Selected quad for the lemma: scripture_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
scripture_n	according_a	church_n	prove_v	2,572	5	5.9942	4	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A31418	A discourse concerning the unity of the Catholick Church maintained in the Church of England	Cave, William, 1637-1713.; Thorp, George, 1637 or 8-1719.	1684 (1684)	Wing C1594; ESTC R22818	40,192	64

thus by degrees be withdrawn from subjection to his Authority abroad that darling point never to be dispensed or parted with whatever else might have been yielded Our Reformers who composed our Liturgy carefully collected the remainders of true Primitive Devotion then in use and separated from them all those corrupt additions which ignorance superstition and crafty policy had mixed therewith Therefore it is so far from being an objection that any part of our Liturgy was translated from the Roman Offices that while nothing is retained contrary to wholsom Doctrine and sound Piety it is a convincing argument of her impartial Sincerity and desire to preserve Uniformity as much as possible with all Christians abroad as well as at home in her own Members securing all the Substantials of Worship according to the plain sense of Scripture and the pattern of the Primitive Church And as to Circumstantials and Ceremonies she is sensible when they are too numerous how apt they are to darken the inward and more essential luster of Religion and prove a Burden instead of a Relief to its Worship which she takes notice St. Augustin complain'd of in his time But have since so encreased in the Eastern as well as Western Churches that it must argue a great aw to make the Service look like any thing serious and Sacred However this number alone where the particulars are not otherwise obnoxious tempts some to spend all their zeal therein and diverts them from things more necessary or gives too much occasion to others to quarrel about them Yet withal being apprehensive how needful it would be to maintain Order and Decency She hath kept some though very few and those most plain and unexceptionable in their nature most significative of the end for which they were appointed and most ancient and universal in their Institution and practice hinted in the title of our Liturgy as it is changed from the former And to prevent all differences hereabout she hath expressed her sense of them so clearly and explicitely that one would think no peevish obstinacy had room to interpose a scruple however the event hath proved Thus abundantly hath the Church of England vindicated her Reformation from all pretence of Apostacy from the True Ancient Catholick and Apostolick Church and shewed in all instances how careful she hath been to preserve the Vnity of the Spirit in the bond of peace with all the Members thereof Nor hath she been wanting in any respect or reverence due thereunto No Church being more cautious and sparing in its determinations more Canonical in its Impositions more Regular in its Succession and more charitable in its Censures making all necessary provision for her own Children so within the bounds of Catholick Unity that had other Churches observed the like method or measures way had been made for an universal consent and every true Christian where ever he came would have found his own Church wherewith to communicate without hesitancy in all Religious Offices And as St. Augustin observed in his time he would have needed but to enquire for the Catholick Church and no Schismatick would have dared to divert him to their Conventicles But if after the confusions and disorders of so many Centuries amidst such a depraved state by corrupt manners diversities of opinion and perplext Interests so great a happiness be not to be hoped for now that private person or particular Church will clear themselves before God and all good men that do what is in their power towards it and pray to Him to amend what they cannot change and in the mean time make the best use of what means they enjoy Upon which Premises an easie Solution is given to the old cavilling question Where was your Church before the Reformation or that time We answer Just where it is Thereby no new Church was set up no new Articles of Faith brought in no new Sacraments no new order of Priesthood to minister in holy things all which would have indeed required new Miracles and a new immediate Authority from Heaven so attested only the old were purged from impurities in Doctrine Worship and Practice which in passing through so many degenerate Ages they had contracted and that an ordinary Power might suffice to do If we were in the Catholick Church before we are so still and hope to better purpose We are not therefore out of it because their rash Censures have excluded us and then they unreasonably take advantage to argue against us from their own act We never formally shut them out what ever they have done to us What degrees of corruption in Faith or Manners may be consistent with the bare being of a Church or the possibility of salvation therein is needless and dangerous for us nicely to enquire it may be impossible for us to know I am sure it is most safe for us to reform what we know to be amiss and to leave those who do not to stand or fall by their own Master It is a very ill requital of our Charity if it be turned into a weapon of offence to wound or slay us by that by which we shewed our desire of their Cure But they and we must stand another trial and await a final infallible Sentence which ours here cannot change The best security that we know to meet it with comfort will be to use the most strict impartiality with our selves and the greatest Charity to others Yet our Adversaries glory in nothing more than in the name of the Catholick Church and boast in no Title so much as that of Catholicks which hath had deservedly so great veneration in all Antiquity But their claim here truly examined will prove as fallacious and arrogant as in any other instance For the term Catholick if we respect the notation of the word or the most constant use of it is the same as Vniversal and so joyned to the Church signifies the general Body of all Christians dispersed thoughout the World opposed to any distinct Party or separate Communion Thus we find it constantly applied by St. Augustin in all his Tracts against the Donatists and so opposed to them who went about to shut it up within their own Party and streitned Communion therein too closely imitated by our Adversaries who in spite of name or thing make the same inclosures about the Catholick as about the Roman Church and are as free in their severest censures of all others and as haughty in what they assume to themselves alone as they were though not proceeding upon the same grounds But what that holy Father every where presseth upon them reacheth as nearly our Antagonists the indispensable necessity of Charity that great bond of Unity in the Church and principal evidence of the Divine Spirit which animates the whole without which the highest gifts and most Sacred Ministrations are rendred ineffectual This is one of the prime Characteristick notes of the true Catholick Church and every living Member

prescribe bounds to their Administrations and subject in great measure all Laws and persons to his Foreign Courts Jurisdiction and Decrees yea their Purses to his Exactions and upon the least dispute hath withdrawn so great a number of his immediate dependants who scarce own any other Governours and raised so many disturbances that great Princes and States have been forced at last to yield Not to mention the Arrogance it at length grew up unto in dethroning Princes giving their Kingdoms to others authorizing their Subjects to rebel against them or all ways to oppose them and what oft follows if not expressed to murder them as in their late Sentence against some of our Neighbour Princes But before much of this may be seen in the long contentions between some of the Western Emperours particularly Henry the Third and Fourth and the Popes as we have them described in their own Authors Also to go no father their various Contests with several of our Kings especially Henry the Second and the almost continual complaints in all our Parliaments before the Reformation of the encroachments made by them upon the Civil Rights of Prince and Subject by vexatious and chargeable Suits and Appeals as far as Rome by Insolencies and divers Rapines committed under the shelter of their protection and defended from due punishment and by their extravagant Extortions c. abundantly prove Now though these Usurpations grew by degrees and were practised in a different manner according to the condition of those they had to do with or the temper of him that managed them yet they must needs seem more or less grievous to all when power sufficient was not left to the greatest Monarchs to defend themselves or protect their Subjects preserve the peace or promote the welfare and provide for the security of their own Countries Then no marvel if some of them grow weary of so insupportable oppressions and at last take courage to grapple with and extricate themselves from such manifest encroachments upon their own and the Peoples Civil Rights as well as the Ecclesiastical of the Church in their Dominions and be forced to some harsh and almost violent methods when the more gentle and benign could prevail nothing 3. But beside these more publick Invasions upon Church and State that which made the Usurpation more odious and insufferable was the farther abuse of the same extravagant power to bring in strange and dangerous Doctrines corrupt and unlawful practices into the Church and impose them upon all in their Communion exactly fitted to feed their Ambition enrich their Coffers secure their Authority and promote their ease and Luxury Such of the first sort are their Doctrine of Transubstantiation and Purgatory of Merit and Supererogation the multiplicity of Vows and delusions in the Principles of Repentance and ministration of Penance Of the latter sort are the Invocation of Saints and Angels Adoration of Reliques and Images their half Communion the Scripture lockt up and Divine Service performed in an unknown tongue c. These and divers like them have proved great Scandals abroad and stumbling blocks at home and whatever varnish they may put upon them by the fairest pretences or however they may cast a mist before the eyes of their Disciples by nice distinctions yet they have so disfigured the face of Christianity that he who compares the late appearances of it in the world with the model of it laid down in Scripture or the Records of the Primitive Church can hardly believe it the same thing But the particulars are not here to be disputed they have sufficiently been confuted and exposed by Protestant Writers and were by several before excepted against and disclaimed though some suffered severely for so doing and many more we may suppose waited an opportunity to free themselves from their pressure That which I am now most to insist upon is this that if the charge we draw up against these of falshood in judgment gross Superstition or Idolatry in Worship and immorality in manners be true and impartial as we have been ever ready to make good and shall do against all the Artifices of the Defendants Then no Authority whatever however regularly founded or unexceptionably conveyed can oblige us to these against the revealed Will or Word of God the Dictates of our Consciences as we hope carefully and rightly informed the sense and reason of mankind and the Belief and practice of the Church in the first and purest Ages Greater cause was there to endeavour by all lawful means to throw off such an usurped Power that made so ill use of what it had unjustly gotten and to restore Religion to its primitive beauty in Doctrine Worship and Precepts of Life But alas many difficulties lay in the way of its accomplishment and all possible struglings and contentions by force and policy were used by the adverse Party to prevent its beginning or obstruct it Progress Great was their Interest in overy place Strong was the influence they had upon persons in Authority Numerous were their Assistants and Dependants at home and abroad Weighty was their concern which lay at stake and many were the advantages which they had of any that opposed them So that no wonder if a Reformation so long wisht for and much wanted were so slowly effected It is rather more strange that in so many places it did master these and such like encumbrances and in so short a time made so considerable a progress If in some places it proceeded with less Order Uniformity and Calmness than could have been wisht for in a Religious Reformation Necessity in part with many perplexed difficulties and encumbrances may in some measure excuse what no Law before-hand fully warrants IV. But leaving others to answer for themselves in my next particular I am to consider how regularly and sedately it proceeded in the Church of Engiand within the bounds of Catholick Unity 1. With the concurrence and encouragement all along of the Supreme Power to free it from any but suspicion of Rebellion So it began at first with the breaking of the Papal yoke of Supremacy the Translation of the Bible and some like preparatives to Reformation under Henry the Eighth and the united Suffrages of his Parliaments and the Bishops themselves therein It proceeded suitably to a further emprovement in most particulars under his Son Edward the Sixth And at last it came to its full settlement and establishment under Queen Elizabeth The beginning and carrying on of the Reformation here was by such loyalty of Principles and Practices that we challenge any Church in the World to a Comparison therein Indeed this was so notorious that her Roman Adversaries have turned her Glory into a Reproach by upbraiding her though most invidiously with the name of a Parliamentary Religion because it received all along so much countenance and assistance from those great Assemblies of all the three Estates of the Kingdom under their Head and Sovereign 2. But farther to