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Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
friend_n	worshipful_a	worthy_a	write_v	45	3	5.9376	4	false

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ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A48308	Defensive doubts, hopes, and reasons, for refusall of the oath, imposed by the sixth canon of the late synod with important considerations, both for the penning and publishing of them at this time / by John Ley ... ; hereunto is added by the same author, a letter against the erection of an altar, written above five yeares agoe, and a case of conscience, touching the receiving of the sacrament, resolved.	Ley, John, 1583-1662.	1641 (1641)	Wing L1874; ESTC R21343	93,675	154

DEFENSIVE DOUBTS HOPES AND REASONS For refusall of the Oath imposed by the sixth Canon of the late Synod With important Considerations both for the penning and publishing of them at this time By JOHN LEY Pastor of Great Budworth in Cheshire Above all things my Brethren sweare not Jam. 5.12 Falsa Juratio exitiosa est vera Juratio periculosa est nulla Juratio secura est August serm 28. de verbis Apostoli Hereunto is added by the same Author A Letter against the erection of an Altar written above five yeares agoe And a case of conscience touching the receiving of the Sacrament resolved LONDON Printed by R. Young for G. Lathum at the signe of the Bishops head in Pauls Church-yard 1641. To the right Worshipfull Sir William Brereton Baronet Peter Venables Esquire Baron of Kinderton Knights of the Shire for the County Palatine of Chester and Sir Thomas Smith And To the Worshipfull Francis Gamull Esquire Burgesses for the Citie of Chester John Ley wisheth the welfare of this and the other World Right Wor ll and worthy Sirs AS the good providence of God and the good will of your Countrie have sorted you together in the designe of publicke service of the Church and State so your united Interests in the cause and composer of this Booke have joyntly rather claimed as a dutie then invited as a courtesie that I should present it to publicke view under all your names It proposeth and pursueth many as I hope a judicious Reader will upon serious perusall find them just and weighty exceptions against the late Oath of the sixth Canon wherein it waiteth upon the wisdome and justice of your Honourable House of Commons who have voted it to vanish like the smoake of a Canon without a Bullet making a great sound but doing no hurt to avow your righteous and religious Act therein against the mis-conceit of such as either partially or perversly misdeeme the deserved doome which you have passed upon it And if now by your hands it may come to the eyes of your venerable Associates it may haply find such acceptance in their sight that by your common favour it may have the honour to appeare before the right Honourable Lords of the Upper House of Parliament and to represent us who were most exposed to the perill of the Canonicall Decree the more capable of the concurrent Grace of you all in the full and finall abrogation thereof And for my selfe besides my generall engagements with thousands who owe you the affectionate observance of publicke Patriots and Patrons in the places to which you are called the particular favours which I have received from you in severall oblige mee this or any other way wherein I may doe you any acceptable service to expresse my selfe Yours most ready to attend you with humble observance JOHN LEY From my Lodging at the Fountaine in Pauls Church-yard Febr. 22 1640. A Letter declaring the occasion of beginning a manner of proceeding for the penning and publishing of the Discourse ensuing TO The Right Worshipfull and Worshipfull my very reverend and worthy Friends and Brethren Mr. Th. M. D. of Ch. Dr. D. D. of R. Mr. R. H. W. of M. and Mr. Ch. H. R. of W. and with them to the rest of my venerable Brethren of the Diocesse of Chester My worthy and well beloved Brethren and Friends BEsides the Doubts of the Oath proposed in this Booke whereof wee must wait for resolution from our Superiours there may bee some Doubts of the Booke it selfe to which it most belongeth to mee to make answer and therein partly to give satisfaction to you and partly to require testification from you since to many of you a good part of what I shall say is very well knowne and that with the rest I shall reduce to these foure particulars whereof most as yet have either none or at least but a doubtfull apprehension and wherein it is meet they should be rightly informed 1. Concerning the occasion of the discourse ensuing 2. The presenting of it at first to you and then to him to whom it is inscribed 3. The addition made in this I may say second edition though a It was then not intended for the Presse yet but a manuscript 4. The Reasons why now I am willing to communicate Copies of it which before I was not First for the Occasion it was this Some of you and divers others my selfe for one met at W. at the monethly Exercise set up or upheld as is confidently delivered by divers persons of unquestionable credit with the good liking and allowance of our late learned Soveraigne as a godly and gratefull memoriall of his Majesties and the Kingdomes deliverance from the Powder Treason At one of the Assemblies there the Bishop of Chester that now is not long before hee was advanced to the Episcopall Chaire bestowed his paines in the Pulpit one part of the day and I mine the other At our premised meeting which was August 18. last past the service of the day was divided betwixt you Mr. Ch. H. and mee and our minds and tongues united in pressing Peace and Charity most needfull Themes for these crazie and distracted times Our Sermons ended and some of us invited to a place of convenient repose the rest of our Tribe who were a part of that Congregation resorted unto us every man accompanying his acquaintance and so making as it were a whole chaine of many linkes and withall it is not unlike but that the most that there met in person met also in perplexity of mind by reason of the late Canonicall Oath and in their desires to be resolved of their Doubts and they might have so much more hope thereof as there were the more at that time with whom in such cases of conscience they might consult Howsoever being so met that which was the common talke of the Laity and the particular trouble of the Clergy could not but be a principall part of our discourse at that time and of that the most that was said was the proposall of a Doubt Whether the Oath were doubtfull or no and all of us expressing but the same conceipt as I verily beleeve which every one brought with him unanimously consented in an Affirmative answer Our next Quaere was what course should be taken either that we might not take it or that it might be so cleared and qualified unto us that our consciences might not be entangled by it and for that wee resolved to propose our Doubts of the Oath to the Bishop of the Diocesse and by him to advance higher though in the low and humble way of Petition if there were cause Then the Question was Who should draw up our desires and doubts in writing and the company assembled presently agreed to put that taske upon me which I then undertooke This was the worst of that daies work which some whose place and profession promised more charity and discretion have slandered as a Schismaticall Conventicle

and a seditious Assembly and have added to their calumnies of us comminations of the highest displeasure and danger against us To what height would they have raised their indignation towards us if wee should have met of purpose to make a common purse to maintaine our cause as the a Bish Godwins Catal. of Bishops p. 116. Clergy in Henry the thirds time did against Boniface Archbishop of Canterbury or should have burnt the new booke of Canons as b Hist of the Councell of Trent l. 1. p. 12 Luther did the Popes Bull and Decretalls when a meeting in it selfe so faultlesse and inoffensive is racked to make it reach to the height of an hainous crime 2. The second particular is the presenting of that which upon the request of my Brethren I had performed first unto them which I did the next Exercise after notwithstanding my burthen of other businesse betwixt them both and received from them such an attestation and acceptance upon the reading thereof as I may well take for a recompence of greater paines then it cost mee and which may embolden mee to adventure it upon the view of other eyes then of professed friends From my Brethren of the Presbytery it was next to be a graduate to the Bishop of Chester But while that was in deliberation when and by whom to be done I was informed that a Letter was written by the Archbishop of Canterbury to other Bishops both of this and the other Province not to presse the Oath upon any untill the 13. of October and for that time it was resolved by some of us to whose discretion such considerations were referred it should be reserved Meane while we had assured newes of a Parliament shortly to ensue That as many of us then conceived so varied the case that it invited us to betake our selves to another course then wee intended before and then it was thought fit neither so to solicite the Bishop as if wee did principally depend upon his favour for our freedome from the Oath nor yet so to passe by him as to give cause of suspition that he was slighted by us and therefore about the 14. of October I brought him the Booke at first especially prepared for his reading which I told him I tendred not to him then as an Agent for the Clergy but as of mine owne private and particular respect unto my Diocesan which was such that I would not consent though much importuned that any should have a Copie of what I had composed untill it were first offered to his perusall for which it was at first intended and by joynt consent concluded among us Thirdly for the addition now made to it I may say truly and some of my Brethren can testifie with mee that the most of it was penned before any part of it was sent to the sight and censure of the Ministers at W. and I therefore kept backe divers sheets of it of purpose that it might not be too long for their leisure at their first meeting after it was finished to reade it together And now since upon notice of more they will not rest content with a part lest they should sort mee to c Act 5.3 Ananias and Saphyra for a sacrilegious detention I am resolved to communicate the whole first unto you and then by you unto others And for this I am now in the fourth place to render some Reasons and they are chiefly these First to gratifie my Brethren and Friends who importunately presse mee to make them partakers of my private Dictates concerning the Oath Secondly to justifie our refusall of it which some have superciliously censured as proceeding of simplicity and some uncharitably as savouring of contumacy or of hypocrisie as if wee did but pretend a tendernesse of conscience and therefore that wee would be sure to take it rather then suffer any thing for standing out against it Thirdly to rectifie the mistaking of divers transcripts of my Booke from the first Copy which are spread abroad in many places either without my knowledge or against my will some whereof I have seen and by them have found out a double falshood the one of theft in stealing of Copies without my consent the other of lying in putting their ignorant or cursory slips upon mine accompt as if I had made them Fourthly to cleare the doubt of some and to confute the mis-report of others who give out that I am the Author of a Booke intituled Englands complaint to Jesus Christ against the Bishops Canons wherein I was a meere stranger for the matter of it untill I saw it in print and am yet for the maker of it now it is printed and though such as well know mee will no more beleeve it to bee mine then mine d Mr. E. B. ingenuous friend would doe who with his advertisement of that mis-taking wrote thus unto mee I am confident you never wrote it for it savours nothing either of your stile spirit or judgement Whereupon I have made bold in your name to disavow it yet for prevention of misprision in others it will doe well that this Booke bee extant as well as that and so may such as will bee pleased to compare them see more difference betwixt them then betwixt e Menander fecit Andriam Perinthiam qui utramvis rectè norit ambas noverit non ita sunt dissimili argumento Terent. in Prolog in Andr. Menanders Andria and Perinthia which though they were composed in a various phrase and stile were yet so like both in their argument and genius of the Poet that he that knew the one must know them both as sister-births of the same Authors braine which I dare confidently averre no well advised Reader will suspect of the Book which modestly discourseth of the Doubts of one Canon and that Booke which peremptorily condemneth them all and yet if not onely private fancy but publicke fame should father it upon mee I should not take the matter much to heart since the other day The most reverend father and for his rare learning constant preaching and consonant living the most renowned Archbishop of Armagh told mee of an egregious imposture putting his name to a late Pamphlet whereof not so much as one line was his which passed abroad a while as a Manuscript but was presently by printing to proceed to more publick notice if he had not opportunely procured an Order from the Honourable House of Commons in Parliament to the Master and Company of Stationers to prevent the impression whereof giving me some f According to the Tenour set downe as hereafter followeth printed Copies of it he willed mee to give an Advertisement thereof to the Readers of my Booke that neither himselfe nor others might be any more abused by such a fraudulent forgery and I might say impudent also for what impudence was it to impose such a discourse upon his Fatherhood a person so well so generally knowne and not more knowne then