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
A56609	A brief account of the new sect of latitude-men together with some reflections upon the nevv philosophy / by S.P. of Cambridge, in answer to a letter from his friend at Oxford.	Patrick, Simon, 1626-1707.	1662 (1662)	Wing P754; ESTC R18217	17,337	26

they shall be cryed out on for disaffected this is all that liberty of conscience they can justly be accused of unless I should add that they are so merciful as not to think it fit to knock people on the head because they are not of our Church The Church of England hath never yet embrued her hands in blood and I hope the Zeal of none of her sons will ever kinle such flames as her step-mother of Rome delights to warm her hands at And now having taken an impartial view of this so much exagitated company of men we find them so far from being any ways dangerous to the Church or fit to be disowned by her that they seem to be the very Chariots and Horsemen thereof for by their sober and unblameable conversation they conciliate respect and honour to her by their Learning and industry they defend her by their moderation they are most likely to win upon the minds of dissenters who are too many to be contemned by their accommodating themselves to the people who as is too too palpable are possessed for the most part by the Presbyterians they may in time bring them over to the Church and prevent her becomming a society of Shepherds without any Sheep for really I fear if the Fathers of the Church were not wiser than some of their angry sons who must needs be thrusting some of their younger brethren out of dores if I say all that have been reproached with the name of Latitude should be disowned by the Church they that remain would be the least party of men of any one denomination in England and to leave themselves so naked were to tempt Providence for their preservation especially considering they stand ready to be assaulted on each hand by two potent Enemies the Papists and the Presbyterians both of them numerous wealthy subtle and industrious who watch all opportunities of subverting the best Church in the world And therefore certainly this is no time for her to mutilate her self or to bleed with intestine Warr but let her embrace those that are so ready to serve her with both her Armes and let all her Children with joint affection and consent oppose the common Enemies 6. But it will be said no man is angry that men conform but that they have no greater zeal for what they conforme to they are as men indifferent and could be as well content with the contrary Truely Sir either I am mistaken in the men or the charge is very unjust for I find as many as it hath been my fortune to converse with that they do very sincerly esteem Episcopal govenment both as in it self the best and of Apostolical antiquity they were alwayes approvers of a Liturgy and think that of our own Church may easilyer be marred than mended That Religion would lose that due law veneration that ought to be preserved in it if it were not attended with outward Rites and Ceremonies that private persons are not the judges of that decorum whereby these things are to be measured but onely the Governours of the Church and that the Church of England as well in these as all other things is the best constituted Church in the world But they presume no man would have them to think the whole weight of Religion lies in externals or that they are of greater accompt than the eternal and indispensable Laws of good and evil but that Ecclesiastical laws are as the Jews were wont to say an hedge about the laws of God these ought stiffely to be observed and therefore the other not to be neglected that they do not consist so indivisibily but that if it should seem meet to the Fathers of the Church to make any alterations they were equally bound to submit thereto this is that Latitude they are so Tragically accused of 5. But there is another crime which cannot be denyed that they have introduced a new Philosophy Aristotle and the Schoolemem are out of request with them True indeed it is that ipse dixit is an argument much out of fashon and fortasse Philosophus non loquitur ex sua sententia sed ex mente aliorum would be accounted as impertinent an answer it will scarce passe for a Philosophical resolution of any Problem to say It is the nature of the beast it is done by virtue of its form or quality They love to search some more particular cause than the influence of the heavens nor will they be put off with complementum Vniversi They embrace a method of Philosophy which they think was as much antienter than Aristotle as you conceive Oxford was before Cambridge and was as great a bug-beare to the Presbyterians as a Crosse or Surplisse and therefore methinks the Church of England should have less reason to be offended with it For my own part I never had any great skill in it and am now too old to learn yet I am far from that humour reprehended by the Poet Turpe put ant parere minoribus quae Imberbes didicere Senes perdenda fateri And I suppose it is this freedome and unconcernedness of mine that makes you think my opinion worth knowing in a matter that I am so little conversant in of late years wherefore I will not undertake to compare the new Philosophy with the old but instead thereof will tell you a tale 7. There was a certain Husbandman who occupied a Farme with an antient mansion-house standing in the fields remote from any Town where there was an old iron Clock in a large wooden frame which had been a long while out of kelter and because he was much troubled to know how the time passed that he might order his business accordingly he resolved to get this Clock repaired and while he was considering where to finde a man able to do it it fortuned that a certain Peripatetick artificer something above the degree of a Tinker came that way who undertook to mend it but after he had bestowed a great deal of work in oyling the wheels filing the teeth and hanging on more weight and all to no purpose at last gave it up for nought and told him it could not be mended the farmer partly out of curiosity and partly in hope to find out the defect desired this Artificer to show him the nature of Clockwork and what was requisite to make up a perfect Clock he though he knew very little what belonged to it yet being a talkative fellow and very loth to confesse his ignorance in any thing began a long story that the nature of Clock-work in general was a principle and cause of motion and rest by means of an inward device of its own accord and not by chance but this Clock having no such nature it was indeed no Clock and could not move he told him also that there are three things go to the making of a Clock the materials and the shape and the want of that shape before it was made for it was not a Clock