Selected quad for the lemma: truth_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
truth_n	age_n	church_n	time_n	2,142	5	3.6322	3	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A66891	Aron-bimnucha, or, An antidote to cure the Calamites of their trembling for fear of the Ark to which is added Mr. Crofton's creed touching church-communion : with a brief answer to the position (pretended to be) taken out of his pocket and added to the end of a scandalous and schismatical pamphlet, entituled Jerubbaal justified.	Womock, Laurence, 1612-1685.	1663 (1663)	Wing W3335; ESTC R38319	81,961	126

ever since the Apostles times and yet the Separatist condemns her for Antichristianism in her Discipline The plain truth is she is between these two Factions as between two Mill-ston●s and unless your Majesty look to it to whose trust she is committed she 'll be ground to Powder to an irreparable both dishonour and loss to this Kingdom And 't is very remarkable that while both these press hard upon the Church of England both of them cry out upon persecution like froward children which scratch and kick and bite and yet cry out all the while as if themselves were kill'd What successe this great Distemper Ibid. paulo post caused by the Collision of two such Factions may have I know not I cannot Prophesie We may change the Phrase into A great Distemper caused by their Coalition and clubbing of Interests to gain a Toleration what success this may have I know not but as that renowned Prelate goes on though I cannot Prophesie Ibid. paulo post yet I fear that Atheism and Irreligion gathers strength while the Truth is thus weakned by an unworthy way of contending for it And while they thus contend neither part consider that they are in a way to induce upon themselves and others that contrary extream which they seem most both to fear and oppose But let the Ark of God be setled with a decent splendor and all the parts of Gods worship and service be performed with a due and becoming Reverence and in order hereunto let the Hierarchy of the Church enjoy its full Authority and incouragement and then we shall be in no such danger of Apostasie to either of these Factions 5. But however they say we have reason to perswade our selves that England's Ark is in danger to be lost were it only for the sins and prodigious iniquities that we are guilty of our Common-wealth sins drunkenness and uncleanness bribery and oppression our Sanctuary-sins our remissness and unfruitfulness our indifferency and lukewarmness the prophanation of Sabbaths and the strange unheard of unthankfulness that is amongst us And that Commination will extend to us if we be guilty of the like unfruitfulness Therefore I say unto you the Kingdom of God shall be taken from you and given to a Nation bringing forth the fruits thereof Mat. 21.43 Pudet haec opprobria nobis Et dici potuisse non potuisse refelli I must ingenuously confess we have but too much cause to be ashamed that we have requited the Lord no better that we have no better means to wipe off the stain of this most deserved reproach And unless we do seasonably repent God will visit for these things and be avenged of such an ingrateful Nation as this is In old Eli's time when the Priests were guilty of so much intemperance and uncleanness so much rapine and sacriledge and yet the out-cries of a complaining people could not awaken the Supreme Governour to unsheath his sword to redress these exorbitancies but the Priests proceeded to multiply and aggravate their crimes and the Prince his Lenity made his reprehensions but little better then a Toleration or Connivance and so the people fell into irreligion and prophaneness they abhorred the offering of the Lord When there was such a complication of sins and the sins of the Rulers as well Ecclesiastical as Civil did both procure and encourage sin in the people Then the Holy Oracle grew silent God himself departed the Cherubims made use of their wings to flye away and the Ark of God was taken If we be in league with Hell 1 Sam. chap. 3. 4. the Ark of the Covenant will not owne us Now the energy and efficacy of witchcrafts depends upon a League with Hell and Rebellion is as the sin of witchcraft as long therefore as we cleave unto and in our hearts follow an Usurper we can have no saving Communion with the Ark of God no more then Israel had while they marched after Jeroboam They are nothing else but their iniquities that do separate betwixt God and his people Isa 59.1 Jer. 7.7 c. it is their sins that with-hold good things from them even the blessings of the Ark and God's Holy Temple As for the beauty of his Ornament he set it in Majesty but they made the image of their abominations and of their detestable things therein Therefore have I set it far from them And I will give it into the hands of the strangers for a prey and to the wicked of the earth for a spoil and they shall pollute it Ezek. 7.20 21. Under the Gospel we finde one Church that left her first Love Another that was neither hot nor cold Rev. chap. 2 3. A third that had a name that she lived but really she was dead A fourth that had such in her bosome and communion as did teach the wicked policies of Balaam and the unclean doctrine of the Nicolaitans A fifth that did grant a Toleration to Jezabel notwithstanding her execrable Artifice and practices in seducing such as had been dedicated to God's Service to commit Fornication and Idolatry And was removed and the Ark of God was taken from them And though the Ark of God were entail'd upon England yet there is a measure there are aggravations there are combinations of sin that when they are once made up will provoke God to use his prerogative over us not in a way of mercy but of justice to cut off that entail and determine as he did in another case against it Though England were the signet upon my right hand yet would I pluck thee thence And yet this I must take leave to interpose in vindication of the present Church of England The fault is not in her She may truly say the Sons of Zeruiah are too hard for us She hath it not in her power to redress things as she would And whose factious clamours and petitions and other acts of open hostility were they that unhing'd the Government and pull'd down those venerable Courts of Justice whose Authority and Splendour were able to dazzle the eyes and break the hearts of the most insolent offenders Till such Courts can be restored we must have patience to preach and pray being in the same condition that we finde the Church of Corinth in 2 Cor. 10.6 Having in a readiness to revenge all disobedience when your obedience shall have been fulfilled The delinquents among them were too numerous and too potent for the Censures of the Church to take place upon them For it is not prudent to exasperate a multitude with the severity of a Discipline which their numbers can so easily over-master But when the Reformation of the major part is so conspicuous and the Zeal of the conformable part so serious and earnest that it may be prudent to proceed against the refractory then the Church will not fail in her duty but inflict such censures upon offenders as shall be suitable to their demerits Having in

Isa 9.16 and a godly people that by such flatteries they might seduce them to run on in errour with them wo unto them for they have gone in the way of Cain and ran greedily after the errour of Balaam for reward and perished in the gainsaying of Corah Jud. ep v. 11. if they repent not away with them And give us and God of his mercy continue to us such a disingaged ingenuous Ministry as may resemble his own incarnate Word Heb. 4.12 one that is quick and powerful sharper than any two edged sword piercing even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit and of the joynts and marrow and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart God grant us such a Ministry that there may follow the like conviction of sinners to that mentioned by the Apostle 1 Cor. 14.25 If all prophesie and there come in one that believeth not or one unlearned he is convinced of all he is judged of all and thus are the secrets of his heart made manifest and so falling down on his face he will worship God and report that God is in you of a truth God knows this Kingdom in general hath need of such a faithful soul-searching Ministry as this is But there are many unruly and vain talkers and deceivers as St. Paul tells Titus whose mouths must be stopped who subvert whole houses teaching things which they ought not for filthy lucres sake Tit. 1.10 11. the silencing or degrading such popular Priests and seditious Levites will not indanger the Ark of God at all And if Abiathar does complot with Joab to promote the intended Usurpation of Adonijah as great a Priest as he is it is fit he should be sent to Anathoth and confined to his Country Village lest he make the City by his Conspiracy too hot for Solomon and in his absence as well the Ark of God as the person of the King will be so much the more in safety 1 Kings 1.5 7. with Chap. 2.26 4. But there is a fourth Prognostication of this sad Calamity that is the abundance of Popish Priests and Jesuites that are in the midst of us the growing and increasing of Popery and that proneness that is in people to run head-long back again to the Garlick and Onions of Egypt this argument sure is sufficient to make us all believe the Ark of God is in danger But the truth is the Persons that make the Argument are none of the most likely men to prevent what they complain of For who have done so much to harden that Popish party to give them encouragement and advantage as they have done not to mention their Club-law and Sequestrations with the sale of their estates no Cogent Arguments sure to resolve and settle Conscience what by charging them with such things as cannot be made good against them and by condemning what is not to be disallowed in them and by opposing very weakly with more strength of passion than reason what is justly to be reproved they have made them more inflexible and obstinate in their opinions And they have given them advantage also by their factious Confederacies against that Hierarchy of the Church whose Learning and Authority is under God the onely probable means to check and silence them It was a most remarkable observation in the Sermon of the late most Reverend Archbishop upon the Scaffold alluding to that Counsel of the Priests and Pharisees against our Saviour Joh. 11.48 Men are afraid saith he that if they let this man alone the Romans will come and that Popery will prevail and then they will take away our place and our Nation but it proved the contrary for after they had put that man to death then the Romans came indeed and vanquish'd the City Popery could never have broken in upon us to shake the Ark of God in its decent and happy settlement amongst us as long as our lawful Governours were undisturbed in their station They were our new door-keepers they that thrust out the right Possessors to make room for their own ambi●ion they turn'd the Key and opened the Door nay they pull'd down the walls of Gods House and let in Popery It was their turning the Ark of God into a Noab's Ark where so many sorts of wild and unclean beasts were herded up together without order or distinction their dangerous mistakes in Doctrine their horrible confusions in Discipline their irreligious defalcations of some parts of Gods worship and their scandalous irreverence in the performance of all the rest these disorders caused so many to abhor the offering of the Lord and they inclined others whether more out of devotion and reverence that out of levity and a desire of change I shall not determine but inclin'd they were upon this account to lend a weak ear to the insinuations of those cunning Charmers of the Church of Rome For to use the words of that Wise and Learned Archbishop A Relation of the Conference with Fisher in Epist Ceremonies are the Hedge that fence the substance of Religion from all the Indignities which Prophaness and Sacriledge too commonly put upon it And this I have observed that no one thing hath made conscientious men more wavering in their own minds or more apt and easie to be drawn aside from the sincerity of Religion professed in the Church of England then the want of Uniform and Decent Order in too many Churches of the Kingdom And the Romanists have been apt to say The Houses of God could not be suffered to lie so Nastily as in some places they have done were the true worship of God observed in them or did the people think that such it were And I may add this as a further matter of scandal and advantage to them when men do openly proclaim and that so crudely and without any distinction that there is not a Nation under heaven * Mr. Calamy's challenge pag. 13. amounts to a positive assertion except this Nation of England that ever enjoyed the Gospel a hundred years together which is so apparently false that nothing can well be more false than that is when they tell us that gray hairs are upon the Gospel which is everlasting * Heb. 12.27 28. ch 8. ult Rev. 14.6 and can never wax old who can fence off the Scandal and not be transported with indignation to hear the holy Text abused by such absur'd allusions designed on purpose to raise up amuzements and jealousies in the people And we may now see the said Archbishops just Complaint to His Majesty of ever Blessed Memory verified In his Relation of the Conference in Epist by too sad an instance That the Church of England was in a hard condition She professes the antient Catholick Faith and yet the Romanist condemns her of Novelty in her Doctrine She practises Church-government as it hath been in use in all Ages and all Places where the Church of Christ hath taken any Rooting both in and