Selected quad for the lemma: duty_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
duty_n	command_v	servant_n	unprofitable_a	1,244	5	10.6349	5	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A54371	Christianity restored to its primitive purity, or the mercenary church reform'd being an abstract of a sermon, preached at Oak-wood Chappel in Surry, and at the Abbey Church in Bath June the 27th. 1699. Shewing that all true pastors must preach freely. By Jos. Perkins.	Perkins, Joseph, b. 1658.	1699 (1699)	Wing P1546; ESTC R221439	13,701	26

to their shame that he made them Rich. 4ly They object that they that serve at the Altar should live by the Altar And Bp. Sanderson saith that since God himself has ordained Wages to him that labours in his work he may not only expect it but even exact it too from those that would unconscionably defraud him thereof I answer They that serve at the Altar should live by the Altar But can they not live without 5 or 6 hundred or a 1000 l. or 4 or 5 Thousand pounds a Year If they expect or exact more than what is enough to keep them and their Families alive they expect and exact more than God hasallowed the very Apostles themselves But to return your objection on your own heads if they that serve at the Altar should live by the Altar why are you so unresonable as to deny your Journey-men that serve for you at the Altar to live by it but are many of them forced to get their livings by teaching School or some other way I allow then that if unconscionable men will deny you your Meat and Cloathing you may exact it of them provided you Labour in the Work But I think it were better by Bp. Sandersons leave not to goe to Law with ungrateful People for a little Victualls and Drink but rather as Christ commanded the Apostles to shake of the dust from your Feet as a witness against them and so leave them By all that has been said I hope it appears plainly that it is the Duty of Christ's Ministers notwithstanding God has allowed them Food c. to execute their Office Freely without respect to that or any other reward when we have done thus we must yet confess we are unprofitable Servants we have done but what was our duty to do and woe be to us as St. Paul said of himselfe if we Preach not the Gospel and that Freely too Were this lesson well learned of us there would be no striving after Pluralities and dignities no Bribery nor Simony nor Perjury in the Church but that a righteous and gratious and learned Person that is Poor might as soon be advanced to a Bishoprick as an ignorant covetous ungratious Person that is Rich. They that seek for Rectories Vicaridges Bishopricks for the sake of gain are no better than those that followed Christ for the sake of the Loaves And are no better ahen the Heathens for after all these things do the Heathens seek When Christianity began to Flourish and Kings and Emperours to embrace the Christian Faith and out of their zeal for Religion made Laws for the support of Church-men and admitted none into Offices but Christians many wicked Persons professed themselves Christians meerly to get Offices and Preferment just as our Sea and Land Captains and Officers who living in a constant and habitual Practice of Cursing Swearing Blaspheming c. do yet take the Communion to qualifie them for the King's Service So ungodly Men screw themselves into the Ministry for the sake of Gain Vngodly men I say for no godly man desires the Office of a Bishop or Priest for the sake of filthy Lucre. I am sorry that the Liberal Arts should become servile and Divinity it self made a Slave to Mammon I am sorry that the pretended Disciples of Christ should strive to be so very much Richer than their Master and they that are not so good Teachers as the Apostles should yet desire to be so very much above them I am sorry that Covetousness has crept into the Hearts of Church-men 'T was the Covetousness of the Clergy brought in those abominable Errors into the Church of Rome as Purgatory Praying for the dead Indulgences Pardons and Intercession to Saints by which means they gull'd and fool'd the ignorant deluded vulgar and got much of their Lands from them to the Church Yet these Popish Bishops and Kings did great works of Charity with what they by their cunning Devices got from the People They Built and endow'd abundance of Colledges and Schools Hospitals and Churches But the Protestants that have these things at present in their Possession do make a worse use than those Papists did for these employ the same to the support of their own Pride and Luxury 'T is Covetousness makes the Roman party strive to bring in Popery again that so they may recover their ill gotten Lands 'T is Covetousness in the adverse Party that makes them prick up their Ears with hopes one time or another to get uppermost that they may enjoy the Riches of the Church All quarreling betwixt these Parties about Religion is but like that of Rivals contending for a Rich Lady take away her Dowry and her Covetous Rivals will soon quit their persuit Veniunt a dote sagittae None will follow her for her Beauty or Virtue Just so let the Church be made Poor and disrobed of her gorgeous Ornaments and then you shall see these false Lovers will soon forsake her He is the true Lover only that Preaches freely and loves Religion not for her Riches but for her Beauty of Holiness Great is Diana of the Ephesians Thus they cryed out not for love of the Goddesse but for fear if her Worship ceased their Gain and Proffit would cease together 'T was for the sake of Gain that they served a false Goddesse 'T is for the sake of gain that Covetous men serve the true God as the Devil falsely upbraided Job A true Church-man and every true Christian must look higher than the things below and be content to suffer for Christs sake proposing to himself Afflictions Reproaches Poverty yea and Death it self if the honour of God and the defence of his Truth require it For the true Pastor as he ought not so neither can he reasonably expect to grow rich in this World because his business is to rebuke Sin and not to please men by flattery or connivance Now 't is not reasonable to think that such a Reformer should have much favour from the World No they that tell Truth shall be fed with the bread of Affliction and the water of Affliction whilst the false Prophets shall be fed at Jezebels Table The World loves the Hireling best because the Hireling always Preaches pleasing things otherwise they know they shall forfeit their Hire Thus they have their great Livings not for declaring the whole Truth but for holding their Tongues just as a false Witness is suborn'd or hir'd to be silent when he should speak the Truth The Devil sometimes gives Church-men great Livings to stop their Mouths that they may not Preach against Popery or Rebellion or any work of Darkness that Satan the Prince of Darkness is about Just as the Thief in the Fable offered the Dog a piece of bread to bribe him to forbear Barking A true Witness will speak the Truth without being Hired to do it but a false Witness must be subborn'd and Hired and these Hirelings are the only Favourites of the World The people love the

very well Contraria inter se posita magis elucescunt Therefore that the People may have a better Opinion of their Doctor than of the Curate it concerns the Doctor to provide a Curate that Preaches worse than himself All Artificers as Shoemakers Taylors c. readily employ such Journey men as are most ingenious in their Craft But alas 't is quite otherwise in Priest-craft There the Pluralist in the matter of Mens Souls employ such Journey men Curates as are always worse than themselves Here I could instance in several Particulars but I spare their Names one of whom has thrust in a Thorn into his Cure to stop the Gap a sorry Fence God knows to keep the Devil out of his Parish And if Learned Men employ such sorry Curates What can we expect from such as have but little Learning And yet that there are many Dunces advanced to Dignities and Pluralities is an undeniable and palpable Truth It is obvious to every understanding Man's Knowledge and Observation That by Bribery Symony Affinity Consanguinity by Favour Friendship and base Partiality very indifferent Scholars and worse Preachers are hoysted up into eminent Places in the present Church whilst others that have more Honesty and better Learning are in a low and mean Condition And thus it comes to pass sometimes A Gentleman has a Presentation of a Living He breeds up one of his Sons at School his Son proves a Dunce yet for his Fees gets a Degree and Orders and then is Presented Instituted and Inducted into the Living which another deserves ten times better Another Marries the Patrons Daughter or Kinswoman or crackt Chambermaid and so climbs up into the Fold by S k Simony Very few or none come into Preferment for their Deservings and then they employ Curates like themselves and then the Church of God is like to be well served To prevent these and many other Abuses I wish that nothing were settled upon the Church by Law but that every Parishioner might give the Minister what he pleased and that the Ministers would think that Christ's Command to the Apostle concern'd them too Freely ye have received Freely give Were it thus none but Religious and Devout Persons would put themselves forward into the Ministry But now Preferment being settled upon the Church he that can get it has it whether he deserves it or no. The Riches of the Church are a Bait for Covetousness to Bite at and the more Covetous and Ambitious any Man is the more forward is he to thrust himself into the Ministry on purpose to serve his own base Ends. For when there is striving for greater Livings and fat Parsonages and but little seeking for Poor ones any Man may easily judge whether they seek the Flock or the Fleece the Salvation of Souls or their own Gain It is reported in Baker's Chronicles That the Prior of a certain Convent in England being dead many of the Monks made great Interest to the King to get to be Prior But the King took notice of one Poor Monk who never sought at all for this Dignity and asked him Brother what wilt thou give me to be Prior not one Farthing said the Monk for I can serve God as well and with more ease with what allowance I have already as if I were a Prior Well then reply'd the King I think thou art the fittest man to be Prior and thou shalt be Prior. And certainly that man best deserves to be a Priest or Bishop that least desires the Profit and he that desires it at all deserves it not at all He that makes Divinity a Step to raise his Fortune by is altogether unworthy of that high and honourable Office And yet alas the World is overspread with these Locusts who make Preaching and Praying the servile Instruments and Trades to get Riches by The present Church of England is quite different from the Christian Church in the Apostles times when they Preached Freely as Christ commanded them and their Flocks as Freely supported their Pastors Here was no pulling and halling of Duties from the Congregation by quarrelsom Suits of Law but all of them resembled God their Father in giving Freely to each other the Pastor his Spiritual to his Flock and they again as Freely their Temporal to their Pastor without the least strife or constraint God grant to us the same Spirit that we may be not only Professors of Christianity but Christians indeed and make it appear by our Works that we have not only the shew but the power of Godlyness Now let us consider the ill consequences and effects of this mercenary Trade of Preaching for gain All that do this are Hirelings and therefore no true Sheepherds And Christ tells us that the Hireling fleeth when he seeth the Wolfe coming because he is but a Hireling and so the Wolfe scatters and devours the Sheep Just so do all mercenary Preachers seeing the Wolfe of Popery or Persecution coming presently fly from their own principals giving way to the Wolfe For what cares the Hireling so long as he has his Hire He matters not which Master he serves God or Satan Whereas he that is content to Preach Freely and has no Preferment to lose has no temptation on him to make him tack about every time the wind Turns like the Vicar of Bray but stands immovable like a Rock in the midst of the Waves of this troublesome World This mercenary Preaching for gain hath caused a very great decay of Piety and Religion amongst all men For men observing the minds of their Teachers set upon this World are apt to believe that there is no other World and that the Resurrection a future State Heaven and Hell are but Chymera's and Fables invented by Priests as I have heard an Athiest affirm who told me One bird in hand meaning the present Life is better than two in the bush meaning the Life to come I am affraid that the Covetousness of Church-men Imbracing this present World has most powerfully taught Atheism and Irreligion Their Examples overthrow their Doctrine Quid verba audio facta cum video T is in vain to Preach against Covetousness which no man that has his mouth stopp'd with 2 or 3 Steeples can well do if it appear that our very Preaching is but a means to gain Riches and an effect of Covetousness it self This Preaching for filthy Lucre has in a great measure evacuated enervated and made void the Gospel of Christ so that it cannot have that influence upon the Hearts of men as it had in the primitive times when it was sincerely Preached without any other design save the honour of God and the Salvation of Souls And it will never recover its strength and efficacy again till it be Preached by such Persons as have indeed renounced the World and shew the same heroick and Apostolick Spirit that was in St. Paul and the other Apostles who had not an Eye to the World but only to God and his truth