Selected quad for the lemma: doctrine_n

Word A Word B Word C Word D Occurrence Frequency Band MI MI Band Prominent
doctrine_n catholic_n church_n primitive_a 2,203 5 9.2806 5 false
View all documents for the selected quad

Text snippets containing the quad

ID Title Author Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication) STC Words Pages
A44536 A letter from a Protestant gentleman to a lady revolted to the Church of Rome Horneck, Anthony, 1641-1697. 1678 (1678) Wing H2845; ESTC R1400 32,717 156

There are 2 snippets containing the selected quad. | View lemmatised text

A LETTER FROM A Protestant Gentleman TO A LADY Revolted to the CHURCH OF ROME LONDON Printed for James Collins in the Temple passage from Essex-Street 1678. A LETTER Of a Protestant Gentleman to a Lady revolted to the Church of ROME Madam AND are you indeed got into the onely Catholick Church And are you sure the Men you have lately believed have not deceived you as you fancy we have done for tho you may be so Charitable as to think that we have not intentionally couzened you yet since you cannot suppose Us to be both in the Right you must necessarily conclude that we have at least ignorantly abused and imposed upon you and did you ever rightly consider what a truely Catholick Church does mean Men of Sense and Reason always believed that a Church which hold's the truely Catholick Faith is a true and sound Member of the Catholick Church and dares malice it self say that we do not hold the Apostles the Nicene and Athanasius's Creed The Church of ROME her self confesses that these Creeds contain the truely Catholick Faith And most certainly when the Nicene Councel was celebrated and in Athanasius's time that Church was counted a sound Member of the Catholick Church that held that Catholick Faith which is expressed in those Creeds and do we not hold that Faith do we not stand up at it to express our readiness to defend it and what have we done that we must not be counted a Catholick Church Is it because we will not receive things which the Church of Rome hath since added to the Catholick Faith Is it because we will not admit of the Doctrines which that Church was first induced to believe by the darkness and ignorance of the Ages it lived in and at last loath to part withal for fear they should be thought to have been so long in an Error Is it because we will not yield to things which we apprehend to be directly against the Word of God and destructive to that Catholick Faith the Christian World hath professed in all Ages Is it because we will not deceive the People of the Cup in the Blessed Sacrament which Christ intended as a mighty comfort to them Is it because we will not believe the Miracle of Transubstantiation against four of our Senses and Reason and Scripture to boot Is it because we will not suffer the Worship of God or that which is very like it to be given to Creatures because of the very appearance of the evil of Idollatry which we are commanded to shun as much as Idollatry it self I● it because we will not believe a Purgatory fire which cleanseth little but peoples Purses of their money Is it because we will not indulge the Pride and Arrogance of a Man at Rome who having first wheadled the Christian Princes out of their means and Power hath at last made that Power and Riches hereditary to his Successors under a pretence of a Legacy from Christ Is it because we will not beleive contrary to the Apostles Rule that publick Prayers which are intended for the benefit and understanding of the Multitude must be said in a Tongue unknown to the People These must certainly be the reasons why we cannot now passe with the Church of ROME for members of the Catholick Church That these things were not in the Ancient Catholick Creeds I hope you are convinced for you have read them over and found none of all these Additions in them And now I beg of you in the name and by the mercy of that Jesus in whom you beleive to judge which is most likely to be the truly Catholick Church our's or their's our's that keeps to the truly antient Catholick Faith or their's that hath added things contrary to Scripture and reason and antiquity And dare you continue in a Church where your very Communion with it is an approbation of their Actions which are directly contrary to the command of Christ can there be any thing more contrary to it than their denying the Cup to the Laity And when you receive the Sacrament but in one kind contrary to Christs command do not you Sin and allow of the Sin of that Church you are in Is not your disobedience to Christs Command a Sin or can you imagine that you are more obliged to Obey men than Christ himself You confess you dare not live in any one Sin But how dare you live in this Sin You talk of the benefit of Confession and absolution when that very Priest to whom you conf●sie and who absolves you lives in that Sin you are guilty of and neither absolves himself nor you from it and you both continue in it as if the Blind had a mind to lead the Blind How dare you act thus against your Reason and Conscience Are you not affraid when you are going to co●f●ss● that God will laugh at your Mock Confe●sion since you neither confesse that Sin of living contrary to Christs Command about the Cup nor are willing to part with it Tell me not here that you drink the blood of Christ in eating his Flesh it so to what purpose doth the Priest Consecrate Wine for himselfe if he drinks the blood of Christ in eating his Flesh But suppose the Bread were transubstantiated into the Flesh and Blood of Christ you know that the not giving the Cup of Blessing to those that come to the Lords Supper is contrary to Christs institution who distinctly consecrated the Cup and gave that to his Disciples who were representatives of all Believers as well as the Bread and peremptorily commanded Drink ye all of this and I hope you do not call eating the consecrated Wafer drinking the Wafer But let Us grant you your Strange Doctrine that you do participate of the Blood of Christ in eating the Consecrated Wafer who gave you Church Authority to alter Christ's Institution How can Men dispense with an express Law of God Can they annull what God would have Established and continue to the Worlds end And can you consent to so great a Sacriledge Doth not some horrour seize on you when you seriously think that you approve of the Priests sinning against so notorious a Precept and which he that runs may read And pray Madam wherein have you bettered your self in going over to the Roman Church Is this your proficiency in Religion to forsake a Church where you felt the lively Oracles of Heaven coming warm upon your Soul and to joyn your self to a Church where you hear nothing but Latine Prayers and where the Priest if he be not a good man may as well Curse you as Bless you for any thing you understand of his Language or Devotion Is this Your proficiency in Religion to leave a Church where you were taught to Worship God in Spirit and in Truth and now to cleave to one where they teach your Prayers to go upon Crutches of Crucifixes Beads and Images Doth this look like that Noble Religion which Christ taught
But it 's pretty to hear your Church-men talk of the novelty of our Religion when it is evident to all the understanding world that our first Reformers began no new Religion but desired only to keep to the Old All their endeavour was to keep to the Religion of the Bible and to cut off all supe●fluities and things prejudicial to Salvation and was there any hurt in that They saw that many things then in use in the Church of ROME were diametrally opposite to the Doctrines and practises of the Primitive Chucrh and they justly thought it their duty to reduce the Church to the antient pattern the prouder Clergy of the Roman Church would not yield to it but would have all their new fangles and all their additions to the Antient Symbols received as articles of Faith though all perish'd and the coat of Christ were rent into a thousand pieces the more humble and more moderate of the Clergy saw the pride and insolence of the other and trembled and thus we and they parted we kept to the old Religion and your men chose the new and much good it may do you with it and pray Judge by this which is the Schismatick Church we or they we that would have healed Israel or they that would not be healed so that it is not our Religion that began so lately as 150 years ago about Luthers time but it 's yours that commenced then for you then embraced the new additions to the antient Catholick creeds with greater greadiness and were resolv'd to maintain that by bravado's which you were not able to defend with Arguments It s a very ordinary thing for people who once incline to the Communion of the Roman Church to demand of us before they go over whither a person may be saved in that Church The Charity and moderation our Divines usually express in their answer to this query I am sensible hath done our Church some harm whereas the Roman Priests being bold in their uncharitableness and damning all that are out of their communion make some weak people believe that they must be in the right because they are more daring in their asseverations We have far greater reason to be peremtory in excluding the members of the Church of ROME from Salvation than they have to exclude us for if that Church be guilty of Idolatry as I see your Divines find it a very hard task to answer the Arguments of our Learned men that prove it Those hat are guilty of this crime may soon be resolved by the Apostle what their lot is like to be in another world for No Idolater saith St. Paul meaning one that lives and dies so shall inherit the Kingdom of God 1 Cor. 6.9 yet we are modest and whatever the principles of that Church may lead men to we hope there may be many in that Church that either while they live in the communion of that Church have an aversion from the dangerous and Idolatrous practices of it or sometimes before they die do heartily repent of the absurd and unreasonable Doctrines and worship they have too long asserted and complied with and of such we cannot but entertain a very favourable opinion and indeed I could name you some very famous men both in France and Italy who though they have continued in the Communion of that Church i. e. have not joyn'd themselves to any particular publick Protestant Church yet have not approv'd of such things in the Roman Church as manifestly obstruct mens Salvation and though like Nicodemus they have not dared openly to avow their dislike of such Errous for fear of danger yet in their hearts they have abhorr'd them and declared so much to their Friends and intimate acquaintance And though their seemi●g communion with a Church so Erroneous cannot be totally excused because it looks like a t●cite approbation of her Errours yet since we read of Joseph that he was a Disciple of Christ secretly and notwithstanding his not confessing Christ publickly accepted of GOD we hope such mens continuing in the external communion of the Roman Church is not a willful Errour but rather a pardonable infirmity a timorousness which hath nothing of malice in it and therefore will not hinder them from Salvation We know not what mercy GOD may shew to many poor people in that Church who are invincibly Ignorant and never saw a Bible from whence they might rectify their mistakes and do live honestly in this present world but we must withal confess that the Servant who hath known his Masters will and hath not done it shall be beaten with many stripes and whether those that have been enlightened in our Church and have tasted the good Word of GOD and cannot but see our Agreement with the Gospel and after all this embrace the Errors of the Roman Church whether these will be excesable at the last day we justly doubt of To live in great Errours is to live in Sin but where that living in Errours is joyn'd with resist●nc● of great light and knowledge there the Sin becomes all crimson which was but of a faint red before And if this be the Character of Christs Friends to do whatsoever he commands us then the inference is very easy that those cannot be Christ's Friends nor reign with him in Heaven that wilfully leave undone what they know he hath commanded and set up a new Worship which he hath no where commanded Madam had you never seen such a thing as the Scripture your going over to that Church might have deserved some apollogy but when you were surrounded with the beams of that light which shines in darkness as St. Peter calls the word with all those rayes about you to shut your eyes and desperately to venture upon a Church which enjoines men to live against some of Gods laws as against Exod. 20.5 6. and Matth 26.27 c. and consequently obliges them to prepare for GODS displeasure this I confess is an action which as it favours of great willfulness so I question if you dye in 't without serious repentance whether the joys you hope for will ever fall to your share If your Church-men do mean honestly and do truly aim at the peace of Christendom and in good earnest design the Union of of men that profess the name of Christ why will not they part with those Doctrines that are so great an offence not only to all Protestants but to Jews and Mahometans too if that worshipping of Saints and Images be not necessary but only useful why will not they quit that Worship which by their own pretences is needless especially when they might do so much good by it if the Cup was formerly given to the Laity why will not they to effect the aforesaid Union restore it to the Laity If the substance of the Sacrament and the comfort arising from it may remaine entire without obliging men to beleive a Transubstantiation or Adoration of the consecrated Wafer why will not they for