Selected quad for the lemma: england_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
england_n	church_n	communion_n	schism_n	2,635	5	10.6078	5	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A36244	A discourse concerning the one altar and the one priesthood insisted on by the ancients in their disputes against schism wherein the ground and solidity of that way of reasoning is explained, as also its applicableness to the case of our modern schismaticks, with particular regard to some late treatises of Mr. Richard Baxter ... / by H. Dodwell.	Dodwell, Henry, 1641-1711.	1683 (1683)	Wing D1808; ESTC R24298	200,473	497

governed by a multitude of Secular Governors Only I confess that herein is a disparity That all Ecclesiastical Governors are more obliged to maintain a mutual correspondence and to ratifie each others Censures than Secular Governors are And it was from this very Principle that I inferred That whoever was lawfully deprived of the Communion of any one Bishop or Church must thereupon lose his Right to the Communion of the whole Episcopal College and consequently of the Catholick Church as including all particulars And what has Mr. Baxter to say to this way of Reasoning If he have any thing let him once at least be perswaded to undertake the Arguments by which I proved it BUT it is Mr. Baxter's usual way to judge of the Language of Antiquity by Modern Notions and Circumstances of Affairs in England And perhaps our Academical Colleges or Collegiate Churches make him fancy that when we speak of an Episcopal College we must mean some such Bodies of the Bishops cohabiting together and ready to assemble as often as there is occasion Accordingly he asks Where is that College that governs you Which way had you their Mandates Were they gathered from all Nations in the Christian World Who compared their Votes What were the cases put to them c. And having fancied this to be our Doctrine it was indeed easie to make it look like an Universal Aristocratical Supremacy But sure he could not think that S. Cyprian or any of his Contemporaries could allude to any of our Modern Colleges Collegia in his time and according to the use of the Roman Laws did not in the least imply Cohabitation The Consuls were called Collegae where-ever they inhabited whether in the City or in what part soever of the Roman Empire The Guilds and Fraternities as we now call them were then called Collegia who even by our Modern Customs are not obliged to cohabit much less according to the Customs then received in the Roman Empire So little occasion he had for even mistaking S. Cyprian But possibly he did not bethink himself how much S. Cyprian was concerned in this matter Could he therefore unwillingly mistake Us His very Expostulations now mentioned plainly imply that he knew we could not so much as pretend to any such Body as now extant in any part of the World And how could he think that we could own a Government from a Body which we did not believe any where existent With what ingenuity can his Brethren charge us with owning a foreign Jurisdiction when what is 〈◊〉 where cannot be foreign SO far are these Fictions from being our Doctrine as that they are indeed against our Interest to hold them Had we done so we must then have been accountable to another Adversary in defence of our own Churches against the Innovations of the Church or Court of Rome And for my own part he and his Brethren might perceive by my Preface that I was particularly wary of giving no advantage to the Church of Rome in my charge of SCHISM against the Nonconformists and that I had therefore purposely set forth my little Discourse of the Fundamental Principles of Popery that the Papists themselves might see that I would speak nothing unagreeable thereunto in dealing with our own SCHISMATICKS But had I owned the Pope as a Principle of Unity I must have owned what I there proved to be the Fundamental Principle of Popery and consulted as such And then how could I have defended our own Churches from SCHISM as being divided from the Principle of Unity If men will take up things so contrary to our Principles and our Interest and yet withal so very destitute of any thing that might give a well-meaning person an occasion of mistaking us the Accuser of the Brethren will never let them want Arguments for invidious tho groundless Accusations He is pleased to call Us Designers We are no doubt much beholden to his Candor that he did not call us Plotters tho many of his Readers will think he meant no less But can he tell any of the Designers that have done more for reconciling us to Popery than his Brother Le Blanc and the Author of the Catholick Theology ALIKE unuseful are his Personal Objections The Answer to them were very easie but very unuseful for publick Writings They are perfectly impertinent to the strength of an Argument or the merit of a Cause What matter is it what Communion I my self am of if my Arguments prove them SCHISMATICKS for dividing from the Church of England Nor are such Discourses like to be grateful to the Readers who are not concerned as we are They will not be pleased to find Histories of our Lives where they expected just Informations concerning the true nature of SCHISM Besides the natural tendency of such Arguments is exasperation and bitterness the very Plague of Controversial Discourses and which usually makes them so mischievous and unsuccessful The Accused will think his Reputation concerned when he is needlesly accused without any exigency of the Cause And the Accuser will again think his concerned in justifying his Accusations And by this time both Parties are too much interested to yield to Truth if it prove unfavorable to their Party and Readers also are too much prejudiced against ungrateful Truths when their manner of Proposal is withal so ungrateful and disobliging I am sensible what disadvantage it will be with popular Readers not to take notice of such things as would make but an ungrateful entertainment to such as were judicious and I am withal sensible how much more numerous this kind of Readers are But I am willing to venture the ill opinion of such Judges rather than allow my self the liberty of any thing that may look like gratifying resentment I cannot think it a good account of my time and I know very well how such employment does gradually degenerate from a defence of Truth to Animosity and Rancor and whatever Mr. Baxter may do who yet seems naturally to be of a temper warmer than mine for my part I am not willing to venture my self under the Temptation He seems to have quite forgotten his own submission of these Personal Disputes to the Dean of Canterbury himself can best tell how consistently with the duty of a good Conscience ALIKE unuseful are his Objections concerning the Consequences of my Doctrine so very dreadful to his Brethren Where they do really follow he and they are more concerned than I am and it will the more oblige them to take care that they be very sure those Principles are not true which if they should prove so would make their condition so very sad and deplorable And his mentioning them with Declamatory Arts of raising odium against my Person and Prejudice against my Writings is so far from being a kindness to the persons whom he pretends to gratifie thereby that it is indeed the greatest mischief he can do them if he do not

first secure them from my Principles Never let him upbraid me with rigor or boast of his own Latitudinarian Charity Our Affections will never change the nature of things nor recal any Divine Establishments As no rigor of mine can make any severe Principles truer so neither will any pretended Charity of his make them falser than they were before It may make them the more senseless of their danger but never the securer from it Where his Consequences do not follow it is no matter whether they be true or false If he would deduce any Consequences from my Principles which he could justifie to be Just Consequences from my Principles and yet prove them false with an Evidence and certainty exceeding those by which the Principles themselves were proved true such Consequences as those would indeed be good Arguments against my Principles and I should think my self obliged to account for them But it is not his way to be accurate in proving any thing He is rather for multiplying Assertions and Arguments than for improving any one Argument to any purpose NO less unuseful are his imaginary statings of our Controversies This is a usual Art with him of making every Case worse than really it is and then raising his Readers Passions as if it were indeed as bad as he has represented it If any of us dispute against the obligation of the Covenant This must be taken for a Pleading for Lying and Perjury and he tells us that he hopes one day to see these Wickednesses taken by us for Cardinal Virtues Who would not think by this that we of the Church of England did indeed defend Lying and Perjury If we dispute for Ministers Obedience to their Ordinaries in an indifferency he will aggravate the indifferent Case with such Circumstances as are neither true nor if they were so would leave the Action any longer indifferent and then argue as if this were our actual Case If Nonconformists who have taken Episcopal Orders and promised Canonical Obedience be obliged to obey Bishops forbidding their Preaching in Conventicles then Bishops may forbid all Preaching and all Hearing and all Christian Assemblies and all publick Worship of Christ for there is nothing so wicked but he will suppose Bishops may be guilty of it how much soever it be against their Interest And because it is not lawful to forbear all Christian Assemblies for any Commands of Bishops whatsoever therefore he concludes it unlawful if he will conclude any thing pertinent to our purpose to forbear Conventicles for them Just as if a Child should argue that because it is not obliged to forbear all meat at the Parents command or the Physicians therefore it ought to obey neither if they should like Jonadab impose any Abstinence in Diet in particular Circumstances If we again think Magistrates who will be true to their Consciences obliged in Conscience to lay out their Talents for the Interest of that Church which themselves believe not only true but the only safe way to Salvation and for the suppression of SCHISM and Heresie which themselves believe destructive to their Subjects Souls this is calling upon them to persecute tho discoursed only in private this is calling for the Haltar and Fire and Fagot tho I doubt not he knows very well that these are no Legal Punishments of himself and such as he and that we of the Church of England as much dislike Capital Punishments for differences only in Opinion as himself can desire Yet after all it seems he finds it much easier to give ill words and to make the Assertion and the Assertors odious to persons interessed in the Consequence of it than to answer the Argument produced for it He has not so much as offered at any Expedient to reconcile the Magistrates Duty with such connivance as he would certainly have endeavoured if he had indeed preferred Truth before the Interest of his party AS little useful are his Objections that if they should prove true will overthrow Criteria allowed by the consent of disinteressed Mankind allowed by his own party nay by himself in Cases wherein he is disinteressed There is nothing so certain in this Life but what all wise men know is liable to many Objections nothing so unlikely but what withal is capable of some likelyhoods more than vulgar capacities are able to resolve This gave occasion for the Academicks and Scepticks to deny all Certainty and to the Sophists to profess an Art of Discoursing probably on any whatsoever Paradox Must we therefore never proceed to practise or not practise with any confidence till we have first resolved all the Subtilties which may be objected against it Must none ever move who is not able to account for all the Arguments against the Possibility of Motion Diogenes was of another mind who did not think such Objections worth the Answering If therefore he and his Brethren be agreed with us that God both intended Peace and a Visible Government in the Church in this Life and that he has instituted means for the preserving them and that the means so instituted by God are sufficient for the Ends for which he has designed them then it will plainly follow that no such Objections are to be heeded as overthrow either the possibility of a Visible Peace or the practicableness of a Visible Government TO these and the like Topicks of Unuseful Objections it were easie to reduce the greatest part of Mr. Baxter's late Discourses on this present Argument of SCHISM Nor is he more happy in his Answers than in his Objections I do not see any thing of mine so much as solidly attempted by him Indeed his Genius is more for Objecting than answering which as it is a very useful Talent when managed by a prudent conscientious person so nothing can be more pernicious to Churches Peace if he who has it be naturally passionate Such a one shall never want appearances for embroiling Christians in irreconcileable SCHISMS and endless Controversies But as for Answering I cannot for my own part think of any thing which even himself can mistake for a just Answer He can hardly think his Remarks upon my Summary to be so when he has not undertaken the Proofs referred to of any one single Proposition in my Book He has taken no notice of that former part of my Preface to my Letters wherein I shewed that his past performances could in no sense deserve the name of a Confutation He has not meddled with that part wherein I gave my Grounds why I thought him self convicted Much less has he attempted any thing in Answer to my last Letter either in his last Answer or in his Treatise of Episcopacy He is pedantically ambitious of the last word And for my part he may easily obtain it if he cannot be prevailed on to answer to more purpose than he has done hitherto HOWEVER to let him see how desirous I am to make my acknowledgments for any thing·