Selected quad for the lemma: authority_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
authority_n	bind_v	king_n	law_n	3,290	5	5.2223	4	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A85839	Analysis. The loosing of St. Peters bands; : setting forth the true sense and solution of the covenant in point of conscience so far as it relates to the government of the church by episcopacy. / By John Gauden ...	Gauden, John, 1605-1662.	1660 (1660)	Wing G340; ESTC R202274	13,622	28

ΑΝΑΛΥΣΙΣ THE Loosing of St. Peters Bands Setting forth The true Sense and Solution OF THE COVENANT In point of CONSCIENCE SO FAR As it relates to the Government of the Church by EPISCOPACY By JOHN GAVDEN D. D. Acts 16.26 The foundations of the Prison were shaken the doors opened and every ones bands were loosed 1 Tim. 1.5 Now the end of the commandment is charity out of a pure heart and a good conscience and faith unfeigned Non est conscientia sine scientia nec pura esse potest si sit caeca Bern. LONDON Printed by J. Best for Andrew Crook at the Green-Dragon in St. Pauls Church-yard 1660. TO His honoured Friend Sir Lawrence Brumfeild Kt. And Colonel in London SIR WEll knowing as St. Bernard speaks The tenderness of conscience how tender and delicate a thing Conscience is how it is not to be baffled or deluded with any Sophistry nor ravished or captivated by any violence and tyranny not cajoled or trepanned by any Policy and hypocrisie but apart from all fraud or force it is then most at its ease freedom and tranquillity when it hath most light and serenity to see its duty also most liberty to act according to those rules of right Reason and Religion which are not partial flexible and mutable but universal fixed and eternal § The rules of Conscience I have here endeavored to give you and others upon your motion that sober sence of the Covenant whereof I believe it is only capable before God before all good Christians and in a mans own wel-informed conscience § Which must and at last will judge of things in point of scruple or obligation not by the occasion beginning them or the power imposing them or the passion clamoring or the multitude applauding or the success abetting or the pertinacy maintaining them Nor yet by the superstition of some men devoutly doting for a while upon that as a goddess or an Image faln from heaven when it may be indeed but the late invention of some cunning work-men whose golden rings and ear-rings being melted in the furnace of Civil wars may sometimes bring forth such a thing as the Authors and Abettors will needs vote to be their God § But the true light and medium of Conscience as to its judgement practice peace and perseverance must be by those clear pregnant and constant beams of right Reason add true Religion which shine in the brightness and stability of Divine and Humane laws which are the solid pillars of Truth the firm supports of duty the sure bounds of obedience and the safe repose of conscience § All other superstructures of fancy policy and Interest as hay straw and stubble will perish but those others will out last the last conflagrations which shall make a fiery trial of all mens thoughts designs and actions both publick and private whether they be made up of popular and peevish dross or of such piety more precious than gold which is both pure and permanent § In this great concern therefore of conscience I must study to be void of all fear and flattery of men Freedom from passion and prejudice in cases of conscience separate from all crowds of passions and prejudices free from popular petitions and the two Houses resolutions from Scottish importunities and English compliances not obnoxious to the Court or the Country to the Assembly or the High-Commission to Episcopal infirmities or Presbyterian insolencies but as in the presence of God and before his Tribunal so serious intent upright and unbyassed shall I declare my judgement to you to your City to my Country and to our most welcome King to my reverend Fathers and brethren of the Clergie and to my dear Mother the Church of England for whose sake nothing must seem hard or too much to be done or suffered by me or any of her Sons since we have the great paterns both of our late Soveraign who suffered as a Martyr in her defence and of our blessed Saviour who was crucified for her redemption § As for my Brethren of the Church of Scotland I confess I understand not their motions or mutations because I think they once enjoyed the best constitutions of Episcopacy in the world I have a Christian pity and charity for them I leave them to that liberty which is the fruit not of the swords and passions of man but of the Word and Spirit of God which clearly unites Loyalty and Religion Duty and Devotion Reformation and Moderation Order and counsel eminency and harmony in one paternal fraternal and filial unity of Bishops Presbyters and People § As to the scruple or case of conscience then with which you tell me The shiness of some mens consciences as to Episcopacy many sober and honest men are by their once taking the Covenant so scared from all complyings with any Church Government under any name of Bishops or notion of Episcopacy never so reformed and regulated that they fear by looking back to the primitive Catholick and universal Government of this and all other antient Churches to be turned into pillars of Apostacy as Lots wife Answers oblique was into a pillar of salt And to prevent which sad Metamorphosis in City and Country my Answer or Resolution in point of Conscience as to the Covenant so far as it relates to Episcopacy is this 1. The Covenants defectiveness as to authority and law First I might shrewdly batter the Covenant by urging the defectiveness of and so the invalidity of any lawful constant or compleat authority in it capable to bind the Subjects or People of England either in the Court of conscience or any other Ecclesiastical or civil Judicature in which nothing can have any permanent bond or tye of Law except Gods Word without the Kings consent no more than the vow of a servant or son a daughter or wife in Moses Law could bind them without Numb 30.2 yea against the declared consent of their Master father or Husband under whose protection they were 2 The violence of the times Secondly I might eccho and retort upon the Covenant the violence and noise of those times in which it was first hatched in England and brought forth by the Midwifery of tumults and Armies of engaged yea enraged parties and factions whose wrath and policies were not probbale to work the righteousness of God nor did they seem good Angels which troubled our waters to an healing but evil ones sent in Gods just anger amongst us to turn our waters into blood 3. The novelty of it as to our laws Thirdly I might further urge the novelty and partiality of the Covenant as the English Laws and genius that it was from a foraign influence and design first invented then obtruded on this Church and State contrary to our antient Laws and constitutions both ecclesiastical and civil to which King and People were bound till by mutual consent they were altered which was never yet done in the point of

to form and take up against any thing short of or beyond the merit of it either as good or evil 3. It cannot bind to the in●ury of others Thirdly No such Covenant can bind us to the injury of anothers liberty right power or lawful authority private or publick and so not against that which is in the King and the Bishops or in the major part of the Church or of the Country or of any Parliament which may look upon Bishops and Episcopacy with a far more propitious eye than those that beheld it only through the Presbyterian spectacles 4. It cannot bind either to evil or from good Fourthly Such a Covenant can bind no man in conscience against any thing that is in its nature good or that is not morally evil for this were for man to bind himself and others beyond Gods eternal bonds of righteousness They are Covenants with Hell and Death which bind men either to what is evil and sinful in its nature or from what is allowed of God as good and lawful yea and may be necessary in its time and place now there is no doubt but there is much good in Episcopal order and government much good was done by it to the Churches of Christ in the primitive and all times much to this Church of England since the Reformation and before the principles and proportions of order subordination and government which hold good in all other polities and fraternities cannot be evil in this of Episcopacy It hath much of God in it from Scriptural precepts and patterns in the Jewish Church which the Christians followed in many things It hath so much of Christs example and the Apostolick constitution of the primitive use of Ecclesiastical custom of holy mens general approbation and universal imitation both here in England and elsewhere that it were extreme folly madness prophaness and blasphemy to cry it down for evil or to engage and covenant against it as such when it hath in it so much good and so attested by experience to be beneficial for the well-being yea almost for the compleat and regular being of any Church and none more than this of England where people are not to be governed by their equals and inferiours because they are in black cotes 5. It cannot oblige to extirpate the use of what is good because of any abuse Fifthly No man may vow or covenant much less keep any such Covenant as he hath taken intentionally against the evil or corruption and abuse of any thing so as to involve the good and usefulness of it and to condem that to destruction or extirpation with the other as Abraham said to the Lord God forbid that the Judge of all the earth should destroy the righteous with the wicked or cast the wheat with the chaff into inquenchable fire No a good conscience abhors confusion it doth not take or do things by whole-sale but by retail weighs all in the ballance of the Sanctuary separates the precious from the vile the superstructures of men from the foundations of Christ and his Apostles which stood firm for so many ages it becomes the children of wisdom to justifie her by trying all things and holding fast what is good 6. It obligeth not to abolish all that is good or christian mixed with Popery Sixthly As they that covenanted against Popery cannot think they did abjure or must abhor all those saving truths and duties of Christianity which are mixed with Popery no more can they justly think because they covenanted against Prelacy that is against its pride presumption idleness covetousness and tyranny that therefore they are for ever engaged against the order presidency and paternal authority of Episcopacy mens malice and hatred may not go beyond the grave if the abuses and disorders in Prelatick Government be dead and buried true Episcopacy may yet have a blessed resurrection from corruption to incorruption from dishonor to honor which I hope and pray God will by the wisdom of the King and his Parliament effect It cannot bind to any thing out of a mans lawful power Seventhly No man may lawfully vow and covenant or accordingly act in any thing which is not in his power and dispose in his sphear and calling beyond which bounds this Covenant permits no man to go yea it doth limit by these all his engagement and activity Now certainly the government of the Church of England especially as established by Law neither was nor is in any private mens power be they never so many either to alter or innovate or abolish and extirpate This is only in the power of the King as Supream by the Law of God and the Land to protect and preserve Nor can it be changed but by his royal assent to the counsel and desire of the Two Houses of Parliament Nor may any man never so much for Presbytery or Independency or Anarchy as to his private opinion either vow or covenant or act overtly and violently further than by humble petition or counsel against established and legal Episcopacy no more than he may against Monarchy because he prefers either Aristocracy or Democracy It cannot bind against what may after appear good Eightly As no man could lawfully covenant against what he thinks to be good or against what is less good then he desires and opines but out of his calling and lawful power to effect so nor can any man in conscience be bound by any such Covenant taken in a gross sense or in general terms against that which may upon second thoughts or after-view and better information appear to be good and useful to him he is here bound not to keep his Covenant in the latitude of his mistakes and presumptions nor to act according to his prejudices and former supposals but rather to retract his rashness and unadvisedness in taking it at first and to act according to the present evidence of what is true just good lawful and useful even in Episcopacy whereof he cannot but stand convinced both by the principles of right reason and the proportions of all Government and by the experience of the defects deformities and inconsistencies of all other models § It is now high time after so many afflictions to learn righteousness and wisdom and to discern between the faults of men or times and the true nature of things between good and bad Bishops between pontifical Prelacy and Paternal Episcopacy which is that wherewith all sober men would be satisfied and against which no Covenanter could in Reason or Religion in piety or policy in prudence or conscience be engaged The duty of a cautious and consci●ntious Covenanter Ninethly The cautious and consciencious Covenanter therefore is now to take a calmer view and exacter measure of the Covenant than perhaps he did at the first offer and taking of it which was in haste and heat in fear and fury what then he greedily swallowed without chewing he should now leisurely and soberly ruminate for in lumps it will not