Selected quad for the lemma: act_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
act_n	king_n	law_n	prerogative_n	3,673	5	10.4433	5	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A51064	The poor man's cup of cold-water ministred to the saints and sufferers for Christ in Scotland who are admidst the scorching flames of the fiery trial.	McWard, Robert, 1633?-1687.	1678 (1678)	Wing M233; ESTC R25489	71,723	46

late Supremacy and sense it and consider if its lowest amount be not this we have no King but Caesar. And to make it emphatickly expressive of this vvhereas other Acts of Supremacy vvherby yet our Lord Iesus Chrest vvas vvronged and his royal prerogative encroached upon did still for shame leave him the title and a supremacy vvas pretended unto under God and his Son Christ and a derivation and conveyance from that fountain vvas in words acknovvledged that the iniquitie of our Supremacy might be supreme● an absolute independent arbitra●y dominion is attributed to our Kings setled upon them by Law And for the more security this povver is declared to be the i●trinsick right and the inherent prerogative of the imperial Crown of the Nation vvhereby al-Church-mat●ers are subjected to their imperial vvisdom to do in all these as they think fit and the managment of these are so solely in his Majesties povver that vvhereas the Council acts in Civils in a subordination to his Maj. according to the Law of the Land His Maj may make use of what kinde of persons so ever he will passing by Parliament or Council to put all the incontrolable dictats and decrees of his Maj. wisdom and good pleasure concerning Church matters in execution And therefore that we may be no longer in suspense nor solici●ous about the sense of our Supremacy that the Church may hen●ceforth know acknowledge who is her Lord and undoubted Superior whose it is to give Laws and appoint Officers to put them in execution and that there may be none in heaven or earth to pretend to any part of this power or paritie in this Supremacy the name of God and of his Son Christ is omitted in it and because mentioned in other Supremacies must be conceived to be delet out of ours O! the patience of God that their names● yea that the name of the Nation where such a wicke●nesse was decreed is not before this perished from under the heavens It is true● this pleased me best in all that Supremacy because it was plain dealing without all cloak or complement for now Iesus Christ hath neither thing nor name of Kingly power left him but is most explicitly put from the exercise of his royal Government And Church Lawes are no more to passe in the old stile nor are things as formerly to be done there by vertue of the Authoritie of this one Iesus who calleth himself a King But according to the new stile And so hence forth Church Lawes must beare the datum of the Iulian account Now our Rulers having framed this Law for hainousnesse of hatred h●ight of opposition to the Lords anointed whom he hath made King in Zion beyond the most supream Supremacies that ever wer● framed or moulded into lawes since God made man upon the earth or Satan that he might destroy the Church prompted men to compet with the Mediator strive with him for state y●a even in its prodigious shape and feature beyond what was arrogat by the Man of sin the Anti-Christ that Son of Perdition ● Our blessed Lord Jesus who hath all his enemies in de●ision stirred up the spirit of some of his zealous Ambassadours to goe forth and give a Testimony against the hainousnesse of this usurpation of their Masters Crown and Sc●pter which will be their crown and which should be now our main question upon which we act and suffer as we expect his p●esence and supportings either in doing or suffering and in pursuance of that Commission which they had received from him to preach in ●eason and out of season and to negociat a peace betwixt this great and glorious King and poor guilty sinners whereupon our blessed Lord Jesus Christ though slighted and set at naught by our Rulers bo●h to signifie his complacency in the zeal of his faithfull servants ●ired into an holy fervo● fo● the Prerogative of their exalted Prince from the observation of the fury whereby they saw he was opposed and to refute till more come O! that is coming which may and certainly would make their souls tremble if thought upon the apprehensions of the righteous revenges he will ●ake for this contempt cast upon him and when he will returne their reproach upon them by speaking unto them in his wrath and vexing them in his sore displeasure the folly and infatuation of that new Pretence to his incommunicable Prerogative● royal framed into a Law and that by an argument easy to be understood by the poorest Lasse and Lad in the Nation he goeth forth conquering and to conquer by the Ministry of these his despised servants and thus he reigns as King in the m●dst of his rageing enemies and acts wonderously so that to the conviction of all he holds the hands of his servants upholds them at his work and doth from tha● day greater things by them then ever in regaird of many circumstances were done in the Nation he makes such noble and notable in roads upon Satans territories and these darke places of the land where the Prince of darkenesse had an indisturbed dominion as multitudes are made in this day of his power to follow after and fall in love with Ordinances dispensed by his own O●ficers and flock unto the standart of this exalted Prince a proof as great as ever was given of his reigneing and that his people shall be willing in the day of his power though all the powers of the earth were on a conspiracy against him and abused that power to the fainting of his followers and the fr●ghting of them into a dis●oyal relinquishing of Iesus Christ which the Adversary perceiving and finding that to no purpose they had cru●ified Christ aga●ne and put him to open shame by taking his Crown and Scepter from him and bu●ying his Supremacy in the grave which they had made for it u●der the fabrick of their newly erected one and that in vaine they had set a watch to keep the grave fearing withal that this reviving of his work and resurrection of his cause might prove to them a second errour worse by far then the first The●efore that rovers may not be ruers and to fortifie themselves in the pos●ession of what they had taken by their Law from our Lord Iesus Ch●ist and to prevent his returning to his throne and his reassuming the exercise of his royal Government o let their feare come upon them who feare left Christ should reigne an Host must be gathered on purpose to march into the West as that part of the Nation o happy and honourable cognizance where Iesus Christ had most remarkably rung and which still was looked upon by them as the Kings head-quarters whereupon it is resolved that that poor Countrey shall be invaded the people in the mean time having behaved themselves as peacably as any part of the nation being amazed at the rumour of this rage against them and the resolution taken to pour●in upon them such a company of Barbar's as

by being distressed by it this bitter potion which the world prepares for the people of the Lord and puts all the gall and worm wood in it they can to make it deadly poison when drunk down and digested by faith and patience dissipats and discusses these ill humors which did weaken the vitals of Religion and brought a consumption upon the inward man and so proves a soveraigne antidot to drive out that poison which would have killed the soul if not purged out And as it serves for dissolving that union between the Saints and the world so secondly it knits them the more closely to him who hath chosen them out of the world for when they finde themselves dealt with as strangers and pilgrims in the earth exposed to all manner of hurt and hardship they then are in earnest in seeking that satisfaction in God which they misse in this howling wildernesse of sorrow and as they never seek it so earnestly and ardently as at such a time so they never so readily finde it that they may have a proof that their own portion is fat enough and can still afford them royal dainties and so sit down satis●ied with the enjoyment of God even their own God and sing amidst all wants and miseries the lines are fallen to us in pleasant places The reason then why the people of God are often in so much heavinesse and frequently hunted harrassed with trouble tentations is that they may be hunted by the worlds hatred and evil handling of them out of the world home to heaven that since they see what they have to expect here they may gird up the loins of their mind set their affections on things that are above where Christ is there treasure hence it is said when the scourge slaieth suddenly he laugheth at the trial of the innocent which is not for want of affection being a●flicted in all there afflictions but if I may say so besids that he meens them not to command a calme in the greatest storme to have a consort of most sweet musick in their soul amidst all their miseries who have an interest in him as their God he rejoiceth to think how the happinesse of his people is promoved by their pressures and persecutions and how much their persecuters are befooled who contrare to their purpose contribute their service to the Saints whom in their rage they intend to ruine All men of reason have judged the mustering and marching of this host against you a high transport of malice and madnesse in the mean time you mourne and the enemies laugh amongst themselves and the Lord notwithstanding he takes pleasure in the prosperity of his people he rejoyceth also But why is it so It is so not only in regaird of your Adversaries at whom he laughs because he sees their day is coming but because he hath such a complacency in the soul prosperity of his people that Court and Councel and all the Nation must be set a work to scoure the Saints the vessels of honour that they may shine in the beauty of holinesse and sing in the begun fruitions of God And thus by the effects of this fury this malice and madnesse of persecuters a company of his poor people whom they intended to eat up as bread and to destroy are made meet to be partakers of the inheritance of the Saints in light the place to which neither they who gave the orders nor they who obeyed and put them in execution shall ever be admitted except they mourne and amend their manners too for heaven is not a place for impure and polluted persons there is nothing that defileth or worketh abomination that can enter-in into that City there is neither swine nor puddle there But to come more particularly to the purpose to show and set before you what grounds of strong consolation you may have while handled as you are by the persecuting enemy Consider first That it ought not onely to remove the strangenesse to alley the bitternesse of your present sad lot but also comfort you over it and while under it that your sweet Lord and Mast●r was handled by the world as you are If the world hate you saith Christ you know that it hated me before it hated you And therefore for sweetening your lot and supporting you Consider him lest you be wearie and faint in your minds O what weight of sorrowes and variety of sufferings did he undergoe both in his life and at his death What pinches was he put to What Pressoures were upon him Reproach Shame Calumnie Hatred Persecution met upon him to make it appeare he was a man of sorrowes What alley is this to your griefe under your pressures and Persecutions that your Lord and Master drunk of the same cup he met with much worse handling Cease then to think strange concerning this fiery trial but rather rejoyce in as much as you are partakers of the sufferings of Christ this may comfort you that herein you are conforme to your Lord and Master If they have persecuted ●e saith he they will persecut you But secondly to make the consolation strong indeed Consider that he not onely was hated of the world and persecut●d by them before you were but he is such a feeling-head as he still suffers with you for all the after fufferings of his servants do ●ir●t light upon him there is never a stroke given to one of his members upon the earth but the stound of it is felt in Heaven Saul Saul why persecuts thou me being the word of our glorified Master puts the matter beyond debate The quarrel is at Him and he will own it as such in as much as you did it unto one of these little on●s you did it unto me holds true here And this is so cleare in your case as it passeth the parts of your most pregnant Adversaries to palliat this persecution with any colourable pretence which will hide it from being a plain fighting against God Is it not the purity of their malice and perfection of their hatred against Christ as King which pouseth them on Prompts them to this persecution Let them ●ender any other reason for what they have done if they can For when to compleat the revolt of the Nation from its sworne subjection and obedience to Iesus Christ as Supreme in his own-house● they have substitut and constitut another in his place and have framed a Supremacy in to a Law to be the rule and standar● according to which our Kings in all succeeding generations shall of right King it over the house of God as knowing no Superior with a more simple absolutnes●e then the Law of the Nation will permit them to do over the house inheritance interest or concerne of the meanest subject in the Kingdom by which Law our Lord Iesus Christ is most explicitly exa●torat he is declared to have neither house people nor propertie in Scotland Le● any read over our