N00779:186
The order of the Gospel, professed and practised by the churches of Christ in…
The order of the Gospel, professed and practised by the churches of Christ in New England, justified, by the Scripture, and by the writings of many learned men, both ancient and modern divines; in answer to several questions, relating to church discipline / by Increase Mather, president of Harvard College in Cambridge, and teacher of a church at Boston in New England. ; [Five lines of Scripture texts]The order of the Gospel, professed and practised by the churches of Christ in New England, justified, by the Scripture, and by the writings of many learned men, both ancient and modern divines; in answer to several questions, relating to church discipline / by Increase Mather, president of Harvard Colledge in Cambridge, and teacher of a church at Boston in New England. ; [Five lines of Scripture texts]
Boston: printed by B. Green for Benjamin Eliot, 1700
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.
3 That Common Argum•••, however […] by Mr. […] (e)which many have produced to […] usage of […] Lords […], deserves •urther […] then it would be unlawful […] th•se words and […]. When it is […], and whe• you Pray, say, those w•rds of our Saviour are not a […], but an absolute Commandment. When […], that is, Whenever you pray. As, w•en you give A•ms, is as much as to say, w•en ever you give Alms. Thus when s•ever a Christian […], he must pray after that manner which Christ in his Sermon ⟨p. 122⟩on the Mount prescribed. If therefore the meaning of Pray thus, is, use these very words, it would not be Lawful at any time to vary from them. Which no man will be so unreasonable as to affirm. It would be less proper for a Christian in his Closet to speak in the plural ••mber. Indeed the Superstitious Jews made a Canon that their Compendious Prayer, which they call Majan q. d a Fountain Prayer, and require their Disciples to say it Eighteen times every day, shall be Expressed in the plural number, though he that says it has no man with him, and they make him Guilty of Sin that shall Pray that Prayer in the singular number though in his Closet, because he must never look on himself as Separated from the Synagogue. But does any man believe, that if a Christian shall say, give me my daily bread, forgive my debts, lead not me into Temptation, deliver me from evil, that he offends by not speaking plurally in the very Syllables of the Lords Prayer? It would be so, if the design of the precept were to tie us up to Words and Syllables.
3 That Common Argum•••, however 〈…〉 by Mr. 〈…〉