Selected quad for the lemma: truth_n
Text snippets containing the quad
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A56717
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The work of the ministry represented to the clergy of the Diocese of Ely / by Symon, Lord Bishop of Ely.
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Patrick, Simon, 1626-1707.
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1698
(1698)
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Wing P867; ESTC R33031
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38,681
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134
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once a Year on the first day of Lent though the Prayers then appointed are to be used at other times as the Ordinary shall appoint This if done solemnly though it seem a thing of no great labour yet might have a great effect For every one knows or ought to know that the Lent Fast was Instituted to be a time of Repentance and to bring Men to it what can be more effectual than this Denunciation of Gods Anger and Judgments against Sinners with most comfortable assurances of Grace and Mercy to the Penitent I know it is hard as the World goes to get a Congregation together upon that day when this is required to be read in the Church You may therefore read it on the First Sunday in Lent and then put the Sense of it into your Sermon where it may be proper to press them to weigh every part of it distinctly And in order to it remove that foolish Objection which I have heard some have in their Mouths that they cannot endure to Curse their Neighbours by showing them plainly that they are not the Curses of the People but of God himself which he hath denounced against Sinners To which when the People are ordered to say AMEN they only consent to the truth of that which God saith The very Office teaches this when it declares the end of reading those Curses gathered out of the XXVII of Deuteronomy and other places of Scripture and the Peoples saying Amen to them that they may flee from such vices for which they affirm with their own mouth the Curse of God to be due And represent to them also that whether they will affirm these Curses to be due or no they will fall upon them if they be such Sinners as are there named and the sooner because they refuse to say Amen to the Words of God that is affirm what he affirms who is the Faithful and the True This Cavil being taken away it will be easie to make them sensible how useful it is for them to joyn with you in this Commination which may awaken drousy Souls to consider and amend their evil doings that they may escape those Judgments that are threatned to them which are unavoidable if they go on still in their Sins There was something like this among the ancient Jews who at certain stated times were wont to denounce a general Anathema against all the Israelites who knowingly and willingly violated such and such Laws A Form of which Mr. Selden hath given us out of their Ritual called Colho Lib. IV. De Jure Nat. Gent. cap. 7. This it is likely the Christian Church thought fit to imitate not by denouncing a formal Anathema but only by a solemn recital of the Threatnings in God's Laws against impenitent Sinners And their affirming the truth and certainty of them Which in the Romish Church came at last to such an Anathema as I now mentioned in the Jewish Ritual call'd The greater Excommunication which here in England was denounced by every Bishop twice a year and by every Parish-Priest four times a year against certain Persons A Form of which great Curse the same most Learned Person hath given us out of the Ritual according to the use of the Church of Sarum in his first Book De Synedriis Cap. X. where he observes that in the room of this our first Reformers only ordered this Maledictory Commination as he well stiles it to be used once a Year In the beginning of which Commination there is mention made of a godly Discipline in the Primitive Church whereby such Persons as stood Convicted of notorious sins were in the beginning of Lent put to open Pennance This Discipline we there wish might be restored again but seem to suppose that for the present we can only instead of it denounce God's anger and judgments against sinners and make them say Amen thereunto whereby they may stand Convicted in their own Consciences that they are under the Curse of God and so be brought to Repentance Had we not need then do this very seriously if it be all that we can do of this kind Yet let it be considered whether we may not be able to do something more if we will attempt it For may not scandalous Persons be more frequently presented than they are May not private Admonitions if not publick be more used Let us not then think fit to do nothing because we cannot do all that we would The right way to enlarge our Authority of the want of which we complain is to use that which we have uprightly and faithfully That is if we presented none in the Ecclesiastical Court till private Applications had been made to them with seriousness and earnestness unsuccessfully and if it were done without respect to Persons Parties or Interests we might bring our Courts into that just esteem and credit which they ought to have And having mentioned private Admonition let me in a few words remember you that at your Ordination you promised to use both publick and private monitions and exhortations as well to the sick as to the whole within your Cures as need shall require and occasion shall be given And perhaps more good might be done this way than any other if it were done at fitting times with as much secrecy as may be and with apparent affection to them In some Cases perhaps it may be done most effectually by Letter which may be sent when you cannot have opportunity to speak to them And here it may be proper to admonish you that Dissenters from our Church are thus to be dealt withal by some way of private Conference with them not by Preaching against them for they are not there to hear it Our own People indeed are by publick Discourses as well as otherways to be confirmed and established in our Communion But there is no way to reduce them but by private arguing with them Which is not to be omitted because the present act of Indulgence doth not justify them in their separation but only suspends the Punishments to which they were before liable Still they are in a state of Schism out of which you should endeavour to recover them by kind Perswasions and Arguments which may work more upon them than all the Penalties formerly inflicted which made them Angry but did not Convert them For the Conclusion of this part of my Treatise I should upon the mention of LENT have said something concerning that Fast and other days of Fasting or Abstinence appointed by the Church which if Men could be perswaded to observe as times of Recollection and Examination of themselves and Prayer they would find great benefit thereby to the encrease of Christian Piety I wrote a little Book about it in the beginning of the late Reign which had the Approbation of my Superiours But I have not room to say more of it here Nor of the Festivals which are ordered to be kept in Commemoration of great Blessings God hath bestowed
the Holy Scriptures and the Ancient Doctors of the Church And they who have not had opportunity to make such improvement in Divine Knowledge may furnish themselves out of their Writings which these Hereticks have occasioned Particularly out of the Bishop of Worcester's Discourse about the Blessed Trinity which is not long but very full and satisfactory 3. Yet I must admonish you when you find it necessary to discourse to your People upon this Subject that you be mindful of His Majesties late Injunctions and not presume to invent any new ways of explaining so sublime a Mystery as the Holy Trinity or use any other terms to express it but such as the Ancient Christians used and are in the Articles of our Religion the Three Creeds and our Liturgy Which teach us that our Blessed Saviour is the Son of God in the highest and most proper sense of these Words by Eternal Generation In like manner we are to believe that the Holy Ghost is God proceeding from the Father and the Son This may be evidently proved out of the Scriptures wherein God hath thus far revealed his own most Blessed Nature as well as his Mind and Will unto us But how the Son is Begotten of the Father and how the Holy Ghost proceeds from both he hath not revealed unto us because it is as incomprehensible as the Divine Essence is and therefore we must not adventure to say any thing about it For though we know that the Son is God and the Holy Ghost is God and yet there are not Three Gods but one God in Three Persons because the Holy Scriptures plainly declare the Son to be a distinct Person from the Father and the Holy Ghost from both yet what it is that makes the distinction of the Person of the Son from the Person of the Father c. that is not declared to us by God who only knows it and therefore is not to be enquired into Accordingly the Holy Fathers of the Church frequently admonish us to forbear such enquiries in that Memorable saying of theirs 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 search not into the manner how such things can be but shun such enquiries For the manner of the Sons Generation and the Holy Ghosts Procession can be comprehended by none but themselves But such things being let alone as out of our reach let it be your business to establish the People in this great Truth that Jesus Christ is really the Eternal Son of God begotten of him before all Worlds By representing this to them as the great support of their Souls which may safely rely upon one so mighty to save For he who is perswaded that our Saviour is perfect God as well as perfect Man can no more doubt of his Power to communicate all Divine Grace to us than he can doubt of the Vertue of his Sacrifice to make satisfaction for our Sins and work our Reconciliation with God whereby whatsoever might hinder his Divine Communications to us is taken out of the way We are sure if this be true that he is an Everlasting Spring of Divine Grace to the whole World would they but believe on him Whereas it is inconceivable how any mere Creatures should be so highly exaulted as to be possessed of Omnipotence and Omniscience that is to be able to know all our needs as well as to supply them Which it is easie for our Blessed Saviour to do if he be the Eternal Son of God who hath taken out Nature into a personal Union with himself 4. Which great truth being firmly established in their belief endeavour I beseech you to improve it all you are able to the amendment of their lives Such an amazing love of God ought to have a mighty effect upon us all and will make a great change in us if it be heartily believed and pressed home by serious consideration Let that therefore be the great business of your Preaching to reduce this and all other Christian Truths to Christian Practice Make them sensible what manner of Persons they ought to be in all holy Conversation and Godliness as St. Peter speaks being so nearly related to the Son of God Whatsoever Sin you know them to be addicted unto lay the heynousness of it before them especially after God hath loved us so much as to give his only begotten Son to redeem us from all iniquity and purifie us to himself a peculiar people zealous of good Works Whatsoever duty you know them to neg lect or to be remiss in the performance of it represent to them how dangerous it is to disobey our Blessed Saviour who hath made this the test of our love to him that we keep his Commandments Remember them frequently of what he said to his Disciples in his last Discourse he had with them XV John 14. Ye are my Friends if ye do whatsoever I command you 5. Endeavour to convince their judgment about these things by clear Reasons and then to awaken their Affections by your Zeal and Fervour And that will be excited in you by an inward sence and feeling in your own hearts of that which you deliver to your People It is an admirable observation of Erasmus in his Book De ratione Concionandi upon those words of our Saviour concerning John the Baptist V John 35. He was a burning and a shining Light ARDERE PRIUS EST LUCERE POSTERIUS To burn with Zeal that is for God and fervent affection to the People is the first thing and then we shall shine by Christian instructions Which will be faint and feeble if they do not proceed from an ardent Spirit 6. And there is very much in another thing of which the same great Man put me in mind in another part of his Works Lib. V. Epist 27. Where he tells Jodocus Jonas Non parum ponderis adder orationi tuae si quae doces potissimum ex arcanis voluminibus haurias si vita doctrinae responderit si docendi Officium nullâ gloriae nulla quaestus suspitione vitietur It will add no small weight to thy Sermons if thou draw those things that thou tacheth chiefly out of the Holy Scriptures if thy life be correspondent to thy Doctrine and the Office of instructing be tainted with no suspition of vain glory or worldly advantage The proof of what you say out of the Holy Scriptures rightly expounded and fitly apply'd will certainly make it very powerful For what is there that hath so much force in it as the Authority of God All Believers have a great reverence to his Word which the Ancient Christians thought the highest learning Insomuch that the Abyssines who retain much of the ancient Simplicity are never so pleased as to hear the Word of God alledged and the more Scripture any Man hath in his Sermons the more learned they esteem him So Ludolphus informs us in his late Historica Ethiopica Lib. III. Cap. V. N. 16. 7. And there is nothing in the Holy Scripture that you ought to