Selected quad for the lemma: truth_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
truth_n	faith_n	religion_n	true_a	4,659	5	4.8297	4	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A45743	A sermon preached before the honourable House of Commons, at St. Margaret Westminster, on the thirtieth of January, 1694/5 by John Hartcliffe ...	Hartcliffe, John, 1651-1712.	1695 (1695)	Wing H970; ESTC R9583	12,292	31

into a safe Harbour The Second sort of ill Consequences were of a Religious Concern for upon the King's Murther a boundless Licence in Matters of Religion broke in upon the Nation all ways of Worshipping God being allowed but that which ought to be and was his most reasonable Service all Persons being admitted to the sacred Function but those who were lawfully called and duly qualified by their Knowledg and Virtue The Bank being in this manner broke down the whole Body of the People began to crumble into Sects and every Sect had its Head and every one that was Head of a Sect was Prince of that Party and how many poor Souls have miscarried by following these false Lights who have led them into the grossest and most abominable Trangsgressions as it must needs be when the very Instruments of their Salvation Preaching Praying Fasting Vowing were made use of to colour over the vilest Actions insomuch that nothing at last was accounted so bad or so unworthy their notice as Obedience to Superiours nothing so ridiculous as Restitution of what was unjustly gotten So that the very Saviour of the World who taught Patience and Humility Justice and Mercy thrô his whole Life is now again most notoriously mock'd with Soldiers and vouch'd the Patron of all that hideous Bloodshed which he hath plainly condemn'd in his Word and will hereafter as severely sentence in his own Person These were sad and mournful days indeed when our distressed Countrey felt such violent Convulsions within her own Bowels such deadly Blows from her own disobedient Children When both its Civil and Religious Concerns were almost destroyed for that Men made use of both the Name Word and Ordinances of God to palliate the most unrighteous Purposes Now a just Reflection on these passed Times of Adversity should arm us that we may escape the like Troubles 1st With a resolution never to meddle with those that are given to change 2ly Never to entertain any Principles of Sedition For to be involv'd in Factions against the Government is a foolish and a dangerous thing it is foolish because a Man that engages therein doth at the same time expose himself to all the Delusions imaginable and to the Cheats of every plotting Knave Besides what an unaccountable thing is it for every pert and ignorant Fellow to sit in Judgment on his Governours and arraign their Administration of Affairs Then in Matters of Religion we shall hear every thing to be branded for Popery and in Matters of State every thing to be called Tyranny which doth not exactly agree with their Model It is also dangerous to be in with Factions because they make Men so bold and rash that at one time or other they will split themselves to pieces against the Law for their Lives and Fortunes are at pawn in the hands of their Confederates who in all probability will betray them or if they do not their most clandestine Councils may be overheard or their own guilty Looks and unavoidable Suspicions may discover all and so hang up their mighty Hopes upon a Gibbet Now these Factions are generally laid at first as they were in the late Times in some little Disputes about Matters of Religion and when once the People are whetted by this kind of Zeal to disturb the establish'd Religion the next thing they do is to muster against the establish'd Government Thus they grow nice about an indifferent Rite of Worship and can take in treasonable Principles without remorse Poor deluded People who are Tools only in the hands of the more crafty and are led by exteriour Appearances without penetrating into the Cause and Nature of things they list themselves in Parties and see where they begin but God knows where they will end they commence the Quarrel for some Loan and are trained on from one Evil to another into the Spilling of Royal Blood for when they are entred into illegal Actions soon despairing of a safe Retreat they think to shelter themselves from the Punishment of one Crime by committing a worse for I make no doubt that many of those wretched Men who murdered King CHARLES the First would have trembled at the imagination of it when first they were concerned in the Attempt but being once drawn in they had no other way to escape but by Rebellion and being Rebels they had no other Sanctuary but Regicide Wherefore it behoves us as we regard our own or the publick Safety to shun all Correspondence with such as would readvance the old Methods of Sedition let us look back a while on the passed Years of our Calamity and we must be astonished at the Misfortunes that have been brought about by the feigned Alarms sometimes of Superstition and sometimes of Arbitrary Power according as either the one or the other might best serve the Turns of ill-minded Men When therefore we find any among us labouring and concerned to raise these Jealousies again be sure they aim at sinking the whole Frame of things into Confusion and whenever we discover any sort of Men strugling for Reformation in a tumultuous manner we must have nothing to do with them for they will assuredly be found Deceivers who make a shew of Religion to undermine the State and whenever some undutiful Persons speak ill of their Rulers in common Converse and whisper Stories to magnifie their Faults be sure they do this to stir up the Passions and Arms of the People against them Whereas if we would maintain the Character of good Christians and good Subjects and desire to walk uprightly in a safe Course of Life we must follow the honest and peaceable Rules of living through all Events whatsoever so shall we live consistently with our selves be always the same immoveably confirmed in our Obedience both to God and the King But then 2ly We must never entertain any Principles of Sedition for if we do we shall always be prepar'd to break the publick Peace and to turn the World upside down We have heard indeed from ill-principled Politicians that to be a zealous and sthrô-paced Christian is to be dangerous to the State Whereas our Saviour's Gospel contains nothing in it prejudicial to the Power of just and lawful Magistrates but on the other side hath stated the Rights of Civil Government upon the firmest Principles hath secured them by the most powerful Obligations and hath urged them upon us by the most effectual Motives of Rewards and Punishments Now if at any time the Professors of our Religion have acted contrary to the Spirit of Christ who was a gentle Lord and a Peace-maker they must be esteemed his Enemies and not his Disciples if in the Rule of our Faith there can be found any Warrant to justifie their privy Conspiracies or open Rebellion then may Kings cease to be our nursing Fathers and Queens to be our nursing Mothers then our preaching is vain and your Faith is vain But the truth of the Case is quite otherwise the Foundation of

Government is deeply rooted in the Foundation of our Religion Insomuch that what human Laws could never effect that the Christian in the true Spirit of it performs to the utmost degree For our Saviour carried himself with Submission to the Powers that then were even to the Sanhedrim and their Delegates and in his Doctrine he hath commanded us to render unto Cesar the things that are Cesars and the Apostles likewise press earnestly for Obedience to them who have the rule over us that we may doe all things without murmuring and pray for all that are in authority But if any object to this that both Christ and his Followers too submitted because they had not Strength nor Force enough to resist we may reply that he could only have spoke the Word and his Father would have sent him Twelve Legions of Angels for his Relief but to this Objection the Behaviour of the Primitive Christians will give a full Answer for Tertullian tells the Emperour in his Apology that his Cities Islands Castles and Armies his Palace Senate and Courts of Judicature were fill'd with Christians who would make no Stirs thô they were oppress'd by the severest Edicts And it is very remarkable that our Saviour did never look into the original Power of the Sanhedrim or what was left them by the Romans but because they sat in Moses his Chair whatsoever they bid you do be charges them to do it and in the Writings of his Apostles not a Word occurs of any enquiry into the Titles or Rights of the Roman Governours but their Pains are spent in fixing all things that relate to the just Measures of Obedience For it had been a very weak Argument for Rulers to become Christians if by yielding to our Faith they must thereby be exposed to the shakings of War upon every breaking out of Religious Melancholy whose untoward Influences were in the late Times of trouble so very powerful as to persuade some over-zealous Persons that they were exempt from the Laws of Men when they were confident enough to call themselves the only Friends of the Kingdom of Christ How far this false Opinion did prevail and how near it came to the digging the Grave of this Kingdom we cannot remember without Consternation but this beneficial Truth we have learnt by it that there is no Cruelty so great as Laxeness of Government nor Tyranny like the Rage of Subjects let loose and unrestrained Hence proceeded such a Deed as was hardly ever seen or heard of before and that will cause the Ears of all future Ages to tingle when the King fell by the Rage of his own mistaken People However it may be God suffered this barbarous Wickedness to succeed that he might shew forth his Wonders in our days and comfort us under the present Reign for all the afflictions that we have smarted under It may be this was done that we might say the Lord liveth who hath delivered us from the Teeth of unnatural Zealots blood thirsty and deceitful Men. Surely all these things have been permitted that the Faith and Patience of good Men might be made bright and shining by the flames they have undergone of Persecution and that in the day when God shall have given the King either the hearts or the necks of his Enemies it may not repent him of the deliverance he hath wrought under God for the State out of the snares of wicked Men or of raising up the afflicted Head of the Church out of the dust of whose Faith his Grandfather lived the most pious Defender and for which he died a Glorious Martyr Which brings me to the second and more delightful part of my Text to consider the comforts we may now hope for when God hath made us glad according to the days wherein we have been afflicted And he hath made us so in that we live First Under a Monarchy not under a multitude of Rulers Secondly Under the Directions of the true Religion not under erroneous Doctrine Thirdly Under the Blessings of Peace not under the Miseries of Civil War The late Troubles were the more heavy and intolerable in that we had many Masters to serve many Taskmasters I mean who did often require brick without affording straw And Solomon observes Prov. 28.2 That for the transgression of a Land many are the Princes thereof but by a man of understanding shall the state of it be prolonged especially where the King Governs his Subjects as a Father doth his Children by equal and just Laws made with their own consent to them And at present we have a particular reason for a more than ordinary joy if we reflect upon the wonderful change from what we were of late to what we are now as S. Paul saith of the calling of the Jews it is like the Resurrection of the dead And we may believe that if the Spirits of just men made perfect know any thing of what is done here below that King CHARLES the First was never so much grieved with the Injuries that were done unto himself as now he may be well pleased with these days of Happiness to his Realms in having a Monarch of his own Blood endow'd with all the Heroical Virtues which may shed a suitable influence upon his Government For he appears to be sent by God himself to build up the Walls of our Jerusalem and to make up the breaches in Sion by restoring whatever we want to complete our good Condition to cure all our Jealousies to banish all our Fears to confirm all our hopes and to remove all our Distractions Now these Blessings can be no more expected from a Multitude of Rulers than order can be kept up in the Universe by a multitude of Gods who will be ever crossing one another But they may be had under a single Person especially from one whom we must own to be designed by Divine Providence to be preserved by Divine Power to be qualified by Divine Wisdom to scatter that cloud which began to gather and look black upon Church and State to establish and prolong our peace plenty wealth strength security reputation and whatsoever other Ingredients there are to render a Nation happy which was so near perishing under the Conduct of many it shall by one man of knowledg and virtue not only be recovered from its former Distempers but be stedfastly settled and the State thereof continued if it be not our own fault for the future whereas the whole Constitution of the Land must needs sink if it should be ever Canton'd into parts or the Sovereignty of the whole be shared among many or among all if it should be divided by Sword-men or by setting up two Chiefs over the same Subjects one in Civil the other in Ecclesiastical Matters whether the conclave or the consistory be the cause of it For Secondly The Confusions of the late Times were the more grievous for the variety of Teachers that sprung up and filled the Heads of their Disciples with