A treatise of miscellany questions wherein many useful questions and cases of conscience are…A treatise of miscellany questions wherein many usefull questions and cases of conscience are…

As for the reasons, take these. 1. If we be not steadfast and unmoveable in the profession of our faith, we frustrate (as to us) the end for which the Scriptures were written. Luke gives this reason ⟨p. 136⟩to his Theophilus, why he wrote the story of Christs birth, life and death. That thou mightest know the certainty of those things wherein thou hast been instructed, Luke. 1. 4. When Peter hath mentioned the voice which came from heaven concerning Christ, he addeth the certainty of the Scripture as a greater certainty. We have also a more sure word of prophecy, whereunto ye do well that ye take he•d, as unto a light that shineth in a dark place, 2. Pet: 1. 19. A voice from heaven might sooner deceive us, then the written word of God. 2. To maintain and profess the true Doctrine, and the true faith is by all protestant orthodox writers made one, (yea the principal) mark of a true visible Church. Christ himself▪ Joh. 10. 4, 5. gives us this mark of his sheep, the sheep follow him (their shepherd) for they know his voice, and a stranger will they not follow, for they know not the voice of strangers. 3. If once we forsake the way of truth, and go into an erroneous way, we shall not know where to find our paths, we shall wander from mountain to hill, & forget our resting place As one wave comes after another, so doth one error come after another. As a canker spreadeth, so doth error, 2. Tim 2. 17, Evil men and seducers, shall wax worse and worse, deceiving and being deceived 2 Tim: 3. 13. Which hath made some, and I hope will make more, who were too inclinable to the new Doctrine and practises of Sectaries at first, now to fall off from them, when they increase unto more ungodliness, & unto more error, and there is no end, one error breedeth a hundred, and a hundred will breed ten thousand. What was it that made so many fall off from the Prelates, who once joined with them? Was it not, because they were growing from the old ceremonies to many new ones, and each year almost, brought in some new superstition, and from Popish rites, they grew to Popish doctrines? 4. If w•e waver, and be led about with diverse and strange doctrine;, then the prophesies which have gone before of the true Church, shall not