Selected quad for the lemma: sin_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
sin_n	great_a	mortal_a	venial_a	3,197	5	11.4523	5	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A61614	A sermon preached before the King at White-Hall, March 7, 1678/9 by Edward Stillingfleet ...	Stillingfleet, Edward, 1635-1699.	1679 (1679)	Wing S5654; ESTC R8214	30,613	56

Officers to be excused from doing it made them a sort of libellati although their names were never entred in the Heathen Rolls and they were forced to undergo severe penance before they were restored to the communion of the Church So much simplicity and singleness of heart was then supposed necessary to the Christian profession No directing the intention no secret reservation no absolution either before committing the fact or immediately upon confession of it were ever heard of or allowed in those days of Christian innocency and simplicity If the Heathen Officers sought after Christians they neither lied to them nor betrayed their Brethren but would rather endure torments themselves than expose others to them for which reason S. Augustin highly commends the resolution of Firmus an African Bishop who rather chose to be tortured himself than discover a Christian committed to his care who was sought after for no other reason but because he was a Christian and the Heathen Emperour himself was so pleased with it that for his sake he forgave the other person and suffered him to enjoy his liberty When the Christians were summoned before the Heathen Tribunals they used no shifting tricks or evasions they concealed no part in their minds of what was necessary to make what they spake to be true they did not first peremptorily deny what they knew to be true and then back such a denial with horrid oaths and dreadful imprecations upon themselves and after all think to justifie the doing so by vertue of some secret reservation in their own minds Is this becoming the simplicity and ingenuity of Christians Such may possibly think themselves Wise as Serpents in so doing but I am sure they are far from being innocent as Doves But are there any who go under the name of Christians who own and defend such practices I think indeed scarce any who went under the name of honest Heathens ever did it For they did not only require constancy and fidelity in oaths and promises but simplicity an● sincerity both in the making and keeping 〈◊〉 them They condemned the Romans wh 〈…〉 t to avoid their oath by a trick and 〈…〉 ck to the Carthaginians they mig 〈…〉 e constancy of Regulus in observing the words of his oath as to his return although very capable of a mental reservation and if he did not promise the Carthaginians to perswade the Roman Senate to the Peace he behaved himself with great sincerity as well as constancy When the King of Persia thought by a trick to avoid the oath he had made to one of his Neighbour Princes viz. That he would not pass such a stone which was set up as a Boundary between them and he took up the stone and caused it to be carried before his Army his Counsellours told him they feared such deceit would never prosper with him because as the Prince sent him word Covenants are to be understood according to the plain meaning of the words and not according to any secret reservation Since then the very Heathens disallowed such artifices and frauds are there any worse than Heathens that justifie and maintain them Is not this rather an artifice and fraud of their Adversaries to render them odious But even in this respect we ought to be harmless as Doves and therein lies a necessary part of Christian Ingenuity in not charging on others more than they are guilty of I shall therefore fairly represent the doctrine held in the Church of Rome about these matters and leave you to judge how far it is consistent with Christian Simplicity There are some things wherein the Divines of the Roman Church are agreed and some things wherein they differ The things wherein they are agreed are these 1. That an Officious lie is but a venial sin This they do not stick to declare to be the common opinion of all their Divines Ex communi-omnium sententiâ saith Azorius A lie that hurts no-body but is intended for the good of others is no mortal sin and herein all are agreed saith Reginaldus because say they where there is no other fault but the meer falsity it is not of its own nature and kind any mortal sin for a lye of it self is a harmless thing or at least saith Lessius the hurt is not great that it doth and it is no great matter whether men be deceived or not if they do not suffer much by it and from hence he concludes it to be venial in its own nature It is true they say an officious lie may become a mortal sin by accident when it is confirmed by an oath when it is too publick and scandalous and used by those from whom the people expects Truth as Bishops and Preachers and Religious men saith Sayr Not even in them saith Navarr unless the scandal be great or their consciences tell them they are mortal sins or some other circumstances make it so If it be in matter of judicature although the thing be small yet I think a lie a mortal sin saith Cajetan because men are then bound to speak truth That reason is of no force at all say Soto and Navarr for that circumstance alone doth not alter the nature of the sin So that if a man tells never so many lyes provided he intend to hurt no body by them they do not make one mortal sin For that is a fixed Rule among the Casicists that an infinite number of venial sins do not amount to one mortal and consequently though they have obliquity in them yet they do not put a man out of the Favour of God But upon these principles what security have men to invent and spread abroad lyes provided they are intended for a good end in their own opinion What sincerity is to be expected when the confessing a truth may do them injury and the telling a lye may do them good For even Cajetan himself makes that only a pernicious lye when a man designs to do mischief by it They cry out upon it as a great scandal for any of us to say they think it lawful to lye for the Catholick cause and in truth they do not say so in words for they still say a lye is unlawful for any end whatsoever but here lyes the subtilty of it They grant it in general to be a fault but such a venial such an inconsiderable fault if it be for a good end and they have so many wayes to expiate the guilt of venial sins that the difference is very little as to the practice of it from making it no sin at all And some think they had better own downright lying than make use of such absurd wayes of evading it by mental reservations by which men may be truly said to affirm that which they do deny and to deny that which they do affirm But notwithstanding this 2. They are agreed that in some cases th●… which otherwise would be a lye is none by

〈◊〉 help of a mental reservation Let us not therefore do the Iesuites so much injury to charge that upon them as their peculiar doctrine which is common to all their Divines and Casuists And herein F. Parsons was in the right when he asserted that the doctrine of Equivocation and mental reservation hath been received in the Roman Church for four hundred years only some have extended the practice of it farther than others have done But in the Case of Confession they all agree without exception saith the same Author that if a man hath confessed a thing to a Priest he may deny and swear that he never confessed it without being guilty either of a lye or perjury reserving this in his mind that he hath not confessed it so as to utter it to another And I find the greatest enemies to the Use of Mental reservation in other cases do allow it in this and do not barely allow it but think a man bound in conscience to use it under grievous sin saith Parsons when by no other means of silence diversion or evasion the said secresie can be concealed I do not now meddle with the inviolableness of the Seal of Confession which I do not deny a great regard ought to be had to where an obligation greater than that of keeping a secret doth not take it off as where the Life of my Prince or the publick Safety are concerned not from any Divine Institution but from the baseness of betraying a Trust but I wonder how they came to think it to be no lye or perjury in this Case and yet to be so in any other It is to no purpose to alledge other Reasons peculiar to this ase for the single question is whether what a man keeps in his mind can keep him from being guilty of a lye or of perjury in his words If it cannot then not in the case of Confession if it may then a mental reservation will equally do it in any other Case And consequently no man who doth allow it in this case can on that account disallow it in any other This Navarr very well saw and therefore from the allowance of it in this Case of Confession he de duces the lawfulness of the use of it in all cases wherein a man is not bound to speak all he knows The common answer in this case is that in confession the Priest doth not know as man but as God and therefore when he is asked any thing as a man he may deny what he knows as God But Navarr at large shews the folly and absurdity of this Answer because this doth not salve the contradiction for to say he doth not know is as much as to say he doth not any way know it which is false if he doth know it in any capacity and it is false that he doth not know it as man because he knows it as a Priest and as such he is not God but man And the very Seal of Confession discovers that it is made known to him as a Man and with the consent of the penitent a Priest may reveal what he heard in confession and in other cases he may make use of that knowledge as a man without particular discoverie I do not therefore wonder to see the stout and plain-hearted Defenders of the lawfulness of this practice in other cases to express so much astonishment at the nicety and scrupulosity of those who dispute against it as so dangerous and pernicious a thing upon other occasions when they think it so pious and innocent in this For say they If it be a lie to deny what a man knows it is not in the power of the Church or of God himself for any end whatsoever to make it lawful for a Priest to deny what he knows And if it be not a lie in that Case neither is it in any other But although none in the Roman Church are able to answer that argument yet I must do some of them that Justice as to clear them from the owning the allowance of this practice in other common cases upon the same ground Yet I fear upon strict enquiry we shall find that those do equivocate more who seem to deny it than those who openly assert it For although two persons of the Roman Church seem wholly to reject it except in the case of Confession yet the one of them is charged with singularity and suspicion of Here sie and the other with little less than Heresie and Apostasie and their proceedings with him shew what esteem they had of him But most of their other Divines and Casuists do approve it in case of Testimony and accusation Soto doth allow a Witness being examined about a secret crime to say he doth not know any thing of it although he were privy to it and for this he quotes some Divines of great Authority before him as he might have done many others but he will not allow him to say he did not see the fact committed nor that he heard nothing of it because saith he words of knowledge seem to be restrained by judicial proceedings to that which a man is bound to declare But this ●ubtilty the latter Casuists will by no means admit of and allow denying the fact in any words and say of him that he was afraid where no fear was They therefore say It is enough that a witness answers to what ought to have been the intention of the Iudge whatever his actual intention was and therefore if a man supposes the Judge not to proceed legally against him he may not only deny the fact he knows but swear to that denial provided he keeps this in his mind that he denied any such fact which belonged to the Iudges conusance or that he did not do it publickly and in this case say they there is neither lie nor per jury Others say no more is necessary to avoid a lie or perjury in such cases but only to understand the word of denial with this restriction so as to be bound to tell you And this is the common case which Parsons and others speak of If a man be examined upon oath whether he be a Priest or not they say he may with a safe conscience deny it with that poor reservation in his mind and that is a known rule in this case among them that what a man may truly say he may truly swear So that a Priest may not only say but swear he is none and yet by this admirable art neither tell a lie nor forswear himself Some of later times being made sensible of the pernicious consequences of the imputation of such doctrines and practices to their Church have endeavoured to qualifie and restrain the Abuse of them But upon due examination we shall find this to be only a greater art to avoid the odium of these things and a design to deceive us with the greater