Selected quad for the lemma: truth_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
truth_n	father_n	holy_a	spirit_n	8,932	5	5.4539	4	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A30771	The several ways of resolving faith in the Roman and Reformed Churches with the authors impartial thoughts upon each of them, and his own opinion at length shewn, wherein the rule of faith doth consist ...	Banckes, Matthew.	1677 (1677)	Wing B632; ESTC R20075	29,922	220

by these Lines here following transcrib'd from thence Quibus potissimum Testimoniis Praesidiis nemque Scriptura Traditionibus in confirmandis Dogmatibus instaurandis in Ecclesia Moribus sit usura Synodus For Scripture and Traditions cannot here be taken for Christs Doctrine it self but for Characters and Sounds apt to discover what is meant by them From the whole therefore I gather That the Council of Trent resolves Faith into Scripture and Traditions when taken for the Word of God or Doctrine of Salvation as into it's proper Object and into the same Scripture and Traditions when taken the one for a Testimony in Writing the other for an Oral Testimony as into it's adequat Rule saving what the Adverb potissimùm in the last recited Passage of the Council may peradventure abate In hopes to enervate the force of this Discourse 't will not improbably be said That Scripture and Apostolical Traditions are granted to be held by the Tridentin Council the Totum or Extent of all reveal'd Truths and consequently the Characters and Sounds or the written and unwritten words wherein they are contain'd the material Rule of Faith but seeing it is Oral Tradition that informs us of the sense of both this alone is the formal Rule of Faith and that even according to the mind of the Trent Fathers themselves as the subsequent Passage of the second Decree of the fourth Session testifieth Ad coercenda petulantia ingenia decernit eadem scilicet Sacrosancta Synodus et nemo suae prudentiae innixus in rebus Fidei Morum ad aedificationem Doctrinae Christianae pertinentium sacram Scripturam ad suos sensus contorquens contra eum sensum quem tenuit ac tenet Sancta Mater Ecclesia cujus est judicare de vero sensa interpretatione Scripturarum sanctarum aut etiam contra sensum unanimem Patrum ipsam Scripturam sacram interpretari audeat In return to this I shall not deny but that if Holy Scripture were Writ and Apostolical Traditions express'd in Words not plainly significative of one determinate sense but had their intelligibleness in Matters of Faith and Manners from Oral Tradition this alone would be the formal Rule of Faith But then in case the thing were truely so and the late quoted place of the Council intended as much I see not how that learned Assembly can be clear'd from contradicting it self since Scripture and Apostolical Traditions if meer unintelligible Characters and Sounds without their suppos'd authentick Interpreter Oral Tradition would be so farr from being two Witnesses or Testimonies of Christs Doctrine which yet as was seen the Council solemnly and not transiently calls them that they would neither of them be any Witness or Testimony thereof at all the very nature and office of a Witness or Testimony being this to manifest and render intelligible to those who are immediatly concern'd to understand it what it bears witness or gives testmony unto immediatly I say concern'd but who those are in respect of the Rule of Christian Faith I deferr the enquiry of to another place At present in regard it will not I prefume be admitted that the Council contradicts it self the sence of the rehearsed Passage is farr more obvious then that which hath been mention'd if not evident to be this That whensoever the Holy Scripture is through either weakness or wilfulness drawn to a wrong sense it of Right belongs to the Governors of the Church to declare the true sence thereof which the Council might very well think to be just and fitting without supposing the words of Scripture to be unsens'd Characters since experience dayly shews that things easie to be understood are often mistaken by the vulgar and very plain words and sentences wrested by men of subtil wits to a perverse sense Two Witnesses then of Christs Doctrine viz. Scripture and Traditions the Council of Trent still seems to me plainly to assert But besides these let 's consider if there was not moreover a third which the Prelats had an eye to in respect of something defin'd by them for I cannot conjecture what they should mean by the Word potissimùm mentioned before except this That there are some divine Truths which are not so clearly contain'd either in Scripture or Apostolical Traditions as to be sufficiently attested by them and that therefore they stood need of a further Testimony to make them manifest which whether it was the unanimous consent of the Fathers or the immediat assistance of the Holy Spirit or something els which the Council intended I have no need to be scrupulous about since my business in this place was no more but to discover Whether the Church of Rome as 't is affirm'd by the Traditionists do really rely on this Maxim for her Faith that it was recommended to her as Orally descending by a continued succession from Christ and his Apostles or that it is but a thing speciously pretended on her behalf to avouch her Doctrine by wherein as the preceding Discourse hath already shewn in general so the subsequent will hereafter shew in particular what the truth to my apprehension is whilst that which has been said concerning the Council of Trents opinion in the Point shall be further seconded and confirm'd by several Instances out of the same The first shall be That it has defin'd Sess 4 Decree 1. What Books are Canonical Sp●ture and anathematizes those who will not receive them as such amongst which the Epistle to the Hebrews is one and yet it has not always been esteem'd Canonical by the Western Church as is granted by Cardinal Perron and others of the Romish Profession that St. Jerom whose testimony cannot be in reason refus'd affirms for being in his time an eminent Member of the same Church he could not be ignorant of her practice and that he would Write an untruth whereof he might easily be detected is not at all credible The Second Instance is That the Books Arocryphal for which there is no Universal Tradition that they are the Word of God as Dr. Cosins late Lord Bishop of Durham in his Scholastical History of the Canon of Scripture shews are defin'd by the Council of Trent Sess 4. Decree 1. to be Canonical Scripture The third and last Instance which at present I shall produce is to be seen Sess 7. Can. 9. of the Trent Synod where we find it thus defining Si quis dixerit in tribus Sacramentis Baptismo scil Confirmatione Ordine non imprimi Characterem in anima hoc est signum quoddam spirituale indelebile unde ea iterari non possunt Anathema sit These according to the Traditionists are the words or at least the sence of the words of the Church diffusive pronounc'd by it's Representative by which it seems there is a Tradition that a Character or a certain Spiritual indeleble signe is imprinted in the Souls of those who are baptiz'd confirm'd and ordain'd Now That the generality of Pastors Parents Tutors