to expose them to sale or purchase without fear of Sacriledge yet the f Gleba pro solo dote Ecclesiae Passim in Jure Canonico Provinciale Angliae lib 3. Tu de Eccles aedificand §. 1. Ibi Lindewod Gleba id est Terra in qua consistit Dos Ecclesiae Theod. Cod. pro quovis saepè agro Sic constit Neap. l iii Tit. 3. servi Gleba H. Spelman Glossar Learned know that in the true notion thereof Glebes were anciently and generally taken for any Church Lands whatsoever and that also all those premised Revenues of the Church were not then stinted to the base narrow bounds of a bare Necessity as to the hire of a Labourer only or as some ignorantly tearm it to the Pittance of a fitting and that also arbitrary maintenance at the most those that by this word mean only just as much as needs and no more would in their own case scarce be content with a Just Retortion But 't is plain to the contrary that the Church hath by all those good Laws been endowed even to an Ample redundant honourable maintenance suitable to the eminent Condition of the Immediate Servants of the most High God which to diminish or to defraud hath alwayes been accounted and accordingly abhorred as most hainous Sacriledge by the whole Catholick Church for above a thousand years one only odde man excepted Aerias in Epiphanius held even therefore by all for an errand Heretick Since all these Truths are attested by whole Troops of Witnesses out of all places France Scotland Germany c. at all times of all sorts of all sides 5. Since that of all this Ecclesiastical Estate the Clergy is really but the Usufructuary God himself to whom by the express Letter of all those Laws and of your own Law likewise the Donations are entitled being therefore the direct Proprietary and God cannot be mocked 6. Since this whole Church Patrimony in general is fenced round about with so many not Bruta fulmina or bare bug-bearwords as the Atheistical Scoffers of these latter-dayes nick-name them but with so many Divine Comminations and most Just Curses thundered out at first by the mouth of Gods own Moses's Ezras's Solomon's Malachie's under the old and executed by his Peter's his Apostle's under the New Testament only in due Conformity repeated after them * See this at large in the Codix Donationum Piarum A. Auberto miraeo besides so many clear Precedents of your own cited above ch vi in all the Solemn Religious Donations not out of any private Interest but out of a publick respect and devout zeal to Gods Glory c. 7. Since this your own National Churches Patrimony in particular is Ex abundanti fortified with the double Rampart of so many Oaths no private Oaths but Royal Oaths First in general then in particular for the special Defence and protection of the Clergy If it were possible for these violent men to perswade a Christian King to such wilful Perjury could either King or People expect to prosper after so many Perjuries and Injuries of all sides 8. Since only in general let it be observed without any further particular Application of Gods Judgments the Usurpation of this Sacred Patrimony hath alwayes proved thus Fatal to the greatest of men to whole Families to whole Nations and Empires as indeed being wholly destructive of all Justice and Honâ—sty Law and Reason and of Religion also though masked under the Pretences of all these Tending really to the Eradication 't is their own truculent Metaphor Root and Branch of the whole Order of the Priesthood in destroying the Fountains of it the Devils great Master-Plot and consequently ending at last in the utter Change and subversion of all Government in Church and State the very Down-fall of the whole Frame of both States Ecclesiastical and Civil For flatter not your selves but mark it who will even in this sense St. Pauls Maxime may pass for an Oracle of State as well as of Religion g Heb. 7.12 WHERE THE PRIESTHOOD IS ONCE CHANGED THERE MUST ALSO OF NECESSITY FOLLOW A CHANGE OF THE LAW The very h 'T is that famous Macenas in Dion Cassius Histor Rom. Lib. Lii who bating only his Heathen style gives unto Augustus the Emperour this excellent counsel concerning his Office 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 That is If thou desirest indeed to become Immortal then do thou thy self at all times and in all places Worship God according to the Religion of thy Country and also compel others to the same Worship as for Innovators about it those thou must both hate and punish also not only out of respect to the Gods whom whosoever contemns will certainly little regard any thing else but because they that in opposition will introduce new Gods will also entice or seduce many to alter the Laws From whence will arise Conspiracies Meetings and Conventicles which are things inconsistent with Monarchy Thou must not therefore TOLERATE any either Atheist or Conjurer Those two indeed are here well-matched together Thus it is plain from the Mouth even of an Heathen That 't is necessary for Kings and Princes to be Religious even for this solid Reason of State Machiavel himself at least in shâ—w goes so far in his Princeps To prescribe Religion even in Policy which Hypocâ—isie proves the Excellency and Necessity of Religion to preserve Policy Heathen could see this great Truth afar off 9. Since therefore such an Act were directly Introductive of a Discipline to say the least of it utterly Vnsuitable yea Incompatible with the Altitude of this Royal Meridian that we say not utterly contradictory to the Platform of the Holy Ghost and to the express Truth of God in his Word which shall be found true when of all others these wilful Innovators shall be found Lyars who dare thus immodestly Controul the general Wisdom and constant Practice of all the Churches of Christ Oriental and Occidental all over for above fifteen hundred years 10. Since this dangerous Mine of Sacriledge if not countermined which is our labour at this time if it be once sprung up would prove destructive not only to the Church but à majori to all Schools of good learning The fruitful Seminaries of both Church and Commonwealth and so consequently would be Introductive of all Barbarisme and Blindeness For you cannot be ignorant that this fatal Plot of Sacriledge did both of old and also of late play at all was there not a time 't is but an Age since when it came to catch Henry VIII who catch can then the Vniversity-Lands were even attempted and in danger Had not some gallant States-men * Sir John Mason then Chancellor of Oxford protected those Incourâ—gements of Learning and Vertue the two Master-Pillars of Church and State For all would be Fish that came to the Net on the turning of the tide and Alteration of Religion How easie was it then for Covetousness to quarrel the Colledge-Lands
of men and Devils against this one poor Church as if the Church of Britain were indeed as of old it was called n BRITANNIA PRIMOGENITA ECCLESIAE Sabellicus Ennead 7. Lib. 5. The Eldest Daughter of the whole Catholick Church you may see the gates of Hell cannot prevail against it but as yet it subsists like Moses burning Bush thus long preserved from utter Consumption in the very midst of all that great fire of Persecution you may visibly perceive Gods Admirable Prevention Gods especial hand of Restraint over the late King of Glorious Memory who although tempted by all the Devils Methods by all the Arts of Fraud or Force yet could never be so much as inclined to yield his Royal Consent or but Countenance or Connivance any wayes towards the Demolition of this Church Because as he told the Parricides first and last he could neither in Conscience nor Honour do such an Act Therefore that Great Prince did rather chuse Christianly to dye a Glorious Martyr then ignominiously to live a Perjured Prince by wilfully betraying the Churches Rights and the Peoples Laws and Liberties for that nothing but * Cornel Burges No Sacriledge c. ch 2. black malice can cast the Odium of that Rebellious War or of the Kings Death upon the Churches Cause only is evident both by the Kings own Protestations in his Declarations and †Numb ii upon the 19. Propositions c. especially by that incomparable we might say inspired Book of his Royal Portraicture and by the Rebel 's own Proceedings all which abundantly testifie that the King dyed for the Liberties of the People as well as for the Rights of the Church To defend both which Church and People according to his Royal Oath at his Coronation the King did use his Sword as long as he could and when he could do it no longer that way the Sword of God being by a Prodigious Rebellion wrested out of his Sacred hand he did seal it with his Blood An act of Heroical Magnanimity that hath no Parallel but that of the King of Kings who came not to destroy Luke xix 10. but to save and therefore gave his Life for his Sheep a Precedent worthy the Admiration of all Christian Princes John x. 15. if not of their Imitation 14. But to return to Gods Providence over this Church what can such a miraculous Restraint of the Father and no less Miraculous Restauration of the Son Stupente orbe to the Admiration yea astonishment of all the world Pagan and Christian what can all these Marvails all these mysterious Wheels of the Divine Providence over this Church signifie but that as yet God hath and if our Sins and National Ingratitude do not reverse it God will have still I trust a special hand of Providence for the preservation of this Church Considering how the destruction thereof was so long since Plotted so notoriously Proclaimed so violently yea so sanguinarily Prosecuted and yet that still for all that the Divine Counsel hath from time to time put off as yet the Period of it under God in whose only hand is and ought to be the Kings Heart as the rivers of water Prov. xxi 1. to turn it whithersoever he will We are all bound to thank the King both the Father and the Son for that Royal Faithfulness and Christian Constancy that yet in chief upholds this persecuted Church And under God and the King thank a Loyal Parliament also We had need to pray to God earnestly to confirm the King that he may conserve the Church for 't is no less then the Kings own Conscience the Assault of Sacriledge aims at to storm and then to Conquer that so the Rebels may once again Reign without him God in mercy to this Church and Nation avert still that final Judgment to the Rebels Conversion or Confusion Amen 15. In this good hope all the Premises duly and sadly considered let us all arm our selves with Christian Patience and Gallant Resolution praying for Perseverance and if Sinners puft up with their late seeming advantages and Penal prosperity because God in his unsearchable wayes to our Trial but to their greater Dementation and Obduration did of late curse them with good successes If by the Representation of these Favours in shew should as 't is too much to be feared and therefore may wisely be presumed they are plotting still to strike at the King himself * Camb. Q. Eliz. through the Churches sides If they should intice you to joyn with them p Prov. 1.10 19. to swallow up Gods own precious substance to fill your houses with the Church spoils to cast in your lot among them bearing you in hand that you shall be all made by it you shall all have one purse with them q Psal 62.10 O trust not in wrong and robbery Take the wise mans good Counsel for all their goodly pretences of Religion or Policy Consent you not but rather refrain your foot from their Path for their feet run to evil and make haste to shed blood Nay in the upshot you shall see yea themselves and all their partners shall find it and feel it that they do but all this while lay wait for their own blood lurking privily for their own lives posting away insensibly to their own destruction in the end like Shimei 1 Kings xi 44. digging their own Graves as so many of them have done lately by their Relapses even after a general Pardon 16. If all this cannot move you as it comes from us Then to draw all towards an end for a sad farewel-Farewel-Truth Imagine what is but too true in the Moral that you now see THE CHURCH OF ENGLAND it self YOUR own Dear MOTHER groveling here at your feet all discheveled and discomposed as she lately was all over rent and torn with so many Fractions and Factions with so many Thorns and Bryars of dangerous Sects and scandalous Schisms all over yet stained and gore with the mutual Blood of her own Unnatural Children that like a brood of cursed Vipers did dilacerate their own Mothers Womb a most ruful Spectacle to a right Christian Spirit In this sad habit and posture the late ruful Dress of your Mother-Church Think you hear still your miserable Parent thus feelingly bespeaking you all for a last warning Ah my Sons Ah the Sons of my Vows let me now if ever once for all beseech you all by this Womb that bare you all and brought you forth unto Christ by those breasts that gave you suck even by Gods holy Word and Sacraments by those Arms that have so long enclosed you all That Holy Doctrine and Godly Discipline that hath as yet kept you safe from the Fangs of so many Heresies and Schisms that have over-spread almost all the Churches of Christ over all Christendom by all these and by more then all these by your hope and share in all the mercies of God in all the merits and sufferings
it in God's Name and stead 29. And this Office being none of the extraordinary Apostolical Prerogatives such as some reckon these to have been their 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Infallibility their power of Miracles and their Oecumenical Jurisdiction is not therefore Incommunicable or Intransitive but as successive and permanent and pertinent to their Successors in ordinary the Bishops and Pastors of God's Flock who as well as the Priests under the Law or the Apostles under the Gospel are God's visible Vicegerents unto the end of the World (i) Heb. 5.1 in all things pertaining unto God as to accept the Peoples Offerings in God's Name and stead so to present (k) The Clause in the Prayer for the Church Militant to accept our Alms and Oblations them unto God as well as to pray to God for the People or to bless the People in God's Name 30. And as to Bless so to Curse in God's Name also for Ejusdem est ligare cujus est solvere and this is in that History the Apostle's second Act to assure us and all the World of the Continuance of God's own heavy Curse and Exemplary Vengeance too even under the New Testament in case of Fraud or Sacriledge And this Ecclesiastical Censure doth here consist of two express parts a Spiritual and Eternal Excommunication as I may say (l) See Ghostwyke's Anatomy of Ananias and Sapphira's Sacriledge chap. 6. from all the means yea from the Life of Grace it self the sorest severest extreamest Vengeance that can be inflicted on a man in this World forsaking and forsaken of God Secondly a Corporal and that too a sudden and utter Deprivation of the Life of Nature also both of them making up that fearful total Extermination which the Jews term (m) Drus qu. l. 1. qu. 9. Sammatha or Sammathizatio of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that signifies desolare ad stuporem vastare 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 tu as much to say as let such a Curse fall upon thee as is Ultima Execratio or God's utmost Malediction Saint Paul from another Root Maran atha seems to allude to this very Curse 1 Cor. 16.22 Cursing them ad magnum diem as the old Councels phrase it till Dooms-day and a day after A Curse so terrible that in the Book of (n) Eum Ananiae Sapphirae †una stix porrigi ne †ejulantem crucians complectatur Selden ad Eadmerum quo suprà p. 156. Curses formerly quoted against Sacriledge Ananias and Sapphira aâ—e become the Proverbial as I may say the Standard to Curse by 31. Surely such a Curse so terrible take in all the circumstances we read not of in all the Old Testament as if God hereby would intimate as the hainousness of the sin of Sacriledge above all sins in general so the aggravation of it in particular as it being a greater sin now under the Gospel than under the Law both respectu Personae and also respectu Status because as our Oblations to all Acts of Devotion are more so is our knowledge and our hope likewise this is (o) Allus ad Decimas Hilariter libenter danda ea non quae sunt minora utpote majorem Spem habentes Iren. l. iv c. 34. Irenaeus his Argument far greater now than it was then 32. And because this Fact of Ananias was the first Notorious Act of Sacriledge that ever was committed under the Gospel therefore least any after them should presume upon their Impunity as they gave ill example to their Generation and to Posterity to boot 't is P. Martyr's note themselves became a sad example to both They were confounded Body and Soul 33. And that too with a suddain Destruction in an Instant the usual Destiny of Sacriledge witness * Dan. v. 30. 2 King xi 16. Belshazzar Athaliah and so many more slain 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as we say In the very Act of Sacriledge 34. This is an History brim-full of horrour in all the grievous circumstances of it To see a Man and his Wife Children of the Church Auditors of the Apostles Professors of Christ's true Religion outwardly conformable to the Apostolical Discipline Benefactors to the Church no apparent professed Enemies or Atheists no Persecutors or Apostates or notorious evil livers for any thing we read of them Ah! I tremble to think it that such persons so qualified should yet be liable to so Execrable an end as say * Gostwick's Anatomy of Ananias Sacril ch 6. some in a moment to be damned Body and Soul dying without repentance should as they were man and wife in the sin upon Earth be still man and wife in the Torment of Hell and all this damnable rigour for grudging a few Pence or Pounds at the most to God and Holy Church But (p) Deut. xxix 29. Secret things belong unto the Lord our God and God's judgments are past finding out Rom. xi 33. Our best course therefore is to adore them with admiration To lay them to heart with fear and trembling and to acknowledge with all humility that God seeth not as man seeth however Sacriledge may be extenuated in the World 's deceitful Scales yet in the Just Ballance of the Sanctuary you see the heavy doom of it weighs down to the bottom of Hell 35. And now although this latter part of the Censure the Corporal part was miraculous and so extraordinary yet let none harden himself in Sacriledge upon the presumption that St. Peter and his fellows that could kill with a breath are now dead and gone As long as the Lord liveth and Ecclesia nunquam moritur in your own sense and in our sense I am sure the Church lives too and the Spiritual Ordinance of God and of his Church the heavy Censure of Excommunication is permanent in the Church unto the World's end and is and ever will be clave non errante still as quick and powerful to plague and to destroy no less now than in those days if not always with visible external Judgments from which we are not yet free yet with far worse with invisible inward Judgments as Blindness of Mind not to see our Disease nor Danger our Duty nor Remedy and Hardness of heart not to repent and return and restore for this Impenitent State may still provoke God to punish one sin with another in his just Permission a Judgment which is of all others the most grievous the very next step to Hell it self and therefore not inferiour for the matter though not so visible for the manner to that dreadful Curse which befel Ananias and Sapphira in whose fatal Example God did purposely express such a Terrible Severity to countenance the just Censures of the Church and to bring into credit Church-Authority a maine Nerve or Sinew in Christ's Body Mystical the Mortification whereof in this latter Age hath occasioned the Gangrene of the whole Body of this Christian Church and State for we may not flatter now but now
or never must strike at the Root of all our Mischiefs and tell you a sad truth that of all our swarms of Heresies and Schismes of all our Divisions and Distractions of all our Seditions and Rebellions too of all our Sacriledges and Prophanenesses of all these cursed branches the Mother Root hath been the Contempt of the Church for these four Buttresses or Master-pillars of the Church The Churches Apostolical Truth Holy Peace Just Power and Due Patrimony stand or fall together and like * Plutarch Scylurus his Arrows whilest kept tied in the bundle do render that Church and State impregnable invincible but one of them once sundered from the other break but any one and you may easily knap all the rest in sunder This is the sad story of all our former National miseries and till the Restitution of this Church Right also and that cum effectu Excommunication so dreaded in other Churches the Greek especially being now become with the many in England but a meer 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Bug-bear unless that Brachium Seculare do corroborate it by some coercive way as shall seem to their wisdom most suitable unto the symptoms and dispositions of this Nation yet very much out of joynt Till then we may in vain hope for a Respit but never obtain the effectual Remedy much less the real Recovery of this Church and Nation 36. And to bring in all this here is a fair Hint given us by the Holy Ghost from this very Text and History of Ananias wherein you may for an Epilogue from Calvin observe yet this one Item more That one main Aggravation and always a deadly Ingredient of this sin of Sacriledge was and is the Contempt of a general Godly Practice of the whole Christian Church whose bare Custom in those honest and simple Apostolical days St. Paul thought an Argument strong enough to confute any Irregular Schismatick saying upon occasion of a Church-Difference (q) 1 Cor. 11.16 If any man seem to be contentious we have no such Custom neither the Churches of God Of such force in those days of Discipline was the general Practice of the Church How much more forcible then would have been the Precept of the Church not only or chiefly of the Church Diffusive the whole Body at large for that in the matter of Exercise or Execution was never could never be Subjectum capax of that Power or Jurisdiction but principally of the Church Representative the Apostles and Ministers who as you have heard and Calvin very well observes still upon the place Though they were but men yet they were no meer private men because God's Vicegerents in which sense the Contempt of the Church is by a plain consequence a Contempt of Christ himself who according to his gracious (r) Matth. 28.20 Promise for a Farewel to his Apostles hath ingaged himself by his Spirit of Power and Counsel to be present with and in his Church unto the end of the world In reference to which Divine Promise That Primitive Catholick Ceremony of placing the Sacred Book of the Gospel on a Throne in the midst of the Councels sitting was till of late Solemn and full of Divine Mysterie namely among the rest to intimate that in regard of Christ's Spiritual and Invisible but undoubted Presence in the midst of his * Reputare debuerat ubi duo aut tres congregati sunt in Christi nomine illic eum adesse Praesidem nec secùs in eo coetu se gerere quà m si Deum oculis cerneret Calv. in Act. v. 4. Church all men ought to behave themselves in and toward the Church with as much Obedience as if there they saw with their Eyes Christ himself visibly present 37. To draw up all our several Observations upon this Apostolical History into a narrow compass By this time you see That the Contempt of the Godly Precept or but General Practice of the Church such as ever was this of Consecrations or Dedications is first of all Injurious to Jesus Christ himself the invisible Guide and perpetual President of the Church 2ly Derogatory to Venerable Antiquity and to all those that have gone before us in this devout way of well-doing 3ly Scandalous yea in its contagious Nature and bad Example pernitious too to the present Age and unto Posterity to boot 4ly Dangerous yea without timely Repentance Damnable unto the Contemners what ever they be 38. And now after all this said and proved too yea ex abundanti sealed also both ways with God's own actual Curse or Benediction as it were his visible Image and Superscription yet still to ask the question whether we shall Render this Sacred Tribute (s) Matth. 22.20 21. unto our Maker or no still for all this to pretend a fear of God's Refusal of our Devotions or to say we want still a particular Revelation of Gods Acceptance or to quarrel about the Authority of the Vicegerent to assure us of all these The Sacrilegious Cavils of some in our days What were all this but plainly to declare we have no more mind to this Religious Errand than he in the (t) Prov. xxvi 13. Proverbs when instead of running he tells you of a Lion in the way a Lion in the streets 39. For as touching the main of all these Assurance of Acceptance since that is now adays called in question I beseech you have we not as much Revelation for God's Acceptance of this as for any other good work as for our Prayers or for our Alms or for any To affirm the contrary were it not besides the sin of Infidelity a Tang of Deep Hypocrisie yea the very Cut-throat of all good works of Mercy or Piety whatsoever private as well as publick would not this Doctrine also bid very fair for Enthusiasme 40. Say we had no more but some one of (u) 1 Cor. 15. ult God's general Promises would not that serve Nay may not the Nature of the work it self be instead of all Revelations if it have all the four Essential usually requisite Conditions of a good work I mean if it be done 1. Upon God's Warrant or according to his Word (x) As under the old Testament Prov. iij. 19. So under the New Gal. vi 5. See above p. 65. 2ly If the general intent in it be to please and serve God (y) Rom. 14.6 He that eateth not eateth not to the Lord c. 3ly If the work be done in love to God for no self-respects or by-ends of our own but chiefly as the Church praiseth him propter magnam gloriam suam for his own Glory because we know that God is (z) To do good and to distribute forget not for with such Sacrifices God is well pleased Heb. xiii 16. honoured by this our Acknowledgment 4ly and lastly If that our Devotion be offered in (a) Luk. vii 47. Faith out of a perswasion of God's love to us in Christ and of his general
the Houses and Lands dedicated for the maintenance of the Service and Servants of the true Gods whose Acceptance of such Oblations and consequently Gods Propriety in them we have clearly made out above Chap. vi p. 64. and elsewhere But this is and ever will be the true Character of our Modern Pharisees like the true off-spring of the Old Pharisees Matth. xxiii 24. To strain at a gnat and swallow a Camel To leave them therefore and by Application to turn unto you By this time we may hope that you and all good men not blinded with Schismatical Prejudice or bewitched with Sacrilegious Avarice will be really convinced of the CONCLUSION As for us That which was our Task to make good we have done God be thanked this Text is clearly our own a Divine and Direct Bar against the Sin of Sacriledge 2. And now after all this let the Fanatical Libertines of our Times in their Atheism or Ignorance say still that Sacriledge is but a Fancy with as good reason they may and rather then miss of the prey the Church-Lands haply they would if they durst say as much of Adultery that it is but a Fancy neither or of Idolatry or of Theft or of any sin that it is no more but so a Fancy also for some are grown now such proficients in the Schools of Atheism that they dare affirm Vertues and Vices to be but Opinions But we hope you have better learned Christ You see clearly that in the natural and full propriety of the word Sacriledge is here by Saint Paul expresly matched with all those Crimes As for the gain-sayers either they must admit all the premised absurdities or else which is far better let them in aserious Reflection upon their own folly and vain imaginations and a day of reckoning for them all speedily Repent and Recant these their own wilde Fancies lest if they go on in their earthly sensual devilish Wisdom these are an Apostles a Jam. 3.15 own Epithets of such Wits for so they would be called through Gods just judgment b Rom. 1.21 they become utterly vain in their own Imaginations and their foolish heart be for ever darkened And let them take heed lest by their wilful impenitency and hardness of heart they provoke a just God to pass upon them that terrible and final Sentence c 2 Thess ii 10 11 12. That because they would not receive the love of the Truth that they might be saved therefore God will send them strong delusion that they shall believe a lye that they all may be DAMNED 3. As for you whom God hath blessed with more of that true impartial wisdom which is from above let no man or men deceive you with vain words Since you have heard this truth so abundantly vouched from such undeniable Principles of all kinds from the Law of Nature from the Law of Moses which is the Law of God his Moral Law confirmed by the Law of Christ for no Text in all the whole Bible more plain against Sacriledge then this we have now treated of 4. Since this Solemn Devotion of Religiouâ— Consecrations whereby good Christians do binde themselves heart and hand and all back again unto God which is the very Nature of Religion d Religio à Religando Lact. hath been unquestionably transmitted to us down from Christ his dayes by the Practice Apostolical and Primitive by whole Juries of several Nations and indeed by the general Verdict of the Church Catholick throughout all Ages all over Christendom and sure in such an Universal sense Vox populi vox Dei one would think 5. Since by all Municipal Laws Civil and Statute Law your own Common Law it so clearly appears that the Churches Claim is no Imaginary Title but as Real as all these Laws can make it Since by them the Church is lawfully possessed of all her Demesnes Praedial as well as Personal unmoveables as well as moveables Houses and Lands as well as Tythes or Rents of Cathedral Lands as well as Glebe Lands which although now and here usually stylo novo restrained more strictly to Lands belonging to Parochial Churches and thence by too nice a distinction maliciously e Cornel. Burges chap. 1. and 4. of his Book for Sacriledge to make way for his Usurpation of the Cathedral Lands doth enter a Caution That he doth not extend his Plea to Parochial Glebes or appropriations of them which Glebes saith he cannot be taken though by his pretended Parliament these were also taken most unjustly from able and faiâ—hful Ministers by any humane Authority without bordering at least upon Sacriledge Thus he determines it without offering any the least solid proof for the Jus Divinum or for the exemption of Parochial Glebes from sale which may not be retorted in the behalf of Cathedral Lands as where he affirms Chap. 4. That the Glebes were given by men of Quality and Piety for the good of the Souls of the living so far as the Founders of those Churches were able to judge Why may not the same be said of Cathedral Lands He that reads the forms of Donations formerly cited will easily confute him And whereas he there restrains our Ministery only to the Office as he describes iâ— of truly and faithfully preaching Christ to the people of those places where such Lands were given This assertion is both a gross petitio principii a begging of the Question and also a Schismatical plot with tke pretence of preaching to justle out the publick Prayers of the Church as if the Solemn Office of the daily publick Prayers duly and daily celebrated in our Cathedrals including also Parish-Churches were not worth the naming which Office is by all sorts of Christians East and West all but the Puritans constantly practised and which indeed where through decay of the Primitive Devotion the daily use of the Eucharist is neglected is the only Juge Sacrificium left to the Christians instead of the Jews m rning and evening Lamb Ex. xxix 39. The daily Sacrifice of Prayers and Praises intimated by the Author of the Epistle to the Hebrews chap. xiii 15. and so understood by the Ancients which daily publick Office of Prayers and Praises as it is profitable not to one single Parish only as the Office of Preaching but in a diffusive Charity to the whole Catholick Church and therefore for the good of the Souls of the Living so is it not at all as he maliciously would insinuate exclusive of the other Holy Office of Preaching that is Soberly and soundly Expounding the Holy Word of God and that also according to the Ancients whose streams may run clearer as they were nearer the fountain and Applying the Divine Word to the right Information of the Christian Faith and the wholesome Instruction of a Godly Life which to do aright is to Preach indeed an Office frequently practised also in our Cathedral Churches wrested to the exclusion of Cathedral Lands thereby the more plausibly