Selected quad for the lemma: cause_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
cause_n	action_n	effect_n	necessary_a	1,860	5	7.1073	4	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A77707	Rome's conviction: or, A discoverie of the unsoundness of the main grounds of Rome's religion, in answer to a book, called The right religion, evinced by L.B. Shewing, 1. That the Romish Church is not the true and onely Catholick Church, infallible ground and rule of faith. 2. That the main doctrines of the Romish Church are damnable errors, & therefore to be deserted by such as would be saved. By William Brownsword, M.A. and minister of the Gospel at Douglas Chappell in Lancashire.	Brownsword, William, b. 1625 or 6.	1654 (1654)	Wing B5216; Thomason E1474_2; ESTC R209513	181,322	400

you say the Scriptures declare not that its lawfull to eat strangled meats and blood Answ 1. The Scriptures declare that every creature of God is good and nothing to be refused if it be received with thanksgiving 1 Tim. 4.4 And that Christians are not to be judged for their eating of any meats Col. 2.16 So it be not with the offence of our brother who is weak thus Lyra on that decree of the Apostles concerning strangled meats and blood saith Those who were newly converted from Judaisme did abhor these meats Lyran. in Acts 5.20 and ther●fore although it was meat that lawfully might be eaten yet for their sakes the Gentiles were commanded to abstain from as a man is to abstain from that meat which is hateful to his companion but afterwards the cause ceasing through the clear discovery of the Gospel the effect ceased And this Gospel light he fetcheth from Math. 15. and 1 Tim. 4. both which are Scripture 2. It may be questioned whether it be necessary to salvation to beleeve that things strangled blood may be lawful to be eaten The Kingdom of God is not meat and drink we are not justified by meat It s weaknesse to think any meat unlawful Rom. 14.2 but not heretical the eating or refusing of meats is of that kind of things quae dubium est quo animo fiant not of those quae non possunt bono animo fi●ri as Augustine distinguisheth Thus much for answer to your reason and its confirmation Lastly In the close of your Chapter you bring an argument to prove that Spiritists do not make the Scriptures a rule of their belief 't is this Were Scripture the rule of their belief though it contain divers truths yet those truths meeting and becoming one in revelation they wo ld all perfectly agree not only Lutherans amo g themselves Zuinglians among themselves Calvenists among themselves but likewise Lutherans with Zuinlians c. It being the property of unitie to unite and make one all that conform to the same Answ 1. You suppose that all they who acknowledg one Rule must perfectly agree amongst themselves which is evidently false an exact walking according the same rule is not attainable by any society on this side heaven For 1. All have not the same measure of knowledg whereby they should understand exactly every point in Scripture many things are Scriptural by consequence which must be found out by argument and are hardlier understood than other things Though in some places of Scripture a Lamb may wade yet in others an Elephant may swim The Apostle saith Let us as many as be perfect be thus minded if in any thing ye be otherwise minded God shall reveal even this unto you Nevertheless whereto we have already attained let us walk by the same rule c. Phil. 3.15.16 It s a perfection an high attainment for Christians to be perfectly one Yea it s a priviledg of another life Rhem. annot on Phil. 3.15 where knowledg becomes perfect Eph. 4.13 with 1 Cor. 13. The Rhemists acknowledg this as the judgment of Saint Paul acknowledging that in this imperfection of mens science in this life everie one cannot be free from all error or think the same that another thinketh whereupon may arise difference of understanding opinion and Judgment in certa n hard matters which God hath not revealed or the Church determined and therefore that such diversity is tollerable and agreeable to our humane condition and the state of the way that we be in 2. All have not the same measure of grace and freedome from corruption and passions which prevail to draw men from a conformity to the same rule Some are of a crosse and peevish temper subject to a spirit of contradiction maintaining errors lest they should seem to be overcome by others or not to have been so sound as others are Passion had a great influx upon the differences of our first reformers nor are you free from this evil this Spirit of contradiction You reject clear expositions of Scripture because we approve of them When Augustine comparing the Jewish and Christian Sacraments saith fuerunt c. they were divers in the signs but alike in the thing signified grounding his speech upon 1 Cor. 10.3 Maldonate answers I am perswaded if Augustine had lived in our age he would have thought otherwise especially perceiving the heretical Calvinists to be of of his opinions And he further adds I rather approve my own exposition than that of Augustin because this is more contradictory to the Calvinists Mald. in Joan. 6. 2. Your selves acknowledg one Rule the Church yet cannot truly say that all Papists do perfectly agree I shall shew the contrary hereafter 3. Though Protestants differ about particular truths yet they all agree in this that whatsoever God reveals to them in Scripture they are bound to beleeve it Herein Lutherans Zuinghans and Calvenists as you name them do fully agree 4. You falsly and ignorantly suggest to your seduced followers that the Protestant Churches are full of divisions and disagreements Calvenists differing amongst themselves and from Lutherans c. Sir I pray you read the harmonious confessions of Protestant Churches and if by them you be not convinced of error in your next give us some catalogues of those divided and sub-divided differences you generally mention till then we shall suspend our belief of you Your reason in these words It being the property of unitie to unite c. is a piece of non-sence If you had mentioned Rule instead of unity it had been most true but nothing to purpose It is the property of a rule to unite and make one all that conform to it So that to the making up of this unity there must not only be an exact rule but a perfect conformity to it in them whom it doth concern which perfect conformity canot be yeelded by any living man to the Word of God because of ignorance and corruption which remain in the very best of men The conclusion of your Argument needs no answer the Premises being overthrown What you say of our doing homage to Luther Calvin and Zuinglius's fancy is simple and false You know we abhor a blind obedience and an implicite faith The books our people read ordinarily are not Luther Calvin or Zuinglius's works but the sacred Scriptures by which we examine all writings even their 's you now mention if we meet with them We look upon Luther Calvin and Zuinglius as eminent lights in the Church of God not as Gods We say not Dominus Deus noster Calvinus c. as some of you have said of your Pope We acknowledg them indued with the Spirit but not infallibly inspired as holders forth of an old light hid under a Romish bushel not as introducers of any new one as reformers not innovators We reverence them as pious men now with the Lord but neither pray to them nor keep holidays for them our homage we

Constantinople did fully decree against them Three points of religion are alwayes good and convenient and cannot become bad and inconvenient by any circumstances as you suggest To say fundamentals cannot become bad but accidentals may were to set up that which you have been endeavouring to throw down pag. 64. viz. the distinction of Fundamentals and Accidentals all points being with you equally fundamental and substantial But granting that matters of religion may be altered so as the contrary to that was formerly taught and believed may now nay must be approved this must necessarily make contrariety division and this will take of the objected slander 6. Objection THe sixt Objection is The Roman Church is injurious to Christs merits approving of humane merits Ans Reason and experience shew a diversity of Agents that as some are necessitated as beasts other-some are free as men and therefore capable of merit and demerit whereby they are differenced from beasts which are uncapable of either the assertion of humane merits is no other wrong to Christ then the affirming of a plaine and clear truth can be wrong to him Reply 1. The Objection doth not speake of merits in general or in order to temporal rewards from men and therefore your answer thus far and the body of it reacheth little or no further is to no purpose But 2. It s questionable whether a creatures capacity of merit or demerit doe absolutely depend upon freedom of will Seneca saith that the service of cruel Elephants is merited by their meat Certainly according to the use of the words with ancient writers it may agree to beasts from them you fetch your prooffs for it Aquinas though he denies them to have freedom of wil affirms that they act quodam judicio by a kind of judgment By this judgment they know what we would have them do do it thereby may for any thing appears to the contrary deserve some thing proportionable to their work And although as you say they are necessitated yet this necessity is not without a kind of judgement whereby a beast doth act somtimes rather willingly then by coaction 3. Though you sometimes ascribe the power of meriting to Grace yet it appears that the main ground is Free-will which is here laid at lest as a foundation of your answer so that the grace of God doth but come in the second place and herein you are not alone but have other Papists joyning with you But I come to examine your answers to the Objections you make for us Obj. 1. It will say you be opposed men are capable of merit and dem rit in order to temporal but not to Eternal rewards Reply As God hath enabled men to deserve temporal so eternal rewards Ans 1. If you speak of rewards as proceeding from God man can never truely deserve eternal nor so much as temporal rewards though one man may deserve these at the hands of another 2. It will not follow that Because men can merit temporal rewards at the hands of men therefore they may merit eternal rewards from God For 1. Humane rewards are finite and may be proportioned by our work and where there is proportion there may be merit But because there is no proportion between our works and an eternal reward there can be no merit Therefore the Apostle doth very well express the immeritoriousness of that which is the top of Christian works viz. Martyrdome Rom. 8.18 Dionys Carthus in Rom. 8.18 and Gloss Ordin The sufferings of this present life are not worthy or meritorious c. Non sunt digni ad vitam Eternam promerendam The reason whereof is rendred by Theodoret. Theod. Haymo apud Lyran. Superant certamina coronae The Crowns surpass the conflicts the rewards are not proportioned to the labours for the labour is little but the gain hoped for is great and therefore the Apostle doth not call those things we expect Wages but Glory So Haymo Si quilibet hominum c. If any man could fulfill all the Commandments of the old and new Testament and could undergoe all kinds of torments he should by no means be worthy of the future glory of the Elect. Why because those are temporal this is eternal Job 35.7 1 Cor. 4.7 2. Man may be profited by us and may have that from us which is none of his but this cannot be said of God He is not profited by our righteousness nor can he receive any thing from us but what is his own But how ●ay it be proved that God hath enabled men to deserve eternal rewards You answer It is apparent in Scripture learning Heaven a Crown of Justice a Reward a Goal 2 Tim. 4. Matth. 5 1 Cor. 9. which necessarily impose merits as their Correlatives bare actions void of desert being looked on only as by way of gifts Reply 1. Your Argument is divers ways peccant For 1. Your consequence is not good Heaven is called a Crown of Justice a Reward a Goal therefore God hath enabled men to merit Eternal rewards Heaven may be so called with relation to Christs merits not ours Primasius calls it a Crowne of Righteousness with relation to the righteousness of justification which is in Christ yea further it may be so called without any necessary supposal of merit A Crown of justice is no more but a crown coming to us in a righteous and just manner and thus it may come without our merits As mercy makes us Kings so it gives us Crowns And what rational man can doubt but that rewards may be free Lyranus brings in Chrysostome thus commenting upon the Text in Timothy Si fides gratia est c. If Faith be Grace and Eternal life the reward of Faith it may seeme that God gives Eternal life to the believer as a due debtowing to him not because he hath merited it by faith but because faith is grace and life eternal is grace he gives it there of grace Heaven as it refers to Christs actions and passions is a truely merited reward an effect flowing from its proper cause but as it refers to ours its onely as an end relating to its means wherein it s attained or as an improper effect of that which hath onely a negative causality or is Causa sine qua non And this is no more then what Cassander observes Cassand Hymn Eccles p. 262 263 The more searching and religious School-men to say conformably to that of Bernard Bernard Durand ap Cass ep 19. p. 110. That those things which we call merits are the way to the Kingdom but not the cause of Raigning Yea further he expresly sayth That mens merits are not such as that life eternal is of justice due unto them or that God should wrong men if he gave it not And Durand affirms that God is not our debtor nor obliged of justice to us because of our good habits or acts which he hath given us and that to thinks or

fancies First prove that Christ hath communicated meritoriousness to mens actions and that this is one of his reall perfections and then we shall conclude that to acknowledge two perfections to Christ is to give more than to acknowledge one onely In the interim this may disswade us from believing you because Christ hath fully merited whatsoever is obtainable by a Christian either here or hereafter He hath purchased eternall redemption for us what need then of our purchasing that which is already fully paid for I will conclude with the speech of learned Rivet Meritum est personalis actio c. i. e. Merit is the personall action of the Son of God incommunicable to any of his members in regard of meriting which consists in the infinite vertue of the person meriting answerable to the excellent weight of glory Whereas therefore no simple creature is capable of this infinite vertue it will follow that Christ alone is the singular solitary and immediate cause of merit who hath therefore fully satisfied and merited whatsoever is necessary to us for salvation Rivet sum contra tract 4. 9. 17. Sect. 6. Object 2. It will be opposed all Actions besides Christs are duties and duties are inconsistent with merit Reply They are so without Covenant and acceptance so is obedience in a childe a servant a subject due to his Father his Master his Prince Nevertheless as a Father a Master a Prince making a compact to gratifie some particular act of his Childe his Servant his Subject innobles the same and intitles it to what was promised even so by the means of Gods Covenant 1 Tim. 4. Rom. 26. Hebr. 6. That he will reward certain actions of men though otherwise due and accept the same as worthy they become meritorious and their reward due upon this account Answ 1. It s Good sport to see what tuging there is amongst Papists about the ground of our actions meritoriousnes or whence it proceeds whether from Free-will as Aquinas Aquin. supr Dionys in Rom. 8.18 or from the Spirit the Fountain of good Actions as Dionysius Carthusiensis or from the habit of Charity as Azorius and Cajetan or from Divine Covenant as Scotus and some ancient Schoolmen or from the work it self as Soto Or lastly from the work it self together with the Divine compact as Bellarmine Bellarm. de Justif c. 5. lib. 17. This Author though first he mentioned Free-will yet he comes off to Covenant or compact Concil Senon decret 16. de fide apud Bennium and seems to lay all upon this and hereby as Vasquez acknowledgeth overthrows merit and condignitie which he hath been pleading for and indeed upon this account one of their Councels doth deny Condignity in these words Facietque tandem omnis misericordia c. At length mercy shall make way for every one according to the merit of their works not by absolute condignitie for the sufferings of this life are not condign to future glory but rather by the free and liberall promise of God c. Now if the promise of God be the foundation of our receiving Heaven and this promise be free then how can it be that because of this promise our works should be meritorious But leaving these boasters of unity to their hot disputes I answer secondly Gods Covenant doth not make our Actions cease to be duties for then it should nullifie the Law of God which doth injoyn acts of obedience as duties But we must not set Gods Covenant and his Law at variance as if contrary one to the other The truth is Gods free Covenant wherein for the sake of Jesus Christ he promiseth to believers salvation is an exciter of us unto obedience causing us to yield more freely and willingly than otherwise we should this is the Tenor of the Gospel Luke 1 68. c. Tit. 2 11. c. Here is first the purchase of Redemption salvation deliverance from the power of Satan and hereby an Obligation to duty A father promiseth a childe that he will make to him such lands freely this promise doth excite the child to do for his father what he commands him and to study in all things to please him whose love to him he is sensible of by the promise This the Apostle shews when he saith We lov● him because he loved us first Exod. 20. And indeed the morall Law runs thus I am the Lord thy God that brought thee out of the Land of Egypt therefore thou shalt have none other gods before me Thus God said to Abraham I am the Almighty God walk before me and be thou perfect But because it may be thought that obedience is meritorious because God promiseth life upon it I further answer this will not follow For first Obedience such as the Law requires is not attainable by us since the fall and therefore the promise may refer to our obedience in the person of Christ whose obedience becomes ours whilest we apply our selves to him by Faith Or secondly if it refer to our personall obedience it doth respect our obedience onely as a disposition wrought by him in the Subject upon whom he will bestow life not as a proper cause of life As if a father should say If his childe please him be hopefull and take good wayes he will give him the inheritance this promise doth not suppose that the childs pleasing of his father or being hopefull and taking good wayes is the proper cause of his receiving the inheritance but it s his fathers good will that gives it him thus disposed and qualified thus it was with the Israelites God promiseth them Canaan onely requires that they should perform their duty to him as their God and Father Now should any one say that this promise made their obedience meritorious of Canaan the Scripture would contradict him which expresly saith Not for thy righteousness or for the uprightness of thine heart dost thou go to possess their land but for the wickedness of these Nations the Lord thy God doth drive them out before thee and that he may perform the word which the Lord sware unto thy Fathers c. Deut. 9.5 Thirdly God doth no where promise to accept of mens works as worthy of heaven or to give them a reward because their works are worthy or condignly meritorious or as your Rhemists speak Fully worthi● of everlasting life For if this were so there would be no room for grace for that which is fully worthy of somewhat hath an equality with the thing which is therefore due to it whether there be promise or no. The Texts you urge prove that God will give heaven to men in the way of godliness patient continuance in well doing c. But they cannot prove that godlyness or well doing are the proper cause of our enjoying heaven the reward being hundred fold more than what we do your instances are short of proof for it for if that Act required of a servant or subject be a part of