Selected quad for the lemma: truth_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
truth_n	believe_v	church_n	err_v	1,967	5	9.6697	5	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A23673	A serious and friendly address to the non-conformists, beginning with the Anabaptists, or, An addition to the perswasive to peace and vnity by W.A.	Allen, William, d. 1686.	1676 (1676)	Wing A1072; ESTC R9363	75,150	222

Church of God When the promised Messias was come and the promise thereby fulfilled and a new Revelation made touching his being come and that Jesus the Son of the blessed Virgin was he some of them believed this and so kept their standing in the Church in as much as by that belief they continued to be the Spiritual Seed of Abraham as they were before by their former Faith Whereas the other Jews who did not believe this but opposed the profession of it in those that did ceased thereby to be so much as nominally or by profession the spiritual Seed of Abraham and so became broken off from the Church being now his Seed but after the flesh only This which is indeed the plain truth and easie to be understood is point-blank against your contrary opinion and assertion on which you much build touching the dissolution of the Church which had been Jewish when the Church as Christian did commence The belief of a new Revelation did not make a new Church but the Church in being before had thereby a new illumination and their faith changed into a belief that that now was done which they believed before would be done The Church considered as well before as after the entrance of the Gospel into the World is resembled by one standing Olive-Tree that had some branches broken off and others grafted in And as the same Church continued under the Gospel which did exist or was in being before so the very same Church-members kept their place and standing in it which were of it before except such as were broken off by unbelief And if so then those little Children which were of the Church immediately before their Parents became Christian did not cease to be so by their Parents becoming such nor by any alteration which the Gospel made For if those who were broken off were broken off by unbelief according to the Apostles express assertion Then unless those little Children I speak of were guilty of unbelief in themselves or had it imputed to them from their Parents they could not be broken off but still kept their place and standing in the Church of God But guilty of unbelief by imputation of it from their Parents they could not be for they were Believers Nor could they be any more guilty of it by any act or omission of their own than they were while as Abrahams Spiritual Seed they were of the Church before And therefore the only reason and cause of the dischurching of those who were dischurched not being found in those little Children they could not possibly be dischurched by any alteration which the Gospel made You may further observe how that such expressions are used in the holy writings of the New Testament as do denote the Children of believing Parents to be holy to be separated to God now as well as they were in old Testament times Thus when the Apostle speaks of the Hebrew Christians and their Seed of which the Christian Church was first constituted as the first-fruits unto God and how it was like to continue as the root or stock into which the believing Gentiles in part were already and were further to be grafted he saith thus in Rom. 11.16 If the first-fruits be holy the lump is also holy and if the root be holy so are the branches In old Testament times if the root were holy if the Parents Abrahams Spiritual Seed were holy the branches their little Children were holy also as coming under the same denomination with their Parents And we here see the Apostle asserts the same thing to be now and to take place under the Gospel dispensation He doth not say in reference to times past if the root were holy so were the branches but with reference to the time present if the root be holy so are the branches And as here St. Paul speaks of the Sanctification of the Seed of the Hebrew Believers so elsewhere he asserts the sanctification of the Children of the believing Gentiles when he saith The unbelieving husband is sanctified by the wife and the unbelieving wife is sanctified by the husband else were your Children unclean but now are they holy 1 Cor. 7.14 If we should read this Text according to your interpretation of it thus else were your Children Bastards but now they are Legitimate we should impose such a sense upon the Apostles words as would represent him as speaking untruly For certainly the Children of Heathen Parents born in lawful Wedlock were no Bastards although the Parents were neither of them Believers nor neither of them sanctified by faith or by means of the faith of the other Whereas the holiness of the Children here spoken of did depend upon the faith of one of the Parents if one of them had not been sanctified by means of the faith of the other their Children would have been unclean and yet not Bastards neither provided the Parents were lawfully Married before either of them believed If then your interpretation be not the true sense of the Text and you see for what reason it cannot then what can so reasonably be assigned for it and so agreeably to the current tenour of the Scriptures as those Childrens being separated together with their Parents from Heathenism to Christianity from Idols to God from being without God and Christ in the World to be related to him as members of his Church chosen and called out of the World by which they became relatively holy Unto all that hath been already said let us add in the last place that little Children together with their Fathers are expresly called Disciples Acts 15.10 Where it 's said Why tempt ye God to put a yoke upon the neck of the Disciples which neither we nor our fathers were able to bear That which is here called a putting a yoke upon the neck of the Disciples was the urging the necessity of proselyting the believing Gentiles with their Children by Circumcision after the manner of Moses ver 1. Now the manner of initiating Proselytes of the Gentiles according to the Law of Moses was to Circumcise the Father and his Male Children too if he had any Exod. 12. And therefore the Children of the believing Fathers as well as their Fathers themselves must needs be understood to be those Disciples upon whose necks this yoke was endeavoured to be put This being the plain and genuine sense of this Text in all probability I must needs say it is but a faint put off and weak evasion to escape the force of the testimony given in this Text to the Discipleship of some Infants for you to alledge that it was the doctrine only of the false Teachers imposed upon the Parents and other grown persons who only and not their Infants were able to understand it that was the yoke the only yoke that was endeavoured to be put upon the neck of the Disciples here and that therefore they only must be here meant by the Disciples upon whose neck the yoke was

Apostle unless you could shew that those undetermined circumstances in the administration of holy things the use of which you scruple had been expresly forbidden by some Law of God the abrogation whereof you question which you will never be able to do And therefore this Text is altogether impertinently alledged to justifie you in your practice as many more have been If you say though these words whatsoever is not of faith is sin be brought to confirm a particular proposition yet they contain in themselves an universal one Admit this for I will not deny it yet they will not prove the contrary that whatsoever is of faith in this sense of faith is no sin that is it does not prove that whatsoever a man is perswaded is no sin is therefore no sin And if it does not prove this it will not prove that the act by which you make a Schism sinful in it self does not do any such thing though you are perswaded it does not Though a mans doubtfulness of the lawfulness of an action so long as the reasons of it preponderate and weigh down the reasons that tend to his satisfaction make it unlawful for him to do it under those circumstances yet this will not free him from sin in case he be in an error in being so perswaded but he remains guilty of that error and consequently is accessary also unto the evil that is caused thereby If mens ignorance and unresolvedness in what is their duty were a protection to them from sin-guiltiness though in error it would be an inducement to them to indulge themselves in their ignorance and irresolution But when a man does not know but that he is in such a dilemma as that he sins whether he act or forbear to act either in acting against his Conscience or in neglecting his duty through error of Conscience it will then awaken a man that desires to keep a good Conscience both towards God and towards men to use both diligence and impartiality in his enquiry after what is his duty indeed It is I think but needful upon this occasion to caution many among you against an affected scrupulosity I call that an affected scrupulosity when people love to be scrupulous about some things when they are far from it in other things wherein they have more reason to be scrupulous As when they are nice curious and squeamish about undetermined circumstances in forms of administration of holy things but do not at all or nothing so much scruple the laying waste the peace of the Church and the grieving and hurting others thereby nor to lay Government it self low nor to speak evil freely enough of them that differ from them and the like not to mention what is of more private concern That such things are abroad is too apparent to be denied but whence they proceed is not perhaps so easily perceived Only this is visible that persons scrupulousness about conforming to publick Orders hath obtained them among many the reputation of the stricter sort of professors And from thence it 's possible they may fansie themselves to be of more tender Consciences than others and think it may be a good sign of the truth of grace in them and upon that account and of being thought to be such by others they may affect such a scrupulosity But such as are thus unequal in their scrupling of things may do well to consider that such scrupulosity is a more sure sign of hypocrisie than of a tender Conscience or of the truth of grace in whomsoever it is found as symbolizing with the Pharisees who strained at gnats and yet could swallow Camels Whereas a tenderness of Conscience of the right kind will make a man as much afraid of erring on the right hand as on the left which temper is in Scripture given as the Character of a good man a man that turns not aside to the right hand nor to the left but is the upright man Though tenderness of Conscience is a right good thing if you understand thereby a fear of transgressing any known rule of duty in one thing as well as another in conjunction with a careful endeavour to know his rule in every thing yet scrupulosity which is a fear of offending in that which a man does not know is forbidden is not such a commendable thing as that men should be in love with it or indulge it in themselves but is rather proper to those who are superstitious than to the truly religious Because it proceeds generally from the false Doctrine of men and from a wrong notion of things rather than from the obscurity of the rule of duty I'ts no marvel if there be no end of scruples with them who believe that nothing can be done in faith especially in the external administration of Gods worship but what they can bring a Divine Command or Institution for there being none of them that so teach but practise otherwise as you may soon perceive if you try all particular circumstances in their worship or administration of holy things and must do so unless they will confine themselves to the very words of the Lords Prayer and to the form of words prescribed in baptism and the Lords Supper There are but two ways of knowing Gods mind concerning our duty Natural light and supernatural Revelation And whatever we are not confined to by Divine determination or restrained from by Divine prohibition in one of these ways we may securely and without any scruple do when we are thereunto called by Parents Masters Magistrates or Ecclesiastical Governours That which is not against us is for us in this case as our Saviour also said in another case The Rule of that which is our duty indeed is doubtless very plain and it would be a reproach to the wisdom and goodness of God to think otherwise He hath shewed thee O man what is good saith the Prophet It is mens additions to Gods word and their teaching that as commanded or forbidden by God which he hath not commanded and which he hath not forbidden that is the true cause of our distractions If men would but keep close to what God hath plainly determined and follow the reason of their Governours in other things which are undetermined and their own best reason where they are at liberty to do it there would be little room for mens scrupulosity or occasion of divisions in point of practice And yet this is nothing but what the Scripture calls for when it directs and enjoins Children to obey their Parents Servants their Masters Subjects their Princes and that in all things only in the Lord or wherein they are not countermanded by him Now concerning that other Position wherein is asserted That when that is imposed as a condition of Communion which ought not to be made a condition if Schism be occasioned thereby the guilt of it lies only on the imposers and not on them upon whom it is imposed I answer As to matter of