his Judg. And in this Infidelity of Man God would not leave himselfe without a Witnesse but hath lively engraved and imprinted himselfe in his Works so that man maugre himselfe is forced in those things to acknowledge this Deity And this is to convince man of his errour and to make good the Justice of his proceedings and the righteousnesse of his Judgments against their impiety And from what hath been said appears the strength of this Testimony against which nothing which is considerable can be objected as being a Testimony not only Humane or proceeding from the fancy or will of man but in effect a Divine one as being the meer motion of Nature and the dictate of Reason and wherein this Proverb is verified Vox Populi Vox Dei But let us pass from this Humane Testimony to that which is directly Divine CHAP. XIII The last Argument Drawn from the Testimony of the Holy Scriptures the Divinity of which is proved against the Atheists ABove all these Proofs and Reasons which have been brought heretofore against Atheism is that which is drawn from the Testimony of the Holy Scriptures contained in the Books of the Old and New Testaments which teach and inculcate to us nothing else then an only true God maker of Heaven and Earth what he is his Virtues his Perfections his Proprieties and Attributes his Works as well of the Creation of the World and his Governing of it as also those of mans Redemption his Counsels Designs the Decrees of his Will concerning Humane kind the Salvation of the one the Condemnation of the others also the Honour Respect Service and Adoration which we are bound to pay unto him and which he doth also require of us what we ought to fear or to expect and hope from him in summ the true and only means to be perfectly and eternally happy which is that which all men do naturally desire and wish for and at which all their actions do aim So that if these Sacred Books are true and not forged and invented by the Artifice or malice of wily and deceitfull men it 's evident and not to be doubted that there is a God and that he is such an one as is there described to us To which the Atheists reply nothing but this Who say they will warrant us that what those Writers say is true and that their design hath not been to impose upon our beliefs and deceive us Moses say they says very much but proves nothing intimating that he is a Tale-teller and that he will be believed upon his bare word And one of them hath said That our Lord Jesus Christ to give the more weight to his Doctrine hath called himself but falsly the Son of God yea God himself Those persons imagine and will have the World believe that these Divine writers are such as Numa Pompilius who did attribute his Books and Laws to the Deity of the Nymph Aegeria with whom he pretended to have familiar Conversation or as Mahcmeth who saith that he received his Alcoran from the Angel Gabriel It 's not my design to proceed very far in this point to prove at large against such persons the Divinity of the Holy Scriptures 'T is too large a subject for the narrow bounds of this small treatrse besides it would be Actum agere since that all those of the Holy Fathers of the Church or Learned Divines which have lived since these 200 years which have demonstrated the truth of Christian Religion against the Heathenish and other Sects which have been raised since have ever begun this way this being the very Basis Hinge and Foundation of true Religion which is whether on purpose or not I know not basely betrayed to the Atheists by those who pretend that the Scripture hath no authority over us but only as those who call themselves the Church give it that power and validity For setting aside the Scripture these persons who call themselves the Church cannot demonstrate their pretended infallibility nor prove and perswade the world that they ought to be beleived upon their bare word whatever they say as the Divinity of the Scriptures may be demonstrated to profane persons upon their own Authority and by themselves I will only for the ending of this small Treatise bring some general Considerations by which one may see the foolishness and vanity of this frivolous exception of the Atheists and of their false accusations in saying that the Holy Scripture is nothing but a dream and invention of men without certain ground of Truth There are then 4 principal things which shew the impertinency of this exception 1. The quality and condition 2. The number and diversity 3. The Scope end of these Sacred Writers And finally The Nature and quality of the things they write These things being well considered it will appear that those things which those men have writ are not Tales and Deceits and things which they have feigned to make the world beleive them I will speak of these four things very briefly leaving those things for any man to amplifie upon As to the first Those that make it their business to deceive and make Fables and Forgeries are for the most part subtile cunning wary and knavish persons and withall of a low or mean Condition But great and high spirits magnanimous and Heroical Souls Kings great Princes and Monarchs Persons of rare and exquisite Learning and of sublime wisdom never stoop to so low and unworthy an imployment as that of Juglers deceivers And those that are rude ignorant illiterate and of too low and abject condition are not fit or able to invent such things and to give so much colour to their forgeries as to make them to be believed and received for currant Now among the Sacred writers there are some of these two sorts There are Kings and Princes great Captains and Conquerours and emment Persons in Dignity and Authority in Learning and incomparable Wisdom You have there a Joshuah one of the greatest and most eminent Captains and Conquerours that ever was You have there David one of the bravest most generous and glorious Kings and most eminent for his Valour Battells Feats of Arms and Victories that ever was seen You have there Solomon the most Rich Magnificent Illustrious and Wisest King that ever was in the World You have Daniel the first and chiefest Officer in the Court of the greatest Monarchy in the World in whom there was found more of true high and sublime Wisdome then in all those Wise men of that Nation and Monarchy in which he was an Officer You have Mordecai and Nehemiah great and mighty Persons and of the chiefest in the Court of the Kings of Persia which relate unto us their own History You have Job a great rich and mighty Person in his time yet greater in in Goodness Patience

Hereticks amongst Christians have done which never intended their inventions and absurdities to any good end as the Publick good or the concernment of humane kind or to induce men to follow virtue and shew them the way to true happiness I believe that no man in his wits will say that the Sacred Histories of the Old and New Testament are Romances invented to delight men and to gain the Writers the credit of worldly-eloquent persons and of that politenesse of Wit which is accounted so among men The stile and manner of writing these Books is farr different from that of the Romances and all the circumstances of time places and persons are so punctually observed and every where so agreeing that one must be barbarous and wilde or altogether stupid and besotted that doth not perceive the wonderfull and infinite difference there is betwixt these Sacred Histories and the fabulous Romances Besides that those who make Romances compile them so if they are able men as that there is some likelihood in what they relate and shun as much as they can the prodigious Fictions of Amadis Nevertheless they clearly evidence that they do not desire to be believed in those things which they relate but that their design is to charm by the elegancy of the stile their ingenious inventions and the likelihood of those things the eyes of the minde and to make it see those things which really are not and to delight their Readers by this pleasant cheat But the Pen-men of the Sacred Histories do propose them as things certain true and indubitable and desire that they may be believed for such Which would be a grosse folly in them and a thing unworthy men of parts if they were Romances forged and invented on purpose Besides that the stile of these Writings is very mean and popular and far from the way of writing of those whose design it is to abuse and deceive the World Neither will it be proved that the Authours of these Sacred Books have endeavoured to entrap and deceive men by their fictions and inventions of honors pleasures estates or riches Neither Moses or Joshua have endeavoured to leave the conduct of the Jewish Common-Wealth to their children Moses had no need to leave Pharaoh's Court to enjoy Honour and Riches since if he had staid there he might have been reputed the Son of the Daughter of Pharach David hath not by his Writings and Psalms acquired that glory and power which he had but hath got it by his Valour by the Wars which he made and the favour and blessing of God who hath protected and directed him What needed he being a great and mighty King to busie himself in composing of those Psalms if they be but meer empty inventions What humane end could he propose to himself in this Solomon his son hath not acquired nor sought after that Honour Glory and Riches which he hath possessed in greater measure then all the rest of the Kings of the Earth Jin the composition of the Proverbs Ecclesiastes and Canticles He enjoyed all these things afore he writ any thing of these Books and in his Ecclesiastes he shews plainly enough the little or no esteem he had of them Have Isaiah Jeremiah Ezechiel and the twelve small Prophets sought by their Writings the goods honours and pleasures of this World They who have been for this thing hated derided persecuted and put to death and this not contrary to their design and expectation and against their will for they submitted willingly and have undergone all those evils in obedience to this God who sent them Did our Lord Jesus Christ and his Apostles follow and endeavour after these things No but quite contrariwise they do exhort and perswade their Disciples and followers not to love or seek them and rather to expect the crosses tribulations and persecutions of the World for the Profession of that Doctrine they taught them Shall we say that vanity and desire of glory have led these Persons to this that they might gain the reputation of men of Parts and of subtile Persons Nothing lesse Could the Apostles who were poor fishermen rude illiterate and ignorant persons aspire to this Glory and could they expect this credit from the men of their times or from posterity Besides that their Writings are full of the contempt they had and would every one of their Disciples to have of such a glory Solomon hath not sought for this by his Writings afore he writ he had that great Wisdom which hath gained him the reputation of the most Learned and Wise of all the men that went before him And he hath had this credit and reputation not by holding or putting forth Paradoxes and extravagant Opinions invented by him against the common Tenents of other men but by a true and right Wisdom and an admirable Knowledge which in effect he had of the Nature of all things David and Joshua had acquired Glory and Credit enough by their Archievements without affecting this by their Writings and maintaining Fantastical Opinions If Moses would have sought after worldly glory he would rather have acquired it by the VVisdom of the Egyptians in which he had been instructed and which was then in great repute in the World then by inventing new Opinions Doctrines Daniel had enough of the Learning of the Chaldeans which he knew well to gain esteem and reputation amongst men without broaching a new unheard-of and strange Doctrine So then it is evident that the desire of vain-glory hath not induced these Holy VVriters to tell us Dreams and Phantasms of their brain VVhat then is it Is it the affection to the Publique good and their desire they had to profit men that hath moved them to tell us their new inventions and stories of their own making Sometimes indeed Fictions are used in Moral and Politick documents Aesop's Fables are all of this nature And many times Oratours do use such Fictions in their Orations as that of Menenius Agrippa of the dissension there was between the belly and the other parts of the body And the Scripture it self uses these sometimes as that of the Son of Geaeon of the Trees that chose themselves a King Parables also are a kind of instructing Moral Fiction as that of Gad to David of the Poor man and his Sheep And of such Parables are the Gospels full and in the Discourses of our Lord Jesus Christ they are very frequent But these things have nothing common nor do not relate to that of which we treat now The question is Whether the Histories of the Old and New Testament are Tales and Fables or whether they be Relations of things that have really and truely came to pass Those who do write Apologues Parables c. do not write them for true Histories they shew plainly enough that they speak such things meerly to instruct and not for things that have really happened But the Sacred Writers do give us their Histories for the true Narrations of things

which they say was discovered by Jesus Christ and stolen by him out of their Temple and partly to the Efficacy and Illusion of Daemons and Magical Arts of which they say they had knowledge which is the foolish and ridiculous Exception of these desperate persons which choose rather to speak all manner of Impertinencies then to confess the Truth The admirable Virtue and Efficacy of the Doctrine of the Gospel which by so weak Instruments as were the Apostles and their first Successours notwithstanding all the Contradiction Opposition and Persecution of the World hath been received in the World and hath abolished all the Heathenish Idolatry and Superstition which hath produced so wonderfull and exemplary Righteousness Uprightness Integrity and Holiness of Life in the Primitive Christians which hath ravished into Admiration their Persecutours themselves and which hath made men to resolve to lose voluntarily all that is sweet pleasing agreeable and most charming the flesh in this Life and to suffer all that which is most harsh and horrible for the hope of another Life after this This Power I say and this so wonderfull Efficacy of the Christian Doctrine in the Professours of it is a Proof and an invincible Argument of the Divinity of it and that it cannot be a Fiction or Invention of man's brain And so consequently that since this Doctrine is no where else Originally to be found then in the Writings of the Old and New Teftament it must needs be that these first Pen-men have received it from God who hath revealed it to men to teach and publish it to other men that it might induce them to that Holiness Uprightness and Integrity of Life to that Patience and Forbearance Humility and incomparable Goodness which it hath caused in those men who have received it and thereby bring them to the fruition of that Eternal Life and Felicity which it promiseth And if it hath not alwaies and at all times and most especially at this day produced these so admirable Effects in all those that make Profession of it it is not for any defect that is in the Doctrine but it is the fault of those that make Profession of it who have not that true Faith and Perswasion which they profess to have But nevertheless there will alwaies be found amongst true Christians more Holiness Justice Uprightness Righteousness and Integrity of Life more Humility Patience Courage Virtue and Constancy more true Piety and Charity then in any other Religion in the World and then can ever be found amongst those that teach and follow Atheism which we oppose whose Profession is quite contrary to this and hath no other end then to carry men to all kinds of Vice Filthiness Dissolution and Injustice These Proofs and Arguments of the Divinity of the Holy Scriptures might be enlarged and amplified many others might be here added great Volumes might be writ on this Subject and it may be that some after us will undertake this task But this sufficeth for our purpose and it is enough to shut the mouth of the Profane that is to reduce them to say nought but fooleries and impertinencies and to shew themselves altogether ridiculous and absurd in disputing against so many invincible Arguments of the Divinity of the Holy Scriptures Now as to those that call themselves the Church and who upon this account do pretend that we cannot nor ought not to give credit to the Scripture but because they give it this Testimony That it is Divine If they will be believed they must necessarily do two things First They must shew that all the fore-going Arguments are invalid and of no moment and are in no wise capable to perswade to any man the Divinity of the Scriptures yea they must even say That there is nothing at all in the Scriptures which is able to make us to discern the Divinity and Truth of them Secondly They must shew that as for their part they have in themselves Reasons Proofs and Arguments much stronger clearer and evident more demonstrative and uncontroulable to evince that they are more Divine and Infallible then the Scriptures and that therefore they ought rather to be believed in whatsoever they say then any thing that is taught in these Books as being in themselves incomparably more Infallible and Divine then this Volume of Holy Writ which is contained in the Books of the Old and New Testament Now I suppose that they would not undertake to demonstrate these two things and if they would come to the triall of it they should finde themselves very busie and their Proofs would be found invalid their Arguments and Reasonings very weak yea none at all For although they had confuted these Reasons which we have here mentioned where will they finde any stronger or more invincible to prove that they are more Divine then the Holy Scriptures For for them to force men to believe them upon their bare word without any reason shew'd why we should believe them that they are Infallible it is to deal too injustly and too unworthily to abuse the patience and credulity of men And to say as they do That we ought to believe them to be Infallible because our Lord hath said to St. Peter I prayed for thee that thy faith fail not and I will give thee the Keys of the Kingdom of Heaven grant even this which we deny them that the sense of these words was such as they would have it to be yet it is alwaies to acknowledge by this that we are perswaded of the Divinity of the Scriptures where these words are found before we can ever be certain of the Infallibility of those to whom they pretend these words are directed And therefore the belief which we have of the Divinity of the Scriptures is not grounded upon the Testimony of those to whom they would have us believe the Scripture renders in the fore-cited words so clear and solemn testimony of Infallibility It is therefore an ill-grounded and vain presumption in them to say That the Scripture can have no more credit with us then Aesop's Fables or Mahomet's Alcoran if it were not for the Testimony they give that it is Divine since that they themselves draw from it and from its Testimony as they do pretend all the Infallibility they so much boast of But let this be said onely by the by for the maintaining more strongly the Divinity of the Holy Scriptures against the Atheists which those men by such an Assertion do wholly subvert and thereby expose at unawares the Christian Religion to the profane mockings of the Atheists who will ask these Gentlemen with reason enough that they demonstrate to them by good and solid Reasons and concluding Arguments their pretended Infallibility which ought to oblige all the World to believe the Testimony they render to the Scripture That it is Divine and that therefore all that is therein contained and taught ought to be certainly believed as a most firm Truth And let