Selected quad for the lemma: conscience_n
Text snippets containing the quad
|
ID |
Title |
Author |
Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication) |
STC |
Words |
Pages |
|
A28559
|
The doctrine of non-resistance or passive obedience, no way concerned in the controversies now depending between the Williamites and the Jacobites by a lay gentleman of the communion of the Church of England, by law establish'd.
|
Bohun, Edmund, 1645-1699.
|
1689
(1689)
|
Wing B3451; ESTC R18257
|
35,035
|
42
|
general and it is now confessedly necessary in Turky and all Countries where Christianity is oppressed and by consequence every where except some Body can shew We have one Gospel for the Afflicted and another for the prosperous Daies of the Church or one Remedy viz. that of Patience was prescribed to our Ancestors and another directly contrary to us which if any Man can shew when and where it was done I shall be very thankful But it may be pretended it has been stretched too far and that some of the Church of England have written too much in Favour of Wicked and Tyrannical Princes even to the encouraging them to do worse than otherwise they would To this I say The Heat of Controversie has in other Instances mis-led Men as well as in this and the Doctrine of Non-resistante is nevertheless true tho' their Notions of it should happen to prove too loose or too large Let it then be fairly and truly stated once for all and then let it be as it ever has been The Glory of the Church of England and the Bulwark of all Religious Kings and States against the Rage of Mutinous and Rebellious Spirits who pretend to sight for God's Truth against the Laws and Governments of their Countries If any Man thinks some of the things that were done in the heat of the late Revolution cannot be justified without exploding this Doctrine I say those are the Faults of a few Men and better it is to leave them to their own Master than to set up our selves against the Doctrines of Christianity to excuse them The Men of our Generation have all the Infirmities that have gone along with the former and being so highly provoked by a handful of perfidious ungrateful Miscreants what Wonder is it if the Temptation which was so strong prevailed over the Restraint and made them guilty of some Irregularities which according to the strict Rules of the Gospel cannot be justified such things have happened in the best of the former Ages and will happen again in those that shall follow us But the Rule of Christianity ought to be preserved notwithstanding and delivered down to our Posterity just as we received it Those that have appeared against this Doctrine have done their Majesties Two great Injuries First They have exasperated the Dissatisfied Party in the Nation and made them harder to be won over they concluding that this Revolution was not the Work of God because so many of those who have defended it have made it their business to ridicule or confute the Doctrine of Passive Obedience as if there were no other way than that to justifie it But then they are well assured this is as certain a Principle of the Christian Religion and was ever practised by the Primitive Church in the five first Centuries and from thence they conculde the Men that do this and all other that joyn with them have made a Defection from this Doctrine and from the Church of England and they think themselves bound in Conscience to oppose all those that are thus united lest they should seem betrayers of this Loyal Holy Excellent Doctrine and of the Honour of that Church that hath ever taught it Secondly They have deprived them as much as in them lies of that religious awe and reverence which is due to all Crowned Heads and Sovereign States If they are the Ministers of God if they are the Powers ordained by God then is all resistance of them a sin against God. But these Men write as if it were lawful to resist when they pleased and whom they pleased which if it is true I am very confident it will not be long before they will pretend they have cause or some other for them and so all Princes shall be deprived of their best Safegard the fear of God over-awing their Subjects as the just avenger of such as rebel against their rightful lawful Princes and the Laws of their Country As there must be in every Country a Supreme Power lodged somewhere against which there is no Appeal but to God so that Power must be acknowledged to be Sacred and Irresistable by the Laws of Christianity and this is as true of Commonwealths as Monarchies for wheresoever the Supreme Power is lodged it is the Ordinance of God approved by his Word and settled by his Providence whosoever then resisteth that Power resisteth the Ordinance of God and shall receive to themselves Damnation He then that shall endeavour to destroy this Obligation and to persuade Men they are not bound in Conscience to submit to the Laws and lawful Governors of their Country contradicts this plain Doctrine of the Apostle and exposeth the Supreme Powers in all Countries to the Rage and Fury of the Multitude or any Faction that is potent and thinks it self injured and consequently he is an Enemy to all Government But then though I am bound not to resist I am not equally bound to assist my hands may be tied both ways If I live in a Pagan Country where Christianity is Persecuted by the Supreme Power I must suffer and ought not to resist but then I am not to lend my assistance to that State to encourage or enable it to destroy this Religion but I must be meerly passive in that case And this was the case of England we were persecuted against Law by a handful of Men who expected to ruine us by our own hands and we were bound not to assist them in this wicked and foolish Project and for want of our assistance they could not justifie or carry on the Enterprize and when they came to be called to an Account by a Prince who was no Subject and consequently was not under the Obligation of not resisting their Injustice and Oppression so they fell an easie Victim to his Arms and we were delivered out of their hand not by any resistance we made but by refusing to assist them and they that went no farther than this which it is certain the greatest part of the Nation did not are justifiable by the strictest Rules of Christianity and the Practice of the best Ages To conclude I would advise even those who have no kindness for the Doctrine of Non-resistance to speak modestly of it it has such Characters of Divinity to shew that it will deserve this respect at their hands if they are Christians And as to those that are not those that despise all revealed Religion for they of late have been very witty against it they ought to shew some reverence to it for the sake of Government and to preserve the Peace of the World in which that sort of Men have a greater interest than others for their All lies in this World and they pretend to nothing in the next and if the World be imbroyled let the pretence be what it will their happiness must necessarily be very much abated and perhaps their Machines destroyed and then there is an end of them FINIS LICENS'D August 27. 1689. J. Fraser History of the Desertion p. 48. Ad Scapulam c. 2. Apolog. C. XXXV Fâ—seb H. E. lib. 7. c. 1. lib. 10. c. X. de Vita Const lib. 2. c. 2. Tertul. Apol. cap. 6. Anno Christi 295. Cum Ecclesia pace gauderet proinde in Maximilianum animadvertitur ob spretam Militiam non ob fidem Christiaâ—am Grotius Cap. 2. Tanta hominum multitudo pars pene major Civitatis cujusque Dan. 4. 17. De civitate Dei lib. V. cap. 21. Lactantius de mortibus persecutorum Euseb H. E. lib. VIII c. 13. Euseb l. 7. c. 13. missis literis persecutionem adversus nostros commotam sedavit †Euseb H. E. l. 7. c. 30. p. 231. * Euseb l. 8. c. 13. Lactantius de mortibus persecut †Jaacius chronicon Alexandrinum say he lived to the Year 316. Lib. 1. cap. 1. § 9. Socratis H. Eccl. lib. 2. cap. 12 13 27. ☞ Bishop Ken. Lâ— vrai Interet des Princes Chretiens Pâ— 176. Hist Eccl. lib. III. cap. 41. See the 1. Collect for the 5 th of Novemb. Thuanus Ann. 1559. Rom. 13. 11 H. 7. c. 1 Magna cha c. 29. 2 E. 3. c. 8. Constantini oratio ad sanctorum caetum