Dissertations on the prophecies which have remarkably been fulfilled, and at this time are fulfilling in the world / Revised by the Rev. W.S. Dobson.

  • Thomas Newton
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Credit: Dissertations on the prophecies which have remarkably been fulfilled, and at this time are fulfilling in the world / Revised by the Rev. W.S. Dobson. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    chiefly for the correction and reproof of their, natural issue and descendants, the clergy of the church of Rome? Read the whole 23d chapter of St. Matthew, and you will find that there isnot:a single woe denounced against the former, but as, pro« perly belongs,. and is as strictly applicable to the latter. ‘Binding heavy burdens, and grievous to be borne, and laying them on men’s shoulders ; doing all their works for to be seen of men; shutting up the kingdom of heaven against men, nei- ther going in themselves, neither suffering them who are enter- ing to go in; devouring widows’ houses, and for a pretence making lone prayers; compassing sea and land to make one proselyte, and when he is made, making him twofold more the child of hell than themselves ;” making useless and frivolous distinctions cf oaths ; observing positive duties, and ‘‘ omitting the weightier matters of the law, judgment, mercy, and faith ; making clean the outside, but within being full of extortion and excess ; outwardly appearing righteous unto men, but within being full of hypocrisy and iniquity ; building the tombs of the prophets, and garnishing the sepulchres of the righteous,” honouring the dead saints, and at the same time persecuting the living; are as strong marks and characters of the one sect as they were of the other.—Do not forbidding implicit faith and obedience to men, (Matt. xxii. 9.) ‘Call no man your Father upon the earth, for one is your Father which is in hea- ven ;” forbidding the worship of angels, (Col. 11. 18.) “ Let no man beguile you of your reward, in a voluntary humility, and worshipping of angels ;” forbidding all pretences to works of merit and supererogation, (Luke xvii. 10.) “ When ye shall have done all those things which are commanded you, say, We are unprofitable servants, we have done that which was our duty to do ;” forbidding the clergy to lord it over God’s herit- age, (1 Pet. iv. 3.) ‘‘ Neither as being lords over God’s heritage, but being ensamples to the flock ;” forbidding the service of Godin an unknown tongue, as St. Paul hath done at large in the 14th chap. of his first Epistle to the Corinthians: do not all these and such like prohibitions, I say, necessarily suppose and imply, that one time or other these particular errors and abuses would creep into the church? and in what church they are publicly taught and practised, no man can be insensible. Such texts of Scripture are as much predictions that these things would be, as they are arguments that they should not be. For laws divine and human are not levelled against chimerical and mere imaginary vices, such as never are, never will be brought into practice ; but are enacted by reason of those enormities, which men either have committed or are likely to commit, and which the lawgivers wisely foreseeing are therefore willing to prevent. —Why doth St. Paul pura the Romans. particularly to 0
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