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
A29665	A discovrse opening the natvre of that episcopacie, which is exercised in England wherein with all humility, are represented some considerations tending to the much desired peace, and long expected reformation, of this our mother church / by the Right Honourable Robert Lord Brooke.	Brooke, Robert Greville, Baron, 1607-1643.	1641 (1641)	Wing B4911; ESTC R17972	85,248	148

passe any severe censure be pleased to Heare these Poore men you call Separatists Know their Tenets and then Judge Their maine Tenets for ought I could ever learne are about some few Points in Discipline in which sure there is lesse danger than in Doctrine of which they dispute not First they would admit none as members of their Assemblies generally to partake with them in all the Ordinances but such which seeme Beleeving Saints and so members of Christs true Church Secondly they conceive every severall Congregation rightly constituted hath within it selfe the power of the keyes committed to it without dependance on other Churches Yet not denying the lawfull association of severall Churches not refusing the advice and counsell of Councells and Synods I shall crave leave to scan the first and see how much it differeth in truth from the received Tenets of the Church of England I doe conceive that England Scotland France all Churches even Rome it selfe will agree in this that a Church is Cetus Fidelium Gathered together in the Name and power of Christ to waite on him in the way of his Ordinances revealed in his Word In this I suppose we all agree where then is that Chasma that great Gulfe of difference which brands so many with the black spot of Separation All the difficulty lies in Stating who are beleeving Faithfull Saints for of these only all agree a true Church consists I beseech you let us call him a Beleever and a Saint whom the Scripture calls so and wee shall soone agree The Pope saith he is a faithfull Saint and a true Member of the Church Who beleeveth as the Church beleeveth The Church of England saith he is a Beleever enough to make a Member of that Church that professeth the truth though in his life he deny it Those men say he is a faithfull Saint who professeth the truth and to all appearance for we cannot see the heart practiseth as he professeth Now all men will agree this last is a Beleeving Saint And these will have none but this to be a Saint and so none but this to be a Member of Christs Church I beseech you Is this such an error to desire Profession and Practise to be conjoyned in one that is to be a Member of the Church of Christ When I desire a good Wife a faithfull Servant a constant Friend a familiar Companion Am I not as desirous to know the Heart as well as the Head the Will as well as Skill Affection as well as Profession And why then may I not doe as much in choosing my Spirituall Friends my constant Companions in the worship and service of God Can any man by right force me to marry such or such a woman to take such a servant to dwell with such a friend to choose such a companion And may any man force me then to bee companion in the neerest and most intimate converse of Spirituall Ordinances with any one or more whom I dare not I cannot I may not trust to be either friends to God or me because what ere their lips professe their life and waies deny God trample on the blood of Christ despise at least profane all his Ordinances I could heartily wish some pitty might bee shewed to these poore mens soules He that eateth and drinketh unworthily eateth and drinketh damnation to his owne Soule And is it not then much better to keepe these men off as they doe in Scotland and other Reformed Churches till they give the Church satisfaction upon good ground of their Repentance and Faith that so they may not hurt themselves by Gods holy Ordinances Sacraments confirme but doe not conferre Grace if they did so the case were altered but now they are like the Paradise of God guarded with the Flaming Sword so that the Tree in the midst of the Garden which is Christ cannot be Touched by prophane hands The other Grand Heresie men so much cry against in Separation is the Independence of their Congregations as it was stated before But why should the Independence of One Assembly to a Province or Nation be more Schismaticall than that of a Province or Nation to the whole World Why may not Geneva be as Independent to France as France may bee to the other parts of Europ's Continent In Geneva why may not one Congregation be as independent to All Geneva besides as Geneva is to all France besides Doth indeed such a Wall or River or Sea so limit and bound the Church within it that it may bee independent on any Church without it and may not one Congregation within this River bee as well independent on all other Assemblies within the same River or Sea Are there not some sparklings of this Truth even amongst us in England Have not we Peculiars some Congregations exempt from the Jurisdiction of the Bishop within whose Diocesse they be And I thinke no Separatist desireth more than this That all Parishes I meane all Congregations should be Independent Peculiars Suppose an East Indi Merchants Ship be cast on some Remote Iland beyond China where there shall be no Inhabitant may not in this Case the men of this Ship gather together choose out some one or more of themselves to Read Preach Administer the Sacraments is not this a true Church and so to bee reputed while they beleeve the Truth and doe what they beleeve Is there any one Essentiall part wanting to this Church so Constituted If it be answered affirmatively that there is yet wanting some Essentiall I rejoyn then it is not a true Church nay so farre from being vera Ecclesia that it is not vere Ecclesia For He is not vere Hom● that wants something Essentiall to Man nor It vere Ecclesia that wants any thing Essentiall to a Church If it be yeelded that in such a Case there is nothing Essentiall wanting to This Church I will againe suppose that within a yeare or Two another English Ship be cast on the same very Iland and have such another Company or Church I demand now whether it be necessary that Both These Churches must needs joyne together or at least depend One on the Other If it be not necessary I have what I desire If it be necessary Then was not the former Church a Tr●e Church because it wanted something Essentiall and necessary to a Church to wit Dependance on some other Church If it be said This Church did before depend on the whole Catholike Church I will not gain say it so They meane onely Thus much that This Church was a true member of the True Church or Body of Christ which is but made up of so many particular Congregations as mans Body of its particular members And so This will be no more then to say All the members of the Body are Parts of the Body and conjoyned together but onely subordinate to the Head For I suppose no man will say One of my hands is dependant on the Other but both as all

more it is opposed it shines the brighter so that now to stint it is to resist an enlightened enflamed Multitude which still was and still will be Durissima Provincia Their mad outrage in all the three Kingdomes of late hath so incensed the Common People that in all mens eyes they are become most vile and while all men reflect on their constant trade of mischeivous practices the wisest begin to conclude The very Calling hurt the Men as much as These disgrace the Calling Thus we have by too too long great and sad experience found it true That our Prelates have beene so farre from preventing Divisions that they have been the Parents and Patrons of most Errors Heresies Sects and Schismes that now disturbe This Church and State SECT II. CHAP. VII BUt it may bee the Remedy will yet bee worse than this Disease Let us therefore yet more exactly weigh all the Inconveniences that may attend the Change of This Church-Government which wee now dispute The Dangers which some have fancied may hence accrew to the State have beene discussed in the former Section to which more properly they doe belong We have here only to consider such Evils as may have bad influence into the Church and Polity thereof Arminianisme Socinianisme Superstition Idolatry Popery will pack away with Them being Their Attendants as was shewed before What is there then to be feared Anabaptisme Brownisme Separatisme nay every body every Lay man will turne Preacher Suppose all This be true which can be but supposed Would it not bee much better to hazzard the comming in of all These than still to suffer our soules and bodies to be groun'd to powder by these Tyrannicall Antichristian Prelates that under pretence of keeping out Separatisme introduce downe-right Popery and a sinck of almost all Errors and Heresies Yea and these Errors of the Right Hand which These pretend so much to oppose owe their birth to our Bishops also as was but now and might yet more fully be cleered Wee all know that within these ten yeares all the Non-Conformists in England could not amount to more than one or two hundred And now how many thousands there bee yea of such that rise one pin higher than Old Non-Conformity Themselves perhaps know much better than I Yet our Bishops never were more active than in all this time Whence then ariseth this New Non-Conformity or Separatisme but out of our Bishops Commotions I will not say as the Fathers did of old Ex martyrum sanguine pullulat Ecclesia yet I must confesse I begin to think there may bee perhaps somewhat more of God in these which they call new Schismes than appeares at first glympse I will not I cannot take on mee to defend That men usually call Anabaptisme Yet I conceive that Sect is Twofold Some of them hold Freewill Community of all things deny Magistracy and refuse to Baptize their Children These truly are such Hereticks or Atheists that I question whether any Divine should honour them so much as to dispute with them much rather sure should Alexanders sword determine here as of old at the Gordian knot where it acquired this Motto Que solvere non possum dissecabo There is another sort of them who only deny Baptisme to their Children till they come to yeares of discretion and then they baptize them but in other things they agree with the Church of England Truly These men are much to bee pitied And I could heartily wish That before they bee stigmatiz'd with that oppr●brious brand of Schismatick the Truth might be cleered to them For I conceive to those that hold wee may goe no farther than Scripture for Doctrine or Discipline it may bee very easie to erre in this Point now in hand since the Scripture seemes not to have cleerly determined This particular The Analogy which Baptisme now hath with Circumcision in the old Law is a fine Rhetoricall Argument to illustrate a Point well proved before but I somewhat doubt whether it be proofe enough for that which some would prove by it since beside the vast difference in the Ordinances the persons to bee Circumcised are stated by a positive Law so expresse that it leaves no place for scruple but it is farre otherwise in Baptisme Where all the designation of Persons fit to bee partakers for ought I know is only Such as beleeve For this is the qualification that with exactest search I find the Scripture require in persons to be baptized And This it seemes to require in all such persons Now how Infants can bee properly said to beleeve I am not yet fully resolved Yet many things prevaile very much with mee in this point First For ought I could ever learne It was the constant custome of the purest and most Primitive Church to baptize Infants of beleeving Parents For I could never finde the beginning and first Rise of this practice Whereas it is very easie to track Heresies to their first Rising up and setting soot in the Church Againe I finde all Churches even the most strict have generally beene of this judgement and practice yea though there have beene in all ages some that much affected novelty and had parts enough to discusse and cleere what they thought good to preach yet was this scarce ever questioned by men of Note till within these Last Ages And sure the constant judgement of the Churches of Christ is much to be honoured and heard in all things that contradict not Scripture Nor can I well cleere that of St. Paul 1 Cor. 7.14 Else were your Children Vncleane but now are they Holy I know some interpret it thus If it be unlawfull for a beleever to live in wedlock with one that beleeveth not Then have many of you lived a long time in unlawfull marriage and so your very Children must be Illegitimate and these also must be cast off as Base-borne But it is not so for Your Children are Holy that is Legitimate I confesse This seemes a very faire Interpretation yet I much question Whether This be all the Apostle meanes by that phrase Holy especially when I reflect on the preceding words The Vnbeleever is Sanctified by the Beleever Nor yet can I beleeve any Inherent Holinesse is here meant but rather That Relative Church-Holinesse which makes a man capable of admission to Holy Ordinances and so to Baptisme yea and to the Lords Supper also for ought I see except perhaps Infants be excluded from This Sacrament by That Text Let him that eateth Examine himselfe aod so let him eat As Women are excluded from Church-Government and preaching in Congregations by That of the same Apostle I permit not a Woman to speak Let Women keep silence The second thing we feare so much is Separation or as some tearme it Brownisme for I am not so well studied in these as to give an exact difference betweene them or properly to state or phrase either Yet I thinke this also hath Latitude and admits of difference Before you