Selected quad for the lemma: authority_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
authority_n	church_n	true_a	word_n	5,705	5	4.5833	4	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A43632	Reflections on a late libel intituled, Observations on a late famous sermon intituled, Curse ye Meroz in a letter to our old friend, R.L.; Reflections on a late libel, intituled, Observations on a late famous sermon, intituled, Curse ye Meroz	Hickeringill, Edmund, 1631-1708.	1680 (1680)	Wing H1824; ESTC R3189	26,477	48

Activity with which God and Nature had blest Mr. Hickeringill inclin'd him to a Military rather than a Colledge-life he therefore visiting the English Army and some of his nearest Relations in Scotland first accepted of a Commission to be a Lieutenant but after some few years he resolv'd to see the Wars in Foreign Countreys none whereof was then so famous as the Wars of Carolus Gustavus King of Swede whose Fame perswaded him to accept a Captains Commission in Major-General Fleetwood's Regiment then Swedish Ambassador in England carrying six score brave English-men to the Swede's Service where he continued till the Peace concluded between the Swede and Dane when he return'd to his Native Countrey in York-shire where he rais'd his Company and soon after was Captain of a Troop of Volunteer-Horse that rise under the Lord Fairfax and Duke of Buckingham declaring for a Free-Parliament the happy Prologue to His Majesties Restauration After that he had the Command of a Man of War under the King of Portugal as he formerly had been Commander of the North-Star a Man of War under the Swedes King afterwards his desire of Travel and seeing Foreign Countreys made him visit the Indies Surinam Barbadoes St. Christophers Jamaica c. from which last-mentioned Island he brought the Governour Doyly's Letters to His Majesty and Duke of Albemarle with a Map of the Countrey and Description of that Island which he Printed and dedicated to his Majesty And having rambled enough by the Bishop of Lincoln Dr. Saunderson he was both perswaded to be and made a Priest and his first Preferment eighteen years ago was what he now enjoys the Rectory of All Saints in Colchester a place that perhaps has more than any other exercised his Patience and other Virtues they that know Fanaticks they that know the men and their Communication must believe that a man of his Integrity Loyalty and plain dealing must meet with Calumnies and Opposition enough he was indicted for a Common-swearer and perhaps may be indicted for a Common-Barretor and what not But for a Common-swearer he stands now convict in the High-Court of Chancery and That never a word comes out of his Mouth but an Oath comes out attested and sworn by three Colchester men and yet it is as certain and commonly known for an undoubted Truth that he never swore a rash Oath in all his Life time or ever took the Sacred name of God in vain which scarce one man in Colchester can say except himself and yet he is the only man that stands convicted as aforesaid for a Common-swearer but 't is his Portion Innocence the most sacred Innocence and Integrity is no Fence or Skreen against Malice But that he should by Flattery or baser means hunt after Preferment is so senceless a Calumny against the Plainness and Austerity of his Conversation even unto Morosity as some construe it is a Supposal so ridiculously suggested that none can believe it that knows him and that large and plentiful Temporal Estate of Inheritance that God has blest him with above all or any of his Neighbour-Ministers and how smilingly careless and unconcern'd he is at the foolish and malicious Attempts of his Adversaries which hitherto has always ended in their own Shame and Confusion And why may not a man that was a Souldier in his juvenile years accept of an Ecclesiastical Office and be a Clergyman in his graver Hours and when he has sown his wild Oats rather than bring them up into the Pulpit with him St. Ambrose was first Governour then Bishop of the same City St. Peter was a Fisherman and then a Divine and after that followed the old Fishing trade still St. Paul was a Weaver and a Taylor for a Tent-maker implyed both these Trades and then a Divine and whilst he was so he sometimes fell to his Needle and Shuttle again Here 's a Doe with what men have been certainly if every mans Faults were exposed and writ in their Foreheads few men would look with any better Complection than this so slander'd Author And certainly if Mr. Hickeringill had still been a Fanatick he had been cry'd up as much for a precious godly Man as any Spiritual Pick-pocket amongst the Crew and as much as the Noyse-Makers now cry him down for a Villain Methinks I see how zealously and devoutly those holy Juglers rate and set on their silly Votaries to bawl and bark against the Author of that Sermon that discovers and bewrays the Craft by which they get their Wealth when they see that almost the Hopes of their Gain is gone And if his Sermon and Comment on that darling Text of Curse ye Meroz which has done such Feats had been Stylo vetere interpreted against all Sence Reason Religion or the Context not a Conventicle in the Nation but by this time had made Bonfires for Joy of that which as now it is they would gladly make a Bonfire on and another of him if they had their Wills But let them proceed as far and as fast as their old Father drives them He that sitteth in the Heavens shall laugh them to scorn the Lord shall have them in derision Nor could they readily have had a man to be the object of Fanatick-wrath who is more cheerfully Armour of Proof by long and large Experience against it than he for the more they have rag'd and ray'ld slander'd and calumniated fretted and fum'd Almighty God has blest him the more with Mercies both of the right hand and the left having given him so many comfortable and promising Heirs for his Estate and so comfortable and plentiful an Estate for his Heirs whilst his Adversaries grin and rail snarl and shew their Teeth and pine away In a little time it will be no Apocrypha that Truth is strongest and no weapon formed against it shall prosper Indeed the silly Observator nibbles p. 6. at that Passage in the Sermon p. 17. namely That all men's Faith must bottom upon some Humane Authority or other The Sermon does not assert that the Top and bottom of all men's Faith is Humane Authority for the Top of a man's Faith is the Grace of God So p. 19. of Curse ye Meroz you find these words Through the Grace of God enabling us to believe what such good men and true did depose upon their own knawledge Faith is the Life of a Christian c. And p. 17. All true Faith is the Gift of God as all other Gifts and Graces are for without Gods special Grace no man can believe the truest Humane Authority or Church upon Earth to be true Now where was the Observator's Eyes that he could not see those Passages of the Sermon and where was his Honesty to expose some bit of the Sermon without what went before and after and then too not to have one word to say by way of Answer but onely holding up his hands and falling to his Prayers and wishes that the Parliament might sit as soon as may

be to authorize the Bible by an Act and furnish People with Bottoms of Faith If the Observator was not very illiterate in the Laws of the Land he might find Acts of Parliament enow before he was born and almost as old as Paul's for England was the first Christian-Kingdom to make the Bible Canonical and to furnish People with bottoms of Faith For though the Holy Bible was and is the Word of God though never a King or Parliament had told us so yet it does not become Canonical that is a Canon or Law to Subjects till it be commanded by Lawful Authority and therefore our Holy Bible is not onely the Word of God and so Sacred but also the Law of the Land and so Canonical and all the Laws of the Land lawfully made and by lawful Authority are also the Laws of God to which we ought to submit not only for wrath but also for conscience-sake And then where would there be place for Mutinies and Rebellions for the Spirit of Popery or spirit of Foppery This makes that Devil rage at Mr. Hickeringill having great wrath because his time is short but to attacque or answer him or his Sermon only with Calumnies Lyes and Slanders Is this Scholar-like Manlike or Christian-like Truth is Truth whoever proclaims it and 't is a base Requital of Ingenuous men onely to load them with false Invectives and Hatred instead of good Will such Returns will make men of more than Vulgar Learning and Attainments say with the Popish Cardinal Si Populus vult decipi decipiatur If the People have a mind to be blockish so let them continue for all me Yet the Observator seems to be in great trouble of mind that the Sermon should p. 38. call the English the most Generous and ingenuous Nation ah Sycophant in the world the blockish English Was it not greatly done of our little Observer to reflect so severely upon that innocent Passage in the Sermon The most loyal Text in all the Bible Whereupon he very gravely observes p. 4. in these words Comparisons are generally odious especially when between things incomparable Why Are they so indeed Beloved Some of the blockish English that are not so concern'd to lessen the Reputation of the Author or his Sermon would have past by so innocent a Passage and never have knit their brows at it nor yet have mark'd it with so sharp-pointed an Asterism Whil'st you live look to your hits and place your words in order when you come within ken of a little Observer Such a Fool was I that I had thought a man might be very innocent though he had said by way of comparison more Spiritual knowledge and comfort is to be had from the New Testament than the Old and from some Texts and Verses therein than from other and from the latter end of the first Chapter of St. Matthew than from the middle or beginning and yet the Holy Bible is Incomparable that is above all other Books but not when compar'd within its self I never till now knew where or how much St. Paul was a Sinner and to be blam'd by the Observator for saying I thought harmlesly 1 Cor. 15.10 I labour'd more abundantly than they all namely All the Apostles Happy St. Paul that never met with such an Observator amongst all the Corinthians that had a Design to lessen the Reputation of him and his Writings if he had how might they have descanted upon him in the words of our Observator Comparisons Paul are generally odious especially when between things incomparable Surely the Corinthians were very blockish Corinthians that could not spy faults at least not so ill-natur'd and malicious as our Observator and willing to spy faults and expose them to lessen mens Reputation or else our Observator is as blockish as envious to make such severe Observations upon so innocent an Expression and more blockish to imagine that any of the Generous and ingenuous English can be such blockish English as not to see that whilst the Observator is so trivially and keenly busie to lessen the Reputation of Mr. Hickeringil He has onely thereby lessen'd his own if ever he had any amongst the generous and ingenuous English at least This Trifler is I say like Mercury in the Planets good with the good and bad with the bad sometimes he cokes's the Clergy sometimes the Fanaticks as p. 7. because Mr. Hickeringill sayes p. 23. If there was not a Papist in England yet they would fright the People with fears of Popery Now for my part such a plain blockish Englishman was I that I could not spy where the Mischief or the Popery lay in that harmless and true Expression But comes me our Observator and very gravely and formally as he never opens but he makes up his Mouth in Mood and Figure nay you ' scape well if he does not gore you with one or other of his dilemma's a keen tool with which just such another W.S. gall'd him that writ concerning the Contempt of the Clergy sagely observing That This Aphorism is but borrowed from another Brother of the Quill Now if the Observator had not a mischievous Design to spoil Mr. Hickeringill's Credit for ever borrowing any more he need not have told every Body how much he was indebted and did borrow of a Brother of the Quill But dear Sir why may not one Brother borrow of another but that the Observator must be concern'd I dare say that neither of the said Brothers of the Quill nor are there any other Brothers of the Quill in England but would make shift with their own Pittance and scanty Store rather than go a borrowing to our little Observator and if they should he would tell all he met and lessen their Credit spoil them for ever borrowing any more But as honest and Loyal Hearts may joyn so good Wits may jump as well as bad ones and if so then though the Observator would seem to tell Tales out of School 't is but a Tale and a Story of his own making like all the rest of the Sham's he would gladly put upon the Author of that Sermon with Design to make them both odious but such a Rayler will but be the black-patch to Curse ye Meroz And most People think that the Author has hired this Zany to set him off with greater Lustre and provoke him or his Friends to a Vindication of himself and his Sermon both which but that Comparisons are odious except when a mans Credit and Reputation lyes at stake may possibly appear in good time as innocent polite unblemisht and unreproveable as any other of his Coat let Lyers and Slanderers vent their utmost Gall and Bitterness our blessed Saviour the holy Apostles pious King Charles the greatest Innocence cannot escape them Nor can the worst of the Authors Adversaries be able to prove in any the worst Instances of his whole Life that any Infirmity Sin or Temptation has befallen him but such