Fenner - Houston-Packer Collection BX5037 .F46 1651

190 CHRISTS ílgrm axd trot, Corinthians 6 8 That ( t e q i o is, the World gives 1 us a name for deceivers, and yet wee are true ; Yee know what was fayd of Chria Jefias himtèlfe l'orne fayd of has bee was a good man, others fayd nay, Hee was a deceiver of the people; it was fayd of David that Hee was a rubric man, a crafty Fox , and that Hee was a ineere Politicion, it was Sa,l.r judgement of him. Thus the Saints have a nick- name put on them ; the World thinkes they are Hypocrites, and that they have fi nil}er ends in what they doe, and vvh :re- as they make fuch a Phew, it is but in Hypocrifÿ, that they may deceive, and that they may have .a Name for Religi- ous people ; fo that the World would faine put downe the having of a Name. But that is a Devillif r uie ; wee nruf# not make fuch a ufè of this point. No ; the Lord does not finde fault with Sardis for having of a Name that they lived , but that they had this Name when as they were dead ; if they had beene alive, the Name to be alive had beene vvell ; well then what ofe muff wee make of this 'point ? Vfe I e The firfi Ufe then is this , to (hew the mifery of the Church el Rome ; which bath a Naine to lave , and in their owne judgement and a great part of Cbri endome, is tk a onely true Church, but in the judgement of God it is dead, and therefore ífarke naught, l 'otne fay its a body full of difèafes, and whofe throat is cut, but yet the heart pants, and life is therein ; But the truth is, its flarke dead, and bath no manner of fpirituall life, What though they have the Sacrament of Baptilme ? fo had Edom circum- cifson, and yet they were never counted a Church of God; And what's, a Seale to a blanke ? what though they have the Scriptures among them and the Articles of our Creed? that does not make a Church ; for Ptolomy and all tEgypt had the Bible, and yet that did not make them a Church ; if the Scriptures might have their ovine fenfe, it were another matter ; but they overturns it with their expofition , and nuke is intheir linfe, to be a fardell of Do &rine of Divels ; 'and

RkJQdWJsaXNoZXIy OTcyMjk=