Selected quad for the lemma: religion_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
religion_n	king_n	law_n	subject_n	4,732	5	6.6515	4	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A93663	Christophilos. The true Christian subiect decyphered in a sermon preached at Saint Pauls London, on the seventh of August, Anno 1642. By Benjamin Spencer, Minister of St. Thomas Parish in Southwarke.	Spencer, Benjamin, b. 1595?	1642 (1642)	Wing S4943; Thomason E123_7	16,848	32

upon any pettie occasions and government utterly dissolved upon small greevances Lastly There is the Christian patience begot by the precept and patterne of Christ Iesus who left us an example 1 Peter 3. that we should follow his steps This patience is to bee used especially when Christian Religion is assaulted of which patience is both the badge and proofe Patience therefore must be used to shew our reverence unto Kings Not but that the powers may be reverenced and yet the goods of the Subject may bee by them defended by Law from rapine and their persons by Legall powers from illegall violence For herein the power is not resisted but the exuberancy and overflowing of the power is stopped and turned into his true Current For example wee resist not the current of a River when wee stop the aestuation of it from drowning our Lands and Houses but wee labour to keepe it in his Channell Romans 13. for as the River is ordained for our benefit so is the power for our good But indeed the power by our impatience is resisted when just obedience is refused the just authority infringed or the person indued with authority is assailed or violated Wee see then there is a feare severally and properly belongs to God and the King God and the King conjunctly Now conjunctly for God hath joyned the King in Commission with himselfe and that so close as nothing comes betweene but a conjunction copulative no power of the Pope nor any other for Non habet parem super terram 〈◊〉 Optat. Com. Tari lib. 3. 1 Pet. 2.13 for hee is next and immediately under God Super imperatorem non est nisi qui fecit imperatorem and therefore saith Saint Peter submit your selfe to the King as to the supreame Namely when there is a King but if there be none then unto those that rule Vice Regis in the place of Kings and so unto Governours as to those that are sent of him or them And these are well joyned together for wee are apt to doe our duty by halfes as either to feare God and contemne the Magistrate and so become religious Rebels or else to feare the King and neglect God and so make the Prince an Idoll but joyned together they must bee and that without any interposition Colimus imperatorem ut hominem a deo secundum solo deo minorem Tert. ad Scap. Yet distinguish them we may separate them we may not Iulians Souldiers would not sacrifice with the Emperour and yet would fight for him disjoyned they may not bee God hath given them to us both together to observe as the two tables of the Law thereby teaching us to avoyd Heresie and faction either of which will observe one table with a damage to the other Heresie with faire shews of good workes to men cover the injuries it doth to GODS Truth So Faction and Hypocrisie by a shew of Holinesse to GOD cloakes the wrong it doth unto men Therefore seperate neither least you spoyle both Wee see therefore that the feare of God and the King must go together not that hereby we make Kings equall with God nor attribute to them indefinite power much lesse infinite power as some flatterers have to the Pope who make him beleeve hee is infallible in knowledge and Almighty in his power Nor do we marry Minerva to our Kings as the Athenians offered to Anthony as if there were no wisdome but in his breast Nor doe wee make them Gods as the Grecians did Alexander but wee teach people to obey them by the word though they rule not alwayes by the word for the neglect of their duty will not excuse the neglect of ours For though they indeed that rule well are worthy of double honour 1 Tim. 5 17. yet wee cannot deny to any our single duty of feare and reverence This therefore may serve to consute the Anabaptists who will know no Magistrate Anabaptists condemned but seperate the reverence of Magistrates from the feare of God and so Ecclipses the glory of Kings and the duty of Subjects by interposing pretences of Christian Liberty against their authority and so turne it into libertinisme even to the subjugating of Princes if they can finde power enough to doe it Anno 1533. as you may read in the History of Thomas Munt zerus Iohn Laydon and Cniperdoling all which made insurrections against Governours though themselves liked well to rule as powerfully and as proudly and tyrannically as the Turke himselfe But this Text will not allow to feare God and contemne the King nor feare God and affright the King but commands us to feare GOD and feare the King Least as saith Optatus Optatus Dum Donatus super imperatorem se extollit non veretur cum qui post Deum So the Papist his Doctrine is here condemned which boasteth of his Catholicke faith Papists condemned but teacheth not true Christian feare The Pope it seemes hath absolved them from it and the Papists ghostly Father comforted them against it as Mortimer did King Edward the seconds keepers with this sentence Nolite occidere reges timere bonum est It is good to doe say they what I feare to name There be others who say they abhor the Papists Seditious Sectaries condemned and can as ill endure the Anabaptists and yet have involved themselves in their opinions of not fearing Kings as well as they witnesse those dangerous positions written in the time of Queene Elizabeth Mart. in Libel 3. pag. 28. which for my part I adhorre to mention though some doe not to preach and practise them Dr. B. Dangerous positions by which opinions as they are tyed together like Sampsons Foxes by the Tayles so there is a firebrand betweene them which is able to set an whole kingdome in a combustion Of such as these one may say as Saint Paul said to Titus there be many unruly men vaine talkers and deceivers who doe subvert whole houses speaking things they ought not Tit. 1.10.11 whose mouthes must be stopped least they subvert whole kingdomes But now as we must feare God and the King 3. Orderly Feare God first and then the King so wee must feare God first and then the King the feare of God will teach us so to doe and not feare the King the lesse for that but the more and the better The first must bee the grand worke of the last piety the foundation of fidelity Obedience to God produceth allegiance to Kings God must bee first and chiefly served Kings in him and for him In him because my obedience active must bee governed by his precepts For him because my obedience passive must be regulated by his example and sulcepted for his sake who suffered himselfe not only to bee baptized with death by wicked Pilate He that observes not this order will confound his service by disorderly feare and give the feare which he oweth God to the King

and so be●●m a Sycophant or give the feare which he oweth his King to God only and so become seditious under a colour of being religious for wee must feare God first and principally and then the King For the King must bee served in relation to God for hee hath set them as Gods and by him Kings Raigne Psal 82.7 Prov 8.15 yet they be but earthen gods and yet gods they are and every earthen picture must not expect to be such a vessell of honour least the bramble exalting himselfe to bee a King a fire come out of the Cedar and consume the bramble and a fire come out of the bramble and consume the Cedar Judge 9.15 20. which commonly comes to passe when solvuntur cingula Regum legum Reverence to Kings and Obedience to Laws are loosened from the loynes of Royalty and Loyalty also The summe of all is this Ephes 6.2 Feare God and keepe his Commandements that is the whole duty of man and one of his Commandements is to obey the King and Honour Him As appeareth in Commandement the fifth which is the first Commandement with promise Therefore feare God and the King and blesse God wee live under such a Prince as will give us leave first to feare God and then him Againe so feare as that you love for feare hath painefulnesse timor edium spirat Tert. the spirit of feare profits not where the spirit of love is not Feare God so as it may direct us to the right feare of the King And feare the King in some measure as ye feare God He that feares God is loath to forsake him so we must feare our Kings as bee loath to desert them Let not this sentence be writ upon our signe posts for a memorandum and wee forget it Feare God and honour the King LEast a voyce cryeth out of the timber and another answers it out of the wall Hab. ● 11 and proclaime our sinne But consider every King is either Gods golden Scepter or his Iron rod by which hee breakes in peeces many a vessell of clay Let us as farre as Gods Word injoy noth submit our selves to both and not strive to wring Gods rod out of his hand least we acquire to our selves the more stripes Therefore meddle not with those that are given to change This is the Negative part of the praecept meddle not which Negative part First Shewes that true feare is of a restraining nature and breeds a Systole or a drawing backe of the breath Psalm 119.131 as if afraid to put the hand or the tongue to evill Say not as Saint Aug. warneth quid miht regi what have I to doe with the King Aug. Super. Jo. unlesse you will say also Quid miht possessioni What have I to doe to possesse the goods I have Secondly It sheweth the full extent of Obedience which proceeds from true feare namely as it keepes us from medling with change so with those that are given to it 3. Thirdly It shewes us as the feare of God will make us cautious how we change our God or our Religion so a true feare of the King will make us take heed how we change or desire to change our Governours So that as this part hath relation to the feare of God it warnes us we should not meddle with those that are irreligions As it hath relation to the King so it warneth not to meddle with those that are seditious And therefore as it is most laudable for a State to root out superstition So is it not lesse commendable to oppose Rebellion Wee are warned therefore here not to meddle with change nor changers Not to be given to it our selves nor meddle with those that are given to it First Not to meddle with it Meddling is to make a meddle or mingling So that in medling with change is understood a mingling of things to make them alter from their proper state and being as in making of colours diverse colours are mixed or medled together and from thence comes a change so man being a creature by nature affecting Novelty is apt to meddle with change though it bee from better to worse and this is rooted in him ever since the first change he made in Paradise From hence it is that every n●w forme appearing to us We first meddle with it in our phantasie and before judgement can determine we suffer it to mingle with our affections From whence followeth a desire or a being given to change But considering what ill successe Adam had in changing it is good to be advised Seldom any change is made but it costs much trouble though it be for the better as sicke bodies to be made well Yet to recover health is worth trouble and against such change the wise man speakes not but against the affectation of it as against people who are given to take physicke more for fashion than necessity or for wantonnesse than want and so sometime stirre humours to the bodies ruine To avoyd this humour of change we must looke back againe feare God and the King that will keepe downe the the humour Then looke on the danger of changing First Of changing God Goe to the Isles of Chittim See hath any Nation changed his God or his Religion and shall we ours for popery or any other which may corrupt the Protestant Ier. 2.10 11. God forbid Againe for changing Kings consider if men affect to change for none see the misery of such a state Iudges 17.6 There was no King in Israel Judg. 17.6 where Micah brings in Idoles So Iudges 18.1 There was no King and then Dan went a robbing Judg. 18.1 So Iudges 19.1 There was no King and then the Levites wife was ravished Judg. 19.1 and afterwards they tooke the daughters of Shiloh by force Againe if men affect changing for others as Samuel for Saul it brought great trouble God gave that King in his wrath and yet as bad as hee was David durst not meddle to make a change though for his own advantage for saith he to Abishai who can stretch forth his hand against Gods anointed and be guiltlesse 1 Sam. 26.9 For had he suffered it he had but taught away to destroy himselfe another time 2 Sam. 3.1 Nay if Sauls House be changed for David the farre better choice yet much bloud it cost Luke 19.14 and therefore meddle not with it without meere necessity enforce but remember those that said in the Gospell Nolumus hunc regnare and therefore as wee would not meddle with changing so not with changers or with those that are given to it Those that meddle some calls homines duplicantes doubling men Medlers Kab Sa●om who fold one thing within another speake one thing and meane another men of a dark light saith others who are twilight men they doe things by halfe lights that is their actions are of a mixed colour not perfect white not