Selected quad for the lemma: truth_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
truth_n	according_a	church_n	word_n	2,678	5	4.0797	3	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A46981	Novelty represt, in a reply to Mr. Baxter's answer to William Johnson wherein the oecumenical power of the four first General Councils is vindicated, the authority of bishops asserted, the compleat hierarcy of church government established, his novel succession evacuated, and professed hereticks demonstrated to be no true parts of the visible Church of Christ / by William Johnson.	Johnson, William, 1583-1663.	1661 (1661)	Wing J861; ESTC R16538	315,558	588

God and in the entrance of the same Epist. he compares Schismatiques to Corah Dathan Abiram who separate themselves from the communion of the Jewes and their high Priest Aaron St. Aug. lib. 20 contr Faustum c. 30. Schisma est eadem opinantem eodem ritu colentem quo caeteri solo congregationis delectari dissidio Schism is a voluntary Dissidium or separation of one who agrees in doctrine from the Congregation viz. of the Church St. Aug. lib. 4. contr Donatistas Cap. 14. Nam caetera omnia vera vel censeatis vel habeatis in eadem separatione tamen duretis contra vinculum fraternae pacis adversus unitatem omnium fratrum Thus he states the Schism of the Donatists if ye continue in separation against the bond of Brotherly peace and unitie of all the Brethren that is of the whole Church Lib 2 contr Donatistas cap. 6. Respondete quare vos separastis quare contra orbem terrarum Altare erexistis quare non communicastis Ecclesiis respondete quare separastis propterea certe ne malorum communione periretis Quomodo Ergo non perierunt Cyprianus Collegae ejus quare ab innocentibus separastis Sacrilegium Schismatis vestrum defendere no●● potestis The holy Father disputing against Schismatiques askes them as we à pari aske Protestants why have you separated your selves why have you erected an Altar against the whole world answer me why did you separate certainly you separated least you should perish in the communion of the wicked how then did not Cyprian and his colleagues perish Lib. contra Petilianum nulla igitur Ratio fuit sed Maximus furor quod isti velut commmnionem caventes se ab unitate Eeclesiae quae toto orbe terrarum diffunditur separarunt There was no cause but a great madness that they fearing communion should separate themselves from the unity of the Church through the whole earth what can be more evident then this that St. Aug. held the Donatists to be out of the Church which you flatly deny St. Hierome Haeretici de Deo falso sentiendo ipsam fidem violant Schismatici discessionibus iniquis a fraterna charitate dissiliunt Contra Luciferianos quamvis ea credunt quae credimus Heretiques by teaching false things of God violate the Faith Schismatiques by unjust seperations depart from fraternal charity though they believe the same thing with us Nothing can destroy more fully your novelty then do these words for he speaks indefinitely of all Heretiques and affirms that they violate the faith and consequently have no faith without which they cannot be true members of Christs Church and that all Schismatiques leave fraternal charity which is necessary to be in the unity of the Church St. Hieron comment in Ep. ad Titum c. 3. Propterea vero a semet ipso dicitur esse damnatus Haereticus quia Fornicator Adulter Homicida caetera vitia per sacerdotes de Ecclesia propelluntur Haeretici autem in semetipsos sententiam dicant suo arbitrio ab Ecclesia recedendo Therefore he an Heretique is said to be condemned of himself because a Fornicator an Adulterer a Murtherer and the like vices are expelled out of the Church by the Priests but Heretiques pronounce a sentence against themselves by receding or departing from the Church of their own accord Does not this profound Doctor condemn your novelty in these words both by teaching that all Heretiques for he speaks indifinitely depart from the Church and by shewing a difference betwixt other criminal sinners and Heretiques when they are to be avoided which you labour to put in the same state with some Heretiques viz. That other sinners are cast out of the Church but Heretiques out themselves and yet farther that even other criminal sinners when they are excommunicated are no actual parts of the Church as you hold they are because they are cast out of it which doctrine is also Emphatically delivered by St. Aug. l. 11. quest cap. 3. Omnis Christianus qui excommunicatur Satanae traditur quomodo Scilicet quiaextra Ecclesiam est diabolus Sicut in Ecclesiae Christus ac per hoc quasi diabolo traditur qui ab Ecclesia communione removetur Vnde illos quos Apastolus Satanae traditos esse praedicat esse excommunicatos demonstrat Every Christian who is excommunicated is delivered up to Sathan how that to wit because the devil is without the Church as Christ is in the Church and by this he is as it were delivered to the devil whosoever is removed from the communion of the Church whence the Apostle demonstrates those to be excommunicated whom he pronounces to be delivered to Sathan whence followes also that seeing all profest Heretiques are excommunicated persons that according to St. Aug. they are all out of the Church I forbear the citation of more Authors esteeming these ●●ufficient 75. I have at large deduc'd the reason of this truth against you in my answer to your first part The sum whereof is this that whosoever disbelieves any divine truth sufficiently propounded to him as such disbelieves the infallible truth of Gods word and consequently evacuates the formal object of Christian faith thereby destroyes faith which cannot subsist without its formal object and by that destroyes Christianity in so much as in him lyes and consequently Gods Church nay and God himself whence also follows that such a disbeliever hath no supernatural faith at all of any other articles which he believes but a meer humane natural and fallible assent to them for he cannot assent to any of them because they are reveal'd by Gods infallible authority for he hath made that fallible in disbelieving something which is sufficiently notified to him to be revealed from God Now if he have no true faith he can neither have salvation nor be a member of Christs true Church which is directly destructive of your novelty That which has deceiv'd you and such as follow you in this is that you make your whole reflection upon the material object of faith which considered alone is as a dead carcass in respect of true Christian faith seeing it wants the soul and life of it the infallible authority of God revealing it and though hereticks perversely perswade and delude themselves they assent for the infallible authority of God to such articles as they believe yet seeing we now suppose there is no defect in the proposition of such articles as they believe not that they are reveal'd from God they being propos'd to them equally with other articles which they believe in reallity there is no other cause of their disbelief then that they attribute not an infallible authority to God revealing the said articles which they disbelieve Now if he be fallible in one he is infallible in nothing for his erring in one supposes him subject to error which is to be fallible And as faith is wanting so is external communion also to every profest heretick and schismatick as

to an Argument not precise I therefore expect accordingly that the unlearned be not made the Iudges of a Dispute which they are not fit to judge of seeing you desire us to avoid their road William Iohnson Num. 2. When I press you to as much brevity as my first Adversary prest me I shall require no more and shall easily bear with penetrations of Syllogisms and mediate consequences when they are proveable in lawfull form My chief care was to obstruct all excursions amplifications and irregularities quite out of form and all Sophisms and Fallacies which I have avoided When the learned are sufficiently informed I hope they will have so watchful a care of conscience and Christian charity that they will impart what they finde to be truth to the ignorant And this I expected signally from you in whom I discovered a fervent desire to publish what you thought truth to every one Baxter Num. 3. And by a Congregation of Christians you may mean Christians politically related to one Head whether Christ or the Pope But the word Assemblies expresseth their actual Assembling together and so excludeth all Christians that are or were members of no particular Assemblies from having relation to Christ our Head or the Pope your Head and so from being of the Congregation as you call the Church universal Iohnson Num. 3. Assembly implies no more an actual assembling then Congregation an actual congregating prove it does They are both taken in the same sense in Scripture and approved Authors and comprised in the word caetus and the one as capable to include a head and members subject to it as the other Baxter Num. 4. I had great reason to avoid the snare of an Equivocation or ambiguity of which you gave me cause of jealousie by your whatsoever as I told you as seeming to intimate a false supposition To your like I answer it is unlike and still more intimates the false supposition Whatsoever Congregation of men is the Common-wealth of England is a phrase that importeth that there is a Congregation of men which is not the ●●ommon-wealth of England which is true there being more men in the world so Whatsoever Congregation of Christians is now the true Church doth seem to import that you suppose there is a Congregation of Christians univocally so called that are not the true Church which you would distinguish from the other which I only let you know at the entrance that I deny that you may not think it granted Iohnson Num. 4. My Simile is alike in what I prest it Viz. That no man can rightly understand me as you do to mean by Congregation a part of the Church when I say it is the whole Church The disparity mentioned by you shall hereafter be examined when I come to confute your Novelty in that point In the interim you may please to take notice that there are as well Congregations of Christians univocally so called which are not the Church as there are of men which are not the Common-wealth of England Such are the Senate of Venice the Common-Council of London the Parliament of Paris c. Baxter Num. 5. Yet I must tell you that nothing is more ordinary then for the body to be said to do that which a part of it only doth as that the Church administreth Sacraments Discipline Teacheth c. The Church is assembled in such a Council c. when yet it is but a small part of the Church that doth these things And when Bellarmine Gretser c. say the Church is the infallible Judge of controversies they mean not the whole Church which containeth every Christian when they tell you that it is the Pope they mean And therefore I had reason to inquire into your sense unless I would willfully be over-reacht Iohnson Num. 5. This is a meer Parergon for I declare in my Thesis that I speak only of that Church out of which no man can be saved as appears in your Edition p. 2. which is not cannot be the Church representative in a Council for then none could be saved who are out of that Council Baxter Num. 6. You now satisfie me that you mean it universally viz. All that Congregation or Church of Christians which is now the true Church of Christ doth acknowledge c. which I told you I deny Iohnson Num. 6. By this appears how inappositely you propounded the question Whether I meant by Congregation in my Proposition the whole Church or only some part of it seeing it was manifest I could not mean any part of it by that word Baxter To my following distinction you say That all the world knows that whatsoever is acknowledged to have been ever in the Church by Christs Institution cannot be meant of any accidentall thing but of a necessary unchangeable and essential thing in Christs true Church To which I reply either you see the grosse fallacy of this defence or you do not If you do not then never more call for an exact Disputant nor look to be delivered from your Errors by Argumentation though never so convincing If you do then you are not faithful to the Truth In your Major Proposition the words being many as you say you penetrated divers Arguments together ambiguities were the easier hidden in the heap That which I told you is accidental to the Church and that but to a corrupted part was the acknowledging of the Papacy Fallacy 1. as of Christs Institution and therefore if it were granted that a thing of Christs Institution could not be accidental yet the acknowledgment that is the opinion or asserting of it may If the Church by mistake should think that to be essential to it which is not though it will not thence follow that its essence is but an accident yet it will follow that both the false opinion and the thing it self so false conceited to be essential are but accidents or not essential You say it cannot be meant of any accidental thing But 1. That meaning it self of theirs may be an accident 2. And the question is not what they mean that is imagine or affirm it to be but what it is in deed and truth That may be an accident which they think to be none Iohnson Num. 7. Sir The fallacy is not in my Proposition but in your understanding You assert that the Soveraignty of the Pope is as accidental to the Church as will hereafter appear as pride and cruelty is to the Spanish Nation and therefore the Acknowledgement of it is Accidental for if the acknowledgement be in a matter Essential it self must also be Essential either to the constitution or destruction of the Catholick Faith For the Essence of Faith requires that all Essentials be believed And it must be destructive of Faith to believe any thing to be Essential and absolutely necessary to Christian Faith which is a meer Accident and non-Essential For such an Errour constitutes a false Christian and teaches that to be Essentially

Pope of Rome had the government of all the Church without the verge of the Roman Empire but only that he was to the Roman Church as the arch-bishop of Canterbury to the English Church and as between Canterbury and York so between Rome and Constantinople there have been contentions for preheminency but if you can prove Canterbury to be before York or Rome before Constantinople that will prove neither of them to be Ruler of the antipodes or of all the Christian world William Iohnson Num. 278. But if you can prove Canterbury to be not only in place and precedency but in authority and jurisdiction above York and withall above all the Metropolitans Primates and Patriarchs which were anciently within the Roman Empire because they acknowledged his authority to be above all the Prelates of God to have Christs vineyard committed to his care from Christ to be the Father to all the Bishops met in general Councils and they his professed children acknowledged by them to be their head and they as parts subject to him c. And never to have been acknowledged as supream in spirituals by these in the Empire because his authority reached as I have prov'd the Bishops of Rome to have been acknowledged by them no farther then the Empire When I say you shall have prov'd the Bishop of Canterbury to have been over all the Metropolitans Primates and Patriarchs within the Empire in this manner as I have proved the Bishop of Rome to be you will have proved Canterbury to have had all the preheminences given him by antiquity to be the Supream spiritual governour of the whole Church But seeing neither you nor any one in his right wits would ever undertake so great a peice of nonsence I should have wondered you dazle the eyes of your readers with such empty shewes as these had it not been so ordinary with you This very argument hath proved that not only one man but as you cannot deny all the Churches in the Empire acknowledge it and yet you say I have not proved one man to hold it whether this be to be termed confidence or impudence I leave to judgement Mr. Baxter Num. 279. Much less have you proved that ever any Church was of this opinion that the Pope was by divine Right the Governour of the world when you cannot prove one man of that opinion 3. much less have you proved a succession of such a Church from the Apostles having said as much as nothing to the first 300 yeares William Iohnson Num. 279. You forget and have proceeded in that act of oblivion through your whole reply that I undertook in these instances noe more then to prove against your bold assertion that within the first 600. 500. and 400 yeares there were some at least who testified the Supremacy of the Roman Bishop over the whole Church by Christs institution though therefore my proofs had not been taken out of those who flourished within the first 300 years seeing they were within the first 400 they had been of force against you But you may remember also that I cited St. Cyprian who was within the first 300 and Vincentius Lyrinensis who witnesses the same of Pope Stephen contemporary with St. Cyprian and very many of my cheif instances prove V. G. in the councils of Nice Ephesus and Chalcedon that it descended from our Saviour and had been in all ages since the Apostles and was to be in all future ages Mr. Baxter Num 380. And much less have you proved that the whole Catholique Church was of this opinion William Iohnson Num. 380. Whether I have or no let others judge Mr. Baxter Num. 381. And yet least of all have you proved that the whole Church took this Primacy of Rome to be of necessity to the very being of the Church to our salvation and not only ad melius esse as a point of order William Iohnson Num. 381. I have proved it to have been a matter ever necessary in the Church by Christs institution and therefore necessary ad esse to the being and not only ad bene esse to the perfection of the Church For seeing some Governours are essential to the Church as appears Ephes. 4. v. 11 12 13. in the order and Hierarchy of those Governours there must be some who are to be over all the rest in visible government otherwise neither could schism be avoided and unity preserved as Optatus cited hereafter affirms l. 2. contra Parmen nor would a visible body have a visible head which would be monstrous Mr. Baxter Num. 382. So that you have left your cause in shameful nakedness as if you had confessed that you can prove nothing William Iohnson N. 382. If you mean to such eyes as yours which I have demonstrated either discovered not or mis-saw the face of my arguments I grant it but all open and right sighted eyes I hope will have seen my cause so invested with grace and truth by what I have here replyed that it will have no shame to appear before heaven and earth before men and angels for its justification Mr. Baxter Num. 383. In the end you return to terms To what you say about the word Christians I only say that it s but equivocally applied to any that profess not all the essentials of Christianity of which Popery is none any more then pride is William Iohnson Num. 383. I leave it to judgement whether this answer related to my explication as of Christianity pag. 64. your edit have any sense in it For what though Popery as you conceit were no more essential to Christianity then pride is yet if a Papist hold all the essentials of Christianity as you hold he does he may be univocally a Christian. Will you say that because pride is none of the essentials of Christianity therefore no proud man holds all the essentialls of Christianity to what purpose then have you added this clause of Pride and Popery when I speak in general and abstractive terms not medling at all with particulars Now you give no satisfaction to your Reader about the clear notion of an univocal Christian you tell him here that an univocal Christian is he who believes all the essentials of Christianity but through this whole answer you never give him either a distinct catalogue of essentials or prescribe any direct rule or means to know which they are as we shall see hereafter Mr. Baxter Num. 384. About the word Monarch in good sadness do you deny the Pope to be an imperious sole Commander Which of these is it you do deny not that he is a Commander not that he is imperious not that he is sole in his Soveraignty I would either you or we knew what you hold or deny But perhaps the next words shew the difference as temporal Kings But this saith not a word wherein they differ from temporal Kings William Iohnson 384. You are really a strange man to deal withal Can any one speak more