Selected quad for the lemma: doctrine_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
doctrine_n	christian_a	church_n	faith_n	9,646	5	5.3008	4	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A65538	An earnest and compassionate suit for forbearance to the late learned writers of some controversies at present / by a melancholly stander-by.	Wettenhall, Edward, 1636-1713.	1691 (1691)	Wing W1494; ESTC R14825	6,885	20

AN Earnest and Compassionate Suit for Forbearance TO THE LEARNED WRITERS OF SOME Controversies at present By a Melancholly Stander-by Knowing that they do gender Strifes 2 Tim. II. 23. LONDON Printed for Nath. Ranew at the Kiug's Arms in St. Paul's Church-yard MDCXCI An Earnest and Compassionate Suit for Forbearance c. THERE is not a greater Blemish to the Reformation than the Open Dissensions of its Professors nor amongst Men that are Serious in Religion a frequenter or perhaps a more scandalous Sin The Mischief hereby to Religion in Common as well as in Special to our Church is so notorious so much complained of by all sorts and lamented by the true Mourners in Sion that it need not here be represented but shall be taken for confest Now nothing certainly has begot more Dissensions than the urging too strict an Union Were Christianity left in that Latitude and Simplicity wherein it was delivered by Our Lord and his Apostles and it is hard to assign sufficient Reasons why it should not be so left our Controversies would be reduced to a very small Compass if not totally cease He who considers the Summ of Christian Doctrin as it now ordinarily stands in the Church and compares it with the Faith once delivered to the Saints will scarcely forbear censuring the School-Doctors to have been worse Enemies to Christianity than either the Heathen Philosophers or persecuting Emperors The Evil which those unlucky Wits have introduc'd has been received into the Bowels and affects the very Vitals of our Christianity insomuch that it is likely to stick not only closer but longer to the Church than any other Darts that have wounded it And 't is sad to think that that very Branch of the Church from whence above any other Healing might be expected is now tearing the Wound wider The First Reformers frequently and passionately complain of this Plague and earnestly endeavoured as well as desired a Purer and more Scriptural sort of Divinity They made great progress therein The forreign part of the Reformation tho' they retained sundry Scholastick Cramping Terms in their Institutions and common Places or Systems yet banish'd them out of their Publick Prayers And it were to be wished the Church of England had used the same Temper Certainly we may worship God right well yea most acceptably in Terms of his own stamp or coinage But pleading for Alterations in our Liturgy is not the Matter I concern my self in at present The summ of what I now urge and would perswade is That Our Doctors would so far hold their Hands that the People may be able to use with due Reverence such Passages in our Liturgy wherein the scholastical terms hinted at do occurr which I do avow if some men proceed will soon be rendred Ridiculous even amongst the Common People who are neither so blind nor haply so ductil as in former days Many a Contradiction yea scurvy biting Reproaches sometimes do wise men receive which yet they dissemble or seem to take no notice of and by this means the Jest as we say is spoiled Convitia spreta exolescunt I am well assured some late Pamphlets had dyed away or been now in few mens Hands had not divers Persons of great Names and deservedly of no less esteem in the Church taken on themselves the labour to confute them which in the Judgment of some it is to be wish'd they had done without running into those very Absurdities to which the Adversary would reduce them It seems to me but an awkward though ordinary Art us'd by many who now-adays deeply engage in Controversies that when they are pinch'd with Difficulties they advance Solutions and Positions the necessary Consequents of which they will as in the same Breath deny I am loth to assign fresh and particular Instances But how Honourable this is before Men of Reason or what it advantageth any Cause before Indifferent Judges I leave to consideration It can certainly be no Pleasure to a Man to find himself entangled in the most curious Net-work of his own knitting however admirable the Make thereof once seemed to himself or his too-easie Friends The Controversie now of late revived and so hotly agitated at present has been above Thirteen Hundred Years ago determined by two General Councils the Nicene and first Constantinopolitan both which are highly owned and have been ever adhered to by this our Church The Creed made up betwixt them stands in our Liturgy and their Determinations have been ratified by succeeding General Councils Why cannot we let the Matter stand upon this Bottom of Authority Those who are vers'd in the History of that Council may be pleas'd to remember what were the Arguments urged and that it was Authority chiefly carried the Point 'T is true indeed there are more hard Terms introduced into the Church-Doctrin even since that Council which Use has now made old But let us stop somewhere Why should we be still moving the Ancient Bounds To be together plain and succinct Give me Leave to say Of all the Controversies we can touch upon at present this of the Trinity is the most Vnreasonable the most Dangerous and so the most Vnseasonable It is 1st the most unreasonable Controversie in the World and that on several accounts First Because it is on all hands confest the Deity is infinite unsearchable incomprehensible and yet every one who pretends to write plainer than another on this Controversie professes to make all comprehensible and easie A man would think it a small Favour to request of Persons of Learning that they would be consistent with and not contradict themselves Again This Matter has been sufficiently determined and by due Authority if any Ecclesiastical Authority can be such is settled already The Councils of Nice and Constantinople as before said and many other Councils since confirming the same have done what Authority can do in it And when we have moved every Stone Authority must define it Our Church-Articles insist in the same Track and we profess our selves at least for Peace-sake bound thereby Moreover the present Issue shews that in this World it never will be better understood What Stuff has the Master of the Sentences in his First Book and upon him all the Scholastick Wits with their too-much Subtilties and too-nice Enquiries made of it And now afresh some by endeavouring to explicate more intelligibly the Quiddity as I may so speak of each person by himself and the Unity of all Three between themselves or to use a more Orthodox Phrase in one Essence have by such Endeavours of speaking more plainly spoke only more adventurously and dangerously O that all who advance new Notions would look forward to their Consequences I forbear Particulars but this Consideration makes me say yet farther That as far as I can perceive the more men draw the Disputacious Saw the more perplex'd and intricate this Question is at least that Truth which is contended for is farther off from being settled For the