Selected quad for the lemma: religion_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
religion_n	argument_n	author_n	great_a	160	3	2.0926	3	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A39119	A vindication of the letter out of the north concerning Bishop Lake's declaration of his dying in the belief of the doctrine of passive obedience, &c. : in answer to a late pamphlet, called, The defence of the profession, &c. of the said Bishop : as far as it concerns the person of quality.	Eyre, William, 1612 or 13-1670.	1690 (1690)	Wing E3946; ESTC R6258	27,474	36

given us a larger Account of that excellent Bishop whose Life I dare say might have furnished him with a great many more remarkable Passages however I think there is nothing more that I need insist upon in the first Part for I do not know that I ever questioned either the Bishop's making of the Profession or the Solemnity of the Circumstances with which it was done therefore must crave leave to tell my Author that he has a little mistaken the Point for 't was not the making but the publishing of it that I excepted against for to another body it would be pretty evident that it was only the publishing of it that seemed so unaccountable to me although indeed it 's a Parenthesis and only in that is said That there seemed no greater occasion for the making of it than there was for my Lord Archbishop to put out Manifesto's to tell the People he is suspended on the same account for these are the very Words of the Letter and where the great offence of them lies or the angry Objection against the making of the Protestation I must confess I do not yet see For I hope the putting him in the same form with his Grace of Canterbury could be no Affront or Disparagement however I dare say the good Bishop would not have thought it so But the Person of Quality is upon all occasions so extreamly obliged to this worthy Author that 't is all one what I say for even my own Encomiums meet with this Return for these are his Words His Civility and due Respect for the Memory of the late Reverend Bishop I should with all Thankfulness most readily acknowledg if I could think it not designed with the better Grace and more Ceremony to cast a blemish upon one of the last and most solemn Acts of his Life But I wonder how long he and the Person of Quality have been so intimately acquainted for although I am sure he does not know my Face yet he pretends to know my Heart a great deal better than I do my self if the Inferences he is pleased to make in this and some other Places are true for I can assure you he tells me of Designs I never thought on But since he makes such Objections I hope he will take care to answer them for I thank God I am not at all concerned to do it But in the mean time he did very well to slip his own Neck out of the Collar and though he pretends to answer my Letter yet waves the main Point which was the Design of publishing the Protestation which he tells us does not at all concern his Friends who had no hand in it But truly that would hardly be credible if he did not affirm it for not many lines before the Person of Quality is accused for designing to cast a Blemish on the last and most solemn Act of his Life Upon which if this be true it seems his Friends set no very great Value for methinks 't is pretty odd that what was signed and asserted so solemnly should be immediately so exposed that the Witnesses and Friends should neither know how nor why it was made publick but that was a Query that I believe it was not convenient to answer and so did very well to start a new Question and although he will not tell you why the Profession was publish'd though he knows it as well as most Men in England yet he will tell you as good a thing and that is the reason why the Bishop made it But before he can do that he must have t'other fling at the Person of Quality in whom he has made such Discoveries as I dare say you in so many Years Acquaintance have never made But Quality indeed were a very desirable thing if it would make one more sagacious than other People but poor I am like to lose my Gentility because I am not so quick-sighted as to see what is so obvious to Persons of less Rank and Quality than I would be thought of for still he will be divining my Thoughts but has hitherto been so much out that I would not advise him to set up for a Fortune-Teller of all things unless he can make better Guesses at other Peoples Hands than he has from my Writing for although I do extreamly value the Esteem of good Men yet I never desired either to be or to be thought a great Man So that without any Offence he may believe me a Chimney-Sweeper or a Cobler if he pleases But now he tells us That all Men of Reason knew that the Reasons for the Doctrine of Passive Obedience could not be contained in so small a Compass and are not well consistent with the Design of a Profession But if the Design of it was to give the World Satisfaction and that in a Controverted Point which was no Fundamental of the Faith nor any way essential either to the Being or Well-being of the Church then I cannot think it would have been superfluous to have subjoined the Reasons that made him of that Opinion rather than of the other For there being as many great and good Men too of the other Side Bishop Lake's bare Name and Opinion is not of Weight enough to turn the Scales and so we of the Laity must still remain in Suspence For we must dissent from some of our Reverend Fathers in God let us take which side we please and being willing to hear both should have been very glad to have seen the Bishop's Reasons for his adhering so stifly to that Doctrine For with Submission to the Reverend Author what Satisfaction soever it might give the good Bishop in the making the publishing has not given the World very much for it only tells us That he lived and died in that Opinion For really I cannot yet see any great Weight in that Argument of his having been bred and born in it Nay indeed I think it is no Argument at all for it being common to all Religions cannot be a Proof of the Truth of any And those which do lay any great Weight upon that I should suspect had but very little to say for that Religion or Opinion that must be adhered to only on that account But to prove the Properness of the Argument the Author is pleased to cite the saying of St. Polycarp Who when at his Martyrdom he was offered his Life if he would revile our Saviour answered That he had now served him 86 Years and he never did me says he any Injury and how can I blaspheme my King and my Saviour This was adds my Author thought so considerable as to be recorded in Ecclesiastical History and delivered down to Posterity Though I suppose it can be no more imagined that Christians only lived then to 86 Years of Age than that only Men of the Church of England now are bred and born in their Religion But what then for really he would have obliged such a dull Creature