A14095:1045
A discovery of D. Jacksons vanity. Or A perspective glass, whereby the admirers of…A discovery of D. Iacksons vanitie. Or A perspective glasse, wherby the admirers of…
A discovery of D. Jacksons vanity. Or A perspective glass, whereby the admirers of D. Jacksons profound discourses, may see the vanity and weakness of them, in sundry passages, and especially so far as they tend to the undermining of the doctrine hitherto received. Written by William Twice, Doctor of Divinity, as they say, from whom the copy came to the pressA discovery of D. Iacksons vanitie. Or A perspective glasse, wherby the admirers of D. Iacksons profound discourses, may see the vanitie and weaknesse of them, in sundry passages, and especially so farre as they tende to the undermining of the doctrine hitherto received. Written by William Twisse, Doctor of Divinitie, as they say, from whom the copie came to the presse
Amsterdam: printed by the successors of Giles Thorp, 1631
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.
Now proceed we along with you: God, you say, doth inspire all that are conformable to his will, with desire of doing to others that which he hath done to them. This is a bone very well worth the picking. I am persuaded many a sweet morsel will be found about it. You do not tell us that God doth inspire any man with a conformity to his will, but as many as are conformable to his will, he inspires with other good desires; whence I pray then comes conformity to his will, if not from the inspiration of God? do you make conformity to Gods will to be the inspiration of the flesh? For I presume you make it not an inspiration of the world, or of the devil. Yet S. Paul saith, that it is God that worketh in us both the will and 1the deed, not by any necessary emanation, as light issueth from the Sun, but according to his own good pleasure. Again, this very desire of doing others good, is it not a part of our conformity to the will of God? Now if God inspire us with one part of conformity to Gods will, why not also with another? And so why may we not run over all parts of conformity to the will of God, and find as good cause to ascribe them all to the inspiration of God, as the cause of them? The mystery of your meaning in this, the next sentence serves as a key to open, when you say, that such as wilfully strive against the stream of his over-flowing goodness, or boisterously counterblast the sweet ⟨p. 446⟩and placid spirations of celestial influence, become creators of their own woe, and raise unto themselves those storms wherein they perish. So then Gods influence is to all, like as the light of the Sun; only the difference ariseth herehence, that some resist it, others yield unto it. As good Arminianism and Pelagianism as ever dropped from the mouth or pen of Arminius or Pelagius himself. So then it is not God, that ex nolentibus volentes facit, but mans free will. And in spite of St. Paul it shall be volentis & currentis, and not miserentis Dei. For these spirations you speak of, can be no other then exhortations, 2whereunto some yield, and some resist. And I pray, who deserves to be accounted the author of my faith, the author of my repentance? he that exhorteth me hereunto, or rather I my self, that do believe, and do repent, though upon another's exhortations? For exhortation may thus far be performed by a reprobate: