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	doctrine_n	england_n	6,989	5	6.3346	4	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A56393	Reasons for abrogating the test imposed upon all members of Parliament, anno 1678, Octob. 30 in these words, I A.B. do solemnly and sincerely, in the presence of God, profess, testifie, and declare, that I do believe that in the Sacrament of the Lord's Supper there is not any transubstantiation of the elements of bread and wine into the body and blood of Christ, at, or after the consecration thereof by any person whatsoever, and that the invocation or adoration of the Virgin Mary, or any other saint, and the sacrifice of the mass, as they are now used in the Church of Rome, are superstitious and idolatrous : first written for the author's own satisfaction, and now published for the benefit of all others whom it may concern.	Parker, Samuel, 1640-1688.	1688 (1688)	Wing P467; ESTC R5001	62,716	138

two grand singularities of his History and the main things that gave it popular Vogue and Reputation with his Party and were these two blind Stories and the Reasons depending upon them retrench'd it would be like the shaving of Samson's Hair and destroy all the strength peculiar to the History The Design was apparently laid before the Work was undertaken that industriously warps all things into Irenical and Erastian Principles and the vain Man seems to have been flattered by his Patrons into all that Pains to give Reputation to their Errors And here lay the Fondness for the Stillingsteetian Manuscript that it so frankly and openly asserted Erastian and Sacramentarian Principles as the Bottom of the Reformation But if such an unprov'd and unwarrantable piece of Paper without any certain Conveyance or Tradition without any Notice of so publick a Transaction in any contemporary Writer without any other Evidence of its being genuine than that it was put providentially into the Hands of Dr. St. when he wrote his Irenicum must be set up for undoubted Record against all the Records of the Churches our great Historian would be well advis'd to employ his Pains in writing Lampoons upon the present Princes of Christendom especially his own which he delights in most because it is the worst thing that himself can do than collecting the Records of former times For the First will require Time and Postage to pursue his Malice but the Second is easily trac'd in the Chimney Corner And therefore I would desire these Gentlemen either to give a better Account of the Descent and Genealogy of the Paper than that it came to Dr. St. by Miracle or else to give it less Authority But to proceed a new Office for the Communion-Service was drawn up in the same Year by the Bishops in compiling of which Cranmer had the chief hand and by his great Power over-ruled the rest at Pleasure in this Service he retains the old Form of Words used in the ancient Missals when there was no Zuinglianism or Doctrine of figurative Presence in the Christian World and the real Presence was universally believed as appears by the very Words of Distribution The Body of our Lord Iesus Christ which was given for thée preserve thy Body and Soul unto everlasting Life And the Blood of our Lord Iesus Christ which was shed for thée c. This was the Form prescribed in the First Liturgy of Edward the 6th and agreeable to this are the King 's own Injunctions published at the same time where the Eucharist is call'd the Communion of the very Body and Blood of Christ by which Form of Words they then expressed the real Presence as oppos'd to Zuinglianism This Liturgy being thus established and withal abetted by Act of Parliament for some time kept up its Authority in the Church against all Opposition though it was soon encountred with Enemies enough both at Home and abroad out of the Calvinian Quarters At the end of the Year ensuing Peter Martyr a rank Sacramentarian came over and after much Conversation with Cranmer he was plac'd Regius Professor in Oxford where he soon raised Tumults about the Zuinglian and Sacramentarian Doctrines But Bucer that prudent and moderate Reformer came not till some time after though invited at the same time And so either came too late or departed too soon for as he came over in Iune so he dy'd in Ianuary so that tho he were a great Assertor of the real Presence as our Church-Historian himself often observes he had not a Season to sow his Doctrine and Martyr reigning alone and being a furious Bigott in his Principles it is no wonder if Zuinglianism spread with so much Authority But the most fatal Blow to the Reformation of the Church of England was given by Calvin's Correspondence with the Protector and afterwards with Dudley taking upon him to censure expunge reform impose at his own Pleasure the Malignity of whose Influence first discovered it self in the Ceremonial War against a Cap and a Tippet but soon wrought into the Vitals of the Reformation especially as to the Liturgy and the Eucharist both which must be removed to give way to the Zuinglian Errors This Alteration was made in the 5th Year of the Kings Reign tho precisely when and by what Persons is utterly unknown only it is remark'd by our Church-Historian to have followed immediately after the Consecration of Hooper When as he observes the Bishops being generally addicted to the Purity of Religion spent most of this Year in preparing Articles which should contain the Doctrine of the Church of England Among which the 29th condemns the real Presence as the new Liturgy to which they are annexed had before almost run it up to the Charge of Idolatry For they were not content to abolish the old Missal Form of Distribution The Body of our Lord Iesus Christ which was given for thee preserve thy Body and Soul unto everlasting Life Take and eat this c. But instead of it appoint this Zuinglian Form Take and eat this without any mention of the Body and Blood of Christ in remembrance that Christ died for thée c. Neither were these Innovators whoever they were satisfied with the Alteration of the old Form but add a fierce Declaration to bar the Doctrine of Real and Essential Presence Whereas it is ordered in this Office of the Administration of the Lord's Supper that the Communicants should receive the same Kneeling which order is well meant for a signification of our humble and grateful acknowledgment of the benefits of Christ therein given to all worthy Receivers and for avoiding such Prophanation and Disorder in the Holy Communion as might otherwise ensue Yet least the same Kneeling should by any Persons either out of Ignorance and Infirmity or out of Malice and Obstinacy be misconstrued and deprav'd it is here declared that no Adoration is intended or ought to be done unto any real or essential Presence of Christ's natural Flesh and Blood for the Sacramental Bread and Wine remain still in their very natural Substances and therefore may not be ador'd for that were Idolatry to be abhorr'd by all faithful Christians and the natural Body and Blood of our Saviour Christ are in Heaven and not here It being against the Truth of Christ's natural Body to be at one time in more places than one And whereas a body of Articles was composed at the same time it is declared in the 29th Article That since the very being of humane Nature doth require That the Body of one and the same Man cannot be at one and the same time in many places but of necessity must be in some certain and determinate place therefore the Body of Christ cannot be present in many different places at the same time And since as the Holy Scriptures testifie Christ hath been taken up into Heaven and there is to abide till the end of the World it becomes not any of the Faithful to

enough in the Cause by making a Noise upon these Two loud Engines they could at pleasure drown the Dispute Now ever since this Alteration of the State of the War between the Two Churches we hear little or nothing at all of the real Presence in the Cause but it is become as great a Stranger to the i.e. their Church of England as Transubstantiation it self but the whole matter is resolved into a meer Sacramental Figure and Representation and a Participation only of the Benefits of the Body and Blood of Christ by Faith. I know not any one Writer of that Party of Men that hath ever own'd any higher Mystery but on the contrary they state all the Disputes about the Eucharist upon Sacramentarian Principles and with them to assert the true reality of the Presence of our Saviour's Body and Blood in the Sacrament as naturally resolves it self into Transubstantiation as that does into Idolatry And the main Argument insisted upon by them is the natural Impossibility of the thing it self to the Divine Omnipotence which beside the prophane Boldness of prescribing Measures to God's Attributes in a Mystery that they do not comprehend 't is as appears by the Premises a Defiance to the Practice of all Churches who have ever acknowledged an incomprehensible Mystery not subject to the Examination of Humane Reason but to be imbraced purely upon the Authority of a Divine Revelation And therefore that ought to be the only matter of Dispute For if it be a Divine Revelation as all Christendom hath hitherto believed that determines the Case without any further Enquiry and if any Man will not be satisfied with that Authority he makes very Bold with his Maker And Men of those Principles would no doubt make admirable Work with the Definitions of Articles of Faith by the Four first general Councils But to let their new way of Arguing pass it is these Men that first set up Sacramentarian Principles in this Church and then blew them into the Parliament House raising there every Session continual Tumults about Religion and it is to their Caballing with the Members that we owe these new and unpresidented TESTS Perhaps to have their own Decrees and Writings established by Law and imposed upon the whole Nation as Gospel In short if they own a real Presence we see from the Premises how little the Controversie is between that and Transubstantiation as it is truly and ingeniously understood by all reformed Churches If they do not they disown the Doctrine both of the Church of England and the Church Catholick and then if they own only a figurative Presence and it is plain they own no other they stand condemned of Heresie by almost all Churches in the Christian World and if this be the thing intended to be set up as it certainly is by the Authors and Contrivers of it by renouncing Transubstantiation then the Result and Bottom of the Law is under this Pretence to bring a new Heresy by Law into the Church of England And yet upon this Foot I find the Controversie stands at this present Day between the Bishop of Rome or the Bishop of Condom on one part and little Iulian in the Back-shop with his Dragoons on the other part The Bishop establishes the Real Presence in Opposition to the Figurative His Answerer turns the whole Mystery into meer Type and Figure by seting up a figurative Interpretation of the Words of Institution and yet confesses it at the same time to be somewhat more than a Figure To this it is reply'd I would gladly know what that is which is not the thing it self but yet is more than a meer Figure of it To this it is answered That the Presence is Spiritual but yet Real but how a Corporeal Substance should have a real Spiritual Presence is a thing that requires more Philosophy to clear it up than Transubstantiation or in the Words of the Author himself We suppose it to be a plain Contradiction that Body should have any Existence but what alone is proper to a Body that is Corporeal This is their last Resolution of this Controversie that a true real Presence is a Contradiction and so I think is a real spiritual Presence of a bodily Substance This Scent the whole Chace follows and unanimously agree in this Cry That there is no Presence but either meerly Figurative and that shuts out all Reality and is universally condemned by all the Reformation or meerly Spiritual i.e. the present Effects and Benefits of the absent Body and Blood of Christ which hath been all along equally cashiered by all other Reformed Churches as the other grand Scandal of Zuinglianism Thus the London Answerer to the Oxford Discourses There can be no real Presence but either Figuratively in the Elements or Spiritually in the Souls of those who worthily receive them So Dr. St. All which the Doctrine of our Church implies by this Phrase is only a real Presence of Christ's invisible Power and Grace so in and with the Elements as by the faithful receiving of them to convey real and spiritual Effects to the Souls of Men. The Oxford Answerer to the Oxford Discourses allows no other real Presence but the virtual Presence that is the meer Effect So the popular Author of the Discourse against Transubstantiation makes no Medium between the meer figurative Presence and Transubstantiation so that all other Presence that is not meerly Figurative comes under the Notion of Transubstantiation Now the gentlest Character he is pleased to give of this Monsieur is this That the Business of Transubstantiation is not a Controversie of Scripture against Scripture or of Reason against Reason but of downright Impudence against the plain meaning of the Scripture and all the Sence and Reason of all Mankind But besides the intolerable Rudeness of the Charge against all the Learned Men of the Church of Rome as the worst of Sots and Ideots if there be no middle real Presence between Transubstantiation and the Figure he hath cast all the Protestant Churches into the same Condemnation of Sots and Fools But howsoever rash and preposterous it may be for Presons that believe the real Presence to abjure the Word Transubstantiation ye to determine any part of Divine Worship in the Christian Church to be in its own Nature Idolatry is inhumane and barbarous IDOLATRY is a Stabbing and Cut-throat Word its least Punishment is the greatest that can be both Death and Damnation and good Reason too when the Crime is no less than renouncing the true God that made Heaven and Earth Thus Exod. 22. 20. He that sacrificeth unto any God save unto the Lord or Iehovah only he shall be utterly destroyed Deut. 13. 6. If thy Brother the Son of thy Mother or thy Son or thy Daughter or the Wife of thy Bosom or thy Friend which is as thine own Soul entice thee secretly saying Let us go and serve other Gods which thou hast not known thou nor thy Fathers namely

to their Duty to himself among these the chiefest are Circumcision and the Sabbath which he instituted as it were the two Sacraments of the Jewish Religion or the Worship of the Creator of Heaven and Earth to distinguish them from their Neighbour Nations who Worship only his Creatures With Circumcision God sign'd his Covenant with Abraham which was the first Revelation of himself against Idolatry and the Foundation of the whole Mosaick Law which was seal'd to by this sacred Rite of Circumcision so that without it they were esteemed no better than Idolaters and an uncircumcised Man signifies no less than an Heathen This Reason is expresly given by God himself at the first Institution of it in his Covenant with Abraham I will establish my Covenant between thee and me and thy Seed after thee in their Generations for an everlasting Covenant to be a God unto Thee and to thy seed after thee This is my Covenant which ye shall keep between me and you and thy seed after thee every Male Child among you shall be Circumcised And you shall circumcise the Flesh of your Fore-skin and it shall be a Token of the Covenant betwixt you and me and therefore the uncircumcised shall be cut off from his People as having broken my Covenant i.e. renounced the true Religion which is as Grotius observes not reasonably to be understood of Infants but of Men grown to Years of Understanding whose Parents had neglected that Office in their Infancy and therefore if they did not supply that Defect when they came to Age it was looked upon as renouncing the Worship of the true God of which this was the first Sacrament or Ceremony of Admission into the Jewish Church which alone profess'd it and that is the Reason of St. Paul's Assertion Every Man that is circumcised is a Debtor to do the whole Law i.e. he that willingly and knowingly undergoes this initiating Ceremony by Vertue of that he obliges himself to the Observation of the whole Mosaick Law and all things commanded in it And for this Reason no Proselyte was admitted to the Paschal Festival the most sacred Solemnity of the Jewish Religion without Circumcision When a stranger shall sojourn with thee and will keep the Passover to the Lord let all his Males be circumcised and then let him come near and keep it and he shall be as one that is born in the Land for no uncircumcised Person shall eat thereof This seems to be the meaning of that Passage Ioshua 5. 9. when God commanded Ioshua to circumcise all the People that were born in the Wilderness and that indeed is all then living for those that came out of Egypt were dead and when Ioshua had done it God tells him This day have I rolled away the Reproach of Egypt from off you the Reproach of Egypt was their Idolatry which they had now renounced by the Sacrament of Circumcision And accordingly in the Persecution of Antiochus Epiphanes to abolish the Jewish Religion and establish Idolatry the Jews are commanded to leave their Children uncircumcis'd and the Apostates endeavoured to blot out the Marks of their Circumcisioni and certain Women that had taken care to circumcise their Children were put to Death and the Infants hanged about their Necks That was the distinctive Mark through all Ages between a Worshiper of the true God and an Idolater So that it was the same thing not to be circumcised and to apostatise to Idolatry The second and indeed the greatest Bar of all against Idolatry was the Institution of the Sabbath in memory of Gods Creation of the whole visible World and for that reason this Doctrine of the Sabbath was reputed as fundamental an Article in the Jewish Church as the Doctrine of the Cross in the Christian because all other Articles of their Religion depended upon the belief of their God's Creation of the World. And therefore when God had given Moses a compleat Body of Laws for his own Worship he ratifies and as it were comprises them all in a vehement and reiterated pressing that one Law of the Sabbath Exod. 31. v. 12. to the end of the Chapter And after the Children of Israel had committed Idolatry in worshiping the Golden Calf for which God had for some time cast them off he is at last prevailed upon by Moses to renew his Covenant with them upon a new Contract First That they worship none of the Gods of the Heathen Nations nor ever use any of their Rites and Ceremonies And then that they be more careful to observe the Passover and the Sabbath Exod. 34. 12. And the Observation of the Sabbath is again enforced in the very beginning of the next Chapter as the Bond and Epitome of the whole Law And Moses gathered all the Congregation of the Children of Israel together and said unto them these are the words which the Lord hath commanded that ye should do them Six days shall work be done but on the Seventh day there shall be to you a Holy day a Sabbath of rest to the Lord whosoever doth work therein shall be put to death As if the Sabbath alone were the whole Law according to that Saying of the Talmud Whosoever denies the Sabbath denies the whole Law. Because that 's an Acknowledgment of the Creator of the World as the Author of the Mosaick Law. And for that reason the Almighty upon all occasions styles himself in Scripture Creator of Heaven and Earth which we improperly enough translate Possessor of Heaven and Earth and indeed the History of the Creation it self and the whole Pentateuch seem to have been written on purpose to prevent Idolatry or the Worship of Created Beings and therefore Moses doth not set down the Creation of the Universe in gross but of every part by it self particularly of the Sun Moon and Stars And that is in it self a sufficient Security against giving them that were meer Creatures the Worship that is only due to the Creator And this seems to be the reason of the particular form of words in the Fourth Commandment Remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy for in six days the Lord made Heaven and Earth and rested the seventh day As if he had said be sure that you be particularly mindful of this Commandment of the Sabbath above all others for it is a Day dedicated to the Eternal Memory of the Creation and therefore enjoyn'd to be observ'd every Seventh Day that it may continually bring to mind that great work and never suffer it to decay out of thy Memory And from hence it is that the Precepts of not worshiping Idols and observing the Sabbath are so frequently coupled together in the Scriptures as if they were inseparable Exod. 23. 12 13. Six days thou shalt do thy work and on the seventh day thou shalt rest and make no mention of the Names of other Gods neither let them be heard out of thy mouth Levit. 19. 34. Ye shall keep my