Selected quad for the lemma: truth_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
truth_n	church_n	faith_n	tradition_n	1,984	5	9.0083	5	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A38440	Englands thankfulnesse, or, An Humble remembrance presented to the Committee for Religion in the High Court of Parliament with thanksgiving for that happy pacification betweene the two kingdomes by a faithfull well-wisher to this church and nation.		1642 (1642)	Wing E3057; ESTC R28612	13,889	20

Sacrifice unto him who hath so mercifully and miraculously saved us so highly honoured us with such a Calling and now maketh the glory of his Love so evidently to rest upon us Here then the question is to be made concerning you for it lieth more upon you then upon others to take this matter publikely to heart what should you doe for the propagation of Gods glory wherein should yee at this time intend to doe him service that you may shew your selfe dutifull and thankfull Give me leave to shew you how you shall be able to resolve this quest Consider then with your selves what your abilities are where they can be employed with best advantage and what opportunity you have to settle upon the worke at this time Your abilities are two fold Nationall and Personall your Nationall abilities are supposed to stand First in the abundance of all manner of men fit for all kind of employments subordinate unto Gods service Secondly in the plenty of outward meanes and helpes whereby these men may be comfortably maintained in any taske which may be laid upon them So that to make these abilities profitable there is no more requisite but to set those that are now idle a work that their Talents may be usefull unto the Common-wealth of Israel in a publike way And this may easily be done if you recommend unto them some taske in a worke of a publike and profitable nature and use meanes to joyne in one way towards the same scope all their endeavours For this will be requisite that the businesse which shall be intended may bee done effectually and to some good purpose As for your personall abilities to intend publike workes and set others upon them they stand first in the soundnesse of your judgements to discerne the objects fittest to be undertaken and to make choyce of persons ablest to be imployed therein Secondly in the Authority and place wherein at this time God hath put you whereby you have power not onely to recommend the undertaking of publike workes to men of able parts but also to ordaine and name that which should be done to order the manner of doing it and to give encouragements towards the performance of the duty These are all eminent and excellent abilities which ought not to be without use like the unprofitable Talent that was hid in the ground Therefore they should be set a worke there where they may become most advantageous to the Kingdome of our God Now we know that there a thing is most usefull where the effects thereof may be extended unto most men for their best advantage in the best things For seeing our goodnesse Psal 26.2 3. as David saith cannot be extended unto God himselfe but onely unto the Saints that are on earth and to the excellent ones in whom should be all our delight Therefore you should looke upon the State of the Church of God on earth to improve the use of these your Talents towards it in the communion of Saints that all the Members of his Church as well those that make profession openly of his truth as those that in secret belong to his election may receive benefit by your meanes in the way of publike edification Here then I meane by the Church of God chiefly and in the first place those that are called Protestants and then also all other Christians that may be disposed to imbrace the same truth which they professe Now by Protestants I understand those men who have protested against Popery for the truthes sake and desiring to be ruled in Faith and practise onely by the will of God alone have renounced all Doctrines and traditions of men and all superstitious Ordinances of worship which God hath not revealed in the holy Scriptures And I conceive to be usefull unto these men and in this very thing which is the fundamentall property of their standing is to pitch upon the best object that can be taken in hand for the advancement of the Kingdome of God and you may be sure whatsoever you shall intend to doe towards others in this kind it will redound as well in the very undertaking as in the progresse and chiefly in the event unto your owne benefit and advantage For if you sowe to the spirit in the Kingdome of Christ you shall reape of that spirit the fruits of that Kingdome even life everlasting And if your endeavours be not stinted to such particulars as doe concerne your selves alone but be as the spirit of Christ is without partiality bent to the universall good of the whole Church then the fruits of those endeavours by the working of the same spirit will first rest upon your owne Common-wealth and from thence be conveyed unto all the rest Whatsoever then you meane to rectifie as being amisse or to make more compleat as being defective within your owne Body if you settle a course to doe it in an universall way which shall be free from all partiality you shall in doing good to many benefit your selves to the full For as a Conduit-pipe is filled with the water which is conveyed from the Fountaine unto a common receptacle so it shall be with you if you aime not at your selves in the use of your Talents but at the common good of many God will make you his Conduit-pipes of Grace and you shall be first filled with the fruits of his Blessings upon your labours and then also be fitted to transfuse the same unto others But if you neglect the universall aim chuse another more particular proceeding then is appliable unto other Protestants you shall be found unprofitable unto the Church of God undutifull in the communion of Saints and withall either perhaps faile of your purposes or if you gaine them yet remaine in a case no better then you were in before because in so doing you shall goe at a venture and changing one particular way for another find perhaps no rest in both at least you shall not be sure to find any rest before you have made a triall But if you would make sure worke chuse the way which cannot faile to bring us at last unto a full Reformation Chuse Gods way for he is the Author of all perfection and in following it you shall be sure to gaine your purpose through his Blessing Gods way doth abstract and raise our spirits above all selfe-seeking intentions and out of his owne way he doth not accompany any mans undertakings with a Blessing But even as he hath called us unto Christian liberty not that we should use our liberties to serve our selves but that we should serve one another through Love not that we should seeke our owne profit but the profit of many for edification so he doth pot send forth his Blessings but upon the undertakings which are ordered according to this Rule Pardon me if I seeme to presse this point somewhat home and to dwell upon it For there is a necessity in it to raise your thoughts beyond

your selves if ever you should be profitable unto your selves or truly thankfull unto God for all his benefits at this time bestowed upon you For as God is not the God of one man alone but of all so he giveth not his gifts unto any one in particular but by every one unto all Thus also he is not the God of one Church People or State alone but of all and therefore when he giveth unto any Church State or Nation extraordinary Blessings and Deliverances he doth it not that they should enjoy the same by themselves alone and live at their ease without the care of others but rather that they should impart and dilate his goodnesse unto their neighbours that by the communication of his Graces unto many manifold thanksgiving may redound by many unto his glory And the more this Sacrifice of thanksgiving shall bee offered unto God on your behalfe by others the more his blessings will be encreased and multiplied upon your owne heads Now the more you helpe to enlarge and disperse his goodnesse the more this Sacrifice shall be offered But if you should goe about as it were to ingrosse his good gifts and make them peculiarly your owne they wil vanish be taken away from you even as fire shut up without a vent is quenched There is then a necessity in this that you resolve upon a larger aime then that which is onely usefull unto your selves in your particular Common-wealth And when you have look'd on all sides beyond your selves you shall find none so neere as these whom I have named to be the fittest object of your charity even your Brethren the Protestants Not that I would have any that can partake of the Grace of God by your meanes excluded or neglected for we must suffer the Sunne to shine upon all but I would have you to aime at these expressely because I know that you are more obliged to extend your bowels unto them then unto others because they are more capable of the encrease of Gods Kingdome by your influence then others are because they have more need of the assistance you can give them then others have and because through the communication of your good things unto them all the rest may be more benefitted then if you should at once set your mind alike towards all indifferently For in these respects they ought to be ranked in the first place before all others in your intention Seeing the whole world would be a scope too large to be embraced as one time and Papists cannot be dealt withall in this nature nor is it wisdome to graspe too much at first lest nothing bee taken hold of and the burthen exceed your strength But the state of Protestant Churches is an object proportionall unto your Talents and most fit to receive the Testimonies of your thankfulnesse and yet the duties which ought to be performed towards those should be such as in due time may be dilated unto all not onely Christians but even Jewes and Pagans that the Kingdome of Christ may have a full progresse untill he possesse all Nations and the ends of the earth for his inheritance For except our endeavours come home to this end at last and be made fit to watch it we doe nothing to any purpose but labour in the fire as it were for that which shall be consumed when his Kingdome shall appeare But here the question will be what are the endeavours which may reach thus farre from Protestants unto all men in the Kingdome of Christ To which that I may answer I must suppose that if Protestants were but united so farre as to leave crossing one another as hitherto they have done and could be made to draw one line in the wayes of propagating Humane and Divine knowledge that then they could easily ferment throughly the rest of the world with Learning and Reformation For they being so great a party as they are and having so much commerce with all the Nations of the world as they doe it would be easie for them to worke first upon the rest of Christians a more perfect Reformation and then to propagate towards all other men the helpes of Learning and Religion which may be much bettered and improved above what now they are if some reall assistance were given to such as elaborate the wayes thereof Now that they may be so farre united and be brought to draw one line in the wayes of Knowledge and Reformation the possibility hereof may be made manifest by the principles of their States by the plaine tenour of their publike profession and practise and by the preparatives of their union already farre advanced both in Religion and Learning The principles of their State are to maintaine the Right of Magistrates as well over Ecclesiasticall and Civill persons as in all affaires of a publike nature concerning the outward profession of Religion and to stand to the Liberty wherewith Christ hath made them free in the profession of the Gospell and the Government of their Churches within themselves The tenour of their profession is to be seen in the publike Confessions of their Churches which are not different one from another in any fundamentall matter and their practise of Reformation is very evidently setled upon the same grounds of publike Edification and of opposition to Popery so that it seemeth not to be a hard matter to bring them being already so farre united to leave jarring about matters not fundamentall and crossing one another for things of no necessary consequence And so much the rather this may be done because the preparatives to bring them from the crosse course wherein hitherto they have walked both in Learning and Religion have beene in agitation these good many yeares not without some profitable and effectuall disposition wrought upon both sides towards a better intelligence of each other in these matters which in due time may be made very evident unto your Wisdomes if this motion be not altogether sleighted and neglected in many particulars whereof I will not make any mention at this time Onely the endeavours themselves whereby this great good may bee brought unto the state of Protestants must here be named somewhat more distinctly and they are but two or three The first is concerning their Schooles and the learning to bee delivered in them to bring the constitution and frame of their Schooles and the matter and manner of delivering Learning and teaching vertue therein to a true and fundamentall Reformation which may facilitate towards the younger sort the perfect wayes of education and towards the more ancient the true advancement of Sciences which my Lord of Saint Albanes hath wished and saluted afarre off The second is concerning their Churches and Church-men that a better correspondencie may be brought to passe amongst them for their mutuall edification in the the truth of Religion and for the taking away of Scandals which hinder greatly the propagation of the Gospel of Jesus Christ To which two endeavours if