Selected quad for the lemma: england_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
england_n	woman_n	write_v	year_n	37	3	3.8902	3	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A68090	An apology or defence for the Christians of Frau[n]ce which are of the eua[n]gelicall or reformed religion for the satisfiing of such as wil not liue in peace and concord with them. Whereby the purenes of the same religion in the chiefe poyntes that are in variance, is euidently shewed, not onely by the holy scriptures, and by reason: but also by the Popes owne canons. Written to the king of Nauarre and translated out of french into English by Sir Iherom Bowes Knight.; Apologie ou défense pour les chretiens de France de la religion reformée. English	Gentillet, Innocent, ca. 1535-ca. 1595.; Bowes, Jerome, Sir, d. 1616.	1579 (1579)	STC 11742; ESTC S103023	118,829	284

of touching this matter namelye the personall succession amongst those of the Romain Clergy wherof they doe so greatly brag thēselues against the Protestantes and their discipline As touching the first point they say they haue as it were a lineall succession from age to age of Bishops and Shepheards from the Primitiue Church and therefore that they be the true Shepheards that by the contrary reason the Ministers of the gospell which haue had no such succession be false Shepheards But this matter of succession is very easie to be answered For if you looke well into the histories of the Popes and conferre them with the canons both of late yeres and of olde time you shal finde that the most part of the Popes and Bishops came in at the window and not at the dore And that they haue been intruders and vsurpers not lawfull successors And to begin at the beginning the canons doe teach vs as truth is that Bishopricks and Ecclesiasticall offices ought to be bestowed by lawfull election and that it is not lawfull for Bishops and Shepheards to appoint in their latter dayes who shall succeede them but only to geue their opinion to their Churches concerning such as they deeme in their consciences to be most meete to succeede them Thus saith a Canon taken out of the Counsell of Antioch It is not lawful for a Bishop to choose or appoint who shall be his Successor though he be neere his death and whatsoeuer he doth in that case is nothing nor nothinge worth By which Canon it followeth that Pope Clement whom they vouch to be the Successor of S. Peter was no lawfull Pope For there is another Canon which saith if it be worthy to be beleued that S. Peter drawing nie the end of his life tooke S. Clement by the hand and betooke vnto him the Church of Rome choosing him to be his successor Also Pope Damasus who was about the yere of our Lord 371. in the time of the Emperor Valentiniā was made Bishop or Pope of Rome by great hurliburlies wherein there were a hundred and seuen and thirty men slaine in the streetes as Marcillinus doth witnes Pope Iohn the eightth being a woman and therfore not capable of the Popedome was borne in England held the Papacie about two yeres and a halfe Pope Siluester the second was a great Negromanser and came to be Pope by the help of the deuill to whom he gaue both body and soule as it is written in his history and he raigned foure yeares and certaine Monethes Pope Siluester the third was made Pope by tumults and factions For in those dayes as sayeth the history the popedome was growen to such a state that it was geuen to him that would geue most for it or which made most frends and fauour Pope Boniface the eightth was made Pope by faction and bribery hauing first by suttle practises gotten the resignation of his predecessor Pope Celestine a man of a simple Wit whom he caused to be straitly shut vp in prison where he dyed for grief of mind when he saw himself so deceiued and il handeled Wherupon it was sayd by this Boniface a good witnesse of his calling that he entered into the Popedome like a fox raigned like a Lion and died like a dog for he dyed mad Pope Iohn the four and twentieth vsurped the Papacie by force and violence and maintayned himselfe in it by the same meanes and was found to erre in the Christian faith in moe than in fortie Articles so holy was his holines To be short the histories of the popes are full of the wicked dealings and practises which the Popes did vse to attaine to that degree Now therefore I aske you whether these ought to be called lawfull successors of S. Peter and whether those Bishoppes which were consecrated by them were lawfully called or not or ought to be reputed the lawfull successors of the primitiue church whether the Curates and other Priestes that were promoted to holy order and to benefices by such Bishops may be reckned as lawfull successors of the Shepheards and Elders of the Primitiue Church It is very ceataine that they were not For then were the Canons vntrue which say that in all prouisions for persons meete for Benefices there ought to be a lawfull election wherein consideration is to be had of the fitnes of the parties age which is to be chosen and of the grauitie of his manners and of his learning and that as many as haue voyces in the election should be heard vpon paine of making the election of no force and that the party be denoūced as vnworthy and vnmeet to haue a benefice which is furthered or preferred therunto by the fauor or power of the world Neither are such diuelish seruings inforcementes subtilties and fauors to be called lawfull vocations but intrusions inuations vsurpations and wicked and damnable practises The Canons also doe confirme it to be Simonie to geue mony or ought els to be promoted to Orders or to be prouided of a Benefice or to obtayn a benefice in recompence of any temporall seruice And that al aduowsions and presētations made by Popes or Bishops in way of Simonye be naught and of no valure or authoritie Now I leaue it to al people of any discretion to cōclude how the Bishops the priestes of these dayes may be called the lawfull successors of those of the primatiue Church For shall a man find any which geueth no mony for his orders or for the bulles of hys benefice Are not the Bishoprickes Abbyes Pryoryes and other Benefices geuen away now adayes and of long tyme agoe in recompence of temporall seruice yea and sometime for such vnworthy vile seruices as deserue rather punishement than recompence And seeing that the Popes and Byshops thēselues clymbe vp into their high degrees by Symonye must it not needes be that the collations which they make in bestowing the benefices of the patronages vpō other inferior priestes are Simonicall and so consequently voyd according to the foresayd Canons If the Romish Catholickes deny this they must also disauow their own Canons and deny the sonne to haue light And therefore the Romish Clergy are farre from the lawful and continuall successiō of the Shepherds and Priests of the primatiue Church wherein they imagine themselues to to remayn For sure Brybery Simonie and such other like practises are not the doore whereby they ought to enter into the succession of the auncient shepheardes and Elders as they doe But they ought to enter by lawful election made by calling vpon the name of God after dew examination of the party that is to be promotid that he be found meet for that charge who beyng so chosen must thenceforth haue the tokens of the auncient Shepheardes whiche are to preach Gods word purely to minister the Sacraments to mayntayn good discipline and to visite and comfort the sicke as the