Selected quad for the lemma: truth_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
truth_n	scripture_n	spirit_n	teach_v	4,680	5	6.6628	4	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A65836	The apostate incendiary rebuked, and the people called Quakers vindicated from Romish hirarchy and imposition in a serious examination of VVilliam Mucklows Liberty of conscience asserted against imposition, but proved a liberty which is in Christ Jesus, and against unity and order in his church / by one whose rejoycing is the testimony of a good conscience toward God and man, G. Whitehead.	Whitehead, George, 1636?-1723.	1673 (1673)	Wing W1890; ESTC R39076	20,163	27

the Saints of old but the Liberty we have in Christ touching these lesser matters we are not bound to give a particular Account of to an Apostate who with an evil Eye hath sought to spy it out and with a prejudiced Mind heaps a Multitude of Queries to us but for no serious or good End to be sure having slandered and traduced us as Usurpers Imposors self-Seekers Romish and what not However God and our own Consciences bear us Witnesses that we would not use or strain our Liberty to give either Offence or Occasion of stumbling to our weak Brethren as false Brethren give by their fleshly Liberty of Self-Will wherein this Man cannot excuse himself by his pleading the Apostles for bidding to judge one another in Meats or Drinks or Dayes so he was so tender of offending his weak Brother about Meat thar he would rather forbear eating Flesh which may condemn thit man's Hardness who would not so much as forbear his Hat a littls space in Prayer to shun such an Occasion so little Regard hath hee either to his weak Brethren or to the Church for their Sake howbeit when abstaining from Meats came to be imposed the Apostle opposed it as a Doctrine of Devils which is to our Purpose of opposing John Perrot's Imposition about the Hat Que. Why not in prophesying he meanes keep off the Hat This Query is because men's praying or prophesying with the head covered is forbidden wherein he seems to tell us we fail in the latter which if it were so is no ground to oppose us in the former or to gain-say that part of Obedience that appears But he is mistaken in taking the whole Course of preaching to be that Prophecying intended that is brought in with Praying for all preaching cannot be that intire or peculiar Prophecying which where any one is immediately called to I grant that its most comely to stand up with the Hat of besides there is a difference between praying to God and preaching to Men I could say more to this Matter but the Man is unworthy also I am informed W. Penn did privately answer him to the Substance of his Queries which he takes no notice of as an Answer which he might have published with his Queries but that he is willing to heap upon us and reitterate a Multitude of triffling Questions as if he would not regard any serious Answer and most unjustly and peevishly reflects like some angry Anabaptist in saying When you can pretend Scriptures prove your Practices then they shall be your Rule and Touch-Stone but when you are out of their Practices and Commands then the Spirit and not the Scriptures is your Rule Whereas we have alwayes preferred the Spirit of Truth as our Rule and Touch-Stone and to produce the Scripture to prove our Practice is not to make them our Rule and Touch-Stone instead of the Spirit which therefore shews our Belief and Esteem of the Scriptures in their place Oh envious and confused Man How dishonestly and perversly hast thou stated the Controversie our citing that 1 Cor. Ch. 11. was not the Ground Touch-Stone and Rule of our Practice for the Spirit of Life which moves us to pray singly brought us into it in the beginning without any such outward Consideration but it was truely cited to prove that our reverent Order and Practice in Prayer was not a Romish Tradition brought forth in the Apostacy and Curse as J. P. and some of his Disciples falsly charged this our Order and Custom in the Church of Christ after they themselves had been some time therein with us His alledging different Measures Growths Motions further Manifestation Addition and how ab●ndantly different Gestures will contend the Unity of true faith for his contradictory and offensive Behaviour in time of publick Prayer these are but false Covers and savor of meer Ranterism in the bottom like the Ranters VARIETY IN UNITY AND UNITY IN VARIETY for their fleshly Liberty wherein they contemptuously have stood staring at us with their Hats on in time of publick Prayer whose Spirits we Judged in the beginning whereas different Measures Growths or further Manifestations in the true Church which must relate to one and the same Light and Truth do neither change the Property of the thing nor make it another Dispensation nor can they cause Contradiction Opposition or Division in one Member against another as is between this Appostatized Ranting Spirit that Quarels about the Hat and the Spirit of the true Church which acts in Unity Peace and good Order His pretence of a further Manifestation Growth or Addition for that his irreverent Custom which is not upheld by him upon a Religious Account is a manifest and gross Contradiction and his further Manifestation Growth and Addition pretended must be beyond us all and above the whole Church if we will believe him for therein he assumes an Authority to judge and revile both Elders and Ancient Friends and infamously to notifie particular persons to the World as he pleaseth and to set a Mark upon them and all this without either dealing with them as Christ injoyned Mat. 18. 16 17. or having the least Consent of the Church which he hath owned among us and indeed contrary to all Gospel and Christian order in the Church Thus while he is accusing ancient Friends with Usurping a Head-Ship setting up a Romish Hirarthy he himself is acting the part of an usurping Pope proud Prelate and exalted Diotrophes that loved Preheminence and yet would make the World believe that he is a man of a very tender conscience and great Humility but this is as real as his Brother John Penyman entituling himself One of the least of thousands in Israel or the Popes being a Servant of Servants Howbeit his great Capital and Charge is That we assert those Romish Positions which having enslaved Nations and destroyed thousands and is of a most dangerous unutterable Consequence Mark Reader by the way how he acts the part of a most malitious Incendiary what more envious an Instigation to Persecution could he have brought forth at this Juncture against us Oh Treacherous Apostate Judas the Lord Rebuke thee But what are those Romish positions They are namely 1st That we are to believe as the Church believes 2dly That the Church cannot err 3dly That she hath Power to bind and to loose 4thly That it is abominable Pride not to submit to her Judgment she having alwayes the infallible Spirit c. However to his own Confutation he seems herein to clear us from setting up an usurped Hirarchy of some that seek Preheminence over the Body limitting the Power to persons as he falsly suggests for here the Power is attributed to the Church in general yet in these Positions he deals very unfairly for to believe as the Church believes c. May be taken as if we use to preach those bare positions as our great Arguments to enforce People into our Faith which we never did but commend

implyed and yet he grants Christ to be the Head of the Body and is not that Body the Church which he hath owned See what Contradiction Envy leads this Man into who also saith That the Chuch was then to be in Subjection to her Head and every Member governed and exercized according to the Order of the Head but now the Body the Church claims Authority over their Fellow-Members as peculiarly having the infallible Spirit c. These latter Words from BUT contain two false and Unjust Reflections upon the Church for First the Body or Church claims no such Authority over their Fellow-Members it is gross Confusion in him for to affirm it for all Fellow-Members thereof are included in the same Body in Subjection to one and the same Head which is Christ. 2. None of the Fellow-Members of the Body of Christ are excluded from having the infallible Spirit in some degree as if it were peculiar only to some few whenas its universal throughout the whole Body though there be diversities of Gifts given as the Lord sees meet to every Man his proper and peculiar Gift which all tends to Unity and Edification of the whole Body But this Man seems to claim a Member-ship in the Church or Body as he calls us and yet judges and reviles the Church what then would he be a Member of Is it of such a Body that he represents as torn to peices and rent from the Head or fallen under Apostacy for we cannot look upon the Church to be made up of himself and John Pennyman or a few of their Spirit and that were also contrary to J. P's writing himself One of the least of the Thousands in Israel but whether he had such low Thoughts of himself or not let God's Witness and his People who have beheld his Deportment and Luceferian Spirit judge W. M. saith Friends That which was declared of and testified unto in the beginning was to direct our Minds unto the Heavenly Gift not to the Church but to the Manifestation of the Spirit in the particular waiting there to feel its Motions and to hear its Voice which would infallibly teach us our Duty towards God our Neighbour and our selves and not to go forth into Reasonings to promote comely Orders after the Manner of men nor to be found in the Exercise of any thing in his pure Worship but what the Lord not the Body required else to stand still c. Herein he hath intermixt his perverse Parenthesis falsly charging us in divers Respects as if the Heavenly Gift and the Church were now separate and what the Lord and his People require in Oppositior or as if we were promoting a Body without the Spirit or Subjection to what the Lord requires as if our Testimony were now so much varied from what it was in the Beginning these are all most falsly suggested his saying It was to direct our minds to the Heavenly Gift not to the Church to what the Lord not the Body required See what Division this would make between the Lord and his People but he mistakes Not to the Church for our Testimony was in the beginning and still is to promote the Unity of the Spirit in our directing the Minds to the Spirit and to them that love the Lord to dwell in Love and Unity which all come unto who come unto the Heavenly Gift and to follow the Lord's Requirings therein which is unerring and what is this but to preach up a true Church-State which hath been the real Intent and Tendency of our Testimony from the Beginning And had this Man been faithful to what was testfied in the Beginning as he pretends a great Esteem thereof the Unity and Society of the Church and People of God called Quakers would have been of more value with him then now so enviously and confusedly to quarrel with them or any comely Order or reverent Custom in the Church as he doth which he did not in the Beginning for when his Mind was directed to the Manifestation of the Spirit which would infallibly teach us our Duty towards God our Neighbour and our selves as he saith then he and the rest concerned in the Beginning did not irreverently sit with their Hats on in publick Prayer among us nor say that the contrary among us was a going forth into Reasonings to promote comely Orders after the manner of Men for what needed that when the infallible Spirit which was then owned to be their Teacher freely led them into it Nor did the Apostle so go out into reasoning when he exhorted the Saints to think on whatsoever things were true honest just pure lovely of good Report c. But this Man is offended at our vindicating that Order which was made both lovely and comely by that Spirit that set it up since he is gone out from that infallible Spirit which he was directed to in the Beginning which then moved and led them into both Reverence to God Respect to his People and how to behave themselves in the Church of Christ both in Decency and in Order Note that W. M. in so plainly professing and in Words owning the Truth 's Testimony and Infallibility of the Spirits Teaching as it was in the Beginning testified to among us he hath therein said more for the comely Order that then was brought forth in our Assemblies and for the Church having the infallible Spirit to know Truth from Error and the right from the wrong Spirit then ever he can say or produce for the contrary viz. for his keeping on his Hat in Prayer for his accusing the Church with Fallibility Apostacy or the Antient Friends with Imposing Usurping c. Out of his own Mouth he is condemned as one apostatized from the Heavenly Gift from his first Love Convincement and Order and hath wilfully excluded himself from the Union and Society of the Church of Christ. He still boggles and seems offended at the Body the Church having the infallible Spirit the certain unerring Judgment reciding with them upon all Occasions to know Truth from Error and the right from the wrong Spirit will you limit the Lord saith he Answ. Is it a limitting the Lord for the Body or Church of Christ to have his Spirit which is infallible and an unerring Judgment so far as we received from the same Spirit What gross Darkness is come over this Man Doth not the spiritual Man judge all Things And the Saints shall judge the World and dare he say that the Spirit of Christ hath not taught the Church Truth from Error nor to know the right from the wrong Spirit Whenas the Principle we direct unto and our Testimony concerning it he dares not say is fallible but seems to justifie our Testimony as it was in the Beginning and in Words to own Inward Motions Voice and Teachings of the infallible Spirit and the measure thereof within to try the Verity of our Doctrine And why should it be rendred a limitting of the Lord