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	know_v	scripture_n	6,716	5	6.3200	4	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A30891	A description of the Roman Catholick Church wherein the pretentions of it's [sic] head, the manners of his court, and principles, and doctrines, the worship and service, the religious orders and houses, the designs and practises of that Church, are represented in a vision / by Iohn Barclay, minister at Cruden ; written in the year 1679.	Barclay, John, d. 1691.	1689 (1689)	Wing B717; ESTC R15131	31,117	64

hath in part rewarded your integrity and constancy and I hope will doe it yet more Your saith is strengthned by these winds of temptation you have the joyes of a good Conscience you are hereby endeared to all serious and Godly persons and providence hath of late interposed to bring some secular affairs of great concernment to your Noble Familie to a confortable and desired period and that at a nick of time when it could searce have been expected and a few days longer delay might have quite ruined them I hope you will in all this observe the loving kindness of the Lord and ever remember your engagements to Iesus Christ who hath interceeded for you that your saith might not fail I have little to say concerning this Poem which I offer unto you I confess it is a mean present yet you know it s offered from an affectionat mind After I had write the first copie of it I put it immediatly in your hands and you were pleas'd to commend it severall copies of it are since spread of which some are very incorrect to doe my self justice I have at length resolved to publish it It cannot much serve the ends of my reputation and so I may hope that it cannot be imputed to vanitie My publishing it under your shaddow can only signifie that which I am well enough pleased the World should know namely that you have a great goodness for me when I can presume that you will favourably accept of such a trifile Gratitude obligeth me to make you richer offerings but I have them not to make my Prayers to God for you are the best compensations I can give for your favours to me and these are and daily shall be offered up unto Heaven for the prosperitie of your Souls the increass of your grace and the florishing of your Noble Family by RIGHT HONORABLE YOUR HONOURS Most Affectionat Most Oblidged and Humble Servant IOHN BARCLAY To the Reader I Can not perswade my self that any have just reason to be offended with me or to clamour that it is a thing unsuitable to a man of my Profession to expose a Religion so Zealously mantained and propagated by so many great and learned men in such a dress as this All that I shall say for my own vindication is that I am none of those that sport my self with the sins and miseries of Mankind and I ever abborred these jests which idle and profane wits doe break upon serious matters that are not to be jested with Nevertheless when a Partie of men have under the venerable name of the Holy Catholick Church so grossly abused the World imposing on the belief of their credulous Disciples so many Reverend Absurdities and perspicuous falshoods and recommending to their practise such superstitious trifles and ridiculous fopperies unbeseeming the gravity of the Christian Religion to give a just representation of them in this manner is a thing that may have it 's own usefulness especially since it may be presumed that many will read a Poem who will not set their eyes on a more serious Book I have only therefore a few things whereof to advertise thee concerning it Namely That I have in a few passages of it taken a libertie to my self in a Poeticall manner to intermix some of my own fancies yet not without designe As when I produce an argument for the Caelibate of the Clergie which I know they never made use of but let it be remembred that this is a Dream and the it were not yet since they make such other inferences from that Text as I have there mentioned I suppose they might draw this Conclusion from it as well as the rest and for any thing I know it is an Argument against the marriage of Church men of as great force as any that they have heretofore hit upon But in truth my aim is to show what ridiculous interpretations of Scripture these pretended infallible expounders of it doe often make He who will prove the Popes supremacie from Genes 1. 1. Because it is there said In principio and not in Principiis as Pope Boniface doth or his Precedencie to the Emperour from Genes 1. 16 Where it is said that GOD made two great lights as Pope Innocent 3 or his Civill and Ecclesiastick power from Ecce duo gladii or the necessity of the Celibate of the Clergie From Rom. 8. 8. as Pope Siricius I think may prove Quidlibet ex Quolibet I have mentioned a Relique which they pretend not to have but in that I mean only to show in whole manner these litle wondrous things are usually alledged to be found All the Sirs which I say they call Veniall are by their Casuists put in that rank and that they account it much more Criminall to neglect the observation of the Traditions of the Church then to break the Commandements of GOD is so well known that it needs no prooff I have spoken at length of their Religious Houses and Orders they being the only things they boast of that have any shew of Sanctitie and to evidence that I meant nothing but fair dealing I have not equally inveighed against all persons among them The words of their Mystick Divinitie that I have mentioned are to be found every one of them in their own books with a great many more which I could not get brought into verse Thebodde talkings which they have of the Superessentiall Life The State of Totalitie The Union of Nothing with Nothing The Dei-forme Fund of the Soul c. I could no more make Rhyme then they can make Reason of them When I reflect on the rude disorders of some who betake themselves to the Religious Houses I doe not slander them the Epistle of Huldericus Bishop of Augusta to Pope Nicolas wherein he tells of six thousand heads of Infants found in one Mote gives sufficient ground for the reproach I wrote this Poem in the Year 1679. When these Nations were allarmed with the noyse of the Popish plot And I thought to have enlarged more on that Subject but ere I finished it that began to be a suspect business and it was come to that which on ingeniously expresseth thus That Shams with Shams and Plots with Plots were cross't And the true Plot among the false was lost If any expect that I should make an Apologie for publishing it the Common-Heads of excuse in these cases are well enough known and I may pretend to have an equall right to them with other Men. If their be any thing in it that may be offensive to the severest modestie I shall be readie upon conviction to acknowledge my faultiness therein but for my litle extravagancies that may be found here I hope thy censure will be gentle for it any sort of men have reason to expect some charitable allowance for escapes it can hardly be denyed to A Dreaming Poet. Farewell THE ROMAN CATHOLICK CHURCH Described in a VISION I Find I 'm haunted with a busie mind Swift as

A DESCRIPTION OF THE Roman Catholick CHURCH WHEREIN The Pretensions of it's Head The Manners of His Court The Principles and Doctrines The Worship and Service The Religious Orders and Houses The Designs and Practises of that Church are Represented in A Uision By IOHN BARCLAY Minister at Cruden Written in the Year 1679 Printed in the Year 1689. To The Right Honourable My Very Noble LORD John EARLE OF ERROLL LORD HAY and SLAINS c. Great Constable of SCOTLAND AND His Truly Noble and Religious LADIE Anna COUNTESS OF ERROLL May it please Your HONOURS I Know it is usuall in addresses of this nature to those who court favour to themselves or applause to their Books to make the utmost stretches in complementing those Persons of Quality whose patronage they claim and to spend themselves in copious panegyricks fetched from all the Topicks of flattery so far as they are capable to improve them But I have the happiness of being fred from this trouble you being such as neither need nor desire to be caressed in that manner And I may justly call this an happiness to me since my naturall temper removes me to the greatest distance from the confines of that service vice I can not indeed withold my self from acknowledging that I owe you all the expressions of Gratitude which I can never be able to pay and when I tell the world that as you have honours entailed upon you from a long Series of Illustrious Ancestors so you are like to transmit them unblemished to your Posterity to whose honours it will be an addition to have it remembered that they are yours and that for your Noble Qualities and Vertues you are justly esteemed and beloved of all who have the honour of your acquaintance I am assured that I doe not transgress the Rules of the severest modestie their is only one thing which I must utter to your commendation because it ought not to be concealed namely your being faithfull to God and Conscience in adhereing to the true Protestant Religion in a time when many have made defection and you have been assaulted with such tentations as nothing but a brave Resolution and a mighty grace could have enabled you to conquer And tho you have been happily united both in the conflict and Victory yet let it not be offensive that I relate what part each of you have acted therein and of this I shall say nothing but with the assurance of a Witness and with the Ingenuity becoming a man of my Profession Those who understood your Inclinations knew that you could have been well pleased that the Romish Missionaries would have saved themselves the trouble of the Visits they made you And it was the opinion of some who were sollicitous for your safety that you should have rid your selves of them by denying them access but as the sweetness of your tempers doth as it were by an inevitable force carry you to deport your selves with an obliging civility to all persons so for other weighty considerations you did not relish that advice Upon you MY LORD they did begin to make some direct attempts to seduce you from your Holy profession but Your Lo took a wise and compendious method to avoid their snares by giving them to understand that your mind was fully satisfied of the truth of your Religion and that you had something else to doe then entangle your self in perplexing debates with them knowing no good fruit that was to be reaped thereby This resolute answer made them perceive it was in vain to insist any further that way but they hoped by fetching a compass a little about to gain more ground It hath been an old craft of seducers considering what interest Ladies have in the affection of their Husbands and what power with their Children to make their utmost essayes to proselite them to their Errours not doubting but if they succeed they shall quickly have the whole familie at their Devotion And therefore You MADAM was the prize on which they set their eyes But Your La did for see the danger and provided to encounter it These Champions of the Romish Religion who were to make their addresses to you were given out to be men of vaste learning and admirable parts for that is one of the arts of Papists as they boast that their Church is infallible so they would have the world believe that their Clergie are an invincible sort of men that they may fright those whom they besiege upon the first summonds to make a surrender you therefore applied your self to a diligent use of all means for your establishment in the Truth you Prayed and Read and conferred and pondered deeply the matters of Religion and thought all you could doe in these wayes no more then was needfull in so weightie an affair Heaven hath endued you with a great stock of excellent gifts a composed and comprehensive mind a clearness and solidity of Iudgment a deep reach and readiness of expression and these being joyned with singleness and sincerity of heart are such ramparts and defences against seduction that they make the Soul almost impregnable And that good God who is never wanting to the assistance of his faithfull Servants did furnish you with such light and Grace that your Faith hath remained unshaken Those who designed to seduce you soon percieved that they had not to doe with a person of an ordinary capacity Their usuall common places of arguments they found you could easily answer and your prejudices against their Religion though you proposed them only by way of Queries and with the modestie of a Learner were yet so framed that it was evident to them you had so penetrated into the controversies of Religion that they thought it a sort of Victory to get of without being at some visible disadvantages and I hardly knew any of them who having once made an essay were sond of a second encounter The Remembrance of the particular passages of your behaviour is still very gratefull to me and the relating of them would sure be very pleasing to others but your modestie and humility is such that I may not adventure to publish them Onely give me leave to say concerning you both that if either crastie insiauations or the charmes of friendship or worldly considerations or long importunities or any thing that could be projected by the wit and subtility of Seducers could have corrupted or byassed your minds none of these methods were left unessayed And when all these efforts proved unsuccessfull and all Topicks were exhausted yet that they might be ever like themselves they had the impudence to write and spread reports to distant places in this Kingdom that you were their Converts or just at the turning point Whether this was done out of spite or to be an Argument to prevail with others of a sequacious humour to imitate such noble Precedents I cannot determine but this I know that Hell it self could invent nothing more false The Gracious God