Selected quad for the lemma: scripture_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
scripture_n	according_a	doctrine_n	word_n	3,266	5	3.9423	3	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A91879	The falsehood of Mr. VVilliam Pryn's Truth triumphing, in the antiquity of popish princes and Parliaments. To which, he attributes a sole, sovereigne, legislative, coercive power in all matters of religion; discovered to be full of absurdities, contradictions, sacriledge, and to make more in favour of Rome and Antichrist, than all the bookes and pamphlets which were ever published, whether by papall or episcopall prelates, or parisites, since the reformation. With twelve queries, eight whereof visit Mr. Pryn the second time, because they could not be satisfied at the first.	Robinson, Henry, 1605?-1664?	1645 (1645)	Wing R1672; Thomason E273_16; Thomason E282_11; ESTC R200048	28,156	36

Infidels where 's your licence from the Court of Heaven for subjugating the Gospell of peace to your litigious law-cases and presidents most whereof are all Popish To sacrifice the Scriptures the Word even God himselfe Joh. 1. 1. whole Christianity both Discipline and Doctrine unto Acts of Parliaments which have beene heretofore so Popish and may possibly be so againe hereafter to which according to your grounds the whole Kingdome must conforme and be obedient not only passively but actively and that for conscience sake But what lawfull calling or warrant have you if a man may be so bold with you as you are with other men from Gods Word or our Lawes to handle the Jurisdiction and Rights of Parliament more then Mr. Goodwin Was not his Imprimatur as legall or authenticall as yours Doe you thinke the Parliament had not far rather heare the submissive cautions and mementoes of a loving tender and affectionate remembrancer as in the presence of the God of Heaven whose duty is to teach all Nations Matth. 28. 19. as occasion is offered from Parliament to peasant than be flattered and soothed up with fusty sweepings of Popish presidents by one who yet I think pretends to be no Canon but a Protestant Lawyer best vers'd at Common-pleas and Chancery bills Certainly 't is none of Mr. Pryns least oversights thus to bring himselfe a Lawyer whose wrangling faculty sets and keeps all people at worse war amongst themselves than all forreigne enemies can do with Mr. Goodwin whose zeale piety and fervent interceding towards the Throne of Grace for reconciling unto the God of peace not only all such as joyne with him but whosoever else are capable thereof hath beene heretofore and is at present well knowne to all the godly and well affected in or about the City both far and neare which does and still will tend so much more to Mr. Pryns great reproach and infamy for thus shamefully traducing him If Mr. Pryn were a man truly godly and conscientious he might long ere this time have considered the unlawfulnesse of his very Calling according to the greatest part of Lawyers practise in entertaining more causes than they can possibly take care of as they ought in taking of excessive fees prolonging suites and so involving the whole Kingdome in their sophisticall quirkes tricks and quille●s as that a man can neither buy nor sell speake nor doe any thing but he must be lyable to fall into their talons without ever being able to redeeme himselfe the Lawyers having most of their mysteries written in a little lesse then heathen language and detaining us in such ignorance or captivity as that we may not plead nor understand our own cases by which and such like devises of theirs they are become the greatest grievance crying loudest to Heaven for justice to be done upon them by this Parliament next to the corrupted depraved Clergy-men Page 153. When you are told that the Apostolicall Church of Jerusalem Act. 15. improperly by you and all Popish writers call'd a Synod and Grand president for Synods was infallible and therefore might say it pleased the Holy Ghost and them and that since you cannot say of whatsoever you shall doe that it doth infallibly please the Holy Ghost and for that cause may not be permitted to make binding determinations you answer most appositly no doubt that the Apostles preacht by an infallible spirit ergo none ought to preach but such as have alike infallible spirit with the Apostles But I wonder Mr. Pryns wits are thus a wool-gathering or rather that he proclaimes it to the world so much for I must needs say I never knew them otherwise Cannot you let Independents preach by way of instruction advice c. though you were not sure whether they have the Holy Ghost or no as well as they give you leave to do the like if you can yea to sit and vote in Parliaments and Synods enacting Ordinances Decrees and what you please even as much as your pretended Synod of Jerusalem call it a Parliament too if you will since there is no remedy though to my knowledge you are brim full of little else than all fallibility But when you have attained to be a Parliament or Synod-man doe no more than that Apostolicall infallible Assembly of Jerusalem did say we doe well if we observe your Ordinances and Decrees and if we doe not we may doe better and therein be confident you say well infallibly Thus you heare how you may become a Synod-man and how your Independent Brethren may easily have leave to preach though neither of you be infallible Let your Decrees and Ordinance passe as peaceably as their Sermons and both may lodge together and likelier become friends the sooner Act. 15. 4. 22. We finde the pretended Synod stiled a Church that is the Church at Jerusalem if a Church it must have Church officers that is ruling and teaching Elders and Deacons which I doe not perceive observed in any Synod since nor can possibly be unlesse they can turne the fixed Churches of any particular place into Synods and if that could be done what would this be otherwise than for one sister-Church to make and impose Canons and Decrees according to you principles upon all other sister-Churches Now and then 't is true you refresh us with an ingenuous confession which if you did but follow close would cleare your understanding from multitudes of grosse errours and unparallel'd mistakes You acknowledge a possibility of erring or some actuall errours in Councels Synods Parliaments and that such as apparently erronious and repugnant unto Scriptures may be disobeyed And now I see you have almost satisfied one of the 8 Queries in answer to your 12 considerable serious Questions which hitherto I thought you had not beene able to give the least satisfaction to because I heard it not in Print cry'd up and downe the streets a priviledge which any thing or every thing of Mr. Pryns enjoyes peculiarly But this short acknowledgement of yours if you understand what you say and sticke to it will undoubtedly bring you over unto the Independents And now that your booke and such as read it over may make a comfortable end since you are so good to grant a little you shall see the Independents will comply with you and say they 'l aske no more They only desire it may be lawfull for them to disobey your Councells Synods Parliaments when they actually erre and are apparently repugnant unto Scripture But now when they tell you so at any time and challenge this free grant of yours professing in the presence of God and Men that they speake the truth and lie not their conscience bearing witnesse Rom. 9. 1. unlesse you will renounce Christianity in practise you must beleeve them and not measure their consciences and understandings by your owne lest they come short of their due you must not be both judge and party no nor judge only where all ought to be Brethren Matth.

thinke you have better in your budget or be ashamed of you when they have leisure but to consider of it 'T is true you complaine that Mr. Rutherfords due Rights of Presbytery Mr. Thomas Edwards his Anti-Apologia and Gulielmus Apollonius with the Vallacrean Ministers were never answered 'T is likely the Independents doe not desire to make no nor bee thought to have any difference with their Scotch Brethren if possibly to be avoided and you know the Proverb sayes The second blow makes the fray And though you would not take notice of a compleatly fit and full answer to Mr. Edwards and so much the more because 't was made by a milde meeke spirited servant of God quite contrary to that of Mr. Edwards his I hope Mr. Pryn will no longer say Mr. Edwards is not answered now that Mr. Chidley hath so clearly and fairly foyld him the second time And that you may see Apollonius speakes no better Latine for Presbytery than you doe English please but to cast your eye upon cap. 3. p. 44 45. in answer to the Assemblies letters to the Churches of Zealand where he sayes in substance That the body of Beleevers in generall have not a power of governing and judging Ecclesiasticall matters by any spirituall jurisdiction but that the Presbyters themselves have received this power of ruling immediately from Christ the King of the Church which what ever he alleadge to prove it with these grosse absurdities besides how many others will plainely follow 1. That all Church Officers have either intruded themselves into their offices or else they must have beene thrust in by some supernaturall meanes of the latter there is no evidence of the former there is no allowance 2. If the Beleevers the Brethren did not choose the Officers so neither might they turne them out 3. Then in such case it would bee in the Officers power to tyrannize even to the highest extent their owne lust should lead them to without any just authority on earth to question or restraine them for if their Presbytery their officiating their governing ruling be by divine Right and not the peoples free choice however they behave themselves in it they cannot be turned out by the people But how doth it appeare that they have their Office or Eldership immediately from God Is it sufficient for them to say so Then may any other number of their Brethren pretend the like He alleadges 2. Cor. 5. 20. Now then we are Ambassadours for Christ as though God did beseech you by us We pray you in Christs stead be yee reconciled to God But may not so many Tinkers use the very same Text and saying they are Christs Ambassadours thrust themselves over any Congregation in the world if this be faire dealing If there goes no more thereunto but confidence and laying claime hee that can justle hardest will doubtlesse get it though Simon Magus could not carry it with money But what kinde of Ambassadours did Paul make himselfe and those Primitive Christians to be What power did they take upon them And how farre They were Christs Ambassadours we know them by their entreating mildnesse gentlenesse and long-suffering as in the same 2 Cor. 5. 20. with Rom. 15. 1. Gal. 6. 1. 2. 1. Pet. 5. 2. 2 Tim. 4. 2. Eph. 4. 2. But the Prelaticall Presbytery the pretended Ambassadours of Christ in these times wee know to be Wolves that worry sterve or flea the very Lambes of Christ alive and as if their cruelty were not satisfied with the destruction of their bodies endeavour what they can to put a yoake of bondage upon the very soules of their Brethren Act. 20. from v. 28. to 31. Matth. 20. 25 26. 3 Joh. 9. The other place produced is 1 Cor. 4. 1. Let a man so account of us as of the Ministers of Christ and Stewards of the mysteries of God but the Presbyters which wee speake of instead of taking upon them a Ministery lay claime unto a Jurisdiction Dominion a Prelaty Instead of being Stewards they command require expecting lordly obedience and submission They scorne to use entreating and beseeching as Paul the aged 2 Cor. 10. 1. 3. stet pro ratione voluntas is their motto their symboll Thus we may see the Texts produced to maintaine the Presbyteriall government to be of Divine Right make eminently against it neither is it more evident in Scripture than from reason and experience to wit That what power the Presbyters have and exercise they have it from man and not immediately from God since the Brethren doe either explicitly or implicitly make choice of them and might as well have chosen any other if they had pleased Church Officers are no more immediately from God than Civill Officers The truth is Apollonius acknowledges the Presbyterie to bee the Representative Church but denies the meanes without which I never yet knew it pretended so much as possible to bee constituted First he sayes Multitudo fidelium in Ecclesia potestatem regendi jurisdictione spirituali negotia Ecclesiastica dijudicandi non habet jure Dei proinde eam senioribus Presbyteris delegare non potest Hoc sensu igitur Representativam Ecclesiam non agnoscimus Nec talem agnoscimus Ecclesiam Representativam quae à multitudine fidelium missa absolutam potestatem per leges jurisdictiones actus suos obligandi multitudinem ejus fidem conscientias subjiciendi ita ut absque examine ut laudatum susciperet quicquid ab hac Ecclesia statutum foret At Ecclesiam Representativam hanc ex sacris literis agnoscimus quae est caetus Presbyterorum à multitudine Ecclesiae electus qui authoritate jurisdictione Ecclesiasticâ à Christo accepta Ecclesiae praeest invigilat decretis secundum sacram Scripturam factis jurisdictione spirituali eam regit which in effect is thus First That Beleevers in generall have no power to judge concerning Church affaires therefore they cannot give or derive unto the Presbyters what they themselves never had and secondly that the Lawes of Country are not sufficient to authorise Beleevers for choosing Church Commissioners who may afterwards oblige them and their consciences by whatsoever decrees shall be by them agreed upon without examining it themselves But sayes he a Representative Church is an Assembly of Presbyters chosen by the multitude who having received Ecclesiasticall authority and jurisdiction from Christ doe watch over the Church and governe it according to the Scripture To him therefore or Mr. Pryn that quotes him I should desire to make these following Queries The truth is Apollonius acknowledges the Presbyterie to bee the Representative Church but denies the meanes without which I never yet knew it pretended so much as possible to bee constituted First he sayes Multitudo fidelium in Ecclesia potestatem regendi jurisdictione spirituali negotia Ecclesiastica dijudicandi non habet jure Dei proinde eam senioribus Presbyteris delegare non potest Hoc sensu igitur

Representativam Ecclesiam non agnoscimus Nec talem agnoscimus Ecclesiam Representativam quae à multitudine fidelium missa absolutam potestatem per leges jurisdictiones actus suos obligandi multitudinem ejus fidem conscientias subjiciendi ita ut absque examine ut laudatum susciperet quicquid ab hac Ecclesia statutum foret At Ecclesiam Representativam hanc ex sacris literis agnoscimus quae est caetus Presbyterorum à multitudine Ecclesiae electus qui authoritate jurisdictione Ecclesiasticâ à Christo accepta Ecclesiae praeest invigilat decretis secundum sacram Scripturam factis jurisdictione spirituali eam regit which in effect is thus First That Beleevers in generall have no power to judge concerning Church affaires therefore they cannot give or derive unto the Presbyters what they themselves never had and secondly that the Lawes of Country are not sufficient to authorise Beleevers for choosing Church Commissioners who may afterwards oblige them and their consciences by whatsoever decrees shall be by them agreed upon without examining it themselves But sayes he a Representative Church is an Assembly of Presbyters chosen by the multitude who having received Ecclesiasticall authority and jurisdiction from Christ doe watch over the Church and governe it according to the Scripture To him therefore or Mr. Pryn that quotes him I should desire to make these following Queries At what time doe the Presbyters receive their Church power from Christ By what meanes and mediation Whether before they be chosen Presbyters or afterwards If before Whether did this power lye idle in them till they became Presbyters And might it not possibly have continued so all their life time if they had never beene chosen Presbyters or are they predestinated to bee chosen when Christ has once made a deed of gift unto them of some considerable proportion of spirituall power But if we see they cannot exercise any spirituall power untill they be chosen Presbyters and that wee might have chosen others as well as they Doe you thinke the people will ever bee brought to thinke they have any other jurisdiction than what they give and suffer them to enjoy Whether doe the Presbyters ever part from their spirituall power after they have once received it and how come they to lose possession and the exercise thereof ever after Surely if these Queries be well answered all the power the Presbyters have besides what the people derive unto them will be one of the strongest phantasticall delusions and Chimera's which ever yet was heard of But because you make so much of Apollonius since he is upon the Stage if the indifferent Reader please to runne over these few following passages he will not only finde him contradict himselfe but Mr. Pryn also in the very title and whole subject matter of his Book Mr. Pryn throughout this volumne of his affirmes and endeavours to prove that Princes and Parliaments have the sole soveraigne and legislative power in all matters of Religion both for Discipline and Doctrine On the contrary Apollonius sayes it is in Ecclesiasticall Assemblies and Synods in these words c. 6. p. 107. Competit ex jure Dei Ecclesiis in Classibus Synodis junctis potestas Canones legesque Ecclesiasticas ferendi quae omnes Ecclesias particulares unius Provinciae aut Regni constringunt ad obedientiam which is in effect That Ecclesiasticall Assemblies Synods have by Divine Right a power of making Canons and Ecclesiasticall Lawes which doe binde unto obedience all the particular Churches of a Province or Kingdome he may as well say of all the world and p. 109. He tells us that That Vnion and Communion of particular Churches in Ecclesiasticall Discipline and Government common to them all which is exercised in Synods and Classes is of Divine Right and proposed to us in the example of the Apostolicall Church for imitation Thus is Apollonius point blanke in opposition to Mr. Pryn neither is he at better agreement with himselfe for p. 108. He sayes The power of Synods doth not take away or disturb the Ecclesiasticall power and liberty of particular Churches but serves to direct conserve and promote their Ecclesiasticall power and liberty that they may become more efficacious powerfull and fit to edifie and yet p. 144. He sayes Classibus Synodis competit authoritativa quaedam inspectio judicium non tantum discretionis sed jurisdictionis approbationis in excommunicationibus à particularibus Ecclesiis peragendis ita ut nulla Ecclesia particularis quae communionem suam Ecclesiasticam cum aliis Ecclesiis in Synodis Classibus colit aliquod suae communionis membrum excommunicare Sathanae tradere legitimè possit absque Classis aut Synodi authoritativo judicio approbatione that is There is due to Classes and Synods a certaine authorative inspection and judgement not only of discretion but also of jurisdiction and approbation in excommunications to bee passed by particular Churches so that no particular Church which keepes Ecclesiasticall fellowship with other Churches assembled in a Synod may lawfully excommunicate or deliver up to Sathan any of their members without the authoritative judgement and approbation of the Synod and to mend the matter he yet tells us p. 108. That the power which particular Churches have is granted them immediatly from ●od not derived unto them by Synods as also that the power of Synods is granted them immediately from God not derived to them from particular Churches which is as much as if he had said that each of them must bee Independent and absolute of it selfe and yet one must submit unto the other contradiction upon contradiction or else I understand it not But to returne againe to Mr. Pryn himselfe who would thinke that any one who had but the head-piece of a man much lesse one that takes upon him to be a Champion should be so miserably transported with vain-glory as thus to play the Bragadocio and fill the world with bookes and pamphlets as if hee had got the victory or spoken somewhat to the purpose when yet it may appeare upon due search of an indifferent judge that neither in the whole catalogue of his bookes which was lately printed nor in whatsoever came since to light will there be found so much as one leafe truly worth reading or any whit availing him in this controversie which he not without recanting in his owne heart I beleeve by this time to see he thrives no better in it hath undertaken against the Independents remaining still so shamelesse that not being able to conceale or any longer to uphold his vaine undertaking flyes unto the High Court of Parliament endeavouring to exasperate their power against such whose prayers and contributions in likelihood have been the only or chiefest meanes to keepe him thus long alive But alas what can we expect of this volumne of Civill-Common-Law-Divinity of yours when you acknowledge it to be distracted subitane collections indigested nocturnall

to the universall griefe is so mortally divided These are hard questions I confesse but Mr. Pryn will get the more glory when hee knowes how to answer them If the Arminians upon the improving of their studies about their other controversies or the Civill Magistrates bad imploying a power ascribed but not due to them saw their errour and amended must they be upbrayded I would be loath that Mr. Pryn should want of such encouragements of providence and mercy lest it might hinder his repentance of what I feare mee he is too highly guilty God is contented to tole us to him and to his truth even with variety of inticements and provocations fraile mankinde is dull and stupid no lesse than Gods infinite wisdome together with his unmeasurable bounty will serve to animate and raise us up to new discoveries of knowledge and obedience Take this then for your learning that whosoever attributes to any man or Magistrate a power of imposing any thing upon the consciences of others in matters of Religion doe justifie them in whatsoever they impose though it be erroneous so they impose according to their owne judgements and understandings condemning the other for not submitting though it be unto erroneous impositions for if the one may impose his owne reason must teach him what he may impose And if he have just authority to impose the other is obliged in conscience to obey and so by consequence should be engaged to submit implicitly to whatsoever superstitious ceremonies and worship were put upon him In your Epistle to the Reader you say the Independents may upon the same grounds deny the Catholicke Church an article of the Creed upon which they deny a Nationall Church as though so many more particular Churches might not as well make one Catholick as severall but yet so many fewer Nationall Churches or as though particular Christians who lived stragling in Turky or any Pagan Countries where they could not possibly be members of a Nationall Church could not possibly be members of the Catholique Church You accuse the Independents as beleeving most things with a reserve according to their present light with a liberty of changing as new light shall bee discovered to them But did ever any man so overshoot himselfe Certainly this is so high a character of the Independents compleatest posture ensuring or growing stature in the Schoole of Christ as could be applyed unto them wherein they glory not a little and place it as the only ground-worke and foundation without which they cannot grow in grace from one degree of faith unto another untill they become perfect Men perfect Saints unto the measure of the stature of the fulnesse of Christ Eph. 4. 12 13. and yet your Law-Divinity knowes no better than to say this is in truth to bring a Skepticisme into Religion And whereas you say their principles dissolve all relations all subordinations and humane society it self I answer that this is even as if you should affirme a Turke not to be a man unlesse he will bee a Christian unlesse he will be a member of some Nationall Church nay of every Nationall Church since his not being of any one is all alike prejudiciall or damageable But they are the Presbyteriall and such other Prelaticall tenets which destroy and expressely murder all humane society in avouching as William Pryn with his ense recidendum and A. Stewart does that sayes whosoever is cut off or cast out of the Church must likewise be cast out and cut off from the Civill state p. 166. in 2. part of his Duply c. Sir I confesse I have spent more time and paper about your Epistles than I intended which if you and the Reader will but excuse I shall endeavour to make you amends in part by troubling you the lesse with your rusty musty rubbish of Popish times and presidents Page 1. Your first proposition is That the calling of Synods or Assemblies about Church matters belongs not to Bishops Ministers nor private or particular Congregations but to Princes or supreme temporall Magistrates and Powers So that if the Magistrate be Turkish under whose jurisdiction live many Protestant Greekes I meane such as disavow the Pope with the greatest part of his unsound doctrine If he be Popish as the Emperour of Germany with the Kings of France and Polonia in whose territories inhabit millions of Protestants all which Protestants must never meet together in Synods and Assemblies about Church affaires because those Emperours and Kings are never likely to summon Synods for them or put them in minde to doe it themselves You still quote multitudes of texts to prove your Propositions with in hopes perhaps that if one faile you another may doe the deed but you happen to be so successelesse therin as if you used still to presse the Scriptures which came first to hand ranking them in your margent whether they would or no which 't is true has stood you in stead no more than a forc't Militia does the King or Parliament yet doubtles that God with whom the Word was from the beginning and who is the very Word Joh. 1. 1. will not approve that his blessed Word should be made use 〈◊〉 and imployed so vainly impertinently preposterously rashly and irreverently Wherefore I would gladly advise Mr. Pryn for the future to insert the very words themselves of every text hee quotes in hopes that if he doe but once read them over by himselfe he will finde they make nothing to the purpose and so have ingenuity enough to leave them out After you have done belying sacred Scripture you flye for assistance unto prophane and from thence tell us by whose authority the first Generall Councells were convocated which proves nothing else but that whether it be King or Parliament that have the strongest sword or shall prevaile and get the better over the other in this Civill War the Assembly of Divines now at Westminster must sit no longer not any of their coat ever meet againe above two in company unlesse the present ruling party please lest they be tearmed a Conventicle and fall into a Pramunire But by what authority tro did the pretended Synod of Jerusalem assemble Act. 15. What Kings or Parliaments Writs or Letters-patents had they for so doing What Court countenance did they procure to second their proceedings for my part I had rather follow such a president and erre with them if you will needs esteem it such than degenerate with the weaker Christians of after ages in supplicating of Powers and Princes in such a manner whereby they should be moved to thinke I granted them such a power as God never gave them or confirmed them in supposing they had a just liberty of denying what through want perhaps of Christian courage only or the Civill powers protection I durst not put in practice without their order and commission Page 4. I am glad to finde you acknowledging a passage of the Bishops letters wherein they return