Selected quad for the lemma: spirit_n
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A39077
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An exposition on that most excellent prayer in the liturgy of the Church of England called the litany Wherein all or most ot the exceptions that have been made against it, are fully answered.
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1698
(1698)
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Wing E3888DA; ESTC R220212
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16,626
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45
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AN EXPOSITION ON THAT Most Excellent Prayer IN THE LITURGY OF THE Church of ENGLAND CALLED The LITANY Wherein All or Most of the Exceptions that have been made against It are fully answered London Printed for Brabazon Aylmer at the Three Pigeons against the Royal Exchange in Cornhil 1698. AN EXPOSITION ON THE LITANY LITANY is a Word of a Greek Original which signifies Supplication or Prayer so that The Litany is as much as The Supplication or The Prayer deservedly so called by way of Eminency as the Best of Humane Composition It begins with a most Solemn and Devout Address made to the Three several Persons in the Holy Trinity distinctly and then to them All conjoyntly as three Hypostases of One and the same God One and the same Fountain of all Goodness and Mercy whence Miserable Sinners must hope to obtain Forgiveness But to wave that as being Forreign to my present Design to discourse of that most glorious and incomprehensible Mystery and consider the Subject Matter of the Prayer it self which is so Comprehensive as to leave out very little and so Pithy and Expressive as to have little redundant or superfluous The Matter is double Deprecation of Evil and Petition for Good both urged with most potent and proper Arguments as we shall see 1. Deprecation of Evil whether incumbent or imminent or probable to betide us And that is either of Sin or Suffering 1. The Evil of Sin and that is also Two-fold past or future First Sin past whether committed by our selves or by those that went before us the Guilt whereof may not be expiated or deprecated sufficiently till the third and fourth Generation according to the Second Commandment and that is done in these words Remember not Lord our Offences nor the Offences of our Fore-fathers neither take thou Vengeance of our Sins Spare us good Lord spare thy People and be not angry with us for ever And this Supplication is grounded upon this strong Argument that we are redeemed by the most pretious Blood of the Son of God And so we do in effect say Let the Blood of our Lord Christ speak better things for us than the Blood of Abel let not our Sins nor the Sins of our Progenitors cry louder to Heaven for Vengeance than the Sufferings of the Son of God for Forgiveness Redeemed by his most pretious Blood so pretious that it is the Cause for which God is not angry with us for ever and for which we may hope he will not keep his Anger any longer he will not Remember our Offences nor the Offences of our Fore-fathers This Supplication is not only agreeable to but in a manner taken out of the Holy Scripture O remember not against us former Iniquities Psa or as in the Margent the Iniquities of them that were before us Be not Wroth very sore O Lord Isa neither remember Iniquity for ever Behold see we beseech thee we are all thy People And here upon this occasion I shall take leave once for all to tell the Reader that those Men do not argue with Understanding that say our Liturgy is a Translation of the Popish Mass-book for neither is that true as to the Whole nor the Argument cogent as to the Parts 1. It is not true as to the Whole for many things are added as this Supplication and others to be mentioned afterwards and more omitted as to give one notorious Instance After the Invocations of the three several Persons and then the whole Trinity they intersert I know not how many Ora pro Nobis's or Invocations of Saints and Angels as thus Holy Mary Holy Mother of God Holy Virgin of Virgins Holy Michael Holy Gabriel Holy Raphael pray for us All ye Holy Angels and Arch-angels of God All ye holy Orders of blessed Spirits All ye holy Patriarchs and Prophets pray for us All ye holy Apostles and Evangelists All ye holy Disciples of our Lord and Innocents All ye holy Martyrs Holy Confessors Holy Monks and Eremites Holy Virgins pray ye for us These are general but besides the Apostles and Evangelists are all particularly invok'd and other He and She-Saints together with several of their Companions whereof S. Vrsula had no less than eleven thousand 1 Cor. 14. Chap. 15 c. Surely They prayed neither with the Spirit nor with Vnderstanding that by such Invocations derogated from our Lord's Intercession and attributed Omniscience and Omnipresence incommunicable Attributes of God to so many Saints whereof several were far from being Holy and some so far as never to have had a Being but in their Legends and Bead-Rolls God be thanked that gave our first Reformers so much Vnderstanding and so much of his Spirit wherewith as with a Refiner's Fire they severed the Gold from the Dross and gave unto God the things that were God's 2. Secondly For those things that are translated out of the Mass-book they are none of them Popish nor ever the more so for being used by them that own'd the Pope's Authority 'T is a Popish Argument to say Where was your Litany or Liturgy before that Translation It is just like that of the Papists Where was your Religion before Luther The same Answer will therefore serve both Our Religion and Liturgy were before Luther but much corrupted and polluted and disguised at and before his time but a thousand or twelve hundred Years before that they were what they are now restored to Pure and Genuine without Mask or Paint without Idolatry or Superstition It is as much as if one should ask a Noble-man whose Ancestors for several Generations had been so great Spend thrifts as to bring a vast Patrimony to a small Annuity and left him to seek his Fortune and he through his own Vertue and Prince's Favour should be restor'd to the Place and Honour due to his Ancientry If an Upstart Malepert Gentleman should ask him Where was his Nobility before such a late King He would answer My Nobility was before the Conquerour c. Before Luther before that Translation they ask We answer before Constantine before Pope Eleutherius in the Councils and Writings of the Fathers for the first five hundred Years in the Scriptures of the Old and New Testament what we have in our Liturgy Articles and Homilies was fetch'd from thence and to them we make our Appeals Having interposed thus much I now go on our Church teacheth us to deprecate 2. Sin future as the great Evil and Mischief together with the Causes and Effects thereof First the Causes the Crasts and Assaults of the Devil for the Devil is both a sly Serpent and a roaring Lyon where Force will not do there he useth Fraud and when his Fraud is detected he flies to main Force but he is dangerous both ways and therefore to be fear'd shunn'd and deprecated Secondly the Effects the first and immediate Effect is the Wrath of God the last and utmost is everlasting Damnation And surely we ought ever to fear
that that is Everlasting and never think our selves too secure from the Danger of it nor past Praying against it the greatest Degree of Assurance attainable in this World can rise no higher than that of the Apostle 1 Cor. 10.12 c. Let him that standeth take heed lest he fall But here I would fain know with what Spirit or with what Sense they Pray this Prayer From the Assaults of the Devil thy Wrath and everlasting Damnation Good Lord deliver us that can so often and so boldly say the Devil take and God damn either themselves or others I say with what Spirit or Sense do they Pray that contradict themselves so desperately and make the Throne of Grace a Refuge of Lies When the Disciples would have fetch'd Fire from Heaven our Lord tells them Ye know not what manner of Spirit ye are of of what manner of Spirit think ye then are they that would fetch Fire from Hell and say Flectere sinequeo Superos Acheront a movebo call both God and the Devil to be Executioners of their Wrath The next Supplication is to be delivered from those Spiritual Wickednesses those Filthinesses of the Spirit which have less of Infamy but more of Malice belonging to them viz. From all Blindness of Heart from Pride Vain-glory and Hypocrisie from Envy Hatred and Malice and all Vncharitableness Wherein we pray God to deliver us from not meerly the outward Assaults but the inward Possession of the Devil For these are the very things that constitute the Essence of a Devil and the main things that he endeavours to plant and propagate in us as being his very Likeness and Image We pray not against Blindness of Eyes Lib. 4. c. 25. but of Heart Socrates tells us what Antonius the Monk said to that great Scholar and Writer I will not say but Dictator of Writings Didymus that was blind Let not the loss of your bodily Eyes trouble you for you are deprived of such Eyes as the Flies and Gnats can see with but rejoyce that you have those Eyes wherewith the Angels see and by which God himself is discerned and his Light comprehended So I may say on the other hand Pray not so much against the loss of bodily Sight which is common to us with Worms and Flies but against Blindness of Heart which will make us see no more than the Devil and with which the Devil labours to lead us Captive So the Apostle tells us the God of this World hath blinded the Minds of them that believe not 2 Cor. 4.4 c. lest the Light of the glorious Gospel of Christ who is the Image of God should shine unto them and from such Blindness Good Lord deliver us The Second thing here pray'd against is Pride another Ingredient of the Devilish Nature Not a Novice 1 Tim. 3.6 c. lest being lifted up with Pride he sall into the Condemnation of the Devil The next is Vain-glory a branch or outward token of Pride and a-kin to it is Hypocrisie for they both pretend to something more than they are owners of As the Devil told our Saviour when from an exceeding high Mountain he shewed him all the Kingdoms of the World and the Glory of them Matt. 4.8 9. All these things will I give thee if thou wilt fall down and worship me When vain-glorious Dissembler as he was he had not one foot of Land to give and certainly whoever belie and ostentate themselves in pretence of being what they are not are of their Father the Devil according to what is said in the Revelation Chap. 2.9 Chap. 3.9 I know the Blasphemy of them which say they are Jews and are not but are the Synagogue of Satan Next follows From Envy Hatred and Malice and all Vncharitableness for these are three and there are other branches of that bitter Root which are all constituent of a Devil and make the Fiend so black as he is Let not the Sun go down upon your Wrath neither give place to the Devil When Wrath rests and settles into Malice then the Devil takes place in the Heart and the Spirit of God is grieved as you may see in the Epistle to the Ephesians the fourth Chapter 26 27 30 31 Verses compared together and these are all contrary to the Fruits of the Spirit mentioned in the Galatians for they are Love Joy Peace Long suffering Gentleness Goodness Meekness Temperance I have been thus particular in this Branch of the Litany because I have long observed these two things First That Men in their Prayers have commonly pass'd by these Sins when they have long insisted upon the Confession and Exaggeration of other less Malign Secondly That Men in common Conversation seldom express their dislike against them as against others that are more Scandalous because more obvious to the Eyes of the World which whether it proceed from a secret Indulging of those Sins or a gross Mistake in thinking them more Pardonable than others or because it is more easie or usual to gild and varnish over those Spiritual Lusts with specious Names and Titles of Virtue as to call Pride Magnanimity Revenge Sense of Honour Envy Emulation and the like I will not inquire And upon this Score I the more value our Litany and shall only observe this farther as to this Branch of it that the Primer of Salisbury hath not Pride Hypocrisie Envy mentioned in it The next Branch hath respect to the Lusts of the Flesh From Fornication and all other deadly Sin that is from all deliberate willful presumptuous Sin for it is Willfulness Presumption Deliberation that makes Sin Deadly or Unpardonable without special Repentance whereas Sins of Surprise and Incogitancy which Tertullian calls Quotidianae incursionis and are so frequent that we can scarce know when we commit them for those God is pleased to accept of a more general Repentance Wherefore it is a groundless Jealousie that makes this Objection against this Prayer that it favours the Popish Distinction between Venial and Mortal Sins And let me tell the Reader farther from all other deadly Sin is not in the foresaid Primer and upon search it will be found that Fornication is a very Venial Sin with them that coined this Distinction and in a Priest more pardonable than honest and honourable Wedlock 2. Then we come to deprecate the Evils of Suffering or Punishment which are of two sorts such as concern our selves and such as touch the Publick First Such as may do us a Mischief in particular instancing in those that endanger our Lives as 1. Lightning and Tempest from which there is no flying nor hiding no arming nor fencing that which doth often set Houses and Barns on Fire and sometimes destroys Men in a Moment 2. The Plague of Pestilence from which we have great reason to beg Deliverance if we call to mind how that Becsom swept away near an hundred thousand in our Capital City in one Summer 1665. and