Selected quad for the lemma: power_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
power_n	authority_n	law_n	legislative_a	2,620	5	12.4064	5	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A30324	An answer to the Animadversions on the History of the rights of princes, &c. by Gilbert Burnet.	Burnet, Gilbert, 1643-1715.	1682 (1682)	Wing B5761; ESTC R7324	19,703	25

Tythes must be every one of them in a state of damnation For the last of these I am not very sollicitous but for the former I will not easily drink in such a damning Doctrine Page 117. He accuses me for gathering some odd pretences to give reason why Tythes were easier to the Iews than to us He says I urge the vast number of the Priests and one would think that the thirtieth part of a Nation which was the lowest proportion of the Tribe of Levi had a right to a greater portion than the six hundredth part He also says that I urge the fruitfulness of their Land and the barrenness of ours which he adds I drew from the Quakers Books but I can assure him if he will believe me I never read one of them on this Argument I think it is no such Mystery but that any Man might have hit on it that a fruitful Land may pay a greater Rate than a barren But I have given no advantage to the Quakers for their unjust Robbery of Church-men or rather the robbing of God in detaining that which the Law provides for them which it might well do tho there were no antecedent divine Right making it necessary and the Law which is the Measure of Property having determined this the denying to pay it is as much Injustice as robbing on the High-way the Sin of which is not one Jot the less tho no Man can make out his Title to his Goods from a divine Right And the Sin of this is so much the greater as the robbing God must be greater than the robbing a private Person Page 118 he accuses me for affirming falsely concerning us and the Iews that the same Rule was applied to all tho I grant that the Iews Tithe was but a fifth Part and know that the Christians was but a tenth So here I lie against my Conscience I will not say this is a willful Mistake in him but I am sure it is a gross one for the all to whom I say the same Rule was applied does not belong to Jews and Christians but to the Northern and barren Climates where the Returns are not above ten five and in some not above three And for the kindness of his Censure I leave it to his own Conscience to consider how far he is bound to ask God Pardon for it Pag. 172. He condemns me for my Criticism about the Term Bishoprick Anno 1077 and says that I bring Proof that it was earlier used and yet all that Proof is the Title of a Chapter where it is once used and every Body knows that Titles we reset before Books or Chapters some Ages after they were written Page 199. He accuses me for saying that Kings might begin the Seizure of the Goods of deceased Bishops as representing the People who before might make those Seizures and whereas the Poor at first made them he argues that the Kings could not be supposed to represent the Poor But since I pretend only in this Matter to proceed upon Conjecture any Errour I may be guilty of ought to be easily forgiven me and I tell what might have fallen out in Fact and not what is to be defended in Right It is probable as long as the Bishops were poor the poor only spoiled their Goods but when they grew rich it is like enough others might have mixed with the poor in these Spoils and that might have invited the Officers of Princes first to seize on them Page 320 He accuses me for saying that there was nothing so dedicated under the New Testament as was under the Old and cites that of Ananias and Saphira But certainly great Difference is to be made between a voluntary Dedication and a divine Appointment and between the Laws of God that cannot be repealed but by the same Authority that first enacted them and human Laws that are still subject to the supream legislative Power But his last Instance makes Amends for all the Defects in the former This Nation has been under great Apprehensions of Popery many Expedients have been proposed and the Dangers have been much considered and nothing has been more seriously examined by both King and Parliament for some Years but none of them were so wise as to foresee one Danger with which he frights me Because I determined that a Popish Prince may extend the Regale to all Churches in his Dominions and this he thinks an unseasonable Assertion to publish here in England as our Case stands with respect to the next in Succession But if this be all the Danger he apprehends he may go to bed and sleep very securely for the Regale is already in the Crownhere and has been for some Ages extended to all the Churches in England So the next Prince can add nothing to what the Crown is already vested with The sixth Head for which I come under his Discipline is the many gross Reflections on the Clergy both ancient and modern which he thinks prodigiously strange and especially in this Age and that the rather that the Ground of many of the Accusations is false and to bring this to Instances he complains that Page 26 I inveigh against the Corruptions of the Church in the Beginning of the fourth Century and yet acknowledg that the better and sounder Part did still prevail in publick Synods from which he inferrs that if the major Part was good there was no Ground for that Invective Yet any that reads that Passage will hardly find much of Invective in it and it 's far short of what might have been cited from Nazianzen and Chrysostom whose Credit he would be sure to magnify if it made for him The running backward and forward as they did in the fundamental Points of Faith will justify a far severer Character than I give of them and may not a Church be corrupted tho the Majority continues sound Nor can we judge of the Majority of a Church by the Majority of a Synod for all Bishops did not come to every Synod And I may likewise add that many will be guilty of ill Practices that have not the Face to defend them when they come to be examined Page 33 He accuses me for calling Constantius a superstitious weak Man upon the Credit of Marcellin a Pagan Writer How judicious a Writer he is all learned Men know and that Passage I refer to has been cited by many of the greatest Men of this and the former Age. Nor was it quoted by me as a Proof but as an excellent Saying The Law Constantius made for Churchmen by which the driving of Trade and Merchandize among Clergy-men was set on and encouraged was severely censur'd by St. Ierome one of the best Men of that Age who saw the ill Effects it had But he says I represent Martel as a brave Man who robbed the Church Do I say any Thing in Commendation of him for his Vertues I only speak of his good Conduct and great Success in his Wars and if