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truth_n	work_v	write_v	year_n	13	3	3.8820	3	false

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ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A30349	An exposition of the Thirty-nine articles of the Church of England written by Gilbert Bishop of Sarum.	Burnet, Gilbert, 1643-1715.	1700 (1700)	Wing B5792; ESTC R19849	520,434	424

Body The Third is concerning his Ascension and Continuance in Heaven And the Fourth is concerning his returning to judge all men at the Last Day These things are all so expresly affirmed and that in so particular a manner in the New Testament that if the Authority of that Book is once well proved little doubting will remain concerning them It is punctually told in it That the Body of Christ was laid in the Sepulchre That a Stone was laid to the Mouth of it That it was rolled away and upon that Christ arose and left the Death-Cloaths behind him That those who viewed the Sepulchre saw no Body there That in the same Body Christ shewed himself to his Disciples so that they all knew him he talked with them and they did eat and drink with him and he made Thomas feel to the Print of the Nails and Spear It is as plainly told That the Apostles look'd on and saw him ascend up to Heaven and that a Cloud received him out of their sight It is also said very plainly that he shall come again at the Last Day and judge all men both the Quick and the Dead So that if the Truth of the Gospels is once fully proved it will not be necessary to insist long upon the special Proof of these Particulars Somewhat will only be necessary to be said in Explanation of them The Gospel was first Preached and soon after put in Writing in which these Particulars are not only delivered but are set forth with many Circumstances relating to them The Credit of the Whole is put on that Issue concerning the Truth of Christ's Resurrection so thar the overthrowing the Truth of That was the overturning the whole Gospel and struck at the Credit of it all This was transacted as well as first published at Ierusalem where the Enemies of it had all possible Advantages in their hands their Interest was deeply concerned as well as their Malice was much kindled at it They had both Power and Wealth in their hands as well as Credit and Authority among the People The Romans left them at full liberty as they did the other Nations whom they conquered to order their own Concerns as they pleased And even the Romans themselves began quickly to hate and persecute the Christians They became the Objects of Popular Fury as Tacitus tells us The Romans look'd upon Christ as one that set on the Iews to those Tumults that were then so common among them as Suetonius affirms Which shews both how ignorant they were of the Doctrine of Christ and how much they were prejudiced against it Yet this Gospel did spread it self and was believed by great multitudes both at Ierusalem and in all Iudea and from thence it was propagated in a very few Years to a great many remoteCountries Among all Christians the Article of the Resurrection and Ascension of Christ was always look'd on as the Capital one upon which all the rest depended This was attested by a considerable number of men against whose Credit no Objection was made who affirmed that they all had seen him and conversed frequently with him after his Resurrection that they saw him ascend up into Heaven and that according to a Promise he had made them they had received extraordinary Powers from him to work Miracles in his Name and to speak in divers Languages This last was a most amazing Character of a Supernatural Power lodged with them and was a thing of such a nature that it must have been evident to every man whether it was true or false So that the Apostles relating this so positively and making such frequent Appeals to it that way of proceeding carries a strong and undeniable Evidence of Truth in it These Wonders were gathered together in a Book and published in the very Time in which they were transacted The Acts of the Apostles were writ two Years after St. Paul was carried Prisoner to Rome and St. Luke begins that Book with the mention of the Gospel that he had formerly writ as that Gospel begins with the mention of some other Gospels that were writ before it Almost all the Epistles speak of the Temple of Ierusalem as yet in being of the Iews as then in Peace and Prosperity hating and persecuting the Christians every where They do also frequently intimate the Assurance they had of a great Deliverance that was to happen quickly to the Christians and of terrible Judgments that were to be poured out on the Iews which was soon after that accomplish'd in the most signal manner of any thing that is recorded in History These things do clearly prove That all the Writings of the New Testament were both Composed and Published in the Age in which that Matter was transacted The Iews who from all the places of their Dispersion went frequently to Ierusalem to keep the great Festivities of their Religion there had occasion often to examine upon the place the Truth of the Resurrection and Ascension of Christ and of the Effusion of the Holy Ghost Yet even in that Infancy of Christianity in which it had so little visible Strength no Proof was so much as ever pretended in opposition to those great and essential Points which being Matters of Fact and related with a great Variety of Circumstances had been easily confuted if there had been any ground for it The great Darkness at the time of Christ's Death the rending the Veil of the Temple in two as well as what was more publick the renting of the Rocks at his death His being laid in a new Sepulchre and a Watch being set about it and the Watchmen reporting That while they slept the Body of Christ was carried away The Apostles breaking out all of the sudden into that variety of Tongues on Pentecost the Miracles that they wrought and the proceedings of the Sanhedrim with them were all things so publickly done that as the discovery of Falshood in any one of these was in the power of the Iews if any such was so That alone had most effectually destroyed the Credit of this Religion and stopt its Progress The Writings of the New Testament were at that time no Secrets they were in all mens hands and were copied out freely by every one that desired it We find within an Hundred Years after that time both by the Epistle of the Church of Smyrna by Iustin and Irenaeus not to mention Clemens of Rome who lived in that time or Ignatius and Polycarp who lived very near it That the Authority of these Writings was early received and submitted to That they were much read and well known and that they began very soon to be read at the Meetings of the Christians for Worship and were esteemed by the several Churches as the great Trust and Depositum that was lodged with them So that though by the Negligence of Copiers some small Variations might happen among some of the Copies yet as they do all agree in the main and most signally in

Grace of Christ and the Inspiration of his Spirit are not pleasant to God forasmuch as they spring not of Faith in Iesus Christ neither do they make men meet to receive Grace or as the School-Authors say deserve Grace of Congruity Yea rather for that they are not done as God hath commanded and willed them to be done we doubt not but that they have the nature of Sin THere is but one Point to be considered in this Article which is Whether Men can without any inward Assistances from God do any Action that shall be in all its circumstances so good that it is not only acceptable to God but meritorious in his sight though in a lower degree of merit If what was formerly laid down concerning a Corruption that was spread over the whole Race of Mankind and that had very much vitiated their Faculties be true then it will follow from thence That unassisted Nature can do nothing that is so good in it self that it can be pleasant or meritorious in the sight of God A great difference is here to be made between an external Action as it is considered in it self and the same Action as it was done by such a Man An Action is called good from the Morality and Nature of the Action it self so Actions of Justice and Charity are in themselves good whatsoever the Doer of them may be But Actions are considered by God with relation to him that does them in another light his Principles Ends and Motives with all the other circumstances of the Action come into this Account for unless all these be good let the Action in its own abstracted nature be ever so good it cannot render the Doer acceptable or meritorious in the sight of God Another distinction is also to be made between the Methods of the Goodness and Mercy of God and the strictness of Justice For if God had suchregard to the feigned Humiliation of Ahab 1 Kings 21.29 as to grant him and his Family a Reprieve for some time from those Judgments that had been denounced against them and him and if Iehu's executing the Commands of God upon Ahab's Family and upon the Worshippers of Baal procured him the Blessing of a long continuance of the Kingdom in his Family though he acted in it with a bad design 2 Kings 10.30 31. and retained still the old Idolatry of the Calves set up by Ieroboam then we have all reason to conclude according to the Infinite Mercy and Goodness of God that no Man is rejected by him or denied inward Assistances that is making the most of his Faculties and doing the best that he can but that he who is faithful in his little shall be made Ruler over more The Question is only Whether such Actions can be so pure as to be free from all sin and to Merit at God's hand as being Works naturally perfect for that is the formal Notion of the Merit of Congruity as the Notion of the Merit of Condignity is That the Work is perfect in the Supernatural Order To establish the Truth of this Article beside what was said upon the Head of Original Sin we ought to consider what St. Paul's words in the 7 th of the Romans do import Nothing was urged from them on the former Articles because there is just ground of doubting whether St. Paul is there speaking of himself in the state he was in when he writ it or whether he is personating a Iew and speaking of himself as he was while yet a Iew. But if the words are taken in that lowest sense they prove this That an Unregenerate Man has in himself such a Principle of Corruption that even a good and a holy Law revealed to him cannot reform it but that on the contrary it will take occasion from that very Law to deceive him and to slay him Rom. 7.12 13. So that all the benefit that he receives even from that Revelation is Ver. 14. that sin in him becomes exceeding sinful as being done against such a degree of Light by which it appears that he is carnal and sold under sin and that though his Understanding may be enlighten'd by the Revelation of the Law of God made to him so that he has some Inclinations to obey it yet he does not that which he would but that which he would not And though his Mind is so far convinced 16 17 18 that he consents to the Law that it is good yet he still does that which he would not which was the effect of sin that dwelt in him and from hence he knew that in him that is in his flesh in his carnal part or carnal state there dwelt no good thing for though to will that is to resolve on obeying the Law was present yet he found not a way how to perform that which was good the good that he wished to do that he did not but he did the evil that he wished not to do which he imputed to the sin that dwelt in him He found then a Law a Bent and Biass within him 21 that when he wished resolved and endeavoured to do good evil was present with him it sprung up naturally within him for though in his rational Powers he might so far approve the Law of God as to delight in it yet he found another Law arising upon his Mind from his Body 23 which warred against the law of his mind and brought him into captivity to the law of sin which was in his members 24 25. All this made him conclude that he was carnal and sold under sin and cry out O wretched man that I am who shall deliver me from the body of this death For this he thanks God through our Lord Iesus Christ And he sums all up in these words So then with the mind I my self serve the Law of God but with the flesh the Law of Sin If all this Discourse is made by St. Paul of himself when he had the Light which a Divinely-inspired Law gave him he being educated in the exactest way of that Religion both zealous for the Law and blameless in his own observance of it we may from thence conclude how little reason there is to believe that a Heathen or indeed an unregenerated Man can be better than he was and do Actions that are both good in themselves which it is not denied but that he may do and do them in such a manner that there shall be no mixture nor imperfection in them but that they shall be perfect in a Natural Order and be by consequence meritorious in a Secondary Order By all this we do not pretend to say That a Man in that state can do nothing or that he has no use of his Faculties He can certainly restrain himself on many occasions he can do many good works and avoid many bad ones he can raise his Understanding to know and consider things according to the Light that he has he can put