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	government_n	3,314	5	6.9877	4	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A50414	A sermon against false prophets preached in St. Maries Church in Oxford, shortly after the surrender of that garrison / by Iasper Maine ...	Mayne, Jasper, 1604-1672.	1647 (1647)	Wing M1474; ESTC R6997	24,686	32

understanding all arguments even in a Preaching and perswasive way which carry not necessity of demonstration in their Forehead may reasonably be rejected Much lesse have I met with it in all my progresse of D●…vinity or Philosophy convincingly maintained that men upon every slight disagreement or dissent in Religion are to be whipt or beaten into a Co●…sent or that the plunder of mens Estates is a fit medium to beget a Beleefe or perswasion in their Minds Here then should I once more grant the charge of these Prophets to be true a very heavy one I confesse that the Protest an●… Religion among us had very farre taken wing and had almost resigned its place in this Island to the Romish Superstition Nay suppose which is yet farre worse that a great and considerable part of this Kingdome had through the Corruption of the 〈◊〉 not onely relapst from the Protestant Religion in particular but from the Christian Faith in generall suppose I say which is the 〈◊〉 that can be supposed that they who have so frequently of late been branded for Papists had out-right turned Infidels however in such a case that Warre which fights against th●…Errours of men thus lost and proposeth to it selfe no other end but their Repentance and Conversion may to some perhaps seem to weare the Helmet of their Salvation and the Army which thus strives to save men by the sword may to some seem an Army of Apostles yet I doe not finde that to come into the field with an armed Gospel is the way chosen by Christ to make Proselites The Scripture indeed tells us of some who took the Kingdome of Heaven by violence But of any who by violence may have it imposed upon them us no where recorded But alas my Brethren if I may speak freely to you in the defence of that defamed Religion in which I was borne and to which I should account it one of the greatest blessings that God can bestow upon me if I might with the Holy Fathers of our Reformation fall a Sacrifice that which these men call Idolatry and Superstition and by names yet more odious was so farre from having shrined it selfe in our Church So little of that drosse and Ore and tinne which hath lately filled our best Assemblies with so much noyse and Clamour was to be found among us that with the same unfainednesse that I would confesse my sinnes to God and hope to obtaine pardon for them I doe professe that I cannot thinke the Sun in all his heavenly course for so many yeares beheld a Church more blest with purity of Religion for the Doctrines of it or better establisht for the Government and Discipline of it then ours was And therefore if I were presently to enter into dispute with the greatest Patriarch among these Prophets who even against the Testimony of sense it selfe will yet perversely strive to prove that our Church stood in such need of Reformation that the growing Superstitions of it could not possibly be exptated but by so much Civi●… Warre I should not doubt with modesty enough to prove back again to him that all such weak irrationall Arguments as have onely his zeale for their Logick are not onely composed of untempered Morter But that in seeing those spots and blemishes in our Church which no good Protestants else could ever see 't will be no unreasonable inference to conclude him in the number of those erroneous Prophe●…s here in the Text Who to the great Scandall and abuse of their Office and Function did not onely palliate and gild over the publique sins of their times but did it like Prophets and saw Vanity too Which is the next part of the Text And is next to succeed in your attentions If the Phil●…sophers rule be true that things admit of definitions according to their essences and that the nearer they approach to nothing the nearer they d●…aw to no Description to goe about to give you an exact definition of a thing impossible to be defined or to endeavour to describe a thing to you which hath been so much disputed whether it be a thing were to be like those Pr●…phets here in the Text first to see Vanity my selfe and then to perswade you that there is a Reality and Substance in it Yet to let you see by the best lights I can what is here meant by Vanity I will joyne an inspi●…ed to a Heathen Philosopher Selomon whose whole Book of Ecclesiastes is but a Tract of Vanty as we may gather from the instances there set downe places vanity in mutability and change And because all things of this lower world consist in vicissitude change so farre that as Seneca said of Rivers B●…s in idem flumen non descendi●…us we cannot step twice into the same stream so we may say of most Sublun●…rie things whose very beings do so resemble str●…ams ut vix idem bis conspiciamus that we can scarce behold some things twice that wisest among the sonnes of men whose Philosophy was as spacious as there were things in nature to bee knowne calls all things under the Sunne vanity because all things under the Sunne are so lyable to inconstancy and change that they s●…eet away and vanish whilst they are considered and hasten to their decay whilst we are in the Contemplation of them Aristotle desines vanity to bee {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} Every thing which hath not some reasonable end or purpose belonging to it For this reason he calls emptinesse and vacuity vanity Because there is so little use of it in nature that to expell it things have an inclination placed in them to performe actions against their kinde Earth to shut out a vacuity is taught to flie up like fire and fire to destroy emptinesse is taught to fall downe like earth And for this reason another Philosopher hath said that colours had there not been made eyes to see them and sounds had there not beene eares made to heare them had been vanities and to no purpose And what they said of sounds and colours we may say of all things else not onely all things under the Sun but the Sun it selfe who is the great {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} the eye of the world without another eye to behold him or to know him to be so had been one of Aristotles vanities As then in Nature those things have deserved the name of vanities which either have no reasonable end or purpose belonging to them or else are altogether subject to Mutability and change so 't is in policy and Religion too To doe things by weake unreasonable inconstant principles principles altogether unable to support and upold the weight and structure of publique businesse built upon them or to doe things with no true substantiall solid usefull but a meere imaginary good end belonging to them As for example to alter the whole frame and Government of a State not that things may be mended but that they

untempered morter That is as Dyonisiu●… Carthusianus very fully expounds the Metaphor Confirmabant eos in errore persuasionibus non solidis sed fucatis The Prophets confirmed them in their errors with weake untempered Reasons All which severall Interpretations doe agree in this one and the same undenyable sense That such is the conscious guilty unjustifiable nature of sinne so suspicious and feare full 't is to be seen publiquely in its owne shape that it not onely deales with all sinners as it did with the first two upon a mutuall sight and discovery of themselves shewes them ashamed and naked to one another but to cover and veyle their nakednesse and shame sends them to such poore f●…aile unprofitable shelters as Bushes and Fig-leaves which though they should grow in Paradise it selfe or should be gathered from the same holy ground in which Innocence and the Tree of Life were planted together yet applyed to hide an oppression or pluckt to cover a sacrilege they will still retaine the fading transitory nature of l●…aves which is to decay and wither between the hands of the Gatherer and lose their colour and freshnesse in the very laying on and to every well rectified religiously judging eye instead of being a veyle to hide will become one of the wayes to betray a nakednesse To speake yet more plainly to you and to lay it as home as I can to every one of your consciences who heare me this day If the designe and project be unlawfull and contrary to Gods Commandements let there be a Prophet found to pronounce it holy let there be a Statist found to pronounce it convenient let Reason of State be joyned to Religion and publique utility to quotations of Scripture Lastly let it be adorned with all the varnishes and paintings taken either from Policy or Christianity which may render it faire and amiable to the deluded multitude yet such is the deceiveable nature of such projects such a worme such a selfe destroyer growes up with them that like Jonas Gourd something cleaves to their ro●…t which makes their very foundation ruinous and fatall to them At best they are but painted Tabe●…nacles of clay or palaces built with 〈◊〉 morter The first discovery of their hypocrisie turnes them into heaps and the fate of the scarlet whore in the Revelation befalls them whose filthinesse and abominations were no sooner opened and divulged but she was dismembred and torn in pieces by her owne Idolaters and Lovers Here then if any expect that I should apply what hath beene said to our times and that I should take the liberty of some of our Moderne Prophets who have by their rude Invectives from the Pulpit ma●…e whatever Names are High and Great and Sacred and Venerable among us cheap and vile and odious in the eares of the people If any I say expect that by way of parallell of one people with another I should here audaciously undertake to show that what ever Arts were used to make bad projects seeme plausible and holy in this Prophets time have been practiced to make the like bad projects appeare plausible and holy now Or that in our times the like Irreligious Compliance hath past between some Spirituall men and Lay to cast things into the present Confusion I hope they will not take it ill if I deceive their Expectation For my owne part as long as there is such a piece of Scripture as this * Diis non maledices thou shalt not revile the Gods that is thou shalt not onely not defame them by lying but shalt not speake all truthes of them which may turn to their Infamy and reproach I shall alwayes observe it as a piece of obligatory Religion not to speak evill no not of offending dignities Much lesse shall I adventure to shoot from this sacred place my owne ill-built Jealousies and Suspitions for Realities and Truths Which if I should doe 't would certainly favour too much of his Spirit of Detraction who hauing lost his modesty as well as Religion Obedience to the Scandall and just offence of all loyall E●…res here present was not affraid to forget the other part of that Text which saies Nec maledices principi in populo meo Thou shalt not reproach the Ruler of my people Yet because so many strange Prophets of our wilde licentious times have preacht up almost five years Commotion for a Holy war And because in truth no warre can be Holy whose cause is not justifiable If I should grant them what they have procla●…ed from so many Pulpits that the Cause for which they have all this while some of them so zealously fought as well as preacht hath beene Liberty of Conscience or in other termes for the Reformation of a corrupted degenerated Church Or to speak yet more like themselves for the Restitution of the Protestant Religion growne Popish if I say all this should be granted them yet certainly if Scripture Gospell Fathers Schoolmen Protestant Divines of the most reverend and sober marke and Reason it selfe have not deceived mee all Sermons which make Religion how pure soever to be ●… just cause of a Warre doe but dawb the undertakers with untempered Morter For however it be an Article in the Turkish Creed that they may propagate their Law by their Speare yet for us who are Christians to be of this Mahumetane perswaston were to transfer a piece of the Alcoran into a piece of the Gospell And to make Christ not onely the Author of all those Massacres which from his time to ours have worne that Holy Impression but 't were to make him over-litterally guilty of his owne saying that he came not to send peace but a Sword into the World For though it be to be granted that nothing can more conduce to the future happinesse of men then to be of the true Religion yet I doe not ●…inde that Christ hath given power to any to compell men to be happy or commanded that ●…orce should be used for the collation of such a Benefit All the wayes more proportioned for the atchieving of such an end hee hath in his Gospel prescribed namely preaching and perswasion and Holy example of life He bade his Apostles goe and teach all Nations not stir up one Nation against another or divide Kingdomes against themselves if they would not receive the Gospell This had been plainly to joyne the Sword of the flesh to the Sword of the Spirit Which to save their Lives and Fortunes might perhaps have made some Hypocrites and dissemblers without who would neverthelesse have remained Pagans and Infidels within In short some things in the Excellency and 〈◊〉 of the Doctrines of Christian Religion being no way 〈◊〉 from Humane principles but depending for the cred●…t and evidence of their truth upon the Authority of Christs miracles conveyed along in Tradition and Story cannot in a naturall way of Argumentation force assent Since as long as there is such a thing in men as ●…berty of