Selected quad for the lemma: england_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
england_n	ceremony_n	church_n	rite_n	3,560	5	9.9325	5	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A28590	A plea for moderation towards dissenters occasioned by the grand-juries presenting the Sermon against persecution at the last assizes holden at Sherburn in Dorset-shire : to which is added An answer to the objections commonly made aganst that sermon / by Samuel Bolde ...	Bold, S. (Samuel), 1649-1737.	1682 (1682)	Wing B3484; ESTC R6070	34,266	46

Whether if they had exerted this Power without Divine Direction they would have resented every thing Imperious and Haughty men have in after Ages called Contempts with the same passion they have done 'T is plain they thought it if not more Christian yet more prudent to forbear laying Snairs in peoples way and chose rather to suspend the exercise of their Authority about these things than to make any unseasonable use of it and than vindicate it by so severe a course as their delivering men unto Satan did amount to 4ly I think it will be very difficult for any man to make it appear that for some hundreds of years after the Apostles the Christian Orthodox Church did ever require any thing more than common Christianity as a Term of Church-Communion Or that any Ceremony was for so long a time imposed on the Church This is not designed in the least to reflect on the Church of England or to expect against any of Her Orders it is designed only to shew 1. That neither Christianity in the general nor the Being of a particular Church is concerned in our Dispute and that therefore considering our present Circumstances there is no need of discovering such immoderate heat in this business as some men do manifest and expect that all who pretend to the Church should approve 2. That some of those who do dissent from us may have more plausible pretences for what they do than some who are inconsiderately furious against them do imagin But allowing that there may somtimes happen such cases that the Church may and ought to proceed to great severity with some offenders we cannot reasonably conclude hence that every difference about outward Rites and Ceremonies especially if managed with meekness and other Christian Virtues by those who do dissent must be treated and prosecuted in that manner This would be to make the Church transcribe that Quack's folly who perceiving a skilful Chyrurgeon had saved a mans life and done him great service by cutting off his Legg when desperately gangreen'd did advise one who was troubled with the Head-ach to have his Head cut off The same Medecine will not cure every Disease nor may the same Remedy be applied to every part Moderation in these lesser things is certainly very desirable it may do the Church great service And whilst we are not obliged by any Law to prosecute and ruine those who are not of our Judgment in these things either unnecessarily to turn Informers our selves or to wheedle or threaten others into such Courses is very unbecoming any who profess they have a desire to befriend the Protestant Religion in this day The Church of England is undoubtedly a very strong and would be if it were not for these violent and headstrong Bigots who indanger the ruining the Protestant Religion under a glorious name and pretence an Impregnable Bulwark against Popery But she is not so by her injoyning any Ceremonies in which point she and other Protestants do difler but in her close and immovable adhering to those Doctrines and Practices which are common to us with the generality of our sober and only scrupulous Dissenters and which are directly contrary to and destructive of Popery I dare affirm That if the Rites and Ceremonies now in use in the Church of England should be altered some changed and some laid wholly aside by the same Authority which did at first injoyn them the Church of England would still be as Impregnable a Bulwark against Popery as now she is And I am fully satisfied there is no man will deny this unless he be either a Real Papist or an Ignorant Superstitious Fool. Nor is this all that may be alledged why we should be cautious of dealing harshly with those who differ from us in these things and against whom we have nothing else to except For the very Consideration of the Fruit and Effect the continued imposing of these things has had on many should both abate our vehemence against Dissenters and make us generally more inclinable to desire that some Abatements might be legally made in these things for the satisfying of those who still remain unsatisfied There are two dreadful Events which have followed these Impositions 1. Many worthy pious and otherwise every way qualified Persons have been hindred from either entering or continuing in the Lords Vineyard to labour and work publickly there 2. The constant imposed use of these things hath almost unavoidably begot in the minds of ignorant and vulgar people a belief that they are indispensably necessary and undoubted parts of those Ordinances to which they are annexed I have known several who would as willingly have had their Children and Relations not baptized at all as not to have the Sign of the Cross added And this not because it is required by Authority but because as they have professedly and openly owned they thought the Baptism not good and valid without it Nay I have known when many Arguments would not satisfie people that private Baptism without the Cross and I know not how any man can justifie the use of the Cross in that case was sound and true Baptism tho they have professed they did believe the Child could not live half an hour And in such cases the Sign of the Cross is I think at least Contradictio in Adjecto And some of these were such I should scarce have believed had been so ignorant or superstitious if I had not had a particular knowledge of it And however both these Effects might happen directly contrary to the primary design in appointing them yet when these Fruits do apparently spring from thence whether naturally or only by accident they may be enough to make those who have the greatest zeal for the power of godliness desire that no more stress may be laid on these things than their own Nature will bear For notwithstanding all the caution the Church hath used to prevent these ill Effects by declaring her own design and the true use and importance of these things that has not been universally effectual to answer her Design Neither her Rubricks her Canons no nor the Admonitions of her Clergy have been so effectual to prevent mistakes and false conceptions about these things as the constant uninterrupted and Injoined use and practice of them has been to ingender and create them in some mens minds Nor is it altogether improbable but more minds would have been leavened with such false Notions as those mentioned before if these things had been universally submitted to and the contests and differences about them had not awakened people to consider them more distinctly and get themselves acquainted with the proper design and true use of them Nor have I only observed that some do misunderstand the Church in injoyning the use of these Ceremonies by the particular knowledge I have had of their laying too much stress on these things and looking on them as assential parts of Ordinances but I am inclined to think

do Dissent till you have effectually subdued them all and absolutely destroy'd both Root and Branch For if there should be a Publick Necessity to indulge them after they have been vigorously prosecuted for a time their numbers will undoubtedly be much greater than they were before And there is scarce an instance to be given of Moderate Dissenters being prosecuted with great warmth and unecessary Heat but in a little time after there has been some or other very notable Emergency which has rendred it very necessary to have them entertained with great Clemency and Gentleness 2. If you destroy them all with an indifferent undistinguishing hand you must keep a strict and constant watch over them after they are dead lest a greater Generation of the like sort do arise and spring out of their blood and ashes Nay you must be able to stop and stifle the Cry of their blood lest otherwise the Nation being so throughly drench'd with it the clamorous noise of that blood coming into Gods ears do provoke him to pour out such dreadful Vials on us as will make us at once to cease being a Church or People It is an excellent true and very useful Observation which Bishop Taylor made concerning Force and Extremity in matters of Religion viz. When Religion puts on Armour and God is not acknowledged by his New Testament Titles Religion may have in it the Power of the Sword but not the Power of Godliness and we may complain of this to God and amongst them who are afflicted but we have no remedy but what we must expect from the fellowship of Christs sufferings and the returns of the God of Peace 6ly It was never known that any Indifferent Ceremonies were universally imposed in a knowing Age and the Judgments and Opinions of all good men did consent and agree to them Indeed I think there never was such an attempt made till Popery had got a great influence over the Christian world I am perswaded there never was an universal compliance in Imposed Indifferences till Popery had involved people in a more than Egyptian and almost inextricable Darkness Some do think it would be as commendable to oblige all men to have the same Face as to have in every respect the same judgment Indeed men would have just ground to wonder if a Law should be made requiring all men to be of one Bulke and Stature and forbidding them to eat and drink at least in Company if they fail to observe it But I am sure I have some where read of a certain Expedient that was sometimes made use of to make Dwarfs and breed them to be all of one Bigness It was not any such Stratagem as Procustes used to make his Friends and Visitants of one length viz. Cutting off their Heads if they were too long and racking them ought of joynt if they were too short This looks like the persecuting way made use of in some Forreign parts of the World when mens Judgments and Consciences do not answer the Politick Standard The way I speak of differs very much from this For it will let People grow till they be of a just size and then stops them that they shall not increase one jot 'T is couping them up at first and then Dieting them proportionably and never suffering them to stir out of their first enclosure till they have not only stuft it quite up but are quite past growing If you would have all men of the same mind in every thing relating to the Service and Worship of God and what men call so the most effectual Expedient will be to involve them in the same Gross Ignorance in which their Ancestors were held under the Romish yoke There is no way so likely to make men to entertain any thing without Scruple as keeping them in so much darkness they cannot see or making them so dull they cannot examine things People are never brought to a servile submission to all kind of Impositions till they have for some time been inured to an Implicite Faith and then you may obtrude on them what you please 7ly Very great and considerable Alterations have been made in our Rubricks our publick Service and our Articles in order to the bringing of the Papists to join with us in our Worship and to prevent our giving them so much as the colour of a pretence for their withdrawing from our Communion And if so much might be parted with to gratifie our worst and most implacable Enemies even them who differ from us in the very Substantials of Religion is it not highly Reasonable we should express some Moderation and Tenderness towards them who are in every thing of the same Religion with us and do only differ about some unnecessary Ceremonies But there are too many who pretend to this Church who discover they are of the mind that we cannot manifest too much Complacency in those who are avowedly of the Popish Perswasion nor appear inexorable enough towards our afflicted fellow Protestants How many are there who pretend to be Sons of the Church of England and yet dare openly declare they have a greater aversion to Protestant Dissenters than Popish Recusants What hopeful Church of England men will these be if the Sins of this Nation should rise so high as to provoke God to pour on us the Vials of his displeasure and to imbitter nay poison them all by adding the greatest of all other Plagues making us subject to a Popish Governor Dr. Heylin tells us there was great care taken for expunging all such Passages in the Book of Common Prayer c. as might give any scandal or offence to the Popish Party or be urged by them in excuse for their not coming to Church c. In the Litany that most excellent passage was expunged where we pray to be delivered from the Tyranny and all the detestable Enormities of the Bishops of Rome In the Communion-Service a whole Rubrick against the Popish Doctrine of the Sacrament was expunged And in the Original Copy of the 39 Articles there is a very considerable Addition to the 28th Article which doth expresly declare that no Christian ought either to believe or profess the Real and Corporal Presence of the Flesh and Blood of Christ in the Encharist giving a very strong and invincible Reason for it But because some alledged that such an express Definition against a Real Presence might drive from the Church many who were still of that Perswasion c. therefore those words were by common consent left out Is it not a very strange and unreasonable thing that some great Pretenders to the Church of England should think it Lawful and consistent with their pertaining to that Church to be familiar and converse ordinarily with nay Feast and it may be revel and be drunk with professed Papists and yet fail at and declaim against others who are much truer Conformists than themselves because they dare visit and have sober and neighbourly