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Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
lord_n	different_a	divine_a	great_a	58	3	2.1235	3	false

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ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A59899	A vindication of both parts of the Preservative against popery in an answer to the cavils of Lewis Sabran, Jesuit / by William Sherlock ...	Sherlock, William, 1641?-1707.	1688 (1688)	Wing S3370; ESTC R21011	87,156	120

worship the Father in spirit and in truth for the Father seeketh such to worship him God is a spirit and they that worship him must worship him in spirit and in truth In which description of Gospel-Worship there are three things included 1. That we must worship God under the notion of a pure and infinite Spirit 2. under the character of a Father 3. With the Mind and Spirit But he has found little here to except against only two or three Fanatical Principles which shall be briefly considered The first God being a Spirit must not be sought for in Houses of Wood and Stone because he must be worshipped in Spirit as a Spirit it should be which differ greatly he must not be worshipped by any material or sensible Representations by material Images and Pictures those words except your righteousness exceeds the righteousness of Scribes and Pharisees you shall in no wise enter into the Kingdom of Heaven cuts off every thing that is external in Religion Here he has jumbled things together of a different nature I shall begin with the last first because it concerns what I have already accounted for That the Christian Religion admits of no external nor ceremonial Righteousness the great design of the Gospel being to make us truly good that we may be partakers of the Divine Nature There is nothing our Lord does more severely condemn than an external and Pharasaical Righteousness Except your Righteousness exceed the Righteousness c. Now this not these words meerly but this rejecting an external Righteousness cuts off every thing that is external in Religion at a blow because it cuts off all hopes and reliances on an external Righteousness and I believe men will not be fond of such Superstitions when they know they will do them no good Now what is the fault of this do not these Principles remit all Christians to the silent Meetings of Quakers exclude singing of Psalms that is because it excludes an external Righteousness it excludes all external Acts of Worship Well rhymed Father Brains and Stairs Since God will be worshipped as a Spirit he will now confine his peculiar Presence to no place as he formerly did to the Temple at Ierusalem for though for typical reasons he had a typical and symbolical presence under the Iewish dispensation yet this was not so agreeable to his nature who is a Spirit and will now be worshipped as a Spirit and therefore must not now be sought for in Houses of Wood and Stone This says he excludes the use of Churches rather than Barns That is because God does not confine his presence to one place because he has no symbolical presence therefore there must be no places set apart from common uses for Religious Worship Thus God will be worshipped as a Spirit and therefore not by Images or material Representations which are so unlike a Spirit that is says he not by such material Representations as singing of Psalms Well guess't for a Jesuite The second Fanatical Principle is this God and Christ are not present in the Assemblies of Christians by a figurative and symbolical Presence There is no symbolical Presence of God under the Gospel Though God fills all Places it is a great absurdity to talk of more symbolical Presences than one for a symbolical Presence confines the unlimited Presence of God to a certain place in order to certain ends as to receive the Worship that is paid to him and to answer the Prayers that are made to him now to have more than one such Presence as this is like having more Gods than one To which he answers to say nothing of the absurdity of this Discourse which makes that Christian an Adorer of two Gods who by Faith adoring God in Heaven and in his own Soul worships him in both places Truly he had better have said nothing than nothing to the purpose for is God symbolically present in Heaven or in the Souls of Men in Heaven he is really present in the Souls of Men he is present by his Grace and Spirit but in neither by Symbols and Figures of his Presence as he was present in the Temple But he has a terrible Argument to come Doth not this destroy the very essence of your Sacrament the Bread and Wine in the Lord's Supper which you own to be a symbolical Presence of Christ but no Place nor Object of Worship And yet though we grant the Eucharist is a Symbol and Figure of Christ's Body and Blood it is no Symbol of Christ's bodily and personal Presence unless it be a Symbol of Christ's bodily Presence on the Cross for it is a Symbol only of Christ's broken Body and of his Blood shed for us and the intention of it is not to represent Christ bodily present with us but to be a Memorial of him in his bodily absence and therefore it is no symbolical Presence of Christ for the Figures and Symbols of his Body and Blood if they be a symbolical Presence must be the Symbols of his bodily Presence His third Fanatical Principle is this If God be better worshipped before an Image than without one then the Worship of God is more confined to that place where the Image is I cannot see how to avoid this whereas there is no appropriate place of Worship under the Gospel and 't is the same case tho' the Image be not appropriated to any place but carried about with us for still the Image makes the Place of Worship Most of these are my words but he has transplaced them so as to lose the Argument The force of the Argument is this If the Worship of God must not be confined to any Place or symbolical Presence then he must not be worshipped by an Image for an Image is a representative Presence of God or of the Saints and Men go to Images as to Divine Presences to Worship so that where-ever the Image is which is a symbolical Presence whether fixt in a Church or carried from one place to another it makes it a peculiar place of Worship as having a symbolical Presence So that the whole force of the Argument lies upon an Image being a symbolical Presence And this he tells us is an Argument for all Dissenters against a Liturgy or Set-Form of Prayer I suppose he means the Book of the Liturgy or Forms of Prayer for if God be better worshipped by a Set-Form of Prayer than without it then the Worship of God is more confined to that place where that Set-Form of Prayer that Set-Liturgy is used and 't is the same tho' no set place be appointed for that Set-Form of Prayer The Parallel is exact It is so indeed if he can prove the Common-Prayer-Book to be a symbolical Presence of God as an Image is but till then it is ridiculous At the conclusion of this Section I observed that to worship God in Spirit is to worship him with our Mind and Spirit And from hence I shewed the

they be cont●ite and absolved again they are restored to a state of Grace again and so toties quoties Now such Penitents as are sorry for their sins but do not reform them are condemned to Hell 〈◊〉 the Protestant Church and only to Purgatory in the Church of Rome and therefore the First is no Calumny The Second is That Indulgencies may be bought for Money this is no Calumny as I have already shewn or avail a Soul undisposed to receive the benefit of them through want of contrition the guilt of sin not being before remitted This I never said and therefore is no Calumny of mine The third That Masses said for any Soul in Purgatory avail such as during life have not deserved and merited that mercy This I take to be nonsense according to the Doctrines of their own Church For certainly those Souls who have merited to get into Purgatory have merit enough to receive the benefit of Masses Another Gospel-Motive to Holiness are the Examples of Good Men but in the Church of Rome the extraordinary Vertues of great and meritorious Saints are not so much for imitation as for a stock of Merits The more Saints they have the less need is there for other men to be Saints unless they have a mind to it because there is a greater treasure of Merits to relieve those who have none of their own and if one man can merit for twenty there is no need there should be above one in twenty good Here he quibbles upon the different acceptation of Merit as it relates to a reward or as it expiates the punishment of sin In the first sense he says Merit is personal not communicative but if it be communicative in the second sense that one man may be delivered from punishments by the Merits of another and if it be not there is an end of the gainful trade of Indulgencies that is sufficient to my Argument and will satisfie most sinners who are not concerned about degrees of glory if they can escape punishment Lastly I shewed that the Gospel-Means and Instruments of Holiness do not escape much better in the Church of Rome among others I instanced in the Sacrament of the Lord's Supper which besides those supernatural conveyances of Grace which are annexed to it by our Saviour's Institution is a great Moral Instrument of Holiness but in the Church of Rome this admirable Sacrament is turned into a dumb shew which no body can be edified with or into a sacrifice for the living and the dead which expiates sin and serves instead of a holy life Here he says there are three crying Calumnies 1. That the Sacrament among them is nothing but a shew or a sacrifice whereas they very often receive it and did I say the Sacrament was never received in the Church of Rome 2. That they require the practice of no Vertue to the receiving the Sacrament whereas they require the Sacrament of Penance to prepare for the Eucharist But I spoke of those Vertues which were to be exercised in receiving which there are not such advantages for in the Church of Rome where the Office is not understood and the mind diverted with a thousand insignificant Ceremonies 3. That our exposing the blessed Sacrament is a dumb shew and so we assist at holy Mass. And whether it be or no let those judge who have seen the Ceremony How much the Sacrifice of the Mass encourages Vertue we have already seen I doubt not but our Jesuite can give as good an Answer to this Vindication as he did to the Preservative and I as little doubt but he will unless Mr. Needham's Name to the License may be my security for he has threatned it shall be to him a sufficient Note and Character of a Book not worth the Reading much less the Censuring where-ever he sees that Reverend Person has opened it the Press and I commend him for it for he has had very ill success with such Books of late but though I never grudge my pains in answering an Adversary who gives occasion for any useful and material Discourse for I desire whatever I say should be sifted to the very bottom and am as ready to own any Error I am convinced of as to vindicate the Truth yet it is very irksom to be forced to write a great Book meerly to rescue my words from the injuries of a perverse Comment which has been my present Task Thus any Book may be answered by a man who has wit or ignorance enough to pervert it and such Answers may be easily answered again by men who have nothing else to do but if this trade grow too common they must be very idle people indeed who will find time to read them And therefore to prevent such an impertinent trouble for the future before I take leave of my Adversary I will venture to give him a little good Advice which may stand him in stead against the next time 1. That he would be more modest and sparing in his Title-page not to paint it so formidable as to make it ridiculous it is a little too much to talk of Principles which destroy all right use of Reason Scripture Fathers Councils undermine Divine Faith and abuse Moral Honesty Or Forty malicious Culumnies and forged untruths besides several Fanatical Principles which destroy all Church Discipline and oppose Christ's Divine Authority If such things be proved against any Book I assure you it is very terrible though there be nothing of it in the Title but the World has been so long deceived with Titles that commonly the more the Title promises the less they expect in the Book Some cry it is a Mountebank's Bill othe●s the Man raves and if curiosity tempts any to look any farther the disappointment they meet with provokes their scorn or indignation The bare name of an Answer to a Book which is commonly known and approved is a sufficient invitation to all men to read it but it is a very impolitick thing to prejudice the Readers by a frightful Title 2. That he would not think he has confuted a Book by picking out some sayings which he thinks very inconvenient and obnoxious but in which the main Argu●ent of the Book is not concerned this is the case in many passages he has objected against the Preservative for though there is never a one but what is very defensible and what I have defended yet there are many that if they could not be defended the main Argument of the Book is never the worse This is as vain as to think to kill a man by laun●hing a Sore while all his Vitals are sound and untoucht 3. That he would not boast of confuting a Book without bearing up fairly to any one Argument in it I know in his Postscript he says that he omitted nothing in Answer to the First part of the Preservative that even pretended to the appearance of an Argument that all the rest which he did not answer in his