Selected quad for the lemma: law_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
law_n	pay_v	priest_n	tithe_n	4,836	5	10.3389	5	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A84760	A sober answer to an angry epistle, directed to all the publick teachers in this nation, and prefixed to a book, called (by an antiphrasis) Christs innocency pleaded against the cry of the chief priests. Written in hast by Thomas Speed, once a publick teacher himself, and since revolted from that calling to merchandize, and of late grown a merchant of soules, trading subtilly for the Quakers in Bristoll. Wherein the jesuiticall equivocations and subtle insinuations, whereby he endeavours secretly to infuse the whole venome of Quaking doctrines, into undiscerning readers, are discovered; a catlogue of the true and genuine doctrines of the Quakers is presented, and certaine questions depending between us and them, candidly disputed, / by [brace] Christopher Fowler & Simon Ford, [brace] ministers of the Gospel in Reding,	Fowler, Christopher, 1610?-1678.; Ford, Simon, 1619?-1699.	1656 (1656)	Wing F1694; Thomason E883_1; ESTC R207293	63,879	81

for Priests which Law differs from that of Tythes very much However that Scripture vvill not stead you vvithout interpretation and that you renounce But to gratifie you vve vvill suppose your meaning and interpretation Sect. 24 for once though that be more favour then you vvill shevv us and upon your ovvn supposition try one Argument with you and that is this If the abolition of the Law of Tithes depend upon the abolition of the Priesthood to which they were due then vve hope you vvill allow us that if the Priesthood to which Tithes were once due and that before the Leviticall Priesthood be not abolished the Law of Tithes to that Priesthood is not abolished But we shall prove that the Priesthood to which Tithes were once due and that long before the Leviticall Priesthood was in being is not abolished vvhich if vve do vve hope vve may be allowed to conclude Therefore there is no abolishment of the Law of Tithes but it is still in force That the Priesthood to vvhich Tithes vvere originally due is not abolished vve prove thus from the same Chapter The Priesthood to which Tithes were before the Leviticall Priesthood due was the Melchizedekian Priesthood But the Melchizedekian Priesthood or Priesthood after the order of Melchizedek is not abolished For it is Christs Priesthood Heb. 16 17 verses Therefore the Priesthood to which Tithes were originally due is not abolished All that we suppose herein is to be proved is that Tithes were due to Melchizedeks order of Priesthood and so still remaine Sect. 25 due to Christ vvho is a Priest for ever after that order Now for proofe of this vve refer you higher in the same Chapter viz. to v. 4. and thence down to the 10. And vve desire you to consider vvith us these three reasons from the Text to prove that Abraham paid Tithes to Melchizedek as a due 1. You pretend to skill in the Originall Tongue and therefore you vvill not be offended if vve argue from it as you do more then once or twice Abraham in the Apostles phrase 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 v. 9 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 v. 6. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 v. 5. is said to be Tithed by Melchizedek and Melchizedek to tithe him v. 6. 9. vvhich is the very same vvord Originally vvith that vvhich is vsed in the Sons of Levi's tithing of the people by commandment v. 5. Now if the word as applied to the Levites signifie to require Tithes as it doth it seems unlikely it was used vvith relation to Melchizedek to denote a receiving of Tithes by way of gratuity only 2. We desire you to consider the scope of the Apostle in that place vvhich is to advance Melchizedeks Priesthood as an Order superiour to Levi's This the Apostle proves because Levi himself in Abrahams loynes paid Tithes to Melchizedek v. 9. Now had Melchizedek received Tithes from Levi in Abrahams loynes as of courtesie only and not of debt it would have been a poore argument to prove Melchizedek a greater Priest vvhich vvill as vvell prove a Beggar a greater man then a Prince because the Beggar receives from him it may be a summ of money out of his courtesie 3. We desire you to consider that Abraham paid the Tithe to Melchizedek with relation to his blessing of him which was an act of his Priestly Office and shewed Melchizedek to be Abrahams and so Levi's superiour v. 6 7. So that Melchizedek as a Priest received tithes of Abraham and Christ in Melchizedek received them from both Abraham and Levi which possibly may be the reason why God reserved even under the Law the tenth of the Tithes as an acknowledgment or high rent to Christ the Priest after the order of Melchizedek to shew that Levi held them of him Numb 18. 26 27 28. which tenth therefore was to be given to Aaron the high Priest who was a Type of Christ Possibly you may according to the garb of your Generation Sect. 26 reject these things as our dark reasonings But seeing your owne Assertions and Quaeres lead us hereunto we hope you will take them into your consideration at least so far as to shew us the darknesse of them In a word you may here gather our Answer to your three Quaeres before mentioned viz. to the First That we grant an end of the Leviticall Priesthood in Christ To the second That in upholding Tithes we uphold not that which was to have an end in Christ Tithes being no necessary appendant to that Priesthood but Christs To the third That we receive not Tithes upon that account but as Ministers of Christ live upon Christs portion which till our former arguments be answered we suppose Tithes to be and therefore are not by receiving them obliged to Leviticall service but Gospell-administrations These things we have a little enlarged upon to let you know Sect. 27 that we are not altogether so destitute of Scripture-warrant for receiving yea requiring Tythes even in kind as you insultingly enough insinuate us to be Whether these arguments conclude the divine right of Tythes or no deserves the consideration of abler men then you or we to vvhom vve humbly submit our conceptions herein However supposing the Law of Tythes be as you say Leviticall and meerly so in its originall and rise yet how you will prove that Law repealed so that it becomes unlawfull for any Proprietor of Land since that administration ceased to set apart the same proportion of the incomes and profits thereof for the maintenance of a Gospell Ministry vve know not vve are sure the Apostle Paul did not think the maintenance of the Leviticall Priesthood so Jewish as you do vvhen he makes it one of the grounds of that Gospel-ordinance for Ministers maintenance 1 Cor. 9. 13 14. Do you not know that they which Minister about holy things live of the things of the Temple c. Even so hath the Lord ordained that they which preach the Gospel should live of the Gospell and that is neither by working nor begging But then say you this maintenance should not be compulsive Sect. 28 to be recovered by Law especially from the poore and needy c. For the true Prophets and Ministers of Christ mentioned in Scripture did not so live on forced substance but ate and drank what the people gave We answer 1. That any of us should force maintenance from the poore and needy by Law we confesse it in matter of fact blameworthy because in cases of indigency and necessity it is every mans duty to relax and remit a just debt but in matter of right no mans legall Title falls because of any such inability So that you must first prove that Ministers have no legall right to their Tenth and then to force it from any were sinfull till which vve shall conceive it in it self as lawfull for a Minister to sue for his Tenth as for another man to put in suit a just Bond. 2. That the Ministers

concern us we cannot see how we may be allowed Shooes to our feet more then Purses and Scrips and then possibly we might please you better seeing we should be more like your good friends the Franciscan Friers who are the only men that we have heard of since our Saviour sent out the Apostles upon that extraordinary errand who have thought themselves concerned to walk by that rule Wherefore if you must have Ministers of that character you are most likely to fit your selves among them For our parts we blesse God that yet provides better for us and whilest he continues to do so we shall not think a profession of voluntary Monkish poverty our duty to undertake seeing we dare not take Gods Gifts and throw them back into his face by contemning the gracious allowance of his providence As for the way of our subsistence by Tythes and forced maintenance Sect. 20 you will needs make it unlawfull as being you say a Leviticall Ordinance and as you add in your Book where P. 13. you againe serve in this Crambo appointed as an inheritance to the Priests and Levites for their service in the Tabernacle and Temple and thereupon you proceed to ask these Quaeries in your Book 1. Whether Christ was not the end of the Leviticall Priesthood 2. Whether he that upholdeth that which was to have an end in Christ do not deny Christ to be come in the flesh and consequently is Antichrist 3 Whether they that claime Priests and Levites Maintenance ought not to do their work And this indeed is the summe of all that you say to this point for as to forcing the payment of maintenance by Law it will stand or fall with the maintenance it selfe Concerning this we shall have a little debate with you And first we desire you to understand that Tithes were paid before ever the Leviticall Priesthood was appointed Surely Abrahams Victory over the Kings and Jacobs Vow were before the Leviticall Ordinances were set up many hundreds of yeares If you object what we frequently meet withal from the men of your principles that these were voluntary Acts in those Patriarchs However we observe it was lawfull to give and receive them then and it lies on you to prove when it became unlawfull But further we demand by what light they walked in so doing was it by a Light without them some traditionall rule received from their godly Ancestors If so then it was a voluntary obedience to a Law Tradition being their Law If by a light within them some immediate motion from God so to do then we say that by the same inward light were those Kings and Princes and other Proprietors of Lands that gave Tythes in this Nation long before Popery began moved to dedicate the Tithes of their Lands to God for ever And so we receive them by the same Title with those to whom they were then paid excepting the consideration of Melchizedeck as he was a Type of Christ which yet confirmes our Title as you shall see anon And moreover we must tell you that the very reason which God gives for his making that allowance to Levie's Posterity afterwards is the Title that he had to them precedent to Levi's whence the Levites themselves were first to offer them to the Numb 18. 24 25 c. Lord and then they were to enjoy them as from God and therefore Mal. 3 8. 9. when the people through covetousnesse then withdrew them as now some do God himself enters an Indictment against them Yee have robbed me saith he in Tithes and Offerings not Levi but Me So that they were Gods by a peculiar claime and Title and the Levites held them from him not from the people and therefore they were to bring them into a Store-house in the Temple as Mede a learned Mede on Act. 5. 34. Antiquary well observes and gives the reason from Philo the Jew to wit that he might thereby take away all occasion from the people of upbraiding the Priests as if they were maintained at their charge God first claiming them and then demising them to the Priests their maintenance became as Philo saies 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 A Gift that reflected no shame upon the receivers who thereby became Gods Eleemosynaries or Almes-men not the Peoples But it may be you will say that the first claime which God Sect. 21 made to Tythes was then when he gave them to Levi and so they were not more anciently Gods then the other Leviticall Offerings So that God claiming them then first that he might bestow them on the Jewish Priests they are since the abolishing of that Administration no more due then Sacrifices For answer whereunto we refer you to Mr. Ainsworth a man very well versed in Jewish Antiquities and one that should be Answ on Gen. 14. 19. more esteemed by you being a friend to separation who tells you expresly that Abrahams and Jacobs payment of Tythes was but according to their duty as a signe of Tribute and Homage to God as Soveraign Lord and King And Abraham particularly in his payment of Tythes to Melchizedek walked by the equity of that rule which the Apostle afterwards left on record in expresse termes Rom. 15. 27. That it was but meet that he being made partaker of Melchizedeks spirituall things should minister to him in carnall things And he further gives us some light to conclude that this Custome of Tythe-paying was by nature implanted in the hearts of men or at least derived by Tradition from the Patriarchs Because even the Heathens who you say have the light of Christ in them paid Tythes to their Gods which practise surely they did not take up of the Jewes they did not love them so well but from some higher Originall He quotes the Athenians from Diog. Laertius and the ancient Latines from Pomponius Loetus and Macrobius for instances Sir we had not suffered our Pens to expatiate into this field Sect. 22 of humane Learning but that we deale with you who professe an allowance of it in its place and we suppose it is not out of place in the search of Antiquities especially when the question is concerning the Origine or beginning of Tythes which you say at least as commanded is in the Leviticall Priesthood we before it But we do not lay the weight of our dispute in this particular Sect. 23 upon this foundation We shall debate the question with you a little more closely from your own Chapter which you appeal to in this case viz. Heb. 7. And because the strength of all the Quaeries thence lies in v. 12. which asserts a necessary change of the Law upon the change of the Priesthood from the order of Aaron to that of Melchizedek we desire you first to consider that it is not necessary to be granted that by the Law there said to be changed must be meant the Law of Tythes but the Law of Priesthood that Law that set up Levi's Posterity

of Christ mentioned in Scripture did not thus was because they had not the same legall right backed with the power of a Christian Magistrate or because they were inforced to forbeare that claime among sorbid people who loved their Purses better then the Gospell 1 Cor. 9. 12. and truly some of us to sweeten perverse Opinionists are faine to remit much of our legall due to those that are able to pay well enough 3. What you call forcing by Law if you mean it of the Law of man you condemne not us but the publike Justice If you mean it of the Law of God you had best ask the Apostle Paul what he meanes in the same verse by using or not using a power of claiming maintenance from the people If others be partakers saith he of this power Viz. Of requiring maintenance for teaching are not we rather neverthelesse we have not used this power And when he tells the Thessalonians That he might have been burthensome to them as the Apostles of Christ 1 Thes 2. 6. As for your other objection against us that vve do not trust Sect. 29 Gods providence but indent for a maintenance We answer That we do not understand how dependance upon divine providence comes to be inconsistent with using humane You will think it an hard case if all the poore in the Country should come about you and require you to lend your Estate among them hoping for nothing againe which is as plaine Scripture Luke 5. 34 35. as that you urge us vvithall in this case and if you should deny them so unreasonable a request they should tell you you are no Christian because you do not trust Gods providence we doubt in such a case you would take shelter under some distinctions or other as ill as you like them in the men of your scorne and wrath the poore Ministers In the ninth Article you excuse your bold censures of our Sect. 30 hearts in calling us Hypocrites upon some pretended reasons as your selfe calls them and vve for our parts believe them no other In the first reason you justifie the charge vvith a meer slander Viz. That vve preach against pride and yet live in it and covetousnesse and yet are greedy of filthy lucre c. Those that do so vve disowne and those that do not so as thousands in this Nations do not you belye Secondly You say vve are Hypocrites because we often tell people we should have proceeded further if time had not prevented us when as indeed we have no more to say How many Ministers have told you they have been drawn so dry that you thus charge us It may be you did so vvhen you vvere a Preacher so you measure other mens Corne by your owne Bushell Your third reason is because in our prayers before Sermon we frequently beg that he would put words into our mouthes and teach us what to say where as even then we have our Sermon-notes either in our Pockets or our Bibles or the platforme of our discourse prepared in our heads As for our Sermon-notes those of us that use them are faine to do so many times when they vvould not because they have to do with such a captious Generation as yours vvho vvould make no conscience of making them say vvhat they do not by mis-reports had they not their owne papers to justifie themselves And yet vve know not why vve may not vvrite Notes as vvell as you write Books vve suppose that posterity is no lesse beholden to some Ministers Notes then to yours But your quarrell is not against Sermon-notes only but against all premeditated discourse Indeed those that can give themselues liberty to talk at the rate that your companions do need not meditate much for vvhat they say A man may safely say that heares you that you are not guilty of premeditated discourses But vve for our parts conceive Meditation a very Ministeriall exercise else Paul would not have required it from Timothy 1 Tim. 4. 15. Immediatly after his charge v. 13. to give attendance to exhortation doctrine he subjoynes meditate on these things It seemes the Apostle and you are of severall minds in this particular as well as in point of Ministers maintenance But we wonder whatsoever may be said against those that have and use written-notes how this reason of yours militates against those that have only the platforme of their discourse prepared in their heads that they must needs be judged Hypocrites for praying to God to put words into their mouthes May not a man that pre-meditates his matter sometimes be at a losse for words And may he not pray that God would furnish him with expressions who finds himself so without hypocrisie And as for those that use Sermon-notes might not they expresse themselves more aptly sometimes then they write And why then may they not pray that God would supply them with apter language upon the service they are called unto then they have prepared of themselves We believe there are no godly Ministers but find this assistance frequently God directing their tongues to considerable alterations and enlargements beyond what they have before them and bringing many things to their memories concerning which they had no actuall pre-meditation Your tenth Article brings in an Indictment of Felony against Sect. 31 poore Ministers for quoting of the Fathers and Expositers of the Scripture and this you think will justifie you against an action of slander for calling us Theeves and Robbers But we desire you to consider Q. 1. Whether Augustine and Hierome and Calvin and Luther be more unlawfull to be quoted by us then Seneca an Heathen Philosopher by you Q. 2. Whether our Saviour Christ quoting Moses and the Prophets Peter quoting Paul and Jude Enoch yea Paul himself quoting Aratus Menander and Epimenides Heathen Act. 17. 28 1 Cor. 15. 33. Tit. 1. 12. Poets do not as much fall under your charge of Thievery as we for quoting those you mention Q. 3. Whether a man may not receive that from the Lord which he gathers from the writings of other men Surely you suppose the Readers that can find leasure enough to look over your Pamphlet will receive some light thereby If not why do you publish it If so is that light from God or from your selfe or from the Devill We suppose you will not say you write either your owne Dreames or Satanicall suggestions And if you say from the Lord then we hope the Lord may as well speak to us by Austine Hierome Calvin or Luther as by you to your Proselites Q. 4. Whether we may not as well quote the words of these men and yet say hearken to the word of the Lord as you receive your principles railings evasions modes and practises from George Fox and James Naylor and yet cry the word of the Lord to your Proselites Q. 5. Whether you be not your selves under the same condemnation who superscribe your Quaeres which you send us now and