Selected quad for the lemma: state_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
state_n	church_n	power_n	society_n	1,162	5	9.1993	5	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A36244	A discourse concerning the one altar and the one priesthood insisted on by the ancients in their disputes against schism wherein the ground and solidity of that way of reasoning is explained, as also its applicableness to the case of our modern schismaticks, with particular regard to some late treatises of Mr. Richard Baxter ... / by H. Dodwell.	Dodwell, Henry, 1641-1711.	1683 (1683)	Wing D1808; ESTC R24298	200,473	497

VI VII This way of determining them will not oblige us to a Recourse to express Scripture Sect. VIII All Church Members were obliged by the ancient Canons to a Personal Attendance at the Bishops Altar at some solemn Times Sect. IX The Ground of that Custom in the Jewish Precedent Sect. X. Sect. 1 BUT tho this had been otherwise and the Christians of the same City had been left to their Liberty whether they would unite under any common Government or not as to any general Establishment which God had made concerning it yet where a Model was laid and a Church was already begun it could not be without breach of Unity that any could resist it or revolt from it and therefore were for the future obliged to submit to it Now that this was actually the Case that all the Christians of the Cities did unite themselves into a Body is not only clear from the Practice of those times wherein our Adversaries themselves who are skilled in Antiquity acknowledge Episcopacy to have obtained as in the time of S. Cyprian but also of the times of the Apostles themselves I mention nothing more to prove it at present but what has elsewhere been mentioned the Convertibleness of Churches and Cities in the Apostles times This therefore being supposed to have been their actual Case whether they were obliged to it or not I say their Sucessors could not infringe this Unity so agreed on without the Sin of SCHISM I mean such Successors as should attempt it without the consent of their Ecclesiastical Governors for the time being Such were they against whom S. Cyprian reasoned which is the Case for which I am concerned at present FOR 1. If no Divine Right did oblige Sect. 2 them to unite into one Body it is withal as certain that no Divine Constitution made it unlawful for them to do so And in that Case it must have been indifferent and therefore in their own Power to settle what extent of their Union themselves pleased which when it was settled might for the future oblige not only themselves but their Posterity at least such a Posterity of their Subjects as I am speaking of This they might have done by that Right of Human Power which is inseparable from all multitudes that are sui juris and which must particularly be acknowledged Lawful in Cases undetermined either way by any Divine Interposition Every single person is acknowledged to have a Power to bind himself and his Heirs which therefore cannot be denyed to Multitudes I shall not now digress so far as to debate the Reasonableness and Equity of it because it is indeed a Subject more proper for another place I shall now suppose it as a Principle Fundamental to all Societies This is the only common Principle of Equity not the less but the more obliging because not written as the Laws of Nature and Nations are much more obliging than any Positive Local Statutes on which the Perpetuity of Societies once established does subsist by virtue of which the Legislative Power and the particular Laws made by them do not extinguish with the Legislators Persons by virtue of which all Leagues and Covenants made by Predecessors are still reckoned as obliging to Posterity without any new Ratification by virtue of which the particular consent of every new born Child and every Stranger is not thought necessary even in those Governments which did at first confessedly arise from the consent of the People And being Principles of Equity grounded on the common Right of Societies in general they cannot be denyed to Ecclesiastical Societies more than others tho they also had been at first confederated by the particular Suffrages of the Laity as well as the Clergy And 2. THIS being once agreed upon tho the agreement it self had been only Sect. 3 human and the Obligation to Posterity human too yet the Obligation is Divine The Sin of Theft is not the less against a Divine Law because the determination of Property depends on Human Constitutions and is accordingly different in several places So that as that is Property in one place which is not so by the Laws of another it accordingly falls out that what is Justice in that place where it is a Property is Theft in that place where the Property belongs to another Accordingly tho the determination of the extent of the Union of that Society which we call a Church had been derived only from the agreement of those who at first planted Christianity in a plate yet the Obligation to preserve the Unity when once established may be Divine None doubts but Parents are as fallible in requiring instances of Obedience from their Children as the Church is Yet who doubts also but the Sin of Disobedience in a matter of its own nature undetermined by the Law of God is a breach of a Divine Law tho the Parents were mistaken in the Prudence of the thing required by them as an instance of Obedience and so that it be not unlawful Yet such Mistakes plainly shew that the determining the instance of Obedience is from an Authority only Human and Fallible nay actually mistaken But whilst the determination extends no farther than their just Parental Power to things not unlawful however imprudent that does not hinder but that the complex Act of Obedience even in that particular human Instance is obligatory by the Law of God Accordingly supposing the Obligation to external Ecclesiastical Unity to be Divine and to have been indeed the principal Design of the Positive Establishments of God under the Gospel it will also follow that the Obligation to that same Unity in the extent to which the Human Ecclesiastical Authority had determined it must also be Divine supposing that the Human Ecclesiastical Authority had proceeded no further than what was lawful for a Human Authority Which Reasoning will the rather hold if we consider 3. THAT indeed tho the particular Sect. 4 Instance be not expresly determined by God yet the Power by which even that Instance had been determined had been from God For it was God only that could make them sui Juris and give them the Power of disposing of themselves and settling Rules for obliging themselves and their Posterity if the Power had been derived from the consent of the particular Suffrages But much more it was so supposing on our Principles that the Power of the Church results from the Power of Sealing Covenants in God's name and of intitling Persons to the Privileged Society and to the Privileges of that Society These were Powers that could come from none but God and consequently all the Authority resulting from them must be given together with them And therefore let our Adversaries state the ground of this determining the Extent of the Unity of Christian Churches as they please yet they cannot state it so as to make the Power of determining the extent of it purely Human. If they call that Power purely Human which is seated in Persons