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scripture_n	according_a	lord_n	word_n	2,689	5	3.8891	3	false

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ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A92855	The nature and danger of heresies, opened in a sermon before the Honourable House of Commons, Ianuary 27. 1646. at Margarets Westminster, being the day of their solemn monthly fast. / By Obadiah Sedgvvick, B.D. Minister of Gods Word at Covent-Garden.	Sedgwick, Obadiah, 1600?-1658.	1647 (1647)	Wing S2377; Thomason E372_13; ESTC R201317	27,115	48

them lay overthrown and cashiered every person in the Trinity All the Scriptures Law and Gospel every distinct morall commandement every particular article of faith every Ordinance of Jesus Christ Preaching of the Word Baptisme Lords Supper c. There are 4. generall heads unto which usually we reduce Christian Religion 1. To the Decalogue of the Law 2. To the symbole of faith 3. To the Lords Prayer 4. To the Sacraments And that learned * See him in ●pusc indice tertio p. 142. c. printed at Geneva M. D. LXXXIII in folio Author doth by name instance the severall hereticall and erreonous teachers who have invaded every one of these and in every particular comprehended in them By all which it doth most clearly appear how dangerously mischievous hereticall opinions are to the Church of God 5. There is one thing more which I would add in the last place by which it shall be manifested that these hereticall opinions are more dangerous then any other flouds and that is a diverse quality in them other flouds are quickly up and quickly down although they grow high and perillous yet there is a suddain transiency in the height and perill their principles are unconstant though violent and being spent these ordinary flouds sink and famish for want of supply and feeding But the flouds of false and erroneous doctrines are such as quickly rise but do very slowly abate They are in this respect worse then the great deluge in the days of Noah which continued many months but then did slack and sink and fell quite away It is not so with hereticall errours but they are like diseases which come upon us flying but goe away from us creeping some erroneous opinions have been kept up for forty years together nay above 100. years together some of them 300. years nay some of the Antichristian heterodoxies have been kept up above a 1000. years together O Brethren men doe extreamly dote upon their own fancies they are exceedingly pleased with their own brats especially with the new conceptions of their own minds they dearly like them and love them and foster them For one Heretique who hath been poysoned in his judicials you may finde a thousand of others converted and reduced who have onely been stained in their morals Heresie or the hereticall opinion is stilted up by all the parts arguments shifts learning of carnall reason and it is born up by an haughty and disdainfull and proud spirit and it is so fallacious and fraudulent when you come to handle it which is not the least it is so rammed in with obstinacy and peremptorinesse that it is almost a miracle to work effectually upon an Heretique Every Heretique is odiously proud All other men who dissent from him are far below him and one saith very truly That no proud man can endure to bee accounted a fool or a knave So simple as to be deceived or so base as to deceive one of which the heretique thinks he must take to his share if at any time he recants his hereticall and seducing doctrine I should now come to shew unto you the reasons why Satan makes use of this dangerous floud against the Church and why especially at some times more then other He well knows that there remains in professing Christians many advantages for him as to erroneous opinions much ignorance much pride and self-conceitednesse much itching vanity much vain glory much fraternall envy much carelesnesse and inadvertency c. but I must wave this and conclude all with some seasonable applications unto our selves Are heresies erroneous and false doctrines such a dangerous Vse 1 and pernicious floud to the Church of God Is there so much sinfulnesse in them so much dishonour to Christ so much injury to the truth of God so much hazard to the immortall souls of men O then what just what sad what singular cause have all of us this day to enlarge our tears and humiliations There are many flouds which doe call for our tears 1. The floud of innocent bloud in Ireland 2. The floud of cries from poore widows and orphans 3. The floud of needy and wounded soldiers and there is yet another floud a worse floud the floud of heresies and blasphemies one deep cals for another the floud of wicked and ungodly opinions doth call earnestly for a floud of sorrow and lamentation We are by Gods mercy and goodnesse indifferently rescued from the cruelty of Dragons O but now we are as much endangered with the floud of the Serpent the bodies of people are in some good measure secured from the edge of the sword but what of this whiles the souls of people are hazarded with the poyson of errours If the danger flies from the body to the soul if the corporall danger be exchanged into a spirituall danger where is our happinesse what is our safety by this Beloved there are 4. notable reasons of our most Note solemn humiliation for the spirituall wickednesses for the false and abominable doctrines which like a floud are now overflowing this Nation 1. The account or height of some of them They amount to no lesse then execrable blasphemies to ignominious contemptuous disgracefull reproaches of God and Christ and the holy Scriptures Beleeve me blasphemy is a daring sin It presseth very close and too sore upon God He that blasphemeth the Name of the Lord he shall surely be put to death Lev. 24 16. The words according to the originall are Hee that strikes through the Name of Jehovah Blasphemy is that bold sword which is hacking of God himself which is as it were cleaving of him asunder The School-men tell us that blasphemy breaks out 3. ways 1. Cùm attribuitur Deo quod ei non convenit when we affirm that of God which is unbeseeming of God which is incompatible with his holy and divine Nature As to make him a creature or a lyer or cruell unjust unmercifull sinfull or the cause of sin 2. Cum à Deo removetur quod ei convenit when we deny that to God which indeed belongs to God It is called blasphemy in the King of Assyria when he said that the Lord was not able to deliver Hierusalem out of his hand 2 Chron. 32. 17. 3. Cum attribuitur creaturae quod Deo appropriatur when we put that upon a creature which is proper to God Thus when the Israelites had made a molten Calf and said This is thy God that brought thee up out of Aegypt it is added and they wrought great provocations Nehem 9. 18. In the Hebrew it is and they committed great blasphemies Now compare this short discourse of the kindes of blasphemies with the many expressions let fall in the speeches of some and set down in the writings of others and then judge whether some of our moderne errours rise not as high as blasphemy Viz. 1. That God is the Author of sin Not onely of the actions unto which sinne doth cleave but of the very

first question which contains the Nature of Heresies I now come to handle the second particular which respects the Danger of Heresies 2. Of the Danger of Heresies That heresies or erroneous doctrines and opinions are dangerous cannot be so much as a scruple to any Christian upon the earth unlesse he be turned into an Heretique or into an Atheist For First the Scriptures doe in terminis charge sin and perniciousnesse and damnation upon them S. Paul reckons up heresies amongst those workes of the flesh which shut persons out from inheriting the Kingdom of God Gal. 5. 20 21. And Saint Peter cals them pernicious and damnable and such as bring swift destruction and speaking of the Authors of them he saith that their damnation slumbers not 2 Pet. 2. 1 2 3. A mans opinion makes him sinfull as well as his practise and a man may be damned for a corrupt opinion as well as for a corrupt conversation I will not put it to a dispute whether a sin against the rule of faith may not caeteris paribus be far more sinfull and damnable then the sin which is against the rule of life But let it for the present suffice that if heresies and heterodoxies be such sins be such locks as can shut up the gates of heaven against a soul If they be such bars as can break up the doors of hell and bring damnation surely that man is not himself who doubts whether they be dangerous or no. Secondly let us consider unto what dangerous things heresies and corrupt doctrines are compared in Scripture and by what dangerous creatures hereticks and false teachers are expressed by them you may judge whether heresies are dangerous yea or no. 1. For heresies they are compared in Scriptures sometimes to a Gangrene or canker 2 Tim. 2. 17. Their word will eat as doth a canker The canker is an invading ulcer creeping from joynt to joynt corrupting one part after another till at length it eats out the very heart and life Sometimes to a shipwrack 1 Tim. 1. 19 20. Hold faith and a good conscience which some having put away concerning faith have made shipwrack In what a condition are the miserable passengers when their ship is split asunder by the Rock All their goods are lost and all their lives too Christ cals them leaven Paul cals them a bewitching Learned writers call them a leprosie poison fire a tempest our text a floud 2. And as for Heretiques they are expressed by creatures very dangerous and hurtfull sometimes they are styled foxes Cant. 2. 15. The foxes which spoil the grapes sometimes they are called dogs rending dogs Phil. 3. 2. Beware of dogs beware of the concision sometimes they are styled wolves grievous wolves which devour the flocks Acts 20. 29. Sometimes they are in effect called very mountebanks and cheaters such as beguile unstable souls c. Thirdly Jesus Christ and his Apostles doe give speciall charges and caveats against them to take heed and beware of them which they never vvould have done had they not been dangerous Mark 8. 15. Beware of the leaven of the Pharisees Matth. 7. 15. Beware of false Prophets Matth. 24. 4 5. Take heed that no man deceive you for many shall come in my name saying I am Christ and shall deceive many Phil. 3. 2. Beware of dogs beware of evill workers beware of the concision 2 Pet. 3. 17. Beware lest ye also being led away with the errour of the wicked fall from your own stedfastnesse Certainly all these things doe clearly prove that there is a danger in them But that is not all danger is not all there is yet more then meer danger in them which will appear in the resolving of the third particular 3. The greatnesse of danger by Heresies Heresies are the greatest and highest of dangers to the Church of Christ you will imagine that the sword and prison and exile and dispersion and spoiling and torments and tortures and the most cruell deaths which befell the Church in the Primitive times were extreamly dangerous and so they were but yet not half so dangerous as the flouds of heresies and corrupt opinions are The Church ever gained by the former grew more in purity in unity in prayer in zeal and courage But did it ever get so by heresies and erroneous doctrines Unlesse by accident and after much striving and physicking for recovery I will goe no farther then the Text it self to set out unto you the exceeding mischief danger which comes by heresies and erroneous doctrines They are in the Text styled a floud cast out of the mouth of the Serpent Now seriously consider 1. They are a corrupting and defiling floud Any floud is so it presently defiles the pure waters spoils the grounds leaves filth and slime and mud behind it But surely a floud that comes out of the mouth of a poisonous Serpent is so And there are 4 precious things which wicked errors or heresies doe poison corrupt and defile The first is the souls of men And is there a more noble and choice thing in man or belonging to man then his soul Our soul is of more value then all the world But heresies and wicked doctrines corrupt the soul nay many souls It was the heavy Indictment against Babylon that in her were found slaves and souls of men Rev. 18. 13. Heretiques in one place are called Merchants making merchandise of you with fained words 2 Pet. 2. 3. In merchandizing there is something bought for a certain price In this merchandise the souls of people are bought for fained words for base metall onely for a corrupt errour Every hereticall opinion buyes a soul or stabs a soul It stabs the soul of him that maintains it and still it trades on to murder more souls It lifts off the soul from the foundation upon which the salvation of souls is built What will become of an house whose foundation is removed And what will become of a soul whose bottome for salvation is denyed and rejected Damnable heresies make us to deny the Lord that bought us 2 Pet. 2. 1. Oh what is this what will follow upon this when a poor sinner comes to deny the Lord Iesus who bought him The second is the leading faculty of the soul There is more danger to corrupt a Captain then to corrupt many private Soldiers and most danger to corrupt a Generall who leads the whole Army It is capitall in some places and at some times to cast poison into the spring this will poison all the streams Heresies corrupt the great leader of the whole soul The Iudgement of man is the Generall the Admirall the Shepherd the Overseer the Guide the Eye the Primum movens for the rest of the spheres in man If the light in man be darknesse how great is that darknesse If the Iudgment be infected how dangerous is that infection Beloved If there be the darknesse of ignorance from inapprehension in the minde the soul hereby is in an ill

case If there be the darknesse of misapprehension by errour it is in a worse case But when that misguiding errour befals the leading faculty of all the soul and this errour fals point-blank against a truth necessary unto the mans salvation and moreover this errour is stifly adhered unto by that leading judgement it doth mislead and it will mislead Oh now in what a desperate condition is the whole soule hereby If it doth not recover of this error it dies for it and it can never be recovered til the judgment be altered And when will that judgement be altered which perversly affronts and rejects the light of truth which onely can carry it off The third is the most active faculty of the soul they doe defile and corrupt the conscience Now this is amazedly dangerous A wicked errrour is blinding whiles in the judgement onely but it is binding when it slips to the conscience also It is a wrangling Sophister in that but it is a working Iesuite in this Diseases falling amongst the vitall spirits are most quick and most dangerous Errours are never more pernicious then when they drop into the conscience for whatsoever engageth conscience the same engageth all and the utmost of our all If the conscience of man be made a party against the truth now all that a man hath and all that a man can doe will be made out against the truth too Now the person will with Paul grow mad and desperate against Christ for Paul being engaged by an erroneous conscience consents to the death of Stephen yea could he in that condition have met with Jesus Christ himself he would have done the like against him The fourth is The conversations of men Heresie is seldom or never divided from Impiety Hymeneus who 1 Tim. 1. 19. made shipwrack of faith made shipwrack also of a good conscience Those whom Paul called dogs he also cals evill workers And in another place speaking of Phil. 3. 2. Tit. 1. 15 16. some whose mindes were defiled he adds and reprobate to every good work Our Saviour speaking of false Prophets saith you may know them by their fruits The lives of men are consonant to the judgements of men Truth and goodnesse are reciprocal and so are falshood and wickednesse The doctrine of faith is a doctrine of holinesse too And the doctrine of lies is the doctrine of prophanenesse too He who fals from truth to falshood will quickly fall from piety to wickednesse Truth is of a reforming vertue as well as of an informing nature It salts and seasons heart and life both but that errour which putrifies the heart will putrifie the life also the plague will at length rise and break out into bla●es and botches They who write the story of the Anabaptists begin Sleid. c. it with errour in their judgements but end it vvith wickednesse in their practises And Cyprian writing long since of Novatus that pestilent Heretique saith Epist 49. ad Cornelium thus of him That he was rerum novarum cupidus one who itched after new notions avaritiae inexplebili rapacitate furibundus and beyond measure covetous arrogantia stupore superbi tumoris inflatus intolerably proud curiosus semper ut prodat no man so prying no man so treacherous ad hoc adulator ut fallat he would commend you before your face but cut your throat behind your back nunquam fidelis ut diligat as false a person as lived Fax ignis ad conflanda seditionis incendia turbo tempestas ad fidei facienda naufragia hostis quietis tranquillitatis adversarius pacis inimicus a very fire-brand cared not what became of truth or peace turned the world upside down so that he might carry on his opinion The Apostle speaking of Antichrist who is the Antesignanus of all Heretiques cals him 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that man of sin no such sinner as he Lyranus expounds it one totally given up to sin and Theophylact the ringleader of sin And truly it is most just with God to give them up to corrupt lives who rejecting his truth have given up themselves to corrupt errors and lies 2. Heresies are a drowning and overwhelming floud a floud you know is such a collection such an heightning confluence of waters as swels the rivers above their bounds and lays all under water Now there are three things which heresies doe overwhelm See 2 Pet. 2. 2. One is the glory of all glories the glorious Name of God the glorious Name of Christ the glorious Name of the holy Spirit the glorious name of divine truths Heresie turns the glory into a lye It gives God the lye and Christ the lye and the holy Ghost the lye For it gives truth the lye the Scriptures the lye which are the glory of God and Christ and the holy Spirit He who makes the Word of God a lyer makes God himself a lyer O sirs what is God without truth and what is all the goodnesse of the Gospel without truth and what is all the fabrick of mans salvation without truth Truth is as it were the pin the clasp the knot that ties all pull out that untie and break that the excellencies of God the glories of Christ the sweetnesse of promises the souls of men the salvation of mens souls all are dashed are broken are gone And such work doth heresie make it doth dissolve the bond of all glory yea it doth resolve God into worse then nothing No God is better then a false god there is an open or secret blasphemy in all heresies No man can contemn the truth of God but in that he must likewise condemn the God of truth The second is the glory of Religion Religion is clipt and darkned It grows low and beggerly when it is patched with errour It is a debasing of the gold to marry it with any metall of a courser birth All Religion is by so much the more excellent by how much the more of truth it hath but when once it is adulterated when once it is tainted and leavened with damnable errours now the silver is become drosse the glory is departed from it when a Religion is like the feet of Nebuchadnezzars image which were part of clay and part of iron now it becomes low and contemptible If the mixture of humane inventions abates of its glory what an impairing is the mixture of corrupt and poisonous faith-subverting doctrines The third is not onely the dignity but also the very vitall entity of a Church Truth is the soul of that body and falshood is death unto it Schismes do it much hurt but nothing like vile doctrines Schismes doe only rent the coat but Heterodoxies do rent the heart those pluck up the fence but these pull down the building those doe tear away the childrens lace but these doe bereave the children of their bread those are a turbulent sea these are a dead sea those doe scratch but these doe kill Men talk

sinfulnesse it self of the ataxy pravity irregularity 2. That the Saints in this life are fully perfect as omniscient as God 3. That the fulnesse of the Godhead doth dwell bodily in every Saint in the same measure as it did in Christ Iesus whiles he dwelt here on earth 4. That when the fulnesse of the Godhead shall be manifested in the Saints then they shall have more power then Christ had and doe greater works then he did and that then they shall have divine honour 5. And one hath been complained of for saying that Jesus Christ was a Bastard 6. Another that himself was Iesus Christ the Messias 7. That Iesus Christ is not God essentially but nominally 8. That his humane nature was defiled with originall sin as well as ours 9. That he is not of an holier nature then men 10. That it is as possible for Iesus Christ to sinne as it is for a childe of God to sin 11. That there is no such thing as the Trinity of Persons 12. That the Scriptures are but of an humane invention a meer shadow a false History and ought not to be the foundation of any mans faith more then the Apocrypha and other Books c. When Hezekiah heard the blasphemies of Rabshekah he rent his clothes and covered himself with sack-cloth and went into the house of the Lord and sent to the Prophet Isaiah saying This is a day of trouble and of rebuke and of blasphemy That day of blasphemy was a day of trouble and vexation to him though the blasphemy was from an Assyrian yet it was a day of trouble to him and what should the day be unto us when it is a day of many blasphemies and that not from professed Assyrians but from professing Christians what Christian can hear can bear such indignities and reproaches cast upon his God and his Christ without a bleeding and rising spirit II. The breadth or number of false and erroneous opinions so many so grievous as quis fando temperet à lachrymis verily they grow so thick so abundant that they will leave us neither Church nor State neither Ministery nor Ordinances neither duties nor worship There are some who have printed large Catalogues of them I will but pick a few of the more notorious of them and spread them before you this day viz. 1. The Scriptures of the Old Testament doe not binde us Christians nor those of the New neither any farther then the Spirit for the present reveals unto us that such a place is the Word of God 2. That God never loved one man more then another before the world and that the Decrees are all conditionall 3. That there is no Originall sin 4. That the will of man is still free even to supernaturals 5. That the Saints may fall totally and finally from grace 6. That Christ died alike for all yea that the salvificall vertue of his death extends to all Reprobates as well as to the Elect yea to the very Devils as well as unto men 7. That Jesus Christ came into the world not for satisfaction but for publication Not to procure for us and unto us the love of God but onely to be a glorious publisher of the Gospel 8. That God is not displeased at all if his children doe sin and it is no lesse then blasphemy for a child of God to ask pardon for his sins 9. That Sanctification is a dirty and dungy qualification 10. That the doctrine of Repentance is a soul-destroying doctrine 11. That fastings and humblings are legall and abominable 12. That the souls of men are not immortall but mortall 13. That there is no heaven to crown the godly nor hell to torment the ungodly 14. That Civill Magistracy is Antichristian and but an usurpation 15. That the whole Ministery of the Land as to their present Ordination and standing is Antichristian 16. That it is as lawfull to baptize cats and dogs and horses which some have done for some of them if not for all and more as it is to baptize the infants of beleevers 17. That there is no true Ministery c. this day in all the world nor was since the generall Apostasie which they say began since the death of the last of the Apostles 18. That there will be none neither untill some Apostles be raised up and sent and when those Apostles come then there will be true Evangelists also and Pastors and not till then Hearken O people and judge O Christians whether the Serpent hath not cast out his floud amongst us Judge whether the errours in our times doe not call for more high thoughts and more deep tears III. The length or perill by all these If the perill were confined onely to the souls of them who are the craftsmen and founders of these opinions yet even this should move us to lament but the floud is running the water is spreading The plague is not onely begun but wasting the contagion grows to be generall It is got into the City into the Countrey got into that other chief University the poison is dropt into the springo It is got into many leaders of the people who doe themselves erre and cause others to erre It breaths and walks rowls up and down It is spreading over the whole Kingdome It surpriseth place after place infects family after family The sword of late was not so swift to conquer bodies as errours now are to poison souls Truly Sirs If blasphemies against God if reproaches against Christ if decisions against the holy Ghost If contempt of the Scriptures if vilifying of the Ordinances of Christ if obloquies to our holy profession If the eternall hazard of souls if all these cannot affect us afflict us I know not what to say unto you IV. The speciall engagements which are upon us all to lay all these things with sorrow to our hearts Beloved we are Christians let others think of us as they please we are covenanting Christians let others deride this as they list and we are or should be penitent Christians let others be what they please now Consider us as Christians we take our selves to be the children of the true and living God and professe our selves to be the members of Iesus Christ The faith of Christ is delivered unto us we are intrusted with it we are responsable for it we are to be zealous for it How then can we suffer our God our Christ our faith to be thus dishonourably injured and abused and not be troubled at all Consider us as covenanting Christians so we have every one of us bound our souls to God can any mortall creature here release us we have lifted up our hands to the most high God in our severall places to extirpate heresies and false doctrines Yea consider us as penitent Christians fasting Christians should be so they should be mourning Christians And Christians who penitentially mourn will mourn for the sins of others as well as for their own sins And they