Selected quad for the lemma: scripture_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
scripture_n	ghost_n	holy_a	inspire_v	2,844	5	10.2489	5	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A50252	A defence of the Protestant Christian religion against popery: in answer to A discourse of a Roman Catholick Wherein the manifold apostaties, heresies, and schisms of the chruch of Rome, as also, the weakness of her pretensions from the scriptures and the fathers, are briefly laid open: by an English Protestant.	Mather, Samuel, 1626-1671.	1672 (1672)	Wing M1278; ESTC R217670	45,074	64

Gospel Ministers and Gospel Churches both the one and the other may be called in a safe sense the pillar and ground of truth But what is this to the Church of Rome How ridiculous a reason were it saith Mr. Cartwright for the Apostle to exhort Timothy to walk circumspectly in the Church of Ephesus Cartwr in locum because the Church of Rome is thepillar and stablement of truth The Papists saith Calvin dum ad se transferunt hoc encomium improbe faciunt alienis se plumis vestiendo Nam ut evehatur Ecclesia supra tertium Coelum nego id totum ad eos ullomodo pertinere Calvin in loc Quinetiam locum presentem adversus eos retorqueo nam si Ecclesia columna est veritatis sequitur non esse apud eos Ecclesiam ubi non modo sepulta jacet veritas sed horrendum in modum diruta eversa sub pedibus calcatur When the Papists transfer this glory to themselves they do wickedly cloathing themselves with the feathers of other Birds For suppose the Church be extolled and lifted up above the Third Heavens I deny that any thing of all this excellency belongs in the least to them yea further I retort this place against them For if the Church be the Pillar of Truth then it follows that the Church is not amongst them where the Truth doth not only lie buried but is torn down and overthrown and trampled under foot in a fearful manner An hoc est vel aeuigma vel cavillum Paulus Ecclesiam non vult agnosci nisi in qua excelsa conspicua stat Dei veritas in Papatu nihil tale apparet sed disiectio tantùm ruinae ergo genuina Ecclesiae nota illic non extat Is there any difficulty or any cavilling in this Paul will not have any Church acknowledged but such as wherein the Truth of God stands on high conspicuous to the view of all men But there is no such thing to be seen in the Papacy but the overthrow and ruines of the Truth therefore there is no true note or mark of the Church to be found there The plain Truth is That Apostate Church and the Head thereof that is Babylon and Antichrist hath no right to any one promise in the Book of God but stands directly under all the Threatnings and Curses written therein because they have both added thereto and taken from it Revel 22.18 19. Indeed those Churches and those Souls have the best right to the promises that prize them most Therefore the Protestant Churches have a better right to them than the Church of Rome By the Protestant Churches I intend all that do subject themselves to the Scripture as the Rule of Faith and Life And by the Church of Rome all those that suffer the Pope to have dominion over their Faith for we do not judge every Individual in the external communion of that Church but onely such of them as have drunk down her deadly poyson What have they to do with the promises What have they to do with God to take his Covenant into their mouths Who do believe in a man that can lye and in a Church of men who may deceive and be deceived How much better and safer would it be for your eternal peace to cleave to the Scriptures which are the voyce of God and so to bottom and ground your Faith upon the truth and faithfulness of him that cannot lye then thus to ground it upon a man that shall dye and upon the sons of men that shall be made as grass For all flesh is as grass and all the glory of man as the flower of grass The grass withereth and the flower thereof fadeth away but the Word of the Lord endureth for ever And this is the Word which by the Gospel is preached unto you CHAP. VII Of Humane Testimonies for and against the See of Rome THat which remains of your Discourse is partly Quotations without so much as attempting to prove your interest in them of some parallel Texts with those before answered partly repetitions of those impertinent Queries Whether did the Roman Church go from any other known Church c Answered also before under the Head of Schism partly Humane Testimonies for the See of Rome for so you phrase it the Body of your Discourse having run upon this expression the Church of Rome the Title being the Roman Faith To your Humane Testimonies I would humbly offer three things to your serious consideration which I suppose may suffice to all you say or can say from the Fathers in whom you seem to repose your greatest confidence for the defence of your cause Consid 1. That you know we do not own the Fathers but the Scriptures onely as the Supreme Judge of Controversies Though we honour them as blessed Instruments in their Generation yet we know they were but men and not Apostles infallibly inspired and assisted by the Holy Ghost Yea we do ingenuously acknowledge That the darkness and inadvertency of the Fathers in some points did contribute and make way for the rise and growth of Popery They had their hands so full of other work partly from without in all their Conflicts both with Jews and Pagans both by writing and suffering while the Christian Princes also in the mean time were not idle but had their hands full in the Wars of Michael against the Dragon against the persecuting Pagan Emperors during that fourth Century And partly from within by those intestine mischiefs which through the malice and craft of Sathan were bred within the Churches own bowels such as Arrianism with all the Errors and Blasphemies accompanying and flowing from it against the Person and Natures of Christ and against his blessed Spirit As also Pelagianism wretchedly undermining the work of his Grace and Spirit in the effectual application of Christ and his redeeming Love to the Souls of his Elect. Donatism likewise at the same time dreadfully disturbing the peace and order and fellowship of the Gospel by dischurching and disbaptising all other Christians and re-baptising themselves whil'st othres in the mean time wereas much too large and loose as they too rigid The faithful Servants of Christ were thus assaulted in those dayes on every side over and beside the daily work of Teaching and Governing their respective Flocks and Churches All which did so severely call upon them for their deepest intentions and endeavours that as it rendred the work heavy upon the shoulders of the faithful Ministry in those conflicting times so truly to my narrow capacity it is no wonder if in the mean time the deep and subtile workings of the mystery of Iniquity in the Papacy did in a great measure escape their observation And the rather if we consider the disadvantage they were under both for want of Printing and of well regulated and formed Universities and Schools of the Prophets The Monastick Institutions at first as some have thought coming nearest and seeming to

condemn as such viz. as false and destructive unto Souls and dangerously intrenching upon the very Vitals and Fundamentals of Religion And if it be demanded of us What are the Heresies of the Church of Rome in this last sense This is a large Field Popery saith Dr. Ames Ames Cas l. 5. c. 4. de Haeres Non est una aliqua singularis Haeresis sed quasi corpus quoddam ex variis Haeresibus conflatum productum Sicut enim Mahumetismus est antecedentium Haeres●●n mixtura in Oriente Meridie sic Papismus quamvis aliâ specie variarum Haerese●n sentina est in Occidente Septentrione Popery is not one single Heresie but a Sink of many Heresies a dead Sea a Sodomitick Lake of many poysonous and erroneous Opinions Look as Mahometism is a mixture of former Heresies in the Eastern and Southern Countries so is Papism though under different pretensions a Sink of many Heresies in the Western and Northern parts of the old Roman Empire Take at present for I would not leave things at random these few Instances of the Heresies your Church hath fallen into It is easie seeing you call us to it it is easie in the strength of Christ in the evidence of his Word and Spirit to make good the Charge against Her CHAP. IV. Of the Heresies of the Church of Rome eight particulars instanced THe first grand Error of your Church is this Your Dethroning and Unlording the Scripture It is Christs own phrase Matth. 15.6 and Mark 7.13 by way of Reproof to your Predecessors those ancient Papists the Pharisees 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Unlording the Word of God through your Tradition But to this written Word did Jesus Christ appeal John 5.39 Search the Scriptures for in them ye think to have eternal life and they are they which testifie of me We are commanded to try the spirits 1 John 4.1 even by the Rule laid down in that Scripture ver 2. The Bereans are commended by the Holy Ghost as Christians of the right breed 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 because they would not take the Apostles Doctrine upon trust but searched the Scriptures daily whether those things were so Therefore many of them believed Acts 17 11 12. But with you it is a Nose of Wax attramentary Divinity of no more Authority in it self than Aesop's Fables or Titus Livius but that your Church hath christened it for Scripture but yet She tells us withall That we must receive Her Traditions Pari pietatis affectu reverentia Concil Trident S ss 4. Decret 1. with as much pious affection and reverence as we receive the Scripture So your Tridentine Council It is lamentable to consider how many Bibles you have burnt and how many Christians you have burnt alive for having Bibles and labouring to acquaint themselves therewith In King Henry the Eighth's time those of you who then had the conduct of Affairs in England did cause to be put forth a publick and authentick Instrument for the abolishing and inhibiting of the Scriptures wherein ye thus express your selves Da●ed May 24. 1531. That foras much as there is ingendered an Opinion in divers of his Subjects that it is his Graces duty to cause the Scripture of God to be Translated into the English Tongue to be communicated unto the people It appeareth That the having of the whole Scripture in English is not necessary to christen men Fox Acts and Mon. Vor. 2. E●it 1641. the divulging of the Scripture at this time in the English Tongue to be committed to the people considering such pestilent Books and so evil Opinions as be now spread among them should rather be to their further confusion and destruction than to the edification of their Souls Thus you said and did your worst but you could not hinder the Sun from rising at its appointed hour nor frustrate the Oath of him who sware that your time should be no longer and he gave the book to his servants to prophesie again Rev. 10. ver 6 9 11. This wretched neglect and contempt of the Scripture is the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the very corner stone of the Tower of Babel We look upon it as the first and chief of all your Heresies and the source and fountain of all the rest Ye do erre not knowing the Scripture Matt. 22.29 For there is a self-evidencing light and majesty in the Scripture it bears the stamp and impress of the Divine Attributes upon it which he that sees not must needs be blind as to other Truths also As he that cannot see the Sun when it shines at Noon-day can see nothing else he that cannot hear the voyce of Thunder is not like to be awakened by a silent whisper 2. The Authority and Infallibility of your Church and Pope as if they were not men but gods for humanum est errare Let God be true and every man a lyar Rom. 3.4 This is the great Idol that you set up against the Scripture and consequently against God himself for the Scripture is God speaking to Mankind Hence it is written of Antichrist that he exalteth himself above all that is called God or that is worshipped so that he as God sitteth in the temple of God shewing himself that he is God 2 Theff 2.4 He takes upon him to dispense even with the Laws of God therefore it is made the brand of a Reprobate to worship the Beast Revel 13.8 And the Lord denounces and thunders forth damnation to them Reve 14.9 10 11. The smoke of their torment ascendeth up for ever and ever and their doom is just for they make a god of him for put case the Pope should erre and go to Hell Bell. De summo Pontif. lib. 4. cap. 5. Bellarmine would fain make us believe that we are bound in conscience to go with him for thus he speaketh Si Papa exraret praecipiendo vitia vel prohibendo virtutes teneretur Ecclesia credere vitia esse bona virtutes malas nisi vellet contra conscientiam peccare If the Pope should erre in commanding Vices and forbidding Vertues the Church were bound to believe that Vice is good and that Virtue is evil unless she would fin against her Conscience Here is sweet Catholick Doctrine is it not yet such stuffe as this is of such value with you that the same Bellarmine saith Bell. Praefatin li●res ●e Fortif Quâ de re agitur cum de primatu Pontificis agitur brevissime dicam de summa rei Christianae The Primacy of the Pope sayes he is the sum of Christian Religion he means Antichristian 3. Your arrogant Attributions to corrupted Free-will in derogation to the sovereignty and efficacy of converting and electing Grace yea to the utter corrupting and undermining of sundry great Gospel-truths as Election Regeneration Assurance Perseverance your Free-will is an Error that draws a soul tail after it But the Scripture saith We are not born again of the will of man