Selected quad for the lemma: england_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
england_n	church_n	faith_n	profess_v	3,565	5	8.8932	4	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A59044	Animadversions upon a book entituled Inquisition for the blood of our late soveraign &c., and upon the offence taken at it wherein in order to peace the ground, reason, and end of our wars are discovered, the old cause stated and determined, the late insurrection animadverted, and a way of peace propounded / by William Sedgwicke.	Sedgwick, William, 1609 or 10-1669?	1661 (1661)	Wing S2382; ESTC R25203	133,070	314

and fill the mind with more enmity and consequently with more blindness How much is poor man to be pittied whose zeal for God and the worship of God is so miserably distracted and misled as to be made use of only to destroy one another And that Religion which is the Law of love peace and salvation should become the great engine of death wrath and destruction and no remedy against it Sure it will be considered That truth is one in Christ That Jesus is the head of man and that mans nature reason and understanding is his own body and spouse That Religion unites and binds this head and body in a Covenant of marriage That love life and truth are only in this union And that therefore truth life and love are together and they that leave one they leave all If so then they that love not err from the truth and they that by their opinions are taught to hate and kill live neither in love nor truth but in death and darkness Error and enmity do destroy and they that do destroy are most in destruction because to them may be applyed that title given to Satan Heb. 2.4 he that had power of death for they that in malice inflict it have power of it All truth is most beautiful and lovely even unto the reason of man and all errour is a lye and monstrous even to the mind of man both in it self and in the foul and devilish effects of it When the light shall shine forth to manifest this men will of themselves fly from errour avoid hatred and love the truth Satisfie your selves therefore you that seem to be zealous for truth of any side or party and know That as mens souls and consciences are the body and Spouse of Christ so they are his care and charge He hath with him a Law wherewith to govern this body and power over all conscience and severe punishment for them that are proud and rebellious He hath a spiritual Court and a spiritual Law with power and authority to execute Spiritual judgements And conscience is most sensible of his strokes and most easily subjected to him and therefore will be ruled by him To him it doth belong to do it and to him alone and he will do it Upon these grounds I do in my spirit give liberty to all perswasions having a perswasion and reason that comprehends them all in one And knowing that one mercy and goodness upholds saves and forgives all and that one truth and one Gospel is under all and in all And being sensible of that one enemy that doth abuse all by engaging them in zeal for some part of truth against their brethren knowing likewise that light that will scattter this darkness and unite all in one in one heart and in one way These things being true there is reason all should have liberty to challenge and plead their right in order to agreement Which must as certainly have its time as confusion hath had his time There is order in and under this confusion and will arise out of it yea this confusion is to this end that a more large and excellent love and light might come forth to reduce all this into order and harmony And when it doth manifest it self it will not only joyn some parts that are nearest one to another but will unite all I absolutely think it impossible to make any true union betwixt any two or three parties or sects in the Nation leaving out the rest as it is impossible to build an house of some parts of the frame of some posts and pillars excluding and denying other parts There is a Church of England or in England it is I think all one If ever there was one there is still one if there be among us the profession and Faith of Jesus Because the Church is built upon a rock and the Gates of hell cannot prevail against it If hell should take it captive and either carry the Church into hell or hell come forth and possess the Church with all its filthyness wickedness darkness and confusion Yet it would be still the body of Christ and therefore it still is not only safe in all this but beloved and honoured by him Antichrist may and doth sit in the Temple of God and defile this temple of God but it is still the temple of God And the Gentiles may enter into the holy City and trample it underfoot but it is still and ever shall be the holy City If we deny there is or was a Church I am sure no man among us hath power to plant a Church For no Church of God was ever planted in the earth but by power and authority from heaven and by a pattern from the Mount Men cannot so much as repair a decayed Church without an heavenly annointing Therefore if there was no Church there is none For our new Churches challenge not from heaven but from the letter If there be a Church of England then all English men that profess faith in Jesus are members of it Till this Church cast them out till they be judicially proceeded against by the Church her self Be they never so corrupt they are corrupt members of her corrupt body till she recover her power to cast them out And she and all her parts must own them and bear them and all their filth and guilt till they be cut off It is not in the power of any parts except they have the power of the whole to cast out any It is much less in the power of any parts to cast out the whole Church or to unchurch the Church Nor is it in the power of any to dismember himself they may like froward children run away when they are ill used but that doth not dissolve the relation betwixt parents and children nor acquit either from their duty All the separations and abjurations of all the Independants Anabaptists and Quakers doth not make them no members of the Church of England Neither are they thereby no children of the true Fathers of the Church Nor must we therefore cease loving of them instructing of them because they have like the prodigal got a portion and gone from their Fathers house If the relation holds the duties of that relation will be required of Fathers authority wisdom justice and love and of children obedience and subjection And no ill affection or desposition can dissolve a relation An ignorant weak decayed old man is a Father and a forward bold rebellious Son is a Son The way to bring wandring sheep to the fold is to seek them out And the way to reduce prodigals is to suffer them to want There are both these simplicity to be sought out and conceited prodigality and this will starve and come to great want And then if there be bread in our Fathers house they will be compelled to seek it I know certainly they will be in great necessity of spiritual food that spend so prodigally in harlots houses in

boasting glorying and quarrelling and then where bread is they must bow for it and will and then the Bishop and Shepheard that can feed them will be honoured by them But if England be still a Church or there be a Church in England of old and late and all men professing faith in Christ are members and neither the worst nor best are dismembred but all continue one body though broken and under confusion Then as every particular member is apart so parties united by any bond of spirit perswasion or opinion must needs be a great part an integral part And if so there can be no peace nor building but of all these parties And it is easier for a workman to constitute a house of all then for another to make a shed or hovel of some parts But there will never be any harmony nor health in the body if every joint supply not its place It is love only can unite and heal and only an intire love or a love of the whole to the whole If any part be rejected there is want of love or love is not in that agreement that leaves out any part and if love be not there the agreement will not hold Love the more the divisions the wider and greater the distance the more able it is to unite and the more pleased to do it because it is infinite And the greater the variety is the more wisdom delights to shew its skill in ordering and composing of them into harmony and the more excellent will the musick be when composed It is not imaginable that any one Party can comprehend the whole nor can any one Party comprehend any other Party And therefore every person and Party will in their divided state think and conclude an union impossible But as it is impossible for any party or few parties to agree or to think how to agree so it is impossible but the whole must agree because she comprehends all the parts and they all do consist in her and she consists only by and in all Therefore as the reason of any or many parts be they eminent parts cannot unite the whole while they stand as parts divided from any of the whole So the reason of the whole cannot but comprehend and gather into it all the parts and consequently must unite all For all do already meet in that universall reason wherein and whereby both all the parts and the whole subsist This is the reason of the liberty of conscience that is in my mind I would that all may have liberty to come forth to come together and to agree and to agree first in this point of liberty For it is impossible that ever we should agree or consent by force No man will agree to be beaten If we give not liberty to men to profess enquire and bring forth their minds we deny them liberty to consent For there cannot be a free consent till there be all freedom to profess and to debate and of all means both of professing and trying all things What is restrained and imprisoned by jealousie and enmity is thereby shut up in division and denyed both the first step to and the right means of agreement And is thereby enforced to dwell in it self and to maintain its own private divided state being thrust out from all fellowship with the whole The admitting all to come abroad into open light and profession with liberty to try is the beginning of peace and agreement But as I would give this liberty of conscience so I expect and may justly challenge a liberty to deal with this conscience in the way of conscience For therefore would I that their consciences may come forth that they may be convinced and instructed Sure then you will not deny me liberty to reprove and rebuke and if I can to wound and afflict your consciences if they be guilty If they be not guilty I cannot hurt them if they be it must be known felt and discovered else they cannot be healed It is a freedom that God hath given me to reprove and reform I shall use it and I hope so use it as not to be denyed the exercise of it At this time I would examine this plea of liberty of conscience as it hath been urged all along in our late troubles I do very much suspect this title and claim of conscience to liberty or liberty for conscience as it hath been and still is promoted by many that there is some notable evil in it more then hath been yet discovered For First Where the whole is unsound the parts must needs be so also And therefore if there hath been deceit and hypocrisie in the whole state and spirit of this work this of liberty of conscience being a great part of the business must necessarily partake of the corruption of the whole Secondly I cannot derive it from any antient and honourable root The Jews while they were in their own land they needed not liberty for they were under a Law of necessity and duty I do not remember that ever they desired it when they were in captivity In Aegypt they would not sacrifice Lo shall we sacrifice the abomination of the Aegyptians before their eyes and will they not stone us Gen. 8.26 And in Babylon they said How shall we sing the Lords song in a strange land Psal 137.4 I am sure if you had been as sensible of your spiritual al captivity as they were of their outward you would not have made such haste to sacrifice and set up so many notes or songs When you feel the confusion that is in your spirits you will find you are still in Babylon and hang up your harps and mourn instead of singing I am most certain of this there hath been a whorish impudency in the great liberty taken to pray profess build Churches Ministries and Worship And for this spiritual whoredom is liberty pleaded as well as for conscience Neither did the Apostles or the Primitive Christians seek for liberty of conscience from the Princes of the world But having commission from Christ the supream Lord to preach the Gospel they executed it boldly and freely They were called both to preach and suffer and therefore did not seek liberty from the cross A true spiritual Ministry derives it self immediately from the person of Christ who is exalted far above all principalities and powers And being far above them they need not cannot rightly seek for a licence from them to obey the commands of a superiour Lord. If the powers of the world be only worldly and the life and religion of the Saints heavenly the heavenly is above the earthly and may justly bless preserve and instruct the earthly and the earthly is to submit to the spiritual and heavenly If the powers of the world are as they were then in the wicked one then it was not only in vain but a wicked thing for the servants of Christ to seek to his enemy the devil and his enemies wicked

cry of the cause be not only a great sound or more sound then substance Empty vessels give the greatest sound Most noise least truth and substance is very common Or things when they go off make the greatest report This I have observed of this cause it floats like Wine in mens heads fills mens Prayers and Sermons flies about in Books and Discourses and so raises a smoak of talk zeal and affection But in all this time First It never attained or gathered a body into any consistency but mens minds are still blown about like dust one people talk this and another that but there never was any consent or agreement about it 2. As it never could gain a body so it never had any form it was never yet stated by any man or by any company of men only confused thoughts and talks there are about it Thirdly it never yet attained any power in the Nation it never was owned as the cause of God by either Parliament or Army Men in their private prayers and Sermons talk of the Kingdom of God of the fall of Babylon and building Zion but those powers owned nothing but necessity safety interest of the people and such like things And therefore you may well think what a bottom it is that you adventure your selves in or rather how bottomless it is Many words many affections many duties multitudes of sacrifices many Scriptures quoted preached on But what power and substance is there in these What heavenly glory is there in them or among you that is able to convince your enemies Or what earthly strength is there in them that can defend and support a poor naked people against a strong and mighty Prince against a standing Law and Authority My reason experience and knowledge tells me that as you are so you will be left in confusion in any engagement for such a cause that hath no more solid body state or power in it And therefore be perswaded to retire from the noise that you make in each others ears and affections and enquire within in your own reasons and memories And remember if you can where had you this Cause from whence came it where and when was it born in what year of these late changes in which of them was it brought forth Or from what Scripture do you derive it is there such a thing spoken or named there as the Cause of God God pleads the Cause of his people by outward Judgements and by his Spirit the Advocate and by Christ their Counsellor But his Cause is not now at the Bar no he hath set Christ upon the throne and he is exalted far above all principalities and powers He is now actually judging and ruling the world he pulleth down and setteth up whom he will You may feel his power and authority he judges you for your unrighteousness and sets up your enemies above you What is it that thus blinds your eyes that you should contend or that which is already done for Christs Kingdom doth not the enemy abuse your understandings and perswade you it is the Cause of God and his Kingdom when indeed it is your own honour dominion and greatness But hath there not been a cause of God in this Nation Yes there hath been that which we may call so and it was this The Church and Kingdom of England stood in a very dark fleshly and corrupt state and the Governors of it were also corrupt and had sinned against God For which God had a Controversie both with their persons and standing And therefore sanctified you with a fleshly holiness against their fleshly corruption and called you forth for the executing of his judgement upon them And therein you were justified being engaged to speak in your language in the cause of God or being employed to administer that judgement which he had given in the cause Thus much I can grant to you and it will be found the right of the case But if the Judgement decreed be executed and the measure of outward punishment be fulfilled then your cause ceases If this kind of wrath by war blood and spoil be finished why should not you be content to be discharged from this employment First it is a mean service to be the Executioners of an outward destruction It is O Assyrian the rod of my anger and the staff in their hand is my indignation I will send him against an hypocritical Nation and against the people of my wrath will I give him change to take the spoil and to take the prey and to tread down like the mire of the streets Isa 10.5 6. Secondly as it is a vile service so it hath been vilely polluted It is a filthy thing to destroy and the filthiness of it is manifested It is Babylonian and the confusion is sufficiently discovered The brightness and cleanness of it and all the honour and glory of it was the wrath and justice of God when that was finished then it presently shewed its vile nature covetousness self-seeking pride and cruelty Nothing but ignorance or a love of the prey and spoil can make men to doat upon it and desire to continue in it Thirdly being it self unclean it cannot purifie nor reform the Nation It reaches but to the out-side to the outward life honour and greatness It never touches the spirit and therefore may waste and spoil and so restrain for a time the fleshly part but the nature and spirit of the thing still remains yea confirmed and strengthened It may tread down in the mire but its unclean feet of wrath and pastion pollute more then purge and so make worse Fourthly to purifie is left to the fire of of his own Spirit which will thorowly purge with the spirit of judgement and burning You administred 1. without judgement you could not discern between the gold and the dross And 2. without burning for if the dross be not separated from the gold it cannot be consumed as yet we have had neither separation nor burning for want of both these their dross still remains after all the wrath administred But doubt not the holy purpose and power of God He will certainly purge both you and them by the breath of his mouth and the brightness of his appearing This pure heavenly fire is descended is kindled is set as a refiners fire and no iniquity shall escape the flame of it For it is holy mighty effectual and eternal it doth and will burn for ever You have heard the sound of it in your spirits ye are in the smoak of it and so is the whole Nation which is the reason of the present blackness darkness and confusion But when the evil is brought forth and discovered he will certainly destroy it yea it is actually destroying and in destruction in being brought forth Fifthly That outward wrath which you administred you could nor but execute it you could not cease from it till it was finished but you have since turned from that cause and made

it That his Majesty needs and may justly require security cannot be denied That no means sufficient is yet used is manifest that the people are willing to do it hath been proved and that it is possible to do in this case what men are ready to do is not to be questioned That this means propounded by a Treaty is probable It will appear if we consider the advantage of a Treaty both as to right understanding removing objections and communicating affections whereby ordinarily enmity is expelled good will union and agreement of hearts and minds is obtained but besides these generals this main thing is to be considered That in such a Treaty it will not be hard to bring forth the roots seeds and principles of all the war and contention that hath been and consequently of future rebellion in the Nation and to offer them up to his Majesty The reason why it will not be hard to do this is because First The judgement decreed upon the Church and Nation is executed the ministry of wrath and war is ceased 2ly The state and spirit in which and by which it was administred is corrupted and by spiritual men loathed and abhorred 3ly And consequently the enmity at the root of it is slain though it still disturbs yet in the hearts and judgements of sober men it hath received a deep and irrecoverable wound Therefore it is very possible and easie to produce the cause and reason of the late war with the righteousness and unrighteousness of both sides And with it all the seeds and principles of civil enmity and division which may possibly beget any disturbance for the future If these roots of war be pulled up and sacrificed it will be the best bone-fire that ever was made in England And will give the fullest satisfaction to his Majesty that can be desired For by it his Majesty will be secured of the hearts and minds of his subjects If his Majesty shall be pleased to answer such a petition and to appoint certain moderate and understanding persons acceptable to these people and so apt to entertain a Treaty with them We may in reason expect that such a door of safety being open all parties will be glad to enter in at it And if the chief of them can gather up the rest of the people into a consent and agreement with them in this work they will be able to offer a valuable consideration for their safety and protection That may really deserve both liberty and subsistence also out of their purchases If this be carried on by judgement and conscience and from a mind enlightened and convinced We have no cause to fear that it will not be understood received and believed by his Majesty For what is done in light is evident to all An Epistle seen and read of all men When the mind is truly convinced it is easie for it to give forth such a declaration of it as is sufficient to convince another that it is convinced And such a declaration coming from reason and from the heart his Majesties heart cannot but feel it and rejoyce in it It being the only thing in the earth wanting to make his Government fully happy Security being given or ready to be given by these people the second thing their liberty and safety comes naturally Indeed it is already granted and declared by his Majesty it only wants to be by such a Treaty and some Articles so explained and confirmed that the people may receive the benefit of it If these two things which are truly and really conceived in the hearts and natures of both sides may be brought forth it will be a blessed foundation of great good to the Nation and Church And a present ease to the minds of his Majesty and of his people and will fill the whole Nation with pleasure and content For of all things love and peace have the greatest felicity in them to a people As discord betwixt brethren or relations is most grievous so love that unites enemies is the most pleasant and contentful Such a meeting of hearts and minds in peace will bring forth some more then ordinary good to the English Nation which are from their own dispositions inclined to love and to an encrease of it unto a kind of excess when once they begin It is said Isa 9.5 Every battle of the warriour is with confused noise and garments rolled in blood Such yet is the sta●e of the Nation confused noise there is and garments rolled in blood which do disturb the minds of men and makes them uncapable of the government and peace of Christs Kingdom But if by this means propounded a civil peace may be obtained it will be a beginning and foundation of a more heavenly and spiritual peace in the Church It is true this seems to be first necessary but if this were obtained I could demonstrate the other as rational and possible as this and more Because the Law and reason of Religion is more large more forgiving healing and uniting then Civil Law or Reason A union and peace in the Church is promised and commanded in the Scripture Nothing is promised that we may not challenge and expect nothing commanded but what is practicable Something I may affirm upon my particular experience For I have gone as far in the way of separation from the Church of England I think as most men and prosecuted it as heartily And yet my mind is now and hath been long enlarged to own and embrace the Church of England and Episcopal government I did not alter as a knave as a fool nor as an enemy to them that differ from me Not as a knave for my mind altered when Episcopacy was at lowest and hath so continued ever since in many troubles without change Nor as a fool I confess I have received it from heaven yet so as is fully demonstrated to me from reason and Scripture Nor as enemy For Episcopacy as I understand it is a tree so high and large that all these birds that now she from it may make their nests in the branches of it and be nourished by the fruit of it And that not by clipping the outward honour of it but by enlarging and exalting of it into its own true heavenly light and glory This I find and know by experience what several sects seek in their private and divided wayes they shall never enjoy but in the Church there only they will find rest for their souls But these things shall rest till their season be to come forth The thing that is here propounded to you that are my Brethren and now in suffering is so essentially necessary in my judgement for your safety and the peace of the Nation that if I knew any thing that might hinder you from accepting and prosecuting it as the means of your deliverance I would remove it There are but two things that I suspect The first thing I doubt is lest your high apprehensions of some extraordinary