Selected quad for the lemma: church_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
church_n	apostle_n	bishop_n	timothy_n	4,167	5	10.7647	5	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A92025	A reply to the answer of Anonymus to Doctor Gauden's Analysis of the sense of the covenant: and under that, to a later tract of one Mr Zach. Crofton of the same fraternity with him. By John Rowland Oxoniensis, CCC. Rector of Footscray in Kent.	Rowland, John, 1606-1660.	1660 (1660)	Wing R2070; Thomason E1038_4; ESTC R207862	40,193	52

that hath made such a rent in the Church for the devil and all his works to enter by against which we covenanted in Baptism and being you can finde no shelter for it in the New Testament you have recourse to the Old and there you are in as bad a case for unless you will make use of Korah and his Conspiracy I know not what precept or pattern you finde for it for you produce none onely you make a question Is there no precept nor pattern for covenanting against our English Episcopacy and you make your own answer There is not any for it I say nor is it much material that he hath found none against it for we can finde no such Episcopacy in the New Testament nor warranted by it But we can finde patterns of Episcopacy both in the Old and New Testament that were not barely typical but an excellent form of Church-Government by High Priests Priests and Levites by the apostles extraordinary in whose room our ordinary Bishops succeeded under whom were the 70. the Presbyters in a large sense sometimes called Bishops also and under them the Deacons This is as clear from the New Testament as noon day in the Acts of the Apostles St. Paul to Titus and Timothy c. and he must wilfully shut his eyes that sees not the distinction of these Offices in the Church which continued from the primitive times until this late Covenanting way pat the Church of God into a confusion and sought to destroy all order and uniformity and I think they are no little proud of it that without either Precept or Pattern were the first inventers of it and would fain propagate it to future times but I hope they will be deceived for it hath cost men so dear already that it is probable they will take warning and learn to be wiser hereafter We have shewed you ground enough for establishing Episcopacy shew us as much if you can for your Piesb terial Government The Covenant is not onely against his adored Episcopacy but in the full latitude extended against Popery heresie schism c. how chance then you break it by being so schismatical profaneness and whatsoever is contrary to sound doctrine c. and for Preservation and Reformation of Religion c. It s well you put Preservation first and we wish you had done so for where you begin to resorm you destroy all witness your information of the Liturgy casting it quite out of doors You say it was not made onely against Episcopacy but it was principally as if that were worse then Popery for you must it seemes stretch it in its full latitude to take in Popery heresie or any thing else and had it not been that Episcopacy stood in your way which you knew not how to remove your Covenant had never been made against any of the rest or else surely you would as there was always cause enough have entred into it long before but Popery heresie schism and all that you were pleased to make to depend upon Episcopacy in the Covenant were onely added to perswade the people who understood no better that Episcopacy was the foundation of them all You have put in also many sweet ingredients to make it go down the better to maintain true Religion You have maintained it fairly Defence of His Majesties person And did you not well defend him Ad populum phaleras And why are you so offended with the Doctor to throw off and abominate the Covenant meerly for onely one single Clause for extirpating the late Hierarchy if so intended You did intend it sure enough and therefore is that single Clause sufficient were it not safer to throw the Covenant away than to take it when the poison lies close in it is discovered Speak I pray you or else let some men of more reason and religion answer for you For the Doctor to desor be particularly what Episcopacy he would have retroduced I think you understand his meaning or let me tell you such as it was before your Covenant drove it out onely with this limitation that particular mens errors should not be imputed to the Government which allows them not but declaims against them You say you might leave it to all sober Christians how little your Covenant differs from the Covenant of Baptism c. wherein every man stipulateth to deny all ungodliness and to live soberly c. If you will leave it so I am certain you will be condemned by them for it for they were no sober Christians that penned the Covenant but hot-spurs and fiery zealots who will force all men to be guided by what they please to set up as Nebuchadaezar did his golden image that every man must fall down and worship it do you say how little your Covenant differs from the sacred Covenant of Baptism You gave that Epithere Sacred to your Covenant before and do you th●nk they are so much of a kinde because of that they differ toto coelo they are no more like as the Proverb is than chalk and cheese and I believe I may safely call it blasphemy to compare the factious Contrivances of seditious men to Gods sacred Ordinances And what you insist upon concerning the Baptismal Covenant to strengthen yours is but vain babling for it signifies nothing to any understanding man Do true Christians truly entred in o the Baptismal Covenant break it by wilful and presumptuous sins Because the Doctor said we break our Covenant in Baptism by wilful and presumptuous sins did you never sin wilfully since you were baptized is all weaknesses with you who I might say have wilfully and maliciously contrary to Gods Law fallen away from your due obedience to your Governors and erected a Covenant a Calf in Horeb to make your selves famous amongst the congregation and to exalt your selves above your Superiors you take too much upon you ye sons of Levi. You say you have insisted upon this the longer because of the Doctors words That by repentance we renew our Covenant in Baptism surely say you no more then it renews the remission of our sins which no repentance but Christ in Baptism hath bestowed upon us once for all Thus you trifle away the time by sinister interpretations of what will admit a very safe and Orthodox construction for without Christs merits all Baptism and Repentance is of none effect yet you have a very acute nose that you can smell here a strong savour of Arminianism and Popery I shall make amends by brevity in the rest You need not have croubled us with so much idle discourse as you have done Whereas the Doctor saith That there is neither Law of God or man requiring or comprobating any such Covenant at the best it is but a matter of Will-worship of human private invention c. an Engine framed of purpose to batter down Episcopacy to seize their Estates and the Church-patrimony to the great enrichment of some sacrilegious Protestants to the great joy of

Government and back what they say by Scripture good Authority by Reason and Examples and we shall draw the parallel against Presbytery and then let every man be judge which of the two hath most cause to be covenanted against and if they please to enumerate the Benefits of their Presbyterial Government we shall do the like for Bishops the work would be large and worth the while to be undertaken to reconcile the Differences in Church Discipline and to give better satisfaction to the Christian world I shall now to avoid prolixtry speak a word or two only of the benefits of Episcopacy for the faults it is obnoxious to are not essential to the Government but meerly accidental First then it is more orderly regular and uniform and by consequence more free from schisms sects heresies and whatsoever mischief may gather to a head for want of good order 2. It is more decent graceful and more consistent with Monarchy a poor creeping Clergy is not comely in Christian Princes Courts who will seem always to upbraid them to their faces as if they were not willing to be at any cost for the preaching of the Gospel whereas the best Kings and Emperors as Constantine Theodosius and others sought still how with rich endowments to beautifie and adorn them Moses and Aaron must be together the King and the Priest the Crown and the Miter the Princes Scepter and the Bishops Crosier or else the Scepter will be soon made to stoop to the Presbyterian Ferula 3. It is greater encouragement to Learning and Religion Take away the reward of Vertue and you do what you can to take away Goodness itself Pramia si tollas tollitur virtus but I must not let my pen run to a volumn 4. Consider that many Reformed Churches are in misery and ready to be swallowed up continually by Popish and cruel Adversaries what can the Presbyterian party do to afford them any help surely little or none whereas when our Church flourishen under the Bishops the Protestants abroad in all places lived in more repose and quiet and found continual assistance from them insomuch that their foes did hardly dare to make any head against them and I doubt not but they will conress how sensible they have been since these troubles of the great loss they have of Prelacy in England by whose wariness and continual care of them as well as of their charge at home they were always fostered and preserved since the Reformation What horrid persecutions have fallen upon them since the expelling of our Bishops here let the Waldenses and the Albigenses and the poor Protestants living about the Valleys of Piedmont whom the Duke of Savoy and others endeavored with all their might to take away from the earth speak The like cruelties were used lately upon the Reformed Cantons in Switzerland also in Poland and Germany and the French Protestants fearing daily to be rooted out and what remedy could they sinde with you I will not speak too bad of the great Collections made by you here for them and how they were employed for their relief Also of the monstrous blasphemies damned heresies shameful adulteries and many other villanies which have sprung up since Presbytery bore the sway the names whereof were scarcely known when Episcopacy ruled Let some more able pen proceed And however some Churches of Christ expelling Popery in heat of zeal have thereby laid lawful Episcopacy aside that is have not had since the opportunity to restore it to its primitive Institution yet many of them desire to conform to the plat-form of the Church of England which they suppose to come the nearest of any to the Apostolick form His next quarrel is If the Covenant abjure all Episcopacy it runs upon a rock of novelty and schism and dasheth us in opinion and practice against the judgement and custom of the Catholick Church in all Ages and places till of latter years from the Apostles days You call this a Magisterial and traditional way Surely such traditions as these are not to be under-valued the Histories and Monuments of the Church are a great light to us in many things especially such as are circumstancial and without them we should wander in the dark But once prove that your abol shed Episcopacy was of so ancient and universal observation Abolished we praise God you cannot say but that you did your best to abolish it the antiquity of it hath been often proved to your shame Whoever shall read the Judgement of Dr. John Reynolds concerning Episcopacy expressed in a Letter to Sir Francis Knolls and Dr. Ushers Reduction will finde this mans bold assertion c. I have not means nor opportunity to see that Letter nor any of his Quotations but I remember when I was a Scholar in Corpus Christi Colledge in Oxford whereof some years before Doctor John Reynolds had been President I was told he was once much given to be a Roman Catholick and that his brother a Protestant converted him whom I knew in Glocester-Hall but he fell shortly after himself to the Church of Rome wherein he died now though Doctor Reynolds was a very learned and pious man who by a kinde of Antiperistasis because of his brothers fall might be more violent against the Discipline of our Church than perhaps otherwise he would have been yet he met with as pious and learned men as himself at the Conference at Hampton Court 2 King James that maintained it and carried it against him and all that were of his judgement The same cause that provoked Dr. Reynolds may be prevailed with an eminent person in this Land to favour your Covenanters so much at first because his brother was revolted to Popery But this was not the Bishops fault it had been more honorable for them both to have followed the example of their Reverend Uncle James Lord Bishop of Winchester Prelate of the Garter and my most honored Patron during my minority who knew better how to direct in Church affairs than they ever did but for want of his Compass they ran a great hazard to fall upon those two dangerous Rocks that lay on either hand of Popery and Presbytery As for Dr. Ushers Reduction if that be the meaning of it we grant it is not held fit that the Bishops should keep too great a distance and estrange themselves too much from their brethren it is acknowledged to have been a fault in some of them and it is proper it should be amended But pray give me leave to referre you to Dr. Downhams Defence of Episcopacy and when you can answer him I shall say that you have answered the Doctor Under colour of propounding the loy land religious sense of it he dasheth it with unlawfulness to be taken at all because not imposed by due Authority This hath been so often repeated that it is crambe saepius cocta and needs no answer Dr. The Jews sometimes solemnly renewed their Covenant with God c. which God