Selected quad for the lemma: ground_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
ground_n	believe_v	faith_n	receive_v	1,549	5	5.5472	4	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A77522	Letters between the Ld George Digby, and Sr Kenelm Digby kt. concerning religion.	Bristol, George Digby, Earl of, 1612-1677.; Digby, Kenelm, Sir, 1603-1665.	1651 (1651)	Wing B4768; Thomason E1355_2; ESTC R209464	61,686	137

Faith that you doe not most intirely assent unto For my part I doe not know what you understand by an Article of Faith but I am sure I have cited out of St. Austin of the necessity of Childrens partaking of the Eucharist an Article in this discourse which 't is evident he held as an Article both of necessary faith and practice wherein I believe you will refuse to joyne with him As for Epiphanius his over-sights I referre you onely to the Jesuit Petavius and for Eusebius to Cardinall Perron who casts upon him a trifling aspersion but of Arrianism or if his authority suffice not let Jerome Ep. 65. ad Pamach Oc. be heard who gives him this good testimony Impietatis Arrii apertissimus propugnator est Now to your third and last ground That the traditions of the Church are infallible I say that in part we agree in this point for I am perswaded that no man in his right wits will ever deny the firmest assent he hath about him to traditions of the nature which you Character doctrines taught by Christ to his Apostles and by them preached through the world and then again delivered to the ensuing ages by them that had these points inculcated in their hearts by the Apostles in this manner with care and every where handed over from age to age which upon particular occasions the Fathers used to summe up and produce against innovators that would make breaches upon the ancient and generally received faith of the Church-Traditions of this nature Doctrines thus delivered I say we agree to be derived from infallible Authority as well as the Scriptures and it is indifferent unto me whether I receive the waters of life from the Springs themselves from the originall cisternes and conserves into which they did immediarly flow or else conveyed through Aquiducts at sixteen hundred yeares distance so I be certain of the stanchnesse and purity of the pipes That such traditions and so exactly conveyed there are in the Church and to which is due as to the Scripture from every prudent man how ever a Sophister may cavill the strongest assent of his soule we likewise both agree such are those fore-named grand fundamentals of Christianity we agree further that by tradition we are as you say plainly fully and practifically taught how to understand Scripture I mean in those Fundamentals And much more must I agree with you that the businesse and errand of tradition is to deliver it so unto us since for my part I hold that those dignifying circumstances by which tradition may rightly pretend to be infallible belong onely to such doctrines as are either plainly or by necessary consequences deducibly coucht in Scripture in regard of which deductions we agree further that it cannot be denied but that it is as you say an easier and better rule to guide our understandings in the affairs of religion to use the help of such traditions then to resort for that end unto Scriptures alone as to read a book wherein there are difficulties with a judicious comment is likely to be more profitable then onely to peruse the single Text. And this last I assent unto without admitting of the supposition upon which you inferre it to wit that there can by tradition be had a compleat knowledge of all that Christ taught All this we are of accord in but what can you infer from hence to the advantage of the Romish cause since I peremptorily deny that there is such a qualified tradition really belonging to any Tenent of the Church of Rome disapproved by us or that seale with those quarterings and dignifyings wherewith you blazon it set by any of the primitive Fathers which yet were no sufficient warrant to any doctrine that doth so much as border upon our disputes since then I am sure you directed that part of your Letter to the same purpose that the rest I must answer what I conceive it tends to as well as what directly your words beare And as I have profest wherein we agree so now I must set down in what and why we differ concerning these particulars of Tradition and Scripture There are two principall poynts wherein I dissent from you First that in the generall you conceive all Traditions of the Church whatsoever infallible Secondly that you hold the Scripture to be no compleat body of Faith and therefore that we are to give tradition much the preheminency in governing the tenour of ours For the first namely that all the traditions of the Church are infallible I could by one demand of which is that Church whose traditions are infallible either bring you to our confession that the true Church is to be known meerly by its conformity to Scripture in belief and practice or else into a circle whilst you are forc'd to prove the truth and infallibility of the Church by her constant reception of those true and infallible traditions whose truth and infallibility you are at the same time proving by the Churches constant receiving them But I passe it by because I would not seeme to argue in any wise captiously and also for that Mr. Chillingworth hath already excellently laid open all the intricasies of this labyrinth And therefore taking the present Romish Church for that you mean I proceed to answer your Arguments wherby in your Letter to the Vicountesse of P. to which you referre me you endeavour to prove all doctrines of the Church received or delivered by way of tradition infallible the chiefe that I finde are in the 12 and 13. conclusions as you call them of that treatise where first for proof of your assertions that no false doctrine of Faith whatsoever can be admitted or creep into the Catholick Church you say that whatsoever the present Church beleeveth as a proposition of faith is upon this ground that Christ taught it as such unto the Church he planted himself a special good ground and that will soon end all controversies in this matter if the ground appear to be well grounded and that the Church of Rome which you suppose the present Catholick do never admit any doctrine of Faith but upon that ground But first the ground can never be made good that whatsoever of Faith the Church of Rome teacheth was ab initio so taught by Christ himself And secondly I beleeve that the Church of Rome her self doth not alwayes in all that she teaches for a tradition of Faith suppose that Christ himself did teach the same for this latter part I am better perswaded of the modesty of the Church of Rome then to think that she will so much as pretend it for all her doctrines as for example that of communicating onely in the bread is a tradition for you will not I suppose vouch Scripture for it unless you mean to apply to it Christ's prayer that the Cup might be removed it is a tradition of Faith yea and I think I may say of necessary faith for unless the Communicants

once take the liberty to except against particular Doctrines or particular Fathers delivering them I may then with out any further proof flatly conclude that nothing can be this way concluded since your adversaries will likewise claim in whatsoever shall thwart them an equal liberty of excepting Now Cousin give me leave to examine a little neerer the three grounds whereon you build the pretended certainty of this Method in resolving your differences out of the Fathers declarations as I collect your sense they are these First That they were faithful Collectors of the general traditions of the Church in their times Secondly that they are sincere conveyers of them to us And Thirdly that the traditions collected and conveyed by them are infallible Should I grant them all to be true it would not follow that they were sufficient till it did appear which I think never will though for the present we will suppose it that there were general traditions preserved in the Church concerning all those points which we dispute of but unless they appear to be true I am sure they cannot pass for sufficient First That they were faithful Collectors of all the traditions of the Church where in faithful I suppose you comprise careful able for in the other single sense of fidelity faithful hath most proper relation to the following condition of Conveyers industry and ability being as fully requisite in this the Collecting part as integrity To this I say that as in one place I have formerly profest how I beleeve them such faithful Collectors of the Churches receptions that is careful and able as well as sincere in many things of greatest importance so in another I think I have said enough whereby to prove it unlikely that in things of less moment such as our controversies the Primitive Fathers did applie their care and abilities to sound the bottome of them whether in this way of collecting the traditions of the Church concerning them or any other Industry requiring alwayes stimulations in the particular businesses where we are to expect it and likewise some leasure remission from other pressing occupations Both which the Primitive Fathers totally wanted by little provocation in our cases and incessant allarms in more weighty ones So that to your first ground I will onely make of new this demand Was the knowledge and Collection of the Churches traditions receptions easie and evident to all careful investigators or hard and difficult If the latter which I beleeve since so many circumstances are requisite to the exact knowledge of the Churches traditions as first certain evidence what is that Church universal whose traditions are so sacred Secondly a clear and unconfus'd delivery of the same unto them lastly not only an exquisite apprehension of the substance of all the doctrines but a perfect intelligence of the degrees and necessities either of belief or practise wherein the Church did hold them if thus hard I say and intricate the Fathers being men and liable as you confess to error how can we be secured that they did not oftentimes mistake them since it is evident that sometimes they did If facill and obvious which is likelyest you take them to be since you prefer them before Scriptures because that you say is difficult how comes it that they disagree having a plain easie and infallible Directory whereby to regulate and conform their judgments And truly Cousin supposing it such I know not how to free divers of them that dissent from one another in matters where tradition is vouched from the imputation of stupidity either in not understanding the common and manifest tenents of the Church or of perversness and malice that knowing them would not own them but by arguing from their variances that they were not all in all matters of Religion careful Collectors of the Churches traditions Which if you once admit we cannot think to conclude any thing from the Fathers till some third authority assure us which of the many for ought appears to us of equal abilities and zeal were the careful Collectors which not and in what particulars they were so and in what not To your second ground that they are sincere Conveyers unto us of the traditions of the Church I say that to the just title of sincere Conveyers two conditions are requisite the one affirmative that they should deliver to us with all their rights that is clearness perspicauity identitie of sense as they received them all the right traditions of the Church And that the Fathers are not likely to have done this may be inferred from what hath been said before of their want of care and industry in collecting the Churches sene concerning our affairs matters being seldome right in the second digestion which were not good in the first The other is negative that they should not deliver any thing for a tradition of the Church universal that was not rightly and evidently such That the Fathers were not Scrupulous in this point my former instances I conceive have sufficiently evinced Wherein it is evident with what confidence to doubtful yea and erroneous doctrines that themselves effected they set this pretended great seal of infallibility Beleeve me Cousin that saying of St. Hierom Ingenium suum facit Ecclesiae Sacramenta belongs not onely unto Origen it may without wrong be extended to most of the Fathers that I have been acquainted with And no marvel that they should sometimes in heat of dispute be transported to vouch for tradition what was not when so often they swerve from what was apparently the universal receptions of the Church as hath been made evident by many examples From which I do not infer that the Fathers had alwayes such erroneous beliefs as their words would many times import but onely that it is likely that they who in heat of dispute or for some ends which they thought very important would recede in their expressions from the confest tradition of the Church in such high constitutive points of Christian Religion would not be scrupulous in the like heats or upon the like ends to misapply the seal of tradition to some points of lesser importance For though it appear a greater falsehood to set a seal surreptitiously where it belongs not yet it is neerer to Rebellion not to conforme to that Authority where the Royal seal is manifestly stamp'd There hath enough been said to maniest that the Fathers that would sometimes thus license themselves be the occasion what it will and the end how pious soever cannot pass for Candid or sincere conveyers of all the Churches receptions unto us and if less punctual in any sure likeliest in our controverted doctrines which rarely had they the occasion to mention but as serving to greater ends there were so many circumstances that might tempt and lead them from the exact punctuallities of a sincere conveyer that I am not much scandalized at their prevarication You shall finde that where Gregory Neoces Ariensis said that