Selected quad for the lemma: reason_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
reason_n	believe_v	faith_n	revelation_n	2,830	5	9.5573	5	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A47133	The deism of William Penn and his brethren destructive to the Christian religion, exposed and plainly laid open in the examination and refutation of his late reprinted book called, A discourse of the general rule of faith and practise and judge of controversie, wherein he contendeth that the Holy Scriptures are not the rule of faith and life, but that the light in the conscience of every man is that rule / by George Keith.	Keith, George, 1639?-1716.	1699 (1699)	Wing K156; ESTC R6589	71,572	164

needs only pretend a Revelation for that and all the other Matters in Controversie betwixt Protestants and Papists to justifie him and prove him to be no Changeling And at this rate of W. P's arguing not only all the peculiar Doctrines of Christianity are wholly uncertain and Papists Socinians and Arians and other the worst of Hereticks that oppugn the Christian Doctrine and Faith may happen to be in the right and these called the Orthodox to be in the wrong but the great Fundamental of the Quakers is overthrown and rendred uncertain also yea this very Position that he laboureth so much to establish That not the Scriptures but the Light in every Man's Conscience is the Rule of Faith and Life to every Man For this Position of his is not literally and expresly in the Scripture so that according to W.P. not the Scripture but his and his Brethrens Interpretation must determine this Controversie and this cannot be done without extraordinary Revelation it being none of those things that fall within the ordinary Discoveries of Men to wit that the Light in every Man's Conscience is Christ and God for then Christ would be God and the Socinians would be Blasphemers that deny him so to be By all which it evidently appears that this Argument of W.P. not only renders all the peculiar Doctrines of Christianity meer Scepticism and Uncertainty but the great Fundamental of the Quakers as concerning the Light being Christ in them and the Rule of their Faith to be equally Scepticism and Uncertainty But that he saith Christ's Divinity is left undetermin'd in Scripture literally and expresly is false for it is in several places literally and expresly affirm'd that Christ is God and that and many other Truths suppose not literally and expresly mentioned in Scripture yet by good and necessary Consequences without all extraordinary Revelation from plain places of Scripture can be certainly inferred And if he will not allow that there is any certainty by arguing from the Scriptures by Consequences of true Reason his whole Discourse in this his Book that I am now answering is disallowable for he has not brought one place of Scripture that literally and expresly saith the Scripture is not the Rule of Faith or that the Light in every Man's Conscience is and he doth not pretend to extraordinary Revelation in the Case and if he did of shall he must give us leave to distrust him until he bring sufficient Evidence for it which I believe he will never be able to do Yea the Falsity of his Reasonings by way of Consequence to prove his Position That not the Scripture but the Light in every Man's Conscience is the Rule of Faith and Life is evidently apparent from the answers already given And suppose he should pretend to extraordinary Revelation in the case and that that is the ground of his Certainty and Rule of his Faith even that Pretence destroyeth his Fabrick for seeing all Men have not that extraordinary Revelation it cannot be a general Rule If he say The common discovery that every Man hath teacheth him sufficiently without either Scripture or extraordinary Revelation That the Light in every Man's Conscience is the Rule of Faith I answer How can that be unless it were a self-evident Proposition as that the whole is greater than the part and if it be a self-evident Proposition why hath W.P. taken so great pains to prove it Men commonly think it needless to prove any self-evident Proposition and properly speaking it is impossible to be proved But if his said Position has no self-evidence of the Truth of it how shall it be proved not from Scripture for that would make the Scripture the Rule nor from Humane Reason for that would make Humane Reason the Rule which W.P. seems not to set up for the Rule It is granted that the Light in every Man's Conscience in respect of some Moral Principles of Justice and Temperance has a Self evidence and so far is a Rule but that it is the Rule of Faith to Christians is denied and by whatever Medium he proveth it that must be his Rule by his manner of arguing which runs him into the like vitious Circle as the Papists are run into when they prove the certainty of Tradition by the Church and the certainty of the Church by Tradition so W.P. proves that the Light within is the Rule of Faith by the Scripture and the certainty of the Scripture by the Light within Section 20. His Proposal of the way to determine all Controversie destructive to the Christian Religon le ts in Deism and Heathenism to overspread the World a Remedy worse than the Disease His misrepresentation of sound Protestants and false and uncharitable Judgment of them Several Scripture places that prove the Doctrine of the Holy Scriptures to be the Rule of Faith and Life to all Christian People I Confess he hath one very notable and plausible Answer to an Objection made by himself P. 44. were it as true as seemingly fair and plausible The Objection is this How will this determine Controversie viz to cast away the Scriptures from being the general Rule of Faith and Life and to set up the Light in every Man's Conscience according to the general Discoveries it gives to all Mankind and allay the Fury of Debates that are on foot in the World He answereth roundly Nothing like it if Men adhere to it But first were it true it would have this mischievous and yet most necessary Consequence that the Christian Religion would be utterly lost so far as it hath any peculiarity or peculiar Dignity Worth and Advantage above Deism or Paganism A rare Cure indeed that W.P. here prescribes to all Christendom to heal their Breaches and end the Disputes and Controversies betwixt the worst sort of Hereticks and the most Orthodox Christians and betwixt Papists and Protestants such a Remedy here prescribed by him is worse than the Disease He saith Most Perswasions he should have come out more plainly with his Expedient saying most Hereticks Arians Nestorians Sabellians Eutychians and them of the opposed side called Orthodox yea Papists and Protestants agree in his general Rule of Faith and Life that is they own the common and general Dictates of the Light in the Conscience and so doth the civilized part of the whole World of Mankind and agree about what he makes the absolute Necessaries viz That God is that he is a Rewarder of them that diligently seek him that the way of God is a way of Purity Patience Meekness c. without which no Man shall see the Lord. Now all Hereticks commonly few I think excepted own these Generals and many of them have Moral Lives Is this enough to their eternal Salvation though they deny the Lord that bought them with his precious Blood as he outwardly suffered on the Cross on this pretence that their general Rule set up here by W.P. teacheth them nothing of any such Lord that bought them

of these Tracts If W.P. say it is because the Authority of the Light within is much gain-said among Men and the Dictates of it grievously perverted and made contradictory If both Parties even among the Quakers themselves may be believed G. F and his Party when alive and now W. P's and G. W's Party judging that which John Story and his Party believed to be the Dictates of the Light within to be the Dictates of a False Spirit and they judging the like of them Therefore Books and Tracts have been multiplied among themselves And as good and much better reason can be given why so many truly pious and edifying Tracts have been written by many Godly Men to vindicate both the Sufficiency of the Spirit and true Light within in all the Faithful and also the Sufficiency of the Scriptures without this as the Rule and that as the principal Teacher Agent and Efficient working with and by the Rule and yet none of the two how much ever sufficient excluding the Lord Jesus Christ God-Man without us from being our All sufficient Saviour each being sufficient in their own order and manner of acting As concerning such Gentiles to whom the offer of Faith has not been made neither by Men nor Writings none say that the Scriptures are a Rule to them but as they have no outward Rule of Christian Faith so nor doth it appear that they have the Christian Faith it self If any have it they have it not by the common Illumination but by some miraculous and extraordinary manner unknown to us And how God disposeth of the more Sober and Virtuous among them doth not at all reach the present Controversie which is not whither the Scripture be the Rule to all Mankind that ever lived or now live but whither it be the Rule of Faith and Life to them who have them or may have them by some possible means Page 16. Arg 13. Whereas he saith Doth not your own Language and Practise prove its viz. the Scriptures Insufficiency to that end at what time you both exhort to and go in secret to seek the Mind of the Lord in this or that important Affair Why do not you turn to Chapter and Verse for satisfaction if the Scripture be appointed of God for the General Rule Ans This Argument hath also as great force or rather much greater against the Light within being the General Rule for do none of the Friends both exhort to and go in secret to seek the Mind of the Lord in this or that important Affair Why do they not turn to the Light within to be forthwith without all Prayer or waiting informed and satisfied If they do not yea if W.P. do not both he and they are wofully deceived by neglecting Prayer and waiting on God to receive Satisfaction in this or that important Affair but if they find their need both for Prayer and waiting for direction then let him answer his own Argument and make due Application But to give a positive and direct answer if it be either a matter of Doctrine or Precept that any Christian wants due Instruction and Direction in they may both Pray and Read and search the Scriptures and Meditate Iad wait for God's inward Illumination and ●nspiration to give them a right Understanding and they may expect it will be given them if they sincerely seek it and use all due Endeavours and Means to attain it one of which is to consult and use the Advice of others whom they have cause to judge Spiritually more enlightned than themselves If it be in Cases that are neither matter of Doctrine nor Precept but where the matter is by it self indifferent and neither simply commanded nor forbidden as many such Cases there are they may and ought to pray and wait for direction and it may please God to give it to them by some secret Motion Impulse or Impression of his Holy Spirit which may sufficiently satisfie them without making that impression Motion or Impulse the Rule of either Faith or Obedience seeing the Matter is neither a Matter of Doctrine nor Precept wherein either Faith or Obedience as touching that particular is concerned but a Motion or Impulse simply from God upon the Will cannot be properly called a Rule because as is above-said a Rule properly speaking is a Form of Words and Propositions either outwardly expressed or inwardly conceived to which the Intellect either assents or dissents And if any true Christian finds such a motion or impulse on his VVill if after examination he find that it doth not incline him to any thing either contradictory to Scripture or true Reason he is in no great danger to yield to it and if he do not yield to it upon just suspicion or fear that it is not of God it will not be charged to be a Sin upon him for nothing is Sin but a Transgression of God's Law Page 19. The Law outward saith he as a Rule was but as Moses till the Son came the Servant abideth not in the House for ever the Written Law held its place but till the inward Rise in more Glory and Brightness or rather till People became more capable of being turned to it and living with and in it Answ Had not Mankind generally the Light within them under Moses How comes it then that it was not the Rule to them and did not dismiss the written Law But if there be no written nor outward Law given by Christ under the Gospel then all that he taught outwardly and for which he sent his Spirit upon the Apostles to bring it all to their Remembrance and to move them to commit it to Writing Yea the whole New Testament Writings must be dismissed and turned out of the Church the House of God as was Ishmael and his Mother out of Abraham's House because by his most false Arguing the written Law given by Christ and the Holy-Ghost under the New Testament is as much the Servant as the Old Covenant was O the Vanity and Folly of this manner of Arguing which wholly makes void Christ's Prophetical and Kingly Office as he was outwardly sent in the Flesh by the Father to give a more full and clear discovery of the way of Salvation as the great Prophet and to give forth his Royal Laws to the Church under the New Testament as King and Head thereof But he further enlargeth upon this Argument P. 17. telling us There are a Thousand Cases in which the Scripture cannot be our Plain and distinct Rule and Guide And he adds on the Margent There 's not laid down in Scripture any general Rule how to answer before Magistrates and to act in times of Sufferings To which I answer First he doth not well to confound Rule and Guide it is granted the Spirit of God is the Guide Teacher and Leader of the Faithful but it doth not therefore follow that the Holy Scriptures i. e. the many excellent Instructions Precepts and Examples given us therein for

whereas the best skilful in the Method of Teaching both pious and learned have not only greatly esteemed but highly admir'd the Method of the Scripture even when it seems least to have Method and most especially the Method of our Saviour's Sermons recorded in the Four Evangelists and of that most excellent form of Prayer he taught his Disciples And if the Scriptures must be rejected from being not only the Rule of Faith and Life but a written Rule as his express words above noted are though in contradiction to himself who elsewhere calls them a Rule but not the Rule now he will neither have them to be the Rule nor a written Rule for want of the Method of a Rule he may quarrel against diverse parts of God's Creation as not being placed in that Method and Order that his Wisdom thinks meet Sure I am some Atheists have argued at such like rate against the Worlds being Created by an infinite Wisdom and Goodness because as they imagined things lye in great disorder throughout the visible World here a spot of the Earth fruitful there a great part of it unfruitful and uninhabitable some parts have too much Water that drown the dry Land overflow Cities fruitful Fields and pleasant Meadows other parts are scorched with drought and uninhabitable for want of Water other large parts not fit for Habitation for Cold. Also the Providences of God towards Mankind are greatly disputed by Atheists because of that seeming disorder and want of method in things and Events that happen to Men of all sorts virtuous Men neglected oppressed afflicted and vitious Men exalted honoured and praised It is a great Default in W.P. thus to argue against the Scriptures for want of Method as being the Rule wherein he too much resembles the Atheists arguing against the Ways and Methods of Divine Providence from thence concluding there is no Rule of Divine Providence in the World as W.P. concludes there is not the Rule of Faith and Life in the Holy Scriptures Section 15. Whither the Laws and Precepts of God and Christ as written in the Holy Scriptures do bind the Faithful to Obedience W.P. his absolute Necessaries of Religion no other but what are generally owned by Infidel Jews Mahomitans Deists and the greatest Hereticks HAving thus finished my Answers to his Arguments against the Scriptures being the Rule of Faith and Life yea not only against being the Rule but a Rule as above noted in contradiction to himself who sometimes calls them a Rule to wit a Subordinate Secondary and Declaratory Rule but yet he will not allow this to the whole Scripture but that several parts of it are so that is so much of it as Heathens and Deists have taught them by the Light within to wit Precepts of Moral Honesty c. but Salvation by Christ Crucified and Remission of Sins by his Blood is not taught them by their Light within therefore this Doctrine of the Scripture is not so much as a Secondary Rule to W.P. and his Deist Brethren the unsoundness of which Distinction I have above shewed I shall now briefly point at some other Impertinencies in his Book now before me and so conclude Page 25. We confess saith he the reason of our Obedience viz. to the Precepts written in the Scriptures is not meerly because they are written for that were legal but because they are the Eternal Precepts of the Spirit in Mens Consciences Here divers things need Correction First I know none that ever said that the reason of our Obedience to those Precepts is meerly because they are written but chiefly and principally we are obliged to believe and obey them being the Commands of God but though the reason of our Obedience to them is not meerly that they are written yet being now written and the Wisdom of God having so appointed it that they should be written and the Writers being inspired to that very purpose to write them for our Instruction and that we should believe them and obey them we ought both to believe them and obey them as they are outwardly written otherwise if their deliverance to us by writing have no Influence on us to believe them and obey them we may wholly disregard them as such and only mind those eternal Precepts of the Spirit as he terms them in the Consciences of Men to wit Jews Mahometans Heathens Deists Again that he saith It is legal to obey them meerly because written I see not how it was legal for the Law did not command them to obey them meerly as written but because they were the Commandments of God but to reject them as having any Influence on us or laying any Obligation on us as written is to reject Christ's Prophetical and Kingly Office a part of which was to inspire his Evangelists and Apostles to commit them to writing But again That nothing is to be obeyed for a Rule or the Rule but the eternal Precepts of the Spirit in Mens Consciences as he affirmeth This indeed makes a very short and near way to Heaven were it as true as short and near He seems to give us an account what these eternal Precepts are Page 44. But most Perswasions saith he are agreed about the absolute Necessaries in Religion from that Light and Witness God has placed in Man's Conscience viz. That God is that he is a Rewarder of them that diligently seek him that the way of God is a way of Purity Patience Meekness c. without which no Man can see the Lord. Answ Note well Reader these few things That every Deist Jew and Mahometan that are sober and rational will acknowledge are all the absolute Necessaries in Religion that he lays down But how falsly doth he alledge that most Perswasions are agreed that these without all the Articles peculiar to the Christian Faith as concerning the Holy Trinity the Incarnation of the Word the Satisfaction of Christ by his Sacrifice on the Cross to Divine Justice c. in a word all the twelve Articles of the Apostles Creed are all the absolute Necessaries in Religion Is the whole Christian Catholick Church of Christ throughout the World in all Ages no considerable part of Mankind having Religious Perswasions Or if they are let him tell us what part of Christ's Catholick Church ever held or doth now hold that none of all the twelve Articles of the Apostles Creed or few of them are the absolute Necessaries in Religion together with other Moral parts relating to Moral Virtues I think he can tell us scarce any but such as may be justly doubted or disowned to be Members of the Church of Christ If he bring in himself and his Party and Deist Brethren he but begs the Question to say they are a part of the Christian Church while they deny the great Fundamentals of her Religion to be absolutely necessary But let us hear him further in the same Page he saith Nay they accord in some considerable Matters super added as some of