Selected quad for the lemma: work_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
work_n	good_a	merit_n	merit_v	6,691	5	10.7705	5	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A33078	The Church of Rome unmask'd, or her false principles briefly detected with some reasons of so many retaining or returning to communion with her, and the great danger of everlasting destruction, that such persons, especially after separations from her, return to her communion, do run themselves on / written by a learned divine, by way of letter to a friend in the country.	Learned divine.	1679 (1679)	Wing C4196; ESTC R18501	78,331	77

with it a worship of those that are deceased and canonized by the Pope and that they may and ought to be invocated they teach remission of Sins but they corrupt the doctrine of it by teaching that it is to be sought for not only in believing on and yielding obedience to Christ but also by their prayers to and invocation of the Saints by Pilgrimages and penances of their own or others imposing on them by the merits of the Saints and not by Christs only by the virtue of their Mass and the very reception of their Sacraments and the like they hold and teach the Resurrection of the Body and Life everlasting but they teach also this corrupt doctrine that life everlasting may be merited of God by our good works for so some of them do teach that good works do truly merit grace in this world and glory in the next and that good works of just persons are of themselves worthy of the reward of Eternal life without any Covenant or acceptation of God yea and that no encrease of dignity comes to just mens works by the Merits or Person of Christ which the same works should not otherwise have had had they been done by the same grace bestowed by the liberality of God alone without Christ and therefore also they say that after grace infused our works are so perfectly Meritorious of life that it cannot be denied them and that therefore they never request of God by the Merits of Christ that the reward of eternal Life may be given to their worthy and meritorious works but that by Christ grace may be given them to inable them to merit worthily that reward and much to the same purpose may be found in some of their Writers as Vasquez his Disputations evidence So that instead of keeping the Faith and Testimony of Jesus they egregiously corrupt and mix it with their own additions which yet they require as much to be believed and practised upon as they do any Articles of the Faith delivered in the holy Scriptures and as much as the belief of the necessity of Circumcision and of keeping the Law of Moses was urged and practised upon by the false Apostles So that to any that will mind the Scriptures and impartially will weigh what is said in them and compare therewith the way of this Church they cannot unless they be stark-blind or wilfully close their eyes but see and conclude that this Roman Church is far from being a true or right Church of Christ muchless can it be the only and Catholick Church or Infallible in her Doctrines and Dictates which things being so it might be marvailed that all men do not fly out of and from her Communion that have any care of their Souls and desire the everlasting Salvation of them and that may be the matter of another inquiry and consideration 5. Whence it is that so many still continue in her Communion after so many convictions of the evil of her ways by so many learned and able Protestants and Reformed Writers and Preachers in so many learned Treatises yea and not only so but that many fall to her also that had rejected her or have lived under the knowledge of the Scriptures and the enjoyments of that light from them by which they might be able to discern and be led to beware of her In answer to which in both its branches it may be noted first of all that this is nothing more than what the Holy Ghost fore-saw and fore-signified in the Holy Scriptures for in the Book of the Revelations it is evident that Mystery Babilon would have many commit Fornication with her until her destruction comes upon her yea and they also many of them no mean persons for it is said that the Kings of the Earth who have committed Fornication and lived deliciously with her shall bewail her and lament for her when they see the smoak of her burning standing a far off for fear of her torment and saying alas alas that great City Babilon c. and the Merchants of the Earth shall weep and mourn over her c. and every Shipmaster and all the company in Ships and Sailers and as many as trade by Sea stood a far off and cryed when they saw the Smoak of her burning c. Revelations 18 9 10 11 17 18. Yea and the holy Ghost signifies that after the Preaching of the everlasting Gospel by an Angel flying in the midst of Heaven to them that dwell on the Earth warning them to fear God and give glory to him and worship him that made Heaven and Earth c. in distinction from and in opposition to all other false objects of worship such as are in Babylon as the Beast and his Image and after another Angel following and saying Babilon is fallen is fallen that great City both fallen from her first love fallen into false and corrupt worship and fallen too from her first dignity and splendor which she had as Babylon as that false Harlot that made all Nations drink of the Wine of the wrath of her Fornications yet it is supposed that some might and would yet worship the Beast and his Image Rev. 14 6 7 8 9. which may denote the continuance of the Babilonish Idolatry after the Gospel Preached by the Reformers calling men to the right and true worship and after the decay and fall of the Roman Church from her pristine splendor and grandeur for the falling of her may be one thing and her Plagues and burning may be another thing between which yet she may be strugling to recover herself and while so she may have some not only continuing in her communion to the last but some also joyning themselves to her Idol worship that were sometimes not joyning with her therein to which purpose also may be interpreted these two expressions concerning the man of Sin the mystical Jereboam that caused Israel to Sin that the Lord shall consume him with the breath of his mouth that is by his word and spirit in the Preaching of the Gospel as the Papacy hath been and is at this day under a consumption thereby and then at length he shall destroy him by the brightness of his coming 2 Thes 2.8 Now as it is in consumptions we know persons that labour thereof will sometimes be very ill and languish and sometimes chear again and revive and seem to be on the mending hand get up a little and be somewhat brisk so may it be with the man of Sin he may seem sometime in his consumptive state to be getting heart again and men may think he will recover his former health and get rid of that deadly wound that by the Sword of the Gospel he hath received and bestir himself then again more vigorously than before that he may keep up and no more fall down but yet at the brightness of the Lords appearance he will thereby totally ruin and destroy him but to speak a little distinctly to the causes and

and the too many miscarriages found among us especially in some transactions of the late times which those Emissaries want neither skill nor will to improve to the furtherance of their designs and also the fair flourishes that she by them makes especially in these Countries where being in the midst of oppositions they put on greater appearances of Piety Patience Charity as they call their Almsdeeds and pretensions of greater Unity and Prosperity and what was lastly said also of her wiliness in accommodating her Doctrines and carriages toward them to mens different humors But besides these things there may be other causes that are more principal assigned which in conjunction with these are of great power and influence so as there is great danger of the fall of many into her embraces As for instance 1. Mens own former and hitherto Carelesness to acquaint themselves with and seek to be established in the truth and to walk in it according to its Instructions and that hath been and is the case of too many both of our Gentry and of others of both Sexes that though they have for many years had the Scriptures and Gospel Doctrines among them and many Learned and Solid disocurses published to discover the deceits of the Romanists yet they have not set their hearts toward God and Christ seriously to know and walk in and be obedient to his truth but have rested in a bare form of Godliness denying the power of it more minding the World and the things of it their Estates Riches Honours Pleasures Ornaments Gallantry or Intemperancy and what their corruptions lead them to than how to serve and please God and make such right improvements of his truths made known to and among them as wherein they might be fitted for and accounted worthy of its utmost Benefits especially in these late and present days in which loose and licentious principles and practises of Atheism infidelity and debauchery take great place and have wonderfully in a few years thriven so as to overcome the Nations Now God is marvailously jealous of his glory and the glory of his Name and truth and will not hold them guiltless that take or receive them in vain that is so as not to be made good by them and therefore will punish them that so do for this cause it was that he gave over the Gentiles to vile affections and to gross Idolatry because when he had in and by his works of creation and providence made known himself to and among them they did not glorify him as God nor were thankful to him but became vain in their Imaginations and their Foolish Hearts were darkened so as professing themselves to be wise they became fools c. Rom. 1.21 22 23 24 25. For this cause God also threatned us Christians that he would give way to the man of Sin to come in upon the World with power and signs and lying wonders after the manner of Sathan and send strong delusions that men might believe lyes and be Damned even because God had first sent the truth of the Gospel among us and men received not the love thereof that they might be saved namely from their Sins nor believed it heartily so as to obey it but had pleasure in unrighteousness 2 Thes 2 8 9 10 11 12. Which horrible threatned judgment he hath sadly executed in the World after the Christian faith being spread abroad in it hath not been duly entertained partly by leting loose Mahomet and seting up a Kingdom in the World as to its Eastern parts that received and propagates his delusions what they can and partly by suffering Rome in these Western parts so to exalt her self with all her corruptions and abominations and surely this is one and the main cause of the falling off of so many to her bad communion after such detection of her so fully made to which way hath also been the rather made by 2. The sad debauchings of the Nations and filling them with Profaneness uncleanness irreligion from the one end to the other thereof which hath doubtless been the project and work of some that hold the Doctrine of Balaam and follow his pernicious ways who taught Balak to cast a stumbling block before the Children of Israel to eat things sacrificed to Idols and to commit Fornication Rev. 2.14 Or rather as Jezabel that painted Strumpet who seduced Gods People to commit fornication first and then to eat things sacrificed to Idols first to commit Fornication and then as a fruit thereof to which they might that way be the easier drawn to eat things sacrificed to Idols Rev. 2.20 According to some Machivillian principles to make men first of no Religion and then they may easily be drawn to embrace any false Religion how much bodily Whoredom and Fornication overspreads the Land is too sad as well as easy to observe and surely its just with God when men give up themselves to that to give them over to Spiritual Fornication also that they might fill up the measure of their Iniquities and his greater and severer wrath might come upon them and especially it s the direct way to promote the Popish Religion and its spiritual Whoredoms because it gives such indulgences to and dispensations for the beloved Sins of bodily Fornication promising to those that practice such Sins Pardon and impunity at least after some penances and Purgatory Pains for their Sins and Heaven and Happiness to at last if they will but joyn themselves in fellowship with that Church and uphold its claims and Pretentions though for others of a devouter complexion as we have noted she can take some precious truths of God compared in Scripture to Gold yea fine Gold or to Silver seven times Purifyed in the fire and his precious promises which are as precious Pearls more precious than Rubies and mixing them with her own superstitions make up pretty taking medals and formes or Images of devotion and composures of Croizons and religious exercises to allure and bewitch them 3. Yea the familiarity and Friendship with Persons of that Religion or being yoked up with them especially in Marriage proves a great inducement to diverse to turn to them for even such correspondencies and conjunctions with any false worshipers have been allways pernicious as may appear even in Solomon who though a wise man and of an exceeding large understanding so as that as Nehemiah observes among many Nations there was no King like him who was beloved of God yet even him did outlandish or strange women of a corrupt Religion cause to Sin Neh. 13.26 1 King 11.3 4 5 6 7. For his Women inclined or turned away his Heart so that it was not right with God but he followed other Gods and built high places for them and who may presume to stand under a temptation when he voluntarily casts himself into it that Solomon could not stand upright under though so wise a man therefore God forbad Israel to joyn themselves in affinity with