Selected quad for the lemma: prayer_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
prayer_n	form_n	lawful_a	set_a	2,091	5	11.0014	5	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A56807	The conformists plea for the nonconformists, or, A just and compassionate representation of the present state and condition of the non-conformists as to I. The greatness of their sufferings, II. Hardness of their case, III. Reasonableness and equity of their desires and proposals, IV. Qualifications, and worth of their persons, V. Peaceableness of their behaviour, VI. The churches prejudice by their exclusion, &c. humbly submitted to authority / by a beneficed minister, and a regular son of the Church of England.	Pearse, Edward, 1631-1694.	1681 (1681)	Wing P976; ESTC R1092	66,864	80

Hist of the Sabbath Just Weights Measures Case of the Sabbath nor which I wonder at to the judicious Bp. Sanderson as much as the Seventh was from the Creation What if an inquiring Child that is catechised should ask his Parent What day do we keep as Sabbath the First hee 'l say But saith the Child Why do we keep the First what Commandment for that or what Promise for we are taught in the Catechism God blessed the Seventh day Is not this a temptation to keep the Seventh-day Sabbath Had the Presbyterians pleaded for that Translation they might have heard of their ignorance in the Hebrew and demanding things not fit to be allowed they would not grant them lest they as the Puritans have been misrepresented should Judaize in keeping the Holy Sabbath The Doxologie or conclusion of the Lord's Prayer for thine is the Kingdom c. to be used always Query Whether they have not thereby taught us this Opinion that tho Forms of Prayers are lawful yet a variety is as lawful as a set form of words We prove the lawfulness by our Saviour's Prescription When ye pray say c. And may we not prove a liberty or a variety of expressions keeping still to the same matter when we read a difference in the same Prayer as delivered by two Evangelists inspired by the same Spirit and when we see the practice of the Church is sometimes to use and sometimes to omit the Doxologie and Conclusion And why shall the Church so severely enjoin the exact use of all her Forms and they who omit when their Prudence and Conscience as to some Prayers tells them they should sometimes concerning some Petitions and Persons are liable to censure when a part of the Lord's Prayer as delivered by St. Matthew is constantly omitted For ought I see a liberty and variety of Prayers strictly keeping to divine matter with abbreviations and enlargements is as lawful as a stinted invariable Form of words and is a matter of Christian Liberty to be used as shall best serve to the edification of the Church of Christ and divers expressions are as much from the same Spirit provided always they agree with the language of the Holy Ghost as diversities of Gifts and consistant with the Unity of the Spirit And they who plead for a necessity of Forms must also yeeld to a variety upon the same subject which we have for the King in the Service and a few others A Reformation was thought absolutely necessary to Union Hear what Mr. Herbert Thorndike one of the Commissioners for the Church in the Savoy wrote But now that Unity is not to be had without setling agreement in matters of Difference A due way of composing Differences printed with his Weights and Measures pag. 236. Edit 1662. to propose what may seem best for the Community of God's Church in the Cure of our Breaches is not to give offence but to take it away Nor do I know any Man professing the Reformation sincerely that could not wish with all his heart that the whole Order and Form to be setled with the Circumstance of the same might be according to the Primitive Simplicity and naked plainness of the Ancient Church p. 245. The form of Service now in force by Law may be acknowledged capable of Amendment without disparagement either to the Wisdom of the Church that prescribed it or of the Nation that enacted it Some promised much but granted little others begg'd more pleaded hard but obtained not And may not this justify the Nonconformists waiting for and earnestly desiring a redress of material things since they could obtain but very little then and cannot in conscience subscribe and declare now If they had been gratified then and had now been discontented without more there had been more reason for the prejudice that is propagated against them If it be objected Why could not they have Conformed as some of their Fellow-Commissioners did I Answer 1. Some very worthy Persons did Conform Dr. Wallis Dr. Horton Dr. Lightfoot and after about seven Years silence to the great loss of Exeter College Oxford and the Church of God Dr. Conant conformed and these were all 2. The Reasons why these did not is because as the same Spectacles will not serve all Mens sight so because they could not as they oft declared both to the shaking off some and the displeasure of others within the Pale My last Observation shall be upon the Persons that managed that Debate The Commissioners that pleaded for the Union as it was without a Reformation were the strongest and stiffest of any in the Church of England Men of great Learning long experience in the Ecclesiastical Government and that had suffered much and were much exasperated as being several of them next the Bishops most obnoxious to the Parliament as most guilty of Innovations in Doctrine and Discipline by the Informations and Complaint of as Learned and as great Men as any of them in the Church of England as may easily be produced out of the best account of those Times all except Dr. Morley Dr. Earle Dr. Sanderson against whom I remember no Complaints and a few beside Their Constancy and Sufferings did recommend them to the King's Favour and the great Agreement in their Persuasions held them to one another and having the disposing of Preferments as they pleased or at least the Recommendation of Candidates Expectants complied with them and were forward to walk according to their Measures The moderating Bishop Hall was gone to Heaven Prideaux Brownrig and others of another temper and so it was easier for them to carry all their own way and two things as conducing to their designs was necessary 1. To frame a Convocation to their minds and to that end great care and pains were used to keep out and to get in by very undue Proceedings Protestations were entred against all Incumbents not ordained by Bishops though it was not through their faults and to exclude others that they feared had any inclination to Moderation indeed under the name of Presbytery And such an Election being made as there was no great fear of calling any thing to free Debates few leading Men being of another mind so there were no Debates to speak of the greatest that I could hear of was between the Cambridg Professor Dr. Gunning and the Oxford Professor Dr. Creed about a hard Point indeed the Age of Children to be Confirm'd 2. For all his Majesty's most gracious and excellent Declaration concerning Ecclesiastical Affairs they laboured by all their Interest and Endeavours to have a Parliament that would pass what they would contrive and prepare for them And so they instead of sending more Labourers into the Vineyard hired as some say Labourers to turn out or keep out Labourers from entring in And the Labourers in Pension were not imployed only in State but also in Church-Work Their Interest was so great in that Parliament as to enact what was

with for their Moderation And truly it is an ill sign of an aspiring contentious nature in those that will fall out with Peacemakers that are sober and moderate and wish that both contending sides may understand one another better and love one another more and remove the matter of debates and strifes How are the Ejected called it grieves my heart to hear them called all to naught and how are these names returned And many throw Bones of Contention among them whisper and backbite and carry tales to soment the heats which gentle tempers labour to cool The other broken Party of the dissatisfied and complaining Family are not so well agreed as it were to be desired but they differ more in Accidentals than Substantials from one another I mean the Brethren whose cause I attempt to open Some of them will consent to an imposed Form of Prayer and all to Decency and Order as necessary in Christian Assemblies and in a word to all that is contained in the General Rules and Laws of Christ and rationally deduced from them as far as they do understand They all submit to an Episcopacy of primitive Institution and Limitation with the due Exercise of Discipline and they that cannot agree to the same Form of Government are for maintaining Peace and Love under different Forms and they yeeld enough to have made them Ministers in the Apostles days and after They say 't is true that to us there is but one Lawgiver and that is Christ and they will teach whatsoever he hath commanded them They hold that his Laws are sufficient for the Government of the Church that the Church must be subject to Christ that her Power as Protestant Writers have maintained is only Ministerial under Him that all Power is seated still in Him and not made over by Him to any other that the Churches Power is not decisive for as such they argue that Controversies have not been decided by any that here ingrossed the name of the Church but declarative and so far binding as the Reasons are cogent and divine They acknowledge the King's Supremacy as it hath been declared by former Learned Writers against the Romish Antagonists and Usurpers of that Sovereign Right as by Nowel against Dorman Rainold's conference with Hart King James and many more They assert a Liberty which Christ hath given them and cannot subject themselves as the servants of men in the things of God They offer to assent to all the Essentials of the Christian Faith to observe all the Ordinances of Christ and every part of his Worship and Decency and Order in the Worship of God as was said before and in short do say Shew us but what the Apostles Rule was and we will walk according to it and as far as we have attained be of one mind and walk according to the same Rule But then they can never yeeld to declare an unfeigned Assent and Consent to Laws Rubricks and Ceremonies that are significant of any Grace or obligatory to any Duty of the Covenant of Grace or to make Ceremonies federal Signs tho not Seals nor the Reading the Apochrypha and Neglecting Canonical Scripture and other things which divers of them have spoken of at large and cannot be repeated in this place They profess and we believe them that they quarrel not because they may not be Lords and Bishops or that others are so promoted they declare it is no grief to them if the Magistrate or legal Patrons bestow the Revenues of the Church upon whom they please and are legally qualified according to the Constitution They only beg the use of that Liberty of their Consciences to preach and worship God according to the Primitive Rule and Simplicity and that they may not be Ejected and Excommunicated and forced to beg their Bread because they cannot consent to what they cannot believe nor vow against their Duty The danger of giving them a Toleration while they remain Dissenters is strongly suggested from the multiplication of Papists Socinians and Jews as the effect of the Toleration in the Netherlands But two things may be replied 1. Widen the Terms which may be done with safety to the Church and there will be no need of a Toleration they will be incorporated with us 2. There can be no such danger from Christians of the same Faith and substantial Worship but of different Accidental Modes as from Socinians Papists Jews of a contrary Faith and Worship And why we cannot be as kind and liberal to Natives indulging a Liberty to them in small things as we are to French Dutch and to Lutherans I do not know I have represented the Divisions of this most famous Church of Christ not with the exactness of an Historian nor of an Arbitrator or a Moderator but as best suiting with a Man in haste and trouble And here 's enough to move the honest and faithful Justices to arbitrate Differences and command the Peace Nothing else will do nor any other Man so likely to compose the Difference as they For Prayers innumerable have been made to God who acts by means in settlements of Peace and Order therefore we must pray Men too The different Parties will not agree The Commissioners * in the Savoy an 1662 commissioned by the King disputed and both carried the Cause The Ejected humbly petitioned the Bishops for Peace they would not hear them And what Arguing Preaching Writing hath been ever since Some Reverend Sons of the Church in love to Peace and fear of Enemies have earnestly called and exhorted the Dissenting Ejected Brethren to come and unite to come into the Present Constitution as safest as strongest as best c. But if they could not come in at the Narrow Door eighteen years ago and the Door as narrow still as it was then and there be the same Cross-bars laid across as were then to keep them out to what purpose is the Exhortation Is there a great Storm a coming they think that Christ is the same Ship and they are as safe as any other They may clearly plead they could have conformed at first upon better worldly terms than now they might have saved what they have lost and got their share with others to come now to conform when all places are full and not enow for numerous Expectants and when there is nothing for them without tedious waiting and if their Judgments and Consciences could not enter then how can they now Unless their Heads have voided all their Reasons and so are grown less or that Custom hath made the Entrance smoother for them Learned and Worthy Men have written for and against and are they gained over to one another If they are it is more than they will confess The one writes the Mischies of Separation the other denies the Charge and Proof and another throws back the Mischief a Mischief of Impositions and many Swords are drawn by Seconds too many bitter words for the Children of the same Heavenly Father that