Selected quad for the lemma: state_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
state_n	authority_n	church_n	power_n	4,040	5	5.1405	4	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A67639	The vindication of the solemnity of the nativity of Christ shewing the grounds upon which the observation of that and other festivalls is justified in the church : with a short answer to certaine quaeries propounded by one Ioseph Heming in oppositon to the aforesayd practise of the church / by Thomas Warmstry ...	Warmstry, Thomas, 1610-1665.	1648 (1648)	Wing W893; ESTC R12863	19,965	29

regard it is more especially required of all her Children to do it at such times then at other times and the fault is the greater to omit it then in as much as to the neglect of the universall duty is added the sinne of disobedience against the wholesome orders of the Church and a division the rein of our selves from the Body and a denyall of that concurrence and assistance that wee ought to give in the communion and fellowship of Gods people in those things which are publickly performed for the celebration of the praise and worship of God and for the advancement of divine comforts in the Congregations And though it be true that the Lords day is a day wherein they ought to rejoyce which yet as to the particular day is but an holy circumstance and a matter of order though established by great Authority notwithstanding it is not the day in such a sence as your parenthesis would perhaps insinuate as to exclude all other dayes from the businesse of solemne rejoycing in Gods mercies for how then will the fifth of November and the dayes of Thanksgiving that have beene of late appoynted be justified and thesefore your question makes nothing against our conclusion for though that day be to be observed for a day of joy it God it doth not forbid others to be so employed To the tenth Quaere Whether Christmas day ought in any respect to be esteemed above another of the Weeke dayes And whether people may not without offence to God follow their lawfull vocations on that day Answer In it selfe no day is necessarily to be esteemed better then another for as the Apostle tells us he that esteemeth all dayes alike doth it to the Lord. But in the use of it as a matter of order and as it is dedicated by a lawfull power in the Church in a more especiall manner then the rest in respect of obedience order and compliance with those sacred ends for which they are so designed Christmas day and other Festivalls of the Church ought to be esteemed above another day For it is the duty of Christians to comply with one another and to obey Authority in those things that are profitable and conducible to holy and good purposes And therefore it will follow that without necessity for people to depart from this Rule and to doe it with contempt of Authority and to the discouragement and hinderance of such holy ends and duties by following their ordinary vocations which are lawfull at other times is a breach of good order a violation of unity an hinderance to piety and the holy Solemnity of such times as well as to doe it upon a day of Fasting or Humiliation instituted by humane Authority and cannot be so done without an offence to God To your eleaventh Quaere Whether you thinke the Parliament and assembly have erred and played the fooles in condemning and r●●sing out Holy dayes not warranted in the Word And whether to observe them be not highly to d●sl●ke and flatly to contradict in poynt of practice at least their proceedings morder to a Reformation Answer I doubt not to say that they have erred in divers respects First in making unnecessary changes in the Church which ought not to be done but upon urgent causes but doth discover in them that doe it a love unto change which the wise man condemneth Prov. v. 4.21 and is ordinarily of evill consequence to the Church as wee finde by too lamentable experience for whist the people like those that are sick of a Feaver have thought good mutationibus pro remediis nti to take such kinde of changes for medicines their remedie have proved their greatest diseases and now wee see how sick they are grown of their Physitians and how sick the Physitians are of their owne administrations Secondly they have erred in going about to abolish so harmelesse and usefull a meanes of the promoting of Gods glory and of the edification of the people Thirdly in undertaking to dissolve so laudable customes and so universally and anciently received and established by full power of the State and Church either without any Authority thereunto or by a power inferiour unto that whereby they were constituted Fourthly in doing those things without any admission of those that are contrary minded to be heard or any faire discussion or debate of those differences that are in mens judgements thereabout and therefore their proceedings therein are and may be justly disliked and contradicted both by declaration and practice without lying open to any such charge as you mention of opposing proceedings in order to Reformation properly so called such undertakings with the rest that are like them being rather in order to a deformation But whether in this they have playd the fooles or no I leave that to you to determine To your twelfth Quaere Whether since most men and women in England doe blindely and superstitionsly beleeve Christ was borne that day preaching on it doth not nourish and strengthen them in that beliefe Answ Although it be admitted to be a matter of some uncertainty whether our Saviour were borne upon that day or no yet it being not materiall unto the lawfulnesse and wholsomnesse of the observation of the solemnity as hath beene declared if it bee an error in the people to apprehend so yet it is an harmelesse one and without the danger of superstition which yet Preaching upon that day doeth neyther necessarily nourish nor strengthen in them I shall not deny but there hath beene some difference in Antiquity concerning the very day upon which Christ was borne but Hospinian who was no friend unto the Church in these things confesseth That from the most ancient times it was celebrated on the 25. of December which hee prooveth out of Theophylus a very ancient Bishop of Cesaren Palestine who lived about the time of Commodus and Severus the Emperours The Arguments that are brought against the reception of this day for the very day of our Saviours Birth from the imposition of the Taxe of the Romane Emperour and from the shepheards watching of their sheepe by night are not at all concludent but of weake importance to overthrow so ancient and received an opinion in the Church Though that time might be lesse convenient for people to travell into their owne Countries as was required in that imposition of Augustus yet it is no strange thing in Magistrates and those both prudent and pious to passe through such small and private inconveniences for the obtaining supplies of publique necessities it would be a very weake argument if any should heereafter undertake to prove this unhappy Parliament began not in November because that Moneth is usually none of the best seasons to travell from the severall parts of this Kingdome to London in And though sheepe are tender creatures yet that season is not of the same bitternesse in all Climates and if I mistake not as tender as they are they are even in this