Selected quad for the lemma: order_n
Text snippets containing the quad
|
ID |
Title |
Author |
Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication) |
STC |
Words |
Pages |
|
A61806
|
The lay-Christian's obligation to read the Holy Scriptures
|
Stratford, Nicholas, 1633-1707.
|
1687
(1687)
|
Wing S5934; ESTC R20560
|
25,603
|
42
|
us more careful to avoid all occasions and to repress the very first motions toward evil This use the Apostle teaches us for having shew'd how shamefully the Israelites sinn'd and how remarkably they were punish'd he concludes Wherefore let him that thinketh 1 Corinth 10. 12. he standeth take heed lest he fall 4. As they teach us to lift up our eyes and our hearts unto God from whom alone cometh our help to implore continually the assistance of his Holy Spirit to inable us to subdue our evil inclinations to withstand all the Temptations of the World the Flesh and the Devil and by patient continuance in well doing to seek for glory and honour and immortality 5. As they teach us Thankfulness to God for his preventing and assisting Grace in case we have withstood those Temptations which other good Men have been overcome by and preserv'd from those sins into which they have fallen since it is not by any strength originally in our selves but by the Grace of God that we stand And by how much the more thankful any Man is for the Grace he hath already received by so much the more he may expect 6. As they teach us to be charitable in our Censures of others and not presently to conclude a Man lost though he fall into some great sin but endeavour to restore him again with the spirit of meekness But 7. If through our neglect and carelesness we fall into any great sin we are by these examples encouraged to rise again What greater encouragement to Repentance than the hope of a pardon in case we repent And this we can have no reason to despair of when we find that others who fell into as foul sins were actually pardon'd and received into God's favour upon their Repentance Thus we see how those evil examples we meet with in the holy Scripture may be highly advantagious to our spiritual Good. THE APPLICATION 1. FRom what hath been said it plainly follows That those Teachers who withhold the Scriptures from the Vulgar have not that regard they ought to have either to the Commandments of God or to the good of their People How careful those of the Church of Rome are to keep the People from being acquainted with them either by hearing them in publick or by reading them in private is well known It is true that Lessons out of the Scriptures and Epistles and Gospels are read in their publick Service but how are they read In a language that the Vulgar do not understand that is so as that they know as little of them after they are read as they did before As the darkness is as great when a Candle is in the house as when there is none if that Candle be hid under a Bushel But if they give the People so little of the Bible in publick do they not make some amends for this by allowing them the free use of it in private I answer No. No Man is allow'd to read or so much as to have Rule 4th of the Index Expurg made by order of the Council of Trent the Bible in the Vulgar tongue though translated by those of their own Church without a Licence from the Bishop of the Diocess or the Inquisitor with the advice of the Parish Priest or Confessor which Licence they must have in writing And if any Man shall presume without such Licence either to read or have it he may not receive Absolution of his sins unless he first deliver up his Bible to his Ordinary This is the standing Law of the Church of Rome establish'd by the authority of the Council of Trent and confirm'd not only by Pope Pius IV. but by many succeeding Popes which because I have heard confidently denyed by some of their ignorant Proselytes I will therefore refer them to a late Author in their own language to whom I presume they will give credit who in his Chapter of reading the Holy Scriptures gives this Character of a Papist It is A Papist Misrepresented and Represented c. c. 10. true he does not think it viz. the Holy Scripture fit to be read generally by all without a Licence or in the vulgar Tongue And having told you why he does not think so he adds For these reasons he is taught that it is not convenient for the Scripture to be read indifferntly by all Men but only by such as have express Licence and good testimony from their Curates c. And is not this course as effectual to keep the generality of the Laity from reading the Scripture as the absolute forbidding it would have been For how few will be at the trouble and charge of procuring a Faculty when it cannot be had but from the Bishop or Inquisitor Or if many were willing to be at the pains and cost yet few of those many will be able to obtain it For how few will be able to satisfie the Bishop or Curate that they are such as will receive no hurt by reading when they cannot so much as ask it without being suspected of Heresie So that all things consider'd it may reasonably be presumed that the effect of such Licences will amount to little or nothing And yet how little soever it be it was thought too much to be granted For by the Order of Pope Clement VIII this observation is added to the Rule That hitherto by the Command and practice of the holy Roman and universal Inquisition the Faculty of granting such Licences for reading or keeping Bibles in the vulgar Tongue or any summaries or historieal compendiums of the said Bibles is taken away which is to be inviolably observed And if no such Licence can be legally granted then no Man of what quality soever can read the Scripture in the vulgar Tongue without transgressing the Laws of the Roman Church I am not ignorant that in this Kingdom and I suppose in some others where the Reformation hath got considerable footing some Lay-persons of that Communion are permitted to have the Bible in their own Tongue But this permission is directly contrary to their Laws and extorted from them in these Countries to prevent a greater mischief which they see would otherwise ensue If you make enquiry in Spain or Italy you will find no such indulgence there I shall add only this That in the Index of prohibited Books published by Pope Alexander VII not only those Bibles that are translated and printed by Hereticks but all Bibles in any vulgar Tongue are absolutely prohibited 2. Let us then be thankful to God and bless and praise and speak good of his name for that we have been born and brought up in a Church which allows free liberty of searching the Holy Scriptures and not only so but lays it as a Duty upon all Men and endeavours to quicken them thereunto by the most powerful motives How earnest our Church is in pressing this Duty upon her Children you may see in her exhortation to the reading of the holy