Selected quad for the lemma: spirit_n
Text snippets containing the quad
|
ID |
Title |
Author |
Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication) |
STC |
Words |
Pages |
|
A62519
|
A defence of humane learning in the ministry, or, A treatise proving that it is necessary a minister (or preacher) should be skill'd in humane learning by H. Th., St. Ch. Ch.
|
Thurman, Henry, d. 1670.
|
1660
(1660)
|
Wing T1139; ESTC R22554
|
31,340
|
79
|
the wayne sometimes in the full and sometimes in the Eclipse Bâ—t that I may not seem to build a portall too big for my house I come to the assertion the which I have taken upon me to defend viz. That it is necessary a Minister or Preacher should be skild in humane Learning This Thesis I shall prove by these ensuing Arguments 1. From the power of the tongue that 1. As 't is a naturall gift common to all 2. As 't is a speciall gift proper to the Priest or Minister 2. In that it is necessary that the Preacher should exceed the people iin knowledge since he takes upon him by his preaching to instruct them 3. Because learning is especially necessary for the understanding of the Scripture And under this head I shall speak concerning the Preachers knowing the Tongues the liberall Arts and Sciences under which is comprehended Philosophy then History and somewhat concerning Classicall Authors not forgetting the main thing of all the Civill Law 4. From the example of 1. Moses Daniel and Solomon in the old Testament 2. Paul Stephen Apollos Nathaniel Nicodemus in the New Testament 3. The Fathers that were the Pillars of the Church and instructed in humane literature 5. Because learning in a Preacher is necessary in a politique sence And to contemne it brings in disorder both to the Church and Common Wealth 6. From the Vse and End of learning 7. And lastly to take in all by answering all objections to the Contrary 1. As to the First Argument drawn from the power of the Tongue and that 1. As 't is a naturall gift common to all with a Preacher Of what power and prevalency a learned and well managed Tongue is of ancient writings witness sufficiently and dayly experience teaches us 'T is like the Achates which stone no painter can paint for the variety of its colours It peirces into mens breasts winding and turning and putting them into any posture captivating the Auditors as it pleases Serpent-like it can cunningly insinuate and enter at the smallest hole when it pleases can presently put its self into a posture of warre and falles upon the enemy with a lyon like violence It sights it makes peace it can highly commend and as bitingly disgrace â—t laughs it cryes it has the dominion over all and is the sole Paramont and Emperour of the Vniverse â—ut I may be silent since St. James does largly describe its qualities in his Epistle c. 2. â—nd as to my purpose more in hand I shall speak of it more particularly 2. As it is a spirituall gift proper to the Preisthood and the Organ or Instrument of the holy Ghost For as we know the gift of a Tongue is common to all sorts of men together almost withall sorts of Creatues and is used to deliver sounds if not speach but speach amongst those that are rationall And yet they that can naturally say Lord and Jesus cannot say that Jesus is the Lord but by the Holy Ghost as St. Paul speaks to the Corinthians 1. Cor. c. 12. v. 3. i.e. cannot speak honourably and reverently and preach his majesty and benefits but by a farther gift of the spirit which takes not away learning but lets it be with it as its servant and subordinate And seeing Moses could speak readily enough in civill matters and say to the Hebrew wherefore smitest thou thy fellow Exod. 2.13 Yet when he was sent on Gods special message to Pharoah saith O Lord I am not eloquent but heavy of mouth and of a slow tongue Exod. 4.10 And seing Isaith â—hen he should be sent to preach could say He was a man of unclean lips and he durst not use them till the Seraphin had toucht his mouth with a Coal from the Altar And seing Jeremy though God told him that he had ordained him a Prophet to the nations says Ah Lord God behold I cannot speak for I am a Child And seing David when he would sing praises cryes Lord open thou my lips when he himself before had opened them to wantonness and murder Finally seing St. Paul before his conversion could breath out threatnings and slaughter against the disciples of the Lord but being sent to preach desires the Saints to pray for him that a doore of utterance might be given him that he might open his mouth boldly to publish the secrets of the Gospell All these considered It is manifest that it is one thing to speak and another to preach one thing to have a tongue by nature and another thing to have the gift of a tongue by the Holy Ghost And that is a speciall honour and priviledge granted to the Calling of the Ministry And here a little I must stand to obviate the pretences of the Enthusiasts who would have us beleeve that they have like those fore mentioned such a tongue from the Holy Ghost and what they speak is from the spirit within them â—o these I answere 1. That those single men of old that delivered Gods word were 1. publickly designed Prophets 2. Approved of by the high preist and Sanhedrim and 3 indued with a publick spirit and its doctrines were always agreeable to the other Scriptures But how farre they are different from these All men in their right senses can easily discerne But 2ly To expostulate the case with these men â—ither their spirit by which they say they preach is a private one or a publick one If private then 't is to themselves only and usefull to none else And how often have we read how mens malancholy tempers have deluded them and made them fancy such Chimeras But again If publick Then it must enter in at the doore of the ministry and divine Ordinances of Gods grace and mans Endeavours I repeat it again mans Endeavours which will take in also our Endeavours after knowledge and learning and it must be subject to the Prophets and their censures of it Else it must justifie its extraordinariness by miraculous effects the which none of us yet ever saw And such a spirit they must confesse they have not I think we never read of any Doctors that have been instrumentall in preaching the word since the Apostles but what had the ground-work of humane learning laid in them And no doubt God most extraordinarily giving the Apostles the gift of Tongues by the holy Ghost did infuse all those habits of Science which we are now put upon to acquire though they were not taught as we are to make a Syllogisme perhaps in Barbara or told there were ten Praedicaments I confesse our Philosophy Arts and all humane Sciences without Gods spirit are but some glimmerings but like the Starres that shine in the night they keep our reason from being quite in the darke True when Gods spirit is superadded like the Sun arising it out shines all those smaller lights but they are not put-out but remaine still as usefull Now of this gift of a learned tongue nothing is spoken but favours and blessings
Acts 6.9 10. where it is said There arose certain of the Synagogue which is called the Synagogue of the Libertines and Cyrenians and Alexandrians and of them of Cilicia and of Asia disputing with Stephen And they were not able to resist the wisdom and spirit by which he spake Moreover we finde it Acts 19.9 That Paul for two years together did 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the School of one Tyrannus a Philosopher And which is most remarkable he wrote almost the greatest part of the New Testament and brought off more Souls from Idolatry to serve Christ then any else I know not where I may not rightly say because he was the most learned of all our Saviours followers knowing best how friendly and prudently to suit himself to the manners of all Nations By the shield of Faith he routed the Minerva of the Graecians and opposed every Nation with their own Weapons whil'st he armed as I may say the knowledge of those things they best knew against them Hereupon he confounded the Jews in their Genealogies shamed the Epicureans humbled the proud and self-conceited Stoicks and brought the barbarous Heathens to a Christian meekness So great an affinity there is we see between the Gospel and Learning the Church and University the Divine and the Peripatetick Now although Christ for the most part chose to himself Disciples that were unlearned lest the flesh might glory and be proud in Learning Whereas God by the inspiration of his All-powerful Spirit can make the mouthes of Babe and Sucklings to be instrumental to his glory yet the Apostles and others had all kinde of humane Learning as well as the knowledge of Heavenly Mysteries not indeed acquired from Schools and Universities but infused into them by the Holy Ghost But withal he admitted those two learned persons Nathanael and Nicodemus into the number of his Disciples lest he might seem to impose upon the simpler sort as having to do with none but whom their simplicity might betray and 't were no difficult thing to deceive 3. The Fathers We read of Nazianzene and Basil to have been well instructed in all the learning of the Gentiles and that they were publick Professors of it in their Schools and Universities and that they blest themselves for having studied humane Learning Austin being eminent in all Studies having told us That Eloquence was taken out of prophane Writers Well says he Aspicimus quanto auro argento veste suffarcinatus exierit ex Aegypto Cyprianus Doctor Suavissimus Martyr beatissimus quanto Lactantius quanto Victorinus Optatus Hilarius ut de vivis taceam quanto innumerabiles Graeci He is withal noted by his Successors to have used all kinde of Learning in his Books de Civitate Dei and other his Works So Jerome also uses the Poets as well as Authorities out of Galen and Hippocrates And what is there in the Encyclopedy that whole Circle of Arts Grammar I ogick Rhetorick Philosophy and Mathematicks which is not by name commended unto us by some of the Fathers And by the ancient Canons of the Church all which Bucer thought necessary to be restored and whose opinion if we should take up we might defend well enough the study of Physick and of the Law was thought convenient for him that professed himself a Divine 5. Because Learning in a Preacher is necessary in a politick sense And to contemn it brings in dis-order both to Church and Common-wealth Julian the Apostate who was not noted to be bloody for à cruore abstinuit says the History he sought not the lives of the Priests but that which was worse the everlasting overthrow of the Priesthood and so by consequence of Christianity used two ways to bring his purpose to pass one by taking away the maintenance of the Church for which he had Scripture beati pauperes another by taking away Learning for which he had Policy For as Theodoret notes Eccl. Hist l. 9. he used to say propriis pennis configimur ex nostris enim libris Christiani armacapiunt quibus in bello adversus nos utantur and therefore forbad them the reading of Philosophy and prophane Authors as Ammianus Marcellinus notes l. 22. 25. futurum sperans ut absque liberali eruditione religionem tueri suam non possint As indeed it is impossible but onely by miracle whereof we have had but one or two examples in the primitive Church Now if we don't require Ministers to be learned then any illiterate persons and all forts as now to our grief they do and are too much countenanced promiscuously may take upon them the Office And so there will be no security against all the evil Doctrines that shall be broach't by a promiscuous unchosen company of Preachers And hereby the door is opened to all such as will pretend to extraordinary Light and a private Spirit who will bely the holy Spirit to cozen us as often as they have a minde to it And such as these directly overthrow all Order Government and a publick Ministry For where these are the Peace of a Nation or Kingdom must be as mutable as their fancy and their Oracles being as they pretend the Dictates of God always will bring in daily new Tables of Divine Commandments which in all reason must cancel the former though never so firmly established Next I proceed to shew how that the contempt of Humane Learning under which we reckon the reading of the Fathers and ancient Commentaries brings in a further Ataxy Nestorius is noted to have fallen into his Haeresie of denying the Virgin Mary to be Deipara because having a natural Eloquence of his own and so thinking himself very Learned scorned to read any Interpreters For being puft up thereby says the History veteribus accurate non incumbebat sed seipsum potiorem omnibus judicabat And when the Historiographer had shewed wherein he might have been instructed in that question by the Fathers he concludes him therefore ignorant because he contemned the ancient The Arrians were guilty of the same pride who would not suffer any of the ancient Fathers to be compared with them nor would they admit 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in any that was not of their party boasting in the Invention of their own Opinions and the revelation of such things that never were heard nor thought of This is that which brought in that disorder spoken of by Isaiah to wit The children behave themselves proudly against the ancient and the base against the honorable Isa 3.5 For when some by reason of a plausible Tongue and a great memory by nature think themselves to have all the Learning in the World as did Nestorius and thereupon despise the Commentaries of the Ancient what marvail we if new Opinions arise and strange Innovations and Tumults and Haeresies and Elasphemies and Churches scorned and Authority reviled whilst they say there is more Divinity in a Country man then all the University more of truth in one Sectarist then all