Selected quad for the lemma: conscience_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
conscience_n	case_n	church_n	resolution_n	1,650	5	9.9602	5	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A47432	An answer to the considerations which obliged Peter Manby, late Dean of London-Derry in Ireland, as he pretends, to embrace what he calls, the Catholick religion by William King ...	King, William, 1650-1729.	1687 (1687)	Wing K523; ESTC R966	76,003	113

Confession is mentioned in Scripture it is to be understood of this kind of Confession except the Circumstances manifestly determine the sence otherwise This Confession alone was sufficient to obtain Remission of Sins under the Old Law Psal. 32. 5. without Auricular Confession to a Priest. 2. It is necessary to Confess and Acknowledge such Sins as injure our Neighbours not only to God but likewise to the injured person where that Confession may be an Advantage or Satisfaction to him Restitution must also go along with Confession if it be possible If the injured person or they who have a title to what was his are not to be found the Restitution is to be made to God for some Charitable use according to the advice of the Priest. This case is thus determined by God himself Lev. 6. Numb 5. and by Our Church in her Exhortation to the Communion 3. Where a Sin is notorious or publick in as much as the Church is injured by it and the Fact falls under her Cognizance and Jurisdiction she may call the Sinner to an account oblige him to make publick Confession of his Guilt and to submit to such Discipline as she judges most probable to reform him Her Sentence of Absolution is necessary to a person thus called to an account by her where it may be had neither can he be absolved from his Sin without submitting to her Orders This appears to be the sence of our Church from the Rubrick to the Communion and 33. Article 4. Where theee is any doubt or scruple in a Man's mind concerning the nature of an Action whether it be good or evil concerning his own Repentance whether it be sincere and sufficient or concerning the means and way to attain to this true Repentance In these and the like cases the Sinner is obliged to repair to his Spiritual Guide for his Resolution Counsel and Direction This is commanded by Our Church in the Exhortation that gives warning for the Communion 5. Where the sence of Guilt lyes heavy on the Conscience of a Sinner so that there is danger of his being swallowed up by too much Grief he who finds his Spirit thus wounded is required to have recourse to his Spiritual Physician that by the Ministry of Gods word he may receive the benefit of Absolution As Our Church has exprest it in her Exhortation whose words Mr. M. has corrupted that he might find an occasion to cavil first by alledging this Proviso as hers in the matter of Confession if a Man be troubled with any doubts or scruples whereas she uses no such words either in her Office for Communion or Visitation of the Sick which are the two places he alledges for them And Secondly by leaving out these words but if any one requires farther comfort or counsel in this following Sentence If there be any of you who by this means cannot quiet his own Conscience herein but requires farther comfort or counsel let him come to me or some other discreet and learned Minister and open his grief Where the words he has left out make her sence plain that she requires men to come to a Priest not only in cases of Scruples and Doubts but likewise of Grief for the sence of Guilt and that she proposes Advice and Counsel as a remedy for the one and Absolution as a remedy for the other Which clearly destroys Mr. M's surmise as if Confession in our Church were for nothing else but to be resolved in our Scruples and Doubts 6. Confession to a Priest even of secret Sins is counted with us an act of Mortification and of great uses in most cases as it is of great use and safety to consult a Physician at any time when one finds himself sick this is prescribed by the 19th Canon of the Church of Ireland It is counted a great Wickedness for the Priest to reveal any such Confession And it is forbidden under the pain of irregularity by the 64 Canon 7. It is not necessary by any Divine Command that a man should discover every Sin to a Priest though he may be had any more than it is necessary every time a man is sick to send for a Physician And therefore Auricular Confession is not the only way for obtaining Pardon of Sins committed after Baptism From these things in which our Bishops and Divines are all agreed though Mr. M. slanders them for want of harmony it appears that neither publick nor private Confession is wanting in our Church and it can no more be said that Confession to a Priest is wanting in her because she doth not oblige all People to it under penalty of Damnation then a City can be said to want Water where the Fountains are full and open only because Men are not obliged under pain of Death to use them If therefore Mr. M. means any thing when he professes himself dissatisfied with the want of Confession to a Priest he must mean the want of a Law to oblige all men who hope for pardon of any sin to confess it in particular to the Priest and receive his Absolution for it We must own that we have no such Law in our Church But the reason of that want is because neither Christ nor his Apostles left us any such § 3. It was incumbent on him before he left our Church on that account to produce this Law and shew Confession to be otherwise necessary than is taught and practised by her Let us us therefore examine what he has said on this head And here the only thing produced by him for the necessity of Confession to a Priest which looks like an Argument is contained in these words p. 7. If we confess our Sins God is faithful and just to forgive us our Sins saith St. John. Faithful and Just to what even to his own promise which he hath thrice repeated in the Gospel whosesoever Sins ye remit they are remitted unto them but other promise that he will do it without the Ministry of his Priests we read not in the New Testament In answer to this Argument I will shew 1. That the words If we confess our Sins do not concern Confession to a Priest. 2. When God is said to be Faithful and Just it doth not particularly respect that promise John 20. 23. Whosesoever sins ye remit they are remitted unto them 3. If it did respect this Promise and the Ministry of a Priest were granted to be absolutely necessary to the pardon of Sins yet it would not follow that Auricular Confession were necessary § 4. First the words of St. John 1 Ep. 1. 9. If we confess our sins do not concern Confession to a Priest but were designed by the Apostle to oblige every man to acknowledge and confess that he is a sinner and that he needs Repentance and the Blood of Christ for his salvation which will appear from the occasion and circumstances of this place I think it is agreed that St. John wrote these words in opposition

Keys obtain Remission and Forgiveness for all his Villanies Saith the Church of England Repent you truly for your sins past have a lively Faith in Christ our Saviour amend your Lives and be in perfect Charity with all Men so shall ye be meet partakers of these holy Mysteries The Church of Rome sees the difference of these two and pretends that Confession was appointed by the Mercy of God to make Pardon the more easie For Let us grant it faith she that Sins could be blotted out by Contrition Yet in as much as few could come to this degree it must happen that very few could expect Pardon of Sins this way The true Intention of Confession and of all other parts of Christian Discipline is Amendment of the Peoples Lives And it will be found that Men do not come to Confession so much to help them to live well for the future as to ease themselves from the Trouble that the memory of their Sins past create them and when by Absolution they are eased of the sense of their former Guilt they are apt to think they may begin on a new score And hence it often happens that Men are more negligent after Confession than before And let never so much care be taken to prevent this abuse which Mr. Arnauld confesses almost Universal while People believe that the Priest can forgive them their sins as soon as they are sorry for them and purpose to forsake them it is impossible it should be removed Whereas when a Man is referred to his own Conscience as the final judge of his own Condition and told that he damns himself if he be partial And that no other Sorrow or Repentance for Sin can save him but such as will in earnest prevail with him to forsake his Sins and live a good Life In this case a Man will find it much easier to satisfie the Priest and obtain Absolution from him than to satisfie his own Conscience Nay after all the Priest can only judge of a Mans Repentance from his own Mouth and if the Man be partial or mistaken in his own sincerity the Priest must be so too and his Absolution insignificant And therefore our Church who lays the efficacy of Absolution on the sincerity of the Penitents Contrition and Faith and tells her People that her Absolution is only Conditional deals more severely and sincerely too with her Penitents than the Roman Church who lays the chief stress on the outward Absolution of the Priest. The Matter of Fact appears to be really thus from the practice of the lewdest Livers amongstus who often take Sanctuary in that Church and without any amendment of Life live in hopes of that Salvation in her which they know they could not hope for in ours § 11. The last Argument Mr. M. urges for Confession is the Interest of the Priest faith he The Church of England for want of Confession appears to me to have lost that Interest in the Consciences of the People which both the Roman and the Greek Priests are happy in at this day I do believei n my Conscience this Argument goes a great way with Mr. M. and not only with him but with all those Priests who value their Interest as he does But he would have done well to have told us what that interest is in which the Priests count themselves happy For the Priests have counted themselves happy sometimes in an interest which contributed very little to the happiness of the People In short we neither do nor ought to covet any other interest with our People than the power of doing and making them good and God be thanked we have as much of that interest as any Clergy of the World and dare compare the Lives of our People with the Lives of either Greeks or Romans It was therefore some other interest which brought in Auricular Confession in which Mr. M. would count himself happy I shall not determine what that may be which Mr. M. could not find in our Church only he must know that among us truly mortified diligent sober prudent Clergy-men who continually reside on their Cures and shew themselves an Example to their Flocks in meekness humility watchfulness and charity have no reason to complain that they want interest with their People But there are some that think it too dear a purchase at that rate and therefore had rather come at it another way That is by perswading people that they can forgive them their Sins though perhaps they are nothing bettered by Confessing Thus Mr. M. seems to state the case What if some Catholicks are never the better for it What are many Protestants the better for all the Sermons they hear and Sacraments they receive If we confess our Sins God is faithful and just to forgive us our Sins What though we are never the better for Confessing If that be Mr. M's meaning and he believes himself he had reason in earnest to change his Church For he may be sure we have no such Catholick Doctrine CHAP. IV. § 1. MR. M. tells us that the third difficulty that stuck with him was the Answer given by Protestants to that Question Where is that one Holy Catholick Church which we do profess to believe in the two Creeds To this he adds several other Questions Was there any such Society as one Holy Catholick Church extant upon the face of the Earth when Cranmer began his Reformation What Provinces of the Earth did this Church inhabit Did Cranmer believe himself a Member of it Who gave him Authority to Reform this one Catholick and Apostolick Church To set up Altar against Altar c. p. 8. To each of these Questions I will give a distinct Answer and shew how little Reason any one has to make a difficulty of them To the first Where is that one Holy Catholick and Apostolick Church which we profess to believe in the two Creeds I Answer not in any one place or Province exclusively to the rest but in all places where Men professing the Faith of Christ live under their Lawful Pastors or Spiritual Governors 'T is by these two marks we must find the Catholick Church if we would not mistake the Society of Schismaticks and Hereticks nay of Heathens for her Where-ever we find the Faith of Christ and the Persons professing it living in submission to their Regular Pastors there we have found a branch of the Catholick Church and to that Society we ought to be ready to unite ourselves in this Profession and Submission But Mr. M. by his eagerness to have us assign the ubi or place where to find this Church seems to imagine that there is some one place or ubi where she is always to be found At least that there is some where a Head and Principle of Unity by union to which the Society is made one But we deny any other Head or Principle of unity to this Society besides Christ Jesus And we believe that to