Selected quad for the lemma: authority_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
authority_n	king_n	law_n	resist_v	2,184	5	9.6676	5	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A45126	A case of conscience whether a nonconformist, who hath not taken the Oxford Oath, may come to live at London, or at any corporate town, or within five miles of it, and yet be a good Christian : stated briefly, and published in reference to what is offered to the contrary, in a book intituled, A friendly debate betwixt a confirmist and a nonconformist : together with animadversions on a new book, entituled, Ecclesiastical polity, the general heads and substance whereof are taken under consideration : as also a peaceable dissertation, by way of composition with some late papers, entituled, Liberty of conscience, in order to the determining the magistrates power in matters of religion.	Humfrey, John, 1621-1719.	1669 (1669)	Wing H3673; ESTC R16379	28,077	32

ad humanum modum non si onus injungant quod à ratione natura plane abhorreat If you ask at last How this Sheet comes out thus alone without the rest against this Debate with it I must say What shall a man do when the Press is become so like the Hedge-hog's Den that when they have one door open still for themselves they will be sure to stop the other where the least wind can but blow upon them FINIS The Animadversions HAving written out the foregoing sheet and left it at the Press there is that Book newly come forth entituled A Discourse of Ecclesiastical Polity wherein the Authority of the Civil Magistrate over the Conscience of Subjects in matters of Religion is asserted containing eight Chapters which require this fresh labour The first is Of the necessity of an Ecclesiastical Power or Soveraignty over Conscience wherein he supposing a competition between the Power of Princes and the Consciences of the Subject gives a superiority to the Power of the Prince above Conscience The very Title of this Book as the flourishing stile does shew him a young man that writ it The Conscience of man is a judgment on his actions in relation to God that is a judging whether that which he is about to do is agreeable or not to his will and it is impossible that any mortal can have an authority over that judgment that the subject should do any thing against it That the Commands of the Magistrate for the peoples good do by vertue of the general Institution and fifth Commandment bind the Conscience so that if they are bound to the King by the Law of Nature or Word of God before this adds a new Obligation and if they be not this brings one on them will be confest I think by the most judicious and sober in this point but that the Authority of the Magistrate must take place of the Authority of Conscience when they stand in competition is a determination I suppose that is strange and unheard-of in the Orthodox VVorld Every single person sayes the Author is subject to two supream powers the Laws of his Prince and the Dictates of his Conscience and therefore if the supream power of the Prince must give place to that of the Conscience it ceases upon that score to be supream because there is a superiour authority that can countermand all its laws and constitutions And who is there that understands himself that does not know the sense of this spoken in modest and right terms as it ought is what is most true and what all are to assert The Supremacy of the King I hope is over the Subject as to their Persons and their Causes not over their Consciences If we were to conceive indeed of men that they might chuse what Consciences themselves pleased and then plead them against the Magistrate as the face of his words do carry it that which he sayes here would have reason and of all Villains the ill-meaning not the well-meaning Zealot as he speaks would be the most dangerous But when the Conscience that man hath is no other then what God hath placed in him and he hath no power himself over it which is and must and will be whether he will or no conclusive with him according to the Light of Nature and the Word of God there is no danger to the Migistrate though some of his Commands sometimes may not actively be obeyed in yielding that authority which is due unto Conscience And how indeed shall a man be subject to the Magistrate for Conscience sake if the command of Conscience had not in it a superiour and more prevalent Power than his It would be for his own sake and not for Conscience sake if his authority were greater than it I remember being discoursing with some about the Title of this Book presently after I had it a little Boy about ten years of age being carried belike to a Play that week which being never at one before had made some impressions in his mind Why Mother sayes he to her standing by Lacy hath confuted this Book for he acting the Tyrant said in the Play That Conscience was a greater King than he I will take this note from hence It is pity that Religion should be brought as it were on the Stage and made Comical in the Friendly Debate and that the Stage should speak more truly and tenderly of Conscience than this Book of Ecclesiastical Polity His Second Chapter is a more particular account of the Magistrates Power in the Affairs of Religion the extent whereof he endeavours to shew to be the same with his power over the Conscience in matters of Morality But this Person hath received no long information into his understanding I believe of these matters for he may be pleased to know that some perhaps of the best that have wrote on this subject will grant him freely that the Magistrate hath the same Power in matters that are Religious as in those that are Moral when there is none will say that that power is over the Conscience in either This very daring as accomplished young person too presuming on his own parts must be acquainted therefore That it is one thing to grant the King his Authority in matters Ecclesiastical as well as Civil and another to grant him any Authority over the Conscience in the least thing in the world If the Magistrate command any matter of Morality or of Religion or of Civil Affairs which are good for the People that which is commanded does oblige as well in the one as in the other But if it be evil which he commands that is if it be against the Word of God in Religion against vertue and honesty in Morals against the common good in Civils such things are to be forborn though Commanded and what or who can be judge if it be so but a man 's own Conscience And how irrational consequently as well as presumptuous are such kind of speeches That Princes may with less hazard give liberty to mens Vices and Debaucheries than to their Consciences unless the acts of men were to be bruitish and performed without judgment His Third Chapter is of the subject-matter of the Magistrates Power that is not the inward acts of the mind but the outward actions from whence he would state the Liberty of the Conscience to lye altogether in the freedom of a man's thoughts judgment or opinion and that Religious worship which is internal when as for his outward actions or practises in the Service of God as of all things else he would have men not so shy of granting the Magistrate power to use still his own language over their Consciences But this really is short of what here is to be said that is a few first thoughts taken into the Pen and written away glibly For though this distinction of the inward and outward acts of men is one thing requisite to the determining the Point in hand

A Case of Conscience Whether a Nonconformist who hath not taken the Oxford Oath may come to live at London or at any Corporate-Town or within five miles of it and yet be a good Christian Stated briefly and published In reference to what is offered to the contrary in a Book intituled A Friendly Debate betwixt a Conformist and a Nonconformist Together with Animadversions on a new Book entituled Ecclesiastical Polity the general Heads and Substance whereof are taken under consideration AS ALSO A Peaceable Dissertation By way of Composition with some late Papers entituled Liberty of Conscience in order to the determining the Magistrates Power in matters of Religion London Printed in the Year 1669. The Case BEing importuned to make some Animadversions on the Friendly Debate I had finished several sheets and intended but two or three more when I was certified that an Answer was in the Press and prevented me which together with the unliklihood of getting an Imprimatur for it when I had done hath given me a supersedeas at present to what remains and made me think what I cannot do in the whole may be effected perhaps in parts I shall begin therefore upon this Point which seems to me the most material of any in that Book to be considered both in regard of the loss the most are at what to Answer and the necessity of their satisfaction seeing if they act not in Faith in what they do they cannot acquit themselves from sin How can that man be a Minister of Christ who is disobedient to his Soveraign And that even in those things wherein Christ and his Laws are not concerned The Law of the Land forbids the Nonconformist to live in London or within five miles of it But that is not repugnant to the Command of Christ and therefore he is not a good Subject and consequently not a good Christian much less such a Minister of Christ as he ought to be By this one passage in that Book I do take my conjecture of the Author to be a Person happy in his Expression and ingenuous in his Disposition rather than deep in the things he delivers or studious and reflective on those more Removes than one he ought to see who will play such a Game as this with all his fellows at once that are in the Ministry of a contrary party To bind the observation of all human Laws not sinful in the fact upon the Conscience without distinction is the doing he does not know what An unmerciful determination which being passed too upon that particular Oxford Act hath drawn from the rest this Animadversion as it lyes there out of my Papers I am sorry that any Person of so much candour latitude and ingenuity as I believe the Writer of this Book to have should be so unkind to his Brethren so unconscionably untender to express the thing as it is as to account That no man who transgresses an Act of Parliament such as for the Nonconformist to come within five miles of London can be a good Christian Alas how precise are some men as to the Law of the Land who are yet so angry at others for being strict to the Laws of God But does this Reverend Person indeed think that every transgression of a Statute of the Realm is no less than a deadly sin Or dare he wilfully judge here any otherwise than himself would be judged What then if a man shall-live and die in the breach of many Statutes which he knows and yet thinks nothing of it must such a one be certainly damned What if a man should live and die in a Cottage of his own erecting that hath not four Acres of Ground to it Or may a man live and die in a wilful known sin without Repentance and be saved Too rigorous were it sayes Mr. Hooker that understood himself here no doubt a little better that the breach of every Law should be so held a Mean there is between these extremities if so be we could find it out I must confess I have not read any to my remembrance that have ventured on the chalking out this Mean that I should gather satisfaction from it so that I must content my self with my own Sentiments which I shall readily deliver being glad at my heart if I can unloose any burden which many that are tender may be apt to bind on their Consciences when some that tye the same would be loth to touch them with their little fingers The Magistrate I account with the Apostle is the Minister of God for the Peoples good If he command in order to that end I think his Commands ought to be obeyed not only for fear of his Sword but for Conscience sake But if he command any thing for the Peoples hurt or that which evidently is not for their good I think his Command if the matter be not sin is yet to be obeyed for Wrath sake and so not to be contemned but I think not any obligation lyes on the Conscience if it can be avoided without contempt or scandal that it should be done We must distinguish here between the authority that resides in the Person and the authority of this or that his particular Command I do apprehend that when any Command or Law does require that which is Morally or Civilly evil every such Command or Law is really divested of authority and so may be left undone without breach on a man's Conscience yet if a man be brought to question about it he must suffer because the authority which resides still in the Person must be submitted to as to the Ordinance of God He must not resist that is express and rather than resist he must suffer whereas if he could avoid it without resistance he was not bound in good earnest either to do or suffer Where we are not obliged ad agendum ad patiendum sayes Grotius tum demum ubi poena evitari nisi vi opposita non potest De Imp. sum pot circa sac p. 98. The reason of this at the bottom lyes here and is firm Power in the Magistrate or Civil power which is the ground of subjection does not lye in might strength or force but in right Potestas say Political writers is jus imperandi This right in the nature of the thing must arise from the Grant or Will of the supream Lord which is God without whose Will or that Grant or Charter which is an act of his will no Power can be derived from any Now that grant or will of God which constitutes any to Rule or to be his Minister being for the Peoples weale He is the Minis●●●●f God for our weale sayes the text it must follow that whatsoever 〈◊〉 not indeed for the Peoples weale the Magistrate is not to command because it is God's will be commands only for their weale And if he do command any matter that is otherwise that Command hath no Authority as to the Conscience at all as being without the

lead unto darkness To these two Questions therefore I answer in the stead of those Papers As to the former I doubt not but men may and ought to be restrained oftentimes in many things unto which they think themselves to be obliged and my ground for it is given As to the latter I humbly do apprehend that in that point alone the Liberty which these said Papers have so ingeniously contended for is to be placed and so far an that comes to the Arguments they have tendred are prevailing It is not because a man's acts barely are Religious that I plead an exemption from the Magistrate as is still said but because of his Conscience Whether the acts be Religious Moral or Civil the man makes a Conscience of them and the Sword cannot reach to the inward-man or to the Conscience It does not me dole we know with mens inward acts at all and it cannot reach I say to compel outward acts against the Conscience because that were to use the Sword against God and the Magistrate is the Minister of God But it may reach to hinder or restrain outward acts which some men are about doing or think they ought to do according to their Consciences because their Conscience or judgment may deceive them And either the thing ought a or to be done or it may not be fit to be done If it be fit for themselves it may not in regard of others or the publick utility unto which they are to give place Let me yet use a few more words I crave pardon I have used so many for while words are onely to make the mind known I may express my self ill but no words are enough though multiplied till that be done Where the Conscience is erroneous I say Gods will lies in both these things That a man should not do against his Conscience because it is his Conscience and that he should not do according to his Conscience because it is erroneous but that he should lay down his Error and so act And this is the meaning of that which Divines do say That such a Conscience does ligare non obligare The Magistrate accordingly may not compel him to that which is positive to act against his Conscience but to that which is negative to wit not to act according to it Put a case in this point as high as you can any Suppose a man who is otherwise a very consciencious man hath imbibed such ill-shapen Fifth-Monarchy-Principles that he cannot own the present Powers that are over him and so dare not do any thing in the doing whereof he shall own them what shall the most tender Magistrate do with such men unless as we do with Wolves and wild Creatures that is lock them up that they may do no hurt I answer The Magistrate I think cannot compel this Fifth-Monarchy-man to any such actual owning of his Authority or to any such act whereby he owns him that does go against his Conscience he cannot compel a man to own the true God or Christ contrary to his Light but if he act according to his Conscience in disowning the Powers speaking against them resisting or rebelling he may be punished too justly upon the same reason because though it be Gods will a man should never act against his Conscience yet it is Gods will too that he should not act according to it when it is erroneous and wicked and for so doing he is punished The sum is The Magistrate may not many times use his Sword in the Positives when he may in the Negatives of his Commands or Laws which he exerts and enforces as Gods Minister for the putting the Divine Will in execution And after this I am very glad methinks to find the Testimony of two such persons as I do to this Determination Suspenso pede hic incedendum ut illi lpsi qui Divinae humanaeque ordinationi resistunt non tam cogantur benefacere quam malefacere prohibeantur Quae duo in hot ipso argumento Magustinus olim Con. Petil. l. 2. c. 83. provide distinxi● Grotius de Imp. Cir. sac c. 6. s 10. To draw then to an end In things agreeable to common Light and the natural Good of Mankind this coercive power of the Magistrate lies open In things Religious whether indifferent or necessary the use of the same Power appears justifiable upon the supposition that they are not against the Consciences of those on whom they are imposed as the service of the true God we are to suppose was not against any of the Jews Consciences or at least in their account was not when the good Kings in the time of the Law compelled them to it but if the Magistrate be inform'd that any thing either is in its nature or becomes grievous to the Consciences of his People the case is alter'd He may apply other Remedies as a Christian but as a Magistrate he may not upon the account declared compel any body to that the doing whereof is sin to him and so against Gods will that he should do it I will adde Power in the Root which in my Papers that lie by is made out is nothing else but Gods will that such a man should command But in these things which God hath prohibited it is not his will that any should command and much less use coercion also Consequently if the Magistrate command a thing against my Conscience that Command at least to me is void and without power Gods Vicegerent within me my Conscience makes his external Voice to cease So far as his power goes then we may grant it to be coercive but in things against the Conscience he indeed hath not any who must say hereof what Paul said of the Truth I can do nothing against it but for it and according to it I remember in the Life of Josephus when some of the Trachonites came in for rescue to the Jews where himself was Governour and the Jews would thereupon constrain them to be circumcized or else let them not abide with them he would not permit that injurious Zeal alledging That every man ought according to his own Mind and not by mans compulsion to serve God In our English Story to suit this when Ethelbert the first Prince that received Christianity of the Saxon Heptarchy was converted by Austin sent hither by Gregory and many thereupon came into the Church it is said He specially embraced those that came in but compelled none for he had learned that the Faith and Service of Christ ought to be voluntary and not of constraint It helpeth much to establish the publick Tranquility says the Imperial Edict of Constantine and Licinius for every man to have liberty to use and chuse what kind of worshipping himself pleases And for that intent is this done of us to have no man inforced to one Religion more than another A Prince who would draw his subjects divided into sects and factions to his Religion should not in my Opinion use Force says