Selected quad for the lemma: truth_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
truth_n	church_n	religion_n	true_a	7,548	5	5.1593	4	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A54142	Good advice to the Church of England, Roman Catholick and Protestant dissenter, in which it is endeavoured to be made appear that it is their duty, principle & interest to abolish the penal laws and tests	Penn, William, 1644-1718.	1687 (1687)	Wing P1296; ESTC R203148	42,315	65

a Riot are as invisible in a Dissenters Meeting as Christ in the Transubstantiation yet it must be a Riot without any more to do The English of which is 't is a Riot to pray to God in the humblest and peaceablest manner in a Conventicle I know it is said The Blood-shed in the fore-going Raign and the Plots of the Papists against Queen Elizabeth drew those Laws from the Church of England But this was no reason why she should do ill because they had done so Besides it may be answered that that Religion having so long intermixt it self with worldly Power it gave way to take the revenges of it And certainly the great men of the Church of England endeavouring to intercept Queen Mary by proclaiming the Lady Jane Gray and the Apprehension the Papists had of the better Title of Mary Queen of Scots together with a long Possession were scurvy Temptations to kindle ill Designs against that extraordinary Queen But tho nothing can excuse and less justifie those cruel Proceedings yet if there were any reason for the Laws it is plainly removed for the Interests are joyn'd and have been since King James the first came to the Crown However 't is certain there were Laws enough or they might have had them to punish all civil Enormities without the necessity of making any against them as Papists And so the civil Government had stood upon its own Legs and Vices only against it had been punishable by it In short it was the falsest Step that was made in all that great Queens Raign the most dishonourable to the Principles of the first Reformers and therefore I know no better Reason why it should be continued than that which made the Cardinal in the History of the Council of Trent oppose the Reformation at Rome That tho it was true that they were in the wrong yet the admitting of it approved the judgment of their Enemies and so good-night to Infallibility Let not this be the Practice of the Church of England and the rather because she does not pretend to it But let her reflect that she has lost her King from her Religion and they that have got him naturally hope for ease for theirs by him that 't is the end they labour'd and the great use they have for him and I would fain wonder that she never saw it before but whether she did or no why should she begrudg it at least refuse it now Since 't is plain that there is nothing we esteem dangerous in Popery that other Laws are not sufficient to secure us from Have we not enough of them let her think of more and do the best she can to discover Plotters punish Traitors suppress the Seditious and keep the Peace better than those we have can enable us to do But for Gods sake let us never direct Laws against Men for the cause of Religion or punish them before they have otherwise done amiss Let Mens Works not their Opinions turn the Edg of the Magistrates Sword against them else 't is Beheading them before they are Born. By the common Law of this Kingdom there must be some Real and Proper Overt Act that proves Treason some Malice that proves Sedition and some violent Action that proves a Rout or Riot If so to call any sort of Religious Orders the one or Praying to God in a way out of fashion the other is prepostrous and punishing People for it down right Murther or Breach of the Peace according to the true use of Words and the old Law of England If the Church of England fears the growth of Popery let her be true to the Religion she owns and betake her self to Faith rather than Force by a pious humble and a good Example To convince and perswade which is the highest honour to any Church and the greatest Victory over Men. I am for a National Church as well as she so it be by Consent and not by Constraint But Coercive Churches have the same Principle tho not the same Interest A Church by Law established is a State Church and that is no Argument of Verity unless the State that makes her so be infallible and because that will not be asserted the other can never oblige the Conscience and consequently the Compulsion she uses is unreasonable This very Principle justifies the King of France and the Inquisition For Laws being equally of Force in all Countries where they are made it must be as much Fault in the Church of Englands Judgment to be a Protestant at Rome or a Calvanist at Paris as to be a Papist at London Then where is Truth or Conscience but in the Laws of Countries which renders her an Hobbist notwithstanding her long and loud Clamours against the Leviathan I beg her for the love of Christ that she would think of these things and not esteem me her Enemy for performing the part of so good a Friend Plain Dealing becomes that Caracter no matter whether the Way be agreeable so it be right We are all to do our Duty and leave the rest to God He can best answer for our Obedience that Commands it and our Dependance upon his Word will be our Security in our Conduct What weight is it to a Church that she is the Church by Law established when no humane Law can make a true Church A true Church is of Christs making and is by Gospel established 'T is a Reflection to a Church that would be thought true to stoop to humane Law for her Establishment I have been often scandal'd at that Expression from the Sons of the Church of England especially those of the Robe What do you talk for our Religion is by Law established as if that determin'd the Question of its Truth against all other Perswasions The Jews had this to say against our Saviour We have a Law and by our Law he ought to Dye The Primitive Christians and some of our first Reformers Dyed as by Law established if that would mend the matter but does that make it lawful to a Christian Conscience we must ever demur to this Plea. No greater Argument of a Churches Defection from Christianity than turning Persecutor 'T is true the Scripture says The Earth shall help the Woman but that was to save her self not to destroy others For 't is the Token that 's given by the Holy Ghost of a false Church That none must Buy or Sell in her Dominions that will not receive her Mark in their Forehead or Right-hand That is by going to Church against Conscience or bribing lustily to stay at Home Things don't change tho men do Persecution is still the same let the hand alter never so often but the Sin may not For doubtless it is greatest in those that make the highest claim to Reformation For while they plead their own Light for doing so they hereby endeavour to extinguish anothers Light that can't concur What a Man can't do it is not his Fault he don't do nor

managed it civilly for a while but Ambition in some and Covetousness in others on the one hand and Discretion giving way to Resentment on the other they first ply the Queen and her Ministers and when that ended in favour of the Men of Ceremony the others arraigned them before the first Reformers abroad at Geneva Bazil Zurich c. The leading Prelates by their Letters as Doctor Burnet lately tells us in his Printed Relation of his Travels clear themselves to those first Doctors of any such Imputation and lay all upon the Queen who for Reasons of State would not be brough to so Inceremonious a way of Worship as that of the Calvanists At this time there were Papists Protestants Evangelists Praecisians Vbiquitists Familists or Enthusiasts and Anabaptists in England when the very first Year of her Reign a Law for Vniformity in Worship and Discipline was enacted and more followed of the severest Nature and sometimes executed Thus then we see that there never was such a thing as a Church of England since the Days of Popery that is a Church of Communion containing all the People of the Kingdom and so cannot be said to be so much as a Twin of the Reformation nevertheless she got the Blessing of the Civil Magistrate She made him great to be great by him If She might be the Church He should be the Head. Much good may the Bargain do her Now is the time for her to stand to her Principle I never knew any body exceed their Bounds that were not met with at last If we could escape Men God we cannot his Providence will overtake us and find us out By all this then it appearing that the Church of England was not the Nation the Case is plain that the Penal Laws were a Make-bate for they Sacrificed every sort of People whose Consciences differed from the Church of England which first put the Romanist upon flattering Prerogative and courting its Shelter from the wrath of those Laws The Address could not be unpleasant to Princes and we see it was not for King James that came in with Invectives against Popery entring the List with the Learn'd of that Church and charging her with all the Marks the Revelation gives to that of Antichrist grew at last so tame and easy towards the Romanists that our own Story tells us of the Fears of the encrease of Popery in the latter Parliament of his Reign In King Charles the First 's time no body can doubt of the Complaint because that was in great measure the drift of every Parliament and at last one Reason of the War. On the other hand the Severity of the Bishops against Men of their own Principles and in the main of their own Communion either because they were more zealous in Preaching more followed of the People or could not wear some odd Garment and less lead the Dance on a Lords Day at a Maypole the Relique of Flora the Roman Strumpet or perhaps for rubbing upon the Ambition Covetousness and Laziness of the Dignified and Ignorance and Loosness of the ordinary Clergy of the Church of which I could produce Five hundred gross Instances I say these things breed bad Blood and in part gave beginnings to those Animosities that at last broke forth with some other Pretences into áll those National Troubles that agitated this poor Kingdom for Ten Years together in which the Church of England became the greatest Looser Her Clergy turn'd out her Nobility and Gentry Sequestred Decimated Imprisoned c. And whatever she is pleased to think nothing is truer then that her Penal Laws and Conduct in the Star-Chamber and high Commission Court in matters of Religion was her overthrow 'T is as evident the same Humour since the Restoration of the late King has had almost the same Effect For nothing was grown so little and contemptible as the Church of England in this Kingdom she now intitles her self the Church of Witness the Elections of the last three Parliaments before this I know it may be said the Persons chosen were Church goers I confess it for the Law would have them so But no body were more avers to the Politicks of the Clergy insomuch that the Parson and the Parish almost every where divided upon the question of their Election In truth it has been the Favour and Countenence of the Crown and not her intrinsick Interest or Value that has kept her up to this Day else her Penal Laws the Bulwork of the Church of England by the same figure than she is one against Popery had sunk her long since I hope I may by this time conclude without offence that the Penal Laws have been a Make-bate in the great Family of the Kingdom setting the Father against his Children and Brethren against Brethren not only giving the Empire to one but endeavouring to extinguish the rest and that for this the Church of England has once paid a severe Reckoning I apply it thus Is it not her Interest to be careful she does it not a second time she has a fair Opportunity to prevent it and keep her self where she is that is the Publick Religion of the Country with the real Maintenance of it which is a plain preference to all the rest If she hopes by her Aversion to a general Ease to set up for a Bulwork against Popery one Year will show the trick and mightily deceive her and the Oppertunity will be lost and another Bargain driven I dare assure her mightily to her Disadvantage Violence and Tyranny are no natural Consequences of Popery for then they would follow every where and in all places and times alike But we see in twenty Governments in Germany there is none for Religion nor was not for an Age in France and in Poland the Popish Cantons of Switzerland Venice Lucca Colonia c. where that Religion is Dominant the People enjoy their Ancient and Civil Rights a little more steadily than they have of late time done in some Protestant Countries nearer home almost ever since the Reformation Is this against Protestancy No but very much against Protestants For had they been true to their Principles we had been upon better Terms So that the Reformation was not the Fault but not keeping to it better than some have done For whereas they were Papists that both obtain'd the Great Charter and Charter of Forests and in the successive Reigns of the Kings of their Religion Industriously laboured the Confirmation of them as the great Text of their Liberties and Properties by above thirty other Laws we find almost an equal Number to Destroy them and but one made in their Favour since the Reformation and that shrowdly against the will of the high Church-men too I mean the Petition of Right in the third Year of Charles the first In short They desire a legal Security with us and we are afraid of it least it should insecure us when nothing can do it so certainly as their