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	revelation_n	1,466	5	9.8611	5	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A38612	Popular errors, in generall poynts concerning the knowledge of religion having relation to their causes, and reduced into divers observations / by Jean D'Espaigne.; Erreurs populaires es poincts généraux, qui concernent l'intelligence de la religion. English	Espagne, Jean d', 1591-1659.	1648 (1648)	Wing E3267; ESTC R3075	73,280	230

certaine Prophets told Paul that bonds did attend him at Jerusalem but the counsell they gave him not to goe thither was a motion of their owne particular spirit proceeding from their humane affection All the dreames which came to the Prophets were not propheticall they had markes by which they discerned the celestiall visions from naturall impressions to which they were subject as well as other men In the same manner as the divine providence of God hath separated that which was writ by their particular motion from that which was transmitted unto us by divine inspiration The Spirit which dictated the letter of David written with the bloud of poore Uria was quite contrary to that which indited the Psalmes Nathan counselling the building of the Temple seemed speaking like a godly man but the consequence shewes he spake not like a Prophet It is most true that neither sagacity nor humane affections reduced into a just temper are not incompatible with spirituall wisdome contrarily they serve for a helpe to our weaknesse All the articles of our faith are equally true but our beliefe embraces them not with equall facility We have lesse trouble to believe a divine Essence then a Trinity of Persons the immortality of the soule then the resurrection of the body The reason is that in the one we have nothing but a supernaturall revelation for the ground of our beliefe and in the other we are moreover sustained by humane reason which strengthens this faith So our obedience is more voluntary in things to which wee have besides the commandement of God some naturall or personall inclination then in those which are repugnant to our affections I doubt not but Abraham obeyed more joyfully when it was bidden him not to lay his hand upon Isaac then when he was commanded to slay him But in this concurrence namely of the Spirit of God with our spirits wee must marke these two principalls the one of which is alwaies regular and the other hath still some spice of obliquity A man addicted to his sence and that adores his owne opinions will very hardly give place to the Spirit of God Ordinarily Prophecies and Revelations came unto men then when they were asleep where God sent them those extasies whilst they lasted they were as if deprived of all sence which was because the soule is then dis-intangled from many functions and freed from an infinity of thoughts and of objects which possessed it waking being then lesse glued to their naturall judgement and so more susceptible of the influencie of heaven and more capable to receive the impression thereof CHAP. IIII. Concerning the Sences and of the imaginations vulgar meditations matters which seeme better in Painting then in the words of the holy Scripture Why the corporall figure of our Saviour is not delineated in the Gospell Why the sight of the places esteemed holy takes away the admiration thereof REligion contains divers matters which for a simple historicall knowledge are intelligible to the externall senses The starre which appeared to the wise men the manger at Bethlehem the crown of Thornes the punishment of the Crosse the Sepulchre of Christ and his comming out thereof the scarres of his Wounds his Ascension to Heaven are objects perceptible to the imagination Nay we cannot conceive the truth of the naturall body of Christ but under an imaginable and sensible forme But the internall forme of all these theologicall truths which is as it were the soul of Religion is not apprehensible but to the intellect The divinity resident in Christ the personall union of the two Natures the merits of his Death the efficacie of his Intercession the interest of the justice of God in this satisfaction The eternall Election the interiour Vocation Justification the essence of the Faith the regeneration are matters purely intellectuall In every narration principally in each article of faith which lies in the Historie there is ever two things requisite to the intelligence thereof 1. The action with its circumstances Secondly the causes and the consequences thereof Now the first point is better studied and more sought into by the common people as being more delectable to the imagination and far easier to bee conceived then the other which touches not the senses and requires a more spirituall and more laborious exercise of the understanding from whence it comes to passe that the science the conception the proofes and meditations of the vulgar are more imaginative then intellectuall A Deaths head the spectacle of a carkasse or of a dying man will represent our humane fragility more lively then can doe all the sentences of the Bible But the supernaturall causes of this corruption and the consequences thereof from whence results the true intelligence of our mortality they are not read in such characters A picture may give knowledge of an action but the reasons and the motives in which lyes the importance of the story askes another Pensill A Crucifix tells us not why Jesus Christ died Never man was yet converted by the sight of a picture If that were Painters and Sculptors would be the greatest Theologians After the same manner the sufferings of Christ reduced into a Tragedy and elevated by the highest colours of Eloquence what teares soever it may draw from the auditors will never suffice for a saving knowledge If the true pourtraict of Jesus Christ representing his naturall face were to be found in the world I would never blame the curiosity of those who would seek the possession and who all superstition set apart would preserve it as one of the most precious jewels that the eye of man can behold Many have thought that they have the originall in an Epistle of Lentulus to the Senate of Rome of which I will say no more but that it is no Roman stile Some others have drawne the Copy from the Monument of a fabulous history which speaks of a Statue erected in memory of our Saviour Howsoever it comes to passe it is a strange thing that the Scripture which paints forth the stature of Saul the haire of Absalom the colour and visage of David expresses not any figure of our Saviour We find not therein the least Idea nor any lineament neither of his face colour aspect stature or yet of his voyce But that by which he was discernable from other men consisted not in his visible forme or in any extraordinary difference of Lineaments otherwise Judas had not needed a signe to make him to be known so that the representation of him at this day to the eye of flesh would make him contemptible to him that would not conceive a divine Majesty under a common and indifferent appearance Or it would be a Patron of Idolatry which would not faile to multiply under so favourable a pretext Our humane vanity would have added there to some frivolous and impertinent speculations of Phisiognomie Or superstition would cast its sight upon each man who should have some seeming resemblance of such a

Alphabet without knowing how to join them to make entire words thereof Religion as it is in the knowledge of many consisteth in the multitude of matters confusedly heaped together in the mind without symmetry or proportiō without any form either of building or body the head and feet being confounded Some of our controversies concern the same order and rank of points The Romane Catholicks coming to contend with us begin voluntarily with the question of the Church giving it the highest place to the end they may make it passe as a rule and principle of faith But the Article of the Church holdeth not the first rank in the Creed CHAP. IIII. Of those which believe the truth by vertue of a false principle or of some passage of Scripture which toucheth not the question MAny believe the truth by a false faith The Turk believes God the creation providence the immortality of the soul Christ born of a virgin a great Prophet and the word of God because the Alchoran saith it These points are true in themselves but the belief which he hath thereby cannot be formally true because it depends on a false principle Truth may not be believed for a lyes sake One may not commend them which endeavour to amplifie the Oracles of the Sybills to the end they may make them speak more advantagiously in favour of the Christian Religion Nor the pious frauds of them which under colour of proving the immortality of the soul have supposed fabulous apparitions It importeth not onely what we believe but also why we believe it A man which believeth there is a God because Philosophy or naturall reason teacheth him so hath not a Theologick faith although the beliefe which he hath touching God be true in it self and in its principles He that believeth all the Articles of Christianity because great Doctors believe them or onely because the Church holds them for true hath built his faith upon mans testimonie 'T is a complaint of a person eminent in humane learning that being Orthodox in the Article of Christs Divinity notwithstanding in his interpretation and Paraprases upon the new Testament he did enervate or allude asmuch as was possible for him all the most manifest passages which authorise the beliefe of this point But on the other side the world is full of people which upon every sort of matter alledge a multitude of Texts though oft times the twentieth part suit not to the subject They which believe a truth but ground it upon a passage of Scripture which maketh not to the purpose believe the truth falsely That which they believe is very true but that by vertue whereof they believe it is not so For the Scripture ill applyed is no more Scripture but a perverting thereof although it be alleadged to prove the truth which it teacheth in other passages And 't were to be wished that many would bring hither as much feare and discretion as they abound in impertinent quotations But the vulgar often suffer thēselves to be led more by passages which come by the by then by those which lead straight to the mark I have seene a man which could never be brought from the Invocation of Saints for any Text alleadged unto him unlesse when one quoted to him the passage of Esay 63. ver 16. which notwithstanding is not the most concluding of all those which are made use of in this controversie A Rabbin converted to the faith and who had writ against those of his nation found the Trinity and the two natures of Christ in the foure Hebrew letters of the word Jehovah And made almost more esteem of this Cabbalistick proof then of all the passages of the old Testament infinitely more cleare and expresse upon this subject That which remaines to be said requires another Parenthesis CHAP. V. Every point of Religion hath its peculiar reasons examples and considerations to this purpose ALL the points of Religion and all the lesser branches of them have every one their particular reason And the Scripture saith not only that it is so but also how and why it is so It gives us not simple positions but teacheth by demonstration and arguments even to the resolving of objections which may be moved to the contrary This is not then sufficient when a man knows all his Religion by Propositions or Maximes though conceived in proper Scripture tearms if he know not also the particular reason of every one of them And to render a reason of our faith is not only to alleadge the Scripture which affirms such or such points but also to shew why these points which the Scripture affirmeth are such and that they are the causes of every one of them in particular Divinity is all full of demonstrative arguments They which have but a naked knowledge of conclusions see well the face and externall shape of Religion But the beating of its arteries the spirit which moves it and the faculties which stir within it are visible to them who know the reasons wherewith it is animated It is not to the purpose to alleadge that one ought not to demand a reason what God saith and that it is enough to believe what the Scripture pronounceth is true This objection is of value as touching points the search whereof is forbidden us as Why God sheweth mercy more to one then to another and for other matters which we may call transcendent which God hath bounded with praecipices environed with high barricadoes which hinder us from entring in thereat But in those whereof the Scripture teaches us the reasons 't is a foolish modesty to reason against his command which obligeth us to learn them Nay this is a manifest arrogance to will the ignorance of those reasons the Scripture gives us thereof under pretence of believing the Scripture simply For the Scripture it self teacheth us to reason upon many points infinitely raised above us When it is asked Why God permitted that sinne should enter into the world though it were in his power to hinder it Many reasons of this permission may be found full of excellent doctrine and saving the matters we have excepted there is not any point of Religion nay any particle whereof one may not find some reason either exprest in the Scripture or duly averred by lawfull consequences or resulting from the property of the subject If there be any thing which seemeth to be out of all enquiry they are the principles of nature As for example The prohibitiō of marriage between brother and sister is the voice of nature which hath no need to be propped with reasons since it is reason it self And though one may always say that the Scripture would oblige men to search the alliance of the remotest races to the end that the affections correspondencies of humane societie might be multiplied which would not be if marriages should be alwayes contracted within the same family Which would by this shame restrain the license which might grow from the facility