Selected quad for the lemma: opinion_n
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A58811
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A sermon preached before the Right Honourable the Lord Mayor, and Court of Aldermen, at Guild-Hall Chappel, upon the 5th of November, 1673 in commemoration of Englands deliverance from the Gun-powder treason / by John Scott, Minister of St. Thomas's in Southwark.
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Scott, John, 1639-1695.
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1673
(1673)
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Wing S2065; ESTC R15382
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20,135
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39
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cutting them off by the Spiritual sword but by the tares cannot be meant persons of wicked lives for then the Text would forbid the punishment of evil doers by not gathering the tares cannot be meant the not cutting them off by the Spiritual sword for then the Text would forbid the Church to excommunicate either wicked livers or obstinate Hereticks And therefore of necessity by the tares must be meant persons of evil Opinions and by the not gathering them the not destroying them by the Temporal sword and this Interpretation is very much favoured by the reason that is given of the Prohibition least ye also root up the wheat with them as if he should have said as for external wickednesses I freely leave them to the lash of humane Judicatures the rectitude or obliquity of them being far more discernable then of inward speculations and Opinions but I will by no means trust you with the punishment of Errors least through interest passion or mistake you should exterminate the Truth with it for you being so fallible and apt to err it is impossible but sometimes you must miss the mark mistake the wheat for tares and hit the Truth though you aime at Error Having thus shewed you how contrary it is to the spirit and genius of Christianity to destroy mens lives upon the score of mere Opinion or Religion I shall now conclude what I have said with one inference from the whole Use From hence I infer the Antichristian tyranny of the Church of Rome who hath fleshed her self with so many slaughters and dyed her Garments so deep in the blood of Christians upon no other score but only their differing from her in some at least disputable and harmless Opinions because upon her bare word they could not believe propositions which to them seemed contrary to sense and reason and Scripture and their Faith had not stomach enough to digest the most fulsome absurdities and swallow the grossest contradictions Blessed Jesu that ever a Church pretending to be thy Spouse should be so forgetful of thy mercies as to spill the blood of so many thousands of Christians upon no other account but because they could not believe her absolution such a Philosophers Stone as to turn attrition into effectual Repentance and a few words of a Priest such a powerful charm as to conjure a man to Heaven in an instant and because thou hast made holiness the sole condition of eternal life durst not depend upon confraternities stations and priviledge-Altars Dei's little offices amulets and such like hallowed baubles because they could not worship Images and pray to God and Saints in the same form of words and durst not run from Scripture to uncertain traditions and from ancient traditions unto new pretences from reasonable services into blind devotions from believing the necessity of inward acts of piety and devotion into a dangerous temptation of resting upon the Opus Operatum the meer numbring of so many Beads and saying of so many prayers that ever Christians should be destroyed by Christians for not believing all those monstrous absurdities which transubstantiation implies that Christs body may be in a thousand places at the same time that it may stay in a place while it is going from it be both in and out of the same place in the same moment that it may come from Heaven to Earth and yet never stir out of Heaven nor be any where in the way between that his whole body is in each crumb of each consecrated wafer and that without being lessened all its parts are crouded up into one single attom and lye all within the compass of a Pin's head though it be 4 foot long that though it be whole and entire in every crumb and there be 10000 of these crumbs in 10000 distant places yet doth it not multiply into 10000 bodies but still remains one and the same now what greater tyranny can there be than to destroy and massacre men for not believing such a mass of palpable contradictions and yet for these and such like causes it is that Rome hath so often washed her barbarous hands in Protestant blood imbroiled the Christian world and by the terrour of her awful thunder-bolts scared Subjects into Rebellion against their lawful Soveraigns and Soveraigns into persecution of their natural Subjects of the truth of which I could give you a thousand forein instances but in complyance with the time and occasion I shall rather chuse to confine my self at home to destroy mens lives upon the score of Religion was a practice never known in England till the time of Henry the 4th who being an Usurper and so liable to many enemies both forein and domestick sought to endear the Pope to him who was then moderator of Christendom by sending him as a token of his love and duty the blood of his enemies and for many years after this was the yearly sacrifice our English Monarks were fain to offer up to the Roman Idol and whensoever through their own weakness they either feared or were forced to flatter him they had no other way to appease the angry Demon but by causing their children to pass through the fire to him and glutting his thirsty vengeance with their blood but when afterwards our English Monarchs threw off the Roman yoak and would no longer be the Popes Leeches he immediately issueth out his Bulls and excommunications to alarum their subjects into a Rebellion against them for immediately upon Queen Elizabeth's coming to the Throne Pope Paul the 4th refuseth to acknowledge her pretending this Crown to be a fee of the Papacy and that therefore it was audaciously done of her to assume it without his leave and because she would not turn out immediately when her great Landlord had given her such fair warning Pope Pius the 5th takes out a Writ of Ejectment issueth out his Bull and deposeth her in which he thus expresserh himself Volumus jubemus ut adversus Elizabetham Angliae Reginam subditi arma capessant it is our will and command that the Subjects of England take up Arms against their Queen upon which followed the Northern Rebellion and sundry private attempts of the Papists to murder her Afterwards Pope Gregory the 15th having two Bastards to provide for one of his own and another of the Emperours he bestowed the Kingdom of England upon the one and that of Ireland upon the other but neither of these prevailing Sixtus the 5th curses her afresh and publishes a crusade against her and bequeaths the whole right of her Dominions to Philip the 2d King of Spain but when neither the Popes bounty nor the blessings of his successors nor the Spanish Arms nor Italian Arts could prevail against God's providence which till the end of her daies pitched its tents about her Pope Clement the 8th seeing there was no other remedy resolved to let her go like a Heretick as she was and to take more care that another Heretick might not succeed
such principles are justly accountable for all the consequent inconveniences and punishable accordingly Thirdly That the Proposition is not be understood of our practice but of our Judgements and Opinions for every man hath a natural Right as he is a Rationable creature to judg for himself and to punish any one for so doing is the greatest tyranny in the world it being an exercise of dominion over the minds of men which are subject only to the Empire of God but as for our practice that 's liable to the restraints of humane Laws and that as well in Sacred as in Civil Affairs they cannot indeed oblige us to do what God hath forbidden us because his being the supreme Authority ought to take place against all the countermands of any inferiour power whatsoever but then there are a world of things which remain in a state of indifferency and are left undetermined both by the natural and positive Laws of God and these are all liable to the commands and determinations of humane Authority and are the proper matter of Civil and Ecclesiastical Laws to the extent of whose jurisdiction there can be no other restraint than only the countermand of a Superiour Authority and therefore if there be nothing antecedently evil enjoyned by the Laws whether Civil or Ecclesiastical we are bound to obey them and if we do not we are justly punishable for our disobedience Indeed if we believe the thing enjoyned to be evil though it be not we ought not to do it in obedience to the Supreme Authority of God which we believe hath forbidden it but yet if we mistake and the thing be not evil but in its own nature indifferent we are justly punishable for the not doing it because our mistake alters not the nature of the thing if it be indifferent it is a proper object of humane Laws whether we think it so or no and as such may justly be imposed and the imposition being just our not obeying it must needs be justly punishable In this extremity therefore we have no other redress but to seek information and get our mistaken consciences better instructed and if when we have done all we cannot alter our Opinion our meek and patient submission to the penalty will be our excuse before the Tribunal of God Fourthly And lastly that the Proposition is not to be understood of our making a publick profession of our Opinions so as to disturb the Peace of the Church with them so long as men are humble and modest in their dissent and do not go about to advance their Opinions into Factions and to divide and rend the Church in the propagation of them I see no reason why they should be punished and persecuted for them but if men openly profess their dissent to the prejudice of the publick Peace and Intrest and doat so much upon their own conceits as to phancy them necessary for all the rest of Mankind and consequently go about to vex their neighbours provoke their Rulers and unsetttle the Government for the propagation of them if through an inconsiderate Zeal for their own notions they should be active and industrious to make a Party against the Church and withdraw others from her communion they are offenders to the publck Peace and as such are justly liable to punishment for they ought to consider that unless their Opinion be of greater moment than the Churches Peace it ought to vail and give way to it and that there are no Opinions weighty enough to ballance the Churches Peace whose contraries do not undermine Christianity it self and utterly defeat the ends of Christian Society for everyman is obliged by vertue of being in Society to do his utmost to preserve the honour and intrest of it and to joyn in all acts of it so far as they tend thereunto and dissent from every thing which tends to the apparent ruine of that Society Now the main end of Christian Society being the honour of God and the salvation of souls the primary reason of mens entring into Churches or Christian Societies is to advance these ends and to joyn in all acts of the Society they are listed into so far as they tend to the advancement of them but if any thing be required of us directly repugnant to these ends we are bound to manifest and declare our dissent from them and if for so doing we are 〈◊〉 cast out of the particular Christian Society by so doing and suffering we preserve our communion with the Catholick Society of Christians but if I am never so much perswaded that such a practice or Article of the Church is an errour yet if it be not such an errour as doth defeat the great ends of Christian Society I am bound either to keep my parswasion to my self or at least not to disturb the Peace of the Church in my indeavours to propagate it to others because next to the honour of God and the salvation of souls the Churches Peace is to be valued above all things whatsoever and therefore is not to be disturbed for the sake of every little errour and trifling Opinion It is sufficient that we are allowed the liberty of opining and are not deprived of our natural right of judging for our selves and we ought not to complain though we should be restrained by Laws and penalties from making Parties against the Church and propagating our little Opinions into Factions since if we will not restrain our selves without such a restriction it is impossible there should be any Peace among Christian Societies every hot-brain'd Opinionist will be making a Party for himself and every differing Opinion will grow into a Sect and so there will be continual dividing and subdividing till the Christian world be crumbled into as many Churches as there are Opinions and as many Opinions as there are men for whilst every one is zealously propagating his little Opinion no man will let his Brother be quiet this man will be ready to burst till he hath vented himself and the other will be as impatient till he hath contradicted what he hath said and whilst both are thus zealous to proselite each other neither will be content with a single conquest but the publick must be disturbed and by the Zeal of the contending Parties rent into infinite Sects and Divisions so that you see it is indispensibly necessary that there should be some restraint though not upon mens Opinions yet upon their publick profession of them since without it the Church will be inevitably exposed to perpetual tumults and disturbances Having thus stated and bounded the Proposition you see the plain meaning of it is this That it is contrary to the Spirit of Christ and the genius of Christianity to destroy or persecute men for meer Opinions or errours in Religion that it is so I shall indeavour to prove from these following Instances I. It is contrary to that tenderness and compassion which Christianity requireth of us For our Religion enjoyns us