Selected quad for the lemma: scripture_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
scripture_n	apostle_n	church_n	tradition_n	9,173	5	9.2350	5	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A70609	Presbyterian inquisition as it was lately practised against the professors of the Colledge of Edinburgh, August and September, 1690 in which the spirit of Presbytery and their present method of procedure is plainly discovered, matter of fact by undeniable instances cleared, and libels against particular persons discussed.	Monro, Alexander, d. 1715?	1691 (1691)	Wing M2443; ESTC R5724	77,713	110

the Masters sure if the Visitors want Men to Accuse these Masters it cannot be ascribed to their want of Industry to procure them 2dly The great Zeal these Commissioners had to purge the Universities from Malignants made them upon all occasions stretch the words of their Instructions far beyond their ordinary and usual signification When some enquired whether by that part of the Test which requires to submit to Presbytery were meant only a quiet and peaceable living under that Government or if it imported any thing farther Some of the Commissioners plainly told that by that Clause of the Test was also meant That every Master should tbereby Declare the Presbyterian Government to be preferable to any other whatsoever and the only Government left by Christ and his Apostles in the Church and warranted by Scripture By the same Spirit of Prebyterian Moderation some of the Commission Declared that by the Acknowledging and Subscribing the Westminster Confession of Faith is not only meant an owning of it in so far as it is a System of Theologie conform to the Holy Scriptures and one of the best designed for distinguishing the Reformed Church from these Hereticks and Schismaticks that now disturb it but that it also imports an absolute owning of every particular Article thereof as the only and most perfect Confession that hath been or can yet be composed and that therefore it was to be Acknowledged Professed and Subscribed without any Limitation Restriction or Reservation whatsoever The Visitors might have been well assured That no Master or Professor of any Conscience who had been Episcopally Ordained or acquainted with the Primitive Constitution of the Church could any ways comply with Conditions so Rigid and Severe It had been soon enough then for the Presbyterians to have fled to their old Experimented way of Libelling when the Masters had stood their ground against that New Test which Originally had no end but to make vacant places But the Preachers of that Party Members of the Visitation judged it more convenient Boldly and Indefatigably to Calumniate the Professors lest if they had been turned out for mere and just Scruples of Conscience the People should have murmmured and complained The Body of Mankind often believe the first and loudest Reports few of the People being capable willing or at leisure to Examine the Truth of things and since now the Faction had got the uppermost and had Power in their hand they enquire into all things that might make the Professours odious to the City or Nation and thought fit to let them feel the effects of their Rashness if in all their Life time they had been once spoke against the Imposture or Enthusiasme of that Sect. The Presbyterian Preachers who earnestly wished to be Employed in the Toyl and Drudgery of this Affair made it their Business to search into all the Actions of the Professors Lives especially such as were capable to be Transformed into a Libel and having the Assistance and Zeal of some of the New Magistrates of Edinburgh to second their Endeavours it was easie to foresee what Quarter they might expect who differed from them And this was no difficult Province for Presbyterians to mannage considering the Nature of their Discipline and their present Constitution The most innocent things have two handles and some Men industriously seize the worst But because they pretended to be most Accurate Reformers they would therefore do their work thorowly and strip their Opposers as bare of their Reputation and Good Name as of their Livelyhoods and Preferments and having now got the Church's Jurisdiction and Revenues into their hands it was not safe for them to want the Government and Psssession of the Seminaries of Learning And therefore the Presbyterians that Preached before the Parliament never forgot to Exhort such as were in Power speedily to Reform the Universities which is no less in their Language than to plant them with Presbyterians To accomplish this it was necessary to Represent the Masters of Universities under the Episcopal Constitution as very Ill Men Enemies to the Godly Socinians Papists now the People could not discern when they spoke Contradictions for tho' Socinianism and Popery be two opposite Points of the Compass yet some of their Emissaries scrupled not among the Gossoping Sisters and at other more Publick Meetings to Accuse one and the same Person of both When the Government of the City of Edinburgh was lodged in the hands of the first and best order of Citizens and Gentlemen the Masters of the Colledge had all the Encouragement that they themselves could wish They lived in all Tranquility and Freedome during the Administration of Sir Magnus Prince and his Predecessour Sir Thomas Kennedy They made it both of them their Business to preserve the Order Fabrick and Revenues of that House they omitted no occasion of Supporting the Honour and Reputation of its Masters as well as of discouraging what ought to be reproved and timously amended whenever there was the least ground for it The Masters of the College in that Period had nothing to do but carefully to look after the Manners and Proficiency of their Students for the Countenance of the Magistrates and their generous Inclinations to Propagate Learning did so secure and guard the Professors against the little efforts of censorious and talkative Fanaticks that they could not contrive how to be more happy in their Stations For these Gentlemen knew what an Ornament their University was to the City and whole Kingdom how necessary Freedom Contentment and Retirement are to the attainment of Learning and therefore they were so far from vexing and disturbing them that they heaped upon them all marks of Honour and Regard Others shuffling themselves into the Magistracy under the Covert of such Commotions as necessarily attend all great Revolutions had not the same view of things They thought their Business was to Reform tho' they knew not what and this Reformation was regulated by such Oracles as managed their Councils and the Responses were always given by Interest Hence they seemed to mind nothing so much as the disturbance of that Seminary Sometimes they thought that they might manage the Discipline of the House without considering the Masters sometimes they thought they might by themselves without the King or any formality of Tryal remove and displace them at their Pleasure sometimes they pick'd Quarrels with the Students of purpose to accuse their Masters sometimes they would contrive odd and phantastick Schemes of Discipline and it is not easie to imagine into what freakish Humours silly Conceits and little Tricks this Fancy metamorphosed it self in the space of two Years But those Attempts served only to make Citizens of the best Sense and Quality some of them to Laugh and others to Lament that the Professors of the Liberal Sciences should be so treated by such illiterate Busie-bodies For generally the Citizens of Edinburgh are not only Affable Kind and Courteous to the Masters of that

Edinburgh ordered Dr. Monro upon the 25th of August within two or three days after to give up to the Clerk of the Committee a Copy of his Dictates The Doctor told them what the Themes were upon which he had his publick Praelections viz. De Deitate Christi De ejusdem Sacrificio De adventu Messiae De natura ortu progressu Religionis Christianae c. And so they needed not be Inquisitive after them for they were not likely to find in them those Opinions that they were most zealous against But withal he added that he himself wrote a very ill hand that the Papers that lay by him were in many places blotted and interlined But he promised where ever he could find a Copy among the Students he would deliver it up to their view For the Copy they wrote was more just than any he had in his keeping for in the very time of the Publick Praelection he did Add Change and Alter as he saw convenient This did not satisfie but one of their number pleaded that he should give up his Dictates immediately and that the Apology he made was a Shift and downright contempt of the Committee I think it was Hume of Polwart that reasoned thus with some degrees of warmth against the Doctor The Doctor was content to undeceive them as far as was possible and therefore he desired they might name some of their own number to examine his Dictates and that he would wait upon them and read the Dictates to them himself since he presumed none else could read them so well It seems they found this overture reasonable for after that offer made by the Doctor he heard not one word more of the Dictates they never inquired after them However the Doctor procured a legible Copy of his Dictates De Sacrificio Christi from one of the Students and gave it to the Clerks that they might give it to whom they pleased It fell out that when they were speaking very hotly about the Doctor 's Dictates that he told them himself that for one year he had changed his publick Dictates into Chatechetio Conferences The reason was this That he perceived that it was not possible to order any publick Lesson equal to the Capacity and Advantage of all the Students for some of them being but so very young that they were but Learning their Latine and Greek Others of them being advanced so near the Degree of Masters of Art most part of the Youth within the Colledge could not be thought capable to understand Theological Controversies which were the ordinary Theams of such Publick Praelections Therefore the Doctor advised with some of the Masters what way the publick Lecture upon the Wednesdays might be made Universally useful to all the Students within the Colledge And the result was that he told the Students he would not put them that Year to the toil of writing any but ordered them to convene frequently on the Wednesdays and he would explain to them the Apostolick Creed one Article after another viva voce this he did for that year The Students were better satisfied much more edified and less wearied than when they were obliged to Write for now they came to the School freely of their own accord without constraint whereas formerly they neither writ what was Dictated nor were all the Masters able to drive them to the publick Hall when they had strained their Authority to the greatest height And perhaps some of them who were most concerned then to magnifie every shaddow of an Objection against the Doctor have found by their proper experience that the publick Dictates are no more regarded than their Character This then was the Doctor 's fault that he changed a publick Lesson that served no end but that of Form and useless Solemnity into a profitable useful and serious Exercise By his imployment he was obliged to teach the Youth the first Principles of Christian Religion what more proper method could he devise than go through the Articles of the Apostolick Creed and explain them partly from Scripture partly from the assistance of Natural Reason partly from the Universal Tradition of the Church and partly from such Concessions of Pagan Authors as might either illustrate or confirm what was believed among the Christians This was the method he took But was the Doctor obliged by any Statute in the House never to vary the former Custom of Praelections No that is neither pretended nor alledged wherein then was he to be blamed that he taught his own Scholars in the manner he judged most proper for their Edification perhaps when Elias comes he 'll tell us where the fault lay and not till then shall we ever know Let me ask one question and so I 'll leave this Argument Did all the Doctor 's Predecessours so Superstitiously observe this way of Dictating without change or alteration of the Method No for the truly Learned and Pious Dr. Lighton Bishop of Dumblain when he was Principal of the Colledge of Edinburgh did never oblige them to write one word from his Mouth But instead of those Dictates recommended to them viva voce the most excellent truths of the Christian Religion in the most unimitable strains of Piety and Eloquence And Mr. Adamson his Predecessour did Catechise as you may see by the Printed Copy of his Catechism nor is there any restraint upon the Principal of the Colledge either from Statute or Custom why he may not change his Method as oft as he sees convenient Yet to make a mighty muster of Arguments against the Doctor his Catechetick Conference must be made a part of his Crime I think one Mr. Law had the honour of making this discovery but I am not very sure of it Report And that it appears by the publick Registers of the Magistrand Laureation that whereas in the Year 1663 till the Year 1687 the Magistrands were always sworn to continue in the Verity and Purity of the Gospel or in the Christian Religion reformed according to the Purity of the Gospel yet in the Year 1687 and 1688 when Dr. Monro was Principal he takes the Magistrands obliged only to persevere in the Blank Christian Religion and this Blank is found three several times in the Book viz. At two publick Laureations and a private one and the Doctor having laid the blame on the Bibliothecarius his negligence and craving the Bibliothecarius might be examined thereupon He being accordingly Sworn and examined Depones that what he wrote in the Magistrand Book was either by direction of the Primar or of one of the Regents and in presence of the Faculty or of a Quorum of them and that what he did write in the said Book was always read over in presence of the Masters and Scholars And particularly the Alteration of the Promise made at the Graduation in the Year 1687. As also the Committee considering that at the two last Laureations in the Year 1689 and 1690 neither Oath nor Promise was required at