Selected quad for the lemma: book_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
book_n	apostle_n	authority_n	church_n	1,814	5	4.2729	3	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A29209	The serpent salve, or, A remedie for the biting of an aspe wherein the observators grounds are discussed and plainly discovered to be unsound, seditious, not warranted by the laws of God, of nature, or of nations, and most repugnant to the known laws and customs of this realm : for the reducing of such of His Majesties well-meaning subjects into the right way who have been mis-led by that ignis fatuus.	Bramhall, John, 1594-1663.	1643 (1643)	Wing B4236; ESTC R12620	148,697	268

deducing Bishops i●… Alexandria from Saint Marke and telling us plainl●… that which we find to be true that without Episcopall Authori●…y there will be as many Schismes as Pries●… in the Church The Hierarchists as he calls them will be contented ●…o wave all other Authors and 〈◊〉 ●…ed by either of these The seven Angells in th●… Revelation cap. 2. 3 cannot be the seven Chu●…ches for the Angells and the Churches are 〈◊〉 distinguished Rev. 1. 20 but it must be the seven Bishops of the Churches These were not Parochiall Churches each of them had many Pastors and many particular Flocks Beza confesseth that these Angell●… were Presidents over the other Presbiters but he believes not they had a priority of Power or that this Presidency was permanent but went by course If the Government went by turnes I would gladly know why one of them is called an Angell more then the other Surely he that shall reade the seven Epistles how some of them are comm●…ended for their constancy and perseverance in their Government and others reprehended for suffering Heretick●… to continue in their Churches will find sufficient ground in every one of these Epistles to believe that they were not changeable every weeke or Moneth or quarter of a Yeare but constant and permanent Governours having power of Jurisdiction to represse abuses otherwise why are they taxed for the abuses done in their Diocesses if it were not in their power to remedy them And if he will give credit to the Testimony of the Primitive Fathers he may find both who sundry of these Angells or Bishops were and also who were their Successors Fourthly though in such variety of new Forms of Church Regiment he hath not expressed himselfe to what Forme he inclines saving that in one place ●…e speakes of a Iancto of Divines I cannot think but himselfe would have the naming of them yet we will suppose that which we are farre from believing that a few green Heads see more then all the Fathers and Councells and Schoolemen and that the Observers busy working braine could molde a Church better then all the Apostles Notwithstanding all this Saint Austins rule to Ianuarius is very considerable if you will not erre doe that which I use to do to whatsoever Church I come I apply my selfe to the Ceremonies thereof He would have added the Discipline also if there had been sundry Formes but there was none but Episcop●…y then in the world God is a mercifull God and lookes upon his Creatures with all prejudices of Education Habitation c. Faction is more offensive to him and breach of Charity more dangerous to the Soule then any unknown errour in Disc●…pline much more where the errour is but supposed or feined and the Schisme apparent Now for the Discipline of the Church of England all Men know and grant that it hath ever been Episcopall In the publick Liturgy of our Church confirmed by Act of Parliament we pray for Bishops In our Booke of Ordination confirmed by the same Authority it is directly affirmed as evident by Scriptures and ancient Authours that from the time of the Apostles there have ever been these Orders of Ministers in Christs Church Bishops Priests and Deacons and that these Orders are appointed by the Holy Ghost In our Booke o●… Articles which conteins the received doctrin of our Church and therefore without doubt comes within the compasse of our late Protestation the same Book of Ordination is mainteined and it is plainely affirmed That there is nothing conteined in it which ●…s either superstitious or ungodly In the Apol●…gy of our Church published to the whole Christian World and by all Protestant Churches approved and applauded We declare that ●…e beleeve that there be diverse degrees of Ministers in the Church whereof some be Deacons some be Priests some Bishops Which being so it deserves some consideration which King Iames saith in the latter end of his Proclamation for Uniformity Such is the unquietnesse and unstedfastnesse of some dispositions affecting every yeare new forms of things as if they should be followed in their unconstancy would make all actions of States ridiculous and contemptible whereas the stedfast mainteining of things by good advise established is the weale of the Commonwealth I should not inlarge my selfe any further about this Consideration but for two reasons The one is I find it said by some that scarce any but Bishops have hitherto mainteined Bishops Take only three Testimonies of many they were all Members of the English Church yet all Strangers and all had lived in places opposite to Episcopall Government none of them either Bishops or their Chapleins or Expectants The first is King Iames the most learned of Kings I have alwayes thought that there ought to be Bishops in the Church according to the Apostolicall institution and by consequence Divine Ordination The second is Learned Bucer a Germane and imployed in the first Reformation of this Church to read Divinity in Cambridge one that was so opposite to Popery that after his Death his very bones were taken out of his Grave and burned by the Papists He is full in many places take one From the perpetuall observation of the Churches from the very Apostles themselves we see that it seemed good to the Holy Ghost that among the Ministers to whom the charge of the Church was especially committed one should undergoe a singular care of the Churches and the whole Ministery and in that care and sollicitude was before all the rest for which cause the name of a Bishop was peculiarly attributed to these highest Procurators of the Church The third is Peter Martyr at the same time imployed to reade Divinity at Oxford having expressed his consent concurrence with Saint ●…erome concerning Episcopacy he proceeds So far it is from us to bring confusion into the Church that rather we follow the same way for there is no Diocesse with us or Citty where of many Pastors there is not some one chosen excelling in Learning and Experience whom they call the Superintendent of the Church He convocates all the rest he admonisheth them he governs them according to the Word of God as the State of things requires The second reason is that I see it lately published to the World in Print that Doctor Whitakers Doctor Fulke and Doctor Reynolds were all Oppugners of Episcopacy Perhaps of Popish Episcopacy that is the abuse not the thing or of an absolute necessity by Divine Right of such and such an Episcopacy indowed with such or such degrees of Power or Preheminence or of such an Episcopacy as is held to differ from Presbiterate in the very power of Order but surely not of Episcopacy it selfe I wondred at the impudence of the Man It is a bad cause which stands in need to be underpropped with such pious impious frauds is onely fortified with hideous palpable Lyes if he fable in this let him have the just

they Facile possent Episcopi legitimam obedientiam retinere c. Bishops might easily retein lawfull obedience if they did not urge us to keep Traditions which with a good Conscience cannot be kept Again Nunc non id agitnr c. It is not now sought that the Government be taken away from Bishops but this one thing is desired That they will suffe●… the Gospel to be purely taught and release some few Observances which cannot be kept without sinne This generall Confession may stand for a thousand Witnesses under which all the Protestants in Germany did shelter themselves To this I may adde the Apology for the same Confession Hac de re in hoc conventu c. We have often testified of this matter in this meeting that we desire wi●… all our hearts to conserve the Ecclesiasticall Policy an●… the degrees made in the Church by Humane Authorit●… Againe This our Will shall excuse us both before God an●… all the World that it may not be imputed to us that th●… Authority of Bishops was weakned by our means Th●… confession of Saxony is subscribed by seventeen Superintendents of Bishops The Suevick Confession i●… so farre from opposing the spirituall power of the Praelates that they doe not exclude them from secular Government and complaineth of great wrong done t●… their Churches as if they did seek to reduce the powe●… of Ecclesiasticall Praelates to nothing And most plain ly they declare for the Ecclesiasticall Jurisdiction o●… Bishops in the 33. Chapter of the secular Magistrat●… I might produce the Articles of the Protestants and more Confessions and many Witnesses to this purpose if it were needfull But perhaps some may say●… That these are all Lutherans and no good Protestant●… That were strange indeed that they who made th●… Protestation and from thence were called Protestants keeping themselves to the same grounds should become no Protestants and they who made no Protestation nor have right to the name but by communio●… with them should become the onely Protestants Bu●… to satisfie them in this also Upon the Words of the Augustane Confession●… before recited the Observations set forth in the nam●… of the French and Belgicke Churches at the latte●… end of the Harmony of Confessions doe divide Bishops into three kinds 1 Apostolicall of Orde●… not of Degree common to all the Ministers of the word 2. Humane both of Order and of Degree which they confesse to ●…e ancient and defined and circumscribed with many old Canons 3. Tyrannicall in the Church of Rome wandring not onely without the word of God but also extra Canones aequissimos without those most equall or just Canons which last they abhominate but of this more in the next Consideration They say further that it is the Office of god●…y Magistrates to see how farre it may be expedient for Bishops to have some kind of Civill Dominion and upon the Saxonick confession they acknowledge that Bishops may make Laws belonging to Order ●…nd Decency so it be not done Arbitrarily but by the judgement of a lawfull Synod and what doe we say more You have also seen the confession of the Church of England directly for Episcopacy which neverthe●…esse was so approved and applauded by the Tigurine Divines That they made no end of praising of it that ●…hey judged nothing to have been published more perfect in those dayes that they promise themselves that the Protestant Church shall never want a Champion so long as the Authour thereof did live yet it was both for Bishops and by a Bishop Calvine was no Lutherane yet he subscribed the Augustane Confession o●… the Apology for it or both And in his Institutions he describeth at large the Regiment of the Primitive Church after the dayes of the Apostles That though the Bishops of those times expressed more in their Canons then was expressed in the word of God yet they composed the whole Oeconomy of the Church with that caution that it may easily appear that it had almost nothing strange from the word of God That in each Citty the Presbyters did choose one of their number to whom they gave the Title of Bishop specially least dissention might spring from equallity as commonly it comes to passe He shews out of Saint Ierome that this institution was as ancient in Alexandria as from Saint Marke He proceeds to shew the end of Arch-Bishops and the Constitutio●… of Patriarkes and concludes That this kind of Government some called an Hierarchy by a name improper at least not used in the Scriptures but if we pass●… by the name and looke upon the thing it selfe we sha●… find that the Ancient Bishops did goe about to devise no other Forme of governing the Church then that which God hath prescribed in his word There might be sundry other places alleged out of his Epistle and his Answer to Sadolet to the same purpose but I omit them only with this note that one of the most conspicuous place●… in his Epistle to Sadolet Talem nobis Hierarchiam c. against those that shall reject Episcopacy being reduced to its due submission to Christ and Society with their Brethren is purged out in the two latter Edition●… of Beza and Gallasius to let us see that the Romanist●… are not the onely men who cut out the Tongues o●… their own Witnesses Zanchy delivers the very same grounds and addes That nothing is more certain●… then this That Episcopacy was received into the Church communi consensu totius Reipublicae Christianae with the common consent of the whole Christian Commonwealth That it was free for them to doe so Tha●… it was done for honest or just causes That it cannot b●… misliked That those things which are defined and received by the Godly Fathers congregated in the nam●… of the Lord by the common consent of all without an●… contradiction to the Holy Scriptures though they be no●… of the same Authority with the Scriptures yet they ar●… from the Holy Ghost Quae hujusmodi sunt ea e●…o ●…probare nec velim nec audeam bona Conscientia ●…uch as he had neither Will nor Confidence nor 〈◊〉 to disallow Which very place being ●…rged by ●…arraviah against Beza he closeth with it A quo ma●…ime certe dissentimus cum Episcopatum illum mere di●…inum Apostolicum ab humano non quasi sint illa ●…nter se repugnantia sed tantum ut diversa imparis ●…uctoritatis discernimus From which opinion of Zan●…y we doe not dissent nor distinguish between that Apostolicall and meerely Divine Episcopacy from this other which is humane as if they were re●…ugnant one to another but onely diverse and of unequall Authority The same Booke is full of such places Quod si nunc Ecclesiae Anglicanae instauratae c. If the English reformed Churches doe now stand underpropped with the authority of Bishops and Arch-Bishops as it hath come to passe in our memoryes that

it will be pealed into their eares dayly I shall deale more ingenuously with the Observer then he hath done with his Soveraigne to catch here and there at a piece of a Sentence and passe by that as mute as a Fish to which he had nothing to say If His Majesties cleare Demonstrations which to a strong judgement seeme to be written with a beam of the Sun and like the principles of Geometry doe rather compell then perswade did leave any place for further confirmation the Observers silence were sufficient to proclaime them unanswerable There needs no other proofe of His Majestyes Lenity and Goodnesse then this That a Subject dare publish such observations in a Monarchy and maintain argument with his Liege Lord Multa donanda ingeniis sed donanda vitia non portenta sunt He deserveth small pitty who priseth his word more then his Head King Lewes said of some seditious Preachers in France If they tax me in their Pulpits I will send them to preach in another Climate Pollio said of Angustus Non est facile in eum scribere qui potest proscribere The King of the Bees though he want a sting yet is he sufficiently armed with Majesty So should King Charles be to the Observer and his pew-fellowes if they were profitable Bees as they are a nest of Waspes and Hornets I find two branches of this Family I cannot call them the Family of Love as a verse one to another as Sampsons Foxes It is hard to say whether is the ancient House for they both sprung up the one in Spaine the other at Geneva about the same time the yeare 1536. The Captaines of the one are Bellarmine Simancha Mariana c. The chieftains of the other are Beza if it be his Book de jure Magistratus as is believed Buchanan Stephanus Iunius c. The former in favour of the Pope the latter in hatred of the Pope yet both former and latter may rise up in Judgement with our Incendiaries and condemne them for if they had had as gracious a Prince as King Charles they had never broached such tenets to the World I have busied my selfe to find out the Progenitors of these two different Parties and for the former I cannot in probabillity derive them from any other then Pope Zachary Who it seemes as the Oestridge left an egge in the Sand which after a long revolution of time was found and hatched by the care of some Loyolists for thus he in Aventine A Prince is subject to the People by whose benefit he reignes whatsoever Power Riches Glory Dignity he hath he received it from the People Regem Plebs constituit eundem destituere potest As for the latter because I know they will scorn to ascribe their Originall to a Pope I cannot fine one of their Ancestors in all the Church of Christ for fifteen hundred yeares untill I come as high as Saint Iudes dreamers or the Pharisees of whom Iosephus saith that they were a Sect cunning arrogant and opposite to Kings And they have one Pharasaicall virtue in great eminency that is self-love and partiallity to make their own case different from all other mens as may appeare by these particulars First a question is moved concerning the Kings Supremacy in Ecclesiasticall Affaires They give Power to Kings to reforme the Church just as Bellarmine gives to the Pope to depose Princes not certainly but contingently in the case of an ungodly Clergy that is in their sense all other but themselves but if they be once introduced neither King nor Parliament have any more to doe but execute their Decrees then the whole Regiment of the Church is committed by Christ to Pastors Elders and Deacons so Cartwright then Magistrates must remember to subject themselves submit their Scepters thr●…w down their Crownes to the Church and as the Prophet speaketh to lick the dust of the feet of the Church that is of the Presbitery what is this but kissing of the Presbiters toes Secondly where they have hope of the King there the Supreame Magistrate may nay he ought to reforme the Church yea though the Statutes of the Kingdome be against it so say the Authors of the Protestation printed 1605. But what if the King favour them not then he is but a conditionall trustee it belongeth to the States and representative body of the Kingdom but what if the Nobility will not joyne then the People must so said Field since we cannot bring this to passe by Suite or Dispute the People and Multitude must doe it yea though it be with blood as Martin threatens in his Protestation The People saith Buchanan have as much power over Kings as Kings have over particular Persons Nobility saith the Book of Obedience is the Bounty of the People to some Persons for delivering them from Tyrants which prerogative the Children kept by the Peoples negligence And of late have not the Peers been exhorted to mingle themselves with the meanest of the People and for the procuring a parity in the Church to consent to a parity in the State and for the subduing of the pride of Kings for a time to part with the power of Noblemen For a time what 's that that is according to the former Doctrine till the People be pleased out of their Bounty to advance them according to their severall Talents for their zeale to shed the blood of the ungodly The Misery beginns now to open itselfe and I trust will shortly appeare in its right colours By these reverend Fathers I mean the Rabble the Discipline was brought into Genevah it self against the will of the Syndicks and two Councels In illa promiscua colluvie suffragiis fuimus superiores saith Calvin Thus these men make Kings and Nobles but as Counters which stand somtimes for a pound somtimes for a penny pro arbitrio supputantis just like Chawcers Frier he knew how to impose an easy Pennance where he looked for a good Pittance Thirdly the wheele of Heaven hath not yet wound up one thred more of the ●…lew of our Life since we heard nothing but Encomiums of the Law Treason against the Fundamentall Laws and Declarations against Arbitrary Government Now the Law is become a Formallity a Lesbian Rule Arbitrary Government is turned to necessity of State It is not examined what is just or unjust but how the party is affected or disaffected whether the thing be conducible or not conducible to the cause we are governed not by the known Laws and Customs of this Realme but by certain farrfetched dear-bought Conclusions or rather Collusions drawn by unskilfull Empericks without Art or Judgement from the Law of Nature and of Nations which may be good for Ladyes by the Proverbe but not for English Subjects Now are we taught down-right that the Laws of the Land are but mans-inventions morall precepts fitter for Heathens then Christians that we must lead our Lifes according to Gods word as if Gods word and the Law of the Land