Selected quad for the lemma: word_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
word_n	faith_n	hear_v	preach_n	3,029	5	10.8817	5	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A48891	A second letter concerning toleration	Locke, John, 1632-1704.; Proast, Jonas. Argument of the letter concerning toleration.	1690 (1690)	Wing L2755; ESTC R5484	59,686	70

do so For however you have put it thus as you have fram'd the Author's Argument Force is utterly of no use for the promoting of true Religion and the Salvation of Souls and therefore no body can have any right to use any Force or Compulsion for the bringing Men to the true Religion yet the Author does not in those Pages you quote make the latter of these Propositions an Inference barely from the former but makes use of it as a Truth proved by several Arguments he had before brought to that purpose For tho it be a good Argument it is not useful therefore not fit to be used yet this will not be good Logick it is useful therefore any one has a right to use it For if the Vsefulness makes it lawful it makes it lawful in any hands that can so apply it and so private Men may use it Who can deny say you but that Force indirectly and at a distance may do some Service towards the bringing Men to imbrace that Truth which otherwise they would never acquaint themselves with If this be good arguing in you for the usefulness of Force towards the saving of Mens Souls give me leave to argue after the same fashion 1. I will suppose which you will not deny me that as there are many who take up their Religion upon wrong Grounds to the indangering of their Souls so there are many that abandon themselves to the heat of their Lusts to the indangering of their Souls 2dly I will suppose that as Force apply'd your way is apt to make the Inconsiderate consider so Force apply'd another way is as apt to make the Lascivious chaste The Argument then in your form will stand thus Who can deny but that Force indirectly and at a distance may by Castration do some Service towards bringing Men to imbrace that Chastity which otherwise they would never acquaint themselves with Thus you see Castration may indirectly and at a distance be serviceable towards the Salvation of Mens Souls But will you say from such an usefulness as this because it may indirectly and at a distance conduce to the saving of any of his Subjects Souls that therefore the Magistrate has a right to do it and may by Force make his Subjects Eunuchs for the Kingdom of Heaven It is not for the Magistrate or any body else upon an Imagination of its Vsefulness to make use of any other means for the Salvation of Mens Souls than what the Author and Finisher of our Faith hath directed You may be mistaken in what you think useful Dives thought and so perhaps should you and I too if not better inform'd by the Scriptures that it would b●… useful to rouze and awaken Men if one should come to them from the Dead But he was mistaken And we are told that if Men will not hearken to Moses and the Prophets the means appointed neither will the Strangeness nor Terror of one coming from the Dead perswade them If what we are apt to think useful were thence to be concluded so we should I fear be obliged to believe the Miracles pretended to by the Church of Rome For Miracles we know were once useful for the promoting true Religion and the Salvation of Souls which is more than you can say for your Political Punishments But yet we must conclude that God thinks them not useful now unless we will say that which without Impiety cannot be said that the Wise and Benign Disposer and Governour of all things does not now use all useful means for promoting his own Honour in the World and the Good of Souls I think this Consequence will hold as well as what you draw in near the same words Let us not therefore be more wise than our Maker in that stupendious and supernatural Work of our Salvation The Scripture that reveals it to us contains all that we can know or do in order to it and where that is silent 't is in us Presumption to direct When you can shew any Commission in Scripture for the use of Force to compel Men to hear any more than to imbrace the Doctrine of others that differ from them we shall have reason to submit to it and the Magistrate have some ground to set up this new way of Persecution But till then 't will be sit for us to obey that Precept of the Gospel which bids us take heed what we hear So that hearing is not always so useful as you suppose If it had we should never have had so direct a Caution against it 'T is not any imaginary Vsefulness you can suppose which can make that a punishable Crime which the Magistrate was never authorized to meddle with Go and teach all Nations was a Commission of our Saviour's But there was not added to it Punish those that will not hear and consider what you say No but if they will not receive you shake off the Dust of your Feet leave them and apply your selves to some others And St. Paul knew no other means to make Men hear but the preaching of the Gospel as will appear to any one who will read Romans the 10th 14 c. Faith cometh by hearing and hearing by the Word of God You go on and in favour of your beloved Force you tell us that it is not only useful but needful And here after having at large in the four following Pages set out the Negligence or Aversion or other hinderances that keep Men from examining with that application and freedom of Judgment they should the Grounds upon which they take up and persist in their Religion you come to conclude Force necessary Your words are If Men are generally averse to a due Consideration of things where they are most concerned to use it if they usually take up their Religion without examining it as they ought and then grow so opinionative and so stiff in their Prejudice that neither the gentlest Admonitions nor the most earnest Intreaties shall ever prevail with them afterwards to do it what means is there left besides the Grace of God to reduce those of them that are got into a wrong Way but to lay Thorns and Briars in it That since they are deaf to all Perswasions the uneasiness they meet with may at least put them to a stand and incline them to lend an Ear to those who tell them they have mistaken their way and offer to shew them the right way What means is there left say you but Force What to do To reduce Men who are out of it into the right way So you tell us here And to that I say there is other means besides Force that which was appointed and made use of from the beginning the Preaching of the Gospel But say you to make them hear to make them consider to make them examine there is no other means but Punishment and therefore it is necessary I answer 1st What if God for Reasons best known to himself would not have

of the Justice of their Cause Here then you allow that taking away Mens Estates or Liberty and Corporal Punishments are apt to drive away both Sufferers and Spectators from the Religion that makes use of them rather than to it And so these you renounce Now if you give up Punishments of a Man in his Person Liberty and Estate I think we need not stand with you for any other Punishments may be made use of But by what follows it seems you shelter your self under the name of Severities For moderate Punishments as you call them in another place you think may be serviceable indirectly and at a distance serviceable to bring Men to the Truth And I say any sort of Punishments disproportioned to the Offence or where there is no fault at all will always be Severity unjustifiable Severity and will be thought so by the Sufferers and By-standers and so will usually produce the Effects you have mentioned contrary to the Design they are used for Not to profess the National Faith whilst one believes it not to be true not to enter into Church-Communion with the Magistrate as long as one judges the Doctrine there professed to be erroneous or the Worship not such as God has either prescribed or will accept this you allow and all the World with you must allow not to be a fault But yet you would have Men punished for not being of the National Religion that is as you your self confess for no fault at all Whether this be not Severity nay so open and avow'd Injustice that it will give Men a just Prejudice against the Religion that uses it and produce all those ill Effects you there mention I leave you to consider So that the name of Severities in opposition to the moderate Punishments ' you speak for can do you no Service at all For where there is no Fault there can be no moderate Punishment All Punishment is immoderate where there is no Fault to be punished But of your moderate Punishment we shall have occasion to speak more in another place It suffices here to have shewn that whatever Punishments you use they are as likely to drive Men from the Religion that uses them as to bring them to the Truth and much more likely as we shall see before we have done And so by your own Confession they are not to be used One thing in this Passage of the Author it seems appears absurd to you that he should say That to take away Mens Lives to make them Christians was but an ill way of expressing a Design of their Salvation I grant there is great Absurdity some where in the case But it is in the Practice of those who persecuting Men under a pretence of bringing them to Salvation suffer the Temper of their Good-will to betray it self in taking away their Lives And whatever Absurdities there be in this way of proceeding there is none in the Author's way of expressing it as you would more plainly have seen if you had looked into the Latin Original where the words are Vita denique ipsâ privant ut fideles ut salvi siant Pag. 5. which tho more literally might be thus render'd To bring them to the Faith and to Salvation yet the Translator is not to be blamed if he chose to express the Sense of the Author in words that very lively represented the extream Absurdity they are guilty of who under pretence of Zeal for the Salvation of Souls proceed to the taking away their Lives An Example whereof we have in a neighbouring Country where the Prince declares he will have all his Dissenting Subjects sav'd and pursuant thereunto has taken away the Lives of many of them For thither at last Persecution must come As I fear notwithstanding your talk of moderate Punishments you your self intimate in these words Not that I think the Sword is to be used in this business as I have sufficiently declared already but because all coactive Power resolves at last into the Sword since all I do not say that will not be reformed in this matter by lesser Penalties but that refuse to submit to lesser Penalties must at last fall under the stroke of it In which words if you mean any thing to the busines●… in hand you seem to have a reserve for greater Punishments when lesser are not sufficient to bring Men to be convinced But let that pass You say If Force be us●…d not instead of Reason and Arguments that is not to convince by its own proper Efficacy which it cannot do c. I think those who make Laws and use Force to bring Men to Church-Conformity in Religion seek only the Compliance but concern themselves not for the Conviction of those they punish and so never use Force to convince For pray tell me When any Dissenter conforms and enters into the Church-Communion is he ever examined to see whether he does it upon Reason and Conviction and such Grounds as would become a Christian concern'd for Religion If Persecution as is pretended were for the Salvation of Mens Souls this would be done and Men not driven to take the Sacrament to keep their Places or to obtain Licenses to sell Ale for so low have these holy Things been prostituted who perhaps knew nothing of its Institution and considered no other use of it but the securing some poor secular Advantage which without taking of it they should have lost So that this Exception of yours of the use of Force instead of Arguments to convince Men I think is needless those who use it not being that ever I heard concern'd that Men should be convinced But you go on in telling us your way of using Force only to bring Men to consider those Reasons and Arguments which are proper and sufficient to convince them but which without being forced they would not consider And say you Who can deny but that indirectly and at a distance it does some Service towards bringing Men to imbrace that Truth which either through Negligence they would never acquaint themselves with or through Prejudice they would reject and condemn unheard Whether this way of Punishment is like to increase or remove Prejudice we have already seen And what that Truth is which you can positively say any Man without being forced by Punishment would through carelesness never acquaint himself with I desire you to name Some are call'd at the third some at the ninth and some at the eleventh hour And whenever they are call'd they imbrace all the Truth necessary to Salvation But these slips may be forgiven amongst so many gross and palpable Mistakes as appear to me all through your Discourse For Example You tell us that Force used to bring Men to consider does indirectly and at a distance some Service Here now you walk in the dark and endeavour to cover your self with Obscurity by omitting two necessary parts As first who must use this Force which tho you tell us not here