Selected quad for the lemma: evil_n
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A41567
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The true character of the spirit and principles of Socinianism, drawn out of their writings With some additional proofs of the Most Holy Trinity, of our Lord's and of the Holy Ghost's divinity. By J. Gailhard, Gent.
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Gailhard, J. (Jean)
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1699
(1699)
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Wing G130; ESTC R213338
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180,830
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207
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Nature but would also deprive Rulers of their chief Glory which is to assert and vindicate the Honour and Service of God and by their Authority to suppress whatsoever is contrary to 't But to turn to the Text the Author saith we ought to prove two things pag. 69. first That meer Errours of the Vnderstanding are evil-Works which by the Grace of God I hope to do but knowing their Cavilling Humour we must clear the way before us The Understanding being the Spring and proper Seat of Theorical Errours it had been fit for him to have said what he meaneth by the word meer whether a transient false Speculation or an immanent such a one as goes no farther but stops there in the Mind This last doth affect only the Party and it making sometimes but a slight Impression is in time forgotten but the first produceth ill Effects for it passes into the Heart where it settles and thence breaks out Now I say that these meer Errours of the Understanding are evil Works The Understanding is the Judgment-Seat of the Soul where whatsoever comes into it is examined and there Judgment passed whether it be true or false And as the Will follows the last Dictate of the Intellect so thence it passes into the Will and is either received as good or rejected as evil when the first as commonly 't is then the Affections seated in the Heart or Will are engaged When we say the Errours of the Understanding are evil Works by Works we do not mean what is generally opposed to Thoughts for all Man's Actions are distinguished into Thoughts Words and Deeds or Works now the Understanding hath its Works and Operations as well as the other Faculties of the Soul or Members of the Body but in another manner and of a different Nature to represent this we use to say that Man hath a working Head and his Brains are at work In this sense we say that Errours of the Understanding are evil Works such is the black List by our Saviour spoken of Mark 7.21 22. Out of the heart of men proceed evil Thoughts Adulteries Fornications Murthers Thefts Covetousness Wickedness Blasphemy c. all these are evil Works and all come from within and Blasphemy which is the great thing in question is named and Heresie another great Evil which we justly charge Socinians with Gal. 5.20 is reckoned among the Works of the Flesh Such workings are in Mind and Heart In heart ye work wickedness saith David Ps 58.2 These are evil Works punishable by the Magistrate according to the Text of the Romans which we now are upon and both Blasphemy and Heresie are certainly Matters of Irreligion which to punish as also Idolatry doth bind the Christian as it did the Jewish Magistrate and he is as much obliged to execute Justice upon as against Adulteries Fornications Murthers Thefts and other Wickednesses already mention'd Now to close up this Head I say that as meer Errours in the Understanding are evil Works it necessarily follows that those who be guilty thereof are Evil-doers all we can do for those who will deny this is in the words of the Roman Poet to wish them mentem sanam in corpore sano a sound Mind in a sound Body The second thing he would have us to prove is this that the Apostle means such here that is as hold Fundamental Errors and are guilty of Blasphemy Heresie and Idolatry else it were not to the purpose for these are the things in question and do own profess and practise it for else no Man being a searcher of the Heart and Mind knows what passes therein and so may not Punish but for what comes within his certain knowledge therefore there ought to be Informations and Proofs drawn out of Overt Acts as Words Discourses Writings and the like the Apostle saying here that the Ruler is a Minister of God a Revenger to execute Wrath upon him that doth Evil and not adding in Civil Matters which had been necessary if he intended to have restrained it only to such or else he had not sufficiently expressed his Mind but seeing he simply saith Vpon him that doth Evil Can any thing forbid us to believe and affirm he meant doing Evil in things pertaining to God as well as to Men And is it not an abominable thing for them to exclude things of Religion and to make Limitations where God hath made none Therefore if God hath appointed the Magistrate to punish all that do Evil for the word him being indefinite doth generally comprehend all that do so and hath not said against his Neighbour or against the Publick Good why should we not understand it in any kind that deserves Punishment and consequently in Religious Matters as well as those of the Civil Society What he saith that this relates only to Civil Matters because of these words Wilt thou then not be afraid of the Power do that which is good and thou shalt have praise of the same is not to the purpose as it will appear somewhat lower We are not so sawcy as they to limitate it only to Matters of Religion and not also extend it to those of a Civil Nature for we own it relates to both Temporal and Spiritual things Here the Apostle from verse 1 to 7. inclusively upon three Motives exhorted to Obey the Superiour Powers First Hope of Reward Second Fear of Punishment and Third for Conscience sake in case the other two could not prevail and though he doth not so plainly mention the Duty of Rulers yet he insinuates how they ought to Reward Good Works and Punish Evil ones Now to Command and to Obey are two Relatives and if Actively or Passively we must Obey in all Just and Lawful things as are not against but for the Honour and Glory of God as are all of a truely Religious Nature then the Magistrate may command all that are such and by Penalties compel Men to Obey in things relating to Religion as well as to Civil Society and if he may make Laws to force Men to be Just one to another much more hath God Authoriz'd him by Law to force them to give God his due and not rob him of his own as more immediately and in a special manner are things belonging to Religion for in the Text Obedience is commanded to be yielded out of a Principle of Conscience verse 5. and for fear of Damnation verse 3. both which certainly relate to Religion When God gave Moses the Decalogue he divided it into two Tables whereof the first immedily related to him as being Matters of Religion as the second did to the Civil Society and were not the breakers of the first Table punished as those of the second Or is it reasonable to think that God took care of Man's Concern and wholly neglected his own so that in this World they might offend him and go unpunished what kind of Encouragement would this have been to all manner of Impiety
in the Soul because God is a Spirit without Body yet some Conformity there is for it affords some Organs which are subservient to the Actions of the Soul and so the Body is in its manner an Image of Divine Perfection it doth hear and see and is a Symbol and Instrument of the Perfections of the Soul and of the Maker for the Wisdom Power and other Attributes of God are commonly represented by the Members as the Eyes Ears Mouth and Hands of the Body Lastly The Image of God did consist in the whole Person in Relation to the dominion which God gave Adam over all other Worldly Creatures also as to Happiness and Immortality for as God is Lord over the whole Work of Creation and Enjoys a Supreme Felicity so he constituted him Lord of other Creatures and placed him in a State of happy Immortality But several of these they deny or have corrupted they would not have God's Image to have consisted in Immortality and Righteousness for they affirm Adam to have been created Mortal and that he had died though he had not sinn'd but if so then God's Threatning his Disobedience with Death had been in vain and to no purpose if he had died whether or not he had sinned then Death had been no Punishment for his Sin yet the Apostle saith Rom. 6.23 Chap. 5.12 the Wages of Sin is Death he said before By one Man Sin entered into the World and Death by Sin Though his Body was made of a frail matter yet thorough God's Gift it might have been Immortal as it shall be after the Resurrection that Immortality of our first Parents we call a power and faculty of not dying which to them was Natural for if they had continued in their integrity they had not died and in that State 't was as Natural not to die as not to Sin Death necessarily follows Sin and no Sin no Death as to that holiness and Righteousness wherein chiefly consisted the Image of God in which they were created the Apostle speaks of it when he saith Epes 4.24 that ye put on the new Man which after God is created in Righteousness and true holiness which in the verse before he called to be renewed in the Spirit of your mind which implies that once in us there was such a thing but was since decay'd and lost in Adam we had and lost it in him but in Christ were restored thereunto but Socinians who pretend to a right of making all things to be as they would laugh at it primum c. to affirm saith one * Smalc exam Err. err 104. That the first Man received in his Creation holiness and supernatural gifts is an Old and stinking Fable They also would have the pains which Adam and Eve underwent to have been natural Gen. 3.16 17 18 19. Chap. 1.31 Chap. 2.17 V. 20. when we read they were a Punishment for their Sin this in them imports a reflection upon God their Maker and 't is to give Scripture the lie when it saith and God saw that every thing he had made was very good and also when God said to Adam in the day that thou Eatest thereof thou shalt surely Die. They say farther that he had not the excellent and certain Knowledge of the Creator nor of the rest of the Creatures which if true then he had been an imperfect Work of God but seeing God who was a competent Judge of the thing left it for him to give names to all Cattel and to the Fowl of the Air and to every Beast of the field which God approved of we must believe he had that certain Knowledge †Se statu prim hom c. 6. v. 23. though Smalcius be of a different Opinion and we also read he knew his Wife to be bone of his bones and flesh of his flesh Now when I am upon this point about Knowledge I shall pass to another which they oppose 't is this That there is a Natural Knowledge of God whereby we mean that Men who have the use of Natural Reason may without special Revelation by the consideration of God's Works in the World know that there is a God a first Cause of all who hath his being of himself and hath given all things theirs but they being used to gainsay Scripture affirm that by the light of nature Men cannot know that there is a God though Paul saith that which may be known of God is manifest in Men Rom. 1.19 20 21 28. for God hath shewed it unto them and it may more appear in the Verses quoted in the Margin and this knowledge is such as to leave them without excuse and this carries them so far as that by nature they do the things contain'd in the law which shew the work of the law written in their hearts Chap. 2.14 15. their Conscience also bearing witness and their thoughts the mean while accusing or else excusing one another an evil Conscience attended with terrours for fear of punishment and a good one with joy do demonstrate there is a God revenger for evil and rewarder of good but what 's that to them let Scripture speak never so positively and plainly things must be as they will have them to be The next thing is about Original Sin that is the stain and corruption which we bring into the World and as it is in humane nature 't is so call'd because it hath it's spring and origine from Adam and also because 't is originally and naturally from the Womb in every Man Woman and Child it consists in the privation of that original righteousness wherein the first Man was created and in the corruption inherent in our nature whereby we are averse from good and inclined to evil which Socinians who are a line of the generation spoken of Prov. 30.12 Isa 65.5 that are pure in their own eyes even from the Womb and so being righteous in their own conceit think they may say to others come not near to me stand by thy self for I am holier than thou yet 't is said they are not wash'd from their filthiness of this Sin there are two parts the imputation and the inherency as to the first Adam was a publick Person the representative of all Mankind which was in his Loyns as Levi was in Abraham's when to Melchisedec he paid the tenth part of all Heb. 7.9 upon which account as the Apostle observes Levi paid Tithes in Abraham by the same reason whole Mankind which were in Adam's Loyns when he sinn'd are accounted to have sinn'd in him God's Promises and Threatnings were not confin'd in him but extended to his whole Posterity which would have enjoyed the benefit of his Obedience if he had continued in his integrity as they have smarted for his Disobedience as 't is usual among Men to see the Blood and Family of Traytors to suffer for the Crimes of Parents and thereby to forfeit Estates and Dignities this imputation