Selected quad for the lemma: cause_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
cause_n	faith_n	ghost_n	holy_a	3,402	5	5.4439	4	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A36019	Prove all things, hold fast that which is good, I Thess. 5.21 handled in two sermons at S. Maries in Cambridge, the first on the Commencement-Sabbath, July 1, 1655, the other since / by William Dillingham.	Dillingham, William, 1617?-1689.	1656 (1656)	Wing D1486; ESTC R19188	41,854	64

interpretationis as they were Pastours of the Church and while they conferred together seeking God they were in the use of the best means to find out truth and under a promise also but not of infallibility and therefore although we cannot make them the rule of our faith yet ought we not rashly to reject them when they are offered to us nor to slight their judgements as if they were nothing worth but seriously to examine their reasons and grounds on which they went We honour the Fathers as men whom God's providence raised up and indued with gifts to quell the growing heresies of their times and doubtlesse if they were more lookt into they would furnish us with tried weapons armour approved to subdue the self-same heresies risen again among us in these our dayes and prove as successefull as that stratagem of the Scythians was who put their rebel-slaves to flight by but shewing them the rods where with they had been wont to whip them But though we honour the Fathers yet we dare not worship them we may not believe in them nor make their writings the rule of our faith This is that which themselves did never desire but forbid and abhorre the thought of they seem to say to us Stand up for we also were but men subject to like infirmities with you {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} Worship God believe in him I doubt not but they that mended many faults in their own writings left some behind and I wish others had not added more We admit them as witnesses but not as a rule since they also were but fallible The Church of Rome ha's boasted so long of the Fathers till at length they grow almost weary of it At first they had like to have put the Centuriatours out of countenance but afterwards Bishop Jewell was so bold as to challenge them in a Sermon at Paul's Crosse afterward printed and to offer that if they could produce any one ancient Father General Councel or example of the Primitive Church for the first six hundred yeares that sided with them against us in any one of 27 articles by him named and in controversie between us he would subscribe to them This challenge Dr. Humfryes thought was more than he needed to have made yet having made it he made it good against Harding and yet died a Protestant and this was no more than we all promise sayes learned Dr. Whitakar against Campian's fifth reason So that the Jesuite needed not to have arrogated to the Church of Rome that priviledge of the Jews Whose are the Fathers and Malone might have spared his scurrilous title-page against the Reverend and learned Primate Though you have ten thousand USHERS yet have ye not many FATHERS We boast not of ten thousand but are glad that we have one worth ten thousand of their Popish-Fathers and as many head-masters of their schools to boot But we hope we have the Fathers with us and I am sure we honour them more than they and yet make them not the rule of our faith neither They honour them not as Fathers but as Lords and Masters as Peter Cotton was wont to call him My Lord St. Austin At servum scis te genitum blandéque fateris Dum dicis dominum Sosibiane Patrem Let them therefore be the vassals if they please while we are the true and genuine sonnes of those ancient Fathers And yet some of the Papists to say the truth cared not overmuch for the judgement of the Fathers when it made against them Cardinal Cajetan will not fear to go against the generall torrent of all the ancient Doctours for which Canus indeed blames him but then Andradius takes his part and I am sure what Cajetan said was no other than what was put in practise by Maldonate Jansenius and divers others Fourthly Nor is the judgement or testimony of the Church a sufficient rule of divine faith The Papists cry up the Church as much as the Jews of old did the Temple but by the Church they mean their own which by that time the Jesuites have done with it is nothing else but the Pope But wee 'll keep their tearm the Church whose testimony they say is infallible and necessary to a divine faith of any one article in religion and although de-Valentia and Canus would fain mince the matter and make it onely necessary as a condition yet that will not serve the Romanists turn which Bellarmine and a-Sacro-bosco knew well enough and therefore make the testimony of the Church necessary as a medius terminus and Cause of assent in all divine faith and so they must say or come over to us Now infallibility as it is required to a rule of doctrine is nothing else but the constant assistance of the holy Ghost which the Papists require a man to believe that their Church hath before he can believe so much as that there is an holy Ghost for that 's one article of faith none of which say they can be believed without the infallible testimony of their Church Wee 'l leave the Jesuites to distinguish themselves out of this contradiction if they can and i' th' mean while let us examine their proofs They offer us Tradition for proof but for them to go about to prove the Churche's infallibity from the tradition of the Church is to beg the question Let them first convince us that the Church is infallible as it gives the tradition and then wee 'l spare them any further pains to prove that it is infallible They often attempt to prove it to us by Scripture by which very practise they do but condemn themselves For First then it seems the Scriptures infallibility may be first known before and without the believing of the Churches infallibility quod minimè vellent for then the latter may be spared And secondly hereby once for all they appeal to mens private judgements and that in a point on which their whole cause turns and if they think the Scriptures so cleare for the Churche's infallibility that a private Christian may discern it I do appeal to themselves whether many other articles be not laid down more clearly in Scripture we say all Well but it may be some will say the Churches infallibility is first known before we know the Scriptures to be infallible I say then 1. let them prove it 2. why do they go about to prove it by Scripture 3. let them avoid the above-named contradiction Or if they 'l be willing to draw stakes with us and have neither the infallibility of the one nor of the other to be first believed Then first let them never more quote Scripture for the Churche's infallibility Secondly let them not require us to prove the Scriptures by the testimony of the Church Thirdly they must give us leave to fetch all the articles of our faith immediately from the Scriptures without the midwifry of their Porphyry-chair and then wee 'l casily grant them if it

if such as have no ballast at all in them be made the sport and pastime of every wind of doctrine no wonder if such as have been bred all their lives time in a dungeon do become dizzie and count all light new when they come first into it My self have known some that much cryed up for new discoveries some crude and raw apprehensions of those very truths which others who had the happinesse of better education had been very well acquainted with and grounded in from their child-hood But others there are who have learned the truth more by rode than by heart and received it from other men upon their bare word without seeing any evidence for it These men when they come once to see an appearance of reason for the contrary opinion which is more than ever themselves had for the taking up of truth it is not much to be wondred at if such are easily drawn aside to errour and then it is but very natural for them to call errour light and to condemn truth for darknesse because they never understood it And then if a little pride get but in once as it is never farre of to mix with their ignorance how easy a thing is it for them to grow conceited of their new attainments which yet wiser men cannot but pitty them for to despise the truth which before they did but ravish and to inveigh against those who formerly taught it them calling them blind guides whereas the fault was themselves had been blind followers and supposing them to have no ground for the truth because indeed themselves never had any yea and to loath the very ordinances in which the truth had been dispensed to them Thus the best food if it lie on the stomach undigested is oftimes vomited up again with the greatest abhorrency and detestation What a sad condition have those men brought themselves into A spirit of errour hath not onely taken possession of them but hath also bolted himself in and made them hate the very means of their recovery By this time the Devil hath got such a commanding power over them that he drives them about in herds and droves as he doth the Quakers at this day Who that it might be apparent unto all men that they are seduced are become mere Vagrants Whereas had they at first entertained truth upon good grounds they would never have proved so false unto it had it taken due possession of them or they of it they would never thus have quitted house and home to be carried about like empty clouds and wandring starres which though they may pretend unto new light yet are they fast bound in chains of darknesse and unlesse they do timely repent S. Jude tells us what their doom shall be verse 13. To whom is reserved the blacknesse of darknesse for ever Now then Sir Since the danger is so great what need have we all as to beg of God that he by his Spirit would keep us stedfast in the truth so also our selves to neglect no means that may be available thereunto among which I conceive this one to be none of the least that we endeavour to understand our selves well in our religion to see truth in clear Scripture-evidence to be intelligent and knowing not merely-believing Christians to be rooted and well-grounded in the Faith so shall we be steàfast and unmoveable For which end if it shall please God to make this discourse in any measure profitable as I hope it is not altogether unseasonable unto his people neither shall I have any cause to repent myself that I ran this adventure nor you to be sorry that you have undergone the trouble of this dedication And thus Sir I take my leave recommending you to the gracious protection of the Almighty and to the riches of his love in our Lord Christ Jesus Sir Your Assured friend much obliged to serve and honour you William Dillingham Cambridge March 18. 1656 1. Thessal V. 21. {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} Prove all things hold fast that which is good SAtan the grand enemie of our salvation knowing that it is the truth which must make us free as it was a lie by which he brought us all at first into captivity labours by all means possible to keep men from the knowledge of the truth and that First if he can by detaining them in grosse and palpable ignorance those chains of darknesse Thus doth he the Turks and Indians to this very day and many millions of souls under the Papacy by a blind obedience and as blind a faith the Coliers faith they call it I doubt 't will come to th' fire at the last Secondly If this will not do but men will needs be knowing then he labours to seduce them into errour giving them husks for bread pro Deâ nubem This old deceiver wants not his strophae nor his methods He will Proteus-like screw himself into all modes and figures that so he may the better deceive Sometimes he assumes the shape of an Oecumenicall Bishop and dictates errours out of an infallible chair intoxicating with the cup of his errours the Kings of the earth otherwhile putting on the appearance of a simple plain man he creeps into houses and the greatest game he flies at are but silly women One while he presents errour under the reverend cloak of antiquity anon he bethinks himself that the newest fashion will give best content and so they shall be new lights Thirdly If both these fail then he raises a dust of controversie that so people may not be able to see the truth or not to know it when they see it He finds it good fishing in troubled waters and cutting purses in an hubub For while people are distracted to see so many opinions in religion whereof they are sure but one can be true and which that is they are not able to judge they resolve to be standers-by untill the learned be agreed supposing it the safest course and easiest to avoid errour by being of no opinion at all Fourthly Another device he hath to bring truth it self into suspicion Thus of old did he set the Poets on work to invent fables like unto many histories recorded in holy Scriptures that when the falshood of those should be discovered the truth of these might be call'd in question Just as he makes some play the hypocrites that when their hypocrisie is detected all professours may be thought to be like them But let us argue è contra If the Scripture were not true sure the devil would never seek to gain credit to his lies by imitating of it It 's an argument that there is true coin in the world because men counterfeit it had there never been such an one as Richard Plantagenet we had never heard of Perkin Warbeck Reject not therefore all coin for there is some good receive not all heedlessely because there is some counterfeit but bring it all to the test and to the touch-stone

wind of doctrine but that we may grow up unto him who is the head and so {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} we must {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} Ephes. 4. 15. Follow the truth in love not out of fansie as children do That Christ may dwell in our hearts by faith we must be rooted and grounded in love Ephes. 3. 17. and therefore where the love of truth once decayes there truth it self staies not long after it We reade of some Rom. 1. 28. who not liking to retain God in their knowledge he gave them over to a reprobate mind And it a remarkable place that of 2 Thess. 2. 10 11 12. where it is said that the man of sinne should come after the working of Satan with all power and signes and lying wonders and with all deceivablenesse of unrighteousnesse in them that perish See what becomes of those who are deceived by the man of sinne they perish and if ye ask why so the words following will give you an answer Because they received not the love of the truth that they might be saved See there how necessary the love of truth is to salvation For indeed where there is no sineere love of the truth there can be no true belief of it For as the Apostle there goes on For this cause God shall send them strong delusions that they should believe a lie that they all might be damned who believed not the truth but had pleasure in unrighteousnesse Observe the opposition A sad place it is and I wish it were well considered by all that are so coldly affected to the truth especially by such as hate it and are so much inclined in their minds and affections to the errours of that man of sinne whom the Lord shall consume with the spirit of his mouth and will destroy with the brightnesse of his coming as he there threatens In the 10 verse 't is they received not the love of the truth and by the 12 verse 't is come to they believed not the truth they had lost the truth for want of love to it Would we hold truth fast we must hold it in corde as well as in capite hold it fast by loving it unfainedly Thirdly hold fast that which is good by remembring it faithfully and doubtlesse where truth is believed and beloved the mind will often be upon it quae curant meminerunt 1 Cor. 15. 1 2. Moreover brethren I declare unto you the Gospel which I preached unto you which also you have received and wherein ye stand by which also ye are saved {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} if ye hold fast keep in memory what I preached unto you unlesse ye have believed in vain Those that do truly believe the truth will be carefull to keep it in memory which is a speciall means to preserve the faith and love of it in their hearts Memory holds fast the truth while faith and love renew their acts upon it for this cause ought we to give the more earnest heed to the things that we have heard {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} lest we leak and let them slip and so we that I say not they be spilt and perish irrecoverably Heb. 2.1 The Spirit of God confirms us in the truths taught by bringing them to our remembrance The Scriptures were written that we might believe that by hearing them preached by frequent reading them and meditating upon them as David did we might have faith begotten increased in us Therefore we ought {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} to be taken up with these duties As Paul to Timothy The minister is appointed for a remembrancer to us 1 Tim. 4.6 If thou put the brethren in remembrance of these things then shalt thou be a good minister of Jesus Christ and when S. Paul himself went over again the cities where he had formerly preached the word the text tells us what the succese was And so were the Churches est ablished in the faith Acts 16. 5. And S. Peter thought it meet as long as he continued in his earthy tabernacle to put Christians in remembrance of the truths delivered that so they might have them alwayes in remembrance after his decease and that although they knew them already 2 Pet. 1. 12. Wherefore I will not be negligent to put you alwaies in remembrance of these things though you know them and be established in the present truth Though they were already established and therefore might seem not to need putting in remembrance which is the means of establishment yet the Apostle thought it meet to do it alwayes even as long as he lived for it would further confirm them and be a means to keep them from falling from their stedfastnesse and to persevere in holding fast that which is good Fourthly another way of holding fast that which is good is by practising it conscientiously To keep the commandments is to obey them Jesus Christ tells his disciples John 15.10 if ye keep my commandments ye shall abide in my love as many branches as bring forth fruit abide in the vine and are fastened in it by the sap they draw S. John 1. cpist 3.c last verse He that keepeth his commandments dwelleth in him and he in him and hereby we know that he abideth in us by the Spirit which he hath given us S. Peter 2. cpist 1. chap. exhorts to give all diligence to adde unto faith vertue temperance godlinesse charity and the rest of the graces there reckoned up for if these things be in you and abound they will make you fruit full in the knowledge of Jesus Christ they will put forth themselves into acts and what then vers. 10. if ye do these things ye shall never fall Oft times custome engages men to continue in evil practises while they are ashamed of their principles but when good practises are backt with good principles the engagement is the stronger to continue in them and defend them An honest and good heart having heard the word keeps it and brings forth fruit with patience A good heart is the fittest cabbinet to keep the good word of God in And indeed when once the word is ingraffed upon the soul by faith it over-rules the sap of the stock and sanctifies the fruit Truth being espoused to the soul by faith and bedded by love brings forth fruit unto holinesse faith working by love and proles firmat conjugium If we would be stedfast and immoveable let us be alwayes abounding in the work of the Lord 1 Cor. 15. 58. If we would but follow that which is good as we are exhorted in the 15 verse before my text we should find that one means and a good one too of holding fast that which is good Fifthly a fifth way that we must hold fast that which is good is by professing of it constantly S. Paul was not ashamed to preach the Gospel no more must we be