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	king_n	pope_n	3,065	5	6.1057	4	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A77856	The first sermon, preached to the Honourable House of Commons now assembled in Parliament at their publique fast. Novemb. 17. 1640. / By Cornelius Burges Doctor of Divinitie. Published by order of that House.	Burges, Cornelius, 1589?-1665.; Marshall, Stephen, 1594?-1655.	1641 (1641)	Wing B5671; Thomason E204_8; ESTC R19018	57,778	90

resolves and sets upon a more thorough Reformation of all these but could never effect it till beside the proclaiming and holding of a publique Fast he and all the people lighted upon this course namely of entring into a publique and solemne Covenant with the Lord subscribed sealed and sworne unto as before you have heard and so from that time forward the worke prospered and the Church was purged of many abominations wherewith till that time she was defiled Behold here Quantae molis erat dilectam condere Gentem how great a work how long a businesse to perfect a Reformation even of Gods deerest people Their captivitie in Babylon lasted not halfe so long time as was spent after their returne thence ere their Reformation could be brought to any to lerable perfection And why so Did they omit prayer and fasting and seeking early after God surely no For in Zach. 8. 19. we read of foure severall publique Fasts * The fast of the fourth moneth the fast of the fifth moneth the fast of the seventh and the fast of the tenth moneth which they held not only by all the time of the 70 yeeres captivitie in Babylon but many yeeres after their return thence Zach. 7. 3. and vers. 5. But all this labour was in great part lost for want of this addition to all their humiliation and prayer namely The joyning of themselves to the Lord in an everlasting Covenant not to be forgotten And when God once directed Nehemiah to this course see how all things began to thrive and come on a maine Now not only the Temple but even the walls of Hierusalem were built up and that within one twelve yeeres after this Covenant was smitten which before lay wast many scores of yeeres Let us now reflect upon our selves and the State of Religion and progresse of Reformation in our owne Church that we may make up the Parallel Some beginnings of our deliverance from Babylon we received by King Henry the eighth For he threw out the Pope His sonne King Edward the sixth came after and cast out Popery in the body and bulke of it A great work and a large step for the short time of his infant reigne And indeed he had many excellent helps that way beside the zeale of his own pious heart an Excellent Archbishop a Prudent and vigilant Protector beside others else he could never have done so much Notwithstanding the potency and secret under-minings of those mightie Factions then prevailing hindred the work not a little so that it exceeded not an inlant-Reformation yea through the immature death of that Iosiah it soone prov'd abortive The Princesse that came after quickly turn'd the Tide before it was half high water and she set all the Gates wide open againe both for Pope and Popery to re-enter with triumph and to drink drunk of the bloud of our Ancestors till God discharged her and released his people from her crueltie So that when Queene Elizabeth that glorious Deb●rah mo●uted the Throne although her heart was upright and loathed the Idolatry of the former Reigne yet found she worke enough to restore any thing at all and to make any beginnings of a Reformation She soone felt when she would have throughly pluckt up Popery both root and branch superfluous Ceremonies and all remaining raggs of superstition as well as grosse Idolatry that she had to do with an Hydra having such a strong partie of stout Popelings to grapple with at home and such potent and dangerous abetters of them to cope withall abroad I need not name them I might adde hereunto some difficulties arising from the interests and engagements of not a few of those though good and holy men that underwent voluntary exile in the heat of the Marian persecution who while they were abroad had a large share in the troubles at Franckford too eagerly perhaps pursuing the English Formes of Worship and Discipline and so when upon their returne they were advanced to places of Dignitie and Government in this Church they were the more apt and forward to maintaine and hold up that Cause wherein they had so farre appeared and for which some of them with more heat than Charitie had so openly declared themselves in forreine parts And so what by one impediment and what by another we see it hath been a long time ere our Reformation can be thoroughly polished and perfected as were to be wished and desired for there is nothing so perfect here but is capable of more perfection Nay so farre are we become now from going forward with the work notwithstanding the pietie and care of our Princes since the last Restitution of Religion in this Kingdome that as it was in Iosiahs time though his own heart were for God yet there was a pack of rotten men both Priests and People very great pretenders to Devotion but indeed mad upon Images and Idols we begin to fall quite back again and not only to coast anew upon the brinks of Babylon from whence we were happily delivered but even to launch ●ut into her deepest Lakes of superstition and Idolatr● under pretence of some extraordinary pietie of the times and of some good work in hand What is the reason of all this but that not so much as once since the first beginning of Reformation of Religion in this Island we never for ought I know entred into such a solemn publique universall Covenant to be the Lords as he requireth for those beginnings already given us but have sate loose from God and so have not joyned together as one man zealously to propugne his trueth and Ordinances and to stand by him and his Cause as becomes the people of God in all just and warrantable wayes against all opposers and gain-sayers So long as we please our selves in this libertie of our holding off from a Covenant with God we may feed our selves with vaine hopes of redresse of things amisse but shall speed no better than those libertines and back-sliders in Ier. 14. who lookt for great matters from God but came short of all and then seemed to wonder at the reason For thus they bespeake him ver. 8. O the hope of Israel the Saviour thereof in time of trouble why shouldest thou be as a stranger in the Land and as a wayfaring man that turneth aside to tarry onely for a night Why shouldst thou be as a man astonied as a mighty man that cannot save yet thou O Lord art in the midst of us and we are called by thy name See here how they are put to it They acknowledge his Power Goodnesse Presence yet they are not saved He seemes to be like Sampson with his Locks cut off as if he were not able to save or would not do it and this they wonder and stand amazed at as a thing incredible and impossible But God makes them a short and sharp answer which may also serve us vers. 10. Thus saith the Lord have they loved

imagination of mine heart and adde drunkennes to thirst See and tremble at what God hath resolved to doe with that man Deut. 29. 20 21. The Lord will not spare him but the anger of the Lord and his jealousy shall smoake against that man and all the Curses that are written in Gods Booke shall ly upon him and the Lord shall blot out his name from under Heaven Here is nothing but fury powred out upon such a wretch not a blessing shall descend upon him not a curse shall escape and go by him not onely himselfe and posterity but his very name so farre as it is an honour shall all be cast out of the world as out of the midst of a sling If he please himselfe with this Yet I shall live as long as some others if they have any happinesse I resolve to share with them he will find that God will not leave him so but the Lord will separate him unto evill out of all the the Tribes of Israel so as though all others be safe yet as a strucken Deere is unhearded from all the rest and followed by the dogs till he be pull'd downe and kill'd so shall it be with this man according to all the curses of the the Covenant that are written in the Booke of the Law Although the whole Kingdome be safe and all others in it be in peace yet he and his house shall perish the line of Confusion shall be stretched out over him hell and damnation shall be his portion how high soever he now beares his head and how much so ever he suffer his heart to swell against the truth supposing all that he likes not to be nothing but a spice of indiscretion yea of faction and it may be of Sedition when yet nothing is offered but what is I trust pregnantly proved out of Holy Scripture So farre the first Vse 2. This may informe us touching the true cause which most neerely concernes our selves of the slow proceedings of Reformation of things amisse among us both in the Church and Common-wealth Why God hath not yet given us so full a deliverance from Babylon why there have been so many ebbings and flowings in matters of Religion yea more ebbings than flowings Why generall grievances swell to such an height and that all the opportunities of cure have vanished so soon● as appeared how it comes to passe that albeit God hath moved the heart of the King to call Parliament after Parliament yet by and by one spirit of division or another sometimes from one quarter sometimes from another like the evill spirit which God sent between Abimelech and the men of Shechem to the ruine of both still comes between blasteth all our hopes leaving us in worse case than we were in before whence it is in regard of our selves that in stead of setting up the Kingdome and Ordinances of Christ in more purity there is such a contrary mixture and such a corrupting of all things in Doctrine in worship in every thing Arminianisme Socinianisme and Popish Idolatry breaking in againe over all the Kingdome like a floud What is a chiefe cause of all this Have we not prayed have we not fasted Have we not had more Fasts at Parliaments of late than in many yeares before Yea hath not there been generally among Gods people more frequent humiliations more frequent seeking of God notwithstanding the malice and rage of some men to discountenance and suppresse it than in former times Why then is Deliverance and Reformation so slow in comming Surely Beloved we have all this while mistaken the maine businesse and neglected the principall part of a Religious Fast You come Fast after Fast to seek God in his House You forbeare your victuals afflict your soules endure it out a long time you pray heare confesse your sins and freely acknowledge that all is just that God hath brought upon us and that we suffer lesse than we deserve All this is well But here is the error and the true Cause of the continuance of all our evils and of their growing greater namely that all this while we have never in any Fast or at any other time entred into such a solemne and publique Covenant with God as his people of old have often done upon like occasions and exigents That I may yet more effectually bring home this to all our hearts give me leave briefly to parallel the slow pace of our deliverance out of Mysticall Babylon with that of Iudah and some of the remna●t of Israel out of old Babylon which for a long time had held them Captives And here first be pleased to call to minde that as touching the Captive Iewes God failed not on his part of his promise At the end of 70 yeeres libertie of returne from Babylon to Hierusalem was proclaimed in the first yeere of Cyrus the Persian Monarch whereupon many did returne under the conduct of Z●robbabel Being come home to Hierusalem we may not conceive that they were not at all touched with sense of their deliverance or of the sinnes which had formerly provoked the Lord to cast them into that great bondage out of which they were delivered Well on they go first to offer sacrifices in the right place Although the foundation of the Temple of the Lord was not yet laid In the second yeere of their coming Z●robbabel began to set forward the work of the house of the Lord and the foundation was laid But the adversaries of Iudah the Great Officers of the Kingdome under the King of Persia apprehending or rather pretending the going on of this building to be matter of prejudice and danger to that Monarchy they procure a stay of it upon reason of State so as it was well nigh an hundred yeers ere they got libertie to go on again and it was above an 100 yeeres before the Temple could be finished For as many exact Chronologers observe the Temple was not perfected in the reigne of Darius Hystaspis as some have thought but in the sixth yeere of Darius Nothus between whom and the former Darius both Xerxes the husband of Esther and called in Scripture Ahashuerus and Artaxerxes Longimanus successively swayed the Persian Scepter In all which time many things were amisse Crueltie Oppression Adultery Mixture with strange wives and other great deformations remained Then comes Ezra after the Temple was finished and somewhat he did to set forward the work of Reformation in the seventh yeere of Artaxerxes Mnemon successor to Darius Nothus And yet there was much more to do After him therefore comes Nehemiah in the twentieth yeere of the same Artaxerxes Mnemon and after all the former endeavours he findes the Church still weltring in her bloud and even wallowing in her owne gore I meane in most of her old and long continued sins although cured of Idolatry so that still there was great corruption in doctrine in worship and in manners Whereupon he now