Selected quad for the lemma: tradition_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
tradition_n	faith_n	reason_n	scripture_n	2,267	5	6.0519	4	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A76080	Independency not Gods ordinance: or A treatise concerning church-government, occasioned by the distractions of these times. Wherein is evidently proved, that the Presbyterian government dependent is Gods ordinance, and not the Presbyterian government independent. To vvhich is annexed a postscript, discovering the uncharitable dealing of the independents towards their Christian brethren, and the fraud and jugglings of many of their pastors and ministers, to the misleading of the poor people, not only to their own detriment, but the hurt of church and state; with the danger of all novelties in religion. / By John Bastvvick, Dr in Physick.; Independency not Gods ordinance. Part 1	Bastwick, John, 1593-1654.	1645 (1645)	Wing B1063; Thomason E285_2; ESTC R200066	144,017	171

wife and many small children came upon me by it through the power and exorbitant authority of the Prelates so that for my duty and Loyalty to the King I had a prison for my reward and the scornes and contumelies of the world to comfort me in it And when I most humbly petitioned his highnesse complaining against the injustice done me and most submissively supplicated his Majesty who was the Caesar to whom onely I could then appeal that he would be pleased to grant me one of these humble requests either That his Majesty would be pleased but for one houre to give me a hearing of my just defence or if that could not be granted That at lest he would then grant me that liberty in his Kingdome that he denied not to Crows and Kites and other Vermine that I might provide for my young ones and if his highnesse would not be pleased to condescend unto either of the former just demands That then he would give me leave to depart the Kingdome and to go into any other Country where I might enjoy my Liberty and provide for my poore distressed family I am most assured there was never a more equall Petition put up to any Prince in the world yet his Majesty vouchsafed not to yeeld unto any of these my requests nor to any other Petition put up either by my poor distressed wife or calamitous children so that without any wrong unto his Majesty I may truely say That Paul found more favour from a Heathen Roman Caesar then I had from a Christian King the defender of the faith After I saw all possibility of releefe was now taken from me I writ my Apologie to the Bishops themselves discovering unto them their unjust proceedings in their Courts and their unrighteous dealings towards my selfe and gave them my reasons of all I spake without any offensive language and without any purturbation of Spirit and Dedicated this my Book to the Lords of his Majesties Privie Councell expecting aide and reliefe from them and indeed I had no hope of succour from any other nor knew none to whom I could better apply my self earnestly imploring their patronage but they as it is well knowne of Patrons became my unjust Judges and after they had made me a spectacle to Men and Angels and exposed me to the scorne and ludibry of the world sent me into banishment where I lived a living death and a dying life and suffered such intolerable misery of all sorts as would exceed belief to relate and I am most consident if all the particulars were truly known the world never heard the like and there I had ended my dolefull life had not God of his infinite mercy called this Parliament and put into their hearts to redeem me from my capacity for the which incomparable favour I do as of duty I am ever bound professe my selfe to the last drop of my blood to be their servant in the Lord and in all their most just and honourable imployments I hope with all fidelity to answer to the expectation of the world and shall in life and death shew my self to be one that without all by-respects shall ever aime at the glory of God the honour of them and my Country and the common good of all and shall never by Gods assistance do any thing in their concernments that shall be unbeseeming a Man and a Christian Now because by my sad experience I found that I could neither from King nor Nobles have protection I resolved never any more in Gods matters to shroud my self under any covert but Divine Providence and that I with an assured confidence promise my self especially when I now maintain the prerogative royall of the King of Saints King of Kings the Lord Jesus Christ Who is our Lawgiver upon whose shoulders the government of his Church is laid who is the wonderfull Counseller the Prince of peace whose dignity and roialty in all this dispute between me and Mr. Walter Montague I have to the uttermost of my power maintained under the shadow of whose wings I have ever found there is only safety whose blessed assistance in all calamities they that trust in him may be most assured of His patronage now and his defence is my shield whose cause and the honour of whose kingdome at this time I contend for And howsoever in all my life in all humane learning I was never so wedded to my own resolves but upon better reason I could easily be divorced from them yet in Gods matters if an Angell should come from Heaven and teach me that that there were another way to happinesse then by that new and living way the blood of Jesus Christ who was the Lambe slaine from the beginning of the world I would count him Anathema Or if an Angel should tell me there were a new way of worshipping God and serving him then that which God himself hath set down in his holy Word I would account him accursed for I have learned to believe God and Faith upon their word and bond without any either Angelicall or Humane reason or the authority of Councels and Fathers and whatsoever I finde a warrant in Gods Word for I have learned to cleave close to it against all humane reason supposing such men none of Gods nor Faiths truest friends that will not believe them upon their own word and bond except they have reason humane authority Councels and Fathers and vaine traditions joyned with them for sureties Again if any man should go about to perswade me that there were any other government established in the Church of God then an Aristocraticall and a Presbyterian one I should notwithstanding all humane reason to the contrary submit my self to that kind of government as being most confidently assured that it is warranted in Gods Word which all Christians are bound for ever to make the Rule and Square both of our faith manners and government And here I must minde all those that shall read this Book that this is no new opinion of mine but that which I have once and again suffered for and if ever they have read my Elenchus religionis papisticis or my Flagellum pontificis or my Apologie or any of my Latine Books in all those they will finde that the cause of all my sufferings was this and this only That I maintained that all Churches were to be governed by an Aristocraticall and Presbyterian government which in those Books I have clearly and fully through Gods assistance made good Yea in my answer to the Bill of Information put up against me in the Star-chamber they shall have some reasons I gave there of this my tenent to the Lords of his Majesties Privie Councell and Judges in the Star-chamber so that I stand to my principles and am no starter And if then amongst Gods people it was thought an opinion worthy the suffering for and my Christian brethren deemed me worthy of honour for it and afforded me their prayers and shewed me

by Christ nor any of his Apostles for they themselves confesse it is a new way and a new-borne truth and a new light and therefore not the doctrine of Christ and therefore such novelties are not to be entertained nor imbraced nor the teachers of them if we will be obedient to Apostolicall precepts I desire therefore those of the Independent brethren to produce any one testimony or any one president out of the Word of God where these things following are taught or have been practiced First that although men and women beleeve and are baptized they are not yet to be admitted as joyned members till they have walked some time in fellowship with the church for approbation of their conversation this is the first thing I desire of the brethren either a precept or an example for this in Gods Word The second where it is commanded that those that beleeve and are baptized should not be admitted as members of the church without a publike confession of their faith before the church The third where it is enjoyned that to their faith and baptisme they should bring in the evidences of the truth of their conversion before they can be capable of their membership The fourth where it is commanded that they should enter into a solemne and private covenant before they can be admitted to Church-fellowship The fifth where it is imposed upon those that beleeve and are baptized that they should not be received into the church without the consent of the congregation Sixthly where it is commanded that the Ministers of the Gospel shall run about from their own places and charges into the sheepfolds of their fellow-shepheards and separate and pick out all their best sheep and bring them into their owne folds and debarre them from all church-fellowship and communicating with the other beleevers in Gods holy Ordinances and Sacraments or where ever it is commanded that the preachers of the gospel shall gather beleeving christians from amongst beleeving christians separate them from the other sheep into Independent congregations and shall proclaim all that are not thus molded up after this new modell to be people out of covenant and to have no right to the seales of the new covenant neither they nor their children though beleevers All these things I desire the brethren by evident places of the holy Scripture to make good and to confirme or by any president or example to declare to have been practiced either by Christ or his blessed Apostles for I looke for a law from Christ the King of his church who was as faithful in the house of God as Moses was and hath not left the ordering and disposing of his church to the will of men but has commanded the church to heare his voyce who is the great Pastor and Bishop of our souls and the teacher of his church his Word therefore I look for for a warrant for the ratifying of all these doctrines and I have good ground and reason to demand of them a warrant and authority out of Gods Word for what they both teach and practice for we are taught by Christ the onely Prophet of his church that they that serve God after the precepts of men offer him a vaine worship and it stands with all good reason that if all humane traditions though of never so ancient standing and of never so long antiquity were all cast out of the church because they had no footing or ground in Gods Word that all novelties or new inventions of men which notwithstanding are imposed upon the people as the wayes of God should be abrogated and nullified and cast out of the church It is recorded in holy writ Joshua 9. that the Gibeonites deceived Joshua and the people of Israel under pretence that they came from a farre country and for proofe of that they produced their mouldy bread and their tattered boots their old shooes and they taking what they said pro confesso and not consulting with the mouth of the Lord as it is fully related in that chapter were deceived by them and entred into a League with their enemies And thus the Papists and Prelats for these many hundred yeers have deluded the world under pretence of their mouldy antiquities tattered ragges of traditions and in all this time they prevailed to mislead the poore people because they consulted not with the mouth of God nor examined things by the Word of God and the holy Scripture as the noble Bereans did Now whatsoever was written was written for our instruction upon whom the ends of the world are come and therefore as it was the errour of the Israelites that they received things barely upon report without consulting with the mouth of God and as it was the honour and praise of those noble Bereans that they searched the Scriptures to see whether the preaching of Paul were according to the holy Scripture so if we shall receive these new borne truths these new lights these new wayes without consulting with the living Oracles we shall offend as the Israelites did in beleeving the Gibeonites upon their words and shall degenerate and be unlike to those the renowned Bereans who would not receive Paul's doctrine though an Apostle without searching the Scriptures whether things were so or no as he taught them and surely now much more ought we to try all things by the Word in these erroneous times whosoever they be that preach them unto us and if they be not evidently proved unto us out of the Scriptures we may not admit of them for it will be not onely a sinne but for our immortall shame to be deluded with novelties much more than it was our ancestors disgrace to be deceived by pretended antiquities And therefore it is the duty of every christian seriously to consider with themselves that these are matters of God and concerne no lesse than our eternall welfare and in that regard we may not call mens wayes Gods wayes but we are to seek for the old wayes Jer. 6. we are to examine Christs and his holy Apostles wayes in gathering of churches and making of members and if we find no footstep in all Gods Word of these new wayes we ought to relinquish them and turne againe into the pathes that God has commanded us to walk in wherein we shall be sure to find rest for our soules and comfort in life and death and it will be no disgrace to any to be undeceived for they are deceived and that greatly and dangerously that thinke or beleeve that any men mortall can shew or teach a better way to Heaven or set downe a better way of converting soules and of gathering of churches and making of members and of setting up Christ as King upon his Throne than that which Christ himselfe and his blessed Apostles have taught and set downe to all posterity and from the which rule we ought not to swerve though an Angel from Heaven should teach us otherwise Gal. 1. ver 8 9.