Selected quad for the lemma: cause_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
cause_n	believe_v	church_n	faith_n	2,838	5	5.7579	4	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A80510	The copy of a narrative prepared for his Majesty about the year 1674. to distinguish Protestants from Papists		1674 (1674)	Wing C6179; ESTC R230957	20,542	16

their bare saying to be taken against others By all that I have said then if allowed it will appear that there is a clear difference between the Authority of a Prince in things Civil and in things relating to Worship and Religion for as his Authority about things Civil is unquestionable and entersares with no Law of God whatever and can have no pretence therefore to intrench upon the Conscience or upon any prior obligation or duty that a man oweth unto God and as it must for all these reasons be necessarily and indispensibly obeyed and submitted unto by all his Subjects so on the contrary a Prince especially as a Protestant can put out no Law about Divine Worship but his Subjects so far as they are Protestants are bound in Conscience and by the very Principles of that Religion which they profess not only to consider it but to examine it whether it be agreeable to the Word of God or not and if it appear not to be such at least according to the best of their understandings as they will have a Plea always not to submit to it by reason it intrencheth upon a prior obligation that they have both in Conscience and according to the Principles of their Reformation unto God and according also to the sixth Article of the Church of England it self so this Plea cannot well with Justice be denied them if no Crime whatever in their Conversation can be proved against them nor can men in this case be actually punished and proceeded against without the sense and grief of that wrong or oppression that is manifestly done to them and suffered by them especially seeing their non-conformity to the said Laws proceeds not as we said either from their Election or Liberty nor yet from any breach of duty or affection to their Prince but only from what appears to them to be an inevitable or indispensible necessity that ariseth and is occasioned from their meer Profession as they are of the Protestant Religion To which end let me humbly beg leave to offer one argument more also which is That the thing which doth Essentially distinguish a Protestant from a Papist more than any note mark or character whatsoever besides is that a Papist by his Principles as a Papist may not and indeed cannot dispute any Law whatever relating to the Worship or Service of God provided it be declared and established by what he acknowledgeth to be the Church because he takes the Authority of the Church for the whole Argument or for the only Foundation of all his Obidence unto God rather than the Divine Authority of the Scripture or Word and because he presumeth the Church also to be a thing altogether holy and such as neither hath erred nor can err for should he question this he must question the whole of his Religion it self whereas the Protestant Church on the other hand having separated from the Church of Rome not only upon the supposition that she hath actually erred but that she hath been grosly corrupted as well in Manners as in Faith and having for the better justification of her own Practice both in matter of Worship and in all things relating to Doctrine and Faith set up the Scriptures as the sole and Soveraign Rule of Gods mind and will to his Church as she cannot challenge the exercise of any Authority therefore that is beyond that of the Scriptures or of any that is not subordinate to the Scriptures it self so it is expected that all the duties consequently which she requires and all those Articles or Points of Faith which she at any time recommends to such as are the Members of her should always be enforced from those Arguments properly and only which are drawn from the Scriptures because it is this which she her self hath appealed unto and this only which she challengeth to justifie her A Protestant then that understands the grounds of Religion or that hath been at all instructed in the rise or Principles of Reformation taking this for the very first Article of his Faith that a Church may err and may have corruption in it and may in its Worship possibly swerve and depart from the pure Mind Word and Wisdom of God and laying this no less firmly as the foundation of his belief on the other hand viz. that the Scriptures cannot err nor can be other than unalterable and incorruptible Rule of Gods Law and of his will and mind to his people he cannot possibly hold the Authority of the Church to be Divine any further or otherwise than as it appears to be clearly grounded upon the Scripture as the word of God and consequently the tye or obligation which he hath to obey the Church so far as it relates to the Conscience and binds the Conscience ariseth out of no other ground than from the conformity which he seeth or is perswaded that the Church hath in her Laws Orders and Doctrines to the said Word and consequently if this conformity doth or shall once cease in the said Church a Protestant as a Protestant cannot but judge his tye or obligation to her as a Church ought to cease also with it And this being the true state of that Radical or Essential difference that is between the Principles of a Protestant and the Principles of a Papist as a Papist if a Church then that professeth her self to be a Protestant or the Clergy rather who are the Rulers properly of it shall not much consider or regard the justifying of what Laws and Orders she makes by the consonancy they expresly have to the Law or Mind of God in his Word which is his Rule to the Church nor shall much concern it self to clear and inforce the Faith and Doctrine which she holds by the evidence of its truth or by the authority of it as sufficiently grounded upon that word that is absolutely divine but shall on the contrary in whatsoever she commands or in the things she teacheth constrain and exact an obedience from her Members to her self and to her own Authority as absolute and as unsubordinate to the Word of God and therefore to her own Authority as it is a distinct thing from the said word that Church or the Clergy rather which are the Rulers of it so far as she doth this in any Doctrine or in any Law that she makes indispensible doth so far cease in her Principles and practice to be Protestant and doth so far disclaim not only a main and chief ground of her separation from the Church of Rome but the very Principle it self upon which she pretends to guide her self and justifie her self in her Reformation For if it cannot be denied that this was one main and great cause of our separation from the Church of Rome viz. because she had made her self and her Commands absolute and had set up an Authority in the matters of worship and faith above that of the Scripture as the word of God and secondly because she did not

barely excommunicate men but did also persecute them and did deprive them both of their Estates Liberties and Lives upon a Principle as contrary to Humane Reason as it was contrary to Humane Society and quiet viz. not for any evil in their Conversations in their Morals or in their Lives but meerly for obeying what they sincerely judged to be the Law Will and Mind of God and meerly for believing that his whole Law Will and Mind to his Church as a Church especially relating to the worship of himself was contained in his word and thirdly because by this persecution as it was extended to the extreme punishment of persons both in their Liberties and Goods and sometimes in their Lives by stinking Prisons and want of Necessaries she did necessarily draw upon her the guilt of mens Apostacy and Hypocrisie and Dissimulation who durst not but obey and comply with her Commands meerly out of fear and did as necessarily draw upon her the guilt of all that suffering cruelty and blood whatever it were she spilt or did inflict upon those persons who withstood her Commands and who were otherwise in all things blameless both as to their Morals Lives and Converlations I say if it be matter of Fact and that which cannot be denied that these three things were some of the main and principal causes for which we separated from the Church of Rome and for which our first Reformers themselves called her Antichristian and sometimes Bloody and sometimes Scarlet Whore and if these three things when at any time mentioned with reference to the Church of Rome are still acknowledged to be evil and so stiled to this day so far as it concerns her yea if these three things are at this very present in controversie with that Church not only charged upon her but cast in her teeth among many other things by way of reproach and to set forth the just ground that we even as the Church of England have as well as other Churches both of exception and hatred against her must not these three things be much more evil in a Protestant Church who after she condemned all these things not only as evil but as Antichristian in the Church of Rome and after she hath pretended to separate from the said Church for them doth nevertheless give her self leave to practise them without condemning her self at all in them and must not this practise cast a manifest blemish and reproach upon her own Reformation and evidence to the World that she doth not either believe the Principles of it or doth not at least dare to trust to it Wherefore if the said Church viz. the Ruling Clergy meerly upon those grounds and only to those ends which are both thus evil in themselves and thus contrary to the grounds and ends of our Reformation shall endeavour to ingage the power of the Civil Magistrate to her assistance I humbly offer it to consideration whether in moving this to a Prince especially as he is a Protestant she doth or can move him to any other purpose than that his Authority may promote the defection she hath made from her own Principles and may countenance her in that which she knoweth that the rules of Reformation and of Protestantism cannot which is not only her cruelty and severity but her exorbitancy and whether she hath or can have any argument to the said Prince therefore for his countenancing of her greater than this viz. than as she knoweth that all the evil which would otherwise be charged upon her wholly and only as a Church may now through his countenancing of her be in part as well charged upon his Royal Authority and pleasure as upon her which argument being really of no better a nature than this whether it be therefore reasonable in it self or whether it be so much as fit or modest for the said Church to make or whether it be agreeable to that duty honour and sincerity which she as a Church professeth and ought at all times uprightly to pay to her Prince I leave to consideration and especially when with reference to the effect of this motion it is matter of fact that 26 private persons are only gratified many of which are men of no Birth Interest or Temporal Estate in the Nation and more than twice so many thousands are greatly grieved injured and wronged in their persons and estates which are equally his Majesties Subjects as well as they and some of which at least are every way Peers to them for Birth for Vertue for Temperance for Morality for Mercy for Charity and Temporal Estate and even for Loyalty it self Besides either guilt is a thing of weight before God or it is not and the guilt which not only our first Reformers but which our Church doth at this day charge upon the Church of Rome by reason of her persecution is justly charged upon her or it is not if the guilt be real and that it be justly charged upon the said Church it is apparently criminal two ways viz. both as she through her persecution is the cause of all that Hypocrisie Dissimulation and Apostacy which men commit for meer fear of her and by which though out of weakness they do greatly wrong their own Consciences and greatly injure their former Profession before God and know they do so and lie oft-times under trouble all their lives afterwards for it and as she is equally the cause of all those solemn complaints cryes and appeals unto God and who are conscious to themselves of their sincerity and integrity towards God and who are destitute of all other help or remedy in the Earth do in their grief and streights oft-times make and pour out unto God as the Righteous Judge of all persons and which righteous Prayers Complaints and Appeals to God we not only as Christians but as Protestants when we write against the Church of Rome do expresly affirm shall be heard and that she shall answer as well for the crimes as the oppressions and wrongs that she hath unjustly brought upon us Wherefore when the Protestant Church or the Clergy who are the Rulers of it shall be guilty of the same manner of persecution and upon the very same grounds or principles that the Popish Clergy are even because men in their worship or service of God do desire to obey the Law Mind and Will of God so far as it appears clear to them from his word and because they believe that his word alone is his rule to his Church and for no other cause whatever relating to any blemish or evil which can be charged upon them in their lives or Conversations and when by the means of this persecution the said Protestant Church or the ruling Clergy of it are the occasion of some mens hypocrisie dissimulation and desertion of their principles through weakness to the extreme injury and wrong of their own Consciences and are not only the occasion but the main and express cause of the sighs