Selected quad for the lemma: religion_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
religion_n	church_n	great_a	way_n	2,889	4	4.3202	3	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A67237	The pretensions of the triple crown examined in thrice three familiar letters ... / written some years ago by Sir Christopher Wyvill ...	Wyvill, Christopher, Sir, 1614-1672?	1672 (1672)	Wing W3787; ESTC R34104	91,353	203

once-enjoyed comforts thou wilt soon confess thy best pleasing or most gainful sin to have been full dear bought and that sweet condition of peace and joy in believing far to fetch So that thy self shall ever after be a witness That the Doctrine of Perseverance rightly understood brings along with it what is as proper to the repelling of sin as it is to the establishing of Consolation Since the fear of losing Gods favourable Aspect hath something more of terrible in it than the unconverted who never had any feeling of such matter can apprehend I will fold up this sheet with the words of St. John Whosoever is born of God sinneth not for his seed remaineth in him 1 Joh. 3. 9. And leave it to you to find out his meaning if it import any thing less than the being sealed unto the Day of Redemption Ephes. 1. 13. 4. 30. LETTER VIII HAving made some reflections upon those words of yours when in our last discourse we rambled over many things very immethodically you named a great and pious Doctor of the Protestant Church who from the Pulpit had long since told you that the difference betwixt the Papists and us lay principally in this That we believed not so much as they So great an inadvertencie was then upon me that I made but little reply not indeed reaching so far as to deduce any objection which might concern us from the Doctors words nor I dare answer for him did he dream of such an acception of them as might represent the choice betwixt the Religions any way indifferent But by the manner of your speech I have since conjectured you perhaps thought there might be some weight in a surmise which would flow from the assertion as if they went beyond us in credible things or that our belief consisting more in Negatives were not sure but it might come short of what it ought to be whilst theirs taking in all might be look'd upon as safe I hope the former Letters if you please to re-view them will give you some satisfaction and may serve to demonstrate that we who dare not go beyond the Pillars set up by God himself in the holy Scriptures to bound our Faith are in a far safer way and posture than they who leap over or trample them down at their pleasures And that if we leave not them till they forsake the guidance of Gods Word and primitive practice of his Church we run no hazard at all nor ought to find less esteem upon that score but do indeed shun and avoid the danger of Will-worship than which there is nothing more prejudicial to man nor more displeasing to God because of ill consequence to his Truth 1. We do know That no man is made a Believer without a freeness of Will that is he is not drawn up to Heaven whether he will or no and all along by meer compulsion or without acting in the Duty as the Papists with other adversaries of the Protestant Doctrine seem to mistake us But he is made a Believer by Gods Grace that frees the Will and inables it to act according to the motions of the Spirit and to follow him in the way of his Precepts Promises Threats and Exhortations But we acknowledge not That the will of man on which in its natural capacity the Apostle James hath fixt the Appellations of Sensual and Devilish can of it self chuse the better part being only help'd forward by some perswasions or probable inclinations such as the outward Preaching of the Word may effect till God by an act of Renovation without any compulsion other than such as wherewith the Soul cannot chuse but willingly go along so sweetly are his operations tempered and suitable to the disposition of the Will hath brought to pass a work which never would be effected but by his exceeding great and mighty power Ephes. 1. 18 19. 2. We do know That in the Lords-supper all Christ with all the benefits of his Life and Passion are not barely represented but really and truly yet spiritually exhibited to every Faithful Penitent Humble Charitable Communicant But we acknowledge not That all Receivers do in a corporal and carnal manner John 7. 37 38. tear their Redeemer with their teeth since the Sacramental way of locution in the Old Testament leads us to the true understanding of This is my body in the New Compare Gen. 17. 10 11. Exod. 12. 11. with John 6. 47 48. 63. We do know That the act of Justification passeth not upon the Soul without a work of Sanctification in the Soul That good works are of such necessity in the business of Justification that there can be no Justification where the practice of them is contemned That the good works of the Regenerate so far as they are good and the product of Gods own Spirit are not displeasing to him nor of their own nature sin yet that in regard of much imperfection which the best of men will confess is adherent to their works in this life we take a safe course not to place confidence or set any value upon them but on him who is the Lord our Righteousness and our Advocate with the Father Jer. 23. 6. 1 John 2. 1. But we acknowledge not That the good works of just persons do truly merit and deserve Grace in this world and glory in the next Nor that such good works are of themselves without any Covenant or acceptation on God's part worthy of Eternal Life and have an equal value of condignity to the obtaining of everlasting Glory Nor that that is the just stipend crown or recompence answering to the weight and time of our labours rather than a free gift Nor that no accession of Dignity comes to the works of the Just by the Merit or Person of Christ which they should not have if they were done by the same Grace bestowed liberally by God alone without Christ Nor that it 's vain after Grace received or infused to expect a continued imputation of Christs Righteousness According to the best Definitions of that Grace which the Romanist allow to be procured for us by Christ their plea for Heaven must run after this manner Lord by the strength of that Grace which because thou didst foresee I would use it well thou hast extended to me I have so performed my duty in doing or suffering for thee as thou canst not in justice deny me for that the Kingdom of Heaven See the Rhemish Annotations upon 2 Tim. 4. 8. 1 Cor. 3. 8. But let them consider what Reply they could make if God should enter the lists with them and say I have a Law that requires perfect unerring universal constant perpetual obedience a Law that exacts Truth in the inward parts that is a discerner of the thoughts and spirit that is not satisfied without the whole heart I have said not one jot or tittle of it shall pass away till all be fulfilled Matth. 5. 17 18. 22. 37 38. These

compelled the most for the sense of danger is more pungent ordinarily in temporal than in spiritual Concerns to suspend the care of Religion and lay it out more sedulously about their outward Condition It pleased the most High to permit those Infidels to prevail to such a degree as the World was in a manner turn'd up-side down And amongst those violent Agitations Theology was forced to seek Corners a thing that might happen to the greater part since we know 't was so here in this Island upon the Invasions of Danes and Saxons so as it was not easie to retain either Principles or Practices right It 's beyond exception certain That by those Perturbations Barbarism got so much the upper hand in the Common-wealth of Learning that what we have in writing from that time till Erasmus is the most of it very litte above Pedantry and it 's probably true That the marrow of Religion was so far consumed amidst these broils as the drie Bones thereof were much without life From the days of St. Augustine downward a kind of Lethargick Temper as to the more Spiritual part did strangely by little and little insinuate it self till at last the total of the Credenda was summed up in the Romish High Priest's supposed Infallibility And very agreable thereto the Agenda consisted in Pilgrimages made Meritorious by his Institution in Offerings paid to Saints of his Canonization in Prayers to relieve Souls out of a Purgatory of his Erection in seeking after Pardons for Sin and Indulgences of his Invention It was not hard to rivet these perswasions into the minds of a People the main body of whom was either lately converted or lamentably perverted Neither yet do I believe that every particular Bishop of Rome or every singular great Man who cooperated towards the Introduction of these things did act absolutely contrary to their Consciences or merely by Rules of Policy though the course of story informs us sufficiently that many of them were of such Frame but one may without violence I hope offered to Reason Truth or Charity entertain a Conjecture That after their hold of right Notions was lost their very Judgment might suffer depravation and lead them to build with Hay and Stubble instead of more precious and durable Materials However it came to pass letting the contract with wicked Phocas the Forgery of Decrees and Donations alone till the review of the last day we find the Pontifical See in the 9th and 10th Century arrived at this height to tread upon the Necks of Princes to suffer them to hold his Stirrop to dispense with Oaths of Allegiance to arm not only their Subjects but their Sons against them and by an unheard of Example to kick off or trample on their Crowns and Scepters whilest the Parish Priests stuff'd their Auditors with wonderful relations of Visions Apparitions Revelations which solitary Monks or voluntary Hermites those first Enthusiasts obtruded on the World all tending either to advance the Reputation or inhance the Revenues of the Clergy For who would not lie at the feet of such men as as they conceived did ever and anon bring them News from Heaven Or who would not lie out their worldly Substance in such ways as those men taught them were available to the Redemption out of a firie Lake of their own and all their Friends Souls Nay who would stick at a liberal distribution of his Coyn even here for such large Indulgences as then went a begging During the disorders brought upon Christendom touched before the Writings of the Primitive Fathers were lock'd up in the privatest retirements of Monasteries rarely seen by the Sun where they suffered a greater Corruption than of Moths and were taught in several things to speak the Language of Ashdod after the Tone and in the Tune of the Superstitions growing more and more Epidemical A great Instance whereof I have now by me an Episte pretended to be St. Augustin's bound up with the 3d. part of St. Hierom's but without any thing that savours either of his Style Spirit or Doctrine One word by way of Return to several Discourses I have met with OF all the Rules that ever were given to judge of Religions by you offer me the most fallacious The Examples of Professors For if the Austerity and strictness of Discipline be it we must look after the Bonzi amongst the Chinoyse carry it away from all I read of If we must go to preciseness of Conversation or demure carriage our present Quaker might lay before us a great temptation But to speak seriously Holiness of life being the great Duty of every Christian is doubtless too a grand Glory to any Church and that Religion the Principles whereof do most effectually lead to sincerity therein does deserve to bear away the Bell. Yet to constitute the sanctity of any man the outside whereof only is to us descernible the main Guide in Religious Elections cannot be other than a most unsafe course 'T is the Roman Examples of Life not the Controvertists you would have me to Contemplate Well! But here you must not be allowed to appropriate in gross to your side a Conceit I have always observed you apt to take up at adventure the Fathers of the Primitive Church who had served their Generations before you put your Tenents those I mean wherein we do not nor dare go along you as a Law upon the World No! You may find them in a matter of Twelve or Thirteen Points wherein we think you Innovators more Ours than so I suppose then the best way to apply your Directions to our purpose will be by examining the Lives of Popes to discover whether they have been universally endued with Cardinal Vertues Inform your self I pray by your own Historians for such words from my pen might look like Calumnies what pretious men your Church was headed with in the Persons of John the Thirteenth Julius the Third Boniface the Eighth John the Twenty third Sixtus the Fourth Alexander the Sixth Leo the Tenth What great Scholars the late Innocent the Tenth and before him many others of them were Is there any Credit to be given Platiná who acquaints us freely That all the Popes from Sylvester the Second to Gregory the Seventh in number about eighteen were What heark in your Ear and I 'le tell you Magicians Can we stop our Ears against the out-cries of all Germany about the Hundred Grievances some of them thwackers We cannot hood-wink our selves so much as not to discover a little how things have gone seeing we find Cardinal Julian telling Eugenius the Fourth That all Councils since that of Chalcedon have been instituted Not for the Investigation of Truth but for the defence or increase of Power to Clergy-men Will you suffer us to put any weight upon a known Saying of St. Basil's where in his Tenth Epistle he tells Nazianzen thus If the Wrath of God continue what help shall we have from those Westerlings so he terms them of