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	think_v	1,479	5	4.5634	4	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A67472	Love and truth in two modest and peaceable letters concerning the distempers of the present times / written from a quiet and conformable citizen of London to two busie and factious shop-keepers in Coventry.	Walton, Izaak, 1593-1683.	1680 (1680)	Wing W673; ESTC R38020	26,280	37

Communion To which the Fathers reply was A man may live in an inficted City and not have the Plague My Judgment and publick Practice in Religion are both so well known here and at Rome and both to my danger and damage that I may continue in it with more safety than others And separation may be a sin in me who Judge the unity of the Church in which I was baptized and confirmed and the peace of the State in which I was born to be preforred before my private opinion interest or satisfaction and I think to commit a Schisin and separate from that Church would make me guilty of the sin of a Scandal justly given and therefore live in it and die in it I must though it be the impurest of Christian Churches But let him that now is not of it never be of that Church which is so far departed from the Primitive purity and now maintained only by splendour and the maxims and practice of polity If you doubt the truth of this relation I will give you unquestionable confirmation of it at our next meeting It has been longer than I intended and I beg your pardon and beg you also to consider with what inconsiderable zeal you and your Party rush into Schism and give just cause of Scandal by opposing Government and affronting that Church in which you were born and baptized and I hope confirmed by a Bishop I think the doing so requires your sad and serious consideration For if there be such sins as Schism and Scandal and if there were not they could not have names in Scripture then give me leave to tell you I cannot but wonder that you and the scruple-mongers of your Party should rush into them without any tenderness or scruple of Conscience And here let me tell you the Church of England which you oppose enjoyns nothing contrary to Gods Word and hath summed up in her Creeds and Catechism what is necessary for every Christian to know and to do And can you that are a Shop-keeper or private man think that you are fit to teach and judge the Church or the Church fit to teach and judge you Or can you think the safety or peace of the State or Church in which you live should depend upon the scruples and mistakes of a party of the Common People whose indiscreet and active zeal makes them like the restless Scribes and Pharisees Mat. 13. 15 who compass Sea and Land to get Parties to be of their opinions and by that means beget confusion in both No doubtless Common reason will not allow of this belief for a liberty to preach and persuade to your dangerous Principles would enflame the too hot and furious zeal of so many of your Party and beget so many more restless and dangerous contentions that there could be neither quiet or safety in a Nation but by keeping a standing Army which I know you detest and from the cause of which God deliver us I have told you often that Samuel says 1 Sam. 15. 23. Rebellion is like the sin of Witchcraft and I cannot tell you too often that Schism is too like that mysterious sin for when the fire of Schism and Rebellion is kindled no man knows where it will end Consider this and remember that St. Jude accounts them that make Sects to be fleshly and not to have the Spirit of God which too many of your Fraternity pretend to And now after so long seriousness give me liberty to be so pleasant as to tell you a Tale by which I intend not to provoke you but to explain my meaning There was a North-Country man that came young and poor to London to seek that which he call'd his fortune and it proved to be an Hostler in an Inn of good note in that City in which condition he continued some years and by diligence and frugality get and saved so much money that in time he became the Master of that Inn. And not long after his arrival to that happiness he sent for three of his Neeces one to serve him in his Kitchin and the other two did serve for some years in a like condition in other houses 'till mine Host their Unkle died who at his death left to each of them a hundred pound to buy each of them a North-Country Husband and also to each of them ten pound to buy new Cloaths and bear their charges into the North to see their Mother The three Sisters resolved to go together and the day being appointed two of them bought very fantastical Cloaths and as gaudy Ribbands intending thereby to be noted and admired but the third was of a more frugal humour yet aimed at admiration too and said she would save her money wear her old Cloaths and yet be noted and get reputation at a cheaper rate For she would hold some singular new fantastical opinion in Religion and thereby get admirers and as many as they should and it proved so And doubtless this is the Ambition of many Women Shop-keepers and other of the Common People of very mean parts who would not be admired or noted if they did not trouble themselves and others by holding some odd impertinent singular opinions And tell me freely do not you think that silence would become our Cosin Mrs. B than to talk so much and so boldly against those Clergy-men and others that bow at the Altar she says to the Altar and use other like reverence in Churches where she and her Party are so familiar with God as to use none And concerning which let me tell you my thoughts and then leave you to judge Almighty God in the Second Commandment says he would have none to bow down or worship a graven Image Intimating as I suppose a Jealousie lest that reverence or worship which belongs only to him be ascribed or given to an Idol or Image But that reverence and worship does belong to him and was always paid to him is to me manifest by what the Prophet David says Psal. 5. I will in thy fear worship towards thy holy Temple And again I will praise thy name and worship towards thy holy Temple And again Psal. 132. 138. O let us worship and fall down and kneel before the Lord These and many more might be urged out of the Old Testament And in the New you may see it is a duty to worship God First St. Paul says Heb. 13. 10. We have an Altar And you may note Rev. 22. 9. where the Angel that had shewed St. John a Vision forbad him to fall down to him but bad him fall down and worship God And again Chap. 14. 7. Worship him that made heaven and earth I omit more Testimonies which might be multiplied and shall tell you next that Churches are sacred and not to be used prophancely For you may note that our Saviour did with a divine indignation whip the money-changers out of the Temple for polluting it and said His house should be

called the house of Prayer And let me tell you that in the Primitive times many of those humble and devout Christians whose sudden Journeys or businesses of present necessity were such as not to allow them time to attend the publick Worship and Prayers of the Church would yet express their devotion by going into a Church or Oratory and there how at the Altar then kneel and beg of God to pardon their sins past and to be their director and protector that day and having again bowed toward the East at the Altar begin their Journey or business and they thought God well pleased with so short a Prayer and such a Sacrifice Much more might be said for bowing at the Altar and bowing toward the East But I forbear And now let me ask you seriously Do you think this which I think to be a duty ought to be forborn because our Cosin and her Party are scandalized at it Or do you think when I in a late discourse told her how restless and active her Unkle and Father and the rest of the Presbyterian Party had been in promoting the late Consusions and placing all Power in that Parliament 1640. that murthered Dr. Laud the late religious Bishop of Canterbury the late good and pious King Charles and were the cause of spilling so much innocent bloud and ruine of so many harmless Familles Can you think hers to be a reasonable excuse That God had determined or appointed this because we were a sinful Nation It shall be granted that we were God knows we still are a sinful Nation And deserved a heavy punishment and God did punish us justly but they had no appointment to be the executioners of that Justice They appointed themselves first to judge and then to be the Executioners of his will And before I pass further I pray observe it was Gods Will that his only Son our Saviour should be betrayed But who would be the Judas to do it Or the Souldiers that Crucified him Or could Judas look back with comfort that he was used in betraying him I hope it is far from your thought to think or say so Let me tell you that the learned Dr. Abbot the late Lord Archbishop of Canterbury that was next before Dr. Laud whose head your Long Parliament cut off intended to kill a Buck 1621. but the Arrow did so glance that he kill'd the Keeper immediately The Church of England judges sudden death to be punishment and therefore prays against it And though it is certain God would not have punished that Keeper with a sudden death if the Keeper had not deserved it and certain also that the good Bishop thought so yet he lamented to the last hour of his own life that his hand was used to bring sudden death upon another And he testified his sorrow by what I shall relate to you After that restless night which followed this sad accident he sent early in the morning for the Keepers Wife bemoan'd himself to her and begg'd her pardon which being obtained he setled upon her an annuity by which she was enabled to live with much more ease and plenty though probly with less comfort than if she had still enjoyed her Husband For her two Daughters he provided competent portions and a better education and settlement for her three Sons than the Father could probably have made if he had still lived This he did for them And as for himself this sad accident begot in him that which St. Paul rejoyced to find in his Corinthians 2 Cor. 7. 11. even a godly sorrow and revenge for he kept a severe Weekly Fast the day that this sad accident befel him during the remainder of his life and died lamenting it Let me stop here and tell you it is far otherways with you and your Presbyterian Party than with this penitent Bishop For though it is most certain you were the cause of the late Confusion in the Church and of the War and Bloud that followed it yet I do not find one of you that lays his hand upon his breast and says Lord what have I done Lord pardon me No you are far from that temper And he that considers the temper of the present times and your restless activity in it may conclude you are as willing to begin new Commotions as you are senseless of the old My meaning is not in saying this to upbraid or provoke you but rather to convince and unbeguile you And that I may the better do that I will in what follows answer some of the most material of your common objections You say the Bishops have great revenues and preach not for it to which I will answer you in love First you say that the Bishops revenues are much greater than indeed they are And you seem to repine because you do not consider how much must go out of them by First-Fruits Tenths and other payments of necessity And you ought to consider much must go out in Bounty and Charity and some in Hospitality and State I say in state and attendance For is it fit that the Judge of all the inferiour Clergy of his Diocess and of many of the Laity should not have a liberal Revenue and live in more plenty and splendour than the Common People do or can do Doubtless it is necessary For let him be never so prudent and diligent so inwardly humble and outwardly meek yet if he have not a Revenue to live above the Common People he must make himself a Companion for them and lose the reverence due to his Dignity and by that make himself both cheap and contemptible and he that will consider the necessity of a Bishop's living thus and the small Revenue that most of the Bishops have may turn his maligning them their Revenue into a wonder how they make their Revenue to do it and a pity it is no more There are indeed some few of them whose Revenues do abound and I think I shall not be mistaken if I say there have been by them more High-ways mended and more Hospitals Schools and Colledges built and endowed than by five times their number of Lay Lords or by all the Physicians and Lawyers of this Nation though very many of their employments turn to much more profit and yet theirs is not repined at And let me tell you also it is not often that any is made a Bishop till the age of sixty years and then he undertakes the Care and toyl of Government to prevent Heresie and Schism or suppress and punish them and as occasion serves by his writing to defend this Church from the Clamours of the Church of Rome or the resiless Sectaries of this And may not the Revenue of a Bishop be thought a just reward for his forty years past study and his present care though he preach not And yet many of them do preach often though not weekly And let me add this to what is said What if the King should give the Revenue to a