Selected quad for the lemma: duty_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
duty_n	church_n	good_a	holy_a	1,129	5	4.2899	3	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A53100	The common interest of king and people shewing the original, antiquity and excellency of monarchy, compared with aristocracy and democracy, and particularly of our English monarchy, and that absolute, papal and Presbyterian popular supremacy are utterly inconsistent with prerogative, property and liberty / by John Nalson.	Nalson, John, 1638?-1686.	1677 (1677)	Wing N92; ESTC R10092	110,919	290

being only from the People For it is not the Persons or Names but the superiority of the Authority against which this Faction of Geneva levels all its aims and though for the accomplishment of their ambitious designs which they vail over with the name of Religion they are pleased in words to vest the Parliament in the name of the People and as their Representatives with Authority both over Church and Crown Yet do they at the same time declare that all men of what degrees ranks or conditions soever must be subject to the Scepter of Christ which Scepter they say is committed to their hands So that here is a Yoke ready for the Neck of a Parliament whose intolerable heaviness has already discovered that it is none of Christs but of these Modern Scribes and Pharisees who lay heavy burthens upon other Men but by advancing themselves into the Chair of Supremacy will not touch them with one of their Fingers For these Saints who pretend to a power of binding Kings in Chains will without scruple so claim the honour of shackling the Nobles with Fetters of Iron That this is most certain will appear if we consider that a Parliament can pretend to no right to Government but a Monarch may do the same and upon far better grounds now you see how all their Doctrines vest the people with a Superiority over Monarchy the same Arts and Arguments which subject the Regal Authority to their Will and Jurisdiction must of necessity bring a Parliament within their Power and it is no more but a Mutato Nomine de te narratur fabula turn the Tables and they will play the same Game at the one as the other for if a King for opposing which they stile persecuting them and their seditious practices may be called in question Excommunicated deposed and deprived of his Royal Authority for the same Crimes a Parliament and the Government by Democracy may be altered abrogated and the several members of it may by the people be punished with loss of Life Estate and all other lesser punishments and disgraces And all this must be fathered upon the Good People who shall be flattered into a belief that they have the Supreme Authority when in truth a few it may be one leading politick Presbyters who shall have gained the Sovereignty over the inferior Clergy and by their means and the severities of their Discipline over all the populace who must of necessity have their heads tyed under their Uncanonical Girdles will have under Christ the whole management of all the affairs of Church and State and whoever will venture to dive to the bottom of the Lake of Geneva wil find the fifth Monarchy of the Church which the Papists have so long been setting up but by an Earthquake was tumbled in thither which the Presbyters are weighing up again in order to the new trimming it and putting in a better figure that so it may pass upon the Princes and People of the World under the Notion of the Scepter of Christ and that it is the defire of Sovereignty under the Colour of Religion at which they aim and to which whatsoever is an obstacle whether King Parliament Prelates Lords or Commons shall all be declared Antichristian and Unlawful Powers THE little respect they have shewn to all Parliaments that have opposed them demonstrates the little value they have either for those Honorable Assemblies or their Constitution and they who could pull down the House of Lords because it stood in their light and are so eager to dislimb the Parliament of the Lords Spiritual cannot in reason be supposed to esteem the lower House further than they frame to themselves a prospect that it may be serviceable to their present Interest I need not go back to fetch instances from former times either in Scotland or England of which I could produce a Cloud of Evidences the rude and insolent treatment which this present Parliament has met with from their blades of the Pen is a conviction beyond exception Nor would a new one of which they appear so fond receive any better entertainment at their hands unless to advance the slavery of the Nation in promoting their interest it should imbarque in their design A short view of their Tyrannick Consistorian Government BUT because some peoples ignorance of their intentions is in probability the reason why they admire this Government let me present them with a short view of it in its proper Colours without the shining varnish which they usually lay upon it to deceive the credulous and unwary THAT they are the true Sons of Ishmael whose hands are against all Men will in short appear if we consider their procedure against all sorts of people whom they indeavour to reduce to Obedience to Christ by the method of their Consistorian Discipline Over the Magistracy WE will begin with the Magistracy If they do not their duty in promoting the Holy Discipline by which name is meant Presbyterian Tyranny of Parochial Ministers and the Lay Elders over their Parishes of the Classis or Presbytery over their Division and of the yearly Assembly over the whole Nation or much more if they oppose it or establish any other Church Government they may and ought to be excommunicated deposed and punished and the rule is Universal as to all and all manner of Magistrates whether Kings Parliaments Judges Counsellors or other inferiour and subordinate Governours Now what is the duty of the Magistrate and whether he performs this duty as he ought what means ways and methods of Government are conducive to the Salvation of Men and the good of the Society in order to the establishment of the Kingdom of Christ they are the only Judges and though they pretend to follow the direction of the Holy Spirit and the Scriptures yet will they put their own Interpretation upon them which though manifestly contrary to the construction of the most learned men in all Ages and to the universal practice of the Church as is plain in the Case of Episcopal Government Yet herein must they be obey'd under pain of Excommunication and though nothing be more manifest that herein their Will is their Law yet must the Magistrate as well as the People submit to this Arbitrary Supremacy premacy which hereby is manifestly vested in the Presbytery as to direction ultimate Judgment and final determination and the secular Magistrate is no more but the Executioner of their Commands No Law can be binding which they declare contrary to the great design of promoting the Gospel though by seditions violence and tumults and this interest of the Gospel is in reality their own absolute Sovereignty No Obedience is due to the Magistrate further than they assure the People the things commanded are lawful To them may be made all appeals even from the highest Courts of Judicature So that down goes Magistracy and its Power or however must receive its limits bounds measures and rules of Government

Papacy is not only Unlimited but Almighty and Property is but a trifle Dist 40 Sect si Papa for if the Pope should lead innumerable People by whole Troops to Hell with him no mortal man ought to presume to question him for so doing If this New Roman Faith can work such Miracles as to remove the Mountains of Government it may with ease trample upon the little Ant-hills of the World and their busie inhabitants The Councils of Lateran and of Trent give him power over all mens Estates Concil Lat. Sess 9. Concil Trident. Sess 25. cap. 19. and to impose pecuniary Mulcts upon all degrees and conditions of people from the highest to the lowest And how great oppressions were formerly brought upon the people of these Nations Matt. Paris p. 844. that Pope can best tell who thought that England was Puteus inexhaustus and sure the pressures were intolerable when the Commons exhibited their complaint with a Satius esset nobis mori better die outright than be pressed to death by such intolerable exactions when a single Pall for Walter Grey Archbishop of York Mem p. 274 667. went at the Rate of Ten thousand pounds and there went out of this Realm Six Hundred Thousand Marks per Annum the Papacy was then but young and the Jurisdiction of the Pope was not defended as an Article of Faith Let the words of Theodorick à Niem suffice in short upon which I leave all sober and judicious men to Comment Camera Apostolica c. The Chamber of the Apostolick See of Rome is now become the Sea of Rome into which all Rivers flow and yet it never overflows Theod. à Niem in Nem. Tract 6. cap. 37. It is a Gulph which can swallow up the Crowns and Coronets of Princes and Miters of all other Patriarchs and Prelates those greater Rivers of Riches and Honour undoubtedly therefore the smaller Brooks of narrow and private fortunes though they be querulous and murmur in their shallow passage yet must they all fatally and finally slide into this Mother Ocean and pay their Tribute to this Great Queen who sits upon many Waters I AM sensible that at present the Court of Rome runs at low-water-mark in the affairs of Europe which possibly is the great reason why our English Romanists who pretend to be good Subjects and lovers of their Prince apprehend no danger in the Church of Rome and would perswade others to be of their Opinion But let them consider what our English Miracle of Wisdom and Learning King James has observed of the Genius of the Supremacy and they will be convinced that the Church of Rome leads them insensibly to the Court of Rome and all those Consequences which attend it which they pretend to abhor K. James Def. of the Right of Kings against Card. Perron pag. 286 287. Popes always court the amity of great and prosperous Princes but let a Kingdom fall into Disasters or Civil Wars who rushes sooner into the troubled streams than the Pope who runs soonér to raise his gain by the Publick wrack than the Pope and all under colour of a heart wounded and bleeding for the Salvation of Souls For this Doctrine of the Pope's Supremacy gives the Western Patriarch an Eternal Title and the unfortunate circumstances of Princes a strong Temptation and all the advantages of laying in his Claim to the disposal of Crowns and Kingdoms And there are too many precedents of this Nature to afford us a possibility of not foreseeing the dangerous Mischief And that though at present it may lye Dormant yet nullum Tempus occurrit Ecclesiae when occasion fairly offers the Pope may rouze the sleeping Lion of his Supremacy which will not fail to seize upon the desired Prey the Crown of a Weak or Unfortunate Prince THE Grandeur of the first Rome was not the product of a Moment and our Proverb tells us It was not built in a Day And the beginnings and gradual progressions of this second Roman Empire are easily discovered and largely discoursed of by many Learned Pens It was the Piety and not the Policy of Princes which first moved them to bestow their bountiful Donations and Favours upon that Church and it is now the Policy and not the Piety of the Papacy which endeavours to make those voluntary Gifts become Duties and Precedents for their unjust incroachments upon the Rights Priviledges and Possessions of the Successors of their Benefactors and their Subjects And by a prodigious Ingratitude he who had nothing Temporal but by their Gift will now have All and would allow them nothing but by his Quantum mutatus ab illo What a vast difference there is betwixt S. Peter and his Successors Silver and Gold he had none they are not satisfied unless they may have all SO that from this necessary chain of Consequences and Effects it is most apparent that the Church of Rome by this Doctrine of Absolute Papal Supremacy is absolutely Inconsistent with the very being security and succession of Monarchy the Liberty Happiness and Property of the People AFTER all this I must be unjust if I should not do the English Roman Catholicks that Reason which they may in common Equity challenge as to Fidelity and Loyalty to their Prince Nor can I do it upon a better Testimony than that of the late Martyr'd Monarch who was so sensible of it as to complain 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Sect. 15. upon the many Jealousies raised and Scandals cast upon the King to stir up the People against him He was sorry the Papists should have a greater sense of Allegiance than many Protestant Professors who seem'd to have learned and to practise the worst Principles of the worst Papists Nor do I know any Considerations that can be powerful enough with me against Truth and Justice and much less the common Bugbear of being reputed by the Presbyterians a favourer of Papists which Censure I know none that can escape who is not a Schismatick And if there were nothing more yet their open avowing of Loyalty against all foreign Interests is of good weight since generally they are persons of Quality Worth and Honour who set the same value upon their Word that some others do upon the most solemn Oaths BUT the Statute of Premunire made by Papists against this Usurpation of the Papal Supremacy 26 Ric. 2.5 is sufficient in a great measure to justifie them as to former times and the Fidelity and Loyalty of the Party to his late Majesty wherewith they sacrificed their Lives and Fortunes to his Interest and their assistance to his present Majestie 's escape from the fatal Fields of Worcester as they deserve this allowance so will they be an Eternal Reproach to all Schismaticks not one of which ever struck a stroke in defence of the invaded Crown thereby to make the least attonement for the Infamy of those Multitudes who were confederated against it Nor do I imagine that the