Selected quad for the lemma: truth_n
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A42725
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Nevves from Poland wherein is declared the cruell practice of the popish clergie against the Protestants, and in particular against the ministers of the city of Vilna, in the great dukedome of Lithuania, under the governement of the most illustrious prince, Duke Radziwell / faithfully set downe by Eleazar Gilbert ...
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Gilbert, Eleazar.
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1641
(1641)
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Wing G705; ESTC R9201
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20,227
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38
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NEVVES From POLAND Wherein is declared the cruell practice of the Popish Clergie against the Protestants and in particular against the Ministers of the City of Vilna in the great Dukedome of Lithuania under the Governement of the most Illustrious Prince Duke RADZIVILL Faithfully set downe by Eleazar Gilbert Minister to the foresaid Prince and Preacher to the Scots Congregation in Keydon Read it over and you shall find it a most unparalelld story for barbarous Treacherie NOLI ALTVM SAPERE LONDON Printed by E. P. for Nathanael Butter and are to be sold at his shop at St. Austins Gate 1641. To the Right HONOVRABLE ROBERT Lord Bruce Baron of Byfleet and onely Sonne to the Right Honourable Thomas Earle of Elgin Eleasar Gilbert wisheth all possible Happinesse Right Honourable I Have placed you here in the Frontispiece of my Dedicatory first because you have a chiefe place in my affections as one whom God hath graced with a more than ordinary portion of his Image for to speak without Flattery what Grace what Vertue what endowment either of body mind or fortune Finally what Perfection or Excellency can make men truly Honourable on Earth and eternally happy in Heaven which doth not shine in your Lordship in the fullest lustre so farre as your condition and yeares can be capable of insomuch that if it please the Lord to addc yeares unto your life as hee hath gifts unto your person a starre more radiant then your selfe I conceive in our age will scarcely appeare in our Brittish Firmament moreover your Lordship may justly challenge the first fruit of my publike labors because I had the first encouragement tomy ministerial studies in your Honourable Familie under your Right Honourable most pious never without much Reverence to bee mentioned Grandmother Magdalen Ladie Bruce where I have beene an eye-witnesse of your vertuous education ab imis as I may say incunabulis from your very infancy and where I have often observed the most vigilant and religious care of your Right Honourable Parents in your vertuous education which to this day doth most spectably appeare as a pattern of imitation to all the Nobles in the Land Goe on therefore most Noble and hopefull Lord good luck have you with your Honour continue that course in these paths of Vertue wâ—ich you have begun to tread especially seeing you have already made so good a progresse for Dimidium facti qui bene coepit habet And you shall find that although the way bee thorny yet the end shall be Honourable that paines which you now take and have taken to please and serve God and your right Honourable Parents shall produce unto you at length not onely the favour of God the love of your Soveraign â—oÌ„mendation of your equals praise of all good men but also contentment to your mind peace unto your conscience protection to your person a blessing unto your estate and a sweet relish to all the honours wealth and pleasures which you shall afterwards enjoy Which that you may doe I shall never be wanting in my best devotion to implore the gracious assistance of that Father of lights the Watchman of Israel to double his spirit upon you and wheresoever you goe for good to be present with you to guard you by his Providence guide you by his counsell and when he hath here satiated your Lordship with honours and pleasures temporall bring you at length unto ioyes and happinesse eternall So prayeth he who desireth to bee reputed as he is One of your Lordships most ancient and affect onately devoted Servants Eleazar Gilbert From my Study in St. Mary-Axe this 8. Decemb. 1641. A True Description of the present estate of the Reformed Protestant Churches within the Kingdome of Poland c. THe industrious policy or rather politick industry of the Roman Clergie for advancing their cause and promoting the Papisticall Hierarchy is as much if not more commendable then was that of the injust Steward Luke 16. 8. did it not crosse the word or Law of God which is the rule of righteousnesse and breake the bond of charity which is the complement and perfection of that Law For what pains doe they not take How doe they stretch their wits What Countries peopled or worthy to be knowne or inhabited have they not peragrated to accomplish their designes and zealous if I may so call them devotions So that if their cause were good and their laborious indeavours to manage that cause guided by a good Spirit or squared to the rule of Justice they should certainly be no lesse then that which they call themselves and pretend to be namely The onely true Catholike Church of Christ that Royall Priesthood and chosen Generation mentioned by the Apostle Peter But true wisedome which is from above is onely justified by her children who doe judge and estimate things especially in matters of Religion and Divine worship not as men value them but as God esteemeth them For God seeth not as men see man oftentimes by reason of the corruption of his heart weakenesse of judgement perversion of will and imperfection of knowledge and understanding may both deceive be deceived but so cannot God who being all eye estimateth and knoweth all things perfectly and essentially as they are as having within himselfe the expresse and true paterne and Ideas of all things that ever have beene are or shall be That therefore men I meane onely Christian men who are within the Pale of Gods Church may be the better setled and persuaded in the truth of that Religion which they doe professe It will be most necessary and profitable for them to take speciall notice of some markes and symptomes whereby the true and orthodoxe Religion or Church of Christ may be distinguished and discerned from all false Antichristian phanaticall inventions traditions enthusiasmes and in a word from all hereticall pragmaticall schismaticall or diabolicall opinions imaginations doctrines and professions in the world which for brevities sake and that I may sooner come to my intended scope I will onely at this time name leaving the more large explication of them unto some other Treatise 1 The first is the purity or rather as I may say the spirituality of a Religion as it is cleansed from the drosse of externall ceremonies and exorbitant superstitions for Almighty God loveth best that Religion or manner of his worship which is most like himselfe and agreeable to his word who being a Spirit will be worshipped in Spirit and truth the more therefore that a Religion hath of outward and gaudy Pompes and Ceremonies to dazle and delude the fancies eyes and affections of the ingorant and simple it is the farther from the nature of God the more contrary to his will it hath more drosse and is the more to be suspected of falshood and to be Antichristian and idolatrous 2 Secondly the more that the grounds doctrine discipline tenets of a Religion are adverse or to do crosse the corruption
pride and insolency of Jesuites and Papists is growne to such a heigth that they spare not to persecute and assault our Ministers and Professors in the open streets affronting them with opprobrious speeches and sometimes with blowes yea often wounding them with gunnes shables clubs or stones as they lately did two of our Dukes Ministers in the Wilde about the moneth of December last one whereof a learned and Reverend Divine Master Iacobus they afflicted with three severall wounds one in the arme another in the left cheeke and a third on the backe of the left hand whereof I my selfe was an eye-witnesse so that they are now forced to forsake their Ministeriall habits and goe like Merchants or Souldiers with coloured clothes and weapons The truth whereof I my selfe have lately experienced having beene two severall times in great danger of my life once namely about the latter end of February last travelling peaceably in my sled from Keydan the place of my residence unto Rogola which is foure Polish miles distant I was set upon in the high-way by a Polish Boyarne or Gentleman who asked me what Bishop I served under but because I could not answer him in his owne language so well as he expected or perhaps by my habit surmised me to be one of Duke Radzivils Ministers stroke at me most desperatly with his shâ—ble or Polish sword three or foure severall times wounded me in the head and had I not warded two or three of his blowes with a thick Cane which I then had in mine hand and which he did almost cut through he had certainely bereft me of my life Not long after being in the Towne of Kowan six Polish miles from Keydan walking in the streets about nine of the clocke in the morning going to buy some necessaries because I saluted not the Crucifix which was then carryed by me in procession and encountred me unawares the Jesuite Schollars accompanyed with two Capushine Fryars fell upon me and assaulted me so fiercely first with words and then with blowes and stones that I was forced to make more then ordinary haste to my lodging Thus have I discharged my duty to my Illustrious Patron discovered unto you the afflicted estate of our reformed Churches under the Crowne of Poland and exposed to the world the treacherous practices malicious tyrannie unreconciliable hatred unlimited and unsatiable ambition of the Romish Prelats and their associates within the aforesaid Kingdome And yet I would not hereby absolutely and totally condemne the Romish Church as it is a Church and a part or member although a diseased and rotten one of the true Catholicke Church of Christ and as it beleeveth approveth and maintaineth with Christs Apostles and us many essentiall and Orthodoxe points of truth both in doctrine and discipline agreeable to the word of God and the analogy of fâ—ith Nor would I discourage too much the modest and better sort of Papists who living in simple ignorance make innocencie and charity the touchstone of their Religion For I am very confident that he that cannot try the truth of his Religion by these two let him be Protestant or Papist or of whatsoever other Religion he will all that he beleeveth knoweth or professeth of that Religion cannot profit him to salvation but is as founding brasse or a tinckling Cymball because the faith or knowledge which he professeth or pretendeth to have is meerely notionall and speculative residing onely in the braine and shewing it selfe onely by words or outward posture but not inwardly affecting or heating the heart with a desire to doe good or frame our actions according to our profession For that Religion that must save us must be a practicall Religion that faith that must justifie us before God must be an effectuall operative faith which worketh by love and that knowledge of God and of his Sonne Christ that knowledge I say of Religion and Divine worship which is true and able to doe us good and bring us to life eternall must bee such a knowledge saith Pet. Mart. Quia ita mutamur ut quae scimus opere conemur exprimere P. M. inloe com otherwise the better our Religion is and the more that we know of it or are leaned in it it will be the worse for us for Potentes potenter torquebuntur that swimming learning or knowledge which we have will but aggravate our condemnation for according to our talent of knowledge doth God expect from us a correspondent reckoning of obedience whereas he doth not so to such unto whom he hath not shewed himselfe so bountifull a Creditor But first I would hereby admonish and give notice unto all the simpler and more ignorant sort of Papists who either have beene lately seduced by these Romish impostures or have not as yet taken deepe footing and are but newly entred into that Antichristian Laborynth that they would in time and before they passe too farre retire and withdraw themselves least in the end they provoke the Lord to complaine of them as he did of those in the fourth Psalme O yee sonnes of men how long will you follow after vanities and seeke after leasings Secondly I would hereby bewayle and condemne Crassam illam supinam Pontificiorum ignorantiam that most grosse or rather wilfull and obstinate ignorance of the Roman Prelates and Church-men who I am perswaded in my conscience beleeve in their hearts know with their understanding discerne by their judgement although they will not confesse with their mouthes most if not all of these humane inventions unnecessary traditions idolatrous superstitions false cruell treacherous and ungodly practices doctrines devices and machinations wherein they differ from us and from that truly antient Catholicke and Apostolike doctrine professed and beleeved in the purer times of the Church many hundred yeares before ever there was the least mention of the Popes holinesse and by Gods grace is continued beleeved and maintained by us in this Angel-like Monarchy I say it is not possible but that they must needs know these things which they teach write professe and maintaine for the grounds of their Religion and maintaining improving and advancing of their Hierarchy to be unjust false unchristian and hereticall and blasphemous did they not by reason of that Regnum ignorantiae erroris that is of that kingdome of ignorance that is amongst them shut up the gates of truth that is of holy Scriptures which is the rule and ground of truth from themselves and their people Haeretici Sacerdotes claudunt Ianuam veritatis the hereticall Priests shut the gates of truth because they know that if the truth were knowne their Religion should be forsaken and they cast downe and debased from their Pontificall dignity into the meane condition of ordinary people yea I should rather have said did not the Prince of this world which ruleth in the hearts of the children of disobedience shut their eyes that they should not see stop their eares that they cannot heare harden their