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Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
spirit_n	change_v	glory_n	lord_n	7,489	5	5.2782	4	false

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ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A30338	A discourse wherein is held forth the opposition of the doctrine, worship, and practices of the Roman church to the nature, designs and characters of the Christian faith by Gilbert Burnet.; Mystery of iniquity unveiled	Burnet, Gilbert, 1643-1715.	1688 (1688)	Wing B5779; ESTC R7432	58,858	73

the Books of the Old Testament have the Doctrine of Vertue Purity Humility and Meekness laid open very fully but without derogating from these it must be acknowledged that as the Doctrine of Christianity teacheth all these Precepts with clearer Rules and fuller Directions so they were in it recommended by the example of its Author backed with the strongest Motives and enforced with the greatest Arguments In these are the Lessons of Purity Chastity Ingenuity Humility Meekness Patience and Generosity so clearly laid down and so fully evinced that no Man who is so much a Man as to love these things whereby his Mind may be improved to all that is truely great and noble but must be enamoured of the Christian Religion as soon as he is taught it The fourth Design of Religion is to unite Mankind in the closest Bonds of Peace Friendship and Charity which it doth not only by the Rules prescribed for the tempering our Passions forgiving of Injuries and loving our Enemies and by the Doctrin of Obedience to those in Authority over us but likewise by associating us into one Body called the Church wherein we are to worship God jointly and to be coupled in one by the use of the Sacraments which are the Ligaments of the Body Having thus viewed the great designs of the Christian Religion in the several Branches and Parts thereof I shall add to this the main distinguishing Characters of our Religion which are also four The first its its verity that it is not founded on the tattles of Persons concerned nor on the reveries of Dotards nor received with a blind credulity being founded on the Authority of the great God which appeared visibly in those that published it chiefly in the Person of Jesus Christ who by his Miracles that were wrought in the sight of all the People even his Enemies looking on and not being able to deny them but chiefly by his Resurrection from the Dead was declared to be the Son of God which was seen and known by many who followed not cunningly devised Fables but were the Eye-witnesses of his Majesty who went in his Name and published it to the World confirming it by Miracles and mighty Wonders attesting it notwithstanding of all the Persecutions they met with most of them confirming it with their Blood And this Doctrine was received and believed by the better part of Mankind though it being contrary to all the Interests of the flesh whose mortification it teacheth its reception cannot be imputed to credulity or interest The second Character of our Religion is its genuine simplicity and perspicuity that all its Doctrines and Rules are clearly and distinctly held out to us not like the Heathen Divinity much whereof lay in dark Oracles in the Books of the Sybils and in other pretended Mysteries which none but the Priests might handle and expound The Jewish Religion was also vailed with Types and Figures so that it was not easie to see the Substance and Truth through all these foldings and shadows But the Glory of the Christian Religion as to this particular is nobly laid out by St. Paul in these words 2 Cor. 3.18 But we all with open face as in a glass beholding the glory of the Lord are changed into the same Image from glory to glory as by the Spirit of the Lord. The third Character is the Reasonableness of the Christian Religion it containing none of these absurd incredible things which abounded among the Heathens nor of these Rites of Judaism the Reasons whereof besides the Will of God in enjoyning them could not be assigned but both the Doctrines and Precepts of the Christian Religion are fitted for Mankind and so congenial to his Nature that they well deserve the designation of reasonable Service or rational Worship God having made our Souls and them of a piece And the fourth Character of our Religion is its easiness Christ's Yoke is easy and his Burden light Mat. 11.30 Wherein we are freed from all the barbarous and cruel Rites of Gentilism and from the oppressive Bondage of Judaism which was a Law of Ordinances and a Yoke that our Fathers were not able to bear but that we are called to by Christ is so simple so easy and so plain that well may we say his Commandments are not grievous 1 Joh. 5.3 Having given this hint of the Design and Characters of the Christian Religion I hold it not necessary to dwell on a further deduction of those Generals into more particular Branches nor to make this Scheme of Religion good by any longer Proof the Position I have laid down being so obvious to the Reason of every considering Person wherefore I go on to examine if there be any such System of Doctrins or Opinions among Pretenders to Christianity which tends to the overthrowing and enervating of this whole Design and whose Characters are directly opposite to these I have mentioned and the less avowed and the more disguised that Society be as it is more likely to prevail since Error and Vice are not so formidable in their own colours as when vailed with the pretences of Truth and Vertue so it will better agree with that great Character the Prophecies give of this defection that it was a Mystery and had Mystery on its Fore-head Rev. 17.15 And here remains the sad part of my Discourse for what lover of Mankind can with pleasure either satisfy his own Reason or convince the Judgment of others in a Matter the issue whereof is to prove so great a part of the Christian Societies to be Antichristian and adulterate and certainly if my love to Truth and the honour of my Redeemer and his Gospel and by consequence a zeal for Souls did not engage me to this Search I could easily quit the Task and chuse more easy and pleasant Subjects for the exercise of my Thoughts but the Wisdom of God having declared it a part of Wisdom to observe the Characters of the Antichristian Beast I therefore though not without pain engage in the survey of it And first in the entry it will be a bad Omen of no good to be expected from any Society that shall study to keep her Members in Ignorance and to bar them the study of the Holy Scriptures which being the Revelation of the whole Counsel of God and written by plain and simple Men and at first directed to the use of the rude illiterate Vulgar for teaching them the Mysteries of Godliness and the Path of Life it is a shrewd indication that if any studied to hide this Light under a Candlestick and to keep it in an unknown Tongue or forbid the Body of Christians the use of it though its native tendency be to enlighten the Understanding and to enflame the Will it being given out by God for that end that those must be conscious to themselves of great deformity to that Rule and apprehend that if it were more known their Doctrin would be less believed especially since the hardest

said by Grotius to have been butchered on the account of Religion And in his Son Philip's time the D. of Alva did in a short time cut down Thirty six thousand Nor need I tell the cruelties were practised in France for about fourty years together nor of that treacherous Massacre wherein there was an equal mixture of perfidy and cruelty which for all that was entertained at Rome with great joy and applauses It will be also needless to tell of their cruelty in England in Queen Mary's days which was chiefly managed by the Churchmen And many are yet alive who remember what enraged cruelty appeared in our Neighbour-Island against all of our Religion which did not only flow from the fury of an oppressed People but they were trained encouraged and warranted to it by their Priests and the Nuntio who came afterwards among them discovered who was the spring of all their motions Shall I to this add all the private assassinations committed on that account which were not only practised but justified I might here congest many instances Brother murdering Brother on the account of Religion Neither is Clement a Dominican his murdering Henry the third nor Chastlets attempt nor Ravillac 's fact on Henry the fourth forgotten Q. Elizabeths life is full of these attempts and the blackest of them all was the Gunpowder Treason All which are to be charged on that Church because the Doctrine of murdering Heretick Princes was taught licensed printed and yet not condemned in it From these hints we may guess how much of the lowly meek and charitable Spirit is to be found with them But should I to this add the horrid cruelties exercised in these Massacres I should be almost past belief had I not undeniable Historians for verifying it but the mildest of them being to be burned alive we may guess what the more savage have done by their tortures and lingering Deaths Next shall I mention their Courts of Inquisition which have been among them in the hands of Churchmen from the days of their pretended Saint Dominick whose Order have been the great Instruments of the cruelties of that Church and whose procedure being tied to no forms of equity or justice is as unjust as unmerciful persons being haled to their black Courts upon bare suspitions or secret Informations without leading of proofs against them are by Torture examined not only of their own opinions but of all that are known to them whose Testimony tho drawn from them by cruel Torture will bring the same Tortures on all they delate neither is there any mercy for any whom this Court declares Heretick but the Civil Magistrate must condemn them to the fire Now what man that considers the meekness of Christ and the Evangelical Spirit can think that Church the Spouse of Christ that hath rioted it with such savage rage against thousands of persons for no other crime but because they adhered firmly to the Gospel of Jesus Christ and would not consent or concur with these signal and palpable corruptions with which they have adulterated it But as from the constitution of their Church we see their deformity from the Gospel-rule so we will next consider their Church-men and we shall find how far they have strayed from the first Original Church-men ought to be the Guides and Pastors of Souls Now how little of this there is among them we will soon be resolved in What do the Popes about the feeding of Souls When do they preach the Gospel or dispense the Sacraments Alas it were below the height of his Holiness to stoop to such mean Offices Does any vestige of a Church-man remain in that Court and do they not directly rule in the Spirit of the Lords of the Gentiles And in this the Cardinals Bishops and Abbots do to their proportion imitate their most Holy Father abandoning wholly the work of the Gospel as if they bore an empty title or at most were only bound to say Mass on some greater Holy-days but in all other things do avowedly cast off the care of their Flocks Shall I here tell of the relaxation of all the ancient rules about the offices and duty of Church-men which these latter ages have invented and mention how children are made Bishops how they allow of Pluralities Non-residencies Unions Commendams Gratia expectativa's with a great many more corruptions which are every day authorised and granted at Rome and so zealous were they for these that they strugled hard against the honest attempts of some at Trent who would have had residence declared of Divine right and got it tho with much ado to be laid aside And thus it is that the Bishops and Abbots among them do for most part relinquish their Charges to live at the Courts of Princes and insinuate themselves upon all affairs and offices And swarms of them go to Rome gaping for preferment there I deny not but even these late ages have produced great men among them who seem to have designed the reviving of the Ancient Discipline both among the Clergy and the People but as these instances are rare so they were hated and persecuted at Rome for their Zeal Witness the condemning of Arnolds Book of frequent Communion and the severity Jansenius and the Abbot of St. Cyran with their followers have met with And thus whatever individuals that Church may have produced yet the corruptions I have hinted are notoriously publickly and generally practised in it and no where so avowedly as at the Court of Rome But to compence this defect of the Superior Clergy they have swarms of the inferior ranks every where both secular and regular who seem to mind the care of souls very seriously But not to reflect again upon any thing hath been hitherto said of their bad conduct of souls I shall now only take notice of the Authority they pretend to as if the People were bound blindly to follow their Confessors direction as the voice of God which clearly makes them the servants of men and subjects them to the heaviest yoke which is most directly contrary to the liberty wherewith Christ hath made us free And what a rack to souls have they made Confession and what an Engine to get into the secrets of all the World and to bring mankind under their subjection is obvious enough to any that considers it And to enforce it the more as they teach it simply necessary to Salvation so the authority they made the World believe the Priests were vested with for pardoning sin together with their easie Pardons and slight Penances did root it deep in the hearts of all of that Communion But I go next to examine the Sacraments of which so much being said already little remains to be added By their dividing the Cup from the Bread they destroy Christs Institution and so make it no Sacrament and the hearing of Mass without communicating tho it make up the greatest part of their worship yet is purely a service of their own devising