Selected quad for the lemma: faith_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
faith_n	covenant_n	sacrament_n	seal_n	4,627	5	9.5821	5	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A67237	The pretensions of the triple crown examined in thrice three familiar letters ... / written some years ago by Sir Christopher Wyvill ...	Wyvill, Christopher, Sir, 1614-1672?	1672 (1672)	Wing W3787; ESTC R34104	91,353	203

God who super-added the word to the sign The Relation is mutual betwixt the Word and the Sign as betwixt the Form and the Matter The Word as the Form the Sign as the Matter Conjoyn them and they are a Sacrament By the Word we are to understand the Mandate of Christ enjoyning us to use them and to expect spiritual Grace thereby So we think we have good right to root out the other two and whole five supernumerary Sacraments since Confirmation and Extreme Unction have indeed the Element but wanting the Word ought not to be accounted Sacraments since Absolution and Ordination have no Element since Matrimony has no promise of Grace And thus we may more than ghess at the just number of Sacraments Wherefore laying aside the Supposititious we find but two Sacraments of the Gospel Baptism and the Lord's Supper In the first of these we have no Dispute with the Church of Rome but will I hope in some sort be cleared by our Disquisitions concerning the latter save about such trifles as their mixing of Salt and Spittle their Exorcisms their suffering Women sometimes to administer it c. Come we then to that which is commonly called the Communion How far the real Presence of Christs Body is allowed by us I shall in the first place declare We are then to distinguish betwixt the outward and inward Act of the Communicant In the outward with our bodily mouths we receive really the Elements of Bread and Wine In the inward we do by Faith really receive the Body and Bloud of the Lord that is We are truly and indeed by Vertue of the Covenant where the Sacrament is a Seal made partakers of Christ crucified to the spiritual strengthening of our souls Our Adversaries of the Roman Perswasion have made such a confusion of these things that for the former they deny that after Consecration there remains any Bread or Wine at all to be received though Paul does in my mind give a strong intimation 1 Cor. 11. 26. 10. 16. That it is Bread at breaking or distribution at eating or participation Then for the second they affirm That the body and blood of Christ is in such a manner present under the outward shewes of Bread and Wine as whosoever receives the one be he good or bad Believer or Infidel does therewith really receive the other A Tenent not consistent with that place in John 6. where our Saviour saith He that eateth my flesh and drinketh my blood hath Eternal life abiding in him and I will raise him up at the last day Hence hath that Reverend Usher often before quoted in that Answer to the Jesuits Challenge where you may find many clear testimonies out of the Fathers to this purpose framed this Syllogism The Body and Blood of Christ is received unto Life by all that do receive it and by none unto condemnation But that which is outwardly delivered in the Sacrament is not received by all unto Life but by many unto Condemnation Therefore that which is outwardly delivered in the Sacrament is not really the Body and Blood of Christ. What was his last shall be my first proof out of St. Augustin handling this very place The Sacrament of this thing viz. of eating the flesh of Christ is taken from the Lord's Table by some unto life by some unto destruction but the thing it self whereof it is a Sacrament is received by every Man that doth receive it unto Life and by none that is made Partaker thereof unto destruction Now seriously if Protestants could adde no more Arguments to this and my self were as much an Adorour of that Way and Church as ever I was I am perswaded that it alone had been sufficient by the blessing of God to have gained me to the Reformed Belief But let us ponder well the Words of Institution 'T is true This is my Body and This is my blood is the Phrase used But were not the Sacraments of the Old Testament instituted with the same manner of Speech This is my Covenant and the slaying of the Lamb called the Passover The former is presently expounded by God himself when he says It shall be a Sign of the Covenant The other is known to have been the Commemoration of passing by the Israelites when the first-born of Egypt were slain Thus our Saviour having said This is my body goes on This do in Remembrance of me Luke 22. 19. The Disciples having been trained up to the meaning of the Old Sacraments could not and we if we will compare them with the New need not think the Expression at all obscure As the Lamb was the Passover As the Sign of the Covenant was the Covenant As the Rock was Christ So we acknowledge the Bread to be his body In the Institution of the other part of this Sacrament the Words are clear Matth. 26. He took the Cup blessed and gave it them saying Drink ye all of this for it is my Blood of the New Testament or as St. Paul and Luke relate it This Cup is the New Testament in my Blood How is the Cup or that conteined therein the New Testament otherwise than as a Sacrament of it And generally for all Sacraments the Rule is thus laid down by St. Augustin If Sacraments did not some way resemble the things whereof they are Sacraments they should not be Sacraments at all for this resemblance they do often bear the names of the things As therefore the Sacrament of the Body of Christ is after a certain manner the Body of Christ c. In another place he tells us the seven Ears of Corn were seven years and the Blood is called the Soul of Man after the manner of Sacraments It 's Evident the Fathers though they delighted to imitate our Saviour's manner of locution yet their meaning even when they followed the Metaphor through large discourses were not dissonant from that of Origen who after he had playd the Rhetorician in this sort concludes Et haec quidem de typico symbolicóque Corpore If you will but observe what strange relations my Authour gives you have full lieve to examine the truth of them though for my part I believe them What can you think but that some by-ended Priests the better to increase their esteem with the People such as Marcus Radbertus Damascen and Amalalarius there named wrought up the Vulgar Ignorance to an amazed Admiration of those mens power who could perform such great wonders and were the Makers of that they were taught to adore In Charles the Bald's time this Phansie had got some ground and several Questions and Debates arose about it That Emperour required Ratrannus to deliver his thoughts upon it whereunto he obeyed in such terms as Turrian the Jesuite is forced to say That to cite Bertram so is Ratrannus more usually named What is it else but to say The Heresie so he thinks fit to phrase it of

habits and acts of righteousness which thou seemest to relye upon even thine own conscience will tell thee have been imperfect unconstant partial yea sometimes none at all but thy soul hath frequently been inslaved to contrary vices therefore thou must have something of more integrity a more immaculate and spotless obedience to present me withal and make out thy interest therein too before thy claim be just Now let us see what answer the Protestant Principles will put into our mouths and let the safer the truer the modester carry it Thus then Lord I know thy Law is holy just and good 't is likewise eternal by the righteousness of this Law Justification is to be had even yet as well as in the Covenant of works made with Adam before his fall onely here is the difference It 's now accepted in the hands of a Mediator The Lord our Righteousness who as surety of a better Covenant and as Head of his Body the Church hath fulfill'd the Law in its utmost Demands My faith my obedience my charity are all weak poor inconsiderable things Eternal life and the whole of my salvation from the one end to the other is purely a free gift Though I have had some Graces of thy Spirit in such a measure as have been a comfortable evidence that my heart was set aright to serve thee for without a conformity to thy Son in holiness begun in the life below no flesh may hope with joy to see thy face above yet I dare not I ought not to present these unto thee as the matter of my justification I have through thy mercy been sincere but it is in Christ only that I am compleat We do know That we ought to have in honour the Saints departed and not to think meanly of the Angels those ministring Spirits But we do not acknowledge that we ought to invocate them or direct our prayers or vows unto them much less place confidence in the wearing their Reliques or Pictures to prevent lightning sudden death c. 5. We do know That an high and profound reverence is due to Fathers Councils voice of the Church But we acknowledge not That any particular place or succession of men is exempt from all possibility of Error Nor that Rome keeps her first Principles 6. We do know That men of ungodly unstable contentious dispositions do not look upon the Bible without danger to their own souls and pervert many things therein to their destruction But we acknowledge not That therefore the sincere milk of the Word is to be lock'd up from those that might grow thereby Nor that meat is to be kept from the children because it is sometimes abused to excess and riot by dissolute and licentious men LETTER IX THat Person to me yet unknown whom you did some years since substitute to shape me an answer unto a few Lines I then hastily offered to your view cut his Work into a very uncourtly Mode and takes it for granted that I have not so much understanding as to know they would be understood to place the Condignity of Merit in works done by Grace not by Nature nor so much Learning as to English Opus Operatum For the first I would have both him and you to know that we oppose as to Justifying before God all Works both of Nature and Grace For certainly if we consider the Testimony alledged Rom. 4. by Paul out of Genesis 15. to prove that Abraham was not then Justified by Works it will appear he was long before that Regenerate and had sundry Works of Faith It was a Work of Faith that he followed God's call out of his Countrey Compare Gen. 12. 4. with Heb. 11. 8. Other Works of Piety and Love see recorded Gen. 12. 8. and 13. 8 9. and 14. 16 20. Yet none of these but after them all Gen. 15. Faith was imputed to him for Righteousness and he obtained the Promise that is saw Christ afar off and had his share in him not by Working but Believing And if Works merely Natural had been in Question why comes in the Example of Abraham rather than of Abimelech Socrates or the like That St. James meant not to reach beyond Justification in Foro Humano by that which he attributes to Works is evident from what he subjoyns ver 18. Shew me thy Faith by thy Works He denies a saving power only to such a Faith as is not Operative and to such a one neither do we ascribe any thing at all The two Apostles both instancing in him to confirm their seeming contrary assertions makes it evident they are to be referred to the several Tribunals of God and of Conscience But if he will give me lieve to mind him that the Franciscans in the Council of Trent were of opinion that Works done before Faith were truly meritorious in the sight of God and how Sir Kenelme Digby doubts not to say The old Philosophers without Christ for so we all know they were if any of them followed the Dictates of right Reason no Grace is there mentioned might attain Heaven it may abate his anger at the Expression I there used I have set my self to School again that I might improve my knowledge in the Romane as well as the Latine Tongue and have learnt from those Doctors at Trent That there are some actions which cause Grace not by the devotion of him that worketh or of him that does receive the work but by virtue of the work it self And That Prayers in absolution are only laudable not necessarily added to I absolve thee So making the Efficacie to flow ab Opere Operato Thus I conceive is to be understood what I have more than once read in their Books That to the merit of Prayer it suffices that the words be repeated but if a man have a particular request to put up it 's necessary the heart and affections accompany them in that desire I think now there 's no great difficulty in construing Opus operatum nor was I much out of the way when I applied it to their practice in their Sacraments I do not conclude that all those who delight to be styled Roman Catholicks making light of the latter appellation if not ushered in by the former are guilty of all this high Treason against God's Truth nor of Misprision of that Treason neither for I am confident very few of the Laity amongst them are privy to such bold Positions as are maintained by Vasquez with the now predominant Faction of the Jesuits and their adherents yet it were well they would consider whereunto their implicite credulity would lead them I once had from the mouth of a Romanist whose memory has all the reason in the world to be ever dear to me an expression wherewith I was much taken as neighbouring very near unto Truth and far from the malignity of some I have before cited When I insisted upon the Righteousness of Christ as our justification it was