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A34962
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Anti-Baal-Berith justified and Zech. Crofton tryed and cast in his appearance before the (so called) prelate justice of peace in an answer to his seditious pamphlet entituled, Berith-anti-Baal : wherein his anti-monarchial principals are made manifest and apparent, to deserve his just imprisonment : together with an answer and animadversion upon the holy-prophane league and covenant : wherein, according to their own words and ways of arguing, its proved to be null and invalid, and its notorious contrariety to former legal oathes, is in several particulars plainly demonstrated / by Robert Cressener ...
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Cressener, Robert.
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1662
(1662)
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Wing C6888; ESTC R4964
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91,100
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91
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made by those who had nothing else to say for themselves and their illegal courses being assisted too by such a Learned Assembly of so many Divines who after a Three years Conference most profoundly voted God to be the Father § 9. And yet notwithstanding this Anti-monarchical limitation they declare they did set it down that the world might bear witness of their Loyalty they might have said Jugling and Rebellion for that is the true english of such a limited Loyalty and that they have no thoughts to diminish His Majesties just power and greatness No question but the world would did and have sufficiently taken notice of that which they call their Loyalty and have found it to be such as their Guisian Leaguing Brethrne practised who under pretence of x 2 Sam. 15. 7 8. maintaining w See The Right of Kings in Marg. the Roman Catholick Religion as these did for that which they usually mis-called the Reformed undermined the Kings Authority and sought to advance themselves the very same which Absalom the Beautiful Rebel showed to his Father when under a fair colour of Evil Councellors at Court and under a plausible pretence of paying his vow he made to the Lord in Hebron he * verse 6. stole the hearts of the men of Israel from their due allegiance to their King and drew them †verse 11 in their simplicity into a damnable Rebellion with him and therefore he that is loyal in practises and works will never approve of these Westmonasterian Leaguers loyalty which onely consists in words whilest their actions declares nothing else but Treason and Rebellion unless y See A Vindication of King Charls by noble Mr. Symmons p. 40. when they are in Cathedris in their seats as Parliament-men they are all as infallible as the Pope and have a power as well as he to do what they please to make evil good and good evil to make Rebellion and Treason to be Duty and Loyalty and duty and loyalty to be Rebellion and Treason to vote sacriledge murder and theft to be no sins killing slaying and destroying to be acts of zeal and christian duty Till then their loyalty will appear in the eyes of all judicious men to be no better then a Wolf in Sheeps clothing As for their disclaymer of diminishing His Majesties just power and greatness upon search and inquiry after it we shall find it to be a chip of the old block a parcel of contradictions like the other of preserving the Kings person with a destructive limitation and therefore I again thus Quaere Is the taking the Antient right of the Militia from him which was never for z See The Royalists Defence p. 97. the space of 1700. years past questioned or disputed until by these usurpers injuriously wrested from the Crown but hath been time out of mind inherent in the King a See Iudge Jenkins Lex Terrae p. 37. The practise of all times and the custom of the Realm no diminishing his Majesties just power Was the justifying the war by a party of the two Houses the Kings sworn Subjects against the Martyr to be warrantable both in point of law and conscience and making a deforming Reformation without the consent and against the express prohibition of their Dread Soveraign and not onely so but justifying for a commendable practise the iniquity of Witchcraft which Rebellion is termed by the Prophet was this no diminishing His Majesties just greatness What do they think English men are made of What are all made up of a bundle of contradictions that they impose such juglings upon us Surely the power of the Militia in the King was a very just necessary power and he being b See A Letter to a Member p. 5. under God the Protector of the Law I wonder how he could could defend it and the d Priviledges of Parliament without the power of the sword and the greatness of His Majesties over all in his dominions was very just too if either the laws of God or of this Land or an oath of Supremacy are able to make it so And yet forsooth people must be forced by vertue of an illegal Anti-parliamentary League not onely to be c See The Animadversions upon General Monk's Letter to the Gentry of Devon p. 4. ingaged in the wars against the King and so thereby become perjured and faithless persons and to swear to assist all those that shall do so too in order to the taking away the Kings Negative voice and the power of the Militia from him which was one of those jurisdictions priviledges preeminencies and authorities belonging to the Kings Highness His Heirs and successors and united and annexed to the Imperial Crown of this Realm which every one of the Parliamenteers as they were called had by a solemn legal Sacred oath of Supremacy sworn to assist and defend to his power but also hipocritically to say no worse to sware too that for all that they have no thoughts of diminishing His Majesties just power and greatness Was there ever such jugling seen that men should endeavour to take away that from their King which is his just right and yet sware with their right hands lifted up to the most high God that they have no thoughts to diminish it Ay and sware too that they had before their eyes at this present the honor and happiness of the Kings Majesty and his posterity in what part of the world can these mens peers be found as to the art of jugling and contradictions in their oaths Where may we find a pattern of their venemous courses but among the damned Guisian leaguers in France who murdered their King with a promise of fidelity and of their being his true and faithful Subjects And yet this this is that Covenant God wot that notwithstanding it set us together by the ears and put us all in blood and confusion must be still kept to inrol us amongst mad men for ever This jugling and contradictions in this ungodly Covenant cannot but be contrary to the nature of a true oath which as the Prophet saith must be made in Truth righteousness and in Judgement and therefore unlawful and not to be kept by any without an evident disobedience to the command of the Lord expressed by the said Prophet to the men of Israel § 10. And though they can tell us in their sixth Article That this Cause and League of theirs so much concerns the glory of God the good of the kingdoms and the honor of the King yet I demand and they may answer me if they can Was is it ever heard spoke before by men that pretend a fear towards God that that which is a most horrible breach of the Laws of God could ever tend to his glory and was not this Rebellions Covenant and covenant Rebellion against the Martyr directly a breach of the Divine Precept spoken by the mouth of his blessed St. Peter d 1 Pet. 2. 13.
cavilling declaring of their own folly That g See his fair warning p. 2. this discipline which the Croftonians so much adore is the very quintessence of refined Popery or a greater tyranny then ever Rome brought forth inconsistent with all forms of civil Government destructive to all sorts of Policy a rack to the conscience the heaviest pressure that can fall upon a people and so much more dangerous because by the specious pretence of Divine institution it takes away the sight but not the burthen of slavery Reader peruse that small book and I 'le undertake it shal give thee full satisfaction what this Cockatrice egge the Scottish discipline is and what a precious jewel it is to be preserved But how will they preserve this Pandora's box why according to the word of God the example of the best reformed Churches that 's brave indeed to swear to preserve that according to the word of God which knows nothing of it as it is singular by it self Suppose I should swear to preserve a thief in his pilfering courses according to the word of God would that make the thieves actions good because it is expressed according to the word of God or would it not rather aggravate and heighten the bloody nature of my sins to swear with such a strange self-contradiction Just as if I should say I would do a thing according to the will and desire of another who hath openly made his protestation against it I am sure the thieves actions cannot be more opposite to the Sacred Canon of Scripture then some part of the Scottish Discipline is which the Reverend Primate hath well informed us of to which I refer the doubtful for satisfaction and therefore notwithstanding that expression the Oath for preservation of such an Anti-Monarchical Discipline cannot but be very wicked and therefore unlawful to be sworn or kept And as for the best Reformed Churches the Church of England by all impartial unbyassed sober Protestants was wont to be accounted the best Reformed Church in the world and h See the fair warning p. 2. before these unhappy troubles in England all Protestants both Lutherans and Calvinists did give unto the English Church the right hand of fellowship which made the most Reverend Doctor Hammond of renowned memory to affirm That i See his View of the new Directory and vindication of the ancient Liturgy P. 7. the Church of England as it stands established by law is avowable against all the Calumniators in the world to be the best and most exemplary Reformed so far saith he that if I did not guess of the sense of the Covenant more by the temper then words of the Covenanters I should think all men that have Covenanted to Reform after the example of the best Reformed Churches indispensably obliged to conform to the King-Edward or Queen-Elizabeth English Reformation the most regular perfect pattern that Europe yieldeth Thus that indefatigable Defender and Propagator of Catholick truths against the novel inchroachments of the then Julianizing times whose memory will be precious and his name smell as sweet odour in the nostrils of all true hearted Christian Protestants when the name of an Assembler will hardly be thought on without immediate branding him for Treason and disloyalty And so now having briefly dispatched the first I shall proceed on to the second and there they speak out what their Covenant for Reformation is for they tell us there too in their Rebellious language § 4. That they shall in like maner without respect of persons endeavour the extirpation of Popery Prelacy that is Church-Government by Arch-Bishops Bishops their Chancellors Commissaries Deans Deans and Chapters Arch-Deacons and all other Ecclesiastical Officers depending on that Hyerarchy Superstition Heresie Schism Profaneness and whatsoever shall be found to be contrary to sound Doctrine and the power of godliness lest we partake in other mens sins and thereby be in danger to receive of their plagues In good time Excellent Deformers They that were the grand Promoters and carriers on at first of the Regular English-Reformation though indeed not by Sedition and Rebellion against their Soveraign nor by making use of cursing Merozian Texts to stir up the people to assist them in such filthy courses but by obedience and subjection to the unjust punishment of Majesty and freely offering their bodies to the fire must now be extirpated by our Deformers of Truth and Christianity under a sly pretence of a detestable Reformation A good requital to them for their incomparable defences of the true Protestant Religion against the Jesuits and others of the Babylonian Romish rout to be now cast out as unprofitable branches by a pack of holy Leaguers not worthy to be named with them but what said our own late most noble Sovereign k See Eikon Basilike upon the Covenant Many Engines of religious and fair pretensions are brought chiefly to batter or rase Episcopacy This saith he they make the grand evil Spirit which with some other imps purposely added to make it more odious and terrible to the vulgar must by so solemn a charm and exorcism be cast out of this Church after more then a thousand years possession from the first plantation of Christianity in this Island and an universal prescription of time and practice in all other Churches since the Apostles times till this last Century But no antiquity must plead for it Presbytery like a young heir thinks the father hath lived long enough and impatient not to be in the Bishops chair and authority all art is used to sink Episcopacy and lanch Presbytery in England which was lately boyed up in Scotland by the like artifice of a Covenant And therefore for that Apostolical-Primitive Universal Church-Government of Episcopacy so Universal That l See Eikon Basilike in 24. P. 103. as the Martyr saith since the first Age for one thousand five hundred years not one example can be produced of any setled Church wherein were many Ministers and Congregations which had not some Bishop above them under whose Jurisdiction and Government they were and so by consequence unavoidable the damnable infamous nature of the Covenant for extirpation thereof There hath been so much said by our Reverend Episcoplains and by our late Josiah of most blessed and glorious memory that I shall forbear to say any thing more of it but refer them that desire satisfaction to their respective writings and I wonder when the Presbyterian will answer them I do not mean by cavillings and railings for there have been too much of that already but by true good solid sound arguments and reasons such as may carry truth in their fore-head which people shall easily perceive when they can once have the happiness to see the Swans turn black § 5. But is this all that these Leaguers swear to extirpate in this Article No they joyn with the former just as if a man should joyn a Scottish Presbytery with a Monarchy which