Selected quad for the lemma: truth_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
truth_n	ancient_a	church_n	doctrine_n	1,896	5	6.2759	4	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A60612	Two sermons preached at two publick assizes for the county of Svffolk, in the sheriffalty of Will. Soame of Hawleigh, in Suffolk, Esq. by Will. Smyth, D.D., Pr. Nor. and vic. of Mendlesham in Suffolk.	Smith, William, b. 1615 or 16.	1674 (1674)	Wing S4283; ESTC R21663	29,870	126

Faith are either expresly declared or evidently deduced from the holy Scriptures and none to be believed as such but those that are so And as to the super-fundamental Articles of Doctrine contrived for the common peace and order of particular Churches such as are our 39 Articles and as the Confessions of other Churches ought to be so accounted if they be not refutable by the Scriptures and the analogy of Faith nor be contrariant to right reason ought also to be reputed the Doctrines of God 2. But then secondly Because God was pleased so to deliver his truths in Scripture for reasons before mentioned to which many more might be added with some obscurity though not so much so by it self as made so by the moral infirmities of mens understandings therefore Christ did provide and immediately send another guide which the Apostles themselves did seem to stand in need of though they were blest with Christs personal instructions and that was the Holy Ghost which he promised should guide them into all truth Joh. 16.13 And lest it should seem to have concerned the Apostles onely in their time it was also promised to abide with them for ever Joh. 14.16 that is for the benefit of their successors and the whole Church to the end of the World Therefore whosoever would afterward understand the doctrines which were of God was obliged not onely to be governed by his own private reading the Scriptures and judgment upon them but also to enquire for and to submit to the conduct of Gods Spirit wheresoever it was to be found Now this is principally to be understood as to cases in controversie and to difficult places but as to the fundamentals of the common Faith and rules of Holy Life as they are plainly set down in Scripture and easily discoverable to every honest mind so every man ought to be encouraged to a constant reading of them for the confirmation of his Faith and government of his Life 3. Therefore thirdly and lastly Our next enquiry is to understand where those promises were or are fulfilled and where the guiding Office of the Holy Ghost was or is executed and performed that men may attend to it and be guided by it in all cases of different perswasions and professions that they may know which are of God The Romanists would engross it to the Churches of their Communion onely and that by as an infallible a conduct as the Apostles enjoyed it But because this pretence hath been so lately examined and sufficiently baffled I shall only enquire how some Popes themselves should be recorded to have been notorious Hereticks as particularly Liberius and Honorius and then how he that relies on that pretence can reasonably think himself secure The Fanaticks on the other side if as to us they may be thought altogether to be of two sides lay claim to it by an especial particular light given to them of God or as the soberer sort of them by a private sufficient assistance from God in the use of the best mears they can for the understanding the Scriptures But there needs no other confuration of this pretence but their certain disappointment that have trusted ' o it made evident by their own unconstancy of opining and the perpetual disagreements of those that have made that claim There is but one more that I know of was ever pretended to and indeed then which I cannot imagine any other that can with any shew of reason be offered in satisfaction to this Enquiry and that is the Holy Ghosts guidance of the universal Church in all Ages and places to be observed in those doctrines and interpretations of Scripture according to the famous rule of Vincentius Lirinensis which claim to Primitive Antiquity universal Profession and Consent Quod ubique quod semper quod ab emnibus hoc vere proprieque catholicum cap. 30. So that the sum of this Enquiry is that those are the doctrines of Christ and his Apostles which have been received as such in the first and purest Ages and that have continued to be acknowledged as such by the most universal Consent and Profession Against the absoluteness and unexceptionable exactness of this rule of Vincentius whatsoever may be alledged or granted it must for ever stand uncontrolled till any other rule can be produced or imagined which I think no man hath pretended to attempt that may in any degree demonstrate the promises of the Holy Spirit guiding into all truth Now this is the Glory of the Church of England and which hath made her the envy of all her dissenting Neighbours round about her that in all her Doctrines Government and Worship she alone can offer her self to this most reasonable and antient Rule to be tried and judged to which no other Church in the World dare pretend to submit Therefore it is that all those doctrines wherein we differ from the Church of Rome cannot be from the conduct of Gods Spirit and so not the doctrines of the Spirits that are of God because they want the first part of Vincentius his rule that is succession from primitive antiquity And therefore the great Archbishop offered this challenge p. 382. That if any Jesuite can prove that by a visible continued succession to this day either Transubstantiation in the Eucharist the Eucharist in one kind or Purgatory or Worship of Images or Prayers in an unknown Tongue with divers other points have been so taught I for my part will yield the cause As to the private opinions of some ancient Fathers as those of Tertul Orig. St. Austin and others though they had antiquity yet they wanted universal consent and so were maintained against that part of the evidence of being the Doctrines of God And then as to the new opinions of these times so strongly contended for by our present dissenters such as concern their new models of Government manner of Worship and several opinions as they stand in opposition to the present established Church of England could not be from Christ and his Apostles and they that teach them not the spirits that are of God because they want all the marks of Gods Spirit as having neither primitive Antiquity nor universal Consent Profession or Practice and we challenge them to shew it if they have any which if they do I shall willingly sacrifice all that I have said against them to shame and Recantation All the Arguments that I know they have to tempt them from their conformity to this excellent Church is either ignorance because they understand it not or perverseness of humour and discontentedness of mind which in some men must for ever be gratified by opposition or else an habitual dislike which they call tender Conscience which we may then believe to be sincerely pretended when we see the same tenderness expressed in the most considerable practices of Christianity and Holy Life as Justice Mercy Obedience to Authority and the like as well as in the declining a poor innocent Ceremony or formation of substantial Worship no where forbidden by God and commanded by the just Laws of men This is the third and last mark and Character of the Spirits that are of God to whose conduct we may entrust our souls and that is such as teach the Doctrines that are of God And now you see by the transient applications that I have made and the clear evidence of the matter it self upon what a sure foundation the present constituted Church of England stands above any Profession of Christianity in the World As to my endeavour of offering all the marks of a true Church and its Ministry I thank God I can testifie to him that I have with-held no evidence that I know of that may discover the truth nor offered any thing in my applications of them to our own which my soul hath not as faithfully dictated as my Tongue expressed Time gives me not leave to offer any further applications onely I desire and pray to God that those that yet truly adhere to this Church may by what I have said find reason to love and honour it and the true Spirits of God within it more and more and that those that are departed from it may timely and seriously consider upon what slender evidence they have done it and may speed their return to it as to a Church that hath all the marks of God and Characters of truth upon it And I hope there be many amongst us that have so much compassion for them as to be willing if God Almighty should grant it as a condition of so great a mercy to be something that may resemble St. Pauls noble Charity when he wished himself accursed that is at least to be deprived of the happiness of an outward Profession of Christianity to bring the Romans to it Rom. 9.3 that such our dissenters were returned in mind and practice to serve God with us with one heart and mouth Which God grant for Jesus sake FINIS

shall 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Rom. 16.18 by good words and fair speeches deceive the hearts of the simple And when St. Peter forewarns them of false Prophets he tells them they shall come with the speaking character 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 2 Pet. 2.3 with feigned words that is framed and fashioned perhaps to the highest strains of Piety But if those Teachers seem to be over-studious to exceed others in more pleasing and melting modes of speaking and to habituate themselves to extraordinary winning and humouring expressions though what they say be good yet they may justly give occasion to wise observers to collect some reasons to suspect their truth and sincerity Therefore St. Jerome observed in his time affabilis sermo blandum eloquium c. sunt haereticorum laequei quibus pisces capiunt volucres an affable way of discoursing and a flattering delivery were the sna●es of Hereticks by which they catched the little People into their affections and opinions But if in stead of the true spirits modest endeavour to found the Peoples souls in the common Articles of the Christian Faith they shall chuse to fly aloft like St. Judes empty Clouds at higher doctrines as they call them As when they turn the Gospel into a Mystery of which they themselves must pretend to be the only men that carry the Keys to open it and if instead of instructing the People in their obligations to obey Christs commandments and soberly directing them in all parts of holy life as Justice Mercie Obedience to Authority and the like which they reach the poor people to undervalue as legal preaching they be venturing at the seals of the Revelation numbring of heads and horns and beasts controuling Governments and disputing Laws or shall be towring up to the lofty Nothings of empty Metaphors extravagant Notions and Phrases or be continually trading with St. Judes 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 great swelling words of Priviledges Saintships Liberties Divine Unions and the like or be always at a thousand repetitions of the name of Christ getting him laying hold o● him closing with him and the like though they do all this with the greatest earnestness zeal and sweat imaginable they grow beyond suspicion their design is not good The sum is To be able to pray and preach with the best skill and capacity is no distinguishing mark for men may have those faculties and yet nevertheless be spirits Teachers that are not of God 2. Nor secondly can a pretence to a claim for their doctrines from the holy Scriptures be a sufficient mark of distinction for as much as no Ancient or Modern Heretick but did and do cry up an interest in Gods Word to support or at least to seem to palliate their plea and doctrines And this is pregnantly to be taken notice of through the whole stock of Ecclesiastick Records Tertullian very early observed in his famous Book De praescriptionibus Haereticorum that Suadere non possunt de rebus fidei nisi de literis fidei scriptur as obtendunt hac sua audacia quosdam movent it had not been possible to have removed some from the truth had they not been prevailed with by the sacred name of Scripture How much would this hour be too little for such heaps of observations of this kind as might be collected Now all the advantage which all false spirits do make by pretending Scriptures is because God hath so delivered his truths in them many of which are so wrapt up in Metaphors and other Tropes and Figures so immixt with occasional discourses and very often so obscurely delivered or as St. Paul expresseth it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 so darkly and as it were in a riddle that they that have designs to deceive others that want humility to hear the sense of the Church and to obey their lawful Guides appointed to instruct them in their right interpretation may find Arguments semblable enough in Scripture to serve the ends of a Deceiver to satisfie a private and prejudicate spirit in any errour in the world wresting them as St. Peter adviseth us to their own destruction Hence it is that Hereticks of the greatest inconsistency among themselves and some of them in perfect contradiction one to another have laid their Plea upon the holy Scriptures So Vincentius observes of the Hereticks before his time and instanceth in Photinus Novatianus Sabellius Donatus and many others And we our selves in our days have seen the same effect To instance How have the Socinians found in Scripture a seeming authority to assert their denial of Christs Divinity and yet the Romanist can think he thence finds proof enough that a Priest in a Wafer may make him the mighty God and worship him accordingly How have the contending Armies of the Remonstrants and Contra Remonstrants whose principles stand at the Poles distance one from another managed their long War with the same weapon of holy Scripture And how from thence have the three great parties among us perswaded themselves that each of them can in Scripture trace the measures of their several Church-governments And which is most to be admired how have the unwarrantable practices of Rebellion Murder and confounding all that 's sacred been so far patronized from Scripture as to engage multitudes to believe them to be the prosecutions of Gods cause and instances of his most acceptable service Hath not experience taught us that such a distant Text as Down with it down with it even to the ground hath prevailed more to destroy the places of Publick Worship then that This House shall be called a House of Prayer could perswade men to keep them up that a binding Kings in chains have tempted men to the most execrable destruction of their natural Princes when they that resist shall receive to themselves damnation could not satisfie their Consciences to preserve them And have we not heard that a Curse ye Meroz could justifie all the Ravages committed upon the Loyal and the Innocent To be short the sum is A bate appeal and claim to Scripture is not an incommunicable mark but that nevertheless the spirit that doth it may not be of God 3. Thirdly and lastly A plausible and fair life and conversation doth not distinguish for as much as the greatest enemies of truth in all Ages have been noted for a greater pretext of framed sanctimony and formed piety outward innocency and humility or so much of these as might serve to advance a reputation to their Plea and Doctrines But this is the sheeps cloathing of false Prophets Mat. 7.14 and the transformation of false Apostles into the likeness of the Apostles of Christ 1 Cor. 11.13 And it is that which St. Paul calls 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 2 Tim. 3.5 the form or appearance of godliness S. Austin relates that the great temperance and devotion of the Manachees betrayed himself and Alipius into the gross heresie of Manachism And S. Basil affirms of the Arians that ob confictam