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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

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ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A49453	A sermon preached before His Majesty at Whitehall, March 12, 1664/5 by B. Lord Bishop of Lincoln.	Laney, Benjamin, 1591-1675.	1665 (1665)	Wing L347; ESTC R17030	18,017	44

quiet of many that the omission of Forms and Ceremonies is more severely punished then some foul and scandalous crimes To this I answer First That they who object this are not to be trusted with the ballance of sins for we know how the Market went for them when they held the Scale Obedience to the King and the Laws and serving God according to them were the great scandalous crimes 2. Allowing it to be true as they say That omission of Forms and Ceremonies is by the Church more frequently and severely punished then greater faults But how greater It may be in their proper and natural guilt and obliquity according to which sentence shall be given at the day of Judgment and to death eternal But our earthly Tribunals are not erected to anticipate the day of Judgment to bring all sinners to trial for whatsoever they have committed in the flesh and according to the proper measure of their guilt but for a particular end and use that people while they live here in the world and in society may be kept in good order and quiet from doing or receiving injuries And to this end is the degree of their punishments commensurate Treason and Rebellion are more severely punished in the State then many other hainous crimes because they destroy the very foundation of government and Society And for the same reason a schismatical disobedience though but in matters of Form and Ceremony is pursued with more care and strictness because it destroys the very end for which the power is given the Church to punish which is the preservation of peace and unity For though the Pastors of the Church may and must by way of Instruction the better to prepare us for our account at the great and general Judgment give every sin the proper weight and measure of guilt that is by way of Instruction But by way of Correction the Church is bound up to certain causes and if they keep not their bounds they shall be sure to hear of a prohibition and those Causes are especially such for which the power is onely given That the peaceable orderly Worship and service of God be not disturbed For though they are ever telling us it is for trifles ceremonies or indifferent things it is but the same quarrel the Atheists have against God himself for being so much offended for an Apple a trifle which scarce any man that hath an Orchard would have been troubled with and one Answer will serve both in effect In that forbidden fruit Gods authority in commanding and Adams duty in obeying were symbolically engaged for him and his and there was venome enough in that to infect both The Rites and Ceremonies of the Church in like manner though not in like degree though in their opinion as inconsiderable as the paring of Adams apple yet when discord and disobedience is found with them there is poyson enough in that for the strongest antidote the Church doth at any time make use of Let not that therefore mis-lead or disturb our Student of Quiet Nor that which in the Fourth place they look at as another Expedient for Peace If fewer Points and Articles of Religion were defined that so the Church-door may be wider open to let in those whose dissent now troubles the peace of the Church It is fit I grant the Church-door should stand always open but for such as shall be fit to enter for it would be a dangerous thing to set any door so wide open to let in an enemy upon us But to what purpose would we have the Church-door so wide when the Gate of Heaven is strait why should they be taken in here if they shall be turned back there The Church is a City as Jerusalem a City that is at unity in it self so it is a City too that hath gates and walls to shut our others He that came to a little City where there was a great Gate merrily warned the Citizens to take heed lest their City went not out at the Gate may soberly be said to those that would have the Church door so wide to let in all Sects to take heed lest the Church gets not out at the door For where so many Religions are it may be feared that soon there will be none at all If we be not as the Apostle commands built up in the same Faith it will avail us little to be found within the same walls It is therefore a perverse remedy for peace to abate or diminish the Articles and definitions of the Church which were made of purpose to take away controversies it would be a strange course to end controversies to take away the definitions Our Student must read his Books back ward if he seek for peace from hence We might as well say all the world would be quiet if there were no Judges nor Laws to determine differences There is another Expedient for Peace which I hear much spoken of and highly set by as a great point of prudence If men of moderate opinions were onely taken into imployment in the Church Moderation I confess is an excellent vertue and much to be desired Let your moderation be known unto all men Phil. 4 5. But then it must be in a subject capable of it wherein there are extremes and excesses to be moderated as there is certainly in our passions there it is proper S. Paul gives it for a Lesson to all Students in Religion Ephes 4 3● Let all bitterness and wrath and anger and clamour and evil speaking be put away from you with all malice and be ye kind one to another and tender-hearted forgiving one another even as God for Christs sake hath forgiven you This no doubt is a very fit temper for quiet and none more unfit then angry waspish and domineering spirits Onely this caution is to be observed in lenity That it be such as may win men into the Church not such as may secure and encourage them to stay without Yet lenity and gentleness is so good a Vertue that I am loth to dast water upon it or seem to temper it But for men of moderate opinions I am at a loss to know what they should be for moderation there cannot be but between extreams Now what extreams are there of opinions in a setled Church unless the Church be one extream and the Schismatick another and then the man of moderate opinions is he that is part Church-man and part Schismatick I hope none are so unkind to their Mother the Church to charge extremities upon her Doctrine or Laws If there be any such they are but Hybrides in Religion and make a new sect in the Church as pernicious to the peace of it as any of the rest The truth is moderate opinions are a Chimaeta a phansie either nothing or somewhat worse then nothing for possibly they may bestow that good word Moderation upon such as care little either to observe the Law themselves or to require it of others If these be

properly within us but without us it is not simply a quiet from motion but commotion a troubling of others 4. And that I may contract my argument and bring it into as narrow a compass as may be I shall not take in every of the disturbances of the quiet of others No not that which is the greatest of all and most contrary to peace and quiet Civil Wars and broils The mischiefs of that we have learned so lately to our cost and so perfectly that I hope we need not be set to study that now when every good man was put to his study how to live and when vile and contemptible wretches ranted in plenty and power The horrid fruits and consequences of that great disturber of quiet War have induc'd some learned men as well as others to think all wars unlawful I should have been much inclined to that opinion upon the strictest rules of Christianity if War were not sometimes necessary to Peace A forraign War for that reason may be lawful but a civil and domestick never And the reason of this difference is because for the composing of all quarrels that may arise between subjects God hath by his Ordinance provided a remedy in Princes and Magistrates from whom alone we are to seek for revenge or defence But for such differences as arise between free Princes and States because there is no Judg on earth to whom they may have recourse for their relief being destitute of the common remedy they may without question make use of that sword which God hath put into their hands to defend their subjects from the injuries as well of strangers as their own Nor are they in this Judges in their own cause which hath some appearance of injustice for a forraign War for defect of a competent Judg on Earth is but an appeal to the supreme Judg of Heaven and Earth And when they go into the Field it is but to plead their cause before God with whom are the issues of VVar. Onely they had need be careful that the cause they bring before him be good For shall not the Judg of all the world do right But the must leave this to Princes and their Ministers who are the onely proper students of that quiet which is disturbed by VVar and come to that which may and must be the study of us all That is a quiet from troubles that arise from different judgments and perswasions in matters of Religion which cause sects and divisions in it though they break not out into an open VVar. Not that VVar be quite left out of the sectaries reckoning For though Civil VVars and rebellions have their beginning for the most part from the ambition or discontent of a few yet because the people who are the necessary instruments of that mischief be not apt to serve the ambition of others if it comes bare-faced to them the mask of Religion is always put on wherein all people are concerned which makes it a common and popular interest And therefore you shall scarce hear of a Rebellion of late times in which Religion did not carry the Colours at least if not command in chief But I shall nevertheless at this time forbear to make that any part of the Schismaticks charge but treat them upon their own terms that they are as great enemies to War as any that object it to them Yet I must charge them all to be guilty of the breach of peace and quiet in the Church and that not accidentally which may sometimes bear excuse but necessarily it is connatural and incident to the very nature of schism which is a rent or division so the word signifies It is the worst disturbance that can be to any body to be torn in pieces It dissolves the bonds by which the parts are joyned together especially that which unites them to the Head for schisme in the Churches notion is properly a separation from the Head and authority and is the same in the Church that Rebellion or Treason is in the State Now as every disobedience to the King and the Laws is not Treason though against the King but the disclaiming the right and power the King hath to govern and the practice of such things by which his Regalia and rights are usurpt by others as to make War to make Laws to thrust Officers upon him to order the Coin these and of the like kind are onely Treason So every error or disobedience in Religion makes not a schisme but the disclaiming the right and power the Church hath to govern them and a usurpation of a right to themselves to order and frame points of Belief and Forms how to serve and worship God apart from the Church for so went the style of the ancient Church for Schisme altare contra altare which in our modern dialect is a Conventicle against the Church For though Schism be formally a separation from the Head yet consequently it works upon the members for that which was at first but difference of opinion soon begets a disaffection and from that grows to hatred and contempt and so falls into the practice of such things as destroy the very being and power of Religion which consists in the mutual offices of Charity and though this mischief breaks not out into an actual War yet is always accompanied with most unnatural and unchristian practises as S. James long since observed Jam. 3.16 Where envy and strife is there is confusion and every evil work Now to avoid all this it will highly concern us to study to be quiet Having cleared the first Point the Object of our study Quiet and wherein the sormalis ratio of it consists and how it comes to be disturbed by Schism The next Point is to enquire into the Principles whereon we are to ground our study for if there should be an errour or mistake in them all our labour and study is lost or worse for an inveterate grounded studied errour is so much the harder to be reclaimed It was no unreasonable demand therefore of the Philosopher who asked a double reward for those Scholars that had been already entred into the study of Philosophy because his pains would be double with them to undoe first and cast out those false prejudices which they had already learned Now if it should happen that they which are otherwise studious and desirous of peace should not do the things that make for peace as the Apostle requires Rom. 14.10 our study will grow upon us first to unlearn those false deceitfull principles of peace before we enquire into the true Of some of the chief of these therefore I shall give you an account in the first place It will conduce much to the peace of the Church they say First 1. If Religion were free and all compulsory means forborne 2. If meer Errours in Judgment howsoever were not punished as crimes which is not in the power of any to help 3. Or if that yet Thirdly That omission