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Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
truth_n	amen_n	jesus_n	lord_n	1,685	5	3.6084	3	false

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ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A94058	A sermon preached at a visitation held at Lin in Norfolk, June the 24th anno 1633. Being an admonition to the clergy to remember and keep those severall oaths, promises, and subscriptions, which they solemnly have made at the taking of their degrees, their ordinations, and institutions to their benefices. By William Strode D.D.	Strode, William, 1600 or 1601-1645.	1660 (1660)	Wing S5986; Thomason E1035_8; ESTC R203693	17,644	32

of Consecration would wring from God all the Vows of their Fathers into their own hands and again rake over the poor gleanings which the Robbers have left But let not Sacriledge in the People hire the Priest to Disobedience and Treachery let not a few Crums bribe you from barking against the Thief and guarding the House of the Lord to which Care you especially are bound by my third and last Proposition directed to Those that be round about him Promises made to God by them which be round about him are in respect of the Parties most constringent And first because they are made to God If a promise past to our Neighbour ought to be kept though it be to our losse much more to God when it also tends to our good Will not his goodnesse hold thee firm let his Fear chain thee That Name which begets Awe and Trust in Human Contracts is much more Awfull in Religious Vows There he is called onely for a Witnesse here he is also a Party thou swearest now both By Him and To Him Did men seriously consider to whom they stand engag'd they would be more heedfull of their Observance 'T is the King to whom thou swearest Loyalty though a Justice take thy Oath 't is God to whom thou makest thy Vow though the Bishop receive it His Receiver thou maist sometimes delude Him thou canst not Words and Thoughts are to him more legible than Actions to us for God is Light whosoever seeks to rob Him doth lesse lie hid than a Thief in a Candle Again as the Majesty of your Lord God obliges you to more awfull Reverence so in respect of your selves doth the neer dependance of your Office to a greater fidelity Perswasions and Arguments may be needfully urg'd to Lay-men nothing to Ecclesiasticall Officers but promise Others are onely bound by order of their Praedecessors you by Personall dedication they to naked Assent you to Action they by Obedience you by voluntary and deliberate Oath Say not before the Angel or thy Bishop saith Ecclesiastes that thy promise was out of Ignorance Thou a seer before thy eyes were open thou blind and presume to be a guide thou a Messenger of Truth and yet perjur'd thou perjur'd and yet so neerly tied to fidelity Want of breeding Ignorance Blind zeal Company Profit lesse Obligation may in some part excuse a Lay-man 't is impossible for an unconform'd Minister to be tolerably dishonest Nothing so much aggravates the Defection of Solomon as his two Antecedent Visions and Dialogues with God how frequent yours have been you well know how many publick Vowings so many Dialogues with the Most High Through such nearnesse of Relation we behold Treachery as through a multiplying Glasse far greater than otherwise it would appear and we do not onely apprehend but find it so indeed To poyson a King is not murder but Treason but for a Wife or Servant to do it is double Treason And breach of Vow to God is not Treason but Sacriledge in a Priest sacro-Sacrilegium the most execrable kind of Sacriledge doubled by the condition of the Person Which being consider'd nothing can be more injurious to God more dangerous to Himself more exemplary and pernicious to Others First a Kissing Judas a Thievish Treasurer a Familiar Divel what more injurious to God for besides the unkind requitall of much Infidelity for much Love and Trust the treacherous defailance brings with it a scandalous Repute on God's service who will not be thought a good Master so long as his neerest Servants Revolt from their Station As in Heaven there is most Joy for a Converted sinner who comes from far so there is most grief for a perverted Servant who goes off so neer But secondly The Evill falls the heavier on himself the more Immediate he was before the lesse Mediation to re-unite him If the Man and Wife be two who shall intercede perchance some friend as deer as a Wife else none But if God and the Priest be two who shall there Officiate an Atonement The fall of an Angell makes him Divel no space for him betwixt Heaven and Hell The sin of a common Priest cost as much Sacrifice as the sin of the whole people but the sin of Eli the High Priest was not to be purg'd away by any Sacrifice whatsoever The nearer to God you are by Office so much the farther off by neglect What can wash Water or season Salt or sanctifie the Priest if these have lost their Purity Savour and Holinesse what can do on them their Office We may write up the forlorn Sentence of the Plague Domine miserere Lord have Mercy upon them no Physition but the God offended Lastly because the Priest is an Angell he seldome falls without a Train the height of his Dependance enlarges the contagious Power of deriving his disorder Well might his sin be rated aequivalent to that of the whole people for the defection which to day is His to morrow will be Theirs If he renounce the Vowes of a Priest why not they the Vowes of Christians Prone they are of themselves to that form of Religion which is most easie and lesse chargeable if he by neglect of Duty and Ceremony by Incouragement of unyoak't Liberty shall push forward this Inclination great must the fall of the Church be For Church-Wardens the next Pillars being men chosen out of the People they also will alternately slacken their Office and prove as carelesse of the Materiall Temple as the Priest of the Spirituall O what shall become of the Congregation when their Guides come in or go out the worst of men what shall become of the Church when Officers are chosen to look to its decay An Officer more neglectfull of Order than the Common Laity is much like his Chancell that Thetcht while the Body of the Church is Leaded or like his Table that foul and moth-eaten while the Pewes are fair and garnish't or like his Surplesse that coorse and ragged while the Womens Aprons are fine and sound Wherefore He and his Church just as they proceed so they will end both in a like ruine Necessity will at length cause us to be all Brownists left without Churches and the stream of deprav'd Custom carry us into Libertinism from thence into Fanaticall madnesse Misery and Death at length God himself will add ruine and call for Zim and Ohim to be his Priests for so he hath done already to many dead Carcass'd and wasted Churches Those places which our Fathers vow'd to Gods perpetuall Service are impropriated by a degenerate Posterity to their own abuses the sacred wills of devout Testators confirm'd by Generall Parliament awfully fenc'd with solemn Execrations of the Priest strongly tied by God's expresse Inhibition Lev. 27. 28. Whatsoever is consecrated to me shall not be taken away are now quite frustrated the Holy Sanctuaries are reform'd from Dens of Idlenesse to Dens of Rapine from Babels of pride to Sties of Luxury where once God's Altar stood there is the Glutton's Table perchance the Bed of the Adulterer the Sculls of Holy Fathers are dug up to make spacious Cellarage for Hogs-heads and Drunkards the very Chalices which held the Blood of Christ are reform'd into Bowls and 't is hop'd that by demolishing the Walls all hand-writing like that against Belshazzar is sufficiently prevented But whence all this the sound whereof makes both the ears of them that hear to Tingle even from the defection of Priests carelesse of their Vowes short of their pretended Holinesse No great evil hath ever befaln the Church but by this way by Persecution it ever prosper'd and only decay'd by the Treachery of her Officers Israel fell to Idolatry but who made the Calf Aaron The Ark was taken and prophan'd but through whose fault the Sons of Ely Israel forsook the Divine Worship at Jerusalem and built them high Places but who serv'd thereon Jereboams Priests How fell the Temple at Jerusalem so often why so many of ours at once and why are the rest yet-standing in so much danger through the Default the Corruption the Tergiversation and perjury of Priests and Officers And in this particular Place I cannot imagine that simple Women zealously though blindly affected would so quickly re-iterate their Rebellious Conventicles contrary to Oath and Subscription if some traiterous Guide did not secretly underbear and encourage them with pestilent Instructions But know this you of the Laity that whensoever ye hearken to such depravers of Form and Discipline critically bent for Innovation sacred pretenders of a most tender Conscience and yet unsensible of solemn Oaths you chuse for your Leaders perjur'd Hirelings wicked Vow-breakers and what can you expect of the Building but Ruine when the first stone of the Foundation is Perjury In all this I speak the Truth I lie not So help me God through Jesus Christ our Lord To Whom c. AMEN Delivered at Lin at a Visitation June the 24. 1633. FINIS

A SERMON Preached at a VISITATION Held at Lin in Norfolk June the 24th Anno 1633. Being an Admonition to the Clergy to remember and keep those severall Oaths Promises and Subscriptions which they solemnly have made at the taking of their Degrees their Ordinations and Institutions to their Benefices By WILLIAM STRODE D. D. LONDON Printed by W. Wilson for Samuel Brown living in Well-yard in Little St. Bartholomews near the Lame-Hospitall 1660. A VISITATION SERMON Preached at Lin in Norfolk June 24. Anno 1633. Psal. 76. vers. 11. Promise to the Lord and keep it all ye that be round about him FOR my present Argument of Promise and Oath What Place more fit than This where some private Innovators have lately conspired against our sworn form of Religion And what Time more seasonable than the time of this Meeting call'd to give an account of sundry publick Promises Ecclesiastick and Sacerdotall freely made by deliberate choice confirm'd by Oath and Subscription And what Persons more apposite Hearers than your selves especially bound to make and to perform them by your high Office your near attendance on the Lord your God Place Time and Persons so well agreeing harken to the charge of my Text You emphatically whom it so closely concerns you of all men Promise to the Lord and keep it all ye that be round about him The Parts are three 1. A Counsell commended Promise 2. An Obligation thereof begotten Keep it 3. The Parties betwixt whom it passes You and the Lord Which may be reduced to three Propositions 1. Holy Promises are laudably made 2. Being once made they must be necessarily kept 3. Especially kept between such Parties The Bond is streightned because assign'd to the Lord assign'd by them that be round about him First Holy Promises are laudably made else Baptism it self is blameable whose covenant binds us to forsake the World the Flesh and the Devill I need not over-urge this truth if onely I forbear the name of a Vow which carries an odious sound of some Jewish or Popish Relick As in manners we may safely equivocate but not lie falsly accuse but not slander take away not rob nor steal So in Religion promise we may so we do not vow protest not swear Nay Religion is grown so verball that many Earnest Points consisting in meer words have quite thrust out all consideration of much pious matter Because we will not hear of Justification but onely by Faith for Faith is the radicall vertue we abhor the concomitant works of Charity as mortall sins scarce to be nam'd never committed amongst us Because Confirmation hath been ranck'd amongst Sacraments for as Baptism is our birth in Christ so Confirmation is our growth and fits us for mans estate in the Eucharist it is now scarce thought a godly Ordinance Because Confession hath sometimes given a name to the Rood for Confession is the reading of faults away with the Apostle's Precept we may not confesse our sins one to another Because Pennance thereafter enjoyn'd hath been held another Sacrament for it is a holy and cleansing Discipline it is now scarce allowed for an honest chastisement Because the Liturgy and Communion hath sometimes been called Masse for there is Christus missus the onely service of God i● now to hear him serve us we come to as little of Prayers as without danger of losing Sermon precisely we can and seldom Receive without compulsion Because the Table hath sometimes been called the Altar though Christ and St. Paul have call'd it so too that 's all one yet for the word's sake 't is humbled to a lower place to another posture to filth and rottennesse till it be scarce known for a Table Because the Minister hath been called Priest for Christ is our High-Priest therefore he is now throughly be-ministred made our Minister not God's and must pipe what we bid him Because some Churches have harboured Superstition though Superstition be ill reformed with Sacriledge selling of Doves with plucking down of Walls yet the word Superstition being given they and many a Parish Church besides at once fell to ground and the word Congregation is built in their steed Ju●● so because some Vows were made superstitiously to the blessed Virgin in hope of Mediation or presumptuously to Christ with opinion of Merit therefore all Vows must be rejected all censur'd unlawfull in themselves Brethren you may remember that the covetous fury of Church-Reformation like that which was wrought on Benjamin did almost proceed to the ruine of a Tribe the rooting out of the Clergy that as Israel was driven to repair the losse by granting them wives of rapine so this Land by admitting ignorant Priests snatch'd from their Shops and Trades How taught they their Hearers in publick but as their Hearers taught them in private And what Doctrine could prove the spoile of the Church lawfull but the unlawfulnesse of Vows And what could totally discountenance the thing but reprobation of the neer common Name including Superstition together with Devotion Words are deputed for Things and change of words made the businesse of Reformation to seem more numerous and weighty as indeed it ought to seem For as the Church had great need to be reformed so the Spoilers had much more need to reform her and their heirs have still the same need Wherefore if you dedicate your selves or any thing else unto God remove it further from the speciall name and favour it with a style more generall call it a Promise no Vow no Vow I beseech you If I spake to unletter'd people I would forbear but before you that can well discern substance from shadow I dare present the truth naked The Greek and Latine Translations are {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} Vovete Vow unto the Lord The Acts which I shall inculcate are properly Vows and therefore I plainly pronounce That Vows are also laudable In strict Language Vows are holy Promises of a more speciall kind We may sometimes promise a matter necessary as Jacob his Tythe Naaman his sole Worship of God such an Act is barely a Promise And sometimes a matter Voluntary as David his provision for a Temple Hanna her son for a Priest such an Act is both a Promise and a Vow As he that denies all promises condemnes Baptism so he that denies all vowes condemnes all Ecclesiasticall Offices and chiefly the Order of Priesthood which Order is ever freely taken but when it is taken drawes with it these inseparable vows Attendance over the Flock many rare Virtues practick Obedience to the form of Liturgy to the Book of Articles to Ecclesiasticall Canons to the Injunctions of the Diocesan Examine Compare a true Vow and the office of Priesthood Is the one by its nature a voluntary Promise made unto God so is the other Are these the Conditions of the one Deliberation of mind Purpose of will Pronunciation of mouth the same are Ingredients in the other No man is surprized ignorantly or forced

gave worship to blessed Saints he to every creature every Picture and Fancy which the Idolatry of Covetousnesse hath set up in his heart Rome he accuses for her swarm of Priests and sundry kinds of Locusts himself by taking away all distinction of holy Orders and Vows would make far more all in a like manner one unholy Priesthood And thus to make all men Priests is to unmake those that are But you my fellow-servants stand up for your Calling and rejoyce in the vow of your Profession whereby ye are separate from the world to Christ a Vow superlative not onely sanctifying your own Persons but giving you in charge all the Vows of the People sanctified under you Other men's Vows admit them nearer into God's Houshold yours into his Closet And next under you are the Church-Guardians preferr'd on their holy Promises to be Stewards and Officers of God's House you his Eyes and they his Hands you his Tongue and they his two rowes of Teeth you to direct and they to execute All that are drawn and lug'd to these places do not remember that it was the ambition of the best King to be God's Dore-keeper My heart is on those who offer themselves willingly When God cried out Who is on my side out stept Levi a whole Tribe at once And God had no better reward for their good service than to make them his Houshold-Chaplains and Servants Now as none can be admitted into a Prince's Attendance without an Oath so neither into an Office under the King of Heaven The heighth of their Royalty requires the best assurance of our Loyalty Duty is not so firm as Promise nor Promise as an Oath wherefore all sacred Contracts with God are tied with this knot Baptism Confirmation Marriage Consecration are all celebrated in the Name of the Father the Son and the holy Ghost a Clause equivalent with an Oath But Ordination more expresly and solemnly with a Head submitted to Imprecation with a Mouth kissing and swearing with a Hand subscribing and a knee bowing For Swearing I could call a Jury of Examples but let one stand for all If God himself confirmed his Promise with an Oath when he made his Son a Priest Shall thy word be taken before his or wilt thou that makest a scruple of all swearing appear more holy than God No Thou shalt swear The Lord liveth in Truth in Judgment in Righteousness Jer. 4. 13. No doubt of the Oath but be sure of the Adjuncts of Truth that thou know the matter fully and deliver it unfainedly of Judgment that thou consider it deliberately with thy self and deliver it judicially before the Magistrate of Righteousnesse that thou weigh both the Possibility and Honesty Wherefore thus Promise Vow Swear to the Lord and when thy hands are so tied to the Plow that thou canst not let them go do not look back with thine eyes as wishing to be loose let these Bonds be thy Triumph The Promissory Oath leads me aside to the Assertory and 't is but a little aside For as the one obliges to a profession of future Offices so the other to a confession of past Offences the one freely taken by our selves the other judicially exacted ex Officio Judicis by the Officious inquiry of the Ecclesiasticall Judge Some Innovators would fain purge the Consistory of this purging Oath but how unworthily you may easily see by the Matter the Proceeding the End For in what Matter is this Oath administer'd in such as may overtempt weak flesh to Perjury The matter is indeed Criminall but not Capitall Some perchance for the present Life of the Body may hazzard the Life of the Soul few I hope for inferior Motives A little meer shame is an evill not comparable to the double guilt of sin and perjury For these are ever to be loaded with fear or punishment the other quickly sets you free and vanishes especially being such as it is a shame that maketh not to be asham'd the Pillory may be objected Pennance cannot 't is like a Cure without any sensible Scar. Think rightly of Deponents and as the Law doth humanely and religiously then is the clamorous doubt of Perjury sufficiently prevented But how proceeds this Oath Violently as 't is objected with intrenching on God's hidden Prerogative with forcing of Nature with wresting of judiciall Order Nothing lesse here 's no Tyrannicall search of hearts no breach into God's Peculiar secrets utterly conceal'd but only a neerer inquiry into scandalous and infectious deeds partly broken out all ready and further suspected nor is it true that the Defendant is unnaturally forc'd to stand a party against himselfe nor true that the Judge is irregularly become a party against the Defendant The Adversary which troubles all and yet seems loath to be found is the Traytour Sin a lowd Inmate whose foul clamour betrayes the Entertainer Though sin hide its Head yet the Foot-steps the Sent and Cry is commonly left behind Effects are the Foot-steps Probabilities the Sent Report the Cry All which supply the place of open Accusers and hunt out the Malefactors they hunt them out as Adam's flight pursued him at his back as Cain's face accus'd him to his face as Sodoms cry call'd for a storm on their heads Any of these tokens may startle a vigilant Over-seer as well as an expresse Information any hint may suffice to stir a Question though not to clear the Decision Wherefore if sin lye cunningly conceal'd Justice must be wisely Inquisitive so long as the Thorn sticks in the sides of the Church partly discern'd and partly hid that which appears must cause a search of that which appears not whether it be the Matter as Achans theft Person as the unknown Murtherer Circumstance as the place in Susanna's slaunder no proceeding till those be drawn forth which sometimes cannot be without swearing the D●ponent to discover the whole and simple Truth Some kind of sin being ever done in darknesse and in no other Court punishable cannot else be punish't And no way more honourable for the party then to be tried by his owne word And nothing more worthy of the Judges favour then the Partie 's own confession Then what 's the end crooked as it is noys'd that the Deponent may become a prey No that Truth may be gain'd What that by speaking Truth he may accuse himselfe No that either he may quit his Innocence or confesse his guilt which Confession differs from accusing as Tenting from Wounding And what next to be then punish't with shame and ruine No to be amended by a fatherly and saving correction such as in other Churches the humble Soul will ingenuously seek by voluntary Confession a practice rather smother'd than ever condemn'd even with us Brethren who live so Anti-popishly undisciplin'd What strength have now those wonted Objections which are still repeated as if they had never been answer'd Fear of Perjury in the matter question'd violence in the Proceeding insnaring of Brethren touching the End What