Selected quad for the lemma: cause_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
cause_n	difference_n	former_a	great_a	135	4	2.1090	3	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A91392	The true grounds of ecclesiasticall regiment set forth in a briefe dissertation. Maintaining the Kings spirituall supremacie against the pretended independencie of the prelates, &c. Together, vvith some passages touching the ecclesiasticall power of parliaments, the use of synods, and the power of excommunication.	Parker, Henry, 1604-1652.	1641 (1641)	Wing P428; Thomason E176_18; ESTC R212682	61,943	101

familiarly with them cannot stand with our owne safety or the honour of Religion or the Law of common decency but those whom we account as Publicans we doe not make Publicans whom we shun as infectious we doe not punish as rebellious their actions we doe generally detest but their persons we doe not judicially condemne Princes under the Law might not eate of the Shew bread nor approach the Sanctuary being in a polluted condition nor in case of Leprosie might they be admitted into the Congregation of the Lord so nor bastards c. but these are all instances of Non-communion not of Excommunication and the reason of Non-communion is perpetuall so that if Princes in open contempt of the Sacraments should desire them at the Ministers hands Ministers ought rather to dye than to administer them But to deny the Sacrament is not any spirituall obduration or castigation to this denyall no speciall authority is necessary neither to that authority is any coercive force internally working upon the soule granted Cain having committed an unnaturall murther was generally abhorred amongst his brethren and abandoned as unfit for humane society but this was a crime proper for the temporall sword and if this was a proper punishment it was temporall And it is plainly cleered to us that adultery it selfe by Gods Law was punished by the temporall not spirituall sword and that abscissio animae amongst the Iewes was ever spoken of corporall punishment by death the inffliction whereof was only left to the temporall Magistrate and that there was no difference observed betweene Crimes Spirituall and Crimes Temporall Non-Communion then we grant to have bin of ancient use and perpetuall but we wish great caution and circumspection to be had therein amongst Christians for as visibly prophane persons are to be rejected so no former profanenesse ought to be cause of rejection where the party with outward professions of repentance and gestures of reverence craves the mysteries at the Ministers hands as almost all Christians doe For in such case if the Sacrament then the word also may be denyed and so no manner of salvation shall be left to such as have bin formerly vitious whatsoever their present demeanour be To come now to Excommunication or the Spirituall Sword and sentence of the Church as it was used in the Primitive times yet so wee finde differences of it amongst our Divines That incestuous Corinthian which was said to be traditus Satanae as Chrysostome conceives was not ejected out of the Church by ordinary excommunication but was miraculously left to Satan ut percelleretur vulnere malo aut morbo and such was the punishment of Ananias and his Wife and of Elymas c. according to Ierom Ambrose Theodoret Oecumenius Theophylact c. This excommunication if it may be called so was a corporall punishment and there is no appearance of any internall obduration by the binding power of the Minister and it was miraculous and therefore though it was of use then when the Keyes of Church-men could not erre and when a Temporall Sword was wanting yet now it is utterly uselesse and abolisht For any other excommunication of present and perpetuall necessity in Ecclesiasticall regiment there is little proofe in Scripture it is the spirituall Scepter of our Hierarchrists without which their Empire would appeare meerely imaginary and therefore their zeale is strong for it though their grounds be weake It seemes to me a very darke deduction that the Keyes of Heaven in the Gospell must needs import reall power and jurisdiction in Church-men and onely in Church-men and that that power and jurisdiction must needs intend such a spirituall sword as our present form of excommunication is and that that sword is as miraculous as it was or as usefull as if it were miraculous and that the stroke of it is meerly spirituall and not to be supplyed by the temporall sword and that Princes are as well lyable to it as other Lay-men Ierome sayes that with God not the sentence of the Priest but the life of the sentenced party is look'd upon and regarded and sayes he Vt Leprosum mundum vel immundum Sacerdos facit Sic alligat vel solvit Presbyter It should seeme our Priests now have the same power to try and discerne scandalous persons amongst us as the Iewish had Leapers in their times and no man supposes that the Iewish Priests had any vertue or force in their judgements to purge such as were uncleane or to infect those which were cleane they were held the most fit and impartiall judges but the matter to bee judged of was visible easie and sensible So much as this no man will deny to our Ministers for if they binde and shut Heaven to persons sensibly profan not altering at all the condition of such as they binde and shut out this is no such strange Spirituall Sword and Celestiall power and supereminent dominion as they have hitherto pretended to neither is it of any such great consequence in the Church of God But if Ministers can yet by vertue of their Keyes either search into the reines and hearts of hypocrites as the Apostles did or alter the condition of such as are subject to them either by absolving or obdurating the guilty or can effect any remedy in the Church for the taking away of scandall by their spirituall power which the temporall ruler doth not effect as the Apostles may be supposed to have done This is more than the Iewish Priests ever professed this is supernaturall and wee ought to admire it I doe not beleeve that our Ministers will lay clayme to any such miraculous vertue and infallibility and if they did I hope they would give us some signes and demonstrations therof by opening Heaven to thousands and by confounding all incorrigible opposers of Religion If Nero had resorted to Peters ministery desiring to bee made partaker of the Word and Sacraments out of fraud and dissimulation Peter doubtlesse would not have refused him and cast him off without a certaine insight into his hypocrisie but if Peter did discerne his hypocrisie and reject him yet our Ministers cannot discerne the like and therefore cannot reject in the like manner With us take Excommunication as a spirituall punishment as it hardens and drives from Repentance for so the shutting of Heaven intimates and our Ministers should bee cruell to use it where they are ignorant of the heart and take it as a wholesome remedy and fit meanes to draw to repentance as corporall punishments sometimes are though it bee strange to conceite the like of spirituall yet their vertue being ignorantly applyed is no proper vertue For in case of utter impenitence and open perversenesse Heaven is shut without the Ministers power and in case of fained penitence the Ministers Key cannot open effectually though he discerne not the fraud and in case of true penitence if the Minister be mistaken yet Heaven will not remaine shut Howsoever if Priests may now