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Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
nation_n	lord_n	mountain_n	top_n	1,666	5	9.5413	5	true

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ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A27112	Certamen religiosum, or, A conference between the late King of England and the late Lord Marquesse of Worcester concerning religion together with a vindication of the Protestant cause from the pretences of the Marquesse his last papers which the necessity of the King's affaires denyed him oportunity to answer.	Bayly, Thomas, d. 1657?	1651 (1651)	Wing B1507; ESTC R23673	451,978	466

ascribing so much to the Church when as 't is well known contrary to what the Bishop of Rome and the Church generally did hold he held the re-baptizing of such as had been baptized by Heretikes Though Cyprian in this did erre yet his very erring in this shewes that hee thought the Church the generality of the visible Church not onely subject to error but indeed to have erred The last Father whom the Marquesse here mentioneth for though hee say cum multis aliis yet hee nameth no more is Irenaeus l. 3. c. 4. where he saith It is not meet to seeke the truth among others which it is easie to take of the Church seeing the Apostles did lay in it as in a rich depository all things that concerne truth that every one that will may out of it receive the drinke of life This indeed is gloriously spoken of the Church and not Hyperbolically neither yet doth it not amount to this that the Church cannot erre The holy Scriptures wherein all saving truth is contained are committed to the Church and the Doctine of salvation is ordinarily held forth in and by the Church but hence it doth not follow that the Church that is such as beare sway in it is not subject to error All that Irenaeus saith of the Church is no more if so much as that of the Apostle 1 Tim. 3. 15. that the Church is the pillar and ground of truth which place it may seeme strange that the Marquesse pretermitteth Bellarmine disputing this point brings in those words in the very first place to prove that the Church cannot erre And whereas Calvin answers that the Church is so styled by the Apostle because in it the Scriptures are preserved and preached he replies that thus the Church should rather be compared to a Chest then to a Pillar But this is a frivolous objection for the Church doth not keepe the truth close and secret as a thing is kept in a chest but so as to professe and publish it and therefore is compared to a Pillar to which a thing is fastned and so hangeth that all may see it But that those words of the Apostle do not infer an infallibility of the Church and an exemption from errour is cleare by this that he speakes of a particular visible Church namely the Church of Ephesus now that a particular visible Church may erre our Adversaries will not deny and that very Church of Ephesus there spoken of doth sufficiently demonstrate The Apostle therefore in those words doth rather shew the duty of the Church then the dignity of it rather what it should be then what it alwayes is As when it is said Mal. 2. 7. Labia sacerdotis custodient scientiam The Priests lips shall keep knowledge that is as our translations rightly render it should keepe So the Jesuite Ribera doth expound it shall keepe that is saith he ought to keep The Marquesse here comes againe to the visibility of the Church and some other particulars before handled That the Church is alwayes visible he proves by Mat. 5. 14 15. The light of the World a City upon a Hill cannot be hid But I have shewed before these words Yee are the light of the world to be meant of the Apostles who as their own Iansenius expounds it were a light unto the World by their preaching So also Theophylact They did not enlighten saith hee one Nation but the whole world And the words following A City set upon a Hill cannot be hid he shewes to have been spoken by way of instruction Christ saith hee doth instruct them to be carefull and accurate in the ordering of their life as being to be seene of all As if hee should say Doe not thinke that you shall lie hid in a corner no you shall be conspicuous And therefore see that yee live unblameably that so you may not give offence to others This exposition sutes well with the admonition given vers 16. Let your light so shine forth before men that they seeing your good workes may glorifie your Father which is in Heaven The Marquesse here further addes 2 Cor. 4. 3. Isai 22. I suppose it should be Isai 2. 2. Now the former of these two places is not to the purpose viz. to prove a perpetuall visibility of the Church For how can that be inferred from those words of the Apostle If our Gospell be hid it is hid to them that are lost The Apostle having said vers 2. by manifestation of the truth commending our selves to every mans conscience in the sight of God because as Oecumenius notes it might be objected that the truth was not made manifest unto all for that all did not believe to prevent this Objection the Apostle addes If our Gospell be hid c. As if hee should say It is not our fault as if the Gospell were not plainly enough preached by us but it is their own fault who perish through their owne blindnesse That Isai 2. 2. is more to the purpose though not enough neither It is said that in the last dayes the Mountaine of the Lords House shall be established in the top of the Mountaines and shall be exalted above the Hills and all Nations shall flow unto it The Prophet there sheweth by metaphoricall expressions taken from Mount Sion where the Temple stood that by the preaching of the Gospell the Church should be increased and exalted farre above what it was before This prophesie was fulfilled by the bringing in of the Gentiles but the Prophet doth not say that in the times of the Gospell the Church should alwayes be so conspicuous and visible Neither doe the Fathers here alledged by the Marquesse viz. Origen Chrysostome Austine and Cyprian speake of the perpetuall condition of the Church but onely as it was in their time I have proved before by Scriptures and Fathers and even by the acknowledgement of our Adversaries that the Church is not perpetually visible After the Visibility of the Church the Marquesse speaketh of the Universality of it saying that the universality of the Church is perpetuall and that the Church of Rome is such a Church For proofe hereof hee citeth Psal 2. 8. Rom. 1. 8. Now the former place shewes that Christ should have the heathen for his inheritance and the ends of the Earth for his possession and consequently that the Church should not be confined as it was in the time of the Law to one Country but should be extended farre and wide throughout the World This also hath been fulfilled and yet shall be but hence it doth not follow that the Church is alwayes so universally extended throughout the World but that sometimes errors and heresies doe so prevaile and overspread all that the truth in comparison can finde no roome See before page 2. The other place viz. Rom. 1. 8. testifies indeed that the Church of Rome was a true Church and famous throughout the World but neither doth

their owne severall Dominions practising disobedience to their Superiours they teach it to their Inferiours The greatest Unitie the Protestants have is not in believing but in not believing in knowing rather what they are against then what they are for not so much in knowing what they would have as in knowing what they would not have But let these negative Religions take heed they meet not with a negative Salvation Neither can the Conversion of Nations be attributed to any other Church then to the Roman which is another mark of the true Church according to the Prophesies of Esay cap. 49. 23. Kings shall be thy nursing fathers and Queens thy nursing mothers And Esay 60. 16. Thou shalt suck the milk of the Gentiles and the breasts of Kings shall minister unto thee And Esay 60. 10. And thy Gates shall be continually open that men may bring to thee the riches of the Gentiles and that their Kings may be brought And the Iles shall doe thee service And the Prophet David I will give thee the heathen for thine inheritance and the uttermost parts of the earth for thy possession c. Now no Protestant Church ever converted any one Nation Kingdome or People Many Protestant people have fallen away from the Church of Rome but this cannot be called conversion but rather perversion for the Romane Church may justly say of such these have not converted Nations from paganisme to Christianity which is the mark of the true Church These are they which went forth from us 1 Joh. 2. 19. Certaine that went forth from us Act. 15. 14. These are certaine men who rise out of our selves speaking perverse things Act. 20. 30. These were they who separated themselves Iude 19. which are marks of false and hereticall Churches But the Romane Church I find stretching forth her armes from East to West receiving and imbracing all within her Communion For the first three hundred years the Church grew down-ward like a strong building whose foundations are first laid in the earth whose stones are knit together in Unity by the morter that was tempered with the blood of her ten Persecutions Afterwards this building hasting upwards Constantine the great Emperour submitting his neek unto the yoke of Christ subdued all Christian Churches to Pope Sylvester then Pope of Rome from which time to these our dayes the Pope and his Clergy hath possessed the outward and visible Church as is confessed by Napier a learned Protestant in his treatise upon the Revelation pag. 145. and all along hath added Kingdomes upon Kingdoms to her Communion untill she had incorporated into her selfe not onely Europe but Asia Africa and America as Simon Lythus a Protestant writer affirmeth viz. The Jesuits have filled Asia Africa and America with their Idols as he calls them for the late Conversions of the East and West-Indies by the Romans if you read Joan. Petrus Maffeus Hist Indicarum Jos Acosta de natur novi orbis You shall find that no Church in the world hath ever spread so farre and wide as the Church of Rome Wherefore I hope in this respect also I may safely conclude that the Church of Rome most justly deserves to be called the Catholick Church Neither is it a vainer thing to say that the Pope of Rome cannot be head of the Church because Christ himselfe is head thereof then it is for a man to say that the King of England cannot be King of England because God is King of all the earth Psal 46. 8. As if the King could not be Gods Vice-gerent and the peoples visible God so the Pope Christs Vicar or Deputy and the Churches visible head And let Kings beware how they give way to such Arguments as these lest at the last such inferences be made upon themselves As strange an inference is that how that the Church was not built upon Peter because it was built upon his Confession as if it might not be built casually upon the one and formally upon the other as if both these could not stand together As if the Confession of Peters Faith might not be the cause why Christ built his Church upon his Person as if Christ did not as well personally tell him Tu es Petrus as significantly super hanc Petram id est super istam Confessionem aedificabo Ecclesiam No lesse invalid is that Objection of Protestants against the oeconomacy of the Bishop of Rome viz. that saying of Greg. sometimes Bishop of that sea viz. He that intituled himself universall Bishop exalted himself like Lucifer above his brethren and was a fore-runner of Antichrist As if there were no more meanings in the word Universality than one as if there were not a Metaphoricall as well as a Literall and Grammaticall sense as if Saint Gregory might not censure this title of Universality in the Grammaticall and exclusive meaning which being so taken would have excluded all other Bishops from their Offices Essences and Proprieties which they held under Christ thereby depriving them of the Key of orders and yet still keep the Superiority viz. of one Bishop over another and himself over all in a Metaphoricall and transferent sense thereby still keeping the Key of Jurisdiction in his own hands and this not onely is but must be the meaning of Saint Gregory for he thus explicates the matter himself lib. 4. ind 13. cp 32. viz. The care of the Church hath been committed to the Prince of all the Apostles Saint Peter and yet had Saint Peter called himselfe the Universall Apostle in the first sence seeing that Christ Jesus made other Apostles as well as him he had been no Apostle himself but Antichrist and yet this hindred not but that the care and principality was committed unto Peter Whereby you may plainly see how he ascribes a head-ship over the Church whilst he denies the Universality of Episcopacy Wherefore having shewed Your Majesty my Church I humble beg that You will be pleased either to give me a few lines in answer hereunto or else to shew me Yours The KINGS Paper in Answer to the Marquesse MY Lord I have perused your Paper whereby I find that it is no strange thing to see Errour tryumph in Antiquity and flourish all those Ensignes of Universality Succession Unity Conversion of Nations c. in the face of Truth and nothing was so familiar either with the Iews or Gentiles as to besmear the face of Truth with spots of novelty For this was Ieremiahs case Ier. 44. 16. viz. As for the word which thou hast spoken unto us in the Name of the Lord we will not hearken unto thee but we will certainly doe whatsoever thing goeth forth out of our owne mouths to burn incense unto the Queen of heaven and to powre out drink-offerings unto her as we have done we and our fathers our Kings and our Princes in the Cities of Judah and in the streets of Jerusalem as we have done there is Antiquity we and our Fathers there is