Selected quad for the lemma: truth_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
truth_n	devil_n	father_n	lie_n	3,415	5	9.0726	5	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A75693	An argument proving, that according to the covenant of eternal life revealed in the Scriptures, man may be translated from hence into that eternal life, without passing through death altho the humane nature of Christ himself could not be thus translated till he had passed through death.	Asgill, John, 1659-1738.	1700 (1700)	Wing A3926; ESTC R208477	45,123	107

yet when I say he did not do it voluntarily I don't mean that he did it unwillingly For as he did it with all frankness and generosity of his Will I lay down my Life of my self so he did it with the highest affection of Love to Mankind Greater Love than this hath no Man that he lay down his Life for his Friend But I mean he did not do it purely voluntarily without a necessity of doing it and a Consideration for it First then There was a Necessity upon God himself God told Adam that if he did eat he should die The Devil told Eve that they might eat and not die And these were the first words spoken to Man by God or the Devil upon the truth or falshood whereof the very Beings of them both were to depend for ever For which ever of them could maintain the Truth of his Word against the other he must have been God and the other the Devil And therefore God having turned the Lie upon the Devil he is from thence called a Liar from the beginning and the Father of it and will never be believed again for ever God could not have dispensed with his Word without complementing the Devil with his Godhead in taking the Lie upon himself and this he could not do For God cannot lie without undeifying himself and this he can't do because all his Qualities being of his Essence he can't change them That God cannot change is not a deficiency in his Nature but the perfection of his Essence which can be nothing but himself For as it is the happiness of imperfect Beings to be capable of change in order to be made better so it is the happiness of perfect Beings to be incapable of change whereby to be made worse Man can lie because he can't speak Truth there 's nothing that a Man can say but what he can unsay and falsify by the change of his mind which he can change only because he can't fix it as a Man that hath a broken Arm can turn it every way because he can fix it no way Nothing but an absolute Power can be absolute in any thing therefore Man having no absolute Power can't absolutely determine his own Will every change of which subjects him to a Lie either by falsifying his former Resolutions or his present Inclinations But God having an absolute Power to determine his own Will he could not change it after he had so determined it for what is fix'd can't be changed Wherefore God could not dispense with the Breach of his Law to pardon it Which was not for want of Mercy in God for he hath and doth daily pardon ten thousand times the Sins committed by Man against the moral Law which seem as great Offences as this Because the moral Law hath in it self a defeazance or condition annexed to it at the time of the first delivering of it Except ye repent ye shall perish By which this Law may be fulfilled without a performance of it in specie by doing another thing which is admitted to be done instead of it A defeazance is not the same thing with the thing to be defeated but something collateral to it And thus Repentance which is not a performance of the Moral Law is nevertheless accepted instead of it But in this Law delivered to Adam there was no such condition annexed to it at the first delivery The words are absolute In the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt die which leaves no room for Repentance Adam did repent but he found no place for it he could not find any words of the Law to which he could apply his Repentance to do him any good And when a Deed hath no defeazance or condition annexed to it at the time of the first delivery it can't be added to it afterwards And hence tho this Law delivered to Adam was at the time of the first delivery a Law of Life and Death yet the Law of Life being ended by breach of the Condition there was then nothing left but the Law of Death which became absolute without any condition And this put God upon a necessity of executing the Sentence of the Law upon Man in specie or making himself a Liar which he could not do and therefore the necessity upon him was absolute Which necessity was all the while a contradiction to his Nature which is Love to Man God is Love And this divided him against himself and laid him under a necessity of finding out an Invention to reconcile his Truth to his Love and his Love to his Truth And this Necessity upon God draw'd a Necessity upon Christ to come and execute this Invention because none could do it but himself Now there being such a Necessity for Christ's assuming the Humane Nature and dying under it there was a Covenant made between him and the Father previous to his coming in the Flesh which is called the Covenant of Eternal Life and is the History of the Scriptures altho it be not set down altogether in any one place Rich Metals and precious Stones don't lie together in heaps above ground but being so valuable when found Men think it worth their while to dig down for them in all places where they have any probability of finding them Then if the way and manner of attaining Eternal Life doth lie in so narrow a Volume as the Bible Search the Scriptures for in them ye think ye have Eternal Life shall we not think it worth our while to search it through for that precious Stone with a new Name which none can read but they that have it And this is a more pleasant Labour than the search for other Jewels for there we meet with nothing of pleasure or profit till we find the very thing we seek for But in making this enquiry we divert our selves with knowledg all the way we go Nor did God think any one Man or any one Age of the World worthy to have the whole of this Covenant revealed to them all at once He was 4000 Years from Adam to Christ delivering it in Types and Shadows to 62 Generations of Men who passed their Age in that time But having thus prefaced it at sundry times and in divers manners to our Fathers by the Prophets he at last spoke it to us by his Son In which these parts do appear 1. The Date 2. The Parties 3. The Contents and Consideration 4. The Sealing and Execution 5. The Witnesses 6. The Ceremony required of Man whereby to execute it on his part and take the advantage of it 1. The Date This was before the Foundation of the World I was set up from everlasting Before Abraham was I am God who created all things by Jesus Christ the Lamb slain before the Foundation of the World The priority of which Date prevents any preincumbrance that could be made of Eternal Life which is more than can be said of any Titles amongst Men. 2. The Parties It was between him