their Champion Bellarmine has told the World in his Apology that the King of England is a Vassal to the Pope ratione directi Dominii and that he holds in Viâ—â—aâ—age of his Roman Landlord Which is no new claim put in for England Our Chronicles are his Authentique Witnesses that King Iohn was depos'd by the same Plea and Philip Augustus admitted Tenant And which makes the more for Bellarmine the French King was again ejected when our King submitted to the Church and the Crown receiv'd under the sordid Condition of a Vassalage 'T is not sufficient for the more moderate and well-meaning Papists of which I doubt not there are many to produce the Evidences of their Loyalty to the late King and to declare their Innocency in this Plot I will grant their behaviour in the first to have been as Loyal and as brave as they desire and will be willing to hold them excus'd as to the second I mean when it comes to my turn and after my betters for 't is a madness to be sober alone while the Nation continues Drunk but that saying of their Father Cres is still running in my head that they may be dispens'd with in their Obedience to an Heretick Prince while the necessity of the times shall oblige them to it for that as another of them tells us is onely the effect of Christian Prudence but when once they shall get power to shake him off an Heretick is no lawful King and consequently to rise against him is no Rebellion I should be glad there fore that they wou'd follow the advice which was charitably given them by a Reverend Prelate of our Church namely that they would joyn in a publick Act of disowning and detesting those Jesuitick Principles and subscribe to all Doctrines which deny the Popes Authority of Deposing Kings and releasing Subjects from their Oath of Allegiance to which I shou'd think they might easily be induc'd if it be true that this present Pope has condemn'd the Doctrine of King-killing a Thesis of the Jesuites amongst others ex Cathedra as they call it or in open consistory Leaving them therefore in so fair a way if they please themselves of satisfying all reasonable Men of their sincerity and good meaning to the Government I shall make bold to consider that other extream of our Religion I mean the Fanaticks or Schismaticks of the English Church Since the Bible has been Translated into our Tongue they have us'd it so as if their business was not to be sa'vd but to be damnd by its Contents If we consider onely them better had it been for the English Nation that it had still remain'd in the original Greek and Hebrew or at least in the honest Latine of St. Ierome than that several Texts in it should have been prevaricated to the destruction of that Government which put it into so ungrateful hands How many Heresies the first Translation of Tyndal produced in few years let my Lord Herbert's History of Henry the Eighth inform you Insomuch that for the gross errours in it and the great mischiefs it occasion'd a Sentence pass'd on the first Edition of the Bible too shamefull almost to be repeated After the short Reign of Edward the Sixth who had continued to carry on the Reformation on other principles than it was begun every one knows that not onely the chief promoters of that work but many others whose Consciences wou'd not dispence with Popery were forc'd for fear of persecution to change Climates from whence returning at the beginning of Queen Elizabeth's Reign many of them who had been in France and at Geneva brought back the rigid opinions and imperious discipline of Calvin to graffe upon our Reformation Which though they cunningly conceal'd at first as well knowing how nauseously that Drug wou'd go down in a lawfull Monarchy which was prescrib'd for a rebellious Common-wealth yet they always kept it in reserve and were never wanting to themselves either in Court or Parliament when either they had any prospect of a numerous Party of Fanatique Members in the one or the encouragement of any Favourite in the other whose Covetousness was gaping at the Patrimony of the Church They who will consult the Works of our venerable Hooker or the account of his Life or more particularly the Letter written to him on this Subject by George Cranmer may see by what gradations they proceeded from the dislike of Cap and Surplice the very next step was Admonitions to the Parliament against the whole Government Ecclesiastical then came out Volumes in English and Latin in defence of their Tenets and immediately practices were set on foot to erect their Discipline without Authority Those not succeeding Satyre and Rayling was the next And Martin Mar-Prelate the Marvel of those times was the first Presbyterian Scribler who sanctify'd Libels and Scurrility to the use of the Good Old Cause Which was done says my Authour upon this account that their serious Treatises having been fully answered and refuted they might compass by rayling what they had lost by reasoning and when their Cause was sunk in Court and Parliament they might at least hedge in a stake amongst the Rabble for to their ignorance all things are Wit which are abusive but if Church and State were made the Theme then the Doctoral Degree of Wit was to be taken at Billingsgate even the most Saintlike of the Party though they durst not excuse this contempt and villifying of the Government yet were pleas'd and grin'd at it with a pious smile and call'd it a judgment of God against the Hierarchy Thus Sectaries we may see were born with teeth foul-mouth'd and scurrilous from their Infancy and if Spiritual Pride Venome Violence Contempt of Superiours and Slander had been the marks of Orthodox Belief the Presbytery and the rest of our Schismaticks which are their Spawn were always the most visible Church in the Christian World 'T is true the Government was too strong at that time for a Rebellion but to shew what proficiency they had made in Calvin's School even Then their mouths water'd at it for two of their gifted Brotherhood Hacket and Coppinger as the Story tells us got up into a Pease-Cart and harangued the People to dispose them to an insurrection and to establish their Discipline by force so that however it comes about that now they celebrate Queen Elizabeth's Birth-night as that of their Saint and Patroness yet then they were for doing the work of the Lord by Arms against her and in all probability they wanted but a Fanatique Lord Mayor and two Sheriffs of their Party to have compass'd it Our venerable Hooker after many Admonitions which he had given them toward the end of his Preface breaks out into this Prophetick speech There is in every one of these Considerations most just cause to fear lest our hastiness to embrace a thing of so perilous Consequence meaning the Presbyterian Discipline should cause Posterity to feel those Evils
which as yet are more easy for us to prevent than they would be for them to remedy How fatally this Cassandra has foretold we know too well by sad experience the Seeds were sown in the time of Queen Elizabeth the bloudy Harvest ripened in the Reign of King Charles the Martyr and because all the Sheaves could not be carried off without shedding some of the loose Grains another Crop is too like to follow nay I fear 't is unavoidable if the Conventiclers be permitted still to scatter A man may be suffer'd to quote an Adversary to our Religion when he speaks Truth and 't is the observation of Meimbourg in his History of Calvinism that where-ever that Discipline was planted and embrac'd Rebellion Civil War and Misery attended it And how indeed should it happen otherwise Reformation of Church and State has always been the ground of our Divisions in England While we were Papists our Holy Father rid us by pretending authority out of the Scriptures to depose Princes when we shook off his Authority the Sectaries furnish'd themselves with the same Weapons and out of the same Magazine the Bible So that the Scriptures which are in themselves the greatest security of Governours as commanding express obedience to them are now turn'd to their destruction and never since the Reformation has there wanted a Text of their interpreting to authorize a Rebel And 't is to be noted by the way that the Doctrines of King-killing and Deposing which have been taken up onely by the worst Party of the Papists the most frontless Flatterers of the Pope's Authority have been espous'd defended and are still maintain'd by the whole Body of Nonconformists and Republicans 'T is but dubbing themselves the People of God which 't is the interest of their Preachers to tell them they are and their own interest to believe and after that they cannot dip into the Bible but one Text or another will turn up for their purpose If they are under Persecution as they call it then that is a mark of their Election if they flourish then God works Miracles for their Deliverance and the Saints are to possess the Earth They may think themselves to be too roughly handled in this Paper but I who know best how far I could have gone on this Subject must be bold to tell them they are spar'd though at the same time I am not ignorant that they interpret the mildness of a Writer to them as they do the mercy of the Government in the one they think it Fear and conclude it Weakness in the other The best way for them to confute me is as I before advis'd the Papists to disclaim their Principles and renounce their Practices We shall all be glad to think them true Englishmen when they obey the King and true Protestants when they conform to the Church Discipline It remains that I acquaint the Reader that the Verses were written for an ingenious young Gentleman my Friend upon his Translation of The Critical History of the Old Testament compos'd by the learned Father Simon The Verses therefore are address'd to the Translatour of that Work and the style of them is what it ought to be Epistolary If any one be so lamentable a Critique as to require the Smoothness the Numbers and the Turn of Heroick Poetry in this Poem I must tell him that if he has not read Horace I have studied him and hope the style of his Epistles is not ill imitated here The Expressions of a Poem design'd purely for Instruction ought to be Plain and Natural and yet Majestick for here the Poet is presum'd to be a kind of Law-giver and those three qualities which I have nam'd are proper to the Legislative style The Florid Elevated and Figurative way is for the Passions for Love and Hatred Fear and Anger are begotten in the Soul by shewing their Objects out of their true proportion either greater than the Life or less but Instruction is to be given by shewing them what they naturally are A Man is to be cheated into Passion but to be reason'd into Truth TO Mr. Dryden On his POEM called RELIGIO LAICI GReat is the task and worthy such a Muse To doe Faith right yet Reason disabuse How chearfully the Soul does take its flight On Faith's strong wings guided by Reason's light But Reason does in vain her beams display Shewing to th' place whence first she came the way If Peter's Heirs must still hold fast the Key The house which many Mansions shou'd contain Form'd by the great wise Architect in vain Of Disproportion justly we accuse If the streight-gate still entrance must refuse The onely free enriching Port God made What shamefull Monopoly did invade One Factious Company ingross'd the Trade Thou to the distant Shore hast safely sail'd Where the best Pilots have so often fail'd Freely we now may buy the Pearl of price The happy Land abounds with fragrant Spice And nothing is forbidden there but Vice Thou best Columbus to the unknown World Mountains of Doubt that in thy way were hurld Thy generous Faith has bravely overcome And made Heaven truly our familiar home Let Crowds impossibilities receive Who cannot think ought not to disbelieve Let 'em pay Tithes and hud-wink'd go to Heaven But sure the Quaker cou'd not be forgiven Had not the Clerk who hates Lay-policy Found out to countervail the Injury Swearing a trade of which they are not free Too long has captiv'd Reason been enslav'd By Visions scar'd and airy Phantasms brav'd Listning t' each proud Enthusiastick Fool Pretending Conscience but designing Rule Whilst Law Form Interest Ignorance Design Did in the holy Cheat together joyn Like vain Astrologers gazing on the Skyes We fell and did not dare to trust our Eyes 'T is time at last to fix the trembling Soul And by thy Compass to point out the Pole All men agree in what is to be done And each Man's Heart his Table is of Stone Where he the God-writ Character may view Were it as needfull Faith had been so too Oh that our greatest fault were humble Doubt And that we were more Iust though less Devout What reverence shou'd we pay thy sacred Rhimes Who in these Factious too-believing Times Hast taught us to obey and to distrust Yet to our selves our King and God prove just Thou wantst not Praise from an ensuring Friend The Poor to Thee on double Interest lend So strong thy Reasons and so clear thy Sense They bring like Day their own bright Evidence Yet whilst mysterious Truths to light you bring And heavenly things in heavenly numbers sing The joyfull Younger Choir may clap the Wing To Mr. DRYDEN on Religio Laici 'T Is nobly done a Layman's Creed profest When all our Faith of late hung on a Priest His doubtfull words like Oracles receiv'd And when we could not understand believ'd Triumphant Faith now takes a nobler course T is gentle but resists intruding force Weak Reason may pretend an awfull
his own Materials Reason is always striving and always at a loss and of necessity it must so come to pass while 't is exercis'd about that which is not its proper object Let us be content at last to know God by his own Methods at least so much of him as he is pleas'd to reveal to us in the sacred Scriptures to apprehend them to be the word of God is all our Reason has to do for all beyond it is the work of Faith which is the Seal of Heaven impress'd upon our humane understanding And now for what concerns the Holy Bishop Athanasius the Preface of whose Creed seems inconsistent with my opinion which is That Heathens may possibly be sav'd in the first place I desire it may be consider'd that it is the Preface onely not the Creed it self which till I am better inform'd is of too hard a digestion for my Charity 'T is not that I am ignorant how many several Texts of Scripture seemingly support that Cause but neither am I ignorant how all those Texts may receive a kinder and more mollified Interpretation Every man who is read in Church History knows that Belief was drawn up after a long contestation with Arrius concerning the Divinity of our Blessed Saviour and his being one Substance with the Father and that thus compild it was sent abroad among the Christian Churches as a kind of Test which whosoever took was look'd on as an Orthodox Believer 'T is manifest from hence that the Heathen part of the Empire was not concerned in it for its business was not to distinguish betwixt Pagans and Christians but betwixt Heriticks and true Believers This well consider'd takes off the heavy weight of Censure which I wou'd willingly avoid from so venerable a Man for if this Proportion whosoever will be sav'd be restrained onely to those to whom it was intended and for whom it was compos'd I mean the Christians then the Anathema reaches not the Heathens who had never heard of Christ and were nothing interessed in that dispute After all I am far from blaming even that Prefatory addition to the Creed and as far from cavilling at the continuation of it in the Liturgy of the Church where on the days appointed 't is publickly read For I suppose there is the same reason for it now in opposition to the Socinians as there was then against the Arrians the one being a Heresy which seems to have been refin'd out of the other and with how much more plausibility of Reason it combats our Religion with so much more caution to be avoided and therefore the prudence of our Church is to be commended which has interpos'd her Authority for the recommendation of this Creed Yet to such as are grounded in the true belief those explanatory Creeds the Nicene and this of Athanasius might perhaps be spar'd for what is supernatural will always be a mystery in spight of Exposition and for my own part the plain Apostles Creed is most sutable to my weak understanding as the simplest diet is the most easy of Digestion I have dwelt longer on this Subject than I intended and longer than perhaps I ought for having laid down as my Foundation that the Scripture is a Rule that in all things needfull to Salvation it is clear sufficient and ordain'd by God Almighty for that purpose I have left my self no right to interpret obscure places such as concern the possibility of eternal happiness to Heathens because whatsoever is obscure is concluded not necessary to be known But by asserting the Scripture to be the Canon of our Faith I have unavoidably created to my self two sorts of Enemies The Papists indeed more directly because they have kept the Scripture from us what they cou'd and have reserv'd to themselves a right of Interpreting what they have deliver'd under the pretence of Infalibility and the Fanaticks more collaterally because they have assum'd what amounts to an Infalibility in the private Spirit and have detorted those Texts of Scripture which are not necessary to Salvation to the damnable uses of Sedition disturbance and destruction of the Civil Government To begin with the Papists and to speak freely I think them the less dangerous at least in appearance to our present State for not onely the Penal Laws are in Force against them and their number is contemptible but also their Peerage and Commons are excluded from Parliaments and consequently those Laws in no probability of being Repeal'd A General and Uninterrupted Plot of their Clergy ever since the Reformation I suppose all Protestants believe For 't is not reasonable to think but that so many of their Orders as were outed from their fat possessions wou'd endeavour a reentrance against those whom they account Hereticks As for the late design Mr. Colemans Letters for ought I know are the best Evidence and what they discover without wyre-drawing their Sence or malicious Glosses all Men of reason conclude credible If there be any thing more than this requir'd of me I must believe it as well as I am able in spight of the Witnesses and out of a decent conformity to the Votes of Parliament For I suppose the Fanaticks will not allow the private Spirit in this Case Here the Infallibility is at least in one part of the Government and our understandings as well as our wills are represented But to return to the Roman Catholicks how can we be secure from the practice of Jesuited Papists in that Religion For not two or three of that Order as some of them would impose upon us but almost the whole Body of them are of opinion that their Infallible Master has a right over Kings not onely in Spirituals but Temporals Not to name Mariana Bellarmine Emanuel Sa Molina Santarel Simancha and at the least twenty others of Foreign Countries we can produce of our own Nation Campian and Doleman or Parsons besides many are nam'd whom I have not read who all of them attest this Doctrine that the Pope can Depose and give away the Right of any Sovereign Prince si vel paulum deflexerit if he shall never so little Warpe but if he once comes to be Excommunicated then the Bond of obedience is taken off from Subjects and they may and ought to drive him like another Nebuchadnezzar ex hominum Christianorum Dominatu from exercising Dominion over Christians and to this they are bound by virtue of Divine Precept and by all the tyes of Conscience under no less Penalty than Damnation If they answer me as a Learned Priest has lately Written that this Doctrine of the Jesuits is not de fide and that consequently they are not oblig'd by it they must pardon me if I think they have said nothing to the purpose for 't is a Maxim in their Church where Points of Faith are not decided and that Doctors are of contrary opinions they may follow which part they please but more safely the most receiv'd and most Authoriz'd And