Selected quad for the lemma: england_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
england_n	catholic_n	church_n	communion_n	6,739	5	9.8919	5	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A56396	Religion and loyalty, or, A demonstration of the power of the Christian church within it self the supremacy of sovereign powers over it, the duty of passive obedience, or non-resistance to all their commands : exemplified out of the records of the Chruch and the Empire from the beginning of Christianity to the end of the reign of Julian / by Samuel Parker.	Parker, Samuel, 1640-1688.	1684 (1684)	Wing P470; ESTC R25518	269,648	630

of the Primitive Church where we shall find the whole matter so fairly and so easily accorded that it is next to a miracle how it should ever be made so great a difficulty in these later times But it hapned in this as it did in most other things at the time of the Reformation that men saw themselves wrapt up they knew not how in woful Errours and Corruptions but did not and indeed as the World then stood could not immediately discover the true original state of the Church as it was at first setled by our Saviour and his Apostles and received into protection by Constantine and the Christian Emperours So that though they had Eye-sight enough and God knows very little would serve their turn to discern the follies and abuses of Rome they were at a loss how to fix the right Reformation and for want of the ancient Records of the Church that lay buried in dust and rubbish at that time could make but slow improvements in it So that before the true state of the Church could be clearly and fully discover'd most of them were setled in some way or other and after any new settlement it is very difficult to make any Alteration and therefore they continue in their first posture to this day But the Church of England at the very first Attempt resolving to reform it self by the Example of the Primitive Church and having the good fortune to retain the Apostolical form of Episcopal Government in subordination to the Royal Power set it self in a right way to Reformation And so as the state of things came to light by degrees brought its work to some competent Perfection For the Reformation of the Church after such an inveterate degeneracy must needs be a work of so great bulk and difficulty that it is an unreasonable thing to expect that it should be finisht at the first stroke So great a design as that must be a work of time and consideration to be reviewed and amended as the Master-Workmen shall find most convenient So as that they who had a Power first to begin it have an inherent right when ever they think fit to take an account of their own Work and if they find any flaws mistakes or defects in it to make them up by an after-care So that there must be a constant Power residing in the Church to enact or abolish Laws as it judges most serviceable to the present state of things And that is truly and properly the Church of England the Governours of it acting under the Allowance of the Sovereign Power by its establisht Laws and Constitutions with a constant power residing in themselves and their Successours to enact new Laws as they shall judge most beneficial to the Edification of the Church And it is a very crude notion of the Church of England as common as it is that it is to be found in its Canons Articles and Constitutions for that is only the Law and dead rule of the Church of England but the Church properly so call'd consists in its living Authority as setled by our Saviour by which these Laws were at first enacted and are or ought to be still executed and may in some cases be alter'd And that is the great difference between the Law and the Authority of the Church that one is alterable and the other is not The Authority of the Church may make new Laws and cancel old ones but that lasts the same for ever So that for men to talk of this or that Church without a particular form of Government setled in it by our Saviour's own Commission is to turn the Christian Church into a Chimaera and imaginary state of Fairies But as for the Church of England according to the design of its Reformation it consists of a National Synod of Bishops together with a select Convocation of Presbyters representing the whole Body of the Clergy in subjection to the Sovereign Power and in communion with the Catholique Church all the World over as far as it can be attain'd And this is contrived so agreeably to the Primitive Platform the Interest of Government the Nature of Christianity that there is little else defective in it then the honesty and the confidence to own it self and put its own Constitution into effectual practice But of that I shall discourse in its proper place §. 9. At present for the practice of the Primitive Churches Government within it self and as it related to the Civil State it must be consider'd in the two Periods before and after the Conversion of the Empire and by comparing the true face and posture of things in these two so different states we shall have an exact description of the Rights of the Church in all estates and conditions whatsoever But most of all of its easy complyance with the Rights of Civil Government in Christian States and of the safest way for Christian Sovereigns to govern and protect the Church within their Dominions without invading its inherent and unalienable Authority And then last of all I shall compare that Royal Supremacy that is acknowledged and asserted in the Church and Realm of England in Causes Ecclesiastical with the sense of the Ancient Church concerning the Authority of Emperours and with the Practice of Christian Princes in the Exercise of this Authority And by shewing their compleat Agreement shall from that Topick distinctly prove that we have in this as well as in other matters attain'd a good degree of Reformation First as for the Period of time before the Conversion of the Roman Empire there are two things to be consider'd first their behaviour towards the Civil Government whilst it supprest and persecuted the Christian Faith Secondly the exercise of their own Authority within themselves From both which it will appear that the Church as a Society founded by Christ challenged a Jurisdiction distinct from and Independant upon the Civil State and that this Jurisdiction was so far from interfering with or abating of the Sovereignty of Princes that it bound them to the strictest Allegiance and Subjection to the most inhumane Persecutors And the Story of this Interval whilst the powers of the Church and the World were separate and indeed as much as it was possible opposite will set before us a much clearer State of the Nature and Extent of the two Jurisdictions then we can have from the Practice of Christian States in which the two Powers concurring in the same Acts of Government it is not altogether so easie to discern their distinct influences but will withal give us the fullest Character of true Christian Loyalty from their practice under the hardest usage and severest persecutions But most of all from their Principles upon which they founded their Obligation to their Practice and when it appears upon what grounds and reasons they submitted to the utmost cruelty of the Civil Government that will prevent the common shift made by all Factious Parties against the Authority of their Example

Opinion of the great merit of Caelibacy was one of the first Superstitions that invaded the Christian Church and was in every Age more busie and forward than any other though I do not find that it could ever obtain the force of Law in the Eastern Church till the Council in Trullo in the year 691 by whom Bishops and no other are forbidden to cohabit with their Wives after Consecration and as that is the first Canon of this kind so is it a flat contradiction to the Apostolical Canon And though the Council endeavour to excuse it yet they do but the more grosly entangle themselves by their own Apology and instead of defending their fault confess it For when they have made the Canon they tell us that they do not intend thereby to contradict the Apostolical Canon when the very making of it is an express contradiction to it And in the very next Canon they condemn the Church of Rome for prohibiting marriage to Priests and Deacons and make good their Decree from this very Canon that equally allows it to all Orders But above all commend me to Gratian upon this Argument who when he has in two whole Chapters recited several Ancient Canons of the Church against this Superstition especially those severe ones of the Council of Gangra and last of all this last mention'd Canon in Trullo in which the marriage of Presbyters and Deacons is expresly warranted he begins his next Chapter with this general Assertion Servanda est ergò continentia ab omnibus in sacris ordinibus constitutis And then proves it by the Decrees of later Popes injoining Caelibacy as a Duty of Piety to all Orders of the Clergy But if they can thus confidently justifie their Innovations out of the Ancients by concluding contrary to their own avowed and express Sense I confess they may make good any Cause though I should think it would be much more adviseable to let fall such a Cause as can be no better way defended Another remarkable Law that was Enacted during this Interval by meer Ecclesiastical Authority was the exclusion of all voluntary Eunuchs from Holy Orders And that was made upon occasion of the Heresie of the Valesians who thought themselves bound to this severity against themselves by too rigid an Interpretation of some passages of our Saviour especially that of St. Matthew's Gospel 19. 12. And the same Canon was afterward renewed in a Synod at Alexandria against Origen upon the same account and after that by the great Council of Nice upon occasion of the fact of Leontius who being a Presbyter and very much delighting in the conversation of a young Virgin by name Eustolia and being upbraided with the scandal of using so much freedom with her to prevent that without losing her Society he made the same attempt upon himself that Origen had done for which he was deposed by the Council though afterwards he was contrary to the Canon or rather in defiance to the Council promoted by the Eusebian Faction with whom he sided to the great See of Antioch But hereby we may see the necessity of a Legislative Power in the Church without which there would be no means to restrain all the wild Conceits and Extravagancies that Superstition can blow into Mens fancies So exorbitant a Principle is it so inconsistent with the Peace and preservation of the Church so absurd so foolish and contrary to the Common Sense of Mankind that nothing ought to be imposed by the Governors of the Church but what is expresly imposed by the Word of God There are many more Examples in this Interval both of the settlement of that Polity in the Church that I have above described and of divers wise and prudent Laws made upon particular Occasions but to avoid being too tedious and yet to do the work effectually I shall confine my self to the Writings of St. Cyprian in whose time the State of the Church was brought to perfection and who I may be bold to say understood it as well as any Writer of the Christian Church either before or after his own time and who has stated the whole matter with the greatest clearness and strength of Reason and reduced it to practice with the most unblameable prudence and wisdom and therefore I shall give a more particular and exact account of his Sense of the Government and Unity of the Catholick Church both for the enlightening of some Mens minds who pretend to be so dull that they cannot understand how it should be govern'd in way of external Polity and for a proof of the exact agreement of the Church of England in its design'd Model of Reformation with this Ancient State of the Christian Church This is made much more easie at this time by the late labour of a very learned Prelate of our own in digesting his Writings that had hitherto lay not a little confused into their due and exact order of time For when we certainly know at what time and upon what occasion every discourse was written it must needs make it much more easie and much more useful then otherwise the discourse could have made it self For that Unity is a very desirable thing is agreed on all hands the only dispute is wherein it consists Some will have it to be only an Union of Faith and Charity others of External Polity so as that all Christians are some way or other United under one Government And these we may subdivide into two Parties Either those that place the Unity of the Catholick Church in a Subjection to one single Monarch Or those that set up an Obligation to a Political Unity among all Churches under several Governments So that though every particular Church or Diocess have Supreme Government within it self as to all things that concern its own State yet it is accountable to the Catholick Church i. e. to all other Churches for the Peace of the whole For though a Church may be at Unity within it self yet if it do any thing injurious to the peace of Government in any other Church it becomes Schismatical to the whole Body of the Catholick Church presuming as much as in it lies to overthrow the Discipline of all other Churches This as I take to be the true State of the Controversie so to be St. Cyprian's sense of it §. 12. And the first Principle that runs through all his Writings and lies at the bottom of all his Notions concerning Church Unity is that there is but one Episcopacy setled in the Church by Divine Appointment distributed among the several Bishops of the Catholique Church every one retaining the whole Power within his own Bishoprick as he expresses it like a Lawyer Episcopatus unus est cujus à singulis in solidum pars tenetur There is but one Episcopacy of which every one holds his own share with full Title and Possession For the word in solidum is a Law-term denoting a Plenitude of Title so that though an Estate

insolentiae tuae agere vel serò paenitentiam caeperis si Deo Christo ●jus plenissimè satisfeceris communicationis tuae poterimus habere rationem manente tamen apud nos divinae censurae respectu metu This was a singular Severity in so gentle a Person as St. Cyprian who allowed full Restitution to all other Offenders but in this case he does it with an If. And in plain truth the Nature of the Crime deserved it for it is an Eternal Subversion of the Peace of the whole Church if the Pride or the Peevishness of one single Man may be suffer'd to censure and condemn the practice of the whole Catholique Church For though this pique of Pupianus lay only against St. Cyprian yet he being as he tells him in Communion with all the Bishops and Churches through the whole World though the blow were aim'd at him singly it lighted upon all and the whole Church was equally involved in the Censure Which was then thought such a piece of Luciferian pride that it was by him placed next to the unpardonable Sin The passages in St. Cyprian to this purpose are innumerable and there is scarce an Epistle in which he does not expresly declare the Unity of the Catholique Church to lye in the Concord and Agreement of the Episcopal Colledge that was a Succession to the Apostolical between whom the Government of the Church was equally divided yet so as to agree all together in one Catholique Communion This is a thing so easily to be understood that I cannot but stand amazed to find Men of Sense Learning and Ingenuity pretend to be so dull as not to be able to comprehend how the Unity of the Church should be reduced to practice by way of external Policy when all the Lines of it are so plainly traced out in the Universal practice of the Primitive Church and particularly in the Writings of St. Cyprian It were easie to give a much larger account of it by transcribing almost all the Records of the Christian Church the chief Affairs whereof were all along transacted by this way of Epistolary Correspondence And therefore the best way of attaining knowledge in Ecclesiastical matters is not by following set and form'd Histories so much as by consulting particular Epistles in which we have a distinct account from time to time of the true Springs and Motions of all the publique Transactions of the Christian Church § 14. But because this Argument of Unity and Communion by way of external Polity in the Church is become a Controversie among some learned Men of our own Church though what I have already discoursed in general be more then enough or at least as much as is in it self needful to state the Case yet unless I assoil some particular Arguments that are at this time on foot notwithstanding all that I have said I shall leave some Readers under the power of great prejudices and those prejudices being maintain'd by the deserved Reputation of some good and learned Men they are not to be easily removed not otherwise then by particular Confutations The two great Men at first engaged in this Controversie are Mr. Thorndike and Dr. Barrow Men of equal value both for Modesty Learning and Piety Mr. Thorndike is peremptory for the necessity of one United Government in the Catholique Church The Dr. granting it to be a thing very desirable and in some rare cases practicable as when all Christendom was almost confin'd within the Roman Empire cannot conceive any Necessity of it or Obligation to it But with all due Reverence to the memory of so great and so good a Man I must make bold to say That however it comes to pass he answers neither his usual Acuteness or Ingenuity in this performance Probably it might have been an imperfect work and an Essay upon the Argument by way of exercise to himself or if he were serious and the discourse were the result of his own Judgment it will appear when I come to consider his way of discoursing it that he had by no means weighed the matter as he ought that he did not comprehend the Arguments that he undertook to answer that he was not consistent with himself but expresly asserts the Opinion that he endeavours to oppose Of all which unusual inconsistency in so Acute a Man I can give no other Reason then that his great Zeal against the Unity of the Catholique Church by way of Papal Monarchy Transported him so far as to make him forget that obligation to Unity and Communion that lyes upon all Churches under their several distinct Governments But whatever was the ground of his mistake his reasons only concern us and here to proceed Methodically I shall in the first place set down his Adversaries Arguments and his Replies upon them and then his own Arguments with my Answers to them And first he begins the dispute with an intimation of the want of perspicuity in his Adversaries Writings and this I know is a popular Objection and very much in the mouths of some Men who will by no means allow him to be an intelligible Writer though for what reason I cannot imagine unless that it is convenient for themselves that he should not be understood for if once Men were convinced of the true Constitution of any one Church by Divine Authority that would forever destroy all indifferency or pretended moderation between the several different Parties among us And if the Church of England be constituted by Divine Right then all that separate from it are both Heretiques and Schismatiques and all that join with it as the right Church and not meerly as the Church in possession are obliged to declare them so and endeavour to have them cast out of all Ecclesiastical Communion If indeed the difference were only about Rites and Ceremonies there might be some room for good nature but when the contest is about the Essential Constitution of a Christian Church as it was Established by our Saviour and his Apostles those that separate from it nay that endeavour with all their might to destroy it as our present Schismatiques do cannot but incur the utmost displeasure and severity of all honest Men that sincerely love it In such cases as these it is a contradiction to talk of terms of Accommodation And that is the reason why some Men that would keep fair with all Parties are so afraid of the Plea of Divine Right for the Church of England for if that be setled they are thereby obliged and determin'd positively to declare against the Schi●● of all other different Parties And not to do it is to partake of their Sin and in effect to join with them in it for not to be for the true Church is to be against it our Saviour will accept of no such lukewarm and perfidious moderation In short Men that Communicate with the Church of England not as founded upon Divine Right proceed upon no other ground then that it is