Selected quad for the lemma: diversity_n
Text snippets containing the quad
|
ID |
Title |
Author |
Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication) |
STC |
Words |
Pages |
|
A33987
|
An answer to Dr. Scot's cases against dissenters concerning forms of prayer and the fallacy of the story of Commin, plainly discovered.
|
Collins, Anthony, 1676-1729.
|
1700
(1700)
|
Wing C5356; ESTC R18873
|
65,716
|
77
|
Acquired 2. He saith That this Natural or Acquired Gift is no where appropriated by God to Prayer but left common to other uses and purposes Whether in Words of Scripture it be any where by God so appropriated is not worth the disputing if from the Nature of the Ability Gift or thing it self it be so appropriated which that it is I think is clear enough from the Description of it given by our Casuist p. 26. where he hath these Words By the Gift of Prayer they mean an Ability to express our Minds to God in Prayer or to offer up our Desires and Affections to him in Words befitting the Matter of them Nor hath our Casuist before contradicted this Notion now how it is possible that an Ability fitly to express our Minds to God in Prayer can relate to any thing but Prayer I cannot understand if he had indeed in stating the Question or explicating it have denied this Notion there might have been some colour for this Assertion but now to tell us as he doth p. 30. That the Gift of Prayer is nothing but a freedom of Elocution or Vtterance is very impertinent But this is fully answered in the Reasonable Account p. 10. and again in the Answer to Dr. Falkners Vindication of Liturgies p. 36 37. but to add yet a little further The Question is Whether an Ability fitly to express our Minds to God in Prayer be a Gift differing from the Lawyers Ability to plead well at the Bar or a Mans Ability to Discourse pertinently in good Company or a Schollars Ability to Dispute well in the Schools Our Casuist saith plainly they are but one and the same Gift 1. By our Casuists Ratiocination those also must be the same Gift with the Gift of Preaching which admitted it must necessarily follow that he who is able to plead a Case well at a Bar or to Discourse well in Company must be able also to Preach a good Sermon and to express himself fitly to God in Prayer Which besides that it would justifie the Socinian in telling the World That they have been a long Time troubled with a needless sort of Men called Preachers or Ministers is most demonstrably false there being some Thousands in the World that can Discourse well in Company and many Lawyers that can Plead very well at a Bar and several Schollars that can Dispute in Mood and Figure that if they were put to it to Pray and Preach in a Pulpit few would think they had a Gift that is an Ability for either 2. According to this Notion all Gods Gifts as to external Action might be reduced to the Gift of Motion All spiritual Habits to the one Gift of the Spirit but the Apostle speaks after another Rate 1 Cor. 12.4 Now there are diversity of Gifts but the same Spirit And tells ver 8. To one is given by the Spirit the Word of Wisdom to another the Word of Knowledge by the same Spirit Ver. 10. To another Prophecy to another the Interpretation of Tongues All these now flow from the same Spirit and are all Species indeed of the Gift of Vtterance but if the Apostle understood himself they were divers Gifts and by his Authority we must crave leave to call them so 3. Besides What can make or argue a Diversity of Gifts if a Diversity of Knowledge as the Foundation of their Exercise and a Diversity of End will not And with what Sense can two Gifts be made the same when it is demonstrable that every one who hath the one of them hath not the other nor any thing like it Neither is that true which our Casuist tells us and I admire to read him asserting what is contrary to all Mens Experience for he saith We find that those who have this Gift viz. of Prayer have it not only while they are speaking in Prayer but when they are speaking on their Occasions and that ordinarily they can express themselves to Men with the same Readiness and Fluency in Conversation as they can express their Minds to God in Prayer Either he means all such or only some such If he speaks of all it is most evidently false How many have we known that want no Words or proper Expressions in Prayer that in Worldly Affairs cannot speak to any purpose If he meaneth it of some only he speaketh true but nothing to the purpose for the same Man might in the Apostles Times have the Word of Wisdom and the Word of Knowledge and Prophecy and Interpretation of Tongues The Apostles doubtless had them all yet the Apostle determines them Diversity of Gifts I Cor. 12. 4 8 9 10. 3. In the Third Place he tells us That this Gift of Utterance not being appropriated by God to Prayer may upon just Reasons be as lawfully omitted in Prayer as in any other Use or Purpose it is designed for Here our Casuist supposeth that the Gift of Prayer is nothing but the Gift of Vtterance which we have disproved under the former Head 2. That the Gift of Prayer is not appropriated to Prayer which we have also disproved so as this Conclusion falls by the Fall of the two Pillars on which it is built only I must not omit what our Casuist hath here said excellently p. 31. I do confess had God any where appropriated it to the End of Prayer those who have it were obliged to use it to that End and to omit it ordinarily by confining themselves to Forms of other Mens indicting would be to neglect a Means of Prayer of God's special Appointment and Institution for had he any where intimated to us that he gave it us purely to inable us to pray without respect to any other End we could not have omitted the Use of it without crossing his Intention and frustrated him of the only End for which he intended it Here our Casuist hath spoke our Heart only we think that if this appears from the Nature of the Gift which is such as it is impossible to use it any other way it is the same thing as if he had told it us in so many Words in Scripture or by an Angel from Heaven Let it now be left to any Man of Sense to judge whether we have not proved this and that from our Casuist's own Words p. 26. where he accepts the Question as stated by us as well as from the Nature of the Gift it self being not Vtterance tho' a Species of it a Gift exercised from a different Species of Knowledge than other Gifts are that fall under Vtterance as the Genus and to a quite different End and not found in Thousands who have Utterance good enough in other things 4. Our Casuist's last Conclusion upon this Case is That to rend our Desires to God in other Mens Words is as much a Means of Prayer as to speak them in our own for to speak in our own Words is no otherwise a Means of Publick Prayer than as it serves to express to God