Selected quad for the lemma: christian_n
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A28383
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A plain and brief explanation upon the church catechisme different from what hitherto hath been extant : wherein the first elements and grounds of religion are reduced to such plain and familiar questions and answers ... : to which is added, a plain and useful tract of confirmation / by Nathaniel Blithe ...
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Blithe, Nathaniel.
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1664
(1664)
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Wing B3197; ESTC R5761
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48,274
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155
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the Lord blessed the Seventh day and hallowed it 5. Honour thy Father and thy Mother that thy dayes may be long in the Land which the Lord thy God giveth thee 6. Thou shalt do no Murther 7. Thou shalt not commit Adultery 8. Thou shalt not Steal 7. Thou shalt not bare false witneses against thy Neighbour 10. Thou shalt not covet thy Neighbours house thou shalt not covet thy Neighbours Wife nor his Servant nor his Maid nor his Ox nor his Ass nor any thing that is his Q. What dost thou chiefly learn by these Commandments A. I learn two things my duty towards God and my duty towards my Neighbour Q. In which of these Commandments do you learn you duty towards God A. In the four first commonly called the first Table Q. In which of them do you learn your duty towards your Neighbour A. In the six last commonly called the second Table Q. What is your duty towards God A. My duty towards God is to believe in him to fear him and to love him with all my heart with all my mind with all my soul and all my strength to worship him to give him thanks to put my whole trust in him to call upon him to honour his holy name and his word and to serve him truly all the dayes of my life Q. In which of the four first Commands do you learn to believe in God to fear him and to love him with all your heart with all your mind with all your soul and with all your strength A. This part of my duty towards God I learn in the first of the Commandements Thou shalt have no other Gods but me in which precept I am bound first to believe that there is a God secondly I am to believe that there is but one God thirdly I am to believe in the true everliving God and to have him for my God and when I have thus chosen him to be my God it can be no less than my duty to stand in awe of so glorious a Majesty and to be fearful of displeasing him and also to love him above all things and for himself alone and to love him not faintly or languidly but sincerely and cordially with my whole mind with all my soul and with all my strength Q. Is this all that you learn from this Command A. No every Command besides that duty it positively enjoyns also forbids the contrary vice as likewise that command which forbids a vice also enjoyns the contrary vertue so that by this command I not only learn to believe in God to fear him and to love him but also I am forbidden infidelity not to believe the one true God or those Laws he hath delivered to the world careless presumption not fearing to offend him hatred of him or of whatsoever he commands Q. In which of these four first commands do you learn to worship this true everliving God to give him thanks to put your whole trust in him and to call upon him A. This part of my duty towards God I learn in the second Commandment Thou shalt not worship any graven Image wherein as I am expressly forbidden the making any graven Image or the worshipping of them when made so also I am implicitely enjoyned to worship that supream infinite Majesty of Heaven and Earth uprightly and sincerely with all bodily worship and external forms of address to adore him with all humility and reverence in all my wants to call upon him who is a ready help in time of need and when he hath fulfilled my desires to give him hearty thanks for his mercies in all straits and dangers to put my whole trust in him who is a sure rock of defence in a word in all respects to pay him that homage reverence and adoration as his greatness and goodness requires from me Q. Wherefore are you bound to worship no Idol nor any representation of God but onely the true God A. Because he is a jealous God and will not suffer the least contempt that is offered to his honour to pass by unpunished Q. In which of these commands dost thou learn to honour his Holy name A. This part of my duty towards God I learn in the third command Thou shalt not take the name of the Lord thy God in vain wherein I am bound to honour Gods Holy Name by not abusing of it in my daily communication not using it rashly foolishly or vainly in my common discourse not cursing either my neighbour or any of his possessions in Gods name not swearing by his name falsly or at all unless it be in a just cause before 〈◊〉 lawful Magistrate for the deciding of some controversie As also by this precept I am obliged to honour Gods name by esteeming highly of it and speaking of it with reverence and sobriety and at all times and upon all occasions praising magnifying exalting and honouring the most holy and reverend name of God his Attributes or any thing whereby he hath made himself known unto us Q. What punishment do you incur if you are failing in your duty in this respect A. God will proceed against me as against a malefactor or guilty person and although possibly in this life I may escape without chastifinent yet in another I cannot but expect to be severely punished Q. In which command do you learn to serve God truly all the dayes of your life A. This part of my duty towards God I learn in the last of these four commands Remember that thou keep holy the Sabbath Day wherein I am bound to devote that time to the worship and service of God which the Church by her authority hath set apart for that purpose Q. Are you not then bound to observe the Sabboth day that is the seventh day on which God rested from the works of his creation A. I am bound to observe one day in seven as a Sabboth that is a day of rest but the primitive Christians instead of the Jewish Sabboth which was to be abolished after the Resurrection of Christ made choice of the first day of the week on which he arose from the grave to be observed as the Christian Sabboth and also honoured it with the title of the Lords day Q. What are the duties required for the right observation of this day A. They are two Sanctification and Rest Q. How must this day be Sanctified A. In must be sanctified by setting it apart to the Worship and service of God Q. What is that service of God which on this day must be performed A. It may be reduced to these three heads either that publique service we are obliged to perform in the Church or that charitable service we are to do towards our neighbour or that private service we are to perform at our own houses Q. Wherein consists that publique service of God we are bound to perform on this day A. It consists in meeting together at the house of Prayer the Church and unanimously joyning together
A Plain and Brief EXPLANATION UPON THE Church Catechisme Different from what hitherto hath been Extant Wherein the first Elements and grounds of Religion are reduced to such plain and familiar Questions and Answers as are obvious to the meanest Capacity To which is added A plain and useful TRACT OF CONFIRMATION The second Edition corrected By Nathaniel Blithe M. A. Rector of Dowesby in Lincolnshire London Printed for Edw Millington at the Bible in Little Brittain 1674. Imprimatur Samuel Parker May 11. 1672. The Reader is desired to take notice that that gross Error Page 16. line 7. with which the Author hath been divers times Charged was a mistake of the Printer which is now Corrected in this Second Edition according to the Original Copy The preface to the READER WHen I consider what care the Church of England hath taken for the instruction of her Children in the mattters of Religion both by Preaching Catechizing and reading of the Holy Scriptures whereby plentiful provision is made for all capacities it is matter of very great wonder that so considerable a number of Christians should live and dye in that Ignorance as our own experience too sadly informs us Many amongst us who although they attain to the full age of Man yet they are almost as Ignorant even in the fundamentals of Religion as if they had all their time conversed amongst Pagans Possibly they can rehearse the Creed the Lords Prayer and the Ten Commandments by rote but they are very ignorant of the true sense and meaning of them Perhaps also they may know at large that Christ dyed for Sinners and they hâ—pe to be saved by him but they understand not that vow and promise they made when they were received into the number of his members and hereby are ignorant of those conditions which must be performed by all those that can receive benefit by his meritorious undertakings this and much more which would be too long to insist upon is the ignorance that divers aged Christians groan under And I know no one reason whereto this wretched ignorance can so justly be attributed as either to the utter omission of that so necessary duty of Catechizing or to the irregular and indiscreet performance of it And to the very same cause I am apt in a great measure to assign that wickedness and lewdness which is so confidently and universally practised amongst us Neither is it strange that many should walk so disorderly when they understand not those Laws and Precepts that require strictness and sobriety in their Conversations and if we do but duly consider how apt young and tender natures are to receive any impressions whether verâ—uous or vitious we cannot not but imagine it to be a business of very great moment by Catechizing to instruct the younger sort betimes in the grounds of Christianity for when vitious habits are by a continued practise rooted in their natures and grown customary it will be almost as difficult to eradicate them as to remove a Mountain and we shall hear divers persons when they fall into daily gross miscarriages they will presently be complaining of their own natural weakness and blaming their original guilt whereas the main cause of these their vices proceeds from a corrupt and ill Education they are so accustomed to the committance of evil that according to the expression of the Prophet it is as hard for them to decline their vitious courses as for the Blackamore to change his skin or the Leopard his spots and therefore to prevent these early corrupt inclinations Solomon adviseth us to train up a Child in the way wherein he should walk to season his tender years with the sound knowledge of Religion and betimes to sow the seeds of goodness and vertue in his heart before it grows hard and impenitrable this is the only way to give him a right understanding of his whole Duty whether relating to God his neighbour or himself to inform him what he is to believe and what he is to do in reference to his happiness and well living in another world And this also is the most compendious way to implant in him such Orthodox and sound knowledge as may fortifie him against all the Juglings and Delusions of cunning Impostors for when they rightly understand their Baptismal vow what they are to belive and that duty they are to perform both towards God and Man as also the Doctrine of both the Sacraments which our Church Catechism plainly and fully treats of when they have a thorough knowledge of these matters engrafted in their minds it will be impossible for them to be imposed upon by every peevish Schismatick As unjustly as the Papists make ignorance the Mother of Devotion so truly may we call it the Mother of Faction It was the opinion of the learned King James that the cause of the miscarriage of our people into Popery and many other destructive errours was their ungroundedness in points of Catechism neither can it at all seem strange that those Souls should be carried about with every wind of Doctrine who are not well ballassed with solid information in the first principles of Religion And upon an impartial enquiry we shall find that the great promoters of those idle false opinions amongst us are ignorant in a very great measure I confess they may have a form of Godliness and a mysterious form of words by which to express it that is stuffed with unintelligible nonsense but they are very far to seek in the knowledge of the great intendment and design of the Christian Religion they wholly busie themselves in prying into the Mysteries if Heaven things which neither are profitable nor possible for them to know and in the mean time let slip the plain necessary duties of Religion and this renders them unstable in all their wayes embracing every sudden fancy as an inspiration from Gods Spirit and delightfully entertaining every fond opinion which a hot-headed Zealot shall broach And therefore if Gatechizing was duly and rightly performed it would lay a good foundation and implant the wholsom truths of Religion betimes in our natures and so consequently our knowledge would encrease with our years and hereby we should be capable of examining opinions before we embrace them rejecting whatsoever is contrary to our Creed or repugnant to that duty God requires of us There is also another great advantage we shall receive by the due exercise of Catechizing this will prepare us for the better understanding of Sermons and the holy Scriptures when by this means a good foundation is layd then we have some Reason to hope that whatsoever is built upon it will prosper when we are hereby established in the plain necessary truths of Christianity this will give us a good insight into the more difficult mysterious truths of the Gospel which are frequently delivered in Sermons It was a complaint which the Author to the Hebrews made of that Church that they were dull of hearing the deep