Selected quad for the lemma: truth_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
truth_n	doctrine_n	scripture_n	tradition_n	1,683	5	8.8849	5	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A91893	The birth of a day: being a treatise theologicall, morall and historicall, representing (as in a scene) the vicissitudes of all humane things, with their severall causes and sacred uses. Compos'd for the establishing mans soul unchangeable in the faith, amidst the various changes of the world. / By J. Robinson Mr of Arts and preacher of Gods Word.	Robinson, John, Preacher at East-Thorpe.	1654 (1654)	Wing R1698; Thomason E1493_4; ESTC R203378	52,211	117

the Winds blew but it fell not because it was built upon a Rock And such a well-built house was Saint Basil who being threatned with death by Val●ns if he would not advise further and turn Arrian answer'd with this brave resolution Sozom. bist lib. 6. c. 16. In hoc mihi consilio non est opus nam idem qui jam sum cras etiam futurus sum I need not any further advice then I have taken already about this matter for to morrow I shall be the same man that I am to day therein and no other And here know that some things are of Necessity wherein we cannot but change as in naturall civill and morall things and to change in these is only humane Others again are of Duty and these either prohibited or enjoyn'd 1. Prohibited as in evill and erroneous things and to change here is pious and divine and not to change either Weaknesse or Obstinacy 2. Enjoyn'd as in sacred and religious and to change here is impious and Diabolicall and not to change true Christian Fortitude and Constancy Whatsoever things we see then wheeling about in the world as Governments Families and the like nay howsoever we may change our selves or be chang'd in some things of an indifferent nature by those that have dominion over our Bodies and Estates yet is there no man that hath dominion over our Faith But this is Gods peculiar and therefore 2 Cor. 1. last in this we must not change It is not with saving Truths as it is with Clothes which alter every year as the fashion doth for the fashion of the world passes away sayes Saint John but true Religion 1 John 2. 17. is ever in fashion with good men and alters not And herein we may justly take occasion to bewail the unsteadinesse of some in these times who are mere Scepticks in Religion alwayes conceiving some new Opinions in it and alwayes in pain till they be deliver'd of their new conceptions though never so monstrous and deformed That which was truth with them yesterday The Magd●burgenses tell us Cent. 4. c. 11. that such was Eustathius Bishop of Sebaste who was one day for the Homousian and another for the Homoiusian Confession accordingly as they suited best with his present turn is no such thing to day and what is so to day is otherwise to morrow such Changelings there be in this last Age who like the Moon do never appear the same two dayes together And I would to God Atque utinam vel sic mutentur Hoec enim cito ad plen●●udinem suam redit hi vero nec sero convertuntur Ambros Proviriis actionibus conc 4. in Tom. 5. sayes Saint Ambrose that their change were no worse then that of the Moon for she returns again within a little time to her full light but these never And he is blind that sees not this among us namely how some turn every day to Popish Superstition but more to Anabaptisticall Francies some unto Socinian Blasphemies but most unto Atheisticall Notions and all into Sensuality this being the Common Sewer into which all the former run and are ultimately resolved But as Saint Paul said to his Galathians so do I to such O foolish Galathians who hath Galat. 3. 1. bewitch'd you that you should not obey the Gospel And it is a metaphor sayes one from Sorcerers who use to cast a mist before the peoples eyes that so they may not take a right view of what is presented to them As if he had said Who hath cast a mist before the eyes of your understandings to make that appear unto you for truth which indeed is not What Are ye so foolish that having begun in the spirit ye will be perfected in the flesh So Are ye so foolish that having begun in truth ye will end in falshood or can ye be so simple as to exchange Gold for Dirt Wheat for Chaffe and your pretious Faith as Saint Peter calls it which is the substance 2 Pet. 1. 1. Heb. 11. 1. of things hoped for for Errours of all sorts and mere shadows of Truth I trow not For if Errour as our Kingly Divine said well have any 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 pag. 137. advantage it consists in Novelty or if Truth any it consists in Constancy Was the Doctrine then of the Reformed Churches and the Harmony of our Confessions grounded upon evident and pregnant Scriptures maintain'd by the Orthodox and primitive Fathers and conveyed to us by the constant tradition of the universall Church the Faith of Christ once deliver'd to the Saints and the Truth of God yesterday why so it is to day and will be to morrow also And therefore to day in our profession of it we must be as yesterday and to morrow as this day because as God is the same Heb. 13. 〈◊〉 yesterday to day and for ever so also is the Truth of God That which was once so Veritas Dei una semperque sui similis In praefat ad Harm Confes will be so alwayes and cannot be otherwise Oh that we would then be exhorted in the Apostles words To stand fast in the Ephes 4. 14. Faith to quit our selves like men and be strong and not to be as children toss'd to 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Metaphora a rota quae motu continuo circumacta partes summas imas semper commutat Pareus in locum and fro and carried about with every wind 1 Cor. 14. 20. of Doctrine but to be as men in understanding stedfast and immoveable that so God may have cause to glory on our behalf as he did on Jobs Hast thou consider'd sayes God to Sathan my servant Job 2. 3. Job So hast thou consider'd such a servant of mine Seest thou to how many changes I have subjected him to changes in his Children to changes in his Estate to changes in his Liberty to changes in his Friends and Acquaintance Nay seest thou how many of his Brethren are chang'd of late from a febrish distemper before now into a sleepy lechargy Seest thou how indifferent they are for their religion round about him and how many shaken reeds there are on every side Nec iratum colere destitit ●●men Sen. ad Marc. cap. 13. of him And yet for all this as my servant Job did so doth he still hold his integrity But enough of this Secondly Gods end also in it is To reform our lives and do us good by his so various dispensations towards us Hence we Huic affine est illud Amos 9. v. 9. ubi duo consideranda vel purgatum frumentum à sordibus vel exagitatum à cribrante dum ab uno cribri laterc in alterum propellitur Sanct. in locum read Isa 30. 28. of a sieve of vanity wherein God sayes he will sift the Nations and shake them to and fro one after another that so he may winnow them from that Chaffe of

an Italian and kinsman of his that had in one In lib. 18. subtil night his hair metamorphosed from black to white And I apply it thus That although now Gods people may ly as the Israelites did among the pots to use the Prophets words and be like some Scullion Psal 68. vers 13. fullied and black'd with the burning coals of Affliction yet may one day of Gods favour to us work a great alteration with us and put such a candy of Prosperity upon us as that we shall be as it is there vers 14. even as white as the snow in Salmon And therefore as Jobs resolution was to wait all the dayes of his appointed time Job 14. ve●s 14. untill his change should come so should every good man wait upon God all the dayes that he shall be pleased to lay trouble upon him whether immediately by Accepimus peritura perituri quid querimur Ad hoc instituti sumus Sen. lib. de provid c. 6. himself or else mediately by the hands of evil men as his instruments in it as knowing that it is appointed but for a little while at the most but a biduum or a triduum and then a change shall come and bring him deliverance from it For in mount Sion and in Jerusalem there shall be deliverance as the Lord hath Joel 2. 32. said neither shall the rod of the ungodly alwayes lye upon the back of the righteous Psal 125. 3. but after two dayes he will revive us and the third day we shall live in his Hos 6. 2. sight Wherefore seeing we are compass'd about as the Authour to the Hebrews speaks with such a cloud of witnesses let us run Heb. 12. 1. 2. and 3. on with patience the race that is set before us looking unto Jesus the beginner and finisher of our faith who for the joy that was set before him endured the crosse and despised the shame Yea let us consider him that endured such contradictions of sinners that so we may not be faint and weary And now Comfort Jerusalem saith my Isa 40. 1 2. God yea comfort her at the very heart and tell her that her sinnes are pardoned and her warfare is accomplished For the Lord knows sayes Saint Peter how to deliver the godly out of temptation and to 2 Pet. 2. 9. make a way for them to escape That as the sufferings of Christ in them do abound so hath God many wayes to make their 2 Cor. 1. 5. consolations abound also If the Devil and his Engineers have Mille nocendi artes a thousand wayes to hurt and destroy them God will either find or make as many wayes to preserve them whereof some he will have to be more secret and under ground others again more open and obvious to the eyes of the world as either by restraining the fury and malice of their persecutours and stopping their mouthes that they shall not hurt them as he did the mouthes of the Lions from hurting Daniel or else by taking them off by his destroying hand of judgement in the full carreer of their pride as he did Pharaoh Antiochus Herod Agrippa Julian the Apostate and many such like or if none of these wayes yet by ingratiating them and giving them favour in the sight of their enemies as he did the Israelites in the eyes of the Aegyptians And as God knows how to deliver the godly so also when to do it and a great deal sooner it may be then they expect even within the space and turning about of one day Since none of us know what a day may bring forth Trin uni Deo Gloria Aspiratio ALmighty God who rulest the Sea of this World by thy power whose paths are in the roughest waters We the unworthiest of all thy servants commit our frail Barks with all that we have to the steerage of thee our great Pilot faithfull Preserver beseeching thee so to order by thy good hand of Providence all outward contingencies to us that we may be able to beare up through them with a steady and even course against the severall storms we shall meet with in this passage to our blessed Harbour of Eternity And however earthly things may like watery Billows be every day rowling up down in their vicissitudes about us yet suffer oh suffer not the heavenly truth of our Reformed Religion to flote about any longer so uncertainly among us nor our selves to be as children toss'd to and fro with every wind of Doctrine But let us be constant and unwavering in the profession of that holy faith we have received and Thou that art the God of Truth be graciously pleased to stay us up firmly in it by the sacred Scriptures which are thy word of Truth and the sole Anchor of our faith to rest upon Lord pull in the sailes of our desires towards fleeting and transitory substances for who will cast his eyes upon that which hath wings to flee away as an Eagle towards heaven Bailast our spirits with Humility in a prosperous condition and when we have the highest and most pleasing gale of the worlds favour for us give us to strike our spreading sailes of Pride and to make our Lenity and Moderation to be known to all men for the Lord is nigh at hand But if thou in thy just judgement against us for our manifold and hainous sins shalt cause some cross wind or other to blow upon us and give us over to shipwrack in our temporalls Supply then we entreat thee their want with thy spiritualls of Patience Faith and other suffering graces That although the tempest be never so boisterous without yet we may enjoy within a Christian calmness of spirit in a happy quietude and contentedness of mind with all thy dealings towards us and not set down our rests upon the creature which is so restless with us but amidst the sundry and various changes of the world may there fix our hearts where only true and unchangeable joys are to be found through Iesus Christ our Lord. Trin-uni Deo Gloria