Selected quad for the lemma: cause_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
cause_n	church_n	pope_n	rome_n	4,587	5	6.8117	4	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A33458	Notes upon Mr. Dryden's poems in four letters / by M. Clifford .... ; to which are annexed some Reflections upon the Hind and panther, by another hand.	Clifford, M. (Martin), d. 1677.; Brown, Thomas, 1663-1704. Reflections on the Hind and panther.	1687 (1687)	Wing C4706; ESTC R1883	19,057	36

alass 't is her fear all and another way of crying the Hawk Mercy and to the end that the Hawk finding nothing but Feathers to strike at she may so perhaps shelter her Body It is very fit indeed you should have a Guide and a Keeper too but Men in their Wits do believe that God made Man a reasonable Creature who feels as much Pleasure when he can give himself a good Account of his Actions as one that sees does perceive in comparison to a blind Man who is led about and therefore they think that the same merciful God would not contrive his Religion to be dark nor place it beyond the reach of their Faculties when he designed it to perfect their Natures and to raise them to the utmost heights they are capable of Fourthly the next Charge is Novelty and Schism thus expressed p. 66. We can point out each Period of the Time When they began and who begat the Crime Can Calculate how long the Eclipse endur'd Who interpos'd what Digits were obscur'd Mr. Bayes you must know was always good at Eclipses as when he made the Sun Moon and Earth act one in a Dance But I must say that this is a new way of writing Controversie to run us down with Whimsies instead of true Reasoning as He hath been used to astonish the Spectators in the Play-House with Scenes Clothes and Dances instead of giving Mankind a Picture of themselves and thereby making Virtue belov'd Vice abhor'd and the little Irregularities of Men's Tempers call'd Humours exposed to Laughter But seeing He is so exact at the Calculation of Time I would have him inform us how old these following Doctrines are Transubstantiation Purgatory the Merit of Works Invocation of Saints the Supremacy of the Bishop of Rome the Authority of the Councils and the Infallibility of the Pope these being the chief Causes for which we dissent from Rome Surely in the beginning these things were not so For according to our Account Infallibility goes no higher than the Scholars of Marcus in Irenaeus or the Gnosticks in Epiphanius Purgatory comes from Origen or at the furthest from Tertullian who had it from Montanus The Denial of Marriage to the Priesthood is derived from Pope Calixtus Transubstantiation is from the Lateran Council The Half-Communion is no older than the time of Aquinas Praying in an unknown Tongue may be fetcht as far as from Gregory the Great St. Austin denies the Invocation of Saints departed to have been in his Days and the Supremacy of the Pope began in Boniface the Third Against Transubstantiation Aquinas argues Oper. Tom. 12. as a novel and an impossible thing for one Body to be locally in more places than one and in all at once The witholding the Cup from the Laity is against our Saviours Institution who hath commanded all Men to drink of this Cup Matth. 26. 27. From the beginning the Holy Scriptures were perused by the People witness the Traditores in the Persecution of Dioclesian who were called so from their delivering up of their Bibles which before they were forced to the contrary they made daily use of therefore the Hebrew Text was read Weekly to the Iews and the New Testament was written in Greek because that Tongue was most known to the Eastern World and to pray in an unknown Tongue is against the plain Sense of the 14th Chapter of the First Epistle to the Corinthians Priests also were permitted to have Wives both in the Old and New Testaments and many of the Blessed Apostles were Married Men And St. Paul asserts his Liberty to carry a Wife along with him as well as Cephas These and many more Corruptions which I could mention in point of Practice and Doctrine too awaken'd the Christian World to look out for a Reformation to enquire for the old paths and to walk therein and to reform what was amiss by what had been the Belief and Practice of the Christian Church from the beginning In this Search are discovered the Rise and Progress of all the new-invented Doctrines in the Church of Rome by what Degrees her several Errours have been brought in For to go no further back than the Council of Trent we find new Articles of Faith such as the Sacrifice of the Mass the Doctrine of Purgatory the Invocation of Saints the Worship of Images and the like were enjoyned under the Pain of Damnation And in the Canon of the Fourth Session of that Council Unwritten Traditions are decreed to be of equal Authority with the Scriptures Upon this our first Reformers consulted the Scriptures and the Primitive Fathers of the Church that they might see how things stood from the beginning and only separated from them who had parted with the old and the true Religion Therefore it is in vain for Mr. Bayes to scorn or to complain of us for leaving the Church of Rome unless He can convince us that we have forsaken the Word of God the Doctrine of Christ and his Apostles the uncorrupted Primitive Church the Four First General Councils or the Antient Creeds This is old Standard Faith Mr. Bayes and these the first plantations of the Truth of the Gospel from the Profession whereof we are no Schismaticks for Schism must needs be theirs who give the cause of Separation not theirs who do but separate when the Cause is given and we have departed from Rome for this Reason because she hath in many Instances departed from the Faith of Christ Nay had not the Pope affected a Supremacy over all other Churches besides his own we never had cast off a Yoak which had never been put on our Necks and so it is plain that the Vsurper did make the Schism It is indeed a Glorious Design to reconcile all Churches to one Doctrine and Communion but then it must not be done by such Tyranny as the Popes have practised to fetter Men streighter under the Bondage of fictitious Articles of Faith but Unity from this kind of Force is rather to be prayed against than wish'd for God only in his own time and by the inscrutable Methods of his Providence is able to range his whole Church scattered over the Face of the Earth into primitive Unity and Christian Order In the mean time Mr. Bayes should lay aside his Projects of Pillories Rods Gibbets and Inquisitions to make us acquiesce in his Judgment whatever be our private Opinion In some parts of his allegorical Poem one would verily believe that the Poet himself was turned into a Wolfe for his Speech is all howling yelling and barking that you would imagin He would presently pull out the Throats and suck the Bloud of all the Protestant Sheep who are always ready to suffer rather than commit that Errour against their Consciences which must render them Hypocrites to God and Knaves amongst Men. Therefore notwithstanding Mr. Bayes hath thought fit to pass over from one perswasion of Religion to another yet he might forbear to spit thrice at every

Article of Religion that he hath relinquished or to animate his new Acquaintance to trample upon his former Companions these are Usages that can only be expected from a Renegado of Argier or Tunis to over-do in Expiation that he may gain better credence of being a sincere Mussulman 5. He Scoffs at the Church of England in calling her the Passive Church For Mr. Bayes is resolved seeing she would not admit him into her Preferments that she shall know what a Satyrist he is for this reason he hath made a Panther a spotted Beast of the most innocent and blameless Church he hath accused of Pride the humblest of Rapacity and Covetousness the most inoffensive and bountiful of Ignorance and want of Devotion the most Learned and Pious of false Doctrine the most Primitive of ill Discipline the most decent Church under Heaven And when nothing else could be said he even upbraids it with its Submission and Obedience Notwithstanding all his impudent disgraces there remains this one comfort to the Church of England That the same Man who now vilifies her so basely was thought unworthy of her Communion for his vicious and ill life Besides it is easie to conjecture at the cause of this his harsh usage of our Church he hath but lately Apostatized from it and is but just entred into the Romish Faith therefore he was resolved to give an unquestionable proof of the Establishment thereof by reviling the Church of England if any should still doubt of the reality of his Conversion And this I confess he hath prosecuted with all the Violence and Bigotry which commonly accompanies new Converts Our Adversary knew very well the Church of England to be a Body that will never Rebell against the King therefore in derision he calls her the Passive Church Thanks be to God she is so therefore she is the True Church of Christ So that for distinction sake we will name yours Mr. Bayes Armarillis because of her Armour against all Princes that are not of her mind and this is now our Poets new Mistress as a Friend of his broke off his Match with Cloris to marry Old Ioan. But Sir you have not in the least hit the Rellish of the Town by this Conceit the choicest Spirits you may have a value for do despise you for it for according to your custom in This you have done what was never done before Traduce a Church for her unshaken Loyalty at the same time that you would be thought a Faithful Subject to the Crown For this reason if a Test be of any use at all it would be to keep out such Zealots as you are Mr. Bayes from being concerned in human Society who would destroy all that stand in their way according to the example of that fiery Order whose vehement Principles are distastful to Rome its self who are uneasie unless they carry all before them Our protection against the heats of these Men next under God is wholly placed in our most gracious King who as a true Father of his Countrey doth act in his Favour and Indulgence to his People according to the temper of our most holy Religion which inspires Mankind with Charity and Mercy But we must needs have sad apprehensions of the designs of those who have ever used all the Arts of Craft and Violence to extirpate the Northern Heresie as they mis-call our Religion and to promote their own Interest in opposition to the ends and the true genius of Christianity Our sole fence against them is his Majesties promise and to Royal and Generous Minds no Stipulations are so binding as their own voluntary promises nor is it to be wonder'd at if they hold those Conditions that they put upon themselves the most inviolable Now I may Appeal to the common sense of any Reader whether this Poem be not one of the rankest pieces of Folly and Malice blended together among all the impertinent dull phantastical things the Town is at this time tired with Yet the Author would be esteemed a solemn and a grave Person and he may observe in the Conversation he hath lately had with the Birds and Beasts that the gravest are the Owl and the Ass. For sometimes this Mr. Bayes is not able to say one good thing in a whole page if it were to save his Life then he lays about him as if he were running a Muck and had resolved to kill all that he met At one time he picks quarrels with the Holy Scriptures and slights the Readers of it with the most impertinent pratings At another time he Roars and Huffs against the Man in Black with the most rude and clownish deportment so that all Civil Company must needs loath his ill-breeding more than the Buffoonry of Hostlers and Porters In one place he blames Protestants for having no Treatise of Humility but what they have borrowed from Foreigners So the Protestants Poets say that Mr. Bayes could never have been an Author without stealing from Milton and many others that have been helps for his Wit to furnish out the Stage And how many good thoughts hath he made his own as he phrases it in the Rehearsal by Transprosing and Transversing As now he hopes these Arguments for Popery may pass for his because he hath put them into an unusual dress and hath tagg'd 'em with Rhimes And to speak the truth there is very little of his own in any Book that he hath published but the Arrogance and unparallel'd Censoriousness which he exercises over all other Writers But if the Credit of all Men whatsoever be and ought to be so well guarded both by Nature Law and Discretion the Clergy certainly of all others ought to be kept and preserved Sacred in their Reputation For they being Men of the same Spirit with others and no less subject to humane Passions it is the most unmanly as well as base thing to treat them with open affronts to pelt them with Ribaldry and Atheistical Drollery For all that these Calumnies are the grand refinements of Mr. Bayes his Poem and without these Flowers he thought his new Religion could not be enough embelish'd or set off Ignorant and mistaken Proselyte Who believes it necessary to part with any Virtue even common Civility that he may cast Dirt upon the Church of England as if that did not require and encourage more Sobriety more Mortification than ever He could be guilty of Whereas it hath always been fruitful of Men who together with Obedience to the best Discipline have lived to the Envy of the Papists in their Conversation and without such true Defenders of the Christian Faith could never have baffled them so shamefully as they have done of late Insomuch that I fancy they will make very few Converts by disputing unless they may pretend to have turned some as in the old Florentine Wars by meer tiring them out and perfect weariness or some such Libertines as Mr. Bayes who will be seemingly religious when it is their