Selected quad for the lemma: duty_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
duty_n	according_a	church_n	law_n	1,084	5	4.5241	4	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A11766	The declinatour and protestation of the some some-times [sic] pretended bishops, presented in face of the last Assembly. Refuted and found futile, but full of insolent reproaches, and bold assertions	Church of Scotland. General Assembly.; Warriston, Archibald Johnston, Lord, 1611-1663.	1639 (1639)	STC 22060; ESTC S116982	52,590	100

such offices They pretend that none of them will decline the lawfull tryall of any competent judicatory in the kingdome especially of a generall Assembly lawfully constitute or his Majesties Commissioner or Laicks having authority and commission from soveraigne authority They will be sure to have such a judge as shall acquite them or none at all An Assembly like to their own pretended Assemblies Seeing the whole pack of them are complained upon and for crimes common to them all where shall we finde other Bishops and Metropolitans to sit in judgement upon them What needeth any further answere but that it is manifest by sundry passages of this their Declinator that they will not and because guilty dare not stand to the judgement of a generall Assembly constitut as the last was according to the established order and practise of our Kirks and therefore are justly cut off as rotten members from the body After the reasons of their Declinator and refusall of the judgement of the Assembly they come to their protests First for the reasons foresaid and for discharge of their duty to God to his Kirk and to our sacred Soveraigne least by their silence they betray the Kirks right and their own consciences that they in their own names and in behalf of the kirk of Scotland are forced to protest that this Assembly be repute and holden null in law and that no Kirk-man be holden to apeare assist aprove it And therefore that no letter petition subscription interloquitor certification admonition or other act whatsoever proceeding from the said Assembly or any member thereof shall be any way prejudiciall to the Religion and confession of Faith by act of Parliament established nor to the Kirk or any member thereof nor to the jurisdiction liberties priviledges rents benefices possessions of the same acts of generall Assembly Councell or Parliament in favours thereof nor to the three Estates of the kingdome or to any of them nor to themselves or any of them in their persons or Estats authority jurisdiction dignity rents benefices reputation and good name But that all such acts and deeds are and shall be repute unjust illegall and null in themselves with all that hath followed or may follow thereupon If their reasons alledged be found frivolous as they were by the Assembly and are cleared so to be by this answer their protest is not worth a fig. They protest in name of the Kirk of Scotland when as they will not acknowledge her Commissioners freely chosen nor her Assembly constitute according to the established order nor any other Assembly constitute according to the said order but will have this Assembly and consequently this Kirk to be their party and yet will protest profest as they are in name and behalf of this Kirk Affrayed are they that some thing should be done prejudiciall to Religion and the confession of Faith established by Parliament meaning that which is extant in the acts of Parliament but passe by the confession sworn to and subscribed by Subjects of all ranks throughout the whole Realme and by themselves We acknowledge not acts of null and pretended Assemblies We interpret not every act of Councell or Parliament procured or assented to by them or made in their favours to be made in favours of the Kirk The Kirk her self must be judge of the fauours bestowed on her If their authority jurisdiction dignity rents benefices reputation good name c. Be prejudiciall to the authority jurisdiction liberties and the spirituall welfaire of the Kirk good reason the estate of the Kirk be preferred to the estate of some few factious men There may be three estates without the bastard estate of Bishops Abbots Pryors erected in time of Popish darknesse They protest next if the Assembly call in question discusse and condemne things not only in themselves lawfull and warrandable but also defined and determined by acts of generall Assemblies and Parliaments and in practise accordingly to the disgrace and prejudice of the reformed Religion authority of the laws and liberties of the Kirk and kingdome weakning his Majesties authority disgraceing the profession and practise he holdeth in the communion of the Kirk where he liveth and branding of reformed Kirks with the foule aspersion of Idolatry and superstition that what shall be done in this kinde may not redound to the disgrace or disadvantage of the reformed Religion nor be repute a deed of the Kirk of Scotland The Assembly hath condemned nothing lawfull and warrandably defined and determined before in Assembly or Parliament and practised accordingly they intended not to weaken his Majesties authority disgrace his practise and profession or brand any reformed Kirks with soule aspersions but only to reforme the abuses and corruptions entred in their own Kirk and to oppose to what more was likely to have entred with the receiving the Service book and book of Canons without relation to any other Kirk If any disgrace redound to others it is but per accidens and it may be retorted that their Canons and constitutions are intended for the disgrace of our Kirk which we do not affirme Next they must distinguish betwixt a free Kirkand a Kirk lying in thraldome But the decliners would have us to refuse nothing which is received in any other reformed Kirk if the same be imposed lest they be disgraced by our refusall which were to make up a fine hotch-potch They protest that they embrace and hold the Religion presently professed according to the confession of Faith ratified in Parliament anno 1567. as the true Religion and detest all contrary errours But they make no account nor mention of that confession where contrary errous are specified or designed and it appeareth for no other cause but that they perceive the episcopall government and other innovations which they were to introduce to be abjured by that confession which is a tacite yeelding to the true meaning and sense delivered by the last Assembly in their Declaration They protest that the Episcopall government is lawfull and necessary and that the same is not opposed for any defect or fault in the government or governours but by the malice and craft of the devill envying the successe of that government these many yeares bypast It hath been condemned by our Kirk as unlawfull and hurtfull yet they dare contradict and protest it to be lawfull and necessary That government which is not warranded by the word and overthroweth the joynt government of Pastors and Elders which is warranded by the word can not but be faultie If the government be faulty the governours can not but be faulty in governing The devill could not envy the successe of so faulty a government as hath brought in the Antichrist to sit in the temple of God Suppose there were no fault in the government but that it were lawfull and necessary but what meanes have they come by it Or what moderation have they keeped after their usurping of it Intrarunt ut vulpes regnarunt ut