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Master Bezaes sermons upon the three chapters of the canticle of canticlesMaster Bezaes sermons vpon the three chapters of the canticle of canticles
Master Bezaes sermons upon the three chapters of the canticle of canticles wherein are handled the chiefest points of religion controversed and debated between us and the adversary at this day, especially touching the true Jesus Christ and the true Church, and the certain & infallible marks both of the one and of the other. Translated out of French into English by John Harmar ...Master Bezaes sermons vpon the three chapters of the canticle of canticles wherein are handled the chiefest points of religion controversed and debated betweene vs and the aduersarie at this day, especially touching the true Iesus Christ and the true Church, and the certaine & infallible marks both of the one and of the other. Translated out of French into English by Iohn Harmar ...
Oxford: printed by Joseph Barnes, 1587Oxford: printed by Ioseph Barnes, 1587
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.
2 We must therefore in this place take heed of two most false doctrines, whereof the one is of those, who being ignorant of the effect of the fall of the first man in his whole posterity, even unto the little children which are yet in the womb of their mother, have thought that man being provided of some natural understanding and judgement, had no farther need of the law of God then to be better and perfectlier informed of the will of God his Creator: as a child that hath a good wit, ⟨p. 57⟩need no more then a good master, or as a fair white paper, which is fit to receive all that a man will write in it. The other of these false doctrines is of them, which compare our nature unto a lame man, that hath no need but of one to stay him up, to go upright. And this is the opinion of those Sophists, which confess indeed that we have need of the grace of God to prevent us, and accompany us, by reason of that natural infirmity which is befallen us by the hereditary corruption which we draw from our first father: but they will have the grace of God to serve us but for a pair of crutches, hereby afterward to establish their own merits. The first therefore utterly take away the supernatural grace of God, which is the first ground and foundation of our salvation: & therefore have they been heretofore rightly condemned and detested: but the other, desiring to part stakes between that which they call Free-will & the grace of God, fall by an other way into the same inconvenience and mischief. For towards God, the former of these doctrines is as good as the later, whereas we ought to avouch & confess, that it is the mere & only grace & mercy of God, not which aideth our nature being weakened, but which changeth it altogether in quality, bringing us out of darkness into light. Act. 26.18. & Ephes. 5.8. & from death unto life, Ephes. 2.1.5. & He which knoweth not this grace & that so far too as this point reacheth, knoweth not what the gospel meaneth, or the words of the Lord, Joh. 6.44. No man cometh unto me except the father draw him. They reply hereupon that we then transform men into blocks & stones, depriving them utterly of understanding & will: which conclusion they falsely draw from our doctrine.