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	true_a	2,893	5	5.1810	4	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A92025	A reply to the answer of Anonymus to Doctor Gauden's Analysis of the sense of the covenant: and under that, to a later tract of one Mr Zach. Crofton of the same fraternity with him. By John Rowland Oxoniensis, CCC. Rector of Footscray in Kent.	Rowland, John, 1606-1660.	1660 (1660)	Wing R2070; Thomason E1038_4; ESTC R207862	40,193	52

himself had made with them in Horeb and mount Sinai punctually prescribed to God to Moses and by Moses as the supream Governor or King imposed upon them but this was not the case of the Church of England nor was there need of such a Covenant or any Moses c. as chief Governor commanding it Here you keep a fearful quoil and whiffle about making a great cry but there is little wooll calling the Doctor Deceiver Reviler and that in his Writings there are falshoods enough and yet shew none First you say it is false that there was no Covenant but of Gods own prescribing and secondly that he prescribed but one I do not finde that the Doctor saith any such thing for ho quoted that spontaneous Vow Numb 30.2 You are still fighting with your own shadow yet you must say something lest the Reader should think you were at a non-plus as Sergeant Green did who would undertake to overthrow all Episcopacy but being worsted by the learned Selden cryed out But Archbishops are no Bishops then said Selden Judges are no Lawyers and Aldermen no Citizens You instance in the Covenant of Moses and the Princes of the Congregation with the cheating Gibeonites as you call them Josh 9.15 But there was Moses the chief whose consent you never had and therefore are less excusable than the Gibeonites were But because you are so much taken with the Gibeonites example and bring it in so often as if it served your turn well I shall say more to it when I meet with it again The chief Covenant indeed was that which God made with his people upon mount Sinai and all lawfull Covenants which man makes with God are but branches of that as when we renew our obedience by serious repentance as the children of Israel and the children of Judah did vowing to keep Gods Commandments But I know not that God gave you any such command to vow against Episcopacy and I doubt you never asked his counsel when you entred into it what ever your heady zeal might suggest to you for it is not a good intention fi we may be so charitable as to think you intended no harm it that makes a good action but you must have sufficient warrant for it from Gods word shew but that and we have done It is false that the Covenant was imposed by Moses or that Moses was supream Governor for Moses was no more supream Governor or King than Samuel You love to move questions Samuel no doubt whilest he was the sole Judge over Israel was their supream Governour until Saul was anointed King But Samuel was never in Scripture called King as Moses was as King in Jesurun The like blustering he keeps who imposed the Covenant of the Law God or Moses Doubtless God principally but ministerially it was done by the hand of Moses this is to amuse his Covenanters and such as will be taken with shadows for what of all this here is great stir to little purpose unless you wil conclude aright as you should do the King in his kingdom is next under God as Moses amongst the Israelites and his subjects must be guided directed by him He blesseth God as one would bless an idol That Apostacy to strange gods was not the Church of Englands case that they should enter into a Covenant Tell me what meant the falling off of several Bishops to too much Popery in doctrine witness all their Arminian Tenents and also their general practice in Cathedrals and elsewhere seiting up Altars Tapers Candles c. devised by mans fancies which last is with many other things in the Queens Injunctions Injunct 3. affirmed to tend to idolatry and superstition c. the like may be said of Church Musick Anthems c. a thing which the judicious Hooker censured and condemned and the late Queen Elizabeth provided against Injunct 49. and if any Hymn were sung care must be taken that it be so done as to be understood and perceived and where this is not so done see the Censure of the Homily of the place and time of Prayer Part 2. To answer to every particular would require a large volumn but you have answered your self and justified the Doctor that Apostacy to strange gods was not the Church of Englands Case You quote judicious Hooker condemning something let him be the Umpire if you please between the Bishops and the Presbyters and you say Queen Elizabeths Injunctions have made provision against such things and the Books of Homilies condemns other things well what would you have then you see there is good provision made against all exorbitancies in Ceremonies and the Doctrine of the Church of England is comprehended in the 39 Articles if any man have transgressed and done more then he can answer he is lyable to be questioned for it and I think so may you for your contempt and covenanting contrary to all former Laws or Examples only what you have labored to procure since for your own security As for Popish families crept into England with swarms of Priests and Jesuites There have more crept in since these civil Wars began with your Covenant than ever were since the Reformation yet you would charge all upon the Bishops The Lawes made against Priests and Jesuits were they put in practice were good enough and had there been as good provision made against your Covenanting it had bin well for the Church of England You are very pettish because the Doctor speaks what others believe to be true that the Covenant was but the petty composition of a few politick men c. Lawyers or Ministers no great Clerks or Statesmen c. adding that their heads rather than their hearts and State-correspondencies more than their Consciences brought it forth we finde a great deal of pretended zeal in it but he that shall use St. Pauls 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and hold it against the Sun shall quickly perceive many flaws and foul spots that it hath and besides the rottenness of their hearts the idleness of their heads that made it by mustering up clean and unclean together making no difference betwixt things lawful and those that are forbidden by the Law of God The Doctor said There is no pattern for any such Covenant in the New Testament nor in all succeeding ages c. no Covenanting Christians until the holy League meaning say you that of the bloody Papists to destrey the Hugonots so they termed the Protestants in France that is but an ill president for you to follow except that of Baptism the new and Evangelical Covenant of all true Christians You answer If there were no Precept nor Pattern in the New Testament it is sufficient if there be any in the Old if not Levitical or meerly typical unless the Doctor be turned An inomian I wish you were as sound in both Testaments as the Doctor is The Evangelical Covenant of Baptism in the New Testament is vastly different indeed from your Scorch Covenant

absence did you not drive him away with your popular Tumults and all the affronts you could or then durst put upon him and what ail you to produce such impertinent proofs of Ezra and Nehemiah saying That they made a Covenant without special Commission from the Persian Monarchy The Tezt is clear that they were more obedient to the Heathen Persian Monarchy than you have been to King Charles a pious Christian King and shall rise up in judgement against you for they asked leave and had their Commissions granted from Cyrus and Artaxerxes to do what they could for the service of the most High God and to build his Temple but you took leave without his consent to dishonor God and defile his Temples had Ezra and Nehemiah for all their Commissions for Gods service entred into a Covenant to have taken up arms and to have destroyed the idolatrous priests in Babylon as you did to destroy a Christian well-ordered Church-Government here and those that were better Christians than your selves you may be assured the Persian Monarchy would never have endured such Rebellion against them Whether his late Majesty did ever command the renouncing of your Solemn League and Covenant as you say he did not I cannot tell or whether there were any Proclamation or Declaration against it yet as I remember there was but be it so or so it is all a case with you He did publish a Proclamation June 21. 1643. against that other Vow and Covenant which was about that time taken by the Lords and Commons and by them appointed to be takeu by every man in the Cities of London and Westminster and suburbs thereof and through the whole kingdom the administring and taking whereof by such as had not taken it were by that Proclamation and the reasons therein contained forbidden c. It should seem that your Solemn League Covenant was taken by both Kingdoms Sept. 11. 1643. but it is very strange that both Kingdoms should take it in one day you made haste for fear of the Kings Proclamation to forbid it but that is most for your purpose because there was no Proclamation against that yet they that had taken the former Covenant were not forbidden by the Proclamation because the Proclamation came too late and they had taken it before it came I doubt not but the reasons therein contained were sufficient to convince them who had taken it before that they had not done well in taking it without the Kings consent and will you tye them that had taken that Covenant which was forbidden by the King afterwards as well as you do to the Solemn League and Covenant supposing they may one contradict the other but if they were both of the same mettal certainly the Kings Proclamation that forbad the one did expresly forbid the other and argues you to have proceeded to a great height of impudence that durst go on further being forbidden by him and you hold those that took the Covenant after the Proclamation as much bound to perform it as those that took it before for you say in many places that the Kings consent is neither necessary nor requisite nor is there any example in Scripture for it and to what end then do you make such a stir about the reprinting of this Covenant without warrant you mean your warrant by one who was an enemy to the other Solemn League and Covenant to one as well as the other as if it had been an interdicting and prohibiting of those that had taken it to perform it To retort your own words upon you This is but a meer cheating and gullery of yours of which it behooves all honest men and sober Christians to take heed and beware Nor are Oathes and Covenants once solemnly taken to be cast off and disclaimed upon any pretence whatsoever be there never so many defects and failings in the imposing or making of them unless the matter of them be sinful as the Jews was to kill Paul Acts 23.14 You say you have said enough already and too much too I think to little purpose for you run round in a circle until your brains are giddy and know not what you say Those that took the Covenant before the Kings Proclamation are bound to perform it and those that took it after the Kings Proclamation are bound to perform it what then do you talk of the Kings Proclamation all the question is if the matter of the Covenant be sinful and in some clauses of it you need not question that for we have proved that already whatsoever saered Title you bestow upon it But your absurdity for want of the Kings consent you would make up by a Book you say you since met withal concerning the Oathes of Supremacy and Allegiance which have been laid aside so many years It s true they have been laid aside ever since the Covenant justled them out of doors but I pray by whom but by those that were perverted by your Covenant Now you would apply the words of that Book to your purpose which as well fit you as a sowe doth a saddle The words are That though there be many infirmities and misearriages committed in the making and taking of publick Oathes c. yet no pretence can make such Oathes void c. Those Oathes I say were confirmed by King and Parliament and the matter of them is just and equal which your Covenant wants and there were so many infirmities in the contriving pressing and taking of it that many wise men held it utterly unlawful to be taken at all and that those that did take it should repent of their errour being restrained by the Law of God and man from the performance of it The reasons you say alledged by the University of Oxford in a full Convocation June 1. 1647. why they could not take this Covenant and another Negative Oath no way concern the present Case for those reasons tend onely to their own justification for their not taking of the Covenant then tendred to them but not to fall upon others who had already taken it What irrational evasions are you forced to They that took it are bound to perform it but the University of Oxford had reasons to justifie them why they should not take it was it not calculated for the Meridian of Oxford if it had been lawful what reasons could they have to justifie them more than the other Subjects had so then it seems some simple Proselytes that you made because they wanted reason to defend themselves are hampered in your net and there they must stay upon pain of hell fire and eternal damnation I have heard of a fool tied by the leg with a pack-thread who would stand and roar and cry as if he had been bound with iron bonds You strain at a gnat and swallow a camel you that were bound with legal Oathes before as strong as the wit of man could devise and snapt them asunder as if it had been but a twine