A26975:406
Of national churches their description, institution, use, preservation, danger, maladies and cure, partly applied…
Of national churches their description, institution, use, preservation, danger, maladies and cure, partly applied to England / written by Richard Baxter for promoting peace ... and for the fuller explication of the Treaty for Concord in 1660 and 1661, and of the Kings gracious declaration about ecclesiastical affairs ... and for further explication of his treatise of episcopacy ...
London: printed by T. Snowden for Thomas Parkhurst, 1691
Chapter 13: What are the dangerous Diseases of a National Church.
Modern spelling is a reading aid: the words are the author’s, only the spelling is modernized. Original shows the page as printed, with the transcription marks.
§ 4. When did it ever go well with Judah or Israel when they had a foolish wicked King? How easy is it for such a King and a foolish wicked Senate or Parliament to undo a Nation, by Laws of Heresy, Cruelty, Persecution, Division and Iniquity? How ordinarily do such make Snares for the Conscionable, by commanding them on pain of Fining, Imprisonment, or Death, or Banishment, to do something that God forbiddeth, or not to do what God commandeth; and then to cry them down, reproach and ruin them, as unruly, disobedient, despisers of all Order and Government, Schismatics and Rebels? And who may call them so with less contradiction, than they that can at their pleasure make them seem such, and few dare contradict them?
§ 4. When did it ever go well with Judah or Israel when they had a foolish wicked King? How easie is it for such a King and a foolish wicked Senate or Parliament to undo a Nation, by Laws of Heresie, Cruelty, Persecution, Division and Iniquity? How ordinarily do such make Snares for the Conscionable, by commanding them on pain of Fining, Imprisonment, or Death, or Banishment, to do something that God forbiddeth, or not to do what God commandeth; and then to cry them down, reproach and ruine them, as unruly, disobedient, despisers of all Order and Government, Schismaticks and Rebels? And who may call them so with less contradiction, than they that can at their pleasure make them seem such, and few dare contradict them?
§ 5. Great is the advantage that Supreme Rulers have, to put the Name of Evil upon Good, and of Good on Evil, and to procure the Vulgar to say as they? Saving that the Innocency and Worth of the Upright (especially of Wise and Charitable Persons) constraineth approbation from those that know them, and are not deplorate in Diabolism. The foolish words of Princes seem wise to ignorant flatterers. But he that will dwell in Gods Tabernacle, and be a Blessing and not a Plague to the Church, must be a Contemner of vile Persons, and an Honourer of them that fear the Lord, Psal. 15. Antisthenes could say that the Nation is hopeless, that cannot difference good Men from bad.