Selected quad for the lemma: nature_n
Text snippets containing the quad
ID |
Title |
Author |
Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication) |
STC |
Words |
Pages |
A39366
|
Reflections upon a pamphlet, entituled, John Elliot's Saving grace in all men proved to be no grace and his increased being in all a great nothing by Edmund Elys ...
|
Elys, Edmund, ca. 1634-ca. 1707.
|
1695
(1695)
|
Wing E687; ESTC R41962
|
2,190
|
5
|
REFLECTIONS Upon a Pamphlet Entituled John Elliot's saving Grace in all Men. Proved to be No GRACE And His INCREATED BEING in All A Great Nothing By Edmund Elys a Servant of Jesus Christ I Have not seen John Elliot's Book but Charity obliges me to believe That what he hath therein Asserted is Agreeable to the Sentiments of a great number of those Men call'd Quakers whose Writings I have Read or with whom I have had some Personal Conversation And therefore I cannot doubt but when he says That GRACE is an Increated Being by Grace he understands the True Light which enlighteneth every Man that cometh into the World consider'd as the Fountain of all GRACE viz. of all Holy Inclinations Dispositions or Operations in the Souls of Men which are call'd by the Blessed Apostle The Fruit of the Spirit Gal. 5. Love Joy Peace Long-suffering Gentleness Goodness Faith Meekness Temperance These Words of John Elliot's Antagonist His INCREATED BEING in All A Great Nothing I Abhor as words written by the Instigation of the DEVIL To whose Suggestions also I impute a Multitude of the Conceits that have been Publish'd by that Person whom he calls 30. Holy and Learned Flavel I desire that the Candid Reader would peruse Clement Lake's Letters to John Flavel And a Paper Entituled Reflections upon several Passages in a Book Intituled The Reasonableness of a Personal Reformation and the Necessity of Conversion And so I Dismiss J. Flavel for the present and return to this other J. E. P. 3. The Eternal Spirit says he the third Person of the Trinity and that which is in every Man are not distinct but Essentially one There 's Divinity for you Ans Most certainly the Third Person of the Trinity is not essentially distinct from the True Light which is in every Man P. 4. Those Texts of Scripture that speak of the Spirits being or dwelling in Believers are not to be understood of an Hypostatical or Personal Union between the Spirit and them Answ Without doubt these Texts of Scripture are not to be so understood for then we should suppose that the Spirit and Believers should be but one Person for Hypostatical Vnion is the Vnion of divers Natures in one Person If the Person of the Spirit says he be in every individual Believer then every individual Believer is two Persons Answ We deny this Consequence Because the Person of the Spirit is not in a Believer so as to become the Person of the Believer but having that Essence which is Absolutely Infinite He is in all Creatures but in a peculiar manner in all rational Souls convincing all of their sinful Practices and Inclinations and converting or turning from Sin all those that do not persist in their Rebellion against the Light If there be a personal Inhabitation of the Spirit in Believers says this Disputer there is also a Personal Inhabitation of the Father and of the Son in them 1 John 4. 15 16. Gal. 2. 20. John 17. 23. The latter is absurd therefore also the former Answ Most certainly the three Persons Father Son and Holy Ghost the only true and Eternal God Infinite Light and Infinite Love dwells in the Heart of every true Believer P. 8. 9. All that are in Christ are throughly and universally renew'd Whoever they are that are not thus throughly and universally renew'd are not yet in Christ And whatever falls short of this is called by a wrong name if it is called Grace If they that are in Christ are new Creatures then Grace in Believers is no Increated but a Created Being Answ If they that are in Christ are New Creatures then there is in Believers or those that are in Christ the Principle or Fountain of New Life which is the only Life of Rational Creatures as Rational The Fountain of Life is the TRUE LIGHT which is the one infinite increated Being P. 10. The humane Nature of Christ says this Flavelite is a greater Excellency than any thing that is in Believers The humane Nature of Christ is no increated Being therefore much less any thing that is in Believers Answ Nothing that is in Believers as a Part Property or any kind of Quality is Increated But if Christ be the only true God and God be a Being absolutely Infinite it must needs follow That he is in all Creatures and in a peculiar manner in all Rational Souls especially in the Souls of Believers in that he does not only Convince their Vnderstandings of the Truth but Convert their Wills to the Will of God in all things so that with the Will or Rational Appetite they do not Affect or absolutely Incline to any thing but GOD They do not incline to any Finite Object but only ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã with Reference to God The Fountain of all Goodness P. 22. Grace may be overpower'd by Corruption Answ This is a most Pernicious Error destructive of the true Notion of the Grace of God that bringeth Salvation Titus 2. 11. Whensoever our Souls are in a Gracious or Holy Temper they act in the Power of the True Light which is Almighty and can never be withstood by the Power of Darkness in our Sensitive Faculties whilst our Will is sincerely concurrent with it So that every Act of true Grace or Holiness implies an Aversion from all known Sin and a Rational Propensity or Inclination to all that we know to be the Will of God that we should either do or suffer I say or suffer for this is a Property of True Grace that it makes the Objects of our sensible Aversion to become the Objects of our Volition or Rational Inclination being the Effects of the Divine Will the boundless Fountain of all Spiritual or Intellectual Satisfaction If this Man or any other of John Flavel's Admirers shall think sit to make any Reply to what I have here written or to what I have written in Defence of R. Barclay and Joseph Noââ I shall treat him by the Grace of God with that Meekness which becomes one who declares to all the World that these Words of our blessed Lord are dearer unto him than Thousands of Gold and Silver Luke 9. 2 3. If any Man will come after me let him deny himself and take up his Cross daily and follow me FINIS