Selected quad for the lemma: duty_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
duty_n	day_n	lord_n	week_n	2,075	5	9.7497	5	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A66360	Ho Antichristos the great antichrist revealed, before this time never discovered, and proved to be neither pope, nor Turk, nor any single person, nor the succession of any one monarch or tyrant in any policies, but a collected pack, or multitude of hypocritical, heretical, blasphemous, and most scandalous wicked men that have fulfilled all the prophesies of the Scriptures ... and especially have united ... together by a solemn league and covenant to slay the two witnesses of God, Moses and Aaron ... that is, the supreme magistrate of the Commonwealth, and the chief pastors and governours of the Church of Christ, and the Christian world is requested to judge whether the Assembly of Presbyterians consulting at Westminster, together with the independents, Anabaptists, and lay-preachers be not the false prophet ... and whether the prevalent faction of the long Parliament ... that killed the two witnesses of Jesus Christ, 1. Charles the First ... 2. William Laud ... be not the grosse and visible body of the same antichrist / by Gr. Williams.	Williams, Gryffith, 1589?-1672.	1660 (1660)	Wing W2662; ESTC R25201	504,825	313

wisdom of God yet glorified not himself to he made an High Priest but he that said unto him thou art a Priest for ever Verse 5. after the Order of Melchisedech And therefore none ought like these Lay Preachers thrust himself into the Office of a Priest or Minister of God but such as are Lawfully Called and sufficiently allowed and approved by them that have their Authority from God as Moses had to confirm Aaron to be Ministers of Christ because they are as the Apostle termeth them Embassadors of Christ and you know every Embassador must have his lawfull Commission or else he shall be taken for an impostor and a seducer as he that came from the King of Ingland to the States of the Low Countreys As the Answerer of W. Apollonius testifieth and was sumptuously entertained the first day but being found an impostor was clapt up in prison the next day which is the just reward of Intruders Therefore the Apostlos and Disciples of Christ though filled with the Spirit of Christ in a far greater measure then the best of these Lady Preachers yet went they not to Preach the Gospell Matth. 10.5.28.19 Marck 16.15 John 20 21. untill they had an outward injunction and Commission from Christ as you may see in Matth. 20.5 28.29 Mark 16.15 John 20.21 where our Saviour saith as my Father sent me even so send I you which is a plain and a full Commission to them that they were no intruders into the Sacred Function And so after the Ascention of Christ we never find that any of the true Servants of God did ever undertake this calling to be the Embassador of Christ and a Publick Preacher of Gods word but such as were Lawfully allowed and Canonically Ordained to that Function by those that had a lawfull Authority to admit them And that Ordination of them consisted chiefly of these two parts 2. Things requisite in the Ordination of Priests 1. Fervent prayers As you may see in Acts 6.6 2. Imposition of hands As you may see in Acts 6.6 Where the seven Deacons are set before the Apostles and when they had prayed they laid their hands on them so Timothy was ordained by Prophesie with the laying on of the hands of the Presbyterie 1 Tim. 4.14 and least we should mistake his meaning as the Presbyterians do by making this place their bulwark to protect their new erected Presbyterie St. Paul sheweth what he meaneth by the hands of the Presbyterie when in the singular number he saith I put thee in remembrance that thou stir up the gift of God which is in thee 2 Tim. 1.6 by the putting on of my hands because he had the sole Power of Ordination residing in him though as the Bishops now following his example do use to call two or three grave Ministers for their assistance so he called the Presbyterie that is some other of the Elder Ministers to lay their hands with him as he joyneth Sylvanus and Timotheus with himselfe 1 Thes 1.1 in his Salutation to the Thessalonians And so because Timothy was Ordained to be the first Bishop of Ephesus as not onely the postscript of his second Epistle testifieth but also Eusebius and all other Ecclesiesticall Writers without any contradiction do affirm St. Paul chargeth him in particular as whom it particularly concerned to lay hands suddenly on no man that is 1 Tim. 5.22 not rashly and carelesly to admit any kind of men to be the Ministers of Jesus Christ but advisedly to consider What the Primitive Church Ordered should be done about the Ordination of Priests and Religiously to Ordain such as he found most fitting for so High a Calling And therefore according to this Charge of the Apostle to Bishop Timothy the Bishops of the Primitive Church and the immediate successors of the Apostles took such special care to provide worthy Ministers for Gods Church that in imitation of the Apostles Acts. 14.23 1. They Appointed and Ordained that the whole Church that is 1. Thing all the faithfull people of God that Professed to believe in Christ should observe foure Ember weeks in every yeare wherein all the Christians should Fast and Pray to God that he would vouchsafe to send them godly and able Ministers because that 2. They Ordained that each Bishop on the next Lords day 2. Thing after each Ember week should with the assistance of some of his Grave Clergy Ordain such as they found most fitting and worthy of this High Calling and I feare that the neglect of the performance of this duty of Prayer and Fasting on those Ember weeks among the people have produced such defects as be in many Ministers and perhahs the Bishops as well as the people were not all so carefull and so circumspect as they ought to have been in the Ordination of their Clergy for as you may see in the 1 Tim. 3.10 and in Titus 1.5.6 1 Tim. 3.10 Tit. 1.5 6. those that were to be admitted Priests or Deacons were to be proved and examined and being found blameless and qualified as the Apostle requireth in the foresaid places prayers were to be made for them The great care taken in former times in the Ordination of Priests and Deacons and hands to be laid on them and then Authority was given unto them to execute that Holy Fuction so great was the care that was formerly used in the Ordination of Priests and Deacons and no man durst presume to intrude himself into this Holy Office nor any man was suffered to execute these Functions but such as were thus Religiously Ordained And no wonder fot this calling being fo transeendently high non collectio pecuniarum not the gathering of Rents or the Kings Revenues but custodia animarum the care and custody of mens souls which are the living images of the Eternal God The great care that should be taken in ordaining priests and Deocons and which is onus Angelicis humeris formidandum a burthen saith S. Hierome that is able to make Angels shoulders to shrink under it so heavy that St. Paul cries out 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 who is sufficient for these things And the Lord God himself sheweth unto Moses what care ought to be had in the choosing approving and sanctifying of them that were to serve at his Altar for Aaron and his sons that were but types and figures of the Evangelical Priests were to be consecrated seven daies together and a bullock was to be offered for a sin offering every day Exod. 29.35 before they were admitted to administer in their office Object But I know that our Lay-Preachers will object that these were Jewish Rites and shadows that are vanished with their temple and therefore no waies pertaining to us Christians Sol. I answer that the Old Testament or the Law Heb. 10. which was the shadow of good things to come and not the very image of the things is acknowledged by all

and to punish those that would observe them as the adherents of that Parliament did if I knew him I should verily believe him to be the great Antichrist But as the Prophet David complaineth of the Jews that they kept not the Covenant of God and would not walk in his law but soon forgate what he had done and the wonderfull works that he had shewed for them Psal 78.12 so we may justly complain of all those the spawn and offspring of the Presbyterian assembly and adherents of that long Parliament that not only forget the due observation of these holy times but also forbid and inhibit and in many places reprove correct and punish their Christian brethren for their religious observation of these good dayes and the performance of these holy duties which they owe to God for his great blessings Yet I hope that with all their subtlety and authority that vote them down they shall never be able to suppress them no more than Antiochus was to abolish the Jewish feasts because the holy Ghost saith the little horn that was the type of the Antichrist when he came to be great Daniel 7.25 and to the height of his power did but think to change the times and was not able to change them because the godly Jews observed all their festival times and holy dayes notwithstanding all the inhibition of Antiochus to the contrary and all the tortures that they endured for observing them So I hope all good Christians and true Saints will observe these their feasts and holy dayes and upon no termes either of fear flattery or gain omit on these times to do their service and holy duties unto God nor shew themselves less thankfull to God for the true substance than the Jews were for the types and shadowes of that substance But I remember Sanders Sanders in demonst Ansel in Apoc. c. 7. ex Irenaeo l. 5. Hypolit in orat de fine seculi Gen. 49.17 Jerem. 8.16 Bellar. de Rom. Pontif. l. 3. c. 12. Anselmus and some others out of Irenaeus and Hippolitus do think that the Antichrist shall be a Jew of the Tribe of Dan because old Jacob saith Dan shall be a serpent by the way an adder in the path that biteth the horse heels so that his rider shall fall backward and the Prophet Jeremy saith the snorting of his horses was heard from Dan and especially because that the Angel in the Revelat. c. 7. where 12 thousand are sealed out of every Tribe of Jacob leaves out the Tribe of Dan for that the Antichrist as these men suppose should arise from that Tribe and Bellarmine saith it is very probable the Antichrist shall be a Jew And whether these men that refuse and forbid the observance of the festival times and dayes of Christ be Danites or no I cannot tell but I am sure they are like Jewes not only in the Jewish precise and ceremonious observation of the Sabbath that was to be sanctified for the remembrance of our creation and the prophanation of these holy Christian feasts that we keep for the remembrance of our redemption but also in many other things that do obliterate and blot out the memorial of the greatest benefits that Christ hath done for us and the chiefest points of our Christian Religion Therefore if the promoting of Judaism the suppressing of the adiutaments and helps to understand and to preserve the main heads of Christianity be a note and property of the Antichrist let our Assembly of Presbyterians and the members of that long Parliament with their adherents that think to change these times take heed they be not found to be the Antich Object But these men will object against the observation of these Feasts and especially of Christmas that they know not on what day of the month he was born and therefore why should they observe the 25th day of December for the day of his Nativity Or if it be true that he was born on that day yet they have no Precept in all the Scripture that they should cease from their vocation and keep that for an holy day Respons To the first part of this Objection I shall but briefly answer by demanding of thee To the first part of the Objection Why dost thou with all other Churches in Christendom observe the year of our Lords Incarnation when the Angel saluted Mary and the Word beg●n his Incarnation in the womb of the blessed Virgin to begin on the 25th day of March if thou doubtest that he was not born on the 25th of December Dost thou think she went either more or less time with her Child than the usual and natural time of other women And therefore if thou wilt change the day of his birth change the day of his Incarnation in the wombe of his mother and let the year of our Lord in all our deeds and writings be altered and begin on another day which thou knowest to be a surer time of his Incarnation than the 25th day of March for why should all our evidences be false and erronious Or if thou my good Presbyterian dost not think the 25th of December to be the day of his Nativity why dost thou not inform us for certain on what day of the month he was born that we may not neglect the duty because we are not sure of the day But you think it a sufficient excuse wholly to neglect the duty because you doubt of the day And yet it might be a sufficient reason to satisfie any reasonable man besides that John Baptist who was born on the 24th of June that then was the longest day in the year and just six months before the birth of Christ as the Angel informed Mary tells us plainly that according to the daies of their birth Christ must encrease and he must decrease that the whole Church of God have unanimously observed this day constantly for the day of Christ his birth and why shouldst thou think that Christ would all this while suffer his Church to be deceived herein or that thou shouldst be wiser than the whole Church hath been for so many Ages together Solut. To the second part of the Objection To the second part of thine Objection that thou hast no Precept in Scripture to observe this day I confess it and how many things dost thou not only in natural businesse and ordinary affairs but also in and about the Service of God that thou hast no Precept for them in all the Scriptures For where hast thou any Precept to keep the first day of the week for the Sabbath To receive the Sacrament of the Lords Supper once every month To preach twice every Lords day To build a Church in such and such a place To make the Sermon so long as thou dost The People to meet in Church twice a day and no more And the Service to be on such hours and no other And the like For though God accepteth of no 〈◊〉 〈◊〉

that have crucified the Lords anointed that is their King and as I may say their Preist so that by the beheading of our King and of our Bishop you have one step to the discoverie of the Antichrist and a plain step it is so that none can step from it thus far he and this his stop I shewed you in the particular sin of the Antichrist more at large Whereby you may perceive that although I have undertaken to prosecute this discoverie at large and followed the same to the full yet others whereof I might produce many are of this opinion that they would have the christian world to judge Whether the long Parliament and their assemblie of instructors at Westminster and the rest of the Presbyterians and lay preachers that were the prime sticklers to have their King killed and their Bishop beheaded and all the rest suppressed that are the two witnesses spoken of in the 11 c. and 7. v. of the Revelation as we conceive be not the two beasts that St John sawe in the 13. c. of the Revelation and the great Antichrist that so long agoe was prophecied he should come into the world to slay the witnesses to persecute the Church of God and to overthrow the Governors and Government thereof And truely reserving mine own judgement to my selfe I have found many learned judicious and godly divines that have observed some one marke of the Antichrist and some another to be most properly belonging and in everie point agreeable and fixed to that pack and knot of the enemies of Christ that I spake of which for brevities sake my booke having swollen The recapitulation of the whole booke with the poison of these two Beasts too big already I must omit and leave you to consider what I have formerly demanded As 1. Whether that Parliament hath not opened the door of the grand apostafie and rebellion for the Antichrist to enter into the Church 2. Whether it hath not seated it selfe in that Babylon where the Antichrist should sit and dominere 3. Whether it hath not fulfilled all the prophecies of the old and new Testament that spake of the comming and of the doings of the Antichrist As 1. The prophesie of Zacharie touching the foolish and the idol Shepherd 2. The phophecie of Daniel touching the doings of Antiochus that was the lively type of the Antichrist 3. The prophesie of St. Paul of the man of the sin which is the proper and peculiar sin of the Antichrist 4. The prophecie of St. John that the Antichrist should denie Jesus to be the Christ that is suppresse both the regall and the priestly offices of Christ 5. The visions of St. John 1. touching the witnesses that the Antichrist should kill 2. The Church that he should persecute and 3. The two beasts that were as the body and the soul of the Antichrist 4. Whether it hath not taken upon it the name and especially the practice of Independants which is the sittest name and the properest work of the Antichrist to separate himselfe from Christ and from the Church of Christ 5. Whether it hath not exceedingly wronged and extreamly persecuted the Church of God and especially the Governors of the Church which is the infallible concomitant signe of the Antichrist 6 Whether it hath not shewed it self so grosse an bypocrite in all his acts and proceedings that none but the Antichrist could doe the same And when you have duely read and impartially weighed all these things that I have set before you as in a glass then judge your selfe whether the Presbyterians and the Parliament be not the great Antichrist or not CHAP VI. Four special Objections answered wherein the right use of all the foresaid discovery of the Beasts and the Antichrist is declared and the precedent Discourse more fully confirmed ANd if any man shall object The Author of the Revelatiou unrevealed in his preface 5 ob 1. Sol. and think it strange as a most reverend and learned Author whom I much honour seems to do that the blessed Apostle in Patmos overlooking all the vast Continent betwixt him and us should have his thoughts taken up with our petty Occurrences in this other side of the World which is not like to be I answer That seeing God out of all the World did such great things for the small Kingdom of Israel that in extent of Ground might scarce be compared to any one of these three Kingdoms the whole length of it from Dan to Beersheba being not above three hundred miles as S. Hierome witnesseth and seeing the Holy Ghost vouchsafeth to set down in this Revelation many particulars of Iess consequence and to fore-shew some things of far lower concernment then are those great things that have been acted by that Parliament as in the 2. c. and 3. c. the Sufferings of some particular Churches and of particular Cities as Ephesus Smyrna Pergamus Thyatyra Philadelphia Sardis and Laodicea and the murthering of some particular men as Antipas c. That it is not strange the spirit of God should foretell the things that were to happen in this Island 2.13 and the failing and remisness of some Churches in Gods Service which are of far lesser note and moment then the men that were martyred the Churches that were prophaned the Apostasie that hath hapned the Kingdoms that have been ruined and the horrible Impieties that have been committed here amongst us let no man wonder that the Spirit of God who is no respecter of persons nor oblivious of the meanest Countries should likewise foretel the sad Accidents and the like or more inexcusable Sufferings and Martyrdom Mat. 24 33. The right use of all the foresaid discoverie of the Antichrist to know that should fall upon the King and upon all the Bishops and very many faithful Pastors besides the multitude of Saints and godly Christians of three of the most famous and purest Protestant Kingdoms and Churches in the World that as our Saviour sayth of the like Predictions when we see them fulfilled we might understand and learn how to make a right use of them and that is 1. 1. From whence our afflictions come and why they are sont To know that these our Persecutions and Afflictions come not out of the dust nor by chance but by the Divine Providence of Almighty God that foresaw them and foretold us of them long before they came and hath sent them to us either as just Chastisements for our sins and remisness in his Service and performance of our duty or as tryals of our faith and constancy in our Profession and for an example unto others to imitate them that do patiently suffer or for so me other Causes best known to God himself 2. 2. To teach us more zealously to serve God To learn hereby to fear God and more zealously and carefully to serve him to pray unto him night and day to forgive us our forepassed sins both of commission and omission to give us

patience in all these our sufferings and to assist us for our constancy and perseverance in our duties that we neither murmure at our present condition nor start aside one inch from the truth of our Christian Profession Non me videre superbum prosper a fatorum nec fractum adversa videbunt said Pompey and how much rather should a Christian say it either for fear of losses or for love of gain and preferment but to proceed on codem vultus tenore with the same cheerful countenance as well in these stormy thundring dayes of Adversity and Persecution as we would do in the cleerest Sun-shining dayes of pleasure and prosperity and to remember that Rebus in adversis facile est in contemnere vitam Fortiter ille facit q●i miser esse potest 3. To abhor the wayes of the wicked 3. To abhor the wayes and to fly from the service and allurements of these Beasts as from a Serpent because the third Angel that S. John saw sayd with a lond voice so that all men might hear him and plead no excuse If any man worship the Beast and his Image that is serve and follow the two horned Beast which is the false Prophet and the ten horned Beast that is the Image of the false Prophet and assist them in their Impieties or imitate and follow them in their blasphemous doctrines and their wicked wayes or receive his mark in his forehead or in his hand that is take an Ingagement and oblige himself to assure the Beasts that he will uphold assist and desend them and so be true and faithful unto them to further their proceedings or to justifie their doings either plainly or covertly directly or indirectly the same shall drink of the wine of the wrath of God The heavy punishment of them that assist and adhere to the Beasts which is poured out without mixture that is of any comfortable thing to allay the fierceness or to sweeten the bitterness of it into the Cup of his indignation and he shall be tormented with fire and brimstone in the presence of the holy Angels and of the Lamb which will encrease his Torment to see their happiness and himself in such extream misery and the smoak of that torment ascendeth up for ever and ever to keep God still in minde of the odiousness and stinking savour of their wickedness and they have no rest day nor night that is no manner of ease or abatement of their Torment at any time that worship the Beast and his Image that is serve and adhere to the false Prophet and the ten horned Beast Revel 14.9 10 11. and whosoever receiveth the mark of his name that is engageth himself to adhere and to assist them which pathetical and fearful expressions of the wrath of God and the unspeakable Torments of them that serve and assist these Beasts if men did believe the Scriptures should as I think make all men affraid to receive the mark The 2 Beasts often termed in the singular number the Beast and why or to do any service to any that is like to have any affinity or society with these Beasts which though they be two as the soul and body are yet by reason of their coberency and conjunction like Samsons Foxes or rather Herod Pilate to crucisie Christ to consume all the Corn in Joabs field as being subservient one to another they are most commonly spoken of in the singular number and tearmed the Beast whose undeniable notes and indelible characters and whose words and works testified by the spirit of God in the holy Scripture I have in all particulars parallel'd and expressed by the doctrines and doings of the Assembly of Presbyters at Westminster and their associates the Independant and Lay-preachers and the long Parliament that beheaded the two Witnesses of Jesus Christ and is therefore believed by very many to be the great Antichrist and the man of the sin that is spoken of by the Apostle from whose impiety iniquity and cruelty I earnestly and humbly beseech Almighty God night and day to preserve me and all the true Servants of Jesus Cstrist Amen Obs 2 The pious works of the long Parliament But secondly Against all this that I have written and shewed in the Application of the description and doings of the Antichrist to the Actions and determinations of the Presbyterians and long Parliament and the just paralleling of the one with the other to be as a man and his Image or shadow in a Glass I know it will be objected and demanded how it can be possible that that Parliament which protested they made their War against the Antichrist to root out Popery Idolatry and Superstition from the Church and made so many Orders and Ordinances for Gods Service and Acts for the propagation of the Gospel and to restrain the prophanation of Gods Name and appointed so many Fasts to beg a blessing upon their Endeavours and so many Thanksgivings unto God for their good snccesses which they ascribed only to God and not to themselves and did many other such like acts of piety and devotion should be the great Antichrist and the greatest enemies that ever were to the honour of Christ and of his Church since his ascention into Heaven as you seem to make theworld to believe they are Are these things the works of the Antichrist or can they be compatiblc with the Antichrist Sol. I answer briefly If they had not done these things they could not have been the great Antichrist for Christ himself doth tell us that the Antichrist and his false Prophets would say Matth. 24.23 Lo here is Christ that is with them and there is Christ that is where they meet in the Desart and in the secret Chambers that is in their private Conventicles and not in his consecrated Church where we pray unto him and hereby sayth Christ they should deceive the World and as S. Revel 13.14 John sayth All them that dwell upon the earth i.e. All earthly men yea Mar. 13 21. and if it were possible they should by this their great profession of Piety deceive the very Elect and the true Servants of Christ and you know the old Rule which is infallible decipimur specie recti Fallit enim vitium specie virtut is umbra We are soonest and oftnest deceived with the shew of piety and under the profession of the greatest holiness Si. Walter Rawleigh in the life of Mabomet pag. 7.8 so Mahomet the great Impostor by embracing a solitary life free from the ordinary conversation of men and his speeches mixed with gravity teaching holiness and a good life and beating down Idolotry and injustice gained such an extraordinary opinion of sanctity among the Arabians that they which saw him admired him and they that heard of him held him to be a Saint and thereby he deceived the greatest part of this side of the world and so all Hypocrits do seem to be