Selected quad for the lemma: end_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
end_n	oath_n	strife_n	swear_v	3,032	5	9.0688	5	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A84760	A sober answer to an angry epistle, directed to all the publick teachers in this nation, and prefixed to a book, called (by an antiphrasis) Christs innocency pleaded against the cry of the chief priests. Written in hast by Thomas Speed, once a publick teacher himself, and since revolted from that calling to merchandize, and of late grown a merchant of soules, trading subtilly for the Quakers in Bristoll. Wherein the jesuiticall equivocations and subtle insinuations, whereby he endeavours secretly to infuse the whole venome of Quaking doctrines, into undiscerning readers, are discovered; a catlogue of the true and genuine doctrines of the Quakers is presented, and certaine questions depending between us and them, candidly disputed, / by [brace] Christopher Fowler & Simon Ford, [brace] ministers of the Gospel in Reding,	Fowler, Christopher, 1610?-1678.; Ford, Simon, 1619?-1699.	1656 (1656)	Wing F1694; Thomason E883_1; ESTC R207293	63,879	81

be all you your self hold of perfection or no we will not judge But we shall shew you anon that those of your perswasion are not altogether so modest It is well if your self be so when you will please to speak out which we scarce believe you will do in a charge against your self of your own drawing up But we hope you will allow us to ask you a few questions upon this Article also seeing you stand upon your justification Q. 1. To what purpose is all this Did any of your pretended Accusers ever accuse our Saviour Christ for mockery or commanding impossibilities in this command of perfection or for falsehood in his commendation of Nathaniel or the Apostle Paul for designing an impossibility 2. Qu. Whether the perfection commanded by Christ or that which is commended in Nathaniel or aimed at by Paul be a perfection of degrees and that as high as that of God himself or a perfection of kind truth or sincerity Say not that we coine distinctions of perfection out of our own braine Doth not the Scripture call Job a perfect man Job 1. 1. and yet chap. 3. gives us a sad instance of his imperfections and Job himself renounceth perfection in himself chap. 9. 20 21. Doth not the Apostle Paul himself in one chapter affirms and deny himself to be perfect Phil. 3. 12. 15. And therefore seeing as we hope you will not allow any contradictions in Scripture there a necessity to distinguish of different sences wherein they affirme and deny And if we distinguish amisse we wish you or your companions would do it better Nay we suppose both these sorts of perfection necessarily held forth in the Scriptures of your own quotation For the command of our Saviour saies not Be yee as perfect as your Father which is in Heaven but Be yee perfect as your Father in Heaven is perfect Perfect as doth not imply more then a perfection of the same kind which perfection we professe a perfection consisting in truth and sincerity of holinesse the perfection of Nathaniel as perfect denotes a perfection of degrees which in the comparison with an infinitely holy God we deny to be attainable by any Creature or to be asserted concerning any Creature without highest blasphemy But a perfection of degrees suitable to the capacity of finite Creatures we hope for in Heaven and a perfection of degrees suitable to the capacity of mortall creatures we presse towards your selves and endeavour with Paul to present all our hearers unto Jesus Christ in the same at the last day 4. About your forth Article concerning rejecting all meanings Sect. 15. and interpretations of Scripture we shall take a more convenient time to reckon with you in a distinct Question subjoyned hereunto Only we make bold to ask you here also Qu. Whether to interpret Christs and the Apostles sayings be not injuriously reflected upon by you as a deniall that they meant as they spake and whether a man may not mean as he speaks and yet not to be understood without interpretation we are so charitable to think that divers of the Familists and Quakers mean as they speak and yet we cannot understand their meaning by their speaking in divers odd phrases used by them without interpretation would you would give us a Lexicon of them 5. Your fifth Article we shall speak more largely to in Sect 16. this place You say that you and your Complices assert that Christ did not speak one thing and intend another when he commanded men not to sweare at all but to let their yea be yea and nay nay Whereas we that are scornfully enough by you called Orthodox do both sweare our selves and teach others so to do And you add the reason as good a one as you please to allow us because otherwise we might happily go without our maintenance for want of swearers in Courts of Justice against those Hereticks that refuse to pay us Tythes And in your Margin to give us a touch of your learning that we may take it for an act of self-deniall in your after-declared contempt thereof and not an act of envious declaiming against the Grapes you cannot reach you quote the Originall in that prohibition 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 with this note That it is a prohibition so universall that it admitteth of no exception Upon which Article we first observe two things 1. That it was very warily done of the Founders of the Quaking Religion who are by many judicious men supposed to be Papists to insert an Article in their new Creed to excuse them from being discovered by refusing the Oath of Abjuration which they may under the shelter of your Principles do and yet passe undiscovered Secondly we quaere We observe secondly that the Quakers refusing to sweare according to the Ceremony now required in England of kissing the Bible and swearing by the contents of that Book is suitable to their Doctrine that the Scriptures are not our rule and by consequence that God will not judge us according to the contents of the Bible so that to call God to witnesse according to the contents of that book according to which they conceive he will not judge were absurd It may be if a new forme of an Oath such as by the light within them were required they might be perswaded to sweare Qu. 1. Whether our Saviour Christ spake or intended any thing which might clash with the expresse command of God elsewhere And if not then surely Christs words in this place must not be taken so unlimitedly as you say seeing we find a command Deut. 5. 13. Thou shalt feare the Lord thy God and sweare by his name So also Deut. 10. 20. Qu. 2. Whether our Saviour Christ forbid any part of Gods morall Worship or no If not then we are assured he forbids See Jer. 4. 2. Is 45. 23. which peculiarly concerneth us as referring to Gospel times and is therefore quoted by the Apostle Rom. 14. 21. with such a variation of the phrase swearing into confessing as plainly proves that to sweare by God is sometimes a necessary part of our confession and acknowledgment of him not swearing without any exception For we find it frequently made a part of Gods morall Worship to sweare by his name and it is also joyned in the mentioned Scriptures with fearing and serving God Qu. 3. Whether our Saviour Christ cut off by this command any necessary meanes of deciding controversies between man and man or confirming truth in matters of testimony If so surely he would thereby have rendred his Doctrine justly obnoxious as being destructive to humane society If not we are certain he forbids not all swearing without exception for the Epistle to the Hebrewes tells us that an Oath of confirmation is an end of all strife Heb. 6. 16. Q. 4. Whether the Author in his former Article setting forth God as a Pattern of perfection to us doth not therein allow us in some Cases to sweare

seeing we are told Heb. 6. 17. that God himself allowes himself to sweare for those ends for which an Oath is legally used by men viz. for confirmation of his word Q. 5. Whether without swearing upon the call of a Magistrate all mens estates be not as liable to prejudice as the maintenance of the Ministry And whether cheating companions will not be as prone to take the same advantage against other men in case there was no judiciall Oathes required as it seems by the Authors confession Hereticks would against poor Ministers except we must take it for granted that every mans yea yea and nay nay is as a sufficient security in this case of testifying the Truth judicially as a solemn Oath Q. 6. Whether Abraham did well or ill to require an Oath of his Servant Gen. 24. 3. Jacob of Joseph 50. 5. Nehemiah of the Jewes Neh. 13 25. Or if you evade these examples as being before Christ whether the Apostle Paul did well or ill to sweare Gal. 1. 20. c. In a word this Doctrine of the unlawfulnesse of swearing in Sect. 14 any case is a fragment of the old Germane Anabaptists a Generation of men against whom the Magistrates saw sufficient cause to dispute with the Sword of Justice for being publick enemies to humane Society and it concernes you to take heed that the Magistracy of England may never have the like provocation to follow their example against their genuine issue the Quakers and other Sectaries among us But least you should seem justly to charge us with swearing our selves and teaching others to do so contrary to the command of Christ we must in the close let you know how we sweare and allow others to do so and what swearing we forbeare our selves and preach downe among them in obedience to Christs command We must tell you that being lawfully called to witnesse to truth upon Oath before a Magistrate we shall not our selves refuse to sweare that is according to the forme required in Law to call God to witnesse that we lye not But in our communication or ordinary discourse we desire both we and our hearers may keep to our yea yea and nay nay as Christ commands and not to sweare at all because we dare not take or allow others to take the name of God in vaine And this we suppose to be all that our Saviour intends in that Prohibition that in our communication we should not sweare at all If any one be not convinced hereof by what we have said let him reconcile our Saviours Prohibition to the precepts and examples before pleaded some other way and Phyllida solus habeto He shall gaine the cause in this point Your following three Articles viz. 6. 7 8. are all concerning Sect. 18 Tythes and forced maintenance wherein the summe and upshot of all shewes your charity to the poore Ministery that you would faine have them reduced to the condition of the unjust Steward that is either to work or beg For working we suppose in such a Generation as God hath now east us into we shall not want whilest besides the ordinary attendance upon our charges which the Apostle Paul accounted a work and a great one too 1 Thes 5. 13. Eph. 4. 12. and such as none will be too forward to intrude into that sufficiently understands the weight of it 2 Cor. 2. 16. The work of a Builder a Sower 1 Cor. 3. 10. Mar. 4. 13 1 Cor. 3. 6. 2 Tim. 2. 6. Jo. 21. 26. Heb. 13. 15. 2 Tim. 2. 3 P. 40. a Planter an Husbandman a Shepheard a Watohman a Souldier We are called upon to answer every idle rayling Paper that you and your companions send us But seeing you account this no work it seemes you would have us worke with our hands or beg An hard Law for men that have been bred in a way of humane Learning which elsewhere you seem to allow some use in the World it may serve to tile the house you confesse and in that place you are content it shall stand But surely should this Law of yours take place that those that have been bred to study must have no subsistence but by handy work or begging I feare the next Generation would yeild few Tiles to keep the house in repaire so that it would quickly drop through and you as well as others would not be able to lye dry in it For who will give his Children ingenuous Education at the Schooles of Learning and set them there to spend the flower of their youth in acquiring humane literature when the highest preferment they could expect after ten or twenty yeares Study would be either to work or beg would not every one conclude it better to set their Sons to some Trade or other in their youth that so at the end of seven yeares they might be able to get a livelyhood at their fingers ends or turne them a begging in their Childhood rather then maintain them twice seven yeares at Schoole and University to come thence to be preferred to a certain beggary as being the only lot of the two like to befall them who are utterly to learne to work having never been bred thereunto But the measure you mete unto us is harder yet You that will have us work or beg will not allow us to carry so much as a Purse to put our Wages in when we have earned it nor a Scrip to put our Almes in when we have begged it but to live as the Sparrowes do that digest one meales meat in seeking where to get another I suppose should God call us to that condition either by an extraordinary command as Christ did his Lu. 10. 7. Apostles in the place you quote or by an extraordinary providence as we suspect in case you can compasse your fifth Monarchy it would befall us we should not want faith to trust him who feeds the Sparrowes and clothes the Lillies whether in a way of working as we are able or asking the charity of others when disabled We have learned a distich of learned and honest Musculus which he made when the fury of the Germane Anabaptists your Predecessors turned him out of his Pulpit and maintenance and enforced him to weave and dig for a subsistence for himself and his Family Est Deus in Coelis qui providus omnia curat Credentes nunquam deseruisse potest Which for the sake of your Brethren who whatsoever you are are no great friends to Latine we shall english A God in Heaven lives whose care extends To all and therefore will not faile his friends But we question yet further whether you that would require Sect. 19 us to follow precisely the Apostolicall example in that Chapter will not yet go further then this in your rigorous exactions Suppose we should work without a Purse and beg without a Scrip at your command what security will you give us that you will not make us work and beg barefoot too For if your Text