Selected quad for the lemma: religion_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
religion_n	answ_n	heretic_n	zion_n	16	3	10.1255	5	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A87552	Allotrioepiskopos, the busie bishop. Or The visitor visited. By way of answer to a very feeble pamphlet lately published by Mr J.G. called Sion Colledge visited, in which answer, his cavils against the ministers of London for witnessing against his errours touching the holy Scriptures, and the power of man to good supernaturall, are answered, and the impertinency of his quotations out of the fathers, Martin Bucer, and Mr Ball are manifested. / By William Jenkyn minister of the Word of God at Christ-Church London.	Jenkyn, William, 1613-1685.	1648 (1648)	Wing J632; Thomason E434_4; ESTC R202641	59,976	70

was to answer h●s accusations against the Ministers for their transcribing his Errours in their Testimony My book would have swolne into a large volume had I handled the Points according to their own extent and according to the helps afforded by our Divines But I hope I have done enough to shew that he had no cause to complain of the Ministers transcriptions and that all his pretended allegations out of the Fathers Bucer and M● Ball help him not at all but rather speak against him My multiplied occasions have hindered me from so speedy and large an Answer as may be expected but as it is Reverend and beloved friends you have it and my self to serve you in the things of Christ WILLIAM JENKYN From my Study at Christ Church Load Errata Page 4. marg read Paul●s voluit p 8. marg l 30. read de Christo l. 35. c. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 p. 8. l 23. r upheld p. 20. l 23. r. wherein you say c. p ●● l ult r. tells m● it is to c p 23. l. 34. r. it is from God written p. 31. marg r abijcere possit p. 41. l. 24 r. and that truly l. 11. r. you did speak to c. p. 45. l. 33. ●●jutorium p. 48 marg r. contendunt p 52. marg r Bacer in Iob 6.44 p. 5● l 32. r with the fathers p. 52 marg r. etesiph ΑΛΛΟΤΡΙΟΕΠῚΣΚΟΠΟΣ OR The Busie Bishop RELIGION never had greater enemies then those of her own house Sion Coll. visited p. 1. And a little after It was never well with RELIGION since the Ministers c. Answ Your work is to kill Religion but your way to do so Ans I perceive is to kisse it You seem to make towards the lips of Religion but your aim is at her fifth rib You advance her head in your Preface but 't is to break her neck in your book In the pretence of your Preface you raise up Religion to the clouds In the performance of your book you lay it among the clods for must not Religion needs fall to the ground when her foundation upon which she stands is pluckt away And takes not ●e away the foundation of religion who denies the Scripture to be that foundation Div. Authority of the Scriptur●● p. 18. And doth not John Goodwin deny the Scripture to be that foundation of Religion What else is the English of these words in terminis his own viz. Questionlesse no writing whatsoever whether translations or originals are the foundation of Christian Religion Away with your hypocriticall exclamations against the enemies of Religion and your Crocodiles tears in that Religion cannot be well for the Ministers were your wit but hair to keen as your will we should in a short time neither have Religion nor Minister left among us But to your stuff The greatest enemies to Religion are in her own house Sion Col. visit p. 1. Answ True For of your own selves saith Paul shall men arise speaking penverse things to draw away Disciples after them Act 20.30 And if of all that are in Religions own house heretikes be her greatest enemies What will become of John Goodwin It was never well with Christian Religion since the Ministers of the Gospel so called by themselves Sion Col. visit p 1. and so reputed by others for want of knowing better cunningly vested that priviledge of the Church of being the pillar and ground of truth in themselves First Answ For the Lectio Your meaning I suppose was and had not rage against the Ministers made you write non-sense you would have said thus The Ministers cunningly vested themselves in or with the priviledge of the Church and not as you doe The Ministers vested the priviledge of the Church in themselves A man may be vested in or with a priviledge but it 's very improper to say a priviledge is vested in or with a man as improper as to say a garment is vested in the man that wears it t were better to say the man is vested in the garment It s a sign your pen is drunk with madnes it doth so stagger and stammer These faults of pure weaknesse I should not regard did I observe either humility in you under the sense of greater in yourself or ingenuity in you in passing by smaller in others But why finde I fault with the vest the phrase of your book The dusty cloaths of your words are good enough for the crooked carcasse of your matter This is Titubare in limite for I may well call the matter crooked if to be true be to be straight for I finde two abominable falsities within the space of two lines 1. That the Ministers of the Gospel are only so reputed by men for want of knowing and considering better 2. That they have vested themselves with the priviledge of being the ground and pillar of truth 1. You say these Ministers of the Gospel are only so reputed for want of considering better Answ 1. 'T is your sorrow to see that they are so much as reputed Ministers But Sir 't is your sin to say they are no more then Ministers reputed If they be no Ministers why disprove you not their calling Why bring you not an argument in stead of a scoff against them But you may write thus with much praise from your deluded followers and little pains to your feeble self 2. Tell me of one man either Minister or private Christian differing from the subscribers only in the point of Independency who dares say thus with you I have heard sundry of the Synodicall dissenters preach and professe the contrary 3. Or are you now got a step or two above Independency acknowledge you any Ministers of the Gospel at all whether your self or any other I observe that you who were wont to stile your self The Minister of a Church such an one as 't is in Colemanstreet now in this last Pamphlet as if you had a minde to be lookt upon under another consideration word your self only Iohn Goodwin a servant of God and men I am sure of men I doubt whether of God haply the Delilah of a Congregation hath entised you to be tampering with the lock of our Ministery you have yeelded already to cast off the word Minister by the next you may have cast off the thing too 4. If you do account your self a Minister I pray tell me in your next which way you had your Ordination whether by that way which the Ministers of London had theirs who you say are no Ministers at all or whether you had it by a Culinary 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in one of your allies You tell the subscribers afterward of sacred unction in a jeer but know that no unction is the lesse sacred for not coming out of the kitchin Secondly You say The Ministers have vested themselves with the priviledge of the Church of being the ground and pillar of truth and it was ●●ver happy since Answ I

know not whether you who subvert the whole Scripture intend not also to pervert this 1 Tim. 3.15 By the Church her being the ground and pillar of truth all the Orthodox agree to be meant the Church her maintaining and holding forth the truth now the Church holds up and holds forth the truth either in a way common to all Christians mutuall exhortations a way of profession and practice c. or in a way peculiar to ●ome a ministeriall way of preaching the Word administration of the Sacraments c. If you say the Ministers have vested themselves with the priviledge of being the pillar and ground of truth the first way 't is ridiculously false profession of the truth being common to the community every one in the Church If you mean as you must needs that Ministers have vested themselves with the priviledge of pillars in the second respect viz. of Ministery 't is odiously false for the Lord Jesus himself and not themselves vested them with the priviledge of holding forth truth by way of Office Christ gave some Pastors and teachers Eph. 4.11 God hath set some in his Church 1 Cor. 12.38 And if in this respect you intend that religion is so miserable because all in the Church may not preach the Word administer Sacraments and because Ministers do c. Speak out Sir It follows not because the Church holds forth the truth therefore that all may hold it forth as Ministers in it Learned Calvin * Galest is sapientia soliue E●clesiae ministe vio censerva tur Quantum ergo onus past●o vibas incumb t quitam inaesti mabilis thes●u ●icus●odiae pr●esunt Pau●u● volnit prop●sita off●●● magnitud●●e admoaito esse pastores qua●td illu● side diligentiâ reveren ia almini lrare debeonr Etenin quam borribilis sutura est ultio si eorii cu●pi intercidat veritas Ecclesi● enin ideo col●●na est veritatis quia suo ●inisterio can tuetur as propagat Ergo elogium boc al ministeriun verbi refertur quo sublato concide● Dei veritas Sustinetur Dei veritas p●ra Evangel●● praed cattane Calv. in 1 Tint 3.15 upon this place 1 Tim. 3.15 will inform you better by whom and what the Church in that place of Timothy maintains and preserves the truth Weigh the quotation Quantum onus ergo c. how great a burden therefore ●●eth upon the Pastors who are to keep so inestimable a treasure as the truth Ecclesia ideo c. Therefore is the Church the pillar and ground of truth because she defends it with the Ministery of the word And ●logium hoc c. This commendation is to be referred to the Ministery of the word which being taken away the truth fals The truth is sustained by the pure preaching of the Word And the subscribers their ministeriall zeal for the truth both in presse and pulpit is the occasion of your rage against them I confesse you may have a further aim viz. to gratifie your deluded followers whose design is to raze and levell the Church of Christ and to preach as well as John Goodwin as indeed they may soon do but the main ground of your rage against these holy men is because they discover your errours You strike at the lanthorn because of the candle in it At the pillar because of the proclamation the Gospel that hangs upon it At the shepherds because they defend their flocks Were it not for these Ministers you would do well enough you think with the people mean while remember Omnis Apostata est osor sui ordinis Religion never had greater enemies then renegadoes The Ministers of the Gospel claim Nebuchadnezzars preregative among men over the truths of God Sion Col visited p. 1. Whom he would he slew whom he would he saved alive The Nebuchadnezzars are among your selves Ans You have his Palace A Babel for such is your way His property pride far surmounting your Palace and take heed even you in particular lest his portion be also yours The heart of a beast given unto you by God for abusing the heart of a man For the truths of God slain by the Ministers I know none unlesse you mean old heresies lately vampt in your alley for new truths where what ever is strange is true O the patience of the God of truth to suffer you to voice prodigious heresies the truths of God so entitle the true God to so many untruths against God Those which you call truths and yet say are slain by the ministers will continue errours till you prove the contrary And whereas you say that the Ministers slay them did the word spare them the Ministers would do so too who dare do nothing against the truth but for the truth and for their saving some errours alive I pray prove what those errours are and the next edition of the testimony will not be wanting in due severity I wish nothing to the Ministers but good Sion Col visi p 1. Ans Devout soul that can curse and blesse in one breath Two lines off you blasted the Ministers with the title of murderous Nebuchadnezzars and here you blesse them with desires of all good to them but whereas you say you wish nothing in your praier but good to the Ministers I fear you do nothing in your preaching but hurt to the people I wish the Ministers had been in print without their own knowledge or consent S●on Col. visi p. 1. Ans Your grief is not that the book was printed with their but without your consent however the Ministers are bound to interpret charitably this wish of yours that they had been in print without their consent because you your self have sped so well by being in print without your consent when your Church set forth that 〈◊〉 ridioulous paper in commendation of you wherein they extold you to the clouds where indeed you alwaies are when you write Then you were in print against your consent the verses put under your effigies which say that you have the perfections of ten thousand men gathered in you this was against your consent too I warrant you I take care how the Authour will get into your favour again So I might maintain honourable thoughts of their persons Sion Col. visited p. 1. which I have alway laboured to doe my witnesse is o● high Is your witnesse on high Answ So is your Judge too but take heed your punishment be not below mock not God nor deceive your self Though I am still opposed by them in my way Sion Col. visited p. 2. Ans You cannot say that you have been opposed by them in Gods way and 't is a mercy for you to be opposed in your own way your way is the way of Balaam and it was an Angel that stopt him in his way The Image stampt upon the Testimony and the men whose names are affixed Sion Col. visited p 2. are very unlike the names subscribed are learned and pious

Theologicall Sion Col. visited p. 4. Heresies are imperiously sentenced as if the chair of Papal Infallibility were translated from Rome to Sion Colledge Name one of those errours in the Catalogue which the Scripture and that writing we cannot as yet deny to be the foundation of religion condemns not Ans if so 't is not Ex imperio but Ex officio to discover them and for your scoff of the Chair of Papal infallibility know that the Ministers are as far from being for the chair of infallibility as for the Chair in Swan-Alley In the next impression mollifie your title Sion Col. visited p. 5. say not against errours and heresies but use this Christian and soft explication as we account and call them errours and heresies Tender-hearted Sir Ans Spare your counsell or if you will give it expect no fee had ever Ministers or Christians such advise given them before Peter was called Satan for bidding Christ to pity himself but what would Christ have called him had Peter desired Christ to have pitied Satan The hereticall devil must not be used gently 'T is a cruell kindenesse to truth to do so Diabolus non est leniter palpandus saith Luther when you had to do with M Edwards of blessed memory then 't was 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Pereat Pap● pereantimp● magestrat● per●aut im●io●u●n dogma●u●n patreni pereat totu● mu●d● salve●ur Deo su●gloria su●● verbu● su● E●tlesia su●● cul 〈…〉 with you rebuke them cuttingly but when we have to do with heresies it must be 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 gently must it yes use mollifying expressions I pray deal gently with heresies for I.G. his sake but heresies have more need of Corasives then lenitives of iron then of oyle was Augustine called Malleus Haereticorum for using mollifying expressions had you given us the advice of Luther we would have thankt you Let the pope perish ungodly Magistrates The Patrons of ungodly opinions of errours let all the world perish only let not the glory of God perish his Church his Worship But why speak we of Luthers spirit your advice is more unsutable to the spirit of the Scripture Rebuke them sharply saith the Apostle that they may be sound in the faith Earnestly contend for the faith Damnable heresies Reprobate concerning the faith filthy dreamers Cursed children Vngodly men bruit beasts Clouds without water Tit. 1.13 Jude 3.4.12 2 Pet. 2.1 2 Tim. 3 8. Jude 8. 2 Pet. 2.14 2 Pet. 2.12 c And yet forsooth we must be all for softnesse and mollisying The Lord pardon our sinfull softnesse formerly The time past may suffice to have connived at you Shall you be bolder to sin then we to speak God forbid But wherein must the Ministers expresse their softnesse he tels us for he gives us direction as well as exhortation though he is more wicked in prescribing the manner of doing then the thing to be done Say not a testimony against Errours and Heresies but say as we account and call Errours and Heresies His plain meaning is Be doubtful whether those damnable Errours and Heresies be such or no Be Scepticks Seekers Expectants Dubitants never beleeve any thing When men deny the Scriptures to be the foundation of faith say This is an heresie as we think when men deny the Divinity of the Son and holy Ghost say These are heresies as we conceive when heaven and hell are denied say this is an heresie as we account and so of the rest Non est hoc Christiani pectori● n●n delectari ass rtionibus Tolle assertiones Christianismum tu●sti Sanctu● Spiritas non est scepticus nec opiniones in cord ●us nostris sed assertiones ●psâ vitâ omni experient●d certiores produc●t Luth. Though the Lord hath not with-held you from giving yet for his Christs sake he keep us from taking this advice We who teach others to beleeve shall we beleeve nothing our selves if we may not be so certain as to write against errours how should we be so certain as to die in opppsition to errours Should one lay down his life for he knows not what Did those blessed Martyrs in Queen Maries daies say That Transubstantion was an errour as they thought Besides are there any things in the world so certain as the matters of faith The Apostle speaks Col. 2.2 of a fulnesse of assurance of understanding 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. Famous is that speech of Luther which in the margin I give you in his own words Non est hoc Christiani pectoris non delectari assertionibus c. It savours not of Christianity when men are not delighted with positive assertions Take away assertions and thou hast taken away Christianity The holy Ghost is no Sceptick nor doth in produce opinions in our hearts but certain assertions more sure then life it self and all experience c. Certainly if I may know any thing to be a truth I may and must upon that ground know the contrary to be an errour as if I know that this is a truth That Christ is God I certainly know that this is an errour to say He is not God and therefore by your putting us to beleeve nothing for an errour you will constrain us to beleeve nothing for a truth And if this be so to what end serves preaching Do Ministers preach and people hear fables or truths Further if nothing be to be certainly known for an errour with what zeal can any way by you be opposed when as you are and must be uncertain whether you strike a friend or a foe a truth or an errour And if so How can you declaim against the way of Presbytery for ought you know it may be a truth How or why against the restraint of herecicks deniall of liberty of conscience And where are you then Sir But are you so undoubted and certain and positive as you seem to your self to be when you oppose the truth and must we be purely doubtfull when we are opposing of errours Did not you blasphemously deny the Scripture to be the foundation of faith with that astonishing expression going before it Questionlesse no writing whatsoever is the foundation of Christian Religion Though in this last Pamphlet your own conference I hope would not suffer you to put it in Must you say questionlesse for errours and must we come with an as we think against errours You extend your title against a toleration of errours also Sion Col. visited p. 5. Now a toleration is a meer non ens a thing not in being and therefore you testify against that of which God made the World If a toleration be not no thank to you Ans I am confident 't is your darling endeavour to effect it You say that because a toleration is nothing to speak against it is to speak against that which Gud made the world of Prophanely enough But sure you meant not to compare a toleration to the nothing of which

God made the world but to the Chaos out of which God made the worid and ●f God made the world of it I am sure you have mar'd the world by it But 't is so far from being that of which God made the world that it is rather that for which God may destroy the world If I had a captious pen there would be no difficulty to finde a calumniating insinuation against the Parliament Sion Col. visited p 5. Ans For the calcumniating insinuation against the Parliament where lies it turn not Sycophant but give me leave to shew you your calumniating insinuation against the Parliament for this testimony of the Ministers hath been in many a wise Parliament mans hand and for you a mean man in comparison to dare to finde out a calumniation against them which they could never finde out against themselves what is this but for you to prefer your sufficiency to theirs and to shew that they cannot cousult without your assistance But if there be a toleration if doth not follow the Parliament is to be blamed perhaps 't is a toleration not given but taken 'T is not from Parliamentary license but Sectaries their licentiousnesse This present generation is fairly acquitted from being the authours of these errours Sion Col. visited p. 6. because these errours are said in the testimony to be the spawn of old accursed heresies dead and buried long ago and now by seducers revived Now revivers are no authours● Answ I am confident the Sectaries of these times will give you but little thanks for taking from them the honour of being the authours of the mentioned errours Ans their greatest contention being whose invention should be most reputed for and fruitfull of the said errours And whereas you say That revivers of errours are no authours the Sectaries again are little beholding to you for the reviver of an errour is worse and more inexcusable then the authour in as much as the reviver of a buried and a condemned errour sins against the president of the concurrent judgements of holy men in former ages whereas the authour wanted the help of former guides I may truly say that John Goodwin sins more inexcusably then Pelagius whose soul seems by a strange metempsuchosis to be transmigrated into M. Goodwin save only that it meeting with Arminius by the way sifred into him all the flour of wit and brought nothing but the bran of heresie to M. Goodwin because M. Goodwin though he be not guilty of the invention of the errours yet of the publication and propagation of them against the counsels and writings of all the Orthodox since Pelagius his time For your acquitting therefore of this generation you go too far though you are an advocate to plead for errours yet you must not be a judge to acquit them and to acquit a whole generation at one clap is with the most the sea of your charity gaineth so much toward heretikes that it s quite dried up toward the Orthodox You are such a prodigall of charity toward the one that when you should contribute to the other you will be found a beggar But take heed least if you acquit this generation from heresie the next generation condemn your self for heresie Judicium melius posteritatis erit The age to come May passe your doom There are severall Ministers of Christ to my knowledge in the Province of London no Independents commensurable for worth with the tallest Subscribers Sion Col. visited p. 6. though not to some of them in Church livings by two or three for whom God provided some better thing then to suffer them to fall into the snare of so unworthy a subscription You said even now Ans they were only reputed the Ministers of Christ for want of mens knowing better and now you say They are the Ministers of Christ to your knowledge you want a better memory for so little honesty You add That these Ministers have not subscribed the Testimony but now you see many of their names subscribed in this last Edition of the Testimony Will you say they are Ministers You finde that they love not to be disgraced with the praises of your pen for abstaining You say that the subscribers exceed the rest in two or three Church livings These are exceeding daies only for Sectaries The Orthodox have but short commons they are rich in imploiments and poor in paiments You are quite contrary you are paid for being a hearer of your people but it were well with the Orthodox if they were paid for preaching to their people You are the Preachers under worldly glory The Orthodox are under the cro●● however I desire to be as far from envy at your condition as imitation of your own opinions Your gains would be my joy were not religion the looser You scraple together a few saying or passages out of severall mens books whereof some are fair truths c. Sion Col. visited p. 7. Answ For the fairnesse of your truths ther 's not one of them but hath a face of soot and of a blackmore but I beleeve they are accounted fair in their own Countrey in Errour-alley but in an orthodox region they are very deformed To reproach mens opinions without answering any one reason or ground upon which they build their assertions Sion Col. visited p. 7. is the Way for propagation of them There is not one mentioned errour in all the Catalogue Answ but is its own reproach and its own refutation And the frequency of your being braid in the morter of an answer hath made hitherto but little of your folly to depart from you A confutation would adde too much reputation to the errours Besides when Sectaries see that their errours deserve disputation they thereby think that they deserve estimation 't is their custome to turn truths into controversies and controversies into truths And at all disputations you still go away with the victory but especially when you are able to say nothing The present work of the Ministers was discovery Refutation if judg'd convenient may follow You rend a parcel of words out of the body of a large discourse Sion Col. visited p. 8. Answ which may carry some face of an unsound saying It seems your fair truths of which you even now spake have but a foul face surely the best part of all your errours is the face if Satan intended to limn any part well it would be that and for the rending the parcel of words out of the body of the discourse If you have a desire that the whole body should be seen the Reader is in the margin referr'd to it and yet if any parcel of a passage seem'd to make for you the Subscribers set down that too but indeed commonly the whole passage was a wrapt complication of errours You shew not in what part of their sayings the errour lies Sion Col. visited p. 8. Answ There 's 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Sion Col. visited p. 9.

of Bucer on Rom. 2 14. and you say that the passage is fuller of the spirit of that opinion which the subscribers reckon among heresies Ans then any passage in your writing I have proved that Bucer shakes you off as a bold beggar is ashamed of you and cals you Pelagian and there 's nothing in this passage of Bucer like your opinion with what engines did you draw your conclusion from Bucers premises Bucer saith not A naturall man hath power to bel●eve That the Sun Moon and Start are Preachers of the Gospel or that if naturall men be unable to beleeve they are excusable or that God should be a tyrant in commanding men to do that which they have not ability to perform What doth he say that looks this way If any thing could have been wrested from this place that agreed with you yet you shew nothing but extream ignorance or impudency to alledge an authour for you the whole strain of whose writings are so directly opposite unto you But in this place which you alledge had Bucer countenanced your opinion you would have told the Reader wherein the agreement between you and Bucer steed or have grounded an argument upon some of Bucers words for your opinion but alas you do none of all this you say that your doctrines and Bucers agree but here 's not a syllable to prove how or wherein Reader I pray observe the harmony between Bucer I. G. Bucer saith here that God in no age left men destitute of the doctrine of salvation as you translate it which he understands of the Law which is in it self doctrina salutaris * Professi● doctruae salutaris boc est recte viven●i Bucer enar sect 4. Rom. 2. and of which the Apostle speaks in that place Rom. 2.14 on which Bucer comments but you assert the Gospel to have been known to the Gentiles Bucer saith here that God so bedeweth nature with his light that they only remain strangers unto righteousnesse who willingly put it from them But you that man hath power willingly to embrace this righteousnesse and not to put it from him to which Bucer speaks expressely contrary in the same Chapter They have saith he light enough to enfirce self-condemnation for Walking wickedly but not sufficient to glorifie God as they know * Deus certâ per●io●e lu●em quibusvis ●or talibus impertit tam ampla qu●dem ut qui ●ra ve vivu●t seipso● tande●n coademnare cogantur at nendum suffi cieme eò ut Deum sicut cognoscunt ●●a etiam queant giorificare In Rom. 2.23 Veru●n qurdem tslu reminem posse nisi Deo lucem suam insundente essioncius eoque agente ad se trabente homi num an●mus in Rom. 1.30 Bucer saith Did the Gentiles not voluntarily put away the desire of righteousnesse they should sooner be taught by an Angel then be suffered to be ignorant of Christ You say that they have ability to do what is righteous and to beleeve which Bucer as you heard even now flatly demeth And for an Angel to reveal Christ that would be according to M. Goodwin superfluous the Sun Moon and Stars are Apostles and all to them the Gospel is to us in Mr Goodwins opinion And where indeed lieth your miserable mistake of Bucer In this place you said even now Soli● babentiiut el●ttionu donum scientta vitae commun●catur ab ijs qui cocareant per praedi calum etiam hoc quod divi nae cognitionls videntur habere auforetur quia reprobi post coxtemptum verbum quod nequeunt recipere magis excaecantur Bucer in Mat. 13. S●o● Col. visited p. 23. that conversion alwaies follows upon the improvement of naturals Bucer though he saith that God would send an Angel to instruct those that did not put from them the desire of righteousnesse yet holds that from the gift of Gods election only and not the improvement of naturals this manifestation of Christ and salvation through him to proceed and from them who want that gift of election shall that which they had by the word preached be taken away because saith he the reprobate after the word contemned which they cannot receive are more blinded by the way tell me in your next whether Bucer makes not God a cruell tyrant in saying that the reprobate contemn the word and cannot receive it though God command them to do it You still labour to make your own face clean by throwing dirt in Bucers You say that Bucer conceiveth that Paul offered this to the consideration of the Jews that the Gentiles even before Christ was revealed unto them were partakers of true righteousnesse And this you say is a saying ten degrees beyond the line of any of yours Your aim is here to make Bucer seem a Gyant that you Ans standing by him may but seem a Dwarf in heresie you should have laid the parallel right and then for degrees you might have blotted out ten and have set down an hundred The Papists were not so cruell by a thousand parts in digging up of Bucers body when dead and buried as you in labouring to bury his name while it is yet living and rather then his name shall want a burying place to make your own throat an open sepulcher You desire that the reader should beleeve it was Bucers judgement that the Gentiles could be justified without Christ 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Legis 〈◊〉 generaliter accipit praossi 〈◊〉 justitiae quae lex dece● Buc. in loc because Bucer saith they were made partakers of true righteousnesse before Christ was revealed to them and if this be not the opinion which you desire to affix to Bucer 't is so far from being ten degree beyond yours that it is a thousand degrees short of yours but by righteousnesse Bucer only understands the duties of righteousnesse commanded in the Law But you do wickedly to seem willing that the reader should beleeve Apostolus praecipue o●nu●but wodis laberat ostendere extra Christum nullos non perditot esse non minus julaeos quam Gentes Enar. Sect 4. cap. 2. Rom. that Bucer did ever imagine any could be justified out of Christ you may consult him in the Enar. Sect. 4. cap. 2. on Rom. where he asserts that all are lost out of Christ If Bucer be a friend to your opinions I know not who is an enemy And I am consident the Ministers of the Province of Babylon that condemned Bucer as you say for an heretick and a man of rotten judgement dig'd him out of his grave and made a sacrifice by fire of his dead and buried corps unto the Genius of their bloudy Religion would have suffered your bones to have rested in their grave if they had not rather been digd up to be reserved as holy reliques to be enshrined according to the Genius of their foolish superstition It were easy to fill many pages with passages from other Orthodox Authours Sion Col. visit