Selected quad for the lemma: sense_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
sense_n	place_n	scripture_n	word_n	9,705	5	4.5641	4	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A59577	The things that make for peace delivered in a sermon preached before the right honourable the Lord Mayor, and the Court of Aldermen, at Guild-Hall-Chappel, upon the 23 of August, 1674 / by John Sharpe, D.D., now Lord Arch-bishop of York.	Sharp, John, 1645-1714.; Hooker, William, Sir, 1612-1697.	1691 (1691)	Wing S3004; ESTC R41707	19,125	33

for it The difference that is among us as to these Points is possibly not much greater than this that some men in these matters speak more clearly and fully others more imperfectly and obscurely Some men convey their sense in plain and proper words others delight in Metaphors and do perhaps too far extend the Figurative expressions of Scripture Some reason more closely and upon more certain Principles others possibly may proceed upon weaker grounds and misapply Texts of Scripture and discourse more loosely But both Parties especially the more moderate of both seem to drive at much what the same thing though by different ways as appears from this that being interrogated concerning the Consequences of their several Opinions they generally agree in admitting or rejecting the same But fourthly another thing that would make for peace is this never to charge upon men the Consequences of their Opinions when they expresly disown them This is another thing that doth hugely tend to widen our Differences and to exasperate mens spirits one against another when having examined some Opinion of a Man or Party of Men and finding very great absurdities and evil consequences necessarily to slow from it we presently throw all those into the dish of them that hold the Opinion as if they could not own the one but they must necessarily own the other whereas indeed the men we thus charge may be so innocent in this matter that they do not in the least dream of such Consequences or if they did they would be so far from owning them that they would abhor the Opinion for their sakes To give you an instance or two in this matter It is a Doctrine maintained by some That God's Will is the Rule of Justice or that every thing is therefore just or good because God wills it Those that are concerned to oppose this Doctrine do contend that if this Doctrine be true it will necessarily follow that no man can have any certainty of the Truth of any one Proposition that God hath revealed in Scripture Granting now that this can by just consequence be made out yet I dare say those that hold the aforesaid Doctrine would be very angry and had good reason so to be if they were told that they did not no nor could not upon their Principles certainly believe the Scripture Some Men think that they can with demonstrative evidence make out that the Doctrine of God's irrespective Decrees doth in its Consequences overthrow the whole Gospel that it doth destroy the nature of Rewards and Punishments cuts the very Sinews of mens endeavours after virtue makes all Laws Promises Exhortations perfectly idle and insignificant things and renders God the most unlovely Being in the world Now supposing all this to be true yet it would be a most unjust and uncharitable thing to affirm of any that believe that Doctrine many of whom are certainly pious and good men that they do maintain any such impious and blasphemous Opinions as those that are now mentioned The sum of all is that a man may believe a Proposition and not believe all that follows from it not but that all the deductions from a Proposition are equally true and equally credible with the Proposition from whence they are deduced But a man may not so clearly see through the Proposition as to discern that such Consequences are really deducible from it So that we are at no hand to charge them upon him unless he do explicitly own them If this Rule was observed our Differences would not make so great a noise nor would the Errors and Heterodoxies maintained among us appear so monstrous and extravagant and we should spare a great many hard words and odious appellations which we now too prodigally bestow upon those that differ from us The fifth Rule is to abstract mens Persons from their Opinions and in examining or opposing these never to make any reflections upon those This is a thing so highly reasonable that methinks no pretender to ingenuity should ever need to be called upon to observe it For it seems very absurd and ridiculous in any Argument to meddle with that that nothing concerns the Question But what do Personal Reflections concern the Cause of Religion what ever it may be to the Reputation of an Opinion I am sure it is nothing to the Truth of it that such or such a man holds it And truly if men would leave this impertinence we might hope for a better issue of our Religious Debates but whilest men will forsake the Merits of the Cause and unmanly fall to railing and disparaging Mens Persons and scraping together all the ill that can be said of them they blow the Coals of Contention they so imbitter and envenom the Dispute that it rankles into incurable distasts and heart-burnings Christians would do well to consider that these mean arts of exposing Mens Persons to discredit their Opinions are very much unworthy the Dignity of their Profession and most of all mis-becoming the Sacredness and Venerableness of the Truth they contend for And besides no Cause stands in need of them but such an one as is extremely baffled and desperate and even then they are the worst Arguments in the world to support it For quick-sighted men will easily see through the Dust we endeavour to raise and those that are duller will be apt to suspect from our being so angry and so waspish that we have but a bad matter to manage We should consider that Mens Persons are Sacred things that whatever power we have to judge of their Opinions we have no authority to judge or censure Them That to bring Them upon the Stage and there throw dirt on them is highly rude and uncivil and an affront to Human Society and the most contrary thing in the world to Christian Charity which is so far from enduring Reproaches and evil Speaking that it obliges us to cover as much as we can all the Faults and even the very Indiscretions of others The sixth and last thing I shall recommend to you as an Expedient of Peace is a vigorous pursuit of Holiness Do but seriously set your selves to be good Do but get your Hearts deeply affected with Religion as well as your Heads and then there is no fear but you will be all the Sons of Peace We may talk what we will but really it is our not Practising our Religion that makes us so Contentious and Disputatious about it It is our Emptiness of the Divine Life that makes us so full of Speculation and Controversie was but That once firmly rooted in us these Weeds and Excrescencies of Religion would presently dry up and wither we should loath any longer to feed upon such Husks after we once came to have a Relish of that Bread Ah! how little satisfaction can all our pretty Notions and fine-spun Controversies yield to a Soul that truly hungers and thirsts after Righteousness How pitifully flatly and insipidly will they taste in comparison of the

necessary points and those that are not so and in those things that are not necessary would not rigorously tie up others to their measures but would allow every man to abound in his own sense so long as the Churches Peace is not hereby injured we should not have so many bitter Quarrels and Heart-burnings among us But alas whilest every one will frame a Systeme of Divinity of his own head and every puny Notion of that Systeme must be Christn'd by the name of an Article of Faith and every man that doth not believe just as he doth must straight be a Heretick for not doing so How can it be expected but we must wrangle eternally It were heartily to be wished that Christians would consider that the Articles of Faith those things that God hath made necessary by every one to be believed in order to his Salvation are but very few and they are all of them so plainly and clearly set down in the Scripture that it is impossible for any sincere honest-minded man to miss of the true sense of them And they have further this Badge to distinguish them from all other Truths that they have an immediate influence upon mens Lives a direct Tendency to make men Better whereas most of those things that make the matter of our Controversies and about which we make such a noise and clamour and for which we so bitterly censure and anathematize one another are quite of another nature They are neither so clearly revealed or propounded in the Scripture but that even good men through the great difference of their Parts Learning and Education may after their best endeavours vary in their sentiments about them Nor do they at all concern a Christian Life but are matters of pure notion and speculation So that it cannot with any reason be pretended that they are points upon which Mens Salvation doth depend It cannot be thought that God will be offended with any man for his Ignorance or Mistakes concerning them And if not if a man may be a Good Christian and go to Heaven whether he holds the right or the wrong side in these matters for God's sake Why should we be angry with any one for having other Opinions about them than we have Why should we not rather permit men to use their Vnderstandings as well as they can and where they fail of the Truth to bear with them as God himself without question will than by stickling for every impertinent unnecessary Truth destroy that Peace and Love and Amity that ought to be among Christians The second thing I would recommend is a great simplicity and purity of Intention in the pursuit of Truth and at no hand to let passion or interest or any self-end be ingredient into our Religion The practice of this would not more conduce to the discovery of Truth than it would to the promoting of Peace For it is easie to observe that it is not always a pure concernment for the Truth in the points in Controversie that makes us so zealous so fierce and so obstinate in our Disputes for or against them but something of which that is only the Mask and Pretence some By-ends that must be served some Secular Interest that we have espoused which must be carried on We have either engaged our selves to some Party and so its Interests right or wrong must be promoted or we have taken up an opinion inconsiderately at the first and appeared in the favour of it and afterward our own credit doth oblige us to defend it or we have received some slight or disappointment from the Men of one way and so in pure pet and revenge we pass over to their Adversaries Or it is for our gain and advantage that the Differences among us be still kept afoot or we desire to get our selves a name by some great Atchievments in the Noble Science of Controversies or we are possessed with a spirit of Contradiction or we delight in Novelties or we love to be singular These are the things that too often both give birth to our Controversies and also nourish and foment them If we would but cast these Beams out of our eyes we should both see more clearly and certainly live more peaceably But whilest we pursue base and sordid ends under the pretence of maintaining Truth we shall always be in error and always in contention Let us therefore quit our selves of all our pre-possessions let us mortify all our Pride and Vain-glory our Passion and Emulation our Covetousness and Revenge and bring nothing in the world to our Debates about Religion but only the pure love of Truth and then our Controversies will not be so long and they will be more calmly and peaceably managed and they will redound to the greater good of all Parties And this I dare say further to encourage you to labour after this temper of mind That he that comes thus qualified to the study of Religion though he may not have the luck always to light on the Truth yet with all his errors be they what they will he is more acceptable to God than the Man that hath Truth on his side yet takes it up or maintains it to serve a turn He that believes a Falsehood after he hath used his sincere endeavours to find the Truth is not half so much a Heretick as he that professeth a Truth out of evil Principles and prostituteth it to unworthy ends The third Rule is Never to quarrel about Words and Phrases but so long as other men mean much what the same that we do let us be content though they have not the luck to express themselves so well I do not know how it comes to pass whether through too much heat and eagerness of disputing that we do not mind one anothers Sense or whether through too much love to our own manner of Thinking or Speaking that we will not endure any thing but what is conveyed to us in our own Methods But really it often happens that most bitter Quarrels do commence not so much from the different Sense of the contending Parties concerning the things they contend about as from their different Terms expressing the same Sense and the different Grounds they proceed upon or Arguments they make use of for the proof of it For my part I verily believe that this is the Case of several of those Disputes in which we Protestants do often engage at this day I do not think in many points our Differences are near so wide as they are sometimes represented but that they might easily be made up with a little allowance to mens Words and Phrases and the different Methods of deducing their Notions It would be perhaps no hard matter to make this appear in those Controversies that are so much agitated among us concerning Faith and Justification and the necessity of good works to Salvation and Imputed Righteousness and the difference between Virtue and Grace with some others if this were a fit place