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A61696 An assertion for true and Christian church-policie wherein certain politike objections made against the planting of pastours and elders in every congregation are sufficiently answered : and wherein also sundry projects are set down ... Stoughton, William, 1632-1701. 1642 (1642) Wing S5760; ESTC R34624 184,166 198

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distinction of the seaventie Disciples from the rest And lastly against the cursing and fighting of the late Bishops of Rome till excluding both 359. Prince and people from yeelding his consent or making their request they had reduced the election wholly to the clergie hee telleth them by 339. their leave it was not so from the beginning From all which sayings of Master Bilson I conclude thus Whatsoever is right lawfull and free by the law of God whatsoever standeth upon the grounds of reason and nature whatsoever is derived from christian equitie and societie whatsoever is from the beginning and was left by the Apostles to the church at Ierusalem ●he same ought still to remain and must be kept inviolable in the church But the peoples interest to choose their Pastor is right is lawfull is free by the law of God standeth upon the grounds of reason and nature is derived from Christian equitie and societie is from the beginning and was left by the Apostles to the Church at Ierusalem Therefore the pe oples interest to choose their Pastour ought still to remaine and must be kept inviolable in the Church The whole proposition and every part thereof together with the assumpt and every part thereof is drawne from M. Bilsons owne confession Only to the proposition hee hath annexed certaine conditions or exceptions viz. Vnlesse by law custome or consent the people have restrained themselves or transferred or altered their right or else by their default or abuse the canons councels superiour powers princely or publike lawes have abridged altered or abrogated the same Now then it remaineth to know whether any consent default abuse custome canons councels superiour powers publike or princely edicts may be a good and sure warrant to abridge transferre or abrogate the peoples interest from having to do in the choice of their Pastours Our Saviour Christ when he came in the flesh he came to reforme the abuse crept in of the Law and to improve the corruptions of doctrine taught by the Scribes Pharisees and Doctors of the Law but hee tooke not away any least tittle of the Law ne abolish any jot of true and sound doctrine in the Church The Gospell teacheth us to order our judgements aright to bridle the unrulinesse of our affections and to moderate our inordinate appetities But yet doth not the same command us to empty our soules of all judgement to bury our affections in our bellies and to become as dead as stones without all Canons and Councels c may bridle diso●dered elections but not disannul elections of the people altogether sense or appetite In like sort we grant that custome consent Canons Councels Superiour powers publike and princely lawes may re●orme reprove restraine direct moderate and bridle the disordered unrulinesse and contentious brawlings of the people in and about their elections yea and we grant further that they may alter abridge or enlarge the forme and manner of elections All this we grant but that Christian Kings or any superiour powers may take this right into their owne hands as hee saith from the people or that the people by any law custome consent canon or councell may transferre or abolite their right f●eedome and interest given and deduced unto them ●y these rules and by these grounds I doe not yet perceive any good ground o● reason for the same For in so doing how should the holy wisedome and providence of God who hath imprinted in our nature these rules and these grounds this equitie and this freedome be so holily regarded and so highly reverenced as it ought to be For hath he made us freemen and can we without contempt of this grace become bondmen And albeit in some cases that may be well said quod volenti non fit injuria and that quilibet potest recedere a suo jure yet the cases must be such as a mans willingnesse and re●dinesse to forgoe his right be not tyed to him with so strong a band as is the band of the grounds of reason and nature of the rules of Christian equitie and of the freedome of the law of God It is free I grant for a man to eate or not to eate to drinke or not to drinke but for a man not to eate at all or not to drinke at all and so with hunger and thurst to sterve himselfe is not free and in this case volenti fi● injuria Every man that hath a wife that hath sonnes and daughters that hath men-servants and maid servants as by the very instinct of nature and by the equity of the Law of Christ he hath freedome to provide for them so must he carefully use this his freedome And therefore hee may not wholly and altogether put ●rom himselfe and expose at hap hazard the provision education instruction dieting apparelling and lodging of his wife his sonnes his daughters and his servants unto strangers neither may husbands fathers nor masters give their consent to the making of any law or the bringing in of any custome whereby their freedomes should be restrained adnihiled or made void in this behalfe For by thus violating the rules and grounds and by thus treading as it were under foot the equitie of Christ and the freedome they have by the law of God should they not most profainely and impiously despite God and as it were overturne the whole order he hath set in nature And if the people may not cast off these rules and these grounds this equitie and this freedome in things appertaining to the frail bodily transitorie and earthly life how much lesse may they cast them off or set little by them in things appertaining to the salvation of their soules and to a durable spirituall everlasting and heavenly life But the peoples right to choose their Bishops did never depend Objection that the peoples right did never depend upon th● expresse commandement of God upon the expresse commandement of God neither can the people challenge by Gods law the right to choose their Bishops I meane saith he no such thing is expressed and contained in the Scriptures What then if it doe depend or bee contained under the generall grounds and rules of reason nature christian equitie christian societie principles of humane fellowships the law of God the practice of the Apostles and that which was from the beginning Is it not sufficient Though it be not expressed in these termes viz. That the people must choose or that the people have right to choose their bishops it is not expressed and contained in the Scriptures that every man must choose his owne wife or that every woman must choose her owne husband And yet by the doctrine expressed or contained in the Scriptures is it true that no man hath right either to choose an other mans wife or to choose an other womans husband And that every man hath right to choose his owne wife and everie woman right to choose her owne husband Againe it is not expressed
not be removed Wherefore if our continued Prelaticall discipline whereby the liberty of the Church is taken away by publike authority of the King and States might be discontinued and libertie granted to the Church to use the Apostolicall discipline either our Admonitorie Protestants must yeeld stoop and obey or els be found to be a way ward a contentious and a ●romple generation And if these two former kinds of our people which the land being divided into five parts make three at the least shall every way bee supporters of unitie and conformitie to the Gospell and no way disturbers of the peace liberty and tranquillitie of the Church what overthrow or what dammage may the Gospell sustaine by the other parts Yea though they should unite linke and confederate themselves in one For are they not weaker in power poorer in purse and of farre lesse reputation than the former And yet neverthelesse these parts are at such deadly feud one against the other and at such an irreconcileable enmitie betweene themselves that the case standeth now betweene them as sometimes it stood with Caesar and Pompey not whether of them should raigne but whether of them should live And how then can these parts thus divided possibly agree together against the other parts so surely combined Besides the first sort of these two sorts whom it pleaseth our Protestants Puritane protestants can never overthrow the Gospell the Admonishers for difference sake to dubb with the Knights Hood of Precisians or precise and puritane Protestants Why They are the onely and principall spokes-men and petitioners for the Apostolicall Discipline required to bee planted Nay these men out of the holy Scriptures so resolutely are perswaded of the truth of God conteyned therein as without which they know perfectly that the doctrine of the Gospell can never powerfully florish or be entertained with so high a Majestie in the hearts of men as it ought to be The Gospel hath overthrown the papist therfore hee can never overthrow the Gospel And as for the other sort the Papists I meane alas that poore ratt what overthrow can he worke to the Gospell whose bane the Gospell hath wrought so long since Alas this faint ghost is so farre spent his disease growne so desperate and his sicknesse now at such an hay-now-hay as all the phisicke of all the Phisitions in the world can not recover his health or once take away his head-ach This silly snake then having hissed out all his sting spit out all his venome and ungorged himselfe of all his poyson how can his skin or how should his taile anoy the Gospell If therefore it might please the Admonishers upon a revew of our State our countrey and our people to cast such men as be open enemies to the Gospell into squadrons causing them to march ranck by ranck and troop by troop and delivering unto the King a muster roule of all the names qualities and conditions of the principall popish recusants within the Realme for none but such only can be suspected openly to band themselves against the Gospell it is not to be doubted but the least part of all the other foure parts would be as great in number as these And what then should the King and State feare the multitudes of Recusants when one standing on the Kings side should be able to withstand ten and ten an hundred and hundred a thousand and a thousand ten thousand papists King Asa 2 Chron. 14. crying unto the Lord his God that it was nothing with him to help with many or with no power and resting upon the Lord overcame ten hundred thousand and three hundred chariots of the Ethiopians and Labimes For the eyes of the Lord behold all the earth to shew himselfe strong with them that are of a perfect heart toward him And when King Joash remembred not the kindenesse which 2 Chron. ●4 Iehoiada the Priest had done unto him but slew Zechariah his sonne the Lord delivered the King and a very great Armie into the hands of a small company of the host of the King of Aram who gave sentence against the King slew all the Princes of Iudah from among the people and caried the spoyle of them unto Damascus And thus much concerning the Admonitors proposition viz. Whatsoever will draw with it many and great alterations of the state of Government and of the lawes the same may bring rather the overthrow of the Gospell than the end that is desired All which speech of his I affirme to bee but a vaine and trifling riddle as the whole strength whereof resteth only upon a may bee Whereunto if I should onely have spoken thus and no more viz. that many and great alterations c. might rather not bring an overthow of the Gospell c. I suppose and that upon good ground that such may might not bee might every way be as forcible to disprove the one as his may bee can any way be pregnant to prove the other And touching his assumption viz. but the planting of the government practised by the Apostles and Primitive Church will draw with it many and great alterations of the state of government and of the Lawes If in this place hee understood the state of Church governement and of the Lawes Ecclesiasticall now in use then is the proposition true And yet notwithstanding wee avow the Gospell to bee so farre from incurring any overthrow by such an alteration as thereby it is certaine that the same shall more and more flourish and bee perpetually established by reason that this alteration should be made from that which by long experience is known to be corrupt unto that which is knowne by the holy Scriptures to be pure and sincere From a government I say and Lawes authorized by tradition and commandements of man alone to a policie and lawes founded and descended by and from God himselfe But if the Admonitor by the assumption meant to informe us that the planting of the Apostolicall government will draw with it many and great alterations of the temporall state of government and of the temporall lawes statutes or customes of the Kingdome then as before The planting of the Apostolicall government will draw no alteration of the Laws of the realme with it to his first so now also to his second I answer negatively and affirme that the planting of the said Apostolicall government will not draw with it any the least alteration of any part of that temporall state of government nor almost of any one common statute or customary law of the Land which may not rather be altered than retained For this platforme of government we are able by the helpe of God to defend the same generally and for the most part to bee most agreeable and correspondent to the nature qualitie disposition and estate of our Countrey People Common weale and Lawes as in our particular answers to his particular reasons shall more at large appeare In all new and