Selected quad for the lemma: prayer_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
prayer_n	pray_v	spirit_n	watch_v	2,594	5	9.9201	5	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A35696	Jus Cæsaris et ecclesiæ vere dictæ or, A treatise wherein independency, presbytery, the power of kings, and of the church, or of the brethren in ecclesiastical concerns, government and discipline of the church : and wherein also the use of liturgies, tolleration, connivence, conventicles or private assemblies, excomminication, election of popes, bishops, priests what and whom are meant by the term church, 18 Matthew are discoursed : and how I Cor. 14. 32. generally misunderstand is rightly expounded : wherein also the popes power over princes, and the liberty of the press, are discoursed / by William Denton ...	Denton, William, 1605-1691.	1681 (1681)	Wing D1066; ESTC R9164	326,898	268

the Ephesians c. 6.18 19 20. that they would always pray with all prayer and supplication in the Spirit and watch thereunto with all perseverance and supplication for him for what I pray that he might have a Dispensation not to preach or not to attend his Flock and be Non-resident or having put his hand to the Plough that he might look back or that he might have great Employments in Civil Affairs in Princes Courts that would necessarily hinder his preaching Nothing less What then Even that Vtterance might be given unto him that he might open his mouth boldly to dispence and make known the Mysteries of the Gospel for which he was an Ambassador Eph. 6.18 19 20. The like unto the Colossians c. 4.2 3. And did not the same Paul most solemnly and most severely charge Timothy before God and the Lord Jesus Christ who shall judge the quick and the dead at his appearing and his Kingdom to preach the Word to be instant in season out of season reprove rebuke c. 2 Tim. 4.1 2. By which it demonstratively appears that in St. Paul's Grammar and Construction to dispense and make known are Terms Synonimous and Equivalent maugre the false Glosses of the Papalins And when think you would Paul unto whom by Revelation was made known the Mystery of Christ whereof he was made a Minister that he should preach among the Gentiles the unsearchable Riches of Christ and to make all men see what is the Fellowship of the Mystery c. Eph. 3.2 3 8 9. or any other of the Apostles have besought Peter or any of his Successors of Rome for a Dispensation not to Preach They were better taught than so than to take other Civil Employments which must necessarily hinder them from preaching and declaring the Mystery of the Gospel for in true understanding to be a Priest and not to preach is to be no Priest having as much as in them lies un-priested themselves after the Character imprinted for Christ never gave any Authority to his Ministers but what was meerly and purely Spiritual Yet so it was that the Judgment of the whole Church or Congregation as is necessary and natural to all Societies Civil and Ecclesiastick for the sake of Order was fit to be conducted and managed by some one who should preside and guide the Actions and Deliberations propose the Matters and collect the Results of the Assembly which Care being always due to the most worthy and best qualified person for such an Action was mostly committed to the Bishop not of right but of choice § This kind of Judicial Proceeding was observed and kept on foot unto the Year 250 Ep. 5. f. 12 13 14. as is plainly to be seen by the Epistles of St. Cyprian who in the matter concerning those who did eat of Meats offered to Idols and subscribed to the Religion of the Gentiles writeth to the Presbytery that he doth not think to do any thing without their Counsel and the Consent of the People and writeth to the People that at his return he will examine the Causes and Merits thereof in their Presence and under their Iudgment And he wrote to those Priests who of their own heads reconciled some that they should give an Account unto the People Soon after this time of the Day these kinds of Proceedings begun to lose of their Purity and Simplicity and to degenerate into Empire For indeed as before so more especially and more confidently soon after Constantines Days and Donations the succeeding Bishops not without some Artifices and some Usurpations quickly began to set up for themselves and indeed in short time mounted so high that they became suspected of Princes and terrible to the People their Tribunals became a common Pleading-place having obtained Execution by the Ministry of the Civil Magistrate Petr. AErodius and to obtain the Name of Episcopal Jurisdiction and Episcopal Audience and the like This Rome was not built in one Day nor in one Age the Piety and Charity of that more pure Age made them and their Judgments to be had in great veneration which insensibly was the Cause that the Church in the truest sence not regarding the Charge given and laid upon them by Christ and his Apostles did supinely leave the Care to the Bishops who readily and with great care embraced it and soon erected their Tribunals This kind of Judgment though it were not like to the first in regard of the former viz. to determine all by the Opinion of the whole Church yet it had some semblance with it and Constantine finding some Ease and Conveniency to have Causes determined by the Authority of Religion added this to his other Powers granted to them viz. That no Appeal should lie from the Sentence of the Bishop and Valence the Emperor inlarged them in the Year 365. But those Judicial Proceedings and Negotiations did not please the best and most pious Bishops being of St. Pauls mind who deemed such Employments and Powers not fit for a Preacher of the Gospel and therefore would not take such himself But Arcadius and Honorius 70 years after the Law of Constantine finding the Bishops to degenerate and to abuse their Power revoked that Law in part ordaining that they should judge Causes of Religion not Civil except by consent and that they should not be thought to be a Court which not being observed in Rome by reason of the great power the Bishop there had Valentinian being there in the Year 452. did renew it but the succeeding Emperors restored some part of it and Justinian established unto them a Court and Audience c. By which means and gradations the Popes had got the Knack of encroaching and were thereby the better enabled to crave and get more and that not without making the world believe that those and more were their due and that not Jure Ecclesiastico only but Divino also a Band so sure and strong that it would hardly be loosed though Posterity should find Inconveniences and would redress them 200 years were not fully elapsed ere they claimed absolutely all Judicature Criminal and Civil over the Clergy and in some things over the Laity also pretending the Cause was Ecclesiastical Besides they contrived another kind of Judicature which they termed Mixt whereby they hooked in all Judicature to themselves so that after the Year 1050. having with much Art and Industry Monopolized all the Causes of the Clergy to themselves and very many of the Laity under the Title of Spirituality and almost all the rest under the Title of a Mixt Judicature and placing themselves above the Secular Magistrates upon pretence of Justice denied they were at length so bold as to say that the Bishop had the power to judge not by the grant or favour of Princes or by the will or concession of the People or the whole Church or by Custom or Vsage but that it was essential to the Episcopal Dignity and given to it by Christ whereby

such as is common to the Laity in private offences i.e. to every Individual of the Church For what concerns Binding and Loosing the Words are plain and demonstrative viz. Whatsever ye shall bind on Earth shall be bound in Heaven which must have reference to the parties grieving and grieved it cannot be denied and those are every individual of the Church and whatsoever ye shall loose on Earth shall be loosed in Heaven Again I say If two of you in general without denoting or pointing at the Clergy shall agree on Earth as touching any thing that they shall ask it shall be done for them of my ●ather which is in Heaven for where two or three indefinitely and not limited to the Pope or to those of the Presbytery only are gathered together in my Name there am I in the midst of them Mat. 18.18 19 20. These are general Precepts and purport a general Duty binding every Christian and not especial or applicable only to Popes or Presbyters Christ then in these places speaketh of private men and offences which he only that is oppressed and wronged hath most right to reprove and forgive and therefore not only the Judgment of Pope and Presbyter making whom they please Banditi of the Church but the reprehension and admonition of our meanest Brother offended and injured by us must be regarded and reverenced for so much as the Lord on high heareth the desires and granteth the Prayers of any two joyning together for his Glory and others Good and in their own debts and trespasses private persons have more right to bind and loose their oppressors before God than either Pope or Presbyter This power here attributed to all Christians is no new Doctrine but hath been acknowledged for good by St. Austin Theophylact and others and it doth not in the least derogate from or impeach the publick use of the Keys in the hands of Bishops and Pastors for they had also their particular Commission John 20.23 Whosesoever sins ye remit they are remitted unto them and whose sins soever ye retain they are retained yea speaking particularly to one of them Mat. 16.19 I will give unto thee the Keys of the Kingdom of Heaven and whatsoever thou shalt bind on Earth shall be bound in Heaven and whatsoever thou shalt loose on Earth shall be loosed in Heaven so that the Keys of the Kingdom of Heaven all Priests received in Peter before Christ's Death and after his Resurrection he gave all his Apostles the like power as Cyprian and Jerome observe and that is a power which no Temporal or Civil Magistrate or Prince can confer it is derived unto them from a higher Power § I am not ignorant that these Doctrines are held as Heretical at Rome and that they that hold them are cursed with Bell Book and Candle which is obvious to every intelligent Reader that consults the first fifth and sixth Canons of the sourteenth Session of the Council of Trent and the Anathemaes following who shall find it to be so and I humbly conceive not without grand reason of State-Papal for should these Doctrines and these that depend upon them be received for Orthodox Adieu to all the Picklocks of all the secretest Councils of all Kingdoms and States where Romish Doctrines prevail and also Adieu to a world of Merry-pence that else would thereby come into their Sanctuary Sanctum Sanctorum their Coffers for commuting and mitigating of Penance c. For by their Institution of their Sacrament of Penance their Church understands it to be instituted by Christ an entire full and Sacramental Confession of all sins to be made by all persons of the years of discretion lapsed after Baptism and that Jure Divino it is absolutely necessary so to do and that because Christ before his Ascension into Heaven lest his Priests to be his Vicars tanquam Praesides Judices unto whom all mortal Sins ought to be brought and confessed whereby by vertue and power of the Keys of remission and retention of Sins Mat. 16.19 John 20.23 they pronounce Sentence and give Judgment which they cannot rightly do if you will believe themselves nor justly proportion or impose Penance upon a general Confession only except the lapsed declare their Sins unto them in specie sigillatim particularly and in kind Can. 5. This to me seems wonderful strange that if Christ would have introduced a Rite to confess our Sins so particularly and punctually to Romish Priests as that no Use was ever the like that y●● he would be so understood by words ambiguous from which it must be drawn by very disjointed and unlinckt consequences very far fetcht consequences as incoherent as are Churton Sands of which the Neighborhood do merrily story that the Devil himself could never make Belropes thereof and not by most plain and perspicuous Terms as when he instituted the Eucharist there being not one plain word in the whole New Testament to command us so to do James indeed c. 5. v. 16. exhorts us to confess our faults one to another but what is that to Romish Priests James writ not to them but to the Twelve Tribes scattored abroad This Text is an Argument to perswade us to confess our faults one to another and to pray one for another that we may receive reciprocally the Councils Benefits and Consolatinos of each others Prayers but this institutes no Sacramental Confession to be performed to Romish Priests nor any power of pardoning to the Pope or his Priests nor any greater obligation on the Laity to confess to the Priest than on the Priests to confess to the Laity Mark the enforcement The effectual fervent Prayer of a righteous man Priest or not Priest availeth much Though these Canons make the Priests the only Ministrators of Absolution and Remission and that the Act in them is not Nudum Ministerium a naked Ministery of pronouncing and declaring Sins to be forgiven to the confessed but that it is in the Priest Act us Judicialis a Judicial Act by whom velut à Judice as by a Judge Sentence is pronounced Canon 6. They farther make the very Circumstances of Sins to alter the kind of them and therefore they have made two kinds of Sins viz. Mortal and Venial Canon 5. which is more than ever God himself made though he made two kinds of Sinners voz Penitent and Impenitent And in the conclusion they have Anathematized all those that are of contrary Opinions though there be not one plain Text of Scripture to warrant their so doing Now I would very fain know why the Institution being made by the Word Remitto the Form also was not Remitto I remit thy Sins rather than absolvo te I absolve thee and that if by these words a Sacrament of Absolution is instituted with this Form Absolvo te by which one is absolved why it doth not follow by an irresistable necessity that another Sacrament of Binding be not instituted in which this Form should likewise

Command or Power so to do If he have Power why so angry that he makes use of it If you know a better way teach it if not submit to this and acquiesee This our Author seems to contradict by opposing experience to the contrary and therefore f. 63. he desires that none would be offended if as his own apprehension he affirms that the Introduction of Liturgies was on the account insisted on the principal means of encreasing and carrying on that sad defection and apostacy in the guilt whereof most Churches in the World had enwrapped themselves A bold Charge I confess but not against us and much they have to answer for that impose and use such Liturgies and therefore I shall not be offended at this his Affirmation but shall grant him his desire and conclude upon the truth of it that if Idolatrous Superstitious erroneous and Heretical Liturgies Mass-Books call them what you will for such he must mean have been so powerful and effectual to keep out Truth and prevent the true Worship of God through most Churches in the World what should hinder but that Liturgies teaching nothing but what the Word of God teacheth nor prescribing any thing in the Worship of God but what is according to Scripture I must mind him that I plead for no other should be as powerful and as effectual for the keeping out of Heresie Idolatry Superstition and what ever is contrary unto sound Faith and Doctrine And that they have been so is as certainly verified and as plainly to be demonstrated in all Places where such Liturgies nay though happily not altogether such though I wish they were all reduced to such have been used as that which he affirms of erronious Liturgies § At the Conference that was before King James at Hampton-Court the Bishop of London put His Majesty in mind of what Monsieur Roguë the French Ambassador gave out concerning our Service and Ceremonies upon the solemn view and audience of them viz. That if the Reformed Churches in France had kept the same order among them which we have he was assured that there would have been many thousands of Protestants more there than now there are f. 38. If some Innocent Ceremonies were not commanded and others not so Innocent abolished what could hinder but that Shrines covering of Shrines Trindilles Rolls of Wax Pictures Painting and all other Monuments of feigned Miracles Pilgrimages Idolatry and Superstition long since razed out of the Walls and Glass Windows might be brought into use again If no Liturgies were established and imposed what should hinder but the use of the Service of Th. Becquet and Prayers having Rubricks containing Pardons or Indulgences and all other Superstitions Legends and Prayers should be again introduced And also the use of Hallowing Water Bread Salt Bells Candles on Candlemas-day Ashes on Ash-Wednesday Palms on Palm-Sunday the Font on Easter Eve Fire on Paschal and a Sepulcher on Good-Friday and several Masses contrary to the Form and Order of the Book of Communion all long since abolished in Edw. 6. and Queen Elizabeth's days and we may conclude confidently yet without Arrogancy that such Liturgies are warrantable and profitable and that as many as do walk according to such Liturgies neither overthrowing that which they have built by superinducing any damnable Heresies thereupon nor otherwise vitiating their Holy Faith with a lewd and wicked conversation Peace shall be upon them and Mercy and upon the Israel of God and I appeal to all that shall read this if I may not with as good a Warrant affirm that our Liturgy hath kept out Popery and its Trinkets as he affirm as he doth and certainly they are both equally and alike powerful towards the encreasing and suppressing of true and false Faith Doctrine and Worship And it cannot be denied but that since 1640. since our Liturgy hath been thus vilisied set at naught and disused but that whole swarms of Sectaries like the Frogs and Locusts in Egypt have overspread the Land and that open Profanation Blasphemy Atheisme more in vogue since than before We have hitherto been openly battering his Out-works his main and strongest Forts are yet behind Vide Act Vniform f. 82.140 Car. 2. viz. That Liturgies are a Humane Invention that they occasion neglect and disabilities 63. That they hinder the due exercise and improvement of Spiritual Gifts and it is accordingly done in the imposed Liturgy 67. It says expresly That the Ministers of the Gospel shall not use or exercise any Spiritual Gift in the Administration of those Ordinances for which provision is made in the Book 68. That the Imposition of a Liturgy to be used always as a Form in all Gospel Administrations which he says do consist in Prayer Thanksgiving Instructions and Exhortations sutably applied unto the special Nature and End of the several Ordinances themselves and the use of them in the Church 63. is an unwarrantable Abridgement of that Liberty wherewith Christ hath made us free and therefore sin in the Use and Imposition thereof And as it is a Sin in others to abridge us of the Liberty purchased for us by Jesus Christ so it is in us to give it up and not to suffer in our Testimony for it 69. and then concludes That the great Rule of Administrations is That all things be done to Edification And this is the main End of the Ministry it self in all the Duties thereof that are purely Evangelical and what ever is contrary unto or a hindrance of Edification ought not to be appointed or observed in the Worship of God and such is the state and condition of this Imposed Liturgy in Church-Administrations for the Reasons mentioned c. 10. f 65. § By which it appears that one great Objection in their Esteem though opprobrious only against Liturgies is That they are an Humane Invention Be it so what then Therefore nothing of Humane Invention be it never so consonant and advantagious unto the Truth or the true Worship of God is to be necessarily and indispensibly used in the publick Worship of God If so then by the same Rule and Reason we may conclude that no Man must teach in private or preach in publick for that such Sermons such Catechisings are as truly the Inventions of the Brains of every Individual Person as Liturgies are of the whole Church or its Representative for be it that the Forms of Liturgies were never instituted nor commanded by Christ no more were the Forms of any Sermon or Prayers preached or prayed by particular Men since the days of Christ and his Apostles It is enough that the Subject Matter both of the one and of the other be according to Holy Writ And we may rest assured that as God will bless the Gifts and Labours of private Men in publick Prayers and Sermons so will he also bless the publick delivery of his Word and Mind by such stinted Prayers and such selected portions of Scripture as many learned pious and gifted Pastors

Teachers and Fathers of the Church met together in the Name and Fear of God which is not without the Promise Mat. 18.20 of a Blessing with Prayers and Supplications inventing divising and ordaining for the Glory of God and real good of the Souls of Men have solemnly appointed to be gathered into an excellent Form and Method called a Liturgy to be solemnly read for Gods Glory and the Peoples Good when as Reading is as truly the Ordinance of God as preaching Deut. 31.11 12 13. Indeed if Liturgies did contain like stuff as that of the Alcoran or of the Romish Services or Credenda or Agenda Matters of Belief and Worship contrary unto Divine Worship Truths and Institutions then indeed they may justly be called Humane Inventions worthily to be condemned and demand who required these things And so to Worship and so to Sacrifice were no more acceptable to God than to slay a Man or to cut off a Dogs Neck or to offer Swines Blood Isa 66.3 or to bless an Idol And then indeed it might justly be said That they have chosen their own Ways their own Inventions and that they that delight in such Liturgies delight in their own abominations But for such like we contend not Ecclesiae non licet quis●●●● instituere qu●d Verbo D●i scripto ad●er setur nay against such our Church hath provided in terminis in the 20 21. Act made 1552. in the Innocent Time of King Edw. 6. viz. It is not lawful for the Church to ordain any thing ergo not Liturgies that is contrary to Gods Word written c. nor to enforce any thing beside the same to be believed for necessity of Salvation nay the very same Josiah-like-Prince in his Injunctions set forth in the second Year of his Reign 1547. commands his Bishops and other his Clergy at least four times in the Year to preach against Works devised by Mens Phantasies besides Scripture so far were our Pastoral Fathers of that time from countenancing Humane Inventions or putting any such thing into the Liturgy that they commanded that they should be preached against by all the Clergy and so did Queen Elizabeth in her Injunctions Anno 1559. which have been observed ever since § That Liturgies are a Provision of Means exclusive of that Provision of Means for the Accomplishing of those Ends in the Worship of God for which Jesus Christ hath made and doth continue to make Provision and therefore not allowable and are unlawful This Argument alone I must confess if true were enough of it self to confound and overthrow all Liturgies whatsoever there would need no other and therefore he labours hard to make it good alledging That the Administration of Gospel Ordinances in the Church consists in Prayer Thanksgiving Instructions and Exhortations sutably applied c. that he appointed Persons viz. Pastors and Teachers for the Regular Administration of them that the Furniture and Provision that Christ made for the performance of them is his bestowing of Gifts on such Persons called according to his mind to the Office of the Ministry enabling them unto and to be exercised in that Work But the Provision that Liturgies make is by a precise reading and pronouncing of the Words set down therein without Alteration Diminution or Addition and that toties quoties let so much go for currant and therefore exclusive the former unless it can be made appear that an Ability to read the prescribed words of the Liturgy be the Gifts promised by Christ for the discharge of the Work of that Ministry § This I conceive is no good Sequel and must be inquired into that those that composed our Liturgy or those that may compose a new one either were or may be Persons qualified and gifted for the Work of the Ministry and for edifying of the Body of Christ and consequently without exception and that the Subject and Matter of our Liturgy is or the Matter and Contents of another Liturgy may be either is or may be will make good my Assertion for Liturgies in general both for the Credenda and Agenda for Prayers Thanksgiving Instructions and Exhortations according to the Doctrine of the Gospel I think no sober Man will deny Now if the Persons and Matter be granted to be such then I conceive that it can be as little gain-said but that the composing of such Forms by such Persons is as truly a Gift and an Exercise of some parts of the Gifts of the Work of the Ministry as their composing of Prayers and Sermons and afterwards praying and preaching them without Book is by the several Ministers of the Gospel This or that Form of words and without Book or within Book cannot alter the Case For that which giveth the very Being to Sermons conceived Prayers c. is the Wit and Vnderstanding of Man and consequently they are many times corrupt and it is the like Wit and Understanding of Man that gives Being to Liturgies jam sumus ergo pares in this though happily they may have their reciprocal Excellencies and Preheminencies one over the other in this or that particular consideration I hope and am verily perswaded that this Author when he penned this Conclusion and Exception viz. And therefore exclusive the former unless that it can be made appear that an Ability to read the prescribed words of the Liturgy be the Gifts promised by Christ for the discharge of the Work of the Ministers did not intend to put tricks upon or abuse his Readers by equivocally wording of it For a Child or Heathen or Infidel or any other not called to the Ministry that hath newly learned his Horn-Book may have an Ability to read the prescribed Words c. And in such it cannot be expected that an Ability to read c. should be the Gifts promised And therefore he is not to be understood barely of an Ability to read which any Infidel or Child may do but of reading the publick Service of God by those whom God hath appointed and gifted to administer in his Temple and Church and by the Gifts that he doth not intend all the Gifts promised nor yet that reading is the Gift 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 above all other Gifts which are many and therefore cannot reasonably be intended that any one or if he mean all or more than one Gift should be instar omnium either instead or above all the other It 's enough for me if I can make it out that publick readings of the publick Service of God by the Pastors of the Church be one of his many Gifts or that it be an Ordinance appointed by God himself and that it is quodam sensu preaching or tant a monte I shall not in the least trouble my self to prove reading to be a Gift presuming that it will not be denied either by our Author or any other But I shall endeavour to make it appear that such reading such reading as we both do or should mean is an Ordinance

or of the Rules which Christ gave to his Pastors and Teachers for the Regular Administration of his Word and Worship or of any spiritual Abilities given or promised to be continued to them for the discharge and performance of the whole Work of the Ministry and will answer the mind of Christ and will much very much conduce unto the main end proposed viz. Edification And that they are but mistaken Averments to affirm that Liturgies or prescribed or limited Forms of Prayer and Praises to be used or Read in the publick Administration of Evangelical Institutions cannot be made use of but by rejection of the Provision made by Christ. And that the Imposition of them doth impose on others the observation of things in the Worship of God which neither the Lord Jesus nor his Apostles did appoint or impose And that all such Imposition is destitute of any Plea or Pretence from Scripture or Antiquity And that Liturgies are an Humane Invention contrary to the mind of Christ I could now wish that this our Author seeing Liturgies do not please would so far have obliged this whole Church and State as to have prescribed us some better and more Adaequate mean for the supplying of the defects of Liturgies and for the more easie and Familiar teaching and keeping our fundamentals pure and clean and for the keeping out of Popery Idolatry Superstition and indeed all kind of Trash and Trumpery that like a Torrent hath overspread this Nation since these dayes of Liberty and decrying Liturgies from Ranters Quakers Adamites Enthusiasts Phanaticks Seekers Antitrinitarians Antisabatarians Famulists and indeed from an Iliad more of others ejusdem farinae 〈…〉 si quid novisti rectius Candidus Imperti si non his utere me●um It were done but like a Man in Buss to make here a proud Challenge to all our new and brightest Luminaries to give us any one Machin or Paralel so excellent or equal in all respects to that of Liturgies for the ends mentioned but I forbear and shall only crave Liberty most humbly to recommend unto all parties viz. Prelates Presbiters Independents c. that Admonition which St. Paul gave to the Phillippians which concern these times as much as those wherein he Wrote and the maintainers of true Religion most of all and it were most happy for Christianity if all Christians could in very good earnest embrace it viz. let nothing be done through strife or vain Glory but in lowliness of mind let each esteem other better then themselves 2 c. 3. And that other Precept also of the same Apostle viz. to study to be quiet 1 Thes 4.11 Duties without doubt with all our might to be endeavoured and in no Age or Church more necessary to be pressed and urged then our own abounding with so many busie Spirits and rest-less male-contents Athens it self not more mad upon News and Novelties then our English Nation not only in vain things but in matters of far greater concern our love of change and that Israelitish humor revived in us even in Church Government to be like other Nations Tho we have seen Gods blessing on our Ministery to the envy of Adversaries and admiration of neighbour Churches and have demonstrated our Discipline to suit with the Primitive and Apostolick State of the Church this yet seems wanting that we have not experimented Forreign Formes nor shaped our Alter according to the fashion fetcht us from Damascus 2 King 16.10 11. from Geneva or other Forreign Countries I could wish our Tumultuous and almost mutinous stirrings and Sallies in that kind had not made us a Reproach among Papists and a scandal amongst the Enemies of the Gospel my Prayer to God shall be to settle us in unity of mind and affections that we may speak and think one thing Studying the things that concern Peace and wherewith we may edifie one another 1 Cor. 1.10 I shall now conclude the discourse concerning Liturgies with this observation that in using a Liturgy we have followed all the Churches in the World even the most Antientest of St. Chrysostome and Basil that never any Church in the World but had its set Formes of Prayer especially for the Publick And because our Discourser doth so peremptorily aver f. 3. that there were no Liturgies in the purest times next and nearest to the dayes of the Apostles and that the Fathers never used any All Negatives and which he can never prove I shall here give you a small Catalogue of some few of many Liturgies and Rituals which if the Legitimate Issue of their reputed Fathers then without all doubt and Controversie they were in use in the Apostles dayes and purest times But at worst if but Spurious and Illegitimate yet if such in truth they at least prove their own Antiquity and Universality to be very early and very general because used in divers Countries as appears by the divers Languages they are in viz. Hebrew Greek Latine Arabick Syriack Gothick Aethiopick c. viz. Liturgiae Grecae nomen Preferentes Jacobi Petri Marci Clementis Basilij Chrysostomi Gregorij Rom. Liturgia Ecclesiae Constantinopolitan Novum Anthologium Basilij Anaphora Syriaca Missa Angamallencis Christianorum St. Thomae Graecorum Euchologium Menaea Octoechum Anastasimum Pentecostarium Armenor Liturgia Missa Ambrosiana Liturg. Aegyptia Basilij Gregorij Nazianzini Cyrilli Alexandrini Gregorij Antiphonarium Sacramentarium Officium Muzarabum in Hispania Missale Gothicum Ordo Romanus Antiquus Missa Latina Antiqua Liturgia Ecclesiae Graecae lingua Prosica Officia Arabica Consider 1o. That in the Jewish Church they had set Formes 10 Numb 35 36. Moses prescribed a set Form of Prayer for the going out and coming in of the Ark. 68 Psal 1 2. The Lord prescribes 6 Numb 23. A set Form of Blessing Confession is prescribed every time they offered the Oblation they should use this Form 102 Psal was Penned for an afflicted Soul and 92 the Title 1 Chr. 16.7 2 Chr. 7 6. Christ taught his Prayer twice which is both a Prayer and Form of Prayer when we Pray this Prayer it is a most sure and excellent Comfort to us that we know that what we ask it is according to his Will 1 Joh. 22. 2o. In the Christian Church set Forms were used even in the dayes of Christ and his Apostles Christ gave his Disciples a set Form 6 Mat. 9. he uses a set Form himself 26 Mat. 44. The same Word 3o. He and his Apostles had their Hymn 26 Mat. 30. 4º Such Psalms and Hymns perpetually in the Apostles times and by their Command 3 Collossans 16.5 Eph. 19. 3o. Davids Psalms which contain Prayers Praises Thanksgiving c. which are the matter of all Liturgies have been Read and Sung in the Church in all Ages And our Non-Conformists who deny set Forms did in Olivers time when the Liturgy was taken away Sing Psalms in the Church many of which are Prayers and set Forms both as to the matter and Form 4o. For the