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	heart_n	spirit_n	2,671	5	4.8621	4	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A92855	The nature and danger of heresies, opened in a sermon before the Honourable House of Commons, Ianuary 27. 1646. at Margarets Westminster, being the day of their solemn monthly fast. / By Obadiah Sedgvvick, B.D. Minister of Gods Word at Covent-Garden.	Sedgwick, Obadiah, 1600?-1658.	1647 (1647)	Wing S2377; Thomason E372_13; ESTC R201317	27,115	48

and Christ and the Truth by the present errors heresies blasphemies You did so lately for the flouds of rain which endangered the Com O that it might seem good unto you so to doe for the floud of errours which endanger souls This humble request I presume to leave with your pious zeal and prudence 9. By using you Coercive power with such methods and propertions 〈◊〉 the reall safety of truth and souls doth require and the repression of dangerous errors doth need So managing the distributions thereof that under the notion of restraining heresie you by no means injure reall sanctity nor yet under the pretence of sanctity you doe not favour the growth of heresie O what an happy people are they amongst whom errours are losing and truths are graining where piety thrives and wickednesse blasts where all who are good can joyn against all that is evill and in lesser things whereas yet they cannot through weaknesse clasp opinions yet for the truth and peace's sake can clasp hearts and hands to promote Gods glory and the common salvation of souls 2. I have a word also to say unto you who are Ministers of the Gospel of Christ Come you forth from your long silences neglects and reserves and help the Church of Christ in swallowing up the floud which the Serpent hath cast out of his mouth when Jesus Christ is blasphemed it is not a time to fear but to cry out so spake Luther to Staupitius Men will say that you are moderate and discreet but what will Christ say to you if at such a time you be silent in his Cause O my brethren you are the husbandmen take heed that none sow tares in the field whiles you sleep you are the builders O bee sure to preserve the foundation safe you are the Shepherds of the Flock O beware of the Wolves lest they break in and destroy the sheep You are the Vine-dressers and keepers of the Vineyard O have an eye to the Foxes which else will spoil the tender Grapes You are the Stewards of Christ O be vigilant on what provision the houshold doth feed You are the Watchmen O look out lest the enemy slip in and surprise the City You are the Fathers bee sure that your children have not a stone given to them in stead of bread or a Serpent in stead of a Fish You must help with your most fervent prayers as Alexander once did and prevailed against Arius You must help with your counsels with your watchings with your preachings You must bona docere mala dedocere as Austine speaks You must be defensores and debellatores stand for truth and withstand errours You are in a singular manner intrusted with truth and souls O watch O pray O preach O doe all that faithfull Ministers should doe when a floud breaks in You read of Eliahs zeal against the false Prophets and of Pauls zeal against false Apostles You have read of the zeal of Athanasius against the Arians and of the zeal of Cyprian against the Novatians and of the zeal of Austine against the Donatists against the Manichees against the Pelagians You have read of the zeal of Hierome of Chrysostome of Nazianzen and many others in ancient times You have read of the zeal of Luther and Calvin and others in later times You have shewed your zeal to the Kingdome in our dangerous times I say no more remember your first works remember your engagements and be zealous If you who are the Angels of Christ the Ministers of Christ the Stewards of Christ if you be drowzie if you be silent if you stop your own mouths when mouths are opened against your Christ whose mouth can we expect should open it self to swallow up the floud It was a brave answer which Cyrill gave to Theodosius that in our private and personall injuries we should hold our peace but when the truth or faith is endangered to be corrupted we ought to speak else we must give an account to God of our unseasonable silence I have but one use more Hath the Serpent cast out such a floud of errours and false doctrines amongst us then 1. Let every one take heed lest he be caried away with any part of this floud I say take heed For erroneous times are trying times and proving times as well as bloudy and persecuting times God hath tryed your fidelity to this Kingdome of late by a floud of bloud and God is now trying your fidelity to the Kingdom of his dear Son by a floud of errours Take heed lest you be carried away by this floud There are seven things which are very apt to bee carried away by a floud 1. Light things 2. Loose things 3. Weak things 4. Low things 5. Rotten things 6. Tottering things 7. Venturous things O take heed 1. That you be not light or proud Christians errours are most apt to breed in a proud brain and a gracelesse heart and no man is more likely to bee overturned by errour then he who hath overturned himself by pride the proud and blasphemers are joyned together 2 Tim. 3. 2. The proud man is exposed to most temptations to most fals and to most errors 'T is the proud man who consents not to wholesome words of Christ but dotes about questions 1 Tim. 6. 3 4. 2. That you be not loose Christians If ungodlines be in the heart it will not be hard for errour to get into the head A loose heart can best comply with loose principles Truth is searching and reforming but errour is more quiet and gratifying 't is grace which settles the minde and stablisheth the heart 3. That you be not weak Christians weake stomachs are most longing A Christian whose faith is implicit and leaning on man doth often trust out his judgement and soul The weaker light you have of truth the more easily may you be cheated with errours in stead of truth 4. That you bee not low Christians a worldly heart is a very low heart It is of all other the cheapest it will be bought and sold upon every turn to serve its own turn The truth can never be sure in that chest which any errour with a little golden key can pick. If thou be the servant of truth for gain thou wilt be a slave to errour for more gain 5. That you be not rotten or hypocriticall Christians they were given up to beleeve lies who did not receive the truth in the love of it How just is it with God that he should fall into reall errour whose heart did never love reall truth that the deceitfull heart should at length be a deceived heart Is it difficult to set him against the faith who never had a sound faith 6. Take heed that you be not tottering and unstable Christians when the judgement is not ballanced and solidly fixed upon the truths of Christ but reeling and wavering and like them in Eliahs time halting between two opinions it is usually in danger to bee poised with errour He whose mind is but indifferent about a truth is more then half on his way to errour 7. That you be not venturous and soul-tempting Christians Julian sipt in his Apostasie by going to hear Libanius The Devill is ready enough to tempt you be not you found to tempt him Eve lost all by hearing one Sermon from the mouth of the Serpent If you will be trading amongst cheaters it is no wonder if you be cheated we are sure to goe by the worst when we venture upon our own strength the man who will expose himself to hear new truths doth oft times come back with old errours newly dressed 2. Let every one strengthen his soul that he may stand and withstand and not be carried away c. The house built upon the Rock stood when the floud came Take all in a word a judgement solidly principled an heart sincerely renued a faith truly bottomed Truth and love of it cordially matched profession and practise well joyned a fear of our selves and dependance on God still maintained Gods Ordinances and the society of humble and growing Christians still frequented watchfulnesse and prayer still continued are the best directives that I can deliver to keep us in the truth and the best preservatives that I doe know to keep us from errours FINIS

case If there be the darknesse of misapprehension by errour it is in a worse case But when that misguiding errour befals the leading faculty of all the soul and this errour fals point-blank against a truth necessary unto the mans salvation and moreover this errour is stifly adhered unto by that leading judgement it doth mislead and it will mislead Oh now in what a desperate condition is the whole soule hereby If it doth not recover of this error it dies for it and it can never be recovered til the judgment be altered And when will that judgement be altered which perversly affronts and rejects the light of truth which onely can carry it off The third is the most active faculty of the soul they doe defile and corrupt the conscience Now this is amazedly dangerous A wicked errrour is blinding whiles in the judgement onely but it is binding when it slips to the conscience also It is a wrangling Sophister in that but it is a working Iesuite in this Diseases falling amongst the vitall spirits are most quick and most dangerous Errours are never more pernicious then when they drop into the conscience for whatsoever engageth conscience the same engageth all and the utmost of our all If the conscience of man be made a party against the truth now all that a man hath and all that a man can doe will be made out against the truth too Now the person will with Paul grow mad and desperate against Christ for Paul being engaged by an erroneous conscience consents to the death of Stephen yea could he in that condition have met with Jesus Christ himself he would have done the like against him The fourth is The conversations of men Heresie is seldom or never divided from Impiety Hymeneus who 1 Tim. 1. 19. made shipwrack of faith made shipwrack also of a good conscience Those whom Paul called dogs he also cals evill workers And in another place speaking of Phil. 3. 2. Tit. 1. 15 16. some whose mindes were defiled he adds and reprobate to every good work Our Saviour speaking of false Prophets saith you may know them by their fruits The lives of men are consonant to the judgements of men Truth and goodnesse are reciprocal and so are falshood and wickednesse The doctrine of faith is a doctrine of holinesse too And the doctrine of lies is the doctrine of prophanenesse too He who fals from truth to falshood will quickly fall from piety to wickednesse Truth is of a reforming vertue as well as of an informing nature It salts and seasons heart and life both but that errour which putrifies the heart will putrifie the life also the plague will at length rise and break out into bla●es and botches They who write the story of the Anabaptists begin Sleid. c. it with errour in their judgements but end it vvith wickednesse in their practises And Cyprian writing long since of Novatus that pestilent Heretique saith Epist 49. ad Cornelium thus of him That he was rerum novarum cupidus one who itched after new notions avaritiae inexplebili rapacitate furibundus and beyond measure covetous arrogantia stupore superbi tumoris inflatus intolerably proud curiosus semper ut prodat no man so prying no man so treacherous ad hoc adulator ut fallat he would commend you before your face but cut your throat behind your back nunquam fidelis ut diligat as false a person as lived Fax ignis ad conflanda seditionis incendia turbo tempestas ad fidei facienda naufragia hostis quietis tranquillitatis adversarius pacis inimicus a very fire-brand cared not what became of truth or peace turned the world upside down so that he might carry on his opinion The Apostle speaking of Antichrist who is the Antesignanus of all Heretiques cals him 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that man of sin no such sinner as he Lyranus expounds it one totally given up to sin and Theophylact the ringleader of sin And truly it is most just with God to give them up to corrupt lives who rejecting his truth have given up themselves to corrupt errors and lies 2. Heresies are a drowning and overwhelming floud a floud you know is such a collection such an heightning confluence of waters as swels the rivers above their bounds and lays all under water Now there are three things which heresies doe overwhelm See 2 Pet. 2. 2. One is the glory of all glories the glorious Name of God the glorious Name of Christ the glorious Name of the holy Spirit the glorious name of divine truths Heresie turns the glory into a lye It gives God the lye and Christ the lye and the holy Ghost the lye For it gives truth the lye the Scriptures the lye which are the glory of God and Christ and the holy Spirit He who makes the Word of God a lyer makes God himself a lyer O sirs what is God without truth and what is all the goodnesse of the Gospel without truth and what is all the fabrick of mans salvation without truth Truth is as it were the pin the clasp the knot that ties all pull out that untie and break that the excellencies of God the glories of Christ the sweetnesse of promises the souls of men the salvation of mens souls all are dashed are broken are gone And such work doth heresie make it doth dissolve the bond of all glory yea it doth resolve God into worse then nothing No God is better then a false god there is an open or secret blasphemy in all heresies No man can contemn the truth of God but in that he must likewise condemn the God of truth The second is the glory of Religion Religion is clipt and darkned It grows low and beggerly when it is patched with errour It is a debasing of the gold to marry it with any metall of a courser birth All Religion is by so much the more excellent by how much the more of truth it hath but when once it is adulterated when once it is tainted and leavened with damnable errours now the silver is become drosse the glory is departed from it when a Religion is like the feet of Nebuchadnezzars image which were part of clay and part of iron now it becomes low and contemptible If the mixture of humane inventions abates of its glory what an impairing is the mixture of corrupt and poisonous faith-subverting doctrines The third is not onely the dignity but also the very vitall entity of a Church Truth is the soul of that body and falshood is death unto it Schismes do it much hurt but nothing like vile doctrines Schismes doe only rent the coat but Heterodoxies do rent the heart those pluck up the fence but these pull down the building those doe tear away the childrens lace but these doe bereave the children of their bread those are a turbulent sea these are a dead sea those doe scratch but these doe kill Men talk

much of un-churching and of Antichrist and limbes of Antichrist but a Church is never more near to give up the ghost then when it is most near to give up the truth It is never nearer to be un-churched and to be essentially Antichristed then when the truth fails and when abominable heresies and corrupt doctrines swarm in it Mark seriously that place in 1 Iohn 4. 3. Every spirit that confesseth not that Christ is come in the flesh is not of God and this is that spirit of Antichrist I this is that spirit of Antichrist The spirit of errour and false doctrine this is that spirit of Antichrist 3. Heresies are a suddenly rising floud A floud is no sober or quiescent puddle no grave or slow-paced river but it is a quick and extemporary collection and inundation And truly herein lies the greatnesse of the danger unto a people and Church by heresies that they are quickly conceived and quickly brought forth quickly born and quickly thriving though truth gets on very slowly by reason of that incapacity of the judgement for supernaturals and by reason of that naturall opposition in man to the things of God and by reason of the subtill interposition of the Prince of darknesse who blinds the minds of men lest the light of the glorious Gospel should shine unto them yet erroneous and false opinions do break out with ease and spread swiftly they are like the plague which is a flying arrow there needs no preparation of the ground for nettles if the seeds doe but drop down you may soon have a full crop yet the ground must be prepared again and again to receive good seed the hearts of men are naturally disposed to suck in errours as they are to send out wickednesses the tinder is so prepared to catch the fire that it is but the striking of the flint and the work is done The Scriptures doe compare false doctrines to leaven O how fast doth a little leaven sowre the lump Paul wondred that the Galatians were so soon removed to another Gospel Gal. 1. 6. The good man slept but one night and the field was sowen all over with tares by the wicked and envious man How quickly did the world turn Arian How suddenly did the Anabaptists endanger Germany The Vines which have been some months in growing are in very few howres torn down and destroyed by Foxes and wilde Boars Now if erroneous doctrines be in themselves so highly pernicious and in their operation so speedily diffusive then certainly they are of all other things the most dangerous to the Church of Christ A plague which suddenly infects many families is therefore the more dangerous and heresies vvhich can suddenly infect many souls are therefore the more dangerous evils 4. Heresies are an increasing and swelling floud A floud at first makes the river onely to look big and to run a little thicker and faster but after a while it causeth the river to be unruly to break in pieces to superabound the waters contribute on every side and at every corner to raise and mount it so that there is no passing False doctrines at first seem to be modest they will be but scruples and quaere's and then they come to be probabilities and then they come to be Like the spreading Leprosie tolerable conclusions and then they rise to be unquestionable tenets and then fit to be made publique articles and then necessary to be held and then the contrary not to be maintained or spoken for nay to be disdained and reproached But this is not all neither For as false opinions rise thus and encrease in their direct line of particular magnitudes by way of intention so doe they likewise enlarge themselves in divers breadths by way of extension They are like circles in a pond one circle begets another so doth one heresie beget another a lesser begets a greater As one morall sin is but a staire to step down lower so this intellectuall sinne of heresie it is but a staire to help up to higher and worse errors If you will consult Historicall Antiquity it is wonderfull to behold the great flames bred out of small sparks what monstrous opinions have been built upon errours which seemed but little at the first how one errour hath hatched a greater they who write of them can distinctly tell us where the man was first planet-struck what his first errour was but after a while they are non-plussed in the account the number of errours have doubled trebled such a maze and labyrinth is errour It is like a whirle-pool which first Dato uno absurdo mille sequuntur sucks in one part and then another and never defists untill it draws in and plungeth the whole body Besides ancient examples wee may see this swelling growth of erroneous opinions in the Church of Rome where one errour still advanced to more errours and those again to higher errours and these still running on until a general corruption ensued from all the particulars compare the first defections and corruptions with their last and present how little then how totall now how particular then how universall now and you will easily acknowledge what encreasing flouds erroneous opinions are The points at first were rather about private interests of precedency but they have been so encreased unto all doctrinals that they are scarce sound in any Their errours about the Scriptures and Traditions and the offices of Christ and humane satisfactions and merits and invocation and adoration of Saints and of justification and faith and good works and free-will and Sacraments c. are evident to all the world I could give unto you an instance also in the Anabaptists in Germany whose first Author there saith David Chytraeus in his Dedicatory Epistle to Ericus King of the Swedes was Nicolaus Pelargus Cygneus about the year 1523. his erroneous doctrines though bad enough for they were laid in the contempt of the Ministery of the Word and Sacraments and rejection of the Civill Magistrate and in nova ac coelesti luce immediate accensain corde as my Author expresly relates yet were not formerly so numerous but when these opinions descended unto Thomas Munzerus and Andreas Carolostadius now they began to swell both in the quantity of the opinions and in the vast number of disciples too Lambertus Danaeus in his Annotations and Explications of Saint Augustines Book De haeresibus quod vult deum addes to that account the many derivations and enlarging propagations of heresies from age to age shewing exactly the severall heresies flowing from some one capitall and originall heresie as from Simon See his Arborem Haerescón as himself styles it Magus's heresie and from that of Valentinus and that of Cardo and that of Artemon and that of Novatus and that of Arius c. In which elaborate work of his you may read of such a strange growth of heresies that they never left multiplying and breeding untill they had as much as in