Selected quad for the lemma: book_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
book_n	church_n	england_n	homily_n	1,679	5	11.5743	5	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A46951	Julian the apostate being a short account of his life, the sense of the primitive Christians about his succession and their behaviour towards him : together with a comparison of popery and paganism.	Johnson, Samuel, 1649-1703.	1682 (1682)	Wing J829; ESTC R30475	76,426	144

Superstitions Which is so great a Truth and so seasonable and coming from so great a Man that it deserves to be written in Letters of Gold And if Popery be ten times worse than all the Heathenish Superstitions then I am sure we do no worse than the Primitive Christians if we have ten times a greater aversion for a Popish Successor than they had for their Julian And yet if it be but equal I think it will serve the turn and therefore it will be sufficient to prove Popery as bad as Paganism though if in so doing I prove it much worse I cannot help that It would be endless to run through all the particulars of both these Religions and to compare them together I shall chuse therefore to insist upon those things wherein they mainly agree and wherein they are removed at the greatest distance from Christianity and they are Polytheism Idolatry and Cruelty which I shall treat of in order CHAP. X. Their Polytheism WHenever Paganism is named the most obvious thing in it and that which comes first to our Thoughts is the multitude of Gods which they worshipped And that the Papists have herein equalled and out-done the old Pagans I shall first shew is the publick and professed Doctrine of the Church of England And secondly I shall demonstrate the truth of it First That the Papists are gross Polytheists and worship a vast number of false Gods is the publick and professed Doctrine of the Church of England And he that doubts of this never read the Homilies which I shall take this occasion to recommend to every Bodies reading as one of the best Books that I know in the World next the Bible and in the mean time shall set down several passages at large which plainly shew what is the Doctrine of the Church in this point In the third part of the Sermon against Peril of Idolatry you have these words And for that Idolatry standeth chiefly in the mind it shall in this part first be proved that our Image-maintainers have had and have the same Opinions and Judgements of Saints whose Images they have made and worshipped as the Gentiles Idolaters had of their Gods And afterwards shall be declared That our Image-maintainers and worshippers have used and use the same outward Kites of honouring and worshipping their Images as the Gentiles did use before their Idols and that therefore they commit Idolatry as well inwardly and outwardly as did the wicked Gentiles Idolaters And concerning the first part of the Idolatrous Opinions of our Image-maintainers What I pray you he such Saints with us to whom we attribute the defence of certain Countries spoiling God of his due Donour herein but Dii tutelares of the Gentiles Idolaters Such as were Belus to the Babylonians and Assyrians Osiris and Isis to the Egyptians Vulcane to the Lemnians and to such other What be such Saints to whom the safeguard of certain Cities are appointed but Dii Praesides with the Gentiles Idolaters Such as were at Delphos Apollo at Athens Minerva at Carthage Juno at Rome Quirinus c. What be such Saints to whom contrary to the use of the Primitive Church Temples and Churches be builded and Altars erected but Dii Patroni of the Gentiles Idolaters Such as were in the Capitol Jupiter in Paphus Temple Venus in Ephesus Temple Diana and such like Alas we seem in thus thinking and doing to have learned our Religion not out of God's Word but out of the Pagan Poets who say Excessere omnes adytis arisque relictis Dii quibus imperium hoc steterat c. That is to say All the Gods by whose defence this Empire stood are gone out of the Temples and have forsaken their Altars And where one Saint hath Images in divers places the same Saint hath divers names thereof most like to the Gentiles When you hear of our Lady of Walsingham our Lady of Ipswich our Lady of Wilsdon and such other What is it but an imitation of the Gentiles Idolaters Diana Agrotera Diana Coriphea Diana Ephesia c. Venus Cypria Venus Paphia Venus Gnidia Whereby is evidently meant that the Saint for the Image sake should in those places yea in the Images themselves have a dwelling which is the ground of their Idolatry For where no Images be they have no such means Terentius Varro sheweth that there were three hundred Jupiters in his Time there were no fewer Veneres and Dianae we had no fewer Christophers Ladies Mary Magdalenes and other Saints Oenomaus and Hesiodus shew that in their time there were thirty thousand Gods I think we had no fewer Saints to whom we gave the honour due to God And they have not only spoiled the true living God of his due Honour in Temples Cities Countries and Lands by such Devices and Inventions as the Gentiles Idolaters have done before them But the Sea and Waters have as well special Saints with them as they had Gods with the Gentiles Neptune Triton Nereus Castor and Pollux Venus and such other In whole places be come Saint Christopher Saint Clement and divers other and specially our Lady to whom Shipmen sing Ave Maris stella Neither hath the Fire scaped the idolatrous inventions For instead of Vulcan and Vesta the Gentiles Gods of the Fire our men have placed Saint Agatha and make Letters on her day for to quench Fire with Every Artificer and Profession hath his special Saint as a peculiar God As for Example Scholars have Saint Nicholas and Saint Gregory Printers Saint Luke neither lack Souldiers their Mars nor Lovers their Venus amongst Christians All Diseases have their special Saints as Gods the curers of them The Por Saint Roche the Falling Evil Saint Cornelis the 〈◊〉 Saint Appolin c. Neither do Eeasts and 〈◊〉 lack their Gods with us for Saint Loy is the Dorseleech and Saint Anthony the Swineherd c. Where is God's Providence and due Honour in the mean season who saith The Heavens be mine and the Earth is mine c. But we have left him neither Heaven nor Earth nor Water nor Countrey nor City Peace nor War to rule and govern neither Men nor Beasts nor their Diseases to Cure that a Godly man might justly for zealous indignation cry out O Heaven O Earth and Seas what madness and wickedness against God are men fallen into What dishonour do the Creatures to their Creator and Maker And if we remember God sometime yet because we doubt of his Ability or Will to help we joyn to him another Helper as if he were a Noun Adjective using these sayings Such as Learn God and Saint Nicholas be my speed such as Neese God help and Saint John To the Horse God and Saint Loy save thee Thus are we become like Horses and Bules which have no understanding For is there not one God only who by his Power and Wisdom made all things and by his Providence governeth the same and by his goodness maintaineth and faveth them Be not all Things

them he was a Roman And did not he in another place bring the Magistrates of Philippi one of the chief Cities of Macedonia upon their Knees when they had illegally beaten him without a fair Trial by telling them he was a Roman Although it is very plain that he and Silas who suffered with him had really offended as they were accused and were guilty of breaking the Roman Laws yet St. Paul insists upon this that they were uncondemned It were easie to produce many more passages to the same purpose And then as for the Laws of the Land That Doctrine overthrows Magna Charta Chap. 29. together with multitudes of Statutes and ruled Cases which as I cannot stand here to name so I need not they are so well known Only I will set down one Case for the 〈◊〉 of it which comprises in it more than all that I have said In the Circuit of Northampton when the Lord Anderson and Glanvile were Justices of Assize a Pursivant was sent by the Commissioners to arrest the Body of a man to appear before them and in resistance of the Arrest and striving amongst them the Pursivant was killed And if this was Murder or not was doubted and this depended upon the validity of Power and authority of the Pursivant for if his authority was lawful then in killing of an Officer of Justice in execution of his Office is Murder And advisement was taken till the next Assizes and upon Conference at the next Assizes it was resolved that the Arrest was Tortius and by consequence that this was not Murder The Pursivant was a proper Officer of the High Commission Court he was sent by the Court to make this Arrest it was one of the Powers of their Commission to send for any by Pursivant c. And yet because this Power had no foundation upon the Act 1. Eliz. upon which their Commission was grounded it could not justifie the Arrest and consequently the Pursivant's Blood was upon his own Head For as every Subject ought to be and therefore is supposed to be connusant of the Law much more ought they to be who have any part in the execution of it Now any man may see that my Discourse does not descend to any such petty Matters as false Arrests though a Man's Liberty is not to be despised neither but I have honest'y and legally parsued the end of our Saviour's coming into the World which as himself witnesses was not to destroy Men's Lives but to save them Of which the Laws of the Land are likewise very tender and have taken a particular care of all those who are put upon an inevitable necessity of defending themselves against the assaults of violent or evil-disposed Persons And to conclude That Doctrine quite alters our Oath of Allegiance and gives us new Measures of Obedience whereas the old ones are these I shall be obedient to all the King's Majesty's Laws Precepts and Process proceeding from the same And then after all that the case of a Pagan Successor might not seem remote and foreign and nothing of kin to Popery I found it necessary to make a short comparison of both those Religions which though an unfinish'd Piece I will be bold to say is very like wherein Popery may see her self neither flattered nor disfigured The Church of England reserves her Faith entire for the Canonical Books of Scripture her Reverence she divides betwixt the Ancient Fathers and the first Reformers of this Church who partly were Martyrs that died for 〈◊〉 Protestant Religion and partly were 〈◊〉 that afterwards setled it as it is now 〈◊〉 How much the Fathers would have been for a Bill of Exclusion we have seen already I shall in a word or two shew you the sense of the other Every Body knows that King Edward the Sixth to prevent his 〈◊〉 Sister from succeeding and not having time to call a Parliament bequeathed his Kingdom by Will to the Lady Jane Gray which was confirmed by the Privy Council It signified nothing indeed because it could not make void an Act of Succession in Henry the Eighth's Time but by doing that nothing they shewed what they would have done if they could I need not 〈◊〉 what Bishops were concern'd nor how far they were concerned in that Business But to pass by that the Bishops in Queen Elizabeth's Time to whom under God and that Queen we owe the settlement of our Church concurred to the making of that Statute 13. Eliz. Ch. 1. which makes it High Treason in her Reign and forfeiture of Goods and Chattels ever aster in any wise to hold or 〈◊〉 That an Act of Parliament is not of sufficient Force and Validity to limit and bind the Crown of this Realm and the Descent Limitation Inheritance and Government thereof And when you see their Names you will find that very many of them were Confessors Canterbury Matt. Parker London Edwyn Sands Durham James Pilkinton Winchester Robert Horne 〈◊〉 John Scory Worcester Nicholas Bullingham Lincoln Tho. Cooper Salisbury John Jewel St. Dabids Richard Davies Rochester Edmund Guest Norwich John Parkhurst Carlisle John Best Chester John Downham Alaph Glocester Richard Cheyney Bangor Nicolas Robinson Landaff Hugh Jones And that these Bishops were active and zealous for such Acts as these and were not concluded by a majority of the other Lords appears by what they did accor ing to some this Parliament but as Sir Simon D'Ewes will have it the next Year in relation to the Queen of Scots I am not satisfied with Sir Simon 's Reason which is That there was nothing moved about the Queen of Scots in the 13th of Eliz. For Cambden says There was a Bill for making her lyable to be tryed as the Wife of a Peer of England if hereafter she offended against the Laws which the Queen hindred from passing into an Act. I should not have mentioned this but by Sir Simon 's Account we lose John Jewel who died in the Interval betwixt this and the next Parliament But still there are Worthies enough left who were excluders with a witness for they were for excluding Mary Queen of Scots the next Heir to the Crown not only from the Succession but out of the World As you may see by their Writing intituled Reasons to prove the Queen's Majesty bound in Conscience to proceed with severity in this Case of the late Queen of Scots Some of which I will here set down only to invite the Reader to peruse the whole Paper Every good Prince ought by God's Commandment to punish even with Death all such as do seek to seduce the people of God from his true Worship unto Superstition and Idolatry For that Offence God hath always most grievously punished as committed against the First Table Deut. 13. His words are these If thy Brother the Son of thy Mother or thine own Son or thy Daughter c. Here you may perceive that God willeth his