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Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
book_n	call_v	church_n	name_n	2,690	5	5.0077	4	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A80418	A coole conference between the Scottish commissioners cleared reformation, and the Holland ministers apologeticall narration, brought together by a well-willer to both.		1644 (1644)	Wing C6045; Thomason E35_15; ESTC R19126	16,004	18

A COOLE CONFERENCE Between the Scottish Commissioners Cleared Reformation and the Holland Ministers Apologeticall Narration brought together by a well-willer to both 1644. REformat Whilest we the meanest of many c. wait for uniformity in Religion so much desired by all the Godly in the three Kingdoms unto which an entrance is made by a solemn League and Covenant Apologet. We approve worthy brethren your expectation as just and confesse our own desires of it so as Reformation be not taken indebite in a strict stinted sence but according to your latitude expressed pag. 15. We are say you neither so ignorant nor so arrogant as to ascribe to the Church of Scotland it s your own phrase such absolute purity and perfection as hath not need or cannot admit of further Reformation So you A golden peace signifying speech as if dropped from the mouth of some Chrysostome or conceived by some Ireneus pluck you that end and we the other likewise and we shall be fastned with a Cordian knot Of which our endeavour you have a full testimony in our League and Covenant wherein we swear to indeavour the preservation of the reformed Religion in Scotland we say of Religion and Reformed is or shall be and till further reformation we will preserve it against our common enemie that you be not made to retreat from that you have wonne And that we will indeavour the reformation of Religion in the Kingdoms of England and Ireland in doctrine worship discipline and government according to the Word of God the example of the best reformed Churches So farre the Covenant Wherein it is as evident as if written with a Sunne beame that the Churches of England have not ingaged themselves to come down to you or do bind you to come to us but the common rendevous where we must all meet is the best ref●●●ed Churches and that according to the word of God which is that Standard of perfection that must weigh and measure out unto us our uniformity Reformat We find our selves bound against the prejudices and mistakings of some who in the dark are afraid of that which they know not and suffer their affections of love and hatred to run before their understanding and against the mis-representations and indirect aspersions of others who do so commend their own way that the reformed Churches thereby suffer disparagement to give that testimony unto the order and government of the reformed Churches and particularly of the Church of Scotland which they do well deserve Apologet. Ah deare brethren why would ye speak thus Do these expressions in the judgement of candor suit with your profession pag. 2. where you promise that you indeavour nothing but a simple and innocent manifestation and defence without desire or intention to give the smallest offence to any who fear God love the truth and c. So you Let an impartiall Angel speak whether multitudes of gracious hearts are not justly offended at this bitternesse so unseasonably administred and applied too to wrong parties Ah how easie is it by our self-mistasting hearts like the sorry Artificer that makes two cracks whiles he is patching and hammering up one rather to cause prejudices then cure them You may be confident let all the world look upon the Apologie and judge that the five Members of the Assembly cast no prejudices upon you to whom you have so hastily replied And for private barkings of inconsiderate and inconsiderable men they are either unknown or un-owned as is supposed by men of your gravitie All wise men generally are silently intentive expecting not paper replyes but disputed Positions from the Assembly grounded on Scripture And therefore this paper comes abroad onely to beseech that on either side there may be committed no more breaches of the peace Ecclesiastick and to leave the Apologie if it may be under the same candid opinion that rayed forth upon it afore this cloud came and interposed Sure if the Houses of So the Ordinance for the Assembly p. 5. Parliament allow any of the Assembly differing in opinion touching the matters proposed to them whereof Discipline is one to present their judgements with their reasons unto the said Houses you cannot judge it a crime to send forth a prodromum presented to the Parliament to tell them and you how farre they close with you and other reformed Churches and dissent from the Separation and Brownists And therefore have not deserved to be whipt with a reply Pardon the phrase for indeed it is a smart stroke upon the spirits of understanding men and standing forth in and for a publick Ecclesiasticall cause to be taxed for those who in the dark are afraid of that which they know not and to suffer their affections c. to run before their understanding c. Sweet brethren do you call your books frequent among us the government of the Church of Scotland the Assertion of your government the peaceable Plea darknesse Or do you think that the Elders of the Quinque Ecclesiae or others that study Discipline to be dark Are we not morall men voluntas vult ut intellectus intelligit to understand first and affect after Or wherein hath appeared this preposterousnesse towards you whiles the Apologie smiles upon you and sweetly cals you and Holland by name the more reformed Churches Apol p 6. do you give them one such a kind word in all your Reply And more then that you call not your selves confessing a need of further Reformation as we noted and quoted afore If then they have commended your Churches according to your own judgements of your selves how hath their commendation of other Churches appeared to discommend yours especially whiles they commend not their own for so perfect but that they found a necessity of holding this for one of their three rules by which they walked in these words Not to make our present judgement and practise a Apol. p. 10. 11. binding law unto our selves for future which we likewise made continuall profession of upon all occasions We had too great an instance of our own frailty in the former way of conformity and therefore in a jealousie of our selves we kept this reserve which we made open and constant professions of to alter and retract though not lightly what ever should be discovered to be taken up out of a misunderstanding of the rule So far the Apolog. There is yet one thing more that makes the Apologists more confident of their candor in that it received so great an approbation from so pious and learned a man of your judgement and a Member of the Assembly As on the other side though the Assembly voted you thanks yet was it onely for the books you gave them not for the Reply as it was expresse to that effect in the vote if observation fail not Reformat pag. 2. Our wayes since our coming into this Kingdom have been and so farre as the truth will suffer us ever shall be

first yet afterwards were of greater number in one City then did or could ordinarily assemble in one place for the worship of God and therefore had a plurality of Pastors and Officers which made a common Presbytery for governing the whole Apologet. These words makes a speech of a Judge at an Assizes touching Lent-fastings to come to mind Who said that he could prove that Lent-fastings were of Apostolicall institution for the last six hundred yeers Whereupon one standing by said to another of his friends That all the craft and cunning lay in this for the Judge to prove it to be Apostolicall for the first six hundred yeers or the first hundred or first f●urty yeers But to return to the Apologie whose words are milde and soft but as wooll-packs deadning Cannon shot that the bullets can do no hurt can make no battery We could not Apol. p. 13. saith the Apologie but imagine that the first Churches planted by the Apostles were ordinarily of no more in one City at first then might make Observe that the same argument that is urged to prove a Presbytery was formerly urged by the Bishops to prove an Episcopacy up one entire congregation ruled by their own Elders that also preached to them For that in every City where they came the number of converts did or should arise to such a multitude as to make severall and sundrie Congregations or that the Apostles should stay the setting up of any Churches at all untill they rose to such a numerous multiplication as might make such a Presbyteri●ll combination we did not imagine We found also the Nonconformists in their answer to the arguments used for Episcopall government over many Churches brought from the instances of the multitudes of beleevers at Jerusalem and other places and Cities mentioned in the New Testament to assert that it could not be infallibly proved that any of those we read of in the Acts or elsewhere were yet so numerous as necessarily to exceed the limits of one particular Congregation in those first times So the Apologie The word afterwards hath a large extent and therefore d●●h no● punctually tell us whether you mean after the Apostles ti●es or when and therefore doth nothing weaken the Apo●●●●i● and so you and we must leave it as we found it unblemished in this as the rest which is the onely designe in this paper leaving it to disputation to be discussed out Reformat pag. 13. To a●●uch when we are not challenged that we 〈…〉 to the Magistrate then the reformed Churches do they being 〈…〉 their own principles of Ecclesiasticall government may suffer a 〈◊〉 ●●●st●uction then we our selves would willingly undergo or put upon the intentions of men who seek not their own things but the things of Jesus Christ Apolog. Let the world judge whether the Apologizers and those of their judgements were not challenged when the Peaceable Plea cals them not onely in the book but in the title of the book in the face of the world Independents Which the Apologie could not but upon just grounds count as a proud and insolent title for any Apol p 23. to assume and as a trumpet of defiance against what ever power Spirituall or Civill from them that should be conceived to own it and therfore do in expresse words there abhor it and detest it that Churches and Magistrates should not loose the true face of their judgement in such a swelling title For if upon a grosse errour of Ref●rm p. 23. C●●●ule Bez●m de Haereticis a civili Magistr pu●●●ndis an another Church they dare exercise onely a non communion with it which after you call no authoritie then there is more left for the Magistrate to do then when you have excommunicated it which you call there your power So likewise when a classicall Presbyterie of many Ministers and lay-men and those of great place and power in the Common-wealth shall authoritatively rule all matters of sixtie or an hundred Parishes that are but mixtly Ecclesiasticall but partly secular or civill if some of them not so altogether one would think now that here were left lesse to the Magistrate then when every one of those severall Parishes regularly gathered into a Church way do meddle with nothing as Churches but things purely Ecclesiasticall leaving the rest to the Magistrate who is the civill power over them all We give for the present some small instance to take off the prejudices of us that may be instilled into the minds of civill power by the abhorred name of Independancy and not to bring any or their way into an odium with any as we hope they in their books that have so oft up the names of Separation Brownisme Independancy Popular Anarchie c. do not intend to render us odious For till Church government be clearly discussed according to the Scriptures the scale is even which side to use your own words doth most imitate the Pagans and Infidels of old the Papists Prelates and Arminians Reform p. 13. of late to make the way of Christ hatefull to Princes and Magistrates And till it doth appear whose principles are closest to the rule of the Word all will say in your phrase that they give fully as much as any to the Magistrate as God in his Word giveth them and so cannot be more or lesse And for our own parts to wash our own hearts from finister intentions we wish a curse upon those designes that shall flatter men to facilitate a forming and winding in of a Discipline that shall not be the closest to the Scriptures Reformat pag. 17. No sooner is the Prelaticall party by the power and blessing of God begun to be subdued in this Island but ariseth unexpectedly the opposition on the other hand waiting the opportunity stronger then it was before which moved some of our Divines of late to write on this hand in defence of the government of the reformed Churches as others had done before them in other Churches In France Beza against Morelius Sadeel Two Nationall Synods also of the reformed Churches in France the one at Orleans 1561. Another at Rochel 1571. Apolog. It should seem by your own quotations here that long before your No sooner c. not staying to wait this opportunitie learned and godly men have written neer an hundred yeers since against Classicall Presbyteries and for Congregationall Churches Besides those many worthy famous men which you quote with honour in your Peaceable Plea As for Mr. Beza against Morelius Sadeel his Tract is not at hand and therefore we cannot now speak to it particularly But this ●ou know that an honest Aeriu● a Presbyter is condemned by a pi●●s and learned Epiph●nius as guiltie of heresie for saying that a B●●hop did not differ from a Presbyter but that a Presbyter was as high in dignity and order as the Bishop * Quid est Episcopus ad Presbyterum Nihil hic differt ab illo unus enim