Selected quad for the lemma: conscience_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
conscience_n	idol_n	knowledge_n	weak_a	1,298	5	9.3976	5	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A53493	Politicall reflections upon the government of the Turks ... by the author of the late Advice to a son.	Osborne, Francis, 1593-1659.	1656 (1656)	Wing O518; ESTC R23027	74,574	208

to put him into another that might in a smal time prove as bad or if he had governed moderately all his life it had been like the good day in a Feaver which is so short and uncertaine that it takes away all tast of Ease and Delight c. A DISCOURSE Upon the Greatness Corruption OF The Court of Rome THere is nothing Idlenesse and Peace makes not worse Labour and Exercise better The Tree that stands in the Weather roots best and deepest The running Water and Aire that is agitated are most wholsome and sweet The Cause of this may be deduced from Gods eternall Decree That nothing in Nature should remain idle and without motion This also extends to the Children of Grace who goe more nimbly about the works of their heavenly Calling being driven by the stormes of Persecution than when they have nothing but the smooth voice of Prosperity to allure and perswade them The Martyrs professed Christ more boldly amidst the flames of the hottest Persecutions than we dare do in the Sunshine of the Gospell God never made a larger promise of his continuing Truth in any place than to the Nation of the Jewes Yet how often do we find it buried in the rubbish of Errors and Impiety Their Kings and Priests either teaching or at least tolerating Idolatry The Church being driven into so dark and narrow a corner as the Prophet Elias could not discover a righteous man Neither was Jerusalem in better plight which had the Temple and in that the Oracles of God in possession For if it did scape profanation during the worser dayes of Solomon his son Rehoboam saw it plundered and in most of his successors raignes it lay neglected or misimploied So that if a stranger led by the glorious title the Jewes had to be the people of God should have conformed himselfe to their worship he had scarce mended his markt though he were before never so great an Idolater Yet God never gave a larger Charter to any Church part of it being contained in these words I have hallowed this House which thou hast built to put my name there for ever This proves Gods Promises conditionall and that outward Felicity seldome accompanies inward Integrity or if they have the luck to meet they presently part mens hearts being ordinarily to narrow to entertain goodnesse and worldly pomp The Churches we read of in the New Testament with whom the Holy Ghost was so familiar as to direct particular Letters unto them are not now to be found Onely Rome brags she remains the same in purity of Doctrine though for Manners she is as corrupt as her elder Sister Sodome so that if Italy be a Circle of Impiety the Court of Rome is the Center Yet these plead their Title with God himselfe grounding it upon the tottering Foundation of worldly felicity Forgetting that it is against the example of all times that any Nation much lesse a Church should so long saile under the merry gale of earthly prosperity not long ere this discharge herselfe of that rich lading she was fraught with all when she traded for Soules under the Fathers of the Primitive times There having been such a succession of imperious greatnesse in that Chaire as Rome is now more like the proud triumphant Chappel of Antichrist than the poore and militant Church of God All the calamities that have of late fallen upon her may be said to have dropt from her owne Ambition in seeking to enlarge her power at the cost and prejudice of others and therefore more naturally to be styled Punishments than Persecutions You cast your eyes on no Story where the villany of Popes is not at large discovered who can then believe that the pure Spirit of God should indow with infallibility of judgment Monsters so visibly corrupted We finde the Holy Ghost did under the Law hate and forbid all impurity though in meer outward Ceremony how then should he under the brighter light of the Gospell suffer himselfe to be poured out of one uncleane Vessell into another beginning again with a Conjurer where he left with a Sodomite Yet they say Rome is the true Church out of which there is no Salvation Not remembring that the holy Scripture Charity and Reason tell us Gods Church is as universall as the Earth and shall one day be gathered together under Christ the Head Now in the meane time that harmony of Opinions they pretend to may be rather wished than hoped for In Pauls time some made conscience of eating things sacrificed to Idols others of Circumcision yet he condemnes them not for schismaticall And it is but a weak evasion to say He bare with them in regard of the infancy of the Church For in these dayes of knowledge she is as infantine in some places as she was then where he that taught had the strength of Miracles to justifie his Doctrine which these want and are driven to this shift in lieu of them to cozen the people with such as are supposititious Now if there be no salvation out of the Church of Rome not to speak of our selves c. what Charity is it to think all the Water cast away that is poured in Christs name upon the faces of those Christians in Greece Rushia and remoter places to which this Ages curiosity covetousnesse hath taught thē the way This makes me think there is no room for such monopolizing Opinions But I leave this to Divines returning to the Pope After the Piety of the first Bishops of Rome had purchased them Reputation and that God had not onely opened the hearts of Potentates to receive the Gospell but their hands to build and endow Churches They being advanced first to the Dignity of Arch bishops thence to Patriarchs so at last to the Papal Supremacy a name derived from Pater Patriarcharum which for brevities sake was written Pa Pa exchanged their Piety for Promotion It being the Custome of fraile Humanity to conclude goodnesse at the beginning of Felicity For taking the advantage of new kindled Zeale wisely observed by them to be the hottest the Popes were able to lead King and People whither they pleased in the interim had the opportunity to proportion what power or riches they thought fit for themselves Now as Policy is not able to keep long the right way to Heaven so at last it led them into a world of Impieties by encroaching under pretence of Religion upon higher Jurisdiction and Power than could naturally belong to Subjects which wanting strength of their own to maintain they sheltered them under the Donation of such Princes as had no better titles to their Crownes than was derived from an Vsurpation over the weaknesse of those in former possession glad of the Popes Protection because they found the generality of men either out of Religion or Ignorance made their estimate of the truth or falshood of the Titles and legality of the Claims of Princes according as they were