Selected quad for the lemma: spirit_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
spirit_n	aaron_n	believe_v	head_n	19	3	6.8197	4	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A43554	Theologia veterum, or, The summe of Christian theologie, positive, polemical, and philological, contained in the Apostles creed, or reducible to it according to the tendries of the antients both Greeks and Latines : in three books / by Peter Heylyn.	Heylyn, Peter, 1600-1662.	1654 (1654)	Wing H1738; ESTC R2191	813,321	541

Of the Authority or Power of remitting sins we shall speak more appositely hereafter in the following Article At this time I shall onely speak of the Form of words which some of the pretenders unto Reformation in Queen Elizabeths time did very much except against affirming That to use the words of our Redeemer and not to give the gifts withal was nothing but a meer mockery of the Spirit of God and a ridiculous imitation of our Saviours actions But unto this it is replied by Judicious Hooker that not onely the ability of doing miracles speaking with tongues curing diseases and the like but the authority and power of ministering holy things in the Church of God is contained in the number of those gifts whereof the Holy Ghost is the Author And therefore he which gives this power may say without folly or absurdity Receive the Holy Ghost meaning thereby such power as the Spirit of Christ hath pleased to endue his Church withal And herein he is seconded by that living Magazin of Learning Bishop Andrews who reckoneth the Apostleship or the very office to be a Grace one of the graces doubtless of the Holy Ghost such as St. Paul calleth 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The grace we English it the gift of ministring unto the Saints 2 Cor. 8.4 For that the very Office it self is a grace St. Paul saith he avoweth in more places than one and in particular Mihi data est haec gratia according to the gift of the grace of God which is given unto me Ephes. 3.7 Where he speaks of his Office and of nothing else And such as this saith he was the grace here given of Spiritum called a Spiritual and of Sanctum an holy Calling from them derived unto us by us to be derived on others to the end of the World and that in the same form of words which our Saviour used For being the especial power which Christ at that time gave unto his Apostles consisted in remitting and retaining of sins and seeing that the same power is given by the Church of Christ why should not the same words be used as were used at first why may not the same words be used in conferring this grace of an holy calling whereby their persons are made publick and their acts authentical and they inabled to do somewhat about remitting of sins which is not of the like avail if done by others though perhaps more learned than they and more vertuous too but have not the like warrant nor the same accipite as is conferred in holy Orders Nor do I utterly deny but that together with the power the Holy Ghost doth give some fitness to perform the same though not in any answerable measure to the first times of the Church when extraordinary gifts were more necessary than in any time since For as the ointment which was poured upon Aarons head did first fall down upon his Beard and after on the skirts of his garments also So we may reasonably believe That the holy Spirit which descended on the head of Christ and afterwards on his Apostles as upon his beard hath kept some sprinklings also to bestow on us which are the lowest skirts of his sacred garments So far we may assuredly perswade our selves That the Spirit which calleth men to that holy Function doth go along with him that is called unto it for his assistance and support in whatsoever he shall faithfully do in discharge thereof and that our acts are so far his as that Whether we Preach Pray Baptize Communicate Condemn or give Absolution or in a word whatsoever we do as the Despensers of Gods Mysteries our Words Acts Judgements are not ours but the Holy Ghosts For this I have the testimony of Pope Leo the first a Learned and Religious Prelate of the Primitive times Qui mihi oneris est Autor ipse administrationis est adjutor Ne magnitudine gratiae there gratiae is used for the office or calling as before St. Paul succumbat infirmus dabit virtutem qui contulit dignitatem Which is in brief He that hath laid the burden on us will give strength to bear it But behold a greater than Pope Leo is here Behold saith Christ to his Apostles I am with you always to the end of the world that is to say Cum vobis successoribus vestris as Denys the Carthusian rightly with you and your Successors in the Work of the Ministry to guide them and assist them by his holy Spirit And when he said unto them upon other occasions He that heareth you heareth me and whatsoever ye binde on Earth should be bound in Heaven Did he not thereby promise so to own their actions that whatsoever they should say or do in order to the propagation of his Gospel and the edification of his Church should be esteemed as his act his act by whose authority and power it is said or done But the assisting of the Church and Ministers thereof with his Power and Spirit is not the onely publick benefit though it be the greatest which it receiveth immediately from the Holy Ghost Without some certain standing Rule by which the Ministers of the Gospel were to frame their doctrine and the rest of the people guide their paths in the way of godliness both Priest and People would be apt to pretend new Lights and following such ignes fatui as they saw before them be drawn into destruction both of body and soul. And on the other side Tradition hath been always found to be so untrusty in the conveyance of Gods will and pleasure to the ears of his people that in small tract of time the Law of God became obliterated in the hearts of men the righteous Seed degenerating after carnal lusts and Abraham himself serving other gods for want of a more certain rule to direct their actions Therefore to take away all excuse from back-sliding men it pleased God first to commit his Law to writing the Two Tables onely and afterwards to inspire many holy Men with the Spirit of Wisdom Power and Knowledge to serve as Commentators on that sacred Text whose Prophecies Reproofs and Admonitions being put into their mouths by the Holy Ghost for Prophecy came not in old time by the will of man but holy Men of God spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost as St. Peter hath it So by direction of the same Spirit were they put into writing Propter vivendi exemplum libros ad nostram etiam memoriam transmiserunt in the words of Ierom The Lord himself did on Mount Sinai give the Law the very Letter The Prophets and other holy Men of God being 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 especially inspired to that end and purpose did compose the Comment By the same Spirit were the Evangelists and Apostles guided when they committed unto writing the most glorious Gospel and other the Records and Monuments of the Christian Faith The

we shall come to speak of the Communion of Saints yet I shall ask this question first and then dismiss the cause to another day My question is if we must call upon the Saints as our Mediatours but Mediators only of Intercession whether they do commend our requests to God immediately by themselves or by the mediation of Christ our Saviour If they reply immediately and by themselves as certainly their doctrine doth import no less what then shall we return in answer to our Saviour words No man comes unto the Father but by me No nor the Saints departed neither if St. Ambrose erre not Eo nisi intercedente nec nobis nec Sanctis omnibus quicquam est cum Deo Nor we nor any of the Saints saith that Reverend Prelate have access to God but only by the intercession of our Saviour Christ. But if they say they do it by the mediation of our Saviour as needs they must and indeed some of them do of late we do but put our selves to a needless trouble in making our address to them which cannot help us nor aid us in our prayers to Almighty God without first going unto Christ for his furtherance in it Especially considering that our blessed Saviour to whom the Saints themselves must become Petitioners hath called us nay commanded us to come to him as often as we are heavy laden with sin or misery upon his gracious promise to relieve us in it Certainly did these men remember the good old rule Frustra fieri per plura quod fieri potest per pauciora they would not make more Mediators then their case requires nor set up such a number of superfluous Priests to become Intercessors for us in the Court of Heaven instead of that one High Priest whom God hath ordained one so compassionate to us in our distresses and every way so sensible of our infirmities For though there be many other qualifications necessary to the constituting of this great High Priest our Saviour Christ for ever blessed as namely to be holy blameless undefiled separate from sinners and higher then the highest Heavens yet none doth speak such comfort to the souls of men as that he had been compassed with infirmities and therefore like to have compassion on the ignorant and on them that are out of the way And such is our High Priest our most blessed Saviour who in the dayes of his flesh had been so afflicted exposed unto the scorn of men and the Temptations of Satan that he was fain to make his prayers and supplication to his heavenly Father and that too with strong cries and tears to be delivered from the dangers which did seem to threaten him His bloudy conflict in the Garden and that of Eli Eli Lamasabachtbani when upon the Cross are proof sufficient that he had need of Consolation And they are proof sufficient for this purpose too that being he suffered and was tempted he is able yea and willing too to succour them that are tempted as the Apostle doth infer concerning him For seeing that such an especial part of the Priestly Office is to make intercession for us in all our distresses it seemed expedient to the wisdome of God that he should finde just occasion in his own person to offer up prayers and supplications with strong cries for himself Non ignara mali miseris succurrere disco said the gallant Lady in the Poet. It was a plausible answer which Matthias Corvinus King of Hungary gave a great undertaker in School Divinity upon a pretty question which himself proposed The question was What reason might induce our Saviour to make S. Peter Head of the Church who had thrice denyed him rather then St. John the dear Disciple whom he loved a Virgin and one never tainted with any crime To which when the great Clerk could make no reply but rambled up and down in Gods secret Councels the King thus solved the Probleme for him Si virgo Johannes in fide firmus Pontifex fuisset c. The words are many in the Author but the sum is this That if our Saviour had made St. Iohn to be the Head of the Church he would have looked that all men should have been as perfect and sincere as himself and so have proved more rigorous and severe in correcting sinners then the infancy of the Church could bear whereas St. Peter being conscious of his own infirmities would sympathize the better with them and proceed more in his government towards them with the spirit of meekness Assuredly did I believe that Peter was made Head of the Church I could not have conceived a more plausible reason which might induce our Saviour unto that Election But howsoever I shall make this use of the story that God dealt most exceeding mercifully with the sons of men in providing such an High Priest for them as had in all things been tempted like unto themselves sin only excepted having made himself an offering for sin knew better then any of the Saints or Angels could how to apply the benefit of it to our wants and weaknesses And that indeed is the main business of the Priesthood For every High Priest is ordained for men in things pertaining unto God to offer gifts and sacrifices for sins as St. Paul defines him Which gifts and sacrifices as they were only types of that gift and sacrifice which Christ made of himself for the sins of the world so that oblation being made there was no longer use of the Legal sacrifice nor consequently of the Aaronical Priesthood By this one offering of himselfe hath ●e made perfect for ever all them that were sanctified and thereby out a signal remarkable difference between that one Sacrifice of himself and the sacrifices formerly required by the Law of Moses For in the time of the Law the Priesthood daily ministring and oftentimes offering the same things which yet considered in themselves and without reference to his own Sacrifice in Gods secret purpose could not take away sin But CHRIST by this one offering of himself for sin did not only take away the sins of many even of all those which faithfully believe in him and sanctifie them in his bloud by that one offering of his body once for all but having so done what he undertook and knowing that there remained no other sacrifice to be performed he sate him down at the right hand of God expecting there untill his enemies be made his footstool No further sacrifice to be offered then that already offered upon the Cross for what could follow after Consummatum est when all which was foreshadowed in the Legal Sacrifices was in that accomplished And as for that upon the Cross how it alluded to the Sacrifices of the Old Testament in what particulars the shadow and the substance held the best resemblance and of the benefit thereof unto all mankinde we have already spoke in the

Spirit beateth let us next take it by the hand or rather by his handy works For some there be who do confess Christ with their mouths but yet deny him in their works The Spirit of God is very active and wheresoever it is it will soon be working if it do not work it is no Spirit For usque adeo proprium est spiritui operari ut nisi operetur non sit as the Father hath it So natural it is for the Spirit to bring forth good works that if it do not so then it is no Spirit These Works St. Paul calls plainly The fruits of the Spirit Love joy peace gentleness goodness and the rest that follow Which as they are planted in the Soul may be called the Graces but as they are manifested in our actions the Fruits of the Spirit to shew us that it is a dead spirit which brings forth no fruits even as it is a dead faith in St. Iames his judgement which brings forth no works In a word as it was in the generation of our Saviour Christ so it is also in the regeneration of a Christian man both wrought by the effectual operation of the Holy Ghost But these being chiefly matters practical are beyond my purpose Proceed we then to such as are more Doctrinal which is the proper subject of my undertaking from this acception of the word in which the Holy Ghost is taken for those gifts and graces which out of his great bounty he bestoweth upon us to that wherein it signifieth The Power and Calling which in the Church is given to some certain men to be Ministers of holy things to the rest of the people That in this sense the word is taken we have shewn before and are now come to shew how it is performed by what authority and what gifts discharged and executed The office of teaching in the Church doth properly belong to Christ the Prophet of the New Testament of whom Moses prophecied Deut. 13.15 As both St. Peter and St. Stephen do affirm expresly A Prophet whom all the people were to hear in every thing which he was pleased to say unto them and that commanded under such a terrible commination that every Soul which would not hear the voice of that Prophet was to be destroyed from amongst the people Yet though it were an office proper to our Lord and Saviour so proper that he seemed to affect it more than either the Priesthood or the Kingdom He entred not upon the same until he had received some visible designation from the Holy Ghost That he took not on him to discharge his Prophetical Function till after he was baptized by Iohn in Iordan is evident by course and order of the Evangelical story Not that his Baptism could confer any power upon him or give him an authority which before he had not for without doubt the lesser is blessed of the greater as St. Paul affirmeth and Iohn confessed himself so much less than Christ as that he was not worthy to untie his shooe but that as man he did receive this power from the Holy Ghost descending on him at that time in a bodily shape and withal giving him that Sacred Vnction whereby he was inaugurated to so high an office And to this Unction of the Spirit doth he himself refer the power he had to Preach the Gospel and to discharge all other parts of that weighty Function and that too in the very first Sermon which he ever preached to give the people notice that he preached not without lawful calling or exercised a power which belonged not to him For entering into the Synagogue of Nazareth on the Sabbath day he took the Book and fell upon that place of the Prophet Isaiah where it is said The Spirit of the Lord is upon me because he hath anointed me to preach the Gospel to the poor he hath sent me to heal the broken-hearted to preach deliverance to the captives and recovering sight unto the blinde to set at liberty them that are bruised and to preach the acceptable yeer of the Lord Which having read he closed the Book and said unto them This day is this Scripture fulfilled in your ears That he did preach by vertue of some unction from the holy Spirit is evident by his own Application of the Text by which he gave his Auditors to understand That he did not undertake the office of his own head onely but by the motion and impulsion of the Holy Ghost by whom he was abundantly furnished with all requisite gifts which might prepare him thereunto Non meo proprio privatoque sed divino spiritu missus sum eo actus eo impulsus eo plenus ad praedicandum Evangelium venio as the learned Iesuite glosseth on it But if you ask where or at what time he received this unction we must send you for an Answer to St. Ieroms Commentary on those words of the Prophet where we shall finde Expletum esse hanc unctionem illo tempore quando baptizatus est in Jordane Spiritus sanctus in specie Columbae descendit super eum maenfit in illo That is to say This unction or anointing was performed or fulfilled at that time when he was baptized by Iohn in Iordan and the Holy Ghost descended on him in the shape of a Dove and remained with him Nor doth St. Ierom stand alone in this Exposition Irenaeus Athanasius ●uffinus Augustine and Prosper all of them Antient Writers and of great renown concurring with him in the same And to this unction or anointing at the time of his Baptism St. Peter questionless alludeth where preaching to Cornelius and his Family he lets them know how God anointed IESUS of Nazareth with the Holy Ghost and with power who from that time forwards not before went about doing good and healing all that were oppressed of the devil In which place by the anointing with the Holy Ghost I understand the furnishing of the Man CHRIST JESUS Iuxta dispensationem carnis assumptae as St. Ierom hath it with those gifts and graces of the Spirit which were requisite and fit to qualifie him for the undertaking By power the Calling and Authority which that Unction gave him to preach the Gospel and do the rest of those good works which properly did pertain to his Ministration But that both gifts and power were conferred upon him by the descension of the Spirit at the time of his Baptism to which St. Peter doth allude I have Maldonate concurring in opinion with me saying Loquitur Petrus de Baptismo Johannis quem Christus susceperat postquam à Spiritu sancto unctum fuisse significat This Office as our Saviour was pleased to execute in his own Person as long as he sojourned with us here upon the Earth so being to withdraw himself from the sight of man he thought it requisit to make choice of some to be about him who might

as to brook no Superior fitted the Government of those Congregations which they called the Churches according unto that equality and want of order which they had been accustomed to in Civil matters For in their Platform every Congregation whether little or great is absolute in it self and independent of any other having in it self a supream Authority of exercising Ecclesiastical Powers and Spiritual Faculties without any reference or appeal in point of grievance And in the exercising of those powers and faculties every Member of the Congregation whether poor or rich as they are all concerned are all equally interessed And for the Ministration of the Word and other Ordinances for I think they do not call them Sacraments though many times they do set a part some particular persons yet do they not exclude any man of what rank soever from exercising of his gift as the Spirit moves him In this quite contrary to the Fathers of the Presbytery who though they do so dearly affect a parity amongst the Ministers themselves yet do they suffer none to perform that Office but such as have an outward calling by giving them the hands of fellowship Which Ceremony they conceive savors more of parity than that of the imposition of hands used in Ordinations And though each Presbyter and Presbytery too stand in equal rank and equipage with one another yet in relation to their Meetings or Bodies aggregate they do allow of sub and supra the Presbytery being subordinate unto the Classis as the Classis is to the Provincial and that to the General Assembly from which lieth no appeal in what case soever But so it is not with the Brethren of the Independency every particular Member of their Congregations being permitted to Preach and expound the Scripture according to the measure of the gift which is given unto him So that if Ierome were alive he might most justly make complaint of that foul disorder which some began to practise in those early days but was never so much in request as amongst this people Whereas saith he all other Arts and Mysteries have their peculiar Artists and distinct Professors Sola Scripturarum ars est quam omnes passim sibi vendicant onely the Art of Preaching and Expounding Scripture is usurped by all men For this saith he each weak old man and ta●ling gossip for we have Women Preachers too in these Congregations and each wrangling Sophister every man in a word doth intrench upon and take upon them to teach others what they did never learn themselves Some with a supercilious look speak big and dogmatize of holy Matters amongst silly women others learn that of women it is a shame to say it which afterwards they teach to men and some again with great variety of words and sufficient impudence do talk to others of those things which they understand not themselves A man would think St. Ierome were inspired with the Spirit of Prophecy and that he spake not of the frenzies of the former times but the distempers of the present And yet perhaps we have a better character of them especially as it relates to their way of Government in the old Acephali the Hereticks which had no head as their name doth signifie Of whom Nicephorus thus informeth us Acephali ob cam causam dicti sunt quod sub Episcopis non fuerint c The Acephali were so called saith he because they were not under Bishops and therefore neither did they minister Baptism according to the solemn and received Order of the Church nor celebrate the Sacrament of the Lords Supper or any other Divine Office in the usual manner And because every man had liberty to adde unto the holy Faith what new points he pleased a very great number of Hereticks and Apostates did ensue upon it with whom the Church for a long time was perplexed and exercised Besides that great seditions and disorders did from hence arise the rascal rabble of that Sect pressing unto the Rails of the Altar threatning to fine the Priests and cast them out of their Churches with reproach and infamy if they presumed to mention the Authority of the General Council that of Chalcedon it is he means or to recite the names of those holy Fathers who were present at it So far and to this purpose he in which we may discern a great deal of the humor as well as we have found the name of our new Acephali But to proceed The Government of the Church not being Monarchical as our Masters in the Church of Rome would have it nor Democratical or Popular as the Fathers of the Presbytery and Brethren of the Independency have given it out both in their Practise and their Platforms it remains then that it must be Aristocratical And this indeed hath been the judgement of most pure Antiquity and verified in the practise of the happiest times For howsoever those of Rome do perswade themselves that Christ invested Peter with a Sovereign power over the rest of the Apostles yet generally the Fathers of the Primitive times have determined otherwise For so saith Origen Haec velut ad Petrum dicta sunt omnium communia Those things which seem spoken to St. Peter onely are common unto all the rest Thus Cyprian Hoc erant utique coeteri Apostoli quod fuit Petrus pari consorti praediti potestatis honoris The rest of the Apostles were as much privileged as Peter and were all invested with a like proportion both of power and honor Thus Ierome also for the Latines the two great Writers of the African and Alexandrian Churches you have heard before Super Petrum fundatur Ecclesia c The Church is founded upon Peter but this is said in another place of the other Apostles all of which had the Keys of Heaven Et ex aequo super eos ecclesiae fortitudo solidatur and the foundation of the Church is setled equally on them all And thus St. Chrysostom for the Greeks Paul saith he had no need of Peter or stood in want of his voice or countenance Honore enim illi par erat ne quid dicam amplius but was his equal at the least that I say no more The like equality was maintained in the following times amongst the Bishops or chief Rulers in the Church of Christ. For being Successors unto the Apostles in the Publick Government though not in their extraordinary power as they were Apostles whereof we shall speak more anone they had no reason to pretend superiority over one another which none of the Apostles could lay claim unto Of this equality of the Bishops doth St. Ierom speak and it is indeed an evidence beyond all exception Vbicunque fuerit Episcopus sive Eugubii sive Constantinopli sive Alexandriae sive Tanai ejusdem meriti ejusdem est Sacerdoti● Potentia divitiarum paupertatis humilitas vel sublimiorem vel inferiorem Episcopum non facit Coeterum omnes Apostolorum