Selected quad for the lemma: nation_n
Text snippets containing the quad
|
ID |
Title |
Author |
Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication) |
STC |
Words |
Pages |
|
A58226
|
Reasons against petitioning the King for restoring the deprived bishops without repentance by a divine of the Church of England.
|
A. B.
|
1690
(1690)
|
Wing R474; ESTC R14464
|
9,255
|
8
|
for which they stand justly deprived by Law And so it is not a Petition for Order and Unity and Concord and the common Good but quite contrary namely for the countenancing and encouraging and upholding of a Faction Sect and Party of Men in the Nation against Order Unity and the common Good that they may have leave and license by Law and publick Authority to ridicule and libel the Government to let in the common Enemy to make their own terms with him and betray the Nation For this one Principle that their present Majesties are Usurpers and that it is sinful to swear Allegiance to them and pray for them as rightful King and Quen is against the very Being and Foundation of the Government it is pregnant of a thousand seditious and disloyal Practices it is as Fire in the Thatch and carries universal Desolation and Confusion in its Bowels The Petitioners do not at all desire an Act of Union and Comprehension for all such of their Majesties Subjects as agree in all Fundamentals towards God and towards the King and differ but in variable Rites and Forms not necessary to the Being of Church and State such an Act would be a blessed Act but thiâ— they are against this they dread they only desire an Act for restoring a few peccant Bishops to their Profits and Places whose deluded Consciences will not permit them to swear Allegiance to their present Majesties that so being in Place and having obtained the establishment of their wicked Principle by Law they may by Law undo the Government and bring in Confusion 7. The Petitioners are Men that have sworn Allegiance to their present Majesties and in their publick Prayers pray daily From all Sedition Good Lord deliver us Now if this be not a seditious Principle that their present Majesties are Usurpers and that it is sinful to swear Allegiance to them there is no such thing as Sedition neither can it be declared what Sedition and Disloyalty is Why halt ye betwe 〈…〉 〈…〉 o Opinions between Loyalty and Disloyalty If their present Majesties â—e not rightful King and Queen before God and all the World why do you swear Allegiance to them Why do you in your publick Prayers Morning and Evening each day beseech God for them as rightful King and Queen and for their Prosperity and good Success against all their Enemies and thereby notoriously dissemble with God and Men and give occasion to all both Friends and Foes both Protestants and Papists to think and speak of you as perfidious and false Men If their present Majesties be in your Judgment rightful King and Queen why are you not zealous for them and their Government Why do you lean to their Enemies Why do you petition for the countenance and upholding those who by their refusal to swear Allegiance to them declare to all the World that they think them to be Usurpers and that it is horrible Perjury to swear Allegiance to them and separate and divide your selves from your dissenting Brethren whom you acknowledg to agree with you in all Fundamentals respecting God and their present Majesties 8. It will perhaps be said That the Persons petitioned for are Reverend Fathers of the Church Men of great Wisdom Conscience and Integrity and if they had not just grounds for their Non-conformity we may well think they would conform To which besides what is already said I return these following Answers 1. It is a saying of Luther's Nunquam periclitatur Religio nisi inter Reverendissimos the State of the Church is never in so much danger as from those who are stiled Most Reverend 2. There be others of their Order stiled Most Reverend Fathers of the Church who do conform and have given as good proof of their Wisdom Conscience and Integrity as those that do not conform Now both cannot be in the right of necessity one of the two must be in an Error and it is no small Error it is an Error against the Foundation of the present Government both of Church and State 3. As to Things Spiritual and Eternal we know no Father but our Father which is in Heaven Mat. 23. 9. and as to Worldly and Temporal Government the Nation knoweth no Father but King William No Bishop no Apostle is more than a Member of Christ's Body the Church Jesus Christ is the sole Head and the King is his Vicegerent who ruleth all Estates as to Temporal Rule by the Sword 4. There are conscientious Heathens Jews Mahometans Papists Arians Socinians Quakers Hereticks and Persecutors of God's Saints who think they do God Service in killing God's most faithful Servants John 16. 2. such an one was Paul before his Conversion Error and Superstition and false Zeal hath perverted and corrupted the Consciences of the Persons petitioned for Their Conscience will give them leave to strain at a Gnat and swallow a Camel to be for an Oath of Obedience from Presbyters to Bishops but not for an Oath of Allegiance from all the Subjects of England to their present Majesties to silence anathematize suspend imprison and undo multitudes of wise and good and useful Men for Non-conformity to things indifferent and in their own nature not necessary in the Judgment of the most rigid Conformists moderate Conformists confess them to be inconvenient tho not flatly sinful and the Dissenters conceive them to be flatly sinful Their Conscience will give them leave to dispense with and keep up Ministers Non-residency and Pluralities which even the Council of Trent condems and selling Spiritual Pardons and Indulgences for Money in their Courts by Commutation of honest Repentance for filthy Lucre it will give them leave not to labour in the Word and Doctrine and yet to expect and receive double Honour and to prefer Ordination by unlearned ungodly idolatrous persecuting Popish Bishops before Ordination by learned ancient godly orthodox and most reverend Protestant Presbyters From such a Conscience I pray God bless me 9. The Persons petitioned for and their Adherents have stood much upon their Loyalty to the Higher Powers and have boasted of it and gloried in it as tho they had been the only Loyal Persons and now by God's just Judgment themselves are fallen into the Pit of Disloyalty and their deluded Conscience will not suffer them to come forth and so it is not in our power to help them Let them in God's Name repent imitate Dr. Sherlock shame themselves before God and the World by honest and wholsome Repentance and Confession of their false Principles concerning the Government and then they will merit Pardon and we shall not need to petition Authority for them 10. Whether King William be rightful King or no is not lawful to dispute because such a Dispute in the nature of it doth suppose the matter doubtful and questionable Whereas it is unquestionably plain that he is rightfully King for he is in full Possession of the Throne by common Consent and disâ—enseth Law and Justice to all the Realm
Reasons against petitioning the King for restoring the deprived Bishops without Repentance By a Divine of the Church of England 1. TO petition King William for restoring those Men to their Revenues Dignities and Functions who think him an Usurper and the late King James to be rightful King and that all who have sworn Allegiance to King William who hâ—â— formerly sworn to the late King James are forsworn is in effect to petition for the late King James that he might be set in the Throne and for the French King his right Arm and for the supposititious and feigned Prince of Wales and for idolatrous Father Peters it is to petition King William against himself and against the Parliament and against the present Government and to undo all that hath been done and involve three Nations in Confusion and establish Popery and Slavery for all Generations I say to petition that they may be restored without Repentance of this their wicked Error is plainly so 2. The Persons petitioned for while they retain this their wicked Error cannot be restored without an essential Alteration of the present Liturgy which the Petitioners themselves are utterly against and the Persons petitioned for all along unto the present Change have been utterly against also and must be supposed to be so still unless Self-Interest or some other Reason hath made them change their Mind For the prescribed Forms of Prayer for K. William and Q. Mary are an essential part of the Liturgy and no Man can without notorious Hypocrisy and dissembling use them and unfeignedly assent and consent to them and require of Persons to be ordained instituted and inducted unfeigned Assent and Consent to them who thinks in his Conscience that King William and Queen Mary are Usurpers and that it is sinful to swear Allegiance to them So that if the King and Parliament had made no Law for swearing Allegiance to their present Majesties but had left all Ministers free to swear or not as they saw good of necessity the Persons petitioned for must have been Non-conformists to the Church of England in one essential Point and to dissent in any one essential Point is instar omnium as if they had dissented in all 3. The Persons petitioned for have made themselves infamous to the Nation and to all the Reformed Churches and to the late King James and all his Adherents by their own notorious self-contradicting and self-confounding Practices For they by their published Declaration Decemb. 11 1688. to which I refer them immedia 〈…〉 upon the late King's withdrawing himself and real Abdication and leaving his People as Sheep without a Shepherd and by subsequent Acts pursuant to that Declaration did indeed tho â—â—t in word renounce and disclaim all Allegiance to the late King James and betook themselves to the then Prince of Orange as under God the Saviour and Prâ—tector of the Nation from Popery and Slavery So that of all Persons in the Nation none have so little reason to scruple Allegiance to their present Majesties as the deprived Bishops Let them but reconcile themsel 〈…〉 to their former Actions and they must needs own and consent that his prâ—seâ—â— Majesty is most rightful King For them now to stand off from Alleg 〈…〉 to their present Majesties what is it but to play fast and loose with God and Conscience in Matters which concern the Temporal and Eternal Safety of three Kingdoms which is very sinful and scandalous in a common Man and much more in Bishops They please not God and are contrary to all Men 1 Thess 2. 15. 4. It is alledged that the Persons petitioned for did in the Reign of the late King perform an Act singularly meritorious which cost them Imprisonment in the Tower Touching which let these things be impartially weighed 1. In the Judgment of the present Bp of H. it was no meritorious Act at all but criminal as his own published Paper doth witness and his sending abroad the late King's Declaration to the Clergy of his Diocess to publish it contrary to the Judgment and Practice of the imprisoned Bishops And therefore it is to be wondred at if his Lordship shall now in petitioning for the deprived Bishops applaud that as highly meritorious which some Years ago he did in Print declare to all the World to be vituperable 2. Admitting it to be singularly meritorious it could merit only Temporal Glory and this they have had the Nation hath applauded them for it This can be no Atonement for future Crimes and Scandals without Repentance They have stained the Glory of their past Merit for lack of Perseverance and by their Disloyalty to the present Government For the late French Invasion and the Rebellion in Ireland and united Endeavours of Papists and other Sons of Belial against their present Majesties and their Government are the genuine Consequence of this wicked Error and seditious Principle held by the deprived Bishops that their present Majesties are Usurpers and that it is sinful to swear Allegiance to them 3. The deprived Bishops about the time of their Imprisonment did in Print express Tenderness towards the Dissenters and promised them fair things when they should have opportunity in the next Parliament and Convocation the generality of the Nation both Clergy and Laity did approve this their Promise They have had the opportunity of performing this their Promise but they have not had the Honesty and Integrity so to do For it is the deprived Bishops and their Adherents who refuse to come to reasonable Accord with the Dissenters and keep up the Breach between their Majesties Protestant Subjects and dislike the Act for Toleration and so render themselves dishonest and peâ—fidious Persons who in time of Affliction and impending Calamity make just and equal Promises and when the Affliction is over refuse to perform and invent sinful Shifts and Evasions to cloak their Hypocrisy 5. To petition the King and Parliament for restoring these Disloyal Persons to their Profits and Honours and Ecclesiastical Functions without Repentance of their 〈…〉 Error against the present Government is plainly to petition the King and Parliament that they will be unjust and make themselves and the Laws and Government odious to God and all good Men by affording equal Honour Countenance and Protection to good and bad Subjects to loyal and disloyal Persons to the worthy and unworthy Sontibus nimis ignoscendo in sontibus fit injuria 6. The present way of petitioning is not for mutual Forbearance and Condescension towards all such as agree in the Foundation and do but differ in Circumstantials and things indifferent and variable Modes and Forms no way destructive of the Foundation such a Petition we are no way against but greatly for But it is that the King and Parliament will devise some way whereby those may be restored to their Profits Dignities and Offices whose disloyal and seditious Principles strike at the Foundation and unhinge the Government and tend to universal Confusion and