Selected quad for the lemma: duty_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
duty_n	parent_n	servant_n	superior_n	1,175	5	11.5024	5	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A23673	A serious and friendly address to the non-conformists, beginning with the Anabaptists, or, An addition to the perswasive to peace and vnity by W.A.	Allen, William, d. 1686.	1676 (1676)	Wing A1072; ESTC R9363	75,150	222

fact it is true that more may and sometimes is made the condition of Communion than is necessary And when it is so it usually becomes a temptation to more or less to run into Schism and it likewise furnisheth such with some pretence to draw Disciples to themselves who are ambitions of Heading a Party In which respects it may be matter of great Prudence in order to the Churches Peace and Unity to make no more than is necessary the condition of Communion But although more should be imposed as the condition of Communion than is necessary yet if it be not so much more as makes it sinful to hold Communion on those terms Then they must needs be guilty of the sin of Schism who separate upon account of such an imposition And the reason is because such a Schism is without sufficient cause or just ground which just ground is when one cannot do otherwise than separate without a necessity of sining Things may be ill imposed as when they are inadequate to their end and yet well observed by them on whom they are imposed as when not sinful in themselves and when by that means they and the Church suffer less in point of inconvenience and enjoy a greater benefit in preserving Peace in the Church than could be obtained in a way of opposition If we should allow a liberty much more if we hold it a duty for inferiours under Government to oppose and withstand the Commands of their Superiours as oft as they think they Command things inconvenient though they should think right so long as they do not Command things which they know to be unlawful for them to observe we should soon bring intolerable confusion into Church and Common-wealth into Families and all Communities of men where Government is exercised Inconveniencies in such cases must be yielded to rather than greater mischiefs drawn on us and on the Community by not yielding But you at least many of you think that it is an infringing of your Christian liberty for men to determine and impose upon you where God hath not determined and imposed and that in such cases it would be a betraying of that liberty should you not withstand such impositions To which I answer that thus far 't is true that when any thing is imposed by men under the notion of being commanded of God of Divine Institution or of necessity to Salvation which is not so as this would be a teaching for Doctrines the Commandments of men so a yielding to them so imposed would be a betraying of our Christian liberty and more than so it would be a betraying of the Prerogative of our Lord unto the usurpation of men and a making to our selves other Masters than Christ and our selves servants of men in the prohibited sense and all contrary to the express Doctrine of our Saviour and his Apostles But though this be the case in the Church of Rome in many things and in some respects among your selves also yet this is not the case touching the things in dispute between you and the Church of England The things imposed at which you most stick are not at all imposed under the notion of Divine right but only upon a prudential account being things mutable in their nature and alterable at the pleasure of them who impose them and are so declared in the Preface before the Book of Common Prayer So that your Conscience is not imposed upon to take the things themselves for any other than they are in their own nature things left undetermined by God one way or other But then there is a sense in which it is not true that our Christian liberty is unduly infringed by the imposition of men although we were at liberty to do or not to do the things enjoined us before such an imposition was laid upon us Our Christian liberty does not exempt us from the duty of obedience to our Superiors in things which in their own nature are but indifferent and out of such circumstances might be done or let alone The same Divine authority which enjoins us to call no man on Earth Master nor to be servants of men enjoins Children also to obey their Parents Servants their Masters Church-members their Spiritual Guides and Governours and Subjects their Princes and that in all things in which they shall not disobey God in doing contrary to his Commands So that when things indifferent or undetermined by God are imposed by our Governours Domestick Politick or Ecclesiastick only as their Commands our Christian liberty is no bar nor plea against them And whoever pretends that it is draws too near the wicked Gnosticks who pretended exemption from being commanded and governed by men by their being Christs freemen Against which abuse of Christian liberty St. Peter cautioned the Christians then For after he had exhorted them to submit themselves to every Ordinance of man for the Lords sake 1 Pet. 2.13 14. he presently adds in ver 16. as free and not using your liberty as a cloke of maliciousness not to pretend Christian liberty to cover their disaffection to Government as the Gnosticks did Our Christian liberty is so far from being a bar to our Obedience to our Governours in all things not otherwise ordered by God as that it is a great accommodation to us in yielding obedience to them without scruple of Conscience For when circumstances in the external administration of holy things are left so much undetermined by God as they are we are at the greater liberty to yield obedience to the prudential determinations of our Governours either one way or other so long as they do not determine any thing against what God hath determined In things even of this nature we are to be subject to our Governours for Conscience sake Rom. 13.5 that is out of Conscience to God who commands our obedience to our Governours but not out of Conscience to the things commanded by them as if by any inherent holiness in them our Consciences were ingaged unto them And here lies the difference between superstition and lawful obedience to authority In the Case of Superstition the act is done out of Conscience to the thing done as if sacred though but indifferent in its own nature But in the case of lawful obedience in indifferent things the same act is done out of Conscience to God not as commanding the thing but as commanding my obedience to him in all lawful things who commands me to do it and commands it under no other notion but as a thing indifferent in its own nature and not made sacred by any command or institution of God Let me say this further to you There is more of real Religion and true Christianity in thus obeying the lawful Commands of our Governours out of Conscience to God who would have it so than I fear is well considered and more of Irreligion Profaness and Hypocrisie in slighting Gods express command in this while we seem so very fearful and scrupulous to

Apostle unless you could shew that those undetermined circumstances in the administration of holy things the use of which you scruple had been expresly forbidden by some Law of God the abrogation whereof you question which you will never be able to do And therefore this Text is altogether impertinently alledged to justifie you in your practice as many more have been If you say though these words whatsoever is not of faith is sin be brought to confirm a particular proposition yet they contain in themselves an universal one Admit this for I will not deny it yet they will not prove the contrary that whatsoever is of faith in this sense of faith is no sin that is it does not prove that whatsoever a man is perswaded is no sin is therefore no sin And if it does not prove this it will not prove that the act by which you make a Schism sinful in it self does not do any such thing though you are perswaded it does not Though a mans doubtfulness of the lawfulness of an action so long as the reasons of it preponderate and weigh down the reasons that tend to his satisfaction make it unlawful for him to do it under those circumstances yet this will not free him from sin in case he be in an error in being so perswaded but he remains guilty of that error and consequently is accessary also unto the evil that is caused thereby If mens ignorance and unresolvedness in what is their duty were a protection to them from sin-guiltiness though in error it would be an inducement to them to indulge themselves in their ignorance and irresolution But when a man does not know but that he is in such a dilemma as that he sins whether he act or forbear to act either in acting against his Conscience or in neglecting his duty through error of Conscience it will then awaken a man that desires to keep a good Conscience both towards God and towards men to use both diligence and impartiality in his enquiry after what is his duty indeed It is I think but needful upon this occasion to caution many among you against an affected scrupulosity I call that an affected scrupulosity when people love to be scrupulous about some things when they are far from it in other things wherein they have more reason to be scrupulous As when they are nice curious and squeamish about undetermined circumstances in forms of administration of holy things but do not at all or nothing so much scruple the laying waste the peace of the Church and the grieving and hurting others thereby nor to lay Government it self low nor to speak evil freely enough of them that differ from them and the like not to mention what is of more private concern That such things are abroad is too apparent to be denied but whence they proceed is not perhaps so easily perceived Only this is visible that persons scrupulousness about conforming to publick Orders hath obtained them among many the reputation of the stricter sort of professors And from thence it 's possible they may fansie themselves to be of more tender Consciences than others and think it may be a good sign of the truth of grace in them and upon that account and of being thought to be such by others they may affect such a scrupulosity But such as are thus unequal in their scrupling of things may do well to consider that such scrupulosity is a more sure sign of hypocrisie than of a tender Conscience or of the truth of grace in whomsoever it is found as symbolizing with the Pharisees who strained at gnats and yet could swallow Camels Whereas a tenderness of Conscience of the right kind will make a man as much afraid of erring on the right hand as on the left which temper is in Scripture given as the Character of a good man a man that turns not aside to the right hand nor to the left but is the upright man Though tenderness of Conscience is a right good thing if you understand thereby a fear of transgressing any known rule of duty in one thing as well as another in conjunction with a careful endeavour to know his rule in every thing yet scrupulosity which is a fear of offending in that which a man does not know is forbidden is not such a commendable thing as that men should be in love with it or indulge it in themselves but is rather proper to those who are superstitious than to the truly religious Because it proceeds generally from the false Doctrine of men and from a wrong notion of things rather than from the obscurity of the rule of duty I'ts no marvel if there be no end of scruples with them who believe that nothing can be done in faith especially in the external administration of Gods worship but what they can bring a Divine Command or Institution for there being none of them that so teach but practise otherwise as you may soon perceive if you try all particular circumstances in their worship or administration of holy things and must do so unless they will confine themselves to the very words of the Lords Prayer and to the form of words prescribed in baptism and the Lords Supper There are but two ways of knowing Gods mind concerning our duty Natural light and supernatural Revelation And whatever we are not confined to by Divine determination or restrained from by Divine prohibition in one of these ways we may securely and without any scruple do when we are thereunto called by Parents Masters Magistrates or Ecclesiastical Governours That which is not against us is for us in this case as our Saviour also said in another case The Rule of that which is our duty indeed is doubtless very plain and it would be a reproach to the wisdom and goodness of God to think otherwise He hath shewed thee O man what is good saith the Prophet It is mens additions to Gods word and their teaching that as commanded or forbidden by God which he hath not commanded and which he hath not forbidden that is the true cause of our distractions If men would but keep close to what God hath plainly determined and follow the reason of their Governours in other things which are undetermined and their own best reason where they are at liberty to do it there would be little room for mens scrupulosity or occasion of divisions in point of practice And yet this is nothing but what the Scripture calls for when it directs and enjoins Children to obey their Parents Servants their Masters Subjects their Princes and that in all things only in the Lord or wherein they are not countermanded by him Now concerning that other Position wherein is asserted That when that is imposed as a condition of Communion which ought not to be made a condition if Schism be occasioned thereby the guilt of it lies only on the imposers and not on them upon whom it is imposed I answer As to matter of