Selected quad for the lemma: cause_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
cause_n	ghost_n	holy_a	son_n	5,168	5	5.9174	4	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A26886	Certain disputations of right to sacraments, and the true nature of visible Christianity defending them against several sorts of opponents, especially against the second assault of that pious, reverend and dear brother Mr. Thomas Blake / by Richard Baxter ...	Baxter, Richard, 1615-1691.	1658 (1658)	Wing B1212; ESTC R39868	418,313	558

signs is truly a ●hristian 7. The Essentials primary in the Matter are to all the same but the Terms of Necessity for expressing them are not the same to all either for number of words or sentences seeing one can receive that in ten words ano●her cannot in twenty And hence is it that if twenty men be set to draw up the Essentials of Christianity they may do it in twenty several forms of words and yet all express the same ess●ntial Matter and one Confession may be in ten lines and another in more pages and yet both speak the same Fundamental Tru●hs one more concisely or generally and the other more copiously and plainly 8. Whatever other words may be necessary to some besides those that directly express the above-said Matter of Belief in God the Father Son and Ghost they are not to this end necessary that we may have more matter of Faith than is there contained as if it were not all that is essential but that this may by the ignorant be better understood so that those other particular Articles which some call Fundamentals are but expositions of those three Fundamentals that indeed we may receive them 6. In point of duty a Minister must require a more full and large expression of his Faith from one man than from another viz. From those that he hath apparent cause to suspect of not understanding or not believing what the more Comprehensive Concise Terms do express but yet if either he neglect that duty or his previous inquiry and examination though sinfully or if the party that gave no cause of suspition be yet ignorant or an unbeliever it doth not follow that the Concise Profession was a Nullity for want of larger Explication He that professeth to believe in God the Father Son and Holy Ghost hath made a Profession of saving Faith in all the Essentials as to the sense of the words and it is to be taken as valid in foro Ecclesiastico in the Judgement of the Church if there be not some of the above-named particulars apparent to invalidate it as Contradiction apparent Ignorance Derision c. May it not be the safest way to imitate the Scripture examples in such cases where we alway find Profession in order to Baptism made but in few comprehensive terms for as by this way we follow the surest Guid so are we most likely to comprehend all the Essentials and leave none out when spinning out a Profession to a Volumn in more particular Explicatory termes if these same generals be not among them may leave out much of the Essence of Religion which these do comprehend Not that I would have the people hear no longer discourses for Explication but it is one thing to put them into a Sermon or Discourse and another thing to put them into the Profession of Faith If notwithstanding all that is said any shall still be prejuced against the requiring of a Professon of saving Faith because of the difficulty of discerning when it is that all the Fundamentals are professed let such consider that it doth as much concern those that differ from us to untye this knot if they can as us We have long shewed the Papists that themselves must be forced to distinguish between those points of Faith which some may be saved without and those which none can be saved without and so indeed Bellarmine and others of them confess And those that say it is a Dogmatical Faith that must be professed must needs comprehend all the aforesaid Essentials in their Dogmatical faith or else they cannot call it the Christian Faith So that as to the Object of Assent they are equally concerned in the difficulties 2. And then for the second part of Faith which is the Wills consent or Affiance or Entertainment Receiving Acceptance Embracing or what other term to that purpose you will use of the Good proposed in the Gospel the same forementioned words do also comprehend all that is Essential to the Object of this Act for the Will as well as the Intellect to Believe in God the Father Son and Holy Ghost is all our Faith that is To receive God as our God our Creator our Soveveraign and Felicity and Jesus Christ our Saviour from the guilt and power of Sin and to bring us to everlasting Glory and this by Ransoming us by his death and merits By Rising Interceding Teaching Ruling us and at last Raising and Judging us and to receive the Holy Ghost as the witness of Christ the inspirer of the writers of his Word and as our Sanct●fier Thus is the Object of true Christian faith expressed as containing the Objects of the Will To conclude in a doubtfull case it is safe to be as express and particular as we can in our Instructions and Examinations and not barely to keep to the meer Essentials because there are many of the Adjacent truths or superstructures which are of so great use as that the fundamentals are hardly and seldom well entertained without them And yet when we play not the part of Instructors and preparers but of Administrators of Gods Ordinances then we must take heed of exacting more as necessary then is indeed necessary and in difficult Cases when the difficulty lyeth in the Darkness of the persons heart and you doubt by reason of the scantness of his expressions whether he believe as he speaketh we must give credit to his own words as far as reason will permit and to judge the best though we may fear the worst and this will be our Duty and if we should be deceived it will not prove our sin but his that makes the false profession And this leadeth me up to the next part of my Task which is having thus explained the Nature of the requisite Profession to prove the Affi●mative of the Question THESIS Mi●isters m●y admit pers●ns into the visible Church of Christ by B●ptism upon the bare Verbal Profession of the true Christian saving faith such as before described without staying for or searching after any further Evidences of sincerity ordinarily and as of necessity to this end This Proposition I prove in short by these Arguments following Argum. 1. We have the warrant of their approved Example in Scripture whom we are to eye as our Pattern in Administrations for the administring of Baptism upon a bare Verbal Profession therefore we may so Administer it I here suppose the Practice of the Church before Christs Incarnation which is out of all doubt Moses took the Verbal profession of all Israel to be a Covenant between God and them wherein they avouched the Lord to be their God and God avouched them to be his people On the like terms did Joshua Asa and others renew the Covenant of God with that people and on the same terms was circumcision administred On these terms did John Baptize multitudes whose lives he knew not before and of whom he required no further Evidence than these present Professions to sati●fie him of their