Selected quad for the lemma: cause_n
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A62456
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Just weights and measures that is, the present state of religion weighed in the balance, and measured by the standard of the sanctuary / according to the opinion of Herbert Thorndike.
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Thorndike, Herbert, 1598-1672.
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1662
(1662)
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Wing T1051; ESTC R19715
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213,517
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274
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enableth Recusants to take the Oath of Supremacy pretense of the pre-eminence of his Church in Ecclesiastical matters hath given this Crown just occasion to declare it self Supreme Head or Supreme Governour for the kingdom of heaven is not in word but in power as St. Paul saith in all Causes and over all Persons as well Ecclesiastical as Civil But the capacity of several senses in words that signifie humane matters capable of so great a Latitude by their nature seemeth to have Produced out of this Act a Sect of Erastians very dangerous to Christianity As immediately denying any Ordinance of God for the Visible Unity of his Church which is an Article of our Creed but by consequence shewing all how they may enjoy the benefit of Civil Law in a State that professes Christianity without beleeving any more of Christianity then they please This capacity was restrained in the beginning of Queen Elizabeths Reign by her Injunctions by the Articles of Religion by an Act of Parliament not to signisie the abolishing or the disclaiming of Ecclesiastical power in part or in whole And to such effect that it is acknowledged now in books written on purpose by one party of Recusants that they may freely take the Oath of Supremacy saving the scruple that may remain of offending those Recusants who think that they may not take it And I can by no means marvel at it For they who do openly profess that unlimited obedience to the Pope in Ecclesiastical maters which hee requireth how can they swearing the Oath of Supremacy bee thought to abjâ—â—e his Ecclesiastical power in England the words of the Oath being restrained by Law to disclaim only the Temporal effect of it But it is manifest that not only the unlimited power of the Pope What further ambiguity that Oath involveth but all authority of a General Council of the Western Churches whereof the Pope is and ought to bee the chief member according to the premises may justly seem to bee disclaimed by other words of the same Oath And that Whereas the Pope usurped not only upon the Crown but upon the Clergy of this Kingdom all those Usurpations are by the Act of Resumption under Hâ—nry the VIII invested in the Crown So that when the Oath declares to maintain all Rights and Pre-eminences annexed to the Crown you may understand that maintenance which a Subject owes his Sovereign against those that pretend to force his claims from him But you may also understand that maintenance which a Divine owes the Truth in asserting the Title of the Crown to all rights vested in it Which hee that believes that some rights of the Church are invested in the Crown ought not to undertake Though as a Subject for preserving the State of his King and Country hee bee tyed to maintain all the claims of the Crown against all the enemies of it Now if an Oath required by the Sovereign Power bear two What scanâ—al the takiâ—g of it in the true sense ministreth senses in the proper signification of the Words which is more ordinary then it is believed the Subject may undergo it in that sense which truth and right warranteth And so in regard the Pope not content with his Regular authority in the Church pretends Temporal power in disposing of the Dominiâ—nâ— which hee disclaims Communion with besides absolute power in materâ— of Religion it is lawful to swear that hee ought to have no manner of power in this Kingdom as things stand tiâ—l hee depart from claims so unjust But there is appearance that the misunderstanding of it hath produced an Opinion destructive to one Article of the Creed to the being of any Visible Church as founded by God And besides it is not possible that all they who are called to this Oath by Law can ever bee able to distinguish that sense wherein they ought from that wherein they ought not to take it And therefore of necessity the Law gives great offense and that offense is the sin of the Kingdom and calls for Gods vengeance upon it Which though all are involved in yet in the other world the account will lye upon them that may change it and do not Now it is manifest that all Recusants believe not the Popes That this Oatâ— ought to bee inlarged to all pretenses in Religiâ—n that abridge Allegiance Temporal Power nor think themselves bound to execute such Acts as the Bull of Pius quintus against Queen Elizabeth Those that do not how should they bee liable to capital punishment which the Law in some cases inflicts For how should they bee taken for the enemies of their Country otherwise On the contrary I have shewed by the Troubles of Franckford in the beginning of the Reformation that there was then the same difference of opinion amongst them that held with the Reformation about obedience to Sovereigns obeying the Church of Rome And that the same difference of opinion was the cause of the late Troubles appeareth by the aspersion of Popery upon his late Majesty alleged to justifie the War against him Whereby it appeareth that they of that opinion do undergo the Oathes of Supremacy and Allegiance as provided only against the See of Rome and the claims of it Thinking themselves enabled notwithstanding the same to limit their Allegiance to that which their Religion shall allow And therefore there is great Reason why the Kingdom should enact a new Oath extending the Original Allegiance of all Subjects to all cases in which experience hath shewed or reason may foresee that Religion may bee pretended to abridge the Obligation of Allegiance This I am encouraged here to declare by the late Act of the Kingdom of Scotland establishing for the future the form of an Oath whereby the obligation of Allegiance iâ— extended to the renouncing not only of any claim for the See of Rome but of all pretenses whatsoever whether upon the account of Religion or of civil Right of abridging the obligation of it For though I neither maintain nor find fault with the terms which it useth yet the agreement and the difference between the case of both Kingdoms as it evidenceth to all the necessity so it determineth to them that are to understand the State of both the agreement and the difference of that which ought to bee provided And seeing it is the true consequence of the common Christianity that enables the Kingdom to do this because supposing as it doth the State of this World it cannot extend to the altering of it there is great reason why a Divine should bee allowed to say it not entring upon other considerations wherein Religion is not concerned For in the next place to the bringing in of a new Provision the conscience of the Kingdom is best discharged the Scandals that may bee occasioned removed the wrath of God prevented or appeased by the secular Powers allowing these interpretations to pass without contradiction that may enable all estates to depose it
profess to leave the world to follow Christ must needs bee meer mater of Counsel because no man is commanded to undertake that estate but invited to it for the securing of his Salvation who knows hee may be saved without it Whereby it appears that this estate imports a profession of abstinence from the pride the revenge the lusts and pleasures of the world as well as from the riches of it as well of the humility the patience the continence the meekness and obedience of our Lord as of the mean estate in which hee lived But that for the means to compass this end it imports first a profession of renouncing the rank estate which every man holds in the world and of dedicating himself to the service of the Church and that imployment which tends to the common good of Christians If it should bee inferred from hence that the state of the Clergy importing the forsaking of the World at this extraornary Rate must therefore import the profession of single life as some of the Church of Rome would have it The answer is that it will not follow And the instance is peremptory That the Apostles themselves who thus left the world did not profess it And if by undertaking the Clergy a man was not obliged to renounce his goods As appears by those Canons which inable the Clergy to dispose of them at death much less doth that estate import a profession of single life being more difficult to perform then to live as a Clergy man upon the Church goods For it is possible for them who have wives to live as if they had them not according to S. Paul No otherwise then it is possible for them who have the dispensing of Church goods to use them as if they used them not The reason of single life for the Clergy is firmly grounded by the Fathers and Canons of the Church upon the precept of S. Paul forbidding man and wife to part unless for a time to attend upon Prayer For Priests and Deacons being continually to attend upon occasions of celebrating the Eucharist which ought continually to be frequented if others bee to abstain from the use of Marriage for a time for that purpose then they always And this is the reason that prevailed so far even in the primitive times that the instances which are produced to the contrary during those times seem to argue no more then dispensation in a Rule which had the force of a Law when an exception took not place That is when those that were thought necessary for the service of the Church thought not fit to tye themselves to live single But this profession was evidently the ground for that discipline which was used all over the Church in breeding youth from tender years to such a strict course of life as only use and custom is able to render agreeable to mans nature And to this education and discipline all the authority and credit of the Clergy over the people is to bee imputed the dissolution whereof is the true occasion of the miseries which wee have seen For did the people think themselves tyed to depend upon the Clergy for their instructions to admit their admonitions and reproofs in mater of Religion that is did the discipline and education of the Clergy maintain them in that authority with the people it is not possible that the pride which hath been seen in setting up new Religions and giving new Laws to the Church should take place But this authority is not to bee preserved without retirement from the world that is from conversation with the People of what ranke or degree soever whether upon pretense of profit or pleasure And therefore being once lost by the debauches of the Clergy before the Reformation it is not to be restored without restoring the ground of it the said education and discipline nor by consequence the Reformation to bee counted compleat otherwise Supposing always the Reformation to bee the restoring of that Church which hath bee not the building of that which hath not been The same education and discipline is by the express Canons of the Church the ground of that title upon which promotion is due to the Clergy in their respective Churches For what is more against the Rules of the Church then to take such men for Priests and Bishops of such Churches as men know not how they behaved themselves in lower degrees Those that talk of the Interest of the People in Ecclesiastical promotions without supposing this ground do allege nothing but their own dreams to bring their own dreams to pass Having this premised I must needs say I see no manner of inconvenience in that which the Presbyterians pretend for the cheif cause of their distance that is the concurrence of Presbyters with their Bishops in Ordinations and the Jurisdiction of the Church provided it bee setled in that form which being grounded upon the Rule of the Catholick Church may tend to restore and advance the common Christianity Now I take the Rule of the Church to bee as evidently this as the common Christianity is evident that every City with the Territory thereof bee the feat and content of a Church For though it hath been used with so much difference in several parts and times of the Church that those Countries which some whiles and some where might have been cast into fourscore Churches have other whiles and elsewhere been cast into four yet these are but exceptions to a Rule which the Law saith do not destroy but confirm it For in maters concerning the Whole the Unity of the Whole may as well bee preserved by the concurrence of four as of fourscore The Churches that is according to this Rule the Dioceses of England have been constituted and distinguished upon occasion of the Sovereignties in which and by consent whereof the Christianity of the Nation was first planted Hee that considers with half an eye shall easily see how the conversion of Kent of the East and South and West Saxons of the East Angles and Mercians and lastly of Northumberland produced the foundation of English Churches For of the British foundations in the West parts of the Island from the two Forths to the Lands end the same account is to bee kept the Dominion of the Britains being for some time divided into several Sovereignties Hee that is convicted of this truth which no man can bee convicted of but hee that considereth the case But who so considereth the case must needs stand convict of it will easily grant me that when the Monarchy prevailed and England came to bee divided into Counties the General Rule of the Church would have required another course to have been observed For had the Head Town of every County been made the Seat of a Church containing that County no man that surveys the division of the Roman Empire into Churches made without the secular Power as before Constantine will deny That the division so made would have been more