Selected quad for the lemma: mercy_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
mercy_n	faith_n	grace_n	repentance_n	2,335	5	7.5639	4	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A04191	A treatise containing the originall of vnbeliefe, misbeliefe, or misperswasions concerning the veritie, vnitie, and attributes of the Deitie with directions for rectifying our beliefe or knowledge in the fore-mentioned points. By Thomas Iackson Dr. in Divinitie, vicar of Saint Nicholas Church in the famous towne of New-castle vpon Tine, and late fellow of Corpus Christi Colledge in Oxford.; Commentaries upon the Apostles Creed. Book 5	Jackson, Thomas, 1579-1640.	1625 (1625)	STC 14316; ESTC S107490	279,406	488

In this latter God himselfe is made the sworn patron of murther incest and all manner of crueltie the heavenly regiment of his Church on earth is transformed into a Machievillian tyrannie not contented to haue stained the beauty of the spouse lest her deformities being openly descried should publickly be detested they seek in latter dayes to disfigure the bridegroome and with the wicked one in the Psalmist misdeeme their Redeemer to be like vnto them because he holds his peace at these abominations impiously presuming that in the day of finall judgement Christ shall ratifie whatsoever the Pope ex cathedrâ hath determined as if your judgement for this infidelitie or their credulitie that herein beleeue you were not alreadie past as if Gods vengeance did sleepe while he were silent This point though prosecuted vpō other occasiōs more at large before I could not in this place so quickly leaue were it not that I shall haue cause to meete with it with fuller indignation hereafter For I will yet pray against this their wickednesse from which this Land can never be sufficiently purged vntill the whole seduced flocke be constrained by severe execution of wholesome lawes to doe publique penance in their Apostaticall Pastors and blasphemous seducers ashes CHAPTER XLIII Of particular transformations or misperswasions of divine goodnesse alike common to the corrupt professors of true Religion as to the zo●lous professors of corrupt Religion 1. GRossenesse in opinions solemnly avouched reduced to method or instamped with the publique seale of authoritie is easily discovered by all to whom long accustomance hath not made their poyson in a sort familiar or as part of daily foode Every punie rightly catechized in the points of doctrine publickely established in our Church can clearely discerne the late mentioned or other like transformations of the Deitie whether Heathenish or Romanish But did each of vs privately vse the orthodoxall forme of wholesome doctrine publiquely professed as a true glasse for discovering as well the obliquitie of our owne practicall resolutions as the errors of others knowne opinions most of vs might see just cause to thinke that we did secretly wrong the divine essence no lesse than they doe whom we condemne of open sacriledge and idolatrie No mans passions in this life can be so moderate if happily immoderate loue of his moderatenesse make him not so partiall as not to obserue them but may affoord him experimentall grounds of this conclusion There is no habituall exorbitance of desire or affection but secretly works a Parallell transfiguration of the Deitie no staine or foule deformitie in life or manners whereto wee giue indulgence and dispensation but will cast the like aspersion vpon the immaculate Maiestie To imagine him that is the best of all to be like vs in those things which we best like or most approue is an error almost inseparable from the corruption of our nature oftimes rather lopped than vtterly extirpated by infusion of grace 2. Dispositions by nature austere and rigid or otherwise by height of place emboldned to practise severitie as the supporter of awe and reverence or as an Antidote against contempt conceipt no sacrifice so acceptable vnto God as strict execution of lawes for the most part preposterously partiall and severe And if the great Moderator of heaven and earth permit the accomplishment of their designes he is apprehended as a favourer of their desires What seemes good to them the same once effected is intertained as an effect of divine goodnesse So Saul would make God the author and approver of the Ziphits kindnesse towards himselfe and bestow a blessing vpon them as presuming of the Lords consent Blessed be yee of the Lord for yee haue compassion on me when as not the least degree of compassion or kindnesse towards him but was extreme crueltie against poore David a man after Gods owne heart And it is a point very questionable Whether the deformedly zealous or hard-hearted Magistrate I meane no Atheist or the Iewes that offered their children vnto Molech do God more wrong The one mistooke the father of murther and crueltie for a God the other make the onely and true God which hath no pleasure in sacrifice or burnt offerings to be delighted in bloud not of Bulles and Goates but of poore and miserable men Every rigid exactor of his owne whether by vsing the permitted benefit of humane law or misconstrued warrant of lawes divine disfigures his Creator and makes him a God of justice onely On the other side such as are ready to kill themselues and their friends with kindnesse frame a God of mercy and bountie vtterly dismembred of justice of indignation and severitie The dissolute and wanton condemne even necessary austeritie of discipline or any set rules of life of Pharisaisme or enimitie against Christ whom by the same error they misconceiue to be much what like themselues though no consort of their riotous or dissolute courses yet one that will saue them sooner than most of such as seeme more holy For did he not open heaven gates to Publicans and open sinners when they were shut to Scribes Pharisees But alas poore soules they consider not that Publicanes and notorious sinners found mercy vnsought for to the end that succeeding ages how great soever their offences were should not despaire to finde it when they diligently sought it Though God haue mercy in as great store for vs as for these first Converts of the Gentiles yet may we not desire it by such extraordinary meanes as they had it Wee in the search of it must frame our liues to the patterne which they had set vs after it had found them They meeting with it tooke a solemne farewell of their former sinnefull courses so then mercy shewed to them when they were alients from faith and blasphemers of the truth did bring forth true repentance And all our hopes of mercy or perswasions of actuall being in the state of grace vnlesse they be mingled with a correspondent measure of true repentance are but the painted fruits of Pharisaicall and Iewish blasphemie To the former sort of these delinquents to the rigid and hard-hearted offender he will declare himselfe to be such as they secretly imagine him to be a God of judgement without mercy because they haue shewed no mercy to their brethren To the latter to the dissolute and presumptuous he will approue himselfe such as they expect not his iustice which they least feare will sodainely overtake them while his mercy with which they haue dallied shall flie from them 3. It is hard for any man seasoned with the rudiments of Christian faith to haue his heart so full stuft with malice as shall leaue no confused notion of Christian charitie in his head with whose abstract beautie or amiable aspect simply considered the most wicked are enamoured But as the naturall knowledge of God was by the Heathen so the notions of his graces are still detained in vnrighteousnesse by Christians in

poynts SECTION I. Of the ingraffed Notion of a Deitie and the originalls of Atheisme ATheisme and irreligion are diseases so much more dangerous than infidelitie or Idolatrie as infidelitie is than heresie Every hereticke is in part an Infidell but every infidell is not in whole or part an hereticke Every Atheist is an infidell so is not every infidell an Atheist The name of Hereticke is common to all and proper onely to such as either deny or mis-beleeue any one Article in the Apostles Creed Infidels all are to be accounted which either deny or beleeue not the Articles concerning Christ Such are the Iewes Turkes Mahumetans in generall c. whom no man calls Atheists An Atheist he is Qui titubat in Limine which either denies or beleeues not the very first Article in the Creed God or the divine providence Now seeing beliefe as it is terminated to the first words of the Creed is as the Diame●rall line or Axis which severs Atheisme or irreligion from Religion whether true or false and doth as it were constitute two distinct Hemispheres of men it will be necessary in the first place to examine the originall meaning of the first words in the Creede I beleeue in God CHAPTER I. To beleeue in God is originally no more than to beleeue there is a God who is in all things to be beleeved Of this beliefe trust or confidence in God is the necessary consequent in Collapsed men Despaire the necessary consequent of the same or like beliefe in Collapsed Angels 1. TO beleeue in God hath gone currant so long for as much as to put trust or confidence in Him that now to call it in or make it goe for lesse will perhaps bee thought an vsurpation of authoritie more then criticall and much greater then befits vs. Notwithstanding if on Gods behalfe wee may plead what Lawyers doe in Cases of the Crowne Nullum tempus occurrit regi that the Auncient of daies vnto whose soveraigntie all truth is from eternitie essentially annexed may not be preiudiced by antiquitie of Custome or prescription especially whose originall is erroneous the case is cleare That to beleeue in God is in their intention which first composed this Creed no more then to beleeue there is a God or to giue credence to his Word For iustifying this assertion I must appeale from the English Dialect in which the manner of speech is proper and naturall were it consonant to the meaning of the originall as also from the Latine in which the phrase being forreine and vncouth must be valued by the Greeke whose stamp and Character it evidently beares Now the Greeke 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as also the Hebrew phrase wherevnto by sacred Writers it was framed is no more then hath beene said To beleeue there is a God otherwise we must beleeue not only in God the Father in Christ the Sonne and in the holy Ghost but in the Catholike Church in the Communion of Saints in the forgiuenesse of sinnes and in the resurrection of the bodie and in life everlasting seeing the Greeke particle vsually expressed by the Latine In is annexed after the same manner to all these obiects of our beliefe as is apparant in the auncient Greeke Creeds And he that diligently reads the translation of the Septuagint shall finde the Greeke phrase which is verbatim rendred by the Latine in Deum credere to beleeue in God promiscuously vsed for the other credere Deo to beleeue God 2. Or if besides the evident records of the auncient Copies personall witnesses be required amongst the auncient I know few amongst moderne writers none more competent then those which are expresly for vs as Beza Mercer Drusius vnto whom we may adde Ribera and Lorinus Now as to vse the benefit of a truth known and testified is alwayes lawfull so in this case it is to vs most expedient almost necessarie For either I did not rightly apprehend whiles I read it or at least now remember not how the Schooleman remooues the stumbling blocke which he had placed in the very entry to this Creed If to beleeue in God be as much as to put trust or confidence in Him by exacting a profession of this Creed at all mens mouths we shall enforce a great many to professe a lie For of such as not onely out of ordinarie charitie but vpon particular probabilities we may safely acquit from actuall Atheisme or contradicting Infidelitie a great number doe not put their trust or confidence in God this being the marke whereat the beliefe of novices must ayme not the first step they are to make in this progresse And for my selfe vntill I be better instructed if a poore deiected soule should come vnto me with a complaint of his distrust or diffidence I would not instantly vrge him to make proclamation of his trust in God against his conscience for this were to quench smoaking flax by violent blowing those weake and smoothered sparkles which should be charily revived by milde and gentle breathing The contrarie advice on my part or practise on his should not want an approved patterne To confesse his present vnbeliefe whiles he prayes for future increase of such weak beliefe as he may safely make profession of And as the fire once throughly kindled bursts out of its owne accord into a lasting flame so beliefe once inwardly planted wil naturally bring forth stedfast confidence without farther plantation or superaddition of any new beliefe or perswasion Many beginning their faith the other way may for a long time be stifly perswaded that they beleeue in God when in deed they doe not truely beleeue him his Word or his mercies These no man firmly can beleeue but he shall assuredly beleeue in him yea put his whole trust and confidence in his goodnesse Howbeit as much as now I write would hardly be permitted me in most mens hearing to speake without this or the like interpellation Shall we then beleeue in Saints or good Angels because we assuredly beleeue there be such natures Or shall we say the wicked Angels beleeue in God because they beleeue his being more firmely then we can doe and know his word as clearely 3. That inferior subiects salute not every officer in the Court after the same manner they doe the Prince is not because they see not the one as perfectly as the other rather the more fully they discerne them by one and the same inerring sight the better they conceiue the different respect which is due to their severall presences Angels we beleeue are ministring spirits appointed to execute Gods will whose maiestie they adore as fervently as we doe putting greater confidence in his mercie then we can doe even because their knowledge of it is more cleare their experience of it more vndoubted But the better we beleeue this their subordinatiō vnto God the lesse shall we be inclined to beleeue in them the more to put our confidence in God in whom even the Angells