Selected quad for the lemma: truth_n
Text snippets containing the quad
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A54036
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Reason regulate[d], or, Brief reflections upon a l[ate] treatise of human-reason by T.P.
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T. P.
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1675
(1675)
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Wing P117; ESTC R25516
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24,178
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78
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Conversion of Nations Fulfilling of Prophesies which baffles all Cavils and strikes all Objections dumb a Miraculous Propagation Now he who prefers the Dictates of his own Private and naked Reason and Understanding in matters that concern Religion before the Guidance of a Church thus Adorn'd thus Mark'd thus Signaliz'd deserves not nor truly has he either the one or the other Nothing certainly can be more contrary to Humane Reason than to think we ought to believe nothing above it For there are Truth 's Un-intelligible by the most Exalted and Sublimated Souls in Heaven viz. The Total and Perfect Quality of the Divine Essence which nothing Created nothing Inferiour to God himself can Comprehend The Saints and Angels enjoy Eternity without knowing what it is the most Towring Wisdom and Depurated Reason can no more reach or fathom that Inscrutable Infinity than Ten Millions of Oceans can be crowded into the smallest Cockle-Shell For it drowns or rather as a Bottomless Abysse swallows up all Philosophy and Learning 'T is the Philosophers-Stone in Divinity too hard to be Penetrated by the Knowledge of Men or Angels In fine We know that such a thing there is but never shall it 's full and perfect Definition it being no less than the Eternal Tri-Une God whose Deep brief Character of Himself was Sum qui Sum. Whence I inferr That Men are not endued with Understanding Presumptuously to stretch beyond it's Strength and Power or to use it as they themselves list But according to the Will and Pleasure of the Divine Donor who certainly gives Man Reason not absolutely but Conditionally that in Matters of Faith at least it should retribute and pay Homage to Him I mean be Regulated by His Beloved Spouse the Church For as that is no true Liberty which has no Limit so that is no true Reason which has no Restriction Besides if most Men are allowed and granted to have Reason certainly the Church do's not want it Vis unita fortior but has in it a more Ample Perfect and incorrigible manner because more immediately and perpetually accompanyed and Assisted by the Holy Ghost And this is true nay infallibly true if Scripture be not false How those Headless-Members the Acephalists would answer here I cannot tell but am certain that As that is not true Reason but Delusion which flowes not from the right Fountain So a Visible Congregation or Body of Men without a Visible Head or with more than one is equally Monstrous But those Spiritual Privateers who slight the Ecclesiastical Hierarchy or Convoy contemn the Doctrine of the Church and resolve to believe no more than their Understandings can Chew and their Reason Digest there being many things in Nature which pose Mortality as the Flux and Re-flux of the Sea the Effects of the Loud-Stone c. will live Infidels and dye Atheists Nor is this said To remove the Cognizance of Divine Truths out of the Court of Reason but to quell it's Pride and Arrogance and bring it to Submit and stoop by an Humble Faith to those Divine Truths for certainly a mans Reason may Rebell against his Faith as well as his Passion against Reason and this Limitation or Coaction does not at all deprive man of his Power nor abridge him of the Liberty and natural priviledge of Election or Choice Religion says he appears and what Christian dares deny it to be the Principal End of mans Creation and therefore as if Horses are made for Burthen they have a Natural ability given where-with to do it If Birds do fly they have Wings given them for that purpose because where an end is Natural the means are so too So if Religion be the End of Man as he is Partaker of a Rational Soul that Reasonable Soul hath some Power naturally placed in it for the excercise judgment and choice of Religion All this is Undeniably true But yet the Author may please to consider That the Horse may be over-loaded and the Bird fly too high and so certainly Reason may soar above it's Natural Pitch Meridian Altitude and Consequently into a Region where 't is a mere Stranger and cannot subsist without some stronger Principle than it 's own proper Strength to support it And so granting the Antecedent I deny the Consequence That because GOD gives man Reason as I have said to light or introduce him into the right Entrance of Religion therefore being once initiated he needs not to ask any more questions or be guided by others but let him follow his own Reason I might as well have said his Nose and he cannot possibly go astray Briefly In the Search or Choice of our Way Reason I grant must rule but that once found Obey For that private Spirit which is not first quickned or animated and then constantly Actuated by that of God's Church which was Authoriz'd and Sanctify'd by the Divine Breath of JESUS is a False Conception no true or lawful Issue of the Understanding but a Spurious or Abortive Embrion of the Brain a Falle Light a Deceitful Phantasm But the Author says If this Doctrine that is for every Man to believe ad libitum were Generally planted in the Minds of men both the Reality and Pretence of Fighting for Religion were utterly Cancell'd Truly so far I should like his Doctrine especially if he could warrant men that Intellectual or Religious Differences should never come to Blowes But Alas Experience makes me more than doubt 't is but an Airy or imaginary Notion For as I do not deny but that those who endeavour an Establishment of Unity and Uniformity in Faith and Religion may possibly occasion War So those I fear of contrary Principles can never long prevent it But I hope that GOD who rules the unruly Ocean will Thus far I do most willingly agree with him That I would have none who disturbe not the publick peace tranquility of the Government be persecuted upon a purely conscientious score For I think it a most uncharitable and unreasonable method because impossible to reduce mens Judgments 't is but one remove from convincing them with Beetles and Halters by taking away their Estates and Starving their Bodies But against those who are found any way machinating against our true and lawful Governours especially the Supream with all Severity and Rigour Currat Lex But yer let every man smart for his proper Fault and not a whole Community or Body of men be made the very Buttocks of the Nation to be kick lash'd and slander'd for the Crimes of Particulars For that certainly is as remote from Reason Equity and Justice as it would be To Pistol a man because his Nose stands awry or knock his Brains our because he Squints Or indeed because the Serpent seduced Eve and she Adam whose Original Guilt corrupted and deprav'd their whole Progeny By the very same Crooked Rule the Apostles themselves might be call'd Traytors because Judas betray'd his Lord and Master Nor can or shall I ever believe
the Foundation For 't is as Irrational as if a Man should say I can guesse so exactly of the Longitude Latitude Altitude and Profunditie of any thing by my Eye that no Demonstration by any Mathematical Instruments can or ever shall Controul or Convince me And truly what better has this Author said from the beginning to the Ending of his Treatise than this That Mens Reasons and Judgements as to the Regulation of their Faith are so very Cleer and Demonstrative that there is no certain way no possibility to know whether they be true or false right or wrong Turne it which way you will this is all you shall find in it which Unreasonable Reasoning verifyes the Old Proverb All is not Gold that Glisters And in Truth if each Man's Reason Promisculously must be Umpire in this Rational Strife men may Play at this Sport to Perpetuity and never win nor lose But certainly our Blessed Saviour has not left the Condition of Mankind in this endless Confusion but has miraculously Founded and Signaliz'd a Church to end all Controversyes if Men that talk so much of Reason would but rightly use it for that Reason which as to Spirituality does not take the Church for it's Rest can never aim or hit right but must necessarily fly at Randome and spend it else without Advantage If that Authority says he which we Obey prescribe Truth we have Good Fortune in our Obedience and meerly Good Fortune but if it draw us into Errours we have nothing to say for our Excuse because we have nothing to Alledge for our Obedience to that Authority It seems then that our Saviour's Commands are of no Validity and Hearken to and Obey the Church meer Fopperies but certain it is CHRIST our Lord has most expresly and Emphatically enjoyn'd this and therefore we may nay must without any If 's absolutely obey it and this questionless will be a very good and sufficient Plea for our Obedience at the Day of Judgement How those who slight it would excuse themselves were there to be any Pleading at that Grand-Assize cannot imagine but am certain if they come off well they will have Extraordinary good Fortune indeed His following Discourse Of Mens Blind-folding themselves as he blindly calls it in obeying Ecclesiasticall Superiours and that those who commit themselves to the Guidance of their own Vnderstanding are as safe on the Left Hand as on the Right but who can credit this That knowes one Hand from the other As secure of Happiness in their Errours very strange as others who are otherwise guilded even in the Truths which they happen to fall into is so extravagantly Frivolous and proofless that it carryes it 's own Confutation with it sic Transeat totum God says he Commands no more but to search and yet shall find whether the Truth or not Ipse Dixit the Reward of Searching And truly I have endeavour'd and narrowly search'd to find Reason in this But after all my Diligence can perceive no Reward of my Searching which makes me conclude That 't is much more Rational to believe that GOD gives Man not only a Will to search but Power to find and Vnderstanding to know the Truth when found or else his Commands were vain But what a Desperate long Leap doe's this Author leave between Searching and Heaven If it were as he imagines I doe not see why a man 's Heartily wishing himself there might not bring him or waft him thither without more adoe and Eternal Happinesse be given him as a reward of wishing But undoubtedly finding the Truth is the reward of Searching and Heaven the reward of finding the Truth which those who search where it is not shall find nothing but anxiety and in the end that they wretchedly cheated themselves and others with shippery Sophism's and Chimaera's c. As no men are sav'd but through Mercy so none unjustly Perish for Truth is missed not so much through Difficulty of Finding as Tepidity and Negligence in searching it I cannot possibly says the Author conceive it agreeable to the Goodness of the Divine Nature so to have hidden and involved and almost disguised the Truth from us if he had intended to have censured the missing of it with so heavy a Sentence as that of Eternal Ruine especially seeing there is but one true Way I thought All ways had been alike with him as to the end for one Hundred false ones and no certain Mark set upon the Entry of that One to Distinguish it from the Others To which I answer If GOD Almighty had left us a Way without any Means or Marks as he strangely imagines to find it out it would be great Cruelty indeed in him which is far enough from his Nature to punish Men Eternally for what is not in their Power possibly to avoyd But since 't is most evident that he hath left both sufficient means to find and Marks to know it by his Discourse upon this Point is in my Opinion only just so many Words to no purpose And since those Marks which are set upon the Entry of this Way are most clear and conspicuous to all Men that look not Obliquely upon them if after they are entred they meet with any thing that Reason may perhaps at first Flinch or Boggle at the Consideration of it's Inerrability takes away all doubt and bids them confidently persevere As in Visible Objects says he we Receive confidently and rest in the Report of the Sight c. So ought we as entirely and absolutely to resign our Belief to the Dictates of our own Understanding in things intelligible which are as Properly and Naturally the Objects thereof as things visible are of the Eye-Sight and we might as well say We will trust our Eyes in Green White and Black but not in Red or Yellow Collours as affirm That our Reason must Guide us in the Contemplation of Nature the Search of Arts the Government of Publick Societies and the Begulation of Mens Lives as far as the Bounds of Morality but that it is not at all to be Followed or Obey'd in Matters that concern Religion Here I must confess the Author has some Colour but I think not much Reason for what he says For if he thinks the Objects of Faith are as Naturally Intelligible by our Understanding as the Colours of the Rain-Bow are visible to our Eyes he makes no Distinction or Difference at all between the Faculties Operations or Effects of Nature and those of Grace which certainly is a Grand Mistake For although our own Reason or understanding tell us There is a God and He to be Worshipp'd and Obey'd by us yet they cannot by their own Light or inward Forces inform us In what manner that must be done by External Agents by some thing which is without us And what imaginably more probable than the Church of Christ which can shew a Lineal Succession from the same Christ and His Apostles a Perpetual Visibility Unity Universality