Selected quad for the lemma: cause_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
cause_n	day_n	time_n	year_n	3,093	5	4.9048	4	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A21016	Certaine arguments and motives of speciall moment propounded to the consideration of our most noble King and state tending to perswade them to abolish that unhappy and unhallowed government of our church by bishops, and in stead thereof to set up the government of the Lord Iesus Christ and his holy ordinances in their purity and power.		1634 (1634)	STC 739; ESTC S5086	18,494	38

minister Math. 20.28 and the servant is not above his Lord Math. 10.24 Hee forbiddeth his disciples all such dominion soveraignty Math. 20.25 Marke 10.43 His Apostles receive equall power and authority from him Math. 18.18 Iohn 20.23 They clayme no superiority or primacy one above another but stile themselves servants 2. Cor. 4.5 Ministers dispensers 1. Cor. 4.1 and Ambassadours 2. Cor. 5.20 They send Peter and Iohn as their messengers to Samaria Acts 8.14 which argueth equality Peter disclaiming all such superiority equalleth himselfe with the Ministers and Elders of the Church calling himselfe their fellow elder 1. Pet. 5.1 and forbiddeth Ministers to usurpe any Lordship over Gods heritage ver 3. S. Iohn rebuketh Diotrephes for affecting preheminence Epist 3.9 Nor did ever any man take upon him to bee a Pastour of Pastours but that man of sinne and Lord Bishops which are his genuine ofspring are lineally descended from him As therefore their offices and functions were hatched in hell so it would bee a very happy thing for this state of ours if it would please God and our King that they might bee returned and sent back againe thither that our church which these many yeeres hath borne them as a heavy burden may bee no longer cumbred with them 2 No man living upon the face of the earth may presume to prescribe a paterne according to which the Churches of Christ should bee formed nor may any creature in heaven or earth without a commission from the sonne of God appoint lawes for the guilding and governing of his house that beeing a glory which the Lord Iesus Christ hath reserved in his owne hands and wil communicate neither with man nor Angel it belonging as properly to him to rule his church according to the good pleasure of his owne will as it belongeth to him to save it by the merit of his sufferings Hee by the appointment of his father is the onely head King Lord Lawgiver supreme Governour of his Church which hee hath washed and made white with his blond Ephes 1.22 Iames. 4.12 Revel 7.14 Hee hath not left his Church which is his body maimed or imperfect destitute of lawes and Offices needfull for the governing of the same but hath appointed a Ministery for it with a calling thereunto and with lawes limiting their function and governments leaving nothing therein to the will of man Col. 2.18 This government with ail the offices functions thereto appertaining are set downe in the written word of God the onely rule both of doctrine discipline in the church which is able to make the man of God perfect to every good worke 2. Tim. 3.17 The offices appointed by Christ for the ruling of his churches are those of Pastours Teachers and Elders whose severall gifts properties and qualifications are distinctly and at large set downe in the Scripture These offices and ministeries and the lawes concerning the same are sufficient for the ruling of Christ his Church here on earth and that forme and frame of government prescribed and left by our Saviour for the ordering of his house is every way complete of it selfe and needeth no helpe of man to make it perfect Else Christ can not bee honoured as a perfect governour of his Church and otherwise both the Scripture and Christs body are imperfect And if these bee not perfect then may man erect new offices and adde new Ministeries and hee may also take away and alter any of these at his owne pleasure Then also is the Church of the new Testament inferiour to that of the old which received all the lawes ordinances from God himselfe But to affirme all or any one of these it is impious and absurd And as this government appointed by Christ is sufficient and most perfect so is it perpetuall and may not bee altered by men or Angeles Timothie is commaunded to keepe this platforme and all the ordinances concerning it to the glorious comming of the Lord Iesus 1. Tim. 5.21 and 6.13.14 All the offices of this church mentioned Rom. 12.6.7.8 are called members of the body of the church ver 5. and 1. Cor. 12.27.28 which is the body of Christ Eph. 1.22.23 If therefore the church of Christ which is his body must continue perfect till his comming these offices and ministeries must also continue for if any one of them bee taken away his body is maimed and mangled And if Christ shall continue to bee governour of his churches hee must continue to rule and governe in them by his owne Officers and by those lawes and ordinances which hee himselfe hath prescribed in his word otherwise hee is not the governour of them If his Officers bee refused hee is rejected and if the order of government appointed by him bee thrust out another substituted in the roome of it then is hee upon the point deposed from his regency the scepter is taken out of his hands 3 If this holy government instituted and ordained by the sonne of God himselfe might bee erected and set up in our churches there would bee such a confluence concurrence of all good things contributing joyntly to the happines of this kingdome as our eyes have never yet seene Gods blessing doth ever accompany his owne ordinance But if that bee either sleighted or neglected though men take the wisest and the most politike courses that their silly and shallow braines can devise for the attaining of the same ends which God aimeth at the Lord bloweth upon them and blasteth them bringeth them all to nothing that they do no good as might easily bee exemplified in many other particulars as well as in this of Church government if neede required For hee destroyeth the wisdome of the wise bringeth to nothing the understanding of the prudent 1. Cor. 1.19 the foolishnes of God beeing wiser then men and the weakenes of God stronger then men ver 25. But to keepe to the point in hand This government of the church by Archbishops and Lord Bishops was first brought in and hath beene very unhappily continued in our land under a pretence of preserving the peace unity of the Church for the preventing of schismes and divisions in the same But the wofull experience of many yeeres sheweth that these strange Lords who by their places should bee fathers and fosterers of the church have beene and are to this day cruell and cursed Stepfathers to it and in stead of preventing distractions and dissensions among us they have beene from time to time the sole cause and originall of all those most lamentable divisions and of those heavy pressures which our poore churches have groned under ever since the Gospel came into this kingdome What errour and heresies have they of late brought in countenanced by their authority to the harts griefe of many of the best affected people of the land How do Arminianisme and Bellarminianisme prevaile by reason of that favour which these linsey-woolsey luke-warme Laodiceans shew

intertainement would it finde in the harts of men if the Lord Iesus might once bee permitted to rule in our Congregations by his owne Officers ordinances and if that holy governement of his might bee set up amongst us in perfect beauty What a goodly sight would it bee to see every Congregation of Christians in this kingdome to bee a complete entire spirituall body within it selfe without having any dependance upon these Romish Prelats and their Popish Canons It is that which the great God of heaven looketh for at the hands of our State to which hee hath vouchsafed so many and so great mercies The Lord Iesus Christ who is a great King and the Lord and Lawgiver of his Church hath fitted furnished men extraordinarily for this great worke service And the harts of all the people of the land which are any whitt well affected tooke that way as appeareth by their continuall labouring for it ever since the beginning of the raigne of Queene Elizabeth of pious and happy memory Onely these wicked Bishops oppose it which never did good nor ever will do They can not endure the name of Discipline but have alwaies set themselves with tooth and naile and with might and maine against the kingdome of our blessed Saviour and his sacred soveraignety But let them looke to it and remember what is like to bee their doome if they mend not their maners Those mine enemies which would not that I should raigne over them bring hither and slay them before mee Luke 19.27 10 They hinder as much as in them lieth the publishing of all bookes though never so modestly written in the defence of Christs holy cause and that unalterable government which hee in his last will and Testament hath prescribed to his Churches And if by their scoutes which they have in every corner they can discover finde out the Printer of any such Treatises they deale very rigorously and roughly with him Himselfe they commit close enough to Prison and there they let him ly as long as they please even till they have ruined him his wife and children they seize upon his Presse and letters and sell them away before his face for a song they rifle and ransack his house and cary away by those helhounds their Pursivants as much of his goods as they list without ever making any restitution of that which they do so wrongfully and feloniously take from him when as in the meane while they suffer the Printers of popish Pamphlets to go on in their way with out interruption Nay when such notorious Offenders are brought to them and put into their hands they send them away if not with a reward yet certainely without any check or punishment so well do many of these lazy lubbers and idle drones like of those Romish varlets and their Religion Yea whereas printing by the blessing of God hath beene a speciall meanes of spreading and divulging the Gospel in the Christian world in these later times it is verily beleeved by many that these wretches have a purpose if they can handsomely and cleanly accomplish it wholly to suppresse that rare mystery and most noble and famous Art Divers Printers complaine and I suppose not without cause that they can get nothing licensed They who are authorised and appointed for that purpose do not simply and absolutely deny to do it but they delay them extraordinarily and beyond all measure When they have attended them and called upon them moneth after moneth and one yeere after another their answere in conclusion is that they are not at leisure to reade over their treatises Nay it is reported by some but how true that is time will shew that they shall not bee suffered to print their old copies which they have formerly printed with priviledge till the Licenser do certify a-new under his hand that hee hath carefully read over every passage both in the body of those bookes and in the Epistles prefixed before them and that there is nothing in them repugnant to those tenents which these grand Clergy-masters do now hold Which if it bee true it is high time both for Printers and Bookesellers to go and learne some new Trade for they will not bee able to live of the old By this meanes these vipers do closely eate out the bowels of our church and they run a course directly and pointblanck contrary to that of the holy Apostle 2. Thess 3.1 whose desire was that the word of God might have free passage bee glorified It were to bee wished therefore that our King and State would turne out these Abby-lubbers pluck those fat morsels out of their mouthes and cause them to get their living by the sweate of their browes as other poore Ministers do which labour in the word and doctrine And it will manifestly appeare to bee a worke most fitt necessary to be done if these things following bee well weighed and rightly and duely considered of 1 Their places and callings are abominable accursed and Antichristian Gods Bishops out of all question they are not Hee knoweth no Lord Bishops nor will hee ever acknowledge and owne them for his Mans Bishops they themselves confidently affirme they are not though the discreetest and moderatest of theirs Predecessours have heretofore ingenuously confessed that their callings are of humane institution and that it in the power of the Magistrate to turne them all out at his will and pleasure that hee may do it without sinne against God But this our Prelats now-a-daies disclaime and will not indure to heare of it Beeing then neither Gods Bishops nor mans they must of necessity bee ordained and set up by the Devill whose eldest sonne is the Pope of Rome and these pety Popes our Bishops are all younger brethren to him there going but a paire of sheetes betweene them Their Lordly authority hath certainely no foundation nor footing in the Scripture but is directly contrary to the institution of Christ his blessed will and Testament and it hath beene the ground of that Antichristian Hierarchy of the man of sinne whom God will consume with the spirit of his mouth 2. Thess 2.8 Their civill power deserveth rather to bee exploded then refuted Christ expressely forbiddeth his disciples such Lordly dominion Luke 22.25 Hee himselfe refused to bee made a King Iohn 6.15 professing that his kingdome was not of this world Iohn 18.36 Hee refused to part an heritage betwixt brethrē Luke 12.14 Hee would not give sentence against the woman taken in adultery Iohn 8.11 What intolerable presumption is it then for our Prelats to exercise such authority as our blessed Saviour neither practised himselfe nor permitted to his disciples Nor is the ecclesiasticall Iurisdiction which they usurpe over the Ministers of the Gospel any whitt better but is Antichristian and naught as well as the other Christ Iesus tooke upon him the forme of a servant Phil 2.7 Hee came not to bee ministred unto but to