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A60243 The Romish priest turn'd protestant with the reasons of his conversion, wherin the true Church is exposed to the view of Christians and derived out of the Holy Scriptures, sound reason, and the ancient fathers : humbly presented to both houses of Parliament / by James Salago. Salgado, James, fl. 1680. 1679 (1679) Wing S380; ESTC R28844 30,919 39

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the promise for which belonging of the promise Peter was willing to confer Baptism upon some Converts as we may see out of the fore-mentioned place Act. 2.38 39. Act. 2.38 39. as against the Papists denying to the Children albeit they be under the promise and the Covenant of Grace dying without being baptized the life everlasting by reason he that is in the Covenant of Grace or under the promises is in Christ he that is in Christ Eph. 2.12 Act. 4. must necessarily be saved Therefore he that is under the promise of life or in the Covenant of Grace as Children are must necessarily be saved But they have an argument against us Obj. Verily I say unto you except a man he born of water Joh. 3.6 and of the spirit he cannot enter into the kingdom of God. Out of which words they conclude that baptism is of that efficacy that none can be saved without it But I answer Resp It is a vain exception because by this water and spirit is nothing else to be understood but the Holy Ghost himself who is of the same nature as water is as to the ablution of our sins Another like expression is to be found in the Gospel of Matthew Mat. 3.11 He shall baptize you with the Holy Ghost and fire that is the Holy Ghost who is of a fiery nature in cleansing as Gold seven times refined in the fire Therefore such expressions are metaphorical or figurative and improper and are call'd Hendiadis a like expression there is in Virgil Poculis libamus auro Virgil. We drink out of Cups of Gold Aeneid 1. Arma virumque cano id est armatum virum Joh. 3.3 that is out of golden Cups so that to be born of water and spirit is nothing else but to be born out of a watery or out of a fiery spirit Hence what Christ saith here by way of Hendiadis he expresseth the same in its own proper words a little higher Except a man be born again he cannot see the kingdom of God. So that hence we may inter by the authority and explaining of our Saviour himself in this place to be understood only the spiritual Regeneration and not the external Ablution of the water As to the second we do utterly deny the Baptism performed by Women to be lawful and irrevocable They have nothing else to alledg only the example of Zipporah Obj. that circumcised her Son Exod. 4.25 26. and so they think a Woman may as lawfully baptize as circumcise I will not answer according to the usual answer of some Divines Ans that Zipporah sinned in doing so because I believe the Almighty God doth never bless men for sin as he did Moses for that doing of Zippora But I answer thus that in the Old Testament circumcision was indifferently performed by any byreason it was not so strictly joyned with the office of Preaching as Baptism is in the New Testament made so by Christ himself Go and teach all Nations baptizing them c. Mat 28.19 So that now it is unlawful for any one to administer the holy Baptism besides him who is ordained for Preaching Now we are minded to speak of the second Sacrament for we will not regard their assertion of the rest of their five Sacraments which have no ground neither in Scriptures nor in the ancient Fathers which is the Lords-Supper This according to the true Doctrine is nothing else but only a visible sign of an invisible grace by which visible sign that is Bread and Wine 1 Cor. 10.16 17. we receive the body and blood of our Saviour as a seal of the Covenant of Grace tending unto our salvation We do not deny the body and blood of Christ to be really present in this holy Sacrament But we deny the same 1. To be there corporally because the body of our Saviour being circumscriptive and in heavens is not everywhere And then 2. We deny this Supper of our Lord to be a sacrifice for the living and the dead Which is my greatest point in this case and I accordingly will endeavour to declare it As to the first the Papists do urge very much their Transubstantiation It is a question and a Controversie very well known but I hope to add some light to it I go on By this Transubstantiation they understand nothing else but the corporal presence of the body and blood of our Saviour under the accidents of Bread and Wine So that they think the substance of those Elements to be turned into the first nothing out of which they were formerly created and the accidents only to remain which acts in the senses of our sight feeling and taste This is the description or 〈◊〉 Transubstantiation upon which we say the same to be quite false and erroneous 1. The name of it nor the matter in it contained is not to be found in Scriptures 1 Cor. 10.17 by reason after the consecration it is still called bread of which we are partakers where not only we are said to be partakers of bread which could not be if it was annihilated but likewise no Papist will admit this Sacrament to be call'd bread after Consecration which nevertheless the Scripture doth 2. The name of it is newly come up nor was it ever heard before the Council of Lateran when Berengarius was forced to recant the truth and fall into a most abominable error as to say that Christs body was eaten and bitten with teeth c. Atteri dentibus in alvum demitti 3. It is a most improper name to a thing yea it is as much to be called Transubstantiation as creation could be called annihilating because Transubstantiation is nothing else but a mutation of one substance into another as in Cana of Galilee Wine was turned into water but here the Papists say that one substance doth not become another but that the one which is the bread and wine is annihilated and the other which is the body and blood of Christ is induced under the accidents or species of bread and wine although here likewise they have a thousand distinctions about the introduction or adduction of the body of Christ underneath the accidents which I will pass over so that by this way it must be call'd annihilation of one and introduction of another substance rather than Transubstantiation but because the thing is false the name must be of that same nature Conveniunt rebus nomina saepe suis 4. There can be no Transubstantiation where the thing that is given in the distribution of the Sacrament is call'd by the ancients a sign a figure because none can be a sign or a figure of himself as Christ should be if he should be given as present corporally or bodily under the accidents Austin Now Austin saith Non dubitavit Dominus dicere hoc est corpus meum ●um daret figuram corporis sui The Lord was pleased to say This is my body
as the things extraordinary must not be compared with the things ordinary because the Disciples had not only the matter but also the words from the indictment of the Holy Ghost so the Churches of our later times Gal. 1.8 and 6.21 2 Tim. 3.16 are bound to the Doctrine of Scriptures which are given by Inspiration of God and are not only profitable but sufficient also for all kind of holy instructions which if the Council doth follow there is no doubt but it shall have the assistance of the Holy Ghost 2. When Christ saith the Gates of Hell shall not prevail against the Church he doth not understand any particular Church or their Bishops but the Militant Church dispersed through all the World and that this cannot err in matters fundamental we willingly allow 3. Whence do you know that the Holy Spirit acts a praeses in every Council by reason the Ariminum Synod may have the name of a Council as well as the Nicene 4. Who can satisfie you that the members of a Council do speak according to truth and by the inspiration of God rather than partially or that their Decrees are framed more by the weight of Reason and Scriptures than by the multitude of Votes or that it is not such a Council as the Tridentine was where the Holy Ghost as the Bishop of Fifechurches Episcopus quinque Eccles a member of that Synod saith was brought over from Rome into Trident in the Bags of the Roman Veredary and he staid out longer when the Waters did rise but came sooner after they were fallen so the Holy Spirit was afraid either to be wet or to be drowned 5. At last a Papist should proceed very disorderly if he being asked about the infallibility of a Council from whence he could prove it should betake him to Scripture because we ask them antecedently to the Word of God of this infallibility of the Church by reason it is her Office as well to make a Canon as to give authority to the Scriptures being their assertion is this That the authority of Scripture as to us doth depend on the authority of the Church But that which giveth authority to another thing cannot mutuate his own from it Hence you may see with what difficulties they intricate themselves that place the Church and its infallibility in the Council But neither those have lesser ones that settle the same in the Pope alone Although this sentiment is very foolish and consutes its own self by reason of its absurdity being it places the Church which is a congregation of many in one man yet we shall proceed in our proposition will run on our race For the most part of the Jesuits do hold this sentence and affirm That the Pope like the Pythia of Delphos only by himself may and can frame Decrees and expose them to the belief of the people Be it so that this Infallibility doth reside with the Pope the same difficulties will come again For how will you be perswaded that the Pope hath been Popable because he could be not Baptized He could have occupied the See by force by Simony he could be a Woman as Johanna was and not a man all which if it be present the Pope is no more a Pope Then how can you know that the Pope when he was going to frame his Decretals did use the usual and necessary preparations as Prayers and Fasting for seven days c How that he made them Motu proprio as the Roman Court saith that is by his own Will and not by the perswasion of the Chamber all which if it be deficient the Decretals and Constitutions are of no value nor pronounced out of the Cathedra or Pulpit and so neither binding the Consciences nor Infallible Further By what Argument will you be perswaded that this Infallibility doth not belong as well to the Bishop of Paris or Mantua as to the Bishop of Rome and so that this infallibility is not auferible from the Roman Bishop Gerson de auferibilitatae Pape of whose Auferibility Gerson did write a Treatise all which you must believe if you will take his Decretals for infallible At last how one single man can be infallible in matters of Faith cannot be understood because he hath neither any promise of it nor hath proved himself to be such an one as is clear and manifest by many examples May be you will betake your self to that vulgar distinction of the Pope pronouncing in his Chair or in his Hall out of the Pulpit and without the Pulpit so that he may be call'd Infallible as to the first but not as to the second But you 'll find very little comfort in that same distinction because besides that it cannot be defined how one and the same man should contradict himself without fear or coaction in the same matters likewise the Pope who can deceive being out of the Pulpit should take advice from himself as sitting in it that he might not be mistaken or else the Cardinals if they would have the holy Father to be without blame should bind fast this good old man to the Pulpit with chains as another Prometheus to a Caucasus that he should not stir from this Cathedra and so speak always truth But it is over-true that the holy Popes did err most abominably as pronouncing out of the Pulpit as it is shewn both by Papists and Protestants Platina de vitis Pontificum Romanorum and is to be seen in John in Stephanus in Formosus and others which are to be read of in Platina of the lives of the Roman Popes 2. They cannot tell us what they do understand by this Cathedra or Pulpit for as to a material Pulpit it can contribute nothing to the infallibility of the Pope or else it could flow in as well upon a Herdsman as the Pope if it should work by its Physical and internal virtue And as to a moral Pulpit of which Christ makes mention when he speaketh of the Fulpit of Moses nothing else can be understood by it besides the Holy Scriptures and if the Pope pronounce accordingly to them we will freely obey him 3. The Holy Spirit upon whom as they say the infallibility of the Pope dependeth is not bound to any place but bloweth where he pleaseth Others seeing no security to be found in the former distinction did commence another viz. That the Pope cannot err in matters of Law but he can be deceived in matters of fact But this likewise is a broken Cane and whosoever leaneth his hand upon it will be deceived This distinction was found out by those that are call'd in the Popish Church Jansenists for to heal that wound that was inflicted on them by Alexand the VII by reason of the famous five Articles of Jansenius● the Bishop of Ypres but nevertheless it hath nothing of truth in it self For 1. when the Pope pronounceth any thing as to the matters of Faith he doth not only look