Selected quad for the lemma: truth_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
truth_n	commandment_n	keep_v	know_v	4,797	5	5.4171	4	true

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ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A35344	A sermon preached to the honourable Society of Lincolns-Inne by R. Cudsworth ...	Cudworth, Ralph, 1617-1688.	1664 (1664)	Wing C7470; ESTC R38833	29,413	70

and Living Faith that worketh by Love which is the very Essence of the New Creature or Regenerate Nature 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to be imputed or accounted for Righteousness under the Gospel-dispensation where God will not proceed according to Legal Rigour and Severity with his fallen Creatures but according to that Equity and ' 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which the Philosopher tells us is the Truest Justice But our onely design is to caution against that Antinomian Error which is too often insinuated under the Notion of Imputed Righteousness as if there were no necessity of Inherent Righteousness and a Real Victory over Sin in order to Salvation but that an Imputed or Imaginary one might serve the turn Which Error springing up very early amongst the Gnostick-Christians S. John gives a seasonable Antidote against it 1 John 3. 7. Little Children let no man deceive you he that doth Righteousness is righteous even as he is righteous and in Chap. 2. v. 4. He that saith I know him and keepeth not his Commandments is a Liar and the Truth is not in him To which purpose is that also in his first Chap. v. 5. This is the Message which we have heard of him and declare to you That God is Light and in him is no Darkness at all If we say that we have Fellowship with him and walk in darkness we lye and doe not the Truth But if we walk in the light as he is in the light we have Fellowship one with another and the Bloud of Jesus Christ his Son cleanseth us from all Sin Wherefore the same Apostle in that Epistle tells us of overcoming the Wicked one Chap. 2. 14. and of overcoming the World by our Faith in Christ Chap. 5. 4. And in the Apocalyps he propoundeth from Christ himself divers remarkable Promises to him that overcometh That he shall eat of the Tree of life that is in the midst of the Paradise of God c. 2. v. 7. That he shall not be hurt of the Second Death v. II. That he shall have the hidden Manna and a white Stone with a new Name written in it which no man knoweth saving he that receiveth it v. 17. That he will give him the morning Star v. 28. That he shall be clothed in white Raiment and his name shall not be blotted out of the Book of Life c. 3. v. 5. That he shall be a Pillar in the Temple of God v. 12. and That he shall sit with Christ in his Throne as he overcame and sate down with his Father in his Throne v. 21. The Condition of all which Promises being Overcoming we may well conclude from thence that there is a Real and not an Imaginary Victory onely to be obtained over the Power of Sin as well as the Guilt of it Nay it is true and very observable that those Places which are usually quoted as the Foundation of an Imputed Righteousness in some other sense then what we have before mentioned are indeed no otherwise to be understood then of a Real Inward Righteousness that is wrought or infused by the Spirit of Christ. As that principal one Philip. 3. v. 8. Yea doubtless and I count all things loss for the excellency of the Knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord that I may win him and be found in him not having mine own Righteousness which is of the Law but that which is through the Faith of Christ the Righteousness which is of God by Faith Where Christ whom the Apostle desires to win and to be found in and the Righteousness which is through the Faith of Christ and the Righteousness which is of God through Faith are no External Imputed Righteousness but the Real Inward Righteousness of the New Creature wrought by the Spirit of Christ through Faith which is opposed here to our own Righteousness and the Righteousness which is of the Law that is the Righteousness of outward Works done by our own Natural power according to the Letter of the Law in our Unregenerate state for so the following words explain the meaning That I may know him and the power of his Resurrection and the fellowship of his Sufferings being made conformable unto his Death If by any means I might attain to the Resurrection of the dead And this same Inward and Real Righteousness is often elsewhere called Christ and the New man that is said to be In us and which we are exhorted to Put on not by Conceit or Imagination onely but by real Conformity to his Nature and Participation of his Spirit And whereas the Magnifiers of Free Grace in an Antinomian sense and the Decriers of Inherent Righteousness commonly conceive that the Free Grace of God consists in nothing but either in the Pardon of Sin and Exemption from Punishment or the Imputation of an External Holiness and accounting men Just freely without any Condition but onely the mere Believing of this that they are so accounted and that Faith is no otherwise considered in the Gospel then in order to the Believing of this Imputation and that our own Works when they are comparatively undervalued to Grace and Faith are to be taken for all Inherent Righteousness and Holiness even the New Creature it self That all these are Errors as it might be abundantly proved from sundry other places of Scripture so it may sufficiently appear from that one Ephes. 2. v. 4 c. God who is rich in mercy for his great love wherewith he loved us even when we were dead in sins hath quickned us together with Christ by Grace ye are saved and hath raised us up together That in the Ages to come he might shew the exceeding riches of his Grace and his kindness towards us through Christ Jesus For by Grace are ye saved through Faith and that not of your selves it is the gift of God Not of Works left any man should boast For we are his Workmanship created in Christ Jesus unto good Works For when we are here said to be saved by Grace it is plain that the Apostle means by Saved inwardly Quickned and Sanctified 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 saith Grotius well here is Purgari à Vittis which inward Sanctification is here attributed to God's Free Grace and denied to our selves and to Works the meaning whereof is that it is not effected by our own Works whether of outward Morality or Legal Ceremonies done by our Natural power in the Unregenerate state but by the quickning and enlivening Spirit of Christ inwardly creating us a-new And lastly Faith is plainly made the Instrument of this inward Sanctification that is not wrought by our own Works but the Grace and Spirit of Christ. Whence we may well conclude That the true Object of the Christian Faith is not onely the Bloud of Christ shed upon the Cross for the Remission of Sin but also the renewing Spirit of Christ for the inward conquering and mortifying of it and the Quickning or Raising of us to an Heavenly Life And I dare be bold

to say That the inward sense of every true and sincere-hearted Christian in this Point speaks the same language with the Scripture For a true Christian that hath any thing of the Life of God in him cannot but earnestly desire an inward Healing of his sinful Maladies and Distempers and not an outward Hiding or Palliation of them onely He must needs passionately long more and more after a new Life and Nature and the Divine Image to be more fully formed in him insomuch that if he might be secured from the pains of Hell without it he could not be fully quieted and satisfied therewith 'T is not the Effects and Consequents of Sin onely the External Punishment due unto it that he desires to be freed from but the Intrinsecal Evil of Sin it self the Plague of his own Heart As he often meditates with comfort upon that Outward Cross to which his Saviour's hands and feet were nailed for his Sins so he impatiently desires also to feel the virtue of that Inward Cross of Christ by which the World may be crucified to him and he unto the World and the Power of Christ's Resurrection in him still to raise him farther unto newness of Life Neither will he be more easily persuaded to believe that his sinful Lusts the malignity and violence whereof he feels within himself can be conquered without him then that an Army here in England can be conquered in France or Spain He is so deeply sensible of the Real Evil that is in Sin it self that he cannot be contented to have it onely histrionically triumphed over And to phansy himself covered all over with a thin veil of mere external Imputation will afford little satisfactory Comfort unto him that hungers and thirsts after Righteousness and is weary and heavy laden with the Burthen of his Sins and doth not desire to have his inward Maladies hid and covered onely but healed and cured Neither can he be willing to be put off till the hour of Death for a Divorce betwixt his Soul and Sin nor easily persuaded that though Sin should rule and reign in him all his Life-long yet the last parting grone that shall divide his Soul and Body asunder might have so great an Efficacy as in a moment also to separate all Sin from his Soul BuT that we may not seem here either to beat the Air in Generals and Uncertainties or by an indiscreet zeal to countenance those conceited and high-flown Enthusiasts of latter times that forgetting that example of Modesty given us by the blessed Apostle Not as though I had already attained or were already perfect But this one thing I doe forgetting those things which are behind and reaching forth unto those things which are before I press toward the Mark boldly arrogate to themselves such an Absolute Perfection as would make them not to stand in need of any Saviour nor to be cleansed by the Bloud of the Lamb which therefore they allegorize into a mystical sense we must declare that we speak not here of Inherent Righteousness and a Victory over Sin in a Legal or Pharisaical sense but in such an Evangelical sense as yet notwithstanding is true and real The First Degree whereof is a Principle of New life infused into the Soul by the Spirit of Christ through Faith which the Apostle calls Semen Dei the Seed of God inclining it to love God and Righteousness as a thing correspondent to its nature and inabling it to act freely and ingenuously in the waies of God out of a living Law written upon the Heart and to eschew Sin as contrary to a vital Principle For the true Gospel-Righteousness which Christ came to set up in the world doth not consist merely in outward Works whether Ceremonial or Moral done by our own Natural power in our Unregenerate state but in an inward Life and Spirit wrought by God Which those very Philosophers seemed in a manner to acknowledge that denied 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to be 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that Vertue could be taught by outward Rules and Precepts like an Art or Trade and Aristotle himself also when he inclines to think that men are 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and that their being Good depends upon some extraordinary Divine Influence and Assistence Which I the rather take notice of because some late Pretenders to Philosophy have prophanely derided this Doctrine after this manner as if it made Good Thoughts and Vertuous Dispositions to be POURED and BLOWN into men by God But there is a Second Degree of Victory over Sin which every true Christian ought not onely to look upon as possible but also to endeavour after and restlesly to pursue which is such a measure of Strength in the Inward man and such a degree of Mortification or Crucifixion of our sinful Lusts as that a man will not knowingly and deliberately doe any thing that his Conscience plainly tells him is a Sin though there be never so great Temptations to it Whether or no this be that Evangelical Perfection which was the Mark that S. Paul pressed towards and which he seems mystically to call the Resurrection from the Dead or any thing further I leave it to others to make a Judgement of But doubtless they that have attained to such a Principle of New Life and such a measure of inward Strength as is already mentioned that is to the Perfection of unfeigned Sincerity may notwithstanding the Irregularities of the first Motions violent Assaults and Importunities of Tentations sudden Incursions and Obreptions Sins of mere Ignorance and Inadvertency which are all wash'd away in the Bloud of Christ in a true Evangelical sense be said to have attained to a Victory over Sin Wherefore I demand in the next place Why it should be thought impossible by the Grace of the Gospel and the Faith of Christ to attain to such a Victory as this is over Sin For Sin owes its original to nothing else but Ignorance and Darkness 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Every wicked man is ignorant And therefore in that sense that other Maxime of the Stoicks may have some Truth also that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Men sin against their will because if they knew that those things were indeed so hurtful to them they would never doe them Now we all know how easily Light conquers Darkness and upon its first approch makes it flie before it and like a guilty shade seek to hide it self from it by running round about the Earth And certainly the Light of God arising in the Soul can with as much ease scatter away the Night of sinful Ignorance before it For Truth hath a cognation with the Soul and Falshood Lies and Impostures are no more able to make resistence against the Power of Truth breaking forth then Darkness is able to dispute with Light Wherefore the Entrance in of Light upon the Soul is half a Conquest over our Sinful Lusts. Again though Sin have had a long and customary Possession in the