Selected quad for the lemma: scripture_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
scripture_n	apostle_n	faith_n	tradition_n	4,048	5	9.0072	5	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A96073	A modest discourse, of the piety, charity & policy of elder times and Christians. Together with those their vertues paralleled by Christian members of the Church of England. / By Edward Waterhouse Esq;	Waterhouse, Edward, 1619-1670.	1655 (1655)	Wing W1049; Thomason E1502_2; ESTC R208656	120,565	278

out the eyes of those their Teachers for whom not many years since they would have pulled out their own But enough of this I return to Traditions which while they contend with Scripture or are made as supplements to inch out Scripture thought too short I wholly disallow Though I confess I love ingenuous freedom and I beleeve Religion is not in many things so stiffgirt as some ridgid people suggest while they portray it clubsisted ready to smite every one it meets with nay in a keenness like Peters sword strait out and off with the ear of every opponent yet do I not comply with the judgment of some who rest on a Counsel-Canon as on Gospel and make less difference between them then is almost discernable because I fear it hath somewhat of a popish smatch in it for were not the Popes infallibility and the Popes virtuall presence and authoritative influence in Counsels in part leaned to some of our Profession would be more nice in that kinde then they are I will contest in reverence and duty to holy Counsels and Synods lawfully called and convened with any he that 's most a servant to them God forbid I should depraetiate worth in any man or judge my self fit to censure and not rather to be censured but this I say Da mihi Magistrum Christum Da mihi Regulam S. Scripturam In matters of this weight I 'le to the beam of the Sanctuary no Master will I own as to imperation over my faith but Christ I like not to crave mens pardons as the Sicilian Ambassadors did Pope Martin the fourths blasphemously Agnus Dei qui tollis peccata mundi miserere nobis While they speak according to Scripture I 'le obey them and take heed not to offend them but if they prove illuminates and eccentrically wilde that they tell me Christ is in this Enthusiasm and that new Light which neither I nor they understand nor doth Gods word clear out to me they are to me but as tinkling cymbals I neither care for their Euge's nor fear I their Anathema's Whatever then becomes of other Writings my zeal and vote shall be ever to preserve the renown of the holy Books of the old and new Testament let loose persons call them by those profane nick-names of Lesbiam regulam Evangelium nigrum Theologiam atramentariam nasum cereum and let Atheists deride them they are the Christians Magna Charta for Heaven cursed be he that violates them to profane uses they are the Christians Canaan Let profane worldlings look with bloody Gardner's eyes upon it not endure to see the Book called Verbum Dei yet the sincere Christian values it as his Canaan the milk and honey of which refresheth him against his tedious march in the wilderness of this sinful and sorrowful life accounting all other Books as Egypts garlick and onyons to its Manna and Quails This this is full of the dew of Heaven as was Gideon's Fleece when all other Writings profit nothing but are dry and sapless 't is the Iliads which every devout Alexander who by faith overcomes the world lodgeth in his noblest Cabinet his heart 'T is the Tree of life on which hangs the Fruit of the knowledge of good and evil 't is the Ark of God in which as it were is the pot of Manna and Aaron's rod comfort and correction therein are Gods staves of beauty and bonds his binding and his drawing cords yea therein the whole duty of man both to God and his neighbour is comprized Now judge O man what could God do more for his Vineyard the Church then he hath done In giving her such an Oracle for her doubts such a Light against her darkness such a Touchstone of her Purity and her rivals adulteration And what can the Church do less in return to God then by signal fidelity maintain the honor and authority of this Canon deposited with her Let that blasphemous new light M r Edwards mentions call the Scriptures the golden Calf and brazen Serpent that set at variance King and Parliament and Kingdom against Kingdom that things would never be well till the golden calf and brazen serpent were broken to pieces yet next to heaven I will venter all I have in the holy war for Scripture He that comes to surprize that Capitol shall have my life his sacrifice and my prayers his curse and let all Christian people say Amen Amen This is the first Jewel in Antiquities Crown her zeal for the reverence of the holy Scriptures Secondly The elder Church Christian was express about a Ministry and the right qualification of Ministers according to the holy Institution of our Lord Jesus the great Head Doctor and Bishop of his Church who left her not as common in which every Christian as to the publick use of gifts had alike right but separated some to instruct to exercise power of the Keys to continue succession and to minister the holy things of the Gospel by virtue of an infallible promise of his cooperation with them to the end of the world This separation has been for many hundred yeers declared by Imposition of hands which the Church calls Ordination and has Apostolique practice to warrant it In Acts 6. 6. Stephen is mentioned to be a man full of faith and of the holy Ghost yet did he not execute any Ministerial Office upon account of his gracious qualifications till he was presented to the Apostles they had prayed for him and laid their hands on him a Scripture well to be weighed by men of contrary judgement especially since backed by the general practice of the Church Catholique For if the Churches fidelity in this Gospel Tradition and Universally received Ordinance should be questioned the Canon of holy Writ and all the Doctrines and Practises of Christianity will become litigious since the Church as the pillar and ground of truth is the deliverer and declarer of them And we are not to doubt but that the holy Ghost who leads into all truth hath rightly guided the Catholique Church to this belief since all holy men of all times and Churches how different soever each from other in Rites and situation have agreed upon it and accordingly declared themselves and nothing hath ever been found against it worthy the sway of our assents in contradiction to so Oecumenical an acknowledgment And truly I much wonder any should be of contrary judgement who ought to know the validity of Antiquities consent echoing to Scripture were Scripture silent had the practice of Antiquity no footing therein I should be as unwilling to follow it as any he that is most against it For that of Reverend Calvin is most true Si in sola Antiquitate c. If Antiquity be only the Judge then prodigious heresies which brake out in Apostolique times will become Catholique faith But when the Word of God gives rise to what in this kinde Antiquity embraceth and

Ark been taken by the Philistims the glory had been departed from the Israel of Gods Church How much prophane mirth would the sonnes of Error have made with these Songs of Zion had God given them up into their power But blessed be God the Church hath ever had ane held the Scriptures in high value though not admitted all parts of it for Canon at one and the same time sometimes they found parts of it not in good hands as they thought other parts by Hereticks were corrupted and handed to them not as they were in the autographon but with emendations to which were added many spurious and rejectitious Gospels Prophecies and Epistles fitted to answer the lying divination Satan had no foot other parts of Scripture not primariò authenticae the ancients allowed to be read sub regulâ morum but not as a rule of faith but such only as were received from Prophets and allowed by Christ Jesus his Apostles and their Scribes and Schollers and their successors hath the Church owned and adhered to and those are the Books in the Canon of our holy Mother the Church of England not that all mouthes have been stopped or all Christians agreed in the harmony no all have not beleeeved Gods testimony in the Churches report and traditional fidelity S t Jerom tells us that it was usual with hereticks to corrupt Catholick Authors the Eunomians dealt thus with Clemens the elder and Ruffinus is not behind-hand for this trick while he prefixed the Name of a holy Martyr to a book of Arrianisme and Evagrius charges them of entitling their hereticall books with the Names of Holy Orthodox men such as Athanasius Gregorius Thaumaturgus and Julius in brief Theodoret is round with them telling us they cared not what Law they broke what boldness and freedom they took for maintenance of their wickedness nay oftentimes they made it the master-piece of their blasphemy to violate the holy Law of God As men in groves cut this stick and that wand they like and leave the rest so pick erroneous men this book and that passage here and there and leave the rest as useless Whatever is contrary to their device and casts dirt in their face they reject and disown their darkness and the light of Scripture agrees not Light is au ill guest to an ill conscience and because Scripture troubles their Owle eyes and dismantles their impostry they cannot away with it Tertullian perstringes the Valentinians for their clucking into corners and their sculking up and down and sayes Our Doves-coat hath no guile is open and visible to all comers who have liberty to see and hear what we do And 't is a Note unimprobated that patrons and professors of error and none but such have ever dishonoured Scripture or questioned its authority nor have ever any who had a grounded hope of Heaven by Gods mercy held themselves above Ordinances as the means of attaining it nor have they ever pick'd and choos'd cull'd and refus'd this and not that Ordinance but had respect to all Gods commands and equally adored all his dispensations Charge an holy soul with queaziness in this kind object to it that it loves not to be limited and enlarged by the word not to humble it self to God in prayer not to obey Authority for the Lord and for conscience sake and it answers in Hazael's word Am I a dog that I should do this No this spot is not the spot of Gods people 't would be a sully which mountains of niter could not cleanse 'T is true indeed in the interpretation of this or that particular Scripture there hath been yet is and ever will be to the end of the world different opinions and many passions have lathered so high that charity hath often layen in the suds as is the Proverb even amongst men otherwayes without exception as between S t Augustine and S t Jerom in the Exposition on the second Chap. of the Galatians yea and in many things and under many temptations some of you have lived and spoken somewhat against the majesty and authority of the holy Scripture as Origen by Name who therefore confessed his errors and publikely retracted them as appears in his Epistle to Fabian and as S t Jerom testifies in his Epistle to Pammachius and Oceanus And therefore Legends Canons and Traditions brought into some Churches as grounds of belief and made obligatory to the conscience as onely the holy Scriptures ought to be held are but of late date in the Christian Church for S t Jerom or Epiphanius in him writes thus to Theophilus That thou mindest us of Church-Canons we thank thee but know this that nothing is so antique as the Laws and rights of Christ And Father Marinarus in the Counsel of Trent denied that the Fathers made Traditions to stand in competition with Scripture but good man he was born down with the many voices that decried his sound assertion as that which better beseemed a Colloquie in Germany then a Counsel of the universal Church but what he said was nevertheless true because disliked by those vipers for as they then so their predecessors long before cried up Traditions and perhaps they had it from the Jews or rather from the devil the author of it both in Jews and others Our Lord Jesus arraigns the Jews for making void the Commandements of God by mens traditions and transgressing the Commandements of God by traditions yea of rejecting the Commandements of God to fulfill them and the Apostle S t Paul reproves this and cautions against it Beware saith he least any man spoyl you through Philosophy and vain deceit after the tradition of men after the rudiments of the world and not after Christ Where the Apostle doth not simply dehort from traditions in affirmance of Scripture or civil custom but from such use of traditions as tends to the eclipse of the testimony of truth in the word written which is transcendently above the witness of man and therefore I cry out to all those New-lights as S t Jerom did Spare your pains hug not the cloud of your conceits instead of the Juno truth Why do you bring that to sale which the primitive Church for four hundred years never heard of Why take you upon your shoulders that task which Peter and Paul never taught nor were they now alive would own untill this day the Christian world hath been without this Doctrine and I in mine old age will profess that faith in which I was born and into which baptized Would S t Jerom have been stanch had he lived to these times wherein old and sound Religion is like wormeaten lumber cast into the outhouses or like unfashionable furniture turned out of the chambers of note to adorn the Nursery or the Chaplains lodgings I trow he would and had he he must have reproached many professors who now would pull

passes by chance and as a spy not by license S t Augustine tels us of Imperiall Laws made against both heathen worships hereticall writings and outrages And I reade of Marcianus his Edict against nice and uselesse disputations of divine Mysteries yea Honorius and Theodosius commanded the Books of prophane men written against the honour of Religion and in defiance of the Church to be burned In S t Jeroms time Origens Book 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 was ill resented by the Orthodox Ruffinus and Pammachius carp at the father for translating it and charge the errors therein upon him as making them legible by his Edition of them which otherwise would not have been understood And S t Jerom is forced to answer it thus What I did I did to discover Truth Do you think me an Interpreter Proditor fui prodidi haereticum ut Ecclesiam ab haereticis vindicarem Ruffinus is charged by Pope Anast●sius to have affixed a Martyrs Name to an hereticall Book on purpose to have it take more and spread farther The Book of the Trinity charged on Tertullian was not his no nor S t Cyprians but a Novatians It hath been ever a course in the Church of God to censure and inhibit Books and Disputations which tend to destruction and not to edification and is so farre from being an entrenchment on Christian Liberty or a burthen to tender consciences that it argues a high and holy zeal well becoming Christian polities and governors 't was good counsel Maecenas gave Augustus Vt ipse Deos moribus patriae receptos colat ad eundem cultum alios compellat nec Deorum contemptorem qu●m permittat aut prestigiatorem tolerot haud dubium nihil magni futurum qui deos contempserit Having thus shortly given a touch upon some of the most remarkable Vertues of Antiquity and Elder Christians My conclusion aims to draw an humble parallell to these excellent presidents from the notable Christians and Christian practises of this once glorious Church the Church of England I know Comparisons are odious and it ill becomes us to vye with Fathers and Martyrs whose lives have been lights and deaths harvests to after-times yet in this case I conceive it pardonable to advance the mercy of God to us by this just and warrantable Vindication and the rather because our mothers miseries seem to be a most triumphant gratification to her enemies making them conclude her forsaken of God because smitten by men and advantageth the interest of the Papacy as Cardinall Sfondrato upon the like grounds in his Negotiations with Charles the fifth noted To give then this inflammation some lenitive and to return their insultation a gentle refutation I shall hope by Gods leave to present her as famous for order and enconragement of Learning and her professors as remarkable for their piety charity and policy as any Christians that preceded them and that not only before but also since the Reformation of this Church in the abjuration of Popery First then The Church of England since the Reformation hath had sundry pious Princes and Prelates who have with warm zeal maintained the honour of Scripture allowing it the only rule of faith both in the direct precepts and necessary divine consequences drawn from it forbidding all traditions in competition with it all adulteration in allay of it and commanding its translation purely out of not understood tongues into the mother Language that people might know and hear the will of God i● his Word declared to them and celebrating all Church-services so as people may be most edified by them This was no small advance from Popery that Religion grew English that care was taken that in the Lessons and Liturgies of our Service pure Scripture was read and if any of the Apocrypha which but rarely yet that only which was morally virtuous and least to be suspected or offensive In this Church not only Martyrs in the daies of Queen Mary died but also Bishops and Presbyters numberlesse ever since have preached and wrote for the honour of holy Scripture as that which contains all things necessary to salvation So declare the articles of our Church And though with grief I write it all of place and learning amongst us have not given Scripture that testimony in their lives but that a morall Epictetus or a Seneca might upbraid them yet the Church in her aggregate consideration and thousands eminent in her have personally attested their obedience to Scripture and brought all doctrines to the test of it according to that of the Prophet To the law and to the testimony if they speak not according to that 't is because there is no light in them Therefore in the Stat. 1 Eliz. c. 1. Not the Pope not partiall and factious Conventions but the Scripture is the judge of heresies and Counsels rightly convened judging according to it This the Laity declared not but upon serious consultation with the Clergy in Convocation that so every sanction might have its due weight I know there have been those that contrary to Scripture have brought in though blessed be God they had no rooting dangerous doctrines and practises threatning overthrow to our well-ordered Discipline by their innovating pragmatiqueness but these were not owned by any publique Canons or State laws but upbraided as encroachments and openly disgraced as scarres to our Religion and some of those that furthered this have accounted to God and men and therefore are to be passed over without further censure The Church hath ever been stanch and her doctrine Apostolique barked at by many but overturned by none traduced for new and worthless but upon search found to be As the apple trees among the trees of the wood shady and fruitfull comfortable in life and pleasant at the hour of death This made the L. Cromwell in H. 8. time in his last speech neer his death call to the people to bear witness that he died in the Catholique faith not doubting in any article of his faith no nor doubting in any Sacrament of the Church And all this because the articles of faith were not founded upon S t Francs S t Dominick this Pope or that Councill but upon the Scriptures upon Prophets and Apostles Jesus Christ being chief corner stone 2. This Church hath answered primitive times in care of Government Ecclesiastique No Nation in the world had a more thriving Church then we In none more purity state decency learning then we In no Church the Clergy more honestly priviledged and respected then in ours wherein Government was not at the Ordinaries pleasure but limited and confined by Laws and fettered to prevent impertinent domineering In this Government according to the pattern of elder times was avowed the Power of Rulers and Princes over all persons within and pretenders from without their Dominions though not their power in sacris yet circa sacros in sacros which every person in Orders was to subscribe