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A41628
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Christ's tears for Jerusalems unbelief and ruine Now humbly recommended to England's consideration in this her day of tryal and danger. By [faded print] reverend and learned divine Mr. Theophilus Gale.
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Gale, Theophilus, 1628-1678.
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1679
(1679)
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Wing G135; ESTC R218690
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143,576
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274
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to its Real object so Consent We shal begin with the first namely What it is not to Assent to the Notional maters or things that belong to our peace Now this dissent from the things that belong unto our peace implies sundrie Gradations or Ascents which tend much to the Explication of Vnbelief 1. Not to know or assent to the sacred Notions of our peace is to reject them This was the case of Jerusalem she rejects al Christs gracious offers of peace she wil not so much as lend an ear to them Thus also it was with those obstinate Unbelievers mentioned Prov. 1. 30. They would none of my Counsel they despised al my Reproof To reject the counsel of Christ and to despise his Reproof is the height of Dissent and Disbelief So Jerem. 8. 9. Lo they have rejected the Word of the Lord and what wisdome is in them The Rejection of Gods Word is the highest degree of Ignorance and Unbelief The like Hos 4. 6. Because thou hast rejected knowlege I wil also reject thee This Rejection of the Word of God is a kind of total Infidelitie yea such a Dissent as implies an aversion in the mind from the sacred Notions of its peace Wherefore it denotes the dregs of Unbelief and a mind principled with enmitie against divine Truths For Truth is the most beautiful thing that is and of al Truths Divine are the fairest Now then to reject such argues a mind very much debauched and distempered by sin 2. Not to know the sacred Notions of our peace is not to give diligent Attention to them Many Evangelic Unbelievers dare not openly reject the things that belong to their peace but yet they do not attend with diligence unto them The first step of saving Faith is diligently to attend to the Reports of the Gospel to bow the ear to divine Truths as Pro. 5. 1. My Son attend unto my wisdome and bow thine ear to my understanding This Attention and bowing the ear to Divine Truths is the first step to the obedience of Faith Whence by Consequence not to attend or listen with diligence to the Reports of the Gospel takes in much of Unbelief This also was the case of many unbelieving Jews they did not attend to Christs Evangelic offers of peace Thus Psal 81. 13. O that my people had hearkened unto me c. i. e given diligent Attention to my Word Attention is the Contention of the soul to understand and that which drawes it forth is the admirable Greatnes Sweetnes and Suitablenes of Reports Unbelievers want an inward sense of the wonderful greatnesse suavitie and fitnesse of Evangelic gladtidings and therefore no wonder that they attend not to them 3. Men know not the things that belong to their peace when they yield not a discrete explicite Assent thereto True saving Faith implies an expresse judicious Assent it carries with it the highest and purest Reason yea the flour and Elixir of Reason What more rational than to assent to the First supreme Truth Truth it self Surely Believers are no fools they know who it is they believe and for what So Paul 2. Tim. 1. 12. I am not ashamed for I know whom I have believed and am persuaded that he is able to keep that which I have committed unto him Paul was not ashamed of his sufferings because he knew whom he had believed he did not content himself with a Popish implicite faith but understood wel the object and reasons of his Faith Alas what is implicite Faith but implicite Unbelief Can he that understands not the Propositions he assents to rationally believe the same Is this to believe to understand nothing of what we believe Doth not this implicite faith destroy the very formal Nature of true faith What! may we suppose that Divine faith consists in ignorance If we pin our Faith only on the Churches sleeve without ever understanding what we believe is not our faith worse than that of Devils who know what they believe and therefore tremble Yea doth not this Implicite faith strip us not only of our Christianitie but also of our Humanitie For is not every rational Being so far a Debtor to truth as to examine wel the reasons and grounds of his Assent Yea doth not this implicite Popish faith carrie in it much of Atheisme and Blasphemie For to believe only as the Church believes without examining the Articles or Motives of our faith what is it but to make the Church our infallible God and our selves but mere Brutes divested of reason So that can there be any thing more destructive to the Notion and Nature of true faith than such an Implicite faith And yet alas how commun is it among a great number of Christians How many are there who pretend to be Believers and yet understand little or nothing of the main Articles or grounds of their faith It stands on sacred Record as a noble character of the Bereans Act. 17. 11. That they searched the Scriptures daily whether these things were so Hence surely we may conclude that an implicite faith is no better than virtual Unbelief 4. Not to know the things that belong unto our peace is not to give a supernatural Divine Assent to them The things that belong unto our peace are supernatural and divine and therefore they cannot be truely apprehended by a Natural Human Assent To yield a natural human Assent to things Supernatural and Divine is no better than real Dissent Now men yield not a supernatural Divine Assent to the things that belong to their peace 1. When the Principal Grounds Formal Reasons and proper Motives of their Assent are only natural and human i e when mens assent is grounded only on some human Autoritie or Argument Al faith is by so much the more firme by how much the more firme and infallible the Autoritie of him that reports the mater is If the Autoritie be only human the Assent can be but human and so fallible the Assent to the Conclusion being founded on the strength of the Premisses as the edifice is on the foundation Now the strength of a Testimonie consists in the Autoritie of him that testifies For such as the principal ground and Foundation of the Assent is such wil the Assent be and if there be any defect or imperfection in the Foundation of our Assent the same wil diffuse it self throughout the whole If Church-tradition or human Argument be the only or main ground of our Assent it can never be supernatural and divine as before 2. Men yield not a supernatural Divine Assent to the Gospel when the productive Principle or Efficient of their Assent is not Supernatural and Divine i. e when their Assent is not infused by the Spirit of God A natural Facultie can never of itself produce a supernatural Assent And the reason is most evident even from the commun nature of al Assent which requires some A'dequation or Agreament betwixt the Object and the Facultie
and seek not what ye shal eat or what ye shal drink neither be ye of doutful minds 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Let not your Minds hang as Meteors in the Air ful of suspense about future supplies be not of an anxious thoughtful Mind Let not your thoughts be distracted and as it were racked with carking cares The word signifies such an Anxietie as fluctuates 'twixt hope and fear Such is the suspicious anxious temper of Unbelief as to Providential maters of the Covenant 3. The last branch of the Covenant concernes maters of coming Glorie wherein also Unbelief may be said Not to know the things that belong unto our peace The chief concernes of our peace are those invisible Glories of the other world Al our present spiritual Suavities and Delices are but dreams in comparison of that formal Beatitude in the Beatific Vision of God face to face Alas how far short is our present vision of God in Evangelic Shadows and Reports of that immediate Intuition of God as he is 1 Joh. 3. 2 3 Whence the main worke of a Believer here is to live by faith in the daily contemplation and expectation of that approching Glorie For the more we eye our home the more industrious lively and pressing wil we be in our journey thither Faith maketh things absent present So Heb. 11. 1. Faith is the substance of things hoped for 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that which gives a substantial Essence an actual Existence a solid Basis or Foundation the First-fruits yea a real presence to those Good things hoped for of the other world So much is wrapped up in that Notion Then it follows The Evidence of things not seen 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Argument the Demonstration the Meridian Light the legal conviction the spiritual eye whereby invisible Glories are made Visible Such is the miraculous efficace of faith as to approching Glorie such a clear real fixed fight of Heaven has it here on earth Ay but now Unbelief draws a veil on al these invisible Glories and makes them to disappear what fantastic dreams what carnal and grosse Notions what base and unworthy thoughts has it of future rest How studious is Unbelief to obliterate and rase out the Idea of Eternitie fixed in the heart How apt is it yea industrious to remove far from conscience the second coming of Christ and ensuing Jugement How fain would it build Mansions here and take up with something short of God Oh! how little doth Unbelief regard those Mansions of Glorie which Christ is preparing John 14. 1 2 How seldome or never doth it take a view with Moses on mount Pisgah of the celestial Canaan the new Jerusalem where is the Lambs Throne Yea what low cheap undervaluing thoughts hath Unbelief of that promissed Land Thus it is said of the unbelieving Jews Psal 106. 24. Yea they despised the pleasant Land or the Land of desire and believed not his word This pleasant land Canaan was a type of Heaven and in despising it they despised Heaven and al this lay wrapt up in the bowels of their Unbelief They did not yield a real supernatural firme certain practic Assent to the word of promisse touching Canaan and therefore they despised it and not only that but also the celestial Canaan which made God swear in his wrath against them that they should not enter in Heb. 3. 11. So much for the Material Notions both general and particular which Unbelief is ignorant of 2. I shal treat a little of the formal Object of Faith and how far Unbelief is defective therein The formal Object of Faith as it comes under the Notion of Assent is the Divine Veracitie or Autoritie of God appendent to his Word For look as in the Workes of God there are certain Divine Characters Ideas Impresses or Notices of Gods Wisdome Power and Goodnesse which a spiritual heart contemplates and admires so likewise in the Words of God there are certain Stampes and Ideas of the Veracitie and Autoritie of God which the Believer contemplates and assents unto as the formal object of his faith Thus 1 Thes 2. 13. Because when ye received the word of God which ye heard of us ye received it not as the word of men but as it is in truth the Word of God Not as the word of men As here notes a Reduplication i. e the formal reason proper motive or principal ground of their assent to Gods Word was not any Human Autoritie but the Divine Autoritie or Veracitie of God And here lies the main specific essential Difference betwixt divine and human faith Divine faith receives the Word of God as the Word of God under that Reduplication i. e as it is clothed with Divine Autoritie but human faith receives the Word of God as the word of men i e as clothed with some human Autoritie Church-Tradition or the like commun Motives Now this human faith as to the Word of God is no other than real unbelief For he that believeth the Word of God only as commended to him by the Church doth really disbelieve the same It is not the Objects believed but the formal Reason of our belief that distinguisheth a Divine from a human faith He that assents to divine Truths merely on human Grounds or Reasons can have but an human faith which is real unbelief as he that assents to natural Truths reveled in the Word of God as reveled and clothed with Divine Autoritie has a Divine faith So that albeit the mind assentes to the whole Word of God yet if the principal ground or formal reason of its assent be not Divine Autoritie its Faith is but real Unbelief And here lies a main plague of Unbelievers its possible they do assent to the whole Word of God ay but yet they see not those sacred Characters those Divine stampes of Gods Autoritie and Truth which are appendent to his Word the chief ground of their belief is only some human Tradition or Autoritie Such was the Faith of those Samaritans John 4. 40. who believed merely for the saying of the woman c. whereas afterward ver 41. Many more believed because of his own word This is a Divine faith there was a sound of Heaven in Christs own voice a little Image or Stampe of Divine Majestie which the believing Samaritans could discerne O! Remember this If the Autoritie of God be not the chief bottome of your Assent your faith is but Vnbelief So much for the Notional object both Material and Formal of Unbelief CHAP. IV. An Explication of Unbelief as it opposeth or is defective in the first Act of faith namely Assent to the good things that belong to our peace WE now procede to the Act of Unbelief comprised in that Notion If thou hadst known This knowlege must be commensurate to or as large as its Object which as we have shewn is either Notional or Real As it refers to its Notional object so its termed Assent as