Selected quad for the lemma: reason_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
reason_n	church_n	scripture_n	tradition_n	3,753	5	9.2711	5	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A54185	One project for the good of England that is, our civil union is our civil safety : humbly dedicated to the great council, the Parliament of England.	Penn, William, 1644-1718.	1679 (1679)	Wing P1334; ESTC R32178	14,589	11

next place they do not only consequentially disclaim the Pope's Supremacy and all adhesion to forreign Authority under any Pretence but therewith deny and oppose the Romish Religion as it stands degenerated from Scripture and the first and purest Ages of the Church which makes up a great Negative Union And it cannot be unknown to men read in the Reasons of the Reformation that a Protestation made by the German Reformers against the Imperial Edicts of Charles the fifth imposing Romish Traditions gave beginning to the word Protestant In short It is the Interest of the Ruling or Church Protestants of England that the Pope should have no Claim or Power in England It is also the Interest of the Dissenting Protestants that the Pope should have no Claim or Power here in England because they are subject to the same Mischiefs and Sufferings in their Civil and Religious Rights that the Church Protestants are liable to if then both are like to lose by Pope and Forraign Authority their Interest must needs be one against Pope and Forraign Authority and if they have but one Interest it will follow that the Church Protestant cannot prejudice the Dissenting-Protestant but he must weaken and destroy his own Interest The Civil Interest of English Protestants being thus the same and their Religious Interest too so far as concerns a Negative to the Usurpation and Error of Rome I do humbly ask if it be the Interest of the Government to expose those to Misery that have no other Civil Interest than THAT of the Government Or if it be just or equal that the Weaker should be prosecuted by the more Powerful Protestants whose Interest is Positively the same in Civils and in Religion Negatively One would think 't were Reasonable that they should not suffer by Protestants who if Popery ever have a day are likely to suffer with them and that upon the same Principles Experience tells us That the wisest Architects lay their Foundations broad and strong and raise their Squares and Structure by the most exact Rules of Art that the Fabrick may be secure against the Violence of storms but if People must be destroy'd by those of the same Interest truly that Interest will stand but Totteringly and every breath of Opposition will be ready to shake it 'T was the Inconfutable answer Christ made to the Blasphemers of that Power by which he wrought Miracles A Kingdom divided against it self cannot stand what he said then let me on another occasion say now an Interest divided against it self must fall I know some Men will take Fire at this and by Crying The CHURCH The CHURCH hope to silence all Arguments of this Nature But they must excuse me if I pay no manner of Regard to their Zeal and hold their Devotion both Ignorant and Dangerous at this time It is not the way to fill the Church to Destroy the People A Church without People is a Contradiction especially when the Scripture tells us that 't is the People that makes the Church And 't is not without an appearance of Reason that some good wise men are apprehensive that the greatest Sticklers for Persecuting Protestant Dissenters in favour of the Church of England are men addicted and devoted to the Church of Rome or at least animated by such as are who disparing of doing any great Feats if known hide themselves under these pretences but the meaning of it is to debilitate the Protestant cause in general by exciting the Church of England to destroy all other Protestant Interests in these Kingdoms that so nothing may remain for Popery to conflict with but the few Zealous abettors of that Church And that this may not look disingenuous or like a Trick of mine I will enforce it by a demonstration It is plain fact that the Church of Rome hath ever since the Reformation practic'd the Restoration of her Religion and Power in these Kingdoms It is as evident that Religion is with her a word for Civil Interest that is that she may have the Rule over men both Body and Soul For 't is Government she aims at to have the rains of Power in her hand to give Law and weild the Scepter To do this she must either have a greater interest then the Protestants that are now in possession or else divide their Interest and so weaken them by themselves and make them Instruments to her ends That her own force is Inconsiderable is clear She has nothing within Doors to give her hope but the Discord of Protestants It follows then that she must of necessity bestir her self and use her Arts to enflame the reckoning among Protestants and carry their Dissents about Religious matters to a division in the Civil Interest And it is the more to be fear'd because whatever she has been to others she has been ever true to her self If this then be the only domestick Expedient left her we are sure she will use it and if so it must needs be of great Importance with all Protestants to let fall their private Animosities and take all possible care that their dissents about Faith or Worship which regard the other World divide not their Affection and Judgment about the Common and Civil Interest of their Country because if that be kept entire it equally frustrates the designs of Rome as if you were of one Religion For since as I said before Religion with the great men of that Church is nothing else but a softer word for Civil Empire preserve you but your Civil Interest from fraction and you are in that sense of one Religion too and that such an one as you need not fear the temptation of Smithfield if you will but be true to it This being the case I would take leave to ask the Zealous Gentlemen of the English Church If Conformity to the fashion of their Worship be dearer to them then Englands Interest and the Cause of Protestancy if their love to Church-Government be greater then to the Church and her Religion and to their Country and her Laws or lastly whether in case they are sincere in their Allegations for the Church which I confess ingenuously I am apt to suspect it is to be supposed that the present Church-men Conformists I mean are better able of themselves to secure Protestancy and our Civil Interest against the Attempts of Rome then in Conjunction with the Civil Interest of all Protestant Dissenters If they say yes I would have them at the same time for the same reason to give it under their Hands that 't is a standing Rule in Arithmetick that ONE is more then SIX and that hitherto we have been all mistaken in the art of Numbers Being brought to this pinch I conceive they must say that they had rather deliver up their Church to the Power and Designs of Popery then suffer Dissenters to live freely among them though Protestant of one negative Religion and of the same Civil Interest or else hasten to break