Selected quad for the lemma: truth_n

Word A Word B Word C Word D Occurrence Frequency Band MI MI Band Prominent
truth_n appear_v true_a zion_n 15 3 8.5222 4 false
View all documents for the selected quad

Text snippets containing the quad

ID Title Author Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication) STC Words Pages
A37496 A plain and necessary confutation of divers gross and antichristian errors, delivered to the vniversity congregation, the last commencement, anno 1653, by Mr. Sydrach Simpson, master of Pembroke Hall in Cambridge Dell, William, d. 1664. 1654 (1654) Wing D924; ESTC R207233 64,161 91

There are 2 snippets containing the selected quad. | View lemmatised text

as dirt and dung and the plain word of the Gospel only shall prevail and flourish among the Christian People which time the Lord hasten for his Elects sake 2. ERROR That they who have endeavoured to pull down Schools have alwayes been men who were found Enemies to Religion So Julian the Apostate shut up the doors of the Schools because he would have all Religion to go down Answer True it is that they who have sought the subversion of Christian Schools wherein the Doctrine of the Gospel is purely taught without the mixture of Philosophy and Heathenism they all have been and are very enemies to the true Religion But they that seek to put down Heathenish Schools and to erect Christian or to reform the Schools of Heathen into Christian or to remove Heathenism out of Christian Schools they are not before God and good men enemies to true Religion but the great friends of it Nay they that call Heathenish Schools by the name of Christian that they may still remain with the better credit in their Heathenism without any true Reformation according to the Gospel I rather judge them to be enemies to the true Religion and friends only to their profit preferment and ends Julian indeed did forbid that Christians should be instructed in the Disciplines of the Gentiles but saith Sozomen the Writer of the Ecclesiastical History he did this because he thought that by those Disciplines men might attain to a great faculty to perswade which advantage he would not have the Christians to gaine to the help of their Religion Now certainly this was done as Socrates another Writer of the Ecclesiastical History doth acknowledge by the singular providence of God For seeing then Christians had begun to degenerate from the Gospel and to betake themselves to Heathenish Learning Julian attribu●●d all the glory and excellency of Christianity to that Learning and so thought with Mr. Simpson that if Humane Learning were denyed to Christians Christianity it self would soon be at end Wherefore the Lord stirred up Julian to put down the Doctrine of the Heathen in the Schools of Christians that it might appear to all the World That as the true Christian Religion is not helped by Humane Learning so neither is it hindred by the want of it And that there is more Light Knowledge Truth Wisdom Power Vtterance given to Christians by the Vnction of the Spirit alone which all receive who believe then through all Heathenish Disciplines And also that it might be manifest that true Christianity is founded on faith in Christ and the gift of his Spirit only and not at all on Humane Learning For what Humane Learning had Peter and John and yet in what Wisdom and Authority did they being ignorant and unlearned men Reprove Convince and Silence the greatest and ablest men of the Jews And what Humane Learning had Steven and yet he confuted the Libertines and Cyrenians and Alexandrians and all the Philosophers of Cilicia and Asia which disputed with him and they all were not able to resist not the Humane Learning but the Wisdom and Spirit by which he spake And Christ hath promised all his people that when for his Names sake they should be brought before Kings and Rulers who usually have the greatest accomplishment of Humane Learning that then they should not study beforehand what to say for he would give them in that very hour a mouth and wisdom which none of their Adversaries should be able to resist And the power and vertue of the Gospel and the wisdom knowledge and utterance of Gods Spirit is more gloriously manifest in plain men then in learned men For in the one the Grace and Vertues of the Spirit are attributed to Humane Learning But in the other to God only who dwells in them Wherefore that the Wisdom and Knowledge and Light and Power of the word of faith in true Christians might not be attributed to Humane Learning God stirred up an enemy to Christian Religion to be so serviceable to it as to hinder Heathenish Doctrine from being taught in the Schools of Christians that so the C●urch might be restored to be as in the dayes of its Youth when there flourished in it only the simple and plain word of faith without any intermingling Philosophy or Humane Doctrine And if Constantine had made such an order in his time Julian had not had such an opportunity to have renounced Christianity and turned Heathen For Julian being instructed in the Philosophy and Disciplines of the Heathen by Libanius his Tutor by this means he came to love Philosophy better then the Gospel and so by degrees turned from Christianity to Heathenisme which may be a fair warning to all Christians that they suffer not their children to be so educated lest at last with Julian they at least in their hearts loath and reject the Gospel and become with him Apostates and Pagans And hence it is most evident that Heathenish Philosophy is so far from being a profitable study for the children of Christians that it is very dangerous for them to be so educated as Socrates is forced to confess where he saith For Christians to be thorowly instructed in the Disciplines of the Gentiles there is none will grant that this is profitable to the Christian Religion For it is not without danger for Christians to be taught in the learning of the Heathens seeing this teacheth that there are many Gods And therefore saith he the Doctrine of the Heathen is not approved by Christ or any of his Apostles or Disciples Wherefore said Luther My counsel is that a youth should shun Philosophy and School Divinity as the death of his soul 3. ERROR That the Knowledge of Heavenly things cannot come to us but by things on earth and that all Divinity is swadled in Humane Learning Answer I conceive that all Christians at the first reading of this will acknowledge that this Doctrine is not Divine but Philosophical The Philosophers say that nothing is in the understanding but that which is first in the sense which is proportionable to that which Mr. Simpson speaks and yet they know not what they say when they say so But let us consider if this be so That the Knowledge of heavenly things cannot come to us but by things on earth then how shall we know the Mysterie of God even the Father and the Mysterie of Christ who is God manifest in the flesh Or how shall the Mysterie of faith and of our union with Christ through faith into one flesh and Spirit with him be known Or the new birth and new Creature which hath all things new in it and all those new things the things of God Or how shall the free Justification of a sinner through the death of Christ and his Reconciliation to God be known with all the rest of the things of the Gospel seeing nothing on earth can reveal the least part of these things And if
Again if any shall Object in reading this Reply that I my self make use of Humane Learning whilst I speak against it I Answer what part of Philosophy is here made use of or who of the Heathens are here quoted I have chiefly made use of the Testimony of some faithfull Christians who have lived in several ages and yet have all witnessed by the same Spirit the same Truth And it is no more Humane Learning to quote Believers in the Church since Christ then to quote the Patriarks and Prophets before Christ or the Apostles and Evangelists which immediatly followed him 5. And last of all If any say I my self relate to the University why then do I speak against it thus I answer that I neither do nor will relate to the University as it is polluted with any of the Abominations herein mentioned But as by the Providence of God alone I have been brought to that Relation in which I now stand and continue in it against the wills and workings of many so through his good pleasure I will remain till he shall otherwise dispose of me and during my sojurning with them I will not fail to testifie against their evil and to endeavor to win all those whom God shall perswade to receive his Truth from Heathenism to the Gospel and from Antichrist to Christ Wherefore let none be offended that I am made willing to hazard and part with my worldly accommodations for Christs Names sake but let them rather praise the Grace of God which hath enabled me to witness a good confession what ever worldly disadvantage I might run into thereby Wherefore welcome the Kingdom Righteousness Power Wisdom Word of Christ though they swallow up all my earthly accommodations For such love hath the Lord put into my heart that I would not willingly conceal any thing of his most precious Truth either to gain or to preserve to my self the whole World And so righteous Father not my will be done nor theirs but Thy will be done in Earth as it is in Heaven FINIS Isa. 62.1 For Sions sake I will not hold my peace and for Jerusalems sake I will not rest until the Righteousness thereof go forth as brightness and the Salvation thereof as a Lamp that burns MAster Sydrach Simpson the last Commencement preaching to the Vniversity Congregation in Cambridge and to many others especially Ministers there gathered together at that time from several parts of the Nation among other things he let fall in that discourse of his these gross and Antichristian Errors The Rehearsal of the Errors 1. He brought in that Scripture 2 Kings 6. v. 1 2. which was his Text the words whereof are these And the Sons of the Prophets said unto Elisha Behold now the place where we dwel with thee is too strait for us let us go we pray thee unto Jordan and take thence every man a beam and let us make us a place where we may dwel and he answered Go yee This Scripture he used to prove the Lawfulness and Religiousness of the present Vniversities and the usefulness and necessity of humane Learning to the Church and Ministery of the New Testament And what the Scripture speaks of those Schools he brought to countenance encourage and justifie these adding that if it were objected That that was the Old Testament He did answer That the old and the new were not distinct Testaments but Administrations thereby holding forth that the Vniversities now are answerable to the Schools of the Prophets that were then and that the Vniversities are as agreeable to the New Testament as the Schools of the Prophets to the Old 2. That they who have endeavoured to pull down Schools have alwaies been men who were found enemies to Religion So Julian the Apostate shut up the doors of the Schools because he would have all Religion to go down 3. That the knowledge of heavenly things cannot come to us but by things on earth and that all Divinity is swadled in Humane Learning 4. That Paul was brought up at the feet of Gamaliel and that God took him so fitted and made him an able Minister of his Church 5. That mens hatred to God doth as well appear in their hatred to Humane Learning as if they hated the Scriptures 6. That if the spirit teach without means men may as well be without the Ordinances as without the Vniversities and Humane Learning 7. That men now are not to receive the spirit in that immediate way to understand the Scriptures in which it was given to them who wrote the Scriptures 8. That men now are to get knowledge by studies and humane Learning and not by inspiration 9. That Humane Learning is as the outworks to the Fort of the Gospel and as the outer Court to the Temple of the Gospel and so if you will keep the Fort well you must keep the outworks strong and if you will preserve the inward you must look to the outward Court 10. But what is the bottom of all this to wit of some mens appearing against Humane Learning as the unction of the Ministerie and against the Vniversities as the Fountain of the Ministerie but this that some say They are one with Christ and as Christ hath the Divine nature in him so every believer hath and he that hath God in him need not go to any man to learn whereas John 17. Christ speaketh of believers as at an infinite distance from him And if believers be so united to Christ as they say they will follow that Christ should not be the only begotten of God and that Christ and we should be equal and be not our Lord c. 11. Arts and Tongues are the Cups in which God drinks to us 12. We shall never keep up Religion if we do not keep up Learning but when Learning goes down Religion goes down too 13. Seeing Religious Foundations are so Antient then keep them up Your Destruction will never be but from your selves These Notes were take from Mr. Simpsons mouth and delivered to me by an honest hand and affirmed to be true for the substance of them and I also heard several others who were hearers of that Sermon relating the same things Now because I find that this Doctrine hath not only grieved the hearts of the faithful but also strengthened the hands of the carnal and evil People The things which he then delivered being usually the thoughts of their hearts and words of their mouths I thought it my duty being set in my place for the defence of the Gospel to give a Publike Reply to such gross Errors so publikely delivered to the danger of so many and which one would never have thought should have proceeded from such a man especially after the day of the Gospel hath so far dawned and the Antichristian shadows are so far retreated and flowen away And so I shall begin with the first of these Errors and proceed in the Order in which they are set down 1.