Selected quad for the lemma: love_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
love_n	apostle_n	great_a	love_v	2,835	5	6.0551	4	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A33542	Bourignianism detected, or, The delusions and errors of Antonia Bourignon, and her growing sect which may also serve for a discovery of all other enthusiastical impostures / by John Cockburn.	Cockburn, John, 1652-1729.	1698 (1698)	Wing C4804; ESTC R17688	48,522	82

Bourignianism Detected OR THE Delusions and Errors OF ANTONIA BOURIGNON AND HER Growing Sect. Which may also Serve for a Discovery of all other ENTHUSIASTICAL IMPOSTURES By IOHN COCKBVRN D. D. Narrative I. LONDON Printed for C. Brome at the Gun at the West-End of St. Paul's W. Keblewhite at the Swan in St. Paul's Church-Yard and H. Hindmarsh at the Golden-Ball over-gainst the Royal Exchange Cornhill 1698. PREFACE AS before the coming of Iesus Christ it is cortain that God did at sundry times and in diverse manners speak by his Prophets to prepare the way of this his only and well-beloved Son and to dispose Mankind to receive this Soveraign Lord of Heaven and Earth with all suitable Respect Honour and Submission so since his return to Heaven many have pretended Divine and particular Revelations from thence authorizing them to alter or add to the Rules and Doctrine which he taught and established for securing and promoting our Salvation which is no small Argument for the Divine Authority of the Books of the New Testament where this is very often and in express terms foretold Almost in every Age and in every Country some or other have set up for Prophets and have spoken confidently in the Name of the Lord. But there is one in this Age viz. Antonia Bourignon whose Pretences are greater and far beyond all were before more cannot nor yet so much can be said for the Apostles themselves for they were but Servants and Ministers to Iesus Christ who if she may be believed only laid the Foundation for her Work and did no more than prepare the way for her Design The last and greatest Manifestation of the Divine Wisdom Power Love and Goodness was reserved to her and therefore she is and must be a greater Person than Iesus Christ himself It is not rare and unusual to see Persons exalt themselves above measure and to think of themselves above what they ought to think But it is somewhat astonishing that others should be affected with their Pride and Vanity and taken with their Delusion or Imposture and that they should become Zealous to support them Yet so it is that the strongest Delusions and the greatest Imposture have had Admirers and Followers and so hath Madamoiselle Bourignon She had only two or three Disciples who adhered closely to her in her Life-time for some who admired her upon the first Acquaintance deserted her afterwards But since her Death a good many have been proselited both to her Doctrine and the Opinion of her Person there be several on the other side the Sea but which concerns us most the Infection has spread hither to this Isle and has seized many especially in Scotland which certainly obligeth every one to contribute all he can to put a stop to it and to prevent as much as possible the dangerous Consequence They are not mean and ignorant Persons who follow this Woman they are some of the better sort who have been reputed Men of Sense Learning and Probity which should lay the Pride of Man and teach him who standeth to take heed lest he ●all Errour like Sicknss seizeth upon strong Constitutions as well as the weak And as sometimes the Air is more infectious and the Bodies of Men more susceptible of Diseases than at other times so there are times which favour Errour very much and in which it doth exceedingly spread At present there is all the World over a wonderful Disposition in all serious Persons to Enthusiasm and the Delusions which follow it as in others a tendency to Atheism and Scepticism both which are Presages of some impendent Iudgment I am one of the weakest who may enter into the field against these Enemies to Truth and True Religion But God sometimes doth work by the meanest Instruments and seeing at this time I have no Charge which requires my attendance I resolve to employ my Time and Thoughts this way that I may at least shew my Zeal to the Cause of God to whose Service I was devoted I have already publish'd Two Parts of the Enquiry into the Nature Evidence and Necessity of Christian Faith and I intend a Third as soon as the present Task is over if not before it by which as well as by many other more accurate Treatises Atheists and Scepticks may see that the Christian Religion is no cunning Fable but a certain Truth and worthy to be received I have turned a while from the Atheist only that I may at the desire of some encounter the Enthusiast who truly does as much disservice to Religion and is the best Tool which the Atheist doth work by At first I design'd only to give some pat Instances to prove that Antonia Bourignon was not Inspired nor her Doctrine agreeable to the Scripture which is sufficient to preserve any from following this Way But seeing this is the first time that Bourignianism was undertaken I was persuaded to do it fully and not to make an imperfect Work of it and especially seeing the Examination of this discovers all other Enthusiastical Impostures and Delusions Our Quakers and Philadelphians as well as the Quietists and Pietists abroad are of the same kidney and do all stand upon the same foundation so that what overturns one overturns all To have publish'd at once a full Examination of Enthusiasm Inspiration Visions and the particular Tenets of Antonia Bourignon would have required a longer time than the impatient curiosity of some would alallow For this cause therefore and for some other reasons I have been prevailed with to set it forth by Parts which are independent upon one another This is the First Narrative which shews the high Opinion that the Disciples of Antonia Bourignon have of her and the Reasons for it The next shall go instantly to the Press So that one may be expected and had always within three or four Weeks at most after another I pray God grant that they may be a means to recover some and to preserve others from those Delusions that disturb the Peace and Vnity of the Church and which lead private Persons unawares both into Temporal and Eternal Ruine Bourignianism DETECTED Narrative I. THE CHARACTER OF Madamoiselle ANTONIA BOURIGNON By her Disciples Consider'd and Examin'd ANtonia Bourignon the Daughter of one Iohn Bourignon and Italian Merchant who lived at Lisle in Flanders was born the 13th of Ianuary 1616 and she died at Franeker in the Province of Friseland the 30th of Octob. 1680 so that she lived Threescore and four Years Nine Months and Fourteen Days None of her Friends had the comfort of attending her when she died but a Considerable Person who some days before was allowed to visit her came very opportunely to kiss her Feet as she was laid in the Coffin and to get her buried after the manner she her self desired And he who gives this Account of her adds That she was the most Divine and the most Pure Soul that ever lived upon the Earth since Jesus

a sense of Divine Things above what all the Doctors of the Church are capable of They will have her when she was little more than a weaned infant to be sensible of Christian Perfection and how much short of it those about her were when she could hardly lisp out a word it is pretended that she asked seriously whether there were any Christians or Followers of Jesus and where they lived Now if all this be true and if these things had proceeded from the Spirit of God to give early notice to the World that He had anointed her to be a Prophetess to declare his Will I say if so it is no ways likely that God would have left her so soon to her self or that he would have suffered her to be corrupted whom he had appointed to be so great a Light Samuel Ieremiah and St. Iohn Baptist who were consecrated Prophets from their birth and who were set apart to be special and signal Instruments of a Reformation among God's People they never turned aside to a wicked vain or light Conversation all their Life was unspotted from the World and from their very Infancy they were Examples of a severe Piety But this New Light of the World suffered an eclipse for some years though as is pretended it began to shine very early The early impressions of Piety which Antonia Bourignon is said to have had were for some time smothered and she who is brought in at four years of age complaining of other Christians did her self when grown up follow their vain Example Which is not agreeable to the Methods of the Divine Oeconomy heretofore if God had raised up this Woman and called her out to so great and high things as She and her Followers alledge It is said of our Blessed Lord that as he grew in Stature so he did grow in Wisdom and Favour both with God and Man And if God had designed Madamoifelle Bourignon a second Saviour to Mankind to finish the Work which was only begun by the other it is not at all to be believed that he would have given place to a Spirit of Folly and Vanity or that he would have suffered her to commit such things as were offensive to himself and contrary to his own Purposes that is which were so far from reclaming Men from their Sins that they rather tended to confirm them therein That which they say tempted her to this vain course of life was the Censures and Misconstructions put upon her early Seriousness and Retirement for upon that account she was represented as simple melancholy and wanting Spirit But could not the Spirit of God break through this Temptation Was her extraordinary Grace too weak to resist it Could one so Divinely Inspired find out no other means of rectifying Peoples Mistakes And must so holy a Person do evil merely to pass for a Wit Is Sense and Judgment no where to be manifested but in the acts of a vain and trifling Conversation But whatever was her motive and temptaion or however she may be excused she confesses that she was far engaged into the Vanities of the World and the love of them If we may believe her self she was ambitious of Honour and did love the Pleasures and Divertisements of Sense and Riches because they did procure them she took pleasure in the company of Young Men admitted their Courtship and Addresses and was well pleased when they commended her Wit and especially when they praised her for being Handsom and Agreeable because she had been called always Ugly by her Mother Thus it appears that Pride and Ambition Sensuality and Covetousness prevailed with this Maid and where these prevail the Spirit of God does not much reside It is said indeed That God did often visit her even in this state That he did not cease now and then to awaken her even in the midst of her Divertisements but Company and these Amusements still got the ascendant that is in plain terms she all this time resisted the Spirit of God and walked contrary to the Dictates of her Conscience Videt meliora probatque deteriora sequitur Which is not compatible with a state of extraordinary Grace and Sanctity I would not exaggerate this so much if I was not provoked by the strange Impudence and Delusion of those who will have us to receive this Woman as more than Humane as without Sin as equal to Jesus Christ who never yielded to the strong Temptations of the Devil whereas she was carried away by the weak Persuasions of Men. Again As there appeared no extraordinary Sanctity in Antonia Bourignon before she arrived to the age of Eighteen so even after this which is pretended to be the time of her Conversion she did not determine the great and important state of her Life by Motives and Principles of Religion It is the End which sanctifies our Actions and Persons truly Devout and Holy make God the End of all that they do They who respect only or chiefly their own Ease Pleasure or Profit are not to be reckon'd very holy or above the common rate of Mankind whatever state of Life they betake themselves to For the height of one's Sanctity is not to be taken from their Outward Quality and Behaviour but from the Inward Principles which move them He that is sober only or mainly for saving of his Money or on the account of bodily Health doth indeed wisely but his Temperance is no more an act of Religion than another's eating and drinking out of Pleasure He that retires from the World because he loves his Ease and has an aversion to Trouble and Vexation his Retirement is not Religious nor is he himself to be esteemed more holy than another who follows worldly Employments Now if Madamoifelle Bourignon had been so extraordinary holy as is pretended if she had been Inspired from Above in every thing she would have considered God and not her self she would have consulted that which was best for his Service and not her own Humour and Conveniency But she resolv'd upon a Coelibate State only because she would not be cross'd and uneasie because she hated the Restraints and Troubles of Marriage though they be both the Occasions and Proofs of great Virtue which was no great Instance of any peculiar Sanctity She did not chuse a Virgins State that she might only care for the things of the Lord as the Apostle speaks and not be incumbred in the doing that by the Obligations of pleasing a Husband too But she preferred this State to Marriage only because she had no great or good opinion of the Husbands who were offered to her and because she was afraid that they might be all like her Father who was sometimes rough surly and ill-natur'd towards her Mother This is the Account which she gives her self And he who continues her Life according to his usual Custom doth enlarge upon this Passage and improves it to a great Act of Piety not