Selected quad for the lemma: city_n
Text snippets containing the quad
|
ID |
Title |
Author |
Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication) |
STC |
Words |
Pages |
|
A56736
|
An answer to Vox cleri, &c. examining the reasons against making any alterations and abatements, in order to a comprehension and shewing the expediency thereof.
|
Payne, William, 1650-1696.
|
1690
(1690)
|
Wing P896; ESTC R36661
|
22,857
|
39
|
against the Assaults of Men and Devils if these things seem necessary to any man it will also seem necessary to that man to admit such Changes as he is perswaded will conduce to such ends (a) p. 8. I have now done with the Cause and leave it to any man who reads his Book and this whether any thing loosely and scatteringly offered in the one has not had its full force fairly given it and as full and complete an Answer returned to it by the other But I have a word or two of Friendly Advice to our Author before I have done with him as a parting civility 1. First then I would advise him not to speak so loudly and openly against the Toleration for fear the Parliament should hear him as he does upon all occasions telling us the Reasons against it are irrefragable that it used to be granted at the instance and for the sake of professed Papists that it is a greater favour than was granted the Church Party in the late Wars I hoped those old Sores had been healed or however that we should not take example of our Enemies ill usage and cruelty to revenge the same upon them The Papists were never for a Toleration of Protestants only as we have it now with exclusion to themselves and they were as much for putting the Penal Laws in execution at one time as they were for Toleration in another so that they have been playing their game on both sides and both have been tricked by them But with submission to the Irrefragable Reasons of the Parliament in 1662. we have since sufficiently tryed other methods and found them not only ineffectual but mischievous so that some such Expedient as a Toleration was absolutely necessary either to prevent on one side the scandalous unsuccesfull prosecution of weak and wilfull men or on the other the King 's illegal dispensing with over severe Laws I see the mischief of a boundless and unlimited Toleration but whether the mischiefs of Persecution i. e. Extreme penalties for the sake of Religion be not greater I leave to experience and the judgment of our Governours to determine However it does not become Clergymen who should use the other methods of Tenderness and Perswasion more proper to the Gospel and their Office to grudge and repine at the favour of the State to those who differ from them and thereby discover their angry and revengefull Resentment and their good will to use other methods if it were in their power 2. I would never have a man that writes against all Alterations at the same time propose any especially such strange ones as reading in our Churches the Epistles of Ignatius and Polycarp or some select Chapters out of King Charles the Martyr's 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 (a) p. 26. For since he knows some People are greatly offended at the Apocryphal Lessons and would have nothing read in the Church but what is undoubtedly Canonical it will look very odly to make such a Proposal to the Convocation at its next sitting and therefore I would desire him not to move any such thing though perhaps the thing might take with some men if others were much against it and out of mere spite to the design of Alterations they might clog the Bill with such an Incumbrance I do not intend to examine particular Alterations but shall leave them to the wisdom of the Church i. e. the Convocation and the wisdom of the Nation i. e. the Parliament to agree and settle them as they shall think fit I am for making some few Alterations but am by no means for this of our Authour 's proposing of reading Ignatius and Polycarp and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in our Churches though I like them almost as well as Tobit and his Dog or Bell and the Dragon however some question whether they are all genuine 3. Above all I would advise our Authour when he writes again never to make Comparisons between men because he knows by the old Proverb they are odious and nothing can excuse them but when a necessary defence calls for them Thus though Dr. Jane be a very worthy person and fills both the Professor's and Prolocutor's Chair very well and gracefully yet why he and his Neighbour Clergy should be in such mighty Joy and Triumph because he was chosen rather than Dr. Tillotson and look upon this as a good Omen for the good of the Church * p. 1. as if the choice of the other would have foreboded some mischief to the Church this is so unmannerly rude and reflecting that it requires the temper of that excellent Man to forgive it who has done as much good to Religion and the Church as half a Convocation Prolocutor and all But I perceive the bottom of the pique our Author has a most ill opinion of Sermons on Week-days Lectures and the Dean has been a Preacher of such and has thereby provoked some but taught more to Preach well and to Live well than any man perhaps since the Apostles but why has our Authour and some others who are not much for Preaching on any day such a spite against Sermons on the Week-days Lectures why he tells us because in those many great Absurdities tonding to Schism and Sedition are injected into the minds of the People (b) p. 26. and cannot they be as well injected on Sunday Lectures if Men have a mind as well as on Week-days Lectures nay I know no absolute Preservative but that they may be injected in Sermons on Sunday morning as well as at any other times if the Preachers be very much inclined to it I will by no means dispute with our Author whether there be not in the Countrey many Ministers who for their Learning may be without disparagement compared with most of the City Ministers (c) p. 15. that they may I 'll assure him and very much exceed them too if he be a Countrey Minister himself as I have two or three Reasons besides his Latine Sayings which are far beyond the learning of most City Ministers to believe him to be But why must he be comparing the Countrey and City Ministers like the Countrey and City Mouse as to the great ease and pleaty of living * p. 37. I perceive he has been searching not only into their Vestries where they sometimes tarry he says till Prayers be ended he might have added where they drink Sack too sometimes after Sermon which they don 't in the Countrey but into their very Kitchings and so far as I know he might be for Reforming of those were he not against all Alterations and Amendments whatsoever What brave Stories does he carry down I warrant you and tell his Neighbours in the Countrey of the City Ministers plentifull eating and seldom preaching having such frequent Supplies besides Lectures and Readers * Ibid. whereas the whole burthen lies upon them in the Countrey of studying carefully and accurately penning their Sermons and then preaching them in great Churches besides writing against Popery and defending at all times the Cause of the Church and Religion Further It ought to be considered he says that a great part of the Countrey Ministers have travelled some an hundred some near two hundred miles but not the Apostolical way of footing it I suppose to meet in Convocation for the benefit of the Clergy and I hope the great good they have done there is a sufficient reward for all their pains and sit sometimes near the whole day in the depth of Winter but they were hot enough they say for all this and I pray where do the City Clergy of the Convocation sit then in a Vestry or some other warm place One would think a man doated either with age or some other feebleness who would thus trifle and expose himself by such drivelling and ridiculous malice This is so below Don Quixot and Fur Praedestinatus to which he mighty wittily compares the Authors of the two Letters p. 56. but with an unaccountable impertinence and silliness that I can think of nothing for a New years gift for him but a Coat with long Sleeves and this Badge upon it Nolumus mutare Leges Angliae So I take my leave of him and wish him and his Neighbours a merry New Year FINIS ADVERTISEMENTS THere is newly Printed a Large Folio Bible of a fair new Roman Letter with Annotations and Parallel Scriptures or References some Thousands more than are in the Cambridge Oxford or any other Bible yet Extant To which is annexed the Harmony of the Gospels As also a Reduction of the Jewish Weight Coins and Measures to our English Standards And a Table of the Promises in Scripture In One intire Volume containing 325 Sheets Printed for Richard Chiswell Jonathan Robinson and Brabazon Aylmer Allegiance Vindicated or the Takers of the New Oath of Allegiance to King William and Queen Mary justified and the Lawfulness of taking it asserted in its consistency with our former Oaths and also with the Doctrine of the Reformed Church of England concerning Non-resistance and Passive Obedience By a Divine of the Church of England Printed for Brabazon Aylmer
agree better with some Constitutions than more substantial food and better Instructions Let the Dissenters crave as long as they will I hope the Church can deny as stifly as they crave unreasonably And I am perfectly of our Author's mind though he had not Dr. Beveridge's Authority for it That to alter the Episcopal Government to take the Power of Ordination from Bishops and place it in the hands of Prsbyters to take away a well ordered Liturgy and bring in extemporary Prayers for publick worship to give every Minister a Jurisdiction and Power of Excommunication and many other things without which some grave Dissenters will not be comprehended is more than the Learned Doctor or any Doctor in England will grant or desire to be granted to them But surely our grave Author knows that the best and wisest if not the gravest Dissenters who are for a National Church whose Interest is most considerable and whose Credit has done the most to keep up Non-conformity that these will be comprehended with something less than what he speaks of and I doe not doubt but the bringing in of those into the Communion of the Church would tend greatly to strengthen its Interest and the Interest of the whole Protestant Religion and to break that lamentable Schism and Separation which weakens both and gives our Popish Adversaries the greatest Advantage against us and which I hope they and we are both weary of If there are some Dissenters so wild that they can never be folded nor brought into any settled Flock or Communion though I would not have them hunted and run down like wild Beasts and therefore I am not altogether so much against the Toleration as our Author is yet I think it would have done more good had the Comprehension took place before it that so the Church might have gathered first before the Separation and not have been left to glean after that has made its full harvest But our Author I perceive is as much afraid at one time that the Dissenters should come in as he is at another that they would not And what says he p. 10. if some leading Presbyterians be by our Alterations let into the Church and advanced to such Preferments as they hope for what security have we that they will not promote Divisions in the Church more dangerous than the Schism they made by Separation from us A secret Enemy within the walls of a well fortified City is more dangerous than an open Foe in the Field How then is this consistent not onely with our Author's Opinion but most serious Protestation in another place p. 26. I do here protest that were it not that the Dissenters have given us an Assurance that though these and many other Alterations should be made it would give them no satisfaction nor bring them into our Communion I would use all the Interest I have for such Alterations and for that end also part with many of the Ceremonies I should think there were a contradiction in these two places and that they would sall out were they not some Pages from one another but surely all things are not right in our Author's Head who has two such different thoughts at the same time but perhaps 't is but a mere struggle between the flesh and the spirit if they should be let in and get Preferments they might keep him and others out and if they would come in the good of it is so visible upon many accounts that a man's reason cannot but desire it and promote it so that there is a natural tenderness and moderation on one side of his head which I suppose is the softest towards Dissenters but on the other side there is a most stiff hatred and aversion to them but which of these shall take place when there is occasion must depend very much upon the Influence of the Moon and the Aspect of the Planets I consess I am not for letting in Enemies into the Church but surely by coming in they become Friends and cease to be Enemies for then they owne the Churches Communion and submit to its Authority and instead of standing out they come in and joyn with it now if any will do this I know no Church is so well fortified as to keep them out nor is there any way to distinguish such secret enemies from its secret friends but 't is a Secret some men have to find out distinctions and make differences between those of the same Communion which is very pernicious and mischievous whoever comes up to the Churches terms of Communion and to full Conformity with it are by no means to be counted secret enemies when if this does not shew them to be open friends every man may as well be suspected to be a secret enemy But if these Dissenters when they are taken into the bosom of the Church should like treacherous Vipers endeavour to sting their Mother or gnaw through her Bowels and attempt all they can to doe mischief to her how shall they be able to effect this and what way shall they accomplish it Will they set up Conventicles in their own Parishes and draw away people from the Communion of the Church of which themselves are Ministers or will they preach or write against those Ceremonies or other things to which they have publickly conformed it would be strange if they should doe this but perhaps they may doe it another way They may be chosen Convocation-men and so have opportunity to oppose and confront the Bishops and though they should pretend great reverence for the Episcopal Order and Authority yet may slight and contemn it as much as open Fanaticks when it does not suit with their humour and like bug Diotrephes love to have the preheminence above it Now if I find they doe this and make a dangerous division in the Church by this means I shall think 'em a sort of Rebellious Presbyters that deserve to be turned out of the Church not as secret but open enemies to the Bishops and that they have forgot a passage or two in Ignatius's Epistles and therefore I shall be very much tempted to be of our Author's mind to have those read hereafter in our Churches for the edisication and reproof of such assuming Presbyters p. 26. I know but one Objection more that can be picked up out of your Author's fardle of important reasons against any Alterations for they lye there like small wares in a Pedler's pack neither sorted nor parcelled but confusedly jumbled together as I suppose they lye in his head but the onely remaining Objection that I can find and I am sure I have done him justice and given full strength to any thing that looked like a reason p. 6. is this That by making Alterations the Church will run the hazard of offending a greater number of more considerable persons than they are like to gratisie thereby And he gives it in as objected formerly against the Bill for Comprehension