A27054:529
The true and only way of concord of all the Christian churches the desirableness…
The true and only way of concord of all the Christian churches the desirableness of it, and the detection of false dividing terms / opened by Richard Baxter.
London: printed for John Hancock, 1680
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.
§. 15. For, 1. Though we receive not the pretended Traditions of Rome or any Church that shall be obtruded on us without proof, or as accusing the Scripture of insufficiency; yet we never denied that the Apostles preaching was Gods Word before they wrote it, and as well as their writing. It being eight years after Christs Ascension (as is commonly supposed) before the first part of the New Testament was written by St. Matthew, and near an hundred years after his incarnation that the last was written by St. John; and only four or five of the twelve Apostles having left us any of their writings, it were intolerable to deny that the constant preaching of them and all the rest to their ⟨p. 170⟩death, was not done by the inspiration of the same infallible spirit as their writing was, and so was the Word of God.
§. 15. For, 1. Though we receive not the pretended Traditions of Rome or any Church that shall be obtruded on us without proof, or as accusing the Scripture of insufficiency; yet we never denyed that the Apostles preaching was Gods Word before they wrote it, and as well as their writing. It being eight years after Christs Ascension (as is commonly supposed) before the first part of the New Testament was written by St. Matthew, and near an hundred years after his incarnation that the last was written by St. John; and only four or five of the twelve Apostles having left us any of their writings, it were intolerable to deny that the constant preaching of them and all the rest to their ⟨p. 170⟩death, was not done by the inspiration of the same infallible spirit as their writing was, and so was the Word of God.
§. 16. 2. And it is certain that Baptism was then as common as Christians, and that nothing was sooner done by the Apostles, nor more constantly, nor with greater concord and consent, than discipling persons and baptizing them: For this was the sum of their first appointed work, in which Christ promised to be with them to the end.