Selected quad for the lemma: cause_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
cause_n	bishop_n	church_n	law_n	2,043	5	4.7282	4	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A33223	The state of the Church of Rome when the Reformation began as it appears by the advice given to Paul III and Julius III by creatures of their own : with a preface leading to the matter of the book.	Clagett, William, 1646-1688.	1688 (1688)	Wing C4400; ESTC R15337	26,546	43

he cannot do well and as he ought if as a Shepherd he dwells not with his Sheep besides Holy Father the example of this custom does a world of mischief For how can this Holy See guide others and correct their Abuses if she suffers such Abuses in her principle Members For we do not think that because they are Cardinals it should be more lawful for them to transgress the Laws but that they should least of all presume to do it since their lives are to be a Law to others nor are they to be like the Pharisees who said but did not but to our Saviour Christ who began to do and then to teach And besides this Licentiousness being the fewel of Avarice the use of it is prejudicial to the Counsels they take in Church Affairs Moreover for the obtaining of Bishopricks Cardinals do court Kings and Princes their dependence upon whom afterwards hinders them from speaking their minds freely at least if they were bold and willing enough to speak yet they would easily be perverted into a wrong judgment by affection and interest We could wish therefore that this custom were broken and that all the Cardinals might have an equal Revenue which would maintain them handsomly according to their Dignity which provision we think might easily be made if we would be willing to serve Mammon no longer and would serve none but Christ. These things being set right which refer to the appointment of your Ministers who are as it were the Instruments for the right performing of God's Worship and the well ordering of the People in a Christian Life We must now come to those things which relate to the Government of Christian People As to which matter most holy Father there is an Abuse in the first place to be corrected and the greatest care is to be taken that Bishops especially no nor Curates be absent from their Churches and Parishes unless for a weighty cause but keep their Residence but especially the Bishops since they are the Husbands of the Church committed to their care For we appeal to God that no sight can be more lamentable to a Christian man going through Christendom than this solitude of the Churches Almost all the Pastors are withdrawn from their Flocks which are almost every-where entrusted with Hirelings There ought therefore to be a great Penalty upon Bishops above all and likewise upon Curates who are absent from their Flocks and who ought not onely to be censured but not so much as receive the Revenues of the Church unless for some short time the Bishops obtain leave of absence from your Holiness and the Curates from their Bishops Let some of the Laws and Decrees of Councils in this matter be read whereby it is provided that a Bishop shall not be absent from his Church above three Lord's Days It is also an Abuse that so many of the most Reverend Cardinals are absent from this Court and do not so much as in part do any thing of that Office which belongs to a Cardinal We think indeed that 't is expedient for some few Cardinals to live in their Provinces since thy are as it were the Root of the Papacy that by shooting out its strings abroad in the Christian World contains the People in their Obedience to the Roman See. But yet we think it were very much for the Interest of your Holiness to recal them though not perhaps every one to their Residence in this Court For besides that by this means they would execute the proper Office of Cardinals the State and Retinue of your Court would be provided for and the want of those many Bishops would be supplied who ought to leave the Court and return to their Churches Another great Abuse and by no means to be endured since 't is a scandal to all Christian People arises from the hindrances and restraints that are upon Bishops in the Governing of their Flocks and chiefly in the punishing and correcting of wicked persons For first there are ill men and especially Clergy-men who by many ways exempt themselves from the Jurisdiction of their Ordinary But then if they are not exempt they betake themselves easily to the Penitentiary or to the Datary where they presenly find a way to protect their Impunity and which is still worse by giving of Money This scandal most holy Father does so disturb Christian People that 't is not to be expressed We beseech your Holiness by the Bloud of Christ wherewith he hath Redeemed his Church having washed the same in his Bloud that these foul blemishes be taken away Let these mischiefs be removed to which if in any Republick or Kingdom allowance were given it would in a little time fall head-long into ruine and would not by any means be able to subsist long And yet we think it is lawful for us so that we have the doing of it our selves to see these Monsters brought into the Common-wealth of Christendom In the Orders of the Religious there is another Abuse to be corrected that many of them are so degenerate that they are grown scandalous and their examples pernicious to the Seculars We think the Conventual Orders are to be abolished not by doing to any man that injury of Dispossessing him but by forbidding them to admit any more For thus without wronging any one they would soon be worn out and good Religious might be substituted instead of them but at present it were best that all Children who are not yet professed should be taken from their Monasteries We think also that as to the Preachers and Confessors that are sent out by the Fryers there is need of Animadversion and Amendment that great care should be taken by their Chief that they be fitly qualified and then that they be presented to the Bishops to whom chiefly the Church is intrusted to be examined by them or by fit persons and that without their consent they be not admitted to the exercise of those Offices We have already said most holy Father that it is by no means lawful to make any Gain by the use of the Keys in which matter the Words of Christ stand firm and sure Freely ye have received freely give This does not onely belong to your Holiness to take notice of but to all who share in this power and therefore we desire that it may be observed by your Legates and Nuntio's For as the custom which has much prevailed dishonours this See and makes the People clamorous so the contrary would be exceedingly for the Ornament of the one and for the Edification of the other Christian People are disturbed by another Abuse which concerns Nuns that are under the care of the Conventual Fryers where in most Monasteries publick Sacriledges are committed to the intolerable scandal of the Citizens Let your Holiness deprive the Conventuals of this care and give it to the Ordinaries or to others as you shall see cause The publick Schools are most perniciously abused especially in Italy where

being taught by the Divine Spirit who as St. Austin says does without noise of Words speak in the Heart very well understands this to be the Original of these Mischiefs that some Popes your Predecessours having itching Ears as says the Apostle Paul heaped up Teachers after their own Lusts not to learn from them what they ought to do but that they should take pains and employ their Wit to find out ways how it might be lawful for them to do what they pleased To which we may add that as the Shadow follows the Body so Flattery follows Greatness and Truth can hardly find any way to the Ears of Princes hence it has come to pass that there have been Doctors ever ready to maintain that all Benefices being the Pope's and the Lord having a Right to Sell what is his own it must necessarily follow that the Pope is not capable of the Guilt of Simony insomuch that the Pope's Will and Pleasure whatever it be must needs be the Rule for all that he does which doubtless would end in believing every thing lawful that he had a mind to do From this Source as from the Trojan-Horse those so many Abuses and such mortal Diseases have broken forth into the Church of God which have reduced her as we see almost to a State of Desparation The same of these things having come to the Ears even of Infidels let your Holiness believe us speaking what we know who deride Christianity more for this then for any thing else so that through our selves we must needs say through our selves the Name of Christ is blasphemed amongst the Nations As for you most Holy Father for so in truth you are besides that Prudence which you so long since have obtained being also instructed by the Spirit of God when you gave your self wholly to this care that the Church of Christ wherewith you are entrusted might be healed of her Distempers and recover a good state of Health you saw and you saw aright that where the Disease grew at first there the Remedy must begin And following the example of the Apostle Paul you intended to be a Dispenser and not a Lord but to be found faithful in the Lord like that Servant in the Gospel whom the Lord set over his Family to give them their Food in their season And in order to this you resolved at no hand to Will that which is unlawful nor to desire the Power of doing what you ought not For these Reasons you called us to your self who how unqualified soever we may be in point of skill for so weighty an Affair do not yet want a good Affection towards the Honour and Glory of your Holiness and above all to the Reformation of the Church of Christ You enjoyned us with most serious expressions that we should go and bring together all those Abuses and lay them before you protesting that if we proceeded herein negligently and unfaithfully the account that should be given to Almighty God of this matter committed to our Trust should be upon our selves And that all things might be more freely handled by us and opened to you afterward you bound us by an Oath and under the Penalty of Excommunication that we should discover no part of this our Trust to any one whatsoever We therefore in obedience to your Command have brought together those Distempers in as few Words as may be and their Remedies the most effectual at least which we for our part could think upon And now we rely upon your Goodness and Wisdom to mend all those faults and supply all those defects of the performance which are left in it by reason of our incompetency for this undertaking But to reduce all our Thoughts to some certain Heads since your Holiness is both the Prince of these Provinces which are the Ecclesiastic Estate and Territory and withal the Governour of the Universal Church and likewise the Bishop of Rome we have not taken upon our selves to speak of those things which concern that Principality which by your Prudence is so excellently Govern'd as we see We will touch upon these matters only that belong to the Office of the Universal Pastor and some also that are proper to the Roman Bishop First of all then we think most B. Father according to what Aristotle says in his Politicks that as in every other Commonwealth so in the Ecclesiastic Government of the Church of Christ it should be esteemed the principal Law of All that Laws should be observed as much as is possible and that it be not lawful to Dispense with the Laws but for a Cause urgent and necessary For no Custom introduced into a Commonwealth can be more pernicious than inobservance of Laws which our Ancestors thought were religiously to be kept and doubted not to call their Authority Venerable and Divine All these things you know Most Excellent Pope you have read them long since in the Philosophers and Divines But one thing there is of moment next to this or rather of far greater consequence as we think that it is not lawful for the Pope who is Christ's Vicar to make any Gain to himself of the use of the Keys of the power of the Keys we say which Christ hath committed to him For this is the Commandment of Christ Freely ye have received Freely give These things being in the first place provided for since your Holiness has the care of Christ's Church upon you so that it may be furnished with divers Ministers by whom that trust is to be discharged and that these are all the Clergy to whom Divine Service is committed the Presbyters especially and those of them chiefly that have the care of Souls and above all the Bishops it follows that in order to a right Proceeding in this Government the first care that is to be taken is that these Ministers be such that are fit for the Duties of their Function And here the first Abuse in this kind is that in the Ordination of Clerks especially of Presbyters no manner of care and diligence is used but every where the most uneducated Youths of the vilest Parentage set out with nothing but evil Manners are admitted to Holy Orders even to Priesthood it self thô that be the Character which expresseth Christ more than all others From hence grow innumerable Scandals from hence comes the Contempt of the Ecclesiastic Order and hence it is that the reverence of God's Worship is not only diminished but well nigh extinguished We think therefore the best way would be for your Holiness to appoint two or three Prelates of Learning and Probity to look after this matter who should govern the Ordinations of Clergy-men and then to enjoyn all Bishops under the Penalty of Censures to take the like care in their Diocesses Nor should your Holiness suffer any to be Ordained but by his own Bishop or with the License of his Bishop or such as are Deputed in the City And every Bishop should provide a Master