Selected quad for the lemma: authority_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
authority_n	bishop_n	church_n	world_n	2,827	5	4.9082	4	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A91248	Jus regum. Or, a vindication of the regall povver: against all spirituall authority exercised under any form of ecclesiasticall government. In a brief discourse occasioned by the observation of some passages in the Archbishop of Canterburies last speech. Published by authority.	Parker, Henry, 1604-1652.; Hunton, Philip, 1604?-1682,	1645 (1645)	Wing P404; Thomason E284_24; ESTC R200064	30,326	40

for all that can onely be introduced by force and compulsion in the Service of God wherefore the severall ends of Magistracy and of the Ministry are different but not contrary but the severall meanes by which they attaine their ends are not onely different but contrary and those meanes which are effectuall to the one are not only ineffectuall but uselesse to the other for the Magistrate can never attaine that end to which his Authority conduceth by no perswation nor information onely nor can the Minister subdue the will nor informe the understanding by any Authority from or in himselfe and both of them have their Commission immediately from God and each of them are subject to the other without any subordination of offices from the one to the other for the Magistrate is no lesse subject to the operation of the word from the mouth of the Minister then any other man whatsoever and the Minister againe is as much subject to the Authority of the Magistrate as any other Subject whatsoever and therefore though there be no subordination of offices yet is there of Persons the Person of the Minister remaining a Subject but not the function of the Ministry but there needes not two Tribunalls nor Independent Courts be erected to provide for their severall ends and dutyes required of them for the Minister can never attaine the end of his labours by no Judiciall processe nor legall proceedings whatsoever and therefore all Judiciall courts are needelesse and uselesse to his ends yet are they not so to himselfe having other ends then what are required of him for the discharge of his duty and function but it is essentiall to the Magistrate to have a tribunall and judiciall Courts for the attaining of his ends and duties required of him without which he can never discharge his dutie as he ought but whensoever the like Tribunall is erected in the Church as is necessary in the State they must be Independent one of another in regard the severall offices governing Church and State are so but all that is to be got by Independant Tribunalls is either dissention and discord which is the usuall fruite that devision of Authority beareth or by compliance to provide for one anothers Interests or particular ends differing from their publick dutyes with the manifest losse of true religion on both sides which many times drawes downe the Judgment of God upon one or both as being a third person no lesse interressed in Justice and Honour then either and many times the Justice of God is most greeveous when least apprehended as suffering men to wallow in their sins to dye in security nor is it a small Judgment to leave men to the necessary effects which division of Authority produceth for the end of all government is the preservation of humane society the meanes of doing whereof is by union and unity and Authority is the effectuall meanes of producing and propagating unity and therefore whensoever Authority is divided Vnitie may alwaies and sometimes must admit of division which destroyes it for unity and division are destructive one of another and when two Tribunalls are erected for the determining of severall and different causes and crimes both armed with a forcible Authority weilding swords of a different nature agreable to their different constitutions and without any dependency and subordination the one to the other what lasting concord and agreement can there be beweene these two they that mannage them must be juster then men are knowne to be or advantages will be taken when given by the one as no sublunary substances which are subject to change can remaine long in an equall ballance for subjecting the other and therefore it was when the Christian world did by a generall consent beleeve that the Church having a sword though invisible for the cutting off of all schismaticall and refractory Members no lesse really and truly then the State hath a visible materiall sword which for the preservation of union and unity was esteemed necessary to be put into the hands of one and therefore willingly submitted their necks under the Imaginary stroake thereof from the sentence of Popes or Bishops of Rome How easie was it for them by reason therof to subject all Christian Princes and Magistrates unto a dependency and subordination unto them and their Authority and how did they trouble the Christian world by transferring of rights and stirring up of rebellion whensoever any of those Princes did oppose them or contradict their wills by a supposed Intrenching upon their pretended Prerogatives though usurped but when the Popes right began to be questioned by some whereby his reputation did decline even amongst those who adhearing still to the doctrine of the Church of Rome as to that in which they had beene educated and bred yet did not beleeve his censures to be so dreadfull as before they apprehended them to be but the edge of his sword being thereby blunted and the edge of the temporall sword being not onely visible but sharpe the advantage returned to Princes whereby those Princes who continued in union with the Church of Rome professing subjection and obedience to the spirituall Authority thereof doe notwithstanding now reduce that power and Authority to which they professe subjection unto a subordination of them and their Authority to be directed by them which will be of no longer permanency then that Church can insnare the world againe to an apprehension and beleife of the reality of their power to beget which they continually indeavour and aspire and have no small hopes from the differences and divisions amongst Protestants for the increasing and fomenting whereof it is not to be imagined that they are idle but whatsoever their hopes and practises are their greatest strength remaineth in this that it is generally beleeved that the Church hath a spirituall Authority for the cutting off of all schismaticall Members and that this Authority is to be preserved in some one forme or other without any derivation thereof from any humane power for then it cleerely and undoubtedly followeth that whosoever by such principles of reason taken from the end of government doth incline to Monarchy and that this spirituall Authority can best be preserved by the Supremacy of one man then the Bishops of Rome having had for a long time and for a long succession and still having the possession besides other advantages of greatnesse and power which begetteth strength and reputation must and will be acknowledged by all those to be the onely spirituall Monarch in the Church armed with spirituall Authority and whosoever out of prejudice against the Church of Rome taken against her by reason of either her errours or abuses or both doth seperate themselves from the Communion of that Church and by consequence onely free themselves from her subjection but doe notwithstand adheare to and retaine the grounds of those errours and abuses by acknowledging and beleeving that the same spirituall Authority which was presupposed to have beene

abused by the Popes and Bishops of Rome as Vsurpers onely over the rest of the Clergy or too great a power and consequently dangerous in the hands of any one man is not onely lawfull but necessary as being Inherent in the function and essentiall for the preservation of union and unity to be preserved in some other forme which they agree upon and like better then the incontrollable Supremacie of one man then this doth necessarily follow that albeit they free themselves from all the errours and abuses which were introduced by the Supreamicie of one man yet so long as they acknowledge that the same power and Authority is resident in others they can never free themselves of all errours and abuses which are introducible by Authority but that the property and condition of things in themselves indifferent will be changed from being indifferent and converted into the nature and necessity of absolute duties which ever begets bondage and subjection and sense of bondage doth ever beget desire of liberty which can never be obtained so long as the opinion of a necessity of Authority in some forme or other is retained and experience hath now taught us what could not be foreseene by reason alone without some additionall helpe from divine illumination that in the Church of England which did not onely shake off the Supreamicie of the Pope but had purged her selfe of all those errours which had either crept in or were introduced by the power of that Supreamicie by retaining of Bishops and giving them a part onely of that spirituall Authority which formerly was acknowledged to Popes and though quallifying that part by restraining it from all legislative power or a power to inact any thing but allowing it a Power of Iudicature the effectuall operation and proper working of that part of spirituall Authority hath now fully manifested it selfe to tend to propogate superstition and errour rather then the sincerity and truth of Religion and as the naturall motions of different bodies differing in quality and substance tend to different centers the naturall motion of Episcopacy hath now discovered it selfe to indeavour continually to unite it selfe to such a head to which it is capable to aspire rather then to be in subjection under such a head to which it hath no capacity to aspyre and that received principle of State that Episcopacy is a support to Monarchy is now likewise discovered to be fraudulent and deceitefull for it is true that it is a support to a spirituall Monarchy or Monarchy in the Church as being the basis and foundation thereof but doth undermine and destroy Monarchy in the State especially in that State which doth trust unto it as to a supporter and the reason is cleere for all supporters which have no solid foundation doe ruinate those buildings which are erected upon them being of greater weight and substance then the foundation can beare and the foundation of Episcopacy being layed in the engrossing of spirituall Authority or Ecclesiasticall censures Spirituall Authority it selfe hath no other existence nor being but what it hath in the Imagination and beleefe which is too slippery a ground to support a solid substance such as temporall Monarchy is but may be sufficient to support an aery and imaginary bulk such as spirituall Monarchy is which Episcopacy not only supports but continually tends towards as to its proper center and my Lord of Cant. when he obtained the Kings good will to confirme by his Letters Patents the late Canons did put a direct cheate upon his Majesty for thereby the Kings Supreamicy in causes Ecclesiasticall was cut off and from thence forth his Supreamicy over Ecclesiasticall persons should have been rather titular then reall If the consent of Parliament could as easily have been obtained as his Majesties own But to conclud this part of my Lord of Cant. Speech he might safely protest upon his conscience that his Majesty was a sound Protestant according to the Religion by law established yet did it not thereupon follow that he himself was guiltles from the sentence of the law because his actions being all warranted by his Majesties consent they could not be divided from the Kings which is the cheife thing implied by this particular His second particular is concerning th●… great and populous City to which he is very kind and prayeth God to blesse it but all his prayers for those who he conceiveth had done him injury have a sting in them and this prayer ends reproaching those he prayes for as if some had subordned witnesses against his life by gathering of hands which he affirmeth to be a way that might endanger many an innocent man and may plucks innocent blood upon their own heads and perhaps upon this City also which before he prayed God to blesse and now again to forbid this Judgement but his prayers are mixed with threates and all tending to justify himself to his Auditours whereof he is never unmindefull upon all occasions and having here occasion to mention the Parliament he bestowes glorious and honourable Titles and epithrates upon it as if that were sufficient to testify his respects thereof but he doth contradict his owne testimony by his Inferences and Applications for by Inference he applyeth the gathering of hands which he affirmeth to have been practised against himself to the stirring up of the people against Saint Stephen and to Herods lying in waite for Saint Peters death by observing how the people tooke the death of Saint James By which Instance he must meane that great honourable and wise Court of the Kingdome the Parliament those be the titles he bestowes upon them for it was they that gave sentence against him as Herod did against Saint James and would have done agaynst Saint Peter which no Christian thinkes was either honourably or wisely done of him and therefore what opininion he had of that great honourable and wise Court for sentencing of him may be collected and that his esteeme of them was not so honourable as his expressions but whatsoever his esteeme of them was they were his Judges so will he never be theirs which he here apprehended when he did put the City in mind of the Justice of God and how fearfull a thing it was to fall into the Hands of the living God because God remembers and forgets not the complaynts of the poore a lesson which he never remembred when he himselfe did sit upon the Tribunall but is of speciall comfort unto him upon the Scaffold for his blood was innocent blood and not onely innocent blood in his owne esteeme but he had a speciall Commission from God to tell them so as Jeremiah had in the 26. Chap. of Jeremiah ver. 15. the words were not expressed by him but directions given to the place the words be these But know ye for certaine that if ye put me to death you shall surely bring innocent blood upon your selves and upon this City and upon the Inhabitants thereof for of a

to all men how far the progresse to Popery was advanced when it durst appear nothing at all disguised but under a thin vail of some few deceitfull words in a Pontificall robe of absolute Authority constituting and ordaining and to shew how absolute and Independent the Protestant Church of England was grown the words We straitly command all Parsons Vicars and Curates and we injoyn all Archbishops and Bishops and We decree and ordain are used all along in the severall Articles published which are all words of absolute Authority and command and the penalties inforcing obedience to all those absolute commands are either suspension and deprivation to the Clergy or the dreadfull censures of Excommunication and casting into hell to all others For no lesse punishment doth the sentence of Excommunication imply because the party excommunicate being cast out of all communion with the Church is thereby presupposed to be deprived of all the benefits that he may hope for by vertue of Christs death and mediation so long as he remains in the state of excommunication which is a great terror to all them that do not rightly understand the nature of Excommunication and what the authority of Church-men is which is ever the much greater part of those who are members of any Church besides the great number of others which be in all Churches that sleight the censure of Excommunication as being a censure from which they feel no present smart without which it hath no operation with them for the inforcing of whom especially it was by these Cannons injoyned that every Bishop shall once every yeer send into His Majesties high Court of Chancery a Significavit of all such who have stood excommunicated beyond the time limited by the Law and shall desire that the Writ De Excommunicato capiendo might be at once sent out against them all Ex Officio And for the better execution of their Decrees They did most humbly beseech his most sacred Majestie that the Officers of the high Court of Chancery whom it shall concern may be commanded to send out the aforesaid Writ from time to time as is desired and that the like command also may be laid upon the Sheriffes and their Deputies for the due and faithfull execution of the said Writs as often as they shall be brought unto them Which whensoever they should obtain would put the Supremacy of all Authority into the hands of some of the Clergy by necessitating the smarting stroke of the Magistrates Sword to follow of course upon notification of theirs whereby all Magistracie and Law should be but executioners of their sentence from which there was no appeal but by submission deserving absolution which was ordained by the authority of the foresaid Synod not to be given untill the party to be absolved should come as a penitent humbling himself upon his knees and first take an Oath De parendo Juri stando mandatis Ecclesiae And for a perpetuall subjecting of all men into a vassalage and subjection to the Authority of Bishops and others of the Clergy it was there decreed That all Clergy men and all others who should take any degree of learning in any of the Vniversities and all that should be licensed to practise Physick all Registers Actuaryes and Proctors all Schoolmasters and all others that should come to be incorporated in any of the Vniversities here having taken a degree in any forraigne Vniversitie should take an Oath in a prescribed and set form of words before they should be admitted to take their degrees Never to give their consent to alter the government of this Church by Archbishops Bishops Deans and Archdeacons By which means an equall allegiance should have been payed to them as to the King and his Successors for ever And all this was presented to the blinded world and abused King as a remedy to secure men against any suspicion of revolt to Popery which was nothing else but a publick setting up of Popery though not yet of the Popes supremacy which was to follow and imploying the help and assistance of the Magistrates Sword and the force and power of the Laws of the Land to that very use and end For Popery consisteth neither in this or that superstition nor Idolatry nor in this or that erroneous Doctrine nor in all-together principally and chiefly but in the absolutenesse of spirituall authority commanding Implicite obedience to whatsoever Doctrine or Superstition shall be invented by man as necessary and essentiall to the true worship of God under the threatned pain and penalty of Excommunication and Interdiction and promising the kingdome of heaven to whomsoever it pleaseth as a gift or reward within the power of man and the assumption of which so divine and incompetent a power to any man or mankind united together and the deriving thereof from one solely to others as inherent in the person or function of one onely doth necessarily inferre and presuppose the gift of Infallibility in him who doth so assume it that he may become an unappealable Judge which doth exalt him in the sight and esteeme of those men who do beleeve in him and willingly submit unto him to the nature and dignity of the incommunicable prerogative of God and makes him undeniably the revealed Antichrist to others by usurping and possessing the throne of Christ upon earth for whom onely such dominion and authority is reserved in heaven And the root of Popery or Antichristianity for so it may be termed as tending continually thither by the Doctrine which it teacheth and the Authority which it usurpeth lieth in this very principle that a power of excommunicating and absolving or sending into heaven or hell is assumed by some as depending upon the purpose and will of man according to the nature of Authority and consented to and beleeved by others and the danger to temporall Authority lieth in the universality and generality of the beleef and assent and the difference between the incontrolable supremacy of the Pope and the exalted Prelacy of Bishops pretending to the same Authority is but a difference of degrees but not of kinds For for the setling of this Authority into the supremacy of any one there is a necessity of ingrossing it into the hands of some few first and Popes had never mounted to their omnipotent throne of Supremacy if a superiority of some of the Clergy invested with spirituall authority over others had not been first assented unto For the same rule necessity and end requireth the supremacy of one Bishop over all other Bishops that requireth the superiority of any Clergy man into the dignity of a Bishop over many others of the Clergy and the same danger of spirituall error indangering the soul lyeth upon all that are subject to this spirituall authority whether it be derived from the supremacy of one or a superiority onely of others or from the Democracy of all the Clergy assembled together or from the Independencie of everyone within their severall

the Kings actions and his owne that they could not easily be distinguished that by so doing he might never be reached but by wounding the King first building thereby great hopes if not assured confidence to escape himselfe and here labouring to justifie himselfe to the People from having ever had any intention to introduce Popery he purposly makes mention of the King for whose purposes intentions he might safely take any deep Protestation as if that conduced much to clear himself in the opinion of his Auditors which was the chiefe thing he now aimed at of all practices tending to that end as a thing impossible for him to bring about without the concurrent consent of the King which was but a fancy but no solid argument necessarily concluding what he would have beleeved for the worke might be advancing without any discovery in the King that it was necessarily tending to such an end untill such time that it should be too late if not impossible to retire as a Deere may be driving into a toyle not suspecting any danger but having leisure at some times to feed by the way untill such time as seeing and apprehending his owne danger by being unawares reduced to such a straight as doth leave him no variety of choice but to place his onely safety and meanes of escape in leapping into that snare which had been prepared for him and to which much paines had been taken to drive him for it is not to be imagined that either his Majestie or any other Christian King should submit themselves to the bondage of Popery if they rightly understood what they did for to passe by the danger which it bringeth to their soules by leading them into by-pathes of errour which can never bring them to heaven it subjects all temporall authority into a vassalage and subordination to its spirituall and that not so much by any accident or contingency arising from the different dispositions of the severall persons who sit upon the severall thrones spirituall and temporall which may be turbulency and ambition in the one and infirmity and weaknes in the other as by the very principles and Fundamentall constitution of Popery by reason of the acknowledgement of and submission into a spirituall authority being once rooted and firmely fixed in the beliefe or imagination by all who embrace it and the naturall effects which doe necessarily spring from thence For when the world was blinded by ignorance as by darknesse at what time the Popes did sit as God in the Temple of God and by their spirituall authority in excommunicating and absolving whom they pleased and for what they pleased did uncontrollably oppose and exalt themselves above all that is called God that is above all Magistracy and power in earth What lamentable and sad effects did Christendome groane under and feel from such transcendent and omnipotent a Power so long as from a generall beliefe it was universally submitted unto But when mens eyes began once to be opened and by the cleer light of the truth revealed in Scripture some men did cleerly see and perceive that no such power was ever nor could be given into any one man upon earth yet the apprehension of such a power and authority that it was given unto some being sunke deeply into all mens understandings great difference did arise where the same should reside and all men acknowledging it to appertain to the Clergy onely did place it amongst them as it were by a generall consent in some one of those formes which are knowen to be best capable to preserve authority all or the most part of all concluding that it must be preserved in one of them each imbracing and submiting into that forme which was preferred and made choice of by those who bare the greatest sway or had the greatest esteem and reputation with them but none of them foreseeing into all effects and events which might follow hath bin the chief cause why so much discord contention hath risen and continued which will never be wanting so long as the cause remains that is until it be clearly understood what the pow-of the Church and of Churchmen is whether any such thing as spirituall authority doth appertain to them by what right and to what end whether or no it be conducing to Religion or be compatible with the end of government for albeit there be no such thing as spirituall authority acknowledged yet all power is not thereby taken away from the Church but the consequence will only be that the power of the Church of Church-men is no more then opperative and declarative not at all authoritative and having no authority they can have no legislative power of making Lawes and constitutions call them by what name soever they will binding to the conscience having no penalties to inforce obedience and why should any such thing as spirituall authority be admitted to be when it cannot be evidenced what execution doth follow for authority without execution ceaseth to be authority by losing its vertue for if authority say to one go he must go or to another come he must come and likewise to a third doe this he must do it but no Clergy man nor Minister of the Gospel can say enter thou into heaven and goe thou into hell all hee can say is thus beleeve and do and thou shall be saved but if otherwise you will be damned but both the doing and beleeving dependeth upon the hearers owne choice nothing is determined by the appointment of the Minister all that rests in the power of the Minister is to declare to others the effectuall meanes of their salvation from the revealed will of God to which whosoever submits by a voluntary profession testifying his beliefe and receiving of baptisme which is the seale of his beliefe but brings not forth fruit according to his Profession and walkes not according to the rules set down in Scripture and will not be convinced nor reclaimed by no admonition nor reproofe then may the Minister safely and boldly pronounce that he is still in the state and condition of an Infidell and unbeleever no more capable of any thing that may accrue unto him by the death and mediation of Christ then a heathen or pagane and therefore may debar him from admission into the holy Communion which is or ought to be the Communion of Saints or true beleevers and is Gods Sacrament to us that is to say his Covenant and seal unto us of the fruits and benefits that we hope for hereafter by vertue of Christs death and resurrection but the party offending is not presently cast into hell by that sentence and though hell fire may follow upon it hereafter yet is it not the Ministers sentence nor the debarring him from the Sacrament that doth send him thither but his want of faith which is made evident and nortorious by no single act of any declared sinne but by an obstinate perserverance in any one sin or more that