Selected quad for the lemma: law_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
law_n	know_v	sin_n	transgression_n	7,418	5	10.8200	5	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A76088	The storming of the Anabaptists garrisons, vvith a brief discovery of the weaknesse of the same, & of the inconsiderableness of the sconces and forts of all the other sectaries, in despight and contempt of all the which, any Christian souldier may safely march to Heaven, without the least danger; ... In a word, in the insuing discourse, the vanity of all novell opinions is discovered, the ignorance of all the which can no way hinder any mans happinesse: and the baptisme of little children borne of Christian parents, whether Iewes or Gentiles, is proved by the word of God to be lawfull, ... / By Iohn Bastwick, Doctor in Physick.	Bastwick, John, 1593-1654.; Smart, Richard, fl. 1647.	1647 (1647)	Wing B1071; Thomason E390_23; ESTC R201542	43,659	52

more some Independents have acknowledged that they were convinced by reading of your Booke which I conceive to be one of the principallest causes that makes them so much maligne you and hinder the publishing of it And others of them upon the reading of your booke have writ out of the Countrey to some of their fraternity here in London telling th●m that they had read your Booke saying moreover that they could witnesse that you had writ nothing of them and their practices but what they could witnesse to be true and therefore earnestly exhorted them to mend their manners and carry themselves so as beseemed the Gospell all this can bee abundantly proved which induces me to believe that if that Book were but knowne amongst the people they would either speedily be undeceived if they were seduced or bee preserved from the errours of the times All that I have now to say unto you besides my good wishes is this You have had great experience of Gods love unto you who hath hitherto preserved you and delivered you out of so many dangers and from so many deaths and from the fury of so many enemies and preserved you in the truth who with all their fury rage and reproches have never in any thing beene dismayed I shall therefore earnestly desire you to consider that you serve the same master still who is the same All sufficient Jehovah be constant therefore to maintaine his cause and truth to the death and be not discouraged with any thing any enemy can doe unto you which words I utter not as in the least doubting of your resolutions but out of my hearty desire of your honour and happinesse which your s●ability and constancy will crowne with a L●●rell of i●mortall praises manger all enemies I pray sir faile no● with the s●●nest to let me receive th●se Arguments I desire and to heare of your health and happinesse and the welfare of all your● and you shall ●●ch 〈◊〉 and rejoyce 〈◊〉 who is Sir Your assured Friend in What I may in the Lords quarrell RICHARD SMART From my house in Scalding Alley at the Hand and Pen this 25 of March 1647. To his Christian friend Mr. Richard Smart at his house in Scalding Alley at the hand and Pen. SIR IF in the very day of the Apostles when truth was so prevalently and powerfully taught and confirmed with so many wonders and Miracles errours did then so abound that Saint in Iohn in his Epistle to the elect Lady greatly rejoyced to find any walking in the truth It is now no wonder that in these latter and perilous times so many revolt from the same and embrace errors and therefore it is exceeding matter of joy to all the lovers of the truth to meet with any that continue constantly in the same and truly it doth much rejoyce me to find you against so many temptations persevering in the love of it which will ever be for your honour here and reall comfort in life and death For your good opinion of me and of the Book I sent you and for your kind acceptance of the same I returne you many thankes and withall for your farther satisfaction I doe here in the presence of the great God that shall judge both quick and dead professe unto you that I never was in my judgement and opinion an Anabaptist Brownist Independent or any Sectary And as I have formerly in almost all my bookes manifested to the world that I differ'd in nothing from the doctrine of the Protestant reformed Churches beyond the Seas as those of France Germany and the Netherlands in any dominative or Principle point of Religion saving in the doctrine of the Sabbath or Lords day which in my judgement ought wholly to be employed and kept both privately and publickly in all duties of piety and charity and that with as much care diligence and reverence as ever it was amongst the Jewes saving I say in this point only I speake it again in the presence of God I never differ'd in any thing concerning faith or any fundamentall point of doctrine from any of those Churches nor never approved of any separation from Gods ordinances celebrated in them or allowed of the leaving of their publick Assemblies and therefore whatsoever either the Anabaptists or any of the Sectaries have formerly published or doe now speak of me intimating that I was once one of them it is a meere calumny and foule reproach and what I now say I shall be able to prove by a cloude of witnesses and those of their own party who have formerly been of my acquaintance and familiarly intimate with me who are ready as they have lately told me to witnesse for me that I was ever against their severall separations from any of Gods ordinances in our publick Assemblies here in England and that in the worst times and therefore the Anabaptists and Sectaries do use me very injuriously to perswade their followers or any others that I was once one of them But before I come to declare my opinion concerning the baptisme of Children of Christian Parents which is my theame at this time and to prove that there is very good warrant for it in the word of God I thinke it fit in this place to declare my judgement which you desired in your Letter I would doe concerning all Separatists whether Papists or Sectaries which is this that I am so farre from favouring their wayes especially in these times of our so happy begun reformation that I am able by Gods blessed assistance ever to make it good that whatsoever either of them by what names soever they are called hold or beleeve concerning Christian religion more then what is beleeved and embraced in the Protestant reformed Churches that it is either blasphemous impious or at least superfluous so that a man may dy either in the ignorance or contempt of it and yet goe safely to heaven And as for the vanity impiety and falsity of all the popish tenents I have sufficiently declared it in many Books and in that my discourse betweene me and Mr. Montayne called the Church of Englands true Church and for all the severall opinions of the Sectaries wherein they differ from the Protestant reformed Churches they are if not as impious yet as vaine and needlesse as those of the Papists so that a man may as safely goe to heaven without the knowledge of them as either the glorious Prophets or blessed Apostles who knew none of them and yet were all saved for nothing keeps men out of heaven but sinne and the transgression of the law of God Now I desire any rationall creature to declare unto me what law of God I or any man transgresse and what sin I commit if I beleeve and practice no more then the written word of God hath taught me to beleeve and doe and if I die in the ignorance of Independency Anabaptisme Antinomianisme c. yea let any of them shew me what sin I commit in rejecting

if I stedfastly to the last period of my life hold that all the conditions of the Independents are meere novelties and their own inventions and that any Christian may die either in the ignorance or contempt of them without the transgression of the law of God The same may be said of all the Anabaptisticall opinions and of all the other erronious doctrines of all the other Sects Yea the rejecting of them all is so farre from sin or depriving men of happinesse and peace of conscience here and eternall felicity hereafter as it is a great vertue to contend earnestly against them for the faith once delivered to the Saints Jud. 3. Yea which is yet more it is a great sinne in any that shall embrace any of those doctrines and approve of those Novelties in Religion for they are all no better then the traditions of men which our Saviour Christ so often warnes his Disciples to take heed of Math. 15. Mark 7. telling them that they worship him in vain who serve him after the precepts of men and confirmes that his doctrine not only by his own testimony but out of the holy word of God Isa 29. And surely those that offer God a vaine worship sinne and that in an elevated nature and greatly provoke God by it which all the Sectaries do that serve him after their own inventions and traditions But had it been so that I had indeed been either a Brownist or an Anabaptist or any Sectary or had I at any time been carryed about with every wind of doctrine or run after every new light as some daily do it had been my sin so to have transgressed the commandements of God but it would have been my glory and honour upon better information and more mature deliberation and judgement to have renounced all those errors and to have embraced the truth Yea it hath bin ever thought praise-worthy in any to change either their manners or judgements for the better and to relinquish the by-waies of sin and error and to receive the truth in the love of it which because many have forsaken it is the just judgement of God to give them over to strange delusions according to that in the se●ond of the Thessal 2. and this I conceive is one of the chiefe causes of the great wrath of God that is now come upon the world and the principall occasion not only of all those miseries and calamities we are now embroyled with but of all those monstrous errors and blasphemous opinions that are now swarming every where And therefore I say if I had at any time been formerly misled and had renounced error and embraced the truth and so have changed my opinion for the botter I had in that done nothing but what God commands and all sollid Christians cannot but allow of and in so doing I should have brought glory to God and procured peace to my owne soule and been a good example to others of doing the like and have given an occasion to all such as truly feare God of praising his Name which all those will do that leave the error of their wayes and the by-paths of sin and turne their feet into Gods commandements But I constantly affirme God and my conscience bearing me witnesse that I never was in my judgement one of them as they falsly calumniate me not only behind my back but to my face reviling me and and that in an odious manner in the open streets calling me an Apostate a persecutor of the Saints an enemy of the people of God and a stirrer up of mutiny against the faithfull of the earth all the which charges they themselves are most guilty of But this is their ordinary language both in private and publick concerning me who never wronged them except to speak the truth and in their own language be to hurt them with which reproches that rabble rout of the Sectaries that were John Lilburnes followers a yeare and a halfe since abused me in the next chamber to the Committee of Examinations and with the which those impetuous women that accompanied his wife to the Parliament with her Petition the last yeare which you heard of most unchristianly bespatter'd me where they behaved themselves in such uncivill manner towards the very Parliament men as the honourable House was forced to order that they should be kept our of that roome which before their insolency was common not only for all Petitioners but to all such as were civill to the great dishonour of God and the shame of their sex and of their holy profession And as they do upon any occasions most barbarously rayle on me wheresoever they meet me though I know them no● by face so they use all possible mean's they can to disparage me by rayling and fomenting calumnies against me and that against all the laws of God and humanity vilifying my books especially the Utter routing of all the Independent Army hindring by all they might the publishing of it pulling down the Titles through Town and Country wheresoever they were set up so that in one night and day they destroyed and defaced no lesse then three hundred through the City and as often as any of them again were pasted up they pulled them down to the number of eleven hundred at times all which their proceedings shew the sinfulness● of their wayes for whereas it is the duty of all good Christians to contend for the truth against error and with all their best indevour to propagate it and spread it abroad for so we are commanded Jud. 3. they hinder it what they can which manifestly proclaimes to the world that they fight against the truth for our Saviour saith John the third That they that doe the truth come to the light that their deeds may be seen and they that shun the light it is because their deeds are evill This I say hath ever beene the method of the truly godly and of the Saints indeed to publish the truth against error and to come to the light and touchstone the word of God for the discovering of errour and proving and declaring the truth but these men being conscious to themselves that their deeds and doctrines are evill shun the light and labour by all their abilities to extinguish whatsoever glimiring of it should discover them and therefore have conspired together to hinder the devulging of my Books especially the utter Routing and my Postscript because they doe apparently hold forth the truth and disolay and discover both the errours of their opinions and their deceitfull dealings in deluding the poore people and in with-holding the truth from them in unrighteousnesse which is not only to their eternall dishonour but one of the most horrid wickednesses that can be perpetrated against God and men for it is an open fighting against God and a hindring of the salvation of the people which was one of those great sinnes the Jewes were guilty of 1 Thess 2 16. by which they filled up the

be Papists and without any injury done unto them may so be called if their own practice and the practice of all times and Nations may be an authentick rule to goe by who from the holding of any one principall point of any Religion or Sect makes them to bee denominated from that Sect either Papists Presbyterians Independents or Anabaptists c. But now Master Smart to the matter in hand for farther satisfaction to you and all men as I have according to your desire declared unto you that I was never any Sectary or Anabaptist and what my opinion and judgement is concerning them So at this time I will briefly make known my opinion unto you concerning that point of difference passing by the rest betweene us and the Anabaptists who as you well know hold the baptizing of Infants borne of Christian Parents unlawfull upon these suppositions that there is neither Precept nor President for it in all Gods word and in regard as they say there is no manifestation of faith and repentance in Infants and in regard also that the children of Christian parents as they affirme are no more within the Covenant then the children of Turkes and Infidels and therefore in all these regards they assert they have no more right to Baptisme then Colts and Dogs c. In which their assertions I differ from them as in all their other tenents wherein they declare themselves divers from the doctrine received in all the reformed Protestant Churches And as for the Baptism of Infants born of Christian Parents I not only believe that they have as much as good right to it as the children of the Jewes had to Circumcision but that they being once baptized by our Ministers ought not to be rebaptized being better Christians then any Anabaptists and I not only believe that children of Christian Parents ought to be baptized but hope to prove that there is both Precept and Presidents and most excellent grounds for it in the word of God notwithstanding all the cavills of the Anabaptists and that not only under the Ministry of John the Baptist and the Apostles and Christs seventy Disciples before Christs death and Ascention but after and that they are all within the Covenant as well as the children of the Jewes were Which if I can by the word of God make good I am confident that those that will be guided by that rule will be satisfied and for such as will follow their wilde opinions I shall leave them to the righteous Judge But before I come to dispute this question I will take the liberty to say something by way of Preface to the following Discourse which will give some light to the whole businesse Therefore I shall desire you seriously to consider the Covenant that God made with Abraham and his seed and not only with Abraham but with all such strangers as should embrace the faith and doctrine of Abraham And to begin with Abraham in the seventeenth of Genesis God there established his Covenant with Abraham and with his seed after him in their generations to be a God unto him and his seed after him ver 7. and in the ninth ver he charges Abraham to keep his Covenant both he and his seed after him and in ver 10. he declareth what that Covenant is viz. that every man-child amongst them should be circumcised which the Lord ver 11. calls a token of the Covenant betwixt him and Abraham which Saint Paul Rom. 4. ver 11. calls the signe of Circumcision a seale of the righteousnesse of the faith which he had being yet uncircumcised c. And in the 12. 13. 15. verses God commands that every male child at eight dayes old should be circumcised he that is borne in the house or ●ought with money of any stranger which was not of his seed and that the soule should be cut off that brake that Covenant And in the eighteenth chapter speaking of him he saith Shall I hide from Abraham the thing that I now do for I know that Abraham will command his children and his houshold after him to keepe the way of the Lord c. God knew well that Abraham would command his children and family to observe his Covenant and would not leave it to their owne wills whether they will keep it or not And in the twelfth of Exodus we shall find that God gave the same law to strangers and those that should become Proselites and embrace the Jewish Religion that he gave to Abraham himselfe the words are these ver 48. And when a stranger shall sojourne with thee and will keep the Passeover to the Lord let all his males be circumcised and then let him come neere and keep it and he shall be as one that is borne in the land for no uncircumcised person shall ●ate thereof One law shall be to him that is homeborne and unto the stranger that sojourneth amongst you By which it is apparantly evident that the same way of admission into the Church that was used for the ingraffing of those that were growne men ●nd converted from the heathenish religion should be used to those that were their children and of their houshold and under their command which lesson the people of God had well learned as wee may see in Joshua 24. who for himselfe and his family promised that he and his house would serve the Lord ver 15. Yea God made many lawes unto all Parents and Masters of Families to looke unto their children and those that were under them that they kept the commands of the Lord and did as he had b●d them as in the twentieth of Exodus where hee enjoynes all in authority that they and their sonnes and daughters and men servants and maid servants should keepe the commandements of God And in the fourth of Deut. and in the sixth Chapter of the same book and in the eleventh chapter and in many other places he commands all parents that they should teach their children at their rising up and lying downe and upon all occasions the statutes and ordinances of the Lord And this was practised not only by men and people of inferiour ranke but by Kings themselves as wee may see in David Prov. 4. ver 3. Who taught Salomon his son when he was tender and young And Salomon likewise carefully instructed his son and family as we may see through all the Proverbs And in the 22 chapter ver 6. he gives this law to all Israel to traine up their children in the way they should walke shewing the benefit of such education for the future saying that when they were old they would not depart from it Yea in many places he commands them if their children be refractory stubborne and disobedient to good counsell not to spare the rod. Yea God made a speciall law to all Israel Exod. 34. ver 23. and Deut. 16. ver 16. saying Three times in a yeare shall all thy males appeare before the Lord thy God in