Selected quad for the lemma: book_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
book_n	holy_a	read_v	scripture_n	8,342	5	5.9261	4	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A26757	The confession of the faithfull witnesse of Christ, Mr. John Bastwick doctor of physick wherein he doth declare his education and the grounds of his conversion and constancie, in the true professions of Faith : with the reasons wherefore hee became an adversary to our bishops whom he proveth to be the toes of antichrist and dangerous prelates to abide in our church : with a relation of their great pride in setting the kings picture over their dresser in the high commission court, with his hat off and his crown and scepter laid downe before their worships like a delinquent / by Iohn Bastwick...	Bastwick, John, 1593-1654.	1641 (1641)	Wing B1059; ESTC R1532	6,239	9

authority and barbarously reviled me for my paines most impiously likewise vilified the holy Scripture saying in their Sessions that they looked for some great matter in my book finding me so confident but more diligently reading of it they found nothing but Scripture in it which was the refuge of all Schismaticks and Hereticks and that the Scripture could not be known to be Scripture but by the Fathers nor distinguished from the Apocrypha but by the Fathers nor the meaning of the Scripture could not be known but by the Fathers and because the Fathers as they said were in their interpretation diverse from mee which notwithstanding is not so therefore they condemned me But I pray are not all these blasphemous Popish and Damnable assertions could worse have b●n forged in the very conclave of hell Is not this I pray you to tell the spirit of God to his face he lyes and to teach another way to heaven then by the Scripture which Christ the Son of God sende●h us to and all the Prophets and Apostles as to the Instructers of the simple and able to make the man of God wise to salvation perfectly furnished to every good work and the which the holy Ghost compares to a Guide a Lanthorn for direction and a light to conduct us in this our Pilgrimage peregrination through the errors of the world and to keepe our feet in the paths of truth and with the Prelates this great and glorious light this Scripture must be so obscure as it must be inferior to all things that have a power in themselves to declare and demonstrate their own nature as fire to be fire gold to be gold light to be light But the Scripture onely that cannot be known but by the helpe of others to be the Word of God it cannot be the word of God without the Fathers and their Interpretation of them for the Scriptures themselves they are the onely refuge of Schismaticks the cause of all errors and that that commeth confirmed and proved onely from Scripture is ever to be suspected with the Prelates O Blasphemy yea the booke that hath nothing but Scripture must be adjudged to the fire and the Author of it given over to the Divell fined 1000 ls and cenfured to pay the costs of sute be debarred of his practice only support left for the reliefe of his distressed family to the utter undoing of him his poore wife and children and all this for sooth because there was nothing but Scripture in it O horrible Impiety The truth is howsoever they seemed to condemn it because it had nothing but Scripture that was not the occasion but the very cause was because I writ against the Pope Father Antichrist such correspondency there is now betweene the Pope and the Prelates that one cannot write against him but the Prelates say by and by that they are meant by it The Grolls IT is worth the looking on to see the pride of the Prelates in setting the Kings picture over their dresser in the high Commission Court for they have placed his Highnes standing with his hat off before their Worships like a delinquent his Crown Soepter laid low as the poore Emperors and Kings were wout to stand before his impiety the Pope when they were cited to his Courts Of which stories you may read many in King James his Apologie to goe no farther and in this very manner have they set up the Portraits of our renowned King And the very intrinsecall Marry-bone of the matter is they trample upon his Imperiall dignity while they seeme to honour him with whom they make themselves in the meane time Ch●ckmates for they say they were before Christian Kings and had their thrones and that they were not beholding to them for their Honour and Dignity of Episcopality for they were Jure Divino that they were FINIS

more an other and whether they be their own or others Servants when they are in their company be they the nobles themselves they are all their attendants and the best of them most heartily glad if by their service they can please them and we know it usuall that the demonstration of the retinu is always from the greatest and they are found to be his followers And I have heard the Pursivants often brag of the greatnesse of their Masters attendance and in such ample manner as I think the Kings Majesty hath not commonly greater and therefore that cannot be denyed which is daily practised And for their servants insolency I have frequently both seene it and felt it Now whereas you think it will not be well taken that I call Bishops Priests and Deacons Antichrists little toes and in my LETANY desire deliverance from them and withall seeme to accuse them of incontinency all which you think will be censured of unadvisednesse at least if not thought scandalous and punishable To this I answere first that By Bishops I understand the Prelates and by Priests their own creatures a generation unknown in the Church of Christ and by Deacons the under Priests in this Kingdome Officers of which the Scripture knoweth nothing likewise For the Deacons such as the Churches chose and were allowed by the Apostles they were men of gravity full of faith and the Holy Ghost men of wisdome and good government and honesty and were the treasurers of the faithfull the Church of God and distributed the liberality of the Saints amongst the poore indigent and necessitated brethren Now I know never a Deacon in England either guilty of any of those vertues before specified or that was ever imployed in that Office or was thought fit to be trusted vvith the treasury of the poore or tooke the least care of them vvhom ordinarily they trample upon und most reproachfully abuse vvith the name of rascality So that such Deacons as I pray against are limbs of the Beast and the inferior order of shavelings and such as ought to be spewed out of the Church as profitable for nothing but increase of wickednesse And for Bishops such as God appointed I honour them and will maintain their dignity to the last drop of my bloud so far I am from praying against such Neither did I ever speake unreverently against the Kings Bishops and those that were appointed as an order in the State till they had in their open Court renounced his authority run themselves by that and many other notorious proceedings into a Primunire so had made themselves enimies to his Prerogative royall delinquents against his Majesty and under his Highnesses displeasure as by the ●tatutes of the Kingdome they are proclamed to be and by the defenders of their proceedings in their Ecclesiasticall Courts who in a booke set forth by their common consent do conclude all these in a Premunire that challenge their authority Iure devino as the Pope and Clergie of Rome which at this time they doe And for your better satisfaction looke in the Apologie for proceedings in Courts Ecclesiasticall a booke made by the Prelates own creatures and in the first Chapter you shall see all the Prelats by their own witnesse in a Premunire and delinquents against his Majesty in a high degree of contumacy And truly I think there was never such an affront put upon regall Dignity as on that day I was censured never such dishonour put upon the Scriptures by such as would be thought Ministers of the word and the Bishops and Pastors of Christ Neither were the Scriptures ever more blasphemously abused then they were at that time in their open assembly I shall briefely therefore tell you that dayes work of which there are a thousand witnesses as also impious words against the most sacred word of God and divine Oracles of holy writ by all which you will see I have good reason to call them ANTICHRISTS LITTLE TOES and to pray against them for they are as desperately impious and equally to bee detested of all such as truly feare the Lord and the King For if we compare them together there will no disparity appeare betwene them they being every way as malicious against the word of God and his deare servants and as diametrally opposing regality as Antichrist himselfe But that all things may the more cleerely be evidenced unto you let me tell you that daies proceedings You must take notice that howsoever they had fained some triviall Articles against mee they were all by the generall consent of the Court thought so poore as they openly averred they would not condemne mee for them and so much the rather because those that had sworne to them were proved to bee my Capitall enimies and also in their depositions to have sworn point blanck one against an other like evill wiinesses could not agree in swearing therefore they condemne me onely for my booke which I writ in defence of Christ and his Kingdome and of the Kings most excellent Majesties prerogative Royall and supremacy against the Pope and Popish Bishops provoked thereunto by a Papist to which duty I was bound both by the law of God and the law of the land and my speciall oath all which I alleadged at the bar and furthermore added that in writing against the Bishop of Rome I intend no such Bishops as acknowledg their authority from Kings and Emperours but onely such Bishops that usurp authority over Kings and Emperours aend their fellow brethren and the Church of God jurc divinos and se I had prefeced in my Booke which I openly readt here And to speake the truth I looked for favour and assistance in this combat from the Prelates never suspecting that they would have bin my enemyes for this endeavour especially I having also in that place alledged the Acts Statutes established by the publick consent of the whole Kingdome in which it was ratified that the Prelates have all their authority and jurisdiction which they now exercise from the King as immediatly derived from him and to affirme the contrary is to be ipso facto an enemy of his Crown Dignity And as the Prelates were an order established by the King State I was so far from opposing them that I never impeached their dignity in the least thing in all the booke neither would I ever have medled with them if they had kept their standing but they like the evill Angels out of pride not keeping their 1 station but openly renouncing the Kings authority and affirming that Jesus Christ made them Bishops and that the holy Ghost consecrated them and that they were Princes and had their thrones and that before Kings and all this Iure divino by all which they made me their enemy they being delinquents against the King And because I had ratified what soever I had said in my booke by the Word of God they as they had before renounced the Kings