Selected quad for the lemma: truth_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
truth_n	aaron_n	apostle_n	son_n	30	3	5.8200	4	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A61626	Sermons preached on several occasions to which a discourse is annexed concerning the true reason of the sufferings of Christ : wherein Crellius his answer to Grotius is considered / by Edward Stillingfleet ...; Sermons. Selections	Stillingfleet, Edward, 1635-1699.	1673 (1673)	Wing S5666; ESTC R14142	389,972	404

preserve the peace of the Christian Church when they are to plant Churches how ready to go about it how diligent in attending it how watchful to prevent all miscarriages among them When they write Epistles to those already planted with what Authority do they teach with what Majesty do they command with what severity do they rebuke with what pity do they chastise with what vehemency do they exhort and with what weighty arguments do they perswade all Christians to adorn the doctrine of God their Saviour in all things So that such persons who after all these things can believe that the Apostles were acted only by some extravagant heats may as easily perswade themselves that men may be drunk with sobriety and mad with reason and debauched with goodness But such are fit only to be treated in a dark room if any can be found darker than their understandings are 2. But yet there may be imagined a higher sort of madness than these men are guilty of viz. That when men are convinced that these things could not be done by meer Mechanical causes then they attribute them to the assistance of Spirits but not to the holy and divine but such as are evil and impure A madness so great and extravagant that we could hardly imagine that it were incident to humane nature unless the Scripture had told us that some had thus blasphemed the son of man and either had or were in danger of blaspheming the Holy Ghost too And this is properly blaspheming the Holy Ghost which was not given as our text tells us till after Christs ascension when men attribute all those miraculous gifts which were poured out upon the Apostles in confirmation of the Christian doctrine to the power of an unclean Spirit For so the Evangelist St. Luke when he mentions the blasphemy against the Holy Ghost which shall not be forgiven immediately subjoyns their bringing the Apostles to the Synagogues and Magistrates and Powers and adds that the Holy Ghost even that which they so blasphemed in them should teach them in that same hour what they ought to say I deny not but the attributing the miraculous works of Christ who had the Holy Spirit without measure to an evil Spirit was the same kind of sin but it received a greater aggravation after the resurrection of Christ from the dead and the miraculous effusion of the Holy Ghost upon the Apostles For now the great confirmation was given to the truth of all that Christ had said before he had some times concealed his miracles and forbid the publishing of them and to such he appeared but as the son of man of whom it is said that had they known him they would not have crucified the Lord of Glory and St. Peter more expresly and now Brethren I wote that through ignorance you did it as did also your Rulers But now since his resurrection and ascension when God by the effusion of the Holy Ghost hath given the largest and fullest Testimony to the doctrine of the Gospel if men after all this shall go on to blaspheme the Holy Ghost by attributing all these miracles to a Diabolical power then there is no forgiveness to be expected either in this world or the world to come Because this argues the greatest obstinacy of mind the highest contempt of God and the greatest affront that can be put upon the Testimony of the holy Spirit for it is charging the Spirit of truth to be an evil and a lying Spirit By which we see what great weight and moment the Scripture lays upon this pouring out of the Holy Ghost on the Apostles and what care men ought to have how they undervalue and despise it and much more how they do reproach and blaspheme it They might as well imagine that light and darkness may meet and embrace each other as that the infernal Spirits should imploy their power in promoting a doctrine so contrary to their interest For Heaven and Hell cannot be more distant than the whole design of Christianity is from all the contrivances of wicked Spirits How soon was the Devil's Kingdom broken his Temples demolished his oracles silenced himself baffled in his great design of deceiving mankind when Christianity prevailed in the world Having thus far asserted the truth of the thing viz. that there was such an effusion of the Holy Spirit now come to consider 2. The nature of it as it is represented to us by Rivers of living waters flowing out of them that believe by which we may understand 1. The plenty of it called Rivers of waters 2. The benefit and usefulness of it to the Church 1. The plentifulness of this effusion of the Spirit there had been some drops as it were of this Spirit which had fallen upon some of the Jewish nation before but those were no more to be compared with these rivers of waters than the waters of Siloam which run softly with the mighty River Euphrates What was the Spirit which Bezaleel had to build the Tabernacle with if compared with that Spirit which the Apostles were inspired with for building up the Church of God what was that Spirit of Wisdom which some were filled with to make garments for Aaron if compared with that Spirit of Wisdom and Revelation which led the Apostles into the knowledge of all Truth What was that Spirit of Courage which was given to the Iudges of old if compared with that Spirit which did convince the world of sin of righteousness and of judgement What was that Spirit of Moses which was communicated to the 70. elders if compared with that Spirit of his son which God hath shed abroad in the hearts of his people What was that Spirit of prophesie which inspired some Prophets in several ages with that pouring out of the Spirit upon all flesh which the Apostle tells us was accomplished on the day of Pentecost But these Rivers of Waters though they began their course at Ierusalem upon that day yet they soon overflowed the Christian Church in other parts of the world The sound of that rushing mighty wind was soon heard in the most distant places and the fiery tongues inslamed the hearts of many who never saw them These gifts being propagated into other Churches and many other tongues were kindled from them as we see how much this gift of tongues obtained in the Church of Corinth And so in the History of the Acts of the Apostles we find after this day how the Holy Ghost fell upon them which believed and what mighty signs and wonders were done by them 2. The benefit and usefulness of this effusion of the Spirit like the Rivers of Waters that both refresh and enrich and thereby make glad the City of God The coming down of the Spirit was like the pouring water upon him that is thirsty and floods upon the dry ground Now God opened the Rivers in

people to those who went before them And Crellius himself grants That Socinus never intended to prove that one mans suffering for anothers sins was unjust in it self from this place no not though we take it in the strictest sense for one suffering in the stead of another Having thus far cleared how far it is agreeable to Gods Justice to punish any persons either by reason of his dominion or the conjunction of persons for the sins of others and consequently whether any punishment may be undergone justly beyond the proper desert of their own sins I now return to the consent of Mankind in it on supposition either of a neer conjunction or a valid consent which must make up the want of dominion in men without it And the question still proceeds upon the supposition of those things that there be a proper dominion in men over that which they part with for others sakes and that they do it by their free consent and then we justifie it not to be repugnant to the principles of Reason and Justice for any to suffer beyond the desert of their own actions And Crellius his saying that such a punishment is true punishment but not just is no answer at all to the consent of Nations that it is so And therefore finding this answer insufficient he relies upon another viz. That it was never received by the consent of Nations that one man should suffer in the stead of another so as the guilty should be freed by the others suffering For he saith neither Socinus nor he do deny that one man may be punished for anothers sins but that which they deny is that ever the innocent were punished so as the guilty were freed by it and so he answers in the case of Hostages and Sureties their punishment did never excuse the offenders themselves And to this purpose he saith Socinus his argument doth hold good that though one mans money may become anothers yet one mans sufferings cannot become anothers For saith he if it could then it would be all one who suffered as it is who pays the money due And then the offender must be presently released as the Debtor is upon payment of the debt This is the substance of what is said by him upon this Argument To which I reply 1. That this gives up the matter in dispute at present between us for the present question is Whether it be unjust for any one to suffer beyond the desert of his own actions Yes saith Crellius it is in case he suffers so as that the guilty be freed by his sufferings But we are not enquiring Whether it be just for another person to be freed for a mans suffering for him but whether it be just for that man to suffer by his own consent more than his own actions without that consent deserved The release of another person by vertue of his sufferings is a matter of another consideration Doth the freeing or not freeing of another by suffering add any thing to the desert of suffering He that being wholly innocent and doth suffer on the account of anothers fault doth he not suffer as undeservedly though another be not freed as if he were As in the case of Hostages or Sureties doth it make them at all the more guilty because the persons they are concerned for will be punished notwithstanding if they come under the power of those who exacted the punishment upon them who suffered for them Nay is not their desert of punishment so much the less in as much as the guilty are still bound to answer for their own offences If we could suppose the guilty to be freed by the others sufferings it would be by supposing their guilt more fully translated upon those who suffer and consequently a greater obligation to punishment following that guilt From whence it follows that if it be just to punish when the person is not delivered from whom the other suffers it is more just when he is for the translation of the penalty is much less in the former case than in latter and what is just upon less grounds of punishment must be more just upon greater I look on this therefore but as a shift of Crellius hoping thereby to avoid the consent of mankind in one mans suffering for another without attending to the main argument he was upon viz. The justice of one person suffering for another 2. It is a very unreasonable thing to make an action unjust for that which of it self is acknowledged by our Adversaries to be very just viz. The pardoning the offenders themselves If it were just to suffer if the other were not pardoned and it were just to pardon whether the other were punished or no how comes this suffering to be unjust meerly by the others being pardoned by it nay is it not rather an Argument that those sufferings are the most just which do so fully answer all the ends of punishments that there is then no necessity that the offender should suffer but that the Supreme Governor having obtained the ends of Government by the suffering of one for the rest declares himself so well pleased with it that he is willing to pardon the offenders themselves 3. Many of those persons who have had their sins punished in others have themselves escaped the punishment due to the desert of their sins As is plain in the case of Ahab whose punishment was not so great as his sins deserved because the full punishment of them was reserved to his posterity If it be said as it is by Crellius That Ahab was not wholly freed his life being taken away for his own sins That gives no sufficient answer for if some part of the punishment was deferred that part he was delivered from and the same reason in this case will hold for the whole as the part As is plain in the case of Manasseh and several others the guilt of whose sins were punished on their posterity themselves escaping it 4. Our Adversaries confess that in some cases it is lawful and just for some to suffer with a design that others may be freed by their suffering for them Thus they assert That one Christian not only may but ought to lay down his life for another if there be any danger of his denying the truth or be judges him far more useful and considerable than himself so likewise a son for his Father one Brother for another or a Friend or any whose life he thinks more useful than his own Now I ask whether a man can be bound to a thing that is in its own nature unjust if not as it is plain he cannot then such an obligation of one man to suffer for the delivery of another cannot be unjust and consequently the suffering it self cannot be so But Crellius saith The injustice in this case lies wholly upon the Magistrate who admits it but I ask wherefore is it