Selected quad for the lemma: church_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
church_n	council_n	general_n	infallibility_n	4,531	5	11.6807	5	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A48024	A relation of the death of the primitive persecutors written originally in Latin by L.C.F. Lactantius ; Englished by Gilbert Burnet, D.D., to which he hath made a large preface concerning persecution.; De mortibus persecutorum. English	Lactantius, ca. 240-ca. 320.; Burnet, Gilbert, 1643-1715.	1687 (1687)	Wing L142; ESTC R234919	60,272	167

uneasie naturally love Changes for these are like the shifting of postures they give some present ease and they slatter the Patient with the hope of more to follow The Advice that the old Man of Samnium sent his Son was certainly very wise he had Intercepted the whole Roman Army in the Hills shutting up the Passages so that they could neither go backward nor forward the Father advised him first to dismiss them all without any Injury since that would probably oblige the Romans or if that were not followed to cut them all off for that would weaken them considerably whereas the middle Method which the General took of letting them all go having first put a publick Affront on them enraged the Romans without weakning them According to this Advice it seems evident that all considerable Bodies of Men that are in any State are to be set at ease or to be quite rooted out and there is nothing wise in this severe Method but an extream and an unrelenting Persecution and in this point if the Church of Rome has forgot the Innocence of the Dove yet it must be confessed that she has retained the Wisdom of the Serpent Persecution is not only hurtful to those that suffer many hard things by it but is likewise mischievous to them by the aversion that it inspires in them to those at whose hands they suffer by the ill Habit of mind into which it throws them and by those violent Projects and Convulsions which do very naturally come into the heads of those who as they feel much so they fear yet more Those that do persecute tho they seem to triumph for a while with the Spoils of their Enemies yet will soon feel how this sinks their Credit extreamly among those that were more Indifferent Spectators while the Debate was managed with the Pen or Tongue but they will certainly take part at least in their Compassions with the Miserable and will be disposed to think ill not only of those men that are heavy upon their harmless Neighbours but even of the Cause it self that is supported by such Methods The multitude even of the lowest Order of men has a remnant of good Nature left which shews it self in the sad looks that all put on at the Executions even of Malefactors but if a false Religion has not quite extinguished Humanity in its Votaries this will make a more sensible Impression when men that have done nothing amiss and are only in fault because they cannot help thinking as they do are made Sacrifices to the Rage of others that perhaps have little more to say for themselves but that they are in possession of the Law which in the next Revolution of affairs that may fall out will be an Argument so much the Stronger for using themselves in the same manner because it is a just retaliation on them for that which they made others to suffer The men of Persecution do also naturally engage themselves into the Intrigues of Courts and all the Factions of Parties they enter into Dependances upon Ministers of State who drive them on to execute all their Passions and to serve all their Ends and who have too good understandings themselves not to laugh at the officious forwardness of those who are perhaps more eager than is intended in the doing of that for which those very persons whose blind Instruments they are at one time will reproach them at another In short Persecution does extreamly vitiate the Morals of the Party that manages it The worst men so they are furious and violent are not only connived at but are even courted and men otherwise of severer morals will insensibly slacken by reason of their Engagments with vicious men whom they will find themselves forced to cherish and Imploy and if those who have persecuted others fall under a Reverse of Fortune and come to suffer themselves a little of that which they made others feel as their ill behaviour will deprive them in a great measure of those Compassions that would otherwise work towards them so it will raise within them many uneasy Reflections upon their own Actings which will prove but Melancholy Companions to them in their Afflictions and these will force them to conclude that because they shewed no Mercy therefore they now meet with the requital of Iudgment without Mercy which how unjust soever it may be in those by whom they suster yet they will find it meet to look up to God and to confess that just and Righteous are all his Wayes and it may be reasonably apprehended that it may have contributed not a little to fill up the measure of the Sins of a Church and to bring down severe strokes upon them when the visible Danger which was apparent from a formidable Enemy could not turn their thoughts to that side but that instead of Using Legal and just Precautions for their own Security they let themselves loose to all the Rages of a mad Prosecution of some poor undiscreet and deluded People and all this to gratify their own Revenges or to Insinuate themselves into the Favours of those who do now justly laugh at them when the turn that they intended is served by their means and those who would prepare themselves for those hard things which they have reason to expect from a Church that has alwayes delighted to bath her self in Blood ought seriously to profess their Repentance of this Fury in Instances that may be as Visible and edifying as their Rage has been publick and destructive But there remains yet one point without which I am sensible that this discourse will appear defective I know it is extream tender in our present Circumstances yet that does not defer me from venturing on it it is How far Protestants ought to Tolerate Papists It seems at first view the most unreasonable thing in the World for those to pretend to it who we are sure must destroy us as soon as it is in their power to do it I say they must do it since by those Councils which they themselves hold to be General the extirpation of Hereticks and the breaking of Faith to them has been so formally decreed that it is a foolish piece of presumption to imagine that they can ever lay down those Principles Infallibility is the bottom upon which their Church is built and she must be as Infallible in the Rules that she gives of Morality as she is in her Decisions in Points of Faith for all the Reasons that are given for private persons depending on the Church for the Rule of their Faith do bind as strongly to depend likewise on the Church for the Rule of Life and Manners If we are in danger of forgetting what was decreed in that Church so long ago they take pains from time to time to refresh our Memories not only by their Cruelties in the last Age for which there was so much more to be said than for later Barbarities because the Reformation was lookt on

of their Pastoral Authority as if that had been given them to Worry their Sheep and not to Feed them objected Articles to their Prisoners upon suspition and required them to purge themselves of them by Oath and because Bishops were not perhaps all so equally Zealous and Cruel some of them being Persons of great Quality so that some remnants of a generous Education and of their lay pity might still hang about them that Bloody Man Dominick took this work to task and his Order has ever since furnished the World with a set of Inquisitors compared to whom all that had ever dealt in Tortures in any former times were but Bunglers So far has this Melancholy Speculation of the Degeneracy of the Church of Rome carried me they at last came to extol a Zeal against Heresie as the highest Act of Piety towards God and since Heresie is reckoned by S. Paul among the Works of the Flesh it seemed as just to punish it in the severest manner as it was to punish any of the other Works of the Flesh and since all Hereticks were looked on as Persons damned all Tenderness towards them and Pity for them was as far exinguished as it was possible For a false Religion will not easily have the better of good Nature so entirely as to root it quite out tho it must be acknowledged that the Roman Religion has done more towards that than any other that has ever yet appeared in the World. All the room that was left for good Nature was the favourable Definition that was given of Heresy by which Obstinacy was made its peculiar Character that distinguished it from Error which lies in a more Innocent Mistake concerning Divine Matters and as many have explain'd this Obstinacy it amounts to a continuing in Errour after one is convinced of it This Notion of Heresy which has been received by many of the greatest Men even in the Church of Rome it self seems to agree well with that of St. Paul's ranking Heresy among the Works of the Flesh for if it is meerly a mistake in the Judgment in which one continues because he cannot overcome his persuasion nor see Reasons that are strong enough to oblige him to change his Mind such an adhering to Error may be called any thing rather than a Work of the Flesh. But if a Man from a Principle of Interest Pride or Discontent either throws himself into ill Opinions or continues in them after his Mind is better enlightned so that he stisles and denies that inward Conviction then the Reason is very plain why such an ill Temper of Mind should be reckoned a Work of the Flesh because it plainly arises out of a depraved Nature I will not here enter into so troublesome an Enquiry as it would be to examine how far an Erroneous Conscience acquits one before God for that must be left to Him who will judge every Man according to his Works and who best knows how far he will accept of a general Repentance of unknown Sins and of a general Act of Faith even of Truths that are yet unknown but as for the Judgments of men certainly when the other parts of ones life make it clear not only to a Judgment of Charity but even to that of Discretion that he is sincere and that he means well it is hard to know when he is Obstinate and when his Errors become Heresies that is to say Works of the Flesh. So far have I been led upon the consideration of the Spirit of Persecution that is not only warranted by Custom and a long continued Practice but is by the Authority not only of Popes but even of General Councils established into a Law on the Church of Rome I am carried next into a Scene of Thoughts that are more particularly suted to the Doctrines of the Reformed Churches and here it must be acknowledged that Persecution is a more justifiable thing according to the Principles of the Church of Rome than it is according to our Tenets for the Church of Rome that pretends to be infallible has a better Right to demand a blind Submission from all its Subjects and to treat those roughly who refuse to grant it than a Church that pretends to nothing but a Power of Order and Government and that confesses she may be mistaken Our being Subject to Error is unreasonably urged when men would carry it so far as to make us doubt of all things yet it ought at least to have this effect on us as to keep us from being too ready to judge hardly of those who are of another mind or to use them roughly for it since it is possible that they may be in the Right and that we may be mistaken at least they may have very probable Reasons for their Opinions which if they do not quite justify their Mistakes yet do very much excuse and lessen them It is likewise visible that all severe Proceedings upon the diversity of Opinions how effectual soever they may be on base-minded men who will alwayes make Shipwrack of a good Conscience when it comes in competition with the Love of this present World yet work quite contrary wise on men of awakned Understandings and generous Souls instead of gaining on such Persons these Inspire them with horror at a sort of men who go about to ruin companies of people that never did them hurt It is from this that those Violent Hatreds arise among men of different Persuasions Every man is not capable to understand an Argument or to be much disturbed at it and tho Divines that carry their Speculations further into the Consequences of Opinions whether Real or Imaginary grow hot and angry at one another upon those Heads yet the people understand them little and feel them less but every man feels an Injury and Nature makes her Inferences very quick upon it and concludes that those who use us ill hate us and there must be a great degree of Regeneration to keep men from hating those that hate them upon this arises all the Animosity that is among the several Parties for every one reckoning himself a Member of that Body to which he associates himself thinks that he is obliged to resent all the Injuries that are done to his Fellow-members as much as if they were done to himself in particular and by the same natural Logick he casts the Guilt of the Wrongs done his own Party not only on those Individuals of the other Party from whom they did more Immediately arise but upon the whole Body of them and so here a War is kindled in mens Breasts and when that is once formed within it will find some unhappy occasion or other to give it self a vent Those who are ill used are in a State like that of a Mass of humours in the Body which roul about less perceived till some unlucky Accident has weakned any part of it and then they will all discharge themselves on the part that suffers Men that are