Chapter
XLVI.—Let Us Cleave to the Righteous: Your Strife is
Pernicious.
Such examples, therefore, brethren, it is right that we
should follow;
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since it is
written, “Cleave to the holy, for those that cleave to them shall
[themselves] be made holy.”
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And
again, in another place, [the Scripture] saith, “With a harmless
man thou shalt prove
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thyself harmless,
and with an elect man thou shalt be elect, and with a perverse man thou
shalt show
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thyself
perverse.”
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Let us
cleave, therefore, to the innocent and righteous, since these are the
elect of God. Why are there strifes, and tumults, and divisions,
and schisms, and wars
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among you?
Have we not [all] one God and one Christ? Is there not one Spirit
of grace poured out upon us? And have we not one calling in
Christ?
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Why do we
divide and tear in pieces the members of Christ, and raise up strife
against our own body, and have reached such a height of madness as to
forget that “we are members one of another?”
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Remember the words of our Lord Jesus
Christ, how
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He said, “Woe
to that man [by whom
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offences
come]! It were better for him that he had never been born, than
that he should cast a stumbling-block before one of my elect.
Yea, it were better for him that a millstone should be hung about [his
neck], and he should be sunk in the depths of the sea, than that he
should cast a stumbling-block before one of my little
ones.”
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Your schism
has subverted [the faith of] many, has discouraged many, has given rise
to doubt in many, and has caused grief to us all. And still your
sedition continueth.
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Literally, “to
such examples it is right that we should cleave.”
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Not found in
Scripture.
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Literally,
“be.”
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Or, “thou wilt
overthrow.”
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Ps. xviii. 25, 26
.
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Or,
“war.” Comp.
James iv. 1
.
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Comp.
Eph. iv. 4–6
.
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Rom. xii. 5
.
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This clause is wanting
in the text.
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This clause is wanting
in the text.
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Comp.
Matt. xviii. 6, xxvi. 24; Mark ix. 42;
Luke xvii. 2
.