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	scripture_n	true_a	1,770	5	4.4847	4	false

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ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A82555	The Quakers confuted, being an answer unto nineteen queries; propounded by them, and sent to the elders of the church of Duckenfield in Cheshire; wherein is held forth much of the doctrine and practise concerning revelations, and immediate voices, and against the holy Scriptures, Christs ministry, churches and ordinances &c. Together with an answer to a letter which was written and sent by one of them to a family of note and quality in the said county, which pleaded for perfection in this life, and for quaking. By Samuel Eaton, teacher of the Church of Christ heretofore meeting at Duckenfield, now in Stockport in Cheshire.	Eaton, Samuel, 1596?-1665.; Waller, Richard, d. 1657.	1654 (1654)	Wing E125; Thomason E719_8; ESTC R9865	69,620	98

ever perfected them that were sanctified out of your own mouths you are judged Friends the Apostle Paul did not tell you these words but you are theeves that steal his words For he spoke to the Saints which had an understanding when he bad them forget those things which were behind which you need not give a sense to his words and wrest them to another meaning that is your condition which James speaks of for you live in the nature by whom Offences come that is but a form and the Robber to apply his words except you had a Principle within you that told you so And Iohn saith if they say they have no sin they deceive themselves and the truth is not in them But saith he if you confess your sins he is faithfull and just to forgive and to clense from all sin and if you walk in the light as he is in the light the blood of Jesus Christ cleanseth from all sin But here you are not in this light onor cannot witness this blood no not the confession of your sin but in the generation of the Pharisees gathered Churches separated from others contending against Christ Who said a good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit and witnessed a good Conscience before Pontius Pilate and where Christ is made manifest he hath destroyed the works of the Devil and he that is born of God sinneth not and he that sinneth is of the Devil Hereby are the children of God known from the children of the Devil And in that Generation you are pleading for the sin and not for the faith which purifies the heart But that mind and servant must serve its own master whom you contend for So every kingdom stands for it self yet you have one of the beasts colours of profession which makes you to appear beautifull as ever the Harlot did under a pretence of the true worship of God which is a stranger from the Spirit of God as you utter it forth which the Saints were guided by Friends you give Exposition of the Apostles words which he gave no such exposition but spake plainly he was a perfect man that could bridle his own tongue and I know none in your Church and Generation can do it Herein thou shewest thy self and thy Religion to be vain For he that hath not power over his own tongue his Religion is vain and thy self no Minister of Christ For he was a Minister of Christ that said so but you are evil beasts and slow bellies which the Scripture speaks of Are they not hirelings as the Priests were are they not called of men masters and have they not the chiefest place in the assemblies are they not lyars which pretend to be in the same state the true Prophets were in you are in the same nature which justifies them who are for condemnation and God will condemn that high wisdom of yours the Apostle said as he is so are we in this present world which of you can witness that there is no hole for Satan But friends look within and you shall see he keeps the house you plead so much for him Friends in that life you live in you cannot see it For none can see God and live therefore are you blinded Fogged and Misted with the corruptions of the dark mind therefore take the alass alass to your selves and pitty your own selves he that believes is born of God and he that is born of God sinneth not and he that is born of God overcomes the world and this belief you shut your selves out of and do make it appear that you do not believe to that in your Consciences I speak Friends as touching Johns words let flesh be silent for giving senses upon them for that fills the world full of imaginations and fancies For you are the Lyars which would draw something out of his words and give another meaning to them and shew a contrary spirit and the wresting of the Scriptures but all such as you are discovered where the life of them is made manifest who wrest the Scriptures and give your own sense and meaning upon them and so bewitch them by your craft and draw them from waiting upon God to have them fulfilled so that mind judgeth all to be deceit which is not according to your own lense and so calls light darkness and evil good Friends you strengthen your selves with that Scripture as he that saith he hath no sin deceives himself and the truth is not in him And here you stand up for the Devils kingdom For you have not confessed your sins yet If you confess you● sin he is faith-and just to forgive and to cleanse from all sin but these thinge you know nothing of but shew forth your corrupt mind and your selves of them which the Scripture speaks of Friends here you have uttered forth your folly without knowledge and understanding and make it appear that you never heard the voice of God for his voice shakes the Earth First you must witness the Earth shaken before you witnes the Heavens and make it appear that an your knowledge is notionary and earthly and yet standing and of this World and the world by their wisdom know not God and there you are to that in your conscience I speak here you thrust your selves out of the Church of God and shew forth your ignorance not having the form of the Letter For Paul when he came among the Corinthians he was with them in fear and weakness and much teembling that their Faith might stand in the power of God and not in the wisdom of Words but here are you not and the Corinthims received Titus trembling and he that was a Minister of Christ exhorted the Saints to work out their salvation with fear and trembling for it was God that wrought both the Will and the Deed and the Assembly which assembled to Ezra had all trembling hearts and Iobs flesh trembled and Davids flesh trembled and his bones quaked and Moses when he heard the voice of God he trembled Habbakuk when he heard the voice of God he trembled Hear the word of the Lord all you that tremble at his Word when your Brethren hate you and cast you out and say 〈◊〉 the Lord he glorified he shall appear to your joy when they shall be ashamed and in that Generation you shew your selves to be not knowing the Power of God not the Scriptures but err so shutting your selves out from the life of them that gave forth the Scriptures making your selves openly to appear blind Friends besilent as giving senses of shaking and of removing of things without you for it is the e●●th within you and the Corruptions within you which plead for the Devils kingdom so much which must be removed and that bufie minds which are giving senses upon the Saints Conditions for eternally you know nothing Friends as touching Moses Condition when any one witnessestlie same Condition you cannot own it but are cavelling about words neither can you

THE Quakers Confuted BEING AN ANSWER Vnto Nineteen QUERIES Propounded by them and sent to the Elders of the Church of Duckenfield in Cheshire WHEREIN Is held forth much of the Doctrine and practise Concerning Revelations and immediate Voices and against the holy Scriptures Christs Ministry Churches and Ordinances c. TOGETHER With an Answer to a Letter which was Written and sent by one of them to a Family of Note and Quality in the said County which pleaded for perfection in this life and for Quaking By Samuel Eaton Teacher of the Church of Christ heretofore meeting at Duckenfield now in Stockport in Cheshire LONDON Printed by R. White for Thomas Brewster and are to be sold at the sign of the three Bibles at the West-end of Pauls 165● To the Supream Authority of the Nation the Parliament now sitting in Westminster Right Honourable IT is the Duty of all that Love the Lord Jesus Christ in Sincerity to contend for the Faith that was once given to the Saints every man in his place according to the Calling Office Power Interest Gift Ability that he hath received from God And I in my place though the weakest of many being yet led forth thereto by special inviting Providences have done it both formerly and at present And I Assume the boldness to present my poor plain weak and slender labours to your Honors view and most humbly beg your favorable construction of my design and scope in them It is not to asperse any who are innocent it is not to bring Saints who are weak and frail under contumelie Neither is it to exasperate the Supream Magistrate against any Persons in whom the visibility of Saintship shall be found Nor is it to conivnce these Persons betwixt whom and my self the contest lies of their Errour for had there been any hope of that I should have found out another way but it is to preserve those who are yet sound in the Faith from infection and it is to awaken others who are far more able in the Scriptures then my self to appear for God for Christ and for the Truth in such times of the great Apostasie of so very many from the Faith And it is to provoke your Honors to a self-reflection if thereby you may discern what your own Duty may be and whether there be not somewhat which the Supream Magistrate according to his Power Place and Interest is called to do in obedience to that command I know you will manifest very much tenderness to all Saints though in different forms and of different judgements in circumstantial Truths and no question Christ will take it kindly from your hands but there is a company of Apostate Christians who are dispersed all over the Land and who do sow much corrupt seed which comes up with great increase in many places who yet do pass with some for precious Saints But my hope is and my Prayer shall be that the Lord will make you wise to judg ef Saintship according to Scriptural Rules and not according to the large Charity of some who are truly good though too much friends to them You are not ignorant what a Character Christ himself gives of false Teachers though appearing a Righteous Innocent and Harmless People as these Quakers stile themselves he calls them Wolves in Sheeps clothing And Paul speaking of such compares them to Satan in this That they will transform themselves as he doth himself into an Angel of Light so they into Ministers of Righteousness And John in his Epistles makes them all Antichrists And the Scope Drift of all the Apostles in all their Epistles almost is to confirm the Faith which the Saints had received and to preserve from recover them out of Errour and it is to impugn such Doctrine as Seducers brought in among them the Zeal that they shewed is worthy of observation You know also that as God is a righteous God loves Righteousness and therefore if you advance Righteousness as my hope in God is that you wil you shall not lose your reward For he is also a jealous God in the things wherein his Glory is more immediately concerned And his Honor is not more concerned in any thing then it is in the Doctrines which men hold and teach and in the Worships which men give to him therefore if you also shew your selves jealous of his Glory in these things it will be assuredly written down in Gods Book of Remembrance what Zeal you had for your God and the Lord will bless you thence forward Are Magistrates for a Praise to good works and for a terrour to evil works while only they are good and evil but when they come to be best or worst as they alwayes be when Religion is in them is it so that they then have nothing to do neither are they to meddle with them If this be the sense of the Apostles words as all Persons which do exclude the Magistrate from having any thing to do with the matters of God will have it to be it is a strange one and hath nothing to bear it up either from that Text or any that I know of But you are sufficiently instructed I doubt not concerning your own power and your Zeal shewed where the honour of God is engaged will provoke many whereto they will the rather be carried considering that no sins do bring more greater plagues upon a Nat on that professeth Righteousness then sins against the first Table do Now Magistrates are the Fathers of the Commonwealth and therefore should study to preserve it from those judgments that would destroy it Or else why are Laws made against Oaths and such kind of Blasphemies if they be not to intermedle with matters of the first Table and are there no sins against the first Table that God hates so much as he hates Oaths yea there are Blasphemies of opinion that are of a more hateful and harrid nature But what ought to be done in this case I leave that to your Honors wisdom to find out by searching of the Scriptures knowing that the Lord hath made many of you very dextrous and skilful in the understanding of the Scripture When you meet with Crimes of a Civil Nature mentioned in the New Testament as Murther Adultery Theft c. You cannot Read their Penalties there which ought to be inflicted you find the sins but not the Punishments against such Offenders What course do you take you are forced to fly to the Old Testament and to fetch your Light thence There are Apostates from the true God from the true Christ from the true Faith in the great Fundamental of it and from the true Worship in the very Substantials of it and who also are Teachers of Apostasie who yet were once enlightned and knew the Truth What ought to be done to such or what course ought to be taken that Dishonour to God may not be increased nor the Land troubled by Gods Controversie against it I leave

to those in whom he is in light in power and grace as he will Therefore neither we nor any others have infallible judgments in all things at all times but we are subject to Errour and in many things we do not apprehend and speak aright of God of Christ of the Spirit of the Saints of our selves of the mysteries of the Gospel which are some of those things which are eternal As God said to Iobs Friends Ye have not spoken of me the things that are right as my Servant Job hath and Iob himself did darken Counsel by words without knowledge when he spake of God Notwithstanding that fallible mind and judgement that is in all men in some things and at some times yet because the Rule that is left men to judge by is an infallible sure and certain Rule which cannot deceive men and because it is a plain Rule in many things and easily understood Prov. 1. 4. and because the principles of Religion and fundamentals of Salvation are so clearly revealed in the Scripture that Babes in Christ may come to the knowledge of them therefore both we and all the Saints may in some things have an infallible judgement and may judge of things eternal with a judgement of Certainty both respecting God Christ Faith Repentance Resurrection of the dead eternal judgment and many other things How else could there be any preaching if persons could not know infallibly that in some things they hold forth they speak the Truth And how could any thing be assuredly believed if the word of Faith in the true sense of it could not infallibly be held forth and judged of And how could any Person be at a certainty concerning his own Salvation And how could any Christian seal the Truth of Christ with his blood if some things could not be judged of with an infallible judgement But whether any person having not the Spirit can have an infallible judgement to judge of things eternal by the knowledge they may get from the Scripture is the drift and scope of the question if I be able to make a judgement of it They think that none can infallibly judge of things of an eternal nature but such who have the Spirit and that we are persons that have not the Spirit and therefore cannot judge of them nor of their way and that they themselves have the Spirit and that judgement belongs to them only both of persons and of things we are but in our first birth and are carnal and know not things of an eternal Nature they are in the second birth and are spiritual and can judge all things and all men for hitherto tends a great part of a large Letter sent unto us from them by which I come to prove them in this question In answer therefore unto this I must distinguish of infallible judgement There is an infallible Judgment which may be made from the Scripture without the Spirit and there 's an infallible judgment which cannot be made from the Scripture without the spirit The Judgment that may be made from the Scripture without the Spirit infallibly respects the Doctrine which the Scripture contains to be received believed by men that they may be saved what they be and what manner of life it is that Persons ought to live that would come to Life eternal these things are clearly and plainly laid down and may easily be taken up by unprejudiced Persons who have unballanced spirits though they have not the spirit Upon this account it is that the Apostle John would not have every Spirit believed but would have the spirits tryed whether they be of God but how must they be tried unless by the Scriptures for every one will pretend the Spirit and there are many false Prophets who have the spirit of delusion and are gone forth into the world 1 Joh. 4. 1. For if the Scripture were not the judge of the Spirit in this case so far as concerns Doctrines and Manners which men have Received and learned whether they be of God or no or whether the spirit of the Devil hath not inspiried them therewith all men living would be put upon desperate uncertainties which is the Spirit that gives our the Truth and which is the spirit of Errour And they would be confounded through the multiplicity of spirits each spirit pretending to Truth and crying down the contrary as Errour Therefore the Scripture alone being of the Spirits inspiring is a light sufficient to shew the Doctrine what it is and the commandment precept what it is to one that will attend unto it without any further inspiration of the Spirit else in vain were the Scriptures at the first inspired But then again there is an infallible Judgement which cannot be made without the Spirit that is whether those Doctrines and Rules of Life which are clearly contained in the Scripture be Doctrines which proceeded from God whether God spake with Moses sent Christ to declare what he hath declared inspired the Apostles in speaking and writing what they have spoken or written or whether all these spake of themselves It is the Spirit of God alone that can give assured satisfaction concerning this The Jews and their Rulers though they saw the Miracles yet they know not Christ to be the Messiah for had they known him they would never have crucified the Lord of glory These are among those invisible things which are revealed unto us by the Spirit as the Apostle tels us 1 Cor. 2. 8 9 10. It is easie for any man that hath his reason and hath not the Spirit by reading the Scripture to conclude that Scripture makes Jesus the Son of Mary to be the Son of God and the Christ But for any man to beleeve it and build upon it as a sure truth of God this is from the Spirit flesh and blood hath not revealed this but the Father which is in Heaven Christ told Peter so Mat. 16 16. The conclusion is That the Scripture is the foundation of an insallible judgement concerning things contained in them and not the Spirit but both Scripture and Spirit must concur to give in the certainty of those things that are there contained that they may become a sure rock to be built upon for no one can say assuredly and by a spirit of Faith that Jesus is the Lord but by the holy Ghost 1 Cor. 12. 3. Quere 5. Whether you be above the Apostle and able to Concerning perfection what may be granted and what not judge his condition because you say he was not perfect who said he spake wisedom among them that were perfect Answ This Question relates to a passage in our Answer to a Letter of theirs which pleaded for perfection which we had the sight of which fell into their hands and hath occasioned this Question The words of our Answer are these He might have discerned that Paul expressly denies perfection in reference to himself Phil. 3. 12. His Question hence is Are you