Selected quad for the lemma: religion_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
religion_n	church_n	discipline_n	doctrine_n	4,176	5	6.2312	4	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A94167	An English translation of the Scottish Declaration against James Graham alias Marquess of Montrosse. Wherein many things are set right between the kingdom of Scotland and Commonwealth of England. With many observable passages, concerning the transactions with the late king, and their now declared king.	Sydenham, Cuthbert, 1622-1654.	1650 (1650)	Wing S6293; Thomason E597_10; ESTC R203680	21,895	28

in enjoying the Peace But that fault is not ours The next thing which runs along the whole Paper as the burthen of the Declaration is and which I cannot pass by the great reflections they cast on the Parliament of England and that honest party that joyns with them joyning them with Montrosse together as if they kept mutual correspondency calling them at every turn The Sectarian Party The now prevailing Party Heretiques Schismatiques as if they meant to supple and make up their harsh expressions against Montrosses person with his party by inveighing on the Parliament of England and these which joyn with them excommunicating them out of their affections and love as they have done Montrosse out of the Kirk Expressions exceeding dangerous and too much provoking that when we shall call them Our Dear Brethren especially after an Army came from them into our Nation to destroy using the same expressions Had they but reflected on their condition but the last year when Ham●lton was the prevailing party and what sort of people they were that set them free and made the Committee of Estates the prevailing party with the dissolution of their whole Parliament they might have fitted more handsom and tender expressions at least if they meant to have kept up any brotherly Union and Correspondence between the two Nations Doth the gentle streams of a River between England and Scotland so alter and change the nature of Transactions that the purging of a Parliament in Engl nd over grown with Malignant and Predominant humours should be less lawful then the breaking up of one in Scotland Or is the natural working out of distempers worse then a violent dissolution It hath been the happiness of England for some few years that the Parliament hath been the prevailing party and why it should be now our misery after we have conquered our visible Enemy to see our friends prevail is too great a Paradox to be suddenly expounded Some must be the prevailing party and why not these that are who have hated these complemental Compliances with the Royal Interest and have followed the first Principles of the War to the best advantage for Peace But I was very unwise to tax the Declaration with that as a fault the expressing of which is our mercy As I doubt not but they think of it concerning themselves that it 's a happiness to Scotland that this Committee of Estates is now the prevailing party though it was brought in without any legal or orderly dissolution of Hamiltons Parliament and Committee of Estates and by these Instruments that they can now gratefully call Schismatiques and Sectaries But the ill Conjunction of the Sectarian party and the prevailing party sets forth the mind of the Committee to the full And yet what is meant by the Sectarian party is yet a greater Riddle then all the rest for set aside the secret Placitum of the Committee of Estates it stands without its signification in England without it be a Title imposed to divide between honest and consciencious men that some may raign But it may be they have some secret and multiplyed meaning in this phrase that must be enquired into if they call them the Sectarian party because they have justly divided the Kings Head from his Body and so have made a Schism between Prerogative and Tyranny they shall willingly own the Title with a Crown of Justice and glory in the head of it But it may be they call them Sectaries because they have made a more exact division of the true and right English Interest and that of Scotland and between new and old Malignants in the three Nations Or it may be they derive it from the word Sectari because they have more closely followed the ends and intentions of the Covenant then the literall and ambiguous expressions in it and have prosecuted the greatest enemies of Reformation by Acts of Justice to their graves But if by Sectaries the Committee mean these men that are of divers factions and parties and interest in England as we have cause to bewaile it so we may in part thank some of that Committee for it who have cast so many bones of division among us to set up the Royall and their own interest as the Parliament have publikely declared in their Answer to the Scots Paper of March 13. 1647. p. 1. 2. complaining of the sad divisions among us expresse themselves c. Vnto the advancing of this design of the common enemy the Commissioners of Scotland have for a long time made themselves or have been made by others very instrumentall whilst forgetting the work they came about and the true interest of those from whom they came have made it their work by their practises and purposes to disaffect the people of both Kingdomes unto the proceedings of the Parliament of England and on the other hand to incline and dispose them to the King and his party upon terms apparently destructive to both Kingdoms That it seems it 's no new thing for the Committee to frame words of division in this Nation but I am loath to repent these old Quarrells if there were not new occasions given But if they mean by Sectaries these which are given to blasphemous Opinions contrary to the Gospell though there are but a few in comparison so left of God yet we will joyne with them not only to write against but weep and lie in the dust for any such abominations and we can never bewail enough these things that on the one side formality and meer shaddowes of Religion should be taken up and all holinesse be only outward and externall and on the other side that fancy and delusion should prevaile to cheat men of their souls and cloud the glory of the truths of Christ But it 's a great wrong to joyne in this since the prevailing party with the Sectarian whose hearts I doubt not but bleed as truly inwardly for these things as they have exprest an outward detestation of them in burning some of their books and casting shame on their persons but as none of these Opinions are vented in publike but with publike Declaration against them so these which are vented in private are but by a few inconsiderable and contemptible persons and we blesse God with little successe at present And I doubt not if we can agree in civill Principles with our Brethren we shall soon in Religion in the Doctrine and substantialls of it wherein the life and power lies and if we differ in Discipline it will not be in the things themselves but in extent and latitude of its power that there will be no more dstinction but as of an English and Scottish Government of the Church I have onely surmized these things that the Reader may take notice of the common design in the Declaration which seems to be very strange that in one Paper made against a great Delinquent the Parliament of England who have most opposed the Malignant interest should be

Kings Commission and in an idem and representation held forth what they mean to do with his person if he prove the Author of the Commission and be found to joyn with Montrosse It s accounted in the Civil Law and I think in the Laws of England That what is done to the picture or publique representation of a person is much more done to the person it self for if they vent their malice to the dead image much more would they to the living person The image and portraiture of Kings are not seen in the lineaments of their faces or bodies drawn by the mixture of colours and the fancy of a painter but in their publique Representations in their Commissions and Grants wherein they appear in their office for else as fair and authentique grave and majestique faces may be drawn better to represent nature then in the best of them But all these things formerly excepted against are but mistakes and politique Evasions by the Committee of Estates Let us now consider waving all personal and particular Engagements and supposing an error in our Proceedings and seriously consider together what may unite us or rather recover the fence of our Union and reciprocal Concernments We are not conscious of ever sinning or transgressing against the Priviledges of Scotland though we are loath to repeat their Actions in England and concerning it if we have offended or done any thing against their real Priviledges we shall humbly acknowledg it with great sence and wherein the Union hath been broken on our side shall endeavor to make it up with satisfaction but if our Brethren think that the King will unite more then the Covenant we are sorry we must not only dissent but differ There is no means left to preserve these two Nations in the eye of Reason but their Union together in common principles waving the particular miscarriages of both Nations And how ever we may imagine and make a fancy of Sectaries equally to be opposed with Malignants we shall find and they with a witness that the one is possible and easily curable by a strict Conjunction with the honest and prevailing party the other engaged against both There is no difference between our Brethren and us of moment but about Kingly Government and the persons which must raign against which we have upon just Reasons protested and it will be hard for them to bear the single burthen of that Monarchy which expects to be maintained by the three Nations And though we dare not dishonor our Cause and Nation to beg a Union and their Correspondence which yet will be both honorable and safe to both Nations and scorn to stoop the grandeur of this Common-wealth so much as to entreat them into the consideration of their own condition as they do mechanically follow their and our Enemy called their King yet we shall be glad to renew any ways of amity and affableness with that Nation and shall account it a high and special favour from Heaven if he give us wisdom to joyn our Interest together in the preservation of the true and right ends of the Covenant which will else be forgotten among us and to settle Religion against these which may be truly called Sectaries and Government contrary to Episcopacy and most proper for Reformation in the setling of an able and powerful Ministry and purging Congregations In a word the countenancing all the ways of godliness which we have an happy opportunity now to effect the principle Obstante removed out of the way upon whose voyce we put the determination of the welfare both of Church and State and if our dissenting Brethren in England and those in Scotland would but lay aside private and special Interests and minde the publique and take advantages of Providences how soon might they have both Kirk and State reformed even unto the utmost period of all desires If there be any defect in setting up Presbyterial Government in taking care for the Ministry I wish it may not prove to lie on the Ministers themselves who out of Principles of Royalty or private Engagements do not only withdraw from but speak against this present Government and the righteous Constitution of it But if our Brethren wil wave the Covenant and make the King the medium of our union we have done our duty Let the Issue be tryed we shal venter on the same Providence maintain the same Cause however the change be in persons and spirits Reformation of Religion in Doctrine and Discipline Civil Liberties a universal Propagation of the Gospel being our end Let them see if K. Charls be the fit Instrument to effect these honest things If the Parlia of England follow not the most adequate and best means to that end viz. of the setting up pure Religion and just Liberties after all the Mercies they have enjoyed from Heaven and if the Kingdom of Scotland joyn not with them on these Grounds waving all other considerations they will both be Anathema Maranatha And if Reason and Religion cannot decide the Controversie between Brethren the Sword will never do it especially when enemies shal mannage it but endanger the ruine of both If our Brethren will not harken to terms of Peace and Love but besides their own danger and hazard will embrace the Enemy of this Common-wealth not only to sojourn but raign among them they must give us leave to secure Religion and Liberty as well as we can and once more leave it to Providence to umpire Only it will be sad that while we are trifling about names and punctilioes of things our common Enemy should grow strong and destroy us I have nothing else to add but to retire my self into my Closet and bewail the Divisions of both Nations about Ceremonies and Shadows while their and our Enemies laugh and design and to lament for our ignorance who think that a Malignant King can be brought in to raign without a Malignant Interest and that we should be all the days of our lives pruning the branches and cutting them off and yet be strengthning and fatning the root of our miseries I end with prayer to the Almighty That both Nations may have a true sence of the Glorious Actings of God these last years and may know the true and proper Interest of Religion and Liberty and both unite once more in common Principles That the good Work of Reformation so blessedly begun notwithstanding the Malignant Parties in the three Nations may receive no obstruction in its perfection by these that profess to intend the growth and glory of it that while we are striving who shall have the Shell Prelacy and Malignancy may not get the Kernel and recover their lost Interests by our private and particular Discontents FINIS