A09339:456
A Golden Chain
A golden chain: or The description of theology containing the order of the causes of salvation and damnation, according to Gods word. A view whereof is to be seen in the table annexed. Hereunto is adjoined the order which M. Theodore Beza used in comforting afflicted consciences.A golden chaine: or The description of theologie containing the order of the causes of saluation and damnation, according to Gods word. A view whereof is to be seene in the table annexed. Hereunto is adioyned the order which M. Theodore Beza vsed in comforting afflicted consciences.
Cambridge: printed by John Legat, 1600Cambridge: printed by Iohn Legat, 1600
Chapter 22 › The affirmative part.Chapter 22 › The affirmatiue part.
Modern spelling is a reading aid: the words are the author’s, only the spelling is modernized. Original shows the page as printed, with the transcription marks.
In judgement, for fear of rashness. Jerem. 4.2. Thou shalt swear, the Lord liveth, in truth, in judgement, and righteousness. Esa. 48. 1. Which swear by the name of the Lord, and make mention of the God of Israel, but not in truth nor in righteousness, &c. Therefore the oath of drunken, furious, and frantic men, also oaths of children, they do not impose an observation of them, but by law are no oaths. III. The end, namely to confirm some necessary truth in question. Hebr. 6. 16. Men swear by him that is greater then themselves: and an oath for confirmation, is among them an end of all strife. I call that a necessary truth, when some doubt, which must necessarily be decided, can none other way be determined then by an oath: as when Gods glory, our neighbours body or goods, or the credit of the party for whom the oath is ministered, are necessarily called into question. Rom. 1.9. God is my witness (whom I serve in my spirit in the Gospel of his Son) that without ceasing I make mention of you. 2. Cor. 1. 23. I call God for a record into my soul, that to spare you, I came not as yet unto Corinth. IV. The divers kinds or sorts of oaths. An oath is public, or private. Public, when the Magistrate, without any peril to him that sweareth, doth upon just cause exact a testimony together with an oath. A private oath is, which two or more take privately. This, so that it be sparingly, and warily used, is lawful. For if in serious affairs, and matters of great importance, it be lawful in private to admit God as a Judge, why should he not as well be called to witness? Again, the examples of holy men show the practise of private oaths, as not unlawful. Jacob and Laban confirmed their covenant one with an other by private oath: the like did Boaz in his contract with Ruth. To this place may be added an asseveration, the which albeit it be like an oath, yet indeed is none: and is nothing else, but a constant assertion of our mind, intersetting sometimes the name of a creature. Such was Christs assertion, Verily, verily, I say unto you. And Pauls, I call God to record in my spirit. Where is both an oath & an asseveration.