Selected quad for the lemma: doctrine_n
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A38061
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A preservative against Socinianism. The first part shewing the direct and plain opposition between it, and the religion revealed by God in the Holy Scriptures / by Jonath. Edwards.
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Edwards, Jonathan, 1629-1712.
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1693
(1693)
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Wing E217; ESTC R24310
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65,484
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89
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have a good opinion of themselves in that they make not only their reason to be the adequate Judge of his revelations but even their own passions and weakness the rule by which they measure at least make an estimate of his infinite nature and most adorable perfections an attempt besides the impiety of it more ridiculous then if a man should endeavour to take the dimensions of the Heavens with a single span or to fathome the depth and reach the bottome of the Ocean with his little finger In the next place we must consider God Relatively in the great mystery of the Trinity And that which the Scriptures teach us to believe of this matter is briefly summed up in the first Article of our Religion established in this Church concerning faith in the Holy Trinity in these words In the unity of the Godhead there be three persons of one substance Power and Eternity Father Son and Holy Ghost Or as it is with some alteration of words but to the same purpose expressed in the Doxology to be repeated upon Trinity Sunday wherein we are taught to make this acknowledgement of Almighty God That he is one God one Lord not one only person but three persons in one substance for that which we believe of the Glory of the Father the same we believe of the Son and of the Holy Ghost without any difference or inequality A brief but comprehensive Epitome of what is more largely declared and explained in the Creed which the Socinians and Remonstrants have so great a spight against commonly called the Athanasian Creed This is the Faith of all the Reformed Churches being herein Agreeable to the doctrine held by the Church of God in all Ages ever since the first planting of Christianity in the world what we and they believe of this matter being conformable to the plain and express declarations of Scripture and especially of what Christ and his Apostles have delivered to us concerning this matter in the writings of the New Testament For this you may consult the Harmony of their Confessions both Lutheran and Calvinist all exactly agreeing in this doctrine without any the least difference or variety where you may likewise see the consent of the Catholick Church from the first Ages next to that of the Apostles from whose inspired writings the Fathers received this Doctrine which by an uninterrupted Tradition thro all the successive Ages of the Church hath bin delivered and brought down to the times we live in In this Faith we have all bin baptized being at our first admission into the Christian Church solemnly consecrated to the worship and service of those three ever blessed and glorious persons Father Son and Holy Ghost Mat. 28. These being the three that bear witness in Heaven and these three are one 1 Jo. 5. 7. For that Text we shall not easily part with notwithstanding the Cavils of the Socinians and the over officious endeavours of some others whether Papists or Protestants who would weaken the Authority of that Testimony and thereby rob us of the advantage of it For tho some Greek MSS. want it yet there are others more approved and of greater antiquity in which you may meet with it Besides it is to be found in the writings of the Ancients Tertull. Cypr. Athanasius and Jerome who quote these very words and if you have a mind to know more of this matter without going any further you may peruse what Mr. Poole in his Synopsis hath quoted out of Gerhard Dr. Hamond and other Writers in vindication of this Text. From which I think it will appear that the Authority of this place remains clear and in full force notwithstanding the attempts that have bin made to overthrow it Tho if we gave up this Text yet we should not the holy Doctrine contained in it which is so plainly delivered in other places of Scripture and shines there with so bright a lustre that a man had need wink hard who would avoid the conviction or else must have so great a confidence in his Eyes that he may hope in time to stare the Sun it self out of countenance For as in some places of Scripture he will find the unity of the Godhead asserted so in others he will find the name and not only so but to avoid any Cavils and exceptions that may be made about the ambiguous signification of that word he will find the same divine Attributes and Operations on all hands acknowledged to belong to God the Father ascribed likewise to the Son and the Holy Ghost who yet are allwaies mentioned as distinct from one another from whence by an easie and a necessary deduction it must unavoidably follow that since they are really distinguished from each other and yet agree in the same common nature as the same properties and the same operations irrefragably evince they must be what we have bin taught hitherto to believe and profess of them in the Language of the Church three Persons and one God And as we pretend to agree in the same doctrine with the Ancient Church so I think it is highly fitting and for many just reasons in a manner necessary to preserve the same words in which it hath bin delivered down to us in opposition to any new modes of speaking For the Ancient words by prescription and long use have obtained both a just Authority among Christians and a setled and determinate signification whereas new phrases may be liable to great exceptions and introductive at long run of new and unwarrantable opinions about these mysteries beyond the intention of them who first made use of them Now against all this the Socinians will tell you that this doctrine concerning the Trinity is so far from being a fundamental truth that it is indeed the foundation of all the errors that have crept into the Christian Church as being opposite to the Scriptures and plainly repugnant to reason it is a Popish doctrine so saith Socinus Lib. quod Regm Polon c. cap. 4. so Welsing Lib. de Oâ—â—ic Hominis Christiani and by so saying they do exceedingly advance the Reputation of Popery by making it of so great and venerable antiquity embraced by all sound Christians ever since the Apostles days It is a Paganish opinion Ethnicismum sapit so saith Smalcius Exam. Cent. Err. So opposite to reason that it is a wonder how any man in his wits could ever have thought of it So saith Ostorod he cannot imagine quomodo homini ulli ratione praedito in mentem venire posset Inst Rel. Christianae Cap. 4. that is sure it could never have entred into any mans head that ever had any brains there Nay it is not only a very foolish but a very dangerous error that puts a stumbling block and rub in mens way to Heaven Strange that that doctrine should be thought an hindrance to mens happiness the belief of which by all good Christians hath hitherto bin thought necessary to salvation but so it is if you
a fair adversary and have treated the mysteries of our Faith with such a Prostitute and Impudent Scurrility that we cannot well tell what reply to make to them except in Imitation of the blessed and meek Arch-Angel Michael we should desire God to Interpose in his own quarrel and to rebuke the Blasphemies of these men but to have mercy upon the Blasphemers To Conclude all as there is no danger at present God be thanked that we should be frighted out of our Religion so I hope we shall not be wheedled out of it by any of the Artifices of these seducers who lye in wait to deceive nor by any other specious pretences that they may make no not by the pretence of Peace which I know hath sometimes bin offered in their behalf I confess peace is a most desireable thing the blessings that attend it are so great that we cannot tell how sufficiently to value and so many that we can scarce number them So that all humble and truly pious Christians should be content to part with any thing to obtain it But I must recal that last word for upon second thoughts I find it may be too dearly purchased as it certainly will be when bought at the expence either of Truth or Justice without which Peace tho otherwise the most useful and excellent would prove one of the most pernicious and mischievous things in the World And when I speak of Truth I chiefly and principally mean those fundamental Truths which are treated of in these following Papers the Belief of which have hitherto bin looked upon by most Christians to be necessary to our Salvation and if there be any Truths of that Importance I hope every man will consider that tho Peace be much to be desired yet that it is not advisable for him to hazard his Salvation to secure it When all is done the reputation of being esteemed a Peaceable and moderate man will stand a man but in little stead when he comes to appear before the Tribunal of Christ and there to be charged with the guilt of betraying his Religion and at the same time the Souls of them committed to his charge to endless perdition and ruin In one word tho Peace be so great a blessing that a man might be content to lay down his Life yet no man should lay down his Soul for the sake of it And tho a Pious man might in some cases commendably submit to Death yet no wise man nay indeed no man not out of his wits would venture upon damnation to Obtain it A PRESERVATIVE AGAINST Socinianism IN all ages ever since the first planting of a Christian Church in the world God for many wise reasons hath thought fit to exercise it with various and different sorts of tryals The Apostles who were immediately commissioned by Christ and sent to teach all Nations and thereby to bring them over to the belief and obedience of the Gospel according to the prediction of their blessed Master in the 10 th of Matth. who had forewarned them of it met with great and violent opposition and that both from Jew and Gentile who with an extraordinary zeal or rather fury set themselves to oppress and stifle this new doctrine if it were possible at its first appearance and before it had gained much ground and footing in the world But besides the open force with which the enemies of it endeavoured to destroy the Christian doctrine the Apostles and other Ministers of it met with another and more dangerous opposition from some false brethren who did not aime so much at the destruction of the Christian faith as by some undue mixtures to corrupt the purity of it Such were the Judaizing Christians who tho they embraced the doctrine of the Gospel yet still they retain'd a weighty affection for their old Religion and the law of Moses to the observance of which they thought themselves under an indispensable obligation and not only so but would oblige all other Converts to the like observance and their zeal in this matter occasioned no small trouble to the Apostles and disturbance to the Churches where they first planted the Christian faith See Acts 15. and 5. Gal. And tho this was a matter of no small concern and might in the conclusion have proved of dangerous consequence yet it was not considerable in a manner if compared with many other execrable opinions and practices which began very early to be introduced into the Church by Ebion and Cerinthus Menander Saturninus Basilides and Carpocrates Succeeded afterwards by Valentinus and Marcus Marcion and Hermogenes and a long train of Hereticks shall I call them or Hogoblins for so I think they might well be styled if we consider either the darkness and ignorance of all religious matters with which they were encompassed or the wild pranks which they played to the great disturbance of all good men who were all descended from that son of perdition Simon Magus who was their Patriarch and Ring-leader It were a difficult task to muster up the names but almost an endless attempt to reckon the senseless and extravagant opinions of these Hereticks by reason of whose pernicious ways the way of truth was evil spoken of For many of the objections of the Heathens against Christianity tho all of them were false yet were taken from the execrable opinions and practices of these lewd miscreants who thereby brought no small disgrace upon the Christian Religion and put no small stop to the growth and propagation of it But not to prosecute this matter any farther if we descend a little lower we shall find that God had no sooner dissipated the storm that hung over the Christian Church for some Centuries and put a stop to the effusion of any more of that blood which without any distinction of Age or Sex was spilt like water under the ten famous persecutions by the advancement of Constantine to the Empire but the devil betakes himself to new shifts who finding his former methods of cruelty so signally baffled by the patience and constancy of the Martyrs he begins to play a new or rather to revive his old game and since he cannot destroy the professors of Christianity he will endeavour to undermine their Religion He had indeed made a vigorous effort to extinguish both the name and memory of the Christian Religion and to have tore up both the faith and the believers quite by the very roots but herein he was disappointed and therefore he endeavours to compass that by stratagem which he cannot effect by storm and in this method he finds greater success than in the former For being baffled as we said before in his attempts upon the disciples of Christ he attacks the doctrine which they embraced and here Inimicus homo the enemy came and sowed tares among the Wheat hoping thereby to choke the word which now he despair'd to extirpate And herein he found fit instruments for the execution of his design for taking