N05401:111
Misrepresentations corrected, and truth vindicated. In a reply to the Rev. Mr. Solomon Williams's…
Misrepresentations corrected, and truth vindicated. In a reply to the Rev. Mr. Solomon Williams's book, entitled, The true state of the question concerning the qualifications necessary to lawful communion in the Christian sacraments. / By Jonathan Edwards, M.A. Minister of the Gospel at Stockbridge. ; [Five lines of Scripture texts]Misrepresentations corrected, and truth vindicated. In a reply to the Rev. Mr. Solomon Williams's book, intitled, The true state of the question concerning the qualifications necessary to lawful communion in the Christian sacraments. / By Jonathan Edwards, M.A. Minister of the Gospel at Stockbridge. ; [Five lines of Scripture texts]
Boston: printed by S. Kneeland, 1752
Title page typeset from the transcription.
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.
But if the Scheme which Mr. W. undertakes to defend, were true, it would follow that such a Kind of Equivocation as this (be it far from us to suppose it) is what the infinitely wise and holy God has instituted to be publicly made use of in the solemn Services of his House, as the very Condition of Persons Admission to the external Privileges of his People! For Mr. W. abundantly asserts, that Persons must be esteemed in the Judgment and Apprehension of Others to have true Piety; and that one Thing that must be done in Order to it, one Thing pertaining to the moral Evidence that recommends 'em to this Judgment, is the Profession they make of Religion. (P. 5. P. 139. P. 47, b, c. P. 132. P. 44. d.) In P. 42, speaking of the Profession of visible Christians, he has these Words, And 'tis from the Nature and Purport of this Profession, we say, the Church is to judge the Members to be wise Virgins or what they make a Show of. And Mr. W. insists upon it, that according to Christ's Institution, this must be in Words equally signifying true Godliness, ⟨p. 43⟩and something else, without any Discrimination or Marks of Difference.—This is the Scheme! And certainly such a Doctrine of deceitful Equivocation in the public Exercises of Religion, is more agreeable to the Principles and Practices of a Religion I am loth to name, than the true Religion of Jesus Christ.
But if the Scheme which Mr. W. undertakes to defend, were true, it would follow that such a Kind of Equivocation as this (be it far from us to suppose it) is what the infinitely wise and holy God has instituted to be publickly made use of in the solemn Services of his House, as the very Condition of Persons Admission to the external Privileges of his People! For Mr. W. abundantly asserts, that Persons must be esteemed in the Judgment and Apprehension of Others to have true Piety; and that one Thing that must be done in Order to it, one Thing pertaining to the moral Evidence that recommends 'em to this Judgment, is the Profession they make of Religion. (P. 5. P. 139. P. 47, b, c. P. 132. P. 44. d.) In P. 42, speaking of the Profession of visible Christians, he has these Words, And 'tis from the Nature and Purport of this Profession, we say, the Church is to judge the Members to be wise Virgins or what they make a Show of. And Mr. W. insists upon it, that according to Christ's Institution, this must be in Words equally signifying true Godliness, ⟨p. 43⟩