Selected quad for the lemma: religion_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
religion_n	aaron_n	head_n	ointment_n	16	3	9.6696	5	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A23697	The causes of the decay of Christian piety, or, An impartial survey of the ruines of Christian religion, undermin'd by unchristian practice written by the author of The whole duty of man.	Allestree, Richard, 1619-1681.	1667 (1667)	Wing A1097; ESTC R225979	242,500	456

not so perfectly Camaelion as to subsist upon this meer air there is another kind of it that proposes to its self something beyond this such is the affectation of rule and dominion which though in respect of any real good to the ruler is as very a Chimera as the former yet commonly they that are under such a Iurisdiction find to their cost 't is more than Imaginative And God knows this aspiring humour has been no less fatally active in Ecclesiastick than in Civil affairs nor has the Church ever been in more danger of Anarchy than by those who most impatiently coveted a share in its government for where this spirit of ambition is the Impellent it does like the Demoniack in the Gospel burst asunder all fetters and chains violates the unity both of doctrine and discipline nor is any attempt too bold for men thus animated They who long to be in authority think the door opens not quick enough for their entry and impatient of so tedious an expectation chuse rather to make breaches in the walls nay sometimes to undermine the foundation than to want an access to their Desires Neither is there any thing so sacred which upon this occasion they cannot prostitute when Diotrephes 3 Ioh. 9. seeks preheminence the Dictates even of an Apostle shall be rejected and even the divinity of Christ God blessed for ever be trampled on when Arius wants a footstool to climb up to his affected greatness In a word if we Examine the occurrencies of all ages we shall find that either the eagerness of acquiring or the Revenge of missing dignities have been the great instigators of Ecclesiastick Feuds and sure our Modern stories are not likely to fall short of the Ancient in examples of this kind And as Pride makes some thus passionately desirous of rule so it makes others as impatient of being ruled and even those who cannot hope to arrive to give Laws will not endure to be under those already established That this is indeed the Christian liberty for which many in our daies have so unchristianly contended is too apparent the fundamental quarrel has been against subjection Yet to countenance and abett that whole Armies of frivolous cavils have been rais'd and the Church attacqued in every its remotest concern and though there be nothing farther from that unity of mind to which the simile was first affixt yet in a perverse sense it imitates the Ointment of Aaron in descending from the head to the skirts of the cloathing not only the supreme and more eminent parts but the most slight extrinsick and inferior relatives to Religion being asperst and depraved and the most innocent Circumstances of Civil or Natural actions made criminal when applied to Divine things A strange infective power which these men have convey'd into Gods service that it must thus pollute every thing that approaches it That the place where his Honour dwells must become a Pesthouse and diffuse contagion to all in it I wish by the way their Sacriledge had not been too valiant in despising the Danger of those infected utensils which may perhaps sadly verifie the reproach and prove treacherous prizes and when mens zeal operates thus unkindly when the pretence of internal sanctity devours all outward decency and God is to be honoured and exalted by those ways whereby men would think themselves affronted and vilified we have too great reason to think such a zeal as little according to godliness as knowledge and that it is not so much the tenderness of their Consciences no nor generally the weakness of their Brains but the Iron sinew in their Necks which makes them at once so scrupulous and so clamorous for though the former might be suppos'd owing to Error the later can surely proceed from nothing but Pride Several other instances might be given to shew how that pernicious temper has contributed to the rise and first being of our divisions and having thus given them birth it does not like the Ostrich abandon its Brood but has as great an influence in the cherishing and maintaining as it had in creating them Of this there need no other proof than the meer nature of Pride which as it averts nothing more than self-condemnation so upon pain of that appearance 't is irreversibly engag'd in the pursuit of its first undertakings any desisting being interpretatively a confession either of an Error or a Defeat both which are insupportable to an assuming temper So that besides the original incentives forementioned it has this of disdain superadded to actuate its motions And accordingly we find they are at this rebound the more violent not only the success but the credit of the first enterprize depending upon a vigorous prosecution So that Catilines Maxim of Villany seems to have been adopted into some mens divinity and they think past Crimes are only to be secur'd by more and greater Nor is it only hope to atchieve their design or hide their shame which thus animates them despair will do it to a yet higher degree Our Concupiscible and Irascible appetites dwell not so remote but they are ready reserves to one another and what was desire in the pursuit becomes anger and revenge in the disappointment and sure we need not be told the wild effects of those passions How many men have in a furious despair over-acted even their own projects and have made it a malicious consolation in their ruine to get it attended with that of the publick As Herod who to secure a lamentation at his death commanded a Massacre should accompany it or to give a more Ecclesiastical instance like Aerius who sought the abolishing of that order in the Church whereof himself could not partake I wish no mans Conscience in our days were qualified to suggest a fresher example But whilest 't is so many ways the interest of Pride to abet our contentions we cannot think it so sluggish or unindustrious an agent as not to find out expedients for its purpose I shall not attempt to give a particular of its instruments when I have said that Schism is one of them I need not add more since that alone serves both to complete and perpetuate the Mischief of all our speculative dissentions How close a Band of concord the communicating in holy duties is we may learn by Ieroboam who seems so well to have understood its unitive efficacy that he durst not trust the newly divided Tribes in a joynt resort to the Temple and therefore least the rupture he had made in the State should close again he thinks it necessary to make another in the Church and secure his defection from his Prince by that from his God But we need not borrow a testimony from that his impious Policy we have a more Authentick attestation from the holy Psalmist who when he would describe the greatest entireness Exemplifies it by the walking to the house of God as friends Psal. 55. 14. And the Apostle goes yet higher and from our