Selected quad for the lemma: nature_n
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A35247
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The strange and prodigious religions, customs and manners of sundry nations containing I. their ridiculous rites and ceremonies in the worship of their several deities, II. the various changes of the Jewish religion ... , III. the rise and growth of Mahometanism ... , IV. the schisms and heresies in the Christian church being an account of ... Adamites, Muggletonians &c. all intermingled with pleasant relations of the fantastical rites both of the ancients and moderns in the celebration of their marriages and solemnizations of their funerals &c / by R.D.
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R. B., 1632?-1725?
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1683
(1683)
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Wing C7348; ESTC R29494
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158,336
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237
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Constantinople under Theodosius the Great Macedonius himself being deprived by the Arrian Bishops died private at Pylas XL. 14. The Aerians so called from Aerius the Presbyter who lived under Valentinian the first three hundred and forty Years after Christ he held that there was no difference between a Bishop and a Presbyter that Bishops could not ordain that there should be no set or anniversary Feasts and they admitted none to their Communion but such as were continent and had renounced the World they were also called Sillabici as standing captiously upon Words and Syllables The occasion of his maintaining his Heresie was his Resentment that Eustathius was preferred before him to a Bishoprick XLI 15. Florinus or Florianus a Roman Presbyter lived under Commodus the Roman Emperour one hundred fifty three Years after Christ hence came the Floriani They held that God made Evil and was the Author of Sin whereas Moses tells us that all things which he made were very good They retained also the Jewish manner of keeping Easter and their other Ceremonies XLII 16. Lucifer Bishop of Caralitanum in Sardinia gave Name to the Luciferians He lived under Julian the Apostate three hundred thirty three Years after Christ. He taught that this World was made by the Devil that Mens Souls are corporal and have their Being by Propagation or Tradition they denied to the Clergy that fell any place for Repentance neither did they restore Bishops or inferiour Clerks to their Dignities if they fell into Heresie tho they afterwards repented XLIII 17. Tertullian that famous Lawyer and Divine was the Leader of the Tertullianists He lived under Severus the Emperour about one hundred and seventy Years after Christ Being excommunicated by the Roman Clergy as a Montanist he fell into these Heretical Tenets That God was corporal but without declination of Members that Mens Souls were not only corporal but also distinguished into Members and have corporal Dimensions and increase and decrease with the Body that the original of Souls is by Traduction that Souls of wicked Men after Death are converted into Devils That the Virgin Mary after Christ's Birth did marry once They bragged much of the Paraclete or Spirit which they said was poured on them in greater measure than on the Apostles they condemned War amongst Christians and rejected second Marriages as no better than Adultery XLIV 18. Nestorius born in Germany and by fraud made Patriarch of Constantinople was the Head of the Nestorians He broached his Heresie under Theodosius the Younger four hundred Years after Christ He taught that in Christ were two distinct Persons the Son of God and the Son of Mary that is the Son of God in Christ's Baptism descended into the Son of Mary and dwelt there as a Lodger in a House he made the Humanity of Christ equal with his Divinity and so confounded their Properties and Operations A great part of the Eastern Bishops were of his Perswasion His Heresie was condemned in the Council of Ephesus under Theodosius the Younger in which Cyril Bishop of Alexandria was President and the Author Nestorius deposed and banished into the Thebean Desarts where his blasphemous Tongue was eaten out with Worms Zeno the Emperour razed to the Ground the School in Edessa called Persica where the Nestorian Heresie was taught XLV 19. Eutyches Abbot of Constantinople from whence came the Eutychians in the Year after Christ 413. set forth his Heresie holding Opinions quite contrary to Nestorius to wit That Christ before the Union had two distinct Natures but after the Union only one to wit the Divinity which swallowed up the Humanity so confounding the Properties of the two Natures affirming that the Divine Nature suffered and died and that God the Word did not take from the Virgin Humane Nature This Heresie condemned first in a Provincial Synod at Constantinople was set up again by Dioscarus Bishop of Alexandria at last condemned in the General Council of Chalcedon under Marcian the Emperour XLVI 20. Eunonius Bishop of Cyzicum embraced the Heresie of Arrius he said blasphemously God of his Essence understandeth no more than we do whatsoever we know of it the same knoweth he and look what his Capacity reacheth to the same thou shalt find in us his Followers re-baptized Orthodox Professors and baptized in the Name of the Father uncreated the Son created and the Holy Ghost created by the Son They affirmed the Trinity to be three different Substances as Gold Silver and Brass He was a Cappadocian by Birth and lived under Valens the Emperour XLVII 21. Novatus Father of the Novatians was an African born he lived under Decius the Emperour after Christ two hundred and twenty Years his Heresie lasted one hundred forty eight Years They denied Repentance to those who fell after Baptism they bragged much of their Sanctity and good Works they condemned second Marriages as adulterous and used Rebaptization as the Donatists He was a Priest of Carthage and Father of the Cathari or Puritans XLVIII 22. Donatus whence arose the Donatists was a Numidian who because Cicilianus was preferred before him to the Bishoprick of Carthage accused him and all the Bishops that ordained him to be Traditores that is such as had delivered their Bibles to be burnt by Idolaters under the Persecution of Maximinus Though this Accusation was found faulty yet Donatus continued obstinate and separated himself and Congregation from all others accounting that no Church where any spot of Infirmity was to be found that such a pure Church was only amongst them yet they would have no man forced to a godly Life they slighted the Magistracy and would not suffer them to punish Hereticks they held the Efficacy of the Sacraments too upon the dignity of the Minister they rebaptized all that were admitted to their Communion they held it no Sin to kill themselves rather than to fall into the hands of the Magistrate and scrupled not to kill such as were not of their Faith they used certain magical Purifications and bragged of Enthusiasms and Revelations With the Arrians they made the Son less than the Father and the Holy Ghost than the Son The Circumcâ—lliones were part of these who lived in Cells and Caves and murdered all they met that were not of their Religion XLIX 23. Pelagius a Britain by Birth and a Monk at Rome was the Ring-leader of the Pelagians he was afterwards a Presbyter under Theodosius the Younger three hundred eighty two Years after Christ thence he went into England and poysoned the whole Island with his Opinions which were such as these That Death was not the Wages of Sin but that Adam should have dyed though he had not sinned that Adam's Sin was hurtful only to himself and not to his Posterity that Concupiscence was no sin that Infants did not draw original Sins from their Parents that Infants might be saved without Baptism that they should have eternal Life but out of the Kingdom of God that Man after the Fall had free
going up into the upper Chambers she finds this deplorable representation of immodesty and impudence but the power and influence of Prophetical integrity brought the Woman to that pass that she was drawn in to wallow in the same mire of unshamefacedness whom therefore he advised to continue always a constant adherer to the unblameable Truth Going out of the House in this posture about three of the clock the other men and Women marched barefoot after him crying out with a horrid Voice Woe woe woe the heavy wrath of God the heavy wrath of God c. In this fanatick Errour did this Hypocondriack Rabble run about the Streets making such horrid noise that all Amsterdam seem'd to shake and tremble at it as if it had been assaulted by a publick Enemy The Burghers not having the lest hint of such a strange and unlook'd for accident for this furious action happen'd in the dead of the night took up Arms and getting these People lost to all shame and Modesty up to the Palace clapt them into Prison Being so disposed of they would own no thoughts of shame or Chastity but would justifie their most white and naked truth In the mean time the Fire being smelt they brake into the House where it was and wondring at their casting of their Clothes into the Fire which had since reached the Bed they made a shift to quench it But the other distracted and mad People such as deserved to be sent to their Kindred the Savages and Heathens inconvincibly persisted in their pestiferous Opinion and so upon the fifth of May the same year they expiated their wicked Impieties with their Death Ones farewel Saying was Praise the Lord incessantly Anothers was O God revenge thou our Sufferings Others cryed out Woe woe shut thine eyes LVIII The next we will bring upon the Stage are John Reeves and Lodowick Muggleton who would perswade us that they are the two last Witnesses and Prophets of Christ sent by his Spirit to seal the fore-heads of the Elect and Reprobate that one John Robins is the last great Antichrist and Son of Perdition spoken of by the Apostle in the Thessalonians because he sheweth lying signs and wonders and assumes to himself the Titles of the only God in that he calls himself Adam and Melchisedeck and Father of Jesus Christ in saying the three Persons in Trinity are Adam that is Himself Abel that is the Son Jesus and Cain that is the Holy Ghost many such Blasphemies they ascribe to him They affirm also that Christians using the Sword of Steel are ignorant of Jesus and Enemies to his Gospel and they teach that the two uncreated Substances of Earth and Water were eternally resident in the Presence of God the Creator that Death was from Eternity that the Person of the reprobate Angel or Serpent entred into the Womb of Eve and there died but quickened in her all manner of uncleanness that there is no Devil at all without the Body of Man or Woman but what dwells within them so that the Devil spoken of so often in the Scripture is man's Spirit of unclean Reason and cursed imagination that God the Father was a Spiritual man from Eternity and that in time his Spiritual Body brought a Natural Body that if the very God-head had not died that is say they the Soul of Christ which is the Eternal Father had not died all men had perished eternally that Moses and Eliah are Angels and did represent the Person of the Father in Heaven as they did the Person of the Son on Earth that Eliah was made Protector of God when God became a Child and that he filled the Lord Jesus with those great Revelations of his former Glory which he possessed in Heaven when he was the immortal Father and that it was Eliah who spake these words This is my beloved Son in whom I am well pleased they say also that all the Ministry in this World whether Prophetical or Ministerial with all the Worship taught by them is a Lye and abomination to the Lord. Again they declare that whereas there are three Witnesses on Earth Water Blood and Spirit that by Water is meant the Commission given to Moses and the Prophets under the Law by Blood the Commission given to the Apostles and Ministers of the Gospel and by the Spirit is meant the Commission of the two Witnesses that were to come in this last age whose Ministry is invisible and Spiritual cutting off all formal worshipping of an invisible spiritual personal God they say there is hardly a Minister in the World that confesseth an invisible God but they preach a God of three Persons that is a Monster instead of one true Personal God they say that the true God is a distinct Body or Person as a Man is a distinct Body or Person Again they say that there is no Christian Magistrate in the World that hath any Authority from Christ to set up any invisible Form of Worship and that the Spirits and Bodies of men are both mortal both begot together and both of one nature that the Spirit is nothing without the Body and that is the Spirit alone that walks and works eats and drinks and dyes for the Spirit is a natural fire of Reason they say also that the Bodies or Persons of holy men wherein they lived and died shall not appear again any more but when the Saints are glorified they are absolutely of the very same glorious nature both in Spirit and Body as God is and that Believers Spirits are of the very same Divine nature of God This is the Sum of their Divinity and Philosophy as may be seen in their transcendent Spiritual Treatise as they call it which is sull of transcendent nonsence and blasphemies for here they lay the axe to the very root of Christianity in giving a new Father to our Saviour Jesus Christ in calling the Blessed Trinity a Monster in denying the Creation whilst they make Earth and Water eternal in making Angels and mens Souls mortal in making weak man Gods Protector and Author of that Divine knowledge which was in Christ in denying the Ministry of the Gospel and the Power of the Magistrates and the outward Worship of God and making the Souls of men corporeal in denying also the Resurrection of the Flesh and transforming men into the Divine nature By these and other wicked Tenets permitted and countenanced among us at this time we see what Christian Religion is come to in this Land LIX But before I quit this Theme it will not be altogether unseasonable that I give an account of the Ranters who are a sort of Beasts who neither divide the hoof nor chew the cud that is to say unclean ones such as hold no small correspondence with the Quakers their Lives and demeanours are much alike only what the Ranters act upon the Stage by an open profession of lewdness and irreligion the other do it within the Curtain by crafty and seemingly