A53727:39
A short and plain answer to two questions
A short and plain answer to two questions: I. Where was your religion before Luther? II. How know you the Scriptures to be the word of God? By a Protestant.A short and plain answer to two questions: I. Where was your religion before Luther? II. How know you the Scriuptures to be the word of God? By a Protestant.
London: printed by T.N. for Jonathan Hutchinson bookseller, 1682
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.
There is yet a further means of assurance, that the Scriptures are the Word of God, namely, from the evidence of the Spirit bearing witness in our Consciences, to the truth of those things contained in our Bibles; of which there is a Counter-part written in our Hearts, and attested by the Holy Ghost. There are indeed many false Spirits, and many vain pretences to the true one; yet a measure thereof is given to every Child of God, and promised to all those, that seek it with sincerity and perseverance. Now I say this Evidence of the Spirit, wherever it is, doth fill the Mind with assurance and satisfaction, about Divine Truth, beyond all Arguments: It is so convincing, that St. Paul calls it a Demonstration. And though perhaps it may not have that force to those who deride it in others, and stifle its motions in their own Breasts, (for neither is Geometrical Demonstration of force to them that understand it not) yet to a mind enlightened by it, and brought under the power of it, the Evidence and Demonstration of the Spirit, is beyond all other Arguments and Demonstrations whatsoever.
To sum up all, we need not to go to a Corrupt and Adulterous Church, to have its Authority and Imprimatur stamped upon our Bibles, from whence on the contrary it ought to derive its own Authority: And it will one day sink under the weight and force of those Laws and Precepts, which it now vainly pretends to Authorize. I say then, the Scriptures are known to be the Word of God beyond all possibility ⟨p. 21⟩of mistake or dubitation, by Evidence of Sense, by Arguments of Reason, and by Demonstration of the Spirit.
To summ up all, we need not to go to a Corrupt and Adulterous Church, to have its Authority and Imprimatur stampt upon our Bibles, from whence on the contrary it ought to derive its own Authority: And it will one day sink under the weight and force of those Laws and Precepts, which it now vainly pretends to Authorize. I say then, the Scriptures are known to be the Word of God beyond all possibility ⟨p. 21⟩