Selected quad for the lemma: spirit_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
spirit_n	aaron_n	apostle_n	son_n	33	3	4.4385	3	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A43647	An apologetical vindication of the Church of England in answer to those who reproach her with the English heresies and schisms, or suspect her not to be a catholick-church, upon their account.	Hickes, George, 1642-1715.	1687 (1687)	Wing H1840; ESTC R20398	73,683	104

and his and are under a political oeconomy of the same nature and he that understood it very well said That Satan was not divided against Satan because if he were his kingdom could not stand But it hath stood firm and undivided ever since it was first formed before the sensible Creation it was never yet shaken with intestine Divisions there was never two or three opposite Soveraigns at one time in that cursed Hierarchy nor two or three Pretenders to the Chair of Lucifer And therefore I hope bare Unity or want of Divisions will never hereafter pass among considering men for a mark of a truly Catholick Church And as it is among Spirits so 't is among men The worst Fraternities have sometimes the firmest Union as we of this Nation very well remember the Time when those of the great Rebellion boasted that God had united the Hearts of his People in his Cause as one Man nevertheless those pretended People of God whose Hearts and Hands were so united that we could not break their Bonds of Union asunder were no better then a Band of Rebels and their Cause downright Rebellion against God and the best of Princes tho' they acted in it as if they had been all informed with one common Soul. The like hath often happened in Ecclesiastical Societies The Samaritans who had neither Sadduces nor Pharisees nor Essenes nor Herodians nor Cabalists nor Carraites among them for that Reason had a firmer Union among themselves then the Church of the Jews had and yet they were not the true Church So among the ancient Christians the Novatians lived in perfect Peace and Unity among themselves when there were many Feuds and Contentions among the Catholicks Which shews that bare Unity is not a good Test whereby to try Churches or if it were I am confident the Church of England upon a fair tryal would carry the Garland from the Roman and appear to be the more Catholick Church Could there be found any fit and indifferent Judge between them I durst as far as I am concerned put the merit of the Controversie between us and the R. Cs. upon this single point of Union and would engage to render my self a Proselyte if their Church carried the Cause Perhaps they may think his a very bold Challenge because of the great number of Sectaries that have gone out from us but then they are to consider that as the Protestants which in several Parts of Europe under several Denominations have gone out from them are now nothing unto them so neither are the Congregational Sects which went off from us any thing or of any account to us But take our Church and theirs as they are precisely in themselves without any regard to their respective Separations and I am very confident for all their boastings of Union that the Church of England will be found to have both more potential and actual Union in it then the Church of Rome For first as to potential Union however the Church of Rome is actually united it hath the seeds of Division in its Bowels and as Rebeckah once had different Nations so has she different Churches struggling in her Womb. The Principle of the Pope's Supremacy is it self sufficient were there no more to cause continual Feuds and Factions in the Popedom and * In his excellent Tracts De causis dissentionum in Ecclesiis de primatu Papae ad calcem Salmasii de primatu Papae Nilus Bishop of Thessalonica did most judiciously assign it for the cause of all the Divisions that then tore the Catholick Church into pieces the Bishops of Christendom not being able to endure the Usurpation nor other Churches contrary to their fundamental Liberty to be Subjects to the Roman Church The exercise of this usurped Power of the Pope's being the supream ordinary of the Universal Church is that which makes the Roman Bishops themselves sigh and murmur in private and say with Spalatensis where they can say it safely Frater noster ille est Collega Coepiscopus nobiscum and however they conceal their Resentments as the Spanish Prelates did before the Council of Trent yet they are willing upon the first opportunity to assert their Apostolical Equality and like the English Prelates at the time of the Reformation will be glad when they can do it with a prospect of success to cast off the Yoke which makes Christendom groan and which neither they nor their Predecessor were able to bear Let but Christian Princes say the word and then we shall see what the Bishops will do or let there be but a free and general Council indeed and then let us see if the Pope shall not be told in both ears That the Church Universal is a great Colledge and the Government of it Aristocratical that the Episcopat is one but that it is divided among all Bishops whereof every one hath his share that the Apostles received equal Power and Authority from the same Masters that the Bishops were their Successors and that the other Bishops receive their Authority no more from the Successor of St. Peter then he doth from them but that all receive it alike from Jesus Christ When it shall be safe the Bishops of the Roman Church will talk and write as much to this purpose as ever the English Divines did who in asserting this Doctrine follow the Example of their Ancestors before the Reformation I mean the Saxon Bishops one of whom in his Advice to his Clergy speaks thus * Ge sceolon eac ƿitan þat eoƿre hades syndan þa aesteran hadar aester urum hadum and us þa nystan gelice þa biscopas syndan ongeƿrixle þara Apostola on þaere haligþa gesomnunge sƿa syndan þa maesse preostas on þam geprixle ●pister þegna þa B●sc●opas Aapones and þa maesse preostas ƿone had his suna Spelm. Concil uol 1. p. 586. Ye ought to know that your Order is next after and next to ours for as the Bishops are in the place and stead of the Apostles over the holy Church so are the Priests in the place of the Disciples The Bishops are of the Order of Aaron and the Priests have the Order of his Sons This Doctrine in all likelihood will one day revive against the Soveraign Pontif for the Spirit of the Archbishop of Granata will for ever be upon the learned Prelates who like Elastick Bodies under pressure are under a constant inclination to recover their liberty and will recover it as soon as they can The next dividing Principle in the Church of Rome is The Doctrine of Transubstantiation which is a Doctrine more full of Contradictions then perhaps any other which Men or Angles can invent It is contrary to all the Senses and Reason of Man to the plain and obvious sense of those very words upon which it is grounded to the Belief of the ancient Catholick Church to the Principles of almost all Sciences It multiplies the hypostatical Union it makes Christ to

may be able to stand against the wiles of the Devil for we wrestle not against flesh and bloud but against principalities and powers against the rulers of the darkness of this world against spiritual wickednesses or wicked spirits in high places All these are several expressions for that society of apostate Spirits which make up the kingdom of darkness as is plain from the 1 st and 2d Verses of the 11 th Chapter of the same Epistle where he saith Ye were dead in trespasses and sins wherein you walked according to the course of this world according to the prince of the power of the air the spirit that now worketh in the children of disobedience who cannot be perswaded to believe the Gospel Wherefore the Combates for which Christians are to fortifie themselves are not only against humane Enemies but the powers of darkness the whole society of Devils who were the Gods of the Gentile World. They are always plotting and contriving against the Church and when they cannot hurt it with Idolatry Polytheism or Persecutions then they strive to get Altar set up against Altar in it and distract it with Heresie and Schism Accordingly St. Ignatius in his Ep. to the Ephesians calls Heresies and false Doctrines Herbs or Plants of the Devil 's planting and tells them in the same Epistle That to meet often together and receive the holy Eucharist in peace and concord was the only way to weaken the powers of Satan and prevent the ruine and destruction he would otherwise bring upon them by Division and to convince them how malicious and vigilant an enemy he is to the Church he tells them That there were three Mysteries of the Christian Religion which were kept from his knowledge The Virginity of Mary her bringing forth or the Nativity of her Son and the Death of our Lord. Had Satan come to the knowledge of these Mysteries unless God had chained him and his evil angels up they would have made ill use of them against the great design of man's Redemption and accordingly many learned men have given his for one Reason of the obscurity of the Prophecies and why God was pleased so artificially to conceal many things in them lest Satan coming to the knowledge of them should endeavour to prevent or obstruct the fulfilling of them or enervate the certainty and demonstration of them after they were fulfilled Thus Justin Martyr in his first commonly called the second Apology observes That he did before-hand to the best of his skill teach and institute many things among the Pagans which had some semblance with the future Mysteries of the Christian Religion that so when they came to pass they might not seem such divine and wonderful Mysteries as indeed they are The like is observed by * Tert●ll dep●●● script Haeres 〈◊〉 40. Tertullian after him and made out by many particular Instances to which I remit the curious Reader which shews That he hath a great and active spite against the Church of God more especially against such parts of it as are pure in Doctrine or Worship to sow Heresies and Schisms among them and divide the unity of their Communion And therefore the same St. Ignatius in his Ep. to the Trallesians bids them beware of Separations and Divisions as of the Snares of the Devil and in his Ep. to the Philadelphians he prays them in his wonted phrase to abstain from the evil Herbs which Christ never cultivated because they were not of his heavenly Father's planting meaning the Weeds of false Doctrines which Satan had sowed among them and which he saith did not only cause different Parties among them but a perfect separation of many from the Church So Justin * P. 403. Martyr in his Dialogue with Trypho ascribes all the impious and blasphemous Doctrines which were then taught in the Name of Christ to the Inspirations of the unclean spirit of the Devil and accordingly when St. Polycarp met Marcion the Heretick he told him He knew him to be the eldest Son of the Devil as being a man who was acted with diabolical Impulse and Inspirations and Tertullian in the Book above-cited saith expresly That the Devil is the Author of Heresie as well as Idolatry The like is observed by St. Cyprian and Theodoret who ascribe all Heresies to the invention and artifice of the Devil and all the Histories of Heresies and Schisms in Ecclesiastical Writers are still ushered in with prefatory Complaints of the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the envious and wicked Devil whose business hath been from the beginning to deceive and molest the Church of God. Nay the purer any Church is in Doctrine and Worship the more we may be sure he will stickle against it and endeavour to weaken and disgrace it by intestine Divisions and perswade the dividing Parties to form themselves into opposite Schisms Indeed where Churches are already corrupted in Doctrine and Worship and firmly adhere to those Corruptions 't is his interest to let them alone and not to hazard the Reformation of them by stirring up Contentions and Divisions in them but in Churches where the Doctrine and Worship are kept pure and Apostolical by the care and vigilance of the Pastors in Churches where the Scriptures are openly taught and read and the whole Worship of God but more especially the holy Sacraments are duly administred by lawful Ministers and the Communion of Saints carefully maintained In such pure and Apostolical Churches as these he hath no other game to play but to get them as far as he can extirpated by Persecutions or where that fails to make Mutinies and Divisions and Schisms in them and so to weaken the common Interest of the whole by dividing it into parts Where he cannot unite the Members of a Church in pernicious Doctrines and Practices he will labour hard to dissolve them by pernicious Schisms where he cannot unite them against Truth he will strive to divide them against Charity and where they will not agree he will make them if he can differ to their own destruction And therefore considering him as the principal Cause of Divisions all that can be concluded upon that Consideration against any particular Church is only this That the Members of it are subject like the Members of all other Churches to be deceived and drawn away by the Devil and if upon special enquiry it be found that she is pure and Apostolical in her Doctrine Worship and Discipline all that can then be concluded is no more then this That the Devil is become her particular Enemy and hath a particular spite against her upon the account of her Excellence and Worth. This is the worst Consequence that can be drawn from Divisions and Separations against such a Church as ours and we are willing to admit it we are willing to acknowledge that the Devil hates the Church of England more then many Churches and if those that object our Divisions to us