A42757:1127
Aaron's rod blossoming, or, The divine ordinance of church-government vindicated so as the present…Aarons rod blossoming, or, The divine ordinance of church-government vindicated so as the present…
Aaron's rod blossoming, or, The divine ordinance of church-government vindicated so as the present Erastian controversy concerning the distinction of civill and ecclesiastical government, excommunication, and suspension, is fully debated and discussed, from the holy scripture, from the Jewish and Christian antiquities, from the consent of latter writers, from the true nature and rights of magistracy, and from the groundlessness of the chief objections made against the Presbyterial government in point of a domineering arbitrary unlimited power / by George Gillespie ...Aarons rod blossoming, or, The divine ordinance of church-government vindicated so as the present Erastian controversie concerning the distinction of civill and ecclesiasticall government, excommunication, and suspension, is fully debated and discussed, from the holy scripture, from the Jewish and Christian antiquities, from the consent of latter writers, from the true nature and rights of magistracy, and from the groundlesnesse of the chief objections made against the Presbyteriall government in point of a domineering arbitrary unlimited power / by George Gillespie ...
London: printed by E.G. for Richard Whitaker, 1646
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.
His sixth Argument is this, All grant that God doth as effectually convert by the eye as by the ear. All grant. I deny it. and I verily believe he can produce very few Authors (if any) for it. He ought not to speak so great words without good warrants, which here I am sure he hath not. Well: but he will prove the thing it self. First he tells us of the book of Nature, and of the Creatures, by which we are instructed &c. But either he means that the very book of Nature can and doth effectually and savingly convert to Faith in Christ and to true sanctification, or not. If the affirmative, then the Heathens who lived and died in Paganism had sufficient means and helps to conversion and faith in Christ: (for those Pagans had the book of the Creatures to instruct them, as is expressed in some Scriptures cited by himself) and so there may be salvation and the means thereof without the Church. If this be not his meaning, but that the book of Nature instructeth us concerning many things of God, yet doth not teach us to know Christ and all things necessary to salvation, far less doth effectually and savingly convert: then he hath said nothing to that point which he had to prove. 2. He saith that all the Sacrifices of the old Law, and Circumcision, and the Passover did teach Gods people who participated of them, or were present at them, by the eye, and ⟨p. 530⟩were converting Ordinances, as all do and must acknowledge.
His sixth Argument is this, All grant that God doth as effectually convert by the eye as by the ear. All grant. I deny it. and I verily beleeve he can produce very few Authors (if any) for it. He ought not to speak so great words without good warrants, which here I am sure he hath not. Well: but he will prove the thing it self. First he tells us of the book of Nature, and of the Creatures, by which we are instructed &c. But either he means that the very book of Nature can and doth effectually and savingly convert to Faith in Christ and to true sanctification, or not. If the affirmative, then the Heathens who lived and died in Paganisme had sufficient means and helps to conversion and faith in Christ: (for those Pagans had the book of the Creatures to instruct them, as is expressed in some Scriptures cited by himself) and so there may be salvation and the means thereof without the Church. If this be not his meaning, but that the book of Nature instructeth us concerning many things of God, yet doth not teach us to know Christ and all things necessary to salvation, far lesse doth effectually and savingly convert: then he hath said nothing to that point which he had to prove. 2. He saith that all the Sacrifices of the old Law, and Circumcision, and the Passeover did teach Gods people who participated of them, or were present at them, by the eye, and