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ID Title Author Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication) STC Words Pages
A76279 Be merry and wise, or A seasonable word to the nation. Shewing the cause, the growth, the state, and the cure of our present distempers. 1660 (1660) Wing B1555; Thomason E765_6; ESTC R17569 5,895 7

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BE MERRY AND WISE OR A Seasonable Word TO THE NATION SHEWING The Cause the Growth the State and the Cure of our present Distempers March 14. 1659 LONDON Printed March 13. in the year 1660. 1659 A Seasonable Word c. I Do not write out of an itch of Scribling or to support a Faction my Duty bids me write Nor do I love Hard words or Many Plain and Few suit all Capacities and Leasures I would be Read by all and Understood by all for my Businesse extends to all Not to spend time in Complement or Apology The Reader 's Wisedom or the Authors Weaknesse is not the Question The Nation is in Distress and every honest English man must lend his hand to save it Nay That must be done Quickly too and Vigorously Delay is Mortal Can any thing be more Ridiculous then to stand Formalizing in a Case where 't is impossible to be too early or too Zealous The event of things takes up our thoughts more then the Reason of them what News more than what Remedy As if it concerned us rather to know whose Fools and Slaves we shall be next than to be such no longer That which completes the wonder and the Oversight is That the Miseries we suffer were before hand as easily to be Fore-seen and Prevented as they are now to be Felt and we are only to look Backward to take a perfect measure of the Future so obvious and formal is the Method that leads to our Destruction If we are not in Love with Beggery and Sondage let us at last bethink our selves of Freedom and from a due Enquiry into the Rise the Growth and present State of our Calamities learn to be wise and Happy for the time to come It may be observed that since Church-men dabled in Politiques and Statesmen in Divinity Law and Religion have been still subjected to the Sword and in effect those same Excursions and Adulterate mixtures are but the workings of a Party already in motion toward that end He that designs a Change of Government must begin by imposing a Delusion upon the People and whatsoever is Necessary to his Purpose must be Accommodate to their Humour The Pulpet by false Glosses and Puzzling distinctions under the doctrine of Conditionate Obedience sugg●sting Liberty cousens the Multitude into a Rebellion Oaths and Covenants are but like Jugglers knots Fast or Loose as the Priest pleases The weaker sort being thus prepared and poyson'd by a Seditious Clergy 't is then the Statesman's part to push those Mutinous Inclinations into Action and to divide the Cause betwixt Consc●ence and Property the better to involve all Interests in the Quarrel Under the Masque of Piety and Publiquenesse of Spirit of Holy men and Patriots the Crafty cheat the Simple engaging by those specious pretenses the Rash mis-judging people with good Intentions but wanting Care and Skill in Sacrilege and Treason This was the very Root and this hath been the process of our Evils Under the Notion of God's glory the Safety and the Honour of the King the Fundamental Lawes and Freedoms of the people the Privilege of Parliaments c. the Kingdom was gulled into a Complyance with an Ambitious and Schismatical Faction The main Pretense was the Assertion of the Subjects Legal Rights against the grand Prerogative and That directed only to the Limitation of an Intended Arbitrary Power the Regulation of such and such Misgovernments c. and all this Saving their Allegiance to His Sacred Majesty whose Person Crown and Dignity th●y had so often and so deeply sworn to maintain This was a Bait so Popular it could not fail of drawing in a Party and That produced a warr The Formal Story of the Quarrel is little to my Purpose the Logique of it Lesse How by the same Authority of Text and Law both King and People could be Justified one against th' other I meddle not Let it suffice that after 6. years Conflict a vast profusion of Blood and Treasure The King a Prisoner and his whole party scattered and disarmed the Commons found themselves dispos'd to end our Troubles and passed a vote to Treat with his Majesty in order to a settlement This met with little opposition except from those who having Gorged themselves already upon the publique ruine were not yet satisfied without their Soveraigns Blood The death of Monarchy it self and the subjecting of a Tame and Slavish People to a Conventicle of Regicides There were not many of so deep a Tincture but what these few could not effect by number they did by Force For upon the 6th of Decemb. 1648. Sir Hardresse Waller Pride and Hewson Seized and imprisoned 41. of the Commons House Clapp'd Guards upon all passes leading to it Some 160. more were given in upon a List to those that kept the Door with an expresse direction from several Leading Members to oppose their entrance a matter of 40. more withdrew for fear of violence Their Crime was only the carrying of a Vote for Peace already mentioned the day before This Action was so Enormous that the very Contrivers of it were ashamed to own it transferring that upon the Army-Officers which was done by their own appointment They passed however a Formal disallowance of the violence and ordered their discharge which yet the Officers refused upon a Combination now most evident Observe this That which in 48. they told us was an Act of the Army-Officers in 59. they call a Judgement of Parliament and they justifie and continue that very seclusion by a Vote of Jan. 5.59 Which they themselves Condemned and Discharged by several Orders in Dec. 48. The Particulars of these Transactions are excellently delivered by Mr. Prynne the Honour of the age in his true and perfect Narrative as also in the Declaration of the true state of the Secluded Members and in the History of Independency two other choice pieces Return we now to the great Test of the Spirits and Designs of the several Partyes and Members of the House and from that Judgement and Discrimination of Persons and Humours we may learn seasonably to provide against After-claps This Blow brake the House of Commons into Three Pieces One Party adhered to the Vote opposed the Violence Declared against it Claimed from time to time their own and the Peoples Rights Pleaded the Covenant and their Declarations and stood it out The Second sort was not so well prepar'd for Martyrdom a kind of Barnacle neither Fish nor Flesh This was a Party that Flew off at first but soon retracted Hearded again and went along for Company my Charity perswades me well of diverse of them and that they mixed rather in hopes to moderate the Rest then in Design to strengthen them A Party rather Weak and Passive than Malicious But nothing can excuse those sons of Belial the perjur'd Remnant no nor express them Beside their Oathes and Covenant they have above an hundred times in Printed Declarations renounced the very Thought of what