Selected quad for the lemma: prayer_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
prayer_n	ceremony_n	church_n	rite_n	2,015	5	9.5563	5	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A53685	A discourse of the work of the Holy Spirit in prayer with a brief enquiry into the nature and use of mental prayer and forms / by John Owen ...	Owen, John, 1616-1683.	1682 (1682)	Wing O738; ESTC R11815	119,966	289

Churches for some ages is demonstratively proved with the very same arguments whereby we prove that they had neither the Mass nor the use of Images in their Worship For besides the utter silence of them in the Apostolical writings and those of the next ensuing Ages which is sufficient to discard their pretence unto any such Antiquity there are such descriptions given of the practice of the Churches in their Worship as are inconsistent with them and exclusive of them besides they give such a new Face of Divine Worship so different from the portraicture of it delivered in the Scripture as is hardly reconcileable thereunto and so not quickly embraced in the Church I do not say that this fatal Consequence of the Introduction of humanely devised set Forms of Prayer in the Worship of the Church in the horrible abuse made of it is sufficient to condemn them as absolutely unlawful For where the Opinions leading unto such Idolatrous practices are openly rejected and condemned as was before intimated there all the Causes Means and Occasions of that Idolatry may be taken out of them and separate from them as it is in the Liturgies of the Reformed Churches whether imposed or left free But it is sufficient to lay in the Balance against that veneration which their general observance in many ages may invite or procure And it is so also to warrant the Disciples of Christ to stand fast in the Liberty wherewith he hath made them free Another Evil which either accompanied or closely followed on the Introduction of devised Forms of Prayer into the Church was a supposed necessity of adorning the Observance of them with sundry Arbitrary Ceremonies And this also in the End as is confessed among all Protestants encreased Superstition in its Worship with various practices leading unto Idolatry It is evident that the Use of free Prayer in Church Administrations can admit of no Ceremonies but such as are either of Divine Institution or are natural circumstances of the actions wherein the Duties of Worship do materially consist Divine Institution and Natural Light are the Rules of all that order and Decency which is needful unto it But when these devised Forms were introduced with a supposition of their necessity and sole use in the Church in all acts of immediate Worship men quickly sound that it was needful to set them off with Adventitious ornaments Hereon there was gradually sound out and prescribed unto constant Observation so many outward Postures and Gestures with Attires Musick Bowings Cringes Crossings Venerations Censings Altars Images Crucifixes Responds Alternatives and such a rabble of other Ceremonies as rendred the whole worship of the Church ludicrous burdensome and superstitions And hereon it came to pass that he who is to officiate in Divine Service is obliged to learn and practise so many turnings and windings of himself Eastward and Westward to the Altar to the Wall to the People So many Gestures and postures in kneeling rising Standings Bowings less and profound secret and loud speakings in a due Observance of the Interposition of Crossings with Removals from one place to another with provision of Attires in their variety of Colours and respect to all the Furniture of their Altars as are difficult to learn and foolishly antick in their practice above all the preparations of Players for the Stage Injunctions for these and the like observances are the subject of the Rubrick of the Missal and the Cautels of the Mass. That these things have not only no Affinity with the purity simplicity and Spiritualty of Evangelical Worship but were invented utterly to exclude it out of the Church and the minds of men needs no proof unto any who ever read the Scripture with due consideration Nor is the Office of the Ministery less corrupted and destroyed by it For besides a so●●y Cunning in this practice and the reading of some Forms of words in an accommodation unto these Rites there was little more besides an easy good Intention to do what he doth and not the quite contrary required to make any one Man or Woman as it once at least fell out to administer in all sacred Worship Having utterly lost the Spirit of Grace and Supplications neglecting at best all his Aids and Assistances and being void of all Experience in their minds of the Power and Efficacy of Prayer by vertue of them they found it necessary by these means to set off and recommend their dead Forms For the lifeless Carcass of their Forms merely alone were no more meet to be esteemed Prayer than a Tree or a Log was to be esteemed a God before it was shaped fashioned gilded and adorned By this means they taught the Image of Prayer which they had made to speak and act a Part to the satisfaction of the spectators For the bare reading of a Form of Words especially as it was Ordered in an unknown Tongue could never have given the least contentment unto the multitude had it not been set off with this variety of Ceremonies composed to make an Appearance of Devotion and sacred Veneration Yet when they had done their utmost they could never equal the Ceremonies and Rites of the Old Temple-worship in Beauty Glory and Order nor yet those of the Heathen in their sacred Eleusinian Mysteries for number solemnity gravity and appearance of Devotion Rejecting the true Glory of Gospel-Worship which the Apostle expresly declares to consist in the Administration of the Spirit they substituted that in the room thereof which debased the profession of Christian Religion beneath that of the Jews and Pagans especially considering that the most of their Ceremonies were borrowed of them or stollen from them But I shall never believe that their conversion of the Holy Prayers of the Church by an open contempt of the whole Work of the Spirit of God in them into a Theatrical Pompous Observance of ludicrous Rites and Ceremonies can give so much as present satisfaction unto any who are not given up to strong Delusions to believe a Lye The Exercise of ingrafted prevalent Superstition will appease a natural conscience outward Forms and Representations of things believed will please the Fancy and exercise the Imagination variety and frequent changes of modes gestures and postures with a sort of Prayer always beginning and always ending will entertain present thoughts and outward senses so as that men finding themselves by these means greatly affected may suppose that they pray very well when they do nothing less For Prayer consisting in an holy Exercise of Faith Love Trust and Delight in God acting themselves in the Representation of our Wills and Desires unto him through the Aid and Assistance of the Holy Ghost may be absent where all these are most effectually present This also produced all the pretended ornaments of their Temples Chapels and Oratories by Crucifixes Images a multiplication of Altars with Reliques Tapers Vestments and other Utensils None of these Things whereby Christian Religion is corrupted and debased

would ever have come into the minds of men had not a necessity of their Invention been introduced by the establishment of set Forms of Prayer as the only way and means of Divine Worship And whereever they are retained proportionably unto the principles of the Doctrine which men profess some such Ceremonies must be retained also I will not therefore deny but that here lyeth the foundation of all our present differences about the manner of Divine Worship Suppose a necessity of confining the Solemn Worship of the Church unto set Forms of Prayer and I will grant that sundry Rituals and Ceremonies may be well judged necessary to accompany their observance For without them they will quickly grow obsolete and unsatisfactory And if on the other hand free Prayer in the Church be allowed it is evident that nothing but the Grace and Gifts of the Holy Ghost with a due regard unto the Decency of natural circumstances is required in Divine service or can be admitted therein Neither yet is this consequent how inseparable soever it seems from the sole publick Use of set Forms of Prayer in sacred Administrations pleaded to prove them either in themselves or their use to be unlawful The Design of this consideration is only to shew that they have been so far abased that they are so subject to be abused and do so alway stand in need to be abused that they may attain the Ends aimed at by them as much weakens the Plea of the necessity of their imposition For this also is another evil that hath attended their invention The Guides of the Church after a while were not contented to make use of Humanely devised Forms of Prayer confining themselves unto their use alone in all publick Administrations but moreover they judged it meet to impose the same practice on all whom they esteemed to be under their Power And this at length they thought lawful yea necessary to do on penalties Ecclesiastical and Civil and in the issue Capital When this Injunction first found a prevalent entertainment is very uncertain For the first two or three Centuries there were no Systemes of composed Forms of Prayer used in any Church whatever as hath been proved Afterwards when they began to be generally received on such grounds and for such Reasons as I shall not here insist on but may do so in a Declaration of the Nature and Use of spiritual Gifts with their continuance in the Church and an enquiry into the causes of their Decay the Authority of some great Persons did recommend the Use of their Compositions unto other Churches even such as had a mind to make use of them as they saw good But as unto this device of their Imposition confining Churches not only unto the necessary use of them in general but unto a certain Composition and Collection of them we are beholding for all the advantage received thereby unto the Popes of Rome alone among the Churches of the second Edition For from their own Good Inclination and by their own Authority without the advice of Councils or pretence of Traditions the two Gorgons heads whereby in other cases they frighten poor Mortals and turn them into Stones by various Degrees they obtained a pretence of Right to impose them and did it accordingly For when the Use and Benefit of them had been for a while pleaded and thence a progress made unto their necessity it was needful that they should be imposed on all Churches and Christians by their Ecclesiastical Authority But when afterwards they had insinuated into them and lodged in their Bowels the two great Idols of Transubstantiation and the unbloudy Sacrifice not only Mulcts Personal and Pecuniary but Capital punishments were enacted and executed to enforce their observance This brought Fire and Faggot into Christian Religion making Havock of the true Church of Christ and shedding Blood of thousands For the Martyrdom of all that have suffered death in the World for their Testimony against the Idolatries of the Mass derives originally from this Spring alone of the necessary imposition of compleat Liturgical Forms of Prayer For this is the sole foundation of the Roman Breviary and Missal which have been the Abaddons of the Church of Christ in these parts of the World and are ready once more to be so again Take away this Foundation and they all fall to the ground And it is worth Consideration of what kind that Principle is which was naturally improved unto such pernitious effects which quickly was found to be a meet and effectual Engine in the Hand of Sathan to destroy and murder the Servants of Christ. Had the Churches of Christ been left unto their primitive Liberty under the enjoined Duties of Reading and Expounding the Scripture of Singing Psalms to the praise of God of the Administration of the Sacraments of Baptism and the Lords Supper and of diligent preaching the Word all of them with Prayer according unto the Abilities and spiritual Gifts of them who did preside in them as it is evident that they were for some Ages it is impossible for any man to imagine what evils would have ensued thereon that might be of any consideration in comparison of those enormous mischiefs which followed on the contrary practice And as unto all the Inconveniences which as it is pretended might ensue on this Liberty there is sufficient Evangelical Provision for their prevention or cure made in the Gospel constitution and Communion of all the true Churches of Christ. But this was not the whole of the Evil that attended this Imposition For by this means all spiritual Ministerial Gifts were caused to cease in the Church For as they are Talents given to trade withal or manifestations of the Spirit given to profit or edify the Church they will not reside in any subject they will not abide if they are by any received if they are not improved by continual Exercise We see every day what effects the contempt or neglect of them doth produce Wherefore this Exercise of them being restrained and excluded by this Imposition they were utterly lost in the Church so as that it was looked on as a rare thing for any one to be able to pray in the Administration of Divine Worship Yea the pretence of such an Ability was esteemed a Crime and the Exercise of it a Sin scarce to be pardoned Yet do I not find it in any of the ancient Canons reckoned among the faults for which a Bishop or a Presbyter were to be deposed But that hereon arose in those who were called to officiate in publick Assemblies as unto the Gifts which they had received for the Edification of the Church in Divine Administrations that neglect which hath given a fatal wound unto the Light and Holiness of it is openly evident For when the Generality of men of that Order had provision of Prayers made for them which they purchased at an easy rate or had them provided for them at the charge of the People they