Selected quad for the lemma: book_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
book_n	david_n	king_n	saul_n	1,839	5	10.0881	5	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A50102	The case of allegiance in our present circumstances consider'd in a letter from a minister in the city to a minister in the country.	Masters, Samuel, 1645 or 6-1693.	1689 (1689)	Wing M1067; ESTC R7622	29,404	42

Argument from this Declaration is of more force as it pleads the judgment and determination of our Legislators which will therefore deserve to be more attentively consider'd I acknowledg that this Form was intended in direct opposition to the Rebellious principles and practices of the times immediately preceding and must conclude that according to the judgment of this Parliament King Charles the I. did never de jure fall from his Regal Right and that consequently the War his Subjects wag'd against him was a Rebellion and the positions on which they proceeded were traiterous and that it is not lawful upon pretence of his Authority or any other pretence whatsoever to take Arms against his person who continues to be de jure King In all which the Parliament doth declare no defensive Resistance to be unlawful which was not always so nor condemn any positions which are not in themselves antecedently traiterous and whoever thinks that they intended more must suppose that that Parliament alter'd the Constitutions of our English Government and did by apparent consequence expose the Nation to utter Destruction And if any of us in subscribing the Declaration had any other apprehensions of it we may and I think we should renounce and condemn them 3. Let us in the last place consider how this resolution will agree with the received Principles and Doctrines of the Church of England We need not I know profess so high a regard for our Church as to think any doctrine upon her sole Authority to be a Sufficient rule of our Faith or Conscience and yet it cannot misbecome us to pay so great a deference to he Judgment as never to depart from it without great regret But upon second thoughts I find we shall be under no necessity of doing so for tho there have been for some time a party among us who have appropriated to themselves the Church of England exclusive of their brethren yet if we extend her Arms wide enough to embrace all her genuine children since the Reformation we shall find enough on our side to justifie our doctrines to be consistent with her principles Her Homilies no where that I know of assert the Errors I have here condemned or condemn any of the positions I have here asserted The Homilies of Obedience teach us to Submit to lawful Authority and to know our bounden duties to common Authority but they teach us no loyalty beside or contrary to law The Homilies against Rebellion are particularly designed against the Papists whose Rebellion was the occasion upon which they were written and tho they teach us not to resist our Prince if his Government be legal however contrary to our Religion or any other interests yet they no where forbid a defensive resistance against illegal oppressions which threaten an inevitable ruin to our Country Hom. of Obed. pag. 75. for they describe the Rebellion they condemn to be no other then resisting or withstanding common Authority And that the principles of loyalty which obtained in the Church at that time were no other then I have been now asserting we may easily satisfie our selves from that form of Prayer they are charged with by the Parliament in Queen Mary's reign that God would turn her heart from Idolatry to the true Faith or else shorten her dayes and take her quickly out of the way Sr. Simon D'-Ewes journall p. 207. Also from tne Reasons which the Bishops presented to Queen Elizabeth to prove that she ought to take away the life of Mary Queen of Scots because an Enemy to their Religion and Country tho the next Heiress of the Crown as Constantine did of Licinius his fellow Emperour because he was an Enemy of the Empire and of the Christan Religion And to such as might object against their Reasons and advice they thus replie If our danger be joyn'd with the danger of our Gracious Soveraign and natural Country we see not how we can be accounted godly Bishops or faithful Subjects if in common peril we should not cry out give warning Or on the other hand how they can be thought to have true hearts toward God and toward their Prince and Country that will mislike our so doing and seek thereby to discredit us We may also know their principles in the present case from the Subsidies which the C●ergy gave to the Queen in several Convocations in the fifth thirty fifth and forty third years of her Reign for her maintaining and assisting the Scotch French and Dutch in their defence of their Liberties and Religion against the injust oppressions of their Princes as may be collected out of the preambles of those Subsidy Acts. And if it were not too tedious this might be fully attested out of the writings of such Bishops as were most eminent in those times Bishop Jewel speaking of Luther Def. of Apol. p. 16. Melancthon c. hath these words They do not teach the people to rebel against their Prince but only to defend themselves by all lawful means against oppression as did David against King Saul and so do the Nobles in France at this day They seek not to kill but to save their own lives as they have openly protested by publick writing to the world Bishop Bilson in his book of the true difference between Christian subjection and Unchristan Rebellion dedicated to Queen Elizaheth P. 520. Edit 1585. thus gives his Judgment concerning that defensive Resistance which the Hugonots used against the injust oppressions of their King. I will not Saith he rashly pronounce all that resist to be Rebels Cases may fall out in Christian Kingdoms where the people may plead their Right against the Prince and not be charged with Rebellion As for example if a Prince should go about to subject his Kingdom to a forreign Realm or change the form of the Comonwealth from Empire to Tyranny or neglect the Laws established by common consent of Prince and People to execute his own pleasure In these and other cases which might be named if the Nobles and Commons joyn together to defend their Ancient and accustomed Liberty Regiment and Laws they may not well be counted Rebels In the next Reign In hoc causa eorum a Veteris Ecclesiae ratione distinguenda est c. Dem. Anti. c. 17. p. 91. c. we have the judgment of Abbot Bishop of Salisbury that the Case of the Primitive Christians and of us differs in this that they had no legal Right for their Religion but were subject to the meer pleasure of the Government And while it was so Christians did suffer themselves to be kill'd and kill'd none in their own defence but when under Constantine the Emperour they had the Laws on their side Non tam caedebantur quam caedebant they did not so much yield up themselves to be kill'd as allow themselves to kill others in their just defence Such were the principles of the Church of England in the Reign of Queen Elizabeth