Selected quad for the lemma: duty_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
duty_n	action_n	law_n	rule_n	1,234	5	7.2505	4	true

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ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A34537	The interest of England in the matter of religion the first and second parts : unfolded in the solution of three questions / written by John Corbet.	Corbet, John, 1620-1680.	1661 (1661)	Wing C6256; ESTC R2461	85,526	278

indulgent to Presbytery withstood the re-ordaining of those Scottish Presbyters elect Bishops upon this reason That they might not seem to question the Ministry of the Reformed Churches For which cause who can forbear to censure the palpable absurdity of some latter Prelatists that unchurch all the forreign Reformed Churches and nullifie their Ministery and Ordinances They have taken up a most destructive killing opinion which 〈◊〉 the unspeakable advantage of the Romish Church lets out the Vitals of the Protestant Cause and Religion And shall any that are hearty Protestants be fond of such Opinionists Moreover it is no less evident that the Prelacy as it stood in England is without the warrant of Divine right and that not only in regard of Lordly titles and exercise of temporal Dominion but also in regard of sole Jurisdiction and deputation of power Is there any text in the Scripture where the name and work of a Bishop is appropriated to a superior Order or degree in the Ministery Do not all the texts of Scripture that mention the name and work of a Bishop attribute both to all ordained Ministers Can there be a clearer evidence that a Bishop and Presbyter is the same spirituall Officer Besides to maintain the Divine right of Prelacy it sufficeth not to shew from Scripture any kinde of difference between a Bishop and a Presbyter unless it can be likewise proved that the Bishop is the alone subject or receptacle of Ecclesiastical Jurisdiction that he alone hath rule and government over all the Presbyters within his limits yea and over all the Churches leaving no power to the Presbyters but to execute his Injunctions But there is nothing more express then that the Holy Ghost hath made all Presbyters to be Bishops or Overseers and hath commanded them to rule the Church and to exercise Episcopacy or to take the oversight thereof And that this is the sence of the Church of England is manifest by appointing the exhortation of Saint Paul to the Elders of the Church of Ephesus and the character and qualification of Bishops written by the same Apostle unto Timothy to be read unto Presbyters at the time of their Ordination Hereupon a late famous Defender of Prelacy was driven to leave the beaten path of Episcopal Divines and to take a new way but to the ruine of the Cause maintained by him He saith That although the Title of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Elders hath been extended to a second Order in the Church and is now in use onely for them under the name of Presbyters yet in the Scripture times it belonged principally if not only to Bishops there being no evidence that any of that second Order were then instituted though soon after before the Writings of Ignatius such were instituted in all Churches Here it is fully granted that the Scripture Presbyters were Bishops and that the second Order of meer Presbyters which were no Bishops was not then instituted whereupon it follows that a meer Presbyter who is no Bishop is not of divine institution but a meer humane Creature if the holy Scriptures be the perfect Rule of all Divine Institutions Neither is the abatement of Prelacy unto moderate Episcopacy or Presidency any departure from the practice of the ancient Church but a true reviving of the same which was an election made by the Presbyters of one of their own number to preside amongst them and that upon no pretence of Divine Right but for remedy of Schism as Jerome witnesseth And with this Bishop or President the whole Presbytery joyned in the common Government of the Church Bishop Usher plainly shews how easily the ancient form of Government may be revived again and with what little shew of alteration namely by erecting a Suffragan Bishop in every rural Deanery into which every Diocess is subdivided who may every moneth assemble a Synod of all the incumbent Pastors within the Precinct and according to the major part of voices conclude all matters that should be brought into debate before them yet with a liberty to appeal if need require to the Diocesan Provincial National Synods That the number of Bishops should be very much augmented doth evidently appear to all that know and consider the weight of Episcopal Superintendency and the learned Bishop now mentioned gives a hint that their number might be very well conformed to the number of rural Deaneries Surely so many hundred populous Parishes now under the Government of one Bishop might be well divided into many Diocesses ample enough And such a course would make not only for the edifying of the Church by the more effectual inspection of many Bishops for one but also for the advancement of Learning by the multiplication of preferments Wherefore nothing of the Churches being or well-being nothing of Divine Institution or primitive practise doth withstand the reduction of Prelacy to moderate Episcopacy or the ancient Synodical government to which the Presbyterians may conform without repugnancy to their principles Section XXIV The point of Ceremonies comes next under debate And for as much as it concerns Divine Worship it is of high importance and a tender point of Conscience And herein we affirm that the Presbyterian concessions are no way defective but sufficient and ample unto all regular devotion in divine Service All natural expressions of devotion or natural external worship they readily acknowledge as kneeling and lifting up of the hands and eyes in prayer and such like which are called natural because nature it self teacheth all Nations to use them without any divine or humane Institution and a rational man by the meer light of nature is directed to them yet not without some government of counsel and discretion For in these things nature is in part determined and limited by the custome of several Ages and Countries and by the difference of several Cases In the act of adoration the prostration of the body is used according to nature in some ages places and occasions and not in others In ancient times the wearing of fackcloth and ashes and renting of clothes were fit expressions of humiliation and that according to nature yet the same suits not with our times For herein nature is subject unto some variety and now adays the wearing of the meanest apparel were sutable in a day of Humiliation because it is now a convenient natural expression of self-abasement and a kind of abstinence Likewise kneeling is a natural prayer-posture but where it cannot be used conveniently standing is naturally agreeable nevertheless neither the one nor the other is necessary where infirmity or other necessity makes it inconvenient Moreover they do not scruple the meer circumstances of order as time place and method without which humane actions cannot be performed They allow and commend all matters of decency as decent Churches or meeting places and furniture as a Pulpit Cloth Communion Cup and a grave habit for a Minister and in holy duties a grave posture of body composed countenance and

the wearing of the best apparel upon solemn sacred times all which are recommended in the general Rule Let all things be done decently and in order Which Rule properly is of the Law of nature and would oblige Christians though it had not been written in the holy Scripture In the things before mentioned we perceive a good accord but here lies the difference The Presbyterians stick at Ceremonies properly sacred and significant by humane institution which they conceive to be more than meer circumstances even parts of Worship and whatsoever instituted Worship is not ordained of God they hold unlawful To the making up of the Ceremonies now in question they observe these things Humane Institution mystical and instituted not natural signification and appropriation to divine Worship And it alters not the case that they are by nature apt to signifie for so are all Sacraments if they do not actually signifie without institution That such Ceremonies are parts of divine Worship they prove from the nature of Worship in general which requires no more then that it hath the honour of God for its direct and immediate end it is something not reductively but directly sacred and religious and an immediate expression of our observance of God and obligation to him And such is the nature of the controverted Ceremonies much differing from matters of order and decency which properly and immediately respect men that use them as the Church or Temple is immediately and directly for the assembling of people a Communion Cup for drinking a Table cloth for covering Decency is no part of Worship but a circumstance thereof not proper to it but common with grave civil actions and doth no more become sacred when applyed to sacred uses than a sacred thing as prayer becomes civil when applyed to civil uses Time considered as a meer circumstance of a sacred action belongs to it not precisely as sacred but as an action because without time no action can be performed And being a meer circumstance it needs not be determined of God but is left to humane prudence according to occasion whether for private or publick Worship which is the case of time for private devotion and dayes of publick Humiliation and Thanksgiving But they that scruple our mystical significant Ceremonies conceive that they are properly and meerly sacred as having the honour of God for their direct and immediate end That the Surplice is not for gravity nor meerly for decent distinction but a religious mystical habit the character or badge of a sacred Office or Service conformable to the linen Ephod under the Law The signing with the signe of the Cross they conceive is more evidently sacred than the former As Baptism consecrates the Child so doth the Cross. It is used as a sealing sign of our Obligation to Christ as the words used in the application thereof do manifest and the book of Canons doth declare expresly which saith That it is an honourable hadge whereby the Infant is dedicated to the service of him that died on the Cross as by the words used in the Book of Common Prayer it may appear And therefore it is in that respect Sacramental Besides if it were not a sealing sign but only for mystical teaching it hath the same nature with divers Levitical Ceremonies which were not typical but doctrinal teaching some Moral Duty A holy day or time properly sacred whether by divine institution as the Lords day or humane as other sacred Festivals is not a meer circumstance but a part of Worship For it is not only belonging to a sacred action as an action but precisely as a sacred action on that day to be performed yea it is of it self sacred and is not only sanctified by the Service but also sanctifieth the Service The truth is sacred Ceremonies may in some respect be called circumstances as being inferiour things subservient to Moral Worship which is the main yet they are also parts of Worship in general for Worship is either Moral or Ceremonial and that Ceremonial Worship which is commanded of God is lawful and good but that which is not commanded by him is neither good nor lawful nevertheless it is Worship On this manner the Non-Conformists and Presbyterians have debated this Controversie and argue further That humane discretion is the rule of Order and Method Nature and civil Custom is the rule of Decency but only Scripture is the rule of instituted Worship wherein both addition and diminution is alike forbidden It the English Ceremonies be warrantably used what hinders the use of divers other Ceremonies used in the Roman Church Is it said their multitude will become burthensom and inconvenient But who can determine the convenient number And however an exchange of one Ceremony for another were not unlawful For what reason may not some other Romish Rites in Baptism be used as well as the Cross seeing they are nothing less significant or inoffensive nay peradventure much more inoffensive because the Papists by giving divine Worship to the Cross have abused it to gross Idolatry We take this to be sound speech or discourse that cannot be gain-said And surely those of temperate spirits that are otherwise minded might well conceive that it hath such probable appearance as might possibly take with learned and pious men And seeing the one Side allow and commend all natural external Worship and all matters of Decency and Order and desire to be spared in mystical Ceremonies of humane institution the other Side should not in reason or charity insist on the said Ceremonies as the terms of Church communion and priviledges and or Christian unity and amity Section XXV As concerning the Liturgy the Presbyterians do not gain-say the lawfulness of a stinted form of Prayer in as much as the observing either of a Form or a Directory is not of the substance of prayer but an accident or circumstance belonging to it and left to humane determination It is further granted by them that in some parts of publick worship a form is ordinarily necessary as in the Sacramental actions in the act of Baptizing and of consecrating and delivering the Lords Supper And herein will be no dis-harmony because they are Scripture forms Likewise in such parts of Divine Service where it is not necessary they can submit unto it for the Churches peace Nevertheless they are not satisfied in the present Liturgy but desire it may be laid aside or much reformed And what solid reason withstands the equity of this desire Moderate Prelatists have acknowledged considerable imperfections in the Book of Common-Prayer and Bishop Usher hath collected sundry particulars in his direction concerning the same presented to the House of Commons upon their request Let sober judgments consider whether this or that form of prayer be of the substance of that sacred exercise or only its outward shape and dress If it were of the substance of Religious Worship it would require Divine Institution to make it lawful as do other