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 |
|
A10795
|
Gods holy house and service according to the primitive and most Christian forme thereof, described by Foulke Robarts, Batchelor of Divinity, and prebendary of Norvvich.
|
Robartes, Foulke, 1580?-1650.
|
1639
(1639)
|
STC 21068; ESTC S121261
|
55,029
|
143
|
GODS HOLY HOVSE AND SERVICE According to the primitive and most Christian forme thereof described by Foulke Robarts Batchelor of Divinity and Prebendary of NORVVICH Psal 26. 8. I have loved the habitation of thine house and the place where thine honour dwelleth LONDON Printed by Tho. Cotes and are to be sold at the Grey-hound in Saint Pauls Church yard 1639. To all such as through weakenesse of judgement with some superstitious feare and not by any malevolent spirit of opposition and schisme are offended at the Decency of our Churches and the Reverend demeanure of our outward expressions in Gods publique Worship Loving Brethren THe worship of God hath of late yeares beene so carried in many places among us as if therein men were not about any businesse relating unto God The places of meetings being so ruinous and sordid the people in the act of prayers and praises demeaning themselves so as if they sate in counsell with God a gesture of which Tertulian saith that in prayer it is irreligiosissimum a most irreligious L. de orat thing rather than devoute and humble worships Much irreverence was in administring and receiving the holy Communion I have often conceived hereupon that either Papist Turke or Pagan observing our fashion would thinke that either our Churches were not the houses of the holy God or that the people in them were not about Gods worship Our present most reverend Metropolian hath in his Metropoliticall visitation layd those grounds which have already reformed much and I trust will by Gods mercy soone reduce all things in Gods worship to due decency and reverence all England over Not doubting of the like successe in other places which we finde in the Diocesse of Norwich For while the right reverend Father now Lord Bishop of Elie for the time his Lordship was our Diocesan as an other Elishaeus in the spirit of Elias his Lordship so proceeded in this pious worke as that the worke of the Lord prospered in his hands The house and service of God shineth among us in the primitive splendor to the great good liking of all sober Christians But as when S. Paul preached of the resurrection Some beleeved others mocked Act. 17. So upon sight of this good worke so happily begunne and so effectually followed some joyfully conformed others frowardly opposed The one encouraged the other exasperated my poore zeale first by preaching and private communications now by printing this slender treatise to put forth my selfe a weak labourer under such Aholiabs Bezaliels master workemen I doe not in all this little treatise frame any one proposition which I doe not in my conscience conceive to be the truth of God Nor doe Iuse any argument or reason but such as I apprehend naturally to inferre the conclusion My desire herein God knoweth is your satisfaction and right information in that which not a little concerneth Gods glory and your good Thinke not that I would reduce all Gods worship to bodily gestures Neither imagine that it belongeth to the soule alone The soule is the most excellent part whose intentions recommend the expressions of the body unto God But the body is a part and an essentiall part of the man and must beare his part with the soule in Gods worship If the body act alone then doth God say Man where is thy soule If the soule alone take all upon it then saith God where is or what doth thy body Where are thine eyes thy hands thy knees thy legges to declare and accompany the lifting up the humility and the confidence of thy soule Thy whole man is to be imployed in my worship It is for God and for his glory that I do pleade thus earnestly with my bretheren How decent a thing is it in the eye of man to behold bodies and soules accord and joyne together in the holy worke How doth the visible and expressive devotion of one Christian beget and encrease the same in an other And how powerfully shall the reverend behaviours and gestures of an whole Congregation together worke one upon an other Is not God the more glorified when our devotion is quickned and advanced O my bretheren be not froward but meeke and tractable Boy strous men in a spirit of error or opposition or both have made too much stirre troubled and affrighted honest hearts On the other side some men expressing devotion outwardly give too much scandall through want of probity But I beseech you turne away your eyes from men turne them upon God and then turne them home upon your selves And then tell me doe you not perceive the Majesty of God to be so great as that it becommeth the whole man soule and body to demeane himselfe in all points of humility and reverence inward and outward when he is in Gods speciall presence Is not the excellent goodnesse of God such as drawes all mens eyes upon him and feedes them all with expectation Is not his bounty such as filleth every living thing with plenty of his goodnesse Shall not the eye then looke up towards God in admiration and hope Shall not the hand be lifted up shewing the heart ready to receive the blessing and to reach out thankes Speake to God with the intention judgement and fervency of the soule Speake also by the expressions of the members of thy body Speake by thy tongue Speake by thine eyes Speake by thine hands and by thy knees The tongue interpreteth the meaning of the soule by words The eyes and hands interpret the confident expectation of the soule by their elevation The knees interpret the humilitie of the soule by bowing And so the rest of our decent gestures doe interpret the soule every one in its owne language which God intendeth understandeth and accepteth when they truly declare outwardly what the soule conceiveth inwardly But I am asked what neede these gestures and postures more now than heretofore Whereto I answer that there is no more neede to use these decent and reverend gestures and expressions in the worship of God now than heretofore And that if heretofore wee have been defective in what was requisite it is time that now we be reformed Againe if by heretofore yee understand the space of 40. or 50. yeares last passed I confesse that what we performe now may seeme a novelty But if by heretofore you meane the best and primitive times of the ages next the Apostles and before the dayes superstition crept on then I say that there is no more required now than what was in use in the practise of Christians heretofore God therefore give us grace to discerne truth from error and light from darkenesse and not to bee put out of the way of true devotion through a panike feare of a supposed superstition heartily prayeth At my Study in Norwich March 4. 1638. Your loving brother Fowlke Robarts The Contents Cap. 1. OF Holinesse 2 Of the holy place 3 Of the consecration of Churches 4 Consecration of Churches is
God will give the eunuches in his house a name But now what of all this will they say that the reverence mentioned in the text Philip. 2. is to be given peradventure to the power renown or memory of the sonne of God and not to be done when wee heare him named by the name JESUS But then here would I know of them which of these power renowne or memory shall I conceive to be meant in this text by the word Name If they say his power then I aske why not his renowne If they say his renowne then why not his memoriall For the word Name doth in Scripture by a trope signifie every one of these And when we leave the proper sence of any word in Scripture wee must shew some necessity why we do so and make it plaine that it must be taken in that significative sence which we give therof It is not inough to say such De doct Chrâ—â— 3 C. 10. a word is in some places taken in a figurative sence and therefore I will so understand it here and where I list besides St Austine dealing with such loose expounders of Scripture saith Nihil facilius est quam dicere Tropus est figura est modus quidam dicendi est Hebraismus est i. It is an easie matter to say it is a Trope It is a figure It is a certaine forme of speech It is an Hebraisme And therefore he giveth this rule Oratio figurata est quae proprieintellecta nec ad fidem nec ad dilectionem nec ad ullam aedificationem accoÌ„modari potest i. Then is the speech figurative when it cannot be made to serve for either faith or charity or any edification in the proper sence of the words Illyâ—â—cus that one of the centuristes well knowne to be no friend to Superstition doth among the rest of his rules for the right understaÌ„ding of scripture give this for De rat Cogn Sacr. lit one Verba sacraruÌ„ literaruÌ„ proprie acccipienda sunt nisi loci sensus in aliqueÌ„ fidei articuluÌ„ propalaÌ„ incurrat i. The words of holy Scripture are to be understood in their proper sence ecept that so the meaning of the words do directy fal foul upon some articles of faith And in an other place he thus adviseth Ne quaerat aliquis umbras aut sectetur somnia allegorianum nisi manifesta sit allegoria literalis seÌ„sus sit alioquin inutilis aut absurdus i. let not a man hunt after shadows or dreame of allegories except there be a manifest allegory And that without an allegory the literall sense be unprofitable and absurd And to this point a learned Countriman of our own speaketh home saying Allegoryes Perk. in gal 4. 24. are to be admitted when the words sound against common reason analogy of faith or good manners Let us consider these rules and see if there be any necessity that the word Name in the text to the Philipians be understood in any other then the proper sense Is it against common reason Faith Charity or good manners so to understand it Or is it against the scope of that place or of any other part or peece of scripture for me to bow my knee or to expresse reverence by any seemly outward gesture when I heare my blessed Lord and Saviour named by his proper name JESUS How then dare I suffer my fancy here to leave the propâ—â—â—â—ase and to devise a figure as if I might worke the Scripture like a nose of waxe as I list my self I will here adde one rule more which we have from Saint Hillary Optimus lector est qui dictorum intelligentiam expectat ex dictis potius quam imponat et retulerit potius quam attulerit Neque cogat id videri dictis contineri quod ante lectionem praesumpserit intelligendum i. He is the best l. de trin 1. reader of Scriptures who lookes for the meaning of the words in the words rather then putteth or imposeth a meaning upon them who fetcheth the sense from the words rather then bringeth it unto them And who enforceth not that to seem to be contained in them which he presumed to find there before he read them If any man will contend that yet there is an allegory Ob. in that text because knees are there ascribed to things in heaven and things in earth and things under the earth I answer that when knees are ascribed Ans to things which properly have none there necessity enforceth us to acknowledge a figure But the Son of God our blessed Saviour hath a name even the name JESUS in the proper sense And men have knees not figuratively but properly Therefore it is without any figure to say that men having knees naturally shall bow those knees at the name JESUS which is not a metaphorical but the proper name of the Son of God And so there is no necessity to seeke a figure in that text in the word name or in the word knees so farre as the duty concerneth man But it is very dangerous against the faith of a good Conscience and against the true rules of right interpreting the Scriptures thus to rove at figures and to imagine allegories where we need not and upon bare uncertaine conjectures not knowing certainly what to stand unto But by this bowing at the name of Jesus we shall Object magnifie the Son above the Father and the holy Ghost No such matter but we shall honour the Father Ans in the Son For so saith the text that this is done to the glory of God the Father And seeing no man can say that Jesus is the Lord but by the holy Ghost Let us never feare that that respect which we do to our Saviour by the instinct and direction of the holy Ghost can be any diminution or disparagement to the holy Ghost Will any man say that the blessed virgin Mary did disparage either the Father or the holy Ghost when she said My spirit rejoiceth in God my Saviour Luc. 1. 47. But why then is this reverence done at the name Quest of the second person more then at the name of the first or third Ans Because that not the Father nor the holy Ghost but the Son made himselfe of no reputation and tooke upon him the shape of a servant and became obedient to the death even the death of the Crosse therefore God hath exalted Him and given Him a name above every Phil. 2. name that at the name of Jesus every Knee should bow Shall I reverence a word or bow to a sound of letters Quest We bow to and worship not the word sound Ans or letters but God thereby expressed The word is our Remembrancer to put us in minde of the duty which we owe to God our Saviour Why is this speciall reverence done at this more then at any other name of God Quest Every name of God is reverend and holy But whereas a sinfull man shall find terror