Selected quad for the lemma: truth_n
Text snippets containing the quad
|
ID |
Title |
Author |
Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication) |
STC |
Words |
Pages |
|
A29039
|
A brief enquiry into the grounds and reasons, whereupon the infallibility of the Pope and the Church of Rome is said to be founded by Edward Bagshawe ...
|
Bagshaw, Edward, 1629-1671.
|
1662
(1662)
|
Wing B404; ESTC R9275
|
31,865
|
56
|
Saviour saith should be ratified in Heaven For saith he where two or three not Bishops but Believers are gathered together in my Name there I will be in the midst of them i. e. When any Number of Believers how small soever though but two or three are met for those Holy Ends of Discipline and in those Ways which I by my Commands have warranted I will be with them to Assist and to Guide their Councels and to Execute their Sentence Chap. 49. Accordingly we find in Tertullian's Apology that in all Christian Meetings upon the Lords-day together with Prayer and Preaching there was likewise Censura Divina i. e. the Sentence of Excommunication pronounced against all refractory and stubborn Sinners according to this our Saviours Institution If any object that if Christ will be with two or three then in all probabily he will be with a Councell of many Hundreds much more I answer No doubt he will if they meet in his Name i. e. according to his Command and Institution for it is not the Assembly though of never so many Thousands but the End and Manner of Assembling which hath the Promise of Assistance And when I can see such a Councell which professeth solely to follow Scripture according to that sense which not the fancy of men whether Fathers or Councells but the Spirit of God enlightning their understandings doth give unto it I shall then with all Reverence embrace their Decrees For I know that such a Councell cannot Erre because they will Command nothing but what is already commanded by God which every true Christian ought to obey without the Sanction of any other Authority But such a Councell as this I am hopelesse of ever seeing under the Papecy since all their meetings for some hundreds of Yeares have been designed not to search but to smother Scripture and to Emprison that Light which if looked into would detect and manifest their Errors So that they come together not in Christs but in the Pope's name or rather in the name of that God of the world who is Prince of the Power of Darknesse and whose Kingdome is founded and upheld by the Artifice and cunning of their Teachers and by the Ignorance and Implicite Faith of their Hearers Fallere Falli To deceive and to be deceived is the best Motto which can be set upon all the Church-doores in the Papall Territories but Heaven is a place of Light and the True Church is full of Knowledge because 〈◊〉 are all taught of God not to obey or to Believe in 〈◊〉 but in him alone 2. That Promise of our Saviour I will send the Spirit John 14. c. 16. which shall lead you into all Truth was spoken Personally to the Apostles And those words Act. 15. It seemeth good to the Holy Spirit and to Us were spoken by them after the accomplishment of that Promise so that without great presumption they cannot be wrested to any other nor such wresting without great vanity be confuted since barely to deny ungrounded suppositions is a sufficient Confutation If any aske me since neither the Pope nor a Councell is Infallible as having no peculiar Promise for that purpose then how shall the Church determine Controversies or How shall Heresies be suppressed I answer that if the word of God is clear and the Heresie be Notorious than every Particular Church hath Power within it self to excommunicate all obstinate Heretickes But where the Scripture is either Dubious or Silent Phil. 3.15 there charitably to beare with dissenters and to wait till God shall reveale it to them is the best way to winne them And this was the onely method which the primitive Christians did take for three hundred yeares together to preserve and maintaine the Truth of our Religion Having no Communion with such as hold manifest and destructive Errors and in things of lesser moment Forbearing one another in Love These will at last be found to be the safe wayes of God whereas to pretend to Infallibility in determining or to practise Tyranny in Imposing these are onely the wayes of Ambitious and self-seeking men found out not so much to promote Truth which stands not in need of such Arts as to Augment a party which makes all Articles of Faith to be meerly like the Civill Lawes of a Land where most Voices doe carry the Cause Such a kind of Universality as this True Piety never had and therefore we need not be sorry that Popery doth make its boast of it And thus I have with as much Brevity and Plainnesse as the subject would beare enquired into the Grounds whereupon the Popes Infallibility is said to be grounded and after the most Impartiall search can pronounce of them all Mene Tekell that being weighed in the Balance of the Sanctuary they are found too light Neither have I diverted my self in confuting their worship of Images their Blasphemous Figment of Transsubstantiation their mingling of works in Justification their Invocation of Angells Col. 2.19 which the Apostle saith is not to hold the Head i. e. to Erre fundamentally Their forbidding of Marriage and commanding to abstain from meats Which he who prophesied of them 1 Tim. 4.1 calls the Doctrine of Devils I have omitted likwise their Furious and Bloody Tenets of Persecuting and Killing all who doe not worship the Image of that Beast which they have erected Rev. 13.15 for these things how plainely soever the Scripture speakes against them will not much concerne them to answer as long as they are fenced about with the Doctrine of Infallibility whereby they are privileged to put what sense upon Scripture they please but if the Christian Reader finds that conceit to be clearly disproved then I hope he will make use of the other Arguments to satisfie himself that we have but too much reason to suspect the Pope to be that Antichrist that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Lawlesse one who sits in the Temple of God and declares that he is God For in the Church which is the Temple or House of God for any man to make Lawes which doe oblige the Conscience For a sinfull man to stile himself the Head and Bridegroome of the Church and above all to affirme that he is Infallible this is nothing else but to say that he is God and therein to fulfill the most clear Prediction that can be concerning The Man of sin whose way of Rising was to be by the Deceiveablenesse of Unrighteousnesse and his Dominion to be Established by Miracles and Lying Wonders Which no Church in the world doth more confidently boast of than the Roman And therefore till her unhappy and much mistaken Followers have cleared that She is not Antichristian we have little reason to believe that She is a True Church much lesse to think that She is Infallible FINIS
A Brief ENQUIRY INTO THE Grounds and Reasons Whereupon the INFALLIBILITY OF THE POPE and CHVRCH OF ROME Is said to be Founded By Edward Bagshawe St. of Ch. Church Luk. 19. Why do you not of your selves judge 〈◊〉 is right Eph. 5. Let no Man deceive you with 〈◊〉 words LONDON Printed by A.M. and are to be sold by the Book 〈…〉 To the Right Honourable the Earl of ANGLESEY one of his Majesties most Honourable Privy Councell Right Honourable I Believe your Lordship in your Search and Survey of the Mysteries of Providence with which you entertain your Privacy have often with great amazement considered how many strange and admirable Effects do daily proceed from small and ignoble Causes for not only Thunder Rain Lightning and other common Phaenomena which do astonish the World have their whole Make and Composition from a seemingly casuall and undesigned Concourse of Light and Fleeting Clouds but likewise largest Rivers are fed by secret and concealed Springs and the World it self if traced and resolved into its most visible Originall is framed of Atomes and the Earth which is vulgarly conceived to be the Basis and Center of the Universe is as God himself is pleased to express it hung upon Nothing and yet by that Almighty Hand which fixed it it is made stable and firm enough to endure unmoved all that Hurry and Variety of Mutation wherewith the rolling Motion of the Heavens do daily threaten it What wonder your Lordships Contemplation hath begot in viewing the Works of Nature I doubt not but hath been continued when you descended from them to behold the Works of Art especially the Civil Policies of States and Kingdomes in which as your Lordship hath been alwayes most knowingly conversant so you can from the deepest and best grounded Experience evince that though Earthly Empires I mean such as are not guided by Christian and truly-Religious Principles have an Outward Semblance of a Substantiall and Lasting Greatness yet the Basis which doth support the whole Politicall Frame is but some State-trick or other some little Expedients found out to amuse the Vulgar whose Folly must be pleased or else they will never be governed But how far the Wit of man can advance it self to imitate the Works of God even those of a Creative Power the making Something out of Nothing is in no Policy more discernible than in that deep and wise contrivance of subtle men the Papacy the Body of which hath a pleasing Aspect and is set out with a very specious Gloss all the Parts do seem extreamly well-proportioned there is a strange Linking and Confederacy of all its Principles and to the Eye of a Superficiall Beholder it presents nothing but a beautifull and comely Outside But if any be so curious as to look beyond its Varnish and first Appearance should we pry into the Foundation of this Goodly Structure we shall find it like the Island of Delos alwayes Floating or rather like the Earth to hang upon nothing For the Pope's Infallibility or the Churches Authority or some such fond Chimera is all the Basis which doth under-prop this Building Things that are so confidently asserted and yet upon triall so shamefully begged that were not the world in Gods just Judgement given over to a vicious and Lazy Credulity all that is built upon such thin and empty Fallacies would not subsist one moment but for the present the Arts of planting a devout Ignorance have so farre prevailed that the world doth hugge its Bondage and men finding a great deal of ease in being quietly deceived they are content to worship the Beast and are angry that any should fright them from embracing a Religion which hath made the way to Heaven so very plaine and easie that whatsoever becomes of the Seeing they that are Blind enough shall be sure never to misse of it It is now My Lord some scores of Yeares since we of this Nation have by Scripture-Light discovered all the Frauds and Cheats of this Mistery of Iniquity and yet it seems all mens eyes are not opened for some of late have pleaded for Popery and for that which is the chief Bulwark of it the Popes Authority with as good a grace if Railing and needlesse Rhetorick may deserve that name as if they had never been answered Rushworth Dial 1. One in his great heat of zeal or something worth doth tell us That Questions about the Popes Authority over Bishops of Bishops over Priests and of Priests over the Laity are of no small moment But he that goes about to destroy this Hierarchy aimeth at nothing lesse then an Utter overthrow of Religion Which are but Bellarmines words in English Bellar. Praef. and if in stead of the word Religion they had said Popery they had spoke nothing but the Truth since that is bottomed onely in the Popes Authority Fiat Lux dedicated to the Countess of Arundell and twice Printed Which a late namelesse Author so farre cryes up that he ventures to speake words which no sober man would owne In my Judgement saith he Christ our Lord hath no lesse showne his Divinity and Power in the Pope than in himself And again All things considered I may truly say that Christ in the Pope and Church Pag. 376 377 c. is more miraculous than in his own Person And yet farther as if those expressions were too modest Blasphemy and not barefaced enough he goes on The first great Fundamentall of Christian Religion which is the Truth and Divinity of Christ had it not been for the Pope had failed long agoe in the world Whereupon enlarging himselfe he addes whence I may truly say that Christ is the Popes God for if the Pope had not been and proved so resolute an Assertour Christ had not been taken for any such person as he is believed this day And so in a boaste concludes This I will boldly say and am assured of that if the Pope be not an Unerring Guide in affaires of Religion all is lost For a man once rid of the Controll of his Authority may as easily deride and as solidly confute the Incarnation as the sprinkling of Holy-water nor could the reason of the world confute them While I relate such kind of Passages as these which I tremble to mention I hope your Lordship will pardon my zeal if I complaine a little that Treatises of a farre more innocent Nature are sharply censured while these open Impieties doe scape unpunished as if our Lawes were keen onely against the Asserters of Christian Liberty but had no edge at all against the Broachers of Antichristian Blasphemy Since then the Pope's Infallibility is that Name of Blasphemy which makes all its Patrons so bold and Irreligious since that is the Bottomlesse Pit out of which all this Deadly smoke doth issue I have here according to your Lordships commands endeavoured to show the Vanity and Ridiculousnesse as well as Impiety of that opinion In which if I have