Selected quad for the lemma: heaven_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
heaven_n	earth_n	new_a	old_a	10,166	5	6.7627	4	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A54944	A discourse concerning the trial of spirits wherein inquiry is made into mens pretences to inspiration for publishing doctrines, in the name of God beyond the rules of the sacred scriptures : in opposition to some principles and practices of papists and fanaticks, as they contradict the doctrines of the Church of England, defined in her Articles of Religion, established by her ecclesiastical canons, and confirmed by acts of Parliament / by Thomas Pittis ...	Pittis, Thomas, 1636-1687.	1683 (1683)	Wing P2313; ESTC R33964	135,179	370

what it will that no subtilty may circumvent us nor creeping into houses lead the silly women captive nor cause us to stray after them We know the Devil is both cunning and diligent and that he suits his temptations to the various interests and dispositions of men that he walks about like a roaring Lion but 't is only to seek whom he may devour 1 Pet. 5.8 The Scribes and Pharisees were pains-taking men For they compassed Sea and Land to make a proselyte but when they had made him he became twice more the child of Hell than themselves Matth. 23.15 Let us not then under the pretence of new discoveries forsake that which has been from the beginning but let the same mind be in us which was in Christ Jesus and according to S. Pauls advice Rom. 16.17 18. Let us mark them which cause divisions and offences contrary to the Doctrine we have learned and avoid them because they are such as serve not our Lord Jesus Christ but their own belly and by good words and fair speeches deceive the hearts of the simple Then as it follows the God of peace shall bruise Sathan under our feet shortly Let us live in that unity which our holy Religion prescribes to us not raise or abett disturbances in the world but endeavour to fulfil S. Pauls joy and make our Ministers task easie in being like minded having the same love being of one accord and of one judgement that nothing be done through strife or vain glory Philip. 2. at the beginning For if we are drawn by hearkening to the various pretences of men that yet account themselves inspired to be alwayes biting and devouring one another we shall be consumed one of another And this we are not only in our own age taught by experience but the Apostle has long ago admonished men of this Gal. 5.15 Let us live therefore like those that have professed rules of faith and conversation endeavouring to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace And then if we thus live in this world we shall be entertained in the glory of the next CHAP. IV. HAving thus discours'd the Apostles Caution and evidenced to you that every one that pretends to Revelation is not to be believ'd I proceed to the second particular I propounded which contains a Direction how we may disentangle our selves from those perplexities and different opinions that various men under the same pretension puzzle us withal But try the Spirits whether they are of God Now as this is a metaphorical expression taken from those who bring Metals to the Touchstone that they may discern the difference betwixt them that they may be able to value them proportionably to their worth So to try the Spirits is to examine the Doctrines that such pretenders deliver to the world and to discern betwixt true and false and accordingly judge whether they are from God or no. It was the duty of the Priests under the Law to shew the people the difference betwixt holy and prophane and to cause men to discern betwixt the clean and the unclean Ezek. 44.23 And the duty is continued under the Gospel in relation to the Doctrines and pretensions of men For as our Saviour foretold that many false Prophets would arise in his Name with pretensions to his power and authority so we find them too suddenly after this prediction to have gone abroad into the World and even yet continuing their boldness and impiety dividing the Church and not only troubling particular men but whole Societies overturning Thrones dissolving Government amongst mankind and raising confusions not only in Secular but Religious affairs To prevent therefore such unsufferable disturbances that Religion may not cover malice or ambition nor give any countenance to the humours or impieties of men we must endeavour to preserve this entire without any mixtures of villany or imposture and by some certain characters know what properly belongs to it that we may not lye open to the fancies or designs of those who cunningly ruine our principles and profession And since new Lights are continually exposed to the view of men which they too easily gaze at till their eyes are dazled we must endeavour to distinguish these blazing Comets from the true and fixed Stars in the Firmament by which we are to be guided on Earth and directed in our way to Heaven We must try both Doctrines and those that publish them whether they are of God because many false Prophets are gone out into the world If you will take an old Apostles advice against the pretended infallibility of new he advises you to prove all things but still to hold fast that which is good 1 Thess 5.21 We must try the Doctrines Opinions Examples nay even the Actions of all pretenders to revelation for by their fruits ye shall know them sayes our Saviour And what we call Tender Consciences as well as those that are very raw being rubb'd often by reason of their former commissions when they are not guided by a well balanced judgement are most apt to have secret combats within themselves and to be sensible of the least touch upon them For the best things in this World have some inconvenience still attending them and that which in some cases is good with other circumstances becomes evil and most men that have an itch upon their ears have had a scab first upon their minds The best Gold is most ductile and a Tender Conscience if the judgement be not the governour of the affections is easily enslaved to such principles as suit with passion and make impressions on the temperaments and bodily dispositions of men A seal we know makes the fairest and most lasting impression upon such Wax as is first softned and a tender Conscience where the head is as soft as the passions plyable easily receives the next Image though to the blotting out and defacing the old We had need therefore when any man comes under a pretence of some new inspiration to examine well both the person and his doctrine and receive to our own the skill of others especially those whom God has set over us in the Lord we may otherwise forsake the true Israel when Ephraim and Manasseh shall combine together or singly encounter it And we have been lately and are not yet out of danger so vex'd with parties different from one another whilst one extreme rides the other that the caution against believing every Spirit cannot too often be repeated nor our trial of all Preachers and Doctrines be too frequently urged and practised Our Saviour gives his Disciples a caution who yet had the view of those Miracles which we only believe that they should take heed that no man deceive them Mat. 24.4 that they might not entertain a secret enemy instead of a bosom friend And certainly we have much more reason to beware now although there were false pretenders then For if they durst when our Saviour was in the world design

reason to the belief of the Gospel which was proved Divine by the testimony and revelation of the Spirit if sufficient means were not afforded them to know and distinguish Divine Revelation from imposture and pretences The things delivered were above the reach of humane reasonings and Philosophy then gave check to their belief and custom and education had impress'd them with different nay contrary notions of things It must be supposed therefore antecedently to their reception of the Gospel that as S. Paul was able to give them evidence that those Doctrines he delivered to them were revealed from Heaven so there were some Methods and Rules by which they might be able to know the revelation and not receive it upon his bare testimony Nay to what purpose would it be for S. John to direct men to try the Spirits if we had not sufficient means to know whether they were from God or no Fifthly This must be granted too that there are false Pretensions and Doctrines of men vented in the World under the notion of true And true and false under the same pretence of inspiration The Apostle tells us that many false Prophets are gone out into the world And our Saviour to prevent a rash belief and thereby an Apostasie from the Gospel or trusting in another Messiah acquaints the World that there would arise false Christs and false Prophets Mark 13.22 And therefore they should not believe and entertain them although according to their different principles and designs they should cry out Lo here is Christ or Lo there And S. Peter tells us that as there were false Prophets formerly amongst the people so there should be false Teachers among the Christians who should privily bring in damnable heresies denying the Lord that bought them and that many should follow their pernicious wayes 2 Pet. 2.1 2. Nay S. Paul tells us of those who in a voluntary humility and worshipping of Angels intruded into those things which they never saw being vainly puffed up in their fleshly minds who yet departed from the head Christ himself who is the head of the Church making the coming to God by the Mediatory application to an Angel a demonstration of their humility and so rejecting the intercession of our Saviour the only Mediator betwixt God and man Col. 2.18 But our own Age is so fruitful in examples of this kind that the possibility of mens false pretences to revelation and of their venting corrupt Doctrines to the World needs no other argument to prove it than our own experience Nor need we rake in the dust of false Prophets in past Ages when we have to our great grief and trouble living monuments on which these things are to be read and seen Yet Sixthly Notwithstanding all this we must maintain that there is such a thing as true inspiration This is plainly implied by S. John to whom I must adhere For it would be ill Logick to infer that because the Apostle adviseth us not to believe every Spirit therefore we should give credit unto none But rather that some are to be believed Especially when we take in his direction with it Try the Spirits whether they are of God This argues that some Doctrines came from Heaven and some men were inspired from above although many false Prophets were gone abroad into the world Should the contrary be held by any among us it would not only invalidate the Doctrine of Moses and the Prophets under the Old Testament But of Christ and his Apostles under the New it would conclude the intercourse betwixt God and men to be an impossible Chimera and turn all Divinity into a Fable And at once render our time mis-spent and lost whilst I am writing and others reading such Doctrines as these and all disputes concerning any positive and instituted Religion the foolish talkings and inventions of men that busie themselves to deceive others and give trouble to their own flesh When mans reason might supply all But such a phancy I suppose to be too wild and extravagant to be admitted in such an age of the world as this Especially among those who have frequented Christian Assemblies and have heard discourses proving the truth of the Old Testament or the New That have read the Jews Arguments for their Law or the Christian Fathers Apologizing for the Religion of the Gospel Nor indeed can any deny the truth of Gods conversing with men that reject not his Omnipotence or else doubt of the nature and capacity of their own souls To be sure they must deny the Scriptures to be the Word of God and affirm all his appearances to men to be a fable Since from them we are assured that all Scripture was given by inspiration from God 2 Tim. 3.16 And therefore to men that acknowledge this I must be supposed to direct this discourse as well as S. John does in the Text so frequently recited who supposes that there is a Divine inspiration before he advises men to separate the pretences of false Prophets from the Doctrines of those that are true 'T is in vain otherwise to perswade men to exercise their faculties assisted by Rules or to make any discrimination at all where there is no foundation for the conclusion of a difference Seventhly Therefore The trial of the Doctrines and Rules of men pretending inspiration having thus far been brought on towards a conclusion The determination of our assent and choice in matters of such huge and vast moment on which the welfare of our souls depends must be directed by what sufficiently without fallacy evidences those Doctrines which we receive from others or are led into the belief of from our own reasonings are certainly such as came from God and that we are not imposed upon by our own temperament or the subtilty of others The evidence therefore for a Divine revelation must be greater and stronger than any argument framed to the contrary Because in all the discoveries of truth my belief is to be determined according to evidence and the greatest probability guides the rational choice of men And all that act suitably to themselves embrace the proposition that comes nearest to truth and certainty But where two things seem equal in their proof a rational man only hesitates and doubts and gives up his assent to neither And therefore had the Magicians of Egypt equall'd the Miracles Moses wrought in the presence of Pharaoh as well as they did in turning rods into Serpents and Rivers into blood and causing Froggs to come up before him They need not at that time have acknowledg'd Moses's power disproportionable to their own nor distinguished their own Miracles from his by saying This is the finger of God And Pharaoh himself might have had an equal argument to detain the Israelites as they had for the command of God to depart out of the Land of Egypt But when the Miracles on their side far exceeded the Wonders on the other his own resolution became his Law and Pharaohs