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A66905
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Suffragium Protestantium, wherein our governours are justifyed in their impositions and proceedings against dissenters meisner also and the verdict rescued from the cavils and seditious sophistry of the Protestant reconciler / by Dr. Laurence Womock ...
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Womock, Laurence, 1612-1685.
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1683
(1683)
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Wing W3354; ESTC R20405
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170,962
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414
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the Fift Commandment now this the Dissenters have done first by their distinction that the King is Singulis Major but Universis Minor According to the last Branch of this Distinction who is the Father Not the Prince for he is Minor to the Body of the People Not the People For if they were above their Prince then They must be their own Father But because this is so grosly absur'd and so perfectly contradicted by the writings of the Primitive Fathers and Holy Scriptures therefore to gain a Right and Liberty to Resist their Prince John Goodwin has delivered it for a great Mr. Joh. Goodwin's Anti-Caval See Dr. Ham. of Resisting the lawful Magistrate c. Pag. 22. c. Truth that God did hide this Liberty of Resisting from the Primitive Christians lest the use of it should cause an Abortion in the Birth of Antichrist God caused a Dead sleep saies he to fall upon these Truths the hiding of them being necessary to help Antichrist up to his Throne Yea he saith that God by special Dispensation suffered him the said Antichrist to make such Truths his foot-stool till he had advanced himself to his highest Pitch in the World But now that this Antichrist is to be destroyed and cast out and the Commonalty of Christians as he pretended being the Men that must have the Principal hand in Executing God's Judgments upon the Whore For bringing this to pass Now saies he in These our times God hath given out this Revelation to us He hath manifested the Doctrine of Resistance and Christians may act contrary to the will of their Superiours This was the Doctrine of John Goodwin who tho he was a single Person yet he was a Leading-Man amongst the Party who generally followed his steps and acted according to his Pernicious Principles Thus have they made that Commandment of God of Non-Effect thro their Tradition How like these men were unto the Pharisees we may Collect from the Character which Josephus tho himself a Pharisee gives of them He saies They were a Crafty and Subtile Generation of men and so perverse even to Princes themselves that they would not fear many times openly to affront and oppose them And so far had they insinuated themselves into the affections and estimations of the Populacy that their good or ill word was enough to make or blast any one with the People who would implicitly believe them let their Report be never so false or Malicious Dr. Cave in the Life of St. Paul Sect. 1. N. 6. Pag. 47. I shall therefore conclude in contradiction to the Reconciler That seeing Obedience to the Impositions of our Superiours is neither a thing indifferent nor unnecessary we ought to practice it tho the Dissenters take offence at it And herein the Doctrine of our Saviour upon that occasion will bear us out which signifies that their Scandal is not so much to be esteem'd that we should therefore cease to Preach a needful Truth and that how much soever they may be offended yet 't is good to consult the welfare of the People Seduced by such blind Guides as lead them into the Pit by their Traditions The next Assault the Reconciler makes at Pag. 155. is upon a Pittiful Trifling Adversary one Meisner a Lutheran whom he slights with as much scorn and insolence as if he had not been worthy to carry his Books after him It was pleasantly said by Mr. Hales of a Friends Letter He sets up Tops and I must Whip them for Him But indeed I am concerned for Meisner I brought him upon the Stage and therefore am obliged in Justice to appear as a Second in his Quarrel 'T was declared in the Verdict Page 272. that no Church of any Creditable Denomination would change their Established Orders to gratify any Emergent Faction Instances were given both of the Lutherans and Calvinists How Rotarius was treated at Geneva for the Breach of a Novel-practice there was specified at Page 280. But that Foolery to say no worse the Reconciler passes over in deep silence which is a conviction of his Partiality For Meisners Arguments if they be not good yet they Evidence the Matter of Fact That the Lutherans would no more recede from their established Rules than the Calvinists which is all that Dr. Womock alledged them for But perhaps Meisners Arguments are not so Weak as his Prejudice would make them The first of which is drawn from the Nature of things Indifferent which is such as that they may be freely used or disused practised or abrogated But when the Use or Disuse the Practice or Abrogation is obtruded as of Necessity the nature of such Indifferent things is violated If he inquires what Meisner means by obtruding he had occasion no doubt as well as we to mean an Insurrection of Dissenters to Reform by force of Arms But the Reconciler has made a Meaning for him that is when men thro the weakness of their Judgment do believe a thing Indifferent to be sinful and having made this to be Meisners meaning he harrangues upon 't with little Judgment and great Bitterness But that he may not run away and think to carry the Cause as he uses to do by his false Surmises let him stop a little and tell me how the Dissenter believes a thing Indifferent to become finful for 't is no less then Oppositum in Apposito Does he believe it either with a Divine or Humane Faith If with a Divine Faith let him shew us some Divine Revelation for the Ground of it If with a Humane Faith that 's only his Opinion and that is to be Corrected by Instruction or some other course of Discipline that it proceeds not to an obstinate Superstition But were Meisner's meaning such as the Reconciler would have it yet common Civility should have taught him better manners than to Charge him that he gave St. Paul the Lye He had the Honour of a Learned Professor when he was alive at Wittengburge and for that Reason the Reconciler should have a little Veneration for his Ashes now he 's Dead especially because being Dead he yet speaketh in his Learned Writings Some body sure has ought this Reconciler a shame for his Factious Arrogance and has paid him home in betraying him to such gross delusions and mistakes What! Meisner give St. Paul the lye 'T is impossible He that gives another man the Lye must contradict him He that contradicts another man must speak Ad Idem in reference to the same Thing the same Time the same Place the same Persons as also to the same Respect and Purpose If there be any Variation in these Circumstances the Opposition will not amount to a Contradiction or a Lye 'T is possible both Partyes may speak the perfect Truth For example If I say the King forbad all Concourse of People and Horse-Racing meaning at such a Time and in such a Place And another man say the King did not forbid the Concourse of People or
are reckoned up by Dr. Sclater There is ad 2 Thes 3. 6. Potestas Ministerii at large Authority to Preach the Gospel and administer the Holy Sacraments Mat. 28. 19. 2. there is Potestas Ordinis a power to Ordein Ministers and make Laws for external Government 1 Tim. 5. 22. Tit. 1. 5. 3. there is Potestas 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Censurae to administer Censures less or greater according to the quality of Offences Every mans zeal and knowledge where there is no Organical Church setled was licence enough for him to report what had been done at Jerusalem and what was the present Faith and Practice there If they had any Ministers to Preach with Authority amongst them no doubt they had their Holy Orders and a Divine Mission and were put in Office to that purpose but 't is most likely they had none because tho they had knowledge to admonish one another of the Doctrine they had received yet they had no Authority to teach as S. Ambrose has observed Rom. 15. 14. non dixit ut invicem se doceant sed admoneant and if there had been any such spiritual guides doubtless in such a case of difficulty and danger the Apostle would have referred the Christians to their Conduct as he did in other places And yet every man that hath a licence as well as ability to preach the Gospel has not presently the Authority of a Governor Philip was an Evangelist and Preached Christ to the City of Samaria Baptiz'd Converts and wrought Miracles amongst them yet he had no Jurisdiction there The Apostles sent Peter and John from Jerusalem to lay their hands upon them to Confirm them Acts 8. 14. to 17. Secondly saith our Reconciler The Apostle among many others whom he calls his Helpers in Christ approved in Christ labourers in Christ Rom. 16. 3 9 12. who may all rationally be deemed to be Church-Officers and as rationally deemed to be none Presbyters Deacons and Diaconesses makes mention of Andronicus and Junias of note amongst Christ's Apostles i. e. saith our Reconciler among the Preachers of the Gospel the Teachers of the Christian Faith If these be his Church-Governors then there was a woman got into the Chair at Rome before Pope Joan was heard of for Theophilact saith that Junias was the name of a woman and Grotius thinks she was wife to Andronicus But what is all this to a setled Jurisdiction to establisht Laws and Governors appointed to put them in execution which was the thing he was obliged to prove and now to pay him back a little of his own coin of the finer mettal who could imagine this Reconciler would have had the confidence to oppose a deliberate Verdict upon a Melius inquirendum and pretermitting all the solid Grounds of Truth Reason and Authority upon which it is established think to quash it by his own vain Imaginations All the Ancients that write of the Church of Rome do conclude that it was founded by those two great Apostles S. Peter and S. Paul and S. Paul being the Apostle of the Incircumcision and above all the rest adorned with the title of a chosen vessel to bear the name and Gospel of Christ among the Gentiles Acts 9. 15. in all reason we should allow him a good share in the establishment of that Church which was the most considerable in his whole Province but 't is evident when he wrote his Epistle he had never been at Rome to do it and tho he sent Phaebe with his Epistle I hope no man will be so ill advised as to think he gave her any Commission to Govern If there had been any such Governors there where should we look for them but among those persons of such excellent note whom S. Paul salutes and yet if the Reconciler will needs have them to be Church-Governors the first of the Catalogue is a Woman Rom. 16. 3. Priscilla so likewise 2 Tim. 4. 19. She is called Prisca and set before Aquila and 't is thought what e're the rest were that her Husband was her Convert Priscillam quidem priori loco ponit cujus ratio certa vix reddi potest Si tamen conjecturis locus est illustrior fortussis fuit uxor magis nota omnibus vel prior ad fidem conversa maritum postea instituit Gualt ad Rom. Homil. 93. in p. 225. 2. in fine He sets down Priscilla in the first place for which no certain Reason can be given but if we may conjecture probably the Wife might be of the more honourable extraction and so more publickly known or being first converted to the Faith her self afterwards instructed her Husband in the same That S. Peter was there to plant a Church and settle Governors so as to make a Coalition of Jew and Gentile into one united body before S. Paul wrote this Epistle if he can prove it solidly the present Church of Rome shall thank him for it but the generality of Protestant Writers are against it Take Gualterus instead of all the rest ad Rom 16. 7 16. Homil. 94. Non parum facit hic locus ad confutandum impudens Papistarum figmentum c. This place saith he makes strongly for the confutation of that impudent Fiction of the Papists who dream of S. Peters coming to Rome in the second year of Claudius and that he first constituted a Church there over which he himself did preside for five and twenty years together Now if they say true in this He must be at Rome when S. Paul wrought this Epistle Why then makes he no mention of him or what reason can be alledged why the name of Peter only should be left out of that long and honourable catalogue of those men who were famous in that Church at that time was it because he was ignorant of his being there But this cannot well be seeing that the Faith of Rome was published in most parts of the World and how could so great an Apostle escape S. Paul's knowledge who was acquainted with so many of far meaner quality or shall we think that he concealed S. Peter's name out of emulation But far be such a thing from the sincerity and uprightness of an Apostle and why should he envy Peter his honour who speaks so honourably of many others far inferior to him Therefore our Romanists will never be able to make good this fancy of theirs For what Answer will they give S. Luke who says that Peter was present at the Council of Jerusalem which as St. Paul witnesseth in his second Chapter to the Galathians was held in the eighteenth year after his Conversion which according to true computation falls on the ninth year of Claudius besides these men are not aware how great mischief they do S. Peter when they talk of his sitting as Bishop of Rome for full five and twenty years who according to Christs command ought to have travelled up and down and preached the Gospel in several places And truly