Selected quad for the lemma: authority_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
authority_n	ancient_a	church_n	time_n	2,337	5	3.6439	3	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A66817	Hermes theologus, or, A divine Mercurie dispatcht with a grave message of new descants upon old records no lesse delightfull in the best sense, then truly usefull for these times / by Theoph. Wodenote ...	Wodenote, Theophilus, d. 1662.	1649 (1649)	Wing W3242; ESTC R38728	47,955	188

and Politie onely and as a meane to testifie Subjection to the lawfull power of the Magistrate What say some who little think how they have done much worse themselves plundered tormented murthered Is it not most unrighteous to inflict punishment for such small matters Is it not cruell to deprive men and their families of their livelyhood for rejecting matters of circumstance and moaths in comparison The matters are small I grant but the contempt of Authority is not small But O a great necessity lyeth upon Authority to vindicate it selfe from contempt The contempt of Authority though in the smallest matter deserveth no small punishment Wherefore were Adam and Eve condemned Not for the fruit but for the forbidden XX. COluthus being himselfe but a Presbyter in one of the Churches of Alexandria took upon him to give holy Orders but was that his so doing approved by the Church No But he himselfe was censured for great presumption and they taken for meere Lay-men whom he had Ordained The truth whereof is sufficiently testified by two Ancient and Learned Fathers of the Church Athanasius and Epiphanius From whence then I marvell came their warrant who being no more but Priests without any farther Apostolicall authority make bold to impose hands to blesse and ordaine other Priests Can they confirme and justifie this either by the Scriptures or practice of the Church Was not the opinion of the Primitive Church otherwise But O! what Christian can choose but blush and grieve and groane when they who are in no holy Orders themselves neither Priests nor Deacons dare order and appoint Priests for the people O what a company of false Prophets have we now abroad in these unruly times put into office and set on work but by the next great perverse Schismatick XXI GReat was the enmity of Pyrrhus to the Romans yet neverthelesse did he give this praise unto Fabritius That a man might as soone turne the Sunne out of his course as turne him from the truth and honestie He would not be so base as not to doe his mortall enemy right He would not defraud a Roman of his deserved commendation But O! selfe-love is growne now a-dayes so discourteous and envious that if an enemy have never so commendable gifts be he learned honest humble and in part what not that is vertuous yet it cannot afford him one good word No though he need encouragement Nay let a mans righteousnesse proceeding from a lively faith indeed and contrite soule exceed the righteousnesse of Fabritius yet if he be but different in affection or distant in judgement from us our lips shall sleight him if others commend him and malice him if others maintaine him Nay though they doe it not to flatter him but to magnifie God Not for the increase of Mans pride but for the advancement of Gods glory XXII ARistotle having gotten great learning from Plato by whom he was taught no lesse then ten yeares afterwards became a great enemy unto him and by all meanes sought his discredit A course cleane contrary to all Morall rules and even common humane civility the which unthankfulnesse caused Plato to call him Mule (l) Aelian de var. hist The property of which beasts is when they have well filled themselves with their mothers milke to beat their dams with their heeles for a recompence Well may our Universities the Nurseries of Gods Vineyard the Seminaries of Christian Learning and Fountaines of holy Religion yea the eyes the light the temper the salt the seasoning of the whole Land take it very unkindly that some of them whom they have not onely taught but maintained with all necessaries some tenne yeares some more should now be found their greatest opposers This may be an Aristotelian an Heathenish but surely no Christian requitall Such unworthy disciples dissemblers may be Men in countenance but in condition Mules XXIII SOcrates at a banquet falling at oddes with one of his familiars and openly rebuking him Plato could not hold but said unto him How much better bad this been spoken privately And had not you then done better to have told me so privately quoth Socrates Plato could see Socrates his fault of unseasonable reprehension but his owne he could not perce●ve Look but amongst your holy Brethren your rank Protestants your devout D●ssemblers now a-dayes and they are not halfe so forward in examining themselves as in finding peccadilloes in others and they are are not halfe so curious in their owne as they are captious and cruell over other mens lives They can readily accuse others of blacknesse and spirituall deformities saying They are wicked He is naught They are Antichristian but when doth any one of them though he hath been in open Rebellion smite himselfe on the thigh saying Oh what have I done They can gaze at the mote in their brothers eye but care not for putting out the beame in their owne sight They cannot beare with a few infirmities of their brethren no not of their Fathers but their owne foule enormities they can easily conceale and continue XXIV PElaretus a Lacedemonian though a man highly deserving was not chosen to be one of the 300. which was a degree of honour at Sparta and yet he was so far from complaining or grudging or grieving thereat that when others marvelled at his contentment and inquired of his reason he told them That he rejoyced at the happinesse of that Common-wealth that it had three hundred men more worthy to governe then himselfe (m) Plut. in his Apopeth How many are there in these times of cleare knowledge wherein it is apparently knowne that true godlinesse teacheth every man contentment with that orbe and place wherein he is set with that portion which God hath given him who as sore eyes are offended at clearnesse of light so envy at the brightnesse of other mens vertues and prosperity who fret themselves because of other mens wealth or honour and are envious against other mens advancement How many rage and storme like Aeolus that not three hundred nor three but some one worthier person is preferred before them XXV ANtoninus Caracalla the Emperour had murdered his brother Geta but was desirous if it were possible to preserve his own credit A Commandment therefore was given by him to Papinian an excellent Lawyer to defend at least if not extoll that his fact before the Senate and People But what said Papinian A murder is not so easie to be excused as committed (n) Spartianus in Caracal By the meanes of some coverous ambitious pettish and newfangled Ministers a spirituall murder hath been of late executed upon the legally confirmed forme of our Divine Service the which hath been burned or torne in pieces or otherwise massacred or made away without any exception of those sacred parts of it for the which they might well have forborne all the rest If the occasioners of this murder for all their rare supposed wisdome were themselves and not others for thē appointed to

men for their speciall pattern in these times Nay more then this how are the very Artiticles of Gods holy Religion i● self here setled slighted and cast aside by them 〈◊〉 wholly insufficient for our faith to build upon How have many of those men who were bound in speciall to defend the same in regard of their office and calling their frequent Oaths and Protestation to that purpose been the Instruments to alter the 〈◊〉 the waged Balaams to blast and disesteeme them And how have they hereby confirmed the slanders of our Romish adversaries against us who have often said that we had no Church no Established Doctrine no foundation for our Profession How are these hereby raised in their hopes to see a restoration of their Babell in the downfall of our Jerusalme O that those who call themselves the Assembly of Divines by their grosse Apostacy from their first faith and love have been the chief meanes of working all these mischiefes would but read over and lay to heart seriously those passages which they shall find to this purpose in a late Book intituled Englands complaint for the sin of Rebellion written by that constant Brother and faithfull Minister of Jesus Christ M. Lionell Gatford whom most of them well know to be a man of most approved integrity But here 's not all yet not the Articles of our Religion only but the protector of them the Annointed of the Lord himself is in like manner cast aside How hath he been contemn'd of late nay how hath the Majesty and Authority of God been vi●●●●d in him together with those Scriptures which command our Honour and Obedience How hath His sacred Person been railed upon slandred and reviled How hath He been persecuted hunted tormented for His Conscience sake How hath he been robbed deprived of all his Revenues his Comforts and his Freedom for His love and affections to the Church of God because He was the Head chief Member of it there was too much of Truth as there was of bitterness in that speech which since His Majesty was in bondage I heard uttered from the Pulpit by a Fryer in France who railing against the Protestants of that Kingdome for denying the Pope to be Head of the Church who sayes he would they have the head thereof the King perhaps even like their Brethren in England who first made their King the Head of their Church and now they make Him their Slave Nay more yet with the Kings Person and Authority His graces also are the object of their scorne and hate His magnanimity His patience His care to keep His conscience undefiled yea the maine study and work of these pretenders to conscience these bawlers for Liberty of Conscience hath been for a long time vastare conscientiam Regis to violate the Conscience of their Soveraign and to breake the peace thereof And what dogged spightfulnesse have they discover'd of late against the pitifulnesse of spirit that is in Him How faine would they be torturing and murdering of Him for His tendernesse of heart towards the miseries of His people its well knowne to all the world and to themselves too who began these wicked Wars and at whose doore the guilt of bloodlies yet because the good King seeing them wholy of the Pharisees stampe abhorring to practice the lesson that Christ taught of denying themselves and confessing their sin and yet being desirous to purchase His peoples peace is content for their security of His pardon that He will not bring them to a triall by Law for their past demerits but remit them wholly to the hand of God to connive even at their throwing their dirt in His face what vile Doctrines and cursed Uses do their Pamphleteers and their Pulpiteers raise from thence and presse upon the people why that God hath now resolved the great doubt hath heard his peoples prayers in charging the guilt of blood upon the Kings soule and brought Him to acknowledge that He hath been the cause of all which hath been shed and therefore it belongs to the people now to see unto it that Justice be done upon Him and upon His friends for it Was ever such horrid wickednesse heard of such transcendent villany in mortall creatures would not the Devil himselfe blush to appear in their shapes may we not looke for some strange judgement like that of the earths opening to swallow them up had Davids people when he to have them spared had cryed out t is I that have sinned spake of calling him to account for the losse of 70000 men they had shewne lesse impudence then these have done Nay the malitious Jews though they crucified Christ because he was a King yet were not so super-superlatively vile as to consult his death because he was content in their stead and for their safety to be accounted as a sinner Assuredly therfore these men have out-gone all before them for aske now of the daies that are past since the time that God created man upon the earth aske from the one side of heaven unto the other whether there hath ever been such bloody spunges as these shew themselves to be such monsters of nature amongst men O the basenesse the impiety the wormewood and the gall of their spirits if ever the Title of Rex diabolorum was rightly applyable to the King of this land 't is since the viperine birth of these miscreants And that such only as themselves are might be continued if possible in the Nation there is a speciall course taken that knowledge and good manners might not abound in those that come after for the Universities are metamorphised and purged too as well as the Church of learned and good men Thistles are there set instead of Wheat and Cockle instead of Barly Yea all Orders and degrees amongst men if some may have their will must be abolished presently and confusion planted in all places as 't is already in a great measure Kings and Princes Nobles and persons of Honour must be but as the meane people which God indeed may justly permit in respect of some for those contempts and miseries which even they have help'd to bring upon his Church sure these things are a lamentation and ought to be for a lamentation Never was there so foolish and so mad a Nation under the Sun as we have proved our selves to the derision of all about us the ruine and decay of our Ancient glory our outward Happinesse and of our soules for ever O therefore I say againe that mine head were full of water and that mine eyes were fountaines of teares to bewaile these things O that the people of this Land especially they that are got Highest would but consider what they have done and yet at last before all is lost set some period to their owne doings O that those men of wealth and place who advanced at first their whole might to lay levell this famous Church to take from it all Honours orders and