Selected quad for the lemma: cause_n
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A44651
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The history of religion written by a person of quality.
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Howard, Robert, Sir, 1626-1698.
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1694
(1694)
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Wing H2998; ESTC R13393
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42,440
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146
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unjust Practices his Error in Opinion cannot be a Crime nor any Foundation of a Punishment If we seriously consider the ill and unjustifiable Grounds of such a Persecution the Heresy will appear to be on the other side the Persecutors will be the Hereticks for those who practise Uncharitableness and Cruelty commit that Heresy of the Flesh directly contrary to what our Saviour taught and founded the Christian Religion upon even Meekness Charity and Mercy But as St. Paul says He that was born after the Flesh persecuted him that was born after the Spirit Even so it is now and so it ever will be while Self-interest and Love of Dominion are allowed to make the Want of Mercy the Means to support and propagate Religion and such ill-gotten Power must encrease the Cruelty and Pride of Men and consequently new and more large Inventions of Massacres and other Persecutions and yet sure themselves cannot but think it ridiculous that a Religion whose Institution is so humane and merciful should be propagated by Cruelty and Inhumanity St. Paul says the Servants of the Lord must not strive but be gentle to all Men in Meekness instructing those that oppose themselves if God peradventure will give them Repentance to the Acknowledgment of the Truth Here Persecution is forbid though against those that oppose the known Truth which needed Repentance they are directed to proceed by Meekness and Instructions sure then the Persecutors that strive to be ungentle and use Cruelty instead of Meekness and Death and Tortures instead of Instruction must be the true Hereticks 'T is very observeable that for real Heresies of the Flesh there are no Inquisitions set up nor any particular Persecutions not for Drunkenness or Whoredom or other Vices they increase as much by Temptation and Example as those sort of Vices can and yet were never made Objects of the pretended pious Zeal or of any Persecution Against such Heresies they follow more the Apostle's Rule endeavouring to convert by Instruction and Perswasion but towards the Heresies that are propâ—rly against themselves they proceed by another Method by the Rule of their own Passions not by the Directions of Christianity The Reason is Heresy against true Morality does not shake their Design of Power and Interest but Heresy against their Rules of Faith which they would have superiour to Scripture is an Abnegation of their Authority The Endeavour to find out Truth should not be reckoned an Offence it should rather tend to unite than divide and raise Tenderness sooner than Persecution God's Service is the pretended Cause of Persecution but without suffering it to be fairly examined whether the Difference consists in Matters truly necessary to Salvation Which again evidences that the Persecution is not for the Cause of God or the Good of the Persecuted but of the Persecutors 'T is sure a most Melancholy Prospect of Persecution that all the Particulars in which those differ who profess the Name of Christ are in themselves of no consequence in respect to Salvation for if it be temperately considered there is not one Particular that if it had never been controverted or so much as thought of had been at all a Prejudice to our following the true and the plain Rules of Christianity nor can the Belief or Dis-belief of any of those disputed Particulars be reputed any Part of the Necessary Faith Suppose that the Devotion paid to Saints Angels Images and Relicks Prayers for the Dead Consecration of Agnus Dei's Blessing of Clouts Indulgences and Pardons made Mercenary had never been thought of where would the Want of them appear if we followed the acknowledged Rules and Precepts of the Gospel Does any of these concern the doing as we would be done to or would they contribute to Mutual Love and Forbearance of one another In relation to Faith and good Works they could neither be Instrumental nor Exciting and had they been material they would have found some place among the Precepts and Institutions delivered by our Saviour in his Sermon on the Mount where no Part necessary to Christian Conduct can be believed to be omitted So that these invented Particulars by Priest-craft are only to create a Faith in them not in Christ or his Gospel where every thing that is necessary is also plain and clear but these consist of Darkness to involve Deceived Mankind in a Blind and Implicit Obedience Another of their abstruse Inventions is Purgatory wholly the Subject-matter of Power and Profit as if it were possible there could be a separate Confined Place where the Punishment or Purgation should be more or less as the Price is as if Heaven were to be bribed according to their lesser or greater Lucre. If Men must believe in their Redeemer and living according to his Example may thereby obtain Salvation to what purpose could that Invention be unless for the Interest and Power of the Priests that invented it For if it never had been thought of what Prejudice could it have been to the Christian Religion whose Rules are perfect and effectual without it and which affords no tolerable Intimation of such a Place They may as rationally affirm that all the Rules of the Gospel followed in a good Life shall yet not be available to Salvation without the Belief of Purgatory so that one Point of Salvation is wholly forgot by him that saved as pretend that after a Life of Contempt or Neglect of the Gospel Precepts a Man for all that may be ransomed by Money given to the Priest from the Place of Punishment so near to Blasphemy does this extravagant Opinion reach Be sure Purgatory is not of so antient date but that there were Christians long before all mention made of it who were questionless in a State of Salvation without the Help of that Fancy and others are so now without the Belief of it the Faith of it is useless to any Person or Thing but only to the Priests to compleat their Catalogue of Mysteries and to increase their Profit and Authority The most famous of their dark Particulars to which they pretend to be directed by the Gospel is the Real Presence where the Priest can Transubstantiate without being himself Transubstatiated which is ridiculous enough For all its seeming Importance 't is of the same nature with the Particulars before-mentioned and if it had never been thought of could in no ways have been prejudicial to the Christian Religion For suppose any one should eat of the very Body and Flesh of our Saviour would that particular Food have been the Food of Salvation without Belief in him that died for us 'T is impossible that any can affirm it would for if it were so and that Priests can make Bread or a Wafer to be Christ's Flesh the Eating of it must of Consequence procure Salvation without the Help of Faith and good Works but if by Faith in his Death for us Love and Charity and following the Example of his Life we must be saved
Divinity belonging only to God and ought to be let alone to act after its own Method Nothing has given a greater Blemish to the Christian Religion than the Controversial Writings of the Learned those Disputes have ingaged Nations in more Blood and War than the Ignorant or the Wicked could ever have occasioned or caused either by their Mistakes or their Improbity The trivial Subjects and the doubtful and uncertain that have been so sharply and definitively argued and contested shew that 't is Private Interest and Humour that has occasion'd and maintained them without any respect to the Service of God or the Christian Religion truly and undoubtedly so called And when they have once drove one another into extreme Notions in Religion the Errors on both sides become alike Thus the Gnosticks held that 't was no matter how Men lived so they believed aright and the Encratites who detested this Libertinism said on the contrary that 't is not material what Men believe so they live well Yet by all this we perceive that the Gospel of Christ in despite of all these affected and sought Clouds and Darkness will and does triumphantly extend its Light and Benign Influence to the discerning and honest Part of Mankind its Truth and Power appear the more great and wonderful by the Opposition of the Falseness and Weakness of Men. I remember that Montaigne tells a Story of one who went to Rome to see as he had perswaded himself the Sanctity of their Manners but he found on the contrary a great Dissoluteness in the Prelates and People of that time nothing less than Rome the Holy but this settled him more firmly in the Christian Religion considering how great the Force and Divinity of it must be that could maintain its Credit and Dignity amidst so much Corruption and in so vicious hands The Consideration of this ought in my Opinion to induce those that are Guides and Teachers to make our Way plain and easy to follow the clear and uncontested Methods of the Gospel to win and excite People chiefly to the Love of God and to encourage rather than distract If any one will but temperately consider it he will with Horror perceive what Persecution and Mischiefs have been caused by the Imposing Power assumed by too many that call themselves the Followers of Christ What Wars and Expence of Christian Blood have been occasioned by their passionate and violent Disputes concerning dark and never to be decided Questions Had their Teaching and Learning been applied only to the right Use of the Gospel-Methods the World had enjoyed an undisturbed and truly Christian Peace not been involved in unnatural Wars and barbarous Persecutions In short I must publish it to the World that I like such Sermons as Dr. Tillotson's now Arch-bishop of Canterbury where all are taught a plain and certain Way to Salvation and with all the Charms of a calm and blessed Temper and of pure Reason are excited to the uncontroverted indubitable Duties of Religion Where all are plainly shown that the Means to obtain the eternal Place of happy Rest are those and no other which also give Peace in this present Life and where every one is encouraged and exhorted to learn but withal to use his own Care and Reason in the working out his own Salvation I will conclude this Preface therefore with some Passages from that excellent Person which relate to the above-mentioned Particulars He tells us Serm. on Luke 9.55 56. that our Saviour came to discountenance all Fierceness and Rage and Cruelty of Man to restrain that furious and unpeaceable Spirit which is so troublesom to the World and is the Cause of so many Mischiefs and Disorders in it He came to introduce a Religion which consults not only the Eternal Salvation of Mens Souls but their temporal Peace and Security their Comfort and Happiness in this World For when Religion once comes to supplant Moral Righteousness and to teach Men the absurdest things in the World to lie for Truth and to kill for God's Sake when it serves for no other Cause but to be a Bond of Conspiracy to inflame the Tempers of Men to a greater Fierceness and to set a keener Edg upon their Spirits to make them ten times more the Children of Wrath and Cruelty than they were by Nature then surely it loses its Nature and ceases to be Religion for let a Man say worse of Infidelity and Atheism if he can Whatever therefore the Inconveniences of Mens judging for themselves may be the Inconveniences are far less on that side than a total and implicit Resignation to the Pretenders of being Infallible no Man being able to know who they are To try Doctrines is to enquire into the Grounds and Reasons of them which the better any Man understands the more firmly he will be establish'd in the Truth and be more resolute in the day of Trial and the better able to withstand the Assaults and Arts of cunning Adversaries and on the contrary that Man will soon be removed from his Stedfastness who never examined the Reasons and Grounds of his Belief when it comes to the Trial he that has but little to say for his Belief will probably neither do nor suffer much for it THE HISTORY OF Religion THERE never was yet any Country or Society of Men but did own some Religion as if all the Dictates of Man's Nature joined in that one Principle though differing in the Particulars of it As they were distinguish'd from Beasts by Reason and the right Use of it so they were directed to the superiour Consideration of an Eternal Being by a certain Reflection on the Finite Condition of themselves and of all living Creatures which must be determined by Time or Accident it seemed no less than ridiculous not to believe some Power of an Infinite Nature that was the Creator and Disposer of Beings and agreeably to that Position of the Apostles the World easily consented that in Religion is no Shame We have heard of some particular Men that have been reputed Atheists but never of any Country or Society of Men that profest Atheism we have notice of many very Ridiculous Opinions that have possest Nations insomuch that Atheism seems the only Folly that has never prevailed with any general Credit which may deservedly put one in mind of that Saying in Holy Scripture The Fool hath said in his Heart there is no God This Folly needs not a Laborious or Artificial Confutation the Demonstrations against it are obvious and clear That which seems most to stagger and confound Apprehension is the endless Search of something without a Beginning a Power derived from no Power an Infinite and Eternal Omnipotency but whoever thinks this too much to be believed of God must of necessity believe as much of other things and while he thinks he does not believe a thing so incomprehensible at the same time he believes it of most if not all the Objects in the World