Selected quad for the lemma: england_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
england_n	book_n	church_n	write_v	2,919	5	5.8866	4	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A57530	Naaman the Syrian his disease and cure discovering lively to the reader the spirituall leprosie of sinne and selfe-love, together with the remedies, viz. selfe-deniall and faith ... with an alphabeticall table, very necessary for the readers understanding to finde each severall thing contained in this booke / by Daniel Rogers.	D. R. (Daniel Rogers), 1573-1652.	1642 (1642)	Wing R1799; ESTC R28805	900,058	728

Oh! these and all other scurfe of this kinde as Antinomian liberty under the Gospell erroneous thinking our obedience to be closer then it is because in some duties which please us we are close whereas in others wee are loose as when God requires us whether alone to be alway well seasoned and least alone or if with others to curbe our vanity and vagaries and either to doe good or take it I say These for it were infinite to say all the Lord will have us cut off by the same sword of his Spirit even by his Commands alway watching a base heart alway armed against Devill and world her threats or her baites and when they have gain●●nd God all they can yet to conclude for God and to determine and resolve all our resistances and demurres by his bare truth saying All these have their colours but against them all is one truth one eternall righteous unchangeable word of God which must carry them all and my soule downe the streame Be warned then brethren by this caveat Doe as the Saints have done before us Rom. 4.18.19 Abraham had a world of exceptions to snare him he foresaw that the killing of Isaac implyed not onely a contradiction to the promise but also infinite many absurdities as to breake a morall law to make himselfe a man execrable an abhorred person therefore forbidding his thoughts to plod any longer hee drownes all in the command God saith he who gave him requires him why should I then deny him Absurd contrary impossible charges to flesh imply that God will ayd the soule of the obeyer with the more singular grace and crowne it with greater rewards and therefore hee resolves to goe downeright with the command Gen. 39.8 Ioseph had his thoughts no doubt stirring when he was tempted by his lewd mistresse perhaps if I doe it honour gaine preferment may ensue But to be sure on the other side it will be most wofull for me to fall into the pit of an whore Prov. 6.26 to be snared for ever with a cursed conscience oh saith he shall I doe this and sinne against God Here beloved lyes the maine triall of a Christian if when all is said that can be against the charge either of beleeving or obeying the soule shall devoure all her objections as Peter when after his idle fishing all the night hee was bidden to cast his net on the right side of the ship Lord Luke 5.7 at thy command I will cast in So doe thou and prosper And so much also may serve for this use of Admonition Vse 6 Now I conclude with two other uses of Reproofe Reproofe and Exhortation For the former thus Are Gods charges so close so spirituall so binding Surely then the course of this world is very blame-worthy for that loves nothing save liberty and dispensations It was wont to be said in the times of those heretiques All the world is become Arrian but now we may say It is all turned libertine Antinomists and Libertines who under the colour of ascribing to the excellency and extent of faith and imputation which they never well understood maintaine a licentiousnesse of practice have filled the world at this day The course of such among us as have written or preached some abatements to our former Tenets and Articles of Doctrine allaying and corrupting our principles of justification free grace and other the like hath brought forth this bastard fruit and Papists dare publiquely write books in the reconciling of our Doctrine in this Church of England with their owne Tenets And as some Separatists from the writings of some of our Worthies have falsely extracted a necessity of our departing from the Church of England so would these impudent Cassanders force us to come in and joyne our selves with their Popish Synagogue What true and Christian spirit should not mourne to see our old pure wine thus to be mixed with water and our old coin so embased with copper For practice much more apparant it is how men make dispensations for liberty in all the chiefe points of Christianity What one act or duty savouring of sincerity or the power of Christ is not catcht at curtolled diminished and dispensed with Dispensations against the power of truths is a great sinne of our times When were the lascivious wits of men more busied or their prophane hearts more bold in fleecing away the extents of the truths of God as they are in Jesus And why Surely because whensoever power of truth decayes there the tenets of truth must also be limited restrained and circumscribed Yea and men would seeme to be mad with reason Sundry instances named and to maintaine That those former times wherein Doctrines and Practices of men were more close and strict were times of lesse light and judgement but now say they we are growne to be more skilfull and able to discerne and therefore may take more liberty Who ever heard that ignorance bred closenesse or that light bred liberty True it is that as truth so the power of truth lies low in the earth and is hidden deep and requires a long time to dig it out But to affirme that the truth was more strict in the beginning of time then after and that it is the honour of time to broach liberty loosnesse how unreasonable it is No rather we have by our base deserting of truth or detaining the same in unrighteousnesse brought upon our selves a revolt from both truth and the power thereof in great measure and made our ends worse then our beginnings except the Lord mercifully doe set our Sunne ten degrees back and reduce us againe to our first temper Let us not think those dayes which God honoured with so much blood of our Martyrs and that in the infancy of our Church were further off the power and savour of godlinesse then we are Rather it might become us even now in our Laodicean self-sufficiency to learn of them and not to pretend our own liberty and breadth as an argument of greater perfection The truth of it is looke wee into all estates and conditions of life Amplification of this reproof great small or middle into all actions behaviours of men morall spirituall into all their wayes either of worship and ordinances or of life and conversation and wee shall finde not one of these to have escaped the taint of carnall liberty and dispensations Our fore-fathers zeale could outbid all feares persecutions and dangers for the maintenance of commands But we degenerate creatures are all for abatements and how we may reconcile Gods and our owne ends together If men could refine the Bible and make an Index Expurgatorius for the dashing out of the most close powerfull Truths as too hot and heavie for the times of loosnesse wherein we live how welcome would they be As Papists have done with the second Command and with other writings of men which favour not their proceedings so doe we now goe